appeared pious and great to make her Conception one of the Miracles of the Lady's Image tho it happened Unluckily afterward that they could not make the times of her Conception and supposed delivery to agree with natures most constant time of Nine Months The Confidents and Advisors about the Imposture hearing the voice of Common â—ame upon the King 's Declaring when the supposed now born Child was shewn that he had now a Son a strong and lively Prince the meanest child bearing Woman that were disintered saying thereupon in mockery that such a child of about Eight Months was as great a Miracle as the Queens Conception hath been reported we say the Confidents fearing it might make the whole story less credible and help to detect the fraud they have perswaded her Majesty to declare that she had miscounted the time of her Conceiving the Child and that she knew very well that she was with Child before her use of the Bath by this new reckoning they thought that it might be affirmed that the Child was born at his due time and might be strong and lively as his Majesty had said and they thought it an easie sham to say Women misreckoned very often But it was unhappily forgotten that her Majesty had continued and expresly affirmed her first reckoning several weeks after her pretended delivery it was forgotten that it was known sufficiently that her Majesty had her Terms in her Journey to Bath and four days after the Kings going from thence which was a manifest proof that there was then no Conception it was not considered that if it be truth that the Queen knew her self to have then conceived as she hath lately declared then it cannot be a misreckoning and the meanest Physitian she had at Bath would have told her that if she had imagined a conception as she now says Bathing would probably destroy the Embryo It was not well remembred how the King had declared with her Majestys privity the miracle of the time of her conceiving quite inconsistent with her now account neither was it thought of in the now Council how her Majesties Truth and Honor should be saved in her contrary Stories of the time of her conceiving even since her supposed delivery but we need not mention that since the World knows how little regard the Jesuite Confessors have to truth Her Majesty shewed no grounds to believe her pregnancy by natures progress there in the Common natural Signs that in four Months follow in every Woman that hath a Child in her Womb were wholly wanting in her Majesty there was no swelling or increase of the usual proportion of her Breasts nor was there any milk ever seen to be in them tho one Lady took the Confidence once to affirm it the proportion of them was visibly the same to the Eyes of all that can be lawfully Witnesses and were usually in her presence and none of those Ladies proper to be VVitnesses could ever obtain the satisfaction to see a drop of milk from her breasts tho it had been her Majesties Honour Interest and Pleasure to have shewed it if there had been any reality in the pretence of her pregnancy We put this Circumstance into our memorial not without some Mirth in our meeting because one of our company said he was now sure that neither her Mujesties Physitians nor the Jesuits were natural Philosophers they might said he with very little arts have caused the Queens Brests at her age to have swelled with milk so plentifully that she might have easily milked it forth in quantity in the sight of the Princess of Denmark and all the Protestant Ladies of the Court it may be done said he in rational or animal Creatures and he gave us instances of undoubted credit wherein it had been done to his knowledge and a Child suckled and to divert us he offered to shew it in an animal â—e having also tried that Experiment and thereby milked out the milk from a young Creatures Udder that had never been with young another of the Company said merily if that were so easie an artifice he wondred that the Romish Priests had not learned it since it s known to the World that they have long had the Art of keeping the Virgin Marys milk above 1600 Years and of multiplying the quantity of it from Horse Loads to Cart Loads to disperse among their credulous vulgar We humbly pray your Highnesses Pardon that we seem herein less serious then so great a matter requires we speak only the words of truth and soberness but the comical tricks of the Romish Priests that commonly ends in Tragedy force us to represent them as they deserve There 's another known sign and testimony of a Womans pregnancy that is the sensible stirring of the Child in the womb that was expected her Majesty should have shewn to the Ladies with Joy especially to those Protestant Ladies of her bed Chamber that doubted with the Protestant Dr. her then Physitian her being with Child as far as they durst when the quickening of a Child in her womb was pretended and published throughout the Kingdom it had been a Pleasure to her Majesty and no trouble if it had been real without deceipt to have shewn the motion of a Child in her womb to honorable Matrons of her Bedchamber that might have been in all respects lawful VVitnesses of that truth to the Justly Jealous Kingdom these might have touched her belly and had been proper Judges from their Experience of the true motions of an infant in the womb and some of Consanguinity to the Heyress apparent might have been admitted to that favour as our Laws and common prudence directed for removing the causes of Jeasie but however industriously her Majesties quicking with Child was spread abroad yet the feeling of its motions was never vouchsafed to any competent VVitnesses of it to give the suspitious Kingdom a ground to believe that she was with Child The next visible and manifest sign of the true natural progress of a great belly is the distension of all the parts of the Body that incircles and incompasseth the womb such is the place and manner wherein nature hath prepared the lodging of the growing Child in the womb that according to its growth and increase and the quantity of liquors that are there naturally and necessarily congested there so are all the Circumambient parts gradually extended and inlarged to make room there never was nor naturally can be an Extention only of the Peritoneum the Rim of the belly to give room to the Child all Naturalists and Anatomists know that if in that manner no Child could keep its natural sight in the womb nor be born alive All men and Women that ever observed Women great with Child know that all the parts that inclose the Cavity swell until the time of their delivery approach but this natural necessary sign of pregnancy so intirely failed in her Majesty that skilful spectators of both sexes wondered that
