TYRANNY DETECTED AND THE Late Revolution Justify'd BY THE LAW of GOD the LAW of NATURE AND THE PRACTICE of All NATIONS BEING A History of the Late King JAMES's Reign and a Discovery of His Arts and Actions for Introducing Popery and Arbitrary Power and the Intended Subversion of the Protestant Interest in the Three Kingdoms AND How that Design affected all EUROPE WHEREIN All the Arguments against the REVOLUTION are fairly Propounded and Candidly Answer'd the Pretended Reasons against the Present SETTLEMENT Recited and Modestly Refuted and Obedience to King WILLIAM and his Government Legally and Religiously Asserted By RIC. KINGSTON LONDON Printed for John Nutt near Stationers Hall MDCXCIX To the Right Honourable WILLIAM Earl of Portland Viscount Woodstock in the County of Oxon Baron of Cirencester in the County of Gloucester Knight of the most Noble Order of the Garter One of the Lieutenant-Generals of His Majesty's Forces Groom of the Stole First Gentleman of the King's Bed-Chamber One of the Lords of His Majesty's most Honourable Privy-Council c. May it please your Lordship MY vast Obligations to your Lordship's Goodness exceeding all possibility of Retaliation and a private Acknowledgment being too faint a Testimony of the Gratitude of my Mind I have presum'd on this Method to make my Thankfulness extend beyond the Limits of my Life and acquaint the World that His Majesty's Bounty and your Lordship's Favours have not been thrown away upon an Ungrateful Person but bestow'd upon a Dutiful Subject who hath hitherto and as long as God affords him Life will express his Duty to your Lordship in the Sincerity of his Service to His Majesty's Government and that I know will be more acceptable to your Lordship than tedious Harangues or elegant Expressions where the greatest I can make is the least that I acknowledge to be due to your Lordship from me The following Discourse my Lord shews the Lawfulness of our late happy Revolution and might justly command my Obliging the World with an Account of your Lordship's extraordinary Merits in that and all other Occasions for England's Safety But when I consider your Lordship is better pleas'd in deserving than hearing an excellent Character and that your Lordship being one of those Pillars that under His Sacred Majesty support the Weight of Publick Transactions I cannot hope the Great Affairs of your Eminent Station should afford you Time to Read a longer Dedication and therefore dare not give my self the Liberty of writing so much as a short Elogy upon a Subject that is able to justifie the largest Panegyrick Now That your Lordship may enjoy a long and happy Life exalted in your Prince's Favour and prosperous in all your Negotiations to the Encouragement of true Piety Loyalty and Vertue shall be the Incessant Prayers of My Lord Your Lordship 's Most Humble and Entirely Devoted Servant RIC. KINGSTON The PREFACE Reader THis small Treatise that now salutes your Hands and is submitted to your Censure is the Tenth I have Writ and Publish'd on the Government 's Behalf since the happy Revolution and for some Reasons being forc'd to conceal my Name some of the Scribling Tribe have been pleas'd to call themselves the Authors of them and have stolen Rewards from Publick Hands for what were only my Productions therefore seeing most of those Books are Sold off and as soon as a Work of another Nature is Compleated that has been long under hand I shall Collect them all into one entire Volume Publish it with my Name to it and leave the Usurpers to prove their Titles to what they have so unjustly claim'd In relation to the Subsequent Discourse I must acknowledge the Path has been already trod by others but whether in Brevity and Perspicuity they have made the Way so plain to every Understanding your self not I must now determine However since large Volumes neither correspond with the Purses nor Leisure of the Generality of English Readers and that our Enemies talk this Subject as leudly now as at the Beginning of the Revolution I have accommodated our Friends with an Antidote against that Infection at a Price and in a Volume that will neither burthen the Reader 's Memory waste his Time nor disoblige his Pocket and yet furnish him with Reasons to answer all Objections in favour of James the Second or those advanc'd against our Legal Establishment Vale. Tyranny Detected AND THE Late REVOLUTION JUSTIFIED c. WHoever has an Inclination to satisfie himself or others that the Attempt of the late King in Subverting the Protestant Religion and Introducing and Establishing Popery in these Kingdoms was no Design of a late Invention nor only owing to the Caprichio of his own Bigotry in the Romish Persuasion to go no further backward must take his Aera from the Restoration of Charles the Second who was Imbark'd in the same Enterprize tho' for fear of Travelling again as he was pleas'd to phrase it he was unwilling to divulge it till he was leaving the World and thought it Inconsistent with his future Estate any longer to conceal the Secret To the Banishment of the Royal Family and their sitting loose in the Principles of that truly Catholick Religion in which they were Educated must be ascrib'd this fatal Change Their Exile and other Inconveniencies laid 'em open to many Temptations The Allurements and Promises of those Popish Princes on whom they must necessarily have some kind of Dependance smooth'd the Way and