without the warrant of any document One of that body solicited the cause in England, and exhibited to statesmen a proof, that though Irish commerce was restricted, its judges made a lucrative traffic to the crown, and by parity of reason to private parties, of the property, liberty and lives of fellow subjects. Nor had these hardened criminals or their partisans any excuse to offer, but merely pleaded great zeal against the Pope and Pretender, though nothing was more likely to introduce these foreigners than the cruelty or corruption of Protestant Judges; however, the whole group would have been removed on the accession of George L, had not one man among them made useful discoveries, and to the original crime of judicial corruption superadded the baseness of an informer. I will not exercise the feelings of a Protestant and a Whig in so partial a manner as to give an exclusive merit to all the new Judges; similar vices stained many of them with those of their degraded and time-serving predecessors; in particular, an equal disposition to haunt the Castle and receive its oracular assistance in popular or criminal trials. These suspicions have been confirmed (were proof necessary) by the confidential correspondence of Primate Boulter.
The Great Seal was taken from Lord Middleton in 1725. This event flowed from an attack in Parliament on account of an absence in England, though with leave from the crown, This last and longest visit was for sixteen months, and had been solicited on the score of ill health. If example could sanctify an evil precedent, the chancellor had many to produce, in the persons of two Englishmen, Porter and Methuen; however, some resolutions were voted reflecting on his Lordship for not stating to his sovereign the injury which the absence of such an officer must occasion, both in the Courts of Chancery and Exchequer Chamber. The plea of known ill health, or being an English commoner, did not avail as a defence, which circumstance seemed a signal for his lordship to retire, as he could not (most probably) remove the former affliction, and the shield of senatorial situation was wrested from him.
I will not guess the motives of individuals, whether they
