it seems to be the very stile of a Malignant I may be readily answer'd to this I confess Let me be what I will what 's that to you Answer my Argument If the Doctrine be true let the Devil be the Parson Speak to the Point In good time I shall And to begin with him I agree with him in all he says or most part at least of his Preamble saving some triflng Matters of Stile and of Notion and we won't stand with him for small things And thus I bring him to his Fourth Page without any trouble for indeed he might have spar'd all the Three Pages for any great signification they have or relation to what comes after The Fifth Paragragh in his Fourth Page and indeed the Substance of the whole Book brings the Dispute to this short Point That any Army in England is inconsistent with the Safety of the Kingdom That Liberty and an Army are incompatible That the King is not to be trusted with either Men Arms nor Money for the last will be the Consequence of the former lest he that has ventur'd his Life in the Extreamest Dangers for us shou'd turn our Devourer and destroy us A great deal of very handsome Language he bestows upon the King on this account calling him with a tacit sort of necessary Consequence Wolf Beast Tyrant and the like He tells us Page 3. All the Nations round us have lost their Liberty by their permitting standing Armies and that they permitted them from Necessity or Indiscretion If from Necessity 't was their Misfortune not their Fault If from Indiscretion that was their Fault indeed But he is not pleas'd to give us one Instance of any People who were brought under that Necessity and lost their Liberty by it and yet if he had 't was no Argument but that if we were reduc'd to the same Necessity we must run the risque of it Of which more by and by In the same Page he lays down the Draught of our Constitution Depending on a due Ballance between King Lords and Commons and affirms from thence That this Constitution must break the Army or the Army destroy this Constitution and affirms absolutely with a Confidence Peculiar to himself That no Nation can preserve its freedom which maintains any other Army than such as is composed of a Militia of its own Gentry and Freeholders And being gotten into a Positive vein he says What happen'd yesterday will come to pass again and the same Causes will produce like Effects in all Ages And indeed all is alike true since nothing is more frequent than for the same Causes to produce different Effects and what happened yesterday may never happen again while the World stands of which King Iames is a visible Instance But to descend to Particulars I shall give you only this remarkable Instance King Henry VIII made as vigorous and irregular Efforts to destroy the Religion of the Kingdom as then 't was establish'd as ever King Iames did and perhaps his Methods were more than ordinarily parallel he Govern'd this Nation with as absolute a despotical Power though the Constitution was then the same it is now as ever King Charles II. or King Iames II. attempted to have done and yet the Effects were not Abdication or calling in a Foreign Aid I could go back to other Kings of this Nation whose Stories might illustrate this but the Gentleman is Historian good enough I perceive to know it and by the way 't is to be observed also that he did this without the help of a Standing Army From whence I only observe as all the present use I shall make of this Instance that there are ways for a King to tyrannize without a standing Army if he be so resolv'd è contra there may be ways to prevent it with an Army and also that I think this proves that the same Causes does not always produce the same Effects and a little further if the same Causes will produce the like Effects in all Age why then Sir pray lay by your Fears for if ever King William which we are sure he won't or any King else goes about to destroy our Constitution and overturn our Liberties as King Iames did the People will call in a Foreign Aid and cause him to run away as they did then for what happened Yesterday will come to pass again and the same Causes will produce the like Effects in all Ages Page the Sixth he begins very honestly with a Recognition of our Security under the present King and softens his Reader into a belief of his Honesty by his Encomiums on his Majesty's Person which would be well compar'd with his Seventeenth Page to shew how he can frame his Stile to his Occasion but in short concludes that when he is dead we know not who will come next nay the Army may come and make who they please King and turn the Parliament out of Doors and therefore in short we ought not to trust any thing to him that we wou'd not trust to the greatest Tyrant that may succeed him So that our Condition is very hard that the Person of a King is no part of the Consideration but a King be he Angel or Devil 't is all one