ELDER G BEEBE - HISTORY OF PROTESTANT PRIEST-CRAFT IN AMERICA AND EUROPE part 7
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T Adams
Nov 8, 2025, 10:57:38 AM11/8/25
to PREDESTINARIANBAPTIST, Adams, Tom
Dear Brethren and Friends,
I submit to you chapter seven of Beebe's book entitled "The History of Protestant Priestcraft in America and Europe." I hope that it has proved as enlightening and interesting to you as it has to me. Elder Beebe brings up SO MUCH history that I was unaware of and don't remember ever being taught.
As always, I appreciate any comments! And if you are given to read this chapter and notice any typing errors please take the time to mention it or them to me. I will ask that if you do so, you will point out which paragraph it comes from and the word in specific.
A Sinner in Hope,
Tom
At the close of the last chapter, we saw a Dutchman invited over with an army to “settle” the kingdom of England; we saw the Dutch guards come to London and thrust out the English guards; we saw the king of England flee for his life, and take refuge in France, after his army had been seduced to abandon him. The stage being now clear for the actors in this affair, we have now to see how they went to work, the manner of which we shall find as summary and as unceremonious as heart could have possibly wished.
The king being gone, the Lord Mayor and aldermen of London, with a parcel of common Councilmen, and such lords and members of the late king Charles’ Parliaments as chose to join them, went, in February, 1688, without any authority from king, Parliament, or people, and forming themselves into “a convention,” at Westminster, gave the crown to William, (who was a Dutchman,) and his wife, (who was a daughter of James, but who had a brother alive,) and their posterity, FOREVER; made new oaths of allegiance for the people to take; enabled the new king to imprison, at pleasure, all whom he might suspect; banished, to ten miles from London, all Papists, or reputed Papists, and disarmed them all over the kingdom; gave the advowsons of Papists to the Universities; granted to their new majesties excise duties, land taxes and poll taxes for the “necessary defense of the realm;” declared themselves to be the “Two Houses of Parliament, as legally as if they had been summoned according to the usual form;” and this they called a “glorious revolution.” After “Reformation” the second, and upon the restoration of Charles, the palaces and livings and other indestructible plunder, was restored to those from whom the “thorough godly” had taken it, except, however, to the Catholic Irish, who had fought for this king’s father, who had suffered most cruelly for this king himself, and who were left still to be plundered by the “thorough godly,” which is an instance of ingratitude such as, in no other case, has been witnessed in the world. However, there were, after the restoration, men enough to contend, that the Episcopal palaces and other property, confiscated and granted away by the “thorough godly,” ought not to be touched; for that, if those grants were resumed, why not resume those of Henry VIII? Aye! why not indeed! Here was a question to put to the church clergy, and to the Abbey land owners! If nine hundred years of quiet possession, and Manga Charta at the back of it – if it were right to set these at nought for the sake of making only “a godly Reformation,” why should not one hundred years of unquiet possession be set at nought for the sake of making “a thorough godly Reformation?” How did the church clergy answer this question? Why, Dr. Heylin, who was Rector of Alresford in Hampshire, and afterwards Dean of Westminster, who was a great enemy of the “thorough godly,” though not much less an enemy of the Catholics, meets the question in this way, in the Address, at the head of his “History of Reformation the First,” where he says, “That there certainly must needs be a vast disproportion between such contracts, as were founded upon Acts of Parliament, legally passed by the king’s authority, with the consent and approbation of the three estates, and those which have no other ground but the bare votes and orders, of both Houses only. By the same logic it might be contended, that the two Houses alone have authority to depose a king.”
This church doctor died a little too soon, or he would have seen, not two Houses of Parliament, but a Lord Mayor of London, a parcel of Common Councilmen, and such other persons as chose to join them, actually setting aside one king and putting another upon the throne, and without any authority from king, Parliament, or people; he would have heard this called “a glorious” thing; and, if he had lived to our day, he would have seen other equally “glorious” things grow directly out of it; and, notwithstanding Blackstone had told the Americans, that a “glorious” revolution was a thing never to be repeated, Dr. Heylin would have heard them repeating, as applied to George III., almost word for word, the charges which the “glorious” people preferred against James II. The doctor’s book, written to justify the “Reformation,” did, as Pierre Orleans tells us, convert James II., and his first wife to the Catholic religion; but his preface, above quoted, did not succeed so well with Protestants.
We shall, in due time, see something of the cost of this “glorious” revolution to the people; but, first, seeing that this revolution and the exclusion acts which followed it were founded upon the principle, that the Catholic religion was incompatible with public freedom and justice, let us see what things this Catholic king had really done, and in what degree they were worse than things that had been and that have been done under Protestant sovereigns. As William and his Dutch army have been called England’s deliverers, let us see what it really was, after all, that they delivered the people from; and here, happily, we have the statute book to refer to, in which there still stands the List of Charges, drawn up against this Catholic king. However, before we examine these charges, we ought, in common justice, to notice certain things that James did not do. He did not, as Protestant Edward VI., had done, bring foreign troops into the country to enforce change of religion; nor did he, like that young Saint, burn his starving subjects with a hot iron on the breast or on the forehead, and make them wear chains as slaves, as a punishment for endeavoring to relieve their hunger by begging. He did not, as Protestant Betsy had done, make use of whips, boring irons, racks, gibbets, and ripping knives, to convert people to his faith; nor did he impose even any fines for this purpose; but, on the contrary, put, as far as he was able, an end to all persecution on account of religion. He did not, as Protestant Betsy had done, give monopolies to his court minions, so as to make salt, for instance, which, in his day, was about fourpence a bushel, fourteen pence a bushel, and thus go on, till, at last, the Parliament feared, as they did in the time of “good Bess,” that there would be a monopoly even of bread. They were amongst the things which, being purely of Protestant birth, James, no doubt from “Catholic bigotry,” did not do.
The Puritans were, in the reign of Charles II., continually hatching Papist plots, and by contrivances the most diabolical, bringing innocent Catholics to the scaffold and the gibbet; and, in the course of these their proceedings, they were constantly denying the prerogative of the king to pardon, or to mitigate the punishment of their victims. But, at last, the king got real proof of a Puritan plot! The king was ill, and a conspiracy was formed for setting aside his brother by force of arms, if the king should die. The king recovered, but the Puritan plot went on. The scheme was to rise in arms against the government, to pay and bring in an army of Puritans from Scotland, and, in short, to make now that sort of “Reformation” the third, which did not take place, till, as we have seen, some years afterwards. In this Puritan plot, Russell and Sidney were two great leaders. Russell did not attempt to deny that he had had a part in the conspiracy; his only complaint was, that the indictment was not agreeable to law; but, he was told, which was true, that it was perfectly agreeable to numerous precedents in cases of trials of Popish plotters! When brought to the place of execution, Russell di dnot deny his guilt, but did not explicitly confess it. That part of his sentence, which ordered his bowels to be ripped out, while he was yet alive, and his body to be quartered, was, at the intercession of his family, remitted by the king, who in yielding to their prayer, cuttingly said, “My Lord Russell shall find, that I am possessed of that prerogative, which, in the case of Lord Strafford, he thought fit to deny me.”
