apt to suspect that the best way to preserve Liberty of Conscience is to keep the Test and Penal Laws III. For Thirdly If there be any reasou to suspect any other design than Liberty of Conscience as suppose to promote Popery and by degrees to make it the Established Religion of the Nation which certainly is the Design unless you can imagine that Priests and Jesuits and one who hath given up his Understanding and Conscience to them can ever be without this Design You will easily be convinced that there is infinite hazzard in repealing the Test and the Penal Laws This sets Papists upon an equal level with Protestants and then the Favour of the Prince will set them above them and when the whole power of the Nation and the whole administration of Justice is in Popish hands there will need no Penal Laws to persecute Protestants If you say this is done in a great many instances now before such a Repeal I answer then you may certainly guess what will be done when those incapacitating Laws are repealed And yet the difference is very great For while they are under such a legal Incapacity the distrust of their power will make them more modest which is the only thing that can plead excuse hereafter but when they have legal authority they will shew their Nature without restraint Men who have any thing to lose will act cautiously in prospect of an After-reckoning or while these legal incapacities continue will be afraid to act but when the Legal Authority and Power is in their hands Protestant Subjects will quickly find what a Popish liberty of Conscience means While these Laws continue some professed Professed Protestants whose Consciences are govern'd by their Interest are afraid to declare and by these means Popery wants hands and numbers to do its work But when these Laws are removed hopes of preferment will prevail on some and fear on others and when this frozen Adder begins to grow warm and recover its blood and spirits it will find its sting too This would certainly overthrow the Constitution of the Church of England which is the most effectual way to let in Popery For when all Incapacities are removed Papists are as well qualified for Church-Preferments as Protestants and it will be an easie matter to find pretences to remove the best Men to make way for them We have four Catholick Bishops as they vainly call themselves already prepared to fill vacant Sees and if such Men have the impudence to publish their Pastoral Letter and make their publick Visitations while all the Laws against them are in force judge what they will do when they are repealed Thus our Parishes may be filled with Roman Priests and they indeed are the fittest to serve under Roman Bishops And if one Colledge be already seized into Popish hands and the Protestant possessors turned out of their Freehold when those Laws are Repealed we may quickly see more follow them and judge whether this be not a fair and easie step to Popery Nay I have heard some good Lawyers say that when the Penal Laws are repealed Popery is the Established Religion of the Nation That when a repealing Law is repealed the repealed Law revives I am not so good a Lawyer as to judge of this but I think it is worth your Considering But who knows when all the Ecclesiastical Laws are Repealed what the King's Supremacy and his Ecclesiastical Commission may do There have been great and big words said of it of late and I believe You had better keep your Penal Laws than fall under the lash of a Popish Supremacy I know there hath been a great talk of an Equivalent but I would gladly know what that Equivalent should be Shall it incapacitate all Papists for any Office either in Church or State That must not be for fear of depriving the King of the natural right he has to the service of his Subjects and then I am sure there can be no Equivalent for the repeal of the incapacitating Laws But you say there shall be a New Charter for the Church of England the Protestant Religion and Liberty of Conscience Now shall this be with a Penalty or without one If with a penalty then you do not repeal but only exchange your Penal Laws and if Penal Laws are not such Unchristian things but they may be allowed we cannot have better for the security of our Religion than we have and therefore we had best keep these Is there any other fault in our Penal Laws especially when they are not executed but that they are too great a security to the Church of England and the Protestant Interest And if this be a reason for Protestants at this time to repeal them I have done But if this new Establishment be without a penalty what is it good for When these Penal Laws are removed Papists are qualified to sit in both Houses of Parliament and who knows whether Closetting and Reforming of Corporations and such other Arts may not quickly make a Popish Parliament And then Good Night to your New Establishment and Liberty of Conscience These things I hope Sir You will consider in your Choice of Members for Parliament and not be cheated with the Popular cry of Liberty of Conscience into the vilest and most despicable Slavery both of Soul and Body I am SIR Your very Cordial Friend and faithful Monitor A Plain Account of the PERSECUTION laid to the Charge of the CHURCH of ENGLAND THE desire of Liberty to serve God in that way and manner which Men judge to be most acceptable to him is so Natural and Reasonable that they cannot but be extremely provoked against those who would force them to serve him in any other But the conceit withall which most men have that their way of serving God is the only acceptable way naturally inclines them when they have Power to use all means to constrain all others to serve him in that way only So that Liberty is not more desired by all at one time than it is denied by the very same Persons at another Put them into different Conditions and they are not of the same mind but have different inclinations in one state from what they have in another As will be apparent by a short view of what hath passed in these Churches and Kingdoms within our memory II. Before the late Civil Wars there were very grievous Complaints made of the Bishops that they pressed the Ceremonies so strictly as to inflict heavy Censures upon those called Puritans who could not in Conscience conform to them Now no sooner had those very Persons who thus complain'd got their liberty to do as they pleased but they took it quite away from the other and Sequestred all those who would not enter into their Holy League and Covenant for the Reforming all things according to the Model which they propounded Nay they were not willing to bear with Five Dissenting Brethren among themselves who could not
means attain it than to open themselves a Gite to Popery and to concur with it to the Ruine of the Protestant Religion You will it may be tell us that it looks ill in us who so much complain That we have been deprived of Liberty of Concience in France to sind fault with the King of England for granting it to his Subjects And that it is the least that can be allowed to a Soveraign to allow him the Right to permit the exercise of his own Religion in his own Kingdoms and to make use of the Service of such of his Subjects as himself shall think sit by putting them into Charges and Employs You will add That his Majesty does not go about neither to abrogate the ancient Laws nor to make new ones All he does being only to dispence with the Observation of certain Laws in such of his Subjects as he thinks fit and for as long time as he pleases and that the right of dispensing with and suspending of Laws is a Right insepably tied to his Person That for the rest the Protestant Religion does not run the least Risque There are Laws to shut the Papists out of Parliament and these Laws can neither be dispensed with nor suspended So that the Parliament partaking with the King in the Legislative Power and continuing still Protestant there is no cause to fear that any thing should be done contrary to the Protestant Religion Besides What probability is there that a King who appears so great an Enemy to Oppression in matters of Conscience and Religion should ever have a thought tho' he had the Power himself to oppress in this very matter the greatest part of his Subjects and take from them that Liberty of Conscience which he now grants to them and which he promises so â—… to observe for the time to come These are all the Objections that can with â—… appearance of Reason be made against what we have before said They may all be reduced â—… five which we shall examine in their order And we doubt not but we shall easily make it appear that they are all but meer Illusions 1. We do justly complain That they had taken from us our Liberty of Conscience in France because it was done contrary to the Laws And one may as justly complain that the K. of England does labour to re-estalish Popery in his Country because he cannot do it but contrary to the Laws Our Liberties in France were founded us on solemn Laws upon perpetual irrevocable and sacred Edicts and which could not be â—… without violating at once the Publick Faith the Royal Word and the Sacredness of an Oath And Popery has been banished out of England by Laws made by King and Parliament and which cannot be repealed but by the author of King and Parliament together so that the therefore there is just cause to complain that the King should go about to overthrow them himself alone by his Declaration 2. It is not true that a Soveraign has always the right to permit the Exercise of his own Religion in his Dominions and to make use of the â—… of such of his Subjects as he himself shall that fit that is to say by putting of them into â—… and Employs And in particular he has this right when the Laws of his Country contrary thereunto as they are in the â—… before us Every King is obliged to observe the fundamental Laws of his Kingdom And the King of England as well as his Subjects ought to observe the Laws which have been established by King and Parliament together 3. For the third the distinction between abrogation of a Law and the dispensing â—… and suspending of it cannot here be of use whether the King abrogates the Laws which have been made against Popery or whether without saying expressly that he does abrogate them he overthrows them by his Declarations under pretence of dispensing with suspending of them it is still in effect same thing And to what purpose is it the Laws are not abrogated if in the â—… time all sorts of Charges are given to Papists and Popery it self be re-established contrary to the tenor of the Laws The truth is if the King has such a power as this if this be â—… Right necessarily tied to his Person 't is in vain â—… the Parliament does partake with him in the Legislature This Authority of the Parliament is but a meer Name a Shadow a Phan â—… a Chimera and no more The King is still the absolute Master because he can alone and without his Parliament render useless by his Declarations the Laws which the Parliament shall have the most solemnly established together with him We confess the King has right of dispensing in certain Cases as if the concern be what belongs to his private Interest he may without doubt whenever he pleases depart from his own Rights 't is a Liberty which no body will pretend to contest with him But he has not the power to dispense to the Prejudice of the Rights of the people â—… by consequence put the Property the Liberty and the Lives of his Protestant Subjects into the hands of Papists 4. What we have now said in Answer to the third Objection will be more clear from the Answer we are to give to the fourth They should perswade the Protestants that their Religion is in safety because on the one side the King cannot make Laws without the Parliament and that on the other there being Laws which exclude Papists out of the two Houses it must necessarily follow That the Parliament shall continue to be Protestant But if the King has the power to break through the Laws under the pretence of dispensing with and suspending of them what Security shall the Protestants have that he will not dispense with the Papists the Observation of those Laws which do exclude them out of the Parliament as well as â—… has dispensed with those that should have kept them out of Charges and Imployments â—… Security shall they have that he will â—… at any time hereafter suspend the Execution of the former as he has already suspended the Execution of the latter Which being â—… what should hinder us from seeing in a little â—… a Popish Parliament who together with the King shall pass Laws contrary to the Protestant Religion What difference can be shewn between the one and the other of these Laws â—… the one should be liable to be dispensed with and suspended and the other not Were they not both established by the King and Parliament Were not both the one and the other made for the Security of the Protestant Religion and of those who profess it Are not the Rights of the people concerned in the one as well as in the other And whosoever suffers and approves the King in the violation of these Rights in some things does he not thereby authorize him to violate them in all If the King has power to put the Liberty and
