Eikåon vasilikåe tritåe, or, The picture of the late King James further drawn to the life in which is made manifest by several articles that the whole course of his life hath been a continued conspiracy against the Protestant religion, laws, and liberties of the three kingdoms : in a letter to himself : part the third / by Titus Oates ...

Article XXIX.

YOU stand charged with many villanous Attempts to break the use of Par∣liaments, and ridiculing that way of Government. O, Sir, it was the more hateful to you, because it preserv'd Liberty and Property, which of all Men in your Day you most hated: But you were not the first Man of Figure that ha∣ted Parliaments; for your Father of ever-notorious Memory hated them, and therefore tried Conclusions with Parliaments for 12 Years together. 'Tis true, he did call that blessed Parliament in 1640, that would have redressed England's

Grievances, had they not been prevented by the factious Spirits of some whose Zeal was not according to Knowledg. Dr. Gauden tells you that your Father call'd that Parliament in Novemb. 3. 1640. Not more by the Advice of others, or by the Necessity of his own Affairs, than by his own Choice and Inclination. I could ex∣pect no better from a Baal's Priest than to begin with a Lie: For what Man that lived in that Time knew not how the Case stood with Charles the First? And besides, if I had not Access to a King, yet I could discover his Inclinations, ei∣ther by those that were about him, and in favour with him, or by the Currant of his Actions; all which, I say, testified to the World your Father's strange aversness to a Parliament. Those that were near him, and most in favour with him, were Courtiers and Rascally Prelats, Vermin whose chief study was to find out how he stood inclined, and to imitate him exactly; and that which was his Will, was their Doctrine concerning Parliaments: and so it was with you. But that I may proceed in some Method, I shall shew, 1. That Parliaments are the Right of the People. 2. That they are an essential Part of the Government. 3. That you hated them, tho such, and by consequence was an Enemy to the Government of England.

1. That Parliaments are the Right of the People of England, which they may claim in order to have their Grievances redressed, the common Safety of the Na∣tion provided for, and their Religion, Laws and Liberties secured: For call to mind, with delight if you can, the wonderful Discovery, and undeniable Con∣firmation of the Popish Plot, which designed so much Ruin and Mischief to these Nations, in all things both Civil and Sacred, and the unanimous Sense and Cen∣sure of so many Parliaments upon it, together with some Acts of Publick Justice upon many of the Traitors. The Nation was not without hopes, that since that cursed Design of introducing Popery and Slavery, and the Murder of your Brother, was discovered for the space of 30 Months at least, some effectual Re∣medies should have been applied to prevent the Attempts of your Cut-throat Party upon us, the better to secure the Religion and Government of the Nation, and the Person of the King: But by sad Experience we found, that notwithstand∣ing the vigorous endeavours of three Parliaments ••o provide proper and whol∣some Laws to answer both Ends, by your influencing a pack of Villains, you and your Party were so prevalent as to stifle in the Birth those Righteous Endea∣vours of our Parliaments, by many surprizing Prorogations and Dissolutions; whereby the Fears and Dangers of the People daily encreased, and the Spirits of you and your Party heightned to renew and multiply fresh Plots against the Re∣ligion, Laws and Liberties of the Realm. I will lay down some known Maxims that relate to a King and Parliament of England. 1. You know the Kings of England can do nothing as Kings, but what of Right they ought to do. 2. The King can neither do wrong, nor die. 3. The King's Prerogative and the Sub∣jects Liberty are determined by Law. 4. The King has no Power but what the Law gives him; and is called King from ruling well, Rex à benè Regendo, viz. according to Law, and is only a King whilst he rules well, but a Tyrant when he oppresses. 5. That the Kings of England never appear more in their Glory, and Majestick Sovereignty, than in Parliaments. 6. That the Prero∣gative

of the Crown can do no wrong, nor can it be a Warrant for so doing.

Now, Sir, having laid down some Truths relating to the Kings of England, give me leave to lay before you some that relate to the Parliament. 1. Then I say, that the Parliament of England constitutes and gives a Being to the Govern∣ment of England. 2. A Parliament of England is to the Government what the Soul is to the Body, which is only able to apprehend and understand the Symp∣toms of all Diseases threatning the Body Politick. 3. A Parliament is the Bul∣wark of our Liberty, the Boundary which keeps the People of England from the Inundation of Tyrannical Power and Government. 4. Parliaments do make new, and abrogate old Laws, reform Grievances, settle the Succession, grant Subsidies, and in a word may be called the Great Physician of the Kingdom. From all which it appears, if Parliaments are necessary in our Constitution, that they must have their Times of Session and Continuation, to provide Laws essen∣tially needful for the being and well-being of the People, and for redressing all Publick Grievances arising, either for want of Laws, or of undue execution of those in being, or otherwise: And sutable hereunto are those Provisions made by the Wisdom of our Forefathers, as recorded by them both in the Common and Statute Law.

1. Sir, you was an excellent Man at the Common Law, and so were your Gang at St. Germains; and tho they have little occasion for it there, yet I may refresh their Memories; for having had so much leasure to study the Excellency of the French Religion and Government, our Common Law may be forgotten by them: Nay, Rhyming Jack Carryl himself, since the loss of his Estate, may have resol∣ved to forget the Law, since he will not have so much occasion for it as he might have had, if he had chosen Sussex instead of St. Germains, and so may be at a loss to inform you. I therefore give you a touch or so, not that I pretend to cure the King's Evil of the Common Law what it saith concerning Parliaments. I pray, Sir, remember what old Coke saith, (one of your Grand-father's Judges, who was a famous Lawyer, and persecuted by him for you know what, but never had the Courage to run away) he tells us in one of his Law Books, (which your old Friend Jenner swears he never understood) That the Common Law is founded in the immutable Law and Light of Nature, agreeable to the Law of God, requiring Order, Government, Subjection and Protection; containing certain antient Ʋsages warranted by the Holy Scriptures; and because given to all, is therefore called Common. Sir, if you will send for your old Drudg Frank Withens, I dare aver he cannot give you a better for his Life. But you will say, What is this to Parliaments? Well, Sir, since this may pass the Understanding of your Dispensing Rogues, I will tell you what he saith in his 9th Book in the Preface, they are his own Words in the Book called the Mirror of Justice, in which appears the whole Frame of the An∣tient Common Laws of this Realm from the Time of K. Arthur, An. 516, till near the Conquest; which treats also of the Officers, as well as the Diversity and Distinction of the Courts of Justice, (which are Officina Legis) and parti∣cularly of the High Court of Parliament, so called from Parlerlament, speaking judicially his Mind: And amongst others, he gives us the following Law of K. Alfred, who reigned in 880, and ordained for a Usage perpetual, That twice a Year, or oftner if need be, in time of Peace, they shall assemble themselves at London

to treat in Parliament of the Government of the People of God; how they should keep themselves from Offences, should live in quiet, and should receive Right by certain Laws and holy Judgments. And thus (saith this Great Coke) you have the Law of K. Al∣fred, as well concerning the holding this Court of Parliament here every Year at the Ci∣ty of London, as to manifest the threefold End of this Great and Honourable Assembly.

(1.) That Men might be kept from offending, that is, that Offences might be prevented, both by good and provident Laws, and by the due Execution of them. Truly, Sir, here is Grief in one Hand, and Sorrow in the other; for your Brother and you, you hated the one, and despised the other. Provident Laws you hated, as much as you did an honest Woman; and the other you de∣spised as much as you did an honest Man: And you were never more at ease, than when thrô the want of a good Law, or so, you and your Party were not on∣ly emboldned, but enabled to do Mischief.

(2.) That all Men might live safely and quiet. This is another End of Parlia∣ment. Old Wright, your quondam Justice of the Kings-Bench, used to say, That the Man that resigned himself up to the Will of his Prince, was always safe and quiet. But yet that Loggerhead of a Judg, with Old Hodg and all his Inferior Crew, could never find one such Saying in the Reports or Institutes of Judg Coke; for the Saying was so silly, that a Man must have judged it to have been his own, unless he had humbly borrowed that wise Saying from (Sir) your sweet under∣standing Self; for he understood as little of the Design and End of a Parliament as your self: The Wretch is gone to his Place, but as for Law and Parliaments, no Man (no not Jenner himself) understood less than his Worship.

(3.) That all Men might receive Justice by certain Laws and Holy Judgments, not by Proclamations, or French Edicts, as you and your Brother did design, but by certain Laws, to the end Justice might be the better administred, that Questions and Defects in Laws might be by the High Court of Parliament explained, and re∣duced to certainty. Your Brother and you, if you had understood this, would not have sent for a set of Rogues clothed in Purple to have gained their Opinion about suspending the Penal Laws against a parcel of Papists and Popish Priests; no, you would have applied your selves to Parliament to have explained the difficult and dark Parts of the Laws in force against those Men; but you loved Dark∣ness, and dark Judges, and therefore what you did was dark; for (Sir) your Brother and you little thought and believed that the High Court of Parliament was the Supream Court of the Realm, and that it was a part of the Frame of the Common Laws, and that in some Cases Parliaments do proceed legally according to the Course of the Common Laws. Had your Brother or you understood or be∣lieved the Antiquity of Parliaments, you would not have preferred a Privy Coun∣cil before them; nor if you had valued the Dignity of Parliaments, would you have preferred the Opinion of a parcel of Lambskin Rogues before a plain and positive Law; nor if you had learned the Sovereign Jurisdiction of Parliaments, would you have followed the Advice and Direction of your villanous Mi∣nisters of State, tho against the Fundamental Constitution of the Government. I wonder you did not take the Villains along with you to St. Germains, your Mi∣nisters, Judges, and your Counsellors, Learned in the Law, your Wrights, Jenners, Miltons, Withers, Sawyers, and the rest of the Hellish Crew: I do not

name them all, but you might have had the Honesty not to have left them to dis∣grace their Profession, which is well improved since I saw you last, and to have procured an Apartment for them▪ that your Ministers might have thought upon some better Politicks, and your Roguy Judges and Lawyers might have under∣stood the Law a little better than scribere est agere: If that Bird had been but hang'd up in a Cage in your Presence-Chamber, he would have sung another Tune: For all his Brave-alls, he and the rest of his Crew might have found some Expedient or another to have helped you to some other Kingdom, since by the Law of some of them, and the Politicks of others, they fairly walked you out of three Kingdoms at once. I do not see any great Reformation of their Man∣ners, or any great Improvement they have made of their Law since you was graciously pleased to take up your Residence at St. Germains; and if you had ta∣ken the Vermin along with you, there might have been a parcel of Dragoons that might have drub'd them to their Books; so that by their Scribere's and A∣gere's they might have found some convenient Government for you, which they might have kept you in to better purpose, than did by their Law and Counsel keep you here: Nay, if you had advanced them a little above their Neigh∣bours, they might have seen the difference between a Declaration of Indulgence, and a Statute-Law for Liberty of Conscience, and between an Act of Parliament and a Proclamation. A good Whip (dear Sir) would have been of admirable Use and Instruction; for it would have made them to understand, and they would have told you, tho somewhat too late; 1. That Parliaments are part of the Frame of the Common Law, which is founded on the Law and Light of Nature, right Reason and Scripture. 2. That according to this Law of Equity and Righteousness, Parliaments ought freely to meet, for the Common Peace, Safe∣ty and Benefit of the People, and Support of the Government. 3. That Par∣liaments have been all along esteemed the Essential Part of the Government, as being the most Antient, Honourable and Sovereign Court in the Nation, which ought frequently to meet and sit for the making and abolishing of Laws, redres∣sing Grievances, and to see to the due Administration of Justice. 4. That as to the Place of the meeting, it ought to be at London, not at New-Market; at Lon∣don, not at Windsor; at London, not at St. Germains, because London is the Capi∣tal City, the Eye and Heart of the Nation, as being not only the Royal Seat, but the principal Place of Judicature, and Residence of the chief Officers and Courts of Justice; where also the Records are kept, as well as the principal Place of Commerce and Concourse in the Nation; and to which the People may have the best Recourse, and where they may find the best Accommodation. 5. They would have instructed you in the Antiquity of Parliaments, which have been so Antient that no Record can give an Account of their beginning. Upon my word I will tell you, that a little Chastisement upon these Villains, by a par∣cel of your Dragoons, would have wrought a mighty Change upon them. There∣fore (Sir) since you have nothing else to do, send for them; you shall have eve∣ry one of them that are above Ground; and if they do not answer Expectation, then hang 'em all, and I do think they should be content: For Passive-Obedience and Non-resistance, and the Divine Right of Ignorance, are so fixt in their Bones, that nothing but a good dragooning Flux will fetch them out.

In a word, Sir, now it is easily known why your Brother in his Reign did not suffer Parliaments to meet and sit, for those Ends for which a Parliament was at first constituted; for such Rogues as I have mentioned, used to teach him the same Doctrine that they taught you, only with these different Effects, which wrought more upon you than it did upon him: For all the brave Notions they gave him of Prerogative and Absolute Power, and the Excellency of the Romish Religion above all other Religions, could neither give him Strength enough to get Old Catherine with Child, nor Courage enough to run away. Now the same Doctrine that your Lawyers, Judges, and Ministers of State taught you, had these wonderful Influences upon you of getting a Child for us, or shamming one upon us, and running from us without the Aid and Assistance of an old English Parliament. The Rogues were running after you; it had been no great matter if he, she, or they had been hang'd that stopt them. But the Vermin by this time are come to themselves, and can tell you for a need, that not to suffer Parliaments to sit to answer the great Ends for which they were instituted, was and still is expresly contrary to the Common Law, and so consequently of the Law of God as well as the Law of Nature; and thereby Violence hath been by your Brother and you offered to the Government it self, and an Infringement of the Peopl•• ••••ndamental Rights and Liberties. We have in some measure made our selves ••••••aration for the Dammage done us; but more of that in its pro∣per place.

2. We have laid before you what the Common Law saith concerning Parlia∣ments; therefore it will (in the second place) be convenient to observe what our Statute Law acquaints us withal concerning Parliaments. I know you had a great Love to our Laws; and therefore I suppose you have read them, that when you come again you may make better use of them than you did before, and not have the Courage to dispense with them as you did before. Old Jenner thought a Wife and nine Children was an admirable Argument for the Dispen∣sing Power, and swears when you come again, he will never set up for an Ex∣pounder of the Law any more; he will rather turn Priest, to put you into the way of gaining the Kingdom of Heaven, since he expounded the Law in so learn∣ed a manner as to make you lose the Kingdom of England. But to the Point:

The Statute Laws (the Learned say) are Acts of Parliament, which are or ought to be only declaratory of the Common Law; which, as you have it told you, is founded upon right Reason and Scripture; and I think our Learned in the Law have told us, That if any thing be enacted contrary thereunto, it is null and void, and of no Effect. Certainly Jenner and the rest of the Dispen∣sing Crew were bewitch'd, in not telling you that any Dispensation against Law was in it self null and void: But there was a Wife and nine Children in the Case, and Law was not his Business. Truly for all his hussing Speech to the President and Fellows of Magdalen College in Oxford, he knew as little Law as your self that sent him down: But since some of the Villains were ignorant of the Law, and the rest of them that had some Law and no Honesty, did not in∣form you, I pray let me intreat your Patience, and observe what I say to you. There are several Statutes that require frequent meetings of Parliament agree∣able to the Common Law.

1. The first of which is 4 Edw. III. cap. 14. in these words; Item, it is accorded that a Parliament shall be holden every Year once, or more often if need be. Alas, that good King never sent to the French King for leave to call a Parliament, nor did he sell him a Session of Parliament for a small Spell of 300000 l. per Ann. it ne∣ver entred into the old Judges Noddles in his Reign, that Parliaments were to be held sooner or later, oftner or seldomer, as the King pleased; no, it was your Lambskin Crew you set up in Charles the 2d's Time that taught that Doctrine: Nay, there were a Set of Rogues in your Father's Time who favoured that He∣resy in the Government, that the meeting and sitting of Parliaments was at the Will and Pleasure of the King; but your Rogues went a Note above Ela, for they would have the Laws to be dispensed with, or suspended, when the graci∣ous Pleasure of the King was such.

2. I have another Statute Law in my green Bag, that is at your Service, it is 36 Edw. III. cap. 10. read it, and if you do not put on your Dispensing Spectacles, you will find the Law to speak these words: Item, For the Maintenance of the said Articles and Statutes, and redressing of divers Mischiefs and Grievances which daily hap∣pen, a Parliament shall be holden every Year; as at another time it was ordained by a Sta∣tute. What Statute, good Sir? I pray ask your Dispensing Judges; let them look into their Law-Books, not upon their Wives and nine Children, nor 〈◊〉〈◊〉 durante bene placito Commissions, and they will find this Statute of the 36th of that King has reference to the Statute of the 4th of the said King above-mentioned.

Well, Sir, what's the English of all this? Your Judges have told you what the French of it is already to your Cost: Now it shall cost you nothing if we tell you the English of it, viz. That a Parliament ought Annually to meet to support the Government, and to redress Grievances happening in the interval of Parliaments, that being the great End proposed in their said meeting. Now for Parliaments to meet Annually, and not be suffered to sit to answer the Ends, but to be prorogued or dissolved, (as Gammer Carwell or Nell Waal should di∣rect) before they had finished their Work, was and would be nothing but an eluding the Law, and striking at the Foundation of the Government, and rendring Parliaments altogether useless. You know there is no great difference between having no Meat at all, and having it in abundance without being suf∣fered to eat; so I think it is to no purpose to have frequent Parliaments, and they not suffered to sit and do the Business of the Nation, for which they were sent by the People, as well as called by the King. You had got such a Trick in your Brother's Time to put off Parliaments, that I doubt if we should try you once more, and take in those durante bene placito Rogues, you would never leave it off: First you got one Session put off, and a truly loyal Band of Pensioners dissolved; then three Parliaments dissolved one upon the neck of another, as you and Nell Waal pleased. Now our Forefathers, and our Antient Kings of England, to prevent Arbitrary Power, and such intolerable Mischiefs as these, did heartily agree to have a Proclamation made in Westminster-Hall before the End of every Session, not to dissolve the Parliament to get a Sum of French Money, but to tell the People that all who had any Matter to present to the Parliament, should bring it before such a Day, for otherwise the Parliament should determine. This was done in the Reigns of Hen. 4. Hen. 5. Hen. 6. So that you may see, and so might

that Villain Jefferies, that the People were not to be eluded or disappointed by surprising Prorogations and Dissolutions, to frustrate the great Ends of Parlia∣ment.

But, Sir, suppose all your Brother's Crew of Judges and Ministers of State, nay I would allow him half a dozen Priests, and Dr. Finch the Warden of All-Souls into the Bargain, who is an excellent Preacher and Pimp to the Whore of Babylon and Arbitrary Power; nay I will allow you to have the French Parliament held at New-Market in 1677; and suppose they should have roared with open Mouth, and said there was no Record, nor Statute upon Record extant concerning the sitting of Parliaments to redress Grievances: What then? And suppose Finch the last 29th of May had told such a Story as this in his loggerheaded Sermon, where he applauded the eminent shining Vertues of Charles II, above those of his Royal Father and yours, his Chastity, Integrity, Peaceableness, and the like; and provided all he had said were true, that Charles was a Man of those Vertues, and that there were neither Common nor Statute Laws extant for the sitting of Parliaments; yet by Warden Finch's leave it is more certain that Parliaments are to sit and redress Grievances by the Fundamental Laws of the Government, than that his Father presented the Grand Seignior with a Pendulum Clock so small, that the Grand Seignior hung it at his Ear, as the Ladies here used to hang their Pendants at theirs.

It may be, Sir, you will ask what Reason I could have to believe the sitting of Parliaments for redress of Grievances was our Right by the Fundamental Law of England? I tell you, Sir, why, because the Government must be lame with∣out it, and a Prince and his villanous Ministers might have done what they pleas∣ed, and their Wills might have been their Laws. Your Brother and you bid fair for such a Government, had your Friend Coleman's Advice been taken, and had K. Charles signed his Declaration for dissolving the Parliament. Coleman had not Jenner's Courage of running away, and so the Declaration was not signed, but to your great Comfort he was graciously left to dance a Christmass Gambrel at Tyburn for his great pains in the mighty Work your Brother, your Self, and he had upon your Hands. Therefore, my good Friend, it was provided for in the very Essence and Constitution of the Government it self; this we may (if Frank Withens and the rest of your Crew will give leave) call Common Law, tho Jeffe∣ries once was pleased to call it a Common Where: This (notwithstanding the filthy Expression of that impudent Villain, that had neither Law, Manners, nor Ho∣nesty, but the Impudence of ten carted Whores) is of as much Value (if not more) as any Statute, and of which all our good Acts of Parliament, and Mag∣na Charta it self, are but declaratory: So that tho your Brother, or any King else, had been intrusted with the formal Part of summoning and pronouncing the Dis∣solution of Parliaments, which is done by Writ; yet the Laws that oblige the King as well as the People, have determined when and how it is to be done. This is enough to shew you, that your Brother as King shared in the Sovereignty that was in the Parliament, and that it was cut out to him by Law, and not left at his Disposal: I must therefore tell you that Thomas and Francis, and the rest of the Bloodhounds, and murdering Dispensing Judges, were much out in point of Law, when they told your Brother; that Parliaments, both as to Calling and Dissolving, were at his Will and Pleasure.

3. There is another Statute, viz. 25 Edw. III. cap. 23. that was Law in your Brother's Reign, which the Judges, if they had been acquainted with the Law, who truly (except a few that had but little Honesty, and were generally Strangers to the Law) must have told him and you too, did oblige him and you to suffer the Meeting and Sitting of Parliaments: Therefore I make use of that Statute to prove that the Meeting and Sitting of Parliaments is the Fundamental Right and Privilege of the People of England. This Statute, Sir, was called the Statute of Provisors, and was made to prevent and cut off the Incroachments of the Bishops of Rome, whose Usurpations in disposing of Benefices had occasioned intolerable Grievances: In the Preamble of which Statute it is expressed as follows.

Whereupon the Commons have prayed our said Sovereign Lord the King, That since the Right of the Crown of England, and the Law of the Realm is such, that upon the Mischiefs and Damage which happen to this Realm, he ought, and is bounden of the Accord of his said People in his Parliament, thereof to make Remedy and Law in a∣voiding the Mischiefs and Damage which thereof cometh, that it may please him there∣upon to provide Remedy. Our Sovereign Lord the King, seeing the Mischiefs and Da∣mage before-named, and having regard to the said Statute made in the Time of his said Grandfather, and to the Causes contained in the same; which Statute holdeth always its Force, and was never defeated or annulled in any Point, and by so much is bound by his Oath to do the same, to be kept as the Law of this Realm, tho that by sufferance and negligence it hath since been attempted to the contrary; and also having regard to the grievous Complaints made to him by his People in divers Parliaments holden hereto∣fore, willing to ordain Remedy for the great Damages and Mischiefs which have hap∣ned, and daily do happen by the said Cause, &c. by the Assent of the Great Men and Commonalty of his said Realm, hath ordained and established.

Come, Sir, what say you to all this? Where is your Holloway, your Withens, and your Walcots? And where is Tom Jenner, with his Sorrow in one Hand and his Grief in the other, an ignorant Rascal like the rest of his Brethren? Where is your Herbert, your Heath, and your Milton? Some of them are gone to their Places, but they lived long enough to enslave the People; and those that yet live, owe a Debt for their Rogueries, the Gallows groans for their perverting of Ju∣stice and Judgment. Where are your murdering Judges of the West? Some of them yet live: They might (without the Consent of a pair of Spectacles) have seen, and might without fear have told you, they could not chuse but see what was contained in this Preamble now recited. Were the Rogues ignorant? Then why did not your Pemberton, your Scroggs, your Levins, your Charlton, and the rest of that Crew, instruct your Brother and you what was contained and point∣ed at in this Preamble? But alas, they did not; they were able enough, but they had rascally durante bene placito Commissions, that indisposed them to be plain and honest in that Affair; they were more afraid of losing their Places, than of being damn'd for not doing their Duties: But since they had not the Ho∣nour, Honesty and Conscience of upright Judges, give me leave to be plain with you. Therefore, Sir, observe,

(1.) The intolerable Grievance and Burden occasioned by the illegal Incroach∣ments of the See of Rome, to which Yoke you and your Villains endeavour'd to reduce and subjugate these Kingdoms. You fired our City, and murdered our

Friends; you promoted Men of Villanous Principles, and worse Morals, to the Judgment-Seat, and made them Vassals to your Will and Pleasure; who, if they complied not, were reproachfully dismissed their Imployments, and ruined if possible: Nay, if any of them attempted but to prosecute Popery; alas, they were not for your Turn, for your Design was by them to revive that intolera∣ble Grievance, by incouraging the illegal Incroachments of the See of Rome.

(2.) Observe the many Complaints the People had made, who in those dark Times under Popery groan'd under such Burdens: What Burdens, I pray you, under the Incroachments of the See of Rome? Why truly in disposing of Benefi∣ces. Ay, it is a good Observation, for the Pope would present none but such as should advance his usurped Power and Interest; and if the People were so bold as to complain of these things, were they not a parcel of Rebels and Traitors for their pains? No, they complain'd without being called or treated as such. What Remedy had they? A Parliament. Now, Sir, had not we as much need of an Act of Provisors against you? for in your Brother's Time, how many of your Rogues were presented to the best Livings in the Realm at your Procure∣ment; and how many Villains were made Bishops by the Whores Cleveland and Portsmouth, and the Pimps and Bawds at Court? Did not we stand in need of Statutes of Provisors? Name me one Man of these that were not to advance the Power and Interest of France, and to wink at the Progress and Growth of Po∣pery. Had we not reason to complain? Yes: To whom? to the King? No, he was engaged for Popery and the French Interest, and Arbitrary Power, as well as your self: His Metropolitan Whores were Papists to please him, or he one to please them: Therefore to what purpose was it? We had none to com∣plain to but a Parliament; and how you used them, we have not forgot; and how our Application to them was not only useless, but dangerous, is not un∣known. In a word, Sir, the Condition of the Complainants in the Time of Edw. III, tho they lived in the dark Times of Popery, were in a far better Con∣dition than we were in your Brother's Reign; for notwithstanding the Religion of Edw. III, his Interest was his Peoples, and therefore held frequent Parlia∣ments, to whom they might complain, and from whom they might find Redress, without being judged Traitors and Rebels to the Government.

