when he came of Age was to swear in Person with all his Family and afterwards with all his People of Scotland a Covenant containing an Enumeration of all the points of Popery and a most solemn Renunciation of them somewhat like our Parliament Test his first Speech to the Parliament of England was Copious on this Subject and he left a Legacy of a Wish on such of his Posterity as should go over to that Religion which in good manners is suppressed It is known K. James was no Conquerour and that he made more use of his Pen than his Sword so the Glory that is peculiar to his Memory must fall chiefly on his Learned and Immortal Writings and since there is such a Veneration expressed for him it agrees not ill with this to wish that his Works were more studied by those who offer such Incense to his Glorious Memory IX His Majesty assures his People of Scotland upon a certain Knowledge and long Experience that the Catholicks as they are good Christians so they are likewise dutiful Subjects but if we must believe both these equally then we must conclude severely against their being Good Christians for we are sure they can never be good Subjects not only to a Heretical Prince if he does not extirpate Hereticks for their beloved Council of the Lateran that decreed Transubstantiation has likewise decreed that if a Prince does not extirpate Hereticks out of his Dominions the Pope must depose him and declare his Subjects absolved from their Allegiance and give his Dominions to another so that even his Majesty how much soever he may be a Zealous Catholick yet he cannot be assured of their fidelity to him unless he has given them secret assurances that he is resolved to extirpate Hereticks out of his Dominions and that all the Promises which he now makes to these poor wretches are no other way to be kept than the Assurances which the Great Lewis gave to his Protestant Subjects of his observing still the Edict of Nantes even after he had resolved to break it and also his last promise made in the Edict that repealed the Edict of Nantes by which he gave Assurances that no violence should be used to any for their Religion in the very time that he was ordering all possible Violences to be put in execution against them X. His Majesty assures us that on all Occasions the Papists have shewed themselves good and faithful Subjects to him and his Royal Predecessors but how Absolute soever the King's Power may be it seems his Knowledge of History is not so Absolute but it may be capable of some Improvement It will be hard to find out what Loyalty they shewed on the Gunpowder Plot or during the whole progress of the Rebellion of Ireland if the King will either take the words of King James of Glorious Memory or K. Charles the first that was indeed of pious and blessed Memory rather than the penners of this Proclamation it will not be hard to find Occasions where they were a little wanting in this their so much boasted Loyalty and we are sure that by the Principles of that Religion the King can never be assured of the Fidelity of those he calls his Catholick Subjects but by engaging to them to make his Heretical Subjects Sacrifices to their Rage XI The King declares them capable of all the Offices and Benefices which he shall think fit to bestow on them and only restrains them from invading the Protestant Churches by force so that here a door is plainly opened for admitting them to the Exercise of their Religion in Protestant Churches so they do not break into them by force and whatsoever may be the Sense of the term Benefice in its antient and first signification now it stands only for Church Preferments so that when any Churches that are at the King's Gift fall vacant here is a plain intimation that they are to be provided to them and then it is very probable that all the Laws made against such as go not to their parish Churches will be severely turned upon those that will not come to Mass XII His Majesty does in the next place in the vertue of his Absolute Power Annul a great many Laws as well those that Established the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy as the late Test enacted by himself in person while he represented his Brother upon which he gave as strange an Essay to the World of his absolute Justice in the Attainder of the late Earl of Argile as he does now of his Absolute Power in condemning the Test it self he also repeals his own Confirmation of the Test since he came to the Crown which he offered as the clearest Evidence that he could give of his Resolution to maintain the Protestant Religion and by which he gained so much upon that Parliament that he obtained every thing from them that he desired of them till he came to try them in the Matters of Religion This is no Extraordinary Evidence to assure his People that his Promises will be like the Laws of the Medes and Persians which alter not nor will the disgrace of the Commissioner that Enacted that Law lay this matter wholly on him for the Letter that he brought the Speech that he made