And here I cannot but add what is still of more. importance, and ought to be the most prevalent of all arguments, that should there be the least hopes given to a Popish successor, the life of her Majesty will certainly be in most imminent danger ; for there will never be wanting bloody zealots of that persuasion that will think it meritorious to take away her Majesty's life to hasten the accession of such a successor to her throne. The only preservation against these terrors are the laws before-mentioned relating to the settlement of the Imperial Crown of Great Britain Thanks ་ ་ན be to Heaven for that settlement. The Princess Sophia, and the heirs of her body, being Protestants, are the successors to her present Majesty, upon her demise without issue. The way is plain before our eyes, guarded on the right hand and on the left by all the sanctions of God and man, and by all the ties of law and conscience. Let those who act under the present settlement, and yet pretend to dispute for an absolute hereditary right, quiet themselves with the arguments they have borrowed from Popery, and teach their own consciences the art of dispensing with the most solemn oath to this Establishment, whilst they think themselves bound only till opportunity shall serve to introduce another. God be thanked! neither we, nor our cause, stand in need of such detestable prevarication. Our cause is our happiness. Our oaths are our judgment and inclination. Honour and affection call us, without the solemnity of an oath, to defend such an Establishment; but with it we have every motive that can influence the mind of man. The terrors of God, added to the demands of our country, oblige and constrain us to let our hearts. and our hands follow our wishes and our consciences; and, out of regard to our Queen, our religion, our country, our liberty, and our property, to maintain and assert the Protestant succession in the illustrious House of Hanover: it is no time to talk with hints and innuendoes, but openly and honestly to profess our sentiments, before our enemies have completed and put their designs in execution against us. As divided a people as we are, those who are for the House of Hanover are infinitely superior, in number, wealth, courage, and all arts, military and civil, to those that are in the contrary interest; besides which, we have the lawsI say the laws on our side. And those who by their practices, whatever their professions are, have discovered themselves enemies to the constitution and friends to the Pretender, cannot make a step farther without being guilty of treason, without standing in broad daylight confessed criminals against their injured Queen and country. When the people were in a ferment, when faction ran high, with irresistible prepossessions against everything in its former channel, sanguine men might conceive hopes of leading them their own way. But the building erected upon that quicksand, the favour of the multitude, will sink, and be swallowed up by that treacherous ground on which the foundation was laid. It is easy to project the subversion of a people when men see them unaccountably turned for their own destruction; but not so easy to effect that ruin when they are come to themselves, and are sensibly and reasonably affected with thoughts for their preservation. We cannot help it, if so many thousands of our brave brethren, who laid down. their lives against the power of France, have died in vain; but we may value our own lives dearly, like honest men. Whatever may befall the glory and wealth of Great Britain, let us struggle to the last drop of our blood for its religion and liberty. The banners under which we are to enter this conflict, whenever we are called to it, are the laws mentioned in this discourse; when we do not keep them in sight, we have no colours to fly to, no discipline to preserve us, but are devoted, and have given ourselves up to, slaughter and confusion. While we act manfully under them, we have reason to expect the blessing and assistance of Heaven on its own cause, which it has so manifestly acknowledged to be such, by our many wonderful deliverances, when all human assistances and ordinary means of succour seemed irrevocably removed. We have no pretensions to the Divine favour, but from our firm adherence to that settlement, which He has, by so many wonders and blessings, after such great difficulties and misfortunes, bestowed upon us, and which we have in his sight, and with the invocation of his sacred Name, after preparing ourselves at his altar, so frequently and solemnly sworn to defend. This plain, unperplexed, unalterable rule for our conduct is visibly the work of his hand to a favoured people. Her Majesty's Parliamentary title, and the Succession in the illustrious House of Hanover, is the Ark of God to Great Britain, and, like that of old, carries death to the profane hand that shall dare to touch it. |