Counsellors whom he had pardoned and was in Honour bound to protect them having himself forced them to be Criminals 3. The third was The consenting to the entire Ruin of Popery in England by hanging many of his Priests and Jesuits and banishing all the rest and pulling down all the Schools and Chappels they had erected all over England a sure Sign they were built upon an Immortal Prince of Wales though this was done before by the unaccountable Zeal of the Mobile 4. He foresaw such a Parliament would not only damn the Ecclesiastical Court that Beast with seven Heads and the Dispensing Power but would in all probability lessen his Revenue and bind up the Prerogative which his great Spirit could not bear 5. The Prince he foresaw would have demanded some Forts to be put into his Hands and the Parliament for their Security so said he If I stay I shall be but a Nominal King of England and only be an Instrument to ruin my Religion my â—riends the Monarchy and the Child also At first he alledged That the Disorders the Preparations to repel the Invasion caused would not suffer a Parliament to meet Secondly After the Prince was landed that all the Countries he had under him would not be free Thirdly That all that had joined with him ought not to sit but when he saw the whole Army and Nation the Roman Catholicks excepted of the same mind mere Force drove him to consent to Call a Parliament and when he had again considered the Consequences of it he at last resolved to throw up the Crown and Government all at once rather than to submit to all these Hardships He seems to have had at the same time a fluttering hope that 1. We should never be able long to agree after he had made it impossible for us to have a Legal Parliament by burning the Writs 2. That the Church of England Principles would when the fear and disorder was over form for him a potent Army in the Nation And 3. That the French King would lend him potent Forces and good store of Mony and if he recovered the Throne by force he should be freed of all these Miseries and have what he only wanted before a Popish Army to insure the Slavery of England for ever Now I would desire those Protestants who pretend now too late to be so zealous for him to consider whether what I have said would not have been expected from him by them for their Security and what they would have done had he called a Parliament and refused them all these things and have insisted That they should have taken his Word as to the Birth of the Prince of Wales have suffered him to have been educated in France and have suffered the Army the Prerogative the Ministers and the Revenues to have continued entirely as they were upon a Promise He would have used them better for the future If they say No They would have had the best Security that Law or Reason could have required Then all the hard things I have mentioned must have been granted them and I much question whether he would now return to the Throne on those terms If they say We ought however to have treated with him have offered him terms I say it would have come to a separate Treaty and the Church the Liberties of the Nation and the Government would have been ruined that way and when all had been done no Bond that he could have broken would have held him longer than the Necessity had continued The only Advantage we could pretend to have by the coming over of the Prince of Orange with an Army was to force the King to what he would never have yielded without that Force Now when he had accordingly passed his Word to the Nation in the Proclamation of the Thirtieth of November That there should be a Free Parliament and to the Prince of Orange in his Message by the three Lords That he would consent to every thing that could reasonably be required for the Security of those that come to it and yet without any Provocation would burn the Writs and resolve to withdraw his Person before these Lords couâ—d possibly return him any Answer for he promised the Queen to follow her who went away the day before him I say this breach of his Word so solemnly made and given both to the Nation and the Prince shew that he was not Master of himself but turned about by others whither they pleased Now suppose the Prince had suffered him to continue at Whiteâ—al and to call a Third Parliament what aâ—surance could he have given that in the end of another forty days we should not have the same trick play'd us and then in March or April have been left in the same state of Confusion we were in in December to the certain Ruin of these three Kingdoms and Holland into the bargain And when all had been done the Scruples would have been the same they are now the Obligations of the Oath of Allegiance the same and the sin of Deposing a Lawful Prince who resolved to do the Nation no Right would have been much greater and more scandalous than barely to take him at his Word and since he had left the Throne empty when he needed not to resolve he should ascend it no more Lastly Suppose the Prince had been Expelled by the King Would the King have then granted us what he would not grant us now Would he not have Disbanded his Protestant Army and have kept the Irish Forces in Pay and have every day encreased them What Respect would he ever after this have shewn to the English Laws Religion or Liberties when he had no longer any thing to fear The memory of what happened after the Monmouth defeat though effected only by Church of England Men will certainly never be forgotten by others whatever the Bigots of this sort of Loyalty may pretend or say That Expression of the Lord Churchil's in his Letter That he could no longer joyn with Self-interested Men who had framed Designs against His Majesty's true Interest and the Protestant Religion to give a pretence by Conquest to bring them to effect ought to be seriously considered by all the Protestants of the Nation This one Argument prevailed upon him when he ran the hazard of his Life Reputation and Fortunes and now they are all on the other side I should consider very seâ—iously if I were one of them what Answer I could make to this turned into a Question in the Day of Death and Judgment before ever I should Act the direâ—t contrary to what he has done For my part I am amazed to see Men scruple the submitting to the present King for if eveâ— Man had a just cause of War he had and that creates a Right to the thing gained by it the King by withdrawing and disbâ—nding his Army yielded him the Throne and if he had without any more Ceremony ascended it he had done no more
the general Indignation their Proposals met with together with the Noise of the Prince of Orange's Preparations frightned them from a further prosecution of their enormous Attempts He ingenuously confesses the seizing of Charters to have been a fault so there is no Contest between us on that Point but he adds That the Prince of Orange has nothing to do with it now others think him highly concern'd in it for if according to Sir Thomas Moore Rex Potest Iuriper Parta mentem potest destrui or according to the Opinion of latter Times a Parliament may make a Bill of Exclusion a Prince that has so near a Relation to the Crown of England ought not to suffer any foul play in the calling together such an Assembly as may null his Title or preclude him of his Right to the Crown in time to come 'T is true the Counsel for seizing Charters was given in the last King's Reign and most of them then seized but no Man can deny but some have been condemned and seized in the Reign of his present Majesty and restored not till the Apprehension of the aforesaid Invasion so that we are promised a Free Parliament only because they cannot put one of their own framing upon us 10. His tenth Paragraph needs no answer 11. In his eleventh he tells us there were but two Papist Judges as if the Laws were not broken unless the Judges were all Papists or that Judges sitting contrary to Law could give a Legal Sentence Both these defects he supposes supplied by the Dispensing Power a Power sufficiently baffled by those Gentlemen of the long Robe of Counsel for the Bishops and not defended by either Judges or Counsel on the other side for which two of the Judges Iones and Holloway lost their places on the Bench. 12 13. His twelfth and thirteenth concern Ireland and Scotland and therefore I will leave them untouch'd to the Gentlemen of those Nations who best understand and are most sensible of the Oppressions they are under 14. In his fourteenth he pleads the Validity of the King's Declaration for Liberty of Conscience tho' that pretended Prerogative has been discuss'd and baffled in Parliament within these few years and deserted as such by His late Majesty he affirms that the King as Head of the Church might oblige the Bishops to cause the Declaration to be read in the Churches which if they had complied with in the Opinion of many good Protestants they had precluded themselves of their Votes in Parliament against it for with what Forehead could they Vote against the Declaration when they caused it to be read in their Churches An Act amounting to no less than maintaining or owning the Dispensing Power 15. In his fifteenth he allows the Prince and Princess of Orange have in terms full of respect signified to the King their deep regret which all these things have given them and their Thoughts abour Repealing the Test and Penal Laws as an Expedient of Peace but blames him it seems for doing all this so respectfully and privately and would rather had it done by a Manifesto that some of the Prince's Friends might be imprisoned for delivering it as Captain Lenham is for bringing over the Declaration He tells us next the King has come up almost to Fagel's Letter which was the Declaration of their Minds viz. The Church-of England-Test and Laws of Supremacy to remain then urging the King's Concessions which may be observ'd to bear date only from the report of the Prince's Preparations for England 16. He tells us in his sixteenth That the Prince thinks a Free Parliament to be the last and great Remedy for these Evils but complains these Wicked Counsellors are against it for fear of being called to Account that they had preingaged Voices to take off the Penal Laws and the Test and regulated Corporations and Burroughs that so they might assure themselves of the Members of Parliament He allows the Charge but says What has all this to do with the King No Man says it has and the Prince only requires the removal and punishment of those Evil Counsellors in a Free Parliament 17. Next our Reflector tells That there never was a Parliament absolutely Free but that Drink Mony and other Evil Arts have had a great sway in Elections This is true but no reason that we should consent to a General or Fundamental Corruption of our Elections because we cannot avoid some few and casual Ones Then he would have had the Prince have desired the King to have laid aside those Evil Counsellors as if it were not Notorious that the Princes dislike of some Men has been their ready way to Preferment in our Court and Embassadors for Holland have been of late chosen out of those he has most aversion for as if these Wicked Counsellors feared nothing so much as a good Understanding between His Majesty and the Prince of Orange 19. In the nineteenth he tells The Prince and Princess of Orange's Question concerning the Birth of the Prince of Wales saying That during the Queen's pretended Bigness and in the manner in which the Birth was managed there have appear'd so many just and visible grounds of Suspicion that not only the Prince himself but all good Subjects in England do vehemently suspect that the pretended Prince of Wales was not born of the Queen 20. Next our Reflector tells us That the Prince ought to have writ to the King for a private satisfaction in this Matter which the King would no doubt have given in the manner that all reasonable Men do when they are examined against themselves All Men allow the imputation of such an Imposture to be a great Reflection on their present Majesties But some think they have in a great measure drawn it upon themselves by omitting to have those Witnesses by and those Methods observed that our Laws require to prove the Birth of a Legitimate Prince of Wales 'T is not perhaps enough to say that there were as many Witnesses and as good Proof of it as the Law exacts still the Question returns Why not the same Persons a Legal Proof admits of no Equivolent Our Reflector will not deny but that there has been common Fame all over Europe that this Prince of Wales was not Born of the Body of her Majesty and common belief of it among Protestants this of it self were enough to make the next Heir to the Crown look about and move every Stone that the Matter might be examined by impartial Methods in a Free Parliament which is all that the Prince and Princess of Orange aims at for their Proofs to the contrary 't is not to expected they should acquaint the World with them before the Trial. 22. In his two and twentieth Reflection on the eighteenth Paragraph where the Prince says He was invited to this Expedition by many Lords both Spiritual and Temporal and many Gentlemen and Subjects of all Ranks Our Reflector is pleased to tell him he is
who can tell what Contests there may be about the Right of the Crown The Deposed Prince is alive and his Right by Sword will be disputed c. If the Government be dissolved the Power devolves on the People no one can claim the Crown the Royal Family is as it were extinct the People may set up what Government they please either the old or a new A Monarchy absolute or limited or an Aristocracy or Democracy If a Monarchy limited supposing it mostly suited to the temper of the English they may choose what Family they please to sit in the Throne They may settle it on the Princess of Orange Princess Ann the Prince of Orange and for want of Issue on whom else they think meet These hold not by virtue of an old Right but by reason of the People's placing it upon them and the Monarchy may be thus de Novo made Hereditary and the King and Prince of Wales gone having lost their Right by the Dissolution of the Government The Iura Majestatis the Militia the Power of War and Peace or the Power of the Sword with the Power of making Judges Sheriffs c. may be lodged where now the Power of Legislation is viz. in King Lords and Commons which will necessitate frequent Parliaments and make it impossible for the Monarch to enslave us There are but two ways by which Slavery can be brought on us viz. Force or Injustice The Militia or Power of the Sword being in the People we are secured from the mischief of Force The Power of making Judges and all the Ministers of Justice being also in the People they cannot be ruin'd by Injustice But we must do no Evil â—hat Good may come of it Is our Government dissolved or is it not If there be a Dissolution Is it of the Constitution or only of the Form of Administration I confess my self not States-man enough to be acquainted with the Fineness of the Politicks but am apt to run the old Road and please my self with an old Distinction All Power is Originally or Fundamentally in the People Formally in the Parliament which is one Corporation made up of three Constituent Essentiating Parts King Lords and Commons so it was with us in England When this Corporation is broken when any one Essentiating Part is lost or gone there is a Dissolution of the Corporation The Formal Seat of Power and that Power devolves on the People When it 's impossible to have a Parliament the Power returns to them with whom it was originally Is it possible to have a Parliament It 's not possible The Government therefore is dissolv'd If what is essential to our Constitution be invaded or ravished from us the Constitution is broken I will instance in two things essential to the Constitution That the People choose their own Representatives And that their Representatives have such an Interest in the Legislation that no Laws be made or abrogated without their Consent The destroying one or both of these subverts the Foundation of our Government The Government being dissolved what must the People do Câ—re must be taken that the Government to be erected by such as will perfectly secure us from Slavery and be a Fence inviolable to the Liberty and Property of the People And the Rights of Majesty must be therefore lodged with the Parliament this will be grateful to the People The way of doing it must be Great Awful and August that none may be able to quarrel it A National Convention made up of the Representatives of the Community That the Convention may be truly National and represent the Community it must be larger than a House of Commons ordinarily is It 's this Convention that sets up what kind of Government they please If they 'l have a Parliament made up of King Lords and Commons it 's sufficient that this Convention is so pleased The Power of this Convention must be absolute and uncontroulable accountable to none but God. It gives Laws to Kings yea to the whole Parliament and sets bounds unto it it shall go so far and no further No Act of Parliament can be strong enough to move the Foundation laid by this Convention The Convention therefore as it has more Power than a Parliament and is it's Creator it must have a larger Body What think you therefore if the first thing done by the approaching Convention be the increasing their Number What if they double it Whether by ordering every Market-Town to send up their Representatives or every Hundred Wapentake c. or by some other way according to the proportion of People and publick Payments as the wise Men of this Convention shall judg most practicable that it may be the Grand Council of the Nation I have unburdened my self and am Your Humble Servant Ian. 5. 1688. Some Account of the Humble Application of the Pious and Noble Prelate Henry Lord Bishop of London with the Reverend Clergy of the City and some of the Dissenting Ministers in it To the Illustrious Prince William Henry the Prince of Orange on Friday September 21. 1688. HE declared in Excellent Words That they came to pay him their Humble Duties and most Grateful Respects for his very great and most hazardous Undertakings for their Deliverance and the Preservation of the Protestant Religion with the Ancient Laws and Liberties of this Nation He addeth That they gave up daily many Thanksgivings to Almighty God who had hitherto been graciously pleased so wonderfully to preserve his Person and prospeâ— and favour his good Design And they promised the continuance of their ferventest Prayers to the same God and all Concurrent Endeavours in their Circumstances for the promoting yet further that Work which was so happily begun and also for the perfecting of it not only in this Kingdom but in other Christian Kingdoms He likewise suggested to the Good Prince That some of the Dissenting Ministers and their Brethren were there present who having the same sense of his Coming hither with themselves had joyned themselves with them by him to render Him their Humblest and most Grateful Resentments His Highness was pleased to declare That he thanked them for their Attendance and acquainted them very briefly with the chiefest Ends of his Difficult and Chargeable Expedition That indeed it was to Preserve and Secure the Protestant Religion his own Religion and their Religion and assuring them he should not think any thing not Life it self too dear to hazard in promoting and perfecting so good a Work. Also he offered up with great Devotion his solemnest Acknowledgments to Almighty God for his Presence with him and Blessing upon his Endeavours and Arms hitherto and asked the Continuance of all their Prayers to God for him The Address of the Nonconformist Ministers in and about the City of London to his Highness the Prince of ORANGE WEdnesday Ianuary 2â—â— divers of the Dissenting Ministers in and about London that go under the Denominations of Presbyterial and Congregational to
