and perhaps a greater Disappointment than ever their Service may repair Besides the Season of the year is now so far gon that they are more like to prove a burden this Winter than any advantage to us And what may now become not only of Ireland but of the Forces we have already sent thither is very doubtful so that we have in a manner already lost all the Expence of this Summer and are in danger to lose a great part of our Forces also And now if from Land we descend to take a Prospect of the Progress of our Affairs at Sea we shall still find all alike The two famous Nations for Action at Sea not only baffled by the sole Power of France but our losses in Men by Sickness and Mortalities greater than by Fight and in our Merchandise and Trade not less than our Expences And as if the Power of our Enemies were not enough to annoy us after all if the Complaints of our Merchants and their Mariners be true our Ships have been made a Prey by those who should have been their Guard and Convoy and were imployed for that Purpose And if we return again to Land and consider the State of the Countrie we shall there find all our Country Commodities at so low a Rate as will hardly pay Wages and other necessary charges besides reasonable Maintenance of the Families And this Condition made harder by Taxes already granted and Levyed and those unsuccessfully spent and more expected And such a Disappointment of the great Expectation which was generally conceived of a happy change of Affairs must needs produce an unhappy change in Mens minds And if we apply our selves to consider the Proceedings of our Councils the great Council of the Nation and the King 's Privy Council we may there more easily find the Original Root Occasions and Authors of all these Mischiefs than any such sound Resolutions or Counsels as ever were or are likely either to have prevented or now to redress the same A bold Speech this I confess it is but being said not maliciously out of any evil Principle or Design but out of Zeal for the common Safety and other good Ends nor of particular Persons I doubt not but the Evidence of Truth and the Consciences of most will excuse and acquit me And yet I must be bold to say there are some things passed of which none of them all who were present or concern'd can acquit or excuse themselves Such was one of the first Acts of the Convention the Form of their Order for the Thanksgiving And if any one dare presume to excuse that as a small matter I dare be bold to say he hath but little sense of the Majesty of God concerned in it of his extraordinary Mercy and Goodness in the Deliverance of the dangerous Consequence of such a fault in the beginning of their Consul-rations or what an Indication it was of an unhappy Temper and Disposition prevalent in that Assembly But had the Form been altogether faultless to order a solemn Thanksgiving to God and never after do any real Act of Gratitude for his Honour and Service when prophane Swearing and other Impieties and Wickedness were grown to that height of Impudence and Presumption is such a thing as would be resented with Indignation by a mortal Man and was more likely to provoke a suspension at least of the Favours of Providence we enjoyed than a continuance thereof But of that more elsewhere One of the next things they did was the ordering of a Committee for the business of Ireland But what have they done ever since in that business Either nothing at all or nothing to the purpose as the Event and what I have before taken notice of doth plainly shew and demonstrate And yet it is plain there wanted not matter enough proper for their consideration There were English Protestants enough in Ireland to have defended themselves and secured that Kingdom had they not been disarmed and their Arms contrary to Law put into the hands of Papists and notwithstanding that had they but had Arms sent them in time And had they needed some small Body of men at first to whom they might have repaired we had more in Arms and Pay here than we needed and therefore not only refused many who offered their Service but Disbanded many of those we had We had Ships also at the same charge whether employed upon that Service or any other Why then were not Men and Arms too sent them in time while our Men were Animated with Success and the Irish under a Consternation Why not we as forward as the French And why instead of sending to them were so many of the Irish who had been in Arms here suffered to return and not rather employed in some Service of the Confederates at least of the Emperour against the Turk if they might not have been trusted against the French And when by our neglect at first there was need of a greater Force if we had then Men enough in Arms why were not more raised at home of those who before had offered themselves of those who were Disbanded and of those who were forced from their Estates in Ireland and wanted Maintenance here But we must send for Forreigners without consent of Parliament and so inour the blame we cast upon others and send for such which must protract the time when we might as well have been certainly provided at home much sooner And whereas all this may seem to have been managed either for the real Service of King James or for a colour to bring in a Foreign Force for the Security of such as having been true neither to Him nor to their Country durst now trust neither but endeavoured to impose upon the present King and under the old pretence of his Service get into their own hands a power to enslave their Country it had been worth the Enquiry how it was serviceable to the present Settlement and who were the Advisers and principal Agents in it And certainly such matters as this had been no improper nor unusual Business for the Consideration of a Parliament The next and greatest matter of all of civil Consideration was the long Debate about the Abdication This took them up little less than three Weeks time And though there was reason enough to declare the Departure of King James under his Circumstances an Abdication of the Government he having before notoriously endeavoured the Subversion of the Constitution actually in divers great Instances Violated the Fundamental Laws given just cause of War to the Prince and of Defence and Vindication of their Rights to the People and after all by recalling the Writs for a Parliament refused a legal Determination of the matters in Question all which make it plainly rather the flight of a Criminal from Justice than of an innocent Man Metus causa cum Animo revertendi and a Cession or Dereliction of the Government in Fact which his deliberate Violations
