carried it on; the wifdom, diligence, and valour, manifefted in the conduct, and the glory with which it was ended, juftifies all that our author can fay in its commendation. If any doubt remains, the fubtilty of making the king of Franee defire that the Netherlands might be an acceffion to his crown; the ingenious ways taken by us to facilitate the conqueft of them; the industry of our embaffadors, in diverting the Spaniards from entering into the war till it was too late to recover the loffes fuftained; the honourable defign upon the Smyrna fleet, and our franknefs in taking the quarrel upon ourselves; together with the important figure we now make in Europe, may wholly remove it; and in confirmation of our authors's doctrine, fhew, that princes do better perform the offices that require wisdom, industry, and valour, than annual magiftrates; and do more seldom err in the choice of officers, than fenates and popular affemblies.

SECT. XXIX.

There is no assurance that the distempers of a flate shall be cured by the wisdom of a prince.

"BUT," fays our author," the virtue and wisdom "of a prince fupplies all. Though he were of a duller "understanding, by ufe and experience he muft needs

excell all." Nature, age, or fex, are, as it seems, nothing to the cafe. A child as foon as he comes to be aking, has experience; the head of a fool is filled with Vor II.

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wisdom,

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wifdom, as foon as a crown is fet upon it, and the most vitious do in a moment become virtuous. This is more ftrange than that an ass being trained to a course, should outrun the best Arabian horse: or a hare bred up in an army, become more ftrong and fierce than a lion; for fortune does not only fupply all natural defects in princes, and correct their vices, but gives them the benefit of ufe and experience, when they have none. Some reasons and examples might have been expected to prove this extraordinary propofition: but according to his laudable cuftom, he is pleased to trouble himself with neither; and thinks, that the impudence of an affertion is fufficient to make that to pafs, which is repugnant to experience and common fenfe, as may appear by the following difcourfe.

I will not infift upon terms; for though " duller un"derstanding" fignifics nothing, inasmuch as no underftanding is dull, and a man is faid to be dull only because he wants it; but prefuming he means little understanding, I fhall fo take it. This defect may poffibly be repaired in time; but to conclude it must be so, is abfurd, for no one has this ufe and experience when he begins to reign. At that time many errors may be committed to the ruin of himself or people, and many have perished even in their beginning. Edward the Fifth and Sixth of England, Francis the Second of France, and divers other kings, have died in the beginning of their youth: Charles the Ninth lived only to add the furies of youth to the follics of his childhood; and our Henry the Second, Edward the Second, Richard the Second, and Henry the Sixth, feem to have been little wifer in the last, than in the

first year of their reign or life. The prefent kings of Spain, France, and Sweden, came to the crowns they wear before the Sixth year of their age; and if they did then surpass all annual magiftrates in wifdom and valour, it was by a peculiar gift of God, which, for any thing we know, is not given to every king, and it was not use and experience that made them to excel. If it be pretended, that this experience, with the wifdom that it gives, comes in time, and by degrees, I may modeftly afk, what time is required to render a prince excellent in wifdom who is a child or a fool? And who will give fecurity that he shall live to that time, or that the kingdom fhall not be ruined in the time of his folly? I may alfo doubt how our author, who concludes, that every king, in time, muft needs become excellent in wifdom, can be reconciled to Solomon, who in preferring a wife child before an old and foolish king that will not be advifed, fhews that an old king may be a fool, and he that will not be advised is one. Some are fo naturally brutish and stupid, that neither education nor time will mend them. It is probable that Solomon took what care he could to inftruct his only fon Rehoboam; but he was certainly a fool at forty years of age, and we have no reafon to believe that he deferved a better name. feems to have been the very fool his father intended, who, though brayed in a mortar, would never leave his -folly he would not be advised, though the hand of God was against him; ten tribes revolted from him, and the city and temple was pillaged by the Egyptians. Neither experience nor afflictions could mend him, and he is

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He

called

called to this day by his own countrymen “stuititia "gentium." I might offend tender years, if I fhould alledge all the examples of princes mentioned in history, or known in our own age, who have lived and died as foolish and incorrigible as he: but no man, I presume, will be fcandalized, that the ten last kings of Meroveus's race, whom the French hiftorians call "les roys fai"neants," were fo far from excelling other men in understanding, that they lived and died more like to beafts than men. Nay the wisdom and valour of Charles Martel expired in his grandchild Charles the Great; and his pofterity grew to be fo fottish, that the French nation must have perifhed under their conduct, if the nobility and people had not rejected them, and placed the crown upon a more deferving head.

This is as much as is neceffay to be faid to the gencral propofition; for it is falfe, if it be not always true; and no conclufion can be made upon it. But I need not be fo ftrict with our author, there being no one found part in his affertion. Many children come to be kings when they have no experience, and die, or are depofed before they can gain any. Many are by nature so sottish that they can learn nothing: others falling under the power of women, or corrupt favourites and minifters, are perfuaded and feduced from the good ways to which their own natural understanding or experience might lead them; the evils drawn upon themselves, or their subjects, by the errors committed in the time of their ignorance, are often grievous, and fometimes irreparable, though they fhould be made wife by time and experience.

A perfon

A perfon of royal birth, and excellent wit, was so sensible of this as to tell me, "that the condition of kings "6 was most miserable, inasmuch as they never heard "truth till they were ruined by lyes; and then every "one was ready to tell it to them, not by way of ad"vice, but reproach, and rather to vent their own spite, "than to feek a remedy to the evils brought upon them, " and the people." Others attain to crowns when they are of full age, and have experience as men, though none as kings; and therefore are apt to commit as great mistakes as children: and, upon the whole matter, all the hiftories of the world fhew, that, inftead of this profound judgment, and incomparable wisdom, which our author generally attributes to all kings, there is no fort of men that do more frequently and intirely want it,

But though kings were always wife by nature, or made to be so by experience, it would be of little advantage to pations under them, unless their wifḍom were pure, perfect, and accompanied with clemency, magnanimity, justice, valour, and piety. Our author durft hardly have faid, that these virtues or graces are gained by experience, or annexed by God to any rank of men or families. He gives them where he pleases without distinction. We fometimes fee those upon thrones, who by God and nature seem to have been defigned for the most fordid offices; and those have been known to pass their lives in meanness and poverty, who had all the qualities that could be defired in princes. There is likewife a kind of ability to dispatch fome fort of affairs, that princes who

continue long in a throne may to a degree acquire or in