Pinions of Power at Sea Portugal revolting to the Family of Braganza they judged that even Hope of Assistance from so crazie maimed and disjointed a Crown was a vain Impossibility France was full of Civil Broils occasioned by the Pretensions of the House of Guise and the Princes of the Blood to the Regency during the Minority of Francis the Second and Charles the Ninth and in danger of becoming totally Hugonot it self had not the Bloody Vespers of St. Bartholomew in the Year 1572. by the Parisian Massacre as they thought let out the most dangerous and Feavourish Protestant Blood in the Body and after that had it not been rescued from that danger in the Head by the more than Roman the Roman Catholique courages of Clement and Ravilliac by whose Assassinating Hands the Two Henries the Third and Fourth fell so that little hope of help was to be expected from that Quarter to regain England to Obedience to the Catholique Faith of Rome Germany was at too great a distance and too much Lutheran and composed of too many jarring and perpetually jealous Interests to expect any Succour from Ratisbonne nor was it well able to defend it self from the furious Shock of the Warlike Gustavus King of Sweden who in probability had he lived any considerable time would have made good the Anagram of his Name and changed it to Augustus These Circumstances of Affairs and the posture in which Europe then stood obliged the Sons of limping Loyola to put off the Lyons Skin and begin to play the Fox and to try if Art and Artifice would not repair what their unsuccessful Treasons and improsperous Arms had in vain attempted And now the After-game they had to play for so great a Stake was to be managed with their most refined Skill from henceforward Divide Impera must be the Word the secret Spring that must move the mighty Machine by which they were to compleat our overthrow All their Arts were used to sow Dissentions Sects Schisms Fears and Jealousies among us and by pretending a danger and fear of Popery really to make the way easie to introduce it The first crop which they reaped and the early Earnest of their future Harvest was the loss of the Palatinate by which the Protestant Interest in Germany sustained a most dangerous Blow and the Catholique received a considerable accession both of Power and Proselytes for by this time they had so infected England with Fears and Jealousies that King James could not get a Parliament to part with a Penny of Money for the Relief of his son-in-Son-in-Law the Elector unless he would pawn his Crown and Prerogative for it Nor could his Successor King Charles do any thing towards Resetling that unfortunate Prince in his rightful Inheritance nor in conclusion to preserve his own Flusht with this lucky Hit and the succeeding loss of Rochel they now resolve closely to follow the Blow and pursue their point and by making the Popish Party in England appear good and loyal Subjects zealous for the Crown and opposite to the Factious of the several Sects they were resolved by this one Artifice to ruine the Heretiques by their own Divisions for by this means the Papists began to appear quiet and innocent and not only so but Loyal Subjects and Friends to the Crown this they knew would disarm the Penal Laws in force against them of their usual severity and that would at once increase the number of their own Proselytes and that of Dissenters too and whilst many were recalled whom the fear of Persecution had staggered from the Romish Religion the Indulgence which was shewn them gave such Apprehensions and Alarms of the growth and fear of Popery that it augmented the number of Dissenters and gave a colourable pretext to the Factions and Disloyal among them to manage their Designs with the greater facility For this unmerited Clemency of our Princes naturally tender of the Lives and Fortunes of their Subjects so long as they saw no appearance from them but of Innocence Kindness and Loyalty they constantly perverted to this ingrateful use secretly to instil a Jealousie into the Minds of their Protestant Subjects of their dis-affection to the Protestant Religion insinuating that the Suspension of the Penal Laws in force against Roman Catholiques was the effect of the Princes inclination to Popery Now the Court was certainly making a tack towards the Coast of Italy and it would not be long before they came to an Anchor in Tyber for what could make it more clear and manifest than the Kindness as well as Indulgence which was shewn to those of that Perswasion This deadly Poison thus sweetned and guilded over went down with the Querulous and Credulous Multitude of dissenting Protestants and was not a little forwarded by those Factious and Discontented Promoters of the late Rebellion as the most serviceable Engine to batter down both the Crown and the Church What unconceiveable pleasure was it now for these concealed Romanists to stand behind the Scene and prompt both Parties to Act the bloody Tragedy which they had composed Without all doubt this intoxicating Jealousie made great Numbers of innocent and undeserving Persons stagger into the other Extream and the extraordinary fears and cry of Popery drive Men so far from that that at last by the violence of the increasing Storm they threw over-board all their Loyalty and in a manner all Religion Had not that great Man Archbishop Laud been one of the Jonahs that was first heaved over the Decks to allay the Tempest we had certainly had