Kings concernment for the unheard of Suffering of the E. of F. I do not wonder at it having ever had so little Affection or rather so great an Antipathy to his English Subjects This will be sufficient to open the Eyes of all our Subjects and let them plainly see what every one of them may expect and what Treatment they shall find from him if at any time it may serve his Purpose from whose Hands a Soveraign Prince an Vncle and a Father could meet with no better Entertainment All wise and good Protestants are so certain of happy times under the Government of this most excellent and incomporable Prince that they have nothing left to fear or desire but that God would preserve him from the Hellish Fury of the Papists And as to all these Relations of a Soveraign Prince an Uncle and a Father The King would have done well to have acquitted himself to the Prince as became all these Relations However the Sense of these Indignities c. And as if we had been capable if supposing a Prince of Wales I believe and know that the Conscience of a Popish Prince wholly under the Conduct of the Jesuits will find no Difficulty in consenting to so pious a Fraud provided it can be carryed on with all prudent Cautions For as on the one hand no change of Fortune shall ever make us forget our selves so far as to condescend to any thing unbecoming that High and Royal Station in which God Almighty by right of Succession has placed us So on the other hand neither the Provocation or Ingratitude of our own Subjects nor any other Considerâ—tion whatsoever shall ever prevail with us to make the least step contrary to the true Interest of the English Nation His Majesty's sincere Friend the French King with whom he now enjoys a nearer Converse will also concur with him in this good Design of promoting the true Interest of England And as to his Majesty's Inclinations to Mercy and passing by Provocations we need mention no other Instances but those in the West where the Cruelties exercised on those unfortunate People cannot be parallel'd in any History of Barbarians Our Will and Pleasure therefore is that you of our Privy Council take the most effectual care to make these our gracious Intentions known to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and to all our Subjects in general and to assure them that we desire nothing more than to return and hold a Free Parliament wherein we may have the best Opportunity of undeceiving our People and shewing the Sincerity of those Protections of preserving especially the Church of England as by Law established A Man wou'd wonder any Prince that overlooks what his Secretary writes should suffer such apparent and palpable Untruths to pass For it is not manifest to all the World That the late King through the Jesuits Counsel did all that was possible to weaken and overturn especially the Church of England as well by open Declarations and Practices as by more secret Ways and Contrivances inciting one part of his Protestant Subjects to destroy the other and then immediately after exposing them for it and encouraging and inspiring these later with a Spirit of Revenge and Retaliation And thus having briefly ran over whatever seems material in this Letter I shall desist from Repetitions and insisting on mere words of Course and Matters of form seeing this would be to tire to Reader 's Patience and a lesning of his Judgment Reasons for Crowning the Prince and Princess of Orange King and Queen jointly and for placing the Executive Power in the Prince alone WHereas the Grand Convention of the Estates of England have asserted the Peoples Right by declaring That the late King James the Second having endeavoâ—red to Subvert the Constitution of the Kingdom by breaking the Original Contract between King and People And by Advice of Iesuits and other wicked Persons having Violatâ—d the Fundamental Laws And having withdrawn himself out of this Kingdom has Abdicated the Government and that the Throne is thereby Vacaâ—t For which Misgovernment He has forfeited the Trust of the Regal Inheritance of the Executive Power both in Himself and in His Heirs Lineal and Collateral so that the same is devolved back to the People who have also the Legislative Authority and consequently may of Right Give and Dispose thereof by their Representatives for their future Peace Benefit Security and Government according to their good Will and Pleasure And forasmuch as it is absolutely Necessary that the Government be speedily setled on sure and lasting Foundations and consequently that such Person or Persons be immediately placed in the Throne in whom the Nation has most reason to repose an entire Confidence It therefore now lies upon Us to make so Judicious a Choice that we may in all Humane Probability thereby render Ourselves a Happy People and give Our Posterity cause to Rejoice when they shall read the Proceedings of this Wise and Grand Convention Who is it therefore that has so highly Merited the Love and good Opinion of the People the Honour of Wearing the Crown and Swaying the Scepter of this Land as His Illustrious Highness the Prince of Orange who with so great Expence Hazard Conduct Courage and Generosity has happily Rescued Us from Popery and Slavery and with so much Gallantry Restored Us to Our Ancient Rights Religion Laws Liberties and Properties for which Heroick Action we can do no less in Prudence Honour and Gratitude than Pray Him to Accept Our Crown II. It is better to settle the Exercise of the Government in One who is not immediate in the Line than in One that is 1. Because it is a clear Asserting of a Fundamental Right that manifests the Constitution of the English Government and covers the Subjects from Tyranny and Slavery 2. It cuts off the Dispute of the pretended Prince of Wales 3. The old Succession being legally Dissolved and a new one made the Government is secured from falling into the Hands of a Papist III. The making the Prince and Princess of Orange King and Queen jointly is the Nation 's Gratitude and Generosity and by re-continuing the Line in Remainder is manifested the inestimable Value the People have for the two Princesses notwithstanding the Male-administration of the Unhappy Father IV. The present State of Europe in General and of these Kingdoms in Particular require a Vigorous and Masculine Administration To recover what 's lost rescue what 's in danger and rectify what 's amiss cannot be effected but by a Prince that is consummate in the Art both of Peace and War. Tho the Prince and Princess be King and Queen jointly and will equally share the Glory of a Crown and we the Happiness of their Auspicious Regin yet the Wisdom of the Grand Convention is manifested First In placing the Executive Power in One of them and not in Both for two Persons equal in Authority may differ in Opinion and consequently in Command and it
is evident no Man can serve two Masters Secondly It 's highly necessary and prudent rather to vest the Administration in the Husband than in the Wife 1. Because a Man by Nature Education and Experience is generally rendred more capable to Govern than the Woman Therefore 2. the Husband ought rather to Rule the Wife than the Wife the Husband especially considering the Vow in Matrimony 3. The Prince of Orange is not more proper to Govern as he 's Man and Husband only but as he is a Man a Husband and a Prince of known Honour profound Wisdom undaunted Courage and incomparable Merit as he 's a Person that 's naturally inclin'd to be Just Merciful and Peaceable and to do all Publick Acts of Generosity for the Advancement of the Interest and Happiness of Humane Societies and therefore most fit under Heaven to have the solâ— Executive Power A LORD'S Speech Without Doors To the Lords upon the present Condition of the Government My Lords PRay give me leave to cast in my Mite at this time upon this great Debate and though it be with an entire dissent to some Leading Lords to whom I bear great reverence it is according to my Conscience and that is the Rule of every honest Man's Actions My Lords I cannot forbear thinking that a greater Reproach can hardly come upon any People than is like to fall upon us Protestants for this unpresidented usage of our poor King We feared the security of our Religion because of Him and are now like to Violate a great part of it by forfeiting our Loyalty towards Him Religion is the Pretence but some fear a New Master is the Thing This I take to have been to Business of to Day for notwithstanding we see how feeble a thing Popery is in England that it is beaten without Blows and routed so effectually that it can never hope nor we justly fear it should return upon us and consequently our Religion pretty secure yet I don't see that this satisfies us unless the King goes also He must be turned away and the Crown change its Head for if the Crown be not the Quarrel more than Property and his Majesty's Person than his Religion Why did not the Prince stop when he heard a Free Parliament was calling by the King's Writs where all Matters especially that of the Prince of Wales might have been considered or at least where his Majesties Commissioners of Peace met â—im Who advised him â—o adâ—ance and give his Majesty that apprehension of â—is own insecurity and if any thing but a Crown would have served him Why was a Noble Peer of this House clapt up at Winsor when his Majesty sent him on purpose to invite the Prince to St. Iames's a Message that affected all good Mens Hearts more then any thing but his Majesty's return it look'd so Natural and Peaceable But it seems as if it had been therefore affronted for the Invitation could not have been received without the King 's remaining King and who was there that did not lately say it should be so I and who is there now that does not see it is not so We can my Lords no longer doubt of this if we will remember that the same Night the Prince should have answered his Majesty's kind Message The King's Guards were changed and at midnight the Prince's Guards were clapt upon hiâ— Majesty's Person and which is yet more extravagant to accomplish the business Three noble Lords in view were sent to let him know It was not for his safety or the Princes honour that he should stay in his own Palace A strange way my Lords of treating ones own King in his own House I cannot comprehend how it was for the Prince's Honour the King should go against his Will or how it was against his Honour that his Majesty should be safe in his own House I leave it with your Lordships to think who could render the King's stay unsafe at White-hall after the Dutch Guards were posted there My Lords this I confess is the great Iniquity that sticks with me and deserves our severest Scrutiny and Reflection that after driving our King away we should offer to â—ddress our selves to any Body to take the Government as if he had formally disserted it It becomes us rather to ask Where the King is how he came to go and who sent him away I take the Honour of the Peâ—rage of England to be deeply ingaged both at Home and Abroad to search but this Minor and especially those who are now present most of whom owe their share iâ— thâ—t noble Order to his Majesty his Brother Father or Grandfather It is not unreasonable to believe the King had not gone at first but upon some Messagâ— sent and Letters received to take care of his Person for that nothing less than the Crown was intended but being not out of his own Territories and therefore no Dissertion Abdication or Remise as the Criticks of the Conjuncture we are under pretend for the King may be where â—e will in his own Kingdom we â—ee while it was in his choice to go he returned and by as good as our advise too so that we cannot in truth say his Dissertion is the cause for it is plainly the Effect of our late extraordinary proceedings If any should say He needed not have gone now it is a great mistake for â— King ought to go if he cannot stay a King in his own Kingdom which Force refused to let him be And to stay a Subject to another Authority had been a meaner forfeiture of his Right then can in justice be charged upon his Retirement Wherefore his going must and will lie at their Doors that set him an hour to be gone out of his own Palace Many are angry and yet pleased that he is gone for France but where my Lords should he go Flanders dared not receive him Holland you could not think he should go to and Ireland you would have liked less and when we consider how far a League with France has been made the cause of his Misfortune though to this day it is in the Clouds what other Prince had the same Obligation to receive and succor him Therefore whatever Arts are used to blacken his Retreat we cannot with any shew of Reason imagine that he could think himself safe with us that had exercised Soveraign Power without him our Soveraign Lord and under the protection of a Forraign Prince and his Army though at the same time we had Sworn Allegiance to him and that it was unlawful for us to take up Arms against him under any Pretence whatever My Lords if this be not virtually and in effect to pull the Crown off his Head and dethrone him unheard I am to learn my Alphabet again This is short warning to give Kings for us at least my Lords that boast of Loyalty and were brought to these Seats by the favour of the Crown What can other Nations think of the Nobility of
those the Opportunity to retrieve the Credit they have lost by other Mens Faults We were also very apprehensive of the ill Consequences of the dispensing Power especially in the case of Sr. Edward Hales but it seems the Common Council of London are forbid to take the usual Oaths and yet required to act which is an unqualified Capacity We were in hopes we had lost a rude Army but we have found a ruder twenty places cry out of them and Kingstone certainly with great Justice that in two Nights time was two hundred Pounds the worse for them And for Closseting we have got Questioning that they that won't enter into Associations to protect the Prince of Orange without one of our King is to have no Imployment so that if the Prince should take the Crown I am bound to defend him against my own King and my sworn Allegiance though he come in the right of his Crown Believe me my Lords it is the boldest bid that ever Men made I see Forty one was a Fool to Eighty eight and that we Church of England Protestants shall cancel all the Merits of our Fathers overthrow the Ground and Consequence of their most exemplary Loyalty to King Charles the first and second render their Death the Death of Fools trample their Memories and Blood under our Feet subject our selves to the just Reproach of the Phanaticks whose Principles and Practices we have outdone even to that King that we forced upon them and by our Example had brought them to live well withal God help us this my Lords makes me say that either we must turn from being Church-of England-Men or steer another course for it is but too plain that Presbytery is leading us out of our ancient way and whether we believe it or no our Church sinks and will more for that is the Interest that suits best with a Dutch Humour and Conjunction and be sure if we are so base to leave our King God will be so just as to leave us and here my Lords I shall leave you with this humble motion that we make an humble Address to his Majesty to return home to us that we may act securely and not go out of the good old way which may intail Misery upon us and our Posterity I should think we have had enough of sending our Princes abroad in that much of the Inconveniency we have lain under since their Restoration has been chiefly owing to it We have driven him where we would not have him go and do what we can to provoke that League we have been afraid of and made a great part of the reason of this strange Alteration in the Kingdom Some tell us it is too late but I cannot comprehend the good sence of such an Objection Is it at any time too late for a King and his People to agree after bloody Battels it has not been thought so in all times and Nations and why it may not be without them I never heard a good reason yet If his going was unreasonable it has hurt him more than us since we may thence hope for the better terms if it was not a Fault to go it will be a great one in us if we can have him home upon good terms and will not for if I may with leave speak it his return is as much our Conveniency as his Advantage The offensive part of Him is gone that is to say the Power of Popery and what remains is our great Interest to keep and improve to our own Benefit and Safety I mean my Lords His undoubted Title and Kingship And whatever some hot Men say that are more governed by private Avarice and Revenge then the publick Good of these Kingdoms I cannot but renew my motion to your Lordships that we may send a Duke an Earl a Viscount and a Baron and two Spiritual Lords to invite his Majesty home upon the Constitution of the Government And my Lords forgive me if I say that if we can but get our Iuries Sheriffs Iudges High Courts of Chancery and Parliaments setled as they ought to be the Army at least reduced the Militia better regulated and a due Liberty of Conscience established to all Protestant Dissenters and so far to Papists only as the Law against Conventicles does admit we may yet be happy and upon these terms my Lords and no other will his Highness the Prince of Orange become truly meritorious with the English Nation Reflections on a Paper called a LORD'S Speech without Doors THIS Noble Lord would have done ingenuously in letting the World know his Name and whether he be a Lord or not for one cannot gather it from his Liberality of casting in a mite at this time when mean People such as Trades-men have more generosity and effectually contributed to the publick Peace and Honour of the Nation And as to his dissenting to some leading Lords on the account of Conscience we are in the dark as to what sort of Conscience his is whether Papist or Phanatick Conscience or indeed whether it be any Conscience at all which makes him differ from some leading Lords for the making of Speeches within or without Doors is no infallible Mark of either But he says He cannot forbear thinking that a greater Reproach can hardly come upon a People than is like to fall on us Protestants Ah good Soul what 's the matter Are the Protestants at length found to be the Firers of â—heir own City or Sr. Edm-B Godfrey and the Earl of Essex's Murtherers c. Why no O it s this unpresidented Vsage of our poor King. A good tender-hearted Jesuit I 'le warrant thee that has entred with Campian into an Holy League and Covenant to destroy all Protestant Kings and Princes unless they become as bigotted to the Society as the poor King was But let me take the Boldness to ask your Honour one Question Is there no time when compassion is due to the Country Religion is the Pretence but some fear a new Master is the thing And is it any wonder if a new Master be desired when the old one will not let me serve him but will destroy me and perhaps himself too this being a clear case and evident to all Orders and Degrees of Men among us We see how feeble a thing Popery is in England and it is I do not doubt your Lordships great Grief that your old Master may not be let in again to strengthen and revive her drooping and almost decayed Spirits But why did not the Prince stop when he heard a Free-Parliament was calling by the Kings Writs where all matters especially of the Prince of Wales might have been considered c. As to a Free-Parliament is it not evident to all the World that the King could not bear it Besides who told his Lordship that his old Master would abide by the Decisions of a Free-Parliament touching the Legitimacy or Spuriousness of his Prince of Wales The Kings Guards were changed and at
