THE VISIONS OF Government WHEREIN The Antimonarchical Principles and Practices of all Fanatical Commonwealths-men and Jesuitical Politicians are discovered confuted and exposed By EDWARD PETTIT M. A. and Author of the Visions of Purgatory and Thorough Reformations Morosophi Moriones pessimi LONDON Printed by B. W. for Edward Vize at the Sign of the Bishop's Head over against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill M DC LXXXIV TO THE High Potent and Noble PRINCE JAMES Duke Marquess and Earl of ORMOND in ENGLAND and IRELAND Earl of Ossery and Brecknock Viscount Thurles Baron of Arclo and Lanthony Lord Licutenant General and General Governour of His Majesties Kingdom of Ireland Lord of the Regalities and Liberties of the County of Tipperary Lord Chancellour of the famous Vniversities of Oxford and Dublin Lord High Steward of His Majesties Houshold One of His Majesties most Honourable Privy Council in England Scotland and Ireland and Knight of the Most Noble Order of the GARTER May it it please Your Grace I Humbly presume to take this opportunity of congratulating the late Deliverance of your Grace's Noble Son his Excellency the Earl of Arran under whose Care and Conduct the flourishing Kingdom of Ireland injoyces both Peace and Plenty at this day and I hope Your Grace will be pleas'd to accept of these honest labours of my Pen in defence of that Monarchy which you have so long assisted with your Counsels so often vindicated with Your Sword My Lord There never was a wiser Government never a more Gracious Sovereign never a more faithful Subject than Your self All your Princely Vertues will make Your Grace an Illustrious Pattern to the Ages to come who cannot be parallel'd by any that are past He that compar'd Your Grace to Barzillai did it because among all David's Worthies there was none that for Greatness Fidelity and long Experience might compare with You and yet You as far exceed his recorded Merits as the Irish Seas do the little River of Jordan May the ever-living God make Your Grace as far excel him in length of daies by adding to Your Illustrious Life those which in his Divine Wisdom he has been pleas'd to take from Your Right Honourable Father and from Your Noble Son the late Earl of Ossery and thus make up to us our loss here upon Earth and Yours with a late but glorious Immortality with them in Heaven This is the hearty Prayer of all that Fear God and Honour the King and in particular of Your Grace's most humble and obedient Servant EDWARD PETTIT THE CONTENTS VISION I. THe Introduction The Ghost of S. Jerom a Native of Hungary after a relation of the present State of that Kingdom condemns their Rebellion from the Doctrine and practice of the Christians of his time The Grand Confederacy against Christian Religion and Government discovered in a Dialogue betwixt the Ghosts of the late Vizier Cuperlee a General of the Jesuits and the Earl of Shaftsbury The reason why the Fanaticks of England lament the defeat of the Turks A parallel in some new Remarques betwixt them Whether was the more Unchristian to wish the success of the Turkish Arms before Vienna or of the Moors before Tangier The impious and foolish conceit of preventing Arbitrary Government under the Protection of the Grand Seignior p. 1 VISION II. THe miserable state of the Christians under the Turks the happy condition of the people of England Good Government the reason of it The Malecontens described and exposed The Argument that converted and confirmed a Jew in the Christian Faith He confutes and condemns the Fanaticks for their Rebellious Murmurings and Practices He proves Monarchy to be of Divine Institution and the best of Governments The Monarchy of England the best in the World The design of Hobbs's Leviathan and of Nevil's Plato Redivivus they are both in the extremes and both exploded The Ghosts of Hobbs Machiavel and some other modern Politicians quarrel about Preheminence Lucifer not able to decide the Controversie referrs it to Bradshaw He determines for Richard Baxter upon the account of that Maxim that Dominion is founded in Grace The Folly of it discovered in his Book intituled A Holy Commonwealth and the Villany of it in the Practices of the late Commonwealth of England p. 45 VISION III. THe monstrous Loyalty of the Fanaticks Their several Ridiculous Policies the growth and design of the late Hellish Conspiracy The two fundamental Principles of the Good Old Cause First That All Civil Authority is deriv'd Originally from the People The extreme villany and folly of this Proposition throughly examined and by a Civiliz'd Cannibal condemn'd The Second That Birthright and Proximity of Blood give no Title to Rule or Government and that It is lawful to preclude the next Heir from his Right of Succession to the Crown The great impiety and folly of this Proposition fully discovered and condemned by an Indian of New England The Authors and Abetters of them both exposed The great Wisdom and Goodness of our present Gracious Sovereign in securing to this Monarchy the right and lineal descent of the Crown p. 147 VISION IV. THe wicked Policy of raising a mean or evil opinion of the Sovereign in the minds of the Subjects The trivial and unreasonable occasions of such an opinion a pleasant instance thereof in the Case of the Salique Law it is condemned by an Hermaphrodite Better that the Sovereignty should be in one Woman than in five hundred men The Sovereignty of England in a single Person The Heresie of the Whiggish Lawyers Those that 〈◊〉 of the Antiquity of Parliamentes and those that vilifie them are Commonwealths men and enemies both of King and Parliament The Characters of several Commonwealths-men good advice to them A Panegyrick upon the King the Duke the Royal Family and all the True-hearted Nobility Gentry Clergy and Commonalty of this Realm an hearty Prayer for them p. 217 Books Printed for and are to be sold by Edward Vize at the Bishop's Head over against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill A Discourse of Prayer Wherein this great Duty is stated so as to oppose some Principles and Practices of Papists and Fanaticks as they are contrary to the Publick Forms of the Church of England established by her Ecclesiastical Canons and confirmed by Acts of Parliament A Discourse concerning the Tryal of Spirits Wherein Inquity is made into Mens Pretences to Inspiration for publishing Doctrines in the Name of God beyond the Rules of the Sacred Scriptures In opposition to some Principles and Practices of Papists and Fanaticks as they contradict the Doctrines of the Church of England defined in her Articles of Religion established by her Ecclesiastical Canons and confirmed by Acts of Parliament A Spittle Sermon Preach'd In Saint Brides Parish Church on Wednesday in Easter Week being the Second Day of April 1684. Before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor the Court of Aldermen and the Sheriffs of the now Protestant and Loyal City of London These three
quality to reduce this Ancient Monarchy into a Democracy in order to which He imploys the whole stock of his malice to scoff and burlesque all the Sacred Orders of the Church as the ready way to ruine the State The truth is says he page 98. I could wish there had never been any Clergy the purity of Christian Religion as also the good and Orderly Government of the World had been much better provided for And so says Mr. Harrington An ounce of wisdom is worth a pound of Clergy Ocean p. 223. And Ministers of all others least understand Political Principles And then having vilisied Monarchy as the worst of Governments and the Corruption of all others He very Dogmatically proclaims the State of Venice to be the Perfectest pattern of Government now existent And so did Mr. Harrington in his Venetian Ballott To gain Authority and success to his Politick frame He recommended to this Nation he Caresses the People with the same unlimited and transcendent power which Doleman is most graciously pleas'd to bestow upon them by which they are inabled to change and depose their Princes at their Leisure and alter and model the Government at their pleasure to prompt them to this with his Father the Devil and Doleman He slights the Plea of Monarchs Divine right makes the King a sharer with and Trustee of the People and looks upon it as a pretence that they have their power from God And after all with an impudence only proper to himself He would cully the King out of his Prerogatives with the rusty Complement of giving him more Ease and of making him more Glorious These and other wicked and ridiculous Positions destructive both of King and People make up the Politicks of this filthy Dreamer who has more of Pythagoras his Ass than of Plato ' s Spirit in him If the Devil said I be in him I will make him come out of him if I can And with that I march't up to him You Sir said I that have so industriously laboured to change and new model our Government did like a Politician indeed to conjure up the Ghost of an Athenian a sort of sickle giddy headed people that felt more fatal Changes and Revolutions than any Nation under the Sun So like our present Fanaticks * Acts 17. â—1 That they spent their Time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing But Sir when you were scraping in the rubbish of their City for the Ghost of Plato you had done well if you had brought along with you the Statua of Jupiter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they erected to deter men from being perjur'd Hence 't is that one of their Poets wondring that such persons escap't when the Oak is sometimes thunder-struck said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Oak is not for sworn Hence it was that they termed a righteous person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a perjurious signified a wicked man insomuch that I meet but one among them fit to make a Foreman of a true Protestant Ignoramus Jury and that was Lysander who was so infamous for that saying of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That we ought to cheat Children with Cock all 's but Enemies with Oaths Now since your Friends at home are grown so scandalous for breaking the Third and Ninth Commandments which were given by Moses who was a King among the righteous You cannot tell how far such a Statua might deter them because set up by a Religious Commonwealth But you have brought nothing with you from thence but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Brazen face And 't is with this Brazen face you have the confidence to appear in defence of your many-headed Democracy to vilisie the present Establisht Government in despight of the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom and when you have done as I am told to appear in Westminster Hall at a time when one a very little worse than your self received Sentence of Death for High Treason And if the Platonick Year were true a man might easily guess your fate every Revolution of Saturn But to the purpose Greece is not able to contain your Politicks but you whip over into Italy and as the Painters of that Country use sometimes to summon the fairest Courtesans together and draw a Beautiful face for the Blessed Virgin Mary from the slagrancies of Harlots So from the Charming Constitutions of Rome in its Youth and Venice in its old Age would you model us a pure sound and glorious Government I would so replied Nevil For in the most turbulent Times of that Commonwealth and Factions between the Nobility and People Rome was much more full of vertuous and Heroick Citizens than ever it was under Aurelius or Anteninus p. 43. But said I are there not as many vertuous and Heroick Persons under King Charles the Second in England But now I think of it the late Shaftsbuty's Conspiracy would have left us as few had it taken effect as Catalines would in Rome And I believe that such a Protestant as you are who will allow of no Priests but those of Mars esteem a few Heathen Philosophers before all the Ministers of the Gospel He was a Conjurer like your self that was ravisht with the love of Tully for writing against Transubstantiation in his third Book de Natura deorum Cum Fruges Cererem vinum Liberum dicimus genere nos quidem sermonis utimur usit ato sed ecquemtam amentem esse put as qui illud quo vescatur Deum credat esse When we call Corn Ceres and Wine Bacchus we only use a customary way of Speech but whom do you think so mad as to believe that with which he is sed to be a God And just such a true Protestant Politick Antiquarian is the Authour of Plato Redivivus and just such a formidable enemy to Popery But Sir if Ancient Governments do not please you said he because out of Fashion What think you of the Venetian I declare it to be the best in the World at this day Indeed said I the Venetians I confess have not been altogether so Pope-ridden as some others have and their Dukes may marry the Adriatick Sea without a Licence from the Bishop of Rome but I hope you believe it cannot be done without the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church of Rome And that the Pope has a great deal less Jurisdiction in England if ever you took the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy But you have lost your English Conscience and no body values your Protestant Policy For is not the King of England much better than a Duke of Venice Is not the Succession in the right Line as Authentick from Scripture as good by experience as Ballotting Is not the King of England by the Grace of God greater and better than a Duke of Venice by the vertue of Hocus Pocus He is greater said he but that greatness is not better either for himself or
