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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift: that it a little concerned His Majesty of Portugal, to interpose
his authority in behalf of a scholar and a gentleman, the subject
of a nation with which he is now in so strict an alliance. But
the other kingdoms and states of Europe have treated me with more
candor and generosity. If I had leave to print the Latin letters
transmitted to me from foreign parts, they would fill a volume,
and be a full defence against all that Mr. Partridge, or his
accomplices of the Portugal Inquisition, will be able to object;
who, by the way, are the only enemies my predictions have ever
met with at home or abroad. But I hope I know better what is due
to the honour of a learned correspondence in so tender a point.
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