His Majesties Declaration Defended by John Dryden
J >>
John Dryden >> His Majesties Declaration Defended
The Augustan Reprint Society
John Dryden
His Majesties Declaration Defended
(1681)
With an Introduction by
Godfrey Davies
Publication Number 23
(Series IV, No. 4)
Los Angeles
William Andrews Clark Memorial Library
University of California
1950
GENERAL EDITORS
H. Richard Archer, Clark Memorial Library
Richard C. Boys, University Of Michigan
Edward Niles Hooker, University Of California, Los Angeles
H.T. Swedenberg, Jr., University Of California, Los Angeles
ASSISTANT EDITORS
W. Earl Britton, University of Michigan
John Loftis, University of California, Los Angeles
ADVISORY EDITORS
Emmett L. Avery, State College of Washington
Benjamin Boyce, University of Nebraska
Louis I. Bredvold, University of Michigan
Cleanth Brooks, Yale University
James L. Clifford, Columbia University
Arthur Friedman, University of Chicago
Samuel H. Monk, University of Minnesota
Ernest Mossner, University of Texas
James Sutherland, Queen Mary College, London
INTRODUCTION
Wherever English literature is studied, John Dryden is recognized as the
author of some of the greatest political satires in the language. Until
recently the fact has been overlooked that before he wrote the first of
these satires, _Absalom and Achitophel_, he had entered the political
arena with the prose tract here reproduced. The proof that the
Historiographer Royal contributed to the anti-Whig propaganda of the
spring of 1681 depends partly on contemporary or near-contemporary
statements but principally on internal evidence. An article by Professor
Roswell G. Ham (_The Review of English Studies_, XI (1935), 284-98; Hugh
Macdonald, _John Dryden, A Bibliography_, p. 167) demonstrated Dryden's
authorship so satisfactorily that it is unnecessary to set forth here
the arguments that established this thesis. The time when Dryden was
composing his defence of the royal _Declaration_ is approximately fixed
from the reference to it on June 22, 1681, in _The Observator_, which
had noted the Whig pamphlet Dryden was answering under the date of May
26.
The bitter controversy into which Dryden thrust himself was the
culmination of eleven years' political strife. In 1670, by the secret
Treaty of Dover, Charles II and Louis XIV agreed that the English king
should declare himself a Roman Catholic, and receive from his brother of
France the equivalent of 80,000 pounds sterling and, in case of a
Protestant rebellion, 6000 French soldiers. In addition, the two kings
were pledged to undertake a war for the partition of the United
Provinces. In the words of the late Lord Acton this treaty is "the solid
substance of the phantom which is called the Popish Plot." (_Lectures on
Modern History_ (1930), p. 211) The attempt to carry out the second part
of the treaty was made in 1672, when England and France attacked the
United Provinces which made a successful defence, aided by a coalition
including the Emperor, Elector of Brandenburg, and King of Spain. The
unpopularity of the war compelled Charles II to make peace in 1674.
Meanwhile the King had taken a step to put into operation the first part
of the Treaty of Dover by issuing a Declaration of Indulgence relieving
Catholics and Dissenters alike from the penal laws. He was forced,
however, to withdraw it and to give his assent to the Test Act which
excluded from all public offices those unwilling to take the sacraments
according to the rites of the Church of England. Henceforth Charles II
abandoned all hope of restoring Catholicism, though his brother and
heir, James, Duke of York, already a convert, remained resolute to
secure at least toleration for his co-religionists. But many Englishmen
continued to suspect the royal policy.
Roman Catholicism was feared and hated by many Englishmen for two
distinct reasons. The first was based on bigotry, nourished by memories
of the Marian persecution, the papal bull dethroning Elizabeth, Guy
Fawkes' Plot, and by apprehensions that a Catholic could not be a loyal
subject so long as he recognized the temporal power of the Pope. The
second was political and assumed that Catholicism was the natural
support of absolutism. As Shaftesbury, the leader of the opposition,
stated, popery and slavery went hand in hand. Such fears were deepened
as the general purport of the Treaty of Dover became known.
Into this atmosphere charged with suspicion was interjected the Popish
Plot, said by Titus Oates and his fellow perjurers to be designed to
murder Charles II and place James on the throne. From September 1678,
when Oates began his series of revelations until the end of March 1681,
when the King dissolved at Oxford the third Parliament elected under the
Protestant furore excited by the Plot, Shaftesbury and his followers had
the upper hand. The King was obliged to propose concessions to the
popular will and to offer to agree to limitations on the authority of a
popish successor. But Shaftesbury was bent on passing the Exclusion
Bill, which excluded James from the throne and substituted the King's
illegitimate son, Monmouth. Here he made a fatal blunder because he
alienated churchmen who believed in the divine right of kings, all whose
sense of decency was outraged by the prospect of a bastard's elevation
to the throne, and the supporters of William of Orange, husband of
Mary, the elder daughter of James, and the great opponent of Louis XIV.