(3.) Observe the Endeavours used in vain by former Parliaments to redress the same, and to bring their Laws in being to have their Force and Effect. You know that when the Kings of England were wicked, then to gain the Point, they used to fly to Rome for Countenance, and advance that usurped Power to the Preju∣dice of the People. So it was with your Brother and you, when you had a De∣sign in hand to enslave the Nation; then you set up the Power and Interest of France, and none were to be preferred in our good Church but Villains, that were case-hardned enough to join with your Brother and you in ravishing the Peoples Rights and Franchises. Had we good Laws in being against Popery? They were suspended. Had we any good Laws against the growing Greatness of France? Yes, we got one poor Act of Parliament against France, and that was e∣luded. Nay, now I think on't, we got an Act to enter into an actual War against France, with which your Party did impudently beg Money from France. We got

a poor sorry Act for the Liberty of the Subject, called the Habeas Corpus Act; this was by you and your Villains evaded; so that we were under a necessity of Complaining. Those in the Time of Edw. III, had redress; we had none, till we drove you and the French Interest and Popery out of the Kingdom.

(4.) Observe the Acknowledgment of the King and Parliament, that the Obli∣gation to this Duty was upon the King, who you know is entrusted by the Law to preserve the Peace and Liberties of the Realm, and to rectify all Miscarriages in the Government: Which is apparent, 1. From the Right of the Crown, ob∣liging him to pass good Laws. 2. There were good Laws committed to his Trust in full Force, which he was to execute. 3. There is the King's Oath to pass new Laws for the Peoples Safeguard which they should tender to him, as well as to execute old Laws already made. 4. From the Sense of the People exprest in their Complaints. And, 5. From the Mischief and Damage that would o∣therwise ensue; and therefore it is said, that by the Desire and Accord of his People he past this famous Law, the Preamble of which I have recited to you in part.

4. There is another Statute worthy of your Consideration, and pretty much to the same purpose; you will find it in the 2d of Rich. II. in N^o 28. Also the Commons of England in Parliament desire, that forasmuch as Petitions and Bills pre∣sented in Parliament by divers of the Commons, could not heretofore have their respective Answers; that therefore both their Petitions and Bills in this present Parliament, as also all others which shall be presented in any future Parliament, may have a Good and Gracious Answer, and Remedy ordained thereupon, before the departing of every Par∣liament; and to this purpose a due Statute be ensealed (or enacted) at this present Parliament, to be and remain in Force for all Times to come. To which the King replied thus, The King is pleased that all such Petitions delivered in Parliament of Things or Matters which cannot otherwise be determined, a good and reasonable Answer shall be made and given before the departure of the Parliament. This King, you know, left not a very good Name behind, being drawn away from loving his People, just as you and your Brother were by a set of wicked Rogues; yet be∣fore they had ravished this Prince, and weaned him from his Peoples Love, he made this excellent Law: in which, Sir, you may observe, 1. A Complaint of for∣mer Remisness; their Bills afore-time have not been passed, and their Grievances unredressed, by unseasonably dissolving of Parliaments before their Laws could pass. 2. That a Law might pass in that very Parliament to rectify that Abuse for the future. And, 3. that it should not pass for a Temporary Law, but to last for ever, being of such absolute Necessity, that before Parliaments be dismis∣sed, Bills of Common Right might pass: to which the then King Richard did freely agree.

5. I have another Proof, which is from that great Oracle of the Law the Chief Justice Coke in Institut. 4. B. p. 11. asserting, That Petitions may be truly prefer∣red, tho very many have been answered by the Law and Custom of Parliament before the end of the Parliament. This that Great Lawyer delivers not as his own single Opinion, but tells us that what he laid down in this Particular, appeared in an Antient Treatise de modo tenendi Parliamentum, in these words faithfully transla∣ted; The Parliament ought not to be ended while any Petition dependeth undiscussed, or

at least to which a determinate Answer is not made. And again, That one Principle of calling Parliaments is for the redressing Grievances that daily happen. Further yet con∣cerning the departing of Parliaments; It ought to be in such a manner (saith Modus Tenendi) demanded, yea and publickly proclaimed in the Parliament, and within the Pa∣lace of the Parliament, whether there be any that hath delivered a Petition to the Parlia∣ment, and hath not received answer thereto: If there be none such, it is to be supposed that every one is satisfied, or else answered unto at the least, so far forth as by the Law he may be. This Custom was observed in after Ages, as you heard before. Once more, and I have done: Observe what this Great Judg saith concerning the Authority and Antiquity of this Antient Treatise called Modus tenendi Parlia∣mentum, which we often make use of in our Institutes: Certain it is, this Mo∣dus was rehearsed and declared before William I. called the Conqueror, and by him approved for England; upon which, according to the Modus, he held a Parliament for England, as appears 21 Edw. 3. Fo. 60.

Well, Sir, how do you by this time, and how doth my old Mistress and the little Welch Gentleman? Are you not satisfied of the Necessity of the Meeting and Sitting of Parliaments? I pray call Tom Jenner, and Frank Wi∣thens, those two Rascals, and all the Crew of Villains that misled your Bro∣ther and you, or were misled by you; for they were willing Vermin, I confess, to do what they were bid, upon pain and peril of losing their Places: And lest these Scoundrels should be too ignorant, let us call in Old Pemberton that did se∣veral Jobs of Journey-work for your Brother and you; he impudently tried Fitz-Harris, tho he was impeached in Parliament, which Scroggs would not un∣dertake; and he tried the Great and never-to-be forgotten Lord Russel; and how he carried himself, let the World judg: I am sure my Ld Russel was murder∣ed: But I have heard Pemberton talk as like a Villain as any of the rest, which was not because of his Ignorance. I say, let us summon them all that remain in the Land of the Living, for the Devil hath not fetch'd them all yet; and tho they are not prating upon the Bench, yet the Rogues are getting a Penny at the Bar: These Vermin I dare say with a little drubbing will aver, that it is most certain these wholsome Laws are not only in full Agreement with the Common Law, and declarative thereof, but fully agree with the Oath and Office of our Kings, who have that great Trust by the Law lodged with them for the Good and Benefit, and not Hurt and Mischief of the People. But if these Dunghil Rascals should be fullen, because not imployed once more to oppress and murder the People un∣der a Form and Colour of Law, and refuse to satisfy you, I will with that little Law I have, propose these three things upon the whole of what has been said upon this fifth Head.

1st. These Laws are very sutable to the Office and Duty of a King, and the End for which he was instituted by God himself, who commands him to do Ju∣stice and Judgment to all, especially the Oppressed, but not deny them any re∣quest for their Relief, Protection or Welfare. It had not been below you to have obey'd the Laws as a Subject, nor your Brother to have kept them as a King; and had he relied more upon his Parliament than he did upon your Counsel, and that of his wicked Ministry, he might have liv'd to this Day: But you and your Crew perswaded him he was above Laws, and that the Statutes of

the Realm signified nothing no longer than they would serve his Turn; who therefore made no Conscience of the Sitting of Parliaments for redress of Grievances.

2ly. These Laws relating to Parliaments do also fully agree with the Corona∣tion Oath your Brother took, and solemnly made to his People, viz. To grant, fulfil and defend all rightful Laws which the Commons of the Realm shall chuse, and to strengthen and maintain them to the utmost of his Power. But, Sir, suppose any of the Learned in the Laws of the Realm should stand at your Elbow, as Tom Jen∣ner, or Old Holloway, or any of that Crew, and tell you that your Brother did not take any such Oath: To this I may say, that if he did not, the Nation had the more wrong; but I never heard yet that any had the Impudence to deny it. I confess when you shuffled on the Crown, it was said some things were abated, for which those concerned in that Ceremony ought to have been hanged.

3ly. Those Laws do also fully agree with Magna Charta it self, which hath been confirmed to us by 40 Parliaments at least, which saith, We shall deny nor defer to no Man Justice and Right, much less to the whole Parliament and Kingdom, in de∣nying and deferring to pass such necessary Bills the Necessities of the People call for. Had Old Brown had but half the Honesty of an Irish Rapparee, he would not have consented to your Brother's dropping of a Bill in the Year 1680, it was intitu∣led, An Act for repealing an Act of the 35th of Q. Elizabeth; a good Bill to have preserved the Protestant Dissenters: But your Party had some barbarous Mur∣ders and Outrages to commit, and could not well go on with their Show unless such a Bill as that of Q. Elizabeth was in Force; so that it might now and then aid and assist your everlasting Holy Cut-throats in their bloody Conspiracy a∣gainst God and his Christ.

Object. But you may say, That your Brother and Father, and several other Prin∣ces, have otherwise practised, by dissolving or proroguing Parliaments at their Plea∣sures, before Grievances were redressed, and publick Bills of Common-Safety passed, because to dissolve and prorogue at Pleasure, is a Privilege which belongs to the Crown.

Answ. This word Prorogue is but a new-fangled Business, a thing brought up in latter Days; but as for dissolving Parliaments at Pleasure, that has been the Practice of our former wicked Kings, by the Advice of their Roguish Ministers and Judges, who laid aside all Law, Honour, Honesty and Conscience, to pro∣stitute themselves to the abominable Lust of a filthy Prince, who designed nothing less than the Ruin of the Kingdom. What your Father did I will not here con∣cern my self; but what your Brother did by your Procurement, is my Province at this Time.

Your Brother when he held his French Parliament at New-Market in 1677, where most of the Rogues and Whores of the Court were present, and your graci∣ous Self waiting on him, did much aggrandize himself by that Glorious Assembly. Upon April 16. the Parliament at Westminster was adjourned till May 21. follow∣ing. Immediately upon the Recess the Duke of Crequi, a••d that modest, so∣ber, chaste Man of God the A. Bp of Rheims, and Mons••eur Barillon, and a Train of 3 or 400 Persons of all Qualities, appear'd there; so that the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of France, with so many of their Commons, made it look like an old-fashioned French Parliament. And the Parliament at Westminster had been

adjourned for their better Reception: But what Address they made to the King, or what Acts passed at that Noble Parliament, I cannot tell, they having not been yet published: But I suppose they were these that follow.

• (1.) An Act for continuing his Majesty's Subjects in the Service of France.
• (2.) An Act for enabling the Dutchess of Cleveland to use the Arch-Bishop of Paris for her Father-Confessor, &c.
• (3.) An Act to discharge her Grace from farther Attendance upon the King.
• (4.) An Act to constitute the French Gentlewoman to be Whore in her room, and a Spy for the French King.
• (5.) An Act to enable Nell Waal to be Woman and Bawd in ordinary to the said French Gentlewoman, and his Sacred Majesty.
• (6.) An Act to supply the Extraordinary Occasions of that Whore Portsmouth, and her Woman Nell Waal.
• (7.) An Act to enable the Dutchess of Portsmouth, in order to her Health, to possess and enjoy a certain Apartment in a House-Royal called the Lock, situ∣ate at the end of Kent-street, and Nell to have the Reversion after her decease in case of Necessity.
• (8.) An Act for the further Supply of French-Money, in order to enslave the Kingdom, of 3000000 Livres per Annum.
• (9.) An Act for enabling James Duke of York to go on with his Conspirators in the Conspiracy against the Laws, Liberties and Religion of the People of Eng∣land, and to demand the French King's Purse, Credit and Interest, for his Help and Assistance.
• (10.) An Act to invest Edward Coleman with the Sum of 20000 l. and a good Pension from the French King, for his great Services done, and to be done, for the Catholick Religion and French Interest.
• (11.) An Act of Abolition of all Claims and Demands from the Subjects of France, on Account of all Prizes made of the English at Sea since the Year 1674 till that Day, and for the future.
• (12.) Act to supply the extraordinary Needs of the Pensioners at Westminster.
• (13.) An Act to continue the Sham-Alliance with the States-General of the Ʋnited-Provinces.

There were, I suppose, several Private Bills in favour of the Pimps, Bawds, and Whores, that were not sworn in Ordinary, but passed the Royal Assent, as I may suppose, because at that time all things between England and France moved with that punctual Regularity, that it was like the Harmony of the Spheres, so consonant with themselves, tho I could not hear the Musick. I pray, Sir, let us know in your next Declaration what other Secret Bills were passed in that August Assembly, wherein the Affairs of Peace and War were transacted with the greatest Confidence; and when, good Boys, they had done their Master's Busi∣ness, with your Brother's Aid and Help, they were adjourned from New-Mar∣ket to London, where they dissol••ed themselves without your Brother's Preroga∣tive, to make way for the Westminster Parliament, and so rubb'd off with all De∣monstration of mutual Affection and Friendship.

Alas, Sir, these were Matters of that Import, that they required all imaginable Expedition and Secresy; and it would have been the highest Presumption for the

poor Pensioners in the Westminster Parliament to have intermedled with them. Alas, if they had been admitted to end the Work, it might have ended in their own Dissolution, in order to a couragious running away.

You say by way of Objection, Your Partisans made that which your Brother and other Kings did by their Prerogative Royal, dissolve Parliaments before Grievances were redressed and necessary Bills past, because things did not move with that punctual Regularity between your Brother and them, that was be∣tween him and the French King. I pray what was the Reason? Had they not had Gratuities at the Charge of the Nation? Or, had the Dutchess of Ports∣mouth jilted them out of the French King's Blessing, which the Duke of Crequi and the Arch-Bishop of Rheims brought them of 200000 Lewis d' Ores? Who can tell what to say to these things? It is no wonder then that Crew of Voters were grown resty, and did not move regularly. Well, what then? the Parliament must not sit till some State-Clockmaker had mended their Motions, and made them go true; the House then had some good Bills, over which they roared on∣ly, and then were sent Home by a blast of Prerogative-Breath.

Had your Brother any other Prerogative but what the Law gave him, and what he was invested with at his Coronation? If he had, let us know it; but for once I will grant he prorogued and dissolved Parliaments at his Pleasure to serve you and your Cut-throat Crew: It doth not therefore follow that he had a Right so to do, according to a Maxim I learned almost 30 Years since, A facto ad jus non valet consequentia, especially when such Prorogations and Dissolutions are against so many express and positive Laws, such Principles of Common Right and Justice, and so many particular Ties and Obligations to the contrary.

Your Brother might, by the Advice of wicked Statesmen and villanous Judges, pretend to a Prerogative the Law had given him, of which nothing ever was known, unless revealed by some French Maxims learned abroad in his Travels: Yet such a Prerogative could not justify such Practices; for if he had been invest∣ed with such Prerogatives by the Law, yet the Law could give none to destroy it self, and those it protects.

But Old Hodg and his Inferior Clergy may interpose and say, Had not King Charles his Prerogative founded upon Law? Who questions, Sir, but the Kings of England had their Prerogatives? Yet observe what Old Bracton saith, Pag. 487. That tho the Common Law allows many Prerogatives to the King, yet it allows none by which to hurt or prejudice any. Therefore with the Learned in the Law I will assert, That whatever Power or Prerogative your Brother had, ought to have been used according to the true Intent of the Government, that is, to preserve the People and their Interest, and not to hinder a Parliament in re∣forming Grievances, and providing for the future Execution of the Laws; and whenever he applied his Prerogative to frustrate these Ends, by the Advice of you or any wicked Person, it was a Violation of Right, and the Breach of his Coronation Oath, since he stood oblig'd to Pass or Confirm those Laws his People should chuse in the Time of his Reign.

6. Your Brother and you had little or no regard to the Laws: All the Cry of your Villains was Prerogative, and nothing was indured that was according to Law: Therefore, Sir, I will give you a Proof, by Dr. Gauden's leave, from

the Words of your own Father, who when in Prison began to recollect himse••f a little, and gave your Brother this Advice when he should come to the Crown; That Prerogative is best shewed and exercised in remitting, rather than exacting the Rigour of the Laws, there being nothing worse than Legal Tyranny; nor would he have him entertain any Aversion or Dislike of Parliaments, which in their Right Constitution with Freedom and Honour, will never injure or diminish his Greatness, but will rather be as interchangings of Love, Loyalty, and Confidence between a Prince and his People.

Surely, Sir, if the Reports and Opinions of the best Lawyers could not, yet the Counsel of his Father the King, or his Father in God, might have wrought upon him and you: But the Truth is, in the Time of Richard II, there were some Flaterers and Traitors that presumed, in defiance of their Countries Rights, to assert such a boundless Prerogative in the Kings of England, as Chief Justice Tresillian, and others, advising him that he might dissolve Parliaments at Plea∣sure, and that no Member should be called to Parliament, nor any Act past in either House without his Approbation in the first place; and that whoever did advise otherwise were Traitors: But this Advice was no less fatal to himself, than pernicious to his Prince. To which let me add a Saying of your Grandfa∣ther in his Speech to his Parliament in 1609, in which he gives them Assurance, That he never meant to govern by any other Law than the Law of the Land: And tho it be disputed among them as if he intended to alter the Law, and govern by the absolute Power of a King, yet to put them out of doubt, he tells them that all Kings, who are not Tyrants or Perjured, will bind themselves within the Li∣mits of their Laws; and they that perswade the contrary, are Vipers, and Pests both against them and the Commonwealth. Thus, Sir, I have plainly proved, that Parliaments are the Right of the People of England, and that no King, without the Breach of his Coronation-Oath, can govern without them. I come now to shew,

II. That they are the Essential Part of the Government. Truly, Sir, I have had occasion to prove that as a necessary Consequence of the foresaid Right: but something may be offered to prove this Point, which will aggravate your Crime, and the Villany of your Party in attempting to render this Essential Part of the Government useless. Therefore, Sir, when you are at leisure, consider with your self the Constitution of the Government, which your Brother did wound, and you attempted utterly to destroy, but therein lost your self and this Govern∣ment, which would have been worth your keeping. Take a View therefore of the Constitution of the English Government, where the King is the Head, from whom the Government it self receiveth its Life, as he from the Law receiveth his Power: He has the Care of the whole, and it is his Interest to seek its Wel∣fare: The Strength of the Nation is his Strength, and the Riches of the Nation his Riches: The Glory and Honour of the Nation is his Glory and Honour. So on the contrary, when the Nation is weak, he is weak; if it be impoverished, he is impoverished; if it lose itss Honour and Glory, he loses his likewise. But lest Passion, Mistakes, Flatteries, or the ill Designs of some about him, should make him forsake his Zeal, and follow a destructive imaginary Interest, there is an Estate of Hereditary Nobility, who are by Birthright the Kingdom's Coun∣sellors,

whose main Interest and Concern it is to keep the Ballance of the Go∣vernment steady, that the Favourites and great Officers exceed not their Bounds, and oppress the People, that Justice be duly administred, and that all Parts of the Government be preserved intire: yet even these may grow insolent; a Dis∣ease to which great Men are liable, or may by Offices, Hopes of Preferment, or other Accidents, become (as to the Majority of them) rather the obsequious Flatterers of the Court, than true Supporters of the Publick and English Inte∣rest. Therefore the Excellency of our Government affords us another Estate of Men, which are the Representatives of the Freeholders, Cities, Boroughs and Corporations of England, who by the old Law were to be chosen yearly, if not oftner, whereby they perfectly gave the Sense of those that chose them, and did the same as if the Electors were present, coming so newly from them, and so quickly returning to give account of their Fidelity, under the Penalty of Shame and no further Trust. Therefore, Sir, consider,

1. If the Constitution of the House of Commons had been destroyed, 'twould have been impossible the Sense of the Nation, and their Complaints, and the Grievances of the People should have beer represented. To what Estate of Men must we have had Recourse? Must it have been to the Nobility? It may be they might not have understood our Grievances, being in a Sphere above the Rank of Common People. And the House of Commons being the Constitution, how could Money be raised to support the Government without them, unless by a total Subversion of the whole Frame of our Constitution? for by the Law the sole Power of giving Money remains in the House of Commons, none being con∣cerned in that but the Commons of England.

2. Those that would overthrow the Constitution of the House of Commons, will not stick to subvert that of the House of Lords, who are so essential a Part of the Government, that to part with them, was to part with the second State, which is the Wisdom and Counsel of the Nation, to which their Birth, Education, and constant Imployment in every Parliament being the same, fits and prepares them. I have read of a House of Commons in the 2d Parliament of Mary I. that was brib'd to consent to the receiving and owning of the Pope's Power; but I never yet heard of a House of Lords that were so bribed: and the House of Lords in 1649 being voted useless, the Commons run into so many Factions, that put General Cromwell to the Necessity of taking upon him the Government of the Nation by a single Person, by the Name and Title of Lord Protector. Those who would destroy the Constitution of the House of Lords, do endeavour the Destruction of the Ballance of the English Government.

3. Consider, the King gives Life and Vigour to all the Proceedings in Parlia∣ment; the Wills and Desires of the People, tho approved by the Lords and Commons in Parliament, without the King signify nothing; unless he bids them be an Act, they are abortive. Therefore he that shall attempt the Subversion of any of the other two Estates, is no more a King but a Tyrant, and useless to God and Man. You see that your Father undid himself to all Intents and Purposes, by following such Measures as subverted his own Government; and so have you: and if you will not believe it, you may ask the French King, and he will soon sa∣tisfy you of the Matter. But from hence, Sir, you may see that you cannot de∣stroy

any one Estate in this Government, but the whole is subverted; and there∣fore I may lay down this Proposition, that Parliaments are the Essential Part of the Government. In a word then, to conclude this Head, let me ask you or any of your Plotters these two Questions.

(1.) If this be so, that by so great Authority (viz. so many Statutes then and now in Force, the Fundamentals of the Common Law, the Essentials of the Go∣vernment it self, Magna Charta, your Brother's Coronation-Oath, and so many Laws of God and Man) the Parliament ought to meet and sit to redress Grie∣vances, provide for Common Safety, especially in times of Common Danger; and that this was so in a most eminent manner, none can doubt that did believe the King, so many Parliaments, the Cloud of Witnesses, the publick Judicatures, their own Sense and Experience of the manifold Mischiefs acted, and the apparent Ruin and Confusion that threatned the Nation by the restless Attempts of you and your bloody Party: Then, Sir, I ask you, Whether, after the People of England had the Point of the Dagger thus set to their Breasts, and the Knife at their Throats, Cities and Habitations fired, Invasions and Insurrections threat∣ned to destroy the King and Government, your villanous Popish Party did not design to destroy the only Remedy hoped for, under God, to give us Relief, that is our Parliaments, who with so much Cost and Pains were elected, sent up, and intrusted for our Help, and to turn them off without answering the Ends for which chosen, by those frequent Prorogations and Dissolutions? Con∣sider, Sir, the Point in hand: Were not the People of England justified in their important Cries, humble Petitions to the King your Brother, fervent Addresses to their Members, and earnest Claims for this their Birthright, pleaded with all the Modesty imaginable, which the Laws of the Kingdom (consonant to the Laws of God and Nature) had given them? How impudent then were your Abhorrers of such Petitions and Claims? What can Withens (who was expelled the House for the same) say for himself? What can the Rascal plead in behalf of himself and a rascally Crew that joined with him in signing an Address of Ab∣horrence; and that Villain Jefferies, who did that in London which Wythens had done in Westminster? Which brings me to a second Question.

(2.) If it be fo, that by so great Authority Parliaments ought to meet and sit to redress Grievances, &c. what shall we say to those who advised your Brother to this high Violation of their Countries Rights, to the infringing so many just Laws, and to the exposing the Publick to those desperate Hazards, even almost a total Ruine; which was done with all the Impudence and Barefacedness imagi∣nable, the Advisers not having the least Remorse upon them?

If K. Alfred (as Andrew Horne in his Mirror of Justice tells us) hanged Dar∣ling, Segnor, Cadwine, Cole, and forty Judges more for judging contrary to Law, and yet all those faise Judgments were but in particular and private Cases; what Death did those deserve who offer'd Violence to the Law it self, and all the sacred Rights of their Country? If the Lord Chief Justice Thorpe i•• Edward Ill's time, for receiving the Bribery of 100 l. was adjudged to be hanged, as having made the King break his Oath to the People, how much more guilty were they that made your Brother break his Coronation-Oath, and perswaded him to act against all Laws for holding of Parliaments, and passi••g 〈◊〉〈◊〉 therein, which ••e

was so solemnly sworn to do? And if the Lord Chief Justice Tresillian was drawn, hang'd, and quartered, for advising the King to act contrary to some Statutes only, what did those deserve that advised your Brother to act, not only against some, but all the antient Laws and Statutes of the Realm?

Moreover, Sir, I would say this further to you, if you will have a little Pati∣ence: If Blake the King's Counsel, only for assisting in the Matter, and drawing up Indictments by the King's Command against Law (tho it's like he might plead the King's Order and Command for so doing) was drawn, hang'd and quar∣tered; what was due to them that assisted your Brother in the total Destruction of all the Laws of the Kingdom, and as much as in them lay, their King and Country too? And if Ʋske the Under-Sheriff (whose Office it is to execute the Laws) for but endeavouring to aid Tresillian, Blake, and their Accomplices, against some of the Laws, was also with five more drawn, hang'd and quar∣ter'd; what Punishment did they deserve, that not only aided your Brother, but endeavour'd to subvert all the Laws of the Kingdom? And if Empson and Dudley in the time of Henry VIII. tho of the King's Privy Council, were hanged for procuring and executing an Act of Parliament contrary to the Fundamental Laws of the Kingdom, and to the great Vexation of the People, when yet they had an Act of Parliament on their Side; what ought to have been done to those who had no such Act to shelter themselves, and who not only acted contrary to, but to the Destruction of the Fundamental Laws of the Kingdom? I can expect, Sir, no Answer from you but this; The Men that did these things, should sure∣ly have died; if they had been discovered, they should have perished without Mercy. Is it so? then I come to the last Particular to be debated, and that is,

III. You are the Man, and your Party was the Party that did endeavour to break the Use of Parliaments by inveighing against that way of Government. In a word therefore I shall descend unto Particulars, and shew you, 1st. That your Inclinations were not for Parliaments, or that Way of Governing. 2ly. What those Parliaments were that you and your Party procured to be dis∣solved. 3ly. What Arts and Methods you used to expose the three last Parlia∣ments your Brother held in 1679, 1680, and 1681. 4ly. Your Unreasonable∣ness in so doing. 5ly. The ill Consequences that attended the Dissolution of those Parliaments. 6ly. What Pretences you and your Party used for procuring the Dissolution of those Parliaments, with Answers thereto.

