'The Horrid Popish Plot' Roger L'Estrange and the Circulation of Political Discourse in Late Seventeenth-Century London by Peter Hinds A British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship Monograph Publishedfor THE BRITISH ACADEMY by OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS Contents List of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction 1. '[T]aking up Plots upon Trust: Titus Oates and Roger L'Estrange 2. '[Wjill you have your Throats cut ere you will believe?': Popish Plot(s) 3. 'Tis the Press that has made 'urn Mad': Publishing the Popish Plot and Exclusion Crisis 4. 'A Popish priest is a certain seducer': Catholics and Anti-Catholicism and . Rome ,. 5. 'Hell, have long been confederate against us Jesuits and Protestantism 6. 'The Subduing of a Pestilent Heresy': Edward Coleman's Letters 7. A Matter too hot... to be Handled': The Death of Edmund Berry Godfrey 8. A Few Words among Many, about the Touchy Point of Succession': The Duke of York and the Exclusion Crisis 9. 'Have a Care of perverted Authorities': Parliament, Partisanship, and the Earl of Shaftesbury 10. After-Birth-Inscriptions': Historical Disputes and the Great Fire of London CONTENTS Conclusion 397 Appendices i. Chronology of the main events mentioned in the text between August 1678 and June 1679 402 z. The Organization of the English Province of the Society of Jesus (1678-85) 407 3. The Test Acts 409 4. The Parliaments of the Popish Plot and the Exclusion Crisis 412 5. The Oath to be sworn by subscribers to the Protestant Association' 413 Bibliography 4i5 Index 445 Illustrations 1. Engraved frontispiece portrait of Titus Oates and title page to his True Narrative of the Horrid Plot, 1679 (Birmingham University Library, Special Collections) 28 2. L'Estrange as the dog Towzer in the engraving Strange's Case, late Strang^ Altered, 1680 (British Library) 49 3. Detail from the engraving Strange's Case Strangly Altered, 1680 (British Library) 50 4. L'Estrange as the dog Towzer in the engraving A Prospect of a Popish Successor, 1681 (British Library) 51 5. Detail from the engraving ./4 Prospect of a Popish Successor, 1681 (British Library) 52 6. John Grove and Thomas Pickering taken from the broadside A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish Plot, 1682 (British Library) 72 7. Thomas Whitebread and Thomas Pickering taken from the broadside A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish Plot, 1682 (British Library) 73 8. Engraving of the 1680 pope-burning procession, The Solemn Mock Procession of the Pope CardinallsJesuits Fryers &c, 1680 (British Library) 99 9. Title page and frontispiece to Sir Robert Filmer's Patrircha, 1680 (British Library) 114 10. An edition of L'Estrange's Observator, 1682 (British Library) 119 11. L'Estrange's frontispiece portrait in the Observator, 1684 (British Library) 120 12. John Michael Wright's portrait of L'Estrange, 1680 (National Portrait Gallery) 129 13. Polysyllabic vocabulary lesson in Benjamin Harris's Protestant Tutor, 1679 (British Library) 133 14. Guy Faulks taken from The Protestants Vade Mecum: or Popery display'd in its Proper Colours, 1680 (British Library) 149 x ILLUSTRATIONS 15. A dark lantern taken from the broadside A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish Plot, 1682 (British Library) 150 16. Tide page from the first volume of Henry Care's Weekly Pacquet of Advicefrom Rome, 1679 (British Library) 154 17. Detail from the frontispiece to Gilbert Burnet's An Abridgement of the History of the Reformation, 1681 (British Library) 159 Detail from the Solemn Mock Procession of the Pope Cardinals Jesuits Fryars &c, 1680 (British Library) 160 Detail from the Solemn Mock Procession of the Pope CardinalsJesuits Fryars &°c, 1680 (British Library) 179 Detail from the Solemn Mock Procession of the Pope Cardinals fesuits Fryars <&c, 1680 (British Library) 194 Roger L'Estrange, The Committee, 1680 (British Library) 195 Edward Coleman and Titus Oates taken from A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish-Plot, 1682 (British Library) 214 2 3. An Elegie on the Right Worshipful Sir Edmund-Bury Godfrey published by Benjamin Harris, 1678 (British Library) 240 24. Henry Care, An Elegie Sacred to the Memory of Sir Edmund-Bury Godfrey published by Langley Curtis, 1678 (British Library) 241 25. Title page of William Lloyd's A Sermon at the Funeral of Sir Edmund-Bury Godfrey, 1678 (British Library) 242 26. Engraved frontispiece of Miles Prance and title page to his True Narrative and Discovery of Several Remarkable Passages relating to the Horrid Popish Plot, 1679 (Birmingham University Library, Special Collections) 252 27. Edmund Berry Godfrey's body from A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish-Plot, 1682 (British Library) 25 8 28. Sedan chair leaving Somerset House from A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish 1682 Popish-Plot, (British Library) 259 29. The alleged attack on Justice Arnold from The Popes Dolefull Lamentation for the unfortunate Miscariage of his severall Late Plotts, 1682 (British Library) 272 30. Title page to VoxPopuli, 1681 (British Library) 336 31. Title page to Vox Regis, 1681 (British Library) 338 Italicized in Vox 32. typography Regis, 1681 (British Library) 341 33. Frontispiece and title page to the 1682 reprint of Basilikon Doron (British Library) 344 34. Contemporary engraving of the Monument to the 1666 fire (Guildhall Library, London) 362 ILLUSTRATIONS XI 3 5. Engraving of Caius Gabriel Cibber's allegorical carving on the Monument (Guildhall Library, London) 363 36. Title page of Benjamin Harris's Protestant Tutor, 1679 (British Library) 367 37. Frontispiece of William Bedloe and title page to his Narrative and Impartial Discovery of the Horrid Popish Plot, 1679 (Birmingham University Library, Special Collections) 380.