g of, the influence of the Crown had been always employed in
supporting the Ministers of State, and in carrying on the public business
according to their opinions. But the party now in question is formed
upon a very different idea. It is to intercept the favour, protection,
and confidence of the Crown in the passage to its Ministers; it is to
come between them and their importance in Parliament; it is to separate
them from all their natural and acquired dependencies; it is intended as
the control, not the support, of Administration. The machinery of this
system is perplexed in its movements, and false in its principle. It is
formed on a supposition that the King is something external to his
government; and that he may be honoured and aggrandised, even by its
debility and disgrace. The plan proceeds expressly on the idea of
enfeebling the regular executory power. It proceeds on the idea of
weakening the State in order to strengthen the Court. The scheme
depending entirely on distrust, on disconnection, on mutability by
principle, on systematic weakness in every particular member; it is
impossible that the total result should be substantial strength of any
kind.

As a foundation of their scheme, the Cabal have established a sort of
_Rota_ in the Court. All sorts of parties, by this means, have been
brought into Administration, from whence few have had the good fortune to
escape without disgrace; none at all without considerable losses. In the
beginning of each arrangement no professions of confidence and support
are wanting, to induce the leading men to engage. But while the
Ministers of the day appear in all the pomp and pride of power, while
they have all their canvas spread out to the wind, and every sail filled
with the fair and prosperous gale of Royal favour, in a short time they
find, they know not how, a current, which sets directly against them;
which prevents all progress, and even drives them backwards. They grow
ashamed and mortified in a situation, which, by its vicinity to power,
only serves to remind them the more strongly of their insignificance.
They are obliged either to execute the orders of their inferiors, or to
see themselves opposed by the natural instruments of their office. With
the loss of their dignity, they lose their temper. In their turn they
grow troublesome to that Cabal, which, whether it supports or opposes,
equally disgraces and equally betrays them. It is soon found necessa