First; Your Inclinations shew'd you an Enemy to a Parliamentary Way of Go∣vernment; and this appears in the following Particulars: 1. From your Nature and Temper. 2. From your Usage even of the Pensioner-Parliament. 3. From the Notions and Practices of your traiterous Party in relation to Parliaments. 4. From the daily Breaches you made upon our Laws. 5. By your Unwilling∣ness to let that Parliament meet and sit. 6. By the Opinion you had of their Affection to you.

1. From your own Nature and Temper, which I shall set forth before you, in relation to, (1.) Your Religion; (2.) Your Politicks; (3.) Your Morals.

(1.) Let us consider your Nature and Temper in respect to your Religion, and this will prove your Aversion to English Parliaments, and that way of Go∣vernment.

Your Nature and Temper inclined you to set up the Popish Religi∣on. How was this to be done? was it by an English Parliament? If any of your Party should suppose this, let me tell you the Supposition in it self was Non∣sense. Your Religion was such (and I am perswaded you are no Changeling) as went not altogether in the Old Primitive Apostolical Way of Preaching and Praying, and teaching all Nations, &c. but Scourging, Wracking and Broil∣ing Men into the Fear of God. Nay, is not your Religion such, that for its own Propagation it will make its Champions divest themselves of Humanity, and act worse than Devils, in order to be Saints? Now, Sir, where could you get a Parliament to have established such a Religion by a Law? And can any Man judg you in love with Parliaments, who are such Enemies to this excellent Reli∣gion of yours? I pray, Sir, reflect upon your Servant Coleman's Words in his Letter to Father La Chaise, the French King's Confessor: We have a mighty Work upon our Hands, no less than the Conversion of three Kingdoms, and by that perhaps the utter subduing of a Pestilent Heresy, which hath domineered over great Part of this Northern World a long time: there were never such Hopes of Success since the Death of our Queen Mary as now in our Days; (What Reason gives Coleman for this Do∣ctrine?) when, saith he, God hath given us a Prince, who is become (I may say to a Miracle) zealous of being the Author and Instrument of so glorious a Work: but the Opposition we are sure to meet with is also like to be great, so that it imports us to get what Aid and Assistance we can; for the Harvest is great, and the Labourers but few. Here was a mighty Work, and a mighty zealous Prince engaged in this Work. I pray, Sir, why did you not apply to your mighty Band of Pensioners in your Long Parliament for Aid and Assistance? No, your Religion would not comply with that, nor their Religion advance your mighty Work: tho they were Vil∣lains enough in some Sense, yet you did not think fit to trust them with the ma∣naging this mighty Work, or to let them know your mighty Mind and Zeal in this great Work. To whom then do you apply your self? Why truly to the mighty Lewis, the French King: for do but observe your Agent's Words in the same Letter, where he saith; That which we rely upon most, next to Almighty God, and the Favour of my Master the Duke, is the mighty Mind of his Christian Majesty, whose Soul inclines him to great Ʋndertakings. Truly, Sir, I think the Case is plain, that the subtle Jesuits had formed a Design to bring in Popery, and to kill the King, which they would never have been such Sots to attempt, had they not been sure you would engage in this mighty Work. Yet you were not privy to it: Let who will believe that, I cannot; for do you think the Jesuits and Cole∣man would have ingaged in that mighty part of the Conversion, had not they seen into your very Heart and Soul? Now upon the whole Matter, can any one think, if there were no such thing in Nature as a mighty English Parliament to have joined with your mighty Zeal in the mighty Work you had upon your Hands, that ever the Religion which you profest would incline you to be in love with an English Parliament, that was ever averse to Popery and Slavery since the Reformation? And because of your Aversion to an English Parliament as an Enemy to your Religion, you apply your self to the French King, which I am sure was not consistent with a hearty Love to an English Parliament.

(2.) Let us consider your Nature and Temper as to your Politicks, and by

that I shall shew your natural Aversion to Parliaments, and a Parliamentary way of Government. As your Religion, so your Judgment leads you to Arbitrary Government: for it was not only Rome's Religion, but the French Mode of Go∣verning that was your Design, and the end of all those Counsels you had with your Jesuits, and your Servant Coleman, who was a main Agent in that Affair; yet when your glorious Enterprize was discovered, you graciously left him to be hanged for all his good Secret Services done you in furthering the mighty Work you had upon your Hands.

But some of your Party may say, That in opposition to a Parliament it was impossible to bring in Popery and Arbitrary Power, it being inconsistent with the Rules of Policy to attempt such a thing in England. To this I answer:

Let the Popish Crew say so if they dare: I am certain they must bely their Consciences in this point, whatever they do in other Points in their Politicks, the hellish Popish Plot being a plain Demonstration that your Cut-throat Papists did believe it possible, or else Coleman and others would not have on your Behalf so far engaged the French King's Aid and Assistance in the Affair: for you attempted to be restored to all your Commissions; and how came it to pass that you did not effect your Restoration? It was not, saith Coleman, hindred by reason of any Aversion they had to your Person. What then? it was because of the Dis∣satisfaction the Faction entertained against you. Who was this Faction but the English Parliament, to whom you were so averse, that the Popish Party could make no brisk Attempt on your Behalf? for the Parliament then was very sensi∣ble that the French King's Interest was much attracted to yours, which declared you to be no Friend to them, and engaged them to provide for themselves against you and your cursed Party.

Again, Sir, by your leave, could any thing be plainer than the Design that Coleman and the Jesuits had formed, and had Hopes of effecting, since they had joined you so close to the French King's Interest? I am sure 'twas contrary to Reason and Nature it self for them to attempt your Brother's Life, and thereby commit the basest of all Murders for Murder-sake: and tho natural Affection might interpose in that Design, had you been privy to it, yet the Jesuits well knew it was impossible for you that was converted to that degree of Zeal for the Romish Religion and French Interest, to have given ground in that Affair. Now, Sir, I hope your Villains here will be fully satisfied that it was possible for the Popish Party to carry on such a Design as this in opposition to a Parliament, which is a great Proof of your Aversness to Parliaments.

But to come close to the Point, That your Nature and Temper, in relation to your Politicks, demonstrated your Aversness to English Parliaments: the Jesuits you know were very industrious with you for the Promotion of their Religion, which you consented to; and what did you in order to this? Did you not lay some Foundations for Popery, in order to its being established? Were there not Judges, Justices of the Peace, Sheriffs, and other Judiciary Officers of your pro∣curing, in order to deprave the Law of the Nation, and defile the Throne of Justice? I pray how did the villanous Judges use even the Protestant Laws, to open the first Gate to Slavery? and our Laws being in their Hands, did they not use them as barbarously as they could, to the Discouragement of Vertue,

and promoting Vice? Did not your Brother's Ministers of State betray our Li∣berties? What Remedy had the People? If a Session of Parliament was near, you so hated them upon this very Principle of Arbitrary Power, that either the Session was put off for a longer time, or else it was to be so short, that Grievances could not be redressed: and when you got a Period put to a Session, your wicked Judges were to play their Parts with the Laws, whilst your Ministers were ra∣vishing all our Liberties from us; and as for Religion, you had a Set of Aposto∣lical Caterpillars, who were to manage that for your Service and Interest.

These Measures of yours taken from your Popish Crew, had rendred you so out of love to an English Parliamentary Government, that you were at one time looked upon by Parliament the greatest Grievance of the Nation, the universal Object of their Hate and Fear, and the Subject of their Clamours and Curses. At whose door did all the Discontents and Murmurs lie but at yours? Were not the Murmurs so violent against you, that they became a great part of the Com∣plaints of good Men to Heaven in their own and their Country's Behalf? Nay, Murmurs were so bold, that your Brother was attackt with them? for did they not look upon you as Jupiter's Stork amongst the Frogs? Notwithstanding all your former Glories and Conquests, your whole Stock of Fame was lost, and buried in your Apostacy from the Protestant Religion. How all this, and an in∣nate Love to your Country and its Government, could stand together, I leave to wiser Men to judg. We saw you design'd to make us submit to an Arbitrary Power: Our Magna Charta was to have been destroyed by you and your Cut∣throats; our Religion and Liberties to have been abolished; Popery and a De∣spotick Power set up; the Lords and Commons extirpated; and all to have de∣volved into you, when they had given the fatal Blow, that you might have set up Idols and Molten Calves, and we have bowed down to them. Now, Sir, consider who the Man was that took such Measures, and laid such Designs; and if it were possible for him to love an English Protestant Parliament, I'll be his Slave.

To conclude this Head, Did you not by these Politicks of yours fet the whole Kingdom in a Flame, and then please your self with it? When you burnt our City, you and your Party sung Te Deum for Joy, whilst others were astonished at the dismal Sight. Did not your unbounded Thirst for innocent Blood make the Kingdom of England a Slaughter-house? And might you have had your Will, you would have made Smithfield your Original Shambles. It is well known, Sir, how you loved humane Sacrifices; and what Measures you took from France and Rome to propagate your Cause, is not yet forgotten, nor I hope never will.

(3.) Let us consider your Nature and Temper as to your Morals, from which we will demonstrate your Disaffection and Aversion to Parliaments. What Mo∣rality could we expect from you, that was and still is a Papist, and a bigotted one too? And being so, all your Morals are but Slaves to your Zeal. Nay, had you been Master of all the Cardinal Vertues, there's not one but must have been used to destroy our Religion, Laws and Liberties. Your Fortitude and Courage (if ever you had any) made you the more daring to push on Rome's Religion and the French Interest, and to withstand the Opposition you met withal in Par∣liament. Your Justice you made use of to restore the Power and Authority of

the Bishop of Rome, believing him to be Christ's lawful Vicar, and Peter's true Successor; and the said Office including the Ecclesiastical Supremacy, you de∣clared it your Duty to give the Pope the same Right over the Consciences of the People of England, as you had to succeed your Brother, tho through his Blood. Let us consider, Sir, your Temperance, which for once I will suppose you to be Master of too, not for the publick Good, but only to testify that you could con∣ceal your Passions, which were great enough to do publick Mischief, for you had always a most firm Resolution to ruin these Kingdoms. As for your Con∣stancy, it was no more than fixed Obstinacy. But it may be your Party may say, you were never heard to rage, or scarce seen to frown; how true that may be, I cannot tell, for I never was your Pimp, or Admirer, and therefore cannot pre∣tend to that Familiarity with you that some may. Yet what was your Tempe∣rance and Constancy but fit Pillars to support your damnable Designs against the Religion and Government of these three Kingdoms? But, Sir, if we should again take a view of your admirable Temperance, in its larger Signification, that is, a Denial of worldly Desires, it was still worse and worse: for when you voluntarily took up your Cross, and quitted your great Employments under your Brother, you left the Management of those Offices to Villains of a deeper dye than the rest of Mankind, who still carried on your Design to destroy us; you only quitted the toil of the Power, and left it to your subordinate Villains. In the last place, we will comply with your Admirers and Flatterers, and own you had Prudence: if you had, it was the worse for us, because that, and that alone, could be your Trump-Gard, the only leading Vertue that managed your Conduct in all your Hellish Plots and Designs with that Care and Art, that you made a fair Progress in effecting the Business of Rome as to Religion, and of the French King as to Arbitrary Power, to enslave and pox us both in Religion and Liberty. To give you your due, you ripened that mighty Work you and Coleman had upon your Hands, to a mighty Perfection: and had it not met with a mighty Blast, you might by your supposed Prudence have ruined three mighty Kingdoms. Now, Sir, if we grant you were endued with these mighty Vertues of Forti∣tude, Temperance and Prudence, yet we must say they were the absolute Hinges that open'd the Gates to Rome and France, where Superstition ruled the Day. Your moral Vertues were but lesser Lights, that took their Light from that greater Orb above: but how these moral Vertues did shine in you, your old Friend Tom Jones (if alive) could plainly tell, for he knew your Vertues very well, even to his dying Day.

I must mind you of one thing more, viz. your Oath of Alle••iance that you took to your Brother as your Sovereign Lord. Did you keep that Oath to him? If you did, surely the only Motive that prompted you was some Obligation you believed was in the Oath. But pray tell me, did not you Apostacy to the Church of Rome not only require a Renunciation of that Oath, but also absolve you from the Ties of it? Therefore I ask you again, Could your Conspiracy with the French King against our Laws and Liberties consist with that Oath? Or if you look'd upon your self released from it, pray what Security could the Government have, when you should come to the Crown, that you would keep your Faith with an Heretical People, that would not keep Faith and true Allegiance to your

Brother, who was of the same Religion with your self? This, Sir, was your Mora∣lity, of which your Party so much boasted. And how the Exercise of these Vertues, that were so used in the Drudgery of France and Rome, could be consi∣stent with an English Parliamentary Government, I cannot tell.

Thus, Sir, the Consideration of your Nature and Temper in all these Re∣spects, shews you were a Person in whom it was impossible there could be any love for Parliaments. Let your Party say what they will, and boast of your Vertues till doomsday, yet I must say that your Nature and Temper shewed you a Man of no good Morals, your Conscience being ready at all times to transmi∣grate as you found occasion. Those near you, that understood the Pulse of your Opinion, did not in the least doubt your Heart, which (whilst you profest to be a Protestant) conveyed Symptoms of Inflammation against the Reformed Re∣ligion, because it was not so ready to consume a Party of Men you hated, ac∣cording to a Maxim of your dearest Great Grandmother of notorious Memory, Mary Queen of Scots; to which purpose you zealously promoted about the time of your Brother's Restoration, abundance of Church-Caterpillars, that with the fiercest Wrath might devour those of the Reformed Religion: nay, how often did you fall upon these Vermin, as not zealous enough in persecuting those that differed from them only in a few rascally Ceremonies, not worthy of wip∣ing a Porter's Breech? by which means those base Creatures ruined several thou∣sands of Families in the space of twenty odd Years, and brought them to great want. And for all the Pretences you ever made for Liberty of Conscience, you used to discover to your Brother the Ardency of your Zeal against poor dis∣senting Protestants, and the Moderate Church-men, that they were the greatest Enemies against his Government; and for no other Reason, but because they would not part with their Religion as Christians, nor their Liberties as English-Men, but preserve both chast and inviolable, that they might approve themselves Men of Uprightness before God and Man.

2. Your Inclinations published you an Enemy of all Parliaments, from your Usage of that very Parliament in which you had such a Band of Pensioners. One would think you should never have parted with such a Parliament, where you and your Villains had purchased such an Interest: truly some of them were so fond to aid and abet the Destruction of the Nation, that the Charges in their Elections were defrayed, whatever they amounted to; any some of them were so profli∣gate, that as they had no Estates, so they had neither Conscience nor Honour, but were such as you pick'd out as necessary Men, whose Votes you most relied upon. You procured Tables for many of them at Whitehall and Westminster, and had them for their great Loyalty in their Votes received into Pension. What vast Sums did they give? a great part of which was by you obtained to carry on your wicked Designs and Purposes: And what Sums did you obtain to carry on your first wicked War against the Dutch, and to supply your extraordinary Occasions in the second? How well they supplied the Necessities of the Court-Whores, Pimps and Bawds, is well known. You no sooner demanded, but they complied; so that your Brother and you once thought your selves exceed∣ing happy in a House of Commons: notwithstanding the Exchequer was shut up, and by a Proclamation that you procured, the Crown was published a Ba••k∣rupt

in the midst of so many Aids and Revenues given by them. Yet what hum∣ble Slaves were these to you and your Interest, that when you ought to have sha∣red in the Publick Justice of the Nation due to Traitors, they not only passed by all your Miscarriages, but stood by you as far as they durst: and tho your Sins cried aloud, yet nothing moved them to call you to an account for them. If your Brother asked, they gave, till even they themselves were near the point of becoming useless, and their Pensions too in danger. In recompence of this you aimed at their Dissolution; and how you branded them in a certain Decla∣ration drawn up by Coleman by your Privity, (which your Brother had promised to sign, but not being a Slave to his Word, did not) is yet remembred.

In that Declaration you charge the House of Commons (that had given your Brother such Testimonies of their Loyalty and Bounty) with misconstruing all his Endeavours to preserve the Nation in Ease and Prosperity, and against all Reason and Evidence represented them to the Nation as Arguments of Fear and Disquiet; and that under pretence of securing Property and Religion, they had demanded unreasonable things from the Crown, to bring those Men that had so well served your Brother and you, out of all Esteem with the Protestant Dissen∣ters. You declared them Enemies to Liberty of Conscience, and to the Pro∣ceedings of the Government; and that they made seditious Constructions of the same, and many other Charges of a very high Nature, especially for opposing your Match with Mrs. Modena your Italian Comrade. Nay, you charg'd them for being Enemies to the Church of England, and therefore you laboured to the utmost to have them dissolved, tho you well knew that if these poor Dogs were not in a Parliament, they must be in a Prison. If this were your usage of a Parliament, in which you were so happy, if we may believe the King's Message to the Commons, Feb. 28. 1663. what can any Man judg from hence but this, that if this Parliament could not please you, none could? This I think suffici∣ently demonstrates what Inclination you had for any Parliament; for certain you nor your rascally Party could never expect to see a Parliament more ready to assist you in all your wicked Designs.

3. Your Inclination to Parliaments was seen by the Notions and Practices of your Party in relation to Parliaments, especially from those of them that knew you best. Were not Coleman, Beddingfield, Whitebread, Strange, Nevil, and several other Villains, of your Privy Council at St. James's? and did not these study to find out your Inclinations, and to imitate you exactly? And how these and the rest of your villanous Crew stood affected to Parliaments in general, is not yet forgotten by some that knew them. Was it not their common discourse, that they hoped there would be no more need of Parliaments? did not your Popish Priests and Jesuits go from Coffee-house to Coffee-house, and ridicule Parlia∣ments? Alas, Sir, this was but the Copy which your Villains took from your own Words; who sometimes, when they wanted a Supply for their extraordi∣nary Occasions, would be seemingly content that a Parliament should meet and sit to raise such a Supply, but never to redress Grievances: nay, some of them have said that a King's Proclamation ought to be sufficient to raise Money, and that it would never be well with us till the whole Government was reduced to the Model of that of France.

4. Your Inclinations to a Parliament were seen in your daily Breaches upon the Laws and Customs of the Kingdom. You knew the Parliament had made an Act of Uniformity, and several Laws against Dissenters in 1663, and seve∣ral Laws were made against Papists in former Kings Reigns; yet to oblige the Popish Party, you broke in upon all these Laws at once, and procured your Brother in the said Year to put forth an Indulgence for tender Consciences, not for the Encouragement of Protestant Dissenters, but the Increase and Growth of Popery. And as a necessary thing to usher in your second wicked War against the Dutch, you put your Brother upon issuing forth another Declaration of In∣dulgence in 1671. Many other Instances I could give of this Matter, but this shall suffice. Now how this could consist with an innate Love to English Parlia∣ments, I must leave to better Judgments.

5. Your Inclinations to Parliaments were seen in your Unwillingness to let that Parliament meet and sit, in which you had so great a Band of Pensioners. To my certain Knowledg Messenger after Messenger has been sent to France with begging Letters, to get Money from the French King to put off the Sitting of the Parliament. Give your Brother his due, he never cared for their Sitting, unless it was to get a Supply, that he might exercise his Talent you know where, without Molestation, which he could not well do at a Session of Parliament. Sir, when the Parliament was by Prorogation to have met in Feb. 1672/3, O what In∣terest was used to put it off till October following? and it had been done, if your Party had brought in a Million as they promised; but bringing in but 356000 l. there was no help but a Parliament must meet; who I think made up the Defect in the Supply you expected from the Popish Party. You know the Par∣liament was put off from Octob. 1670, till Feb. 1672/3. by which long Interval you had a competent Scope for the mighty Work you had upon your Hands, that you and the rest of the Architects of our Ruine might be so long free from their odious and busy Inspection, till it were finished. A drinking Companion of your Bro∣ther's telling you that the Session of Parliament drew near, and asking you what you thought of the Humour the Parliament-men would be in at next Session? you answered, you trusted there might be no Occasion for their meeting any more, for you had hopes to bring the Cause to bear without a Parliament; and took it as a great Affront that the Question was asked. You know the old Squire your Brother laughed at you for that Capricio of yours, tho your Jesuits thought it a piece of Impudence in that Gentleman so much as to mention the name of a Par∣liament in your Presence, he knowing your Opinion as to that way of Govern∣ment. I must conclude that Man to be at a perpetual War with Mankind, that will not admit of the sight of either Friends or Enemies. If, Sir, you could not bear the Congress of your Friends that had been so loyal and bountiful, you must certainly be averse to the meeting of a Parliament, that would call you and your wicked Party to account for your many traiterous Designs against our Laws and Liberties.

6. And lastly, Your Inclination to Parliaments was seen in your Opinion of the Affection which your Band of Pensioners did bear to you and your Cause. You know, Sir, you had put your self under the Protection of the French King, and therefore it was scarce possible for you to engage any more in

a Parliamentary way, for all English Parliaments are haters of the French Inte∣rest. Your Friend Coleman in his Letter to La Chaise, Sept. 29. says, That in Fa∣ther Ferier's time he had inculcated the great danger the Catholick Religion and the In∣terest of his most Christian Majesty would be in at the next Session of Parliament, which was to be in Oct, 1673. at which I fore saw that the King my Master would be forced to do somewhat in Prejudice to his Alliance with his most Christian Majesty; which I saw so evidently, and particularly that we should make Peace with Holland, that I urged all the Arguments I could, which to me were Demonstrations to convince your Court of that Mis∣chief, and pressed all I could to perswade his most Christian Majesty to use his utmost Endeavours to prevent that Session of our Parliament. Again, you find him pressing him for the Dissolution of the Parliament, in order to bring the Confederates to a Peace upon the French King's Terms. Then he plainly tells you, That the Parliament, as it was managed by the then Ministry, was both unuseful to England and France, and the Catholick Religion. In another Part he tells you, That Prorogations were but loss of time, and a means to strengthen those who opposed the Crown; and there∣fore still presses for a Dissolution, which would give the Protestant Religion the greatest Blow that ever it receiv'd since its first Birth. So that we may see by your Servant Coleman what Opinion you had of the then Parliament. But that we may rivet the Matter, I pray, Sir, take but a Note or two of your own Letter to La Chaise, wherein you express your self extreamly pleased, That the French King was satis∣fied of the unusefulness of the Parliament in order to the Service of the King your Brother, and his most Christian Majesty. In another place you say, that his Christian Maje∣sty was of Opinion that the Parliament was neither in his Interest nor yours. Pray let me know what Parliament would be in your Interest joined to that of the French King: Shew me such a Parliament, and I will then say I can shew you one that you would have a good Opinion of: and since you could retain no good Opinion of your Band of Pensioners, you can certainly have none of those that are for preserving the English Protestant Interest. So that I think I have sufficiently shewed your Inclinations, and by them your Enmity to Parliaments.

Secondly; I now come to shew what those Parliaments were to which you were so averse, and which you procured to be dissolved, whereby your hatred to Parliaments, and that way of Government, did appear. Were they Men of Common-wealth-Principles, or did they aim at the Promotion of their own Am∣bition and Greatness? did you or your Rogues know of such Persons? why then did you not discover them? The Nation would have charged the Account to themselves, and have made your Party some recompence for so signal a Piece of Service to the Publick. Nay, if your Crew had brought these People to light, and let the Parliament sat to have tossed them in a Blanket, they would have found a little severer quarter, than the Mayor of Scarborough did from one of your Apostles, whom you sent to plant a Colony of Red-coat-Christians in that Place. But, Sir, in plain English your Common-wealth-Christians we found were a num∣ber of Men that were in a most zealous manner devoted to the publick Good and common Service of their Country, who believed Kings were instituted for the Good of their People, and Government ordained for the sake of the Governed, and therefore complained or were grieved when it was used to contrary ends. Every wife and honest Man would then and still be proud to be of that Rank and Number.

And if Common-wealth signifies Common Good, in which sense it has been taken in all Ages by most good Authors; as Bodin, speaking of the Government of France, calls it a Common-wealth, as do our own Authors (the Mirrour of Justice, Bra∣cton, Fleta, Fortescue, &c.) in former times, as well as those of later Years, par∣ticularly Sir Thomas Smith in the time of Q. Elizabeth; and not only several Statutes use the word Common-wealth, but K. James your Grandfather in his first Speech to an English Parliament own'd himself the Servant of the Common-wealth; and K. Charles I. your dearest Father of famous Memory, both before and in the time of the War, never exprest himself otherwise: to be fond then of such Common-wealth Principles becomes every good English Man, and the whole Kingdom were glad to find they had sent such Men to Parliament. But, Sir, your Villains used to call those Parliaments, which you procured to be dis∣solv'd, Persons conspiring to set up a Democratical Power in opposition to Mo∣narchy, that would overthrow the Government both in Church and State, tho it was that which you and your Rogues designed in that villanous Alliance you made with France to destroy the King and the Protestant Religion. The Nation saw it was not those they had sent up to Parliament, but you that had a Design to overthrow the Government; for you were so fond of your beloved Arbitrary Power, and therefore resolved to subvert our legal Monarchy instituted for the Benefit of the Common-wealth, by destroying the Honour and Reputation of our English Parliaments.

