The sagacity of Shaftesbury, the honour of Russell, the genius of Sydney, might, in the opinion of a modest man, be safe and eligible guides. The partiality of friendship, and the conviction of his firm attachment, might be some excuse for his listening so much to Grey; but he never could, at any period of his life, have mistaken Ferguson for an honest man. There is reason to believe that the advice of the two last-mentioned persons had great weight in persuading him to the unjustifiable step of declaring himself king. But far the most guilty act of this unfortunate man's life was his lending his name to the declaration which was published at Lyme, and in this instance Ferguson, who penned the paper, was both the adviser and the instrument. To accuse the king of having burnt London, murdered Essex in the Tower, and, finally, poisoned his brother, unsupported by evidence to substantiate such dreadful charges, was calumny of the most atrocious kind; but the guilt is still heightened, when we observe, that from no conversation of Monmouth, nor, indeed, from any other circumstance whatever, do we collect that he himself believed the horrid accusations to be true. With regard to Essex's death in particular, the only one of the three charges which was believed by any man of common sense, the late king was as much implicated in the suspicion as James. That the latter should have dared to be concerned in such an act, without the privacy of his brother, was too absurd an imputation to be attempted, even in the days of the popish plot. On the other hand, it was certainly not the intention of the son to brand his father as an assassin. It is too plain that, in the instance of this declaration, Monmouth, with a facility highly criminal, consented to set his name to whatever Ferguson recommended as advantageous to the cause. Among the many dreadful circumstances attending civil wars, perhaps there are few more revolting to a good mind than the wicked calumnies with which, in the heat of contention, men, otherwise men of honour, have in all ages and countries permitted themselves to load their adversaries. It is remarkable that there is no trace of the divines who attended this unfortunate man having exhorted him to a particular repentance of his manifesto, or having called for a retraction or disavowal of the accusations contained in it. They were so intent upon points more immediately connected with orthodoxy of faith, that they omitted pressing their penitent to the only declaration by which he could make any satisfactory atonement to those whom he had injured. FRAGMENTS. _The following detached paragraphs were probably intended for the fourth chapter_. _They are here printed in the incomplete and unfinished state in which they were found_.