PART III.

Note I.

_And mother Hubbard, in her homely dress,

Has sharply blamed a British Lioness;

That queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep,

Exposed obscenely naked, and asleep._--P. 197.

The poet, in the beginning of this canto, anticipates the censure of

those who might blame him for introducing into his fables animals not

natives of Britain, where the scene was laid. He vindicates himself

by the example of Æsop and Spenser. The latter, in "Mother Hubbard's

Tale," exhibits at length the various arts by which, in his time,

obscure and infamous characters rose to eminence in church and state.

This is illustrated by the parable of an Ape and a Fox, who insinuate

themselves into various situations, and play the knaves in all. At

length,

Lo, where they spied, how, in a gloomy glade,

The Lion, sleeping, lay in secret shade;

His crown and sceptre lying him beside,

And having doft for heat his dreadful hide.

The adventurers possess themselves of the royal spoils, with which the

Ape is arrayed; who forthwith takes upon himself the dignity of the

monarch of the beasts, and, by the counsels of the Fox, commits every

species of oppression, until Jove, incensed at the disorders which

his tyranny had introduced, sends Mercury to awaken the Lion from his

slumber:

Arise! said Mercury, thou sluggish beast,

That here liest senseless, like the corpse deceast;

The whilst thy kingdom from thy head is rent,

And thy throne royal with dishonour blent.

The Lion rouses himself, hastens to court, and avenges himself of the

usurpers.--There is no doubt, that, under this allegory, Spenser meant

to represent the exorbitant power of Lord Burleigh; and he afterwards

complains, that his verse occasioned his falling into a "mighty peer's

displeasure." The Lion, therefore, whose negligence is upbraided by

Mercury, was Queen Elizabeth. Dryden calls her,

The queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep;

because the tumultuous pope-burnings of 1680 and 1681 were solemnized

on Queen Elizabeth's night. The poet had probably, since his change

of religion, laid aside much of the hereditary respect with which

most Englishmen regard Queen Bess; for, in the pamphlets of the

Romanists, she is branded as "a known bastard, who raised this prelatic

protestancy, called the church of England, as a prop to supply the

weakness of her title."[264]

Spenser's authority is only appealed to by Dryden as justifying the

introduction of lions and other foreign animals into a British fable.

But I observed in the introduction, that it also furnishes authority,

at least example, for those aberrations from the character and

attributes of his brute actors, with which the critics taxed Dryden;

for nothing in "The Hind and the Panther" can be more inconsistent with

the natural quality of such animals, than the circumstance of a lion,

or any other creature, going to sleep without his skin, on account of

the sultry weather.

Note II.

_You know my doctrine, and I need not say

I will not, but I cannot, disobey.

On this firm principle I ever stood;

He of my sons, who fails to make it good,

By one rebellious act renounces to my blood._--P. 202.

The memorable judgment and decree of the university of Oxford, passed

in the Convocation 21st July, 1683, condemns, as heretical, all works

which teach or infer the lawfulness of resistance to lawful governors,

even when they become tyrants, or in case of persecution for religion,

or infringement on the laws of the country, or, in short, in any case

whatever; and after the various authorities for these and other tenets

have been given and denounced as false, seditious, heretical, and

impious, the decree concludes with the following injunctions:

"Lastly, we command and strictly enjoin all and singular readers,

tutors, catechists, and others, to whom the care and trust of

institution of youth is committed, that they diligently instruct

and ground their scholars in that most necessary doctrine, which in

a manner is the badge and character of the church of England, of

submitting to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be

to the king as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are sent

by him, for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them

that do well: Teaching, that this submission and obedience is to be

clear, absolute, and without exception of any state or order of men."

Note III.

_Your sons of latitude, that court your grace,}

Though most resembling you in form and face, }

Are far the worst of your pretended race. }

And, but I blush your honesty to blot,

Pray God you prove them lawfully begot!

For in some Popish libels I have read,

The Wolf has been too busy in your bed._--P. 202.

During the latter years of the reign of Charles the Second, the

dissensions of the state began to creep into the church. By far the

greater part of the clergy, influenced by the ancient union of church

and king, were steady in their adherence to the court interest. But

a party began to appear, who were distinguished from their brethren

by the name of _Moderate Divines_, which they assumed to themselves,

and by that of Latitudinarians, which the high churchmen conferred

upon them. The chief amongst these were Tillotson, Stillingfleet,

and Burnet. They distinguished themselves by a less violent ardour

for the ceremonies, and even the government, of the church; for all

those particulars, in short, by which she is distinguished from other

Protestant congregations. Stillingfleet carried these condescensions

so far, as to admit in his tract, called _Irenicum_, that, although

the original church was settled in a constitution of bishops, priests,

and deacons, yet as the apostles made no positive law upon this

subject, it remained free to every Christian congregation to alter

or to retain that form of church government. In conformity with this

opinion, he, in conjunction with Tillotson and others, laid a plan

for an accommodation with the Presbyterians, in 1668; and, in order

to this comprehension, he was willing to have made such sacrifices in

the point of ordination, &c. that the House of Commons took the alarm,

and passed a vote, prohibiting even the introduction of a bill for

such a purpose. As, on the one hand, the tenets of the moderate clergy

approximated those of the Calvinists; so, on the other, their antipathy

and opposition to the church of Rome was more deeply rooted, in

proportion to the slighter value which they attached to the particulars

in which that of England resembled her. It flowed naturally from this

indulgence to the Dissenters, and detestation of the Romanists, that

several of the moderate clergy participated deeply in the terrors

excited by the Roman Catholic plot, and looked with a favourable eye

on the bill which proposed to exclude the Duke of York from the throne

as a professor of that obnoxious religion. Being thus, as it were, an

opposition party, it cannot be supposed that the low church divines

united cordially with their high-flying brethren in renouncing the

right of resisting oppression, or in professing passive obedience to

the royal will. They were of opinion, that there was a mutual compact

between the king and subject, and that acts of tyranny, on the part

of the former, absolved the latter from his allegiance. This was

particularly inculcated by the reverend Samuel Johnson (See Vol. IX. p.

369.) in "Julian the Apostate," and other writings which were condemned

by the Oxford decree. As the dangers attending the church, from the

measures of King James, became more obvious, and the alternative of

resistance or destruction became an approaching crisis, the low church

party acquired numbers and strength from those who thought it better at

once to hold and assert the lawfulness of opposition to tyranny, than

to make professions of obedience beyond the power of human endurance to

make good.

This party was of course deeply hated by the Catholics, and hence

the severity with which they are treated by Dryden, who objects to

them as the illegitimate offspring of the Panther by the Wolf, and

traces to their Presbyterian origin their indifference to the fasts

and ascetic observances of the more rigid high-churchmen, and their

covert disposition to resist regal domination. Their adherence to

the English communion he ascribes only to the lucre of gain, and

endeavours, if possible, to draw an odious distinction between them

and the rest of the church. Stillingfleet, whom this motive could not

escape, had already complained of Dryden's designing any particular

class of the clergy by a party name. "From the common people, we come

to churchmen, to see how he uses them. And he hath soon found out a

faction among them, whom he charges with juggling designs: but romantic

heroes must be allowed to make armies of a field of thistles, and to

encounter windmills for giants. He would fain be the instrument to

divide our clergy, and to fill them with suspicions of one another.

And to this end he talks of men of latitudinarian stamp: for it goes

a great way towards the making divisions, to be able to fasten a name

of distinction among brethren; this being to create jealousies of each

other. But there is nothing should make them more careful to avoid such

names of distinction, than to observe how ready their common enemies

are to make use of them, to create animosities by them; which hath made

this worthy gentleman to start this different character of churchmen

among us; as though there were any who were not true to the principles

of the church of England, as by law established: If he knows them, he

is better acquainted with them than the answerer is; for he professes

to know none such. But who then are these men of the latitudinarian

stamp? To speak in his own language, they are a sort of ergoteerers,

who are for a _concedo_ rather than a _nego_. And now, I hope, they are

all well explained; or, in other words of his, they are, saith he, for

drawing the nonconformists to their party, _i.e._ they are for having

no nonconformists. And is this their crime? But they would take the

headship of the church out of the king's hands: How is that possible?

They would (by his own description) be glad to see differences

lessened, and all that agree in the same doctrine to be one entire

body. But this is that which their enemies fear, and this politician

hath too much discovered; for then such a party would be wanting, which

might be played upon the church of England, or be brought to join with

others against it. But how this should touch the king's supremacy, I

cannot imagine. As for his desiring loyal subjects to consider this

matter, I hope they will, and the more for his desiring it; and assure

themselves, that they have no cause to apprehend any juggling designs

of their brethren; who, I hope, will always show themselves to be loyal

subjects, and dutiful sons of the church of England."--_Vindication of

the Answer to some late Papers_, p. 104.

Note IV.

_Think you, your new French proselytes are come

To starve abroad, because they starved at home?_

* * * * *

_Mark with what management their tribes divide,

Some stick to you, and some to t'other side,

That many churches may for many mouths provide._ P. 203.

The Huguenot clergy, who took refuge in England after the recal

of the edict of Nantes, did not all adhere to the same Protestant

communion. There had been long in London what was called the Walloon

church, exclusively dedicated to this sort of worship. Many conformed

to the church of England; and, having submitted to new ordination,

some of them obtained benefices: others joined in communion with the

Presbyterians, and dissenters of various kinds. Dryden insinuates,

that had the church of England presented vacancies sufficient for the

provision of these foreign divines, she would probably have had the

honour of attracting them all within her pale. The reformed clergy

of France were far from being at any time an united body. "It might

have been expected," says Burnet, "that those unhappy contests between

Lutherans, Calvinists, Arminians, and Anti-Arminians, with some minuter

disputes that have enflamed Geneva and Switzerland, should have been

at least suspended while they had a common enemy to deal with, against

whom their whole force united was scarce able to stand. But these

things were carried on rather with more eagerness and sharpness than

ever." _History of his Own Times_, Book IV.

Note V.

_Some sons of mine, who bear upon their shield

Three steeples argent, in a sable field,

Have sharply taxed your converts, who, unfed,

Have followed you for miracles of bread._ P. 203.

The three steeples argent obviously alludes to the pluralities enjoyed,

perhaps by Stillingfleet, and certainly by some of the divines of

the established church, who were not on that account less eager in

opposing the intrusion of the Roman clergy, and stigmatising those who,

at this crisis, thought proper to conform to the royal faith. These

converts were neither numerous nor respectable; and, whatever the Hind

is pleased to allege in the text, posterity cannot but suspect the

disinterestedness of their motives. Obadiah Walker, and a very few of

the university of Oxford, embraced the Catholic faith, conforming at

the same time to the forms of the church of England, as if they wished

to fulfil the old saying, of having two strings to one bow.--The Earls

of Perth and Melfort, with one or two other Scottish nobles, took the

same step. Of the first, who must otherwise have failed in a contest

which he had with the Duke of Queensberry, it was wittily said by

Halifax, that "his faith had made him whole." And, in general, as my

countrymen are not usually credited by their brethren of England for

an extreme disregard to their own interest, the Scottish converts were

supposed to be peculiarly attracted to Rome by the miracle of the

loaves and fishes.[265] But it may be said for these unfortunate peers,

that if they were dazzled by the momentary sunshine which gleamed on

the Catholic church, they scorned to desert her in the tempest which

speedily succeeded. Whereas, we shall do a kindness to Lord Sunderland,

if we suppose that he became a convert to Popery, merely from views of

immediate interest, and not with the premeditated intention of blinding

and betraying the monarch, who trusted him. Dryden must be supposed,

however, chiefly interested in the vindication of his own motives for a

change of religion.

