Parliament you used great Endeavours for a standing Army under the notion of securing the Peace against those Dissenters and Field Meeters but tho' you had labour'd hard in that point yet the Success did not answer your expectation so fully as to give you content Well Sir what becomes of old Lauderdale your faithful Servant and dearly beloved Favorite for I do not find him in this Parliament No he 's forced to stay in England not daring to appear in Scotland for his Hell hounds were not able to weather the Point because the Stream run so strong against him not that you had made any change of his Measures in the Conspiracy against the Protestant Interest and Religion unless it were for the worse and very desirous you were of getting him into Scotland and no doubt you would have served him a Scotch Maiden Trick Why so Because that Old Dog had been heard to say that all you had done in Scotland was nothing in regard the Oaths were omitted and that the Parliament was but a Convention and what you had done was in it self void and of no effect These were bloody words and highly resented by you and afterwards you had an Eye upon Argyle who began to snort at the Test and though he had been a Dog in a String to your Brother and your self some Qualm came cross his Conscience He therefore began to make his Interpretations upon it which were such as cut the Throat of the thing it self And altho' the Interpretation he gave could be no other than the genuine sence of the thing and plain to be understood that it could mean no other than what he intended to take it in yet it was so much disliked that he was then to have been made a Sacrifice under the notion of being guilty of High Treason only for explaining the Test he was accordingly seized and libelled against and found guilty of the Fact and he was then in a fair way to have lost his Life for his Ingenuity but he with a great deal of dexterity made his escape and so saved himself for that time from being murder'd by you and your Cut-throats there Scotland Sir you bridled and saddled and brought the Government there to be something like the French Mode differing nothing but that you had made the Scots the greater Vassals of the two And the People of that Kingdom caressed you highly for the grace and favour of their Vassalage notwithstanding which you were not willing to stay any longer there your Friends advising you by all means to return to England to secure your Interest in England you having setled Scotland to your content And this remember Sweet Sir that the Whore Portsmouth with her Bastard Son was by your Royal Brother sent to France to renew the Dover Treaty in which she was more successful than your Sister of blessed memory for she was caressed by the French King and her Bastard honour'd as a Prince of the Blood and she setled a firm Correspondency between Lewis of France and Charles of Great Britain pursuant to the Treaty at Dover This you heard of and you judged the Strumpet was undermining you and obtaining the Succession for her son which made you after your arrival at Whitehall more unwilling to return again for Scotland than before and you pressed the then King your Brother for your stay here but you were told that you must return to Scotland where your stay should be but short you obeyed and went by Sea with your chief Favourite Mumper who with you was like to have been lost but you saved your self and the Curr and lost some Treasure with a great part of your Retinue who drank your Health and went to the bottom But you arrive in Scotland and the Mony being lost your Intentions of having a standing Army there were sunk also Your stay was to be short in Scotland and so shall mine therefore since I have put you in mind of your bridling and saddling that poor Kingdom as a Subject and a High Commissioner for King Charles give me leave to remember you of your Carriage when you pretended to and usurped that Crown as King of Sâ—otland for by the Laws of that Kingdom all Popish Princes were uncapable of that Crown And because of your Omission of the Oaths that were to be by you taken all that you did in repealing them was null and void and to no effect so that those Laws were still in force against you notwithstanding the aforesaid pretended Repeal for without those Oaths the meeting together of Lords and Commons was no Parliament but a Convention which cannot repeal any Statute there Upon your taking that Crown the Earl of Argyle upon the 20th of May 1685 well knowing how the Protestant Religion must suffer in Scotland lands in Scotland near a place called Kentire and on the 21st sent forth his Declaration wherein he tells the Scots That the End of his coming was the defence of the Protestant Religion the Laws and Liberties of the Protestants of Scotland against Popery and Arbitrary Government and therefore he required all persons from sixteen to sixty to come and joyn with him with Arms and Provisions necessary One of his sons sent Letters to several Gentlemen upon the same account so that in few days his Army was encreased to 2500 Men. But Sir your Trappan that betray'd the poor Protestants at Bothwâ—ll bridge 1679 escaping the Gallows lived to betray this poor Gentleman in the year 1685. for instead of shewing him the true way wherein he should have marched provided Rogues who led him into a bogg from whence he returning towards Glyde was fallen upon by some Scots and taken and Sir by your Arbitrary Order he was basely murder'd at Edinburgh on the 30th of June following This man had all along fought in your Brother's Cause and Quarrel and was an Instrument to betray his Father to your Brother and was murder'd in the beginning of his Reign after his Return This man had served your Cause and Interest in Scotland many years and had run in the same excess of Riot with your Conspirators but God opened his Eyes to see your base Designs against the Religion and Liberties of his Country and therefore nothing would satisfie you but his Blood and the ruine of his whole Family Well he is dead but I must say of him he deserved better Fortune in the World and more Favour from your Hands and his that is gone to his place Scotland did another time become a Field of Blood and till it was you were not contented But the Scots being weary of these perpetual disappointments they submitted to your Government and you then declared by the Advice of your Villanous Conspirators especially the damn'd Bishops that you were clothed with an Absolute Power and that all your Subjects of that Kingdom were bound to obey you without reserve upon which you did assume an Arbitrary Power both over the Religion and Laws of that
of England's Affairs should publickly abjure the Protestant Religion by which means he was not only very unfit but also uncapable of holding any publick Employment And did not the Banditti give you such proof of their submission to your Popish Directions you gave them that they had continued in their Places to this day had not God of his Infinite Mercy deliver'd us from them and your self For they were men of an agreeable disposition to have furthered your designs of Popery notwithstanding all your Promises to maintain the Church of England for they took care that none should be prefer'd that had any zeal for the Protestant Religion for if you will be serious in considering who they were that you prefer'd to the Dignities in the Church and upon what terms you must own that they were men of such Morals and Principles as render'd them a very scandal to that villanous Design that you and your Conspirators were carrying on against the Church of England 3. I pray Sir was the suspension of the Bishop of London another demonstration of your Purpose and Resolution to maintain the Church of England Let any of your trayterous Crew stand forth and answer for you Was not that Prelate suspended for refusing to obey an Arbitrary Order sent to him by your Banditti Commissioners for the suspending of Dr. Sharp now Archbishop of York for preaching against Popery according to his Office and Calling without so much as citing the said Dr. Sharp before him to make his defence or observing any common forms of Process commonly us'd in such cases The Bishop comply'd with your Suspension and what damage it was to him he can tell better than I but it did work for our Good and hasten'd our Deliverance but it shew'd that you had but little regard to your Oath and Promise to maintain the Church of England 4. Another Specimen you gave us of your pious Resolution of maintaining the Ch. of England as by Law establish'd was the dealing with Magdalen Colledge in Oxford In the first place you turn'd out the President who was legally chosen by the Fellows of the Colledge who if I mistake not are sworn to chuse one from among themselves to bear that Office then you turn'd out all the Fellows for refusing to chuse one of your recommendation without so much as citing them to appear before any Court that could take legal cognizance in that affair or obtaining any Sentence against them by a competent Judge and the only reason you gave for the turning them out was because they had refus'd a person that was a Papist who was not only uncapable by the Laws of the Land but also by the Statutes of that Colledge of bearing the Office of a President or Fellow of that Community And having expel'd both President and Fellows you put the said Colledge into the hands of Papists that you might the better maintain the Rights and Liberties of the Ch. of England as by Law establish'd But I hope it may be a warning to that Community and to all others of that University how they advance the Prerogative of the Crown so high and nourish those two pestilent Doctrins of Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance and the Divine Right of Succession lesâ— those Doctrins do expose them to a greater Danger than the last 5. Another demonstration that was given by you of your stedfast Purposes of standing by and maintaining of the Ch. of England was your proceeding against the Vice Chancellor of Cambridge 1687. You had a great Favour for one Francis a Benedictine Monk a Rogue that was fit for any Villany that you could put him upon to act him you sent to Cambridge to corrupt the Youth there and no doubt but for his time he did the business for which you sent him You planted him in Sidney Colledge where you had placed one Basset a Papist in that House as Master but your Monk had an Apartment wherein he perform'd the Office of a Priest according to the Ch. of Rome but being a Fellow that had taken no Degrees in any University either at home or abroad you were resolv'd that he should be a Master of Arts in the University of Cambridge and in order to this you sent a Letter to the said Vice-Chancellor to admit the said Father Francis to be a Master of Arts without taking the Oaths which the Vice-Chancellor refus'd as contrary to the Law of the Land and the Statutes of the University Upon this you caus'd the Vice-Chancellor and the Delegates of the University to be summoned before your Commissioners of Ecclesiastical Affairs where that Villain Jefferies contrary to all Law or Reason pronounced Sentence that the Vice-Chancellor being guilty of great Disobedience to the King's Commands and other Crimes and Contempts should be depriv'd of the Office of Vice-Chancellor and suspended of his headship of Magdalen Colledge in the said University of Cambridge Thus Sir you were pleas'd to maintain the Ch. of England by suffering the Learning and Gravity of that University to be trampl'd upon and by letting in a parcel of silly impudent and illiterate Popish Priests and Fryers who were to joyn with you in supporting the Protestant Religion as it was then by Law establish'd Unless your Commissioners of Ecclesiastical Affairs judg'd that to destroy the two Universities as to Learning and to break in upon their Laws made to preserve their Communities would be a means to preserve the Church of England I cannot but wonder at those extravagant Proceedings in the last years of your Tyranny against them since they had so highly espoused your Cause when you were Duke of York against the Sence of the whole Nation 6. Another Reason you give us to believe that you did design to stand by and support and maintain the Ch. of England was your proceeding and causing to be summoned before your Ecclesiastical Commissioners all the Chancellors and Archdeacons of England and requiring them to certifie the Names of those Clergymen who had read the Declaration for Liberty of Conscience as well as the Names of those who had refused the same without considering that the reading of it was not enjoyn'd the Clergy by the Bishops who are their Ordinaries So that this was another way you intended even by these extrajudicial Proceedings in your Court of Commissioners Ecclesiastical to maintain the Liberties of the Ch. of England This was one great cause why several Persons of Quality both in Church and State refused to be concern'd in this Commission for they at last clearly saw that this damnable Commission tended to nothing less than the total Subversion of the Protestant Religion for you us'd it to no other end and purpose than to oppress such persons as were eminent for Learning and Virtue that should at any time or season preach against Popery Superstition And it was God's great Mercy to the Protestant Interest that they did at last see for sure I am that in the latter part
doth not the Law set a boundary to their Government as well as to the Peoples Obedience Is there not a mutual Contract between King and People Now when any K. shall by a Suspending or Dispensing Power dissolve this Contract and break in upon our Laws and overturn the Government the People cease to be his Subjects and he to be their King It is your own case Sir by your Dispensing Power you did not only pretend to be above Law but also that you were not bound by Law tho' by your Oath you were as much bound to observe the Law as a King as your People were bound to observe the Laws as your Subjects But the People of England seeing that it was in vain to expect any Justice or Righteousness from you for means of reformation was propounded but was denied to be comply'd withal several noble Lords saw themselves slighted their Counsels rejected and the Protestant Religion upon its last Legs they therefore did implore the help of the Prince of Orange now our Gracious King he comes over seizeth your Treasure your fortified places Navy and Naval Stores and with one Consent of the People of England was made our Sove Lâ—rd and King and hath his health very well without the help and aid of a Dispensing Power God send him a long and prosperous Reign 2. The Laws of England are the Kings Laws if your Dispensing Vermin did mean by the Laws being your Laws that is that you were intrusted with the Conservation and the Execution of them then we agree with the Rogues but how doth this Trust reposed in the King for the time being intitle him to Suspend and Dispense with these Laws but if by the Laws being yours they understood that they were your Property either to Execute or not Execute either to keep or break at your pleasure I pray Sir to what end were they made and to what end were you Sworn to keep and maintain these Laws why was there the trouble of an Oath to keep the Law But Sir here they laid down a notorious falshood for the Laws of England are the Laws made by King and People as the Rule of the Government of the King on the one hand and of the Obedience of the People on the other 3. That it is an inseparable Prerogative of the King of England to Dispense with Penal Laws upon necessity and urgent Occasions this was laid down as good Law But Sir I pray consider were not all the Laws of England Enacted by the King and the People of England met in Parliament for the security of the Government and of the Subject how then could these Villains give you a Power of annulling these Laws at your Will and Pleasure since you could not suspend or dispense with them but by the same Authority by which they were made It is true the King of England for the time being may pardon a Punishment that a Transgressor hath incurred and to which he is condemned as in cases of Fellony and Treason yet it cannot be inferred from hence with any colour of reason that you or any other King could intirely suspend the Execution of those Laws relating to Fellony or Treason unless Sir your villainous Judges could have proved by any other Authority than barely their Opinions that you were cloathed with a Dispotick and Arbitrary Power and that the Lives and Liberties Honours and Estates of the People of England did depend wholly upon your good Will and Pleasure and were intirely subject to you which must infallibly follow on your having a Power to suspend the Execution of the Laws and to dispence with them It may be Sir some of your Dispensers may say That you were not well informed when you took the Coronation-Oath to maintain the Laws of the Land and that you had prejudiced your self greatly by yielding to the Oath and that you had weakened your Authority too much in submitting your self to the observation of those Laws These things were much talked of by some of your Bully Conspirators when they little dreamed of your taking the Air at St. Germains Nay some of the Devils Brokers roared this out of their Pulpits by the direction of Old Hodge their guide But Sir I pray inform me how it could be that you should not be well informed when you yielded to take the Oath at your Coronation to observe and keep the Laws of the Land It is impossible that you should be ignorant of that which all the World knew and all your Predecessors before you as it was almost impossible that you should not be acquainted with the Oath that you were to take and the Laws you were to preserve by that Oath So this know that you were bound to those Laws immediately upon taking the Oath and I wonder much that you should be a stranger to the Coronation Oath and to the Laws by which you were to defend your Government that had been twenty four Years a looker on in the Reign of your Brother Therefore this Plea is as frivilous as the Opinion of your never to be forgiven Judges was Impudent and against Law But this is one of the madest Thoughts that ever you or your villainous Judges could be guilty of that it was a blemish to the Sovereign Power of the Kings of England to submit to the Laws I pray Sir What blemish would it have been to your Sovereign Power to have submitted to the Laws of your Countrey which your Predecessors were contented to acknowledge and observe You derived your Authority to your self by virtue of the Laws Why then was the Observation of the Laws such a prejudice to you and your Sovereign Power But we saw the Laws broken and you forsworn and your Subjects deposed you In this I am sure you have found a greater blemish and prejudice than the observation of the Laws would have been But to be short you may plead for your self and your Judges That were under a necessity and an urgent occasion Well What was that necessity What were those urgent occasions that could put you upon forswearing your self and bringing your self under the guilt of Perjury In truth Sir your necessity you lay under was the subversion of the Protestant Religion and bringing in Popery and the subversion of the Civil Government and bringing in Tyranny and Slavery Is not Perjury a most grievous Offence but much more grievous when it is voluntarily committed And then a King committeh Perjury willingly when he doth any thing willingly against the Oath he hath taken not by force but by freewil not unadvisedly but with great consideration not to his hurt but to his advantage not to perform a thing that was impossible or dishonest but to bind himself to a condition that is honest and possible too Now when a King breaketh such an Oath there can be no colour or pretence of necessity or urgent occasions to excuse his Perjury 4. That the King of England is sole Judge of
witness his being reconciled to that Church by Father Richard Huddleston who was related to John Huddleston of whom the said King Charles had such a tender care and not only so but Receiv'd the Sacrament from Father Ireland the Jesuit in the Duchess of Portsmouth's Lodgings and the same day afterwards he receiv'd it according to the Usage of the Church of England it being the Sunday called Easter-day In the last place witness those Papers that were found under his own hand in his Strong Box all which testify his inclinations were bent that way and therefore how can any man wonder at his being careless of supporting the Protestant Religion Nay Sir I must not forget one Instance more of his being of the Romish Persuasion that is that most Excellent Memorial that he put in by his Protestant Envoy to the Court at Poland wherein there was a passage to this effect That he had a great Esteem of the Roman-Catholick and Apostolick Religion as being most consistent with Monarchy give me leave to Cite a passage of a Letter of his to the Governor of St. Omers when it was by Conquest reduced to the Obedience of the French King which was That he should take care of the Jesuits according to the Contract he had made with his Master they being men upon whom the hopes of England did depend Give me leave Sir to put you in mind of his promises he made to the Jesuits in Spain after he was reconciled to the Church of Rome upon their Contributing Three thousand Pistols for his support of restoring the Catholick Religion when ever he should come to the Enjoyment of his Right in England and not only to them but to the Nuns in Ghent when he borrowed Money of them for which they waited several Years Then I say he declared he would restore their Religion when ever he should come to his Right When the Princess Henrietta came to Dover you know what her Errand was to press the King to restore the Romish Religion here in England and that the breach of the Peace with the Dutch was then and there contrived by you and your Conspirators and consented to by the King and all in order to the reducing those State to the Catholick Faith And it was determined to begin the Publick Exercise of the Romish Religion in Ireland and to facilitate that work you may well remember who was sent over Lord Lieutenant Upon all these Considerations a Man may not now wonder at King Charles's carelesness in the Support and Maintenance of the Protestant Religion You well remember that you your self and your other Conspirators had begot in the King your Brother a full persuasion of the Truth of this Proposition That the Roman-Catholicks were the greatest favourers of Monarchy therefore in his Letter to the French King bearing Date June 1676. that he resolved to be like his Neighbours in Religion but you know that he was prevented by the Lord Arlington and the Parliament for which you were pleased to tell Father Lacheise in your Letter of July 1676. that the Lord Arlington and others by a Thousand deceits endeavoured to break the good Intelligence that was betwixt the King your Brother and his most Christian Majesty and your self to the end they might deceive you all Three and therefore the Parliament and the said Lord Arlington and his party were by you declared in that Letter as useless and dangerous for that the said Arlington and his Friends did work incessantly to advance the Interest of the Prince of Orange and the Dutch and to lessen the Interest of the French King Now the King your Brother being a man unsteady in his resolutions he sometimes failed your Brother of France as well as your self and other Conspirators 9. We in his Life-time saw there was no likelihood of his having any legitimate Issue to Succeed him in the Government Truly Sir I think I may say that was contrived by your Father Clarendon and your self and in it you intended the hurt of the People of England but God who governs the World hath made his want of legitimate Issue to be the greatest Blessing that ever England saw for by that means we have a King that well knows that it is most certain and evident to all men that the publick Peace and Happiness of any State or Kingdom cannot be preserved where the Laws Liberties and Customs Established by the Lawful Authority in it are openly Transgressed and Annulled more especially when the alteration of Religion is endeavoured and that a Religion which is contrary to Law is endeavoured to be introduced Upon which those who are immediately concerned in it are indispensably bound to endeavour to Preserve and Maintain the Established Laws Liberties and Customs and above all the Religion and Worship of God that is Established among them and to take such an effectual care that the Inhabitants in that State or Kingdom may not be deprived of their Religion nor of their Civil Rights which is so much the more necessary because the Greatness and Security both of Kings and Royal Families and of all such as are in Authority as well as the Happiness of their Subjects and People depend in a most especial manner upon the exact Observation and Maintenance of these their Laws Liberties and Customs This Sir is the Sentiment and Blessed Resolution of King William and this he and his Ministers put in Execution which is a blessed Change which we could not have lived to enjoy had Charles your Brother left any Issue behind him that had been capable of the Crown but that which you contrived for our Mischief is turned to our greatest Good for we have the best of Kings upon the Throne and the worst of Men taking of the Air at St. Germains 10. The late King Charles your Brother did obstinately refuse to enter into a League with those who intended to uphold and maintain the Protestant Religion This I must say of the Dutch that ever since they delivered themselves from the intollerable Yoke of the Crown of Spain their great aim and design hath been to promote the Interest of the Reformed Religion and have endeavoured to make Alliances with those Princes that were and are of the Reformed Religion and have endeavoured to make good these Alliances but how King Charles your Brother your self and the rest of your Partisans treated the Dutch ever since his Restoration to the Crown it is well known and how he in the compass of Ten years made Two ungodly Wars but as I said before I must say again The Dutch did most commonly send us home with broken bones Our Cause was Wicked and God gave us Success suitable thereunto and for what ends and purposes these Wars were made you and your most Christian Brother can very well tell but least Sir you should have forgotten those Wars give me leave to give you a brief note of them In the year 1665. it is well known that
a War was made upon the Dutch I could wish it were as well remembred what the provocation was that occasioned it and what success it had I think Sir as I said just now the success was suitable in the first fight you had the Command of the Fleet and truly it was a Victory you obtained but how came we of at Bergon and how in the year 1666. when Monk had the Command your Conspirators got vast supplies from your Band of Pensioners for the defraying the charge of this wicked War yet after all there was no Fleet set out in the year 1667. but the Flower of the Royal Navy burnt or taken in Port to save charges but you know your Brother and your self had good health of Body at Bruxelles when you had no Ships and therefore you were the less concerned But that which is the greatest Riddle to some of your Conspirators Why the French should at that time a day join with the Dutch against England Therefore be pleased to remember that the French did not join with the Dutch to Support and Maintain the Protestant Religion or to advance the Interest of the Dutch but whilst he was in Friendship with the Dutch he had an interrupted leisure tho' contrary to all Oaths and Treaties whilst the Dutch and we were embroiled to Invade the Spanish Netherlands which had been by Wise men considered as the natural Frontier of England and took a great part of it The Dutch could not oppose him because of the pretended Alliance We could not interpose because we were engaged both against the Dutch Dane and France so he went forth Conquering and to Conquer that part of the Dominion of Spain to whom Sir your Brother and your self were very much obliged when never a Prince in all Europe durst own you he did and how basely your Brother and your self and Conspirators have treated him let all Europe judge But what was the reason we had not a Fleet set out in the year 1667. since such large Supplies were obtained for to carry on this ungodly War against the Dutch The reason was this notwithstanding he had joined with the Dutch against us yet by the Credit he had with the Queen your Mother he by her so far deluded the King your Brother that upon the assurance the Dutch would not have any Fleet out that year he forbore to make ready and so incurred that notable loss and disgrace at Chatham This was the fatal end of all our Sea-undertakings against the Dutch for that War and as the French King and your self and Conspirators were the persons to whom we were much obliged for that War so we were glad to receive Peace from his favour which was agreed at Breda betwixt England France and Holland Well what was the Event of this Peace which if I am not out we were forced to pay for it for we stood in need of it and the Dutch stood in need of our Money which they had but the Event of this War brought the King to some little consideration of which he was seldom guilty for he saw that the French King had in the year 1667. taken the time of us and whilst we were both made weak he had play'd his Pranks in the Spanish Netherlands hereupon he judgeth it necessary to interpose before the flame that consumed his next Neighbour should throw its Sparkles over the Herring-Pond and affect him Therefore he having some good Counsellors about him you may well remember that neither you nor your Conspirators had any hand in this affair he generously slighted all Punctilios of Ceremony or Piques of Animosity for being so well beaten and so horribly disgraced He sent first into Holland and invites them to a nearer Alliance and to enter into such farther Counsels as were most proper to quiet this publick disturbance the French had raised This work was wholly designed by the King your Brother and those few honest Counsellors he had left him and it being so good a work it did succeed accordingly you by this Sir may see what felicity attends that King who follows the Counsels of Honest Wise Men and excludes the corrupt Politicks of Rogues that aim at nothing but the advancement of themselves and Families tho' it be upon the ruin of their Countrey for it is a thing scarce credible tho' very true that two Treaties of such Weight and Intricacy and various aspect as that of the Defensive League with Holland and the other for repressing of the further Progress of the French in the Spanish Netherlands should in five days time in the year 1668 be concluded when yours and the Politicks of your Conspirators were excluded Such was the secresy and expedition then used in prosecuting the King your Brother's Instruction and so easy a thing it is for Princes when they have a mind to it to be well served You may remember that the Swede also shortly made the third in this Consort whether wisely judging that in the Minority of their King Reigning over late acquired Dominions it was their true Interest to have their hands in all the Councils that tended to Peace and Undisturbed Possession Or whether indeed those Ministers like ours did even project in so glorious an Alliance to betray it afterward to their own greater advantage from their joining in it it was called the Tripple Alliance the King you know was so fond of it that he ceased not to sollicite other Princes according to the Seventh Article of that Treaty to come into the Guaranty of the same and he extremely for a time delighted himself in cultivating by all good means what he by the Counsel of some good men had so happily planted and what satisfaction this Tripple League so made gave to the English Nation and how it did charm the more ready Votes of the House of Commons into a Supply and justify the necessity of it in the very face of the whole Kingdom For it was of so good report and so generally acceptable to the Protestant Party as being a Hook in the French Nostrils that the Pensionary Parliament who were wont whether it were for War or Peace to make the Nation pay for it could not have desired a fairer pretence to colour their Liberality You know Sir what vast sums were obtained and lavished in the first War with Holland that Parliament in the Month of April 1670. giving the Additional Duties upon Wines for eight years which did amount to Five hundred and Sixty thousand pounds and confirmed the sale of the Fee-Farm Rents which was no less their gift being a part of the publick Revenue to the value of Eighteen hundred thousand pounds nay not only so but they met again upon the 24th of October in the year 1670. and upon the Speech of the Lord Keeper Bridgman who telling the Parliament what a multitude of Beneficial Leagues the King had made and naming to them the Tripple League they could no longer hold gave again a
Subsidy of One shilling in the pound to the real value of all Lands and other Estates proportionably with several more Beneficial Clauses into the Bargain to begin the 24th of June 1671. and to expire the 24th of June 1672. together with this they gave the additional Excise upon Beer and Ale for Six years to reckon the same from June the 24th 1671. And lastly the Law-Bill commencing from the first of May 1671. and at nine years end to determine If you now you are at leisure will cast up these Three Bills you will find them not a penny less than 2500000 l. Thus Sir you may see what a Reputation this Tripple League gave the King your Brother both at home and abroad at home this Triple League obtained a Tripple supply which some men thought would as with three Golden Nails have revetted it All the Princes of Europe courted him abroad and were highly pleased with it the Emperor used all the pressing means that became him that he might partake of the benefit of that Alliance and was refused The Duke of Lorain who had been always a true Friend to your Brother and your self and by his affection to the Tripple League did incur the displeasure of the French King and lost his whole Territory It was seized in the Year 1669. against all Laws not only of Peace but of Hostility too because of his not being admitted into the Alliance for which he had so great a regard that the honour he had for it proved fatal to him he was left by your means to be a Sacrifice notwithstanding King Charles's Invitation of all Princes to come in yet when they desired to be admitted they were refused But in a short time all those Honest Counsels which had taken effect with so great satisfaction to the Nation and to the great honour of your Brother were all changed just as if Treaties as soon as the Wax is cold do lose their vertue the King your Brother went down to Dover in the Month of June 1670. to meet after a long Absence Madam his and your only remaining Sister and if the Duke of Buckingham and Sir Thomas Armstrong were alive they could tell what a pleasant Meeting they had and how pleasantly they passed the time of the interview and what passed I shall not now relate you knowing all of it well enough But as the days were the more pleasant because the King had not seen her for a long season so the Interview proved fatal to that Princess for though she left England in good health yet upon her arrival in France she suddenly expires Well then she dies what was the consequence of her death The Marquess Belfonds is immediately dispatched hither and a Person of great Honour sent to the Court of France and before ever the inquiry and grumbling at her death was over in a trice there was an invisible League in prejudice of the Tripple one struck up with France to all the height and dearness of affection as if upon diffecting the Princess there had been some State-Philtre been found in her Bowels or the Reconciliation with France were not to be celebrated with a less Sacrifice than the Blood Royal of England The sequel of this Interview was fatal to the Princess and the consequence of her coming was fatal to England for as the Treaty was a work of darkness and could not presently be discovered so the Parliament I told you must meet again to give a Tripple Supply to maintain the Tripple League and they being ignorant of what was done thinking all had been secure gave the aforesaid supply Sir You got the Supply what use did your Conspiritors make of it Was not the Parliament prorogued and met not again till the 4th of Febr. 1672. by which means you and your Accomplices had a convenient scope for the mighty work you had upon your hands to ruin the Protestant Religion and the Professors thereof and that you might be free from the inspection of a Parliament till this mighty Work was finished I observed to you That the King your Brother before the Interview was inciting of the Princes to come into the Alliance but from hence forward it ceased and as I said before when any did offer themselves they were basely refused Oh! what joy Sir you and the rest of the Conspirators did conceive with what diligence was Smith the Jesuits Agent in London dispatched over to St. Omers to acquaint your Friends there of the English Jesuits and from thence to Doway to acquaint the Crew there in what a happy way you were in to do the Catholick Religion service and that the King was clearly come over he having promised to do all things now that might tend to the destroying of the Interest of the Dutch and to advance the Power and Interest of France and if that the Tripple League were once dissolved the King your Brother would never more make any such Alliance with those Rebels I have seen your Letters dispatched by the said Smith You indeed with the help of your Hellish Crew your Brother being gained to your side in this particular you resolve upon the annulling of that Alliance which was of very little use for some time before it was totally dissolved In order to the dissolving this Treaty old Henry Coventry one of your Conspirâ—tors was dispatched to the Court of Sweden and he with as much impudence as truth affirmed at his departure That the end of his Journey to Sweden was to break the Tripple League and this is apparent that after his jugling with the French Ministers there and the King of Sweden the said King did never more prosecute the Design and ends of that Alliance until the breach between us and the Dutch What did he arm himself at the expence of the League and did first under the disguise of a Mediation act the French Interest and at last he threw off the Vizor and drew his Sword in their Quarrel Truly Sir I cannot but admire how successful you were in gaining that great Point of ruining Europe in general and this Nation in particular by this way designing the utter subversion of the Protestant Religion and all our English Liberties as I shall shew you in the sequel of this Memento Nevertheless I cannot but much more admire that Mr. Coventry that in his Embassy at Breda was so instrumental in putting a period to that first wicked and unfortunate War with the Dutch should at length be made a Tool of a Second and break such an Alliance as rendered England honourable to all Europe and by which all Christendom was fastened And that which rendered his Carriage in that Affair more vile and base since no man understood the Theory and Practick of Honour better than himself and yet could in so eminent an Instance forget it and himself too the imployment being more fit for a Butler or a Downing or some such Dunghil Rascal all that I shall say in his