property and Lives of his Protestant Subjects at the mercy of the Papists by placing them in Charges contrary to the Law why should he not have the power to raise the same Papists to the Authority of Legislators by declaring them capable of sitting in Parliament seeing that is but contrary to Law Do not deceive your selves the Laws are the Barrier which bound the Authority of the King and if this Barrier be once broken he will extend his Authority as far as he pleases And it will be impossible for you after that to set any bounds to it 5. In fine he must be very little acquainted with the Spirit of Popery who imagins that it will be content to re-establish it self in England without aiming to destroy the Protestant Religion Give it but Time and Opportunity to fortifie it self and you may then expect to see what it is In all places where it has got the power in its hands it will not only rule but rule alone and not suffer any other Religion besides it self and imploys the Sword and Fire to extirpate that which it calls Heresie Were not this a Truth confirmed by infinite Examples both ancient and modern which every one knows who has read any thing of History it would be too much evidenced by the Cruelties which it has so lately exercised against the Churches of Hungary of France and of the Vallies of Piemont And men ought not to be lulled asleep by the pretence of an Inclination which the King of England would be thought to have for Liberty of Conscience nor by the Promises which he makes to perserve it to all his Subjects without distinction Every one knows that persidiousness and breach of Faith are Characters of Popery no less essential to it than Cruelty Can you doubt of this Gentlemen you who so lately came from making a sad Experiment of it How often did our King promise us to preserve us in our Priviledges How many Declarations How many Edicts did he set out to that purpose How many Oaths were taken to confirm those Edicts Did not this very King Lewis XIV himself solemnly promise by several Edicts and Declarations to maintain us in all the Liberties which were granted to us by the Edict of Nantes And yet after all what scruple was there made to violate so many Laws so many Promises and so many Oaths The Protestants of England have themselves also sometimes likewise experimented the same Infidelity And not to alledge here any other Example let us desire them to remember only the Reign of Queen Mary what promises she made at her coming to the Crown not to make any change of Religion and yet what bloody Laws she afterwards passed to extinguish the Reformation as soon as she saw her self fast in the Throne And with that inhumanity she spilt the Blood of her most faithful Subjects to accomplish that design After such an instance as this a man must be very credulous indeed and willing to deceive himself that will put too much confidence in the promises of the King that now reigns Do we not know that there are neither Promises nor Oaths which the Pope does not pretend to have power to dispense with in those whom he employs for the Extirpation of Heresie And do we not also know that it is one of the great Maxims of Popery a Maxim authorized both by the Doctrine and Practice of the Council of Constance That they are not obliged to keep any Faith with Hereticks We ought not to believe that King James II. a Prince who has so much Zeal for Popery should be governed by any other Maxims than those of his Religion And whosoever will take the pains to examine his Conduct both before and since his coming to the Crown will find that he has more than once put 'em in practice And this Gentlemen we suppose may be sufficient to convince all reasonable persons that there is nothing more pernicious than that Declaration which you have approved whether by publishing it as some of you have done or by addressing to the King to thank him for it When you shall have reflected upon these things you will without doubt your selves confess that you have suffered your selves to be amused with some imaginary advantages which you hope to make by this Declaration In the mean time most dear Brethren you will pardon us if we have chanced to have let any thing slip that is not agreeable to you We had no Design to give the least Offence either to you or to our Brethren the Dissenters of England If we have spoken our Thoughts freely of your Conduct and â—… theirs we have at least spoken with no less liberty of that of the Bishops And God is our Witness that we have said nothing of the one or the other but in the sincerity of our Heart and out of a desire to contribute somewhat to his Glory and the good of his Church We are Most honoured Brethren Your most Humble most Obedient and most affectionate Brethren in Jesus Christ. N. â—… Popish Treaties not to be rely'd on In a Letter from a Genleman at York to his Friend in the Prince of ORANGEs Camp. Addressed to all Members of the next Parliament THE credulity and Superstition of Mankind hath given great Opportunities and Advantages to cunning Knaves to spread their Nets and lay â—… Traps in order to catch easie and unwary creatures these being led on by Ignorance or â—… they by Pride or Ambition or else a Vile and â—… Principle Therefore seeing we are in this state of Corruption bred up to believe Contradictions and Impossibilities led by the Nose with â—… State Monntebank and Mankish Jugler â—… like Puppets by Strings and Wires it seems â—… time to vindicate Humane Nature and to free â—… from these Shackles laid upon her in the very â—… for Man who ought to be a Free and â—… Animal in his present state is only an â—… and Machine contriv'd for the Vanity and â—… of Priests and Tyrants who claim to themselves â—… seem to Monopolize the Divine Stamp tho' we â—… all made of the same Materials by the same â—… and in the same Mould equal by Nature â—… together and link'd in Societies by mutual contracts plac'd by turns one above another and intrusted for some time with the Power of executing our own Laws and all by general consent for the Publick Good of the whole Community this is â—… genuine Shape and Figure of Primitive and â—… Government not distemper'd and fatally â—… with the monstruous Excrescencies of Arbitrary Power in one single Member above all the Laws of the whole Infallibility Divine Right c. â—… by Knaves and Sycophants bellev'd by Fools â—… scarce ever heard of the Greek and Roman Histories and never read their own I shall therefore give some Examples out of an infinite number of People ruin'd and utterly destroy'd by their â—… Credulity and good Nature matter of Fact â—… a stronger Proof
If in a Country whose â—… was perfectly in the English hands so sudden an alteration was made that both the Courts of Judicature and Charters of their Corporations were taken from them without any fault of theirs have they not reason to complain and be affraid If those very Arms which are taken from them be put into the hands of their sworn Enemies and their just Debts paid after a new Method by beating or killing the Creditors when they demand their own Have they not reason to fear and desert the Kingdom If these and an hundred other things do not justifie the retreat of several of the British into England I know not what shall be adjudged a sufficient Reason This our Author would insinuate is caused by a sullen Combination as if the Gentry of a Nation could agree together to do a thing so contrary to their visible Interest as desert their Houses and Estates to the loss of one half of them meerly out of spite to the Government But because our Author is so good at his Narratives and would induce the World to believe that there was but two Regiments disbanded by his talking only of two and in another place speaking of some Officers that were Cashiered We shall hereafter give a faithful Account of the Proceedings in the business of Disbanding and in the mean time affirm That his whole Account of the Affair at Molingar is most unsincere The English Soldiers were given to understand that they were all to be turned out and the only Grace his Excellency did them was to declare before a long and tedious March That such as had a mind or had Settlements in that Country might better quit then than hereafter This is plainly shewn by the turning out afterwards all those English who then actually continued in the Service they were glad that any would quit voluntarily but those that did not and after a publick Tryal were willing to serve His Majesty they soon after turn'd out Thus the false gloss that our Author puts upon my Lord Tyrconnel's Speech is discover'd And I assure the Reader the Memoires I have by me are from such unquestionable hands and there are so many hundred living Witnesses to the truth of them that our Author will not have the Impudence to deny what may be prov'd before His Majesty if he require it I shall only take notice of the ill Application of our Author's Sea-Metaphor Though in stress of Weather the Owner is willing to make use of all hands that may be helpful towards the saving the Vessel yet he takes care to call for none whose practice it hath been to cut the Tacklings and to steer contrary to the Pilot's Directions he thinks such safer by far shut up under Hatches then set at liberty or employ'd to do mischief As for his supposition of 30000 men to be sent out of Ireland into Flanders I cannot tell what to make on 't Let them crack the Shell that hope to find a Kernel in it For my part I despair though the readiness of the English Soldiers of Ireland who at twenty four hours warning came into England to serve His Majesty in the time of Monmouth's Rebellion ought to have been remembered to their advantage and might serve to any unprejudic'd person as a Pattern of the Loyalty and good Inclinations of all the Protestants in that Kingdom if His Majesty had had occasion â—… them Whether the Parliament will Repeal â—… Test for those several weighty Reasons our Author says are fitter for Contemplation then Discourse tho methinks it would be pleasant to see a House of Commons sit like the Brethren at a silent Meeting is not my Province to determine As likewise Whether they will so much consider that â—… Reason the King will have it so for his Conscience and theirs may differ or what the Dissenters will do I cannot tell One thing I am sure â—… there will be no such Stumbling-block in the â—… of the King's desires when they meet as the present condition of Ireland they will be apt â—… His Majesty tells them they shall have their â—… shares in Employments when they have Repealed the Laws to say Look at Ireland see what is done there where the Spirit of Religion appears â—… fac'd and accordingly compute what may become of us when we have removed our own legal â—… Since they now leap over those Hedges what may we expect when they are quite taken away Poyning's Law is a great grievance to our Author and here in one word he discovers that 't is the dependance this Kingdom has on England he quarrel at 'T is fit the Reader should understand that Law enacted when Poynings was Lord Deputy make all the English Acts of Parliament of force in Ireland we are therefore so fond of that Law and cover so much to preserve our dependance on England that all the Arguments our Author can bring shall not induce us to part with it I will not reflect in the least on the Courage of the Irish I know there are several brave men among them but they have had the misfortune to fall under the Consideration of as our Author softens â—… but the plain sence is been beaten by a Warlike Nation and I question not unless they behave themselves modestly in their Prosperity they will again fall under the Consideration of the same Nation 't is better we should live in peace and quietness but the Choice is in their hands and if they had rather come under our Consideration again than avoid it let them look to the Consequence Another Advantage which may accrue to Ireland by a Native as Governour our Author â—… to be His personal knowledge of the Tories and their Harbourers and his being thereby better capacitated to suppress them Malicious People would be apt to infer from this Suggestion that his Excellency had occasion formerly to be familiarly acquainted with such sort of Cattle I have heard indeed that one of our bravest English Princes â—… the during the Extravagancies of his Youth â—… company with publick Robbers and often shar'd both in the Danger and Booty But as soon as the Death of his Father made way for his Succession to the Crown he made â—… of his former acquaintance of their Persons and â—… to the extirpating and dissolving the greatest knot of Highway-men that ever troubled England My Lord therefore in imitation of his great Prince no doubt will make use of his Experience that way to the same end and I really assent to the Author that no English Governor can be so fit to clear that Kingdom of Tories and that for the same reason he gives us There are two other Advantages remaining one is his Excellency's having already made different Parties in that Kingdom the Objects of his Love and Hatred let the Offences of the one or the Merits of the other be never so conspicuous Whether the British can draw any comfort from his Excellency's knowledge of
making of Laws which shall Authorize the Deisying a bit of Bread the Worshipping of it for a God the Praying to it Idolatry Blasphemy any thing in the World for them that like it Now is not this a very fair Speech and does it not well become the mouths of Protestants I would fain press this home upon the Consciences both of those Dissenters who are hired and of those who are not hired to labour the Repeal of our Laws Do you fear the Informers more than God Will you for the sake of your little Conventicles do the greatest Evils which you know to be such You know in your very Hearts that the Worship of Images Crosses and of a Wafer is abominable Idolatry that the Half-Communion is Sacriledge and that many other Points of Popery are blasphemous Fables And will you set up this for one of your Religions as by Law Established Will you do all that hands can do to entail Idolatry upon the Nation not only Removendo prohibens as Divines distinguish by pulling down the Laws which hinder it but also Promovendo adjuvans by making a perpetual Magna Charta for it The Laws and Constitution of a Country do denominate that Country if Atheism were Authorized by Law this would be an Athiestical Nation and if Idolatry be set up by Law it is an Idolatrous Nation and all that have any hand in it make it the Sin of the Nation as well as their own Think therefore of these things in time before you have involved both your selves and your Country in a miserable Estate and remember poor Francis Spira who went against Light. But Secondly There is just as much Prudence as Conscience in these Proceedings for by Repealing the Laws against Popery you Reverse the Outlawry and take of those legal Disabilities which the Papists now lie under and which have hitherto tied their Hands from destroying Hereticks When Papists shall be right Justices and Sheriffs and not Counterseits when they shall be Probi legales homines and pass Muster in Law when they shall be both our legal Judges and our lawful Juries and when Protestants shall come to be Tryed by their Country that is to say by their Twelve Popish Godfathers they may easily know what sort of Blessing they are to expect The Papists want nothing but these Advantages to make a fair riddance of all Protestants for we see by several of their late Pamphlets that if any thing be said against Popery they have a great dexterity in laying it Treason Now this is a civil way of answering Arguments for which we are bound to thank them because it so plainly discovers what they would be at if it were in their Power But how comes it to be Treason to speak against a Religion which is itself High-Treason and is Proscribed by so many Laws Why their Medium is this That Popery is the King's Religion and therefore by an Inuendo what is said against that is meant against him But is there any Law of England that Popery shall be the King's Religion Or is it declared by any Law that Popery either is or can be his Religion On the other hand we are enabled by an Act in this very Reign to pronounce Popery to be a False Religion and to assert the Religion which is now professed in the Church of England and Established by the Laws of this Realm to be the True Christian Religion Act for building St. Ann's Church p. 133. But these Gentlemen it seems are for Hanging Men without Law or against Law or any how and therefore we thank them again for being thus plain with us