Davenant in his twelfth determin'd Question sayes Induant quam velint isti Magistratuum Reformatores c. Let those Reformers of Magistrates mask under what vizor they please Religion may be their Plea but Rebellion is their Practice And this is so true of Mr. Baxter that as far as I can perceive he will confirm it with his last breath But the Mask he has on will appear to be that of the Fool as well as of the Knave for whatever he in one place denyes he most strictly and rigidly maintains in another and there is not a more ridiculous Book of Polity in the world He confesses indeed that he did not design an Accurate Tract of Politicks not a discovery of an Utopia or City of the Sun And indeed I am apt to believe him for it rather dropt from the concavities of the Midsummer Moon Had he spent his Itch of Scribling in writing his Wifes Life the History of Stew'd Prunes or the Pedigree of his Gib-Cat he had done much better than to have defiled so much good Paper with the indigested Excrements of his Brain upon such a subject For Mr. Baxter did not either honestly or seriously enough consider that his whole Pile of Politicks stands tottering upon a false and rotten foundation For he holds that the Soveraignty of England is in the three Estates viz. King Lords and Commons that the King has but a Co-ordinate Power and may be over-ruled by the other two This is the fundamental Maxim of all his Politicks without which he never could have pretended to the framing his Theocratical Government as he calls it or have made such a Bustle for his peculiar godly Friends and Associates but if this were true which is utterly false why may it not as well happen that the King and Lords should over-rule and consequently exciude the Commons And then what thanks is that House bound to give such a notable Aphorismmonger The Counsellors in that August Assembly are of three sorts by the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom Some are by Birth as the Barons some Lambards Archion p. 118. by Succession as Bishops and some by Election as Knights and Burgesses and these be all for the time the Kings Council Did ever any King call a Council to depose him But suppose according to Mr. Baxter they might or should do so who should then hinder the two that are by Birth and Succession from over-ruling and excluding the third that are by Election But the Bishops it seems must troop out after the King for fear Mr. Baxter should stumble upon such an horrid piece of non-sense as the making two Estates become three by the taking away of one No less ridiculous is Mr. Baxter in this deposing humour of his for he does like the Abbess who chid the Nun for Fornication when she her self had the Monks Breeches on her head instead of her Veil at the same time He pronounces very terribly Thes 327. That it is a most impious thing for Popes to pretend to disoblige Christians from their Oaths and Fidelity to their Sovereigns and to encourage their Subjects to rebel and murder them But as if it were a most pious thing in a Jack Presbyter he breathes nothing but perfidious Covenants Engagements Associations Seditions and murdering Treasons for several Pages together immediately after Like a Fool as he is to his own Good Old Cause he confesses pag. 461. that God has no where in Scripture told us whether England should be governed by one or two or an hundred but that where the King is Supreme it is the will of God that the people should obey him A strange things that the Politick Saint should want Scripture upon so material an account who is used to squander it away so plentifully upon every trivial occasion Well! since Scripture as he sayes cannot nothing more or better can declare the King of England to be Supreme unaccountable to none but God than the fundamental Laws of this Ancient and Just Monarchy But because Mr. Baxter who would never be govern'd has little or no knowledge of the Laws he sends his Reader in p. 458. to Bacon and Prynn who were as great Hereticks for Lawyers as he is for a Divine I wish that Mr. Baxter who has deserv'd to lose his Tongue as much as Prynn did his Ears would take example by him and lay things seriously and impartially to his heart that by better Aphorisms of Humility and Obedience he would grow so good a Politician indeed as at last to cheat the Devil For 't is a strange thing that a man who has taken so much pains for the salvation of other mens souls should so carelesly run on tick for the damnation of his own If it be true that the King is Supream and that they who resist him as Mr. Baxter has done shall receive damnation to themselves and as Mr. Prynn himself Prynn's Repub. or spurious Good Old Cause sayes they shall But I fear he will never be of so good a mind For like a Knave as he is by his Politicks in this Book and by his Schism and Separation to this day he practises those very Rules which in the beginning of this Book he discovers and declares to be the Jesuits Directions for preserving Popery and changing Religion in this Nation I do not wonder that the late Colonel Sidney who was so great a Crony of Father Oliva ' s the General of the Jesuits at Rome for several years together should borrow part of his Speech he left behind him out of Baxter ' s Holy Commonwealth for sayes he pag. 377. No Man or Family hath originally more right to govern a Nation than the rest till Providence and Consent allow it them Few Princes will plead a Successive Right of Primogeniture from Noah And this without doubt was the Original of that politick strain in Colonel Sidney ' s Speech as the directions of the Jesuits are of Mr. Baxter's Politicks and practices For sayes he himself the summ of Campanella ' s Counsel for promoting the Spanish Interests in England was in Queen Elizabeths daies 1. Above all to breed dissentions and discords among our selves To exasperate the minds of the Bishops against King James by perswading them that he was in heart a Papist and would bring in Popery To make the Kingdom Elective And lastly To perswade the chief Parliament men to turn England into the form of a Common-wealth Pray Sir said I do but hear what Mr. Baxter sayes for himself at the latter end of his Book p. 489. If any one saies he can prove that I was guilty of hurt to the Person or destruction of the Power of the King or of changing the Fundamental Constitutions of the Commonwealth c. I will never gainsay him if he calls me a most perfidious Rebel and tell me that I am guilty of far greater sin than Murder Whoredome Drunkenness or such like or if they can solidly confute my Grounds
the ruine of the King and his Government and look upon them as Hellish and Damnable Truly Sir said I it is a very wicked Age wherein men arrive to that height of disobedience that the lives of Princes should lie at the mercy of every discontented Russian and that their unquestionable Rights should depend upon the Wills and Fancies of every scribling crackt-brain Politician But these are the Ascarides the very excrementitious Vermin of the Body Politick and deserve no other Answer than what a Louse or a Flea receives for biting a man however because to the Infamy of Vermin they have added the Venome subtlety and malice of Serpents I think it not amiss to pluck them out of their holes and expose and show them But oh have a care you don't abuse an ingenious man and a good Scholar cryeth the meek hearted Well! there is no great fear of it For I think a Serpent is never a whit the more amiable for his poisonous gay speckles and I do declare that if a person that is incorrigibly seditious should at last write a Treasonable Book for the which by the Law he deserves to be hang'd and for the which he must be hang'd let him be never so good a Scholar I think that all the mercy he could expect in this world should be to have the many Seditious Volumes he has read hang'd at his heels to dispatch him the sooner But if these Politicians and Casuists escape hanging they do the more admire and applaud themselves not considering all the while the great wickedness a man commits that writes an ill Book by which he may be said to sin after he is dead nor the great mischiefs they do the living by poisoning the minds of the unwary people and disordering and disturbing the Affairs and Councils of Princes Surely said Seignior Christiano no Prince in the World ever had a greater trial of his patience wisdom and goodness than our present Gracious Sovereign has had about this Bill of Exclusion Nothing more inhumane could be propos'd than that He to satisfie their unjust Complaints should offer so unseasonable so unreasonable an injury to his Royal and only Brother whom the loss of his other Brother and Sisters the sufferings of his Father and his own merits had so much indeared him contrary to the Laws of natural Justice and Honesty and to the Fundamental Laws of this Hereditary Monarchy And although at the very first thought and suspicion of such thing his Majesty at the very first rejected it as we may gather from his speech on Saturday Novemb. 9th which was soon after a debate arose in the House of Commons for an Adress to be presented that his Royal Highness should withdraw himself from his Majesties Person and Counsels Yet we presume that in his Royal and serious Meditations He considered the Righteous Judgments of God in all Ages that have fallen upon them who thought themselves either the Richer or Safer in the Possessions of injur d Princes that therefore it would be an injury even to that person that should next succeed upon his removal That He considered the Fatal consequences of his Fathers compliance in the Case of the Earl of Strafford But that this was of much greater Consequence we presume that in his wisdom He foresaw the malicious designs of a restless Faction who indeavour'd to wound him through the sides of his dearest Brother That he foresaw the many dismal Calamities that would unavoidably fall upon the People and that of his goodness he was resolv'd to prevent them under which his Royal wisdom and goodness we now injoy all the comforts of this life and the best opportunities of obtaining a better For which this present Age is bound to love and honour him and for which those to come will certainly magnifie and extol him and suppose God should so order it in his Providence whose will must be done that none of his Loyns shall sit upon his Throne Yet we and all good Subjects do hope and pray that after a long and prosperous Reign here on Earth He that is the King of kings will infinitely recompense him with an immortal Crown of Glory in Heaven THE Fourth VISION OF GOVERNMENT The CONTENTS The wicked Policy of raising a mean or evil opinion of the Sovereign in the minds of the Subjects The trivial and unreasonable occasions of such an opinion a pleasant instance thereof in the Case of the Salique Law it is condemned by an Hermaphrodite Better that the Sovereignty should be in one Woman than in five hundred men The Sovereignty of England in a single Person The Heresie of the Whiggish Lawyers Those that write of the Antiquity of Parliaments and those that vilifie them are Commonwealths men and enemies both of King and Parliament The Characters of several Commonwealths-men good advice to them A Panegyrick upon the King the Duke the Royal Family and all the True-hearted Nobility Gentry Clergy and Commonalty of this Realm an hearty Prayer for them THe Garden Gate that was set open gave us a very pleasant Prospect into the most solitary and shady Walks fit for Owls and Politicians to hatch in at a small distance from us we observ'd a very Diminutive Non-con taking the fresco after the labour of the day and pulling his Handkerchief out of his pocket he drew out with it a Scroll of Paper which fell to the ground without his notice Seignior Christiano following softly took it up and as soon as I came to him Here are his Notes said he smiling without doubt here is a great deal of stickling stuff in them let us for Diversion peruse them We found a great deal of their war like Divinity such as raised the late Rebellion But in the midst of all the bundle we found a ticket rolled up very hard and at first opening thought it had been a blank but it prov'd to be the most virulent and lewd Libel against the King in a few lines that ever I read in my life Here said Seignior Christiano here 's the Peace and Purity of the Gospel wrapt up together the Devil certainly wrote them when he stunk of Brimstone don't put them in your pocket they will set your Breeches on fire I do assure you said I I have heard the Cub of a London Tub Preacher when he was a Schole Boy repeat these very Verses when I am sure you might as soon have perswaded him to be circumcis'd as to have said three lines of the Litany So early do these Wolves instruct their whelps to bark so early are they Catechiz'd in the Doctrine of Slander and Reproach That one would think they hold it to be Mans chief End to despise Dominion and speak evil of Dignities And so diligently do they afterwards practise it that it seems to be not only one of the Liberal Sciences of Fanaticism but you would conclude that they maintain Throwing of Stink Pots to be necessary to Salvation It is a wicked
Evidence in a Controversie betwixt a Turk and a Christian And that most of the Assembly of Divines came from the Vniversities of Aleppo or Scanderoon for Mr. Ricaut tells us that the success of the Mahometan Arms produces an Argument for the Confirmation of their Faith that whatsoever prospers has God the Author for it and by how much the more successfull have been their Wars by so much the more hath God been an owner of their Cause Now do but examine the tenth proposition condemned at Oxford 1683. Possession and strength give a right to govern and success in a Cause or Enterprise proclaims it to be lawful and just to pursue it is to comply with the will of God because it is to follow the Conduct of his Providence This is the Doctrine of Owen Baxter and Jenkins and of all the great sticklers for the good Did Cause but I think the Laws of England and the Arms of Germany and Poland have almost put it out of fashion But moreover they do so fully agree in their Sanguinary positions and Violent Practices that our Saints Militant propagate the Faith of the Gospel by the Doctrine of the Alcoran and are therefore the worst of all Christians by thus sympathising with Turks To qualifie a man to be a true Christian according to the Peace as well as the Purity of the Gospel We will take Grotius his Word and Rule for once in his Book de veritate Christianae Religionis page 400. His words are these Revocatur etiam eâdem Occasione ipsis in memoriam arma Christi Militibus assignata non esse qualibus Mahumetes nititur sed Spiritûs propria apta expugnandis Munitionibus quae se adversus Dei cognitionem erigunt pro scuto siduciam pro Lorica Justitiam c. They call to mind upon the same occasion that the Arms assigned to the Souldiers of Christ are not such as support Mahomet but such as properly belong to the Spirit being fitted to the pulling down of strong Holds that exalt themselves against the knowledge of God for a Shield Faith and for a Breast-plate Righteousness of Life On the contrary Sir said I the way of Catechising mankind with Ammunition and sanctifying the Nations with Powder and Shot is the avowed doctrine and practice of the Dissenters and to joyn with Turks rather than with Papists for such they call the men of the Church of England does not come by any new way of inspiration into the Pericranions of the Saints for Cartwright popt that notion into their heads long ago as Mr. * Novemb. 5. 1683. Pelling observes in his excellent Sermon preached before my Lord Mayor at Bow But shall they have the rewards of Saints shall they receive the Crown of Righteousness that wish siccess to the Arms of Infidels Oh Heavens to what an height of wickedness are they now arrived They who had need of a Turkish Veil to hide their Hypocrisie have now more need of one to hide their Villany if they had any Shame for that for which an Atheist would blush and yet they call themselves the Reform'd Christians What mortal Tongue can tell the sad consequences of the taking the Imperial City What Crowds of innocent people would have been massacred What abominable rapes committed What terrours and desolations would those Ravaging Barbarians have carried along with them like a flood What Rivers of Blood would they have sent before to the very German Ocean My very Heart trembles at the thoughts that any such imaginations should ever enter into their O Sir replyed He I perceive you are a Novice too in these Cases let me propose one thing to you What do you think of those persons that would have sacrific'd the Garrison of Tangier to the Fury of the Moors rather than have missed of their designs in England Considering indeed how much the wellfare of Christendom depended upon the protection of Vienna it was a diabolical thought to wish it in the hands of the Turks but considering withal how much the Reputation of England depended upon the preservation of the Garrison and People of Tangier it was no less dishonourable no less unchristian-like to abandon them to the Moors Pray Sir who did so said I They said he who refused to comply with his Majesties just demands when he so earnestly and so frequently mov'd them for Supplies for that Garrison at that time so much in danger Now let us weigh the Case the first was the Result of the flashy Politicks of the Zealous of the Land over a Pipe and a Pot in a Tavern or an Ale house but the latter was the deliberate determination of those who in particular stiled themselves the Patriots of their Country and were the most active of all the great Council of the Nation assembled in Parliament 't is true they were not many of them but they had got such a trick of starting Bugbears at that time that the Loyal the Wise and the Honest knew not which way to turn themselves You know said I that the Nation was then in great danger of the Papists at home But reply'd He the Spanish Pilgrims that so affrighted us it seems were driven out of Spain to the Coasts of Barbary and not visible in these parts Sir said I again was it not reported to be a Nest and Harbour for Papists They said He that can make a Turk a true Protestant can by inverting the Rule make a Church of England man a Papist when they please No no Sir they knew as well they were no Papists as that they themselves were no Christians if they be none who designed the Ruine of so good a King and of so Righteous a Government and had not his Majesty whose Goodness extends it self to all his Subjects as far as the Sun shines when He had more need of their Help at home taken care to preserve them at his own excessive Cost and Charges they must have been all lost But for a further touch of the piety of our true Protestant Numidians and to determine the point Consider that our own Countrymen are dearer to us by the Laws of Nature and Nations than Foreigners and consider that the Moors are the worst sort of Mahometans the very spawn of Incestuous Saracens and the most barbarous Mongrels of all mankind and therefore show me now if you can in the Histories of all the Commonwealths that have been since the world began such an Instance of unnatural Barbarity When did the Athenians Lacedemonians Romans or Carthaginians ever do the like how many emblems of Honour and Reward do we meet with in ancient Coins ob Cives servatos for the saving the lives of fellow Citizens sed haecest fides Punica this is treachery with a vengeance and not to be parallel'd by any but those Rebels who after they had destroyed their King and Master put the Moors to less trouble and sold their fellow Subjects to them for Slaves Well delenda est Carthago if
e poi patienza Patience to the loss of our heads and patience after that Since the case is thus with us his other Subjects have little encouragement to build plant or sow any more than what will protect them from the immediate Injuries of Hunger and Cold or to provide for the next Generation who are so miserable in their own But pray Sir said he to me what is the reason that the people of England are so very Rich so very Happy as they seem to be They really are so replyed I if they knew their own happiness The people of England by the Providence of God and the Goodness of their Princes from the Times that were before your Empire had a Name or Being have enjoy'd many great Priviledges under the Name of Property and what may seem strange to you the Prerogative of the King is the very Property or Liberty of the Subject a Mysterie as unknown to you in our State as the Articles of the Christian Faith in our Church 'T is hard indeed I believe said he many of your own people do'nt understand it I wish they did said I for our Government is so divinely temper'd that the Honour of the King consists in the Happiness of his People and the Happiness of the People in the Honour of the King He by his good and wholsome Laws protects and encourages them and they all ought to honour and defend him By his Laws those Lands have those delightful limits and boundaries which you see and instead of Thorns and Briars are rich in what is good for food and pleasant to the taste By his Laws the Lusts Ambition and Covetousness of men are kept under every one being confin'd to his proper Business and Station to the encrease of Vertue Honour and Justice Hence 't is that you see the waters burden'd with the Fruits and Products of other Nations and the Land with our own Hence 't is that all Arts and Sciences flourish and even from our improv'd Arts of War for our defence you learn how to invade the effects of our peace Look but into that famous City of London and see how vastly the condition of mankind is altered from what you find it in Constantinople here you will see the Markets crowded with fatted Sheep and Oxen there with lean Slaves whose only hopes depend upon the being bought by a good Master here our greatest trouble is to get a good Servant and if they were but all good Subjects there is not a better King in the World Not good Subjects cry'd He then 't is too good a Land for so bad a People but methinks they seem to have little either of Business or Trouble for they walk to and fro as they please pray Sir let me be so happy as to partake with them of their great freedom At this we went down into the Walks and on a sudden fell upon two Persons that were talking together very earnestly we were unwilling to interrupt them yet kept at such a distance as to overhear them for they talk't very loud one of them saying well well I confess I have pretty well feathered my Nest but let the Kings affairs go how they will I will e'en secure my self I will e'en lie and Lowng as they call it let others stickle that have a great deal to get and little to lose for my part I am for Cokesing of Mammon I 'll not hazard my Fortunes truly not I. Indeed said the other things are carried very strangely at Court I wonder what becomes of all the money I think they did well to vote that no body should lend him any upon any Branch of his Revenue Of whom do they speak said the Turk Of the King said I And who made that Vote the Parliament said I And what is that replyed He The Great Council of the Nation into which some Seditious persons crept in of late years and promoted such a Vote And who are these persons that talk at this rate said He Why said I they have both of them very good Offices under the King how many Aspers a day have they said He again Aspers said I do you talk of Aspers they have at the rate of 4. or 5000. pieces of Eight of Yearly Revenues besides what they get by the bye At this the Turk fell into such a rage that he had like to have run over me and looking sternly upon them Ye ungrateful Dogs quoth He do Ye eat your Masters Bread to vomit it up in his face again were ye in the Grand Seigniors Dominions he would scorn to defile the meanest Slave he has by being your Executioner but would cram ye both into a hole until ye either devoured one another for Hunger or that those Mouths that spoke those words eat up those Hands that used to feed them And then turning to me Are these said he the fruits of Virtue Honour and Justice you lately talkt of You talkt Sir said I of Patience too lately pray have a little now I could rather said he indure to have my head cut off than my ears on to hear what such ungrateful men say But perhaps those other two Gentlemen that walk yonder are of a better mind they too are hot in discourse let us hear them As soon as we came near them What Justice Tom cry'd one of them can we expect from those Tory Lawyers now they are got upon the Bench the very name of Whigg is enough to cast a man in any Suit or Trial that comes before them That is an hard case said the Turk to me And what will become of the Protestant Religion Jack said the other for Dr. Oates tells us That most of the Bishops are Popishly inclin'd and you know Popery is Image-worship mere Idolatry Poor men said the Turk I protest I pity them But hark you Tom said he again pray lend me 50. l. for a Fortnight I vow Jack reply'd the other thou art a merry fellow but thou hast such slippery tricks with thee you know how you serv'd Mr. L. N. t'other day who was your good friend and besides if Fortune frown'd upon you or your Friends were unkind to you that you could not pay Your Debts t' were another case but you have got a trick of Borrowing Money when you have a great deal by you either for the sake of the use of it or with a design never to repay it However I have a Bottle of Wine or two and a Wench at your service but a pox on the pulling down these Conventicles a man cannot get a wholsom Wench half so conveniently now as formerly Prithee Tom don't stand fooling said he let me have so much Money I 'll be faithful to you At this the other began to Curse and Swear at such a desperate rate that the Turk jumpt as if he had been frighted out of his wits and rolling his eyes to and fro and looking upwards Are we said he poor Turks so careful of defiling that
Captivity the Changes of their Government it had as it were a veil drawn over it and became obscure to them as to the Time of his Coming In short the giving the Jews a King was the greatest Blessing and the taking him away the greatest Curse the one the Righteous Ordinance of God the other his just Judgment But Sir said I they will say What signifies the Jewish Government to us Protestants Protestants said he do they call themselves Mahomet has not more corrupted the History than they the scope and design of the Old Testament where and when it may serve their turn How many hundred Sermons have they preach'd against Monarchy from this instance of the Israelites asking a King the deluded people swallowing these impudent Falsifications with so much greediness that they would gobble down Goliah for one of the Minor Prophets if one of these lying ones did but bid them gape and thus much it signifies to those True Protestants that if it was a sin in the Israelites at that time to ask a King it is ten times more a sin in the people of England at this day to ask or seek after a Commonwealth for these three reasons First Because under the Gospel there are particular and especial Commands for our Obedience to The King as Supreme and consequently for our continuance in that Obedience but there was no prohibition under the Law positively forbidding the Jews to ask a King but there was a certain Promise that they should be governed by Kings Secondly Because after the full Revelation of Gods will the ordinary course of his Providence joyned with the foresaid Apostolical and Evangelical Precept is as obliging and binding as all the Miracles he wrought under the Theocracy of the ancient Israelites though I think the Preservation of the Kings of England of late dayes have been little less Miraculous Thirdly Because such disobedience of which deposing him and altering the frame of his Government is the highest is threatned with a greater Curse and Punishment than the Breach of all or any of the Laws of Moses even with Damnation in that sense wherein it is threatned to the Scribes and Pharisees the scrupulous observers of small things of that Law whilest they neglected the greater ones of Judgment c. But Sir said I they have as much abused the sense and meaning of the New Testament as they have the scope and design of the Old You may cloy them with Repetitions of Arguments and endless Quotations out of both of them and all to no purpose You may tell them that God shadows the rewards of Heaven with what he accounts most excellent upon Earth with Crowns Scepters Thrones and Robes of Glory That to fill us with an awful sense and veneration of the excellency of his Eternal Majesty He stiles himself King of kings and Lord of lords that Heaven is his Throne and Earth his footstool You may tell them that by him Kings reign and Princes decree Justice That they are stiled gods and are his Vicegerents who is the God of all gods That Treason is a very great sin and the breach of all the Commandments because the highest offence against him who is Custos utriusque Tabulae that beareth not the Sword in vain but is to execute wrath upon all them that do evil by the breach of any of them But it will be in vain they will be deaf as Adders and still Rebellious as the old Serpent You may urge them with the Laws of Nature and Nations you may tell them that there never was any Language spoken under Heaven that have not some word or other signifying the Supreme Power in a single Person That the very Heathens acknowledged this power to be derived from God and still 't is much more in vain when the Atheist cannot do the Business of the Rebel the Fanatick shall and when the Fanatick cannot the Atheist shall and when neither of them the Politician The Politician said he what kind of Politician do you mean The Politician said I I here speak of is a stranger Monster than any Beast of America He is a Composition of Fool and Knave of Hawk and Buzzard Atheist and Fanatick Beast and Devil in the shape of a Man His Father begat Him being at enmity with his Mother when the Bells rung backward for a great fire in a deep Snow One that never was long of one mind nor ever a friend to any one body He quarrel'd with his Milk Porrage the very first Breath he drew to cool it beat his elder Brother by surprize gave his Sisters black eyes pist in his Mothers mouth when she was fast asleep and oft-times pull'd the Chair from behind his Aged Father when he was going to sit down These were the Domestick stratagems of his Childhood But no sooner is He come to Years of Rebellion but you see him as rampant in Publick He finds fault with every Ordinance of God and man He is for knocking down of Monarchs pulling Lawn Sleeves over the ears of Bishops Altering and Changing the Government and all this while thinks himself wondrous wise and very Holy And now his Freak is come to full Maturity He lies cheats is perjur'd writes and fights ventures to be Hang'd and then Damn'd And now what do you think of him Is not such an heterogeneous Buffoon fit to make Laws for others who would never be govern'd himself Is he not a dainty projector to model the World and of full growth to become the Perpetual Dictator of all mankind the standing Oracle of the Times and in opposition to the wisdom and experience of twenty Ages to prescribe new forms of Government for three Nations and oblige them in all hast to become a Commonwealth who have been rul'd by Kings for above a thousand years Your very Character of him said he has already set my teeth on edge and so no more of him But I must tell you that there has been so much said and written in defence of Monarchy that a man might talk his Tongue to the stumps in the repetition of other mens Arguments And the Inconveniencies of Aristocracy and Democracy are so notorious that they were no News above two thousand years ago Old Aristotle hath so sufficiently described them in his Book of Politicks that we gather from thence that He sooner found out the Madness of the people than the Raging of the Sea But one would think that that Government for Christians should be the most Authentick which God for the Jews thought most convenient More than one would think said I that men should most of all desire to continue under that form of Government under which by all variety of experience they have been most happy And if Seignior Boccalini would be pleased to lend us his Ballance with which He weighed the Kingdoms and States of Europe I dare venture to confute all the Republicans upon Earth with this one Experiment Let them put into one
of the Scales all the Commonwealths that have been under the Sun let them clap in the Ephori of Sparta the Demarchi of Athens the Tribunes and Consuls of Rome the Gentlemen and Senators of Venice the Hoghen Moghen States of Holland the Cantons of Switzerland the Leagues of the Grisons the Elders of Geneva with whole Bundles of Hans Towns and all the late Holy Brethren that are fled to them and I will put but one single Monarchy into the other and it shall as certainly weigh them all down as the Bible does the Pope and his Trinkets the Devil and all his works in the Book of Martyrs What Monarchy is that said he The Ancient and Flourishing Monarchy of England said I a Monarchy which has the singular advantages of all the three known Forms of Government without the Inconveniencies of any one of them a Monarchy so divinely good as neither Jew or Gentile knew of Old and such an one as none other Christians besides enjoy at this day Pray Sir said he give me a short account of it As well as I can said I with all my heart You must know that this Monarchy of England is a Paternal Hereditary Monarchy the Kings thereof not using that absolute Despotical Power which the Kings of Judah sometimes did No mans Life is taken away from him by any of the Kings Messengers but he may clear himself if Innocent or give better satisfaction to the world if guilty by being tryed according to Law And where the Chronicles of England seem to speak the contrary those persons as Tho. Becket c. are to be considered as Traytors in the very act of open Hostility and Rebellion or protected from the proceedings of the Law by the Pope or the People But our present Gracious Soveraign hath given such admirable instances of his great Justice Clemency and Patience as no History can parallel even the very Murderers of his Father who would scarce allow him to speak before their impious Tribunal were permitted to say what they could in their own defence And those very Barbarous Villains that did not design to * at the Ryeâ— allow him time to say his Prayers were not only legally try'd convicted and justly condemned with all manner of regular proceedings but had afterwards the charitable assistance of his own Chaplains And although upon the relation of such an horrid design against his Royal Person if He had cut them all to pieces without any more ado no mortal man could have question'd or have call'd him to an account for it yet such is the malice of that implacable Party that for his great Clemency they insinuate that he wants Courage and for his Justice they do as much as say he is a Tyrant But as the King so are his Laws so good for the People that King James did as truly as solemnly declare That the Common Law of England was as proper for this Nation as the Law of Moses was for the Jews But still to supply the defects of the Common Law we have our Statute Laws which were made at sundry times and upon divers occasions in Parliament and these Laws receive matter from the Lords and Commons but form and life from the King and then our Ecclesiastical and Maritine Courts are governed by the Civil Laws which are the result of the Wisdom and Prudence of the best Law-givers that have been in all Ages and for the Good of others as well as of our own Nation If your Laws said he be so very good how comes it to pass that there are so many Controversies long and vexatious Suits such endless Differences and Quarrels among the Subjects What is the reason that those who have been Factious Turbulent and Seditious should go so long unpunished The Reason Sir said I is because the King will govern by Law but they will not be ruled by it But have a little patience Hemp is not ripe in a day 'T is no Magical plant rais'd by the sin of Witchcraft and yet 't will conjure down the Devil in Time Easter Term is coming on a pace and as some of their mouths have been pretty cool the last great Frost So if others be not more quiet for the Future they will not have so much money to burn in their pockets against the next To your first Question I might Answer by asking you the reason of so many Disputes and Janglings in Religion I am sure you confess that you are satisfied as to the excellency of the Christian Faith and yet you might as well object against the Truth of it because there have been so many Heresies in the Church as against the goodness of our Laws Because there are so many peevish subtil and factious persons in the State There are likewise Hereticks among the Lawyers as well as among the Divines For if the Laws of God are not free from the false Glosses and Expositions of ambitious or covetous Casuists how shall any Law of man escape them To conclude after all our Government is a Miracle of a thousand years working And although some will tell you the Times and Occasions of Enacting or Repealing any Statute Law and the Originals of all our Courts of Judicature Yet considering the many and strange revolutions that attend all sublunary Principalities and Powers 't is a work beyond the reach of the most exquisite Judgment to unravel the whole Series of Affairs that have brought this admirable frame of Government to perfection Truly Sir said he I do not perceive that the People of England have any reason to fear Arbitrary Government under so gracious a Prince or to he weary of a Monarchy so vastly differing from those four which were so formidably represented in the Ancient Vision of the Prophet Daniel I am sure said I there is none in being that may at this day compare with it all the Eastern Empires and Monarchies are absolutely Tyrannical and of the West the people of France have lost their Liberties the Kingdom of Spain suffers extremely by the clashing Interests of the Jesuits with other Orders and their treachery to the House of Austria and so does the Empire of Germany the Kingdoms of Denmark and Bohemia have not been so long Hereditary and the Kingdom of Poland is Elective to this day Now said he you are come to my Native Country I can assure you that there are great Inconveniencies attending the Time of the Interregnum and Election too And however our present Magnanimous and truly Illustrious King has by his Conduct and Valour gain'd himself immortal renown Yet 't is better for the people to have Peace than a prosperous War And the King of England has had as hard a Task and which has required as much Courage and Prudence to subdue and quell his Turkish Protestants at home as the King of Poland had to conquer the Protestant Turks abroad Against which sort of true Protestants the true Turks shall arise in the Judgment
his people So sayes the Authour of Plato Redivivus said I but he does not think so Believe me in the Ballotting Vrns are buried all the Liberties of the common people of Venice they are there so far from chusing a Soveraign that they cannot chuse a Gentleman and never by any art merit or industry become one But the meanest Subjects of England have one advantage which no Democracy in the World much less the Aristocracy of Venice ever afforded That by their vertues they sometimes arrive from the lowest condition to an higher Sphere of Splendor Honour and Riches than any Commonwealth upon Earth affords I know some have argued for a Commonwealth from the great successes and long continuance of that Government but they who look into the Original of it will find better reasons from the place and Situation from the occasions of its being inhabited why it should fall into that Model than why any others especially the Monarchy of England should condescend and conform to it But the Authour of Plato Redivivus would have it so or else He loses his longing I wonder in this hatching Age that no Politick Fop ever yet stood up and demanded or propos'd that the Kings of England should be acknowledged by the same odd and fantastical Ceremonies with which the Arch-Duke of Austria is confirm'd in his Dukedom of Carinthia For there is nothing so ridiculous nothing so dangerous as our Modern Hereticks and Politicians do not now-adaies assert Therefore Sir let me as a Friend advise you to keep your Politicks to yourself You may frame and model in your Study as long as you please without breaking your shins but if you put them either in writing or practice you will indanger the breaking your Neck And suppose you escape that you may chance to meet with those if you have one Grain of honour or sense lest you that will break either your brains or your heart But if your head be so full of Politicks e'en petition Jupiter to pluck thee up an Island somewhere in the Atlantick Ocean as He is seign'd to have done Delos for the Birth of Apollo there thou maist be delivered of thy Politick Conceptions for I do not know any part of the Earth that hath long peep'd over the surface of the Waters that will be plagued with them I say e'en petition Jove for such a restless Varlet as thou art art not fit to pray to the God of the Christians whose Vicegerent thou hast debas'd and whose Ministers thou hast vilified What Religion you are of I cannot tell but by your recommending to us the Dmocratical Government of old Rome I am apt to believe that you would bring us under the Jesuitical Discipline of the new This was the advice of Parsons the Jesuit alias Doleman and of his Confederates in his High Court of Memorials for Reformation of England at Sevil in Spain Anno 1590. as Watson a Secular Priest relates in his Quodlibets p. 94 95. And of Tho. Campanella an Italian Friar who in his Book de Monarchia Hispanica c. 25. p. 204. informs the King of Spain That nothing will so much conduce to weaken the English as dissention and discord sown among them First by Instigating the swaying men in the Parliament House Vt Angliam in Formam Reipublicae reducant in Imitationem Hollandorum