and then most abhominably Christian-like he briskly lets fly at the Dissenters from the Church of England with a most Dismal Judgment that Heaven and Hell is as easie to be brought together as to reconcile those People to any terms of Piety or Civil Order that corruptly style themselves Protestants I must confess here perchance the Author may apprehend he hath the whip hand of any one that will undertake to answer in respect of the Law but I think without offence I may put you in mind of the Words of the Bishop of Donn in his Preface to his Grand Exemplar which are That when it appears a Kingdom is converted to Christianity the Common-wealth is made a Church Gentile Priests are Christian Bishops the Subjects Servants of Christ the Religion turned Christian and the Laws of the Nation made part of the Religion there is no change of Government but Christ is King and the Temporal Power his Substitute and is to promote obedience to him Now I must confess I am and I doubt not but every really true Son of the Church of England will be much more inclinable to take Doctor Tayler for an Authentick Author in this Point of Religion than Mr. L'Estrange though he does not use the word Protestant and without all peradventure his Judgment is upon Truth I mean the word of God which Mr. Roger altogether omits to the great proof of his Sonship and only grounds himself in that case in my apprehension upon several and Vulgar Errors as first I take it to be an undeniable Truth from our Saviour and his Apostles that there is but one Religion and not Legions and that under two Heads 1. Loving God with all your heart 2. Love our Neighbours as our selves unless it may be said that every Chimera of mens brains or every Notion as the Author calls Religion or every Form is a Religion I am of opinion it's Nonsence and I cannot but concur with Dr. Tayler that the Antiochian or Christian Religion is the Religion Catexochene and what ever Forms in true and due order to that are framed doubtless they are praise-worthy and ought to be observed by all that Love the Kingdom of Christ but yet I take it the Form is improperly called a Religion but for this Author that hath the Confidence to style himself the true Son and would fain be esteemed the Champion of the Church of England to leave out the only Essential part of a true Church whose Foundation ought to be upon the Rock of Ages and to place it only in humane Laws which as Dr. Tayler says are but part and only in Substitution to that which is really true is as I said before to take the Church-Yard and all for the Church or instead of commending the Vine to praise the Hedge or Fence about it for as Dr Tayler's opinion is the Temporal Power is to be used primarily and principally to promote obedience to Christ not to its self or any thing contrary to Christ's Doctrine Practices or Precepts therefore to me it seems apparent that the Author hath not done right to his Mother the Church of England which makes me fear in regard the Fathers of the Church seem to be of opinion against him in discription of a Church I conceive it may without straining be rationally conjectured he was not suckled by his Mothers milk but by a Foster Nurse otherwise certainly he would not have omitted so Essentiala Worth of the Church of England and the rather for that he might with ease have proved That when the Body of this Kingdom began to shake off that Spiritual Slavery imposed on our Ancestors by the Romish Yoke they then lay under the alteration that then was made by the Governours and Government of this Nation was the nearest and most agreeable by the Articles Cannons and Injunctions then agreed and established to the Apostolical Rule and pursuant to Dr. Tayler's Judgment therein as they could For that our Religion should solely depend upon humane Law it must be and may be as changeable as that of which I am sure we and our Ancestors have had woful Experience as by Repeals of Statutes for that purpose in the Reign of Queen Mary witness Another Vulgar Errour I conceive him with some clearness gullty of is in calling the Church of England the only Protestant Religion aimed at in this Case by the Papists Indeed I have heard once the Question was debated amongst Persons of an higher Sphere than Mr. L'Estrange what the Protestant Religion was and it was thought fit to be left undetermined and doubtless not imprudently for if we should make that the Basis of the Religion of the Church of England it would give our Adversaries the Papists a vast and inevitable Advantage for if History be in that Case to be depended upon the Lutherans the Calvinists c. were before the Church of England under the denomination of Protestants and I do doubt it will appear if it should be brought into dispute they differ in many and main Points but then the Consequence would inevitably follow that we must be put to prove which is the true one another advantage the Papists would have and which I have heard often made use of That they I mean the Church of Rome are the Mother Church and of many hundreds of years before the Church of England and doubtless they may be too hard for us in that Point if our Foundation begun only in Protestantism but in truth the