Note VI.

_Such who themselves of no religion are,

Allured with gain, for any will declare;

Bare lies with bold assertions they can face,

But dint of argument is out of place;

The grim logician puts them in a fright,

'Tis easier far to flourish than to fight._ P. 203.

Dryden here puts into the mouth of the Panther some of the severe

language which Stillingfleet had held towards him in the ardour of

controversy. He had, in direct allusion to our author, (for he quotes

his poetry,) expressed himself thus harshly:

"If I thought there were no such thing in the world as true religion,

and that _the priests of all religions are alike_,[266] I might have

been as nimble a convert, and as early a defender of the royal papers,

as any one of these champions. For why should not one who believes no

religion, declare for any? But since I do verily believe, that not only

there is such a thing as true religion, but that it is only to be found

in the books of the Holy Scripture, I have reason to inquire after the

best means of understanding such books, and thereby, if it may be, to

put an end to the controversies of Christendom."[267]

"But our _grim logician_ proceeds from immediate and original to

concomitant causes, which he saith were revenge, ambition, and

covetousness. But the skill of logicians used to lie in proving; but

this is not our author's talent, for not a word is produced to that

purpose. If bold sayings, and confident declarations, will do the

business, he is never unprovided; but if you expect any reason from

him, he begs your pardon. He finds how ill the character of a grim

logician suits with his inclination."[268] Again, "But if I will not

allow his affirmations for proofs for his part, he will act the grim

logician; no, and in truth it becomes him so ill, that he doth well to

give it over."[269] And in the beginning of his "Vindication," alluding

to a term used by the defender of the king's papers, Stillingfleet

says: "But lest I be again thought to have a mind to flourish before I

offer to pass, as the champion speaks in his proper language, I shall

apply myself to the matter before us."[270]

Note VII.

_Thus our eighth Henry's marriage they defame;

Divorcing from the church to wed the dame:

Though largely proved, and by himself professed,

That conscience, conscience would not let him rest._

* * * * *

_For sundry years before he did complain,

And told his ghostly confessor his pain._ P. 204.

This is a continuation of the allusion to Stillingfleet's

"Vindication," who had attempted to place Henry VIII.'s divorce from

Catherine of Arragon to the account of his majesty's tender conscience.

A herculean task! but the readers may take it in the words of the Dean

of St Paul's:

"And now this gentleman sets himself to _ergoteering_;[271] and looks

and talks like any grim logician, of the causes which produced it,

and the effects which it produced. 'The schism led the way to the

Reformation, for breaking the unity of Christ's church, which was the

foundation of it: but the immediate cause of this, which produced the

separation of Henry VIII. from the church of Rome, was the refusal of

the pope to grant him a divorce from his first wife, and to gratify

his desires in a dispensation for a second marriage.'

"_Ergo_: The first cause of the Reformation, was the satisfying an

inordinate and brutal passion. But is he sure of this? If he be not,

it is a horrible calumny upon our church, upon King Henry the Eighth,

and the whole nation, as I shall presently show. No; he confesses

he cannot be sure of it: for, saith he, no man can carry it so high

as the original cause with any certainty. And at the same time, he

undertakes to demonstrate the immediate cause to be Henry the Eighth's

inordinate and brutal passion; and afterwards affirms, as confidently

as if he had demonstrated it, that our Reformation was erected on

the foundations of lust, sacrilege, and usurpation: Yet, saith he,

the king only knew whether it was conscience or love, or love alone,

which moved him to sue for a divorce. Then, by his favour, the king

only could know what was the immediate cause of that which he calls

the schism. Well! but he offers at some probabilities, that lust was

the true cause. Is Ergoteering come to this already? 'But this we may

say, if Conscience had any part in it, she had taken a long nap of

almost twenty years together before she awakened.' Doth he think, that

Conscience doth not take a longer nap than this in some men, and yet

they pretend to have it truly awakened at last? What thinks he of late

converts? Cannot they be true, because conscience hath slept so long

in them? Must we conclude in such cases, that some inordinate passion

gives conscience a jog at last? 'So that it cannot be denied, he saith,

that an inordinate and brutal passion had a great share at least in

the production of the schism.' How! cannot be denied! I say from his

own words it ought to be denied, for he confesses none could know but

the king himself; he never pretended that the king confessed it: How

then cannot it be denied? Yea, how dare any one affirm it? Especially

when the king himself declared in a solemn assembly, in these words,

saith Hall, (as near, saith he, as I could carry them away,) speaking

of the dissatisfaction of his conscience,--"For this only cause, I

protest before God, and in the word of a prince, I have asked counsel

of the greatest clerks in Christendom; and for this cause I have sent

for this legat, as a man indifferent, only to know the truth, and to

settle my conscience, and for none other cause, as God can judge." And

both then and afterwards, he declared, that his scruples began upon

the French ambassador's making a question about the legitimacy of the

marriage, when the match was proposed between the Duke of Orleans and

his daughter; and he affirms, that he moved it himself in confession to

the Bishop of Lincoln, and appeals to him concerning the truth of it in

open court."--_Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers_, p. 109.

Note VIII.

_They say, that, look the Reformation round,

No treatise of humility is found;

But if none were, the gospel does not want,

Our Saviour preached it, and I hope you grant,

The sermon on the mount was Protestant._--P. 204.

Stillingfleet concludes his "Vindication" with this admonition

to Dryden: "I would desire him not to end with such a bare-faced

assertion of a thing so well known to be false, viz. that there is

not one original treatise written by a Protestant, which hath handled

distinctly, and by itself, that Christian virtue of humility. Since

within a few years (besides what hath been printed formerly) such

a book hath been published in London. But he doth well to bring it

off with, 'at least that I have seen or heard of;' for such books

have not lain much in the way of his inquiries. Suppose we had not

such particular books, we think the Holy Scripture gives the best

rules and examples of humility of any book in the world; but I am

afraid he should look on his case as desperate if I send him to the

Scripture, since he saith, 'Our divines do that as physicians do

with their patients whom they think uncurable, send them at last to

Tunbridge-waters, or to the air of Montpellier."

Dryden, in the Introduction, says, that the author of this work was

called Duncombe; but he is charged with inaccuracy by Montague, who

says his name is Allen. It seems to be admitted, that his work is a

translation from the Spanish. The real author may have been Thomas

Allen, rector of Kettering, in Northamptonshire, and author of "The

Practice of a Holy Life, 8vo. 1716;" in the list of books subjoined to

which, I find "The Virtue of Humility, recommended to be printed by

the late reverend and learned Dr Henry Hammond," which perhaps may be

the book in question. A sort of similarity of sound between Duncombe

and Hammond may have led to Dryden's mistake. Alonzo Rodriguez, of the

Order of the Jesuits, wrote a book called "_Exercicio de perfecion y

virtudes Christianas, Sevilla, 1609_," which seems to be the work from

which the plagiary was taken.

Note IX.

_Unpitied Hudibras, your champion friend,

Has shown how far your charities extend;

This lasting verse shall on his tomb be read,_

"_He shamed you living, and upbraids you dead._" P. 205.

Our author, in the preceding lines, had employed himself in repelling

the charge of his having changed his religion for the sake of interest.

His loaves, he says, had not been increased by the change, nor had

his assiduity at court intimated any claim upon royal favour: and

in reference to her neglect of literary merit, he charges on the

church of England the fate of Butler, a brother poet. Of that truly

original genius we only know, that his life was spent in dependence,

and embittered by disappointment. But unless Dryden alludes to some

incident now unknown, it is difficult to see how the church of England

could have rewarded his merit. Undoubtedly she owed much to his

forcible satire against her lately triumphant rivals, the Presbyterians

and Independents; but, unless Butler had been in orders, how could the

church have recompensed his poetical talents? The author of the most

witty poem that ever was written had a much more natural and immediate

claim upon the munificence of the wittiest king and court that ever was

in England; nor was his satire less serviceable to royalty than to the

established religion. The blame of neglecting Butler lay therefore on

Charles II. and his gay courtiers, who quoted "Hudibras" incessantly,

and left the author to struggle with obscurity and indigence. The poet

himself has, in a fragment called "Hudibras at Court," set forth both

the kind reception which Charles gave the poem, and his neglect of the

author:

Now you must know, Sir Hudibras

With such perfections gifted was,

And so peculiar in his manner,

That all that saw him did him honour.

Among the rest, this prince was one,

Admired his conversation:

This prince, whose ready wit and parts

Conquered both men and women's hearts,

Was so o'ercome with Knight and Ralph,

That he could never claw it off;

He never eat, nor drank, nor slept,

But Hudibras still near him kept;

Nor would he go to church, or so,

But Hudibras must with him go;

Nor yet to visit concubine,

Or at a city feast to dine,

But Hudibras must still be there,

Or all the fat was in the fire.

Now after all, was it not hard,

That he should meet with no reward,

That fitted out this knight and squire,

This monarch did so much admire?

That he should never reimburse

The man for th' equipage, or horse,

Is sure a strange ungrateful thing,

In any body but a king.

But this good king, it seems, was told,

By some that were with him too bold,

If e'er you hope to gain your ends,

Caress your foes, and trust your friends.

Such were the doctrines that were taught,

Till this unthinking king was brought

To leave his friends to starve and die,

A poor reward for loyalty!

Note X.

_With odious atheist names you load your foes;

Your liberal clergy why did I expose?

It never fails in charities like those._--P. 205.

Our author here complains of the personal reflections which

Stillingfleet had cast upon him, particularly in the passage already

quoted in Note VII., where he is expressly charged with disbelieving

the existence of "such a thing as true religion." The second and third

lines of the triplet are somewhat obscure. The meaning seems to be,

that Dryden, conscious of having given the first offence, which we

shall presently see was the case, justifies his having done so, from

personal abuse being the never-failing resort of the liberal clergy.

The application of the neuter pronoun _it_ to the liberal clergy, is

probably in imitation of Virgil's satirical construction:

_Varium et mutabile semper fæmina._

It happened in this controversy, as in most others, that both parties,

laying out of consideration the provocation which they themselves had

given, complained bitterly of the illiberality of their antagonists.

Stillingfleet expatiates on the unhandsome language contained in

Dryden's Defence, and the passages which he quotes are those which

contain the exposure of the liberal clergy mentioned in the text:

"Yet as if I had been the sole contriver or inventor of all, he

bestows those civil and obliging epithets upon me, of _disingenuous_,

_foul-mouthed_, and _shuffling_; one of a _virulent genius_, of

_spiteful diligence_, and _irreverence to the royal family_; of

_subtle calumny_, and _sly aspersion_; and he adds to these ornaments

of speech, that I have a _cloven-foot_, and my name is _Legion_; and

that my Answer is an _infamous libel_, a _scurrilous saucy pamphlet_.