the Caresses and Incessant Importunities of their Mother assisted by the Crafts and Treachery of Priests and Jesuits who know how to improve every Advantage at length prevail'd upon the Unsteady Royal Brothers to Abjure the Protestant and Espouse the Popish Religion Their Example Influenc'd many that had either Dependance on them or Expectation from them to Write after * Quicquid Principes faciunt praecipere videntur Quint. â—la 4. their Copy and so the King and Duke were early furnish'd with a Sett of Men Ready Prepar'd to execute what was subservient to the Great Design of Subjecting England's Obedience to the Triple Crown Nor can any Rational Man at this time of day doubt but that Charles the Second Liv'd and Dy'd a Papist who hath either heard what he both Said and Did when under the Prospect of approaching Death and past hope of Acting a Part any longer or who have Read the two Papers left in his Strong Box publish'd to the World and Attested by the late King James to be Genuine No less have we Reason to doubt but Setting up Popery and Arbitrary Power was his Darling-Project since the whole Course of his Reign was but one Entire Confirmation of those Destructive Machinations And tho' with the Highest Asseverations and Dreadful Imprecations he often deny'd both making us believe what he was not by Inveighing against what he really was yet the Actions of Princes that speak louder and convince more effectually than feign'd Declarations or Proclamations Evidently shew'd he did but
of his People to prevent Distractions and the effusion of Christian Blood to call a Parliament free in all its circumstances but the late King was pleas'd to Deny their Request till the Prince of Orange had acquitted the Realm * vid. his Answer to the Lord's Petition Several Privy Counsellors before this had advis'd his Majesty to call a Parliament without delay and before his Subjects Ask'd it assuring him that if any attempts were made upon his Royal Person or Authority it would effectually engage many honest Men to stand by him besides no ill consequences could be suspected from it because it would always be in his Power to Prorogue or Dissolve it and then he might at the last Shift trust to his Land and Sea Forces But The Jesuites who had his Ear and Heart entirely open and fix'd to their pernicious Counsels on the other hand represented to him that he would be in Danger to see the great Forces which he had then on foot join with his Parliament against him or at least Discontents and Divisions would arise amongst them But if he stood his Ground and suffer'd no Parliament to meet All would faithfully adhere to him so long as he absolutely rely'd on his Forces And accordingly he took this last and worst Advice and would never be brought off till it ended in his Ruin In order to fight the Prince the late King having sent a great Army before he marches down to Salisbury himself where continuing a while and finding his Army daily Desert and being assur'd by the Lord Feversham and others that he could not Rely upon the remaining part of his Soldiery who unanimously declar'd they would not fight against Protestants nor offend the Prince that Heaven had sent for the Deliverance of the Nation from Popery with a very small Number of Attendants the late King returns again to London and in Council orders the Lord Chancellor Jeoffreys to * vid. the Proclamation dat Nov. 30th 1688. Issue out Writs for the Sitting of a Parliament at Westminster on the 15th Day of January following And To second this plausible Pretence of Gratifying the Prince and the whole Nation in Calling a Parliament the late King by three Noble Peers sets on foot a Treaty with the Prince for the Security of the Parliament's Sitting without Interruption the Accommodating all Differences and Restoring Peace and Tranquility to the Nation The Prince freely accepts it and with the Advice of the Lords and Gentlemen assembl'd with him his Highness was pleas'd to send the late King such Proposals as he was pleas'd to say * The Letter to a Bishop q. 14. were Better and Fairer than he could or did expect from him But all this on the late King's part was only a Flourish a Touch of the Jesuits Morals for the late King never intended to perform one Syllable of these Specious Pretences and therefore having sent away the Queen the Child Count Dada the Pope's Nuntio Father Petre and caused the Broad Seal to be thrown into the Thames he only shew'd this Complaisance to Gain Time for his own Departure into France after them What a fair Opportunity was now at the very last put into the late King's Hands to have Redeem'd his Honour Settl'd the Nation and prevented all ill Consequences to his Person and Affairs if he had pursu'd his own propos'd Methods for an Accommodation and kept his Voluntary Promises but he would not So that we can solve these Self-sought Evils no otherwise but by saying What Heaven in the Eternal Council of his own Will has Decreed can never be Revok'd and that for the Accomplishing God's Divine Pleasure Men act directly contrary to their own Interests which has been notorious in the whole Conduct of this Unhappy Prince and has been Jocosely observ'd by others I remember to have seen a Letter written into France from Ireland by a French Commander there giving an Account of the late King James's Management of his Affairs in that Kingdom wherein he expresses himself after this manner