minister can procure a majority even of that council to shelter him; which I am sure you will allow to be a desperate crisis under any party of the most plausible denomination. The only instance you produce, or rather insinuate, to prove the late invectives against the King, Queen, and Royal Family, is drawn from that deduction of the English history, published in several papers by the _Craftsman_; wherein are shewn the bad consequences to the public, as well as to the prince, from the practices of evil ministers in most reigns, and at several periods, when the throne was filled by wise monarchs as well as by weak. This deduction, therefore, cannot reasonably give the least offence to a British king, when he shall observe that the greatest and ablest of his predecessors, by their own candour, by a particular juncture of affairs, or by the general infirmity of human nature, have sometimes put too much trust in confident, insinuating, and avaricious ministers. Wisdom, attended by virtue and a generous nature, is not unapt to be imposed on. Thus Milton describes Uriel, "the sharpest-sighted spirit in heaven," and "regent of the sun," deceived by the dissimulation and flattery of the devil, for which the poet gives a philosophical reason, but needless here to quote.[218] Is anything more common, or more useful, than to caution wise men in high stations against putting too much trust in undertaking servants, cringing flatterers, or designing friends? Since the Asiatic custom of governing by prime ministers hath prevailed in so many courts of Europe, how careful should every prince be in the choice of the person on whom so great a trust is devolved, whereon depend the safety and welfare of himself and all his subjects. Queen Elizabeth, whose administration is frequently quoted as the best pattern for English princes to follow, could not resist the artifices of the Earl of Leicester, who, although universally allowed to be the most ambitious, insolent, and corrupt person of his age, was yet her greatest, and almost her only favourite: (his religion indeed being partly puritan and partly infidel, might have better tallied with present times) yet this wise queen would never suffer the openest enemies of that overgrown lord to be sacrificed to his vengeance; nor durst he charge them with a design of introducing Popery or the Spanish pretender.