Note 334 — Chapter XVI · ON THE STATE OF THE CONSTITUTION IN THE REIGNS OF ANNE, GEORGE I., AND GEORGE II.

The rage of the tory party against the queen and Lord Oxford for retaining whigs in office is notorious from Swift's private letters, and many other authorities. And Bolingbroke, in his letter to Sir W. Wyndham, very fairly owns their intention "to fill the employments of the kingdom, down to the meanest, with tories."—"We imagined," he proceeds, "that such measures, joined to the advantages of our numbers and our property, would secure us against all attempts during her reign; and that we should soon become too considerable not to make our terms in all events which might happen afterwards; concerning which, to speak truly, I believe few or none of us had any very settled resolution." P. 11. It is rather amusing to observe that those who called themselves the tory or church party, seem to have fancied they had a natural right to power and profit, so that an injury was done them when these rewards went another way; and I am not sure that something of the same prejudice has not been perceptible in times a good deal later.