P. 457. Burnet. Government was appointed for those that were to be governed, and not for the sake of governors themselves.—Swift. A true maxim and infallible.
P. 458. Burnet. It was a maxim among our lawyers, that even an Act of Parliament against Magna Charta was null of itself.—Swift. A sottish maxim.
P. 459. Burnet. For a great while I thought the accepting the limitations [proposed in the Exclusion Bill] was the wisest and best method.—Swift. It was the wisest, because it would be less opposed; and the King would consent to it; otherwise an exclusion would have done better.
P. 471. Burnet. The guards having lost thirty of their number were forced to run for it.—Swift. For what?
P. 475. Burnet. Dangerfield, a subtle and dexterous man, who ... was a false coiner, undertook now to coin a plot for the ends of the Papists.—Swift. Witty.
P. 479. Burnet. Godolphin ... had true principles of religion and virtue, and was free from all vanity, and never heaped up wealth: So that all things being laid together, he was one of the worthiest and wisest men that has been employed in our time.—Swift. All this very partial to my knowledge.
P. 483. Burnet. I laid open the cruelties of the Church of Rome in many instances that happened in Queen Mary’s reign, which were not then known: And I aggravated, though very truly, the danger of falling under the power of that religion.—Swift. A BULL!
Ibid. Burnet. Sprat had studied a polite style much: But there was little strength in it: He had the beginnings of learning laid well in him: But he has allowed himself in a course of some years in much sloth and too many liberties.—Swift. Very false.
P. 489. Burnet. Here was a justice to be done, and a service to truth, towards the saving a man’s life.... He advised with all his friends, and with my self in particular. The much greater number were of opinion that he ought to be silent.—Swift. Damned advice.
P. 496. Burnet. Jones stood upon a point of law, of the unseparableness of the prerogative from the person of the King.—Swift. A lawyer’s way of arguing, very weak.
P. 509. Burnet, speaking of the grand juries in the latter end of King Charles’s reign returning ignoramus so frequently on bills of indictment, states that:—in defence of these ignoramus juries it was said, that by the express words of their oath they were bound to make true presentments of what should appear true to them: And therefore, if they did not believe the evidence, they could not find a bill, though sworn to. A book was writ to support that, in which both law and reason were brought to confirm it: It passed as writ by Lord Essex, though I understood afterwards it was writ by Somers.—Swift. Lord Somers.