and the Instructions which he got are all too well known to be so soon forgotten and if Princes will give their Subjects reason to think that they forget their Promises as soon as the turn is served for which they were made this will be too prevailing a Temptation on the Subjects to mind the Princes promise as little as it seems he himself does and will force them to conclude that the Truth of the Prince is not so absolute as it seems he fancies his Power to be XIII Here is not only a repealing of a great many Laws and established Oaths and Tests but by the Exercise of the Absolute Power a new Oath is imposed which was never pretended to by the Crown in any former time and as the Oath is Created by this Absolute Power so it seems the Absolute Power must be supported by this Oath since one branch of it is an Obligation to maintain his Majesty and his Lawful Successors in the Exercise of this their Absolute Power and Authority against all deadly which I suppose is Scotch for Mortals now to impose so hard a yoke as this Absolute Power on the Subject seems no small stretch but it is a wonderful exercise of it to oblige the Subjects to defend this it had been more modest if they had been only bound to bear it and submit to it but it is a terrible thing so far to extinguish all the remnants of natural Liberty or of a Legal Government as to oblige the Subjects by Oath to maintain the Exercise of this which plainly must destroy themselves for the short execution by the Bow-strings of Turkey or by sending Orders to Men to return in their Heads being an Exercise of
Protestant Religion in the Churches And that We will and hereby promise on Our Royal Word to maintain the possessors of Church Lands formerly belonging to Abbeys or other Churches of the Catholick Religion in their full and free possession and right according to Our Laws and Acts of Parliament in that behalf in all time coming And We will imploy indifferently all our Subjects of all Perswasions so as none shall meet with any Discouragement on the account of his Religion but be advanced and esteemed by Us according to their several Capacities and Qualifications so long as We find Charity and Unity maintained And if any Animosities shall arise as We hope in God there will not We will shew the severest Effects of Our Royal Displeasure against the Beginners or Fomenters thereof seeing thereby Our Subjects may de deprived of this general Ease and Satisfaction We intend to all of them whose Happiness Prosperity Wealth and Safety is so much Our Royal Care that We will leave nothing undone which may procure these Blessings for them And lastly to the End all our good Subjects may have Notice of this Our Royal Will and Pleasure We do hereby command Our Lyon King at Arms and his Brethren Heraulds Macers Pursevants and Messengers at Arms to make timous Proclamation thereof at the Marcat-Cross of Edinburgh And besides the printing and Publishing of this Our Royal Proclamation it is Our express Will and Pleasure that the same be past under the great Seal of that Our Kingdom per saltum * without passing any other Seal or Register In Order whereunto this shall be to the Directors of Our Chancelary and their Deputies for writing the same and to Our Chancellor for causing our Great Seal aforesaid to be appended thereunto a sufficient Warrand Given at Our Court at Whitehall the twelfth day of Febr. 1686. and of Our Reign the Third Year By His Majesties Command MELFORT God save the King His Majesties Gracious DECLARATION to all His Loving Subjects for Liberty of Conscience JAMES R. IT having pleased Almighty God not only to bring Us to the Imperial Crown of these Kingdoms through the greatest difficulties but to preserve Us by a more than ordinary Providence upon the Throne of Our Royal Ancestors there is nothing now that we so earnestly desire as to Establish our Government on such a Foundation as may make Our Subjects happy and unite them to Us by Inclination as well as by Duty Which We think can be done by no Means so effectually as by granting to them the free Exercise of their Religion for the time to come and add that to the perfect Enjoyment of their Property which has never been in any case Invaded by Us since Our coming to the Crown Which being the two things Men value most shall ever be preserved in these Kingdoms during Our Reign over them as the truest Methods of their Peace and Our Glory We cannot but heartily wish as it will easily be believed That all the People of Our Dominions were Members of the Catholick Church yet We humbly thank Almighty God it is and hath of long time been Our constant Sense and Opinion which upon diverse Occasions We have Declared That Conscience ought not to be constrained nor People forced in Matters of meer Religion It has ever been directly contrary to Our Inclination as We think it is to the Interest of Government which it destroys by Spoiling Trade Depopulating Countries and Discouraging Strangers and finally that it never obtained the End for which it was employed