Is this indeed the spirit of a new convert? Is this the meekness and

temper you intend to gain proselytes by, and to convert the nation?

He tells us in the beginning, that truth has a language peculiar to

itself: I desire to be informed, whether these be any of the characters

of it? And how the language of reproach and evil-speaking may be

distinguished from it? But zeal in a new convert is a terrible thing;

for it not only burns, but rages, like the eruptions of Mount Ætna;

it fills the air with noise and smoke, and throws out such a torrent

of liquid fire, that there is no standing before it. The Answer alone

was too mean a sacrifice for such a Hector in controversy. All that

standeth in his way must fall at his feet. He calls me Legion, that

he may be sure to have number enough to overcome. But he is a great

proficient indeed, if he be such an exorcist, to cast out a whole

legion already. But he hopes it may be done without fasting and

prayer."--_Vindication of the Answer_, p. 1.

Note XI.

_It now remains for you to school your child,

And ask why God's anointed he reviled;

A king and princess dead! Did Shimei worse?_ P. 207.

The Hind having shewn that her influence over Dryden was such as to

induce him to submit patiently, and without vengeance, to injury and

reproach, now calls upon the Panther to exert her authority in turn

over Stillingfleet, for his irreverend attack upon the royal papers

in favour of the Catholic religion. Upon a careful perusal of the

Answers and Vindication of that great divine, it is impossible to find

any grounds for the charge of his having _reviled_ Charles II. or the

Duchess of York; on the contrary, their names are always mentioned with

great respect, and the controversy is conducted strictly in conformity

with the following spirited advertisement prefixed to the Answer:

"If the papers, here answered, had not been so publicly dispersed

through the nation, a due respect to the name they bear, would have

kept the author from publishing any answer to them. But because they

may now fall into many hands, who, without some assistance, may not

readily resolve some difficulties started by them, he thought it not

unbecoming his duty to God and the king, to give a clearer light to the

things contained in them. And it can be no reflection on the authority

of a prince, for a private subject to examine a piece of coin as to its

just value, though it bears his image and superscription upon it. In

matters that concern faith and salvation, we must prove all things, and

hold fast that which is good."--_Advertisement to Answer to the Royal

Papers._

Dryden, however, like the other Catholics, was pleased to interpret the

impugning and confuting the arguments used by the king and duchess,

into contempt and disrespect for their persons. It was this forced

construction on which was founded the prosecution of Sharpe and of

the Bishop of London before the ecclesiastical commissioners. Sharpe

having been defied to a polemical contest, by a paper handed into his

pulpit, took occasion to preach on the arguments contained in it;

and mentioned, with some contempt, persons who could be influenced

by such weak reasoning. This was interpreted as a reflection on the

new converts, and particularly on the king himself; and a mandate was

issued to the Bishop of London, commanding that the obnoxious preacher

should be suspended. The issue of this matter has been noticed in the

notes on "Absalom and Achitophel," Vol. IX. p. 302.

Note XII.

_Your son was warned, and wisely gave it o'er;

But he, who counselled him, has paid the score._ P. 207.

Dryden here triumphs in the conquest he pretends to have gained over

Stillingfleet. In the beginning of the controversy, the Dean of St

Paul's had spoken dubiously of the authenticity of the paper ascribed

to the Duchess. In his Vindication, he fully admitted that point, and

insisted only upon the weakness of the reasons which she alleged for

her conversion. This Dryden compares to a defeated vessel, bearing away

under the smoke of her last broadside.

The person, whom he states to have counselled Stillingfleet, is

probably Burnet; and the score which he paid, is the severe description

given of him under the character of the Buzzard. Dryden always seems

to have viewed the Answer to the Royal Papers as the work of more than

one hand. In his "Defence," he affirms, that the answerer's "name is

Legion; but though the body be possessed with many evil spirits, it

is but one of them that talks." In the introduction to the "Hind and

Panther," he says, he is informed both of the "author and supervisors

of this pamphlet." He conjectured, as was probably the truth, that a

controversy of such importance, and which required to be managed with

such peculiar delicacy, was not entrusted to a single individual.

Besides Burnet, it is probable that Tillotson, Tennison, and Patrick,

all of whom mingled in the polemical disputes of that period, were

consulted by Stillingfleet on this important occasion.

Note XIII.

_Perhaps you think your time of triumph near,

But may mistake the season of the year;

The Swallow's fortune gives you cause to fear._--P. 210.

The general application of the fable of the Swallows to the short

gleam of Catholic prosperity during the reign of James II. is

sufficiently manifest. But it is probable, that a more close and

intimate allusion was intended to an event which took place in 1686,

when the whole nation was in confusion at the measures of King James,

so that the alarm had extended even to the Catholics, who were the

objects of his favour. We are told, there was a general meeting of the

leading Roman Catholics at the Savoy, to consult how this favourable

crisis might be most improved to the advantage of their cause. Father

Petre had the chair; and at the very opening of the debates, it

appeared, that the majority were more inclined to provide for their

own security, than to come to extremities with the Protestants.

Notwithstanding the King's zeal, power, and success, they were afraid

to push the experiment any farther. The people were already alarmed,

the soldiers could not be depended upon, the very courtiers melted

out of their grasp. All depended on a single life, which was already

on the decline; and if that life should last yet a few years longer,

and continue as hitherto devoted to their interest and service,

they foresaw innumerable difficulties in their way, and anticipated

disappointments without end. Upon these considerations, therefore, some

were for a petition to the king, that he would only so far interpose

in their favour, that their estates might be secured to them by act of

parliament, with exemption from all employments, and liberty to worship

God in their own way, in their own houses. Others were for obtaining

the king's leave to sell their estates, and transport themselves and

their effects to France. All but Father Petre were for a compromise

of some sort or other; but he disdained whatever had a tendency to

moderation, and was for making the most of the voyage while the sea was

smooth, and the wind prosperous. All these several opinions, we are

farther told, were laid before the king, who was pleased to answer,

"That before their desires were made known to him, he had provided

a sure retreat and sanctuary for them in Ireland, in case all those

endeavours which he was making for their security in England should be

blasted, and which as yet gave him no reason to despair."[272]

It will hardly, I think, be disputed, that the fable of the Swallows

about to cross the seas refers to this consultation of the Catholics;

and it is a strong instance of Dryden's prejudice against priests of

all persuasions, that, in the character of the Martin, who persuaded

the Swallows to postpone the flight, he decidedly appears to have

designed Petre, the king's confessor and prime adviser in state

matters, both spiritual and temporal. The name of Martin may contain

an allusion to the parish of St Martin's, in which Whitehall, and the

royal chapel, are situated. But should this be thought fanciful, it

is certain, that the portrait of this vain, presumptuous, ambitious,

bigotted Jesuit, who was in keen pursuit of a cardinal's cap, is

exactly that of the Martin:

A church begot, and church believing bird,

Of little body, but of lofty mind,

Round-bellied, for a dignity designed.

Two marked circumstances of resemblance conclude the inuendo,--his

noble birth, and superficial learning;

But little learning needs in noble blood.[273]

It may be doubted, whether the reverend father was highly pleased with

this sarcastic description, or whether he admitted readily the apology,

that the poet, speaking in the character of the heretical church, was

obliged to use Protestant colouring.

The close correspondence of the fable with the real events may be

farther traced, and admit of yet more minute illustration:

The Raven, from the withered oak,

Left of their lodging,----

may be conjectured to mean Tennison, within whose parish Whitehall

was situated, and who stood in the front of battle during all the

Roman Catholic controversy. As Petre is the Martin who persuaded the

Catholics not to leave the kingdom, his preparations for maintaining

their ground there are also noticed:

He ordered all things with a busy care,

And cells and refectories did prepare,

And large provisions laid of winter fare.

This alludes to the numerous schools and religious establishments which

the Jesuits prepared to establish throughout England.[274] The chapel

which housed them is obviously the royal chapel, where the priests

were privileged to exercise their functions even during the subsistence

of the penal laws. The transient gleam of sunshine which invited the

Swallows forth from their retirement, is the Declaration of Indulgence,

in consequence of which the Catholics assumed the open and general

exercise of their religion. The Irish Catholics, with the sanguine

Talbot at their head, may be the first who hailed the imaginary return

of spring: they are painted as

----Swifts, the giants of the Swallow kind,

Large limbed, stout hearted, but of stupid mind.

I cannot help thinking, that our author, still speaking in the

character of the English church, describes himself as the "foolish

Cuckow," whose premature annunciation of spring completed the Swallow's

delusion. Perhaps he intended to mitigate the scornful description of

Petre, by talking of himself also as a Protestant would have talked of

him. The foreign priests and Catholic officers, whom hopes of promotion

now brought into England, are pointed out by the "foreign fowl," who

came in flocks,

To bless the founder, and partake the cheer.

The fable concludes in a prophetic strain, by indicating the calamities

which were likely to overwhelm the Catholics, as soon as the death of

James, or any similar event, should end their temporary prosperity. It

is well known, how exactly the event corresponded to the prophecy; even

the circumstance of the rabble rising upon the Catholic priests was

most literally verified. In most of the sea-port towns, they watched

the coasts to prevent their escape; and when King James was taken at

Feversham, the fishermen, by whom he was seized, were employed in what

they called by the cant phrase of "priest-codding," that is, lying in

wait for the fugitive priests.

Note XIV.

_But most in Martin's character and fate,

She saw her slandered sons, the Panther's hate,

The people's rage, the persecuting state._--P. 217.

The conclusion of the fable naturally introduces a discussion of

the penal laws, which unquestionably were extremely severe towards

Catholics. By the fourteenth of Queen Elizabeth, it was enacted, that

whoever, by bulls of the pope, should reconcile any one to Rome,

should, together with the person reconciled, be guilty of high treason;

that those, who relieved such reconcilers, should be liable in the

penalties of a _premunire_, and those who concealed them in misprision

of treason. A still more severe law passed in the twenty-eighth of the

same queen, upon discovery of Parry's conspiracy against her life, to

which he had been stirred up by a book of Allen, or Parsons the Jesuit,

written for the express purpose. It was thereby enacted, that all

Jesuits and Popish priests should depart the kingdom within forty days;

and that those who should afterwards return into the kingdom, should be

guilty of high treason; and all who relieved and maintained them, of

felony. There were other enactments of a similar nature made upon the

discovery of the gun-powder plot. Samuel Johnson (I mean the divine)

gives an odd justification of these laws, saying, that the priests are

hanged, not as priests, but as traitors. But, as their being priests

was the sole reason for their being held traitors, it does not appear,

that the Protestant divine can avail himself of this distinction.

Note XV.

_No church reformed can boast a blameless line,

Such Martins build in yours, and more than mine;

Or else an old fanatic author lies,

Who summed their scandals up by centuries._--P. 218.