succeed when he elsewhere acknowledges that the late King's Design was to ruin us and the Prince's to prevent it As to Tricks and Sophistry I detest them as much as any Man yet think such harmless Guides whoever was the Author less pernicious and destructive than force and bloodshed This Gentleman who sâ—ily pleads all along for the Popish Interest is now for sooth much scandaliz'd at the Dutch-Papists in the Princes Army but at this he need not take Offence seeing they are going over whence they came to serve the States against the most unchristian Usurper or both Popish and Protestant Countrys But before this worthy Author can come to a Conclusion of his Book he must have several things proved to him to wit That the Prince of Wales is a supposititious Child that a League was made by our King with the King of France for the Destruction of his Protestant Subjects and rooting out our Religion under the Notion of the Northern Heresy that the late King was poyson'd and that the Earl of Essex was murthered These things we desire may be proved and then we cannot but agree that nothing can be too bad for the guilty Authors This Gentleman cannot but know the Unreasonableness of his Demands and that what he desires is not only unseasonable but impracticable till the Government be setled when and at what time perhaps to his great Confusion these and many other Deeds of Darkness will be brought to light Moreover the Astonishment he expresses at the mention of these vile Practices seems to arise in him rather from some crafty Design than mere Ignorance of what has been done oftner than once in Neighbouring Courts To conclude then in my Authors own Words If these Accusations be cleared once who can reverence the Person guilty of them as the Father of his Country and not rather avoid and fly him as the worst of Tyrants The Scot's Grievances Or a Short Account of the Proceedings of the Scotish Privy-Council Iusticiary Court and those Commissionated by them whereby the Consciences of good Men have been Tortured the Peace of the Nation these several Years past exceedingly Disturbed and Multitudes of Innocent People cruelly Oppressed and inhumanely Murthered IN the Tract of these Years although Informing was a Trade more encouraged than in the Reign of Tiberius yet they arraigned Multitudes without Informer or Accuser and whosoever appeared not upon their Summer Citation which often times was impossible were treated as Criminals They seized many of all Ranks and detained them Months and Years without any Signification of the cause of their Imprisonment and seldom liberate any such without Exorbitant Bail but if they could find the least Shadow to prosecute any suspected to mislike their Arbitrary Courses they precipitated their Process not allowing them time or means to vindicate their Innocency They sent their Inquisitors through their Prisons and Citizens Houses to examine whom they pleased upon most intricate Questions of Church and State Government and made their refusing to answer or dissatisfactory Answers the Foundation of their Indictments others seized in the Crowd at Executions and some when visiting the imprisoned were condemned and executed for refusing to justify their Severities against their Brethren and disowning their Dagon of Nor resistance They frequently sent out Spies to Prisons Cities and Country under Disguise who by simulating their Dissatisfaction at the Exorbitances of the Government and Zeal for persecuted Piety might draw Words from the most wary sustaining such and other Informers as habil Witnesses to the taking away the Lives of many Innocents notwithstanding of one Express Act of Parliament to the contrary They often prosecuted without a Libel and when they formed Libels they seldom restricted themselves to the Points therein contained holding them as confessed who refused to answer their captious and extraneous Questions They not only employed Emissaries but Judges themselves were active to suborn Witnesses against the Lives Estates and Honours of Peers and worthy Patriots a palpably gross Management of such an Intrigue having qualified a Person for a chief Seat in their High Court of Justice and when they could not find such Execrable Russians to serve their turns they forced Pannals to answer de super Inquirendis in the most Criminal Cases They have often sustained Jurors and Witnesses who could not purge themselves of Prejudice or partial Counsel They have Indicted Tryed Condemned and executed Persons in one day and when Intercession hath been made for some time to prepare for Death it hath been answered They shall have no time to prepare for Heaven Hell is too good for them They have kept some in Expectation of Reprieves and Pardons till the very Day and Hour of their Execution others they have hanged early in the Morning thereby preventing the Peoples seeing their Cruelty and hearing the dying Persons last Words and too palpably designing by such Surprizals the Ruine of their Souls They frequently beat Drums about the Scaffolds their Cause being such as could not bear the Words of dying Christians They searched several when removing them from the Prison to the Scrffold seized their Testimonies that so they might not come to publick They would have their Laws to reach Thoughts as well as Actions and many against whom they could charge no matter of Fact they sought to reach their Lives for their Thoughts asking them What think you of the Government c. Some they have wheedled to Confession by promising to favour their Ingenuity upbraiding them for Dissemblers if they would not speak freely and by mock-Expostulations viz. Are ye ashamed of your Principles Are ye afraid to give a Testimony c and forced them to subscribe their Confessions before the Council which they produced as Witness against them at the Criminal Court whereupon they were Sentenced and Executed When any refused to give Categorical Answers then could they extort all by Torture with their Engines of Cruelty the Boots fired Matches betwixt the Fingers and Thumkins and after torturing hanged several though thereby they could extort nothing When some had answered all their Questions and cleared themselves of all charged against them yet would they not pass them so but impose some of their wicked Oaths which they concluded they would not take and according to the measure of Tenderness they discovered in any they apportioned the Oaths to the stricter the more smooth to the laxer the more harsh such as once their own Natural Consciences did fear at They required not only to have their Laws obeyed but subscribed also holding it not sufficient that People transgress them not but likewise own the Justice of them and the Lawfulness of the Authority enacting them and swear to maintain them and yet when some have complyed to all they sought yet would they not discharge them but upon Bond to answer again when called Not only Extrajudicial Confession will sustain with them but when they have given the publick Faith the King's Security
same Ruin upon the Kingdom as those Barons did by their Delay Lastly If the Discusser will not be convinc'd by what has hitherto been said Let him examine the King 's own words and try whether he can pick out any better Construction out of them then that which I shall make Says the late King in his Letter to the Earl of Feversham Things being come to that Extrâ—mity that I have been forc'd to send away the Queen and my Son the Prince of Wales that they might not fall into my Enemies hands I am oblig'd to do the same thing and to endeavour to secure my self the best I can c. Expresâ—ions of a disponding Mind and only full of Grief for the Disappointment of the Popish Career The King was afraid of the Queen and his Son the Prince of Wales as he calls him and therefore deeming it convenient to send Them out of the way believes himself oblig'd to follow them 'T is true there might be some Reason perhaps for him to send Them away but none to send away himself not being under the same Circumstances For let it be Paternal or Conjugal Affection or both together What could be a greater Desertion than this for the sake of a Wife and a Son to leave three Kingdoms at six and sevens He speaks of securing himself as well as he can but mentions nothing of Danger only leaves it to the Lord Feversham and others to presume the Causes of his Fears But certainly the apprehension of Danger can never excuse a Sovereign Magistrate from the Desertion of his Dominions at the same time striving and strugling under the Pangs of the Dissolution of Government If such a Desertion of his Territories in that forlorn and languishing Condition to accompany the Tribulations of a Wife and a Son be not a perfect Abdication of his Territories the Words relinquish desert forgo abandon abdicate have lost their Signification Thus Lysimachus in Plutarch de sera vindicta Dei after he had surrendered his Person and Dominions to the Getae for a Draught of Drink in the extremity of a parching Thirst when he had quench'd his Thirst cryed out O pravum Hominem that for so small a Pleasure have lost so great a Kingdom He would be thought very unfit to be the Master of a Ship that should throw himself into the Sea when his Vessel and Cargoe were almost ready to perish And I will appeal to the Lord of Wemm himself whether if he were to try an Abdicating Prince upon this Point with the same Huffing and Domineering as he did Inferiour Offenders he would take it for a good Justification to say I had thought or I apprehended my Person to be in Danger Rather it becomes a Prince at such a time to exert his Courage and contemn his own when the publick Security lies at stake especially when the Remedy propounded was so easy as the Convoking of a Free Parliament But to withdraw at such a perillous Conjuncture from the Application of his desir'd nay almost implor'd Assistance What can the Discusser think of himself to deny so plain an Abdication And this I take to be the Opinion of the late King's Abdication intimated by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal assembled at Guild-Hall Decemb. 1688. where they are pleased to say That they did reasonably hope that the King having sent forth his Proclamation and Writs for a free Parliament they might have rested secure as doubtless the King might also have done in that Meeting But his Majesty having withdrawn himself c. they did therefore unanimously resolve to apply themselves to his Highness the Prince of Orange c. That is to say The King having withdrawn himself from the Cure of the Grand Distempers of the Nation and consequently Abdicated the Government they resolv'd to apply themselves to a more Skilful at least a more Willing Physician Which had the Discusser more considerately discuss'd when he wrote his Discussion would have sav'd him a great deal of trouble and expence Thus much for the Reasons which the Discusser brings to prove that the King before his withdrawing had sufficient Grounds to make him apprehensive of Danger and that therefore it cannot be call'd an Abdication That which follows being altogether grounded upon certain Statutes and Laws of the Land to the knowledg of which the Discusser seems to be a great Pretender is answer'd in a Word That they who pronounc'd the Throne Vacant understood the Latitude of their Power and the Intent and Limits of the Laws and Statutes of this Realm to that Degree that if nothing else the Consideration of that might have deterr'd the Discusser from the Presumption of appearing so vainly and scandalously in the World. Nor would I be thought so impertinent to transgress the Bounds of my own Understanding as he has done For indeed to tell ye the Truth if the Discusser should come to a Trial at Westminster-Hall I am afraid the Lawyers will certainly inform him that he has very much either mistaken or misquoted his Authors FINIS SATISFACTION tendred to all that pretend Conscience for Non-submission to our present Governours and refusing of the New Oaths of FEALTY and ALLEGIANCE In a LETTER to a FRIEND By R. B. late Rector of St. Michael Querne London And now Rector of Icklingham All-Saints Suffolk SIR I Cannot but admire at the Stiffness not to say Obstinacy of some in not complying with the present Government considering the late danger of Popery and that an Arbitrary Power was exercised amongst us by our late Rulers in asserting their Dispensing Power by the Mercenary Judges declared to be Law. You may remember in our late Conference upon this Subject you pleaded in Defence of your selves and others the Obligation you lay under to the Oath of Allegiance with your Subscription to the Doctrine of the Church of England contained in the 37 th Article and the First Canon of the Church but if it appear that all this is rather grounded upon Mistake than any solid Reality I will not question your ready Submission Oaths I confess are very strong Ties upon Men of Conscience and they are to be tenderly dealt with until that Prejudice be removed give me leave therefore with Sobriety and Meekness to enquire Whether that Oath be still in Force with the Obligation to it if not that Plea must vanish and disappear And here first let me remind you of the occasion of imposing the Oath of Allegiance it was injoyn'd to distinguish betwixt Church and Court Loyal and Disloyal Papists upon that horrid Gunpowder-Treason which hath left a Stain of Villany and Cruelty upon that Religion never to be wiped off Read over the Anatomy of that Oath made by K. Iames the First in his Book of the Defence of it And what is there in if that can stick upon any Protestant except that Clause of denying all Foreign Jurisdiction Prince or Potentate And this you seem'd to hint at when you said the
than all other Princes do on the like occasions and when the King after this was taken and brought back by force he was no longer then bound to consider him as one that was but as one that had been King of England and in that capacity he treated him with great Respect and Civility how much soever the King complained of it who did not enough consider what he had done to draw upon himself that usage But when all is said that can be said there may possibly be some Men to whom may be applied the Saying of Ioab Thou lovest thine Enemies and hatest thy Friends for thou hast declared this day that thou regardest neither Princes nor Servants for this Day I perceive that if Absolom had lived and all we had died this Day then it had pleased thee well Had the Protestant Religion the English Liberties the Nobility and Gentry of this Nation been all made an Holocaust to their Reputations and Humours their Scruples and School-niceties and the Prince of Orange perished or returned Ruin'd or Inglorious into Holland we should then have had the Honour of cutting up our Religion our Laws and our Civil Rights with our own Swords and we should have been the only Church under Heaven that had refused a Deliverance and Religiously and Loyally had Destroyed it self In truth the Men would have purchased Popery and Slavery so dear ought to have enjoyed both to the End of the World. The REASONS of the Suddenness of the Change in England THE true Reasons of the Swiftness of this Change may easily be assigned by shewing the Temper and Designs of Iames the Second the Temper of William the Third our Present Soveraign and the Nature of the English Nation and of the Times all concurring with Wonderful Harmony to produce this wonderful Effect For had Iames the Second undertook any thing but the subjecting England to Popery and the Exercise of Arbitrary Power to that end his vast Revenue his great Army and the Reputation he had gained at Home and Abroad by the defeat of the Monmouth-Invasion would have gone near to have effected it and after all this if he had in the beginning of October frankly granted all the Ten Proposals made by the Bishops and suffered a Parliament to have met and given up a considerable Number of his Ministers to Justice and suffered the pretended Prince of Wales his Birth to be freely debated and determin'd in Parliament It would in all probability have prevented or defeated the then intended Invasion But whilst he thought to save the Pretended Succession the Dispensing and Suspending Power and the Ecclesiastical Commission to carry on his former Design with when he had baffl'd the Prince of Orange the Nation saw through the Project and he lost all Had a Prince of less Secresy Prudence Courage and Interest than the Prince of Orange undertaken this business it might probably have miscarriâ—d but as his Cause was better so his Reputation Conduct and Patience infinitely exceeded theirs he would not stir till he saw the French Forces set down before Philipsbourgh and then he was sure France and Germany were irrevocably ingaged in a War and consequently he should have no other opposition than what the Irish and English Roman Catholicks could make against him For no English Protestant would fight his Country into Vassalage and Slavery to Popish Priests and Italian Women when a Parliament sooner or later must at last have determin'd all the things in Controversy except we resolved once for all to give up our Religion Laws Liberties and Estates to the will of our King and submit for ever to a French Government A Nation of less sense than the English might have been imposed upon of less bravery and valour might have been frighted of a more servile temper might have neglected its Liberties till it had been too late to have ever recovered them again But none but a parcel of Iesuits bred in a Cloister and unacquainted with our Temper as well as Constitution would ever have hoped to have carried two such things as Popery and Abitrary Power both at once upon so jealous a Nation as the English is which hates them above any other People in the World. The cruel slaughter they had made of the poor wretches they took after the defeat at Bridg-water ought to have made them for ever despair of gaining any credit with the Dissenters who rarely forgive but never forget any ill treatment Yet these little Politico's had so little sense as to build all their hopes on the Gratitude and Insensibility of these Men as if they should for Liberty of Conscience arbitrarily and illegally granted and consequently revocable at the will of the Granter have sold themselves to everlasting Slavery They were equally mistaken in their carriage towards the Church of England party for when some of them had pursued both Clergy and Laity with the utmost obloquy hatred oppression and contempt to the very moment they found the Dutch storm would fall upon them Then all at once they passed to the other extream the Bishops are presently sent for the Government intirely to be put into their hands and all Places Presses and Papers fill'd with the Encomiums of the Church of England's Loyalty and Fidelity who but three days before were Male-contents if not Rebels and Traytors for opposing the Kings Dispensing Power and the Ecclesiastical Commission And which was the height of folly the same Pen which had been hired to defame and blacken the Church of England the Author of the Publick Occurrences truly stated was ordered to magnify its Loyalty By which they gained nothing but the intire and absolute disobliging the whole Protestant party in the Nation so that for the future no Body would serve or trust them To compleat their folly and madness they perswaded the King to throw up the Government and retire into France pretending we would never be able to agree amongst our selveâ— but would in a short time be forced to recal him and yield to all those things we had so violently opposed or if not he might yet at least force us to submit by the Succours he might gain in France without ever considering how possible it was we might agree and how difficult it would be to force us by a French Army which was equally contrary to the Interest of England and all Europe besides and to all intents and purposes destructive of the Interest of that Prince they pretended thus to exalt and re-establish Had France been now in Peace there might yet have been same colour for this but when all Europe was under a necessity to unite against him for its own preservation then to perswade the King of Great Britain to desert his Throne and fly thither for succour upon hopes of recovering his Kingdoms again by the assistance of the French the mortal and hereditary Enemies of the English this was so silly a Project that there seems to have been something of a
