Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n
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A47806
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L'Estrange his appeal humbly submitted to the Kings Most Excellent Majesty and the three estates assembled in Parliament; Appeal humbly submitted to the Kings Most Excellent Majesty and the three estates assembled in Parliament
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L'Estrange, Roger, Sir, 1616-1704.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing L1202; ESTC R13428
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24,333
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40
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Design to destroy the Hierarchy and all the Sons of the Church by the name of Papists in Masquerade and get all the places of Profit to themselves Now for my Suggesting the Popish Plot to be only a Blind to enrage People I defy the world either to shew that I have misrecited my Self in what I have already deliver'd or to produce any one passage out of all my Writings that without extreme Violence will in any degree countenance Such a Construction But still as I am Innocent of rendering That to be only a Blind which King Lords and Commons have pronounced to be a damnable and hellish Plot So am I thoroughly convinc'd on the Other hand that there are Several Sham-Plots contriv'd and Started where there was no colour or pretense for a man to Imagine that there was any Plot at all and that great use is made of these Inventions for a Blind to the Advancing of a Fanatical Design And how far That Project may reasonably tend toward the destruction of the Hierachy and the Sons of the Church under the notion of Papists in Masquerade and the engrossing of all Power into their own hands shall be set forth in its proper place But how comes L'Estrange to be charg'd with turning the Popish Plot over to the Presbyterians now in 1680. that has been perpetually ringing the same Peal in the ears of the Government ever since 1661. that he does at This Instant And I do not remember any Popish Plot that was taken notice of in those days In the Epistle Dedicatory of my Holy Cheat to the House of Commons 1661. I have these Words speaking of the Presbyterians they cast the blood and guilt of the late War upon his Majesty make his Adherents Traytors place the Supreme Authority in the two Houses Subject the Law to an Ordinance the Government to a Faction and Animate the Schismatiques to Serve his Majesty in Being as they did his Father This is the Drift of their Seditious Libells c. And a little farther This Citation of Douglas's Coronation-Sermon Then newly Reprinted This may serve to justify the Proceedings of this Kingdome against the late King who in a Hostile way set himself to overthrow Religion Parliaments Laws and Liberties Pag. 10. What could I say lesse to the Insolence of such Pamphlets or what is it more that I do now upon this Subject that what I did twenty years since §. 3. About disparaging the Kings Wittnesses The next Calumny layd to my Charge is the discrediting of the Kings Witnesses wherein I once again repayre to my own Papers which without a new Dictionary and a new Grammar will abundantly acquit me For according to Common English and Syntaxe I have rather strain'd a point of Modesty upon an Excess of Respect then on the Other side been wanting to it As for Example in my Further Discovery to Dr. Oates They are wonderfull things Dr. which you have done already and I am Perswaded that you are yet reserved for more wonderfull things to come which must be the work of Time to disclose when Truth shall deliver her self from the Rubbish of Oppression and Slander and in despite of Envy and Imposture render your Name as famous to Posterity as your Virtue has made it to the present Generation And this I write with little lesse then the Genius of a Prophet Pag. 21. These very words from the Pen of a Servile Parasite would have pass'd for a Panegyrick which in L'Estrange must be Interpreted for a Libell Nay all the force of Argument and Intention must be destroy'd and the very Standard of the English Tongue alter'd to do me a good Turn Every Syllable is put to the Torture to know what Moutbs I made upon the Writing of it And if I do but stumble upon a Figure that would be an Ornament perhaps upon another mans Paper it is a Blot upon mine and the most Innocent of my Metaphors and Allusions are melted down into Articles and Depositions without the Allowance of so much as one grain for Humane Frailty And all this by the virtue of a kind of Inverted Alchymy that instead of the more Generous Operation of exalting Baser mettles into Nobler and turning Copper into Gold sets up a New Profession of turning Gold into Dirt. Who was it but You again that so effectually layd open the Intrigues of the Priests and Jesuits with the Schismatiques in the late Rebellion That shew'd his Majesty so plainly who they were that Dethron'd and Murther'd his Father and painted the whole Conspiracy so to the Life that a body might Wink and see thorough it Who but you Sir to trace them down to this very Instant through all their Disguises and Caballs Fomenting a Rebellion in Scotland with the Presbyterians Incendiaries in London with the Millenaries and up and down Tampering with the whole Crew of of Sectaries Who was it but You that first found out the Conspiracy it self and then the Conspirators Who but You the Eminent Instrument in the opening of the Combination What is all this but to Trace the Dr. in the very History of himself And to say more to his Honour then perchance ever any man sayd before me bating only the Person that First gave him the Title of THE SAVIOUR OF THE NATION It cannot be deny'd but that the Kings Witnesses have ventur'd as far and done as much as men could do under Their Circumstances to make out the Truth of a Damnable and Hellish Popish Plot upon the Life of his Sacred Majesty our Religion and Civill Government Ib. pa. 23. It would be endlesse to encounter the Malice of every Scurrilous Buffoon that neither dares own his Name to the Government nor to the Subject of his Outrage and Venom But yet in regard that the whole pack of them fall in with full Cry upon two Passages in the Second and Third Pages of my Further Discovery I shall bestow a word or two more upon those Reflections The Words are These I have naturally a Veneration for the Government and all that Love it for the Kings Loyall Wittnesses and the Preservers of his Sacred Life in the First place with an Equall Horror and Detestation for all his Enemies under what Mask or form Soever I believe the Plot and as much as every good Subject ought to believe or as any man in his Right Wits can believe Nay I do so absolutely believe it that in my Conscience You your Self Doctor do not believe more of it then I do Pag. 2. Now where 's the disparaging of the Kings Wittnesses in all This I believe the Plot and as much of it as an honest man ought or a Sober man can believe nay as much of it as the Dr. himself believes And would any body have me now to believe more But the whole World Say I shall never bring me to believe or to Say that I believe That