I pray, Sir, call to mind the Band of Pensioners you had in that Parliament which your Brother kept so long; yet you could not bear with their Proceed∣ings against your Party, when your Designs were laid open before them, and so plainly proved, that they could not withhold Justice from being executed upon several of your Case-hardned Traitors. When they were dissolved, it is mani∣fest that three greater Parliaments were never known in England since the time of William I: than what succeeded them, viz. those two that met at Westminster, and that at Oxford; they were, I dare say, the Flower of the whole Kingdom, and might with all Justice be termed the Wisdom of the Nation: their Debates and Votes which were printed and published, shewed them to be Gentlemen of very great Ability and Integrity; those that sent them knew them to be Persons of great Estates, not beggarly Rascals, such as were in your Pensionary Parliament, that had betrayed us to you and your Party in a great measure: these did not please you, because they would not perpetrate so great a Piece of Villany; how then could those please you that met together afterwards, and approv'd them∣selves Well-wishers to the Protestant Religion, and duly consider'd the State of the Nation, and the many Dangers to which it was exposed by you and your Villains? Therefore, Sir, if any one can inform me how all this doth not prove you an Enemy to the Constitution of Parliaments, let him come forth, and he shall be heard; or let us know what sort of Men you are inclined to, for I believe if you could obtain 513 Papists, that were not of the French Interest, to esta∣blish Popery separate from Arbitrary Power, even such could not please you, but would soon be exposed as others have been: and if you should have met with 513 Men, that could have complied with you in both, you must have met with such as would have destroyed their own Constitution, and put a Period to all

Parliaments. Now if any of your Party can say, this would be a Demonstration of your Affection to Parliaments, and prove••t, Erit mihi magnus Apollo.

Thirdly; Remember what Arts and Methods you and your Party used to ex∣pose the three last Parliaments your Brother held in 1679, 1680, 1681. It is worth your considering that when you had a great desire to have the long Parli∣ament dissolved, some objected, that if that was dissolved, the Crown was in danger, because a new one was to be called. But those that made the Objection, did not consider a new one must be chosen; which if they did, yet they did not consider what the Men were that would in all probability be chosen: and those new Parliaments, if they might have been suffered to redress Grievances, would have stuck at nothing to have rendred themselves acceptable both to Prince and Peo∣ple: for it was, first, the best way your Brother took to become acquainted with the Nation, to dissolve that Parliament that had so long continued. Secondly, the King might, if he would have let his Parliaments sat, obtained a great Sum of Money for Payment of his Debts; nay, they would have given it him as a Pledg of Endearment between him and the People; they resolved to give free∣ly, and hoped he would receive as graciously: in truth, Sir, they would have been generous even to your self, for they would have excluded you from being King, that you might enjoy the greater Security of your Person and Estate as a Subject, which if you would have believed, you had not at this day been rattling your Beads at St. Germains: the People would have been free under their King, as the King would have been happy in his People; and both secured by frequent Parliaments, which therefore could never endanger your Brother's Crown. Mis∣take not your self, nor think that we could be cheated with that Nonsense; for nothing could endanger his Crown but your advancing the Religion of Rome, and the Arbitrary Power of France in England. It was these things endanger'd your Brother's Government, nothing else could: but, good Gentleman, he was engaged with you in these things beyond recovery, to the ruin of himself, and the endangering of all our Laws and Liberties.

The Devil's Brokers did not join with you in dissolving the Long Parliament, but cried out, if that Parliament was dissolved, the Church would fall: but, Sir, I will say that for you, you had as little regard for the Church as you could, considering how the Rogues had espoused your Quarrel, and thought that Passive-Obedience, Nonresistance, and the Divine Right of Succession would have been ad∣mirable Orv••etans against the Plague of Rebellion. But why must this Church fall with the Pensioners? Alas, alas, the poor distressed Church, and the poor di∣stressed Band of Pensioners! For the latter, they were a Parcel of matchless Villains, and she Whore enough not to be in the Nation's Interest: but dissolved they were, and what escaped the Jail, were secured by the Friars; those who had stood by the Interest of their Country, were sent again, and such a Set of Gentlemen as no King would have sent home in so ignominious a manner but your Brother at your procurement; and being sent home, you and your Party made it your Business to expose them.

1. You had them exposed on your Stages, in your rascally Play-houses, by a Parcel of mercenary Rogues and Whores, who you and your villanous Party set up to debauch the Nation, and to ridicule the essential Parts of the Government,

as if the Votes and Debates of that August Assembly were to be ridiculed by such Vermine, who were Tools you made use of in some part to do your Drudgery. But stay, it is not fit the Whores that are Stage-players should be reflected on, left there should be a more severe Act made for cutting of Noses; for a Par∣liament-Man, you know, had his Nose cut for speaking against that sort of Ver∣mine: but I will not be afraid to mention their contemptuous reproaching of Parliaments.

2. You had Monsieur Barillon, who managed the Intrigue of charging the principal leading Members of both Houses of those three Parliaments with being in a Conspiracy against your Brother and your self; and this he, and your Jesuits, Priests, and other Vermine contrived by Subornation and Perjury, a Proceed∣ing not unusual to some Persons and Courts: all the Mischiefs, Poisonings and Villanies in all the European Courts, were owing chiefly to his and his Master's most Christian Politicks: he was used as a main Agent fit to expose three as great Parliaments as England ever knew, to all the Courts of Christendom, as a Confederacy of Men in a Plot to destroy the King and your self, and as Ene∣mies to Monarchy. And what was this but to render Parliaments odious to all the Princes of Europe?

3. Notwithstanding those three Parliaments had nothing before them but to secure the Government against the Depredations that Popery and Arbitrary Power would have made upon it; and notwithstanding their great Duty to the King, yet what a scandalous Declaration was emitted, wherein the said Parliaments were most villanously treated, as if they had aimed at nothing but the change of the Government? This Declaration may be supposed to be drawn by that Villain, the French Ambassador, in his own Mother-Tongue, because tho it was turned into English, yet the French way of wording it shews there was a French Counsellor in the case, which could be none but he, who was the chief Counsel∣lor your Brother and you used in the management of your Conspiracy; yet it is but the Copy of your Grandfather's and Father's way of Proceeding, which your Brother and you thought fit to use to asperse Parliaments; you were all Friends alike to that Constitution of the English Government.

4. It is very remarkable, that your villanous Judges were instructed in their Circuits to spit their Venom against the Proceedings of the said Parliaments; and in their respective Stations they were to let their Grand Juries know what reason the King had to dissolve them: and how they recommended the King's most Gracious Declaration to their Consideration, and what Converts they made, I was never curious to inquire; for I could not suppose but the Country knew the Men, and their Character, and under what necessity they lay to be Villains, from the tenour of their illegal Commissions, and that they must prostitute them∣selves to the Will of the Court, or be dismissed from their Imployments: but they chose rather to be Scandals to the Bench, than to appear as so many Re∣proaches to their Professions at the Bar. Upon all which Considerations I cannot believe they ever made any farther Profelytes against the English Parlia∣ments, than a paltry Sheriff of a County, or a villanous Grand Jury, pack'd on purpose to draw up an Address of Thanks for the Court's attempting to ruin the Government as established by Law.

5. Since, Sir, the City of London could not be debauched, but the eminent Merchants and Traders in it stood firm to their Laws and Liberties, and to the Government of England by Parliaments, so that you could not influence the Ma∣sters, you took an unheard-of Course to debauch the Servants and Apprentices in their Morals, and procured a Day of Feasting for them, wh••re they were in∣couraged to huzza it away against Parliaments, and to reproach the Senators as a Herd of Men set upon the Destruction of the Government both in Church and State: but it pleased God to open the Eyes of several of those young Gentle∣men, to see that this Feasting and Rioting was carried on by ill Men, and that the dissolving of Parliaments was only to screen some publick Offenders from Ju∣stice; and by degrees quitting themselves of that scandalous Congress, in a year or two their Feasting fell to the ground.

6. You imployed old Hodg, your Buffoon in ordinary, to write against the Proceedings of those Parliaments: the Rogue by his Lies, Equivocations and Prevarications, did much Mischief, having called in a parcel of little Priests, who engaged themselves to rail at Parliaments, and admire the Loyalty of old Hodg their Guide, whose Observators were the Subjects of their Discourses every Lord's day; nay, they would scarce look upon a Sacramental Discourse, the first Sunday in the Month, to be well dish'd up, unless some of Roger's Frippery was mingled with it: so that the old Villain was not unsuccessful in his traite∣rous Papers which he published several times a week, till God in his Mercy open∣ed the Eyes of some of our Passive-Obedience-Puppies, and let them see the Vil∣lain was aiming at Popery, and destroying the Church of England, notwith∣standing his specious Pretences to defend it.

7. You had your spiritual Myrmidons throughout the Kingdom, roaring from their Pulpits against the Proceedings of those Parliaments, by the Instruction of some of their Superiours: this by the help of new Matter the Court instructed them in, lasted several years; so that they were rather Court-Agents to carry on some design, than Ministers of Christ, and Stewards of the Mysteries of God. But alas, when the Tithe-pig began to squeak, they turned their Discourses another way. Truly, Sir, to give the pious Herd of your Ecclesiastical Swine their due, they will do any thing to serve you, if they can but enjoy their Swill and Grains; poor Wretches, I never met with any of them that would lose a Meal to save either King or Kingdom.

8. You had your Rascals in the most publick Coffee-houses, who spent their time chiefly in railing at Parliaments, that they were unuseful, and were bring∣ing 40 and 41 again upon the Stage; that they had a Design to ruin the King by giving no Money, and starving his Servants: nay, Sir, they were so insolent as to offer all Indignity to those Gentlemen that had served in any of those Parliaments; for doing of which they were not only incouraged by your Grace and Favour in your Smiles, but were also well rewarded. The Particulars might be set down, but I leave them to reply upon those that shall pretend to an∣swer this or any part of it, provided they put their Names to their Answer, as I have done to this my Memorial, otherwise I shall not take notice of any Scribler in your Party. You have your Friend Sherridan, one of your Devil's Brokers in Ireland, and honest Togra Smith another excellent Partisan of yours; nay,

you have a Set of Case-hardned Villains, that would if they durst be barking at the Government; the Rogues stand still for want of Business: I pray give them orders to disprove any part of the truth of what I now write; if you do, you have a notorious Rogue, the Quondam Bp. of Kilmore, that walks in your Quon∣dam Park of St. James's; he is still a Malignant, and hates our English Govern∣ment: you would do well to send for him, for he would be a main Champion with you in the Case of governing by Parliaments. The Sum of all which is this: You may reflect upon the various ways you and your Party took to expose three Parliaments, by which you shewed your self an Enemy of all English Parliaments; and therefore we could not but judg who were the Men that would poison the People, and change the Government, even the Enemies of the Constitution, and of those who endeavoured to preserve the old English Government.

Fourthly; The unreasonableness of the ill usage of those Parliaments, shews you an Enemy to Parliaments in general. You cannot but remember what ama••••∣ment seized every good Man, to see two of the greatest Parliaments England ever knew dissolved within the space of three Months. I confess the Kings of Eng∣land have in a great measure been intrusted by the Kingdom with appointing the times of the Sitting and Dissolving of Parliaments: but lest thro' defect of Age, Experience, or Understanding, they should forget or mistake our Constitution, or by Passion, private Interest, or the Influence of evil Counsellors be so far misled, as not to assemble Parliaments when the publick Affairs require it, or should declare them dissolved before the Ends of their Meeting were accomplish∣ed, the Wisdom of our Forefathers has provided divers Laws both for holding Parliaments annually, and oftner if need be, and that they should not be put off till all the Bills were passed, all Petitions answered, and Grievances ••edressed. But to be more particular with you, I will ask you a few Questions; which if any of your Teagues can answer me on your behalf, they shall be my Counsellors I assure you, if ever I come to be Duke of Modena.

1. What Precedent can be produced for such a Dissolution amongst our anti∣ent Records in Parliament, held in the times of our antient English Kings? We are taught by the Writ of Summons that Parliaments are never called without the Advice of the Council; and the usage of all Ages has never been to send them away without the same Advice. Now if these Methods of calling and dismissing Parliaments were safe, then not to pursue them, was to expose the King to the Censures and Reflections of the whole Nation for an Action not only illegal and uncustomary, but also very ungrateful to the People.

2. Have not the Laws of the Land taken great care to make the King always dear to the People, and to preserve his Person sacred in their Esteem, by wisely preventing his appearing in any Action that may be unacceptable to them? Now was the Dissolution of three Parliaments, nay four in the compass of 26 Months, acceptable to the People? Ought you not then to have used your Interest with him to have acted according to the Laws and Customs of Parliaments, which would have rendred you both acceptable to the People? And had he given him∣self leasure to have had this debated in Council, because then his Counsellors must have answered for their Advice, you and your Brother had remained Honourable in the Eyes of the Nation, and not have been judged guilty of such Orders as were not only irregular, but also very illegal.

3. Suppose you should say, the King commanded it to be done, and his Mini∣sters were bound to obey, and therefore are justified: yet, Sir, let me tell you that the Ministers that advised and assisted in the Administration of Affairs, could not justify an unlawful Action under Colour of the King's Commands, since all his Commands contrary to Law were in themselves void; which is the true rea∣son of that old Maxim in the Law, That the King can do no wrong; a Maxim not only true in self, but safe for a Prince and Subject too: for certainly it was Non∣sense in your Brother's Favourites to think of excusing their many Enormities under pretence of their Master's Command. The truth is, it was so unreasona∣ble, that the Privy Council was ignorant of the thing, and surprised at it, not being worthy to be trusted with it: but the French Whore near St. James's House had the News of the Parliament's being to be dissolved two days before we knew of it at Oxford; so that it was a Work of darkness concerted between Barillon and Portsmouth, and the King resolved upon it by their Advice.

4. Would it not have been unreasonable in your Brother and you to have dis∣missed the 12 Judges from sitting in Term-time, and from going the several Cir∣cuits, that Justice and Judgment might not be done? Now that Parliaments should meet and sit for Redress of Grievances, and making good and wholesome Laws, by the same Sacred Tie whereby at his Coronation he obliged himself to let his Judges sit to distribute Justice every Term, and in both the Seasons of the Year in their Circuits, and to preserve inviolably all the Rights and Liberties of the People, is very evident. Therefore, Sir, abruptly to dissolve Parliaments, when nothing but the Legislative and united Wisdom of the Kingdom could relieve the Protestant Party from their just Fears, or secure their Religion from its certain Dangers, is very inconsistent with the great Trust reposed in your Brother, and seems to express but little of that Love and Tenderness which the People of Eng∣land might justly have expected from him.

5. Would not the Constitution of Parliament, as by the Laws and Customs of England established, have been equally imperfect, and destructive of it self, had it been left to the Arbitrary Will of a wicked King, whether he would sum∣mons a Parliament, or had it been put into his Power to dismiss them at his pleasure, or at the Pleasure of two rascally French Whores, or a little scoun∣drel French Ambassador? And therefore was not your Brother's dissolving the Parliaments at Westminster and Oxford, by your procurement, a most unreasona∣ble thing?

6. Was not the Kingdom so alarm'd at the Wickedness of your Brother in dissolving those Parliaments, that Men began to be exceedingly concerned, not knowing where it would end; insomuch that your Brother was necessitated in a sneaking Declaration to let the Nation see he was conscious to himself that his Dissolution of those Parliaments stood in need of an Apology; so that it was but at the best an Appeal from his Parliament to the People of England? And if your Brother and you could not justify your Usage of these Parliaments, because so destructive to the Liberty of the Subject, what assurance did your two French Whores Portsmouth and Mazarine, and Barillon give you and the rest of your Par∣ty, that your Brother's Declaration, shewing Reasons for such a Violation to our English Government, would make the Nation in love with such Treatments

of their Representatives? For, Sir, could you think in your Conscience that the People of England did not see themselves hereby exposed to the restless Ma∣lice of their Enemies, and resented it highly, since they could not but be sensible of the languishing Condition of the three Kingdoms, and that nothing but a Par∣liament could cure the Distempers with which we were infected by you and your Party, both as to Religion and Morals? And had they not with great Charge and Difficulty chosen three Parliaments, on whom they placed their Hopes? And those being suddenly dissolved, could they believe your Brother or you designed any thing less than a total Subversion of the Government? Come, Sir, sit down, put on your Irish considering Cap, and judg why since Ned Coleman's Protestant Decla∣ration was so unhappily published before its time, the Nation should not be as much alarmed at Barillon's Declaration in April 1681, as they were at Coleman's in 1678. And could you and your Irish Teagues imagine that one French Decla∣ration should so soon succeed another? nay, could you, without being confound∣ed, see your Servant Coleman's Original (fairly drawn by the Advice of the French King's Confessor, to bring in Popery and Slavery) so much outdone by Barillon's Copy, since you judged it could never be outdone by any Man what∣ever? And since the former exposed you and your Brother as the worst of Men, how could you expect the latter should not have the same effect upon the English Nation, and put them into such a Ferment, as to deal by you and your Party just as we did in 1688?

7. Did not your Brother, April 20. 1679, not only in Council, but Parlia∣ment, declare how sensible he was of the ill Posture of his Affairs, and the great Jea∣lousies and Dissatisfaction of his good Subjects, whereby the Crown and Government was become too weak to preserve it self; which proceeded from his use of a single Ministry, and of private Advices; and therefore professed his Resolution to lay them wholly aside for the future, and to be advised by those able and worthy Persons whom he had chosen for his Council in all his weighty and important Affairs? Now, Sir, consider, was it not most unreasonable in you and your French Vermine to put the King upon such a manifest Violation of his Royal Word and Promise to the Nation? But to put the Matter out of dispute, Did not your Brother, on that Choice of his Coun∣cil, tell the Parliament of his Resolution of meeting his People often in Parlia∣ment? And who was it that changed his mind, and made him alter those Gra∣cious Purposes, but you and your wicked Party? Would you make us be∣lieve that your Brother could so soon forget his Promises, or that upon the meeting of these Parliaments there were no weighty Matters to be debated?

8. Did not you and your Party, in prevailing with the King, shew the World, that your Cunning kept not pace with your Malice, since by this wicked usage of our Representatives in those Parliaments you and your Cutthroats made your selves known, tho you had secretly and cautiously given that wicked Advice to your Brother, only to be protected from the publick Justice of the Nation? But in time you discovered your selves, and told your own Names, when Case-hardned enough to pull off the Mask, and let us see what you would be at. But what Offence did you take at those Parliaments? Surely it was because the re∣peated Treasons and traiterous Designs of you and your Conspirators rendred you obnoxious to them. And did you not put the King upon dissolving those

Parliaments, thinking thereby not to have been judged the Authors of that villa∣nous Counsel? Alas, good Sir, you have so exposed your self in that Matter, that you left your self and Party not only without Justification, but without all pre∣tence hereafter; but thanks be to God, I lived to see the Justice of the Nation take place upon you, and some of your Party. There are some yet lurking, and basking themselves in good Imployments; but I hope our King will rid himself of the Vermine in time. I am confident, Sir, you may reflect upon these Conside∣rations, and pronounce your self guilty of this unreasonable Usage of three as great Parliaments as ever England saw. Now how can we conclude otherwise, than that you then was, and still continue an Enemy to Parliaments?

Fifthly; The ill Consequences attending the Dissolution of those three Parlia∣ments are worthy your Consideration: and that I may be brief herein, take notice;

1. What Divisions you and your Party caused amongst the People of England thereby: you made such Breaches in Families, that I fear are not made up to this day, unless Death hath reconciled them; this you did by the Advice of your Priests, Jesuits, and Popish Council at St. James's, and the wicked Ministry at White-hall, who, rather than the People should not be divided, took their seve∣ral Copies by your Original, and came in a most comfortable manner to your Assistance, hoping to make the People rebel. These Differences you nourished with all the Industry imaginable, to the great Hazard of the whole Kingdom. But, Sir, this was to betray us into the Hands of our Popish Adversaries, which they could not do but by inflaming the Differences between the Conforming and Non-conforming Protestants, that we might not unite our Forces against the Common Enemy.

2. You and your Party by this means weakened the Protestant Interest. There can be nothing more plain than this: for upon the Dissolution of the Oxford Par∣liament, Swarms of Priests and Popish Conspirators returned home, and fell to work, to pervert the People to the Obedience and Communion of the See of Rome. What Pensions then you got for some, and Imployments for others; and with what care you maintain'd their Interest, and defended their Cause and Quar∣rel against those that pursued them for their many Treasons against the Govern∣ment, we all saw to our great Sorrow. And what help was there, since you and your Party had so much countenance from your Brother, who was ingaged with you in the whole Popish Conspiracy, saving that of his own Life?

3. You procured a severe Persecution against Protestant Dissenters which you nor none of your rascally Crew durst do during the Session of Parliament; but immediately upon their Dissolution you fell upon them, either because they had occasioned the sending of good Men to Parliament, or because they were zea∣lous Assertors of the Protestant Religion against Popery, and of our English Li∣berties against Slavery: these were indeed high Crimes, for which you and your Villains made them smart, to the ruine of several thousand Families; and had you continued somewhat longer in that glorious Adventure, you might have made poor England a howling Wilderness, tho when your Brother and you came home, you found it a Land flowing with Milk and Honey. Nay, you had rather all should have run into Confusion, than the Dissenters should not be ruined, because they could not comply with a few Ceremonies, for which your Party had no other Authority than a few Acts of Parliaments.

4. You advanced Arbitrary Proceedings in Westminster-Hall, where you had a Set of rognish Judges exactly of a size for that turn, who had as much Impudence for the Court, as they had had Dread of being called to Account in Parliament for all their Villanies. And tho it was a standing Constitution, that if any Man stood impeached by the Commons of England before the Lords in Parliament, no inferiour Court could take Cognizance of that Cause, or try him for that Trea∣son in Westminster-Hall, for which he stood impeached in Parliament, (which up∣on the Dissolution of the Oxford-Parliament, was Fitz-Harris his Case) yet for all this, you found out your Pemberton, your Jones, and your Raymond, that had Impudence enough to try the said Fitz-Harris, and condemn him; for, alas, good Men, they were not to lose their Places for every small Peccadillo, if it were to serve the Government, especially to do a Job for you and your Crew.

5. Upon the Dissolution of the 3 last Parliaments, to alienate the King from his People, you and your Party did industriously revive the Memory of the late unhappy Civil War between your Father and the Parliament; which was your Brother's Interest as well as the Nation's to have buried in oblivion: the menti∣oning that unhappy War serv'd only to put us in mind of the sudden Dissolution of 3 Parliaments, and the 12 years want of one, and what the Villains had done in your Father's Reign: and the better to colour your procuring the Dissolution of those three Parliaments, you had your Parties abroad to asperse and brand the Members, as being of the same Complexion with those that met Nov. 3. 1640; but none of your Cut-throats did ever mention the bloody Massacre in 1641, be∣cause begun and carried on by your Father's Command, and for his Service.

But, Sir, let me tell you, that none lived more peaceably under your Bro∣ther's Government than they who were engaged in that War on the Parliament's side: therefore I cannot tell by what prudent Topick you went, when you dis∣courag'd those Men in their obedient living by such villanous Reflections, and upbraided them with what the Law had pardoned, and they had expiated by their Loyalty since, supposing they had been Criminals, which yet I think they were not. But this is plain beyond all dispute, that the Parliament that restored your Brother to his Throne, and you to be a constant Plague to this Na∣tion, made an Act of Indemnity, wherein many things were enacted, which they judged necessary for the Settlement of the Nation; they prohibited, un∣der a Penalty, one Man's reproaching another with being concerned in that War, for the space of three years after the Date of the said Act: sure then they never intended Men should afterwards take the liberty to upbraid one another with it.

6. Another ill Consequence of dissolving those three Parliaments was, that by this means you made a way to succeed your Brother in the Government. If those Parliaments had sat, and their Counsels not been defeated by their unex∣pected Dissolutions, you must have been disabled from ever inheriting the Impe∣rial Crown of these Realms: and it was plain, those Whores and other Trai∣tors that procured the Dissolution of those Parliaments, aim'd at your coming to the Throne. But, Sir, I think your Party should have shown so much Ingenuity and Candour, as to have owned that all the People of England, particularly those that were for your Exclusion, were as zealous for Monarchy, even in the Royal

Line, as any of your clamorous Bullies durst for their Ears be. I am sure, no∣thing so much endanger'd the legal Monarchy of England as your coming to the Crown, which the Wisdom of the Nation foresaw; and therefore, that it might be preserved, resolved to pass you by, and let it descend to another Heir. Nay, Sir, if you had continued James Duke of York, I am sure you might have lived with more Honour and Comfort than you can propose by putting your Feet under the French King's Table: but God having ordained you to be a Plague to us for our Sins, I think you let us see what you aimed at in your four Years Tyranny. There are some blind Puppies, whose Eyes are not yet opened; I could wish you had their Company at St. Germains, being confident you would soon lick them open.

7. Another Consequence of the Dissolution of those three Parliaments, was the possessing the King of a Design carried on by the dissenting Party for his De∣struction, and to introduce a Democratical Power, which they called a Common-wealth: nay, that you might hasten the Dissolution of the Oxford-Parliament, you made use of this Lie for an Argument, which your Brother was willing to believe, that he might have some Pretence for quitting that way of Government. There were two sorts of Persons charged: (1.) The Parliaments themselves. (2.) Those who stedfastly asserted the Power and Privileges of Parliaments, the Protestant Religion, and Liberties of the People, in opposition to Popery and Slavery.

(1.) These Parliaments were charged with a Design against his Majesty's Per∣son and Government. Now, Sir, let us know what ground you had to raise such a foul Report and Slander upon so considerable a part of the Legislative Power. I confess I can give no other name to these Proceedings of yours, than a Conspiracy to destroy the use of Parliaments: therefore had your Brother cal∣led another upon the Dissolution of the Oxford Parliament, all English Prote∣stants would have joined as one Man in humble Applications to that Assembly, that you and your infamous Crew might have a due Punishment for such scan∣dalous Reflections, and false Accusations of those Parliaments.

It is well known, Sir, notwithstanding your said usage of these Parliaments, that many of those honourable Persons, sent up to serve as Members of those Assemblies, had ventured their Lives, and lost their Estates in endeavouring to restore the Monarchy, in opposition to that very thing you charged them with∣al: Nay, they were all Lovers of Monarchy, not only upon true English Prin∣ciples, but from their own Inclinations; for deceive not your self, they had too sad experience of a Common-wealth, to be in love with that way of Govern∣ment, which they well knew was inconsistent with the Genius of this Nation, and that nothing more agreed with the Peoples Temper than a well-regulated Monarchy, as ours is by the fundamental Laws of the Realm; and if your Bro∣ther had but considered the Point, he could not have believ'd otherwise, than that they were not, nor could be true to the Monarchy, that joined with you and your Conspirators to subvert the Rights and Privileges of Parliaments.

