Tuesday, July 18. 1704.

Numb. 39.
[169]

EUROPE look’d without any concern upon the prodigious Conquests of the K. of Sweden; believing the Dane ought to be Chastis’d for so basely Invading the Dominions of a Prince, with whom he was in a strict League; without any Provocation, and without so much as a Declaration; and while that Prince was engag’d in a Bloody War, remote from his own Dominions.

But under all these Provocations, the King of Sweden used so much Moderation in his Victory, that he contented himself with forcing his Enemy to a Disadvantageous Peace, by which the Swede obtained great part of Schonen, a share in the Toll of the Sound, and a great many considerable Concessions.

But as Princes are not always capable of bounding their Ambition, and the Dangers of excess in Prosperity are very great, the King of Sweden pretending next Year, that the King of Denmark was Arming against him, but really vex’d at Heart, that he had let his Enemy slip out of his Hands, when he might have made an Entire Conquest of his Dominions; breaks the Peace, puts to sea with a great Fleet, Lands an Army in Seeland, and sits down again under the Walls of Copenhagen.

The Gallant Defence the King of Denmark made, how he would not quit the City, as his Councellors advis’d him, but resolv’d to be shut up with his Citizens; how he pitch’d his Royal Tent upon one of the Bastions of the City, and nearest to the Danger; that, as he said, he might call to his Soldiers, Come to the breach, and not bid them Go. How he Challeng’d the King of Sweden to fight him, hand to hand, for the Crown of Denmark, who told him for Answer, That Kings do not use to fight, but in good Company. These things I may hint for the Readers Diversion, and to Invite them to read the Histories of Those Times; but I omit Writing them at large, as Foreign to the present purpose.

But this part of the Point is to our Business: The Dutch who had immediately no concern in the Quarrel, but as they found the Ballance of Power in Danger to be broken, immediately fitted out a Squadron of Men of War to Assist the Dane, and I am not without reason if I say, had it been the other way, had the Dane been at that time Besieging Stockholm, they would have done the same for the Swede.

They first sent an Embassy, as we have now done, to the Swede, to let him know, they could not be easy to see him over-run the King of Denmark, and propos’d very good Conditions of Peace to him; but he, blinded by his Prosperity, and the hopes of a Crown to be added to his own, push’d on the Siege with all the fury imaginable, till he had extreamly harrass’d his Army, by the desperate Defence of the King of Denmark: at last came the Dutch Fleet into the Baltick, they reliev’d the City, [170] beat his Fleet before his Face, the Angry King fretting and riding his Horse into the Sea for eagerness. Thus they forc’d him to a Peace less Honourable than he made before: The Grief of which being too much for his great Spirit to bear, threw him into a Fever, and broke his Heart.

This is the Precedent I would lay before the Confederates on one hand, and his Swedish Majesty on the other.

If the King of Poland may not be brought by the Mediation of the Confederacy, of which he is a Member, to make an Honourable Satisfaction to the King of Sweden, for the unjust Invasion of Livonia, he ought to stand and fall by himself, for without doubt he was very much in the wrong in that Action; it was Circumstanc’d with some Particulars which gives it a black Aspect to the World; the King of Sweden young, and but just stept up into his Throne, unsetled, and having hardly time to look about him, Invaded on one hand by 150000 Muscovites, and on the other hand by the Dane, so that the King of Poland, in reason, could not suspect the whole Power of Swedeland should fall upon him; these things, though they might offer him great Advantages, yet without Question, they made the thing it self so much the more dishonourable.

He Invaded Livonia, without Pretence, without Complaint of Grievance, or Demand of Satisfaction, without Ground of Quarrel, or Declaration of War; just as the Dane did by Carolus Gustavus, in the Story related.

