Letters on the Spirit of Patriotism: On the Idea of a Patriot King; and on the State of Parties, at the Accession of King George the First

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A. Millar, 1749 - 243 pages
Attributed to Viscount Bolingbroke in NUC pre-1956. To recommend himself to Frederick, prince of Wales, Bolingbroke entrusted to Alexander Pope his unpublished manuscript of three works: 'The patriot king' dated December 1738; an essay previously written upon the 'Spirit of patriotism' and afterwards addressed to Lord Lyttelton; and a paper on 'The state of parties at the accesssion of George I.' Pope's secret publication of 1500 copies of 'The patriot king' led Bolingbroke to anonymously publish a "correct edition" in 1749 edited by David Mallet. Cf. DNB and advertisement (p. v-xi)
 

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Page 133 - ... of their fall. Under him, they will not only cease to do evil, but learn to do well ; for, by rendering public virtue and real capacity the sole means of acquiring any degree of power or profit in the state, he will set the passions of their hearts on the side of liberty and good government.
Page 212 - Her successor had no virtues to set off, but he had failings and vices to conceal. He could not conceal the latter ; and, void of the former, he could not compensate for them. His failings and his vices therefore standing in full view, he passed for a weak prince and an ill man, and fell into all the contempt wherein his memory remains to this day.
Page 84 - And surely it is far better for kings themselves to have their authority thus founded on principles incontestable, and on fair deductions from them, than on the chimeras of madmen, or what has been more common, the sophisms of knaves. A human right that cannot be controverted is preferable surely to a pretended divine right, which every man must believe implicitly, as few will do, or not believe at all. But the principles we have laid down do not stop here.
Page 120 - I say remote; for in hereditary monarchies, where men are not elected, families are: and, therefore, some authors would have it believed, that when a family has been once admitted, and an hereditary right to the crown recognized in it, that right cannot be forfeited, nor that throne become vacant, as long as any heir of the family remains.
Page 49 - ELOQUENCE, that leads mankind by the ears, gives a nobler superiority than power that every dunce may use, or fraud that every knave may employ to lead them by the nose.
Page 147 - ... instead of putting himself at the head of one party in order to govern his people, he will put himself at the head of his people in order to govern, or more properly to subdue, all parties.
Page 208 - To sum up the whole and draw to a conclusion, this decency, this grace, this propriety of manners to character is so essential to princes in particular that whenever it is neglected, their virtues lose a great degree of lustre and their defects acquire much aggravation. Nay more: by neglecting this decency and this grace and for want of a sufficient regard to appearances, even their virtues may betray them into failings, their failings into vices, and their vices into habits unworthy of princes and...
Page 10 - I say, it seems to me, that the Author of nature has thought fit to mingle, from time to time, among the societies of men, a few, and but a few of those, on whom he is graciously pleased to bestow a larger proportion of the ethereal spirit, than is given in the ordinary course of his providence to the sons of men.
Page 146 - To espouse no party, but to govern like the common father of his people, is so essential to the character of a Patriot King, that he who does otherwise forfeits the title. It is the peculiar privilege and glory of this character, that princes who maintain it, and they alone, are so far from the necessity, that they are not exposed to the temptation, of governing by a party; which must always end in the government of a faction: the faction of the prince, if he has ability; the faction of his ministers,...
Page 124 - ... first. Just so, our Patriot King must be a patriot from the first. He must be such in resolution before he grows such in practice. He must fix at once the general principles and ends of all his actions, and determine that his whole conduct shall be regulated by them and directed to them. When he has done this, he will have turned, by one great effort, the bent of his mind so strongly towards the perfection of a kingly character that he will exercise with ease and, as it were, by a natural determination...

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