to the French Interest which Letter Sir I saw and the Instructions were followed to a Tittle by the Fathers at S. Omers In those Letters the States-General were to be acquainted with this Now Sir it is well known that the King your Brother's being ingaged in the French Interest was no Secret at the Court at Vienna nor with the States-General but that the Prince of Orange was drawn into that Interest this must be surprizing Therefore Sir we might easily see the secret Hatred you conceived against the Prince and his Cause and Interest You and your Conspirators could have been heartily glad of being blest with such an Ally but because he was true to his Cause and Interest you by your lying Jesuits did what you could to create a Jealousie in the then Confederate Princes of the Sincerity of the Prince to the Confederacy and to the Interest of the United Provinces in order to his Ruin These Letters that were sent to the Emperor's Confessor bore Date Jan. 4. 1678. Stilo Novo Sir You may not forget the 12 Jesuits that Whitebread the Provincial of the Jesuits sent into Holland to create a Belief in the Dutch that the Prince of Orange designed no less than the Subversion of the Government of the United Provinces by procuring his Party to receive and own him as their King and that it was the Design of the said Prince to assume the Title and Crown of a King and change their Government and make a Seisure of their Freedoms These Jesuits were sent by Virtue of Letters sent from Coleman in your Name and Money was sent over to be received at Dunkirk the Sum was 4000 Crowns to bear the Charge of the Mission into Holland and the Bills were signed by one Busby a Merchant here in London the Money being paid in by Sir Allen Apsley therefore Sir it may well be concluded who was at the Head of this Piece of Villany In a word Sir you see what means you and the rest of your Popish Incendiaries used to beget in the Dutch an ill Esteem of the Prince of Orange and to widen the Difference between the Lovistein Party and his Friends and if possible to seduce his Friends and destroy his Interest and the Interest of the Protestant Religion and the best Title the Jesuits of St. Omer's us'd to give him was Apple-tree Will at which you were pleased in the multitude of your witty Thoughts to laugh as Coleman us'd to tell us when ever any Discourse happened concerning the Prince of Orange But Sir you may say That he was your Sister's Son and that at that time you had married your Daughter to him so that he was not only your Nephew but your Son-in-Law What then How you and your Party used him when he was your Nephew the Princes of Europe saw and the Honest Party of England resented his Usage and had Thoughts of you accordingly yea and of your Brother to but you pretend that you had married your Daughter to him No Sir it was neither you nor your Brother married the Lady Mary to the Prince of Orange it was something else I had almost said the Siege of Charleroy and the Advice of a worthy Minister of State upon the same But suppose you had married your Daughter to the Prince of Orange and that it was your own Inclination to which I cannot yet be reconciled in my thoughts but that after the Marriage you pursued his Ruin with as much vigour as you did before give me leave to sum up the whole in a few words You and your Accomplices resolved That the Prince of Orange should not become Great therefore he must be destroyed and in order to effect so mighty and so great a Work all means are used to stir up the Dutch to mutiny against him upon that Diabolical Suggestion of your Conspirators That he had designed and was resolved to subvert their Government and usurp a Crown and Title of a King the Emperor is also instigated to create a Belief in the States-General That the Prince designed the making himself Absolute and oh how did you and your Party hug your selves with the Expectation of a Breach between him and the States-General so that his and the whole Protestant Interest might fail in Holland In truth when a Man reflects upon this Affair he would wonder at your Barbarity and naturally ask this Question Why should this Prince aim at the Destruction of the Prince of Orange Was he not his Sister's Son his Son-in-law What profit would it be to you to destroy him An honest-thinking Man would hesitate at these things but when he considers who it is attempts this and for what cause then it naturally follows there was a pretended Cause for such Diabolical Suggestions and such Barbarous Designs You that was his Uncle was converted to such a degree of Zeal as not to regard any thing in the World in comparison of the Conversion of Heretical Kingdoms and so your Interests we know were inseparately united to the French King that it was impossible to divide them You know that you used all means to secure His Most Christian Majesty's Interest in England and that for many weighty Reasons one among the rest was That his and yours prevailing would give the greatest Blow to the Protestant Religion that ever it receiv'd from its birth then undoubtedly the Prince of Orange through God's mercy now our Gracious King at that time stood within a step or two of the Throne and being a Protestant ought in all Policy to be removed notwithstanding his being your Nephew and Son-in-law For what do Men talk of natural Affection amongst Popish Princes Was you not in a Conspiracy against Charles the Second when he was at Bruxels though he was your own Brother or else he is basely bely'd And was not the Queen his Mother zealous in the same Conspiracy notwithstanding he was her Son Why then should any Man talk of natural Affection Sir you cannot forget that you had a mighty Work upon your Hands that was The Conversion of these Kingdoms and subduing the Northern Heresie and that your hopes of it were very great and that you were zealous to a miracle of being the Author of so Glorious a Work Your mighty Mind and the Mighty Mind of the French King were relied upon by the Conspirators for that also that the Interest of the French King was highly attracted to that of yours Why then should any wonder at your Passing a Bill of Exclusion upon the Prince of Orange who the World knew notwithstanding all your Hellish Suggestions both to the Emperor and States-General stood ready with all his might to Baffle You and the French King and all your mighty Undertakings Consider further That the Interest of the French King was highly attracted to your Interest and this pleased you and your Party and so you thought your selves secure But here was your Nephew and Son-in-law his Interest was as highly attracted
neither pay'd by him nor yet receiv'd by them and not only so but that the Protestants in the North of Ireland were much alarm'd at those Quantities of Arms and Ammunition that were put into the Hands of the Irish Catholicks 10. Your Conspirators Coleman and the Jesuites in London receiv'd Letters from St. Omers written from Father Ireland not he that was hanged for his own Name was Ironmonger but this Man 's own Name was Saltmarsh That Care was taken for the Destruction of the Duke of Ormond in Ireland he being then Lord-Lieutenant there And for what Reason Because he had refused Sir to join with you in Breaking the English Interest in that Kingdom though Sir you may remember that the said Duke was a Person very Obsequious to your Brother and your Self and the Reason why you could not get him to engage with you in Omnibus was his own Safety and Ease Yet when you acted by the King's Command the said Duke never failed you nor did his Son the Earl of Ossory which cost that good Gentleman many a Sigh when he came to dye for the Business of the Smyrna Fleet and the Wicked War against the Dutch stuck upon his Soul to the last Minute of his Life But I say Because the Duke of Ormond would not push on every thing you put upon him he was not for your turn though give him his due he had gone farther than his Inclinations lead him to please your Mind 11. In the last place when you took the Crown you in a short time put the whole Government into the Hands of the Irish Papists by which means the English Protestant Interest was in great danger to be lost and the Protestant Inhabitants were under the daily Fears through your Grace and Favour of having their Throats cut nay many daily by your Cut-Throat Teagues were by your especial Direction basely inhumanely and barbarously murthered So that some tasted of that Cruelty which others justly apprehended from the Arbitrary Power you set up there Some of them left the Kingdom and abandoned their Estates calling to mind that Cruel and Bloody Massacre which fell upon their Fathers in that Kingdom in the year 1641. And to crown your Work you traiterously invaded that Kingdom and called a Number of your Villains together and christened them by the Title and Name of a Parliament and what you did by their countenance many yet alive can tell But Doctor King an old Passive Obedience Friend of yours hath painted you out at large in those particular Carriages of yours when you with your French Mirmidons invaded that Kingdom But Sir let me tell you That Great William our King hath endeavoured and doth still study to bring Ireland into such a State that the Settlement of the Protestant Religion may there be religiously observed and the Protestant English Interest may be secured against any Effort of yours or your Irish Teagues to the contrary notwithstanding III. SCOTLAND You having play'd your Game so well in Ireland it will not be amiss to cast our Eye upon that Quondam Ancient Kingdom and see how you managed there for as you managed Ireland by a Tool that succeeded the Lord Roberts so in Scotland You and your Brother acted by Lauderdale for he brought all the Laws and Liberties of Scotland to the Council-Chamber bringing all Persons and Causes of any moment to your Arbitrary Council who acted as Lords Paramount without controul and so zealous were you by him to promote and support the French Interest there that continually new Levies were making in Scotland for the Service of the French King tho' at that very time we were pretending a French War in England You remember Sir that by your Influence upon the King your Brother and on the Council of Scotland you make them use all the diligence that was possible to get an Army there to be a standing Army in the room of the Militia of that Kingdom the Militia being not thought fit for your Popish Designs And the means to effect the same you pitch'd upon those you judged to be the most effectual which was first to Oppress and Enrage the Dissenters and this could not be better accomplished than by disturbing and prosecuting their Meetings and Religious Assemblies for the Worship of God which You and your Conspirators did with all imaginable diligence And you having found out a new way by caution your Conspirators devised a Bond should be imposed upon every Man they marked out for Ruine as being Enemies to their Arbitrary Proceedings which Bond was That the Landlord should be bound for his Tenant the Master for his Servant and the Husband for the Wife and Father for the Children not to go to Conventicles Which you knew many would not do for that the People of Scotland generally hated Praelatical Government But this way they thought would so enrage the People whom they fore-knew would not part with their Meetings that they doubted not but to force a Rebellion and thereupon have a fair Pretence to raise Forces for the Security of the Kingdom against restless Meeters and Meetings Which Design Sir You and your Party in that Kingdom did at last effect Another Device you and your Conspirators had of seizing the Field-Meetings by the armed Forces and destroying them both in Bodies and Estates and dragging them to Gaols and then by whole Ship-loads selling them to the Plantations as Condemn'd Men and Ship-loads coming here for London they by one way or another got their Liberty Was this of the Bond all And was the Selling of them all No For You and your Conspirators found out another way by the Tyranny of Duke Lauderdale and that was this There was a Warrant procured from the Council of Scotland to disarm divers Shires and Low-lands of that Kingdom and when that would not exasperate them then another Order was procured to order the High-landers a sort of barbarous Papists to be armed and by whole Regiments to come down upon the Inhabitants spoiling and destroying the whole Country living amongst them at discretion and these very High-landers thus armed under the pretence of keeping the Peace had in their Commission from your Brother's and your Council in Scotland Authority to live at Free Quarter upon those Inhabitants which they did divers Months together to the destruction of the poor People And all this was to procure a Rebellion at any rate But least this should be too general I will descend to some Particulars that the thing may be plain to your Ragged Regiment at St. Germans and your Hell-born Cut-throat Crew here in England I. I will shew you in several Particulars how your Brother and You invaded the Rights of the Good People of Scotland in general II. I will give you to remember some Instances of your Brother's and your Barbarity to particular Persons III. Your Brother's and your way of using your Prisoners I. Give me leave to put you and your Conspirators in mind of
in the fourth year of the Reign of James the First your Grandfather which intended the better abolition of all memory of Hostility and the dependencies thereof between England and Scotland and the better repressing the Occasions of Discord and Disorders for time to come and of a like Act passed about the same time in Scotland by the force of which said late Acts there was a Militia setled in that Kingdom of Twenty thousand Foot and Two thousand Horse who were obliged to be in a readiness to march into any part of the Kingdom of England for any service wherein your Brother's Honour and Greatness might be concerned and they were to obey such Orders and Directions as they should from time to time receive from the Privy Council of that Kingdom By colour of which general words the then Parliament did conceive that the Kingdom of England was liable to be invaded upon any pretence whatsoever And this was done by the procurement of that Lauderdale he having been all the time of those Transactions Principal Secretary of that Kingdom and chiefly intrusted with the administration of the Affairs of State there and he being Commissioner for holding the Parliament at the time of passing the latter of the said Acts whereby the providing the said Horse and Foot was effectually imposed upon that Kingdom and that extraordinary Power vested in the Privy Council there so that the Commons of England conceived they had just reason to apprehend the ill Consequences of so great and an unusal Power especially since at that time the Affairs of the Kingdom of Scotland were managed by the said Duke who publish'd himself to be a Person of such pernicious Principles thereupon they pray'd the King your Brother to dismiss him from all his Employments and forbid him his Presence and Counsels for ever as a person obnoxious and dangerous to the Government This Sir is the Character and these are the Qualifications of a person that your Conspirators judg'd meet for a man to serve your Cause and Interest and how near he brought the People of Scotland to the French Government and Interest I must leave an impartial Reader to judge he wanted nothing but a King to make an Example of him and all such profligate Monsters of Mankind But I will give you a second Instance of the good Opinion that the Commons of England assembled in Parliament had of this Varlet and that is as follows 2. Upon the 10th of May 1678 the Commons of England assembled in that Parliament represented to the King your Brother the deplorable condition the state of the Kingdom thro' evil Counsellors which Sir you know were your Conspirators and were designing to overthrow the Protestant Interest in both Kingdoms and were the Cause why the King your Brother follow'd not the Advice of his Parliament for the redressing of Grievances amongst whom they reckon'd John Duke of Lauderdale and pray'd that the King would remove him from his Council and Presence for ever 3. I hasten to a third Instance of the Opinion that the Commons of England had of the said Duke of Lauderdale and that was in a Parliament held in May 10th 1679. They tell the King in their Address That they found the Kingdoms involv'd in imminent dangers and great difficulties by the evil designs and pernicious Counsels of some who had been and were then actually in high Places of Trust and Authority about the Person of the then King who contrary to the Duty of their Places by their arbitrary and destructive Counsels tending to the subversion of the Rights Liberties and Properties of the People of Great Britain and the alteration of the Protestant Religion did endeavour to alienate the Hearts of the People from the then King and his Government amongst whom they had just reason to accuse the Duke of Lauderdale for a chief promoter of such Counsels and more particularly for contriving and endeavouring to raise Jealousies and Misunderstandings between the Kingdoms of England and Scotland whereby Hostilities might have ensued and might have risen between the two Nations They took notice of the many repeated Addresses of the immediate preceding Parliament and were much concerned that notwithstanding those Addresses they found that Duke Lauderdale with all his Qualifications continued in the Councils of the then King for that the Affairs of the Kingdom required that none should be put into such Employments but such as were not only of known Abilities Interest and Esteem in the Nation but also were without all suspicion of mistaking or betraying the true Interest of the Nation Upon these Considerations a new Parliament pray'd the then King to remove him the said Duke Lauderdale from his Employments and Person and Councels for ever You well know that in the Month of February 1678 you were banish'd into Flanders before the meeting of the new Parliament for the good King your Brother parted with his old Pensioners who lowed very loud for want of Fodder and to save Charges that stale Parliament was dissolv'd and a new one call'd whom your Conspirators by the insight they had in the Elections knew it would be such a Parliament as was not for their turns therefore a deep Consult was held how to make the Nation to believe that they were in earnest they resolv'd to discover the Plot and discourage Popery tho' in truth it was the two things you and your Conspirators aimed at to be still supported However to blind the Eyes of Mankind it was resolved that all imaginable symptoms should be publickly professed both for the discovery of the Popish Plot and leaving you and your Conspirators for you were to absent your self from your Brother and go beyond Sea for some time upon these Considerations the one was That you being out of the way might stop the further examination of the Popish Plot then newly discover'd to the King who was in every bit of it but that of his own Life and it had a near relation to your self And by this means your Conspirators thought to preserve the Chief Conspirator alive and safe The other was for a gloss to make Mankind to think that the King your Brother and the Court were such mortal Enemies to Popery that he would not endure you his Popish Brother near him for fear of being influenc'd by Popish Councels But Sir you may remember that your self and Conspirators at St. James's were of a different Opinion some of your Partisans with all their might and skill opposed your leaving the Kingdom for that it would weaken your Party extreamly and make persons more bold to come in and give Evidence against you when you were absent than if you were present and that if you were absent tho' by the Royal Command of your Brother the King yet the People would be ready enough to say you flâ—d for fear and that it was in effect to own your self guilty Such Arguments as these were used by your Conspirators but the Whore Portsmouth
of your Brother's time and in the beginning of your time they were given up to such a secure state and judicial blindness that the Protestant Religion was in greater danger of being supprest than ever it was since the Reformation notwithstanding your Promise of maintaining and preserving it 7. Another Indication of your Care for the maintenance of the Ch. of England was the breaking thro' those Laws which forbid the erecting Churches and Chappels for the exercise of the Popish Religion and also against Monasteries and Convents and more particularly against the Order of the Jesuites for you did contrary to your Oath and Promise made to support the Ch. of England give out arbitrary and illegal Orders to erect Monasteries and in contempt of the Law you set up several Colledges of Jesuites to corrupt the Youth of the Nation Nay Sir that you might not leave your self without Witness of your stedfast Resolution of maintaining supporting and defending the Ch. of England you rais'd up a Jesuite that was in the Popish Plot in which the death of the King your kind and loving Brother was plotted and contriv'd and the subversion of the Government both in Church and State to be a Privy Councillor and a Minister of State By all which you did evidently shew that you were restrain'd by no Laws and therefore the Ch. of England must perish you being so well seconded in your Popish Progress by your most excellent Commissioners of Ecclesiastical Affairs But to conclude this Paragraph how those Villains that acted in that Commission of yours can look Mankind in the Face after they have done so many things against all Law Honour and Conscience I do not understand The truth is those that are yet alive have with the Whore in the Proverbs wiped their Mouths and say They have done no wickedness and without all doubt if they might be trusted would with as great earnestness appear against your Cause and Interest as they did wickedly in your time espouse it but they would be such a Reproach to an honest Government as would render the best and most honest Cause suspicious if engag'd in it IV. I come now to consider a 4th Passage in your Speech to the Council wherein you were pleas'd to say That you had been reported to have been a man for Arbitrary Power but you did assure them that you would preserve the Government in Church and State as by Law establish'd And That you knew that the Laws of England were sufficient to make the King as great a Monarch as he could wish How you preserv'd the Government of the Church is plain enough nothing indeed is more plain than this that you intended its Destruction and utter Subversion and that nothing less would serve your turn notwithstanding its Principles were for Monarchy and its Members had shew'd themselves Loyal Subjects How fared it then with the State Surely the Civil Government was preserv'd since the Laws of England were sufficient to make the King as great a Monarch as he could wish In truth Sir there was but a lamentable account to be given to your more than Glorious Successor of your management of Affairs in the Civil Government all things were out of order at his accession to the Crown which you may have forgotten therefore Sir be pleas'd to remember in the first place your Villains of your Council and of your Ecclesiastical Commission As they were in a Conspiracy against the Ch. of England to turn our Religion into downright Popery so they were in a Conspiracy against the State to turn the well establish'd Government of this Land into downright Slavery and this not secretly as if those Rascals were not asham'd of what they did for they had that matchless Impudence to act in an open and undisguis'd manner and to carry on your villanous purposes you and your Accomplices set up the Dispensing Power by vertue of which you might suspend and dispense with the execution of the Laws at your pleasure and in order to give this devilish Maxim of yours and your Conspirators countenance and credit you so manag'd that matter that you obtain'd an Opinion from the Judges most of which were mercenary Rogues who declar'd their opinion That this Dispensing Power was in the Kings of England as if it were in the power of these Villains to offer up the Laws and Liberties of the whole Nation to your self to be dispos'd of by you arbitrarily at your pleasure and expresly contrary to those Laws that were enacted for the liberty of the Subject In order to obtain this Judgment your Conspirators did before hand examine secretly the Sentiments of the Judges and procur'd such of them as could not in Conscience concur in so villanous an opinion or sentence to be turn'd out and others that had neither Law nor Conscience were substituted in their rooms so that by changing of hands they found out 12 matchless Rogues from whom you obtain'd that wicked Judgment which if my Memory fail me not was laid down in these 5 particulars 1. That the Kings of England are Soveraign Princes 2. That the Laws of England are the King's Laws 3. That it is an inseparable Prerogative of the K. of Engl. to dispense with Penal Laws upon necessity and urgent occasions 4. That the K. is the sole Judge of that necessity 5. That this is not in Trust given to the K. but 't is the ancient Remains of the Crown which ne'r was nor can be taken from him Give me leave Sir to examin these Particulars and let the world see how you were abus'd and how you abus'd the Government by the Opinions of these 12 mercenary Rogues 1. That the Kings of England were Soveraign Princes What then Must you by a Dispensing Power do what you list were you not subject to those Laws which you were sworn to keep And if you had not fled might you not have been call'd to an account Might not the People from whom you deriv'd your Authority have had any Power over you And was it not dangerous both to Church and State to have a Popish Prince so mighty that no Protestant House of Peers or Commons dare controul him Truly Sir I own that the Kings of England are soveraign Princes yet the Nation by their Representatives did ne'r allow the Kings of England to do what 12 mercenary Judges should deliver as their Opinions for Sir it was ne'r intended when you assumed the Government that your Will and Pleasure should stand for a Law for the Laws that support the Grandeur of the Crown limited your Will to Reason and ty'd your Commands to the Word of God the Laws of the Realm and the Weal of the People And since Sir you regarded not these things but follow'd the Sentiments of your corrupt Judges your Will was unlawful and Commands unjust The Kings of England always have been and still are Soveraign Princes but what makes them so Is it not the Law of the Land And
that necessity I never took you so much behind hand in Sense and Reason but that you might plainly see that this is but a bantre of these Rogues for they neither stated the necessity and the urgent occasions you had to forswear your self and never inquired whether any necessity or any urgent occasions could excuse you from lying under the guilt of Perjury Then they came off with an impudent lye and say the King is sole Judge of that necessity He is sole Judge of nothing but what he is intitled to by the Law where the Law makes him a sole Judge there I do and own my self bound to obey him as such But once more Sir Where was this necessity of which you were to be sole Judge When did it spring Out of what part of the World I believe if you could have convinced the Nation of this necessity and these urgent occasions they would not so readily concurred to your going to St. Germains were your Popish Friends oppressed And did the necessity arise from thence If it did Why did you not tell the Parliament of this Oppression Were they in want of Places at Court and Imployments under you which they could not hold Truly a great many Protestants went without them notwithstanding their being qualified Oh! but the Priests of the Church of Rome were in danger of the Law I never could yet see that day If they would be quiet and the Religion of the Church of Rome was your Religion Well if it was Had you not better to have refused the Crown rather than to have taken it with such Incumbrances and Clogs as should expose you to such necessities and urgent occasions of Perjuring your self and Damning your Soul and Ruining of three Kingdoms It was well you were the sole Judge of the necessity for if an honest English Parliament had sat in the time of your necessity and urgent occasions they would have made these Rogues have swung for their villainous Advice 5. That this is not in Trust given to the King but the Antient Remains of the Crown which never was nor can be taken from him you nor no King in England ever had any thing but what you received in Trust from the People of England in Parliament assembled therefore this was the greatest of Impudence that these Twelve ignorant Devils could be guilty of for what Authority Power or Riches have the Kings of England but what they received from the People and it is plain the Power and Authority that you received was for the benefit of the People and not for the ruin and destruction of the Laws you consented to you were intrusted with the Conservation of them not to Suspend or Dispense with them at your will and pleasure But what King of England was there since the pretended Conqest that was not Sworn to keep the Laws and defend the Rights and Liberties of the Church and People of England and who Administred this Oath to them but one or more in the behalf of themselves and all the People of England Your Brother though bad enough took the Government as a trust reposed in him by his good People of England what part was it then that was not a Trust they trusted him with vast sums of money they trusted you but with a very little I pray Sir would your Scoundril Conspirators but tell me what parts were the Remains of the Crown and how they came so to be if they cannot it is all Cheat and Nonsence By your management notwithstanding all that might have been said to the contrary even in your Reign without the danger of being hanged you obtained from your Judges this wicked Opinion I suppose you were not Idle but was resolved to proceed according to this Judgment of theirs for you presently invaded the Liberties both of Church and State I have given you some instances of your Invasion upon the Rights of the People of England in relation to Matters of the Church Now let us proceed to see how you carried your self in reference to the Civil Rights and Liberties of the People of England which brings me to a second Instance of your invading our Civil Rights 2. As your Brother did begin and made a very great Progress in so you went on to invade Priviledges and to seize the Charters of the Towns that had a right to be represented in Parliament and by your Tools procured Surrenders of them to be made to you especially where they were poor and not able to defend them And a Gentleman that valued himself upon his Oath that he had made to a Corporation whereof he was a Magistrate and therefore refused to deliver the same you rewarded him with a two or three years imprisonment and had not God interposed it had been to the ruin of himself his Wife and Children By these Surrenders Sir you caused all the Magistrates to give up their Rights and Priviledges to be disposed of at your pleasure and the pleasure of your Villains the Conspirators and by this means you placed in several of these Towns Popish Magistrates notwithstanding their incapacity or such as were Popishly affected and willing to concur with you in all your evil Designs and Purposes assuring your self that when necessity or your urgent Occasions should force you to call a Parliament you might have such a Parliament returned as should at once set up Popery and Arbitrary Power Nay Sir our danger in your time and in the time of your loving and kind Brother did most and doth still arise from those Beggarly and Paltry Borroughs that either are by Charter or Prescription enabled to send Members to Parliament 3. That you might not fail in the Counties of obtaining your wicked ends you gave Orders to Examin all Lords Lieutenants Deputy Lieutenants Sheriffs Justices of the Peace and all other that were in any Publick Employments if they would Concur with you in the Repealing the Test and Penal Laws and those whose Consciences would not permit them to comply with your wicked Designs and Purposes were turned out and others who you found would be more compliant to you in your intentions in defeating the End and Execution of those Laws which had been made with so much Care and Caution to preserve not only the Protestant Religion but also our Civil Rights and Liberties and into many of those places you put in Papists and other persons of Arbitrary Principles notwithstanding the Law had incapacitated the former and the other for want of Reputation and Interest could do their Country but little Service unless like Devils they could do mischief by serving your Designs and the Purposes of your Conspirators so that this Nation was in a deplorable Condition and must have perished had not God raised up the Prince of Orange now our King to come over and deliver us out of your Hands 4. As your Brother in his time hated the Peoples Petitioning him for the redress of their Grievances and had a
fit to lay you aside as a Person useless and dangerous to the publick Weal of the Three Kingdoms Your Pretences therefore to the Imperial Crown of this Realm are very foolish and frivolous for by the Laws of all Nations you having been guilty of the most notorious Perjury you are therefore Infamous and the Laws of your own Synagogue say that no Infamous Person is fit for the Execution of an Office of Honour and Dignity a perjured Man is always repelled from bearing witness in any Cause whatsoever because that being Convicted to have Forsworn himself in one Cause it is not only a Presumption but a sufficient Proof that he will Depose falsly in another And this is so true that altho he hath amended his Life yet he cannot be admitted for a Witness be it either in a Civil or a Criminal Cause So Sir you having once Forsworn your Self in subverting our Religion Laws and Liberties by the advice of a parcel of Men that feared not God nor reverenced Men How do you think that we can ever trust you again For if the Nation should be brought under such dismal and deplorable Circumstances which God avert as once more to submit to your Administration of the Government it would not only be a strong presumptive Conclusion but Proof that admits of no Objection that you would run again into the same Enormities if not worse for I fear and so do all True Protestants that by your Crew that you have with you you are possessed with strange and very vile Opinions And these are such as have not only in times past but are still entertained by you and your villainous Conspirators both at home and abroad about the Coronation Oath which you took when you entered upon the Administration of the Government of this Realm And they are these Four 1. That Subjects cannot receive an Oath of their Prince without the Authority of some Judge and that a Promise made before no competent Judge can bind any Man much less a Prince and they have affirmed that this was your Case I would have you remember Sir that he that administred you the Oath was a lawful and competent Judge because that Law and the Custom of the Realm had made him so and therefore to him you Swore and in Swearing to him you Swore to the whole Nation that you would defend their Laws and Liberties In a word this Coronation Oath you took was a lawful Oath and not only so but it was lawfully taken as well because general Custom hath the force and strength of a Law for the persons present do stand and are taken by general Custom to have Power to give and receive that Oath But a bold Assertor of your Cause was pleased once to tell me that there was no Parliament in being when you took this Oath What then When you took the Coronation Oath there were persons who upon your taking the Oath that did take the Oath of Fealty and Homage to you in the behalf of themselves and all the Nobility and Commons of England and this Oath must avail them though absent as though they were present and if they were to be bound by the one though absent then certainly you were bound by yours though they were not present 2. These wicked Conspirators of yours have Asserted That Princes being above the Law are not bound to observe Oaths and Contracts which have their full force and strength from the Law and that Princes may alter and change their own Laws at their Pleasure This Doctrine was carefully propogated by your trusty Roger and his inferiour Clergy by your Direction in order to bring about that wicked Design of yours of Subverting of the well established Government of this Realm and introducing French Slavery But Sir this you must now know that the Princes of England are not above the Law and therefore cannot alter them at their Pleasure without the manifest breach of their Coronation Oath I confess they may by their Judges interpret the Law in an Interval of Parliament and in time of Parliaments The Parliament are the best interpreters of the Law and not only so but the Kings of England by and with the advice and consent of Parliament and by the Authority of the same may Repeal and Abrogate Laws as they shall think fit But what you did was against Laws in force to the manifest breach of your Oath and you rendered your self odious to God and dispenced with those Laws that were for the preservation of Persons Honours Estates and Religion of the People of England and by this means you dissolved the Government and for which Cause you were hated of the People and at last the Kingdom departed from you you provoked that God that made you a Man and that People that made you a King But Sir your trusty Guide Hodge with his inferiour Clergy deceived you much and those who believed this Doctrine when they taught that your Oaths made to and contract made with the People of England had their full force and strength from the Law of the Land for they had their strength and force from the Law of Nature which binds Kings Princes Lords Priests and all Men whatever Therefore Sir did you not against the very Laws of Nature break your Contract with the People of England and the Oath you made to them Doth not the Law of Nature oblige all Princes to keep their Contracts even with their Enemies How much more ought you to have kept your Contract with your Friends and People How could you expect to wear the Name of an honest Man since that the Laws of Honesty charge Princes to keep their Oaths and Contracts There is nothing becomes them better nothing commendeth them more and nothing that Men require so much at their hands In the last place Princes Oaths to and Contracts with their Subjects and Allies are as good as Laws they have the same force as Laws they have the same strength and vertue against their Successours which they have against themselves nay let me tell you that they are of greater strength than Princes Laws for Laws may be Repealed but Contracts can never be Revoked and why so The Reason is plain That Laws may alter according to the necessity of Affairs but Contracts and Oaths can never be Revoked they admit of no Change no Alteration if once perfected they can neither receive Addition Substraction Diminution or Enlargement they must not be wrested but taken according to the true meaning of King and People But Sir you may say Why may not Princes break their Oaths and dissolve their Contracts made with their Subjects at their Coronation To this I give you this Answer Before you had Sworn to maintain our Laws Liberties and Religion you were free and before you made a Covenant with us you were at your liberty But when you had Sworn and when you had perfected your Contract then of necessity you were bound to keep and perform
