apology, but leave my subject and its requirements to make apologies as we go along.1 It is stated in a vindication of Lord Shaftesbury-who was tried, as all the leading men of the reign of Charles II. were tried, for some plot or other, real or pretended, Roman Catholic or Presbyterian-as the oppressor Charles or his brother James had the power of pulling the strings-Lord Shaftesbury's real offence being the uncompromising open opposition he gave in his place in Parliament to the succession to the throne of these realms by James Duke of York. He was tried A.D. 1681, and acquitted, to the great joy of the nation, who testified their feelings in court by cheers and acclamations, and by bonfires at night through the country; the witnesses for the crown, on their way to the court at Westminster, having to be guarded through the city by the sheriffs with a strong guard to the limit of the jurisdiction of the city of London, Temple Bar. It is stated in this vindication what was the class of witnesses produced by the crown on these sham RomanCatholic-plot trials; for most of the plots were shams trumped up by the royal brothers and their abettors, the sycophants and prostitutes of the court. "They had such a medley of evidence as is almost comical to consider: there were the Macks and the Mounsieurs, the midwife and the priest, the skip-kennel and the Newgate birds, the justice and the bog-trotter, the countess and the kitchen wench. No discourse was heard among them but captains' places, deaneries, rewards, gratuities, preferments, and as much money as you will. They were advanced from bonny-clabber to claret and frontiniack; from turnips and oat-cakes to oysters and pheasants; from brogues and bandle (a cow-band) to velvet and cloth of silver. They discoursed 1 Examples of the way in which the Stuarts exercised arbitrary power are but too abundant; but the following may be quoted :—“At this time (1635, or thereabout), Sir Edward Coke, Sir Thomas Wentworth, and Sir Robert Philips, were pricked to be high sheriffs for Buckingham, York, and Somersetshire, to incapacitate them to be members of this Commons' House; whereunto the Bishop (Williams, late Lord Keeper and Bishop of Lincoln, and made Archbishop of York by poor infatuated Charles I., when up to the chin in national and personal difficulties—his own bringing on) alluded when he was told that he should be restrained from the House of Peers, 'What!' said he, am I made high sheriff of Huntingdonshire?'” of his Majesty as if they had been of his council, and of his ministers as if they had been their confederates." In this vindication there is a sentiment of Lord Shaftesbury on Popery, the mainspring of all these plots, which is worthy of being handed down to the latest posterity. "That Popery and slavery, like two sisters, go hand in hand; sometimes the one goes first, sometimes the other, in at doors, but the other is always following close at hand. "In England Popery was to have brought in slavery; in Scotland slavery went before, and Popery was to follow." To show how heartily De Foe entered into the movement of the Revolution, and his admiration of William III., the hero of it, it may be stated, that he annually kept or commemorated the 4th of November, in token of our deliverance, as a day of thanksgiving, for it was the day of the landing of William III.—" a day," says he, "famous on various accounts, and every one of them dear to Britons who love their country, value the Protestant interest, or have an aversion to tyranny and oppression. On this day William the Third was born; on this day he married the daughter of England; and on this day he rescued the nation from a bondage worse than that of Egypt-a bondage of soul as well as bodily servitude-a slavery to the ambition and raging lust of a generation set on fire by pride, avarice, cruelty, and blood." Bravo! De Foe! Never had Britain a subject more devoted, more loyal, and more religiously thankful for the glorious revolution of 1688 than thou. It was a movement after thine own heart, Daniel! CHAPTER II. We have said "Poor James," in having to run for his life and desert the throne of his fathers; but may we not say, with equal propriety and feeling, "Poor William," who married the daughter, and was thus dragged into the inheritance. Which was most to be pitied is a question for speculation; but certainly William came in for a hard stone seat, a Scotch throne, and a crown of thorns; his whole reign was a scene of annoyance, perplexity, and disappointment, which he was made to feel in a thousand forms every year of his life; for William was no sooner seated upon the throne than the old Whig and Tory jealousies at once broke out to disturb his peace, and all parties appeared to act as though William had been supported in a church-in-danger panic; but now, when time had been given for cool reflection, all, both Whig and Tory, regretted what they had done, and heartily