As to Sidney, he had been one of the leading men in the “thorough godly” work of the last reign, and had even been one of the Commissioners for trying Charles I., and bringing him to the block, though, it is said by his friends, he did not actually sit at the trial. At the restoration of Charles II., he had taken refuge abroad. But, having confessed the errors of his younger years, and promised to be loyal in future, the king pardoned him, great as his offences had been. Yet, after this, he conspired to destroy the government of that king, or, at the very least, to set aside his brother, and this, too, observe, by force of arms, by open rebellion against the king who had pardoned him, and by plunging into all the horrors of another civil war, that country which he had before assisted to desolate. If any man, ever deserved an ignominious death, this Sidney served his. He did not deny, he could not deny, that the conspiracy had existed, and that he was one of its chiefs. He had no complaint but one, and that related to the evidence against him. There was only one parole witness to his acts, and, in cases of high treason, the law England required two.
But now, if James be to be loaded with all those which have been called the bad deeds of his brother’s reign, we cannot, with common justice, refuse him the merit of the good deeds of that reign. This reign gave England the Act of Habeas Corpus, which Blackstone calls “The second great charter of English liberty.” There are many other acts of this reign, tending to secure the liberties and all the rights of the people; but, if there had been only this one Act, ought not it alone to have satisfied the people, that they had nothing to apprehend from a Popishly inclined king on the throne? Here these “Popish tyrants,” Charles and James, gave up, at one stroke of the pen, at a single writing of Charles’ name, all prerogatives enabling them, as their predecessors had been enabled, to put people into prison, and keep them there in virtue of a mere warrant, or order form a minister. And, was this a prof of that arbitrary disposition, of which we hear them incessantly accused? We are always boasting about this famous act of “Habeas Corpus:’ but, never have we the gratitude to observe that it came from those against whom Russell and Sidney conspired, and the last of whom was finally driven from his place by the Dutch guards in 1688.
Then again, was this act ever suspended during the reign of these Popish kings? Never. Not even for a single day. But, the moment the “glorious revolution,” or Reformation the third came, the Dutch “deliverer” was, by the Protestant “Convention,” whose grand business it was to get rid of arbitrary power, the moment that this “glorious” affair had taken place, that moment was the Dutch deliverer authorized to put in prison, and to keep there, any Englishman that he or his ministers might suspect! But, why talk of this? We ourselves have seen this “second great charter of English liberty” suspended for seven years at a time; and, besides this, we have seen the king and his ministers authorized to imprison, in any goal that they chose, in any dungeon that they chose; to keep the imprisoned person from all communication, with friends, wives, husbands, fathers, mothers, and children; to prevent them from the use of pen, ink, paper and books; to deny them the right of being confronted with their accusers; to refuse them a specification of their offence and the names of their accusers; to put them out of prison (if alive) when they pleased, without any trial; and, at last to hold them to bail for good behavior, and that, too, mind, still without stating to them the names of the witnesses against them, or even the nature of their offence! All this we have seen done in our own dear Protestant times, while our pulpits ring with the praises of the “glorious revolution” that “delivered us from Popery and slavery.”
We shall, before the close of this chapter, and after we have taken a view of the torments inflicted on the Catholics and other Dissenters, (Irish and English) in the reigns of William, Anne, and the Georges, trace this “Reformation” the fourth, directly back to “Reformation” the third.
We have seen that Reformation the Third, commonly called the “Glorious Revolution,” grew directly out of Reformation the Second; and we are now to see Reformation the Fourth, commonly called “the American Revolution,” grow directly out of Reformation the Third; and we are to see how severely the people have been scourged, and how much more severely they are likely still to be scourged in consequence of these several “Reformations,” which have all proceeded from Reformation the First, as naturally as the stem and branches of the tree proceed from the root.
James found faithful adherents in his Irish subjects, who fought and bled in his cause with all that bravery and disregard of life of which so many Irishmen have given proof. But, with the aid of Dutch and German armies, paid by “England,” the Deliverer finally triumphed over James and Irishi, and the whole kingdom submitted to the sway of the former. It is hardly necessary to say, that the Catholics were now doomed to suffer punishments heretofore unknown. The oppressions which they had had to endure under former sovereigns were terrible enough, but now began a series of acts against them, such as the world never heard of before, which we shall find going on increasing in number and in severity, and presenting a mass of punishment which, but to think of, makes one’s blood run cold, when, all of a sudden, in the 18th year of George III., came the American Revolution, which grew out of the English Revolution, and which produced the first relaxation in this most dreadfully penal code.
But how did the American Revolution grow out of the Dutch Deliverer’s, or “Glorious” Revolution?
The “Protestant Deliverer” had, in the first place, brought over a dutch army for the English nation to support. Next, there were the expenses and bloodshed of a civil war to endure for the sake of the “deliverance from popery.” But these, though they produced suffering enough, were a mere nothing compared to what was to follow; for this was destined to scourge the nation for ages and ages yet to come, and to produce, in the end, effects that the human mind can hardly contemplate with steadiness.
King James had, as we have seen, been received in France. Louis XIV., treated him as King of England, Scotland and Ireland. William hated Louis for this; and England had to pay for that hatred. All those who had assisted, in a conspicuous manner, to bring in the “Deliverer,” were now embarked in the same boat with him. They were compelled to humor and to yield to him. They, historians say, wished to give the crown solely to his wife, because, she being James’s daughter, there would have been less of revolution in this than in giving the crown to an utter alien. But he flatly told them that he “would not hold his power by the apron strings;” and, the dispute having continued for some time, he cut the matter short with them by declaring, that if they did not give him the crown he would go back to Holland, and leave them to their old sovereign! This was enough: they gave him the crown without more hesitation; and they found, that they had got not only a “Deliverer,” but a master at the same time.
The same reasons that induced a submission to this conduct in the “deliverer,” induced the same parties to go cordially along with him in his war against France. There was James in France; a great part of his people were still for him; if France were at peace with England, the communication could not be cut off. Therefore, war with France was absolutely necessary to the maintenance of William on the throne; and, if he were driven from the throne, what was to become of those who had obtained from him, as the price of their services in bringing him in, immense Crown lands and various other enormous emoluments, none of which they could expect to retain for a day, if James were restored!
But, those who make wars, like those who make confiscations of property, generally know how to give them a good name; and, accordingly, this was called and proclaimed, as a war, “to preserve the Protestant Religion, and to keep out Popery and slavery.”
