est unless the Magistrate who is Virtute Officii Gods Vicegerent in rewarding the Good and punishing the Evil interpose and shew himself really a Terrour to Evil doers and a Rewarder and Encourager of such as do well Thirdly I take it also for an undoubted truth that by our English Laws no person is punished or as his Grace and the Discenters call it Persecuted purely for that which he calls his Religion which is his private Opinion And it raises my admiration to wonder how his Grace who hath had his share in the preparation of those Laws for the Royal Assent should be so far mistaken in the nature and necessity of them All the Laws of the Land shewing the Reason of their Penal Nature to be purely Political and not Spiritual and it is the Overt Acts of Treason Sedition and Rebellion and the fatal Consequences of pretended Religion which the Laws endeavour by Penalties to obviate or prevent and to punish if men be so wicked or so foolish not to take the fair Caution that is given them A man may be to himself of any Religion nay so great Indulgence does our Law give that they may privately exercise it provided they exceed not such a number besides their Family by which it is most evident that the Quarrel is not immediately at the Opinion which is pitied because False and indulged because the Assertors are obstinately Foolish but at the practical Consequences which by terrible Experience have been found to be fatal to the Prince and People to the Peace and Prosperity of the Community even that dreadful 35th of Eliz. tells us in the Title that it is An Act to retain the Queens Subjects in their due Obedience If there be severe Laws against Papists Priests and Jesuites the reason of them was for their Turbulency and continual Unchristian Machinations against the Life of the Prince and the Peace of the Nation for their Doctrines of the Lawfulness of Excommunicating Deposing and even Murdering Soveraign Princes and disposing of their Realms and Dominions for pretended Heresie or Incapacity Doctrines able to ruine the whole Earth and lay the Foundations of Eternal Mischiefs to mankind And if the Dissenters on the other hand complain of the severity of Penal Statutes or suffer by them it is because they have actually been guilty of the most horrible Crimes of Rebellion and the most consummated Wickedness in Murdering the Best of Princes and overturning the Best of Governments it is because the lewd Principles of Democracy are inconsistent with Monarchy and contain in them the Seeds of Sedition Rebellion Anarchy and Confusion And though in Charity we may conclude that all Dissenters of different Perswasions are not so tainted with the worst of Principles as to become Rebels and Regicides yet there being an absolute impossibility to distinguish the Innocent from the Criminal since none will acknowledge themselves such the Innocent must be content to suffer with the Criminal and partake of their Punishments unless they can make us Momus his Windows to see into their Hearts and Souls not onely what they are but what they will or may be And to conclude this particular I dare confidently aver That neither the Intention of the Laws was to punish men for their different Opinions or that any have been punished by virtue of any Penal or Capital Law but upon the account of the Political not Religious necessity to secure the Peace and Safety of the Government And if a Political punishing the Disturbers of publick Peace Order and Government be so great a Crime as in his Graces Opinion to be near a kin to the Sin against the Holy Ghost and to render men Persecutors and Antichristian the whole World and all Ages Places Times Governments and Governours must have been are and will be Antichristian and Persecuting to the World end even David and Solomon not excepted the one the Wisest and the other the Best King being a man after Gods own Heart And how his Grace will escape the lash of his own Censure I cannot imagine who hath I presume often given his Consent to penal Bills and may yet to others for the securing the Person of his Prince and the Peace of his Country from Religious Rumbalds and Conventicling Blunderbusses as he is in duty bound as well as from any other Irreligious Rebels And upon the whole if all those who prosecute Dissenters are Persecutors and all Persecutors Antichristian his Grace will be at a great loss where to finde any sort of People in the World that call themselves Christians who by this Logick may not be proved Antichristian And certainly this is a notable way of Arguing Men and Athiests into Religion to lay that down as a Fundamental Maxim which if admitted for Truth will infallibly prove there never was any true Religion in the World since it is impossible to finde any Society or Government which hath not endeavoured to preserve it self by Rewards and Punishments by Penal and Capital Laws against Usurpers Rebels and Seditious Persons and Principles though never so fairly gilded over with fine and glittering Titles of Holy