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A44807
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Remarks upon a pamphlet stiled, A letter to a dissenter, &c. in another letter to the same dissenter.
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Halifax, George Savile, Marquis of, 1633-1695.
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1687
(1687)
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Wing H318; ESTC R21462
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8,285
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14
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it may in time to come return again and possess them you have then no other way to conjure down the evil Spirit of Persecution but by a Repeal of the Penal Laws that only can assure you that a rigid Prelacy shall not hereafter destroy you and you have reason to take the Alarum at your Woers next harangue Nescit nox missa reverti She or He no matter which has enchantment in her Face and can instantly put your Nose out of joynt with your new Friend nay look you Dead for you are told that at this very hour and in the heat and glare of your present Sun-shine the Church of England can in a moment bring Clouds again and turn the royal Thunder upon your Heads blow you off the Stage with a breath if she would give but a smile or a kind word the least glimpse of her compliance would throw you back into the state of Suffering and draw upon you all the arrears of Severity which have accrued during the time of this kindness to you This is in truth my good Friend plain dealing look to your self therefore and make your peace with her or you perish if you believe her for Clouds Thunder and Tempests a wait and as she saith are at her command She can at pleasure take you into her Power add to your Yoke and chastice you with Scorpions and that 's not all She can bring you to an Aster-Reckoning lash you for playing Truant and exact what you have run in Arrear this last discovery will undoubtedly porcure the Gentleman an Address of Thanks from Doctors Commons for the City Dissenters are near two years Reut run there Nay and to compleat your misery after all the Reckonings paid She can by her Excommunication throw you with a quick hand to Satan You may demand what shall poor I do in this my great Strait Why as you love your Life keep out of her Clutches defy her and attone our English Iupiter That he may not entrust his Thunderbolts in this mad Hand Be true I beseech you to your Interest and deport your self so to the King that your new conciliated Friendship which she upbraids and envies may not be endangered I shall now give you a Reason or two why you may justly suspect this Gentleman now making Love to you in the Name of the Church I find his Letter stuffed with malitious and false Infinuations against dissenting Ministers amongst whom I never found a Knave I will therefore hope that my telling you Truth tho' to his Disparagement will not be taken as a Breach of the Rules of good Manners If the Church of England's Commissioners in the present Treaty with you have been tampering with those of the Roman Communion and offering Terms for the Life of their dearly beloved Penal Laws If they to come a little closer have proposed That if the Roman Catholicks will not joyn with you for the Repeal of those Laws they shall be secured against any imaginary Danger from the Test-Penalties in a succeeding Reign by a Mortgage of the Honours and Estates also of som great Men driving that Bargain I say should this be true there 's certainly Mischief in her Heart and she will reveng your runing her into this Incumbrance by teaching you hereafter as Gideon did the Men of Succoth with Briers and Thorns If She hath her Ambassadors at this very Hour treating an Alliance with the Papists and proposing to yield them Liberty by Act of Parliament with Exception of the Fanatick If these or any others should at this time prate and buâ— Fears and Iealousies in your Ears you are obliged to be deaf upon pain of all the Mischief they intend you The Church seems to tâ—emble the bloody Tyrant and seeing her Power reduced she would be content for a time to turn Pedagogue and whip-Boys to keep her Hand inâ—ure The Church Plenipotentiary towards the close of his Letter points his Wrath towards the King and his Government And with you he seems to descend to calm but very wickedly intended Reasoning It is with Regret that he beholds you disposed to quarrel the Church of England now she is upon the Brink of Suffering 'T is very unkind in you for she never persecuted the Dissenters but by Direction and as she was set on A bad Excuse you know is better than none The Gentleman further insinuates and you are to believe him if you will That the taking away the Penal Laws and Tests the Bane of Religion and of Liberty will put you under a Tyranny and absolutely destroy you In truth Sir were I in the East Indies the sight of this lamentable Complaint would greatly move me for I should doubt the Case of the Church of England to be very deplorable but 't is a great Blessing that all this is Misrepresentation and soul Slander The King's Promise secures her of Peace and Plenty and that Act of Parliament which shall secure you out of her Paws may give her further Security if she wants it This her grim faced