The fanatic author is John White, commonly called Century White. He

was born in Pembrokeshire in 1590, was educated for the bar, and made

a considerable figure in his profession. As he was a rigid puritan, he

was chosen one of the trustees which that sect appointed to purchase

impropriations to be bestowed upon fanatic preachers. This design was

checked by Archbishop Laud; and White, among others, received a severe

censure in the Star-Chamber. In the Long Parliament, White was member

for Southwark, and distinguished himself by his vindictive severity

against the bishops and Episcopal clergy, saying openly in a committee,

he hoped to live to see the day, when there should be neither bishop

nor cathedral priest in England. He was very active in the ejectment

of the clergy, by which upwards of eight thousand churchmen are said

to have lost their cures in the course of four or five years. In order

to encourage and justify these violent measures, he published his

famous treatise, entitled, "The First Century of Scandalous Malignant

Priests, made and admitted into benefices by the Prelates, London,

1643;" a tract which contains, as may be inferred from its name, an

hundred instances of unworthiness, which had been either proved to

have existed among the clergy of the church of England, or had been

invented to throw a slander upon them. When this satire was shown to

Charles I., it was proposed to answer it by a similar exposition of

the scandalous part of the puritanical teachers; but that monarch

would not consent to give countenance to a warfare in which neither

party could gain, and religion was sure to be a loser between them.

Similar considerations are said to have prevented White himself from

publishing "A Second Century," in continuation of his work. He wrote

another tract, entitled, "The Looking Glass;" in which he attempted to

prove, that the sin against the Holy Ghost was the bearing arms for the

king in the civil war. His own party bestow on White a high character

for religion and virtue; but the cavaliers alleged, that although he

had two wives of his own, a large proportion of matrimony, he did not

forbear to visit three belonging to his neighbours in the White Friars.

He died in January 1644, and is said, in his last illness, to have

bitterly lamented the active share which he had taken in ejecting so

many guiltless ministers, and their families. This, however, may be a

fiction of the royalists; for the death-bed repentance of an enemy is

amongst the most common forgeries of party. White's body was attended

to the grave by most of the members of Parliament, and the following

distich inscribed on his tomb:

"Here lyeth a JOHN, a burning shining light,

His name, life, actions, all were WHITE."

_See Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses._

Note XVI.

_The Lion, studious of our common good,

Desires (and kings' desires are ill withstood)

To join our nations in a lasting love;

The bars betwixt are easy to remove,

For sanguinary laws were never made above._--P. 218.

When James II. ascended the throne, deceived by the general attachment

of the church of England for his person, and the little jealousy which

they seemed to entertain of his religion, he conceived there would

be no great difficulty in procuring a reconciliation between the

national church and that of Rome. With this view he made a favourable

declaration of his intentions to maintain the church of England as

by law established, and certainly expected, that, in return, they

would consent to the repeal of the test act and penal laws;[275] and

this, it was conceived, might pave the way for uniting the churches.

An extraordinary pamphlet, already quoted, recommends such an union,

founded upon the mutual attachment of both communions to King James,

upon their success in resisting the Bill of Exclusion, and their common

hatred of the dissenters. "This very stone, which was once rejected by

the architects, is now become the chief stone in the corner. We may

truly see in it the hand of God, and look upon it with admiration; and

may expect, if fears and jealousies hinder not, the greatest blessings

we can wish for. An union betwixt these two walls, which have been thus

long separated, and now in a fair way to be united and linked together

by this corner stone; after which, how glorious a structure may we hope

for on such foundations!" A plan is therefore laid down, containing

the following heads, of which it may be observed, that the very first

is the abrogation of these penal laws, which Dryden states to be the

principal bar between the alliance of the Hind and the Panther.

"First, that it may be provided, That those who are known to be

faithful friends to the king and kingdom's good, may equally with us

enjoy those favours and blessings we may hope for under so great and

so just a king, without being liable to the sanguinary penal laws, for

holding opinions noways inconsistent with loyalty, and the peace and

quiet of the nation; and that they may not be obliged, by oaths and

tests, either to renounce their religion, which they know they cannot

do without sacrilege, or else to put themselves out of capacity of

serving their king and country.

"Secondly, That, for healing our differences, it be appointed, that

neither side, in their sermons, touch upon matters of controversy with

animating reflections; but that those discourses may wholly tend to

peace and piety, religion and sound morality; and that, in all public

catechisms, the solid grounds and principles of religion may be solely

explicated and established, all reflecting animosities being laid aside.

"Thirdly, That some learned, devout, and sober persons, may be made

choice of on both sides, who may truly state matters of controversy

betwixt us; to the end, each one may know others pretensions, and the

tenets they cannot abandon, without breaking the chain of apostolic

faith; which, if it be done, we shall, it may be, find that to be

true, which the Papists often tell us, that the difference betwixt

them and us is not so great as many make it; nor their tenets so

pernicious, but if we saw them naked, we should, if not embrace them

as truths, yet not condemn them as errors, much less as pernicious

doctrines. Yet if, notwithstanding all this, we cannot perfectly

agree in some points, let us, however, endeavour to live together

in the bonds of love and charity, as becomes good Christians and

loyal subjects, and join together to oppugn those known maxims, and

pernicious errors, which destroy the essence of religion, loyalty, and

good government."--_Remonstrance, by way of Address, to the Church of

England_, 1685.

Note XVII.

_Yet still remember, that you wield a sword,

Forged by your foes against your sovereign lord;

Designed to hew the imperial cedar down,

Defraud succession, and dis-heir the crown._--P. 219.

The Test-act was passed in the year 1678, while the popish plot was

in its vigour, and the Earl of Shaftesbury was urging every point

against the Catholics, with his eyes uniformly fixed upon the Bill of

Exclusion as his crowning measure. It imposed on all who should sit

in parliament, a declaration of their abhorrence of the doctrine of

transubstantiation. The Duke of York, with tears in his eyes, moved

for a proviso to exempt himself, protesting, that he cast himself upon

the House in the greatest concern he could have in the world; and that

whatever his religion might be, it should only be a private thing

between God and his own soul. Notwithstanding this pathetic appeal,

he carried his point but by two votes. With seven other peers he

protested against the bill. Dryden therefore, and probably with great

justice, represents this test as a part of his machinations against

the Duke of York, whose party was at that time, and afterwards, warmly

espoused by the church of England. But though the Test-act was devised

by a statesman whom they hated, and carried by a party whom they had

opposed, the high-church clergy were not the less unwilling to part

with it when they found the advantages which it gave them against

the Papists in King James's reign. Hence they were loaded with the

following reproaches: "My business is to set forth, in its own colours,

the extraordinary loyalty of those men, who obstinately maintain a

test contrived by the faction to usher in the Bill of Exclusion: And

it is much admired, even by some of her own children, that the grave

and matron-like church of England, which values herself so much for her

antiquity, should be over-fond of a new point of faith, lately broached

by a famous act of an infallible parliament, convened at Westminster,

and guided by the holy spirit of Shaftesbury. But I doubt there are

some parliaments in the world which will not so easily admit this new

article into their creed, though the church of England labours so much

to maintain it as a special evidence of her singular loyalty."--_New

Test of the Church of England's Loyalty._

Note XVIII.

_The first reformers were a modest race;

Our peers possessed in peace their native place,

And when rebellious arms o'erturned the state,

They suffered only in the common fate;

But now the sovereign mounts the regal chair,

And mitred seats are full, yet David's bench is bare._--P. 221.

This passage regards the situation of the Roman Catholic peers.

Notwithstanding their religion, they had been allowed to retain their

seats and votes in the House of Lords. So jealous were they, (as was

but natural,) of this privilege, that, in 1675, when Danby proposed a

test oath upon all holding state employments and benefices, the object

of which was to acknowledge the doctrine of non-resistance, and disown

all attempts at an alteration of government, the Roman Catholic peers,

to the number of twenty, who had hitherto always voted with the crown,

united, on this occasion, with the opposition, and occasioned the loss

of the bill. This North imputes to the art of Shaftesbury, who dinned

into their ears, "that this test (by mentioning the maintenance of the

Protestant religion, though that of the royal authority was chiefly

proposed) tended to deprive them of their right of voting, which was

a birth-right so sacrosanct and radically inherent in the peerage,

as not to be temerated on any account whatsoever." When the earl had

heated the Catholic lords with this suggestion, he secured them to the

opposition, by proposing, and carrying through, an order of the House,

that no bill should be received, tending to deprive any of the peerage

of their right. But when the Test-act of 1678 was moved, which had,

for its direct purpose, that exclusion which that of 1675 was supposed

only to convey by implication, Shaftesbury laughed at the order which

he himself had proposed, saying, _leges posteriores priores abrogant_.

And by this test, which required the renunciation of their religion

as idolatrous, the Catholic peerage were effectually, and for ever,

excluded from their seats in the House of Lords. Dryden intimates, in

the following lines, that this test applied to the Papists alone, and

complains heavily of this odious distinction, betwixt them and other

non-conformists.

Note XIX.

_When first the Lion sat with awful sway,

Your conscience taught your duty to obey._--P. 223.

James II. and the established church set out on the highest terms of

good humour with each other. This, as the king afterwards assured

the dissenters, was owing to the professions made to him by some

of the churchmen, whom he named, who had promised favour to the

Catholics, provided he would abandon all idea of general toleration,

and leave them their ancient authority over the fanatics. Moved, as

he said, by these promises, the Declaration in council, issued upon

his accession, had this remarkable clause: "I know the principles of

the church of England are for monarchy, and the members of it have

shewn themselves good and loyal subjects, therefore I shall always

take care to defend and support it." This explicit declaration gave

the greatest satisfaction to the kingdom in general, and particularly

to the clergy. "All the pulpits of England," says Burnet, "were full

of it, and of thanksgivings for it. It was magnified as a security

far greater than any that laws could give. The common phrase was,

_We have now the word of a king, and a word never yet broken_. This

general feeling of gratitude led to a set of addresses, full of the

most extravagant expressions of loyalty and fidelity to so gracious

a sovereign. The churchmen led the way in these expressions of zeal;

and the university of Oxford, in particular, promised to obey the king

without limitations or restrictions." The king's promise was reckoned

so solemn and inviolable, that those addresses were censured as guilty

at least of ill-breeding, who mentioned in their papers the "religion

_established by law_;" since that expression implied an obligation on

the king to maintain it, independently of his royal grace and favour.

But the scene speedily changed, as the king's intentions began to

disclose themselves. Then, as a Catholic pamphleteer expresses himself,

"My loyal gentlemen were so far out of the right bias, that, in lieu

of taking off the tests and penal laws, which all people expected from

them in point of gratitude and good manners, they made a solemn address

to his majesty, that none be employed who were not capacitated by the

said laws and tests to bear offices civil and military."[276]

If James, had viewed with attention the incidents of the former reign,

he might have recollected, that, however devoted the clergy had then

shown themselves to the crown, his brother's attempt at his present

measure of a general indulgence had at once alarmed the whole church.