better arts were not used to make that vissible sign and appearance of the growth of a Child in her womb we were satisfied by skilful Matrons of great Experience that attended on purpose to observe her Majesty Exactly that all the outward parts of her Body that incompass the womb were of the same proportion that they were at other times save only her belly which was exceedingly copped up and high that shewed like a great bellied Woman to them that looked upon her Majesty before but said they when we saw her Majesty walking and looked upon her behind and on each side we saw not the least appearance in her of a great bellied Woman we took care to have the fashion of her Majestys Body observed by skilful Women at several periods of time during her supposed pregnancy and once a very short time before her pretended Delivery and we had always the same accompt we have here faithfully given Your Highness We compared this Circumstance with another that we had marked whereof we had from time to time full assurance during all the four last Months time of her Majesties supposed being with Child those being the Months wherein usually all the circumambient parts of the Womb swell most we were very well informed that in all these Months Her Majesty contrary to her former usual course always withdrew from her Chamber and retired into her Cabinet or some other private room with two or three Italians when she changed her Linnen and would never permit any one of the Protestant Ladies of the Bedchamber to see her change her Linnen as they had constantly done Those two circumstances explained each other and plainly shewed that the natural naked and true shape of her Majesties Body as it was then was not to be seen by those that were not of the Confederacy in the intended Imposture those that were only capable of being lawful VVitnesses for her Majesty against common Fame if Fame had belyed her those were all excluded from a possibility of seeing whether her belly was truly and naturally great and a few foreigners of no Quality were only to keep the Secret of what Her Majesty was to make the copling belly Nothing can be more manifest then it is by all these Circumstances taken as they ought in connexion each with other that there hath nothing appeared of the natural plainness and simplicity that always accompany truth in the whole Demeanor of her Majesty from the time of her pretended Conceiving a Child to the very time of her feigned delivery of this supposed Prince of Wales all that hath been acted in the matter hath plainly imported Trick and Design to hide and smother Natures VVorks that ought to have been most freely exposed to the whole World if there had been any truth in the pretences that could have born the Light we may securely affirm to your Highness that in all the eight Months and four Days first reckoned to have been the time of her Majesties Pregnancy or from the time of her going to Bath in the new Reckoning there never hath been any of these constant natural signs in her Majesty that could afford to any understanding Man or Women a ground to believe that she conceived a Child The Progress towards finishing the intended Imposture of this Prince of Wales hath been answerable to its beginning In the preparation for her Majesties supposed Delivery there hath been no regard to the rules of natural Equity or Law or common 〈…〉 nor any appearance of that open freedom and naturally plain proceeding that ought to have shewn that they did not fear the Kingdom or the World knowing the truth of all that should be done in that pretended natural work of Bearing a Child wherein the whole Kingdom and so much of the World was concerned if the Customs and Laws of England or natural Equity had been consulted in the Circumstances of the Case about the preparations needful for her Majesties expected deliverance of a Prince the first of all Advises had certainly been to give early notice to your Highness and to others in the nearest possibility or expectance of succeeding to the Crown of the time of her expected travel and deliverance of a Prince and of the place of her residence at such time That proper Noble Matrons and others might have prepared themselves and attended there and have been present in their behalf which might have suppressed and silenced for ever by their Testimonies all Suspitions of Fraud or Imposture But 't is not only undeniable that no such notice was given either to her Royal Highness or to any of Consanguinity with her nor to any other of the Noble Matrons of England but such Artificers were used as might most conceal the time and intended Place of her pretended Travel such feigned time of her supposed Conception was published by the King and Queen that neither her Royal Highness nor any of the Nobility could possibly foresee the time when the Comedy that is now said to have been acted was to begin The Place where her Majesty was intended to lye in was kept in such uncertainty and often published so variously sometimes that it should be at Richmond