Also, when it became obvious that the King would not agree to a change
in the succession, many feared another civil war with all its attendant
dangers of a second military domination. Moreover, the lies of Oates and
his imitators were becoming discredited.
Though a reaction against the Whigs was beginning, propaganda was needed
to disabuse the public of two anxieties--that there was still a danger
that Roman Catholicism might be restored and that the three dissolutions
might foreshadow a return to unparliamentary government such as Charles
I had established from 1629 to 1640, also after three dissolutions. The
royal party was at first on the defensive. Their propaganda began with a
proclamation issued on April 8 and ordered to be read in all churches.
In the proclamation the King posed as the champion of law and order
against a disloyal faction trying to overthrow the constitution. It was
read in churches on April 17 and, according to Luttrell's _Brief
Historical Relation_ (I, 77), "in many places was not very pleasing, but
afforded matter of sport to some persons." Among several replies was one
entitled _A Letter from a Person of Quality to his Friend_. Clearly
there was need to answer this pamphlet and to state more fully the case
against the Whigs. This task was undertaken by two of the greatest
writers of English prose--George Savile, then Earl, later Marquis of
Halifax, and John Dryden. Halifax, in the tract lately identified as his
by Hugh Macdonald (Cambridge, 1940), _Observations upon a late
Libel_--though he might scarify an individual opponent like Shaftesbury
or pour ridicule upon a sentence from _A Letter_, set himself the task
of answering the Whig case as a whole. The text he dilated upon was:
"there seemeth to be no other Rule allowed by one sort of Men, than that
they cannot Err, and the King cannot be in the Right." With superb irony
and wit he demonstrated how inconsistent such an attitude was with the
constitution of that day.
Dryden's tract, _His Majesties Declaration Defended_ is, like the one
he is answering, in the form of a letter to a friend who has asked the
writer's opinion of the _Declaration_ and the answer to it. "I shall
obey you the more willingly," Dryden responds, "because I know you are a
lover of the Peace and Quietness of your Country; which the Author of
this seditious Pamphlet, is endeavouring to disturb." He writes to show
the "goodness and equity" of the Prince, because once they are
understood, the faction will lose its power and the well-meaning but
misled crowd will be no longer deceived by "the specious names of
Religion and Liberty." After these introductory paragraphs Dryden began
to reply to the pamphlet point by point. His method is to quote or, more
strictly, partly to quote and partly to paraphrase, a sentence and then
refute its argument. In so doing he is following the method of the
author of _A Letter_. Accordingly, to understand and judge the fairness
of Dryden's refutation, it is well first to read _His Majesties
Declaration_, then _A Letter_, and finally Dryden. The first has not
been reprinted in full but a substantial extract may be found in
Echard's _History of England_ (III, 624-6) and in Arthur Bryant's _The
Letters of Charles II_ (pp. 319-22), the second is available in a not
uncommon folio, _State Tracts: being a Collection of several Treatises
... privately printed in the Reign of K. Charles II_ (1689), and the
third is here reproduced for the first time. After the perusal of these
three tracts, the student may well turn to _Absalom and Achitophel_, and
find instruction in comparing the prose and the verse. He may reach the
conclusion that while both were written to win converts to the royal
cause, the first was designed to weaken the Whig party and the second to
take advantage of a tide that had turned to ruin the Whig leaders. (For
a fuller discussion of the relationship of Dryden's tract and his poem
see the writer's article, "The Conclusion of Dryden's Absalom and
Achitophel" in the _Huntington Library Quarterly_, X (1946-7), 69-82.)
In addition to its historical interest Dryden's tract is a fine specimen
of his masculine, vigorous style so well suited to controversial
writing.
I desire to thank Mr. James M. Osborn, Yale University, for helpful
suggestions in the preparation of this introduction.
This facsimile has been made from the copy in the William Andrews Clark
Memorial Library.
_Godfrey Davies_
_The Huntington Library_
His Majesties
DECLARATION
DEFENDED:
In a _LETTER_ to a Friend.
BEING AN
_ANSWER_
TO A
_Seditious Pamphlet_,
CALLED
_A LETTER from a Person of Quality
to his Friend_:
CONCERNING
The Kings late Declaration touching the Reasons
which moved him to Dissolve
THE TWO LAST
_PARLIAMENTS_
AT
_WESTMINSTER_ and _OXFORD_.