before hand Now if they be thus insolent when they are so very abnoxious themselves and have Halters about their own Necks with what a Rod of Iron will they Rule us when they are our Masters What havock will they then make of the Nation when we already see Magdalen Colledge which was lately a flourishing Society of Protestants now made a Den of Jesuits and that done to in such a way as shakes all the Property in England Or who can be safe after our Laws are Repealed when Endeavours have been lately used to extract Sedition even out of Prayers and Tears and the Bishops Humble Petition was threatned to be made a Treasonable Libel But here the Dissenters have a plausible excuse for themselves for say they We have now an opportunity of getting the Laws which are against us Repealed which is clear gain and as for our refusing to Repeal the Laws against Popery there is nothing gotten by that either to us or to any body else for they are already as good as Repealed by the Dispensing Power and therefore such Discourse as this only advises us to stand in our own light without doing any good to the Nation at all for there will be Popish Justices Sheriffs Judges and Juries whether we will or no for whatsoever we refuse to do the Dispensing Power will supply To which I answer Do you keep your hands off from Repealing the Laws let who will contravene or Transgress them for then you are free from the Blood of all Men you have no share in the guilt of those Mischiefs which befal your Country which would sooner or later be a heavy burden and a dead weight upon the Conscience of any Protestant But besides let the Laws alone and they will defend both themselves and us too for if the Law says That a Papist shall not nor cannot have an Office then he shall not nor cannot for who can speak Louder than the Laws As for a Dispensing-Power inherent in the King which can set aside as many of the Laws of the Land as he pleases and Suspend the Force and Obligation of them which has been lately held forth by many False and Unlawful Pamphlets the Dissenters know very well that there is no such thing but that no body may pretend Ignorance I shall here prove in very few words That by the Established Laws of the Land the King cannot have such a Dispensing-Power unless Dispensing with the Laws and Executing the Laws be the same thing and unless both keeping the Laws himself and causing them to be kept by all others be the English of Dispensing with them For in the Statute of Provisors 25 Eaw 3. c. 25. we have this laid down for Law That the King is bound to Execute those Statutes which are Unrepealed and to cause them to be kept as the Law of this Realm The words are these speaking of a Statute made in the time of Edward the First Which Statute holdeth always his Force and was never Defeated or Annull'd in any point And by somuch our Sovereign Lord the King is bound by his Oath to do the same to be kept as the Law of this Realm although by Sufferance and Negligence it hath since been attempted to the contrary So that the Coronation Oath and the Dispensing-Power are here by King Edward the Third and his
remarkable that that bloody Commission is founded on the King 's Absolute Power and his Zeal for Religion This is the only Edict that I know in which a King has pretended to Absolute Power before the two Declarations for Scotland in the year 1687. so whether they who penned them took their pattern from this I cannot determin it I could carry this view of History much further to shew in many more Instances how little Protestants can depend on the Faith of Roman Catholicks and that their condition is so much the worse the more pious that their Princes are As for what may be objected to all this from the present State of some Principalities or Towns in Germany or of the Switsirs and Grisons it is to be considered that in some of these want of Power in the Roman Catholioks to do mischief and the other Circumstances of their affairs are visibly the only Securities of the Protestants and whensoever this Nation departs from that and gives up the Laws it is no hard thing to guess how short-lived the Liberty of Conscience even though seiled into a Magna Charta would be V. All that our Author says upon the General Subject of Liberty of Conscience is only a severe Libel upon that Church whose Principles and Practices are so contrary to it But the proposition lately made has put an end to all this dispute since by an Offer of Repealing the Penal Laws reserving only those of the Test and such others as secure the Protestant Religion the question is now no more which Religion must be tolerated but which Religion must Reign and prevail All that is here offered in opposition to that is that by this means such a number of persons must be ruined pag. 64. which is as severe a way of forcing People to change their Religion as the way of Dragoons I will not examine the particulars of this matter but must express my joy to find that all the difficulty which is in our way to a happy quiet is the supplying such a number of men with the means of their subsistence which by the execution of the Law for the Test must be taken from them This by all that I can learn will not come to near an hundred thousand pound a year and indeed the supplying of those of the King's Religion that want it is a piece of Charity and Bounty so worthy of him that I do not know a man that would envy them the double of this in Pensions and if such a Sum would a little charge the King's Revenue I dare say when the settlement of the Nation is brought to that single point there would not be one Negative found in either House of Parliament for the Reimbursing the King. So far are we from desiring either the Destruction or even the Poverty of these that perhaps wait only for all occasion to burn us I will add one bold thing further That though I will be no Undertaker for what a Parliament may do yet I am confident that all Men are so far from any desire of Revenge but most of all that the Heroical Minds of the next Successors are above it that if an Indemnity for that bold Violation of the Law that hath been of late both Practised and Authorised amongst us would procure a full settlement even this could be obtained Though an impunity after such Transgressions is perhaps too great an Encouragement to offend for the future But since it is the Preservation of the Nation and not the Ruine of any Party in it that is aimed at the hardiness of this Proposition will I hope be forgiven me It is urg'd pag. 63. That according to the Dutch Pattern at least the Roman Catholicks may have a share in Military Employments but the difference between our Case and theirs is clear since some Roman Catholick Officers where the Government is wholly in the hands of the Protestants cannot be of such dangerous consequence as it must needs be under a King that is not only of that perswasion but is become nearly allied to the Society as the Liege Letter tells us VI. It is true our Author would perswade that the King 's Dispensing Power hath already put an end to this Dispute and that therefore it is a seeming sort of Perjury see pag. 48. to keep the Justices of Peace still under an Oath of executing those Laws which they must consider no more Some Precedents are brought from former times p. 22 23 24. of our King 's using the Dispensing Power in Edward 3d Richard 2d Henry 7th Henry 8th Edward 6th and Queen Elizabeth's time It is very true that the Laws have been of late broke through amongst us with a very high hand but it is a little too dangerous to upbraid the Justices of Peace with their Oaths lest this oblige them to reflect on so Sacred an Engagement For the worthy Members of Magdalen Colledge are not the only Persons in England who will make Conscience of observing their Oaths So that if others are brought to reflect too much upon what they do our Author's officiousness in suggesting this to them may prove to be no acceptable piece of Service I will not examine all his Precedents we are to be govern'd by Law and not by some of the Excesses of Government nor is the latter end of Edward the Third a time to be much imitated and of all the parts of the English History Richard the Second's Reign should be least mentioned since those Excesses of his produced so Tragical a Conclusion as the loss of his Crown and Life Henry the Sixth's seeble and embroyled Reign will scarce support an Argument And if there were some Excesses in Henry the Eighth's time which is ordinary in all great Revolutions he got all these to be either warranted or afterwards to be confirmed in Parliament And Queen Elizabeth's power in Ecclesiastical Matters was founded on a special Act of Parliament which was in a great measure Repealed in 1641 and that Repeal was again ratified by another Act in the late King's time We are often told of the late King's Acts concerning Carts and Waggons but all Lawyers know some Laws are understood to be abrogated without a special Repeal when some visible inconvenience inforces it such as appeared in that mistaken Act concerning Waggons So the King in that Case only declared the inconvenience which made that Law to be of itself null because it was impracticable It is true the Parliament never question'd this A Man would not be offended if another pulled up a Flower in his Garden that yet would take it iil if he broke his Hedge And in Holland to which our Author's Pen leads him often when a River changes its course any Man may break the Dyke that was made to resist yet that will be no Warrant to go and break the Dyke that resists the Current of the same River So if a Dispensing Power well applyed to smaller Offences has been past
to mind how it fared with those in King Charles the First 's Reign who read the Book of Sports as it was called and then preached against it To return then to our Argument if reading the Declaration in our Churches be in the nature of the Action in the intention of the Command in the opinion of the People an interpretative consent to it I think my self bound in conscience not to read it because I am bound in conscience not to approve it It is against the Constitution of the Church of England which is Established by Law and to which I have subscribed and thefore am bound in Conscience to Teach nothing contrary to it while this Obligation lasts It is to Teach an unlimited and universal Toleration which the Parliament in 72. Declared illegal and which has been condemned by the Christian Church in all Ages It is to teach my People that they need never come to Church more but have my free leave as they have the King 's to go to a Conventicle or to Mass It is to teach the dispensing Power which alters what has been formerly thought the whole Constitution of this Church and Kingdom which we dare not do till we have the Authority of Parliament for it It is to recommend to our People the choice of such persons to sit in Parliament as shall take away the Test and Penal-Laws which most of the Nobility and Gentry of the Nation have declared their judgment against It is to condemn all those great and worthy Patriots of their Country who forfeited the dearest thing in the World to them next a good Conscience viz. The Favour of their Prince and a great many honourable and profitable Employments with it rather than consent to that Proposal of taking away the Test and Penal Laws which they apprehend destructive to the Church of England and the Protestant Religion and he who can in Conscience do all this I think need scruple nothing For let us consider further what the effects and consequences of our reading the Declaration are likely to be and I think they are matter of Conscience too when they are evident and apparent This will certainly render our Persons and Ministry infinitely contemptible which is against that Apostolick Canon Let no man despise thee Titus 2. 15. That is so to behave himself in his Ministerial Office as not to fall under contempt and therefore this obliges the Conscience not to make our selves ridiculous nor to render our Ministry our Counsels Exhortations Preaching Writing of no effect which is a thousand times worse than being silenced Our Sufferings will Preach more effectually to the People when we cannot speak to them but he who for Fear or Cowardise or the Love of this World betrays his Church and Religion by undue compliances and will certainly be thought to do so may continue to Preach but to no purpose and when we have rendred our selves ridiculous and contemptible we shall then quickly fall and fall unpitied There is nothing will so effectually tend to the final ruine of the Church of England because our Reading the Declaration will discourage or provoke or misguide all the Friends the Church of England has can we blame any man for not preserving the Laws and the Religion of our Church and Nation when we our selves will venture nothing for it can we blame any man for consenting to Repeal the Test and Penal Laws when we recommend it to them by Reading the Declaration Have we not Reason to expect that the Nobility and Gentry who have already suffered in this Cause when they hear themselves condemned for it in all the Churches of England will think it time to mend such a fault and reconcile themselves to their Prince and if our Church fall this way is there any any reason to expect that it should ever rise again These Consequences are almost as evident as Demonstrations and let it be what it will in it self which I foreseee will destroy the Church of England and the Protestant Religion and Interest I think I ought to make as much conscience of doing it as of doing the most immoral Action in Nature To say that these mischievous consequences are not absolutely necessary and therefore do not affect the Conscience because we are not certain they will follow is a very mean Objection Moral Actions indeed have not such necessary consequences as natural causes have necessary effects because no moral causes act necessarily Reading the Declaration will not as necessarily destroy the Church of England as fire burns Wood but if the consequence be plain and evident the most likely thing that can happen if it be unreasonable to expect any other if it be what is plainly intended and designed either I must never have any regard to Moral Consequences of my Actions or if ever they are to be considered they are in this case Why are the Nobility and Gentry so extreamly averse to the Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws why do they forfeit the King's Favour and their Honourable Stations rather than comply with it if you say that this tends to destroy the Church of England and the Protestant Religion I ask whether this be the necessary consequence of it whether the King cannot keep his promise to the Church of England if the Test and Penal Laws be Repealed We cannot say but this may be and yet the Nation does not think fit to try it and we commend those great men who deny it and if the same questions were put to us we think we ought in Conscience to deny them our selves and are there not as high probabilities that our Reading the Declaration will promote the Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws as that such a Repeal will ruine our Constitution and bring in Popery upon us Is it not as probable that such a complyance in us will disoblige all the Nobility and Gentry who have hitherto been firm to us as that when the power of the Nation is put into Popish Hands by the Repeal of such Tests and Laws the Priests and Jesuits may find some salvo for the King's Conscience and perswade him to forget his Promise to the Church of England and if the probable ill consequences of Repealing the Test and Penal Laws be a good reason not to comply with it I cannot see but that the as probable ill consequences of Reading the Declaration is as good a reason not to read it The most material Objection is that the Dissenters whom we ought not to provoke will expound our not Reading it to be the effect of a Persecuting Spirit Now I wonder men should lay any weight on this who will not allow the most probable consequences of our Actions to have any influence upon Conscience for if we must compare consequences to disoblige all the Nobility and Gentry by Reading it is likely to be much more fatal than to anger the Dissenters and it is more likely and there is much more
