in Preparation and bringing to Perfection it is our Resolution and we do Declare that in Defence of your Majesties Person and the Protestant Religion we will Stand by your Majesty with our Lives and Fortunes and shall be ready to Revenge any Violence Offered by them to your Sacred Majesty It is to be noted that the Vote was Soften'd in this Address For as it was Worded at first Whoever had Kill'd the King the Papists should have Gone to Pot for 't which Hint did as good as say Get but over This Iobb my Masters and y 'ave done your Bus'ness But the Conspirators found a way however to Supply That Restrictive Distinction by Murdering him Themselves and giving it out that the Papists had done it according to the Evidence of the Republican Conspiracy which says it was so Determin'd if the Rye House Project had Succeeded The Conspirators were to go to several Persons and Ask them Supposing that the Papists should Rise or that there should be a General Insurrection or a French Invasion Are you in a Posture of Defence This was the very Practice and the Imposture in the Case of the Militia the Double-Guards and the Rout they made among the Papists But Keeling a little Lower in the same Tryal puts it into somewhat Plainer English. These Men says he where to be in a readiness and it was Design'd that the Thing should be laid upon the Papists as a Branch of the Popish-Plot Which may serve for an Excellent Commenâ— upon the Present Text. Upon the 15th of Dec. 1680. There was no way with 'em but immediately to Banish All the Considerable Papists in England out of the Kings Dominions And it is to be Suppos'd that they would not have Forgotten his Royal Highness in the Number Especially Considering how Mindfull they were of him in Other Cases Insomuch that there was hardly any thing done by the Conspirators that had Worm'd themselves into the House but for Countenance-sake and to While away Time that had not the Ruine of the Duke and consequently of his Royal Brother in the Bottom of it and they were so Eager upon 't that all they could do without it was to no purpose Resolved Nemine Contradicente that so long as the Papists have any Hopes of the Duke of Yorks Succeeding the King in the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and the Dominions thereunto Belonging The Kings Person the Protestant Religion and the Lives Liberties and Properties of all his Majesties Protestant Subjects are in Apparent Danger of being Destroy'd And then follows Another Resolve upon the Necessity of such a Bill Excluding and Proroguing Two Great Points THE Refusal of This Bill and the Last Refuge that the King had left him of Proroguing Parliaments were Two Terrible Rubbs in their way For with the Help of the One they could have done the Bus'ness of the Roman Catholiques at pleasure and made as many Reputed and Suspected Papists of the Rest of his Majesties Subjects as they found Averse to the Popular Design And Then under the Countenance of a Sitting Parliament they had a Thousand Tricks and Devices by their Printed Votes Papers and Intelligences to make their Principals Fall down and Worship them as the Bulwark of the Protestant Religion the Heroes and Patriots of the Common Cause and the Saviours of the Nation But the Cunning Snapps of the Faction finding that the King would not let go his Power of Calling them and sending 'em away again as he pleas'd and that Prorogations and Dissolutions were but as Sentence and Execution to them They had the Wit to make a Provision of Parliamentary Guards for the Oxford Meeting under Colour of Securing the Protestant Members from having their Throats Cut there by the Papists And it is more then Probable that if his Majesty had not very prudently taken Two Steps at a Time and Dissolv'd them upon the very Spot and Instant without the Antecedent Ceremony of Proroguing them they would have found under the Colour of a House of Commons yet in Being Another Game to Play. There had been a Heavy Cry made upon all their Former Disappointments in Pamphlets Papers Discourses Addresses upon Surprizing Prorogations Popish and Amazing Prorogations c. which humour they did Notably set forth in an Address to his Majesty of No. 11. 1680. IN relation to the Tryalls of the Five Lords Impeached in Parliament for the Execrable Popish Plot we have so far Proceeded as we doubt not but in a short time we shall be ready for the same But we Cannot without being Vnfaithfull to your Majesty and to our Country by whom we are Intrusted Omit upon This Occasion humbly to Enform your Majesty that our Difficulties even as to these Tryalls are much Increased by the Evil and Destructive Councels of those Persons who Advised your Majesty first to the Prorogation and then to the Dissolution of the Last Parliament at a time when the Commons had taken great pains about and were Prepar'd for those Tryalls And by the like Pernicious Councells of those who Advised the Many and Long Prorogations of the Present Parliament before the same was permitted to Sit whereby some of the Evidence which was prepared in the Last Parliament may possibly during so long an Interval be Forgotten or Lost and some Persons who might probably have Come-in as Witnesses are either Dead have been Taken-off or may have been Discourag'd from giving their Evidence But of One Mischievous Consequence of those Dangerous and Unhappy Councells we are Certainly and Sadly Sensible Namely that the Testimony of a Material Witness against every of Those Five Lords and who could probably have Discover'd and brought-in much Other Evidence about the Plot in General and Those Lords in Particular cannot now be given Viva Voce forasmuch as That Witness is Unfortunately Dead between the Calling and the Sitting of this Parliament To prevent the Like or Greater Inconvenience for the Future we make it our most Humble Request to your Excellent Majesty that as you tender the Safety of your Royal Person The Security of your Loyal Subjects and Preservation of the True Protestant Religion you will not suffer your self to be prevail'd upon by the Like Councell to do any Thing which may Occasion in Consequence though we are Assured never with your Majesties Intention either the Deferring of a Full and Perfect Discovery and Examination of This most Wicked and Detestable Plot or the Preventing the Conspirators therein from being brought to speedy and Exemplary Justice and Punishment and we humbly beseech your Majesty to rest Assured Notwithstanding any Suggestions which may be made by Persons who for their Own Wicked Purposes Contrive to Create a Distrust in your Majesty of your People that Nothing is more in the Desires and shall be more the Endeavours of us your faithfull and Loyal Commons then the Promoting and Advancing of your Majesties True Happiness and Greatness NOW to Observe a little upon
This Lamentably-Complaining Address the Old Vein I perceive of Popery and Calamity Conspiracy and Destruction runs quite thorough it And what Misery soever has either Threatn'd or Befall'n the King the Government the Church or the People is All-Charg'd upon the score of This Almighty Plot as the First Cause and Mover of it And which was the spite on 't no Averting of Those Impending Miseries but by the Kings Parting with his Honour his Crown Natural Affection Humanity Gratitude In short His Ministers His Friends His Prerogative Reasâ—n and Iustice 'T is Urg'd that the Councels were Evil and Destructive that Mov'd his Majesty to a Prorogation and Then to a Dissolution of the Foregoing Parliament How could it be Evil and Destructive in the Advising and not so in the Doing too Or what matters it whether it be done Without Advice or With it so long as the Venom of This Address Wounds the King Equally under the Cover of his Ministers The Want of That Advice and Resolution in the Parliament of One and Forty Cost the Royal Father his Life and the Son Probably upon such a Concession would not have come-off much Cheaper Unless it shall be Imagin'd that he might have found Better Quarter in the House then in the Field from the very same Persons that were Now in Councell and Afterwards in Arms against him It is pretended that the Commons were ready for the Tryal of the Five Lords at the Dissolution of the Last Parliament Now This was only Bubbling the Multitude for the Commons Themselves would not Yield to 't unless the Earl of Danby might be Try'd First But to say All in a word The King was Vndone if he did Not Prorogue and the Republicans if he Did. As to the Possibility of more Witnesses Coming in it cannot be Deny'd that according to the way of Summons that was then in Fashion the Common Iayles nay Newgate it Self in the Case of Prance were Consulted for Evidence and they could not well fail of as many Witnesses as either Malice Faction Countenance or Reward could Prevail upon to Forswear themselves But a Material Evidence it seems was lost by 't Bedloe they mean. A Fellow known for a Blasphemous Atheistical Wretch A Thief a Cheat and in fine a Scandal to the very Alms-Basket What a Dismal VNFORTVNATE Loss was This now of so Material an Evidence in Good Time upon the Plot in General which Material Evidence in the True Intent of it is no Other then a Rogue that would Swear any thing But against the Five Lords they say in Particular And if there had been Five times Fifteen Hundred more of them he should have Sworn against 'em All at the Same Price I can hardly look back upon the Parting Complement without Thinking of the Addresses and Declarations of One and Forty for the making of Charles the First a Glorious King they are so Very Very Alike But so much for the Bus'ness of Prerogative And now for the Other Great Point the Matter of Exclusion let the Bill Speak for it self 'T is Long But it Carries the Heart in the Face on 't and 't is Pity but Posterity should have it Entire The Bill amended as the House had order'd was read Intituled An Act for securing of the Protestant Religion by disabling James Duke of York to Inherit the Imperial Crown of England and Ireland and the Dominions and Territories thereunto belonging WHEREAS James Duke of York is notoriously known to have been perverted from the Protestant to the Popish Religion whereby not only great Encouragement hath been given to the Popish Party to enter into and carry on most Devilish and Horrid Plots and Conspiracies for the Destruction of his Majesties Sacred Person and Government and for the Extirpation of the True Protestant Religion But also if the said Duke should succeed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm nothing is more manifest then that a Total Change of Religion within these Kingdoms would ensue For the prevention whereof Be it Enacted by the King 's most Excellent Majesty by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in present Parliament Assembled and by the Authority of the same that the said James Duke of York shall be and is by the Authority of this present Parliament Excluded and made for ever uncapable to Inherit Possess or Enjoy the Imperial Crown of this Realm and of the Kingdoms of Ireland and the Dominions and Territories to them or either of them belonging or to have exercise or enjoy any Dominion Power Iurisdiction or Authority in the same Kingdoms Dominions or any of them And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That if the said James Duke of York shall at any time hereafter Challenge Claim or attempt to possess or enjoy or shall take upon him to use or exercise any Dominion Power or Authority or Iurisdiction within the said Kingdoms or Dominions or any of them as King or chief Magistrate of the same That then he the said James Duke of York for every such offence shall be deemed and adjudged guilty of High Treason and shall suffer the Pains Penalties and Forfeitures as in case of High Treason And further that if any Person or Persons whatsoever shall assist or maintain abet or willingly adhere unto the said James Duke of York in such challenge claim or attempt or shall of themselves attempt or endeavour to put or bring the said James Duke of York into the Possession or Exercise of any Regal Power Iurisdiction or Authority within the Kingdoms and Dominions aforesaid or shall by Writing or Preaching advisedly publish maintain or declare That he hath any Right Title or Authority to the Office of King or Chief Magistrate of the Kingdoms and Dominions aforesaid That then every such Person shall be deemed and adjudged guilty of High Treason and that he suffer and undergo the pains penalties and forfeitures aforesaid And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid that he the said James Duke of York shall not at any time from and after the 5th of November 1680. return or come into or within any of the Kingdoms or Dominions aforesaid And then he the said James Duke of York shall be deemed and adjudged guilty of High Treason and shall suffer the pains penalties and forfeitures as in case of High Treason and further that if any Person or Persons whatsoever shall be aiding or assisting unto such return of the said James Duke of York that then every such person shall be deemed and adjudged guilty of High Treason and suffer as in cases of High Treason And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That he the said James Duke of York or any other Person being Guilty of any of the Treasons aforesaid shall not be capable of or receive benefit by any Pardon otherwise than by Act of Parliament wherein they shall be particularly named and that no Noli prosequi
