could to enslave the country, and as long as he was a thorn in the King's side." Yet, from the exulting triumph of Mr. Horne's reply, one would think that I had rested my expectation that Mr. Wilkes would be supported by the public, upon the single condition of his mortifying the King. This may be logic at Cambridge, or at the treasury; but, among men of sense and honour, it is folly or villany in the extreme.
I see the pitiful advantage he has taken of a single unguarded expression, in a letter not intended for the public. Yet it is only the expression that is unguarded. I adhere to the true meaning of that member of the sentence, taken separately as he takes it; and now, upon the coolest deliberation, re-assert, that, for the purposes I referred to, it may be highly meritorious to the public, to wound the personal feelings of the sovereign. It is not a general proposition, nor is it generally applied to the chief magistrate of this, or any other constitution. Mr. Horne knows, as well as I do, that the best of princes is not displeased with the abuse which he sees thrown upon his ostensible ministers. It makes them, I presume, more properly the objects of his