the City of God. But before that comes it is possible that the Throat that belch'd out this Nasty Insolence may be stopp'd with something which it cannot swallow II. Besides there are some Passages in the Declaration which in Conscience we cannot Read to our People though it be in the King's Name for among others we are to Read these Words We cannot but heartily wish as will easily be believed that all the People of our Dominions were Members of the Catholick Church Our People know too well the English of this and could not but be strangely surpriz'd to hear us tell them that it would be an acceptable thing to the King that they should leave the Truth and our Communion and turn Papists The Wish of a King when solemnly Declared is no light insignificant thing but has real influence and effect upon the minds of Men. It was but a Wish of Henry the Second that cut off T. Becket then Archbishop of Canterbury Councils and Courts of Justice too often bend to a King's Wishes though against their own Inclinations as well as against their Rule And can we imagine that they can have no force at all upon the common people therefore we cannot in Conscience pronounce these words in the Ears of the People whose Souls are committed to our Charge For we should hereby lay a snare before them and become their Tempters instead of being their Instructers and in very fair and reasonable construction we shall be understood to sollicite them to Apostacy to leave the Truth of the Gospel for Fables and the mistakes of men a reasonable and decent Worship for Superstition and Idolatry a true Christian Liberty for the most intolerable Bondage both of soul and body If any will forsake our Doctrine and Fellowship which yet is not ours but Christs at their own peril be it But as for us We are resolv'd by the grace of God to lay no stumbling block in their way nor to be accessary to their ruine that we may be able to declare our integrity with S. Paul That we are pure from the blood of all men III. In the next place We are to declare in the King's name That from henceforth the Execution of all and all manner of Penal Laws in matters Ecclesiastical for not coming to Church or not receiving the Sacrament or for any other Nonconformity to the Religion established or for or by reason of the exercise of Religion in any manner whatsoever be immediately Suspended and the sarther Execution of the said Penal Laws and every of them is hereby Suspended What! All and all manner of Laws in matters Ecclesiastical What the Laws against Fornication Adultery Incest For these are in Ecclesiastical matters What! All Laws against Blasphemy Prophaneness open Derision of Christian Religion Yet these crimes are punishable by no other Laws here than such as have been made in favour of the Established Religion How shall the Lord's day be observ'd What shall hinder covetous men to Plow and Cart and follow their several Trades upon that day since all the Laws that secure this observance and outward countenance of respect to the Christian Religion are by this general expression lade aside Besides these words for not coming to Church or not receiving the Sacrament or for any other Nonconformity to the Religion Established cannot in Conscience be read by us in our Churches because they may be a temptation to young unguided people to neglest all manner of Religious Worship and give them occasion of deptiving themselves of such opportunities of grace and salvation as these Penal Laws did often oblige them to use For being discharg'd attendance on our Service they are lest at liberty to be of any Religion or none at all Nay Christian Religion is by these general terms left at discretion as well as the Church of England For men may forsake us to become Jews or Mahometans or Pagan Idolaters as well as to be Papists or Dissenters for any care taken in this Declaratoin to prevent it And even of such as pretend to be Christians there either are or may be such Blasphemous Sects so dishonourable to our Common Lord and Master as are incapable of all publick encouragement and allowance for that would involve the Government in the Imputation of those Blasphemies and the whole Nation in that curse and vengeance of God which such provocations may extort Wherefore it is not out of any unreasonable opinion of our selves nor disaffection to Protestant Dissenters that we resuse to publish this Indulgence but out of a tender care of the Souls committed to us especially those of the weaker sort to whom we dare not propose an Invitation to Popery and much less any thing that may give countenance or encouragement to Irreligion It is said indeed that we are not required to approve but to read it To this Sir you have very well answer'd that Reading was Teaching it or if it be not so absolutely in the nature of the thing yet in common Construction I am affraid it would have been so understood But we do not stand in need of this Excuse for if there be any passages in it that are plain temptations to Popery or Licentiousness it cannot consist with our duty either to God or the Church to read them before our People As for the Dispensing Power and the Oaths and Tests required to qualifie men for Offices Military and Civil I must leave them to the Consideration of those who are nearer concern'd and therefore reasonably presum'd to understand them better Nor do I envy his Majesty the use of his Popish Subjects though I do not know what service they may be capable of doing more than other men This Nation has for some time made hard shift to subsist without much of their Aid and against the wills of several of them but now they are become the only necessary men and seem to want nothing but Number to fill all places Military and Civil in the Kingdom in the mean time the Odiousness of their Persons and the Insolence of their Behaviour with their way of menacing strange things makes some abatement of the merit of their service Lastly The respect which we have for His Majesties Service will not permit us to Read the Appendix to the Declaration Where the flower of the Nobility and Gentry of this Kingdom are something hardly reflected on as Persons that will not contribute to the peace and honour of the Nation Because they would consent to the taking away the Laws against Papists that they be put into a Condition to give us Laws The Persons here reflected on We know to be the chief for Ability and Interest and Inclination to serve the King and therefore cannot do His Majesty that disservice as to be Publishers of their disgrace make our selves the Instruments of alienating from his Majesty the Affections of his best Subjects Nay we find in our selves a strange difficulty to believe that this could
come from His Majesty who has experienc'd their faithfulness upon so many and pressing Occasions This could not well proceed from any but a Stranger to those Honourable Persons and the Nation and a greater Stranger to shame and good manners and what have we to do to Publish the Venome and Virulency of a Jesuit A Letter to a Dissenter from his Friend at the HAGUE concerning the Penal Laws and the Test shewing that the Popular Plea for Liberty of Conscience is not concerned in that Question SIR I Suppose you are very busie about the Choice of Parliament-men and all hands are at work to Elect such Members as may comply with the great Design to Repeal the Penal Laws and the Test. The pretence I confess is very plausible for all men are fond of Liberty of Conscience who dissent from the Established Religion but you and I have liv'd long enough in the world to observe that the most pernicious Designs have been carried on under the most plausible Pretences and that is Reason enough to enquire whether there be no danger of it now I shall not say one word against Liberty of Conscience nor for Penal Laws and Tests Imagine the best things you possibly can of the one and declame as much as you please against the other For I do not see that either of them are concerned in the present Dispute but only made use of to wheadle unthinking people and to catch them with a very inviting Bait and therefore before you engage too warmly in this Cause I would offer some few things to your calm and deliberate Thoughts The great Pretence is Liberty of Conscience and if this were the true state of the Case the Dispute would be more doubtful and perplexed for that is an Argument a man may talk of without end and it is not to be expected that men who feel the want of Liberty or taste the sweetness of it should be perswaded by any Arguments to forgo it when it may be had But now if Liberty of Conscience may be had without the Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws if it be apparent to men who will open their eyes that the true spring of all this zeal for Repealing the Test and Penal Laws is not Liberty of Conscience if there be great danger that by consenting to this Repeal we shall forfeit both the Liberty of our Consciences and our Civil Liberties into the Bargain then I presume you will readily grant that Liberty of Conscience as good a thing as it is is no Reason for such a Repeal I. As for the first it is a very plain case For you enjoy Liberty of Conscience now and yet the Penal Laws and Test are not Repealed What greater Liberty do you desire than you now have What can the Repeal of the Penal Laws and Test do for you which the King's Declaration hath not done You have his repeated Promises his avow'd Principle that Conscience is not to be forced and that no man ought to suffer meerly for his Religion though the Penal Laws are not repealed yet ' they are suspended they are not executed either against Papists or Dissenters and you have the security of the King's Declaration for it If you say that the King can quickly recall his Declaration and reinforce the Penal Laws if he find you obstinate against Repealing them I Answer first It is very dishonourable to imagine such a thing of the King after such a Declaration as this which he hath repeated the second time with all possible assurances of his Resolutions to stand to it and that not as a meer Act of grace and favour but as his own avowed Principle that Conscience ought not to be forced If you Reply that the King may very Honourably recall this Liberty of Conscience when you will not have it but resolve to keep these persecuting Laws I answer Not if it be against the Principles of his own Conscience to Persecute Meer favours may be withdrawn when they are slighted but no man will violate his own Conscience to be revenged of such ingratitude And yet this is not the case You do not slight the grace and favour of his Declaration but gladly accept the Liberty he gives and all the World sees that You use it too but instead of Repealing these Penal Laws You chuse to rely upon his Royal Word and Dispensing Power which argues so great a Confidence in him and attributes such Authority to him that it cannot possibly displease him This is a plain sign that you think your selves secure in his Reign and can you think the King will persecute you in his own Reign because you are contented to trust his Successors too which would be a very odd kind of passion for Liberty of Conscience To imagine the King should reinforce the Penal Laws upon your refusal to Repeal them is to suspect that this great Zeal is not for Liberty of Conscience but for the Repeal of the Penal Laws and Test that is that Liberty of Conscience is granted for the sake of Repealing the Penal Laws and Tests not the Repeal of the Penal Laws and Tests desired for the sake of Liberty of Conscience and then who knows what will become of Liberty of Conscience when the Penal Laws and Test are Repealed If you suspect any such thing which never ought to be suspected of so just and indulgent a Prince it is better to make the Experiment before than after such a Repeal Suppose the King should withdraw his Declaration upon your refusal to comply who would put the Laws in Execution against you They must either be Dissenters or Papists or the Church of England I presume you do not fear that you should execute the Laws against your selves and as for Papists it were worth trying whether they who are so obnoxious to the Laws themselves would put them in Execution against Dissenters especially after all their Clamors against them and as for the Church of England when they have been so reproached by Papists for Executing these Laws already though more at the instance of the Court than from their own inclination they will no longer be made the instruments of such Executions only to serve the turn of them that will reproach them So that if the Declaration were recalled you have a moral certainty that the Penal Laws cannot be Executed in this Kings Reign because there is no body to execute them As for the Test you cannot pretend that Liberty of Conscience is concern'd in the Repeal of that You may go to Conventicles and the Papists may go to Mass without any disturbance though the Test be never repealed and therefore the only design of repealing that must be to give a legal Qualification to Papists to possess all places of Honour Profit and Trust in the Nation that is to put your Lives and Liberties into their hands which I confess is a great Complement to a Roman Catholick Prince but a Complement may sometimes
