must answer for their misdemeanors as well as they must for his Next the Ministers his great care is to instil into the People a great aversion for the Loyal Judges and Magistrates but if they warp a little then he admires them for men and lovers of the Liberty of the People But that which next Hanging is most dreadful to him are the Loyal Gentry and their dependents These he knows can neither be wheedled nor frighted generally and therefore all the Forces he provideth are only against these Canaanites who keep the good People out of the Land of Promise or make their lives uneasie in it by denying them liberty of Conscience to be of any Religion or none as occasion serveth besides they have great Estates good meat and drink and some Authority all which belong to the Godly After Liberty of Conscience he places a Lawless Licence to do what he list and take what he please which he calls Property for he would fain have the Hedge broken down that all mens Estates Wives and Daughters might be common to him which is the most beloved Notion he has Reipublicae of a Commonwealth His Study is well stuffed with seditious Pamphlets and intelligences but his Staple Author is the Loviathan which he hath read ten times oftener than the Bible and Practiseth a thousand times more yet he hath a good Parcel of other Commonwealth Authors too and admires nothing in the Greeks and Romans but their hatred to Monarchy and love of Liberty and Popular Governments and were it not for this would be contented all their Books were burnt When all things are well he frights the little Folk with Predictions of what may be or is intended shall be and the less probable the thing is the more easily it is sometimes believed Only the wonder is men should court Fear and fall in love with Jealousie which are uneasie Passions to them but profitable to our Gentleman who to create them in his Followers pretends himself horribly over run with them when indeed his only fear is he should not after so many Cheats put upon the People be believed The Plot and the Duke are his two great Pretences and he wisheth they may never fail till he hath overthrown the Monarchy for then he shall want his best handles to take the People by Priviledge of Parliament is his last retreat and if that fails then he must take Achitophels course and set his house in Order to provide for what follows FINIS Pag. 3. Pro. Dom. Rege dicit quod cum placeat ei Parliament suum tenere pro utilitate Regnà sui de Regali potestate suâ facit summoneri ubi quando c pro voluntate sua Cok. Jurisdict p. 16. * The Three Estates do but Advise as the Privy-Council doth which if the King imbrace it becomes the Kings own Act in the one and the Kings Law in the other for without the Kings Acceptation both the publick and private Advices be but as empty Egg-shells Sir Walter Ralcighs Prerogative of Parliaments pag. 57. Vide Grotium de imp sum potest circa Sacra Cap. 6. Pag. 3. 4. Ed. 3. c. 14. 36 Ed. 3. c. 10. 2 R. 2 Num. 28. Pag. 2. Pag. 2. Pag. 2. Colledges Trial p. 37 57 73. Colledges Trial p. 27 30. Pag. 2. Pag. 3. Pag. 3. Pag. 3. Pag. 3. Pag. 3. Pag. 4. Pag. 4. Declaration Pag. 5. Pag. 4. Pag. 5. Pag. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cap. 15. â—â—lledge averred that the 〈…〉 of 40. did 〈…〉 what they had just 〈…〉 for and the Parliament 〈…〉 last at Westminster 〈…〉 of the same opinon 〈…〉 83. And to this 〈…〉 a great while 〈…〉 had excused the 〈…〉 from 〈…〉 War and 〈…〉 King which he 〈…〉 Papists did â— du Moulin's Vindication of the sincerity of P. c. p. 58. London 1679. Colledges Trial â— 81 82 83. Pag. 6. Pag. 7. Declaration from Breda April 4. 1660. ☞ Declaration concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs Octob. 25. 1660. ☜ ☜ ☜ There are some seditious Preachers who cannot be content to be dispenced with for their full Obedience to some Laws Established without reproaching and inveighing against those Laws how Established soever who tell their Auditors that the Apostle meant when he bid them stand to their Liberties that they should stand to their Arms c. Lord Chancellors Speech May 8. 1661. Address to the Freemen and Freeholders of the Nation Part. 1. By a Declaration published December 26. 1662. in which are these words We shall make it our special care so far forth as in us lies without invading the freedom of Parliament to incline them to make such an Act c. Friday Feb. 27. 1663 Collection of Messages Addresses c. Pag. 6. ☞ See the first part of the Address to the Freemen c. Pag. 7. The Declaration Pag. 7. Speech Octob. 21. 1680. Pag. 8. Address to the Freemen and Freeholders Part II. pag. 22. * Though his Majesty could not do that without acting contrary to his own judgment strengthened with the Opinion and Advice given by his Royal Grandfather King James of blessed memory to his Eldest Son Price Henry in these words But if God give you not Succession defraud never the nearest by right whatsoever conceit ye have of the person For Kingdoms are ever at Gods disposition and in that case we are but live-rentars lying no more in the Kings nor Peoples hand to dispossess the righteous Heir Basil Doron 62. ult Ed. Pag. 8. Speech Octob. 26. 1662. Speech Deceâ— 26. 1662. Pag. 8. Pag. 8. Speech Mar. 6 1678-9 Pag. 8. Lord Chancellors Speech March 6. 167â—-â— Pag. 9. Speech Mar. 6. 1678-9 Pag. 9. A seasonable Address to both Houses of Parliament pag. 4. Pag. 9. Pag. 10. Pag. 10. Pag. 10. Votes Nov. 13. 1680. Pag. 10. * 16 Car. 2. c. 4. Pag. 10. Friday March 25. 1681. Pag. 10. Historical Collect of the four last Parliaments of Q. Eliz. p. 47. 13 Car. 2. ca. 5. Pag. 10. * By the Bill to disinherit his Royal Highness Pag. 11. Pag. 11. Lord Chancellors Speech May 23. 1678. The words are these The influence such a Peace will have upon our Affairs are fitter for Meditation than Discourse Therefore it will import us to strengthen our selves at home and abroad that it may not be found a cheap or easie thing to put an Affront upon us * Dr. Nalson observes that the like disorders had the same effect in the time of His Majesties Father who he saith by this means lost the opportunity of being able to support his Friends and Allies as also that Honour and Terrour among his Enemies Abroad which the Union and hearty Affections of his Parliament would have rendred great and dreadful but now he became mean and contemptible that Prince who hath not power oâ—â—â— his own Subjects at home being in no probable capacity of doing any great matters abroad Preface to his impartial Collection Pag.