The expenses of this famous “no-Popery” war were enormous. The taxes were, of course, in proportion to those expenses; and the people, who already paid more than four times as much as they had paid in the time of James, began not only to murmur, but to give no very insignificant signs of sorrows for having been “delivered!” France was powerful; the French king liberal and zealous; and the state of things was ficklish. Force, as far as law, and the suspension of law, could go, was pretty fairly put in motion; but a scheme was, at last, hit upon, to get the money, and yet not to tug so very hard at that tender part, the purse.
An Act of Parliament was passed, in the year 1694, being the fifth year of William and Mary, chap. 20, the title of which Act is in the following words; words that every man should bear in mind; words fatal to the peace and the happiness of England; words which were the precursor of a scourge greater than ever before afflicted any part of God’s creation: “An act for granting to their Majesties several Rates and Duties upon Tonnage of ships and vessels, and upon Beer, Ale, and other Liquors, for securing certain Recompenses and Advantages in the said Act mentioned, to such persons as shall voluntarily advance the sum of fifteen hundred thousand pounds towards carrying on the war against France.” This Act lays certain duties, sufficient to pay the interest of this sum of 1,500,000l. Then it points out the manner of subscribing; the mode of paying the interest, or amenities; and then it provides, that, if so much of the whole sum be subscribed by such a time, the subscribers shall have a charter, under the title of “the Governor and Company of the Bank of England!”
Thus arose loans, banks, bankers, bank-notes, and a national debt; things that England had never heard, or dreamed of, before this war for “preserving the Protestant religion as by law established.”
This monstrous thing, the usury, or funding system, not only arose out of the “Reformation;” not only was established for the express purpose of carrying on a war for the preservation of this Church of England against the efforts of Popery; but, the inventor, Burnet, was the most indefatigable advocate for the “Reformation” that had ever existed.
Burnet, whose first name, as the Scotch call it, was Gilbert, was, in the first place, a Political Church Parson; next, he was a monstrously lying historian; next, he was a Scotchman; and, lastly, he received the thanks of Parliament for his “History of the Reformation;” that is to say, a mass of the most base falsehoods and misrepresentations that ever were put upon paper. So, that the instrument was the very fittest that could have been found on earth. This man had, at the accession of James II., gone to Holland, where he became a Secretary to William (afterwards the “Deliverer;”) and where he corresponded with, and aided the “Glorious Revolutionizers” in England; and, in 1689, the year after the “deliverance,” the “deliverer” made him Bishop of Salisbury, as a reward for the “glorious revolution” services!
This was the finest man in the world to invent that which was destined to be a scourge to England. Though become a Bishop, he was still a most active politician; and, when the difficulty of carrying on the “No Popery” war arose, this Bishop of the “law established Church” it was, who invented, who advised, and who backed by the “Deliverer,” caused to be adopted the scheme of borrowing, of mortgaging the taxes, and of pawning the property and labor of future generations. Pretty “deliverance”! Besides sparing the purses of the people, and quieting their discontents on account of taxes, this scheme had a further and still more important object in view; namely, to make all those who had money to lend wish to see the new king and new dynasty, and all the grants and emoluments of the “glorious revolution” folks upheld! That was the permanent object of this “no-popery” project.
The case was this, and we ought clearly to understand it, seeing that here is the true origin of all our present alarms, dangers and miseries. James II., and his son had been set aside, because they were Catholics; a “glorious revolution” had been made; the great makers of it had immense possessions, which had been public or church possessions. If James were restored, all these would be taken from them, together with all the titles of nobility, all the bishoprics, and, in short, everything granted by the “deliverer.” And as the “deliverer” was liable to die, it was necessary to these great possessors and “glorious” actors to take care, if possible, that James or his son, should not be the successors of the deliverer. Acts of Parliament were passed to provide against this danger; but still, experience had shown that Acts of Parliament were, in some cases, of but little avail, when the great body of the people, feeling acutely, were opposed to them. Therefore, something was wanted to bind great numbers of the people fast to the new dynasty. The cry of “No Popery) had some power; but it has not power sufficient to weigh down that which, in later times, Castlereagh had the insolence to call, the “ignorant impatience of taxation;” and for which impatience the English were, in former times, always remarkable.
The “deliverer,” and all those who had brought him in, together with all those who had been fattened or elevated by him, were, as we said before, embraced in the same boat; but the great body of the people were not yet thus embarked. Indeed, very few of them, comparatively, were thus embarked. But, if all, or a great part, of those who had money to loan, could, by the temptation of great gain, be induced to loan their money on interest to the Government; if they could be induced to do this, it was easy to see that all this description of persons would then be embarked in the same boat too; and that they, who must necessarily be a class having great influence in the community, would be amongst the most zealous supporters of the “deliverer,” and the “glorious” aiders, abettors, and makers of the “revolution” which had just taken place.
For these purposes, this funding system was invented. It had the two-fold object, of raising money to carry on the “No Popery” war; and, of binding to the “No Popery” Government all those persons who wished to loan money at high interest; and these were, as is always the case, the most greedy, most selfish, least public-spirited, and most base and slavish and unjust part of the people. That scheme, which was quite worthy of the mind of the Puritan Bishop Burnett, answered its purposes; it enabled the “deliverer” to carry on the “No Popery” war; it bound fast to the “deliverer” and his bringers in all the base and selfish and greedy and unfeeling part of those who had money. The sceme succeeded in effecting its immediate objects; but, what a scourge did it provide for future generations! What troubles – what shocks – what sufferings it had in store for a people whose rulers, in an evil hour, resorted to such means!
The sum at first borrowed was a mere trifle. It deceived by its seeming insignificance. But, it was very far from being intended to stop with that trifle. The inventors knew well what they were about. Their design was to mortgage, by degrees, the whole of the country, all the lands, all the houses, and all other property and even all labor, to those who would loan their money to the State. The thing soon began to swell at a great rate; and before the end of the “glorious No Popery” war, the interest alone of the debt, the annual interest amounted to 1,310,942l., a year, which, observe, was a greater sum than the whole of the taxes had yearly amounted to in the reign of the Catholic James II! So that here were taxes laid on forever; mind that; here were, on account of this grand No Popery affair, merely on account of this “glorious revolution,” taxes laid on greater than the whole raised by James II!
At last, it produced what the world never saw before; starvation in the midst of abundance! Yes, verily; this is the picture we now exhibit to the world: the Law-Church parsons putting up, in all the churches, thanksgiving for a plenteous harvest; and, the main mass of the laboring people fed and clad worse than the felons in the goals!
The American Revolution grew directly out of the “glorious revolution,” and its “no-popery” wars and debts.
