The History of England, from the Accession of James II Volume I Part 31

"At Doctor fictus non fictos pertulit ictus A tortore datos haud molli in corpore gratos, Disceret ut vere scelera ob commissa rubere."

The anagram of his name, "Testis Ovat," may be found on many prints published in different countries.]

[Footnote 276: Blackstone's Commentaries, Chapter of Homicide.]

[Footnote 277: According to Roger North the judges decided that Dangerfield, having been previously convicted of perjury, was incompetent to be a witness of the plot. But this is one among many instances of Roger's inaccuracy. It appears, from the report of the trial of Lord Castlemaine in June 1680, that, after much altercation between counsel, and much consultation among the judges of the different courts in Westminster Hall, Dangerfield was sworn and suffered to tell his story; but the jury very properly gave no credit to his testimony.]

[Footnote 278: Dangerfield's trial was not reported; but I have seen a concise account of it in a contemporary broadside. An abstract of the evidence against Francis, and his dying speech, will be found in the Collection of State Trials. See Eachard, iii. 741. Burnet's narrative contains more mistakes than lines. See also North's Examen, 256, the sketch of Dangerfield's life in the b.l.o.o.d.y a.s.sizes, the Observator of July 29, 1685, and the poem ent.i.tled "Dangerfield's Ghost to Jeffreys."

In the very rare volume ent.i.tled "Succinct Genealogies, by Robert Halstead," Lord Peterbough says that Dangerfield, with whom he had had some intercourse, was "a young man who appeared under a decent figure, a serious behaviour, and with words that did not seem to proceed from a common understanding."]

[Footnote 279: Baxter's preface to Sir Mathew Hale's Judgment of the Nature of True Religion, 1684.]

[Footnote 280: See the Observator of February 28, 1685, the information in the Collection of State Trials, the account of what pa.s.sed in court given by Calamy, Life of Baxter, chap. xiv., and the very curious extracts from the Baxter MSS. in the Life, by Orme, published in 1830.]

[Footnote 281: Baxter MS. cited by Orme.]

[Footnote 282: Act Parl. Car. II. March 29,1661, Jac. VII. April 28, 1685, and May 13, 1685.]

[Footnote 283: Act Parl. Jac. VII. May 8, 1685, Observator, June 20, 1685; Lestrange evidently wished to see the precedent followed in England.]

[Footnote 284: His own words reported by himself. Life of James the Second, i. 666. Orig. Mem.]

[Footnote 285: Act Parl. Car. II. August 31, 1681.]

[Footnote 286: Burnet, i. 583; Wodrow, III. v. 2. Unfortunately the Acta of the Scottish Privy Council during almost the whole administration of the Duke of York are wanting. (1848.) This a.s.sertion has been met by a direct contradiction. But the fact is exactly as I have stated it. There is in he Acta of the Scottish Privy Council a hiatus extending from August 1678 to August 1682. The Duke of York began to reside in Scotland in December 1679. He left Scotland, never to return in May 1682.

(1857.)]

[Footnote 287: Wodrow, III. ix. 6.]

[Footnote 288: Wodrow, III. ix. 6. The editor of the Oxford edition of Burnet attempts to excuse this act by alleging that Claverhouse was then employed to intercept all communication between Argyle and Monmouth, and by supposing that John Brown may have been detected in conveying intelligence between the rebel camps. Unfortunately for this hypothesis John Brown was shot on the first of May, when both Argyle and Monmouth were in Holland, and when there was no insurrection in any part of our island.]

[Footnote 289: Wodrow, III. ix, 6.]

[Footnote 290: Wodrow, III. ix. 6. It has been confidently a.s.serted, by persons who have not taken the trouble to look at the authority to which I have referred, that I have grossly calumniated these unfortunate men; that I do not understand the Calvinistic theology; and that it is impossible that members of the Church of Scotland can have refused to pray for any man on the ground that he was not one of the elect.---- I can only refer to the narrative which Wodrow has inserted in his history, and which he justly calls plain and natural. That narrative is signed by two eyewitnesses, and Wodrow, before he published it, submitted it to a third eyewitness, who p.r.o.nounced it strictly accurate.

From that narrative I will extract the only words which bear on the point in question: "When all the three were taken, the officers consulted among themselves, and, withdrawing to the west side of the town, questioned the prisoners, particularly if they would pray for King James VII. They answered, they would pray for all within the election of grace. Balfour said Do you question the King's election? They answered, sometimes they questioned their own. Upon which he swore dreadfully, and said they should die presently, because they would not pray for Christ's vicegerent, and so without one word more, commanded Thomas Cook to go to his prayers, for he should die.---- In this narrative Wodrow saw nothing improbable; and I shall not easily be convinced that any writer now living understands the feelings and opinions of the Covenanters better than Wodrow did. (1857.)]

[Footnote 291: Wodrow, III. ix. 6. Cloud of Witnesses.]

