An Essay on Projects | Page 5

one was Mr. Foe, the other Mr. D. Foe. He may have meant
to write much, and wishing to be a friend to his country, meant also to
deprive punsters of the opportunity of calling him a Foe. Whatever his
chief reason for the change, we may be sure that it was practical.
In April, 1687, James the Second issued a Declaration for Liberty of
Conscience in England, by which he suspended penal laws against all
Roman Catholics and Nonconformists, and dispensed with oaths and
tests established by the law. This was a stretch of the king's prerogative

that produced results immediately welcome to the Nonconformists,
who sent up addresses of thanks. Defoe saw clearly that a king who is
thanked for overruling an unwelcome law has the whole point
conceded to him of right to overrule the law. In that sense he wrote, "A
Letter containing some Reflections on His Majesty's Declaration for
Liberty of Conscience," to warn the Nonconformists of the great
mistake into which some were falling. "Was ever anything," he asked
afterwards, "more absurd than this conduct of King James and his party,
in wheedling the Dissenters; giving them liberty of conscience by his
own arbitrary dispensing authority, and his expecting they should be
content with their religious liberty at the price of the Constitution?" In
the letter itself he pointed out that "the king's suspending of laws strikes
at the root of this whole Government, and subverts it quite. The Lords
and Commons have such a share in it, that no law can be either made,
repealed, or, which is all one, suspended, but by their consent."
In January, 1688, Defoe having inherited the freedom of the City of
London, took it up, and signed his name in the Chamberlain's book, on
the 26th of that month, without the "de," "Daniel Foe." On the 5th of
November, 1688, there was another landing, that of William of Orange,
in Torbay, which threatened the government of James the Second.
Defoe again rode out, met the army of William at Henley-on- Thames,
and joined its second line as a volunteer. He was present when it was
resolved, on the 13th of February, 1689, that the flight of James had
been an abdication; and he was one of the mounted citizens who
formed a guard of honour when William and Mary paid their first visit
to Guildhall.
Defoe was at this time twenty-eight years old, married, and living in a
house at Tooting, where he had also been active in foundation of a
chapel. From hose factor he had become merchant adventurer in trade
with Spain, and is said by one writer of his time to have been a
"civet-cat merchant." Failing then in some venture in 1692, he became
bankrupt, and had one vindictive creditor who, according to the law of
those days, had power to shut him in prison, and destroy all power of
recovering his loss and putting himself straight with the world. Until
his other creditors had conquered that one enemy, and could give him
freedom to earn money again and pay his debts-- when that time came
he proved his sense of honesty to much larger than the letter of the

law--Defoe left London for Bristol, and there kept out of the way of
arrest. He was visible only on Sunday, and known, therefore, as "the
Sunday Gentleman." His lodging was at the Red Lion Inn, in Castle
Street. The house, no longer an inn, still stands, as numbers 80 and 81
in that street. There Defoe wrote this Essay on Projects." He was there
until 1694, when he received offers that would have settled him
prosperously in business at Cadiz, but he held by his country. The
cheek on free action was removed, and the Government received with
favour a project of his, which is not included in the Essay, "for raising
money to supply the occasions of the war then newly begun." He had
also a project for the raising of money to supply his own occasions by
the establishment of pantile works, which proved successful. Defoe
could not be idle. In a desert island he would, like his Robinson Crusoe,
have spent time, not in lamentation, but in steady work to get away.
H. M.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

TO DALBY THOMAS, ESQ., One of the Commission's for Managing
His majesty's Duties on Glass, &c
SIR,
This Preface comes directed to you, not as commissioner, &c., under
whom I have the honour to serve his Majesty, nor as a friend, though I
have great obligations of that sort also, but as the most proper judge of
the subjects treated of, and more capable than the greatest part of
mankind to distinguish and understand them.
Books are useful only to such whose genius are