have to make to these Gentlemen and it is By what branch of their Oath of Allegiance they are impower'd to make Conditions with the King and which of the Laws is it that gives the Subjects such an Authority over the King as to offer them They are absolutely against recalling or receiving the late King back without Conditions If so then I will suppose that equitable Conditions were offered the late King and I can suppose very easily that He will not be so obliged but requires to be admitted into the Possession of his Crown without any other Terms than the Oath He took at his Coronation and the Promises He then made of defending our Church and governing us by Law. In this case upon their own grounds these Gentlemen must resolve to resist his resuming his Government and must never admit him if he will never condescend to Conditions and then I would know of them what is become of the whole Oath of Allegiance or the Obligation their Consciences were formerly under by it This Matter is too plain to need more words But suppose Conditions for his return were offered by the Nation and accepted by Him and that as soon as He was secure of his Throne He forgot them all as much as He did his First Promise at Council-Board and his Coronation-Oath what must be done in this State when the Nation will be in ten times worse condition than it was this time twelvemonth when his Dispensing power and arbitrary Government were at the height No Man can suppose Conditions of any worth that have no security in them and the least they can have in this case must be that if the King breaks them then He forfeits the Benefit of them to wit his Restitution to his Government and we as well as He should immediately be in the very condition we were in upon his leaving or losing the Government That such would be our condition inevitably is the easiest thing in the world to prove For 1st No Conditions made for the securing Property to the Subject and the Protestant Religion to the Nation can signifie any thing to Him who is governed wholly in all his affairs by French Counsels and by the Iesuits who are not truer Enemies to our Reformed Religion than French Counsels to the Liberty and Property of Subjects But 2dly His Religion is wholly inconsistent with our safety either in our Properties or in our Religion and this we have had experience enough of one would think already too much to make us fond of trying the Experiment over again Let it but be considered that by his Religion and by such Power He is obliged upon pain of forfeiting his Kingdoms to extirpate Hereticks to dâ—stroy every Protestant in England and that by the Conditions made He will be at least obliged to secure the Nations in their Protestant Religion and in their properties and then I would ask such a Person what the best and the safest Conditions can avail in these circumstances If an Obligation to destroy us and an Obligation to preserve us be inconsistent and no Man in the World can perform both I think the talk about Conditions ought to be at an end since there is no way to bring these contradictions to agree The Wisest Part my Lord of those who are dissatisfied do very easily see into the Vanity and Inconsistency of this Project about Conditions and grant that they would be useless And therefore since Conditions are vain and that the late King was unfit for Government They were for having a Regency set up during the late King's life He retaining only the Title of King and this they thought would sake their Oaths to Him and their Consciences But this cannot do the business since it is plain that such a Regency would have been as much against the Oath of Allegiance as the present Seâ—â—lement and a submitting to That would have been as direct a Violation of the Oath of Allegiance as they suppose a submission to the present Settlement is To prove this then By a Regency the King would have been divested of all Power which the Regent must have been entrusted with of the Revenue too which must be an next to the Power wherever that is lodg'd because by it the Regent must have been supported in the Exercise of his Power He would have had no Command nor Authority left him nothing but the bare Title of King and to have all business run in his Name though he have nothing to do with it Now is not this as directly against the Oath of Allegiance as a thing can be By Oath as long as it obliges every one is bound to preserve to the King and main ain nis Crown and Dignity By a Regency the King is divested of all his Power and Authority of making Laws of having the Militia in his hands and of the Administration of the Government which are chief if not only branches of Royalty of his Crown and Dignity And yet these Gentlemen think that a Regency and their Oaths of Allegiance to the late King are consistent whereas by a Regency he is deprived of every thing but his bare Title and by their Oaths of Allegiance they are bound to preserve to Him every thing else as well as his Title I can see no more opposition in the present Settlement to the Oath of Allegiance than would have been in their Regency since the Kingly Power of K. Iames is equally destroy'd by both and Oaths do concern Matters of Substance and not meer Shadows such as the bare Title of a King is where there is not the least jot of power left So that there is not any considerable difference betwixt the present Settlement and their Regency upon the Oaths account and I wonder that so much ado should be made and so much insisting upon Leaving to the late King the bare Title of a King whereas a Title is a thing of no worth and if the Laws of St. Edward the Confessor