sometimes at Windsor another time at Hampton-Court that none of the Nobles of either Sex that were of the Kindred and Friends of the Heir Apparent nor of the Protestant Nobility could know how to prepare themselves for attendance on her Majesty as was their duty to Their Majesties Her Royal Highness and the Kingdom As the Publication of the place was often changed as if a surprise in the place was designed so at last such a sudden and seeming hasty Resolution was taken a day or two before her pretended Delivery that her lying in should be at St. James's tho none expected the time to be near by above three Weeks that Commands were given for preparing her Lodgings there so hastily that when her Majesty said on the Friday She would lye there on Saturday and it was told her it was not possible her Lodgings should be ready She then said She would lie there on the floor It was hoped by all the Protestants that the Princess of Denmark would have been a faithful watcher for her own sake when the time of her Majestys deliverance of her great belly should come tho she had not been able or she durst not give them advice of the occurrences in the time of her Majestys supposed pregnancy it was thought that she could not be avoided but she would be present to see what was brought forth whether any thing or nothing but care was taken that advise should be given her when she wanted astringent Medecines to go to the loosening Waters of the Bath to keep her fourscore Miles distant till the pretended Prince should be born At the first Notice we had of her Majesties passionate Declaration that She would lie at St. James's on the Saturday Night we could not conjecture that there was to be
a pretended Prince brought forth on the Sunday nor was there any Whispers of it or the least natural Feigned or Counterfeit sign of fore-running Pains of a Woman whose time of Travel approacheth Her Majesty was late in the Night at Cards and no appearance of an indisposition then nor is any pretended to have been in the Night but we learned by the Event on the Sunday the reason of Her Majestys fixed and immoveable Resolution to lie at Saint James's on the Saturday Night she was to seem to bring forth a Prince on the Sunday There was a cunning contrivance to chuse a fit time of that day it was to be between the hours of nine and ten in the Morning that all or most of the Protestant Ladies might be at Church and the Trick be over before their return and that the Midwife Mrs. Labady and the Favourite Mrs. Tourain might have Freedom and Secrecy as they had to act their Parts in the bringing forth of a supposititious Prince The Room also that was chosen wherein the Trick was to be acted was fit for the purpose and contrary to the Rules of Common Prudence in a Case suspected for setting up a supposititious Child and ought to have been avoided if their meaning had been just and good there was a private Door within the Rail of the Bed into a Room from whence a Child might be secretly brought and put into the Bed unseen by any that should attend in the Queen's Room tho at the feet of the Bed none of them coming into the Rail and by that Door the three Confidents the Midwife Mrs. Labady and Mrs. Tourain brought into her Majesties Bed what they pleased unseen If they had wanted no secret conveyance by that Door common Prudence required that they had nailed or sealed it up to avoid confirming and increasing the Kingdoms just and known Jealousies of imposing upon them a Counterfeit Prince when it should be known that there were such secret ways as made it so easy to be done by Confederation undiscerned by others that were in the Room but it appeared by the Event that the privy Door was so necessary for the designed Imposture that all the Transactions of it were managed by that Door as is well known to all those Lords of the Council that were brought for a shew not to see any thing that was done but only to be seen in the Bed-Chamber with His Majesty that their Names might be published to the People as if they had been Witnesses of the Queens being delivered of this pretended Prince The Civil Law provided as a Rule of common natural Equity that when a Woman was to be delivered of a Posthume Child that might defeat another appearing Heir that the Chamber wherein she was to be delivered should have but one Door and if there were more that they should be sealed up with the Seals of both Parties and that Keepers should be set at the single Door and no Woman suffered to enter until she was searched in all kinds that no Child might be conveyed to the Woman in her real or supposed Travel and tho' we have no express Statute that gives direction in such Cases yet our Common Law abhors all appearance of Fraud about Inheritances and 〈…〉 pointed 〈◊〉 of the most able Neighbours to judg of all the Signs and Appearances of Fraud an 〈…〉 Heirs who may also judg upon presumptive Evidence and reject any pretended Hell where they see signs of Fraud and Imposture whereupon to ground their Judgment and every one must at his peril take care that there be no grounds of suspicion given of a supposititious Heir We have faithfully shewed Your Highness what were the Preparations for her Majesties supposed time of Travel wherein there appeared no Marks of an Intiention to deal uprightly and openly with her Royal Highness as Heiress apparent of the Crown and with the Subjects of the Kingdom nor were there any natural signs that Her Majesty really feared or expected the common Sorrows Pains and Danger of a Woman in Travel or made any sutable Provisions We cannot learn that there were in readiness so much as the usual Instruments of Midwives whereupon they commonly place all Women of Quality in their time of Travel that such Assistance may be given them by the Matrons and Midwives as is not possible to be given on their Knees which is the common Posture of meaner