Parliament of Scotland to an Act acknowledging and ratifying the Acts of the Convention of Estates of Scotland called by the Council and Conservers of the Peace and the Commissioners of the Common Burthens and assembled the Two and Twentieth day of June 1643. and several times continued since and of the Parliament of the Kingdom since convened XIII That the Lords and Commons in the Parliament of England assembled shall during the space of twenty years from the first of July 1646. Arm Train and Discipline or cause to be Armed Trained and Disciplined all the Forces of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed already raised both for Sea and Land-service and shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years raise levy arm train and discipline or cause to be raised levied armed trained and disciplined any other Forces for Land and Sea-service in the Kingdoms Dominions and Places aforesaid as in their judgments they shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years think fit and appoint and that neither the King His Heirs or Successors nor any other but such as shall Act by the Authority or Approbation of the said Lords and Commons shall during the said space of twenty years exercise any of the Powers aforesaid And the like for the Kingdom of Scotland if the Estates of the Parliament there shall think fit That Moneys be raised and levied for the maintenance and use of the said Forces for Land-service and of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service in such sort and by such ways and means as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years think fit and appoint and not otherwise That all the said Forces both for Land and Sea-service so raised or levied or to be raised or levied and also the Admiralty and Navy shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years be imployed managed ordered and disposed by the said Lords and Commons in such sort and by such ways and means as they shall think fit and appoint and not otherwise And the said Lords and Commons during the said space of twenty years shall have power 1. To suppress all Forces raised or to be raised without Authority and Consent of the said Lords and Commons to the disturbance of the publick Peace of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them 2. To suppress any Foreign Forces who shall invade or endeavour to invade the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them 3. To conjoyn such Forces of the Kingdom of England with the Forces of the Kingdom of Scotland as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of Twenty years judge fit and necessary to resist all Forreign Invasions and to suppress any Forces raised or to be raised against or within either of the said Kingdoms to the disturbance of the Publick Peace of the said Kingdoms or any of them by any Authority under the Great Seal or other Warrant whatsoever without Consent of the said Lords and Commons of the Parliament of England and the Parliament or the Estates of the Parliament of Scotland respectively and that no Forces of either Kingdom shall go into or continue in the other Kingdom without the Advice and Desire of the said Lords and Commons of the Parliament of England and the Parliament of the Kingdom of Scotland or such as shall be by them appointed for that purpose And that after the expiration of the said Twenty years neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any person or persons by colour or pretence of any Commission Power Deputation or Authority to be derived from the King His Heirs or Successors or any of them shall raise arm train discipline imploy order manage disband or dispose any of the Forces by Sea or Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of VVales Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed nor exercise any of the said Powers or Authorities in the precedent Articles mentioned and expressed to be during the said space of Twenty years in the said Lords and Commons nor do any Act or thing concerning the execution of the said Powers or Authorities or any of them without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons first had and obtained That after the expiration of the said Twenty years in all Cases wherein the Lords and Commons shall declare the Safety of the Kingdom to be concerned and shall thereupon pass any Bill or Bills for the raising arming training disciplining imploying managing ordering or disposing of the Forces by Sea or Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of Wales Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any part of the said Forces or concerning the Admiralty and Navy or concerning the levying of Moneys for the raising maintenance or use of the said Forces for Land-service or of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service or of any part of them and if that the Royal Assent to such Bill or Bills shall not be given in the House of Peers within such time after the passing thereof by both Houses of Parliament as the said Houses shall judge fit and convenient that then such Bill or Bills so passed by the said Lords and Commons as aforesaid and to which the Royal Assent shall not be given as is herein before expressed shall nevertheless after declaration of the said Lords and Commons made in that behalf have the force and strength of an Act or Acts of Parliament and shall be as valid to all intents and purposes as if the Royal Assent had been given thereunto Provided that nothing herein before contained shall extend to the taking away of the ordinary Legal power of Sheriffs Justices of Peace Maiors Bailifs Coroners Constables Headboroughs or other Officers of Justice not being military Officers concerning the Administration of Justice so as neither the said Sheriffs Justices of the Peace Maiors Bailiffs Coroners Constables Headboroughs and other Officers nor any of them do levy conduct imploy or command any Forces whatsoever by colour or pretence of any Commission of Array or extraordinary command from His Majesty His Heirs or Successors without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons And if any persons shall be gathered and assembled together in warlike manner or otherwise to the Number of Thirty persons and shall not forthwith disband themselves being required thereto by the said Lords and Commons or command from them or any by them especially authorized for that purpose then such person and persons not so disbanding themselves shall be guilty and incur the pains of High
and Consent of the said Lords and Commons or of such Committees or Council in the Intervals of Parliament as they shall appoint 3. That during the same space of ten years the said Lords and Commons may by Bill or Ordinance raise and dispose of what Moneys and for what Forces they shall from time to time find necessary as also for payment of the Publick Debts and Damages and for all other the Publick uses of the Kingdom 4. And to the end the temporary Security intended by the three particulars last precedent may be the better assured it may therefore be provided That no Subjects that have been in Hostility against the Parliament in the late War shall be capable of bearing any Office of Power or publick Trust in the Commonwealth during the space of five years without Consent of Parliament or of the Council of State or to sit as Members or Assistants of either House of Parliament until the second Biennial Parliament be past III. For the present form of disposing the Militia in order to the Peace and Safety of this Kingdom and the Service of Ireland 1. That there be Commissioners for the Admiralty a Vice-Admiral and Rere-Admiral now to be agreed on with power for the forming regulating appointing of Officers and providing for the Navy and for ordering the same to and in the ordinary Service of the Kingdom and that there be a sufficient provision and establishment for Pay and maintenance thereof 2. That there be a General for Command of the Land-Forces that are to be in pay both in England Ireland and Wales both for Field and Garrison 3. That there be Commissioners in the several Counties for the standing Militia of the respective Counties consisting of Trained Bands and Auxiliaries not in pay with power for the proportioning forming regulating training and disciplining of them 4. That there be a Council of State with power to superintend and direct the several and particular powers of the Militia last mentioned for the Peace and Safety of this Kingdom and of Ireland 5. That the same Council may have power as the King 's Privy Council for and in all Forreign Negotiations provided That the making of War or Peace with any other Kingdom or State shall not be without the Advice and Consent of Parliament 6. That the said power of the Council of State be put into the hands of trusty and able persons now to be agreed on and the same persons to continue in that power si bene se gesserint for a certain Term not exceeding seven years 7. That there be a sufficient establishment now provided for the Salary Forces both in England and Ireland the establishment to continue until two Months after the meeting of the first Biennial Parliament IV. That an Act be passed for disposing the great Offices for ten years by the Lords and Commons in Parliament or by such Committees as they shall appoint for that purpose in the Intervals with submission to the Approbation of the next Parliament and after ten years they to nominate three and the King out of that number to appoint one for the succession upon any vacancy V. That an Act be passed for restraining of any Peers made since the 21. day of May 1642. or to be hereafter made from having any power to sit or vote in Parliament without Consent of both Houses VI. That an Act be passed for recalling and making void all Declarations and other Proceedings against the Parliament or against any that have acted by or under their Authority in the late War or in relation to it and that the Ordinances for Indemnity may be confirmed VII That an Act be passed for making void all Grants c. under the Great Seal that was conveyed away from the Parliament since the time that it was so conveyed away except as in the Parliaments Propositions and for making those valid that have been or shall be passed under the Great Seal made by the Authority of both Houses of Parliament VIII That an Act be passed for Confirmation of the Treaties between the two Kingdoms of England and Scotland and for appointing Conservators of the Peace betwixt them IX That the Ordinance for taking away the Court of Wards and Liveries be confirmed by Act of Parliament Provided His Majesties Revenue be not damnified therein nor those that last held Offices in the same left without reparation some other way X. An Act to declare void the Cessation of Ireland c. and to leave the prosecution of that War to the Lords and Commons in the Parliament of England XI An Act to be passed to take away all Coercive Power Authority and Jurisdiction of Bishops and all other Ecclesiastical Officers whatsoever extending to any Civil Penalties upon any and to repeal all Laws whereby the Civil Magistracy hath been or is bound upon any Ecclesiastical Censure to proceed ex officio unto any Civil Penalties against any persons so censured XII That there be a repeal of all Acts or Clauses in any Act enjoyning the use of the Book of Common Prayer and imposing any Penalties for neglect thereof as also of all Acts or Clauses in any Act imposing any penalty for not coming to Church or for Meetings elsewhere for Prayer or other Religious Duties Exercises or Ordinances and some other provision to be made for discovering of Papists and Popish Recusants and for disabling of them and of all Jusuites or Priests from disturbing the State XIII That the taking of the Covenant be not enforced upon any nor any penalties imposed upon the Refusors whereby men might be constrained to take it against their Judgments or Consciences but all Orders or Ordinances tending to that purpose to be repealed XIV That the things here before proposed being provided for settling and securing the Rights Liberties Peace and Safety of the Kingdom His Majesties Person His Queen and Royal Issue may be restored to a Condition of Safety Honour and Freedom in this Nation without diminution to their Personal Rights or further Limitation to the Exercise of the Regal Power than according to the particulars aforegoing XV. For the matter of Compositions 1. That a less number out of the Persons excepted in the two first Qualifications not exceeding five for the English being nominated particularly by the Parliament who together with the persons in the Irish Rebellion included in the third Qualification may be reserved to the future Judgment of the Parliament as they shall find cause all other excepted persons may be remitted from the Exception and admitted to Composition 2. That the Rates for all future Compositions may be lessened and limitted not to exceed the several proportions hereafter exprest respectively That is to say 1. For all persons formerly excepted not above a third part 2. For the late Members of Parliament under the first Branch of the fourth Qualification in the Propositions a fourth part 3. For other Members of Parliament in the second and third Branches of the
Proclamations and other Proceedings against it to be void An Act concerning Peers lately made and hereafter to be made An Act concerning the Adjournments of both Houses of Parliament Soit baillé aux Seigneurs A ceste Bille les Seigneurs sont assentuz An Act concerning the Raising settling and maintaining Forces by Sea and by Land within the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of VVales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed BE it Enacted by the King's Majesty and by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament and by Authority of the same That the Lords and Commons in the Parliament of England now assembled or hereafter to be assembled shall during the space of twenty years from the first of November 1647. Arm Train and Discipline or cause to be Armed Trained and Disciplined all the Forces of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed already raised both for Sea and Land service and shall appoint all Commanders and Officers for the said Forces and shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years raise levy arm train and discipline or cause to be raised levied armed trained and disciplined any other Forces for Land and Sea-service in the Kingdoms Dominions and Places aforesaid as in their judgments they shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years think fit and appoint and shall from time to time appoint all Commanders and Officers for the said Forces or remove them as they shall see cause and shall likewise nominate appoint place or displace as they shall see cause all Commanders and Officers within the several Garrisons Forts and Places of strength as shall be within the Kingdoms of England Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and Town of Barwick upon Tweed and that neither the King His Heirs or Successors nor any other but such as shall act by the Authority or Approbation of the said Lords and Commons shall during the said space of twenty years exercise any of the powers aforesaid And be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid That Moneys be raised and levied for the maintenance and use of the said Forces for Land-service and of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service in such sort and by such ways and means as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years think fit and appoint and not otherwise and that all the said Forces both for Land and Sea-service so raised or levied or to be raised or levied and also the Admiralty and Navy shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years be imployed managed ordered disposed or disbanded by the said Lords and Commons in such sort and by such ways and means as they shall think fit and appoint and not otherwise And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That the said Lords and Commons during the said space of twenty years shall have power in such sort and by such ways and means as they shall think fit and appoint to suppress all Forces raised or to be raised without Authority and Consent of the said Lords and Commons to the disturbance of the Publick Peace of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them and also to suppress any Forreign Forces who shall invade or endeavour to invade the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them and likewise to conjoyn such Forces of the Kingdom of England with the Forces of the Kingdom of Scotland as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of twenty years judg fit and necessary to resist all Forreign Invasions and to suppress any Forces raised or to be raised against or within either of the said Kingdoms to the disturbance of the Publick Peace of the said Kingdoms or any of them by any Authority under the Great Seal or other Warrant whatsoever without consent of the said Lords and Commons of the Parliament of England and the Parliament or the Estates of the Parliament of Scotland respectively and that no Forces of either Kingdoms shall go into or continue in the other Kingdom without the Advice and desire of the said Lords and Commons of the Parliament of England and the Parliament of the Kingdom of Scotland or such as shall be by them respectively appointed for that purpose And be it Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That after the expiration of the said twenty years neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any person or persons by colour or pretence of any Commission Power Deputation or Authority to be derived from the King His Heirs or Successors or any of them shall raise arm train discipline imploy order manage disband or dispose any of the Forces by Sea and Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of Wales Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or of any of them nor exercise any of the said Powers or Authorities before-mentioned and expressed to be during the said space of twenty years in the said Lords and Commons nor do any act or thing concerning the Execution of the said Powers or Authorities or any of them without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons first had and obtained And be it further also Enacted That after the expiration of the said twenty years in all cases wherein the said Lords and Commons shall declare the Safety of the Kingdom to be concerned and shall thereupon pass any Bill or Bills for the raising arming training disciplining imploying managing ordering or disposing of the Forces by Sea or Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of Wales Isles of Gernsey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or of any part of the said Forces or concerning the said Admiralty or Navy or concerning the levying of Moneys for the raising maintenance or use of the said Forces for Land service or of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service or of any part of them and if that the Royal Assent to such Bill or Bills shall not be given in the House of Peers within such time after the passing thereof by both Houses of Parliament as the said Houses shall judge fit and convenient that then such Bill or Bills so passed by the said Lords and Commons as aforesaid and to which the Royal Assent shall not be given as is herein before expressed shall nevertheless after Declaration of the said Lords and Commons made in that behalf have the force and strength of an Act or Acts of Parliament and shall be as valid to all intents and purposes as if the Royal Assent had been given
upon Tweed already raised both for Sea and Land service and shall from time to time during the space of ten years raise levy arm train and discipline or cause to be raised levied armed trained and disciplined any other Forces for Land and Sea service in the Kingdoms Dominions and places aforesaid as in their judgments they shall from time to time during the said spaceof ten years think fit to appoint and that neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any other but such as shall Act by the Authority or approbation of the said Lords and Commons shall during the said space of ten years exercise any of the powers aforesaid That Monies be raised and levied for the maintenance and use of the said Forces for Land-service and of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service in such sort and by such ways and means as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of ten years think fit and appoint and not otherwise That all the said Forces both for Land and Sea-service so raised or levied or to be raised or levied and also the Admiralty and Navy shall from time to time during the said space of ten years be imployed managed ordered and disposed by the Lords and Commons in such sort and by such ways and means as they shall think fit and appoint and not otherwise And the said Lords and Commons or such as they shall appoint during the said space of ten years shall have power 1. To suppress all Forces raised or to be raised without authority and consent of the said Lords and Commons to the disturbance of the publick Peace of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them 2. To suppress any foreign Forces who shall invade or indeavour to invade the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed or any of them And after the expiration of the said ten years neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any person or persons by colour or pretence of any Commission power deputation or authority to be derived from the King His Heirs or Successors or any of them shall without the consent of the said Lords and Commons raise arm train discipline imploy order manage disband or dispose any the Forces by Sea or Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of Wales Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Barwick upon Tweed nor exercise any of the said powers or authorities herein before-mentioned and expressed to be during the space of ten years in the said Lords and Commons nor do any act or any thing concerning the execution of the said powers or authorities or any of them without the consent of the said Lords and Commons first had and obtained And with the same Provisoes for saving the ordinary legal power of Officers of Justice not being Military Officers as is set down in your Propositions and with a Declaration That if any persons shall be gathered and assembled together in a warlike manner or otherwise to the number of thirty persons and shall not forthwith disperse themselves being required thereto by the said Lords and Commons or command from them or any by them especially authorized for that purpose then such person or persons not so dispersing themselves shall be guilty and incur the pains of high Treason being first declared guilty of such offence by the said Lords and Commons any Commission under the Great Seal or other Warrant to the contrary notwithstanding and he or they that shall so offend herein to be uncapable of any pardon from His Majesty His Heirs or Successors And likewise that it be provided that the City of London shall have and enjoy all their Rights Liberties c. in raising and imploying the Forces of that City in such sort as is mentioned in the said Proposition With these Provisoes following to be inserted in the said Act. First That none be compelled to serve in the War against their Wills but in case of coming in of strange Enemies into this Kingdom And that the powers above-mentioned as concerning the Land-Forces other than for keeping up and maintenance of Forts and Garrisons and the keeping up maintaining and pay of this present Army so long as it shall be thought fit by both Houses of Parliament be exercised to no other purposes than for the suppressing of Forces raised or to be raised without authority and consent of the said Lords and Commons as aforesaid or for suppressing of any Foreign Forces which shall invade or endeavour to invade the Kingdoms Dominions or places aforesaid And that the Monies be raised by general and equal Taxations saving that Tunnage and Poundage and such Imposts as have been applyed to the Navy be raised as hath been usual And that all Patents Commissions and other Acts concerning the premisses be made and acted in His Majesties name by Warrant signified by the Lords and Commons or such others as they shall authorize for that purpose If it shall be more satisfactory to His two Houses to have the Militia and powers thereupon depending during the whole time of His Majesty's Reign rather than for the space of ten years His Majesty gives them the election Touching Ireland His Majesty having in the two preceding Propositions given His consent concerning the Church and the Militia there in all things as in England as to all other matters relating to that Kingdom after advice with His two Houses He will leave it to their determination and give His consent accordingly as is herein hereafter expressed Touching publick Debts His Majesty will give His consent to such an Act for raising of Monies by general and equal Taxations for the payment and satisfying the Arrears of the Army publick Debts and engagements of the Kingdom as shall be agreed on by both Houses of Parliament and shall be audited and ascertained by them or such persons as they shall appoint within the space of twelve Months after the passing of an Act for the same His Majesty will consent to an Act that during the said space of ten years the Lord Chancellour or Lord Keeper Commissioners of the Great Seal or Treasury Lord Warden of the Cinque-ports Chancellour of the Exchequer and Dutchy Secretaries of State Master of the Rolls Judges of both Benches and Barons of the Exchequer of England be nominated by both Houses of the Parliament of England to continue quam diu se bene gesserint and in the intervals of Parliament by such others as they shall authorize for that purpose His Majesty will consent that the Militia of the City of London and Liberties thereof during the space of ten years may be in the ordering and Government of the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Commons in the Common Council assembled or such as they shall from time to
