in-Law could counter-balance so many Great and stupendious Interests or the Sacred and Inviolable Obligations that ingaged him to God and the publick good of so many Millions of Souls that depended on it Every Prince of the Royal Blood of England is in Right of that Blood oblig'd to regard England as his Own Country and to take care of the Inhabitants over whom he has a Right to Reign that the Demeans of the Crown be not Wasted nor the Subjects Injur'd and the nearer he approaches the Succession the greater is his Obligation to Defend them from Violence and his Country from Ruin to which Country next unto his God * Chari sunt parentes chaâ—â—i liberi propinqui familiares sed omnes omnium charitates Patriae una complexa est pro qua quis bonus dubitet mortem oppetere fi ea sit profituturus 〈…〉 and before all other Relations whatsoever he stands Particularly and Religiously concern'd for its Peace and Preservation His Highness the Prince of Orange could not neglect it now in common Prudence without manifest prejudice to his Right of Succession for the People of England by applying to his Highness had not only Recognized his Right to the Succession but also acqaainted him in their Memorial that if he refused them Succor under their present Ill Circumstances they would Assume their own Right and Free themselves and how far their Resentments of such a Slight might have Transported them is not easy to imagine Now altho the Reasons alledg'd are sufficient to shew the Justice of the Prince's Interposing between the late King and his Subjects yet I shall shew also that it is justified by many Presidents and where the Emergencies were not so considerable as ours nor their Titles to the Government so Incontestable as the Prince of Orange's was to the Crown of England who yet are Celebrated in History for their great Atchievements on such Occasions Constantine's quarrel with Maxentius * Eusebius Eccl. Hist p. 268. had no other ground and that was enough than that Maxentius Tyranniz'd over the Romans for which Constantine Invaded him Slew him and was receiv'd by the Romans as their Deliverer As remarkable was his Raising War against his Brother in Law Licinius because he persecuted the Christians for which when he had overcome the Tyrant the Christians plac'd him on the Throne in Licinius's Room and Historians have Celebrated his Name as a most Holy and Generous Champion in the Cause of Christ and their Country Constantine the Younger Son of Constantine the Great threatned his Brother Constantius with a War and made him desist from persecuting the Catholick Bishops and forc'd him to Restore Athanasius to his Bishoprick of Alexandria The like was done by King Pipin and Charles the Great against the Lomlards and by all the Christian Princes against the Turk in the Holy War To come nearer our own times Queen Elizabeth gave a Powerful Aid to the Hollanders * Vid. English Chron. and Hist of her Life against the Tyranny of the Spaniards King James the First * See his Manifesto 16. and K. C. Declaration on that Subject on the behalf of the Prince Palatine against the Emperour of Germany King Charles the First assisted the Rochellers with a Fleet and an Army against the French King in the cause of Religion and was incouraged to it by several of his Bishops and 't was always look'd upon as a great Blemish on the Reign of King Charles the Second and gave suspicion of his being in the Popish Interest that he suffered the F. K. to proceed so far in destroying his Protestant Subjects without such a seasonable Interposition as might have prevented it or gain'd an Opportunity of making his Reign glorious and his Kingdom easy by a War which in all probality would have brought that Monarch into better Terms for the Advantage of Europe So that from the Reasons aforementioned and the Presidents now alledg'd his Highness's Expedition to Rescue an Injur'd People from the Tyranny of Arbitary Power was one of the most Generous and Pious Enterprizes that any Age has acquainted us with and that the Good of this Nation was the only motive that gave birth to this undertaking see it in the Words of his Highnesses own Declaration Since the English Nation has always testified a most particular Affection and Esteem both to our Dearest Consort the Princess and to our selves we cannot excuse our selves from Espousing their Interests in matters of such high Consequences and from contributing all that lies in us for maintaining both of the Protestant Religion and of the Laws and Liberties of those Kingdoms and for the securing to them the continual enjoyment of all their just Rights to the doing of which we are most earnestly solicited by a great many Lords both Spiritual and Temporal and by many Gentlemen and other Subjects of all Ranks Therefore it is that we have thought fit to go over into England and to carry over with us a Force able by the Blessing of God to defend us from the Violence of those Evil Counsellors and we being desirous that our Intentions in this may be rightly understood declare that this our expedition