itten with an eye to posterity,
cannot justly be described as unreadable, they contain comparatively
little which makes them worthy to be read.

His defence of his conduct in _A Letter to Sir William Windham_, written
in 1717, but not published until after the author's death, though
worthless as a defence, is a fine piece of special pleading in
Bolingbroke's best style. It could deceive no one acquainted with the
part played by the author before the death of Queen Anne, and afterwards
in exile, but it afforded him an opportunity for attacking his former
colleague, Oxford, with all the weapons available by an unscrupulous and
powerful assailant. He declares in this letter that he preferred exile
rather than to make common cause with the man whom he abhorred. Writing
of Oxford as a colleague in the government of the country he observes in
a skilfully turned passage:

'The ocean which environs us is an emblem of our government; and
the pilot and the minister are in similar circumstances. It
seldom happens that either of them can steer a direct course,
and they both arrive at their port by means which frequently
seem to carry them from it. But as the work advances the conduct
of him who leads it on with real abilities clears up, the
appearing inconsistencies are reconciled, and when it is once
consummated, the whole shows itself so uniform, so plain, and so
natural, that every dabbler in politics will be apt to think he
could have done the same. But on the other hand the man who
proposes no such object, who substitutes artifice in the place
of ability, who, instead of leading parties and governing
accidents, is eternally agitated backwards and forwards by both,
who begins every day something new, and carries nothing on to
perfection, may impose awhile on the world: but a little sooner
or a little later the mystery will be revealed, and nothing will
be found to be couched under it but a thread of pitiful
expedients, the ultimate end of which never extended farther
than living from day to day. Which of these pictures resembles
Oxford most you will determine.'

It has been said with somewhat daring exaggeration, that Burke never
produced anything nobler than this passage, and the writer regards the
whole composition of the _Letter to Windham_ as almost faultless.[58]

That it is Bolingbroke's masterpiece may be readily admitted, but in
this _L