of a strong chest your lordship’s writings under a heap of others that treat of liberty, and spread over a layer or two of Hobbes, Filmer, Bodin[22] and many more authors of that stamp, to be readiest at hand whenever I shall be disposed to take up a new set of principles in government.  In the mean time I design quietly to look to my shop, and keep as far out of your lordship’s influence as possible; and if you ever see any more of my writings upon this subject, I promise you shall find them as innocent, as insipid and without a sting as what I have now offered you.  But if your lordship will please to give me an easy lease of some part of your estate in Yorkshire,[23] thither will I carry my chest and turning it upside down, resume my political reading where I left it off; feed on plain homely fare, and live and die a free honest English farmer:  But not without regret for leaving my countrymen under the dread of the brazen talons of Mr. Wood:  My most loyal and innocent countrymen, to whom I owe so much for their good opinion of me, and of my poor endeavours to serve them,

I am
  with the greatest respect,
           My Lord
    Your Lordship’s most obedient
              and most humble servant,
                                     M.B.

From my shop
in St. Francis-Street,
Dec. 14.
1724.

[Footnote 22:  Sir Robert Filmer, the political writer who suffered for his adhesion to the cause of Charles I. His chief work was published after his death in 1680.  It is entitled, “Patriarcha,” and defends the patriarchal theory of government against the social-compact theory of Hobbes.  Locke vigorously attacked it in his “Two Treatises on Government” published in 1690.

Jean Bodin, who died in 1596, wrote the “Livres de la Republique,” a remarkable collection of information and speculation on the theoretical basis of political government. [T.S.]]

[Footnote 23:  Molesworth’s estate in Yorkshire was at Edlington, near Tickhill. [T.S.]]

LETTER VII.

AN HUMBLE ADDRESS TO BOTH HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT.

BY M.B.  DRAPIER.

“Multa gemens ignominiam Plagasque superbi Victoris.—­”

[VIRGIL, Georg.  III., 226-7.]

NOTE.

This letter was published in the fourth volume of the collected edition of Swift’s Works, issued by Faulkner, in Dublin, in 1735.  It is there stated that it was written “before the Lord Carteret came over, and soon after the fourth Drapier’s letter.”  If Faulkner be correct, and he probably is, the subject matter of the letter shows that it was not to be printed until after the agitation had subsided.  The letter is in an entirely different spirit from the other letters, and deals with suggestions and methods of action for a general righting of the wrongs under which Ireland was suffering.  In matter as well as in manner it is not a continuation of the contest against Wood, but an effort to send the people along paths which would lead to their general welfare and prosperity.  As such it properly concludes the Drapier series.