and still must pursue those ends and undergo that Charge for which it was first granted to the Crown it having been so long and constantly continued to Our Predecessors as that in four several Acts of Parliament for the granting thereof to King Edward the Sixth Queen Mary Queen Elizabeth and Our blessed Father it is in express terms mentioned to have been had and enjoyed by the several Kings named in those Acts time out of mind by authority of Parliament And therefore upon these reasons We held it agreeable to Our Kingly Honour and necessary for the safety and good of Our Kingdom to continue the receipt thereof as so many of Our Predecessors had done Wherefore when a few Merchants being at first but one or two fomented as it is well known by those evil Spirits that would have hatched that undutiful Remonstance began to oppose the payment of Our accustomed duties in the Custom-house We gave order to the Officers of Our Customs to go on notwithstanding that opposition in the receiving of the usual duties and caused those that refused to be warned to attend at the Council-board that by the wisdom and authority of Our Council they might be reduced to obedience and duty where some of them without reverence or respect to the honour and dignity of that presence behaved themselves with such boldness and insolency of speech as was not to be endured by a far meaner Assembly much less to be countenanced by a House of Parliament against the body of Our Privy Council And as in this We did what in honour and reason was fit for the present so Our thoughts were daily intentive upon the re-assembling of Our Parliament with full intention on Our part to take away all ill understanding between Us and Our people whose loves as We desired to continue and preserve so We used Our best endeavours to prepare and facilitate the way to it And to this end having taken a strict and exact survey of Our Government both in the Church and Commonwealth and what things were most fit and necessary to be reformed We found in the first place that much exception had been taken at a book intituled Appello Caesarem or An Appeal to Caesar and published in the year 1625. by Richard Mountague then Batchelour of Divinity and now Bishop of Chichester and because it did open the way to those Schisms and Divisions which have since ensued in the Church We did for remedy and redress thereof and for satisfaction of the Consciences of Our good people not only by Our publick Proclamation call in that Book which ministred matter of offence but to prevent the like danger for hereafter reprinted the Articles of Religion established in the time of Queen Elizabeth of famous memory and by a Declaration before those Articles We did tie and restrain all Opinions to the sense of those Articles that nothing might be left for private fancies and innovation For We call God to record before whom We stand that it is and always hath been Our hearts desire to be found worthy of that Title which We accompt the most glorious in all Our Crown Defender of the Faith neither shall We ever give way to the authorizing of any thing whereby any Innovation may steal or creep into the Church but preserve that unity of Doctrine and Discipline established in the time of Queen Elizabeth whereby the Church of England hath stood and flourished ever since And as We were careful to make up all breaches and rents in Religion at home so did We by Our Proclamation and Commandment for the execution of Laws against Priests and Popish Recusants fortifie all ways and approaches against that foreign Enemy which if it have not succeeded according to Our intention We must lay the fault where it is in the subordinate Officers and Ministers in the Country by whose remissness Jesuites and Priests escape without apprehension and Recusants from those convictions and penalties which the Laws and Our Commandment would have inflicted on them For We do profess that as it is Our duty so it shall be our care to command and direct well but it is the part of others to perform the Ministerial Office And when We have done Our Office We shall account Our Self and all charitable men will accompt Us innocent both to God and Men and those that are negligent We will esteem as culpable both to God and Us and therefore will expect that hereafter they give Us a better accompt And as We have been careful for the setling of Religion and quieting the Church so were We not unmindful of the preservation of the just and ancient Liberties of Our Subjects which We secured to them by Our gracious Answer to the Petition in Parliament having not since that time done any Act whereby to infringe them but Our care is and hereafter shall be to keep them intire and inviolable as We would do Our own Right and Sovereignty having for that purpose enrolled the Petition and Answer in Our Courts of Justice Next to the care of Religion and of Our Subjects Rights We did Our best for the provident and well ordering of that aid and supply which was granted Us the last Session whereof no part hath been wastfully spent nor put to any other use than those for which it was desired and granted as upon payment of Our Fleet and Army wherein Our care hath been such as We chose rather to discontent Our dearest Friends and Allies and Our nearest Servants than to leave Our Souldiers and Mariners unsatisfied whereby any vexation or disquiet might arise to Our people We have also with part of those Moneys begun to supply Our Magazines and stores of Munition and to put Our Navy into a constant form and order Our Fleet likewise is fitting and almost in a readiness whereby the Narrow Seas may be guarded Commerce maintained and Our Kingdom secured from all forein attempts These Acts of Ours might have made this impression in all good minds that We were careful to direct Our counsels and dispose Our actions so as might most conduce to the maintenance of Religion honour of Our Government and safety of Our People But with mischievous men once ill-affected Seu bene seu malè facta premunt and whatsoever once seemed amiss is ever remembred but good endeavours are never regarded Now all these things that were the chief complaints the last Session being by Our Princely care so seriously reformed the Parliament re assembled the twentieth of January last We expecting according to the candor and sincerity of Our own thoughts that men would have framed themselves for the effecting a right understanding between Us and Our people But some few malevolent persons like Empiricks and lewd Artists did strive to make new work and to have some Disease on foot to keep themselves in request and to be imployed and entertained in the Cure And yet to manifest how much offences have been diminished the Committees
the advice of private men or by any unknown or unsworn Counsellors but that such matters as concern the publick and are proper for the High Court of Parliament which is Your Majesties great and supreme Council may be debated resolved and transacted only in Parliament and not elsewhere and such as shall presume to do any thing to the contrary shall be reserved to the censure and judgment of Parliament And such other matters of State as are proper for Your Majesties Privy Council shall be debated and concluded by such of the Nobility and others as shall from time to time be chosen for that place by approbation of both Houses of Parliament And that no publick Act concerning the Affairs of the Kingdom which are proper for Your Privy Council may be esteemed of any validity as proceeding from the Royal Authority unless it be done by the advice and consent of the major part of Your Council attested under their hands And that Your Council my be limited to a certain number not exceeding twenty five nor under fifteen And if any Counsellors place happen to be void in the Intervals of Parliament it shall not be supplied without the assent of the major part of the Council which choice shall be confirmed at the next sitting of the Parliament or else to be void III. That the Lord High Steward of England Lord High Constable Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal Lord Treasure Lord Privy Seal Earl Marshal Lord Admiral Warden of the Cinque-Ports chief Governor of Ireland Chancellor of the Exchequer Master of the Wards Secretaries of State two Chief Justices and Chief Baron may always be chosen with the approbation of both Houses of Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament by assent of the major part of the Council in such manner as is before exprest in the choice of Counsellors IV. That he or they unto whom the government and education of the King's Children shall be committed shall be approved of by both Houses of Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliaments by the assent of the major part of the Council in such manner as is before exprest in the choice of Counsellours And that all such Servants as are now about Them against whom both Houses shall have any just exception shall be removed V. That no Marriage shall be concluded or treated for any of the King's Children with any foreign Prince or other person whatsoever abroad or at home without the consent of Parliament under the penalty of a Praemunire unto such as shall so conclude or treat any Marriage as aforesaid and that the said Penalty shall not be pardoned or dispensed with but by the consent of both Houses of Parliament VI. That the Laws in force against Jesuites Priests and Popish Recusants be strictly put in execution without any toleration or dispensation to the contrary and some more effectual course may be enacted by authority of Parliament to disable them from making any disturbance in the State or eluding the Law by trusts or otherwise VII That the Votes of Popish Lords in the House of Peers may be taken away so long as they continue Papists And that His Majesty would consent to such a Bill as shall be drawn for the Education of the Children of Papists by Protestants in the Protestant Religion VIII That Your Majesty will be pleased to consent that such a Reformation be made in the Church-Government and Liturgy as both Houses of Parliament shall advise wherein they intend to have consultations with Divines as is expressed in their Declaration to that purpose And that your Majesty will contribute Your best assistance to them for the raising of a sufficient maintenance for Preaching Ministers through the Kingdom And that Your Majesty will be pleased to give Your consent to Laws for the taking away of Innovations and Superstition and of Pluralities and against Scandalous Ministers IX That Your Majesty will be pleased to rest satisfied with that course that the Lords and Commons have appointed for ordering the Militia until the same shall be further setled by a Bill And that Your Majesty will recall Your Declarations and Proclamations against the Ordinance made by the Lords and Commons concerning it X. That such Members of either House of Parliament as have during this present Parliament been put out of any Place and Office may either be restored to that Place and Office or otherwise have satisfaction for the same upon the Petition of that House whereof he or they are Members XI That all Privy-Counsellours and Judges may take an Oath the form whereof to be agreed on and setled by Act of Parliament for the maintaining of the Petition of Right and of certain Statutes made by this Parliament which shall be mentioned by both Houses of Parliament And that an inquiry of all the breaches and violations of these Laws may be given in charge by the Justices of the King's Bench every Term and by the Judges of Assize in their Circuits and Justices of Peace at the Sessions to be presented and punished according to Law XII That all the Judges and all Officers placed by approbation of both Houses of Parliament may hold their places Quam diu bene se gesserint XIII That the Justice of Parliament may pass upon all Delinquents whether they be within the Kingdom or fled out of it And that all persons cited by either House of Parliament may appear and abide the censure of Parliament XIV That the General Pardon offered by Your Majesty may be granted with such Exceptions as shall be advised by both Houses of Parliament XV. That the Forts and Castles of this Kingdom may be put under the Command and Custody of such persons as Your Majesty shall appoint with the approbation of Your Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament with the approbation of the major part of the Council in such manner as is before expressed in the choice of Counsellours XVI That the extraordinary Guards and Military Forces now attending Your Majesty may be removed and discharged And that for the future You will raise no such Guards or extraordinary Forces but according to Law in case of actual Rebellion or Invasion XVII That Your Majesty will be pleased to enter into a more strict Alliance with the States of the United Provinces and other neighbour-Princes and States of the Protestant Religion for the defence and maintenance thereof against all designs and attempts of the Pope and his adherents to subvert and suppress it whereby Your Majesty will obtain a great access of strength and reputation and Your Subjects be much encouraged and enabled in a Parliamentary way for Your aid and assistance in restoring Your Royal Sister and the Princely Issue to those Dignities and Dominions which belong unto them and relieving the other distressed Protestant Princes who have suffered in the same Cause XVIII That Your Majesty will be pleased by Act of Parliament to clear the Lord Kimbolton and the
chuse and to remove none till they appear to Us to have otherwise behaved themselves or shall be evicted by Legal proceedings to have done so But this Demand as unreasonable as it is is but one link of a great Chain and but the first round of that Ladder by which Our Just Ancient Regal Power is endeavoured to be fetched down to the ground For it appears plainly that it is not with the Persons now chosen but with Our chusing that you are displeased For you demand That the persons put in the places and imployments of those who shall be removed may be approved by both Houses which is so far as to some it may at the first sight appear from being less then the power of nomination that of two things of which We will never grant either We would sooner be content that you should nominate and We approve than you approve and we nominate the meer nomination being so far from being any thing that if We could do no more We would never take the pains to do that when We should only hazard those whom We esteemed to the scorn of a refusal if they happened not to be agreeable not only to the Judgment but to the Passion Interest or Humour of the present major part of either House Not to speak now of the great factions animosities and divisions which this power would introduce in both Houses between both Houses and in the several Countries for the choice of persons to be sent to that place where that power was and between the persons that were so chosen Neither is this strange Potion prescribed to Us only for once for the cure of a present pressing desperate disease but for a Diet to Us and Our Postetity It is demanded That Our Counsellors all Chief Officers both of Law and State Commanders of Forts and Castles and all Peers hereafter made as to voting without which how little is the rest be approved of that is chosen by them from time to time and rather then it should ever be left to the Crown to whom it onely doth and shall belong if any place fall void in the intermission of Parliament the major part of the approved Council is to approve them Neither is it only demanded that We should quit the Power and Right our Predecessors have had of appointing Persons in these places but for Counsellors We are to be restrained as well in the Number as in the Persons and a power must be annext to these places which their Predecessors had not And indeed if this power were past to them it were not fit We should be trusted to chuse those who were to be trusted as much as We. It is demanded That such matters as concern the publick and are proper for the High Court of Parliament Which is Our Great and Supreme Council may be debated resolved and transacted only in Parliament and not elsewhere and such as presume to do any thing to the contrary shall be reserved to the Censure and Judgment of the Parliament and such other matters of State as are proper for Our Privy Council shall be debated and concluded by such of Our Nobility though indeed if being made by Us they may not vote without the Consent of both Houses We are rather to call them your Nobility and others as shall be from time to time chosen for that place by approbation of both Houses of Parliament and that no publick Act concerning the affairs of the Kingdom which are proper for Our Privy Council may be esteemed of any validity as proceeding from the Royal Authority unless it be done by the Advice and Consent of the major part of Our Council attested under their hands Which Demands are of that nature that to grant them were in effect at once to depose both Our Self and Our Posterity These being past We may be waited on bare-headed We may have our hand kist the style of Majesty continued to Us and the Kings Authority declared by both Houses of Parliament may be still the style of your Commands We may have Swords and Maces carried before Us and please Our Self with the sight of a Crown and Scepter and yet even these Twigs would not long flourish when the Stock upon which they grew were dead but as to true and real Power We should remain but the outside but the Picture but the Sign of a King We were ever willing that Our Parliament should debate resolve and transact such matters as are proper for them as far as they are proper for them and We heartily wish that they would be as careful not to extend their Debates and Resolutions beyond what is proper to them that multitudes of things punishable and Causes determinable by the ordinary Judicatures may not be entertained in Parliament and so cause a long chargeable fruitless attendance of Our People and by degrees draw to you as well all the Causes as all the faults of Westminster-Hall and divert your proper Business That the course of Law be no ways diverted much less disturbed as was actually done by the stop of the proceedings against a Riot in Southwark by Order of the House of Commons in a time so riotous and tumultuous as much increased the danger of Popular Insolencies by such a countenance to Riots and discountenance of Law That you descend not to the leisure of recommending Lecturers to Churches nor ascend to the Legislative Power by commanding the Law not having yet commanded it that they whom you recommend be received although neither the Parson nor Bishop do approve of them and that the Refusers according to the course so much formerly complained of to have been used at the Council Table be not sent for to attend to shew cause at least that you would consider Conveniency if not Law and recommend none but who are well known to you to be Orthodox Learned and Moderate or at least such as have taken Orders and are not notorious depravers of the Book of Common-Prayer a care which appeareth by the Discourses Sermons and Persons of some recommended by you not to have been hitherto taken and it highly concerns both you in duty and the Commonwealth in the consequences that it should have been taken That neither one Estate transact what is proper for two nor two what is proper for three and consequently that contrary to Our declared will Our Forts may not be seized Our Arms may not be removed Our Moneys may not be stop'd Our legal Directions may not be countermanded by you nor We desired to countermand them Our Self nor such entrances made upon a real War against Us upon pretence of an imaginary War against you and a Chimoera of Necessity So far do you pass beyond your limits whilst you seem by your Demand to be strangely streightned within them At least we could have wish'd you would have expressed what matters you meant as fit to be transacted only in Parliament and what you meant by only in Parliament You
direction of the House of Commons till this Parliament it being the first appeal to the People and of a dangerous consequence to Parliaments themselves But as in other things neither Our Desires or Commands have been considered without giving Us leisure to answer either the one or the other special direction is given for the printing that Remonstrance and equal care taken for the publishing it in all places and parts of the Kingdom Having taken this care for the shaking and perplexing the minds of all men the next work was to get such a Power into their hands as might govern and dispose of those Affections To this purpose they had from the beginning of the Parliament by reason of some complaints against the immoderate exercise of the authority of the Lieutenants and their Deputies in raising Coat and Conduct-money and some excesses in them had several debates in the diminution of the Office it self but still grounded upon the illegal Pressures used by them and upon some words in the Commission it self which though of long usage in very happy days were conceived not agreeable to the Law but they were so far from supposing the Office it self or Commission to be illegal that both Houses of Parliament had recommended two Lords to Us and desired Our Commission to make them Lords Lieutenants of Yorkshire and Dorsetshire the only end seeming then to be that good and approved men should be in those imployments and trusts But at last they resolved against the Office it self and would think of some other way to provide for the safety of the Kingdom in that point and in this they had a double end First to fright all persons Members of both Houses who had been Lieutenants and Deputy-Lieutenants to comply with them in their Votes lest they should be called in question for the execution of those Offices a Stratagem they had found to engage many persons to their Opinions as Sheriffs for the collecting Ship-money and all other persons who in truth were or might be made obnoxious to their Power then that by unsettling that whole business of the Militia throughout the Kingdom they might the more easily bring in their own power of governing it as they have since endeavoured to do And thereupon they presumed to bring in such a Bill into the House of Commons to place a General at Land and an Admiral at Sea by Act of Parliament with such Power and Authority over the Lives and Fortunes of all Our Subjects as should be liable to no control nor to be questioned by any Superintendent hand with a pre-pardon for whatsoever they should do under colour of those Offices either of which Officers should have been a much greater Man than Our Self and commanded in Our Kingdom above Us the matter of which Bill to shew their Design is since digested into their new Generals Commission and the pretended Ordinance to the Earl of Warwick And all this was then pretended to be a matter of absolute Necessity for the Preservation of Us and Our Kingdom but at that time it could procure no other credit than to be suffered to rest in the House as an evidence of the liberty might be used in the preferring of Bills They had by this time taken all the licence at their private Cabals to undervalue and vilifie Our Person and Our Power and in publick to give way and countenance to any Scandals upon Us. Letters from the Mayor of Plymouth that the Rebels in Ireland call themselves The Queen's Army and pretend the King's Authority for what they do and store of such Discourses upon such Evidence is every week printed in the Journals of the House which without doubt must be of great authority with Our People who must conceive such Informations to be not only fully and clearly proved but to be accepted and published upon very weighty reasons above the consideration of Our Honour and Safety And now they were to examine what notable credit their Remonstrance and their other general Infusions had got with the People and how ready they would be upon any occasions to venture themselves at their direction They had made themselves so terrible in the House of Commons that by their Threats and their Promises of Places and Preferments to several Men and by the absence of many they had gotten the major part But in the House of Lords their power was not the same that must be wrought another way yet there they had used all means to prevail upon the hopes and fears of such who they thought might that way be dealt with witness among many other things of the same nature that insolent Speech of Mr. Pym to the Earl of Dover That if he looked for any Preferment he must comply with them in their ways and not hope to have it by serving Vs. Shortly after their coming together upon the Recess a new Bill was preferred in the House of Commons for the taking away of the Votes of Bishops out of the House of Peers which being once rejected before ought not by the Course and Order of Parliament to have been admitted again the same Session but that was easily over-ruled and in the House of Commons it did pass many good Man the more willingly concurring therein upon hope that that Bill being once consented to the Fury of that Faction which with so great Violence pursued an absolute Destruction of the Ecclesiastical Government would be abated or that Rage being discerned they would lose that strength which supported them But the Lords quickly found that the Ring-leaders of that Faction had not Ingenuity enough to be compounded with and therefore with them it was not like to find so easie a passage Now their resort was to the People whom upon several occasions they had trained down to Westminster in great multitudes with Swords and Clubs and had often sent for them when any debate was like to be carried against them in either House the particulars whereof We are ready to prove Every Man will conceive We were in a great streight to find Our Self so much disappointed of that return the consciousness of Our own Merit and the many glorious Professions made by both Houses bade Us to expect We saw the Laws absolutely trampled under feet and a Design laid to ruin the Government of the Kingdom and to destroy Us and Our Posterity We saw this Design carried by a few Men whose Hatred and Malice to Our Person We found implacable and their Contempt of Us and Our Authority so visible and notorious that they forbore not to express it in their mention of Us in all companies We saw their Power and Interest to be so great that they were able to mis-lead very many honest Men and to countenance their actions under the name of both Houses of Parliament We were resolved that nothing they should do within those walls should provoke Us till time and the experience good Men should have of them should discover their purposes
