uke of York a known papist was presumptive heir to the crown, the
House of Commons would not hear of any expedient for securing their
religion under a popish prince, nor would the King or Lords, consent to
a bill of exclusion: The French King was in the height of his grandeur,
and the vigour of his age. At this day the presumptive heir, with that
whole illustrious family, are Protestants, the Popish Pretender excluded
for ever by several acts of Parliament, and every person in the smallest
employment, as well as the members in both Houses, obliged to abjure
him. The French King is at the lowest ebb of life; his armies have been
conquered and his towns won from him for ten years together, and his
kingdom is in danger of being torn by divisions during a long minority.
Are these cases parallel? Or are we now in more danger of France and
popery than we were thirty years ago? What can be the motive for
advancing such false, such detestable assertions? What conclusions would
his Lordship draw from such premises as these? If injurious appellations
were of any advantage to a cause, (as the style of our adversaries would
make us believe) what appellations would those deserve who thus
endeavour to sow the seeds of sedition, and are impatient to see the
fruits? "But," saith he[20], "the deaf adder stops her ear let the
charmer charm never so wisely." True, my Lord, there are indeed too many
adders in this nation's bosom, adders in all shapes, and in all habits,
whom neither the Queen nor parliament can charm to loyalty, truth,
religion, or honour.

[Footnote 20: Page 28.] Among other instances produced by him of the
dismal condition we are in, he offers one which could not easily be
guessed. It is this: That the little factious pamphlets written about
the end of King Charles II's reign, "lie dead in shops, are looked on as
waste paper, and turned to pasteboard." How many are there of his
Lordship's writings which could otherwise never have been of any real
service to the public? Has he indeed so mean an opinion of our taste, to
send us at this time of day into all the corners of Holborn, Duck Lane,
and Moorfields, in quest after the factious trash published in those
days by Julian Johnson, Hickeringil, Dr. Oates, and himself[21]?

[Footnote 21: The Rev. Samuel Johnson, degraded from his clerical
rank, scourged, and imprisoned, for a work called "Julian's Arts to
undermine Christianity," in which he drew a parallel between that
a