_LONDON:_
Printed for _T. Davies, 1681_.
THE
Kings Declaration
DEFENDED.
Sir,
Since you are pleas'd to require my Opinion of the Kings Declaration,
and the Answer to it, which you write me word was sent you lately, I
shall obey you the more willingly, because I know you are a lover of the
Peace and Quietness of your Country; which the Author of this seditious
Pamphlet, is endeavouring to disturb. Be pleas'd to understand then,
that before the Declaration was yet published, and while it was only the
common news, that such an one there was intended, to justifie the
Dissolution of the two last Parliaments; it was generally agreed by the
heads of the discontented Party, that this Declaration must be answer'd,
and that with all the ingredients of malice which the ablest amongst
them could squeeze into it. Accordingly, upon the first appearance of it
in Print, five several Pens of their _Cabal_ were set to work; and the
product of each having been examin'd, a certain person of Quality
appears to have carried the majority of Votes, and to be chosen like a
new _Matthias_, to succeed in the place of their deceas'd _Judas_.
He seems to be a man cut out to carry on vigorously the designs of the
Phanatique Party, which are manifestly in this Paper, to hinder the
King, from making any good impression on his Subjects, by giving them
all possible satisfaction.
And the reason of this undertaking is manifest, for if once the goodness
and equity of the Prince comes to be truly understood by the People, the
Authority of the Faction is extinguish'd; and the well meaning crowd who
are misled, will no longer gape after the specious names of Religion and
Liberty; much like the folly of the _Jews_, expecting a _Messiah_ still
to come, whose History has been written sixteen hundred years ago.
Thus much in general: I will now confider the Cavils of my Author
against the Declaration.
He tells us, in the first place, _That the Declaration seems to him as a
forerunner of another Parliament to be speedily call'd:_ And indeed to
any man in his right sences, it can seem no other; for 'tis the business
of its three last Paragraphs to inform the People, that no
irregularities in Parliament can make the King out of love with them:
but that he looks upon them as the best means for healing the distempers
of the publick, and for preservation of the Monarchy.
Now if this seems clearly to be the Kings intention, I would ask what
need there was of the late Petition from the City, for another
Parliament; unless they had rather seem to extort it from his Majesty,
than to have it pass for his own gracious action? The truth is, there
were many of the Loyal Party absent at that Common Council: and the
whole strength of the other Faction was united; for it is the common
failing of honest men to trust too much in the goodness of their cause;
and to manage it too negligently. But there is a necessity incumbent on
such as oppose the establish'd Government, to make up with diligence,
what they want in the justice of their undertaking. This was the true
and only reason why the majority of Votes was for the Petition: but if
the business had not been carried by this surprise, My Lord Mayor might
have only been troubled to have carried the Addresses of _Southwark_,
&c. of another nature: without his offering them with one hand, and the
City Petition with the other; like the Childrens play of, This Mill
grinds Pepper and Spice; that Mill grinds Ratts and Mice.
In the next place he informs us, _That if has been long the practice of
the Popish and Arbitrary Party, that the King should call, frequent,
short, and useless Parliaments, tell the Gentry, grown weary of the
great expences of Elections, should sit at home, and trouble themselves
no more but leave the People expos'd to the practices of them, and of
their Party; who if they carry one House of Commons for their turn, will
make us Slaves and Papists by a Law_.
_Popish_ and _Arbitrary_, are words that sound high amongst the
multitude; and all men are branded by those names, who are not for
setting up Fanaticism and a Common-wealth. To call short and useless
Parliaments, can be no intention of the Government; because from such
means the great end of Settlement cannot be expected. But no Physician
can command his Physick to perform the effects for which he has
prescrib'd it: yet if it fail the first or second time, he will not in
prudence lay aside his Art, and despair of his Patient: but reiterate
his Medicines till he effect the cure. For, the King, as he declares
himself, is not willing to have too hard an Opinion of the
Representatives of the Commons, but hopes that time may open their eyes,
and that their next meeting may perfect the Settlement of Church and
State. With what impudence can our Author say, _That an House of Commons
can possibly be so pack'd, as to make us Slaves and Papists by a Law?_
for my part I should as soon suspect they would make themselves
Arbitrary, which God forbid that any Englishman in his right sences
should believe. But this supposition of our Author, is to lay a most
scandalous imputation upon the Gentry of _England_; besides, what it
tacitly insinuates, that the House of Peers and his Majesty, (without
whom it could not pass into a Law,) would suffer it. Yet without such
Artifices, as I said before, the Fanatique cause could not possibly
subsist: fear of Popery and Arbitrary power must be kept up; or the St.