Foundation of our Apostolical British Church which is fully clearly and elegantly proved and made out by the Learned and Judicious Author of the Book intituled of the Heart and its right Sovereign to be ancienter than Rome's especially here in this Nation by many Centuries of Years and for his saying by your Evidence it appears the Fanaticks as he calls them are to be Papists Auxiliaries and therefore it s not rational they the Papists would work their Ruine It 's true according to the Common and Vulgar term you in your Depositions call it the Protestant Religion indefinitely but why this must not concern all manner of Dissenters from the Romish Church I am sure does not in the least appear nor can any other thing rationally be expected but the extirpation of all Dissenters from them of Rome without distinction nor is it proved by you Doctor the Jesuitical Party endeavoured to make any other use of them but as all Conquerors do to divide their Dissenters to facilitate their intended Enterprize if so then his unchristian like Censure must of necessity be unwarrantable and groundless Dear Doctor I must beg your pardon for my prolixity upon this Paragraph but finding this the Author's Corner-Stone I could not pass it over slightly being so really zealous for the ancient British Apostolical Religion that as God was heretofore pleased to honour this Island to have the first Christian King and a British Woman to be Mother of the first Christian
Emperour in the World so to me the finger of God seems plainly to point at and shew that in this latter Age he intends further to honour this Nation with a King and Government that will be his true and real Substitutes to promote sincere obedience to his Son and to bring us with healing under one Shepherd and all to be of one Sheepfold Then taking that forgranted which is denied him That the Protestant Religion aymed at in the Plot is the Established Religion of the Church of England the Author tells you that you cannot be a Friend to the State without being one to the Church too This as I have said before is but a begging of the Question and then he concludes from thence that he that phancies you Doctor not Canonical and Orthodox supposes you build with one hand and pluck down with the other here is begging Question upon Question to bring something out that is no way applicable to you for your business Doctor hath been solely and only to acquaint the King and his Councils with matters of Fact and leave the building and pulling down to their Wisdoms and not therein in the least to concern your self as the Author hath done in that Pamphlet too much Then he puts the Case the general way and says the Dissenters from the Church of England cannot any way be ayding in a Reformation but by their Prayers and good Wishes upon pain of Sedition It 's much such a man as Mr. L'Estrange who takes himself to be of such profound Parts and Knowledge should so much mistake himself for certainly as men and Subjects under his Majestie 's Obeysance they are as capable and legally of serving his Majesty in any such Commands as any other men or Subjects whatsoever I think his Case put whether or no and how far Protestants may unite is fully answered in the Solution to the last Paragraph but what the Dissenters to the Church of England meeting and assembling as to Religious Worships is any way material to the Defence of his Majestie 's Person or Government or what it signifies to the Plot I am to seek for and what offence it is against Law I shall not presume to meddle with it and I am assuredly satisfied in all sober mens Judgments he would not have lost Reputation if he had not shot his bolt thereat so suddenly but indeed much better fruit cannot well be expected from one that hath sucked in an Opinion that he dares tell you Doctor that Religion is a Spiritual Notion I think no man in his right wits will conceive he knows what he says and certainly Doctor this Author will be extreamly Fortunate if such Notions as he hath uttered in that Pamphlet make not him reputed and legally judged Seditious In the Conclusion of this large Epistle in a Jeer and Scoff he tells you They are Wonderful things you have done and would fain have you condescend to believe that he is perswaded you are yet reserved for more Wonderful things but on the other hand I am perswaded he did not believe himself when he wrote it nor designed any body else should if he could prevent it but to his shame if he had any his betters have done it and notwithstanding his flurts of your Name being as famous to Posterity as your Vertue hath rendred you to the present Generation It may be true that you have not that Stock of Confidence he hath and to conceit your self without Personal Infirmities and I dare say that in Justification of his Innocence in that particular he will not be so hardy or bold as to adventure to throw the first stone at you But he tells you Doctor again that none in his right Wits should take you for no Friend to the Church of England I concur with him in it and certainly had he been in his he durst not have taken the Confidence to have reflected so much upon you in regard by so doing he hath much wounded and unworthily traduced the Wisdom