in these Words P. 20. If this WORK OF GOD possess us with the Veneration which is due to it We ought NOT TO STOP THE COURSE OF IT till it has had its full Effect nor to DAUB matters by slight and palliating Remedies We see now before us the most GLORIOUS BEGINNING of a noble Change of the whole face of Affairs both with relation to Religion and the Peace of Europe that we could have wish'd for It is so far beyond our Hopes that we durst scarce let our Wishes go so far We may if we are not wanting to our selves and to the Conjunctures before us hope to see that which may be according to the Prophetick Stile termed a New Heaven and a New Earth But if a Spirit of Jealousie and Murmuring of Impatience and Faction and of returning back to that out of which God has so signally extricated us grows up so that instead of reaping the Fruits that we have now in Prospect we have not Souls big enough nor Hearts good enough to carry this on to Perfection then we may justly fear our being DEIVERED UP to all those Evils from which we will not be healed c. And a little after There is scarce any INDICATION more certain of the Sins of a Nation being grown up to that height that it must be destroyed than the MISCARRIAGE of so great a Deliverance as God has wrought for us which will be an Eternal Blot on the Wisdom of the Nation c. Again P. 24. In order to the preventing the return of the like Evils We must avoid the RELAPSING into the like Sins It is neither the Vnion nor Wisdom of Councils nor the Strength of Fleets or Armies that will secure us from the Judgments of God which we may expect will fall upon us with an extraordinary redoubling of seven times heavier than any thing that we have yet seen or known if those that are filthy will be filthy still If Men think that their Fears are over and that therefore they may give themselves up to work Wickedness without Restraint then we may justly expect a return of the like if not of greater Miseries And toward the Conclusion P. 31. If in all that we do we take not Care to have God ever on our Sides it will be easie for him to blast all Councils and to defeat even the greatest and best laid Designs We have now before our Eyes one of the signallest Instances that is in any History of the Instability of all humane things c. Perhaps some may imagine that we are safe because we cannot be dashed on the same Rock about which we see so great a Shipwreck But alas If we provoke God to hide his Face and to withdraw his Protection from us his Ways are past finding out He can bring Ruine and Destruction on us from that Hand from which perhaps we apprehend the least If Prosperity and Success blow any up and make them forget God and all the Vows that they made to him he will never want Means and Methods to make them return to themselves and to remember him To these I will subjoyn one more delivered by the same Person upon the solemn Occasion of the Coronation in these Words Page 3. Those who are raised up to a high Eminence of Dignity are so much the more accountable both to God and Man not only for all the Ill which either they themselves or others acting in their Name or by their Example may have done but likewise for all the Good which they might have done but did not And as they have much to answer for to God so likewise men expect much from them c. These are all truths and so plain truths that there needed no extraordinary Spirit of Prophesie to reveal them and yet I doubt not but we may say truly This spake he not of himself but being ordered to preach on such occasion he prophesied If we believe that this great work was the work of God in whose hand are the hearts of all men why should we question but he who directed the Wind at Sea directed also now at their arrival here the motions of this mans heart to so seasonable and necessary Admonitions for the farther promotion of that work which he had so eminently favoured hitherto And the great change in the progress of affairs which we have since seen confirms the same inasmuch as it shews the Admonitions to have been not a little necessary And if that be so it is the more likely that some Miscarriage there hath been contrary not only to certain Duties but to some such particular express Admonition which is a great aggravation of that fault which hath had the unhappy effect to raise up such an Interposition between the happy Influence of Heaven and us The next thing then to be enquired is whose and what this Miscarriage may be The persons concerned in the Success and Management both were the Prince himself his Counsellors Ministers and those about him and among them he especially who gave those Admonitions the Convention the Army and the Navy in the Success alone the people of these Nations the Church of England and the Confederates beyond Sea whose Design is as much affected with it as the concern of any other But whoever else might be concerned in the Fault because the Prince was not only principally concerned in the Success and Management both but had before been made so glorious an Instrument that nothing could stop his Advance it is not reasonable to believe that he should have been at all deserted by the propitious Powers of Heaven without some Offence given by himself either by his own Act or Neglect or by Participation with some other And to discover that what it might be is a matter of great importance and requires no less Fidelity in any man to endeavour it than Skill to do it effectually Fidelity to God to himself now King to his Country and Good Will to a most just and honourable Cause and to all concerned in it And all this I hope is ground enough for plain dealing I cannot think of this King without thinking also of his Predecessors in the Throne of these Kingdoms from whom he is personally descended and now succeeds in their Estate Had he been only personally descended from them he had not been so far concerned in the Fate of their Family but having now accepted their Seat and Right he thereby succeeds in their Obligations and must either discharge their Debt by Reformation of what they have in that Capacity done amiss or bear their Iniquity and succeed also in their Punishment They had all the Favour of Providence in their access to the Throne and some of them in a special manner even beyond their Expectation or Hope but none more than this But they all deserted imprudently the Conduct and ungratefully the Service of that benign Providence and following their own ways were thereupon deserted by it and
