He wrote only the prospectus and the first article for Baker's paper, the _Universal Spectator_, and when he died, Baker contented himself with a simple intimation of the fact.
If my reading of this letter is right, it might stand as a type of the most strongly marked characteristic in Defoe's political writings.

It was a masterly and utterly unscrupulous piece of diplomacy for the attainment of a just and benevolent end.

This may appear strange after what I have said about Defoe's want of honesty, yet one cannot help coming to this conclusion in looking back at his political career before his character underwent its final degradation.

He was a great, a truly great liar, perhaps the greatest liar that ever lived.

His dishonesty went too deep to be called superficial, yet, if we go deeper still in his rich and strangely mixed nature, we come upon stubborn foundations of conscience.