Selected quad for the lemma: parliament_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
parliament_n	act_n	king_n	title_n	3,788	5	7.4113	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51392	A letter to Her Highness the Duchess of York some few months before her death written by the Bishop of Winchester.	Morley, George, 1597-1684.; York, Anne Hyde, Duchess of, 1637-1671.	1683 (1683)	Wing M2792; ESTC R27514	11,780	24

of the KING and his Brothers were nothing else but the malicious Inventions of those that were either in fact or in consent the Murderers of their Father and consequently irreconcileable and implacable Enemies unto his Children For said I to my certain Knowledg who was almost always an Eye-witness of their actions the KING and both his Brothers did not only by their Profession but by their Practise declare and testifie themselves to be true Sons of the Church of England even in the midst of its Enemies by coming daily to our Prayers and weekly to our Sermons and frequently to our Communnions Which I do not now Repeat by way of Boasting of what I did for though it was all I could do yet perhaps it was less I am sure it was no more than I am bound to do But I repeat this and what I said before of the late King to let your Highness see how dangerous a thing it is for any of the Royal Family to suffer themselves to be traduced to the People by any such Reports and Discourses as now are made of your Highness which certainly ought not to be despised or neglected but carefully and seriously to be enquir'd into and speedily to be suppressed by a severe and exemplary Punishment of the Authors and Abettors of them It was very well and wisely done therefore of our present Sovereign remembring his Fathers Fate and the Cause of it to pass an Act of Parliament presently after his coming home whereby the saying that the King is a Papist or that he indeavours to introduce Popery is made punishable in a very high degree And it is observable that this Act wherein this Clause is is in the Title of it called An Act for the safety and preservation of the KINGS Person and Government thereby implying that the raising and spreading of such Reports must needs be very Dangerous and consequently those that raise or spread them very Criminal as being indeed the greatest Enemies both of the King and Kingdom which though it be most true when such Reports reflect immediately on the KING himself yet is it in proportion true likewise when any of the Royal Family are concerned in it So that they are the Kings and Kingdoms Enemies as well as Yours and your Husbands and your Childrens that were the Authors and are the Abettors of what is so generally spoken and seems to be so generally believed of your Royal Highness in this particular to the divulging and the belief whereof I do verily think that none have been more Active nor so much Instrumental as some of the Popish Party and amongst them especially the Popish Priests themselves and that partly out of Vanity and partly out of Cunning. For as some of our Secular Gallants do out of Vanity only sometimes boast of favours they have received from such or such Women of known Honour and Virtue though they never did nor ever durst speak so much as one word to any of Them to any such purpose so do many of the Clergy Cavaliers of the Church of Rome as vainly vaunt how Many and how Great Proselytes they have made and of how many considerable Persons of both Sexes they have gained from our Church unto theirs which though it be too true in too many yet as to some whom they most boast of and would fain have it believed they have prevail'd with as particularly and especially with your Royal Highness I am confident it is but a vain Brag and yet I do not think 't is done out of Vanity only but out of Artifice and Cunning also because they have good Reason to hope that if they can make it to be believed that they have gained but one such Proselyte as your Highness it would be the most effectual Means they can make use of to perswade Others and consequently the most compendious way they can take in Order to their main End In the mean time it is another notable Effect of their Fineness and Subtilty that when They themselves have been the Authors and Divulgers of such a malicious and scandalous Report and done You all the Mischief they can by it than if they find Those that are most Concerned in it to be Alarum'd with it and to resent it with that indignation as so bold and so injurious a Practise ought indeed to be resented withall then I say the next thing they do is by such Instruments as they never want about great Persons upon such Occasions to perswade the Parties concerned in such Reports that all the Noise which they hear and which seems to disquiet them so much is not from the howling of those Wolves but from the barking of their own Dogs who being as they say more afraid than hurt do by giving too soon and too loud a Warning of a Danger which they think to be greater and nearer than it is rather increase than lessen the Noise which was made before and which perhaps would have ceased of it self if too much Notice had not been taken as there was of it And such an Artifice as this it was to inform your Highness as some body did that this Clamour against your Highness from whomsoever it had its first Rise it had its Growth from some of our Clergy and particularly from Me for One as if I had given some body or other some Cause to Believe it and consequently made it more to be Suspected and Spoken of by others than it was before which as I then said I hope there is none knows me can think Me though I was never so Wicked to be so very a Fool as to believe of me For what End could I have especially having had such and so long a Relation to your Highness as I had what End I say could I have in making your Highness Believed or Suspected to be a Papist unless it were to make my self to be believed to be a Papist also and consequently to be an old arrant Hypocrite seeing I always did and do and ever shall by the Grace of God profess the contrary though I were to dye at a stake for so doing No no Maddam it was neither I nor as I verily believe any of our Priests or Bishops but as I then said they were some of the Priests of the Church of Rome that in all probability were both the Authors and Abettors of this Scandal and that I was told no longer ago than the night before by a Person of Honour and Title that the very day before he came to me he was told by a Romish Priest that your Highness was already of their Church and would very shortly declare your self to be so Whereunto my Reply was that although I did believe his Lordship yet I did not and hoped he would not believe the Priest that told him so because your Highness had been pleased as I told his Lordship not long before to give me all the Assurance I could desire to the contrary with which Answer