Women and least of all as they lie in their Bed which is seldom used until the length of the Travel and Failures of Strength enforce it There being many natural Reasons for the Posture of the Womens Bodies helping them in their Travel Amongst other suitable Provisions it had been certainly fit that a Colledg of Physicians had been called to attend somewhere near to Her Majesty if She had not known there could be no need of them and had not been sure there could be no hour of danger to her self in a feigned Travel nor any sudden need of Physicians Advice or help to a strong lively supposed Prince that was intended then to be brought forth As all the Preparations for her Majesties supposed time of Travel discovered to knowing and observing People that there was no reality in her pretences made of a great Belly so the Fiction and Fraud was made more manifest when the Trick came to be acted Her Majesty lying in Bed with all the Curtains round close drawn all that was provided belonging naturally to a Child and intended to be used by them in their bringing forth the supposititious Prince being prepared and ready within the inner Chamber then Her Majesty's feigned Travel began and all these things were by the help of the Midwife Mrs. Labady and Mrs. Tourain the Confederates brought through the Door in the Wall by the Queen Bed and put between her Sheets that is a Child and all that naturally attends a Birth Then the Midwife and the Confidents seemed very busy about Her Majesty in the Dark none seeing what they did and being afraid as appeared by the Midwife's Words that the Child which was prepared to sleep to prevent its crying before it was got into the Bed should be stifled by the Closeness of the Bed they were forced to hasten the Queen's pretended Delivery even beyond what was reasonably to be believed notwithstanding all that could be said of the Lady of Loretto or any other Saints Assistance therefore the Queens supposed Deliverance was in very short time But nothing appeared in Her Majesty like the real natural Travel of a Woman in Child-bearing there were none of the usual natural Signs in Her Majesty of being in real Travel which cannot be hidden there was no appearance of an approaching Travel by various intermitting Pangs usually very great by the Infants struggling to free it self of the Womb no shew of the Pains naturally and gradually increasing as more of the Ligatures came to be broken or rent whereby every Infant is safely retained
known to England and the World before his Patrons ought to have entred in his name upon her Royal Highnesses Right in the Judgment of our Laws to be stiled and reputed the Heiress apparent to the Crown of England and to assume to him that Honour and Glory which her Highness justly had in England and all the Kingdoms and States of Europe to be apparently the next Successor to the Crown of England Questionless all the Civilized Kingdoms in the World that are Hereditary have pursued these principles of Justice and Reason in their common Custom to have their Princes born in the presence of the Princes of the Blood the chiefest Men of Religion and the greatest Nobles and Officers in the highest Trusts for the Kingdom and the Ambassadors and Ministers of foreign Kingdoms and States That the Heirs o those great Inheritances might be so known and manifest that it might not be possible for any Controversies to arise about their Births and their being the Lineal Heirs of the Respective Kingdoms Whensoever Rights of any kind are obtained meerly by virtue of Birth those that claim them are bound to prove by Witnesses suitable to the Respective Circumstances of every Case the reality of their pretended Birth at their Peril of being justly excluded from the Rights they demand yet Justice does not always require the like Witnesses and clearness of Testimony about the Birth of all common Persons the Circumstances of their cases being so different that Witnesses of such qualities and in such a number as may be sufficient proof for the birth of one Heir may justly be judged insufficient for the birth of another But the Birth of the pretended Prince of Wales was attended with such Circumstances that Justice required that his Birth of the Queen should have been testified by a plenty of such Witnesses as their proof might have amounted to the highest degree of Certainty that is possible to be built upon humane Testimony doubtless the Circumstances of his pretended Birth were very extraordinary It was generally reputed and believed that the Queen's sicknesses and infirmities had disabled her to bring forth a living Child The famous Physician Dr. Willis shewed that opinion to his Brethren of one of her Children when her Majesty was much stronger saying there were mala stamina vitae and the popular opinion therein was confirmed by several years experience It was notorious that two hundred to one throughout the Kingdom did not believe the report that her Majesty was with Child notwithstanding all that was said of it by the King and the Queen and the Prayers injoyned thereupon That her Majestys pregnancy was as little believed in foreign Protestant Countries as in England and Pamphlets were published in several Countries as well as in England that declared the Report of the Queens being with Child to be nothing more than an Artifice of the Jesuits by those hopes of a Popish Successor to the Crown to encourage their Catholicks in their Designs and to gain Proselytes It was publickly known that there was a jealousie in the greatest part of the Kingdom that the Popish Councils had designed to impose upon them a counterfeit Prince of Wales There were also Circumstances about the Birth of this supposed Prince of another sort and no less important It was the general opinion that the Security or Danger of the Profession of the Protestant Religion not only in England but