sincerity from 〈…〉 at noble principle that conscience ought not to be constrained nor people forced in matters of meer Religion as he would delude weak and easie people to believe and had not all his Arbitrary and illegal proceedings in granting Liberty to Dissenting Protestants been to subserve and promote other designes which it is not yet seasonable and convenient to discover and avow he would have then acted with that conformity to the Principle he professeth to be under the influence and Government of and with that consonancy and harmonious agreeableness in all the degrees of Indulgence vouchsased to those of the Reformed Religion in England and Scotland that differ from them of the established way that there would have needed no second Proclamation apporting new measures of Liberty and favour to Scotts Dissenters seeing they would have had it granted them at first in the same latitude and illimitedness that it was bestowed upon the English nonconformists But when Princes carry on and pursue mischievous designes under the palliations of Religion publick good and the Right of Mankind it comes often to pass thro adapting their methods to what they mean and intend and not to what they pretend and give out that their crafty projections by being not sufficiently accommodated to their purposes prove ineffectual to the compassing what was aim'd at and this forceth them to a new game of falsehood and subtilety but still under the old varnish and gloss and obligeth them to have recourse to means that may be more proportioned than the former were for their reaching the End that they ubtimately drive at Thence it is that those Rulers who are engaged in the prosecution of wicked and unjustifiable designes are necessitated not only to apply themselves to opposite Methods towards different parties and those such as must be suited and apportioned to their discrepant interests without the accommodating of which they can neither hope to mould them to that tame and servile compliance nor work them up to that active and vigorous abetting of their malicious and crasty projections as is necessary for the rendring them succesful but they are forced to vary their proceedings towards one and the same Party and that as well when the ways they have acted in towards them are found inadequate to the End unto which they were calculated as when the mischief hid under them comes to be too soon discovered This weak and short-sighted people fancy to arise from an uncertainty in Princes councels and from their being at no consistency with themselves but they who can penetrate into affairs and that do consider things more narrowly can easily discern that all this variation diversity and shifting of methods in Rulers actings proceed from other causes and that it is their stability and perseverance in an illegal and wicked design that compels them to those crooked and contrary Courses either for the gaining the unwary and ill applyed concurrence of their Subjects to the hastning distress and desolation upon themselves or for the throwing them into that lethargy and under that supiness as may hinder them from all endeavours of obstructing and diverting the evils that their Governours are seeking to bring upon them Nor is there a more certain indication of a Princes being engaged in a design contrary to the good and happiness of the Society over which he is set than his betaking himself to illegal ways upon pretence of promoting the ease and benefit of his people or according as he finds his Subjects to differ in their particular interests his applying himself to them in methods whereof the contrariety of the one to the other renders them the more proper and adapted to ensnare the divided factions thro accosting each of them with something that they are severally fond of Legal means are always sufficient to the pursuing and compassing legal Ends and whatsoever is for the general good of the Community may either be obtained by courses wherein the generallity find their united interest and common felicity or else by application to a Parliament freely and duly chosen which as it represents the whole politick Society so there may be expected most compassion and tenderness as well as wisdom and prudence for redressing the grievances easing the troubles and providing for the benefit and safety of all that are wrapt up in and represented by them And as every Prince who sincerely seeks and pursues the advantage of his People will so adjust and attemper all his actions towards them that his whole carriage shall be uniform and all the exercises of his Governing power meet in the benefit of the Community as so many lines from a circumserence uniting in their Centre so there needs no other proof that these two or three late Actions of His Majesty which a foolish sort of men are apt to interpret for favours and to account them effects of compassion and kindness are but to conceal his malice and to subserve as well as cover some fatal and pernicious design that he is carrying on against his Protestant Subjects than that while he is gratifying a few of them in one thing he is at the same time robbing all of them of many and that while he is indulging the Dissenters with a Freedom from the penal Laws for matters of Religion he is invading the properties and subverting the Civil Rights of the three Nations and changing the whole Constitution of the Government He that strips us of what belongs unto us as we are English and Scotts men cannot mean honestly in the savours he pretends to vouchsafe us as we are Christians nor can he that is endeavouring to enslave our persons and to subject our Estates to his Arbitrary lust and pleasure intend any thing else by this kindness granted to Fanaticks in matters of Religion than the dividing them from the rest of the People in what concerns the Civil Interest and external happiness of the Community and to render them an engaged Faction to assist and abet him in enthralling the Kingdoms Whosoever considers the whole Tenor of his Majesties other Actings in proroguing and dissolving Parliaments when he finds them uncompliant with his 〈…〉 pish and despotical Ends his keeping on 〈…〉 ot a formidable Arâ—â— against all the 〈…〉 aws of the Land and upon no other in 〈…〉 ention but to maintain him in his Usurpa 〈…〉 on s over our Rights and to awe us into 〈…〉 tame and servile submission to his Preroga 〈…〉 ve will His filling all places of Judicature â—ith weak as well as Treacherous persons who instead of administring Justice may be â—he Instruments of Tyranny his robbing men of their Estates by judicial forms and under â—retence that nullum tempus occurris Râ—gi after they have been quietly enjoyed by the Subjects for several hundred years his advanâ—ing none to Civil or Military Employs but whom he hath some confidence in as to the finding them ready to execute his despotical â—njunctions and his esteeming no persons
subverting our Religion and also further to enlighten and confirm others in the just apprehensions they are possessed with of the design carrying on in Grear Brittain and Ireland for the extirpation of Protestancy and that the late Declaration for Liberty of Conscience is emitted in subserviency thereunto and calculated by the Court toward the paving and preparing the way for the more facile accomplishment of it And while Mercinary Sycophants by their Flatteries infect and corrupt Princes and by their Representing them to the World in Colours disagreable from their tempers and dispositions and in milder and fairer Characters than any thing observable in them either deserveth or correspondeth with do delude Subjects into such Opinions of them as beget a neglect of means for preserving themselves 't is become a necessary Duty and an indispensable Service to mankind to deal plainly and above board that so by describing Kings as they are and setting them in a true and just Light we may prevent the Peoples being further imposed upon or if through suffering themselves to be still deceived they come to fall under miseries and persecutions they may lay all their Distresses and Desolations at the door of their own folly in not having taken care how to avoid what they were not only threatned with but whereof they were warned and advertised For as I am not of Sr. Roger l'Estranges mind That if we cannot avoide being distrustful of our Safety yet it is extreamly vain foolish and extravagant to talk of it so I am very sensible how many of the French Ministers by painting forth their King more like a God than a Man and by possessing their people with a belief of Wisdom Justice Grace and Mercy in Him of which they knew him destitute they both emboldned him to attempt what he hath perpetrated and laid them under snares which they know not how to disentangle themselves from in order to escape it Nor would the King of England have acted with that neglect of the future Safety of the Papists nor have exposed them to the resentment and hereafter revenge of three Nations by the Arbitrary and Illegal steps he hath made in their favour if he intended any thing less than the putting Protestants for ever out of capacity and condition of calling them to a reckoning and exacting an account of them which neither He nor they about him can have the weakness to think they have sufficiently provided against without compelling us by an Order of à la mode France Missionaries to turn Catholicks or by adjudging us to Mines and Galleys according to the Versailles President for our Heretical Stubborness or which is the more expeditious way of converting three Kingdoms to cause murder the Protestant Inhabitants according to the pattern which his Loyal Irish Catholicks endeavoured to have set anno 1641. for the conversion of that Nation Had his Majesty been contented with the bare avowing and publishing himself to be of the Communion of the Church of Rome and of challenging a Liberty tho against Law for the Exercise of his Religion it might have awakened our Pity and Compassion to see him embrace a Religion where there are so many impediments of Salvation and in doing whereof he was become obnoxious unto the imprecation of his Grandfather who wished