An essay on Junius and his letters; embracing a sketch of the life and character of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, and memoirs of certain other distinguished individuals; with reflections historical, personal, and political, relating to the affairs of Great Britain and America from 1763 to 1785

Front matter

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Preface

We make books in America as we made our men-of-war,— one man contrived and executed, what employed several in the ship-yards of Europe. If our ships be as good as the French and English, we do as well as they with less means. The time has been when one man procured the timber from our forests, planned and superintended the building of the ship even to its rigging, obtained and placed on board the warlike equipments and stores, collected the crew, and then commanded the very ship he had created, and came off con-~ quefor, — necessity thus generating ambidexterity. So with our literary productions, we have less aid, and fewer helps, than they in the capital cities of the old world, where libraries and learned men abound, with oral infonnation on every side. If we in these ends of the earth labor under these disadvantages, our work should be judged of accordingly. We have no guide but Truth, nor other ambition than to be thought to follow her.

We have taken hold of a gnarled question. Should we, like others, fail to maintain our long conceived hypothesis of the authorship of Junius, we trust that our book will be found, nevertheless, to contain political and moral principles, and a spirit of rational liberty, worthy an American.

IT PBSFACE.

This essay is a new attempt to disentangle the most important and artfully contrived secret of modern times, the devellopement of which will open curious matter for speculation. It has already exercised the wits of the ^t men of the ii^e ; until conjecture has been wearied and fallen asleep.

The British reader may well ask—Who and what are you, who thus undertake to solve the greatest secret in our bis* tory ?*-you, bom and dwelling in a far distant region of the globe, which was unknown to the world four hundred years ago, and where, little more than two hundred years since, an EngUsh word had never been uttered. Is it likely that a native of the new-found quarter of the globe should untie a knot after all our efforts have failed ; and unravel a snarl, the disentanglement of which we on the spot have given up in despair ? I reply to such in the words of their great light and ornament, their polar-star and ours. Lard Bagok. " Sir^ce a Slum who standi a little removed from a spot of ground^ may often survey it better than those who are up<m it, ^tis not f«ipossible but that as a spectator, I may have observed some things which the actors themsehes have not" * Still, however, when a man offers a book of this sort to the attention of a discerning public, they ought to know not only who the author is, but what he is ; whether he has ever been in the way of correct information respecting private characters, facts, and circumstances, personages and affairs, of which he ventures to speak ; and what portion of his time and thoughts has be^a given to the subjects he presumes • to handle. Books on the healmg art have been written in a confident style, with every mark of deep learning, and trait of genius :

* An Attempt to proniote the Peace of the Church. Sect U.

PBBVACS. V

sysieins haY^d even been built upon theni, by able men, who in feet, knew nothing, from their own experience, of the diagnostics of diseases, adjunct or pathognomonic, nor of the natuial course of distempers, nor of the operaticms widiin us^ which, without the aid of art, tend to restore the disordered machine to its pristine regolarity, — mere closet medical pfaUosopfaers. No prudent man would take such a guide to health, or listen with patience to his speculations on life, hedtb, disease, and its curative process.*

These is<Hisiderations compel me to the disagreeable task of speaking of myself. But irksome as it is, '' If these things be necessities, let ^s meet them like necessities,^' and speak like a man who has lived long enough in the world to have all his vanity evaporate into thin air.

After being under the instruction of an eminent practitioner of phy^ severed y^ars, I embarked in the early part^ of die year 1775, at my native place, Newport, Rhode- Iriand, b the last ship that escaped the interdicted port of Boston ; and was consigned by my fiunily to Doctor Foth- KifcuiLi^j in London, for farther improvement. He was a relation on my mother's »de, and was bom in the same neighbourhood with her in Yorkshire. After enjoying a cordial reception from the Doctor, he sent me in the autumn of the same year to Edinburgh, where I remained nine months, and then returned to the house of my patron ia Harpur-^treet, London, in which I resided about three years, at the same time attending various lectures, es:pressly on or conilected with my profession, also the hospitals, and occasionally some of Fothergill's own practice. In the lat^

