The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• To William Hippisley, Esq;
• To the Public.
• A Collection of Tracts.
• Trenchard: an Argument, Shewing That a Standing Army Is Inconsistent With a Free Government, and Absolutely Destructive to the Constitution of the English Monarchy. An. 1697.
• Trenchard: the Second Part of an Argument, Shewing, That a Standing Army Is Inconsistent With a Free Government, and Absolutely Destructive to the Constitution of the English Monarchy. With Remarks On the Late Published List of King Jame S’s Irish
• Trenchard: a Letter From the Author of the Argument Against a Standing Army, to the Author of the Ballancing Letter.
• Trenchard: a Short History of Standing Armies In England. Anno 1698.
• Trenchard: the Thoughts of a Member of the Lower House, In Relation to a Project For Restraining and Limitting the Power of the Crown In the Future Creation of Peers. Anno 1719.
• Trenchard: Some Reflections Upon a Pamphlet, Called, the Old Whig. Anno 1719.
• Gordon: a Modest Aplogy For Parson Alberoni, Governor to King Philip, a Minor, and Universal Curate of the Whole Spanish Monarchy; the Whole Being a Short, But Unanswerable Defence of Priestcraft, and a New Confutation of the Bishop of Bangor.
• Gordon: an Apology For the Danger of the Church, Proving, That the Church Is, and Ought to Be Always In Danger; and That It Would Be Dangerous For Her to Be Out of Danger. Being a Second Part of the Apology For Parson Alberoni. Anno 1719.
• Gordon: a Dedication to a Great Man, Concerning Dedications: Discovering Amongst Other Wonderful Secrets, What Will Be the Present Posture of Affairs a Thousands Years Hence.
• Gordon: a Letter to the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury; Proving, That His Grace Cannot Be the Author of the Letter to an Eminent Presbyterian Clergyman In Swisserland, In Which the Present State of Religion, In England, Is Blackened and Exposed, and
• Gordon: a True Account of a Revelation Lately Discovered to Jeremiah Van Husen, a German Physician. As Be Deliver’d It On Oath Before John Shephered, Esq; One of His Majesty’s Justices of the Peace; Foretelling Many Strange Events; Particularly, the
• Trenchard: a Comparison Between the Proposals of the Bank and the South-sea Company, Wherein Is Shewn, That the Proposals of the First Are Much More Advantageous to the Publick, Than Those of the Latter; If They Do Not Offer Such Terms to the Annuita
• Trenchard: Some Considerations Upon the State of Our Publick Debts In General, and of the Civil List In Particular. Anno 1720.
• Gordon: a Learned Dissertation Upon Old Women, Male and Female, Spiritual and Temporal In All Ages; Whether In Church, State, Or Exchange- Alley. Very Seasonable to Be Read At All Times, But Especially At Particular Times. Anno 1720.
• An Essay Upon the Late Union of the Whig-chiefs.
• Gordon: Considerations Offered Upon the Approaching Peace, and Upon the Importance of Gibraltar to the British Empire, Being the Second Part of the Independant Whig. Anno 1720.
• Gordon: a Letter to a Leading Great Man, Concerning the Rights of the People to Petition, and the Reasonableness of Complying With Such Petitions. Anno 1720.
• Gordon: a Supplement to the London-journal of March 25, 1721; Being the State of the Case Relating to the Surrender of Mr. Knight, Farther Considered. Anno 1728.
• Gordon: the Character of an Independent Whig. Anno 1720.
• Gordon: a Discourse of Standing Armies; Shewing the Folly, Uselesness, and Danger of Standing Armies In Great Britain. Anno 1722.
• Gordon: the Nature and Weight of the Taxes of the Nation: Shewing That, By the Continuance of Heavy Taxes and Impositions, and the Mis-application of Publick Money, Trade Is Destroy’d, the Poor Increased; and the Miseries and Misfortunes of the Whole King
• Trenchard: the Natural History of Superstition.
• This Day Is Published,

An Essay upon the late Union of the Whig-Chiefs.

THE Reconciliation of our Two Courts is of such happy Consequence to the Nation, and the Royal Family, as must be highly pleasing to all Men who love either. Differences of this kind are nothing rare; but they generally have publick ill Consequences, and weaken the Hands, and embarrass the Wheels of Government. I thank God, the late one has produced more Coldness than Violence, and more Talk than Terror. It is to be presumed, that nothing was done on either Side during the Breach, which may occasion painful Pangs, or angry Reflections, now it is cured. I doubt not but the Union is as sincere, as I wish it lasting.

