the Kings Authority and person as those that stand indebted to the King for their Lives and Estates who yet act as confidently as if one Rebellion might be placed in Justification of another For they do now afresh and in publick avow the methods and practices of the late Times while the true sons and servants both of the English Church and State lie in the dust waiting for the righteous Judgment of the Lord in want and patience Now if according to the Appellants Rule those are the most dangerous to whom the King has been most kinde that Danger must be understood of the Fanatiques for otherwise the Appealer runs the Hazzard of a Premunire upon the Act for the safety of the Kings Person in scandalizing his Majesty for a Favourer of Popery It is not yet that the general Rule fails because of this Exception For the greater the Obligation the greater in reason ought to be the confidence though the Appellaâ—…t seems to be of another opinion Who betrays you in your Beds says he your Friend for your Enemy is not admitted to your House Who betrays you in your Estate your Friend for your Enemy is not made your Trustee So that nothing is more dangerous then a blinde friendship This is an admirable fetch of his to prove his Royal Highness dangerous to his Majesty because he is both a Friend and a Brother and still the Nearer the more dangerous as if the King were safer in the hands of his Enemies then of his Friends But he expounds himself that they are more dangerous in respect of greater Confidence and fairer Opportunities There is no sence against that danger but utterly to cast off and renounce all the Bonds and Dictates of Society and Good Nature We must contract no Friendships and trust no Relations for fear they should cut our Throats How much more wretched then the very Beasts has our Appealler at this rate made Mankinde by poysoning the very Fountain of Human Comforts Nor is it a Friend that betrays us but an Enemy under that appearance By which Rule an Episcopal a Fanatical a Popish Friend are all equally dangerous For a Man has no more security of a Friend under one denomination then under another But the Appellant in this place speaks of the danger of a blinde Friendship that is to say a kindness that is taken up without any consideration or Choice and runs on without fear or wit which in this application must either be very little respectfull or altogether Impertinent He produces instances of perfidious Favourits and Relations as if there were no other to be found in Nature By his Argument because One Woman poyson'd her Husband all men should destroy their Wives Because One Son supplanted his Father all Parents should drown their Children like Kitlins Because One Younger Brother offer'd violence to his Elder there should be no longer any Confidence or Faith maintain'd among Brethren If little petty Interests says he make one Brother wish the others Death how much more prevalent will the Interest of a Crown be Nay of two Crowns viz. One here and another hereafter in Heaven promis'd him by an Old fellow with a bald pate and a spade-beard As to the Argument this is only the Second Part to the same tune and a Particular Instance emprov'd into an Universal Exception There are Wicked Husbands Wives Children Let there be no more Marrying Men have been poyson'd in the Sacrament in their Cups and Dishes shall we therefore never receive the Communion nor Drink nor Eat There have been Tyrants in all forms of Governments shall we therefore have no Government at all And moreover as this way of Reasoning Lessensall the Bonds of Human Trust and Concord and runs us back again into Mr. Hobb's Original State of War so does it as little serve the Appellants purpose even if it were admitted First the Temptation of a Crown does not work upon any Man either as a Brother or as a stranger but equally upon Both and more or less as the man is more or less Consciencious or Ambitious So that the danger arises from the Humour of the Person not from the Relation Nay Secondly The Danger is Greater from a Popular Faction that has no Right at all to a Crown then from a Legal Pretendent to it upon a Claim of Descent For the One only waits his Time according to the course of Nature whereas the Other presses his end by the ways of Bloud and Violence having no other way to compass it He makes it yet a stronger argument where there is but One Life betwixt a Successor and Three Kingdoms But does not this Argument hold as strong on the other side There was only the Kings Life betwixt the Faction of 1641 and the Three Kingdoms which Life they took away and so possest themselves of his Dominions Their pretence was only a Reformation of Abuses with Horrid and Multiply'd Oaths that they designed Only the Glory of God the Honour of the King the Preservation of the Protestant Religion His Majesty they said was misled by Popish Counsells and their Business was no more then to rescue him out of the hands of Papists and bring him home to his Parliament And