* e.^ g« the Mrummian system.

cer part of the year 1778, be sent me to Leyden, to acquke, as he smilingly said, a little of the Dutch phlegm* To that renowned University I was attached four academical years, making excursions in the four months' vacation of every year to England, France, and elsewhere. When I entered the University, being requested, agreeably to custom^ to inscribe my name and country on the records of matriculation, I wrote after it, ^* Libebjb Reipubug jq AMEiucANiB Fcedeba- TJE Civis " ; which ultimately occasioned more talk and captious remark among some there, and at the Hague, than the subject of it was worth,* insomuch that, at my graduation a few years after, I was constrained to add after my name, subscribed to my Inaugural Dissertation, only the word Ameri' caniUy before I could obtain the imprimatur of the University, and this by the friendly advice and request of the Rector Mag' nijicui and Professors: for the British Ambassador at the Hague knew all the gossip, through his agents, among the students (few of whom were under twenty-five years of age, and some were forty, and from almost every nation in Europe, while there was but one from America ) ; and this at a time when the American struggle was the great topic of universal conversation, and her cause very popular ; and when the British Ambassador at the Court of the Hague f domineered the Dutch as if they were English Colonists.

Our illustrious countryman, John Adams, who succeeded Washington in the Presidency, was sent by Congress to Holland as to sister States to court an alliance. He sojourned in that country over a year before he was publicly

* President Adams notices this in his printed Correspondence, p. 572. f Sir Joseph Yorke. See Correspondence, ib.

FBXPACC. TU

acknowledged as the American Minister. He resided almost entirely at Leyien, only nine miles bom the Hague, which cities are not farther apart than the extremes of the citj of London. During that time, I made one of his family, living, together with his two sons, in the same house. This may account for my strong bias to politics without any wish of ever becommg an official actor in them, ardent as my attachment was to the holy cause of our stnigglmg country.

My venerable kinsman in London, my JiUcrum in every thing good, was a conscientious advocate of the American cause, as far as a wise, loyal, and honest Englishman could or ought to be.* He labored day and night with Dr. Franklin and others to prevent hostilities with the colonists ; and afterwards, when the battle raged with alternate success, he en* deavoured to open the eyes of the King and his Minister ; for he had in the course of bis profession, and from his rank in life, the fieicilities to attempt it Their ignorance of America was astonishing ! The people of Britain generally were ignorant whence we sprung ; what language we spoke ; what religion we jHTofessed ; and even of what complexion we were. The hland of Virginia was spoken of in a Court of Judicature^ by a learned pleader. In a word, ignorance of this vast region pervaded England, Scotland, and Ireland^^ their Universities, their Courts of Law, the Le^lature, and, in too general a manner, even the administration of George the Third ; otherwise it is impossible to account for

* See his '* ConsideraHons relative to tht Nmik American CoUmtes/' printed in 1765, and ^ An English FreehMer^s Address to his Gminfrymen/* printed in 1779, in which his decided opinion upon political matters is mamfested.

Viii PRCFACS.

its conduct, unless we may attribute their ignorance to judicial infatuation. Were we to descend to a less general view, we might remark that the monarch, his minister, and advisers, private and ostensible, were more inclined to lend a listening ear to vindictive refugee governors, contractors, and hungry expectants on both sides the Tweed, than to the words of truth and soberness; and this fiital delusion operated the division of one half of the Empire ftom the other, and formed an epoch in the history of nations.

In Franklin's affection, next after America, was England ; with Fothergill, next to his native land was America. He had long studied our country ; his fitther having visited it, and travelled through it twice at distant periods, and his brother once, with no-tnercantile or worldly views whatever. Fothergill and Franklin were patriotic men. Both of them wished, most ardently wished, for such an union between Great Britain and America, as should be equally just, honorable, and beneficial to both countries ; and that great Physician never ceased to the last week of his useful life to urge the necessity of Peace with America. Hence the reader sees, — and who can wonder, that Medicme and Politics were mixed together in a young, ardent, and anxious brain, hr distant fi*om his suffering country !

