No More Learning

And indeed, to look upon the whole
faction in a lump, never was a more pleasant sight than to behold
these builders of a new Babel, how ridiculously they are mixed, and
what a rare confusion there is amongst them. One part of them is
carrying stone and mortar for the building of a meeting-house; another
sort understand not that language; they are for snatching away their
work-fellows' materials to set up a bawdy-house: some of them
blaspheme, and others pray; and both, I believe, with equal godliness
at bottom: some of them are atheists, some sectaries, yet all true
protestants. Most of them love all whores, but her of Babylon. In few
words, any man may be what he will, so he be one of them. It is enough
to despise the King, to hate the Duke, and rail at the succession:
after this it is no matter how a man lives; he is a saint by
infection; he goes along with the party, has their mark upon him; his
wickedness is no more than frailty; their righteousness is imputed to
him: so that, as ignorant rogues go out doctors when a prince comes to
an university, they hope, at the last day, to take their degree in a
crowd of true protestants, and thrust unheeded into heaven[28].

It is a credit to be railed at by such men as these. The charter-man,
in the very title-page, where he hangs out the cloth of the city
before his book, gives it for his motto, _Si populus vult decipi,
decipiatur_[29]; as if he should have said, "you have a mind to be
cozened, and the devil give you good on't. " If I cry a sirreverence,
and you take it for honey, make the best of your bargain. For shame,
good Christians, can you suffer such a man to starve, when you see his
design is upon your purses? He is contented to expose the ears
representative of your party on the pillory, and is in a way of doing
you more service than a worn-out witness, who can hang nobody
hereafter but himself. He tells you, "The papists clap their hands, in
the hopes they conceive of the ruin of your government:" Does not this
single syllable _your_ deserve a pension, if he can prove the
government to be yours, and that the king has nothing to do in your
republic? He continues, as if that were as sure and certain to them,
as it is to us, without doubt, that they (the papists) once fired the
city, just as certain in your own consciences. I wish the papists had
no more to answer for than that accusation. Pray let it be put to the
vote, and resolved upon the question, by your whole party, that the
North-east wind is not only ill-affected to man and beast, but is also
a tory or tantivy papist in masquerade[30]. I am satisfied, not to
have "so much art left me, as to frame any thing agreeable, or
verisimilar;" but it is plain that he has, and therefore, as I ought
in justice, I resign my laurel, and my bays too, to Mr Hunt; it is he
sets up for the poet now, and has the only art to amuse and to deceive
the people. You may see how profound his knowledge is in poetry; for
he tells you just before, "that my heroes are commonly such monsters
as Theseus and Hercules; renowned throughout all ages for
destroying[31]. " Now Theseus and Hercules, you know, have been the
heroes of all poets, and have been renowned through all ages, for
destroying monsters, for succouring the distressed, and for putting to
death inhuman arbitrary tyrants. Is this your oracle? If he were to
write the acts and monuments of whig heroes, I find they should be
quite contrary to mine: Destroyers indeed,--but of a lawful
government; murderers,--but of their fellow-subjects; lovers, as
Hercules was of Hylas; with a journey at last to hell, like that of
Theseus.

But mark the wise consequences of our author. "I have not," he says,
"so much art left me to make any thing agreeable, or verisimilar,
wherewith to amuse or deceive the people. " And yet, in the very next
paragraph, "my province is to corrupt the manners of the nation, and
lay waste their morals, and my endeavours are more happily applied, to
extinguish the little remainders of the virtue of the age. " Now, I am
to perform all this, it seems, without making any thing verisimilar or
agreeable! Why, Pharaoh never set the Israelites such a task, to build
pyramids without brick or straw. If the fool knows it not,
verisimilitude and agreeableness are the very tools to do it; but I am
willing to disclaim them both, rather than to use them to so ill
purpose as he has done.

Yet even this their celebrated writer knows no more of stile and
English than the Northern dictator; as if dulness and clumsiness were
fatal to the name of _Tom_. It is true, he is a fool in three
languages more than the poet; for, they say, "he understands Latin,
Greek, and Hebrew," from all which, to my certain knowledge, I acquit
the other. Og may write against the king, if he pleases, so long as he
drinks for him, and his writings will never do the government so much
harm, as his drinking does it good; for true subjects will not be much
perverted by his libels; but the wine-duties rise considerably by his
claret. He has often called me an atheist in print; I would believe
more charitably of him, and that he only goes the broad way, because
the other is too narrow for him. He may see, by this, I do not delight
to meddle with his course of life, and his immoralities, though I have
a long bead-roll of them. I have hitherto contented myself with the
ridiculous part of him, which is enough, in all conscience, to employ
one man; even without the story of his late fall at the Old Devil,
where he broke no ribs, because the hardness of the stairs could reach
no bones; and, for my part, I do not wonder how he came to fall, for I
have always known him heavy: the miracle is, how he got up again. I
have heard of a sea captain as fat as he, who, to escape arrests,
would lay himself flat upon the ground, and let the bailiffs carry him
to prison, if they could. If a messenger or two, nay, we may put in
three or four, should come, he has friendly advertisement how to
escape them. But to leave him, who is not worth any further
consideration, now I have done laughing at him,--would every man knew
his own talent, and that they, who are only born for drinking, would
let both poetry and prose alone[32]!

I am weary with tracing the absurdities and mistakes of our great
lawyer, some of which indeed are wilful; as where he calls the
_Trimmers_ the more moderate sort of tories. It seems those
politicians are odious to both sides; for neither own them to be
theirs. We know them, and so does he too in his conscience, to be
secret whigs, if they are any thing; but now the designs of whiggism
are openly discovered, they tack about to save a stake; that is, they
will not be villains to their own ruin. While the government was to be
destroyed, and there was probability of compassing it, no men were so
violent as they; but since their fortunes are in hazard by the law,
and their places at court by the king's displeasure, they pull in
their horns, and talk more peaceably; in order, I suppose, to their
vehemence on the right side, if they were to be believed. For in
laying of colours, they observe a medium; black and white are too far
distant to be placed directly by one another, without some shadowings
to soften their contrarieties. It is Mariana, I think, (but am not
certain) that makes the following relation; and let the noble family
of Trimmers read their own fortune in it. "Don Pedro, king of Castile,
surnamed the Cruel, who had been restored by the valour of our Edward
the Black Prince, was finally dispossessed by Don Henry, the bastard,
and he enjoyed the kingdom quietly, till his death; which when he felt
approaching, he called his son to him, and gave him this his last
counsel. I have (said he,) gained this kingdom, which I leave you, by
the sword; for the right of inheritance was in Don Pedro; but the
favour of the people, who hated my brother for his tyranny, was to me
instead of title. You are now to be the peaceable possessor of what I
have unjustly gotten; and your subjects are composed of these three
sorts of men. One party espoused my brother's quarrel, which was the
undoubted lawful cause; those, though they were my enemies, were men
of principle and honour: Cherish them, and exalt them into places of
trust about you, for in them you may confide safely, who prized their
fidelity above their fortune. Another sort, are they who fought my
cause against Don Pedro; to those you are indeed obliged, because of
the accidental good they did me; for they intended only their private
benefit, and helped to raise me, that I might afterwards promote them:
you may continue them in their offices, if you please; but trust them
no farther than you are forced; for what they did was against their
conscience. But there is a third sort, which, during the whole wars,
were neuters; let them be crushed on all occasions, for their business
was only their own security. They had neither courage enough to engage
on my side, nor conscience enough to help their lawful sovereign:
_Therefore let them be made examples, as the worst sort of interested
men, which certainly are enemies to both, and would be profitable to
neither. _"