what was the Event of all A Gracious Prince was Murther'd and 500. Tyrants set up in his stead Our Religion and Our Laws were Trampled upon and the Free-born English-men subjected to a Bondage below that of Gally-slaves The whole Nation becoming a Scandall a Hissing and a Scorn to all our Neighbours round about us But what were these â—…eople all this while If we may credit the Appellant they were Priests and Iesuits Or at least Papists But the King tells us they were Brownists Anabaptists and Other Sectaries Preaching Coachmen Felt makers c. The Act for Indempnity gives us a List of the Regicides The Act of Uniformity stiles them Schâ—…smatiques and throughout the whole History of their Acts and Ordinances there appear none but Dissenting Protestants The Church of England being the Only Sufferer betwixt the Two Extreams And these People had the Interest of the Two Crowns in prospect too which the Appellant descants so Jollily upon Almost every Pulpit promising Salvation to the Fighters of the Lords Battels against the Lords Anointed with a Cursed be He at the End on 't that doth the work of the Lord Negligently Upon the Third Head he says that most Princes Believe or Disbelieve the Information which is given them of a Plot according to the Nature of the Evidence and Credit of the Informants There is no more in This then that most Princes Believe upon the Common Inducements that move all men of Reason whatsoever to Believe Viz. the Probability of the matter in Question and the Credit of the Witnesses Now as to the Popish Plot we shall give him these Two Points for Granted but without discharging a Plot likewise on the Other hand upon the
Both Nay he goes so far toward the owning of a dislike for the Form of our Government it self that he says no Government but Monarchy can in England ever support or favour Popery as who should say A Common-wealth would put us out of fear on 't He says again Pag. 3. that the Parliament Party never Entertain'd any Papists unless under a Disguise and yet we never heard of any more of them then the Kings Heads-man in a Mâ—…sque We could shew him several Instances of the contrary but no man is so senselesse as to imagine that the King was Depos'd pursu'd rob'd taken condemn'd and put to Death by a hundred thousand Priests in Visors we have nothing to say to the Loyalty of the Papists but yet the Incongruity of our Appellants charge upon them we cannot but in Honesty and common reason take some notice of Especially when the Dust of his Objection flies in his own Eyes Their Loyalty and Good service pay'd to the King says he was meerly in their own defence well knowing that the Foundation of these Commotions was only in Opposition to their Party Putting the Case now that they serv'd the King only for their Own Ends We have an acknowledgment yet that there was Loyalty and good service in it however qualified and we know that there were many Brave and Eminent men among them that lost their Estates and Lives in that service If it lyes as a reproach upon them that they did not serve the King out of Loyalty that which they did was yet better then not serving him at all and better in a higher degree still then fighting against him But supposing now that they had no known Papists in their Army the Case is not one jot mended for they were all Schismatiques then and it is worth the Observation that not a man drew his sword in that Cause who was not a Known Separatist and that on the other side not one Schismatique ever struck stroke in the Kings Quarrel The One side contending according to their Duty in favour of the Law and the Other against it Our Appellant lyes open to another Objection in the clâ—…use above recited He says the Commotion was only founded upon an Opposition to that Party How came it then that they seiz'd the Crown and Church-Lands put the King to Death plunder'd sequesterd and beheaded his Protestant Friends if the Opposition was only to Popery But we have seen their pretences and we have felt the meaning of them He insists upon the Papists desiring Oliver to accept of the Crown There 's a little Book that will inform us better concerning that transaction It 's call'd Monarchy asserted consisting of a Collection of Speeches upon that debate We are at this time he says acting the same Play still though an Old-one newly Reviv'd and as that which the Papists then Acted was laid upon the Fanatiques so was the like to have been done in this present Plot. It will be easily granted that this is in a high degree the Old-Play Reviv'd but we are too well acquainted with the circumstances of the present Plot to carry the resemblance thorough That which the Fanatiques then acted was layd on the Papists and when they had master'd the King under the Calumny of a Papist they Murther'd him as a Protestant The Question at present is not the Certainty of One Plot but the Superfoetation of another For it is compossible enough that a Papist may be before his Majesty with a Dagger and some