The North Briton
No. XLV, * Saturday, April 23, 1763
[John Wilkes]
The following advertisement appeared in all the papers on the 13
of April.
THE North Briton makes his appeal to the good sense, and to the
candour of the English nation. In the present unsettled and
fluctuating state of the administration, he is really
fearful of falling into involuntary errors, and he does not wish to
mislead. All his reasonings have been built on the strong foundation
of facts; and he is not yet informed of the whole interior
state of government with such minute precision, as now to
venture the submitting his crude ideas of the present political
crisis to the discerning and impartial public. The Scottish minister
has indeed retired. Is his influence at an end? or does he still
govern by the † three wretched tools of his power, who to
their indelible infamy, have supported the most odious of his
measures, the late ignominious Peace, and the wicked
extension of the arbitrary mode of Excise? The North Briton
has been steady in his opposition to single, insolent,
incapable, despotic minister; and is equally ready, in the service
of his country, to combat the triple-headed, Cerberean
administration, if the Scot is to assume that motley form. By Him
every arrangement to this hour has been made, and the
notification has been as regularly sent by letter under His Hand. It
therefore seems clear to a demonstration, that He intends
only to retire into that situation, which He held before He first
took the seals; I mean the dictating to every part of the king's
administration. The North Briton desires to be understood, as having
pledged himself a firm and intrepid assertor of the rights of his
fellow subjects, and of the liberties of Whigs and Englishmen.
* The passages included within the
inverted commas [here red] are the only passages, to which
any objection is made in the Information filed in the King's-Bench
by the Attorney General against the publisher, Mr. George
Kearsley.
† The earls of Egremont and Halifax, and G.
Grenvlle, Esq;
Genus Orationis atrox, & vehemens,
cui opponitur lenitatis & mansuetudinis. [The
kind of terrible eloquence, & severity, which is opposed by
leniency & gentleness.]
Cicero.
THE King's Speech has always been considered
by the legislature, and by the public at large, as the Speech
of the Minister.* It has regularly, at the beginning of
every session of parliament, been referred by both houses to the
consideration of a committee, and has been generally canvassed
with the utmost freedom, when the minister of the crown has been
obnoxious to the nation. The ministers of this free country,
conscious of the undoubted privileges of so spirited a people, and
with the terrors of parliament before their eyes, have ever been
cautious, no less with regard to the matter, than to the
expressions, of speeches, which they have advised the
sovereign to make from the throne, at the opening of each
session. They well knew, that an † honest house of parliament,
true
* Anno 14 G. II. 1740. Duke of Argyle.
The King's Speech is always in this House considered as the
Speech of the Ministers. Lords Debates, vol. 7. p. 413.
Lord Carteret.
When we take his Majesty's Speech into consideration, though we
have heard it from his own mouth, yet we do not
consider it as his Majesty's speech, but as the speech of
his ministers, p. 425.
Anno 7 Geo. II. 1733. Mr. Shippen.
I believe it has always been granted, that the speeches from the
Throne are the compositions of ministers of state;
upon that supposition we have always thought ourselves
at liberty to examine every proposition contained in them; even
without doors people are pretty free in their
remarks upon them: I believe no Gentleman here is
ignorant of the reception the speech from the Throne, at the close
of last session, met with from the nation in
general. Commons Debates, vol.8. page 5.
Anno 13 Geo. II. 1739. Mr. Pulteney, now earl of Bath.
His Majesty mentions heats and animosities. Sir, I don't know who
drew up this speech; but whoever he was, he should
have spared that expression: I wish be had drawn a
veil over the heats and animosities that must be owned once
subsisted upon this head; for I am sure none now
subsist. Vol. II. p. 96.
† The House of Commons in 1715 exhibited, Articles of
impeachment of high treason, and other high crimes
and misdemeanors against
to their trust,
could not fail to detect the fallacious arts, or to remonstrate
against the daring acts of violence, committed by any minister.
