THE PRIME MINISTER

James Miller's libretto Joseph and his Brethren, which begins with its hero's entry to the service of Pharaoh, portrays in the character of Joseph a perfect chief minister. It was written after the fall of Robert Walpole, the most powerful chief minister since Wolsey (to whom Walpole was often compared by his detractors). Polemic against Walpole continued well into 1743; government critics demanded that the minister who had been forced to resign should be called to account. Almost nothing came of this, and disillusion with government was deepened among Patriots committed to reform by the apostasy of their leader William Pulteney (see chapter 8). While Miller's libretto was being set by Handel, the king's chief minister was Lord Carteret, whose pro-Hanoverian mind-set enraged patriots of every hue. The long-desired changes of political management altered none of the defects in government and public life of which moral-political writers like Miller complained.

Much of Miller's description of his hero recalls contemporary writing about the desired qualities of a head of government: