Selected quad for the lemma: england_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A69451
|
The character of a bigotted prince, and what England may expect from the return of such a one
|
Ames, Richard, d. 1693.
|
1691
(1691)
|
Wing A2975AB; ESTC R9100
|
14,420
|
28
|
barefaced as the Sun And after all this and the Deliverance we Enjoy must we go into the House of Bondage again and put on those Fetters we so lately shook off Let the seeming warmth of this Parenthesis be a little excus'd yet I must confess such considerations as these are almost valid enough to justify a Passion and make Anger appear no Fault for were the Roman Catholicks the only Asserters of the Rights of the late King James the wonder would be little bodies often Sympathise at a distance and they by several Obligations are bound to wish him Success and while they terminate in empty Hopes let them still regale themselves with their airy Diet I pity the deluded Creatures but cannot blame them because they Act upon their own Principles and 't would be as unnatural for them not to Pray for his Return as for a Cardinal in hopes of the Popedom to wish success to the Protestant Forces or a Calvinist to Drink a Health to Monsieur Catinat But when a sort of Men guided as they pretend by the Dictates of an unerring Conscience shall at this time of day openly declare for an exploded Interest and these Protestants too Men no ways leven'd with Popery or any of her Doctrin's but Zealous Maintainers of the Church of England Devout and Pious Charitable and Just in the chief Employments of the Church and the Brightest of the Golden Candlesticks For these so openly to declare their Aversion to this Present Government and their Fondness for the Last is what does not a little elevate and surprise to use an Expression of Mr. Bays and comes almost as near to a Miracle as Transubstantiation A late very Eminent Doctor of the Church when the Prosecution was Violent against the Dissenters wrote a most Learned Tract concerning the Nicety of a Scrupulous Conscience wherein he very curiously Anatomizes the several Meanders and turnings of that invisible Operation and Proves that Humour Discontent and Interest do frequently wear the Livery of Conscience How nice soever some may be in point of Religion I wish these Gentlemen could acquit themselves from the forementioned Disguise with which they masquerade their Political Conscience One would wonder what strange bewitching Sophistry the Church of Rome makes use of to blind the Understandings of her Votaries to that degree that they are continually mistaking their own Interest and tamely to deliver up their Bodies Souls Reputation and Fortunes for the Reversion of Purgatory hereafter only for the slight gratification of their humours here and I appeal to the greatest asserter of King James his Interest if they can produce any Crown'd Head in England since the Conquest who was half so Infatuated and Bigotted to the Interest of the See of Rome as the late King Indeed we Read of a Religious Edward and a Pious Devout Henry but our English History cannot afford us one Instance of a Prince who would Sacrifice his own Honour his Kingdoms Safety his Interest Abroad and the Love of his Subjects at Home meerly out of a mistaken Zeal to the Advancement of the Romish Faith the most solemn Oaths and Protestations esteem'd no more than words of Course and that which was held Sacred amongst all mankind valued as nothing in competition with a Command from the Apostolick Chair The old Lady at Rome with all her Wrinkles has still some Charms to subdue great Princes and tho she has Abus'd Depos'd and Murther'd so many of her Lovers yet she finds every day some new Admirers who are proud of her Charms a Practice which comes as near a Miracle as any that Church in her Legends can boast of and I hope some passages in the late Reign are not so forgotten but they may serve to justify the truth of the Assertion Indeed for our amusement we were once told by a popular Pen That allowing a King upon the English Throne Principled for Arbitrary Government and Popery yet he was Clog'd and Shackl'd with Popular and Protestant Laws that if he had ne're so great a mind to 't there was not a Subject in his Dominions would dare to serve him in his Design How true this Assertion has since prov'd let any indifferent person judge the late King himself both dar'd and found no small number of his Subjects as resolute as their Master to alter the whole Frame of the English Government he found not Men only of his own Communion but