88

DE FOE'S REFLECTIONS UPON IT.

more consistent than those of our author, but also more consonant to reason, and to the just liberties of mankind.

It seems that the "Rehearsal Revived," soon fell under the frowns of the government, which put an end to its short career. De Foe, writing in December, has the following reflections upon its fall. "It has always been the usage of this paper (The Review), and of its author in all cases, never to strike his enemy when he is down. 'Tis not a generous English way of fighting, and I scorn the advantage of it. If the author of "Scandal,"(M) if the "Rehearsal Revived," is taken up and fallen, through any of his inadvertencies, into the hands of the government, he has enough upon him; I wish him well out again, and shall never officiously prompt any man's disasters."* Without alluding to this paper in particular, De Foe cautions the Church of England not to be misled by the specious friendship of those writers who were the organs of none but Non-jurors; that prompted those measures which would infallibly occasion her ruin; and whilst they stood at a distance, would laugh at her destruction.

(M) A new paper was started in September this year, in opposition to the Review and other papers, by a writer who styled himself Novellus Scandalus. He intitled it "The General Postscript; being an Extract of all that is most material from the Foreign and English Newspapers. With Remarks upon the 'Observator,' 'Review,' 'Tatlers,' and the rest of the Scribblers. In a Dialogue between Novel and Scandal." The twelfth number contained a descriptive catalogue of all the papers then published in London, some twice, others three times a week, and amounting in the whole to eighteen.

Review, vi. 413.

CHAPTER IV.

Sacheverell's Sermon at St. Paul's.- Ridiculed by De Foe.-His Advice to the Dissenters on the Occasion.-Remarks upon the English Character. —And upon the Impeachment.—He Reminds the Dissenters of their illtreatment of him.—His Address to the Parliament.-" Judgment of Whole Kingdoms and Nations."-Works in Reply.-De Foe's Remarks upon Sacheverell's Trial.-His Generous Feelings.-Estimate of High-church Writings.-Endeavours to Weaken the Toleration.-Sacheverell quotes some Passages from the "Review."-Exploits of the Mob Described by De Foe.-Sacheverell emulated by other Clergymen.-De Foe's Remarks upon Milbourn's Sermon.-Fatal Consequences of Sacheverell's Prosecution.-De Foe's Life Threatened.-His Courageous Confidence in his Cause.-Rejoicings at Sacheverell's lenient Sentence.-The High Party gain Ground.-De Foe's Address to the Whigs.- Excesses in the Country. -Hoadly and others burnt in Effigy.-Publications by De Foe.-Dr. Welton's "Altar-piece."-" Ward's British Hudibras."-Sixth Volume of the "Review."―Topics Discussed in it.—Remarks upon Stock Jobbing.-De Foe's Notions of Trade.-His Remarks upon the King of Sweden.—And Satire upon the Follies of the Times.-Clandestine Attempts to Suppress his Paper.- His Publisher Threatened.—And Changed.—De Foe's " Letter to Lord Wharton, concerning a Yorkshire Clergyman."

1709-1710.

TOWARDS the end of this year, an event occurred which fully justified all that De Foe had written concerning the temper and views of the high party, and which involved the most important consequences to the nation. Upon the 5th of November, Dr. Sacheverell preached his far-famed sermon at St. Paul's, before the city magistracy, upon the perils among false brethren; and afterwards published it. Great was the sensation produced by this strange discourse; wherein,

90

SACHEVERELL'S SERMON AT ST. PAUL'S.

says De Foe, "having plentifully railed at, and anathematized, the Dissenters, and left them in custody, without bail or main-prize, with the devil and his angels, he particularly asserts two things: 1. The doctrine of passive obedience, which he most remarkably justifies from the late revolution. 2. The hereditary right of her present majesty to the crown."* The political tenets advanced by this pulpitincendiary, had been answered over and over again by our author, in his replies to Leslie, and the whole race of Nonjurors; so that, in confuting this production, he could do no more than repeat his former arguments.

