This, sir, is the detail. In one view, behold a nation overwhelmed with debt; her revenues wasted; her trade declining; the affections of her colonies alienated; the duty of the magistrate transferred to the soldiery; a gallant army, which never fought unwillingly but against their fellow-subjects, moldering away for want of the direction of a man of common abilities and spirit; and, in the last instance, the administration of justice become odious and suspected to the whole body of the people. This deplorable scene admits of but one addition—that we are governed by counsels, from which a reasonable man can expect no remedy but poison, no relief but death. If, by the immediate interposition of Providence, it were [be] possible for us to escape a crisis so full of terror and despair, posterity will not believe the history of the present times. They will either conclude that our distresses were imaginary, or that we had the good fortune to be governed by men of acknowledged integrity and wisdom. They will not believe it possible that their ancestors could have survived or recovered from so desperate a condition, while a Duke of Grafton was Prime Minister, a Lord North Chancellor of the Exchequer, a Weymouth and a Hillsborough Secretaries of State, a Granby Commander-in-chief, and a Mansfield chief criminal judge of the kingdom.
Junius.
DOCTORS NOTES:
[A] 1. Dated January 21, 1769. There is a great regularity in the structure of this letter. The first two paragraphs contain the exordium. The transition follows in the third paragraph, leading to the main proposition, which is contained in the fourth, viz., "that the existing discontent and disasters of the nation were justly chargeable on the king and ministry." The next eight paragraphs are intended to give the proof of the proposition, by reviewing the chief departments of government, and endeavoring to show the incompetency or mal-administration of the men to whom they were intrusted. A recapitulation follows in the last paragraph but one, leading to a restatement of the proposition in still broader terms. This is strengthened in the conclusion by the remark, that if the nation should escape from its desperate condition through some signal interposition of Divine Providence, posterity would not believe the history of the times, or consider it possible that England should have survived a crisis "so full of terror and despair."
[B] 2. We have here the starting point of the exordium, as it lay originally in the mind of Junius, viz., that the English nation was "insulted and abused" by the king and ministers. But this was too strong a statement to be brought out abruptly. Junius therefore went back, and prepared the way by showing in successive sentences, (1.) Why a free people obey the laws—"because they have themselves enacted them." (2.) That this obedience is ordinarily cheerful, and almost unlimited. (3.) That such obedience to the guardian of the laws naturally leads to a strong affection for his person. (4.) That this affection (as shown in their history) had often been excessive among the English, who were, in fact, peculiarly liable to a "mistaken zeal for particular persons and families." Hence they were equally liable (this is not said, but implied) to have their loyalty imposed upon; and therefore the feeling then so prevalent was well founded, that the king in his rash counsels and reckless choice of ministers, must have been taking advantage of the generous confidence of his people, and playing on the easiness of their temper. If so, they were indeed insulted and abused. The exordium, then, is a complete chain of logical deduction, and the case is fully made out, provided the popular feeling referred to was correct. And here we see where the fallacy of Junius lies, whenever he is in the wrong. It is in taking for granted one of the steps of his reasoning. He does not, in this case, even mention the feeling alluded to, in direct terms. He knew it was beating in the hearts of the people; his whole preceding train of thought was calculated to justify and inflame it, and he therefore leaps at once to the conclusion it involves, and addresses them as actually filled with resentment "to see such a temper insulted and abused." The feeling, in this instance, was to a great extent well founded, and so far his logic is complete. In other cases his assumption is a false one. He lays hold of some slander of the day, some distorted statement of facts, some maxim which is only half true, some prevailing passion or prejudice, and dexterously intermingling them with a train of thought which in every other respect is logical and just, he hurries the mind to a conclusion which seems necessarily involved in the premises. Hardly any writer has so much art and plausibility in thus misleading the mind.
[C] 3. Here is the central idea of the letter—the proposition to be proved in respect to the king and his ministers. The former part of this paragraph contains the major premise, the remainder the minor down to the last sentence, which brings out the conclusion in emphatic terms. In order to strengthen the minor, which was the most important premise, he rapidly contrasts the condition of England before and after the king ascended the throne. In doing this, he dilates on those errors of the king which led to, and which account for, so remarkable a change. Thus the conclusion is made doubly strong. This union of severe logic with the finest rhetorical skill in filling out the premises and giving them their utmost effect, furnishes an excellent model for the student in oratory.
[D] 4. In this attack on the king, there is a refined artifice, rarely if ever equaled, in leading the mind gradually forward from the slightest possible insinuation to the bitterest irony. First we have the "uniting of all parties," which is proper and desirable; next "trying all characters," which suggests decidedly a want of judgment; then "distributing the offices of state by rotation," a charge rendered plausible, at least, by the frequent changes of ministers, and involving (if true) a weakness little short of absolute fatuity. The way being thus prepared, what was first insinuated is now openly expressed in the next sentence. The word "folly" is applied to the conduct of the king of England in the face of his subjects, and the application rendered doubly severe by the gravest irony. Still, there is one relief. Allusion is made to his "unbounded goodness of heart," from which, in the preceding chain of insinuations, these errors of judgment had been deduced. The next sentence takes this away. It directly ascribes to the king, with an increased severity of ironical denial, some of the meanest passions of royalty, "a capricious partiality for new faces," a "natural love of low intrigue," "the treacherous amusement of double and triple negotiations!" It is unnecessary to remark on the admirable precision and force of the language in these expressions, and, indeed, throughout the whole passage. There had been just enough in the king's conduct, for the last seven years, to make the people suspect all this, and to weaken or destroy their affection for the crown. It was all connected with that system of favoritism introduced by Lord Bute, which the nation so much abhorred. Nothing but this would have made them endure for a moment such an attack on their monarch, and especially the absolute mockery with which Junius concludes the whole, by speaking of "the anxiety of the purest of all possible hearts for the general welfare!" His entire Letter to the king, with all the rancor ascribed to it by Burke, does not contain so much bitterness and insult as are concentrated in this single passage. While we can not but condemn its spirit, we are forced to acknowledge that there is in this and many other passages of Junius, a rhetorical skill in the evolution of thought which was never surpassed by Demosthenes.
[E] 5. The Duke of Grafton, first Lord of the Treasury. It is unnecessary to remark on the dexterity of connecting with this mention of a treasury, "sinking under its debts and expenses," the idea of its head being a gambler loaded with his own debts, and liable continually to new distresses and temptations from his love of play. The thought is wisely left here. The argument which it implies would be weakened by any attempt to expand it. Junius often reminds us of the great Athenian orator, in thus striking a single blow, and then passing on to some other subject, as he does here to the apostasy of the Duke of Grafton, his inconsistency, caprice, and irresolution.
[F] 6. Within about seven years, the king had run up a debt of £513,000 beyond the ample allowance made for his expenses on the civil list, and had just applied, at the opening of Parliament, for a grant to pay it off. The nation were indignant at such overreaching. The debt, however, was paid this session, and in a few years there was another contracted. Thus it went on, from time to time, until 1782, when £300,000 more were paid, in addition to a large sum during the interval. At this time a partial provision was made, in connection with Mr. Burke's plan of economical reform, for preventing all future encroachments of this kind on the public revenues.