the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and the Principality of Wales and of the Dominions and Islands of the same of the Town of Calais and of the Marches of the same and of Normandy Gascoign and Guienne General Governor of the Seas and Ships of the Kingdom Master of the Horse to the King Lord Warden Chancellor and Admiral of the Cinque Ports and of the Members of the same Constable of Dover-Castle Justice in Eyre of all the Forests and Chases on this side of Trent Constable of the Castle of Windsor Gentleman of his Majesty's Bed-Chamber one of his Majesty's most Honourable Privy-Council in his Realms of England Scotland and Ireland and Knight of the most Honourable Order of the Garter But tho all others worshipped this prodigious Favourite yet Arch-bishop Abbot a Prelate of Primitive Sanctity and Integrity would not flatter neither the King nor his Favourite in their Courses so dangerous to the Church and State and dishonourable to the King and tho in Disgrace he wrote this following Letter to the King which you may read in Rushworth fol. 85. May it please your Majesty M I Have been too long silent and am afraid by my Silence I have neglected the Duty of the Place it has pleased God to call me unto and your Majesty to place me in But now I humbly crave leave I may discharge my Conscience towards God and my Duty to your Majesty and therefore freely to give me leave to deliver my self and then let your Majesty do what you please Your Majesty hath propounded a Toleration of Religion I beseech you to take into your Consideration what that Act is what the Consequence may be By your Act you labour to set up the most Damnable and Heretical Doctrine of the Church of Rome the Whore of Babylon How hateful will it be to God and grievous to your Subjects the Professors of the Gospel that your Majesty who hath so often and learnedly disputed and written against those Heresies should now shew your self a Patron of those wicked Doctrines which your Pen hath to the World and your Conscience tells your self are superstitious idolatrous and detestable and hereto I add what you have done by sending the Prince into Spain without the Consent of your Council the Privity or Approbation of your People and altho you have a Charge and Interest in the Prince as the Son of your Flesh yet the People have a greater as Son of the Kingdom upon whom next after your Majesty are their Eyes fixed and their Welfare depends and so tenderly is his going apprehended as I believe however his Return may be safe yet the Drawers of him into this Action so dangerous to himself so desperate to the Kingdom will not pass away unquestion'd and unpunished Besides the Toleration which you endeavour to set up by your Proclamation cannot be without a Parliament unless your Majesty will let your Subjects see that you will take to your self the Ability to throw down the Laws of the Land at your Pleasure What dread Consequence these things may draw afterwards I beseech your Majesty to consider and above all lest by this Toleration and discountenancing the true Profession of the Gospel wherewith God hath blest us and this Kingdom hath so long flourished under it your Majesty doth not draw upon this Kingdom in general and your self in particular God's Wrath and Indignation I have heard my Father say that King James kept a Fool called Archy if he were not more Knave whom the Courtiers when the King was at any time thoughtful or serious would bring in with his antick Gestures and Sayings to put him out of it In one of these Modes of the King in comes Archy and tells the King he must change Caps with him Why says the King Why who replies Archy sent the Prince into Spain But what said the King wilt thou say if the Prince comes back again Why then said Archy I will take my Cap from thy Head and send it to the King of Spain which was said troubled the King sore But if we look back into Spain we shall see things of another Complection than when Buckingham came into it For now he is disgusted he put the Prince quite out of the Match as that tho all things were agreed upon the coming of the Dispensation from Rome so as King James said all the Devils in Hell could not break the Match yet his Disciple and Scholar could tho the Duke had certified the King the Match was brought to a happy Conclusion and the Match publickly declar'd in Spain and the Prince permitted Access to the Infanta in the Presence of the King and the Infanta was generally stiled the Princess of England and in England a Chappel was building for her at St. James's and the King had prepared a Fleet to fetch her into England which only proved to bring back his Son How things especially actuated by Love should stay here may seem strange yet such an Ascendant had Buckingham over the Prince that the Affront put upon him Buckingham must quite deface the Prince's vowed Love and Affection to the Infanta but how to prevail with King James to comply might have an appearance of some Difficulty