That if the late King James had as many Kingdoms to lose as are number'd in Europe his own Conduct would forfeit them all for if he had Twenty Counsellors and Nineteen of them were Men of approv'd Wisdom and Integrety and but one Fool and sensless Person among them he would certainly follow the advice of that blind Bayard in opposition to all the other Sages But Without reflecting upon his Counsellors the late King confirm'd the French Gentleman's Opinion of himself in pursuing the False and Destructive Opinions of those that advised him to withdraw himself against the wholesome Counsels of so many Wise Men that advis'd Calling of a Parliament in order to his own and the Nation 's future Happiness and made it appear a Project so weak and silly that there seems something of a Divine Infatuation in it But he had promis'd the Queen and as some say taken the Sacrament upon it to follow her and thought fit rather to break his Promise with a whole Nation than not humour a pettish Woman Go he must go he will let whatever will be the Consequence of it And therefore to do all the Mischief he could before he went and leave the Realm in all the Confusion was possible He Order'd all those Writs for the Sitting of a Parliament that were not sent out to be burnt and a Caveat to be Enter'd against the making use of those that were sent out and about the same time sent Orders to the Earl of Feversham to Disband the Army and Dismiss the Soldiers which was done accordingly And then the late King made his first Attempt to leave the Kingdom How could the Jesuits have done their King a greater Injury than in persuading him to a continual Breach of his Promises which expos'd his Honour and Integrity to common Censure and drew the Contempt of the whole Nation upon him as a Prince never to be trusted At his first Accession to the Throne one of the Things his Favourites magnify'd him for was for being True to his Word but he resolv'd to prove the contrary and break it in every Instance He promis'd to protect the Church of England and maintain the Protestant Religion when his whole Design was to destroy both and declar'd it in every Action He promised to Govern by Law and not Arbitrarily and at the same time was Investing himself and his Ministers with a Power to destroy them He promis'd an equal Distribution of his Favours and that he would serve himself and the Government indifferently with the Use of All his Subects yet set up Papists to crush the Protestants And when driven to the last Extremity when his All was at Stake He promis'd to Call a Parliament when he was resolv'd it should have no Effect and therefore burnt the Writs to hinder their Sitting He promis'd by this Means to secure the Peace and Happiness of the Kingdom when he had resolv'd before-hand
the very first Descent that it could never be throughly setled in after Ages The Truth is before the Flood the Scripture is so silent in this matter that no Man can affirm whether the Government of the World in those yearly Ages was Regal Aristocratical or Paternal and consequently not in which Form to fix this pretended Divine Right without offering injury to the other Nor after the Flood do we mind this Right granted to Noah in greater proportion than to his Sons in common Which was to acquire what they could and enjoy what they acquir'd for these are the words of their Charter to subdue the earth and * Gen. 9. possess it The New Testament gives no greater incouragement to this pretence of Divine Right than the Old for tho' in the Theocracy Kings were set up by God yet that method ceas'd when Shylo came and tho' the blessed Jesus and his Holy Apostles were very pressing in those Moral duties of Obedience to Superiors yet they no where asserted a Divine Right nor prescrib'd any Forms of Government or making alterations but yielded a cheerful Submission to the Reigning Powers where they came without calling their Titles into doubtful Disputations Now seeing we cannot find this Divine Right of Monarchy and Hereditary Succession granted by the Law of God as founded in Paternal or Patriarchal Authority nor Morally impress'd on human Nature nor possitively Reveal'd in holy Scripture which I shall particularly discourse hereafter let us descend into our own Histories and if we cannot find it there we must leave it as a Chimera or a politick Stratagem to Introduce Tyranny Democracy was the first Government in this British Isle Their Druids serv'd both for Priests and Judges the whole Nation were a barbarous People that knew not God and worship'd Idols And it would seem strange to search for a Pearle in this Dunghil to derive a Pedigree from these bruitish Ancestors or build a Divine Right of Succession upon such a Heathenish foundation when a Human Right is more Eligible and Honourable After the Druids succeeded a Race of Lords or Petty Kings that divided Britain into eight and twenty Provinces and chang'd the Democracy into an Aristocracy every Province paying Allegiance to their own Lord and because among such a Medly it would be hard to find from which of them to derive a Divine Right of Succession I shall leave it as too Nice and Intricate a matter and pass to the Romans Whose Government when Julius Caesar made his first and second Descent into Britain was Aristocratical and he himself had then no greater title than Dictator and if we examine the whole time of their continuance here which was