Page:The genuine remains in verse and prose of Mr. Samuel Butler (1759), volume 1.djvu/476

have it. They preserve and improve their own Interests most by complaining of that, which makes most for it, that is, the extravagant Expences of the Crown, which consequently reduce it to Wants; and the supplying of those is the only Thing that renders them considerable, though the Crown is forced to pawn all its own Jewels to them for mere Brokage and Forbearance: For they are but a kind of Scriveners that put out the Nations Money, of which they have the disposing, for all Sorts of their own Advantages, but nothing less than that of the Public. They seek all Occasions (as if they had not too many offered them) to pick Quarrels with the Government, as Hectors do with Chowses, until the Business is compounded, and then they are made Friends and reconciled for ever after, and are well paid for doing that, which in all good and wise Governments they would be punished and hanged for. This is one of the most barbarous Knaveries in the World, though but a just judgment upon those unhappy Princes, who bring themselves into a Condition to be so wretchedly baffled by their Subjects, to be forced to pay Fines to them for their Miscarriages, and the ill Management of their own