Essays on the Stage Preface to the Campaigners (1689) and Preface to the Translation of Bossuet's Maxims and Reflections on Plays (1699) (Paperback)

Excerpt: ...advantage, for there is only this quibbling difference between us, 'Tis a fault in us in swearing when we should not, and in him for not swearing when he should; but that now he may have occasion to say my Civilities are particular to him, I will make him do't. I J.C. do sincerely promise and swear, that I will be faithful, and bear true Allegiance to His Majesty King William: And I do swear that I do, from my heart, abhor, detest and abjure, as Impious and Heretical, that damnable Doctrine and Position, that Princes excommunicated, or depriv'd by the Pope, or any Authority of the See of Rome, may be Depos'd or Murther'd by their Subjects, or any other whatsoever. And I do declare that no Foreign Prince, Person, Prelate, State or Potentate, hath, or aught to have, any Jurisdiction, Power, Superiority, Preeminence or Authority, Ecclesiastical or Spiritual, within this Realm. So help me God. 16 This now, with a sincerity proper, and coming to Church to hear our Divine Service, with the Prayer for the King in't, would give one a little satisfaction as to the Doctors present opinion, for what he has been, if you will but examine and scan it by his Book, tho it be a Reforming Book, is I am sure very disputable; in one Page of it he seems very zealous for the Protestant Reformation, and says, Collier, p. 108. being very much piqu'd at Sir John Brute's putting on a Clergy-man's Habit in the Provok'd Wife, that the Church of England, he means the Men in her, is the only communion in the world, that will endure such insolencies as these; and this, tho it be somewhat Bonnerish again, and Switcher-like, yet however seems to leer of our side; but then presently in another place he's as zealous for the Roman Sect, and Jesuitically condemns a little wholesom Satyr in the Character of a pamper'd hypocritical covetous Spanish Fryer, Collier, p. 98. for incivility in making him a Pimp to Lorenzo, and is very angry at the Author for calling this virtuous person a...