govern

character of those who filled the principal departments of state, and declaring, "We need look no farther for the cause of every mischief which befalls us." "It is not a casual concurrence of calamitous circumstances-it is the pernicious hand of ment alone, that can make a whole people desperate." All this was done with a dignity, force, and elegance entirely without parallel in the columns of a newspaper. The attention of the public was strongly arrested. The poet Gray, in his correspondence, speaks of the absorbing power of this Letter over his mind, when he took it up casually for the first time at a country inn, where he had stopped for refreshment on a journey. He was unable to lay it down, or even to think of the food before him, until he had read it over and over again with the most painful interest. The same profound sensation was awakened in the higher political circles throughout the kingdom. Still it may be doubted whether the writer, at this time, had formed any definite plan of continuing these Letters. Very possibly, except for a circumstance now to be mentioned, he might have stopped here; and the name of Junius have been known only in our literature by this single specimen of eloquent vituperation. But he was instantly attacked. As if for the very purpose of compelling him to go on, and of giving notoriety to his efforts, Sir William Draper, Knight of the Bath, came out under his own signature, charging him with "maliciously traducing the best characters of the kingdom," and going on particularly to defend the Commander in Chief, the Marquess of Granby, against the severe imputations of this Letter. Junius himself could not have asked, or conceived of, any thing more perfectly suited to make him conspicuous in the eyes of the public. Sir William had the character of being an elegant scholar, and had gained high distinction as an officer in the army by the capture of Manilla, the capital of the Philippine Islands, in 1762. It was no light thing for such a man to throw himself into the lists without any personal provocation, and challenge a combat with this unknown champion. It was the highest possible testimony to his powers. Junius saw his advantage. He perfectly understood his antagonist-an open-hearted and incautious man, vain of his literary attainments, and uncommonly sensitive to ridicule and contempt. He seized at once on the weak points of Sir William's letter. He turned the argument against him. He overwhelmed him with derision. He showed infinite dexterity in wresting every weapon from his hands, and in turning all his praises of the Marquess, and apologies for his failings, into new instruments of attack. "It is you, Sir William, who make your friend appear awkward and ridiculous, by giving him a laced suit of tawdry qualifi cations which Nature never intended him to wear!" "It is you who have taken pains to represent your friend in the character of a drunken landlord, who deals out his promises as liberally as his liquor, and will suffer no man to leave his table either sorrowful or sober!" He then turned upon Sir William himself. He glanced at some of the leading transactions of his life. He goaded him with the most humiliating insinuations and interrogatories. He hinted at the motives which the public would impute to him, in thus coming out from his retirement at Clifton; and concluded by asking in a tone of lofty contempt, "And do you now, after a retreat not very like that of Scipio, presume to intrude yourself, unthought of, uncalled for, upon the patience of the public?" Never was an assailant so instantaneously put on the defensive. Instead of silencing the "traducer," and making him the object of public indignation, he was himself dragged to the confessional, or rather placed as a culprit at the bar of the public. His feelings at this sudden change seem much to have resembled those of a traveler in the forests of Africa, when he finds himself, without a moment's warning, wrapped in the folds of a boa constrictor, darting from above, and crushed beneath its weight. He exclaimed piteously against this "uncandid Junius," his abominable scandals," his delight in putting men to "the rack," and "Inangling their carcasses with a hatchet." He quoted Virgil, and made a feeling

