Page:Essay on the First Principles of Government 2nd Ed.djvu/157

 at length, fix a popish pretender upon the throne of these kingdoms. Seriously as this argument for persecution might have been urged formerly, I cannot help thinking that, ever since the last rebellion, the apprehension on which it is grounded, is become absolutely chimerical, and therefore that it does not deserve a serious answer. After the pope himself has refused to acknowledge the heir of the Stuart family to be king of England, what can a papist, as such, have to plead for him? And, for my own part, I make no doubt, there are men of good sense among the popish gentry, at least, and persons of property of that persuasion, as well as among persons of other religious professions; and therefore, that if they lay under fewer civil disadvantages, they would not only chearfully acquiesce in, but would become zealously attached to our excellent form of free government; and that, upon any emergency, they would bravely stand up for it, protestant as it is, in opposition to any popish system of arbitrary power whatever.