and Justice of the Governours and Government of this Nation for which he says he hath a Natural Veneration by turning all their Transactions in this Affair to mere Sophistical ridicule then he tells you of the Evidence you have made of the Intrigues in the late times and now by the Priests and Jesuits with Schismaticks and that you have given the Sectaries a great blow so that they have nothing to say why they should not be sifted with all exactness imaginable Doubtless it 's as great a mistake of and as forreign and remote from the Scope and Drift of your Evidence as is possible to be supposed For although the Jesuits and their Legates are for leaving no stone unturned that may advance their Design in every or any particular of it and to that purpose as much as in them lies do endeavour to creep into Societies and all sorts of men Yet must it therefore needs follow that such Societies or men are Confederate It 's a remote and forreign Supposition it 's a meer non-sequitur Nevertheless though I have not asked any of them the Question nor shall make it my business to open my lips to them further or other than truth will clearly warrant me I dare be bold to say so much for them that there is not one Society or Sect whatsoever called Dissenters from the Church of England but will with all true Zeal earnestly lend their helping hands to find out and be purged from any such corrupt Member that may lurk amongst them and if that Author or any other can further them will well reward them Then Mr. Roger in his jeering and flouting manner says that after gleaning up about 35 Priests in the whole it was you that informed the Government where they were to be had by Sholes It seems he is very exact in keeping the Account of their suffering Members but whether out of pity or friendship to them or for Publick Service I leave the Doctor upon the whole matter to judge but he was too exact in charging you with that Information for I am sure he neither hath or can prove to whom nor when given unless it must be taken for granted because he hath said it which really I cannot do nor have any grounds to perswade you or any other to it Then he asks some Questions if it be not true that the Plot goes on still I am justified by the opinion of the Governours and and Magistrates in the Nation to answer the Question in the affirmative his next is if it be not true that we are all undone if it be not disappointed I must answer that affirmatively in part and negatively in the rest That is all honest and loyal men and true Dissenting Christians from the Church of Rome are but Papists and popishly affected are not but he making the Answer and Construction of the Questions otherwise and without colour of a true cause upon them he draws this Inference That it 's a
matter of absolute necessity to fetch these Plotters out of their Holds That is to use his own expression he that winks may perceive Mr. L'Estrange his meaning and of what spirit he is of That all such guilty or not guilty that are under the notion of Dissenters from the Church of England must be destroyed as Plotters but not one word in all that his Pamphlet against any one Papist Priest or Jesuit elsewhere for he seems to be satisfied their Number as to Sufferers is full Then his last Question is If it be not true that whoever doubts of the truth of this matter of Fact or of the necessity of this way of proceeding is undeniably a Blaster of the King's Evidence and a favourer of the Conspiracy I think I have fully demonstrated to you Doctor why the Fact as he states it and would have it taken for granted is not true but altogether fallacious and shored up with untrue Glosses and Inferences for the by-end he drives at and therefore cannot in the least be apprehended to be any ground to judge him that doubts it a Blaster of the King's Evidence a Favourer of the Conspiracy but if Doctor you will take my opinion and that with some clearness I rather judge the Author of that Pamphlet to be such an one by wresting the construction of your Evidence contrary to the words and meaning thereof Then he closes his long Epistle with desiring you Doctor to lay to heart what he hath writ but I am glad to see you do not concern your self thereat so far as it concerns you alone then he desires you to cast your eye upon what follows which indeed is the Second Part to the same Tune and then prays Heaven and Earth to reward you and that you may be as happy as he wishes you I doubt not but that you are happier already and if you expect any further happiness by others prayers it must not be by such sort of people of whom it 's said their prayers will not prevail He stiles what follows A further Discovery of the Plot drawn he says from your Narrative and Depositions It is certainly drawn out but it 's by violence enough and that by Forreign and remote Inferences and Conclusions But what ever there is further in that Pamphlet but in truth it 's no further Discovery of your Discovered Plot but of his own it is and what that is what I have by my observations already made to that of which part of this is in matter but repetition and of that of which I shall make to that which is new I doubt not Doctor but will give you full