them and you could not have added to or detracted from any thing in such a manner perfected without the consent of the people with whom you made this Contract for we were to have been benefited by this Oath and Contract of yours and not deceived again If Princes may break their Oaths and Contracts made to and with their Subjects How can we deal with such a King How can we tell when we obey We must be then at great uncertainties and so by consequenue we cannot be safe Furthermore Did it not lye at your door to have preserved your self from Scandal and Fraud Of which you took no care therefore you made no Conscience of of your Oaths and Contracts Again Sir we must suppose you to be a reasonable Creature and if so we must also conclude you ought to have submitted to Reason that you might have at least have had the reputation of a Man and not be signalized with the Character of a filthy Monstrous Beast Hence it is that Tyrants in sacred Writ are called Beasts because they will not submit to nor be governed by the Rules of right Reason In the last place Sir other Men may in their Oaths and Contracts have an Eye to their Profit but you ought to have had an Eye to your Honour and to have had an especial regard thereof Now what can be more Dishonourable in a King than to break his Word falsifie his Faith and violate his Contract And was not your Word Faith and Contract confirmed by a solemn Oath 3. There was a third Doctrine that was much promoted by your Conspirators that although Kings should be strictly bound to stand to their Contracts and their Oaths yet if they were induced to make a Contract and to take an Oath in things wherein they were not well informed or if the Contract and Oath do contain things too much derogating or diminishing their Jurisdiction or Authority Royal or if they have made a Promise that may be prejudicial to their Greatness they may then lawfully break their Contract Faith and Oath This Doctrine was very industriously spread about by your Party especially by your Jesuits and your Jesuited Papists and Passive Obedience Men. But certainly Sir your Conspirators represented your understanding to be but of Irish Standard and to be of the same Scantling with their Honesty Give me leave to ask you this one fair Question Was you not well informed what you were to do and what you did promise to do when you took the Coronation Oath to defend the Protestant Religion and preserve and maintain the Laws of the Realm and by them to govern this great People you took the Charge of Can any Man think Sir that you should be the only Man that was Ignorant of that which all the Nation knew and what your Grand-father Father and Brother had done before you Where Sir was the Dishonour or Blemish that might fall upon you if you had kept your Oath and made the Laws of the Land the Rule of your Government If you had been a good King you would have delighted to have been bound by the Laws of the Land and have rejoyced the Hearts of the People of England and then you would not have at this time have been obliged to France for your Subsistance But Sir God in his just Judgment gave you up to believe these lies and therefore you violated those Laws by which you were Sworn to govern to gratifie your Popish Hellborn Crew they have got you to themselves We have a King that thinks it no Blemish to his Regal Authority to maintain and keep our Laws he judges it no Dishonour to preserve the Liberties of his People and their Honours and Estates You have the reward of your Unrighteousness I wish you much Joy of it 4. Some of the Doctors and Casuists of your Synagogue of Rome say that Princes who may dispense with others may give a sufficient Dispensation to themselves and so revoke their Contracts and break their Oaths for that they have Might and Power and Authority there is no Law no Judge that can compel them to keep their Oaths and observe their Contracts It is manifest that you did take upon you to dispense with others and to give your self a Dispensation too and we own that we were not then in a Condition to call you to an Account but you were Admonished very often by the best and greatest of your Subjects to reform all that was amiss But after all this Admonition you did remain incorrigible then what could we do but make your Actions Cruelties and Tyrannies and Perjury known to the World And we implored the Aid and Help not of the French King but William Prince of Orange who came and suppressed you as an incorrigible Oppressor and Tyrant And your Party appearing bare-faced to murther our King and invade the Kingdom with a Foreign Force in order to enslave us will be treated as Villains and Common Rogues and receive the just recompence of Reward for all their Treasonable Conspiracies against our King and the well established Government of the Kingdom and the Protestant Religion To conclude this point How detestable and odious hath your Perjury made you it hath excluded you from that great Honour to which you arrived and it hath removed you from your native Country in a word it hath clothed you with so much infamy that it is impossible for you to attain that Honour Power and Authority and Majesty you have lost And therefore it is highly unreasonable for you or your Conspirators ever to attempt your Restauration 2. As your Perjur is an argument why it is not only impossible for you to be restored and folly for you to attempt it so in the second place we are Protestants And what can a Popish Apostate do at the head of a Protestant Interest The Popish Queen Mary she no sooner obtained the Crown by a Protestant Interest but she destroyed that very Interest by which she was advanced to the Throne This we well remember Sir and we need not burn our Fingers again the third time Suppose Sir that we should have so little sense as to try you once more and should succeed What Monsters must we appear to the World a Body of Protestants with a Popish Head This doth much astonish me that our little Prick-ear'd Priests of the Church of England have so much admired your Cause and pleaded it with such earnestness when as they cannot but conclude that you must of necessity deal by the Church of England as you would with an impudent Harlot Your Brother was careless in the maintenance of our Religion because he was a Papist though a loose one And can we otherwise conclude but you who have at all times and in all places whereever you have come shewed your self a bigotted Papist will not only discountenance the Protestant Religion but destroy it with all that Zeal that is consistent with the Principles of a perverse
Member of the Romish Synagogue You in the time of your short Tyranny made a sad Havock with the Protestant Religion and can we expect better usuage from you seeing you having Seven Devils more within you rageing against the Protestant Interest than you had before you left us What I say to you in this particular I speak not without Witness for it is most certain that you have and do to this very day entertain a very great aversness to any Man that bears the name of a Protestant Therefore since by your late behaviour to those whose Principles have led them to espouse your Interest and have followed you into France if they have any Sense of their English Liberties and of the Protestant Religion will abhor the thoughts of your return hither For if you appear so violent against our Religion now you are under so great an estate of Sufferings What will your declared Hatred be against Protestants here in England if we should admit you to reign over us For if you can presume to that degree of Malice as to deny your Protestant Tools your Grace and Favour at St. Germains What can we that are Protestants expect from you whenever you shall return Do you think that any of us should be so stupid to expect fair Quarter from you since your very Religion lays you under the necessity of Converting us with a Fagot and bringing us to your Obedience with the dint of a Dagger Nay Sir your Passive Obedience Curs fare not much better though they saved you from your being prosecuted for your being deeply interested in the Popish Plot and from being excluded from the Succession to the Imperial Crown of this Realm and also from being beaten out of the Kingdom by the late Duke of MONMOVTH What reason than have we not to believe that you will not only in general invade the Protestant Religion but also once again attempt the depressing the Church of England In your short Reign you sent Seven Bishops to the Tower but if ever you should return I will not excuse the whole Twenty Six from being more hardly used Upon which consideration I will appeal then Sir to your Judgment or the Judgment of your Friends here or those with you at St. Germains whether or no it is impossible for you to gain so great a Point as to be received again as a King And whether it would not be the greatest Folly or Madness in you or any of your Party to attempt it For have you any that are with you that are Protestants upon a Principle of Conscience How have you used and treated them and if they have no better usage from you since they follow you in their Afflictions and are contented to share with you in your Hardships as not to enjoy the Liberty of serving God according to their Dictates of their own Conscience How must it fare with them if you should arrive to that State and Condition in which you should stand in no need of them And if so What can we expect from you that have hated your Person and do hunt down your Cause and Interest out of the Nation Therefore the Duty that we owe to Almighty God and the Affection and Zeal we have for the Protestant Religion will oblige us to pursue you as a Murderer and an Assassin of the People of England and a Traytor to the Nation and those who shall be found fighting under your Banner will be used as Banditti and Robbers and Protestants that shall not have the benefit of Repentance 3. Consider we are English Men and that very Consideration might satisfie any Man that will but consult his Reason of the impossibility of your being restored to your pretended Right and of the folly of your many attempt in order thereunto Had your Interest been an English interest than your Conspirators might have had some colour for their attempt of this Nature but your Interest is a French Interst and therefore your Interest that you have espoused is incompatible or inconsistent with your being restored Here are two Points that must be considered 1. That your Interest is a French Interest 2. That a French Interest is not consistent with your Endeavours after a Restoration and both these Points fairly proved will justifie the refusal of the Kingdom of Englands admitting you to act and execute the Office of a King here again amongst us 1. Your Interest is not an English but a French Interest for as you followed your loving and kind Brother in most of his Vertues so you persued the same Interest that he pursued For was not the Interest of your Brother and the Interest of the French King and yours inseperably united Knowing saith your Quondam Secretary the Interest of our King and in a more particular manner of my immediate Master the Duke and his Most Christian Majesty to be so inseperably united that it was impossible to divide them without destroying them all Again his Majesty the French King was pleased to give Order to signifie to his R. H. my Master that his Majesty was fully satisfied of his R. H's good Intentions towards him and that he esteemed both their Interests but as one and the same and that my Lord Arlington and the Parliament were both looked upon as very unuseful to their Interests And again Father Ferier begged his R. H. to propose to his Most Christian Majesty what he thought necessary for his own Concern and the advantage of Religion and his Majesty would certainly do all that he could to advance both or either of them I communicated it to his R. H. to which his R. H. commanded me to answer as I did the 29th of the same Month. That his R. H. was very sensible of his Most Christian Majesty's Friendship and that he would labour to cultivate it with all the good Offices he was capable of doing his Most Christian Majesty That he was fully convinced that their Interests were both one That my Lord Arlington and the Parliament were not only unuseful but dangerous both to England and France and therefore it was necessary they should do all they could to dissolve it I did communicate this Design of mine to Monsieur Ravigney who agreed with me that it would be the greatest Advantage to his Master to have the Duke's Power and Credit so far Advanced Again If we can advance the Duke's Interest one step forward we shall put him out of the reach of Chance for ever Then would Catholicks be at rest and his Most Christian Majesty's Interest secured with us in England beyond all apprehensions whatsoever Our prevailing in these things would give the greatest blow to the Protestant Religion here that ever it received from his Birth If the Duke should once get above them after all the Tricks they have plaied with him they are not sure he will totally forget the usage he hath had at their Hands For my part saith he I can scarce believe my self awake
or the thing real when I think on a Prince in such an Age as we live in to be converted to such a degree of Zeal and Piety as not to regard any thing in the World in comparison of Christ These are the Discoveries of your Old Servant Mr. Coleman but to rivet the Matter I pray consider what Discoveries you were pleased to make of the Union of your Interest with that of the French King which Sir will put the Matter out of dispute Give me leave to put you in mind of your Letter you wrote to the French King's Confessour wherein you were pleased to own that the Interests of the French King and yours were so clearly linck'd together that those that opposed the one should be looked on as Enemies to the other and that the French King had told you that he was of the Opinion that neither the Lord Arlington nor the Parliament were in his Interest nor yours 2. As it is as clear as the Day that your Interest is not an English but a French Interest so now I must tell you in the second place that your Interest being a French Interest it will render your return impossible and the attempt in order to it very foolish and irrational You know that the English Nation is never safe unless a check be put upon the growing Greatness of France Therefore do but observe the Address of the House of Commons March 10. 1676 they put the King your Brother in mind of the great Danger that the Nation was exposed to by reason of the growth of the French King's Power and Greatness Now any Man that is in the Interest of the French King his Interest is no ways reconcileable to the Interest of England 1. As to its Peace 2. As to its Trade And the Consequence of both these are the Riches of the Nation which must be consumed by a Prince that is of an Interest different from that of the People 't is true the present War with France hath proved very chargable to the Nation but here is our Happiness that we have a King that advanceth the Interest of our Trade his People and He go Hand in Hand Their Interests are the same with His and His the same with Theirs which to me is an Argument that when it shall have pleased God by His Arms to reduce the French King to Reason that then no Nation under the Heavens can or will be more happy than the English Nation But if a Prince shall instead of pursuing the Interest of his People pursue their Destruction by setting up and advancing the Interest of a Foreign Power his Government cannot stand This Sir was that which lost you your Crown And can you then expect by that Interest to regain the Crown of England by which you strangely lost it Therefore to conclude this Head let not your Conspirators think that it is either probable or possible that ever the People of England will ever be brought into a French Interest or ever admit you to resume the Throne and Government since that you purely lost it for the sake of that Interest Your Scoundrel Abettors here at Home are such a sort of Animals that the Reformed Nations Abroad are at a stand and cannot tell what to make of them their Carriages of late Years have been so unaccountable and since it hath pleased God to put it into the Hearts of most of the Princes of Europe though of the Romish Communion heartily to embrace the late Revolution in England as the last Effort for the Common Liberty of Europe and have entered into the strictest Alliance with our King though of a different Religion to support it it looks like a Dream to meet with Men that call themselves English Protestants embarqued in your Interest in opposition to the Interest of their Native Countrey A little Priest of the Church of England in a Sermon of his on the Day your Father made his Exit was pleased to threaten us with an endless War that would be entailed on the Nation he is a mighty Votary for your Cause and Interest notwithstanding his Oath to King William to the contrary But Sir a thousand such Fellows can never reconcile your Interest with that of England nor would your Restoration put an end to his supposed War for it is not reasonable to imagine that so many Noblemen and Gentlemen who have associated and by their Association have engaged to support the Interest and Cause of our King will tamely submit to your Restoration Or that King William will ever abandon his Throne or that its possible that the Common Cause of Europe will ever be suffered to sink in such a manner as to comply with the Pride and Ambition of your Self or of him whose Cause you have espoused and whose Interest is the very same with yours When you were upon the Throne your Aim was to destroy the Interest of England but we have been too many for you and the Throne is filled up with one that will maintain and support our Interest notwithstanding the vain Efforts of your Crew both at Home and Abroad to the contrary And therefore that Loggerhead of a Cathedral Priest hath not made one single Convert to your Cause and Interest by the Noise he made of disputed Titles and endless Wars I will observe this to you that the Rascal hath more Preferment than Learning or Honesty but what can we expect of an Apostate 4. We are Freemen and therefore we can never be supposed ever to admit you who have always been a Person of Arbitrary Principles to govern this Nation You cannot but remember that the English Nation hath a very great Security for its Liberties and that is the Government it self with a good King at the head thereof and that is our present Happiness for our King Rules not upon the same Terms as your Brother of France doth for he by Force Usurps that share which his People ought to have in the Government and for several Ages past hath been in possession of an Arbitrary Power which yet no prescription can make Legal and he exerciseth it over the Persons and Estates of his People in a most Tyrannical manner And this your loving and kind Brother and you aimed at Witness your Dispensing Power that you took upon you when you ascended the Throne But our King hath so ordered it that his Subjects shall retain their Proportion in the Legislature the very meanest Commoner of England is represented in Parliament and is a Party to those Laws by which our King is Sworn to govern himself and his People 'T is true you Swore but you made no Conscience of your Oath nor did you in the least boggle at the Violation of our Laws you hated that way of Government which you had solemnly promised to maintain and defend Witness the Names you used to give the Parliament of England Now according to the Laws of the Realm no Money is raised but by
Hell shall prevail he hath secured us our Liberties Laws and Religion he hath brought himself and Government to that Perfection notwithstanding the vexatious War which lies hard upon us that he is capable of doing good to all Mankind and he hath totally disabled himself from doing hurt to any he wants not the French King's Purse nor his Friendship he wants not his Interest for his Interest is his Peoples and his Peoples his by which they are so united that the attempts of your Scoundrel Crew for your Restoration will be in vain the Hearts of the Nation are set against you and for your perfidious dealing both in Church and State the People of England will trust you no more Sir We have Sworn Allegiance to this King we chose in your stead and we are bound to stand by him our choise of him was from a Principle of Love to God and the Protestant Religion which he hath asserted You kept not your Faith with us and therefore our Allegiance ceased to you your Actions have been very plain and open and so pernitious that it was a Wonder of Wonders thaâ— we and our Religion have been delivered from Blood and Oppression And Sir I would let you know that we are not afraid of you and your Adherents for I believe the Protestant Religion and Protestant King will stand notwithstanding alâ— your Attempts and if you had brought your French Dragooning Apostles oâ—er to us yet we would and should have maintained our Ground and destroyed â—â—em and you We value not your little Two-penny Stuff that you have left â—â—hind you to plead your Cause your impertinent ignorant Non-juring Clergy-men can never preach us out of love to that Loyalty that we owe to K. William â—e have scarce a Williamite Cobler but can baffle them all These things consiâ—ered How can you ever expect any thing less than that Judgment the Psalmist â—rays for to be inflicted upon his Enemies Hath not God already set a wicked Tyrant over you Have you not been Judged by the Lords and Commons of England and Condemned Was not your Reign short And hath not another taken your Office In time Sir the Judgment may be compleated upon you There is of your Issue that have had no Hand in our Miseries and for this Cause our Eyes are set upon them for good and we shall pray for their long Life But as for you that God would cloth you with Shame and Confusion of Face and that he would upon the Head of our Protestant King let the Crown long florish And I do not question but God will hear the Prayers of his Faithful Subjects and will by his means bring the Nation to such a Settlement that our Allegiance will be firm to him and his Successors notwithstanding all those villainous Attempts that you and that Monster of Mankind your Brother of France by his and your Traiterous Accomplices have made to deprive us of so great a Blessing Which brings me to a Sixth Consideration 6. The last Reason I shall give you why it will be impossible for you to return to the Administration of the English Government and that all Attempts of that nature will be in vain because of your late barbarous and villainous Attempt you by your Conspirators have made upon the Person of our King and your purpose of backing that intended Murder by an unnatural Invasion you had some that pittied you but now our Hearts are shut up against you and are hardned against all your Cursed Adherents For now your Plot is discovered and it is a Plot and a Villainous One nothing can be plainer no Man of Common Understanding but must see your Conspiracy to bring in Popery and Slavery and to destroy the Protestant Religion and the Liberties of England We know Sir the Doctrine of your Popish and Non-juring Priests too well and your wicked Practices and we are now assured that you will not stick at any thing that may bring your wicked Designs about You must excuse me if I am plain with you I would not asperse you with hard Words if they were not very true I should not have been so Hot if you had not been concerned in the late wicked Design of murthering our King but if you had succeeded it would have been no more than you did to your Loving and Kind Brother but all this as well as the other is owing to you and your Popish Traiterous Crew who have debauched Mens Understandings overturned all Morals and destroyed all Divinity What shall I say of you and your villainour Party What is your Charity such as to destroy Kings And where was the Humility of insulting over the Nation The Mystery of Iniquity is revealed and you are disappointed The Nation sees that you are no Changeling as to yâ—â—r Vices and you will find that English-men are no Changelings Therefore it wâ—ll be in vain to make any more attempts to be Restored again for the future To conclude this Memorial Sir give me leave to tell you that I have thus fâ—â— laid open the Conspiracy against our Religion and Government and indeed it waâ— more than time it should be discovered for I think here hath been nothing asserteâ— but what hath been and can be made out we see how the French have been courted by you and your Party with what Ease have they been assisted and witâ— what Difficulty the Dutch both in your Brothers and your Reign We see your Brother and you abandon the Prince of Orange now our King in compliance with his and the Nations Enemies How can any Man think upon the French Depredations and Cruelties exercised at Sea upon the Subjects of England without Regret Call to mind your notorious Treacheries in that Affair Remember the constant Irregularities and Injustice from term to term of those who should have administred Justice between King and People Remember the search you made throughout the whole Kingdom to find Men of Arbitrary Principles that would bow the Knee to Baal in order to their being promoted to all publick Commissions and Employments and disgracing and displacing all those that durst in so universal a Depravation be honest and faithful in their Trust and Offices We saw to our great Grief the Defection of considerable Persons both Male and Female to the Popish Religion as if they enter'd by Couples Clean and Unclean into the Ark of that Cursed Synagogue not more in order to their Salvation than for their Temporal Advantage and Safety Sir the State of Ireland managed by your Brother and you would require a Volume to represent it and in your Time we could not but observe that all your Affairs and Councils in the Nation tended to a Popish Revolution And by the Foresight and Civility of the Man of Sin there was an English Cardinal prepared like Cardinal Pool to give us Absolution Benediction and to receive us to the Obedience of the See of Rome It is true your Conspiracy had taken effect had you not met with many Disappointments but the last Disappointment was the overturn of all your Designs at once which was occasioned by the Arrival of the Prince of Orange Guilt made you to flee The Sense the Nation had of your wicked Intentions against our Laws and Liberties caused the People of England to make choice of our Deliverer to reign over us He is anointed our King and as God hath set a Crown of pure Gold upon his Head so we question not but the same God will satisfy him with long Life and Happiness and that he will give him the Spirit of Wisdom Knowledge Zeal and Faithfulness to do what in him lies to the bringing on the New Heavens and the New Earth wherein Righteousness and Peace shall dwell by repairing the Breaches and decayed Places that you have made and caused amongst us And from hence Sir remember that though Hand join in Hand yet the Wicked shall not go unpunished they are Gods own Words who hath also declared with the greatest Solemnity that there shall be no Peace to the Wicked Isa 57.21 You have leisure to consider of these things and so Farewell FINIS
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 OR THE PICTURE OF THE Late King James Drawn to the LIFE In which is made manifest That the whole Course of his Life hath to this day been a continued Conspiracy against the Protestant Religion Laws and Liberties of the Three Kingdoms In a Letter to Himself And humbly Dedicated to the King 's Most Excellent Majesty WILLIAM the Third Our Deliverer and Restorer By TITVS OATES D. D. LONDON Printed for Richard Baldwin near the Oxford-Arms Inn in Warwick-Lane MDCXCVI To His Sacred MAJESTY William the Third By the Grace of GOD of Great Britain France and Ireland KING Defender of the Faith c. GREAT SIR I Have here undertaken to draw the Picture of a Person that once was invested with the Stile Title and Dignity of a King and certainly he might have been the greatest in his time could he but have complied with the ends of his great Office in this Nation to which he was admitted and with the observation of the Laws of the Realm to which he was solemnly Sworn according to the Customs and Constitutions thereof at his Coronation I did never in my whoLe life take him to be the Wisest of Men nor did I believe him to be so much behind-hand in Understanding but that he must needs know That as Government was Originally instituted by the Great God himself and this or that Form of it chosen and submitted to by Men for the Peace Happiness and Security of those who are Governed and not for the private Interest and personal Greatness of them that Rule so that Government hath been always esteemed the best where Supream Magistrates have been invested with the Power and Prerogatives that might capacitate them not only to preserve the People from Violence and Oppression but to promote their Prosperity and yet where nothing was to belong to them by the Rules of the Constitution that might enable them to Injure and Oppress them This unhappy Prince was a long stander by in his Brother's Reign from the Year 1660 to 1685 and Experience and the Informations of wise Men without all doubt taught him That it had been the Glory of England above other Nations and Countries where his Brother and he had Travelled that its King hath had all Intrusted with him that was necessary for the advancing the welfare of the People or for his own Protection in the discharge of his Office and support of his Dignity and Grandure and withal stood so limited and restrained by the Fundamental terms of the Constitution that without the violation of his own Oath as well as the Rules and Measures of the Government he could do them no hurt nor exercise any act of Authority but through the Administration of such hands as stood obnoxious to be Punished in case they Transgressed So that according to the true Primitive frame of the Government the Prerogatives of the Crown and the Rights and Privileges of the Subject were so far from justling one another that the Immunities reserved unto the People tended to render the King Honourable and Great and the Prerogatives settled on the King were in order to the Subjects Protection and Safety Notwithstanding all this it is well known to your Most Excellent Majesty that in the two last Reigns there was a dismal and an unaccountable alteration of the Government attempted by this Prince and his Popish Accomplices and the most excellent Monarchy endeavoured to be changed into an absolute French Tyranny For tho our Religion and Liberties were fenced and hedged about by as many Laws as the Wisdom of Men could devise for our Preservation from Popery and Arbitrary Power yet our Religion was in those unaccountable Reigns Undermined by Popish Counsels and our Privileges ravished from us by the Fraud and Violence of the two last Kings who were in a continued Conspiracy against the Protestant Religion and the Rights of the People of England of which your Majesty may take a full Account in the following Memorial I must confess to Your Majesty that to discant on the Misfortunes of a Person that is fallen from so high a Dignity and is reduced to a State that is next to Death is neither a thing that I coveted or desig'nd tho I was a great Sufferer by him both in his Brother's and his Reign but the Insolency of his wicked Conspirators that are here among us hath so provoked me that I cannot in point of Duty that I owe to God and Your Majesty forbear letting the Nation know what we must trust to if ever that Man should return again and Reign over us This present Conspiracy against Your Majesty and Government hath not only provoked me to publish the Arts and Methods of the late King used for the destruction of our Laws Liberties and Religion in conjunction with the Popish Party but it hath encouraged me to Dedicate the same to your Royal Name and Patronage and to no other because I am well assured it will not only justifie the truth of the Popish Plot for the discovery of which I have undergone a fierce Fiery Tryal out of which I was delivered by Your Majesties coming to Save us when we were even upon the brink of Ruin and Destruction the sense of which hath created in me an undelible Love and Loyalty to Your Majesty and Government and I question not but that Your Majesty will Pardon the Human Frailties that may appear in this Memorial in the manner of my expressing the Truths therein Contained The Villainous Party against whom I now Write have used many Arts and ways to traduce your Majesty and Government meerly because you promote the Grandure of your People and the Ease and Welfare of your Subjects rather than intrench in the least upon any of their Immunities and Privileges some of whom would be thought to be good Protestants but their late Conspiracy to Assassinate Your Majesty shews them to be very Traytors and Rebels to your Majesty and Government and it proves that Party to be obstinately restless and never be brought to Reason by Mercy and Clemency How little therefore these Criminals will deserve from Your Majesty the World will better judge if they will but consider how Graciously Your Majesty hath dealt with them ever since Your happy Accession to the Imperial Crown of this Realm to the very day that their wicked Purposes were discovered to Your Majesty I have seen some of the very same Spirit caressed by some that were about You whist your real hearty Friends were Slighted and Abandoned Nay I shall be so plain to say with truth that your Majesty hazarded the Hearts and Affections of your best Subjects and much of your Royal Honour in conniving at the Carriages of these Men though with frustration to win and oblige if possible these everlasting holy Cut-throats But Sir what Arguments of Clemency and Grace can persuade such Men to be true to your Majesty their Rightful and Lawful King maintaining the Laws and