(2.) The Parliaments not only lay under this filthy Calumny, but your Party did also traduce those brave Men that stedfastly asserted the Power and Privi∣leges of Parliament, the Protestant Religion, and the Liberties of the People,

as being in a Conspiracy against the King and Government: but 'tis plain that you knew not one Soul engaged in any such Conspiracy; if you did, why did you not (according to your Duty and Allegiance) discover them, that they might have been brought to Justice? If not, why was all that noise made of a Conspiracy against the King's Person and Government? But I believe you were afraid that your Folly as well as Knavery would have been manifested to the World, and your Malice too into the Bargain. Nay, Sir, let me tell you, that upon the Intimation given by your Devil's Bro••ers, and the special Direction of old Hodg the Fidler to your little Parasitical Clerks, the Pulpits rung with the noise of a Presbyterian Plot, in order to betray us into Popery and Arbitrary Power: for many, if not all, but especially those who made some sort of Figure in the Country, hung their Tongues, and set the tune of their Preaching to the humour of the Times, and like the Devil's Messengers, being instigated by your High Priests, all they preached was against the Dissenters, charging them with a Design to bring in a Common-wealth and Confusion.

But why was all this noise about a Prebyterian Plot? Come, I'll tell you the Reason: You may remember that your Popish Party were by me and others charg'd with a Hellish Conspiracy against the Person of the King, our Religion and Government, and the Lives of all the Protestants in England, and this prov∣ed against them to the satisfaction of all sober Men, as well by their own Papers as the Testimonies of several Witnesses; and finding all your devilish Arts and Practices could not bring your selves off from the Reproach you justly lay under, or the Punishment you must have suffered, had a Parliament been permitted to sit, you made this noise of a Dissenters Plot as your last Refuge, which you and your Crew said was against the Monarchy under pretence of prosecuting a Popish Conspiracy: And therefore with what Application did you form the Intrigue of the Meal-tub, and also those Shams of Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey's murdering him∣self, and Lord Howard's penning Fitz-Harris's Libel? all which discovered your Purposes, as well as your Disappointments at once.

Surely, Sir, your Party never considered what a notorious Scandal they en∣deavour'd to fasten not only upon the most considerable People of England, but the whole Kingdom, which you caused to suffer much in its Reputation abroad, as broken and divided against it self, and relapsing into Confusion and Anarchy. Nay, let me tell you, that you and your Party hereby brought your Brother, and his Government and Prudence under the greatest Disreputation: for must not our Neighbours stand amazed to see a King (restored by unanimous Consent, to the great Joy of the Nation) in so few Years lose that Esteem, Honour and Reve∣rence for so great a number of his Subjects as you had caused to be accused? What Nation would maintain an Alliance with such a King, who had so much sunk his Interest? How could they expect he should be able to support and an∣swer the ends of such an Alliance? Your great Ally the French King could not but laugh in his Sleeve, to see the Nation in such a Posture. Nay further, what Jealousies did you create in the Peoples Minds, so that the Popish Party were strengthned to destroy both Conformists and Nonconformists, who were both Hereticks to them? Hereby also that Impudent Tyrant the French King was em∣boldned to proceed in his Ravages upon his Neighbours Countries; and if your

Brother should have had the least Inclination to put a stop to this Nimrod, what a Condition would he have been in, since you and your French Pensioners had created such Feuds amongst us?

8. Another Evil happening upon the Dissolution of those Parliaments, was your Endeavours to perswade the People that they were in a secure State, with relation to their Religion, Laws and Liberties, that so the Nation might be a Prey to your Popish Crew. Now, Sir, how can your Party answer the so do∣ing, when we were in the midst of so many notorious Dangers? Do you not remember that four Parliaments had represented the manifold Dangers the Na∣tion was threatned with? And hath it not been one of the greatest Difficulties that ever a Nation groaned under, to preserve it self from your Popish Rage and Fury? Nay, all thinking Men judged it impossible: but God, with whom all things are possible, did the Work his own way, you know well enough, to your woful experience. I remember your Conspirators used to wipe their Mouths, and mimp them up with a maidenly God damme, the Nation was in no dan∣ger from the Popish Party, tho the King in several Proclamations had signified the same: and if your Rascals had not the manners to believe the Parliament, they might have believed the King, since he not only published his Proclamations to let the Nation know its danger, but also in divers Speeches to both Houses of Parliament acquainted them therewith; and upon the whole not only required their Advice and Counsel, but proposed that some effectual Laws might be made to prevent those Dangers and Mischiefs that then attended the Nation.

But, Sir, you and your Party may say, What danger could there be, since the Laws of the Land were the Rule of his Government? To which I answer:

(1.) Suppose K. Charles had all his days governed according to the Laws of the Land; was his having governed according to the Laws already, sufficient to discourage you and your Villains from plotting to destroy us? And when your Conspiracy was detected, did the King's governing according to Law re∣move the Fears we had of the Popish Party?

Object. But you will say, We had an ill Opinion of your Brother and his Govern∣ment, and thence came our pretended Fears and Jealousies.

Answ. Alas, Sir, you are mistaken, our Fears did not proceed so much from our ill Opinion of him, as from the sense we had of the implacable Hatred you and your villanous Popish Party had to him, and your Resolution to destroy him, because he made not such ha•••••• to destroy us as you would have had him. But suppose we had entertain'd all evil Opinion of the King, we had just Cause for it, he having left us in the hands of such as were so far from protecting the Nation, that not one Law made to preserve the Protestant Religion was put in execution: and you had so filled the Courts of Westminster-Hall with a Set of Rogues, that perverted the Law to the hazard of the whole Nation, that your Traitors esca∣ped those Punishments due to them for their many Treasons.

(2.) Could the Laws we then had (without some additional Provision) con∣tribute to our safety, since you were to succeed him? Were not you and your Party then the worst of Men to declare to the World, that we were in no danger, notwithstanding your vigorous Application to extirpate the Northern Heresy, which you were in a more effectual way to effect than ever? Hence may appear

the Malice of your Party in preaching Peace, when they were preparing to make War upon us.

I might enumerate other Evils that happened on Dissolving those Parliaments, but these at present shall serve, and therefore I come to the last Particular of the third Head of this Article, viz.

Sixthly; The foolish Pretences you and your Party made for procuring these 3 Parliaments to be dissolved in so reproachful a manner; all which prove you an Enemy to Parliaments, and that way of Governing. I pray, Sir, let me put you in mind that your Brother hated Parliaments mortally, which appears by his Let∣ter to the French King in June 1676. to this purpose, That if he could be assured of his Pension, that it might continue, he should not continue that way of Governing, (viz. by frequent Parliaments) which at the best was but a clamorous Rabble, that took up∣on them to direct Kings: but as he was resolved to be like his Neighbours in Riches and Grandeur, so he was resolved to be like them in Religion too. Thus it seems at the long-run you were both of a mind, except that he was not so hardy in observing his own word, to ruin the Nation all at once, as you were: and what your good∣ly Pretences were for Dissolving three Parliaments to effect the same, you have laid before you in these following Particulars.

1st. The first Pretence was their too vigorous prosecuting the Popish Plot. Now with what colour could you charge this upon them? for as I told you be∣fore, so I must again, that those Parliaments were composed of Men of as good Sense and Quality as any in the whole Kingdom, who proceeded and managed their debates with as great Moderation and Gravity as became their Place; if they went too far in any thing relating to that cursed Design, you might have instanced in the Particular, and not have suffered your Hell-born Crew to cen∣sure their whole Proceeding in it. But let me tell you, they were so far from going too far, that your Brother and you suffer'd 'em not to sit till they could do any thing considerable in any part of the Discovery. Now, Sir, let me ask you one Question; Why did not you and your Party rather fall upon the King and his Ministers for those Speeches and Declarations he made concerning the Po∣pish Plot, of which you shall have your full in its proper place? But pray observe.

(1.) Your Brother did frequently recommend the Prosecution of the Popish Plot to them with a strict and impartial Inquiry: and can you think that a Par∣liament, consisting of so many worthy Patriots, would be such Traitors to their King and Country, as not to comply in ••ome measure with his Commands, especially since in his Speech, Octob. 21. 1680. he used that prevailing Argument, That he neither thought himself nor them safe, till the Matter was gone through with. Was not the King's Person nor Government safe; and would you not have them zealous in inquiry into the said Plot, to prevent the threatning Dangers?

(2.) Did not your Brother in his Speech to his Parliament, April 30. 1679. assure them of his constant Care to secure our Religion for the future in all Events, and that in all things which concerned the publick Security, he would no•• follow their Zeal, but lead it? Therefore, Sir, you may see that by making this a Pretence for dis∣solving three Parliaments, you did fly in the very Face of the King and his lead∣ing Zeal to have that Plot discovered, and the Criminals brought to publick Justice.

2ly. A second Pretence you and your Banditti had for dissolving the three last Parliaments was, because they would give no Money for supporting the Alliance your Brother had made for preserving Christendom in Peace, and the keeping of Tangier: by which the Nation might see the true Reason for which those Parlia∣ments were called. The truth is, Sir, you had almost perswaded the King not to use that Parliament which sat down Octob. 21. 1680. and in order to that you made Application to the French King for a Sum of 300000 l. Sterling, and promised if your Brother was supplied with it, the Parliament should not meet. The French King agreed, and the Money was to be paid at two Paiments. Up∣on this the Parliament newly chosen in August 1679, was prorogued till Novem∣ber following; and your great Ally assuring your Brother of the Paiment of the Money, the Parliament was further prorogued till October 21. 1680. so that we had no Parliament sitting from May 1679, till October 1680. but the Duke of Buckingham, getting Intelligence of this Contrivance, and being in danger of his Life by the Subornation of a Villain, to whom he had given Bread, as also to his whole rascally Family, finding his Head must fly for it if a Parliament did not meet, makes a Journey over to France, and so prevailed with the French King, that the Money promised was not transmitted; so that of Necessity (not of Choice) you permitted your good Brother that one time to meet his People in Parliament.

Well then, Supplies were demanded to maintain the Alliance made for the Support of the General Peace of Christendom, the Preservation of Tangier, and for the Paiment of your Brother's Debts; and the Parliament would give no Mo∣ney. Come, Sir, a word or two to the point in general, and then I will descend to some Particulars.

1. What, would not the Parliament give Money to support the Alliances? I'll assure you they were a parcel of naughty Boys indeed to be so refractory. I pray, Sir, with whom were those Alliances made? with the Dutchess of Cleve∣land? Alas, pious chaste Lady, she had been a Cast-whore for several Years; the triple League between your Brother, her Grace, and Mother Knight, had been broke for many Years, and she had made a new Alliance with her good Confes∣sor the Archbishop of Paris, and had given him all she had for a Guaranty. What Alliances then were they? Were they new ones with the Dutchess of Ports∣mouth and Nell Waal? Truly your Band of Pensioners had so often supplied their extraordinary Occasions, that one would think they should not have asked any more; and if they knew not when they had enough, the Nation could tell them they had too much, and wanted nothing but an Apartment at a convenient Man∣sion-house in Tuttle-fields, and the civil Usage of that House once a Week or so, as the Ladies of their Profession use to be serv'd, as a just Reward of their Dili∣gence in their Calling. It may be, Sir, there were Alliances of another nature (as with Barillon your old Friend) that were to be supported: Alas the Parlia∣ment knew full well that your Brother and you could not want a Supply for such Alliances; and that rather than fail, you might have got a new Bill to have pas∣sed, Intituled, An Act to enter into an actual War with France, with which you might ha••e beg'd Money of the French King, as you did in 1678.

It may be you will say, They were Alliances your Brother had made for Pre∣servation

of the General Peace of Christendom. You say well; and it is a won∣der, since your Brother was graciously pleased to demand Money, that he was not as graciously pleased to tell the Parliament what those Alliances were. Sure∣ly, Sir, you did not expect a blind Obedience from that Eagle-ey'd Parliament, to contribute to the Support of what they were wholly ignorant of; or if they had had some Hints from the Court, it would not have been amiss to have used them as civilly as your Band of Pensioners were, and to have had those Alliances laid before them: those humble Curs never parted with Money for the support of Leagues, till acquainted with the Nature and Tendency of them. And if the Alliances were not designed for the end pretended, you might have asked Mo∣ney with as good Success for the two Whores at the lower end of the matted Gal∣lery, both Mistress and Woman, as for those Alliances.

Let me, good Sir, ask you one fair Question; Did your Brother expect Mo∣ney for these Alliances, and nothing else? and for once we will suppose Ports∣mouth and her Woman not to have had one Great, no nor Fitz-Harrris so much as a Sop in the Pan, tho he had a hopeful Plot upon the Stocks that deserved two, but that it should be applied only for Alliances made to preserve the General Peace of Christendom: truly then, ought not the Parliament to consider well of the General Peace it self, and its Influence upon our Affairs, before they came to any Resolution, or so much as to debate about it, since you had a Tool in the Ministry that told us, it was more fit for Meditation than Discourse; nay, he impudently said the Peace was but the effect of Despair, and I think he was not much out in it; but he might have been so honest as to have told us the true Cause of that Despair: yet for all his Worship's Rhetorick, the Nation learn'd by whose means they were reduced to so low a Thought of their Condition; nay, if that Loggerhead were alive, I could tell him what Price you and your Bro∣ther demanded of the Fr. King for that noble and most Christian piece of Service.

In a word, Sir, we had no reason to simper upon the Business, unless with the wrong side of our Mouths; for we could not sing any Tune but that lamen∣table one of a bad Market: we all knew the effect of this General Peace of Chistendom, that it was the Dissolving the Confederacy against the French King, the Enlarging his Dominions, and his gaining time to refresh his Souldiers almost harassed out of their Lives by long Service, the settling and composing the Minds of his Vassals at home, increasing his Fleet, and filling his Exchequer for new and greater Designs: but your Rogues, that were Pensioners to the French King, grew impudent upon it, and expected he might have a spare hour or so to assist you in ruining the Religion, Laws and Liberties of England, and to have fairly laid aside the use of Parliaments, and broke them up, as you would have done a Field-meeting in Scotland, or a private Conventicle in England, and treated them like Traitors and Villains, and not like the great Assembly and Wisdom of the Nation.

Was it the Alliance your Brother had made with the States General? Truly your Band of Pensioners had so stigmatized that, that neither the first Westminster nor the Oxford-Parliament would foul their Fingers with it, much less give any Money towards the Support of it; for the Pensioners, speaking modestly, could not believe it tended to the safety of the Nation. Truly I must look again,

and see what this new Alliance was; and, good Sir, I beg your pardon, it was a new Alliance with Spain: and would they not give Money to support this? Well, let us then see how the Case stood in relation to it.

I confess Alliances to a Parliament make a very pretty noise, and may be as diverting as ever old Hodg's Fiddle was to any of his Tory Gang. Indeed old England stood in need of some new Friends, being so beset with Enemies abroad, and with Pensioners to those Enemies at home: but what shall I say to this Point? When I view the Speech at the opening of that Parliament that sat down Octob. 21. 1680. there is nothing said of any new Ally, except the poor Spa∣niard, whose Affairs at that time, thro' the Defects of his own Government, and the villanous falseness of our Ministers, were reduced to such Extremities, that he might sooner have been a Burden to the Nation than a Help; unless you let us judg that this Name of a new League was necessary to recommend our Ministers to a new Parliament, and bubble our honest Country Gentlemen out of their Money: for by it we were like to have trouble enough, being to espouse, without any Limitation, all the Quarrels of the Spaniards, tho in the Philippina Islands and the West-Indies, or that he had drawn upon himself by any of his Barbarities there or elsewhere; nay, his difference with the Elector of Branden∣burgh was not excepted, tho all that Elector had done in Reprisals upon the Spa∣nish Ships for a just Debt often demanded in vain, was according to the Law of Nations, and the Rules of Justice: nay, Sir, we might have been engaged in his Quarrel with old Kate's native Country, which we ought to have had special regard of for the Blessing they sent us in 1662. And pray what was the Quarrel? Truly nothing but a treacherous seizing the Island of St. Gabriel, which the Por∣tuguese had peaceably enjoyed several Years; upon which you know Jack the Portuguese invaded some part of the Spanish Country. Also by virtue of this Alli∣ance we were even obliged to assist the Spaniard, in case of any disturbance in his own Dominions. You and your Brother were admirable good at secret Articles, and in one of those it is plainly expressed we were to furnish him 8000 Men for 3 Months; so that if he inclin'd to make his Subjects as great Slaves to the Crown as they are to the Church, our good King was to assist him in so good a Work.

Truly, Sir, when I reflect on Philip the Second's Barbarity to the People of the Low Countries, whom our Ancestors thought fit to succour, I could not but think this Alliance now under debate was for the Preservation of the Protestant Religion, and the Good of the Nation, because my Lord Hallifax and old Lau∣derdale told me so; and therefore (as the Stars would have it) it was not fit the League should be laid before the Parliament, lest they should think so too, and find a blind side or two in it; and think it would contribute but little to the Good of the Nation, or securing the Peace of poor Flanders. Well, Sir, your Cake proved Dough that bout, for there was Death in the Pot, a standing Ar∣my aimed at in England, that would not down with us at that time, of which you were to have been General, that would have done more good Business upon Hounslow-Heath than in Flanders, for they were not to help the Spaniard till the French had invaded them three Months, and it's well known he could then have been Master of a considerable part of that Country. But yet no Money came, nor can I help it if I should cry my Eyes out; let me therefore be a little more par∣ticular

with you, and ask two or three Questions; it may be we may find some Expedient they might have used to allay the matter on your side. Now sup∣posing this League the best that ever could be made, yet,

(1.) Had not the Parliament just Cause to be very jealous of your Brother's Sincerity in this Alliance, and the more because he would not declare what it was, nor suffer it to be laid before them? Therefore had it been the best in Christendom, nay as good as that between him, and Cleveland, and Mother Knight the Bawd, which he had broken for several years, or that that was then in being between Mrs. Portsmouth and her Woman Nell Waall; yet what could they say to such a League, or what Security could they have that it should be kept more than the Triple League, or that with the Prince of Orange, or that with the States General, which were all broken almost as soon as made?

(2.) The Parliaments of England had been ill used by you and your Banditti, and therefore you must allow this not to meet with that Temper you desir'd; who after they had heard of this Alliance, were not suffered so much as to have it laid before them to consider of, tho it had been before your Council at St. James's, and Barillon the French Ambassadour had perused it, and was privy to the secret Article in it, and had (not like a Man of Truth) given a Copy of it to one that let some have a sight of it. Surely, Sir, you and your Party could not but pro∣voke a Parliament by these Carriages; and how then could you expect Money to support this new Alliance?

(3.) I pray, Sir, how was it possible any good could come to Christendom in general, or to these Nations in particular, by this new Alliance? It is plain that all Christendom after the separate Peace with the Dutch, could not preserve Spain and the Spanish Netherlands from falling under the Dominion of the French King; how then could your Brother by this new Alliance be in a Condi∣tion to support them, without the Dutch, since by the help of you and your Traitors he brought this Nation into a distracted and deplorable Condition? Nay, Sir, one word more; What good could these Kingdoms expect by this Alliance, since thereby all the Hardships imaginable were put upon our Traders both to Spain and the West-Indies? and had that King been as able as willing, he would have let you known it 'ere this time.

(4.) Was it not unreasonable to ask Money for the support of this League, tho we suppose it the best that ever was made? Your Brother was the first King that ever asked Money to support Alliances. I have read of Kings, when by the Advice of Parliament they have made War upon any of their Neighbours, they have called for Money to carry it on with Vigour; but I never find any of our Kings that ever called for Money to support Alliances, especially when they were justly ashamed to declare what they were.

(5.) Again; Your Crew, I confess, at that time made a horrid noise about the Spanish Alliance, and wondered the Parliament would give no Money to maintain it: Alas, Sir, there was never yet an Alliance made with any State in Christendom, (if a good one) but would earn its own living, and therefore needed no Money to support it; if it were a bad one, I am sure it deserved none.

(6.) Once more, and I'll conclude this Point: since your Party made such a noise about the Spanish Alliance, pray, Sir, how was it kept? If my Memory

fails not, it was not over-well observed: for I think in 1682. your Ally the French King blocked up Luxemburgh; and in the year my Lord Russel was mur∣dered, took Courtray, one of the six Towns delivered up by the French to the Spaniard, and keeps it to this Day, as he doth Luxemburgh which he took by force in 1684. Now I do not find your Brother ever assisted this Confederate of his ac∣cording to the tenour of the Alliance, or as he was Guarantee in the Treaty of Aix la Chapelle, which in his excellent Declaration of War against the Dutch he declared he would maintain. Upon the whole, I see no reason why the Par∣liament should have given any Money to support this Alliance.

2. As the Parliament would give no Money for the support of this Alliance, so neither for the support of Tangier: this stuck mightily in your Stomach, and in the Maws of all your Party. Now, Sir, Tangier being most valiantly deserted, it deserves not to be mentioned; but because it so highly offended your Friends, who to this day mention it with reluctancy, I will say a word or two to it. It is some years since that the Commons of England (to the best of my remembrance 'twas in 1680) gave it a due Consideration; nay, they were so candid as to repre∣sent to the King how that important Place came to be in so miserable a Condition, after so vast a Treasure consumed to make it useful; and that nothing better could be expected of it, since it consisted most of Papists, and such as were Enemies to the Religion, Laws and Liberties of England. These Inconveniencies might have been redressed by your Brother, had he so pleased; and truly the Parliament advised him to it: nay, Sir, you may put on your Spectacles, and read the Ad∣dress of Parliament November 1680, wherein they promised to assist him in the Defence of that Place, if they might have a tolerable Security that any Supply for it should not be applied to augment the Strength of our Popish Adversaries, and to increase our Dangers at home from that villanous Faction: and could you with any reason blame them, since they had to their Sorrow seen Money imployed contrary to those Ends, for which given by your Band of Pensioners? But above all, the Popish Party's Insolencies, and the Impudence of those that espoused the French Interest, threatned the Nation with total Ruine at home; and therefore they judged it not prudence to leave the Consideration of England, to provide for Tangier, it looking like securing one single Cabin, whilst the whole Ship was on fire. Therefore to conclude this Head, let me ask you these plain Questions:

(1.) Whether it could be judged consistent with the Wisdom of a Parliament, that had seen the dismal Consequences of the Incouragement your Popish Party had received from your Brother and you, to give Money to supply a Garison, which was used to augment their Strength, and increase the danger of the Na∣tion? and whether you would not have laughed as much at them for such a Com∣pliance, as you did at your Band of Pensioners for giving 1250000 l. for the King's extraordinary Occasions in 1673, or for that vast Sum they gave for a War with France in 1678?

(2.) Had you not several Regiments in pay, besides the Guards, in Eng∣land, which might be transported and maintained as cheap there as here? and would it not have been more honourable for them to have been sent to Tangier, to have beaten the Moors, than to stay at home to beat their Landlords and Landladies in their Quarters?

(3.) Had you not a Company of Popish Gentlemens Sons to be imployed in that Service, whose Fathers were undone by the Supply they gave for maintain∣ing Liberty of Conscience, and the Dutch War, in order to destroy the Protestant Religion all over Europe? And could you and your Teagues think, on any rational ground, that ever a Protestant Parliament would give Money to preserve that Place, which was nothing else but a Nursery of Popish Officers and Souldiers? I believe your Popish young Gentlemen might want the Charity of those Imploy∣ments; but the Parliament had a foresight of the fatal Consequences that would attend the placing their Bounty upon such Vermin, who would have been ready to return home for those ends designed by you and your Council at St. James's.

3. The Parliament would not part with Money for Paiment of the Debt of the Exchequer to the Bankers, which your Crew urg'd did put your Brother out of a Possibility of supporting the Government: This is the Charge, and a heavy one too. Now what was this Government that was to be supported, but a par∣cel of nasty Whores, Pimps, Bawds, Informers, Suborners of Perjury, Murderers, and Thieves? This was your Government in your Brother's days, was it not? Nay, did he not consume more Money upon such Vermine in one year, than would serve the Government of England ten? Did the Credit of the Crown both at home and abroad depend upon Portsmouth's having 52000 l. Sterling a Year, and Nel Waal, for being Bawd in ordinary, getting 30 or 40000 l. in Mo∣ney, and other Cattle of the same Profession being maintained in all manner of Luxury, for no other merit but having had a hand in the ruin of the Nation? No, Sir, the Credit of the Government did not depend thereupon; the Parliaments did not settle Revenues, nor give Taxes for such Ends: but your Brother and you had advanced the Credit of the Government, if you had sent such Vermin to Bride∣wel, to have been set to work for their living, as Whores ought to be, and to have the Correction of the House, all Titles of Honour to the contrary notwithstand∣ing. Come, Sir, to be plain with you, the Honours of England are intrusted with the King, but were never designed for such Vermin as Portsmouth, that was but the Daughter of a poor French Fellow, or a Bastard of some Body, I name not who, nor to have whole Families advanced for providing or pimping another Man's Wife to be a Whore Royal, that has had no less (to speak modestly) than 20 Stallions to attend her, besides your dear Brother of blessed Memory.

Sir, it is certain, notwithstanding the noise your Party made of your Bro∣ther's being (thro' the Parliaments refusing to give Money) put out of a Possibi∣lity to pay his Debts, that he never would pay them, which was his Resolution: and therefore what Faith could be given to his Promises, tho he knew the Honour of the Nation would suffer highly in his taking up his Brother of France's Custom of not being a Slave to his Word? The truth is, had the People always been to pay his Debts, there might have been Taxes without end: this, Sir, your Band of Pensioners well knew, who therefore, as mercenary as they were, would never pay the Debt due to the Bankers: and the last Westminster Parliament, having so fair and fresh an Instance before their Eyes, and their Ears filled with the daily Cries of the Widows and Orphans, were obliged in duty to give a publick Cau∣tion to the People not to run again into the same Error, because they judged all Securities of that Nature absolutely void, and that no future Parliament could

without breach of Trust repay that Money that was at first borrowed to prevent the sitting of a Parliament. Thus I have gone through all the Particulars of the second Pretence, that is, that the Parliament would not supply your Brother with Money to support the Spanish Alliance, preserve Tangier, and to pay his Debts.