rank Enthusiast behinde him with a Pistol He proceeds with a Story of Mr. Claypool not at all to our purpose and then gives us further an account of the Papists designe in Scotland who first by their Councells procured the poor Inhabitants to be Oppress'd and then sending their disguised Priests and Emissaryes amongst them encourag'd the poor silly Natives to Mutiny against those Oppressions hoping to cast the Plot upon the Presbyterians If the Power Number and Industry of these Emissaries be such as our Appellant would have us believe a man would think there should hardly be a Rat trap in the three Kingdoms without a Priest in 't Let us but lay together several Circumstances in this Appeal concerning the Miraculous Influences of these men upon all sorts of People and it will be a hard matter to represent any thing more Comicall First he says that the Papists have already made sure of all the Young beggerly Officers or Souldiers Courtiers and Over-hot Church-men Fol. 2. Secondly he makes them to have an Absolute Dominion over the King and his Councill for they have made him Banish those Officers he says that should lead the people up against the Popish Army Thirdly they govern all the Conventicles in the Kingdom as our Appellant will have it And Fourthly they procur'd the Scots to be Opprest and after that shifted hands and made them rebell and all this is every man bound to believe as the Thirteenth Article of his Faith Now can any thing be more wonderful then that these people that can turn the King and his Councill with a Twine thread that have so absolute a Command of the Multitude and can set Governors and Subjects handy-dandy to Box one another like Punchinello's Puppets when they please is it not a wonderfull thing I say that these men with all this Interest are not yet able to save a Priest from the Gallows or any single person of the Party from the Exact Rigour of the Law Have they only a Power to do the Government Mischief and themselves no Good We insist the more earnestly upon this Point because the comfort of Humane Society is totally destroy'd if we come once to be transported by these stories into a Common Diffidence every man of his Neighbour and put into such a condition by the Entertainment of these Jealousies that there will be no longer any Faith or Confidence in Mankinde for fear of these Invisible and undistinguishable Enemies in our dayly Conversation Now to support and fortify himself in his Opinion he says farther that not only Dr. Oates mentions this in his Evidence but that the Papists themselves were so well assured of the Scotch Rising before it happen'd that at the Disbanding of this late Popish Army many of the Officers and Souldiers had secret Orders not to sell their Horses but to be in a readiness for that they should have occasion to use them again within a Fortnight and so it happen'd for within a fortnight after the Disbanding the Rebellion brake out in Scotland So well acquainted were the Authors of this Mischief with the time when it would happen With the Appellants leave Dr. Oates only Reports what these Agents Design'd to do and the Hopes of their succeeding in it but says nothing positively that I can finde of what they had done and in his Thirty fifth Deposition expresly makes their Project to be the weakening of both
the Presbyterian and Episcopal Faction As to the casting of the Plot upon the Presbyterians it was not so well contriv'd me thinks as it might have been For it is no Clearing of the Papists from One Plot upon the Kings Life the charging of the Presbyterians with another Then there 's another slip he will have the Papists privy to the Scotch Rising because at the Disbanding of the Popish Army some Officers were order'd not to sell their Horses c. First it is not prov'd that they had any such Orders Secondly he calls it a Popish Army and implys that these Orders were given to Popish Officers which Officers either went upon the service or not If they went they over threw their own design for he makes it the Papists Interest to entertain those Tumults and these Gentlemen made it their business to suppress them If they did not go their Orders were to no purpose But why does the Appellant call it a Popish Army He should do well to wash his Mouth after so foul and scandalous an expression But now let us change hands and see if it be not more probable that the Fanaticks knew before-hand of that Rising then the Papists For though we had at that time greater apprehensions of the French then ever yet the importunities of some people were so violent for the immediate disbanding of the Army that it lookt like a design to remove that Block out of the Scots way The next passage is a little misterious He says that it was likely the Scots would be beaten by the Kings Forces that says he it might make both Them and Us less apt to Rise upon any account whatsoever So that here is a tacit Confession that the Appellant found some inconvenience in this discouragement to a joynt