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 |
|
A48827
|
The pretences of the French invasion examined for the information of the people of England
|
Lloyd, William, 1627-1717.; Defoe, Daniel, 1661?-1731.
|
1692
(1692)
|
Wing L2690; ESTC R20528
|
11,190
|
19
|
in that still keeps it at a low Ebb so that for the late King's Friends to expose the present Government for this is like a Conjurers complaining of the Storms he raises That ingenious History of Bishop King 's of the Estate of the Protestants in Ireland under King James makes it out that the late King feared and hated the increase of Trade which made him use all means to hinder it and all the World fees that no Absolute Monarch as he affects to be likes that his Subjects should grow rich by Trade But our present King so soon as he can have Peace will make it his first Care to promote Trade here as he did in the Country he came from and even in the difficult times he had Trade hath been a great part of his and his Parliaments Care Finally if Men can remember the times that are so lately past when Law and Right was only the King's Pleasure dictated by Mercenary Judges when no Party but the Papists flourished when a general Consternation had stopt all Business they cannot hope to be happy by his Return who caused all these Miseries And they must expect now he hath more perfectly Learned the French Methods of making a King the greatest of Monarchs by making his Subjects the vilest of Slaves that he will practise it with greater Industry and Application than ever to put it eternally out of his Subjects Power to protect themselves again For oppressing his People which was but expedient before will now be thought absolutely necessary So that nothing can be more improbable not to say impossible than for England to be happy under him that attempted to make her Miserable without any provocation and must return with the same Principles and Designs the same Counsellors and Interests he had before and with all the addition that Revenge Hatred and Fear can make to an angry and implacable Mind But it may be said his Dear-bought Experience of the ill success of these Methods will make him rule more moderately if he be restored To which I reply Coelum non Animum mutat The fore-cited Book of Bishop King's demonstrates that after he had lost England and Scotland and a great part of Ireland upon his Return thither from France he was more Arbitrary and hard to his Protestant Obedient Subjects than ever he had been before even though it was against his visible Interest and tended to disgust all the Protestants who would have served him there His declaring himself Papist at first here and all his Actions since shew that he prefers his Will and an obstinate pursuing his own Methods far above his true Interest whence it follows that we vainly expect from one of his Temper that either his past Experience or his future Interest should teach him Moderation any longer than till he hath Power to oppress us And if he should by a Thousand Promises or Oaths engage to rule by Law his frequent breach of both hath given us no reason to trust him and the Religion he professes can so easily dispence with both that neither of them give us any security from that sort of Obligations The Interests of Popery and France require he should be Absolute and his Nature spurs him on to it and nothing but Fear can for a Moment restrain him from being so What a shadow of a Dream then must this be of Protestant Subjects being happy under a bigotted Popish Prince of such a Temper Thirdly Whereas 't is said we have changed our old Hereditary Monarchy into one meerly Elective and by degrees shall bring it to a Common-wealth nor can any thing prevent this which will be of Fatal consequence to the Church but our restoring the late King I answer the Position is false and the Consequence a meer Sham the Government of England always was and ever must be Monarchical that Twelve Years when it was endeavoured to make it otherwise convinced all Men that all Projects to the contrary must come to nothing As for this Revolution 't is not likely a Parliament which made an Entail of the Crown in a Lineal Succession should be for setting up a Common-wealth or altering the Hereditary Monarchy If it be alledged there was a great Breach as to the Person of the Reigning King 't is replyed he himself made it and they did not make but find the Throne void And there have been greater Breaches since the Conquest as to the true Lineal Succession and laying aside yea deposing the Reigning King and setting up his Son or a Remoter Person which indeed was an Injury to the Kings so Deposed but still the Monarchy was called and continued to be Hereditary In our case the King deserted us yea left us without any Government but we applied to his next certain Heir with whom at her Request and for our Safety and hers by general consent a Title was given to her Husband and our Deliverer but this only for Life though he be much nearer in Blood to the Right of Succession than either Henry the Fourth or Henry the Seventh successively made Kings of England And the saving the Succession to the Princess of Denmark and her Heirs shews how far that Parliament was from designing any such thing as a Common-wealth We see Philip of Spain who had no Title to be King of England but by his Marriage with Queen Mary was made King at her Request and in her Right but he had not merited so much as our King and therefore his Title was to cease at her Death As for the Prince of Wales there are so clear Indications of his Birth being an Imposture and the Design of forming that Project is so known to be Revenge on the Princesses for adhering to their Religion and to get more time to force Popery and Slavery upon us yea his Health and Strength make it so unlikely he should proceed from such crazy Parents that till the Parties concerned prove the Affirmative by better Witnesses and clearer Evidence and the People of England in Parliament own him for the Heir we need not go about the unreasonable Task of proving a Negative Wherefore since the breach in the Succession was the late King 's own Act and only concerns his Person and a supposed unknown Heir we are not to answer for that and considering the hurry his unexpected Desertion put all things in and the absolute necessity of a speedy Settlement the Friends of the old English Monarchy have just cause to rejoyce it was made so near the old Foundation with a small and only Temporary Variation from it which was also absolutely necessary in that Juncture of Affairs And 't is evident that there are many of the best Quality and Interest who hate the notion of a Common-wealth in England and love Monarchy as well as any of the late King's Abettors who freely consented and firmly adhere to this Establishment If it be objected that King William was bred up in a Common-wealth and inclines to