3ly. You had another Pretence for procuring those three Parliaments to be dis∣solved, viz. two Votes that passed the Commons Jan. 7. 1680. 1. That whoso∣ever should lend, or cause to be lent by way of Advance, any Money upon the Branches of the King's Revenue arising by way of Customs, Excise and Hearth∣money, shall be adjudged the hinderer of the sitting of Parliaments, and be re∣sponsible for the same. 2. That whosoever should accept or buy any Tally, or Anticipation upon any part of the King's Revenue, or shall pay such Tally here∣after to be struck, shall be adjudged to hinder the sitting of Parliaments, and be responsible therefore in Parliament.

Notwithstanding these Votes, you had a Rogue that rose from a Kitchin-boy to possess (as some say) 14000 l. per annum, of which he wronged the Nation, hav∣ing had the Opportunity to cheat three Governments, and suck their Blood, to whom the City of London ows much of her Misery; he, I say, furnished your Brother with Money in contempt of these Votes: but he has wiped his Mouth, and hugs himself, as if not one of the greatest Villains that ever England bore: I leave him, he was a Friend of yours, and you have reason to remember him. I remember the Votes very well, and certainly they were justifiable to the whole Kingdom: for consider a little, did you take the Revenue to be disposed of at your Brother's pleasure? Was it for his private use, or the publick Good? Sir, the Revenue the Parliament had fixed was a publick, not a private one: your Brother was trusted with the disposing of part only, and that not without the Advice of some of his great Ministers of State, as a Secretary of State, and the Lord Privy Seal, for smaller Sums; and for all great Paiments, the Lord Chan∣cellor, Lord Keeper, or Commissioners of the Great Seal, were to have been ad∣ded: the other part of the Revenue was assigned to other Uses; the Customs to the maintenance of the Navy. The Maintenance of the Household, the Tables at Court, and Wages of the King's Servants, were in our former Kings Reigns so established by Parliament, that the Cofferer had his Money paid him out of the Exchequer, under great Penalties to be inflicted for the neglect thereof; and the House of Lords judged it a great part of their immediate Care: It maintained the Dignity and Honour of the Government, and contributed much to Love and good Understanding between the King and People; no Countrey Farmer had Bu∣siness at Court, but he found those who bad him welcome, and so had all De∣grees; therefore the King's Servants had justly the same Return wherever they came: the outward Rooms of the House did not smell of Match, nor was the Language of the Court, Who goes there? there used to be the Smell of better Hospitality: this was plain even in your Father's time.

Besides, Sir, 'tis well known, that by the evil Counsel and Course your Bro∣ther and you took, you made the Bankers of London and elsewhere become the very Bane of the Nation; not only to the Gentleman and Farmer, but I doubt to the Merchant too, they raised and kept up the Interest of Money; they drained the Country, and bought Warrants, so that your Brother paid 25 per Cent.

for all his Expences. You know the Revenue was in many of its Branches ap∣propriated, and provision made that they should not be alienated: and if rascal∣ly Fellows that had decoyed into their Custody the ready Monies of Merchants, Gentlemen and others, did by the Strength of their Cash anticipate the Reve∣nues of the Government, who could have provided for the Nation? Could any but a Parliament do it? Now, Sir, it plainly follows, that if your Brother had found out another way to supply his Wants than by Parliament, the great hinge on which the Government turn'd was lost: therefore what ground you and your Party had to make this a Pretence to put off those Parliaments, especially the last Westminster-Parliament, I cannot tell; and how you could make them Crimi∣nals for these two Votes, I leave to the Judgment even of your ragged Ministry at St. Germains.

4ly. A 4th Pretence you had for dissolving the Parliaments aforesaid, was a Vote concerning Protestant Dissenters, That the Prosecution of Protestant Dissenters upon the Penal Laws, is at this time grievous to the Subject, a weakning the Protestant Interest, an Incouragement to Popery, and dangerous to the Peace of the Kingdom. This was the Vote of the Commons in the last Westminster-Parliament: Truly, Sir, they could not but pass the Vote as their Opinion, since they judged themselves invited to it by your Brother himself, who had often wished, whilst his Band of Pensioners sat, that he might be able to exercise a Power of Dispensation in refe∣rence to Protestants, who thro' the tenderness of a misguided Conscience did not conform to the Ceremonies, Discipline and Government of the Church; and promised he would make it his special Care to incline the Wisdom of the Par∣liament to concur with him in making an Act to that purpose. But, Sir, I know your Party usually said, that these Inclinations of the King lasted no longer than he had a Prospect of giving the Papists an equal Benefit of Toleration also: I doubt it was too true, and that they had that honourable Notion of the King from your sweet self; but whether true or no, I will not insist here, but shall only mind you, that your Brother after he parted with you, did on the 6th of March, in his Speech to the first Westminster-Parliament (after the disbanding your small Officers) express his Zeal not only for the Protestant Religion in general, but for a Union amongst all sorts of Protestants: and did he not command the then Tool of a Chancellor at the very same time to tell them, that it was necessary to distinguish between Protestant and other Recusants, between them that would destroy the whole Flock, and those that wander from it? I am much dispos'd to believe, and that on good ground, that your Brother was not sincere in the thing; yet whatever his Heart was in the Case, the following Parliament might justly incourage that Vote from the aforesaid Declarations.

You and your wicked Party, especially your Church-Bums, did attacque that last Westminster-Parliament, as if that Vote relating to Protestant Dissenters, was to shew that the Commons had in themselves a Power of suspending the Pe∣nal Laws established by the three States of the Realm, who yet said it was a Power not to be allow'd in the King, and caused to be cancelled all that he had done in relation to the ease of Dissenters from the Church of England: and if the King had not Power to suspend the execution of the Penal Laws, then had not they. To this I answer:

1. A few Years before that Parliament sat, your wicked Ministers did remember that the whole Nation was justly alarm'd upon the King's assuming to him∣self by their Advice an arbitrary Power of suspending the Penal Laws; upon this they thought it very popular to charge the House of Commons with an U∣surpation on that Attempt. Now, Sir, if they did by a Vote declare the Incon∣venience of prosecuting Protestant Dissenters at that time, or at any time here∣after, I cannot see where the Crime was, or of what Usurpation they stood guil∣ty, since they made the Vote for the very same Reason which your Brother had for expressing himself as he did in his foresaid Speech, supposing his Heart had kept pace with his Tongue: they had with great Trouble of Soul perceived that the Design of the Popish Party was not against any one Sort of Protestants, but against all; they were sensible what Advantages your Popish Crew had made of our Divisions, and observed with what Subtlety they had escaped Pro∣secution by the Laws in force against them, by fomenting our Jealousies: they saw the Strength and Greatness of the French King, and how his Interest had been advanced by your Brother and you, and judged of his Inclinations by his bloody Usage of his own Protestant Subjects: they considered the Number of the Irish Papists, and their bloody Principles and Practices, and what Conspira∣cies were formed in that Kingdom, and were ripe for Execution; and that Scot∣land was in the Hands of you and your Villains; and that you was the Head of the Popish and Popishly affected Party in the three Kingdoms: they had with Grief observed that all the Places of Trust both Civil and Military were in the Hands of the avowed Enemies of the Laws and Liberties of England; and notwith∣standing all the humble Addresses made to the King, and all his Proclamations for a strict Execution of the Penal Laws against Papists, yet your villanous Faction evaded those Laws, and went scotfree, and only the poor Protestant Dissenters smarted under their Severity.

The Case being thus, certainly that House of Commons had as much Reason to think of an Union amongst Protestants in 1680, as your Brother had (if ever he spake Truth) in 1679. And can you think they had any just Ground to believe that the Protestant Dissenters, whilst under such Pressures and Provo∣cations, should chearfully and couragiously undertake the Defence of their Countrey, since by it they had been, and then were so ill treated? Experience taught them it was in vain to force us to be of one Opinion, and therefore the Commons took a very probable way to unite us in Affection.

2. It is true, they made this Vote, not to arrogate to themselves a suspending Power, but to shew they had a repealing Power: They well knew that your busy Rascals would be striking whilst there were Weapons at hand; and therefore (that the Land might be in Peace) they designed to take away all Occasions of Provocation from each other, and resolved to take away those Penal Laws that occasioned them, and accordingly began with a Vote, declaring the Necessity of it; to which (if I am not much mistaken) there was not one Negative in the House: and a Vote of this nature did but precede the bring∣ing in a Bill for the Repeal of that, or those Laws they had voted grievous and inconvenient. With what Face could you or your Party revile a Parliament for so regular a Proceeding, according to the Custom and Usage of Parliaments?

How could you call the voting of a Law or Laws grievous and inconvenient, a suspending of Acts of Parliament, and charge them with Contempt of the Law established?

3. We will suppose the Commons did not intend to bring in a Bill to repeal the Laws then in force against Dissenters; for the Vote was not made to as∣sume a Power of suspending Acts of Parliament; neither did they require the Judges to forbear the Execution of them, who were bound to see them per∣formed; but they only delivered their Opinion as a Matter of great Concern in that Juncture: and notwithstanding the Noise your Cattel made, it was wise and pious Counsel; and tho it could neither command nor secure the Judges or Justices from doing their Duties, if required, yet we might have justly ex∣pected those that had the Management of Affairs to have hearkened in so plain a Case to the Voice of the Nation, or given them or other Parliaments a Mea∣sure how to confide in them: and the Judges and Justices, had they not received Direction from your Brother and you, were in Discretion and Conscience as much obliged to omit the Execution of those Laws, as that of Bows and Arrows, and several other Statutes, then, if not still in force, but out of Use.

If our Ceremony-mongers had but given themselves leave to think, and their Romish Zeal would have let them remembred they were obliged to put on Bowels of Compassion, they would have found their Proceedings against their Protestant Brethren could not be justified either by Scripture, or the Practice of the Primitive Church, where nothing was so common as different Rites and Ce∣remonies, nay Doctrines amongst them, and yet the Band of Charity and Love maintained; and Christians never learnt to persecute, till Wealth and Secular Power did attend Religion, and the Prince and Church made use of each other to enslave the World.

4. Had not the Parliament reason to make that Vote (charge them with what Usurpation you please) since it was your constant Practice to inflame the Differences you had made, thereby to betray us into the Religion of Rome, and the Government of the French King? therefore the united Strength of all Pro∣testants was little enough to withstand you. I pray let me ask you one Question, why might not a Parliament attempt to make Abatements in the Terms of Conformity, or dispense with the Ceremonies of the Church, when those Ce∣remonies, the Form of Worship, and the very Hierarchy it self could plead no other Authority by which they are enjoined than some Acts of Parliament? Nay Sir, the Commons saw there was a Necessity of passing this Vote, for your Po∣pish Crew had poxt a Number of Men that pretended to be so zealous for the Protestant Religion, that nothing could serve the turn for its Preservation but a Popish Head; and tho the sorry Rogues were a Disgrace to any Religion, yet they were so dangerously infected, that they thought the Dissenters were equal∣ly, if not more dangerous than the Papists to the Government, tho they well knew the Dissenters had never sworn to any foreign Jurisdiction or Power. The Parliament therefore seeing such a Division made in order to weaken our Hands, and make us a Prey to your Teeth, made this Vote in order to strengthen the Protestant Interest, by which they manifested a Resolution of repealing those Laws that were used as Scorpions by our Clergy-men and scoundrel Justices to destroy their quiet and peaceable Neighbours.

5. A fifth Pretence starts up in your Vindication, and pricks up its Ears; one would have thought some Countrey Vicar in his Study over the Oven had con∣trived and sent it up to you sweetly drest; and it struts so daintily, that I must not let it go without its due Consideration: What is it then? truly the House of Commons issued out Arbitrary Orders for taking Persons into Custody for Matters that related not to Privileges of Parliament: Truly this is a pretty sort of Pretence, surely the Parson's Wife or Daughter had a Hand in finding this Business out; but it shall have its due Weight, and therefore I shall say these three things.

1. We will suppose they did issue forth Orders for taking Men into Custody for Matters that had no relation to Privileges of Parliament; yet that House of Commons might have had this to say for themselves, that they had erred with their Fathers; the Power of that House concerning taking Men into Custody had not then, nor to this Day has received an exact Adjustment, and therefore wants not Precedents of the like Nature; and if they were Arbitrary Orders, they were such as had been executed by Parliaments many a fair Year before your Sires of the antient Kingdom of Scotland were born: and since Orders of the same nature had been made by Parliaments in the times of our antient Kings, these Orders might have been passed by, and not branded with the reproachful Name of being Arbitrary.

2. Tho we have supposed that the Commons might issue out those Orders, yet they took none into Custody by such Orders but what might well be suppo∣sed guilty of Breaches of Privilege in the highest Degree: the Truth is, when Parliaments met annually, or at least frequently, we find few or no Com∣plaints; but when they were not frequent, but there were long Intervals of Parliament (the Consequence of which was long sitting, which began within these two hundred Years) there were some Complaints of the Breaches of Pri∣vilege, as in the time of Hen. 8. the 4th of Edw. 6. and in the time of Q. Eliz. when the Justice of the Commons hath been applauded by our former Kings for asserting their Privileges, and not stigmatized for exerting an Arbitrary Power. 'Tis true, the most notorious thing that could be fixed upon that House, was the Fees extorted by the Serjeant of the House, who tho he attends the House of Commons, yet he ought to have considered that he was the King's Officer, and by Law no Officer of the King's shall take any Fee or Reward for doing his Office but what he receives from the King, upon Penalty of returning double to the Plaintiff, and being further punished at the Will of the King; but of this you and your Party took no notice, because the then Serjeant was a Creature of your own, tho I think he smarted for it, and your Brother laughed at his Ca∣lamity in the Case of an Under-Sheriff of Norfolk. Therefore I say, that to assert that their Orders that were made for the taking Men into Custody were for Matters that had no relation to Privileges of Parliament, was an impudent Lie; for there were a Number of Men, who to distinguish themselves from the rest of their Countrey, had basely given their Hands for Abhorrences of Par∣liaments, and of those who most humbly petitioned for their sitting in a time of such extream Necessity: their Names I will give, that you may put a Mark of Favour upon those of them that are alive, whenever they shall have occasion to

meet you at St. Germains. You may remember that House did fall upon such as had countenanced the Popish Plot, and were Abhorrers of petitioning for the sitting of Parliaments, and voted that it was and ever had been the undoubted Right of the Subjects to petition the King for the Calling and Sitting of Parlia∣ments, and Redress of Grievances; and that to traduce such Petitioning as a Vi∣olation of Duty, and to represent it to his Majesty as tumultuous and seditious, is to betray the Liberty of the Subject, and contributes to the subverting the an∣tient and legal Constitution of this Kingdom, and introducing Arbitrary Power. The first that fell under these Votes was Withens, that was knighted for his Ab∣horring, and after made a Judg; he was expelled the House, and voted a Be∣trayer of the undoubted Rights of the Subjects of England, and received his Sentence at the Bar of the House; he is yet alive: I suppose he and his Brother Jenner may set up at St. Germains for Expounders of our Law in good time. The next was Sir George Jefferies, then Recorder of London, against whom they voted an Address to the King to remove him out of all publick Offices, and that the Members which served for the City should communicate the Vote to the Court of Aldermen. There were several others that upon the same Account were taken into Custody, as Sir Giles Phillips, Mr. Coleman, Capt. William Castle, Mr. John Hutchinson, Mr. Henry Walrond, Mr. William Stawel, Mr. Thomas Herbert, Mr. Sheridon, and Parson Thompson of Bristol. And because Sir Francis North the Chief Justice of the Common-pleas, advised and assisted in drawing up a Procla∣mation against petitioning for the sitting of the Parliament, the Commons vo∣ted it a sufficient Ground to proceed against him for high Crimes and Misdemea∣nours: the like Vote passed against Sir Thomas Jones one of the Judges of the King's Bench; and upon Sir Richard Weston one of the Barons of the Exche∣quer: but they went higher with Scroggs, for they impeached him of High Treason for discharging the Grand Jury of Middlesex before they had finished their Presentments, and for the Order made in the King's-Bench against Care's Pacquet of Advice from Rome, That it should be no more printed or published by any Person.

Well, Sir, what say you now to these Vermine? Those now alive are still the same Rogues, and your very humble Servants and Admirers; and I could wish you had them with you at St. Germains, being pretty Company, and worthy of your Favour: indeed to give them their Due, they have been pretty false in their Oaths to King William, whom some of your Party stile Prince of Orange. These were the Men that House of Commons did censure: I pray, Sir, on with your Spectacles, and see whether the Crimes they were guilty of had no Rela∣tion to Privileges of Parliaments; surely your Friends, when they charged the House of Commons with this Crime, were not in good earnest; if they were, they shall have a Rowland for their Oliver; I'll be in good earnest too, and let them know, that if the Privileges of Parliament be concerned when an Injury is done to a particular Member, how much more when they strike at Parliaments themselves, and endeavour to wound the very Constitution? Nay in the Case of Sheridon, who afterwards troubled the Nation with a Litter of scandalous Pamphlets upon that Account, 'tis plain that his Commitment was only in order to examine him about the Popish Plot, and his Endeavours to stifle it. Do not

you know that Sheridon? Say you never did; yet let me tell you it was you in∣structed him how he should behave himself to the House; whose Behaviour in∣deed was with as much Contempt and Insolency, as if you or your Father had been demanding some of the Members; and therefore they had reason surely to commit him. Thompson you know him too very well, he was zealous in di∣vers Breaches of Privilege to serve you and the Popish Party, witness his Usage of poor Bedlow and the rest of the Discoverers of the Popish Plot; yet his Com∣mitment was only in order to an Impeachment; and as soon as they had gone through with his Examination, he was set at Liberty, giving Security to answer the Impeachment they had voted against him. But,

3. What if the Matters upon which the House of Commons did commit Men were not relating to the Privilege of Parliament, and had been without Prece∣dent, yet you and your Crew carrying on a Design to root out the Protestant Re∣ligion, in which you had engaged your Brother, which was a Plot without Prece∣dent, why might not the House of Commons proceed against the Abettors of it without Precedent? Other Parliaments, before you were born, had made Prece∣dents for particular Offenders, and why might not that Parliament without ask∣ing your Leave? If it be in the Power of one Parliament to make Precedents, why not in another? I am sure there was as much Occasion for new Precedents in that House of Commons as ever in any. Your mealy-mouth'd Cattel used to wipe their Mouths, and say, they were as great Lovers of Parliaments as any Men, but thought it strange that the Commons should be so zealous against Ar∣bitrary Power in the King, and take such a Latitude to themselves. These Hogs-heads have their Buts, a Parcel of Coxcombs that would not consider under what Circumstances the then House of Commons lay: there was a Plot laid before them for the bringing in of Popery and Arbitrary Power, and to kill the King; and that it was a Plot, and a villanous one, none yet could with any Sense or Reason deny, but such Rogues as were either in it, or Well-wishers to it. When the Commons came to consider of this devilish Conspiracy, they found Criminals that had been by a side-Wind Abettors of it, and others that had been Sinners above the common rate; therefore they were forced to take a Latitude in their Dealings with them, that the Nation might not be undone by them: and where there were Criminals of this Standard, certainly a House of Com∣mons, if they could not find Precedents how to manage such unruly Monsters, might make some, in order to tame them. Sir, I could give Instances of such Precedents made by former Parliaments; and if that House of Commons made new Precedents, they did but follow the Steps of their Predecessors, who made Precedents as the Necessity of Affairs required; and if the House of Commons had not taken such Courses, they had betrayed their Trust, if by those Prece∣dents (whether new or old) they had not asserted the Rights of those that sent them thither. Now what becomes of this your Pretence of illegal and arbitrary Orders in Matters not relating to Privileges of Parliament, for which you pro∣cured their Dissolution?

6ly. A sixth Pretence for dissolving that Parliament, was for their Addresses to the King, which I am sure were with all the Duty and Humility that could be; nevertheless to allenate the King from them, you and your Party called them

Remonstrances rather than dutiful Answers to those Messages sent them by the King. Surely, Sir, it was a strange Age in which that Parliament sat; and they could not but judg themselves under very unhappy Circumstances, when notwithstanding their extreme Caution and Prudence, yet all was under an ill Construction at Court. Now if the Commons had returned Answers to his Majesty's Messages, without shewing on what Grounds they proceeded, they had been (and that justly too) accused as Men proceeding peremptorily and with∣out Reason; but when they expressed with all becoming Modesty the Reasons of their Resolutions, they were accused of Remonstrating. But what if we should give your Ministers at St. James's, and your Brother's at White-Hall this Word, and so I will for once, if those of them that are alive will but tell me what they understoood by that Word, and with what Crime they would charge that House of Commons; for my part I am at a Loss in the Point: perhaps Portsmouth and Barillon that understood French might have given you the Meaning of the Word Remonstrance, and it may be told you there was some pernicious thing in it, as the Carnegey, or some Pox like it, and therefore it might preju∣dice your Brother, as it had done you, you know when; take it so, and much good may it do you: but if by Remonstrance you mean a declaring the Causes and Reasons of what they were doing, where was the Fault that was so unwor∣thily imputed to them, since it was a way they learned from your own Brother in his Messages to his former Parliaments? This is another Pretence much of the same Value with the rest, and so let them go together.

7ly. A seventh Pretence you had for dissolving that Parliament, was the falling foul upon several of your Friends, and giving them their due Character; the Mi∣nisters at White-Hall would never forgive the last Westminster Parliament for the Vote passed upon some Men then much in fashion at yours and your Brother's Courts, which gall'd you to the Heart and Soul: truly I would not have you think this a Character the House of Commons only had fixt upon them; no, every honest Man had done it long before, the whole Current of their Lives, Practices and Counsels, being a full Proof of that Charge: Therefore why did your Paltroons call these Votes illegal? Was it illegal for that Parliament to im∣peach Persons that were Enemies to the King and Kingdom, or to determine by a Vote who were wicked Counsellours, and did deserve to be impeached, so to find out the Sense of the House?

But since you are my old Friend, my never-failing Friend, and upon that Con∣sideration I have an old Kindness for you and your Party, I will with you sup∣pose the Votes that passed against those Beasts of Prey, were not in order to an Impeachment; yet still there was nothing of Illegality in them, nor nothing ex∣traordinary: for the Commons in Parliament have always had two Ways of delivering the Countrey from such Vermine, either to bring them to a publick Trial, that they may have publick Justice done upon them, or give the Rogues an ill Name in an Address to the King, that the Court and Council may not be plagued with such Rubbish; and hereby the Countrey will know them again, and treat them accordingly. You were very tender of the Lives and Liberties of these Favourites, and so was your Brother; but I conceive their Lives and Liberties were never in danger till they had forfeited them, and the Forfeiture

could not appear till they had received a fair Trial: Now, Sir, it's plain they durst not stand one, unless it were a Trial of Skill whether the Parliament should sit and see Justice done, or be dissolved and the Nation undone: this was the Trial they were in danger of, and no other; for that was concluded on by the King and Barillon in the Lodgings at the lower end of the matted Gallery. But suppose their Lives and Liberties had been in danger by an Impeachment, there was just Cause for the Parliament's proceeding that way with those Traitors; and if they had been but endowed with Courage to have stood Trial, there would have been legal Evidence to have proved the Matter of Fact upon them, that they were Enemies to the King and Kingdom; but if there was not Evi∣dence, truly then they had been acquitted with more Honour to themselves and Families than they acquired by sending home that Parliament. Again, Sir, do but consider a little, and set your own Mother-Wit at work, and you will find that a Parliament may act as the great Council of the King, and the Wisdom of the Nation (I use your Brother's own Phrase) and when they saw Affairs ill ad∣ministred, and their Advice rejected, the Course of Justice perverted, the King's Counsels betrayed, Grievances multiplied, and the Government it self managed in a most weak and disorderly Manner, who should they have charged? the King? No, you will say he could do no Wrong: Who then should they accuse, but those that had the Administration of Affairs, that had the King's Ear, as the villanous Authors of those Evils that hung over our Heads? And ought they not to have applied themselves to the King by humble Addresses to remove such Persons from his Presence and Councils for ever? You may say they had no Testimony against them; you know to the contrary: but suppose they had not legal Proof, yet you know to your woful Experience there were many things plain and evident even beyond the Testimony of Witnesses; so that it was im∣possible as well as unnecessary to have had legal Proof. What if it was your Brother's Pleasure to hear those Villains? was it therefore unlawful for the Commons to conclude that all the Evils the Nation groaned under came from their wicked Advice and Counsel? and then might they not represent those things to the Nation, that it might appear they had not been negligent in mak∣ing Inquisition after those Men, who had been for several Years carrying on their wicked Designs with you and your Popish Party? They imagined to secure themselves by whispering in the King's Ear: What then? must not a Parlia∣ment inquire into the Names of these Whisperers? and tho they had not legal Proof to make these Men publick Examples, yet they had so much Certainty of the Matter of Fact, as was Ground enough to stigmatize them as Promoters of the French Interest, and Enemies to the King and Kingdom.

