Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
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A47820
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Citt and Bumpkin in a dialogue over a pot of ale concerning matters of religion and government
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L'Estrange, Roger, Sir, 1616-1704.
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1680
(1680)
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Wing L1216; ESTC R15090
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33,146
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42
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Cause if you can but produce any One Material Point which he hath either Falsify'd Palliated or Omitted in the whole Proceeding But to be plain with you Citt One of the Authours of your Preface is a Common setter a Forger of Hands a little spy upon the Swan in Fishstreet a Hackny Sollicitor against both Church and State You know this to be true Citt and that I do not speak upon Guess so that Calumny and False Witnessing is the best part of that Authours Trade And then the pretended History is a direct Arraignment of the Government He takes up the King and Council Pag. 381. reflects upon the Iudges in the very Contents and elsewhere he descants upon the Duke of York in opposition to the express sense and declaration of the Bench Pag. 145. and has the confidence yet to Dedicate this Gally-mawfry of audacious slanders to the Two Houses of Parliament There is little more in the whole then what has been eaten and spew'd up again Thirty times over and the intire work is only a Medly of Rags and Solaecisms pick'd up out of Rubbish and most suitably put together Citt. You may take his part as ye please But there 's a Famous Lecturer charg'd him Publiquely for Popery in his Answer to the Appeal and for falling upon Dr. Lloyd True He did so but at the same time that Lecturer found no fault with the Appeal it self and the best on 't is his Tongue 's no more a slander then his Pen And whoever reads what he has written concerning the Late King and the Episcopal Church will think never the worse of L'Estrange for what he says Now for the Reverend Dean of Bangor I dare say he never spake or thought of him but with Veneration Let me see the book Look ye here 't is pag. 18. in L'Estrange's Impression and 't is pag. 15. in this and here 's the Point Their Loyalty and Good service paid to the King says the Appealer speaking of the Papists was meerly in their own Defence Now see L'Estrange's Reply upon it If it lies says he as a Reproach upon them that they did not serve the King out of Loyalty that which they did was yet better then not serving him at all and better in a Higher degree still then Fighting against him And a little after It is worth the Observation that not a man drew his Sword in the opposite Cause who was not a Known Separatist and that on the Other side not one Schismatick ever struck stroke in the Kings Quarrell And now for your Notes upon his Answer they are so silly that it were Ridiculous to Reply upon 'um who knows says he but the Regicides were Papists in disguise pag. 19. And a deal of such senselesse stuff enough to turn a bodies Stomach And if you 'd inform your self of his Malice look ye here pag. 4. p. 9. and p. 33. how he Palliates if not Justifies the Late Rebellion the Murther of the Arch-Bishop of St. Andrews and the drawing of the Sword against the King Briefly 't is an Insipid Bawling piece of Foolery from One end to the Other And it is not but that I highly approve of your Zeal for the Discovery of the Plot and Suppressing of Popery but we are not yet to Trample upon Laws and Publique Orders for the attaining even of those Glorious ends But now I think on 't deal freely with me did you really go to the Registers ye spake of to furnish Names for your Subscriptions Citt. No That was but a Flourish but all the Rest we Literally did True Are not you Conscious to your selves of your Iniquities who made You a Commissioner for the Town or You for the Country But we are like to have a fine business of it when the Dreggs of the People set up for the Representatives of the Nation to the Dishonour of the most Considerable and Sober part of the Kingdome Pre'thee Bumpkin with thy Poles and Baltiques how shouldst thou come to understand the Ballance of Empires who are Delinquents and who not the Right of Bishops Votes And You forsooth are to Teach the King when to call a Parliament and when to let it alone And are not you a fine Fool i' the mean time to Drudg fot the Faction that Sets ye on to be afterwards made a slave for your pains And then for You Citt with your Mouldy Records your Co-ordinate Estates and your Sovereign Power of the People Do not I know all your Fallacies your Shifts and Hiding-holes There 's not one step you set but I can trace you in 't You have your Spies upon all Libraries as well as Conversations your Agents for the procuring of old Manuscripts and Records and for the Falsifying of New ones to make them look like Old Ones Nay the Papers of State themselves had much ado to scape ye Those that assert the Iust Rights of the Crown you either Bury or Conceal only Publishing the Presidents of Seditious Times in Vindication of such Principles Citt. I must confess I take the Government to be Co-ordinate and the King One of the Three Estates with submission to be better inform'd True If it be so how comes it that the House of Commons even in their most Popular seasons have still own'd the Crown of England to be Imperial How comes it that all our Laws are call'd the Kings Laws all our Courts of Iustice his Majesties Courts and all Publick Causes try'd in the Kings Name and by the Authority of his Majesty Citt. But have not the Two Houses their share in the Legislative Power True You must distinguish betwixt the Consent and the Sanction the Preparatory Part is Their's the Stamp is the Kings The Two Houses Consent to a Bill It is only a Bill when it is presented and it remains yet a Bill even when the King has Consented to it and in this Common Consent in Order to a Law the Two Houses may be said to share with his Majesty But then the Fiat that superinduces an Authority and is Only and Properly the Act of Legislation is singly in the King So that though they share in the Consent they have no pretence at all to the Sanction which is an Act of Authority the other but of Agreement And yet again admitting your Coordination First every King runs the hazzard of his Crown upon every Parliament he calls For That Third Estate lies at the Mercy of the Other Two And further 't is a kinde of Ringing the Changes with the Government the King and Lords shall be Uppermost One day the King and Commons Another and the Lords and Commons the Third For in this Scale of Constitution whatsoever the One will not the Other Two may Citt. Well but Ours is a MIXT Government and we are a Free People Tru. If ours be a Mixt Government so as to any Popular Participation of Power with the King then it
