I often had done in print many years before, declare that it was my opinion we ought to have an open trade with France, because I did believe we might have the advantage by such a trade; and of this opinion I am still. What part I had in the Mercator is well known; and could men answer with argument, and not with personal abuse, I would at any time defend every part of the Mercator which was of my doing. But to say the Mercator was mine, is false; I neither was the author of it, had the property of it, the printing of it, or the profit by it. I had never any payment or reward for writing any part of it, nor had I the power to put what I would into it. Yet the whole clamour fell upon me, because they knew not who else to load with it. And when they came to answer, the method was, instead of argument, to threaten and reflect upon me, reproach me with private circumstances and misfortunes, and give language which no Christian ought to give, and which no gentleman ought to take.

I thought any Englishman had the liberty to speak his opinion in such things, for this had nothing to do with the public. The press was open to me as well as to others; and how or when I lost my English liberty of speaking my mind, I know not; neither how my speaking my opinion without fee or reward could authorise them to call me villain, rascal, traitor, and such opprobrious names.

It was ever my opinion, and is so still, that were our wool kept from France, and our manufactures spread in France upon reasonable duties, all the improvement which the French have made in the woollen manufactures would decay, and in the end be little worth; and consequently, the hurt they could do us by them would be of little moment.

It was my opinion, and is so still, that the ninth article of the Treaty of Commerce was calculated for the advantage of our trade, let who will make it; that is nothing to me.

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My reasons are because it tied the French to open the door to our manufactures at a certain duty of importation there, and left the Parliament of Britain at liberty to shut theirs out by as high duties as they pleased here, there being no limitation upon us as to duties on French goods, but that other nations should pay the same.

While the French were thus bound, and the British free, I always thought we must be in a condition to trade to advantage, or it must be our own fault. This was my opinion, and is so still; and I would venture to maintain it against any man upon a public stage, before a jury of fifty merchants, and venture my life upon the cause, if I were assured of fair play in the dispute. But that it was my opinion that we might carry on a trade with France to our great advantage, and that we ought for that reason to trade with them, appears in the third, fourth, fifth,

and sixth volumes of the Review, above nine years before the Mercator was thought of. It was not thought criminal to say so then; how it comes to be villainous to say so now, God knows; I can give no account of it. I am still of the same opinion, and shall never be brought to say otherwise, unless I see the state of trade so altered as to alter my opinion; and if ever I do I shall be able to give good reasons for it.

The answer to these things, whether mine or no, was all pointed at me, and the arguments were generally in the terms villain, rascal, miscreant, liar, bankrupt, fellow, hireling, turncoat, &c. What the arguments were bettered by these methods I leave others to judge of. Also, most of those things in the Mercator for which I had such usage were such as I was not the author of.

I do grant, had all the books which had been called by my name been written by me, I must of necessity have exasperated every side, and perhaps have deserved it; but I have the greatest injustice imaginable in this treatment, as I have in the perverting the design of what I have really written.

To sum up, therefore, my complaint in a few words:

I was, from my first entering into the knowledge of public matters, and have ever been to this day, a sincere lover of the constitution of my country; [ 273]

VOL. II. - 18

zealous for liberty and the Protestant interest; but a constant follower of moderate principles, a vigorous opposer of hot measures in all parties. I never once changed my opinion, my principles, or my party; and let what will be said of changing sides, this I maintain, that I never once deviated from the Revolution principles, nor from the doctrine of liberty and property on which it was founded.

I own I could never be convinced of the great danger of the Pretender in the time of the late ministry; nor can I be now convinced of the great danger of the Church under this ministry. I believe the cry of the one was politically made use of then to serve other designs, and I plainly see the like use made of the other now. I spoke my mind freely then, and I have done the like now, in a small tract to that purpose not yet made public; and which if I live to publish I will publicly own, as I purpose to do everything I write, that friends may when I am abused, and they imposed on.

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It has been the disaster of all parties in this nation to be very hot in their turn; and as often as they have been so I have differed with them, and ever must and shall do so. I'll repeat some of the occasions on the Whigs' side, because from that quarter the accusation of my turning about comes.

The first time I had the misfortune to differ with my friends was about the year 1683, when the Turks

were besieging Vienna, and the Whigs in England, generally speaking, were for the Turks taking it; which I, having read the history of the cruelty and perfidious dealings of the Turks in their wars, and how they had rooted out the name of the Christian religion in above threescore and ten kingdoms, could by no means agree with. And though then but a young man, and a younger author, I opposed it, and wrote against it, which was taken very unkindly indeed.

The next time I differed with my friends was when King James was wheedling the Dissenters to take off the penal laws and test, which I could by no means come into. And as, in the first, I used to say, I had rather the Popish house of Austria should ruin the Protestants in Hungary, than the infidel house of Ottoman should ruin both Protestants and Papists by overrunning Germany; so, in the other, I told the Dissenters I had rather the Church of England should pull our clothes off by fines and forfeitures, than the Papists should fall both upon the Church and the Dissenters, and pull our skins off by fire and faggot.

The next difference I had with good men was about the scandalous practice of occasional conformity, in which I had the misfortune to make many honest men angry, rather because I had the better of the argument than because they disliked what I said.