since the King had set his Rest upon it and had quarelled with the Parliament and dissolv'd them in great Anger and Fury for but mentioning it After the Duke had gained the Prince to break or at least not to observe the Conditions of the Treaty of the Marriage with the Infanta so solemnly sworn to by both the Kings and the Prince let 's now see how he behaved himself to King James afterwards but this will be better understood if we look back and see how things stood before the Prince's and Duke's Arrival in Spain The Prince's going into Spain was not only kept secret from King James ' s Council but from my Lord Keeper Williams tho the King confided in his Abilities above all the other of his Council but when it had taken vent the King asked the Keeper what he thought Whether the Knight Errant's Pilgrimage meaning the Prince's would prove lucky to win the Spanish Lady and to convey her shortly into England Sir answered my Lord Keeper If my Lord Marquess will give Honour to Conde Duke Olivares and remember he is the Favourite of Spain or if Olivares will shew honourable Civility to my Lord Marquess remembring he is a Favourite of England the Wooing may be prosperous but if my Lord Marquess should forget where he is and not stoop to Olivares or if Olivares forgetting what Guest he hath received with the Prince bear himself haughtily and like a Castilian to my Lord Marquess the Provocation may be dangerous to cross your Majesty's good Intentions and I pray God that either one or both do not run into that Error The Answer of the Keeper took such Impression upon the King that he asked the Keeper if he had wrote to his Son and the
other Person to be thought so fit for it and therefore the King with many kind Expressions gave order to Sir William to prepare for his Journey and the Secretary to draw up his Instructions But how forward soever the Juncto were for Peace the Dutch out-run them or at least kept equal Pace with them for tho the Prince of Orange were victorious in Holland and with admired Prudence and Conduct like another Scipio carried the War out of his Country and thereby saved it for in the dead of the Year he joined Montecuculi the Emperor 's General and besieged and took Bon the Residence of the Elector of Cologn and thereby cut off the Communication between France and Holland whereby the French were forced not only to quit their conquer'd Towns by heaps but he opened a Passage for the Imperial Forces to join the Dutch and Spanish yet the Dutch having but newly recovered their drowned Country and lost their Trade the Charges of maintaining their Land Army became so great that it was impossible this Year to set out a Fleet by Sea The Dutch States therefore gave the Marquess of Frezno the Spanish Ambassador in England Power to treat and conclude a Peace with the King which came in three Days after the Juncto had sent to Sir William and this by Sir William's Advice stayed his Journey into Holland it being more honourable for the King to be sought to than seek a Peace and that the King's Interest might be better pursued at London than at the Hague The King and Juncto agreed to it and withal added That tho Sir William did not treat the Peace at the Hague he should at London And when Sir William had received his Instructions he at three Meetings with the Marquess concluded the whole Treaty with the Satisfaction of the King Sir William says the Articles being publick need no Place here but the two Points of greatest Difficulty were the Flag and recalling the English Troops out of the French Service But that this last was composed by private Engagements to suffer those to wear out without any Recruits or not to permit new ones to go over yet at the same time to give Leave to the Dutch to raise such Levies as they should think fit in his Majesty's Dominions But this is an odd Equivocation to recal the French Troops which was to let them wear out without Recruits which was not observed neither for Men were not only encouraged but pressed to this Service and to these in the French Service does Sir William and the Germans too ascribe the Glory of all the French Actions who not only in Turenne's Life but at his Death saved the whole French Army But if this be as Sir William says yet the King hereby instead of being the Protector becomes a Murderer of his Subjects in permitting them to kill one another on both sides for it is impossible the War should be just on both sides Nor do I believe the like Precedent can be shewed unless by the King's Grandfather James I. I confess I have not seen the Articles of the Treaty at large but by so much as I have seen I do not find that the Arrears for the Dutch Fishing upon the Coasts of England and Scotland agreed upon in King Charles the First 's Time which was 30000 l. per Annum and a settled Revenue for that Fishery for the Time to come insisted upon at the Treaty of Cologn nor the Damages to the Executors of Sir Paul Pindar and Sir William Courten were so much