Selected quad for the lemma: state_n
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A25719
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An Appendix to Mercurius reformatus, or, The new observator by the same author.
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1692
(1692)
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Wing A3573; ESTC R30819
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24,994
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16
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thereafter when they saw he was going in earnest they assured her That before he could be well landed there there would be a formidable Insurrection here which the few Forces the King was to leave behind him would not be able to make head against Queen Mary upon those Assurances and that of the Weakness of our Fleet prevail'd with the French King to send out his Fleet to Sea to countenance and back this imaginary Insurrection In all which our Murmurers trick'd the late Queen and she again trick'd the French King for neither had they the Courage to rise nor had she so little reason as to hope it But the Letter intercepted about that time to her from Tyrconnel shews that she and he was upon a shorter Project and one Assassine was to do what all her Friends in England durst not Here it is I must beg leave to give my own Opinion about one of the true Reasons that I believe prevailed with the French to be at the Charge of so mighty a Fleet just upon the certain News they had received of the King 's being ready to embark for Ireland For it was then that Monsieur de Tourville their Admiral had first Orders to be ready to Sail. There has been probable-enough Reasons given for this Attempt both in some of the foregoing Papers and in another that has made a great Noise in the World under the Name of the Modest Enquiry about the late Disasters in England c. Which I am so far from contradicting that I believe they concurred greatly to turn the French Counsels that way But that accursed Project of JONES being on foot at that time and the concurring of so great probabilities of a change of Affairs in case of its taking effect there is no question to be made but that it help'd to cast the Balance for setting out their Fleet at that precise Juncture The truth is our Enemies at home could scarce be brought to believe that the King could go for Ireland in the Circumstances his Affairs then stood And indeed it was a bold tho necessary stroke for the King to attempt it King James's Friends in England had assured him so positively of the impossibility of it that the first sure Intelligence he had of His Majesty's Landing was full eight days after he was actually there for some of our Men being taken Prisoners in a Skirmish at Lâ—ghbricklane the Commander was brought before the late King and the first Question that was put to him was If the Prince of Orange was landed It 's hard to say whethet Jones went over to Ireland with the King in order to perpetrate the Villany there he had miss'd of here But this is certain Tyrconnel and the French Generals plac'd their last hopes in that Rogue 's undertaking after they heard the King was safe Landed In a Letter about that time intercepted from Tyrconnel at Ardee to the Late Queen Mary he gave her a very melancholy account of their Affairs tells her The Enemy was 40000 strong and furnish d with all things necessary That the King meaning King James was for fighting but he himself was against it and he concluded That notwithstanding of all her care of their Affairs he had now no hopes but in Jones 's Negotiation Thus a Villain was appointed to put a stop to the Fortune of the Confederates by one single Blow against him on whom the Confederacy chiesly depended And thus Heaven warded off a Stroke that carried with it the Fate of Europe This War with France notwithstanding of all the Taxes we are at to maintain it is the only true Measure but one that the English Crown has fallen into as to Foreign Affairs for the space of more than half a Century of Years It is true we have entred into it when our Enemies may be said to be in the best Posture they ever were in to deal with us But whose fault it is that they are so there is scarce any man of common sense in Christendom but knows and over and above The greater and stronger our Enemies are the greater is the necessity of the War on our part The other measure that was taken for the true Interest of England was the Triple Alliance betwixt Vs Sweden and Holland tho one of the Princes that entred into it was never hearty in it The breaking that Alliance as it was the work of those Five call'd the Cabal in concert with the French Court so it was turn'd into another Alliance the most unhappy and worst design'd that ever the English Nation made Good God! Who could imagine that England could have ever been wheedled into a League with France against a State which our Interest it was to preserve and upon whose standing or falling the Fortune of our King 's only Nephew depended All the Glory we got by that Holland War was that we began it with two of the most infamous Actions that ever was viz. The attempt upon the Dutch Smyrna Fleet and the shutting up of the Exchequer and in the sequel we were roughly treated in the only Element was our part to deal with them in at last after a great Treasure spent only to agrandize France and weaken our selves We were glad of a Peace Upon the ending of this Vnlucky War the whole Nation groaned for One with France The Parliament the People and most Princes and States about us courted King Charles to enter into it And indeed if King Charles had yielded to them this Point the French King had in all human probability been inevitably brought back to the Treaty of the Pyrenees which was all the Hollanders and their Confederates aim'd at and which is that alone that both then and now can secure the Peace and Safety of Europe But alas King Charles was too much in the snares of France to hear any such Proposal All he could be brought to was to make an Offer of a bare Mediation and even in this he was both jealous'd and slighted by the Parties engaged in the War and at last had the Mortisication to see first The Peace betwixt France and Holland made I may almost say without his knowledg and thereafter That betwixt France and the House of Austria sign'd by the Plenipotentiaries of those Crowns at Nimeguen in such a manner that the English Ambassadors could not sign it with them for a Punctilio of Honour refus d them by the Emperor The comparing of the condition France was in then and what it 's now obliges me to a Thought that I am afraid few will agree to it looks so like a Paradox I am of opinion that at that time when both we at home and most people abroad were so earnest for our declaring War with France both the French and We were in a mistake in our Apprehensions of it It is not necessary I should tell the mighty Successes we promised to our selves against them For how far we were to imitate if not to out do
