Selected quad for the lemma: england_n
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A64294
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Tell-truth's answer to Tell-troth's letter to the Right Honourable the Earl of Shaftesbury in vindication of His Lordship / by as down-right an English-man as himself, without scandalous reflections.
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Tell-truth.
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1680
(1680)
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Wing T623B; ESTC R37880
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4,627
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5
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Tell-Truth's Answer TO TELL-TROTH's LETTER To the Right Honourable the Earl of SHAFTESBURY In Vindication of his LORDSHIP By as down-right an ENGLISH-MAN as himself Without Scandalous REFLECTIONS SIR I Have lately seen and perused a Letter in Print to the Right Honourable the Earl of Shaftesbury from one that stiles himself Tom Tell-Troth a downright Englishman I must confess he begins well and expresseth himself in very good words to the due honour of that truly Noble Lord as owning him to be as indeed he is a stout Asserter of the Protestant Religion and Interest and tells us that Monarchy and the Protestant Religion do suffer in respect of the present Designs of Papists and Common wealths-men but what he meant by coupling good Common-wealths-men and Papists together I could not understand till Reading his Letter a little farther I quickly found and discovered that he was a Wolf in sheeps cloathing and it will be Strange if I do not find him to be a Jesuite or one as bad before the end of this Letter Yet very honestly he in the next words tells my Lord that Ruine and Desolation Confusion and every evil work will come swift upon us nothing more sure if some speedy Remedy be not instantly proposed by the wisdom of the great Council of this Nation by that great Council I suppose he means the Parliament and therein he writes honestly and truely for I will give the Devil his due but it is to be feared if they do not sit speedily it will be too late to prevent that Ruine and Desolation he truly fore-tells is coming upon us though I believe he writes Ironically and in a jeering way In the next place he comes with many words though to little or no purpose from 41 to the happy Restauration of the King in which glorious work I am perswaded he was no way instrumental for His Majesty was thanks be to God wonderfully restored to His Royal Throne by Gods Providence and some worthy Instruments the Earl of Shaftesbury being one eminent in that great work Then he would make a parallel between 41 to this present time concerning the person of the late King Church and Government and that they were the Results of such pernicious Counsels and Designs as are now hatching by these Sons of Belial to the present disturbance of our Church and Kingdom If there were Sons of Belial as you say and I believe there were in 41 I mean the Jesuits and the Popes Emissaries as Dr. Oates that worthy person and ever to be esteem'd hath made appear there were those I suppose are generally dead gone to Purgatory or somewhere else But you say there are now Sons of Belial that study all the mischief they can to King Church and State I suppose you writing so confidently of it must be well acquainted with them and be of their Councils and therefore you would do good service to discover them which I would do did I know them if you will not you must give me leave to tell you in down-right English that you are either a Jesuite of the Church of Rome or a Masked Protestant in the Church of England for I am a truer down-right Englishman and Protestant than I find you are In the next place he tells us That in Forty and after the Papists seeing our Church so well guarded with Purity of Doctrine and Faith that is true behold what Emissaries were sent out and with what cloathing to deceive what cloathing indeed the Puritan is the man he names and three persons that are dead and then tells us that Arch-bishop Laud must be the first called into question and butcher'd for being a Papist or Popishly inclin'd This I deny but must needs say that Archbishop Laud was an Eminent Assertor of the Rights of the Church and a true Protestant as his Learned Books against Fisher the Jesuite do declare for I knew Bishop Laud I think better than you did but by your leave Sir as old as you are Bishop Laud suffered for other matters as the Articles that were against him will inform you Then he comes to tell us that the Rabble in those times cried down Evil Counsellors their design being to bring in Popery and destroy Liberty ay Liberty of the Subject in a jeering scoffing way Sir know it is our Birthright and you are an unworthy man if you are against it and ought never to enjoy it but live and dye a slave And then he mentions Ship-money a huge burden was against Magna Charta so it was though but small in it self as also all other Monopolies in those days contrived by Ministers which were conscious of their ill deserts to keep off the sitting of the Parliament which they knew would call them to account for above Ten years in which time had the Parliament sate it would no doubt have supplyed His Majesty with much more in a legal way and the Subjects would have been ready and willing to have paid it But do you not remember you old Englishman as you stile yourself in the latter part of your Letter what became of those persons that kept off the King from His Parliament for so long a time if you do not I do I wish we had not some such persons now adays if we have they must look for the same success as they had then in the end A King of England in Parliament is Absolute and as Redoubtable as any Monarch in the world nor did ever any King that relyed upon and agreed with his Parliament miscarry As on the other side when ever base Flatterers to serve their own ends and to secure themselves from Justice have perswaded a Prince to slight grow jealous of or be estranged from Parliaments it hath always proved of fatal Consequence to the King and Kingdom Pray God bless and preserve his Majesty from all Popish Conspiracies as he hath hitherto done that he may more and more discover his real Friends from his pretended ones and then his Majesty will finde that those persons whom this Scribler terms Meeters in Clubs at Taverns and other places are his Majesties best and faithfullest Friends he hath for they meet only to enjoy the Society of one another and to study the Preservation of his Majesty the Protestant Religion the Peace and Quiet of the Kingdome against the Attempts and Plots of the Devil and the Pope and all their Party who still study how and nothing more than how Ruine and Destruction may be brought upon King and People as this their late Hellish and Damnable Plot sufficiently and fully have discovered Though Sir you to exasperate the people and tell of 41 to put this Plot aside say Then comes forth a Plot full of Treason and Popery and is there not just cause to suspect you to be concerned in it since you write so slightingly of it as if there were no reality that there was this Hellish Popish Plot But you say it came forth So it
