Page images
PDF
EPUB

[iv]

The Auditor old Bickerstaff revives Good his defign, and honestly he strives To yield his readers rational delight. May they his modest industry requite! The young Spectator too, with studious

care,

Weekly provides, and dishes out his fare: Taies, humour, morals, modes, intrigues, and wit,

o fuit all tempers, and both fexes fit. Here might I far the catalogue purfte; And give the Weekly Regifter its due, The Corn-cutter, andWhat d'ye call it, names To cripple verfe, and quench a poet's flames: But by thy choice their merit will appear; Perhaps they fill a column in a year.

Now we behold how senators debate; And from their freedom learn our happy state.

[blocks in formation]

On feeing the following Caveat written by an Irib Father Inquifitor on the first Leaf of fome Volumes of Mr Addifon's Guardians and the Gentleman's Magazine, which had been feized among the Books of an English Merchant, and detained fix Months in the Spanish Inquifition.

N. B. This whole work is to be cautiously read, being written (in the latter compiled) by a condemned author.

by int'reft join'd,

Princes and Pricftives, enlave mankind:

One thakes the fword, and t'other spreads
Thro' all the foul a thousand dreads.
The church confirms the monarch's right;
And for their mother monarchs fight.

This once in Britain was the scene;
And duinefs made thofe days ferene :
Dulness, ordain'd the strong fupport
Of her two feats, the church and court!
In folemn Spain who dares oppofe
Or pope or king, in verfe, or profe?

But Britain now rejects the chains; And reafon here fecurely reigns. "Twixt truth and falfehood taught the odds No more we worship mortal Gods. "Tis ours, religion to divide

From bugbear schemes, and priestly pride;
To bound the fov`reigns rightful sway;
Affert our freedom, yet obey.
Shall we confine to names or blood
An office rais'd for publick good?
Or close our eyes against the light,
And hire a guide to lead us right?

Who thus condemns this freeborn pages
How feeble feems the jefuit's rage,

Where English fentiments are dreft,
Warm as they flow from ev'ry breast!
How low the race! how dull the beaft
Rid by this grave Baotian pricft!
Each genuin Briton fmiles difdain,
Bleffes himself, and pitics Spain.

There live, unworthy of thy clime!
Thy country's fcandal and her crime!
Nor ever taste that freedom more,
Which gilds Hibernia's happy shore!
O never feel, thou loft to thought!
What godlike Addison has taught.
Exil'd, enflav'd, deípis'd, alham'd,
Live long a priest, then die unnam'd!

URBAN, thy labours fhall proceed, Till fervile Spaniards dare to read. To grov'lling minds fhalt thou difpenfe True patriot warmth, and manly sense. On bigot realms fhall reason fmile; And fouls unfetter'd blefs this ifle: E'en diftant climes fhall, with delight, Behold how Britons think and write.

We are too fenfible of imperfections, to affume to ourselves what is fo largely advanced in the above pieces to our praife, but as we could not leave out thofe poetical heightenings, which otherwife we ought not in modefty to have let pafs, without spoiling the lines; fo que can most truely affirm, that our endeavours have been received in fuch a favourable manner, as to produce a great many letters of acknowledgment, in which our good-natur'd orrefpondents have express'd themselves in a manner little fort of the real meaning of the fe premis; and we may add, that they base alfo inform'd us of certain practices made use of sur prejudice, which they condemn with the utmost indignation.

[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][subsumed]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

A View of the Weekly DISPUTES and ESSAYS in this Month.

London Journal, Dec. 30. No. 705.

[Omitted in our laft]

An Answer to a Pamphlet call'd, No Time proper to repeal the Teft A, continued from p. 1115.

HE Author of this Pamphlet proceeds to object against the Repeal of the Teft, that it would divide the King's Friends, fince feveral of the WhigChurchmen are against it.] If there be any fuch Churchmen, they must be weak indeed, not to know, that the King's Intereft and the Intereft of Liberty confift in a firm Union of all the Whigs in the Kingdom. The Whig Intereft brought the Royal Family to the Throne, and preferved them in it, against all the Efforts of the Jacobites and Tories ; and if united, will preserve them till Time fhall be no more. Shall we then enrage fome, and cool others, of the King's Friends? Or, fhall we repeal this Act, and heal all Wounds on Account of Religion and Politicks? Do this and live. Repeal

A

ing this Act will ftrengthen the Whig Intereft, as it will render Thousands capable of ferving their King and Country, who now, thro' religious Scruples, are abfolutely incapable.