This sensibility, when the interest of the church is concerned, is

severely contrasted with the general indifference to the cause of

freedom, into which they relapsed when the indulgence was recalled, in

a party pamphlet of the year 1680-1. "You may easily call to mind, a

late instance of the humanity and conscience of this race of men here

in England: For when his majesty, not long since, attempted to follow

his own inclinations, and emitted a declaration of indulgence to tender

consciences, the whole _posse cleri_ seemed to be raised against him:

Every reader and Gibeonite of the church could then talk as saucily

of their king, as they do now of the late honourable Parliament; nay,

they began to stand upon their terms, and delivered it out as orthodox

doctrine, that the king was to act according to law, and, therefore,

could not suspend a penal statute; that the subjects' obedience was

a legal obedience; and, therefore, if the king commanded any thing

contrary to law, the subject was not bound to obey; with so many other

honest positions, that men wondered in God how such knaves should come

by them. But wherefore was all this wrath, and all this doctrine?

merely because his majesty was pleased for a time to remove the sore

backs of dissenters from under the ecclesiastical lash; the bloody

exercise of which is never denied to holy church, but the magistrate is

immediately assaulted with the noise and clamour of Demetrius and his

craftsmen.

"But now, the tables being turned, the same mercenary tongues are

again all Sibthorp, and all Manwaring; not a bit of law, or conscience

either, is now to be had for love or money; not any limits to be put to

the king's commands, or our obedience. It is a gospel truth with these

men, that all which we have is the king's; and if he should command our

estates, our wives and children, yea, and our religion too, we ought to

resign them up, submit, and be silent."--_The Freeholders' Choice, or,

A Letter of Advice concerning Elections._

Note XX.

_Possess your soul with patience, and attend;

A more auspicious planet may ascend;

Good fortune may present some happier time,

With means to cancel my unwilling crime._--P. 224.

The first expression in these lines seems to have been a favourite with

Dryden. In the Introduction to the Translation of Juvenal, he makes

it his glory, "that, being naturally vindicative, he had suffered in

silence, and _possessed his soul in quiet_."

The arguments used by the Panther in this passage seem to have more

weight than her antagonist allows them. It was surely reasonable, that

the church of England should rest upon her penal statutes and test act,

as the sole mode of preventing the encroachments of her rival during a

Catholic reign, and at the same time that she should look forward with

pleasure to a future period, when such severe enactments might be no

longer necessary for her safety; a time, of which it has been our good

fortune to witness the arrival.

The argument of the Panther, in this speech, is, with the simile of

the inundation, literally versified from an answer to Penn's pamphlet.

"The penal laws cannot prejudice the Papists in this king's reign,

seeing he can connive at the non-execution of them, and the repeal

of them now cannot benefit the Papists when he is gone; because, if

they do not behave themselves modestly, we can either re-establish

them, or enact others, which they will be as little fond of. But their

abrogation at this time would infallibly prejudice us, and would prove

to be the pulling up of the sluices, and the throwing down the dikes,

which stem the deluge that is breaking in upon us, and which hinder

the threatening waves from overflowing us." _Some reflections on a

discourse, entitled_, "Good Advice to the Church of England."--_State

Tracts_, Vol. I. p. 368.

Note XXI.

_Your care about your banks infers a fear

Of threatening floods and inundations near;

If so, a just reprise would only be

Of what the land usurped upon the sea._--P. 225.

This conveys a perilous insinuation, which perhaps it would, at the

time, have been prudent to suppress; since it goes the length of

preparing a justification of the resumption of the power, authority,

lands, and revenues, of the church of England, upon the footing of

their having originally belonged to that of Rome. It cannot be supposed

that this hint could be passed over at the time, without a strong

feeling of a meditated revolution in church government and property.

Note XXII.

_Behold how he protects your friends oppressed,

Receives the banished, succours the distressed!

Behold, for you may read an honest open breast._--P. 225.

Burnet, in the "History of his Own Times," gives the following account

of the relief which James, either from inclination or policy, extended

to the French Protestants, who were exiled by the recal of the edict of

Nantes.

"But now the session of Parliament drew on, and there was a great

expectation of the issue of it. For some weeks before it met, there

was such a number of refugees coming over every day, who set about a

most dismal recital of the persecution in France; and that in so many

instances that were crying and odious, that, though all endeavours were

used to lessen the clamour this had raised, yet the king did not stick

openly to condemn it as both unchristian and unpolitic. He took pains

to clear the Jesuits of it, and laid the blame of it chiefly on the

king, on Madame de Maintenon, and the Archbishop of Paris. He spoke

often of it with such vehemence, that there seemed to be an affectation

in it. He did more: He was very kind to the refugees; he was liberal

to many of them; he ordered a brief for a charitable collection over

the nation for them all; upon which great sums were sent in. They

were deposited in good hands, and well distributed. The king also

ordered them to be denizen'd, without paying fees, and gave them

great immunities. So that, in all, there came over, first and last,

between forty and fifty thousand of that nation. There was such real

argument of the cruel and persecuting spirit of popery, wheresoever

it prevailed, that few could resist this conviction; so that all men

confessed, that the French persecution came very seasonably to awaken

the nation, and open men's eyes in so critical a conjunction; for upon

this session of Parliament all did depend."--BURNET, Book IV.

Note XXIII.

_A plain good man, whose name is understood,

(So few deserve the name of plain and good.)_--P. 226.

These, and the following lines, contain a character of James II. most

exquisitely drawn, though, it must be owned, with a flattering pencil.

Bravery, economy, integrity, are the ingredients which Dryden has mixed

for his colours. Without attempting a character of this unfortunate

monarch, we may say a few words on each of the attributes ascribed to

him. Bravery he unquestionably possessed; but it was of that ordinary

kind, which, though unshaken by mere personal danger, is unable to

sustain its possessor in great and embarrassing political emergencies.

The economy of James, being one great engine by which he hoped to carry

on his projects, was so rigid as sometimes to border upon avarice. His

upright integrity, the virtue upon which he chiefly prided himself, and

which was the usual theme of courtly panegyric, frequently deviated

into obstinacy. When he had once resolved upon a measure, he often

announced his resolution with imprudence, and almost always pressed it

with an open disregard of consequences. No fault can be more fatal to

an English king; because the stream of popular opinion, which would

subside if unopposed, becomes irresistible when the obstinacy of a

monarch persists in attempting to stem it.

Note XXIV.

_A sort of Doves were housed too near their hall,

Who cross the proverb, and abound with gall._--P. 228.

The virulent and abusive character which our author here draws of the

clergy, and particularly those of the metropolis, differs so much

from his description of the church of England, in the person of the

Panther, that we may conclude it was written after the publishing of

the Declaration of Indulgence, when the king had decidedly turned

his favour from the established church. Their quarrel was now

irreconcileable, and at immediate issue; and Dryden therefore changes

the tone of conciliation, with which he had hitherto addressed the

heretic church, into that of bitter and unrelenting satire. Dryden

calls them doves, in order to pave the way for terming them, as he

does a little below, "birds of Venus;" as disowning the doctrine

of celibacy. The popular opinion, that a dove has no gall, is well

known. In Scotland, this is averred to be owing to the dove which Noah

dismissed from the ark having flown so long, that his gall broke; since

which occurrence, none of the species have had any.

Note XXV.

_An hideous figure of their foes they drew,

Nor lines, nor looks, nor shades, nor colours true;

And this grotesque design exposed to public view._--P. 231.

The Roman Catholic pamphlets of the time are filled with complaints,

that their principles were misrepresented by the Protestant divines;

and that king-killing tenets, and others of a pernicious or absurd

nature, were unjustly ascribed to them. A tract, which is written on

purpose to explain their real doctrine, says, "Is it not strange and

severe, that principles, and those pretended of faith too, should be

imposed upon men which they themselves renounce and detest? If the

Turks' Alcoran should, in like manner, be urged upon us, and we hanged

up for Mahometans, all we could do or say, in such a case, would be,

to die patiently, with protestations of our own innocence. And this

is the posture of our condition; we abhor, we renounce, we abominate,

such principles; we protest against them, and seal our protestations

with our dying breath. What shall we say, what can we do more? To

accuse men as guilty in matters of faith, which they never owned, is

the same thing as to condemn them for matters of fact which they

never did."[277] Another author, speaking in the assumed character of

the established church, says, that the Catholic controvertists have

often told us, that "we behave ourselves like persons diffident of our

cause, decline disputes on equal terms, and either misrepresent their

tenets, as appears manifestly in their doctrines of justification

and merit, satisfaction and indulgences; or else play the buffoons,

joking, scoffing, and relating stories, which, if true, would not touch

religion."--_A Remonstrance, by way of Address_, &c.

Note XXVI.

_No Holland emblem could that malice mend._--P. 231.

Emblems, like puns, being the wit of a heavy people, the Dutch seem to

have been remarkable for them; of which, their old-fashioned prints,

and figured pan-tiles, are existing evidence. Prior thus drolls upon

the passage in the text:

"_Bayes._ Oh! dear Sir, you are mighty obliging: but I must needs say

at a fable, or an emblem, I think no man comes near me; indeed I have

studied it more than any man. Did you ever take notice, Mr Johnson,

of a little thing that has taken mightily about town, a cat with a

top-knot?[278]

_John._ Faith, Sir, 'tis mighty pretty; I saw it at the coffee-house.

_Bayes._ 'Tis a trifle hardly worth owning. I was t'other day at

Will's, throwing out something of that nature; and, i'gad, the hint was

taken, and out came that picture; indeed the poor fellow was so civil

to present me with a dozen of 'em for my friends. I think I have one

here in my pocket; would you please to accept it, Mr Johnson?

_John._ Really 'tis very ingenious.

_Bayes._ Oh, Lord, nothing at all! I could design twenty of 'em in an

hour, if I had but witty fellows about me to draw 'em. I was proffered

a pension to go into Holland and contrive their emblems; but, hang 'em,

they are dull rogues, and would spoil my invention."--_Hind and Panther

Transprosed._

Note XXVII.

_The noble Buzzard ever pleased me best._--P. 233.

Gilbert Burnet, well known as an historian, was born of a good family

in Scotland, in 1643. He went through his studies with success; and,

being ordained by the Bishop of Edinburgh, obtained the living of

Salton, in East Lothian, in 1665. While in this living, he drew up a

memorial of the abuses of the Scotch bishops, and was instrumental in

procuring the induction of Presbyterian divines into vacant churches;

a step which he afterwards condemned as imprudent.[279] To measures so

unfavourable for Episcopacy, Dryden seems to allude, in these lines:

I know he hates the Pigeon-house and Farm,

And more, in time of war, has done us harm;

But all his hate on trivial points depends,

Give up our forms, and we shall soon be friends.