Men of all Religions or rather of no Religion at all whose desperate Fortunes push't'em on to the most daring Enterprises his single Command added Life to their Motions and no wonder he found Tools to Work withal when all the Obligations of Law were shrunk into the small compass of a Princes Will and the musty Lines of Magna Charta dwindled to a Sic volo sic jubeo Several other artifices were us'd to let us conceive a Popish Prince no such terrible Bugbear as common Fame represents him as that the Idolatrous Superstition of the Church of Rome was by a long series of time so worn off the minds of the People and the Reformation so strongly Rooted the Church of England so firmly Establish'd the Romanists so detested for their Innovations in Doctrin and Absurdity in Ceremonies c. that it was impossible ever to fix Popery here But alas 't was meer Delusion we quickly saw through the Juggle and the State-Quacks discover'd their Leigerdemain tricks too openly and had not Almighty God by a most surprising and almost unparllel'd Providence Deliver'd us I know not by this time but that the Name Protestant had been as odious in England as the Term of Hugonot is now in France and the Dominicans and Franciscans left their Cells in Lincolns-Inn-Fields and the Savoy to have Sung their Regina Coelorum in all the Cathedrals in England I am not Ignorant how some Persons do still Magnifie the Merits of the late King as to his Private Virtues as his being Descended of the Blood Royal his Inviolable tenderness for his Friend the exact Correspondency of his Mouth and Heart his Courage against the Dutch c. but these were glimmering Rays of his which shin'd upon some few only for when he came to his Meridian they chang'd their Nature and the scorching Beams of his Zeal for his Religion got the Ascenednt of all his other Accomplishments which so clouded his discerning Faculties that he mistook his Friends for his Enemies and his Enemies for his Friends the most sage and deliberate Advices given him in opposition to beloved Jesuits were censur'd as intrenchments upon his Prerogative and the single Ipse Dixit of Father Peters valued above the Joynt Council of the Realm the Colledges of Oxford and Cambridg esteem'd as Nurseries of Hereticks and the President and Fellows of Magdelen Colledg most illegally Ejected from their just Rights to receive upon the Foundation a sort of Sparks who were neither Schollars nor Gentlemen Priviledg was swallow'd up by Prerogative and Know
Soul and Vincit Amor Patriae seem'd to be Written in indelible Marks upon their Breasts for this the ancient Greeks and Romans were Famous Remarkable to this purpose is the Relation Livy gives us of Curtius a Noble Roman who when the Earth was sunk with a wide Gap in the Middle of the Forum and it was told it would not come together again unless some Prime young Nobleman were put into it he to Deliver his Country mounted on Horse-back Rode into the Gaping Chasma But we on the contrary have a sort of Men amongst us who would gladly see their Native Soyl over-run with a knot of Villains to gratifie one Mans Lust of Power on the one hand and their unaccountable Humour on the other I would fain ask them supposing the possibility of such Success whether the French Arms are so well bred as to distinguish them from the rest of the English Sufferers by such a Revolution to which that of the Goths and Vandals in Italy was but a civil Visit I fear like Tarpeia the Vestal Virgin who Covenanted with the Sabines to betray the Capitol to them for what they wore on their left Arms but when they were Entred into of Bracelets which she intended they threw their Targets upon her and Pressed her to Death so would these very Men Suffer in the Common Calamity for the French as well as other Nations agree in this That though they Love the Treason they Hate the Traytors To Invert a little the Words of Mr. Dryden to the Reader before his Poem of Absalom and Achitophel Every Man is a Knave or an Ass on the Contrary Side and there 's a Treasury of Merits in Sam 's Coffee-House as well as in Richard's at the Temple but the longest Chapter in Deuteronomy has not Curses enough for well-wishers to the French It was the Speech of a Moderate Gentleman in the Long Parliament when the Faction in the House of Commons was high against the Bishops and the Establish'd Church Gentlemen says he let us see the Model of your New intended Superstructure before you pull down the Old one If we should ask some of these Fiery Bigots for the Interest of the late King what Advantages they can