My Lord,
I have been informed of the Calumnies that Sir W. T. hath caused tobe Printed against me. I know very well that Sir W. is of greatWorth, and deserves well; and that he hath been a long time employed,and that too upon important occasions; but I am as certain, that hehad but a small share in the Secrecy of the late King Charles'sDesigns in the greatest part of the Affairs, for which he wasemployed, from 72, till 79, which is the main Subject of his Work.
This Consideration alone might not perhaps have given me thecuriosity, or at least, any great earnestness to read his Memoirs; andI might have very well judged that I could draw from them nosufficient light and insight for the discovery of so many Intrigues.
Nay besides, I might have doubted whether orno these Memoirs might not have been his ownPanegyrick upon himself, and the diminution andundervaluing of the real Worth and Glory of severalPersons of Quality, and distinguished bytheir Merit; whose Fortune and Reputation SirW. T. hath so much envied: for I am particularlyacquainted with Sir W's Pride. He looks upon[Pg 3]himself to have the greatest Reach, to be thewisest and ablest Politician of his Time; and aman may perceive abundance of Satyrical Reflexionsscattered here and there in his Work againstmost illustrious Persons, and that he hathstuffed his Memoirs with his own Praise, andthe fond over-weening Opinion he hath of himself.
Without doubt this is quite different from thatSincerity and Modesty which reigns throughoutthe Memoirs of Villeroy, in the Negotiations andTransactions of Jeanin, in the Letters of Card.Dossat, those mighty and truly eminent Persons,esteemed as such by the greatest Princes of theirAge; and even still are to this day, by the ablestPoliticians, with much more Justice and Glorythan Sir W's Book-Seller stiles him, One of theGreatest Men of this Age. It had been Sir W's dutyto have regulated himself according to theirmost excellent Pattern.
I shall at present only quote one Passage, whichI accidentally light on at the first opening his Book,whereby one may easily guess at the greatness ofhis presumption; in a short time, My Lord, I shallgive you occasion to observe many others. TheNegotiations, saith he, that I managed and transactedat the Hague, at Brussels, at Aix la Chapelle,which saved Flanders from the French Churches, in68. made People believe I had some Credit and Reputationamongst the Spaniards, as well as in Holland.
'Twas a Piece of strange Ingratitude of the Hollanders andSpaniards, as well as of his own dear Country-men, so much concern'dfor the preservation of Flanders, not to rear him a Statue, which,[Pg 4]he saith, some-where else, Mr. Godolphin had promised him. CouldSir. W. T. have done any thing to deserve it more; or was there anything more worthy of Triumph than to have preserved Flanders, aCountr