was a great argument some people used against suppressing the old
money, that it was a time of war, and it was too great a risk for the
nation to run; if we should not master it, we should be undone. And
yet the sequel proved the hazard was not so great but it might be
mastered, and the success was answerable. The suppressing the
Dissenters is not a harder work nor a work of less necessity to the
public. We can never enjoy a settled, uninterrupted union and
tranquillity in this nation till the spirit of Whiggism, faction, and
schism is melted down like the old money.

To talk of the difficulty is to frighten ourselves with chimeras and
notions of a powerful party, which are indeed a party without power.
Difficulties often appear greater at a distance than when they are
searched into with judgment and distinguished from the vapours and
shadows that attend them.

We are not to be frightened with it; this age is wiser than that by
all our own experience and theirs too. King Charles the First had
early suppressed this party if he had taken more deliberate measures.
In short, it is not worth arguing to talk of their arms. Their
Monmouths, and Shaftesburys, and Argyles are gone; their Dutch
sanctuary is at an end; Heaven has made way for their destruction, and
if we do not close with the Divine occasion we are to blame ourselves,
and may remember that we had once an opportunity to serve the Church
of England by extirpating her implacable enemies, and having let slip
the minute that Heaven presented, may experimentally complain, _Post
est occasio calva_.

Here are some popular objections in the way:--

As first, the Queen has promised them to continue them in their
tolerated liberty, and has told us she will be a religious observer of
her word.

What Her Majesty will do we cannot help; but what, as head of the
Church, she ought to do, is another case. Her Majesty has promised to
protect and defend the Church of England, and if she cannot
effectually do that without the destruction of the Dissenters, she
must of course dispense with one promise to comply with another. But
to answer this cavil more effectually: Her Majesty did never promise
to maintain the toleration to the destruction of the Church; but it is
upon supposition that it may be compatible with the well-being and
safety of the Church, which she had declared she would take especial
care of. Now if these two interests clash, it is plain Her Majesty's
intention