Burnet's opinion, or rather indifference, concerning forms, may be

guessed at, from the applause with which he quotes a saying of Dr Henry

More; "None of them are bad enough to make men bad, and I am sure

none of them are good enough to make men good." He was next created

professor of divinity at Glasgow; but as his active temper led him

to mingle much in political life, he speedily distinguished himself

rather as a politician than a theologian. In 1672 he was made one of

the king's chaplains, and was in high favour both with Charles and his

brother. He enjoyed much of the countenance of the Duke of Lauderdale;

but a quarrel taking place between them, the duke represented Burnet's

conduct in such terms, that he was deprived of his chaplainry, and

forced to resign his professor's chair, and abandon Scotland. He

had an opportunity of revenging himself upon Lauderdale, as will be

noticed in a subsequent note. During the time of the Popish plot,

he again received a portion of the royal countenance. He was then

preacher at the Rolls Chapel, under the patronage of Sir Harbottle

Grimstone, master of the rolls, as also lecturer at St Clement's,

and enjoyed a high degree of public consideration. Having, as he

conceived, a fit opportunity to awaken the conscience of Charles, he

ventured upon sending him a letter, where he treated his personal

vices, and the faults of his government, with great severity,[280]

and by which he forfeited his favour for ever. This freedom, with his

low-church tenets, gave also offence to the Duke of York, who was,

moreover, offended with him for some interference in the affair of the

Exclusion, in which, if he did not go all the length of Shaftesbury, he

recommended the appointment of a prince-regent; a measure scarcely more

palatable to the successor. At length, his regard for Lord Russell,

and the share which he took in penning, or circulating, his dying

declaration, drew upon him the full resentment of both brothers. To

this, a whimsical accident, in the choice of a text for the day of the

gun-powder plot, happened to contribute. The preacher _chanced_ (for

we must believe what he assures us, _ex verbo sacerdotis_) to pitch on

these words: "Save me from the _lion's_ mouth; thou hast delivered me

from the horns of the _unicorn_." This was interpreted as referring to

the supporters of the royal arms; and Burnet was discharged, by the

king's command, both from lecturing at St Clement's, and preaching

at the Rolls Chapel. After this final breach with the court he went

abroad, and, having travelled through France and Italy, settled in

Holland at the court of the Prince of Orange. Here he did not fail,

with that ready insinuation which seems to have distinguished him,

to make himself of consequence to the prince, and especially to the

princess, afterwards Queen Mary. From this place of refuge he sent

forth several papers, in single sheets, relating to the controversy

in England; and the clergy, who had formerly looked upon him with

some suspicion, began now to treat with great attention and respect a

person so capable of serving their cause. He was consulted upon every

emergency; which confidence was no doubt owing partly to his situation

near the person of the Prince of Orange, the Protestant heir of the

crown. He stood forward as the champion of the church of England, in

the controversy with Parker concerning the Test.[281] In the "History

of his Own Times," the bishop talks with complacency of the sway which

circumstances had given him among the clergy, and of the important

matters which fell under his management; for, by express command of the

Prince of Orange, he was admitted into all the secrets of the English

intrigues. These insinuations of Burnet's importance, although they

afterwards drew the ridicule of Pope, and the Tory wits of Queen Anne's

reign, may, from the very satire of Dryden, be proved to have been well

founded. This acquired importance of Burnet is the alliance between

the Pigeon-house and Buzzard, which Dryden reprobates, believing, or

wishing to make others believe, that Burnet held opinions unfavourable

to Episcopacy. James considered this divine as so formidable an enemy,

that he wrote two very severe letters to his daughter against him,

and proceeded so far as to insist that he should be forbidden the

court; a circumstance which did not prevent his privately receiving

a double degree of countenance. A prosecution for high treason was

next commenced against Burnet, and a demand was made that he should

be delivered up; which the States evaded, by declaring that he was

naturalized, by marrying a Dutch lady. The court of England were then

supposed to have formed some plan, as they had attempted in the case

of Peyton, of seizing, or perhaps assassinating him, and a reward of

L. 3000 was offered for the service. Burnet, however, confident in the

protection of the prince and states of Holland, answered, replied,

and retorted, and carried on almost an immediate controversy with

his sovereign, dated from the court of his son-in-law. This active

politician had a very important share in the Revolution, and reaped his

reward, by being advanced to the see of Salisbury. He died on the 17th

of March, 1714-15.

His writings, theological, political, and polemical, are very numerous;

but he is most remarkable as an historian. The "History of the

Reformation," but more especially that of "His Own Times," raises him

to a high rank among our English historians.

Note XXVIII.

_A portly prince, and goodly to the sight,

He seemed a son of Anach for his height;

Like those whom stature did to crowns prefer,

Black-browed, and bluff, like Homer's Jupiter;

Broad-backed, and brawny built, for love's delight,

A prophet formed to make a female proselyte._--P. 234.

The following song, which is preserved in the "State Poems," gives a

similar account of Burnet's personal appearance:

_A new Ballad, called, The Brawny Bishop's Complaint._

To the Tune of--_Packington's Pound._

I.

When B----t perceived the beautiful dames,

Who flocked to the chapel of hilly St James,

On their lovers the kindest looks did bestow,

And smiled not on him while he bellowed below;

To the princess he went,

With pious intent,

This dangerous ill in the church to prevent:

O, Madam! quoth he, our religion is lost,

If the ladies thus ogle the knights of the toast.

II.

Your highness observes how I labour and sweat,

Their affections to raise, and new flames to beget;

And sure when I preach, all the world will agree,

That their ears and their eyes should be pointed on me:

But now I can't find,

One beauty so kind,

As my parts to regard, or my presence to mind;

Nay, I scarce have a sight of any one face,

But those of old Oxford, and ugly Arglas.

III.

These sorrowful matrons, with hearts full of truth,

Repent for the manifold sins of their youth;

The rest with their tattle my harmony spoil;

And Bur--ton, An--say, K--gston, and B--le,

Their minds entertain,

With thoughts so profane,

'Tis a-mercy to find that at church they contain;

Even Hen--ham's shapes their weak fancies entice,

And rather than me they will ogle the Vice.[282]

IV.

These practices, madam, my preaching disgrace;

Shall laymen enjoy the just rights of my place?

Then all may lament my condition for hard,

To thresh in the pulpit without a reward.

Then pray condescend,

Such disorders to end,

And from the ripe vineyards such labourers send;

Or build up the seats, that the beauties may see

The face of no brawny pretender but me.

V.

The princess, by rude importunities pressed,

Though she laughed at his reasons, allowed his request;

And now Britain's nymphs, in Protestant reign,

Are locked up at prayers like the virgins in Spain;

And all are undone,

As sure as a gun,

Whenever a woman is kept like a nun,

If any kind man from bondage will save her,

The lass, in gratitude, grants him the favour.

The jest of his being "a prophet, formed to make a female proselyte,"

was more cutting, as he had just acquired a right of naturalization

in Holland, by marrying Mrs Mary Scott, a Dutch lady, but of Scottish

extraction, being descended of the noble house of Buccleuch.

Note XXIX.

_The hero and the tyrant change their style,

By the same measure that they frown or smile._--P. 235.

It must be owned, that, with all Bishop Burnet's good qualities, there

are particulars in his history which give colour for this accusation.

His opinions were often hastily adopted, and of course sometimes

awkwardly retracted, and his patrons were frequently changed. Thus, he

vindicated the legality of divorce for barrenness on the part of the

wife, and even that of polygamy, in his resolution of two important

cases of conscience. These were intended to pave the way for Charles

divorcing his barren wife Catherine, or marrying another; and so

raising a family of his own to succeed him, instead of the Duke of

York. These opinions he formally retracted. Notwithstanding his zeal

for liberty, his first work is said by Swift to have been written in

defense of arbitrary power. Above all, his great intimacy with the

Dukes of Hamilton and Lauderdale, the King and the Duke of York, the

Pope and the Prince of Orange; in short, his having the address to

attach himself for a time to almost every leading character, whom he

had an opportunity of approaching, gives us room to suspect, that

if Burnet did not change his opinions, he had at least the art of

disguising such as could not be accommodated to those of his immediate

patron. When the king demanded that Burnet should be delivered up by

the States, he threatened, in return, to justify himself, by giving an

account of the share he had in affairs for twenty years past; in which

he intimated, he might be driven to mention some particulars, which

would displease the king. This threat, as he had enjoyed a considerable

share of his confidence when Duke of York, may seem, in some degree, to

justify Dryden's heavy charge against him, of availing himself of past

confidence to criminate former patrons. It is remarkable, also, that

even while he was in the secret of all the intrigues of the Revolution,

and must have considered it as a near attempt, he continued to assert

the doctrine of passive obedience; and in his letter to Middleton,

in vindication of his conduct against the charge of high treason,

there is an affectation of excessive loyalty to the reigning monarch.

Against these instances of dissimulation, forced upon him perhaps by

circumstances, but still unworthy and degrading, we may oppose many

others, in which, when his principles and interest were placed at

issue, he refused to serve the latter at the expence of the former.

Note XXX.

_His praise of foes is venomously nice;

So touched, it turns a virtue to a vice._--P. 235.

This applies to the sketches of characters introduced by Burnet in his

controversial tracts. But long after the period when Dryden wrote, the

publication of the History of his Own Times confirmed, to a certain

extent, the censure here imposed. It is a general and just objection

to the bishop's historical characters, that they are drawn up with

too much severity, and that the keenness of party has induced him, in

many cases, to impose upon the reader a caricature for a resemblance.

Yet there appears to have been perfect good faith upon his own part;

so that we may safely acquit him of any intention to exaggerate the

faults, or conceal the virtues, of his political enemies. He seems

himself to have been conscious of a disposition to look upon the dark

side of humanity. "I find," says he, "that the long experience I have

had of the baseness, the malice, and the falsehood of mankind, has

inclined me to be apt to think generally the worst of men, and of

parties." Burnet therefore candidly puts the reader upon his guard

against this predominant foible, and expressly warns him to receive

what he advances with some grains of allowance.

But whatever was Burnet's private opinion of the conduct of others,

and however much he might be misled by prejudice in drawing their

characters, it should not be forgotten, that, in the moments of triumph

which succeeded the Revolution, he not only resisted every temptation

to revenge for personal injuries, but employed all his influence to

recommend mild and conciliating conduct to the successful party.

Some, who had suffered under the severity of James's reign, were

extremely indignant at what seemed to them to argue too much feeling

for their discomfited adversaries, and too little sympathy with their

own past distresses. Samuel Johnson, in particular, reprobates the

Scottish bishop's exhortations to forgiveness and forgetfulness of

injuries. "And, besides, we have Scotch doctors, to teach us the art

of forgetfulness. Pray you have _gude_ memories, _gude_ memories; do

not remember bad things, (meaning the murders and oppressions of the

last reigns,) but keep your memories for _gude_ things, have _gude_

memories." To this mimicry of the bishop's dialect, in which, however,

he seems to have conveyed most wholesome and sound council, Johnson

adds, that, during the sitting of King William's first parliament,

while his complaints were before them, the bishop sent to him his

advice, "Not to name persons." "I gave, says he, an English reply

to that message; 'Let him mind his business, I will mind mine.' His

bookseller, Mr Chiswell, by whom I had the message, seemed loth to

carry him that blunt answer. Oh! said I, he has got the title of a Lord

lately, I must qualify my answer: 'Let him _please_ to mind his own

business, I will mind mine."--This was very natural for one smarting

under sufferings, who complains, that "while a certain traveller,"

meaning Burnet, "was making his court to the cardinals at Rome, he got

such an almanack in his bones, (from scourging,) as to incapacitate him

from learning this Scotch trick of a _gude_ memory."[283] But it is

the very character of moderate councils to be disgusting to those who

have been hurried beyond their patience by oppression; and Johnson's

testimony, though given with a contrary view, is highly honourable to

the bishop's prudence.

