Claret and other good Liquor that was spent at Elections had never been paid for it had been one of the greatest Grievances the Nation ever groaned under since the Conquest But this is not the worst Mischief that might have followed Suppose the People had been generally overawed by this Vote and an Invincible Armado had appeared on our Coasts with a potent Army ready to be put a Shoar What a Case had this poor Nation been in No Money no Men no Ammunition sufficient to oppose the Invader We had been made an easie Prey to a Foreign Enemy We must have tamely yielded our Throats to the Sword of the Conqueror Every Penny of Money we had every Foot of Land we possessed had been at his Disposal the whole Kingdom might have been suddenly surpriz'd and inslav'd And who had been the Betrayers of the Liberties of the Subject then I believe the greatest and soberest part of the Nation was something startled at such Proceedings as these that by Degrees might have made us perfect Vassals to our Fellow Subjects that would have quite disarmed the King and Kingdom and exposed our Lives and all that we had to any growing Power that had but the Confidence and Ambition to invade us But to imagine that we are therefore Enemies to Parliaments is a very great mistake And to convince you of this I shall shew you the Excellent use and publick Advantages of Parliaments What it is that too frequently hinders the good Effects they might otherwise have and What are the pernicious Consequences of that And then desire you to accept the most Hearty and Seasonable Advice I am able to give concerning your present Elections As to the Excellent Use and many publick Advantages of Parliaments I must here profess and I think I speak the Sense of a great many more that I really esteem it my greatest Temporal Happiness that I was born in a Land where the Government is so admirably Tempered that the King has all the Power that is requisite to inable him to execute Justice and protect his People and which may be enough by the Blessing of God to make him Great and Victorious And his Subjects injoy so much Liberty under him as is abundantly sufficient to make their lives pleasant and easie And as the power of our Kings has not been known to degenerate into Tyranny so I wish and hope that the Liberty of the People will never be turned into a froward petulancy and contempt of the Royal Authority The Parliamentary way of consulting for the publick good has been a very Antient usage in all these parts of Europe and some Foot-steps of it are still remaining in most of our Neighbouring Nations But the Freedom and Dignity of those Noble Assemblies has been no where so entirely preserved as it is in this And the Benefits we might all receive from it if not prevented by our own Folly are exceeding Great I shall name a few that seem very apparent And one is That it tends directly to the increase of that Love and care which ought to be betwixt a King and his People for it gives them both the fairest opportunity of knowing and understanding one another which is always the Original Ground and first occasion of all good will and kind inclination And this being once produced by the intercourse of Parliaments between the Sovereign and his Subjects will be easily preserved in the Breast of the King and may quickly be propagated by the respective Members through every Town and County in the whole Kingdom The ordinary Method of proceeding in those Honourable Assemblies seems purposely contrived for the most happy procurement of this good effect For when all the Nobility and many of the principal Gentry meet together from every quarter they must needs be intimately acquainted with the State and concerns of all and every part of the Nation And after they have considered and agreed upon Bills for the Publick good and Interest these cannot pass into Acts till they be strengthened by the Royal aslent which being granted is the most generous expression of the King's Grace and Favour to his People when he gives them Laws to be Governed by which were proposed and advised for their particular advantage by their own Representatives On the other side when the necessities of the Government have been intimated to the Parliament and they freely consent to the raising such Summs as the occasion requires what might indeed be esteemed but a Duty may be received as a kindness And here is the best Foundation imaginable for a mutual indearment When the King lays the highest Obligations upon his People by consenting to such Laws as make for their ease and prosperity and the People return their thanks for these Royal Favours by begging his acceptance of such supplyes as may be sufficient to maintain the Dignity and Power of the King The advantages of such a reciprocal Love and affection are so very great and manifest that it will not be necessary to mention more but there are some which Spring from the same root which may be a further evidence of the excellency and wisdom of our established Constitution It gives the greatest security that can be had that