their Sovereign like a Pupil and turn off his Ministers like so many Footmen because they are of OPINION that they give him This or That Advice and that such Advice is Pernicious If Matters be thus Manag'd what 's become of the Imperial State of This Government Here 's Opinion and the Opinion of Subjects too without Proof without Power without Prerogative and shortly without any Foundation Taking upon it self to give Laws to the Majesty of a Sole Governour and if they could have Carry'd That Point it would have been as good as a Title Gain'd in the Account of the Multitude to the Government of the Three Kingdoms For nothing less then the Exclusion would serve their Turn and the Confounding of all Those that were Against That Exclusion Nay and That it self would not have Done at Last neither as we shall see by and by So that once for all having the Modelling the Iudging and the Discriminating of the Friends and Enemies of the State Themselves and in their Own Right as they pretended what betwixt Associating on the One side and Seizing Banishing Disarming Imprisoning Opining Suspecting Reputing and the Sweet Comfortable Methods of Swearing Hanging and Quartering on the Other there would have been little more for the Conspirators to Do then to Kill and Take Possession and to lay Violent Hands upon the King under the Colour of a Rescue BUt Religion and Loyalty was still the Burden of the Song A Company of Rogues to Blunderbuss his Majesty Burn Protestant Cities and Massacre Poor Innocent People This was the Voyce that was Lifted up and the Outcry that Caused so much Weeping and Wailing among us While the Witnesses in the mean time were All-to-be Colonell'd Doctor'd Captain'd and Squir d for the Credit of the Story It was a most Remarkable and an Auspicious Resolution taken to set a-part Gods Day for Gods Cause as it was Blasphemously Christen'd when they Postpon'd the Consideration of the Lord Chancellors Speech of Apr. 30. 1679. Time after Time untill Sunday the 11th of May following which was so Arrant a Forty-One-Banter that I presently told my Friends without going to a Wizzard the very Dunstable Meaning of it and the Plot-Leaders were so kind to me in That as well as in Other of my Predictions that they made a Prophet of me But I shall have another Touch upon this Particular by and by Upon Nov. 8. 1678. They Resolv'd upon an Address to Desire his Majesty that there might be a Particular Prayer or Prayers Composed for the Cities of London and Westminster relating to the Plot and Conspiracy Contrived and Carry'd-on by the Papists against his Majesties Person and Government Upon Sunday the 10 th following they Complain'd That in the Prayer there was no mention made of the Papists who says the Vote are the Contrivers of These Damnable and Hellish Plots c. And they humbly Desire his Majesty to give Effectual Order c. After this and in the Next Parliament they had Another Tour of Passe-Passe of the Same Stamp with the Former which went a Great way toward the Moving of All Those Passions that might be Serviceable to the Project of That Season as will be better seen upon the Reading of that Address it self or which is all one of Another Address for a day of Humiliation on Nov. 25. 1680. in the Following Parliament which Address is within a very little of Word for Word with the Former We your Majesties most Dutifull c. being Deeply Sensible of the Sad and Calamitous Condition of This your Majesties Kingdom Occasioned Chiefly by the Impious and Malicious Conspiracies of a Popish Party who have not only Plotted and Intended the Destruction of your Majesties Royal Person but the Total Subversion of the Government and True Religion Established among us c. All which Our Many and Grievous Sins have Iustly Deserved and being now by your Gracious Favour Assembled in Parliament c. do in All Humility beseech your Majesty that by your Royal Proclamation one or More Days may be Solemnly set a-part wherein both our Selves and All your Majesties Loyal Subjects may by Fasting and Prayer Seek a Reconciliation with Allmighty God and with Humble and Penitent Hearts Implore him by his Power and Goodness to Infatuate and Defeat the Wicked Councils and Machinations of our Enemies c. HEre 's just the Style of the Old Blessed Times over again when Days of Humiliation were used to be set a-part for the Kings Success against the Rebells A Body would have thought by the Solemnity of the Wording of it that there had been Sword Pestilence and Famine Earthquakes and Fire and Brimstone in the Case Now Every Thing help'd to Move Terror Iealousie Mortal Animosities Indignation and Transports of Ardent and of Vindictive Zeal Even to the Degree of a Temptation to break through all the Barrs of Duty Shame Modesty Conscience and Respect Beside that upon the making of God Almighty a Party to the Quarrel Temporal Power Thrones and Magistrates are no better Accounted then Dirt under the Feet of Enthusiastique Bigotts To Conclude the Addresses for One Day of Humiliation should have put the Kingdom Methinks upon Petitioning for another for the Sin of the very Addresses At least if the Plot should in the End Prove False at the Bottom But after all this Dust and Scuffle now betwixt Petitioners and Ahorrers True-Protestants and Pensioners Whigg and Tory Observator and Trimmer there are several more Difficulties yet behind to be Enquir'd into It is a Thing Evident without Dispute that a Prince Cannot be more Affronted and Endanger'd then by Pinching him in his Revenue Paring and Cramping his Royal Prerogative and Power Lessening him in his Reputation and putting him out of Condition of Receiving the Servicâ—s of his Dutifull Friends and Those Friends out of Condition to Support and to Maintain the Honour and Dignity of their Master Now all this has been Attempted and Pursued with the Vttermost Industry and Bitterness Imaginable But here was a Dev'lish Plot it seems and for That Dev'lish Plots Sake the Heir of the Crown must be Disinherited and the Roman Catholiques in a manner Exterminated from off the face of the Earth and no other way in the World to Save our Prince and our Religion as the Infallible Oracle of St. Stephens Chappel gives us to Vnderstand but by a Fair Riddance of all the Kings English Subjects of That Persuasion which by Pursuivanting Messengering Sergeanting Cooping-up Squeezing Rifling Plundering and Oppressing they had well-nigh Effected already Only the Late King stuck at the Exclusion of the Duke But however the Faction had such an Offer made them by the way of a kind of Composition for the Exclusion as would certainly have put them into the Possession of Their Own Wishes If they had not been most Providentially Infatuated into the Neglect or Refusal of it to the Preservation of the Crown the Duke the Royal Line and the
Designs have so far prevailed that he hath created many and great Dependents upon him by his bestowing Offices and Preferments both in Church and State. 3. It appearing also to us That by his Influence Mercenary Forces have been levied and kept on Foot for his secret Designs contrary to our Laws the Officers thereof having been named and appointed by him to the apparent hazzard of his Majesties Person our Religion and Government if the danger had not been timely foreseen by several Parliaments and part of those Forces with great difficulty caused by them to be Disbanded at the Kingdoms great Expence And it being Evident that notwithstanding all the continual endeavours of the Parliament to deliver his Majesty from the Councils and out of the Power of the said D. yet his Interest in the Ministry of State and others hath been so prevalent That Parliaments have been unreasonably Prorogued and Dissolved when they have been in hot pursuit of the Popish Conspiracies and ill Ministers of State their Assistants 4. And that the said D. in order to reduce all into his own Power hath procured the Garisons the Army and Ammunition and all the Powet of the Seas and Souldiery and Lands belonging to these Three Kingdoms to be put into the hands of his Party and their Adherents even in opposition to the Advice and Order of the last Parliament 5. And as we considering with Heavy Hearts how greatly the Strength Reputation and Treasure of the Kingdom both at Sea and Land is Wasted and Consumed and lost by the intricate expensive management of these Wicked destructive Designs and finding the same Councils after exemplary Iustice upon some of the Conspirators to be still pursued with the utmost devilish malice and desire of Revenge whereby his Majesty is in continual hazzard of being Murdered to make way for the said D's Advancement to the Crown and the whole Kingdom in such case is destitute of all security of their Religion Laws Estates and Liberty sad experience in the Case Queen Mary having proved the wisest Laws to be of little Force to keep out Popery and Tyranny under a Popish Prince 6. We have therefore endeavoured in a Parliamentary-way by a Bill for the purpose to Bar and Exclude the said Duke from the Succession to the Crown and to Banish him for ever out of these Kingdoms of England and Ireland But the first Means of the King and Kingdoms Safety being utterly rejected and we left almost in Despair of obtaining any real and effectual security and knowing our selves to be intrusted to Advise and Act for the preservation of his Majesty and the Kingdom and being persuaded in our Consciences that the Dangers aforesaid are so eminent and pressing that there ought to be no delay of the best means that are in our power to secure the Kingdom against them We have thought fit to propose to all true Protestants an Union amongst themselves by solemn and sacred promise of Mutual Defence and Assistance in the preservation of the true Protestant Religion his Majesties Person and Royal State and our Laws Liberties and Properties and we hold it our bounden Duty to join our selves for the same intent in a Declaration of our United Affections and Resolutions in the Form Ensuing THE Association I A. B. Do in the presence of God solemnly Promise Vow and Protest to maintain and Defend to the utmost of my Power with my Person and Estate the True-Protestant Religion against Popery and all Popish Superstition Idolatry or Innovation and all those that do or shall endeavour to spread or advance it within this Kingdom I will also as far as in me lies maintain and defend His Majesties Royal Person and Estate as also the power and priviledge of Parliaments the lawfull Rights and Liberties of the Subject against all Incroachments and Usurpation of Arbitrary power whatsoever and endeavour intirely to Disband all such Mercenary Forces as we have reason to believe were raised to advance it and are still kept up in and about the City of London to the great Amazement and Terrour of all the good people of the Land. Moreover I. D. of Y. having publickly professed and owned the Popish Religion and notoriously given Life and Birth to the Damnable and Hellish Plots of the Papists against his Majesties Person the Protestant Religion and the Government of this Kingdom I will never consent that the said I. D. of Y. or any other who is or hath been a Papist or any ways Adher'd to the Papists in their wicked Designs be admitted to the Succession of the Crown of England But by all lawfull means and by force of Arms if need so require according to my Abilities will oppose him and endeavour to Subdue Expell and Destroy him if he come into England or the Dominions thereof and seek by force to set up his pretended Title and all such as shall Adhere unto him or raise any War Tumult or Sedition for him or by his Command as publique Enemies of our Laws Religion and Countrey To this end we and every one of us whose hands are here under-written do most willingly bind our selves and every one of us unto the other joyntly and severally in the Bond of one firm and loyal Society or Association and do promise and vow before God That with our joint and particular Forces we will Oppose and Pursue unto Destruction all such as upon any Title whatsoever shall oppose the Iust and Righteous ends of this Association and Maintain Protect and Defend all such as shall enter into it in the just performance of the true intent and meaning of it And lest this Just and Pious Work should be any ways obstructed or hindered for want of Discipline and Conduct or any evil-minded persons under pretence of raising Forces for the service of this Association should attempt or commit Disorders we will follow such Orders as we shall from time to time receive from this present Parliament whilst it shall be Sitting or the Major Part of the Members of both Houses subscribing this Association when it shall be Prorogued or Dissolved and obey such Officers as shall by them be set over us in the several Countries Cities and Burroughs untill the next meeting of this or another Parliament and will then shew the same Obedience and Submission unto it and those who shall be of it Neither will we for any respect of Persons or Causes or for Fear or Reward separate our selves from this Association or fail in the Prosecution thereof during our Lives upon pain of being by the rest of us prosecuted and suppressed as Perjur'd persons and publick Enemies to God the King and our Native Countrey To which Pains and Punishments we do voluntarily submit our selves and every one of us without benefit of any Colour or Pretence to excuse us In witness of all which Premisses to be Inviolably kept we do to this present Writing put our Hands and Seals and shall be most ready to
