which they formerly reputed Idolatrous They now think themselves justified in their Espousing the Parliaments side from whom they expected and had Indulgence and please themselves to find another kind of non Addressors and as zealous persons to hinder the Repeal of Penal Laws against their Sovereigns declared desire as they were formerly for it Yet though the Scene be thus changed I hope there are sufficient numbers of such whom the Church of England will own to be her Children that will let no Dissenters out-goe them in Loyalty and Dutifulness to their Sovereign and who are well assured the King will have as great regard to them and our Church for their sakes and as freely permit them the enjoyment of the Exercise of their Religion and Benefices as to any provided they will concur with Him in the Repeal and be content to let their Fellow-Subjects of different Persuasions enjoy likewise their Liberty That the Members of the Church of England ought to yield this in common prudence and even for the Preservation of their own Religion I think there are many Reasons especially this that as yet the time is not clapsed but that when His Majesty convenes His Parliament sufficient Security may be obtained that the Church of England shall enjoy all the King hath promised and when by the Wisdom of the Houses such an Act is contrived as will answer the Kings desires of the Universal ease of His Subject the Church of England will feel as great effects of the Kings kindness as she can expect or desire and by the freedom all will enjoy there will be no more contests but who shall approve themselves most dutiful and deserving of His Majesties Clemency and Kindness Upon such a closure the Roman Catholicks and Dissenters will freely yield to the mutual security of the Church of England and that Church will regain its Reputation of Loyalty and confirm what you promise in her name of being kind to Dissenters and a Protestant Prince succeeding and finding things thus Amicably Composed will reap the benefit as the whole Kingdom will do of this happy undertaking of the King But on the contrary if the Majority of the Members of the Church of England in Parliament obstinately oppose the Kings desires they will oblige His Majesty to pursue other Methods and it will give occasion to all such as are no great well-wishers to our Church to urge its uncharitableness that rather than it will permit the King to exercise His Prerogative of being served with all His Subjects of what denomination soever He pleases to make use of and that Men of different Professions in Religion may enjoy the favour of the Kings Indulgence they will put themselves out of His Royal Protection and absolve Him from His promise therein and the upshot of all will be that by His Majesties steady pursuit of this great work which He firmly believes will conduce so much to the universal good of His Subjects In a few years by such sedulous countenancing all those who will strenuously co-operate with Him to effect it the Dissenters will obtain the Majority of Voices in Parliament which if once effected those Members of the Church of England who have Obstructed the Repeal will be at the mercy of Dissenters and if the King be not their best Friend may fall short of what they may now so effectually obtain I shall conclude with a short Paraphrase upon the Words His Majesty used to His Privy Council March the 8th 1686. concerning this Indulgence in which the substance of what need be said in justifying the Kings granting it are clearly laid down First His Majesty shows the practice of former Ages and the success of them That although an Vniformity in the Religious Worship had been Endeavoured to be Established within this Kingdom in the successive Reigns of Four of His Majesties Royal Predecessors assisted by their respective Parliaments yet it hath proved altogether ineffectual This is obvious to every one that reads the History of those times and well know to those that lived in the beginning of the Rebellion for Dissenters were then so encreased that they were numerous and powerful enough to overthrow not only the Church of England but the Monarchy that defended it The Kings Words are That the Restraint upon the Consciences of Dissenters in order thereunto viz. to Conformity had been very prejudicial to this Nation as was sadly experienced in the horrid Rebellion in the time of His Majesties Royal Father The King then pitcheth upon the true and principal cause of all those Calamities that befel the blessed Martyr and were freshly commencing again in the later time of His Majesties Royal Brothers Reign which are best expressed in the Kings own Words That the many Penal Laws made against Dissenters in all the foregoing Reigns and especially in the time of the late King had rather increased than lessened them If therefore our Gracious King out of an excess of love and Paternal care did not study the Universal benefit ease profit and enriching of His people He might have pursued former Precedents But as a Wise and Compassionate Prince He searcheth diligently for the true Causes and while too many are busying themselves in Traducing His zeal for His Religion as if it were the only concern of His Royal Cares He Demonstrates to all His Subjects how much more sollicitous He is to find some