acknowledge it thankfully to him My Author goes on thus But it is not only of the Dissolution it self that we complain the manner of doing it is unwarranted by the precedents of former times and full of dangerous Consequents We are taught by the Writ of Summons that Parliaments are never called without the advice of the Council and the usage of all Ages has been never to send them away without the same advice To forsake this safe method is to expose the King personally to the reflections and Censures of the whole Nation for so ungrateful an Action We may grant it the most usual and the best and safest way to consult the Council in both these Cases But yet that will not presently make the Act Arbitrary or Illegal if it be omitted and in this Case if it were otherwise it may possibly in the end appear to have been matter of necessity rather than choice We may very well remember that a great number of the Gentlemen of the Lower House went to Oxford with armed men to guard them from the Papists and some of them told the people at parting They did never expect to see them again The meaning of which is possible to be understood And besides these there were some other zealous men went so that if his Majesty did not think it fit or safe to consult his Council and spend time in deliberating in the midst of such dangers they must bear the blame who gave the occasion and made it necessary So that these are the men next such as my Author who are to be charged tho not with advising yet with necessitating the last dissolution to be made in the manner it was for the security of his Majesties Life and Liberty which yet I would never have said but to justifie his Majesty But yet we must know all this Concern for the Council is not out of kindness or respect to them he saith They are punishable for such Orders as are irregular nor can the Ministers justifie any unlawful Action under colour of the Kings Commands since all his Commands that are contrary to law are void which is the true reason of that well known Maxim that the King can do no wrong a Maxim just in it self and alike safe for the Prince and for the Subject there being nothing more absurd than that a Favourite should excuse his enormous Actings by a pretended Command which we may reasonably suppose he first procured to be laid upon himself But we know not whom to charge with advising this last Dissolution it was a work of darkness and if we are not misinformed the Privy Council was as much surprized at it as the Nation The sorrow was that in the next Parliament this great Patriot would be at a loss in his hunting for some body to blame for an Action so ungrateful as he represents it to the whole Nation which in my judgment is a pretty way of spending his Reflections and Censures on the King And this is not all his vexation neither for in the next Paragraph he tells us Nor will a future Parliament be able to charge any body as the Author or Adviser of the late Printed Paper which bears the Title of his Majesties Declaration tho every good Subject ought to be careful how he calls it so for his Majesty never speaks to his People as a King but either personally in his Parliament or at other times under his Seal for which the Chancellour or other Officers are responsible if what passes them be not warranted by Law Nor can the direction of the Privy Council enforce any thing upon the People unless that Royal and legal Stamp give it an Authority but this Declaration comes abroad without any such Sanction and there is no other ground to ascribe it to his Majesty than the uncertain credit of the Printer whom we will easily suspect of an imposture rather than think the King would deviate from the approved course of his Illustrious Ancestors to pursue a new and unsuccessful method So here is all the Credit of the Declaration gone and the poor Printer left in the lurch to answer it to the next Parliament for putting this imposture on the Nation But what comfort is there in such small game A Lord Chancellour or other great Officer is a Royal Game and worth the pursuit of a House of Commons to pull him down but a pitiful Printer who can find in his heart to imploy his Oratory against such mean Mechanicks and as for the Privy Council they can enforce nothing upon the People without the Seal so that for time to come all Proclamations and other publick Papers may be securely slighted except they come Sealed with the great Seal or some body be sent with them to assure us he saw it to the Original Thus far the Historian went but then the Prophet comes forth and assures us as this Method is new so it will be unsuccessful How truly the World is not now to be told From the Effect of the first Declaration of this kind which he saith was published in 1628. and filled the whole Kingdom with Jealousies and was one of the first Causes of the ensuing unhappy War he proceeds to tell us That Declarations to justifie what Princes do must always be either needless or ineffectual their Actions ought to be such as may recommend themselves to the World and carry their own Evidence along with them of their usefulness to the publick and then no Arts to justifie them will be necessary Were all Mankind wise and honest this Argument would be unanswerable but as long as some men out of Dulness and others out of Obstinacy and Interest shut their Eyes to the plainest and most evident demonstrations of Reason it must of necessity be sometimes necessary and fit for Princes to Inform their Subjects of the reasonableness of their Actions and accordingly the same course hath ever been taken and though it might fail of that end in 1628. yet it hath often heretofore and doubtless will often again succeed and the Jealousies which then arose were not the effect of the Declaration but of those ill Arts by which such a sort of men as we have now to deal with wheedled the Populace into an ill opinion of the best of Princes for Ends that are now too well known to be again imbraced When a Prince descends so low as to give his Subjects Reasons for what he has done he not only makes them Judges whether there be any weight in those reasons but by so unusual a submission gives cause to suspect that he is conscious to himself that his Actions want an Apology I never thought before that the French Kings Logick was the only Argument that became a Prince Car tel est nostre plaisir For so our will and pleasure is And those Subjects must be very ill natured that grow jealous upon the Condescentions of a Prince and judge the
in love with the Book of Common-Prayer as you can wish and have prejudice enough to those who do not love it who I hope in time will be better informed and change their minds and you may be confident I do as much desire to see a Uniformity settled as any amongst you I pray trust me in that Affair I promise you to hasten the dispatch of it with all convenient speed you may relie upon me in it I have transmitted the Book of Common-Prayer with those Alterations and Additions which have been presented to me by the House of Convocation to the House of Peers with my Approbation that the Act of Uniformity may relate to it so that I presume it will shortly be dispatched there And when all is done we can the well setling that Affair will require great Prudence and discretion and the Absence of all Passion and Precipitation The Act of Uniformity being setled and passed his Majesty did not give over all his thoughts for the Dissenters but in the year 1662. was again labouring to revive his Declaration from Breda for Liberty of Conscience which the House of Commons opposed and drew up their reasons against it in the form of an Address wherein they particularly answer the pretences from the Declaration from Breda Which tho the whole Address is in the third part of the Address to the Freemen and Freeholders of the Nation I will here transcribe because this Book may possibly fall into some hands which have not that We have considered the nature of your Majesties Declaration from Breda and are humbly of opinion that your Majesty ought not to be pressed with it any further BECAUSE it is not a Promise in it self but only a Gracious Declaration of your Majesties Intentions to do what in you lay and what a Parliament should advise your Majesty to do And no such advise was ever given or thought fit to be offered nor could it be otherwise understood because there were Laws of Uniformity then in being which could not be dispensed with but by Act of Parliament They who do pretend a right to that supposed Promise put their Right into the hands of their Representatives whom they chose to serve in this Parliament for them who have passed and your Majesty consented to the Act of Uniformity if any shall presume to say that a right to the benefit of this Declaration doth still remain after this Act passed it tends to dissolve the very bonds of Government and to suppose a disability in your Majesty and your two Houses of Parliament to make a Law contrary to any part of your Majesties Declaration though both Houses should advise your Majesty to it Yet still his Majesty was so tender of these men that the tenth of February 1667. the Commons addressed to the King for a Proclamation to enforce obedience to the Laws in force concerning Religion and Church Government as it is now established according to the Act of Uniformity And the fourth of March following the House taking into consideration the Information of the Insolent carriages and abuses committed by persons in several places in disturbing of Ministers in their Churches and holding Meetings of their own contrary to the Laws of this Realm Addressed again for a Proclamation against Conventicles and that there may be care taken for the preservation of the Peace of the Kingdom against unlawful Assemblies of Papists and Nonconformists which was promised the next day The third of November 1669. the House of Commons gave his Majesty thanks for issuing a Proclamation for putting the Laws in execution against Nonconformists and for suppressing Conventicles with the humble desire of this House for his Majesties continuance of the same care for suppressing of the same for the future The Eighth of March 1669. the House having received information of a dangerous and unlawful Conventicle lately met in the West of this Kingdom and of Treasonable words there spoken and that his Majesty had upon information given order for the Prosecution of the Offenders The House returned him their Thanks and desired that his Majesty would be pleased to consider the danger of Conventicles in and near London and Westminster from the nature of those further off and to give order for the speedy suppressing of them and that his Majesty would give order to put the Laws against Popish Recusants in execution Yet after all this the Fifteenth of March 1671-2 his Majesty published a Declaration for Liberty of Conscience by the Advice of his Privy Council which he was hardly persuaded to depart from by the Commons in Feb. 1672. The mischiefs of which Toleration or Indulgence have been so great to his Majesty in particular and the whole Nation in general that no man can well express them And now who can enough admire the Insolence of this discontented Gentleman who dare say as he doth That if the same diligence the same earnest solicitations had been made use of in that affair which have since been exercised directly contrary to the design of it there is no doubt but every part of it would have had the desired success and all his Majesties Subjects would have enjoyed the fruits of it and have now been extolling a Prince so careful to keep sacred his Promises to his People I say on the contrary could his Majesty have been prevailed on by the unanswerable reasons of that most Excellent and most Loyal House of Commons to have enforced the execution of the Laws against Dissenters he had never seen his Affairs reduced to that ill condition they were not long since in And tho I question not but by Gods blessing his Majesty will in a short time resettle things yet I will hope for time to come it shall be a Maxim in England That the Strength of the Dissenters is the Weakness of the Throne As for our Authors jeering reflection on his Majesties other Declaration of April 20. 1679. concerning the Privy Council and some persons then taken into it his Majesty hath had but too much reason not to stick to the same when he see there were some men whom nothing could oblige to be faithful to him but if his Majesty hath not advised with them he hath with some others at least as wise and much honester than some of those who were laid aside so that that Declaration hath been effectually made good to the Nation And therefore we have no reason to question his Majesties Candor in this As for the Declaration read in our Churches the other day there needs no other Argument to make us doubt of the reality of the Promises which it makes than to consider how partially and with how little sincerity the things which it pretends to relate are therein represented it begins with telling us in his Majesties Name That it was with exceeding great trouble that he was brought to dissolve the two last Parliaments without more benefit to the People by the calling
Reasons of a King to have the less weight because he graciously offers them to the Judgment of his People Sure I am sometimes God Almighty is pleased to do it who only hath a right to command our absolute submission upon the account of his infinite both Wisdom and Soveraignty So that to suspect the want of of an Apology on no other grounds than a mans willingness to satisfie the World of the justice of a mans Cause and the reasonableness of his Actions is a perverseness to which common Knaves do seldom arrive the Heroes of Villany do not often rise to that pitch of Brutality without the help of Malmsbury Philosophy And I am persuaded that our Author would have spared this Cavil against his Majesties Declaration if he had before-hand considered that in natural consequence he charges not only the King but also the Three Estates with so many deliberate Acts of folly and injustice as there are Acts of Parliament containing the reasons of Enacting so or so If a Princes Actions are indeed unjustifiable if they are opposite to the Inclinations and apparently destructive of the Interests of his Subjects it will be very difficult for the most eloquent or insinuating Declaration to make them in love with such things And if they be none of all these if a Crafty man may but comment upon them and by Ifs and An ds insinuate into the heads of the Common People that he takes them for such it is possible all the Eloquence in the World may not be powerful enough to bring them into their right wits again but yet this may fail too sometimes And therefore they did certainly undertake no easie task in pretending to persuade men who see themselves exposed to the restless malice of their Enemies who observe the languishing condition of the Nation and that nothing but a Parliament can provide remedies for the great Evils which they feel and fear that two several Parliaments upon whom they had placed all their hopes were so suddenly broken out of kindness to them or with any regard to their advantage No I suppose no body was so silly as to undertake such an impossible task but there was another sort of men who had looked better into things and care was to be taken of them to confirm them and a third sort that were not yet well resolved what to think of things and they were to be directed and assisted and it was not impossible the Declaration might have a good effect upon them as indeed it had as for those that had placed all their hopes upon the two last Parliaments and were pleased with all they did there was neither hopes nor design of working that Miracle upon them but they were to be left to time to be cured And in the interim I would advise them to study Colemans Declaration of which my Author saith fine things which I care not to transcribe But should this Declaration be suffered to go abroad any longer under the Royal Name yet it will never be thought to have proceeded from his Majesties Inclination or Judgment but to be gained from him by the Artifices of the same ill men who not being content to have prevailed with him to dissolve two Paliaments only to protect them from Publick Justice do now hope to excuse themselves from being thought the Authors of that Counsel by making him openly to avow it But they have discovered themselves to the Kingdom and have told their Names when they number amongst the great Crimes of the House of Commons their having declared divers Eminent Persons to be Ememies to the King and Kingdom So his Majesties Inclination and Judgment being kindly absolved from the guilt of this Declaration of purpose to abate the Esteem it ought to have And seeing it is not possible to keep it within doors and that some may think the worse of it because there was a sham Declaration