Leagues Holy Covenants Gods People and Saints Vizors with which ill men have endeavoured to conceal the most Flagitious Crimes Having thus shortly run over the two main things I hope we shall with more ease surmount the third which seems by being put as the Sting in the Tayl to have been the efficient Cause of the Book which Logicians tell us is always first in Intention though last in the Execution and that is the necessity of a Toleration For in truth if Persecution be really Antichristian and no Man ought to be forced in Religious Matters then Toleration is absolutely necessary in order to the very Essence of being a Christian a good Man and able Polititian Now if I be able to shew that Toleration of all Religions is neither good Politicks nor Divinity in a Monarchy I think I shall have done with his Graces Paper and this I belive to unprejudiced or undesigning Persons will not appear either difficult or impossible to be proved First therefore It is ill Divinity unless my Lords new Scheme of the Possibility of being saved by the conduct of Humane Reason in any Religion which acknowledges a God and teaches Morality be granted for a Truth And if it should I cannot see any manner of necessity of Faith or Christian Religion nor according to this Divinity was the Incarnation of the Son of God so great a kindness to the World as all Pious Men believe if Men might go to Heaven before this Stupendious Mercy was known to them or may so still by the help of that Instinct which his Grace tells us is so near a-kin to God and we must now after almost 1700 Years come to question the truth of Canonical Scripture which assures us there is no other Name under Heaven by which Salvation is to be obtained but the glorious and the blessed
Name of Jesus the Saviour of the World Again It is most certain that as there is but one God so there is but one Faith and one Truth Whereas there are many Errours and Doctrines of Devils in all dresses even that of Christian Religion Now these will all plead as strongly for Toleration and Liberty of Conscience as the true Religion and upon my Lords Hypothesis will have as undoubted a Right to it So that the whole World must be suffered to continue in damnable Errours and Heresies which they call Religion and no Person under Penalty of being guilty of one of the greatest Crimes and being Antichristian must punish them for their blasphemous Tenents or charitably indeavour by the fear and terrour of Humane Laws and Penalties as well as by Reasons and Arguments to oblige them to procure a better information of their Understanding and a clearer Notion of these necessary Truths wherein they have been by their folly and obstinacy mightily and it may be long mistaken for want of the Rod of Correction to cure them of that folly which is naturally bound up in the Hearts of the Children of Men. Now if it be true as it must if we believe every Word of God is true That no Man can be saved but by comming to the knowledge of the Truth by Supernatural Revelation and that they must all be damned who believe a lie that there is but one Name to give Salvation and one Truth to be believed Is it not a very fine way of leading Men to that glorious Truth and Light to tell them all who pretend to it have it how far remote from it soever and to render it almost morally impossible among so many authoriz'd Counterfeits to find the real Truth And is it not a charitable Doctrine to give Men Liberty of Conscience to go headlong to the Devil for God's sake without endeavouring to stop their Carreer when we see them mounted upon the blackest and most furious Steeds of damnable Errours and Heresies Will his Grace think it convenient to Tolerate the Conscience of a Calvinist who rides Whip and Spur upon the Pegasus of his Sanguinary Divinity and has the blasphemous impudence to compare Almighty Mercy which he says Gods Revealed Will seems to offer to all to be only like the Artifice of a little Vermin-catcher who baits his Trap with it only that by their refusal to which they are precondemned by his secret Will he may have something to say against them And were I at leisure to write or his Grace to read I could furnish him with a Bill of Items of this Nature in the Opinions of our several Dissenters longer then a Taylor of the greatest Faith ever trusted a promising Courtier for But let this pass only with this Remark that if it were for my life that I indeavoured either to make a witty Man an Atheist or to propagate Atheism in the World I would desire no other Favour or Foundation but a Toleration of all Opinions and Liberty of Conscience to effect it Nor is Toleration worse Divinity then Politicks I cannot say how it may stand with the Nature of a Commonwealth though because our Republicans are so fond of it one would think it calculated for their Meridian but certainly not onely Reason but dreadful Experience have assured us it is inconsistent with Monarchy Nothing can make a Monarchy Great and August but the Love and Union of the People and if