To operate on her Majesty’s fears, and to gain popularity among a numerous portion of the people who deemed the Whigs inimical to the church establishment, an outcry was raised that the church was in danger. Marlborough and Godolphin were regarded as deserters from the great cause, and the press was employed in attacking the low church party, in terms both unscrupulous and indelicate. That celebrated libel, entitled, “The Memorial of the Church of England,” the author of which has been already specified, was published at this critical juncture; “a doleful piece,” as the Duchess calls it, “penned by some of the zealots of the party.” This was among the first and most scurrilous efforts of those who hoped by invective and slander to produce a deep impression on the public mind. It was dedicated to the Duke of Marlborough, as being considered still the strength of a party which he had not explicitly renounced: and was forwarded to him in the midst of his campaign on the Ische. To his great mind the aspersions of the anonymous party were too contemptible to merit a moment’s serious indignation. The vehemence of passionate indignation is, on such occasions, the ebullition of minds of an inferior stamp. The injustice and invective which scarcely drew forth an angry exclamation from Marlborough, produced a feverish heat in the warm temperament of the Duchess. “In this camp,” writes the Duke to Lord Godolphin, his bosom friend and confidant,[73] “I have had time to read the pamphlet called ‘The Memorial of the Church of England.’ I think it the most impudent and scurrilous thing I ever read. If the author can be found, I do not doubt but he will be punished; for if such liberties may be taken, of writing scandalous lies without being punished, no government can stand long. Notwithstanding what I have said, I cannot forbear laughing when I think they would have you and I pass for fanatics, and the Duke of Buckingham and Lord Jersey for pillars of the church; the one being a Roman Catholic in King James’s reign, and the other would have been a Quaker, or any other religion that would have pleased the late King.” To the Duchess he calmly writes:— “Tirlemont, Sept. 7. “I received last night a letter from you without date, by which I see there is another scurrilous pamphlet come out. The best way of putting an end to that villany is not to appear concerned. The best of men and women, in all ages, have been ill used. If we can be so happy as to behave ourselves so as to have no reason to reproach ourselves, we may then despise what rage and faction do.” This wise and dignified mode of receiving attacks to which eminent individuals have in every age been exposed, was succeeded by the exposure and punishment of the scurrilous writer. Of that event, with its painful circumstances, a detailed account has already been given in the preceding volume. CHAPTER IV.