found among Colemans Papers as you know there was a sham Plot in the Meal-Tub and yet there may be others that are real The next Inquiry or rather Hue and Cry is after the Authors and those he thinks he hath found by the passage he cites out of the Declaration those Eminent Persons or some of them must needs out of Revenge and Fear be the Authors of this Pestilent Declaration His Reason is this None could be offended at the Proceedings of the Parliaments but they who were obnoxious none could be concerned to vindicate the Dissolution but they who advised it But is my Author sure of that that never a man in the Nation was offended at their proceedings but such as were obnoxious to them I am of another mind and so is all the world now Is it impossible for any man to be concerned to vindicate the Actions of a Prince but they that advise him What pitiful Sophistry this is But were no men obnoxious to the proceedings of these Parliaments but these eminent men May not it be some of those Subjects who were by Arbitrary Orders taken into Custody for matters that had no relation to Priviledges of Parliament They are mentioned before the Eminent Persons tho of a Meaner degree If I be not mistaken some Members too were very disgracefully Expelled the House Might not some of them have a hand in it We are assured a little lower that the Writer was of another Nation from this Gallicism It was a matter extremely sensible to us So that this Gentleman is suspitious it is but a Translation of a French Copy and the rather because Monsieur Barillon the French Embassadour read it to a Gentleman three days before it was communicated to the Privy Council if his intelligence did not deceive him So here is fair Scope left to find or suspect at least other Authors besides the Eminent Persons other Advisers besides those that were obnoxious For I suppose Monsieur Barillon doth not fear a House of Commons And as for this and other Gallicisms that may occur they are not to be wondred at in an Age that generally understands the French Tongue in a Court where almost all the Great men speak it in a Prince who hath lived in France and is descended of a French Mother And the wonder is not so prodigious neither that the French Embassadour should get a transcript of a Paper intended to be published to the whole Nation two or three days before it was read in Council These things make a great noise to ignorant people whilst I am persuaded this Gentleman smiled to think how finely he was deluding them But be these things as they will the Eminent Persons must expect to answer it And our Author thinks they cannot blame him or his Party for hoping one day to see justice done upon such Counsellours And that the Commons had reason for their Vote when they declared those Eminent Persons who manage things at this rate Enemies to the King and Kingdom and Promoters
they were never able to effect themselves the Dissenters did for them for from the moment the Popish Plot was discovered they entered into a project to make use of it another way against the King and Court on one hand and against the Church and the Loyal Gentry on the other In order to this they had these close Cabals and private Meetings I last mentioned where they invented and spread abroad a thousand idle Stories to fright the Common People out of their little Wits and also raised Money which they liberally bestowed amongst the Informers to render them more obsequious to them so that in a short time Informing became a very thriving trade if it would have held and this great familiarity betwixt the discoverers of the Plot and the Whigs was the best colour afterwards for the Meal-Tub Presbyterian Plot. By this means the People were easily deluded into a conceit that these Gentlemen who took such care of the Discoverers and their Party who were always haranguing against Popery were the only Protestants in the Nation that could save them out of the hands of the Papists And on the other side the Court and all the Loyal Gentry and Clergy became suspected of want of zeal against Popery and this was heightned by the Discoverers themselves who were for the most part men of no very great or good qualities and were so puffed up by the flatteries and Liberalities of the Whigs and their own high conceits of the Service they had done the Nation that they thought no recompence no respect which was bestowed upon them was great enough and so became insolent both in their carriage and discourses by which means they became less respected rhan before till at last they were forced to give themselves up intrirely to the Whigs This had two very different effects upon several sorts of men some believed that there was no Popish Plot after they saw the Dissenters reap all the advantage by it And others thought that all but the Dissenters were more or less concerned in the guilt of it as well as the Papists or at least were favourers of the Papists and Popery Things being in this state especially after the dissolution of the Long Loyal Parliament the Discoverers lost much of their reputation but that ever any vile Arts were used to hinder any further discovery of the Plot by any but the Papists or that liberty was given to reproach or any means used to corrupt or destroy them that were the Witnesses except it were by Papists doth not appear and in all those cases all the care in the world was taken of the Witnesses too by the King and his Council And as to that which my Author mentions in the last place How the very Criminals were incouraged and allowed to be good Witnesses against their Accusers I cannot imagine what he means by it or when or where it should be done tho I have read over all the Printed Trials and therefore it is enough to deny this and put him upon the proof of it But how did all these things tend to the advantage of the Popish Plotters in the end First As the Zeal of these people fired the Rabble so it put the Long Loyal Parliament too into so great a fret that it proved mortal and then going downward it put the Country into such disorder that tho his Majesty hath given us the opportunities of chusing three Parliaments one after another we have not been able to send up one that has not fallen into those little Excesses which have occasioned their dissolution before they had done us any considerable good And at length his Majesty is forced for some time to keep us without one to try if Fasting will bring us into our senses again and in the mean time the noise of the Popish Plot is drowned by new and more surprizing attempts of the Whigs and that Popish Party which whilst it had none but real Papists in its List was the abomination of all Protestants now the Whigs have joyned all the Church of England men to them by their lies and slanders even that very Popish Party begin to be better thought of for their sakes who are falsly joyned with them and by these and many other ways the prosecution of the Popish Plot any further is thought by most men impossible Whereas had not the Dissenters been thus serviceable to them there is reason to believe they would have suffered much more than they have done and there would have been much sharper Laws made against them than they need fear now If all this be considered it will easily appear it was not the Protection of the Duke whom this Gentleman can never prove the Publickly avowed Head of the Papists but the over-doing of the business that hath delivered the Popish Faction out of that fear and danger which the discovery of the Plot had cast them into We must own saith my Author that his Majesty has opened all his Parliaments at Westminster with very Gracious Expressions nor have we wanted that Evidence of his readiness to satisfie the desires of his Subjects but that sort of Evidence will soon lose its force if it be never followed by Actions correspondent by which only the World can judge of the sincerity of Expressions or Intentions Had the two short Parliaments at Westminster been the only Parliaments his Majesty had ever called since his return there might have been some colour for this undutiful reflection but all the World knows there were two there before them and that his Majesty complied with them in almost all they asked in a regular way and when at any time he was necessitated to deny them any request he gave them such reason for it as they seemed to be well pleased with his denial It will appear to any man that his Majesty hath passed more Acts in twenty years than any one of his Ancestors have done in twice the time that he hath abated more of his just and real Prerogative than any Prince we ever yet had could be brought to part with The Court of Wards and the Right of Purveyance were great advantages to the Crown and as troublesom to the Subjects till his Majesty generously gave them up and these two Prerogatives were never Contested and I might instance in some other if I did not think it sit to be as short as I can In almost twenty years that the Long Loyal Parliament sate I never heard of above one Bill that had passed both Houses which was denied his Royal Assent and that was The Bill for preserving the peace of the Kingdom by raising the Militia and continuing them in duty for two and forty days which Bill was refused November 30. 1678. and then also his Majesty gave this reason for it That he did not refuse to pass it for the dislike of the matter but the manner because it put the Militia for so many days out of his power and if it