Come, Sir, to be plain with you, the People of England were highly in∣terested in all those great Officers of State; and as they were your Brother's Servants, so they were Servants to the whole Kingdom: therefore who should have detected the Treachery and Villany of those Servants but their Represen∣tatives in Parliament, whose Business it was to represent all the Nation's Grie∣vances to the King? Certainly such a Representation ought to have been esteem∣ed by him worthy of Consideration, and not to have treated them as having made illegal Votes: but this you and your Brother made a Pretence for dissol∣ving

that Parliament, and preferred your secret Counsels before the publick Council of the Kingdom. In a word therefore, to conclude this Head, let me tell you in all Faithfulness, that those Votes your Party was pleased to term strange and illegal, were not so strange as honest, and not illegal, but very righteous: The House of Commons had before addressed the King for their re∣moval from his Person and Councils, but he was graciously pleased to take no no∣tice of their Addresses, tho made with all Humility and Duty; nay, Sir, he was so far from that, that it was observed even by that House of Commons, and many other sober Men, that an Address from the Commons against any evil Man at Court, was a fore-runner of his being preferred to a Place of greater Profit or Honour, if not both; it proved so thrice to that old Traitor Lauder∣dale: and on the other hand, if those three Parliaments had addressed on behalf of any Man, he was sure to receive no Favour, and came off very well if he was not mark'd out for some Vengeance. Now I think it no Crime to tell you, that your Brother ought not to have entertained any of those Vermin after they had a Blast of angry Breath from that or any other House of Commons: for cer∣tainly if a House of Commons declar'd any number of Men, Persons that put the King upon Arbitrary Counsels, or Betrayers of the Interest of the Nation, there needed no Process of Law and Legal Proof against them before they are dis∣missed, tho it was but reasonable if they had proceeded against them, in order to fine, imprison, or put them to death: but to remove them from the King, cer∣tainly the Advice and Opinion of the Nation by their Representatives was e∣nough; if not, you would have allowed them time to act their Villany to the Hazard of the Government it self: and till this was done, with what face could your Brother expect Supplies from the Parliament? Your Cattel at St. Germains can tell you, there are some things so reasonable, that they are above any written Law, and will at all times have their Effect in despite of all Power on Earth, whereof this was one: so that from the whole Matter, this Pretence of yours falls to the Ground with the others before named.

8ly. Your eighth Pretence was the Parliament's Behaviour in the Case of Fitz-Harris; and this was rendered a very hanious Crime, and just Cause hereby was given to your Brother and you to send that Parliament packing, which accord∣ingly after 8 days sitting was dissolved for no other reason, but because the House of Commons impeached him of High Treason. Truly, Sir, I'll appeal to Jack Caryl, or any of your ragged and outlawed Crew at St. Germains, whether that House of Commons had not reason to judg the Treasons of that wretched Man of such a nature as to deserve Examination in full Parliament; and the reason was as plain as the Sun at noon-day, if you but remember that this Fitz-Harris was one of your own dear Religion, and an Irish Teague, and appeared to the House of Commons, as made use of by you know who, to set up a Counterfeit Protestant Conspiracy, in order to stifle the Popish Plot, and to destroy those worthy Patriots who had kept their Consciences chaste, and had not bowed the Knee to Rome and France, and betrayed the Interest of their Countrey for Prefer∣ments at Court. There had been many such polite Designs on foot before (a Particular of which you shall have in its proper place) but they proved abor∣tive; but your principal Conspirators avoided the Discovery, as others had the

Punishment, in what manner, and by whose assistance, the Nation was then very sensible: but your Villains being warned by their ill Success in former Shams, grew more cautious; and therefore, that this damnable Treason might not look like a Popish Design, your Tools by your Appointment composed a Libel full of the most bitter Invectives against Popery and your sweet self; this Libel car∣ried as much Zeal for the Protestant Religion as ever your Declaration, penn'd by your quondam Servant St. Coleman, did; and had as much concern for our Laws and Liberties, as Portsmouth, Nell Waal, or Barillon could have for their Lives. Notwithstanding all this, you may remember how it inveighed against the King with all the bitterness imaginable, and incited all Men to rebel against him, in order to destroy his Person and yours. This Paper, as villanous as it was against the King, was by him, Portsmouth, and her Bawd Nell, and Barillon, ordered to be conveyed into the Pockets and Lodgings of several Noblemen, Gentlemen, and others, that (when they were seized, and this found upon them) they should be charged with Treason and Rebellion, and the finding of this upon them should be a Proof of the same. The Tool that was to carry on this Roguery was Fitz-Harris, who was to be one of the Witnesses to swear this Conspiracy designed by the Protestants: and your Conspirators had prepared the Business to be laid in Oxford-shire, Buckingham-shire, and Bark-shire, that this Villany might not miscarry, but be believed by the Juries that should be pack'd in those Counties, in order to a speedy Justice upon the pretended Criminals. But, Sir, as well laid as this Design was, it proved to be a Brat of Popish Extraction, and the Midwives were that Whore Portsmouth and trusty Nell her Bawd, with whom you would have engaged in Person, had not the Catholick Cause called for your Presence in Scotland: but I suppose, let who will believe it that you know nothing of the Bu∣siness, I shall prove you in it in its proper place.

Well then, the nature of the Crime, and the King your Brother, Barillon, and the two Strumpets aforenam'd being engaged in this piece of Villany, and seve∣ral great Persons being to be destroyed, surely deserved an Inquiry, which an Oxford-Jury neither could or would ever make; for they, it may be, in the Multi∣tude of their Mercies, would have dealt with other Protestants as they did by poor Colledge, whom they basely murdered, to please your Brother and you. That House of Commons, as if endowed with a Prophetick Spirit, unanimously agreed that none but the Parliament was capable of looking into the bottom of this Affair, both in its Original and Tendency; and the more zealous they were for that, the more they saw the Zeal of the Judges, and the inferiour Courts in Westminster-Hall, abated in relation to the Popish Plot, and its Discovery, but heightned for you and your Party against the Protestants; and that those Blood-hounds thirsted after their Blood, that asserted the Laws and Liberties of England. Truly, to speak the best I can of those Judges, they were much changed for the worse, as appeared in the Trials of Wakeman, Gascoyne, and others that were in the Popish Conspira∣cy; and in good truth, Sir, the Oxford House of Commons were the more jea∣lous: and could you blame them? for when this Fitz-Harris was sensible of his Crime, or at least of his Danger, and had begun to tell Tales, he was removed out of the Legal Custody of the Sheriffs, and illegally committed close Prisoner to the Tower, to the great astonishment of all sober Men. That Parliament

therefore had no other way to have the Prosecution effectual, and the Judgment according to the Laws of the Land, and that Fitz-Harris should not lie under any hopes, but by impeaching him; for they well knew that no Pardon could stop their Sail, tho it might the King's. Now, Sir, consider how this Pretence of yours could justify the Dissolution of that Parliament.

9thly. The last Pretence I shall mention which you had for dissolving the three last Parliaments, was their bringing in a Bill to exclude you, and to render you incapable of inheriting the Imperial Crown of this Realm. This was the best Pretence you and your Party could make for doing so wicked a thing, so perni∣cious to the Peace of the Kingdom: but if I destroy this Goliah, I trust you will quit it, and let it take its fate with the others. There were many of your Par∣ty that used several Arguments against that Bill, which I shall take notice of.

1. The Conspirators did impudently assert, that the Bill of Exclusion was unlawful, and therefore in it self null and void, especially since the King had de∣clared against it. Some of them were pretended Protestants, and had been for some time educated in the University under a Parcel of High-church-Logger∣heads; they, even they were tainted with this Notion, that was fit for none but such as believed Transubstantiation. Now, Sir, if it were against Law, it must be against a written or an unwritten Law: if it were against a written Law, your Party should have named it; which when they had done, they should have named that Parliament that ever was bound up by any written Law, if we take them in their Legislative Capacity, as we must do in this Case: and to declare that a Parliament is bound up by written Laws in their Legislative Capacity, is both destructive and absurd.

(1.) It was destructive; the Parliament being the fundamental Court and Law of the Kingdom, and ordained to make Laws, and see them executed, or to supply their Deficiency according to the present Exigency, for Preservation of the Peace and Safety of the People, which is universally in them, but not so in particular Laws and Statutes, which cannot provide against future Exigencies as the Law of Parliaments doth, and therefore were not Limits to those Parlia∣ments: and it would have been farther destructive, by depriving those Parlia∣ments of half their Power at once, whenever they should be circumscribed by written Laws in their Legislative Capacity, which is a peculiar Property belong∣ing only to inferiour Courts of Law and Justice, but not to the Parliament of England, which is the Supream Court, but must have ceased to be so, and have divested it self of that inherent and uncircumscribed Power, which the Safety of the People comprehends and requires.

(2.) It was absurd in the Conspirators to urge that the Bill of Exclusion was against Law, and therefore null and void of it self: for the Legislative Power of Parliament is to give Laws to England, and not to receive any, saving from the Nature and End of their own Constitution; which as they give Parliaments a Being, so the Parliaments make Laws for Preservation of themselves, and the whole Kingdom they represent.

As for your unwritten Law, it is to me like your unwritten Verities in the Church of Rome, and the paltry Ceremonies of a Church, that cannot be pro∣ved lawful either from the Command of Christ, or the Practice of his Apostles:

if therefore by unwritten Law, you mean Custom of Inheritance, that's against your Party by the Practices that have been both at home and abroad; or if you mean the Equity of the thing, then the Parliament in their Legislative Capacity were Judges of that; or if you mean Prudence, the Parliament being the Wis∣dom of the Nation, are certainly Judges of that also.

From all which it undoubtedly follows, that the Proposal of a Bill to exclude you from inheriting the Crown of this Realm was in it self lawful, because of the uncircumscribed Power of Parliaments in judging what is lawful, and what is necessary for the Safety of the People, by whom they are sent to Parliament for redress of Grievances; which no written Law could provide against in an uni∣versal way. So then it being lawful in it self to propose a Bill to exclude you from the Crown, the doing it after your Brother had signified his Pleasure against the Bill, could not make it against Law: for I remember no Law written or un∣written, that ever constituted him Lord of the Articles upon the Parliament, which they were to debate and propose, or not: But what was his Will and Pleasure, or the Pleasure of two or three Villains and Whores that joined with him in usurp∣ing such a Power, altogether strange to our English Constitution of Parliament? And I must tell you, your Brother's intolerable Stiffness in that Particular I can∣not think was out of Kindness to you, or from any suspicion he had of the Dan∣ger of the English Monarchy by such a Law, but from the Influence of some ill Men engaged in the Conspiracy with you to destroy that Constitution; who knowing your Brother's Inclination in that Particular as well as yours, made it their Business to nourish in your Absence a Misunderstanding between him and the People, whom you and he mortally hated, justly fearing if he should ever have come to the due Temper of an English Monarch, and to have a Sense of the Peoples Affection to him as the Father of the Kingdom, he would have deliver∣ed up you and your Rogues, who had infected him with that deadly Notion, that the Interest of an English Parliament was not only distinct from, but oppo∣site to his Interest and Designs.

2. Your Conspirators used to urge another Argument against the Bill of Ex∣clusion (no doubt your own first, or they would never have presumed to use it so long till it was become thredbare) viz. that the King could not comply with the House of Commons in it, tho the Interest as well as the Desire of the Peo∣ple of England, because it so nearly concerned him in point of Honour, Justice and Conscience. Your Brother and you were both Men of Honour, Conscience and Justice, of which you both made this Nation sensible. Well, since it was so, let me argue upon the Topicks of Honour, Justice, and Conscience with you: Had it not been honourable in your Brother to be true and faithful to his Word and Oath, to keep and maintain the Religion and Laws established? Nay, Sir, could any Man have thought it dishonourable in him to have loved the Safety and Welfare of his People, and the true Religion established amongst them, above the temporal Greatness of his Relations? Was it not just, in conjunction with his Parliament for his Peoples Safety, to make use of a Power warranted by our English Laws, and the Examples of former Ages? Or where was his Justice, that was the Father of his Country, to expose his Children to ruin, out of Fond∣ness to a perverse Brother; and to abandon the Religion, Laws and Liber∣ties

of these Kingdoms, which he was sworn to maintain, and expose them to the Rage of you and your traiterous Jesuits, who thought your selves in Con∣science bound to subvert them? Your Brother by his own, might have remember∣ed your Religion; and what your Brother's Conscience was in relation to your Succession, a cunning Man could scarce find out: but if he had been a Protestant, I might have asked, what Conscience obliged him to ascend the Throne to over∣throw the Protestant, and set up the Popish Religion? ••ir, since your Brother insist∣ed so much upon Honour, Justice and Conscience, I'll say of him, as I ought, that he was a Papist; yet I am sure he was bound in Honour, Justice and Conscience, to have preserved to the People of England their Religion, Laws and Liberties, and in con∣junction with this Parliament to have secured them from being subverted by you and your Followers, since with•••• much Duty and Affection they recalled him from a miserable Banishment, attended with Poverty and Dishonour, and chearfully placed him upon the Throne, and enlarged his Revenue above what any of his Predecessors had enjoyed, and gave him vaster Sums in 20 Years than had been given to all the Kings since William the Norman. Where then was his Honour, Conscience and Justice, in leaving them to be destroyed by you? It cannot be said he had therein more regard to the Government than to the Person that suc∣ceeded him, seeing if he had passed the Bill of Exclusion, he had no ways preju∣diced the legal Monarchy, which he did enjoy with all those Rights, Prerogatives and Powers which his Ancestors did ever claim, besides what he usurped against Law, which yet the People quietly submitted to.

3. A third Argument your Party used, was, That it was a hard Case that a Man should lose his Inheritance because of this or that Perswasion in Matters of Religion. Truly, Sir, had your Case been only so, I should have thought your Argument pretty strong: but alas, Popery was not in you and your Conspira∣tors, an innocent Perswasion of Men differing from others in religious Matters, but a real Conspiracy against Christianity it self; nor was this Inheritance your Cattel used to mention, a bare Inheritance of a private Person, without the Consideration of an O••••••ce annexed to it, which required you to be Par Officio. I pray what did your Logger-heads mean, when they made such a Noise about an Inheritance? nothing less than a Government of three Kingdoms, the Pro∣tection of several Nations, the making of War and Peace for them, the Pre∣servation of their Religion, the disposal of all publick Places and Revenues, the Execution of all Laws, with many other things of the greatest Importance. Truly, Sir, these inconsiderate Persons were mightily out in their Claim: for the three Parliaments had reason to look about them, when they had reflected upon the Bloody Tenets of the Church of Rome, and more particularly upon the hellish Conspiracy then discovered, and at that Time carrying on with Vi∣gour by your Popish and Popishly affected Traitors: and finding you to be the avowed Head of this devillish Party, could you with any Justice think they should not prevent as much as in them lay your being a Shepherd, since you had declared your self a Wolf? And since you were a Papist, how could they believe you would ever appear in the Defence of the Protestant Religion? I think this may suffice for this Argument.

4. A fourth Argument against the Bill of Exclusion was the Oath of Allegi∣ance taken to your Brother by the Parliament of England. Truly I never heard the Argument from any but an Irish Man, not but we had then Fools enow to invent such an Argument, as we have at this Day to attempt your Restoration. But their Arguments were as silly as their Plots; and this is one of the most foolish Ar∣guments could be used against such great and wise Assemblies as those Parlia∣ments were composed of. Give me leave, Sir, to put this Question to you: Suppose you had been found guilty of Treason by your Peers in Parliament, or in any Court of Peers, and the Case so plain, that you had been condemned and executed for that Treason; whether or no that Parliament or Court of Peers that had condemned you, had been guilty of a Breach of their Allegiance, and Murder? This you cannot say: then I must tell you, that since whilst you were Duke of York, you had made your self obnoxious to the Government in a low∣er degree, why might not the same Authority proportion the Punishment, and leave you your Life, and debar you of the Succession? This is to shew the Ab∣surdity your Crew were guilty of in this Argument.

Now I will speak one Word by way of Answer: Whereas your Conspi∣rators did say the Bill of Exclusion was diametrically opposite to the Oath of Allegiance taken to your Brother and his Heirs; no Man could bear Allegiance to two Persons at once, nor could Allegiance be due to a Subject: the Word Heirs obliges no Man till the Heir is in Possession of the Crown, then the Obliga∣tion is fixed by virtue of the Oath made to his Predecessor. Now, Sir, do but consider what Mischief your Party did to the Succession it self for the next Heir by their way of prating: for by it they let loose your self from all the Re∣strictions and Penalties of human Laws; so that you had no other Ties upon you not to snatch the Crown from off your Brother's Head, than purely those of your own Conscience; and what they were, the Nation quickly saw.

5. A fifth Argument you and your Conspirators used against the Bill of Exclusion, was, That it argued a Distrust of the Providence of God. Now, Sir, was our Care to preserve the Protestant Religion a Mistrust of God's Pro∣vidence? and must those that were thus zealous, be judged Men of little Faith? God forbid. 'Tis true, I cannot allow the least Evil to be done, that Good may come of it; but the Bill against you was justifiable by the Laws of God, and the Constitution of the Government: for, Sir, look back and consider how the Protestant Religion was first established here in England; it was indeed by the mighty Hand of God influencing the publick Counsels of the Nation, so that all imaginable Care was taken both by Prince and People to rescue themselves from the Romish Yoke, and accordingly most excellent Laws were made a∣gainst the Usurpation and Tyranny of the Bishop of Rome; our noble Ance∣stors in those Days did not manifest a want of Zeal for their Religion, with a lazy Pretence of trusting God's Providence, but together with their Prayers to, and Affiance in the great Jehovah, joined the Acts of their own Duty, without which they well knew they had no reason to expect a Blessing. And a young Whipper-snapper, a Friend of yours, in a certain Coffee-house had prated at this rate till he was plentifully kickt for his Pains, which was the best Way of an∣swering such a Coxcomb, that was not to be answered any other way.

6. Another Argument against the Bill of Exclusion was this: A standing Force would have been absolutely necessary to place and keep the Administration of the Government in Protestant Hands; and the Monarchy it self would have been destroyed by a Law, which was to have taken all sort of Power from the King, and made him not so much as a Duke of Venice. This I have heard your Brother talk, but it was when he was drunk; and this was the Talk of your Party, drunk or sober: truly they had little in their Discourses but Absurdity and Incoherence. Sometimes they would say, the Government, and Succession to the Crown was of such Divine Right, that nothing could lessen your Right: nay, some of them were so fulsome and nauseous as to talk of Acts of Parlia∣ment to banish you out of your own Dominions, and to deprive you of your whole Power of Kingship, after your being actually King: but truly this nasty Cheat appeared so plain to the Parliament, that one of your professed Vassals, who had more Honour than the rest of your nonsensical Parasites, was ashamed of it, and openly renounced that self-contradicting Project, which they had been so long contriving, and thought they had so artificially disguised; but tho it was so well-favouredly exposed in the House, yet your Coxcombs thought the Nation might be deceived, and therefore blusht not to offer it in their common Discourses in all Places and Companies: but who they converted to the Cause, I never was curious to inquire.

But, Sir, was a standing Force so necessary in case of your being excluded? suppose it was: nay, I will go farther; suppose a War had been necessary, yet would it not have been a War justified by the Authority of Law, and against a banished excluded Pretender? There would have been no fear of its Conse∣quence; no true English Men could have joined with you, or countenanced your Usurpation after such an Act; and as for your Popish and French Adherents, they would neither have been more angry nor more strong by the passing that Bill.

Truly, Sir, I must be plain, and tell you, that your being excluded when Duke of York, would by no Means have necessitated a standing Army for the Preserva∣tion of the Government and Peace of the Kingdom; the whole People of England would have been an Army for that Purpose, and every Heart and Hand would have been prepared to maintain that so necessary and much desired Law, for which those three Parliaments were so earnest with your Brother, not only in pursuance of their own Judgments, but by the Directions of those that sent them, to remove so great a Grievance from the Nation, as you then was, and continued to be till you were graciously pleased to let us know that one pair of Heels was worth two pair of Hands. Your notorious great Grand-mother was excluded by Act of Parliament, yet Queen Elizabeth enjoyed the Crown with much Comfort and Peace for 44 Years, and needed no standing Force to secure her from that pretty conditioned Gentlewoman's pretended Right.

Again, a Word more to this standing Army: I wonder that you and your Party should be so afraid of what you so eagerly desired; nay, some of them al∣most ventured a hanging to get one established: If I am not much mistaken, I have seen two Armies raised for no other Design than to bring in Popery and Slavery, as was proved to the Shame of him that raised them; and the first was as shamefully disbanded, as it was impudently and against Law raised: but

the last Army you procured to be raised, you and your Party were so unwilling to part with, that two Acts were passed before we could get them disbanded. And after your Brother had thrown off the use of Parliaments at your Instance, he so increased the Number of his Guards, that they became formidable to the People of England; who being a free People, hated such a standing Force. Now why your dissembling Rascals should use this as an Argument, I am yet to learn.

And as for that Objection, that it would have destroyed the Monarchy by a Law, and taken all sort of Power from the King, and made him less than a Duke of Venice; this was as false as could be: for, as I have said before, so I must again, that it is evident beyond Contradiction, that the Bill of Exclusion could not prejudice the legal Monarchy, which your Brother did enjoy, with all the Rights and Powers that his Ancestors ever claim'd, because many Acts of like nature have passed not only in England, but in your quondam antient King∣dom of Scotland, without danger of diversting the Monarchs of their legal Pow∣er. The Preservation of a Government consists in, and depends upon an exact Adherence to its Principles on which it was founded: and the essential Principle of the English Monarchy being that well-proportioned Distribution of Powers, whereby the Law at once provides for the Greatness of the Sovereign, and the Safety of the People, for this Reason our Ancestors have been more careful to preserve inviolable the Government, than to favour any personal Pretences. And in your Case we followed the Examples of other Nations; I meet with none in Story so slavishly addicted to any Person or Family, as to admit of a Prince who open∣ly professed a Religion contrary to that established amongst them: it would be easy to produce a Multitude of Examples of those who have rejected Princes for Reasons of far less Weight than the Difference of Religion, and this with∣out endangering the Monarch's Power, or the Subject's Right: therefore your Party talked like Fools when they said the Bill of Exclusion would have divested the King of his Power; nothing could have made a King of England so much look like a Duke of Venice as one of the lowsy Expedients your Party proposed to the Houses of Parliament.

7. Another Argument against the Bill of Exclusion, was, That it would have led the Parliament to attempt other great and considerable Changes, and there∣by endangered the whole Government, and the Peace of the Nation. Now what your Villains would have had the Nation to understand by this Change, is worthy of Consideration: Therefore, first, if by a Change they meant a Change of the Constitution of the Government, let me tell you that Hell could never have forged a more villanous Lie than those wicked Wretches did, that they might in conjunction with you instil such Thoughts into the Mind of the King, as might effectually alienate his Soul from the Use of Parliaments. It is evident even to these Hell-born Wretches, that there was no Vote or Proposition in either of those Parliaments that could give any Ground for such a malicious Reflection; and therefore in this Matter we that were Lookers-on might reasonably charge your Brother and you, and your whole Party, with a malicious Design against all Parliaments, in thus arraigning the whole Body of the Nation upon those ill grounded and malicious Suggestions. I am sure this did not become the Grandeur

and Justice of Princes, nor was agreeable to the Measures of Prudence and Wis∣dom, by which you should have governed yourselves. And now, Sir, I will give the true Reason why you thus delighted in these Men, viz. your hating Parlia∣ments, being afraid they should have called you and them to account for your high Crimes and Misdemeanours: by this Means, together with the Incli∣nations of your dear Brother, you so swayed him, that you could never want Grounds to dissolve not only three such Parliaments, but threescore, if there had been Occasion.

In the second Place, Sir, If you and your Admirers had understood by at∣tempting great and important Changes, that the Parliament would have besought the King, that you might no longer have the Government in your Hands; that your villanous Conspirators should no longer preside in his Councils, nor possess all the great Offices of Trust in the Kingdom; that our Ports, Garisons and Fleet should no longer be governed by those that were at your Devotion; that Marks of Favour, and Characters of Honour should no more be placed upon such as the Wisdom of the Nation had adjudged Favourers of Popery, or Pensioners to the French King; these, I confess, were great and important Changes, such as be∣came English Protestants to believe were designed by those Parliaments, and would have been by any other Parliament your Brother should have called in his time, and such as the People of England would have prayed for, and left the Success to Almighty God, who governs the Hearts of Kings and Princes. Truly without these Changes, the Bill of Exclusion would have signified little; it might have provoked, but not disabled your wicked Party: Nay, the Money the Na∣tion must have paid for it, would have been used to hasten your Return upon us.

8. Another Argument used against the Bill of Exclusion, was your great Grace and Favour for your Countrey, and the Excellency of your Temper and Vertue. Surely, Sir, if you had heard these Men magnify you for your excellent personal Qualifications, you would have spit in their Faces, and told them they lied; for the Violence of your natural Temper was sufficiently known, and your Vehemency in exalting the Prerogative in your Brother's Reign beyond its due Bounds; and the Principles of your cursed Religion, which carried you to all imaginable Ex∣cesses of Cruelty, convinced all Mankind that there was a Necessity of excluding you, rather than to leave you the Name, and place the Power in a Protector: for in good truth, they must have looked upon it as the greatest Folly to have made such a Change in the Government, which would have been a Means to de∣stroy, and not preserve the Government. Sir, they saw your Temper, that you, who was bred up in such Principles of Politicks as made you in love with Arbi∣trary Power, and bigotted to that Religion which always propagates it self by Blood, could never bear with such Shackles as would even disgust a Prince of the meekest Disposition: this was your Temper; and how it is amended since you placed your self at St. Germains, I suppose your Followers can tell better than I.

But what Regard and Favour you have born to this Nation, was well seen from your first Return to England in 1660, to your leaving it in 1688. You engaged it in two wicked Wars with the Dutch, and a third with France. I would not have your Cattel low too much of your Grace and Favour: but truly if you had a∣ny

for this Nation, you was pleased to conceal it, except in two things, in which you did England the most signal Service that ever Man did; the one was destroy∣ing your Brother, and the other your running away: and if you will keep on the other Side of the small River that parts France from us, we will forgive you all the Faults of your Life. But notwithstanding all the Noise your Party have made about your Exclusion, I think they are now fully satisfied, or at least may be, that those three Parliaments that did proceed to exclude you, had just Grounds for it; so that all your Pretences stand convict as foolish and impertinent. Now these things being thus, can any Man judg you otherwise than an Enemy to Parlia∣ments, and that way of English Government, which made you and your Trai∣tors so much inveigh against their most just Proceedings?

I must confess I intended to have made an end this time with you, but there is so much yet behind, that I must have another Touch with you before I leave you: for you know a Picture that is not to all Intents and Purposes perfect, is but a silly Business, and not worth the viewing; and what Faults there are in your Picture, your worthy Ally will seek to have mended. Old Hodg I hear, as old as he is, swears rather than you shall not sit again, he will (now the Trade of Observatoring is out of doors) turn Fidler again in Ordinary to you, he may help you to many a penny worth of Farthings by doing a Job at a Countrey Wedding for your Neighbours at St. Germains; who, tho poor, yet are much af∣fected with fidling: I pray send for him, for I question not but he is Rogue e∣nough to be imployed by you in that excellent Function.