the Compass of his intention exprest in the Preface 3. The Epistle acknowledges a Detestable Plot and a Conspiracy but advises Moderation and that the Rabble may not dictate Laws to Authority for that Licence was the Cause of the Late Rebellion 4. It was more then a Story the Murther of the Late King and the Subversion of the Government and the suppressing of these Necessary Hints and Cautions is notoriously a part of the Grand Phanatical Design 5. In L'Estranges History here Pag. 79 and 80. there 's every particular of Mr. Bedloes Evidence in Sir George Wakemans Tryal Pag. 46. with many other passages over and above whereas your Damnable History here Pag. 295. falls short at least by One Half And then for the shuffles and Omissions reflected upon Pag. 77. see L'Estranges Words Pag. 88. The Lord Chief Iustice says he after some Remarkes upon the Romish Principles summ'd up the Evidence and gave Directions to the Iury which is the substance of the Page cited in the Preface Touching your Elsewhere it is in plain English No where 6. Look ye here 's more Juggling He says SEVERAL Gross Incoherences and you have made them MANY and then you have left out the Parenthesis especially in the Latter of them which varies the Case too And I remember again that the Erratum was supply'd after L'Estrange had corrected it And sure it was a Gross one too to expose a Protestant Gentleman for a Papist Nine times in two Pages I could shew ye several other Material Mistakes but One shall serve for all Pag. 45. as I take it of Irelands Tryal which you will finde charg'd upon the Press in L'Estranges History Pag. 18. 7. Pray'e mark me now L'Estrange findes Errours of the Press in the Other Tryals and Rectifies them in his Own Now if Posterity shall finde in the Right that the Other are wrong they are in no danger of being Misled by the One in what is Corrected by the Other And if they do not read the Right Copy at all there 's no harm done to the Other but they must take it as they finde it So that this Remark is so far from Disparaging the Proceedings that a greater Right can hardly be done to Publick Iustice by a Pamphlet But now let the Epistle speak for it self To the READER THere has not been any point perhaps in the whole Tract of English Story either so dangerous to be mistaken in or so difficult and yet so necessary to be understood as the Mystery of this detestable Plot now in Agitation A Judgement for our Sins augmented by our Follies But the world is so miserably divided betwixt some that will believe every thing and others nothing that not only Truth but Christianity it self is almost lost between them and no place left for Sobriety and Moderation We are come to govern our selves by Dreams and Imaginations We make every Coffee-house Tale an Article of our Faith and from Incredible Fables we raise Invincible Arguments A man must be fierce and violent to get the Reputation of being Well-affected as if the calling of one another Damned Heretique and Popish Dog were the whole Sum of the Controversie And what 's all this but the effect of a Popular Licence and Appeal When every Mercenary Scribler shall take upon him to handle matters of Faith and State give Laws to Princes and every Mechanique sit Judge upon the Government Were not these the very Circumstances of the late Times When the Religious Jugglers from all Quarters fell in with the Rabble and managed them as it were by a certain sleight of hand The Rods were turned into Serpents on both sides and the Multitude not able to say which was Aaron and which the Enchanter Let us have a Care of the same Incantation over again Are we not under the protection of a Lawfull Authority Nor was there ever any thing more narrowly Sifted or more vigorously discouraged then this Conspiracy Reformation is the proper business of Government and Council but when it comes to work once at the wrong End there is nothing to be expected from it but Tumult and Convulsion A Legal and Effectual provision against the Danger of Romish Practices and Errours will never serve Their Turn whose Quarrel is barely to the Name of Popery without understanding the Thing it self And if there were not a Roman Catholick lefâ— in the three Kingdoms they would be never the better satisfied for where they cannot find Popery they will make it nay and be troubled too that they could not find it It is no new thing for a Popular Out-cry in the matter of Religion to have a State-Faction in the belly of it The first late Clamour was against Downright Popery and then came on Popishly Affected That sweeps all The Order of Bishops and the Discipline of the Church took their Turns next and the next blow was at the Crown it self when every Man was made a Papist that would not play the Knave and the Fool for Company with the Common People These things duly weighed and considering the Ground of our present Distempers the Compiler of this Abridgment reckoned that he could not do his Countrymen a better Office than by laying before them the naked state of things to give them at one view a Prospect both of the subject matter of their Apprehensions and of the Vigilance Zeal and needful severity of the Government on their behalf To which end he hath here drawn up an Historical Abstract of the whole matter of Fact concerning those Persons who have hither to been Tryed for their Lives either upon the Plot it self or in Relation to it opposing Authentick Records to wandring Rumours and delivering the Truth in all Simplicity He hath not omitted any one material Point There is not so much as one Partial Stroke in it not a flourish nor any thing but a bare and plain Collection without any Tincture either of Credulity or Passion And it is brought into so narrow a Compass too that it will ease the Readers head as well as his purse by clearing him of the puzzle of Forms and Interlocutories that serve only to amuse and mislead a man by breaking the Order and confounding the Relative parts of the Proceeding Having this in Contemplation and being at the same time possest of a most exact Summary of all passages here in Question This Reporter was only to cast an Extract of these Notes into a Method especially finding that upon comparing the substance of his own papers with the most warrantable Prints that have been published his own Abstract proved to be not only every jot as Correct but much more Intelligible which being short and full he thought might be useful and find Credit in the world upon its own account without need of a Voucher True You have now the whole matter before you the Epistle ye see justifies it self And then for the Narrative I dare undertake he shall yield up the