and unimproved as they are. We have many of those useful prejudices in this country, which I should be very sorry to see removed. The good Protestant conviction, that the Pope is both Anti-*christ, and the Whore of Babylon, is a more effectual preservative, in this country, against popery, than all the solid and unanswerable arguments of Chillingworth.
The idle story of the Pretender's having been introduced in a warming-pan, into the queen's bed, though as destitute of all probability as of all foundation, has been much more prejudicial to the cause of Jacobitism, than all that Mr. Locke and others have written, to show the unreasonableness and absurdity of the doctrines of indefeasible hereditary right and unlimited passive obedience. And that silly, sanguine notion, which is firmly entertained here, that one Englishman can beat three Frenchmen, encourages, and has sometimes enabled one Englishman, in reality, to beat two. [Same date.]
Liberty of the Press.—Can an author with
reason complain that he is cramped and shackled
if he is not at liberty to publish blasphemy, bawdry,
or sedition? all which are equally prohibited in
the freest governments, if they are wise and well
regulated ones. This is the present general com-
