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THE ANSVt^ER TO THE AWFUL LIBEL THE SPANISH FREEHOLDER, AOAimr THE CARDINAL ALBERONI. BY DIEGOt Vpom «y righi hand rise the ffauth; they pfuth away mf fiei^ ami * ih^if raite up ojrafiuf nu th* wags of their destmetUm. JOB, CHAr. XZZ, 18. MX 4, „s»w* .■ : [y^^ m N V SARAGOSSA, September Slst, 18t4. DON ERIO^ Your letter addressed to the Lorb Chief Justice of His Imperial Majesty of Spain, containing the most opprobrious charges against a certain Cardinal intimately connected with the administration of public justice, would pass un- noticed and unanswered . as the bitter effusions of an angry and disappointed man, were I not apprehensive that the continued indulgence of such feelings might, in these dangerous times, bring upon yourself that very disgrace which you labour with impotent exertions to cast upon the character of this distinguished^ personage. As you affect to write for the ** Cardinal's good," surely I may profess to write for your's ; and at the same time admit the influence of another and more selfish motive — the pleasure which flows from the vindication of a generous and insulted fffiend. There is, as you observe, something venerable in age: and there is, too commonly, something insolent in youth. That age, learning and expe- rience, about which you write with such senti^ mental hypocricy, neither silence you into respect, |ior soften you into moderation. Every base im- • / M ^^p«^v,-- [4] putation that has been during thirty years whim- pered about by the tongue of slander; every wicked and designing charge which political envy haa raised against hiiQ ; every idle report which sprung up in malice, and was for a season propo- gated by it, till each perished in it's epiicineral course, are sought out by you with insect curi- osity, and. maliciously revivedi and as maliciously recorded in a style which bespeiA^s well of your headt and thei^efore the worse of your heart. Though generally right, it would in this case be decidedly wrong, and unworthy the venerable Judge whose indignity I feel myself, to punish the intemperate reviler with his own weapons. Instead of manufacturing charges after your own example, and artfully collecting against your private and public life ever^ malignant insinuation which may have formed the floating scandal of days that are passed and forgotten; instead of seeking every vicious contribution from fame with her thousand tongues; instead of wandering a- broad to glean from evil report every injurious forgery against your reputation; instead of con- \trasting what you have said against Alberoni, tvith what might be said and thought of you, I l^aW merely examine the letter with which you,, in ci^njunction perhaps with others, have insulted the pi^>lic, and outraged the freedom of the press, ;.ii. A.^. nn 1 judge qJ the author's moral charocter and political opinioiiij, from the internal indications of Ills own production. Let me for a moment rc- presB my indignation, which prompts me to that rctulintion which you deserve, but in which 1 ehali not indulge. With all the coolness which by the painful eiercisc of self-government, 1 can possibly command, let mc review however briefly, ihe evident extent and manifest inconsistency ^ of your infamou!;) crimination. Cardinal Alberoni I have known for upwards of thirty years. I have seen bis virtues and his talents riiiing superior to calumnies as multiplied as untrue ; and, as is always th^ case with accus* ed innocence, he has amidst all, gradually risen in esteem with his Royal Master, till honorably promoted to a high and most dignified office in a free and independent country — Cardinal Alberoni M still keeps his exalted station : you have lost your% and vent your spleen amidst the despair of ever attaining it again. >^ ^*^ *^f ^/i t/ lyr,* ^« The above fact is alone a sufficient answer to those more daring and outrageous accustftions which you so cruelly and so brutally alledge against that aged Minister of Justice — '^A Traitor! and a Judge who has immolated human victims to the molach of his own emolument.''^ These are \ 1 chnrges at once so awful and so false, Jhat I won<< der not at an attempt to conceal your name, as a mean and paltrj* and, I do hope, unavailing re- fuge from the probable consequences of detection. The Press — the liberty of which I would maintain ■ by the sacrifice of my life, and the prostitution of which, you have aided, perhaps by the sacrifice of your reputatipn — the Press is made the eiigino of your malice, which, raging to an excess i|n- . parallelled in my experience of human depravity, has not only transcended the bounds of the most vicious credulity, but even created internal evi- dence for the clearest refutation. It is necessary in the first place to ascertain ^ a moral test, and then apply it to you. Malice ever directs its acriinony against some particular object; fair and candid criticism spreads its remarks over the whole field of inquiry. Sinful resentment propels with indiscriminating fury against whatever iiccidentally provokes itj bold and patriotic* vievV^regard the whole system with its general aberrations. ' Spitefulness selects its victim; honorable indignation animates to just and general scrutiny. Wrath ^s infuriated with prejudice; truth is displayed in the impartiality of research. The one riots in excess, and is therefore ever inconsistent; the latter is an inmate of a wise and virtuous heart, and therefore blendu capacity for general inquiry with fairness of in- • duction. 