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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
B08918 A descent from France:, or, The invasion of England, considered and discours'd 1692 (1692) Wing D1137A; ESTC R224508 4,109 7

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A Descent from France OR THE French INVASION of England CONSIDERED and DISCOURS'D LICENS'D May 10. 1692. THat there is or at least has been an intended Invasion from France Headed by King James is too apparent and that the greatest Encouragement to such an Undertaking must be the expected if not promised Succours ready to join him upon the Descent is as plainly evident Now that there can be such a Party of Englishmen and those professing themselves Protestants too for the Romanists are no part of our wonder whose Reasons and Sense can be so lost and depraved as to conspire with such a Design is not a little stupendious The business of this Paper therefore is to examine What Consequences they can expect from the Success of such an Invasion and what Patriots they shall make themselves in Assisting the Return of King James In the first place Do they flatter themselves because forsooth the greatest part of our Invaders for the more plausible pretext are composed of English Scotch and Irish Natives and Subjects to the Crowns of England that therefore King James's Service so poor a mask is all the business of this Expedition Have we forgot since so lately in Ireland the French King could hardly hold the Vizor on till the Conquest of that Kingdom where the very Irish themselves began to be jealous and with too much cause of their pretended Friends but intended Lords the French And that no Anguis in Herbâ no French Reserve lies at the bottom of this Invasion Secondly Do they think this Succour to King James tho in so important a Service as Resettling him upon his Throne can deserve any grateful Return and upon that Encouragement they found the Safety of their Religion and Liberties in any Promises of Security from that Obligation Alas is it so late since woful Experience convinced them that Acknowledgment or Gratitude are no part of a Popish King's Principle witness the unkind return he made to that very Church of England that more than once were so exemplarily zealous for securing the Crown upon his Head in their strenuous opposition against both the Bill of Exclusion and Monmouth's Insurrection And if both those deserving Services those accumulated Obligations were such feeble Cobweb-Lawn shall any thing done in his Service now make a stronger Tye upon him No quite to the contrary For example The Church of England had then twice obliged him and never once offended him besides there was not only a Coronation Oath but his first voluntary Declaration at his assumption of the Government one would reasonably think enough to bind him to Performance But how little all those Bonds signifie when the Cancelling Hand of Rome came into Play we have but too much reason to remember And if all those Tyes I say could not hold then what can we hope for when there neither is nor can be any Tye at all to hold him now For example suppose the blind and mistaken Frenzy of some of our Protestant Zealots if that name can be proper for them could remo●● him to his Throne what shall they deserve for it any more than the Title of ●●p●●f●●●ble Servants Their turning him out from the Throne together with the remembrance of the dear Irish Blood shed by them and the rest of our Faults are such Capital Transgressions that the restoring him into it again will not be half our Expiation And supposing he Publishes the most mollyfying Declaration upon his Landing that all the Eloquence of Rome can put together shall that oblige him No so far from it that it neither is nor can be any more than a scroll of wast Paper For supposing the Contents of it should run in these flattering Insinuations viz. What wondrous Clemency he would shew us upon our return to our Allegiance and with what Moderation he would Reign over us upon our re-admitting of him to his Throne with all the most solemn Protestations and what not Now as 't is unlikely that King James should ever return without Opposition and undoubtedly a very strenuous one it being impossible we should be all drawn in with the specious Bait of sweet words and fair Promises and consequently he must have a Blow for it Supposing nevertheless I say his Party so strong and his Success so great as to recover his Kingdoms Upon such a recovery whatever he promises in his Declaration is from that Moment null and void For the Consideration is not performed and consequently the Obligation cancell'd For instance he comes not in by our Submission and return to our Allegiance but by Force and Conquest And as such not only his Declarations but his very Coronation-Oath without the stretch of a mental Reservation are all actually absolved And if Law nor Oaths Service nor Fidelity as before-mentioned were able to keep his Romish Zeal in any Bounds or Limits before what shall the loosening of 'em all expect now And consequently what driving Jehu must we look for when that black Day comes which Heav'n of its mercy keep far from us And whatever private Gratuities or Favours some particular Eminent Protestant Hands may possibly receive for their signal Services in this Revolution nothing of sense but must conclude us the miserablest Nation and People in the World Besides could we look for Miracles and expect a Reign of Clemency from him our Religion and Civil Rights secured what a Crew of Irish Dear-Joys that come over with him are here to be rewarded all Preferment and Honours nay the fat of the Land to be canton'd out amongst them And consequently the Power in these confiding Hands the whole Nobility Gentry and Commonalty of England must live under the check and awe of Tories and Rapparees and submit to all the Insults of Miscreants and Vagrants and