Rebellion And â—…o he goes on saying that if this had been a Fanatical Plot the same Party would certainly have risen in England at the same time But this under favour will not hold for the Scots tumulted in 37. and appeared in actuall Rebellion in 38. whereas their Brethren in England did not take up arms till 41 though privy to and confederate in the Tumults of 37. He lays it down for granted in the next Line that the Papists Murthered the Late King and so proceeds in these words After the Catholiques had thus brought the Fathers head to the Block and sent the young Princes into Exile let us reflect upon their Usage of them in France c. Now to give the Devil his due I cannot finde so much as One Papist in the whole List of the Regicides and yet I have turn'd over all the Acts and Ordinances Walkers Independency and in one word the whole History of those times and can hear no news of them Take notice that it is not the question here whether or no the Papists would have scrupled it upon a fair Occasion but whether or no in the Truth of the â—…act it was the Papists that did it and I do not think it Fair to hang one Man or Condemn one party for anothers fault Put the case one man steals a Horse and another robs a Church 't is no vindication of the Horse stealer to discharge him of the Sacrilege no vindication of him that rob'd the Church to acquit him of the Horse stealing but it were a high injustice to charge one offender with the crime of another His following Reflections upon the Ill-usage the Royall Family received in France when his Majesty was abroad and the good Offices which France has received from hence in requital are only meant for a sly and invidious Reproach upon the Government and there is more of flourish in them then matter of weight only he has one speculation not to be past over I cannot but ascribe great part of our present Calamities says he to his Highnesses Education in that Arbitrary and Popish Government Here he pretends to tell us of our miseries and from whence in a great measure they proceed but it would puzzle a man to finde out what these present Calamities are more then the froward and fantastical apprehensions of remote and imaginary Evils Nay the very fear it self is counterfeited as well as the danger and the men that dresse up these goblins to fright the silly multitude they do but laugh at them themselves Our State-Empericks do with our Politique as our Physicians do with our Natural Bodies for there are Intoxicating Opinions as well as Passions they make their Patients many times stark raving mad with that which they are not one jot affected withall themselves Do we not live or if we will at least we may in Peace and Plenty under the protection of a Gracious and a Protestant Prince and under the blessing also of so particular a providence that when all our Neighbours have been at fire and sword round about us this Nation has been yet exempt from the common calamities of Christendom And shall we now expose and abandon our present quiet and security only for future possibilities and make our selves certainly miserable before-hand for fear of being miserable hereafter Whosoever soberly considers what we enjoy on the one hand and what we fear on the other comparing and examining both parts with their due and reasonable circumstances he shall finde all attempts and proposals of popular prevention or reformation to be as wilde a project as if a man should cut off a leg or an arm for fear of corns and chilâ—…lains But what if our fears were yet juster then they seem to be how many things may yet intervene accurding to the ordinary course of humane affairs to disappoint the danger as Mortality Survivorship change of thought c. or can the Appellant prescribe us any Remedy that is not worse then the disease shall a man cast himself from the top of Bow for fear of tumbling down stairs shall we destroy Protestantism for fear of Popery or a Good Government for fear of a bad One shall we run the hazzard of Damnation for fear of Oppression Nay what if our present apprehensions were Gratify'd New ones would yet succeed into their places For the Rage of Jealousy is boundless and Incurable And so we found it in the Late Rebellion which was built upon the same Foundation Never so mean and so despicable a slavery as that which we then brought upon our selves for fear of slavery Never was any Papacy so Tirannical and so Ridiculous together as that Persecuting and Non-sensical Presbytery which we had in Exchange for the best temper'd Ecclesiastical Government upon the Face of the Earth Were not Those blessed days when our Divines had Salesmen and Mechaniques for their Tryers and the Laity a supercilious Company of Classical and Congregational Noddys for the Inspectours of our Lives and Manners When Tone and Lungs without either Learning or Honesty were the distinguishing Marks of a Gifted Brother Methinks the very Memory of these servile and profane Indignities