and Evident satisfaction The Author tells you It must not be denied the Kings Witnesses have done as much as men could do to make out the truth of this Plot so must it not be denied that the Justice and Wisdom of this Nation hath improved all the Discoveries by the strictest Inquisition and Scrutinie imaginable and done all Possible to suppress it yet it goes on with Confidence and vigour as we have it from those that wrought in the same Myre till better light brought them to other Measures but to lay a Foundation for his next Fallacie he tells you the Fact lies in the Dark and truly Doctor in my opinion it must and will do so unless we have better light to see it by than a Meteor I do not Doctor at all doubt of what the Witnesses have done and as little of what hath been done by the Justice and Wisdom of this Nation for the finding out and suppressing this hellish Plot. But I have before told you as in the case of the Earl of Danby all was not done that might and ought to have been done or else the Commons House of Parliament did mistake in their Charge against him which I think becomes no man to presume But Doctor Mr. L'Estrange tells you that after all this Havock made of the Papists the Coffee-House Discourse is the Plot goes on as they that must be presumed that know best say but those on the Negative ask if it will work without hands where are the Papists in the Air or under ground or are they Invisible for as they aâ—e dispersed besides the Terrour that over awes them there are three Thousand Protestants to one Papist Indeed Doctor I am in admiration of his Confidence to call the just Proceedings of the Authority of the Nation an Havock he shews much of his natural Veneration to the Government and his true Sonship to the Church of England by it and then he lays a mighty stress upon the tatling at Coffee-houses and indeed he hath some reason for I perceive he hath been much beholden to them for matter and Evidence or otherwise he had been exceeding barren in both and in all Probability I am apt to conjecture and not without ground either he hath lost some Intimate in the Havock as he Scandalously terms it or his Bowels of Compassion are strongly towards that Party because he always expresses their suffering with great reluctancy and his Negative Arguments which are for them are the strongest But now the Author again begins to lay his meaning more open for he says they meaning the Popish party may be any where and his reason is he says Persons of great quality have told him they will indure all shapes exercise all Prosessions they speak of one Jesuit cried work for a Cooper another a Shoe-maker others Read Coats ' Its observed upon bringing the Plot to light all the little French men with their Marionetts and Puppit-Showes vanished which gave Suspicion they were Agents for the Faction I do now Doctor plainly preceive why he is so angry with you for now it appears much of his loss this Discovery of this Hellish Plot hath brought upon him for it seems these Persons were of his acquaintance otherwise he could not have been so well knowing of their hard Condition and truly I think he may cry work for a Tinker for instead of stopping one Hole he hath made many but for the matter he not charging it upon you I need not give you the trouble of answering it only let me observe this to you that although at most the Author can and does make no more of these Assertions but hear-says and no body knows from whom nor can well guess for it s not to be presumed that any Persons of quality but such as are in Prison for the Plot use such Company yet he takes it for a granted truth and makes use of it to be a ground-Work for what follows which he tells you Doctor Shall be supported upon your Authority for you still must come in to help the Lame Dog over the Stile With respect to the validity of your Testimony and weight of your Observations you having dived Deeper into it than any other Alas poor Gentleman he is forced to speak truth sometimes against his will but his truths and Fallacies do not
amongst all Parties whatsoever nay and by his own shewing as he puts the case they may be as secure amongst the members of the Church of England nay and more than the Dissenters from the Church of England for although he says because many of the Dissenters will not take Oaths therefore there the Jesuites c. may hide themselves so also he says many of the Jesuites and Papists will take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and so will the members of the Church of England if so then what can hinder the Jesuites c. to herd and hide there Into what Confusion hath this Author brought us if all his Suppositions be true but certainly had the Earl of Castlemain the Countess of Powis John Gadbury Mris. Celier and their accomplices been of Opinion that their Security had lain amongst the Dissenters to the Church of England they would not have been so injurious to them as to have endeavoured to have turned the Plot upon them and besides its to all rational men a strange Proof against this Authors Assertion in that particular for if the Jesuites c. herd only amongst Dissenters from the Church of England and they had been their fellow-Conspirators