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A75357 Anglia liberata, or, The rights of the people of England, maintained against the pretences of the Scotish King, as they are set forth in an Answer to the Lords Ambassadors propositions of England. Which ansvver was delivered into the Great Assembly of the United Provinces at the Hague, by one Mac-Donnel, who entitles himself Resident for his Majesty, &c. June 28/18 1651: and is here published according to the Dutch copy. Whereto is added a translation of certain animadversions upon the answer of Mac-Donnel. Written by an ingenious Dutch-man. As also an additional reply to all the pretended arguments, insinuations and slanders, set forth in the said Scotish answer written a while since by a private pen, and now presented to the publick. MacDonnell, William, Sir.; Ingenious Dutch-man. 1651 (1651) Wing A3178; Thomason E643_7; ESTC R18922 48,537 72

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shine forth under the Kingly Government How comes this Answerer to praise the Kings Religion when as himself as well as the rest of his Scots Countreymen have not onely made the first insurrection against the Kings Religion but entred into a Covenant and raised war and at last sold the King for money according to the Kings own published profession Principally against the Kings Religion or against the innovation thereof at least And what the King said further of the Scots Religion and consequently of the Answerers Religion you may read at large in the 14 and 16 Chapters of his printed Book It is well known what harsh and bitter Sermons and Books were made but lately at Breda and the Hague against the Reformed Religon whom they still hatefully termed Calvinists Are there in England divers Sects there are here also not a few God mend it and even as the Governors here would gladly see it otherwise so likewise those in England in the mean time we are assured that in England divers books are forbidden and were burnt by the Hangman which here passe up and downe yet every where The Ambassadors have in the Name and behalf of the whole English Government declared the Conformity of their Religion with ours They tolerate some others and so do we onely we allow more and greater toleration then they Neither we nor they approve of a Spanish Inquisition They do not allow the Church an absolute power of Excommunication no more do we and the Scottish Kirk also was fain to remit it now themselves So that the Presbyterians rage and roaring against Sects and Sectaries is groundless for between themselves and the Independents so named there is not difference in the main of Religion or profession besides Discipline but it should seem the Presbyterian Boutefeus aim at a Papall Power to administer the Jus Clavium at pleasure as the Scots have But their young King hath already taught them another Lesson disapproving thereby also the English Presbyterians It were much to be wished indeed that all men were of one minde that there were but one Religion Our Answerer I believe knows as little how to advise or compass it as others Nay he himself refusing to go to the same Church where the King went during his abode here and the Queen of Bohemia and the Princess Royal and all the Royalists doth thereby sufficiently evidence that there are sects and divisions as well between his party and the Kings as there is between the English and the Presbyterians That which he mentioneth of the good life of his Royal Christians I profess I understand not If by a good life he means a merry joviall life dum vixit vixit bene I yeild that at Court they live more merrie and frollick then elsewhere and thence it is that at London they have put down all the Play-Houses and such like places and practises of profane and scandalous recreation That otherwise the life and fruitfull Conversation of the Royalists should be more holy and exemplary then that of the English Independents as they call them I never heard of before Were they not the Kings evil Councellors his flatterers and seducers whom I return to the Answerer for his Albii Cassii Nigri that made as well the Presbyterians as the rest complaine so much against him from time to time And I pray were not the Presbyterians the first and the onely men that took the King to task The Answerer himself was one of them and of those Covenanters that supplanted the King for his maintaining the Episcopal Hierarchie And when the Presbyterians afterwards went about to introduce the Presbyterian Hierarchie changing onely the Name and maintaining the Substance then said the others whom he calls Independents Soft my Masters we have freed our selves from the Bishops Yoke shall we put our necks under the Presbyterians The Answerer alledgeth some other books which make for him How many other blew books might easily be produced against the same and to his prejudice The King himself complains in his book ch 15. and 21. how much hurt these books did him so that I know not why the Answerer so highly esteems these blew books and that publickly in print too now as well as in the Generall Assembly odiously checking the Soveraign Government here for having begun to treat with the English and presumptuously spreading the same abroad among the Commons as though the Magistrates were regardless of their Office and as if he intended to incense and raise the Commons against the Governors contemning the publick O●dinances in this behalf As for the Successes the Answerer knows well enough that several other Kings Republicks Princes and Potentates had beforehand acknowledged the Republick of England and honored the same with their Ambassies and Credentials And England also sent first unto this State before this State sent to England We have not looked upon the successes but upon the Example of others The Answerer saith that the English th●mselves do disavow the great Turk Again the Gentleman throwes it beyond my reach or he knows not what he avers himself I never heard of any such Disavowing but this I know well on the contrary that all Christian Potentates acknowledge the Turk for what He is and accordingly honor him with their Ambassies The Answerer's King himself scrupled not to send to the Turk no more doth the English Republick Men Laws Governments must every where be taken and used as they are As long as the Answerer and his King are forced to let the Government remain as it is so they must give us leave to do the same The Answerer saith that there is as much difference between the English Government and Liberty and that of ours as there is between Milk and Ink according to the saying of one Salmasius calling him a great Personage Sure the Answerer knows well that Salmasius his Book where he had this crotchet is publickly declared a Libell and scandalous here Do great Personages use to write Libells Furthermore He saith That the Batavians or Hollanders have been a Free Nation from all ages and under the subjection of none Certainly he is a dreaming or else he hath the art to make white black and black white at pleasure or Milk and Ink is all one to him What hath not Holland been under Earls above eight hundred years And lastly under the House of Burgundy Austria and Spain Indeed the Earls were tied to Laws and so were the Kings of England if he say an Earl is no King I answer England is divided in more then fifty Counties or Earldomes so France is divided into many principalities and Counties He that gets the command over them soon gets a Title King Prince Earl or Lord it comes all to one if they have no Superiours But all of them are bound to their Oaths and the Laws Neither in France nor in Spain nor anywhere else are Kings allowed an unlimited power The Examples in France are too fresh