his Grace will enquire of Lewis the Fourteenth he will inform him that is his Opinion and indeed nothing begets greater Divisions and Animosities in a Kingdom then Religious Feuds which weaken its Power at home and Reputation abroad but where these diversities in Opinion about Religion all meet as in a Center in the Point of the Lawfulness for the Sake or Name or Cause of Religion for Subjects to take up Arms to Dethrone and Assassinate privately or publickly to Murder their Prince and subvert the Government as the Principles of all Covenanters Associators and Excluders do I appeal to all Crowned Heads to all Persons who have any share in Government to all Ministers of State and Polititians nay even to his Grace himself whether such dangerous Principles and Persons Poisoned with them are not so far from deserving Toleration as to be most pernicious and intolerable in any Monarchy that desires or expects to be safe But what need we to argue from Reason when Fact is so evident Has not Indulgence Toleration and Liberty of Conscience murdered one King set up a thousand Usurpers made England suffer a thousand miseries and cost this Nation many thousand Lives many Millions of Treasure His Grace had a share and a large one in the effects of that Liberty of Conscience It was a Conscientious Felton that robbed him of a Noble Father and the World of a most Illustrious Life it was a Conscientious Rebel that slew his Brother it was Conscientious Rebels that Sequestred his Estate Imprisoned his Person and would have taken away his Life and if he has a mind to run the Gantlet again through all those Risques of Fortune I would recommend him to a Toleration and Liberty of Conscience to gratifie his desires for I dare assure him a Ducal Coronet is no more a Protection against Conscience when once it takes the Field then an Imperial Crown or a much hated though Innocent Mitre Were that late Rebellion onely the single dismal Extravagance of Conscience grown Frantick by Indulgence or wantonly Cruel by too much Liberty something might be alledged in mitigation of its Crimes But it is a Wild Creature in Dissenters whose Chain is no sooner loose but it flies at the Throat of its Keeper And no Man can doubt of this who reflects upon the Troubles and Dangers which have befallen our late Sovereign and His Illustrious Brother our most Gracious King which must date their Aera from the last Indulgence for no sooner had the Dissenters gained that Point but they threw at all and the good and loyal Subjects of the Church of England the best Supporters of the Crown being discouraged the Faction grew Rampant to the highest Degrees of Insolence imaginable and wanted but little of pushing on a more dreadful Revolution than that of Forty one For who were the Petitioners the Addressers the Life and Fortune Men the Associators the Exclusioners the Rye-house Conspirators but the great Friends to the Dissenters to Liberty of Conscience and Toleration And who were to assist these mighty Undertakers but the Dissenters the Band of Pensioners to this pretended Conscience And whoever Indulges those who plead Conscience opens a secret Sally-port to let in Traytors disguised under the Name of Tender Conscience betrays a Principal Gate of the Government to his Enemies and for one Conscience really Tender will find a thousand as hard as Iron and as sharp as Steel and as mortal too in a Dissenters Hand And I cannot but infinitely admire at that Passage
A SHORT ANSWER To His GRACE the D. of Buckingham ' s PAPER CONCERNING RELIGION TOLERATION AND Liberty of Conscience LONDON Printed for S. G. and are to be sold by Randal Taylor near Stationers-Hall 1685. To the READER THat I have written this Pamphlet is plain and the Reason of it as plain in Answer to one Printed with His Grace the Duke of Buckingham's Name wherein I think he hath not rightly informed himself or his Readers I have no Apology to make for the Printing of it but only that I think a Sore always wants a Plaister till it hath got one Of how dangerous Consequence to Religion and the Peace of the State such Arguments may prove I hope his Grace did not give himself leave to consider And should he take the pains to do it it is not to be expected he should draw both Bill and Answer and act for the Plaintiff and Defendant successively one after another How pernicious an Animal this Mountain and Wild Conscience hath been to England is too well known and how fatal Toleration would be I hope in a few words to make evident in the ensuing Papers And the Nation being in a fair way of Composure the stirring of this extravagant Ferment which hath run us into so many Fevers of State seems very unseasonable at this time and requires something to precipitate the Lees of Sedition and keeping them from rising again and turning the Wine of our Hopes into the Vinegar of Despair My Opinion in these points having ever been diametrically opposite to those of his Grace's Paper and having been long convinced that nothing could more effectually