of their being called to an Account for their
former Misdemeanors, found themselves caressed and applauded by the whole
Nation; and to crown all, the Parliament itself voted a prodigious Sum of
Money to reimburse the _New-Englanders_ for their Expences, and their
Services in this glorious Work.

This, I say, or to this Effect, was the Account which I received;--and
which I believe in my own Mind, will be found to be for the most Part very
true, when it can be very thoroughly _examined into_. But as I have been
hurried, by the _early_ Meeting of Parliament, to publish the present
Treatise at least three Months sooner than intended, I cannot at present
_authenticate_ Facts and Dates in the Manner I wish to do, in an Affair of
such Importance. Therefore I give this public Notice, that I build nothing
on the present Narration; and I only offer it (because not corroborated by
sufficient Evidence) as a probable Case, and as my own Opinion.

Indeed I have a particular Reason for acting in this cautious Manner;
seeing that I have suffered already by making a Slip in an Affair of this
Nature, which in any other Cause or Controversy, would have been reckoned
to be a very _venial_ one. The Case was this: In the First Edition of my
Fourth Tract, I had accused Dr. FRANKLIN with having acted a very
disingenuous Part, in opposing and denying the Authority of the _British_
Parliament, to lay a Tax [the Stamp-Duty] on _America_, when he himself
had solicited to be employed as an Agent in the Collection of that very
Tax. In Letters which passed between us, he denied the Charge, asserting
first, that he did not make Interest for a Place in the Stamp-Office,
'till the Bill was passed into a Law;--And 2dly. that the Place, for which
he asked, was not for himself, but for a Friend, one Mr. HUGHES, who was
accordingly appointed by Mr. GRENVILLE. Now in Consequence of this
Information, I omitted in the next Edition, the whole Paragraph, and said
nothing, either _pro_, or _con_, particularly relative to Dr. FRANKLIN.
And surely, every Thing considered, and the _faux pas_ of Dr. FRANKLIN
concerning the _stolen_ Papers of Mr. WHEATLEY duly weighed, one would
have thought, that I had made Satisfaction fully sufficient to almost any
Man in such a Case, whose Pretensions to _nice_ Honour might have been
much better founded than those of Dr. FRANKLIN. But it seems, I was
mistaken: For before he left _England_, I was called on in Print, to make
Repara