might but he heard this Controversie about the meer Title would have fallen since by them a King by misgovernment verum nomen Regis perdit forfeits the Title of King as well as the Power But I will suppose further that this Project of a Regency had taken and that a Regent had been chosen for the late King's Life I must now ask what they would done with the King himself either They must have had him kept in safe custody or let him as he did escape away If they would have had him secured I would fain know whether it had been consistent with that Oath of Allegiance which they took to King Iames and think themselves obliged still by But if He was to be let go whether He would and should have got back into England with the same assistance by which He is now got into Ireland I ask them whether they should not look upon themselves as obliged to defend that Regency which was set up for the absolute Good of the Nation and to which they had sworn Allegiance and whether this would not have obliged Them to oppose King Iames who was come to break the Regency and tho' all had judg'd him and knew him unfit for Government was yet for regaining it by force Either They must notwithstanding his Vnfitness for our Government have quietly submitted because of their former Oath of Allegiance to Him or they must in defence of the Regency have fought against the late King himself notwithstanding that former Oath to Him. My Lord if those dissatisfied Gentlemen who were for the Regency will but reflect upon what I have been able to say about it I do not fear their being any longer of opinion that a Regency was the only way could settle the Nation in safety and secure mens Consciences in peace and I hope They will for the future not be so sharp and severe against the present Settlement as contrary to our Oaths of Allegiance since I have shewn that their own Regency is every jot as much I humbly beg of them that they would examine things impartially and lay by all prejudices upon other accounts and then I am confident that they which did desire and contend for a Regency notwithstanding their late Oaths of Allegiance will see reason to submit to the present Settlement under their Majesties notwithstanding those very Oaths which I am sure are no more against the present Settlement than against their Regency I am afraid I have tired your Lordship and must beg pardon for this tedious Letter which tho' it should be so unhappy as to do no service to any of those persons for whom it was design'd yet will do my self a great one in being a witness for me how ready I am to obey your Lordship's Commands and in giving me this further opportunity of assuring your Lordship how much I am My Lord Your Lordships most Obedient and most Humble Servant
because He was resolved to come back to destroy our Religion and to be reveng'd of the Nation My Lord I think such an Animus revertendi to be so far from making the Dereliction lame and void that is is as good a Proof of making the late King's Action a compleat Dreliction as if He had left it attested under his Hand and Great Seal that He would never return to us or this Government more For my own part I am perswaded that the late King withdrew himself voluntarily and by the Advice of popish Counsels out of this Kingdom I am perswaded that He went off with an Animus revertendi and I am as fully perswaded that the Inâ—ention of his returning was to ruine our â—roperties and Laws and to destroy our Reformed Religion or to put it into the Popish Dialect to have his Ends of us From the first of these to wit his withdrawing voluntarily I am satisfind that the late King James's Government and our Allegiance to Him are fâ—llen and the last of them the Intention of his Return will I hope satisfie all others as much as it has done me that we have no tempting reasons either to wait for the lat King's Return or to accept of his Government if He should get back I must now my Lord go on to another Consideration for there are some who are little satisfied notwithstanding all the Evidence that can be offered about the King 's voluntary withdrawing himself as they were at his misgovernment being urged as the destruction of his Royal Dignity And tho' these Gentlemen have not agreed with me thitherro yet in this last Consideration they must concur with me and that is That the late King was conquered by the Prince of Orange and driven away involuntarily at least So that if by this Conquest He was was put out of the condition of Governing and Protecting us we were as much depriv'd of the liberty of paying Obedience to him who was now driven from us The Business to be examin'd here is What sort of a Conquest this was and whether it was a just one such a one as by reason of which the People of England might lawfully submit to the Conquerour of their King To begin with the Expedition of his then Highness the Prince of Orange there appears to be all the Reasons in it that could justifie such an Invasion or make a Conquest just and good The Prince was no Subject of England but a Sovereign Prince who made this Descent into our Nation against our late King in defence of his own Rights as well as of ours and therefore his Action could upon no account be still'd a Rebellion But the Cause of his Expedition is above all other things to be enquired after for that must be the chief thing that can justifie the Revolution here and ought to be highly reasonable and such as can give satisfaction to all wise and indifferent Men since tho' the Prince of Orange were never so much a Sovereign Prince yet if he had not a very justifiable Reason of coming hither with an Army his