And might not the same plea be urged in defence of a minister who, when no other expedient would avail, paid greedy and lowminded men not to ruin their country?
It was by some such reasoning as this that the scruples of William were overcome.

Honest Burnet, with the uncourtly courage which distinguished him, ventured to remonstrate with the King.

"Nobody," William answered, "hates bribery more, than I.But I have to do with a set of men who must be managed in this vile way or not at all.

I must strain a point or the country is lost." [584] It was necessary for the Lord President to have in the House of Commons an agent for the purchase of members; and Lowther was both too awkward and too scrupulous to be such an agent.

But a man in whom craft and profligacy were united in a high degree was without difficulty found.
This was the Master of the Rolls, Sir John Trevor, who had been Speaker in the single Parliament held by James.