Majesty and her government! He has been poring so long upon Fox's
Book of Martyrs, that he imagines himself living in the reign of Queen
Mary, and is resolved to set up for a knight-errant against Popery. Upon
the supposition of his being in earnest, (which I am sure he is not) it
would require but a very little more heat of imagination, to make a
history of such a knight's adventures. What would he say, to behold the
"fires kindled in Smithfield, and all over the town," on the 17th of
November; to behold the Pope borne in triumph on the shoulders of the
people, with a cardinal on the one side, and the Pretender on the other?
He would never believe it was Queen Elizabeth's day, but that of her
persecuting sister: In short, how easily might a windmill be taken for
the whore of Babylon, and a puppet-show for a popish procession?

[Footnote 60: Page 71]

[Footnote 61: Page 72]

But enthusiasm is none of his Lordship's faculty: I am inclined to
believe he might be melancholy enough when he writ this Introduction:
The despair at his age of seeing a faction restored, to which he hath
sacrificed so great a part of his life: The little success he can hope
for in case he should resume those High-Church Principles, in defence of
which he first employed his pen: No visible expectation of removing to
Farnham or Lambeth: And lastly, the misfortune of being hated by every
one, who either wears the habit, or values the profession of a
clergyman: No wonder such a spirit, in such a situation, is provoked
beyond the regards of truth, decency, religion, or self-conviction. To
do him justice, he seems to have nothing else left, but to cry out,
halters, gibbets, faggots, inquisition, Popery, slavery, and the
Pretender. But in the meantime, he little considers what a world of
mischief he does to his cause. It is very convenient, for the present
designs of that faction, to spread the opinion of our immediate danger
from Popery and the Pretender. His directors therefore ought, in my
humble opinion, to have employed his Lordship in publishing a book,
wherein he should have asserted, by the most solemn asseverations, that
all things were safe and well; for the world has contracted so strong a
habit of believing him backwards, that I am confident, nine parts in ten
of those who have read or heard of his Introduction, have slept in
greater security ever since. It is like the melancholy tone of a
watchman at midnight, who thumps with his pole, a