should put the bare thought of the Second part of it out of Countenance And he seems as much out in the pretended Cause of our Calamities as he was in the Calamities themselves There were no Princes Educated abroad in the Late Kings time and yet the same clamour to a Tittle But if the Appellaâ—…t had been so minded he might have given us a much more Rational account of our misfortunes then he has done He might have charg'd them upon those people who in truth first sent the young Princes into Exile and then kâ—…pt them there and have at present a design upon the Exercise of he same Arbitrary power again which they would be thought to fear They began with a cry against Popery but they concluded in the Murther of the King the dissolution of the Monarchy and the perpetual Exclusion of the Royal Family as may be seen in their Proclamation of Ian. 30. 48. for Inhibiting any person to be King Whereas Charles Stuart King of England say they being for the Notorious Treasons Tyrannies and Murthers committed by Him in the Late Unnatural and cruel Wars condemned to Death c. It is remarkable that though they possest the people against His Majesty as a Papist there is not one word of Religion in the Reasons of their putting him to death The Appellant comes now to shew his Reading in two passages out of Philip de Comines with an application of his Observations upon them The former concerning certain English Pensioners which Lewis the Eleventh of France kept in Pay Now though I cannot agree the hundreth part of those persons to be Pensioners which out of an envy to the Government the Common people are instructed to call so yet I shall never differ with him upon this point that the Money of Lewis the Fourteenth may perhaps have been current in England as well as that of Lewis the Eleventh was The other story is that of Lewis the Eleventh to Charles Duke of Burgundy in the Case of Campobache The French King advertizes the Duke of Burgandy they being then in hostility that the Count Campobache was a Traytor to him But the Duke would not believe it And there was one Cifron also who was of the Plot with Campobache This same Cifron being taken prisoner by the Duke before Nancy and condemned to dye gave the Duke to understand that he had a most Important secret to communicate to him But the Duke neither giving admittance to Cifron nor credit to the King lost his Life afterward and his Dominions by being too incredulous The Appellant applies this to his Majesties Case in Language so course and scandalous that there is no repeating of it And what does all this amount to but that a Prince may be as well undone by believing too much as too little If he had Trusted either less to Campobache or more to the King it had come all to a purpose He will have his Majesty in danger for not believing enough of the Popish Plot But his Royall Father was Ruin'd on the other side by not believing enough of the Presbyterian Plot. And God grant that his present Majesty may only believe so much of that Plot over again as may stand with his honour and safety But it appears in this place by the coursness of the Appellants Expressions and by the byasse of the whole Libell throughout that he is not so much concern'd for the Kings believing or not believing as to fasten a scandall upon his Majesty by perswading the People that the King does not believe it and consequently to possess them that his Majesty is a favourer of Popery tho' never any Prince in Christendom gave more Convincing and Irrefragable Proofs of the contrary This passage of the Duke of Burgundy he says Fol. 4. may be very much to our purpose to shew you that when God designs the destruction of a King or People he makes them deaf to all discoveries be they never so obvious And having Levelled the Application in particular he speculates in general terms toward the bottom of the leaf upon the whole matter There are four several Arguments he says which many times prevail with Princes to be incredulous of all pretended Conspiracies against themselves The First is drawn from their being in or made privy themselves to Part of the Plot but not to the whole The Second from their own good nature and Clemency The Third from the nature of the Evidence And the Fourth from the nature and Interest of the pretended Conspirators To begin then with the First when the Prince hath been made acquainted with a Design of Introducing a New Government or a New Religion but not with the Design of taking away his own Life this sometimes hath prevailed with him not to believe that the same party with whom he himself is in a Conspiracy should have any such other Plot against his Life But this I hope is not Our Case For c. And then he Reasons that his Majesty could get nothing by it Fol. 3. We shall put him together now and make English of him First he makes the Duke of Burgundies Case in his Deafnesse to Discoveries to be the Kings Secondly He infers from that Deafness that God has design'd his Majesty to Destruction Thirdly he takes upon him to