After recovery from a slight infection caught from Thomas Paine, which disorder never rose to delirium, I was marvellously struck by the Letters of Junius ; and my rapture increased at every review of the brilliant and weighty volumes. The high and noble bearing of that writer, seemed akin to that daring spirit which impelled the Americans to declare not only resistance, but defiance, to the gigantic power of Britain, — an inspiration, we believed, like that

PttEyACe. IX

vMch emboldened joum^ David to combat and prostrate Ooliah. Enough, and perhaps more than enough, has been said to show that the healing art did not engross all my thoughts.

My mind was first impressed with the belief that Lord Chatham was Jun^ius, by contemplating the high*wrought aad very singular panegyric of that nobleman in the fifty-fourth Letter of the work in question ; an impression, which time and reflection have deepened* I now and then committed my thoughts to paper, and looked forvfard to a more convenient season for enlarging and arranging a premeditated publication, not confined to the valorous !Ejught in armour of polished steel and closed beaver, but extended to other men without a visor. But that time came i¥>t till old age> with its dilatory concomitants, crept insensibly u]K>n me ; admonitory to others not to put off a literary task to that late period, when loitering hours are wasted in rumination, rather than spent in acquisition.

I was called in 1783, by the authorities of the state of Massachusetts, and of the University in this place, to commence a seccmd Medical School. The only one then existing in America was at Philadelphia. My duties in the complicated department of the Theory and Practice of Physic in a great measure shut out politics. I performed those duties during thirty years; seventeen years of that time I was pleasantiy employed in rearing the hitherto neglected science of Natubal Histobt amongst us. I labored Jtfineralogy and Botany, Of the first a word had never been uttered publicly, fi'om teacher to pupil, in this country ; of Botany almost as little. I therefore selected and broke up the ground, and sowed the seed, and left the easier task of b

X PREFACE.

smoothing it to those who came after me with their nomenclatures and systematical arrangements. The botanical branch grew and flourished like Naboth's vineyard, and shared the same fate, from the like cause.* As to Mineralo' gffy being even more simple than Botany, it increased surprisingly in various parts of the Northemi Middle, and Westem States, so as greatly to outstrip the knowledge of its first promulgator in this region. His original intention was merely to suggest to his countrymen to be no longer indebted to Europe and other regions for riches which Providence had bountifully laid under their feet. The instruction in these two branches of natural science was a volunteer service without any aid from the University, or the Government

These things occupied my mind intently, and almost engrossed it, when a sudden and unexpected task seemed, if I may speak so, thrown down before me. When m England^ I had never seen Dr. Jenner, nor heard his name. In the year 1799, he, through Dr, LetUom^ communicated to me the discovery of the prophylactic power of Vaccination with the means of practising it. The prospect of the vast importance, not only to my country, but to mankind, of this discovery, so filled my mind, that I put every other consideration under my feet, and gave myself up to the cultivation and diffusion of a practice, destined to withdraw another evil from the condition of man. I willingly sacrificed my private business to this great work. For seven years I defended this salutiferous practice, in its disputed march through a host of enemies, till it attamed a triumph so com-

* See the Botanist, in one volume, printed in 18f i, dedicated to President Adams.

PREFACK. XI

plete, that throughout the six New England States, it is rare, trery rare, indeed, at this dme, to meet an American wearing in his face the marks of small pox.

Towards the close of the thirty years of my connexion with the Uniyersity of Cambri(^e, the evil times arrived, when those unruly passions rose, from which come wars and fightings, hard words, jealousies, and fears ; in which, let a man say what be would, write what he would, or be silent, he was sure not to please more than one half of the community. The consequence of this state of things constrained me to dissolve my connexion with the University in 1812.