And in this We are the more confirmed by the Reflections We have made upon the Conduct of the Four last Reigns For after all the frequent and pressing Endeavours that were used in each of them to reduce this Kingdom to an exact Conformity in Religion it is visible the Success has not answered the Design and that the Difficulty is invincible We therefore out of Our Princely Care and Affection unto all Our Loving Subjects that they may live at Ease and Quiet and for the increase of Trade and encouragement of Strangers have thought fit by virtue of Our Royal Prerogative to Issue forth this Our Royal Declaration of Indulgence making no doubt of the Concurrence of Our Two Houses of Parliament when We shall think it convenient for them to Meet In the first place We do Declare That We will Protect and Maintain Our Arch-Bishops Bishops and Clergy and all other our Subjects of the Church of England in the free Exercise of their Religion as by Law Established and in the quiet and full Enjoyment of all their Possessions without any Molestation or Disturbance whatsoever We do likewise Declare That it is Our Royal Will and Pleasure That from henceforth the Execution of all and all manner of Penal Laws in Matters Ecclesiastical for not coming to Church or not Receiving the Sacrament or for any other Non-conformity to the Religion Established or for or by reason of the Exercise of Religion in any manner whatsoever be immediately Suspended And the further Execution of the said Penal Laws and every of them is hereby Suspended And to the end that by the Liberty hereby Granted the Peace and Security of Our Government in the Practice thereof may not be endangered We have thought fit and do hereby straitly Charge and Command all Our Loving Subjects That as We do freely give them Leave to Meet and Serve God after their own Way and Manner be it in private Houses or Places purposely Hired or Built for that use So that they take especial care that nothing be Preached or Taught amongst them which may any ways tend to Alienate the Hearts of Our people from Us or Our Government and that their Meetings and Assemblies be peaceably openly and publickly held and all Persons freely admitted to them And that they do signifie and make known to some one or more of the next Justices of the Peace what place or places they set apart for those uses And that all Our Subjects may enjoy such their Religious Assemblies with greater Assurance and Protection We have thought it Requisite and do hereby Command That no Disturbance of any kind be made or given unto them under pain of our Displeasure and to be further proceeded against with the uttermost Severity And forasmuch as We are desirous to have the Benefit of the Service of all Our Loving Subjects which by the Law of Nature is inseparably annexed to and inherent in Our Royal Person And that none of Our Subjects may for the future be under any Discouragement or Disability who are otherwise well inclined and fit to serve Us by reason of some Oaths or Tests that have been usually Administred on such Occasions We do hereby further Declare That it is Our Royal Will and Pleasure That the Oaths commonly called The Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance and also the several Tests and Declarations mentioned in the Acts of Parliament made in the 25th and 30th Years of
the Reign of Our late Royal Brother King Charles the Second shall not at any time hereafter be required to be Taken Declared or Subscribed by any person or persons whatsoever who is or shall be Employed in any Office or Place of Trust either Civil or Military under Us or in Our Government And We do further Declare it to be Our Pleasure and Intention from time to time hereafter to Grant Our Royal Dispensations under Our Great Seal to all our Loving Subjects so to be Employed who shall not take the said Oaths or Subscribe or declare the said Tests or Declarations in the abovementioned Acts and every of them And to the end that all Our Loving Subjects may receive and enjoy the full Benefit and Advantage of Our Gracious Indulgence hereby intended and may be Acquitted and Discharged from all Pains Penalties Forfeitures and Disabilities by them or any of them incurred or forfeited or which they shall or may at any time hereafter be liable to for or by reason of their Non-conformity or the Exercise of their Religion and from all Suits Troubles or Disturbances for the same We do hereby give Our Free and Ample Pardon unto all Non-conformists Recusants and other Our Loving Subjects for all Crimes and Things by them commited or done contrary to the Penal Laws formerly made relating to Religion and the Profession or Exercise thereof Hereby Declaring That this Our Royal pardon and Indempnity shall be as Good and Effectual to all intents and purposes as if every individual person had been therein particularly named or had particular Pardons under Our Great Seal which We do likewise Declare shall from time to time be Granted unto any person or persons desiring the same