To compass this, the triple bond he broke,
The pillars of the public safety shook,
And fitted Israel for a foreign yoke.—P. [222.]
The Earl of Shaftesbury is allowed to have been a principal adviser of the Dutch war in 1672; by which the triple alliance between England, Sweden, and Holland, the chef d'œuvre of Sir William Temple's negociation, by which France and Spain were forced into the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, was for ever broken. It was he who applied to Holland the famous saying, Delenda est Carthago; and who, with all his wit and eloquence, furthered a closer connection with France, to the destruction of our natural ally. But when the success of the Dutch war was inferior to the expectations of this ardent statesman, when he found himself rivalled by Clifford and others in the favour of Charles, and when he perceived that the king, to preserve his quiet, would not hesitate to sacrifice an obnoxious minister, he chose to make what some of his biographers have called a short turn; and, by going over to the popular party, to escape the odium attached to the measures he had himself recommended.
In Israel's courts ne'er sat an Abethdin
With more discerning eyes, or hands more clean;
Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress,
Swift of dispatch, and easy of access.—P. [223.]