I know that you will think I had enough to do without dabbling in politics, but in all your criticisms of me and my doings you must take into consideration my education, my position, and my responsibilities. Of course, I had daily dealings with every class of politicians, and became acquainted with every shade of politics.
There is no knowing on which side I should have ranged myself—whether among the Whigs or among the Tories—had I been allowed a choice; but circumstances decided for me, and made me, and kept me for several generations, a determined Whig.
My friend Joseph Addison[1] fully realised my position, and in a pretty allegory set forth the calamity which would fall upon me should I by chance favour the Tories.
It is very elegantly written, and, as it is not long, I will relate it to you.
You will see that he speaks of me as a queen—by name “Public Credit.”
“I saw Public Credit on her throne in Grocers’ Hall, the Great Charter overhead, the Act of Settlement full in her view. Her touch turned everything to gold.
“Behind her seat bags filled with coin were piled up to the ceiling. On her right and on her left the floor was hidden by pyramids of guineas.
“On a sudden the door flies open, the Pretender rushes in, a sponge in one hand, in the other a sword, which he shakes at the Act of Settlement.
“The beautiful queen sinks down fainting; the spell by which she has turned all things around her into treasure is broken; the money-bags shrink like pricked bladders; the piles of gold pieces are turned into bundles of rags, or faggots of wooden tallies.”[2]
The truth which this picture was meant to convey was never absent from my mind or from my governors’.