contribute to the Ruin of this Monarchy Church and State than Toleration and Liberty of Conscience I have prevailed upon my self to expose my thoughts to the publick View and Censure upon this Subject and Occasion as being thoroughly perswaded I am in the Right as to the main and not much solicitous for the fate of a five or six hours Paper which the Ingenuous will pardon if it be not exact and the Rigorous would condemn tho an Angel had writ it That I do not affix my Name to it is because I do not design to be known And tho I am not ashamed to have writ it or think it will do me any disreputation yet I am unwilling to seem arrogant in attempting to answer a Person of so Great a Character and so Celebrated a Name to whom I desire to be known under no other Name than that of His Grace's most Humble Servant And a most True Friend to the Interest of ENGLAND A SHORT ANSWER To His GRACE the D. of BVCKINGHAM's Paper Concerning Religion Toleration c. IT is a pretty odd Adventure to see a Person of His Grace's High Character and Parts enter the Lists and advance himself the Champion of some things so much out of Countenance and Reputation that even those who formerly owned them would take it unkindly not to be thought wholly to have forsaken and abandoned them And in truth Whiggism in both its dresses of Toleration and Persecution which made her so amiable to the Noble Peer and others in the days of Association is now with sorrow become so abominably superannuated that she looks like a Cast Mistriss scorned and contemned even by the Porters and Footmen and it can be nothing but pure compassion and pity sure that procures her such a Glorious Protector But is it not as odd an Adventure to see any person so bold as to think upon such great disadvantages of coping with so disproportionate a Combatant as a Peer of the highest Rate of England whereby he must render himself liable not only to all the force of Wit and Sense but if he does not well guard himself with all Decency and Discretion to the fatal and murdering blow of Scandalum Magnatum And in truth if I had not put on the Armour of Conscience I durst never have taken up his Grace's Gantlet But I esteem my self invulnerable under that Mail and dare confidently believe my Lord would not for an unwary slip prove himself an Antichristian by persecuting an innocent person purely for what he believes his Religion exacts from him especially considering that his Grace's Maxim is infallible which assures us That no man believes because he has a mind to do so but because his Judgment being convinced he cannot chuse but believe it whether he will or not Nor do I believe should I be criminal in point of Deference or Good Manners towards his Grace that he would by animadverting severely upon me undo what he hath so publickly owned as an Opinion of which he hath been long convinced and to confute the labour of his brain by any action diametrically opposite to his Hypothesis But for fear of the worst neither my Nature or Education inclining me to any thing disobliging much less rude I will take care of my self And tho I cannot in approaching so near his Grace be procul a Jove yet I will be sure to keep my self procul a fulmine And I should be very angry with my felf if I should say any thing which even his Grace may think beneath the Dignity of his High Character for which I profess a most profound Veneration and Respect And my Lord being the Agressor I know he will not be displeased since we differ mightily in Opinion about Religion if I endeavour to defend my Belief which I cannot help very warmly and with some Opinionatrê And should I chance to pretend to be Comical and Pleasant now and then a Contagion no man can almost escape that comes but near his Grace's Pen which even in this serious matter is very facetious I hope he will look upon it but as my being stung with the Tarantula of his Paper which may make me dance and caper even contrary to my Nature and Inclination by the secret sympathy that is in the unaccountable poison of being Witty I confess my Lord writes with that taking air and pleasantness that it is impossible not to be delighted with it But not to flatter his Grace 't is too much of that nimble Contexture and seems to want not only the temperamentum ad pondus but the pondus it self and to make it in any measure currant must have many Grains not only of Salt but of Allowance too And in truth I cannot wonder to see a Peer write of Religion en Cavalier but do as much wonder to see a Noble Cavalier writing of Religion as I should to see a Blew-Apron-Knight correcting Euclids Elements or a Countrey-Clown drawing up Maxims of Politicks or Navigation I cannot be induced to believe our Noble Author hath made Polemical Divinity or the abstruse Notions of the Schools any one Scene of his diversion and therefore his Reasonings are witty and pleasant but not at all concluding his Notions are very fine and many of them very natural and true but not too Logical His Grace seems only to have done