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Digital Paxton: Digital Collection, Critical Edition, and Teaching Platform

A Humble Attempt at Scurrility - 27

Country, especially at this Crisis; and no Man, if he had really the Good of his Country at Heart, would be ashamed or afraid to support them publickly. But how scandalous is the Part the Pr—ry Faction have acted on the Occasion! They even make the very Equity of the Proposal a Reason for not agreeing to it; “for (say they) that would be securing Mr. H—s HALF A CHANCE of a favourable Decree”!— Now can these Men expect to be deem’d Gentlemen, or as having the least Tincture of Honour, who will engage in a Cause they think so very bad, that they cannot trust it to impartial Persons, because there will then be half a Chance that it is not decided in their Favour? Nothing less, it seems, will satisfy them than does their Master, the Pr—r, who will not submit any Cause of his to Judges here, unless he can command the Determination of a Majority.— Mr. H—s had not any Objection to refer the Matter to Persons chosen in Quilsylvania, but he imagined that it would be deemed fairest to leave it to those who might be supposed to be entirely disinterested, and unbiassed by Party. If, however, the Protesters are willing to leave it to Gentlemen of their own Province, mutually chosen, I dare say, he has not the least Objection, notwithstanding they say, “Five Sixths of the People of this Province who have seen the Answer to the Remarks seem already to have decided in its Favour.”

THAT Word seem is indeed cautiously chosen, but it cannot with Truth be applied to any but P—ry Minions; “five Sixths” of whom, it must be confessed do seem, and only seem, to “decide in its Favour”— because they dare not do otherwise: But even among them there is not a single Man to be found who thinks so favourably of it, as to show himself openly in its Behalf. As to other Readers of the Answer in this Province, there is not even one in Five hundred but what are so far from seeming to approve, that they publickly express their Abhorrence of it and its Authors, and think they ought, if possible, to be dragg’d into Light, and exposed to publick Scorn.

Contents of this annotation:

In reply to an attack on Benjamin Franklin by John Hughes. Attributed to Isaac Hunt in the Dictionary of American biography. Ascribed to the press of Anthony Armbruster by Evans. "Prologue to the coffee-house politician, or The justice caught in his own trap."--p. vii-viii. "Thirteen descriptions of the great A. drawn from the life by that celebrated master D---d J--s D-ve, poet laureat to the Pr---ry Party."--p. 38-42. Signatures: [A]? B-E? F_ (F2 verso blank). "Errata."--p. [43].