The Speech at the close of the session, has ever been
considered as the most secure method of promulgating the
favourite court creed among the vulgar; because the parliament,
which is the constitutional guardian of the liberties of the
people, has in this case no opportunity of remonstrating, or of
impeaching any wicked servant of the crown.
This week has given the public the most abandoned instance of
ministerial effrontery ever attempted to be imposed on mankind.
The ministers speech of last Tuesday, is not to be
paralleled in the annals of this country. I am in doubt, whether
the imposition is greater on the sovereign, or on the nation.
Every friend of his country must lament that a prince of so many
great and amiable qualities, whom England truly reveres, can be
brought to give the sanction of his sacred name to the most odious
measures, and to the most unjustifiable, public declarations, from
a throne ever renowned for truth, honour, and unsullied virtue. I
am sure, all foreigners, especially the king of Prussia, will hold
the minister in contempt and abhorrence. He has made our sovereign
declare, My expectations have been fully answered
by the happy effects which the several allies of my crown have
derived from this salutary measure of the definitive Treaty. The
powers at war with my good brother the King of
Prussia, have been induced to agree to such terms of
accommodation, as that great prince has approved; and the success
which has attended my negotiation, has necessarily
and immediately diffused the blessings of peace
through every part of Europe. The infamous fallacy of this
whole sentence is apparent to all mankind: tor it is known, that the
King of Prussia did not barely approve, but absolutely dictated,
as conqueror, every
Robert Earl of Oxford, and Earl Mortimer. Article 15
is for having corrupted the sacred fountain of
truth, and put falsehoods into the mouth of Majesty, in several
speech's made to parliament. Vide VoL III. and Journals
of the House of Commons, vol. 18, p. 214.
article of the terms of peace. No
advantage of any kind has accrued to that magnanimous prince from our
negotiation, but he was basely deserted by the Scottish prime
minister of England. He was known by every court in Europe
to be scarcely on better terms of friendship here, than at Vienna;
and he was betrayed by us in the treaty of peace. What a
strain of insolence, therefore, is it in a minister to lay claim to
what he is conscious all his efforts tended to prevent, and meanly
to arrogate to himself a share in the fame and glory of one of the
greatest princes the world has ever seen? The king of Prussia,
however, has gloriously kept all his former conquests,
and stipulated security for all his allies, even for the elector
of Hanover. I know in what light this great
prince is considered in Europe, and in what manner he has been
treated here ; among other reasons, perhaps, from some contemptuous
expressions he may have used of the Scot: expressions which
are every day ecchoed by the whole body of Englishmen
through the southern part of this island.
The Preliminary Articles of Peace were such as have drawn
the contempt of mankind on our wretched negotiators. All our most
valuable conquests were agreed to be restored, and the
East-India company would have been infallibly ruined by a
single article of this fallacious and baneful negotiation. No
hireling of the minister has been hardy enough to dispute this; yet
the minister himself has made our sovereign declare, the
satisfaction which he felt at the approaching re-establishment
of peace upon conditions so honourable to his crown, and so
beneficial to his people. As to the entire approbation
of parliament, which is so vainly boasted of, the world knows how
that was obtained. The large debt on the Civil List, already
above half a year in arrear, shews pretty clearly the transactions
of the winter. It is, however, remarkable, -that the minister's
speech dwells on the entire approbation given by parliament to the Preliminary
Articles, which I will venture to say, he must by this time be
ashamed of; for be has been brought to confess the total want of
that knowledge, accuracy and precision, by which such immense
advantages both of trade and territory, were sacrificed to our
inveterate enemies. These gross blunders are, indeed, in some
measure set right by the Definitive Treaty; yet, the most
important articles, relative to cessions, commerce,
and the Fishery, remain as they were, with respect to the French.
The proud and feeble Spaniard too does not Renounce, but
only Desists from all pretensions, 'which he may have
formed, to the right of Fishing — where? only about the
island of Newfoundland — till a favourable opportunity arises
of insisting on it, there, as well as elsewhere.
