Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 14.djvu/29

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DR. SWIFT AND MR. POPE.
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As to what is called a revolution principle, my opinion was this; that whenever those evils which usually attend and follow a violent change of government, were not in probability so pernicious as the grievance we suffer under a present power, then the publick good will justify such a revolution; and this I took to have been the case in the prince of Orange's expedition; although in the consequences it produced some very bad effects, which are likely to stick long enough by us.

I had likewise in those days a mortal antipathy against standing armies in times of peace. Because I always took standing armies to be only servants hired by the master of the family, for keeping his own children in slavery. And because I conceived that a prince who could not think himself secure without mercenary troops, must needs have a separate interest from that of his subjects. Although I am not ignorant of those artificial necessities which a corrupted ministry can create, for keeping up forces to support a faction against the publick interest.

As to parliaments, I adored the wisdom of that gothick institution, which made them annual[1]: and I was confident our liberty could never be placed upon a firm foundation, until that ancient law were restored among us. For, who sees not, that while

  1. It is in allusion to this sentiment of Swift that Dr. Stopford, the learned and amiable bishop of Cloyne, thus expresses himself in a Latin panegyrick on Swift. "Incorruptus inter pessimos mores; magni atque constantis animi; libertatis semper studiosus, atque nostri reipublicæ status, a Gothis quondam sapienter instituti, laudator perpetuus, propugnator acerrimus. Cujus tamen formam, ambitu et largitione adeo fœdatam, ut vix nunc dignosci possit, sæpius indignabundus ploravit."
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