Willing and Requiring Our Judges Justices and other Officers to take Notice of and Obey Our Royal Will and Pleasure herein before Declared And although the Freedom and Assurance We have hereby given in relation to Religion and Property might be sufficient to remove from the Minds of Our Loving Subjects all Fears and Jealousies in relation to either yet We have thought fit further to Declare That We will Maintain them in all their Properties and Possessions as well of Church and Abby-Lands as in any other their Lands and Properties whatsoever Given at our Court at Whitehall the Fourth Day of April 1687. In the Third Year of Our Reign By His Majesties Special Command A LETTER containing some Reflections on His Majesties Declaration for Liberty of Conscience Dated the Fourth of April 1687. SIR I. I Thank you for the Favour of sending me the late Declaration that His Majesty has granted for Liberty of Conscience I confess I longed for it with great Impatience and was surprised to find it so different from the Scotch Pattern for I imagined that it was to be set to the second part of the same tune nor can I see why the Penners of this have sunk so much in their stile for I suppose the same Men penned both I expected to have seen the Imperial Language of Absolute Power to which all the Subjects are to Obey without reserve and of the Cassing Annulling the stopping and disabling of Laws set forth in the Preamble and body of this Declaration whereas those dreadful words are not to be found here for instead of Repealing the Laws his Majesty pretends by this only to Suspend them and though in effect this amounts to a Repeal yet it must be confessed that the words are softer Now since the Absolute Power to which his Majesty pretends in Scotland is not founded on such poor things as Law for that would look as if it were the gift of the People but on the Divine Authority which is supposed to be delegated to his Majesty this may be as well claimed in England as it was in Scotland and the pretentions to Absolute Power is so great a thing that since his Majesty thought fit once to claim it he is little beholding to those that make him fall so much in his Language especially since both these Declarations have appeared in our Gazettes so that as we see what is done in Scotland we know from hence what is in some peoples hearts and what we may expect in England II. His Majesty tells his people that the perfect Injoyment of their Property has never been in any Case invaded by him since his coming to the Crown This is indeed matter of great Incouragement to all good Subjects for it lets them see that such Invasions as have been made on Property have been done without his Majesties knowledge so that no doubt the continuing to levy the Customes and the Additional Excise which had been granted only during the late King's Life before the Parliament could meet to renew the Grant was done without his Majesties knowledge the many Violences committed not only by Soldiers but Officers in all the parts of England which are severe Invasions on Property have been all without his Majesties knowledge and since the first Branch of Property is the Right that a man has to his Life the strange Essay of Mahometan Government that was shewed at Taunton and the no less strange proceedings of the present Lord Chancellour in his Circuit after the Rebellion which are very justly called his Campagne for it was an open Act of Hostility to all Law and for which and other Services of the like nature it is believed he has had the reward of the great Seal and the Executions of those who have left their Colours which being founded on no Law are no other than so many murders all these I say are as we are sure Invasions on Property but since the King tells us that no such Invasions have been made since he came to the Crown we must conclude that all these things have fallen out without his privity And if a standing Army in time of Peace has been ever lookt on by this Nation as an Attempt upon the whole Property of the Nation in gross one must conclude that even this is done without his Majesties knowledge III. His Majesty expresses his Charity for us in a kind wish that we were all Members of the Catholick Church in return to which we offer up daily our most earnest Prayers for him that he may become a Member of the truly Catholick Church for Wishes and Prayers do no hurt on no side but his Majesty adds that it has ever been his Opinion that Conscience ought not to be constrain'd nor people forced in matters of meer Religion We are very happy if this continues to be always his sense but we are sure in this he is no Obedient Member of that which he means by the Catholick Church for it has over and over again decreed the Extirpation of Hereticks It encourages Princes to it by the Offer of the pardon of their Sins it threatens them to it by denouncing to them not only the Judgments of God but that which is more sensible the loss of their Dominions