Tho’ I always looked upon the late Misunderstanding as a great Evil; yet, now it is past, I do not know whether some Good may not come of it. It will have shewn the Whigs that they are much mistaken, if upon every Fit of Spleen or Disgust, they think to meet a Resource among the Tories, who are not used to give any Quarter, much less Shelter to Men who will but part with a Piece of their Principle. He who goes over to them, must not go halting. If they have a Mind to go to Rome, or the Pretender; it is not enough that you do not oppose them, or even that you wish them a good Journey: If you do not go along with them, and accompany them to the very last Stage, you do nothing. A Vote and a Speech now and then will not serve them; they must have all your Votes, and all your Speeches, otherwise you will never be loved nor trusted

It will also have taught the Tories, that the Whigs, however divided, are still too many for them, and can subsist without sneaking Compliances, or dangerous Coalitions with them. There have been but few Instances, of late, where they have been suffered to exert that Spirit of Oppression, which is inseparable from them; and fewer, I hope, of their being offered Seats near the Helm. The Principle of a Whig, and that of a Jacobite, are so opposite and hererogeneous, that there can be no other Mixture or Comprehension between them, but that of the One’s devouring the Other. Every other Project for reconciling them, is Madness or Knavery, and there is not at present the least possible Pretence for it; which I take to be none of the least Blessings attending the present Agreement.

The Whig Interest is again united, and for ought I know, the more strongly for having been disunited. It is therefore a happy and unexceptionable Season for doing all those necessary publick-spirited Things, which are wanting for the Establishment of Whiggism, but which were prevented by the late Rupture. I hope it will now be enquir’d, whether our Universities are not the very Sinks of Sedition, and of every wicked Principle; and whether enjoying as they do, at the Nation’s Cost, Eare and Abundance, they do not pay the Nation, in return, with disaffected, slavish Doctrines, and poisoned Youth. Let the Universities remain but unpurged, and the Jacobites may sneer in our Face at every other Scheme of ours for our Security.

Princes are always respected Abroad, in proportion to their Strength at Home. It is not to be doubted but this our Domestick Unanimity will raise our foreign Credit still higher, and make the Peace with Spain, which seems to linger, go on with greater Alacrity and Ease; and it is reasonably hoped, that hereafter we shall be more upon the Square with our good Allies, both in the Administrations of War, and in the Negotiations of Peace, than our Circumstances have hitherto suffered us to be.

I therefore congratulate my Countrymen upon the present happy Pacification and Unanimity. It will make us considerable to our Friends, and formidable to our Foes. It will enable us to avow, protect, and encourage every publick Principle; and leave us without Excuse, if we disown or neglect it. It will render every Opposition impotent, and every Shift and Procrastination scandalous. It will serve to shew, whether our past Omissions and Trimmings were founded upon real Weakness, or sleeveless Pretences; and whether we wanted Power or Inclinations to bid Defiance to Craft and Corruption. Here are publick Grievances, and here is a Call and an Opportunity to redress them. Here are Enemies in our Bosom, and here is a fit Occasion and Capacity to quell and disarm them———If we are in Earnest, the Success is sure. In this Case to succeed well, is only to mean well; and nothing but selfish personal Regards, can obstruct the publick Good, which therefore, we hope, will not be obstructed at all.

We may presume, that no Man, who calls himself a Whig, will make Delay or Difficulty, to come roundly into every Scheme which will bring Advantage to his Country, and Honour to himself; we may particularly expect that no Man who bears that Character, will oppose or postpone the Scouriug of those Nests of Pedants, who sill the Kingdom with Locusts and Disloyalty; who, by their execrable Positions and Example, have dissolved all the Ties of Conscience and common Honesty; who have sanctified the hellish Sin of Perjury, and tacked Fame and Reputation to Sedition and Rebellion. They have been heaving at our Constitution, railing at Liberty Civil and Religious, and poisoning the Nation Time out of Mind: So that I cannot see how we can any longer neglect putting a Stop to this popular Contagion, without giving up the first Law of Nature, that of Self-Preservation and Self-Defence.

The Prospect I have of the Cure of this great Evil, gives me Joy, as the Continuance of it has often given me Sadness; and I amuse myself with the certain Expectation of a new and agreeable Scene. What I have said may probably appear warm Language; but it is intirely the Effect of publick Spirit, and of my own private Judgment. God knows, I have no personal Animosity towards these Men, who, as to their Morals, deserve Pity; and as to their Genius and Productions, are below Contempt: And as to their Income and Circumstances, no Body envies them their Plenty and Idleness; nor are we demanding a Reformation of Gluttony and Laziness. All that we contend for is, the taking away of their Stings; we will tolerate them to be Drones, but cannot allow them to turn our World upside down.