To reduce England into a form of a Commonwealth in Imitation of the Hollanders But they value not what sort of Commonwealth whether Dutch or Venetian they model us to so that at last they may but obtain their Ends of ruining our present establisht Government For my part Sir I wonder that any English man of common sense should be cajol'd to admire the Politicks of every whiffling Rascal who under the name of a true Protestant is managing the most malicious Designs of our inveterate Enemies the Jesuits I wonder that any man of the least reason and experience should not dread the desperate Hazzards that inseparably attend every change and revolution in Government the Restitution indeed of this Monarchy after the late Civil Wars was the greatest wonder that I meet with in all History since Dominion was founded on Earth considering that it was done without Violence or Bloodshed but it never was nor ever will be chang'd without numberless Deaths and Calamities and suppose it should be done what would the People of England get by being in the same Condition they were in twenty five Years ago Or which the common people of Holland are in at this day who pay Customs for Foggs and Damps and are Tax'd for Quartane Agues and who have nothing cheap among them but Heresie and Schism I confess you have a great deal of reason to admire the Fundamental Immunities and Priviledges of the Venetians because very rare in a Christian Commonwealth for they may whore and be clapt according to Law and go to the Conventicles of Venus without any great danger of persecution for Righteousness sake But how in the mean Time is this Liberty of the people consistent with the Purity of the Gospel for which you so strenuously stickle and make a noise Oh pray pardon me I forgot that you are a Politician a Politician that is for obliging mankind with vertues a-la-mode and Morality and Divinity of the newest fashion you Politicians hate the old dull phlegmatick grey-beard Apostolical Rules you are for spick and span new Riddles and Paradoxes and therefore Sir to oblige you I will tell you a piece of news What is that said he I am heartily sorry Sir said I for the great loss you particularly had four thousand years ago What an hard case was it that the Records of Sodom and Gomorrha should be so unluckily burnt Without doubt you would have gathered things of great Moment from them and might have gratified a great many of your true Protestant Friends with surprising relations of the great Liberties and Priviledges of those people of which we have a small hint by the memorable clutter they made about Lots door Gen. 19. vers 4. And such a rabble of Catamites would most properly have raised the Ghost of Plato from the dead who was so notorious a Sodomite when alive You are a railing prating Boy reply'd he who values your Judgment that have nothing of solid Learning or substantial Politicks in you You are a paltry quibbling insignificant Black Coat Before I could answer him Hobbs took courage and fell in with him pellmell calling me Pedantical Academick His Vniversity-Learning said he has quite spoil'd him and for want of my reasonings and conclusions he is no better than a dull pragmatical Ideot But yonder is a grave serious and Ancient learned man I will be judg'd by him Ay! and so will I too replyed Nevil For He is one of our Friends an Holy man and a good Commonwealths man a great Enemy to Tyranny Ay to Popery too said Hobbs I followed them and at some distance I espied Mr. Richard Baxter walking
I will thank them and confess my sin to all the world but Malicious railings I take for Rebellions themselves I shall not regard I will not rail on Mr. Baxter replyed Seignior Chr. for 't is a difficult thing to nickname Schism Sedition Murther and Treason but this I must say of his writings If they were made hangings to his House of Office as Olivers Porters Papers are to his Cell he might do himself the kindness of hiding the one side of them that contradict the other for certainly no man living ever gave himself the lie so often or complemented himself into so many titles of Infamy in one breath since the world began no man ever took so much pains to justifie himself as Baxter has to expose and condemn himself For would you know what sin he is most guilty of that is so ready to make his Confession 't is certainly that which he most declaims against how dangerous a thing in his most serious Meditations upon these his superfine Politicks saies he is pride of heart When once it grows to an enormous height it will make men swell with self conceit and think none so fit to govern Countries and Nations as they nor any so fit to teach the Church nor any so meet to judge what is good or evil to the Commonwealth This he saies at the end of that Book wherein he dogmatically prescribes rules of Polity for the State as since he has done for the Church in opposition to all the rules of Modesty and Obedience and contrary to all the Laws of God and man To conclude for all Mr. Baxter's pretences to Gods glory and the increase of Religion these his impracticable whimsies would be so far from procuring that good to this Nation which he promises to himself and pretends to us that they would certainly over-run us with Enthusiastick Knaves and Hypocrites and from Elihu in Job we may learn the fatal consequences of his ridiculous Politicks for we gather from Job 34. 30. that He maketh an hypocrite to reign when he is minded to scourge a sinful people We have learn't said I dear friend we have sufficiently learnt the truth of this by late and sad experience we have found the wicked and dismal Conclusions of this and other villanous Maxims of Fanatical and Hypocritical Policy for twenty years together wherein the Courts of Justice were fill'd with Violence and Oppression the Churches with Sacriledge and Blasphemy the Earth with the dead bodies and Hell with the souls of Rebells wherein there was more wickedness committed in this one Island than in all the world besides so that Foreigners said that the King of England was King of Devils and I will swear that there is none to compare with the white ones THE Third VISION OF GOVERNMENT The CONTENTS The monstrous Loyalty of the Fanaticks Their several Ridiculous Policies the growth and design of the late Hellish Conspiracy The two fundamental Principles of the Good Old Cause First That All Civil Authority is deriv'd Driginally from the People The extreme villany and folly of this Proposition throughly examined and by a Civiliz'd Cannibal condemn'd The Second That Birth-right and Proximity of Blood give no Title to Rule or Government and that It is lawful to preclude the next Heir from his Right of Succession to the Crown The great impiety and folly of this Proposition fully discovered and condemned by an Indian of New-England The Authors and Abetters of them both exposed The great Wisdom and Goodness of our present Gracious Soveraign in securing to this Monarchy the right and lineal descent of the Crown THE more haste the worse speed cry'd a blundering Fellow that stumbled upon me and had almost beaten me down Whither so fast friend what is your business said Seignior Christiano to him I am upon life and death Sir said he pray don't stop or stay me I am going for Cordials for a matter of forty or fifty people in the next room that are all ready to swoon and dye away This broke off our discourse and we hastened immediately to know what was the matter and who they were At our first entrance how wonderfully was I surpriz'd to see Hobbs and Boxter Knox and Buchanan Hunt and Gilby Milton and the Jesuits sitting all together like friends but in a very disconsolate posture Some complained of grievous pains in the Spleen others were sick at the Heart but all of them were most dismally tormented in their heads Whilst I stood looking on them I can tell you what they all ail said a Gentleman to me whom I took to be a Physician I can tell what they ail without feeling their pulses do but follow me He open'd a door which led us into a Court like that of the Scholes at Oxford in the midst of it there was a great Fire and an Officer very solemnly threw a great number of Books into it These are said the Gentleman the Books and Writings containing those infamous Heretical and Blasphemous Propositions which that famous Vniversity condemn'd and sentenc'd in their Convocation July 21. 1683. upon the discovery of the late Hellish Conspiracy And those men you just now past by are Fanatical Wizards who are in pain whilst their charms of Rebellion are burning but yonder Fellow is giving them a refreshing Cordial made of a composition of Impudence Contradiction and Obstinacy and you shall see them all recover themselves immediately What he said prov'd true for Hunt grew presently as brisk as a Body-Louse and smiling and turning himself round about It is very certain said he good people that these Protestant Subjects namely the Dissenters have cheerfully given their Assistance to the support of the Government It is well known that they are an Industrious Trading People that willingly pay whatsoever Taxes the Law requires And it is remarkable that no people ever exprest a greater zeal to oppose the various attacques of a Foreign Anti-spiritual Power than these Dissenters And could I know any one of them that would shrink from his Princes service when his Royal Person and Government are menaced I would esteem him not only a Fool but a Traytor to boot We are very much beholden to you indeed reply'd Seignior Christiano a smart fellow truly I think you wrote the Postscript not long before and what you now say is in a Book entitled Compulsion of Conscience condemn'd and that came out a little after the discovery of the late Conspiracy and would you call him a Traytor Surely Judas himself never look'd damnation in the fate with half that impudence with which the Author of the Postscript has done Hell it self within an inch of the Gallows and thus to justifie his or their pretended Innocency out-does him that hang'd himself and so confest his Treachery What Devil said he turning towards us can trace these Infernal Changlings who if their villany succeeds are Righteous if it miscarries are Innocent Indeed Sir said I they are no Changlings
a Glass of Wine with you but that I have extraordinary business with yonder Gentleman at present But pray meet me to morrow about three of the Clock at the With all my heart replyed Seignior Christiano and then took his leave of him Turning again to me That Jesuit said he entertain'd me very civilly at Rome but I don't like his company in London Why Sir said I is he a Jesuit He is so replyed he I remember him a great deal better than Oates does Don John That those Sir said I who receive moneys from the French Agents should exclaim against French Pensioners that a Jesuit should cry down Popery is no more news than that an old Bawd should inveigh against Fornication that a Libertine should struggle for Toleration may be because in the height of his Politicks he may fancy that the letting loose the Lyons in the Tower or three or four thousand Bears would most properly conduce to the good of the Subject But I wonder that the people of England should be cajol'd into Fears Discontents and Mutinies by such an unreasonable and ridiculous distinction as of the Court and Countrey Party For have the Courtiers no Estates No Interests in the Countrey Have not they Liberties and Priviledges appertaining to them as well as the rest of His Majesties Subjects Are they not as fit for His service who have been abroad and have learn'd the experience in Foreign Countreys and know their Designs and Policies are they not as fit for his Great Council as if they had only strutted after a Pack of Dogs or walkt up to the knees in Puppy in their own Grounds all the dayes of their lives I do not speak this to reproach any Countrey Gentleman No Nation in the World has more or better qualified for all Honourable employments than this of England has in every County but I speak it against those who object against any Gentleman though every way well qualified only because forsooth he is a Courtier as if a man could not be a Good Subject and a Good Patriot at the same time and in the same place Why any body should fear that they should be instrumental to the Bringing in of Popery I cannot tell But I am sure a man may observe more Devotion in the Kings and Dukes Chappels than in any other Churches or Chappels in England But of all the men living they have the most reason to be against Tyranny if there was the least reason to fear it For search the Histories of all Ages and you will find that under Tyrants none of the Subjects were more in danger than those who immediately attended upon their persons What a miserable condition were the very Cronies of Alexander Nero Domitian c. in The Officers of the Grand Seignior's Seraglio at this day though fine and gay are the veriest Slaves of the Turkish Empire and a Bustling English Countrey Fellow would sooner chuse to dangle on a Gibbet than to stand sixt and starcht in such a posture of silence and mortification as they are forc'd to do many hours together Why then is this unreasonable this silly distinction 'T is they replyed Seignior Christiano who make a difference between the King and his People that make this distinction they who would destroy the King and his Government alwayes begin with his Council and his Court. This is but the repeated practice of these restless and Diabolical Politicians and according to the methods and growth of the late Rebellion you may trace them in all the waies that directly led to the last Hellish Conspiracy No Vermin that were ever run down ever left such a stink behind them all the way for these twenty years we have had the second part to the same tune of Lying Libelling Reviling Swearing Forswearing Caballing Canting and Covenanting So that I do not wonder that you in your * Visions of Thorough Reformation p. 230. last Book that was Printed before the discovery