or Agents in the Plot It could not be unknown to them and then certainly there had not been such necessity as they conceived to go about by desperate and false Oaths to make them either Authors Abetters or Contrivers of the Plot and doth it not evidently and plainly Demonstrate the Contrary for had those Assertions been true this Author would have you Doctor and the world believe in that particular surely there had not needed a Sham-Plot to bring the Dissenters from the Church of England into the real Plot for had it been true it might have been proved by other means but yet to this day there is not one man of the dissenters from the Church of England come to my knowledge that is either charged with or detected of any such thing unless the Authors bare word be to be taken for granted so that though the Jesuites and Priests have according to your Depositions endeavoured to draw them in yet have they not prevailed for what appears so that for ought I can preceive its undeniable that the Saddle was and is upon the right Horse and then all his Queries of if's or not's fall to the ground and needs not any answer but what is before upon the like questions But that the Dissenters from the Church of England have Jesuites and Priests actually amongst them doth not by your's or any other deposition proof or experience whatsoever appear there is any or if there be that they have not wrought any Influence at all upon them or at least such an one as may from the Government merit a total Extirpation which the Author strongly presses for but I presume an healing Plaister is better But he having been heretofore accustomed to Write new's-Books thought his book would not appear authentick or at least would not be vendable without an advertisment annexed to it which Advertisment is indeed as much to the purpose and Coherent to the Subsequent matter of his Pamphlet as comes just to nothing and truly he is so Ingenious as to tell you so for he says in the close of it that its Forraign to the Subject of his Pamphlet but more Accomodate to the Season But for my part I think its Forraign to both for it is that the Subjects right of Petitioning hath been of late in such manner asserted as if his Majesty had no right of refusing and then answers it with some Instances from Edward the Third to Henry the Eight of Granting and Refusing I know not his Author nor I believe he did not for that Assertion for if he had certainly he would have named him But if any one did so he was to blame and was I suppose as much under a mistake as the Author is in his Pamphlet and the Subject matter of it for I take it to be undoubred that the person or Power that may be petitioned to hath a power of granting and denying as for instance if a Party of his friends should in a petition to his Majesty set forth according to their apprehension his merits by his Pamphlet and pray a reward for him his Majesty might refuse it and on the other hand if you Doctor and others by petition to his Majesty should set forth how he hath traduced his Majesty the Government and the Kings Witnesses in his said Pamphlet and pray that the same and he might be left to the Law to be punished according to their demerits the same might and would be granted but in regard he could not or at least would not make a further Discovery of that Damnable and hellish Plot Discovered by you give me leave to tell you if he could have been convinced by any other Evidence or Testimony than Dives and his brethren how he might have done it by publishing to the world as the truth is that the singer of God hath been in this Discovery of your's throughout for it cannot proved be that you Doctor had the least advice or assistance of any one man to guide or help you to contrive the way you took and was to take and that with eminent danger and vast hazard and great difficulty for the making your self Master of this Discovery in less than a year That you had not the least advice or assistance of any one man to help you to contrive the time the way and method how to publish this Discovery to Authority but came barely and nakedly to it yea and with a proof in your mouth from those you were to discover you nor any one else should be credited That when many of the material measures you had proposed to your self and depended upon to make good and for the manifestation of your Discovery as Coleman's latter Papers Langhorne's Papers the foreign Pacquets were removed and you deprived of them and by reason thereof barely stood as a single Witness and inevitable ruine and destruction ghastly and grimly staring in your face yet your Spirits were supported and you not at all discouraged from sticking to the truth But then the Jesuitical Party being infatuated and raging with madness must needs to hide their Villanies as all notorious Sinners commonly do by committing another Sin so did they by committing that barbarous and inhumane Murther of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey which proved otherwise than they designed it for instead of suppressing the Discovery of the Plot it did as it were give a new life to what you had delivered Then doubtless moved by the same spirit you were did not the then Representatives of