Liberties of your Subjects since they profess an Allegiance out of Conscience to a contrary Sovereign who destroy'd our Laws and Liberties and made them sharers in his many Designs and Conspiracies against us Or how can your Majesty expect Truth and Sincerity from these Conspirators where Treason and Lies are Virtues and Merits You have in this Tract many Tragical Instances within fresh Memory of their Wicked Purposes and Designs look back but to the beginning of your Majesties Reign since which time your Majesty cannot but remember how many Proofs they have given out of their own Mouths of their more than Villainous Disaffection to your Majesty and Government and Trayterous Intentions against your Royal Person both at Home and Abroad nay before your happy Accession to the Throne I may without offence to your Majesty take notice to you of your being abandoned by King Charles in Compliance with the French King at the Instigation of the then Duke of York and his Popish Adherents and not only so but your Ruin and Destruction when you only had the Title of Prince of Orange was designed by the Popish Party my Affection and Respects to you then though wholly a Stranger to your Person made me then discover the Conspiracy against you but none of the Council took any notice of what related to your Self but Prince Rupert and the Earl of Arlington and another considerable Peer who I suppose did transmit the same to you when in Holland But blessed be God your Majesty as a Monument of the Mercies of the most High is once more delivered out of their Hands and in your Deliverance we that have Espoused you are delivered and we question not but you will remember to distinguish between those that have testified their Sincere Loyalty to your Majesty and those that have openly appeared Traytors to your Royal Person and Government and question not Great Sir but that God who hath now so Miraculously delivered you and in whose hand are the Hearts of all Kings and Princes will fully Convince your Majesty of all the unworthy Principles of your secret Enemies and of my Integrity too how strange soever they have endeavour'd to represent me to your Majesty till then with all Patience and Humility I shall commend my Cause to the All-seeing Judge with a Resolution to persevere through his Assistance in my Truth Integrity and Loyalty against all Discouragements or Terrors or Neglects or Blandishments either to my last gasp What Peace can these Brutes have in their Souls and Consciences that do surrender their Liberties and Religion to the Mercy of a Person that would have inslaved them and being through the Mercy of God to us driven out from these Kingdoms for his Tyranny he neither can nor will he own them if he were to return It is strange to any thinking Man that of these Conspirators who profess the Protestant Religion that they should not consider the whole Series or Course of Life of that pretended King for whom they venture Body and Soul hath been a continued Conspiracy against them and their Religion Why should they not sit down and consider his Contriving the Burning of London his instigating a Confederacy with France and two ungodly Wars with Holland his fomenting the Popish Plot and contriving the Murther of Justice Godfrey to stifle it his forging of Treason against Protestants and suborning Witnesses to swear the Patriots of our Religion and Liberties out of their Lives his hiring execrable Villains to Assassinate and Murther the Great Earl of Essex and causing several others to be clandestinely Murthered in hopes to conceal it his advising and procuring the Prorogation and Dissolution of Parliaments in order to prevent inquiry into his Crimes so that he might escape the Justice of the Nation Why should not these Protestant Professors remember his Poysoning the King his Brother in order to his Invading the Throne his Murdering Algernoon Sydney Esq upon the Deposition of one scandalous Witness and the cutting off the late Loyal and Brave Lord Russel and Murdering him for Crimes alledged against him in reference to which if all had been Truth which was sworn against him yet there was nothing that according to Law could have reached his Life Give me leave Great Sir to acquaint your Majesty that none murmured more against the Proceedings of the late King than the Protestant Jacobites did I can remember how confounded they were when he began his Reign with a bare-fac'd avowing himself of the Romish Religion and calling into the Nation a multitude of Priests and Jesuits and empowered them to Exercise their Idolatries Nay who were so much concern'd as some of these Men and in my own hearing have owned that he was ill advised to trample upon those Laws which concern our Property seeing that by two Proclamations whereof the one required the Collecting of the Customs and the other the continuing the Excise which was to expire at King Charles's Death he violently and against all the Laws of the Land broke in upon the Estates of many of the People of England and they did own that the seven or eight suborn'd and forsworn Judges that countenanc'd him in doing so vile a Thing ought to have been hanged and they have often said that if he proceeded thus he would soon bring the Kingdom about his Ears and he must take it for his pains How can these Men look Mankind in the Face who have been in a barbarous Conspiracy for the restoring of a King that had thus acted in oppressing his People and for the Murdering of your Majesties Person that had delivered the Nation from these Oppressions When I reflect upon the Reign of that late King I cannot but be filled with the greatest Horror to think that there should be a number of Men left in England that should so much as attempt his Restoration when they well knew that he had precluded his Subjects of all hopes of Redress in Westminster-Hall and deprived us of all Succour where our Ancestors found it I thought that all Men would have joined with your Majesty to have declared the late King James a Tyrant Traytor and Murderer and all that did adhere to him should have been treated as Banditti and Freebooters and not as Gentlemen and English Men but instead of this that in the compass of seven Years behold two or three Conspiracies against your Majesties Person and Government detected and proved and yet these People will scarce so much as blush at the self-contradicting Carriage of themselves and Party Some of these Protestant Jacobites have been at St. Germains and then they must Experience the late King's usage of his Protestant Friends there and if a certain Writer may be depended upon their usage is hard and severe first he denied them a Protestant Chappel and Chaplain nay if a Protestant be any thing zealous for his Religion they want not Irish Papists to swear a Plot upon them and so they are confined
notwithstanding their Quality and the signal Services performed for their pretended King Many Instances might be given of this nature and a reasonable Man might have judged that the many Instances of those Slights and Contempts that have been put upon them should have convinced them of the Folly and Madness of any of those that pretend to the Protestant Religion and Church of England who should Espouse the Cause of a Man that hates their Religion and Liberties Can they think that the present Misfortunes that the late King James lies under would if he should be re-invested with Power frighten him to alter his Measures and Resolutions of invading our Laws and Liberties for time to come seeing that neither the abandoning of Wives Children and Estates nor the hazarding nay loss of Life in his Service can render him just and favourable to those Protestants who have made a Sacrifice of all these things to follow him and yet that these Men should be found in so Villanous a Conspiracy to Murder him that delivered the Nation What Tongue can speak for such brutish and sensless Wretches I must leave to the Judgments of wiser Men than my self And what can they expect from a Man whose Father's Misfortunes his Brothers Exile wherein he himself was a sharer have not wrought a Reformation in him Can we expect that ever he will be more cautious of violating our Laws intrenching upon our Liberties or subverting our Religion or that ever he will be made more pliable For if he denies Men that have followed him into France the Exercise of their Religion what hopes have they of obtaining and enjoying it whenever he shall return Nay what then must your Majesties Protestant Subjects expect who have renounced him and associated to defend your Majesty as our Lawful and Rightful King against this pretended King and all his Wicked and Trayterous Adherents But Sir give me leave a little further to plead with your Majesty concerning these People that certainly never give themselves leisure to think I am sure no Man in his right Wits but must judge it the highest degree of Stupidity and Folly that these very Men should expect good Terms from a Person who doth not only treat his Protestant Adherents very ill who have followed him in his Misfortunes but also whose Religion lays him under the necessity of using them thus What Obligations did our Church lay upon him when he was a Subject Did she not like a Prostitute save him from being Prosecuted for the Popish Plot and from being Excluded from the Succession to the Crown Who were so Hot in that point on his behalf as the then Prelates in the House of Peers and afterwards from being driven out of the Kingdom by the late Duke of Monmouth yet all those Obligations were of no more value with him than his Coronation-Oath which he violated without the least regret and spared not to invade the Protestant Religion in general but the Liberties of the Church of England in particular What wicked Traytors are these wretched Men that shall assist the Popish Party in their attempts to pervert the Church and to bring that about in effect which even to mention makes every Loyal Subject of your Majesties to tremble For certainly had these Conspirators been all of them avowed Papists your Majesties Person and Government had not been in that danger but some of them that have undertaken this Horrid Design are such as lye under no Temptations of Religion Men thought to be secure that these now the Mystery of Iniquity is revealed are found Men obliged by all the Sacred Ties of Malice and Ambition to assist in the advancing your Majesties Ruin and the Ruin of the three Kingdoms and much better qualified than others under the Name of Good Church of England Men nay Preachers of Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance will not be shut out of this Hellish Conspiracy for Wranglers but will have a hand against your Majesty's Person rather than so Eminent a piece of Service shall go unperfected Give me leave therefore Sir with the greatest Duty and Submission to observe to your most Excellent Majesty the Excellency of that Religion they would subvert by shewing the Vileness of that they would introduce and the happy Government they would destroy in the attempt they have made upon your Majesty's Person These Conspirators that say they are Protestants cannot but own that we are exceeding happy in relation to our Religion since by your Majesty's happy Accession to the Throne that we are once more freed from the Romish Yoke which so great a part of Europe do yet draw and labour under that Popery is such a thing as cannot but for want of a Word to express it be called Religion nor is it to be mentioned with that Civility which is otherwise decent to be used in speaking of Differences of Humane Opinion about Divine Matters were it open Judaism or plain Turcism or honest Paganism there is yet a certain Bonafides in the most extravagant Belief and the Sincerity of an Erroneous Profession may render it more pardonable But this Popery is a Compound of all the three an Extract of whatsoever is most Ridiculous and Impious in them incorporated with more peculiar Absurdities of its own in which those were deficient and all this deliberately contrived and knowingly carried on by the Rascally and Villainous Clergy under the Name of Christianity The Wisdom of this fifth Religion in this last and most Insolent Attempt upon the Credulity and Conspiracy against the Liberty of Mankind seems to all Understanding Men principally to have consisted in their owning the Scriptures to be the Word of God and the Rule of Faith and Manners but wickedly prohibiting at the same time their common Use or the Reading of them by those of their Communion there being no better or more rational way to frustrate the very design of our Lord Jesus Christ who first planted by the miraculous Power and extraordinary Gifts of the Holy-Ghost than to forbid the use of them in such a Language as the People could understand for having the Scripture which by all Christians are avowed to be of Divine Authority but appointing it to remain in such hands as were intrusted to undertake and carry on their holy Cheat they had the Opportunity to vitiate suppress or interpret to their own advantage for the support of their Villainous Priestcraft those admirable Evidences by which the common People hold their Salvation and they having by this Fraud gained their Point there was from that time nothing so monstrous to Reason and so abhorring from Morality or so contrary to Scripture which they might not in prudence venture on The Idolatry of Adoring and praying to Saints and Angels and worshipping Pictures Images and incredible Miracles and palpable Fables to promote that Veneration The whole Liturgy and Worship of the blessed Virgin the saying of Pater Nosters and Creeds the Honour of Saints and Ave-Maries too not to her
Qualities than Popery The Pagans are excusable by their natural Darkness without Revelation The Jews are tolerable who see not beyond the Old-Testament Mahomet was so honest as to own what he would be at That he himself was the greatest Prophet and that his was a Religion of the Sword So that these were all as I may say of another Allegiance if they were Enemies yet they were not Traytors But the Romish Beast avowing Christianity by Profession doth in Doctrin and Practice renounce it and presumeing to be the only Catholick doth presume to prosecute those to death who dare Worship the Author of their Religion instead of his pretended Vicegerent And yet there is nothing more manifest notwithstanding all his most notorious Forgeries and falsifications of all Writers than that the Prelate of Rome was for several hundreds of Years an honest Bishop as other Men are and never so much as dreamed of the Seven Hills of that Universal Power which he is now come to Nay he was the first that opposed that Pretension But some of them at last growing Wiser by foisting a Counterfeit Donation of Constantine and wresting another Donation from our Saviour advancing themselves in a Weak Ignorant and Credulous Age to that Temporal and Spiritual Principality that they are now seized of Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church Of this I may say to your Majesty That never was a Bishoprick and a Text of Scripture so Improved by good Management thus by exercising in the quality of Christ's Vicar the Publick Function under an invisible Prince the Pope like the Maiors of the Palace hath set his Master aside and delivered the power over to a new Line of Papal Succession But who can unless wilfully be ignorant what wretched doings what Bribery what Ambitions there are how long the Church is without a Head upon every Vacancy till among the filthy Crew of bandying Cardinals the Holy Ghost hath declared for a Pope of the French or Spanish Faction Surely Sir your Majesty will judge it one of the greatest Miracles of the Synagogue of Rome that it should still continue and that in all this time the Gates of Heaven should not prevail against it Give me leave Great Sir to observe to your Majesty that it is almost inconceivable how Princes can yet suffer a Power so pernicious and Doctrins so destructive to all Government that so great a part of the Land should be alienated and condemned to Pious Uses as they call it That so many Thousands of the People that are Clergy should by remaining unmarried either frustrate Humane Nature if they live chastly or if otherwise adulterate it that they should be privileged from all Labour and publick Service and exempt from the power of all Secular Jurisdiction that they being all bound by strict Oaths and Vows of Obedience to the Pope should evacuate the Fealty that is due to the Sovereign nay that not only the Clergy but the Laity too if of the Cursed Communion of that Synagogue should be obliged at any time to Rebel at the Pope's pleasure And yet how many of the Neighbouring Princes are content or do choose to Reign upon those Conditions which being so dishonourable and dangerous surely some great and weighty Reason does cause them to submit to whether it be out of personal Fear having heard perhaps of several attempts which the blind Obedience of Popish Zealots hath executed against the Princes or whether aiming at a more absolute and tyrannical Government they think it still to be the Case of an Usurping Emperor and an Usurping Bishop and that this as other Cheats is to be managed by Confederacy But Sir as far as I can apprehend there is more of Sloth than of Policy on the Princes side in this whole matter and all that pretence of enslaving Men by the assistance of Religion is neither more nor less than when the Bramine by having the first Night of the Bride assures himself of her Devotion for the future and makes her more fit for the Husband This Reflection upon the state of our Neighbours in respect to Religion doth sufficiently illustrate our Happiness we enjoy by your Majesties Accession to the Crown of ours Therefore it spares me the labour of describing it further than by the rule of Contraries our Religion and Interest standing upon all points in a direct Opposition to the above-mentioned Errors our Doctrin being true to the Principles of the first Institution of Christ the Ministry being formed upon the Primitive Model and no Ecclesiastical Power justling with the Civil but all concurring in the Common Obedience to the chief Magistrate Nor therefore is there any whether Prince or Nation that can at this time with less probability be reduced back to the Romish Communion than the Protestant Interest here in England For if we respect our Obedience to God what appearance is there that after so durable and general enlightning of our Minds with the sacred Truth of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ we should again put out our own Eyes to wander through the palpable Darkness of that Gross Superstition But for as much as many Men are less concern'd for their Interest in Heaven than on Earth this seeming the nearer and more certain also on this account our Alteration from the Protestant Religion is the more inconsistent with temporal Advantage when besides the common ill Examples and Consequences observable Abroad whereby we might grow wise at the Expence of our Neighbours we cannot but reflect upon our own Experiments at Home which would make even Fools docible The whole Reign of Queen Mary the First in which the Papists made Fuel of the Protestants the Excommunicating and Deprivation of Queen Elizabeth by the Pope pursued by so many Treasons and Attempts upon her Person by her own Subjects and the Invasion of Eighty-Eight by the Spaniard The two Breves of the Pope in order to exclude King James the First from the Succession to the Crown seconded by the Gunpowder-Treason In the time of K. Charles the first besides what they contributed to the Civil Wars in England the Rebellion and Horrid Massacre in Ireland which ended in the Ruin and Destruction of the Person and Government of that King In the time of King Charles the Second we saw several visible Effects of the same Spirit as the Firing of London the Popish Design carried on against the Person and Government of that King not that he was a Protestant but because he came not up to the Measures of the Jesuits and his Brother the late King James But as for him his whole Life was nothing else but a Contrivance or a Plot against our Religion Laws and Liberties But this Horrid Conspiracy against your Majesty's Person and Government being so happily discovered we cannot but hope that the Discovery of such a tremendous Villany will so rivet the Protestant Interest and Religion that it shall stand so sure that
the Gates of Hell and Rome shall not prevail against it 'T is true Sir before the Discovery of the Popish Plot in the time of King Charles the Second many loose People some also of Note were perverted to the Church of Rome but when that Villany was detected then a Check was put for a time to the Popish Parties making such a number of Converts till the Priests saw that King Charles the Second did not Prosecute the Discovery of that Conspiracy he being in every part and particular thereof but that of his own Life then they let loose their Seducers who were not only incouraged but also recompensed for such a piece of Treachery But when the late King invaded the Crown then large steps were taken to ruin the People and to Pox them in their Religion Upon your Majesties Landing in the Year 1688 the Keeper of the Prison of the King's-Bench gave me some liberty and I went amongst some of the most substantial of my Friends who did inform me under what a Consternation our Great Conspirators were and how ready they were to have given up all their Ill-gotten Estates by which they had been enabled to prosecute the wicked Designs of the late King to subvert our most Excellent Religion and none of us did question but that they would have been called to an account for all those trayterous Devices of theirs of this I am sure they would have given up their All to have saved their Lives But your Majesty being resolved not to begin your Reign with Blood was inclined not to make any severe Examples of these Men which a thinking Man might judge would lay such an Obligation upon them all of Gratitude and Obedience to your Majesty and Government nay these above-named fresh Instances of the Papal Tyranny in Religion might have been enough to have cautioned the Kingdom from giving them little hopes of being able of being brought to restore King James who was so bigotted to the Arbitrary Proceedings of the Romish Synagogue our Noble-men some of them had a great part of Church Lands in their hands our Clergy-men great Preferments all which must have gone notwithstanding their Zeal for the Divine Right of Succession and Passive Obedience and Non-resistence Therefore the Consideration of Temporal Interest one would have thought might have gone a great way to have engaged them to be true to their own Cause and Quarrel In a word a Man that observed the Insolencies of the Popish Party against those Prelates that were committed to the Tower would have made them for ever to have declared an everlasting War against that Party of Red-letter'd Men and heartily have come into your Majesties Interest in order to have secured our Liberties Properties and Religion But to conclude this Head the Excellency of that Religion of which some of the Conspirators had made a Profession since they were English that had Bodies Souls and Estates to save and found your Majesty resolved if they had pleased to save all they upon the score of your Royal Grace and Mercy to them shewed at the beginning of your Reign and continued Clemency would have invited to have joined in with your Majesty to have preserved that Religion they profess and not in stead of that to have attempted the Murther of your Person and the Invasion of your Realm with a Foreign Power in order to restore an Abdicated King who hates their Religion and will violate their Liberties I come Sir now to observe to your Majesty the Excellency of this Civil Government which these Conspirators would change into Slavery The Kings of England Rule not upon the same Terms with those of our Neighbour Nations who having by Force or by Fraud Usurped that due share which their Subjects had in the Government are now for some Ages past in Possession of an Arbitrary Power which yet no Presciption can make legal and Excercise it over their Persons and Estates in a most Tyrannical Manner but here in England the Subjects do retain their Proportion in the Legislature and the very meanest Commoner of England is represented in Parliament and is a Party to those Laws by which the Prince is sworn to Govern himself and his Subjects No Mony is to be levied but by common Consent no Man is for Life Limb or Goods or Liberty at the discretion of the Supream Magistrate but we have the same Right modestly understood to our Property that the Prince hath to his Regality In all Cases where the King is concerned we have our just Remedy as against any private Person in the Neighborhood in the Courts of Westminster-Hall or in the High-Court of Parliament his very Prerogative is no more than what the Law hath determined His Great Seal which is the Stamp of his Legitimate Pleasure yet is no longer current than upon the tryal it is found legal he cannot commit any Person by his particular Warrant he cannot himself be Witness in any Cause the ballance of Publick Justice being so delicate that not the Head only but even the Breath of the Prince would turn the Scale nothing is to be left to the King's Will but all is subjected to his Authority by which it follows that he can do no wrong nor receive wrong and a King of England keeping these measures may without Arrogance be said to remain the only Intelligent Ruler over a Rational People in recompence therefore and acknowledgment of so good a Government under his Influence his Person is most Sacred and Inviolable and whatever Excesses are committed against so high a Trust nothing of them is imputed to him as being free from the necessity or temptation but his Ministers only are accountable for all and must answer it at their Perils He hath a vast Revenue constantly arising from the Sweat of the Labourers and the Rent of the Farmer and the Industry of the Merchant and consequently out of the Estate of the Gentleman a large competence to defray the ordinary Charge of the Crown and maintain its Grandure and Lustre and if any extraordinary occasion happen or be but with any probable descency pretended the whole Land at whatsoever season of the Year doth yield them a plentiful Harvest So forward are the People to give that a Foreigner would think that they could neither will nor chuse but that the asking of a Supply was a meer piece of Formality the People of England being so ready to give it The King of England is the Fountain of Honour and hath the distribution of so many profitable Offices of the Houshold of the Revenue of State of Law of Religion of the Navy and when it is necessary that the King hath an Army he disposeth of a multitude of Military Offices that it seems as if this Nation had scarce Men of Abilities to supply all these Employments So that the Kings of England are nothing inferior to other Princes saving in being abridged in injuring their own Subjects but have as large
a Field as any of external Felicity wherein to exercise their own Virtue and to reward and encourage it in others In a word your Majesty hath enlarged our Liberties in consenting to the Bill to Regulate Tryals in Cases of High-Treason in which there are large Immunities granted to any that fall under that black Circumstance that their Lives may not be at the mercy of a Mercenary Judge or Judges if God should in his Judgment leave poor England to such Men But your Majesty hath begun and I question not but your Royal inclination will carry you on to compleat our security from such Vermin Therefore to conclude what a Government is this we enjoy than which nothing can come nearer the Divine Perfection The Monarch enjoys a capacity of doing all the good imaginable to Mankind but under a disability of doing any thing that is Evil. This Scheme of the Civil Government the Late King did well know and therefore in Council on the day of his Accession to the Crown he was pleased to say That the Laws of England were sufficient to make the King of England as great a Monarch as he could wish or desire so that your Majesty may see that he could own that the Greatness of the English Monarchy had its Birth and rise from the Laws Who then would have lessened himself as he did by breaking in upon those very Laws that had made him Great And who would have broken so excellent a Government as made him Secure and Happy And what Subject of England Papist or Protestant that would lose such Immunities and Privileges by joyning in with that unhappy Man to destroy themselves Were they so in love with King James that they were not satisfied till they had him Nay he and they waded through King Charles's Blood that he might Reign Why then did they not keep the terms of the Government which would have been the most effectual way of continuing him on the Throne Besides all this we cannot forget that the Parliaments under Queen Elizabeth King James King Charles the First and King Charles the Second made it Treason in whosoever that should attempt to Seduce any one of the meanest of your Majesty's Subjects to the Church of Rome And the Long Parliament held in the time of Charles the Second to all Penalties of the Statute Law added an incapacity for any Man to say that that King was a Papist or an introducer of Popery What Lawless and incapable Miscreants were these What wicked Traytors were those Men who did indeavour to pervert the whole Body of Protestants and to bring that about in effect which even to mention was penal at one Italian stroke attempting to subvert the Government and Religion to kill the Body and damn the Soul of the Nation Your Majesty finds to this day there are such a Set of Men in this Nation who have undertaken and have made it their business under your Majesties happy legal and perfect Government by the intended destruction of your Royal Person to introduce a French Slavery and instead of so pure a Religion that your Majesty ventured hard to preserve to establish the Roman Idolatry either of which Crimes are of the highest nature for if we look upon the Government if the Murther of your Royal Person be a fact so horrid as no Man can find words enough to declare his detestation and abhorrence of it how much more then is the Murther of your Royal Person with an intent to Assassinate the Kingdom And Sir none will deny but that to alter the Monarchy of these Kingdoms into a Republick is High Treason So by the same fundamental Rule the Crime is no less to Murther your Royal Person in order to make the Monarchy Absolute Sir I beg your Majesty's leave to tell you that my Heart is much enlarged to your Majesty I beseech your Majesty that your Royal Heart may be for this one time enlarged to me in your Grace and Pardon for this trouble I now give your most excellent Majesty Let me undertake upon serious inquiry to give your Majesty some satisfaction who these Men are that have from the Year 1660 to this day attempted to Subvert our Government and our Religion Had these Men been the old honest Cavaleers that fought for Charles the I. or suffered much in the time of Charles II. it would have been allowable in them as oft as their Wound did break out at Spring or Fall to think of a more Arbitrary Government as a sovereign Balsom for their Aches or to imagin that no Weapon-Salve but that of the Moss that Grows on an Enemies Skull could cure them or could they to have kept their Hands in ure have fought their Cause over again since they saw they were neglected and left to Starve yet their Age and times they lived in and their unjust usage they met with from two Kings might have pleaded something on their behalf in mitigation of Damages But Sir give me leave to make this Remark to your Majesty concerning those Gentlemen that they were and are still if any of them remain too Generous too good Christians and Subjects too affectionate to the English legal Government to be capable of such an Impression whereas these Conspirators that carried on the design of subverting our Religion into Popery and changing the Government into downright Slavery are such as have not one drop of Cavaleer Blood or no Bowels at least of a Cavaleer in them but such as starved the Cavaleers to revel and surfeit upon their Calamities making their Persons and the very Cause by pretending to it themselves almost Ridiculous Or had these Villains been all of the Popish communion and avowed so to be give me leave to say it over again to your Majesty your danger would have been the less their Religion would in some measure have been answerable for the Errors and Extravgancies they might have been guilty of to promote it but these render their intended Villany more black they were Protestants and of the Church of England too that joyned with Papists to Assassinate your Royal Person What can any Man say for them Your Majesty knows what to do with them These Villains because I perceive they lye under a great difficulty to find Accomplices enough at home to Mutiny and Rebel and Murther your Majesties true and loyal Subjects therefore they put themselves under the Banner and Pay of the French King to compleat their wicked designs and purposes to bring a foreign Enemy to Invade us that King being endowed with all those which in a French Prince or in an Abdicated King may pass for Vertues but in any private Man they would be Capital and moreover so abounding in Zeal for Popery and Slavery above all other Princes that none else could engage both Body and Soul in such a Villanous Undertaking to which Consideration adding that their Interests are both one and the one is and the other would be the Master of
absolute Dominion and both are inveterate Enemies to your Majesty and this Protestant Kingdom and the French King is in all respects the most likely to support maintain and uphold them in those Attempts they being so exactly suitable to the inclinations of his Soul yea and of the Late King's Soul too notwithstanding your Majesty's being his Nephew and Son-in-Law into the bargain Sir these Conspirators have made it their business to asperse your Majesty's Government because of the great Taxes that are upon the Nation but I never find them to take notice of the Treasure that K. Charles II. wasted It 's true he was engaged in two most impious Wars against the Dutch and these Wars were very chargable to the Nation But besides those two Wars he spent abundance upon his Whores Pimps and Bauds under the notion of secret Service and yet we find nothing to be said of that Our Taxes are greater than ever the Nation paid but your Majesty's Loyal Subjects do not believe them so heavy but that they can and will hold it out many Years In a word there are none that retain their Loyalty and Duty to your Majesty but are highly pleased with your Majesty's being fully supplied to carry on so necessary a War and there is no good Man but will rather hazard his Person to keep the Enemy abroad than see either a French or Irish Army within your Kingdom of England destroying our Substance burning our Habitations and committing those Barbarities that were done in the Palatinate by the one or in Ireland in 41 by the other so that your Majesty may see that we that are English Men are not so much concerned at our Taxes as at the imminent Dangers your Majesty is daily exposed to both at home and abroad And being more confident than perhaps becomes me to judge the thoughts of Men I believe the Conspirators are more concerned that your Majesty is yet in the Land of the Living than at any of these Taxes of which I suppose their proportion is but small But your Majesty is not the first and only Prince that Fugitive Conspirators have traduced as these have filled the Ears of the French King and the Late King with monstrous Stories of your Majesty's Oppressing the Nation with unheard of Taxes thereby insinuating to him and his chargeable Guess how easy it would be to reduce the Nation that they might have farther opportunity of revelling and surfeiting upon his Treasure So the Fugitive Conspirators in the time of Q. Elizabeth were perpetually whispering in the Ears of the then King of Spain with prodigious Stories as false as Hell thereby to Exasperate that then great and Powerful Monarch against the Kingdom and did disparage the Forces of the said Queen and the posture and conduct of her Affairs in order to make him believe that the Conquest of England to be a matter of no great difficulty They did calumniate that Queen's Justice and blamed her proceedings against Seminaries and Romish Priests and for having a jealous eye upon those of their Communion for receiving those Priests and Jesuits thus sent into this Realm to seduce her Subjects and to withdraw them from their Obedience but our Conspirators could not traduce your Majesty or blacken your Government with those Points none might have been more easie and quiet under your happy Government than they if their Villainous Principles would have suffer'd them and not only so but they might have had Preferments too whilst poor Sufferers and your hearty Friends were Starving had not their damnable Insolencies and implacable hatred of your Majesty's Person and the welfare of the Kingdom been an obstacle in their way but that which I shall observe to your Majesty that they traduced that Queen with overcharging her Subjects with heavy and unaccustomed Taxes But it was then well known that no Prince could maintain such a Fleet at Sea and such an Army at Land without great Expence and Charge for her main end was to prevent a Foreign Invasion by which that wise Queen certainly knew would be more Expensive and Chargeable to the Nation than a Maintenance of a Force at Sea and Land would be to prevent it It is not unknown that your Majesties Prudence and Conduct hath appeared that tho your Majesty found the Nation in a Lamentable Condition the Trade Sunk Liberties Seized the People in a Ferment the Ensigns of the many Murders committed in the Reign of the Late King upon the Gates of the City and upon your Majesty's accession to the Throne a necessary War to be commenced yet the Trade hath in some measure been preserved Liberties restored the condition of the Nation much mended and like to be more and more improved both as to its Honour and Interest the People Quieted and Reprizals about to be made for the Murder of our Friends Your Majesty hath Reigned now Seven Years and never raised one Penny without the consent of Parliament and by the Authority of the same and the Late King had not Reigned seven Hours but he Levied Mony without Parliament But I would fain have these Fugitive Cut-throats that envy and malign your Majesty's easie Government to compare the necessities of Queen Elizabeth with the urgent occasion your Majesty hath of greater Taxes than ever that Princes could pretend to for it is most plain beyond all contradiction First that Wars are now more chargeable in this Age than in that which she Reigned Then it is plain your Majesty hath had but little or no Assistance the Dutch excepted from any Protestant Prince or any other Prince of the Confederacy but you have been rather necessitated to help them in the last place your Majesty hath every year of your Reign been obliged to have great Forces both at Sea and Land the Charges of your Majesties Predecessors have been for the most part Voluntary their Soldiers fought upon these Terms no Purchase no Pay and therefore the Subjects were not so much burthened by Foreign Wars but they went forth to Conquer Now its plain that for a King to defend his own Realm and the Liberties thereof is more Expensive than to Conquer other Princes Countries for the Conqueror would always pay himself and Army in his new Conquest But Sir that which is a wonder to me is this that they should complain to King Lewis and King James of the greatness of the Taxes here caâ—â—hey think that although he should comply with them once more to Invade us yet at the same time to charge your Majesty with that thing as a high Crime must be an unmannerly Charge since the French King himself doth the same every Year by his own Arbitrary Despotick Power that your Majesty hath only done by the Advice and Consent and Authority of a dutiful and loyal Parliament But truly Sir I must here acquaint your Majesty that some People have condemned the French King and King James too for giving Credit to these Conspirators for first they
