TWO LETTERS

WRITTEN BY THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

EDWARD EARL OF CLARENDON,

LATE LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR OF ENGLAND:

One to his Royal Highness the Duke of York: The other to the Duchess, occasioned by her embracing the Roman Catholick Religion.

As these Letters serve to rescue the Memory of the worthy Earl, their Author, from all Imputation of Popery, or of being Popishly affected, and, as I can find, no where recorded, they are deservedly thus preserved from the Injury of Time, in the Vindication of that noble Personage.

SIR,

HAVE not presumed in any manner to approach your royal presence, since I have been marked with the brand of banishment; and I would still with the same awe forbear this presumption, if I did not believe myself bound by all the obligations of duty to make this address to you. I have been too much acquainted with the presumption and impudence of the times, in raising false and scandalous reproaches upon innocent and worthy persons of all qualities and degrees, to give credit to those bold whispers, which have been too long scattered abroad, concerning your wife's being shaken in her religion. But when those whispers break out into noise, and publick persons begin to report that the duchess is become a roman catholick: When I heard that many worthy persons, of unquestionable devotion to your royal highness, are not without some fear and apprehension of it; and many reflexions are made from thence, to the prejudice of your royal person, and even of the king's majesty; I hope it may not misbecome me, at what distance soever, to cast myself at your feet, and beseech you to look to this matter in time, and to apply some antidote to expel the poison of it. It is not possible your royal highness can be without zeal, and intire devotion for that church, for the purity and preservation whereof, your blessed father made himself a sacrifice; and to the restoration whereof, you have contributed so much yourself, and which highly deserves the king's protection and yours, since there can be no possible defection in the hearts of the people, whilst due reverence is made to the church. Your wife is so generally believed to have so perfect duty, and intire resignation to the will of your highness, that any defection in her, from her religion, will be imputed to want of circumspection in you, and not using your authority; or to your connivance. I need not tell the ill consequence that such a mutation would be at

tended with, in reference to your royal highness, and even to the king himself, whose greatest security (under God) is in the affection and duty of his protestant subjects. Your royal highness well knows how far I have always been from wishing that the Roman Catholicks should be prosecuted with severity; but I less wish it should ever be in their power to be able to prosecute those who differ from them, since we well know how little moderation they would or could use.

And if this, which people so much talk of, I hope, without ground, should fall out, it might very probably raise a greater storm against the Roman Catholicks in general, than modest men can wish; since, after such a breach, any jealousy of their presumption would seem reasonable. I have written to the duchess, with the freedom and affection of a troubled and perplexed father. I do most humbly beseech your royal highness, by your authority, to rescue her from bringing a mischief upon you and herself, that never can be repaired; and to think it worthy your wisdom to remove and dispel those reproaches, how false soever, by better evidence than contempt; and hope you do believe that no severity I have, or can undergo, shall in any degree lessen or diminish my most profound duty to his majesty, or your royal highness; but that I do, with all imaginable obedience, submit to your good pleasure in all things.

God preserve your Royal Highness,

SIR,

and keep me in your favour,

Your Royal Highness's

most humble and obedient servant,

CLARENDON.

The Earl of Clarendon's Letter to the Duchess of York.

You have much reason to believe that I have no mind to trou ble you, or displease you, especially in an argument that is so unpleasant and grievous to myself; but as no distance of place that is between us, in respect of our residence, or the greater distance in respect of the high condition you are in, can make me less your father, or absolve me from performing those obligations which that relation requires from me: So when I receive any credible advertisement of what reflects upon you, in point of honour, conscience, or discretion, I ought not to omit the informing you of it, or administering such advice to you, as to my understanding seems reasonable, and which I must still hope will have some credit with you. I will confess to you, that what you wrote to me many months since, upon those reproaches which I told you were generally reported concerning your defection in religion, gave me so much satisfaction, that I believed them to proceed from that ill spirit of the time that delights in slanders and calumny; but I must tell you, the same report increases, of late, very much, and I

myself saw a letter, the last week, from Paris, from a person who said the English ambassador assured him, the day before, that the duchess was become a Roman Catholick; and which makes greater impression upon me, I am assured that many good men in England, who have great affection for you and me, and who have thought nothing more impossible, than that there should be such a change in you, are at present under much affliction, with the observation of a great change in your course of life, and that constant exercise of that devotion which was so notorious; and do apprehend, from your frequent discourses, that you have not the same reverence and veneration, which you used to have, for the church of England, the church in which you were baptized, and the church the best constituted, and the most free from errors, of any christian church, this day, in the world; and that some per. sons, by their insinuations, have prevailed with you to have a better opinion of that which is most opposite to it, the church of Rome, than the integrity thereof deserves. It is not yet in my power to believe that your wit and understanding, with God's blessing upon both, can suffer you to be shaken further, than with melancholick reflections upon the iniquity and wickedness of the age we live in, which discredits all religion, and which, with equal license, breaks into the professors of all, and prevails upon the members of all churches, and whose manners will have no benefit from the faith of any church.

