A petition being presented to the house by the lustring company, against certain merchants who had smuggled alamodes and lustrings from France, even during the war; the committee of trade was directed to inquire into the allegations, and all the secrets of this traffic were detected.

Upon the report the house resolved, That the manufacture of alamodes and lustrings set up in England had been beneficial to the kingdom; that there had been a destructive and illegal trade carried on during the war, for importing these commodities, by which the king had been defrauded of his customs, and the English manufactures greatly discouraged; that, by the smuggling vessels employed in this trade, intelligence had been carried into France during the war, and the enemies of the government conveyed from justice.

Stephen Seignoret Rhene, Baudoin, John Goodet, Nicholas Santini, Peter de Hearse, John Pierce, John Dumaitre, and David Barreau, were impeached at the bar of the house of lords; and, pleading guilty, the lords imposed fines upon them according to their respective circumstances.

They were in the meantime committed to Newgate until those fines should be paid; and the commons addressed the king, that the money might be appropriated to the maintenance of Greenwich hospital.
The house having taken cognizance of this affair, and made some new regulations in the prosecution of the African trade, presented a solemn address to the king, representing the general degeneracy and corruption of the age, and beseeching his majesty to command all his judges, justices, and magistrates, to put the laws in execution against profaneness and immorality.

The king professed himself extremely well pleased with this remonstrance, promised to give immediate directions for a reformation, and expressed his desire that some more effectual provision might be made for suppressing impious books, containing doctrines against the Trinity; doctrines which abounded at this period, and took their origin from the licentiousness and profligacy of the times.
SOCIETY FOR THE REFOrMATION OF MANNERS.
In the midst of such immorality, Dr.Thomas Bray, an active divine, formed a plan for propagating the gospel in foreign countries.
Missionaries, catechisms, liturgies, and other books for the instruction of ignorant people, were sent to the English colonies in America.