I beg pardon for this; I hope you will be so good as to grant my request: I do it with great deference to you.

If I had the pleasure of seeing you, I would soon say something to you that would convince you I am not wrong: they are not proper for a letter as you will easily guess...." It is evident that Swift had gone so far as to consult with Faulkner on the matter of the printing of the "History," because he was present when Oxford's letter arrived, and he tells us that Swift answered the letter immediately, and made him read the answer, the purport of which was: "That although he loved his lordship's father more than he ever did any man; yet, as a human creature, he had his faults, and therefore, as an impartial writer, he could not conceal them." On the 4th of June, 1737, Swift wrote at length to Oxford a letter in which he details the circumstances and the reasons which moved him to write the History.

The letter is important, and runs as follows: "MY LORD, "I had the honour of a letter from your lordship, dated April the 7th, which I was not prepared to answer until this time.
Your lordship must needs have known, that the History you mention, of the Four last Years of the Queen's Reign, was written at Windsor, just upon finishing the peace; at which time, your father and my Lord Bolingbroke had a misunderstanding with each other, that was attended with very bad consequences.
When I came to Ireland to take this deanery (after the peace was made) I could not stay here above a fortnight, being recalled by a hundred letters to hasten back, and to use my endeavours in reconciling those ministers.

I left them the history you mention, which I finished at Windsor, to the time of the peace.
When I returned to England, I found their quarrels and coldness increased.

I laboured to reconcile them as much as I was able: I contrived to bring them to my Lord Masham's, at St.James's.