Oath upon Our Subjects to execute all the Commands of both Houses They waste and consume the Mony given by Act of Parliament for the discharge of the great Debt of the Kingdom and for the relief of the bleeding Condition of Ireland imploy the Mony brought in by the Adventurers and those Men who are levied by Our Authority and Commission for the preservation of Our miserable Subjects there to serve them in a War against Us whereby all Men may see what reason We had not to consent to a Warrant dormant under pretence of Levies for Ireland which might have furnished them with Men to fight against Us as the same Pretence hath done with all the Arms We had in Our Magazines They commit such of Our Subjects to Prison whom they are pleased to suspect as the Earl of Portland and for no other reason but that they believe them loyal to Us censure and degrade nine Lords at a clap for obeying Our Summons and coming to Us when scarce that number concurred in the Judgment and declared two others Enemies to the Commonwealth taking their Votes from them without so much as summoning them to answer any Charge brought against them They presume to take Tonnage and Poundage by a pretended Ordinance without Our Consent though they have so often pressed it against Us that We took it without theirs and so now dispence with a Praemunire made this Parliament as they have formerly done with Treason Lastly to shew into what hands they intend the Government of this Kingdom shall be put they have reduced the business of the whole Kingdom from both Houses of Parliament into the hands of a few desperate persons who have the power committed to them to act this Tragedy without acquainting the Houses and so have gotten the Authority of King and both Houses of Parliament to destroy all Three make Orders to break up Houses take away Plate and Money because 't is possible the Owners wish it with Us at York send Troops of Horse to make War upon Us in what Counties they please and commit such unheard-of Acts of Oppression and Injustice as no Story can parallel where the least form of Government hath been left that all Our good Subjects may see by what Rules they shall live and what Right they are like to enjoy when these Men have gotten the Sway who in the infancy of their Power and when there is yet left some memory of and reverence to the Laws under which their Fathers lived so happily dare leap over all those known and confessed Principles of Government and Obedience and exercise a Tyranny both over Prince and People more insupportable than Confusion it self And for all this impudent Injustice odious to God and Man what is objected against Us That We will not be advised by Our Parliament In what what one Proposition that is evidently for the ease of Our Subjects have We denied That We have granted many is confessed We will not consent that the Ordinance of the Militia shall be executed and obeyed that is We will not allow that both Houses of Parliament shall make Laws and impose upon the Property and Liberty of Our Subjects Without Our Consent which if We should yield to upon the same pretences of Necessity a word fatal to this Kingdom and the publick good the House of Commons might as well and would quickly come to make Laws without the House of Peers and the common People without either nor are willing that those Men who have discovered all Malice to Our Person and dis-esteem and irreverence of Our Office shall be legally qualified to take up Arms against Us when they shall be thereunto provoked by their Malice or Ambition There can be no new thing said in this Argument We must refer Our good Subjects to Our several Answers Declarations and Proclamations in that point only it will be worth their considering that this extraordinary unheard-of extravagant Power was assumed in a case of peremptory Necessity for the prevention of imminent Danger in the beginning of March how long it was in design before is understood by Sir Arthur Hesilrigge his Bill long preceeding whether any such Danger hath been since discovered and whether unspeakable Calamities have not already and are not like to ensue from that Fountain We wish it were not too apparent And if those Fears and Jealousies which seem to make that Ordinance necessary were indeed real and honest that in truth nothing were desired but putting the Kingdom into a posture that is that all Our Loving Subjects might be provided with Arms and dexterous in the using them if any Invasion or Rebellion should be is not all this Care taken and all this Security provided for by the Commission of Array What honest end can that Ordinance have which is not obtained by the execution of and obedience to that Commission But 't is true the power is not in those hands nor like to be imployed to those uses 't is now intended Who hath not heard these Men say That the alteration they intend and is necessary both in Church and State must be made by blood Are not the Principles by which they live destructive to all Laws and Compacts Is not every thing Necessary they think so and every thing lawful that is in order to that Necessity Sure if Our good Subjects were throughly awake in this business they would think they had much more cause to thank Us for denying this Ordinance than for granting all that We have granted What is there else We do not think Sir John Hotham hath dealt well with Us in keeping Our Town from Us nor do take it kindly that We are robbed of Our Magazine and Munition but think of recovering both by Force because We cannot have them otherwise which will be an actual levying War against Our Parliament This Argument is sufficiently vexed too Our good Subjects will read the Messages Answers Votes and Declarations in this Case and We are sure upon the grounds laid to justifie this Treason no Subject in England hath a House of his own which may not to morrow be given to Sir John Hotham for as long a term as they think fit and he may be sent to morrow to murther Us and be no Traitor and they who shall shut the door against him shall be Delinquents Is there no more Yes We will not submit to those Nineteen dutiful and modest Propositions which have been lately thrown at Us as the necessary means of removing Jealousies and Differences and as the last Complement of all their Scorns and Injuries that Posterity may see to what a tameness We were brought when such things were asked of Us We will not be content that all Our Officers and Ministers of State be they never so faithful to Us so affectionate to their Country never so wise never so honest shall be immediately removed from Us and their places be disgraced and undone and in their rooms these Gentlemen who have
the present Rebellion raised in this Kingdom against His Majesty and that all His Majesty's Subjects are bound by their natural Allegiance and the Oaths lawfully taken by them to the utmost of their power to resist and repress the same and particularly the Army now under the Command of the Earl of Essex and all other Armies raised or to be raised without His Majesty's Consent under pretence of the two Houses of Parliament And we do disclaim all Votes Orders and Declarations in countenance or maintenance of the said Armies and Declare That no Oath or Covenant voluntarily taken or inforced doth or can bind or dispense with the breach of those other Oaths formerly and lawfully taken to His Majesty and that all those who aid assist or abett this horrid and odious Rebellion are and ought to be accounted and pursued as Traitors by the known Laws of the Land That we utterly detest and disclaim the Invitation which hath been made to His Majesty's Subjects of Scotland to enter this Kingdom with an Army the same being as much against the Desires as against the Duty of the Lords and Commons of England and all true-hearted English-Men And we do Declare and publish to the World That as any such Invasion or Hostile entry into the Kingdom by the Rebellious Subjects of Scotland is a direct and peremptory breach of the late Act of Pacification between the two Kingdoms so that we and all the Subjects of this Kingdom are bound by our Allegiance and by that very Act to resist and repress such Invasion And whosoever is or shall be abetting aiding or assisting to those of Scotland in their Hostile Invasion of this Kingdom ought to be looked upon as betrayers of their Country and are guilty of High Treason by the known Laws of the Kingdom And that our weak misled and seduced Country-men may no longer pay an implicite regard and reverence to the abused name of Parliament which these guilty Persons usurp to themselves and so submit to those Actions and Commands which two Houses of Parliament never so legally and regularly constituted have not Authority to require or enjoyn and since these Men will not suffer their poor Country to be restored by a Treaty to the benefit of a Parliament which would with Gods blessing easily remove these Miseries and prevent the like for the time to come we must and do declare to the Whole Kingdom That as at no time either or both Houses of Parliament can by any Orders or Ordinances impose upon the People without the Kings Consent so by reason of the want of Freedom and Security for all the Members of Parliament to meet at Westminster and there to Sit Speak and Vote with Freedom and Safety all the Actions Votes Orders Declarations and pretended Ordinances made by those Members who remain still at Westminster are void and of none effect and that as many of the Lords and Commons assembled at Westminster as have at any time consented to the raising of Forces under the Command of the Earl of Essex or to the making and using of the new Great Seal or to the present coming of the Scots into England in a warlike manner have therein broken the Trust reposed in them by their Country and are to be proceeded against as Traitors And yet we are far from dissolving or attempting the dissolution of this Parliament or the violation of any Act made and confirmed by His Majesty's Royal Assent this Parliament which we shall always maintain and defend Acts of Parliament are only in danger to be destroyed by those who undervalue and despise the Authority and Power of Acts of Parliament who therefore deny the Kings Negative Voice and neglect His Concurrence that their own Resolutions may be reputed as Acts of Parliament to the Ruine and Confusion of all Laws and Interest It is our grief in the behalf of the whole Kingdom that since the Parliament is not dissolved the Power thereof should by the Treason and Violence of these Men be so far suspended that the Kingdom should be without the fruit and benefit of a Parliament which cannot be reduced to any Action or Authority till the Freedom and Liberty due to the Members be restored and admitted and they who oppose this must be only looked upon as the Enemies to Parliament In the mean time we neither have nor shall attempt any thing for the Adjourning Dissolving or Proroguing thereof otherwise than as it may stand with the Act in that case provided Lastly we Declare That our endeavours actions and resolutions tend and are directed and shall always be directed to the maintenance of God's true Religion established by Law within this Kingdom to the defence of His Majesty's Sacred Person His Honour and just Rights to the preservation of the Liberty and Property of the Subject settled and evident by the Laws Statutes and Customs of the Realm and the just Freedom Liberty and Privilege of Parliament and that what we shall do for the defence and maintenance of all these proceeds from the Conscience of our Duty to God our King and Country without any private and sinister ends of our own and out of our sincere love to Truth and Peace the which as we have so we shall always labour to procure as the only blessed End of all our Labours And we do therefore conjure all our Country-Men and fellow-Subjects by all those precious obligations of Religion to God Almighty of Loyalty towards their Soveraign of Affection towards one another and of Charity and Compassion towards their bleeding Country to assist and joyn with us in the suppressing those Enemies to Peace who are so much delighted with the Ruine and Confusion they have made that they will not so much as vouchsafe to Treat with us that all specious Pretences might be taken away and the grounds of this bloody Contention clearly stated to the World If these Men with a true sence and remorse of the ill they have done shall yet return to their Duty and Loyalty they shall God willing find us of another temper towards them than they have been towards us And if the Conscience of their Duty shall not draw all our fellow-Subjects and Country-Men to joyn with us in assisting His Majesty we hope that the prudent consideration That 't is impossible to Reason for our miserable Country ever to be restored to Peace and Happiness but by restoring all just and legally-due Power and Authority into His Majesty's hands again will direct them what is fit to be done by them And if any yet shall be so unskilful and to say no worse vulgar-spirited to hope by a Neutrality and odious Indifferency to rest secure in this Storm though we shall not follow the examples of other Men in telling them that their Estates shall be forfeited and taken from them as pernicious and publick Enemies God be thanked the Law is not so supprest but that it proceeds in Attainders and Forfeitures and all Men
to and near Coventry and that it was not made known to His Majesty that the same were for Ireland till after the seizure thereof when it was impossible to recover the same from the Soldiers who had taken them whereas if a safe Conduct had been desired by His Majesty as it ought to have been the same being to pass through his Quarters there would have been no Violence or Interruption offered For the giving the Names of the Persons who subscribed the Letters delivered to your Lordships the Originals of which have been shewed to you by us we have given your Lordships a full and reasonable Answer and if your Lordships will assure us that the giving their Names to you shall be no prejudice to the Persons who did subscribe if at any time any of them shall be found within your Quarters we will forthwith deliver their Names to you otherwise we conceive your Lordships cannot but give credit to that we have said and shewed to you All which we hope hath clearly satisfied your Lordships that the Cessation with the Rebels was neither unjust nor unlawful and that you will proceed to satisfie us by what means the War may be managed in Ireland with probable hope of the preservarion of His Majesties Protestant Subjects there we being very willing to concur with your Lordships in any just and honourable way for the good and settlement of that miserable Kingdom And together with this last the King's Commissioners delivered in this other Paper 20. February HAving given your Lordships clear Reasons why the Cessation which hath been made in Ireland is not in Reason or Justice to be made void and that the making void thereof if the same might be done is not or cannot be for the benefit or advantage of His Majesties Protestant Subjects in that Kingdom so long as the unhappy Wars in this Kingdom continue to the other part of your Lordships first Paper concerning Ireland for the prosecution of the War there to be settled in both Houses of the Parliament of England to be managed by the joynt advice of both Kingdoms and His Majesty to assist we say That it appears by the other Papers delivered to us by your Lordships as the Articles of the Treaty of the sixth of August and the Ordinances of the eleventh of April and ninth of March and otherwise That the intent is that that War shall be managed by a joynt Committee of both Kingdoms and that the Committee of each Kingdom shall have a Negative voice and consequently it is very probable that upon difference of Opinion between them that War may stand still or to the utter Ruin of His Majesties good Subjects there be absolutely dissolv'd For whereas your Lordships say That in case of such Disagreement the Houses of the Parliament of England may prosecute the War as they shall think fit observing the Treaty of the sixth of August 1642. and the Ordinance of the 11. of April your Lordships well know that by that Treaty and that Ordinance the two Houses of the Parliament of England alone cannot prosecute that War that Ordinance of the 11. of April expresly making the Earl of Leven the Scots General Commander in chief of all Forces in that Kingdom both British and Scotish without any reference unto His Majesty or His Lieutenant of that Kingdom and directing that the War shall be managed by the Committee of both Kingdoms without any other reference to the two Houses of the Parliament of England And therefore we cannot consent that such an Act of Parliament be passed for the confirmation of that Treaty or the Ordinance of the 11 of April as your Lordships propose by reason that thereby all His Majesties Authority would be wholly taken away in that Kingdom and in truth that whole Kingdom be thereby delivered into the hands of His Majesties Subjects of Scotland which we conceive is neither just prudent nor honourable to be done And we are of Opinion that it is not agreeable to His Majesties Honour or the Justice and Protection which He ows to His Subjects of His Kingdom of Ireland to put the nomination of His Lieutenant and Judges of that Kingdom out of Himself and to commit the whole Power of that Kingdom to others and to bind Himself to pass all such Acts of Parliament as any time hereafter shall be presented to Him for raising of Moneys and other things necessary for the prosecution of the War in that Kingdom which your Lordships say in your Paper the 9. of this Instant you intend by those words His Majesty to assist in your first Paper And we conceive it cannot be expected that His Majesty should consent to an Act of Parliament for prosecution of the War in Ireland to be managed by the Advice of the Houses of Parliament here and the Estates of the Parliament of Scotland so long as the War in this Kingdom shall continue For these and many other Reasons we conceive it doth appear to your Lordships that the Propositions as they are delivered to us by your Lordships are by no means fit to be consented to and therefore we desire your Lordships to make other Propositions to us which may be for the preservation and relief of His Majesties Protestant Subjects there and for the settlement of that Kingdom in which we shall very readily concur and we shall be very willing that the business of that Kingdom shall after a Peace settled in this be taken into consideration and ordered as His Majesty and both Houses of Parliament here shall think fit Their Answers to these two Papers Their Paper 20. Feb. VVE expected that your Lordships would have been fully satisfied by what we have alledged against His Majesties Power to make the Cessation with the Rebels in Ireland and we cannot find those important Reasons which your Lordships mentioned to have induced His Majesty so to do or that thereby His Majesties Protestant Subjects there have been preserved or subsisted but we have made it evident that this Cessation tended to the utter Destruction of the Protestants in that Kingdom as we conceived was designed by those who advised His Majesty thereunto And we observe your Lordships urge that this Cessation was the only means for the subsistence of the Protestants there when it cannot be denied but that very many of the Protestants in Vlster Munster and Connaught have yet subsisted although they have refused to submit to the Cessation and opposed the same as the means intended for their Ruin And we do affirm unto your Lordships that the two Houses of Parliament have been so far from failing to supply His Majesties good Subjects in that Kingdom that although His Majesties Forces have as much as lay in their power endeavoured to prevent the same and have taken to themselves that which was provided for those whom your Lordships mention to have been in so great Want and Extremity yet the two Houses not discouraged thereby have constantly sent
any time or times within the space of two years now last past held or enjoyed or of right ought to have held or enjoyed the same In trust and confidence nevertheless and to the intent and purpose that they the said Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Malbourne Esquire and the Survivors and Survivor of them his and their Heirs and Assigns shall satisfie and pay unto all and every Arch-bishop Bishop Dean Sub-dean Arch-deacon Chaunter Chancellor Treasurer Sub-treasurer Succentor Sacrist Prebendary Canon Canon-Residentiary Petty-Canon Vicars Choral Choristers old Vicars and new Vicars and other Officers and persons belonging unto or now imployed in or about the said Cathedral or Collegiate Churches such yearly Stipends and Pensions for so long time and in such manner as by the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled shall be ordered directed and appointed and shall dispose of all and singular the aforesaid Mannors Lands Tithes Appropriations Advowsons Tenements Hereditaments and other the Premisses and of every part and parcel thereof and of the Revenues Rents Issues and Profits thereof to the uses intents and purposes above and hereafter expressed that is to say for a competent maintenance for the support of such a number of Preaching Ministers for the service of every Cathedral and Collegiate Church and His Majesties free Chappel of Windsor as by the Lords and Commons shall be ordered and appointed and likewise for the maintenance of Preaching Ministers throughout the Kingdom of England Dominion of VVales and Town of Barwick in such places where such maintenance is wanting and for a proportionable allowance for and towards the reparation of the said Cathedral and Collegiate Churches in such manner and form and to such persons and for such other good uses to the advancement of true Religion and the maintenance of Piety and Learning as by this or any other Act or Acts of Parliament now or hereafter to be made shall be set down or declared And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all Leases Gifts Grants Conveyances Assurances and Estates whatsoever hereafter to be made by the said Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Mabourne Esquire the Survivors and Survivor of them or the greater part of them his and their Heirs and Assigns of any the Mannors Lands Tenements or Hereditaments which in or by this Act shall come or be limited or disposed of unto the said Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Malbourne Esquire other than for the Term of One and Twenty years or Three Lives or some other Term of years determinable upon One Two or Three Lives and not above from the time as any such Lease or Grant shall be made or granted whereupon the accustomed yearly Rent or more shall be reserved and payable yearly during the said Term whereof any former Lease is in being and not to be expired surrendred or ended within Three years after the making of such Lease shall be utterly void and of none effect to all intents constructions and purposes any thing in this Act to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding Provided nevertheless where no Lease hath been heretofore made nor any such Rent hath been reserved or payable of any the Lands Tenements or Hereditaments in this Act limited or disposed of unto the said Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Malbourne Esquire that in such case it shall be lawful for the said Sir William Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John Wollaston John Warner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Malbourne Esquire the Survivors and Survivor of them or the greater part of them his and their Heirs to make any Lease or Estate for the Term of One and Twenty years or Three Lives or some other Term of years determinable upon One Two or Three Lives and not above taking such Fine as they in their Judgments shall conceive indifferent and reserving a reasonable Rent not being under the Third part of the clear yearly value of the Lands Tenements or Hereditaments contained in such Lease And it is further Declared to be the true intent and meaning of this Act That all and every the Lessees Farmers and Tenants of all and every the said Persons and Corporations whose Offices or Places are taken away by this Statute now having holding or enjoying any Estate Term or Interest in possession by himself his under-Tenants or Assigns of or in any Mannors Lands Tenements Appropriations or other Hereditaments whatsoever shall and may be preferred in the taking and renewing of any Estates Leases or Grants of any such Mannors Lands Tenements or Hereditaments before any other Person the said Lessees Farmers or Tenants or other Parties interessed as aforesaid desiring the same and giving such Fines Rents and other considerations for the same as by the said Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Peter Malbourne Esquires or the Survivors or Survivor of them or the major part of them his or their Heirs or Assigns shall be thought and held just and reasonable Provided also and be it enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all and singular Revenues Rents Issues Fees Profits Sums of Money and Allowances whatsoever as have heretofore been and now ought to be paid disposed or allowed unto or for the maintenance of any Grammar-School or Scholars or for or towards the Reparation of any Church Chappel High-way Causey Bridge School-house Alms-house or other charitable use payable by any the Corporations or Persons whose Offices or Places are taken away by this Act or which are chargeable upon or ought to issue out of or be paid for or in respect of the said Premisses or any of them shall be and continue to be paid disposed and allowed as they were and have been heretofore any thing in this present Act to the contrary thereof notwithstanding And to the intent and purpose the Parliament may be certainly and clearly informed of the Premisses to the end the same may be distributed applied and imployed to and for such pious and godly uses and purposes as is intended and herein declared Be it Ordained and Enacted That the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England for the time being shall by virtue of this Act have full Power and Authority and is hereby required to award and issue forth several Commissions under the Great Seal of England into all and every the Counties and Cities within the Kingdom of England and Dominion of VVales to be directed unto such and so many persons as by the
