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Another controversy typical of the war between the Englishman and the Examiner centered on Robert ( later Viscount ) Molesworth, a Whig leader in Ireland and a member of the Irish Privy Council.
On December 21, the day that the Irish House of Commons petitioned for removal of Sir Constantine Phipps, their Tory Lord Chancellor, Molesworth reportedly made this remark on the defense of Phipps by Convocation: `` They that have turned the world upside down, are come hither also ''.
Upon complaints from the Lower House of Convocation to the House of Lords, he was removed from the Privy Council, his remark having been represented as a blasphemous affront to the clergy.
Steele, who had earlier praised Molesworth in Tatler No. 189, now defended him in Englishman No. 46, depicting his removal as a setback to the Constitution.
On the other hand, Molesworth was naturally assailed in the Tory press.
Swift, in the Dublin edition of A Preface to the Bishop of Sarum's Introduction, indicated his feelings by including Molesworth, along with Toland, Tindal, and Collins, in the group of those who, like Burnet, are engaged in attacking all Convocations of the clergy.
In the same way he coupled Molesworth and Wharton in a letter to Archbishop King, and he had earlier described him as `` the worst of them '' in some `` Observations '' on the Irish Privy Council submitted to Oxford.
A month later, in The Publick Spirit Of The Whigs, he used Steele's defense of Molesworth as evidence of his disrespect for the clergy, calling Steele's position an affront to the `` whole Convocation of Ireland ''.
On this issue, then, as on so many in these months, Steele and Swift took rigidly opposed points of view.

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