the Publick Treasure shall not be mispent Not only because the misapplication of what had been raised is the only pretence that can be made use of for any backwardness to a further supply but because it is inconsistent with the generosity of a great Prince to lavish away the best expressions of his Peoples Gratitude for the Liberties and Protection they injoy under him It affords the best incouragement to every man's private Industry to make what improvement he can of his Estate when he is assured that whatever he gains is his own Property and that not one Farthing shall be demanded of him without the Consent of prudent and worthy Persons freely chosen and intrusted by the Body of the Nation And Industry increases Wealth and Wealth brings content and satisfaction to them that injoy it and preserves the People in a prosperous and flourishing condition Besides our most excellent Constitution might if any thing can ingage the minds of all men to an unconstrained and chearful Obedience to the Laws Since our submission is required to nothing else but what has been seriously weighed and deliberately resolved by Legal Representatives impowered to do it by our own choice And there can be no possible excuse for the man that will not be bound by his own Act that refuses Subjection to what has been at least implicitly consented to by every Free-holder in the Kingdom And now let any Man judge what an admirable Constitution it is where the Prince and the Subject are strongly ingaged to Love one another where the Publick Treasure is guarded by Loyalty and Honour where Industry is incouraged as much as is possible and where a chearful and voluntary Obedience cannot be denyed Let other Nations call themselves Free
SEASONABLE ADVICE TO THE Citizens Burgesses and Free-holders OF ENGLAND Concerning PARLIAMENTS AND THE Present Elections By a Divine of the Church of ENGLAND LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Church-yard 1685. SEASONABLE ADVICE TO THE Citizens Burgesses and Free-holders OF ENGLAND Dear Countrey-men WHEN it seem'd good to the Divine Providence to remove our Late King of happy Memory from the Cares of an Earthly Crown to the Joyes and Rest of his Heavenly Kingdom he left the World entirely beloved and generally lamented by all his Loyal Subjects and the deep Sense of having so wise so just so good a Prince almost unexpectedly snatch'd away from us was enough to drown the whole Nation in perpetual Sadness and Tears But to support us under that inestimable Loss our Most Gracious Sovereign that now is has by the Assistance of the same Almighty Goodness been peaceably established on the Throne of his Ancestors in spight of all the desperate Attempts and restless Endeavours of a few turbulent Spirits to deprive him of his most undoubted Right of Inheritance A Prince of mature Age and great Experience and so admirably qualified for Government that if it had not been his by unquestionable Succession his own personal Worth might have been thought enough to have preferred him to a Crown And to quiet the Minds of his People and silence all the imaginable jealousies any of them might have been possibly seduced into by the false and malicious Suggestions of Factious Men the First thing he did after his coming to the Crown was to confirm the hearty Professions he had often made before To preserve this Government both in Church and State as it is now by Law established For this he has already received publick Thanks in several of the Addresses that have been presented unto him and though it be not expresly set down in some yet we may reasonably suppose it is implyed in all otherwise whatever Protestations they may make it will not be believed that they can have any true Zeal for God or Respect for their King that think so gracious a Promise so frequently repeated does not really deserve their most grateful and solemn Acknowledgments But this and the rest of His Majesty's Expressions of a very great Care and Tenderness for His People had that good Influence that the Suspicions of the most timorous did immediately vanish His Advancement to the Throne gave present Ease and Satisfaction and was attended with the most universal Acclamations of Joy from every part of the Nation And certainly now it must be confessed to be the Duty and Interest too of every English-man indeed to do whatever lies in his power for the Continuance of our present Happiness And because the Welfare of the publick may very much depend on the Issue of this first Parliament It will highly concern all those whom the Law has intrusted with the priviledge of Electing to make Choice of persons of approved Prudence and Integrity that may be able to assert the known Liberties of the People without intrenching upon the Dignity of the Crown For we must needs be involved in endless Miseries and Confusion unless the Prerogative of the King be as carefully preserved as the Property of the Subject These two must mutually support the one the other or else they will be both in danger of a Fall But we may chance to meet