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Ba&ter , has not ventured to notice , that jyfr . El wall refers in bis iC Declaration against all the Kings arid temporal powers under Heaven . " I quote his third edition , 1734 , pp . 16 , 17 . He is there addressing- Geo . 11 ., whom he had
challenged " out into * James ' s Park , " to settle the question of Christian freedom from civil eontroul , not bringinghis " ugly carnal sword" but c < pure spiritual weapons / ' To his " royal friend , " his " Lord and King in all temporal things , " Elwali says :
" Thy great predecessor King William , the glorious TVilliam > when the priests here , joined by some Dissenters too , solicited him to persecute the Socinians , a people that began to see a few of those monstrous doctrines of trinity , transubatantiation , absolute election and
reprobation , iaftnite satisfaction , impated righteousness , making the Most High God , the holy One of Israel , to be a plurality of persons , a , ad making God t <* have a eeuple of equals ( and some more sneh j ^ rgou as above ); but his generous soul * that had breathed in a freer air , gave tbfcm
this truly Christian and courageous answer , That he would not < fo the priests * drudgery Unfortunatel " y for these line speeches , attributed to King William with " sit ** - plicity and godly sincerity /* by a triumvirate of exemplary Christian confessors , before whom too many " names of awe and distance here" will , at least ,
hereafter " rank with com mow ixten ;*' a plain tale is sufficient to put them down . We read , " Fet > , 17 , 1698 , " of " an address of the Comm 6 na" to the King ** for suppressing all pernicious books and pamphlets containing doctrines against the Holy Trinity , and other fundamental articles of faitn ,
and for punishing the authors and publishers / ' We next learn the conduct of this prince who " was not willing to be made a persecutor , " or to
do the priests' drudgery , ° After a week ' s consideration , 0 € Feb . 24 , a proclamation was issued accordingly - * then follows , "AaA <; t for tfce more effectually suppressing- Blasphemy and Profaneaess /* inflicting on all Un&arims , as well a * Unbeliever * , w&a
were rw > t content to ejij ^ y their * ' private option , " tfee penalties of inqntsonment and confiscation . ( Chrm . Mist . 1 291 , 292 . ) TWt HTittmmVkl . l |» d not alwttf * 4 < *« fifered MmMAf to fee prevailed vol
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upon , " but could , on other occasions , fredy exercise bis prerogative , by © bjectmg to csomply wkk addresses , or to pass bills presented by the Parlia ment , sufficiently appears from various transactions of his reign . In 1692 , he refused the rvyal assent to a " Bill for frequent Parliaments ; " in
1693 , to " a Place-Bill ; » wd in 1694 , to a Bill for free and impartial Proceedings in Parliament ; " facts which justify Mrs . Macaulay ' s remark , in her Letters ,, on * ' the History of England , " ( 1779 , p . 144 , ) " that the enlarging- civil liberty was not the errand for which William undertook so
hazardous and expensive an enterprise as the invasion of England . " Nor , among the royal refusals ^ can it be easily forgotten that King William , " not willing to be made a persecutor / ' determined to suppress the inquiries urged by the justly indignant Scottish Parliament , respecting the barbarous massacre of Glencoe .
Burnet acknowledges , ( O . T . II . 156 , ) that " the King seemed too remiss in inquiring into it ; " and , ( ibid . 162 , ) that " the libellers" ( as the exposers of ** wickedness in high places' * are g&a&refib y described by courtiers of various moral temperament , from
Burnet dawn to Londonderry } were " furnished with some colours in aspersing tbe King , as if be must have been wilLbaff to suffer it to be executed , since he seemed so unwilling to let ft ; be punished . " Some of your readers can look back , not without pensivtfly-pleasing
recollections , to a period , when ** the glorious and immortal meroorr of King William" was annually celebrated by the moat enlightened friends of liberty and of feuman kind . Should- those readers , or any others be prepared and inclined to shew that I hare
ill-appreciated the King ' s character , and especially that be deserved the commendation of such men a $ Emlyn , EUcall and Und&ey , 1 shall thank them for an opportunity of correcting my jtodgment , on a question of some iinportttfltee in the British History . J . T . RUTT .
February 2 . P . 8 . Since I concluded this letter I liuve observed , in " The History of Kiag William III . / ' 1732 ; ( p . 240 , ) the lolloping confirmation ofMurvef *
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King- Willimm ne Friend to Religious Liberty . 73
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. xvn . j
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1822, page 73, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2509/page/9/
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