_Georges_ of their side, would have no Dragon to encounter; yet they
will never persuade a reasonable man, that a King, who in his younger
years, when he had all the Temptations of power to pursue such a Design,
yet attempted it not, should now, in the maturity of his Judgment, and
when he sees the manifest aversion of his Subjects to admit of such a
change, undertake a work of so much difficulty, destructive to the
Monarchy, and ruinous to Himself, if it succeeded not; and if it
succeeded, not capable of making him so truly Great as he is by Law
already. If we add to this, his Majesties natural love to Peace and
Quiet, which increases in every man with his years, this ridiculous
supposition will vanish of itself; which is sufficiently exploded by
daily experiments to the contrary. For let the Reign of any of our Kings
be impartially examin'd, and there will be found in none of them so many
examples of Moderation, and keeping close to the Government by Law, as
in his. And instead of swelling the Regal power to a greater height, we
shall here find many gracious priviledges accorded to the Subjects,
without any one advancement of Prerogative.
The next thing material in the Letter, _is the questioning the legality
of the Declaration; which the Author sayes by the new style of_ his
Majesty in Council, _is order'd to be read in all Churches and Chappels
throughout_ England, _And which no doubt the blind obedience of our
Clergy, will see carefully perform'd; yet if it be true, that there is
no Seal, nor Order of Council, but only the Clerks hand to it, they may
be call'd in question as publishers of false news, and invectives
against a third Estate of the Kingdom_.
Since he writes this only upon a supposition, it will be time enough to
answer it, when the supposition is made manifest in all its parts: In
the meantime, let him give me leave to suppose too, that in case it be
true that there be no Seal, yet since it is no Proclamation, but only a
bare Declaration of his Majesty, to inform and satisfie his Subjects, of
the reasons which induc'd him to dissolve the two last Parliaments, a
Seal in this case, is not of absolute necessity: for the King speaks not
here as commanding any thing, but the Printing, publishing and reading.
And 'tis not denyed the meanest Englishman, to vindicate himself in
Print, when he has any aspersion cast upon him. This is manifestly the
case, that the Enemies of the Government, had endeavour'd to insinuate
into the People such Principles, as this Answerer now publishes: and
therefore his Majesty, who is always tender to preserve the affections
of his Subjects, desir'd to lay before them the necessary reasons, which
induc'd him to so unpleasant a thing, as the parting with two successive
Parliaments. And if the Clergy obey him in so just a Design, is this to
be nam'd a blind Obedience! But I wonder why our Author is so eager for
the calling them to account as Accessaries to an Invective against a
third Estate of the Kingdom, while he himself is guilty in almost every
sentence of his discourse of aspersing the King, even in his own Person,
with all the Virulency and Gall imaginable. It appears plainly that an
House of Commons, is that _Leviathan_ which he Adores: that is his
Sovereign in effect, and a third Estate is not only greater than the
other two, but than him who is presiding over the three.
But, though our Author cannot get his own Seditious Pamphlet to be read
in Churches and in Chappels, I dare secure you, he introduces it into
Conventicles, and Coffee-houses of his Faction: besides, his sending it
in Post Letters, to infect the Populace of every County. 'Tis enough,
that this Declaration is evidently the Kings, and the only true
exception, which our Answerer has to it, is that he would deny his
Majesty the power of clearing his intentions to the People: and finds
himself aggriev'd, that his King should satisfie them in spight of
himself and of his party.
The next Paragraph is wholly spent, in giving us to understand, that a
King, of _England_ is no other thing than a Duke of _Venice_; take the
Parallell all along: and you will find it true by only changing of the
names. A Duke of _Venice_ can do no wrong; in Senate he can make no ill
Laws; in Council no ill Orders, in the Treasury can dispose of no
Money, but wisely, and for the interest of the Government, and according
to such proportions as are every way requisite: if otherwise all
Officers are answerable, &c. Which is in effect, to say he can neither
do wrong nor right, nor indeed any thing, _quatenus_ a King. This puts
me in mind of _Sancho Panca_ in his Government of the Island of
_Barataria_, when he was dispos'd to eat or drink, his Physitian stood
up for the People, and snatch'd the dish from him in their right,
because he was a publick person, and therefore the Nation must be Judges
to a dram and scruple what was necessary for the sustenance of the Head
of the Body politique. Oh, but there is a wicked thing call'd the
Militia in their way, and they shew'd they had a moneths mind to it, at
the first breaking out of the Popish Plot. If they could once persuade
his Majesty, to part graciously with that trifle, and with his power of
making War and Peace; and farther, to resign all Offices of Trust, to be
dispos'd by their nomination, their Argument would be an hundred times
more clear: for then it would be evident to all the World, that he could
do nothing. But if they can work him to part with none of these, then
they must content themselves to carry on their new Design beyond Seas:
either of ingaging the _French_ King to fall upon _Flanders_, or
encouraging the States General to lay aside, or privately to cut off the
Prince of _Orange_, or getting a War declared against _England_ and
_France_ conjoyntly: for by that means, either the King can be but a
weak Enemy, and as they will manage matters, he shall be kept so bare of
Money, that Twelve _Holland_ Ships shall block up the River, or he shall
be forced to cast himself upon a House of Commons, and to take Money
upon their Terms, which will sure be as easie, as those of an Usurer to
an Heir in want. These are part of the projects now afoot: and how Loyal
and conscionable they are, let all indifferent persons judge.
