they suffered not before for confcience-fake, but only out of pride and obftinacy, to separate from a church for thofe impofitions, which they now judge may be lawfully obeyed? After they have fo long contended for their claffical ordination (not to speak of rites and ceremonies) will they at length submit to an epifcopal? If they can go fo far out of complaifance to their old enemies, methinks a little reason should perfuade them to take another step, and fee whither that would lead them. Of the receiving this toleration thankfully I fhall fay no more, than that they ought, and I doubt not they will confider from what hand they received it. It is not from a Cyrus, a heathen prince, and a foreigner, but from a christian king, their native fovereign; who expects a return in fpecie from them, that the kindness, which he has graciously shewn them, may be retaliated on those of his own perfuafion. As for the poem in general, I will only thus far fatisfy the reader, that it was neither imposed on me, nor fo much as the subject given me by any man. It was written during the last winter, and the beginning of this fpring; tho with long interruptions of ill health and other hindrances. About a fortnight before I had finished it, his majesty's declaration for liberty of confcience came abroad: which, if I had fo foon expected, I might have fpared myself the labor of writing many things which are contained in the third part of it. But I was always in fome hope, that the church of England might have been per-, fuaded to have taken off the penal laws and the test, which was one defign of the poem, when I proposed to myself the writing of it. It is evident that fome part of it was only occafional, and not first intended: I mean that defence of myself, to which every honeft man is bound, when he is injuriously attacked in print: and I refer myself to the judgment of those, who have read the Answer to the Defence of the late King's Papers, and that of the Dutchess (in which laft I was concerned) how charitably I have been represented there. I am now informed both of the author and supervisors of this pamphlet, and will reply, when I think he can affront me: for I am of Socrates's opinion, that all creatures cannot. In the mean time let him confider whether he deferved not a more fevere reprehenfion, than I gave him formerly, for ufing fo little respect to the memory of those, whom he pretended to anfwer; and at his leifure, look out for fome original treatise of humility, written by any Proteftant in English; I believe I may say in any other tongue for the magnified piece of Duncomb on that fubject, which either he must mean, or none, and with which another of his fellows has upbraided me, was tranflated from the Spanish of Rodriguez; tho with the omiffion of the feventeenth, the twenty-fourth, the twenty-fifth, and the last chapter, which will be found in comparing of the books, He would have infinuated to the world, that her late highnefs died not a Roman Catholick, He declares himself to be now fatisfied to the contrary, in which he has given up the cause; for matter of fact was the principal debate betwixt us. In the mean time, he would dispute the motives of her change; how prepofteroufly,. let all men judge, when he feemed to deny the fubject of the controverfy, the change itself. And because I would not take up this ridiculous challenge, he tells the world I cannot argue: but he 1 may as well infer, that a Catholic cannot faft, because he will not take up the cudgels against Mrs. James, to confute the Proteftant religion. I have but one word more to fay concerning the poem as fuch, and abftracting from the matters, either religious or civil, which are handled in it. The first part, confifting most in general characters and narration, I have endeavored to raise, and give it the majestic turn of heroic poefy. The second being matter of dispute, and chiefly concerning church authority, I was obliged to make as plain and perfpicuous as poffibly I could; yet not wholly neglecting the numbers, tho I had not frequent occafions for the magnificence of verse. The third, which has more of the nature of domeftic conversation, is, or ought to be, more free and familiar than the two for mer. There are in it two epifodes, or fables, which are interwoven with the main defign; so that they are properly parts of it, tho they are alfo diftinct ftories of themselves. In both of these I have made ufe of the common places of fatire, whether true or falfe, which are urged by the members of the one church against the other: at |