him to get acquainted among the Papists and when he had done so then my Father told him there had been many Plots in England to bring in Popery and if he would go over among the Jesuits and Observe their ways it was possible it might be One now and if he could make it out it would be his Preferment for ever But however if he could get their Names and a little Acquaintance from the Papists it would be an Easy matter to stir up the People to fear Popery And again My Father and He Dr. Otes went and Lodg'd at Fox-Hall at one Lamberts a Bell-Founder which House was call'd by the Neighbours the Plot-House And there Otes 's Narrative was Written whereof several Copies were Written very Different from the Other and the Four Jesuits Letters wherein Oates pretended was the whole Discovery were Counterfeits c. To the Instances above I shall Add One More for the Further Reputation of All the Rest which is That when Otes'es Credit ran High and the Faction as Bold as Ever upon May the 15. 1682. I Publish'd This Following Advertisement And it went down without either Check or Controll If any Man Woman or Child will be so Kind and Generous as out of an Affection to the Protestant Religion and the Vindication of Dr. Otes to call Simpson Tonge to a Legal Account for Endeavouring to Destroy the Credit of the said Doctor and his Evidence by Scandalous Reflexions upon Both Roger L'Estrange does hereby offer Himself out of a Zeal to the Publique Good to Furnish Authentique Papers and Memorials toward the Prosecution of the Work. THe Whole Party were as Mute as Fishes after This Publication which they would never have been if they durst have put the Reputation of Otes'es Evidence to the Test. To say Nothing of the Congruity betwixt the Method and the Drift of their Open Proceedings in the Case and the Scope of Tonge's Private Enformations For the Father and Otes Acted the Same Part before the Commons which Young Tonge said they did betwixt Themselves and the Mortal Malice of the Cabal struck at the Duke of York too just according to the Report of His Papers Insomuch that while His Royal Highness was Wounded for the Pretended Sake of the Roman-Catholiques The Romanists Themselves were likewise to be Sacrific'd for the sake of the Duke of York and Both for the Common Interest of the Change they Design'd After this Preparatory to a General Vnderstanding of the Case here under Consideration it will be Proper and Needfull to set forth what such a Plot Is before I come to a Resolution that This Damnable Hellish Popish Thing of Otes'es was in Truth such a Plot That is to say a Plot upon the Life of the King The Frame of the Government and the Destruction of the Protestant Religion And to This End Parliamentary Uotes will be as Good in Payment I hope as Fox-Hall Narratives and as Current in the Uindication oâ— the Royal Family as the Other were to the Defaming of it The Plot-Faction Design'd the Ruine of the Late King and to Compass it by leaving him neither MONY POWER CREDIT nor FRIENDS WHat 's a Prince I would fain know without MONY without POWER without CREDIT without FRIENDS And what are Those People that Endeavour to Robb and to Strip their Sovereign of All These Necessary Supports Or what can any man do More toward the Execution of the Malice of the Pretended Popish Plot then to enter into a League and to Ioyn in a Conspiracy to All These Execrable Ends If the Project of doing All This may be call'd a Plot If to Labour the Doing of it be to be In a Plot And if This was upon the Wheel and Actually a Doing by Otes and his Confederates and Founded upon His Counterfeit Plot too And if I make All This Out from Publique Acts and Orders as Credible as Records the Question and the Reputation of This Sham is at an End for Ever And so I shall Proceed to the Four Heads above mentioned in Course as they lye No Mony. AS to the Matter of MONY How many Addresses were made by a Prevalent Majority of the House of Commons for Reward to the Discoverers of Godfrey's Murder Five Hundred Pound Reward to Bedloe Dangerfield to be Pardon'd and Rewarded And so for Turberville Bourk Sampson Macknamarra Eustace Commins c. Beside the Horrible Charge of Pensions for the Entertainment of Otes Bedloe Dugdale and Forty more But after all these Expences not a Penny to be either Supply'd by Bill or so much as Borrow'd upon Anticipations unless upon Terms Worse then Death as by These following Votes will Appear Resolved That his Majesty in his Last Message having Assured This House of his Readiness to Concurr in all other Means for the Preservation of the Protestant Religion This House doth Declare that untill a Bill be likewise passed for Excluding the Duke of York this House cannot give any Supply to his Majesty without Danger to his Majesties Person Extreme Hazzard of the Protestant Religion and Vnfaithfulness to Those by whom This House is Intrusted Resolved That whosoever shall hereafter Lend or Cause to be Lent by way of Advance any MONY upon the Branches of the King's Revenue arising by Customs Excise or Hearth-Mony shall be Adjudged to Hinder the Sitting of Parliaments and shall be Responsible for the same in Parliament Resolved That whosoever shall Accept or Buy any Tally of Anticipation upon any Part of the Kings Revenue or whosoever shall pay such Tally hereafter to be Struck shall be Adjudged to hinder the Sittings of Parliaments and shall be Responsible therefore in Parliament In the Address of Decem. 21. 1680. The Commons Insist upon the Excluding of the Duke of York and an Act of Association Or otherwise see what Follows Without these Things the Allyances of England will not be Valuable nor the People Encourag'd to Contribute to your Majesties Service From hence it does abundantly Appear that his Late Majesty was Driven upon Expence and Hinder'd of Supplys by All Arts and Shifts Imaginable and the Readiest way of finding to what End All this was done will be to look into the Grounds and Reasons of their so doing The Lords sent down a Vote to the House of Commons for their Concurrence Declaring that their Lordships were fully Satisfy'd that there was a Horrid and a Treasonable Plot Carry'd-on by the Papists in Ireland Unto which Vote the Commons Agreed with an Addition in Manner Following This House does Agree with the Lords in the said Vote with the Addition of These Words That the Duke of York being a Papist and the Expectation of his Coming to the Crown hath given the Greatest Countenance and Encouragement thereto the Irish Plot that is as well as to the Horrid Popish Plot in This Kingdom of England Resolved That it is the Opinion of This House that there
accept and admit any others hereafter into this Society and Association Notes upon the ASSOCIATION THE Reader will find in this Paper of Association All the Lines of the Pretended Popish Plot the Summ of the Whole Cause and of all they Contended for It shews the Modell and Expounds the Meaning of the Design the Manner of Working-it-up and the Degrees of Ripening it for Execution It lays Open the Rise Progress and Drift of a Republican Conspiracy Step by Step Insomuch that a man may Trace out with a Chalk the Entire Course of the Intrigue from the First Broaching of it to the Last Resolution and understand that Resolv'd upon the Question had a Hand in 't as well as Wée the Knights c. And This will Plainly Appear upon Comparing the One with the Other My Next Bus'ness is to lay open the Conformity of Parts and the Harmony of Design betwixt the Proceedings of the House and the Tendence of the Paper of Confederacy and when I have made out That once there will be No Separating the Conspirators in the Votes from Wée the Knights c. in the Association but they must be Both of Necessity Involv'd in the same Plot. The First Clause finds a Hellish Popish Plot agreeable to the Vote of Oct. 31. 1678. The Second finds the Duke of York in the Bottom on 't And so did a Following Vote some Four Days after the Former Whereupon I remember there was a Debate Started for an Address to Remove him It speaks of the Power and Influence of Popish Councells in the Disposing of Offices which is the Main Topique again of the Address of Nov. 29. 1680. And so in the Third and Fourth Clauses it falls upon the Illegal Mercenary Forces Unreasonable Prorogations and Dissolutions The Strength of the Nation both at Sea and Land put into the hands of His Royal Highnesses Party and their Adherents which is no other again then an Extract out of Several Votes and Addresses already mention'd The Fifth takes a General Prospect of the Miserable Condition of the King and Kingdom through the Vindictive Malice of the Papists Which is over and over Inculcated also in Several of their Addresses as in that of November 29. 1680. If so and so We have Freed our selves from the Guilt of That Bloud and Desolation which is like to Ensue And so afterward in that of Decemb 21. 1680. The Question is Put Whether in case the Crown should Descend to the Duke of York the Opposition which may possibly be made to his Possessing it may not onely Endanger the Further Descent in the Royal Line but even Monarchy it self In the Sixth Clause it sets forth that since they cannot Prevail upon the King to Exclude the Duke by a Bill in a Parliamentary-way they Propose a Promise of Mutual Defence and Assistance among All True-Protestants In the Preservation of the True-Protestant Religion his Majesties Person and Royal State and our Lives Liberties and Properties c. These are the Words of the Preamble or Introduction to the Association which are but the very same Thing in Other Terms with the Proposal of Dec. 21. 1680. in the Address it self Wherein they desire That his Majesty will be Graciously pleased to Assent to an Act whereby his Majesties Protestant Subjects may be Enabled to Associate Themselves for the Defence of his Majesties Person the Protestant Religion and the Security of his Kingdoms These Requests say they we are Constrained humbly to make to your Majesty as of Absolute Necessity for the Safe and Peaceable Enjoyment of our Religion So that This Association is Parliamentary from Head to foot and little more in 't then a Working upon Their Modell Only Wée the Knights c. Took Leave in One Case and Ask'd it in the Other I speak of the Majority of the House as it was then Leaven'd and with Great Honour to the Loyal and Sober Mixture that was in That Assembly While the Address above-Mention'd in Answer to the Kings Speech of the 15th of the same Month was under Debate the Collectour of the Proceedings of That Season takes upon him to Report this following Passage of a Speech Deliver'd in the House upon That Question I cannot agree in Pressing the Association-Bill For being it hath not yet been brought into the House we do not well know what will be the Purport of it And it is not Proper that we should Ask of the King we know not What nor Expect that he should Grant us what He can know nothing of And truly Sir I think that These Things about the Judges Deputy-Lieutenants and Justices of the Peace are Minute Things to be Insisted on at This Time Compar'd with Others which might be Demanded Queen Elizabeth's Councellours never thought Her Safe 'till the Popish Successor was in a Tower and I am afraid that you will never be Safe untill you take some such Course that may bring things to an Issue When you have done That and Banished All the Considerable Papists out of England I think we shall not be in such Apparent Danger as we now are And seeing This may Probably be Granted and the Other Bills Not I humbly Move you to Recommit the Address that it may be better Consider'd And what 's the Difference now in Substance betwixt the Biass of the Debate and the Effect of the Resolution The Exclusion and Association were not let fall because they were Vnequal and Vnreasonable but because they were not Attainable and only in Exchange too for Other Equivalent Expedients for Such an Imprisonment and Such a Banishment would have had the Force of an Exclusion and an Association without the Name of it for the Banishing of All on the One side does Naturally Resolve into an Vnion of All on the Other Now to put All This together it amounts to no more then what the Prevailing Party in the House had Propounded Declar'd and Resolv'd upon Before-hand Only the Kings Peremptory Refusal put 'em upon the After-Game of Attempting to get That by Force which they could not Gain by Address And it is not to be doubted but the Faction Acted In the House as well as Out of the House by the Same Spirit To say the Truth on 't The Conspirators that Influenc'd These Desperate Designs were Past Rubicon long since and No Retreat left them but with Halters about their Necks if Tenderness and Clemency it self had not well nigh Dissolv'd the Awe of Royal Power and Iustice in the Overflowings of That most Gracious Prince's Patience and Mercy But when the Ring-Leaders found that they might Ask any thing Gratis they never fail'd of following Denyals with Importunities and Importunities with Expostulations 'till in the End upon a Full Tryal of their Interest and Skill they might come to Settle their Measures They Reckon'd upon 't that they had Two Strings to their Bow And that if One Fail'd they had Another would Hold. They Ply'd his Majesty
not Venture upon the Tracing of Particulars thorough All the Turns and Windings of that Diabolical Mazâ— or so much as Think of Digesting the Inconsistencies and Confusions of That-Story into any Pretence of Connexion or Form it may nevertherless very well stand with the Reputation as well as the Duty of a Sober Man not to let the Whole Truth be Lost for want of here and there an Original Provided that it may come so much as is on 't Pure and Vntainted to Posterity and Carry an Authority in the Face on 't not to be Controll'd Now as This Plot partly in the Sham partly in the Operation of it and Partly again in the Occasions Administer'd by it has furnish'd Matter for a Course of Almost Six Years Papers I cannot do better then to Tack the History to the Reflexions Especially when the One will be found so Needfull to the Expounding of the Other and the Truth laid as Clear and Certain as if it had been Pointed-out by a Beam of the Sun. I Draw All my Water from the Fountain And not One Drop that is not Neat Natural and Syncere and that will not abide the Vttermost Test. That is to say I have for my Authorities The Uotes of Several Parliaments Printed by Order and Publish'd with an Express Design to Enform the World of the very Matters which I am now about to lay open Printing our Votes says one will be for the Honour of the King and the Safety of the Nation If our Actions be Naught let the World Iudge of them If they be Good let them have their Virtue c. Therefore I am for Printing c. The Popish Party Dread Nothing more then Printing what you do This Printing c. is like Plain Englishmen who are not Asham'd of what they do Now over and above the Main Chance in a Complyance with Auâ—hority and Order I have likewise upon the Publishing of These Papers taken This Thought into my Care That whereas there are many People that would be Glad and Willing enough to be Enform'd in this Intrigue if it might be done without the Incumbrance of buying a Heavy Book for the sake of a Preface Therefore I have so far Consulted the Readers Ease as to Order the Printing of it apart in a Less Volume to the End that it may serve to Both Purposes But for Distinction sake I shall give it a Title by it self however that People may not Confound that which is properly Preface with the Following History A Brief HISTORY Of the TIMES FROM Dr. Otes'es taking his Degree at Salamanca to the Bearing of his Testimony at a Carts-Arse from Newgate to Tyburn THE Devil is never so Dangerous as when he Presents himself in the Shape of an Angel of Light and there 's nothing so Diabolical as a Religious Wickedness When a man Blasphemes the Holy Ghost by Kissing the Book and Defies and Renounces God in the very Act of Appealing to him This was the Case of the Witnesses and the Plot which Plot was in Effect such a sort of Miracle Impos'd upon the People as the Serpents that the Magicians would have Shamm'd upon Aaron But Truth in the End Devour'd the Imposture It was in short a kind of Perverse Creation Made out of Nothing and without any Pre-existence of Matter