The minister cannot forbear, even in the
King['s] Speech, insulting us with a dull repetition of the word œconomy.
I did not expect so soon to have seen that word again, after it
had been so lately exploded, and more than once, by a most
numerous audience, hissed off the stage of our English
theatres. It is held in derision by the voice of the people,
and every tongue loudly proclaims the universal contempt, in which
these empty professions are held by this nation. Let the
public be informed of a single instance of œconomy, except
indeed in the houshold. Is a regiment, which was completed
as to its compliment of officers on the Tuesday, and broke
on the Thursday, a proof of œconomy? Is the pay of
the Scottish Master Elliot to be voted by an English
parliament, under the head of œconomy? Is this, among a
thousand others, one of the convincing proofs of a firm
resolution to form government on a plan of strict œconomy? Is
it not notorious, that in the reduction of the army, not the least
attention has been paid to it. Many unnecessary expences have been
incurred, only to encrease the power of the crown, that is, to
create more lucrative jobs for the creatures of the minister? The staff
indeed is broke, but the discerning part of mankind immediately
comprehended the mean subterfuge, and resented the indignity put
upon so brave an officer, as marshal Ligonier. That step was
taken to give the whole power of the army to the crown, that is, to
the minister. Lord Ligonier is now no longer at the head of
the army; but lord Bute in effect is: I mean that every
preferment given by the crown will be found still to be obtained by
his enormous influence, and to be bestowed only on the
creatures of the Scottish faction. The nation is still in
the fame deplorable state, while he governs, and can make
the tools of his power pursue the same odious measures. Such
a retreat, as he intends, can only mean that personal indemnity,
which, I hope, guilt will never find from an injured nation. The
negociations of the late inglorious peace, and the excise,
will haunt him, wherever he goes, and the terrors of the just
resentment, which he must be to meet from a brave and insulted
people, and which must finally crush him, will be for ever before
his eyes.
In vain will such a minister, or the foul
dregs of his power, the tools of corruption and despotism, preach
up in the speech that spirit of concord, and that
obedience to the laws, which is essential to good order.
They have sent the spirit of discord through the land,
and I will prophecy, that it will never be extinguished, but by
the extinction of their power. Is the spirit of concord to
go hand in hand with the Peace and Excise thro' this nation? Is it
to be expected between an insolent Exciseman, and a peer,
gentleman, freeholder, or farmer, whose private houses are
now made liable to be entered and searched at pleasure? Gloucestershire,
Herefordshire, and in general all the Cyder
countries, are not surely the several counties
which are alluded to in the speech. The spirit of
concord hath not gone forth among them; but the spirit
of liberty has, and a noble opposition has been given to the
wicked instruments of oppression. A nation as sensible as the English,
will see that a spirit of concord, when they are
oppressed, means a tame submission to injury, and that a spirit
of liberty ought then to arise, and I am sure ever will, in
proportion to the weight of the grievance they feel. Every legal attempt
of a contrary tendency to the spirit of concord will
be deemed a justifiable resistance, warranted by the spirit of
the English constitution.
A despotic minister will always endeavour to
dazzle his prince with high-flown ideas of the prerogafive
and honour of the crown, which the minister will
make a parade us firmly maintaining. I wish as much as any
man in the kingdom to see the honour of the crown
maintained in a manner truly becoming Royalty. I lament to
seek it sunk even to prostitution. What a shame was it to see the
security of this country, in point of military force, complimented
away, contrary to the opinion of Royalty itself, and sacrificed to
the prejudices and to the ignorance of a set of people, the most
unfit from every consideration to be consulted on a matter
relative to the security of the house of Hanover?