from the Bishops than that they have in part retained in their Government and Ceremonies the Exteriors of that Religion should now themselves joyn to bring it intirely in But above all Who could have believed that the French Ministers who after having experimented all the Fury of Popery in France were at last banished rather than that they would subscribe to its Errors and Abuses And for this very cause fled into England that they might there more freely profess the Protestant Religion should now contribute to re-establish Popery in their new Country where they had been received by their Brethren with so singular a Charity Would you indeed Gentlemen see England once more submitted to the Tyranny of the Pope whose Yoke it so happily threw off in the last Age Would you there see all those monstrous Doctrines all those Superstitions and that horrible Idolatry which reigned there before the Reformation domineer once more in it Would you that the People should again hear the Pulpits and the Churches sounding out the Doctrins of Purgatory of Indulgences of the Sacrifice of the Mass c. and see the Image and Reliques of the Saints carried solemnly in Procession with a God formed by the hand of Man. And that in sine they should again publickly adore those vain Idols We are confident there is not â—… good Protestant in the World that would not startle â—… at the thought of it But this is not yet all The Declaration of which we speak does not only re-establish Popery with all its abominations but does moreover tend to the Ruine of the Reformation in England A Man need not to have any great Sagacity to be convinced of this And that as much as it seems to establish for ever the Protestant Religion in that Kingdom it does on the contrary destroy the very Foundations of it The ground upon which the Reformation is founded in England are the Laws which have been made at several times for the settlement of it and to abolish either the Tyranny of the Pope or the Popish Religion altogether And as these Laws have been made by the King and Parliament together so that the King has not the power to Repeal them without a Parliament they secure the Protestant Religion against the Enterprizes of such Kings as should ever think to Destroy it But now if this Declaration be executed we are no more to make any account of those Solemn Laws which have been passed in favour of the Reformation they become of no value and the Protestant Religion is intirely lest to the King's Pleasure This is what will clearly appear from what we are about to say The King not having been able to obtain of the last Parliament to consent to a Repeal of the Laws which had been made against the Nonconformists dissolved the Parliament it self Not long after without attending a new one he did that alone by his Declaration which the Parliament would not do conjunctly with him He granted a all Liberty of Conscience to the Nonconformists he freed them from the Penalties which had been appointed against them and dispensed with the Oaths to which the Laws obliged all those who were admitted to any Charges whether in the souldiery or in administration of Justice or of the Government In pursuance of these Declarations he threw the Protestants out of all Places of any great Importance to clap in Papists in their room and goes on without ceasing to the intire establishment of Popery Who does not see that if the Protestants approve these Declarations and themselves authorize such Enterprises the King will not stop here but that this will be only one step to carry him much further What can be did when he shall do the same thing with reference to those Laws which exclude the Papists out of the Parliament that he has done to those which shut them out of all Charges and Imploys and forbad them the Exercise of their Religion Does not the approbation of such Declarations as it overthrows these last carry with it before-hand the approbation of those which shall one day overthrow the former And if the King shall once give himself the Authority to bring Papists into the Parliament who shall hinder him from using Solicitations Promises Threatnings and a thousand other the like means to make up a Popish Parliament And who shall hinder him with the concurrence of that Parliament to repeal all the ancient Laws that had been passed against Popery and make new ones against the Protestants These are without doubt the natural Consequences of what the King at this time aims at These are the fruits which one ought to expect from it if instead of approving as some have done his Enterprises against the Laws they do not on the contrary with all imaginable Vigor oppose them Reflect a little on what we have here said and you will confess that we have reason to commend the Conduct of the Bishops who refused to publish the Declaration and to condemn those Dissentèrs who have made their Addresses of Thanks for it It is true that the Dissenters are to be pitied and that they have been treated hardly enough and we do not think it at all strange that they so earnestly sigh after Liberty of Conscience It is natural for Men under Oppression to seek for Relief and Liberty of Conscience considered only in it self is it may be the Thing of all the World the most precious and most desirable Would to God we were able to procure it for them by any lawful means and without such ill Consequences tho' it were at the peril of our Lives But we conjure them to consider how pernicious that Liberty of Conscience is which is offer'd to them as we have just now shewn On the one side it is inseparably linked with the Establishment of Popery and on the other it cannot be accepted without approving a terrible Breach which his Majesty thereby makes upon the Laws and which would be the ruine of the Reformation in his Kingdoms were not some Remedy brought to it And where is the Protestant who would buy Liberty of Conscience at so dear a rate and not rather chuse to continue deprived of it all his Life Should the private Interest of our Brechren the Dissenters blind them in such a manner that they have no regard to the general Interest of the Church Should they for enjoying a Liberty of Conscience so ill assured shut their Eyes to all other Considerations How much better would it be for them to re-unite themselves to the Bishops with whom they differ only in some Points of Discipline but especially at this time when their Conduct ought to have entirely defaced those unjust Suspicions which they had conceived against them But if they could not so readily dispose themselves to such a Re-union would it not be better for them to resolve still to continue without Liberty of Conscience and expect some more favourable time when they may by lawful
and better Rule to steer mankind than the empty Motions of the Schools â—… only to perplex and confound our â—… lest it should discover the naked Truth of things The present Letter will confine it self only to Publick Promises Oaths and Solemn Contracts scandalonsly violated by the Roman Catholicks nor with Heathens and Hereticks only but amongst themselues We will begin with the more remote Countries The Spaniards and Portugueses have acted so treacherously with the Africans and the Natives of both Indies that the Cruelty of the History would be incredible if it was not related by their own Historians their Leagues and Treaties the most sacred Bonds under Heaven were soon neglected and the Spirit of their Religion broke all before it how many Millions of those innocent Creatures were murder'd in cold Blood and for Pastime sake with all the variety of Torments that the Devil could inspite into them how soon were the vast Regions of Mexico New Spain Peru Hispaniola Brasel c. depopulated above twenty Millions of the poor harmless Inhabitants being put to death in full Peace and they the best natur'd People in the World and very Ingenious tho' they may seem Savages to a sort of Men who think all Barbarians that differ from them in Habits Manners Customs Diet Religion Language c. not considering that all-wise Nature hath contriv'd a different Scene of things for various Climates Nay such is the Inhumanity of these Catholick Nations here at home that they will frequently bring Strangers settled amongst them by the Laws of Commerce and their own fellow Subjects into the Inquisition especially if they are Rich upon a pretence of some Heretical opinion tho' they themselves at first protect and license the Opinion is in the case of Molino whose Book had receiv'd an Imprimatur from most of the Inquisitors of Spain and Italy and even from the Infallible Head of the Church yet afterwards it was burnt and he himself together with many of his Followers miserably tortur'd the Pope scarce escaping the Punishment The Generous Marshal Schombergh driven out of France for his great Services who had won many Battels for the Portugueses and sav'd their Country could not be suffer'd to end his Old Age amongst them but was forc'd in the midst of Winter to commit himself to the Sea and fly to an Inhospitable Shoar The present French King renounced all his Pretences on Flanders concluded the Pyrenean Treaty and swore at the Altar not to meddle with that Country but how well he observ'd that Sacred Covenant Baron D'Isola will best inform you in his â—…â—… for which he was thought to be poison'd neither hath the French Monarch been contented to break all Faith and Measures with the Spaniard but he hath gone about to deceive and ruine the Pope Emperour all the Princes and Electours of the Empire the Prince of Orange Duke of Lorrain the Swizzes the Dutch and the English and not only these his Neighbours and Allies but his own Protestant Subjects who had all the Security that Solemn Edicts Oaths and Promises could afford then besides many other obligations upon the Crown for bringing the King to the Throne yet all of a sudden they found themselves oppress'd and destroy'd by his Apostolical Dragoons their Temples razed their Wives and Children taken away their Goods and Estates confiscated themselves cast into Prisons sent to the Gallies and often shot at like Birds His seising of Lorrain Franch Compte Alsact Strasburgh Luxembergh the Principality of Orange the County of Avignon Philipsburg the whole Palatinate the Electorates of Mentz Trevis and Cologn his building of Citadels in the Empire and in Italy c. are so contradictory to National Agreements and Publick Treatles that scarce a Jesuit or a Frenchman can have Impudence enough to defend them a Banditto a Pyrate or a Pick-pocket would be asham'd of such Actions and an ordinary Man would be hang'd for a Crime a Million times less His seising upon Hudson's Bay and leading the English into Slavery the French Treachery in the Engagement at Sea between us and the Dutch their frequent seizing of our Ships are light things not worthy our Resentment being under the Conduct of a Monsicur whom the World so justly vilifies and despises The Emperour can have no good Pretence to condemn the King of France or any other Catohlick Prince for breach of Common Faith and Honesty since he himself hath plald the same Game with his Protestant Subjects inviting some of the â—… of the Hungarian Nobility to Vienna under the colour of Treaty and Friendship and then cutting of their Heads seizing their Estates and Properties destroying their Pastors and Churches and extirpating the whole Reform'd Religion after he had promis'd and stipulated to protect and give them the liberty of their Consciences The Parisian Massacres were carried on and executed under a Mass of Friendship all the Principal Protestants of France being invited to the healing Marriage to Revel and Caress were Barbarously Butcher'd at the Toll of a Bell in their Beds when they dream'd they â—… securely The Irish Massacre of above 200000 Protestants was no less Treacherous it was a Copy of the Spanish Cruelty in the West Indies to whom the Irish are compar'd by Historians for their Idleness and Inhumanity tho'not for their Wit. The Persecutions of the Protestants in the Valley of Piedmont are another instance of Popish Immunity and baseness they were under the common shelter of publick Pactions and Treatles and â—… been solemnly own'd by the Dukes of Savoy to â—… the most Loyal and the most Couragious of the Subjects The present Duke who undertook the last Persecution was not content to destroy the with his own Troops but call'd in the French assist at the Comedy to shoot them off the Rock to hunt them over the Alps and to sell the stronger of them to the Gallies that the very Turkish Slave themselves might deride and insult over â—… Catholicks who have not Power or Opportunity execute the same things seem to condemn the Conduct in Publick but sing Te Deum in Private and soon as ever they have got a sufficient Force commit the like Barbarities so essential to their Religion that all the instinct of Nature cannot separate them The Holy Father at Rome tho' he sets for a moderate and merciful Pontificate order'd Deum to be Sung up and down for the extirpation of Heresie out of France and Pidemont and â—… English Catholicks have given us as their Army â—… Interest encreas'd several proofs how well â—… can juggle and disguise themselves setting up â—… of Inquisition turning Protestants out of all â—… and even out of their Freeholds dispensing â—… Laws Ravishing Charters packing Corporations â—… and all under a notion of Liberty or a Divine â—… they with their Accomplices defended illegal Declarations and set up an Authority above all our â—… under the Cloak of a sham Liberty of Conscience racking at the very same time the