The President of the United States saw this disagreeable condition of things, and following the example of his predecessor, Jefferson, gave me the Medical Superintendency of the nine military posts of the United States in New England, with as much indulgence as his duty to the public would admit. I held this pleasant station from 1813 to 1820 ; and firom that period have withdrawn myself from every professional concern, save epistolary consultations and extraordinary cases. From that time and not before, I found leisure to vrrite ^' Concerning Junius and his Letters '' ; and to read all I could find that had been written by others. The result has been the book in your hand. Not that this engrossed my mind entirely. I found time and inclination for making a sketch, too long neglected, of the life and character of the great and early file-leader of our revolution. I also attempted to wipe off some of the aspersions cast upon the greatest man of our age, who died in the fiiU belief ih^t posterity would do his character justice. In the estimation of characters, space operates like time.

3L11 PREFACE.

I was convinced that people looked too low for the author of JuNius-^among the weeds and shrubbery, instead of the oaks and elms of Old England, or else I magnified the production beyond reason. I compared its style and diction with the prose writings of Milton, with Swift, with the precise Gibbon and Johnson, and with the luxuriant Burke, and thought I discovered something in Junius superior to any of them, — a personal ardor, a feeling, a deep experience, a selfconviction, a patriotic enthusiasm, and a martyr-like devotion in risking discovery, and all sublimed by a fire better regulated than that of Dante or Milton. I could find nothing that amalgamated with the best Letters of Junius but the best Speeches of Lord Chatham.

Furthermore; to whom can be applied the motto of " Stat " [magn%\ " Nominis Umbra," omitting through modesty the magni^ but to the Earl of Chatham ?

Among the disadvantages of situation in writing such a book as this, is the liability to err in compellation, from the changeableness of names and titles of members of Parliament of both Houses. Even in relation to this country, now void of titles, British senators, historians, and pamphleteers frequently mistake one man of the same surname for another. A fact of this sort that might be determined m. a few minutes in London, has cost weeks of inquiry here, and ended in uncertainty.

Moreover, an apprehension exists, lest in a long course of years, I may have made extracts on small pieces of paper, backs of letters, and the like, and in the lapse of time and wane of memory, have forgotten whether they were my own thoughts or those of others ; and this is more likely to have occurred at a recent date, than at a remote one ; for reminis-

PREFACE. XUl

cence is, I find, more faithful to facts of half a century ago, than to those of the current year. But this error cannot have occurred very often.

As to the curious popular question — ^Whether the terrific man in the mask was the great Lord Chatham, I have nothing farther to urge here. In stating a connected series of fects, I have laid no traps for the understandmg ol the reader, but left him to judge for himself — ^to remark, as he proceeds, how the parts cohere with the subject, and where contrarieties appear to lie across, threatening the harmony of our hypothesis.

If I have been too often silent in regard to authorities, I would remind the reader that the physician is more in the way of knowing the whole interior of habitations, domestic characters, and sentiments, than any other class of gentlemen whatevOT.* Dr. Fothergill practised forty years at the court end of London, was Physician to many of the nobility, and most of its old families, and occasionally was consulted by the first rank in the kingdom. His prudence and delicacy were equal to his wisdom ; yet it would be difficult for an a&ble man to conceal entirely his opinion of characters occupying different ranks in authority, £rom one who prudently sought information. Nearly every night, during three years, I, with my transcript Liectures and common-place book, sat at the same table with that industrious philanthropist, from eight * o'clock to eleven, both of us exercising our pens in our own way. Had I possessed any of the BosweUian ambition, I had

* See the correspondence of Lord and Lady Chatham with Dr. *Addington, their family Phynciariy and Sir James Wright, relative to Lord Bute, p. 367 of this volume.

XIV PREFACE.

the best opportunity of compiling a Fothergillianay which might well wear for its motto that on the Fothergittian Med-- al-^" FoTHERGiLLius. Medicus. Amicus. Homo."

