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turns things juft upfide down, and expofes a Prince to his people's mercy. It did yet worse in him, for it forc'd him alfo to depend on his great neighbour of France, who play'd the Brother with him fufficiently, in all those times of extremity; yet this profuseness of his did not so much proceed from his over-valuing those he favoured, as from his under-valuing any fums of money which he did not fee; tho' he found his error in this, but I confess a little of the latest.

HE had fo natural an averfion to all formality, that with as much wit as most Kings ever had, and with as majestick a mien, yet he could not on premeditation act the part of a King for a moment, either at Parliament or Council, either in words or gef ture; which carried him into the other extreme, more inconvenient of the two, of letting all diftinction and ceremony fall to the ground as useless and foppifh.

His temper both of Body and Mind was admirable; which made him an easy generous Lover, a civil obliging Husband, a friendly Brother, an indulgent Father, and a goodnatur'd Mafter. If he had been as follicitous about improving the faculties of his mind, as he was in the management of his bodily health,

VOL. II.

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health, tho' alas the one prov'd unable to make his life long, the other had not failed to have made it famous.

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HE was an illuftrious exception to all the common rules of Phyfiognomy; for, with a moft faturnine harfh fort of countenance, he was both of a merry and merciful dispofition; and in the laft thirty years of his life, as fortunate, as thofe of his father had been difmal and tumultuous. If his death has been by fome fufpected of being untimely, it may be imputed to his extreme healthy conftitution; which made the world as much furpriz'd at his dying before threefcore, as if nothing but an ill accident could have killed him.

I would not fay any thing on fo fad a fubject, if I did not think filence it felf would in fuch a cafe fignify too much; and therefore, as an impartial writer, I am oblig'd to obferve that the most knowing and moft deferving of all his phyficians did not only believe him poisoned, but thought himself fo too not long after, for having declared his opinion a little too boldly.

BUT here I muft needs take notice of an unusual piece of Juftice, which yet alf the world has almost unanimoufly agreed in;

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I mean, in not fufpecting his Succeffor of the leaft connivance in fo horrid a Villany; and perhaps there was never a more remarkable inftance of the wonderful power of Truth and Innocence. For 'tis next fō a miracle, that so unfortunate a Prince, in the midst of all those disadvantages he lies under, fhould be yet clear'd of this even by his greatest enemies; notwithstanding all those circumstances that use to give a suspicion, and that extreme malice which has of late attended him in all his other actions.

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A.

CHARACTER

OF THE

Earl of Arlington.

H

ENRY BENNET, a younger fon of a private gentleman, had followed

the Royal Family into exile; at whose restoration he was made firft PrivyPurse, then Secretary of State, Earl of AR

LINGTON,

LINGTON, Knight of the Garter, and at last Lord Chamberlain to King CHARLES the Second, and to his Brother King JAMES the Second afterwards. He was for fome years a kind of favourite Minifter, I mean converfant in his Mafter's pleasures, as well as intrufted with his bufinefs, notwithstanding the conftant enmity both of the Duke of YORK, and Chancellor CLARENDON, whose fuperior Power, especially in ftate-affairs, was yet unable to shake King CHARLES'S inclination to this gentleman; who therefore, at the other's banishment, remained if not sole minister, at least the principal one for fome time. He met with one thing very peculiar in his fortune, which I have scarce known happen to any man elfe: with all his advancement (which is wont to create malice, but feldom contempt) he was believed in England by moft people, a man of much lefs abilities than he really had. For this unusual fort of mistake I can only imagine two causes: Firft, his over-cautious avoiding to fpeak in Parliament, as having been more converfant in affairs abroad; tho' no body performed it better when

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