I have only a dark remembrance of this story, and have not the Spanish
author by me, but, I think, I am not much mistaken in the main of it;
and whether true or false, the counsel given, I am sure, is such, as
ought, in common prudence, to be practised against Trimmers, whether
the lawful or unlawful cause prevail. Loyal men may justly be
displeased with this party, not for their moderation, as Mr Hunt
insinuates, but because, under that mask of seeming mildness, there
lies hidden either a deep treachery, or, at best, an interested
luke-warmness. But he runs riot into almost treasonable expressions,
as if "Trimmers were hated because they are not perfectly wicked, or
perfectly deceived; of the Catiline make, bold, and without
understanding; that can adhere to men that publicly profess murders,
and applaud the design:" by all which villainous names he
opprobriously calls his majesty's most loyal subjects; as if men must
be perfectly wicked, who endeavour to support a lawful government; or
perfectly deceived, who on no occasion dare take up arms against their
sovereign: as if acknowledging the right of succession, and resolving
to maintain it in the line, were to be in a Catiline conspiracy; and
at last, (which is ridiculous enough, after so much serious treason)
as if "to clap the Duke of Guise" were to adhere to men that publicly
profess murders, and applaud the design of the assassinating poets.

But together with his villainies, pray let his incoherences be
observed. He commends the Trimmers, (at least tacitly excuses them)
for men of some moderation; and this in opposition to the instruments
of wickedness of the Catiline make, that are resolute and forward, and
without consideration. But he forgets all this in the next twenty
lines; for there he gives them their own, and tells them roundly, _in
internecino bello, medii pro hostibus habentur. _ Neutral men are
traitors, and assist by their indifferency to the destruction of the
government. The plain English of his meaning is this; while matters
are only in dispute, and in machination, he is contented they should
be moderate; but when once the faction can bring about a civil war,
then they are traitors, if they declare not openly for them.

"But it is not," says he, "the Duke of Guise who is to be
assassinated, a turbulent, wicked, and haughty courtier, but an
innocent and gentle prince. " By his favour, our Duke of Guise was
neither innocent nor gentle, nor a prince of the blood royal, though
he pretended to descend from Charlemagne, and a genealogy was printed
to that purpose, for which the author was punished, as he deserved;
witness Davila, and the journals of Henry III. where the story is at
large related. Well, who is it then? why, "it is a prince who has no
fault, but that he is the king's son:" then he has no fault by
consequence; for I am certain, that is no fault of his. The rest of
the compliment is so silly, and so fulsome, as if he meant it all in
ridicule; and to conclude the jest, he says, that "the best people of
England have no other way left, to shew their loyalty to the king,
their religion and government, in long intervals of parliament, than
by prosecuting his son, for the sake of the king, and his own merit,
with all the demonstrations of the highest esteem. "

Yes, I can tell them one other way to express their loyalty, which is,
to obey the king, and to respect his brother, as the next lawful
successor; their religion commands them both, and the government is
secured in so doing. But why in intervals of parliament? How are they
more obliged to honour the king's son out of parliament, than in it?
And why this prosecution of love for the king's sake? Has he ordered
more love to be shewn to one son, than to another? Indeed, his own
quality is cause sufficient for all men to respect him, and I am of
their number, who truly honour him, and who wish him better than this
miserable sycophant; for I wish him, from his father's royal kindness,
what justice can make him, which is a greater honour than the rabble
can confer upon him.

But our author finds, that commendation is no more his talent, than
flattery was that of Æsop's ass; and therefore falls immediately, from
pawing with his fore-feet, and grinning upon one prince, to downright
braying against another.

He says, I have not used "my patron duke much better; for I have put
him under a most dismal and unfortunate character of a successor,
excluded from the crown by act of state, for his religion; who fought
his way to the crown, changed his religion, and died by the hand of a
Roman assassinate. "

If it please his Royal Highness to be my patron, I have reason to be
proud of it; because he never yet forsook any man, whom he has had the
goodness to own for his. But how have I put him under an unfortunate
character? the authors of the Reflections, and our John-a-Nokes, have
not laid their noddles together about this accusation. For it is their
business to prove the king of Navarre to have been a most successful,
magnanimous, gentle, and grateful prince; in which character they have
followed the stream of all historians. How then happens this jarring
amongst friends, that the same man is put under such dismal
circumstances on one side, and so fortunate on the other, by the
writers of the same party? The answer is very plain; that they take
the cause by several handles. They, who will not have the Duke
resemble the king of Navarre, have magnified the character of that
prince, to debase his Royal Highness; and therein done what they can
to shew the disparity. Mr Hunt, who will have it to be the Duke's
character, has blackened that king as much as he is able, to shew the
likeness. Now this would be ridiculous pleading at a bar, by lawyers
retained for the same cause; and both sides would call each other
fools, because the jury betwixt them would be confounded, and perhaps
the judges too.

But this it is to have a bad cause, which puts men of necessity upon
knavery; and that knavery is commonly found out. Well, Mr Hunt has in
another place confessed himself to be in passion, and that is the
reason he is so grosly mistaken in opening of the cause. For, first,
the king of Navarre was neither under dismal, nor unfortunate
circumstances: before the end of that very sentence, our lawyer has
confessed, that he fought his way to the crown; that is, he gloriously
vanquished all his rebels, and happily possessed his inheritance many
years after he had regained it. In the next place, he was never
excluded from the crown by act of state. He changed his religion
indeed, but not until he had almost weathered the storm, recovered the
best part of his estate, and gained some glorious victories in pitched
battles; so that his changing cannot without injustice be attributed
to his fear. Monsieur Chiverny, in his Memoirs of those times, plainly
tells us, that he solemnly promised to his predecessor Henry III. then
dying, that he would become a Romanist; and Davila, though he says not
this directly, yet denies it not. By whose hands Henry IV. died, is
notoriously known; but it is invidiously urged, both by Mr Hunt and
the Reflectors: for we may, to our shame, remember, that a king of our
own country was barbarously murdered by his subjects, who professed
the same religion; though I believe, that neither Jaques Clement, nor
Ravaillac, were better papists, than the independents and
presbyterians were protestants; so that their argument only proves,
that there are rogues of all religions: _Iliacos infra muros peccatur,
et extra. _ But Mr Hunt follows his blow again, that I have "offered a
justification of an act of exclusion against a popish successor in a
protestant kingdom, by remembering what was done against the king of
Navarre, who was _de facto_ excluded by an act of state. " My
gentleman, I perceive, is very willing to call that an act of
exclusion, and an act of state, which is only, in our language, called
a bill; for Henry III. could never be gained to pass it, though it was
proposed by the three estates at Blois. The Reflectors are more
modest; for they profess, (though I am afraid it is somewhat against
the grain,) that a vote of the House of Commons is not an act; but the
times are turned upon them, and they dare speak no other language. Mr
Hunt, indeed, is a bold republican, and tells you the bottom of their
meaning. Yet why should it make the "courage of his Royal Highness
quail, to find himself under this representation," which; by our
author's favour, is neither dismal, nor disastrous? Henry IV. escaped
this dreadful machine of the League; I say dreadful, for the three
estates were at that time composed generally of Guisards, factious,
hot-headed, rebellious interested men. The king in possession was but
his brother-in-law, and at the time publicly his enemy; for the king
of Navarre was then in arms against him; and yet the sense of common
justice, and the good of his people so prevailed, that he withstood
the project of the states, which he also knew was levelled at himself;
for had the exclusion proceeded, he had been immediately laid by, and
the lieutenancy of France conferred on Guise; after which the rebel
would certainly have put up his title for the crown. In the case of
his Royal Highness, only one of the three estates have offered at the
exclusion, and have been constantly opposed by the other two, and by
his majesty. Neither is it any way probable, that the like will ever
be again attempted; for the fatal consequences, as well as the
illegality of that design, are seen through already by the people; so
that, instead of offering a justification of an act of exclusion, I
have exposed a rebellious, impious, and fruitless contrivance tending
to it. If we look on the parliament of Paris, when they were in their
right wits, before they were intoxicated by the League, (at least
wholly) we shall find them addressing to king Henry III. in another
key, concerning the king of Navarre's succession, though he was at
that time, as they called it, a relapsed heretic. And to this purpose
I will quote a passage out of the journals of Henry III. so much
magnified by my adversaries.

