come to church, and one age would make us all one again. To talk of five shillings a month for not coming to the sacrament, and one shilling a week for not coming to church, is such a way of converting people as never was known. This is selling them. a liberty to transgress for so much money. If it be not a crime, why don't we give them full license? and if it be, no price ought to compound for the committing it; for that is selling a liberty to people to sin against God and the Government. We hang men for trifles,* and banish them for things not worth naming; but an offence against God and the Church, against the welfare of the world and the dignity of religion, shall be bought off for five shillings. This is such a shame to a Christian government, that 'tis with regret I transmit it to posterity." Carried away with the excitement of the first perusal of the pamphlet, the fire-eaters of the Church were wild with delight. Here was not only "the opportunity," but the "man" for the "hour"— eloquent as Atterbury himself, and a hundredfold more vigorous; giving expression, with fluency and ardour, to their own thoughts and feelings, which they had tried in vain to utter without hesitation or misgiving. Their mortification was in the same degree bitter when they found the world laughing at the dulness of their perception in mistaking solemn banter for serious argument and earnest expostulation. A warrant was issued for the apprehension of the audacious scribbler. De Foe, to escape the rising storm, absconded, and from the place of his concealment addressed the following letter to the Secretary of State : "Jan 9, 1702. "To the Rt Hon. Heneage, Earle of Nottingham, her Maties "Principal Secretary of State. "MY LORD, "I am exceeding sencible that I have given her May and * Amongst the State Papers are petitions from prisoners under sentence of death for stealing a piece of calico. Offer of De Foe to raise a Troop. the Govt offence, and several Poor and some Innocent People being in Trouble on my acct, move me to address yo Lordship in this manner, for wh rudeness I humbly ask your Pardon. I had long since surrendered to her Majesty's clemency had not y° menaces of yor Lordship's officers possest me with such ideas of her Majty and your Lordship's resentment as are too Terrible, and such as respect former Things wch I have had no concern in, tho' I have had y misfortune to pass for guilty by common fame. "To flee from her Majts justice seems, my Lord, to be a kind of raising war against her, and is very irksome to me. I beseech your Lordship to assist me in laying down these arms, at least making such a truce as may, through her Majesty's condescension, obtain her pardon. "My Lord, a Body unfitt to bear ye hardships of a Prison, and a mind impatient of confinement, have been yo onely reasons of withdrawing myself; and, my Lord, the crie of a numerous ruined family, the prospect of a long banishment from my native country, and ye hope of her Majts mercy, move me to throw myself at her Majesty's feet, and to intreat your Lordship's inter cession. "I beseech your Lordship to assure her Maj" that I am perfectly free from any seditious designs, and howsoever I have unadvisedly offended, I am and was entirely devoted to her interest and service. With the lowest submission I intreat her Majts Pardon for this mistake, for which I am ready to make any publick acknowledgment, and further humbly Beseech your Lordship's pardon and pacience, making a proposal on my own behalf. For tho' it must be unusual condescension in her Maj to capitulate with an offending subject, yet offences differ in their nature, and her Majts mercy is unbounded. "I was informed, my Lord, that when my distressed wife made application to your Lordship, you were pleased to direct I should surrender and answer such questions as sha be asked me. My Lord, would your Lordship condescend to permit any questions you think fitt to be writt down, and sent to or left at my house. I will, as soon as I can receive them, give your Lordship as plain, full, direct, and honest answer as if I were in immediate apprehension of death from your resentments; and perhaps, my Lord, my answers may be so satisfactory as may incline you to think that you have been misinformed respecting me. "But, my Lord, if after this I sha still have ye misfortune to remain under her Majt displeasure, I am then her most humble Petitioner that she will please to remitt the rigor of prosecution, and that, pleading guilty, I may receive a sentence from her particular justice a little more tollerable to me as a gentleman than Prison, Pillory, and such like, which are worse to me than Death. "I beg leave to observe to your Lordship that felons and thieves whose punishment is death are frequently spared upon entering into her Majesty's service. If her Majesty will be pleased to order me to serve her a year or more at my own charge, I will surrender myself, and volunteer at the head of her armies in ye Netherlands to any column of horse her Majesty shall direct, and without doubt I shall die