ought to have considered That none of the vain Pamphlets that either Ferguson or L'Estrange or any of that rascally Crew ever writ were ever able to shake the natural and dutiful Affections of our English Nation to your Majesty and of this I am sure they have had sufficient Experience In the next place many of these Conspirators are Priests and Jesuits more fit to manage a Pen than a Launce to dispute of Philosophy than to discourse of War to have a low opinion of their own Parts than to be prodigal in their Assurance and let them say no more than what is true and judge that to be the great truth that is best made out In the last Place if that those have not been of the Tribe of Levi yet then they have been Fellows of desperate Fortunes which they are ambitious to advance by Lies and the ruin of their Country I do not wonder why they traduce and asperse your Majesty's Government for they are and have been for many Years plotting your Ruin and Destrâ—â—tion both before and since you were our King and the business is plain that they can never hurt your Person till they have destroyed your Interest and have withdrawn a considerable Party from your Majesty by which they may make a Stand then they may possibly if not discovered make an attempt upon your Person which they cannot do till your Interest is destroyed by their many traiterous Aspersions and they believed thrown upon your Majesty Nay tho King Charles the Second did comply with them in many things yet because he did not comply in every thing they spared not him but made it their business to traduce him it is true his Government was Censurable because he complied not with the Terms and preserved not the fundamental Constitutions of an English Monarchy therefore his Government was exposed to the Censure of some that opposed even his proceedings when they had liberty as they were Members of Parliament for they had just Ground to believe that he closed with the French Interest against that of his own Kingdom and with the Popish Party in order to betray the Protestant Interest both at Home and Abroad and the Conspirators they let lose their Tongues against him because he was not wholly theirs but ever and anon gave them the slip by which they were disappointed in their Designs therefore in a Letter of theirs to their Party in Scotland they plainly say That he was so addicted to his Pleasure that he was not fit to Govern and in another Letter they charge him with unsteadiness in his Resolutions as to Religion and when they had a design to hasten his Exit then they charge him with all the Falseness and Vileness that might be imagined to be in the worst of Men so that your Majesty is not the only Prince that these Miscreants have Traduced And truly it filled me with great Horror when I saw their Industry in dispersing their filthy and scandalous Libels against your Majesty and Government it being the method of those Men first to beget a disaffection in your Subjects against your Majesty if it were possible that your Destruction might be the more easily accomplish'd by them but your Majesty hath been very happy for nothing these Villains could either Write or Speak ever made the least impression upon the Hearts of your Loving Subjects but on the other hand it filled them with Zeal against that party of Men especially since they were so highly sensible of that Grace and Clemency by which their Lives had been continued to them for we all know that this was not the first Conspiracy that they have been engaged in against your Majesty I pray God it may be the last Give me leave to put your Majesty in mind of a Passage in one of Mr. Coleman's Letters to the French King's Confessor which is this he saith there The Design prospered so well that he doubted not but the Business would be manaaged to the utter ruin of the Protestant Party So the design of these Cut-throats prospered so well that they did not doubt but that in a little time their Business would be managed to the Destruction of your Majesty and your Protestant Subjects for they carried on one Design to Murder your Person and another to Invade your Kingdoms with a Foreign Force and they were much in the right for it would have been impossible for them to have Restored the Late King by an Invasion and to have set up Popery and Slavery without destroying a Protestant King and the Protestant Interest in England All good Protestants I hope will find to their great Satisfaction that these Traitors have brought Destruction upon themselves and their Party and that not a Man of them shall Escape for your Majesty's Proceedings with such will be as quick as their Gunpowder and much more effectual So that your humble Subjects may rejoice in your Majesties Justice upon these Men since Grace and Clemency could not Reform them Sir I was a Discoverer of a Conspiracy carried on by the Popish Party for the Destruction of King Charles the Second and your Majesty when Prince of Orange and for the Subversion of the Government and the Protestant Religion in England and all over Europe but it was my Misfortune to discover a Conspiracy to a King that was engaged in every part thereof but that of his own Life and I met with such Opposition from the then Duke of York and his Conspirators that it was scarce possible for me to have withstood it had not I had a more than an ordinary Presence of Mind to have supported me This Sir I say was my Case yet notwithstanding all the Opposition I met with all I gave the Popish Party such a deadly Wound that they could not be cured of it no not in the Reign of the late King though they had all the Incouragement that Men could have because the Villany of that Party of Men stuck so upon the Minds of the People of England that no Stone was left unturn'd to rid our Hands of them and their Popish King which was effectually done when your Majesty undertook and compleated the Deliverance of this poor bleeding Nation Many Men have wondered that the late King when he was Duke of York should have such an Ascendency over his Brother King Charles the Second since it is well known that when King Charles was upon his return Home to enjoy his Crown that the Duke of York with the Queen Mother was in a Conspiracy to have destroy'd King Charles to the end that he the said Duke of York might have return'd Home and enjoy'd the Crown himself the Lord Arlington discover'd the same and so the design was baffled yet no Man was so much in favour as the Duke of York and as a Testimony of the King's Grace and Favour He was made Lord High Admiral of England and held that Office till he openly refused the subscribing the Test
Life Then they procured King Charles to take away my Maintenance and Protection and this angry Duke he Sued me for charging him to be reconciled to the Church of Rome and then Suborned Witnesses against me and procured me in his Brother's Reign to be Indicted of two pretended Perjuries but he being impatient in his Expectation he snatched the Crown from his Brother's Head and mounted the Throne and then he and his Popish Witnesses his Packt Juries and Impudent Lawless Senseless and Mercinary Judges compleated my Ruin and I must have been destroyed had not God by your Majesty's coming to England rescued me beyond all Expectation Give me leave Sir with the humblest Submission to your Majesty to observe that where there is a Subject of such Credit with the King of such Authority with the Court and such Power in every County of the Kingdom as the Duke of York had when he was a Subject and to have such an Interest in the Church and Civil Government and Military Employments and Naval Preferments Could it be possibly hard or difficult for him to insult over and suppress those Truths I then Revealed for the service and preservation of the Religion Laws and Liberties of my Native Country against him and his numerous Party And how much more was it easie for him to destroy me when he had the Crown it self upon his own Head But above all Great Sir how can it be that such a Subject perverted to such a Villainous Religion should not be most dangerous to his Prince and Country And to what a lamentable State and Condition he brought it when he had Possession your Majesty well knows It was therefore high time for the Protestants of this Kingdom to implore your Majesties Aid and Help in that Hour of Distress that the Nation was brought to by that unhappy Person and his wicked Accomplices and blessed be God for putting it into your Royal Heart to come over to us and to bring along with you a Force sufficient to defend your Person from him and his Conspirators and tho he and they would have insinuated that your Majesty came to Conquer us and Enslave us and notwithstanding the villainous Scribling of some that would to this day assert your Majesty's Title to be by Conquest We that are Protestants do from the bottom of our Hearts believe That your Majesty had no other design in your Royal Undertaking but to procure a settlement of Religion Liberty and Property of the People of this Nation on so sure a Foundation that there might be no danger of this Nation 's Relapsing into the like Miseries at any time hereafter And for the Justice of your Cause your Majesty may appeal to God and to all Protestant Kings Princes States and People in bringing a Force sufficient to suppress the Conspirators and their damnable hellish Conspiracy And with the like Justice your Majesty then might require and adjure all English Protestants to assist you against those Enemies of God his Christ his Gospel and the Rights of this Nation and Liberties of Mankind And your Majesty might with the like Justice have Punished those as Banditi and Free-booters and common Rogues and Traytors to their Country that should have appeared to Oppose your Majesty in so Glorious a Work you had undertaken for the Rescuing three Kingdoms out of the Jaws of Hell Rome and France Since God engaged me in asserting the Laws and Liberties of England and the Protestant Religion and in discovering the Malicious and Hellish Designs of the Popish Party against us the Opposition of that Party and the Passive-Obedience and Non-Resistance Clergy-men grew strong and thick upon me and how those Varlets run in with the Popish Party together with their Guide Sir Roger L'Estrange to decry the discovery of the Popish Plot and would to this day decry by the very same Method they then used the present Discovery of this Hellish Design against your Majesty's Royal Person and the Religion and Government of this Nation if they had but hopes to go off with Impunity and by your Majesty's leave I dear challenge any of these Men to tell me what particular there was by me discovered that did not in process of time come to pass It will be to tedious to recite all particulars of the discovery of the Popish Plot that did come to pass and from the dismal and sad Consequences of that Conspiracy your Majesty under God hath delivered us or else these Villainous Traytors would insult and ask why and to what end your Majesty exposed your Royal Person in your late Glorious Undertaking in the Year 1688 The evil usage I have had from our Popish high Church Non-juring Conspirators hath so hardened and inured me to suffering that I praise God who hath taught me some weak Rudiments of his heavenly Art of drawing Light out of Darkness for mine own use I have not been trampled upon for so many Years to so little purpose as to remain yet either ignorant or insensible of mine own Vileness and to what Element I am nearest allied or so tender or querulous as either to complain of the weight of those who still go over me as the Stones in the Street or to project the suffering of any Man in order to please or solace my self my long Deprivation and want of respects from some that should have treated me as a Christian a Gentleman and a Presbyter of the Church of God is now turn'd into an Athletique habit some what after the manner of those who through long Fasting lose their Appetites and withall either Contract or find an Ability or Contentedness of Nature to live with a little or no Meat afterwards I can through the Strength of Christ suffer my self to be oppressed and from my poor Dunghil whereon I sit behold both Friends and Enemies that with much Contentment and sufficient Enjoyment of my self partaking of the good Things of this Life the more because that God still preserves your Royal Person from the Attempts that the Trayterous Conspirators have so often made to destroy You and the Nation from the intended Invasion by our implacable Enemies that would destroy and enslave us Next to Christ and this Truth I shall with the utmost Breath and Power I have according to my Oath and Duty in what Place and Station soever I am endeavour to be found Loyal and True to your Majesty as my Rightful and Lawful Sovereign Lord and King as all good Subjects and Christians ought to be and I cannot forbear out of the great and sincere Zeal and Affection that I bear to your Majesty bless God for the great Concord there is between your Majesty and Protestant Subjects which your Majesty hath found to have turn'd to a good account to your Ease Comfort and Peace in the managing your Affairs of Government both in Church and State and it is a great Comfort to your good People to see your Majesty relying upon your two Houses
your self in a different stile In some of your Papers you write your Heart and Soul in words at length and not in figures then it 's your pleasure that we are to know to what we are to trust when ever you shall return to your Native Countrey and enjoy your pretended Right Sometimes you intimate as if England were to be the Field of Blood and that Man Woman and Child should be a Sacrifice to your Revenge which made your little scoundrel Party here to prick up their Ears and look as if a Leg or an Arm were not sufficient to appease your Wrath or a Carts Arse or a Pillory could not make satisfaction to your self and Party for the wrong you and your Friends have suffered from us nothing less than death and damnation of the Honest Nobility Gentry and Commons of England can attone for the delivering themselves from your Tyranny and the Oppression they suffered from you and you Insolent Party Nay the poor Fishermen men of Feversham must not escape your Fury and Vengeance But in your latter Papers you are pleased to express your self in softer terms and the Vengeance threatned in one Year's Papers is hushed up and fairly laid to sleep and I remember in the last you are pleased to give us a French Grimass and smile upon us as if you were made up of nothing but Grace Mercy and Peace and unparallell'd Humility in order to create in us a good thought of the bitterness of death being past notwithstanding you have in some of your former Papers given us to understand That in regard you have sustained such Affronts from the People of England you might justly have proceeded severely with us yet in your younger Papers you think fit by a more gentle Method to use means to regain us to your self which is the first Born of all the Cunning you and your Friends at St. Germains have been pleased to bless this Nation withal But Sir it hath been your will and pleasure not to give your self the trouble of emitting any more Declarations of your good Intentions towards us for these two or three Years last past therefore I do think fit to acquaint you and your Trusty Friends and Councellors at your Court at St. Germains that are now with you for I understand some of your old Partisans have sometime since left you that you must have but a very mean and low opinion of the English Nation if you think ever to return hither again upon the strength of your last Bantering Paper called A Gracious Declaration to all your loving Subjects For the People of England have not forgot but very well remember That for divers Years in the Reign of King Charles the Second your dear Brother that there was a horrid Design carried on by him your self and your Party to change the Lawful Government of England into an Absolute Tyranny and to convert the Established Protestant Religion into down-right Popery than both which there can be nothing more destructive and contrary to the Law and well-being of this Nation And whilst you your self was pleased to usurp the Throne these Three Kingdoms were highly sensible with what violence you and your wicked Party overthrew our Laws Liberties and Religion and what Ruin and Vengeance attended these poor Nations notwithstanding all your Oaths and Promises made to the contrary in Council and in a Packt Parliament that met in May 1685. which as bad as it was it could not keep pace with you and your Popish Cut-throats in your Intentions of enslaving the People of these Kingdoms and of totally overturning our Laws Liberties and Religion Before I begin my designed Method of laying before you yours and the Practices of your Accomplices to put you in mind of some Passages in your Brother's Reign of which the Parliaments of England had just cause to complain as worthy of your Consideration and when they did address they found it was to very little or no purpose for no redress could be obtained from him And by whose Advice and Counsel such Misdemeanors were committed your self can best tell that it was your self King Charles the Second was no sooner restored but contrary to the Expectation of all those good men that were the Instruments of his Restauration they found to their sorrow 1. That Justice was corruptly administred and Offices appertaining to Justice dearly bought and sold 2. Benefices and Ecclesiastical Dignities unworthily collated upon Men that deserved no other Titles than of common Rogues and Cheats Men that were many of them unskilful in the Word of Righteousness and others that were Persons of unsound Principles and of worse Morals their Doctrines tending highly to enslave the Nation and their Morals to debauch it This was the Advice of an old Friend of yours and a great-Prop of the Church of Rome Cardinal Mazarine whose Counsel and Advice it was To debauch the Kingdom of England and make them Atheists and then they would be soon good Papists This was in the Year 1654. at which time you and your Party were but at a low ebb but how much you pursued the Counsel of the old Cardinal I leave all reasonable and unbyassed Men to judge and how your sneaking Eccleastical Parasites contributed towards it It is plain enough to any man that will look back into those Times There was one Jones your Chaplain who you ruined because he would have contributed to the advancing the Protestant Religion in your Family according to his Office and Calling of a Minister in the Church of God You may remember by whom Bishopricks and other Ecclesiastical Dignities were thus procured truly by your Popish self and Popish Whores Popish Pimps and Popish Bowds and not without Money or some Promise to favour your Catholick Designs and how they suffered your quondam Consort to apostatize to the Church of Rome it is well known But they poor Prelates are gone to their Places and there let them remain till God shall reckon with them and others of that Oorder for betraying of God's Cause which they pretended to espouse tho in truth they were Enemies to him and his Gospel 3. In the third place They saw new Impositions daily invented and levied and the Publick Treasure of the Nation and the Revenues prodigally consum'd Sir you know how 200000 l. was spent and in order to what and the Parties that receiv'd the same were in a Conspiracy against our Laws Liberties and Religion And did not you your self join in the wasting of the King's Treasure and procured great Summs of Money to be issued out of His Majesty's Exchequer to keep your Priests Jesuits Monks and to find your Irish Officers with Subsistence-money till that you should have occasion to make use of them for those Ends and Purposes that might advance your Cause and wicked Purposes against the English Interest and the Protestant Religion Well therefore might you in your Speech to the Council Feb. 6. 1684. call Charles the Second your
kind and loving Brother for he joined with you in those wicked Designs and Purposes which you were carrying on to destroy and enslave us and too often took your Faults upon himself to screen you from the publick Justice of the Nation 4. They saw old Officers unjustly displaced and men of base Quality unworthily advanced by which Contrivance you Sir may very well remember you created a great disaffection in the King 's best Friends both of the old Nobility and Gentry and others that had espoused the King your Brother's Quarrel upon just English Principles and chose rather to advance a parcel of base Irish Papists and vile Frenchmen to the great discouragement of the English and those that heartily would have served the King your Brother upon English Protestant Principles It is well known that some of those you preferred were so insolent that when they came to have and enjoy great Places in the Ministry of King Charles the Second's Government that they assumed to themselves by your direction the Regal Power treating in Matters of War and Peace with Foreign Ministers and Ambassadors giving Instructions to the said King Charles's Ministers abroad without communicating them to those that ought to have been privy to the same contrary to Law and all this I can prove hath been done by your direction How many honest Old Servants were displaced by the influence you had on the King your Brother some are yet alive to tell especially those who were well affected to the Protestant Religion and in Parliament had appeared for the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom in opposition to Popery and Slavery 5. They saw King Charles the Second carried away with Vanities and wholly governed by his Whores You may remember that some of those Whores you your self put upon him as Jenny Roberts who was in part kept by you as a Spy upon him and for this end at your Command she turned Papist and when she could be of no use to you nor was constant to King Charles you and he put her off and left her to starve Cleveland and Porismouth two Metropolitan Whores that governed him as they pleased and what Sums of Money through the ascendency they had over him they obtained from him I shall not need to tell you and how many Bishopricks they disposed of we have not forgotten And in all this Sir it is plain you promoted them to advance your Cause and Interest 6. He entred into a League with England's mortaâ— Enemies the French and such strong Alliances were made with that Savage Prince and Nimrod of Europe by which means we were hurt in our Trade and impaired in our Riches and Greatness and to effect this Work what Arts and Contrivances you and your Conspirators did use by introducing French Whores French Fashions and Customs and French Officers and French Servants whom we have nourished and cherished with all the Caresses imaginable and to the meanest Valet de chamber or Contemptible Lacquey or Fidler who pretended to be but alamode de France your Parasites paid more respect to than to our brave Englishmen nay so amorous too had your fine but debauched Ladies been of a French Kick shaw that they have even hugged them in their very Bosoms and have lamented the loss tho but of the meanest French Skips witness the Tears that fell from divers great Personages of the Feminine Sex that on their Knees made supplication for that insipid High way-man Du Vall who at last though with great difficulty was hanged at Tyburn for Robberies committed on the Highway It is true he was a man of excellent Parts and singular Learning only he could neither Write nor Read But had this been all I should not have mentioned this Particular There wae more in this then some unthinking men at that time were aware of for you and your Accomplices made further steps to maintain this strong Alliance with the French our mortal Enemies for you did not only introduce the Modes and Customs of France amongst us but the Yoke of France that must be put on too I have heard of a cer certain Knight called Sir James that in a Coffe-house was heard to say That it would never be well in England till our King was as Absolute as the King of France He was an Alderman of London and Sir your very humble Admirer and at that time you had made a very gracious promise to him of obtaining of your Brother the great Park near Dublin for him for the great Services he had done your self and the French Interest And truly Sir he hath deserved that Boon at your hands were it but for the aforesaid wise Saying of his and had that Rascal had but Brains suitable to his Impudence a man might easily have taken him for one of the Chief of the Conspirators with your self against the Religion Laws and Liberties of the People of England This Fellow I say was an Alderman of London and his Residence was in the City but by his Discourse a man would have sworn he had always lived with your Conspirators at St. James's or at Whitehall or with the French Taylor an old Companion of yours who thanked God That his great King of France could send for his Head and his Estate when he pleased Blessed be God Sir your Residence is in that sweet place of St. Germains where you enjoy your self and Friends in a most comfortable manner and you have your health as well as if you had 100 Sail of Ships at your Devotion and an Army of 50000 men which is a mercy I pray let me ask you What sort of People are your French Neighbours Is there not such a slavish temper in those poor Wretches as is astonishing Just to such a slavish and knavish Temper you were about to bring the People of this Nation to your Conspirators had made a considerable progress in this mighty Work and had not Divine Providence interposed you had compleated the same Your Party to compleat this Work found out the only true way which was first to enslave our Souls by subjecting them and our Reason to the blind Superstition of the Church for that Priest craft having once so far won upon Englishmen as to make them trust and pin their Faith and Reason upon their Sleeves they may after that bring them to any thing that they shall direct and therefore as in your Day so in all Ages heretofore nothing did shew more the Cunning of your Banditti than to drive on these two together Popery and Slavery only sometimes they have driven on the one by the other sometimes Popery led the Van to bring on French Slavery and sometimes French Slavery led the Van to bring on Popery Your Friends well knew that Popery and Slavery like two Sisters they go hand in hand sometimes one goes first and sometimes the other In England your Council resolved that Popery was to bring in Slavery in Scotland Slavery was to have brought in
Popery and this was done by our Priests blind admonition to the people of obedience to our Governors be it good they command or be it evil whatever they command it must be obeyed And what Nation soever came under the misfortune of being robb'd of their Rights and Liberties it was chiefly brought to pass by Priest-craft in preaching up blind obedience and extolling Vicious Kings and calling them excellent tho the vilest of Tyrants who were riding Post to swallow them up This was the Practice of our Pulpit-hunters in the time of the Reign of your Brother and in the beginning of your Usurpation of the Government and so they would have done to this day had not the Tythe-pig been in danger Nothing I say contributed more to the confirming and establishing the late King your Brother's Alliances with France as that progress your Priests and Jesuits made in perverting the people as to their Religion and our Ecclesiastical Brokers debauching their Morals by their immorality and looseness of living and enslaving their minds by their damnable Doctrines of Passive Obedience and Non-resistance and the Divine Right of Succession to the Imperial Crown of the Realm 7. He being fully resolved to follow his Pleasure he left the Administration of the Three Kingdoms to your self and Cut-throat Party who were Enemies to the people of England and were in a damnable Conspiracy against his person and Government and the Protestant Religion That he was resolved upon his Pleasures you nor no man can deny and that you had the ascendency of him it is too plain and manifest to admit of the least doubt or scruple But that which was most wicked you kept him plied with those vile Wretches who promoted that Vice in him And tho he was the vilest of all the Kings that went before for his many Immoralities yet how did his Ecclesiastical Parasites flatter him and admire him as a Prince of the greatest Virtues a King of Peace they called him and a King of Righteousness I am sure he engaged the Government in two unjust Wars against the Dutch and thanks be to God he was by them worsted in both those Wars and it proved fatal to the Conspirators for the great Design of ruining the Dutch was the advancement of Popery and Arbitrary Power here in England which you durst not attempt till they were weakened you fearing their joining their Forces together to rescue us from your damnable Designs against our Religion Laws and Liberties as you know they did and that to very good purpose the effects of which will not be gotten out of your old Bones as long as you live Before I conclude this Head give me leave Sir to observe that whilst the King your Brother was swallowed up in his Pleasures you and your Minions did make it your business to beget in the people a low opinion of the method of Governing and by your Priests you taking opportunity by reason of our then villanous Caterpillars of the Church countenancing it in a very high manner to beget in the people a mean opinion of the Protestant Religion and Interest and you may remember you gained not a few to your Party Therefore when we consider our danger we cannot but be astonished at our deliverance For had your Banditti been avowed Papists our danger might more easily have been conquered for some nay the most of them when the Test came in force quitted their Imployment at Court amongst them Sir your sweet self quitted the Office and Title of Lord High Admiral of England but Sir you had gotten a Crew about you that did undertake with you to ruin and destroy the Government which lay under no temptation of Religion these joined their Forces and Interest against King and Kingdom and truly I think our greatest danger was from them You having this fair opportunity of your Brother's being so addicted to his Pleasures and he leaving the Administration of Affairs to you and your Hellborn Crew it was a great wonder you did not strike sooner and leap into the Chair an Age or two before the time you did It 's certain you came not in without Murther and Murther would have been but Murther if it had been done ten or a dozen years before Truly tho you had Villains that one would have thought were bad enough yet you had not enough for so black a Design as the overthrow of the Government and the Protestant Religion they were not I say ripe enough your Popish Party at home were keen enough but they wanted a good back to their edge therefore Sir you fearing your strength at home you applied you self abroad to the French King he being indowed with all those Qualities which in a Prince may pass for Vertues but in any man of a private Station they would be capital He being a Champion for Popery and Arbitrary Power with him you joined to ruin the Government and the Protestant Religion your damnable Conspiracy being a Project every way suitable to the Inclination and Interest of that Bloody Monster of Mankind You may remember the Trayterous Correspondencies you maintained with him and he with you by your most Excellent Secretary Coleman who you honestly left to be hanged for that great piece of secret Service he did you in that time 8. We well remember how careless he was in the maintenance of our Religion Truly when Princes are given up to their Pleasures it is no great matter what Religion they profess you may well call to mind what breaches you and your Party made upon our Religion through his carelesness and remisness how you advanced the Popish Interest and discountenanced the Protestants and as your Secretary Coleman observed that you would not forget the Tricks the Parliament of England had playd with you so we cannot but remember what Tricks you plaid with us for it is plain that there was not a considerable Preferment in the Church that fell but either he that was preferred was one of no Religion or else that which was worse he was a person that engaged in your unrighteous Cause and Quarrel Sir by your means and the means of your Partisans such men were made use of in the Church that through the ignorance and insufficiency of some of them and oscitancy and remisness of others to whom the Guardianship of her was committed our Religion and Worship became lamentably dismantled misfigured and defaced and this well nigh in all the integral and principal parts of it more or less insomuch that a man that understands the Doctrines and holy Intentions of our first Reformers from the Synagogue of Rome and shall compare things with things could nor yet can hardly be able to say this is the Protestant Religion But how can any man wonder that King Charles the Second should be careless in the support and maintenance of our Reformed Religion since that he was in his heart and soul engaged to the Doctrines and Communion of the Church of Rome
excuse is that upon his return he was made a Secretary of State by your procurement for such a set of Devilish Services that he had done for the French King the King your Brother and your self by this means he had made a Tripple Confederacy to ruin us in opposition to a Tripple League that might have preserved us and all Europe in perfect peace If my poor Judgment might pass Mr. Conventry if he had continued an honest Gentleman he might have been an Instrument of good to Europe and more honourable here at home But this Gentleman was not the only Sinner that was imployed in the Devil's Service for Sir William Lockyard and several others were dispatched to other Courts upon the same Errand This Lockyard was grown as great a Villain as your heart and soul could desire and had in the basest manner prostituted himself to do your Popish Drudgery and would have gone along with it to the utmost tedder of your Designs Well then what was next to be done Your Designs looked with as fair an aspect as your heart and soul could desire You had France your Brother and your self linked together that a man would have thought you could not have been parted what then is the next Intention truly a War with the Dutch and that you might reasonably expect for all your Affairs were disposed towards it Here Sir I must remind you of two things 1. What you did to procure a War 2. What you did to carry on that second wicked War 1. What you and your Conspirators did to procure a War with the Dutch For it cannot be conceived that after the King had made so firm a League with the States-General of the Vnited Provinces but that therefore you and your Councellors must have some fair Pretence for breaking with them or else to spill so much Blood and spend so much Treasure without cause must occasion your Neighbours to think you were men that would keep no Faith or that you did not understand your own Interest nay they must have thought the same of all the English Nation but that they well knew that this second as well as the first War was against the Judgment and Genius and Interest of the Nation in general But a War you would have And therefore 1. You set up a Si quis if any one could give Evidence for you and the rest of the Conspirators against the Dutch let them come forth and they should be heard therefore an O yes was made and the East-India Company was sent for to know what they had to say against the Dutch but the Dutch had so punctually performed the Treaty at Breda and especially as to the honour of the Flag that nothing could be objected against them so here you failed of your aims of picking a quarrel with them 2. You would have quarrelled with them for having their Fleet abroad tho that Objection vanished their Fleet was upon their own Coasts pursuant to the Tripple League and in prosecution of that Treaty so Sir you failed here But what then you was resolved upon a War and therefore you would not leave one Stone unturned but you would find some cause or another to ruin if it had been in your power that Protestant State 3. You were put upon a third Experiment to commence a War and to make a Case which never happened before or could have been imagined by any sober man you had a pimping Yatcht which you caused to bear an English Jack in the Month of August 1671. which you ordered to sail into the midst of the Dutch Fleet and singled out the Admiral and shot twice at him which Action was certainly very ridiculous and unnatural as for a Lark to adventure upon a Hawk Notwithstanding this impudent Action of the Commander of the Scoundrel Boat the Admiral in respect to his Majesty's Colours paid our Yatch-Admiral a visit to know the reason of such a Carriage found it was because the Dutch had refused to strike Sail to his little Bum-boat the Dutch Admiral excused the matter with all the civility that could be desired it being a Case of the first impression and therefore he could have no Instructions as to that Point and therefore as it became him he promised he would acquaint his Masters in the Affair and take their directions and so they parted and the noble Commander with his Oyster Boat returned being fraught with the Quarrel for which he was sent which yet was for some time passed over here in silence without any complaint or demand of satisfaction but your Conspirators were resolved to improve it afterwards When the Conspiracy against those Protestant States was ready to take effect then this Point began to be debated and a reason for the intended wicked War The Conspirators assigned the Dutch had not vailed their Bonnets to the English Dung-boat it carrying the King 's most Excellent Jack tho it is plain the Dutch had all along both at home and here as carefully endeavoured to give as the Conspirators that were Ministers to avoid the receiving all manner of satisfaction Nay our Villains would not so much as let the States-General know what would be received and owned as satisfaction nay they were so afraid that the Dutch would comply in the business of the Flag and by that means the Rogues should be disappointed of a hopeful War the Clock was set forward some minutes so that by their roguery they did happily obtain a War And what joy there was at St. James's and amongst your Priests some of whom were so drunk that the news they wrote of this Breach with the Dutch in their Letters could not be read And it 's well known that upon the arrival of the News Te Deum was sung very devoutly at the Queen's Chappel at St. James's and Money ordered by the Queen for to be distributed to poor Catholicks a token of Joy and Thanksgiving 4. Pictures and Medals This was another Pretence which you and your Banditti took up to commence a War against the Dutch but your Conspirators handled this Point very nicely fearing the Dutch should give them satisfaction in this very Point and thereby prevent a War It is very plain that the Dutch were not conscious to themselves of any Provocation given to England but did solemnly protest That if any provocation were given by them nay they went so far that they were ready to make satisfaction for Offences taken the English should make their Demands You Sir and the rest of the Conspirators against the Protestant Religion do accuse them of these Medals and Pictures what then Must you have a War I confess I have read of a Poet by a dash of his Pen was the Cause of a War against Poland but that Sir was the first time that ever a Painter could by the stroke of his Pencil occasion the breach of so considerable a League as was made with the Dutch 5. To fill up the measure of the
