It is now, near fourteen years…that the glory and peace of the purest and most flourishing Church in the world has been eclipsed, buffeted, and disturbed by a sort of men, whom, GOD in His Providence, has suffered to insult over her, and bring her down. These have been the days of her humiliation and tribulation. She has borne with an invincible patience, the reproach of the wicked: and GOD has at last heard her prayers, and delivered her from the oppression of the stranger.

And now, they find their Day is over! Their power gone! And the throne of this nation possessed by a Royal, English, true, and ever constant member of, and friend to, the Church of England! Now, they find that they are in danger of the Church of England's just resentments! Now, they cry out, "Peace!" "Union!" "Forbearance!" and "Charity!": as if the Church had not too long harboured her enemies under her wing! And nourished the viperous blood, till they hiss and fly in the face of the Mother that cherished them! (The Shortest Way with the Dissenters)

Basic Set Up:

In this satire, Defoe shows just how overzealous defenders of the Church of England could be. Though he himself doesn't actually approve of these defenders of the Church, he's speaking in the voice of a defender of the Church here in order to criticize it.

In this tract, Daniel Defoe is pretending to side with the Church of England. Just pretending, people: Defoe himself was actually a "dissenter," or a "Nonconformist." He disagreed with the way that the doctrines of the Church of England were imposed on everyone, regardless of whether they agreed with them or not.

So Defoe is actually criticizing the Church here, and he's specifically criticizing the way in which critics of the Church were persecuted at the time.

We told you those Augustans were really into satire. By writing in the tone of a very enthusiastic defender of the Church of England, Defoe is actually making fun of all those people who stood up for the Church in such a red-blooded way, regardless of whether the Church's actions and doctrines were correct or not. The function of the satire is to reveal just how ridiculous all those defenders of the Church are.