hat in coffee-houses you began,--
Pull down the master, and set up the man.

Footnotes:
1. The association proposed in parliament was, by the royalists, said
to be, a revival of the Solemn League and Covenant. But the draught
of an association, found in Lord Shaftesbury's cabinet, and
produced on his trial, in which that memorable engagement seems to
be pretty closely copied, was probably what our poet alludes to.

2. The protestant flail was a kind of bludgeon, so jointed as to fold
together, and lie concealed in the pocket. They are supposed to
have been invented to arm the insurgents about this period. In the
trial of Braddon and Spoke for a misdemeanor, the recorder offered
to prove, that Braddon had bragged, that "he was the only inventor
of the protestant flails; an instrument you have heard of,
gentlemen, and for what use designed." This circumstance was not
omitted by Jefferies, in his characteristic address to the
prisoner. "But oh what a happiness it was for this sort of people,
that they had got Mr Braddon, an honest man and a man of courage,
says Mr Speke, a man _a propos_! and pray, says he to his friend,
give him the best advice you can, for he is a man very fit for the
purpose; and pray secure him under a sham name, for I'll undertake
there are such designs upon pious Mr Braddon, such connivances to
do him mischief, that, if he had not had his _protestant flail_
about him, somebody or other would have knocked him on the head;
and he is such a wonderful man, that all the king's courts must
needs conspire to do Mr Braddon a mischief. A very pretty sort of
man, upon my word, and he must be used accordingly." _State
Trials_, Vol. III. p. 897. In one of the scarce medals struck by
James II. Justice is represented weighing mural crowns, which
preponderate against a naked sword, a serpent, and a protestant
flail: on each side of the figure are a head and trunk,
representing those of Argyle and Monmouth. An accurate description
of this weapon occurs in the following passage from Roger North:
"There was much recommendation of silk armour, and the prudence of
being provided with it against the time protestants were to be
massacred. And accordingly there were abundance of these silken
backs, breasts, and pots (i.e. head-pieces), made and sold, that
were pretended to be pistol proof; in which any man dressed up wa