Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A47819
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The character of a papist in masquerade, supported by authority and experience in answer to The character of a popish successor / by Roger L'Estrange.
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L'Estrange, Roger, Sir, 1616-1704.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing L1215; ESTC R21234
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71,116
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87
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God and the Gospel to be Subject to Him to Fear Honour pay him Tribute and Legally obey him Nay the same reverend Prelate Pag. 54 in confirmation of this Doctrine cites the Precept of our blessed Saviour himself as well as St. Paul Our blessed Saviour Says he whose Vicar the Pope pretends to be does himself pay Tribute to Caesar Tho' a Pagan and Idolatâ—r leaving us an Admirable and most Pious Example of that obedience and Loyalty due even to Impious and Pagan Princes Nâ—r is this all for he further gives express Command that all should render to Cesar the things which are Cesars He acknowledgeth the Imperial rights of Câ—sar of which his Impiety and Idolatry did not deprive him Our Author said but just now that Passive Obedience was no more then a Bug-bear and a Doctrine groundless and only slipt into the world as by the By. But he tells us now Fol. 20. toward the bottom that in case of a Vow'd Allegiance to an Absolute and Arbitrary King a Passive Obedience was due But what 's this says he to a King of England With his leave I take it to be the same thing as to the Peoples Obedieâ—ce or Submission tho' in respect of the assuming and Exercising that Power the Case on the Kings side is greatly differing for the question is not whether the King does Well or Ill in forcing his Authority beyond the due hounds but whether the Tyranny on the one side will justify an undutiful behaviour on the other And the Law it self will easily determine This Controversy If the Subject be ty'd up by the Law to an Allegiance unconditional as aforesaid and without any Exception or qualification to discharge him of that Duty in any Cace whatsoever the Cause is clear against him And this is enough said to shew that under the Masque of a zeal to crush one Sort of Popery there is a design Carryed on for the introducing of another See now what he says of Monarchy Monarchy says he fol. 21. can be acquir'd but by two ways First By the Choice of the People who frequently in the beginning of the World out of a natural desire of Safety for the securing of a Peaceful Community and Conversation chose a Single Person to be their Head as a Proper Supream Moderator in all Differences that might arise to disquiet that Community Thus were Kings made for the People and not the People for Kings This Principle of Popular Liberty and placing the Original of Government in the People is highly derogatory to the Providence of God contrary to the express Letter of the Text and destructive of the very Being of Human Society First By implying Mankind to be cast into the World unprovided for Secondly It makes Magistracy which the Apostle tells us Rom. 13. 2. is the Ordinance of God to be of Human Institution or at best Nature's second Thought but in truth an effect either of Tumult or Chance according as Men were led to 't either by Choice or Necessity Thirdly in supposing Power to be radically in the People and the grant of it to be only an act of conveyance by common Consent and with a power of Revocation upon certain equitable Conditions either express'd or imply'd there goes no more than the Peoples recalling of their Power to the dissolving of all Commuâ—ities and Humane Society at this rate lyes at the Mercy of the Multitude But how this Revocation shall be notify'd unless by way of Advertisement in one of the True Protestant-Anabaptist-Mercurys I cannot imagine But then consider again That this Grant and Revocation must Pass with a Nemine Contradicente nay and a Nemine Absente too for one single Dissâ—â—â— or the want of one single Vote spoils all and makes void both the Original Grant and all that was done subsequent upon it for by reason of that defect it is no longer the act of the People It may put a Man in admiration to see what Credit this Phantastique and Impracticable Conceit has got in the World if he does not observe the Address in the Application of it and the use that is made of it All violent Motions of State we see are wrought and brought about by the Favour and Assistance of the People And there can be no readier way in the World to make them sure then either to calumniate or otherwise to lay open the Nakedness of the Government and to tell them that Princes are only Trustees for the Peoples good the Sovereignty in themselves and that if Governours break their Trust the People may resume their Power When the Multitude has once imbib'd this Doctrine the next work will be to set up for the recovery of their inheritance and when it comes to that once we need but look behind us to see the end on 't Our Author has already admitted upon this mistake of the Fountain of Power that the People may yet pass away their Original Right without power of Revocation Here indeed says he speaking of a Concession of Absolute Power a passive Obedience was due but what 's this to a King of England Now though the Doctrine of this Passage fol. 20. seems to clash with an Equity of Resumption reserved to the People in the last Paragraph above-recited fol. 21. I shall yet lay no hold of that implication but turn the force of his own allowance against himself If the Peoples alienation of their Power to a Prince without conditions shall stand good against them so shall the alienation of their Power also to a Prince under conditions stand every jote as good within the limits of those conditions And where shall we find those conditions but in the Establish'd Law which marks out the bounds both of King and People Now if the Law Pronounces the King to be Supream in all Causes and over all Persons c. and yet with some Limitations and Restraints upon his Prerogative Suppose he passes those Terms who shall judge him but God if he be Supream and has no other Power above him Or if the People have reserved in such a case any controuling Power to themselves how comes it that the Law takes no notice of it but on the contrary makes the Subjects accountable for any act of Disobedience or Violence to or upon the Person or Authority of the King upon what pretence soever So that under the colour of opposing or preventing an Arbitrary Power the Law is subverted here at a bâ—ow and a Foundation laid of the most pernicious and shameful sort of Tyranny He says that Kings were made for the People and not People for the Kings which is well enough if he means that Kings were made for the Government of the People which is the great Blessing of Mankind and not People for the Government of the King which turns Society into Confusion But after all these words to shew that Government Originally was not Popular I shall add a few more to prove the Institution of it to