Towards the end of September, 1585, there was published at Paris a
bull of excommunication against the king of Navarre, and the prince of
Condé. The parliament of Paris made their remonstrance to the king
upon it, which was both grave, and worthy of the place they held, and
of the authority they have in this kingdom; saying for conclusion,
that "their court had found the stile of this bull so full of
innovation, and so distant from the modesty of ancient Popes, that
they could not understand in it the voice of an Apostle's successor;
forasmuch, as they found not in their records, nor in the search of
all antiquity, that the princes of France had ever been subject to the
justice or jurisdiction of the Pope, and they could not take it into
consideration, until first he made appear the right which he pretended
in the translation of kingdoms, established and ordained by Almighty
God, before the name of Pope was heard of in the world. " It is plain
by this, that the parliament of Paris acknowledged an inherent right
of succession in the king of Navarre, though of a contrary religion to
their own. And though, after the duke of Guise's murder at Blois, the
city of Paris revolted from their obedience to their king, pretending,
that he was fallen from the crown, by reason of that and other
actions, with which they charged him; yet the sum of all their power
to renounce him, and create the duke of Mayenne lieutenant-general,
depended ultimately on the Pope's authority; which, as you see, but
three years before, they had peremptorily denied.

The college of Sorbonne began the dance, by their determination, that
the kingly right was forfeited; and, stripping him of all his
dignities, they called him plain Henry de Valois: after this, says my
author, "sixteen rascals (by which he means the council of that
number) having administered the oath of government to the duke of
Mayenne, to take in quality of lieutenant-general of the estate and
crown of France, the same ridiculous dignity was confirmed to him by
an imaginary parliament, the true parliament being detained prisoners,
in divers of the city gaols, and two new seals were ordered to be
immediately made, with this inscription,--the Seal of the Kingdom of
France. " I need not enlarge on this relation: it is evident from
hence, that the Sorbonnists were the original, and our Schismatics in
England were the copiers of rebellion; that Paris began, and London
followed.

The next lines of my author are, that "a gentleman of Paris made the
duke of Mayenne's picture to be drawn, with a crown imperial on his
head;" and I have heard of an English nobleman, who has at this day a
picture of old Oliver, with this motto underneath it,--_Utinam
vixeris. _ All this while, this cannot be reckoned an act of state, for
the deposing king Henry III. , because it was an act of overt rebellion
in the Parisians; neither could the holding of the three estates at
Paris, afterwards, by the same duke of Mayenne, devolve any right on
him, in prejudice of king Henry IV. ; though those pretended states
declared his title void, on the account of his religion; because those
estates could neither be called nor holden, but by, and under the
authority of, the lawful king. It would take more time than I have
allowed for this Vindication, or I could easily trace from the French
history, what misfortunes attended France, and how near it was to
ruin, by the endeavours to alter the succession. For first, it was
actually dismembered, the duke of Mercæur setting up a principality in
the dutchy of Bretagne, independent of the crown. The duke of Mayenne
had an evident design to be elected king, by the favour of the people
and the Pope: the young dukes of Guise and of Nemours aspired, with
the interest of the Spaniards, to be chosen, by their marriage with
the Infanta Isabella. The duke of Lorraine was for cantling out some
part of France, which lay next his territories; and the duke of Savoy
had, before the death of Henry III. , actually possessed himself of the
marquisate of Saluces. But above all, the Spaniards fomented these
civil wars, in hopes to reduce that flourishing kingdom under their
own monarchy. To as many, and as great mischiefs, should we be
evidently subject, if we should madly engage ourselves in the like
practices of altering the succession, which our gracious king in his
royal wisdom well foresaw, and has cut up that accursed project by the
roots; which will render the memory of his justice and prudence
immortal and sacred to future ages, for having not only preserved our
present quiet, but secured the peace of our posterity.

It is clearly manifest, that no act of state passed, to the exclusion
of either the King of Navarre, or of Henry the fourth, consider him in
either of the two circumstances; but Oracle Hunt, taking this for
granted, would prove _à fortiori_, "that if a protestant prince were
actually excluded from a popish kingdom, then a popish successor is
more reasonably to be excluded from a protestant kingdom; because,"
says he, "a protestant prince is under no obligation to destroy his
popish subjects, but a popish prince is to destroy his protestant
subjects:" Upon which bare supposition, without farther proof, he
calls him insufferable tyrant, and the worst of monsters.

Now, I take the matter quite otherwise, and bind myself to maintain
that there is not, nor can be any obligation, for a king to destroy
his subjects of a contrary persuasion to the established religion of
his country; for, _quatenus_ subjects, of what religion soever he is
infallibly bound to preserve and cherish, and not to destroy them; and
this is the first duty of a lawful sovereign, as such, antecedent to
any tie or consideration of his religion. Indeed, in those countries
where the Inquisition is introduced, it goes harder with protestants,
and the reason is manifest; because the protestant religion has not
gotten footing there, and severity is the means to keep it out; but to
make this instance reach England, our religion must not only be
changed, (which in itself is almost impossible to imagine,) but the
council of Trent received, and the Inquisition admitted, which many
popish countries have rejected. I forget not the cruelties, which were
exercised in Queen Mary's time against the protestants; neither do I
any way excuse them; but it follows not, that every popish successor
should take example by them, for every one's conscience of the same
religion is not guided by the same dictates in his government; neither
does it follow, that if one be cruel, another must, especially when
there is a stronger obligation, and greater interest to the contrary:
for, if a popish king in England should be bound to destroy his
protestant people, I would ask the question, over whom he meant to
reign afterwards? And how many subjects would be left?

In Queen Mary's time, the protestant religion had scarcely taken root;
and it is reasonable to be supposed, that she found the number of
papists equalling that of the protestants, at her entrance to the
kingdom; especially if we reckon into the account those who were the
Trimmers of the times; I mean such, who privately were papists, though
under her protestant predecessor they appeared otherwise; therefore
her difficulties in persecuting her reformed subjects, were far from
being so insuperable as ours now are, when the strength and number of
the papists is so very inconsiderable. They, who cast in the church of
England as ready to embrace popery, are either knaves enough to know
they lie, or fools enough not to have considered the tenets of that
church, which are diametrically opposite to popery; and more so than
any of the sects.

