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The most deftru&tive Circumftance in our Affairs feems to be, that by the long and repeated Infinuations of our Enemies, many are worn into a kind of Doubt of their own Cause, and think with Patience of what is fuggefted in favour of contrary Pretenfions. The most obvious Method of reviving the proper Sentiments in the Minds of Men for what they ought to esteem most dear, is to fhew, That our Caufe has in it all the Sanctions of Honour, Truth, and Juftice, and that we are, by all the Laws of God and Man, enftated in a Condition of enjoying Religion, Life, Liberty, and Property, refcued from the most imminent Danger of having them all for ever depend upon the Arbitrary Power of a Popish Prince.

We should have been chained down in this abject Condition in the Reign of the late King James, had not God Almighty in Mercy given us the late happy Revolution, by that glorious Inftrument of his Providence the great and memorable King WILLIAM. But though this wonderful Deliverance happened as it were but Yesterday, yet fuch is the Inadvertency or Ingratitude of fome amongst us, that they feem not only to have forgotten the Deliverer, but even the Deliverance it felf. Old Men act as if they believed the Danger which then hung over their Heads was only a Dream, the wild Effects of ill-grounded imaginary Fears; and young Men, as if they had never heard from their Fathers, nor read of what paffed in this Kingdom, at a Period no farther backward than the Space of Five and Twenty Years.

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I flatter my felf, that if the Paffages which happened in thofe Days, the Refolutions of the Nation thereupon, and the just Provifions made from Time to Time against our falling into the fame Difafters, were fairly ftated and laid in one View, all indire& Arts and mean Subtleties pra&tifed to weaken our Securities would be fruftrated, and vanish before the glaring Light of Law and Reason.

I fhall not govern my felf on this Occafion by the partial Relation of particular Persons or Parties, but by the Senfe of the whole People, by the Sense of the Houfes of Lords and Commons, the reprefentative Body of the whole Nation; in whofe Refolutions, according to the different State of Things, the Condition of the Kingdom, by thofe who had the greatest Stakes in it, has been from time to time, plainly, impartially, and pathetically expreffed.

I fhall begin with the A&t of Parliament made in England in the fecond Seffion of the first Year of the late King William and Queen Mary, entituled, An Act declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject, and fettling the Suc-ceffion of the Crown.

It carries in it the noble Refentment of a People that had been just rescued from Tyranny; and yet, that they might juftify their Actions to Pofterity, it recites all the particular Inftances of the Tyrannical Reign in a plain and difpaffionate Simplicity. The A&t runs as follows.

Whereas the Lords Spiritual and Temporal;

and Commons affembled at Westminster, lawfully, fully, and freely representing all the

Eftates

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'Eftates of the People of this Realm, did upon the 13th Day of February, in the Year of our Lord 1688, prefent unto their Majefties, then called and known by the Names and Stile of William and Mary, Prince and Princefs of Orange, being prefent in their proper Perfons, a certain Declaration in Writing, • made by the faid Lords and Commons in the • Words following, viz.

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'Whereas the late King James the Second, by the Affiftance of divers evil Counsellors, Judges, and Ministers employed by him, did ' endeavour to fubvert and extirpate the Protestant Religion, and the Laws and Liberties of • this Kingdom;

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By affuming and exercising a Power of dif penfing with and fufpending of Laws, and ⚫ the Execution of Laws, without Confent of • Parliament;

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By committing and profecuting divers worthy Prelates, for humbly petitioning to be ex'cufed from concurring to the faid affumed 'Power;

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By iffuing, and caufing. to be executed, a • Commiffion under the Great Seal for erecting 6 a Court called the Court of Commiffioners for Ecclefiaftical Causes;

By levying Money for, and to the Ufe of the Crown, by Pretence of Prerogative, for other Time, and in other Manner, than the • fame was granted by Parliament;

'By raifing and keeping a Standing Army within this Kingdom in Time of Peace without • Confent of Parliament, and quartering Soldiers contrary to Law,

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By caufing several good Subjects, being Proteftants, to be difarmed, at the fame time ' when Papists were both armed and employed, contrary to Law ;

By violating the Freedom of Election of "Members to ferve in Parliament;

By Profecutions in the Court of King's Bench for Matters and Caufes cognizable only in • Parliament, and by divers other arbitrary and "illegal Courses:

And whereas of late Years partial, corrupt, and unqualified Perfons have been returned and ferved on Juries, in Trials, and particularly divers Jurors in Trials for High Treafon which were not Free-holders;

And exceffive Bail hath been required of • Perfons committed in criminal Cafes, to elude the Benefit of the Laws made for the Liberty of the Subjects;

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And exceffive Fines have been imposed,

And illegal and cruel Punishments inflicted, And several Grants and Promises made of Fines and Forfeitures, before any Conviction or Judgment against the Perfons upon whom the fame were to be levied:

All which are utterly and directly contrary to the known Laws, and Statutes, and Freedom of this Realm.

And whereas the faid late King James the IId having abdicated the Government, and the Throne being thereby vacant,

His Highness the Prince of Orange (whom it hath pleafed Almighty God to make the glorious Inftrument of delivering this King'dom from Popery and Arbitrary Power) did (by the Advice of the Lords Spiritual and

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Temporal, and divers principal Perfons of the Commons) caufe Letters to be written to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, being • Proteftants, and other Letters to the several • Counties, Cities, Univerfities, Boroughs, and Cinque-Ports, for the chufing of fuch Perfons to reprefent them as were of Right 'to be sent to Parliament, to meet and fit at Westminster upon the two and twentieth Day of January, in this Year One thousand fix • hundred eighty and eight, in order to fuch an Eftablishment, as that their Religion, Laws, and Liberties might not again be in Danger of being fubverted, upon which Letters Elections having been accordingly made.

And thereupon the faid Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, pursuant to their • refpective Letters and Elections, being now affembled in a full and free Reprefentative of this Nation, taking into their most serious • Confideration the beft Means for attaining the • Ends aforesaid, do, in the first place, as their • Ancestors in like Cafe have usually done for the vindicating and afferting their ancient Rights and Liberties, declare,

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That the pretended Power of fufpending of Laws, or the Execution of Laws, by Regal Authority, without Confent of Parlia ment, is illegal.

That the pretended Power of difpenfing with Laws, or the Execution of Laws by Regal Authority, as it hath been affumed and • exercifed of late, is illegal.

'That the Commiffion for erecting the late Court of Commiffioners for Ecclefiaftical 'Causes, and all other Commiffions and Courts

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