Philosophize upon the Reasons of Princes Incredulity in such Cases and very fairly represents his Majesty as a Party in the Conspiracy and consenting to the Introduction of a New Government and a New Religion though not privy to the Plot of taking away his Own Life Only he concludes with a But this I hope is not Our Case in such away of Doubting as implys Believing And so much for the first point The Second Motive he says Fol. 5. which may incline a Prince to disbelieve the report of a Plot is from his Own Good Nature and Clemency which makes him not believe any ill of those to whom he has been so kinde But this is a fallacious way of arguing Now by his Favour This is not so much an Argument from Good Nature on the One side as from the Tye of Gratitude on the Other but whether way soever it be taken the Late King found it indeed a very fallacious way of arguing for almost all his Acts of Grace and bounty turn'd to his mischief as appears in his Majesties Declaration of Aug. 12. 1642. when after delivering up his Ministers to Impeachments his Concessions in the business of the Star-Chamber High Commission Court Ship-Mony Forest-Laws Stannery-Courts Tonnage and Poundage Continuance of the Parliament c. they improv'd all these Trusts and Condescensions even to the formal taking away his Authority Revenue and Life And those particularly whom his Late Majesty Oblig'd to the highest degree laid the foundation of his Ruine Nor is the ingratitude of the same party to the Son less notorious then the other was to the Father None flying so fiercely in the face of
same Principles and no less pregnant Evidence We do not speak here of the Popish Plot which the Papists would most sillily have turn'd upon the Presbyterians the shallowest Contrivance certainly that ever was hatch'd and the most palpable Imposture But we speak of a Plot that was Bred and born in the Fanatical party whereof we have as many Witnesses almost as Readers in Forty Libells of That Leaven and Extraction Beside several Open and Violent attempts upon the Government which do unanimously bear Testimony against them The Following parts of This Paragraph are wrought into such a Complication of Zeal and Scandal one Snap at the King and another at the Plot that every period is a Bait And whoever touches upon it is sure of a Hook in his Nostrills Under Colour of Asserting and making out the Truth of the Plot which no sober man doubts of he throws Dirt upon his Majesty and his Ministers for dodging and Imposing upon the People in favour of it One while too Much comes out another while too Little The Frequent Dissolutions and Prorogations of Parliaments he says expresly were to prevent the Tryal of the Lords And so the Squib runs sputtering on from the King to his Privy Councell Thence to his Courts of Justice and in One word the whole Story comes to no more then a Political abstract out of Harris's Domestick Intelligence But why these Pamphlets to the Multitude First There 's no fear of the peoples running into Popery For 't is their Horrour and Aversion Secondly There 's no need of Convincing Them of the Truth of the Plot But rather to keep them from Extravagances upon the Jealousies and apprehensions they conceive of it already Thirdly There 's no need neither of calling Them to our assistance toward the suppressing of it For the sifting and Examining of this Conspiracy with the bringing of the Confederates to Publique Justice is a great part of the business of the Government So that these Libells cannot be reasonably understood to have any Other then these Two ends First to Teaze and Chafe the Rabble into a Rage disposing and preparing them to entertain any occasion for uproar and Tumult Secondly when their Blood is up against This Detestable Plot with the Contrivers Promoters and abetters of it what does he but turn the Rancour of That Outragious Humour upon the King rivy Councell Courts of Justice and Briefly all his Friends by marking Them out for Parties in the Treason And so rendring his Majesty and his Government Odious by these Malicious Insinuations and endangering the Peace of the Publique to the Highest Degree The Fourth and Last Argument says he which may sometimes prevail with the Prince to disbelieve any report of a Conspiracy is taken from the Nature and Principles and from the Interest of the Pretended Conspiratours But neither of these Motives can pretend to Influence Our Prince into a Disbelief of This Popish Plot Fol. 7. The Appellants Observation and Inference is this that the Popish Plot is to be Believ'd because it squares with the Principles and Interest of the Party We are better informed in the History and Doctrine of Massacres and Regicides then to question the Malice of the Iesuiticall Positions or the credibility of the Plot here in Debate and so we shall yield him the Hellish Tenet which he insists upon of Murthering KINGS and a Hellish Tenet it is indeed and as Hellish undoubtedly in a Schismatique as in a Iesuit For his Quarrel