Commons still had an evil Eye upon the Conspirators and got eight New Regiments to be disbanded that as the Exchequer had been shut up London might not be plundred and the Citizens might not be Dragooned out of their Estates Liberties and Religion all at once Upon this Peace being concluded with the Dutch oh what complaining Letters did you send to your Friends at St. Omers charging the King your Brother with the greatest breach of Promises and Oaths made to Madam the Princess and also Letters were sent to Doway to the Monks there yet assuring them you would never leave the Cause so for you still hoped that his Most Christian Majesty would do the work and ruin the Dutch States that they might not be a Nest for Rebels and Hereticks I was saying just now How could King Charles answer the Cancelling the Declaration of Indulgence and the passing the Test-Bill to Lewis his great Ally But now Sir I much more wonder how he could answer to that King his Concluding a Peace with the States-General of the Vnited Provinces for this seemed to me and many others the greatest Riddle how this would stand with the Holy League that he had made with that King to root out Heresy and to set up Popery for could we have but ruined the Dutch the work had been done to all intents and purposes Your Party well knew that Charles your self and the then Lords of the Admiratly fell under the displeasure of the French King by consent and since you could not humble the Dutch how willingly you condescended that the High and Mighty Monarch of France should have the humbling of the English Nation for by your Advice and Procurement it was agreed That he should let loose his Privateers among our Merchant-men so that from that time there was no security of Commerce and Navigation notwithstanding the publick Amity that was between the two Crowns but at Sea they murthered plundered made Prize and confiscated those they met with their Pyrats laid before the Mouths of our Rivers hovered all along upon our Coasts took our Ships in the very Ports insomuch that we in a manner were blockt up by Water and if any made application at his Sovereign Port for Justice they were insolently baffled if not cruelly beaten This you know and the Nation well knew that Charles your self and the Admiralty were Accomplices in this matter and that it did turn to a good account to the Conspirators as can be made appear even Sir to your face at St. Germains And this way of using the Nation continued till the latter end of the Year 1676. even from our concluding the Peace with the States-General of the Vnited Provinces Was this all No this way of Pyrating was only a mark of his Most Christian Majesty's Displeasure It was no reparation for our good King Charles's not keeping his word with him therefore all diligence was used to supply him with Recruits and those who would go voluntarily over were incouraged others that would not were pressed imprisoned and carried over by main force even as the Parliament here was ready to set down notwithstanding all the former frequent Applications to the contrary Nay yet further How did you empty all the Magazines of the Kingdom to furnish the French with all sorts of Ammunition of which Sir a particular Account was taken and can be given if demanded It is Sir well known that King Charles having broken the Tripple League and made a War upon the Dutch without Cause and had made Peace with them he would never enter into a League Offensive and Defensive with them yet he could make one with the French tho he had taken the Kingdom 's Money to enter into an actual War Nay that Conspirator Conventry had the League Offensive and Defensive made with the French King in his Pocket when the House of Commons voted the Money for an actual War with France It may be Sir you may say that King Charles did make an Alliance with Holland and the Articles of the League were on April 30. 1678. laid before the House by the King 's especial direction It may be so But will your Party call that a League Offensive and Defensive fit for a Parliament of England to agree to No for see how the House resented that Sham-League and to this end observe their Vote May the 4th 1678. Resolved That the League Offensive and Defensive with the States-General of the United Provinces with the Articles relating thereunto are not pursuant to the Addresses of this House nor consistent with the Good and Safety of the Kingdom That was one Resolve But there was a second Resolution of the House upon the same day Resolved That it is the Opinion of this House That His Majesty be humbly advised and desired forthwith to enter into the present Alliances and Confederations with the Emperor the King of Spain and with the States-General of the United Provinces for the vigorous carrying on the War against the French King and for the good and safety of His Majesty's Kingdoms and particularly That effectual Endeavours be used for continuing the States-General in the present Confederation And that it be agreed by all Parties Confederate to prohibit all Trade between their Subjects and Countries and France and all other Dominions of the French King And that no Commodities of France or of the Dominions of the French King be imported into their Countries from any place whatsoever And also that all endeavours be used to invite all other Princes and States into the said Confederation and that no Truce or Peace be made or agreed to with the French King by His Majesty or any of the Confederates without the general Consent of all the Confederates had first therein Both which Resolves were sent to His Majesty by the Members of Parliament that were of the Privy Council and what a message they receive on the 6th of May following shews plainly his unwillingness to enter into League with the Confederates against France And Sir you know the Reason why Because the Interest and Religion of Lewis the French King was the Interest and Religion of the King your Brother and your self and Conspirators But Sir that which testifies your Brother's Obstinacy is refusing to enter into such a League Offensive and Defensive with the States-General of the Vnited Provinces c. For notwithstanding the Treaty of Peace with the States General had not you and your Conspirators furnished the French King with Men and Arms and Ammunition against the very Tenure and Intent of the said Treaty Therefore the Lords and Commons join in an Address on the 10th of November 1675. in which they earnestly pressed the King your Brother to call home his Subjects from the Service of the French King but instead of that more were sent and many of them by force or fraud call to mind the Address made by the House of Commons on May 20 1675. where great Complaints were made
by the House of the Conspirators supplying the French King with Men not a few but considerable numbers to the great discouragement of the Confederates engaged in the Common Cause against that proud Monster of Mankind So the Vote of May 23 1677. Resolved That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty That he would be pleased to enter into a League Offensive and Defensive with the States-General of the United Provinces and to make such other Alliances with such other Confederates as His Majesty shall think fit against the Growth and Power of the French King and preservation of the Netherlands And what was done upon all these Addresses truly very little but up starts a League made with the Dutch that was not worth one Farthing and how that Sham-League was kept we all very well remember But as a further proof of your Brother's Being unwilling to enter into any firm and hearty League with the Confederates engaged against the French King remember this Thâ—â— through yours and the Power the rest of the Conspirators had over him he could never be brought to enter into and be engaged in an actual War with France notwitstanding all the humble Applications made to him by Parliaments nay tho he passed a Bill to enter into a War with France and had the benevolence given in that Bill in order to the same yet a firm League was made with France the Interest and Religion of the French King and the King your Brother and your self being all one In the first place be pleased Sir to remember that the Parliament that was adjourned to the Third of December 1677. and then put off till the Fifteenth of January 1677 78 but that day being come both Houses met but by a Message to the House of Commons they are ordered to adjourn till the Twenty eighth and the pretended reason the then King gave or rather you and your Conspirators that his Majesty had matters of great Importance in order to the satisfaction of their Addresses for the Preservation of Flanders but it so fell out that things were not then so ripe as in a few days they would be therefore it was his Majesties Royal Will and Pleasure that the House do immediately Adjourn till the Twenty eighth of the same Month. The Message was very Grateful to the House of Commons and to many others who understood not the Conspiracy for the design was clear another thing than what they had conceived The day of their meeting comes and they are entertained with a Speech full of good Words yet he Reprimands them for their distrust and to shew them how they were mistaken they are told what a great care the King had taken of the Protestant Religion And in order thereunto he had concluded a Match with the Lady Mary to the Prince of Orange but you know Sir thaâ— it was full sore against his and your Wills a Prince Professing the same Religion wâ—â—â— us which by King Charles's good leave was a great mistake for I dare say that the Prince of Orange now our King never Receiv'd the Sacrament from the Church of Rome in all his days which to my certain knowledge King Charles did and afterwards Receiv'd it from the hands of a Bishop of the Church of England the self-same day But to go on with his Speech he told them that the Prince of Orange was a Prince ingaged in Arms to Defend the Common Cause of Chridendom and so he goes on and talks of Alliances and forgets not to call for a fresh supply that he might carry on his Alliances made and to be made Well Sir What was the effect of this Most Gracious Speech I remember that the House in return made an humble but a sharp Address and the Speech was not answered with Thanks in General but only in Particular relating to the King's care he had of the Protestant Religion which Address was Concluded on January 31st following In that Address they promise the King Supplies provided he would enter into an actual War with France and join in with the Confederates and Exclaim against the growing Greatness of the French King and that if it must be Peace that they would have the French King left in no better condition than he was upon the Conclusion of the Pyrenean Treaty I remember when this Address was made I was at St. Omers but we had news from Coleman how you resented it nay Sir it 's well known that the Address stuck terribly in your stomach as well as the Match between the Prince of Orange and the Lady Mary our Late Gracious Queen by which Sir you could not but easily perceive that the House of Commons had got some scent of the Damnable Plot that was carrying on against our Religion Laws and Liberty and your underhand-dealing with France and the Popish Interest But that men might not understand you too well your Agents were busy both in City and Countrey to nâ—â—â—ish a Report of Alliances with the Confederates and a War with France and so big they pretended to be of the War with France that they avowed the certainty of it both in words and in Print all this I say was to keep the Nation in horrid Ignorance To this end Sir you hired a Tool that had pawned his Soul for Bread to write against the French King but all was not gold that glistered there was no Money like to come because that the House was resolved to be satisfied that the Alliances were made and the War proclaimed This Sir you and your Party looked upon as a great hardship put upon the King and that the House of Commons took too much upon them but your Rogues made use of this Address to be a poor Cripple to beg Money even from France it self you know who undertook in that Affair to get Money from France upon the strength of that Address and was in a fair way of succeeding had not something happened between the Cup and the Lip In a word Nothing but War with France is talked of the French is content it should be a Bill passed for a War and Money was given the French King concurred with you in it a Law passes against the Importation of French Goods he wills that too for you had so ordered the matter that notwithstanding that Act by the diligent care of the Officers of the Custom-House there was more French Goods brought into the Custom-House than before But Sir you were not idle all this time for while the People of England were talking of War and Alliances you and your Conspirators were busie both at home and abroad oh the multitude of Messages that were sent to Rome and France and you know what Advice was given you that upon the account of the pretended War you should raise Forces for the Priests doubted not through the assistance of the Saints the work would be done you raised Forces and got Money tho for other ends than the Parliament gave it
shame and disgrace if ever they were capable of any that King was himself informed a little before he was executed that the Jesuits at a general Meeting at Paris in revenge for his condescending in the Treaty at the Isle of Wight to pass some Bills in prejudice of them and the Romish Religion had unanimously resolved by the Power and Interest and Influence that they had in and upon the Army to bring him to Justice and get him executed and accordingly when the stroke was given both one that was a Romish Priest and Confessor brandished his Sword and proclaimed that now their greatest Enemy was cut off and destroyed I suppose Sir you and your Party will be convinced if you observe a Passage from one that knew those Transanctions and see what he saith in his Letter to a Reverend Divine of the Church of England it bears date Aug. 9.1673 This I may safely say and will do it confidently That many Arguments did create a violent suspicion very near convincing Evidences that the Irreligion of the Papists was chiefly the occasion of the murther of that Prince the odium whereof they would file to the Account of the Protestant Religion However Sir your Popish Conspirators having not only escaped the legal Arraignments upon this account but having since the Restoration of K. Charles the IId been esteemed by your self and some other pretended Friends of that King they have thereupon arrived at more respect and to carry on your damnable Designs they have enjoyed more peace in their Persons and Estates than they were in possession of at any time since the Reformation 4. But how little they deserved this Honour and Peace both in their Persons and Estates you may see in a fourth Particular and that was in the Escape of the King your Brother from Worcester 1651. how did they above all men endeavour to betray and sacrifice that King unto the hands of his Enemies And who was to pay the 1000 l. promised for his being discovered and taken but Father Joseph Symmonds and Father Carleton Compton both Jesuits and whence that Money came Sir you well know as did the Queen your Mother for you know that your Mother and your self was in a plot against his Life that you might wear the Name and Title of a King as being the more likely to perform what your Brother had so lustily promised to the Popish Party It is true Sir that one or two of the Romish Persuasion amongst many loyal and faithful Protestants both Male and Femâ—le might then have contributed to that King's Deliverance but such Sir have been by your self and Party well chidden reproached and discountenanced and called Fools for this grain of Loyalty more owing to their English Blood than Romish Principles 5. Since my hand is in give me leave to add a fifth Instance of their Loyalty to your Family That Popish Lord is not unknown nor yet forgotten who brought a Petition to the late Protector signed by about 500 Principal Papists in England wherein they promised upon condition of a Toleration of the Popish Religion here by a Law their joint Resolution to abjure and exclude the Family of the Stewarts for ever from enjoying the Crown This Sir you know startled you when you heard of that Attempt a man that hath but an Irish Understanding may easily judge from hence of the Loyalty of that Party of men I would willingly Sir appear to any one of your dear Joys and stand by his Judgment in that Case 6. One Point more and then Sir I shall have done upon this Head and that is the Loyalty of your Popish Conspirators who to ingratiate themselves with the Government of the said Protector procured Manning to be a Spy upon your Brother and he was not only allowed well by that Party by your direction but also had a very Bountiful Pension too by the said Protector but he was in due time found out and executed by your Brother he was of the same Red Letter with your self and therefore when dead he had Masses sung for him as the usual Reward and Playster There were other Specimens of their Loyalty but I forbear to mention them now because there are some other things to be discoursed with you but this I say That we should have forgotten and forgiven all these soul Proceedings of your dearly beloved Popish Party and we should not have envied the Security they enjoyed or the Favours through your procurement they had attained to provided they had not abused them in joining with you to subvert the Protestant Religion and Government in turning the one into downright Popery and the other into French Slavery but alas good men and true such an opportunity of promoting the Catholick Religion was not to be lost they having a Prince converted to such a degree of Zeal and Piety as not to regard any thing in the World in comparison of the Conversion of England that hath a long time been oppressed and miserably harassed with Herery and Schism to accomplish which you would assassinate the King's Person destroy our City murther his Majesty's Subjects subvert our Religion and disturb the Peace of Mankind and your present Design that is discovered doth prove beyond all manner of objection and doubt That that Sir throw your Brother's and your grace and favour they did then carry on their Designs for advancing the Power of the Pope and French King to advance the Religion of the one and the Interest and Government of the other none daring to suggest the least thing to bring them under jealousie who would not be aspersed for being Maligners of the King 's best Friends and your Fellow-Conspirators till one appeared and took the Popish and French Interest by the Collar and gave it such a deadly wound that it could not recover it self to this day but you were even with him for it when you usurped the Government and so I conclude this Head 2. A second thing that gave you and your Popish Conspirators such an advantage for the carrying on you wicked Designs and Purposes was the unhappy Divisions amongst us poor Protestants for as the Conspirators improved that little Stock of Credit they had by being for Charles the First in the Civil War against himself and Parliament and the Priests Jesuits and Fryars made use of that Credit to reduce us to the Obedience of the See of Rome so you and the rest of the Popish Crew made use of our Divisions amongst our selves to carry on the same Design Now Sir there were two main things which did greatly administer to this unhappy Division 1. The Parties divided were come to a more equal Ballance as to numbers on each side respectively than at any Season heretofore For Sir consider this That during the Reigns of Q. Elizabeth K. James I. and K. Charles I. the Dissenters from the Established way of the Church of England were but few in comparison of those who were for Prelacy
and the Rites and Ceremonies required by Law in their Worship and Service of God so that there being little or no jealousy of any danger to the Church of England from the Protestant Dissenters how zealous soever they might be in their way yet the watchfulness of the Prelates and their Curates were chiefly exercised upon those of the Romish Communion But the Protestant Dissenters since are like to the People of Israel in the Land of Egypt very much multiplied to that degree that they are come nearer to the other Party than heretofore they did the main care therefore of the Prelates and their inferior Clergy together with old Roger their Guide did much abate towards their old Friends of the Church of Rome and exerted the same to the Protestant Dissenters 2. But another great Cause of the dividing the Protestant Interest was the very severe but just Entertainment the Prelates with the Scandalous and Ignorant Clergy met with from the Protestant Dissenters in the late Times of Reformation when they were restored by the return of your Brother from Exile they measured the same again to the Protestant Dissenters when they had the Law on their side and your Grace and Favour into the bargain they remembred all the old Scores by which great Animosities and Heats have been between Party and Party the Prelates aiming then at the ruin of the Dissenters for aiming at the reformation of Prelacy and Superstition By this I say a difference is risen that in all humane probability can never be made up We cannot but from hence very easily not only by Reason but by Experience gather the great use you and the rest of the Popish Party made of them to carry on their Designs for the subverting the Religion and Government of this Nation For as the pretence of these Divisions hath been made use of as an Argument to pervert such as knew not that the Divisions of your Synagogue of Rome are more numerous and their Fewds more irreconcileable than ours so subtile have your Conspirators been by winding themselves into all Companies nay mustering themselves in all Parties endeavoured both to heighten the Differences to make their Annimosities not only hotter but more immortal and while the one Party of Protestants have been crying out against the other for their Schism and the other crying out against them for their Superstition and Persecution you and your Party to the reproach of both were undermining that holy Faith which they equally center in and carrying a Design of destroying the one as well as the other they being in you esteem both equally Hereticks 3. A third thing that contributed much to your bringing of Popery and Slavery into these Kingdoms was the general Prophaneness and Debauchery which had overspread these Nations beyond what in any former Reign had been observed Sir You in this by and with the Consent Advice and Example of the King your Brother and your Conspirators followed the Counsel of Cardinal Mazarine in the Year 1654. at Paris when the Popish Party were but at a low ebb in England That the only way to accomplish the Work in England was to debauch them first and make them Atheists and when that was done they would soon make good Papists for this you well knew and so did your Popish Party That a prophane debauched Person is truly of no Religion and therefore indifferent to seem to be of any as Interest and Temptation sways him so it is plain that no man cares to be of that Religion which condemns all those Ways and Practices which he is resolved to pursue with his utmost vigour Do but take notice that the Popish Religion was such as would allow them in all those wicked ways to which their vicious Inclinations led them and doth secure them from the horror and dread of Eternal Wrath and Vengeance for your Religion maketh those to be no Sins tho committed by some against the express Command of Christ himself If they are such things as the Word of God hath set a mark upon as enormous then they are made Venial Offences only and if they are Sins which your Synagogue calls Mortal which are indeed the most daring and prodigious Enormities through their Doctrines of Pennance and Absolutions and Papal Indulgences you are secure from the Pains of the damned in the other World By this means Sir you and your Conspirators increased the number of your Converts and strengthened your hands so far that you boasted to Beddingfield your Confessor That you did not doubt but in a very few years to have such a number of Catholick Gentlemen and others tha you feared not but to have a Catholick Army sufficient to suppress the Factious Protestant Party in case they should rebel this saying of yours Beddingfield the Jesuite communicated to the Jesuites at Wild-House upon the 24th of April 1678. Nay Your Zeal was such for the Popish Religion that poor Mr. Jones your Chaplain-Naval and Domestick for opposing Popery was by you turned out of his Imploy and left as a Sacrifice to that wicked Prelate of Winchester Dr. Morlay for saying That it was his fault that your Dutchess turnest Papist and that the said Morlay might have prevented the Dutchess of York 's being seduced to Popery if he pleased and that her turning Papist was to be laid at his door You therefore would not for a long time pay him his Wages tho that most Christian Prelate had sued him upon the Statute de Scandulis Magnatum to the poor man's utter ruin for his Living was extended and he left to perish for want of Bread And he had never received his Arrears due to him in your Service had I not shamed old Sir Allen Apsley publickly in Westminster-Hall for it you pretending it was referred to him Moreover I told him If he did not pay Jones I would fetch it out of his old Bones it was a time Sir when Men began to observe your steps and perceive your Designs so Jones much against your Will got his Money and after that Jones had suffered several years Famine from that Villanons Old Priest of our Church and he could not hold his Living from him any longer he most Graciously delivered Jones from the extent but Jones being so ill used by Morley he died within a year or two after he had his Living restored but by the way Sir by the Dutchess of York I mean her that was the Daughter of the Earl of Clarendon sometimes Lord Chancellor but the two Ladies your Daughters were by God's Providence saved from being corrupted by you and your Conspirators Now Sir it remains that I tell you or rather put you in mind what Steps your Conspirators took to ruin these Nations they were Sir your Favourites and of the same Religion and of the same Interest with your self for you having made such Advantages from the three Heads before-mentioned and by these means strengthened you Hands to dispose you to do the Three
between the King your Brother and his Most Christian Majesty and your self which you say Arlington and his Party endeavoured by a thousand Deceits to break to the end they might supplant all three of you but Arlington's Design was to establish a good Understanding and Intelligence between the Parliament the Prince of Orange and the States-General You say that Arlington and his Party had used a thousand Deceits to carry on his Rogueries to betray the Councils of France and England and you and your Party used Ten thousand Rogueries to betray England Holland and the Prince of Orange to the French King You said through the Deceits of the Lord Arlington your Designs succeeded not but through your Violence and Folly his Designs succeeded to the Honour of God and the Happiness of the three Kingdoms and you are living upon the Charity of that Monster of Mankind whose Interest you advanced whilst you were here But you will say what is all this to the Purpose Yes it is much to the Purpose You may see that the Nation knows well how you interested the French King in all your Councils to change the Protestant Religion into down-right Popery and the well established Government into French Arbitrary Power and were not your Party grown to such a height of Insolence that they boasted openly of the Aid and Assistance the French was to give for the setting up the Romish Religion 3. A Third Step you took to ruin the Protestant Religion and the well established Government of England was your unhappy Match with the Daughter of Modena I must put you in mind what the Opinion of the then Parliament entertained of that Match and that you may see in these following Particulars 1. That it would disquiet the Minds of the Protestants at home and fill them with endless Jealousies and Discontents and would bring the King your Brother into such Alliances abroad as might prove highly prejudicial if not destructive to the Protestant Religion it self Now Sir it was your main Design to inflame the hearts of the People and put them upon a Ferment And you engaged the King in the said Marriage as might put him upon those Alliances as might weaken his Esteem with his People and strengthen you and your Popish Cut-â—hroats in your Conspiracy against the Peace and Tranquility of the Nation For Sir in a Letter of Coleman's to Ashby the Rector of S. Omers he saith you commanded him to let the Fathers know that that Match was to strengthen the Catholick Cause and Interest and that now the King your Brother who had ingaged in it would be engaged to unite himself in a more near Alliance to his Majesty of France and the Princes of Italy Apr. 2. 1674. 2. That they had found by sad experience that such Matches had encouraged Popery within this Kingdom and had given Opportunity to Prieists and Jesuits to propagate their wicked and devilish Doctrines and to seduce great numbers of the King's Protestant Subjects You that had such a mighty Work upon your hands as the Conversion of three Kingdoms and the Subduing of a pestilent Heresie which had so long domineered in these Kingdoms and it being a great Work and the Labourers in your great Harvest being but few and you being like to meet with mighty Opposition as indeed you did and an effectual one too so that it did import you to have all the Assistance you could that your Labourers might not be out of breath and tho' next to Gods or rather the Devil's Providence you did rely on the mighty Mind of his Most Christian Majesty whose Generous Soul had inclined him to many Barbarous and Traiterous Undertakings and tho' his Temper was in that very much like your own yet three or four Strings to your Bow were more than one for the more Alliances abroad with Catholick Princes would increase the Number of your Labourers in the Devil's Harvest Therefore in order to this what Alliances you were engaging your Brother in you well know and you cannot forget how all that Design was dashed and by whom But Sir you must be stone-blind and so must your whole Party if you did not see that Experience had taught my Lord Arlington and the Parliament how such Matches had been fatal to this Kingdom and to their Designs The Match of the King your Father with the Daughter of France was the first Step that was taken to advance Popery and the French Interest in England and when she came over what a Swarm of Priests and Friars followed her and what Numbers of Priests and Jesuits she protected and what Numbers were seduced in hopes of Employment under her or of Preferment by her Grace and Favour and how that unhappy Prince was influenced by her Councils till she had promoted a War in Scotland by the Influence of that old Incendiary Cardinal Richlieu and the Rebellion in Ireland and the bloody Civil Wars here which terminated in the Ruin and by the Just Judgment of God in the untimely end of your Father 2. The Match of the King your Brother with the Daughter of Portugal by whom he could through the Blessing of God have no Issue This Lady what she wanted in Understanding to be a Councellour she had made up to her in the blessed Gifts of Malice and Treason and Revenge which she exercised to the utmost And what Swarms of Priests Jesuits Monks and Friars were by her protected and with what Zeal she promoted the Romish Religion and protected Men that were in a Conspiracy against our Religion Laws and Liberties and how great Numbers were by her Priests perverted to the Romish Faith to the great disquiet of the Government the Parliament well knew And therefore Sir you must know that the Experience they had of these two considerable Matches how fatal they had been to these Kingdoms was a sufficient Motive for to interpose in yours 3. The Parliament observed how your Devilish Popish Party were animated by the hopes of this Match before it was consummate which were discouraged by the King's Concessions at the last meeting of that Parliament you know what they were the Breaking the Indulgence and the Passing the Test Bill My Lord Arlington and the Parliament were very prosperous in their Rogueries as you called them those Sons of Zerviah were then too many for you and your damnable Crew It is remembred upon the hopes of this Match that a Protestant could scarce come within your Court at S. James's but he was affronted by your Popish Crew and scarce a better Word than Damn you for a Heretick Dog and when Complaints were made to you of these Insolencies the Complainer found no other Redress than What Business had you there insomuch that this sort of Carriage was observed by the Parliament and upon this Consideration they interposed with all their Might to hinder if possible the Consummation of the intended Marriage to that Italian Princess 4. They did greatly fear it would