propose to themselves by his Return unless like the unrewarded poor expecting Caviliers at the Restauration of King Charles the Second they can be content to be Loyal and Starve for if the latter end of King James his imaginary Reign should be of a piece with his first real beginning he will still neglect his truest Friends and stick close to Flattering Enemies With so deep a Root has the Advice of a Chancellor about the year 1660 still remain'd in the Breasts of the Princes Oblige your Enemies and your Friends will be true to your Interest But I have wandred from my Subject by a long but I hope not very Impertinent Digression and therefore asking my Reader 's Pardon return to my Subject or rather the Applicatory part of it We have seen the Character of the Prince and his Bigotted followers And as all things are best set off by Examples let us now draw a Parallel or Landscape of the two different Complexions of the Reigns of King William and Queen Mary and King James and what we are unavoidably to Expect should Almighty God in the Course of his Providence for our Punishment and the gratification of some restless Spirits bring King James to his Throne again Of the Ease and Tranquility of the first we are certain but of the Horrour of the latter the most terrible Ideas we can form of it in our Imaginations will come short of the Life for as the safety we now enjoy almost exceeds our Hopes so the Stripes we must then feel will transcend our very Fears In the Person of the King we have a Prince who is truly what the Historian says of Titus Humani generis Deliciae who has centred in his Person all the Valour and Wisdom of his Ancestors A Prince so truly Great that those Lawrels which add such Lustre to anothers Brow look but faintly on His He needing no additional Varnish to set off His Native Goodness A Prince Born to be the Arbiter of Christendom whom all the Crown'd Heads and States of Europe Adore as the only Person who must break the Jaws of the French Leviathan Not the greatest Dangers which so terrify pusilanimous minds can at all move Him who caring not for an inactive inglorious Greatness expos'd his Sacred Person to Rescue these ungrateful Kingdoms from the moct insupportable Tyranny of Arbitrary Power since which in Ireland he gave most Invincible Proofs both of his Courage and Conduct the United Force of Europe could not concert their Measures against France till his Presence Influenced their Counsels at the Hague to which he went through a thousand Perils at Sea after a short Return He is now gone again to Flanders to head that Prodigious Army Victory seems to accompany him in Attempts of War and his worst Enemies must own him to have the very Soul of Courage In the Person of the Queen we have a Second Queen Elizabeth but with respect to her Sacred Ashes we may say the Copy far exceeds the Original Never did a Crown'd Lady shew more Conduct and Magnanimity than when the French Fleet was upon our Coast when her Illustrious Husband was Fighting in Ireland A Princess whose thousand Charms make her fit to Rule and Command even Respect from her very Enemies if any such there are her Majesty is Temper'd with so much Mildness that at the same time she neither invites nor forbids Access the Glory of her own Sex and the Admiration of ours Under these two Illustrious Persons is England c. at this time Govern'd by the most exact Laws that ever were made the Prerogative of the King not Dominating over the Priviledges of the People the Church of England Flourishes not withstanding the Peevishness of some of her Votaries and the Dissenters enjoy their Liberty of Conscience without Design The great Blessing of this Nation viz. the Parliament does frequently Meet and their Votes are Unanimous for Supplies for the Nations Good The Taxes by them Levied are excepting by some few discontented Spirits willingly Paid and the People satisfied that their Mony is Employ'd for the uses intended not Lavishly and Unaccountably thrown away on Pensioners c. every Man enjoys his Plentiful or Competent Fortune with all the freedom Imaginable no Tricks are made use of to Decoy us into Slavery from the very Prospect of which the King designs by his utmost Endeavours to free us by appearing himself in Person at the Head of the Confederate Army in opposition to the Power of France He designing to Rescue the Glory of the English Nation from that Stupidity the Luxury and Effeminacy of the late Reigns had obscur'd it with and we have nothing to render us unhappy but our own groundless Fears and Jealousies in which