is a Bugbear and not to be trusted A fine Story indeed and our great Deliverer as he calls the King must not regret this but be contented that now he has cleared the World of all our Enemies but himself he should be esteem'd the great Charibdis which the Naâ—ion was to be split upon and we must entirely disarm him as a Wolf who ought not to be trusted with Teeth for these are his own Words Then he tells us No Legislators ever establisht a Free Government but avoided this as the Israelites Athenians Corinthians Accaians Lacedemonians Thebanes Sammites Romans Now 't is notoriously known that all these were first establish'd Commonwealths not Monarchies and if this Gentleman wou'd have us return to that Estate then I have done with him but I appeal to himself if all these Governments when they became Regal did not maintain a Millitary Power more or less Nay God himself when the Israelites would have a King told them this would be a Consequence as if it might be inferr'd as of absolute necessity that a Military Power must be made use of with a Regal Power and as it may follow no King no Army so it may as well follow no Army no King Not that I think an Army necessary to maintain the King in his Throne with regard to his Subjects for I believe no Man in the World was ever the Peoples King more than his present Majesty But I shall endeavour a little to examine by and by what the King and Nation so as Matters now stand in the World wou'd be without an Army But our Adversary rests not here but Page 7. he proceeds truly he wou'd not have the King trusted with an Army no nor so much as with Arms all the
Magazines too must be taken from him And referring to the Estates mentioned before he says They knew that the Sword and the Sovereignty marcht Hand in Hand and therefore a general exercise of the People in Arms was the Bulwark of their Liberties and their Arms that is Magazines of Amunition c. for the Term is now changed wâ—re never lodg'd in the Hands of any but the People for so the following Words directly imply The best and bravest of their Generals came from the Plough and contentedly return'd to it again when the War was over We shou'd have made a fine War against France indeed if it had been so here And then he goes on with Instances of Nations who lost their Liberties when ever they deviated from these Rules At the end of these Examples our Author tells all the World in short what he would be at For there he has like God Almighty divided the World and he has set the Sheep on his right hand and the Goats on his left for he has reckon'd up all the Monarchal Governments in the World with a Go ye cursed into the most abandon'd Slavery as he calls it and all the Commonwealths in the World on the other side with a Come ye blessed into freedom from Kings standing Armies c. Nay he has brought Algiers and Tunis in for People who enjoy their Liberty and are free I suppose he has never been there and truly I believe the Freedom he mentions here wou'd be very like that or like the Days when there was no King in Israel but every Man did what was right in his own Eyes Thus far I have follow'd him only with Remarks in general to Page 13. he proceeds then to tell us the Danger of an Army and the Misfortune of all Countries to be forc'd sometimes to take up Arms against their Governours A Man ought to be an universal Historian to affirm that and I have not time to examine it now From hence he draws this Assertion That 't is therefore necessary to put us into a Capacity always to be able to Correct our Kings that we may have no occasion for it for when we are enabled to do it we shall never be put upon it The English is this Keep your King so weak that he may always be afraid of you and he will never provoke you to hurt him For says he that Nation shall be sure to live in Peace which is most capable of making War But if the King has 20000 Men before-hand with us observe it with us in totidem verbis I leave his meaning to be construed the People can make no Efforts without the Assistance of a Foreign Power Another Consequence of an Army is They may come and force the People to choose what Members they please to sit in Parliament or they may besiege the Parliament-House and the like Now it happened that both these things have been done in England and yet the People preserved their Liberties which is a Demonstration beyond the Power of Words from his old Maxim What happen'd Yesterday will come to pass again and like Causes will have like Effects The choice of Members of Parliament were obstructed and the House of Parliament was besieged and insulted by the Soldiers and yet the People were not depriv'd of their Liberties therefore it may be so again for what happen'd Yesterday will come to pass again Page 14. He descends to a particular which reverst I think is a lively Instance what a vigorous Opposition