occasion the lessening the Affections of the People to your Person and for that you were so nearly related to the Crown they desired that your Honour and Esteem should be preserved But had they known of your Trayterous Confederacy with the French King and with him designing to subvert our Religion Laws and Liberties they would sooner have addressed for your being Banished from the King's Presence and his Councils for ever if not to have sent you out of the World as you justly deserved But Sir you may remember that you once were the Darling of the Nation and had the Esteem and Affections of the People upon the Account of your being the Son and Brother of a King and stood in a very near Relation to the Crown of England in the time of your Brothers Reign but when your Traiterous Designs were laid open the Parliament Apr. 27. 1679. Resolved That your being a Papist and the Hopes of your coming such to the Crown had given the greatest Encouragement to the then discovered Conspiracy and Designs of the Papists against his Majesty your Brother and the Protestant Religion Notwithstanding this Vote of the House of Commons you had an impudent Crew that did endeavour to perswade the Nation and not without some Effect through the Power of their bold Asseverations that you were no Papist but of the established Religion only that you were a Prince of more Generosity and Greatness of Mind than to comply with the Capricio's of a Parliament in Renouncing this or Swearing to that as they should in humour enact which Roguery in Conversation passed with a great many Rascally Profligate Protestants who would not believe your being a Papist till the day you opened your Chappel or Oratory the next or next Sunday but one after you took the Crown 5. The Parliament was of an Opinion that for an Age after the Consummation of the said Marriage at the least the People of England would be under continued Apprehensions of the Growth of Popery and the Danger of the Protestant Religion and so they were an Age before For when they saw so many Piracies made on the Dutch Factories in the Years 1663 1664. and a wicked War commenced in the Year 1665. and the City fired by Papists in the Year 1666. and the Papists incouraged not only in the Years aforesaid but in the Year 1667. and 1668. and Persons that had a hand in firing the City of London not only protected but preferred and the Trpiple League broken and another ungodly War proclaimed Priests and Jesuits increasing in their Numbers and their Insolencies and Impudence This increased the Fears and Jealousies of the Nation and your first Lâ—dy turning Papist and dying such but when you married an Italian Papist you had more Eyes upon you and the People by degrees began to see into your Designs against the Protestant Religion and Government That the Protestant Religion was by this means in danger is beyond Disputation for it had three great Enemies conspiring against it that had made a League together to destroy it and all those Princes and States that did intend to maintain and uphold it viz. your Brother Charles the French King and your self and this Confederacy was set up to destroy the Prince of Orange the Government of the States-General and the Parliament of England and this the Parliament feared and therefore they interposed in this marriage Object But here an Objection will arise Why should the Parliament object against this Match and be so zealous in their Interposition to prevent this Match with the Daughter of Modena since it is plain you in view of the World had been for several Months ingaged in a Treaty of Marriage with another Catholick Princess yet a Parliament nay that very Parliament held during the time of the Treaty and not the least Exception taken at it To this I Answer 1. That the Archduchess of Inspruck though she was of the Romish Religion yet she was an avowed Enemy of the French Cause and Interest For observe this there were many Papists which Sir you hated and by your Conspirators were looked upon with an evil Eye for the Lord Castlehaven that was one that served the King of Spain was one that was used very hardly by you Sir Kenelm Digby was also very obnoxious to you and so was my Master the Duke of Norfolk being one of the Spanish Faction and Anderson the Priest and several others that I can when called to it name who were Enemies of the French Faction And this Lady being not of the French Faction and Interest the Match through the Influence of the French King was broken and this Piece of Flesh you have was sent from Modena in her Room 2. The Match between you and that Duchess was never so near a Consummation as this between the Daughter of Modena and you was de non Appaparentibus non existentibus eadem est Ratio the Match did not appear to them therefore they touched not upon it But to make sure they addressed the King that you might not match with Modena or any other Popish Princess for several weighty Considerations 6. The House of Commons considered that your Princess of Modena being so near a Relation and Kindred to the many Eminent Persons of the Court of Rome might give great Opportunities to promote their Designs and carry on their Practices amongst us and by the same means penetrate into the most secret Councils of the King your Brother and more easily discover the State of the whole Kingdom It is observed that it is a standing Rule amongst the Venetians that if one of their Senators have a Relation that is made a Pope or Cardinal or is preferred to any great Dignity in the Court of Rome that the said Senator withdraws from or is dismissed his serving in the said Senate And the Reason is plain First Because they will not be imposed upon by any of that Vermine and Secondly Because they will not have their Councils looked into by any that belong to the Court of Rome nor Thirdly Will they have the Secrets of their Government discovered to them and lastly they will not have the State of their Commonwealth exposed to the Censure of the Ecclesiastical State Sir You were no sooner married but how Letters pass betwixt the Court of Rome and you self and your servant Coleman Jan. 4. 1676. Cardinal Howard writing to Coleman intimates That Sir Henry Tichburn was appointed by you to be your Minister at Rome and rejoyced at the Prorogation of the Parliament and further said That if the King would do well then all would do well Now you know what was meant by the King 's doing well that is if he were removed In that Letter he saith he hoped to do you good Service It is plain that now not only France but Rome was also to be interested in your Councils to destroy the King your Brother and expose the Councils and Secrets of the
to that of England Holland and the Reformed Churches of Europe to the Support of the Protestant Religion which You and the French King were to destroy by the Name and Title of the Northern Heresie I pray then what signifies a Nephew and a Son-in-law in such a Case as this Can any Man that ever knew you believe that natural Affection should interpose and prevent your destroying him since your natural Affection and Bigotry were and are still no Strangers in England or Holland Consider once more and then I have done with this Point You may remember that the French King did most generously offer you the use of his Purse to assist against the Designs of those that were Enemies to you and that Monarch Nay you know he protested That those that opposed you he should look on them his Enemies and you did as well protest That those who opposed him you would look upon them as your Enemies and it was the Opinion of the French King that the Parliament of England was neither in his Interest nor yours and you entirely agreed with him in that Thought of his so that it was your Opinion that it was necessary for you both to make use of your joint and utmost Credits to prevent the Success of the Parliaments Evil Designs against you both What Designs against you and the French King Yes Designs against you and the French King nay that which is more a dangerous Plot. Who are the Plotters And what was the Plot my Lord Arlington was at work without ceasing to advance the Interest of the Prince of Orange and the Hollanders and to lessen that of the French King And that he and several others were endeavouring to break the good Intelligence between Charles the Second the French King and your self wherefore you earnestly solicited the French King to assist with the Help of his Purse to prevent such Rogueries Thus Sir you make a Tripple League and set it up in Opposition to another In the one King Charles the French King and your sweet Self are engaged in the other the Parliament of England the States of Holland and the Prince of Orange are engaged The French is to furnish you with Money which is the Sinews of War the Parliament are declared Enemies King Charles stands as a Cypher only and therefore the French King and your self put your selves under the solemn Engagements to perform what was stipulated and strenuously to assist each other against the Designs of your and the French King's Enemies for that there was a dangerous and desperate Design on foot to advance the Prince of Orange and to lessen the French King And therefore can any think that it was unreasonable in you to endeavour to destroy him since his Advancement was of such a desperate and dangerous Consequence to the French King your Self and Romish Religion These things duly considered no Man that hath his Thoughts and Judgment keeping pace with each other but must from the Premisses rationally conclude That you and your Incendiaries must have a design of destroying the Prince and his Party and Protestant Interest in Holland notwithstanding any Excuses you may make to the contrary or your Party for you II. IRELAND Since Sir you have not left so good a Name in Holland as you might have pretended to it is much to be feared that upon enquiry your Name and Memory will not be very precious here in Ireland If you please to give me your Company thither I 'll assure you if you deserve it you shall have my good Word from thence for all the old Favours I receiv'd from you in the Day of your Power here amongst us but I suppose I shall find sad havock there made by you and your Plotters of the Protestant Religion and of the Civil Rights Liberties and Customs of the English and Protestant Interest Sir it pleased King Charles the Second to send the Lord Roberts as his Vicegerent into Ireland who was a warm Man and not at all Popishly affected and therefore not for your Turn or one that would gratifie the Conspirators in any one Point of countenancing Popery and therefore you procured him to be removed so that Ireland was put into such Hands as your Heart and Soul could wish for For whoever was Deputy or Lieutenant your Conspirator Boyle an Archbishop was the Governor a Fellow ' tho' of the Communion of the Church of England yet was a well-wisher to the Romish Mathematicks So Ireland was in a fair way to be Over-run and Ruined to all Intents and Purposes by yours and the Procurement of the Jesuites Upon the Removal of the Lord Robarts afterwards Earl of Radnor you remember who succeeded him and what Promises was made by this Successor and what Terms you required from him and how he complied and who it was that recommended this new Lieutenant as a Person fit to all Intents and Purposes to execute your Designs These things are worthy of consideration I assure you for we have considered them and what could be done in so little time as our King hath had many of those Abuses have been corrected and amended This Tool brought the Kingdom of Ireland into a sad condition by encouraging the Popish Recusants who are the profess'd Enemies to the Protestant Religion and English Interest by his or rather your Encouragement they grew more Insolent and Presumptuous than before that Tool of a Lieutenant came there which was of a dangerous Consequence to that Kingdom and the Protestant Religion and English Interest And it was like to have proved Fatal to that Kingdom had it not been in some measure prevented by the sending in his room that Great and never-to-be-forgotten Earl of Essex whom you and your Party procured to be Murthered in the Tower to make the Murther of the Good Lord Russel less difficult 1. For in the First Place in the Month of January 1672 3. you procured a Commission of Enquiry into Irish Affairs containing many Powers that were new and extraordinary not only Prejudicial to the English whose Estates and Titles were liable to be questioned but in a manner to Overthrow the King's Acts of Settlement which Commission you caused to be pursued to the great Charge and Attendance of many of the Protestants there And by this means you shook the Peace and Security of the whole Kingdom of Ireland It is well known Sir that you gave the Jesuites great Hopes of making a fair Step to establish the Romish Religion and old Gray the Jesuite in a Letter of February 1672. exhorts the Fathers at St. Omers to be very thankful to God that he had put it into the Hearts of the King and Duke to remember the sad Estate of the Catholick Religion in Ireland and that now there was some Hopes of Establishing it there since the Lord-Lieutenant was so well disposed towards it by the especial Care of His Royal Highness II. You were pleased to cause the Popish Party to be armed
in that Kingdom and some of them were Commanders to others Instructions were given from Richard Talbot then your Agent there by your Order for those of the Roman Catholick Party to furnish themselves with quantities of Arms and this your Conspirators said were to keep the English in order This Sir can be proved whenever there is occasion No Man can think that Sir Ellis Leyton a Papist that was Secretary to the Government by your especial Grace and Favour should not pursue the same Instructions that your Agent Talbot had received Nay give me leave to tell you That your dear Brother was highly engaged to reduce that Kingdom to a Popish Establishment according to the Agreement he had made with Madam your Sister to whom he had promised to begin the Establishing the Roman Catholick Religion in Ireland and that High-Mass should in a short time be sung at St. Patrick's in the City of Dublin the Metropolis of that Kingdom It is true Sir Ellis Layton was a lewd Fellow but there was none that did your Business in jest so well as he did for the time of his residence in Ireland For under the Notion of Ridiculing the Irish he promoted every Man that was a Papist if he had but common Sense and a Place open And it is well remembred what vast Quantities of Arms and Ammunition were daily sent from England to that Place and considerable Quantities both from France and Spain which your Party used to say would do more good towards the Establishing the Catholick Religion than so many Bibles And great care Sir was taken by you to secure the poor Irish Catholicks in the North that the Planters of Ulster and the Scotch should give them no disturbance that is in plain English they should themselves stand still and be peaceably murthered by your Irish Cut-throats 3. How many Popish Judges Justices of the Peace Sheriffs Coroners Mayors Sovereigns and Portriffs were made by your Princely Care in that Kingdom And was this for the Preservation of the Protestant Religion and the English Interest there No certainly it is well known by several Letters of yours to Richard Talbot and Sir Ellis Layton that the Reason why you gave such Instructions was to crush and ruine the Protestant Religion and the English Interest in that Kingdom for you having Popish Judges and Popish Sheriffs you would quickly find Popish Juries and Irish Witnesses to swear any thing against the Protestant Nobility and Gentry that stood in opposition to your Proceedings in that Kingdom Then Sir what Security had a Gentleman of his Estate when Judges Sheriffs and Witnesses were against him The many Instances of the Wrongs and Oppressions done to the Protestant English Gentlemen the Records of your Villainous Court of Claims can tell how they were sworn out of their Estates and Fortunes by your Rogues and Banditti I am certain that this Point being gained by You and your Conspirators it proved very Fatal to Ireland 4. You took great care of the Church too not of the Protestant Church but of your Popish Titular Archbishops Bishops Vicar-Generals Abbots and others that had Power from Rome to exercise Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction that they should be established in particular Sir your old Friend Peter Talbot the pretended Archbishop of Dublin and your old Friend James Lynce Archbishop of Tuam both of them had been notoriously disloyal to the King your Brother in that they had long lived in Disobedience to him and in Contempt of his Laws But to cure that you procured a Pardon for them both which Boyle the Chancellor passed under the Great Seal by your special Command and Direction nay you hectored your Brother when he was unwilling to pass Talbot's Pardon and challenged his Promise and Agreement made at Dover at the Interview with Madam his Sister and yours And Sir that all things might appear with some Face of Grandeur a Meeting of all the Popish Archbishops Bishops Vicar-Generals Abbots Priors and Priests for the settling and establishing their Clergy both secular and regular which was connived at by your Tool of a Lieutenant upon which the Popish Party grew so insolent that a Protestant went in danger of his Life amongst them nay to preserve their Stock in many Places they were forced to pay Tythes to the Popish Priest as well as to the Protestant Minister But when the Earl of Essex was sent over with much difficulty some small Check was put to these insolent Carriages of the Irish Papists Tuam fled and Talbot withdrew for a while or rather absconded themselves and the Publick Popish Schools were put down and many secular and regular Priests did depart the Land For which Sir you hated the Earl of Essex and Plunket you also despised because he said It was not Prudence for Catholicks to live in Contempt of Law and therefore you may remember how and by whom his end was promoted and with what zeal you and your Party sent him out of the World he was of the same Opinion with Cardinal Howard that in whatsoever Business Talbot was engaged he ever spoiled it and he was impudent and false to his Party for which the Jesuites turned him out of the Society but that he might not in discontent leave the Church of Rome the General of the Jesuites procured of the Pope that he might be made a Bishop But this Sir I will assure you That if Talbot when he was taken in Ireland had been taken in England he would have done You and your Party a signal Piece of Service for Coleman had certainly given Evidence with him against you So that your traiterous Correspondency with France and Intentions to destroy the Prince of Orange and the Protestant Religion within these Realms and all over Europe would have been so fully detected that it had been almost impossible for you to have escaped the hand of Justice Of this Sir I can give a particular Account if ever there should be occasion And Plunket himself gave you such an Item of Talbot's Intentions in that Point that Coleman's Death was hastened and Talbot dy'd strangely in Prison and so you escaped to do more Mischief And how well you rewarded Plunket for his Good will towards you is well known and all to oblige your Cut-throat Jesuits to whom they were mortal Enemies 5. On the 26th of Febr. 1671. It is remembred that for the better Encouragement of the Irish Papists and that they might many of them live in greater Bodies together you procured Letters from King Charles your Brother and a Proclamation to give Liberty in General to all Irish Papists to live in Corporations against the Act of Settlement and to be excused from all those Oaths that were required from those who were duly licensed according to the true intent and meaning of that Act And your Agents Siâ— Ellys Leyton and Richard Talbot were very vigorous to see those Letters and Proclamations put in Execution Then the Irish flocked into Towns
carry'd it for your going therefore a Command was sent to you all of a sudden That it was your Brother's pleasure you should be gone This Sir fill'd many with amazement who knew not for what ends such Counsels had been taken and it filled others with great Joy they now believing that the King your Brother and his Court would have been purg'd from Popery and his Popish Councels and the Popish Fabrick which had been so long a building would again tumble down when they saw you that were the chief supporter of it had left your station Well Sir away you go for Flanders as if you had been going into another World but your Conspirators were not a whit daunted but resolv'd to stick as faithfully to you as you had done before to them And tho' by this departure of yours many of your Conspirators for whom the Kingdoms were too hot and who ought to have danced a Gambrel at Tyburn under the pretence of being your Servants yet notwithstanding the hardiest and boldest of your impudent Crew staid behind and watch'd Affairs at home letting nothing be done that was material but what was done by your Advice and Direction and theirs and by your being abroad they had the opportunity of studying and advising what was fit to be done at home This Sir I must observe to you by the way that before you could be prevail'd upon to go you were faithfully promised that nothing of value or moment should be done or acted without you nay the Speech that was to be made at the Opening of the Parliament was concluded on before you went Yet for all this at the Meeting of the New Parliament which was now become almost a Wonder in this Nation a great panick Fear was struck in all or most of your Crew and they certainly had so much Fear upon them from the least to the greatest that they were even ready to cry Quarter or at least to offer terms of accommodation the Nation being in a very great ferment and your Party that had rely'd so much upon the mighty Mind of the French King for Mony began to curse him for driving them upon these Extremities nay you your self did not spare to revile him for the same The King your Brother happening to be indispos'd at Windsor which being posted over to you you return with all speed and unexpectedly and being here you had but a little inclination to return to Flanders again but the King pleasing you with some private Resolutions of his you did submit to return again to Flanders where you was as coldly received as at first but your stay was not long there for the Coast being then clear you resolved upon returning home and did accordingly return and the design you know was then to fix the Sham Protestant Plot you and your Conspirators had contriv'd But that would not keep you in England for it was resolv'd that you should go to Scotland to settle the Protestant Religion there where you receiv'd the sad News of the baffling the Sham-Plot that you and yours had thought to charge upon some Protestants which made you take new Measures and you resolv'd to part with a small spell of Mony to get the Parliament prorogued for some longer time and a greater Sum was pressed from France but without success for the Duke of Bucks spoil'd that Design for which piece of service you owed him a Cake and was resolv'd if it had not been timely prevented you would have bestow'd upon him a whole Loaf But that by the way Well you arrive in Scotland I pray how were you receiv'd with great Joy to your Banditti there Nay the most excellent Protestant Bishops receiv'd you with tokens of Welcome and highly resented the Affront that the Parliament of England had put upon you when they went about to exclude you and very honestly declar'd against it and tho' the Commons of England were so dim sighted as not to see that the only way to settle the Protestant Religion was by a Popish King yet they could see it and declare it as an undoubted Truth Now Sir it was expected that you should admire the Fabrick that your old Friend Lauderdale had so delicately contrived and in reward of his good Service advance his Interest No no you no sooner got into Scotland but you were designing against Lauderdale he being the great Instrument of sending you thither for you never forgave him that Affront so that after your arrival in Scotland his Interest much dwindl'd away Thus you rewarded one of your old Friends who had sold Body and Soul and all to the Devil to serve you and your Cause he is gone to his place I fear in sure and certain expectation of Wrath and Vengeance for the many Villanies he had committed against the Religion Laws and Liberties of his Country Whilst Sir you were in Scotland you and your Conspirators made your Designs to go on to your full content tho' much diligence was us'd and pains were taken in the point and to give you and your Accomplices that which is your due you never did spare your Pains for the bringing on your wicked Devices to perfection and you thought it good Policy and your best way to make sure of something that if England should be too hard for you yet you resolved to make sure of Scotland And to repeal those Laws that were in force which did debar a Popish Prince from inheriting that Crown therefore you got a Parliament call'd and your self made High Commissioner Upon this you labour the Point for the choice of the Commoners that should be fit for the purpose and to cajole some of the Lords you entice Hamilton to come into your Interest You mounted the Throne as High Commissioner without regarding the Law or due Qualifications necessary in taking the Oaths for that was below you And the King having furnish'd you with Letters you are admitted into the Council without taking the Oaths But being got into the House you carried all before you and got your Succession to the Crown of Scotland secured by an Act and you got a Test passed by which all were to swear not to endeavour to alter that Government either in Church or State and all such as refused were to lose their Employments In a word you made every thing to pass that you and your Crew had a mind to As you were a Privy Councillor in that Kingdom you wheedled in the Duke of Hamilton and admitted him one of the Council who was very zealous for the Protestant Religion formerly but then began to be very cool And so were the rest of the cajoled Lords they all put on the Temper that Scotchmen usually are attended withal that is to be false to the Cause that is persecuted for upon the rising of the Parliament they suffer'd the poor Dissenters to be squeezed to death and suffer'd all imaginable Severities to be used towards them You succeeding so well in
cut him off whilst Hill slept in a Pocky Skin Now Sir to lay open to you and the whole World the truth of this matter I pray observe that this Hill and this Riggs were in your Pay to be Spies upon the Conversations of several Honest men as Butler and Seely was afterwards in your Brothers for the same purpose Riggs and Hill gets into the Company of several Dissenters and in their hearing did talk at a strange rate against the Government and what a secret Cabal there was meeting in London for the change of the same and how that the King your Brother and your self were for introducing Popery and Slavery But to prevent your Attempts of that sort the said Riggs and Hill told them That Arms and Ammunition were provided and that a number of honest men were left to rise and defend the true Religion Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom and that Deale Castle and Windsor Castle were to be surprized This sort of Talk they had with some few honest men who in the Integrity of their Hearts confessed that they heard Hill and Riggs talk at this rate Nay these Devils could not deny but that they did use this sort of talk and intimated that they had a License so to do Notwithstanding these poor Creatures denied that ever they had any hand in any such Conspiracy nor indeed was any thing proved but what Hill and Riggs swore they had talk'd to them yet they were condemn'd and basely murder'd and their Families ruin'd by your procurement and Hill and Riggs escaped with Impunity tho' not without Infamy Your Jesuites would have courted them both to the Church of Rome but they appearing to be such Rogues they were afraid they would be a Disgrace to them who from their rising up in the World had themselves been a Scandal and Disgrace to the Creation of God 5. You having some Success in this your Conspirators would not be idle but drew in some warm Men into another Conspiracy in the North. The then Sheriff of the County of York and a great man whose Name I will omit because he did in part afterwards make England some amends for that piece of Villany you know at that time to please the Court he was reconciled to the Church of Rome and no doubt whilst so he was a fit Tool to carry on so wicked a Design which was to discourse of the Oppression the Nation lay under thro' the Duties of Excise c. and the disturbance that the Lawyers had made in the Kingdom That your Brother and you were bringing in of Popery and Slavery at which these poor Creatures were enflam'd and being promis'd the supply of Mony and by the High Sheriff the Assistance of Posse Comitatus they were drawn in to engage But alas it was but a Trappan they were taken and executed upon the Evidence of some of them that were engaged with them but how you rewarded that Person of Quality afterwards it is well-enough known This was another of your Projects as the Person of Quality you employed hath told to several Friends with great Grief some of whom are alive to this day But not to forget one passage let me tell you that you and your Conspirators made at the Tryal of Mr. Alured two Witnesses of one Man first he appear'd in a strange disguise with one Eye and gave his Testimony under one Name and then withdrew and appear'd in his common Dress and gave his testimony by his own Name and so Alured was murder'd by the Conspirators This can be prov'd by good testimony 6. I will give you a short Truth of the Fire of London how that Eight Men were executed for having a design to fire the City of London on the third of September 1666. And great care was taken to lay it upon the Fifth-Monarchy-Men and the old Officers of the Army that served under the Parliament but in truth it was contrived by your self and your wicked Popish Party and by you and them carried on to destroy that great Protestant City that with more ease you and your Accomplices might introduce Popery and Slavery among us for London was the Bulwark of the Protestant Religion and English Liberties and therefore she must be made a Burnt-Offering to your self and Hellish Popish Crew 7. Another Instance of your Conspirators shamming their Plots upon poor innocent Protestants and that is the Case of the Lord Claypool and by this cast an Odium upon the whole body of Protestant Dissenters For in the Month of August just about the time that your Conspirators were to execute their wicked Design to destroy the King then you deal with Secretary Coventry to clap up that poor innocent Gentleman for designing to seize the King as he went to Newmarket and you had two Witnesses ready at hand to have sworn that Design against him the said Claypool who was by the Secretary's Warrant arrested for High Treason But he the said Claypool knowing nothing of the matter demanded to know his Accusers that was according to that Villain 's usual way deny'd him and he frown'd upon as if he had been the greatest Knave in England next to Coventry himself Claypool was as stout as that Knave of a Secretary was proud and insolent and as for Claypool he would scarce answer any Question so away he was sent to the Tower a close Prisoner This startled every one except the Conspirators and my self who was privy to the whole business by the repeated Orders Coleman receiv'd from Sir your self for his Prosecution that when the Blow was given upon the King it might be charg'd upon the Fanaticks And to that end Sing and Throgmorton two virulent Papists and Butler and Seely two Popish Spies of your Brother's and yours both pretended Fanaticks the last I think is a Cornish man and was a Major in the late Protector 's Army so that you and all your Popish Conspirators intended as one Man to revenge the Death of the King on the Dissenting Party concluding that the Vermin of the Church of England would strike in with the Popish Party since they hated a Dissenter worse than a Papist tho' differing from them only in a few scoundrel Ceremonies not worthy to wipe a Porter's Tail withal Therefore as a Prologue to that cursed Design you could not think of a man fitter than this Lord Claypool he being Son-in-Law to that Lord Protector Cromwell but you and your Villains were disappointed for a time from destroying the King for when the true Plot was discover'd your devilish Witnesses against the Protestant Party disappear'd And so much for Claypool 8. Another Instance of your implacable Hatred to the Protestants and of your designing to sham a Plot upon them was your old and very good Friend Mr. Thomas Blood whom you and your Brother set upon my self to bring me into a Conspiracy with Richard late Lord Protector and him the said Blood to dethrone your Brother and your self which Sir
was a great mistake for your Crimes were so plain and notorious that an honest man would have thought the Laws of the Land and publick Justice would have reach'd you both without such irregular Methods as these were but I discover'd the Letter and the Trappan escap'd for a while and then God cut him off with Infamy and Disgrace 9. I must entreat your patience to remember another Instance and that is the particular Case of Mr. Thomas Dangerfield who was maintained by you and your Conspirators with Twelve pounds per week to invent a Plot against the Protestants the better to colour or hide your own What Papers you and the rest of your Conspirators contrived to be put upon the Duke of Buckingham The Gentleman of his Horse was Mansfield and he was prepared to be a second Witness against the said Duke as Dangerfield was suborned to be the first so that you might have the Blood of that great man as being one in a Conspiracy to destroy the King your Brother But Dangerfield had not been so mindful of his Lesson as he ought and fixeth himself upon one Mansel who had been a Retainer to the Earl of Essex who at that time was carried away with the dissimulation of the Popishly-affected Party but instead of leaving them in Mansfield's Chamber left them in Mansel's Chamber In these Papers there was a List of Noblemen and Gentlemen that were to be sworn against as being in a Conspiracy against the Life of the King your Brother and your self and Church of England And to make the World believe that these Papers were not forged this Dangerfield repairs to Secretary Coventry your old League-breaker and informs the Secretary who was privy to the whole Concern of a dangerous Plot against the Government and that there were dangerous Papers in the Chamber of Coll. Mansel that would make the same out but the fellow tho' he had been a Rogue all his days as God would have it scrupl'd the Oath tho' if he had said in Mansfield's Chamber he should have had a Warrant without an Oath but mentioning the Name of Mansel the Secretary was startled because that Mansel was a Favourite of the Earl of Essex against whom this Conspiracy was not at first to appear therefore Coventry would do nothing without an Oath in relation to Mansel because of the Earl of Essex who was then actually a Privy Councillor therefore Dangerfield was resolv'd to have the papers brought to light and therefore gets an Officer or Officers of the Customhouse to search Mansel's Chamber for prohibited Goods and then these papers were seiz'd And Mansel hearing of what was done when he came to his Lodging and that papers of dangerous consequence was found in his Chamber behind his Beds-head where he had never laid any he immediately repairs to the Council and complains of his usage before Dangerfield had told his Story Well then what becomes of this Affair so foolishly miscarrying in its first birth I must observe to you that Dangerfield is called in question and tho' he had many Friends in the Council and many that knew the Design well enough yet the Blunder that Dangerfield made was so great and his Story hung so ill together that the Conspirators that were at the Board began to be confounded and were much dejected that their Tool had succeeded no better for besides all his self-contradictions shrewd proofs were brought against him Yet notwithstanding the aforesaid blunder and his being so confronted with Major Richardson and others Dangerfield was as bold as his Folly was great and stood in it that the Papers taken in Mansel's Lodgings were not put there by him till at last the proof of the Customhouse Officer that searched and Dangerfield's own words the Cheat and the Roguery was most manifest so that the Council tho' many of them your Conspirators and his intimate Friends were of necessity obliged to commit him to Newgate who being there was still upheld by that Whore Cellier and the rest of your Conspirators who had redeem'd him out of Newgate for this very end and purpose and had forbad him to discover but some Letters being discover'd and he being out of all hopes made his application to the then Lord Mayor to take his discovery which was done and upon that Discovery it plainly appear'd who set him on work to frame such a piece of Villany You were so nettl'd at the Discovery that instead of the Lord Mayor's having Thanks return'd him for his Service to the King and the Nation that he met with a Check at Court for meddling in that which concerned him not But by this Trick the Earl of Essex's Eyes were open'd and he fairly left you and the Council abhorring such Villanies as never was to be parallel'd in future nor heard of in past Ages Your Sham-Plot thus miscarrying and the Book found in the Meal-Tub shewing who they were that was to be sworn out of their Lives falsly appearing you know Sir that you were with your Accomplices at a stand for Sir you know that this Villany if it had been placed with Mansfield the Duke of Buckingham's Servant who was to have been a second Witness with Dangerfield and both these to have been corroborated by Blood Butler and Seely you would have cut off by a Form of Justice all such persons as had stood in opposition to your wicked Designs and Practices so that a new Parliament should have been open'd with the noise of a Presbyterian Plot therefore you know the Parliament was prorogued for a longer time and your self forced to part with a small Spell to get this thing done and the French King pressed for a bigger Seame which was happily prevented by the Duke of Buckingham 10. I must beg your Pardon if I put you in mind of another piece of Roguery your restless Conspirators undertook For a new Parliament being to meet at Oxford in the year 1680 1 they were resolved to welcom that Parliament with a Protestant Plot in good earnest to the end with more ease you might bring your cursed Designs to pass In order to this it was agreed by your Crew that Papers containing Treasonable Matters should be got to be written and lodg'd in the Houses of private men and shuffled into Gentlemen's Pockets at Oxford and before the meeting of the Parliament they should be seiz'd with such Papers about them and one Fitz-Harris who was to be their Tool was well acquainted with one Everard that was a Villain much of the said Fitz-Harris's stature or standard for it was a hard matter to know which was the greatest of the two This Everard had been countenanc'd by the Earl of Shaftsbury and therefore the said Everard was judg'd the most fit to joyn with him in the Roguery And Everard had agreed with this Fitz-Harris to be seized with these Papers about him when they had dispersed as many of them as would do the business but those that employ'd