then a full discovery of the whole Design as most fully appears by the Letters now lately Printed of Sir William Boswell The ground Design of the Papists in the Reign of King Charles the First c. the English Ambassador in Holland to the Archbishop Andreas ab Habernfeilds the Archbishops to the King and his Majesties Answer together with a particular of the whole Design of the Papists who are therein by Name mentioned to ruine the King and Archbishop and with them the Church and State by Civil Wars which were begun by their contrivance in Scotland But it was too much the Interest both of the Papists and Rebels to suppress those Papers and the further discovery of those Designs by his hasty death for had he lived to compleat the Discovery all the After-game of both Parties had been counter-plotted and though possibly the Rebels knew nothing of the Design till after his death and that his Papers fell into their hands yet then they were too far imbarqued in the Civil Wars to sound a Retreat and to proclaim themselves Murtherers for taking away the Archbishop as a Papist whose Innocence would thereby have been fully vindicated and their Guilt made notorious to the ruine of all their Esteem with the People and the utter confusion of their Ambitious Design of Soveraignty and erecting a Commonwealth upon the Ruines of the Monarchy So that nothing can be more
clear and evident than this That from the subtil Practices of the Jesuites those Diversities in Opinion and Differences in Practice among Protestants received their Encouragement if not their Rise and Original and while every new Sect pretended still to out-do others in the Purity of Reformation and a further escape from the Superstition of the Romish Babylon they were all made Instrumental to undo the Protestant Religion and a thorough Reformation became the Apple of Contention between the Prince and the People the King was accused of favouring Popery and designing to introduce it and with it Arbitrary Tyranny the Natural Child of that Religion because he would not comply with the Zealous Fury of some Popular Spirits to throw down the Hierarchy of the Church which is one of the Fundamental Pillars of our Government The other by their disobedience to the known and Establisht Laws of Church and State became guilty of Disloyalty and were not without just cause suspected of Dangerous and Treasonable Designs against the Royal Person and Government which they did endeavour to conceal under the specious pretences and taking shews of Zeal against Popery and eager forwardness to promote the pretended Reformation Thus did these subtile Foxes like Sampsons while their Heads lookt several ways carry those Firebrands between their Tails with which they set us all at last into a Flame continually fanning with their pestilent Breath those Jealousies and mutual Animosities between the Soveraign and his Subjects till they had reduced three of the most potent and flourishing Kingdoms in Europe into Ashes and had fill'd us with Blood and Confusion Thus far they had succeeded in their Enterprise that they had absolutely ruin'd the Monarchy and pull'd down the old Cathedral without Establishing or so much as ever intending so far as any body could conjecture any Church at all and while in Policy they tolerated all Religions they fairly opened a way for us to have none at all and which was the thing the Jesuites aimed at to work us from our own Divisions to destroy one another and at last either by Force or Policy to reduce us to the Vnity of the Roman Church And doubtless they were in hopes in a little time to have accomplished this great Design when unexpected Providence what by the Peoples general weariness of the Tyranny of those many Governments and by the Loyalty of the Remainders of the Church of England whom no Cruelty nor Oppression could remove from their firm Principles of Allegiance brought back with the general Joy of the People their long Desire our Banished Soveraign Restoring Him miraculously to a Peaceful Throne and with Him Restoring to these Languishing Nations their Antient Government and Laws their long-wanted Liberty and Religion Now were the Roman Conspirators at a loss again seeing their hopes defeated and their expectations gone and therefore encouraged by former Successes and Experience they begun to play their old Lessons over again and we had scarcely taken breath after our violent Revolutions when they began again to trouble our calm Waters that so they might fish with more advantage But by the Loyâ—lty of the Parliament and Vigilance of the Ministers of State that being like to prove a Work of too long time for Men of so much impatience and though they had made so great a progress as to raise some Disorders in Scotland for which two of them were under the disguise of Presbyterians executed there yet the generality of the English were too sensible of the goodness of their present Condition and sufficiently instructed in the Calamities of a late Civil War to enter into a second and above all this great City manifesting upon all occasions great Testimonies of their Loyalty and Fidelity to His Majesty and the Government they were forced upon new and more precipitate Counsels How they have managed their Affairs and with what cruelty they had laid their Designs is by the Goodness of God already in a great measure and it is to be hoped will be fully discovered it was in short a Design against His Majesties Sacred