While he was vice-chancellor of Oxford, a story was raised against Owen, that he had spoken contemptuously of the Lord's Prayer, and that he had put on his hat when it was on some occasion repeated at the close of the services in Christ Church. The slander was widely propagated, and Owen published a denial of the story, in English and French, in 1655. Meric Casaubon, nevertheless, published in 16G0 a work in defence of the Lord's Prayer, and against their " ungrounded zeal who are so strict for the oh3ervation of the Lord's Day and make so light of the Lord's Prayer." Vernon, too, revived the slander, and Owen again gives it an emphatic contradiction in the following Letter ; and yet Anthony Wood persists in it I — Ed.
EEFLECTIONS ON A SLANDEEOUS LIBEL.
Sir, It is upon your desire, and not in any compliance with my own judgment or inclination, that I have taken a little consideration of a late slanderous libel published against me. I have learned, I bless God, to bear and pass by such reproaches without much trouble to myself or giving the least unto others. My mind and conscience are not at all concerned in them ; and so far as my reputation seems to be so, I am very willing to let it go, for I cannot entertain a valua- tion of their good opinion whose minds are capable of an impression from such virulent calumnies. Besides, I know that there is no- thing absolutely new in these things under the sun. Others also have met with the like entertainment in the world in all ages; whose names I shall not mention, to avoid the envy in comparing myself with them, I acknowledge that it is a dictate of the law of nature, that where others do us open wrong, we should do ourselves right so far as we lawfully may ; but I know also that it is in the power of every one to forego the prosecution of his own right and the vindi- cation of himself, if thereby there arise no detriment unto others. That which alone in this case may be feared is, lest offence should be taken against my person to the disadvantage of other endeavours wherein I desire to be useful in the world.
But against this also I have the highest security, from that indig- nation and contempt wherewith this libel is entertained by all per- sons of ingenuity and sobriety. Not out of any respect, therefore, to myself or my own name (things of little or no consideration in or to the world), nor out of a desire that this paper should ever pass far- ther than to your own hand and thence to the fire, but to give you some account of this pamphlet, whose author it seems is known unto you, I have both perused it and made some short reflections upon it, which I have herewith sent unto you.
The whole design of this discourse is, " per fas et nefas," to en- deavour the defamation of a person who, to his knowledge, never saw the author of it, and is fully assured never gave him the least provocation unto any such attempt; for when I am told who he is, I am as wise and knowing unto all his concernments as I was before.
272 REFLECTIONS ON A SLANDEROUS LIBEL.
And yet it is not only my reputation, but, considering my present state and condition, with the nature of his libellous aspersions, my further outward trouble in the world, that he aimeth at; from Avhich he seemeth to be much displeased that I am secured by the right- eousness of the government and laws under which I live. Now, how- ever he pleased himself in this attempt, yet there is no man but may give as tolerable an account, by the law of God, the customs of civilized nations, and in the estimation of wise and honest men, of robbing persons on the highway and spoiling them of their goods, as he can do of this undertaking. It is true, some others have of late dealt not much otherwise with me ; wherein how far they have satis- fied themselves and others time will discover. But yet, accordiug to the present custom and manner of men, they may give some tolerable pretence to Avhat they have done; for they sufficiently de- clare that they were provoked by me, — though no such thing was intended, — and it is abundantly manifest that they had no other way left them to give countenance unto some fond imaginations, which they have unadvisedly published, but by petulant reviling of him by whom they thought they were detected. And such things have not been unfrequent in the world. But as for this author, one wholly un- known to me, without the compass of any pretence of the least pro- vocation from me, to accommodate the lusts and revenges of others with that unruly evil, a mercenary tongue, full of deadly poison, without the management of any difference, real or pretended, merely to calumniate and load me with false aspersions (as in the issue they will prove), is an instance of such a depraved disposition of mind, such a worthless baseness of soul, such a neglect of all rules of moral- ity and principles of human conversation, such a contempt of Scrip- ture precepts innumerable, as, it may be, can scarcely be paralleled in an age amongst the vilest of men. Something, I confess, of this nature is directed unto in the casuistical divinity or modern policy of the Jesuits: for they have declared it lawful to reproach and calum- niate any one who hath done them an injury, or otherwise reflected on the honour of their society; and notable instances of their ma- nagement of this principle are given us by the ingenious discoverer of their mysteries. But they always require a previous injury or provocation to justify themselves in this filthy kind of revenge. And hereby is our author freed from the suspicion of having been influ- enced by their suggestions ; for he hath gone in a way whereon they never attempted to set a foot before him, and, scorning a villany that hath a precedent, he seems to design himself an example in the art of sycophantry. However, the same author hath directed men unto the best way of returning an answer unto false and calumnious ac- cusations, whatever be their occasion ; for he tells us that Valerianus