is intended for no other design but to have a free and lawful Parliament assembled as soon as is possible and that in order to this all the late Charters by which the Elections of Burguesses are limited contrary to the Antient custom shall be considered as Null and of no Force and likewise all Magistrates who have been unjustly turn'd out shall forthwith Resume their former Imployments as well as all the Boroughs of England shall return again to their ancient prescriptions and Charters and that the Writs for the Members of Parliament shall be addressed to their proper Officers according to Law and Custom That also none be suffer'd to choose or to be chosen Members of Parliament but such as are qualified by Law and that the Members of Parliament shall meet and sit in full freedom that so the two Houses may concur in preparing such Laws as they upon full and free debate shall judge Necessary and Convenient both for the confirming and executing the Law concerning the Test and such other Laws as are necessary and convenient for the security and maintenance of the Protestant Religion c. Thus his Highness was pleas'd to declare his intentions with which the Nation was so Intirely satisfied that they conquer'd all that Read or heard them insomuch that many Persons of Quality and others met his Highness at Exeter put themselves under his Conduct and many other Lords and Great Men who had rais'd Forces in all parts of the Kingdom to strengthen the Prince's Expedition were marching with all speed to joyn his Highness's Troops And now A War being ready to break forth in the Bowells of the Kingdom several Spiritual and Temporal Lords in an humble Petition to the late King advise him in order to Redress the Grievances
Laws do not only totally exclude Papists from Military Offices but injoin them to be Disarm'd also Notwithstanding James the Second did not only Arm them but put them into the First Employments of the Army and all other Stations And was so fond of them that no Consideration either of Quality Loyalty or Merit except he was a Papist could Recommend any Man to this King's Favour or give him Title to the common Kindness of a Civil Reception but all were Smil'd or Frown'd on as they were distinguish'd by their Religious Principles Men may live happily under a Government and yet be excluded from having any Office or exercising any Authority under it and therefore the late King's Fondness and the Papists Forwardness to thrust themselves into Employments gave a great Suspition that it was for no good End that he put Wise and Experienc'd Men out to make room for a sort of Raw Papists who being not us'd to Publick Business were not capacitated for it No Man can imagin that the late King made this bold Adventure in Employing Papists for nothing or that he would disoblige the Body of his People for their sakes only without designing some other Advantage to himself by it He must have some peculiar Service for these Unqualify'd Favourites to do in which the rest of the Nation would not inter-meddle The Contest was between the King 's Absolute Power on the one side and our Laws and Religion on the other And therefore to know what Work their King had for them to do and to what End he would have employ'd these Services here is but to see Vide State of Ireland under the Reign of the late King James what Use he put them to in Ireland and how they demean'd themselves towards Protestants where the Scene was open'd and all manner of Violences committed upon Protestants by his Authority He also corrupted the Exercise of Justice on which depends the Safety of the Nation and the Stability of the Throne The Judges were Tamper'd with and Admitted upon Condition of favouring and promoting the late King 's Arbitrary Power and the Popish Interest Those Judges were Depos'd who were fix'd in their Religion and Resolutely defended the True Interest of their Country and others put into their Places of no Honour Integrity or Capacity but known Temporizers or Papists who were excluded by the Laws of their Country Upon this follow'd very Arbitrary and Illegal Proceedings in the Courts of Judicature A Prosecution was carry'd on against Seven Reverend Prelates for Petitioning the King to Redress their Grievances and giving their Reasons why they could not obey his Arbitrary Commands Causes were Try'd in the Court of King's Bench that were only Cognizable in Parliament Partial Corrupt and Unqualify'd Persons were Return'd and Serv'd on Juries in Cases of High Treason that were not Free-Holders Great Bail requir'd of Persons Committed in Criminal Causes Excessive Fines Impos'd for small Offences Illegal and Cruel Punishments Inflicted without Example or Law to warrant them And for a finishing Stroke The late King was also pleas'd to Grant and Seal a Commission to several Unqualify'd Persons to Examine the Revenues and Search into the Foundations of all the Hospitals in the Kingdom and see to what Uses they were first given by their Benefactors And into the Estates that some time ago belong'd to Monks Friars and