better Method whereby at once He may Establish His Throne and those of His Successors in a stable peace and security and give Ease Freedom and Riches to all His People of what Persuastion soever Therefore declares That nothing can more conduce to the peace and quiet of His Kingdom and the increase of the Numbers as well as the Trade of the Subjects wherein the greatness of a Prince does more consist than in the extent of His Teritories than an entire Liberty of Conscience That His Majesty may likewise obviate all the great scruple such as you raise as if He did this for any private ends you have His Royal Word to the contrary when He tells all His Subjects That it hath been His Opinion as most suitable to the Principles of Christianity that no Man should be Persecuted for Conscience sake which His Majesty thinks is not to be forced By this His Majesty shows that He grounds not His judgement upon the agreeableness or ungreeableness of it to the interest of any Church but as it is suitable to the uery Principles of Christian Religion and having by this shown His Royal Intentions how to proceed upon that bottom during His own Reign out of a well grounded Confidence that it may be a rule and standard to His Royal Successors He closeth all with this Maxim That it can never be the true Interest of a King of England to endeavour to force Conscience Have not all Men from hence and all His Majesties Actions reason to think there is a Clemency Benignity and tenderness in the King
cannot get the better of such broad Conviction as some things carry along with them Will you call these vain and empty Suspitions have you been at all times so void of Fears and Jealousies as to justifie your being so unreasonably Valiant in having none upon this occasion Such an extraordinary Courage at this unseasonable time to say no more is too dangerous a Vertue to be commended q If then for these and a thousand other Reasons there is cause to suspect sure your new Friends are not to Dictate to you or advise you for instance The Addresses that fly abroad every Week and Murther us with another to the same the first Draughts are made by those who are not very proper to be Secretaries to the Protestant Religion and it is your part only to Write them out fairer again Strange that you who have been formerly so much against Set forms should now be content the Priests should Indite for you The nature of Thanks is an unavoidable consequence of being Pleased or Obliged they grow in the Heart and from thence shew themselves either in Looks Speech Writing or Action No Man was ever thankful because he was bid to be so but because he had or Thought he had some Reason for it If then there is cause in this Case to pay such extravagant acknowledgments they will flow naturally without taking such pains to procure them and 't is unkindly done to tire all the Post-Horses with carrying Circular Letters to Sollicite that which would be done without any Trouble or Constraint If it is really in it self such a favour what needeth so many pressing men to be thankful and with such eager Circumstances that where perswasion cannot delude Threatnings are imployed to fright them into a compliance Thanks must be Voluntary not only Vnconstrained but Vnsollicited else they are either Trifles or Snares they either signifie nothing or a great deal more than is intended by those that give them If an Inference should be made That whosoever Thanketh the King for His Declaration is by that engaged to justifie it in point of Law it is a greater stride than I presume all those care to make who are persuaded to Address If it shall be supposed that all the Thankers shall be the Repealers of the TEST when ever a Parliament shall meet Such an expectation is better prevented before than disappointed afterwards and the surest way to avoid the lying under such a scandal is not to do any thing that may give a colour to the mistake These bespoken Thanks are little less improper than Love-Letters that were Sollicitated by the Lady to whom they are to be Directed so that besides the little ground there is to give them the manner of getting them doth extreamly lessen their Value It might be wished that you would have suppressed your impatience and have been content for the sake of Religion to enjoy it within your selves without the Liberty of a publick Exercise till a Parliament had allowed it But since that could not be and that the Artifices of some amongst you have made use of the Well meant Zeal of the Generality to draw them into this mistake I am so far from blaming you with that sharpness which perhaps the matter in strictness would bear that I am ready to err on the side of the more gentle construction r There is a great difference between enjoying quietly the advantages of an Act irregularly done by others and the going about to support it against the Laws in being the Law is so Sacred that no Trespass against it is to be Defended yet Frailties may in some measure be Excused when they cannot be Justified The desire of enjoying a Liberty from which men have been so long restrained may be a Temptation that their Reason is not at all times able to resist If in such a case some Objections are leapt over indifferent men will be more inclined to lament the Occasion than to fall too hard upon the Fault