before his being required or appearing to take the Oath there were spread abroad such Scruples and Objections by some of the Orthodox Clergy and others so that the Earl can never in any sense be construed in his Explication wherein he took the Oath to have done it animo infamandi and to declaim against the Government for the Scruples and Objections that were spread abroad by others were a fair and rational occasion why the Earl in any sense or explication which he offered might have said that he was confident the Parliament never intended to impose contradictory Oaths and this is so far from importing the insinuation and inferenâ— made by the Libel that thereby the Parliament were so impious as to impose contradictory Oaths as on the contrary considering the circumstances fore-mentioned that there were papers spread abroad insinuating That there were inconsistencies and contradictions contained therein the said expression was an high Vindication of the Honour and Justice of the Parliament against the Calumnies and Mis-representations which were cast upon it and was also a just Rise for the Pannel for the clearing and exonoration of his own Conscience in the various senses and apprehensions which he found were going abroad as to the said Test humbly to offer his sense in which he was clear and satisfied to take the Oath 7. To the Libel in so far as it is founded upon the Act of Parliament viz. Act 130. Par. 8. James 6. declaring That none should presume to impugn the Dignity or Authority of the three Estates of Parliament or procure any Invasion or diminution thereof under the pain of Treason as also in so far as it is pretended in the Libel That the Pannel by offering the sense and explication libelled has assumed the Legislative power which is incommunicable and has made a Law or a part of a Law It is answered The Libel is most groundless and irrelevant and against which the Act of Parliament is opponed which is so plain and evident upon the reading thereof that it neither is nor can be subject to the least cavillation And the plain meaning whereof is nothing else but to impugn the Authority of Parliaments as if the King and Parliament had not a Legislative Power or were not the highest Representative of the Kingdom or that any of the three Estates were not essentially requisite to constitute the Parliament And besides there is nothing more certain than that the occasion of the said Act its being made was in relation to the Bishops and Clergy and there is nothing in the pretended Explanation that can be wrested to import the least Contravention of the said Act or to be an impugning of the three Estates of Parliament or a seeking any innovation therein And it is admired with what shadow of Reason it can be pretended that the Pannel has assumed a Legislative power or made a part of a Law seeing all that is contained in the alledged Explication libelled is only a Declaration of the Earls sense in which he was satisfied to take the Oath and so respected none but himself and for the clearing of his own Conscience which justly indeed the Word of God calls a Law to himself without any incroaching upon the Legislative power And where was it ever debated but that a man in the taking of an Oath if as to his apprehensions he thought any thing in it deserved to be cleared might declare the same or that his exhibiting at the time of the taking of the Oath his sense and explication wherein he did take it was ever reputed or pretended to be the assuming of a Legislative power it being the universal practice of all Nations to allow this liberty and which sense may be either rejected or accepted as the Legislator shall think fit importing no more but a parties private sense for the exoneration of his own Conscience And as to that Member of the Libel founded upon Act 19. Par. 3. Queen Mary it contains nothing but a Declaration of the pain of Perjury and there is nothing in the Explication libelled which can in the least be inferred as a Contravention of the said Act in respect if it should be proved That the Pannel at the time of the taking of the Oath did take it in the words of the said Explication as his sense of the Oath it is clear that the sense being declared at the time of taking the Oath and allowed as the sense wherein it was taken the Pannel can only be understood to have taken it in that sense And although publick Authority may consider whether the sense given by the Pannel does satisfie the Law or not yet that can import no more though it was found not to satisfie but to hold the Pannel as a Refuser of the Oath but it is absolutely impossible to infer the Crimes of perjury upon it being as is pretended by the Libel the â—annel did only take it with the Declaration of the Sense and Explication Libelled 8. As the Explication libelled does not at all import all or any of the Crimes contained in the said Libel so by the common principles of all Law where a person does emit words for the clearing and exoneration of his own Conscience altho there were any ambiguity or unclearness or involvedness in