Rehoboam-like left to the unsound and pernicious Counsels of Flatterers and unfaithful self-seeking Favourites who for their own sinister ends divided the Common Cause and set up a Separate Interest of Prerogative against Law and King against the People and turned the Court and Church into a Combined Faction This hath been the Stumbling Stone and Rock of Offence to all the former and I know not any thing that can be more dangerous to this and if he be not well aware of it to the remainder of that Royal Family if not to Monarchy it self in this Nation This is a matter of so great consequence for the Peace and Prosperity both of King and People to be well understood that it deserves a more particular consideration And these two Observations will make it very plain and apparent 1. It is certain that by the Constitution of our Government the King can legally do very little but by the Advice of some legal Council The Councils by whose Advice he is to proceed are 1. The Great Council of the Kingdom the Parliament 2. The Lords who are Conciliarii Nati 3. The Kings Council for matters of Law anciently consisting of other and more persons besides the Judges and Sergeants than now are consulted with And 4. The Privy Council But Secret Cabals and Cabinet Councils of Favourites are neither agreeable to the English Constitution nor have been ever successful but always pernicious and destructive to such Kings as have most relyed on them In what is done by advice of Legal Council the King is always and ought to be excused and the advisers answerable for it But what is done by illegal Councils is imputed to the King himself and usually produceth Discontents in the people And of this was K. Ch. II. very sensible when in his Declaration Apr. 20 1679. he tells the Privy Council He is sorry for the ill success he hath found in this course and sensible of the ill posture of affairs from that and some unhappy Accidents which have raised great Jealousies and Dissatisfaction among his good Subjects and thereby left the Crown and Government in a condition too weak for those dangers we have reason to fear both at home and abroad And then declaring his Hopes that those evils may be prevented by a course of wise and steady Councels for the future and these Kingdoms grow again to make such a figure as they have formerly done in the World and as they may always do if our VNION and CONDVCT were equal to our Force and his Resolution to that end to lay aside the use he had made of any single Ministry or private Advisers and to constitute such a Privy Council as for number and choice may be fit and to govern by constant Advice of such a Council together with the frequent use of his great Council of Parliament he adds which he takes to be the true Ancient Constitution of this State and Government The mode was before and soon taken up again to draw the Orders matters of greatest moment being first resolved in a private Cabal as made by the King in Council instead of by advice of the Council and to prefix the Names of all present instead of each who consented to them subscribing his own so that none could be charged with what was done but the King himself which was no less prejudicial to the King and Kingdom than contrary to ancient custome and the good Polity of our Ancestors The other observation is this What at first and for some time was ordered by the Assemblies of Christians the Clergy in process of time assumed to themselves to order alone and what was then done by the Common Council of the Clergy the Bishops afterward assumed to themselves alone with their Chancellors And in some ages after the Bishops of Rome made the like Encroachments upon the Right of all especially in matters of most advantage as the disposing of Bishopricks c. At last Hen. 8. with us perceiving the injustice of the Papal usurpations instead of restoring things to the right and original Institution so far prevailed with his Parliament as to get all annexed to the Crown And no doubt this was thought a special acquest and much for the advantage of the King and his Successors but it proved like ill gotten goods a pernicious morsel For it soon excited the most aspiring of the Clergy to seek by Flatteries to obtain their Favour who had the disposal of the great Preferments of the Church This soon produced false Notions concerning the Royal Power and the interest of those who designed that Profession made those Notions easily swallowed without much examination till at last the very youth in the Universities were levened with them and being so early seasoned therewith they could not but take deep root in many honest and well-meaning persons Again this must needs have the like influence upon Kings who are of themselves as apt to assume as Flatterers are to attribute whatever tends to the enlargement of their Power On the other side the greatest part of the Nation that is all who have no temptation to Flattery well knowing their own Rights could not be wheadled out of them with mistaken Names and groundless Notions And from these two Roots have sprung that combined Faction which hath so long and often occasioned the shaking this Throne with such violent concussions and will undoubtedly overturn it if things be not restored in time to their right order And to prevent so great a mischief it may be farther serviceable to observe the Difference between this Faction or the Factious Church of England and the true Church of England For as the Church of Rome arrogates to it self the Name and Title of Catholick and excludes all others who are not of that Communion from any right to it and yet is it self at best but a part of that which is indeed the Catholick Church so the great Zealots for this Faction under the Name of the Church of England will hardly deign the Name of Church of England men to any who run not to the same excess with themselves though if the matter be rightly computed they will not be found so great a part of those who do justly come under that denomination much less of the People and Strength of this Nation as they may seem to some and would be thought to be For of those who are not inferiour to any either in Conformity to the Church both in Doctrine and Worship and that not out of any sneaking or crafty compliance but judgment and choice or in true Loyalty and Fidelity to the King in his Just and Legal Rights they are as little inferiour in Number or Interest who notwithstanding preferring Christianity it self before any particular Church and a compleat genuine Loyalty to the intire State and Constitution before a partial pretended Loyalty to any party in it do not think themselves obliged either by any Duty to the present Church to