in all the Kingdoms and States of Europe would be the certain consequence of her Majesties bearing or not bearing a Prince of Wales The Birth of such a Prince was to be a great diminution of many Princes and Princesses in their Expectancy and Right to the Succession to the three Crowns and threatned England with the Danger and Misery of falling under an Infant Prince in name and in truth under the Domination of Rome All these special Circumstances attending the birth of this supposed Prince of Wales being of such nature import and number as the like never met together before in the Expectations of the birth of any Prince in the world In this Case Natural Justice common to all Nations and the practical reason of the special Customary Law of England in the proof of Matters of fact we say both universal Justice and the Peculiar Law of England required indispensibly that there should have been such proper proof that this supposed Prince was born of the Queen as was answerable unto all the special Circumstances in the case such proof as had comprehended the objections that might arise from every of them as fully as was possible in the nature of the things that the testimony of his birth might have been sufficient to have satisfied the most jealous and distrustful about it in our own and foreign Countreys and to have removed all the prejudices against it that were known to have been spread far and near by Common fame It was absolutely necessary in Justice Law and Prudence to have had such proof of his birth as our precedent conclusion hath asserted that is That there had been Testimony of it of personal and absolutely certain knowledg Women to have testified their Personal sight and perception of that very individual Child coming naturally out of the Queens womb and men to have witnessed their immediate free and full sight and inspection of that very Child by the womens assistance in his pure natural nakedness with all the known marks and tokens of his being just separated from the womb and from those other things that are natural to the birth of a Child the effects of such separation being there visible and impossible to be hidden such Testimony is always provided for in the birth of every Prince of the blood in France tho never so remote from the Crown That the witnesses of those matters had been fit and proper witnesses suitable to the greatness of the Persons and things that might be in question and to the vast Extensive Consequence that may ensue thereupon Nature or the first light from God Created in the minds of mankind dictated the equity of those Roman imperial Laws that appointed those which asserted filiation or marriage to prove them by fit or proper and most unquestionable witnesses most of the Writers about those Laws serve themselves therein of these Words severally which we will for shortness put together Matrimonium filiationem qui asserunt debent probare per testes idoneos omni Exceptione majores they that alledg a marriage or a Child being by virtue whereof they claim ought to prove it by witnesses that are above or beyond all possible Exception in this case there ought to have been such fit witnesses that nothing could have been objected against them in any respect either by Englishmen or Foreigners That the witnesses that Law and Prudence required of both sexes had been fit and proper in respect of their years or age that the women had been Matrons whose gravity and sobriety were fit
The Course of the Law of England is known to most Englishman in the Tryal of all claims by Birth the claimant is always put to prove all that he sets forth of his Descent in his Declaration and the least defect of proof is fatal to his process if the Defendant perceives the piantiff to want sufficient legal Testimony of his Descent and Birth he never troubles the Court with proofs on his behalf 't is enough for him that denies the Descent pretended to shew the insufficiency of the Witnesses and their Testimony produced to prove it Your Highness is not obliged either by our Laws or Natural Justice to have VVitnesses to prove the pretended Prince of VVales to be an Impocture Her Royal Highness having been the legal acknowledged Heiress apparent of the Crown Unless such Lawful Witnesses that he was born of the Queen were known and published as did satisfie the Kingdom neither your Highness nor any Princes or States may in Justice acknowledg his pretences her Royal Highness ought to remain in the esteem of the Kingdom and of all Princes ann States as the Heiress apparent of the Crown at least until a Prince shall be legally known and declared and 't is a manifest wrong to your Highness to the Kingdom and to all the Protestants Interest to suffer this supposed Prince silently and submissively without publick Complaint of the wrong to assume the Name of Prince and Heir apparent to the Crown When the Popish League endeavoured to set aside the claim of your Highness's Ancestor Henry 4. to the Crown of France and proclaimed the Cardinal of Bulloign to be King he sent Agents to the Pope though he was then a Protestant and to all the Princes and States of Christendom to manifest himself to be the right lawful Heir of that Crown and the Venetian State to his vast advantage contested it with the Popes Nuncio that they ought so to acknowledg him because it appeared that he was the right Heir His Right indeed was to be King in possession but there is the like reason and justice to support her Royal Highness Title to the Crown in reversion since another is set up and declared throughout the World to be the right Heir of it immediately after his now Majesty 'T is undoubtedly just and reasonable for her to demand and expect that the pretenders Birth so much and so justly suspected should be made manifest to the Kingdom by Witnesses without exception according to the Law and Custom of England and to