the curse of God to fall upon such of his Posterity as should at any time turn Papists but it would have raised no intemperated heats in the minds of any against him much less have alienated them from the Subjection and Obedience which are due unto their Soveraign by the Laws of the several Kingdoms and the Fundamental Rules of the respective Constitutions Or could he have been contented with waving the rigorous Execution of the Laws against Papists of whatsoever Quality Rank or Order they were and with the bestowing personal and private Favours upon those of his Religion it would have been so far from begetting rancor or discontent in his Protestant Subjects that they would not only have connived at and approved such a procedure and those little Benignities and Kindnesses but had the Papists quietly acquiesced in them and modestly improved them it might have been a means of reconciling the Nation to more lenity towa 〈…〉 them for the future and might have iâ— fluenced our Legislators when God sh 〈…〉 vouchsafe us a Protestant on the Throne 〈◊〉 moderate the Severities to which by thâ— Laws in being they are obnoxious and 〈◊〉 render their condition as easie and safe 〈◊〉 that of other Subjects and only to take car 〈…〉 for precluding them such places of poweâ— and trust as should prevent their being ab 〈…〉 to hurt us but could bring no damage or iâ— convenience upon themselves But thâ— King instead of terminating here anâ— allowing only such Graces and Immun 〈…〉 ties to the Popists as would have been 〈◊〉 nough for the placing them in the priva 〈…〉 Exercise of their Religion with Security 〈◊〉 them and without any threatning dangeâ— to us He hath not only suspended all thâ— penal Laws against Roman Catholicks but 〈◊〉 hath by an usurped Prerogative that is par 〈…〉 mount to the Rules of the Constitution and 〈◊〉 all Acts of Parliament dispensed with anâ— disabled the Laws that enjoin the Oath of A 〈…〉 legeance and Supremacy and which appoi 〈…〉 and prescribe the Tests that were the Fenceâ— which the Wisdom of the Nation ha 〈…〉 erected for preserving the Legislative A 〈…〉 thority securing the Government and keeping places of Power Magistracy and Offic 〈…〉 in the Hands of Protestants and thereby 〈◊〉 continuing the Protestant Religion and Engli 〈…〉 Liberties to our selves and the generation that shall come after us And as if this werâ— not sufficient to awaken us to a consideration of the danger we are sin of havinâ— our Religion supplanted and overthrown He hath not only advanced the most viole 〈…〉 Papists unto all places of Military comman 〈…〉 by Sea and Land but hath established many of them in the Chief Trusts and Offi 〈…〉 of Magistracy and Civil Judicature so th 〈…〉 there are scarce any continued in Poweâ— and Employment save they who have 〈◊〉 ther promised to turn Roman Catholicks 〈◊〉 who have engaged to concur and assist 〈◊〉 the subverting our Liberties and Religion uâ— der the Mask and disguise of Protestan 〈…〉 〈◊〉 is already evident that it is beyond the â—â—lp and relief of all Peaceable and Civil â—eans to preserve and uphold the Protestant â—eligion in Ireland and that nothing but force â—nd an intestine War can retrieve it unto â—nd reestablish it there in any degree of safe 〈…〉 Nor is it less apparent from the Arbiâ—â—ary and Tyrannous Oath ordained to be â—â—quired of His Majesties Protestant Subjects 〈◊〉 Scotland whereby they are to swear Oâ—â—dience to Him without Reserve that our Reâ—â—gion is held only precariously in that Kingâ—â—m and that whensoever he shall please to â—â—mmand the establishment of Popery and 〈◊〉 enjoin the
narrow power and intereâ—â— would extend It ought therefore to lay uâ— under a conviction what we are to expecâ— from His Majesty on the Throne when wâ— find the whole thread and series of his conduct while a Subject to have been a continued design against our Religion and an uninterrupted plot for the subversion of our Laws and Liberties 'T is sufficiently known how active he alway's was to keep up and inflame the differences among Protestants and how he was both a great Promoter of all the severe Laws made against Dissenters and a continual instigator to the rigorouâ— Execution of them So that his affirming it to have been ever his judgment that none ought to be oppressed and persecuted for matters of Religion nor to be hindred in Worshipping God according to their several perswasions serves only to inform us either with what little Honesty Honor and Conscience Hâ— acted in concurring to the making of the foresaid Laws or what small faith and credit is now to be given to his Declaration and to what he hath since the Emission of it repeated both in his Speech to Mr. Penn and in his Letter to Mr. Alsop And to omit many other Instances of his kindness and Benignity to the Fanaticks whom he now so much huggs and caresseth it may not be amiss to remember them and all other Protestants of that Barbarous and illegal Commission issued forth by the Council of Scotland while He as the late Kings High Commissioner had the management of the affaires of that Kingdom by which every Military Officer that had command over twelve men was impower'd to impannel Juries try condemn and cause to be put to death not only those who should be found to disclaim the Kings Authority but such as should refuse to acknowledg the Kings new modelled Supremacy over that Church in the pursuance and execution of which Commission some were shot to death others were hang'd or drowned and this not only during the conti 〈…〉 〈◊〉 oâ— the Reign of his late Majesty â—ut 〈◊〉 〈…〉 e a year and a half after the preâ—â—nt King came to the Crown But what â—eed is there of insisting upon such little parâ—â—culars wherein he was at all times ready 〈◊〉 express his malice to Protestants seeing 〈…〉 e have not only Dr. Oates's Testimony 〈…〉 d that of divers others but most authen 〈…〉 ck proofs from Mr. Coleman's Letters of 〈…〉 s having been in a Conspiracy several years 〈…〉 r the subversion of our Religion upon the 〈…〉 eritorious and sanctified Motive of extir 〈…〉 ating the Northern Heresie Of which be 〈…〉 de all the Evidence that four Successive â—arliaments arrived at I know several who 〈…〉 nce the Duke of York ascended the Throne have had it confirmed unto them by â—ivers forraign Papists that were less reâ—â—rved or more ingenuous than many of 〈…〉 hat Communion use to be To question 〈…〉 he Existence of that Plot and his present Majesties having been accessory unto and in 〈…〉 he head of it argues a strange effrontery and 〈…〉 mpudence thro casting an aspersion of weakness folly and injustice not only upon those three Parliaments that seem'd to have reâ—ained some zeal for English Liberties but by fastning the same imputations upon the 〈…〉 ong Parliament which had shew'd it self at all times more obsequious to the will of the Court than was either for their own Honor or the safety and Interest of the Kingdom and who had expressed a Veneration for the Royal Family that approached too much unto a degree of Idolatry Whosoever considers that Train of Councels wherein the King was many years engaged and whereof we felt the woful effects in the burning of London the frequent Prorogation and Dissolution of Parliaments the widening and exasperating Differences among Protestants the â—â—irring up and provoking Civil Magistrates and Ecclesiastical Courts to persecute Dissenters and the maintaining Correspondencies with the Pope and Catholick Princes abroad to the dishonor of the Nation and danger of our Laws and Religion cannot avoid being apprehensive what we are now to look for at his hands nor can he escape thinking that he esteems his Advancement to the Crown both a reward from heaven for what he hath done and plotted against these three Kingdoms and an opportunity and advantage administred unto him for the perfecting and accomplishment of all those Designes with which he hath been so long bigg and in travel for the destruction of our Religion the subversion of our Laws and the reestablishment of Popery in these Dominions The conduct and guidance under which His Majesty hath put himself and the fiery temper of that Order to whose Government he hath resigned his Conscience may greatly add to our fears and give us all the jealousie and dread that we are capable of being impressed with in reference to matters to come that there is nothing which can be fatal to our Religion or persons that we may not expect the being called to conflict with and suffer For tho most of the Popish Ecclesiasticks especially the Regulars bear an inveterate malice to Protestants and hold themselves under indispensable Obligations of eradicating whatsoever their Church stiles Heresie and have accordingly been alway's forward to stirr up and provoke Rulers to the use and application of force for the destruction of Protestants as a Company of perverse and obstinate Hereticks adjuged and condemned to the Stake and Gibbet by the infallible Chaire yet of all men in the Communion of the Romish Church and of their Religious Orders the Jesuites are they who do most hate us and whose Councels have been most sanguinary and alway's tending to influence those Monarchs whose Consciences they have had the guiding and conducting of to the utmost Cruelties and Barbarities towards us What our Brethern have had measured out to them in France thro Father de la Chaise's influence upon that King ' and thro the bewitching power and domination he hath over him in the quality of his Confessor and as having the direction of his Conscience may very well allarm and inform us what we ought to expect from His Majesty of Great Brittain who hath surrendred his Conscience to the guidance of Father Peters a person of the same Order and of the like mischievous and bloody disposition that the former is 'T is well observed by the Author of the Reasons against repealing the Acts of Parliament concerning the Test that Cardinal Howard's being of such a meek and gentle temper that is able to withstand the Malignity of his Religion and to preserve him from concurring in those mischievous Councels which his purple might seem to oblige him unto is the reason of his being shut out from acquaintance with and interest in the English affaires transacted at Rome and that whatsoever his Majesty hath to do in that Court is managed by his Ambassador under the sole direction of the Jesuites So that it is not without cause that the Jesuite of Leige in his