other Religious Orders of the Romish Church with Intent to Restore them to the Papists who complain'd to the late King that they were Wrongfully Depriv'd of them In brief Never any Prince in so short a time committed so many Irregularities and made such Inroads upon our All as James the Second did by his Dispencing Power in England his Absolute Power without Reserve in Scotland and his Actual and Absolute Destruction of the Liberties and Religion of the Protestants in Ireland To which if we add the more than seeming Probability of the late King 's Leaguing with France for the Extirpation of the Northern Heresie 't will compleat his Design and make the intended Ruin of England unavoidable for more Hands would have made lighter Work and Experienc'd Artists would have finish'd it sooner I will not urge this League as a plain and positive Truth tho' I am strongly inclin'd to believe it and therefore shall only produce my Reasons and leave them with the Reader to judge as he pleases Mr. Coleman who must be presum'd to know much of his Master's Mind being in the same Interest and the Tool he work'd with in all his Secret Practices gives great Suspicion of the Truth of this Combination in a Letter to Sir William Throgmorton Feb. 1. 1678. You well know saith he that when the Duke comes to be Master of our Affairs i. e. to be King of England the King of France will have Reason to promise himself All things that he can desire And in a Letter to Father Le Chaise Confessor to the French King he says That His Royal Highness was convinc'd that His Interest and the King of France 's were the same And whether he ever thought fit to change his Mind since his Accession to the Crown his own Actions will better declare than any Gloss of mine In this State of Amity Things continu'd between the French King and the Duke of York till he was King And when the Prince of Orange's Fleet was preparing for his Noble Expedition into England they seem'd to rest on the same Foot for Monsieur le Comte d' Avaux the French King's Ambassador at the Hague in a Memorial to the States General acquaints them That his Master knowing the great Preparations for War that their Lordships were making both by Sea and Land was not without some Design form'd answuerable to the greatness of those preparations and his Master believing that it threaten'd England he had Commanded him to declare on his part that the Bands of Friendship and Allyance between him and the King of Great Britain will oblige him not only to assist him but also to look upon the first Act of Hostility that shall be committed by your Troops or your Fleet against his Majesty of Great Britain as a manifest Rupture of the Peace and a Breach with his Crown To this Memorial the States of Holland gave Answer That they Arm'd after the Example of their Neighbours to be ready upon Occasion 'T is true the French Ambassador does not mention the League in express words yet he gives very shrewd Hints that there was some such thing as a League or an Equivilent between the two Crowns and so the States of Holland took it For in their Answer to the English * The Marquiss d'Arbaville Ambassadors's Memorial their Lordships tell him That they were long since fully convinc'd of the Allyance which the King his Master had treated with France and which has been mention'd by Mr. Le Comte d'Avaux in his Memorial The Industry and Care that has been us'd to stifle this League does also
Inactivity to which the Kings of France were then accustom'd was grown very disadvantageous to the Government But France was not in danger of perishing by his Idleness and England was on the very Moment of being destroy'd by the late King's Tyranny and Subversion of the Laws And so much Difference as there was between doing Nothing and endeavouring to Ruin All so much Difference was there between the Dethronement of Childeric and that of James the Second There have been Kings Depos'd for Involuntary Absence upon certain Occasions but that cannot stand in Competition with the late King 's wilful Renunciation of the Government by refusing to Govern by the Laws of the Constitution and his Voluntary Deserting the Kingdom when no Force compell'd him to it Was there ever any Mention of Introducing another King till the Throne stood empty by the late King 's going away Did ever so Great a People comport themselves with so little Disorder when they were Lawless and without a Government And was it not high time to provide for the Safety of the Nation when he that should have Govern'd it had voluntarily left it and not only so but left it in the greatest Confusion he could possibly reduce it to and went off only to procure a Foreign Army to Conquer and Subdue the whole Nation into Slavery and profest himself an open and Hostile Enemy to the Kingdom Was the Absence of a Prince to be compar'd with these Extravagancies Were they any longer to be submitted to when there was no Hope of Amendment They that assert such Contradictions and Improbabilities might as well affirm that a Fever was a Recipe for Health and the