may do against a far greater Force than 20000 Men If King Charles the First says he had had but 5000 Men the People cou'd never have struck a Stroak for their Liberties Turn this Story and let us but recollect what Force the Parliament had and what the King had and yet how many Stroaks he struck for his Crown The Parliament had the Navy all the Forts Magazines and Men in their Hands The King when he erected his Standard at Nottingham had neither Ships Men Arms Ammunition or Money but seem'd to be turn'd loose into the Field to fight with the Commons of England and all the Militia was in the Hands of the Parliament by the Commission of Array and yet the King was ready in Keynton Field and at the Head of an Army sooner than the Parliament were ready to fight him nor do the Writers of that Side pretend to call that a Victory Then he comes to King Iames and says he If he had not attempted Religion but been contented with Arbitrary Power we shou'd ha' let him bound us Hand and Foot and tho' King James had all the Nation and his own Army against him yet we account the Revolution next to a Miracle To this I reply No Sir no Miracle at all on that Score for the Nobility Gentry and People of England did not question but they shou'd reduce him to reason else they had never call'd in the present King for they did not expect him to work Miracles but to procure a Free Parliament c. as is at large express'd in his Majesties Declaâ—ation But here lay the Miracle of the Revolution The Providential Removal of the French Kings Forces to the Siege of Philipsburgh against all manner of Policy when if he had made but a feint on the Frontiers of the Dutch they could neither have spar'd their Troops nor their Stadtholder The wonderful Disposition of the Wind and Weather which lockt up King Iames's Fleet so as to make the Descent easie and safe And at last the Flight of King Iames and the Re-settlement of the whole Kingdom without a Civil War which was contrary to the Expectations of all the World this was that which was next to Miraculous Now we must come to examine his Quotations by which I must be excus'd to guess at the rest of his Instances which indeed generally speaking are chosen very remote he tells us a very small Army is capable to make a Revolution Oliver Cromwel left behind him but 17000 Oportet Mendacem esse Memorem Oliver Cromwel did not work the Revolution which he brought to pass on the Parliament with less than 35000 Men and if he left but 17000 behind him which nevertheless I do not grant there must be reckoned the Army left in Scotland with General Monk which was at least 12000 and the Settlement in Ireland which at least also took off from the old Army above 10000 Men more besides those which had chang'd Parties and laid down their Arms As to the Pretorian Soldiers I don't read that they by themselves made any Revolution in the Roman Empire Iulius Caesar had a much greater Force when he March'd out of Gaul and they were great Armies who Declared Galba Otho and Vespasian Emperors Then as to the Ottoman Empire of which this Author I suppose knows very little the Ianisaries have not been less in that Empire till this War than 70000 Men what he calls the Court Ianisaries I know
General of 40000 Men. I remember 't was a great cry among the Iacobite Party about four Year ago what a vast Charge are we at about a War for the Confederates Damn the Confederates let us keep a good Fleet and we are able to defend our selves against all the World let who will go down and who will go up no Body will dare to meddle with us But God be thanked the King knew better than these what was the true Interest of England a War in Flanders is a War in England let who will be the Invaders for a good Barrier between a Kingdom and a powerful Enemy is a thing of such Consequence that the Dutch always thought it well worth the Charges of a War to assist the Spaniard for thereby they kept the War from their own Borders and so do we In defending this silly Equivalent of a Fleet he has the Vanity to say If our Fleet be well mann'd 't is a ridiculous thing to think of any Princes Invading us and yet we found it otherwise This very War we found King Iames invaded Ireland and the French sent him an Aid of 8000 Men who stood their Ground so well at the Battle of the Boyn that if King Iames had done his part as well it might have been a dearer Victory than is was after this he fetch'd those 8000 off again and after that sent Monsieur St. Ruth and after that a Relief to Limerick tho' it came too late and all this notwithstanding we had the greatest Fleet at Sea that ever England had before thâ— time since it was a Nation Thus Experience Bafles this foolish Equivalent for Armies are not Transported with so much Difficulty and the Six hundred Sail the P. of Orange brought with him had not been absolutely necessary for 