otherwise is to the Faction not to the Maxim which is equally Dangerous and detestable in all Factions Now wheresoever we find the same Principles we have the Appellants leave honestly to suspect the same Designs Was not this the Doctrine of the Fanatiques from Forty to Sixty And did they not make good their Doctrine by their Practice Did they not declare the King Accountable to the People And did they not put him to Death upon that Foundation We have the very Iournals themselves of those Times to prove what we say beside the Damned Harmony of their best received Authors to that purpose We propound say the Remonstrants that the Person of the King may be speedily brought to Iustice for the Treason Bloud and Mischief he is Guilty of An Act says another agreeing with the Laws of God Consonant to the Laws of Men and the Practices of all Well-order'd States and Kingdoms Let Iustice and Reason blush says another and Traytors and Murtherers Parricides and Patricides put on white Garments and Rejoyce as Innocent ones if this man speaking of the Late King should escape the hands of Iustice and Punishment The Government of England says a Fourth is a Mixt Monarchy and Govern'd by the Maior Part of the three Estates assembled in Parliament Whensoever a King says a Fifth or other Superior Authority Creates an Inferior they invest it with a Legitimacy of Magistraticall Power to punish themselves also in case they prove Evill Doers It is Lawfull says a Sixth for any who have the Power to call to account a Tyrant or wicked King and after due Conviction to Depose and put him to Death if the Ordinary Magistrate have deny'd to do it Detrahere Indigno c. It is not for private persons to Depose a wicked Governnour but that the Universality of the People may Lawfully do it I think no body questions These Seditious Pasitions with many more and some worse perhaps were publiquely Printed and avow'd before his Majesties Return And the very same Principles with Pestilert Additions to them have been expos'd by the same Party in the face of the Sun since his Majesties Restauration And there is scarce a Pamphlet without something of this Mixrure that comes from any of the Private and Pragmaticall Intermeddlers in the present Controversy So that the Principles are the very same as to the Quality and Ingredients under several Colours And so much for their Principles Now to their Interests In his following way of Reasoning under the Countenance of proving it to be the Papists Interest to Murther the King he does all he can in the world by a side-wind to possesse them with the Necessity of doing it and consequently to force them upon it Only as good luck is the Arguments will not bear that stress I should not dare to speak his words after him if it were not First that the Libell is allready by several Impressions of it made as Publique as a News-Book And Secondly that his Propositions are erected upon a false Bottom Upon which two Considerations we shall presume to insert only two Periods of his upon this Subject Their Interest says he does unavoidably excite them to Murther his Sacred Majesty For First they know he cannot long subsist without a Considerable Sum of Money which he must Receive either from the Party or from the Parliament Now for them to supply him with so vast a Suâ—… is a Charge that you may well
imagine they would desire to get rid of it if they could tho' by the Kings Death On the other side for the Parliament to supply him with mony that they know cannot be done but by taking off the Heads of their Faction excluding their Succession and consenting to such Laws as must of Necessity ruin them Besides his Majesty hath allready permitted the Executing so many of their Party as they never can or will forgive it It falls out Happily that the force of his Argument does not come up to the Drift of it But the Weakness of the One takes off the Edge of the Other He tells the whole world that the Papists have no way in the Farth to save themselves but by the Murther of the King The One half of this spoken in a Corner to a Knot of Priests and Jesuits and fairly prov'd upon a man would be as much as his Head 's worth And is the Crime ever the Lesse for doing the same thing in Publique where the Provocation is stronger These Discourses are not to pass for Simple Declarations of a mans Opinion but Artificiall Encouragements rather and Advises toward the doing of the thing especially coming from the Pen of a Person that calls himself Iunius Brutus and recommends himself to the City by the Borrow'd name of a King-killer Tho' I cannot inform my self of any of that Family that lives near Richmond His First Argument runs thus The King wants mony and there 's none to be got but either of the Papists of the Parliament The Parliament he says will give his Majesty none and therefore the Papists will Murther him to save Charges This is a Policy far fetch'd The Fathers Head we know was set at a Price but we hope better of the Sons Now in his prejudging