4M^. ^i^» •"•^ S^ h^ w^^*mf i^l \ Having ascertained the moral test, let us next attend to the application of it. • Now the extent of your criminal allegations, is truly serious and alarming; yet the whole bitter <>^ •lesp of your invective is directed on/^ against the Cardinal Alberoni. We know from the very con' stitution of our Spanish Courts, that the venerable 1 %#4 Cardinal did not preside as an arbitrary Judge. 0gkx Jfmf^i^ Putting out of our co nsideration the implied coI.I||iiM«^*^^^ lusion of the Grand Inquest, it .is to be observed *^ 'I C that a Petty Jury selected under the right of chal-^«« ^ ^fj^ ^*^'* lenge, and solemnly impannelled in the face otc^vM^ God and man, interposed between the Prisoners and the Judge. The sentence pronounced by him, was the inevitable result of their verdict; and therefore what he did in pursuance of it, cannot possibly raise against him a heavier charge, than may upon the same principle and with as much reason be alleged against the executioner. The Judgment was grounded on the v'«^rdict ; and the verdict was rendered by an uttdissenting Jury : yet not one syllable do you address to them, who might with greater probability listen to your ani- madversion and profit by your advice, were they ''1 ■i r [8] iioi stampi with nfbiuy of iiiteiitioii. Furnished with your fertiiitv of diabolical conjecture, 1 might •v-^i IfilP^Qt^hl^ ^o (iibrij^te^omejnoloch^which the Jury paid their devotion. - But if'ypiTaJquijvihem, let the public say, op'on what principle you can condemn the Judge, without iacurriiig the charge of that inconsistency which betrays the viciousnecs of your design. Assuming the truth of yoqr charge, what epithet shall I tind sufficiently detestable for the govern- ment! Soon shall we see through the iniquity of your motive, which was something more than th^ ** Cardinal ^8 good/* The most horrid and blood<^ chilling charges against the judge who took the bribe ; and an unaccountable sileitpe abj^ut those by whom you suppose the bribe was given. You revile the one for seeking promotion by such ser. vlct J ; and you dare not, (ev«n for the decency of being consistent) afiect to disapprove the con- duct of the King, who paid, as you indirectly as- sume, the price of human Jblood! And if from trem- bling, you cowardly fellow, before executive dis- pleasure, you protest, as I know you would upon your knees, the innocence of him who gam the bribe, let the public decide how you can consis- tently condemn him whQ took it. *^ Confusion Com- eth upon the wicked.'* ■ ♦ ■ r •^^.^*'^.-^ftoie,v - CM All the Traitors whoee fate is the regretfat theme of your pathetic lucubrations, were not tried by the Cardinal Alberoni. Two other Cardinals shared with him alternately the arduouH duty. One btill lives: and not even the Freeholder with his unbridled tongue says aught against him.— The other now ** sleeps with his Fathers^*— « But your evil genius pauses not to haunt the shades which hallow the memory of departed worth. He of whom we may speak, because he is beyond the reach of censure or of praise; he from whose « heart ever flowed the milk of human kindness, and •'**^* J^^i who was never more distressed himself than when ^A- ^ duty made him the instrument for the punishment *^^A«w,^^ others ; he whose humanity even you would y/T ^ share, could your barbarous insinuations distu|^ ^' ^ff^^ his abode of peace; he against whom the blood ^^ ^^ of no man ever raised an accusation to the God^f of Heaven, and who from mercy to mankind sought not the liberation of Traitors against Spain ; he. Sir, was associated with the Cardinal Alberoni in the discharge of the very duty, which forins the subject of your bloody malediction. The late Chief Justice at the close of the Stat^ trials, claimed it as his province to pronounce sentence of death upon all the prisoners, but each Judge regarded it as his duty to (Condemn thos$. he had tried. / '^ iW [>o1 Thci'e are others obviously liable to the charge o^ being accessaries; & yet not one syllp^ble is address- ed to them. Two very distinguished counsel lent the aid of their learning to the judge, and direct- ed the force of their eloquence to the jury. And the exertions of all these were crowned with the indespensible contributions of many witnesses- witnesses not strangers to the court, or to the atten- tive spectators of the awful scene ; witnesses not* borrowed from a remoter land, but taken from tJie bosom of your Country; witnesses not loose- 5^V« \r^* \ ly relating an idle tale, but solemnly pledging their ^ Jt — etornai salvation for the truths which they told. If/ fm ' ***»/:^*^i^out witnesses, without evidence, there can be j^ rf*^*\ ^''"^o verdict, no conviction, no punishment. Tes- .^%^ i^^f%J»»^^iaouj under oath is the basis upon which the ^^ whole stands — and without the concurrent testi- mony of two witnesses, treason can be established against nO man. Alarmed at the magnitude of your accusation, and the extent to which it goes, and not a little apprehensive of a punishment, to which your conjecture is no doubt already alive, you will (as your silence sufficiently implies) freely acquit the learned counsel and the ingenuous witnesses ;— and then I again leave the public to conceive with what truth you can declare Cardi- nal Alberoni so exclusively in the wrong. In ordir to give to aa unsuspecting and credcd- ous reader the serablunce of truth, you insimi. ate that '* the jury were disposed to merfc^." If really ignorant, you ought to receive a pun- ishment commensurate with your temerity ; and if, indeed, you know better, the more unspeak- able is your