Burnet’s contrivance did very well for present use: it made the nation deaf to the voice of all those who foreboded mischief from it: it made all those who were interested in the funds advocates for taxation: the deep scheme set the rich to live upon the poor, and made the former have no feeling for those who bore the burden of the taxes: in short, it divided the nation into two classes, the tax-payers, and the tax-eaters, and these latter had the government at their back. The great protection of the people of England always had been, that they could not be taxed without their own consent. This was always in former times, the great principle of the English government; and, it is expressly and most explicitly asserted in Magna Charta. But, how was it to be expected, that this grand principle would be maintained, when a large part of the rich people themselves lived upon the taxes? When a man’s next door neighbor received the taxes paid by that man? When, in short, the community was completely divided, one part having a powerful interest in upholding that which was oppressive and ruinous to the other part?
Taxes, of course, went on increasing, and the debt went on in the same way. The Puritan interest demanded more wars, and brought on a couple of civil wars. Taxation marched on with dreadful strides. The people did not like it. At the “glorious revolution” it had been settled and enacted; that there should be a new Parliament called every three years at least; and this had been held forth as one of the great gains of the “glorious revolution.”
Yet to uphold the new system it was necessary to demolish event his barrier of liberty and property; and in the year 1715, being the first year of the reign of George I., chapter xxxviii., this law, this vital law, this solemn compact between the Puritan dynasty and the people, was repealed and forever abolished; and the three years were changed for seven; and that, too, observe, by the very men whom the people had chosen to sit only for three years! Yes, men chosen by the people to sit for three years enacted that they should sit for seven; that they themselves would sit for seven; and that those who had chosen them, together with their descendants forever, should have no choice at all, unless they voted for men who might, at the king’s pleasure, sit for seven years!
After the passing of the Septennial Act, the people would, of course lose nearly all the control they had ever had with regard to the laying of taxes and the expending of the public money. Accordingly taxes went on increasing prodigiously. The “Excise system,” which had had a little beginning in former Protestant reigns, and the very name of which had never been heard of in former times, now assumed somewhat its present form; and the “castles” of Englishmen became thenceforth things to be visited by excise men. Things went on in this way, until the reign of George III., when by the means of “no Popery” wars, and other measures for “preserving the Protestant Religion as by law established,” the debt from 1,500,000l, had swelled up to 146,682,844l. The yearly interest of it had swelled up to 4,810,821l., which was about four times as much as the whole annual amount of the taxes in the reign of the Popish James II.! And the whole of the yearly taxes had swelled up to 8,754,682l. That is to say, about eight times as much as James had raised yearly on this same “no Popery” people!
Now though men will do much in the way of talk against “Popery,” or against many other things; they are less zealous and active, when it comes to money. The nation most sensibly felt the weight of these burdens. The people looked back with aching hearts to former happy days, and the nobility and gentry began to perceive, with shame and fear, that, already, their estates were beginning to pass quietly from them (as Swift had told them they would) into the hands of the Jews, and other money-changers. It was now too late to look back; and yet, to look forward to this certain, and not very slow ruin, was dreadful, and especially to men of ancient family and by no means destitute of pride. Fain would they, even at that time, have applied a sponge to the score brought against them by Burnet’s tribes. But this desire was effectually counteracted by the same motive which led to the creation of the debt; the necessity of embarking, and of keeping embarked, great masses of the money-owners in the same boat with the Government.
In this dilemma, namely, the danger of touching the interest of the debt, and the danger of continuing to pay that interest, a new scheme was resorted to, which, it was hoped, would obviate both these dangers. It was, to tax the American Colonies, and to throw a part, first, and perhaps, the whole, in the end, of the No Popery debt, upon their shoulders! Now, then, came “Reformation” the fourth, having for cause, the measures necessary to effect the “glorious revolution,” taking the principles and the manner of that revolution as its example in these respects.
The Septennial gentlemen proceeded, at first, very slowly in their attempts to shift the pressure of the debt from their own shoulders to that of the Americans. They sent out tea to pay a tax; they imposed a stamp duty on certain things in the Colonies; but they had a clever, and resolute, and brave people to deal with. The Americans had seen debts, and funds, and taxation, and abject submission, creep, by slow degrees, over the people of England; and they resolved to resist, at once, the complicated curse. The money people there were not, like those in England, the owners of stock and funds. They were not, as the money people of England were, embarked in the same boat with the Government.
It is curious enough that they should, as the “glorious” people had done, call themselves Whigs! But the Septennial people were Whigs too; so that there were now Whigs resisting Whigs. A Whig means, in England, one who approves of the setting of James and his heirs aside. A Whig meant, in America, one who approved of the setting of George and his heirs aside. The English Whigs called a Convention: so did those of America. The English Whigs published a declaration, containing charges against James; and so did those of America against George. The charges against James were twelve in number. This is a favorite number with Whigs; for the American Whigs had twelve charges against George. We have seen that Puritans accused a Popish king of; and it is but fair for us to see what Puritans and Catholics too accused a Puritan king of. Blackstone, in justifying the “glorious” affair, took good care to say, that the like was never to take place again; and the Septennial gentlemen declared, and, I think, enacted, that the king in future (being of course a Puritan) could do no wrong. Now, the Americans seemed to think it hard, that they should thus be positively forbidden to do was so “glorious” in Englishmen. Blackstone had told them, that, to justify another revolution, all the same circumstances must exist; not a part of them, but the whole of them. The king must not only endeavor to subvert the laws: he must not only commit acts of tyranny: but he must be a Catholic, and must have a design to overthrow the Puritan religion: and he must, into the bargain, have abdicated his authority by going out of the kingdom. So that, according to this lawyer, there never could, by any possibility, be a “glorious” revolution again, seeing that two essential circumstances must, in any future case, be wanting, as no Catholic was ever to be king again, and as no king was ever to do wrong any more.
But, alas! these American Whigs did not listen to Blackstone, though he had talked so piously about the “dark ages of monkish ignorance and superstition.” They thought nay, they said, that a Protestant king might do wrong, and had done wrong. They thought, or, at least, they said, that a king might abdicate his authority, not only without going out of the country, but also, without ever having been in it! In short, they drew up, a la “glorious,” charges against the Protestant king, his late majesty; and, as the charges against James II., are found in an Act of Parliament, so the charges against George II., are found in an Act of Congress, passed on the memorable Fourth of July, 1776. These charges were as follows:
“The history of the present king of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world:
1. He has refused to pass laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the Legislature – a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.
2. He has called the legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the repository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
3. He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly for opposing with firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
4. He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
5. He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
6. He has created a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to arass our people and eat their substance.
7. He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our legislatures.
8. He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, civil power.
9. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation.
10. He has imposed taxes on us without our consent.
11. He has deprived us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury. He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us. In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
I submit to you chapter seven of Beebe's book entitled "The History of Protestant Priestcraft in America and Europe." I hope that it has proved as enlightening and interesting to you as it has to me. Elder Beebe brings up SO MUCH history that I was unaware of and don't remember ever being taught.