In the close of this Paragraph, he falls upon the King for appealing to
the People against their own Representatives. But I would ask him in the
first place, if an Appeal be to be made, to whom can the King Appeal,
but to his People? And if he must justifie his own proceedings to their
whole Body, how can he do it but by blaming their Representatives? I
believe every honest man is sorry, that any such Divisions have been
betwixt the King and his House of Commons. But since there have been,
how could the King complain more modestly, or in terms more expressing
Grief, than Indignation? or what way is left him to obviate the causes
of such complaints for the future, but this gentle admonishment for what
is past?
'Tis easily agreed, he says, (and here I joyn issue with him) _That
there were never more occasions for a Parliament, than were at the
opening of the last, which was held at_ Westminster. But where he
maliciously adds, _never were our Liberties and Properties more in
danger, nor the Protestant Religion more expos'd to an utter extirpation
both at home and abroad_, he shuffles together Truth and Falshood: for
from the greatness of _France_, the danger of the Protestant Religion is
evident; But that our Liberty, Religion, and Property were in danger
from the Government, let him produce the instances of it, that they may
be answer'd; what dangers there were and are from the Antimonarchical
Party, is not my present business to enquire. As for the growing terrour
of the _French_ Monarchy, the greater it is, the more need of supply to
provide against it.
_The Ministers tell us in the Declaration, That they asked of that
Parliament the supporting the Alliances they had made for the
Preservation of the general peace in Christendom, and had desir'd their
advice and assistance for the preservation of_ Tangier: _had recommended
to them, the farther examination of the Plot; and that his Majesty had
offer'd to concurr in any Remedies for the security of the Protestant
Religion, which might consist with the preserving the Succession of the
Crown, in its due and legal course of descent, but to all this they met
with most unsuitable returns._
Now mark what the Gentleman infers, _That the Ministers well knew, that
their demands of Money for the ends abovesaid, were not to be complyed
with, till his Majesty were pleas'd to change the hands and Councils by
which his Affairs were managed_.--that is, nothing must be given but to
such men in whom they could confide, as if neither the King, nor those
whom he employed were fit any longer to be Trusted. But the supream
power, and the management of all things, must be wholly in their Party,
as it was in _Watt Tyler_, and _Jack Cade_ of famous memory, when they
had got a King into their possession: for this Party, will never think
his Majesty their own, till they have him as safe, as they had his
Father. But if they could compass their Designs, of bringing the same
Gentlemen into play once more, who some years since were at the Helm;
let me ask them, when the Affairs of the Nation were worse manag'd? who
gave the rise to the present greatness of the _French_? or who counsel'd
the dissolution of the Tripple League? 'Tis a miracle to me that the
People should think them good Patriots, only because they are out of
humour with the Court, and in disgrace. I suppose they are far other
principles, than those of Anger and Revenge, which constitute an honest
Statesman. But let men be what they will before, if they once espouse
their Party, let them be touch'd with that Philosophers stone, and they
are turn'd into Gold immediately. Nay, that will do more for them, than
was ever pretended to by Chymistry; for it will raise up the shape of a
worthy Patriot, from the ashes of a Knave. 'Tis a pretty juggle to tell
the King they assist him with Money, when indeed they design only to
give it to themselves; that is, to their own Instruments, which is no
more, than to shift it from one hand into another. It will be a favour
at the long run, if they condescend to acquaint the King, how they
intend to lay out his Treasure. But our Author very roundly tells his
Majesty, _That at present they will give him no supplyes, because they
would be employ'd, to the destruction of his Person, and of the
Protestant Religion, and the inslaving the whole Nation_, to which I
will only add, that of all these matters next and immediately under God,
he and his Party, constitute themselves the supream Judges.