Person and the Government our Laws Lives Liberties and the Protestant Religion a Design as universally laid as it was to have been tragically executed The present Race of our Kings were either to have been wholly extirpated or become vile Tributaries to the Triple Mitre One would think it impossible that such barbarous and savage Actions should proceed from any of Human Race or that there would be found any who have so far lost the Native Generosity of Englishmen which in the Times of the Papal Monarchy durst bid defiance to his Encroachments as to prostitute the Imperial Crown of these Realms to Vassallage and Slavery A stolen smile will part from me to think how all this while these Purblind Conspirators could not see how short an Enjoyment they and their great Three Crown'd Master must have had of the bloody Spoils of England There is a certain great Neighbor of theirs who has told a Pope That he does not value his * Witness the Column erected at Rome in disgrace of the Pope for a Petty Affâ—ont offered his Ambassador tâ—ere Holiness at a Farthing and who would certainly have made the Moral of old Aesop's Fable good upon them the Lion Fox and Bear had made a Hunting Match the Fox and Bear Subtilty and Cruelty took the Prey but the Lyon as most powerful challenged it wholly for himself and had it without a Murmur from his fellow Hunters who were glad at that rate to compound with his armed Paws for the security of their own Skins I canot believe but that the whole World will entertain this discovery with Horror and though the Jesuits will with the greatest Effrontery deny or mitigate it yet certainly their Religion will receive the Blow which they intended for ours for who that is not resolved to quit Humâ—nity it self can believe that Religion to be true which is to be propagated with Treasons Murders of the most Purple-dye violation of all that is Sacred in Human Society Law Justice Equity the most Solemn Oaths Promises and Covenants Who can believe the Pope the Successor of St. Peter in Faith and Doctrine when he shall under his most Authentique Hand and Seal Absolve the Subjects of any Prince from their Natural Civil and Religious Allegeance to their Lawful Soveraign when he shall grant Pardons to whosoever shall Murder him and dispence with all the Oaths that have been or can be taken to secure the Royal Person or the Government by Law established Nero that Monster of Nature from whom he claims a Succession at least of Practice set Rome on fire slew his Friends made Cruelty his divertisement and became a Parricide out of Curiosity Ripping up his Mothers Belly that he might see the Nest that had brought that Viper into the World Flaming London is a witness that the second Rome can equal if not exceed the First and the Pope scorns to
to secure themselves in other particulars they will never so far as we yet know be compelled by us or allowed by their Superiors to partake with us in the Holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper I do not speak this to oppose any way of Publick proceedings against them by Oaths or Tests declaring their believing that there is no Transubstantiation of the Elements of Bread and Wine at or afer the Consecration of them in the Lords Supper c. if their Consciences can swallow and digest Perjury much good may it do them I am assured it can do us no injury but will certainly render them obnoxious to that Vengeance which must and will infallibly fall upon perjur'd heads and how sudden or severe that will be let them look to it for it nearly concerns them whatever they may think What I offer is only in a private way and to private persons that they in their sphere may be assistant to the Publick Ministers of Justice and of State in the discovery of these dangerous and cunning sort of Men and thereby contributing what lies in our power to our own particular and the general security of his Most Sacred Majesty whom God long preserve the Government our Lives Liberties Laws properties Religion and Posterity from the outrages violences treasons and Conspiracies of these our inveterate and mortal Enemies And certainly would all people be perswaded to be Vnanimous in this duty of coming three times at the least in every Year to celebrate and publickly receive the Holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper and an account taken of all such as refuse and absent themselves it would be impossible upon strict enquiry into their manner of life and other Circumstances and especially tendering it to them on some Lords day next after such their Examination that they should escape being discovered One would think that the proposal were so rational so easie and so Religious that none but the very Criminals themselves or their Accessories and Confederates should refuse this way of Tryal and discrimination nor is it possible for any impartial person to consider and deliberate of it but he must in his Judgment accuse such as shall refuse it as manifest favourers of Papists and Jesuits The Law Esteems all such as aid conceal and comfort Traitors or protect them from discovery to be Traitors themselves and though they may plead for themselves that they do not know them that are such and that may free them from the Penalties and danger of the Laws of Men yet this Ignorance being perfectly voluntary and proceeding from their wilful neglect of the way and means they had to detect them it will not excuse any persons in foro Conscientiae