this Argument again before we have done In the mean time it is like enough to be objected That to undertake to give Advice in these Cases is a very improper Work for a professed Divine I know indeed that of late Years if we did but preach Obedience to Magistrates or reflect though but gently upon the most horrid and unnatural Sin of Rebellion we were presently condemned for going beyond the Bounds of our Calling and being too forward to intermeddle with Matters of State And at Elections of Members to serve in Parliament we could not appear in some places without undergoing some publick Affront Attempts were made to raise a general prejudice against us and all those that had any Respect and Kindness for us It was sometimes esteemed Exception enough against Gentlemen of very great Worth if they stood but fair in the Opinion of the Clergy But it was then easily perceived and since plainly discovered which way the Stream was running and by what sort of Men and upon what Occasion all that Noise and Clamour was raised The Clergy were generally firm to the established Government and professed Enemies to the designs that were then setting on Foot And it was but necessary for those that were indeavouring to subvert the Government both in Church and State under pretence of reforming abuses to make the multitude jealous of them and blacken them as much as possibly they could in the eyes of the People And they wanted neither cunning nor malice to do it But to return some answer to what has been objected If the things I have mentioned may be called Intermeddling with matters of State they are no more than what may be very well justified When we were made Ministers we did not cease to be men and the Church being as it were incorporated with the State He that has an Interest in the one must not be wholly unconcerned for the other The Laws allow us a Vote in Elections and without immodesty we think our selves as capable of Judging who may be fitly qualified to be made our Representatives as other Ordinary Free-holders are And it would be very unjust in those that talk so loud of Liberty and Property to blame us for desireing the concurrence of our Friends much more to Abridge us of the Freedom of our Voices in the choice of a Knight of the Shire Besides it is the indispensable Duty of every Minister of the Gospel to exhort the People to Fear God and Honour the King to Preach Subjection to the Higher Powers not only for wrath but Conscience sake And this they are obliged to by an express Divine Command by the Canons of the Church by the common Laws of Humanity and the respect they ought to bear to true Piety and Holiness of Life That they may contribute what they can to the preventing the Miseries of Civil as well as Foreign Wars and the great increase of profaneness and irreligion which unavoidably follows all popular Tumults and Insurrections when the Commands of Almighty God concerning Obedience especially are quite forgotten or distinguished into nothing the Laws of the Land insolently trampled under Foot and all reverence to Authority wholly laid aside And because it is well known what a Powerful influence a Parliament may have upon the Settlement or ruin of the Nation no less in our Religious than Civil concerns this consideration alone may be sufficient to excuse a Clergy-man if he shall undertake to Advise the Choice of such Worthy Gentlemen as to him seem the most likely to promote the
Let potent Princes assume what Titles they please there is none can boast of more Liberty than the English-man injoys there is no Monarch more absolute and really Great than a King of Great Britain inthroned in the Hearts and affections of his People Having thus briefly mention'd some of the more manifest and plain advantages of Parliaments I shall in the next place shew you What it is that too frequently hinders the good effects they might otherwise have And the general occasion of this Is a strange notion that has been almost universally spread and will very hardly be rooted out of many mens minds That the Court and the Country the King and his Subjects are two quite different Interests This has been slyly infinuated by some and easily believed by others and eagerly fomented by those whose profit or Ambitition made them desirous of a Change Such are always very forward to Discharge their private Discontents upon the Government and hope to advance themselves and repair their shattered Estates by dissetling the Foundations of our Peace But the pretences on which these men are wont to bear up themselves are manifestly vain and supported by nothing but a most palpable mistake The true Interest of a King and his People is still the same For it is certainly the Interest of the People that the King should be in a condition to administer Justice and preserve the Peace at home and likewise to defend them from their Enemies abroad And it is no less the Interest of the King that the People should thrive under his Government be free from discontents and in a capacity to contribute Liberally to the Publick