thereunto Provided always and be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That nothing herein before contained shall extend to the taking away of the ordinary Legal Power of Sheriffs Justices of Peace Maiors Bailiffs Coroners Constables Headboroughs or other Officers of Justice not being Military Officers concerning the Administration of Justice so as neither the said Sheriffs Justices of Peace Maiors Bailiffs Coroners Constables Headboroughs and other Officers or any of them do levy conduct imploy or command any Forces whatsoever by colour or pretence of any Commission of Array or extraordinary Command from His Majesty His Heirs or Successors without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons and that if any persons shall be gathered and assembled together in Warlike manner or otherwise to the number of Thirty persons and shall not forthwith separate and disperse themselves being required thereto by the said Lords and Commons or Command from them or any by them especially authorized for that purpose then such person and persons not so separating and dispersing themselves shall be guilty and incur the pains of High Treason being first Declared guilty of such Offence by the said Lords and Commons any Commission under the Great Seal or other Warrant to the contrary notwithstanding and he or they that shall offend herein shall be incapable of any Pardon from His Majesty His Heirs and Successors and their Estates shall be disposed as the said Lords and Commons shall think fit and not otherwise Provided also further That the City of London shall have and enjoy all their Rights Liberties and Franchises Customs and Usages in the raising and imploying the Forces of that City for the Defence thereof in as full and ample manner to all intents and purposes as they have or might have used or enjoyed the same at any time before the sitting of this present Parliament Soit baillé aux Seigneurs A ceste Bille les Seigneurs sont assentuz An Act for justifying the Proceedings of Parliament in the late War and for Declaring all Oaths Declarations Proclamations and other Proceedings against it to be void WHereas the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament have been necessitated to make and prosecute a War in their just and lawful Defence and thereupon Oaths Declarations and Proclamations have been made against them and their Ordinances and Proceedings and against others for adhering unto them and for executing Offices Places and Charges by Authority derived from them and Judgments Indictments Outlawries Attainders and Inquisitions for the causes aforesaid have been had and made against some of the Members of the Houses of Parliament and other his Majesties good Subjects and Grants have been made of their Lands and Goods Be it therefore Declared and hereby Enacted by the Kings Majesty and by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament and by Authority of the same That all Oaths Declarations and Proclamations heretofore had or made against both or either of the Houses of Parliament or any the Members of either of them for the causes aforesaid or against their Ordinances or Proceedings or against any for adhering unto them or for doing or executing any Office Place or Charge by any Authority derived from the said Houses or either of them and all Judgments Indictments Outlawries Attainders Inquisitions and Grants thereupon made and all other Proceedings for any the causes aforesaid had made done or executed or to be had made done or executed whether the same be done by the King or any Judges Justices Sheriffs Ministers or any others are void and of no effect and are contrary to and against the Laws of the Realm And be it further Enacted and hereby Declared by the Authority aforesaid That all Judges Justices of the Peace Maior Sheriffs Constables and other Officers and Ministers shall take notice hereof and are hereby prohibited and discharged in all time to come from awarding any Writ Process or Summons and from pronouncing or executing any Judgment Sentence or Decree or any way proceeding against or molesting any of the said Members of the two Houses of Parliament or against any of the Subjects of this Kingdom for any the causes aforesaid Soit baillé aux Seigneurs A ceste Bille les Seigneurs sont assentuz An Act concerning Peers lately made and hereafter to be made BE it Enacted by the Kings Majesty and by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament That all Honour and Title of Peerage conferred on any since the twentieth day of May 1642. being the day that Edward Lord Littleton then Lord Keeper of the Great Seal deserted the Parliament and that the said Great Seal was surreptitiously conveyed away from the Parliament be and is hereby made and declared Null and Void Be it further Enacted and it is hereby Enacted by the Authority aforesaid that no Person that shall hereafter be made a Peer or His Heirs shall sit or vote in the Parliament of England without consent of both Houses of Parliament Soit baillé aux Seigneurs A ceste Bille les Seigneurs sont assentuz An Act concerning the Adjournments of both Houses of Parliament BE it Declared and Enacted by the Kings Majesty and by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament and by the Authority of the same That when and as often as the Lords and Commons assembled in this present Parliament shall judge it necessary to adjourn both Houses of this present Parliament to any other place of the Kingdom of England than where they now sit or from any place adjourn the same again to the place where they now sit or to any other place within the Kingdom of England that then such their Adjournment and Adjournments to such places and for such time as they shall appoint shall at all times and from time to time be valid and good any Act Statute or Usage to the contrary notwithstanding Provided always and be it Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That no Adjournment or Adjournments to be had or made by reason or colour of this Act shall be deemed adjudged or taken to make end or determine any Session of this present Parliament And they also commanded us to present to Your Majesty these ensuing Propositions Heads of the Propositions 1. That the new Seal be confirmed and the old Great Seal and all things passed under it since May 1642. be made void 2. That Acts be passed for raising Moneys to satisfie Publick Debts 3. That Members of both Houses put from their places by the King be restored 4. That the Cessation in Ireland be made void and the War left to both Houses 5. That an Act of Indemnity be passed 6. That the Court of Wards be taken away and such Tenures turned into common Soccage 7. That the Treaties between the English and Scots be confirmed and Commissioners appointed for Conservation of the Peace between the Kingdoms 8. That the Arrears of the Army be paid out of the Bishops Lands forfeited Estates and Forests 9. That an Act be
reforming both Universities and the Colleges of Westminster Winchester and Eaton His Majesty will consent to an Act for the better discovery and speedy conviction of Popish Recusants as is desired in your Propositions and also to an Act for the Education of the Children of Papists by Protestants in the Protestant Religion As also to an Act for the rrue levying of the Penalties against Papists to be levied and disposed in such manner as both Houses shall agree on and as is proposed on His Majesties behalf And also to an Act to prevent the practises of Papists against the State and for putting the Laws in execution and for a stricter course to prevent hearing and saying of Mass But as to the Covenant His Majesty is not yet therein satisfied that He can either sign or swear it or consent to impose it on the Consciences of others nor doth conceive it proper or useful at this time to be insisted on Touching the Militia His Majesty conceives that your Proposition demands a far larger power over the Persons and Estates of His Subjects than hath ever hitherto been warranted by the Laws and Statutes of this Realm yet considering the present Distractions require more and trusting in His two Houses of Parliament that they will make no further use of the Power therein mentioned after the present Distempers setled than shall be agreeable to the Legal exercise thereof in times past or just necessity shall require His Majesty will consent to an Act of Parliament That the Lords and Commons in the Parliament of England now assembled or hereafter to be assembled or such as they shall appoint during the space of ten years shall Arm Train and Discipline or cause to be Armed Trained or Disciplined all the Forces of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland and Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernesey and Jersy and the Town of Berwick upon Tweed already raised both for Sea and Land-service and shall from time to time during the space of ten years raise levy arm train and discipline or cause to de raised levied armed trained and disciplined any other Forces for Land and Sea-service in the Kingdoms Dominions and places aforesaid as in their judgments they shall from time to time during the said space of ten years think fit to appoint And that neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any other but such as shall act by the Authority or approbation of the said Lords and Commons shall during the said space of ten years exercise any of the Powers aforesaid That Moneys be raised and levied for the maintenance and use of the said Forces for Land-service and of the Navy and Forces for Sea-service in such sort and by such ways and means as the said Lords and Commons shall from time to time during the said space of ten years think fit and appoint and not otherwise That all the said Forces both for Land and Sea-service so raised or levied or to be raised or levied and also the Admiralty and Navy shall from time to time during the said space of ten years be imployed managed ordered and disposed by the Lords and Commons in such sort and by such ways and means as they shall think fit and appoint and not otherwise And the said Lords and Commons or such as they shall appoint during the said space of ten years shall have power 1. To suppress all Forces raised or to be raised without Authority and Consent of the said Lords and Commons to the disturbance of the Publick Peace of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Berwick upon Tweed or any of them 2. To suppress any Foreign Forces who shall invade or endeavour to invade the Kingdoms of England and Ireland Dominion of Wales the Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Berwick upon Tweed or any of them And after the expiration of the said ten years neither the King His Heirs or Successors or any person or persons by colour or pretence of any Commission Power Deputation or Authority to be derived from the King His Heirs or Successors or any of them shall without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons raise arm train discipline employ order manage disband or dispose any the Forces by Sea or Land of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland the Dominion of Wales Isles of Gernesey and Jersey and the Town of Berwick upon Tweed nor exercise any of the said Powers or Authorities herein before mentioned and expressed to be during the space of ten years in the said Lords and Commons nor do any act or any thing concerning the execution of the said Powers or Authorities or any of them without the Consent of the said Lords and Commons first had and obtained And with the same Provisoes for saving the ordinary Legal Power of Officers of Justice not being Military Officers as is set down in your Propositions And with a Declaration That if any persons shall be gathered and assembled together in a Warlike manner or otherwise to the number of thirty persons and shall not forthwith disperse themselves being require thereto by the said Lords and Commons or command from them or any by them especially authorized for that purpose then such person or persons not so dispersing themselves shall be guilty and incur the pains of High Treason being first declared guilty of such offence by the said Lords and Commons any Commission under the Great Seal or any other Warrant to the contrary notwithstanding And he or they that shall so offend herein to be uncapable of any Pardon from His Majesty His Heirs or Successors And likewise that it be provided that the City of London shall have and enjoy all their Rights Liberties c. in raising and imyloying the Forces of that City in such sort as is mentioned in the said Proposition With these Provisoes following to be inserted in the said Act. First That none be compelled to serve in the Wars against their wills but in case of coming in of strange Enemies into this Kingdom And that the Powers above mentioned as concerning the Land-Forces other than for keeping up and maintenance of Forts and Garisons and the keeping up mantaining and pay of this present Army so long as it shall be thought fit by both Houses of Parliament be exercised to no other purposes than for the suppressing of Forces raised or to be raised without Authority and Consent of the said Lords and Commons as aforesaid or for suppressing of any Foreign Forces which shall invade or endeavour to invade the Kingdoms Dominions or places aforesaid And that the Monies be raised by general and equal Taxations saving that Tonnage and Poundage and such Imposts as have been applyed to the Navy be raised as hath been usual And that all Patents Commissions and other Acts concerning the Premisses be made and acted in His Majesties Name by Warrant signified by the Lords and Commons or
consent to abolish the Episcopal Government Octob. 2. 1648. p. 612 II. The Answer of the Divines to His Majesty's Reason Octob. 3. ibid. III. His Majesty's Reply to their Paper Octob. 6. 616 IV. The Rejoynder of the Divines to His Majesty's Reply Octob. 17. 621 V. His Majesty's final Answer concerning Episcopacy Nov. 1. 1648. 634 ΕΙΚΩΠΒΑΣΙΛΙΚΗ I. UPon His Majesty's calling this last Parliament page 647 II. Upon the Earl of Strafford's Death 648 III. Upon His Majesty's going to the House of Commons 650 IV. Upon the Insolency of the Tumults 651 V. Upon His Majesty's passing the Bill for Triennial Parliaments And after setling this during the pleasure of the Two Houses 654 VI. Upon His Majesty's Retirement from Westminster 656 VII Upon the Queens departure and absence out of England 658 VIII Upon His Majesty's Repulse at Hull And the Fates of the Hothams 659 IX Upon the Listing and Raising Armies against the King 661 X. Upon their seising the King's Magazines Forts Navy and Militia 665 XI Upon the Nineteen Propositions first sent to the King And more afterwards 667 XII Upon the Rebellion and Troubles in Ireland 671 XIII Upon the calling in of the Scots and their coming 674 XIV Upon the Covenant 677 XV. Upon the many Jealousies raised and Scandals cast upon the King to stir up the People against Him 680 XVI Upon the Ordinance against the Common Prayer-Book 684 XVII Of the Differences between the King and the Two Houses in point of Church-Government 687 XVIII Upon Vxbridge Treaty and other Officers made by the King 692 XIX Upon the various Events of the War Victories and Defeats 694 XX. Upon the Reformation of the Times 696 XXI Vpon His Malesty's Letters taken and divulged 699 XXII Upon His Majesty's leaving Oxford and going to the Scots 701 XXIII Upon the Scots delivering the King to the English and His Captivity at Holdenby 702 XXIV Upon their denying His Majesty the Attendance of His Chaplains 703 XXV Penitential Meditations and Vows in the King's Solitude at Holdenby 707 XXVI Upon the Armies Surprisal of the King at Holdenby and the ensuing Distractions in the Two Houses the Army and the City 708 XXVII To the Prince of Wales 710 XXVIII Meditations upon Death after the Votes of Non-Addresses and His Majesty's closer Imprisonment in Carisbrook-Castle 716 THE LIFE OF CHARLES I. CHARLES I. King of Great Britain France and Ireland was the Son of James VI. King of Scots and Anne his Wife a Daughter of Denmark By His Father descended to Him all the Rights together with their blood of all our Ancicient both Saxon and Norman Kings to this Empire For the Lady Margaret Sister and sole Heir of Edgar Atheling the last surviving Prince of the English Saxons being married to Malcolme Conmor King of Scots conveyed to his Line the Saxon and Margaret Daughter of Henry VII married to James IV. did bring the Norman titles and blood From this Imperial Extract He received not more Honour than He gave to it For the blood that was derived to Him elaborated through so many Royal Veins He delivered to Posterity more maturated for Glory and by a constant practice of Goodness more habituated for Vertue He was born at Dunfermeling one of the principal Towns of Fife in Scotland on Nov. 19th An. 1600. An. 1600 in so much weakness that his Baptism was hastened without the usual Ceremonies wherewith such Royal Infants are admitted into the Church Providence seeming to consecrate Him to Sufferings from the Womb and to accustome Him to the exchange of the strictures of Greatness for clouds of Tears There was no Observation nor Augury made at His Birth concerning the Sequel of His Life or course of Fortune which are usually related of such whose lives have different occurrences from those in others of the same state Either the fear of His Death made those about Him less observant of any Circumstances which curious minds would have formed into a Prediction He appearing like a Star that rises so near the Point of his Setting that it was thought there would be no time for Calculation Or He being at distance by his Birth from the Succession to the Crown Prince Henry then having the first hopes made men less sollicitous to enquire of His future state on whom being born to a private Condition the Fate of the Kingdom did not depend But in the third Year of His age when King James was preparing himself to remove to the English Throne a certain Laird of the Highlands though of very great age came to the Court to take his leave of him whom he found accompanied with all his Children After his address full of affectionate and sage Advice to which his gray hairs gave authority to the King An. 1602 his next application was to Duke CHARLES for in the Second year of his Age he was created Duke of Albany Marquess of Ormond Earl of Rosse and Baron of Ardmanock whose hands he kiss'd with so great an ardency of affection that he seem'd forgetful of a separation The King to correct his supposed mistake advised him to a more present observance of Prince Henry as the Heir of his Crown of whom he had taken little notice The old Laird answered that he knew well enough what he did and that It was this Child who was then in His Nurses arms who should convey his name and memory to the succeeding ages This then was conceived dotage but the event gave it the credit of a Prophecy and confirmed that Opinion That some long-experienced souls in the World before their dislodging arrive to the height of prophetick Spirits When he was three years old He was committed to the Care and Governance of Sir Cary's Lady An. 1603 as a reward for being the first Messenger of Queen Elizabeth's death whose long life had worn the expectation of the Scotish Nobility into a suspicion that the Lords of England would never acknowledge her to be dead as long as there was any old Woman of that Nation that could wear good cloaths and personate the Majesty of a Queen In the fourth Year An. 1604 after he had wrestled with a Feaver He was brought in October to the English Court at Windsor where on the Jan. 6. following having the day before been made Knight of the Bath He was invested with the Title of Duke of York An. 1606 and in the sixth Year was committed to the Pedagogie of Mr Thomas Murray a Person well qualified to that Office though a favourer of Presbytery Under this Tutor and confined to a retiredness by the present weakness of his Body He was so diligent and studious that He far advanced in all that kind of Learning which is necessary for a Prince without which even their natural Endowments seem rough and unpleasant in despight of the splendour of their Fortune His proficiency in Letters was so eminent that Prince Henry taking notice of it to put a Jest upon Him one day put the Cap
though my Sins are so many and grievous that I may rather expect the effects of thy Anger than so great a deliverance as to free Me from my present great Danger yet O Lord since thy Mercies are over all thy Works and Thou never failest to relieve all those who with humble and unfeigned Repentance come to Thee for succour it were to multiply not diminish my Transgressions to despair of thy heavenly favour wherefore I humbly desire thy Divine Majesty that Thou wilt not only pardon all my Sins but also free Me out of the hands and protect Me from the Malice of my cruel Enemies But if thy wrath against my hainous offences will not otherwise be satisfied than by suffering Me to fall under my present Afflictions thy Will be done yet with humble importunity I do and shall never leave to implore the assistance of thy Heavenly Spirit that My Cause as I am Thy Vicegerent may not suffer through My weakness or want of Courage O Lord so strengthen and enlighten all the Faculties of my Mind that with clearness I may shew forth thy Truth and manfully endure this bloody Trial that so my Sufferings here may not only glorifie Thee but likewise be a furtherance to My Salvation hereafter Grant this O merciful Father for His sake who suffered for Me even Jesus Christ the Righteous Amen KING CHARLES HIS MESSAGES FOR PEACE I. From CANTERBURY Jan. 20. MDCXLI II. For the Composing of all Differences HIS Majesty perceiving the manifold distractions which are now in this Kingdom which cannot but bring great inconveniencies and mischief to this whole Government in which as His Majesty is most chiefly interessed so He holds Himself by many reasons most obliged to do what in Him lies for the preventing thereof though He might justly expect as most proper for the duty of Subjects that Propositions for the remedies of these evils ought rather to come to Him than from Him yet His Fatherly care of all His People being such that He will rather lay by any particular respect of His Own Dignity than that any time should be lost for prevention of these threatning evils which cannot admit the delays of the ordinary proceedings in Parliament doth think fit to make this ensuing Proposition to both Houses of Parliament that they will with all speed fall into a serious consideration of all those particulars which they shall hold necessary as well for the upholding and maintaining of His Majesty's Just and Regal Authority and for the setling of His Revenue as for the present and future establishment of their Priviledges the free and quiet enjoying of their Estates and Fortunes the Liberties of their Persons the security of the true Religion now professed in the Church of England and the setling of Ceremonies in such a manner as may take away all just offence Which when they shall have digested and composed into one intire body that so His Majesty and themselves may be able to make the more clear Judgment of them it shall then appear by what His Majesty shall do how far he hath been from intending or designing any of those things which the too great Fears and Jealousies of some persons seem to apprehend and how ready He will be to equal and exceed the greatest examples of the most indulgent Princes in their Acts of Grace and Favour to their People So that if all the present Distractions which so apparently threaten the Ruine of this Kingdom do not by the blessing of Almighty God end in an happy and blessed Accommodation His Majesty will then be ready to call Heaven and Earth God and Man to witness that it hath not failed on His part From HUNTINGDON March 15. Upon His Removal to YORK In pursuance of the Former HIS Majesty being now on His remove to His City of York where He intends to make His Residence for some time thinks fit to send this Message to both Houses of Parliament That he doth very earnestly desire that they will use all possible industry in expediting the business of Ireland in which they shall find so chearful a concurrence by His Majesty that no inconvenience shall happen to that service by His absence He having all that Passion for the reducing of that Kingdom which He hath expressed in His former Messages and being unable by words to manifest more affection to it than He hath endeavoured to do by those Messages having likewise done all such Acts as he hath been moved unto by His Parliament therefore if the misfortunes and calamities of His poor Protestant Subjects shall grow upon them though His Majesty shall be deeply concerned in and sensible of their sufferings He shall wash His hands before all the World from the least imputation of slackness in that most necessary and pious work And that His Majesty may leave no way unattempted which may beget a good understanding between Him and His Parliament He thinks it necessary to declare That as He hath been so tender of the Priviledges of Parliament that He hath been ready and forward to retract any Act of His own which He hath been informed hath trencht upon their Priviledges so He expects an equal tenderness in them of His Majesty 's known and unquestionable Priviledges which are the Priviledges of the Kingdom amongst which He is assured it is a Fundamental one That His Subjects cannot be obliged to obey any Act Order or Injunction to which His Majesty hath not given His consent And therefore He thinks it necessary to publish That He expects and hereby requires Obedience from all His loving Subjects to the Laws established and that they presume not upon any pretence of Order or Ordinance to which His Majesty is no party concerning the Militia or any other thing to do or execute what is not warranted by those Laws His Majesty being resolved to keep the Laws Himself and to require Obedience to them from all His Subjects And His Majesty once more recommends to His Parliament the substance of His Message of the twentieth of January last that they compose and digest with all speed such Acts as they shall think fit for the present and future establishment of their Priviledges the free and quiet enjoying their Estates and Fortunes the Liberties of their Persons the security of the true Religion now professed in the Church of England the maintaining His Majesties Regal and Just Authority and setling His Revenue His Majesty being most desirous to take all fitting and just wayes which may beget a happy understanding between Him and His Parliament in which He conceives His greatest Power and Riches do consist III. From NOTTINGHAM Aug. 25. MDCXLII When He set up His Standard By the Earls of Southampton and Dorset Sir John Culpepper Knight Chancellour of the Exchequer and Sir W. Wedale Knight WE have with unspeakable grief of heart long beheld the distractions of this our Kingdom Our very Soul is full of anguish until We may find some remedy to