whilst it is covered with the Apologie of a good Intention but where to rescue your selves from the Severity of one Law you give a blow to all the Laws by which your Religion and Liberty are to be protected and instead of silently receiving the benefit of this Indulgence you set up for Advocates to support it you become voluntary Aggressors and look like Counsel retained by the Prerogative against your old friend Magna Charta who hath done nothing to deserve her falling thus under your Displeasure s If the case then should be that the Price expected from you for this Liberty is giving up your Right in the Laws sure you will think twice before you go any further in such a losing Bargain After giving Thanks for the breach of one Law you lose the Right of Complaining of the breach of all the rest you will not very well know how to defend your selves when you are pressed and having given up the Question when it was for your advantage you cannot recal it when it shall be to your prejudice If you will set up at one time a Power to help you which at another time by parity of Reason shall be made use of to destroy you you will neither be pitied nor relieved against any mischief you draw upon your selves by being so unreasonably thankful It is like calling in Auxiliaries to help who are strong enough to subdue you in such a case your complaints will come too late to be heard and your sufferings will raise mirth instead of Compassion t If you think for your excuse to expound your Thanks so as to restrain them as to this particular case Others for their end will extend them further and in these differing Interpretation that which is back'd by Authority will be the most likely to prevail especially when by the advantage you have given them they have in truth the better of the Argument and that the inferences from your own Concessions are very strong and express against you This is so far from being a groundless Supposition and there was a late instance of it the last Session of Parliament in the House of Lords where the first Thanks though things of course were interpreted to be the Approbation of the Kings whole Speech and a Restraint never so much disliked and it was with difficulty obtained not to be excluded from the liberty of objecting to this mighty Prerogative of Dispensing meerly by this innocent and usual piece of good Manners by which no such thing could possibly be intended u This sheweth that some bounds are to be put to your good Breeding and that the Constitution of England is too valuable a thing to be ventured upon a Complement Now that you have for some time enjoyed the benefit of the End it is time for you to look into the danger of the Means The same Reason that made you desirous to get Liberty must make you Sollicitous to preserve it so that the next thought will naturally
Sir we dare not encourage You to be kind to us and we must stay our Addresses of thanks lest we give a Scandal to our Brethren or they hereafter punish us for this forwardness I fancy you have the vanity to hope that your Letter will prevail with some to desist from Addresses upon those motives otherwise what need was there for you to be so urgent with them to suppress their impatience and for the sake of those that are now Abhorrers to stick close to the Act of Vniformity till the King die whom God long preserve to finish this great work in hopes a Protestant Parliament under a Protestant King will grant them better Terms For I hope by the word Parliament you mean not the Two Houses like those of 41 who Entitled them to the Supream Power It seems if Dissenters hearken not to you though at present you are willing to make a gentle Construction of the well meant Zeal of some in drawing others into the Mistake yet you threaten them with Sharpness and Satyr because in strictness the matter will bear it if we believe you r It seems a Dissenter may feed fully but must say no Grace or cry Roast-meat would you have them pet like froward Children because the Benevolence was not offer'd first to them or in the Circumstances they desire it It seems they may privately thank God for putting it into the Kings Heart to grant them ease yea they may enjoy the Advantag e of it but without noise lest some Dog catch the Morsel the Cat purs upon Oh! a publick owning and desire to have Indulgence Establlsh'd by Law is to support an Act irregularly done against the sacred Laws of the Land This is such a Trespass as may no ways be defended but to observe any rules of good manners or dutifulness to the King is a grievous fault Methinks you ought to have brought very undeniable Authorities e're you had presumed to question the judgement of the King His Privy Council and the Court of the Kings-Bench as to the Dispensing Power But since you offer not one Syllable of Argument I shall remit you to Westminster-Hall to defend the point and receive your doom You endeavour gentâ—y to stroke the Dissenters that are under Temptation and Frailties which makes them you say leap over the Objections may be made and overlook the sad consequence of giving thanks not only as an inlet to Popery but the giving a deadly blow to all the Laws by which their Liberty and Religion are to be protected This is an heavy Sentence whereby they are judg'd to sell their Birth-right for a morsel