With an irresistible force of ridicule, which was better suited to the occasion, he thus taunts him with his paradoxes. "How merry a tale it is to hear him prove the doctrine of non-resistance, from the Prince of Orange's declaration, and reconcile the Revolution to the principle of unconditioned subjection, because it was founded on the vacancy of the throne. As if the Prince of Orange had not brought an army with him to resist, but came with fourteen thousand men at his heels, to stand and look on while the English gentry and clergy, with prayers and tears, besought King James to run away and leave the throne vacant! What a banter on King James is this new started whimsy, to tell us the Revolution was no breach of non-resistance; as if inviting and bringing over the prince, was not the effectual and original cause of the throne being vacant. If the Doctor does not think it below him to answer a short question or two from one of the meanest of his admirers, I would most humbly intreat him to solve but two little difficulties arising from his sermon. 1. That since he will not have the nation charged with the least breach of non-resistance in King William's case, he will be pleased to tell us, what the raising an army in England, for driving their lawful and sacred

* Review, vi. 429.

RIDICULED BY DE FOE.

91

king out of Ireland, must be called? And since this army was raised and paid by the whole kingdom, fought King James, beat him, and as far as lay in their power killed him, let him tell us if this was resistance; and if not, we intreat him to tell us what to call it? Let him do this, Et erit mihi magnus Apollo. 2. Since he is pleased to glory very much about the hereditary right of her present majesty to the crown of England, a thing I doubt above his reach to explain, I most humbly beseech him to tell the world, in a few words, by what part of her majesty's hereditary right she is now possessed of the crown?" *

De Foe blames the Dissenters for being angry at the Doctor's excursion; "For, his flight is not at you singly, but at the government, the parliament, the queen, the bishops; in short, every body but the Papists come in for a share. You are abused in excellent company,

'And dirt flings dirt without respect,

To merit or to law.'

I assure you, I shall be none of those that prompt you to resent the Doctor's ill-usage; and my reasons are, because the faster he runs, the sooner he will be out of breath; and because by this method the high-flying gentlemen really expose themselves, not you."+ "We need no more than that the clergy should rave a little now and then: that they should show the world how mad they are, and how mad they must be, that will follow their measures. They need do no more than rail and call bear-garden names; it will soon open the eyes of the world, and bring the people to a conviction, that this is not the still soft voice of truth, the spirit of the gospel of peace: they will soon apprehend that railing and Billingsgate language, may often supply the want of argument, but never is any part of it."* Upon the whole,

Review, vi. 426 7.

+ Ibid, 421, 2.

+ Ibid, 426.

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REMARKS UPON THE ENGLISH CHARACTER.

he observes, "I think the roaring of this beast ought to give you no manner of disturbance. You ought to laugh at it; he'll vent his gall, and then he'll be quiet. In the meantime, let us rejoice that it is not in the power of these creatures to hurt us; that the present constitution of Britain is firm, and out of their power to reach or impair; that the Dissenters are enclosed in the fold, and have the guard of the royal shepherdess; that moderation and toleration are supported by one another, and the God of the Revolution is the defence of both."*

De Foe has some excellent remarks upon the character of the English, as displayed in former times, when the same mad game was played at the expence of liberty. "For my part," says he, "I really think these ecclesiastic faggotsticks, when they are thus lighted at both ends, do no harm. They awaken the people, and bring them to their senses; and these senses are their protection against all the highflying lunacies of the age. Englishmen are never in hazard when they are awake to see their danger; the mischief is, when they are dozed with dreams and delusions, and go hood-winked into the pit. Englishmen are apter to be wheedled than frightened; when you bully and threaten them, they rouze and look about them; and, like Sampson, break the little foolish cords with which these non-resisting Philistines have bound them. This was the very case in the late reigns of King Charles II., and King James. The people had for almost thirty years, from the Restoration to the Revolution, been wheedled into a lethargic state; they had swallowed the gilded pill; they had been charmed with the court-syrens, till they were brought into bonds; and indeed they were strangely fettered with oaths to unsettled heirs, supremacy, blind incoherent notions of absolute dominion and unlimited submission, the Jus divinum of tyrants, and