is reduced to want an extraordinary supply and then he ought to resort to his Parliament Well but suppose as it may happen the necessity is so urgent that it cannot be put off till a Parliament can be called and meet and raise money Or if you please suppose a Parliament dare not trust the King with money or which is all one will pretend so Or will not supply him unless he will pass an Act that they shall sit as long as they please or unless he will let them turn out what Ministers of State Justices of the Peace c. they think sit and put in others as they please May not a Prince relieve himself in these cases by an Advance or Anticipation but must submit absolutely to the Commons I hope he will not say these are impossible accidents Our Ancestors did wisely provide that the King and his People should have frequent need of one another and by having frequent opportunities of mutually relieving one anothers wants be sure ever to preserve a dutiful affection in the Subject and a Fatherly tenderness in the Prince When the King had occasion for the liberality of his People he would be well inclined to hear and redress their Grievances and when they wanted ease from oppressions they would not fail with alacrity to supply the occasions of the Crown All this is certainly true and was the very reason why the two first Parliaments of his Majesties Reign of whose Loyalty and hearty affections to the Crown no man ever doubted setled part of the Revenue on his Majesty for his Life only that his Successor might be obliged by a regrant of it And the whole which they gave to this King was but equal to the constant and regular Expences of the Government as they designed it tho it is said it falls short of that too Now might things be thus carried as my Author tells us they were designed to be England would certainly be the happiest Nation in the World The King would be as rich as his People could make him and the People as happy as a tender and good King could make them But alas there is sprung up a new Generation of men who have taken such an Aversion for Monarchy and the just Prerogatives of the Crown that till these Grievances the greatest Grievances that ever can betide a free-born people be totally taken away they can find no gust in the removal of all those other petty Grievances of which our Ancestors complained so often and as often found redress There is also arisen a sort of sober Protestants as the Dissenters will needs be called who can neither agree one with another nor with the Religion that is Established and to them it is an intolerable Grievance to see Episcopacy a Liturgy and a few innocent Ceremonies which they call Popery established in the Church and till these are extirpated Root and Branch and every of their pious Whimsies setled successively in the place of them or tolerated at once they good men cannot be at ease neither These two have twisted their interests together with a third sort that have no Religion at all but have a damnable inclination to the Spoils of the Church and the Plunder of the Nation And they by Popular Arts have wheedled and deluded great numbers of the Freemen and Freeholders of the Nation into a strong belief that Popery is by our Governours designed to be set up in the Church and Arbitrary Government in the State things which these good men hate mightily as there is good reason for it but are very much abused by the Information and much more by being persuaded as they have been that the chusing discontented men to be their Representatives in the House of Commons was the only way to prevent these two dreadful things from falling upon them These men however have sometimes got to be the major part of that House and the Consequence hath ever been that the King could get no Supplies be his necessities what they could be unless he would grant such things as tended immediately to the ruine of the Church and Monarchy And if he were a little averse to it then he was presently Libelled to the Nation as a favourer of Popery and a designer of Arbitrary Government but if it were not safe to attack him then according to the method of the late Rebels the cry was raised against the Evil Counsellors or the Corrupt Ministers and nothing would do but the turning them out of their employments as treacherous Servants to the Kingdom for being too faithful to the King And because they can never effect these great things by other means they have always turned this excellent Constitution against it self and that which was intended to endear the King and his People each to others their mutual want of each others assistance hath been made a Steppal to mount the Throne and pluck down the Mitre So that his Majesty who knew how things went in his Father's days was not out when he told the Commons in his Speech March 1. 1661. as followeth Gentlemen I need not put you in mind of the miserable effects which have attended the wants and necessities of the Crown I need not tell you that there is a Republick Party still in the Kingdom which have the courage to promise themselves another Revolution and methinks I should as little need to tell you that the only way with Gods blessing to disappoint their hopes and desires and indeed to reduce them from those extravagant hopes and desires is to let them see that you have so provided for the Crown that it hath wherewithal to support it self and to secure you which I am sure is all I desire and desire only for you preservation Therefore I do conjure you by all the professions of affection you have made to me by all the kindness I know you have for me after all your deliberations betake your selves to some speedy resolutions and settle such a real and substantial Revenue upon me as may hold some proportion with the necessary Expences I am at for the Peace and Benefit and Honour of the Kingdom that they who look for troubles at home may despair of their wishes and that our Neighbours abroad by seeing that all is well at home may have that esteem and value of Us as may secure the Interest and Honour of the Nation and make the happiness of this Kingdom and of this CITY once more the Admiration and Envy of the World This Parliament understood things well and provided accordingly so that the nineteenth of May following the Lord Chancellor in a Speech made at their Prorogation told them They had wisely very wisely provided such a constant growing Revenue as may with Gods blessing preserve the Crown from those scandalous wants and necessities as have heretofore exposed it and the Kingdom to those dismal miseries from which they are but even now buoyed up for whatsoever other humane
