COMPARED WITH GODOLPHIN 45

observe your Honour stands so right in the people's opinion, being very confident you will so manage the weaknesses and follies of both sides as will in the issue redound to the true interest and advantage of the kingdom.

"The Duke, the Treasurer, and yourself are called the Triumvirate, and reckoned the spring of all public affairs; and that your interests and counsels are so united and linked together that they cannot be broken, nor in any danger of it during this reign." 1

It was natural that there should be this connection between Harley and Godolphin, for in many points they were strikingly alike; yet it is remarkable that men so similar in political opinion, and so little fitted in many ways to be leaders, should have been at the head of affairs throughout the reign of Queen Anne. "Both," writes Mr. Lecky, "were slow, cautious, temporising, moderate, and somewhat selfish men, tedious and insufficient in debate, and entirely without sympathy with the political and religious fanaticism of their party." For the moment, one wonders how these politicians, apparently so ordinary in character, could ever have carried on the business of the nation. But while this description sets out in negatives certain similarities of both statesmen, it omits to de

1 Harley Papers, ii. 215.

scribe those qualities which led to their attainment of power, qualities which since their time have over and over again been found to be the most valuable for success, not only in the House of Commons, but in every representative assembly in the world -patience and perseverance and good temper, tact and knowledge of business, and an intuitive insight (in Godolphin it was often humorous) into the weaknesses of men with whom they came into contact. By the admission of all his contemporaries, Harley ✓ possessed a first-rate capacity as a leader in the House of Commons, and his decline may perhaps be dated from the day when he quitted it.

CHAPTER III

HARLEY AND DE FOE

1703-1714

DE FOE IN NEWGATE-RELEASED BY HARLEY'S INTERCESSION-THE RELATIONS BETWEEN DE FOE AND HARLEY-DE FOE'S WORK HIS MISSION TO SCOTLAND HIS HOPE OF OFFICIAL EMPLOYMENT-HIS OPINION ON HARLEY'S FALL IN 1708-CONTINUES IN GODOLPHIN'S SERVICE AFTER HARLEY'S DISMISSAL HIS RETURN TO HARLEY IN 1710-PROSECUTED FOR LIBEL IN 1713-INTERCESSION OF HARLEY-THE ReviewHARLEY AND JOURNALISM.

IT was in 1703, while Harley was still Speaker, that he entered into close relations with De Foe. In December 1702, when religious passions were roused by the parliamentary controversy upon occasional conformity, De Foe had published The Shortest Way with the Dissenters. Assuming the character of a High-Flyer-as the extreme intolerant High Churchmen were called, whom above all others De Foe disliked-the writer advised the extirpation of the Nonconformists. Characterised by the realism which marks all De Foe's works, from a New Voyage round the World to Robinson Crusoe, the pamphlet was approved by many Tories. But its publication resulted in De Foe's prosecution for libelling the Church. He was convicted, and sentenced (July 1703) to imprisonment and the pillory,

and for the last three days of the month stood in Cornhill, in Cheapside, and at Temple Bar, amid a friendly crowd, who drank in pots of beer to the health of the author of the True-Born Englishman and of the spirited Hymn to the Pillory.

It was in November 17031 that, through Harley's good offices, De Foe was set at liberty. "What you propose about De Foe may be done when you will and how you will," wrote Godolphin to Harley on the 26th of September, and on the 4th of November he remarks, "I have taken care on the matter of De Foe." On the 9th comes the first of those numerous and vivid letters, full of varied facts and fresh suggestions, which for ten years De Foe was constantly writing to Harley. There was but one interruption in their course-during the period that Harley was out of office.

1 De Foe's biographers have placed his release from Newgate as having occurred about August 1704, the Review as having been begun in Newgate in February 1704, and a Collection of the Most Remarkable Casualties and Disasters which happened in the Late Dreadful Tempest both by Sea and Land as being the first of his imaginative works. The storm reached its height on 26th November, and De Foe tells (p. 25), with every appearance of truth, how on the preceding day he was nearly injured by materials from a house. The book itself is largely a compilation of accounts of the storm, many of which have the appearance of simple narratives of facts. This publication, taken in connection with the letters at Welbeck, is evidence of De Foe's release in 1703. That he was set at liberty in 1703 is further substantiated by letters of the 12th and presumably 16th May 1704 (Harley Papers, ii. p. 83), as to meetings with Harley, and a letter from an informer that De Foe was in Canterbury in June 1704 (p. 93), a fact quite inconsistent with his release in August 1704. The dates are plainly legible in the original letters.

RELEASE OF DE FOE

49

"As there is something surprising in your bounty to a mortified stranger, so I am more than usually at a loss in what manner to express my sense of it; but at the same time that you stoop to do good you subject yourself to a necessity of bearing the impertinence of a thankful temper.

"Of all the examples in sacred story none moves my indignation like that of the ten lepers who were healed by our Saviour. I, like that one grateful wretch, am come back to pay the tribute of thankfulness which this so unexpected goodness commands from me.

"And though I think myself bound to own you as the principal agent of this Miracle, yet, having some encouragement from you to expect more particularly to know my benefactors, I cannot but wish for that discovery, that my acknowledgments may in some measure be proportioned to the quality of the persons, and the value of the favour.

"It remains for me to conclude my present application with this humble petition, that if possible I may by some means or other know what I am capable of doing, that my benefactors, whoever they are, may not be ashamed of their bounty as misapplied. Not that I expect to be able to merit so much goodness; but as a grateful temper is always uneasy to be loaded with benefits, so the virtue which I call gratitude has always so