necessities What King could Reign happily where the People were extremly poor and indigent in danger of being ruined by a six months tax and unable to give what the exigencies of State may require And what People could esteem themselves safe where the Exchequer were so low and the King so straitned that he could not curb the insolence of unquiet and Seditious Spirits among his own Subjects nor repulse the force and assaults of a Foreign Power The thing is so exceeding plain and abvious that there is no man but he may presently perceive how these Lines which seem to be drawn from the most opposite parts of the Circumference do meet at last and must always center in the same Point But this notwithstanding there are some that would fain persuade us that the Distance betwixt them is so very great that it is impossible they should ever be united And when they have practised upon the credulous Multitude and made them believe it their Heads are easily filled with a thousand Jealousies and wonderful Chimera's They are like Melancholly musing Men that draw Pictures in the Clouds that can discover fiery Dragons and most dreadful Apparitions in the clearest Sky They are mightily troubled not with any thing they see or feel but with very strange imaginary Fears created only by their own Fancies But I shall indeavour to disabuse those if there be any such that do not yet see through the Design And to this end I shall lay before you the most common Pretences upon which these Jealousies have been advanced They are no other than what you have often heard and it may be you have been very much concerned about them and there was Reason enough for it if they had been true We have been told therefore of Grievances of the Subject that our Liberties and Properties were like to be invaded and that we were in imminent Danger of Arbitrary Power and Popery These were the things with which the whole Nation was allarm'd and the cry was sometimes so strong and almost universal that it might have something discomposed a very sober and steddy-minded Man But when the fright was a little over and he had time to recollect himself he would quickly find that he had no just ground to be much disturbed with these terrible Apprehensions And that they were but like a fit of the Night-Mare in which the Party affected Dreams he is so horribly oppressed with some mighty Weight lying on him that he can scarce fetch his Breath when all the pressure is occasioned only by feculent Humors in his own Body and gross Blood too much thickened with Melancholy But whatever they be or from what cause soever they may arise I shall briefly examine the several Pretences that have been wont to be made The most common and general is that of Grievances a Word of a loose and uncertain Signification and in Vulgar Acception implyes any thing that any Man is displeased at and can declaim against with some shew of a popular Zeal for the good of the Subject And the Invective is always the easiest part of Eloquence at least it makes the deepest Impressions on the Minds of those that are readily disposed to entertain an ill Opinion of their Governours But you know what sort of Men they are who if a waggish Boy do but tie a Straw about their Finger imagine presently they are in Chains and most heavily loaded with Bolts and Irons Complaints have run high and the talk has been loud but it is hard to conceive what Grievances we have suffered since the happy Restitution of the Royal Line unless it be that our Trade has been incouraged our Shipping and Navigation exceedingly increased and that we have lived in plenty and ease and injoyed our own quietly and been almost miraculously preserved in Peace by the great Wisdom and continual Care of a most Excellent Prince when most of our Neighbours were harassed and miserably wasted with Fire and Sword and felt the Extremities of a most Bloody and Cruel War I cannot tell of any other Grievances but these yet I will not deny but that there may possibly be some Inconveniences not formerly foreseen which may be provided against by future Acts. But if any such shall be really found and Bills prepared for the Redress of them no Man can have any Reason to doubt but that His Majesty will be so far from rejecting them that he will be glad of that and all other Opportunities of Expressing the Passion he has for the Ease and Satisfaction of his People In the mean time if we shall murmur and be discontented still and complain of Grievances when we feel none but what every Man 's private Misfortune or Negligence or Prodigality has brought upon him instead of the most happy as we are if we could but be made sensible of it we may be justly esteemed the most foolish repining querulous ungrateful People in the World Another Pretence has been that our Liberties and Properties were like to be invaded Liberty and Property are Words that chime well enough and have been a great while yoaked together and men have been taught to tune them over in a most Lamentable note as if all they had were ready to be seized on and they hurried to Goal and made absolute Slaves and Beggers