were the principal Advisers and Managers in those illegal Projects and now being conscious of their own Guilt and Desert have by themselves and their tools not only hitherto obstructed Justice upon the betrayers of their King and Country to the great disparagement of the present Settlement but animated such a mungrel party and therewith filled many Offices of the Revenue Army and Navy as are real and hearty neither to this nor the former King but intending only their own safety or advantage are disposed to act as in a doubtful case so as may best serve their turn which ever prevail And from this sort of people have proceeded most of the Rubs and Difficulties in our Proceedings and among such it could not be hard for some of the Agents of King James to creep in But as when men do not closely and fully follow the Divine Conduct if they be but a little deserted by it and left to themselves they are immediately exposed to various miscarriages so there was another miscarriage of his Ancestors into whibh he likewise fell if what is commonly affirmed and believed is true which proved a great inlet unto all sorts and the very worst of men into Offices and Employments and that was permitting the Sale of Offices and Places or granting them at the sollicitation of such as did it for money and which is worse yet such as were strangers and utterly unacquainted with Persons and their Qualities This could not but expose very considerable Places to the Agents not only of King James but of the French King to be purchased with his money which of late is become more common here than ever no dout but for his own advantage He is believed to have been a good Chapman to those who were before in places to do him but some particular service and therefore to get in such as were intirely at his service he would undoubtedly be much more liberal but especially under such a juncture of affairs when the Purchase of our Diversion in Ireland but for this last Summer was worth for ought I know as much as half his Kingdom Now from such people as by these means might be and undoubtedly were let into places of great importance what can be expected less than all Vnfaithfulness and Treachery imaginable and what less from that than such Success and Disappointments as we have met with And what is a more natural product of that especially when it proceeds either immediately or originally from a mans own oversight or miscarriage than Dishonour and Contempt or a juster provocation of the Divine Majesty to cause or permit it to befal them than their neglect of his Honour and Service He poureth Contempt upon Princes and weakeneth the strength of the Mighty Job 12.21 Psal 107.40 They that honour me I will honour but they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed 1 Sam. 2.30 So easily can the most Wise and Powerful God when he pleaseth cause a just punishment in all circumstances of Mens Miscarriages to proceed even naturally from some small insensible beginning in their own actions Thine own wickedness shall correct thee and thy backslidings shall reprove thee Know therefore and see c. Jer. 2.19 And yet to give some gentle admonitions that there was more than meerly natural in it he was pleased to intermix some occurrences of a distinguishing Previdence Such was that brave undaunted and admirably successful Resistance of all the Assaults of King James his Force in a close Siege for near Twelve Weeks together by those poor unexperienced and undisciplined but sober and serious people of London-Derry Such the magnanimous and successful Attacks of the Irish Forces by those of Inniskiling Whereas the Famous General Schomberg with all his disciplin'd Forces of the old Army and his experienc'd and lately successful Forreign Forces had not the power to hurt or attack the Irish Army which lay encamped so long together almost by his side And such was that in Scotland when one single new-raised Regiment bore the brunt and defeated the same Force which before had beaten the General there with several Regiments of the old Army And it is very observable to this purpose how little serviceable either to King James in England or to King Williliam in Ireland those poor creatures of that dissolute Army have been whose provoking sins by a generous mixture of Authority and Encouragement to reform might have been restrained at first and in a great measure cured to the Honour of God and greater Service in this Cause But on the contrary many of them there languishing in their Iniquities and Corporal Sickness together have only helped to consume our Provisions and are daily consumed by Death and swallowed up of the Earth the Merciful God being constrained to purge the Land by degrees by his severer methods while inconsiderate men neglect to be the Instruments of his milder A pitiful and deplorable Case indeed which I cannot think on without sad Reflections upon him to whom this matter was so early recommended with no inconsiderable though very plain admonitions relating to his Station And I do the rather take notice of this here because this Person was of all Men next to the Prince himself concerned in this matter in regard as well of the Circumstances he then was in as of that special Recommendation of a matter of so great consequence to his care Whoever was the Person by whom it was recommended it was undoubtedly by the secret direction of the same Providence which directed his Admonitions and no less obliged him than those did them to whom they were delivered If he did faithfully discharge the Duty of his Circumstances as he ought he hath the less to answer for but then that is an unhappy Ingredient in this case But if he did not but instead of the personal plain and powerful Admonitions and Perswasions of a judicious and faithful Divine he took up with the prudential Considerations of a Statesman or Politician and instead of imminding the Prince of his great Duty of attendance to the Conduct of that powerful Providence which attended him and of exciting him to a magnanimous prosecution of that glorious work to which it led him he prudentially misled him to stop at the Bait which lay in his way and daubing even stoop to raise such as oppos'd him and by compliance animate a mungrel Party he disabled the Prince by lowering his Authority hath unhappily retarded if not deseated a principal part of the Glorious Work which God had laid before us and must be accountable both to God and Man for all the Good he might have done and did not and for all the Evil which hath followed upon this neglect and the more because contrary to his own Admonitions True Divinity is much different from the Notional Schismatical and Polemick in which a man may be very ready and have besides a great furniture of other Reading Oratory and all kind of Polite Learning as