Representative seems to take his short and angry Turns like the Tower-Lyon and ever and anon roares but 't is not want but a ravenous Appetite to rend and tear that occasions all this Wrath and Rage Nature will be Nature Therefore you may tell the Church in your Excuse for a reason of your Doings ought something to appease her toward you in the language of the Lepers My Distress is great If I still sit here I dye if the Syrians save me alive I shall live if they kill me I shall but dye To cokes and work you off from getting Liberty of Conscience from the only Hand which can dispense it You are told that some of the Church of England were Trimmers for enduring you and the Maxim was It is impossible for a Dissenter not to be a Rebel This Gentleman certainly thinks that you have forgot who gave those moderate Men that Name of Reproach therefore you may tell him That to your Knowledg the Church esteemed them but spurious Sons and could not endure them becaufe they gave you a good Look you need not go to Gloucester to make this out but if you should let me engage you to take Salisbury in your way and enquire there how the Church treated a Protestant Reconciler If you do so pray use your Interest with her and try whether in this height of her Caresses she will demonstrate the sincerity of her Affection to you by recomending it to that Doctor to recant his Recantation As to the Maxim cited It is impossible for a Dissenter not to be a Rebel I am certain it was delivered from a Pulpit nearer to Ludgate then that of Limestreet So much for the Gentleman 's angry and whedling part Now I bring you to his Politicks and the Dissenters are meer Fools if they trust not to his most wise Conduct for he saith you silly soul act very unskilfully against your visible Interest this were to purpose indeed if made out but the Mischief of it is the powerful Argument of Interest turns against him The Dissenters Liberty may nowbe certainly established but saith the Church I see my halcyon Days at hand put on a little Patience and then you and I will treat about the Matter Were you in the Extremity of the Stone and sure of receiving present Ease by an infallible Chirurgion your next Neighbour who tells you his Price and ever made good his Word how would you entertain that Friend's Counsel who should say let me advise you to wait a little for I hear that Germans excell all others in this Case and about Six Months hence I may bring you one from Vienna to try his Skill But to be plain with you when he comes he will leave you as he finds you if you break with him for Terms but I do think he will not be unreasonable for he hath a very good Character I know you have an Answer at Hand therefore without leading you I pray transmit it to this your Counsellor A Word or two more and I have done He passes his Word That the Church of England is convinced of its Error in being Severe to you I know not how this will pass with you but being too much a Stranger to this Author and to the nature of his Commission I should be glad to see her put out her own Declaration of Repentance for should this Person have Authority to speak for her tho of old true Penitents spoke for themselves he doth it so ukwardly in this Paper that to be plain I suspect 't is insincere for he contends and that with the height of Passion to uphold her Penal Laws and I have no other Quarrel with her but about Thunderbolts He proceeds The Parliament when ever it meeteth is sure to be gentle to you 't is the first thing we agree in and it grieves me that we could not hit upon it sooner I do hope and believe he is at length in the right but that I may not be cheated if you find him in good humor when you see him let him know from me with my service that my suffrage shall never help him or any of his Spirit and Principle into the House of Commons He admonishes you not to misapply your anger allow another Friend to exhort you not to misplace your Voice when the King shall please to call a Parliament and you will oblige your self and me Setemb 10 1687. Adieu Yours Affectionately T. W. FINIS
contradiction true that our errable Church of England has run to the Arguments of that Church which claims Infallibility to justifie her self in her attempts to extirpate Dissenters and right or wrong they had been Ruined had not the present Kings Clemency rescued them But the Principles of the Roman Church allow not Liberty to Hereticks Nor do those of the English Church to Schismaticks such she esteems her Dissenters and as such she when in Power constantly treats and labours to destroy them If so the argument of present hugging in order to the better squeezing hereafter vanishes and the seting up Bills and offering Plaisters for tender Consciences may deserve as great regard from the Romish as from the Lambeth Church and in our present conjuncture much more The Gentleman goes on to tell you The other day you were Sons of Belial now you are Angels of Light. And he asserts that to come so quick from one extream to another is such unnatural a motion that you are to look to your self Pray do so and in doing it remember that in the word of a King there is Power and that the Church of England which now hath none to hurt or save till her present exigence extorted a Complement stiled you a Child of Darkness In the next place the Men of Taunton and