Besides the heads of the noble Houses of Northumberland and Portland^ the Doctor appeared to be most acquainted with the Marquis of Rockingham, and Lords Camden and SheUmme. J never knew that he ever spoke with Lord Chat* HAM or North. He frequently expressed his great pleasure in repeated conversations with Itord Mansfield, who was now and then his patient, as was Lord Chancellor Thurlow, He, more than once, to my certain knowledge, made written communications to Lord North respecting the real state of things in America, during the war ; and received, after a week or ten days' delay, very respectful answers ; but not admitting, to the full, the correctness of all the information^ till the conduct of France proclaimed its truth to all the world 1

Wisdom can draw, even from such a book as this, lessons moral and political. The reader of it has seen Retribution's refluent wave passing over certain individuals, and a whole nation. He has seen that God's ways are not like man's ways, — ^that He makes use of the smallest means and causes to operate the greatest and most powerful elSects. ^^ In His hands, a pepper-corn is the foundation of the power, glory, and riches of India. He makes an Acorn, and by it communicates power and riches to a nation." *

CAMBRIDGE, NEW ENGLAND, 1830.

« Bruce on the Source of the Nile.

Chapter I

The first Impression made by Junius's Letters in Old England, and in New. — ^The first Question, Who is Junius ? — Suspicion fell on the Right Hon. Eklmumd Burke. — ^Arguments against that Supposition. — ^An Episode 75

Chapter II

Lnposaible that Jonius could have been the sole Depositary of his own Secret — ^Must have been past the Noon of Life.^— A Nobleman, rich, and powerful^ — ^His Writings marked by Peculiarity of Style. — Their Tendency always Patriotic, and exclusively English^— His Letter to Lord Cambden diferent from all the Rest 97

Chapter IX

Stratagems and Subterfuges of Politicians. Junins's Co-operation with the Whig-Party. Chatham never countenanced American Independency. This always maintained by Samuel Adams in Massachusetts, and by Stephen Hopkins in Rhode Island. Sketch of the Character of Samuel Adams. Independency never lost Sight of in Massachusetts. Conceded by the Author — Confirmed by Chalmers. Miscellaneous Observations . . . 235

CHAPTER XIII. Character and Policy of George the Third 384

General Washington's Resignation of hia Commission .... 444 Address of the President of Congress to Washington on his

Resignation 444

Introductory Audience of the first Minister from the United

States to George the Third 445

CoNCLUSioir 449

ERRATA.

PRELIMINARY VIEW.

Much has been said in America, and more in Britain, on this celebrated question, — Who was the author of those famous Letters which appeared in the early part of the reign of King George the Third, under the signature q/" Junius ?

These Letters were intended, it seems, for the English nation generally, but addressed, most of them, nominally, to certain individuals of the highest rank in it. They were of a character to attract great attention in that country and in this, by their facts, their boldness, and their splendid diction. They first appeared in a London Newspaper, entitled " The Public Mvertiser,*^ printed by Henry Sampson Woodfally a man well educated, complete in his business, and of discreet, steady, and respectable character in his profession. They came forth about nine years after the accession of a young King, who could, and did boast that he was a native Englishmanj* and at a critical period, and under circumstances which gave them great interest and effect. By his motto — Stat fwminis umbra^j the writer stipulates, with the. reader,

* The King's first speech to Parliament

t *' Stat magni nominis umhra,^ Lucan ; He stands (he shadow of a mighty name ; or, paraphrastically, He exhibits a faint image of kis Jbrmer gretdnus.

concealment To understand his design clearly, it may be needful to give the American reader a general view of the affairs and condition of things in the reign preceding; that he may see the cause and effect of that change, which has made the history of George the Third so remarkable. in that country and in this ; and which forms that link in the chain of our history, which connects the old world with the new. In the course of our discussion, Junius may appear a primary, or a secondary object ; for the mere solution of a puzzling question is hardly worth the labor we shall probably bestow upon it.

It appears from the best moral and political writers of the day, that in the latter years of the long protracted reign of George the Second, the English nation, and particularly London, had gradually slid down into an idle, vain, luxurious, and selfish effeminacy ; not so much from absolutely bad traits in the character of the King or his Queen, as from a degeneracy of manners and principles, bred and fostered, as some would fain make us believe, by the celebrated prime minister of King George the First and the Second ; which has rendered, according to the parties to whom you listen, the name of Sir Robert tValpole notorious, or honorably famous.