REFLECTIONS UPON THE OCCURRENCES OF THE LAST YEAR From 5 Nov. 1688. to 5 Nov. 1689. WHEREIN The Happy Progress of the late Revolution and Vnhappy Progress of Affairs since are Considered The Original of the latter discovered and the proper Means for Remedy Proposed and Recommended PROV XXVII 5 6. Open Rebuke is better than secret Love Faithful are the Wounds of a Friend but the Kisses of an Enemy are deceitful London Printed in the Year 1689. Advertisement THese Papers though in Print were not Printed for vulgar View but for the use of such as are principally concerned in them and therefore in number proportionable to that intention They contain a search into a dangerous Sore which cannot faithfully be performed without some smart to the Patient And in such case they who are wise will not rage and storm at the Hand which toucheth them but consider that it is but what is necessary to prevent greater Mischief in time Perhaps the Operation might have been performed more tenderly by others but more faithfully it could not have been done by any If any blame it as a Work of too much Officiousness for one thus to obtrude himself before he be sent for it must be remembred that he had some concern in as well as for the Safety of the Patient And were it not so yet the good Samaritan for his good Office in supplying the neglect of the Priest and the Levite was not censured but approved by the Great Physitian our Lord and Saviour If after all any one will be troublesom he is hereby admonished to be wise and consider first how he will clear himself before the supream Judge who will certainly take Cognizance of the Cause and give Righteous Judgment upon each For for his Service it was done and to him the Success is intirely committed The Reader is desired to strike out IN some Copies page 1. line 4. from two notable c. to Deliverances were l. 8. and instead thereof to insert after the word November l. 12. And in this that they were Deliverances from Conspiracies of the same inveterate Enemies though at so great a distance of time and of quite different Form and Contrivance the first secret under-ground and in the dark the other bare-fac'd above-board and visible to the VVorld And to read p. 9. l. 31. had not then p. 11. l. 33. among them p. 17. l. 26. Predecessors of the last race in p. 18. l. 24. Nati p. 21. l. 21. by any p. 32. l. 2. systematical Other mere literal Faults being left to his own Observation REFLECTIONS UPON THE OCCURRENCES OF THE LAST YEAR WE are now by the course of Time and Providence of God brought to an Vnited Solemn Anniversary Commemoration of two great Deliverances of this Nation from two notable Conspiracies of our inveterate Enemies the one secret and under ground in the dark the other bare-faced above-board and visible to the World And the Deliverances were one of our Ancestors but in them of our selves about one Age that is 84 years since the other of our own selves commencing in the Princes Arrival but one year since But both concurring in the same happy and memorable Day of the Fifth of November Almighty God of his Infinite Goodness and Wisdom was pleased not only to renew his Mercies to us to do it when considering the corrupt and vicious State of the Nation we had great reason rather to fear some severe Judgment to do it in such a Manner as might make his Divine Power and Efficacy in it the more apparent but to do it with such Circumstances of Time as might mind us also of his former Mercies of his long continued Favour and the constancy of his Providence over us the more to endear his Goodness to us and to oblige us the more effectually to himself The Year that of Eighty Eight to mind us of the famous Eighty Eight one Hundred Years before in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth when the Wind and the Sea by his Divine Direction fought for us against a supposed Invincible Armado And the Day of the PRINCE's Landing determined by the remarkable Motion of the Wind under the same Divine Direction to the very day of the Fifth of November to mind us of the Deliverance in the Reign of King James the First upon the same day from one of the most Barbarous and Hellish Conspiracies that the World hath known And certainly they must be very dull and stupid Souls who by such Admonitions as these are not provoked to Consider with Admiration and raised Affections the observable Course of the Divine Providence in preserving this Nation from such various and continual Machinations of the Antichristian Faction not only during the long Reign of four and forty Years of that Queen but for this full 130 Years from her Accession to the Crown unto this late Revolution As these Circumstances of the Time invite us to look backward upon the former course of Divine Providence in the Occurrences of this Nation so there is another Circumstance in our late Deliverance which doth no less excite our Consideration and oblige us to look forward upon what hath since occurred in the space of this one Year last past And that is the eminent and wonderful Manner of the Revolution The Deliverance it self was so full fraught with Mercies and Favours from Heaven that every Circumstance had some special obliging Favour in it and this of the manner more than one It was no small favour that it was effected with so much Ease to us and with the Effusion of so little Blood especially considering the general Corruption of the manners of all sorts of People among us which not only deserved but seemed to need and require a Purgation But the Merciful God it seems was pleased first to try whether there was so much Ingenuity left among us as to be wrought upon by his more gentle method of so surprising a Mercy and eminent Deliverance which if it be not will certainly aggravate the sin of the Nation and in all probability increase and hasten some remarkable Judgment upon it But that which I principally intend here is that it was carried on with a high Hand like that of the Children of Israel in so powerful and eminent a manner a certain Dread and Terror going before as makes the Providence of God visible his Power known and gives a great Indication of his special Presence by his Invisible Ministers in it This is such a special Favour and produeeth such special Obligations upon us as must needs highly aggravate the Crime of any unsuitable Return as not only Notorious Ingratitude for an extraordinary Benefit but a kind of contempt or slighting of so great a Benefactor to his Face Behold I send my Angel before thee to keep thee in the way and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared Saith God to Moses and then subjoyns this Caution Beware of him and obey his Voice provoke