the Nation unanimously by their Votes testifie their credit of your Evidence Then by the same hand apparently were sent in to your assistance and confirmation Mr. Bedlow Mr. Dugdale and many others who have proved many other particulars and concurred in the general to a tittle with you That until you and the rest of the Witnesses in this Hellish and Damnable Plot had been made use of at a publick Trial you did not converse or associate with one another as can be proved by a multitude of authentick Witnesses so far as is provable in a negative and I am confident cannot be proved in the affirmative That not any two of you that are the King's Witnesses in that Plot or any part of it were of any Familiarity or acquaintance before your being ingaged in that business and you all lived remote from one another and although you do not all swear to the same particulars yet do concurr in the whole as to the generality of the Plot. That not any one of them but your self who for some short time was under a necessity to counterfeit your self a Papist These things Doctor I only mention to put you in mind by what hand you as I conceive have been supported in this Discovery and to shew you according to my apprehension what improbability nay I may say impossibility there is that this Discovery of yours of this Hellish Plot is in the least any thing of an invention or contrived Design by you but is pure matter of Fact and of undeniable verity and not to be so slighted as that invention of Beddingfields being alive again All which I was prompted to as I conceived as a Duty incumbent upon me upon and by the obligation of the Loyalty I truly owe to my natural Prince the real veneration I have for the Government and true Christian Religion and Justice of the Nation the Cordial Love I have to my faithful fellow-Subjects and my profess'd and faithful Friendship to your self and therefore keep up your Spirits and be not dismayed or in the least discouraged for it is my opinion and I hope not without good grounds and presume I may with reverence and without offence say it unless to the tender ears of some captious Masquerade and strange Sons of the Church of England that God will neither forsake you nor this Cause but in despite of all opposition will therein glorifie himself and in truth set up the Kingdom of his Son But give me leave to tell you my Judgment that if this Author's Assertions and Arguments Your Cordial Friend B. W. FINIS
in his first Edition of this Pamphlet and all this upon your Credit as he tells you But if this Author should fall under this misfortune that neither you Doctor nor any sober Wise man should approve of his abortive births from his false Conceptions how can he make the Nation a Compensation for these abuses as without all Peradventure the Case will appear to every one that considers impartially the Plot it self that it is not an Inextricable Labyrinth but in truth is pure and easie Matter of Fact and the Essence thereof lies not at all in any of those by-Circumstantials Mr. Roger hath made use of and as he says For his own ends which is certainly true for they are not in the least to the Advantage of the Nation the Governors or Government the Protestant Religion nor the Kings witnesses but in apparent and great dishonour to all In his next Paragraph he cries out what Innocence can Warrant against Envy or Authority protect when Le Strange comes to be arraigned as a Papist for shewing the likeliest was to Extirpate Popery and yourname cannot Protect him in it nay he tells you it is well if you can uphold your self if this goes on and concludes that none can fall foul upon that Discovery without Wounding your Evidence Now certainly had this Author as well believed the truth of this reason as he cannot but imagine others do he would never under this Disguise of Friendship to you Doctor have undertaken thus publickly to Villifie you Alas he talks of Innocence that is begging the question I know not of any that can be allowed him by any one in his right Wits nor do I know nor never heard but from himself that ever he did or could shew any way that is likely to extirpate Popery I admire at his Confidence to adventure upon such a subject to the people which only and singly appertains to the Magistracy and I think he hath cause to rejoyce that he is not questioned for a Seditious Pamphletteer for that his Work in such a time as this is which calls for our Union not division He says some call his book Jesuitical for my part I think there is no man in his right Wits that can Judge less of his Book than call the Scope and Drift of it of a Jesuitical Stamp but what is that to you Doctor does it therefore follow that because he hath written a book deserves that Censure you must be accounted a Papist that was no way Privy to it but this Consequence is like the rest but upon hard Pumping he has indeavoured to bring you in by Head and Shoulders for he says he hath your Word and Oath for it for you swear the Priests and Jesuites herd themselves amongst the Non-Conformists they denie it and yet prove themselves in the Plot and discredit the Kings Evidence What Hocus Pocus is here I am sure in no part of your Evidence is it Sworn they herd