malevolence. Whatever may bfe your sentiments, so long disguised and so "un- wittingly betrayed, it is, and ever may it be, ♦he glory of Spaniards that mercy is reposed in the Royal Breast. I will not here transcribe those judicial oaths which are familiar to every Spanish Freeman. By oath the \^itness dare noti.d|,^_ _ irom mistaken feelings of compassion suppress a jf^//t^^ #-/«Wt material fact : from yielding to thp untimely im- / *U ^^,^ij'v pulse of the same tenderness, the jury must not, J forgetful of their obligation, render a verdict re- pugnant to the evidence. And whoever heard, ex- cept from the mouth of a licentious democrat who i$ nearly allied to the unprincipled renegado, that a judge could suspend the obligations of his own Oath, or either countenance the jurors in assum- ing the Ro%jal Prerogative, or venture to exercise it himself. If mercy became the jury or the judge, ite- qually became the King. The obvious inference follows, that where justice loudly called for the interposition of mercy ^ the Throne denied it. Let me adopt your own words, and reflect them up* T« [ 12 ] on their mafevolent author. T^et me **hold the **glasi* *of truth before jou that you may cor4emplate your- *8elf " — that you may blush over your Rebel doc- •'•'trines, if not void of shame, and reform your mo- ral and p(^itical creed, if not too hacknied in the ways of sin. Are not you the more guilty because fresh in the exercise of your mental faculties ?** — Are not you "strong and eager to pervert justice and infringe upon our Constitution.'*" Are not you "bold and unblushing" not "to oppress the i«no- cenr but to acquit the Guilty ? Have not "the \, "scenes in Revolutionary France," glowing to your _ relish on the bloody page of history, fired your breast with the mania of exterpating," ojt* at least, abridging the "Kingly authority .?" Have they not " fallen upon your spirit," amidst some long-smothered and renegade opinions, "like the ignited spark upon the nitrous composition, which produced that curious" Rebel "paper" called the Spanish Freeholder? • ' ■ The jury were constrained to find the prisoners guilty ; and the King, as wise as he is just, consi- dered that the extension of His Royal clemency would be as dangerous for the times, as it was un- merited by the traitors. But you, forsooth, would have again let these miscreants loose upon society. You, — ^from motives best known to yourself, — ^you would have dismissed a Rebel-banditti, whiclihad '"^'^ifmmi-^-' '"■ r««**'^ LI3] • lent a willing aid to desolate our afflicted frontiei', and subjugate our struggling country. Vou would liave commissioned them infuriated with treason to wreak their vengeance on the judges, whos# fate such a writer would not avert, and could not commisseratc — upon the witnesses who deposed a- gainst them — upon the jury who convicted, and, what must be equally within the range of your con- templation, and witliin the scope of their rebelli- ous principles — upon the very King who spared them ! ! Can I be right in my conjecture of the writer ^*Tu quoque Brute!" Would you again licence a- gainst society men who brood an eternal enmitjira- gainst all that endears a Spaniard to his country ? Significant lamentation of the Spanish Freeholder over the awarded fate of convicted traitors! — men who would subvert every venerable institu- tion, and dissipate those civil and religious rights which our posterity will claim from us, and which our ancestors achieved amidst an incredible ex- penditure of treasure and of blood. It is awful to contemplate the real sentiments so clearly implied, and so unguardedly divulged. Alberoni is a Trait* orous and unjust Judge! and why? because he did not under the mask of mercy ^ induce the jury to swerve from their imperious duty equally pre- scribed by the law and required by their oath — iii'i U "¥ •'■!'Tn"(S»)iJPP)|;> C'.4J t)ecause he did not soften down to your merciful design of enabling treason to triumph ov2r loyal- ty, and renew its darkest machinations — because Tie did not prostitute his high and sacred functions to steer your rebel friends through the awful tem>«. pest of a wounded and accusing nation! — because he would not, as it were, sow the already ger- minating seeds of your favourite sedition, and hazard the moistening of Spanish territory, with the precious blood of her brave and intrepid citr izens. Alberoni! Alberoni! you rise pure and un- tainted from his foul aspersions; be of good cheer, you are honored by your friends, and revered 'by the nation. ' It is strange that you who can so readily supply the deficiencies of evil report from the abominable resource of your own corrupt suspicions, could only detect and expose two instances of judicial malfeasance, to wit, when he tried the Traitors and when he tried Yourself. Now the presump- tion in my mind, as an utter stranger to the pre- dicament which brought you into Court, is that both were equally guilty, and perhaps equally deserving of decapitation. "Your accusation (and you evidently had eflfrontery enough to prefer a greater) extends only to those two occasions ; and therefore in the absence of any farther allegation, I am at liberty to consider that my friend th<^ [ 15 i Cardinal is free from any additional imputatioi). This supposition is strengthened by the conviction of my own experience, by the patronage of the King, and by the voice of the people. During thirty years practice at the Spanish Bar, I have seen the Cardinal every year judicially engaged in the trial of causes both civil and crim- inal. Amidst the wrangling