Massacre of the English in it If thus all the several Branches of our Constitution are dissolved it might be at least expected that one 〈◊〉 should be left entire and that is the Regal Dignity But â—â—â—cerâ—â—ng the Birth of the supposed Prince of Wales no Proofs â—â—re ever given either to the Princess of Denmark or to any othâ—â— Protestant Ladies in whom we ought to repose any Conâ—â—â—â—â—ce that the Queen was ever with Child that whole Matter bâ—â—â—g managed with so much Mysteriousness that there were violent and publick Suspicions of it before But the whole Contrivance of the Birth the sending away the Princess of Denmark the sudden shortning of the Reckoning the Queen 's sudden going to St. Iames's her no less sudden pretended Delivery the hurrying the Child into another Room without shewing it to those present and without their hearing it cry and the mysterious Conduct of all since that time no Satisfaction being given to the Princess of Denmark upon her Return from the Bath nor to any other Protestant Ladies of the Queen's having been really brought to Bed. These are all such evident Indications of an Imposture in this Matter that as the Nation has the justest Reason in the World to doubt of it so they have all possible Reason to be at no quiet till they see a Legal and Free Parliament assembled which may impartially and without either Fear or Corruption examine that whole Matter If all these Matters are true in Fact then I suppose no Man will doubt that the whole Foundations of this Government and all the most sacred Parts of it are overturned And as to the Truth of all these Suppositions that is left to every Englishman's Judgment and Sense An ANSWER to a PAPER intituled Reflections on the Prince of ORANGE's Declaration IT seems a strange piece of Arrogance that any Man should reflect on a Declaration because it does not begin as he would have it that is with a Manifestation of our Clandestine League with France whereby an Army of Frenchmen together with our Papists Irish and other Mercenaries might establish Popery in England The Reflector ought to have consider'd that a Clandestine League tho' it may be very notorious to its Existence and Effects may likewise be very difficult to prove according to the meaning of the word Clandestine But that there is such a one we have the Testimony of the King of France in a Memorial delivered to the States of Holland and though it has been since disowned by our Court and Mr. Skelton upon it committed to the Tower his short Confinement and sudden Advancement to a Regiment shews that his Disgrace was but a trick of State It is also an inconsequential way of Arguing that because the Prince does not begin his Declaration with it therefore there is no such League things of that high consequence being easier and better carried on by secret Messages than Writings under Hand and Seal 2. In his second Reflection he tells us the Prince had needed less Apology if he had pretended only to have come to deliver the King from Evil Counsellours and to ingage him further in the Interest of Europe forgetting the Prince does declare to us he comes for that end tho' not singly and brought over his Army to secure him from the Rage and Fury of those Evil Counsellours His next Quarrel is that the Prince uses the Stile Of We and Vs within His Majesties Dominions a thing I believe ordinary enough in Great Princes when they speak or write to their Inferiours The Prince of Orange is General of a great numerous Army Admiral of a vast Fleet State-holder to a High and Mighty Common-wealth and consequently too great to speak in the Stile of a Private Person so that Rewarding Punishing Commanding Advancing may very naturally fall within his Power Nor is it any Crime to endeavour the calling of a Free Parliament and settling the Nation tho by ways and methods unusual in our days nothing being more frequent in our Histories than for our Barons with Arms in their Hands to compel their Kings to call and hearken to their Parliaments But now there being a standing Army of fourty thousand Mercenaries in the Land it was grown a Crime to petition for a Parliament and a Folly to expect a free one new Charters and Corporations and a general Nomination of incompetent Magistrates having taken the Election of Members for Parliament out of those Hands the Laws of the Land and Memorial Custom had intrusted with them According to the new Scheme designed by those Upstart and Popish Counsellours no Man was to Elect or be Elected for Parliament that would not ingage as far as in them lay to take away the Penal Laws and Test nay those wicked Counsellors prevailed yet farther upon his Majesty and he that pardoned so many of his Enemies was not suffered to forgive his best Friends and most Loyal Subjects a Refusal or Excuse in that particular That the Prince will send back his Army seems to some a strong presumption that he will not stay behind since even our own lawful King thinks himself not safe without an Army of Mercenaries in his own Kingdom From a strain'd Phrase or two Of We and Vs Require and Command sometimes used in his Declaration to infer That the Prince of Orange intends to make himself King of England seems to all rational Men a very captious and unsatisfactory way of arguing and a very unjust Calumny cast upon so great a Prince since more than once in express terms he declares he has no design upon his Majesty's Crown or Person so that all that Reproach falls to the Ground 3. In his third Reflection he tells us the Prince wants a clear Call and that a Son against a Father a Nephew against and Unkle a Neighbour against a Neighbour cannot be such That he is a Son-in-Law and a Nephew to his Present Majesty gives the Prince a fair and just pretence to interpose in our Affairs had he been a Foreigner as our Reflector terms him it might have look'd like an intended Conquest had he not been a Neighbour it had been Impossible for him to have afforded us this seasonable Assistance But some think that where Attempts are made to introduce the Catholick Religion by a Conspiracy against the Laws that secure and establish the Protestant Religion and the Test that only can keep the Papists out of the Government And to carry on this Conspiracy the better the old Charters are taken away under pretence of Forfeiture and Surrender new ones granted such as might bring Elections within the Power of those Evil Counsellors Papists upon the Bench a Jesuit in the Council and whole Troops of them in the Army 'T was high time for a Protestant Prince that had so near relation to the Crown of England to look about him and choose rather to be censured by our Reflector and such as he for entering upon the Stage a little before
Steeds managed and used to War in Head-Pieces Back and Breast bright Armour 2. 200 Blacks brought from the Plantations of the Netherlands in America having on Imbroider'd Caps lin'd with white Fur and Plumes of White Feathers to attend the Horse 3. 200 Finlanders or Laplanders in Bears Skins taken from the Wild Beasts they had slain the common Habit of that cold Climate with black Armour and broad flaming Swords 4. 50 Gentlemen and as many Pages to attend and support the Prince's Banner bearing this Inscrption GOD and the PROTESTANT RELIGION 5. 50 Led-Horses all manag'd and brought up to the Wars with two Grooms to each Horse and two Coaches of State. 6. After these Rid the Prince on a Milk-white Palfrey armed Cap-a-Pee a Plum of White Feathers on his Head all in bright Armour and forty two Foot-men running by him 7. After his Highness followed likewise on Horseback 200 Gentlemen and Pages 8. 300 Switzers with Fuzees 9. 500 Volunteers each two led-Horses 10. His Captain and Guards 600 armed Cap-a-Pee The rest of the Army brought up the Reer Saturday most part of the day and Sabbath-day and Monday and Tuesday the main Body of the Army came and most of them only some few Regiments of Foot marched to Tiverton Collumpton Honiton c. and to the Neighbouring Parishes and the Foot to Clist-beath where they incamped and pitch'd their Tents The Bishop fled and is come for London and we hear is made Arch-bishop of York the Dean likewise withdrew whose House the Prince took for his Lodgings The Lord's-day Dr. Burnet preach'd at the Cathedral on the last Verse of 107 th Psalm wherein he observed the wonderful Providence of God towards them in the whole Conduct of Affairs in this Undertaking and how they intended to have landed the 4 th of November if it had been possible it being the Prince's Birth-day and the Day of his Marriage to the Princess but they could not possibly make the Land and so could not get the Shoar till the 5 th that England's Deliverance might be begun on the same Day that it was formerly designed for Ruin and Destruction On Monday all the Canons that were in Town were summoned to appear in the Quire and likewise the Singing-Men when after they had sung Te Deum Dr. Burnet read the Prince's Declaration and after the Declaration a short Prayer for the Success of the Prince and so departed There was not one of the Canons appeared and when the Declaration was reading the Singing-Men went away they being commanded in the Service to forbear praying for the Prince of Wales Monday Captain Burrington who lives by Crediton came to the Prince and offered him his Service who was very kindly received by Him after that every day the Gentry from all parts of Devonshire Somersetshire c. flocked to him in great numbers it would take up too much time to name them few absenting themselves and those that did there is great notice taken of them they have entered into an Association to stand and fall with the Prince several Lords came to him while here as the Lord Colchester the Lord Abbington the Lord Cornbury the Lord Shrewsbury c. It is incredible to tell you what they have brought with them except you saw it there being 200 of their Ships come into the River of Topsham Plymouth Fort is surrendered to the Prince by the Lord of Bath and the Lord Huntington and the Popish Officers that were therein with Father Turner are seized and secured and the Popish Souldiers discharged and coming hither and owning themselves such are committed by Mr. Seamour who is made our Governour and one Major Gibson Deputy-Governour Here are several thousands of Souldiers that have listed themselves and many thousands more would have done the same but the Marschal de Schomberg told the Prince there was no need of them so were dismist again They have a vast Treasure with them I am certainly informed of 50 Waggons loaded with Cash They have landed about 120 Field-Guns several of which remain still here the other are gone with the Prince The last News we had was that the Prince was at the Earl of Bristol's which is by Sherborn where we are informed that Prince George the Duke of Grafton the Lord Churchill and Colonel Trelawny met him and that the Prince saluted them in the words of David to the Men of Iudah and Benjamin 1 Chron. 12.17 If ye be come peaceably unto me to help me mine Heart shall be knit unto you but if ye be come to betray me to mine Enemies seeing there is no Wrong in my Hands the God of our Fathers look thereon and rebuke it And they replied in the words of Amasai in the 18 th Verse Thine are we David and on thy side thou Son of Jesse Peace Peace be unto thee and Peace be unto thine Helpers for thy God helpeth thee Then David received them and made them Captains of the Band. The Prince at his going from hence gave the Mayor this Character That he was worthy to be trusted for being faithful to his Trust. A further Account of the Prince's Army in a Letter sent from Exon dated Nov. 24. HAD I not insensibly over-slipt my Time the last Post you had received this then When I came here I endeavoured to inform my self after the best manner I could as to the Number and Quality of the Prince's Army and all generally concluded them to be about 30000 all pick'd Men and many of them personally present at the Siege of Buda This I am certain of that they appeared to be Men resolute well Disciplined and Stout and of an extraordinary Stature and their Arms suitable Musquets Swords and Pikes being far larger than ever I yet saw and notwithstanding the Streets were thronged almost as thick as yours on a Lord-Mayor's Day yet was it even a rarity to see one of them shorter than six Foot and some of them were I am confident six foot and a quarter if not six foot and an half in Height So that were it lawful to trust in an Arm of Flesh they might have some cause to presume but the tenour of their words were otherwise their civil deportment and their honesty of paying for what they have and the strictness of their Discipline hinders them from being otherwise winning not a little the Affections of the Country-men who daily resort hither forty or fifty in a Gang to be Listed My Lord Mordent's Regiment was soon compleated which with two others was raised and maintained at the Charge of the Gentry in this County of which Edward Seymour Esq is by the Prince made Governour During his Highness stay here which was till last Wednesday there appeared a Court most splendid composed not only of Foreign but of many of the English Nobility and Gentry which came hither to wait on his Highness since his Arrival of both Ranks upwards to the number of Sixty all mighty Gallant in their Equipage
Estates that they are not to be subjected to the Arbitrary Proceedings of Papists that are contrary to Law put into any Employments Civil or Military Both We our selves and our Dearest and most Entirely Beloved Consort the Princess have endeavoured to signify in terms full of Respect to the King the just and deep Regret which all these Proceedings have given us and in Compliance with his Majesties Desires signified to us We declared both by word of Mouth to his Envoy and in writing what our Thoughts were touching the repealing of the Test and Penal Laws which we did in such a manner that we hoped we had proposed an Expedient by which the Peace of those Kingdoms and a happy Agreement among the Subjects of all Perswasions might have been settled but those Evil Counsellors have put such ill Constructions on these our good Intentions that they have endeavoured to alienate the King more and more from us as if We had designed to disturb the Quiet and Happiness of the Kingdom The last and great Remedy for all those Evils is the calling of a Parliament for securing the Nation against the evil Practices of those wicked Counsellors but this could not be yet compassed nor can it easily be brought about For those Men apprehending that a lawful Parliament being once assembled they would be brought to an account for all their open Violations of Law and for their Plots and Conspiracies against the Protestant Religion and the Lives and Liberties of the Subjects they have endeavoured under the specious Pretence of Liberty of Conscience first to sow Divisions among Protestants between those of the Church of England and the Dissenters The Design being laid to engage Protestants that are all equally concerned to preserve themselves from Popish Oppression into mutual Quarellings that so by these some Advantages might be given to them to bring about their Designs and that both in the Election of the Members of Parliament and afterwards in the Parliament it self For they see well that if all Protestants could enter into a mutual good Understanding one with another and concur together in the preserving of their Religion it would not be possible for them to compass their wicked Ends. They have also required all Persons in the several Counties of England that either were in any Imployment or were in any considerable Esteem to declare before-hand that they would concur in the Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws and that they would give their Voices in the Elections to Parliament only for such as would concur in it Such as would not thus preingage themselves were turned out of all Imployments and others who entred into those Engagements were put into their places many of them being Papists And contrary to the Charters and Priviledges of those Buroughs that have a Right to send Burgesses to Parliament they have ordered such Regulations to be made as they thought fit and necessary for assuring themselves of all the Members that are to be chosen by those Corporations and by this means they hope to avoid that Punishment which they have deserved