upon or about the thirtieth day of November in the year last mentioned at Newbury aforesaid and upon or about the eighth day of June in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred forty and five at the Town of Leicester and also upon the fourteenth day of the same month in the same year at Naseby-field in the County of Northampton At which several times and places or most of them and at many other places in this Land at several other times within the years aforementioned and in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred forty and six he the said Charles Stuart hath caused and procured many thousands of the Free People of the Nation to be slain and by Divisions Parties and Infurrections within this Land by Invasions from Forein Parts endeavoured and procured by him and by many other evil ways and means he the said Charles Stuart hath not only maintained and carried on the said War both by Land and Sea during the years before mentioned but also hath renewed or caused to be renewed the said War against the Parliament and good People of this Nation in this present year one thousand six hundred forty and eight in the Counties of Kent Essex Surry Sussex Middlesex and many other places in England and Wales and also by Sea and particularly he the said Charles Stuart hath for that purpose given Commission to his Son the Prince and others whereby besides multitudes of other persons many such as were by the Parliament intrusted and imployed for the safety of the Nation being by him or his Agents corrupted to the betraying of their Trust and revolting from the Parliament have had entertainment and Commission for the continuing and renewing of War and Hostility against the said Parliament and People as aforesaid By which cruel and unnatural Wars by him the said Charles Stuart levied continued and renewed as aforesaid much innocent blood of the Free People of this Nation hath been spilt many Families have been undone the publick Treasury wasted and exhausted Trade obstructed and miserably decayed vast expence and damage to the Nation incurred and many parts of the Land spoiled some of them even to Desolation And for further prosecution of his said evil Designs he the said Charles Stuart doth still continue his Commissions to the said Prince and other Rebels and Revolters both English and Foreiners and to the Earl of Ormond and to the Irish Rebels and Revolters associated with him from whom further Invasions upon this Land are threatned upon the procurement and on the behalf of the said Charles Stuart All which wicked Designs Wars and evil Practices of him the said Charles Stuart have been and are carried on for the advancing and upholding of the Personal Interest of Will and Power and pretended Prerogative to himself and his Family against the Publick Interest Common Right Liberty Justice and Peace of the People of this Nation by and for whom he was intrusted as aforesaid By all which it appeareth that he the said Charles Stuart hath been and is the Occasioner Author and Contriver of the said unnatural cruel and bloody Wars and therein guilty of all the Treasons Murders Rapines Burnings Spoils Desolations Damage and Mischief to this Nation acted or committed in the said Wars or occasioned thereby And the said John Cook by Protestation saving on the behalf of the People of England the liberty of exhibiting at any time hereafter any other Charge against the said Charles Stuart and also of replying to the Answers which the said Charles Stuart shall make to the Premisses or any of them or any other Charge that shall be so exhibited doth for the said Treasons and Crimes on the behalf of the said People of England impeach the said Charles Stuart as a Tyrant Traitor Murtherer and a publick and implacable Enemy to the Commonwealth of England and pray that the said Charles Stuart King of England may be put to answer all and every the Premisses that such Proceedings Examinations Tryals Sentence and Judgment may be thereupon had as shall be agreeable to Justice His Majesty with His wonted Patience heard all these Slanders and Reproaches sitting in the Chair and looking sometimes on the pretended Court sometimes up to the Galleries and rising again turned about to behold the Guards and Spectators then he sate down with a Majestick and unmoved countenance and sometimes smiling especially at those words Tyrant Traitor and the like Also the silver head of His Staff happened to fall off at which He wondred and seeing none to take it up He stooped for it Himself The Charge being read Bradshaw began Sir you have now heard your Charge read containing such matters as appear in it you find that in the close of it it is prayed to the Court in the behalf of the Commons of England that you answer to your Charge The Court expects your Answer KING I would know by what Power I am called hither I was not long ago in the Isle of Wight how I came there is a longer story than I think is fit at this time for Me to speak of but there I entred into a Treaty with both Houses of Parliament with as much publick Faith as it 's possible to be had of any People in the World I treated there with a number of Honourable Lords and Gentlemen and treated honestly and uprightly I cannot say but they did very nobly with Me we were upon a conclusion of the Treaty Now I would know by what Authority I mean lawful there are many unlawful Authorities in the world Thieves and Robbers by the high-ways but I would know by what Authority I was brought from thence and carried from place to place and I know not what And when I know by what lawful Authority I shall answer Remember I am your King your lawful King and what sins you bring upon your heads and the Judgment of God upon this Land Think well upon it I say think well upon it before you go further from one sin to a greater Therefore let Me know by what lawful Authority I am seated here and I shall not be unwilling to answer In the mean time I shall not betray My Trust I have a Trust committed to Me by God by old and lawful Descent I will not betray it to answer to a new unlawful Authority Therefore resolve Me that and you shall hear more of Me. Bradshaw If you had been pleased to have observed what was hinted to you by the Court at your first coming hither you would have known by what Authority which Authority requires you in the name of the People of England of which you are elected King to answer KING No Sir I deny that Bradshaw If you acknowledge not the Authority of the Court they must proceed KING I do tell them so England was never an Elective Kingdom but an Hereditary Kingdom for near these thousand years therefore let Me know by what Authority I am called
Privileges to alter the Fundamental Laws of the Kingdom Sir you must excuse Me. Bradshaw Sir this is the third time that you have publickly disown'd this Court and put an Affront upon it How far you have preserv'd the Privileges of the People your Actions have spoke it but truly Sir mens Intentions ought to be known by their Actions you have written your meaning in bloody Characters throughout the whole Kingdom But Sir you understand the pleasure of the Court. Clerk record the Default And Gentlemen you that took charge of the Prisoner take him back again KING I will only say this one word more to you If it were only My own particular I would not say any more nor interrupt you Bradshaw Sir you have heard the pleasure of the Court and you are notwithstanding you will not understand it to find that you are before a Court of Justice Then the King went forth with the Guard And Proclamation was made That all persons which had then appeared and had further to do at the Court might depart into the Painted Chamber to which place the Court did forthwith adjourn and intended to meet in Westminster-Hall by ten of the Clock next morning Cryer God bless the Kingdom of England Westminster-Hall Saturday Jan. 27. Afternoon TWo or three dayes being spent in a formal Examination of Witnesses and preparing themselves for the last scene of this Mock-shew at length on Saturday the twenty seventh of January Bradshaw in his Scarlet Robes appeared in the Hall and Sixty seven others answered to their Names As the King came in in His wonted posture with his Hat on and passed toward them some few Souldiers began a clamour for Justice Justice and Execution O yes made and Silence commanded the Captain of their Guard ordered to take into Custody such as made any disturbance His Majesty began I desire a word to be heard a little and I hope I shall give no occasion of interruption Bradshaw saucily answered You may answer in your time hear the Court first His Majesty patiently replied If it please you Sir I desire to be heard and I shall not give any occasion of interruption and it is only in a word A sudden Judgment Bradshaw Sir you shall be heard in due time but you are to hear the Court first KING Sir I desire it it will be in order to what I believe the Court will say and therefore Sir A hasty Judgment is not so soon recalled Bradshaw Sir you shall be heard before the Judgment be given and in the mean time you may forbear KING Well Sir shall I be heard before the Judgment be given Bradshaw Gentlemen it is well known to all or most of you here present that the Prisoner at the Bar hath been several times convented and brought before this Court to make Answer to a Charge of Treason and other high Crimes exhibited against him in the name of the People of England To which Charge being required to answer he hath been so far from obeying the Commands of the Court by submitting to their Justice as he began to take upon him to offer Reasoning and Debate unto the Authority of the Court and to the highest Court that appointed them to try and judge him But being over-ruled in that and required to make his Answer he was still pleased to continue Contumacious and to refuse to submit to Answer Hereupon the Court that they might not be wanting to themselves nor the Trust reposed in them nor that any man's wilfulness prevent Justice they have thought fit to take the matter into their consideration they have considered of the Charge they have considered of the Contumacy and of that Confession which in Law doth arise upon that Contumacy they have likewise considered of the Notoriety of the Fact charged upon this Prisoner and upon the whole matter they are resolved and are agreed upon a Sentence to be pronounced against this Prisoner But in respect he doth desire to be heard before the Sentence be read and pronounced the Court hath resolved that they will hear him Yet Sir thus much I must tell you beforehand which you have been minded of at other Courts That if that which you have to say be to offer any debate concerning the Jurisdiction you are not to be heard in it You have offered it formerly and you have struck at the Root that is the Power and Supreme Authority of the Commons of England which this Court will not admit a debate of and which indeed it is an irrational thing in them to do being a Court that acts upon Authority derived from them But Sir if you have any thing to say in defence of your self concerning the matter charged the Court hath given me in command to let you know they will hear you KING Since I see that you will not hear any thing of Debate concerning that which I confess I though most material for the Peace of the Kingdom and for the Liberty of the Subject I shall wave it I shall speak nothing to it But only I must tell you that this many-a day all things have been taken away from Me but that that I call dearer to Me than My Life which is My Conscience and My Honor And if I had a respect to My Life more than the Peace of the Kingdom and the Liberty of the Subject certainly I should have made a particular Defence for My Self for by that at leastwise I might have delayed an ugly Sentence which I believe will pass upon Me. Therefore certainly Sir as a man that hath some understanding some knowledge of the World if that My true Zeal to My Countrey had not overborn the care that I have for My own Preservation I should have gone another way to work than that I have done Now Sir I conceive that an hasty Sentence once past may sooner be repented of than recalled and truly the self-same desire that I have for the Peace of the Kingdom and the Liberty of the Subject more than my own particular Ends makes Me now at last desire That I having something to say that concerns both I desire before Sentence be given that I may be heard in the Painted Chamber before the Lords and Commons This Delay cannot be prejudicial unto you whatsoever I say If that I say no Reason those that hear Me must be Judges I cannot be Judge of that that I * have If it be Reason and really for the welfare of the Kingdom and the Liberty of the Subject I am sure on it it is very well worth the hearing Therefore I do conjure you as you love that that you pretend I hope it is real the Liberty of the Subject the Peace of the Kingdom that you will grant me this hearing before any Sentence be past I only desire this That you will take this into your Consideration it may be you have not heard of it before-hand If you will I will retire and you may think of
and informed in the Rights of Our Sovereignty And because the Trials in Our several Courts by the formalities in pleading will require a long protraction We have thought fit by this Letter directed to you all to require your Judgment in the Case as it is set down in the inclosed Paper which will not only gain time but also be of more authority to over-rule any prejudicate opinions of others in the point Given under Our Signet at Our Court of White-hall the second day of February in the twelfth year of Our Reign 1636. C. R. CHARLES R. WHen the good and safety of the Kingdom in general is concerned and the whole Kingdom in danger whether may not the King by Writ under the Great Seal of England command all the Subjects in His Kingdom at their charge to provide and furnish such number of Ships with Men Victuals and Munition and for such time as He shall think fit for the defence and safeguard of the Kingdom from such danger and peril and by Law compel the doing thereof in case of refusal or refractoriness And whether in such case is not the King the sole judge both of the Danger and when and how the same is to be prevented and avoided The Answer of the Judges MAY it please Your most Excellent Majesty We have according to Your Majestie 's command severally and every man by himself and all of us together taken into serious consideration the Case and Questions signed by Your Majesty and inclosed in Your Letter And We are of opinion That when the good and safety of the Kingdom in general is concerned and the whole Kingdom in danger Your Majesty may by Writ under Your Great Seal of England command all the Subjects of this Your Kingdom at their charge to provide and furnish such number of Ships with Men Victual Munition and for such time as Your Majesty shall think fit for the defence and safeguard of the Kingdom from such peril and danger And that by Law Your Majesty may compel the doing thereof in case of refusal or refractoriness And we are also of opinion that in such case Your Majesty is the sole judge both of the Danger and when and how the same is to be prevented and avoided John Bramston John Finch Humphrey Davenport John Denham Richard Hutton William Jones George Crook Thomas Trevor George Vernon Robert Barkly Francis Crauley Richard Weston His MAJESTIE's Declaration to all His loving Subjects of the Causes which moved Him to dissolve His Fourth Parliament THE King 's most Excellent Majesty well knoweth that the Calling Adjourning Proroguing and Dissolving of Parliaments are undoubted Prerogatives inseparably annexed to His Imperial Crown of which He is not bound to render any account but to God alone no more than of His other Regal actions Nevertheless His Majesty whose Piety and Goodness have made Him ever so order and govern all things that the clearness and Candor of His Royal heart may appear to all His Subjects especially in those great and publick matters of State that have relation to the weal and safety of His People and the Honour of His Royal Person and Government hath thought fit for avoiding and preventing all sinister constructions and misinter pretations which the Malice of some persons ill-affected to His Crown and Soveraignty hath or may practise to infuse into the minds an ears of His good and faithful Subjects to set down by way of Declaration the true Causes as well of His Assembling as of His Dissolving the late Parliament IT is not unknown to most of His Majestie 's loving Subjects what discouragements He hath formerly had by the undutiful and seditious carriage of divers of the lower House in preceding Assemblies of Parliament enough to have made Him averse to those ancient and accustomed ways of calling His People together when in stead of dutiful expressions towards His Person and Government they vented their own Malice and disaffections to the State and by their subtle and malignant courses endeavoured nothing more than to bring into contempt and disorder all Government and Magistracy Yet His Majesty well considering that but few were guilty of that seditious and undutiful behaviour and hoping that time and experience had made His loving Subjects sensible of the distemper the whole Kingdom was in danger to be put into by the ill-govern'd actions of those men and His Majesty being ever desirous to tread in the steps of His most noble Progenitors was pleased to issue forth His Writs under the great Seal of England for a Parliament to be holden on the thirteenth day of April last At which day His Majesty by the Lord Keeper of His great Seal was graciously pleased to let both Houses of Parliament know how desirous He was that all His people would unite their hearts and affections in the execution of those Counsels that might tend to the Honour of His Majesty the Safety of His Kingdoms and the good and preservation of all His people and withal how confident He was that they would not be failing in their duties and affections to Him and to the publick He laid open to them the manifest and apparent mischiefs threatned to this and all His other Kingdoms by the mutinous and rebellious behaviour of divers of the Scotish nation who had by their examples drawn many of His Subjects there into a course of disloyalty and disobedience not fit for His Majesty in Honour Safety or Wisdom to endure How to strengthen themselves in their disloyal courses they had addrest themselves to forein States and treated with them to deliver themselves up to their protection and defence as was made apparent under the proper hands of the prime Ring-leaders of that Rebellious Faction These courses of theirs tending so much to the ruine and overthrow of this famous Monarchy united by the descent of the Crown of England upon His Majesty and his Father of blessed Memory His Majesty in His great Wisdom and in discharge of the trust reposed in Him by God and by the Fundamental Laws of both Kingdoms for the protection and government of them resolved to suppress and thereby to vindicate that Sovereign power entrusted to Him He had by the last Summers trial found that his Grace and Goodness was abused and that contrary to his expectation and their faithful promises they had since his being at Berwick and the Pacification there made pursued their former rebellious designs and therefore it was necessary now for his Majesty by power to reduce them to the just and modest condition of their Obedience and subjection which whenever they should be brought unto or seeing their own Errors should put themselves into a way of Humility and Obedience becoming them his Majesty should need no other Mediatours for Clemency and Mercy to them than his own Piety and Goodness and the tender affection he hath ever born to that his native Countrey This being of so great weight and consequence to the whole Kingdo