about the rights of property (rights contemptible often in amount^ and important only in principle,) I have witness^ ed habitual and constitutional patience occasion- ally overcome by the jarring of Attoripiiiies and the irregularities of an inexperienced B:tr. In the midst of his accumulated vexations, how often have I seen a Prisoner arraigned before the Court, xmd the whole aspect of the man has in an instanfc changed. A transient awe visible in a counten- ance venerable with age, soon ripens info an un- tarying solemnity; and a judicial gravity immedi- ately characterises his demeanor, deepens every tone and modifies every action. The estrays of Counsel are then noticed in a voice and with a manner which bespeak him tender of restraint. And to see him address his charge to the jury upon whose one word impends the Prisoner's fate, is Ho contemplate the human heart hushed from every tumult, soothed in every passion, and reign- y ing in that tranquil dignity imposed by a ihost awful trust. The inference is painful to me, and not very honorable to you. A man who has for thirty years in all other respects thus faithfully, actively and conscientiously dischai^ed his judicial func- tions, has a right to claim, or his friend for him, an overwhelming presumption in favour of his innocence. Human nature, as you very well know, ■ which has long paid its devotions at the shrine of licentiousness, cannot, without a power, to which I fear, you are as yet a stranger, drink in the truth, renovate his principles and reform his ac- tions. Now it is very necessary, on the other hand, to acquaint you with a fact, quite out of the latitude of your experience and the moral limits of your perception. He who has for thirty years been under the salutary influence of up- right and honorable principles, and thereby ac- quired a character, the worth of which you can- not appreciate, is morally incapable of suddenly diverting his conduct from that rectitude which has become habitual, to that depravity to which he is a stranger. And in my mind the latter aber- ration, as a postulate against the Cardinal, involves an improbability ten thousand times greater than the high apparent probability of your moral tur- pitude in the very transaction which, it seems, I huH brought you under some heinous charge (the nature anil magnitude of which I cannot Batis&c- tori!)' collect from your letter) both before Alber- Divi and before the world. Indeed the questiol) propounded to the public by your own statement may be narrowed to this : — which is most entitled ' to credit, thd presumed opinion of such a judge corroborated by a verdict, that the person tried is guilty, or the suspicious vociferations of the same person convicted by a Spanish jqry, that he is Gun.TLEss ? f My reluctant pen shall not drop tlie answer, which, it is to be feared, conscience thunders to yourselC '. Viewing your letter in themost favorable light, it is a vnidication. Your character either has, or yoti apprehend that it will sufler, from some trial un- known to me, in which you were a defendant, and at which trial the Cardinal presided. On this mo- mentous occasion, being a favorite of the King, you were entrenched behind the ablest counsel the Empire could afford ; and yet upon inspecting the documents in the Grand judicial conservatory at Madrid, I find recorded against you the verdict Guilty. The defence which you now offer to the public (because I suppose you deemed a defence necessary) is the alleged unworthiness of the judge who tried you. Upon your own grounds, there- fore, your only chance (and a sorry chance it is) of ■v [ 18 1 rctrit'vlng wlmi you seoni iiiclirectly to acknou- ledge you Imve lost, vnrios invnrHely witli tlio char- acter of the judge. It is strange, by (lie I yc, you did not borrow from your counsel what he could spare out of his superabundance, instead of tak- ing from another who, according to your statement, has none to spare. To asperse, however, the jud- ge's reputation, is the means by which you would repair your own. But should it already appear from what has, and more certainly from what shall be deduced from your own letter, (b«?ing the only cfaluiffniation in the world against him) that the Good Name of Alberoni is wholly impregnable to your attack, — away then goes, and justly too, the sinking character of a worthless man who would have rescued himself from moral and political an- nihilation, by the wreck of another. Let me sum up the matter for you, lest you should feel too much bewildered to do it for your- self. The King gave no bribe, and therefore Al- beroni could not receive it ; the witnesses related the truth, and the jury gave their verdict on it. — Upon this verdict the judge pronounced the sen- tence and directed the execution of it. And yet for this faithful discharge of a duty indisputably re- quired from him by law^, you charge him with the crime of "immolating Human victims ! ! " Now what opinion can such a writer entertain of treason 4 ['9] against Spain? PorlmpH flic conce»Hion I have occasionally in iU'iti letter laade for you, you will he constrained ere long to avow for youruelf with untimely penitence^ when Hhivering before the King in Council under your favourite 41th of the late King. Let me next expose yoiy inconsistency. You abuse my friend the Cardinal for the part he acted in his judicial character at the State tri- als mentioned in your letter; and turning from it with insufferable disgust, I imagined that you had passed over in silence all others who t<|pk a part in that memorable transaction. Not so however ; for a more glaring inconsistency was never wit- nessed than is conspicuous in your disgraceful pro- duction. The present King's counsel for conducting crim- inal prosecutions was then in office, and accord- ing to public report, discharged his duty with great ability and transcendant eloquence. He ne- cessarily preferred the charge, framed the indict- ment, marshalled the witnesses, elicited the testi- mony, expounded his views of the law, and pre- sented to the jury the cogency of the proof, and the enormity of the crime. He, then, who (again to assume it for argument's sake) conspired with the Cardinal to condemn and immolate human vic «» \ ■^h- . 