As always, I appreciate any comments! And if you are given to read this chapter and notice any typing errors please take the time to mention it or them to me. I will ask that if you do so, you will point out which paragraph it comes from and the word in specific.
A Sinner in Hope,
Tom
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THE HISTORY OF PROTESTANT
PRIEST-CRAFT IN AMERICA AND EUROPE
Elder Gilbert Beebe
BANNER OF LIBERTY
1865
Elder Gilbert Beebe
BANNER OF LIBERTY
1865
CHAPTER
VII.
“Reformation” the Third – Parliamentary purity – Habeas Corpus Act – Settlement of American colonies.
“Reformation” the Third – Parliamentary purity – Habeas Corpus Act – Settlement of American colonies.
At the close of the last chapter, we saw a Dutchman invited over with an army to “settle” the kingdom of England; we saw the Dutch guards come to London and thrust out the English guards; we saw the king of England flee for his life, and take refuge in France, after his army had been seduced to abandon him. The stage being now clear for the actors in this affair, we have now to see how they went to work, the manner of which we shall find as summary and as unceremonious as heart could have possibly wished.
The king being gone, the Lord Mayor and aldermen of London, with a parcel of common Councilmen, and such lords and members of the late king Charles’ Parliaments as chose to join them, went, in February, 1688, without any authority from king, Parliament, or people, and forming themselves into “a convention,” at Westminster, gave the crown to William, (who was a Dutchman,) and his wife, (who was a daughter of James, but who had a brother alive,) and their posterity, FOREVER; made new oaths of allegiance for the people to take; enabled the new king to imprison, at pleasure, all whom he might suspect; banished, to ten miles from London, all Papists, or reputed Papists, and disarmed them all over the kingdom; gave the advowsons of Papists to the Universities; granted to their new majesties excise duties, land taxes and poll taxes for the “necessary defense of the realm;” declared themselves to be the “Two Houses of Parliament, as legally as if they had been summoned according to the usual form;” and this they called a “glorious revolution.” After “Reformation” the second, and upon the restoration of Charles, the palaces and livings and other indestructible plunder, was restored to those from whom the “thorough godly” had taken it, except, however, to the Catholic Irish, who had fought for this king’s father, who had suffered most cruelly for this king himself, and who were left still to be plundered by the “thorough godly,” which is an instance of ingratitude such as, in no other case, has been witnessed in the world. However, there were, after the restoration, men enough to contend, that the Episcopal palaces and other property, confiscated and granted away by the “thorough godly,” ought not to be touched; for that, if those grants were resumed, why not resume those of Henry VIII? Aye! why not indeed! Here was a question to put to the church clergy, and to the Abbey land owners! If nine hundred years of quiet possession, and Manga Charta at the back of it – if it were right to set these at nought for the sake of making only “a godly Reformation,” why should not one hundred years of unquiet possession be set at nought for the sake of making “a thorough godly Reformation?” How did the church clergy answer this question? Why, Dr. Heylin, who was Rector of Alresford in Hampshire, and afterwards Dean of Westminster, who was a great enemy of the “thorough godly,” though not much less an enemy of the Catholics, meets the question in this way, in the Address, at the head of his “History of Reformation the First,” where he says, “That there certainly must needs be a vast disproportion between such contracts, as were founded upon Acts of Parliament, legally passed by the king’s authority, with the consent and approbation of the three estates, and those which have no other ground but the bare votes and orders, of both Houses only. By the same logic it might be contended, that the two Houses alone have authority to depose a king.”
This church doctor died a little too soon, or he would have seen, not two Houses of Parliament, but a Lord Mayor of London, a parcel of Common Councilmen, and such other persons as chose to join them, actually setting aside one king and putting another upon the throne, and without any authority from king, Parliament, or people; he would have heard this called “a glorious” thing; and, if he had lived to our day, he would have seen other equally “glorious” things grow directly out of it; and, notwithstanding Blackstone had told the Americans, that a “glorious” revolution was a thing never to be repeated, Dr. Heylin would have heard them repeating, as applied to George III., almost word for word, the charges which the “glorious” people preferred against James II. The doctor’s book, written to justify the “Reformation,” did, as Pierre Orleans tells us, convert James II., and his first wife to the Catholic religion; but his preface, above quoted, did not succeed so well with Protestants.
We shall, in due time, see something of the cost of this “glorious” revolution to the people; but, first, seeing that this revolution and the exclusion acts which followed it were founded upon the principle, that the Catholic religion was incompatible with public freedom and justice, let us see what things this Catholic king had really done, and in what degree they were worse than things that had been and that have been done under Protestant sovereigns. As William and his Dutch army have been called England’s deliverers, let us see what it really was, after all, that they delivered the people from; and here, happily, we have the statute book to refer to, in which there still stands the List of Charges, drawn up against this Catholic king. However, before we examine these charges, we ought, in common justice, to notice certain things that James did not do. He did not, as Protestant Edward VI., had done, bring foreign troops into the country to enforce change of religion; nor did he, like that young Saint, burn his starving subjects with a hot iron on the breast or on the forehead, and make them wear chains as slaves, as a punishment for endeavoring to relieve their hunger by begging. He did not, as Protestant Betsy had done, make use of whips, boring irons, racks, gibbets, and ripping knives, to convert people to his faith; nor did he impose even any fines for this purpose; but, on the contrary, put, as far as he was able, an end to all persecution on account of religion. He did not, as Protestant Betsy had done, give monopolies to his court minions, so as to make salt, for instance, which, in his day, was about fourpence a bushel, fourteen pence a bushel, and thus go on, till, at last, the Parliament feared, as they did in the time of “good Bess,” that there would be a monopoly even of bread. They were amongst the things which, being purely of Protestant birth, James, no doubt from “Catholic bigotry,” did not do.
The Puritans were, in the reign of Charles II., continually hatching Papist plots, and by contrivances the most diabolical, bringing innocent Catholics to the scaffold and the gibbet; and, in the course of these their proceedings, they were constantly denying the prerogative of the king to pardon, or to mitigate the punishment of their victims. But, at last, the king got real proof of a Puritan plot! The king was ill, and a conspiracy was formed for setting aside his brother by force of arms, if the king should die. The king recovered, but the Puritan plot went on. The scheme was to rise in arms against the government, to pay and bring in an army of Puritans from Scotland, and, in short, to make now that sort of “Reformation” the third, which did not take place, till, as we have seen, some years afterwards. In this Puritan plot, Russell and Sidney were two great leaders. Russell did not attempt to deny that he had had a part in the conspiracy; his only complaint was, that the indictment was not agreeable to law; but, he was told, which was true, that it was perfectly agreeable to numerous precedents in cases of trials of Popish plotters! When brought to the place of execution, Russell di dnot deny his guilt, but did not explicitly confess it. That part of his sentence, which ordered his bowels to be ripped out, while he was yet alive, and his body to be quartered, was, at the intercession of his family, remitted by the king, who in yielding to their prayer, cuttingly said, “My Lord Russell shall find, that I am possessed of that prerogative, which, in the case of Lord Strafford, he thought fit to deny me.”