of their Hellish Conspiracy should so positively foretel their Doom who had so diligently observ'd their practices I do not reply'd I pretend to be either a Prophet or a Poet but when his Majesties Declaration was read I was startled to find them playing the same Game over again so exactly that a Body can scarce distinguish their Conspiracy in 83. from their Villany in 62. which they then confest and for which some of them were executed for the ends and design were the same and that too was managed by a Council of Six as I have observ'd in that Book I alwaies fear'd that they would grow desperate and certainly concluded that they would never be quiet until they had again either ruin'd the Government or themselves Yet the particulars which the King has declar'd to all his Loving Subjects and which they themselves have confest and acknowledged more waies than one are so astonishing that I tremble to think that ever it should enter into the hearts of men to destroy so excellent a Prince so wise and just a Government by such Barbarous and bloody means as would make the most wretched slaves afraid to think of Attempting against the most cruel and Tyrannical Moors and Infidels and most of all amazing is it to consider that men of Honour Estates and good Education as they say they had should ingage themselves in so unnatural and barbarous a Conspiracy for Gods sake how shall we wipe off that huge scandal that is brought upon the English Nation before all mankind upon Christianity before Infidels and Vnbelievers upon the Reformation before Papists by this unnatural and cruel Treachery There 's a question indeed reply'd Seignior Christiano for a Politician to ask I can carry you to several people in this Town that can do it in the twinkling of a Cows Thumb How is that said I Why the Fanaticks lay it upon the Church of England they say that most of the Conspirators were Conformists Well! they confess then said I that there was a Conspiracy but I say that they that were ingag'd in it were no more of the Church of England than those who cut off King Charles his Head are of the Church Triumphant He that rebels against his Sovereign is no more a Member of the Church of England let him go to Church as oft as he will than those Jews were of Christs Mystical Body who oft came to him and throng'd him and yet at last denied and Crucified him But Sir that I may by any means be somewhat instrumental to the preventing men from running into such dangerous Courses for the future Pray let me know some of those Principles by the which they at first are insensibly wheedled and drawn into these fatal practices for the present The truth is Sir reply'd he the first and last Movers to these Enormities let them pretend what they will are the Devils of Pride Ambition and Covetousness But because 't is the trick of such Politicians to puzzle the understandings of men
multitude when they shall be called to answer before Kings and Rulers for his sake Besides even wicked Kings are the just Judgements of God and shall we fight against his Judgements We may no more remove a wicked Prince by murder than seek to asswage the Pestilence by Idolatry but this wicked and ungodly Maxim is never more preach't and proclaim'd abroad than when there is the least reason for it even whilst we are under Religious Kings and Governours However 't is at all times most Diabolically impious because diametrically contrary to the plainest sense of the word of God in which we are taught that by him Kings Reign and Princes decree Justice By him Princes rule and Nobles even All the Judges of the Earth Secondly This Proposition is impious and false because the Kings of England do not derive either their power or form of Government from the People All the Objections about Contracts Covenants Coronation-Oaths c. come at last to this consequence that then God Almighty himself has a less right of Dominion over us because he condescends to incourage our Obedience to him by the Grants and Promises he makes in his Covenant with us For by him and for him do the Kings of this Realm rule over us and from him they receive all that power and goodness which they as his Ministers to us for good communicate unto the People and indeed they have been Ministers to us for good in reducing us from the Barbarism of Heathenish Picts to become the most civiliz'd Nation and best Christians in the world For let but any man without the squint-ey'd malice of Doleman and his Disciples peruse the Chronicles of England and he will find that the people thereof are under God beholding to their Kings for all the good they injoy at this day it may be truly said of the Ancient Britains Populus nullis Legibus tenebatur Arbitria principum pro Legibus erant 'T was Lucius the first Christian King in all the World that sent to Rome for the unvaluable Treasures of the Gospel which he set the higher price upon by his own pious and illustrious example 'T was he chang'd the Arch-Flamins and Flamins and all that mockery of Heathenisin wherein the Devil pretended to ape the Divine Institutions into Arch-Bishopricks and Bishopricks long before the name of a Rebellious Presbyter or of a persidious Jesuit was known upon the face of the Earth 'T was Alfred the Saxon but Christian King of England that divided this whole Realm into Shires those Shires into Lathes Rapes or Ridings those again into Wapentakes or Hundreds those again into Boroughs and then as Jethro advis'd Moses set over them c. 'T was Edward the Confessor that like Justinian collected the Laws that were dispersed into one Body But said the Politician again interrupting me Were they not Laws before he put them in order Without doubt said I they were not until allow'd of by his Predecessors although perhaps they were never inroll'd But hark you Sir I will thank you and so shall all my Neighbours if you can shew me a Copy of the Grant of the People to this King wherein they impowered him to cure them of that nauseous Disease the Struma and when you have done I will as easily prove that they gave the Levites of old power to heal the Leprosie and when I have done I will take care that it shall not be called the Kings Evil but the Peoples Evil for the future But don't so frivolously interrupt me How can the King derive his Power from the People when all Power is originally under God from him The People indeed sometimes chose their subordinate Magistrates as the May or of a City and this choice designs the Person but does not confer the Power which descends by virtue of the Kings Charter and therefore are said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as are sent by him and Lambard in his Archion or Commentary upon the High Courts of Justice in England learnedly derives all the Lay and mixed Courts of Records from the Crown their Original and saies moreover that whatever power is by him that is the King committed over unto other men the same nevertheless remaineth still in himself for as Bracton saith well Rex habet Ordinariam Jurisdictionem omnia jura in Manu sua quae nec ita delegari possunt quin ordinaria remaneant cum ipso Rege Though the Great Council of the Nation to which He gives life may by the same sacred Breath be dissolv'd yet the King never dies and all other inferiour Courts Civil or Ecclesiastical derive their Power from the King by which as well the Sovereign's goodness to the People as that he derives not his Power from them is very manifest Henry the Third granted unto his Subjects that great Charter wherein he Ordained thus * Communia 9 Hen. 3. Placita non sequantur Curiam nostram sed teneantur in aliquo certo Loco Yet the Kings Power is not diminished though Himself and his People thereby both eas'd I might confirm what I defend with innumerable Instances but once I say for all That the Liberties the Priviledges the Power the People have is from this that the King has not his power from them For Thirdly This Proposition is impious and false because the most ready way to Tyranny King Charles the First died a Martyr for the People for their Liberties and Properties and Our Gracious Sovereign King Charles the II. restored them but how long might they have whistled for them had Cromwell's or any other Family continued the Vsurpation About the Year 1410. John de Medicis stoutly maintaining the Liberties of the People of Florence against the Nobles first setled that Soveraignty over them that they pay excise for Herbs and Sallads and but that the Princes of Tuscany have generally prov'd mild and good there is not the least scrit of a Law or compact to limit them For the people who alwaies do such things in a heat and hurry never trouble their heads about such Contracts and Compacts as our santastical Politicians dream of But why is this Proposition so frequently started under so gracious a Prince and so good a Government Oh! without doubt to settle the Nation Why at this Time a-day do we puzzle our heads with prying into the remotest times of darkest Ignorance and Barbarism for an unnecessary uncertainty Oh! by all means to establish Christs Throne But must Christ's Throne be establish't by appealing to the People Was he ever so revil'd in his three Offices before To the People Who it seems need him not in his Prophets to instruct them they can preach to themselves who it seems need him not in his Priests to interceed for them because they can pray for themselves who it seems need him not in his Kings to rule them for they can govern themselves Was he ever so revil'd by people that call themselves Christians Such Doctrine is more suitable
with the lewd Revels of Fescenninus than with the wise and peaceable Discipline of the obedient and holy Jesus and if you be not convinc't of the Impiety of it you shall see enough of the madness and folly of it The Wainscot behind his back parted asunder on a sudden and opened like a Scene discovering a very large Field in the which there were several companies of people distinct from one another who were very busie and clamorous I suppose Sir said I to him you will allow that this Proposition of yours was never design'd either to please or oblige those People of England who are Loyal Subjects to the King or Obedient Sons of the Church and every Body will grant that it is now vented to put the Dissenters into a posture of Rebellion against their present Sovereign therefore to pleasure both you and them I have brought them here all before you and given them here all before you and given them every one their particular choice and humour and pray do but see what delicate work they make in the Conclusion The first Company we came among were a great number of Presbyterians they were so hot and lowd that we thought that there had been several Competitors for the Sovereignty and that there had been a mortal difference between them but it seems there was no such thing for all that great Bustle was made because they could get no body to take it upon him No sooner said a young Fellow that stood by us when we inquired the reason had they hung up yonder Table that contains the * See Baxters H. Com. Terms and Conditions of their Sovereign but they proved so slavish so base and dangerous that all men of Quality and Fashion privately withdrew and there were none but Mechanicks left and now they have been several hours proposing it to them it seems none of them have accepted of it yet But if you please you may hear what Arguments they use by what they are going to say to yonder Cobler As soon as we came to them We are not ignorant said they unto him that God hath indued Thee with the Spirit of Wisdom Fortitude and Justice and that thou art a man fearing God and hating Covetousness and therefore most sit to go in and out before this great People Men and Brethren replyed he You may translate Kingdoms and Common-wealths when you please and to whom you please but as for me I am resolved to translate nothing but old Shoes as long as I live I am not so weary of my life yet I thank you by Gomms here I can sit and be quiet and not be Plagu'd with your Monstrances and Petitions you shan't say I have Popish or Evil Counsellors Here I can be safe and fear no Caballing Plotting or Conspiring I am sure you won't depose me from my Bulk you shan't say I spend the Treasure of the Nation or spoil Trading I fear no Protestant Flails or Blunderbusses the Boyes now and tan beat out my Candle with Squirts and sometimes a Drunken Bully staggers against my Shed and puts my Lasts out of order but I make 'um make Constitution for the damage they do me and that is all I ever receive and who the Deuce would be plagued to rule you who tatter out more Governments in a Years time than sixteen Solomons can mend in an Age. Therefore e'en go about your Business to some body else if you walk until you wear out your Shoes I 'le mend 'um as cheap as any body shall and thank you into the bargain We left them and went to the Anabaptists and Independents and there we found the case much otherwise for if some little Jack of Leyden Knipperdolling or any other Enthusiast did but tell his Dream the Rabble were for wrapping him in Purple putting the Sword into his hands and then willing to starve in his Service being fed with nothing but Revelations acted all manner of Infernal Villanies for a time until at last weary of their King they as hastily dispatcht him The Quakers were not so hot upon the point of chusing a Supreme Magistrate for they had a silent meeting about it a longtime at last one of them very gravely broke the Ice saying Friends it is doubtful Whether 't is most convenient to have One or Fifty or an Hundred or none at all to rule over us it is dangerous to have One because we hear how Friend Pen exalteth himself above the Brethren in the Land of the Heathen by taking upon him the Titles and Ceremonies of the Kings of the Gentiles and Ye know that we must call no man Master At this an arch Wag that was in their dress and had compos'd his Face and Hat like the Brethren interrupting him said Friends Ye have heard that ye must call no man Master 't is true But why should this hinder you from having one to oversee the Flock For though Ye have all the Spirit Ye are not all the Head or the Eye Therefore I have thought of one whom Ye may set over you and call him Master too and yet call no man Master Who is that Friend Who is that cry'd they all at once Friends said he Among your Brethren the Tartars there arose one of late daies who was neither Man nor Woman nor Hermophradite But He was Man and eke Horse in him was the the Spirit of Meekness and Humility for he lived on the Herbs of the Field and hath been at Grass all the daies of his life Verily said they he is of the Family of Nebuchadnezzar Now you talk said he of Nebuchadnezzar Harken O Ye Children of men to what I am going to say unto you There was a Neighbour of his one Darius Hystaspis and he gat his Dominion by the Neighing of his Horse for very prudently he contriv'd to have a beautiful Mare in the next room by which means the Affections of his Horse were wonderfully mov'd in his behalf If our Friend Green of Colchester would bring his Mare into some private place near him we should soon perceive and know whether or no the Spirit of Government be upon him They never were so near coming to a positive resolution in this world as at this moment for the Motion was new and extraordinary however having humm'd and groan'd a little time they could not agree nor never will about any thing of Government so long as they are Quakers I should have said Slaves such as the Romans call'd Servi poenae and such indeed they are by despising Civil Offices and lawful Authority Going away from them an Olive-colour'd Tawny complexion'd Fellow came staring and running so violently along that he overthrew the Politician and had like to have beaten all the oraculous breath out of his Body we stopt the man thinking he had been distracted but we perceiv'd that he began to recollect himself and therefore we askt him his Name his Country and what he was My Name said he good