tho it is apparent that all Acts made by Popish Magistrates are null and void of themselves so that no Parliament can be lawful for which the Elections and Returns are made by Popish Sheriffs and Mayors of Towns and therefore as long as the Authority and Magistracy is in such hands it is impossible to have any lawful Parliament And tho according to the Constitution of the English Government and immemorial Custom all Elections of Parliament-Men ought to be made with an entire Liberty without any sort of Force or the requiring the Electors to chuse such Persons as shall be named to them and the Persons thus freely elected ought to give their Opinions freely upon all matters that are brought before them having the Good of the Nation ever before their Eyes and following in all things the Dictates of their Consciences yet now the People of England cannot expect a Remedy from a free Parliament legally called and chosen But they may perhaps see one called in which all Elections will be carried by Fraud or Force and which will be composed of such Persons of whom those Evil Counsellors hold themselves well assured in which all things will be carried on according to their Direction and Interest without any regard to the Good or Happiness of the Nation Which may appear evidently from this that the same Persons tried the Members of the last Parliament to gain them to consent to the Repeal of the Test and Penal Laws and procured that Parliament to be dissolved when they found that they could not neither by Promises nor Threatnings prevail with the Members to comply with their wicked Designs But to crown all There are great and violent Presumptions inducing us to believe that those Evil Counsellors in order to the carrying on of their ill Designs and to the gaining to themselves the more time for the effecting of them for the encouraging their Complices and for the discouraging of all good Subjects have published that the Queen hath brought forth a Son tho there have appeared both during the Queen's pretended Bigness and in the manner in which the Birth was managed so many just and visible grounds of Suspicion that not only We our selves but all the good Subjects of those Kingdoms do vehemently suspect that the pretended Prince of Wales was not born by the Queen And it is notoriously known to all the World that many both doubted of the Queen's Bigness and of the Birth of the Child and yet there was not any one thing done to satisfie them or to put an end to their Doubts And since our Dearest and most Entirely Beloved Consort the Princess and likewise We our Selves have so great an Interest in this Matter and such a Right as all the World knows to the Succession to the Crown Since also the English did in the Year 1672. when the States General of the Vnited Provinces were invaded in a most unjust War use their uttermost Endeavours to put an end to that War and that in opposition to those who were then in the Government and by their so doing they run the hazard of losing both the Favour of the Court and their Imployments And since the English Nation has â—ver testified a most particular Affection and Esteem both to our Dearest Consort the Princess and to Our Selves We cannot excuse our selves from espousing their Interests in a Matter of such high Consequence and from contributing all that lies in us for the maintaining both of the Protestant Religion and of the Laws and Liberties of those Kingdoms and for the securing to them the continual Enjoyment of all their just Rights To the doing of which we are most earnestly solicited by a great many Lords both Spiritual and Temporal and by many Gentlemen and other Subjects of all Ranks Therefore it is that we have thought fit to go over to England and to carry over
with us a Force sufficient by the Blessing of God to defend us from the Violence of those Evil Counsellors And We being desirous that our Intentions in this may be rightly understood have for this end prepared this Declaration in which as We have hitherto given a true Account of the Reasons inducing us to it so we now think fit to declare that this our Expedition is intended for no other Design but to have a free and lawful Parliament assembled as soon as possible and that in order to this all the late Charters by which the Elections of Burgesses are limited contrary to the Ancient Custom shall be considered as null and of no force and likewise all Magistrates who have been injustly turned out shall forthwith resume their former Imployments as well as all the Buroughs of England shall return again to their Ancient Prescriptions and Charters And more particularly that the Ancient Charter of the great and famous City of London shall again be in force and that the Writs for the Members of Parliament shall be addressed to the proper Officers according to Law and Custom That also none be suffered to choose or to be chosen Members of Parliament but such as are qualified by Law and that the Members of Parliament being thus lawfully chosen they shall meet and sit in full Freedom that so the two Houses may concur in the preparing such Laws as they upon full and free debate shall judg necessary and convenient both for the confirming and executing the Law concerning the Test and such other Laws as are necessary for the Security and Maintenance of the Protestant Religion as likewise for making such Laws as may establish a good Agreement between the Church of England and all Protestant Dissenters as also for the covering and securing of all such who will live peaceably under the Government as becomes good Subjects from all Persecution upon the account of their Religion even Papists themselves not excepted and for the doing of all other things which the two Houses of Parliament shall find necessary for the Peace Honour and Safety of the Nation so that there may be no more danger of the Nations falling at any time hereafter under Arbitrary Government To this Parliament we will also refer the Enquiry into the Birth of the pretended Prince of Wales and of all things relating to it and to the Right of Succession And We for our part will concur in every thing that may procure the Peace and Happiness of the Nation which a Free and Lawful Parliament shall determine since We have nothing before our Eyes in this our Undertaking but the Preservation of the Protestant Religion the covering of all Men from Persecution for their Consciences and the securing to the whole Nation the free Enjoyment of all their Laws Rights and Liberties under a just and legal Government This is the Design that We have proposed to our Selves in appearing upon this occasion in Arms In the Conduct of which We will keep the Forces under our Command under all the strictness of Martial Discipline and take a special care that the People of the Countries through which we must march shall not suffer by their means and as soon as the State of the Nation will admit of it We promise that We will send back all those Foreign Forces that we have brought along with us We do therefore hope that all People will judg rightly of us and approve of these our Pâ—oceedings but We chiefly relie on the Blessing of God for the Success of this our Undertaking in which We place our whole and only Confidence We do in the last place invite and require all Persons whatsoever all the Peers of the Realm both Spiritual and Temporal all Lords-Lieutenants Deputy-Lieutenants and all Gentlemen Citizens and other Commons of all Ranks to come and assist us in order to the executing of this our Design against all such as shall endeavour to oppose us that so we may prevent all those Miseries which must needs follow upon the Nations being kept under Arbitrary Government and Slavery and that all the Violences and Disorders which have overturned the whole Constitution of the English Government may be fully redressed in a FREE AND LEGAL PARLIAMENT And We do likewise resolve that as soon as the Nations are brought to a State of Quiet We will take care that a Parliament shall be called in Scotland for the restoring the Ancient Constitution of that Kingdom and for bringing the Matters of Religion to such a Settlement that the People may live easie and happy and for putting an end to all the injust Violences that have been in a course of so many Years committed there We will also study to bring the Kingdom of Ireland to such a State that the Settlement there may be religiously observed and that the Protestant and British Interest there may be secured And we will endeavour by all possible means to procure such an Establishment in all the three Kingdoms that they may all live in a happy Union and Correspondence together and that the Protestant Religion and the Peace Honour and Happiness of those Nations may be established upon lasting Foundations Given under our Hand and Seal at our Court in the Hague the Tenth day of October in the Year 1688. WILLIAM HENRY PRINCE OF ORANGE By His Highnesses special Command C. HUYGENS. His Highnesses Additional Declaration AFter We had prepared and printed this our Declaration we have understood that the Subverters of the Religion and Laws of those Kingdoms hearing of our Preparations to assist the People against them have begun to retract some of the Arbitrary and Despotick Powers that they had assumed and to vacate some of their unjust Judgments and Decrees The sense of their Guilt and the distrust of their Force have induced them to offer to the City of London some seeming Relief from their great Oppressions hoping thereby to quiet the People and to divert them from demanding a Secure Reestablishment of their Religion and Laws under the shelter of our Arms. They do also give out that we intend to Conquer and Enslave the Nation and therefore it is that we have thought fit to add a few words to our Declaration We are confident that no Persons can have such hard Thoughts of us as to imagine that we have any other Design in this Undertaking than to procure a Settlement of the Religion and of the Liberties and Properties of the Subjects upon so sure a Foundation that there may be no danger of the Nation 's relapsing into the like Miseries at any time hereafter And as the Forces we have brought along with us are utterly disproportioned to that wicked Design of Conquering the Nation if we were capable of intending it so the great Numbers of the principal Nobility and Gentry that are Men of Eminent Quality and Estates and Persons of known Integrity and Zeal both for the Religion and Government of England many of them
his Majesty to Treat with Him. And his Highnesses Answer WHereas on the 8 th of December 1688 at Hungerford a Paper signed by the Marquess of Hallifax the Earl of Nottingham and the Lord Godolphin Commissioners sent unto Us from His Majesty was delivered to Us in these Words following viz. SIR THE King commandeth us to acquaint You That he observeth all the Differences and Causes of Complaint alledged by Your Highness seem to be referred to a Free Parliament His Majesty as He hath already declared was resolved before this to call one but thought that in the present State of Affairs it was adviseable to defer it till things were more compos'd Yet seeing that His People still continue to desire it He hath put forth His Proclamation in order to it and hath Issued forth His Writs for the calling of it And to prevent any Cause of Interruption in it He will consent to every thing that can be reasonably required for the Security of all those that shall come to it His Majesty hath therefore sent Us to attend Your Highness for the adjusting of all Matters that shall be agreed to be necessary to the Freedom of Elections and the Security of Sitting and is ready immediately to enter into a Treaty in Order to it His Majesty proposeth that in the mean time the respective Armies may be restrained within such Limits and at such a Distance from London as may prevent the Apprehensions that the Parliament may in any kind be disturbed being desirous that the Meeting of it may be no longer delay'd than it must be by the usual and necessary Forms Signed Hallifax Nottingham Godolphin Hungerford Dec. 8 88. We with the Advice of the Lords and Gentlemen Assembled with Us have in Answer to the same made these following Proposals I. THat all Papists and such Persons as are not qualified by Law be Disarmed Disbanded and Removed from all Employments Civil and Military II. That all Proclamations which Reflect upon Us or any that have come to Us or declared for Us be recalled and that if any Persons for having so Assisted have been committed that they be forthwith set at Liberty III. That for the Security and Safety of the City of London the Custody and Government of the Tower be immediately put into the hands of the said City IV. That if His Majesty shall think fit to be at London during the Sitting of the Parliament that We may be there also with equal Number of Our Guards Or if his Majesty shall please to be in any place from London at what-ever distance he thinks fit that We may be at a place of the same distance And that the respective Armies do remove from London Thirty Miles and that no more Foreign Forces be brought into the Kingdom V. That for the Security of the Citiy of London and their Trade Tilbury Forâ— be put into the hands of the said City VI. That to prevent the Landing of French or other Foreign Troops Portsmouth may be put into such hands as by Your Majesty and Us shall be agreed upon VII That some sufficient part of the Publick Revenue be Assigned Us for the Maintaining of our Forces until the Meeting of a Free Parliament Given at Littlecott the Ninth of December 1688. W. H. Prince of Orange The KING's Letter TO THE EARL of FEVERSHAM Upon his leaving Whitehall Together with the Earl of Feversham's Letter to his Highness the PRINCE of Orange after the King's departure Whitehall Decemb. 10. 1688. THings being come to that Extremity that I have been forced to send away the Queen and my Son the Prince of Wales that they might not fall into my Enemies Hands which they must have done if they had staid I am obliged to do the same thing and to endeavour to secure my self the best I can in hopes it will please God out of his infinite Mercy to this Unhappy Nation to touch their Hearts again with true Loyalty and Honour If I could have relied on all my Troops I might not have been put to the extremity I am in and would at least have had one Blow for it but though I know there are many Loyal and brave Men amongst you both Officers and Souldiers yet you know that both you and several of the General Officers and Men of the Army told me it was no ways adviseable for me to venture my Self at their Head or think to fight the Prince of Orange with them and now there remains only for me to thank you and all those both Officers and Souldiers who have stuck to me and been truly Loyal I hope you will still retain the same Fidelity to Me and though I do not expect you should expose your selves by resisting a Foreign Army and a poysoned Nation yet I hope your former Principles are so enrooted in you that you will keep your selves free from Associations and such pernicious things Time presses so that I can say no more I. R. I must add this That as I have always found you Loyal so you have found me a kind Master as you shall still find me to be The Earl of Feversham's Letter SIR HAving receiving this Morning a Letter from His Majesty with the unfortunate News of his Resolution to go out of England and that he is actually gone I thought my self obliged being at the Head of his Army having received His Majesties Order to make no opposition against any body to let your Highness know with the Advice of the Officers here so soon as it was possible to hinder the misfortune of effusion of Blood I have ordered already to that purpose all the Troops that are under my Command which shall be the last Order they shall receive from c. By the Prince of Orange a DECLARATION WHereas We are Informed That divers Regiments Troops and Companies have been Encouraged to Disperse themselves in an Unusual and Unwarrantable Manner whereby the Publick Peace is very much Disturbed We have thought fit hereby to Require all Colonels and Commanders in Chief of such Regiments Troops and Companies by Beat of Drum or otherwise to call together the several Officers and Soldiers belonging to their Respective Regiments Troops and Companies in such Places as they shall find most Convenient for their Rendezvous and there to keep them in good Order and Discipline And We do likewise Direct and Require all such Officers and Soldiers forthwith to Repair to such Place as shall be Appointed for that Purpose by the respective Colonels or Commanders in Chief Whereof speedy Notice is to be given unto Us for Our further Orders Given at Our Court at Henly the Thirteenth Day of December 1688. W. H. Prince of Orange Guild-Hall London December the 11th 1688. By the Commissioners of Lieutenancy for the said City Ordered THat Sir Robert Clayton Knt. Sir William Russel Knt. Sir Basil Firebrace Knt. and Charles Duncomb Esq be a Committee from the said Lieutenancy to Attend His Royal Highness the Prince of