[Footnote 292: Wodrow, III. ix. 6. The epitaph of Margaret Wilson, in the churchyard at Wigton, is printed in the Appendix to the Cloud of Witnesses;

"Murdered for owning Christ supreme Head of his church, and no more crime, But her not owning Prelacy.

And not abjuring Presbytery, Within the sea, tied to a stake, She suffered for Christ Jesus' sake."]

[Footnote 293: See the letter to King Charles II. prefixed to Barclay's Apology.]

[Footnote 294: Sewel's History of the Quakers, book x.]

[Footnote 295: Minutes of Yearly Meetings, 1689, 1690.]

[Footnote 296: Clarkson on Quakerism; Peculiar Customs, chapter v.]

[Footnote 297: After this pa.s.sage was written, I found in the British Museum, a ma.n.u.script (Harl. MS. 7506) ent.i.tled, "An Account of the Seizures, Sequestrations, great Spoil and Havock made upon the Estates of the several Protestant Dissenters called Quakers, upon Prosecution of old Statutes made against Papist and Popish Recusants." The ma.n.u.script is marked as having belonged to James, and appears to have been given by his confidential servant, Colonel Graham, to Lord Oxford. This circ.u.mstance appears to me to confirm the view which I have taken of the King's conduct towards the Quakers.]

[Footnote 298: Penn's visits to Whitehall, and levees at Kensington, are described with great vivacity, though in very bad Latin, by Gerard Croese. "Sumebat," he says, "rex saepe secretum, non horarium, vero horarum plurium, in quo de variis rebus c.u.m Penno serio sermonem conferebat, et interim differebat audire praecipuorum n.o.bilium ordinem, qui hoc interim spatio in proctone, in proximo, regem conventum praesto erant." Of the crowd of suitors at Penn's house. Croese says, "Visi quandoquo de hoc genere hominum non minus bis centum."--Historia Quakeriana, lib. ii. 1695.]

[Footnote 299: "Twenty thousand into my pocket; and a hundred thousand into my province." Penn's "Letter to Popple."]

[Footnote 300: These orders, signed by Sunderland, will be found in Sewel's History. They bear date April 18, 1685. They are written in a style singularly obscure and intricate: but I think that I have exhibited the meaning correctly. I have not been able to find any proof that any person, not a Roman Catholic or a Quaker, regained his freedom under these orders. See Neal's History of the Puritans, vol. ii. chap.

ii.; Gerard Croese, lib. ii. Croese estimates the number of Quakers liberated at fourteen hundred and sixty.]

[Footnote 301: Barillon, May 28,/June 7, 1685. Observator, May 27, 1685; Sir J. Reresby's Memoirs.]

[Footnote 302: Lewis wrote to Barillon about this cla.s.s of Exclusionists as follows: "L'interet qu'ils auront a effacer cette tache par des services considerables les portera, aelon toutes les apparences, a le servir plus utilement que ne pourraient faire ceux qui ont toujours ete les plus attaches a sa personne." May 15-25,1685.]

[Footnote 303: Barillon, May 4-14, 1685; Sir John Reresby's Memoirs.]

[Footnote 304: Burnet, i. 626; Evelyn's Diary, May, 22, 1685.]

[Footnote 305: Roger North's Life of Guildford, 218; Bramston's Memoirs.]

[Footnote 306: North's Life of Guildford, 228; News from Westminster.]

[Footnote 307: Burnet, i. 382; Letter from Lord Conway to Sir George Rawdon, Dec. 28, 1677. in the Rawdon Papers.]

[Footnote 308: London Gazette, May 25, 1685; Evelyn's Diary, May 22, 1685.]

[Footnote 309: North's Life of Guildford, 256.]

[Footnote 310: Burnet, i. 639; Evelyn's Diary, May 22, 1685; Barillon, May 23,/June 2, and May 25,/June 4, 1685 The silence of the journals perplexed Mr. Fox; but it is explained by the circ.u.mstance that Seymour's motion was not seconded.]

[Footnote 311: Journals, May 22. Stat. Jac. II. i. 1.]

[Footnote 312: Journals, May 26, 27. Sir J. Reresby's Memoirs.]

[Footnote 313: Commons' Journals, May 27, 1685.]

[Footnote 314: Roger North's Life of Sir Dudley North; Life of Lord Guilford, 166; Mr M'Cullough's Literature of Political Economy.]

[Footnote 315: Life of Dudley North, 176, Lonsdale's Memoirs, Van Citters, June 12-22, 1685.]

[Footnote 316: Commons' Journals, March 1, 1689.]

[Footnote 317: Lords' Journals, March 18, 19, 1679, May 22, 1685.]

[Footnote 318: Stat. 5 Geo. IV. c. 46.]

[Footnote 319: Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, book xiv.; Burnet's Own Times, i. 546, 625; Wade's and Ireton's Narratives, Lansdowne MS.

1152; West's information in the Appendix to Sprat's True Account.]