1 • ^ [ 20 ] time agairiHt the ini()reculionH of mcrrj, inunt im involved in every incapacity prcrHumed against his co&djutor. Mark your inconsistency. This very gentleman you designate in your libel an honortAle man. He was selected by you and others as an ambassador upon the very mission, for which the Ju^ge was unworthy. To superintend in an all important embassy the national interests of Spain, an ac- knowledged aciMsary to the immolation of human victims, was by your exertions substituted for his principaL Now 1 leave tp your choice the only alternative, either to admit that your charges are equally true against both, or that they are the oiispring of the foylest, and most diabolical ma- levolence. You not only contributed to appoint the base Cardi- naVs fionorabk accessary to a certain embassy ; but you have, as appears from the journal oi the Cor- tes, been a promin^pt supporter of that leadine Statesman. The duties of men vary with the stations they are appointed to fill. Elected a member of the Cortes by noble and generous Spaniards, as one of many to watch over the popular interests and the national welfare, I shall feel it my duty to impeach every minister who is a traitor, and e- •A... 12> ] very judge who » unjuBt. The very same re- sponsibility was attached to you, while, as you Htate, Allieroni patronized treason and exempli- fied judicial corruption. Have you with the op- portu[iitios afibrdcd by twelve years' active in- terference in public life, brought the supposed traitor to trial, or thr unjust Judge to the test of* inquiry ? N^* ! you are equally a contributer to the letter I answer, and hitherto, a voter of a Halary to the very nobleman you accuse. Dis- regarding the rights of the people, the safety of their property, and, what you equally allege, the safety of their lives, you have allovfed him (ac- cording to your own statement) to pursue a course of administering injustice, and immolating human victims; and yet in your recorded, and they say, cxpost facto speeches, there is nothing but the excellency of our laws, the merits of the adminis- tration, the purity ofthe judicary, and the imper- ative duty of voting ample ways and means to maintain what you now dare to pronounce treason and corruption. I will put you to the test. Come during the ap- proaching session to the Bar ofthe Cortes, and discharge a duty Mere, which you corruptedly ne- glected when a member of it. Disclose only a inhadow of well grounded charge, and the assem- bly will promote the very inquiry, which, confessing /' .- 1 . ' i [22] your political sins, you so long and so corruptly suppressed. Upon further inspecting the journal of the Cortes I was by no means surprised to find that you voted to the Cardinal the very sum, the misapplication of which is now the subject of your complaint ; a sum which was granted for many years' unre- warded services of an importance to the public weal exceeding the belief of any person unac- quainted with the nature and extent of them ; ser- vices therefore rewarded by a vote of the Cortes nemine contradicente. The "King's Peculuim" is also the child of your own politics. Circumstances, however, have changed; and stript of one character, you assume another, held as odious and detestable by all men, an injormer. Supposing you to have "been a confi- dant of the various administrations, they must have been characterised by unusual purity; for you seem to disgorge from the fancied plenitude of your information, every political peccadillo which you can remember, even though you yourself are directly or indirectly a party to it; just as felons often turn King's evidence. What is uppermost in the mind, an artful man ^closes last, that the motive Vi^hich really agitatee his unc Th loo ed ing •.•■....dAinlBnaDIUieMmftiKlK is^iitfci _ ,_ ser- [ 23 ] his reviling temper may seem bjr chance to flow undesignedly from the purity of his , indignation. Therefore at the close of your abusive letter I look for the cause which has so cruelly envenom- ed your pen ; and there I see you smart, accord- ing to your own report, under the indexible integ- rity of a Spanish Judge. Indeed! Did Alberoni resist, perhaps spurn your importunities to intrench about with power a certain Spanish magistrate, charged with misdemeanor in his public office.? Elevated on the Bench and the " mouth piece of Justice," did he for a moment lend an^ear to the Spanish Peasant against the weightier pretensions of the Spanish Freeholder ? Did h(eitj;|^en and there forget the efficient part you had acted in creating the " King's Pecuhum" out of which judicial in- tegrity was rewarded with a few envied pounds a year .'* Not strange to tell, but strange no doubt to you, that in the sanctuary of justice all pre- sumptions of rank and all distinctions of station should be utterly renounced, and the magnani- mous Judge appear to the jaundiced eye of a defendant, (over anxious, one would hope, without a cause,) to befriend the humbler citizen complain- ing against the alledged severities of the Spanish magistrate. Let me examine your letter, and show, whether A I ,'|,-*.