As to Sidney, he had been one of the leading men in the “thorough godly” work of the last reign, and had even been one of the Commissioners for trying Charles I., and bringing him to the block, though, it is said by his friends, he did not actually sit at the trial. At the restoration of Charles II., he had taken refuge abroad. But, having confessed the errors of his younger years, and promised to be loyal in future, the king pardoned him, great as his offences had been. Yet, after this, he conspired to destroy the government of that king, or, at the very least, to set aside his brother, and this, too, observe, by force of arms, by open rebellion against the king who had pardoned him, and by plunging into all the horrors of another civil war, that country which he had before assisted to desolate. If any man, ever deserved an ignominious death, this Sidney served his. He did not deny, he could not deny, that the conspiracy had existed, and that he was one of its chiefs. He had no complaint but one, and that related to the evidence against him. There was only one parole witness to his acts, and, in cases of high treason, the law England required two.
But now, if James be to be loaded with all those which have been called the bad deeds of his brother’s reign, we cannot, with common justice, refuse him the merit of the good deeds of that reign. This reign gave England the Act of Habeas Corpus, which Blackstone calls “The second great charter of English liberty.” There are many other acts of this reign, tending to secure the liberties and all the rights of the people; but, if there had been only this one Act, ought not it alone to have satisfied the people, that they had nothing to apprehend from a Popishly inclined king on the throne? Here these “Popish tyrants,” Charles and James, gave up, at one stroke of the pen, at a single writing of Charles’ name, all prerogatives enabling them, as their predecessors had been enabled, to put people into prison, and keep them there in virtue of a mere warrant, or order form a minister. And, was this a prof of that arbitrary disposition, of which we hear them incessantly accused? We are always boasting about this famous act of “Habeas Corpus:’ but, never have we the gratitude to observe that it came from those against whom Russell and Sidney conspired, and the last of whom was finally driven from his place by the Dutch guards in 1688.
Then again, was this act ever suspended during the reign of these Popish kings? Never. Not even for a single day. But, the moment the “glorious revolution,” or Reformation the third came, the Dutch “deliverer” was, by the Protestant “Convention,” whose grand business it was to get rid of arbitrary power, the moment that this “glorious” affair had taken place, that moment was the Dutch deliverer authorized to put in prison, and to keep there, any Englishman that he or his ministers might suspect! But, why talk of this? We ourselves have seen this “second great charter of English liberty” suspended for seven years at a time; and, besides this, we have seen the king and his ministers authorized to imprison, in any goal that they chose, in any dungeon that they chose; to keep the imprisoned person from all communication, with friends, wives, husbands, fathers, mothers, and children; to prevent them from the use of pen, ink, paper and books; to deny them the right of being confronted with their accusers; to refuse them a specification of their offence and the names of their accusers; to put them out of prison (if alive) when they pleased, without any trial; and, at last to hold them to bail for good behavior, and that, too, mind, still without stating to them the names of the witnesses against them, or even the nature of their offence! All this we have seen done in our own dear Protestant times, while our pulpits ring with the praises of the “glorious revolution” that “delivered us from Popery and slavery.”
We shall, before the close of this chapter, and after we have taken a view of the torments inflicted on the Catholics and other Dissenters, (Irish and English) in the reigns of William, Anne, and the Georges, trace this “Reformation” the fourth, directly back to “Reformation” the third.
We have seen that Reformation the Third, commonly called the “Glorious Revolution,” grew directly out of Reformation the Second; and we are now to see Reformation the Fourth, commonly called “the American Revolution,” grow directly out of Reformation the Third; and we are to see how severely the people have been scourged, and how much more severely they are likely still to be scourged in consequence of these several “Reformations,” which have all proceeded from Reformation the First, as naturally as the stem and branches of the tree proceed from the root.
James found faithful adherents in his Irish subjects, who fought and bled in his cause with all that bravery and disregard of life of which so many Irishmen have given proof. But, with the aid of Dutch and German armies, paid by “England,” the Deliverer finally triumphed over James and Irishi, and the whole kingdom submitted to the sway of the former. It is hardly necessary to say, that the Catholics were now doomed to suffer punishments heretofore unknown. The oppressions which they had had to endure under former sovereigns were terrible enough, but now began a series of acts against them, such as the world never heard of before, which we shall find going on increasing in number and in severity, and presenting a mass of punishment which, but to think of, makes one’s blood run cold, when, all of a sudden, in the 18th year of George III., came the American Revolution, which grew out of the English Revolution, and which produced the first relaxation in this most dreadfully penal code.
But how did the American Revolution grow out of the Dutch Deliverer’s, or “Glorious” Revolution?
The “Protestant Deliverer” had, in the first place, brought over a dutch army for the English nation to support. Next, there were the expenses and bloodshed of a civil war to endure for the sake of the “deliverance from popery.” But these, though they produced suffering enough, were a mere nothing compared to what was to follow; for this was destined to scourge the nation for ages and ages yet to come, and to produce, in the end, effects that the human mind can hardly contemplate with steadiness.
King James had, as we have seen, been received in France. Louis XIV., treated him as King of England, Scotland and Ireland. William hated Louis for this; and England had to pay for that hatred. All those who had assisted, in a conspicuous manner, to bring in the “Deliverer,” were now embarked in the same boat with him. They were compelled to humor and to yield to him. They, historians say, wished to give the crown solely to his wife, because, she being James’s daughter, there would have been less of revolution in this than in giving the crown to an utter alien. But he flatly told them that he “would not hold his power by the apron strings;” and, the dispute having continued for some time, he cut the matter short with them by declaring, that if they did not give him the crown he would go back to Holland, and leave them to their old sovereign! This was enough: they gave him the crown without more hesitation; and they found, that they had got not only a “Deliverer,” but a master at the same time.
The same reasons that induced a submission to this conduct in the “deliverer,” induced the same parties to go cordially along with him in his war against France. There was James in France; a great part of his people were still for him; if France were at peace with England, the communication could not be cut off. Therefore, war with France was absolutely necessary to the maintenance of William on the throne; and, if he were driven from the throne, what was to become of those who had obtained from him, as the price of their services in bringing him in, immense Crown lands and various other enormous emoluments, none of which they could expect to retain for a day, if James were restored!