Not to insist on the quiet and security, which protestant subjects at
this day enjoy in some parts of Germany, under popish princes; where I
have been assured, that mass is said, and a Lutheran sermon preached
in different parts of the same church, on the same day, without
disturbance on either side; nor on the privileges granted by Henry the
fourth of France to his party, after he had forsaken their opinions,
which they quietly possessed for a long time after his death.

The French histories are full of examples, manifestly proving, that
the fiercest of their popish princes have not thought themselves bound
to destroy their protestant subjects; and the several edicts, granted
under them, in favour of the reformed religion, are pregnant instances
of this truth. I am not much given to quotations, but Davila lies open
for every man to read. Tolerations, and free exercise of religion,
granted more amply in some, more restrainedly in others, are no sign
that those princes held themselves obliged in conscience to destroy
men of a different persuasion. It will be said, those tolerations were
gained by force of arms. In the first place, it is no great credit to
the protestant religion, that the protestants in France were actually
rebels; but the truth is, they were only Geneva protestants, and their
opinions were far distant from those of the church of England, which
teaches passive obedience to all her sons, and not to propagate
religion by rebellion. But it is further to be considered, that those
French kings, though papists, thought the preservation of their
subjects, and the public peace, were to be considered, before the
gratification of the court of Rome; and though the number of the
papists exceeded that of the protestants, in the proportion of three
to one, though the protestants were always beaten when they fought,
and though the pope pressed continually with exhortations and
threatenings to extirpate Calvinism, yet kings thought it enough to
continue in their own religion themselves, without forcing it upon
their subjects, much less destroying them who professed another. But
it will be objected, those edicts of toleration were not kept on the
papists' side: they would answer, because the protestants stretched
their privileges further than was granted, and that they often
relapsed into rebellion; but whether or no the protestants were in
fault, I leave history to determine. It is matter of fact, that they
were barbarously massacred, under the protection of the public faith;
therefore, to argue fairly, either an oath from protestants is not to
be taken by a popish prince; or, if taken, ought inviolably to be
preserved. For, when we oblige ourselves to any one, it is not his
person we so much consider, as that of the Most High God, who is
called to witness this our action; and it is to Him we are to
discharge our conscience. Neither is there, or can be any tie on human
society, when that of an oath is no more regarded; which being an
appeal to God, He is immediate judge of it; and chronicles are not
silent how often He has punished perjured kings. The instance of
Vladislaus King of Hungary, breaking his faith with Amurath the Turk,
at the instigation of Julian the Pope's legate, and his miserable
death ensuing it, shews that even to infidels, much more to
Christians, that obligation ought to be accounted sacred[33]. And I
the rather urge this, because it is an argument taken almost
_verbatim_ from a papist, who accuses Catharine de Medicis for
violating her word given to the protestants during her regency of
France. What securities in particular we have, that our own religion
and liberties would be preserved though under a popish successor, any
one may inform himself at large in a book lately written by the
reverend and learned doctor Hicks, called Jovian, in answer to Julian
the Apostate[34]; in which that truly Christian author has satisfied
all scruples which reasonable men can make, and proved that we are in
no danger of losing either; and wherein also, if those assurances
should all fail, (which is almost morally impossible,) the doctrine of
passive obedience is unanswerably demonstrated; a doctrine delivered
with so much sincerity, and resignation of spirit, that it seems
evident the assertor of it is ready, if there were occasion, to seal
it with his blood.

I have done with mannerly Mr Hunt, who is only _magni nominis umbra_;
the most malicious, and withal, the most incoherent ignorant scribbler
of the whole party. I insult not over his misfortunes, though he has
himself occasioned them; and though I will not take his own excuse,
that he is in passion, I will make a better for him, for I conclude
him cracked; and if he should return to England, am charitable enough
to wish his only prison might be Bedlam. This apology is truer than
that he makes for me; for writing a play, as I conceive, is not
entering into the Observator's province; neither is it the
Observator's manner to confound truth with falsehood, to put out the
eyes of people, and leave them without understanding. The quarrel of
the party to him is, that he has undeceived the ignorant, and laid
open the shameful contrivances of the new vamped Association; that
though he is "on the wrong side of life," as he calls it, yet he
pleads not his age to be _emeritus_; that, in short, he has left the
faction as bare of arguments, as Æsop's bird of feathers; and plumed
them of all those fallacies and evasions which they borrowed from
jesuits and presbyterians.

Now for my templar and poet in association for a libel, like the
conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter in a fiery sign. What the one wants
in wit, the other must supply in law. As for malice, their quotas are
indifferently well adjusted; the rough draught, I take for granted, is
the poet's, the finishings the lawyer's. They begin,--that in order to
one Mr Friend's commands, one of them went to see the play. This was
not the poet, I am certain; for nobody saw him there, and he is not of
a size to be concealed. But the mountain, they say, was delivered of a
mouse. I have been gossip to many such labours of a dull fat
scribbler, where the mountain has been bigger, and the mouse less. The
next sally is on the city-elections, and a charge is brought against
my lord mayor, and the two sheriffs, for excluding true electors. I
have heard, that a Whig gentleman of the Temple hired a livery-gown,
to give his voice among the companies at Guild-hall; let the question
be put, whether or no he were a true elector? --Then their own juries
are commended from several topics; they are the wisest, richest, and
most conscientious: to which is answered, _ignoramus_. But our juries
give most prodigious and unheard-of damages. Hitherto there is nothing
but boys-play in our authors: _My mill grinds pepper and spice, your
mill grinds rats and mice. _ They go on,--"if I may be allowed to
judge;" (as men that do not poetize may be judges of wit, human
nature, and common decencies;) so then the sentence is begun with _I_;
there is but one of them puts in for a judge's place, that is, he in
the grey; but presently it is--_men_; two more in buckram would be
judges too. Neither of them, it seems, poetize; that is true, but both
of them are in at rhime doggrel; witness the song against the bishops,
and the Tunbridge ballad[35]. By the way, I find all my scribbling
enemies have a mind to be judges, and chief barons. Proceed,
gentlemen:--"This play, as I am informed by some, who have a nearer
communication with the poets and the players, than I have,--". Which
of the two Sosias is it that now speaks? If the lawyer, it is true he
has but little communication with the players; if the poet, the
players have but little communication with him; for it is not long
ago, he said to somebody, "By G----, my lord, those Tory rogues will
act none of my plays. " Well, but the accusation,--that this play was
once written by another, and then it was called the "Parisian
Massacre. " Such a play I have heard indeed was written; but I never
saw it[36]. Whether this be any of it or no, I can say no more than
for my own part of it. But pray, who denies the unparalleled villainy
of the papists in that bloody massacre? I have enquired, why it was
not acted, and heard it was stopt by the interposition of an
ambassador, who was willing to save the credit of his country, and not
to have the memory of an action so barbarous revived; but that I
tempted my friend to alter it, is a notorious whiggism, to save the
broader word. The "Sicilian Vespers" I have had plotted by me above
these seven years: the story of it I found under borrowed names in
Giraldo Cinthio; but the rape in my tragedy of "Amboyna" was so like
it, that I forbore the writing. But what had this to do with
protestants? For the massacrers and the massacred were all papists.