THE Character OF A PAPIST in MASQUERADE Supported By Authority and Experience In Answer to the CHARACTER OF A POPISH SUCCESSOR By Roger L'Estrange LONDON Printed for H. Brome at the Signe of the Gun in S. Pauls Church-yard 1681. The CHARACTER of a Papist in Masquerade THe Character of a Popish Successor were an excellent Piece in the kinde if it had not too much Sublimate in it For I have heard of some people that with only holding their Noses over it but one quarter of an hour have run stark mad upon 't And when This Fume has once taken the Brain there 's nothing in the world but the Powder of Experience the Remembrance of things past to set a man Right again The Truth of it is the Authour has made the Figure of his Successour too Frightful and enormous Sawcer-ey'd and Cloven â—ooted and when he has painted the Monster as black on the One side as Ink and Words can make him he finishes his Master-Piece with a Paradox on the Other Fol. 4. by the Supposal of a most Excellent Person and yet making him the greater Devil for his Virtues His Fortitude he says makes him only the more Daring in the Cause of Rome his Justice makes it a Point of Conscience to deliver us up to the Pope his Temperance in the Government of his Passions makes him the more close and steady and his Prudence crowns the Work by the assistance it gives him in the Menage of his Policies and Conduct And so he goes on Wbat booss it says he in a Popish Heir to say he 's the Truest Friend the Greatest of Hero s the best of Masters the Justest Judge or the Honestest of Men All meer treacherous Quicksands for a people to repose the least glimpse of Safety in or build the least hopes upon This is fairly push'd I must confess but 't is only a cast of his Rhetorique For every body knows that all Christian Princes thus Qualify'd and under Articles of Treaty and Agreement keep touch even with Infidels nay and Infidels with Christians Before I go any further let me recommend to the Reader one Remarque as a thing worthy of his Attention He cuts all the way upon the Successor as presupposing him to be a Papist and consequently ` Dangerous and Insufferable by reason of That Perswasion And very magisterialy he gives us his own bare word for the dangers of that Perswasion Why does he not rather tell us in express and particular Terms These and These are the Principles of the Church of Rome and then make his Inference from those Principles to the Dangers that attend them and so leave the unbyass'd part of the world to judge of the Congruity and Proportion betwixt such Causes and such Effects For His dilating himself thus at random upon his Character and striking so point-blank at the Rescinding of the Succession makes men apt to imagine that his Pique may be rather to the Person then the Religion It will behove me in this place to inform the Reader that I do not charge him for not producing the dangerous Principles of the Papists as if I thought there were no Instances of that Quality to be given For I am better acquainted with their Ecclesiastical Politiques then so But the true Intent of my Quaere upon that Objection was to shew the Authours Prudence in reserving himself upon those Particulars For if he had said Behold Thâ—se are the Positions of the Church of Rome and they are not to be endur'd in any Government I should have ask'd him presently How comes it then that you your self under the Colour of Rooting out Popery One way are Planting it Another and Erecting the very same Pestilent Positions that you condemn Insomuch that while you would be thought zealous to Abolish the Name of Popery you are no lesse zealous to Establish the Doctrine of it Whereof at leisure The suddain bolting out of this Phantôme from behinde the Hanging may so far serve a present turn as to startle and surprise the undiscerning Vulgar Yet when upon Second and Recollected thoughts this Mormo shall come to be examin'd and taken to pieces the very multitude themselves that were affrighted at the Apparition will be asham'd of the Imposture The thing that I would say is this that the Truth is somewhat too much Hyperboliz'd in a Declamatory Torrent of Words and Exuberance of Phansy without any one Concluding and Convincing Period If Apollo had been of Counsell with the Authour he would have advis'd him to the Moderating of his Character as he does Olaus Magnus in Boccalini to moderate the Greatness of his Northern Eagles that prey'd upon Elephants as being a very Extraordinary thing for a Bird to trusse an Elephant and fly away with him which is perhaps the more Venial Excess of the two It is one of the greatest Indignities that can be put upon the simplicity of a Just Truth the dawbing of it with Embrodery and Flourish and the over-doing of it If Little Epictetus had been at his Elbow he would have minded him that some things are in our our own Power and others are not so and that the subject matter of his Discourse being wholly out of His Cognizance he might have done well to have left the business of the Succession to the Ordering of Gods Providence This is a Subject I know that whoever touches upon it treads upon Burning Coals and there must be great Caution as well as Innocence to carry a man through this Ordeal For who shall dare to Dispute the danger of a Popish Successor But so far am I from undertaking that Province that I 'le compound the matter with him beforehand and take all his suppositions of Difficulties and Hazzards in the Case for Granted But then I must distinguish betwixt the unhappy circumstance of being under the Allegeance of a Prince of that Perswasion who is actually in the Possession and Exercise of his Power and the remote Possibility only of that Danger and a Possibility too of such a condition as a thousand things may intervene to prevent it As the Contingences of Issue Survivorship c. and at the Worst this dismal apprehension amounts at last but to the Contemplation of a Prince of That Communion in a Parenthesis betwixt a Predecessor and a Successor of the Reformed Religion Not but that I am as much against the Principles and Practises of the Church of Rome wherein the Church of England hath depâ—rted from that Communion as any man living that keeps himself within the compass of Christian Charity Humanity and good Manners And so far I shall heartily joyn with the Compiler of the Character by a previous Concession of the Inconveniences as I have said already that may arrive by reason of that Religion But then I must take this Consideration along with me That First there are many Dreadfull Dangers which we cannot avoid but by incurring Greater As the Leaping of a Garret-window when the Fire