and Innovations as might make them apt to joyn with England in that great Change which was intended Whereupon new Canons and a new Liturgy were prest upon them and when they refused to admit of them an Army was raised to force them to it towards which the Clergy and the Papists were very forward in their Contribution The Scots likewise raised an Army for their defence and when both Armies were come together and ready for a bloody encounter His Majesties own Gracious Disposition and the Counsel of the English Nobility and Dutiful submission of the Scots did so far prevail against the evil Counsel of others that a Pacification was made and His Majesty returned with Peace and much Honour to London The unexpected Reconciliation was most acceptable to all the Kingdom except to the malignant party whereof the Archbishop and the Earl of Strafford being heads they and their faction begun to inveigh against the Peace and to aggravate the proceeding of the States which so incensed His Majesty that He forthwith prepared again for War And such was their confidence that having corrupted and distempered the whole frame and Government of the Kingdom they did now hope to corrupt that which was the only means to restore all to a right frame and temper again To which end they perswaded His Majesty to call a Parliament not to seek counsel and advice of them but to draw countenance and Supply from them and engage the whole Kingdom in their Quarrel and in the mean time continued all their unjust Levies of Money resolving either to make the Parliament pliant to their Will and to establish mischief by a Law or else to brake it and with more colour to go on by violence to take what they could not obtain by consent The ground alledged for the justification of this War was this That the undutiful Demands of the Parliaments of Scotland was a sufficient reason for His Majesty to take Arms against them without hearing the Reason of those Demands And thereupon a new Army was prepared against them their Ships were seized in all Ports both of England and Ireland and at Sea their Petitions rejected their Commissioners refused Audience this whole Kingdom most miserably distempered with Levies of Men and Money and Imprisonments of those who denied to submit to those Levies The Earl of Strafford past into Ireland caused the Parliament there to declare against the Scots to give four Subsidies towards that War and to ingage themselves their Lives and Fortunes for the prosecution of it and gave directions for an Army of eight thousand foot and one thousand horse to be levied there which were for the most part Papists The Parliament met upon the thirteenth of April one thousand six hundred and forty The Earl of Strafford and Archbishop of Canterbury with their Party so prevailed with His Majesty that the House of Commons was prest to yield to a Supply for maintenance of the War with Scotland before they had provided any relief for the great and pressing Grievances of the people which being against the fundamental Privilege and proceeding of Parliament was yet in humble respect to His Majesty so far admitted as that they agreed to take the matter of Supply into consideration and two several days it was debated Twelve Subsidies were demanded for the release of Ship-money alone A third day was appointed for conclusion when the Heads of that Party begun to fear the people might close with the King in satisfying his desire of money but that withal they were like to blast their malicious designs against Scotland finding them very much indisposed to give any countenance to that War Thereupon they wickedly advised the King to break off the Parliament and to return to the ways of Confusion in which their own evil intentions were most like to prosper and succeed After the Parliament ended the fifth of May 1640. this Party grew so bold as to counsel the King to supply Himself out of his Subjects states by His own Power at His own will without their consent The very next day some Members of both Houses had their studies and cabinets yea their pockets searched another of them not long after was committed close prisoner for not delivering some Petitions which he received by authority of that House And if harsher courses were intended as was reported it is very probable that the sickness of the Earl of Strafford and the tumultuous rising in Southwark and about Lambeth were the causes that such violent intentions were not brought to execution A false and scandalous Declaration against the House of Commons was published in his Majesties Name which yet wrought little effect with the people but only to manifest the impudence of those who were Authors of it A forced Loan of money was attempted in the City of London The Lord Mayor and Aldermen in their several Wards enjoyned to bring in a list of the names of such persons as they judged fit to lend and of the summ they should lend And such Aldermen as refused so to do were committed to prison The Archbishop and the other Bishops and Clergy continued the Convocation and by a new Commission turned it to a Provincial Synod in which by an unheard of presumption they made Canons that contain in them many matters contrary to the Kings Prerogative to the fundamental Laws and Statutes of the Realm to the Right of Parliaments to the Property and Liberty of the Subject and matters tending to Sedition and of dangerous consequence thereby establishing their own Usurpations justifying their Altar-worship and those other superstitious Innovations which they formerly introduced without warrant of Law They imposed a new Oath upon divers of his Majesties Subjects both Ecclesiastical and Lay for maintenance of their own Tyranny and laid a great tax upon the Clergy for supply of his Majesty and generally they shewed themselves very affectionate to the War with Scotland which was by some of them styled Bellum Episcopale and a Prayer composed and enjoyned to be read in all Churches calling the Scots Rebels to put the two Nations into blood and make them irreconcilable All those pretended Canons and Constitutions were armed with the several Censures of Suspension Excommunication Deprivation by which they would have thrust out all the good Ministers and most of the well affected people of the Kingdom and left an easie passage to their own design of reconciliation with Rome The Popish party enjoyned such exemptions from the Penal Laws as amounted to a Toleration besides many other encouragements and Court-favours They had a Secretary of State Sir Francis Windebank a powerful Agent for the speeding of all their desires a Pope's Nuntio residing here to act and govern them according to such influences as he received from Rome and to intercede for them with the most powerful concurrence of the foreign Princes of that Religion By his authority the Papists of all sorts Nobility Gentry and Clergy were convocated after the
satisfie their own private Ends and Ambition for themselves know what overtures have been made by them and with what importunity for Offices and Preferments what great Services should have been done for Us and what other undertakings were even to have saved the Life of the Earl of Strafford if We would confer such Offices upon them We were sure We could make such particular proofs against them of a solemn Combination entred into by them for altering the Government of the Church and State of their designing Offices to themselves and other Men of their solliciting and drawing down the Tumults to Westminster and of their bidding the People in the height of their rage and fury to go to White-Hall of their scornful and odious mention of Our Person and their design of getting Our Son the Prince into their hands of their treating with Foreign Power to assist them if they should fail in their enterprises Yet we saw too that their Interest and reputation was so great with many of both Houses of Parliament their Power so absolute with a multitude of Brownists Anabaptists and other Sectaries about London who were ready to appear in a body at their command that it would be a hard matter to proceed against them In this streight We resolved to do Our part in both to give Our People a clear satisfaction of Our upright Intentions to the publick whereby they should find their Happiness did not at all depend on such Instruments and to proceed against the Persons of the other in a legal way that all the world might see what Ambition Malice and Sedition had been had under the Vizour of Conscience and Religion Hereupon We prepared an Answer to the Remonstrance the House of Commons had before published to the People of the State of the Kingdom wherein without taking notice of the uncomely Language in and the Circumstances of that Remonstrance We declared with as gracious and full Expressions as We could make Our earnest Resolutions for the maintenance of the true Protestant Religion the Liberty and Property of the Subject and the Law of the Land and made no less gracious offers to consent to any Act that should be offered for the ease of tender Consciences in matters indifferent and very earnestly desired that the same might be provided and whatever else should be thought necessary for the Peace and Security of Our People And then that We might likewise manifest the Actions of that Malignant Party which had done so much mischief and intended so much more We resolved to accuse the Lord Kimbolton Master Hollis Master Pym Master Hampden and Master Stroud who had so maliciously contrived the Ruine of Our Self and the established Government of this Church and Kingdom and Sir Arthur Hesilrigge who had been made their Instrument to obey and execute their bold and wild designs of High Treason as We had great reason to do hoping that their Duty due to Us and the Obligations We had put upon Our People this Parliament would never suffer the Interest and reputation of these Men to be laid in the scale and to over-weigh Our Regal Authority and the Law of the Land but that We should have found a way open to a fair and Legal Trial of them which was all We desired How our proceeding was in that business and Our managery of it We have truly and at large set forth in Our Answer to the Declaration of both Houses of the nineteenth of May That what We did first in acquainting the House of Commons with Our Accusation by Our Serjeant at Arms was in Correspondence and out of regard to that House that We might rather have them delivered to the hands of Justice by them than apprehend them by an ordinary Minister of Justice which We were and are assured whatever Doctrine is preached to the contrary We might well have done in the case of Treason otherwise that Maxime in the Law acknowledged in a Petition of both Houses to Us in the beginning of Our Reign in the Case of the Earl of Arundel That in case of Treason Felony and breach of Peace Priviledge of Parliament doth not extend is of no signification The words are They find it an undoubted Right and constant Priviledge of Parliament That no Member of Parliament sitting the Parliament or within the usual times of Priviledge of Parliament is to be imprisoned or restrained without Sentence or Order of the House unless it be for Treason Felony or for refusing to give Sureties for the Peace In those Cases 't was then thought a Member of either House was not to be distinguished from another Subject and why We might not as well have expected that upon Our Articles not so general as a meer verbal Accusation of High Treason either House would have committed their several Members as they had done so many this Parliament and about that time Twelve together upon a confessed ground which every Man there who knew what Treason was knew that fact to be none meerly because they were accused and as the House of Peers had formerly done a Member of that House the Earl of Bristol accused in the same manner most of the good Lords being then Judges We neither could then nor can yet understand That Our own coming to the House was to prevent that shedding of blood which in all possibility was likely to follow that Order made the night before for resisting all such Officers who endeavoured upon how legal Warrant soever to arrest any Members of either House an Order much more unjustifiable by any Rule of Law and Justice by which Orders or Acts are to be examined than any thing We have done or any body by Our Authority That Our purpose was no other but to acquaint that House with the matter of Our Accusation to desire their Persons might be secured and without any thought of the least violation of their Priviledges This is that which We did Examine now their part and their progress since and then judge whose Priviledges have been invaded and with how good a mind to the Common-wealth they have proceeded We were no sooner gone but the House adjourned it self with some unusual expressions of offence and We were speedily informed that some Reports and Scandals were raised against Us in Our City of London That We had offered Violence to Our House of Commons come thither with force to murther several Members and used threatning Speeches there against Our Parliament and that this was but a Preface to an attempt We meant to make against and upon the City Whereupon We resolved the next day to go to the Guild-Hall and to shew the great Confidence We had in the affections of Our said City which We expected should have begot a proportionable Confidence from them in Us We went attended with very few of Our own Servants and then in the presence of the Lord Mayor the Aldermen and a very great assembly of the chief Citizens and others We made
Propositions could be more unreasonable than those Fourteen except the former Nineteen To pass by the Preamble in which most unnecessarily they lay most heavy and most unjust Charges upon His Majesty and yet draw an Argument of His Aversion to Peace from those known Truths which either His defence or the matter in question Crimes being impossible to be spoken of but as Crimes did after extort from Him would not any man have expected that had observed with what violence this War was begun and prosecuted against His Majesty to have found in the Propositions for Peace the Demand of at least some and those very important Rights which were withheld from them before the War and so had given some colour for it But of these there appears not so much as one and yet till all these are granted and performed they do as much as say in Terms plain enough in their Conclusion that they have not any hope nor will use any endeavours that His Majesty and His People may enjoy the Blessings of Peace and Justice which was certainly by terrour of Arms to demand new Laws and as great a Proof that they did so as they seem to confess it unparliamentary if they had done it Is not the taking away of the Bishops Deans and Chapters and indeed the whole establisht Ecclesiastical frame of Order and Government a new Law yet unless His Majesty will yield to take it away though there were but five Lords present when the Bill past and though no other form be yet offered or shewed to Him but the Presbyterians and Independents are left to fight it out among themselves what shall succeed in the place His Majesty is told He must not hope for Peace And the division likely to ensue between different Parties what shall after be introduced shews sufficiently what hope there should be of Peace if He should pass it Are not the Bill against Scandalous Ministers in which most of their own Faction are appointed Commissioners that they may make way for and introduce a new Clergy of their own the Bill against Pluralities which makes no difference of conditions or merits of Persons or of value of Livings and looks not only forwards but extends to the immediate dispossessing of present Incumbents of what is vested in them for their Lives by the Law of the Land the Bill for the Consultation of Divines Persons of their own choice and most of them of their Faction and of no esteem but with themselves hardly at all bounded as to the matter and absolutely unlimited as to the time of their consultation all news Laws Is not the settling of the Militia both by Sea and Land and the Forts and Ports in such a manner as shall be agreed on by both Houses in which His Majesty is expected with a blind implicite Faith to trust them with the whole Power of the Kingdom and with His only means of defending Himself and protecting His Subjects though into what hands or for what time or in what manner they will order or dispose of it is so far from appearing to Him that it doth not yet appear that both Houses know themselves and how they have already used that Power is known to all the World both a new and a strange Demand Are the Earl of Bristoll's Removal and Exclusion from all possibility of Employment a Person uncondemned unimpeacht and unsummoned no crime or error either proved or but named against him or the choice of the Judges and Master of the Rolls the change of Commissioners of the Peace and Oyer and Terminer or the restoring of Members of the Houses even to such menial places of Service as required a personal attendance and who had yet refused to attend upon command or the assenting to whatsoever Acts He shall be advised for paying of Debts contracted upon the publick Faith that is by the Authority of both Houses by which His Majesty must allow Himself to be no no part of the publick and must directly allow and as it were ratifie that Rebellion which this Money was raised to foment either due to them by Law or reasonable in themselves Doth the directing His Majesty with whom and how far to make Alliances belong to them or was that at all necessary His inclination to the strictest bands with Princes and States of the Protestant Religion being by the Match of His Daughter sufficiently expressed And yet till all this be done and unless He will pardon all that have born Arms against Him and leave those that have assisted Him to their Mercy who have none they will not promise any hopeful endeavours for Peace and Justice But is there any thing else that is due by Law which was before denied and is here demanded that can in any degree justifie or extenuate that ever Peace was broken and Justice destroyed Not so much as one tittle Did His Majesty give any Commission till they had mustered many men Or did He so much as take any Guard to Him till both they had a much greater many months and had of their own Authority ordered a Serjeant-Major-General of their City Forces and till His Magazine and Town were by Arms kept against Him though He were provoked to it before by all the other Indignities and Injuries which Insolence and Injustice could devise Was not Sir John Hotham for all his known Treason refused to be left by them to Justice and the trial of the Law before ever any that was but call'd a Delinquent was protected by His Majesty And was not His Majesty then denied that which themselves confess to be the due and right of the meanest Subject and do so far expect as to look upon it rather as a scorn than a satisfaction now His Majesty offers it to them Was any one Papist armed by His Majesty before many of that Religion and multitudes of persons against whose Recusancy the Law is as severe as against theirs were armed against Him or than either until their mere being of that Religion made them without colour of Law be plunder'd and imprison'd in all parts and some of them fly into His Army for protection Did not His Majesty before of himself often offer to vindicate the Privileges of Parliament from any imaginable breach of them in the business of the Lord Kimbolton and Five Members and did He not offer to wave their Charge willingly submitting it to the publick Peace So that the obtaining that demand or the disbanding of the Army or the disarming of Papists or the trial of Delinquents though they make some such shew as they are set in this place yet not any of them were any grounds of this their War And all that is due in these Demands having been offered before the War or occasioned or necessitated by it and being still to be had without it the whole People cannot but see that nothing but Fears and Jealousies have been the fumes with which they have so intoxicated His seduced Subjects
which seems to prove the contrary to that which by this they intend to prove Fourthly That of the Persons there named there is not one that either is a Papist or so like one that a Jesuit may be thought to have recommended him nor any one except the Lord Digby that was either impeacht or otherwise taxt or that could appear to His Majesty to have ever been in any degree dislik'd by both or either House before assisting His Majesty against a Rebellion did lately become Treason and whoever considers the Time and other Circumstances even of that Impeachment and that their Eyes were then so dazled with Fears and Jealousies as to take a Coach and six Horses for an Army raised against them will hardly look upon that Impeachment with that reverence which hath usually been paid to Accusations of that kind And for their bearing of Arms in such a Time wherein all His Majesty's Subjects do either bear or assist Arms either for or against Him He supposes that it will not be thought strange if He chuse Persons for such Places as are in His own Disposal rather out of the first Sort than out of the second And as His Majesty hath fully answered their Observations upon His Letters so He believes that one thing more though unobserved by this Declaration cannot but be observed out of them by His People and that is That in His Majesty's most private Letters to the Person nearest to Him wherein He cannot as by some in His publick Declarations He is be suspected to say any thing out of Design or Policy His own clear perswasion that the Rebels and not He have been the cause and are the fosterers of this War and universal Distraction and His Sense of it and His Desire of the end of it are so plainly exprest that they will by this Accident be much satisfied with His Majesty's Innocence and Reality and believe that the reading this in such a Letter is the very next Degree to reading it in His Heart Their fifth and last Argument is The attempts of Force and Violence against the Kingdom and this Parliament and they instance in four The first is a Design many years since to bring into this Kingdom the German Horse to compel the Subjects to submit to an Arbitrary Government And to this His Majesty replies That He esteems His Condition more miserable than that of any of His Subjects when He sees a few Factious persons have obtained that power as to be able to publish to all His People in the name of both Houses a Charge which coming forth with the semblance of such Authority may much work with them against Him and yet do not which is certainly because they cannot tell any one proof or particular either whence whether when by whom or by whose Design these Horse should have been brought They confess it is many years since and it seems it is so many that these particulars are all worn out of the memory of man The second is the endeavour to bring up the Northern Army by Force and Violence to awe the Parliament To this His Majesty hath so often answer'd and received so little Reply that He will only now briefly say that according to the Evidence they have publish'd themselves and that before hearing the persons concern'd in it after so long a time of the Houses leisure and their attendance whose Answer it was perhaps feared would have cleared it more it doth not appear that there was ever any Endeavour used in it nor any thing further than a mere motion which died as soon as it was conceived and it doth appear that His Majesty absolutely dislik'd it as soon as by way of Discourse it was but named to Him But if it had been really endeavoured it had been but an Endeavour towards that which was directly put in Execution by the Tumults and those countenanc'd by the Refusal of the House of Commons not only to punish them but so much as to joyn with the Lords in a Declaration against the like for the future and by the stopping the legal Proceedings against Riots by a single Order of the House The third is His Majesty's coming in Person to the House of Commons with many armed men to demand their Members to be delivered up His Majesty confesseth He came He denies that to His knowledge He came accompanied with any men otherwise armed than with His Guard and Pensioners in the same manner as He usually came to the House of Lords and with some Gentlemen as His Train when He goes to any publick place is always so waited on with their usual Weapons their Swords And if they had been as careful to publish what Persons of Quality as Serjeant-Major Ashly for one testified upon their knowledge and Oath as what mean unknown and unsworn Persons delivered upon their bare Credit or upon hear-say it would have appeared to His People how little Violence was intended by any who came with Him however armed and what Care He took and what Orders He gave to be sure to prevent any that possibly might have happened His Majesty likewise confesses that He demanded the Members He had accused of High Treason but puts them withal in mind that the House of Commons had hardly left him any other Course having by their single Order the night before intercepted all ordinary proceedings of Justice against them forbidding all Officers to attach any Member for any Crime without the Consent of the House and encouraging the People in that case to assist them against any Officer though their Privileges had been confess'd by a late Petition of both Houses not to extend to Treason and though this Order were as illegal and unjustifiable as not only His Majesty's coming to the House but even as any thing they would have had the People believe that He intended when He came But whatever Breach of Privilege there was in this His Majesty did not offer to justifie it by their preceding breach of Law but offered them often Reparation and Satisfaction for it but it seems nothing but the Ships Forts Ports Magazine and Militia of the whole Kingdom would appear to them a Reparation for a single and this Circumstance considered perhaps a disputable Breach of Privilege The Fourth is the Treason of the Earl of Strafford to bring over the Irish Popish Army to conquer the Kingdom To this His Majesty replies That whatever the Earl of Strafford could have said for this Army He is sure was never brought nor that He ever heard was ever endeavoured to be brought over either to that or any other purpose His Majesty cannot see why it might not have remained buried with him or why any other satisfaction should be given for it or other security against the like than the Punishment he hath already undergone Having given what Reasons they can to justifie their Limitations of His Majesty's Propositions this Declaration in the next place attempts to satisfie that