But it is observable, they say, that "though the massacre could not be
acted, as it was first written against papists, yet when it was turned
upon protestants, it found reception. "

Now all is come out; the scandal of the story turns at last upon the
government: that patronizes popish plays, and forbids protestant[37].
Ours is to be a popish play; why? Because it exposes the villainy of
sectaries and rebels. Prove them first to be protestants, and see what
you will get by it when you have done. Your party are certainly the
men whom the play attacks, and so far I will help you; the designs and
actions, represented in the play, are such as you have copied from the
League; for though you have wickedness enough, yet you wanted the wit
to make a new contrivance. But for shame, while you are carrying on
such palpable villainy, do not assume the name of protestants. You
will tell us, you are friends to the government, and the king's best
subjects; but all the while you are aspersing both it and him. Who
shall be judges, whether you are friends or not? The government or
you? Have not all rebels always sung the same song? Was ever thief or
murderer fool enough to plead guilty? For your love and loyalty to the
king, they, who mean him best among you, are no better subjects than
Duke Trinculo; they would be content he should be viceroy, so they may
be viceroys over him[38].

The next accusation is particular to me,--"that I, the said Bayes,
would falsely and feloniously have robbed Nat. Lee of his share in the
representation of OEdipus. " Now I am culprit; I writ the first and
third acts of OEdipus, and drew the scenery of the whole play:
whenever I have owned a farther proportion, let my accusers speak:
this was meant mischievously, to set us two at variance. Who is the
old serpent and Satan now? When my friends help my barren fancy, I am
thankful for it: I do not use to receive assistance, and afterwards
ungratefully disown it.

Not long after, "exemplary punishment" is due to me for this most
"devilish parallel. " It is a devilish one indeed; but who can help it?
If I draw devils like one another, the fault is in themselves for
being so: I neither made their horns nor claws, nor cloven feet. I
know not what I should have done, unless I had drawn the devil a
handsome proper gentleman, like the painter in the fable, to have made
a friend of him[39]; but I ought to be exemplarily punished for it:
when the devil gets uppermost, I shall expect it. "In the mean time,
let magistrates (that respect their oaths and office)"--which words,
you see, are put into a parenthesis, as if (God help us) we had none
such now,--let them put the law in execution against lewd scribblers;
the mark will be too fair upon a pillory, for a turnip or a rotten egg
to miss it. But, for my part, I have not malice enough to wish him so
much harm,--not so much as to have a hair of his head perish, much
less that one whole side of it should be dismantled. I am no informer,
who writ such a song, or such a libel; if the dulness betrays him not,
he is safe for me. And may the same dulness preserve him ever from
public justice; it is a sufficient thick mud-wall betwixt him and law;
it is his guardian angel, that protects him from punishment, because,
in spite of him, he cannot deserve it. It is that which preserves him
innocent when he means most mischief, and makes him a saint when he
intends to be a devil. He can never offend enough, to need the mercy
of government, for it is beholden to him, that he writes against it;
and he never offers at a satire, but he converts his readers to a
contrary opinion.

Some of the succeeding paragraphs are intended for very Ciceronian:
there the lawyer flourishes in the pulpit, and the poet stands in
socks among the crowd to hear him. Now for narration, resolution,
calumniation, aggravation, and the whole artillery of tropes and
figures, to defend the proceedings at Guild-hall.
The most minute
circumstances of the elections are described so lively, that a man,
who had not heard he was there in a livery-gown, might suspect there
was a _quorum pars magna fui_ in the case; and multitudes of electors,
just as well qualified as himself, might give their party the greater
number: but throw back their gilt shillings, which were told for
guineas, and their true sum was considerably less. Well, there was no
rebellion at this time; therefore, says my adversary, there was no
parallel. It is true there was no rebellion; but who ever told him
that I intended this parallel so far? if the likeness had been
throughout, I may guess, by their good will to me, that I had never
lived to write it. But, to show his mistake, which I believe wilful,
the play was wholly written a month or two before the last election of
the sheriffs. Yet it seems there was some kind of prophecy in the
case; and, till the faction gets clear of a riot, a part of the
comparison will hold even there; yet, if he pleases to remember, there
has been a king of England forced by the inhabitants from his imperial
town. It is true, the son has had better fortune than the father; but
the reason is, that he has now a stronger party in the city than his
enemies; the government of it is secured in loyal and prudent hands,
and the party is too weak to push their designs farther. "They rescued
not their beloved sheriffs at a time (he tells you) when they had a
most important use of them. " What the importancy of the occasion was,
I will not search: it is well if their own consciences will acquit
them. But let them be never so much beloved, their adherents knew it
was a lawful authority that sent them to the Tower; and an authority
which, to their sorrow, they were not able to resist: so that, if four
men guarded them without disturbance, and, to the contempt of their
strength, at broad noon-day and at full exchange-time, it was no more
their honesty to stand looking on with their hands in their pockets,
than it is of a small band of robbers to let a caravan go by, which is
too strong for them to assault.

After this, I am called, after the old rate, loose and infamous
scribbler; and it is well I escape so cheap. Bear your good fortune
moderately, Mr Poet; for, as loose and infamous as I am, if I had
written for your party, your pension would have been cut off as
useless. But they must take up with Settle, and such as they can get:
Bartholomew-fair writers[40], and Bartholemew-close printers; there is
a famine of wit amongst them, they are forced to give unconscionable
rates, and, after all, to have only carrion for their money.

Then, I am "an ignorant fellow for not knowing there were no juries in
Paris. " I do not remember to have written any such thing; but whoever
did, I am confident it was not his ignorance. Perhaps he had a mind to
bring the case a little nearer home: If they had not juries in Paris,
we had them from the Normans, who were Frenchmen; and, as you managed
them, we had as good have had none in London. Let it satisfy you we
have them now; and some of your loose and infamous scribblers may come
to understand it a little better.

The next is, the justification of a noble peer deceased; the case is
known, and I have no quarrel to his memory: let it sleep; he is now
before another judge. Immediately after, I am said to have intended an
"abuse to the House of Commons;" which is called by our authors "the
most august assembly of Europe. " They are to prove I have abused that
House; but it is manifest they have lessened the House of Lords, by
owning the Commons to be the "more august assembly. "--"It is an House
chosen (they say) by every protestant who has a considerable
inheritance in England;" which word _considerable_ signifies forty
shillings _per annum_ of free land. For the interest of the loyal
party, so much under-valued by our authors, they have long ago
confessed in print, that the nobility and gentry have disowned them;
and the yeomanry have at last considered, _queis hæc consevimus arva_?
They have had enough of unlawful and arbitrary power; and know what an
august assembly they had once without a King and House of Peers.