Another thing I request is, When your humble Servant the broken Souldier bauls against me about Perjury, and Perjury upon Record, that you would advise him to put in a civil Word about forging the Seal; you know it is not unusual to lay the Hare's Head to the Goose-giblets: they say he can dance better than he can talk; let him attend his old Friend Hodg; we can spare him, Sir, to serve you when you shall command him, for I think he is lewd enough for you to make what you please of him: his three Cousins were once in hold, and it vexes him to the Heart that he cannot get them again to engage in a fresh Plot, no not so much as to make a Swear that the Seal was a good Seal, if his Life lay on it: good Man, I pity his Misfortune; I am afraid the scarlet Cloak must once more go to pawn at some Pawdy-House or other, but it can procure no great Sum, for it is as thredbare as my old Gown; and how to help my self I know not, till our King shall be pleased to do me right.

There is your other Friend, that would have been a Lord in your Brother's Reign and yours, or the Lord knows what; he used to walk with Sir J. Fenwick in the Mall; and tho Sir J. is decently sent out of the World, yet he's a constant Advocate to bless his Memory, either for fear or for love, with his good word, by defending whose villanous Cause he pleaded his own. You know he was a dutiful Child to his old Dad, and let him have 400 l. per Annum to drink Ale withal in his elder Days; the old Gentleman could have dispensed with a Bottle of Claret if his dutiful Child would have let him enjoyed his own: you would do well to move your Brother of France to make him a French Count, or some such Business; for I am afraid if he should wait till Dooms-day in the Afternoon, he will not get

any Title here, unless that of a Case-hardened impudent Knave. Upon my Word, if you would have his Company, I do not think any of our East-land Mer∣chants would mourn for him, except in Sack and Claret. When he was in play, he was such a false Card, that a whole Pack of them was laid aside; and ever since he bellows and roars like a Town-Bull, that the Children here cannot sleep for the direful Noise he makes: he has had his old Friend Hodg, with some of the inferiour Clergy, to give him Ghostly Counsel; but he swears and damns, that nothing can do his Business, or give him any Content like being made a Lord, therefore what to do for him I know not; the poor Man is in a great Di∣stress, and 'tis high time you give him some ease, before yo•• gang over the Alps, for I understand you must amble to Rome, there to end your wicked Life.

Be not in a heat, but let me tell you of another humble Servant of yours, that wants your good Company, and that is Dr. Graines, a very sweet-fac'd honest Priest as ever broke up a Church; his Father was a poor honest Hoy-man, and gave the Rogue a little Learning, and in time he ascended the Pulpit, and made some Earnings; he hath a small Concern in Wales, where he brews now and then a little Ale to refresh his wicked Soul: but the Man is extraordinary wary in his way, and sells his Grains to the Poor, in propriâ Personâ, at a Half-penny and a Penny per Bowl. I conceive he got more by his incomparable Ware-house, he knows where, than by the Merchandise before mentioned: the Man was popular, and the Neighbourhood where he once lived, brought him with great Honour to a certain Place where he was well known, and better trusted than with his Gar∣diner, whose Pockets he would have pickt of sixteen Shillings; but the Gardi∣ner was as jealous of his Honesty, as all honest Men that know him are of his Truth and Sincerity to the Government and the Protestant Religion, and there∣fore secured his Money, and disappointed the poor Priest of his Design. I once had hopes, that since you was so gracious as to send him into Wales, you would have had his Company with you, for you used to say he was Company for any King in Christendom: it is therefore much he should be left behind, having been a mighty Tool for you in your time; and therefore Sarsfield, and a certain other Person of some Quality, did give him all the countenance they could, and procu∣red an Opportunity for him to breathe in Wales sometimes for the Health of his sweet Countenance. The Man is humble, and therefore refused not to lie in a Friend's House of yours, tho he was but poorish, he being a hearty Rogue that hath ventured hanging for you, as may be testified in due time.

I once happened into the Company of this Northern Welsh Priest, and he gave account to some Ladies of the good Company he had at his House when in the height of his Glory, and complained of a prodigious Quantity of Damask Linen he lost, all made up by his own Mother, and marked with the Crest of his Fami∣ly. I am not to question the Veracity of this goodly Parson, for his Father was an honest Hoy-man, and his Mother was a Pudding-wright in the Town he was born, and now and then brewed a Bushel of Malt against a good Time; and whe∣ther she sold her Grains or no I cannot tell: but as for Damask Linen, whe∣ther she ever saw any in her Life, I must leave that to your Friends to believe if they please; but this I know, he never deserved so great a Favour at her Hands, for I remember when he was ashamed both of Father and Mother. But let him

go as he is, I could wish you had him with you, as also that logger-headed Priest, who for his Learning, Parts and Honesty, might have been Fenwick's Chaplain in Extremis, he having been so deeply engaged with him in that glorious Design, for which he hath justly suffered Death as an abominable Traitor to God, his King and Country. This Priest lives and wipes his Lockrum-jaws, as the Whore in the Proverbs; and like an impudent Rogue saith, he has done no Wic∣kedness. I do not question, Sir, as infirm as I am through your Grace and Fa∣vour, but to live to see an end of his supposed endless War, and a happy Deter∣mination of his disp••••ed Titles; for the Villain, notwithstanding his black mouth'd Sermon, may be made to know that the Election of the People of Eng∣land is the best Title most of our Kings ever had: if he cannot be convinced with rational Arguments, a Halter may chance to be his Portion, which is oftener the Reward of a Traitor than a Lawrel. I am of opinion that his Plotting against the Government hath been more his Master-piece than any Sermon he ever preached. I conceive him so well fixed here, that I doubt you will not have his Company, tho I do not find him a Fellow of any great use to his Party, unless to lead a Mob to disturb an Election of Parliament Men in Westminster; but notwithstand∣ing the Bustle he made in the last, he could do you no great Service.

But to return to the Matter of Fact, with which you and your Brother and villanous Party stand charged to the end of the 29th Article, I ask you, What you think of all these things, and how could your Party behold the Face of the English Nation, or your Scots Villains their Country, which they have so base∣ly abused and betrayed? Come, Sir, what say you to all this? Was not the Prince of Orange right in those few Passages of his Declaration, that more par∣ticularly related to your Personal Vertues? Truly had he said nothing, yet these Articles are sufficient, which are so fully proved, that I defy your old Observator to confute any one thing mentioned, or your Scotish Scribler that is become a hearty Rogue in your Cause; he hath ventured hanging for you, and I hope will in due time meet with his long-deserved Reward for all his Villanies. Dr. Wil∣kinson's Lady, notwithstanding his great Care of her Husband's Library, will not put in a Petition against it.

If you are not satisfied, we hold four Campagns in a Year at Westminster-Hall, and six or eight at the Old Baily, Hixes-Hall, and Guildhall, where are very notable Combatants, who use to be too many for those they engaged in former times: I pray come and try your Skill and Fortune, it may turn to some account to you in time. Poor Pilgarlick fought two Days together at one of the Campagns that you opened, and came off by the lee, tho he had a good Sword, and fenc'd as well as any Man in Christendom: but you may fare better than many an honest Man; and I conceive my old Landlady will be content that you should rather retain your old Name, than be guilty of such a Piece of Rashness; she may come and act your part for you, unless the Virago Part in her Ladyship be decayed for want of its due Exercise, and may win more Credit than ever you had. But do what you will, it's all one to me, I am ad arma paratus, I dare try a touch with you and your Party at any time. I would have you know I do not tell you this now you are at such a distance, for you and your Villains have had several Trials of Skill with me, and in seven or eight Fights I never lost the day but

twice, notwithstanding all the Efforts you and your Rogues by their Perjuries and Subornations of Perjury made against me: and let me tell you, that as ill as you have used me, I may live to see a day wherein our King and his Government will do me right, tho I confess I have waited a long time for the Benefit of the Justice of the Nation, due to those Men that have served and saved their Coun∣try.

It may be you will knock under board, and grant that you have been guilty so far as you have been charged hitherto; truly it's well you are so honest: then I pray be not offended if I have another fling at your ••••cket as soon as possible, that I may do you Right; and when that is done, I pray let me desire you, that if you leave another Letter at St. Germains, as you did at Rochester, not to say that the Prince of Orange endeavoured to make you as black as Hell, but confess the Truth, and say, that it was you your self, instigated by the Devil himself, and all his wicked Angels and Instruments, that had done it to his Hand many Years before, more effectually than he could have done it, had he had the Ad∣vice even of those honest Gentlemen that drew up the third Declaration in his Name, which was dated from Sherborn Castle; that was a Tickler I'll assure you, and did your Business as effectually as Cromwel did your Brother's at Worcester Fight; it sent you packing in the Devil's Name, and half such a one in France would send you over the Alps, without the Help of a strong Guard, unless it were to keep you from being torn in pieces by the French Mob, who if they were not three quarters starv'd, would have as much a Mind to it as ever the English Nation had, and I am sure you deserved it many a Year before you wore the Crown.

I cannot ye•• take my leave of you, for you are sensible that my hearty Affecti∣on to you and your Cause, intitles me to do you all the Service I can; therefore I will give you the best Information I can how your Party stand affected. Your Friend Robin was no sooner out of Pound, but he made an Elopement to the loyal Club at the Pope's Head in Cornbil, and it's supposed did give but a melan∣choly Account of his Confinement, but a far better than he gave of the Lady Wilkinson's Books, or of the Widow's Bond of a hundred Pounds, which in a most Christian manner he forsware, hoping to have paid her with a false Oath the whole Sum he was intrusted with. The Villain once set up for a Saint, and then your Villains hated him to the same Degree that God and all good Men do at this time. I suppose he hopes that if you should make your Abode in Partibus Trans∣marinis, you may procure him to be made a Popish Bishop or so, which is the least you can do for him, for I assure you he is Rogue enough to wear the Title of an Arch-Bishop, tho it be of Bell-Isle, Ʋshant, or some such Place: he is yours, dear Sir; I pray take him to you, and if he has any Hairs growing on the Palms of his Hands, you may safely swear by the Lady of Loretto's old cast Smock, that he is an honest Scot, and as fit for your turn as the Deel can make him.

I have much wondred he did not face about in your Brother's time; he might and would have serv'd to join with old Maple-face in the Trade of Book-cut∣ting, and have given you a Scots Palm for a tickling Sum, and that in a more de∣cent way than the Irish Bogtrotter did: but the Truth of it is, he was as one born out of due time, for he came not into your Villanous Cause till Hanging came in

fashion on your side, and so he was forced for a time to take up his Quarters at the old College: he has been an eminent Confessor, but has not yet arrived at Martyrdom, but in good time the Gallows may have its Due, and then good night poor Robin, the most excellent Manager of my Lady Wilkinson's Books.

I sometimes see Tumbledown Dick, that is a pretty Fellow I assure you, and very well shaped, for he is almost as thick as he is long, and very acceptable to your villanous Party, and understands something of Heraldry, as he pretends: you put him into a pretty Imployment, and made him a Colonel, and he would have been Governour of a certain Place, but was prevented by a seasonable Imprison∣ment, tho the Rascal never understood any thing of military Discipline but what he learned from a certain Bookseller's Boy, with whom he would have been very familiar, but the Boy escaped his Love; so that my Gentleman had not the Understanding requisite for a good Souldier. He was once a Professor of a great deal of English Truth; but your Brother and you had a cogent way of bring∣ing over such Cattel to your Cause and Interest. There was a Gentleman he would have been sweet upon, but he courteously refused the Compliment, not∣withstanding the Offer of a good Place in the Band of Pensioners, and the Enjoy∣ment of his Wife into the Bargain. I see him rump along the Court of Requests, and straddle like a Pair of Compasses over a Map, but looks as if he could not say bough to a Goose. He hath sworn to this Government, but you know that is nothing to him that could turn a Rogue, get a good Place, and had turned Pa∣pist to hold it, had he not been prevented by the coming of our Protestant King, for he can turn any thing: nay, I question not but if he could regain his lost Place, he would be a true Williamite, and would not for the best Jack of small Beer Whitehall can afford him, quit it, tho your Life, and the ••••ar Life of the Bookseller's Boy lay upon it. I once called upon him for his Testimony to the Truth of Fact; but the Villain having without reason abandon'd it, forswore himself, and so let him go like a Rogue as he is; for he that once espoused an ho∣nest Cause without a Principle, might quit it without a Reason: Tho he hath sworn to this Government, as several have done, he is as much your humble Ser∣vant as the best of 'em all, and looks very sorrowfully to see his Friends hang so decently, and not yet see the desired Effect of so hopeful a Plot. But old Nick and John of Kent can never make him leave his old Conundrums, unless the Bookseller's Boy, now he is somewhat mannish, do buffet him to some purpose; this may chance to lay the Devil, that hath been sometimes very unruly. He is something older than when you left him, but his long Face is just where it was, and would be as ready to sneer upon you as ever. I pray, Sir, send for him, and let him have the Blessing of your Company.

I understand that when our honest Feversham-men met with you in your intend∣ed Passage to France, they did not only make you show your Shapes, but com∣pelled you to part with your Gold: in this lamentable Adventure, your Friends say you lost your Crucifix, which had in it a Piece of the Wood of the Cross on which our Saviour suffered: truly I am mighty sorry for your Loss; it seems you are more sensible of the Loss of that Relick than of the three Crowns you for a short time usurped. Alas, good Man, what shall we do to make up this great Loss to you? for a Piece of that Cross may easily be worth thirteen Crowns

for ought I know. But you may see what a trusty Card you had of Odescalchi, that he did not furnish you with a Cross, since for his Religion and the French. Interest you parted with your Crown. But now I think on't, I can tell how you may be supplied; I understand you are going to Rome, and if you repair to St. John of Lateran, that was dedicated to St. Silvester, a Pope God wot, there is a good Gobbet of Christ's Cross, where you may have a good Sliver for one of your Irish Crown Pieces; and if the Rogues should be sawcy, and refuse your Money because it is Brass, then I pray repair to the Church of St. Eustathius, and there you may be fitted with a Piece to your Heart's Content, where is a consi∣derable Quantity, and very good Penny worths may be had: but those Rogues it may be may be stubborn, and not make you as welcome as you made them, the you had old Hodg with you to fiddle them into a good Humour. But rather than you should want a good Piece of Wood, what think you if we sent a Piece of Tyburn Tree, or a Piece of the Pillory I stood upon in ••our time? Or if that will not do, what think you of a Piece of your Father's Scaffold, or of Sir John Fenwick's? Come, come, if you can't meet with what you would, you must take what you can. If you would send Scotch Robin, he might as easily rob some Church or other for the Good of yours or his own Soul, as he cheated Madam Wilkinson of her Books. If you once get to Rome, you may be furnished with Crosses enough: but where you will find a Crown, God knows, unless it be one of Thorns, and there you may meet with good Store.

It may be honest Robin may be afraid to steal; then I think you may send him to beg a Piece •••• this Cross you make such a Stir about: I could be content you had a House full of Crosses, so we were certainly shear'd clear of you, and your Villains. But what need you make such a Stir for a little Cross, when you have my old Landlady so near you? If that good Lady has not been a great Cross to you, the Devil's in the Dice: but in my poor Judgment you had more need get clear of these Articles if you can, and get a good Name if possible, than go whining about for a lowzy Cross. I have offered you my Thoughts upon the matter; and if you cannot be satisfied but you must have a Cross, I have told you the way: you may do what you please; and if all I have said will not do, then I pray write to honest Robin, who may find you out some Scots Trick or a∣nother, that may do your Business more effectually: but if the Villain should not be as good at stealing as he has been at lying, cheating, and plotting, then he that broke up your Brother's Closet and yours, may have a good Hand at breaking up a Church or so for your Service; I pray, Sir, do not let him lie here, for cer∣tainly his Hand will be out of use: the Rogue has got a good Estate by these Courses, therefore I advise you to send for him over, that he may be an absolute Master of his Trade, there may be many a Peny got; and were it not for hanging, I believe the Villain could like the Trade better than if he were to continue in his Secretary's Place, he knows where well enough, and where he meets with many a hearty Curse.

If my old Landlady wants a female Servant, I can more easily help her than I can you to your Crucifix: she is a worthy Person I assure you, and a Woman of an excellent Reputation; she knows how to plant behind the Hangings as well as you can for your Heart's Blood, and has given as good Proof of her Dexteri∣ty

in that Piece of Service upon a Relation of hers, as she has of her Reputation for many Years last past, notwithstanding the wicked Aspersions thrown upon her, good Woman. I pray be pleased to admit her into my Gammar Sweetapple's Service; I believe you are all so much alike in Vertue, Honour and Truth, that it is pity she should be a Minute from you, tho her quondam Gallant should cry his Eyes out. Your old Eves-dropper shall attend her, and you may take him as Paper and Packthred into the Bargain, and the rather because he is a French Man, and stood behind the Hangings to serve you and your Brother's wicked De∣signs upon an honest French Protestant, that applied himself to him and you (not knowing you to be a Papist) for the Security of the Protestant Interest in France. Now I rather propose this, because you your self were planted behind the Hangings or Wainscot with old Coventry and your old Chymist, to hear what passed between your Brother and my self, when there was some Discourse to be in relation to your sweet self, and old Kate of Lisbon. What Advantage you got by your Evesdropping, I know not; if you got any, much good may it do you: but upon the whole Matter, I think I have made you a pretty Proposal, and should be glad if it takes, for I would fain have you easy and comfortable in your Company; for you know the old Proverb, like to like, as the Devil said to the Collier. Now for all this Piece of Good Will, I desire nothing of you but a Coat the Virgin Mary made for her Son, which is at present in the Church of St. Martinellus; for my Coat is very thredbare, and I have been told it is as fresh as when it was first made: now such a Coat that will never be old, would do my Business, for I cannot tell when I shall have a new one. When you come to Rome, you will be ambling from Church to Church; I pray call in there, and beg it for me; since I have been such a Friend to Rome's Chair and your self, they will not deny me that Favour, being sensible of the great Value I have for you for the many gracious Obligations you have laid upon me in particular, as well as upon this Nation in general, for whose Honour you have fought many a bloody Battel; but old Hodg swears and damns too by his Treble and Base Viols, that he cannot tell the Time when, or the Place where you entered upon these noble Adventures, except it were between a Pair of Sheets with Jenny Roberts, or some of those noble Fireships that were rigg'd at White-Hall or St. James's: and if by any of those noble Adventures you did the Nation any Honour, you have met with a competent Return of our Gratitude, especially since you were so great a Sufferer by one of them, for whose sake you wear a Me••••••andum to this day, you know what I mean, and a Word to the Wise is enough.

Now, Sir, I have but one thing more to say, and then you may go and dry the Clouts whilst my Landlady gets the Welsh Tiler to Bed, and that is this: Doth it not appear as plain as the Sun at noon-day, how you have not only in conjunction with your Brother sham'd the Nation, but been also sham'd by your Priests and Rogues, and by your Pope and French King, and your Passive-Obedience and Non-resistance-Rogues here in England? For the former, that is your Popish Priests and Jesuits, how were you fooled with their lying Fables? And had you not been blest with an Irish Understanding, you might have seen they were For∣geries and meer Fopperies: they told you of their Houses being the Houses of Cloe, and their Housholds the Housholds of Onesiphorus; but alas, they were but

the Sons of Sodom, and villanous Offspring of cursed Gomorrah; and take them from their Uncleanness, what they study is nothing but imposture and Legerde∣main. These were the Men you countenanced: Beddingfield your Jesuit was a Pimp, a Drunkard, a Whoremonger, and a Sodomite; yet you used to say he was a holy, humble Man. What say you to your Sabran, that was a Reproach to Sodom, and the Scandal of Gomorrah? or to your trusty Ned Petre, and his Brother Charles, two notorious Villains, one famous for his Ignorance, and the other for his Impudence, Drunkenness, and Blasphemy against God and his Word? What say you to your four ignorant Popish Bishops you procured to be made? these were your Counsellours. As to your Religion, I pray what have your Popish Crew done for you in your Distress? Nay, how did your old Odes∣calchi leave you in the lurch? 'tis true he told Porter you should have his Prayers; but if they had been worth a Groat, or half the Money, you must have gone without them; half the Money would have perswaded him to have given you a Ma••nday Curse. What Subsidies have you had from St. O••••irs and Liege, and from your Popish Party? Alas, like Rats, they forsake a falling-House, or a sinking Ship.

But I pray in the next place, what's become of your mighty Ally, Lewis the Great? How stands his Friendship with you? What use have you of his Purse and Assistance against your Enemies? how fares it with your inseparable Interests? Come, come, tell me plainly, how is the Pension paid, that you and my good Landlady may chew the Cud comfortably together? If it be no better paid than mine, you may ••ang your self for ought I know, and no body be the wiser or better for it. ••••ray how do the Funds hold out? for ours have fallen so short, that I have lost above three Parts in five of mine, and cannot tell how to help it for my Life. But I suppose the Purse his most Christian Majesty offered you the use of in 1675, is not yet drawn dry; if it be, the Lord have mercy upon you, you have no other way but to try whether the Officers of the Treasury in France can with old Maple-face fall to the Trade of Book-cutting, and cheat the French King of a good Sum: for if Begging will not do, Cheating must; and 'tis all one between you and the French King, since your Interests are the same. I pray how is my Landlady's Interest? Is hers and the French King's the same too? If it be, old Boy, you have no reason to fear but she will get her Living and yours too, not by the Sweat of her Brows, for that is too mean for an adopted Daughter of France, but in a ••••••re cleanly way I assure you: be of good Chear, Man, for you have two strings to your Bow, two such Interests, your Pug's and your own; and if the old Villain should at last leave you, we will have him curst by Bell, Book and Candle. Yet now I think on't, Pug is somewhat stricken in Years; therefore I must ••ell you he will sham you off, or play the Rogue with you and send you upon the ••••••ble, and so good night Nicholas the Leather weaver. What must we do then? Do you rely upon the Loyalty of your Party here in England? Come over a little, and behold what a Set of Rogues you depended upon.

Here is old ••mkin the Hen-groper swears by his Pen, Ink and Paper, he turn∣ed Papist on purpose to betray you, and mimps up his Mouth as if he had acted the Part of a very honest Fellow: but those that hear him, tho your Enemies, count him a Villain for his Pains. I see him sometimes, and he mimps up his

Lockrum-Jaws as if he had never been of any Religion in his Life but that of Mother-Church: truly to give the Villain his due, you ought to have hanged him rather than imployed him; he wears the Wages of his Unrighteousness, but you must thank your self, for he was one of your Houshold Gods: If you trust him now, you trust on a broken Reed. And what think you of old Sir John Greazy-guts, he that had the most comfortable Opportunity of cheating your Brother and your self? he is in his old Post; but if you should trust in him, all Mankind must say you are at your last Prayers. Old Stiff Jaws he got into Pre∣ferment with all the Speed he could. And truly there is not one of your old Friends, but if he can get into a good Place, would in a decent manner cut your Throat to keep in. Nay, I am confident, Mr. Wind and Stink, the Warden of All Souls, would help keep you out by the same Power you forced him into that Imployment: That Fellow hath given the best account of your Father's Vertues of any of the Devil's Brokers I know; for he told his Auditory upon May 29th ••696, that the Vertues of your Father were more resplendent, and did shine forth more eminently in your Brother than in your Father. Truly I have heard of many of your Father's good Qualifications, but I could not tell what they were till this Logger head of a Warden gave us such Information, and directed us to view the Vertues of your Brother: now you will give me leave to tell you that I was pretty well acquainted with Old Pious his Vertues; and so by the Pai••s of this Sermon-spoiling and nonfensical Blockhead of a Warden, we may clearly see the excellent Vertues of Old Blessed Memory. I pray return the Booby your Thanks, especially for not blazoning yours into the Bargain, no, nor so much as taking notice of the great Vertues of the Troop that fix•••• him against all Law in the Possession of his Place. I understand the Coxcomb quits his Post very often for hearsay: he is a Debtor to the Jew and the Greek, to the Wise and Un∣wise, to the Bond and the Free. When he will be otherwise, I cannot tell: but let him go like a Blockhead as he is; we can never expect a Horse •••• s••ite Oats till he hath eat some. He made bold with me, but was laught at for his Pains; and in good truth I have learned to despise such Scoundrel Vermin. There are more of his Stamp; but you may as soon trust the Devil or the Pope as any of them, for they all bid you farewel, and so they did your Father before you, except a few that were hang'd for his Cause; and so thanks be to God have some for yours, tho it was a long while first. I hope you have canonized them by this time, for the Rogues were in earnest to have you home again; and if their Actions had been sutable to their Words, they might have done Wonders: but now your Cause is lost here, without the least Hopes of Recovery.

I should have detained you somewhat longer, but the young Cu•• will how I for his Pap, and I doubt you begin to smell in your Harness: nay Landlady will open her Mouth if you do not assist her in getting ready his Whittles, that he may quietly be put into his Crib. But do not break your Heart, for you shall with all convenient speed consider of what I have here offered to your View; and what Lines are wanting in this, shall be supplied in my next, which I reckon will be by Trinity-Term: by that time you will see whether or no you are not apret∣ty black Spark. I pray recommend to my old Acquaintance the Business you have given a new Name to; I forget his old one: he was once in Limbo for the

same Cause you are now at St. 〈◊〉〈◊〉. Le•• 〈…〉〈…〉 be forgo•••• 〈…〉〈…〉 old Mistress and the young Welsh Gentleman; and let him know that Will. 〈…〉〈…〉 my Landlady's Page of Honour, if he saith true, hath told us a formal Story of his Mother Mrs. Mary Grey: how true or false it is you know best, 'tis all one to me, I have nothing to say to the Point, but only shall pray you to instruct him in his old Uncle's Vertues, that he may be the better able to judg of those that were in his Grandfather: if you cannot do it your self, I pray send for Mr. Warden's Worship, and he will tell him what they were, and where they did shine. And so farewel till you hear from me again.