Expedition had been altogether a most unaccountable Action and his Conquest unjust Now to give all the satisfaction requisite to this justest Scruple the Princes Reasons for coming hither in that manner appear to be as just and as good as his Success was great and if ever one Prince's Invasion of another Prince's Kingdom were to be justified the Prince of Orange's was For to instance in one or two of these Reasons He himself as well as his Princess had most undoubted Right to the Succession of the Crown of England and the Dominions belonging to it after the death of the late King James This Right was notoriously set aside or made wholly useless to Them by the Arts and Counsels of those Papists who were about the King and did influence him The Imposture of a pretended Prince of Wales was thought of and pitcht upon as the most effectual Bar to either of Their Titles and did set Them as well as Her Royal Highness the Princess Ann of Denmark aside and deprive All Three together of their Rights of Succession and provide effectually against a Protestant Successor the only Person the People then in Power at Court were afraid of But to wave the Instance of the setting up a pretended Prince of Wales betwixt these Protestant Princes and their Right of succession because the Proof of that Imposture has not been laid open as it might have been to the World and therefore cannot so strictly be insisted upon tho' most people even those who are dissatisfied about the present Settlement are satisfied of the Imposture the Right of Succession which was in the Two Royal Princesses and the Prince of Orange was made wholly useless to Them by the late King 's putting the Government of part of the Dominions of the Crown of England into such hands as would not deliver them up or submit to any Protestant Successor Ireland is an evident proof of this where all Offices Civil and Military contrary to the Laws of the Land were put into Popish Hands and such a biggoted Irish Papist was made their Governour as that whatever Rogueries or violences the Papists should be guilty of towards the British Protestants among them they should never need to fear being call'd to account being certain that his own management of the Government as well as his Religion would keep him from ever delivering up Ireland to any Protestant while He had the Sword in his hands and such a throughly Popish Army at his Command Now in this case when Ireland was wholly given up into such hands and Scotland was almost in the same condition and England ready to be put into the same it was high time for the Prince of Orange to assert his own and his Princesses Right and it was most reasonable for Him by all justifiable Ways and Means to prevent their being debarr'd their Right of Inheritance of these Kingdoms by bringing the late King to reasonable Terms or by depriving Him of the power of doing Them or their Right any further Mischief herein This therefore together with the Prince's Concern for our Religion and our Laws which were violated in so high a degree by the late King and with which His own Right of Succession was interwoven was a most just Reason for the prince of Oranges coming with an armed Force and if the King would rather put things to the hazard of Battels than the decision of a free and legal parliament no body else could help it and if his Army would neither fight for nor stand by him but suffer Him to be driven out of his Dominions it was because He had taken sufficient care to let all of them as well as the rest of the Nation know how very unjust the War would be on his part and how very unreasonable it would be for them who were the greatest part of them protestants to assist
it and thereby ceased to be King and if once He ceased to be such no body will deny that the Obligation of all Oaths to Him as King did expire at the same time But since my Lord we have commonly receiv'd a very transcendent Notion of our Monarchy which will not allow the Destructive Practices I have now mentioned nor worse than these to make a forfeiture of the Kingly Power here or to be the Subversion of our Monarchs Rights whatever they be of the Peoples I shall were the insisting further upon this Head. Let it then be supposed for that Opinion's sake that the King does not destroy his own Right or the Exercise of his Royal Authority tho' He does destroy our Constitution by ruling directly against the Law and making Laws by his own Power The next Enquiry is Whether a King can lay down his Government and divest himself of all Authority and whether King James did not voluntarily leave his Government by withdrawing himself out of the Kingdom and making no provision for the Publick No body will dispute with me thtt a King cannot lay down his Government The Case of the Emperour Charles the fifth and which comes nearer our own concern that of the Queen Christiana of Sweden are Instances of it beyond opposition And I think it would be as little disputed that the late King James did by a voluntary withdrawing himself out of the Kingdom recede as fully from his Government if these few things were fairly consider'd First That he was at that time of withdrawing himself actually upon a Treaty with the Prince of Orange and had Three Lords Commissioners with Him who the very night He withdrew that He himself could not but give this Just Character of the Prince's Proposals as to say of them That they were fairer than he could or did expect so that the King had no reason then to be afraid of his Person but might have continued with security in his Palace and taken care of the Government and called such a Parliament as both