But now they have me in a burning scent, and run after me full cry:
"Was ever such licence connived at, in an impious libeller and
scribbler, that the succession, so solemn a matter, that is not fit to
be debated of but in parliament, should be profaned so far as to be
played with on the stage? "

Hold a little, gentlemen, hold a little; (as one of your fellow
citizens says in "The Duke of Guise,") is it so unlawful for me to
argue for the succession in the right line upon the stage; and is it
so very lawful for Mr Hunt, and the scribblers of your party, to
oppose it in their libels off the stage? Is it so sacred, that a
parliament only is suffered to debate it, and dare you run it down
both in your discourses, and pamphlets out of parliament? In
conscience, what can you urge against me, which I cannot return an
hundred times heavier on you? And by the way, you tell me, that to
affirm the contrary to this, is a _præmunire_ against the statute of
the 13th of Elizabeth. If such _præmunire_ be, pray, answer me, who
has most incurred it? In the mean time, do me the favour to look into
the statute-book, and see if you can find the statute; you know
yourselves, or you have been told it, that this statute is virtually
repealed, by that of the 1st of king James, acknowledging his
immediate lawful and undoubted right to this imperial crown, as the
next lineal heir; those last words are an implicit anti-declaration to
the statute in queen Elizabeth, which, for that reason, is now omitted
in our books. The lawful authority of an House of Commons I
acknowledge; but without fear and trembling, as my Reflectors would
have it. For why should I fear my representatives? they are summoned
to consult about the public good, and not to frighten those who chose
them. It is for you to tremble, who libel the supreme authority of the
nation. But we knavish coxcombs and villains are to know, say my
authors, that "a vote is the opinion of that House. " Lord help our
understandings, that know not this without their telling! What
Englishman, do you think, does not honour his representatives, and
wish a parliament void of heat and animosities, to secure the quiet of
the nation? You cite his majesty's declaration against those that dare
trifle with parliaments; a declaration, by the way, which you
endeavoured not to have read publicly in churches, with a threatening
to those that did it. "But we still declare (says his majesty) that no
irregularities of parliament shall make us out of love with them. " Are
not you unfortunate quoters? why now should you rub up the remembrance
of those irregularities mentioned in that declaration, which caused,
as the king informs us, its dissolution?

The next paragraph is already answered; it is only a clumsy
commendation of the Duke of Monmouth, copied after Mr Hunt, and a
proof that he is unlike the Duke of Guise.

After having done my drudgery for me, and having most officiously
proved, that the English duke is no parallel for the French, which I
am sure he is not, they are next to do their own business, which is,
that I meant a parallel betwixt Henry III. and our most gracious
sovereign. But, as fallacies are always couched in general
propositions, they plead the whole course of the drama, which, they
say, seems to insinuate my intentions. One may see to what a miserable
shift they are driven, when, for want of any one instance, to which I
challenge them, they have only to allege, that the play SEEMS to
insinuate it. I answer, it does not seem; which is a bare negative to
a bare affirmative; and then we are just where we were before. Fat
Falstaff was never set harder by the Prince for a reason, when he
answered, "that, if reasons grew as thick as blackberries, he would
not give one. " Well, after long pumping, lest the lie should appear
quite barefaced, they have found I said, that, at king Henry's birth,
there shone a regal star; so there did at king Charles the Second's;
therefore I have made a parallel betwixt Henry III. and Charles II. A
very concluding syllogism, if I should answer it no farther.

Now, let us look upon the play; the words are in the fourth act. The
conjurer there is asking his devil, "what fortune attended his master,
the Guise, and what the king? " The familiar answers concerning the
king,--"He cannot be deposed, he may be killed; a violent fate attends
him; but, at his birth, there shone a regal star. "--_Conj. _ "My master
had a stronger. "--_Devil. _ "No, not a stronger, but more popular. " Let
the whole scene, (which is one of the best in the tragedy, though
murdered in the acting) be read together, and it will be as clear as
day light, that the Devil gave an astrological account of the French
king's _horoscope_; that the regal star, then culminating, was the sun
in the tenth house, or mid-heaven; which, _cæteris paribus,_ is a
regal nativity in that art. The rest of the scene confirms what I have
said; for the Devil has taken the position of the heavens, or scheme
of the world, at the point of the sun's entrance into Aries. I dispute
not here the truth or lawfulness of that art; but it is usual with
poets, especially the Italians, to mix astrology in their poems.
Chaucer, amongst us, is frequent in it: but this revolution
particularly I have taken out of Luigi Pulci; and there is one almost
the same in Boiardo's "_Orlando Inamorato. _" Now, if these poets knew,
that a star were to appear at our king's birth, they were better
prophets than Nostradamus, who has told us nothing of it. Yet this
they say "is treason with a witness," and one of the crimes for which
they condemned me to be hanged, drawn and quartered. I find they do
not believe me to be one of their party at the bottom, by their
charitable wishes to me; and am proud enough to think, I have done
them some little mischief, because they are so desirous to be rid of
me. But if Jack Ketch must needs have the handling of us poets, let
him begin first where he may take the deepest say[41]; let me be
hanged, but in my turn; for I am sure I am neither the fattest
scribbler, nor the worst; I'll be judged by their own party. But, for
all our comforts, the days of hanging are a little out of date; and I
hope there will be no more treason with a witness or witnesses; for
now there is no more to be got by swearing, and the market is
overstocked besides.

But are you in earnest when you say, I have made Henry III. "fearful,
weak, bloody, perfidious, hypocritical, and fawning, in the play? " I
am sure an unbiassed reader will find a more favourable image of him
in the tragedy, whatever he was out of it. You would not have told a
lie so shameless, but that you were resolved to second it with a
worse--that I made a parallel of that prince. And now it comes to my
turn, pray let me ask you,--why you spend three pages and a half in
heaping up all the villainies, true or false, which you can rake
together, to blast his memory? Why is all this pains taken to expose
the person of king Henry III. ? Are you leaguers, or covenanters, or
associators? What has the poor dead man done to nettle you? Were his
rebels your friends or your relations? Were your Norman ancestors of
any of those families, which were conspirators in the play? I smell a
rat in this business; Henry III. is not taken thus to task for
nothing. Let me tell you, this is little better than an implicit
confession of the parallel I intended. This gentleman of Valois sticks
in your stomachs; and, though I do not defend his proceedings in the
States, any otherwise than by the inevitable necessity which caused
them, yet acknowledging his crime does not extenuate their guilt that
forced him to it. It was bad on both sides, but the revenge was not so
wicked as the treason; for it was a voluntary act of theirs, and a
compelled one of his. The short on't is, he took a violent course to
cut up the Covenant by the roots; and there is your quarrel to him.

Now for a long-winded panegyric of the king of Navarre; and here I am
sure they are in earnest, when they take such overpains to prove there
is no likeness where they say I intended it. The hero, at whom their
malice is levelled, does but laugh at it, I believe; and, amongst the
other virtues of that predecessor, wants neither his justice nor his
clemency, to forgive all the heads of the League, as fast as they
submit. As for obliging them, (which our author would fain hook in for
an ingredient) let them be satisfied, that no more enemies are to be
bought off with places and preferments; the trial which has been made
in two kings reigns, will warn the family from so fruitless and
dangerous an expedient. The rest is already answered, in what I have
said to Mr Hunt; but I thank them, by the way, for their instance of
the fellow whom the king of Navarre had pardoned and done good to,
"yet he would not love him;" for that story reaches home somewhere.

I must make haste to get out of hearing from this Billingsgate
oratory; and, indeed, to make an end with these authors, except I
could call rogue and rascal as fast as they. Let us examine the little
reason they produce concerning the Exclusion.

