man, dishonoured as I am, has no use for your service. It is not probable that he would appear again before his soldiers, even in the pacific ceremony of a review. But, wherever he appeared, the humiliating confession would be extorted from him: I have received a blow, and had not spirit to resent it. I demanded satisfaction, and have accepted a declaration, in which the right to strike me again is asserted and confirmed. His countenance, at least, would speak this language, and even his guards would blush for him.

But to return to our argument. The Ministry, it seems, are labouring to draw a line of distinction between the honour of the crown and the rights of the people. This new idea has yet only, been started in discourse; for, in effect, both objects have been equally sacrificed. I neither understand the distinction, nor what use the Ministry propose to make of it. The King's honour is that of his people. Their real honour and real interest are the same. I am not contending for a vain punctilio. A clear, unblemished character comprehends not only the integrity that will not offer, but the spirit that will not submit to an injury; and whether it belongs to an individual, or to a community, it is the foundation of peace, of independence, and of safety. Private credit is wealth;

* A mistake: he appears before them every day, with a mark of a blow upon his face. Proh pudor

public honour is security. The feather that adorns the royal bird, supports his flight. Strip him of his plumage, and you fix him to the earth.

I HOPE your Correspondent Junius is better employed than in answering or reading the criticisms of a newspaper. This is a task, from which, if he were inclined to submit to it, his friends ought to relieve.him. Upon this principle, I shall undertake to answer Anti-Junius, more, I believe, to his conviction, than to his satisfaction. Not daring to attack the main body of Junius's last letter, he triumphs in having, as he thinks, surprised an out-post, and cut off a detached argument, a mere straggling proposition. But even in this petty warfare he shall find himself defeated.

Junius does not speak of the Spanish nation as the natural enemies of England; he applies that descrip

tion, with the strictest truth and justice, to the Spanish court. From the moment, when a Prince of the house of Bourbon ascended that throne, their whole system of government was inverted, and became hostile to this country. Unity of possession introduced a unity of politics; and Lewis the Fourteenth had reason, when he said to his grandson, "The "Pyrenees are removed." The history of the present century is one continued confirmation of the prophecy.

The assertion, "That violence and oppression at home, "can only be supported by treachery and submission "abroad," is applied to a free people, whose rights are invaded, not to the government of a country, where despotic or absolute power is confessedly vested in the Prince; and, with this application, the assertion is true. An absolute monarch having no points to carry at home, will naturally maintain the honour of his crown, in all his transactions with foreign powers. But, if we could suppose the sove reign of a free nation possessed with a design to make himself absolute, he would be inconsistent with himself, if he suffered his projects to be interrupted or embarrassed by a foreign war, unless that war tended, as in some cases it might, to promote his principal design. Of the three exceptions to this general rule of conduct, (quoted by Anti-Junius,) that of Oliver Cromwell is the only one in point. Harry the Eighth, by the submission of his Parliament, was as absolute

a Prince as Lewis the Fourteenth.

Queen Elizabeth's

government was not oppressive to the people, and as to her foreign wars, it ought to be considered, that they were unavoidable. The national honour was not in question. She was compelled to fight in defence of her own person, and of her title to the crown. In the common cause of selfish policy, Oliver Cromwell should have cultivated the friendship of foreign powers, or, at least, have avoided disputes with them, the better to establish his tyranny at home. Had he been only a had man, he would have sacrificed. the honour of the nation to the success of his domestic policy. But, with all his crimes, he had the spirit of an Englishman. The conduct of such a man must always be an exception to vulgar rules. He had abi lities sufficient to reconcile contradictions, and to make a great nation, at the same moment, unhappy and formidable. If it were not for the respect I beár the Minister, I could name a man, who, without one grain of understanding, can do half as much as Oliver Cromwell.

Whether or no there be a secret system in the closet, and what may be the object of it, are questions which can only be determined by appearances, and on which every man must decide for himself.

The whole plan of Junius's letter proves, that he himself makes no distinction between the real honour of the crown and the real interest of the people. In

the climax to which your correspondent objects, Ju nius adopts the language of the court, and, by that conformity, gives strength to his argument. He says, that "the King has not only sacrificed the interest of the "people, but (what was likely to touch him more "nearly) his personal reputation, and the dignity of his

crown."

The queries put by Anti-Junius can only be answered by the Ministry. Abandoned as they are, I fancy they will not confess, that they have, for so many years, maintained possession of another man's property. After admitting the assertion of the Ministry, viz. That the Spaniards had no rightful claim, and after justifying them for saying so, it is his business, not mine, to give us some good reason for their suffering the pretensions of Spain to be a subject of negociation. He admits the fact; let him reconcile them if he can.

The last paragraph brings us back to the original question, Whether the Spanish declaration contains such a satisfaction as the King of Great Britain ought to have accepted? This was the field upon which he ought to have encountered Junius openly and fairly. But here he leaves the argument, as no longer defensible. I shall, therefore, conclude with one general admonition to my fellow-subjects; that, when they hear these matters debated, they should not suffer themselves to be misled by general declamations upon the conveniences of peace, or the miseries of war.