natural Equity It may be of dangerous consequence to suffer a false Opinion of him in the Kingdom and the world to gain strength by time and neglect yet neither Law nor Equity puts any burden of proof in the Case upon your Highness 't is only incumbent upon your Highness to declare the wrong to your selves and the Kingdom by the pretended Prince and to take care that no illegal imperfect or fallacious Testimony in the Case be invented or obtruded upon your selves and the Kingdom to support his pretences her Royal Highness claim and right to be the next in reversion after his now Majesty in the legal descent of the Crown ought to stand unshaken and unquestionable in the Judgment of our Law and the Kingdom notwithstanding any thing to the contrary that hath been hitherto lawfully published or declared We cannot doubt but 't is here made manifest that your Highness publick refusal to acknowledg this pretended Prince of Wales may be built upon such sure Foundations of Law and Justice as can never be overturned we would not therefore trouble your Highness with all the Circumstances of the Case which we have remarked in our Observations that make it to us not only improbable but incredible that he was born of the Queen Since 't is not possible for us to send Witnesses personally to prove to your Highness every circumstance that we have noted and 't is not just that Your Highness should take them up upon unknown Authority since we cannot in prudence subscribe our Names to this Memorial nor so much as the Names of our Witnesses to the Facts since the Proof of the Circumstances can never be a Foundation of positive unquestionable certainty but can only serve to make the Falsehood and Jesuitical contrivance in this imposture more infamous and odious since 't is undoubtedly Your Highness Interest never to depart from the manifest Principle of Law and Justice which put it wholly and entirely upon the Maintainers of the supposed Prince to prove him to be such as they pretend with the highest human certainty that can be acquired by Witnesses and to the Kingdoms full Satisfaction And since 't is notoriously know that above all others of the Roman Church the Jesuits which in this matter will most earnestly contend against Your Highness have the greatest effronted Confidence to deny and forswear Matters of Fact however certainly proved and known and they would be glad to have any thing offered in this Case that might give them room or a possibility for dispute and seeming doubtfulness of Fact that they might obscure the Truth and deceive some of the People with their Equivocal Affirmation and impertinent Cavils at Your Highness Witnesses or their Testimonies and their bold Asseverations of Falsehoods Upon all these Considerations we shall restrain from the relation of many very pregnant Circumstances that we had collected which if they were taken jointly in their natural Order and due Connexion would by their united force strongly induce impartial Judges to conclude that the Queen could not be the Mother of the supposed Prince We could give very great circumstantial assurances to Your Highness that there never was or appeared to be any reasonable natural grounds for a belief that her Majesty had Conceived a Child She never had the first most natural known and common sign of Conception her menses profluvium or Terms continued their usual uncertain Course as formerly during the whole time of her pretended great helly She did not conceal that it was with her after that manner of Women in her journey to Bath nor that they continued some days after the King left her there and all the industry used afterward to hide them in their Seasons proved in-effectual because those things come to the knowledge of more then were made privy to the whole Imposture designed Her Majesty having not that natural Sign of her Termes stopping whereby Women usually conclude themselves to have conceived from whence she could make a reckoning it seems by the Kings Speech in Council that their Majestys had both thought fit to publish her Conception to have been at the time of the Present made to the Lady's Image at Loretta upon the Kings return to the Queen at Bath It was then too soon for them to be provided of a supposititus Child and so might name any time they pleased of her Conception and then seek for a Child that might agree with it and it
the mouth of Publick fame or to have shewed the justly jealous Subjects that there were such fit and proper Witnesses that a Prince was now born of the Queen as were unquestionable without any possible exception whose truth and faithfulness might be relied upon securely Justice also required for full security that there had been competent and sufficient numbers of those fit and proper Witnesses at least that there had been so many of them as were able to obviate all ways and practices of deceit that it could not have been supposed to be possible that a Fraud had been put upon them This sort of Caution is always just and necessary in the Birth of our Princes but in the present case there could have been no honest end intention or pretence to have confin'd themselves to a small number of Witnesses of a fact wherein a Kingdom known to be filled with just suspitions of an Imposture to be put upon them were to be satisfied meerly by the Witnesses averrment and a Noble Princess also to be excluded from being Heiress apparent to the Crown Our Laws require Witnesses of Facts answerable to the Nature and Circumstances of them and always require ample Testimonies when the Parties that are obliged to prove them had it in their powers and choice without charge or burden to themselves to have multiplied their Witnesses to what number they had pleased and could not be ignorant of the usefulness or necessity of it and yet more especially if the fact were such whereby Great Benefit was to accrue to them