the tenor or import of the expressions or words yet they are ever to be interpreted Interpretatione benigna favorabili according to the general Principles of Law and Reason And it never was nor can be refused to any person to interpret and put a congruous sense upon his own words especially the Pannel being a person of eminent Quality and who hath given great demonstration and undeniable evidences of his fixt and unalterable Loyalty to His Majesties Interest and Service and at the time of emitting the said Explication was invested and intrusted in publick Capacities And it is a just and rational interpretation and caution which Sanderson that judicious and eminent Casuist gives Praelect 2. That dicta facta principum parentum rectorum are ever to be looked upon as benignae Interpretationis and that Dubia sunt interpretanda in meliorem partem And there is nothing in the Explication libelled which without detortion and violence and in the true sense and design of the Pannel is not capable of this benign Interpretation and construction especially respect being had to the Circumstances wherein it was emitted and given after a great many Objections Scruples and alledged Inconsistencies were owned vented and spread abroad which was a rise to the Earl for using the expressions contained in the pretended Declaration libelled 10. These words whereby it is pretended the Pannel declares he was ready to give obedience as far as he could first do not in the least import That the Parliament had imposed any Oath which was in it self unlawful but only the Pannels scrupulosity and unclearness in matter of Conscience And it is hoped it cannot be a Crime because all men cannot
of the Kings Officers cannot prejudg his Interest It is answered The Pannel is very confident that neither the Lords of His Majesties Privy Council consisting of persons of eminent Loyalty and Judgment nor His Majesties Officers were capable of any such escape as is pretended and if the tenor of the Pannel's Explication did in the least import the high and infamous Crimes libelled as beyond all peradventure it does not it were strange how the same being contained in the aforesaid Vindication and the whole Clauses thereof justified that this should have been looked on as no Crime and allowed to be published And the Pannel neither does nor needs to make farther use thereof but to convince all dis-interested persons that his Explication can import no Crime And whereas it is pretended That the Crime of Treason is inferred from the fundamental Laws of the Kingdom and from that Clause of the Pannel's Explication whereby he declares he is not bound up by any thing in this Oath not to endeavour any alteration in a lawful way which being an indefinite proposition is equipollent to an universal and is upon the matter coincident with a Clause which was rebellious in its consequences contained in the Solemn League and Covenant It is answered That it is strange how such a plain and innocent Clause whereby beyond all question he does express no more than was naturally imported the Crime of Treason which no Lawyer ever allowed except where it was founded upon express Law Luce Meridiana Clarior And indeed if such stretches and inferences can make men guilty of Treason no man can be secure And the words in the Pannel's Declaration are plain and clear yet non sunt cavillanda and import no more but that in his station and in a lawful way and consistent with the Protestant Religion and his Loyalty he might endeavour any alteration to the advantage of Church and State And was there ever any loyal or rational Subject that does or can doubt that this is the natural import of the Oath And indeed it were a strange Oath if it were capable of another sense and being designed for the security of the Government should bind up mens hands to concur for its advantage And how was it possible that the Pannel or any other in the capacity of a Privy-Councellor or a Member of the Parliament would have satisfied his Duty and Allegiance in other terms And whereas it is pretended that there was the like case in the pretended League and Covenant it is answered The Assertion is evidently a Mistake and tho it were the Argument is altogether inconsequential For that League and Covenant was treasonable in it self as being a Combination entred into without His Majesties Authority and was treasonable in the glosses that were put upon it and was imposed by absolute violence on the Subjects of this Kingdom And how can the Pannel be in the least supposed to have had any respect to the said League and Covenant when he had so often taken the Declaration disowning and renouncing it as an unlawful and sinful Oath and concurred in the many excellent Laws and Acts of Parliament made by His Majesty condemning the same as seditious and treasonable And whereas it is pretended That the Pannel is guilty of Perjury having taken the Oath in another sense than was consistent with the genuine sense of the Parliament and that by the Authority cited he