Note XXXI.

_But he, uncalled, his patron to controul,

Divulged the secret whispers of his soul;

Stood forth the accusing Satan of his crimes,

And offered to the Moloch of the times._--P. 235.

In 1675, the House of Commons being resolved to assail the Duke of

Lauderdale, and knowing that Burnet, in whom he had once reposed

much confidence, could bear witness to some dangerous designs and

expressions, appointed the doctor to attend and be examined. His own

account of this delicate transaction is as follows:

"In April 1675, a session of parliament was held, as preparatory to

one that was designed next winter, in which money was to be asked; but

none was now asked, it being only called to heal all breaches, and

to beget a good understanding between the king and his people. The

House of Commons fell upon Duke Lauderdale; and those who knew what

had passed between him and me, moved, that I should be examined before

a committee. I was brought before them. I told them how I had been

commanded out of town; but though that was illegal, yet since it had

been let fall, it was not insisted on. I was next examined concerning

his design of arming the Irish Papists. I said, I, as well as others,

had heard him say, he wished the Presbyterians in Scotland would rebel,

that he might bring over the Irish Papists to cut their throats. I was

next examined concerning the design of bringing a Scottish army into

England. I desired to be excused, as to what had passed in private

discourse; to which I thought I was not bound to answer, unless it were

high treason. They pressed me long, and I would give them no other

answer; so they all concluded, that I knew great matters; and reported

this specially to the House. Upon that I was sent for, and brought

before the House. I stood upon it as I had done at the committee,

that I was not bound to answer; that nothing had passed that was high

treason; and as to all other things, I did not think myself bound to

discover them. I said farther, I knew the Duke Lauderdale was apt to

say things in a heat, which he did not intend to do; and, since he had

used myself so ill, I thought myself the more obliged not to say any

thing that looked like revenge, for what I had met with from him. I was

brought four times to the bar; at last I was told, the House thought

they had a right to examine into every thing that concerned the safety

of the nation, as well as into matters of treason; and they looked on

me as bound to satisfy them, otherwise they would make me feel the

weight of their heavy displeasure, as one that concealed what they

thought was necessary to be known. Upon this I yielded, and gave an

account of the discourse formerly mentioned. They laid great weight on

this, and renewed their address against Duke Lauderdale.

"I was much blamed for what I had done. Some, to make it look the

worse, added, that I had been his chaplain, which was false; and that

I had been much obliged to him, though I had never received any real

obligation from him, but had done him great services, for which I had

been very unworthily requited: Yet the thing had an ill appearance, as

the disclosing of what had passed in confidence; though I make it a

great question, how far even that ought to bind a man when the designs

are very wicked, and the person continued still in the same post and

capacity of executing them. I have told the matter as it was, and must

leave myself to the censure of the reader. My love to my country, and

my private friendship, carried me, perhaps, too far; especially since I

had declared much against clergymen's meddling in secular affairs, and

yet had run myself so deep in them."--_History of his Own Times_, Vol.

I. p. 375.

The discourse to which Burnet refers was of the following dangerous

tendency, and took place in September 1673.

"_Duke._ If the king should need an army from Scotland, to tame those

in England, might the Scots be depended upon?

"_Burnet._ Certainly not. The commons in the southern parts are all

Presbyterians. The nobility thought they had been ill used, were

generally discontented, and only waited for an opportunity to show it.

"_Duke._ I am of another mind. The hope of the spoil of England will

bring them all in.

"_Burnet._ The king is ruined if he trusts to that; for even

indifferent persons, who might otherwise have been ready enough to push

their fortunes without any anxious enquiries into the grounds they went

upon, will not now trust the king, since he has so lately said, he

would stick to his declaration,[284] and yet has so soon given it up.

"Duke. _Hinc illæ lacrymæ._ The king was forsaken in that matter, and

none sticks to him but Lord Clifford and myself."--_Ralph, with the

Authorities he quotes_, Vol. I. p. 275.

James II. afterwards revived the plan of maintaining a Scottish

standing army, to bridle his English subjects.

Note XXXII.

_And runs an Indian muck at all he meets._--P. 235.

To run a-muck, is a phrase derived from a practice of the Malays. When

one of this nation has lost his whole substance by gaming, or sustained

any other great and insupportable calamity, he intoxicates himself

with opium; and, having dishevelled his hair, rushes into the streets,

crying _Amocca_, or _Kill_, and stabbing every one whom he meets with

his creeze, until he is cut down, or shot, like a mad dog.

Note XXXIII.

_Such was, and is, the Captain of the Test._--P. 236.

Burnet may have been thus denominated, from having written the

following pamphlets, in the controversy respecting the Test, against

Parker, the apostate bishop of Oxford:

"An Enquiry into the Reasons for Abrogating the Test imposed on all

Members of Parliament, offered by Dr Samuel Parker, Bishop of Oxford."

"A Second Part of the Enquiry into the Reasons offered by Doctor Samuel

Parker, bishop of Oxford, for Abrogating the Test; or an Answer to his

plea for Transubstantiation, and for Acquitting the Church of Rome of

Idolatry."

"A Continuation of the Second Part of the Enquiry into the Reasons

offered by Dr Samuel Parker, Bishop of Oxford, for Abrogating the Test

relating to the Idolatry of the Church of Rome."

These two last pamphlets were afterwards thrown together in one tract,

entitled, "A Discourse concerning Transubstantiation and Idolatry,

being an Answer to the Bishop of Oxford's plea relating to these two

points."

Burnet himself admits, that his papers, in this controversy with

Parker, were written with an acrimony of style which nothing but such

a time and such a man could excuse. His papers were so bitter, that

nobody durst offer them to the bishop of Oxford, till the king himself

sent them to him, in hopes to stimulate him to an answer.

Several of these pieces seem to have been published after "The Hind and

the Panther;" but it must have been generally known at the time, that

Burnet had placed himself in the front of this controversy.

And much the Buzzard in their cause did stir,

Though naming not the patron, to infer,

_With all respect_, he was a gross idolater.

The passage particularly referred to in these lines occurs in a tract,

entitled, "Reasons against repealing the Act of Parliament, concerning

the Test," which is the first of six papers published by Dr Burnet when

in Holland, and reprinted at London in 1689. His words are these:

"IX. I am told some think it very indecent to have a test for our

parliaments, in which the king's religion is accused of idolatry;

but if this reason is good in this particular, it will be full as

good against several of the articles of our church, and many of the

homilies. If the church and religion of this nation is so formed by

law, that the king's religion is declared over and over again to be

idolatrous, what help is there for it? It is no other than it was when

his majesty was crowned, and swore to maintain our laws.

"I hope none will be wanting in all possible respect to his sacred

person; and as we ought to be infinitely sorry to find him engaged in a

religion which we must believe idolatrous, so we are far from the ill

manners of reflecting on his person, or calling him an idolater: for

as every man that reports a lie, is not for that to be called a liar;

so that, though the ordering the intention, and the prejudice of a

mis-persuasion, are such abatements, that we will not rashly take on us

to call every man of the church of Rome an idolater; yet, on the other

hand, we can never lay down our charge against the church of Rome as

guilty of idolatry, unless at the same time we part with our religion."

We cannot suppose that Burnet was insensible to the poignancy of

Dryden's satire; for, although he attempts to treat the poem with

contempt, in the defence of his "Reflections on Varillas' History,"

his coarse and virulent character of the poet plainly shows his inward

feelings. "I have been informed from England, that a gentleman, who

is known both for poetry and other things, had spent three months in

translating M. Varillas's History; but that, as soon as my Reflections

appeared, he discontinued his labour, finding the credit of his author

was gone. Now, if he thinks it is recovered by his Answer, he will

perhaps go on with his translation; and this may be, for aught I know,

as good an entertainment for him as the conversation that he had set on

between the Hinds and Panthers, and all the rest of animals, for whom

M. Varillas may serve well enough for an author: and this history and

that poem are such extraordinary things of their kind, that it will

be but suitable to see the author of the worst poem, become likewise

the translator of the worst history, that the age has produced. If his

grace and his wit improve both proportionably, he will hardly find that

he has gained much by the change he has made, from having no religion

to choose one of the worst. It is true, he had something to sink from,

in matter of wit; but as for his morals, it is scarce possible for him

to grow a worse man than he was. He has lately wreaked his malice on

me for spoiling his three months' labour; but in it he has done me all

the honour that any man can receive from him, which is to be railed at

by him. If I had ill-nature enough to prompt me to wish a very bad wish

for him, it should be, that he would go on and finish his translation.

By that it will appear, whether the English nation, which is the most

competent judge in this matter, has, upon the seeing our debate,

pronounced in M. Varillas's favour, or in mine. It is true, Mr D. will

suffer a little by it; but at least it will serve to keep him in from

other extravagancies; and if he gains little honour by this work, yet

he cannot lose so much by it, as he has done by his last employment."

Note XXXIV.

_They long their fellow-subjects to enthral,

Their patron's promise into question call,

And vainly think he meant to make them lords of all._ P. 236.

Part of the controversy which now raged, turned on the precise meaning

of the king's promise, to maintain the church of England as by law

established. The church party insisted, that the Declaration of

Indulgence was a breach of this promise, as it suspended their legal

safeguards, the test and penal laws. The advocates for the toleration

answered, that the promise was conditional, and depended on the church

consenting to the abrogation of these laws. This was stated by Penn, in

his "Good Advice;" to which the following indignant answer is made by a

champion of the church, perhaps Burnet himself:

"And if there be no other way of giving the king an opportunity of

keeping his word with the church of England, in preserving her, and

maintaining our religion, but the repealing of the penal and test laws,

as he intimates unto us, (Good Advice, p. 50.) we have not found the

royal faith so sacred and inviolable in other instances, as to rob

ourselves of a legal defence and protection, for to depend upon the

precarious one of a base promise, which his ghostly fathers, whensoever

they find it convenient, will tell him it was unlawful to make, and

which he can have a dispensation for the breaking of, at what time

he pleaseth. Nor do we remember, that when he pledged his faith unto

us, in so many promises, that the parting with our laws was declared

to be the condition upon which he made, and undertook to perform

them. Neither can any have the confidence to allege it, without having

recourse to the Papal doctrine of mental reservation. Which being one

of the principles of that order, under whose conduct he is, makes us

justly afraid to rely upon his word without further security. However,

we do hereby see, with what little sincerity Mr Penn writes; and what

small regard he hath to his majesty's honour, when he tells the church

of England, that if she please, and like the terms of giving up the

penal and test laws against Papists, that then the king will perform

his word with her; (Good Advice, p. 17.) but that otherwise, it is she

who breaks with him, and not he with her." (_Ibid._ p. 44.)