allusion to Æsop's Fables: "You bite against a file; cease, viper!" Junius replied in three Letters, two of which will be found below. He tells Sir William that an "academical education had given him an unlimited command over the most beautiful figures of speech." "Masks, hatchets, racks, and vipers dance through your letters in all the mazes of metaphorical confusion. These are the gloomy companions of a disturbed imagination; the melancholy madness of poetry, without the inspiration." As the correspondence went on, Sir William did, indeed, clear himself of the imputations thrown out by Junius affecting his personal honesty, but he was so shocked and confounded by the overmastering power of his antagonist, that he soon gave up the contest. Some months after, when he saw these Letters collected and republished in a volume, he again came forward to complain of their injustice. "Hæret lateri lethalis arundo," was the savage exclamation of Junius, when he saw the writhings of his prostrate foe. Such was the first encounter of Junius before the public. The whole nation looked on with astonishment; and from this hour his name was known as familiarly in every part of the kingdom as that of Chatham or Johnson. It was a name of terror to the King and his ministers; and of pride and exultation to thousands throughout the empire, not only of those who sympathized in his malignant feelings, but those who, like Burke, condemned his spirit, and yet considered him engaged in a just cause, and hailed him as a defender of the invaded rights of the people. Junius now resumed his attack on the ministry with still greater boldness and virulence. After assailing the Duke of Grafton repeatedly on individual points, he came out in two Letters, under date of May 30th and July 8th, 1769, with a general review of his Grace's life and conduct. These are among his most finished productions, and will be given below. On the 19th of September, he attacked the Duke of Bedford, whose interests had been preferred to those of Lord Rockingham in the ministerial arrangements mentioned above. This Letter has even more force than the two preceding ones, and will also be found in this collection. Three months after, December 19th, 1769, appeared his celebrated Letter to the King, the longest and most elaborate of all his performances. The reader will agree with Mr. Burke in saying, "it contains many bold truths by which a wise prince might profit." Lord Chatham now made his appearance on the stage, after an illness of three years; and at the opening of Parliament, January 9th, 1770, took up the cause with more than his accustomed boldness and eloquence. Without partaking of the bitter spirit of Junius, he maintained his principles on all the great questions of the day, in their fullest extent. He at once declared in the face of the country, "A breach has been made in the Constitution-the battlements are dismantled-the citadel is open to the first invader-the walls totter-the Constitution is not tenable. What remains, then, but for us to stand foremost in the breach, to repair it, or perish in it?" The result has already been stated in connection with that and his other speech on this subject, p. 114-18. At the end of nineteen days, January 28th, 1770, the Duke of Grafton was driven from power! About a fortnight after, Junius addressed his fallen adversary in a Letter of great force, which closes the extracts from his writings in this volume. Lord North's ministry now commenced. Junius continued his labors with various ability, but with little success, nearly two years longer, until, in the month of January, 1772, the King remarked to a friend in confidence," Junius is known, and will write no more." Such proved to be the fact. His last performance was dated January 21st, 1772, three years to a day from his first great Letter to the printer of the Public Advertiser. Within a few months Sir PHILIP FRANCIS was appointed to one of the highest stations of profit and trust in India, at a distance of fifteen thousand miles from the seat of English politics!

8 Still rankles in his side the fatal dart.

LETTERS OF JUNIUS.

LETTER

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.'

SIR, The submission of a free people to the executive authority of government is no more than a compliance with laws which they themselves have enacted. While the national honor is firmly maintained abroad, and while justice is impartially administered at home, the obedience of the subject will be voluntary, cheerful, and, I might say, almost unlimited. A generous na-example home to ourselves! tion is grateful even for the preservation of its rights, and willingly extends the respect due to the office of a good prince into an affection for his person. Loyalty, in the heart and understanding of an Englishman, is a rational attachment to the guardian of the laws. Prejudices and passion have sometimes carried it to a criminal length; and, whatever foreigners may imagine, we know that Englishmen have erred as much in a mistaken zeal for particular persons and families, as they ever did in defense of what they thought most dear and interesting to themselves.

the history of a free people, whose rights have been invaded, we are interested in their cause. Our own feelings tell us how long they ought to have submitted, and at what moment it would have been treachery to themselves not to have resisted. How much warmer will be our resentment, if experience should bring the fatal

It naturally fills us with resentment to see such a temper insulted and abused. In reading

Dated January 21, 1769. There is great regularity in the structure of this letter. The first two paragraphs contain the exordium. The transition follows in the third paragraph, leading to the main proposition, which is contained in the fourth, viz., "that the existing discontent and disasters of the nation were justly chargeable on the King and ministry." The next eight paragraphs are intended to give the proof of this proposition, by reviewing the chief departments of government, and endeavoring to show the incompetency or maladministration of the men to whom they were intrusted. A recapitulation follows in the last paragraph but one, leading to a restatement of the proposition in still broader terms. This is strengthened in the conclusion by the remark, that if the nation should escape from its desperate condition through some signal interposition of Divine Providence, posterity would not believe the history of the times, or consider it possible that England should have survived a crisis "so full of terror and despair."