Five hundred Years we shall find that all the several Governors came in by Intrusion Usurpation Adoption Confirmation or Purchase but not one of them ever claim'd by Hereditary Succession Britain being abandon'd by the Romans they elected Vortigern Earl Cornwall King but upon the Leudness and Debauchery of his life and neglecting the true Interest of the Kingdom they Depos'd him and chose his Son Vortimer and after his decease upon promising to Govern more Regularly by a new Election re-inthron'd Vortigern who was Conquer'd by the Saxons whom he call'd in to assist him in his Wars against the Picts and Scots so that here also we have quite lost all pretences to a lineal Succession from the Britains or a pretended Power from God to Oppress and Ruin his People The Saxons were a Wild Illeterate and Barbarous People living by Plunder and Rapine Souldiers of Fortune without any certain Habitation and having no Title of their own as they Demean'd themselves could very ill pretend to have one from God nor could their Heptarchy introduce a Divine Right among us for then we must allow seven Kings at once to Govern by Divine Right in England The Danes drove out the Saxons injoy'd the Monarchy many Years and after much strugling were repuls'd by the Saxons and they again by the Danes among whom were so many Kings Banish'd Murther'd and Depos'd that 't is impossible with any kind of certainty to fix a Succession from any of them For Edward the Confessor that succeeded Harold the last Danish King in England and in whom for want of Issue that Line was extinguish'd had no Hereditary Right 'T was at first indisputably in Edward Son of Edmond Ironside Father to Edgar Etheling his Nephew during his Life and after his Decease to that Edgar who was also Nephew to the Confessor Harold Son of Earl Godwyn that without other Ceremony set the Crown upon his own Head had no pretence of Right to it tho' as affairs then stood was very fit for it for Edgar Etheling was then living and claim'd it tho' he wanted Power to maintain his Right and so Harold kept the Crown till he was depriv'd of that and his Life by one of another Family and a Foreign Nation which has utterly destroy'd all pretensions to the Divine Right of Succession in this Kingdom unless you will make God the Author of all those horrid Murthers Devastations and Confusions that were committed by many of these Princes in acquiring their Crowns And here I must pursue the Succession from the Norman Race William the First was Illegitimate and had no Right but from his Sword and the Peoples submission and Electing him after he had subdu'd King Harold and the latter Right he always preferr'd before the former William the second was Elected against the Right of his Elder Brother Robert who was then living Henry the first was Elected King Favente Clero Populo his Elder Brother Robert being living at the same time and claim'd the Crown in Right of his Birth King Stephen was Elected a Clero Populo and Maud who had the Right of Succession was excluded Henry the second came in by consent yet he had no Hereditary Right for his Mother Maud the Empress Daughter and Heir to Henry the First was then living King John had no Right of Succession for he had an Elder Brother Jeffery Earl of Brittany who had issue Arthur and Eleanor whose Heirs for ought we know to the contrary may still have a being in the World but John tho' Arthur his Eldest Brother's Son was then living was Elected a Clero Populo and being divorc'd from his Wife had Henry the Third by his new Queen Henry the third was Crown'd and settl'd in the Kingdom by the general Election of the People tho' he had no Right to the Succession for Eleanor Daughter to Jeoffry his Father's Eldest Brother was then living Roger Mortimer Earl of March Son of Edmund by Philippa Daughter and Heiress to Lionel Duke of Clarence a younger Son of Edward the Third was by Parliament in the 9 R. 2. declared Heir apparent to the Crown which could not be but by vertue of an Act of Parliament Henry the Fourth came to the Crown by way of Election and in the eighth Year
into Scotland with the Lord Seaford without being able to obtain a Pardon for his Life or Estate From this and other Instances that might be given we may see their Popish Juggling for when an Act of Parliament is made against a Papist 't was no less than Treason to question the King 's Pardoning and Dispencing Power but when an Act bears hard on a Protestant and their King as he pretends has a Mind to Ease them then the King has no Power to Dispence he cannot grant a Pardon his Hands are bound up by Law So that the End of Setting up this Dispencing Power was only to shelter Papists from the Law and ruin Protestants for the Papists in their Hearts we see are as much against it as the Protestants To go on The late King declar'd in Council that he would publish such a Proclamation in England as he had done in Scotland and that none should have Employments under him that would not co-operate in taking off the Penal Laws And he began to execute these Resolutions with a Conduct full of Violence and Injustice The Lord Bishop of London was put out of the Privy Council and Suspended from his Episcopal Office because he would not Suspend Doctor Sharp now Archbishop of York without Legal Process The Earl of Rochester was depriv'd of his Office of Lord Treasurer because he would not change his Religion And the Duke of