Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A37426
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The Englishman's choice, and true interest in a vigorous prosecution of the war against France, and serving K. William and Q. Mary, and acknowledging their right.
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Defoe, Daniel, 1661?-1731.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing D831; ESTC R9535
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15,661
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38
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the same credit with the French King when with his Fleet upon our Coasts he so Graciously declared for the Church of England As to them who come in to the Government and yet deny its Right or place it upon such an uncertain bottom as is a Virtual denyal of it whether Conquest or such a Providence as gives one's Purse to a Robber it must be said that we find not this flying Party the same Men in one station that they are in another But what ever party they are of through whose hand the Administration has pass'd they ought to remember that Old Saving The Publick Affairs will not be ill Administred In this Case bare indiscretion or inadvertency or want of Intelligence is a crime of an high Nature And if any Man has arrived to that height to own himself the occasion of laying aside a Victorious Admiral because he has been against him in the House of Commons this would be to assume more than Regal Power and such Insolence if there were no more it it would deserve equal punishment with the most Notorious Treachery But if any in the Government have held out a Flag of Truce to its Enemies If being against the Right of their Majesties has with them been a Recommendation to Preferment and zeal for their Right a Cause of Disgrace what in others might pass only for Mismanagement cannot but be judged Treachery in them Whatevever is given under the Management of Men of an other Allegiance is but providing Cannon to be turned upon our selves But when Men are assured that they who hold their present Majesties to be our Lawful and Rightful King and Queen which is the True Test of Loyalty shall be the only Persons entrusted under them with the Administration Who is he that Wishes well to England that will not Chearfull Contribute to his Power for the maintaining the Right of a Prince without whom we cannot hope to be long a People They who have asserted his Right from the first Settlement of it as they have therein Renounced the Late King we may be sure can have no Merit to plead upon another change Nor will they Act to their own Apparent Ruine and hold the Bason at the cutting of their own Throats Others tho' they cannot long enjoy their Crimes may Fancy that what they have done for a French Tyrany and their fitness to be Instruments of it may continue to them the advantages they are now possessed of or at least they may be assured of the Ill-natured Satisfaction of seeing those whom they have long trampled on destroyed before them And indeed were it not for the inhumane pleasure of Malice and Envy it were impossible that Protestants and they men at ease in their Fortunes should engage in Plots against a Government which is the only Security of their Religion and Estates And the good of England is so bound up in the Life of His Majesty that it can hardly be thought that numbers of any Party should engage against him The Papists themselves owe to him that Protection and Security which King Iames could not have given them besides the restitution of those Fundamental Laws in the defence of which their Fore-fathers had signaliz'd themselves when they so truly distinguished between the Church of Rome and the Court of Rome and thought themselves very good Catholicks when they maintain'd their Liberties by resisting the Usurpations of Popes and of Princes as no part of Gods Ordinances The High Church and Passive-Obedience Men were perhaps the most sensible of the mischief of the late Reign as they found such advances towards turning them out of all Offices in Church and State and their most celebrated Heads had while under that Sense in their Proposals to King Iames their refusal to sign an abhorrence of any design against him their closing with the Deliverance if not inviting the Deliverer and joyning to put him into possession of the Power of the Nation acted so contrary to all their former Proceedings that one would have thought they had all of a sudden become Englishmen and would have vindicated the Reformation from the Reproach under which it has suffer'd as if we lost in Civil Rights while we gain'd in Spiritual and that to be true Christians we were to lay all our Worldly Goods at the feet of our Princes that they might distribute them among these Successors of the Apostles The moderate true Church Party could not but rejoyce to find such a return of their Endeavours in the Settlement of the Government upon a Bottom for which they had ventured so far and so long to no purpose But if any of them who have suffered in the Publick Cause or sympathiz'd with them that did now fall off from a Settlement call'd for by the Voice of the People and the Necessities of the Publick what do they but condemn themselves or those their Friends who by their laudable Endeavours for the Bill of Exclusion shewed that their Religion was more Sacred to them than the suppos'd Divine Right of Succession vested in a Popish Prince But if such men desert this Government the Blood of the Lord Russel Colonel Sydney Sir Thomas Armstrong Alderman Cornish and many other Sufferers for the Publick will in great measure lye at their doors as accessaries ex post facto to their Murders and partakers of the Crime with whatever pomp they adorn their Sepulchres what do they but pay honour to the memories of Iefferies and of those willing Iury-men who helpt to dispatch so many Traytors to God and their King But certainly it would be very strange if any of them who have so justly exploded the Doctrine of the Bowstring should become Proselites to it and if any one of their Spiritual Guides should now be for King Iames or King Lewis I should think him worse than Father Peters who may be said to have acted with uniformity to a Principle when such men must be destitute of all colour for their Actions and indeed of Common Sense unless they can think to bring back King Iames without French Forces or to restrain those Insolences which the French Faction would give them the opportunity to commit Should they think to supplant this Government and set up an other without such selp the vanity and madness were past cure or pity nor considering the power of France and how little vertue is left in those who should take cure for the Nation can Englishmen see any anchor for their hopes and expectations of Good to the Publick but in King WILLIAM Is there any man who tho' he set out well is weary of the race of Glory not finding the Reward due to his Merit or not enough to satisfie a boundless ambition let him consider how many like the Philenian Brethren of old contentedly suffered themselves to be buried alive to maintain the boundaries of their Country and that Perseverance in a Good Cause gives a Pleasure equal to the greatest Rewards and and is more honourable than the highest promotion Let him not envy those men whose rise has been a publick calamity but those Volunteers in the Cause of