Tiverton for sound or Jingle sake no doubt are hook'd in and their Loyalty ridiculed notwithstanding in this our Church-Mans opinion that renders them vile it would not offend a good Subject to see others imitate them and tho H. at this day non est litera methinks Hull and Hallifax o a Northern-man should chime every whit as well as T. and T. of the West wherefore pray prevail with your new Friend who will not break with you in trifles to write a second Letter Northward and if your Intrigue with him continues till the return of the general Post for we are admonished to have a very tender regard to Horses I doubt not but he will be obliged to tell you that the worthy Inhabitants of those Places have the courage to vre Loraliy with any of his Majesties Subjects If I mistake them Libera me Now our Valiant Author the West being vanquished points Southward and picks a Quarrel with the poor Quakers This may well surprise you I 'm sure it did me at first sight for you and I believe they will not draw the Sword much less encounter a Goliah therefore you may say certainly no fear of them to a fearless Man ay but the Gentleman now handling them resolves to spoil an English Proverb and to his courage would monopolize Wit and the Quaker he says has learn'd to speak sence and which is worse he becomes mannerly to such a degree that this your new Friend who grumbles for a place at Court begins to suspect himself in some danger of being post-posed for the Quaker having given the King decent thanks for his Protection may for ought he knows become Courtier Sir you are now to believe the Gentleman has spit his Poyson for he tells you that no sharpness is to be mingled where healing only is intended and he promises hereafter to say nothing to expose particular Mâ—n how strong soever the temptation may be or how clear the proofs to make it out he might as well have said Now Gentlemen Dissenters look to your hits we have been Complicens provoke me not to detect our Rogueries please me or all shall out but begging his Pardon he shall speak for himself and see what follows 't is in friendship this for Arguments sake and to promote the proposed healing the honest well-meaning Man not willing to tell tales bearly whispers you poor deluded Dissenter in the Ear that to his knowledg there is Death in the Pot your Minister is a Knave you are Sold the Money is Paid and you are most certainly Betrayed Is not this said like a Church of England Worthy not tied or confined to this or that subdivision of Protestants like one estranged from sharpness and who affects and intends healing Can Hell it self furnish a more inveterate and malicious Insinuation We remember the time when some Men talk'd of Pensioners in Parliament they obliged the World with a List of those who were reputed such and if I mistake not with the Name of him who they said hired and paid them The Dissenter now addressed to for his own safety ought to challeng this his new Suiter for the Names of such Ministers as have made the bargain and sale suggested and methinks his Charity and the warmth of his Affection should dispose him to gratifie such a modest and necessary Request if it be refused I must conclude my Friend so far gone in his Passion that he has wholly lost his Understanding should this Gentlemans Courtship any longer impress or influence him Now our Author falls with down right Blows upon the Addressers and bestows bitter Invectives upon them and upon the Government to boot that part of his Libel deserves and probably will be reckoned for in Westminster Hall therefore I shall shun the danger of becoming his Accessary by transcribing him Then he betakes himself to Flattery and tells you that if you had to do with those riged Prelates who made it a matter of Conscience to give you the least Indulgence but kept you at an uncharitable distance and even to your more reasonable scruples continued stiffe an inexorable the argument might be fairer on your side I conclude then that your Argument to accept of Liberty from the King is no way enervated Is here any sort of proof that Prelacy has changed its thoughts and put on tenderness to you you may not trust this undertaker in a thing so valuable as is that now discussed the Church of England cannot intend well or use you so without incurring the guilt of Perjury as I have heard her say till she gives up her Laws of force and you see that her Zeal to uphold them occasions this great concussion in the Kingdom wherefore I doubt she is not right and your only sure way of dealing with her seems to me to be to disarm her by Act of Parliament of every Weapon which the Gospel did not put into her hand then I 'm sure She can do no Mischief Reverend Mr Baxter's expectation was raised about twenty six years since by the same pretence as now yours is to be but after the then Prelacy which I am confident the present will not disown had long triffled with him and his worthy Brethren about healing in the Savoy Conferences they found themselves disappointed and shamd If the Church be as skilful in Chirurgery as our Author would perswade she was the more to blame to hold the Patient so long in hand as then she did and in fine to leave or make the Wound worse then she found it honesty I do find is absolutely necessary to a good Chirurgion The same Spirit still lives in our Church-Men or