Absalom =
Duke of
Monmouth.

David for him his tuneful harp had strung
And Heaven had wanted one immortal song.
But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand,
And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land.
Achitophel, grown weary to possess
A lawful fame and lazy happiness,
Disdain'd the golden fruit to gather free
And lent the crowd his arm to shake the tree.
Now, manifest of crimes contrived long since,
He stood at bold defiance with his Prince,
Held up the buckler of the people's cause
Against the crown, and skulk'd behind the laws.
The wished occasion of the Plot he takes;
Some circumstances finds, but more he makes;
By buzzing emissaries fills the ears

Of listening crowds with jealousies and fears
Of arbitrary counsels brought to light,
And proves the King himself a Jebusite.
Weak arguments! which yet he knew full well
Were strong with people easy to rebel.

For govern'd by the moon, the giddy Jews
Tread the same track when she the prime renews:
And once in twenty years their scribes record,
By natural instinct they change their lord.
Achitophel still wants a chief, and none
Was found so fit as warlike Absalom.
Not that he wished his greatness to create,
For politicians neither love nor hate:

But, for he knew his title not allow'd

Would keep him still depending on the crowd,
That kingly power, thus ebbing out, might be
Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.

200

210

220

John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel. Poetical Works (edited by G. Gilfillan, Edinburgh, 1855), I, 96–102.

97. A Record of the Popish Panic (1681) In 1671 a

monument in commemora

tion of the London in great fire in 1666 was erected near

Pudding

"This Pillar was set vp in Perpetvall Remembrance of that most dreadful burning of this Protestant city, begun and carryed on by ye treachery and malice of ye Popish factiō, in ye beginning of Septem. in ye year of our Lord 1666, in order to ye carrying on their horrid Plott for extirpating the Protestant Religion and old English Liberty, began. In and the introducing Popery and Slavery."

Lane, where the fire 1681 the accompanying inscription was added. "It was obliterated in the reign of James II, recut deeper than before in the reign of William III, and finally erased in 1831." H. Wheatley, London, Past and Present.

In April, 1688, James

II issued a

CHAPTER XV-THE REVOLUTION

98. Petition of the Seven Bishops (1688)

second Dec- To the King's most Excellent Majesty.

laration of
Indulgence,
following it
with the com-
mand that it
should be
read in the
course of
divine ser-
vice on two
successive
Sundays in
every parish
in the king-
dom. The
clergy were
in sore straits

between the
law of Parlia-

one hand,

and their cherished doctrine of non-resistance on the other. Finally, on May 18, two days before the first Sunday named in the royal

The Humble Petition of William Arch-Bishop of Canterbury, and divers of the Suffragan Bishops of that Province, (now present with him) in behalf of themselves, and others of their absent Brethren, and of the Clergy of their respective Diocesses.

Humbly sheweth,

That the great averseness they find in themselves to the distributing and publishing in all their Churches your Majesty's late Declaration for Liberty of Conscience, proceeds neither from any want of Duty and Obedience to your ment on the Majesty, (our Holy Mother the Church of England, being both in her Principles and in her constant Practice unquestionably Loyal; and having, to her great Honour, been more than once publickly acknowledg'd to be so by your Gracious Majesty;) Nor yet from any want of due tenderness to Dissenters, in relation to whom they are willing to come to such a Temper as shall be thought fit, when that Matter shall be considered and settled in Parliament and Convocation. But among many other Considerations, from this especially, because that Declaration is founded upon such a Dispensing Power as has been often declared Illegal in Parliament, and particularly in the Years 1662, take counsel, and 1672, and in the beginning of your Majesty's Reign; and is a Matter of so great Moment and Consequence to the whole Nation, both in Church and State, that your Peti

decree, some of the leading clergy

met with the Primate to

The result of the conference was this petition

tioners cannot in Prudence, Honour, or Conscience, so far make themselves Parties to it, as the distribution of it all over the Nation, and the solemn publication of it once and again, even in God's House, and in the Time of his Divine Service, must amount to in common and reasonable Construction.

Your Petitioners therefore most humbly and earnestly beseech your Majesty, that you will be graciously pleased, not to insist upon their distributing and reading your Majesty's said Declaration.

And Your Petitioners, as in Duty bound, shall ever pray.

WILL. CANT.
WILL. ASAPH.
FR. ELY.

Jo. CICESTR.

THO. BATHON. & WELLEN.

THO. PETERBURGEN.

JONATH. BRISTOL.

The Humble Petition of Seven Bishops to his Majesty. A Collection of Papers relating to the Present Juncture of Affairs in England (London, 1688), No. 1.

which was presented to the king that evening, and by midnight was in print and hawked

about the streets. On the trial of the bishops, see No. 99,

and Macaulay, History of England.

99.

The Trial of the Seven Bishops

(1688)

18 April. The King injoyning the ministers to read his Declaration for giving liberty of conscience (as it was styl'd) in all the churches of England, this evening, 6 Bishops, Bath and Wells, Peterborough, Ely, Chichester, St. Asaph, and Bristol, in the name of all the rest of the Bishops, came to his Maty to petition him, that he would not impose the reading of it to the several congregations within their dioceses; not that they were averse to

By JOHN
EVELYN.
See No. 94.

The king called the petition a standard of

rebellion," and the bishops,

" trumpeters of sedition."

At Westminster the congregation withdrew when the Bishop of Rochester began to read.

the publishing it for want of due tendernesse towards Dissenters, in relation to whom they should be willing to come to such a temper as should be thought fit, when that matter might be consider'd and settl'd in Parliament and Convocation; but that, the Declaration being founded on such a dispensing power as might at pleasure set aside all laws. ecclesiastical and civil, it appear'd to them illegal, as it had done to the Parliament in 1661 and 1672, and that it was a point of such consequence, that they could not so far make themselves parties to it, as the reading of it in church in time of divine service amounted to.

The King was so far incens'd at this addresse, that he with threatening expressions commanded them to obey him in reading it at their perils, and so dismiss'd them.

20. I went to White-hall Chapell, where, after the morning Lessons, the Declaration was read by one of ye Choir who us'd to read the chapters. I heare it was in the Abby Church, Westminster, but almost universally forborne throughout all London: the consequences of which a little time will shew.

25. All the discourse now was about the Bishops refusing to read ye injunction for ye abolition of the Test, &c. It seemes the injunction came so crudely from the Secretary's office, that it was neither seal'd nor sign'd in forme, nor had any lawyer ben consulted, so as the don churches Bishops, who took all imaginable advice, put the Court to

In four only of the Lon

was the

Declaration

read.

greate difficulties how to proceede against them. Greate were the consults, and a proclamation expected all this day; but nothing was don. The action of the Bishops was universaly applauded, and reconcil'd many adverse parties. Papists only excepted, who were now exceedingly perplex'd, and violent courses were every moment expected. Report was, that the Protestant secular Lords and Nobility would abett the Clergy. .

...

8 June. This day the Archbishop of Canterbury, with