permitted me to distinguish between his case and mine own; and it was
worse than death to lie under the necessity of making them the same, and
of taking measures in concert with him.
I am now come to the time at which I left England, and have finished the
first part of that deduction of facts which I proposed to lay before you.
I am hopeful that you will not think it altogether tedious or
unnecessary; for although very little of what I have said can be new to
you, yet this summary account will enable you with greater ease to recall
to your memory the passages of those four years wherewith all that I am
going to relate to you has an immediate and necessary connection.
In what has been said I am far from making my own panegyric. I had not
in those days so much merit as was ascribed to me, nor since that time
have I had so little as the same persons allowed me. I committed,
without dispute, many faults, and a greater man than I can pretend to be,
constituted in the same circumstances, would not have kept clear of all;
but with respect to the Tories I committed none. I carried the point of
party honour to the height, and specified everything to my attachment to
them during this period of time. Let us now examine whether I have done
so during the rest.
When I arrived in France, about the end of March, 1715, the affairs of
England were represented to me in another light than I had seen them in
when I looked upon them with my own eyes very few weeks before. I found
the persons who were detached to speak with me prepared to think that I
came over to negotiate for the Pretender; and when they perceived that I
was more ignorant than they imagined, I was assured by them that there
would be suddenly a universal rising in England and Scotland. The
leaders were named to me, their engagements specified, and many
gentlemen, yourself among others, were reckoned upon for particular
services, though I was certain you had never been treated with; from
whence I concluded, and the event has justified my opinion, that these
assurances had been given on the general characters of men by such of our
friends as had embarked sooner and gone farther than the rest.
This management surprised me extremely. In the answers I made I
endeavoured to set the mistake right, to show that things were far from
the point of maturity imagined, that the Chevalier had yet no party for
him, and that nothing could form one but the extreme violence which the
Whigs threatened to exercise. Great endeavours were used to engage me in
this affair, and to prevail on me to answer the letter of invitation sent
me from Bar. I alleged, as it was true, that I had no commission from
any person in England, and that the friends I left behind me were the
only persons who could determine me, if any could, to take such a step.
As to the last proposition, I absolutely refused it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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