there much more to her service than in a prison; and if by my behaviour I can expiate this offence and obtain her Majesty's Pardon, I shall think it more, much more honourable mercy to me than if I had it by Petition. And least I shd seem to prescribe to her Maj mercy, my Lord, if her Maj", abateing prison and corporal punishment, shall please to pass any sentence upon me that I am capable to put in execution, I resolve cheerfully to submit to it, and throw myself upon her native clemency. But if her Majty shall extend her grace to a total remission of this offence, and if I may presume to say shall be further pleased to accept my service, I will raise her Maj" a troop of horse at my own charge, and at the head of them Ile serve her as long as I live. At least, my Lord, this may assure you I am ready with my hand, my pen, or my head, to show her Majesty the gratitude of a pardoned subject, and to give her Majesty all the satisfaction I am capable of, being extremely grieved that I have offended her. Humbly intreating your Lordship's favour and intercession, woh possibly your Lordship will not repent when you shall find you have granted it to a zealous, thankfull, and faithful subject, and so may it please y' Lordship's most obedient, distressed, humble petitioner and servant, "DE FOE."* *S. P. Dom. On the 10th of January, 1703, the following proclamation appeared in the "London Gazette":— "Whereas, Daniel De Foe, alias De Fooe, is charged with writing a seditious pamphlet, entitled, The Shortest Way with the Dissenters.' He is a middle-sized, spare man, about forty years old, of a brown complexion, and dark brown-coloured hair, but wears a wig, a hooked nose, a sharp chin, grey eyes, and a large mole near his mouth; was born in London, and for many years was a hose-factor in Freeman's Yard, in Cornhill, and now is owner of the brick and pantile works near Tilbury Fort, in Essex Whosoever shall discover the said Daniel De Foe to one of her Majesty's principal Secretaries of State, or any of her Majesty's Justices of the Peace, so he may be apprehended, shall have a reward of £50, which her Majesty has ordered immediately to be paid on such discovery." : The pamphlet was indicted at the Old Bailey Sessions, February 24th, 1703, and on the next day condemned by the House of Commons to be burnt by the common hangman in New Palace Yard. De Foe was tried in the following July, and sen tenced to pay a fine of two hundred marks to the Queen, to stand three times in the pillory, to be imprisoned during the Queen's pleasure, and find securities for his good behaviour for seven years. Fortunately for the clever pamphleteer, the crowd that mustered to witness the infliction of the sentence at the pillory gave him on each occasion, at the Royal Exchange, at the conduit in Cheapside, and at the Temple, a perfect ovation. The pillory * Earl Nottingham writes to the Lord Treasurer, May 25th, 1703 :"The person who discovered Daniel Fooe (for whom a reward of £50 was promised in the 'Gazette') sends for his money, but does not care to appear himself; if, therefore, your Lop will order that summe to be paid to Mr. Armstrong, I will take care that the person shall have it who discover'd the said Fooe, and upon whose information he was apprehended."-Treasury Papers, vol. lxxxv., 154. itself was hung with garlands of flowers; the health of De Foe was drunk with enthusiasm, and when he descended he was received with shouts of applause, and conducted by his admiring friends to a place of refreshment. He sung with triumph, in his "Hymn to the Pillory"— 66 Shame, like the exhalations of the sun, Falls back where first the motion was begun; And he who for no crime shall on thy brows appear, The time was not yet come for a general raid on the Dissenters, but unceasing efforts were made to hasten on the intended and, as it was expected, decisive assault. At intervals might be heard the tone of calm persuasion, but it was soon drowned in the growing tumult. Archbishop Tennison, in his speech against the Bill for Preventing Occasional Conformity (1704), said: Conciliatory Tennison. "At a time that all Europe is engaged in a bloody and expensive war; that this nation has not only such considerable foreign enemies to deal withal, but has a party in her own bowels, ready upon all occasions to bring in a Popish Pretender, and involve us all in the same, or rather worse, calamities than those from which, with so much blood and treasure, we have been freed; at a time that the Protestant Dissenters (however they may be wrong by departing from us yet) are heartily united with us against the common foes to our religion and government-what advantage those who are in earnest for defending those things can have by lessening the number of such as are firmly united in this common cause, I cannot for the life of me imagine. Therefore, I am for throwing out the Bill without giving it another reading." In another tone the intolerant clergy demanded that the Church should be weeded of all who looked with favour on Nonconformists. "The Church," |