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and France continued: and the preserva

brought it to this extremity, if the interest as well as the honour of the whole kingdom had not been at stake and if I had omitted this conjuncture, perhaps, I had not again ever met with the like advantage." -The lord chancellor, Shaftesbury, one of the cabal so infamous in our histories, backed his majesty; and, among other things, observed, "that both kings, knowing their interests, resolved to join against them [the Dutch], who were the common enemies to all monarchies; and especially to ours, their only competitor for trade, and power at sea; and who only stand in their way to an universal empire as great as Rome. This the States understood so well, and had swalloweḍ so deep, that under all their present distress and danger, they are so intoxicated with that vast ambition, that they slight a treaty and refuse a cessation. AH this you and the whole nation saw before the last war: but it could not then be so well timed, or our alliances so well made. But you judged aright, that, at any rate, delenda est Carthago, that government was to be brought down. And, therefore, the king may well say to you, 'Tis your war. He took his measures from you, and they were just and right ones; and he expects a suitable assistance to so necessary and expensive an action: which he has hitherto maintained at his own charge, and was unwilling either to trouble you, or burden the country, until it came to an inevitable necessity. And his majesty commands me to tell you, that unless it be a certain sum, and speedily raised, it can never answer the occasion.-Let 'me say, the king has brought the States to that condition, that your hearty conjunction, at this time, in supplying his majesty, will make them never more formi

tion of the former was owing to the spirit

dable to kings, or dangerous to England. And if after this you suffer them to get up, let this be remembred, the States of Holland are England's eternal enemy, both by interest and inclination"."-What amaz→

ing impudence is here! To tell the parliament it was. their war, when, by reason of several prorogations, they had not sat for near ten months, and, consequently, were incapable of giving their consent or approbation: I say, under these circumstances, to call it their war; and to tell them, the king took his mea sures from them, was a strain worthy Shaftesbury himself. But ministers of state, as they engross the power, seem to think they engross the sense too of the community; and that they may talk what they please without fear of their auditors. It is, however, a gross mistake: there are standers-by, much their superiors, who remark their behaviour; and take care to expose it, properly, to posterity.-In Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel, there are many portraits which bear no resemblance to the originals: but Shaftesbury's seems taken from life.-Compare the following lines with the above speech, and then, reader, determine:

"In friendship false, implacable in hate; Resolved to ruin or to rule the state.

To compass this, the triple bond he broke ;

The pillars of the publick safety shook ;

And fitted Israel for a foreign yoke :

Then, seiz'd with fear, yet still affecting fame,

Usurp'd a patriot's all-atoning name."

There is another picture of him in the Medal, part

of which I will here add:

* Journal of the House of Commons.

and bravery of the prince of Orange, aided

"Behold him now exalted into trust;
His counsels oft convenient, seldom just.
E'en in the most sincere advice he gave,
He had a grudging still to be a knave.
The frauds he learnt, in his fanatick years,
Made him uneasy in his lawful gears:
At best, as little honest as he cou'd:
And, like white witches, mischievously good.
To his first biass, longingly, he leans;
And rather would be great by wicked means.
Thus, fram'd for ill, he loos'd our triple hold;
(Advice unsafe, precipitate, and bold);
From hence those tears; that Ilium of our woe:
Who helps a pow'rful friend, fore-arms a foe.
What wonder if the waves prevail so far,

When he cut down the banks that made the bar?

Seas follow but their nature to invade;

But he, by art, our native strength betray'd."

To return.As it appears, from his majesty's de claration, and lord Shaftesbury's speech, that the Dutch were to be rendered odious, that the war might be popular; so the court employed able pens to accuse, expose, and exaggerate what had been done by any of that nation, in any time, or any part of the world. Let us hear Henry Stubbe on this subject." I should injure Christendom," says he, "to reckon the United Netherlands a part thereof. Such are their practices, that 'tis a crime in them to profess that religion, and a great mistake in those that entitle them thereunto. I know not whether I do not speak too mildly concerning those deluded persons, since 'tis a wilful error in them that imagine so: the Dutch themselves have avowed it; and those that have managed their trade in Japan, when the Christians there (at the instigation of the Dutch) were all, by horrible tortures, put to death, and every housekeeper enjoined to declare

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by the neighbouring powers: who yet were

in writing that he neither was a Christian nor retained any Christians in his family; Melchior à Santvoort, and Vincentius Romeyn, subscribed themselves, that they were Hollanders: most impiously, for lucre's sake, declining that profession of Christianity to which Christ and his apostles oblige them ".""We do complain," says he, in another place," that these Netherlanders, who do so highly pretend to piety and protestantcy, should violate all divine and humane rules of civility; that they rail instead of fighting; that they attack us with contumelious language; and aggravate their unjust enmity with an insolence that is not to be endured. I am as much perplexed to find out the rules of their politicks herein, as I am elsewhere to seek for those of their religion; seeing that this deportment must needs exasperate all mankind against them, and common humanity obligeth every one to endeavour their extirpation. Provocations of this kind, injuries of this nature, admit of no composition, and render the most bloody wars to be most just. The indignities done to our king do extend unto all princes, and become examples of what they universally must expect in time to suffer from the continuance of their High and Mighties. But these affronts particularly and most sensibly touch the subjects of the king of Great Britain, and turn their just anger into implacable fury b."" As to their religion, we could never be convinced that the Hollanders did regard any. Their first revolt was not founded on any such principles: they patiently endured the suppres

Justification of the War against the United Netherlands, p. 2. 4to Lond. 1672.

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Id. p. 5.

in a manner forced to aggrandize France,

sion of their churches and ministers: the country did not stir thereat; nor upon the execution of so many thousand protestants. It is notorious, that the exaction of the tenth penny, by the d. of Alva, did more exasperate them than the inquisition.-If we look upon them in their more flourishing condition; all religions are tolerated there as well as protestants, even such as are most repugnant to the Deity and gospel of Christ. Their actions are regulated by principles of state; and upon those grounds do they invite and encourage all sects to live in their territories. When their interest doth sway them, they desert or fight against protestants."It is very amazing that all this should fall. from the pen of a learned, unbigotted, if not sceptical man! But, it seems, that there were then, as well as now, authors, by profession, who, for the sake of gain, would undertake to vindicate any cause. "For the compiling "the author was al

of these two books," says Wood, lowed the use of the Paper Office at Whitehall; and when they were both finished, he had given him 2007. out of his majesty's exchequer; and obtained a great deal of credit from all people, especially from the courtiers, and all that belonged to the king's court "."

b

A poor reward, however, for such infamous service! Another writer, engaged on the same side of the question, averred, "That his majesty of Great Britain, and the most Christian king, of all princes in Europe, have most studied and endeavoured (for the good of their subjects) to advance trade and commerce; yet

* Further Justification, p. 75. 4to. Lond. 1673. €. 567.

Athenæ, vol. II.

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