Sommerset lost his Office because he would not violate the Laws of the Kingdom in performing the Honours at the Reception of the Pope's Nuncio as is usual at the Introduction of Ambassadors To say in Excuse of this that James the Second turn'd out Great Officers of State because they would not obey him and concurr with his Intensions is to publish a Truth that ought to have been Conceal'd by his own Party because it was an evident Demonstration that his Intentions were Unjust and level'd against our Laws and Religion In Things Lawful tho' not Expedient he found a Tacit Compliance nay some of them to keep him in Temper perhaps comply'd further with him than the Strictness of the Law would justifie as Men pull down some Houses at a Fire to preserve the whole Town from Burning But to comply in all things had been to forfeit their own Honours to justifie his Illegalities and Tyranny 2. The Second Means that the late King James employ'd for the Destruction of the Religion and Liberties of England was granting an Ecclesiastical Commission directly contrary to Law This declar'd by what Methods he intended to govern for every Step he made was a new Project to assert his Arbitrary Power and acquaint his Subjects that he would make all Laws Useless that all Power should rest in his own Hands and the Administration be Issu'd from no other Source but his own Will and Pleasure for there was no Occasion for such a Commission but only to shew what he would be at and declare his Purpose to ruin the Church of England Therefore the Commissioners were Devoto's of the Court for the Archbishop's Name was put in but to grace the Matter They knew before that he would not Act and therefore to colour the Sham they oblig'd him to ask Leave to be absent To make this Commission more Illegal a Papist is appointed one of the Commissioners and the whole cloathed with as Absolute a Power as the late King himself was aspiring after They had not only Power to Repress and Punish all Abuses punishable by the Ecclesiastical Laws and to proceed against Offenders by Interdiction Suspention Excommunication Perpetual Imprisonment c. but they had also Power to Exercise their Authority in all Parts of England to Visit Cathedral-Churches the Universities Colleges Parishes Schools and Hospitals to Judge in all Causes and make new Laws Rules Orders and Statutes and Abolish the Old ones as the present Necessity requir'd notwithstanding any Privilege Statute Exemption or Prerogative to the contrary Which was such a boundless Stretch of Power as never had nor I hope never will have any other President than it self Thirdly He pursu'd his Arbitrary Methods by 3. Setting up Popery in Opposition to the National Religion to Ruin his Protestant Subjects and force the whole Kingdom under Subjection to the Papal Laws which had already sentenc'd them to Destruction and that nothing less could be the Design of this Unhappy Monarch will evidently appear if we consider how Popery represents us to the World and how Papists think themselves oblig'd to treat us under those Characters The modestest Terms the Popish Writers can afford the English Protestants is That they are a Pack of Sacrilegious Usurpers of their Church's Patrimony and a Nest of Obstinate Hereticks that ought to be Sacrific'd to their Revenge and Rooted out of the World by any Means whatsoever and this say they is always to be attempted by every good Prince according to Bellarmine's Salvo Ne sint fortiores nobis Unless they be too strong to be subdu'd For otherwise even Massacres are never condemned but when they are unsuccessful And how then they would have us'd us if they could have established their Mischiess by Laws as Bloody as their Minds let the Marian Persecution acquaintus And why should we tempt them again whose Religion is Cruelty and smells so much of Fire that the very Smoak makes us tremble The Laws of England always intend the Preservation of the Subject but Popery when Triumphant in respect of Protestants is destructive to all Laws contrary to the Law of Society to the Law of Government to the Law of Empire to the Law of Royalty and especially to the Laws of a Mix'd Monarchy such as England's are and Protestants can never be safe where 't is Regnant First 1. Popery is against the Laws of Society in all Protestant Countries as well as in England for according to the Romish Tradition the Reform'd are all Hereticks and as such are Ipso Facto depriv'd of the Right they had to their Goods their Children their Liberty their Privileges and even of their Country and ought to be regarded only as Robbers * Becan Theol Scol p. 1. cap. 15. quaest 6. Thieves Murtherers Rebels and Traytors condemn'd to Death by the Church and ought to be deliver'd to the Secular Power to be Executed And to compleat the Tragedy that Holy Church appoints prodigious Recompences to Princes that Exterminate them and Anathematize those that refuse it Now whilst a Popish Prince lies under the Persuasion that his Protestant Subjects are such as his Church represents them that they are not a People nor have Right to any thing they possess he lies under so great a Temptation to destroy them that they had no Reason in the World to trust him with their Lives or suffer him to set up a Power that will inevitably destroy them Secondly 2. It is not less Incompatible with the Law of Government for that is design'd to Protect and Defend And how can that