76, 'till the
meeting of Parliament July 15, 1677, printed in folio 1678. Our author
in a letter dated June 10, 1678, wrote thus; 'There came out about
Christmas last here, a large book concerning the Growth of Popery,
and Arbitrary Government. There have been great rewards offered in
private, and considerable, in the Gazette, to any, who would inform of
the author, and Printer, but not yet discovered. Three or four printed
books since have described (as near as was proper to go, the man being
a member of Parliament) Mr. Marvel to be the author, but if he had, he
surely could not have escaped being questioned in Parliament, or 'Some
other place.' This book was so offensive to the court at that time,
that an order was published in these words,

'Whereas there have been lately printed, and published several
seditious, and scandalous libels against the proceedings of both
Houses of Parliament, and other his Majesty's Courts of Justice,
to the dishonour of his Majesty's government, and the hazard of the
public peace, these are to give notice, that what person soever shall
discover unto one of the secretaries of state, the printer, publisher,
author, or hander to the press of any of the said libels, so that
full evidence may be made thereof to a Jury, without mentioning the
informer, especially one libel, entitled An Account of the Growth
of Popery; and another called A Reasonable Argument to all the Grand
Juries, &c. the discoverer shall be rewarded as follows; he shall
have fifty pounds for such discovery as aforesaid, of the printer or
publisher of it from the press, and for the hander of it to the press,
one hundred pounds.'

Mr. Marvel begins this book with a panegyric on the constitution of
the English government, shewing how happy the people are under such
wholesome laws, which if faithfully observed, must make a people
happy, and a monarch great. He observes, that the king and the subject
are equally under the laws; and that the former is no longer king than
he continues to obey them. 'So that, says he, the kings of England,
are in nothing inferior to other princes, save in being more abridg'd
from injuring their own subjects, but have as large a field as any of
external felicity, wherein to exercise their own virtue, and to reward
and encourage it in others. In short there is nothing that comes
nearer the divine perfection, than when the monarch, as with us,
enjoys a capacity of doing all the good imaginable to ma