and Answerable Loss unto others in such a Case it would much abate the strength of the proof in the course of the Law if there were such a small number of Witnesses as might leave room for any objection or the least doubt of the fact The ancient Roman Imperial Laws in the Cases of Subjects when there was a Posthumus to be born that might exclude another Heir apparent We say those Laws in common natural Equity to prevent a supposititious Child appointed thirty days notice to be given to the apparent Heir and all others whose Right was concerned of the Expected time of her Travel and delivery that on the behalf of the Heir apparent Women might be sent to be present to see the Birth of the Child that might become the Heir that Law confined the number to five free Women to be sent allowing her that was to be delivered to have also five Women of her own chusing and no more so that the number to be present at her delivery should not exceed Ten besides two Midwives and six Maid Servants that were no Witnesses This Rule was set down positively in the Empire as the Dictate of natural Equity and Prudence and although England hath no positive written Law that prescribes any set number of Friends to be sent in such a case by the Heir apparent to see the Birth of such a Child yet the Custom and Practice is in every such case tho' no Fraud be suspected to give notice to the next Heir and that some of their Friends are customarily sent to what number they please to be present at the Birth of the Child that may be an Heir to the Exclusion of another That practice with us is not of Favour but of Legal Right our Common Law generally Binds all that set up a claim to any thing that another hath to give such Notice of his pretence as is needful to make his just defence if he can and to prove the Fact whereby he claims by such a number of Witnesses as may put the Truth of it out of doubt to the Court of Judicature but that number in the Course of our Law is greater or smaller according to the Cause that appears of jealousy or distrust of the Truth of the Fact pretended These Rules of our Law and the Reasons of them fully include the case of a Pretence of a Child to be born to exclude an Heir apparent and if there were many known grounds of suspition in any such case that it was designed to set up a supposititious Child and a notorious Common fame of it and no notice were given of the time expected of the Childs Birth hoped to be Heir to the then Heir apparent or to any that had expectances of the Inheritances We say in such a case by the Rules and Practices of our Laws a small number of Witnesses of the Birth of a Child ought not to be believed since they that should claim for such a Child might by due notice to the Parties concerned have had such Witnesses as had put the Childs Birth beyond all question Certainly by the reason of our Common Law there ought to be a much greater number of Witnesses of the Birth of every of our Princes than of the Birth of the Subjects Heirs but our Law requires that the Birth of this pretended Prince of Wales should have been proved by a greater number of Witnesses than was ever needful heretofore in the case of a Prince there ought to have been so many fit and proper Persons present at his pretended Birth that it might have been manifest to all that had heard it that the Eyes of so many Witnesses of such Condition Knowledg and Judgment could not have been deceived in what they had testified to have known and seen the number ought to have been so considerable that there could have been no reasonable Suspition that so many of both Sexes and of various Dignities Honours and Interests and some of them of Consanguinity with the former Heiress apparent had made a Confederacy amongst themselves to abuse the Kingdom with a Counterfeit Prince and that so many had kept each others Counsel in a Fraud and Falshood so odious and injurious It had been common Prudence as well as Justice to the Realm that the Witnesses of the Birth had been very many that amongst such a Number some of them might have been known in one part of the Kingdom and others in another Part and that some of their Names and Qualities might have been known in Foreign Countries and for that Reason the Ministers of Foreign Princes according to Custom ought to have been some of the Witnesses the Peoples knowledg of the Names Qualities or Persons of the Witnesses had much conduced to their fuller assurance of the Truth it would have appeared to them incredible and almost impossible that the Integrity of such and so many Witnesses could have been attacked either separately or jointly But on the contrary seeing Custom and Law required a good number of fit and proper Witnesses to have made up a Testimony of the Birth of a Prince that might have been truely said to have been omni Exceptione majus above all possible Objections against it and seeing the wit of Man cannot invent a reason why the King and the Patrons of this pretended Prince of Wales did not provide such ample and unquestionable Testimonies that he was born of