Himself and the Prince desired which might have quietly and effectually settled this Nation and prevented all ill consequences to his Person or to his Affairs Secondly That it was the Design of the Popish Party to perswade him to withdraw himself their End in it being to put us thereby into Confusion This they did not boggle to speak out the Lord Dover and Mr. Brent made no secret of it but said it more than once that the King would withdraw himself out of the Kingdom above a Fourtnight before He did it Nor were these Two the only Persons in this Secret and of this Opinion In the Letter that was sent down to the King while He was at Salisbury with his Army and can be produced He was told that it was the Unanimous Advice of all the Catholicks here at London that he should come back from thence and withdraw Himself out of the Kingdom and leave us in Confusion assuring Him that within Two Years or less we should be in such Confusions that He might return and have his Ends of us as their phrase was Now if the King was pleas'd to take such desperate Counsellors Advice and thereupon to withdraw Himself out of the Kingdom and command his Army to be let loose upon the People by disbanding them at such a Juncture I can see nothing herein to make his going away involuntary If then his withdrawing Himself out of the Kingdom was done out of design and willingly He did as effectually divest Himself pro tempore of the Government as if He had left a formal Resignation of the Kingdom behind him attested by all his Privy-Counsellors hands and our Allegiance to him did fall with it and our Oaths did no more oblige now than the Oaths taken to Christina Queen of Sweden did when she resign'd and went to Rome since in both Cases the Government of these Two Princes was equally at an end but our condition the worse of the two since Queen Christina left the Government to her Kinsman but our King left us to the Rabble and his disbanded Army There is one Objection my Lord which I have often heard made against this that tho' the late King out of a groundess fear or for any other reason or design whatsoever did voluntarily withdraw himself ou of the Kingdom yet this ought not to be accounted a compleat Cession or Dereliction of the Government unless it could be proved withal that there was not Animus revertendi that he never intended to return to us more But this Objection is of no weight in the Case of a Kingdom For whether the King intended to return back any more or no signifies nothing herein since the withdrawing Himself and making no manner of Provision for the Government and Safety of the Nation did actually put an end to his Government at least for that time and our Constitution can no more than any other Government in the World be left in such a condition or can be said to subsist in such a Case and it is against all the sense and reason of Mankind to think that any Nation either will or ought to continue without a settlement till the Governour who hath left it unawares and in confusion will be pleased to think of returning Does any one believe that if the late King when He withdrew intended not to return these ten Years that we of this Nation should have continued in the Anarchy He left us and have no Government till He would come back Among all our Discontents I hope none can be found so weak to imagine this and the same reason I am sure holds as fully against his leaving us one Month as ten Years So that whether the late King intended to return or no when He went away He ceased to govern us and the very same moment He was pleas'd to leave off governing by withdrawing himself He cancell'd the Obligation of all Oaths and Allegiance to Him as King. But beyond all this I can grant my Lord that the late King from the very time of his withdrawing nay from the very minute of resolving to do it had Animum revertendi did intend to return to us I do believe that those Papists which advised him to withdraw did design that He should return and that He himself did concur in both resolutions But what was He to return for Was it not to have his Ends of us What those Ends are I suppose no Protestant needs be told none of those who make this Objection can doubt of it since his late coming to Ireland Should we have waited then till the late King could return with his borrowed Forces from France to destroy our Protestant establisht Religion and our Civil Constitution because He had Animum revertendi and therefore not have setled and provided for the Nations safety Was the King's Government not at an end tho' He had withdrawn himself from us and left no Provision
Jehoahaz who was carried by Pharaoh Nechoh into Egypt and was to die there After the Deposition of Shallum Pharaoh Nechoh who was his Conqueror made Eliakim King whom he called by the name of Jehoiakim tho' he was but the second brother and no notice is taken of the eldest Brother Johanan who if he was then living was certainly the true Heir to that Crown This Jehoiakim reign'd eleven years 2 Kings 23.36 in the third whereof he was conquer'd by Nebuchadnezzar King of Babel Dan. 1.1 Who afterward took him away and set up his Son Jehoiachin or Jeconia or Conia in his stead But he continued on the Throne but three Months for Nebuchadnezzar came again and besieged Jerusalem to whom Jehojachin surrendred himself and was by him carried into captivity Then Nebuchadnezzar made his Uncle Zedekiah king who was the third of those four Brothers 1 Chron. 