well we compound so cheap Nay though some People fancy we shall at least enjoy this Blessing of being eased from Taxes by his Return 't is so much a mistake that in the other Extream that very shadow vanishes too For what must this Expedition cost the French King and what must all his Irish Arrears and other infinite unacountable Sums amount to which must all lie upon this ruin'd Nation to satisfy with a very courteous Complement into the Bargain if the French King will graciously and mercifully please to demand no more Nay perhaps the whole Charge of his several Years Naval Preparation for had King James continued on his Throne most of all that Expence had been saved must lie at our Door a Score too terrible even to think of and take it altogether a very grateful Payment out of the Protestant Pockets to so prodigious a Champion of the Protestant Religion as King L●●●s But for once though contrary to common sense granting we should allow all in his Favour that the most zealous Jacobite can pretend viz. That King James upon his return to the Throne shall to a tittle perform every particular Article in his very Declaration as
plausible soever as it may be penned viz. We 'll suppose that the French King shall disclaim directly or indirectly all Pretensions whatever to England that the Restoration of his Friend King James is his only part and design in this Expedition and King James on the other side shall abjure all manner o● violation to the Laws shall support the Protestant Religion and making a Sea-mark of his former Wreck shall peaceably keep up to the full observance of so generous a Profession granting all this I say and whatever other imaginary Security his dreaming Party can form to themselves nevertheless in the fairest Face let us observe the dismal and tremendous Effects of his Restoration 'T is known to the whole World to what the French Ambition tends viz. Universal Monarchy And 't is as notoriously famous what Desolations and Ravages the Arms of France have made and how formidable that Successful Destroyer is even to the whole united Powers of Europe And as his present Majesty King William is possibly without a vanity the Leading Champion of the whole Confederacy and all little enough to make head against France upon King James's return to the Throne here is not only so potent an Arm as the Alliance of Britain lopt off from the Confederacy but added to the Strength of France For tho in his Reign before he only stood Neuter with little or no other Assistance to his Idoliz'd Grand Lewis than his heartiest Vows and Prayers for the success and prosperity of that encroaching Enslaver of Mankind Yet now he will lie under a more pressing obligation and the least return even of common Gratitude for his remounting him on his Throne will be to list under that Tyrant's Standard and joyning the Arms of England to the finishing and crowning the whole Designs of that universal Aspirer And as the whole Confederacy already is little enough to match him upon this Revolution in England 't is impossible to ex●ect less than that the whole Cause of Christendom must sink and all Eur●pe truckle beneath him And whilst the English hands must be●● so great a part in th●s fatal Turn to give it no harder Name what is it but a making our selves the Monsters of Mank●nd the inevitable instruments and Tools to that grand Cut-throat of Christend●m And what has some little palliation on his side as having the pretence of Renown and Honour in the Quest of Laurels and Enl●rgement of Empire c. will on our part amount only to Butchery and Desolation for meer Butchery and Desolations sake The Gl●ry if any will be Lewis's and the Infamy England's Infamy indeed if we meet with no worse Reward when we consider what barbarous part we must act in the yoking and shackling of Europe But suppose it end● there and that will be the only Brand in the English Scutcheon And that Lewis in his grasp of Universal Empire shall exclude England from any part of his Feudatories and Tr butaries viz. he sh●ll make Golden Promises to King James and once in his life his first vertue of that kind keep Faith and no worse follow a very unlikely Flattery yet what an Eternal Shame to the Old English Honour the sleeping Dust of our Third Edward and Fifth Henry and indeed the whole British Chronicles is our portion in aggrand●zing of France to that prodigious Bulk and Growth and dwindling our selves to that diminutive and despicable state and condition as are and must be the unavoidable consequences of King James's Restoration Granting the Jacobites therefore all their own Delusions can shape that King James shall forget and forgive shall rule by Law and turn a Saint upon a Throne And that the disinterested Lewis shall have no other Designs upon England but purely King James's Assistance yet still the most they can look for is perhaps to enjoy a little English Liberty upon their own supposition during the short Remnant of King James's Days whilst his Gray Hairs perhaps shall fill the Seat But I wonder any reasonable man that pretends but to common Sense can think it possible that France should engross the Dominion of Europe and England ever hope to continue the only Exempt from the Universal Yoke Is there that Frenzy so mad as to fancy it No all our best Hopes will be to be swallow'd last and the annexing of Brittain a Province to France and consequently to groan under all the Slavery and Vassallage of a French Government is the undoubted Fate of England and hereby the Restoration of King James in its favourablest Aspect brings no less Fatality along with it than entailing of Misery upon us to the end of the World and all the Honour our Protestant Restorers will reap is to be the Ruine and Curse of their whole Posterity their very Names and Memories loath'd and abhorr'd to all succeeding Generations London Printed for Richard Humphryes near the Oxford-Arms in Warwick-Lane 1692.