in the Womb until its full growth and appointed time there were no Signs of Her Majesties known Weakness in bearing such Pangs in her State of Body debilitated with long lingring Infirmities there were no Signs of a violent Eruption of an untimely Birth from the Womb of eight Months and four days as Her Majesty then reported it to have been All that was to be feigned was suddenly dispatched and the Midwife delivered something close covered to Mrs. Labady which could be nothing but the Child they had put in and went with is together through the privy Door in the Rail of the Bed into the next Room in so great haste that it was not considered how plainly it might discover that it was a meer feigned counterfeit Travel of the Queens if the Midwife durst quit her attending and assisting Her Majesty in those moments when there was the greatest Necessity of her Skill and Assistance in her Office and the most extream danger of her Majesties Life by any neglect of her if she had really brought forth any Child as they were obliged to pretend Instead of fair open freedom in shewing that the Queen was really delivered of a Prince which our Customs and Laws and natural Equity required that all those works of Nature might have been seen and testified by noble Matrons their pretended Birth of a Prince and all that they did about it was done in the dark with the Curtains close drawn round about the Bed and under the Coverings of it and none of either Sex permitted to see any thing done about Her Majesty or her supposed Child save only the Confederates no others of those in the Bed-Chamber that drew as near as they might were suffered to see what was taken out of the Bed being something wholly covered and immediately carried away by the private Door All hearkned after the common and most constant natural Sign of the Birth of a living Child that is its crying but we are fully assured from divers Lords of the Council and others that were in the Bed-Chamber that the crying of a Child was heard by none there when the pretence was that a Child was born tho' the Midwife would not at first say it was a Prince We have related to Your Highnesses no Circumstances but such as are notoriously known or could be judicially proved before any impartial Court of Judicature and therefore we will not offer to Your Hss those Conjectures tho we have them from good hands of what was acted about the pretended Prince in the Room from whence he was brought and to which he was carried before the Lords of the Council or any others were told that there was a Prince born but we have it of certainty from those that were present that during the whole 〈…〉 Travel of the Queens and a considerable time after it his Majesty kept those Lords of the Cou 〈…〉 far from the feet of her Majesties Bed that were close shut up and they neither saw nor heard any thing about the Birth of the supposed Prince whereof they can be lawful Witnesses to the Kingdom yet the Actors of this whole Imposture had the Confidence to publish forthwith to the Kingdom by Authority that those Lords and many Ladies of Quality were present at the Queen's Delivery of a Prince equivocating therein like the Jesuits and falsely insinuating to the People that those Lords and many Matrons of the Nobility had been such ocular Witnesses as our Laws require of the Queens being delivered of a Prince whereas in truth all that were not of the Confederacy waited to no more purpose than if they had been ten Miles off her Bed-Chamber After long waiting His Majesty left them and retired into the inner Room where was Mrs. Labady and the Confidents with the supposed Prince and it was soon after said to the Lords that a Prince being born there was no more need of them whereupon several of them went away and whatsoever was done in shewing a Child to those that staid was not worthy of our Inquiry since it could be of no use to Your Highnesses or the Kingdom Yet we carefully observed and inquired after the Queens supposed Deliverance of a Prince whether there were any natural demonstrable signs in her Majesty that she had newly born a Child that had broke its way by Violence into the World before Natures time as she then affirmed Some of us know well the usual and necessary Consequences of such force upon Nature in Women of such tenderness and weakness as her Majesty we expected to have heard of her great Weakness and danger of her Life by a Feaver that commonly attends such untimely Births we inquired after the danger of her Majesties Breasts by the usual redundancy of Milk because one had reported so long before that she had plenty of it in her Breasts we imployed proper Persons to ask what Woman had the Honour to draw her Breasts or whether any applications were made to her Breasts to repel or dry the Milk and also to ask after the good progress of her Majesty in the natural Cleansings that follow Child-bearing and of her strength in bearing these unavoidable Consequences whereby all Women of her Majesties Tenderness and Weakness are greatly debilitated but we could never learn by our most diligent inquiry that there was any appearance of these natural Effects of Child-bearing tho a good Doctors skill might have easily feigned all those to the delusion of all about her Majesties Court. We have now given Your Highness an abstract of many of the Circumstances which we had collected in this Affair and must freely affirm that we cannot observe from the beginning to the end of it one footstep of sincere plainness all that hath been done therein from the Queens pretended Conception to her supposed Delivery of a Prince hath shewed desires and intentions to hide the truth of those natural things which they were obliged by the Laws of England by natural Justice and by their own Honour and Interest to have made demonstrable or proveable by sufficient Witnesses to all the Kingdom if there had been truth in their pretences There hath been such a total neglect slighting and disregard of all the necessary Rules of Law and Justice about needful Witnesses of the Birth of a Prince and Heir to the Crown when they knew that most of the Kingdom suspected their setting up a Counterfeit that it looks like a contempt of Your Highnesses and the whole Kingdom as if no Satisfaction were due to her R. Highness in her admission of an Heir to the Crown before her nor to the Kingdom in their acknowledgment of a Prince to be the next Successor to the Crown The most modest Judgment we can make of it is to think that a blind Zeal always nourish'd by the Romish Church to settle a Popish Successor hath made them break through all the Rules of Righteousness and stifle and extinguish all the natural Affections of a