Plague a Medicine for Long Life and would gain Credit as soon to one as they can do to the other Subjects have Renounc'd their Kings for Usurping a Power to treat them as they pleas'd as was the Case of Rehoboam and Jeroboam But what is Arbitrary Power tho' bad enough too when compar'd with an Actual Necessity of Destroying the Nation and that Necessity impos'd upon the Prince by his Conscience under the Expectation of Eternal Rewards in the World to come There may be Hopes of Reclaiming a Prince from the Evil Counsel of Others but there is no dividing a Man from himself In culpa est Animus * Hor. lib. 1. ep 14. qui se non effugit unquam In James the Second's Mind the Fault did lie That never from it self could fly Constantius Copronimus was Deposed for Impiety but that being a Personal Evil affected the Publick only by the Ill Consequences of a Regale Example And Impiety was never the Parent of so many Cruelties as the Superstition we are speaking of has been amongst us Atheism and Infidelity are Sins of the highest nature but never were guilty of Shedding so much Humane Blood as Superstition And therefore Princes have not been thought so Justly to deserve a Deprivation and the Loss of their Crowns and Countries as a Prince Superstitiously devoted to a False Religion who thinks his Actions Pious at the same time that he is * Que est facto pius est sceleratus eodem committing the greatest Wickedness and †Crudelitas nobilitata Religione rendring himself Infamous by Inglorious Cruelties to his Subjects Which we had Cause to dread for * Lucret. l. 5. Saepius olim Religio peperit Scelerosa atque Impia facta In our Fore-Fathers Times Religion did commit the foulest Crimes Some Princes have been Depos'd for Cruelty but their Cruelty not to be compar'd with his for a Transient Cruelty was always thought more tolerable than one that was Durable A particular rather than a publick Mischief A Cruelty hated by all the World as appearing in its own Likeness frightful rather than a Cruelty hidden under the pretext of Piety and Religion A Cruelty which destroys the Body only rather than a Cruelty that destroys both Body and Soul at the same time A tolerable Cruelty and Oppression before a Cruelty advanc'd before we are aware into an Inviolable Law of the Kingdom and may be justly nam'd an * Immortale odium nunquam Sanabile Vulnus Juvenal Sat. 13. Immortal Hatred and an Incurable Wound in the Body Politick that threatens Destruction to the whole Nation Such was the Tyranny of the late King whose Outside was Devotion and In-side Destruction for tho' in the general Representation of Things he seem'd but to take off the Penal Laws against Papists yet in the Distinct Idea he design'd to execute the Penal Decrees of the Church of Rome against Protestants which was visible in setting up Popish Magistrates who think themselves oblig'd to work our Ruin And in these cover'd Designs he exceeded most of the Tyrants that went before him who were contented to abuse their Subjects themselves without endowing their Inferiour Magistrates with a Supream Power for the same Purposes Nero kill'd his Mother and Brother and most of his Honest Courtiers but did not command his Governors of Provinces to follow his wicked Example Astiages gave his Favourite the Head of his Son to eat but did not impose upon his Lieutenants a Necessity of Imitating him in his Barbarous Repasts The Roman Emperors persecuted the Primitive Christians with all manner of Cruelties but we do not find that they were so oblig'd in Conscience to do it that they put it out of their power to shew them any Mercy But that Popery does it is known to Heaven and Earth and they must pull out their Eyes that will not perceive it So that our Adversaries must consent that the Proceedings of the late Convention of Estates in Deposing James the Second were the most Natural Just Necessary and Lawful that ever was or can be on the like Occasion And they have nothing left them to object unless they can prove that the Laws of which we have spoken were not of great Consequence to the Nation or that the late King did not break them since I have already prov'd that no Prince can have such an Absolute Right to a Crown but for the Safety of a Kingdom he may be Dethron'd For By the same Reason that he may Lose it to a Conqueror or Resign it to a Successor he may Abdicate it Otherwise the very End of Government would be lost if the Prince that endeavours to subvert the Kingdom does not at the same time forfeit his own Right to it And therefore the Convention of Estates who bless'd the Nation with the present Settlement had been Justifiable though they had fail'd of Success the late King having long before ceas'd to be a Legal King of England My next Undertaking is to shew that King William the Third now in the Throne of his Ancestors is Rightful and Lawful King of England Scotland France and Ireland and the Dominions and Territories thereunto belonging And to prove this beyond all possibility of Dispute tho' I need use no other Argument than that he is King by the