But, those who make wars, like those who make confiscations of property, generally know how to give them a good name; and, accordingly, this was called and proclaimed, as a war, “to preserve the Protestant Religion, and to keep out Popery and slavery.”
The expenses of this famous “no-Popery” war were enormous. The taxes were, of course, in proportion to those expenses; and the people, who already paid more than four times as much as they had paid in the time of James, began not only to murmur, but to give no very insignificant signs of sorrows for having been “delivered!” France was powerful; the French king liberal and zealous; and the state of things was ficklish. Force, as far as law, and the suspension of law, could go, was pretty fairly put in motion; but a scheme was, at last, hit upon, to get the money, and yet not to tug so very hard at that tender part, the purse.
An Act of Parliament was passed, in the year 1694, being the fifth year of William and Mary, chap. 20, the title of which Act is in the following words; words that every man should bear in mind; words fatal to the peace and the happiness of England; words which were the precursor of a scourge greater than ever before afflicted any part of God’s creation: “An act for granting to their Majesties several Rates and Duties upon Tonnage of ships and vessels, and upon Beer, Ale, and other Liquors, for securing certain Recompenses and Advantages in the said Act mentioned, to such persons as shall voluntarily advance the sum of fifteen hundred thousand pounds towards carrying on the war against France.” This Act lays certain duties, sufficient to pay the interest of this sum of 1,500,000l. Then it points out the manner of subscribing; the mode of paying the interest, or amenities; and then it provides, that, if so much of the whole sum be subscribed by such a time, the subscribers shall have a charter, under the title of “the Governor and Company of the Bank of England!”
Thus arose loans, banks, bankers, bank-notes, and a national debt; things that England had never heard, or dreamed of, before this war for “preserving the Protestant religion as by law established.”
This monstrous thing, the usury, or funding system, not only arose out of the “Reformation;” not only was established for the express purpose of carrying on a war for the preservation of this Church of England against the efforts of Popery; but, the inventor, Burnet, was the most indefatigable advocate for the “Reformation” that had ever existed.
Burnet, whose first name, as the Scotch call it, was Gilbert, was, in the first place, a Political Church Parson; next, he was a monstrously lying historian; next, he was a Scotchman; and, lastly, he received the thanks of Parliament for his “History of the Reformation;” that is to say, a mass of the most base falsehoods and misrepresentations that ever were put upon paper. So, that the instrument was the very fittest that could have been found on earth. This man had, at the accession of James II., gone to Holland, where he became a Secretary to William (afterwards the “Deliverer;”) and where he corresponded with, and aided the “Glorious Revolutionizers” in England; and, in 1689, the year after the “deliverance,” the “deliverer” made him Bishop of Salisbury, as a reward for the “glorious revolution” services!
This was the finest man in the world to invent that which was destined to be a scourge to England. Though become a Bishop, he was still a most active politician; and, when the difficulty of carrying on the “No Popery” war arose, this Bishop of the “law established Church” it was, who invented, who advised, and who backed by the “Deliverer,” caused to be adopted the scheme of borrowing, of mortgaging the taxes, and of pawning the property and labor of future generations. Pretty “deliverance”! Besides sparing the purses of the people, and quieting their discontents on account of taxes, this scheme had a further and still more important object in view; namely, to make all those who had money to lend wish to see the new king and new dynasty, and all the grants and emoluments of the “glorious revolution” folks upheld! That was the permanent object of this “no-popery” project.
The case was this, and we ought clearly to understand it, seeing that here is the true origin of all our present alarms, dangers and miseries. James II., and his son had been set aside, because they were Catholics; a “glorious revolution” had been made; the great makers of it had immense possessions, which had been public or church possessions. If James were restored, all these would be taken from them, together with all the titles of nobility, all the bishoprics, and, in short, everything granted by the “deliverer.” And as the “deliverer” was liable to die, it was necessary to these great possessors and “glorious” actors to take care, if possible, that James or his son, should not be the successors of the deliverer. Acts of Parliament were passed to provide against this danger; but still, experience had shown that Acts of Parliament were, in some cases, of but little avail, when the great body of the people, feeling acutely, were opposed to them. Therefore, something was wanted to bind great numbers of the people fast to the new dynasty. The cry of “No Popery) had some power; but it has not power sufficient to weigh down that which, in later times, Castlereagh had the insolence to call, the “ignorant impatience of taxation;” and for which impatience the English were, in former times, always remarkable.
The “deliverer,” and all those who had brought him in, together with all those who had been fattened or elevated by him, were, as we said before, embraced in the same boat; but the great body of the people were not yet thus embarked. Indeed, very few of them, comparatively, were thus embarked. But, if all, or a great part, of those who had money to loan, could, by the temptation of great gain, be induced to loan their money on interest to the Government; if they could be induced to do this, it was easy to see that all this description of persons would then be embarked in the same boat too; and that they, who must necessarily be a class having great influence in the community, would be amongst the most zealous supporters of the “deliverer,” and the “glorious” aiders, abettors, and makers of the “revolution” which had just taken place.
For these purposes, this funding system was invented. It had the two-fold object, of raising money to carry on the “No Popery” war; and, of binding to the “No Popery” Government all those persons who wished to loan money at high interest; and these were, as is always the case, the most greedy, most selfish, least public-spirited, and most base and slavish and unjust part of the people. That scheme, which was quite worthy of the mind of the Puritan Bishop Burnett, answered its purposes; it enabled the “deliverer” to carry on the “No Popery” war; it bound fast to the “deliverer” and his bringers in all the base and selfish and greedy and unfeeling part of those who had money. The sceme succeeded in effecting its immediate objects; but, what a scourge did it provide for future generations! What troubles – what shocks – what sufferings it had in store for a people whose rulers, in an evil hour, resorted to such means!
The sum at first borrowed was a mere trifle. It deceived by its seeming insignificance. But, it was very far from being intended to stop with that trifle. The inventors knew well what they were about. Their design was to mortgage, by degrees, the whole of the country, all the lands, all the houses, and all other property and even all labor, to those who would loan their money to the State. The thing soon began to swell at a great rate; and before the end of the “glorious No Popery” war, the interest alone of the debt, the annual interest amounted to 1,310,942l., a year, which, observe, was a greater sum than the whole of the taxes had yearly amounted to in the reign of the Catholic James II! So that here were taxes laid on forever; mind that; here were, on account of this grand No Popery affair, merely on account of this “glorious revolution,” taxes laid on greater than the whole raised by James II!
At last, it produced what the world never saw before; starvation in the midst of abundance! Yes, verily; this is the picture we now exhibit to the world: the Law-Church parsons putting up, in all the churches, thanksgiving for a plenteous harvest; and, the main mass of the laboring people fed and clad worse than the felons in the goals!
The American Revolution grew directly out of the “glorious revolution,” and its “no-popery” wars and debts.