Letters to the Speaker of the House of Commons a Copy of which was sent to Us were forthwith sent to them That Our Army would be forced through wants to disband or depart the Kingdom and that there would be nothing to be exspected there but the instant Loss of the Kingdom and the destruction of the remnant of Our good Subjects yet left there In stead of any redress or relief according to these Letters such Ships as were by the care and charity of well-affected Persons provided to transport Cloths and Victual to them were in their Voyage thither seized and taken by the Ships under the Command of the Earl of Warwick and in stead of endeavours to send more Forces thither attempts were made to draw the Scotch Forces from thence into this Kingdom So that We thought Our Self bound in Duty and Conscience since it was not in Our power otherwise to preserve that Kingdom from utter Ruine at least to admit any Expedient which with God's blessing might be a means to preserve that People and therefore We directed the Lord Marquess Ormond whom for his Courage Affection and Loyalty We had made Our Lieutenant-General of that Our Army and who having gotten so many notable Victories upon the Rebels was very well approved of by the two Houses of Parliament to agree on Our behalf to such a Cessation of Arms with the Rebels as upon his understanding and knowledge of the condition of Our affairs there should be thought reasonable This Cessation was concluded on the 15. day of September for one whole year and the Articles thereof printed at Dublin were sent to Us by Our Lords Justices and Council and arrived here on Saturday last with a Letter from them to one of Our Secretaries expressing the great sufferings of Our Army there through want of relief out of England We have thought fit with this true and plain relation to publish the said Articles according to the Copy sent Us that all Our good Subjects may see how We have proceeded herein What opinion the principal Persons as well of Our Council as the Officers of Our Army there have of this Cessation may appear by the Testimony which We have caused to be Printed after the Articles with their names who have set their hands to the same And let all Our good Subjects be assured that as We have for these Reasons and with this Caution and deliberation consented to this Preparation to Peace and to that purpose do continue Our Parliament there so We shall proceed in the accomplishing thereof with that care and circumspection that We shall not admit even Peace it self otherwise than as it may be agreeable to Conscience Honour and Justice By the Lords Justices and Council Jo. Borlase Hen. Tichborne UPON consideration had of the annexed Articles of Cessation of Arms whereby it is concluded and accorded that there be a Cessation of Arms and of all Acts of Hostility for one whole year beginning the fifteenth day of September Anno Domini one thousand six hundred forty three at the hour of twelve of the Clock of the said day We the Lords Justices and Council according to His Majesty's Letters of the one and thirtieth of July last do by this Proclamation in His Majesty's Name ratifie confirm and publish the same and do require all His Majesty's Subjects whom it may concern by Sea and Land to take notice thereof and to yield all due Obedience thereunto in all the parts thereof Given at His Majesty's Castle of Dublin the 19th day of September 1643. R. Bolton Canc. Roscomon Cha. Lambart Tho. Rotherham Tho. Lucas La. Dublin Edw. Brabazon Geo. Shurley Ormonde Ant. Midensis Gerard Lowther Fr. Willoughby Ja. Ware God Save the KING ARticles of Cessation of Arms agreed and concluded on at Singingstown in the County of Kildare the 15. day of September in the nineteenth year of His Majesty's Reign by and between James Marquess of Ormond Lieutenant-General of His Majesty's Army in the Kingdom of Ireland for and in the Name of Our Gracious Sovereign Lord CHARLES by the Grace of God King of Great Britain France and Ireland c. by virtue of His Majesty's Commission bearing date at Dublin the last of August in the said nineteenth year of His Majesty's Reign of the one part and Donnogh Viscount Muskery Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Nicholas Plunket Esquire Sir Robert Talbot Baronet Sir Richard Barnewell Baronet Torlogh O-Neal Geffry Brown Ever Mac-Gennis and John Walsh Esquires authorized by His Majesty's Roman Catholick Subjects of whose party they are and now in Arms in the said Kingdom c. to treat and conclude with the said Marquess for a Cessation of Arms by virtue of an Authority given unto them bearing date at Cashel the 7. day of September in the said nineteenth year of His Majesty's Reign of the other part FIrst It is concluded and accorded that there be a Cessation of Arms and of all Acts of Hostility between His Majesty 's said Roman Catholick Subjects who are now in Arms c. in this Kingdom and their Party and all others His Majesty's good Subjects for one whole year to begin the fifteenth day of Septemb. Anno Dom. 1643. at the hour of 12. of the clock of the said day Item It is concluded and accorded that free passage Entercourse Commerce and Traffick during the said Cessation shall be between His Majesty 's said Roman Catholick Subjects who are now in Arms c. and their Party and all others His Majesty's good Subjects and all others in League with His Majesty by Sea and Land Item It is concluded and accorded and the said Viscount Muskery and the rest of the above-named Persons do promise and undertake for and in the behalf of those for whom they are authorized to treat and conclude as aforesaid that all Ships Barques and Vessels which shall bring Provisions to any Harbour in this Kingdom in the hands or possession of such as shall obey the Articles of this Cessation from Minehead and White-haven and from all the Ports between on that side where Wales is situate so as they be Ships belonging to any of the said Ports and do not use any Acts of Hostility to any of the said Roman Catholicks who are now in Arms c. or to any of their Party or to any who shall be waged or employed unto or by them shall not be interrupted by any of their Party nor by any Ships or other Vessels of what Country or Nation soever under their Power or Command or waged employed or contracted with on their behalf or by any Forts Garrisons or forces within this Kingdom under their power in their coming to this Kingdom or returning from thence Item It is concluded and accorded and the said Lord Viscount Muskery and the rest of the above-named parties do promise and undertake for and in the behalf of those for whom they are authorized as aforesaid that all Ships Barques and Vessels which shall bring
lastly after having lived so many years in the most glorious and most unblemished Church of Christendom the total defacing and pulling down the whole Fabrick of it censuring and reproaching the Doctrine and destroying the Discipline and as if we were cast ashore in some uninhabited Climate where the Elements of Christianity were not known the calling without the least shadow or colour of Law or Lawful Authority against His Majesty's express Consent manifestly against the Statute of 25 th year of King Henry the Eighth an assembly of Divines composed of some Noblemen Gentlemen and Ministers all under the style of Godly and Learned Divines most of which are not otherwise known than by their Schism and Separation from that Church in which they were born and to which they have subscribed and these Men now must new-make and mould the Religion by which we must all be saved God in his good time we hope will vindicate his own Cause and repair the breaches which have been lately made For the Laws of the Land and the Liberty of the Subject so speciously urged and pretended to be the end of those who have disturbed our Peace we need say little every place and every person is an ample evidence and testimony of the bold and avowed violation of either The Charter of our Liberties Magna Charta so industriously and Religiously preserved by our Ancestors and above Thirty several times confirmed in Parliament that Rampire and Bulwark of all the precious Privileges and Immunities which the Subjects of this Kingdom could boast of and which distinguishes them from all the Subjects of Christendom is levelled and trampled under foot scorned despised and superseded by Votes and Orders Men of all sorts Clergy and Laity imprisoned without the least charge that by the Law is called a Crime and their Estates are sequestred by Persons of whom the Law can take no notice Committees made by Committees Rob Banish and Imprison the Lords and Commons of England Men committed by Persons of no Authority for no cause to Prison have by Habeas Corpus the good old Remedy and Security for our Liberty been brought to the Kings Bench and by command of those who first committed them remanded and Commands given to the Judges that they should grant no Habeas Corpus which they were sworn to grant to any Persons committed by them or by those to whom they grant Authority to commit which themselves have not Power to do Neither can we pass over the motion made by Mr. Rigby a Member of the House of Commons to transport those Lords and Gentlemen who were Prisoners and by them accounted Malignants to be sold as Slaves to Argiers or sent to the new Plantation in the West Indies urged the second time with much earnestness because the Proposer had contracted with two Merchants to that purpose the which though it took no effect at that time may awaken those who have observed so many things to pass and be ordered long after they have been once or twice denied and rejected And who sees the new and inhumane way of imprisoning Persons of Quality under Decks on Ship-board by which cruel usage many of our Country-men have been murthered may have reason to fear they may be hereafter carried a longer voyage than is yet avowed The twentieth part of our Estates is at once taken and if we are not willing to obey that Order the other Nineteen are taken from us as Malignants a term unknown and undefined and yet crime enough to forfeit our Lives and all that we have Our fellow-Subjects have been executed in cold blood for doing that which by the Laws of God and Man they were bound to do and after their Murther their Estates seized and their Wives and Children exposed to Misery and Famine Laws made and Penalties imposed by Laws this Parliament are suspended dispensed withal and those things done by Order against which those Laws were made And that there may be no face of Justice over the Land the Judges are prohibited to ride their Circuits for the administration of that Justice which the King owes His People and they are bound to execute And after all this and after the merciless shedding so much English Blood after the expending so much Money much of which was given for relief of our poor Protestant Brethren of Ireland and diverted for the improving the Distractions at home after the transportation of such vast sums of Money and great Treasure into Foreign parts to the unspeakable impoverishing this Poor Kingdom to make our Misery lasting and our Confusion compleat a Foreign Enemy is invited and brought into the Bowels of this Kingdom to drink our blood to divide our Possession to give us new Laws and to Rule over us And the better to make way to those horrid Impositions by confounding and making void all civil Rights and Proprieties and the better preparing the Kingdom to be shared by Strangers a New Great Seal the special Ensign of Monarchy and the only way by which Justice is derived and distributed to the People is counterfeited and used albeit it be by the express letter of the Statute of the 25 th year of King Edward the Third declared to be High Treason Having now made this clear plain Narration to the Kingdom the truth and particulars whereof are known to most Men that when Posterity shall find our names in the Records of these times as Members trusted by our Country in that great Council by whose Authority and Power the present Alteration and Distraction seems to be wrought it may likewise see how far we have been and are from consenting to these desperate and fatal Innovations we cannot rest satisfied without Declaring and Publishing to all our fellow-Subjects and to the whole World that all our Intentions and Actions have been are and shall be directed to the defence of His Majesty's Person and just Rights the preservation of the true Protestant Religion and Liberties of the Kingdom established by Law That as we do with all humility to God Almighty and as a great Blessing from him acknowledge His Majesty's happy and Religious Reign and Government over this Kingdom and especially the excellent Laws and Statutes made in His time and particularly those in this Parliament so we do with all duty and submission Declare That His Majesty is the only Supream Governour of this Realm in all Causes Ecclesiastical and Temporal That His Natural Person is not to be divided from His Kingly Office but that our natural Allegiance and the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy do bind us and all His other Subjects to Loyalty and Allegiance to His Natural Person That His Majesty's Negative Voice without which Monarchy is dissolved is an inherent Right of His Crown and that no Orders of one or both Houses of Parliament without His Majesty's express Consent can make a Law to bind the Subjects either in their Property or Liberty That we do from our Souls abhor
time such a mutual Confidence may be begot betwixt His Majesty and all His People that the Peace will be firm and lasting That the Commissioners before their entrance upon the said Trust shall take an Oath for the due execution of the said Commission and that after the expiration of the said term of three years from the time of the issuing the said Commission they shall not presume to continue any execution of the said Authority and it shall be high Treason in any of them to execute the said Authority after the expiration of the said three years And all the Commanders in chief of the Garrisons Forts and His Majesty's Ships shall likewise take an Oath for the due execution of their Trust That the Commissioners shall have Power to prevent the violation of the Articles of Peace or any Troubles arising in the Kingdom by breach of the said Articles and to hear and determine all differences that may occasion the same We shall be willing that any just Privileges and Immunities be granted by His Majesty to the City of London as being the chief City of this Kingdom and the place His Majesty desires to honour with His most usual and most constant Residence But we conceive it too envious a thing and may prove very prejudicial to the Happiness of that great City to distinguish it in a matter of so high importance as the business of the Militia from the Authority that the whole Kingdom is to submit to If your Lordships shall not consent to the election of persons in that manner as we have proposed half by His Majesty and the other half by the two Houses we do then propose to your Lordships that the said persons who shall have the said Powers in manner and form above mentioned may be named by mutual consent upon Debate between us in which consideration may be taken of the fitness or unfitness of those who shall be named And in case that any of them who shall be thus agreed upon shall die within the said term of three years the survivers or the major part of them shall nominate and chuse another in his place who shall be deceased This way we should most have desired but in regard the consideration of persons may take up a long time in debate which neither the time allotted for the Treaty nor the present Distractions will permit we do propose the former as the most expedite and certain way but leave the election to your Lordships And whatsoever shall be found deficient in the settling this according to the present Agreement or shall be thought fit to be added to it upon any inconveniencies or defects that shall be hereafter discovered the same shall be mended or supplyed in such manner as shall be thought reasonable by the joynt Consent of His Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament After which the King's Commissioners delivered in this Paper 6. Feb. WE shall be ready against the time that the Militia is again in order to be Treated upon to give your Lordships an Answer to your Demands concerning the Militia of the Kingdom of Scotland the which for the present we have not had time to do having wholly spent these three days in the perfecting the Paper delivered to your Lordships this day and the Debates in preparation thereof And at the same time their Commissioners delivered in this Paper 6. Feb. YOUR Lordships Paper which we have received so late at the end of the third day appointed to Treat upon the Militia on which we expected a satisfactory Answer to our Demands concerning it is very far differing from what we have proposed and unsatisfactory to our just and necessary desires for securing the Peace of the Kingdoms and wherein we cannot but observe that the Kingdom of Scotland is wholly omitted We do therefore insist upon our Paper formerly delivered concerning the Militia and desire your Lordships full and clear Answer being ready by Conference to remove all Objections which may be made to the contrary The King's Commissioners Answer thereupon 6. Feb. VVE conceive the Paper delivered by us to your Lordships may justly satisfie your Lordships for the securing the Peace of this Kingdom against all Forces that may any ways endanger it at home or from abroad and for securing the performance of all things that shall be agreed in this Treaty and we are ready by Conference to make the Reasonableness thereof appear and to receive any Reasons from your Lordships to the contrary And as touching Scotland we hope your Lordships will be satisfied by the last Paper we delivered to you Their Paper 6. Feb. IN our last Paper we insisted upon our former demands for the Militia and offered by Conference to satisfie your Lordships of the Reasonableness of them if any Doubts remained with you to the contrary which we are still ready to do they being the proper Subject of this part of the Treaty And whereas your Lordships have in your Paper referred what concerns the Kingdom of Scotland unto another time and seem to intend it a several Answer both Kingdoms being united in the same Cause and under the same Danger and mutually providing for the joynt Safety and Security of both and each other our Propositions are joyntly made by both and are inconsistent with a divided Answer The King's Commissioners Answer 6. Feb. WHereas your Lordships have offered in your last Paper to satisfie us by Conference of the Reasonableness of your Demands if any Doubts remain with us to the contrary We desire to receive satisfaction by Conference that it is reasonable for us to grant the nomination of the Persons by the two Houses only and that the Time ought not to be limited Their Paper 6. Feb. AS we have given to your Lordships our Propositions for the Militia of both Kingdoms in writing so do we again desire your Lordships full and clear Answer to them both in writing and we are ready to answer any Doubts you shall make upon them in order as we delivered them and as they do relate to both Kingdoms but we cannot Treat upon your Lordships Answer which divides them The three first day allotted for the Treaty upon the Militia being spent and that Subject resumed upon Friday the 14 th Saturday the 15 th and Monday the 17 th of February in those days divers Papers were delivered and some Debates had touching the nomination of the Persons who were to be intrusted with the Militia whether they should all be nominated by the two Houses only and touching the Time how long they should have it and whether the same should be unlimited as it was in the Propositions or be limited to a certain time as likewise concerning the Powers of the English and Scotish Commissioners for the Militia which are so intermingled in the Propositions that it was not well understood upon the Propositions how far the Commissioners of one Kingdom and their Power might extend unto and have influence
at Our Court at Tavestock the 8 th of September 1644. The Bill for Abolishing Episcopacy VVHereas the Government of the Church of England by Arch-bishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-deacons and other Ecclesiastical Officers depending upon the Hierarchy hath by long experience been found to be a great impediment to the perfect Reformation and growth of Religion and very prejudicial to the Civil State and Government of the Kingdom Be it therefore Enacted by the King 's most Excellent Majesty and the Lords and Commons in this present Parliament assembled and by the Authority of the same That from and after the fifth day of November in the year of our Lord One Thousand Six Hundred Forty and Three there shall be no Arch-bishop Bishop Chancellor or Commissary of any Arch-Bishop or Bishop nor any Dean Sub-dean Dean and Chapter or Arch deacon nor any Chancellor Chaunter Treasurer Sub-treasurer Succentor or Sacrist of any Cathedral or Collegiate Church nor any Prebendary Canon Canon-Residentiary Petty-Canon Vicar-Choral Choristers old Vicars or new Vicars of or within any Cathedral or Collegiate Church or any other their Officers within this Church of England or Dominion of Wales and that from and afrer the said fifth day of November the Name Title Dignity Jurisdiction Office and Function of Arch bishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commissaries Deans Sub-deans Deans and Chapters Arch-deacons Canons and Prebendaries and all Chaunters Chancellors Treasurers Sub-treasurers Succentors and Sacrists and all Vicars-Choral and Choristers old Vicars and new Vicars and every of them and likewise the having using or exercising of any Power Jurisdiction Office or Authority by reason or colour of any such Name Title Dignity Office or Function within this Realm of England or Dominion of Wales shall thenceforth cease determine and become absolutely void and shall be abolished out of this Realm and the Dominion of Wales any Usage Law or Statute to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding And that from and after the said fifth day of November no Person or Persons whatsoever by Virtue of any Letters-Patents Commission or other Authority derived from the King's Majesty His Heirs or Successors shall use or exercise any Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical within this Realm or Dominion of Wales but such and in such manner as shall be appointed and established by Act of Parliament And that all Counties Palatine Mannors Lordships Castles Granges Messuages Mills Lands Tenements Meadows Leasues Pastures Woods Rents Reversions Services Parks Annuities Franchises Liberties Priviledges Immunities Rights Rights of Action and of Entry Interests Titles of Entry Conditions Commons Courts-Leet and Courts-Baron and all other Possessions and Hereditaments whatsoever of what nature or quality soever they be or wheresoever they lie or be other than Impropriations Parsonages appropriate Tithes Oblations Obventions Pensions Portions of Tithes Parsonages Vicarages Churches Chappels Advowsons Nominations Collations Rights of Patronage and Presentation which now are or lately were of or belonging unto any Arch-bishop Bishop Arch-bishoprick or Bishoprick or any of them or which they or any of them held or injoyed in right of their said Arch-bishoprick or Bishoprick respectively shall by the Authority of Parliament be vested adjudged and deemed to be and shall be in the very real and actual possession and seisin of the King's Majesty His Heirs and Successors and He shall have hold possess and enjoy the same to Him His Heirs and Successors without any Entry or other Act whatsoever and that the King's Majesty His Heirs and Successors His and their Lessees Farmers and Tenants shall hold and enjoy the same discharged and acquitted of payment of Tithes as freely and in as large ample and beneficial means to all intents and purposes as any Arch-bishop or Bishop at any time or times within the space of two years last past held or enjoyed or of right ought to have held or enjoyed the same Provided nevertheless and be it enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all Leases Grants Gifts Letters-Patents Conveyances Assurances or Estates whatsoever hereafter to be made by the King's Majesty His Heirs or Successors of any the Mannors Lands Tenements Hereditaments which in or by this Act shall come or be limited or disposed of unto His Majesty His Heirs or Successors other than for the Term of One and Twenty years or Three Lives or some other Term of years determinable upon One Two or Three Lives and not above from the time as any such Lease or Grant shall be made or granted whereupon the accustomed yearly Rent or more shall be reserved and payable yearly during the said Term and whereof any former Lease is in being not to be expired surrendred or ended within three years after the making of any such new Lease shall be utterly void and of none effect to all intents constructions and purposes any clause or words of non obstante to be put in any such Patent Grant Conveyance or Assurance and any Law Usage Custom or any thing in this Act to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding And be it further Enacted and Ordained That all Impropriations Parsonages appropriate Tithes Oblations Obventions Portions of Tithes Parsonages Vicarages Churches Chappels Advowsons Nominations Collations Rights of Patronage and Presentation which now are or lately were belonging unto any Arch-bishop or Bishop Arch-bishoprick or Bishoprick and all Mannors Castles Lordships Granges Messuages Mills Lands Tenements Meadows Pastures Woods Rents Reversions Services Parsonages appropriate Tithes Oblations Obventions Pensions Portions of Tithes Parsonages Vicarages Churches Chappels Advowsons Nominations Rights of Patronage and Presentation Parks Annuities Franchises Liberties Priviledges Immunities Rights Rights of Action and of Entry Interests Titles of Entry Conditions Commons Courts-Leet and Courts-Baron and all other Possessions and Hereditaments whatsoever of what nature or quality soever they be or wheresoever they lie or be which now are or lately were of or belonging to any Sub-dean Dean Dean and Chapter Arch-deacon Chaunter Chancellor Treasurer Sub-treasurer Succentor Sacrist Prebendary Canon Canon-Residentiary Petty-Canon Vicars Choral Choristers old Vicars and new Vicars or any of them or any of the Officers of them or any of them which they held or enjoyed in right of their said Dignities Churches Corporations Offices or Places respectively shall by Authority of this present Parliament be vested adjudged and deemed to be and shall be in the very real and actual possession and seisin of Sir VVilliam Roberts Knight Thomas Atkins Sir John VVollaston John VVarner John Towes Aldermen of the City of London John Packer Esquire Peter Malbourne Esquire and they shall have hold possess and enjoy the same to them their Heirs and Assigns without any Entry or other Act whatsoever and that for themselves their Lessees Farmers and Tenants discharged and acquitted of payment of Tithes as freely and in as large ample and beneficial manner to all intents and purposes as any of the Persons or Corporations whose Offices or Places are taken away by this Act at
