MEMOIRS RELATING TO THAT CHANGE WHICH HAPPENED IN THE QUEEN'S MINISTRY IN THE YEAR 1710. THESE Memoirs are placed as introductory to Swift's Political Tracts during the Reign of Queen Anne, because, like the foregoing Journal, they tend to make the reader acquainted both with the author's personal sentiments, and with the scene of intrigue and faction it which it was his fate to be engaged. They have some appearance of having been intended as an apology, or, as Swift would rather have called it, a vindication of his own political conduct, as well as an explanation of the series of mutual quarrel and recrimination, which, under circumstances demanding their closest adherence to each other, dissolved the union between his patrons Oxford and Bolingbroke. On the first point the paper is sufficiently explicit, and openly declares, that a concurrence between his feelings as a clergyman of the Church of England, outraged by the conduct of the Whig party, and the neglect with which his individual services had been regarded, induced him to desert the standard of Halifax and Somers, for that of the Tory chiefs, whose professed object was the elevation of his order, and from whom, individually, he received all the solicitous attention necessary to conciliate so proud a spirit. By comparing the two next articles with the remaining tracts in this department, the reader may distinctly ascertain in what degree Swift, in shifting his party and changing his friends, made any dereliction of his original principles. of four years in a HAVING continued for near the space good degree of confidence with the ministry then in being, although not with so much power as was believed, or at least given out by my friends, as well as by my enemies, especially the latter, in both Houses of Parliament; and this having happened during a very busy period of negotiations abroad, and management of intrigue at home, I thought it might probably, some years hence, when the present scene shall have given place to many new ones that will arise, be an entertainment to those who will have any personal regard for me or my memory, to set down some particularities which fell under my knowledge and observation, while I was supposed, whether truly or not, to have part in the secret of affairs. One circumstance I am a little sorry for, that I was too negligent (against what I had always resolved, and blamed others for not doing) in taking hints, or journals of every material as it passed, whereof I omitted many that I cannot now recollect, although I was convinced, by a thousand instances, of the weakness of my memory. But, to say the truth, the nearer knowledge any man has in the affairs at court, the less he thinks them of consequence, or worth regarding. And those kind of passages which I have with curiosity found or searched for in memoirs, I wholly neglected when they were freely communicated to me from the first hand, or were such wherein I acted myself. This I take to be one among other reasons, why great ministers seldom give themselves the trouble of recording the important parts of that administration where they themselves are at the head. They have extinguished all that vanity which usually possesses men during their first acquaintance at courts; and, like the masters of a puppet-show, they despise those motions which fill common spectators with * wonder and delight. However, upon frequently recollecting the course of affairs during the time I was either trusted or employed, I am deceived, if in history there can be found any period, more full of passages, which the curious of another age would be glad to know the secret springs of; or whence more useful instructions may be gathered, for directing the conduct of those who shall hereafter have the good or ill fortune to be engaged in business of the state. It may probably enough happen, that those who shall at any time hereafter peruse these papers, may think it not suitable to the nature of them, that upon occasion I sometimes make mention of myself; who, during these transactions, and ever since, was a person without titles or public employment. But, since the chief leaders of the faction, then out of power, were pleased, in both Houses of Parliament, to take every opportunity of showing their malice, by mentioning me (and often by name) as one who was in the secret of all affairs, and without whose advice or privity nothing was done, or, employment disposed of, it will not, perhaps, be improper to take notice of some passages, wherein the public and myself were jointly concerned; not to mention that the chief cause of giving myself this trouble, is to satisfy my particular friends; and at worst, if, after the fate of manuscripts, these papers shall, by accident or indiscretion, fall into the public view, they will be no more lia * Swift could not but remember, though he has not thought it necessary to add, that the reason is the same. The machinist is not less unwilling to destroy the marvel of the spectators by displaying the wires and springs of his performers, than ministers to acknowledge how often their success is owing to the most trifling, and even meanest incidents. |