I desire to open this matter, and leave the Whigs themselves to determine upon it. The House of Commons resolved, _nemine contradicente_, that the Speaker should congratulate Mr. Harley's escape and recovery[8] in the name of the House, upon his first attendance on their service. This is accordingly done; and the speech, together with the chancellor of the exchequer's, are printed by order of the House.[9] The author of the "Medley" takes this speech to task the very next week after it is published, telling us, in the aforesaid paper, that the Speaker's commending Mr. Harley, for being "an instrument of great good" to the nation, was "ill-chosen flattery"; because Mr. Harley had brought the "nation under great difficulties, to say no more:" He says, that when the Speaker tells Mr. Harley, that Providence has "wonderfully preserved" him "from some unparalleled attempts" (for that the "Medley" alludes to) he only "revives a false and groundless calumny upon other men"; which is "an instance of impotent, but inveterate malice,"[10] that makes him [the Speaker] "still appear more vile and contemptible." This is an extract from his first paragraph. In the next this writer says, that the Speaker's "praying to God for the continuance of Mr. Harley's life, as an invaluable blessing,[11] was a fulsome piece of insincerity, which exposes him to shame and derision"; because he is "known to bear ill will to Mr. Harley, to have an extreme bad opinion of him, and to think him an obstructor of those fine measures he would bring about." I now appeal to the Whigs themselves, whether a great minister of state, in high favour with the Qu[een], and a Speaker of the House of Commons, were ever publicly treated after so extraordinary a manner, in the most licentious times? For this is not a clandestine libel stolen into the world, but openly printed and sold, with the bookseller's name and place of abode at the bottom. And the juncture is admirable, when Mr. H[arle]y is generally believed upon the very point to be made an earl, and promoted to the most important station of the kingdom:[12] nay, the very marks of esteem he hath so lately received from the whole representative body of the people, are called "ill-chosen flattery," and "a fulsome piece of insincerity," exposing the donors "to shame and derision."