these Rascals in this affair were such that it would â—ill an Englishman with Confusion to name them Fitz-Harris had his Instructions from your Brother and Portsmouth and when Access could not be had to them then they received them from Nell Wall a notorious Whore that from a poor Wench that washed down the Stairs was made her Mistresses Woman and privy to the whole Intrigue The Writing was drawn up and much approved by the King your Brother and the Dutchess and their Approbation signified to this Fitz-Harris by this Whore Nell Wall and the same told to this Everard by Fitz-Harris but no Mony considerable appearing unless it were one Thirty pound Everard discovers this Intrigue to one Smith commonly call'd Narrative Smith and Sir William Waller They are planted in a secret Room where they might not only hear but see the Transactions between Everard and this Fitz-Harris so that Fitz-Harris was apprehended and committed upon Everard's Testimony and Try'd and Condemn'd upon the Testmony of Smith and Waller and Everard and fairly Hang'd that he might not tell Tales So Shaftsbury and several others escaped that one time from being made a Sacrifice to your Will and Pleasure The Story Sir is too long to be fully repeated but when any of your Cursed Crew shall Answer this I shall tell the whole Story at length but this shall suffice for this Particular 11. Be pleas'd to remember how many Irish men were suborned to swear against the Life of the said Earl of Shaftsbury and how diligent your Conspirators were to suborn others that were of the same stamp for Roguery and Villany but God by the Industry and Care of his Friends deliver'd him and what these Villains swore against him was so inconsistent with either the Principles or declared Judgment of that Noble Lord and the Particulars of their Testimony so contradictory one to the other that the Grand Jury would not return a billa ver a upon the Testimony of these Rogues tho' the Court used all the indirect methods with that Jury to have the Bill found 12. Sir I must deal plainly with you and your Tribe that my Heart is ready to bleed when I must name to you the Murther of the Earl of Essex whose Throat you procured to be cut that very Morning that a Way might be made for the Horrible Murther of the Lord Russel who was by your means basely murder'd by a Form of Law and the great Collonel Sidney what Juries of Common Rogues and Villains were pack'd upon them by the contrivance of murdering Rich and North your two pretended Sheriffs of London and Middlesex Fellows that valued not the Blood of a Protestant but rejoyced that they had made you and your Conspirators drunk with their Blood I must not forget poor Stephen Colledge who was basely murder'd at Oxford by a Sett of wicked Judges and a Pack'd Jury at Oxford whose Blood cries to Heaven for Vengeance against you and your Cut-throat Party We have a Cloud of Instances against you and your Party of your suborning Witnesses against Mr. Colt Mr. Arnold Sir Samuel Barnadiston Mr. Covet Mr. Culliford Mr. Braddon Mr. Johnson Sir Thomas Pilkington and Mr. Hampden my self and others what a long and tedious Imprisonment we all suffer'd through the Testimony of your suborned and perjur'd Witnesses But this may suffice for this second Particular how you and your Conspirators from the very time of your being restor'd to your Native Country which was in the year 1660 to the year 1685 that you took the Crown III. A third Project that you and your Popish Crew had on foot was to ruine our Trade It was not enough that you fired our Cities and abused the Professors of the Protestant Religion by the many Murders that were by you and your Party committed by the help of your Mercenary Judges and Hackney Jury-men but you also labour'd heartily to disturb the Trade of the Nation that you might with more ease enslave it and bring in Popery upon us I will but give you only one or two Instances Many might be given to your Shame and the Shame of your Party if there was any such thing remaining with you 1. The first Instance I shall give you is the countenancing the French King to take so many of our Merchants Ships by his Pyrates and Rovers in our Seas and several Letters were written by your Secretary Mr. Coleman to Sir Ellys Leyton wherein several Merchantmen whose Owners and Merchants had been obnoxious to you or your Party by opposing Popery and Slavery he was by your especial Order to see their Ships and Goods condemned to the utter undoing of several Families And your Servant Coleman when any thing of a Tradesman was mentioned he used to say Damn them they are a sort of Fanaticks that have no Kindness for my Master or our Religion and it will be never well till we make them poor then they will be brought to obey Nay Sir this was your Language too or else you would never have been so much of the Opinion of the French King your most Christian Brother 2. A second Instance is taken from the Letters that were written to the Rector of St. Omers Richard Ashby from Thomas White and John Keines and others of the Society in London in which Letters from them and others were enclosed Letters to Thomas Stapletoa then Procurator at Bruxels to perswade the Father Confessor of Duke de Villa Hermosa then Governor of the Spanish Netherlands to inform him the said Duke That the King your Brother did not intend to assist the King of Spain but would stand a looker on till he was ruin'd by the French King Which Letter being not sealed I saw it and that in case the Father Confessor to the said Governor should not be ready to comply with the said Stapleton that Messengers should be forthwith sent to Father Swiman at Madrid to inform the King of Spain of the said Concern and to make the same relation of the business to the Popish Archbishop of Tuam of the Kingdom of Ireland who was then at the Court at Madrid that he the said Swiman and the said Titular Archbishop might jointly give an account of the Motion made or to be made to the said Father Confessor of Duke de Villa Hermosa and also to advise the Spanish King to seize the Estates of the English Merchants in their several Factories in his Dominions for that they had endeavour'd to transport their Estates and did transport them to England and all or most part in the Coin of Spain to the great Prejudice of the Kingdom of Spain And for the confirmation thereof they procur'd Letters from one Fonseca sometimes an Agent in London to attest the same this Fonseca willingly complying with your Conspirators and sent his Letter to St. Omer's that the Fathers there might give their Approbation to the said Letter in order to be sent to the Court of Spain which Letter was
long and large Attestations therein made against the Merchants of the several Factories concerning the Matter of Fact before mentioned and other Letters were dispatch'd to Daniel Armstrong at Valladolyd and John Cross then at Madrid in which they were order'd to confirm this Attestation made or to be made by the Fathers in England and of the English Seminary at St. Omer's and of the said Stapleton together with that of the said Fonseca the abovenamed Spanish Agent who then lived at Bruges in Flanders Therefore 1. In this Villanous Contrivance to disturb the Nation in the Spanish Trade your Servant Coleman was very active in your Name and on your behalf and engaged that your Letter to Villa Hermosa should be procured 2. It is well known that your Brother and your self were so engag'd with the French King that it was all one to you what became of the King of Spain's Concerns in Flanders but you were both grieved to see the English Nation enrich'd with the Trade it had with Spain for during the time of the Riches and Plenty of England it would be very difficult for you and your Conspirators to bring in Popery and Slavery upon us 3. What Agents you make use of to carry on this Wicked Design to ruine Trade Even Fonseca that hated the English Nation and much envied her Greatness and that she might be in a condition to be brought under the French Yoke you tamper with him that tho' a Spaniard by Nation yet he was wholly in the French Interest 3. A third Instance that I shall remember you of by which you intended to ruine our Trade and that was in the adulterating debasing and clipping the Coin of this Kingdom It may be said by you and your Partisans That it is very hard you should be charged with this vile Act but Sir it can be prov'd that the Merchants Goldsmiths Brokers Bankers and the other Traders that the Jesuites dealt with all was by your Advice and Direction and that your Servant Coleman had in your Name promised them the management of the Mint So that your Conspirators were to be the Judges of good and bad Mony and were to manage the same to the best advantage for your Cause and several Materials for Coining was provided by Smith your Agent and lodged at Mr. Longhorn's Chambers in the Temple And this Sir I must observe to you for publick Good that there hath been few or none that ever hath been executed but hath been of your Religion or Interest That our Mony hath been abused is notorious And all this you did in order to impoverish the Kingdom and destroy its Trade 4. A fourth Instance of you and your Traytors to disturb the Trade of the Kingdom was the Fire of London I have treated of that already As it was the Habitation for several Thousands of good Protestants that stood in opposition to Popery and Slavery and as by the destroying this City you endeavoured to weaken the Protestant Interest so now give me leave to tell you it was with this design to ruine the Trade of the Nation for you know that London was the Metropolis and Fountain of Trade and when she was destroy'd you could not but conclude that the Trade must be disturbed with which the other parts of the Kingdom were made happy through the great devastation that the Fire that was carried on by your Wicked Instruments had made IV. A fourth Project that you had to accomplish your Wicked Designs was the Attempt of maintaining of a standing Army contrary to the Laws and Liberties of England in the times of Peace and labour'd that point much with the King your Brother to lay down the legal Force of this Kingdom viz. the Militia as useless to the Government and therefore you and your Party advis'd him to lay them down and to have Forces in every County under Pay and they were to be your Conservators of the Peace And Sir had the Revenue of the Crown been able to have born the Charge you your self projected a standing Army to keep the People in due Obedience Now what that due Obedience was I shall not need to explain to you for it was a standing Army alamode de France nay they were to have the Power of the Civil Watch in the Night which you said would excuse many ancient useless Men from that Service And for the accomplishment of your wicked Enterprize you advis'd that the greater part of the Army should consist of French and Irish and that the Officers of this Army should consist of as many Roman Catholicks as could well be gotten to serve in that Army and you had several of that sort of Cattel that you kept in half-pay in readiness whenever your Brother should have agreed to your Advice It was not for want of Good will but for want of Mony that your Design did not then take 5. A fifth Project that you had on foot to enslave the Nation and that was the advising and contriving with your damnable Conspirators the seizure of the Charters Franchises and Liberties of the Cities Towns and ancient Corporations of the Kingdom It was Sir your self and your Conspirators that invaded the Privileges and seized on the Charters of most of the Towns that had a Right to be represented by their Burgesses in Parliament and by over awing some of them you procur'd Surrenders of them to be made to the King your Brother by which the Magistrates deliver'd up all their Rights and Privileges to be dispos'd of at his pleasure and the pleasure of your self and Conspirators Upon this you procur'd new Magistrates to be placed in those Places as would carry on your wicked designs and purposes of advancing Popery and Slavery 6. It was your Advice together with your Conspirators that put the late King your Brother to turn out of the Commission of the Peace and the Lieutenancy of the Counties all such who had been zealous for the defence of the Protestant Religion and Liberty and had appear'd vigorously against Popery and Arbitrary Power as persons disaffected to the Government both in Church and State and represented them as Fanaticks and Favourers of such by which means you got in Men of Villanous Morals and such heartily joyned in with your Conspirators to ruine the Protestant Interest and to overthrow the Laws and Liberties of England This was done in the year 1679. 7. Notwithstanding some of your Conspirators represented you as a person whose Judgment was for Liberty of Conscience yet because the Protestant Dissenters appear'd earnestly in the asserting the Laws and Liberties of England and gave Countenance to the Discovery of the Popish Plot to King Charles your Brother who was in it in every part and particular thereof excepting that of his own Murther you and your Conspirators stirred up that King to raise a terrible Persecution against those men by which means you were the ruine of some Thousands of Families who by the severity of
the said Persecution were reduced almost to Beggery or to live upon the Charity of Friends Some were forced to fly the Nation and yet were more loyal under their Pressures and Provocations than your Cut-throat Papists were under their then Caresses and Favours received from your Brother and your self Nay a reverend Minister of the Gospel of Christ who had been very instrumental in your Restauration yea and ventur'd his Life for your Brother's Restauration in the year 1650 you suffer'd to perish in Newgate as a Reward for so great a piece of Service to your Brother and your self and Family and for no other reason but because he could not comply with some Rascally Ceremonies that our Ecclesiastical Vermin had borrow'd from the Church of Rome to Adorn our Protestant Worship and because he would not take the Oxford Oath lay'd upon the Nation to enslave it 8. Another Project you had for the ruining the Interest of the Protestant Religion and the Interest of England was the Advancing of Men that were Enemies to the Protestant Interest into the greatest Places of Trust As What a Sett of Villains had you made Judges of the Land by which means you brought all the Matters of Civil Justice into great Uncertainties by reason of the Tenour of their Commissions and the Ignorance of the Rogues you employ'd Therefore how miserable was the Nation who were obliged to Answer to such Judges that were forced to comply in all things with the Directions that were given by you and your Wicked Cut-throats or else to be turned out at yours and their Pleasure If we look further you had in your Brother's time the disposing of all Military Employments And how you did shew your Hatred to the Protestant Religion and the English Interest You did in his time raise a great many Persons to the greatest Military Trusts both by Sea and Land Strangers as well as Natives so that by these measures your Conspirators became Masters of the Affairs of the Government of the Nation and of the course of Justice and you had all the Church Vermin engag'd with you to subject the whole Kingdom to a despotick Arbitrary power and all these joyn'd together to execute your wicked Designs to enslave and debauch the People of the Land 9. To compleat the Work that nothing might stand in your way of Establishing your Popish Religion you murder'd your Brother who was uncertain in his Engagements in the Conspiracy for when he found it was not safe for him to appear in promoting Popery he soon left you Or if a Sum of Money could be gotten from a Parliament he commonly bless'd the Nation with a Proclamation or two against Popish Priests Jesuites and Popish Recusants or pass a Bill or so to the prejudice of the Popish Party as he did in 1673 when the Test-Bill passed as also another in 1678. This obliged you and your Conspirators to hasten his destruction which you had long contrived You found a fit Tool and as fit a Dose to do the Work in it you had your desired Ends and so you mounted the Throne Which brings me to the Second Point What you did in order to the Ruine of the Protestant Religion and the Government after your accession to the Crown II. Your Tyranny was very cruel but short yet full of strange and surprising Circumstances It was highly astonishing to see a Popish Prince ascending the Throne to rule a Protestant Nation and defend a Protestant Church but Sir you had no such Designs in your Head for you shew'd what you would do with our Laws when you could engage your Conspirators to dispense with part of the Oaths that you should have taken It is manifest and notorious that when you were upon the coming to the Crown you was receiv'd by all the People of England Scotland and Ireland as King without the least opposition for our Ecclesiastical Vermin had made your way clear by their Doctrine of Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance and the Divine Right of Succession and the possibility of preserving the Glory and Grandeur of their Church of England by a Popish Prince and that there was more danger from Fanaticks than from Papists and such-like scoundrel Notions You cannot but remember that King Charles your Brother having received the deadly Dose your Conspirators had prepar'd for him on February the 6th 1684 5 he went to his Place that very day Sir you were proclaim'd King to the sorrow of all that wish'd well to England and its Religion Liberties and Laws you then appear'd at the Council-Table as King and by all your Conspirators you was owned and saluted as such to whom you were pleas'd to make a sort of a Speech in which you were pleas'd to declare your self to this effect THat Since it hath pleased Almighty God to place you in that station and that you were now to succeed so Good and Gracious a King as well as so Kind a Brother you thought it fit to declare That you would follow his Example and more especially in that of his great Clemency and Tenderness to all his People That you had been reported to have been a man for Arbitrary Power tho' that had not been the only Story that had been made of you That you would make it your Endeavour to preserve Government both in Church and State as it was by Law establish'd That you knew the Principles of the Church of England were for Monarchy and that the Members of it had shewn themselves good and loyal Subjects and therefore you would take care to defend and support it That you knew the Laws of England were sufficient to make the King as great a Monarch as you could wish and therefore as you would never depart from the Just Rights and Prerogatives of the Crown so you would never invade any Man's Property And that you had ventur'd your Life very often in the defence of the Nation And that you would go as far as any Man in preserving it in all its Just Rights and Liberties This Sir is the sum and substance of what you were pleas'd to say at the Council board and one would have sworn that you would have taken up the Trade of being Speech wright-general to the whole Band of your Conspirators I am confident your old Friends the Jesuites that had been hang'd but a little before could not have outdone you though it had been to have saved their Lives Well it was a Speech and how true you were to this Speech you shall judge and your Conspirators too if you will but consider 1. You said You would not invade any man's Right and Property and that you would preserve the Nation in its Just Rights and Liberties And so you did for you the next day after your accession to the Crown publish'd a Proclamation for the continuing the payment of the Custom and Excise which were expir'd by the death of the King your Brother for several weeks after Did not this shew
of what they had confess'd against themselves others that had been in actual Arms hundreds of them were hang'd in the principal Towns and their Quarters hang'd up in the Highways as lasting Monuments of your Grace and Compassion And you being glutted with Blood you then thought of other Punishments for some other of those Offenders many Men and Women were order'd to be whip'd publickly in the Market-Towns others had their Estates seiz'd and a great number were sold into America to serve all days of their Lives so that there was nothing but the Voice of lamentation and weeping to be heard In a word your Grace Clemency and Tenderness was such that several of the Western Counties were made so many Fields of Blood and Butchery Nay Sir those who escaped your Mercy by vertue of your Proclamation were forced to retire to the Woods and desolate places their nearest and dearest Relations not daring so much as to harbour or relieve them so that several starved to death or perish'd with cold for want of things necessary for the preservation of Human Nature Some fled to the Dutch for shelter and were not only kindly receiv'd but as civily entertain'd till you began to have some Shame in you and pardon'd some in hopes that they would be of use to you and others came over with the Prince of Orange who by the Just Judgment of God upon you and your Adherents banish'd you the Kingdom and the Lords and Commons of England deposed you as useless to God and Man But Sir this is notorious that you never entertain'd the least Remorse of Conscience for the murther of these men in the West for those you pardon'd paid a Price sufficient for their Pardons or if you gave them Pardon freely it was to prevent their setting up their Trades in other Countries And Jefferies your Tool that you ought to have hang'd you let him go off with no other Punishment than to be made Lord High Chancellor of England who also did enrich himself with the Sum of 15000 l. extorted from one person who wanted a Pardon for nothing else but the not delivering his Country which he might have done for half the Mony I am more sorry that Jefferies got the Mony than for that Gentleman 's losing that Sum. Truly Sir I was in hopes that the Time of that Villain Jefferies had been come in which he should not only have paid his Debt to Nature but to his Faults too but he is gone to his Place and thereby he hath sav'd the Hangman a Labour but had he liv'd he would in my opinion have been made an Example for all his Villanies that he had committed both as a corrupt Judge and a trayterous Chancellor 3. You were pleased in the years 1687 1688 to publish a Declaration for Liberty of Conscience and professed in both the said Declarations That it was always your Judgment that no man's Conscience should be restrain'd in Matters of Religion Now Sir if that were true why then did you persecute the Protestant Dissenters for their Conscience from Feb. 6. 1684 till the latter end of the year 1686 And if it were not your Judgment why then did you proclaim Liberty of Conscience as your Judgment But Sir to deal truly in the point you had a Popish Fabrick to erect and you wanted Liberty of Conscience to be the Scaffold and when you had done your business of settling Popery you would have laid Liberty of Conscience aside as your Brethren abroad of the Popish Religion have always done And this was the Clemency your Brother was pleas'd to shew to Dissenters and afterwards he and you could with great Tenderness suffer them to perish in Prison and you your self when you were in the Chair persecuted them to the ruine of some Thousands of Families you surfeited your self and Party with the murder and ruine of so many Men and yet you pretend to Clemency and Tenderness To conclude this particular your Brother and you made two Declarations for Liberty of Conscience for no other intent but to cheat the People of England into Slavery and Popery to the end that you might damn the Body and Soul of the Nation at once From such Clemency and Tenderness I trust God hath deliver'd this Nation and will preserve her under the present Government all your pretences to the contrary notwithstanding 4. What shall I say of those worthy persons that you kept in Jayl for the pretended Damages of 100000 l. and others of 10000 l. and others for one Fine or another What shall I say of the Murther of the Lady Lisle and Alderman Cornish Mr. Ayliff and Mr. Nelthrope and poor Disney These were Monuments of your Clemency and Tenderness 3. You promis'd in your Speech to the Council That you would maintain the Church of England as it was establish'd by Law Nay I think if you had not wrong done you you swore it too at your Coronation And Sir if you please call to mind how you kept your Promise and Oath in relation to the Church of England and the Protestant Interest nay you gave a reason for your Promise it being the only Reason that you ever gave in your Life I will put you in mind of it Because said you Her Members had shew'd themselves Loyal Subjects and that the Principles of the Church of England had been for Monarchy Therefore 1. How did you maintain the Church of England as by Law establish'd Were there not Laws in force for the preservation of the Church of England that had been enacted in the Reigns of several Princes that were your Predecessors amongst which Laws as a security of the Church of England against Popery That all persons whatsoever that were advanced to any Ecclesiastical Dignity or to bear Office in either University as likewise all Civil and Military Officers should declare they were not Papists but of the Protestant Religion and that by taking the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the Test yet you and your Conspirators annulled all those Laws that were made to secure the Protestant Religion against Popery Was this to defend the Church of England and to maintain Her Laws I leave it to all men to judge But you and your villanous Commissioners thought your selves so wise as to reconcile Contradictions and therefore you were resolv'd to try your Skill upon the Church and the Nurseries of Learning which prov'd fatal to you and your Party by the Just Vengeance of Almighty God 2. Did you not against express Law and against the Promise of your maintaining the Church of England set up an Ecclesiastical Commission and impower the Persons named in that illegal Commission to take cognizance and to give arbitrary directions in matters Ecclesiastical in which Commission there was one who profess'd the Popish Religion and others that were Abettors of Popery and Popish Superstition therefore to what deplorable condition was the Church of England reduc'd that a Commissioner for the Church
common Consent But you were pleased to raise Money upon the People by your Proclamation The very Day after you had promised to invade no Mans Property Now no Man is for Life Limb Goods or Liberty at the Sovereigns Direction but how soon it would have been had not a period been put to your Tyranny For your Sycophant Parasites were very zealous to have delivered up those Priviledges in to your Hands judging it would not be well with England till you were as Absolute as the Monster of France by which we might easily understand your Intentions For Sir who knows not that the inclination of a Prince is best known either by those that are about him and most Favour with him or by the current of his own Actions Those who were nearest to you and most your Favourites were your Irish and French Courtiers and your Popish Priests and Prelates who these Men stood affected to Your Discretionary Dispotick Power can never be forgotten No Man but may remember that in their common Discourse were for advancing your Will and Pleasure over your Subjects to be equal with that of the King of France is over his This was but a Copy which those Villains had industriously taken from your own Words and Actions In Scotland you did publickly set up for that Power and openly declared you would be obeyed without reserve The attempt you and your Conspirators made in the time of the Lord Chancellor Hyde upon our Liberties is never to be forgetten a Bill was prepared to enable the King your Brother in the time of any interval of Parliament to raise what Money he pleased upon an extraordinary occasion as the Dutch War was pretended to be This had taken its much desired effect had not that Lord Chancellor been awakened by an intimate Friend of his who understanding what was doing in the House of Commons came to him and shewed him what the Consequences were which such an unheard thing would produce and he using one Argument above all the rest in telling him he came to his Honour and Greatness by the Gown and not by the Sword and if that Bill passed he advised him to consider what his Gown or all the Lawyers Gowns in England were worth which that Lord Chancellor though one of the Actors with you to enslave the Nation being a Man of Sense had that Honor as to think it no Dishonor to retreat from that Devilish Invention which he to comply with your Ambition and Pride had set on foot to destroy us at once So that Bill though once read in the House for enabling the King your Brother to raise Money at pleasure was by the Providence of God and the Prudence of that Noble Penitent Lord droped so far as that it dwindled into a Bill of 75000 l. not exceeding a Months Tax No doubt but you had procured this Bill to be dressed in the French Mode for emergent Occasions yet had it passed in the same manner as you and your Accomplices designed there would not have wanted emergent Occasions and extraordinary Services to have given Colour for keeping that Power on foot until Dooms Day in the Afternoon The French King whose Example you followed in this particular got his Power by such a villainous Stratagem but he hath not been at leisure yet to call his Parliament to dispute that Point I question not but that your loving Brother and you would have found other Matters of moment to have diverted you from that way of raising Money so England must have taken leave of Parliaments for ever and we must have submitted all we had to your French Discretion But through the Blessing of Heaven and the Care of our Legislators we are delivered not only from your Government and your intended French way of Governing for we continue to have the same Right modestly understood in our Propriety that our Prince hath in his Royalty and in all Cases where the King himself is concerned we have our just Remedy as against any private Person in the Nation in the Courts of Westminster-hall or in the High Court of Parliament for his Prerogative is not like that you would have usurped but what the Law hath only determined His great Seal which is the legitimate Stamp of his Royal Will and Pleasure yet it is no longer currant than upon the Tryal it is found to be according to Law and Justice The King cannot commit any Man by his own particular Warrant he cannot be himself a Witness in any Cause whatever tho your Brother would have been one against me The Ballance of publick Justice being so delicate that not the Head only but even the Breath of the King would turn the Scale nothing is left to the Win of the King but every thing is subject to his legal Authority by which means it follows that as he can do no Wrong nor can he receive Wrong But you by your Dispensing Power put your self in a state of Wronging the Nation and destroying your self and Government but had you kept to the Measures of an English King you might have remained to this Day to have been the only intelligent Ruler over a rational People your Person had been Sacred and Inviolable and whatever Excess had been committed in your Reigh would not have been imputed to you as being free from the Necessity and Temptations Your Ministers would have been only accountable for all and must have Answered it at their Perils You had a vast Revenue and if any emergency of Affair should have appeared you had at your Call a number of Men to have advised with a supply would have been readily granted You were the Fountain of Honour the disposer of many profitable Places both in Church and State but this would not serve your turn for you would not be abridged the Power of injuring the People of England but against all Law invaded our Rights and designed nothing so much as enslaving us and our Posterity for ever And we that have tasted so much of the sweetness of Liberty and on the other hand have smarted under your short but cruel Tyranny will never be intangled again with the French Popish Yoke of Bondage but stand in defence of the King we have chosen and the Liberty we have recovered as long as we have a Being in this World Therefore consider with your self the impossibility of your return to that Government you abused to the Administration of those Laws you violated to a Nation that you made a Field of Blood and if you had remained for ought I know England might have been a Howling Wilderness In fine then I am sure if you should make any attempt to return it will be in vain and appear very rediculous 5. We have Sworn Allegiance to King William who is of the same Religion and Interest with us who delivered us out of your Hands and the Hands of your villainous Conspirators and hath fixed us upon those Foundations against which France Rome nor
you to be a man for Arbitrary Power to invade the Properties of a great part of the Subjects of England by your Proclamation what Value you had for the Rights of the Nation for whom you had ventur'd your Life in a Coiled Cable and what Regard you had to its Laws that at your first step in your pretended Government you bring in a Proclamation equivalent to those Laws that expir'd as aforesaid by which the Excise and Customs in the time of the Reign of your kind and loving Brother had been setled and paid 2. You said That you would follow the Example of your Brother in his Clemency and Tenderness to the People of England What your Brother's Clemency and Tenderness to the people of England was I am yet to learn What was his Clemency to his old Cavaliers that had serv'd both his Father and him in the Wars to the ruine of themselves and Families spending their Substance in both their Services and not so much as looked upon when you were restor'd After that Sir John Webster a Merchant had lent him 150000 l. Sterling did not he after much Importunity reward the said Sir John with the refusal of a Land-waiter's Place and graciously suffer'd the poor man to starve as a Reward of his Loyalty Was not his Clemency such that within the compass of a very few years all his whole Interest was melted down into a small Regiment of Pimps Whores and Bawds on whom he lavishly confer'd great Honours and on them he profusely spent the Treasure of the Nation Remember Sir how his Clemency was extended to those Ministers that brought him home and to that Party of Men that restor'd him to his Crown and Dignity Mr. Jenkins is a notable Instance of his Clemency who ventur'd his Life for his Restoration in that Cause that Mr. Love lost his What a Tenderness he had for Mr. Jenkins was seen in his murdering him in Prison notwithstanding all the humble application made to your tender Brother for his release in order to preserve his Life His Clemency to Sir Henry Vane was admirable for rather than Vane should not be sent to Heaven he broke through an Act of Parliament lest the Martyr should find delay in his passage thither What can you say of his Clemency to Great Essex and Noble Russel whom he basely and barbarously murder'd I think that Sir Thomas Armstrong is another Instance of his Clemency And so you were as good as your word in following the Example of his Clemency and Tenderness to the People of England For upon your entering into the Regal State you let England have a taste of your Clemency I must begin with my own Case I sufficiently tasted of your Grace and Favour after that with the hazard of my Life I had discover'd a Damnable Conspiracy carried on by the Popish Party for the destruction of the King your Brother and the Protestant Religion and the Government of the Nation how you used me let all the World judge notwithstanding the Credit the Parliament had given me as you may rememember in the Vote of March 15. 1679. Resolved Nemine Contradicente by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled That they do declare that they are fully satisfied by the Proofs they have heard that there now is and for divers years last past hath been an Horrid and Treasonable Plot and Conspiracy continued and carried on by those of the Popish Religion for the murdering of His Majesty's Sacred Person and for subverting the Protestant Religion and the Ancient Establish'd Government of this Kingdom Notwithstanding all your Clemency and Tenderness to the English Nation produce such a Vote for the Justifying your Reputation in the Nation and for ought I know you may perswade your self that the Nation may be enclin'd to receive you into favour again and admit your tender Government of them once more But to return to the Point Notwithstanding the Power of Truth and the Credit of this Vote with what implacable Malice did you and your Banditti pursue me How often did you attempt to take away my Life by the Testimony of False Witnesses With what Importunity did you prevail upon the King your Brother to withdraw that Protection and Subsistance that the said King allow'd me at the request of several Parliaments so that I might starve for want of Bread Nay to express your Clemency and Tenderness how warmly did you prosecute me in an Action of Scandalum Magnatum for speaking this Notorious Truth of you That you were reconciled to the Church of Rome and that it was High Treason to be so reconcil'd And what a noble Verdict a pack'd Jury of your Conspirators upon the prosecution brought in against me of One hundred thousand Pound Damages And thereupon you generously Charged me in Execution in the Kings-Bench Prison And was you afraid that I was Able to have paid the Debt and Charges and as Willing as Able Well to prevent it you resolv'd that I should not want your Clemency and Tenderness you therefore to justifie those Vertues to be inherent in you you prevail'd with King Charles the Second to give you and your Conspirators Leave to prefer two several Indictments of two pretended Perjuries in my Evidence concerning the Popish Plot but your Villains would not let the King your Brother live to see those Indictments try'd therefore they were brought to tryal in your tender Reign What sort of Witnesses did you produce against me but those very men that had been in no less than three Tryals prov'd and judg'd to be False Witnesses the Religion they professed no ways admitting them to be Credible and therefore as they were not believ'd when they gave their Testimony without an Oath so they were not to be believ'd when they were upon their Oaths for you know tender Sir they were of a Religion that could dispense with Oaths tho' false for the sake of your Catholick Cause These Sir were your Witnesses and you had two Juries of Men that had as large a Faith to believe as the Rogues had Consciences to swear and so I must averr Juries and Witnesses to be alike for he is as criminal and is as much damn'd that believes a Lye as he is that makes one and swears it too for the Rogues your mercenary wicked Judges and the Villains that were Witnesses and your pack'd Hell-born Jury-men were all in as it were a Confederacy to be reveng'd on me for the discovery of the Popish Plot and to cast a Reproach upon the Wisdom and Honour of four successive Parliaments and upon the publick Justice of the Nation Well Sir I was convicted notwithstanding the Witnesses I brought in who were brow-beaten abused by that Villain Jefferies who had neither Law nor Sence nor Manners but had the Impudence of Ten Carted Whores therefore nothing now remained for me but Judgment which was your own appointing with the Advice of your twelve Villains that were