2 We have here the starting point of the exordium, as it lay originally in the mind of Junius, viz., that the English nation was "insulted and abused" by the King and ministers. But this was too strong a statement to be brought out abruptly. Junius therefore went back, and prepared the way by show ing in successive sentences, (1.) Why a free people obey the laws-" because they have themselves enacted them." (2.) That this obedience is ordinarily cheerful, and almost unlimited. (3.) That such obedience to the guardian of the laws naturally leads to a strong affection for his person. (4.) That this

The situation of this country is alarming enough to rouse the attention of every man who pretends to a concern for the public welfare. Appearances justify suspicion; and, when the safety of a nation is at stake, suspicion is a just ground of inquiry. Let us enter into it with candor and decency. Respect is due to the station of ministers; and if a resolution must at last be taken, there is none so likely to be sup. ported with firmness as that which has been adopted with moderation.

The ruin or prosperity of a state depends so

affection (as shown in their history) had often been excessive among the English, who were, in fact. peculiarly liable to a "mistaken zeal for particular persons and families." Hence they were equally liable (this is not said, but implied) to have their loyalty imposed upon; and therefore the feeling then so prevalent was well founded, that the King, in his rash counsels and reckless choice of ministers, must have been taking advantage of the generous confidence of his people, and playing on the easiness of their temper. If so, they were indeed insulted and abused. The exordium, then, is a complete chain of logical deduction, and the case is fully made out, provided the popular feeling referred to was correct. And here we see where the fallacy of Junius lies, whenever he is in the wrong. It is in taking for granted one of the steps of his reasoning. He does not, in this case, even mention the feeling alluded to in direct terms. He knew it was beating in the hearts of the people; his whole preceding train of thought was calculated to justify and inflame it; and he therefore leaps at once to the conclusion it involves, and addresses them as actually filled with resentment "to see such a temper insulted and abused." The feeling, in this instance, was to a great extent well founded, and so far his logic is complete. In other cases his assump tion is a false one. He lays hold of some slander of the day, some distorted statement of facts, some maxim which is only half true, some prevailing passion or prejudice, and, dexterously intermingling them with a train of thought which in every other respect is logical and just, he hurries the mind to a conclusion which seems necessarily involved in the premises. Hardly any writer has so much art and plausibility in thus misleading the mind.

event has not been answerable to the design. After a rapid succession of changes, we are reduced to that change which hardly any change can mend. Yet there is no extremity of distress which of itself ought to reduce a great nation to despair. It is not the disorder, but the physician; it is not a casual concurrence of ca lamitous circumstances, it is the pernicious hand of government, which alone can make a whole people desperate.

Without much political sagacity, or any extraordinary depth of observation, we need only mark how the principal departments of the state are bestowed [distributed], and look no farther for the true cause of every mischief that befalls us.

The finances of a nation, sinking under its debts and expenses, are committed to a young nobleman already ruined by play. Introduced

