The Junto did not find it so easy to fix new ciphers as to displace the old. Dr. Johnson, the new Bishop of Gloucester, was the object of their wishes for Preceptor; but his education with Murray and Stone, and his principles, which were undoubtedly the same as theirs (whatever theirs were), proved obstacles they could not surmount. The Whigs were violently against his promotion; the Archbishop strongly objected to him. It was still more difficult to accommodate themselves with a Governor: the post was at once too exalted, and they had declared it too unsubstantial, to leave it easy to find a man, who could fill the honour and digest the dishonour of it. Many were named; some refused it. At last, after long waving it, Lord Waldegrave, at the earnest request of the King, accepted it, and after repeated assurances of the submission and tractability of Stone. The Earl was very averse to it; he was a man of pleasure, understood the Court, was firm in the King’s favour, easy in his circumstances, and at once undesirous of rising, and afraid to fall. He said to a friend, “If I dared, I would make this excuse to the King; Sir, I am too young to govern, and too old to be governed.”--But he was forced to submit. A man of stricter honour, or of more reasonable sense, could not have been selected for the employment; yet as the Whig zeal had caught flame, even this choice was severely criticized. Lord Waldegrave’s grandmother was daughter of King James; his family were all Papists, and his father had been but the first convert. The Preceptor was not fixed till the beginning of the new year, but I shall include his promotion here, not to interrupt the thread of the narration: it was Dr. Thomas, who during the first civil war of Leicester-house, had read prayers to the present King: it was not till within two years of this period that the King had found an opportunity of preferring him, and then made him Bishop of Peterborough. He was a man of a fair character, esteemed rather a Tory in his principles. It may not be unentertaining to mention another instance of the King’s good fortune in being able to promote an old friend. General Legonier one day went and offered his Majesty the nomination to a living in his gift. The King expressed the greatest joy and gratitude, and said, “There is one I have long tried to make a Prebendary, but my Ministers never would give me an opportunity; I am much obliged to you, I will give the living to him.” FOOTNOTES: [216] The Author of these Memoirs. [217] Archibald Campbell, [Earl of Isla, and, on the death of his brother,] Duke of Argyle, died suddenly in his chair after dinner, at his house in Argyle Buildings, London, April 15, 1761. [218] Headed by one Lucas, an apothecary, who was soon after banished from that kingdom, and turned physician in London, where he wrote controversy in his own profession.