real Interest of Church and State in this very Critical juncture of Affairs But this had never prevailed with me to adventure these Papers into publick view if there had not been a strange Rumor spread over the Nation that we of the Clergy were Enemies and despisers of all Parliaments This Groundless calumny was so industriously propagated through the whole Kingdom not without a mixture of many other False and uncharitable reflections that many of the People firmly believed it and it was so deeply rooted in the minds of some that wherever we appeared they were easily perswaded to take the contrary side at all Elections in divers places It is not now hard to conceive for what purposes this malicious report was invented what effect it had we all know But to undeceive some well meaning men that may still be mislead by such unjust and Scandalous Aspersions I shall acquaint you with the true occasion of this report and then shew the Honourable opinion we have of Parliaments The true Occasion then of this report That we were Enemies of Parliaments was really and plainly no other than this We could not express any great good likeing for some things which sometimes happened to be carryed by a Majority of Votes and because we could not always admire all their Proceedings those who served a Design by rendring us Odious indeavoured to make the World believe that we hated the very Constitution which is a most false and malicious Scandal I must confess I never thought that any Man was obliged to yield a blind and implicite Assent to all the Determinations of any Assembly upon Earth This were a kind of Civil Popery and more I believe than they themselves will require of us And then what fault have we committed if we honestly profess our Dissent and have not learned the Art of Flattery to magnify and applaud what we do not approve Where every Man is concerned every Man may be allowed to speak his own Judgment and to differ from whom he pleases provided he do it with Modesty and due respect And to be menaced and frighted out of this Innocent Freedom is of all Slaveries the most Intolerable We find even some Parliaments censured in our Chronicles and very odd Epithets sixed upon them there is one that is called the Wood Parliament it was the Language of those times and the Veneration I have for these great Assemblies will not permit me to put it into more Modern English But you may see by this that the truth will out at last and I cannot Prophesie what Character some of later date may expect in the Histories of after Ages when the Writer shall be secured from a Serjeant at Arms and out of danger of being brought upon his Knees at the Bar of the House The time will certainly come when all Men will Speak and Write their Minds freely of all Debates and resolves whatever And we cannot be therefore justly condemned if we have been so open hearted as to express some kind of dislike of some Proceedings which as far as we were able to judge might be made the Occasions of very great and publick Inconveniences Nor ought we for this to be esteemed Despisers of Parliaments any more than we can be said to be Enemies of Monarchy because we will not undertake to justify every thing that has been done by every Crowned Head in the World But to deal frankly and plainly with you I will give you some Passages which we could not be so well pleased with in some of our late Parliaments Some of them relate more immediately to the Commoners of England and some of them to the King himself That which especially regards the Commoners is the punishing many of them severely enough without any Offence against any known Law of the Realm There was a great Noise made about Abhorrers and Betrayers of the Liberties of the Subject Very strange and frightful words but what unpardonable Crimes may lurk under them will be very difficult for an ordinary man to Conjecture I have searched the Statute Book and there I cannot yet discover the very names much less any Punishment appointed for the Fault Now if a Man should be punished when he has not been Guilty of the Violation of any Law his Punishment cannot be esteemed Legal and Just but meerly Arbitrary and must be resolved into nothing else but the Will and Pleasure of him that inflicts it And yet very many and it might have been any Man's Case were forced to leave all their private concerns and brought up to London from the remotest Parts of the Land at any Season of the Year sometimes under great Infirmities of Body to the certain Detriment of their Estates and hazzard of their Lives and then put under a very Chargeable Confinement during Pleasure and not dismissed at length without a Censure and the Payment of very Liberal Fees And all this not for any Offence against any Law that any one could tell of but only for Words casually let fall that would not bear an Action in any Court in England What a Miserable Condition is this Who could tell when he was safe unless he hung a Padlock on his Lips What Patrons of Liberty are these And