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A90770
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A Plea for succession in opposition to popular exclusion wherein it is evidenced, that an association, or any other such method, is a more immediate way to arbitrary power and a more certain road to popery than a standing up to the right of succession can in any reason be supposed to be : with some remarques on Coleman and his letters.
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1682
(1682)
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Wing P2516; ESTC R225594
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23,646
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20
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therefore he will not resist him and to Love his Religion and for that Reason he will not help to destroy it He hath been taught in the same Acts to Fear God and to Honor the King by yielding Passive where he cannot yield Active Obedience Therefore if he shall ever fall under a King that shall set up Popery he neither helps forward the work nor resists the Powers but commits himself to Him who governs the Kingdoms upon Earth which of old was called the Faith and the Patience of the Saints Now when these stand Neuter it is utterly impossible that the Papist Party should ever do any thing by Arms upon the numerous Body of Dissenters Indeed if Dissenters prepare or begin a resistance or if at any time they take up Arms against the King the case is quite altered for then the King and all Loyal Subjects whom these Parties all brand for Papists are equally indangered and then we are bound to defend both our King and our selves against fellow Subjects who have no Authority to disturb us Now suppose we fall under so nice and trying a case that we conceive we cannot defend our King but we must enable Him to inslave our selves and Enemies together yet however we must do our Duty and leave the event to God For we are not to sin our selves that thereby we may prevent others from doing so You cry Popery is coming and therefore Rebel now we do not see the Popery but we see the Rebellion we cannot tell whether that will ever come but we see the other is come already Now we are to take the safest side but if we joyn with you we may be gull'd into a needless War as many were in the time of the late King whereas by a Rebellion the Powers the Government and every private Interest are indangered Moreover if we run on your side we are sure to be undone which way soever the Victory falls for if you are overcome we perish with you as Malefactors but if you do overcome we are ruin'd by you and if we sit still you destroy us and our King together Therefore in such a case as duty commands so safety presses us to defend our selves and King at once without considering Him as such but simply as our King and therefore whether he be this or that which is agreeable to the voice of God both in Nature and Revelation too And indeed if we allow any Liberty of resistance we bring confusion into the World set all Government upon Hinges and make a gap for all manner of Villanies to creep in at Whence St. Paul discours'd like a Polititian as well as a Divine when he commanded the Romans to submit and not to resist the Powers even when Nero was their Emperor who was justly branded for the Monster of Mankind Therefore unless Dissenters by their Rebellions give such advantages to Popery it cannot in our time come in by our own Arms. Nor 2. By Foreign Aids For 1. If a King shall make use of such He takes the readiest course imaginable to disoblige His Protestant Subjects Especially since these Aids must be supposed to come from France against whom the English have the greatest antipathy of any People in the World 2. In case the French King come at all he must come with very numerous Forces and consequently leave himself weak at home and thereby would draw all Neighbor Princes upon him not only for the recovery of what he hath lately taken from them but also to hinder his farther growth whereby he may set up himself an Universal Monarch over this part of the World By which means he would soon be drawn off to save his own at home 3. We cannot in Reason think the King of England will ever call in those who if too weak loose Him His Crown and if strong enough will take it from Him For hereby he would bring Himself into a certain ruine either by His Subjects at home or His Aids from abroad Look into the World and tell me where Protestant or Papist Princes either in this or in former Ages use to sell their Kingdoms into the hands of any for the sake of forcing their Subjects to a Religion they could not otherwise oblige 'em to Honor and secular Interest cause Princes of the same Religion to War one upon another At this very time the Emperor the King of Spain the French King and Italian Princes though all Roman Catholicks are either in a War or upon their Guards every one waiting but till another strikes Queen Mary while settling Popery at home lost the last of the English Conquests on the Continent of France And can we think that the King of England will tread counter to all the Kings upon Earth That he alone had rather have no Subjects than not have them in all points such as himself could wish Judg by your selves and you will believe there is no Man so mad as rather to have no Estate than not have a few incumbrances with it Indeed when Subjects are contending for the Government they usually call in Foreign assistance for when once it comes to this point that they must have such Aids or fall it is easie determining what to do For by such means they may reach their end however they can but fall and they think better fall under a Foreigner who by their means may gain the whole than under the Powers they would have dispossess'd for the former may give 'em Life the latter the Gallows Thus our True Protestant Rebels called in the Scots And a piece Entituled The growth of Knavery tells you by what Lord they desired the French King to be ready in case they should Pray his Aids And this at that very time too when they were charging the late King with Foreign Correspondencies it being ever their way to charge those Evils on the Government which they are Acting their own selves as again in this case because they may not Act Arbitrarily in chusing Sheriffs contrary to the Law and usage of this City for many Ages before us and contrary to their own Order in the Reign of King Charles the first they cry out of Arbitrary Power as if they could never make Persons and things appear so odious as by putting them in their own Livery Their Brethren the True Protestants in Hungary having Rebelled against their Emperor call in the Turk and are shuting out the Bible by the Alcoran But as Kings may fall but cannot rise so they are very jealous of their Interest both at home and abroad and industriously careful that they give none an advantage against them And certainly none could have thought such a thing of His Royal Highness was it not for Coleman's Letter which as His Royal Highness did deny to be writ by His order or knowledg so we have all the Reason in the World to believe Him not only from the unreasonableness of the Hypothesis as before but farther 1. From Coleman's