I wish to see the honour of the crown
religiously asserted with regard to our allies, and the dignity of
it scrupulously maintained with regard to foreign princes. Is it
possible such an indignity can have happened, such a sacrifice of the
honour of the crown of England, as that a minister should
already have kissed his majesty's hand on being appointed to the
most insolent and ungrateful court in the world, without a previous
assurance of that reciprocal nomination which the meanest court in
Europe would insist upon, before she proceeded to an act otherwise
so derogatory to her honour? But Electoral Policy
has ever been obsequious to the court of Vienna, and forgets
the insolence with which count Colloredo left England. Upon
a principle of dignity and œconomy, lord Stormont,
a Scottish peer of the loyal house of Murray, kissed
his majesty's hand, I think, on Wednesday in the Easter
week; but this ignominious act has not yet disgraced the nation in
the London Gazette. The ministry are not ashamed of doing
the thing in private; they are only afraid of the publication. Was
it a tender regard for the honour of the late king, or of
his present majesty, that invited to court lord George
Sackville, in these first days of Peace, to share in the
general satisfaction, which all good courtiers received in the
indignity offered to lord Ligonier, and on the advancement
of — ? Was this to shew princely gratitude to the eminent
services of the accomplished general of the house of Brunswic,
who has had fo great a share in rescuing Europe from the
yoke of France; and whose nephew we hope soon to see made
happy in the possession of the most amiable princess in the world?
Or, is it meant to assert the honour of the crown only
against the united wishes of a loyal and affectionate people,
founded in a happy experience of the talents, ability, integrity,
and virtue of those, who have had the glory of redeeming their
country from bondage and ruin, in order to support, by every art of
corruption and intimidation, a weak, disjointed, incapable set of —
I will call them any thing but ministers — by whom the Favourite
still meditates to rule this kingdom with a rod of iron.
The Stuart line has ever been intoxicated with the slavish doctrines
of the absolute, independent, unlimited
power of the crown. Some of that line were so weakly advised, as to
endeavour to reduce them into practice: but the English nation
was too spirited to suffer the least encroachment on the ancient
liberties of this kingdom. The King
of England is only the * first magistrate of this country;
but is invested by law with the whole executive power. He is,
however, responsible to his people for the due execution of "the
royal functions, in the choice of ministers, &c, equally with
the meanest of his subjects in his particular duty. The
personal character of our present amiable sovereign makes us easy
and happy that so great a power is lodged in such hands; but the favourite
has given too just cause for him to escape the general odium. The
prerogative of the crown is to exert the constitutional
powers entrusted to it in a way, not of blind favour and partiality,
but of wisdom and judgment. This is the spirit of our constitution.
The people too have their prerogative, and, I hope, the fine
words of Dryden will be engraven on. our hearts,
Freedom is the English subject's Prerogative.
* In the first speech of James I. to his English parliament,
March 32, 1603, are the following words, That I am a SERVANT is
most true — I will never hi ashamed to confess it.
My principal honour, to be the GREAT SERVANT of the commonwealth.
Journals of the House of Commons, Vol. I, p. 145.
To the NORTH BRITON.
Sir,
Please to state the following fact, which is of a nature almost
entirely new, and I will soon trouble you with my observations on so
remarkable a proceeding.
L. S.
By the Right Hon. WELBORE ELLIS,
His Majesty's Secretary at War.
Having received his Majesty's commands, do hereby discharge Anthony
Nichols, a private man, from the Coldstream regiment of
foot-guards, commanded by General James Lord Tyrawley, from any
further service in the lame regiment.
Given under my hand and seal, at the War Office, this 26th day of
March 1763.
W. ELLIS.
To all his Majesty's officers, civil and military, whom it may
concern.
By the Articles Of War, Sect. 3. Art. 2. After a
non-commissioned officer, or soldier, shall have
been duly enlisted, and sworn, he shall not be dismissed our
service, without a discharge in writing; and no
discharge granted to him shall be allowed of as sufficient,
which is not signed by a Field Officer of the Regiment into which
he was enlisted; or commanding officer, where no
Field Officer of the regiment is in Great-Britain.
Quere. Is the Secretary at War a Field-Officer? or what Officer
is he?
I am, &c.
End of the Second Volume.
See also:
- The
North Briton, Wikipedia article.
- Wilkes,
Liberty, and Number 45, Jack Lynch
- The
North Briton, complete, PDF.