Attempt do it for us Pray Sir said he What did you expect would be the consequence of that Bills passing Why said the Jesuit we in a short time would have made the Kingdom of England Elective and this would have dissolv'd the Hereditary lineal Descent for ever for by that Precedent we had never wanted some excuse or other for a Bill of Exclusion which would have been of greater Authority than all the Antiquated and disparate instances which Doleman hath gathered from all History And then we should have removed the greatest Obstacle in the world to our affairs by setting up Kings of another Family in opposition to the true Hereditary Line which was the advice of Campanella a great many years ago and it was wise Counsel then and wiser now For First That Family is so mortally and justly incens'd against us that we can never expect that they will ever trust or be reconcil'd unto us Secondly The Profits Honours and security which that Royal Family according to the Laws of the present Establisht Government injoys and to which it has a fundamental Right are greater than any Prince that is a Roman Catholick can have were it not for the disturbances we give them by making Factions and Divisions among the People And Thirdly The People of England under the Rules of that Government and the protection of that Royal Family enjoy such advantages not only of Riches but of Knowledge and good Conversation that all the little Monastical Arts and Devices of Monks and Friars can never over-reach or impose upon them but if we could ruine that Family their Government would soon fall and nothing would more effectually have done it than the Bill of Exclusion had it passed Well! and What then reply'd the Gentleman looking a little sternly upon him Why then said he England should have been an Island of Jesuits An Island of Devils said the Gentleman frowning You will never have done until you have ruin'd us our condition was pretty tolerable before such perfidious Traytors as you are justly provok't the Government to which you have been so injurious to Enact severe Laws and Statutes against us 'T is you that have imbroil'd all the rest of Christendom and now you envy that so small a spot of ground should injoy the blessings of Peace For by this infernal stratagem you would again involve us in the miserable Confusions of Civil Wars that so no part of the Earth may be free from your wickedness and no place in Hell too hot for your reward What do you mean Sir said the Jesuit What! are you turn'd Heretick No Sir replyed he I acknowledge that I am a Roman Catholick yet I detest such barbarous and unnatural Doctrines and Practices the very Venemous Conceptions of Father Parsons who was not only the worst of Jesuits but a Bastard to boot and I have here with me a poor Indian Savage that can indeed speak English but has scarceshak't of his Soot and Grease and is just polisht enough for the common Civilities of life and I dare venture my reputation that as soon as you shall acquaint him with and make him understand such a Proposition that he will naturally abhor and condemn it All this while there stood waiting behind him a tall man of a true Philomot complexion but a very lusty Fellow Coâ—â—â— Come hither said the Gentleman his Master come hither to this man At this he fell a shuddering and went backwards so that his Master stept to him and took him by the Arm but then he drew back until his breech almost toucht the ground spreading out his hands and staring like a wild Bull. I pray Master said he I am afraid indeed I am not Christian enough yet What do you mean Sirrah said his Master Is not this Sir said he Tanto Tanto said the Jesuit What is that That is replyed the Gentleman the Devil or the Tempter but Coâ—â—â— Why do you fancy this man to be Tanto Why then he is a Presbyterian Christian as you call 'um and I tell you why I am afraid of him My Father knowing that I was tamper'd with one of them like this man at Boston in New England beat me almost to death for it telling me that he would learn me to kill my Father and to kill my King Well Corëe said his Master tell me one thing do you Indians love your King And do you love his Son for his sake And when your King dies and goes to the Green Fields behind the Hills has his Son his Matts his Skins his Canoes his Feathers his Bracelets and all his fine things Yes yes said he All All. And if the King said his Master has no Sons do you Indians love his Brother if he has one O yes said he and his Brother has all his Whigwhams his Womans all all and then we go lay our hands on our knees and he laies his head on his shoulders and then we sing and dance and go out to sight for him and to hunt for him and indeed if it were not for our Kings we should utterly destroy one another Now although the Massachusetes are several Nations yet every one takes their Kings part and do what he commands and honour him as much as he can and so keep together and defend one another Nor is it only the Custome of the Massachusetes in New England but the Paroisti ' s in Florida are honoured so too When English men came first to New England our people used to say that King James was a good King and his God a good God but our Tanto naught But when they heard that they killed that Kings Son when he came to be King they said that they were all Tanto's and could not endure them but said that you sent thither the worst Christians you had for in all places the Indians love their Kings and his Brothers and his Sons and do but ask those that have a Plantation call'd New York and they will give you a better account than I can for I was very young when I came first among the English That place replyed the Gentleman is so called from his Royal Highness the chief Proprietor and then turning to his Indian hark you Corëe thou art Christian enough to incounter that Tanto Devil therefore beat him soundly and tell him I bid you do so The Jesuit seeing the Indian coming up to him in good earnest began to run for it however he soon overtook him and gave him half a dozen American Complements with his Indian Bill in exchange for his Bill of Exclusion As soon as they were gone I am very glad Sir said I to see this Jesuit so disappointed I do not question Sir said he but you may find a great many called Roman Catholicks of my mind as to the Doctrine of Submission and Obedience to the Civil Magistrate And I do declare that I from the bottom of my heart do abhor all Traiterous Positions and Practices tending to
not better for you You are a man of parts that may be very serviceable to your Countrey come come with me I 'le help you to as good a Wife as your heart can wish for some Women will be cruel Queen Mary was a grievous Persecutor not fit to govern a very Jezabel saith Calvin and one that burnt Protestants with their Books and Writings The Youth sate leaning on a Bank answering nothing at last a Messenger came to him with a Letter which we suppose brought more comfort in it than any of us could give him for he had not the power to read it altogether but when he had done he was so ravisht and transported with joy as never was poor Malefactor when unexpectedly reprieved from a most cruel death just ready to be inflicted upon him for he trembled with excess of joy his colour came and went now he stood fixt like an Image without life and then kneeling down My dearest sweetest Sovereign Queen and Goddess cry'd he again weeping I 'le love thee I 'le obey thee all the daies of my life A thousand Beams of gladness dart through me I am all over Sunshine I 'le do homage to the very Wormholes of thy Footstool With this he kist the ground and then arising up and looking sternly on the Non. Con. and the Jesuit he laid his hand upon his Sword and said Traytors Rebels and Villains speak one syllable more in dishonour of that glorious Sex and I 'le cut you both into Atoms But you Sir that spoke against Queen Mary assure your self for what you have said against her already because a Woman I am resolv'd if ever I come to be Justice of the Peace I 'le put the 35th of Queen Elizabeth in execution against all those of your Faction before any other Statute of any Kings whatsoever Oh! Sir said the Non. Con. indeed Queen Elizabeth was a very gracious Queen she was most worthy to Reign Truly said the Jesuit I am not so much against all Women I love them well enough for I am sure we would monopolize them all I say the Queen of Sweeden was a most renowned and glorious Queen The Queen of the South shall not only be celebrated but the North too have had a Queen of as famous memory most worthy to Reign because she refus'd it But mine mine said he is worth them all and she shall Reign and I will live as long as I can that she may long live and Reign over me At these words the Youth very nimbly marcht off and as soon as he was gone Well! said the Jesuit I do and must say that the Salique Law which debars Women from the Crown is a very wise and good Law So 't is indeed sad the Non. Con and very fit to be put in execution upon Occasion for Women are foolishly silly and weak and not at all fit to govern More fit than you are to preach cry'd an odd kind of a person as I thought of the Epicoene Gender Who affronted you cry'd the Non. Con. staring upon h You did said the Hermaphrodite You have injur'd the better part of me which is Woman you say they are foolish weak and not fit to govern which I tell you is contrary to the Law of Nature to the Laws of this Realm and most of all contrary to my Own Experience For when my Manhood has a mind to be reserv'd I find that almost every Drab can pump it out of him but my Womanhood can keep her Counsel better than she can hold her water when my Manhood discovers his love or hatred openly violently and foolishly my Womanhood can more easily hide and cover them than the freckles and wrinkles on her face 'T is my Womanhood makes my Manhood witty wise and valiant and in my self I find by experience that the Women influence direct guide and govern all Men living and since I cannot indure two Principles of Sovereignty in the same Soul and that the Nature of my Body inclines most to the Female Sex I have therefore rightly plac't it in the Woman They were so confounded with this Positive Conviction from one of the Doubtful Gender that they both of them sneakt away and as soon as they were gone that Sovereign said I that pleases them shall be Sovereign it seems as long as they think fit and none else For they measure the Rights of Princes by the rule of their own Interests and whether the Sovereign be Man or Woman it is all one to them if either Her or His Majesty do not favour them so as to let them have their wills they are presently upon the Deposing Vein and rather than want Arguments to incite the People to it they will make use of old ones or borrow of one another Come for once and away I 'le tell you what a strange fancy I have now in my head I do fancy That the time will come when the Spawn of these very Presbyterians Independents c. who now at this time do so magnifie and cry up the Reign of Queen Elizabeth will join with the Jesuits in defence of the Salique Law and wherein they will as much extol and commend the Reign of King Charles the Second However the great Game is that the Sovereignty of England should not remain in one single Person Man or Woman for they are for transferring it to a great many Well! for my part said Seignior Christiano I should not like well to see three or four hundred Suns shining in England at once it is a good Temperate Climate now but then it would be too hot for me For I must tell you that it is much better for England that the Sovereignty should be in One woman than in five hundred Men. And I wonder that the Jesuits who call the Virgin Mary the Queen of Heaven and adore her more than our Saviour himself who is the King of Glory should not pay the Homage of Sovereign Honour to that Sex on Earth to which they pay Divine Worship in Heaven But our Politicians who say in their hearts there is no God there would have no King here They think a great many heads is better than One and one Man 's much better than a great many Womens However the simple and honest Christian is very apt to think that God who is the fountain of all Wisdom and by whom Kings and Queens are made Nursing Fathers and Nursing Mothers of his Church does not limit his Spirit to either Sex That he can inrich one single heart with his Heavenly Grace that it shall prove more instrumental to his Glory and our Good than the Worldly Wisdom and Policy of all Mankind and on the other hand let those Politicians look into the 29th Chapter of Isaiah at the 13th and 14th Verses a Prophet is as good as a Politician because he foresees what will come to pass they only design what they would have come to pass and they will find that God saies Because