^K^. '/■ •I [ 24 ] I infer too much, or juJge too harehl}-. In the first place you complain of what is in- famously false, that the Cardinal manifested feel- ings inimical to your interests. Being your own admission, we may assume it. I will also assmne the character of the writer as deleniated from the least suspicious source — the effusions o£. his own mind. Atid I am also at liberty, in the absence of other evidence, to assume the high character of the Cardinal as unimpeachable, othenvise than can be fairly credited from a jargon of charges pre- ferred by such a libeller. Making myself a stran- ger to the cause, I suspect the expressive anxiety of a man for. himself, who is equally solicitous for the escape of traitors. I suspect the msijesterial temperance and judicial correctness of one, who can be the author of such a letter as the one be- fore me ; and I regard the alleged displeasure of such a man as Alberoni as affording violent pre- sumption of that guilt, which is ever outrageous at detection. I may be wrong ; but you yourself shall lead mo astray. It is stated for Alberoni by you, that the "case had given rise to a good deal of talk." What! The misdoings of a magistrate against an humble and obscure individual,have attracted pub- lic attention and kindled public indignation.. I i 125] ; Sr6le&t it i& suspicious — The people and the Cai*- inal equally deceived ! Be assured, Alberoni was correct : " vox poprili, vox Dei. " Again — ^^ The Cardinal was glad it had come before the country," and why was the magistrate sorrtf if he was not ashamed of it ? How singularly the truth sometimes obtrudes itself! Throughout the whole of this suspicious paragraph, there is a general and rather obscure complaint that the '(acts (disagreeable ones 1 suppose) were submitted to the jury (who therefore ought not to have heard them) subject, it appears, to the opinion of the court above, as to the propric^ty of t^e form of action. Your accusing inquiry is, why did not the Judge, under pretence of a legal objection, at once nonsuit the Peamnt, just as he had been tion- suited by the Squire and fleeced by the Constable.^ Because the investigation was not in the Spanish magistrate's star-chamber; because it was in open day, before the assembled country, and under the management of a most learned counsel who would not by a technical objection, be arrested in the developement of, no doubt, a very interesting case; The censure is that Alberoni would not a little stretch his power to nonsuit an obscure plaintiff, daring to prosecute the very Spanish magistrate who had for years (as the people's friend) smoth- ered inquiry, and never before disclosed that the / illustribus Cardinal was a disloyal subject and an unjust Judge. This seems the burden of the song, " never did I expose Alberoni, until Alberoni exposed me." Every intelligent man very well knows that iii'hen a record is placed before tlie Judge, he i» obliged to try the cause; and if counsel insist up- on it, he is equally obliged to submit it to the jury. It is strange that a Spaniard at heart, should disapprove the law, or that a magistrate conscious c^ innocence, should shrink from the application of it From your letter I derive satisfactory evidence that the writer was present at t^ ~ trial and a party to it. There is not a paragraph which does not by some unguarded phrase indicate what you have endeavoured with unavailing artifice ia conceal under the garb of antiquity — Acquainted as you must be with all the facts, I naturally inquire into the possible cause of your silence respecting e- very thing which could present the case in if s ge- nuine aspect I am simply informed that you were tried for something done in the discharge of your majesterial duty." This 5ome/Atn^ is not unlike the XMj in algebraical sceince involving values which are possible or impossible, positive or negative, ' >.w S^ ^^ ^* It may be all your enemies have "*-3«««Pkr* ijD i ^ i .i « » ii.i j l>i .«mi ' i l .W iwii P" ' «"■ [27] wished ; it may be all your friends have feared* This something may be any thing. Conjecture is put upon the wingi and between respect for the Cardinal and charity for you. I am be- wildered amidst the intermediate possibilities between something very right and somethjing very wrong. With your reputation at stake, it was imprudent to ^depend upon any thing, or rather something so problematical. A simple narrative of the "majes- terial duty'' so faithfully discharged and of th^ chain of incidents calling for the exercise of it, would have satis^ed every restless doubt, removed evey painful suspicion and displayed the purity of your conduct (whatever it was) in a candid dis- closure of the whole transaction. But the subject is enveloped in darkness by one who, if he pleas- es, can elucidate it. The various' points which might impart a new complexion to the case, are suppressed by him who is in the full possession of them. The som£ihing brought before you as a magistrate, and the something done by you in pur- suance of it, are blended together and wrapt up in the mysterious word something. Guessing may be very suitable to your princi- ples ; but it is very repugnant to mine. I do, and I have good reason to complain of your making a / i. ?