causes may be assigned according to the several fancies and imaginations of men of our late miserable distractions they cannot be so reasonably imputed to any one cause as to the extreme poverty of the Crown the want of power could never have appeared if it had not been for the want of money But since that the rising greatness of our Neighbours have mounted the Expences of the Crown above that growing Revenue that was then setled and the Republical Party as his Majesty stiles them promise themselves the happiness of bringing about another Revolution by the same means the last was in his Majesties days if it be possible but however at his Death And therefore if the Crown thus beset shall at any time make use of Anticipations to relieve it self they only ought to be responsible for it who have or shall make it necessary For surely no Prince would borrow when he might have it freely given upon reasonable terms unless he took a pride in counting the number of his Creditors And therefore saith my Author it has ever been esteemed a Crime in Counsellors who persuaded the King to Anticipate his Revenue and a Crime in those who furnish'd money upon such Anticipations in an extraordinary way however extraordinary the occasion might be For this cause it was that the Parliament in the 35 of Henry VIII did not only discharge all these Debts which the King had contracted but Enacted that those Lenders who had been before paid again by the King should refund all those Sums into the Exchequer as judging it reasonable punishment to make them forfeit the Money they lent since they have gone about to introduce so dangerous a precedent It is bad Logick that raiseth general Conclusions from particular instances and it will appear so in this that we have in hand which because I cannot so well and creditably do it my self I will make appear by transcribing a passage out of my Lord Coke tho it be somewhat long Advice concerning new and plausible Projects and Oâ—â—ers in Parliament When any plausible project is made in Parliament to draw the Lords and Commons to assent to any Act especially in matters of weight and importance if both Houses do give upon the matter projected and promised their Consent it shall be most necessary they being trusted for the Commonwealth to have the matter projected and promised which moved the House to consent to be established in the same Act lest the benefit of the Act be taken and the matter projected and promised never performed and so the Houses of Parliament perform not the trust reposed in them as it fell out taking one example from many in the Reign of Henry VIII On the Kings behalf the Members of both Houses were informed in Parliament that no King or Kingdom was safe but where the King had three Abilities First To live of his own and be able to defend his Kingdom upon any sudden Invasion or Insurrection Secondly To aid his Confederates otherwise they would never assist him Thirdly To reward his well deserving Servants Now the Projâ—ct was that if the Parliament would give unto him all the Abbies Priories Friories Nunneries and other Monasteries that for ever in time then to come he would take order that the same should not be converted to private use but first That his Exchequer for the purposes aforesaid should be inrich'd Secondly the Kingdom strengthened by a continual maintainance of Forty thousand well trained Souldiers with skilful Captains and Commanders Thirdly For the benefit and ease of the Subject who never afterwards as was projected in any time to come should be charged with Subsidies Fifteenths Loans or other common aids Fourthly Lest the Honour of the Realm should receive any Diminution of Honour by the dissolution of the said Monasteries there being twenty nine Lords of Parliament of the Abbots and Priors that held of the King per Baroniam that the King would create a number of Nobles which we omit The said Monasteries were given to the King by authority of divers Acts of Parliament but no provision was therein made for the said Project or any part thereof only ad faciendam populum these Possessions were given to the King his Heirs and Successors to do and use therewith his and their own wills to the pleasure of Almighty God and the honour and profit of Almighty God Now observe the Catastrophe in the same Parliament of 32 Henry VIII when the great and opulent Priory of St. Johns of Jerusalem was given to the King he demanded and had a Subsidy both of the Clergy and Laity and the like he had in 34 Henry VIII and in 37 Henry VIII he had another Subsidy And since the dissolution of the said Monasteries he exacted divers Loans and against Law received the same Now let my Reader judge if it be reasonable to make what the Parliament did in the 25 of Henry VIII a standing Rule for all succeeding times when it is morally impossible that ever any King of England should have such a Treasure and Revenue as they had given this King within less than seven years and a Subsidy but the very year before besides If we had such Parliaments now and it were possible to give the King such Supplies as they did I would freely give my Vote to have the next Lender Hanged The true way to put the King out of a possibility of supporting the Government is to let him waste in one year that money which ought to bear the charge of the Government for seven But Sir to put you out of pain for that this would necessitate the sitting of Parliaments and the yielding to whatsoever they could desire So this tho true was not the reason of the Vote but directly contrary to it but the King knows the Consequence of that too well to need any restraint in that particular for he knows as well as you that this is the direct method to destroy not only the Credit of the Crown at home and abroad but the Monarchy it self If the King resolves never to pay the money that he borrows what faith will be given to the Royal Promises and the honour of the Nation will suffer in that of the Prince And if it be put upon the People to repay it this would be a way to impose a necessity of giving Taxes without end whether they would or no. Omitting the undutifulness of these suppositions it is very remarkable that the great Anticipations upon the Revenue were made in the time of the last Dutch War when they who now so much clamour against them were Ministers and they who now are such and bear all the blame were not in a capacity to hinder it Whether they had any such intentions as these in it they best know but I am sure one of them made it out powerfully that there was all the reason in the world that the Parliament should pay off
that you would not let your Conscience in this passage give your Passion in all the rest the lie Now if I might interpret your meaning I should guess it to be this They that on the one hand pretend to maintain the Legal Monarchy but do really intend to advance it into an absolute form without any dependence upon Parliaments and they who pretend the same thing but design to throw off the Monarchy and put the whole Power into the hands of the People i. e. the Commonwealth Party are the men that have brought things into the disorder they are now in Whilst they who love the Legal Monarchy both out of Choice and Conscience amongst which persons I will subscribe my name when occasion requires are they who desire the frequent and successful meetings of the Great Coucil Now Sir here seems to be a little Justice in this for as it were a high and flagrant piece of injustice to say that all that made up the House of Commons in the two last Parliaments designed to ruine the Monarchy and set up another Parliamentary Commonwealth of England So it is the same notorious and base injustice in you to traduce the Ministers in general as you do throughout the whole Pamphlet when as it is apparent enough first That his Majesty never did intend to set up one Dram of Arbitrary Government Secondly That it is not possible for the Ministers to do it without his consent Thirdly That it is scarce possible for him and them to do it if they had designed to do it till there hath been another War Fourthly That never any considerable person or number of persons amongst the Ministers did ever yet make one step towards it For all those Acts that have been so basely traduced are fairly defensible Those that look worst the Transactions about 1671. and 72. not excepted one of which you your self have excused viz. the Postponing of all Payments to the Bankers out of the Exchequer And the Declaration for Liberty of Conscience though you stile it an Arbitrary Power assumed to suspend Penal Laws and say the whole Nation was justly alarmed upon it yet I believe should his Majesty do the same thing over again those that now make the greatest noise against Arbitrary Power without cause would willingly enough accept of it And yet there is no reason that the present Ministers should bear the blame of these things when they that promoted them are now Sir in your Interests And Sir that the meetings of the Great Council may be successful as well as frequent one of these things must be that either the People change the Members of the Lower House or that those Members change their Methods of Proceeding and till this be done these meetings how frequent soever can never be successful For if things be carried in the next Convention as they were in the late