3.16 and he reigned near eleven years as King of Judah while the eldest Brother Johanan was living and the second Brother perhaps Jehoiachim in the Babylonian's hands without all doubt if Jehoiachim was dead his Son Jehojachin the right Heir and the true King was living for we find him releas'd out of prison after 37 Years 2 Kings 25 27. during all which time we never find God complaining of the peoples submitting and paying Allegiance to this King Zedekiah that was set up by Nebuchadnezzar but we meet with Jeremiah's Lamentation taken up for this very King whom he calls The Breath of our Nostrils the Anointed of the Lord. Lamentations 4.20 tho' he was made King while the true King and Heir of that Crown was alive Here we have a Subject made King and set up against the true King by the Conquerour whose power herein God did so far approve as to call Zedekiah's defection from his Fealty to Nebuchadnezzar 2 Chron. 36.13 whose power over Judah was no more than what a Conquest and an unjust one too did â—ive a Rebellion and to give him and all that belonged to him up to Destruction and Captivity for it Whoever will reflect upon these Examples will see how far the people were from being condemned or discouraged from transferring their Allegiance to these four Kings the first of which Iehoahaz was set up by â—he People against the Right Line and before his Three Elder Breâ—hren the second Jehojakim was by a Conqueror made King before his Elder Brother Johanan the third Jehoiachin was set up against his own Father and the fourth was of a Subject made a King while the true King and Rightful Heir was still in beeing There is another thing very observable here and that is about the Oaths taken to Kings who were such meerly by Conquest It was the manner of the Subjects of Israel and Judah to take Oaths of Obedience to their Kingâ— as one may very justly collect from that passage in Ecclefiastes 8.2 Where the Preacher advises to keep the King's Commandment and that in regard of the Oath of God that is of the Oath of Obedience which the Subject had taken to â—he King. Now this Oath was sworn not only to King 's of God's own appointment or to their Hereditary Successors but to those who had no other Title or Right than that of Conquest when such Conquerous requir'd it of them tho' their own Princes were still living Thus Nebuchadnezzar made Zedekiah wear by God 2 Chron. 36.13 with Ezekiel 7.13 to be faithful to him while his own Prince Jehojachin was yet alive and Zedekiah took Authority from Nebuchadnezzar to reign as King under him which he continued to do according to his Oath for some Years but afterwards rebell'd against the Conquerour This Oath God did approve as lawful and calls it Mine Oath Ezeck 17.19 and held himself obliged to punish the breach of it as he should have done if Zedekiah had taken it to Jehojachin himself and had broke it as he did the Oath in this case This is plain from Ezek. 17.15 16 18 19. And for those Kings in the New Testament to whom Allegiance is so strictly commanded to be paid it is most evident that Augustus and those after him were direct Vsurpers upon the People and Senate of Rome having gained the Supreme Power into their hands by Craft and Arts and chiefly by the assistance of the Soldiery whose Right to dispose of the Supreme Power over the People and Subjects of Rome I cannot hear that any man does maintain and this was more particularly plain in the Advancement of Nero to the Throne by the Soldiery whom his Mother Agrippina had tampered with against Britannicus the last Emperour's Son and yet this is the very Emperour to whom St. Paul teacheth Obedience under pain of damnation Rom. 13.1 2. for whom he exhorts the Christians to put up Prayers and Supplications that under him who had no better Right to that Government than what I have just mentioned they might lead quiet and peaceable Lives in all godliness and honesty 1 Tim. 2 1 2. Whoever my Lord will compare our present Case in England with the Instances I have produc'd out of Scripture cannot deny me that Scripture does allow the transferring of Allegiance in the Case of Conquest from one Prince to another some of the Instances do reach further which shew the Command for and the Practice of Obedience to those who had meerly the Possession of the Government but no manner of Right or Title to it And now my Lord I have dispatch'd the Consideration of all your Lordship's Commands and of all I have been able to say in so narrow a Compass and amidst so many other necessary Avocations upon this Subject and yet I cannot conclude without examining a little their Reasons and their Intentions who are so little satisfied with ours or with the present Settlement If the present Settlement of this Nation under their Majesties does not give them satisfaction and is such as they cannot with a Conscience submit to it must be because they have sworn Allegiance to Another Person to whom they believe it to be still due because He is still alive If they find themselves under such an Obligation then their Endeavours or at least their Wishes ought to be that the late King might be recalled to his Government or that if He be unfit for Government a Regency might be seâ—led by the Consent of the Nation in Parliament He still retaining the Title of King. These Methods are the only ones that either themselves or any one for them thinks can salve their Allegiance But examin them singly and see whether they can If the late King should be recalled either it must be upon Terms and Conditions or it must be without them To recal Him to his Government without Conditions I never yet met nor heard of one Protestant that was for it but they all cry out upon Terms or not at all upon Conditions or we are all ruin'd in our Properties and ruin our Religion One Question then I