some kind of possession of the Kingly Office. Bâ—t after the Judgment made and declared there seems to be no dâ—fference in the consequence and result of the thing between such an extraordinary case of the Cesser of the Royal Dignity and the case of Death or voluntary Resignation or as if the King had been prosest and made himself a Recluse in a Religious House Then it must devolve upon the next Heir her Royal Highness the Princess of Orange As to the pretended Prince of Wales if there had been no Suspicions as to his Birth as there are many violent ones yet his being conveyed into unknown Places by Persons in whom no credit can be reposed and at an Age which exposes him to all manner of Practices and Impostures touching his Person then can there hereafter be no manner of Certainty of him so as to induce the Nation ever to consider any Pretence of that kind These things being considered First Whether will not the declaring her Royal Highness Queen of England as next in Succession be the surest and beâ—t Foundation to begin our Settlement upon rather than upon a groundless Conceit of the Government being devolved to the People and so they to proceed to Elect a King Secondly If that Conceit of devolving to the People be admitted Whether must we not conclude that the Misgovernment of King Iames the Second hath not only determin'd his Roylaty but put a period to the Monarchy it self And then 't is not only a loss as to his Person but to the whole Royal Family Thirdly Whether those Persons that have started this Notion upon pretence of giving the Nation an opportunity of gratifying his Highness the Prince of Orange in proportion to his Merits which it must be acknowledged no Reward can exceed if they were searched to the bottom did not do it rather to undermine this Ancient and Hereditary Monarchy and to give an Advantage to their Republican Principles than out of any Affection and Gratitude to his Highness For if the latter was that they had tâ—e chief respect to would it not be the more proper way to declare her Royal Highness Queen which will immediately put the Nation under a regular Constitution and posture of Government Then it will be capable of expressing its Gratitude to the Prince of Orange in matters touching even the Royal Dignity it self without making such a Stroke upon the Government as the Electing of a King or making any other immediate Alteration in the right of the Monarchy before the Parliament is compleated and constituted in all its parts must amount unto The Heads of the EXPEDIENT proposed by the Court-party to the Parliament at Oxford in lieu of the Bill for excluding the Duke of York I. THAT the Duke of York be banish'd during his Life five hundred Miles from England Scotland and Ireland and the Dominions and Territories to them belonging II. That the whole Government both Ecclesiastical and Civil shall upon the demise of the King be vested in a Regent for such time as the Duke of York shall survive III. That the Regent be the Princess of Orange and in case of her Decease without Issue or with Issue in Minority then the Lady Ann. IV. That if the Duke have a Son educated a Protestant then the said Princesses respectively shall succeed in the Regency during the Minority of such Son and no longer Which obviates an incurable Absurdity in the former Bill of Exclusion V. That the Regent nominate the Privy-Council and they to be or not to be approved in Parliament as shall be judged safest upon directing the drawing up of this intended Act. VI. That notwithstanding these Kingdoms out of respect to the Royal Family and Monarchy it self may be governed by the said Regent in the Name â—nd Stile of Iames the Second c. yet it shall by this intended Act be made Capital for any to take up Arms on his behalf or by a Commission not signed by the said Regent or not granted by lawful Authority derived from and under such Regent or to maintain an Opinion that the retaining the said Name and Stile shall in this case purge the disabilities imposed by this Act or elude the force thereof VII That Commissioners be forthwith sent to the Prince and Princess of Orange to take their Oaths that they will take upon them the execution of this Act and that their Oaths be here recorded VIII That all Officers Civil and Military forthwith take Oaths to observe this Act and so all others from time to time as in the Act for the Test. IX That his Majesty would graciously declare to call a Parliament in Scotland in order to the passing the like Act there and recommend the same and the like to be done in Ireland if thought necessary X. That in case the said Duke shall come into any of these Kingdoms then he shall be ipso facto totally excluded and shall suffer as in the former Bill and the Sovereignty shall be forthwith intirely vested in the Regent upon such his coming into any of these Kingdoms XI That all considerable Papists be banish'd by Name XII That their fraudulent Conveyances be defeated XIII That their Children be educated in the Protestant Religion By these means these three Kingdoms will be united in defence of the Protestant Religion his Majesty's Person and Government and a sure Foundation laid of an effectual League with Holland and consequently with the rest of Christendom in opposition to the growing Greatness of France ☞ 'T was thought fit to reprint this Expedient that the Reader may compare it with the Bill of Exclusion which may be seen at large in the Debates of the House of Commons lately published and judg which was the greatest Evil of the two viz. that which would have set the Duke aside and given him liberty to live where he pleased or that which would have strip'd him of all Power and banish'd him 500 Miles off and left him only the Name of a King. An Excellent Expedient indeed An Account of the irregular Actions of the Papists in the Reign of King James the Second With a Method proposed how to rid the Nation of them By a Person of Quality THE dreadful Revolutions Plots and Conspiracies which have been promoted by the Roman Catholicks in England since the Resormation are of that nature and have caused such fearful Convulsions in our Church and State that it is a great Argument of the Goodness and Providence of God that we have been able to bear so many Shocks and to avoid so many deep Designs as have now twice within the memory of Man brought us to the brinks of Ruin. We must be very impious or very stupid if our last Deliverance has not been able to make us adore the boundless Goodness of God towards us his sinful and unthankful Servants he having defeated the Hopes and totally overthrown the Contrivances of that restless implacable persidious Faction when they seemed
to be in such a Condition that they need fear nothing but the Almighty Power of God miraculously exerting it self as in the case of Sennacherib which they neither feared nor suspected The Non-resisting Doctrine had so ty'd the hands of the Church of England Men that they thought they might safâ—ly inâ—â—l over us and ridicule the Bond that bound us to our good Behaviâ—ur The Dissenters were as they thought so obliged by the Liberty of Conscience and the fulsom Applications they had made to them in many ill writ pieces and by the Favours â—eâ—â—owed on Pen and Lob the two Patriarchs as they would have been thought of that Party That they not only suspected no oppositions from them but really conceived they would have been more than Scaffolds in the ruining Design they had then on foot The Gentry were reduced to the utmost degree of Contempt and the Nobility who only were capable of putting a stop to such notorious and impolitick Encroachments on our Birth-rights and Liberties were not only closeted examin'd re-examin'd turn'd out of their Stations brow-beaten ridicul'd at Court and in short driven into the Country but they were also by all the Arts that were possible rendred odious to the Crown contemptible to one another and of no use to their Inferiours The Army which was the next great Engine to bring about their Design was managed with more Art than is commonly considered for first there was a Party of Roman Catholicks mixed with the Common Souldiers to be as it were Spies and Tempters to creep into all the places of their resort to observe their Words Looks and Actions and to take the opportunity of all their Needs Crimes Vices and Follies to pervert them and draw them over to the Church of Rome and in the mean time to secure them from contriving any thing that might interrupt their Projects upon us Secondly They punished all who deserted the Service with the utmost Rigour and Severity to keep up â—hâ—ir numbers And thirdly They sent them to quarter in those places that had in any degree refused to comply with their Wills and not only suffered but encouraged them to outrage and sometimes to murder their Hosts but to be sure in all places they very much impoverish'd those that entertain'd them and in the Interim they kept all in awe and quiet whilst the State-Mountebanks practised upon their Lives Consciences Liberties and Properties A People thus harassed and beset one would have thought had been consigned to Ruin and Destruction for where could our Deliverance begin The Parliament which is our last resort was at the same time practised on with all the Art and Address that the Wiâ— of Men or Dâ—vils could invent and he must be of a deep Reach or a Sanguine Complexion who in the beginning of September last could hope to see a â—ree and a quiet Parliament meet and sit one Month to represent with any degree of Liberty our deplorable State and Condition much less to redress any of our Grievances We had one Hope which if they had left us still we had certainly been as quiet and patiâ—nt as Iob himself and that was that the Princess Mary of Orange would when God thought fit succeed his Majesty and then we promis'd our selves a Day of Redemption from all our Calamities and Oppressions so that our Posterity would at worst see better days To deprive us of this remote Comfort that Scene was laid and the Lady of Loretto sollicited to procure a Prince of Wales to reduce us to an utter Desperation of any Redress for ever And now they thought they were so secure of the Day that they might attack the Heretical Bishops and the whole body of our Clergy at once and make them eat their own Dung in the Faces of their respective Congregations if they had comply'd the whole Nation would have abhorred them as a parcel of Cowards if they did not the Ecclesiastical Commission was to have mowed them down by whole sale and when the People had been once deprived of their faithful and learned Shepherds the Wolves in Sheeps-clothing hoped to have had much better Success than hitherto but the Bishops interposing so united the inferior Clergy that this Design proved abortive and the declaring the Bishops Petition a Seditious Libel and so much the more dangerous because penn'd with great Modesty and Humility so far opened the Eyes of all Men that the most Ignorant saw nothing less than the Extirpation of the Protestant Religion was aim'd at The Army however which was the great Wheel in this most dreadful Machine was for the most part Protestant and had express'd so much Joy at the acquittal of the Bishops in the Camp at Hownslow-Heath that they clearly saw till it was new-modell'd it could nâ—t bâ— relied on and therefore the French and Irish were to be invited over and the Companies changed by degrees and when six of the Oâ—ficers at Portsmouth had with the greatest Humility imaginable only desired leave to fill up their Companies with such Men of this Nâ—tion as they judged most serviceable to the King or otherwise that thâ—y might be permitted with all imaginable Duty and Respect to lay â—own their Commissions for this Offence they were brought up Prisoners to London and it was given out they should be hanged as perhaps they had been if Monsieur de Avaux's Memorial given in at the Hague had not come in that very Post to enlighten our little Statesmen and shew them their approaching Danger and yet after all the 10 th of September last they were cashier'd at Windsor And when the Storm from Holland seemed unavoidable with what Insolence did they treat the Eleven Proposals made by the Bishops and the Petition presented the 17 th of November last by the Bishops and Peers about the Town So that till the Army began to go over to the Prince of Orange and the greatest part of the Nation had declared for him No Parliament was to be thought of and the Dispensing Power was the most Sacred of all the Prerogatives of the Crown That we may not imagine all this was undertaken and entred upon without good Consideration of the Difficulties the Roman Catholicks were to met with I would desire the Reader to peruse a small Piece by them published in the Year 1685 during the first Session of Parliament of Iames the Second stil'd Salus Britannica or the Safety of the Protestant Religion against all the present Apprehensions of Popery in Folio The Design of which as the Author himself tells us is to examine what National Operation or Influence a Real Popish Crown'd Head can have over the Lives Liberties or Estates of English-men as now enjoyed and the Religion of the Kingdom as at present Establish'd and by confuting even the most substantial of their imagined Dangers to dissipate those false fears of Popery c. page 1. And in truth I believe no Man can deny but he has very effectually
yet if these few should happen to be Persons of Character of known Prudence and Abilities Integrity and Honesty in Church or State their Examples would give a terrible Shock to such a new tottering Government tho they were never so Tame and Peaceable void of Faction and Sedition themselves And yâ—t lâ—t me tell you you must not judge of the Numbers of â—hese Men by the late general defection The whole Nation I confess was very unanimous for the Prince great numbers of Gentlemen nay of the King 's own Soldiers went over to him very few but Papisâ—s offered their Service to the King but the reason of this was very evident not that they were willing to part with the King and set up another in his room but because they were horribly afraid of Pâ—pery and very desirous to see the Laws and Religion of the Nation settled upon the old Foundations by a Free Parliament which was all the Prince declared for but many who were Well-wishers to this Design will not renounce their Allegiance to their King and now they see what is like to come of iâ— are ashamed of what they have done and ask God's pardon for it and are ready to undo it as far as they can 2. Besides a thousand occasions of Discontent which may happen in such a Change of Government as this which no Body can possibly foresee and yet may have very fatal Consequences there are some very visible occasions for it besides the sense of Loyalty and Conscience How many Discontents think you may arise between the Nobility and Gentry who attend the new Court Every Man will think he has some Merit and expect some marks of Favour to have his share of Honour and Power and Profit and yet a great many more must miss than those who speed and many of those who are Rewarded may think they han't their Deserts and be disconternted to see others preferred before them and those whose expectations are disappointed are disobliged too and that is a dangerous thing when there is another and a righful King to oblige for Duty and Discontent together to be revenged if a new King and to be reconciled to an old One will shake a Throne which has so sandy a Foundation The like may be said of the Soldiery who are generally Men of Honour and Resentment and have the greater and sharper Resentments now because they are sensible of their mistake when it is too late yet as they ought not to have Fought for Popery nor against the Laws and Liberties of their Country fo neither ought they to have deserted the defence of the King's Person and Crown but have brought the Prince to Terms as well as the King. Thus you easily foresee what a heavy Tax must be laid upon the Nation to defray the Charge of this Expedition and I believe the Country would have paid it very chearfully and thankfully had the Prince resâ—ored to them their Laws and Liberties and Religion together with their King but you know Men are apt to complain of every thing when Money is to be paid and it may be it will be thought hard to lose their King and to pay so deaâ— for it too And tho what the Convention does is none of the Prince's fault no more than it was his design yet angry People don't use to distiâ—guish so nicely But there is a greater Difficulty still than all this There are no Contentions so fierce as those about Religion this gave Life and Spirit to the Prince's Design and had the main stroke in this late Revolution And though Popery were a hated Religion yet most Men are as zealous for their own Religion as they are against Popery Those of the Church of England are very glad to get rid of Popery but they will not be contented to part with their Church into the Bargain for this would be as bad as they could have suffered under Popery The several Sects of Dissenters are glad to get rid of Popery also but now they expect glorious Days for themselves and what they expect God Almighty knows for I am confident they don't know themselves Now consider how difficult it will be for any Prince who has but a crazy Title to the immediate possession of the Crown to adjust this matter so as neither to disgust the Church of England nor the Dissenters and if either of them be disobliged there is a formidable Party made against them This being the Case should the King be deposed and any other ascend the Throne it will be necessary for them to keep up a standing Army to quell such Discontents for where there are and will be Discontents without any tye of Conscience to restrain Men there can be no defence but only in Power and this will raise and encrease new Discontents for it alters the frame of our Constitution from a Civil to a Military Government which is one of the great Grievances we have complained of and I believe English People will not be better pleased with Dutch or German or any foreign Souldiers than they were with their own Country-Men and I believe English Souldiers will not be extreamly pleased to see themselves disbanded or sent into other Countries to hazard their Lives while their Places are taken up by Foreigners who live in ease plenty and sasety And when things are come to this pass which is so likely that I cannot â—ee how all the Wit of Man can prevent it I will suppose but one thing more which you will say is not unlikely that the King return with a foreign Force to recover his Kingdoms how ready will the Men of Conscience and the Men of Discontent be to join him nay to invite him Home again and if he returns as a Conqueror you will wish when it is too late that you had treated with him and brought him back upon safe and honourable Terms Secondly Let us suppose now that all this should be over-voted for I am sure it can never be answered and the Convention should resolve to proclaim the next Heir 1. You must be sure to examine well who is the next Heir that is you must throughly examine the Pretences of the Prince of Wales and yet if you have not good Proofs of the Imposture you had better let it alone For tho the Nation has had general presumptions of it yet a Male Heir of the Crown is mightily desired and People would be very fond of him if they had one and seem to expect some better Proofs than meer Presumptions against him because common Fame has promised a great deal more and if you should either say nothing to it or not what is expected it would be a very plausible pretence for discontented People to quarrel 2. Suppose the Princess of Orange should aâ—pear to be the next Heir what if a Lady of her eminent Vertue should scruple to sit upon her Father's Throne while he lives Or what if she should scruple it hereafter and