• . [28] ejBcret of every thing upon which jour friends could realize a belief instead of roving in conject- ure; every thing which could enable them to know the truth of the stigma and who deserves it. Nothing distresses me so insupportably as to be told that a friend is accused of something. What is it ? Tell me ! I do insist upon it ! is the im- portunity c^ growing suspicion. The mind is not at rest till this something is analysed. Moral che- mistry might detect some strange ingredients; and the very circumstance of not knowing what it isi heightens the curiosity to decompose and ascertain. There are for example three essential ingredients, viz, what relates to Alberoni, what relates to you, and what relates to the unhappy victim of your ma- jesterial functions. Now moral cases, like natural substances, vary not only with their component parts, but also with the relative qualities and pro- portions of them ; and it is impossible for your friends to be satisfied without an intimate acquain- tance with every circumstance composing thia compound something. It is quite unsatisfactory to be told by you about the " leaning" of the judge ; because an insulated fact may make a very different impression when combined with others. You have excited investi- gation, and you must facilitate it. You have pro- r friends [1 conject- ) to know B it. Y as to be §-. What is the im- ind ia not loral che- ents; and vhat it is, ascertain. igredients, tes to you, f your ma- ke natural component IS and pro- 5 for your e ac()uain> toslng this you about 1 insulated sion when ed investi- haye pro- [29] yoked inquiry and you must satisfy it. You have imposed upon yourself the task of developing the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Such an exposition is the obvious plan to justify yourself, if all be right, and bring the conduct of the judge to something more conclusive than the disputable test of your censorious dictum* — ' It becomes you to relate the particular^ which, evinced this judicial corruption; not to promul-^ gate a charge in a form scarcely tangible ; not ) o envelope it in the mist of conjecture ; not 1 o shroud it with "darkness visible" : not to leav e me to ruminate in doubt, or call upon you in our public tribunals to supply those deficiencies which indicate a want of candour, or a motive of prudence. It is very strange ; for, assuming all to be right, ambiguity could by possibility be prejudicial only to yourself. It opens against you that unsparing fa- culty of the busy mind, in the restless exercise of which, every doubt creates its own suspicion, and forges it's own solution : whereas the chaste and simple truth would have exhibited your ma- jesterial innocence in an unquestionable point of view. To lawyers you might then have left the discussion of the question, ought the Cardinal to have rejected the record or, receiving it, to have manifested his displeasure ? You alleire. indeed, f I ri VI If I I ..MjMby^. >!i<*n<««*;o. ^-i**^ li [30] that you seemed "obnoxious" (I suppose you mean disagreeable) Ho the judge" ; and you require me to believe that it was unmerited by you, and that this unknown fruitful "something" could dis- close against the Cardinal as much as Pandora^s box or the "Green bag" of the popular Cortes. Nevertheless I invite you to open it ; and you who know the contents need not, I hope, shrink iirom compliance. But no selection; no partial disclosures. The question recurs to the mind with trouble- some impatience ; what was the "something" for which the peasant was arraigned before your ma- jesterial self .^ Treason ! No. You would in that case "be disposed to mercy." And what was the "something" you did to him for doing this unknown "something" to somebody ? The tor- ture ! Forbid it ! Spain, my native land, ever tender of human life an4 human happiness, though numbers are inevitably sacrificed at the altar of public good ; Spain, the centre of moral feel- ing, the focus of christian excellence, the "land of Bibles", and the friend of man ; Spain, grand in the dispensation of her justice, and the theme of universal praise to the wondering world ; Spain has taught me to be. tender of human liberty even when abridging it, and, amidst a supera- bundance of manly feeling, not to tame my free- [31 5 borA countrymen in the sickening cells of tb^ humbling gaol. ^^Something*^ fills me with suspicion ; and the more so because the very man who draws so largely upon my credulity, is the prominent character in the subject of inquiry. The judge was corrupt because seemingly doubtful of your integrity ; and the verdict is "preposterous" for the same reason. "Preposterous" is another of those mysterious compound expressions, which are ever the objects of my critical research. Ask the question why .'* and neither the word nof the letter affords an answer. A verdict is com* pounded of facts, and often of a prodigious num- ber of very disagreeable ones. What are they in your case ? Is a question which it becomes me to ask, and which you, if an honest man, will not decline to answer. It is more than im- pertinence to send me a communication containing an odious and incredible charge without a solitary fact to satisfy me ; to write about something prepos- terous which you will not explain, and this merely to insult me with a libel against the Cardinal Al« beroni. It would be easy to multiply observations of the same tendency; but I shall confine myself to the brief statement of two very important facts corroborating my suspicions. It is matter of pub* I ■'I -'Vfe-^: , » j:i*- I 32 ) lie record that this unfortuimtu pcusaiit was com. mitted to the cells oi' a certain gnol for six. mentbb till he paid JC25 