Advice of his Councill in case of death or Breach of trust to substitute new Privy Counsellors A Competent Revenue to be setled for the maintenance of Ten thousand Horse and 15. thousand Foot and the Navy and not to be altered or lessened but by the Advice of the Council upon the disbanding of them the money to be brought to the Exchequer No new Levies nor Laws to be made without consent in Parliament All forfeited Lands unsold to belong to the Protector The Protectorate to be elective but the Royal Family to be excluded Oliver Cromwell to be the present Protector All places of trust and Office to be in the Protectors disposal if in Interval of Parliament to be approved and confirmed in Parliament The Rest for the purity and toleration of Religion out of which the Papist and Protestant were to be exempted and all Laws in favour of them to be abrogated All Sales of Parliament to be confirmed Articles of War to be made good And lastly the Protector and his Successor to be bound by Oath to observe these present Articles and to uphold the Peace and Welfare of the Nation which Oath was in 〈◊〉 verba I promise in the presence of God not to violate or infâ—inge the matters and things contained in the Instrument but to observe and cause the same to be observed and in all things to the best of my understanding govern the Nations according to the Laws Statutes and Customes to seek their peace and cause Justice Law to be equally administred The Feat needed no more security as good altogether as its Authority in this following Proclamation which was published throughout England Scotland and Ireland in these words Where as the late Parliament Dissolved themselves and resigning their Powers and Authorities the Government of the Common-wealth of England Scotland and Ireland in a Lord Protector and saccessive Triennial Parliaments is now established And whereas Oliver Cromwell Captain General of all the Forces of this Common wealth is declared Lord Protector of the said Nations and hath accepted thereof We have therefore thought it necessary as we hereby do to make Publication of the Premises and strictly to charge and command all and every Person or Persons of what quality and condition soever in any of the said three Nations to take notice hereof and to conform and submit themselves to the Government so established And all Sheriffs Mayor Bailiffs c. are required to publish this Proclamation to the end none may have cause to pretend ignorance in this behalf This Miscellany of the Laws and new projections suted a great many humours and different perswasions of the Phanaticks Independents Anabaptists and others being the second part of the Alchoran And because there is occasion for it we will discourse a little of the present State of Religion and what opinion Cromwel best aspected The Orthodox Protestants were wholly supprest and yet some Reverend persons as Dr. Vsher the Bishop of Armagh and Dr. Brownrig the Bishop of Exeter received some shews of respect and reverence from Him which he more manifestly boasted in the funeral Expences of the Learned Vsher and this to captate a Reputation of his Love to Scholars and the meek modest and vertuous Clergy The Presbyterian was rather tolerated then countenanced and yet such of them as would comply with his Court greatnesse were much in his eye and his favour for others of them he cared not pleasingly expressing himself how he had brought under the Pride and Arrogance of that Sect making those that would allow no liberty to others sue for it for themselves The Independents and Anabaptists he loved and preferred by turns and was most constant to them as the men that would and did support his Usurpation only he could by no means endure the Fifth Monarchy men though by their dotages he had raised himself to this height and therefore Feak and Rogers were by him committed to Prison in the Castle of Windsor where they continued a long while and not only so but he set Kiffin the Anabaptist whom he had taken out of design into his favour with his party together by the ears with Feaks to the raising of a Feud between them the Ballance of his Security in the Government The like he did betwixt the Presbyterian the Independent a subdivided Schisme from the Church of England as Feaks and Kiffins were from Independency whom when out of his zeal to the Unity of Christian Religion he seemed to bring together to compose and accommodate all Differences in the near probability of such expedients he would divide and more irreconciliably sever and alienate And this was all his practical Devotion But to return Great shooting of Guns at night and Volleys of Acclamations were given at the close of this mock solemnity by Cromwell's Janizaries while the Cavaliers were more joyfully disposed at the Hopes of the Kings Affairs but no body of any Account giving the Usurper a good word or miskiditche with his greatness save what was uttered in Fur by my Lord Mayor and the Complices in this Fact who tickled his ears with the Eccho of the Proclamation done with the usual Formalities These Triumphs so disgusted Harrison as also Col. Rich that he withdrew himself from the Gang and turned publique Preacher or Railer against his Comrade Oliver who was glad to be rid of such a busie and impertinent Assistant in the moduling of Government so Cromwell had now two Common-wealth-contradivided Factions against him the old and the new Parliaments and therefore it nearly concerned him to make much of the Anabaptist and Sectary which now succeeded Independency as the Religion maintained and favoured above all other and Kiffin a great Leader and Teacher was now in great request at the Court at White-hall and contrarily Sir Henry Vane jun. was look'd on askue as also Sir Arth. Hazilrig and Bradshaw and Scot and so the Fabel builders were