of Bread or a mess of Pottage Let us therefore turn the Optick Glass and you may more surely discover that the King designs no breach of Magna Charta nor to retain any Council for the Prerogative against it but on the contrary to have it confirmed in a much larger extent than ever it was by His Royal Predecessors for it is most certain that all Penal Laws for Religion are so many infringments of it and if you would have Magna Charta inviolably kept you know what Church is thereby Establish'd Here therefore you quarrel with the King for endeavouring to have a Charter of Liberties Establish'd that will be a standard for all future freedom and enfranchisement of Conscience and to infer that the Subjects yielding to this will put them out of the protection of all the Laws that secure their Liberties is no less an ignorant than seditious Suggestion s We are a most happy people in the security we have by Law to enjoy the Liberties the Royal Predecessors of our most Gracious King hath granted But if His Majecty effect His desire in this Repeal He will be the Author of a greater freedom to the Subjects then they ever yet enjoyed so that none in matters of Religion shall be put upon ever Complaining against or the giving up the Question since all pretences of puttng it will be thereby prevented By the operating power of such an Act such a mutual assurance and security would be given as it would be in no parties power to endevour or to desire to mischief or destroy another I fancy indeed some Apparators and Bailifs may suffer a diminution of profit and some men of vindicative spirits may want the assistance of sanguinary and Penal Laws to revenge themselves by But the benefit that will redound to the whole will sufficiently compensate that loss The Kings of England will be the gainers in that they will be no more disquieted with Rebellions upon the account of Religion The Parliaments will be eased of the tiresom disquieting and unpleasing toyl of making Laws upon every emergence to restrain some party or other from their way of Worship and imposing Tests and Oaths according as prevailing Parties have power and when the intestine struggles of every party to manacle and put the shackles and badges of slavery upon each other shall be taken away the Legislative will be at full liberty to attend soly the aggrandizing of our Kings and restoring them to the power and interest at home and abroad of the gloriousest of their Predecessors And to make good Laws for the enriching of the body of the people and by perpetual harmony unite the Subjects in the common band of Duty and Allegiance to their Sovereign and mutual love and endearment to one another The Roman Catholicks would have no occasion to repine since they might freely enjoy their Religion and the Church of England would be possess'd of the Dignities and Benefices they enjoy and the Dissenters would be satisfied that they had the freedom of their Tabernacles and Conventicles and all the content of this would be heightned in the peaceable and durable enjoyment of it when it would be in no Parties power to invade the Liberties of another This is the right Scheme of His Majesties generous design and if Dissenters fall not to their old work of stubbing up Episcopacy root and branch it may most certainly continue For the obedience of Roman Catholicks under a Protestant Government we have the most near and compleat instance in the United Provinces where they live with the free exercise of their Religion under a Bishop of their own who is Treated according to his Character by the States to whom they impart their pleasure and by his directions the Roman Catholicks obey So that when the King of France Invaded that Country none stood firmer than They did These pay such an absolute Obedience that if the States should for a time interdict them the use of their Religion they would yield to it So that all you urge as consequences of the Repeal vanisheth upon the very opening the Kings intentions which I dare venture my head that I have more truly declared than You by all your smooth Oratory have made out by suspicions t Expounding of the sense and meaning of Oaths is generally granted peculiarly to belong to the
to His Subjects flowing in His Princely Blood from His Royal Ancestors and peculiar to the family which His Religion can never alter so that where the necessity of His people rather han His own safety does not oblige Him to severity We see daily instances of a Mercifulness beyond all expectation and even to the envy of others some of which have been very late and if this difficulty of the Repeal were once over all His Subjects would know that He would deserve the Epethites of Just Merciful and Pacifick as well as any of His Royal Predecessors having that personal Courage and Fortitude over and above what is to be found in few Crowned Heads so that satis est prostrasse must be owned by all His Majesties ill-willers as peculiar to His Generosity I should here have closed this Discourse but that I find His Majesties late Speech to the LORD MAYOR and Aldermen of London when they Presented Him with their late Address hath occasioned a new Misrepresentation because His Majesty mentioned the advantages would redound to the Subjects by a general Naturalization and publick Register which those