leave to arrange the
administration as he pleases, and put whom he chooses into
office (there can be no danger in that as you can dismiss him
when you think fit); and when he has got thus far (to which his
extreme self-love and the high opinion he entertains of his own
importance, will easily conduce), it will be necessary that your
majesty should seem to have a great regard for his health;
signifying to him that your affairs will be ruined if he should
die; that you want to have him constantly near you, to have his
sage advice; and that therefore, as he is much disordered in
body, and something infirm, it will be necessary for his
preservation for him to quit the House of Commons, where
malevolent tempers will be continually fretting him, and where,
indeed, his presence will be needless, as no step will be taken
but according to his advice; and that he will let you give him a
distinguishing mark of your approbation, by creating him a peer.
This he may be brought to, for, if I know anything of mankind,
he has a love of honour and money; and, notwithstanding his
great haughtiness and seeming contempt for honour, he may be won
if it be done with dexterity. For, as the poet Fenton says,
'Flattery is an oil that softens the thoughtless fool.'

"If your majesty can once bring him to accept of a coronet, all
will be over with him; the changing multitude will cease to have
any confidence in him; and when you see that, your majesty may
turn your back to him, dismiss him from his post, turn out his
meddling partizans, and restore things to quiet; the bee will
have lost his sting, and become an idle drone whose buzzing
nobody heeds.

"Your majesty will pardon me for the freedom with which I have
given my sentiments and advice; which I should not have done,
had not your majesty commanded it, and had I not been certain
that your peace is much disturbed by the contrivance of that
turbulent man. I shall only add that I will dispose several whom
I know to wish him well to solicit for his establishment in
power, that you may seem to yield to their entreaties, and the
finesse be less liable to be discovered.

"I hope to have the honour to attend your majesty {305} in a few
days; which I will do privately, that my public presence may
give him no umbrage.

(Signed) ROBERT WALPOLE