them on from Perverse Principles in the matter of Rule and Subjâ—ction to Evil Thoughts of their Superiors and Governors and from Thence to transport them into Undutiful and Intemperate Practises against the publick Peace We have already felt the Effects of This way of Proceeding in the most outragious Rebellion in all Circumstances perhaps that ever was heard of And the Late King himself imputed it principally to the Force of Seditions Libels Now the same Methods being set a foot again and That Invective Course of Liberty against both the Church and the State proceeding without any Check or Controll I thought my self bound in Honour and Duty both as an English Man and as a Subject to use the best means I could either to Stop or to divert that Torrent Upon This I took upon me so much as in Me lay the Defence of the Law and the Government against all those Erroneous and Disloyal Positions that were dayly Published and imposed upon the Unskilful and Unwary Multitude to the extreme Hazard and Dishonour of the State I brought the Terms of Dominion and Obedience to the Right Standard I laid Open and Rectified all their Fallacious Distinctions and the dismal Consequences of the Peoples swallowing such Mistakes I took off the Baits of Religion Liberty and Reformation in the very sight of the Common People and laid open the Hook that was under them I shewed them that the whole Pretence was no other than a Counterfeit and that there was no more of Religion Liberty or Reformation in the bottom of it then of a Living Fly in an Artificial one and that one Leap at it was as much as their Lives Estates and their Souls were worth I gave the Multitude Antidotes against all their Pestilent and Poysonous Infusions I resolv'd all their Riddles and from their own Actions and Acknowledgments in the like Cases expounded their meanings In one word by the blessing of God upon this Naked and honest Simplicity of Dealing I have found some Well-meaning Dissenters reclaim'd from their Errors and Others that were wavering before Now to be fully fatisfyed and Confirm'd Nor can it well be otherwise in so Righteous and Reasonable a Cause where the manifest Iustice and Evidence of the matter would do its own business with the help even of a very slender Advocate to support it I have spoken enough to the Circumstances of my Charge but all That Story serves only for a Blind And in truth my Zeal for the Upholding of the Government is my Unpardonable Crime the Libellers would Otherwise take notice of the many and the open Scandals that are cast upon the King and the Church with an Evident Design to expose Majesty and Episcopacy to Hatred and Scorn and shew their Affections That way for the Life and Honour of the KING and for the Protestant Religion and not stand picking of Holes in the Coat of a person that has so unquestionably dedicated all the Faculties of his Soul Body Fortune and Interests to the Service of his Prince and Country and to set Spyes upon every Action and Line in his whole Life to try if they can find but any one poynt either in his Conversation or Writings that might bear a Double meaning and at last to render that very Ambiguity if it were possible no less than Capital too But I thank God My Faults of That kind are as hard to be found out as my Accusers Virtues It goes a great way with many Moderate Nonconformists and other Reasonable Persons too that have not as yet taken any strong Impressions either on the one side or on the other that notwithstanding all the rudenesses of Clamor and ill Language against me for the Papers I have Published I have not as yet received one single Reply to the Argument of any thing that ever I wrote more than the Opposing of Revilings to my Reasons So that their Quarrel to me is purely for interposing betwixt Faction and Authority It will be said perhaps that my Papers are not worth the Answering How comes it then that they think it worth the while to bestow so much pains upon my Person nay and to propound and meditate so many extraordinary Ways of Animadversion upon L'Estrange as if the Foundations of the Government were to be removed for my sake and that an Englishman were to be no longer safe under the Protection of the Law But these are only Coffee-House-Imaginations and which I am sure will never receive any Countenance or Encouragement from the Authority and Wisdom of a Parliament But since my Hand is in upon this Subject there are Two Points more worth the Clearing than all the rest as being of greater Importance toward the understanding of the present Controversie The One has a Respect to the more effectual Discovery of Priests and Iesuits The Other To the Impartial Stating and Discussing the Business of Toleration The former of these I have handled in my Further Discovery Dedicated to Dr. Oates and Grounded upon the Authority of his Evidence The Other I have Treated upon more at large in my Toleration Discussed and with a regard to all the Circumstances that I could fairly bring within the Compass of the Question Let the whole World fairly and by dint of Reason overthrow either the One or the Other and I will yield my self to have been all this while under a great Mistake I know very well that I am Charg'd for writing more than my Share when the true Reason of it was that others wrote less and in effect it was more than one Man's Work to attempt what I have done But upon a Sense that the thing was of absolute Necessity for some body to do and finding other People more Cautious than I thought was either Needful or Expedient in so Publick a Case I engag'd my self further than my Neighbours and not without the Foresight of these Outrages which I knew I was to draw upon my self Neither is this the first time that I have Sacrificed all other Considerations to my Duty Some will have it that I have been set on by the Promises and Temptations of Advantages and Reward which is an Imagination so far from the truth of this Matter that all things considered saving my Veneration and Humble Acknowledgments to His Majesty who hath been very Gracious to me I do positively averr that the King has not a Subject in his Three Kingdoms that has suffered harder Measure and more contrary to Law and Iustice than I my self have done and all this without the Ballance of any other Recompence than a little Court-Holy-Water and Fair Words Besides that in the Worst of Times I did the same thing through all Difficulties and Hazards Having already in general Terms reflected upon Scandalous and Dangerous Libels as the Occasion of my Writings I shall now take a Taste of the Condition and Tendency of those Libels and lay open as briefly as I