"Did the pope, the clergy, the nobility and commonalty of France think
it reasonable to exclude a prince for professing a different religion;
and will the papists be angry if the protestants be of the same
opinion? No, sure, they cannot have the impudence. "

First, here is the difference of religion taken for granted, which was
never proved on one side, though in the king of Navarre it was openly
professed. Then the pope, and the three estates of France had no power
to alter the succession, neither did the king in being consent to it:
or afterwards, did the greater part of the nobility, clergy, and
gentry adhere to the Exclusion, but maintained the lawful king
successfully against it; as we are bound to do in England, by the
oaths of allegiance and supremacy, made for the benefit of our kings,
and their successors? the objections concerning which oath are fully
answered by Dr Hicks, in his preface to Jovian; and thither I refer
the reader.

They tell us, that what it concerns protestants to do in that case,
enough has been heard by us in parliament debates.

I answer, that debates coming not by an act to any issue, conclude,
that there is nothing to be done against a law established, and
fundamental of the monarchy. They dare not infer a right of taking up
arms, by virtue of a debate or vote, and yet they tacitly insinuate
this. I ask them, what it does concern protestants to do in this case,
and whether they mean anything by that expression? They have hampered
themselves before they were aware; for they proceed in the very next
lines to tell us, they believe "the crown of England being hereditary,
the next in blood have an undoubted right to succeed, unless God make
them, or they make themselves uncapable of reigning. " So that
according to them, if either of those two impediments shall happen,
then it concerns the protestants of England to do that something,
which, if they had spoken out, had been direct treason. Here is fine
legerdemain amongst them: they have acknowledged a vote to be no more
than the opinion of an house, and yet from a debate, which was
abortive before it quickened into a vote, they argue after the old
song, "that there is something more to be done, which you cannot chuse
but guess. " In the next place, there is no such thing as incapacity to
be supposed, in the immediate successor of the crown. That is, the
rightful heir cannot be made uncapable on any account whatsoever to
succeed. It may please God, that he may be _inhabilis_, or _inidoneus
ad gerendam rempublicam_,--unfit or unable to govern the kingdom; but
this is no impediment to his right of reigning: he cannot either be
excluded or deposed for such imperfection; for the laws which have
provided for private men in this case, have also made provision for
the sovereign, and for the public; and the council of state, or the
next of blood, is to administer the kingdom for him. Charles the Sixth
of France, (for I think we have no English examples which will reach
it) forfeited not his kingdom by his lunacy, though a victorious king
of England was then knocking at his gates; but all things under his
name, and by his authority were managed. The case is the same, betwixt
a king _non compos mentis_, and one who is _nondum compos mentis_; a
distracted or an infant-king. Then the people cannot incapacitate the
king, because he derives not his right from them, but from God only;
neither can any action, much less opinion of a sovereign, render him
uncapable, for the same reason; excepting only a voluntary resignation
to his immediate heir, as in the case of Charles the Fifth: for that
of our Richard the Second was invalid, because forced, and not made to
the next successor.

Neither does it follow, as our authors urge, that an unalterable
succession supposes England to be the king's estate, and the people
his goods and chattels on it. For the preservation of his right
destroys not our propriety, but maintains us in it. He has tied
himself by law, not to invade our possessions; and we have obliged
ourselves as subjects to him, and all his lawful successors: by which
irrevocable act of ours, both for ourselves and our posterity, we can
no more exclude the successor, than we can depose the present king.
The estate of England is indeed the king's; and I may safely grant
their supposition, as to the government of England: but it follows
not, that the people are his goods and chattels on it; for then he
might sell, alienate, or destroy them as he pleased: from all which he
has tied himself by the liberties and privileges which he has granted
us by laws.

There is little else material in this pamphlet: for to say, "I would
insinuate into the king a hatred to his capital city," is to say, he
should hate his best friends, the last, and the present Lord Mayor,
our two honourable Sheriffs, the Court of Aldermen, the worthy and
loyal Mr Common Serjeant, with the rest of the officers, who are
generally well affected and who have kept out their factious members
from its government. To say, I would insinuate a scorn of authority in
the city, is, in effect, to grant the parallel in the play: for the
authority of tumults and seditions is only scorned in it,--an
authority which they derived not from the crown, but exercised against
it. And for them to confess I exposed this, is to confess, that London
was like Paris.

They conclude with a prayer to Almighty God, in which I therefore
believe, the poet did not club. To libel the king through all the
pamphlet, and to pray for him in the conclusion, is an action of more
prudence in them than of piety. Perhaps they might hope to be
forgiven, as one of their predecessors was by king James; who, after
he had railed at him abundantly, ended his lampoon with these two
verses:

Now God preserve our king, queen, prince and peers,
And grant the author long may wear his ears[42].

To take a short review of the whole. --It is manifest, that there is no
such parallel in the play, as the faction have pretended; that the
story would not bear one where they have placed it; and that I could
not reasonably intend one, so contrary to the nature of the play, and
so repugnant to the principles of the loyal party. On the other side,
it is clear that the principles and practices of the public enemies,
have both formerly resembled those of the League, and continue to hold
the same resemblance. It appears by the outcry of the party before the
play was acted, that they dreaded and foresaw the bringing of the
faction upon the stage: and by the hasty printing of Mr Hunt's libel,
and the Reflections, before the tragedy was published, that they were
infinitely concerned to prevent any farther operation of it. It
appears from the general consent of the audiences, that their party
were known to be represented; and themselves owned openly, by their
hissings, that they were incensed at it, as an object which they could
not bear. It is evident by their endeavours to shift off this parallel
from their side, that their principles are too shameful to be
maintained. It is notorious, that they, and they only, have made the
parallel betwixt the Duke of Guise and the Duke of Monmouth, and that
in revenge for the manifest likeness they find in the parties
themselves, they have carried up the parallel to the heads of the
parties, where there is no resemblance at all; under which colour,
while they pretend to advert upon one libel, they set up another. For
what resemblance could they suggest betwixt two persons so unlike in
their descent, the qualities of their minds, and the disparity of
their warlike actions, if they grant not, that there is a faction
here, which is like that other which was in France? so that if they do
not first acknowledge one common cause, there is no foundation for a
parallel. The dilemma therefore lies strong upon them; and let them
avoid it if they can,--that either they must avow the wickedness of
their designs, or disown the likeness of those two persons. I do
further charge those audacious authors, that they themselves have made
the parallel which they call mine, and that under the covert of this
parallel they have odiously compared our present king with king Henry
the Third; and farther, that they have forced this parallel expressly
to wound His Majesty in the comparison: for, since there is a parallel
(as they would have it) it must be either theirs or mine. I have
proved that it cannot possibly be mine: and in so doing, that it must
be theirs by consequence. Under this shadow all the vices of the
French king are charged by those libellers (by a side-wind) upon ours;
and it is indeed the bottom of their design to make the king cheap,
his royal brother odious, and to alter the course of the succession.

