LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP SHARP. 379 



No doubt can be made but his reason for 

 this was the ill use that would have been made 

 of such a concession by our dissenters at home ; 

 and perhaps by some others too, who, not con- 

 sidering the difference there is between the case 

 of the Protestant Churches abroad, and our dis- 

 senting co7igregations here in England, might 

 argue loosely from it, that he could, in point 

 of conscience, were that only considered, oc- 

 casionally conform to the Presbyterian way of 

 worship in our meeting-houses ; which, as it 

 was far from his thoughts when he made the 

 aforesaid declaration, he prudently endeavoured 

 to keep it out of other people's thoughts too, 

 by not consenting to the publication of those 

 words, unless he had also added an explanation 

 of them, with respect to our non- conformists at 

 home. 



What it was that he said in the House of 

 Lords by way of comparison between the 

 usage of Protestants abroad in Roman Catholic 

 countries, and our treatment of the English 

 Roman Catholics at home, which could occa- 

 sion a scandalous passage in a French book 

 printed at Brussels or Antwerp in 1703, and 

 styled Les Interests de VAngleterre mal-entendus 

 dans la Guerre presente; or whether he spoke 

 any thing at all that might be a foundation for 

 the calumny, is quite uncertain. Only thus 



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