he sense only of the profligate and dissolute;
and, that whatever parliament should be convened, the same petitioners
would be ready, for the same reason, to request its dissolution.

As we once had a rebellion of the clowns, we have now an opposition of
the pedlers. The quiet of the nation has been, for years, disturbed by a
faction, against which all factions ought to conspire; for its original
principle is the desire of leveling; it is only animated, under the name
of zeal, by the natural malignity of the mean against the great.

When, in the confusion which the English invasions produced in France,
the villains, imagining that they had found the golden hour of
emancipation, took arms in their hands, the knights of both nations
considered the cause as common, and suspending the general hostility,
united to chastise them.

The whole conduct of this despicable faction is distinguished by
plebeian grossness, and savage indecency. To misrepresent the actions
and the principles of their enemies is common to all parties; but the
insolence of invective, and brutality of reproach, which have lately
prevailed, are peculiar to this.

An infallible characteristick of meanness is cruelty. This is the only
faction, that has shouted at the condemnation of a criminal, and that,
when his innocence procured his pardon, has clamoured for his blood.

All other parties, however enraged at each other, have agreed to treat
the throne with decency; but these low-born railers have attacked not
only the authority, but the character of their sovereign, and have
endeavoured, surely without effect, to alienate the affections of the
people from the only king, who, for almost a century, has much appeared
to desire, or much endeavoured to deserve them. They have insulted him
with rudeness, and with menaces, which were never excited by the gloomy
sullenness of William, even when half the nation denied him their
allegiance; nor by the dangerous bigotry of James, unless, when he was
finally driven from his palace; and with which scarcely the open
hostilities of rebellion ventured to vilify the unhappy Charles, even in
the remarks on the cabinet of Naseby.

It is surely not unreasonable to hope, that the nation will consult its
dignity, if not its safety, and disdain to be protected or enslaved by
the declaimers, or the plotters of a city tavern. Had Rome fallen by the
Catilinarian conspiracy, she might have consoled her fate by the
greatness of