Now, after the malice of this sputtering triumvirate (Mr Hunt, and the
two Reflectors), against the person and dignity of the king, and
against all that endeavour to serve him (which makes their hatred to
his cause apparent), the very charging of our play to be a libel, and
such a parallel as these ignoramuses would render it, is almost as
great an affront to His Majesty, as the libellous picture itself, by
which they have exposed him to his subjects. For it is no longer our
parallel, but the king's, by whose order it was acted, without any
shuffling or importunity from the poets. The tragedy (cried the
faction) is a libel against such and such illustrious persons. Upon
this the play was stopt, examined, acquitted, and ordered to be
brought upon the stage: not one stroke in it of a resemblance, to
answer the scope and intent of the complaint. There were some
features, indeed, that the illustrious Mr Hunt and his brace of
beagles (the Reflectors) might see resembling theirs; and no other
parallel either found or meant, but betwixt the French leaguers and
ours: and so far the agreement held from point to point, as true as a
couple of tallies. But when neither the king, nor my lord chamberlain,
with other honourable persons of eminent faith, integrity, and
understanding, upon a strict perusal of the papers, could find one
syllable to countenance the calumny; up starts the defender of the
charter, &c. opens his mouth, and says, "What do ye talk of the king?
he's abused, he's imposed upon. Is my lord chamberlain, and the
scrutineers that succeed him, to tell us, when the king and the duke
of York are abused? " What says my lord chief baron of Ireland to the
business? What says the livery-man templer? What says Og the king of
Basan to it? "We are men that stand up for the king's supremacy in all
causes, and over all persons, as well ecclesiastical as civil, next
and immediately under God and the people. We are for easing His Royal
Highness of his title to the crown, and the cares that attend any such
prospect; and we shall see the king and the Royal Family paralleled at
this rate, and not reflect upon it? "

But to draw to an end. Upon the laying of matters fairly together,
what a king have these balderdash scribblers given us, under the
resemblance of Henry the Third! How scandalous a character again, of
His Majesty, in telling the world that he is libelled, and affronted
to his face, told on't, pointed to it; and yet neither he, nor those
about him, can be brought to see or understand it. There needs no more
to expound the meaning of these people, than to compare them with
themselves: when it will evidently appear, that their lives and
conversations, their writings and their practices, do all take the
same bias; and when they dare not any longer revile His Majesty or his
government point blank, they have an intention to play the libellers
in masquerade, and do the same thing in a way of mystery and parable.
This is truly the case of the pretended parallel. They lay their heads
together, and compose the lewdest character of a prince that can be
imagined, and then exhibit that monster to the people, as the picture
of the king in the "Duke of Guise. " So that the libel passes for
current in the multitude, whoever was the author of it; and it will be
but common justice to give the devil his due. But the truth is, their
contrivances are now so manifest, that their party moulders both in
town and country; for I will not suspect that there are any of them
left in court. Deluded well-meaners come over out of honesty, and
small offenders out of common discretion or fear. None will shortly
remain with them, but men of desperate fortunes or enthusiasts: those
who dare not ask pardon, because they have transgressed beyond it, and
those who gain by confusion, as thieves do by fires: to whom
forgiveness were as vain, as a reprieve to condemned beggars; who must
hang without it, or starve with it.


Footnotes:
1. As the whole passage from Davila is subjoined to the text in the
play, the reader may easily satisfy himself of the accuracy of what
is here stated. But, although the scene may have been written in
1661, we must be allowed to believe, that its extreme resemblance
to the late events occasioned its being revived and re-presented in
1682.

2. The poem, alluded to, was probably the _Religio Laici_, first
published in November l682.

3. Dryden and Shadwell had once been friends. In the preface to "The
Humourists," acted, according to Mr Malone, in 1676, Shadwell thus
mentions his great contemporary:

"And here I must make a little digression, and take liberty to
dissent from my particular friend, for whom I have a very great
respect, and whose writings I extremely admire; and, though I will
not say, his is the best way of writing, yet, I am sure his manner
of writing is much the best that ever was. And I may say of him, as
was said of a celebrated poet, _Cui unquam poetarum magis proprium
fuit subito astro incalescere? Quis ubi incaluit, fortius et
fæclicius debacchatur_? His verse is smoother and deeper, his
thoughts more quick and surprising, his raptures more mettled and
higher, and he has more of that in his writings, which Plato calls
_sôphrona manian_ than any other heroic poet. And those who shall
go about to imitate him, will be found to flutter and make a noise,
but never to rise. "

Such a compliment, from a rival dramatist, could only have been
extracted by previous good offices and kindly countenance.
Accordingly we find, that Dryden, in 1678-9, wrote a prologue to
Shadwell's play, of "The True Widow. "

4. "The Female Prelate, or Pope Joan," is a bombast, silly performance
of Elkanah Settle; the catastrophe of which consists in the
accouchement of the Pope in the streets of Rome. The aid necessary
in the conclusion of an English tragedy, (usually loudly called
for, but never brought) is of a surgical nature; but here Lucina
was the deity to be implored, and the midwife's assistance most
requisite.

Shadwell's comedy of "The Lancashire Witches," was popular for many
years after the Revolution, chiefly, because the papists were
reflected upon in the character of Teague O'Divelly, an Irish
Priest, the high-church clergy ridiculed under that of Smerk, and
the whole Tory faction generally abused through the play. It is by
no means one of Shadwell's happiest efforts. The introduction of
the witches celebrating their satanical sabbath on the stage,
besides that the scene is very poorly and lamely written, is at
variance with the author's sentiments, as delivered through Sir
Edward Hartfort, "a worthy, hospitable, true English gentleman, of
good understanding and honest principles," who ridicules the belief
in witches at all. A different and totally inconsistent doctrine is
thus to be collected from the action of the piece and the
sentiments expressed by those, whose sentiments are alone marked as
worthy of being attended to. This obvious fault, with many others,
is pointed out in a criticism on the "Lancashire Witches,"
published in the Spectator. The paper is said to have been written
by Hughes, but considerably softened by Addison.

5. Half-a-crown was then the box price.

You visit our plays and merit the stocks,
For paying half-crowns of brass to our box;
Nay, often you swear when places are shewn ye,
That your hearing is thick,
And so by a love trick,
You pass through our scenes up to the balcony.
_Epilogue to_ "The Man's the Master. "

The farce, alluded to, seems to have been "The Lancashire Witches. "
See Shadwell's account of the reception of that piece, from which
it appears, that the charge of forming a party in the theatre was a
subject of mutual reproach betwixt the dramatists of the contending
parties.

6. This single remark is amply sufficient to exculpate Dryden from
having intended any general parallel between Monmouth and the Duke
of Guise. To have produced such a parallel, it would have been
necessary to unite, in one individual, the daring political courage
of Shaftesbury, his capacity of seizing the means to attain his
object, and his unprincipled carelessness of their nature, with the
fine person, chivalrous gallantry, military fame, and courteous
manners of the Duke of Monmouth. Had these talents, as they were
employed in the same cause, been vested in the same person, the
Duke of Guise must have yielded the palm. The partial resemblance,
in one point of their conduct, is stated by our poet, not to have
been introduced as an _intended_ likeness, betwixt the Duke of
Guise, and the Protestant Duke. We may observe, in the words of
Bertran,

The dial spoke not--but it made shrewd signs.
_Spanish Friar. _

7. Alluding to a book, called "The Parallel," published by J.
Northleigh L. L. B. the same who afterwards wrote "the Triumph of the
Monarchy," and was honoured by a copy of verses from our author.

8. "Julian the Apostate, with a short account of his life, and a
parallel betwixt Popery and Paganism," was a treatise, written by
the Rev. Samuel Johnson, chaplain to Lord Russell, for the purpose
of forwarding the bill of exclusion, by shewing the consequences to
Christianity of a Pagan Emperor attaining the throne. It would
seem, that one of the sheriffs had mistaken so grossly, as to talk
of Julian the Apostle; or, more probably, such a blunder was
circulated as true, by some tory wit.