Ships Power and even the security of Our Person who have Armed Our Subjects here who have brought in the Scots into this Kingdom to the tearing up the bowels of it who have infamously libelled against Us and Our Consort who have threatned to depose us and impeached Her of Treason and who those are who have denied Peace to this miserable Kingdom unless We would consent to their unreasonable destructive Propositions overturning the whole frame of Government both in Church and State They say and it is true We trusted them with the Prosecution of that War and how faithfully they discharged it VVe will not again repeat but VVe never trusted them so as to exclude Our selves as they now suppose and if VVe had relied more on the Judgments and Advice of Our Privy Council and less on theirs neither that nor this Kingdom had been in the condition they now are It was their Interposition and Advice which hindered the transportation of the Army of Irish Natives out of that Kingdom into Spain even to Our dis-reputation abroad who had agreed with the Spanish Ambassador to send them over and he in confidence of Our performance had disbursed Money for their transport and had they been transported their stay as it provoked them so it emboldening and strengthening the other Irish VVe are confident the flames of that Rebellion would never have broken forth at all or at most have been so small as might suddenly have been extinguished It was their Advice that staid Our going over thither in Person which probably might have stopped the rage of that VVar and by the Blessing of God would have saved the Effusion of much Blood which was since shed in that Kingdom It was their unseasonable Declarations at the beginning of the Rebellion before the old English and other Papists had engaged themselves with the Rebels of Vlster of making it a VVar of Religion and against that connivence which had been used in that Kingdom ever since the Reformation and tending to make it a National Quarrel and to eradicate the whole stock of the Irish which they now pursue by giving no Quarter to those few of that Nation in England who never were in that Rebellion but according to their Duty assist us their Sovereign which made the Rebellion so genera whereas otherwise the old English as in former times though Papists would have joyned against those Rebels VVhen VVe had offered in December 1641. that 10000. Voluntiers should be raised presently in England for the service of Ireland if the House of Commons would declare they would pay them instead thereof in January following Propositions were made for the transporting the Scots into Ireland and VVe were advised by the two Houses to give the Command and keeping of the Town and Castle of Carick fergus to the Scotish who were to be transported thither and pay'd by this Kingdom to which VVe returned Answer That we did not approve the same as prejudicial to the Crown of England and the Service intended and implying too great trust for Auxiliary Forces yet afterwards because VVe perceived the insisting upon it would breed a great delay in the necessary supply of that Kingdom VVe did admit of the Advice of the Parliament in that particular and since by the Articles of the sixth of August 1642. which though said to be made by Commissioners authorized by Us and the Parliament of England VVe never were made acquainted with them till upon this Treaty almost three years after both the Towns and Castles of Carickfergus and Colrane are left with them as Cautionary The consequence whereof was such that though the Service of Ireland were little advanced or the poor English Protestants relieved by it and this Kingdom drained to pay those whose great Arrears growing upon that Agreement must be paid out of Lands in Ireland where they have so good footing already or of Our good Subjects in England according to their other Propositions by this means the Scotish having an Army there under colour of supplying them Our Arms and Ammunition were sent into Scotland for the supply of another Army to be brought into England and the countenance of that Army in Ireland as it gave encouragement to some of Our Scotish Subjects so it over-awed others and was a means without any the least provocation to those Our ungrateful Subjects of bringing of another Army into this Kingdom where they still remain to the utter Ruine of many of Our good Subjects and the probable Destruction of the whole Kingdom And lastly it was upon their Advice in February 1641. shortly after those Propositions tendred for transporting the Scots into Ireland that We agreed that the Rebels Lands should be shared amongst the Adventurers and the Rebels to have no Pardons though We then expresly declared We did it meerly relying upon their Wisdom without further examining what We in Our particular Judgment were perswaded whether that course might not retard the reducing of that Kingdom by exasperating the Rebels and rendring them desperate of being received into grace if they should return to their Obedience And it is most apparent that those Propositions and the Act drawn upon them wherein also a further Clause not observed by Us but passed as conceiving that Act had wholly pursued the Propositions was inserted That every person who should make enter into to take any Compact Bond Covenant Oath Promise or Agreement to introduce or bring into the said Realm of Ireland the Authority of the See of Rome in any case whatsoever or to maintain or defend the same should forfeit his Lands and Goods as in case of Rebellion were great causes not only of provoking but increasing and encouraging the Rebels who having no pretence before for the horrid Rebellion had now some colour to make it a matter of Religion and so to make their application to Foreign Princes and to negotiate with them for delivering that Kingdom into their hands We profess Our aversion from their Religion and hatred to their Rebellion but though We think them worse Christians because they are Rebels We think them not worse Rebels because they are Papists A Protestant Rebel in the same degree of Rebellion hath far more to answer as having more light and it being more expresly against the Religion he professeth whereof it hath heretofore been a Maxim though it be now taken for Apocryphal Doctrine Not to take up Arms against their Prince upon any pretence whatsoever And as We have endeavoured by Our Personal Example and otherwise so We shall still continue by all good means to propagate the Protestant Religion but We are far from that Mahometan Doctrine that We ought to propagate Our Religion by the Sword And though We shall be most willing to hearken to the Advice of Our People assembled in a free Parliament yet We should be wanting to the Trust that God hath reposed in Us and Our use of that Reason with which He hath endowed Us if
for example had Authority to perform such Acts and Offices of Church-Government as his Majesty hath not yet found by any thing represented unto Him by you or any other from the Scripture that a single Presbyter ever had authority to perform which is enough to prove that the Community of Names in some places notwithstanding the Functions themselves are in other places by their proper work sufficiently distinguished But for the Name Episcopus or Bishop His Majesty hath long since learned from those that are skilful in the Greek tongue that it imports properly no more than an Overseer one that hath the charge or inspection of some thing committed unto him as hee that is set to watch a Beacon or to keep Sheep whence in the New Testament and in the Ecclesiastical use it is applied to such persons as have the Care and Inspection of the Churches of Christ committed unto them in Spiritualibus as both Bishops and Presbyters have in some sort but with this difference that mere Presbyters are Episcopi gregis only they have the oversight of the Flock in the duties of Preaching Administration of Sacraments Publick Prayer Exhorting Rebuking c. but Bishops are Episcopi gregis and Pastorum too having the oversight of the Flock and Pastors within their several Precincts in the acts of external Government so that the common work of both Functions is the Ministry of the Gospel but that which is peculiar to the Function of Bishops as distinguished from Presbyters is Church-Government It is not therefore to be wondred if it should happen in the New Testament the word Episcopus to be usually applied unto Presbyters who were indeed Overseers of the flock rather than unto Church-Governors who had then another Title of greater Eminency whereby to distinguish them from ordinary Presbyters to wit that of Apostles But when the government of Churches came into the hands of their Successors the names were by common usage which is the best Master of words very soon appropriated that of Episcopus to the Ecclesiastical Governor or Bishop of a Diocese and that of Presbyter to the ordinary Minister or Priest His Majesty had rather cause to wonder That upon such premises you should conclude with so much confidence as if the point were rendred most clear to the Judgment of most men both ancient and of latter times That there is no such Officer to be found in the Scriptures of the New Testament as a Bishop distinct from a Presbyter whenas His Majesty remembreth to have seen cited by such Authors as He hath no reason to suspect both out of the ancient Fathers and Councils and out of sundry modern Writers even of those Reformed Churches that want Bishops great variety of Testimonies to the contrary His Majesty is not satisfied with your Answer concerning the Apostles exercise of Episcopal Government which you would put off by referring it to their extraordinary Calling Our Saviour himself was the first and chief Apostle and Bishop of our Souls sent by the Father and Anointed by the Holy Ghost to be both the Teacher and the Governour of his Church By that Mission he receiv'd Authority and by his Unction ability for those works which he performed in his own person whilst he lived upon the earth Before he left the world that the Church might not want Teaching and Governing to the worlds end he chose certain persons upon whom he conferred both these Powers whereby they became also Apostles and Bishops by making them partakers both of his Mission before his Ascension As my Father sent me so send I you and of his Vnction shortly after his Ascension when he poured upon them the Holy Ghost at Pentecost The Mission both for teaching and governing at least for the substance of it was ordinary and to continue to the end of the world Matt. xxviii 18 20. and therefore necessarily to descend and be by them transmitted to others as their Substitutes and Successors But the Vnction whereby they were enabled to both Offices or Functions by the effusion of the Holy Ghost in such a plenteous measure of Knowledg Tongues Miracles Prophecyings Healing Infallibility of Doctrine discerning of spirits and such like was indeed extraordinary in them and in some few others though in an inferiour measure as God saw it needful for the planting of the Churches and propagation of the Gospel in those Primitive times and in this which was indeed extraordinary in them they were not necessarily to have Successors But it seems very unreasonable to attribute the exercise of that Power whether of Teaching or Governing to an extraordinary calling which being of necessary and continual use in the Church must therefore of necessity be the work of a Function of ordinary and perpetual use Therefore the Acts of Governing of the Church were no more nor otherwise extraordinary in the Apostles than the Acts of Teaching the Church were that is to say both extraordinary for the manner of performance in respect of their more than ordinary abilities for the same and yet both ordinary for the substance of the Offices themselves and the works to be performed therein and in these two ordinary Offices their ordinary Successors are Presbyters and Bishops Presbyters qua Presbyters immediately succeeding them in the Office of Teaching and Bishops qua Bishops immediately in the Office of Governing The instances of Timothy and Titus you likewise endeavour to avoid by the pretension of an extraordinary calling But in this Answer besides the insufficiency thereof if all that is said therein could be proved His Majesty findeth very little satisfaction 1. First you say that Timothy and Titus were by Office Evangelists whereas of Titus the Scriptures no where affirm any such thing at all and by your own Rule your Authority without Scripture will beget if that but a humane Faith neither doth the Text clearly Prove that Timothy was so 2. Setting aside mens conjectures which can breed but an humane Faith neither you cannot make it appear by any Text of Scripture that the Office of an Evangelist is such as you have described it The work of an Evangelist which Saint Paul exhorteth Timothy to do seems by the Context 2 Tim iv 5. to be nothing but diligence in preaching the Word notwithstanding all impediments and oppositions 3. That which you so confidently affirm That Timothy and Titus acted as Evangelists is not onely denyed but clearly refuted by Scultetus Gerard and others yea even with scorn rejected of late as His Majesty is informed by some rigid Presbyterians as Gillespy Rutherford c. And that which you so confidently deny that Timothy and Titus were Bishops is not onely confirmed by the consentient testimony of all Antiquity even Jerome himself having recorded it that they were Bishops and that of St. Paul's ordination and acknowledged by very many late Divines but a Catalogue also of 27. Bishops of Ephesus lineally succeeding from Timothy our of good records is vouched by
attain to that Kingdom of Peace in my Heart and in thy Heaven which Christ hath purchased and thou wilt give to thy Servant tho a Sinner for my Saviours sake Amen II. Vpon the Earl of STRAFFORD's Death I Looked upon my Lord of Strafford as a Gentleman whose great Abilities might make a Prince rather afraid than ashamed to employ him in the greatest affairs of State For those were prone to create in him great confidence of undertakings and this was like enough to betray him to great errors and many enemies Whereof he could not but contract good store while moving in so high a sphear and with so vigorous a lustre he must needs as the Sun raise many envious exhalations which condensed by a Popular Odium were capable to cast a cloud upon the brightest Merit and Integrity Though I cannot in my Judgment approve all he did driven it may be by the necessities of Times and the Temper of that People more than led by his own disposition to any height and rigor of actions yet I could never be convinced of any such Criminousness in him as willingly to expose his life to the stroke of Justice and Malice of his Enemies I never met with a more unhappy conjuncture of affairs than in the business of that unfortunate Earl when between my own unsatisfiedness in Conscience and a necessity as some told Me of satisfying the importunities of some people I was perswaded by those that I think wished Me well to chuse rather what was safe than what seemed just preferring the outward Peace of my Kingdoms with men before that inward exactness of Conscience before God And indeed I am so far from excusing or denying that compliance on My part for plenary consent it was not to his destruction whom in my Judgment I thought not by any clear Law guilty of Death that I never bare any touch of Conscience with greater regret which as a sign of my Repentance I have often with sorrow confessed both to God and men as an act of so sinful frailty that it discovered more a fear of Man than of God whose name and place on Earth no man is worthy to bear who will avoid inconveniencies of State by acts of so high injustice as no publick convenience can expiate or compensate I see it a bad exchange to wound a mans own Conscience thereby to salve State sores to calm the storms of Popular discontents by stirring up a tempest in a mans own bosome Nor hath Gods Justice failed in the event and sad consequences to shew the world the fallacy of that Maxime Better one man perish tho unjustly than the people be displeased or destroyed For In all likelihood I could never have suffered with my people greater calamities yet with greater comfort had I vindicated Strafford's Innocency at least by denying to sign that destructive BILL according to that Justice which my Conscience suggested to Me than I have done since I gratified some mens unthankful importunities with so cruel a favour And I have observed that those who counselled Me to sign that BILL have been so far from receiving the rewards of such ingratiatings with the People that no men have been harassed and crushed more than they He only hath been least vexed by them who counselled Me not to consent against the Vote of my own Conscience I hope God hath forgiven Me and them the sinful rashness of that business To which being in my Soul so fully conscious those Judgments God hath pleased to send upon Me are so much the more welcome as a means I hope which his Mercy hath sanctified so to Me as to make Me repent of that unjust Act for so it was to Me and for the future to teach Me That the best rule of Policy is to prefer the doing of Justice before all enjoyments and the Peace of my Conscience before the preservation of my Kingdoms Nor hath any thing more fortified my resolutions against all those violent importunities which since have sought to gain a like consent from Me to Acts wherein my Conscience is unsatisfied than the sharp touches I have had for what passed Me in my Lord of Strafford's Business Not that I resolved to have employed him in my Affairs against the advice of my Parliament but I would not have had any hand in his Death of whose Guiltlesness I was better assured than any man living could be Nor were the Crimes objected against him so clear as after a long and fair hearing to give convincing satisfaction to the Major part of both Houses especially that of the Lords of whom scarce a third part were present when the Bill passed that House And for the House of Commons many Gentlemen disposed enough to diminish my Lord of Strafford's greatness and power yet unsatisfied of his guilt in Law durst not condemn him to die who for their Integrity in their Votes were by Posting their Names exposed to the popular calumny hatred and fury which grew then so exorbitant in their clamours for Justice that is to have both My self and the two Houses Vote and do as they would have us that many 't is thought were rather terrified to concur with the condemning party than satisfied that of right they ought so to do And that after-after-Act vacating the Authority of the precedent for future imitation sufficiently tells the world that some remorse touched even his most implacable Enemies as knowing he had very hard measure and such as they would be very loath should be repeated to themselves This tenderness and regret I find in my Soul for having had any hand and that very unwillingly God knows in shedding one mans blood unjustly tho under the colour and formalities of Justice and pretences of avoiding publick mischiefs which may I hope be some evidence before God and Man to all Posterity that I am far from bearing justly the vast load and guilt of all that Blood which hath been shed in this unhappy War which some men will needs charge on Me to ease their own Souls who am and ever shall be more afraid to take away any mans life unjustly than to lose My own But Thou O God of infinite mercies forgive Me that act of sinful compliance which hath greater aggravations upon Me than any man Since I had not the least temptation of Envy or Malice against him and by My place should at least so far have been a preserver of him as to have denied my consent to his destruction O Lord I acknowledg my transgression and my sin is ever before Me. Deliver Me from blood-guiltiness O God thou God of my salvation and my tongue shall sing of thy righteousness Against Thee have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight for Thou sawest the contradiction between my heart and my hand Yet cast Me not away from thy presence purge Me with the Blood of my Redeemer and I shall be clean wash Me with that precious effusion and I shall be whiter
Rumors spread and Informations given which may have induced many to believe that We intend to make War against Our Parliament We Profess before God and Declare to all the World That We always have and do abhor all such Designs and desire all Our Nobility and Commoners who are here upon the place to declare Whether they have not been Witnesses of Our frequent and earnest Declarations and Professions to this purpose whether they see any colour of Preparations or Counsels that might reasonably beget a belief of any such Design and whether they be not fully perswaded that We have no such intention but that all Our Endeavours according to Our many Professions tend to the firm and constant settlement of the true Protestant Religion the just Priviledges of Parliaments the Liberty of the Subject the Law Peace and Prosperity of this Kingdom MDCXLVII Aug. 1. The Heads of the Proposals agreed upon by his Excellency Sir THOMAS FAIRFAX and the Council of the Army to be tendred to the Commissioners of Parliament residing with the Army and with them to be treated on by the Commissioners of the Army Containing the particulars of their Desires in pursuance of their former Declarations and Papers in order to the clearing and securing of the Rights and Liberties of the Kingdom and the settling a just and lasting Peace To which are added some further particular Desires for the removing and redressing of divers present pressing Grievances being also comprized in or in necessary pursuance of their Former Representations and Papers appointed to be Treated upon I. THat the things hereafter proposed being provided for by this Parliament a certain period may by Act of Parliament be set for the ending of this Parliament such period to be within a year at most and in the same Act provision to be made for the succession and constitution of Parliaments in future as followeth 1. That Parliaments may Biennially be called and meet at a certain day with such provision for the certainty thereof as in the late Act was made for Triennial Parliaments and what further other provision shall be found needful by the Parliament to reduce it to more certainty And upon the passing of this the said Act for Triennial Parliaments to be repealed 2. Each Biennial Parliament to sit 120. days certain unless adjourned or dissolved sooner by their own Consent afterwards to be adjournable or dissolvable by the King and no Parliament to sit past 240. days from their first meeting or some other limited number of days now to be agreed on upon the expiration whereof each Parliament to dissolve of course if not otherwise dissolved sooner 3. The King upon Advice of the Council of State in the Intervals betwixt Biennial Parliaments to call a Parliament extraordinary provided it meet above seventy days before the next Biennial day and be dissolved at least sixty days before the same so as the course of Biennial Elections may never be interrupted 4. That this Parliament and each succeeding Biennial Parliament at or before adjournment or dissolution thereof may appoint Committees to continue during the Interval for such purposes as are in any of these Proposals referr'd to such Committees 5. That the Elections of the Commons for succeeding Parliaments may be distributed to all Counties or other parts or divisions of the Kingdom according to some Rule of equality or proportion so as all Counties may have a number of Parliament-Members allowed to their choice proportionable to the respective Rates they bear in the common Charges and burthens of the Kingdom according to some other Rule of equality or proportion to render the House of Commons as near as may be an equal Representative of the whole and in order thereunto that a present consideration be had to take off the Elections of Burgesses for poor decayed or inconsiderable Towns and to give some present addition to the number of Parliament-Members for great Counties that have now less than their due proportion to bring all at present as near as may be to such a Rule of proportion as aforesaid 6. That effectual provision be made for future freedom of Elections and certainty of due Returns 7. That the House of Commons alone have the power from time to time to set down further Orders and Rules for the Ends expressed in the Two last preceding Articles so as to reduce the Elections of Members for that House to more and more perfection of Equality in the distribution Freedom in the Election Order in the proceeding thereto and Certainty in the Returns which Orders and Rules in that case to be as Laws 8. That there be a Liberty for entring Dissents in the House of Commons with provision that no Member be censurable for ought said or voted in the House further than to exclusion from that Trust and that onely by the judgment of the House it self 9. That the Judicial Power or power of final Judgment in the Lords and Commons and their power of Exposition and Application of Law without further Appeal may be cleared and that no Officer of Justice Minister of State or other person adjudged by them may be capable of Protection or Pardon from the King without their Advice and Consent 10. That the Right and Liberty of the Commons of England may be cleared and vindicated as to a due Exemption from any Judgment Trial or other Proceeding against them by the House of Peers without the concurring Judgment of the House of Commons as also from any other Judgment Sentence or Proceeding against them other than by their Equals or according to the Law of the Land 11. The same Act to provide that Grand-Jury-men may be chosen by and for several parts or divisions of each County respectively in some equal way and not remain as now at the discretion of an Under-Sheriff to be put on or off and that such Grand-Jury-men for their respective Counties may at each Assize present the Names of persons to be made Justices of Peace from time to time as the County hath need for any to be added to the Commission and at the Summer-Assize to present the Names of Three Persons out of whom the King may prick one to be Sheriff for the next year II. For the future security to Parliaments and the Militia in general in order thereunto that it be provided by Act of Parliament 1. That the power of the Militia by Sea and Land during the space of Ten years next ensuing shall be ordered and disposed by the Lords and Commons assembled and to be assembled in the Parliament or Parliaments of England or by such persons as they shall nominate and appoint for that purpose from time to time during the said space 2. That the said power shall not be ordered disposed or exercised by the King's Majesty that now is or by any person or persons by any Authority derived from Him during the said space or at any time hereafter by His said Majesty without the Advice