“My Lord,
“I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your grace’s letter of the 16th instant, and I beg to inform you that the letter addressed to H. N. Coleridge, Esq. was inserted in the Standard by my authority. As I had publicly given my approbation and sanction to the establishment of the King’s College, London, last year, by his Grace the Duke of Wellington’s becoming a subscriber to it, I thought it incumbent upon me, in withdrawing my name, also publicly to state my reasons for so doing.
“I have, &c.
Winchilsea and Nottingham.”
(5.) FROM THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON TO THE EARL OF WINCHILSEA.
“London, March 19.
“My Lord,
“I have had the honour of receiving your lordship’s letter of the 18th instant. Your lordship is certainly the best judge of the mode to be adopted of withdrawing your name from the list of subscribers to the King’s College. In doing so, however, it does not appear necessary to impute to me, in no measured terms, disgraceful and criminal motives for my conduct in the part which I took in the establishment of the college. No man has a right, whether in public or in private, by speech, or in writing, or in print, to insult another, by attributing to him motives for his conduct, public or private, which disgrace or criminate him. If a gentleman commits such an act indiscreetly, in the heat of debate, or in a moment of party violence, he is always ready to make reparation to him whom he may thus have injured. I am convinced that your lordship will, upon reflection, be anxious to relieve yourself from the pain of having thus insulted a man who never injured or offended you.
I have, &c.
“Wellington.”