REPRESENTATION Of The Threatning Dangers Impending Over PROTESTANTS In GREAT BRITTAIN With an Account of the Arbitrary and Popish Ends unto which the Declaration for Liberty of Conscience in England and the Proclamation for a Toleration in Scotland are designed Neque enim satis amarint bonos Principes qui malos satis non oderint Plin. in Panegyr c. 53. Sedem obtinet Principis ue sit Domino locus id ibid. c. 55. Tantum tibi licet quantum per leges licebit Pacat. ad Theodos. August THey are great strangers to the Transactions of the World who know not how many and various the attempts of the Papists have been both to hinder all endeavours towards a Reformation to overthrow and subvert it where it hath obtained and prevailed For beside the innumerable Executions and Murders committed by means of the Inquisition to crush and stiffle the Reformed Religion in its rise and birth and to prevent its succeeding and settlement in Spain Italy and many other Territories there is no Kingdom or State where it hath so far prevailed as to come to be universally received and legally established but it hath been through strange and wonderful conflicts with the rage and malice of the Church of Rome The Persecutions which the Primitive Christians underwent by vertu ' of the Edicts of the Pagan Emperoâ—s were not more sanguinary and cruel than what through the Laws and Ordinances of Popish Princes have been inflicted upon those who have testified against the Heresies Superstitions and Idolatries and have withdrawn from the Communion of the Papal Church Nor were the Martyrs that suffered for the Testimony of Jesus against Heathenism either more numerous or worthier of esteem for vertu ' Iustice and Piety than they who have been slaughtered upon no other pretence but for Endeavouring to restore the Christian Religion to the simplicity and purity of its Divine and first Institution and to recover it from the corruptions wherewith it was become universally tainted in Doctrine Worship and Discipline How have all the Nations in Europe been soak't with the Blood of Saints through the Barbarous Rage of Popish Rulers whom the Roman Bishops and Clergy stirred up and instigated in order to support themselves in their secular grandure and in their Tyranny over the Consciences of men and to keep the World in Slavery under Ignorance Errors Superstition and Idolatry which the reducing Christianity again to the Rule of the Gospel would have redeemed mankind from and been an effectual means to have dissipated and subverted They of the Roman Communion having strangely corrupted the Christian Religion in its Faith Worship and Discipline and having prodigiously altered it from what it was in the Doctrines and Institutions of our Saviour and his Apostles they found no other way whereby to sustain their Errors and Corruptions and to preserve themselves in the possession of that Empire which they had usurped over Conscience and in the enjoyment of the Wealth and secular Greatness which by working upon the Ignorance Superstition Lusts and Prophanness of People they had skrewed and wound themselves into but by adjudging all who durst detect or oppose them to fire and Sword or to miseries to which Death in its worst shape were preferrable Nor have they for the better obstructing the growth and compassing the Extirpation of the Reformed Religion omitted either the Arts and Subtlities of Julian or the Fury and Violence of Galâ—rius and Diâ—cletian Whosoever hath not observed the Craft and Rage that have been employed and exerted against Protestants for these 170. Years must have been very little Conversant in Histories and strangely overlook't the conduct of affaires in the World and the Transactions in Churches and States during their own time And tho the Papists do not think it fit to put their Maxim's for preserving the Catholick Religion and converting Hereticks in Execution at all times and in every place yet some of their Writers are so ingenuous as to tell us the reason of it and that they do not forbear it upon Principles of Christianity or good Nature but upon motives of Policy and Fear lest the cutting one of our Throats might endanger two of their own However they have been careful not to suffer a period of twenty years to elapse since the beginning of the Reformation without affording us in some place or another renewed evidences of Papal Charity and of the Roman method of hindring the growth of Heresie either by a Massacre War or Persecution begun and executed upon no other account or provocation but meerly that of our Religion and because we cannot believe and practice in the matters of God as they do And having obtained of late great Advantages for the pursuing their malice against us more boldly and avowedly than at an other Season and that not only through a strange concurrence and conjunction of Princes in the Papal Communion who are more intoxicated with their Superstitions and Idolatries or less wise merciful and humane than some of their Predecessors of that Fellowship were but through having obtained a Prince intirely devoted unto them under the implicit guidance of their Priests to be advanced unto a Throne where such sometime used to sit as were the Terror of Rome the Safeguard of the Reformed Religion and the Sanctuary of oppresed Protestants they have thereupon both assumed a Courage of stirring up new and unpresidented Persecutions in divers places against the most useful best and loyallest of Subjects upon no other charge or Allegation but for dissenting from the Tridentine Faith and denying Subjection to the Tripple Crown and are raised into a Confidence of wholly Extirpating Protestancy and of reestablishing the Papal Tyrannies and Superstition in the several Countries whence they had been expelled or stood so depressed and discountenanced as that the Votaries and Partizans of their Church had not the Sway and Domination Nor need we any other conviction both of their Design and of their Confidence of Succeeding in it than what they have already done continue to pursue in France Hungary and Piedmont wheretheir prospering to such a degree in their Cruel and Barbarous Attempts not only gives them boldness of entertaining thoughts of taking the like Methods and Acting by the same measures in all places where they find Rulers at their beck and under their Influence but to unite and provoke all Popish Monarchs to enter into a holy War against Protestants every where that by Conquering and Subduing those States and Kingdoms where the Reformed Religion is received and established they may extirpate it out of the World under the Notion of the Northern Heresie If principles of humanity Maxim's of Interest Rules of Policy Obligations of Gratitude Ties of Royal and Princely Faith or the repeated Promises Oaths Edicts and Declarations of Soveraigns could have been a Security to Protestants for the Profession of their Faith and Exercise of their Worship in the forementioned Territories and Dominions they had all
that could be rationally desired for their Safety and Protection in the free and open profession and Practice of their Religion whereas by a violation of all that is Sacred among men of a binding vertu unto Princes except Chains and Fetters or that confer a Right Claim and Security unto Subjects the poor Protestants in those Places have been and still are persecuted with a rage and Barbarity which no age can parallel and for which it is difficult to find words proper and severe enough whereby to stamp a Character of infamy upon the treacherous cruel and savage Authors Promoters and Instruments of it Nor do's it proceed from a Malignancy of Nature peculiar to the Emperor the French King and the Duke of Savoy above what is in other Princes of the same Communion or that they are more regardless of Fame and less concerned how future generations will brand their Memories than other Papal Monarchs seem to be that they have suffered themselves to be prevailed upon to violate the Promises and Oaths they were bound by to their Protestant Subjects seeing the Emperour is character'd for a person of a meek and gentle temper and of the goodness of whose Nature thereremain some shadows interwoven with the bloody streaks of the Hungarian Persecution And the French King tho he stand not much commended for sweetness and Benignity of disposition is known to be unmeasurably Ambitious of having his name transmitted to Posterity in Letters of Greatness and Honor which his behaviour towards his Subjects of the Reformed Religion is no way 's adapted unto but calculated to make him hereafter listed with Nero and Julian As to the Duke of Savoy there seems by the whole course of his other Actions to be a certain Greatness of Mind in him not easily consisting with that savage and brutal temper which the Cruelties he hath exercised upon the Protestants in Piedmont would intimate and denote But it ariseth from the Mischievousness and Pestilency of their Religion their Bigottry in it and their having put themselves so entirely under the conduct of the Clergy particularly of the Jesuites who are for the most part a set of men especially the latter that through acting in the prospect of no other Ends but the Grandure Wealth and Domination of the Church of Rome do with an unlimited rage and a peculiar kind of Malice persecute all that have renounced Fellowship with it and care not if they Sacrifice the Honor Glory and Safety of Monarchs and bring their Kingdoms into contempt and desolation by rendring them weak poor and dispeopled provided they may wreck their spleen and revenge upon those whose Religion is not only dissonant from theirs but should it prevail to be the Religion of the Legislators and Rulers of Nations those springs of Wealth would be immediately dried up by which their Superior Clergy and all their Religious Orders are enriched and fed up in idleness And should the People come to be generally