to the Liberties Laws Religion and Priviledges of England and its Wealth and Inhabitants too and what is left you may be pleased to divide amongst your Men of Character To all this he assures us § 10. There will be a Thousand Occasions of Discontent Juâ—â— a Thousand neither one more or less besides those springing from the sense of Loyalty and Conscience Strange that these Two should be so troublesome as to equal if not exceed the whole Thousand that went before He that had been before so liberal of his Informatiâ—n now sets us to guess in § 10. How many will be discontented in the new Court for want of Preferment Why Sir If you please to inform me how many days in February shall be clear and how many shall be cloudy I will fall a guessing how many in the new Court shall be pleased and how many shall be dissatisfied but when I have done it will not be worth the while because this ever happens and Courtiers have an old way of keeping these Malecontents in hope till they fall off or gain what they desire and so if there should happen to be a Thousand of them they will not be able to shock the Government if there is no other cause of Discontent than that Well but here Duty and Discontent will mix because they are sensible of their Mistake when it is too late For as they ought not to have fought for Popery nor against the Laws and Liberties of their Country so neither â—ught they to have deserted the defence of the King's Person and Crown but have brought the Prince to Terms as well as the King Why Sir Nemo tenetur ad impossibilia The King was never brought to Terms nor perhaps never will So that if they 〈◊〉 Fought at all it must have been for Popery and against both our Laws and Liberties Sir shew when and where the King offered us or the Prince any Terms and I will pass my word you shall be employed to frame Laws for the Convention which is certainly a good Employ for one that is so expert at it as you pretend to be Well § 13. A heavy Tax must be laid upon the Nation to defray the Charge of this Expedition Why Sir Are you of the Privy Câ—uncil to the Prince Surely he will be able to find some other Cause or not make the Tax so very heavy But Men will be very sorry to lose their King and pay so dear for it too Yes doubtless a Gracious King is a great Loss but if he will be gone and inâ—olve us in a War too Taxes must be pâ—id yea heavy Taxes to support the Charge of it or Louis will in a short time teach us what the Prince's Expedition was worth whatever it cost But this is not all we must part with our Church too the crazy Title will require the giving the Church to the Dissenters § 14. The Dissenters have or late acted very well and perhaps if a wise Man has the mannaging of them and the Popish Emissaries be carefully looked after we may compound the Quarrel better cheap than the parting with our Church Sir I am well assured a great deal less will for the present content them and the King is not Immortal and whenever he Dies the Crazy Title will be Soâ—â—red again if no Body be to blame for giving it another terrible Shock § 15. Should the King be Deposed or any other ascend the Throne it will be necessary to keep a standing Army to quell such Discontents You may be a good Law-framer for ought I know but I will swear you are no States-Man this whole Section is meer Whimsey borrowed from the Dutch Design Anatomized who had the folly to talk of Governing England by an Army of Dutch and Germans but why God knows except it were because a few were brought over to deliver us and cannot presently be returned back to Holland The Prince is both a wise and a good Prince and knows the Consequence of keeping those Forces long here better than a Thousand such Law-framers Supposâ— the King should return with a Foreign Force to recover his Kingdom how ready will the Men of Conscience be and the Men of Discontent to joyn with them nay to invite him Home again This looks so like a Roman Catholick Zeal that if I were not assured he is a Church of England-Man I could not believe but it was a Disciple of St. Omers But will the Conscientious Men invite the King home again with all his Apostolick Vicars Jesuits Ecclesiasticall Judges Dispensing Power and a round Army of French Dragoons to teach us the French Faith after the French Fashion Are these the Men of Character Prudence Ability Integrity or of Conscience either Would one of the Primitive Christians have talked thus have stood for a Licinius against a Constantine Well if the King comes in a Conqueror we shall wish we had Treated Truly I shall not I had rather be forced than deceived for then I know what I have to trust to and I would not willingly be accessary to my own Ruine Well suppose this unanswerable stuff is over-voted § 17. We are to bring good proof the Prince of Wales is an Imposture or else we hâ—d better let it alone Very good the Negative is to be proved we may guess by this what kind of Laws you Sir would frame Well but if this be not done the Discontented Men will have a plausible pretence to quarrel What the Conscientious Men will do we must guess but in all probability they will not be better qualiâ—ed What if the Princess of Orange be a Lady of that eminent Virtue that she should scruple to sit upon her Father's Throne whilst he lives Well his Majesty has deserted his Throne and Kingdom when he needed not except he had pleased and some Body must sit upon his Throne though he is yet Alive Now if it be her Right after his Death why not now Our Author is at his Prayers that God would give her Grace to resist the Temptation and I at mine That the Author may never be one of her Chaplains till he is better inform'd The rest of that Section is not unanswerable but not worth answering He has all along supposed the Prince of Orange Crown'd yet in the 19th Section he proves he can have no Right to it neither by Descent nor Gift and truly I am of the same mind for many Reasons and especially for the sake of the Three alledged by him Sect. 20 21 22. and for some others too of as great weight which may be found in the Lord Virulam 's History of Henry VII And yet our Case now before us has three Difficulties that had not 1. A King living 2. A Prince of Wales true or false 3. A Nation divided in Religion to which I might perhaps add the Excessive Power of France and the Excessive Zeal of this Generation to preserve the Descent of the Crown in the
't is for ever lost But I hope your Lordships and all those Gentlemen who compose this August Assembly will proceed with so much Zeal and Harmony that the Result of your present Consultations may be a lasting and grateful Monument to Posterity of your Integrity Courage and Conduct SEVERAL QUERIES Relating to the present Proceedings in Parliament More especially recommended to the Consideration of the BISHOPS I. HOW the House of Commons can answer it to those People whom they Represent if now they have an Opportunity they do not settle the Government upon such a Foundation as will be likely not only to preserve the Nation from Foreign Enemies but also from falling into the like unhappy Circumstances which it is but just now escaped out of and which in a great measure have proceeded from a want of a right Settlement of Publick Affairs at the Restauration of King Charles the Second II. Whether this can be done without altering the Succession since the Birth of the Prince of Wales is not proved supposititious though perhaps no Body doubts but it is so And supposing it proved so Whether it would not be more feasible to make a President now than to try the Experiment first when the next Right of Succession is claimed by the Infanta of Spain or perhaps some Prince her Heir too strong to resist without the Assistance of the Prince of Orange especially if there happen to be such Divisions amongst Us as are at this Time III. Whether it can be immagined to be worth the Prince of Orange's while to leave Holland where he is the chief Man and become a Subject in England nay and have such an uncertain Interest in his stay here that if his Wives Life chance to drop perhaps he may be banished in a Years time and not have a Place as things may happen to put his Head in For his Interest in Holland must necessarily fall into other Hands And no Body knows what fallings out may happen betwixt Us and the Dutch or what other Contingencies may happen that may give cause of Disgust IV. Whether considering the present State of Affairs the Strength of the King of France and the Irish Rebellion to say nothing of the Effects which the Entreaties and subtile Insinuations of a Father must necessarily have upon any one that is good natur'd it be safe to trust the Administration of Affairs to a Woman though never so vertuous And whether we shall be able to protect our selves against all these formidable Enemies and bring things to a due Settlement without the Assistance of the Prince of Orange whose Foreign Alliances are such as we can never hope to obtain if we confer the Crown upon any other V. Whether it would be a greater real Kindness to the Princess of Orange to make her sole Queen after such a manner as she will be likely to be turned out again or to make her and her Husband joint King and Queen during their two Lives I say her Husband who is a Prince not only able to defend her and her Kingdom from all the Dangers that may happen but also to take all the Trouble which may occur in the Administration of Affairs off her Hands so that she will enjoy all the Pleasure of being Queen without any thing of Trouble And we may add to this that if it had not been for him she had never enjoyed the Crown nor the Nation their Freedom VI. Whether the Terms the Parliament shall make with one that can pretend no Right to the Crown but what they give him will not be more likely to be kept by him than by one that pretends a Title and will be flatterâ—d up both by Lawyers and Divines I mean the Scum of them with Notions of a Right jure Divino and a Prerogative which cannot be parted with or abolish'd though by the King's Consent or Act of Parliament VII Whether the House of Commons upon these Considerations and divers others too long to mention will not think it necessary that the Prince and Princess of Orange be crowned King and Queen for their two Lives And whether it can be imagined that the Commons should so far betray their Country as to recede from this Point so necessary for its Preservation notwithstanding all the Disturbances which the Bishops shall make in the House of Lords and though they do not meet with the Concurrence of that House so soon as in reason might be expected VIII Whether the House of Lords will suffer themselves any longer to be imposed upon by the Bishops in a thing that will be so injurious to the Nation as it will be not to comply with the House of Commons in this great Point which must necessarily put such a damp upon Trade that it will certainly be the Ruin of many hundreds of Families in the Nation whose dependance are upon Handy-Craft-Trades to say nothing of the Disadvantages which may accrue by such a Delay to the poor Protestants in Ireland and admitting they should whether the Circumstances of Affairs would not in a little time force them to a compliance with the House of Commons IX Whether the Prince of Orange will not shew himself one of the unkindest Men in the World if he doth not stick by these People till he seeth them secured that have ventured their Lives and Fortunes for Him and their Country in confidence of his Protection and whether he as Head of the Protestant Religion be not obliged to stand by the 48 Protestant Lords and House of Commons that have served their Country so faithfully X. Whether it would not be Prudence in the Bishops supposing their Designs be good as I would hope they are to shew their readiness to assist the Nobility and Gentry in carrying on this great Work whereby they might settle the Church upon the surest Foundation the Laws of God and of the Land and continue themselves in the Affections of the People XI Whether all the Protestant Blood which shall be spilt in Ireland by reason of these long Delays will not be justly laid at the Bishops doors if they proceed after the same manner they have begun And lastly To answer the great Objection that we shall lose the Kingdom of Scotland if we make the King Elective for this Turn Whether the Scots can chuse any body that will be more agreeable to their Interests than the Prince of Orange and supposing they can Whether it be not madness to imagine since they have a different Parliament different Laws and a different Original Contract so that the King may commit a Forfeiture there when he hath committed none here or a Forfeiture here when he hath committed none there that they will not place the Crown upon him without any respect to what is done here whether we make it a Forfeiture or only a bare Demise A Protestant Precedent offer'd to the Bishops for the Exclusion of K. James the Second IF Necessity which is a great Branch
at any time it may serve his Purpose from whose Hands a Soveraign Prince an Uncle and a Father could meet with no better Entertainment However the sense of these Indignities and the just Apprehension of further Attempts against Our Person by them who already endeavoured to murther Our Reputation by infamous Calumnies as if We had been capable of supposing a Prince of Wales which was incomparably more injurious than the destroying of Our Person it Self together with a serious Reflection on a Saying of Our Royal Father of blessed Memory when He was in the like Circumstances That there is little distance between the Prisons and the Graves of Princes which afterwards proved too true in His Case could not but persuade Us to make use of that which the Law of Nature gives to the meanest of Our Subjects of freeing Our selves by all means possible from that unjust Confinement and Restraint And this We did not more for the Security of our own Person then that thereby We might be in a better Capacity of transacting and providing for every thing that may contribute to the Peace and Settlement of Our Kingdoms For as on the one hand no change of Fortune shall ever make Us forget Our Selves so far as to condescend to any thing unbecoming that High and Royal Station in which God Almighty by Right of Succession has placed Us So on the other hand neither the Provocation or Ingratitude of Our own Subjâ—cts nor any other Consideration whatsoever shall ever prevail with Us to make the least step contrary to the true Interest of the English Nation which We ever did and ever must look upon as Our own Our Will and Pleasure thereof is That you of Our Privy Councel take the most effectual care to make these Our Gratious Intentions known to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in and about Our Cities of London and Westminster to the Lord Mayor and Commons of our City of London and to all Our Subjects in general and to assure them that We desire nothing more than to return and hold a Free Parliament wherein We may have the best Opportunity of undeceiving Our People and shewing the Sincerity of those Protestations We have often made of the preserving the Liberties and Properties of Our Subjects and the Protestant Religion more especially the Church of England as by Law establish'd with such Indulgence for those that dissent from Her as We have always thought Our selves in Justice and Care of the general Welfare of Our People bound to procure for them And in the mean time You of Our Privy Councel who can judg better by being upon the place are to send Us your Advice what is fit to be done by Us towards Our returning and the accomplishing those good Ends. And We do require you in Our Name and by Our Authority to endeavour so to suppress all Tumults and Disorders that the Nation in general and every one of Our Subjects in particular may not receive the least Prejudice from the present Distractions that is possible So not doubting of your Dutiful Obedience to these Our Royal Commands We bid you heartily Farewel Given at St. Germans on Laye the 4 4 Ianuary 1688 9. And of Our Reign the fourth Year By his Majesties Command MELFORT Directed thus To the Lords and Others of our Privy Councel of Our Kingdom of England Some Remarks on the late Kings pretended Letter to the LORDS and Others of his Privy Council IT begins thus My Lords When we saw that it was no longer safe for us to remain within our Kingdom of England c. His Majesty would have given great Satisfaction to the World in discovering where the Danger lay in tarrying here from whom and for what cause He is pleased to say farther We now think fit to let you know that though it has been our constant care since our first Accession to the Crown to govern our People with that Iustice and Moderation as to give if possible no occasion of Complaint c. I do not understand why his Majesty would not let us know these his Gracious Intentions before when they might have done Himself and Us Good. But quid verba audiam cum facta videam to what purpose are Words when we see Facts And as to his Moderation I appeal to the Pope himself or the French King who chiefly blame him for his Rashness and want of Temper and as for his Justice among a thousand publick Instances to the contrary he should remember his discountenancing and turning out of their Employments all such as would not enter into his Idolatrous Worship and comply with his illegal and arbitrary Designs Besides what Justice can Hereticks expect from a Prince who is not only a Papist but wholly devoted to the Order of the Jesuits and values himself for being a Member of those Reverend Cut-throats Yet more particularly upon the late Invasion seeing how the Design was laid and fearing that our People who could not be destroyed but by themselves The Design was to preserve the Nation from falling under the cruel Dominion of the French and to keep our selves from being dragg'd by the Hair of the Head to Mass and from undergoing all those Miseries which those of the same Religion and for the same Cause have endured now lately in France and Savoy To prevent so great a Mischief that is to say destroying our selves and to take away not only all just Causes but even Pretences of Discontent We freely and of our own accord redrest all those things that were set forth as the Causes of that Invasion I appeal to the common Faith of Mankind touching the Insinserity of these Words whether if this Invasion had not been these and worse Grievances had not followed And that we might be informed by the Counsel and Advice of our Subjects themselves which way we might give them a further and full Satisfaction We resolved to meet them in a Free Parliament c. The late Kings of England have been as desirous of a Parliament as Popes of a Free and General Council there being nothing they have more studiously avoided and greatlier feared But the Prince of Orange seeing all the Ends of his Declaration answered the People beginning to be undeceived and returning apace to their ancient Duty and Allegiance resolved by all possible means to prevent the meeting of the Parliament c. How far the Prince of Orange has been from preventing the meeting of a Parliament we need only consult our senses The hurrying us under a Guard from our City of London whose returning Loyalty we could no longer trust and the other Indignities we suffered in the Person of the Earl of Feversham when sent to him by us and in that barbarous Confinement of our own Person we shall not here repeat Do's any Man think the Prince of Orange would have had the same gentle Treatment from the King had he been in like manner under his Power And as to the