Burnet’s contrivance did very well for present use: it made the nation deaf to the voice of all those who foreboded mischief from it: it made all those who were interested in the funds advocates for taxation: the deep scheme set the rich to live upon the poor, and made the former have no feeling for those who bore the burden of the taxes: in short, it divided the nation into two classes, the tax-payers, and the tax-eaters, and these latter had the government at their back. The great protection of the people of England always had been, that they could not be taxed without their own consent. This was always in former times, the great principle of the English government; and, it is expressly and most explicitly asserted in Magna Charta. But, how was it to be expected, that this grand principle would be maintained, when a large part of the rich people themselves lived upon the taxes? When a man’s next door neighbor received the taxes paid by that man? When, in short, the community was completely divided, one part having a powerful interest in upholding that which was oppressive and ruinous to the other part?
Taxes, of course, went on increasing, and the debt went on in the same way. The Puritan interest demanded more wars, and brought on a couple of civil wars. Taxation marched on with dreadful strides. The people did not like it. At the “glorious revolution” it had been settled and enacted; that there should be a new Parliament called every three years at least; and this had been held forth as one of the great gains of the “glorious revolution.”
Yet to uphold the new system it was necessary to demolish event his barrier of liberty and property; and in the year 1715, being the first year of the reign of George I., chapter xxxviii., this law, this vital law, this solemn compact between the Puritan dynasty and the people, was repealed and forever abolished; and the three years were changed for seven; and that, too, observe, by the very men whom the people had chosen to sit only for three years! Yes, men chosen by the people to sit for three years enacted that they should sit for seven; that they themselves would sit for seven; and that those who had chosen them, together with their descendants forever, should have no choice at all, unless they voted for men who might, at the king’s pleasure, sit for seven years!
After the passing of the Septennial Act, the people would, of course lose nearly all the control they had ever had with regard to the laying of taxes and the expending of the public money. Accordingly taxes went on increasing prodigiously. The “Excise system,” which had had a little beginning in former Protestant reigns, and the very name of which had never been heard of in former times, now assumed somewhat its present form; and the “castles” of Englishmen became thenceforth things to be visited by excise men. Things went on in this way, until the reign of George III., when by the means of “no Popery” wars, and other measures for “preserving the Protestant Religion as by law established,” the debt from 1,500,000l, had swelled up to 146,682,844l. The yearly interest of it had swelled up to 4,810,821l., which was about four times as much as the whole annual amount of the taxes in the reign of the Popish James II.! And the whole of the yearly taxes had swelled up to 8,754,682l. That is to say, about eight times as much as James had raised yearly on this same “no Popery” people!
Now though men will do much in the way of talk against “Popery,” or against many other things; they are less zealous and active, when it comes to money. The nation most sensibly felt the weight of these burdens. The people looked back with aching hearts to former happy days, and the nobility and gentry began to perceive, with shame and fear, that, already, their estates were beginning to pass quietly from them (as Swift had told them they would) into the hands of the Jews, and other money-changers. It was now too late to look back; and yet, to look forward to this certain, and not very slow ruin, was dreadful, and especially to men of ancient family and by no means destitute of pride. Fain would they, even at that time, have applied a sponge to the score brought against them by Burnet’s tribes. But this desire was effectually counteracted by the same motive which led to the creation of the debt; the necessity of embarking, and of keeping embarked, great masses of the money-owners in the same boat with the Government.
In this dilemma, namely, the danger of touching the interest of the debt, and the danger of continuing to pay that interest, a new scheme was resorted to, which, it was hoped, would obviate both these dangers. It was, to tax the American Colonies, and to throw a part, first, and perhaps, the whole, in the end, of the No Popery debt, upon their shoulders! Now, then, came “Reformation” the fourth, having for cause, the measures necessary to effect the “glorious revolution,” taking the principles and the manner of that revolution as its example in these respects.
The Septennial gentlemen proceeded, at first, very slowly in their attempts to shift the pressure of the debt from their own shoulders to that of the Americans. They sent out tea to pay a tax; they imposed a stamp duty on certain things in the Colonies; but they had a clever, and resolute, and brave people to deal with. The Americans had seen debts, and funds, and taxation, and abject submission, creep, by slow degrees, over the people of England; and they resolved to resist, at once, the complicated curse. The money people there were not, like those in England, the owners of stock and funds. They were not, as the money people of England were, embarked in the same boat with the Government.
It is curious enough that they should, as the “glorious” people had done, call themselves Whigs! But the Septennial people were Whigs too; so that there were now Whigs resisting Whigs. A Whig means, in England, one who approves of the setting of James and his heirs aside. A Whig meant, in America, one who approved of the setting of George and his heirs aside. The English Whigs called a Convention: so did those of America. The English Whigs published a declaration, containing charges against James; and so did those of America against George. The charges against James were twelve in number. This is a favorite number with Whigs; for the American Whigs had twelve charges against George. We have seen that Puritans accused a Popish king of; and it is but fair for us to see what Puritans and Catholics too accused a Puritan king of. Blackstone, in justifying the “glorious” affair, took good care to say, that the like was never to take place again; and the Septennial gentlemen declared, and, I think, enacted, that the king in future (being of course a Puritan) could do no wrong. Now, the Americans seemed to think it hard, that they should thus be positively forbidden to do was so “glorious” in Englishmen. Blackstone had told them, that, to justify another revolution, all the same circumstances must exist; not a part of them, but the whole of them. The king must not only endeavor to subvert the laws: he must not only commit acts of tyranny: but he must be a Catholic, and must have a design to overthrow the Puritan religion: and he must, into the bargain, have abdicated his authority by going out of the kingdom. So that, according to this lawyer, there never could, by any possibility, be a “glorious” revolution again, seeing that two essential circumstances must, in any future case, be wanting, as no Catholic was ever to be king again, and as no king was ever to do wrong any more.
But, alas! these American Whigs did not listen to Blackstone, though he had talked so piously about the “dark ages of monkish ignorance and superstition.” They thought nay, they said, that a Protestant king might do wrong, and had done wrong. They thought, or, at least, they said, that a king might abdicate his authority, not only without going out of the country, but also, without ever having been in it! In short, they drew up, a la “glorious,” charges against the Protestant king, his late majesty; and, as the charges against James II., are found in an Act of Parliament, so the charges against George II., are found in an Act of Congress, passed on the memorable Fourth of July, 1776. These charges were as follows:
“The history of the present king of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world:
1. He has refused to pass laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the Legislature – a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.
2. He has called the legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the repository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
3. He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly for opposing with firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
4. He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
5. He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
6. He has created a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to arass our people and eat their substance.
7. He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our legislatures.
8. He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, civil power.
9. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation.
10. He has imposed taxes on us without our consent.
11. He has deprived us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury. He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us. In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
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