imbued with principles of Gospel Light and Liberty they would immediately shake off a blind and slavish Dependence upon Pope and Priests and thereby subvert the Foundation upon which the Monarchick Grandure of the Romish Church and their whole Religion is superstructed and destroy the Engine by which they are inabled to Lord it over the Bodies Estates and Consciences of men And if Protestants every where especially under Popish Rulers were not under a strange Infatuation they would look for no fairer Quarter from Papists than what their Brethren have met with in France and Piedmont nor would they rely upon the Faith of any King that stiles himself a Roman Catholick seeing Sacred Promises tremendous Oaths and the most Authentick Declarations are but Papal Arts and Tricks sanctified at Rome whereby to full Subjects into a Security and delude them into a neglect of all means for preserving themselves and their Religion till their Rulers can be in a condition of obeying the Decrees of the fourth Lateran Council that enjoins Kings to destroy and extirpate Hereticks under pain of Excommunication and of having both their Subjects absolved from Allegiance to them and their Territories given away to others and till without running any hazard they may comply with the Ordinance of the Council of Constance which not only releaseth them from all Obligation of keeping Faith to Hereticks but requires them to violate it and accordingly made Sigismond break his Faith to John Hus whom in dâ—fiance of the Security given him by that King they caused to be condemned and burnt Nor is the practice and late Example of the Great Louis designed for less than a pattern by which all Popish Princes are to act and his proceedings are to be the coppy Moddel which they who would merit the name of Zealous Catholicks and be esteemed dutiful Sons of the Church are to transcribe and limn out in lines of force violence and Blood and for the better corresponding with the Original to imploy Dragoons for Missionaries And tho I will not say but that there may be some Popish Princes who through an extraordinary measure of good Nature and from principles of Compassion woven into their Constitution previously to all notices of Revelation whether real or preâ—ended and who through Sentiments imâ—ib'd from a generous Education and their â—oming afterwards to be under the influence â—nd Management of wise and discret Counsellors may be able to resist the malignant â—mpressions of their Religion and so be preserved from the inhumanities towards â—hose of different perswasions from them in the things of God which their Priests would lay them under Obligations unto by the Doctrines of the Romish Faith yet there appears no reason why an understanding man should be induced to believe that the King of England is likely to prove a Prince of that great and noble temper there being more than enough both to raise a jealousie and beget a perswasion that there is not a Monarch among all those who are commonly stiled Catholicks from whom Protestants may justly dread greater Severities than from Him or look for worse and more Barbarous Treatments I am not ignorant with what candor we ought by the Rules of Charity and good manners to speak of all men whatsoever their Religion is nor am I unacquainted with what Veneration and Deference we are to Discourse of Crowned Heads but as I dare not give those flattering Titles unto any of which there are not a few in some of the late Addresses presented to the King by an inconsiderable and foolish sort of Dissenting Preachers so I should not know how to be accountable to God my own Conscience or the World should I not in my station as a Protestant and as a Lover of the Laws and Liberties of my Countrey offer something whereby both to undeceive that weak and short-sighted People whom their own being accommodated for a Season by the Declaration of Indulgence hath deluded into an Opinion that His Majesty cherisheth no thoughts of
I shall not mention would have taken so many bold wide and illegal stepps for the supplanting our Religion and Laws and for the introduction and establishment of Popery and Tyranny and this not only to the losing and disobliging his former Votaries and Partizans but to the strange allarming and disgusting most persons of honor quality and interest in the three Kingdoms were he not beside the being under the sway of his own Bigottry and the strong ballance of a large measure of ill nature bound by ties of implicite obedience to the Commands of that extravagant and furious Society to the promoting of whose passions and malice rather than his own safety and glory or the lasting benefit of the Roman Catholicks themselves the whole course of his Government hitherto seems to have been shapen and adapted The occasion and subject of the late contest between him and the Pope which hath made so great a noise not only at Rome but thro all Europe may serve to convince us both of the Extraordinary zeal he hath for the Society and of the transcendent power they have over him and that 't is no wonder he should exact an obedience without reserve from his Subjects in Scotland seeing he himself yields an obedience without reserve to the Iesuites 'T is known how that by the Rules of their Institution no Iesuite is capable of the Myter and that if the Ambition of any of them should tempt him to seek or accept the dignity of a Prelate he must for being capacitated thereunto renounce his Membership in the Order Yet so great is His Majesties passion for the Honor and Grandure of the Society and such is their domination and absolute power over him that no less will serve him neither would they allow him to insist upon less than that the Pope should dispense with Father Peters being made a Bishop without his ceasing to be a Iesuite or the being transplanted into another Order And this the old Gentleman at Rome hath been forced at last to comply with and to grant a Dispensation whereby Father Peters shall be capable of the Prelature notwithstanding his remaining in the Ignatian Order the Iesuites thro their Authority over the King not suffering him to recede from his demand and His Majesties zeal for the Society not permitting him to comply either with the prayers or the Conscience and Honour of the Supream Pontiff Not only the Kings unthankfulness unto but his illegal proceedings against and his arbitrary invading the Rights of those who stood by him in all his dangers and difficulties and who were the Instruments oâ— preventing his exclusion from the Crown and the Chief means both of his advanc 〈…〉 ment to the Throne and his being kept in are so many new evidences of the ill w 〈…〉 he bears to all Protestants and what they a to dread from him as occasions are admin 〈…〉 stred of injuring and oppressing them a 〈…〉 may serve to convince all impartial a 〈…〉 thinking people that his Popish malice to o 〈…〉 Religion is too strong for all principles of H 〈…〉 nor and Gratitude and able to cancel t 〈…〉 Obligations which Friendship for his pers 〈…〉 and service to his interest may be suppos 〈…〉 to have laid him under to any heretofor Had it not been for many of the Church 〈◊〉 England who stood up with a zeal and v 〈…〉 gour for preserving the succession in t 〈…〉 right line beyond what Religion co 〈…〉 science Reason or Interest could co 〈…〉 duct them unto he had never been able 〈◊〉 have out-wrestled the endeavours of thr 〈…〉 Parliaments for excluding him from the I 〈…〉 perial Crown of England and had it n 〈…〉 been for their abetting and standing by 〈◊〉 with their swords in their hands upon th 〈…〉 Duke of Monmouth's descent into the Kingdom anno 1685. he could nothave avoid 〈…〉 the being driven from the Throne and th 〈…〉 having the Scepter wrested out of his hanâ— Whosoever had the advantage of knowin 〈…〉 the temper and genius of the late King an 〈…〉 how affray'd he was of embarking into an 〈…〉 thing that might import a visible hazard t 〈…〉 the peace of his Government and dra 〈…〉 after it a general disgust of his person wi 〈…〉 be soon satisfied that if all his Protestant Subjects had united in their desires and coâ— curred in their endeavoures to have ha 〈…〉 the Duke of York debarred from the Crow 〈…〉 that his late Majesty would not have onâ— scrupled the complying with it and th 〈…〉 his Love to his dear Brother would havâ— given way to the apprehension and fear 〈◊〉 forfeiting a love for himself in the hear 〈…〉 of his people especially when what wa 〈…〉 required of him was not an invasion upoâ— the fundamentals of the constitution of th 〈…〉 English Monarchy nor dissonant from th 〈…〉 practice of the Nation in many repeated i 〈…〉 stances Nor can there be a greater evidence 〈◊〉 the present Kings ill nature Romish Bi 〈…〉 ry and prodigious ingratitude as well 〈◊〉 of the design he is carrying on against our 〈…〉 ligion and Laws than his carriage and be 〈…〉 viour towards the Church of England tho 〈◊〉 cannot but acknowledg it a righteous 〈…〉 gment upon them from God and a just 〈…〉 nishment for their being not only so un 〈…〉 ncerned for the preservation of our Reli 〈…〉 n and liberties in avoiding to close with 〈…〉 e only methods that were adapted there 〈…〉 to but for being so passionate and indu 〈…〉 ious to hasten the loss of them thro put 〈…〉 g the Government into ones hands who 〈…〉 s they might have foreseen would be 〈…〉 e to make a sacrifice of them to his belo 〈…〉 d Popery and to his inordinate lust after 〈…〉 spotical and arbitrary power And as the 〈…〉 ly example bearing any affinity to it is 〈…〉 t of Louis the 14 th who in recompence to 〈◊〉 Protestant Subjects for maintaining him 〈◊〉 the Throne when the late Prince of Con 〈…〉 assisted by Papists would have wrested the 〈…〉 own from him hath treated them with Barbarity whereof that of Aâ—â—iochus to 〈…〉 ards the Jews and that of Diocletian and 〈…〉 aximian towards the primitive Christians 〈…〉 ere but scanty and impersect draughts so 〈…〉 ere wants nothing for compleating the pa 〈…〉 lel between England and France but a little 〈…〉 ore time and a fortunate opportunity and 〈…〉 en the deluded Church men will find that 〈…〉 er Peters is no less skilful at Whitehall for 〈…〉 nsforming their acts of loyalty and merit 〈…〉 wards the King into crimes and motives 〈◊〉 their ruin than Pere de là Chaise hath shewn 〈…〉 mself at Versailles where by an Art peculiar 〈◊〉 the Iesuites he hath improved the loyalty 〈…〉 zeal of the Reformed in France for the house 〈◊〉 Bourbon into a reason of alienating that 〈…〉 onarch from them and into a ground of 〈◊〉 destroying that dutiful and obedient