to Work upon Only a Parliamentary Fiat at last brought it out of the Abysse Resolved Nemine Contradicente That upon the Evidence that has allready appear'd to This House This House is of Opinion that there is and hath been a Damnable and Hellish Plot Contrived and Carry'd-on by Popish Recusants for Assassinating and Murthering the King for Subverting the Government and Rooting-out and Destroying the Protestant Religion This was no more then to say That Otes Bedloe and Tonge Made the Plot and the House of Commons Found it and they could not well do Less at That Time of the Day Considering the Positive Oaths of so many Profligate Villains and the Constitution of That Loyal Parliament who thought they could never Sufficiently Abominate or Revenge themselves on the Papists for so Vnnatural and Vngratefull a Conspiracy against their Prince and their Religion Beside that the Noise of Godfreys Murder the Ferreting of the Monks in the Savoy Langhorn Whitebread Mico Coleman and the Lord knows how many more to be Seiz'd Papists Banish'd and Disabled from Sitting in Parliament the Raising of the Militia c. This Hurry put People out of their Wits and Consequently there was no Place left for Fair Reasoning in the Sober Way of a Cold and Temperate Debate Now he that shall Stumble upon These Papers Five Hundred Year hence and have a mind to be Peeping into the History of a Villany so many Ages before him shall never need to Consult the Records either of Salamanca or St. Omers for the Mystery the Design or the Issue of it Nor to look any farther then to the Two First Parts of These Observators for his ample Satisfaction And so without spending any more Time and Paper upon Preliminaries I shall Hasten to what I am to say upon This Subject without laying any Stress at all upon the Authority of Hearsays and Conjectures without taking any thing upon Trust or Delivering any other Truths over to Posterity then what I have receiv'd in Form from the very Lips of the Oracle it self I Appoint John-a-Nokes and John-a-Styles to Print These Votes Perused and Sign'd by me according to the Order of the House of Commons and that no other Person presume to print them ET CAETERA The History of the Plot. IN Sept. 1678. Otes and Tong Together made a Composition of a Damnable Hellish Story that they call'd the Popish Plot. And such as it was it was Sworn before Sir E. B. G. and Presented with Wond'rous Formalities of Zeal and Caution to his Late Majesty Himself There were Iesuits Letters forsooth to be Seiz'd at the Post-House to Patch up the Credit of a Broken Bus'ness I have at This Instant the Originals by me Five in All and at Least Three of the Five most Vndeniably the Hand-Writing of Otes and Tonge Themselves Briefly the Shot was Manifesâ—ly Pointed at his Royal Highness and thorough Him at the King his Brother and thorough his Late Majesty at Monarchy it self as will be made Clearer then the Day in the Sequel of this Discourse The Faction that was Resolv'd to make the Most on 't and to Emprove the Imposture wrought such Havock for a Month or Six Weeks upon 't with Frightfull Stories Continual Alarums Fresh and Fresh Discoveries and Enformations that a great many Wise Good and Sober Men were Startled at it and the Common People as Mellow as Tinder to take Fire at the least Spark At the Opening of the Following Parliament of October 21. 1678. His Majesty had This Passage in his Speech I now intend to Acquaint you as I shall allways do with any thing that Concerns me that
I have been Enformed of a Design against my Person by the Jesuits of which I shall forbear any Opinion lest I should say too Much or too Little but I will leave the Matter to the Law. The Commons fell presently to work upon the Plot-Papers the Further and Further Enformations of Titus Otes That Inexhaustible Fountain of Invention and Slander Sir Edmundbury-Godfreys Matters Priest-Hunting and Impeaching And Then came-on the Humour of Seizing Caudle-Cups for Altar-Plate Medals and Guineys for Popish-Trinkets the Burning of our Blessed Saviour in Effigie Playing the Merry-Andrews and Buffoons in Priests-Habits Making Sport with Holy Orders and Holy Things 'till in the Conclusion for fear of Popery they ran-a-Muck as they call it at Christianity it self and bore down Every thing that stood in their Way betwixt This and Hell. There was no Place left for Moderation Sobriety or Councel Truth Iustice Humanity Honour and Good Nature were All Popishly-Affected and never such a Competition betwixt Divine Providence on the One hand and the World the Flesh and the Devil on the Other for the Preserving or the Destroying of a Nation The History of the Interval betwixt Otes'es Damnable Discovery and if the Conceit be not too Trivial the Discovery of Damnable Otes has been the Entertainment of all Peoples Tongues and Thoughts and the Amazement of Christendome no less then the Horrour of All Good Men To see the Foundations of Three Kingdoms Shaken with the Breath of Four or Five Prostitute Mean and Stigmatiz'd Varlets An Imperial Monarchy well-nigh Sunk into a Common-Wealth upon the Credit of Notorious Impostors and Common Cheats An Apostolical Church in danger to be Over-turn'd in the Name of God and for the sake of Religion by the same Instruments Iayls and Dungeons fill'd with Men of Honour Faith and Integrity upon the Testimony of Pillory'd Pick-Pockets and of the Sink of Mankind The Heir Apparent to the Crown in a fair way too to be Disinherited at the Instance of Felons and Renegades Perjury and Subornation Triumphant and Nothing so Sacred either in Heaven or upon Earth as to be Secure from the Outrages of the Rabble The Faction in short had got a-Head and there was No Resisting the Torrent Now the Fact was Agreed upon at All Hands but as to the Rise the Occasion and the Danger of these Distempers People were Divided Some would have it to be a Popish Plot upon the Kings Person and Government and the Protestant Religion Others would have it to be a Republican Plot against All Three under Another Name but with the self Same Design That is to say of Killing the King Changing the Government Dissolving the Church and rather then fail their Ends to be Compass'd by Fires and Massacres as was Expresly Own'd by divers of the Common-Wealth-Conspirators that were brought to Iustice Some in 1666. and Others in 1683. Certain it is that the Cover of the Four Evangelists never had Fouler Lips laid to 't the Merits of the Cause apart then Those of the Kings Witnesses upon This Occasion And it fell out too huge Vnluckily for Their Purpose that the People that were to be Massacred should break out into so many Rebellions for fear of having their Throats Cut while the People that they swore were to Cut their Throats were either Coop'd-up in Prisons or Gibbeted up and down the Kingdom like so many Vermin in a Cony-Warren without making anyOne Attempt either upon the Person of his Majesty or upon the Peace of his Dominions Nay and to give them their Due without so much as Muttering against the Government under All This Rigour The Cause is now coming to an Issue and the Articles of the Charge Mutatis Mutandis the very Same on Both sides as Perjury Subornation Packing of Witnesses and Iuries Only for Pickering reade Rumbold for Papist reade True-Protestant And so in like manner where the Same Reason holds in Other Cases The Theme that I am now upon is so Copious It has so many Incidents that Necessarily fall into the Story the Matter is of so Great a Consequence to be Clear'd and there is so Great a Variety of Previous and Leading Circumstances in the Nature of Praecognita that require a Place in the Preamble to This Narrative that the Prologue to my Bus'ness has been a great deal longer then I intended But I shall now Hasten to an Impartial Account upon the Two Plots in Question AS to the Proof or Testimony of a Popish Plot we have the Credit of Witnesses Innumerable such as they are both English and Irish But the Foundation of the Whole Fabrick is Otes'es Consult at the White-Horse in the Strand And All the Rest has been but a Superfoetation upon that Original It has been Sworn to be a Plot Iudg'd to be a Plot I know not how many Priests Iesuits and Others have Dy'd for 't as a Plot But in fine Such a Plot it was as no body ever yet saw Any thing Of it or any thing Like it but with Otes'es Eyes which in the Bus'ness of Don Iohn Mr. Coleman and Several Other Instances have been found not be Infallible So that upon the Main Otes'es Plot is the Ground-Work of the Whole And if That Fails All Fails which may nevertheless Be and No Affront to the Believers of it For an Oath may be Good in Law and yet Carry a Man to the Devil upon the Point of Conscience Simpson Tonge proves the Popish-Plot to be only a Contrivance betwixt his Father and Titus Otes NOW as to the Project commonly call'd Otes'es Plot if a man may Speak Truth and Shame the Devil it was not the Doctors Alone but a kind of a Club betwixt Titus Otes and Ezrel Tonge as I have it under the Hand of Young Tonge Himself and upon Other very Good Authorities beside As for the Purpose Your Petitioner doth Protest in the Presence of Almighty God that it is very True that the Plot was Contrived by my Father and Titus Otes when he returned the Second Time beyond the Seas Subscribed Simpson Tonge The Petition to His Late Majesty and the Original I have in My Own Hand As likewise of these Instances that follow Vnder the Pretence of a Popish Plot which my Father first Imagin'd was a-foot and afterwards Otes at his Second Return Swore to be True Their Main and Principal Design was to Disinherit his Royal Highness The first Persons that Manag'd the Plot and were Privy to it were my Father Otes c. This was Address'd to my self Dated from the Kings-Bench Ian. 5. 1681. and Sign'd Simpson Tonge And once again yet When I came from the Vniversity in the Year 77. I found Otes with my Father in a very poor Condition who complained he knew not what to do to get Bread who went under the Name of Ambrose My Father took him home and gave him Cloaths Lodging and Dyet saying he would put him into a way And then he persuaded
they had a Months-mind to make Tryal of the Same Experiment Themselves too as may be seen by the By in their Parliamentary Addresses and Votes but most Expresly in the Throng of Popular Addresses to his Majesty and in the Libel of Vox Patriae where so many of the Members got themselves Address'd to in a kind of an Association to That very purpose As for Example In the Address against Sir George Ieffreys the Earl of Hallifax and several Votes upon the same Occasion We your Majesties most Dutifull c. in hopes to bring the Popish Conspirators to speedy Iustice were about to Petition to your Majesty in an Humble Dutifull and Legal Way for the Sitting of This Parliament c. And so again We c. being deeply sensible of the Manifold Dangers and Mischiefs which have been Occasion'd to This your Kingdom by the Dissolution of the Last Parliament and by the Frequent Prorogations of This Parliament whereby the Papists have been Greatly Encouraged to Carry on their Hellish and Damnable Conspiracies c. Resolved That Whosoever Advised his Majesty to Prorogue This Parliament to Any Other purpose then in Order to the Passing of a Bill for the Exclusion of James Duke of York is a Betrayer of the King the Protestant Religion and of the Kingdom of England a Promoter of the French Interest and a Pensioner to France What is All This but Overturning and Overturning Confusion like Waves following One upon the Back of Another and the Cabal so Intoxicated with Passion in the Logick of This Last Vote that the very Despite of being Defeated made them Forget their Ordinary Prudence For the Conclusion is never to be Reconcil'd to the Premisses All that can be said for This Worrying Vote is that they were then in their Last Agonies for they were That Day Prorogu'd from the aforesaid 10th of Ianuary to the 20th in Order to a Dissolution And in All Mischievous Creatures the Convulsions of Death are ever the Strongest But for the Rolls of the Written Addresses of Those Days they are most of them Peremptory for Sitting 'till they might be Effectually Secur'd and That 's One Main Condition too of the Countrys Addresses to their Members And the Address of Sir Patience Ward then Lord-Mayor c. to his Majesty Himself Your Petitioners were Extremely Surpriz'd at the Late Prorogation whereby the Prosecution of the Publique Iustice of the Kingdom and the Making the Provisions Necessary for the Preservation of your Majesty and your Protestant Subjects hath received an Interruption c. They do therefore most Humbly pray c. That the said Parliament may Sit from the Day to which they are Prorogued untill by their Councels and Endeavours Those Good Remedies shall be Provided and Those Iust Ends Attained upon which the Safety of your Majesties Person The Preservation of the Protestant Religion The Peace and Settlement of your Kingdoms and the Welfare of This your Ancient City do so Absolutely Depend What is This now but the Counter part of the Bill for Continuing the Parliament that was Pass'd in Forty One and Chiefly upon the very Same Pretences too Viz. That Publique Grievances might be Redress'd and Iustice done upon Delinquents before the Parliament should be Dissolv'd Or in short The King was Not to Prorogue Adjourn or Dissolve This Parliament without Consent of Both Houses And there 's Another Parliamentary Point yet to Come in the Vote of Unqualifying the Members for the Receiving of any Beneficial Office from the King. 