The New Hampshire Gazette

which the best illusions conspire to envelope in the darkest Clouds that Light which ought to enlighten and direct the Sovereign in the Administration of that Justice which he is especially charged to do his Subjects. Even in the Times of Paganism, those illustrious Emperors, who had nothing in View but to immortalize their Names among Men, were intimately persuaded that the principal Interest of a Sovereign was to make Truth come freely to him. How watchful were they, against the false Zeal of Informers, the Poison of Flatterers, and the Insinuations of Liars, dressed in the Liveries of Honesty and Sincerity! And yet they did not always escape the Traps and Snares laid for them.

Permit us Sire, on this Occasion, to cite the Confession of one of the ablest Monarchs that ever filled the Throne of the Caesars. He was indeed an Enemy to our Religion; but TRUTH ceases not to be TRUE in the Mouth of a Persecutor. Diocletian, after he had abdicated the Empire, perceiving in his Retirement part of the Faults he had been induced to commit during a Reign of twenty Years, used to Say to his Friends,

'Nothing is more difficult than to govern well. Four or Five Persons in league together deceive the Sovereign. They shew him Things in the Light that suits their own Views. The Prince immured in his Palace, cannot of himself discern the Truth: he knows nothing but what they tell him: he gives Employments to those who ought not to be about him; and he turns out the very Man whom he ought to retain: in a word, in spite of the most upright Intentions, in spite of all his Precautions, the best of Princes is betrayed and sold; he becomes the Sport and the Victim of Men who conceal the TRUTH from him.'

Your Parliament, Sire, owe you this precious Truth, so rare, so much a stranger in Palaces. They present it to you without Fear, because they know you cherish it. As often as it has made its way to you, the Homages which your Majesty paid to it have covered you with a Glory still more immortal than the Laurels which Victory has crowned you with. There is more Magnanimity in submitting to TRUTH, than in subduing the World. How criminal would your Parliament be, if at this Conjuncture they disguised it? Perhaps it never was more necessary, for the Interest of your Authority, and for the support of public Order in your Kingdom, to tell you the TRUTH without any Dissimulation. This is the Object of the most humble and most respectful Remonstrance which we have the Honour to bring to the Foot of your Throne.