declare he had before Deserted in Affection yet as if they indeed layed the whole stress upon the Departure and the other matters charged against King James were not criminal or punishable so much as in his Ministers Counsellors and Accomplices or at least doubted their own Authority as a Parliament not one of those who by their wicked Counsels and Compliances betrayed not only their Country but their King himself whom they pretended to serve into such mischiefs as were like to have been fatal to both whatever yet may come of it hath yet been brought to condign Punishment or so much as called in Question upon a fair Tryal quite contrary to all the Practice of our Ancestors who always punished the Counsellors Ministers and Agents in such Miscarriages but rarely the Prince himself unless in extraordinary cases directly tending to the Destruction or Subversion of the Government as this did And whereas upon such a Revolution one of the most necessary things to be done especially when meeting with such Opposition as this hath and is yet like to do is to Remove as much as may be all Occasions of Difference and Vnite all Parties in a firm Agreement for a Mutual Assistance in civil Matters such hath been the Jealousies Animosities and preposterous Zeal of many that a great part of the most sober and serious People of this Nation are to this day kept out of the Service of their Country and the most debauched and profligate freely let in and let in with the grossest Profanation of Sacred things that hath I think been known in any Christian Nation and no expedient can yet be agreed on though in a matter of so great Importance And to sum up all that belongs to this Consideration of the Parliament in one Word they have been all along infested with a Spirit of Division so prevalent upon them that they have scarce done one brave and clever Action nor so much as enquired to any purpose into the Causes and principal Authors of the evil Management of our Affairs ever since they met Should we come nearer to the King himself and enquire into the more secret Proceedings of his Privy Council and great Ministers of State 't is possible we should come so much the nearer yet to the Fountain head of much of this Unhappiness For it must all have been either the Effect or Disappointment of their Counsels But such an Enquiry is a business so proper for the grand Inquest of the Nation that it is fit to be left to them to do it effectually But as for the King himself this is apparent to the World that the embroil'd if not lost condition of Ireland and the loss of this Summers Assistance to His Confederates is a great Eclipse and Diminution of that Honour which the success of his former Proceedings had acquired and was of so great Importance to him for the farther Progress of His Affairs But I need not proceed farther on so ungrateful a subject the Instances I have already produced are sufficient to shew a great and unhappy Change in the Course and Progress of our Affairs from so smooth and prosperous that formidable Armies could give no check or interruption but vanished like Smoke before the Wind to so rough and disturbed and that so universal in all that neither Abroad nor at Home at Sea or at Land in Country or in Council do we find any chearful face of Affairs but every where Rubs Impediments Failures and Disappointments and our way fenced up that we cannot pass So great a change as this is enough to move the curiosity of an unconcerned Spectator to enquire into the true Causes of it much more ought our own concern to move us to do it with no less care and diligence than a skilful and faithful Chyrurgeon would use in the search of some dangerous Wound or Sore Nor would it be hard to discover the particular immediate Causes of many of these things but to rest in them would prove but a shallow and superficial Speculation and the Application of means for the redress of them alone could not be expected to have better effect than the application of a Plaister to a deep and ulcerous Wound Here is so great a concurrence of so many and various evil Symptoms and particular immediate Causes conspiring to cross and disappoint us as is a plain Indication of some more secret and powerful common cause influencing all They are men of no very clear but clouded Minds or of no very strict Observation who having any considerable time been conversant with Men and Business in the World do not feel in themselves and perceive in others that the most minute concerns of men are under the Conduct and Regimen of certain invisible Powers Though Providence and Industry often succeed yet we see them often defeated and lucky and unlucky Hits as we call them and those many times unaccountable prevail above and against both and that not once or twice but in a long course together And had we but the understanding of Balaam's Ass we might discern that an Angel of the Lord is standing in our way to stop our Progress and that this great change is indeed Mutatio dextrae Altissimi Israel hath sinned and transgressed and therefore cannot prosper Our strength is departed from us and we are become like other men Neither will it return unless the cursed thing be found out and removed This therefore is our business which this change of success loudly calls us to to find out the Sin that keeps good things from us and to dissipate the Cloud that intercepts the benign Influences of Heaven And to that end it will be fit to return to that Period of the Revolutien the Exit of King James and the Arrival of the Prince at the Roval Palace and the confines of the Metropolis of the Nation and consider what Indications have since occurred Here he was met and attended by most of the Nobility and a numerous concourse of the Gentry and People of all Ranks and Qualities from all parts of the Nation And the very next Lord's Day were the following ADMONITIONS very sealonably given to him and to all then present from the Pulpit and soon after by his Highnes's special Command to all others from the Press by a Person of great Name who having shewed from the amazing Concurrence of Providence in the late Revolution that it was the LORD's DOING he makes some Reflections upon it One whereof he thus Expresseth P. 22. If we will carry on and perfect this Marvellous WORK OF GOD we must study to be such that God may not repent him of the good which he seems to have prepared for us While we are under such a happy Influence of Heaven we must not RAISE UP SUCH AN INTERPOSITION between it and us as may not only make us lose this happy Opportunity but turn it to a Curse by the ill use we may make of it Another he Expresseth