I presume, you do not intangle yourself in the particular controversies between the Romanists and us, or think yourself a competent judge of all difficulties which occur therein; and, therefore, it must be some fallacious argument of antiquity and universality, confidently urged by men, who know less than many of those you are acquainted with, and ought less to be believed by you, that can raise any doubts and scruples in you; and, if you will, with equal temper, hear those who are well able to inform you in all such particulars, it is not possible for you to suck in that poison, which can only corrupt and prevail over you, by stopping your own cars, and shutting your own eyes. There are but two persons in the world, who have greater authority with you than I' can pretend to, and am sure they both suffer more in this rumour, and would suffer much more, if there were ground for it, than I can do; and truly I am as unlikely to be deceived myself, or to deceive you, as any man who endeavours to pervert you in your religion; and, therefore, I beseech you, let me have so much credit with you, as to persuade you to communicate any doubts or scruples, which occur to you, before you suffer them to make too deep an impression upon you. The common argument, that there is no salvation out of the church, and the church of Rome is that only true church, is both irrational and untrue. There are many churches, in which salvation may be attained, as well as in any one of them; and were many even in the apostles time, otherwise they would not have directed their epistles to so many several churches, in which there were different opinions received, and very

different doctrines taught. There is, indeed, but one faith, in which we can be saved, the stedfast belief of the birth, passion, and resurrection of our Saviour; and every church, that receives and embraces that faith, is in a state of salvation. If the apostles preached true doctrine, the reception and retention of many errors does not destroy the essence of a church; if it did, the church of Rome would be in as ill, if not in a worse condition, than most other christian churches, because its errors are of a greater magnitude, and more destructive to religion. Let not the canting discourse of the universality and extent of that church, which has as little of truth as the rest, prevail over you. They, who will imitate the greatest part of the world, must turn heathens; for it is generally believed, that above half the world is possessed by them, and that the Mahometans possess more than half the remainder. There is as little question, that of the rest, which is inhabited by christians, one part of four is not of the communion of the church of Rome; and God knows, in that very communion, there is as great discord in opinion, and in matters of great moment, as is between the other christians.

I hear you do, in publick discourses, dislike some things in the church of England, as the marriage of the clergy; which is a point that no Roman Catholick will pretend to be of the essence of religion, and is in use in many places, which are of the communion of the church of Rome, as in Bohemia, and those parts of the Greek church which submit to the Roman. And all men know, that, in the late council of Trent, the sacrament of both kinds, and liberty of the clergy to marry, was very passionately pressed, both by the emperor and king of France, for their dominions; and it was afterwards granted to Germany, though under such conditions, as made it ineffectual; which however shews, that it was not, nor ever can be, looked upon as matter of religion. Christianity was many hundred years old, before such a restraint was ever heard of in the church; and, when it was endeavoured, it met with great opposition, and never was submitted to. And, as the positive inhibition seems absolutely unlawful, so the inconveniences, which result from thence, will, upon a just disquisition, be found supe-, rior to those, which attend the liberty which christian religion permits. Those arguments, which are not strong enough to draw persons from the Roman communion into that of the church of England, when custom and education, and a long stupid resignation of all their faculties to their teachers, usually shuts out all rea-. son to the contrary, may yet he abundant to retain those who have been baptised, and bred and instructed in the grounds and principles of that religion, which are, in truth, not only founded upon the clear authority of the scriptures, but upon the consent of antiquity, and the practice of the primitive church. And men, who look into antiquity, know well by what corruption and violence, and with what constant and continual opposition those opinions, which are contrary to ours, crept into the world; and how unwarrantably the authority of the Bishop of Rome, which alone

supports all the rest, came to prevail, who hath no more pretence of authority and power in England, than the Bishop of Paris or Toledo can as reasonably lay claim to; and is so far from being matter of catholick religion, that the Pope hath so much, and no more, to do in France or Spain, or any other catholick dominion, than the crown, and laws, and constitutions of several kingdoms gave him leave, which makes him so little, if at all, considered in France, and so much in Spain. And, therefore, the English catholicks, which attribute so much to him, make themselves very unwarrantably of another religion than the catholick church professeth; and, without doubt, they who desert the church of England, of which they are members, and become thereby disobedient to the ecclesiastical and civil laws of their country, and there in renounce their subjection to the state, as well as to the church, which are grievous sins, had need have a better excuse, than the meeting with some doubts which they could not answer; and less than a manifest evidence, that their salvation is desperate in that communion, cannot serve their turn. And they, who imagine they have such an evidence, ought rather to suspect, that their understanding hath forsaken them, and that they are become mad, than that the church, which is replenished with all learning and piety requisite, can betray them to perdition. I beseech you to consider (which I hope will over-rule those ordinary doubts and objections which may be infused into you) that, if you change your religion, you renounce all obedience and affection to your father, who loves you so tenderly, that such an odious mutation would break his heart. You condemn your father and your mother (whose incomparable virtue, and piety, and devotion, hath placed her in hea ven) for having impiously educated you; and you declare the church and state, to both which you owe reverence and subjection, to be, in your judgment, anti-christian. You bring irreparable dishonour, scandal, and prejudice, to the duke your husband, to whom you ought to pay all imaginable duty, and who, I presume, is much more precious to you than your own life, and all possible ruin to your children, of whose company and conversation you must look to be deprived; for God forbid, that, after such an apostasy, you should have any power in the education of your children. You have many enemies, whom you herein would abundantly gratify, and some friends, whom you will thereby, at least as far as in you lies, perfectly destroy, and afflict many others, who have deserved well of you.

I know you are not inclined to any part of this mischief, and therefore offer these considerations, as all those particulars would be the consequence of such a conclusion. It is to me the saddest circumstance of my banishment, that I may not be admitted, in such a season as this, to confer with you; when, I am confident, I could satisfy you in all your doubts, and make it appear to you, that there are many absurdities in the Roman religion, inconsist ent with your judgment and understanding, and many impieties, inconsistent with your conscience; so that, before you can sub