doth commento eludere Juramentum which ought always to be taken in the sense of him that imposeth the Oath It is answered The Pretence is most groundless and Perjury never was nor can be inferred but by the commission or omission of something directly contrary to the Oath And altho it is true That where an Oath is taken without any Declaration of the express sense of the persons who take it it obliges sub poena Perjurii in the sense not of the taker but of the imposer of the Oath because expressing no Sense Law and Reason presumes there is a full acquiescence in the sense and meaning of the imposer of the Oath and then if an Oath be not so taken he that takes it is guilty of Perjury Yet there was never Lawyer nor Divine Popish or Protestant but agree in this That whatever be the tenor of the Oath if before the taking thereof the party in express terms does publickly and openly declare the sense in which he takes it it is impossible it can infer the Crime of Perjury against him in any other sense this not being Commentum excogitatum after the taking of the Oath And if this were not so how is it possible in Sense and Reason that ever any Explication or Sense could solve the Scruples of a mans Conscience For it might be always pretended That notwithstanding of the express sense wherein he took it he should be guilty of Perjury from another sense And that this is the irrefragable opinion of all Divines of whatever peswasion is not only clear from the Authority above-mentioned even those who allow of reserved senses but more especially by the universal suffrage of all Protestant Divines who tho they do abominate all thoughts of Subterfuges or Evasions after taking of the Oath yet they do always allow and advise for the safety and security of a doubting and scrupulous Conscience that they should express and declare before the taking of the Oath the true sense and meaning wherein they have freedom to take it and for which Sandersone de Juramento is cited Prelct 6. Sect. 10. pag. 75. where his words are Sane ut inter Jurandum omnia recte fiant expedit ut de verborum sensu inter omnes partes quarum interest liquido constet quod veteribus dictum liquido Jurare And an Oath being one of the highest Acts of Devotion containing Cultum Latriae there is nothing more consonant to the Nature of all Oaths and to that Candor Ingenuity and Chrstian simplicity which all Law and Religion requires in such cases The Kings Advocate 's Third Plea against the Earl of Argyle HIS Majesties Advocate conceives he has nothing to answer as to depraving Leasing-making and mis-interpreting c. save that this Oath was only designed to exclude Recusants and consequently the Pannel may thereby be debarred from his Offices but not made guilty of a Crime To which he Triplies 1. If ever the Earl had simply refused that had been true but that did not at all excuse from defaming the Law for a defamer is not punished for refusing but for defaming 2. It he had simply refused the Government had been in no more hazard but if men will both retain their places and yet take the same in such words as secure not the Government it were strange to think that the design of the Law being to secure against mens possessing who will not obey that yet it should allow them possession who do not obey Nor is the refuser here in a better case than the Earl
discourage any kind of favour towards them save that which the concession whereof would not only be inconsistent with the peace and safety of those of the Reformed Religion in England but which might enflame the Nation to such Resentments as would in all likelihood both endanger his Majesties Person and Crown and come at last to issue in the reducement of the Roman Catholicks to worse circumstances than they have hitherto been acquainted with But to proceed with our Author to whom it is so natural to act foolishly and with sauciness and injustice that neither the Character he is said to bear nor the Quality of the Persons of whom he speaks can either restrain his intemperance or correct his rudeness and indiscretion For Monsieur Fagel having said that he believes there are many Roman Catholicks who under the present state of Affairs will not be very desirous to be in Publick Offices and Employments nor use any attempts against those of the Reformed Religion and that not only because they know it to be contrary to Law but lest it should at some other time prove prejudicial to their Persons and States Our Author is so unjust as well as imprudent as to call this a menacing not only of all the Non-conformists and Roman Catholicks in England but a threatning of his Majesty and an insulting over him And from thence he takes occasion to add that he hopes God will inable his Majesty to repress and prevent the effects of these menaces and furnish him with means of mortifying those who do thus threaten and insult over him It certainly argues a strange weakness and distemper of mind to call so modest and soft an expression both a menacing of the King and of all