Parliaments neither can the King neither will the Nation endure it and for all our Threats you will find when you come to bring it into Act such difficulties as I car not to foretel tho I can foresee them As for the other sort of Peevish men of whom the Declaration gives us warning who are angry at the disappointment of their Ambitious Designs If these words are intended to reflect on those men of Honour and Conscience who being qualified for the highest imployments of State have either left or refused or be removed from them because they would not accept ro retain them at the Price of selling their Country and inslaving Posterity and who are content to sacrifice their Safety as well as their Interest for the Publick and expose themselves to the malice of the men in power and to the daily Plots Perjuries and Subornations of the Papists I say if these are the Ambitious Men spoken of the People will have consideration for what they say and therefore it will be wisdom to give such men as these no occasion to say they intend to lay aside the use of Parliaments This your Appeal to the People hath spoiled all the fine things you had said before for supposing all the rest had been true as it is notoriously false yet this making the People the Judges is a kind of attempt to separate them from their Governours and exasperate them against the Government from whence must spring as great inconveniences as those you pretend to avoid and therefore had I been one of these men I would never have appealed to them but to God and my own Conscience and have sate still till he had pronounced the Sentence in this World or that which is to come You know Sir the People are not able to examine any thing but being once put into a rage by such specious Harangues as these are rush into disorder and confusion and take all that endeavour to quiet them for Enemies and Papists and so the guilty escape and then innocent are cut in pieces And besides all this never was any disorder in a Government rectified by the People but by a greater and more fatal disorder as we had experience in the late times and very often before But let the Event be what it will you are resolved to stir up the People to the utmost to revenge your case upon the Government and to that purpose insinuate there is a design to lay aside the use of Parliaments as if you should have said Stand to your Arms Gentlemen against these Ministers for as they have laid us aside men of Honour and Conscience because we would not sell our Country and enslave Posterity so the next thing to be done is the laying aside Parliaments and you are the men that must by your consideration of us prevent this great mischief This was pretty well but the next is excellent In good earnest the behaviour of the Ministers of late gives but too just occasions to say that the use of Parliaments is already laid aside for tho the King has own'd in so many of his Speeches and Declarations the great Danger of the Kingdom and the necessity of the aid and counsel of Parliaments he hath nevertheless been prevailed upon to dissolve four in the space of twenty six months without making provision by their Advice suitable to our dangers or wants My Author was sensible that the People might think that the former hint proceeded from Passion or was not serious or at least the danger was not eminent and he comes now nearer to them and tells them in good earnest they had but too just occasions to say that Parliaments were already laid aside as to any use of them and he proved it too Four had been dissolved in twenty six months but three of them were called in that time And this is an odd sort of laying them aside to call as many in twenty six months as heretofore have been called in so many years Well but there was no provision made by their Advice suitable to our Dangers
not so nice but it might have been â—een determined by a meaner Critick than our Author who hath shewn his great skill in the French Tongue in his learned Remarques on the Phrase it is a matter extremely sensible to us And in the Latine upon the word Republick or Commonwealth If he had not from hence sought an occasion to call his Majesties Fidelity in question which tho it may become a Republican is very indecent in a good Subject When we see the real fruits of these utmost endeavours to extirpate Popery out of Parliament when we see the Duke of York no longer first Minister or rather Protector of these Kingdoms and his Creatures no longer to have the whole direction of Affairs when we see that love to our Religion and Laws is no longer a Crime at Court no longer a fore-runner of being disgraced and removed from all Offices and Imployments in their Power That is when the Duke of York is ruined and not only his Popish but his Church of England Creatures who have shewn themselves such by Voting against the Bill of Exclusion be laid aside When our Religion which no man knows what it is and that part of the Laws which we skulk behind now to ruine all the rest and the King and Kingdom to boot shall not hinder our Preferment whatever we do or say When the word Loyal which is faithful to the Law shall be restored to its own meaning and no longer signifie one who is for subverting the Laws That is when men may safely pretend so much respect to the Laws that they may affront his Majesty who is the Fountain of all Laws and the Protector of them and us by them when the word Loyal shall have no other relation to his Majesty than the same word if in use there hath in Venice when spoken concerning their Duke When we see the Commissions filled with hearty Protestants that is with Whigs and Republicans and the Laws executed in good earnest against the Papists and the Dissenters passed by unpunished The Discoverers of the Plot countenanced or at least heard and suffered to give their Evidence except when they make bold with our selves and such a Colledge and Fitz-Harris and the Association-men in which cases they ought neither to be heard nor believed The Courts of Justice steady and not avowing a jurisdiction one day which they disown the next but just such as they were in the late times When we see no more Grand-Juries discharged lest they should hear Witnesses nor Witnesses hurried away lest they should inform Grand-Juries tho it were against his Majesty and when all Grand-Juries are of the Family of Ignoramus the Lawyer and will find according to their Conscience tho against both their Oath and their Evidence especially when a Precious man is in jeopardy to be hanged for something done or said against the King When we see no more instruments from Court labouring to raise jealousies of Associating Petitioning Protestants who have a Patent from heaven to retail all the fears and jealousies that ever shall from henceforward be put off in England Scotland and Ireland and in all other his Majesties Dominions and Countries whatsoever And to that purpose have erected several Mints for the Coining of them in London and the parts adjacent and do maintain several Presses and a great many Intelligencers to collect and disperse the same for the benefit of his Majesties discontented Subjects who receive much comfort by the worst and falsest of them and hope to have just such another harvest in the end as they reaped from the same Seed in and about the years 1640 41 42 and so on till 1660. When we see some regard had to Protestants abroad tho his Majesty should be by our defaults brought into such straits as hardly to be able to maintain the Government at home When we observe somewhat else to be meant by Governing according to Law than barely to put them in execution against Dissenters in whom our strength against the Government doth chiefly consist the Laws made against Papists In which number we desire the Church of England men that is all that stick to the Religion by Law Established may be included and then we shall promise our selves not only frequent Parliaments but everlasting ones and all the blessed effects of pursuing Parliamentary Councils the Extirpation of Popery and Prelacy the redress of Grievances the flourishing of Laws and the perfect restoring the Monarchy to the credit which it had in 1658 and 59. both at home and abroad There needs no time to open the Eyes of his Majesties good Subjects the Whigs and their hearts are ready prepared to meet him in Parliament in order to perfect all these good Settlements and Peace which are now wanting in Church and State But whilst there are so many little