Service them he usually if not always leads to some special Tryal of their Fidelity wherein if they acquit themselves well he makes them afterward very happy and prosperous but if ill either wholly lays them aside or leaves them to great difficulties till they recover themselves by Repentance and some very generous Act of Fidelity This Declaration was presented to him the same day in the morning on which the Lords in the afternoon presented him with an Address to accept of the Administration till a free Parliament could be assembled That both these proposals were presented to him on the same day was not without the Disposal of the Divine Providence The one was for the Honour and Service of God the other in appearance for his own Honour and both made up a plain compleat Trial. And the latter he accepted but the former hath been neglected to this day The cause of such neglect is principally either the Fascination of Prosperity which disposeth men to forget God or the Deceitfulness of Worldly Wisdom which betrays them to forsake him and apply themselves to ordinary sensible means to secure what they do in fact prefer before him When these two meet they make a strong Temptation but against both he had the fresh Experience of the Favour of God and of the irresistable Power of the Divine Providence over him and making all things easy and plain before him and this made the fault the greater and more inexcusable Nor is this so small and inconsiderable a matter as sensual men may be apt to think it which possibly may be the better perceived if we take notice more distinctly of the several particular Ingredients comprehended in it and how aptly certain like particulars of which the unhappiness of this Change is composed do correspond to them And first if we consider it only as a Neglect of Duty and Desertion for the present of a principal part of the Work to which he was led in so extraordinary a manner by the propitious Providence of God is it not as plain that that propitious Providence which before made his Progress so exceeding smooth easie and successful hath in like manner since either deserted or so neglected his affairs that all have either gone back stood still or proceeded very slowly Secondly as this Neglect was also a matter of Vnfaithfulness in his Lords Service in which he was as a special Instrument employed and intrusted so never was Unfaithfulness more notorious than in the occurrences of this last year in such as were employed and intrusted under him as is commonly believed and shall be discovered in its causes hereafter Thirdly it was a Neglect of his Honour who had conferred by so extraordinary success so much Honour and Reputation upon him and such change of success is usually attended with proportionable diminution of Honour and Reputation Lastly here was the Root of all a Desertion of Dependance and Trust in that potent Providence which had favoured him hitherto in so extraordinary a manner and recourse to deceitful Worldly Wisdom It was the Unhappiness of King James I. that after an admirable Deliverance from an horrid Popish Conspiracy ready for execution he applied himself first to connivance and at last to association with Papists for his security which contrary to his expectation proved the Original of all the mischiefs which have since befallen his Family So likewise this Prince after as great an experience of the Divine Providence over him lest the Kingdom should return to King James thought to deal wisely with them and after Hushai's advice defer this great Work first till the Kingdom should be settled and then when he was Proclaimed King till Ireland should be reduced and he should have sufficient Power an Arm of Flesh to do it effectually and in the mean time try what effect a good example and kindness intrusting them with Offices and Employments in State Army and Navy would have upon such vitious people in the end which in like manner contrary to his expectation hath proved the Original of all the Impediments and Disappointments in his affairs O that my people had hearkened unto me and Israel had walked in my ways I should soon have subdued their Enemies and turned my hand against their Adversaries The Haters of the Lord the Profane and Debauched should have submitted themselves unto him but their time should have endured for ever Psal 81.13 Now would the Lord have established thy Kingdom upon Israel for ever 1 Sam. 13.13 This was the Root of the Miscarriage Hast thou not procured this unto thy self in that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God when he led thee by the way Jer. 2.17 From hence hath plainly proceeded this great change of the former prosperous course of Affairs into so disturbed impedited and unsuccessful even by a natural Chain of Causes after the first breach but those moved and promoted by the Divine Permission by other invisible Powers than those which gave that great success before The presence of so favourable a Providence ought to have been answered with a proportionable Magnanimity Resolution and Constancy in dependance upon that Divine Power but in such a case to stoop to compliance to those who ought to have been awed and subdued is dishonourable and a great offence to those Divine Powers And if those be once provok'd to withdraw a man sinks presently under the Power of them who otherwise should have been subject to him And by this Fault without doubt and his acceptance of their State did this Prince enter into the Fate of his Ancestors of this Nation and will be daily more and more involved therein until it either prove fatal to him or he by Repentance and some Magnanimous and resolute change of his course and methods extricate himself And it is very observable that he not only fell by the same Sin but fell into the very same Faction which for the four last Reigns successively have by their Flatteries of Princes for their private advantage and provocations of the people by Tricks illegal Projects and Practices brought all those mischiefs which we have seen and felt upon both Whereas both civil Prudence and Duty to God i. e. Fidelity to the Conduct of his Providence required that he should have maintained the Reputation and Authority he was raised to made himself Umpire of all Parties restrained the Excesses and discouraged the Insolences of each and with a mixture of Authority and equal Kindness to all reduced them as near as might be to a Union at least to a mutual agreement in matters of common concern But by the course of Affairs he seems to have been rather passive than active in the management thereof and what Counsels prevailed therein may by the same also be perceived Nor was it only into the same Faction that he fell but into the hands of those very Persons who in the Reign of King Charles the Second for under King James they were overtopp'd by others