away the Foundation upon which they argue than that Maxim in our Law received by all honest and learned Lawyers The King of England never dies For if so how is the Government laps'd And if it be not laps'd how can the Throne be said to be vacant And if the Throne be not vacant we are still a Body Politick consisting of Head and Members though much distemper'd and out of order by reason of the Infirmities of the Head. We still live tho we are not in good Health and our Case doth not require the Sexton to make our Grave but calls for the Physician to apply proper Remedies to cure our Disease If the King can dye 't is such a defect in our Government as doth strangely disparage it and further supposes that which hitherto we are all to learn the Crown is not Successive Now if it be successive it cannot be disposed of by the Will of the People but only by the Will of God who in that very moment calls the lawful Heir to the Crown wherein he is pleased to put a Period to the Life of his Predecessor If he be said that the Voice of the People is the Voice of God I believe that should this be granted it will not do their Business for I doubt not but that if the Pole was taken and the Question put to all People who are of Years of Discretion the Answer would be That they have still a King and that they are as willing to keep him as they are desirous to exclude Popery for ever that which hath made both him and them so unhappy This I do not much question would be the Answer if we should appeal to the sense of the People in general who yet if the Government be fallen to them must be allowed to have a right of Suffrage and a Liberty to speak their Minds as freely as other Commoners in this great Convention Further still If the King never dies by our Law how can he be lawfully depos'd For by Deposition the Throne necessarily becomes void for some time There must be some Interstice some space of time before they who depos'd a King can set up another and till the King in Designation be actually invested with the Regal Office there must of Necessity be an Interregnum that is The King contrary to the Mind of our Law may dye The Government of England always supposes a Monarch regulated by Law and therefore 't is presumed that he can do no wrong that is though he may err as well as other Mortals yet the Law of which he is the Guardian brings no Accusation against him but only against his evil Ministers If therefore the King hath err'd as doubtless he hath very much in God's Name let his Ministers be called to an account but why must the Government be dissolved and the King arraign'd condemn'd and depos'd to make way for any new Scheme of Government whatsoever whether French Italian or Dutch Our History indeed affords two Examples since William the First 's time that of Edward the Second and the other of Richard the Second but they did both of them actually resign and besides what they did or was done to them ought to preclude the right of no succeeding Prince These Examples ought no more to be urged than the stabbing King Henry the Fourth of France or the murthering King CHARLES the First of England The Historian in the Life of Richard the Second gives no very good Character of that Parliament which pass'd the Vote for this Deposition The Noblemen says he partly corrupted by Favour partly aw'd by Fear gave their Voices and the Commons commonly are like a Flock of Cranes as the first fly all the Followers do the like Continuat Dan. Hist. p. 46. Let it be here observed that I do not dispute whether the King together with his Parliament may not regulate and entail the Succession as shall by them be thought fit but only whether whilst the King lives whether the Throne can be vacant and the Government be truly said to be laps'd This we deny But however supposing that these things may be so who can make so fair a Claim and so generally satisfactory to the People as the next Heir by Proximity of Blood I mean if the Prince of Wales be proved supposititious that incomparable Lady the Princess of Orange These Reflections I have thought fit to make upon some new Notions of our present States-men by which we guess what they would be at In my Opinion I think it is but too evident that they are taking Advantage of our present Fears and Distractions to run us into those Extremes which the State as well as the Church of England hath always carefully avoided and taken particular care to provide against 4. In this Design can we in Honour and Conscience go along with them whom yet we cannot but highly esteem and value for their Learning and Parts and more especially for their happy and successful Labours in rescuing us from those gross Corruptions of Christian Religion and human Nature Popery and Slavery But shall we run into Popery and perhaps Slavery too when we have been so long striâ—ing against both and are now Thanks be to God in a great measure freed from the Danger of either And is not the Deposing a Popish Doctrine And is it not as Antichristian for any Assembly to put it into Practice as it was for the Council of Lateran at first to establish it And as for Slavery must not a standing Army be necessarily kept up to maintain a Title founded only upon the consent of the fickle and uncertain People granting that the major part of them are willing And in such a case must we not be beholden to the Goodness of the Prince rather than the Protection of our Laws if an Arbitrary and Despotick Power be not again introduced We have as yet no Law which wholly disables and excludes a Popish Successor from the Throne and till we have one which I question not but we shall have soon I do not see how we can disanul the King's Title or vacate his Regal Capacity howsoever his Power may be restrained Innovations without former Precedent are always dangerous especially those of this Nature It will be much more wise as well as safe to bear with some Inconveniencies than bring upon our selves those Mischiefs which such unparallel'd Proceedings may produce The Prince of Orange in his additional Declaration hath these Words We are confident that no Persons can have such hard Thoughts of us as to imagine that we have any other Design in this Undertaking than to procure a Settlement of the Religion and of the Liberties and Properties of the Subjects upon so sure a Foundation that there may be no danger of the Nations relapsing into the like Miseries at any time hereafter How far some Persons may extend this Clause that there may be no Danger of the Nations relapsing into the like Miseries
as the Discusser imposes upon the World. Besides the many Instances in History of several Princes who have forfeited their Succession and consequently their Title to the Crown for revolting from the Establish'd Religion of the Realm But says the Discusser for I look upon his Friend and Him to be all one and that he does but put the Question with one side of his Mouth and answer it with the other I had thought our Laws as well as our Religion had been against the Deposing Doctrine That 's not the Question but whether a Prince may commit those Miscarriages in Government whether he may not so far peccare in Leges Rempublicam as to incur the Forfeiture of his Regal Power and whether a Prince may be allow'd to subvert the ancient Constitutions and Religion of a Nation and yet be said to be the Lawful King of that Realm These are the Questions For theâ— it is not the Law that deposes him nor the Religion that justifies it But it is He that deposes Himself 't is the bad Advice of Evil Counsellors to which he Listens and which he follows to the ruin of the Kingdom contrary to the Original Contract between Princes and People grounded upon the Foundations of all Original Government I say 't is that Adhering to Evil Counsel which deposes a Prince by degrading him from a Lawful King to an Unlawful Tyrant and renders him Liable to the Animadversion of the Law and the impeachments of the oppress'd and injur'd People To assert otherwise were to deprive all National Law and Religion of their self Defence which is against all the Law and Religion in the World. I am apt to believe that Christ himself had no very good Opinion of the lawfulness of Herod's Regality when he sent him that Message Go tell that Fox Herod Which I look upon as a Deposal and Degrading of that Arbitrary Prince by the Founder of our Religion in his own Breast and Judgment though he forbore the Execution of his Celestial Power And therefore it is not the Error of Religion but the Fault of those that do not well distinguish that Religion suffers in her Doctrines For only he who governs according to Law is a King he that endeavours to subvert the Law is none Nor is every rambling and precipitate Brain to be Judg of this neither but the Solid Law and fundamental Constitutions of the Realm So that the Country Gentleman was mistaken in his Thoughts both of our Laws and our Religion However the pretended Scrupulous Country-Gentleman desires the Discusser to expound the State-Riddle of the Vacancy and to give him the Ground of the late extraordinary Revolution To which the Discusser gives no direct answer at present but desires his Friend to take notice That the Gentlemen of the Convention who declar'd a Vacancy in the Government lay'd the main Stress of their opinion upon the King's withdrawing himself For that since the Story of the French League and the Business of the Prince of Wales were pass'd over in silence most Men believed that the pretended Breach of that which they called the Original Contract was no more then a popular Flourish All which is such an imperfect peice of Incoherence that none but a madman would have thrust in by Head and Shoulders as the Discusser has done For how can it be inferr'd that the Breach of the Original Contract should be a Popular Flourish because the Clandestin League and the False Birth are hitherto pass'd over in silence As for the surreptitious Birth one would think it was sufficiently dilated upon in the Declaration of the Lords and why it is not farther brought upon the Stage there may be several Reasons given and among the rest because it may be thought that the Imposture will vanish of it self and so there will be no need of casting an Eternal Blot upon the memory of them that contriv'd and own'd it Then for the Clandestin League it Suffices that there is apparent Proof of it in Bank. But to call the Breach of the Original Contract pretended and a Popular Flourish is a yerk of Malitious Reflection which only serves to expose the Discusser to Publick censure For as there is nothing more certain then that there is an Original Contract between the King and People of England the Breach of which has cost the Effusion of so much Blood so is it as certain that that Original Contract was never so infallibly broken then it was of late Which as it is allow'd by all the Laws of God and Man to be a sufficient ground to seek a Remedy so was nothing more vigorously urg'd by the Convention Which might have convinc'd the Discusser that they did not pretend it for a popular Flourish But now lest the Country Gentleman should be shogg'd by seeing the Votes of so considerable a Meeting debated by a private Hand the Discusser reminds him That a Parliament and a Convention are two different Things The latter for want of the King's Writs and Concurrence having no share in the Legislative Power But the Discusser forgets that it was only a Convention of Lords that sent to Richard the Second to meet them at Westminster which the King at first promis'd to do but upon altering his Mind sent him another peremptory Message that if he would not come according to his Promise they would chuse another King and then proceeding farther according to that Power they had expell'd against the King's Will several of his chiefest Favourites from the Court constrain'd others to put in Sureties to appear at the next Parliament and caus'd several others to be arrested and committed to several Prisons If a Convention could do this where the King was present what signifi'd the Writs and Concurrence of an absent Prince Nor did they contend for Legislative Power but only met in a kind of embodied Dictatorship to take care of the present Necessity of Affairs But this says the Discusser was not justifiable for that the Nenessity which they pretended was either of their own making or of their own submitting to which is the same Thing But this is all Nonsence For if the Necessity was of their own making then were the Lords and Commons the Authors of all the Miscarriages which they laid to the late King's Charge If of their own submitting to then would they never have call'd out for succour and crav'd Relief from their Oppressions No They were those crying Grievances sum'd up in the Declaration of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons assembl'd at Westmister presented to their Present Majesties upon the Twelfth of February Last which when the late King could not justify them by force of Arms but fled for it not being able to answer his endeavours to subvert and Extirpate the Protestant Religion and the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom put them to that necessity of assembling after an Unusual Manner to provide for the Common Safety How ever the Discusser will have it a
If the dissatisfied Party accuse the Convention for making the Prince of Orange King it is not my Duty to judge those above me therefore I shall only say that if they have done ill Quod fieri non debuit factum valet aâ—d they of the Clergy ought not to censure their Superiours but obey according to the Law and Doctrine of Passive Obedience FINIS The TWELFTH and Last Collection of Papers VOL. I. Relating to the Present Juncture of Affairs in England and Scotland VIZ. I. The Secret League with France proved II. The Reasons why the late King Iames would not stand to a Free and Legal Parliament III. The Reason of the Suddenness of the Change in England IV. The Judgment of the Court of France concerning the Misgovernment of King Iames the Second V. The Emperor of Germany his Account of the late King's Unhappiness in joining with the King of France VI. A full Relation of what was done between the Time the Prince of Orange came to London till the Proclaiming him King of England c. VII The Declaration of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons of England concerning their Grievances presented to King William and Queen Mary With their Malesties Answer VIII The Declaration of the States of Scotland concerning their Grievances IX The Manner of Proclaiming King William and Queen Mary at Whitehal and in the City of London Feb. 13. 1688. X. An Account of their Coronation at Westminster Apr. 11. 89. XI The Scots Proclamation declaring William and Mary King and Queen of England to be King and Queen of Scotland XII The manner of their taking the Scotish Coronation Oath at Whitehal May 11. XIII The Coronation Oaths of England and Scotland London printed and are to be sold by Richard Ianeway in Queen's-head-Court in Pater-noster-Row 1689. The Secret League with France proved 1. BY the Treaty managed by the Dutchess of Orleans between Charles II. her Brother and Lewis XIV 1670 published by the Abbot Primi in his History of the War with Holland with the priviledg of the French King This Treaty expresly tells us That the French King did promise Charles II to subject his Parliament to him and to Establish the Romish Religion in his Kingdom But before this could be done the said Dutchess told him the Haughtiness and Power of the Hollander must be brought down 2. By the Current of the Design throughout all Coleman's Letters which contain nothing else but the Conspiracy of the Duke of York and the Jesuits against the Government and the Protestant Religion For you know says he in his Letter to Sir W. Throgmorton Feb. 1. 1674 5. when the Duke the late King Iames comes to be Master of our Affairs the King of France will have reason to promise himself all things that he can desire c. Both he and the two Royal Brothers being closly joined together to destroy the Northern Heresy as he in his Letter to Monsieur La Cheese assures us 3. Which Friendship with the French Court is further confirmed by a French Author who wrote the Life of Turene in which he brings in the Duke of York lamenting the Death of that great Marshal of France after this manner Alas says the Duke the loss is great to me in that I am greatly disappointed in those great Designs I have been long meditating upon if ever I come to the Crown of England For the sake of which Passage the then Secretary of State of England forbad the printing of that Book which was then translated and prepared for the Press 4. The French Ambassador at the Hague in a Memorial to the States General Sept. 9. 1618 peremptorily declares there was such an Alliance between the King his Master and King Iames II as to oblige him to succour him c. 5. Both King Charles II and King Iames II were so engaged with the great Nimrod of Francâ— that â—hough several Parliaments of England strugled hard to break the Friendship and gave a vast Sum of Mony in order thereunto yet all in vain And King Iames II was so eager to follow the French Measures that after the Defeat of Monmouth he declared to the Parliament that for the time to come he would make use of Popish Officers as well as keep up a standing Army contrary to Law. 6. We have had sufficient Evidences of his Designs by the care he took to fill his Army with Irish Papists at the same time that he disbanded all the Protestants that served him in Ireland that he might always have an Army at hand in that Kingdom ready to promote his Popish Designs in England which could not be done without a Secret League with France and without a very express assurance of being vigorously supported from thence when the nick of time should come 7. His flying to France and secret conspiring with the great Leviâ—tâ—an there and bringing French Aids with him into Ireland are no other than the putting the Secret League into Execution Many more Proofs may be produced but what has been said may convince any rational unprejudiced Protestant As for those Pharisees that wilfully shut their Eyes of whom we may say That seeing they see and do not peeceive because they are resolved not to yield to the most convincing Evidences that this Affair is capable of for the Parties concerned will hide it as much as they can I bewail their Condition and believe they are so obstinate that only the French Dragoons those booted Apostles can convince them when they come with the League in their Hands to put the Popish Penal Laws in Execution on their Backs from Neâ—gaâ—e to Tybâ—â—n The REASONS why the late K. James would not stand to a Free and Legal Parliament proposed to those that are fond to have him again WHEN the Prince of Orange now our Gracious King his Glorious Expedition was first made known to the late King he resolved to have a Parliament upon the Belief that he should have been intirely Master of the Lower House by Reason of the Regulations he had made in Corporations in order to his Popish Designs But when he was forced to take other Measures as he told the Dissenters when he sent for them in the time of his Distress in restoring the Charters the Bishop of London the Fellows of Magdalen-Colledg c. He dreaded nothing more than a Parliament on the old Foundations to which the Prince in his Declaration had referred all for he knew several things would have been done by such a Parliament that he chose rather to perish than submit to 1. The first thing is The Examination of the Birth of the Prince of Wales as he is call'd the questioning of which was a Stab at his Heart as appears by his last Letter And the Reflections on the Bishops Petition mentioning That as a Business not fit to be referred then to a Parliament 2. The next thing was That Justice would certainly have been demanded against the Evil