1. That this supposed Army will be as unwilling to be put out of a way to Live and to give up the Power and Revenues they have got into their Hands as the other were before and consequently will be as much against a King as they 2. The Heirs to the Crown must be supposed at least some of 'em still in being and therefore waiting an opportunity of recovering their own for which very cause as well as others they will not part from their Power in giving the Sword out of their Hands lest by some slip of Government or any other means the Right owner return from whom after a second Rebellion they must not expect so large an Indemnity When the Roman Armies Rul'd the Empire they were never willing to part from their Power though indeed they made Emperors yet they unmade them again at their pleasure and forc'd the Senate to confirm their next Election that for many successive Reigns they still rode Masters of the Government In like manner the Parliament Army would have shook off Oliver Cromwell though at last their General and set up by themselves neither could he have held it had he lived but a little longer Next they tumble down his Son Richard and set up themselves again under their General Lambert Nor must you ever expect that another Army of the People if it once come to tread down all Authority and Laws will act any otherwise because it is their Interest to do so They will not voluntarily give up their Arms and become your Servants and be turn'd a Begging at your pleasure when they are once become your Masters But to return a little back whom will you suppose this Army to set up It must not be the Lawful Successor which is His Royal Highness for whose Exclusion they pretend to rise nor His next Heirs who will not take it over a Fathers Head and in whose Hands Rebels will not put themselves least Justice should overtake them But it must be one whom we must suppose a very Vsurper who therefore like the Protector must keep up this Army to secure himself For if he Disband them he is exposed to the Lawful Heir to whom the Loyal Party will adhere and great part of these Forces so Disbanded will fly some out of revenge and others that they may still have somthing to do Therefore in fine it comes to this viz. that you must Petition and ask this Army first whether you shall have a King or not and then afterwards how long you shall keep Him For if they stand they are able to put by your King at pleasure and if Disbanded they make way for the owner People are thus vilely mistaken in reckoning what mighty feats they may do by Arms because they do not consider the different Interest of the People and of an Army Take the People peaceably imbodyed together and they are a Civil Society whose Interest is Government and Trade without either of which they perish but raise an Army from amongst this Body let them ride over all Authority and Power and their circumstances are quite altered for they are now unhous'd disfurnish'd of Goods Tools Implements and Commodities and some never had any they are now grown Idle Proud and Imperious and can neither Beg nor Work Therefore their Interest is quite altered too which is no more to sit under Laws and follow their Labour and Trades but to continue in Arms to inslave and eat up the People And those very Men of them that have other thoughts now yet will have these if they ever fall into such Circumstances a Man's mind and sentiments usually vary with his condition For Men are always ready to follow their Interests to take their advantages and make their own markets Therefore the People in such ways do but conjure up a Devil which they will never be able to lay and which will give them no King unless such an one as Jupiter gave the Petitioning Frogs which devoured some and made all the rest a weary of him Nor is there any help in such a case unless it fall down from Heaven as it did before For the Commons whom you suppose to have Commissioned these Forces and from whom alone you can expect it neither will nor can help it For 1. They share with the Army in their stollen Revenues and Estates ergo will not help it 2. This Army if displeas'd will exclude some Members and terrifie the rest or set up a single Person themselves who be sure shall be one that hath no pretences to the Crown lest he should keep it longer than he serves their Interest but must be a Person whom themselves may reign under Ergo the Commons cannot help it but each must comply with the other for Mutual preservation The Commons must Vote Mony for the Army and themselves together and then the Army must force the People to pay it Whence the Friends to this way will be utterly disappointed and find themselves passed out of God's Blessing into the warm Sun and will soon become a Thousand times more weary of their Arms than they are of what they please at present to call their Grievances 4. Look to the People and there can be no expectation of a King from them who are made up of so many and so different Parties of whom some can dispense with the Name but not with the Power of Kings they would possibly give the Title so they may keep the Authority themselves under whom for he must not live above 'em a King should not be half so happy as a Man that hath but five honest Tenants whereof one pays Ten another Twelve another Fifteen and the other each about Twenty Pound per annum For this Man knows what he hath to trust to and may command his own but the other lives precariously and can command nothing Others are for an Universal equality who that themselves might never want would have none above ' em Here are a pure sort of Saints that will indure none but King Jesus And there a late Sect of Puritans yet descended with the rest from the old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 demure things a narrow Soul'd People whose Consciences cannot stretch so wide as to call any Man Master or own any Guide but the Light within ' em A special Medley A Parcel like to pull down and destroy if they can but not to Establish and Build up a Government Discord brought a Babel to nought and shattered the first Monarchy in pieces and hath ruin'd all the Empires of the World Ergo the Poets to signifie all her Works are Desolation Paint her in a tatter'd Garment and if after the Observation and Experience of all Ages to the contrary we expect to see her Erect a Throne and Build up a Church and that while she is threatning the ruine of both we betray our own weakness and make our selves one of the greatest Instances of Vanity that the wise Man hath found