found to have taken Orders in 〈…〉 e Church of Rome obnoxious to death or 〈…〉 ose other Statutes by which the King hath 〈…〉 ower Authority for levying two thirds of 〈…〉 eir Estates that shall be convicted of Recu 〈…〉 cy but by an usurped prerogative and an Absolute power he is pleased to suspend all 〈…〉 e Laws by which they were only disabled 〈…〉 rom hurting us thro standing precluded 〈…〉 rom places of power and trust in the Government So that the whole security we have in time to come for our Religion depends upon the temperate disposition and good nature of those Roman Catholicks that shall be advanced to Offices and Employments and does no longer bear upon the protection and support of the Law and I think we have not had that experience of grace and favour from Papists as may give us 〈…〉 just confidence of fair and candid treatment from them for the future Now that we may be the better convinced how little security we have from his Majesties promise in his Declaration of his protecting the Arch Bishops Bishops and Clergy and all other his subjects of the Church of England in the free exercise of their Religion as by Law established and in the quiet and full enjoyment of their possessions without any molestation or disturbance whatsoever which is all the Tenour that is left us 't is not unworthy of observation how that beside the suspending the Bishop of London ab Officio and the Vice Chanceller of Cambridg both ab Officio and Beneficio and this not only for Actions which the Laws of God and the Kingdom make their duty but thro a sentence inflicted upon them by no legal Court of Judicature but by five or six mercinary persons supported by a Tyrannous and Arbitrary Commission his Majesty in his Proclamation for Toleration in Scotland â—earing date the 12. of February doth among many other Laws cass disable and dispense with the Law enjoining the Scots Test tho it was not only enacted by himself while he represented his Brother as his high Commissioner but hath been confirmed by him in Parliament since he came to the Crown Surely it is as easie to depart from a promise made in a Declaration as 't is to absolve and discharge himself from the obligation of a Law which he first concurred to the enacting of and gave the creating Fiat unto as the late Kings Commissioner and hath since ratified in Parliament after he was come to the Throne As there is no more infidelity dishonor and injustice so there is less of absolute power and illegality in doing the one than the other Nor is it possible for a rational man to place a confidence in his Majesties Royal word for the protection of our Religion and the Church of England men's enjoying their possessions seeing he hath not only departed from his promise made to the Council immediately after his Brothers death but hath violated his Faith given to the Parliament of England at their first Session which we might have thought would have been the more sacred and binding by reason of the grandure state and quality of the Assembly to which it was pledged If we consider how much protestants suffered what number of them was burnt at the stake as well as murderd in Goals beside the vast multitudes who to avoid the rage and power of their Enemies were forced to abandon their Countrey and seek for shelter in forraign parts and what endeavoures of all kinds were used for the Extirpation of our Religion under QueenMary we may gather and learn from thence what is to be dreaded from James the II. who is the next popish Prince to her that since the Reformation hath sat on the Throne of England For tho there be many things that administer grounds of hope that the Papists will not find it so easie a matter to bring us in shoals to the stake nor of that quick and easie dispatch to suppress the protestant Religion and set up Popery at this time as they found it then yer every thing that occurs to our thoughts or that can affect our understandings serves not only to persuade us into a belief that they will set upon and endeavour it but to work us up to an assurance that his Majesty would take it for a di 〈…〉 ution of his glory as well as reflection upon his zeal for the Church of Rome not to attempt what a woman had both the courage to undertake and the fortune to go thro with And there is withal a concurrence of so many things both abroad and at home at this juncture which if laid in the ballance with the motives to our hope of the papists miscarrying may justly raise our fears of their prospering to a very sad and uncomfortable height Whosoever shall compare these two Princes together will find that there was less danger to be apprehended from Mary and that not only upon the score of her Sex but by reason of a certain gentleness and goodness of nature which all Historians of judgment and credit ascribe unto her than is to be expected from the present King in whom a sourness of temper fierceness of disposition and pride joined with a peevishness of humour not to bear the having his will disputed or controlled are the principal ingredients into his Constitution and which are all strangely heightned and enflamed by contracted distempers of Body and thro furious principles of mind which he hath imbib'd from the Iesuites who of all men carry the obligations arising from the Doctrines of the popish Religion to the most outragious and inhumane excesses Nor can I forbear to add that whereas the cruelty which that Princess was hurried into even to the making her Cities common shambles and her streets Theatres of murder for innocent persons for which she became hated while she lived and her memory is rendred infamous to all Generations that come after was wholly and entirely owing to her Religion which not only proclaims it lawful but a necessary duty of Christianity and an act meriting a peculiar Crown of Glory in heaven to destroy Hereticks 't is to be feared there will be found in the present King a spice of revenge against us as we are Englishmen as well as a measu 〈…〉 heap't up and running over of furious 〈◊〉 zeal against us as we are Protestants 〈◊〉 the wrath he bears unto us for our depar 〈…〉 from the Communion of the Romish Chu 〈…〉 and our rebellion against the triple Crow 〈…〉 the war wherein many of the Kingdom wer 〈…〉 engaged against his Father and the issue of it in the execution of that Monarch is what he hath been heard to say that he hopes to revenge upon the Nation And all that the City of London underwent thro that dreadful conflagration 1666. of which he was the great Author and Promoter as well as the Rescuer and Protector of the Varlets that were apprehended in their spreading and
in the late King and his Brother of their giving no discouragement nor obstruction to so holy a design and thereupon as the first Edicts for infringing the liberty and weakning and oppressing Protestants in France and the persecution in Hungary commenced and bore date with the Restoration of the Royal Family and multiplied and encreased from year to year as they grew into farther assurance of the Royal Brothers approving as well as conniving at what was done so that for the abolition of the Edict of Nant's and the total suppression of the Reformed Religion in France was emitted upon his present Majesties being exalted to the Throne and the encouragement he gave them to a procedure which as he now justifies he will hereafter imitate It were to suppose English Protestants exceedingly unacquainted with the History of their own Nation to give a long deduction of what the Papists have attempted foâ— the extirpation of our Religion while we had Princes on the Throne whose belief and principles in Christianity led them to assert and defend the Reformation and who had courage as well as integrity to punish those that conspired against it Their many Conjurations against Queen Elizabeth's person and their repeated endeavours of bringing in Forraigners and of betraying the Nation to the Spaniards who were to convert the Kingdom as they had done the West-Indies by killing the Inhabitants are sufficiently known to all who have allowed themselves leasure to read or who have been careful to remember what they have been often told by those that have inspected the Memoires of those times The Gunpowder plot with the motives unto it and the extent of the mischief it was shapen for together with the insurrection they were prepared for in case it had succeeded and the forraign aid they had been solliciting and were promised and all for the extirpation of English Hereticks are things so modern and which we have had so many times related to us by our Fathers that it is enough barely to intimate them The Irish Massacre in which above two hundred thousand were murderd in cold blood and to which there was no provocation but that of hatred to our Religion and furious zeal to extirpate Hereticks ought at this time to be more particularly reflected upon as that which gives us a truè scheme of the manner of the Church of Rome's converting Protestant Kingdoms and being the Copy they have a mind to write after and that in such Characters and lines of blood as may be sure to answer the Original At the season when they both entred upon and executed that hellish conjuration they were in a quiet and peaceable enjoyment of the private exercise of their Religion yea had many publick meeting-places thro the means of the Queen and many great friends which they had at Court and were neither disturbed for not coming to Church nor suffered any severities upon the account of their profession but that â—ould not satisfie nor will any thing else 〈…〉 less they may be allowed to cut the 〈…〉 roats or make bonefires of all that will 〈…〉 ot join with them in a blind obedience to 〈…〉 e Sea of Rome and of worshipping St. Pa 〈…〉 ick The little harsh usarges which the Papists at