'T is a kind of a Scandalous Incapacity for a Subject to fare the worse for his Master's Commission And too much in all Conscience for the Same Men to Tye-up the King's Hands from Any Act of Grace and Bounty toward his Subjects that had before Ty'd-up the Peoples Hands from Supplying his Majesty The Vote was This Resolved That no Member of This House shall Accept any Office or Place of Profit from the Crown without the Leave of This House nor any Promise of any such Office or Place of Profit during such time as he shall continue a Member of This House An Eminent Member that Started This Motion made it his Observation upon the Long Parliament That All Those that had Pensions and most of Those that had Offices Voted All of a side as they were directed by some Great Officer c. If That Gentleman had taken as much Notice that the House had but Two sides and who Voted on the Other he would have found a Noble Peer to have Weigh'd against his Great Officer and the Matter to be no more then the Old Discrimination over again of King and Parliament It may be a Question now the Tendency and Intent of This Touch duly Consider'd whether they made the King or the Member in such a Case the Greater Delinquent of the Two. And they were not Contented here neither without a Further Essay upon the Choice of his Majesties Ministers and Officers of State War and Iustice After the Copy of the Old Nineteen Propositions The King not to Chuse his own Officers and Ministers NO Judges but men of Ability Integrity and Known Affection to the Protestant Religion And They Themselves to be Iudges of the Iudges Their Offices and Salaries to hold Quamdiu se bene gesserint c. No Lord-Lieutenants but Persons of Integrity and Known Affection to the Protestant Religion the Religion of the Associators that is No Deputy-Lieutenants and Justices of the Peace but so Qualify'd And moreover Men of Ability Estates and Interest in their Country uâ—der the Same Character still None to be Employ'd as Military Officers or Officers in his Majesties Fleet but men of Known Experience Courage and Affection to the Protestant Religion All Parliament-Proof still and of the Same Stamp To say nothing of the Habeas-Corpus Bill and other Encroachments upon the Prerogatives of the Crown for fear of being too too Tedious We 'le see next how they Beâ—av'd themselves in the Bus'ness of the Militia and the Kings Guards over and above the Step they made to have the Approbation of All Officers Themselves After the Blessed Example still of Old Forty One Nay and in the very Method too Beginning with an Address for Guards as follows They offer at the Militia and the Guards WHereas the Safety and Preservation of your Majesties Sacred Peâ—son is of so Great a Consequence and Concernment to the Protestant Religion and to All your Subjects We do most humbly beseech your Majesty to Command the Lord Chamberlain and All Other the Officers of your Majesties Houshold to take a Strict Care that no Vnknown or Suspicious Persons may have Access near your Majesties Person and that your Majesty will likewise please to Command the Lord Mayor and Lieutenancy of London to Appoint sufficient Guards of the Train-Bands during This Session of Parliament and likewise the Lords Lieutenants of Middlesex and Surry to appoint
War That Repriev'd the Plot and the Conspirators Was it the Papists that Suborn'd Witnesses against Shaftsbury and College for That 's their Meaning And was That the Case of Subornation that This Address Strikes at Was it the Papists that Ruin'd All for not Yielding to the Exclusion of the Duke Was it the Papists again that they make Answerable for the Bloud and Desolation Threaten'd in This Address because They Would not do the Things which only the King Could do How could Any man Believe These Calumnies and at the same time keep his Thoughts of his Prince within the Bounds of his Duty Or how could any man Disbelieve 'em without the Vttermost Abhorrence of so Diabolical a Practice upon the Honour of their Sovereign They stript the Late King of his Friends too AND the Malice of the Conspirators was not Satisfy'd Here neither unless after the Stripping his Majesty of All Other Means of Supporting Himself they Depriv'd him of the Vse and Service of his Friends too which Friends of his may be Properly Divided into Papists Convict and Suspected or Reputed Papists The Former were Visible and Known The Other were a sort of People of their Own Creation For whoever was not for their Turn they could make such a Papist of him at pleasure We shall see in Good Time how it far'd both with the One and with the Other while the Remaining Body of the Nation was only a Party of so many Vnited or Associated Protestants that were Link'd in One Band of Confederacy and Wag'd War to the Everlasting Reputation of the Plot under Otes'es Banner But to come to the Matter I shall begin with the Former Sort of them and Carry These Two Points Before me First The Story and Secondly The Ground of their Sufferings And bring the Whole into as Few Words as Possible in a Consistence with Candor Truth and Iustice. PApists or so Reputed were to be Banish'd BECAVSE of the Bloudy and Traiterous Designs of Popish Recusants To be taken into Custody and Disarm'd Their Names Taken Rewards given to the Discoverers of their Arms BECAVSE of the Damnable and Hellish Plot for the Destruction of his Majesties Person c. Papists to be Disabled from Sitting in Either House of Parliament BECAVSE of the Restless Conspiracies of Popish Recusants against his Majesties Person c. No Popish Recusants to have a Residence in his Majesties Palace or Access unto his Presence BECAVSE his Person is in Danger at This Time from Popish Conspiracies All Popish Recusants or Iustly Suspected Papists to be Apprehended Disarm'd and Secur'd BECAVSE of the Pernicious Plots and Contrivances of Popish Persons Resolved That if any Popish Recusant Convict shall Receive any Commission he shall be Deemed a Felon And shall be Pursued Apprehended and Executed as such Popish Delinquents to be brought to speedy Iustice BECAVSE of the Manifest Danger to his Majesties Sacred Person c. from the Notorious Conspiracies of Popish Priests and Iesuites Pickering to be Executed and all Papists or Reputed Papists to be Banished Twenty Mile from London and Westminster for Six Months BECAVSE of the Horrid Conspiracies of Popish Recusants London and the Parts Adjacent to be Freed from Popish Inhabitants At this rate they Proceeded against Papists Convict in the Quality of Papists and put That Part of his Majesties Friends out of Condition of either Serving their Master or Helping Themselves But then tâ—e Distinction of Suspected or Reputed Papists Swept the whole Remainder of tâ—em to a Single Man for One Wry Word of Otes or of his Works was enough to bring any Mans name into the Black Roll. Whoever Adher'd to the Duke of York Oppos'd the Exclusion was Suppos'd to Advise a Prorogation or Dissolution Deny'd the Plot Spoke Coursly of the Evidence and in fine Whoever was not an Associator or a Friend to That Interest was Popishly Affected But before I proceed to That Part of the Division of the Kings Friends there are Certain Qualifications of Papists and Popery under Other Circumstances that are to be taken in the way An Address to be Presented to his Majesty that his Royal Highness may Withdraw himself from his Majesties Person and Councel Resolved That a Bill be brought in to Disable the Duke of York to Inherit the Imperial Crown of This Realm And then follows immediately The Resolve Nemine Contradicente of the Revenging Vote In the Next Parliament they were at the very same Sport again Resolved Nemine Contradicente That the Duke of Yorks being a Papist and the Hopes of his coming such to the Crown hath given the Greatest Countenance and Encouragement to the Present Designs and Conspiracies against the King and the Protestant Religion The Next Resolve is the Revenging Vote and after That the Disabling Bill These Three Successively So that the Matter and the Order of it were Evidently Fore-laid and the Caball in Both Parliaments agreed upon 't before-hand Nay the Queen her self was brought into the Conspiracy to the Eternal Infamy of the Believers as well as the Reporters of That Sacrilegious Scandal and an Address Resolv'd upon as follows We Your Majesties most Dutyfull c. having received Enformations by Several Witnesses Otes and Bedloe of a most Desperate and Trayterous Design and Conspiracy against the Life of your Sacred Majesty wherein to their Great Astonishment the QVEEN is particularly Charged and Accused In Discharge of our Allegeance and out of our Affections and Care for the Preservation of your Majesties Sacred Person and Consequently of the whole Kingdom do most Humbly beseech your Majesty that the Queen and All her Family and All Papists and Reputed Papists be forthwith removed from your Majesties Court at Whitehall And then follow'd a Resolve of the Same Date That an Humble Address be Presented to his Majesty that All Papists and Suspected Papists within the Several Counties of England and Wales and Town of Berwick upon Tweed may be Apprehended and Secur'd This was a Ready way now to have a Clear Stage to Themselves And the Wickedness of That Age Stopt at Nothing when the Four Evangelists came once to be made a Stale to the Bus'ness and when Murder was Super-Added to the Hypocrisy and Perjury of the False Witnesses and their Confederate Patrons and Abettors I come now to the Address that was made upon the Revenging Vote WE do humbly Represent to your Majesty that being Deeply Sensible that the Greatest Hopes of Success against our Religion in the Enemies thereof the Papists are Founded in the Execrable Designs which they have laid against the Sacred Person and Life of your Majesty which it is not only our Duty but our Interest with the Greatest Hazzards to Preserve and Defend we have Apply'd our selves to the making such Provisions by Law as may Defeat those Popish Adversaries their Abettors and Adherents c. And while any such Laws are
draw from This Preposterous way of Proceeding is that the Whole Story from End to End was a Practice that the Suborners of the Perjury were also the Protectors and the Patrons of it Both under One And that they had their Accomplices in the House of Commons upon This Crisis of State that play'd the same Game which their Fore-fathers had done upwards of Forty Years before The Earl of Shaftsbury a Busie Man in our Late Troubles BUt after the History of the Wickedness of These People it will be Needfull to look a little into the Woe they Wrought us Or at least to Compute upon the Calamitous Infelicities of That Season and Whence they took theâ—r Rise The Man knows little of the Histoâ—y of Our Troubles that 's a Stranger to the Life Practice and Character of the Late Earl of Shaftsbury who had the Wit in All Changes and Revolutions of State still to Turn Tail to the Weather and Swim with the Tyde And he did This too by Nature as well as by Application for beside the Advantages of a Mercurial Humour a Ready Tongue And a Dext'rous Address he had none of Those Vulgar Barrs upon him of Honour Shame or Conscience to put any Checque to the Impetuous Course of his Ambitious Lusts I am not upon the Story of his Life but it shall serve My Purpose to say that thorough All the Vsurpations from Forty to Sixty he came Sailing down still before the Wind and so from that time forward steer'd by the same Compass ON November 17. 1672. His Lordship being already Chancellour of the Exchequer and one of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury was further Advanc'd by his Majesty to the Keeping of the Great Seal with the Title of Lord Chancellour of England And upon the 8th of November 1673. He was Discharg'd of That Commission Upon the Opening of the Parliament Feb. 5. 1672. His Lordship in a Large and Elegant Speech Blesses God and the King as follows LEt us Bless God that he hath given us such a King to be the Repairer of our Breaches both in Church and State and the Restorer of our Paths to dwell in That in the midst of War and Misery which Rages in our Neighbours Countrys our Garners are full and there is no Complaining in our Streets c. Let us Bless God that he hath given This King Signally the Hearts of his People and most Particularly of This Parliament Let us Bless the King for taking away All our Fears and leaving no room for Jealousies for those Assurances and Promises he hath made us Let us Bless God and the King that our Religion is Safe That the Church of England is the Care of our Prince That Parliaments are Safe That our Properties and Liberties are Safe What more hath a Good Englishman to Ask but that This King may Long Reign and that This Triple-Allyance of King Parliament and People may never be Dissolv'd HIs Lordships Matters as yet went Merrily on and his Good Humour kept pace with his Good Fortune But so soon as ever the Wind came about All these Blessings were thrown over the Left Shoulder The Clouds began now to Gather and soon after Discharge themselves in a Storm upon Papists and Publique Ministers In This Mood they brought-on the Bill about the Test whereof Andrew Marvel for the Honour of his Noble Patron gives This Account The Parliament having met the 5th of Feb. 1672. Prepared an Act before the Mony-Bill Slipt thorough their Fingers by which the Papists were Obliged to Pass thorough a New State-Purgatory to be Capable of Any Publique Employment Vpon this Occasion it was that the Earl of Shaftsbury though then Lord Chancellor of England yet Engaged so far in Defence of That Act and of the Protestant Religion that in due time it Cost him his Place and was the First Moving Cause of all Those Mis-adventures and Obloquy which since he lies ABOVE not UNDER IT deserves a Note the Libellous Deduction Marvel gives the World of the Kings Administration of Affairs as well Before as After This Celebrated Exploit of my Lord Shaftsbury's in a flat Contradiction to his Lordships Character of the King and to his Report of the Happy the Safe and the Peaceable State of the Government For whoever reads That Pamphlet will find it only an Artificial Scandal Imposture Cast-out to the Multitude upon set Purpose to make his Majesty Odious to his People One would have thought that the Gaining of the Test-Bill should have set their Hearts a little at Ease but That was not sufficient without calling for Fast upon Fast Raising the Militia Voting down the Guards Enquiring into Publique Grievances c. which being Said and Done with a Noverint Vniversi in the Eyes and Ears of the Nation is all one in many Cases with Ringing the Bells Backward and Firing the Beacons as if the Town were a Burning or an Enemy Landed and as far as Black-Heath in their March to London And all upon the Old and Everlasting Ground of Iealousie and Apprehension still That is to say BECAVSE The Restless Practices of Popish Recusants threatn'd the subversion both of Church and State. The Wheel was now in Motion and they drove like Iehu 'till they Dropt at last into Otes's Bottomless Plot. Shaftsbury had been a long time at the Trade of Fast and Loose and what with Industry Craft Malice and Experience the Fittest Man perchance in the Three Kingdoms to be the Head of a Faction And he was the Fitter for 't because his very Inclination prompted him to Mischief Even for Mischiefs sake It was his Way and his Humour to Tear All to pieces where he could not be the First Man in Bus'ness Himself And yet All this while his Faculty was rather a Quirking way of Wit then a Solidity of Iudgment and he was much Happier at Pulling-down then at Building-up In One Word He was a man of Subtlety not of Depth and his Talent was Fancy rather then Wisdom His Arts were Popular and after All his Politiques he was as great an Hypocrite in his Vnderstanding as in his Manners But the Best Incendiary yet upon the Face of the Earth for he had an Excellent Invention and a Protesting Face without either Faith or Truth Now when the Common People are to be Couzen'd One Imposture puts off Another and False Conclusions follow Naturally upon False Premises This is the Brief of his Character from those that knew and understood him Best and a man cannot do Right to the History without giving the Next Age a True Account of a Person that had so Great a Hand in the Confusions of This 'T is with the Mobile as with the Waters the very Blowing upon them makes them Troublesom and Dangerous and in the End to Overflow their Banks His Author sets him forth as the Great Advocate and Champion for the Bill of the Test and makes him Effectually