Account of it who said That he had not heard of it any other way and was so fully convinced that the Nuion had cause given them to be jealous that he himself set forward the Act and the rather because he saw that the E. of S. did not much like it The Parliament as long as it was known that the Religion was safe in the King 's Negative had not taken any great Care of its own Constitution but it seemed the best Expedient that could be found for laying the Jealousies of his Late Majesty and the Apprehensions of the Successor to take so much Care of the Two Houses that so the Dangers with which Men were then allarm'd might seem the less formidable upon so effectual a Security And thus all the stir that he keeps with Perjury and Imposture ought to make no other impression but the wantonness of his own temper that meddles so boldly with things of which he knew so little the true Secret. For here was a Law passed of which all made great use that opposed the Bill of Exclusion to demonstrate to the Nation that there could be no danger of Popery even under a Prince of that Religion but as he would turn the matter it amounts to this That that Law might be of good use in that Season to lay the Jealousies of the Nation till there were a Prince on the Throne of that Communion and then when the turn is served it must be thrown away to open the only door that is now shut upon the Re-establishment of that Religion This is but one hint among a great many more of the state of Affairs at the time that this Act of the TEST was made to shew that the Evidence given by the Witnesses had no other share in that matter but that it gave rise to the other Discoveries and a fair opportunity to those who knew the Secret of the late Kings Religion and the Negotiation at Dover to provide such an effectual Security as might both save the Crown and secure the Religion and this I am sure some of the Bishops knew who to their Honour were faithful to both The Third Reason he gives for Repealing the Act is the Incompetent Authority of those who Enacted it for it was of an Ecclesiastical nature and here he stretches out his Wings to a top-flight and charges it with nothing less than the Deposing of Christ from his Throne the disowning neglecting and assronting his Commission to his Catholick Church and entrenching upon this Sacred Prerogative of his holy Catholick Church and then that he might have occasion to seed his Spleen with railing at the whole Order he makes a ridiculous Objection of the Bishops being present in the House of Lords that he might shew his respect to them by telling in a Parenthesis That to their shame they had consented to it But has this Scaramuchio no Shame left him Did the Parliament pretend by this Act to make any Decision in those two points of Transubstantiation and Idolatry Had not the Convocation desined them both for above an Age before In the 28th Article of our Church these words are to be found Transabstantiation or the change of the substance of bread and Wine in the Supper of the Lord cannot be proved by Holy writ but it is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture overthrows the nature of a Sacrament and hath given occasion to many Superstitions and for the Idolatry of the Church of Rome that was also declared very expresly in the same Body of Articles since in the Article 35. the Homilies are declared To contain a godly and wholsome Doctrine necessary for those times and upon that it is judged that they should be read in the Churches by the Ministers diligently and distinctly that they may be understood of the people And the second of these which is against the Peril of Idolatry aggravates the Idolatry of that Church in so many particulars and with such severe expressions that those who at first made those Articles and all those who do now sign them or oblige others to sign them must either believe the Church of Rome to be guilty of Idolatry or that the Church of England is the Impudentest Society that ever assumed the name of a Church if she proposes such Homilies to the People in which this Charge is given so home and yet does not believe it her self A man must be of Bay's pitch to rise up to this degree of Impudence Upon the whole matter then these points had been already determined and were a part of our Doctrines enacted by Law all that the Parliament did was only to take these out of a great many more that by this Test it might appear whether they who came into either House were of that Religion or not and now let our Reasoner try what he can make out of this or how he can justifie the Scandal that he so boldly throws upon his Order As if they had as much in them lay destroyed the very being of a Christian Church and had profanely pawned the Bishop to the Lord and betrayed the Rights of the Church of England as by Law established in particular as well as of the Church Catholick in general p. 8 9. All this shews to whom he hath pawned both the Bishop and the Lord and something else too which is both Conscience and Honour is he has any lest When one reflects on two of the Bishops that were of that Venerable Body while this Act passed whose Memory will be blessed in the present and following Ages those two great and good men that filled the Sees of Chester and Oxford he must conclude that as the World was not worthy of them so certainly their Sees were not worthy of them since they have been plagued with such Successors that because Bays delights in Figures taken from the Roman Empire I must tell him that since Commodus succeeded to Marcus Aurelius I do not find a more incongruous Succession in History With what sensible regret must those who were so often edified with the Gravity the Piety the Generosity and Charity of the late Bishop of Oxford look on when they see such a Harleguin in his room His Fourth Reason is taken from the uncertainty and falshood of the matters contained in the Declaration itself pag. 9. For our Comedian maintains his Character still and scorns to speak of Establish'd Laws with any Decency here he puts in a Paragraph as was formerly marked which belonged to his Second Reason but it seems some of those to whom he has pawn'd himself thought he had not said enough on that head and therefore to save blottings he put it in here After that he tells the Gentry That Transubstantiation was a Notion belonging to the Schoolmen and Metaphysicians And that he may bespeak their Favour he tells them in very soft words That their Learning was more polite and practicable in the Civil Affairs of Human Life to understand the
Rules of Honour and the Laws of their Country the Practice of Martial Discipline and the Examples of Great Men informer Ages and by them to square their Actions in their respective Stations And the like But sure the Bishop is here without his Fiocco yet at least for Decencies sake he should have named Religion and Vertue among the proper Studies of the Gentry and if he dares not trust them with the Reading the Scriptures yet at least they might read the Articles of our Church and hearken to the Homilies for though it has been long one of the first Maxims that he has infused into all the Clergy that come near him That the People ought to be brought into an Ignorance in matters of Religion that Preaching ought to be laid aside for a Preaching Church could not stand that in Sermons no Points of Doctrine ought to be explained and that only the Rules of Human Life ought to be told the People yet after all they may read the short Articles and though they were as blindly implicite as he would wish them to be yet they would without more enquiry find Transubstantiation to be condemned in them Next he triumphs over the renouncing of it pag 11. As too bold and too prophane an Affront to Almighty God when Men abjure a thing which it is morally impossible for them to understand And he appeals to the Members of both Houses whom in a fit of Respect he calls Honourable after he had reproach'd them all he could If they have any distinct Idea or Notion in their minds of the thing they here so solemnly renounce I do verily believe none of them have any distinct Notion of Transubstantiation and that it is not only Morally but Physically impossible for them to understand it But one would think that this is enough for declaring that they do not believe it since the TEST contains no declaration concerning Transubstantiation itself whether it is a true or a false Doctrine but only concerning the belief of him that takes it And if one can have no distinct Notions of it so that it is morally impossible for him to understand it he may very well declare That he does not believe it After a Farce of a slight Story he concludes That there seems to be nothing but a Prophane Levity in the whole matter and a shameless abuse put upon God and Religion to carry on the Wicked Designs of a Rebel-Faction For he cannot for his heart abate an ace of his Insolence even when he makes the King Lords and Commons the subject of his scorn Certainly whatever his Character is it ought not to be expected that a Man who attacks all that is Sacred under God and Christ should not be treated as he deserves it were a seeble weakness to have so great a regard to a Character that is so prostituted by him He tells us pag. 47. That all Parties agree in the thing and that they differ only in the word and manner and here he makes a long excursion to shew his Learning in tacking a great many things together which passes with ignorant Readers as a mark of his great Reading whereas in this as well as in all his other Books in which any shews of Learning appear those who have searched into the Fountains see that he does nothing but gather from the Collection of others only he spoils them with the Levities of his Buffoon-Stile and which is worse with his Dis-ingenuity I leave all thse matters to be Examined by those who have leisure for it and that think him worth their Pains But as for Transubstantiation the Words that I have cited from one of our Articles shew plainly that it is rejected in our Church so that he is bound either to renounce it or to renounce our Church therefore all that shew he makes with our History comes to nothing since whatever he may say with relation to Edward the Sixth's Reign it cannot be denied but they were Enacted by the Convocation in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign and they have been ever since the Doctrine of our Church so that without going further ' this is now our Doctrine and since Sa. Oxon carries the Authority of the Convocation so high he will find the Original Record of these Articles in Corpus-Christi Colledge in Cambridge subscribed by the Members of both Houses in which there is a much more positive Decision then is in the Prints not only against Transubstantiation but against any Corporeal or Real Presence of the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Sacrament And if he will give himself scope to rail at those who suppressed this I leave him to his Liberty But here is the formal decision of this Church and the pretending that there was no Evidence of Cranmer's Opinion but in an unknown Manuscript or a famous Invisible Manuscript p. 46. 47. when there are two Books writ on this matter by Cranmer himself and when all the Disputes in Queen Mary's Time besides those that were both in Oxford and Cambridge in King Edwards time shew so clearly that this was his Doctrine is a strain becoming his Sincerity that gives this among many other Essays of the Trust that is due to him But it seems he thought that Dr. Tillotson Dr. Stillingfleet and Dr. Burnet besides some others whom he does not Name had not Reputation enough in the World and therefore he intended to raise it by using them ill which is all the Effect that his Malice can have He had set on one of his poor under-work-men some years ago to decry the Manuscript which Dr. Stillingfleet had in his keeping for above twenty years and which Dr. Burnet had in his Hands for many Months and which they shewed to as many as desired to see but that had turned so much to his Shame that first vented the Calumny that it seems he summoned Sa. Oxon to appear his Second in the Slander and he whose Brow is of so peculiar a Composition will needs bring it here tho never so impertinently But I forgive the Hatred that he bares both to that Manuscript and to those Doctors since nothing could be less to the Satisfaction of those for whom he published his Book then to see the Nature and Regular Methods in which the Reformation was advanced For the Bishops and Divines were appointed to Examine all Points with much Care and to bring every man his Opinion in Writing all which were compared very faithfully and upon these the Decisions were made There any many other Papers yet extant which by comparing the Hands shews these to be Originals and they were in the Salisbury Family probably ever since they were at first brought together Their Ancestor the Lord Burghly who was Secretary of State in Edward the Sixth's time gathered them up and as appears in a Letter under his own Hand yet extant he had six or seven Volumes of them of which Dr. Stillingfleet had only two but Dr. Burnet saw
Godly and wholsom Doctrine all this Clamour against Idolatry turns against himself for he will find the Church of Rome charged with this almost an Age before Dr. Stillingfleet was born and though perhaps none has ever defended the Charge with so much Learning as he has done yet no Malice less impudent than his is could make him the Author of the Accusation It will be another strain of our Author's Modesty if he will pretend that our Church is not bound to own the Doctrine that is contained in her Homilies he must by this make our Church as treacherous to her Members as Sa. Oxon is to her for to deliver this Doctrine to the People if we believe it not our selves is to be as impudent as he himself can pretend to be A Church may believe a Doctrine which she does not think necessary to propose to all her Members but she were indeed a Society sit for such Pastors as he is if she could propose to the People a Doctrine chiefly one of so great Consequence as this is without she believed it herself So then he must either renounce our Church and her Articles or he must answer all his own Plea for clearing that Church of this Imputation which is so slight that it will be no hard matter even for such a trifling Writer as himself is to do it As for what he says of Stabbing and Cut-throat Words he may charge us with such Words if he will but we know who we may charge with the Deeds I would gladly see the List of all that have been murder'd by these Words to try if they can be put in the Ballance either with the Massacre of Ireland or that of Paris upon which I must take Notice of his slight way of mentioning Coligny and his Faction and telling us in plain Words p. 45. That they were Rebels This is perhaps another instance of his kindness to the Calvinist Prince that is descended from that Great Man. If Idolatry made our Plot it was not the first that it made but his Malignity is still like himself in his charging Dr. Stillingfleet who he says is the Author of the Imputation of Idolatry as if he had suborned the Evidence in our Plot. I should congraulate to the Doctor the Honour that is done him by the Malice of one who must needs be the Object of the Hatred of all good Men if I did not look upon him as so comtemptible a Person that his Love and his Hatred are equally insignificant If he thinks our Church worse than Canibals I wish he would be at the pains to go and make a trial and see whether these Salvages will use him as we have done I dare say they would not eat him for they would find so much Gall and Choller in him that the first bit would quite disgust them REFLECTIONS on a Late PAMPHLET Entituled PARLIAMENTUM PACIFICUM Licensed by the Earl of Sunderland and Printed at London in March 1688. I. PEace is a very desirable thing yet every state that is peaceable is not blindly to be courted An Apoplexy is the most peaceable state into which a man's Body can be laid yet few would desire to pacific the Humours of the Body at that rate an Implicit Faith and Absolute Slavery are the two peaceablest things that can be yet we Confess we have no mind to try so dangerous an Experiment and while the Remedies are too strong we will chuse rather to bear our Disease than to venture on them The Instance that is proposed to the Imitation of the Nation is that Parliament