its self fat beyond its wonted wealth and interest forasmuch as for these many hundred years it hath continued labouring and strugling under the yoak of a Tyrant so that it could not possibly arive to such a height and measure of happinesse as it may now attain in a condition of Liberty But why should Englands happinesse be counted an eye-fore to the Netherlands as our Scot would have it Surely the world is wide enough for them both and questionlesse if England shall thrive as the enemies of it feare in this new form the Dutch will then see it much more concerned them both in honor and interest to have settled with us in the relation of a friend then remain in a state of neutrality 'T is but a crude supposition that they shall lose any thing by our Amity but very probable they may lose much without it Yet in another place he alledges to the States that their Lordships having no enemy at present will by uniting with us involve themselves in a labyrinth But their Lordships may be pleased rather to consider it were a strange Wild-goose-chace to be led about by the way of Scotland to settle an interest for themselves in England upon the uncertain favour of a subtile Tyrant and his followers who in times past at Court here were wont to dart the name of Rebell as freely at them as they doe now against us being men of opposite principles to Freedom such as hated the very name of the Vnited Provinces And if the States please to remember the carriage of King James they will find that he himself was of the same humor and opinion and the first that set an edge upon the tongues of the Courtiers In vain therefore doth this Resident tell them that their Lordships have no Enemy at present For however our English Fugitives and Desperado's for present ends may seem to court them yet if they had a while since regained possession in England and should the young Prince of Orange have lived to see it it would have appeared to purpose that they are the very worst of all their enemies How much more secure then had it been for their Lordships to have embraced the late offer of England in its present establishment as a sure friend then to depend upon the good will of a deceitful Enemy And whereas it is insinuated that a League with us would draw enmities upon them elswhere they having no enemy at present it will concern them to remember what a friend they have of the French who onely gives faire words but hates them mortally in heart as appeares by the continuall depredations made upon them at Sea by those of the French Nation Also it were worthy consideration upon what ticklish termes they stand with Denmark and Sweden and in manifest discontent especially with Portugall Not any of these will or can be more a friend or enemy for the sake of the King of Scotland they are all swayed by their own interest and accordingly measure both their love and hate not out of respect to any single Person or Family Therefore it wil concern the States more rationally to weigh what advantages they might have reap't by an union with England which had it been concluded upon such terms as were offered would have rendred them so considerable in the eyes of the world that not any of all the Friendly Pretenders round about but would have been the more inclined to continue their Pretences and the lesse apt to break them Most absurd therefore is that affirmation of the Scotish Resident in saying The States may promise themselves more profit repute and security in Commerce England abiding a Kingdom then being transform'd into a Republick For as a Kingdom the actions both of James and Charls will tell them Kings were no cordiall friends nor indeed can they be whereas being in the form of a Republick the Provinces had they embraced our offers might have been admitted into a neerer union and complication of interests then ever they can hope for from a Monarchy He tells us farther there is a wide difference betwixt the Hollanders and us in the manner of acquiring our Freedom The Hollanders saith he were a free people time out of mind but we in England have been under Soveraign Kings for a thousand years and were bound to them by oaths Besides he saith the K. of Spain after a tedious warre of 80. years hath declared the Provinces free c. But the case is otherwise with us in England To this we say If the Hollanders have of old been a free people so have we been in England and both they and we in the same manner They were of old under Earls or Princes but such as were limited by the laws Auctoritas Principum er at plurimis pro libertate legibus repetitis definita saith the Author de Statu Belgii 1650. So were we in England under Princes called Kings but such only as were limited by lawes It was a Politicall Kingship not Despotick or Tyrannick as may be seen in all our law-Law-books Let one or two old instances serve for all Bracton l. 2. c. 16. Fletal 1 c. 17. say that the King of England hath the Law and the Parliament for his superiors and therfore if the King have the reins loose and be without a Bridle they ought to bridle him For as Bracton saith again l. 3. c. 9. The King can do nothing but what the Law permits him Thus only and with this limitation implied wee we sworn to our Kings as the Hollanders were first to their Earls and afterwards to the King of Spain but finding the Spaniard to oppresse them contrary to Law and Liberty therefore they conceived themselves acquitted of their former Oaths Et Philippi simul omnium Principum Imperium ejuravere and as our former Author saith bound themselves by a new Oath to abjure the Government not onely of Philip but of all Princes for ever which cours exactly parallels our case here in England all the difference now then is onely in a circumstance of Time We have not had 80 years Warre to make good our Freedom but alas this alters not the verity of the thing For as the Freedom of the provinces being really free from the very first moment wherein they drave out Philip did not depend upon the Spaniards acknowledgement so neither doth ours upon the acknowledgement and declaration of Charls or any future Pretender of the Family Yet notwithstanding this the Resident saith our case in reference to the recovery of our Freedom is no more like to the Hollanders then Milk is like Ink. But for illustration take this farther were they oppressed in matter of Religion So were we tied up to strange forms and innovations Were they crucified with an Inquisition So were we with a High Commission Were they squeezed with Impositions So were we such as Ship-money Privy-seals Coat and Conduct Monopolies and a thousand other devices Besides the Priests