wished their old King back again, for he was a "true-born Englishman." The Whigs acted with the greatest jealousy towards their new sovereign, and thus forced William into the arms of the Tories, who held out hopes that they would accomplish everything; but they were powerless, for they had a Tory House of Commons, devoted to the late King, and they would advance no money, even for the most necessary demands of the government. The Tories, devoted to their James II., repealed the Septennial Act of Charles II. in the Commons; and they did this to annoy William, which forced him to dissolve the Parliament. The Whigs annoying the Tories, and the Tories embarrassing the Whigs, and both loving the Pretender, forced William to pass through his troublesome reign as he could; he borrowed money, to be paid out of the estate some time or other; he borrowed thirteen millions, and left it as a legacy; and with it he also left the legacy of borrowing, which was the secret of the funding system and of our national debt. Whigs and Tories contending for place and power, forced William on the system, and thanks to them for it. In derision I say it, thanks to them for it! There was not a single aspirant for preferment under his government who, when he met with disappointment, did not return to the support of the abdicated James, and give as a reason that he was a "true-born Englishman." Poor William's Dutch origin was thrown in his face by every disappointed expectant of place or office. His Parliament thwarted and annoyed him in every way; and really, if he had been a vagrant bastard instead of a legitimate-born man and son-in-law of a King of England, they could not have treated him with more jealousy or suspicion. They behaved scurvily to him, after his noble risks and behaviour to them. These men had acted as sycophants to James, and they acted as bullies to William; they were like slaves set free -insolent in their possession of freedom, as all slaves are and will be. Who ever knew a crawling lick-the-dust sycophant that was not a bully when in power? I never did. I have always observed through my life, that these two characters are only halves of one whole, for they both rest together invariably in one breast. Low writers were employed to write doggerel verses or ballads on foreigners, Dutchmen, &c., with the view of annoying royalty. Insulted to the last degree by the Commons, in being forced to disband his army to that insignificant standard as to render the King contemptible in the eyes of the powers of Europe, so thoroughly disgusted was William with the ruling powers of this kingdom, that he heartily wished himself back again in Holland, and clear from all the troubles and perplexities of governing so ungrateful a people. At this juncture, to answer the scurrilous attacks upon William's Dutch Presbyterian origin, and, if possible, to check the national ingratitude, so constantly expressed in the national cant of "He was a true-born Englishman," De Foe was induced to write his poem with this title, to show what was a true-born Englishman; and the work was very successful. I will give a few extracts, for the sentiments are true to the letter, how little soever they may be flattering to the ideas of our national vanity for distinctness or antiquity of breed as Englishmen. He observes, in his Preface: “When I see the town full of lampoons and invectives against Dutchmen, only because they are foreigners, and the King reproached and insulted by insolent pedants and ballad-making poets, for employing foreigners, and for being a foreigner himself, I confess myself moved by it to remind our nation of their own original, thereby to let them see what a banter is put upon ourselves in it; since, speaking of Englishmen ab origine, we are really all foreigners ourselves." "As for answers, banters, true English Billingsgate, I expect them till nobody will buy, and then the shop will be shut. Had I wrote it for the gain of the press, I should have been concerned at its being printed again and again by PIRATES, as they call them, and PARAGRAPHMEN: but if they do justice, and print it true, according to the copy, they are welcome to sell it for a penny, if they please: the pence, indeed, is the end of their works.” Again: "Possibly somebody may take me for a Dutchman, in which they are mistaken; but I am one that would be glad to see Englishmen behave themselves better to strangers and to governours also, that one might not be reproached in foreign countries for belonging to a nation that wants manners." "As to vices, who can dispute our INTEMPERANCE, while an honest drunken fellow is a character in a man's praise? All our reformations are banters, and will be so, till our magistrates and gentry reform themselves by way of example." From the Introduction : Speak, Satire, for there's none can tell like thee, That makes this discontented land appear Fools out of favour grudge at knaves in place, |