much upon the administration of its government, that, to be acquainted with the merit of a ministry, we need only observe the condition of the people. If we see them obedient to the laws, prosperous in their industry, united at home, and respected abroad, we may reasonably presume that their affairs are conducted by men of experience, abilities, and virtue. If, on the contrary, we see a universal spirit of distrust and dissatisfaction, a rapid decay of trade, dissensions in all parts of the empire, and a total loss of respect in the eyes of foreign powers, we may pronounce, without hesitation, that the government of that country is weak, distracted, and corrupt. The multitude, in all countries, are patient to a certain point. Ill usage may rouse their indignation, and hurry them into excesses, but the original fault is in government. Perhaps there never was an instance of a change in the circumstances and temper of a whole nation, so sudden and extraordinary as that which the mis- of absolute fatuity. The way being thus prepared, conduct of ministers has, within these very few what was first insinuated is now openly expressed years, produced in Great Britain. When our in the next sentence. The word "folly" is applied to the conduct of the King of England in the face of gracious sovereign ascended the throne, we were his subjects, and the application rendered doubly a flourishing and a contented people. If the persevere by the gravest irony. Still, there is one resonal virtues of a king could have insured the lief. Allusion is made to his "unbounded goodness happiness of his subjects, the scene could not of heart," from which, in the preceding chain of inhave altered so entirely as it has done. The sinuations, these errors of judgment had been deidea of uniting all parties, of trying all charac-duced. The next sentence takes this away. It ters, and distributing the offices of state by ro- directly ascribes to the King, with an increased setation, was gracious and benevolent to an ex-verity of ironical denial, some of the meanest pas treme, though it has not yet produced the many salutary effects which were intended by it. To say nothing of the wisdom of such plan, it undoubtedly arose from an unbounded goodness of heart, in which folly had no share. It was not a capricious partiality to new faces; it was not a natural turn for low intrigue, nor was it the treacherous amusement of double and triple negotiations. No, sir, it arose from a continued anxiety in the purest of all possible hearts for the general welfare.* Unfortunately for us, the

Here is the central idea of the letter-the prop osition to be proved in respect to the King and his ministers. The former part of this paragraph contains the major premise, the remainder the minor down to the last sentence, which brings out the conclusion in emphatic terms. In order to strengthen the minor, which was the most important premise, he rapidly contrasts the condition of England before and after the King ascended the throne. In doing this, he dilates on those errors of the King which led to, and which account for, so remarkable a change. Thus the conclusion is made doubly strong. This union of severe logic with the finest rhetorical skill in filling out the premises and giving them their utmost effect, furnishes an excellent model for the student in oratory.

In this attack on the King, there is a refined artifice, rarely if ever equaled, in leading the mind gradually forward from the slightest possible insinuation to the bitterest irony. First we have the "uniting of all parties," which is proper and desirable; next, "trying all characters," which suggests decidedly a want of judgment; then "distributing the offices of state by rotation," a charge rendered plausible, at least, by the frequent changes of ministers, and involving (if true) a weakness little short

faces," a "natural love of low intrigue," "the treach-
sions of royalty, "a capricious partiality for new
erous amusement of double and triple negotiations!"
It is unnecessary to remark on the admirable pre-
cision and force of the language in these expres
sions, and, indeed, throughout the whole passage.
There had been just enough in the King's conduct
for the last seven years to make the people suspect
all this, and to weaken or destroy their affection for
It was all connected with that system
the Crown.
of favoritism introduced by Lord Bute, which the
nation so much abhorred. Nothing but this would
have made them endure for a moment such an at-
tack on their monarch, and especially the absolute
mockery with which Junius concludes the whole, by
speaking of "the anxiety of the purest of all possible
hearts for the general welfare!" His entire Letter
to the King, with all the rancor ascribed to it by
Burke, does not contain so much bitterness and in-
sult as are concentrated in this single passage.
While we can not but condemn its spirit, we are
forced to acknowledge that there is in this and many
other passages of Junius, a rhetorical skill in the
evolution of thought which was never surpassed by
Demosthenes.

5 The Duke of Grafton, first Lord of the Treasury. It is unnecessary to remark on the dexterity of connecting with this mention of a treasury, "sinking under its debts and expenses," the idea of its head being a gambler loaded with his own debts, and liable continually to new distresses and temptations from his love of play. The thought is wisely left here. The argument which it implies would be weakened by any attempt to expand it. Junius often reminds us of the great Athenian orator, in thus striking a single blow, and then passing on to some other subject, as he does here to the apostasy of the Duke of Grafton, his inconsistency, caprice, and irresolution.