instanc'd in History I must confess the Character and Account that Learned Gentleman gives of the King meets so close with those Transactions of his Life that has hapned since that one would be almost tempted to think the Book had either been written or at least lick'd over again after this late Revolution in England was brought about But so far was it from being so that it 's committed now to the Press just as it came from the Author's Pen several years before this Revolution was either thought upon or the least occasion for it and that without his Knowledg or Review or the least Alteration Addition or Deduction of any one single sentence through the whole In reading these Curious Memoirs and the part His Majesty has in them it brought to my mind a Book of Monsieur Aubery's printed at Paris in French Twelve Years ago with Approbation of the French King entituled Memoirs pour servir a l'Histoire de Holland Memoirs to give light to the History of Holland In which there is a Character given of the present King in a few words that rather outdoes than falls short of Sir William Temple's And because Monsieur Aubery is both an Author of great account and much more that the very Design of the Book it self is mighty unfavourable to the Family of Orange and he as much an Enemy to the present King as can well consist with the Temper of an Historian I beg leave to do the ungrateful part of a Translator as to some Passages in it Let us hear therefore what a French-man a Roman-Catholick an Enemy of the then Prince of Orange and of his House and an Idolater of the present French King tells us of the Affairs of Holland during the last War and His Majesty's part therein and withal let us pardon an Air of Vanity that naturally attends a French Author when he writes of his King In Page 300 of these Memoirs he has these words as near as I can give them in English This young Prince meaning the present King then Prince of Orange has from his Infancy given the greatest Marks of his Reservedness and Moderation His Prudence augments as he grows up in years And all that pretend to know any thing of Merit that are acquainted with him do agree in this That never Prince has given the world greater hopes of himself He endured with the profoundest Dissimulation pardon the Expression from an Enemy the Injuries of the Barnevalt Faction restored in the Persons of the two De Wits waiting with a Patience and Taciturnity even beyond that of his Great Grandfather Prince William of Orange the Advantages of Time and a favourable occasion for his own Re-establishment for being deprived by a solemn Edict of all the great Employments of his Family after the sudden Death of his Father he came to be re-established in them by a contrary Edict the beginning of this War He was obliged for his Restoration to France which having about seven years ago made the greatest Conquests that has been heard of in so short a time the most part of the Frontier Towns of the Vnited Provinces and many of their Capitals Utrecht and Zutphen among others rendred themselves at the first view of our Troops Tho those Places were provided of great Garisons yet being composed of Officers and Soldiers without skill the King meaning the French saw himself Master of above Forty Places in less than Two Months time and found himself so overwhelm'd with Success not only above his Hopes but Wishes that he might say with Caesar Veni Vidi Vici I came I saw I overcame These Thunderclaps that presag'd yet others worse to come and which put the Hollanders to the greatest Consternation gave occasion to the People to complain of the ill Conduct of the De Witts and furnished a just Cause for the Friends of the House of Orange to say That there was none capable to sustain their Tottering State nor to defend them against that Powerful Enemy but the Princes of that Family And that as they had protected them before against the Tyranny of Spain there was no others able to save them from the Thunder of France The Grandmother of the present Prince a Woman of a Masculine Courage that had endured with the greatest impatience the low Ebb of that House which she had once seen in the greatest Splendour took pains to gather together all the best Friends and Dependants of the Name of Nassau which were very numerous These People displeased at their being turned out of all the Employments in their State and to see them in the hands of the Children of the Burgomasters and being back'd with the Fury of all the rest that lov'd their Countrey and saw themselves under the hazard of present Destruction by a Victorious Army in the bowels of their Countrey they came as to their last Sanctuary to restore the present Prince to the Possession of all the Dignities his Ancestors had enjoyed that is of Captain and Admiral General and Stadtholder whicb were thereupon entail'd on his Family for ever by a Solemn and Vnanimous Decree This same Author comes afterwards to tell us that before this re-establishment of the Prince of Orange The Holland Troops were such sort of creatures that places wherein there were Five Thousand Foot and Eight Hundred Horse in Garison would render themselves Prisoners of War at the first approach of the French without making the least Resistance And that Fifty Reisters of Munster would put ordinarily to Flight Three Hundred of the Dutch Horse that fled before them as so many Sheep before a Wolf But Page 311. Returning to speak of the present King and his Part in the War after his Re-establishment he expresses himself thus The Prince of Orange saw himself at the Age of Twenty One Years at the head of an Army as his Great Grandfather William of Orange had been at the same Age under the Emperor Charles the 5th And in the whole course of this War he made appear to the World so much Conduct and so much Bravery in a great many Rancounters Battels and Seiges as certainly far surmount the Actions of his Renowned Ancestors who had set a Copy for Two Hundred Years together for the greatest Captains to imitate If he had not had the unhappiness to be born in the Age of Lewis le Grand whose Power Genius and Fortune admits of no stop This Young Hero continued He with a few Troops hastily Levied and but ill Disciplin'd had the Courage to make head against this great Monarch in the height of his Fortune And his Conduct and Personal Valour in Battel made Victory for some hours incline to his scale till at last he had the consolation not to have Yielded but to the Greatest Prince on Eartb And it may be justly said of him tho an Enemy That nothing but so Glorious a Sun could lessen the Rays of this Rising Star Thus far Monsieur Aubrey and