as mention'd in it It may be the 800000 Patacoons to be paid by the Dutch to the King by this Treaty were intended in Satisfaction of the Executors Demands of which they denied they ever received one Penny This hasty Peace thus huddled up in less than 4 Days viz. between the 5th or 6th and 9th of February would not admit of the Establishment of a Marine Treaty and Regulation of the East-India Trade between the English and Dutch and Treaty at Cologn And therefore it was agreed That Commissioners on both sides were to meet at London to treat of these and determine them in three Months after such Meeting and in case any Differences should not be adjusted these to be referred to the Queen Regent of Spain who should name 11 Commissioners the greater part of whom should determine the Differences in 6 Months after and these to meet in 3 Months after the Queen Regent shall have taken the foresaid Arbitriment upon her self But the States as wise in this Treaty as the English were improvident and hasty got the 7th Article agreed to viz. That the Treaty made at Breda 1667 as also other Treaties renewed by it be confirmed and remain in full Force and Vigour as far as they shall not be contrary to this present Treaty The Marine Treaty was agreed by the Commissioners but the first and fifth Articles ill observed by the Dutch as I have seen made publick but nothing was agreed for the Regulation of the East-India Trade nor any thing concerning it referred to the Queen Regent of Spain This is that honourable Peace to his Majesty's Satisfaction which succeeded this glorious War to the Expence of such vast Treasure and Charge to England and involving Christendom into a War wherein we taught the French to fight by Sea while they encouraged the Dutch and us to destroy one another whereby we got nothing but dry Blows except the 800000 Patacoons for the Flag was ever given by the Dutch to Queen Elizabeth King James and King Charles I. and by the Treaty to Oliver in 1654 and to the King in 1666 and 1667 nor ever desired by the States But the Dutch got confirmed the Islands of Amboyna and Polloroon which they had ravished from the English whereby they not only supply Europe but India and Persia with Spice and Surinam and also got discharged again from the Piracy or Robbery perpetrated upon the Bona Esperanza and Henry Bonadventura in Time of Peace and all the Arrears of 30000 l. per Annum for fishing upon our Coasts since 1636. So little Regard was had in this Treaty either of the King's Honour or of the Good or Interest of the Nation However 't was the Interest of Spain to promote this separate Peace with the Dutch for this Year the French King having brib'd the Swiss to a Compliance took the Franche County from Spain the Swiss keeping Garisons in Dole and Besanzon And this Year Messina revolted from Spain and submitted to the French King CHAP. III. A further Detection of this Reign till the breaking out of the Popish Plot. TO mollify his most Christian Majesty highly exasperated you must think by this Peace the King 't was said and I believe it sent his Ship-Carpenters to instruct the French how to build his Men of War and I say Sir Anthony Dean told me that by Order of the King he built the Model of a Man of War as I
so in Extreams yet his Actions so diametrically opposite to his Profession Here you see a Jesuited Prince pleading for Liberty of Conscience to the breaking down the â—aws which before he had so often professed to maintain and for such a sort of Men whom but little before he had slaughter'd banished and imprisoned as if he had designed to extirpate the whole Race of them If to reconcile these to Truth or Reality be not as great a Miracle as is in any of the Popish Legends I 'll believe them all and be reconciled to the Roman Catholick Church how inconsistible soever the Terms be The generality of the Protestant Dissenters having for near seven years together been so severely treated by the Tories were as forward to congratulate the King for his Indulgence in manifold Addresses as the Tories were in King Charles his time in their Addresses of Abhorrence to petition the King to call a Parliament to settle the Grievances of the Nation However this Declaration was so drawn in the sight of every Bird that of my knowledg many of the sober thinking Men of the Dissenters did both dread and detest it That this Declaration might be more passable Popish Judges were made in Westminster-Hall and Popish Justices of the Peace and Deputy-Lieutenants all England over the Privy Council was replenished with Popish Privy Counsellors the Savoy was laid open to instruct Youth in the Romish Religion and Popish Principles and Schools for that purpose were encouraged in London and all other Places in England Four Foreign Popish Bishops as Vicars Apostolical were allowed in Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction all England and Wales over From instructing the St. Omers Boys how to behave themselves in their Evidence