understanding, might judge whether they appeared to them to be reasons becoming the Wisdom of a King, or only as the House somewhere express it, "the freaks of a capricious Minister of State." If I have leisure I shall write you again. In the mean Time, I am, Your's, A CHATTERER. 1The succeeding articles of this series were attributed to Adams by George Bancroft. This is confirmed by apparently contemporaneous annotations in the file of the Gazette owned by Harbottle Dorr, at one time a selectman of Boston. At the trial of Capt. Preston in November, 1770, he was drawn as a juror and "challenged for cause." An advertisement of his business appears in the Boston Gazette, October 1, 1770. 2August 3, 1770, Massachusetts State Papers, pp.249-254. 3May 29, 1766 Massachusetts State Papers, p. 75. 4Massachusetts State Papers, p. 254. ARTICLE SIGNED "A CHATTERER." [Boston Gazette, August 20, 1770.] "One of the greatest indications of Wisdom that a Prince can show, is to converse with and have about him virtuous and wise Men: But Princes are liable to be deceived; Fraudum sedes aula, was the saying of a Philosopher who understood Courts well.--A good Prince may suffer by employing bad Ministers and Servants." MESSIEURS PRINTERS, WE are told in a late reply, that "the offices of Attornies and Sollicitors-General have been for more than fifty years past filled up by persons of the highest reputation for learning and integrity."1 I am apt to think, if we look back we shall find that some of these officers of the crown have been as deficient in learning or integrity, or both, as we know some ministers of state have been. The house of Representatives say, "the province has suffer'd much by their unjust, groundless and illegal opinions"--2 Among other instances of weakness or wickedness in some persons who have filled these offices, I shall only mention one which now occurs to my mind--There is an act of Parliament which exempts seamen from an impress in America: This act was upon several occasions urged by the Americans, and it has been the opinion of attornies and sollicitors general, at different times, that the act was limitted to a time of war, when in truth there was no part or clause whatever in it to justify such opinion.--Well then may it be called a groundless opinion; and if groundless, will any one insist that there was no defect in these instances in point of integrity, if not of learning--Perhaps these opinions may appear to his Honor to be founded upon wise reasons; but others who cannot see the force of these reasons, have a right to think differently; and such a freedom is not likely to bring dishonor upon them--It is enough for those who are dependent upon the great for commissions, pensions, and the like, to preach up implicit faith in the great--Others whose minds are unfettered will think for themselves--They will not blindly adopt the opinions even of persons who are advanced to the first stations in the