Whig and Tory," says Dean Swift, "are stale and old
as Troy-town story." But if the principles were old, the titles of the
parties were new. Steele, in 1710, published in the _Tatler_ a letter
from Pasquin of Rome to Isaac Bickerstaff, asking for "an account of
those two religious orders which have lately sprung up amongst you, the
Whigs and the Tories." Steele declared that you could not come even
among women "but you find them divided into Whig and Tory." It was
like the famous lawsuit in Abdera, alluded to by Lucian and amplified
by Wieland, concerning the ownership of the ass's shadow, on which all
the Abderites took sides, and every one was either a "Shadow" or an
"Ass."

Various explanations have been given of these titles Whig and Tory.
Titus Oates applied the term "Tory," which then signified an Irish
robber, to those who would not believe in his Popish plot, and the name
gradually became extended to all who were supposed to have sympathy
with the Catholic Duke of York. The word "Whig" first arose during the
Cameronian rising, when it was applied to the Scotch Presbyterians, and
is derived by some from the whey which they habitually drank, and by
others from a word, "whiggam," used by the western Scottish drovers.

The Whigs and the Tories represent in the main not only two political
doctrines, but two different feelings in the human mind. The natural
tendency of some men is to regard political liberty as of more
importance than political authority, and of other men to think that the
maintenance of authority is the first object to be secured, and that
only so much of individual liberty is to be conceded as will not
interfere with authority's strictest exercise. Roughly speaking,
therefore, the Tories were for authority, and the Whigs for liberty.
The Tories naturally held to the principle of the monarchy and of the
State church; the Whigs {18} were inclined for the supremacy of
Parliament, and for something like an approach to religious equality.
[Sidenote: 1714--Political change] Up to this time at least the Tory
party still accepted the theory of the Divine origin of the king's
supremacy. The Whigs were even then the advocates of a constitutional
system, and held that the people at large were the source of
monarchical power. To the one set of men the sovereign was a divinely
appointed ruler; to the other he was the hereditary chief of the realm,
having the source of his authority in popular election.