tine and as much more for cost and further imprisonment till both were paid. And yet before the lapse of perhaps as many days, the King, in the exercise of his royal plea- sure, without the concurrence or knowledge of those who accused^ condemned and punished him* directed his release without the payment of either. It is a matter of equal truth and equal noto- riety, that notwithstanding the most eloquent and ingenious appeal to the Jury by His Majesty's Counsel^ they continued under all the privations imposed Upon them by law, laboring to acquit th" magistrate from four o^clock of one day, till ten o'clock the following morning. Let it be some apology for the Cardinal Alberoni that he held a doubtful opinion upon the merits of a question which required from an enlightened and impartial jury that continued and patient investigation^ which terminated, according to the record, in the conviction of the very man, who, in the seeming bitterness of detected cruelty, would unblushingly impeach his judge of crimes nearly allied to those 80 far established against himself. Recrimina- tion, at all events, implies mutual guilt: and as you offer your letter as evidence against the Car^ ■■i i6 com. for €08t re paid, iti many ral plea- ledge of bed bimt )f either. ual Doto- ^uent and Majeiiy's privations to acquit J day, till it be some be beld a at question impartial estigation^ ord, in tbe iC seeming blushingly ed to tbose Recrimina- It: and as 9t the Car- 4tru)l, if^Ij I may adduce the Verdict a« pttinA facie evidence of magisterial obliquities. Obligmtiei! and shall I Uom that delicacy which might become me upon any other occasion, affect to credit, or forbe/ur to doubt that you as an infe- rior minister of Justice who can conspire to throw abroad the most frightful and execrable charges against its chief distributor, are pure and upright? It can ill become me to assume what your own production palpably denies; for he whose head can conceive, whose judgment can approve, whose heart can sanction, or whose principles can adopt, a tissue of malicious falsehoods as impure as the sources from which Uiey were derived, is as un- worthy of being himself a judge, as he is destitute of all pretensions to be himself esteemed an hon^ #st one. I am indignant, and t will again express it. Car-' flinal Alberoni did sit in judgment over you and over certain Traitors^ whose crimes, I would hum- bly hope, were expiated at their death. Can you, into whose mind [ Would eagerly inibse the inten- gcst patriotism (for God knows I do adore my country this side idolatry) can you hold treason a doubtful crime, in J^ronouncing against which the awful senfence of the law, tho uriliappy judge ' C»n possibly deserve your strange and suspiciQ^i^ ^^4)^lM&ifa^£B| 1 [ 31 j curse ! Traitors, too, w^o cons{)'M'ed agaiifbt .**'|)Qm "whcii she stru^rgltMl with uriexnmp)f*«l conrngo and uiiprpccdoiited glory ngainst a power, before which all other nations yielded to the yoke; traitors who forsook their country, when her dangers nerved every arm, fired every Spaniard's heart, and kindled even up ithy into zeal. Piiy, Sir, (o such men from one who hy his production, has forfeited every claim to correct feeling and genuine setisihility, can (low from no noUe source; and when that sentiment unaccountably maddens into the raosi. singular revilings against the judge, and no doubt increased antipathy against the ex- ecutioner, I begin again to feel what I am wil. ling to leave to the silent province of conjecture. » Peace to their ashes ! Your unrighteousness has provoked a discussion unwelcome to the feelings^ but in no de-ree disreputable to the character of their surv iving fi'ieuds. Upon you, and perhaps up- on your^ may be visited with usurious accumula- tion, e\ cry unhappy emotion awakened by your "wanton cruelty, and which your humanity would 11 . • allay, ft is all in unison; to injure one en- m^ jou would sacrifice many friends. Ar»J tlie name of what Prince, I ask, would you daro to staiii with the crime of paying the price of lyunwi blood? It was a monarch of glorious mem^ r: \ . Ueforc [» yoke ; \en her iniiinril's I. Piiy, duction, ling and ! source J maddens ic judge, it the ex- [ am wil. Hijecture. sness has feelings* iractcr of rhaps up- iccumula- by your y would e one en- vould you le price of ous men^ [ 3r, ] ory, who entwined about bin throne every grace that couid make a King ilhistrious and his people liappy ; a monarch piouH as a christian, wise as a state.^mnn, brave as a soUlier, and ever moved by those humane and princely sentiments, which are trnnHmitted as a blessing for posterity, to Him who now sways the sceptre over a peaceful land; a patriot Ki)\' , the leader of our armies and the iiitre}iid of the victories of Spain; a BL^ ^ Nf ; Ji.DIRll,* forgetful of his wounds, « Btili M'^..>;r 'i')'»»nhant tlirough the carnage of the fielV ' . spartan spirit and with a spar- tan k uud repelling the invading thousands from our desolated shores. Illustrious Sire! Those liberties for which you fought f^nd bled and cheerfully would have died, survive the era of your glorious reign to yield a refuge to this daring libeller of Spain. Upon reviewing your letter, bow little it ap- pears that the Cardinal Alberoni deserves all you have baselv written of him. It is indeed a vain attempt, and were "you invested with the fiend- like power to over-shadow the veteran judge with a cloud of maledictions; yet 4ime would soon dispel the melancholy delusion* and transmit to a purer posterity, a character that will brighten * Sir G. Drummond. ■'.«a>g*»'»