to prove Oates was at St. Omers all April and May in 1678 my Lord Castlemain is sent Ambassador to the Pope to render the King's Obedience to the Holy and Apostolical See with great hopes of extirpating the Northern pestilent Heresy In return whereof the Pope sent his Nuncio to give the King his Holy Benediction yet I do not find that he beforehand sent for Leave to enter the Kingdom as was observed by Queen Mary Henry VIII and before The Judges in their Circuits had their private Instructions to know how Men were affected with the King 's Dispensing Power and those who were disaffected to it were turned out from the Lieutenancy and Commission of the Peace Justice Judgment and Righteousness support the Thrones of Princes but these were Strangers to this King's ways other Means must be found out to support and carry them through a standing Army is judged the best Expedient and as the King told the Parliament at their second Meeting he had encreased his Army to double what it was before so he made his Word good that he would employ Men in it not qualified by the late Tests and to this end Tyrconnel having disbanded the English Army in Ireland qualified by the Tests sends over an Army of Irish not qualified by the Tests to encrease the Army in England This Army thus raised against Law committed all manner of lawless Insolences though the King by several Orders would have had their Quarters restrained to Victualling-Houses Houses of publick Entertainments and such as had Licences to sell Wine and other Liquors the Officers too when they pleased would be exempt from the Civil Power And though the King had no other Wars but against the Laws and Constitutions of the Nation yet he would have the Act of the 1 2 Edw. 6. 2. which makes it Felony without Benefit of the Clergy for any Souldier taking Pay in the King's Service in his Wars beyond Sea or upon Sea or in Scotland to desert from his Officer to extend to this Army thus raised by the King And because the Recorder of London Sir J. H. would not expound this Law to the King's Design he was put out of his Place and so was Sir Edward Herbert from being Chief Justice of the King's Bench to make room for Sir Robert Wright to hang a poor Souldier upon this Statute and afterward this Statute did the Work without any further dispute Thus this Prince did not only assume a Power to controul the Laws of the Nation at his pleasure in Civil Affairs but when he pleased made them bend to his Will to establish an illegal Army and countenance the Effusion of Christian Blood but you 'll soon see God will blast these ungodly Ways and that not the Arm of Flesh but Judgment Justice and Righteousness establish the Thrones of Princes Thus Affairs stood in England Scotland and Ireland in the year 1687. wherein I suppose no History mentions so great and violent Alterations in so little time as in this King's Reign all tending to introduce a Foreign Power and to enslave the Nation yet so patiently endured by it but the Dangers of these Designs were not circumscribed within the bounds of this Nation but extended into France where for above twenty years a Conspiracy was carried on for promoting these Designs thus far advanced so that the Year 1688 had a much more terrible Aspect upon England than the Year 1588 had when Philip the II. designed the Conquest of it for then the Nation was firm and intire for its own Interest whereas this Year it was not only torn in pieces by internal Discords but had an Army and Fleet designed to join with the French King in propagating his boundless Ambition not only upon England but upon the Empire of Germany Spain Holland the Duke of Savoy and other Princes of Italy About the beginning of the year 1688 a Gentleman of High Jesuited Principles told me The States of Holland were Rebels against the King of Spain and that I should soon see the King of France would call them to an Account for it and humble them and that the French King would assist our King with Men of War I took more heed to this because I knew that he was frequently visited by several Jesuits in whose Counsels I believe the French King's Designs this Year were locked up for my Lord of Sunderland in his Letter recited in the History of the Desertion fol. 32. protests he knew nothing of a League between the King yet you will see it come out another way But my Lord of Sunderland says that French Ships were offered to join with our Fleet which was refused however this shews there was a Design contriving by these Princes yet at present the Affairs of France seemed to look another way and a French Fleet and Souldiers in them are sent to Canada the Design and Success you will soon hear of The King having thus as he thought laid a Foundation tho it proved a very Sandy one of his Designs and to shew how Absolute he would be in them upon the 4th of May passed an Order in Council that his Declaration of Indulgence should be read in all Churches and Chappels in England and Wales in time of Divine