their fear towards me is taught by the precepts of men therefore behold I will proceed to do a marvellous Work amongst this People even a marvellous work and a Wonder for the Wisdom of their Wisemen shall Perish and the Understanding of their Prudent shall be hid This Sir said I would have been a good Text to have Preacht upon before the Wittena Gemot or meeting of the Wisemen at S. Margarets in Westminster about the Year 1641. Oh! replyed Seignior Christiano it had been a Malignant Text and the Preacher would have been committed to the Custody of the Black Rod. For they were then scrambling for the Sovereignty to share it amongst themselves however they soon lost it by the same Principles by which they Usurpt it and whilst they kept it they made so ill use of it that had the Protestants in Queen Maries Reign been then alive they would have commended her as much as the Fanaticks have done Queen Elizabeth So dreadful was that Judgement when inflicted upon England which was anciently threatned to the Israelites for their rebellion against their Sovereign * Hos 3. 4. the Children of Israel shall abide many daies without a King and without a Prince c. Lord Sir said I if it was dangerous to preach then upon such a Subject before the Wise Men at Westminster 't is in vain to preach it now to some people for they very learned in the Law will tell you that they did not set up another King a Jeroboam to which that Text relates but that they more prudently transferr'd or at least fixt the Sovereign Power in a Parliament and therefore will say What signifies your old fashioned Divinity to the Learned in the Law Those Lawyers reply'd Seignior Christiano learnt their Seditious Principles in the State from Schismatical and Heretical ones in the Church And they that maintain that the Sovereignty of England is not in one single Person are as great Hereticks for Lawyers as the Archontici the Marcionites the Heracleonites the Colarbasians or Valentinians were for Divines and they were Hereticks who were condemn'd for holding several Beginnings Truly Sir said I I think here comes one of these antient sort of Gentlemen you talk of For we now overtook a Comical old Fellow in such a Garb as I never before had seen he had a great Ruff-band on which needed no imbroidery for it was made up of old Saxon Manuscripts and the Trimming to his Cloaths was old Parchment tassels tagg'd with Wax upon which was the Impression of King Arthurs Tooth and of the Fangs of all his Knights This is a pleasant Antiquarian said Seignior Christiano let 's brush the Cobwebs off him a little and make our selves merry with him We needed not to seek long for an opportunity for he immediately came up to us saying Gentlemen my Business in this World is to vindicate the honour of our English Parliaments from the Calumnies of those who say That the Commons of England were introduced and begun An. 49 H. 3. Therefore pray come along with me into yonder Castle and there I will shew you all the ancient and undeniable Records under the British Saxon and Norman Governments We willingly followed him until he brought us into a very large Room where there was Provender enough for the Rats and Mice of twenty Generations He had now pull'd his Hat off and made a low obeysance to an heap of musty Parchments when a bold Fellow came up and with a great deal of scorn kickt them all about the room You old fop said he look you here I have in this Cabinet of mine a sett of Antiquities worth a thousand loads of your mouldy Parliament Rolls Here is said he the Tongue of that Parrot that was first Speaker to the House of Commons in the Parliament of Birds and here are two of his Speeches Here is the Ancient Charter of the City Mouse which he forfeited for eating too far into an Holland Cheese Here is a Tobacco stopper made of Log the first King of the Froggs What do you talk of your Records and Parliament Rolls and House of Commons a fart for your House of Office We did certainly expect that the Antiquarian would have blead him alive to have made new Vellum of his skin for the affronts he put upon his old Parchments But what was extraordinary strange we could not discover that he was in the least angry with him at which we much wondred and therefore I examined those Parchments and found them to be the same which Mr. Petyt of the Inner Temple had made use of for Asserting the Ancient Rights of the Commons of England Printed in the Year Eighty And therefore said I to Seigntor Christiano the writing that Book at a Time when the just Priviledges of Parliament were not in the least call'd in Question but on the contrary when not only the Kings Prerogative but his life also was in Danger by a Conspiracy formed among several that were Members of that House was just as if one should have written of the Antiquity of the See of Rome and of the Grants of our English Kings to several Popes at that very Time when the Popish Plot was first discovered Why truly reply'd Seignior Christiano 't is pitty but that Mr. Petyt should have the same reward the next Parliament which that last Parliament would have bestowed upon such an Authour and that he may not want company some hope that the next Parliament will take the Ignoramus Jury into consideration it being a case according to Mr. Lambard his own Antiquarian not within the reach Archion f. 105. of any standing Law or Statute and in which the Parliament hath Jurisdiction But Sir said I I further remarque upon that Book that whilst he pretends to assert the rights of the Commons he hinders the main Ends of Parliaments What a noise does he make of Baronagium Generale placitum and Communitas Regni and several other denominations by which the Common Council or Parliaments were expressed But not with any design to the right ends for which they were called One great end according to his own Quotation out of †Preface f. 43. Knighton de Event Angl. is ut Inimici Regis Regni Intrinseci hostes extrinseci destruantur repellantur that the Domestick and foreign Enemies of the King and Kingdom may be destroyed and repelled And in order to this it is very requisite that the King should have those that are all Loyal Subjects in that Great Council that He should be supplied with moneys to defray the Publick Charges and therefore what signifies a great many of the Records he has quoted and that in particular of the 34 E. 1. unless he had design'd that the last Westminster and Oxford Parliament should have considered Onera Domino Regi incumbentia as that Parliament did by which dutiful Considerations of his Parliament King Edward I. became a Victorious Prince for he awed France
subdued Wales and brought Scotland into subjection of whose King and Nobility he received Homage But a King it seems may be made Glorious at a cheaper rate than Victorious and our Antiquarian forgot in his Quotation that honest old Rule Incivile est particulam aliquam Legis sumere non perspect a tota Lege For he should as well have had respect to the end of their meeting as to the particular Persons that were there had he written as became a Loyal Subject and an honest man at that time and I do not at all question but he who seems so tender of wounding the Peerage would be the first were it in his power that would turn the Bishops out of the House of Lords although for the blood of him he cannot in all his reading bring the Burgesses into the House of Commons but must stumble over Archbishops and Bishops by the way I suppose reply'd Seignior Chr. He Dedicated that Book to the late Earl of Essex for the same reason that the last Edition of Gods Revenge against Murder is Dedicated to the late Earl of Shastsbury At this both the Antiquarian and He that kickt about his Parchments join'd together and came up to us with a great deal of Fury and had not I by chance catcht hold of his venerable Ruff and threatned to demolish that reverend relick we had not parted without a fray but he thus receiving some damage at the first onset they compounded the matter and so we parted pretty quietly No sooner were we got from them But you see said Seignior Chr. they both agree against any one that defends the Government and in the main design of changing this Ancient Monarchy into a Commonwealth For they who vilifie Parliaments if they do it not out of a rash and inconsiderate humour do it with an ill design to make the King suspected by his People and so at last would have no King and they who give to Parliaments that power that does not belong to them give them power to destroy themselves and so would have no Parliaments a true notion of a Commonwealth destroys the very being both of King and Parliament for he that diminisheth or taketh away the Prerogative of the King takes away the very Power of Parliament even when He pretends to give them the Kings Prerogative So they that fought for King and Parliament in the late Wars fought against them both as appear'd in the conclusion and England can never be a Commonwealth again until their be no King and then there will ipso facto be no Parliament As soon as we were out of the Castle we saw a world of people coming towards the Gates so that I fancied that we were formally Besieged but it seems they only came thither for Intelligence as their Custom was once or twice a week Upon which we fell in among them and found people of all Qualities and Conditions but most of the commonsort and a great many Women I do not know But methoughts I found my self strangely uneasie among them for they differed very much from men of Debonair and civil conversation they had such a dreaming way of talking such leering and suspicious looks that I never saw so much ill Nature together in a crowd all the daies of my life and almost fancied that they had a particular smell with them Seignior Christiano who saw me in a musing quandary taking me aside if there was said he but a small strinkling of Laplanders and Canibals among them they would be the compleatest Body of Commonwealths-men under the Sun However that they may not want some Foreigners to illustrate them they have a few Calvinistical and busie Walloons prickt in among them Have they not a few Rattoons and Baboons too said I Truly they have as much reason to be altering and changing the Government as any Walloon of them all Is it not an horrid shame and scandal that they who are naturaliz'd by the favour of the Prince and have here gain'd good Estates under the Protection of his Laws should grow insolent and mutinous and join with Rebels to ruin him and his Government You know the monstrous gratitude of a Factious Fanatick or you know nothing said Seignior Chr. how many men whose dulness his Majesty has covered with a Title of Honour and a Gold Chain have in requital acted as if they design'd the old Game of binding Kings in Chains ' T is nothing certainly but the Spirit of ingratitude pride ambition covetousness or revenge that makes so many Commonwealths-men in the Kingdom of England I could give you the exact Characters of these men their particular rules of Education and their behaviour in their several Imployments but they will not singly stand the shock of a reprimand and I have no time at present to do it therefore I will in general advise them all We being now got up a little hill and they all before us Men Women and Children said he Tag Rag and Bobtail since the good old Cause is in so bad a condition that you can never expect to turn this Kingdom into a Common-wealth whilst ye live and think that without one you can never die in peace Let me advise you all to make a step to a certain place at the Head of the River Nilus where Sir John Mandevil in his Travels tells us the People themselves have none but that like Flounders they wear their eyes and mouths in their Breasts these would be fit Companions for you Commonwealths-men for those who will have no King or no Bishops are properly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men without heads truly solks Niceph. l. 18. c. 45. ' t is not sit ye should stay here for ye have made your selves such monsters of men as the world never knew You that stickle so for a Commonwealth have taken such wicked courses to procure one as are condemned by the Laws of all the Common-wealths that ever were since the World began the Gallant Romans under Consuls and Tribunes scorn'd to make use of treachery breach of Faith secret Assassinations against their most dangerous and formidable Enemies in Time of War or at least they were forbid in the Civil Law but you have added the invention of Blunderbuzzing against your own Gracious and good Prince in Times of Peace Perjury of which you have been so scandalously Guilty was a crime so detestable to all Nations * Sanderson de Jur. oblig Prael 7. that a learned Casuist tells us Perjurium autem vel ipsis etiam Ethnicis inter gravissima illa Crimina est habitum quae credebantur Deorum Immortalium Iram non in Reos tantum sed in Posteros ipsorum imo in universas Gentes accersere Perjury even by the very Heathens was reckon'd among those highest crimes which were thought to stir up the anger of the Immortal Gods not only against those that were Guilty of it themselves but also against their Posterity ay and against