any time met with there or in England they derived them upon themselves 〈…〉 y their Crimes against the State and for their Conspiracies against our Princes and their Protestant Subjects For till the Pope had â—aken upon him to depose Queen Elizabeth and absolve her Subjects from their Allegiance and till the Papists had so far approved that Act of his holiness as to raise Rebellions at home and enter into treasonable confedaracies abroad there were no Laws that could be stiled severe enacted in England against Papists and the making of them was the result of necessity in order to preserve our selves and not from an Inclination to hurt any for matters of meer Religion Such hath always been the moderation of our Ru 〈…〉 ers and so powerful are the incitements to lenity which the generality of Protestants through the influence and impression of their Religion especially they of a more generous education have been under towards those of the Roman Communion that nothing but their unwearied restlessness to disturb the Government and destroy Protestants hath been the cause either of enacting those Laws against them that are stiled rigorous or of their having been at any time put into execution And notwithstanding that some such Laws were enacted as might appear to savour of severity yet could they have but submitted to have dwelt peaceably in the land they would have found that their meer belief and the private practice of their worship would not have much prejudiced or endangered them and that tho the Laws had been continued unrepealed yet it was only as a Hedg about us for our protection and as Bonds of obligation upon them to their good behaviour To which may be added that more Protestants have suffered in one year by the Laws made against Dissenters and to the utmost height of the penalties which the violation of them imported and that by the instigation of Papis 〈…〉 and their influence over the late King and his present Majesty than there have Papists from the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign to this very day tho there was a difference in the punishments they underwent However we may from their many and repeated attemps against us while we had Princes that both would and could chasten their insolencies and inflict upon them what the Law made them obnoxious unto for their outrages gather and conclude what we are now to expect upon their having obtained a King imbu'd with all the persecuting and bloody principles of Popery and perfectly baptised into all the Doctrines of the Councils of Lateran and Constance And it may strengthen our faith as well as increase our fear of what is purposed against and impends over us in that they cannot but think that the suffering our Religion to remain in a condition to be at any time hereafter the Religion of the State and of the universality of the people may not only prove a means of retrieving Protestancy in France and of assisting to revenge the barbarities perpetrated there upon a great and innocent people but may leave the Roman Catholiks in England exposed to the resentment of the Kingdom for what they have so foolishy and impudently acted both against our Civil Rights and Established Religion since James the II. came to the Crown and may also upon the Government 's falling into good hands and Magistrates coming to understand their true Interest which is for an English Prince to make himself the Head of the Protestant cause and to espouse their quarrel in all places give such a Revolution in Europe as will not only check the present Career of Rome but cause them repent the method's in which they have been ingaged These things we may be sure the Papists
is in â—â—e mean time a member of the most persecuting and bloody Society that ever was cloathed with the name of a Church and whose cruelty towards Protestants he is careful not to arraign by fastning his offence at severity upon differences in smaller matters which he knows that those between Rome and us are not nor so accounted of by any of the papal Fellowship It were to be wished that the Dissenters would reflect and consider how when the late King had emitted a Declaration of Indulgence anno 1672. upon pretended motives of tenderness and compassion to his Protestant Subjects but in truth to keep all quiet at home when in conjunction with France he was engaging in an unjust war against a Reformed State abroad and in order to steal a liberty for the Papists to practice their Idolatries without incurring a suspition himself of being of the Romish Religion and in hope to wind up the prerogative to a paramount power over the law and how when the Parliament condemned the illegality of it and would have the Declaration recalled all his Kindness to Dissenters not only immediately vanished but turned into that Rage and fury that tho both that Parliament addressed for some favour to be shew'd them and another voted it a betraying of the Pretestant Religion to continue the execution of the penal laws upon them yet instead of their having any mercy or moderation exercised towards them they were thrown into a Furnace made seven times hotter than that wherein they had been scorched before And without pretending to be a Prophet I dare prognosticate and foretel that whensoever the present King hath compassed the Ends unto which this Declaration is designed to be subservient namely the placing the Papists both in the open exercise of their Religion and in all publick Offices and Trusts and the getting a power to be acknowledged vested in him over the Laws that then instead of the still voice calmly whispered from Whitehall they will both hear and feel the blasts of a mighty rushing wind and that upon pretended occasions arising from the abuse of this Indulgence or for some alledged crimes wherein they and all other Protestants are to be involved tho their supiness and excess of Loyalty continue to be their greatest offences this liberty will not only be withdrawn and the old Church of England severities revived but some of the new à là mode à France treatments come upon the stage and be pursued against them and all other perverse and obstinate British Hereticks The Declaration for liberty of Conscience being injurious to the Church of England and not proceeding from any inward and real good will to the Dissenters it will be worth our pains to inquire into and make a more ample deduction of the Reasons upon which it was granted that the grounds of emitting it being laid under every man's view they who have Addressed may come to be asham'd of their simplicity and folly they who have not may be farther confirmed both of the unlawfulness and inconveniency of doing it and that all who preserve any regard to the protestant Religion and the Laws of England may be quickned to the use of all legal and due means for preventing the mischievous effects which it is shapen for and which the Papists do promise themselves from it The motives upon which his Majesty published the Declaration may be reduced to three of which as I have already made some mention so I shall now place every one of them in its several and proper light and give such proofs and evidence of their being the great and sole inducements for the Emitting of it that no rational man shall be able henceforth to make a doubt of it The first is the Kings winding himself into a Supremacy and Absoluteness over the Law and the getting it acknowledged and calmly submitted unto and acquiesced in by the Subjects The Monarchies being legal and not Despotical bounded and regulat 〈…〉 by Laws and not to be exercised accoâ—ding to meer will and pleasure was th 〈…〉 which he could not digest the though 〈…〉 of when a Subject and had been hea 〈…〉 to say that he had rather Reign a day in th 〈…〉 absoluteness that the French King doth th 〈…〉 an Age tied up and restrained by Rules as 〈…〉 Brother did And therefore to persuade t 〈…〉 Prince of Orange to approve what He h 〈…〉 done in dispensing with the Laws and 〈…〉 obtain Him and the Princess to join wi 〈…〉 his Majesty and to employ their inter 〈…〉 in the Kingdom for the Repealing the T 〈…〉 Acts and the many other Statutes ma 〈…〉 against Roman Catholicks he used this Argâ—ment in a Message he sent to their Roy 〈…〉 Highnesses upon that errand that the ge 〈…〉 ting it done would be greatly to the aâ—vantage and for the increase of the prorog 〈…〉 tive but this these two noble Prince 〈…〉 of whose ascent to the Throne all Prâ—testants have so near and comfortable prospect were too generous as well 〈…〉 wise to be wheedled with as knowin 〈…〉 that the Authority of the Kings and Quee 〈…〉 of England is great enough by the Rul 〈…〉 of the Constitution without grasping at new prerogative power which as the La 〈…〉 have not vested in them so it would b 〈…〉 of no use but to inable them to do hur 〈…〉 And indeed it is more necessary both fo 〈…〉 the honor and safety of the Monarch an 〈…〉 for the freedom and security of the peopl 〈…〉 that the prerogative should be confined withi 〈…〉 its ancient and legal Channels than be left t 〈…〉 that illimited and unbounded latitude whic 〈…〉 the late King and his present Majesty have eâ—deavoured to advance and screw it up unto 〈…〉 That both the Declaration for liberty of Coâ—science in England and the Proclamation for Toleration in Scotland are calculated for raâ—sing the Soveraign Authority to a transceâ—dent Power over the Laws of the two Kingdoms may be demonstrated from the Papers themselves which lay the Dispensin 〈…〉 Power before us in terms that import n 〈…〉 less than his Majesties standing free an 〈…〉 solved from all ties and restraints and 〈◊〉 being cloathed with a Right of doing â—hatsoever he will. For if the Stile of 〈…〉 yal Pleasure to suspend the execution of 〈…〉 ch and such Laws and to forbid such 〈…〉 d such Oaths to be required to be taken 〈…〉 d this in the virtu ' of no Authority decla 〈…〉 d by the Laws to be resident in his Ma 〈…〉 sty but in the virtu ' of a certain vagrant 〈…〉 d indeterminate thing called Royal prero 〈…〉 tive as the power exercised in the English â—eclaration is worded and expressed be not 〈…〉 ough to enlighten us sufficiently in the 〈…〉 atter before us the Stile of Absolute Power â—hich all the Subjects are to obey without reâ—â—rve whereby the King is pleased to chalk â—efore us the Authority exerted in the