The Church will be the fafer by this Repeal; for, the Diffenters being put, in all Civil Affairs, upon an equal Foot with Churchmen, will have nothing further to ask; and looking on the Church as their faft Friends, they B will infenfibly abate of their Prejudices, and grow into a Liking of them. There were Ten Diffenters 40 Years ago, to one now, who counted Communion with the Church finful: And if this Act be repealed, there may not be one 20 Years hence; unless a Quaker; for Good Senje, the Daughter of Liberty, will leffen them every Day.

[graphic]

C

D

The Whig-Churchmen and Diffenters are grown wifer; they fee that thefe Differences about Rites and Ceremonies, are Trifles, and beneath the Confideration of a Man of Senfe; But if Churchmen will revive the old monftrous Doctrines of No Bishop, no King, and that the Church is the State, the Confequence is, a Man may be made a State

B

Criminal for Reasoning against Doctrine contain'd in establish'd icles or Creeds; which is the very Jence of Popery, and we shall be Slaves by Law establish'd. But we will not be brought again under the Yoke.

B

They will remember, that in the lat ter End of Q. Anne's Reign there was a Defign to deprive them of their Right A of voting, as well as a Law made to deprive them of their Right of educating their Children. The Quakers were actually tried to give up their Right of Voting: For when they applied to Parliament to have their Affirmation At lengthened, the October Club at the Bell Tavern in Westminfter, fent for fome of their Leaders, and told them, they would pafs their Affirmation Act, on Condition they would confent to have a Clause in it, to take away their Right of Voting for Members of Parliament; which they rejected with Indignation, refign'd themselves to Providence, end waited a more convenient Seafon, which happen'd at the Acceffion of the present Royal Family.

Another Argument against the Repeal, is, The States of Holland employ no Perfons in Civil Trufts but those of the Eftablish'd Church.] What then? The States of Holland are against Trials by Juries, and the Liberty of the People in chufing Magiftrates. But the Fact is not fairly ftated; there never was a Law in Holland to incapacitate the Arminians, or any Proteftant Diffenters, for Civil Trufts. 'Tis true, indeed, G the Arminians have not been employ'd fince they were in the Barnevelt Faction against the Houfe of Orange. So that they are laid by, not on a Religious, but Civil Account, as the Papifts are both here and in Holland.

It is faid by the Friends of the Mi-D niftry, that tho' it may be reasonable in itself to repeal the Teft Act, yet a Government is not always in a Condition to do what is reafonable; that Minifters are not to confult what is

beft for one particular Man or Body of Men, but the whole Community; that all Parties ought to be confider'd, and the beft Ballance poffible fettled amongst them; that as the Prejudices of the Diffenters fhould be regarded, fo fhould thofe of Churchmen, who would be alarm'd by this Bill, and roar out the Danger of the Church; and that all good Subjects will fubmit to Neceffity, and wait proper Jun&tures.

The beft Advice to the Diffenters is, if the Test At fhould not be repeal'd, not to refent it fo far as to join with the Tories, and fo break the Whig Intereft, render themselves odious among the Whigs, contemptible amongst the Tories, obnoxious at Court, and terribly affect themselves as well as the Interests of Liberty. Let them confider, that if the Whigs don't do them all the Good they defire, the Tories will do them all the Ill they are able.

E

F

I wish from my Soul, the Whigs in the House would confider, and not

force Gentlemen into Measures in their own Defence against their Principles, and the true Interest of their Country. SOCRATES.

Free Briton, Jan. 4. No. 162.

Of a Standing Army. MY prefent Defign, fays Walfing

ham, is to obferve the Mistakes of the Craftsman. He treats the two Papers which I publifh'd on the Subject of the Army (fee p. 645, 651. Vol. II.) as drawn from what was fpoken in the Houfe of Commons by the Hon. Gentleman in the Administration; but I affure the Publick I had not the Honour of fo great an Authority. The Dif pofition of Forces, which the Craftsman G remarks on (fce p. 1120 C) were drawn from the Obfervation of a noble martial Duke in the other Houfe. But to prevent any future Miftakes, the genuine Speech which the Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke in the Committee on the Debate of the Army, is as follows:

H

[blocks in formation]
« PreviousContinue »