what English-man is there that had not much rather be governed by an Act deliberately passed by the Lords as well as Commons authentically confirmed by the Royal Assent and sufficiently promulged to the notice of all Men than to lic at the Mercy of every hasty Vote of the lower House This is what was most of all complained of in some late transactions wherein all Free-born Subjects are more directly concerned That which more particularly respected the King was a certain kind of resolved stiffness in turning of many of his Gracious Messages not always expressing so much Loyal reverence as was due to Majesty under whose Protection they injoyed their Lives and Fortunes and that Freedom of Speech which they sometimes made use of to the very utmost But to say no more of that among other things of a high Nature His Majesty was precluded as far as a Vote could go from advanceing Money upon any part of his Revenue and all Men were frighted as much as was possible from considering the emergent Necessities of the Kingdom and lending any thing in the greatest Exigencies of State This seems extreamly harsh and puts the King in harder Circumstances than the meanest of his Subjects It contradicts the most Fundamental and Divine Principle of all Justice and Equity Do unto all Men as ye would they should do unto you For some of them might have remembred that without a Power to take up Money on what Estates they had they could not have treated the several Corporations so liberally as they did and then they had not been put in a Capacity of giving their concurrence to that or any other Vote Without borrowing the Reckoning could not always have been discharged and I 'm sure if all the
lay under the strongest temptations Nay did they not even then among all the pressures and difficulties they were in most stoutly oppose all Popish Innovations and write most learnedly and convincingly against them And if the Priests or others of that Church should nourish a vain hope and imagin they had gotten some present advantage and should be thereby incouraged to try their Arts of Insinuation and begin to practise upon the weakness and credulity of the Vulgar I do not doubt but they would quickly find very great Numbers who by the Grace of God would be ready and able to incounter them with Success and expose their Fallacies and evidence to the World that the Additions that have been made to the Creed are inconsistent to Scripture Reason and Antiquity and that it is our Church as it is now by Law Established that does constantly maintain the true and Antient Catholick Faith So that there cannot be that appearance of Danger here which some have very uncharitably suspected Besides we have the Countenance and Security of the Laws all on the side of the Church of England and at once to banish the wildest Fears and most unreasonable Jealoufies His Majesty has been pleased to give us his most Gracious Promise that he will always take care to defend and support it And who can entertain the least doubt of the sincerity of his Royal Word Flattery and Dissimulation are base and plebeian Vices that can never gain Admittance in a Noble and Generous Mind The Honour of him that speaks gives a proportionable Value and Credit to what he says and the word of a King ought to be esteemed as sacred and inviolable as his Person And when we have the Word of a King and such a King as was never known to fail of his Word it is the vilest Ingratitude and the highest Affront and Dishonour we can do him not to rest perfectly satisfied but to express a distrust where he has given us the greatest Assurances Imaginable For to conceive that a Prince of the most unspotted Honour and unquestionable Generosity should so often and so solemnly declare what he did not really intend and firmly resolve to perform is little less then a Contradiction I am sure it is far beyond the ordinary rate of a Moral impossibility And they that will not be convinced by this stand in need of dayly Miracles to create a Belief But God be praised we have great Reason to be full of Hopes for the danger of the prevailing of Popery for ought we can see is chiefly seated in our own cowardly and mistrustful Fancies unless it should please God to punish us for pretending too great a sollicitude for the future which is a degree of Infidelity towards him and in this Case the most unpardonable indignity and disrespect to our Soveraign I have touched upon all the most common Pretences that have been made use of to ingender Differences between the King and his People and they all appear to be great mistakes or vain surmizes The truth is they have been usually promoted for the carrying on of some Design Some that have raised the loudest Clamours had been discontented on some Occasion or other and did it only to be revenged on the Government Some intended to Signalize themselves by bold Speeches and hoped to be silenced by Places at Court And some it is to be feared indeavoured by this means to put all things in Confusion and then expected to enrich themselves with Comfortable