The English and Dutch concern’d themselves in the War between his Swedish Majesty and the King of Denmark; the Princes of the House of Lunenbergh sent an Army to prevent him in the Invasion of Holstein, and raise the Siege of Tonnigen, and the Confederate Fleet spread themselves in the Sound, joyn the Swedes Fleet, cover the King of Sweden in his Descent on the Isle of Seeland, where he presents the Capital City with an approaching Siege.

When the King of Denmark was reduc’d to this Exigence, they take an equal care of him too; the young King, flush’d with this Success, and eager to fly upon his Enemy, would fain have March’d to the Siege of Copenhagen; No, sir, say the Confederates, our Business is to make an Honourable Peace between you, that neither of you may be oppress’d.

Thus the Dane was first restrain’d, when he had the Advantage, and protected when he had the Disadvantage; the Swede was first Protected when he had the worst end of the Staff, and restrained when he had the better.

A Bloody War was quench’d in the beginning, and the Superiority of the English and Dutch very well asserted and Exerted, better, if I may say so, than ever it has been since.

By this Action the Swede heartned up, that seem’d ready to be devour’d; and being let loose at the rest of his Enemies, as in whole Quarrels Europe had less Concern, he flyes first at the Muscovite, and Gallantly Attacks 100000 Men Entrench’d, with 22000 Swedes, and beats them.

In the next place he meets the King of Poland, beats him, pursues him from Place to Place, Traverses his whole Kingdom, takes Warsaw, Cracow, Elbing, Thoorn, and all that was worth taking, in his Kingdom.

And now his Enemy being Reduc’d low enough, the English and Dutch finding his pushing things on to Extremity affected the general Grand Alliance, in which all Christendom is concerned, both for Liberty as well as Religion, send their Ambassadors to him, to Mediate an Honourable and Advantageous Peace for him; and who shall undertake to tell the Treatment our Ambassadors have met with? whether they have found a suitable Reception to the Respect their several Principles might expect, if the Swede paid the Debt of Gratitude, due to those that deliver’d his Brother of Holstein from being Ruin’d, and himself from being Opress’d – Let all Men judge, who knew how long the English Ambassador followed his Camp without Audience; how Coldly, how Haughtily they were received, and to how little purpose they proposed Terms of Accommodation.

If the several Treaties made with him for 10000 Men, to be entred into the Pay of the Confederates, if the Sollicitations made to him for his Quota of Men, to serve on the Rhine; if the offers of Peace made him have been hitherto all in vain, let all Men judge what Gratitude has been shewn to his English and Dutch Benefactors, and what Return he has made them for that signal Service done him at the beginning of his Reign; by which his Sister, at least, Enjoys the Dutchy of Holstein Guttorp; and if I think right, himself the Swedish Crown.

As to the Ambition of the present Proceeding —— Let us next Enquire for what it is the King of Sweden now makes War, that he cannot be prevailed with by any Mediation to hearken to Peace.

[171]

His Province of Livonia is recovered; his Enemy, the King of Poland, is beaten, and so beaten, that it cannot be called Presumption in me to say, he would comply with a very disadvantageous Treaty.

All Wars whose End is not Peace are Cruel and Unjust. This I take to be an Eternal and Unanswerable Maxim, founded upon natural Right, and the unalterable principle of common Justice. If Peace is here offer’d, if Le Charte blanche is presented to the King of Sweden, L’Amende Honorable offer’d him by the Confederates, Persons Interested in neither Party, and yet Interested in both; Persons he stands bound to for courtesies of the most Capital Kind —– and these are rejected, or at least not closed with, the War push’d on to a most unjustifiable Extreme; nothing less proving Satisfactory than the Deposing and Dethroning his Adversary, stirring up his own Subjects against him, abetting Rebels and Traytors to break their own Allegiance, and pull down their Sovereign: and all this, as is pretended, not to take that Crown to himself, but to set up somebody else; then the War is purely Personal, if the Pretence be real, and this Part of it is all Ambition and Revenge.


ADVICE from the Scandalous CLUB.