Constantiue's Poyson hath some Lethargick or Narcotick Vertue in it to benum the Nerves and stupifie the Spirits and Life of Zeal and Devotion in such as taste but a little too deep of it And of this to what is already mentioned I will add Two fresh Instances of my own knowledge the one of a great Clergy-man who having well providod for himself in the World before elsewhere and besides gotten good Preferment here could yet permit though admonish'd of it the Propagation of Religion among his own Countreymen to go a begging here for so small a Relief and Assistance as he himself might very well have supplied The other of some Dignified Persons of considerable Note in the Church who when a well affected Lay-man out of pity to Forty or Fifty Thousand Souls had considered and proposed to have the Care of so great a Parish committed to some man of a Primitive Christian Disposition who contenting himself with a reasonable share of the Profits would have distributed the rest among as many young Curates as it would maintain whereby both the needs of the people might have been better supplied and those Persons by their mutual advices and assistance in such a Work the better fitted and prepared for the Cure of Souls in Parishes of their own yet were pleased to interpose for the Presentation and so far as to obtain it at least from another Competitor in no commendable manner for one who had at that time a good Parsonage a good Lecture and a good Prebend as a Preferment for him Such Scuffling for Preferments in the Church is a great Scandal to many ingenious Lay-Spectators to suspect the Sincerity of those who take upon them to be Preachers of the Gospel and yet discover so little of the Power and Effects thereof in their own Actions And this cannot but greatly obstruct the good effect of all their Preaching upon such It is also a great Temptation to one of the greatest and most common immediate causes of most of our Mischiess both publick and private Over-valuation and Greediness of the Supersluities of the things of this World which all their Preaching can never cure while it is daily confirmed and heightned by such Examples And from the same root doth proceed all that Pharizaical Zeal for the Church and Jealousie and Dread of the least alteration though never so reasonable and necessary in many who shew little sense of Religion in any thing else which hath long disturbed both Church and State and doth at this time expose both to danger These things being observed together with so great coldness in the weighty matters of the Law cannot but cool the affections of their best friends to them and avert the favour both of God and Man from them This therefore we may reasonably look upon as one of the Original and Provoking Causes of this Stop and Change of the late Happy course of Affairs Thou sayest I am rich and increased with Goods and have need of nothing and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind Be zealous therefore and repent Concerning our Judges and Civil Magistrates I have little to say Our Courts of Justice are so well filled with such Persons as the Profession of the Law doth not afford better than most of them are only few of those who are in were more worthily preferred than one whom I need not name was unworthily left out His personal Worth doth well qualifie him for that Service and his singular Merit in his generous appearing for the Service of his Country in occasions of greatest difficulty did most justly claim it and however it came to pass certainly no man of Vertue and Ingenuity would ever oppose it But because Corruption and Abuses in great Places besides other mischiefs are of pernicious consequence by their Example I think fit to take notice of one which deserves Correction because it not only concerns divers great Lords but is obstinately persisted in contrary to the Opinion and Advice of Mr. Atturney himself And if the Lords will pass by such an abuse to themselves I know not what people of inferiour Quality may expect in time It is the needless and illegal Charge they are put to before they can be inserted into the Commission of the Peace of any County for Custos Protulorum I need but name it As to the Army and Navy the Seamen are generally honest and true to their Country and the Protestant Religion and many among them sober and serious people but a great part of their Officers and the Land Army who were nearer the influence of the evil Examples at the Court are generally so dissolute and debauched that it is not to be believed that God will ever be with them or prosper them but rather by degrees waste and consume them till he has wholly purged the Land of them and therefore so unhappy a Company of people amongst us must needs make us unprosperous and unsuccessful till they be either destroyed or reformed Concerning the Body of the People of England though the unhappy effects of the pernicious Examples at Court have reach'd all Ranks and Degrees amongst us yet have they been most prevalent upon such as were nearer in degree or converse to it so that the lower Ranks of men which are most numerous and the strength of the Nation though not wholly escaped have yet been least corrupted by them and were but the Examples of Vertue in our great men now but any way proportionable to what their Examples of Vice have been for so long past I do not doubt but they would soon appear again as considerable as heretofore they have done So that there is little to be noted in them but what is derived from those above them and is plainly to be imputed not more to their neglect of good Examples good Laws and good Execution than to the energy of their wicked profane and impious Examples And these being besides only Passive and concerned only in the Success not in the Management of the Affairs are not so much to be considered in the case Nor shall I say any thing of our Confederates beyond Sea. And therefore to draw up the conclusion The CONCLVSION AS almost all the Wickedness of the former Reigns proceeded originally from those Kings and Judgment hath been begun first to be executed upon them so hath likewise the Fault whereby that great Work whereof this King was called out to be the Glorious Instrument in these Nations hath been hitherto interrupted plainly proceeded from himself For by Neglect through prudential Connivance of the Duty to which he was led and through politick Compliance of the Authority to which he was raised by so manifest a Divine Conduct he did not so much engage to himself as animate against his Interest that party which first opposed his ascent to the Throne and afterward by pernicious Counsels and under-hand Dealings as is believed imposed upon him disappointed his