so Still p. 170. This was a Shot at Random I hope without considering where it would fall for it makes All Men whatsoever without any Exception of Persons to be either Fools or Knaves that were not of the Managers Pretended Opinion I call it Pretended because I look upon it as a Flight of his Rhetorique rather then a Motion of his Conscience And that it was Design'd to work upon the Passions of those that heard him rather then upon their Iudgments This Liberty does not only give every Honest Thinking Man an Honourable Right but puts him upon a Defensive Necessity of Throwing-off that Infamous Character let it Light where it Will and of Rangeing the Fools and the Knaves on the Other side But This is a Sentence however with Two Edges One way he makes People Conspirators and Abetters for not Believing the Plot at a Uenture whether the Supposed Fact be True or False The Other way he makes a General Plot on 't by taking All Into 't that do not Believe it But as to the Proof now of a General Plot If Otes'es Plot falls there Remains No General Plot to Prove upon Colemans Letters are a Particular Matter of a Personal Practice and Vndertaking And His Crime at the Vttermost Stretch of it amounted to no more then a Forward Intermeddling with State-Matters without a Commission I could never find out the least Colour in that whole Proceeding to Imagine any sort of Affinity that Colemans Letter-Plot had with Sir Will. Iones'es pretended Narrative Plot. He had a Plot undoubtedly upon the Fing'ring of French Mony But without any Malice in my Conscience against Either King or Government Sir William Iones draws Inferences from the Jesuits Several Meetings Their Raising of Arms and Gathering of Moneys toward the Execution of their Design fol. 169. Certain Imaginary Commissions to Popish Lords Seditious Sermons and Discourses Ibid. All which is upon Otes'es Bottom still And so my Lord Staffords being at Fenwicks Chamber and his Bolting-out Treasonous Words in Otes'es Hearing against the King fol. 170. The Pages 178. 179 are spent in Iustifying Otes wherein Sir William does not only admit Otes'es Change of Religion but even blesses Providence for 't in these Words I am sure it is happy for us that he Did Change his Religion Without That we had not had the First Knowledge of the Plot nor of many Particulars which he could not come to know but by Occasion of that Change fol. 179. This was a Mighty Mistake for we had the First Knowledge of the Plot from Tonge And then for so great a Man there was as unlucky an Oversight Sir William Iones upon the Summing-up of the Evidence makes Otes to be a Papist though He Himself Swore he was None in the Tryall Nay and he raises Arguments from his Being the Thing that he Swore he was Not and Emproves His Forswearing Himself to the Advantage of his Evidence I desire to know says my Lord Stafford whether Mr Otes was Really a Papist or did but Pretend Otes I did only Pretend I was not Reaâ—â—y One I Declare it fol. 123. The Evidence says Sr W. in another Place is so Strong that I think it admits of No Doubt and the Offences prov'd against My Lord and the Rest of his Partâ— are so Foul that they need no Aggravation The Offences are against the King against his Sacred Life against the Protestant Religion nay against All Protestants for it was for the Extirpation of All Protestants out of These Three Nations I mean not of Every one that is Now so but of Every one that would have Continu'd so Every one amongst us if These Designs had been Accomplish'd must either have Turn'd his Religion or turn'd out of his Country or have been Burn'd in it fol. 186. Here 's a Charge of Treason against every Papist in the Three Kingdoms to a Single Man Every Protestant Throat to be Cut or to fly his Country or to Turn or to Burn. Taking away the Kings Life and the Extirpating of the Protestant Religion by Violence were the Points of the Conspiracy what could be more Incentive toward an Vniversal Tumult What more Repugnant to Christian Charity and to Common Sense then to Build such Conclusions upon the Testimony of Abandon'd Cheats and the Visionary Extravagances of Dreamers of Dreams for such was Tonge most Superstitiously according to the Letter But to carry it further yet All These Pretences have been Detected for a Forgery and a Counter-Plot Prov'd on the Other side to Answer Every Malicious Point of This. What Atonement is the whole World able to make for the Affronts that have been put upon Gods Providence Truth and Iustice upon the Honour of the King the Peace of the Kingdom and the Reputation of the Oppress'd and Injur'd Party But to return to my Point It will deserve one word more now after Otes'es Passing Muster for a Competent and a Credible Witness according to Sr William Iones'es Qualifications and Measures to take a little notice on the other side what it is that he makes to be an Incapacity for a Warrantable and a Creditable Discharge of that Duty 'T is no great Wonder where a Profligate Sodomite and a Common Knight-of-the-Post passes for a Testis Probus to See a Man of Honour upon tâ—e File for an Infamous Rascal Sir William Iones makes his Exceptions to Mr. Lydcot's Evidence which he gave Concerning My Lord Castlemain Lord Staffords Tryal pag. 115. c. I refer the Reader to the Tryal it self and he will find no need of a Gloss upon the Text to shew him how that Worthy Honest Gentleman was handled in Court by the Manager But He that would more Particularly Enform himself in the Ground of Sir Williams Exceptions must look for his Crime fol. 177. upon Summing-up the Evidence A Man says Sir W. Iones that owns himself the Continual Companion and Secretary of one so Famous in the Popish Party as my Lord Castlemaine is A Man that Pretends he was never out of his Company And a Man that owns that two Years since he was Taking of Notes at a Trial for This Plot Not only for his Curiosity but for his Lord who was Concern'd in the Accusation That This Man should be a Fellow of Kings College seems Strange and 'till it be better Prov'd will hardly be Believ'd Nor will he deserve any Credit From one End to the other of This History of the Pretended Popish Conspiracy the Weight of the Proof still rests upon Otes'es Probity and Reputation and the Whole Frame has nothing more to Support it then Flourish and Noise The Proof and Character of a Licentious and Habitual Dissolution of Manners through the Entire Course of Otes'es Conversation is still Blown-off with one of These Two Banters Set a Rogue to Catch a Rogue That is to say He must be a Party to the Treason to Qualify him for a Testimony The other
Invasions Past Present and to Come Nothing in short came Amiss to him Order'd that Dr. Tong and Mr. Otes be Summon'd to Attend the Bar of This House at Four a Clock in the Afternoon to give an Account Touching the Plot and the Conspiracy c. Commons Journal Oct. 25. 1678. Order'd that Dr. Tong do Attend again to morrow Morning to give an Account concerning the Fire of the City of London Ib. Here 's a Manifestation sufficient of the Hand Interest and Design that Dr Tong had in the Plot and the Encouragement he met withall on the One side was in All Respects Answerable to the Zeal he Express'd for the Promoting of it on the Other As will be further seen hereafter But yet the Wisdom of the Nation was Certainly never more over-shot then in laying any sort of Stress upon the Credit of His Report For over and above the Absurdity of his Reasons the Impotence of his Passions and the Scandal of his Authorities that lye Open for All the World to Judge of he Cuts his Own Throat with his Own Hand in a Petition to That very House of Commons that seem'd to Believe him by laying Reasons Vnanswerable before them why they Ought Not to Believe him wherein he Declares and Affirms that he had no Knowledge of any Person Charg'd or Suspected to be in the Confederacy Hardly of any One Popish Gentleman in England So that here 's a Popish Plot Undertaken to be Prov'd against so many Persons by Name And That Proof Accepted for Current when the very Accuser himself Confesses and Declares that he knows not so much as any One Conspirator But an Infallible Vote Solves Impossibilities and Reconciles Contradictions A Plot is â—esolv'd upon A Plot there Is and a Plot there Must be though they fetch it out of the Grave again after so many Years Dead and Bury'd This is a Story so Silly Flat and Nauseous that I should hold my self Oblig'd to beg a Publique Pardon for Exposing it if it were not for These Two Vses of Application First to shew the Senseless Ground and Foundation of All our Late Troubles and Distresses And Secondly That there is No Tale or Fable so Monstrous or Incredible that Prejudice and Credulity shall not make to Pass for Gospel This Plot in fine such as it is was Tongs Plot The Project of it Copy'd-out from That of Habernfeld and no more upon the Whole then One Forgery Grafted upon Another But This will be Best Clear'd by Confronting the Two Narratives The Parallel will be somewhat Large but my hand is now In 't is a Matter of Moment that Depends upon 't and so the Case will the Better Bear it CHAP. IV. The Pretended Popish Plot of 1678. was only a Copy drawn from Habernfelds Original of 1640. THe History of Habernfeld's Discovery was first Published in Forty Three by Prynne in his Romes Master-Piece having been seiz'd by him as he sets it forth in his Preface in the Arch-Bishops Chamber in the Tower by Warrant from the Close Committee May. 31. 1643. His Introduction is a kind of Synopsis of the Whole Relation which Prynne Pronounces for so Indubitable a Truth that Whoever deems it an Imposture may well be Reputed an Infidel he says if not a Monster of Incredulity To which I may Interpose that I have known many of Mr Prynne's Infidels and Monsters that have been very Good Christians and very Honest Men. Upon the Coming-forth of Otes'es Popish-Plot-Narrative in 1678. The Old Story of Habernfeld was Reprinted under This Title The Grand Designs of the Papists in the Reign of our Late Sovereign Charles the 1 st And now Carry'd on against his Present Majesty his Government and the Protestant Religion The Prefacer seems to be Absolutely of Tong 's and Otes'es Opinion upon the Matter in Question about the Two Plots only with This Difference That the One Illustrates the Old Plot by the New one and the Other Illustrates the New Plot by the Old one and so there 's an Inference Interchangeably drawn from the Resemblance of the Counterfeit to the Authority of the Story But over and above These Considerations it seems to Me not unlikely that Tonge had some hand in the Publication For it came out just after my Refusal to License his Royal Martyr where the Stress was laid upon That Point And the Conspiracy being at That Time Hot from the Forge Tong could not do better then by Matching the President to make One Sham Vouch for Another It is not the Design of These Papers says the Publisher to give an Account of the Discovery of the Late Plot but only to Present the Reader with the Narrative of Another against his Majesties Royal Father of Blessed Memory So Exactly resembling This which now lies under Examination that it can hardly be call'd Another Being nothing else but the Same thing Acted over again only with the Necessary Alteration of Circumstances of Time Places and Persons Preface After this Preface follows a Paper Entitled Sir William Boswell's First Letter to the Arch-Bishop concerning the Plot. Dated Hague Sep. 9. 1640. which he dispatch'd away to the Arch-Bishop with one from Habernfeld Enclosed under the Title of Andreas ab Habernfeld's Letter to the Arch-Bishop concerning the Plot Revealed to him This is Accompany'd with Another Paper Entitled The General Overture and Discovery of the Plot. And there is likewise a Third Paper of Habernfelds which he calls The Large and Particular Discovery of the Plot and Treason against the King Kingdom and Protestant Religion and to raise the Scottish Wars The Story is Heavy and there 's too Much on 't to be Inserted at Length but my Bus'ness being only to set forth the Resemblance betwixt the Two Plots and to run the Parallel the Heads of the Relation in Abstract will abundantly Answer My End And when I shall have gotten over This part of the Proceeding a Man may properly enough Enquire into the Merits of the Whole Matter and see what Opinion the King Himself the Arch-Bishop and Sr William Boswell had of This Discovery To take the Particulars as they Rise and to Apply the Parallel to Those Points in the Same Order as I find them in the Original I shall begin with the Preface and run thorough both the Abstract of Habernfeld and Tong 's Counter-Part in as Few Words as Possible The Parallel of the Two Plots The Discoverer he says was a Chief Actor in This Plot sent hither from Rome by Cardinal Barbarini to Assist Con the Popes Legat in the Pursuit of it and Privy to All the Particulars therein Discovered Preface And was not Our Prime Discoverer Otes a Chief Actor too Sent over from St Omers to Assist the Plot and about the Iesuits Affairs Lord Staffords Tryal fol. 28. Intrusted with Commissions Iesuits Tryal fol. 13. Tempted to Kill the King Narrative Ar. 60. Dispatched with Proposals to the Carmelites about it fol.