â—xercising his Absolute Power in whatsoever Acts he pleaseth over his own Subjects wheâ—her after the French fashion in commanding them to turn Catholicks because he will â—ave it so or after the manner of the Grand â—eignior to require them to submit their Necks to the Bow string because he is jeaâ—ous of them or wants their Estates to pay â—is Janizaries The united Provinces are they whom he bore a particular spleen and indignation unto when he was a subject and upon whom he is now in the Throne he resolves not only to wreak all his old malice but by conquering and subduing them if he can to strengthen his Absoluteness over his own People and to pave his way for overthrowing the protestant Religion in great Brittain without lying open to the hazards that may otherwise attend and ensue upon the attempting of it And instead of expecting nothing from him but what may become a brave and generous Enemy they ought to remember the encouragement that he gave heretofore to two varlets to burn that part of their Fleet which belong'd to Amsterdam an action as ignominious as fraudulent and that might have been fatal to all the Provinces if thro a happy and seasonable detection and the apprehension of one of the miscreants it had not been prevented He knows that the States General are not only zealous assertors of the protestant Religion but alway's ready to afford a Sanctuary and a place of Refuge to those who being oppressed for the profession of it elsewhere are forced to forsake their own Countries and to seek for shelter and relief in other parts And as he is not unsensible how easie the withdrawment and flight is into these Provinces for such as are persecuted in his Dominions so he is aware that if multitudes and especially men of condition and Estates should for the avoiding his cruelty betake themselves thither that they would not be unthoughtful of all ways and means whereby they might Redeem their Country from Tyranny and restore themselves to the quiet enjoyment of their Estates and liberties at home But that which most enrages him is the Figure which the two Princes do make in that State of whose Succession to the Crown the Protestants in Brittain have so near a prospect and the Post which the Prince filleth in that Government so that he dare neither venture to difinherit Them nor impose upon them such Terms and Conditions as their Consciences will not suffer them to comply with while either these States remain Free or while such English and Scotts as retain a zeal for Religion and the ancient Laws and Rights of their respective Countries can retreat thither under hopes of Admission and Protection And so closely are the interests of all Protestants in England and Scotland woven and inlaid with the interest of the united Netherlands and such is the singular regard that both the one and the other bear to the Reformed Religion the liberty of Mankind and their several Civil Rights that it is impossible for his Majesty to embarque in a design against the One without resolving at the same time upon the ruin of the Other Neither will the One be able to subsist when once the Other is subdu'd and enslaved As Philip the II. of Spain saw no way so compendious for the restoring himself to the Soveraignty and Tyrannous Rule over the Dutch as the subjugating of England that hel'p to support and assist them which was the ground of rigging out his formidable Armado and of his design against England in 1588. so his Brittish Majesty thinks no method so expeditious for the enslaving his own People as the endeavouring first to subdue the Dutch. And as upon the one hand it would be of a threatning consequence to Holland could the King subjugate his own People extirpate the protestant Religion out of his Dominions and advance himself to a Despotical Power so upon the other hand could he conquer the Dutch we might with the greatest certainty Date the woful Fate of great Brittain and the loss of all that is valuable to them as men and Christians from the same moment and Period of time They are like the Twins we read of whose Destiny was to live and die together and which soever of the two is destroyed first all the hope and comfort that the other can pretend unto is to be last devoured Now after the advances which his Majesty hath made towards the enslaving his Subjects and the subverting the Reformed Religion in his Kingdoms he finds it necessary before he venture to give the last and fatal stroke at home and to enter upon the plenary exercise of his Absolute Power in laying Parliaments wholly aside in cancelling all Laws to make way for Royal Edicts or Declarations of the complexion of the former and in commanding us to turn Roman Catholicks or to be dragoon'd I say he thinks it needful before he proceed to these to try whether he can subdue and conquer the Dutch and thereby remove all hopes of shelter relief comfort and assistance from his own People when he shall afterwards fall upon them And how much soever the Court endeavoures to conceal its design and strives to compliment the States General into a confidence that all Alliances between them and the Crown of England shall be maintained and preserved yet they not only speak their intentions by several open and visible actions but some of them cannot forbear to tell it when their blood is heated and their heads warm'd with a liberal glass and a lusty proportion of wine Thence it was that a Governing Papist lately told a Gentleman after they two had drunk hard together that they had some Work in England that would employ them a little time but when that was over they would make the Dutch fly to the end of the World to find a resting place Delenda est Carthago is engraven upon their hearts as being that without which Rome cannot arrive at the universal Monarchy that it aspires after It was upon a formed design of a war against the united Provinces that the King hath for these two years stirr 〈…〉 up and incited as well as countenanced a 〈…〉 protected the Algerines in their Piracies th 〈…〉 thro their weakning and spoiling the Du 〈…〉 before hand it may be the more easie a maâ—ter for him to subdue them when he sh 〈…〉 think fit to begin his hostilities 'T is in oâ—der to this that he hath entred into neâ— and secret Alliances with other Princes thâ— purport of which is boldly talk't of in Loâ—don but whether believed at the Hague I caâ—not tell For as Monsr Barrillion and Monsâ— Bonrepos present Transactions at Whitehal relate to something else than meerly to the aâ—fair of Hudsons Bay so Prince Georges erranâ— to Denmark is of more importance than bare visite or a naked compliment to hiâ— Brother 'T is upon this design that all thaâ— great Marine preparation hath been so lonâ— making in the
these being â—incible to a person of an ardent love to God â—nd of a lively faith in Jesus Christ and which accordingly many thousands have been â—riumphantly victorious over Nor is it likely that this new and uncouth phrase of â—ot using an invincible nec 〈…〉 would have found room in a Paper of that nature if it had not been first to counceal some malicious and mischievous design and then to justify the consistency of its execution with what is promised in the Proclamation Moreover were there that security intended by these two Royal Papers that protestant Dissenters might safely rely upon or did the King act with that sincerity which he would delude his people into a belief of there would then be a greater agreeableness than there is betwixt the Declaration for liberty of Conscience in England and the Proclamation for a Toleration in Scotland The principle his Majesty pretends to act from that Conscience ought not to be constrained and that none ought to be persecuted for meer matters of Religion would obliege him to act uniformly and with an equal extention of favour to all his Subjects whose principles are the same and against whom he hath no exception but in matters meerly Religious Whereas the disparity of grace kindness and freedom that is exercised in the Declaration from that which is exerted in the Proclamation plainly shews that the whole is but a Trick of State and done in sâ—bserviency to an end which it is not yet seasonable to discover and avow For his circumscribing the Toleration in Scotland to such Presbyterians as he stiles moderate is not only a taking it off from its true bottom matters of meer Religion and a founding it upon an internal quality of the mind that is not discernable but it implyes the reserving a liberty to himself of withdrawing the benefits of it from all Scots Dissenters thro fastning upon them a contrary Character whensoever it shall be seasonable to revive persecution And even as it is now exerted to these moderate ones it is attended with Restrictions that his Indulgence in England is no ways clog'd with All that the Declaration requires from those that are indulged is that their Assemblies be peaceably openly and publickly held that all Persons be freely admitted to them that they signify and make known to some Justice of the peace what places they set apart for these uses and that nothing be preached or taught amongst them which may any ways tend to alienate the bearâ—s of the people from the King or his Government whereas the Proclamation not only restrains the meetings of the Scots Presbyterians to private Houses without allowing them either to build meeting Houses or to use out-houses or Barns but it prohibits the hearing any Ministers save such as shall be willing to swear that they shall to the utmost of their Power assist defend and maintain the King in the exercise of his Absolute power against all deadly Nor is it difficult to assign the reason of the difformity that appears in His Majesties present Actings towards his dissenting Protestanâ— Subjects in those two Kingdoms For should there be no Restriction upon the Toleration in Scotland to hinder the greatest part of the Presbyterians from taking the advantage of it the Bishops and Conforming Clergy would be immediately forsaken by the generality