did blessed be God that it was discovered by Dr. Oates with others 〈…〉 ere none of them Your Brother Coleman and others might yâ—â— have been living if it had not been discovered and we had been in Blood and Confusion before this day What may become of us yet I know not for I fear the Devil and the Pope with all their Hellish party are still Conspiring and Plotting against the peace of our Sion but God who hath I hope will still preserve his Majesty and poor England from all their wicked Designes I do not like your slighting expressions to say it came forth but must give you one word more concerning it It came forth from the Devil first from the Pope next and thither let it return again with all those that were Instrumental in it and will not truely repent of it but labour all they can to suther it Then you say The D. must needs be the Foundation of this Damnable Plot. If by your Capital D. you mean the Devil I have already agreed with you but if you mean by your D. His Royal Highness the Duke of York you are a very unworthy man and deserve to be punished For what good Protestant or sober man can think the Duke of York would ever own so Damnable and Hellish a Plot being so brave a person and having had to his Father the best of Kings Deceased and to his Brother the best of Kings Living whom God grant may long Live and Reign over us And God preserve the Discoverers who as he stiles them truely have been blessed Instruments to save us at this time from the Paw of Antichrist though I would not have them as he jeeringly expresses rever'd as Demigods but I could wish they were better rewarded as they well deserve and I hope they will one day be Then he tells of a Hurly-burly which caused the King to Dissolve the Parliament and to Prorogue them from time to time but what he means by it I know not And 't is no wonder you should fling a stone at Mr. Marvel's Grave for any whiffling Cur will venture to beard a dead Lion 't is well known that little Andrew as you contemptibly call him had Wit and Policy enough to silence the greatest Droll and Scribler that ever troubled the Nation and other Treatises that are for the good of the Nation cannot escape your Scurrilous Reflections And do not these Blisters on your Tongue betray the venome of your heart and plainly shew you are no true friend to the Church of England but rather a Jesuite or a favourer of Popery since you would hush us to sleep with apprehensions that there is no fear of it till our Throats are cut There are several other passages in your Letter which might deserve Animadversions but by what I have said already I doubt not but each considerate Reader will be sufficiently informed of your design and armed against your wheadling insinuations and so I shall leave you to pursue your Game But know in vain is the net spread in the presence of any Bird. Now Sir I am drawing to a Conclusion and it may be you will say its time When I first read your Letter I thought it not worth the while to give an Answer to it for Solomon says Answer not a fool according to his folly lest he be wise in his own conceit Pardon me Sir though I express my self thus freely to you for I assure you I do not in the least think you to be a Fool but one that God hath given great Parts and Abilities to and I wish you may have grace to make a good use of them in order to which I shall give you a few cautions by way of advice and I do it for your good 1. Be sure you print nothing for time to come to please the men of the times and to humour them that may be displeasing to God for if you and I and all men must one day give an account of every idle word yea of our secret thoughts and actions then you must give an account of this you scribling Letter and the ends and grounds you had to make it publick and I the like for my Answer and then it will be made appear who aimed most at the honour of God the peace and welfare of the Kingdom and advancement of the Protestant Religion you or I. 2. Print no more for time to come but what you know to be true else you wrong your self and the Readers and you must give an account for that also one day and write no more in a jeering way under a pretence of reality in which you shew Hypocrisie and Dissimulation which you have done in many places in your Letter though to no purpose at all 3. Follow the Advice you give to that Noble Lord study to do your own business and write no more Letters to such Honourable and worthy persons you shew great presumption and sawciness you think you may write any thing and to any person Better you had an Imployment in the Penny-Post-Office of carrying Letters than writing any more 4. If you are now of the Church of Rome as I think you are come away from them to the Church of England which is the best Church in the world for Doctrine and Discipline and come away quickly â—…or Antichrist will speedily fall he hath but three horns left of ten and one of them begins already to decline and forsake him yea to push at him but if you are of the Church of England already declare it really Sir I have done and must assure you that I am no affector of Complements and therefore shall not tell you that I am Your Servant Though to my King and Country and the Protestant Religion A faithful Subject and Sincere well-wisher POSTSCRIPT I Would have set my Name to this my Answer for I am not ashamed nor afraid to own any passage in it but you not setting your Name to your Letter makes me forbear setting mine to my Answer FINIS