before God and their own Consciences from being guilty not only of the Murders and mischiefs that have already happen'd but of whatsoever may or shall happen hereafter for or by reason of their escaping undiscovered the true Maxim qui non probibet cum poâ—â—st jubet will infallibly lie against them at the great day of accounts He who has a possibility of preventing a Mischief and either neglects or refuses to do it most certainly in the sight of God the Righteous Judg is guilty of it I cannot tell what arguments to make choise of in such a Crowd of them as come thronging into my mind to persuade people to be willing and ready to perform a duty they owe to God and Man in order to the securing our Peace and Religion in their private Capacities as well as the Government is to do all that can be done or devised in order to it but however in short I will offer these following as to me appearing most pressing and considerable and if any other person can suggest more or more proper Motives it will become them considering the present necessity in charity to themselves and the Publick of offer them to the view and consideration of the people of these Nations First therefore I heartily wish that all people would consider with themselves that what I offer is no Innovation here is nothing proposed to them or imposed on them but what the wisdom of our Ancestors and of King James esteemed one of the wisest Princes in the World with the advice of his Parliament thought fit to pass into a Law and I hope that very Name will oblige people to believe the owe a duty of obedience to it all the difference seems to be this that when that Statute was made all Protestants in general received the holy Sacrament and onely the Papists were they who refused to do it whereas now it is to be feared through the industry of the Jesuits among us many who call themselves Protestants will refuse it as well as Papists however to shew the duty and the advantage of it especially were it a little accommodated to our present Circumstances and because it does not lie in the way of every person to consult the Statute at large I will faithfully set down so much of it as concerns our present Case and purpose Tertio Jacobi cap. 4. An Act for the better discovering and repressing Popish Recusants Forasmuch as it is found by daily Experience that many his Majesties Subjects that adhere in their hearts to the Popish Religion by the Infection drawn from thence and by the wicked and devillish counsel of Jesuits Seminaries and other like persons dangerous to the Church and State are so far perverted in the point of their loyalty and due Allegiance unto the Kings Majesty and the Crown of England as they are ready to entertain and execute any treasonable Conspiracies and practises as evidently appears by that more then barbarous and horrible attempt to have blown up with Gunpowder the King Queen Prince Lords and Commons in the House of Parliament assembled tending to the utter subversion of the whole State lately undertaken by the Instigation of Jesuits and Seminaries and in advancement of their Religion by their Schollars taught and instructed by them to that purpose which attempt by the only goodness of Almighty God was discovered and defeated and whereas divers persons * Observe that they judged all such as would not receive the Sacrament to be Popishly affected popishly affected do nevertheless to cover and hide their false hearts and with more sufety to attend the opportunities to execute their mischievous designs repair sometimes to Church to avoid the Penalty of the Laws in that behalf provided For the better discovery therefore of such persons and their evil affections to the Kings Majesty and the State of this Realm to the end that being known their evil purposes may be better prevented Be it enacted by the Kings most excellent Majesty the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled and by the authority of the same That every popish Recusant convicted or hereafter to be convicted which heretofore hath conformed him or her self or which shall hereafter conform him or
her self and repair to the Church and continue there during the time of Divine Service according to the Laws and Statutes in that behalf made and provided shall within the first Year next after the end of this Session of Parliament or within the first year after that he or she shall after this Session of Parliament so conform him or her self and repair to the Church as aforesaid and after the first Year once in every Year at the least receive the blessed Sacrament of the Lords Supper in the Church of that parish where he or she shall most usually abide or be within the said Year wherein by the true meaning of this Statue he or she ought to receive And if there be no such parish Church then in the Church next adjoyning to the place of his or her most usual abode The forfeiture for the first year twenty pounds for the second Year forty pounds and for every Year after threescore pounds And the Officers are therein by rewards incouraged to present the Monthly absence of all Recusants from the Church and for default of performing their duty are to be fined as in the Statute more largly appears Were this Statute with a little variation fitted for our Circumstances and duly put in Execution it would be impossible but that all Recusants must in a small time be detected and by consequence those dangerous Jesuits and Seminaries whose whole