his Catholick Subjects when I dare say it proclaimeth the sense of all among the Papists who are endowed with any measure of Wisdom and is nothing else save a Declaration of the measure by which they do at this day regulate and conduct themselves But the injustice of our Author towards Their Highnesses in his Reflections upon the forementioned expression of the Pensionary's is his intending them by the persons that do threaten his Majesty and insult over him For did he take Mijn Heer Fagel for the only guilty person in reference to this Phrase which he miscalls a Menace it would be a strange detracting in him from the Power and Glory of his Majesty of Great Brittain to wish him sufficient means whereby to shun the effects of a Gentleman 's threatning whose highest Figure in the World is meerly to be a Minister in a Republick Nor would he bring down his Master to so low a level as to make it the highest Object of his Hopes concerning so great a Monarch that he shall be able to mortifie a person who whatsoever his Merit be yet his Fortune is to fill no sublimer a Post So that it can be no other save the Prince and Princess whom our Author in his usual way of injustice petulancy and indiscretion does here character represent and intend And what he thereupon means by the Kings having power in his hands and by his hoping that God would furnish him with means by which he may mortifie them is not a matter of difficult penetration even by persons of the most ordinary capacities For the several methods that have been projected and are still carrying on for the debarring them from the Succession to the Imperial Crowns of England Scotland and Ireland to which they have so Just and Hereditary a Right are sufficient to detect unto us what our Author intends and serve as a Key whereby to open the scope and meaning of his Expressions But whatsoever the Papal and Jesuitick Endeavours may be for the obstructing and preventing their Ascending the Thrones of Great Brittain I dare say that all the effects they will have will be only the discovering the folly and malice of those that attempt it and that they can never be able to compass and accomplish it For as their Highnesses have both that interest in the Love and Veneration of all Protestants and so indisputable a Title that it is impossible they should be precluded either by Force or in a way to which their Enemies may affix the Name of Legal so there is no great cause to apprehend or fear their being supplanted by their King 's having Male Issue of a vigour to live considering both his Majesties condition and the Queens which is such that they can never communicate bona stamina vitae And for the Papists being able to Banter a suppositious Brat upon the Nation tho' there are many among them villanous enough to attempt it we have not only the watchfulness of Divine Providence to rely upon for preventing it but there are many faithful and waking Eyes that will be ready and industrious to discover the Cheat. And if the People once perceive that there hath been a contrivance carried on for putting so base an affront upon a noble and generous Kingdom and of committing so horrid a wrong against such Vertuous and Excellent Princes I do not know but that their Resentment of it may rise so high as that all who are discovered to have been accessory unto it may undergo the like fate that they of old did who were found to have been conscious and contributory unto the thrusting the Eunuch Smerdis into the Persian Throne Nor do I in the least doubt but that the same Righteous Wise and Merciful God who prevented the like villany when designed in the time of Queen Mary and which was advanced so far that some Priests had the wickedness and impudence both to give thanks in the publick Churches for her Majesties safe delivery of a Prince and also to describe the Beauty and Features of the Babe tho' all she had gone with amounted only to a Tympany of Wind and Water I say that I do not question but that the same God will out of his Immense Grace and Sapience find ways and methods of which there are many within the compass of his Infinite Understanding by which so hellish a piece of villany if there be any such projected and promoting may be brought into light and disappointed And truly when I consider the Christian and Royal Vertues wherewith their Highnesses are imbued and how they are furnished with all the Moral Intellectual and Religious accomplishments that are requisite for adapting them to weild Scepters and which render them not only so agreeable to the necessities and desires of all good people but so admirably qualified to answer both the present posture of Affairs in Europe and the Exigencies of those that are oppressed and afflicted I grow into a confidence that as the Church of God both in Brittain and elsewhere and the circumstances in which so many Countreys are involved do bespeak and crave their Exaltation to the Thrones of the Brittish Dominions so that they are both destined of God unto them and will in due