with Non-Conformists nor have I yet ever seen or heard any proof that any Non-Conformists have proved themselves to be in the Plot or that any of them whatsoever discredited any of the Kings Evidence but this must be accepted upon his Veracity or else his strain of Wit by his Subsequent Querie for thus the Author argues if they Shelter not themselves in Conventicles and field-Meetings to stir up Broyls in the Government What becomes of your Testimony and none but Papists would oppose the Ferretting them out What he means or what he would be at If you know Doctor it s well but for my part I understand not the Sence of it but because you have proved there were some Jesuites or their Agents sent into Scotland to Facilitate their design amongst the discontented Scots if they could therefore all the Dessenters from the Church of England in England are guilty of the Plot I am very Confident the meanest of Grammarian School-Masters in England would have whipped the dullest Boy he had under his tuition for using such a Nonsensical Argument In Confirmation of this the Author further tells you nothing can be clearer according to your Evidence of Wright and others sent amongst the Scots with other Evidence to that Purpose and then says all this will not serve to Convince some of the Priests mingled with Fanaticks till the Pilgrims and the Forty Thousand black Bills come to open their Eyes This Author is in much wrath that every body does not wear his Spectacles for I am fully assured there is not a sober English Christian of what perswasion soever except such Sons of the Church of England as he and God-dam-me Sons that see no further than the Church-yard but do believe your Evidence in that particular as fully as your Words or intention thereby extended Then he concludes that Paragraph with a Clamorous acclamation If these Infidels I presume he means the Dessenters from the Church of England Have any Priviledg for the Defaming publick Justice and blasting the Kings Evidence above other People they should do well to produce it But I am sure it would have been better done of him to have produced some Proof of the Slander before he had aspersed the Parties with it I never heard of their guilt of the one nor the other but from his Pen which I take to be as little Slander as his mouth Then he proceeds to tell you he hath read considered and studied you and what wonderfull things you have done for him in the Dark and at length brought him into the light and when he hathlent you these Ironical Expressions he comends you in the same Dialect and further tells you of his Sensibility of the roundness of your Periods the Luxuriancy of your Invention where there is Scope for it the Frankness of your Stile and the Harmony of your Câ—â—ceptions Indeed had it been your design Doctor to have made your trade of Living and getting Dinners by Scribling or had those things which you have published in Print been otherwise than pure matter of Fact to satisfie the Governors Government and People of the Nation and limitted and bounded to the nature and quality of the thing in question and in a great part in the nature of a report It s morally Possible you might as well have observed your Periods as the Fault-finder nay I can say it with some Assurrance It is so in all Impartial mens Judgments all things duely considered which answers may also serve you for your Inventions and Conceptions for I know not of any such in all your works and doubtless those that do as well know you Doctor and understand you as Mr. Le Strange are clearly of opinion that had you Imployed your Genius that way if it had been but in making a Play against your own Mother you might and would have come off with as much Reputation made as good Syllogismes and had as pertinent Coherences as any that have undertaken or performed the like and for the
from thence can be inferred without a violent or at least strange Construction and for my part I do not at all know or suspect that any one true Member of the Church of England is or will in the least joyn with the Jesuitical Party in it but do hope both they and the Dissenters from them will unite to defend his Sacred Majesty and the Government from it Then he tells you The Law is general in that case there is no relaxation the Law takes not notice of Honesty but Obedience and this Rule he says holds in common as well to the Papists as to the Protestant Recusants With something more to the same purpose but truly I think to very little purpose for as I take it those Statutes he cites are by their Title Preamble and Body only and litterally against the Popish Recusants For the Dissenters he talks of or the greater part of them were not then publickly in being nor in the least mentioned in any of them and if so I think they cannot be concerned But that being under the construction of a power above me I shall not be positive in it or determine it Then he rivets this he thinks by saying But what if it be said that it is not the thing sworn but the Oath it self that is scrupled at This he tells you Doctor is nice and unhappy to those that are so strait-laced and from thence he infers its dangerous to the Government for it lets in all the Priests and Jesuits