Another class remains, including Vincent Alsop and Stephen Lobb; the former being drawn into “some high flights” of loyal flattery in return for a Royal pardon granted to his son; the latter showing himself contemptibly obsequious in his approaches to the King, and receiving in consequence the appellation of the “Jacobite Independent.” Of the favourable addresses then presented, one from the Anabaptists in and about the City of London came first:[179] One from the Presbyterians in the same neighbourhood came next. This, whilst giving thanks for the Indulgence, expressed a hope that the two Houses of Parliament would concur in the measure.[180] The Quakers said the Declaration did the less surprise them, because it was what some of them had known to be the principle of the King long before he came to the throne.[181] In some of these compositions very eulogistic terms appear. The loyal subjects of the Congregational persuasion in Ipswich, and other towns of Suffolk, displayed a curiously rhetorical style. “The shields of the earth,” said they, “belong unto God, He hath made you a covering cherub to us, under whose refreshing shadow we promise ourselves rest.”[182] The Dissenters of Malden in Essex spoke of the great service God designed to accomplish by His Majesty, “the blossoming whereof is now made visible in your celebrated wisdom, in hapning (_sic_) upon the most melodious harp to charm all evil spirits, that many other princes had no skill to use.”[183] Some Dissenters, in and about the City of London, exceeded their brethren in extravagance. “Your Majesty,” they declared, “hath distinguished and set the bounds of your own dominion from that of heaven itself. You have given to God and man their due, and yet preserved your own right.”[184] Who were the persons engaged in drawing up these adulatory compositions, by what kind of people, and by how many they were signed, we have no method of ascertaining; but it is more than probable, that Court agents employed the most insinuating arts to secure their production. Addresses to the King were for a twelvemonth all the fashion. They were presented by all sorts of people, who vied with each other in most absurd expressions of loyalty. The Company of Cooks were pre-eminent in their laudations, and praised the Indulgence as resembling the Almighty’s manna, which suited every man’s palate; and they declared “that men’s different gustos might as well be forced, as their different apprehensions about religion.”[185] In some cases the compliments of the subject were matched by the complaisance of the Sovereign; and in answer to a Presbyterian address he professed he had no other design than toleration, and “hoped to see the day when the people should have a _Magna Charta_ for liberty of conscience, as well as for the protection of their property.” [Sidenote: 1687.]