There happen’d a great and bloody Fight this Week, between two Ladys of Quality, one a Roman Catholick, the other a Protestant; and as the Matter had come to Blows, and Beauty was concern’d in the Quarrel, having been not a little defac’d, by the Rudeness of the scratching Sex ——- The Neighbours were called in to part the Fray, and upon Debate the Quarrel was refer’d to the Scandalous Club.

The Matter was this.

The Roman Catholick Lady meets the Protestant Lady in the Park, and found herself oblig’d, every time she past by her, to make a reverend Curtsey, tho’ she had no knowledge of her, or Acquaintance with her —-. The Protestant Lady receiv’d it at first as a Civility, but afterwards took it for a Banter, and at last for an Affront, and sends her Women to know the meaning of it.

The Catholick Lady returned her Answer, she did not make her Honours to the Lady, for she knew no respect she deserv’d, but to the Diamond Cross she wore about her Neck, which she being a Heretick did not deserve to wear.

The Protestant Lady sent her an angry Message, and withal, some reflecting Words upon the Cross it self, which ended the present Debate, but occasion’d a solemn Visit from the Catholick Lady to the Protestant, where they fell into grievous Disputes, and one Word followed another, till the Protestant, Lady offered some Indignities to the Jewel, took it from her own Neck and set her Foot upon it, and the like; which so provok’d the other Lady, that they fell to Blows, till the Waiting Women having in vain attempted to part them, the Footmen were fain to be called in.

After they were parted, they ended the Battel with their other Missive Weapon, the Tongue; and there was Heretick W —— and Popish B ——, and all the Eloquence of Belinsgate, on both sides, more than enough. At last, by Advice of Friends, it was, as is before noted, brought before the Society.

After a long Hearing on both sides, the Club came to these Resolutions.

1. That there is really something unfair in it, that the Protestant Ladies should wear any thing about them to oblige the Popish Ladies to pay more Homage than they will return.

2. That to wear that which in all Countries is the Badge and Signal of a Roman Catholick, and which for that Reason, has been left off by all the Protestant Ladies in the World, is a tacit owning themselves in the Wrong, and is Scandalous to Protestants, as if they were asham’d of being Distinguish’d.

3. That a Cross, which is an Engine of Justice, cannot be an Ornament unless wore on a Religious Account, and is therefore Ridiculous and Absurd, and just as proper a Jewel as the form of a Gibbet, or Gallows, which if wore about the Neck would make but a scurvy Figure.

4. As ’tis never wore but on a Religious Account, so ’tis as Ridiculous to wear it where there is no such Respect shown it, as ’tis to deny the real Presence, and yet pull off your Cap, to the Altar.

Upon the whole, the Society Voted the Protestant Lady was in the Wrong, and ought to beg the other Ladies Pardon; for that for a Protestant to wear a Cross about her Neck is a Ridiculous, Scandalous piece of Vanity; an Affront to the Roman Catholick Ladies, and a Reproach to themselves.

[172]

As for the other nameless Uses of this new fashion’d Ornament, the Society thinks them a little hinted at in the following Lines.

Silvya her vainer Lover to Entice,
By this
pretended Signal prompt her Vice,
While they pay Homage to her flowing Breast,
The pointing Jewel represents the rest.
This outward Zeal they to
that Image show;
But ’tis the idol meant that dwels below:
She means it so her self, and ’tis as good
To have it Spoke, as have it Understood.

Upon the whole, the Society, resolved after mature Deliberation, that for a Protestant Lady wearing a Cross about her Neck, can neither signifie Religious or Ornament, and therefore must have some worse Original; and made it a standing Rule for all the Beaus, &c. to observe, That when ever they see a Cross about such a Ladies Neck, if she is not a ……. She is very willing to be thought so ——- and they may use her accordingly.

ADvertisements are taken in by J. Matthews in Pilkington-Court in Little-Britain.

A D V E R T I S E M E N T S.

***
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