Emissaries imployed to sow and encrease divisions in the Nation as if the Ministers had a mind to make his Majesty head of a Faction and joyn himself to one Party in the Kingdom who has a just right of Governing all which Thuanus lib. 28. says was the notorious Folly and occasioned the destruction of his great-Grandmother Mary Queen of Scots whilst we see the same differences Promoted industriously by the Court which gave the Rise and Progress to the late troubles and which were once thought fit to be buried in an Act of Oblivion What is meant by the little Emissaries here I know not nor will I guess Nor did I ever observe the Ministers had a mind to make his Majesty the Head of a Faction which your Author much blames in Henry III. of France too when he suffered the Holy League the Prototype of the Association to be set afoot and propagated so far before he took notice of it that he was forced at last to attempt to make himself the Head of it which was properly a Faction combined by an Oath against the Right Heir to the Crown and a part of the Natural Subjects of France on pretence of Religion for the Exclusion of the first and destruction of the latter without and against the consent of the King which caused a Rebellion in France the destruction of the King a sooner Succession of Henry IV. the right Heir upon changing his Religion and if God had not prevented it had betrayed France into the hands of the Spaniards or Cantoned it into small Principalities Now this is properly to make a Prince the head of a Faction without consideration of the Rise of our late Troubles which sprung from such another League but to countenance a Loyal Party more than a Rebellious one is not so and whatever effect it had in the Reign of Queen Mary his Majesties Grandmother seems the only way now to save England and prevent the need of another Act of Oblivion and Indemnity for all those Crimes that were pardoned by his Majesty but never repented of by them that acted them Whilst
we see then the Popish Interest so plainly countenanced which was then done with caution when every pretence of Prerogative is strained to the utmost height when Parliaments are used with contempt and indignity and their Judicature and all their highest Priviledges brought in question in inferious Courts we have but too good reason to believe tho every Loyal and good man does yet the Ministers and Favourites do but little consider the Rise and Progress of the late troubles and have little desire or care to preserve their Country from a relapse All this is Party-per-pale a justification of the last and an Exhortation to another Rebellion upon the self-same false pretences only a little aggravated because the People are more slow to a new Rebellion than they were to the last And who the Ministers as they never yet shewed regard to Religion Liberty or Property so they would be little concerned to see the Monarchy shaken off if they might escape the Vengeance of Publick Justice due to them for so long a course of Pernicious Counsels and for Crowning all the rest of their faults by thus reflecting upon that High Court before which we do not doubt but we shall see them one day brought to Judgment Sir I suppose my Reader is very well informed by this time that your Pen is no slander and I assure you there is some hopes of seeing your Party one day brought in Judgment for all your ill Courses which have so much dishonoured Parliaments and by these repeated Threats endeavoured to make them Odious as well as Dreadful to so many who are Loyal not in your hide-bound Notion but in the good old Christian acceptation of the word in the affection of their Souls of which humane Laws can take no notice and that not to the Law which is nonsense but to the King But Sir how can you be so positive in your Menaces who in the Page before were in some degree of doubt there might be a long interval of Parliaments and so you may not see this One desirable day but may happen to be brought to Judgment in the interim before a higher Court for all your slanders and defamations of your Sovereign the Lords Anointed And now Sir I have taken the same liberty in relation to you which you took with less modesty and reason against all the Ministers and if you please you may reply and for ought I know the Press is as open for you as me and I had not taken all this pains but to shew the World your sheets are as weak and as full of Errors as of Malice against the Ministers in pretence but against his Majesty in good earnest And if you had been pleased to have used the name of Evil Counsellors instead of Ministers it would have been more apparent what you designed and I do not in the least question but there are very many Persons in his Majesties Dominions who are not only of true English courage but of greater intellectuals than to be Cajoled by such a Pamphlet as yours into an ill opinion of the King his Ministers or the Declaration of which number in every respect I do acknowledge my self to be one of the meanest POSTSCRIPT THe Vindicator Pag. 43. of his Book hath concluded his Character of a Commonwealth man and his Principles with this Expression that Every wise and honest man will be proud to be ranked in that number perhaps yet all of them will not be of the same opinion when they have read that which follows which I dare presume to say is more truly drawn He is a great Admirer of the collective body of Protestants as â—â—â—onsists of a hundred and fifty Sects for any one of which distinctly considered he has just as much veneration as I have for the Musulmen He divides himself so exactly betwixt the Church and a Conventicle that he doth not know to which he belongs and would gladly be excused from the trouble of going to either if it were possible to beguile the People without a pretence to Religion and Devotion He treats his Prince as the Souldiers did our Saviour first Crowns him with Thorns and then kneels before him and mixes his submissions and reproaches so equally that no man can tell which is the principal ingredient and he intends to crucifie him too when it is safe to conclude the sport He is ever talking of the Laws and hath listed a parcel of them to take his part against all the rest and with these and his other Auxiliaries and Ignoramus Iuries he hopes to prevail And then the Book of Statutes shall again be reformed into a Packet of Votes and Ordinances He hates nothing so heartily as he doth Monarchy and Majesty and thinks that as Princes were instituted for the good of their People so they ought to be sacrificed to it too and in order to it he Crowns them first with Garlands and then lays all the sins and follies of the People upon their Heads and is in great pain for a Knife or an Ax to finish the Attonement The next thing he hates is Popery of which he hath no more true and determinate Notion than he had of the number or the Hairs of his head nor ever took more care to inform himself of the one than the other and the reason is because his Ignorance will excuse him if he calls that Popery to morrow which was good sound Protestantanism three days agone He takes Oaths not to bind but loose him 〈◊〉 men do Alloways and Rubarb for the Evacuation of suspicion and they have usually the same effect upon-him only they operate cross-ways and purge out all his natural good humours too and leave all the bad ones behind them He pronounceth of a Clergy man at first sight by his Habit all that wear Cassocks are drunkards and Popishly affected the Cloak-men are all sober Protestants He is something shie of a Stranger and therefore first Pumps a man before he opens himself if he finds him Loyal he is so too but not without some dissatisfaction If the Party be of his own side then he cherisheth his malice and spite against the Government by communicating his own to him If the Company happen to be mixt then he hath a Set of Canting Language which signifies quite different things to the different parts of the Company as for instance Popery signifies the Church of England to one Party and Arbitrary Government Monarchy to the other Party quite another thing Next the 〈◊〉 he hates most a Wise Loyal States-man and because he knows it is not yet safe to attack the Master he takes care to represent all his Servants as Knaves and Traytors French Pensioners and Popishly affected for he knows that if the People can once generally be brought to think the Court a Den of Thieves the Master of the Family that chuseth and employeth them