which called in the late King and yet that cannot so much as be called a Parliament unless it be upon a Common-wealth Principle That the Sovereign Power is radically in the People for its being Chosen without the King 's Writ was such an Essential Nullity that no subsequent Ratification could take it away For all People saw that they could not depend upon any Acts passed by it and therefore it was quickly Dissolved and ever since it has been called by all the Monarchical Party a Convention and not a Parliament But now in order to the Courting the Common-wealth Party this is not only called a Parliament but is proposed as a Pattern to all others from the beginning to pag. 19. II. But since this Author will send us back to that time and since he takes so ill That the Memory of the late King should be forgotten let us Examine that Transaction a little and then we shall see whether it had not been more for his Honour to let it be forgotten The King did indeed in his Declaration from Breda promise Liberty of Conscience on which he insisted in a large and wise Declaration set out after he was settled on the Throne But after that he had got a Parliament chosen all of Creatures depending on himself who for many years Granted him every thing that he desired a severe Act of Uniformity was passed and the Kings Promise was carried off by this That the King could not refuse to comply with so Loyal a Parliament It is well enough known that those who were then secretly Papists and who disguised their Religion for many years after this as the King himself did to the last animated the Chief Men of our Church to carry the Points of Uniformity as high as was possible and that both then and ever since all that proposed any Expedients for uniting us or as it was afterwards termed for Comprehending the Dissenters were represented as the Betrayers of the Church The Design was then clear to some that so by carrying the Terms of Conformity to a great rigidity there might be many Non-Conformists and great occasion given for a Toleration under which Popery might insensibly creep in For if the Expedients that the King himself proposed in his Declaration had been stood to it is well known that of the 2000 Conscientious Ministers as he calls them pag. 14. by an Affectation too gross to pass on them that were turned out above 1700 had staid in Their Practices had but too good Success on those who were then at the Head of our Church whose Spirits were too much soured by their ill usage during the War and whose Principles led them to so good an Opinion of all that the Court did that for a great while they would suspect nothing But at the same time that the Church Party that carried all before them in that Parliament were animated to press things so hard the Dissenters were secretly encouraged to stand out and were told That the Kings Temper and Principle and the consideration of Trade would certainly procure them a Toleration and ever since that Party that thus had set us together by the ears has shifted fides dextrously enough but still they have carried on the main Design which was to keep up the Quarrel in the Intervals of Parliament Liberty of Conscience was in vogue but when a Session of Parliament came
and the King wanted Money then a new severe Law against the Dissenters was offered to the angry men of the Church-party as the price of it and this seldom sail'd to have its effect so that they were like the Jewels of the Crown pawned when the King needed Money but redeem'd at the next Prorogation A Reflection then that arises naturally out of the Proceedings in the Year 1660. is That if a Parliament should come that would copy after that pattern and repeal Laws and Tests The King's Offers of Liberty of Conscience as may indeed be supposed will bind him till after a short Session or two such a meritorious Parliament should be dissolved according to the precedent in the Year 1660. and that a new one were brought together by the same Methods of changing Charters and making Returns and then the Old Laws de Heretico Comburtedo might be again revived and it would be said that the Kings Inclinations are for keeping his Promise and Granting still a Liberty of Conscience yet he can deny nothing to a Loyal and Catholick Parliament III. We pay all possible respect to the King and have witnessed how much we depended on his promises in so signal a manner that after such real Evidence all words are superfluous But since the King has shewed so much zeal not only for his Religion in general but in particular for that Society which of all the other Bodies in it we know is animated the most against us we must crave leave to speak a little freely and not suffer our selves to be destroyed by a Complement The Extirpation of Hereticks and the Breach of Faith to them have been Decreed by two of their General Councils and by a Tradition of several Ages the Pope is possessed of a power of dissolving all Promises Contracts and Oaths not to mention the prviate Doctrines of that Society that is so much in favour of doing Ill that Good may come of it of using Equivocations and Reservations and of ordering the Intention Now these Opinions as they have never been renounced by the Body of that Church so indeed they cannot be unless they renounce their Infallibility which is their Basis at the same time Therefore though a Prince of that Communion may very sincerely resolve to maintain Liberty of Conscience and to keep his Word yet the blind Subjection into which he is brought by his Religion to his Church must force him to break through all that as soon as the Doctrine of his Church is opened to him and that Absolution is denied him or higher Threatnings are made him if he continues firm to his merciful Incliations So that supposing His Majesties Piety to be as great as the Jesuits Sermon on the Thirtieth of January lately printed carries it to the uttermost possibility of Flesh and Blood then our Fears must still grow upon us who know what are the Decrees of that Church and by consequence we may infer to what his Piety must needs carry him as soon as those things are fully opened to him which in respect to him we are bound to believe are now hid from him IV. It will further appear that these are not injust Inferences if we consider a little what has been the Observation of all the Promises made for Liberty of Conscience to Hereticks by Roman Catholick Princes ever since the Reformation The first was the Edict of Passaw in Germany procured chiefly by Ferdinand's means and maintained indeed religiously by his Son Maximilian the Second whose Inclinations to the Protestant Religion made him be suspected for one himself but the Jesuits insinuated themselves so far into his Younger Brother's Court that was Archduke of Grats that this was not only broken by that Family in their Share but though Rodolph and Mathias were Princes of great Gentleness and the latter of these was the Prorector of the States in the beginning of their War with K. Philip the Second yet the violence with which the House of Grats was possessed overturned all that so that the breaking off the Pacificatory Edicts was begun in Rodolph's time and was so far carried on in Mathias's time that they set both Bahemia and Hungary in a Flame and so begun that long War of Germany 2. The next Promise for Liberty of Conscience was made by Queen Mary of England but we know well enough how it was observed The Promises made by the Queen Regent of Scotland were observed with the same Fidelity after these came the Pacificatory Edicts in France which were scarce made when the Triumvirat was formed to break them The famous Massacre of Paris was an instance never to be forgot of the Religious Observance of a Treaty made on purpost to lay the Party asleep and to bring the whole Heads of it into the Net This was a much more dreadful St. Partholomew than that on which our Author beflows that Epithere pag. 15. and when all seemed setled by the famous Edict of Nantes we have seen how restless that Party and in particular the Society were till it was broken by a Prince that for thirty years together had shewed as great an aversion to the Shedding of Blood in his Government at home as any of his Neighbours can pretend to and who has done nothing in the whole Tragedy that he has acted but what is exactly conform to the Doctrine and Decrees of his Church so that it is not himself but his Religion that we must blame for all that has fallen out in that Kingdom I cannot leave this without taking notice of our Author's Sincerity who page 18. tells us of the Protestants entring into their League in France when it is well known that it was a League of Papists against a Protestant Successor which was afterwards applied to a Popish King only because he was not zealous enough against Hereticks But to end this List of Instances at a Countrey to which our Author bears so particular a kindness when the Dutchess of Parma granted the Edict of Pacification by which all that was past was buried and the Exercise of the Protestant Religion was to be connived at for the future King Philip the Second did not only ratifie this but expressed himself so fully upon it to the Count of Egmont who had been sunt over to him that the easie Count returned to Flanders so assured of the King's Sincerity that he endeavoured to perswade all others to rely as much on his Word as he himself did It is well known how fatal this Confidence was to him and see Mettren lib. 3. that two years after this that King sent over the Duke of Alva with that severe Commission which has been often Printed in which without any regard had to the former Pacification or Promises the King declared That the Provinces had forfeited all their Liberties and that every man in it had forfeited his Life and therefore he authorised that numerciful man to proceed with all possible rigor against them It is also
over as an Excess of Government that might be excusable though not justifiable this will by no means prove that Laws made to Secure us against that which we esteem the greatest of Evils may be suspended because Twelve Men in Scarlet have been tried or practised on to say so The Power of Pardoning is also unreasonably urged for justifying the Dispensing Power the one is a Grace to a particular Person for a Crime committed and the other is a Warrant to commit Crimes In short the one is a Power to save Men the other is a Power to destroy the Government But though they swagger it now with a Dispensing Power yet Rede Caper Vitem c. may come to be again in Season and a time may come in which the whole Party may have reason to wish that some hair-brain'd Jesuits had never been born who will not only expose them to the Resentments but even to the Justice of another Season in which as little regard will be had to the Dispensing Power as they have to the Laws at present VII Our Author's kindness to the States of Holland is very particular and returns often upon him and it is no wonder that a State settled upon two such hinges as the Protestant Religion and the Publick Liberty should be no small Eye-sore to those who intend to destroy both So that the slackning the Laws concerning Religion and the moderating that State by invading it seem to be terms that must always go together In the first War began the first slackning of them and after the Triple Alliance had laid the Dutch asleep when the Second War was resolved on it was begun with that Heroical Attempt on the Smyrna Fleet for our Author will not have the late King's Actions to be forgotten at the same time the famous Declaration for Suspending the Laws in 1672 came out And now again with another Declaration to the same purpose we see a return of the same good inclinations for the Dutch though none before our Author has ever ventur'd as in a Book Licensed by my Lord President of the Council to call their Constitution pag. 68 a Revolt that they made from their Lawful Prince and to raise his stile to a more sublime strain he says pag. 66. that their Common-wealth is nothing else but the result of an absolute Rebellion Revolt and Defection from their Prince and that the Laws that they have made were to prevent any casual return to their natural Allegiance and speaking of their obligation to Protect a Naturalized Subject he bestows this honour on them as to say p. 57. 58. Those that never yet dealt so fairly with Princes may be suspected for such a superfluous Faith to one that puts himself upon them for a Vassal Time will shew how far the States will resent these Injuries only it seems our Author thinks that a Soveraign's Faith to protect the Subject is a superfluous thing A Faith to Hereticks is another superfluous thing So that two Superfluities one upon another must be all that we are like to trust to But I must take Notice of the variety of Methods that these Gentlemen use in their Writings here in England we are always upbraided with a Revolt of the Dutch as a scandalous imputation on the Protestant Religion And yet in a late Paper Entituled An Answer to Pensionary Fagel's Letter the Services that the Roman Catholicks did in the beginning of the Common-wealth are highly extolled as Signal and Meritorious upon which the Writer makes great Complaints that the Pacification of Gaunt and the Union of Utrecht by which the free Exercise of Religion was to be continued to them was not observed in most of the Provinces But if he had but taken pains to examine the History of the States he would have found that soon after the Union made with Utrecht the Treaty of Collen was set on foot between the King of Spain and the States by the Emperour's Mediation in which the Spaniards studied to divide the Roman Catholicks in those Provinces from the Protestants by offering a Confirmation of all other Priviledges of those Provinces excepting only the Point of Religion which had so great an effect that the Party of the Male-contents was formed upon it and these did quickly Capitulate in the Walloon Provinces and after that not only Brabant and Flanders Capitulated but Reenenburg that was Governour of Groening declared for the King of Spain and by some places that he took both in Friesland and Over-Issel he put those Provinces under Contribution Not long after that both Daventer and Zutphen were betrayed by Popish Governours and the War was thus brought within the Seven Provinces that had been before kept at a greater distance from them Thus it did appear almost every where that the Hatred with which the Priests were inspiring the Roman Catholicks against the Protestants disposed them to Betray all again to the Spanish Tyranny The New War that Reenenburgh's Treachery had brought into these Provinces chang'd so the State of Affairs that no wonder if this produced a Change likewise with relation to the Religion since it appeared that these Revolts were catried on and justified upon the principles of the Church and the general Hatred under which these Revolts brought the Roman Catholicks in those Out-Provinces made the greater part of them to withdraw so that there were not left such numbers of them as to pretend to the Free-Exercise of their Religion But the War not having got into Holland and Utrecht and none of that Religion having Revolted in these Provinces Roman Catholicks continued still in the Countrey and though the ill inclinations that they shewed made it necessary for publick Safety to put them out of the Government yet they have still enjoyed the common Rights of the Countrey with the free Exercise of their Religion But it is plain that some men are only waiting an Opportunity to renew the Old Delenda est Carthago and that they think it to be no small step to it to possess all the World with the odious impressions of the Dutch as a Rebellious and a Persidious State and if it were possible they would make their own Roman Catholick Subjects fancy that they are persecuted by them But though men may be brought to believe Transubstantiation in spight of the Evidence of Sence to the contrary Yet those that feel themselves at Ease will hardly be brought to think that they are persecuted because that they are told so in an ill-writ Pamphlet And for their Rebellion the Prince that is only concerned in that sinds them now to be his best Allies and chief support as his Predecessors acknowledged them a Free State almost an Age ago And it being Consest by Historians on all sides That there was an Express Proviso in the Constitution of their Government That if their Prince broke such and such Limits they were no more bound to Obey him but might Resist him And it being no less certain