Shares of plundered Goods and Malignant Lands But however it were if a prevailing Party could but be possessed with these Jealousies they might be able to be sure to intangle Matters of the greatest Importance and obstruct the most weighty Proceedings in Parliament And I now come to mind you of the Pernicious Consequences of this For as the Constitution of this Kingdom is the most happy that Human Prudence can Invent when there is a blessed Harmony and Agreement between the Head and the Members so it is the most unfortunate and deplorable of all when such mis-understandings arise as cannot be speedily reconciled These will beget a perpetual struggling and very dangerous Convulsions in the State Jealousies will be increased and these will give a check to the most material Debates that they will hardly be brought to any good Issue When a chearful concurrence to the King 's most Reasonable Demands shall be obstinately refused out of I know not what Fear he cannot be well pleased with the Disappointment And when Parliaments return Home full of Dissatisfactions whether they be Just or no the several Members instead of making a kind Construction of their Princes Actings as they should in Duty do will be too apt many times to sow their own private Discontents all the Country over and the Multitude will be easily impressed with suspitious Thoughts and imagine that there are some very strange Designs upon them This will breed secret Animosities which will soon discover themselves in Words or Actions and then the King cannot be secure of their Obedience but will be forc'd to have a watchful Eye upon all their Motions And there needs no more but this mutual Distrust to make this Nation Miserable enough But I will further evince this in the Grand Instance of Pecuniary Supplies These every Man knows are frequently Necessary for the support of the Government and Defence of the Kingdom and if they be with-held in some Junctures must undoubtedly prove of very Fatal and Ruinous Consequence to both For the Laws have given the King the Sole Power of Peace and War on the other side no extraordinary Levies are to be made without the Advice and Consent of Parliament So that the one hath the whole Power of the Sword and the Purse is born by the other and it may be very well so long as a good accord can be maintained betwixt them But if a Difference should be started which cannot be adjusted in time this would lead directly to the Subversion of the Government and might be made the sad Occasion of bringing the whole Nation into Slavery The thing is Plain and Visible to every Eye For when the Sword is put into the Prince's Hand if the People should wantonly bind the Arm or cut the Sinews by which it should be managed he must either let it drop to the Ground or it might be wrested from him without Resistance Suppose the King ingaged in a War and the necessary Supplies for the carrying it on should be stiffly denyed what must be the Event of such an obstinate Refusal The Enemy would be hereby mightily heartned and the English Courage extreamly damped many favourable Opportunities of Action must be lost many Dammages suffered that might have been prevented none but a very faint Opposition could be made we might possibly linger out a while like a man in a deep Consumption and be forced at length to yield to the pleasure of an Insolent Conqueror or to
corrupted and byassed any way with the hopes of a little gain If you are indeed affraid of Pistoles there are none so like to be overcome by that kind of Arms as men of mean and indigent Fortunes But setting that consideration aside it is in it self an unbecoming thing that they should have any power of laying Taxes upon other men who cannot or will not pay their own Debts that any should be suffered to get into the House only to be protected from their Creditors and take Sanctuary at Westminster to escape the Fleet or the King's-Bench But I suppose such as these will not be forward to appear or if they should you that know them will easily put them by In the next place therefore you should be very cautious that you do not favour any whom you can suspect to have the least taint of the Bill of Exclusion A Bill of a most daring and dangerous Nature and such a one in many respects as was never brought into Parliament before you can scarce imagin what a heap of miseries you escaped when it was bravely and resolutely rejected in the House of Lords You are now God be praised in perfect Peace you possess your own quietly and converse together with a Neighborly Kindness and Familiarity But if that desperate Bill had taken place you had at this moment been sheathing your Swords in one anothers Bowels you had seen your Houses in a Flame the Country smoaking round about you your Cities and Towns laid in Ashes and been subject to all the Calamities that the most Bloody Civil War could bring upon you For Princes are not to be Voted out of their unquestionable Rights nor debarred of their inheritance by a Scrowl of Parchment A Title to the Crown was never decided in