design is to contrive plot and execute their horrible Treasons against both Church and State and unless people can be brought to comply with their own Interest as well as duty the Excellent Method of that Law will be wholly impracticable and it will be impossible to effect or attain the end for which it was so wisely intended for so long as such numbers of people who call themselves Protestants shall wilfully absent themselves from their Parish Churches under the shew of Religion and by their Example so many who have no Religion at all but perfectly out of Idleness looseness and debauchery shall stay at home or do worse abroad these Traytors and Conspirators will expect and find Security by pretending to be dissenters and so long as there are so many who never regard any Laws of God or Men Civil or Ecclesiastical which enjoyn them to receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper these will also pass undiscovered among the throng for it is all one to a Jesuit whether he pass for a separatist Libertine or Atheist so long as he believes himself a good Catholique and so long as thereby he has the opportunity of concealment and thereby to prosecute the main Affair of propagating the Popish interest and Religion by the Ruine of Protestants and Protestant Religion And therefore in the second place I wish that all people would seriously reflect with themselves at whose door the guilt will lie if by their means mischief either publick or private overtake us If the glorious Light of the Gospel the Lamp of Eternal Truth should come to be extinguished by the Superstitious darkness of Rome if by the Subversion of England the whole Protestant Cause should suffer and be ruin'd as in all probability if that Bullwork were blown up it must or however suffer a persecution as Sharp and cruel as all those ten of the Primitive ages put together the Pagans being nothing so ingenious and wittily Cruel as the Jesuits if Millions of souls should by a false Religion come to perish Everlastingly if our streets and fields should blush with the blood of Massacred Protestants our houses be reduced to ashes and our miserable posterity with such as should survive the Common Rage and desolation should be made and sold for bondslaves certainly there must be a strict account given to Almighty God by whose default all this came to pass he gives us the means of securing our selves and if we neglect the fault and guilt will be wholly theirs who do obstruct it our blood will be upon their heads who hear the Trumpet and see the Sword coming and are so far from taking or giving the All-arm that they joyn with ours and their own Enemies if they be not secret Papists and put a Sword into their hands to slay us when God to whom vengeance belongs shall make Inquisition for blood he will not forget the cry of the poor he will not forget those who have been the occasions no more then those who were the Actors of cruelty and how it is possible for those who obstruct the discovery of Popish Priests and Jesuits not to be in the sight of God and men guilty of all the Miseries and mischiefs which may be occasioned by their concealment I must protest my self to be utterly ignorant If there can be found any persons so incredulous as not to be apprehensive of these dangers from them and who may that way think to evade the necessity that lies upon them to contribute their utmost towards this Discovery I will in short endeavour to convince them from Former Examples Let the horrible Massacre in France be remembred in which according to the Relation even of Popish Historians there perished near a hundred thousand Protestants of all Ages Sexes and Conditions among which twenty Lords of Eminency twelve hundred Gentlemen persons of great Condition in the City of Paris besides what fell in other places The subtile Contrivance and deep dissimulation with which it was managed and the Exquisite and ingenious Cruelty with which it was Executed may sufficiently Instruct us what we are to trust to from such Murderers as glory in what is the shame and reproach of humane Nature and render the most propitious and merciful Divinity a cruel and sanguinary Being while they pretend to please and do him acceptable service by such bloody sacrifices as even heathens generally by the light of mere nature thought he abhorred and who encourage one another in mischief as if the Heavenly Paradice were an Aceldama and to be purchac'd with the price of blood making such actions of â—orror and Cruelty as even exceed belief meritorious performances capable to enrol them in the Catalogue of their Calender Saints though we know none shall ascend the holy Hill but they who have clean hands as well as a pure heart If this were not sufficient to convince us at the expence of our neighbours that which comes nearer to us is the Rebellion and Massacre of the English Protestants in Ireland the fatal Flambeau which kindled our English Flames the Cruelties which were then exercised are beyond Expression and belief three hundred thousand souls perished by most cruel deaths according to computation and God onely knows how many more who could never be brought into account and both in this and the Parisian Massacre how many of those who escaped the barbarous Rage of these merciless Butchers perished afterwards with cold hunger nakedness and all the hardships that attend the miserable Condition to which they were exposed Whither to fly they knew not