the Parliament upon an Assumption that the King gets not a penny of Mony of them but upon such and such Terms he does not so much speak his thought as vent his Proposition rather Desiring then Foreseeing that the House of Commons will hold the King to such unhappy Conditions And then he finishes his Contemplation with this Conclusion that the Papists will never forgive his Majesty for what he has done allready Wherein First he Contradicts himself in supposing the King an Enemy to the Papists whom he has hitherto insinuated to be their Friend And Secondly instead of proving the Papists Design against the King in this Particular he advances One of his Own Now if he would have come roundly up to the Point of the Papists Interest he should have told us of the Ecclesiastical Dignities and Preferments that the Church of Rome has confer'd upon their Emissaries into his Majesties Dominions And he should have expounded it to the people what pains they take and what Hazzards they run only in the playing of their Own Game and making way to their advantages in Reversion This is so great a truth that most of the serious Catholiques themselves reflect familiarly upon these Busie People as the common troublers of the Peace of Christendome But then I should have oppos'd an interest also on the Fanatiques side to Ballance this For they have their Reversionall prospects too their sequester'd Livings and Estates their plunder'd goods their profitable Offices and Commissions Crown and Church Lands c. And they wait for their day again as impatiently as the Iews do for their Messias Nay to keep their title still a foot they stand fast to their Old Covenant still as the Fanatiques Magna Charta by which they pretend to make out a Religious claim to all the advantages they got by sacriledge and oppression So that their principles and interests lying indifferently against the Establisht Order both of Church and State there will be no need of casting eithers faults upon the other After a worse then Astrological Determination upon the Kings Fate he bestows another Cast of his Cunning upon the City and Citizens of London which he says is in danger to be consum'd by Fire It is a lewd and a seditious Hint in both these Cases the putting of it into the head as it is much in the power of any profligate and desperate villain to verify his calculation Besides that in telling the Citizens what they are to expect he does at the same time Counsell the Papists what to do They will burn London he says First as the only United force able to withstand Arbitrary Government and without that Popery can never prevail If â—…opery cannot come in without Arbitrary Government 〈◊〉 the Iesuits design the burning of London as the only Unâ—… 〈◊〉 â—…hat can withstand that power either there is no fear of Popery and Arbitrary Government and consequently of such a design taking place in this Kings â—…ign or the whole calumny falls directly upon his Majesty himself or otherwise if the Appellants prospect looks forward into the future what s the meaning of all these Alarms so unseasonably to trouble our present peace with the sickly Visions of things to come And he should have done well also to have expounded himself a little upon the United Force that should withstand and the Arbitrary Government to be withstood For otherwise it may be taken for the sounding of a Trumpet to a Rebellion For the Arbitrary Government which he phansies to himself must be exercised either by a Lawful Prince or by an Usurper If by the Former his Tyranny is no Warrant for our opposition if the Latter there 's no appearance of any other Usurpation then as we shall see presently of his own setting up Secondly he says that London is the only place where by reason of their Excellent Preaching and dayly instruction in the Protestant Religion the people have a lively sense thereof and douhtless will not part with it to pleasure a Prince but perhaps rather lose their Lives by the Sword in the Wars than by Faggots in Smithfield The passage now is plain English and as many indignities upon the Government crouded into one sentence as could well be brought together Here is First an Exhortation to a Rebellion For the Prince here in question against whom the sword is to be drawn can be no other upon his supposition then actually the King And let him take his choice now whether it shall be intended of his present Majesty or of his Successour It is a Rebellion against the King that now is in the one Case and against the Next King in the other And Secondly It is not only a simple Rebellion but to the scandal of the Reformation and particularly of the Church of England a Rebellion founded upon the Doctrine of the Protestant Religion Thirdly It is no other then as he himself has worded it the Hellish Tenet of Murthering Kings in a disguise only a Iesuitical Principle in Masquerade It is Fourthly a Condemnation of the practices and submissions of the Primitive Christians and the whole story of our Protestant