in nature under that colour for they will all flow in thither that is amongst the Dissenters from the Church of England for shelter and carry on their Designs without trial or danger Is not this most incomparable Jugling he can blow hot and cold at his pleasure an excellent Artist for observe when he had some trouble of Spirit upon him for the Papists Sufferings upon this Hellish Plot and to take off the edge of the Magistrate and the opinion of the People as to the further and severe prosecuting of it that there might not be any more havock made with them then there was not a Papist to be seen they were invisible but now when the Tables must be turned upon the Dissenters to the Church of England then because of some of the Dissenters scruplesomeness in Swearing his Opinion is changed for now there is a great deal of danger he says but if you will believe the Author before it must be of no body or at least so few that they are not worth the looking after but one to three thousand if so much so here is Mr. Roger against Mr. L' Estrange and indeed I take the Author's Inference from hence to be altogether foreign and remote from your words or meaning in your Deposition or the truth of the case for though your Deposition in fact is true and common experience joyns with you in it that the Jesuits and their Party are so active that they will if possible thrust themselves into any Society of Men to try their skill in disturbance of Governments and carry on their Design yea even as well where there are Dissenters from the Church of England as where there are none and according to what he said equally safe to themselves Now to conclude all he tells you Doctor It must be granted that either the Papists have a design upon the King Religion and Government and advance it by acting the parts of Quakers Anabaptists Presbyterians and other Sectaries or not and admitting your Deposition to be true there can be no security to this Government without either dissolving all seperate meetings or bringing in all Dissenters to this Legal Test otherwise the Papists have all sorts of liberty and security in herding themselves amongst Conventiclers where upon the beating of a Bush it will be an even wager whether you start a Jesuit or a Fanatick and in this case there is not much difference between them where the Jesuit plays the Fanatick or the Fanatick the Jesuit and then says if this main Assertion be true there is no way of finding out the Papists but by this Test and Dissenters cannot chuse but incourage the Proposition either they have Priests amongst them or not if they have why do they not the best they can to find them out if not why do they say they have Either they are influenced by the Jesuits or not if they be why do not they purge their Congregations If not why do they pretend they are and so set the Saddle on the wrong Horse Either its possible to clear their Conventicles of this dangerous mixture or not If so why do they still complain and do nothing in it If not then there is no way to extirpate Popery but by rooting out Fanaticism and then he calls to the world to judge with what injustice the Orders and Rituals of the Church of England are charged with a tincture of Superstition and Popery when the Calumniators are tainted with this Leaven and then concludes he is come to the bottom of the Popish Plot. I am sure a blind man would be glad to see it for I that have both my eyes can neither see top middle nor bottom of what he promised of a further Discovery of your discovered Plot and all he hath said I take to be but a meer groundless Phantasm for in the beginning of his Pamphlet he undertook a further Discovery of the Plot than you discovered and could you or any other rational man have from thence expected or looked for any thing else but some new matter and clearly made out and evinced either by authentick Testimony or undeniable Arguments but instead thereof he hath spoiled three or four Sheets of Paper by stuffing them full of strained and wrested Constructions of and inferences from some part of your Depositions and Observations many manifest contradictions and apparent mistaken Conclusions thereupon Nevertheless to do him what right I can perchance if you take not his litteral expression but his mystical meaning I am perswaded you will go nigh to judge he hath made or really intended to make a further Discovery of a Plot but not the Plot you have discovered for if you well and seriously observe the subject matter of his Discourse and Arguments and to what they tend and add to it the time when this Learned Piece came forth and compare it with the invented Plots of the Earl of Castlemain Countess of Powis John Gadbury Mrs. Celier c. I may easily suppose Doctor you may without any great stress readlly conjecture with whom he conversed for what Meridian this elaborate Piece of his was calculated and for whose use by its Image and Superscription but the All-mighty Providence having taken them in their own Snares both in those and other things hath thereby plainly proved to the world the manifest untruth of his Assertions for although is be undeniably true what you have deposed that the Jesuits and their Agents endeavoured to Work