14000 Men but there were vast Stores Artillery Arms and heavy Baggage with them which are not always necessary for we know Monsieur Pointy carried 4500 Men with him on his Expedition to Cartagena in but 16 Ships and the 8000 Men before-mentioned sent to Ireland were carried in not above 35 or 38 Sail. Another wretched Equivalent which this Author would have us trust to is the Militia and these he magnifies as sufficient to defend us against all the Enemies in the World and yet at the same time so Debases them as to make them nothing in Comparison of a small Army Nay he owns that notwithstanding these we are undone and our Liberties destroyed if the King be trusted but with a few Guards This is such a piece of Logick as no Man can understand If a Militia be regulated and Disciplin'd I say they may enslave us as well as an Army and if not they cannot be able to defend us if they are unable to Defend us they are insignificant and if able dangerous But says the Author there is no danger from the Militia for they are our selves and their Officers are Country Gentlemen of Estates And is not our Army full of English Gentlemen of Estates and Fortunes and have we not found them as inflexible to the Charms of Tyranny when closetted in the late Reign and as true to the Protestant Interest and Liberties of England as any Country Gentlemen or Freeholders or Citizens in England Did they not lay down their Commissions did they not venture to disobey his illegal Commands when the Cowardly Citizens address'd him with their nauseous Flattering fulsome Harrangues thank'd him for their Bondage and gave up their Charters and Priviledges even before he ask'd for them These are the Persons that must guard our Liberties and they would be finely Guarded God help us I remember a Speech which I have to show in Manuscript of Sir Walter Rawleigh on the Subject of the Spanish Invasion which comes directly to this Case The Author of this Pamphlet to instance in the prodigious Navy that is necessary to bring over a small Army tells us the Spanish Armado Embark'd but 18000 Men but he forgot that they were to take the Prince of Parma on Board from Flanders with 28000 old Low Country Soldiers more with which Army as Sir Walter Rawleigh observ'd to that Gentleman it was no improbable thing to think of Conquering this Kingdom and Queen Elizabeth was so sensible of it that she often told Sir Walter that if they had not been beaten at Sea they had been all undone for her Armies were all Tumultuary Troops Militia and the like To proceed I 'll grant all the Improbabilities which he suggests of the French King 's reviving a War which has been so fatal to him And as to King Iames Coming truly I 'll allow the Militia are fittest at all times to deal with him but to use his own Method of supposing the worst I 'll suppose the French King waving the Ceremony of a League and a Declaration of War when he has recovered Breath a little shou'd as much on a sudden as can be break with us single and pour in an Army of 50000 Men upon us I 'll suppose our Fleet may be by accident so lockt in as King Iames's was for what has been may be and they take that Opportunity and get on Shore and to oppose their Army truly we raise the Militia a Fine Shew they wou'd make but what wou'd they do against 60 Batalions of French and Swiss Infantry wou'd this Gentleman venture to be hang'd if they run all away and did not fire a Gun at them I am sure I wou'd not But on the other Hand if the Militia are a sufficient Guard against a Foreign Power so they are against a Home Power especially since this Home Power may be kept down to a due Ballance so as may but suffice to keep us from being insulted by a Foreign Enemy for Instance suppose the King were to entertain in constant Pay 20000 Men including his Guards and Garrisons the Militia of England Regulated and Disciplin'd join'd to these might do somewhat but by themselves nothing I can give him innumerable Instances of the Services of the Militia but I never heard or read of any real Bravery from them but when join'd with Regular Troops To Instance once for all 't is notorious that when the Prince of Conde attackt the Citizens of Paris at Charentoâ— that Populous City being all in an Uproar sent a Detachment of 20000 Men to dislodge the Prince who with 1500 Horse and Dragoons drove them all away and they never lookt behind them till they got within the City Walls Another Necessity for keeping up a certain Number of Troops is the vast Expence and Difficulty of making a New-rais'd Army fit for Service I am bold to say as the Nature of Fighting is now chang'd and the Art of War improv'd were the King now to raise a New Army and to be Commanded by New Officers Gentlemen who had seen no Service it should cost him Three Years Time and 30000 Mens Lives to bring them into a Capacity to face an Enemy Fighting