that Form of Government 't is answered He doth and may like it in Holland but they must shew some Instances that his Zeal for a Common-wealth is as hot and as blind as King James's for Popery before they can prove him so desperate a Foe to his own Interest as to uncrown himself and make himself the People's Vassal when he is and may be their Gracious Lord. If it be urged that it is a dangerous Precedent for future Kings to allow the People a Liberty to take away their Princes Right and set up another on Pretence of Misgovernment The Reply is the late King was the occasion of this Precedent by first attempting to alter the whole frame of our Laws Government and Religion and then Deserting us And if it be an ill Precedent for the safety of Princes that the Advantage was taken it was however necessary to take it for the Safety of the People for whose good Heaven made Kings Sure I am there are as dreadful Consequences of Arbitrary Tyranny as there are of Rebellion witness the Misery and Slavery of the poor French at this Day and it seems as necessary there should be some Precedents to deter Princes from abusing their Power as well as to restrain the People from abusing their Liberty For both Tyranny and Rebellion are great Sins and of most mischievous Consequence Wherefore this unexpected Example may make our Kings more Just and more apt to Rule by Law but it can never hurt the Monarchy it self or countenance a Rebellion while a King is in the Throne that will stay to hear and redress his Peoples Grievances which will never be denied by the present or any other good King The last Pretence is the most surprising of all That there is no way to preserve the Church of England no nor the Protestant Religion but by restoring the late King who its said in his Declaration promises this as liberally as he did at his first Accession to the Throne If Mankind were not the oddest part of the Creation one would wonder how 't is possible for Protestants to believe that the Wolves design good to the Sheep When the late King was here he involved himself in infinite Mischiefs and did the most odious things in the World to destroy the Protestant Religion and especially to ruin the Church of England and hath he given any Evidence of changing his Temper his Principles his Zeal or his Methods He shewed in Ireland a greater spite to Protestants than ever he hath lived in France ever since where he hath seen how much it tends to advance his dear absolute Power to Dragoon all Men into the Kings Religion his only Motives to draw in this Frenchify'd Pope to lend him Mony to invade us is by convincing him he lost all by his Zeal to restore Popery and by engaging he will use his Power if he can regain it only to promote the Catholick Interest His other Ally the French-Persecutor cannot be endeared by any better Interest till the Principal of the Sums Lent are repaid by poor England than by Assurance that he will make one Kingdom in the World as miserable by absolute Empire and forcing one Religion as France now is that his Barbarity Cruelty and Treachery may not be the infamous single Instance of such Proceedings his Promises to his Allies his Zeal his Principles and his Nature all engage him to destroy the Protestant Religion He attempted it when he was not half so deeply obliged and can we think he will not pursue it now 'T is next to Frenzy to think the Pope and King of France furnish him with Mony Ships Forces c. only to secure the Protestant Religion and Church of England he must be tyed in more than ordinary Bonds to endeavour the Ruin of both or no such Favours had been shewn by such a Pope and such a Persecutor It cannot be Ease to Roman Catholicks he desires They are more at Ease under King William than under any Protestant King ever since the Reformation It must therefore be the suppressing all other Religions and setting up that alone must engage Rome France and Lucifer in his Restauration As for his Promises to us in his Declaration alas he hath already given greater and stronger to the Pope and French King to the contrary and though his Interest and the Hopes that some will be so mad to believe him put him upon renewing these Promises to England yet his Consessor can soon resolve him which Promise is to be kept whether that pious Catholick Promise to the Holy Father and the Hector of that Cause or that extorted one to Hereticks Besides we should remember the Italian Proverb God forgive him who deceives me once but God forgive me if one Man deceives me twice No Prince in the World ever promised with more Solemnity than the late King to protect the Protestant Religion or the Church of England yet nothing is more clear than that he designed to gull us only not to oblige himself by this Protestation and the first thing he did was to break it as soon as he durst and can we be so distracted to believe him again He declared in Ireland that the Church of England stunk in his Nose and that he abhorred it He cannot truly love either any person of that Persuasion or any other Protestant he may flatter some of them to get into the Saddle but when they have mounted him he will ride over their Heads his own Friends of the Protestant Religion are very few and his Revenge on the far greater number who have opposed his Designs will out-weigh the Kindness of a few inconsiderable Hereticks who abetted his Interest and who will be told that it was not Sense of Duty but despair of obliging his Enemies that forced them into his Quarrel They had sufficient Experience after Monmouth's Rebellion suppressed only by the Church of England Men how little any Acts of those he counts Hereticks can oblige him his carriage in Ireland to the Loyal Protestants writ this in Capital Letters and it must be supposed they have drunk deep of Lethe who can forget all this But I pray what is it the Church of England wants or any other Protestant This King is as serious and sincere a Protestant and as true a Lover of that Interest as King James is a professed Enemy to it and why may not he be more likely to preserve the Religion he professes than the other to maintain that Religion which he vilely deserted and mortally hates The Church-Men say King William is too kind to Dissenters but hath he given them any other or more Liberty than King James did That King begun with Toleration and it was not for a new Prince in a troublous State of things to alter any thing of that Nature Besides at the same time the Dissenters do think the present King too kind to the established Church not considering that 't is the National Religion which he