of Christian Charity suffers them not to Conceal These Things Yet both from his Majesty and the Lord Arch-Bishop some Small Exemplar of Gratitude will be Expected p. 8. These are the very Reasonings and Pretences of Ezrel Tong put into the Mouth of Titus Otes No Figments So help me God No Thought of Gain but Pure Zeal and Christian Charity to work upon the Discoverers But yet some Small Exemplar of Gratitude will be Expected as a matter of Ten or Twelve Pound a Week-Pension for Otes and the Value perhaps of Four or Five times as much more in Presents and Veils A Deanery or some such Trifle for Tong. What is All This but a Flat Contradiction thrown in the very Face of the Pretext It is as Clear as Day that Tong and Habernfeld in All Things Material Walk Hand in Hand thorough the Whole Story But to avoid Idle Repetitions as much as may be I shall in the Next Place make a Short Abstract of Habernfeld's Last and Long Paper of Intelligence and so Finish my Parallel It bears This Following Title And from thence I shall Proceed to the Heads of it The Large and Particular Discovery of the Plot against the King Kingdom and Protestant Religion and to raise the Scottish Wars p. 13. The A King is in Danger of his Life and Crown B England and Scotland to be Subverted The Discoverer of This was Born and Bred in the C Popish Religion being D Fit for the Design p. 13. He was E sent over by Cardinal Barbarini F Troubled in Conscience and G came over to the Orthodox Religion H Reveal'd the Treason to a Friend I Put the Particulars in Writing out of which were drawn K. Articles p. 14. He falls upon the L Iesuitical Off-spring of Cham. p. 15. The M Society are the Conspirators The N Popes Legat is their Chief Patron They hold their O Weekly Intelligences p. 16. Cuneus the Instrument of the P Conjur'd Society He Presents the King with Roman Curiosities Promises but Means it not to Espouse the Cause of the Palatinate p. 17. Offers the Bishop a Cardinals Cap makes use of Court-Instruments and Mediations p. 18. But finding All in Vain Q Ambushes were to be Prepar'd wherewith the Lord Arch-Bishop together with the King should be Taken p. 19. They pass R Sentence against the King and lay hold of the Indignities put upon Prynne Burton and Bastwick and the Scotch Service-Book to stir up the Puritans to a Revenge Some Scottish Popish Lords are sent to Enflame S Scotland by which the T Hurtfull Disturber of the Scottish Liberty might be Slain V An Indian Nut provided by the Society and shew'd to the Discoverer in a W Boasting Manner To Poyson the X King after the Example of his Father p. 21. Hamilton's Chaplain Private with Cuneus A Chaplain of Richelieu's sent over to Assist the Conspiracy A Character given of Sr Toby Mathews p. 22. And an Account of his Intelligences Haunts and Meetings p. 23. The Story of Reade over again p. 24. Iesuits Letters and Meetings And Y All the Papists of England Contributing to the Design p. 25. One Widow Gave Forty Thousand Pound English toward it And Others beyond their Ability in Proportion He follows This with a Ramble upon Several Persons by Name that were dipt in the Conspiracy And further with This Remarkable Discovery The President of the aforesaid Society was my Lord Gage a Jesuit Priest Dead above Three Years since He had a Palace Adorn'd with Lascivious Pictures which Counterfeited Prophaneness in the House but with them was Palliated a Monastery wherein Forty Nuns were Maintained hid in so Great a Palace It is Scituated in Queen Street which the Statue of a Golden Queen Adorns The Secular Jesuits have bought All This Street and have Reduced it into a Quadrangle where a Jesuitical College is Tacitly built with the Hope that it might be Openly finish'd as soon as the Universal Reformation was begun p. 29. To pass a Short Note now upon the Whole The Design upon the A King and B England and Scotland is the General Scope of Otes'es Plot. He pretends to come over from C the Popish Religion No man Fitter for the D Design E sent over F Troubled in Conscience and G Converted The General of the Iesuits at Rome and the Provincial Here did the Parts of Cardinal Barbarini and the Popes Legat. Otes H Revealed the Treason to Tong and I put the Particulars in Writing out of which Tong Extracted K Articles Otes makes M the Society the Conspirators The Provincial serves for N The Popes Legat. The O Weekly Intelligences Grove took an Account of and for Instruments of the P Conjur'd Society Otes'es Narrative has them in abundance The Q Ambushes were laid in St. Iames'es and at Windsor The R Sentence pass'd at several Consults The Rebellion in S Scotland by Irritating the Puritans was Manag'd by Otes'es Missionaries and the King to be Murder'd as the T Hurtfull Disturber of their Liberties Wakemans Poyson was V the Indian Nut and Cuneus's Boasting of it Answers Conyers'es shewing Otes the Dagger in Grays-Inn-Walks Habernfelds Talk of Poysoning the X King after the Example of his Father was Match'd both in the Narrative of Otes'es Plot and Expressly in his Epistle before that Narrative to the Eternal Infamy of the Reporters of it And as Habernfeld Y makes All the Papists of England to be Concern'd in This Conspiracy so Otes in his Epistle and Narrative has made an Vniversal Plot on 't Only we want a Forty-Thousand-Pound Widow to Perfect the Parallel But That Defect is Amply Supply'd in Irish Contributions and Other Secret Services As to the Foolery of the Last Paragraph the Man must be a Great Stranger to London as well as to Common Sense that can look upon it as any other then a most Extravagant Foppery and without any Colour or Coherence After This Large Discovery as the Enformer Pretends comes a Summary in Eleven Heads of the Whole Matter which is only the same over again and is Answer'd over again by the same Parallel Only the 10 th Clause has an Expression in it Worthy of Remarque Some says he of the Principal Vnfaithful ones of the Kings Party are Notify'd by Name Many of whose Names Occur Not yet their Habitations are Known p. 31. Now in Otes'es Muster of the Conspirators it runs Whose Names Occurr at Present Nar. fol. 61. One would have thought they might have Vary'd the Phrase a little But our Modern Discoverers have been much better at Copying then at Inventing Witness This Whole Parallel and the Five Iesuits Letters It must not be Omitted neither that the Order of Politicians which Habernfeld speaks of p. 15. is Learnedly Turn'd forsooth into the Order of POLITITIANI by Otes in his Narrative Art. 53. In Conclusion here 's a Plot Copy'd-out to the Life and the Transcript a most Scandalous and Impious Cheat beyond all Controversy whatever the Original was
Prevented AFter so many Several Tales and Those Several Tales so many Several Ways Told too of one and the same Thing After the Saying and Swearing of That same Same Thing to be done in so many Several Places Shapes and Manners At so many Several Times By so many Several Methods and Persons upon such and such Several Reasons and to so many Several Ends It can be no Longer a Question I say upon the Whole Matter After These Diversities Disagreements and Contradictions Whether the Point in Issue be True or False For Truth is Simple Vniform Consistent with it self and in Every Line and Article of it Still and Ever the same This is the very Case betwixt the History of the Somerset-House-Murther upon Saturday and That of the Dead Body that was found the Thursday following They are without more ado so Vnlike so Forreign Nay so Contrary One to Another in many Passages even of the Greatest Weight that they Agree only in the Name of the Iustice Insomuch that Supposing Two Sir Edmund Godfreys the Relation might very well Pass for an Account of Two several Persons Now since it is a Thing Utterly Impossible to Vnite These Variations and Oppositions in the same Point and to make good Evidence to the VVorld of Those Allegations that are Never to be Reconcil'd I am in This Chapter to Ask Bedloes and Prances Pardon for having made such Fools of a Couple of the Kings Witnesses in some Half a dozen Chapters before as if it had been VVholly Their Faultâ— that Things and Things Cotton'd No better together when in very Deed Their Present Circumstances and the Parts they had in the Plot Duly Consider'd they were at That Time Under a Moral Necessity either of laying themselves open or of doing Things not to be Done So that for want of Well-grounded Presumptions and Authentique Proofs to move mens Vnderstandings they were fain to Content Themselves with Dazling the Peoples Eyes and Boyling up their Passions by the most Popular and Plausible Arts the Matter would bear Where the Sham was not strong enough to stand upon its own Legs the Security of his Majesties Person and the Protestant Religion the Honour of so many Parliaments the Wisdom of the Nation and the Credit of the Kings Witnesses were All Call'd in to the Vpholding of it and the Restless Alarms of Popish Fires Massacres and Faggots were like so many Rods in Piss for Those Infidels that had not the Grace to give Credit to a Forgery so Necessary to be Believ'd VVhen I speak of the Difficulty of Reconciling the History to the Fiction in This Present Instance I do not Mean that the making a Plausible Imposture of it was a Thing Vtterly Impossible if it had been Attended in Time though I am very well aware too that Falsity can Never Pass for Truth but for want of Means and Industry to find out where the Inconciliable Difference Lyes But the Difficulties to be Treated of in This Place are of Another Quality and not so much arising from the Contradictions in the Nature of True and False as Peculiar to the State of Things in That Iuncture and to the Matter in Hand The Body was found out of Town yonder in a Ditch and the Murther was laid at Somerset-House The Death of Sir Edmund was made a Murther Nay and a Popish Murther as is formerly Observ'd even while he was Yet Alive Now this could be no other then an Ominous Foreboding upon a Desperate Melancholy which he had then upon him For there was No Talk of any Apprehension he had of the Papists 'till the very day that he left his House We shall speak in Another Place to the Bus'ness of his Saying that he should be the first Martyr or the first Man that should suffer The Faction had no sooner made a Popish Murther of this Disaster but it dropt Naturally into the Common Receptacle of All Rogueries the Pretended Popish Plot. This Occasion lay so fair for the Hand of the Republican Conspirators who under Another Pretext were at that time Designing upon the King the Royal Line and the Monarchy it self that having drawn his Royal Highness the Queen Consort and Almost the Late Blessed King Himself into the Confederacy they thought they could not do better then to make her Majesties Palace the Scene of the Villany This was the Ground-work of the Mock-Tragedy that Our Knights of the Post Bedloe and Prance Nay Otes came in for a Snack too afterward Play'd their Parts in upon That Stage In one Syllable the Plot-Cabal Lodg'd it there and Bedloe took them at their Word and Swore to 't there by which Vnlucky Blunder the Project was as good as Curs'd in the Cradle for when it was once Lodg'd within Those Walls there was no removing of it at least without taking the House for Company The Story 't is true went off well enough at Volley for a good while and pass'd Current among the People upon Content without either Weighing or Computing it But when they came once to Confront Matters and to Adjust Things to Things they found themselves Horribly out in their Measures and that they might as well pretend to bring Heaven and Hell together as to Tally the Two Stories of Somerset-house and Primrose-Hill There was the Hat the Gloves the Stick the Sword the Ditch the Posture the Two Wounds the Bruises the Fly-blows the Bloud the Linnen Cloth the Looseness of his Neck and the Circles about it c. Now All these Cases and Accidents were to be Obviated and Provided for in the Counter-part As in some sort they were too There was a Twisted Hankercher and a Crevat to Answer the Linnen Cloth Green to Wring his Neck about Hill and the rest to Punch him to Encounter the Bruises Tryal fol. 17. Hill Kelly and Gerald to run him through with his own Sword throw him into a Ditch and lay his Gloves and other Things upon the Bank Tryal fol. 20. to make the Tale Square with the Original To say nothing of the Risque of Discovery upon the Place or upon the Way and the Vanity of so much as Hoping to Prevail upon any Man in his Right Wits either to Vndertake or Believe so Ridiculous an Adventure Upon the whole Matter If People had but taken Half the Pains to Detect and to Crush this Imposture that they did to Countenance and Conceal it the Cheat could never have stood a Six Minutes Close Examination For the Witnâ—sses Launch'd out into such a Variety of Circumstances and Matters that it was wholly Impossible for them so to Concert their Lessons as not to lye open to a Hundred Surprizes It was a kind of Fantastical if not an Vnaccountable Resolution taken to send the Body away to Primrose-hill and just to such a Ditch there A Place that 't is odds none of the Assassins ever so much as heard of Before and to give such Orders as they pretend they did about the Disposing of things
to Christianity and call for Fire from Heaven even in the Case of Religion it self do not know of what Spirit they are In One word All Extremes are Stark Naught both in Divinity and in Reason and One Ill Circumstance is Sufficient to Destroy the Merit and to Blast the Glory of the most Honourable Vndertaking and Pretence A man may Cut the Throat of his Own Religion by Contending for 't How many Men have we seen to Set-up and pass for Patriots in Common Fame and Reputation that in the Sight of God and in the Courts both of Law and Conscience have been found no betrer then Arrant Traitors This is no more then to say that we are to Govern All our Actions with a respect to Persons Customs Laws Times Places Duty Good Manners Proportion Measure and Discretion 'T is Possible that a man may Forfeit One Privilege or Title by Invading Another and Lose what he has Already by Grasping at more then belongs to him To say Nothing of the Imprudence of the Weaker Provoking the Stronger the Vnwarrantableness of Subjects Stepping out of their Province to Intermeddle in Matters of State the Sin as well as the Scandal of Irreverent and Contemptuous Innuendo's The Impotency of an Intemperate Ardour of Contention the Affectation of Popular Applause in Setting-up for the Head of a Party c. These and a Hundred other Difficulties came into my Head upon This Occasion and I was Heartily afraid what might come on 't if the Wisdom of the Serpent should not Accompany the Innocence of the Dove for there goes more then Greek and Latin to the making of a Thorough-Wise Man and if States men and Divines would but Respectively Attend to their Proper Functions they would e'en find as much work as they could turn their Hands to in their Own Trade And then the Better the Worse when the Burning Intention of Holiness makes People forget the Indispensable Allegeance of a Civil Duty But to come now to the Point I was thus thinking within my self If the bare Name and Fancy of Popery had the Power to Destroy One Imperial Protestant Prince and to Endanger Another together with the very Foundations both of Church and State in Three Kingdoms and without any Other Aid to the Doing of it then the Artificial Manage of the Imposture What will not the Same Cheat over again under Our Circumstances be able to bring about if any Vnwary Zelots among our selves should chance to Ioyn in the Same Fears and Iealousies and give Credit to the Conspiracy We have the Word of a Prince of Faith and Honour for our Security A Prince of Grace and Clemency A Prince of Power Iustice and Resolution and it will be our Own Fault if we fail of our Own Desires and Wishes Diffidence in the Case is both an Ingratitude and a Provocation Or if we canot avoid Beeing Distrustfull 't is Extremely Vain yet Foolish and Extravagant to Talk on 't for we do not only Betray our Selves but Create Suspicions in Others and where Subjects are the Aggressors 't is Time for Princes to look about them Insomuch that 't is Base to Suspect Foolish to Discover our selves and Bootless to Struggle where we are Sure to be Worsted The Honour of Princes is to be kept Religiously Sacred in Thought Word and Deed And however the Law may Mince the Matter a man may as well in Conscience Defame his Prince in words at length as by a Glance If a man Preaches upon This Text All Mouths are presently Open upon him with a What Shan't we Defend our Religion I Answer