Westminster-Hall Those Disputes cannot be ended but in the Field and of all the Nations in the World England has the greatest reason to dread the starting of such a Controversie The Competition betwixt the Houses of York and Lancaster cost us dear Look into your Chronicles and see what Lamentable devastations were every where made How many cruel Battles were fought How many thousands of English lives were spent in the Quarrel How many Ages almost the wound was kept bleeding and never fully closed till the happy Success and happier Marriage of Henry the Seventh What can you expect from those that had the confidence to attempt the Interruption of the Royal Line and to dig up the surest Foundation of our Legal Settlement They that were for Excluding our Gracious Sovereign might quickly stretch their destractive Principles a little farther and be easily induced to assault him now that by the Blessing of God he is peaceably Seated on the Throne of his Ancestors But I trust that the same Providence which placed him there will continue to defend him from the Subtilty and violence of all His and our Enemies And I cannot but believe that you will be very careful how you give those a fresh opportunity of doing mischief that would have suddenly plunged you into the most miserable Confusions But after you have delivered your selves from the Fear of these be sure you put none in their room but men of approved Wisdom and Integrity None else can be safely intrusted with any concern but these you may securely venture your Lives and Fortunes in their hands These will be able to foresee a Danger and willing and ready to prevent it they will consider all circumstances and weigh every thing impartially and carry themselves evenly between the King and the Subject They will presently discern any inconveniencies the People may lye under and prepare suitable Bills for the remedying of them When the King's occasions require their aid they will grant it freely without pinching any thing from him They are not imposed on by that great mistake which seems too common as if they were always to drive a kind of Bargain with their Prince So much ready money for so much Prerogative This is unkind and disobliging and a very unequal way of Dealing For money that is given may be gotten again Bulloin may be imported and the Circulation of Trade will bring it in But the Prerogative once diminished can hardly be repaired there is no trucking for such Goods our Merchants cannot furnish us with this sort of Commodity from the Coasts of Gninea or Spain At this rate the greatest Prerogative might be soon exhausted and a King some years if he could be supposed to be so easie might sell away the whole Regal Power But Sovereigns have as much reason to be careful of the Prerogative as the People can have to be Jealous of any Right or Property whatsoever Nay the People themselves if they would but understend it are equally concerned in the preservation of it For it is the main foundation of their Security and they that should Foolishly go about to undermine it would find it fall heavy upon their own Heads Without a full Power of Calling and Dissolving Parliaments of Signing and Rejecting Bills of Raising and Disbanding Forces of Pardoning Offenders and Executing Justice nothing could be rightly managed A Prince that should be devested of such an Authority would be no more but a Royal Statue he must be render'd weak and contemptible to all and utterly unable to defend his People Of this Wise and Honest men will be very sensible and no other will be chosen by those that have any value for their own private as well as the Publick safety In the last place you should be very careful to choose men of known affection to the established Church of England A Church against which there cannot lye the least just exception that has purged it self from the errors and abuses which a long tract of time had by degrees brought in and mixed with the Primitive Practice and Belief that has been always highly esteemed by all the Reformed beyond the Sea's and those at home that have professed a Dissent from it have generally approved the Doctrine of it and the controversie how high soever it may have been carried has been only about matters of external Discipline and the refusing Obedience to a few Indifferent Rites And that which it may be is a Glory Peculiar to this Church no Member of it has been ever known to be ingaged in any Rebellion against their Prince His Majesty is very sensible of this and has publickly signified how satisfyed and assured he is of our Loyalty and has promised to support us and you cannot then better express your hearty thanks for the Gracious Declarations he has made you then by the shewing your Zeal for that Church which he has taken into his Royal Protection There are none of any other Denomination amongst us who have not either openly abetted some Factious Design or given too great occasion of suspecting their Fidelity to the Crown And if any of you should be prevailed with upon any pretence to make choice of any