With equal good humour and skill in leaving open a double
interpretation, he commented on the fact that the new Parliament did
not, as had been customary, give a formal vote of thanks to Marlborough
for his conduct of his last campaign.

"We have had a mighty pother here in print about rewarding
of generals. Some think great men too much rewarded,
and some think them too little rewarded. The case
is so nice, neither side will bear me to speak my mind; but
I am persuaded of this, that there is no general has or ever
will merit great things of us, but he has received and will
receive all the grateful acknowledgments he OUGHT to expect."

But his readers would complain that he had not defined the word "ought."
That, he said, with audacious pleasantry, he left to them. And while
they were on the subject of mismanagement, he would give them a word of
advice which he had often given them before. "While you bite and devour
one another, you are all mismanagers. Put an end to your factions, your
tumults, your rabbles, or you will not be able to make war upon
anybody." Previously, however, his way of making peace at home was to
denounce the High-fliers. He was still pursuing the same object, though
by a different course, now that the leaders of the High-fliers were in
office, when he declared that "those Whigs who say that the new Ministry
is entirely composed of Tories and High-fliers are fool-Whigs." The
remark was no doubt perfectly true, but yet if Defoe had been thoroughly
consistent he ought at least, instead of supporting the Ministry on
account of the small moderate element it contained, to have urged its
purification from dangerous ingredients.

This, however, it must be admitted, he also did, though indirectly and