That King Philip the Second Authorized the Duke of Alva to seize upon all their Priviledges their resistieg him and maintaining their Priviledges was without all dispute a justisiable Action and was so esteemed by all the States of Europe and in particular here in England as appears by the preambles of several Acts of Subsidy that were given to the Queen in order to the Assisting the States And as for their not dealing fairly with Princes when our Author can find such an instance in their History as our Attempt on their Smyrna Fleet was he may employ his Eloquence in setting it out and if notwithstanding all the failures they have felt from others they have still maintained the Publick Faith our Author's Rhetorick will hardly blemish there The Peace of Nimeguen and the abandoning of Luxemburgh are perhaps the single instances in their History that need to be a little excused But as the vast Expence of the last War brought them into a Necessily that either knows no Law or at least will hearken to none so we who forced them to both and first sold the Triple Alliance and then let go Luxembuogh do with very ill grace reproach the Dutch for these unhappy steps to which our Conduct drove them VIII If a strain of pert boldness runs through the whole Pamphlet it appears no where more eminently than in the Reflections the Author makes on Mr. Fagel's Letter he calls it p. 62. a pretended piece and a presumption not to be soon pardoned in prefixing to a surreptitious and unauthorized Pamphlet the reverend Name of the Princess of Orange which in another place p. 72. he had reason to imagine was but a counterfeit Coyn and that those Venerable Characters were but politically feigned and a sacred Title given to it without their Authority All this coming out with so solemn a License has made me take some pains to be rightly informed in this matter Those whom consulted tell me they have discoursed the Pensioner himself on this Subject who will very shortly take a sure method to clear himself of those imputations and to do that Right to the Prince and Princess as to shew the World That in this matter he acted only by their â—… For as Mr. Steward's Letter drew the Pensioner's Answer from him so this Paper Licensed as it is will now draw from him a particular recital of the whole progress of the matter Mr. Alloville knows that the Princess explained her self so sully to him in the Month of May and June 1687. upon the Repeal of the Test that he himself has Acknowleged to several Persons That though both the Prince and Princess were very stiff in that matter yet of the two â—… found the Princess more inflexible Afterwards when Mr. Steward by many repeated Letters pressed his Friend to renew his importunities to the Pensioner for an Answer he having also said in his Letters that he writ by the King's Order and Direction Upon this the Pensioner having consulted the Prince and Princess drew his Letter first in Dutch and communicated it to them and it being approved by them he turned it into Latin but because it was to be shewed to the King he thought it was fit to get it put into English that so their Highnesses might see the Translation of that Letter which was to be offered to his Majesty and they having approved of it sent it with his own in Latin and it was delivered to the King. This Account was given me by my Friend who added That it would appear ere long in a more Authentical manner And by this I suppose the impudence of those men does sufficiently appear who have the Brow to publish â—… stuff of the Falshood of which they themselves are well assured and therefore I may well conclude that my Lord President 's License was Granted by him with that Carelesness with which most Books are Read and Licensed Our Author pretends that he cannot Believe that his Letter could flow from a Princess of so sweet a temper pag. 62. and yet others find so much of the sweetness of her temper in it â—… for that very reason they believe it the more easily to have come from her No Passion nor indiscreet Zeal appears in it and it expresses such an extended Charity and Nobleness of Temper that those Characters shew it comes from one that has neither a narrowness of Soul for a sowerness of Spirit In short She proposes nothing in it but to preserve that Religion â—… Believes the true one and that being â—… she is willing that all others Enjoy all the Liberties of Subjects and the Freedom of Christians Here is Sweetness of Temper and Christian Charity in their fullest Extent The other Reason is so mysteriously expressed that I will not wrong our Author by putting it in any other words but his own pag. 62. She is â—… as little pleas'd to promote any thing to the disturbance of a State to which she still seems so â—… related She seems still are two significant â—… and not set here for nothing She â—… in his Opinion only related to the â—… that is she is not really so But â—… is something that these Gentlemen have in reserve to blow up the seeming Relation and she seems still imports that though this seeming relation is suffered to pass at present yet it must have its period for this Seems still can have no other meaning But in what does she promote the disturbance of the State or Patronize the Opposers of her Parents as he says afterwards ibid. Did she ossiciously interpose in this matter Or was not her Sense asked And when it was Asked must she not give it according to her Conscience She is too perfect a Pattern in all other things Not to know well how great a Respect and Submission she ows her Father But she is too good a Christian not to know that her Duty to God must go first And therefore in matter of Religion when her mind was asked she could not avoid the giving it according to her Conscience And all the invidious Expressions which he fastens on this Letter and which he makes so many Arguments to shew that it could not flow from her are all the Malicious and soon discovered Artifices of one that knew That she had ordered the Letter and that thought himself safe in this Disguise in the discharging of his Malice against her So ingratefully is she required by a party for whom she had expressed so much Compassion and Charity This Author page 53. thinks it an indiscreet forecast to be always Erecting such Horoscopes for the next Heir both in Discourse and Writing as seem almost to Calculate the Nativity of the present and he would almost make this High-Treason But if it is so there were many Traytors in England a few Years ago in which the Next Heir though but a Brother was so much considered That the King himself lookt as one out of countenance and
be overstrained And yet it is such a Complement as they need not For we see they are qualified by the Dispensing Power without the Repeal of the Test which hath made me often wonder why they are so zealous to have it repealed Do they still question the Kings Dispensing Power And desire some better security Let them say so then and give up that point and then we 'll talk with them about repealing the Test but there is no need of repealing this Law since the King it seems hath power to dispense with it in his Reign and they are very sanguine men if they hope to have any occasion for it in another And if after all their boasts of a Dispensing Power the Law still keeps them in awe can it be the interest of Protestants to take off these restraints Are they not insolent enough already while these threatning Laws hang over their heads Or do we hope that their modesty and good Nature will increase with their Power For my part I desire that all men whom I fear may lie under a legal incapacity for though their Force and Power may be the same yet there is some difference in point of Authority and Self-defence II. There are many things which would make a wise man suspect that there is some farther Design than Liberty of Conscience in all this zeal for repealing the Penal Laws and Test. For it would be very surprising to find a Roman Catholick Prince whose Conscience is directed by a Jesuit to be really zealous for Liberty of Conscience to see so many Popish Pens imploy'd in pleading for Liberty of Conscience and declaiming against Sanguinary Laws when all the World knows what Opinion the Church of Rome has about Liberty of Conscience what great friends the Jesuits are to it how they abhor persecuting men for their Religion witness the mild and gentle usage of the French Protestants by a King whose Conscience is directed by a tender-hearted Jesuit And if a Princes zeal for his Religion be much greater than for Liberty of Conscience it would make one suspect that his chief design is to serve his Religion by it and this is no new invention but as old as the days of the Apostate Julian when the same method was taken to reinforce Paganism by Liberty of Conscience This was the last effort of dying Paganism may it be so of Popery too We know there was no talk of Liberty of Conscience till the Nobility and Gentry of the Church of England refused to take off the Test and then there was no other way left but to buy off the Penal Laws and Test with Liberty of Conscience which demonstrates that Liberty of Conscience is not the last End but only a Means in order to some further End and the Means is seldom valued when the End is obtained Men who can offer so much violence to their own Nature and the Principles of their Religion as to grant Liberty of Conscience which of all things they hate to procure a Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws when that is done can easily find some occasion to pretend a forfeiture of this Liberty and to salve their Conscience and Honour together Penal Laws to keep men from damning themselves will be thought more merciful than Liberty of Conscience and the softness and tenderness of Nature must give place to a Bigottry in Religion and then we shall in vain wish for our old Penal Laws and Test again when we feel the more terrible smart of new ones Though it be told us that it hath always been his Majesties Persuasion that Conscience ought not to be forced I think that is no security because though this has always been his Principle yet it hath not always operated We know whose hand was most concern'd both in making and executing Penal Laws in the last Reign and if our Dissenters suffer'd so much then as they now complain of they know what they may suffer again notwithstanding these Principles for Liberty of Conscience for the same Principles obtain'd then as do now Upon the last withdrawing into Scotland notwithstanding those Principles the poor Scotch felt the severity of those Penal Laws with a witness and methinks it is not safe trusiing to such Principles as so often act by way of Antiparistasis and produce Effects quite contrary to their own Natures and however the Church of Rome may indulge such Principles now they are convenient to serve a present turn if the Scene ever alter this private Conscience will be thought as great Heresie as a private Judgment and whosoever now may own it must then be guided by the publick Conscience of the Church as well as by their Faith. There are so many surprising Circumstances in this whole matter as cannot but amaze a thinking Man that so fierce a Zeal should be now kindled for a Liberty of Conscience that a Liberty of Judgment will not be allowed but who ever will not concur in this Opinion must undergo the high displeasure whereas there can be no Liberty of Conscience without Liberty of Judgment And to be mortally angry with every man who is not of my Opinion is no good Preface to granting every Man a Liberty to think and act as he pleases If a Potentate should be so Zealous for Liberty of Conscience as to change all his old Antipathies and Friendships to receive his profess'd Enemies and Rebels into his bosom and cast off his tryed and Experienced Friends that he should forget all injuries and all kindnesses together this would be such an effect of a great passion for Liberty of Conscience as was never known before and when Causes do not work naturally we suspect some preternatural ingredients mixed with them That a Zeal against the Test and Penal Laws should be made a Test to the whole Nation and that not without severe Penalties too viz. The forfeiture of our Princes favour of all Places of Trust and Honour and incapacity to serve in Parliaments if they can prevent it or to be Members of any little Corporation That for the sake of Liberty of Conscience the whole Clergy must be forced to publish the Declaration though they declare it to be against their Consciences That the Archbishop and six of his Suffragans must be sent to the Tower for Petitioning for their own Liberty of Conscience and whither they must have gone next God knows unless they had been rescu'd by an Honest Jury That all those who did not read the Declaration are still threatned with Suspensions and Deprivatious Archdeacons and Chancellors commanded to turn Informers though almost all of them must inform against themselves for not reading or not sending the Declaration and all this while the Laws are on their side It is like to be a very terrible Liberty of Conscience when it is grown up into the Maturity and strength of a Law which like another Hercules can strangle all Laws and Liberties in its Cradle These things make me