Note XXXV.

_Then, all maturely weighed, pronounced a doom

Of sacred strength for every age to come.

By this the Doves their wealth and state possess,

No rights infringed, but license to oppress._--P. 237.

The declaration for liberty of conscience was a strange and

incongruous, as well as most impolitic performance. It set out with

declaring, that although the king heartily wished that all his

subjects were members of the Catholic church, (which they returned,

by heartily wishing that he were a Protestant,) yet he abhorred all

idea of constraining conscience; and therefore, _making no doubt of

the concurrence of Parliament_, declared, 1. That he would protect

and maintain the bishops, &c. of the church of England, as by law

established, in the free exercise of their religion, and quiet

enjoyment of their possessions. 2. That all execution of penal laws

against non-conformists be suspended. 3. That all his majesty's

subjects should be at liberty to serve God after their own way,

in public and private, so nothing was preached against the royal

authority. 4. That the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, and the tests

made in the 25th and 30th years of Charles II., be discontinued. 5.

That all non-conformists be pardoned for former offences against the

penal laws and test. 6. That abbey and church lands be assured to the

possessors.

Such were the contents of this memorable Declaration, in which

a bigotted purpose was cloaked under professions of the highest

liberality; and prevarication and falsehood were rendered more

disgusting, by being mingled with very unseasonable truth.

Note XXXVI.

_Concluding well within his kingly breast,

His fowls of nature too unjustly were opprest;

He therefore makes all birds, of every sect,

Free of his farm._--P. 237.

When the king had irreconcileably quarrelled with the church, he began

to affect a great favour for the dissenters; and, as has been often

hinted, endeavoured to represent the measure of universal toleration

to be intended as much for the benefit of the Protestant dissenters as

of the Catholics. He dwelt upon the rigour of the church courts, and

directed an inquiry to be made into all the vexatious suits which had

been instituted against the dissenters, and the compositions which had

been exacted from them, under pretence of enforcing the laws. In short,

Burnet assures us, that the royal bed-chamber and drawing-room were as

full of stories to the prejudice of the clergy, as they used formerly

to abound with declamations against the fanatics.

Note XXXVII.

_'Tis said, the Doves repented, though too late,

Become the smiths of their own foolish fate;

Nor did their owner hasten their ill hour,

But, sunk in credit, they decreased in power;

Like snows in warmth that mildly pass away,

Dissolving in the silence of decay._--P. 238.

In the preceding lines, the poet had intimated the increase of trade

and wealth; an effect of toleration, much dwelt upon in James's

proclamation for liberty of conscience, and, indeed, the ostensible

cause of its being issued. But Dryden, as every one else, further

augured from the Declaration of Indulgence, under the circumstances of

the time, the speedy downfall of the church of England, though he is

willing to spare the king the odium of hastening what he represents as

the natural consequence of her own ambition and intolerance. A writer

of his party is less scrupulous in expressing the king's intentions:

"So, on the whole matter, the loyal church of England must either

change her old principles of loyalty, and take example by her Catholic

neighbours, how to behave herself towards a prince who is not of her

persuasion, or she must give his majesty leave not to nourish a snake

in his own bosom, but rather to withdraw his royal protection, which

was promised on account of her constant fidelity: For it is an approved

axiom in philosophy, _Cessante causa, tollitur effectus_; and we have

a common saying of our own, _No longer_ _pipe, no longer dance_. And

now let us leave the holy mother church at liberty to consult what new

measures of loyalty she ought to take for her own dear interest, and,

for aught I know, it may be worth her serious consideration."--_New

Test of the Church of England's Loyalty._

Note XXXVIII.

_But each have separate interests of their own;

Two Czars are one too many for a throne.

Nor can the usurper long abstain from food;

Already he has tasted Pigeon's blood,

And may be tempted to his former fare._--P. 239.

Dryden insinuates the improbability, that the high and low church

party would long continue in union, since the authority assumed by

Burnet, their present advocate, was inconsistent with that of Sancroft

the primate, Compton bishop of London, and other leaders of the high

church party among the clergy. He resumes the theme of Burnet's alleged

disinclination for episcopacy. In fact, although his lot cast him

into the church of England, the bishop of Sarum, in many parts of his

writings, expresses an unfavourable opinion of her clergy, whom in

one place he calls the most remiss of any in Europe. Even this harsh

expression is nothing to the following account of the controversy

between the clergy and dissenters, as it stands in the MS. of his

history; for it is greatly softened in the printed copy:

"Many books came out likewise against the church of England. This

alarmed the bishops and clergy much; so that they set up to preach

against rebellion, and the late times, in such a strain, that it was

visible they meant a parallel between these and the present time.

And this produced at last that heat and rage into which the clergy

has run so far, that it is like to end very fatally. They, on their

part, should have shewed more temper, and more of the spirit of the

gospel; whereas, for the greatest part, they are the worst natured,

the fiercest, indiscreetest, and most persecuting sort of people that

are in the nation. There is a sort of them do so aspire to preferment,

that there is nothing so mean and indecent that they will not do to

compass it; and when they have got into preferments, they take no care,

either of themselves, or of the flocks committed to their charge, but

do generally neglect their parishes. If they are rich enough, they hire

some pitiful curate, at as low a price as they can, and turn all over

on him; or, if their income will not bear out that, they perform the

public offices in the slightest manner they can, but take no care of

their people in the way of private instruction or admonition; and so do

nothing to justify the character of pastors or watchmen, that feed the

souls of their people, or watch over them. And they allow themselves

in many indecent liberties, of going to taverns and ale-houses, and

of railing scurrilously against all that differ from them: and they

cherish the profaneness of their people, if they but come to church,

and rail with them against the dissenters; and are implacably set

on the ruin of all that separate from them, if the course of their

lives were otherwise ever so good and unblameable. In a word, many

of them are a reproach to Christianity and to their profession;

and are now, perhaps, one of the most corrupt bodies of men in the

nation."--_Somers' Tracts_, p. 116.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 264: A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty.]

[Footnote 265:

Blue bonnet lords, a numerous store,

Whose best example is, they're poor;

Merely drawn in by hope of gains,

And reap their scandal for their pains;

Half-starved at court with expectation, }

Forced to return to their Scotch station,}

Despised and scorned by every nation. }

_The New Converts._

]

[Footnote 266:

This put the heathen priesthood in a flame,

For priests of all religions are the same.

_Absalom and Achitophel_, Part I.

]

[Footnote 267: A Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers.]

[Footnote 268: A Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers, p. 116.]

[Footnote 269: _Ibidem_, p. 117.--Stillingfleet plays on this

expression of the _grim logician_, in allusion to a passage of our

author's "Defence of the Duchess of York's Paper;" where he says, "That

the kingdom of heaven is not only for the wise and learned," and that

"our Saviour's disciples were but poor fishermen; and we read but of

one of his apostles who was bred up at the feet of Gamaliel, and that

poor people have souls to save, as precious in the sight of God as the

_grim logician's_." Dryden retorts it upon him in the text.]

[Footnote 270: A Vindication, &c. p. 1.]

[Footnote 271: _Ergoteering_ was a phrase used by Dryden in his

"Defence of the Duchess's Paper," and which Stillingfleet harps upon

throughout his "Vindication."]

[Footnote 272: Ralph's History, Vol. I. p. 933.--Secret Consults, &c.

of the Roman Party, p. 59.]

[Footnote 273: "One Petre, descended from a noble family; a man of no

learning, nor any way famed for his virtue, but who made up all in

boldness and zeal, was the Jesuit of them all, that seemed animated

with the most courage."--BURNET.]

[Footnote 274: "We have," says one of the order, "a good while begun

to get footing in England. We teach humanity at Lincoln, Norwich, and

York. At Warwick, we have a public chapel secured from all injuries by

the king's soldiers; we have also bought some houses of the city of

Wiggorn, in the province of Lancaster. The Catholic cause very much

increaseth. In some Catholic churches, upon holidays, above 1500 are

always numbered present at the sermon. At London, likewise, things

succeed no worse. Every holiday, or preaching, people are so frequent,

that many of the chapels cannot contain them. Two of our fathers,

Darmes and Berfall, do constantly say mass before the king and queen.

Father Edmund Newill, before the queen-dowager, Father Alexander Regnes

in the chapel of the ambassador aforesaid, others in other places. Many

houses are bought for the college in the Savoy, as they call it, nigh

Somerset-house, London, the palace of the queen-dowager, to the value

of about eighteen thousand florins; in making of which, after the form

of a college, they labour very hard, that the schools may be opened

before Easter." A Letter from a Jesuit at Liege. _Somers' Tracts_, p.

248. About this letter, see Burnet's History, Vol. I. p. 711. The king

also granted the manor of York to Lawson, a priest, for thirty years,

as a seminary for the education of youth in the Catholic faith; to the

great displeasure of Sir John Reresby, the governor of the city, who

had fitted it up for his own residence. See his _Memoirs_, pp. 245,

246.]

[Footnote 275: So says the memorable "Test of the Church of England's

Loyalty."]

[Footnote 276: New Test, &c.]

[Footnote 277: Roman Catholic Principles, 1680.]

[Footnote 278: There is a copy of this old caricature print in

Luttrell's Collection.]

[Footnote 279: History of his Own Times, Vol. I. p. 280.]

[Footnote 280: See Burnet's Life, by his Son, p. 686.]

[Footnote 281: See Dr Flexman's catalogue of his works, under the head

"Tracts, Political, Polemical, and Miscellaneous."]

[Footnote 282: Mr B--ty, vice-chamberlain.]

[Footnote 283: Notes on the Phœnix Pastoral Letter, _Johnson's Works_,

pp. 317, 318.]

[Footnote 284: The Declaration of Indulgence. See Vol. IX. p. 447.]

BRITANNIA REDIVIVA:

A POEM

ON

THE BIRTH OF THE PRINCE,

(BORN 10TH JUNE, 1688.)

_Di patrii indigetes, et Romule, Vestaque mater,

Quæ Tuscum Tyberim et Romana palatia servas,

Hunc saltem everso puerum succurrere sæclo

Ne prohibete! satis jampridem sanguine nostro

Laomedonteæ luimus perjuria Trojæ._

VIRG. GEORG. 1.

BRITANNIA REDIVIVA.

The remarkable incident, which gave rise to the following poem, was

hailed by the Catholics with the most unbounded joy. That party,

whose transient prosperity depended upon the declining life of James

II., could hardly enjoy their present power, embittered as it was by

the reflection, that it must end with the reign of the king and the

succession of the Princess of Orange. Many circumstances seemed to

render the hopes of the king having a male heir of his body extremely

precarious. His system was said to have been injured by early

dissipation, and he was now advanced in life. The queen, also, had been

in a bad state of health; had lost all her children soon after they

were born; and had now, for several years, ceased to have any. Amidst

these discouraging considerations, the queen's pregnancy was announced

in 1687; and even before his birth, addressers and panegyrists in verse

hailed the future prince, as a pledge for the maintenance of liberty of

conscience, and the security of the royal line.[285]