That Declaration smote my heart, as particularly addressed to me; and I took it as a command laid upon me by God himself.

Whereupon I made a solemn vow to God that, as far as Latin and French could go in the world, I would make the justice of the King's and the Church's cause to be known, especially to the Protestants of France and the Low Countries, whom the King's enemies did chiefly labour to seduce and misinform.

To pay my vow, I first made this book" [entitled originally "_Apologie de la Religion Reformee, et de la Monarchie et de I'Eglise d'Angleterre, contre les Calomnies de la Ligue Rebelle de quelques Anglois et Ecossois_"; but in an imperfect English translation the title was afterwards changed into "_History of the Presbyterians_", and in the second French edition, on a copy of which Du Moulin was now writing, it became "_Histoire des Nouveaux Presbyteriens, Anglois et Ecossois_"]--which was begun "at York, during the siege [i.e.June 1644, just before Marston Moor], in a room whose chimney was beaten down by the cannon while I was at my work; and, after the siege and my expulsion from my Rectory at Wheldrake, it was finished in an underground cellar, where I lay hid to avoid warrants that were out against me from committees to apprehend me and carry me prisoner to Hull.

Having finished the book, I sent it to be printed in Holland by the means of an officer of the Master of the Posts at London, Mr.
Pompeo Calandrini, who was doing great and good services to the King in that place.

But, the King being dead, and the face of public businesses altered, I sent for my MS.