Yes Vndoubtedly He that upon Good Grounds finds himself in Possession of the Truth ought rather to Dye then Relinquish it Fathers Mothers Brothers Sisters Friends Relations Acquaintances Life and Estate are All Nothing to 't where they fall in Competition But then the Defence must be Apostolical Primitive and Christian without Noise Tumult or Force There must be no Drawing of Swords in the Case No not so much as any Grumbling Calumniating or Repining Towards it No Cutting of Ears off No Military Executions For to Trouble Governments under That Pretext is to Renounce the Doctrine of Christianity and Example of our Blessed Saviour Himself What 's the Difference betwixt Actual Violence and Scandalous Provoking Words and Practices that Leade to 't any more then as they are Several Links of the Same Chain 'T is the Heart sets the Tongue at Work The Tongue the Hands And 't is the Devil Himself that blows the Coal of Sedition into a Blaze of Religion How often have I Talk'd and Turn'd These Thoughts and Discourses over and over upon Occasion of Considering the State of our Affairs Why These Animosities say I among Christians upon the Subject of Religion in so Notorious a Contradiction to the Faith that we Profess As if the Salvation of a Nominal Protestant depended upon the Damnation of a Papist Neither are We to Stand or to Fall upon Their Bottom nor They upon Ours but Evesy Man to his Own Master Cannot I Maintain my Own Religion without Waging War against Anothers There 's room enough upon the Points wherein we Agree and upon the Topique of Good Life and Manners for the Christian and Charitable Exercise of Holy Duties And as to the Points that are in Controversy we may Deliver and Assert our Own Perswasion without Lashing out into Invectives against People of a Differing Tast. That Bitterness of Spirit does not become the Disciples of our Blessed Lord. Beside that the Multitude are Prone enough to Faction of Themselves without Incentives to 't and need no Encouragement or Example to Transport them into Distempers Nay it is a Matter of Dangerous Consequence to have them Wonted or so much as Permitted to Rail at Things that they do not Vnderstand For it puts them in Possession of a most Pernicious Liberty which will take the Same Freedom in State that it does in Religion when they are once set a gog by Thiâ— Itch of Meddling upon Controversy and Brawl without any Sense of the Truth and Reason of Things Let the Doctors Sport Themselves like the Lâ—viathan in the Depths and Subtleties of the Schools The Simplicity of the Gospel takes no Delight in High Flights and Figures Neither are the Common People Proper Iudges of Abstruse and Mysterious Points Their Province is Reasonable Resignation and Dutyfull Obedience without taking upon them the Office of the Chair Their Bus'ness is the Plain Truth of Things and not to trouble their Heads about the Cracking of Controversies that are too Hard for their Teeth 'T is a kind of a Protestant Implicit Faith to Assent to they know not what and I take an Vnknown Meaning to be Every jot as Bad as an Vnknown Tongue There can be no Edification without a Due Vnderstanding of the Matter Propounded And it is much about the Same Thing too in Religion as it is in Government I find Little or No Difference upon the
Parity of the Reason betwixt Haranguing against Popery at Cripplegate for the purpose and against Arbitrary Power at Guâ—â—ohall The Reforming Porters and Car-men of One and Forty understood Privileges of Parliament Every jot as well as they did the Right of the Bishops Uotes In fine This is a way to Transport People not to Enform them and to make a Party without any Prospect of Clearing or Establishing a Truth With These Contemplations and Precautions about me and not without Divers Previous Discourses and Deliberations upon the Sober Apprehensions I had of the Hazzard of a Mistaken Zeal on That Notable Change and Conjuncture of Affairs I Proceeded to This Third and Concluding Part of my Observations I found that the Church of England could not either in Honour Reason or Prudence Doubt of his Majesties Goodness Iustice and Protection and Consequently of her own Safety nor in Truth run any Risque at all but by the Forfeiture of That Loyalty to all manner of Purposes which she has ever Practic'd and Profess'd I Consider'd as I ought to do the Mighty Work of Divine Providence in the Disposition of the Crown and the Fatality of any Gross Miscarriage in the Matter of Reverence and Duty on the Part of the Subject I had in my Thoughts a Thousand Difficulties what the Heats of Some the Ignorance of Others the Feuds and the Piques of Mutineers as well as of Vnthinking Zelots might probably bring upon us without Singular Care and Moderation toward the Preventing of Mischief But the Thing I fear'd above all others was the Imposture of Wolves dress'd up in Sheeps Clothing and least the Common Enemies of our Peace and Wellfare a Sort of People among our selves that stick neither to Canon nor Rubrique should cast out a Bone betwixt his Majesty and the Loyal Subjects of his Blessed Father and Brother and no Less of his ROYAL SELF and Cry The Church of England did it As if so many Rogues in Red Coats should Robb the Kings Chappel and Cry the Guards did it Upon this Agitation of Matters I concluded within my self that This was the Time for the Kings Reformed Subjects of the Establish'd Church of England to make Good the Character of their Integrity and the Allegiance of their Profession and without Complementing-away Articles of Faith to Ioyn with the Roman Catholiques in a Harmony of Reverence to their Prince as Fellow-Subjects to the same Master For the Scandal is not to be Born not to be Defended and never to be Forgiven to Charge Roman Catholicks with Vndutifullness to their Sovereign and yet at the same Time not to Vnite as Franckly with Roman Catholicks in the Defence of a Prince of That Persuasion as ever the Roman Catholiques did with Church-of-England-men in Defence of his Majesties Protestant Faâ—â—er In One word more for I would be very Explicit upon this Subject I bent my Vttermost Endeavours toward the Allaying and the Pacifying of all Vnkindnesses and Aversions which My Interpreters have been pleas'd to call A Project for the Uniting of the Two Churches and to Issue-out so many Anathema's and Fulminations against me for that if their Prayers had been Heard I had been Fifty Fathom Vnder Ground before this Time. Here lies the Core of the Vlcer and who but the Noisy Advocates as they pretend for the Protestant Cause to Move This Wrath and Indignation against me They look Big and Grave They Garnish the Matter out with Pomp Form and Solemnity and when they have turn'd up their Stomachs their Disciples Gather up the Qualm as the Lesser Poets did Homers and set-up for Authours upon 't But in fine the Story has not One Syllable of Truth in 't as is made evident beyond All Contradiction over and over in These Papers and yet betwixt Credulity Passion Lazyness and want of Skill in Common Sense Transubâ—tantiation and Idolatry the Bug-bear of the Times has not been more Sbittle-Cock'd then This Argument the Plot it self was not more Believ'd nor the Story of it more Ridiculous Nay This very Practice is a Branch of it And what 's my Crime at last taking it at the very Worst of their Own Construction but the Hunting and Discovering of a Pack of Forsworn Miscreants and laying Open the Confederacy betwixt the Mercenary Brutes and their more Execrable Masters Which I have done with the Conscience of a Christian a Subject a Church-of-England-man and a Lover of Iustice I never lik'd the Hobby-Horsing Processions of Godfreys Funeral and the Burnings of the Pope And it is but Natural for Those that were up to the Ears in the Plot when I was Tooth and Nail against it to Hate Me for Presuming to be in the Right when they were in the Wrong But to come now at last to a Close upon This Question the short-English of the Device was to make as Arrant a Iugling Sacramenting Rascal of me Saving the Then Kings Evidences as ever Renounc'd God upon the Holy Altar They did not only Propagate my Shame by Word of Mouth Hand it from One to Another Well-nigh the Only Tradition that they would Allow of and Spread it abroad in their Missives and Intelligences where they were sure it could not be Contradicted but they Clubb'd I know not how many of 'em to the Libelling of me in Print Insomuch that I was forc'd to Complain to their Right Reverend Diocesan of the Hard Vsage in a Pamphlet call'd The Observator Defended Where I set forth the Naked Truth of the Bus'ness and after the Exposing of the Sham I heard no more on 't Now for Your Parts Gentlemen that were not so much as in Beeing when These Ceremonies Pass'd what Opinion would You have Entertain'd of This Abominable Observator without These Papers to Enform your Iudgments and to keep you Vpright in the Ways of Honour Charity and Iustice What would you have Thought of a Creature that should have come down to you in Thousands of Pamphlets Mercuries Pacquets Domestiques c. in the Shape of so many several sorts of Rogue And all this for the sake of an Interest where the Master was Painted yet Blacker then the Servant Before I go any further I must desire you to take Notice of the Particular Date of This Preface and to Compute upon the Present Face of Things as well as upon the Whole Antecedent Matter Who were the True Friends to the Church of England the Plaintiffs or the Defendent and whether I do not Rise the very same Man in April 1687. that I Sat down in April 1681 I am No Prophet nor the Son of a Prophet but I do not know any One Accident of State that I have either Mis-judg'd or Mis-represented in all These Papers And I do persuade my self that I was never more in the Right then in the Iudgment I made and the Measures I took upon This Last Revolution for the Point is Clear even to the degree of a Demonstration and that the Two things that I mainly
is no Security or Safety for the Protestant Religion the King's Life or the Well-Constituted and Established Government of This Kingdom without Passing a Bill for Disabling James Duke of York to Inherit the Imperial Crown of England and Ireland and the Dominions and Territories thereunto belonging and to Rely upon any other Means and Remedies without such a Bill is not only Insufficient but Dangerous Here 's the Horrid Popish English Plot made the Ground for the Excluding of the Duke and keeping the King short of Mony according to the Intent of the Votes of Ian. 7. 1680. above-mention'd And That 's made the Foundation likewise for the Refusal in the Address before-Cited in the very Syllables of the said Address That your Majesties Sacred Life is in Continual Danger under the Prospect of a Popish Successor is Evident not only from the Principles of Those Devoted to the Church of Rome but also from the Testimonies Given in the Prosecution of the Horrid Popish Plot against Divers Traytors Attainted for Designing to put Those Accursed Principles into Practice against your Majesty There needs no Subtlety of Quirking or Reasoning upon this Case of MONY the Spite of it lying so Open that Every Common Eye sees thorough it and that the Terms the Republican Cabal Treated upon in some of those Parliaments were no other then a Tryal of Skill to see if they could bring his Late Majesty to a Composition for his Crown For the King was to have No Mony but upon Conditions of Disinheriting his Brother and more yet as I shall shew in Due Place Contrary to all the Tyes of Conscience Gratitude Iustice and Prudence And All for fear of a Damnable Hellish Popish Plot. We shall see now how they Dealt with his Majesty likewise in the Matter of Power No Power THE Power of a Prince Exerts it self in the Means of an Ample Revenue to Answer all the Necessities of the Crown to Pay his Troups and to Reward Honourable Services In the Privileges of Sovereign Authority the Love and the Reputation that he has in the Hearts of his People In the Arms of his Militia the Command of his Subjects and the Chearfull Obedience of his Friends They had allready Maim'd and Disabled his Late Sacred Majesty in the First Great Point of his Revenue That which comes-on Next is to see how they dealt with him in respect of his Power of Prerogative in General and as to his Forces both by Land and by Sea in Particular and whether the whole Proceeding was not still Grounded upon the Damnable Bug-bear of the Popish Plot. How they us'd him upon the Matter of his Credit and Friends shall come-on in due Time. But to Proceed now to an Enquiry how they handled him upon the Subject of his Prerogative First in the Case of the Earl of Danby The Kings Prerogative of Pardoning Question'd REsolved That an Humble Address be made to His Majesty Representing to his Majesty the Irregularity and Illegality of the Pardon mentioned by his Majesty to be Granted to the Earl of Danby and the Dangerous Consequence of Granting Pardons to Any Persons that lie under an Impeachment of the Commons of England Here 's the Kings Power of Life and Death shaken at the very Root and what 's the Unpardonable Crime at last but This among Others That he is Popishly-Affected and hath Trayterously Conceal'd after he had Notice of the Late Horrid Plot or Conspiracy Contrived by the Papists against his Majesties Person and Government and hath Suppress'd the Evidence and Reproachfully Discountenanced the Kings Witnesses in the Discovery of it in favour of Popery Immediately tending to the Destruction of the Kings Sacred Person and Subversion of the Protestant Religion There happen'd no Evil under the Sun in those Days but the Late Horrid Plot or somewhat like it had still a Finger in the Pye But from Pardoning in my Lord Danby's Case they proceeded afterward to a Bolder Step in my Lord Staffords and to make a Moot-Point of it whether the King by his Prerogative could so much as Remit any Part of the Sentence but Sir W. I. gave his Opinion upon 't in Favour of the Prerogative upon a very Weighty Reason This House says he lyeth not under any Obligation to Offer at any Opposition nor concern themselves herein Especially at This Time when such a Dispute may End in Preventing of the Execution of the said Lord Stafford And therefore I do humbly Conceive you may do well to give your Consent that the said Writ be Executed according to its Tenor. The Short of the Bus'ness was This Sentence of Death was pass'd in Form upon my Lord Stafford and the Kings Writ to the Sheriffs Commanded only his Head to be Sever'd from his Body Bethel and Cornish the then Sheriffs of London and Middlesex Apply'd themselves by Petition to the Lords to know whether they should Obey the Writ or Not The Lords found the Scruples Vnnecessary and Declar'd That the Kings Writ ought to be Obey'd After this to the Commons Stating the Matter under These Four Following Quaeries I speak upon the Credit of the Collection of Debates above-mention'd 1. Whether the King being neither Iudge nor Party can Order the Execution 2. Whether the Lords can award Execution 3. Whether the King can Dispense with any part of the Execution 4. If the King can Dispense with some part of the Execution why not with All Upon the Debate it was in the Conclusion Resolved That This House is CONTENT That is to say it does VOVCHSAFE and with MVCH A-DO too that the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex do Execute William Late Viscount Stafford by Severing his Head from his Body only The Story of these Insolencies will never be Believ'd in After-Ages but however we are upon the Foot still of the Trayterous and Execrable Conspiracy for the Imprisoning Deposing and Murdering his Sacred Majesty and the Raising and Disposing of Men Monys Arms and other Things Necessary for their Wicked and Trayterous Designs and Namely a Commission for William Viscount Stafford to be Paymaster of the Army HEre 's a Dreadfull Bus'ness as the Good Woman said about this same Trayterous and Execrable Conspiracy Pray the Lord it be all True at Last for the Government was Mightily off the Hinges about it and the Fountain of Mercy and Power seem'd to be quite Dry'd-up The Sheriffs were become the Peoples Officers and the Commons made Iudges of the Validity of the King 's Writ The Style of Authority was no longer We Charge and Command but Resolv'd upon the Question and the Power of the Keys dropt into St. Stephens Chapel Parliamentary as well as Pardoning Power Encroch'd upon AND that they might not seem Partial to One Prerogative more then Another They struck at the King's Power of Parliaments as well as of Pardons and finding that an Everlasting Parliament Agreed so well with their Predecessors