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 |
|
A88839
|
The Jacobite principles vindicated in answer to a letter sent to the author. Dedicated to the Queen of England.
|
Lawton, Charlwood, 1660-1721.
|
1693
(1693)
|
Wing L739C; ESTC R215013
|
27,077
|
30
|
pity'd but no Man will in all probability be able to help them How Universal and Catholick soever their Religion may be in other places I am sure they are Fanaticks in England under a Civil Consideration and therefore that they have all the reason in the World to be State-Whigs and as such only will ever be impartially used by us I think nothing that I have said has depretiated the Doctrine of Passive-Obedience I do not pretend to determine who is in the Right in that Controversie much less to handle it as a Religious One But give me leave to tell an admirable Story concerning Dr. Colvil a great Man in the Kingdom of Scotland but one that was thought not to understand clearly the Principle of Non-Resistance The late Earl of Middleton having him once at Dinner asked him Whether there could be no Case in which Defensive Arms were Lawful The Doctor replied It was fit for the People to believe them unlawful and for Kings to believe them lawful It was an admitable Repartee upon a sudden Question But perhaps had he thought of it he would have said likewise That it is fit for the Ministers of Kings to believe them lawful too and I presume the present Earl of Middleton set down that additional Instruction to the Apothegm For tho' to the eternal shame of the Judges who now sit upon the King's Bench they violated our Laws in the continuance of his Imprisonment it must be allowed for his everlasting Honour that that Noble Lord was as cautious of making the Law the Limits of his Ministry as if it were lawful to rise up in Arms whenever the Laws were broken But I must Answer your Postscript wherein you tell me that you neither know how the King can be restored now the Prince of Orange is in possession nor what will become of the Prince of Orange if we should restore the King nor what Security we could have from any Conditions the King could make with us I Answer that if the Prince of Orange is not kept in possession by English men he may soon be brought to Reason and I do assure you that there are many Jacobites that desire rather to see the Prince of Orange return to his Station of Stadtholder again in Holland than wish him any personal Injury And as for the Security you require for any promised Conditions you must forgive me if I think you a little insincere if not trifling when you place so much Weight upon the Pope's giving King James an Absolution for any Promises he should make You might have said this artfully to the Mobb but you cannot suppose that I would believe you were in earnest though you make such a clutter with it I allow as you say that our Histories tell us of some Kings that were absolved by Popes but you know that Bulls Absolutions and the Pope's Excommunications were like to go farther with the Nation in Popish Times than they are like to do now And yet by your very instance of King Henry the Third you might be convinced that the People of England never would even then let a King be at rest till he had performed his Promises I will not write a long Confutation of a thing that I know cannot stick with you or any wise considering Man And besides I do not go about to perswade you to take up with a Constitution that will depend either upon a King's Temper or Religion Honour or Veracity Make a Government that is easie to all and it will be the Interest of all to preserve it But if you would do so you must bring the Right Line into it you must nicely preserve the Church of England as the National Church and yet you must remember that the Kngdom of Heaven is not of this World You must take care in your Civil Compacts that Priestcraft does not spoyl all at last You must take care even of a Protestant in Ordine ad Spiritualia and let the Tares and the Wheat grow up together But farther although you have such wild accounts concerning the Jacobites there are amongst those that serve King James Men that know what you are a doing that know you are looking far and near for a Deliverance that know how impotent you think the Prince of Orange is to Rule how that you depise him as much as the Nation misliked Richard Cremwel before the Restauration that know your extravagant Projects and more temperate Thoughts and yet have accounred for all things and will as things ripen find ways to give you satisfaction if any thing will We know that Maud the Empress even when King Stephen was a Prisoner and though her Title was indisputable and though the Nation was all Catholicks lost the Crown because she was refractory and haughty and denied to the Londoners Edward the Confessor's Laws And I assure you there will be Men that will lay before the King the Necessity and Wisdom of giving Satisfaction to all your Reasonable Demands If you do not ask too much Counter-security things unfit for an English King to grant there are Jacobites that will not only deliver but second your Petitions A Good and Settled Monarchy you may have and a Common-wealth is scarce practicable will be hazardous at present and cannot be lasting I know there are some amongst the Jacobites who are otherwise Men of great Honour and Worth and yet suspect every thing such as you promote is to make the King a Doge of Venice But there are others who have compared and taken in pieces and viewed in parts all the Models of Government who if you would rectifie and not change either the Name or Nature of ours will receive very kindly any thing you offer will instruct you how to make it palatable to the King and shew him how consistent it is both with his Honour and his Interest Let the manner be decent and your Propositions allow King James to have the Ballance that an English King should have and must necessarily have in our Constitution And I assure you many of the Jacobites know no other but such an English King to be our Supreme Head and Governour But after all if King James is called home by the Nation we need no other Security than a well-chosen Parliament The present Parliament may call him home when they please without any other Force but their own denial of Money And the King 's being of another Religion will in some measure check the effects of a Revolutionary Joy and prevent our Excesses And if sober and honest Men would in all Corporations instead of all other Projects instruct all the Populace That all those that drink upon their Members Cost hazard being Slaves for that Draught and that it is time seriously to take Care of Themselves and their Posterity by choosing Men of Virtue rather than the Favourites or the Factions of any Opinion whether they are Jure Divino or Original Contract men Men that are as well Loyal