Who but He who made the human heart, and gave the secret bias of the soul, shall pronounce the character and true motives of Kings? We shall draw upon writers of the first reputation, and speak according to our best judgment, being all along aware of our liability to error.

PREUMINART VIEW. 3

George the Second^ by birth and education a German, was, it appears, on the whole, a good man, just, honorable, and brave ; but poorly fitted, by nature and education, to be King of Britain, in which Island he was always, in a manner, a stranger. Being past thirty years of age when the Hanover succession took place, his native electorate was nearer his heart than Great Britain, and this natural partiahty affected too many of his measures, and often hung a heavy weight on the machinery of his government. He ever aimed at doing right, but was less acquainted with the English constitution, laws, politics, and pecuhar character, than with the policy and intrigues of the leading powers on the continent, constituting the science of the balance of power. He said to his favorite, the Earl of JVcUdegrave — « You are a very extraordinary people, continually talking of your constitution, laws, and liberty; — ^you pass near an hundred laws every session, which seem made for no other purpose but to afford the pleasure of breaking them." The same nobleman says, that << the King had a good understanding, though not of the first class, and a clear insight into men and things, within a certain compassJ^ The celebrated Lord Chesterfield, known, slightly, in this country, by his Letters to his son, tells us, " that George the First was a dull German gentleman, who neither understood nor concerned himself about the interest of England, but was well acquainted with the interest of Hanover ; and that his son, George the Second,

was all that, leaving out the word gentlematu^^ *

* Chest^field was Secretary of State to George the Second,

According to Mr. Glover, a member of Parliament, and a distinguished literary character,* " George the Second was a weak, narrow-minded, sordid, and unfeeling master, who, seated by fortune on a throne, was calculated by nature for a pawn-broker's shop." Lord Waldegrave, who was bound by the ties of gratitude to that monarch, acknowledges that too great attention to money was his capital failing — that, however, " he was always just, and sometimes charitable, though seldom generous." Mr. Belsham, a very respectable and rational whig writer of a History of Great Britain, says of George the Second, "that equally a stranger to learning and the [arts, he saw the rapid increase of both under his reign, without contributing, in the remotest degree, to accelerate that progression by any mode of encouragement, or even bestowing, probably, a single thought on the means of their advancement, — that, inheriting all the political prejudices of his father, he was never able to extend his views beyond the adjustment of the Germanic balance of powers ; and with unsuspicious satisfaction in that system, into which he had been early initiated, he never rose even to the conception of that simple^ dignified, and impartial conduct, which it is equally the honor and interest of Great Britain to maintain in all the complicated contests of the continental states."

Belsham's, we think, is the most impartial character of the old Hanoverian King of England ; yet some doubts hover over my mind, as to the exact likeness

* Author of a popular drama, entitled Ltonidaa.

of the picture. A Gennan military education of a Prince has a direct tendency to make him an unfeeling despot. It greatly injured our favorite, the Duke of Kent. The High-German character is at a greater distance from the English than that of the Low- Dutch. It is evident that the second George had wisdom enough to perceive, that his German military education disqualified him from governing properly so peculiar a people as the British really are. He therefore, after several mortifying occurrences and disappointments, allowed his minister. Sir Robert Walpokj to hire his officers and his Parliament to be good, as he had not either the power to compel, or the address to manage them himself. To bribe men or children without corrupting them is a very difficult task. Walpole, however, ventured on the experiment ; and if it did not succeed entirely to his own and the nation's wish, may we not attribute it to something else than wickedness of heart in the minister? Nevertheless, it was any thing but true wisdom, a mere temporary palliation, as it not only produced a lax and careless government, but contributed to loose and frivolous morals in the great family of England. I say England, for Scotland was still marked by her poverty, characteristic frugality, discretion, and safe morality.