who suck poison out of every flower censure as manifest tokens that if these be effected the growth of Popery will be promoted which they thus prove First that Naturilization will open a door to let in from foreign parts such sholes of Roman Catholicks that the Protestants shall soon be out-numbered Secondly that a publick Register will so discover all Mens Estates that the King may easily dispose of them when the Laws of Property shall be as now we see Penal Laws are dispensed with As to the first of these malicious Insinuations I desire all thinking Men to consider that it is a very known Maxim that not only the power of any Prince but the Riches of every Kingdom consists in the multitude of the people well Governed Let us now therefore consider who they are that are likeliest to flock hither if an Act of general Naturilization should pass There are none that leave their own Country to Transplant themselves into another Soil but such as have a Prospect to live more at ease abroad than in their own Country and such must be principally those who retire to avoid Persecution for their Religion or are obnoxious to the Laws for some notorious Trespasses against them or such who dare not show their Heads for Debt or lastly those who in the way of Traffick think to better their Fortunes For it is ridiculous to imagine that Roman Catholick Princes will unpeople their Countries to send Colonies abroad unless it were to make War and to such I presume no Law of Naturilization will extend I suppose then no Objections will be made to the incoming of Aliens but such as do it upon a Religious account Let us therefore consider who they are that can flock hither because they want the freedom of their Religion in their own Countries and surely in Europe we can find none except they are Protestants that are in such a state under Catholick Princes and it will be very difficult to believe they will fly Persecution at home to turn Roman Catholicks here Therefore it appears most manifest that the only effect such a Law can have will be to bring from Poland some parts of Germany Denmark Sweden or Holland the French Refugees since England is known to be a place of more comfortable Retreat than those Countries are and if such French or any other Aliens were Dispersed in some proportion through the Kingdom and not suffered all to settle in the Populous City of London there might be hopes that by their Industry and Trades as well as the consumption of the growth of the Country there would be advantage to the Kingdom by their numbers Thus I hope I have made it appear how directly contrary an effect to what is suggested would naturally follow upon a Bill of Naturalization viz. the increase of Protestants if of any As to the publick Register it is notoriously known how attempts have been made in former Ages to have effected this and it is so far from enabling any Prince to invade thereby the Property of any Subject that it is the greatest security to them For by such speedy Transferring Estates as may be done by a publick Register even Forfeitures to the Crown may be prevented when every one in some few hours may pass their Estates Real or Personal into what secure hands they please It is likewise obvious how many frauds would be prevented by it and how much more plentiful Mony would be when none would be in danger of loosing either Purchase or Lent-mony by Pre-Engagements since fewer shifts could be used to deceive any moderately circumspect person The Proceedings likewise in Law-Suits would be less tedious and intricate and yet many Hundreds of Clerks would find Imployment in Registring in every County and Corporate Town and when mony Men could have such such clear Security not haunted with the Spirit of Forgery the middle sort of Traders the Husbandman Farmers and all sort of Men who had honest occasions for ready Mony might be furnished without so great scruple which the doubtfulness of Security now occasions But these being matters to be Transacted in Parliament need no further discussing here Only I thought it necessary to hint these things that all Ingenuous Men might see how unreasonable some Mens suspicions are and what sinister Interpretations Malice and Envy will make of what is most apparently design'd for a quite different end In fine Would we enjoy the free exercise of the Protestant Religion We have the Kings Sacred Promise for it and upon the taking off the Penal Laws and Test we may have it firmly Established Would Dissenters have Ease they have it freely granted without Terms Would we enjoy all the advantages of Wealth Honour Peace Plenty and the Benefits which a Gracious Valiant and Wise Prince may afford Us We may to the height of our Wishes have them yielding only that our Fellow-Subjects in general and those of His Majesties Religion in particular may be all alike freed from any Force put upon their Conscience for matters of their Religion at present and for time to come while in all other Respects they approve themselves Dutiful Subjects FINIS ERRATA PAge 4. line 23. for reasonable read seasonable P. 5. l. 23. for gratefully r. greatly P. 7. l. 8. for hinder r. hindred ibid. l. 39. dele of P. 9 l. 10. for such as Seclusion r. such as Seclusion P. 11. l. 16. for Communion r. common P. 16. l. 29. for cumlocution r. circumlocution