if not all the people and so an â—ssue would not only be put to the division among Protestants in that Kingdom but they would become an united and thereupon a formidable Body against Popery which it is not for the interest of the Roman Catholicks to suffer or give way unto Whereas the more unbounded the Liberty is that is granted to Dissenters in England the more are our divisions not only kept up but increased and promoted especially thro this Freedom's arriving with them in an illegal way without both the Authority of the Legislative Power and the approbation of a great part of the People it being infallibly certain that there is a vast number of all ranks and conditions who do prefer the abiding in the Communion of the Church of England before the joining in fellowship with those of the Separate and dissenting Societies Upon the whole this different method of proceeding towards Dissenting Protestants in matters meerly Religious shews that all this Indulgence and Toleration is a Trick to serve a present juncture of Affairs and to advance a Popish and Arbitrary design and that the Dissenters have no security for the continuance of their Liberty but that when the Court and Jesuitick end is compassed and obtained there is another course to be steered towards them and instead of their hearing any longer of Liberty and Toleration they are to be told that it is the interest of the Government and the safety and honor of his Majesty to have but one Religion in his Dominions and that all must be Members of the Catholick Church and this because the King will have it so which is the Argument that hath been made use of in the making so many Converts in France They who now suffer themselves to be deluded into a confidence in the Royal word will not only come to understand what Mr. Coleman meant in his telling Pere de la Chaise that the Catholicks in England had a great work upon their hand being about the extirpation 〈◊〉 that Heresie which hath born sway so long 〈◊〉 this Northern part of the world but they wiâ—â— also see and feel how much of the desig 〈…〉 of Rome was represented in that passage 〈◊〉 the Popes Nuncio's Letter dated at Bruxel 〈…〉 Aug. 9. 1674. wherein upon the confidencâ— which they placed in the Duke of York whicâ— is not lessened since he came to the Crown he takes the confidence to write that theâ— hop'd speedily to see the total and final ruin 〈◊〉 the Protestant Party And as Protestant Dissenters have no secu rity by the Declaration and Proclamation foâ— the continuance of their Liberty so theâ— that have by way of thanksgiving Addresseâ— to the King for those Royal Papers have noâ— only acted very ill in reference both to the Laws and Rights of the Kingdoms and of Religion in general but they have carried very unwisely in relation to their own interest and the avoiding the effects of that resentment which most men are justly possessed with upon the illegal Emission of these Arbitrary and Prerogative Papers I shall not enter upon any long Discourse concerning this new practice of Addressing in general it having been done elsewhere some years ago but I shall only briefly intimate that it was never in fashion unless either under a weak and precarious Government or under one that took illegal courses and puâ—sued a different interest from that of the People and Community As he who Ruleth according to the standing Laws of a Countrey over which he is set needs not seek for an Approbation of his Actions from a part of his Subjects the Legality of his proceedings
deserve should they be proceeded against according to their demerit yet it is to be hoped that both they and the Addressers of the former stamp may all find room in an Act of Indemnity and that the Mercy of the Nation towards them will triump over and get the better of its Iustice. As it would argue a strange and judicial infatuation should they proceed to farther excesses and think to escape the punishment due to one Crime by comitting and taking Sanctuary in another thro improving their compliments into actions of treachery so all their hope of pardon as well as of lenity and moderation from a true Protestant and rightly constituted Authority depends upon their conduct and behaviour henceforward and their not suffering themselves to be hurried and deluded into a co-operation with the Court for the obtaining of a Popish Parliament All their endeavours of that kind would but more clearly detect and manifest their treachery to Religion and the Kingdom it not being in their power to ontvote the honest English part of the People so as to help the King to such a House of Commons as he desires and were it possible that thro their assistance in conjunction with violence and tricks used in Elections and Returns by the Court such a â—ouse of Commons might be obtained as would be serviceable to Arbitrary and papal Ends yet neither the King nor they would be the neâ—rer the compassing what is aimd at it being demonstrable that the Majority of the House of Lords are never to be wrought over to justify this illegal Declaration or to grant the King a Power of Suspending Laws at his pleasure nor to give their Assent to a Bill for Repealing the Test Acts and the Statutes that enjoin and require the Oaths of Allegeance and Supremacy And if they should be so far left of God and betrayd by those among themselves whom the Court hath gained as to become guilty of so enormous an Act of folly and villany and should the Election of the next Parliament be the happy juncture they wait for and the improving their interest as well as the giving their own votes for the Choice of Papists into the House of Commons be what they mean by an essential proof of their Loyalty and of the sincerity of their humble Addresses and that whereby they intend to demonstrate that the greatest thing they have promised is the least thing they will perform for his Majesties service and satisfation as in that case they will deserve to forfeit all hopes of bei 〈…〉 forgiven so it would be an infidelity to Go 〈…〉 and Men and a cruelty to our selves 〈◊〉 our Posterity not to abandon them as betray 〈…〉 of Religion expunge them out of the Roll 〈◊〉 Protestants strip them of all that where 〈…〉 free Subjects have a Legal Right and not 〈◊〉 condemn them to the utmost punishment 〈…〉 which the Laws of the Kingdom adjudg th 〈…〉 worst of Traitors and Malefactors unto There are some who thro hating of them do wish their miscarrying and offending t 〈…〉 so unpardouable a degree that they ma 〈…〉 hereafter be furnished with an advantage both of ruining them and the whole Diâ—senting party for their sakes But as the lov 〈…〉 that I bear unto them and the perswasio 〈…〉 and belief I have of the truth of their Religious principles do make me exceeding solic 〈…〉 tous to have them kept and prevented from being hurried and transported into so fata 〈…〉 and criminal a behaviour so I desire 〈◊〉 make no other excuse for my plain dealin 〈…〉 towards them but that of Solomon who tell us that faithful are the wounds of a friend whi 〈…〉 the kisses of an Enemy are deceitful and that h 〈…〉 who rebukes a man shall find more favour afterwards than he who flattereth with the tongu 〈…〉 POSTSCRIPT SInce the fore-going Sheets went to the press and while they were Printing off there is come to my hands a new Proclamation Dated at Windsor the 28. of Iune 1687. for granting further Liberty in Scotland and which was published there by an Order of the privy Council of that Kingdom bearing Date at Edinburgh the 5. of Iuly This Superâ—â—tation of one Proclamation after another in reference to the same thing is so apportioâ—ed and parallel to the late French method of Emitting Edicts in relation to those of the Reformed Religion in that Kingdom that they seem to proceed out of one mint to be calculated for the same End and to be designed for the compassing and obtaining the like effects For as soon as an Alarm was taken at the publishing of some unreasonable and rigorous Edict there used often to follow another of a milder strain which was pretended to be either for the moderating the severities of the former or to remove 〈…〉 d rectify what they were pleased to call 〈…〉 isconstructions unduly put upon it but 〈…〉 e true End whereof was only to stiffle and 〈…〉 tinguish the jealousies and apprehensions 〈…〉 at the other had begotten and excited and â—hich had they not been calmed and allayd 〈…〉 ight have awakened the Protestants there 〈◊〉 provide for their safety by a timely withâ—rawing into other Countries if they had â—ot been provoked to generous endeavoures â—f preventing the final suppression of their â—eligion and for obviating the ruin which 〈…〉 at Court had projected against them and â—as hastning to involve them under Nor 〈…〉 es my suspition of his Majesties pursuing â—e same design against Protestants which â—e great Louis glories to have accompli 〈…〉 ed proceed meerly from that conjun 〈…〉 ion of Counsels that all the world observes â—etween Whitehall and Versailles nor meerâ—â— from the Kings abandoning his Nephew â—nd Son in Law the Prince of Orange and not 〈◊〉 much as interposing to obtain satisfaction 〈◊〉 be given him for the many injuries dam 〈…〉 ages spoiles and robberies as well as 〈…〉 fronts done him by that haughty Monarch â—hen one vigorous application could not 〈…〉 il to effect it nor yet meerly from that â—greeableness in their procedures thro the â—ing of Englands imitating that forraign Po 〈…〉 ntate and making the whole course that 〈…〉 at h been taken in France the Pattern of 〈…〉 ll his actings in Great Brittain but I am â—uch confirmed in my fears and jealousies 〈…〉 y remembring a passage in one of Mr. Cole 〈…〉 ans Letters who as he very well knew what 〈…〉 e then Duke of York had been for many 〈…〉 ears ingaged in against our Religion and 〈…〉 ivil Liberties and under what Vows and 〈…〉 romises he was not to desist from prose 〈…〉 ting what had been resolved upon and un 〈…〉 ertaken so he had the confidence to say 〈…〉 at his Masters design and that of the King of 〈…〉 ance was one and the same and that this â—as no less as he farther informs us than 〈…〉 e exâ—â—â—pating the Northern Heresie Had the â—ing of England acted with