God their King and Conntry whom constancy and the general Voice advance to the notice of their Prince Can it be thought that when he comes to know what men have adhered to their Countries Cause in the worst of Times and what men served for the sake of that with the hazard of their Lives and Fortunes that this great mind will leave it in the power of some few to keep such men down by their misrepresentations of when he knows that these might have been as great as their Expectations or Desires if they would have joyn'd with the Enemies to the English Liberties who can believe that he who refus'd to invade the Liberties of Holland when France and England tempted him with a Crown and a carte blanche will not reward such virtue where ever he finds it Courage is if not the Source at least the sign of all other vertues in Princes especially nor can a Nation ever apprehend an Invasion of their Liberties but from pusillanimous Princes whose fears make them grasp at false securities instead of what they might be certain of in the prosperity and affection of their Subjects they who read the History of this Kingdom and mark the Characters of those Princes who have been encompassed with Armies of Mercenaries at home and them who have headed the English abroad may be satisfied that Examples to warrant this Observation need not be fetch'd from foreign Countries And as we have reason to believe that our King can desire nothing more than the good of his People we ought as we love our Country every one according to his Station and Capacity to contribute our Endeavours that England may not be wanting to its self or in gratitude to him and indeed it must be said it has had so few good Princes that it has always till now acted as in a transport upon the very expectation of such an one not need we go farther back for an instance than to the beginning of the last Reign Certain it is our King has no quarrel to revenge upon his People and has manifested that disposition to unite all Parties and Interests against the Common Enemy which if King Iames had in the least inclined to all the Blood and Treasure which has been spent in this necessary War would have been spar'd and Christendom might have enjoyed that settled Peace which can be expected from nothing under God but King WILLIAM's Arms. Let it never be said that we have neglected an opportunity for the use of which late posterity will praise as otherwise they will curse us for transmitting French Slavery to them Whoever will come into the Standard perhaps the last that will be set up against France is to be embraced as a Friend to England But many it must be confess'd ought to go through a state of trial before they be receiv'd into any place of Trust. The most gentle the most safe like the Military Sacrament among the Romans must needs be an Oath of Fidelity to Their present Majesties not an Oath which either can bear a doubtful Interpretation or at least has been interpreted into air by Men who seem to think that as long as they do not in words acknowledge the Right of Their present Majesties there can be no Perjury by Implication But such an Oath as may rise in judgment even in this World against every body who shall act any thing aginst the Right of Their Majesties An Oath which will leave no Loop-hole and by which as by the Word to an Army we may know who and who are together It will never be well till the generality are engaged to be for the Government in all events Some for certain there are who have made themselves desperate in this Cause and as they never thought of making peace with the other side are incapable of pardon They abhor a double Game and leave it to others to be Heads of a Party which is against the Government and to support its Enemies under colour of getting into their Secrets or bringing them over from their Principle or Faction They give Men Characters according as they find their affections to the Publick whatever their Carriage has been towards them nor have they Friend or Enemy but as they are for or against their Country The love of which as Cicero well says is above all other Loves They who would be Trimmers in this Cause make it evident they are for having the ship of State sink all at once King William's and our Countries side can never have too much weight against France and Rome Nor howmuch soever some talk for the English Monarchy can they reasonably expect to see it flourish but under King William or till His Wisdom and his Arms have left it secured to us I know it is difficult to make men wise when the Wit and Mony of France raise so much Art to impose upon them Yet this would be lost upon the generality of Englishmen if all disguises were thrown off and they who are for France or King Iames would speak out That well meaning Men may no longer be cheated by their false appearances it may be convenient to pull off their Masks and borrowed Faces 1. They are very copious upon the theam of Taxes and the exporting Mony to our Armies abroad or to assist any of the Confederates but chiefly upon the payment to the States of Holland for their Charges in the late Expedition They would have it believ'd that France would bring in a shorter Reckoning and would rather-have the Nation like Constantinople keep its Riches for a Prey to the Enemy than to give part to keep them out 2. They to the prejudice of Thier Majesties their Crown and Dignity advance Subjects to be Head of the Church of England When a Man has once receiv'd that Unction his Person is become sacred and to suggest that such an one is treacherous is matter of excommunication But who can with patience hear it said in such a Man the Government loses or disobliges a whole Party When if the Party be for the Government they will esteem no man longer than he can be thought true to it If they be against it kindness to any of them will but embolden the rest and give them opportunities for mischief Who when his House is beset with Thieves finding some of them lurking within instead of going to master them will think to tempt them to his defence against their accomplices They are too far engag'd with one another to dare to be honest till their whole gang is nor can they be reclaim'd by gentle usage 3. They have their known Cant and Shiboleth to distinguish their Party from all others the Church and the King are the words given among them to unite Papist and High-Church Iacobite and Loyalists And they have a certain Anagram