confounded one amongst another The Council appointed by the Officers or taken rather by himself by whose advice he was to govern were 14. at first Lord Lambert Lord Viscount Lisle General Desbrow Sir Gilbert Pickring Major General Skippon Sir Anth. Ashley Cooper Walter Strickland Esq Sir Charles Wolsley Col. Philip Jones Francis Rous Esquire Richard Major Esquire John Lawrence Esquire Col. Edward Montague Col. William Sydenham I should have mentioned the Dutch War in its place which aggrandized him with the usual victorious successe but because he was never personally engaged in the Service but owed this Garland as he did the glory of Dunbar to the noble General Monk and wore but a second-hand Triumphal Robe I will not constellate Him with that Hero's Splendor and Brightness of Fame That which properly concerns Cromwell is rather the Dishonour of that War the Peace that ensued the Conclusion of it for the Stomach of that Nation had been so humbled by several great losses their Trade so spoyled and their Subjects so impoverish'd that
by Cromwell Thus he progressed from New-market to Royston thence by S. Albans to Hatfeild to Windsor being carried towards London almost in the same Road in which he was driven thence to Caversham back again to Maiden-head to Latimer Stoke Oatlands Sion-House almost in view and hearing of those Tumults which forced him away while in the interim Oliver having made a Pique against the Citizens and revenged one Tumult by another had made the City Submit and receive the Domineering Army in Triumph through their Streets with Lawrel and other Ensigns of victory in their hats With the Army returned those Fugitive Members that left the Parliament upon the same Tumults being invited by Cromwell to his Sanctuary of Redcoats while the remaining members had voted the Kings present coming to London to treat personally with his two Houses all which votes being Tumultuously obtained by instinct of some of Cromwell's own sending to encrease the violence were afterwards vacated after a long struggling in the Parliament as contrary to Priviledge and the secluded Members who had resumed their seats deserted London and went some over Sea others with passes to their own homes in the Country resigning their ill employed power to Cromwell and his Faction in the Parliament who abused it ten times more In Justification of this insolence they published a Declaration wherein they said that the Parliament had declared that it is no resistance of Magistracy to side with just principles and the Law of Nature and Nations being the same Law upon which they had assisted them that the soldiers may lawfully hold the hands of the Generall who will turn his Cannon upon the Army on purpose to destroy them The Seamen the hands of the Pilot who willfully runs the Ship upon a Rock as their Brethren the Scotch-men had also argued The said Declaration still-directing them to the equitable sense of all Laws and constitutions as dispensing with the very letter of the same and being supreme to it when the safety and preservation of all is concerned and assured them That all Authority is fundamentally seated in the Office anâ but ministerially in the persons But before this great successe the dubious Expectation thereof had caused Cromwell to stagger now and then at his first resolutions which it prosperous would at all times help themselves and there ultimately he was fixed whatever conditions and promises cross accidents should extort from him and therefore he was dealing with the King in way of recompence and reward for his Service in his restitution that he should be made Earl of Essex and a Knight of the Garter his eldest Son to be of the Bedchamber to the Prince his Son in Law Ireton to be either Lord Deputy or at least Feild Marshall Generall of Ireland and it was reported by Henry Cromwell that then Commanded the Generalls Lifeguard that the King had put himself upon his Father and Brother Ireton to make his terms for him and restore him to his Crown which grant of the Kings caused and produced those proposals beforementioned to be contrived but now in the very nick of this Juncture set forth and published called the Proposals for the setling a just and lawfull peace where in the three first and last particulars the Authority was left as entire in the King as before the rest were some Caprichio's of Bienniall Parliaments and the like Figaries whose impertinences discredited the important veracity of the other But this feud betwixt the Presbyterians and Cromwell ending so fortunately for him there being nothing at present to withstand his first and grand intendment he began to waive his respects to the King and cast off those disguises wherewith he had made himself acceptable to the Kings adhaerents and laid aside the King and them The King therefore gently reminds Cromwell of his promises repeats to him his Protestations and urgeth the Proposals aforesaid and not only so but in confidence of the fair meaning of the Army declines a speedier accommodation with the Parliament but Cromwell begins to turn a deaf ear to deny many things what he had said and promised to retract from others pretending the difference of times and circumstances that they cannot be performed telling the King moreover that He did mistake and not rightly understand his meaning and in short that though he would keep his word with His Majesty that now it was not in his power for that the Adjutators were grown to such an ungoverned and insolent licentiousnesse that untill the Discipline of the Army could be recovered it were in vain to expect any such things as he when he promised really intended The King was at this time at Hampton-Court perplext on the one hand with the obstinacy of the Parliament in their Propositions being more rigid since the last garbling by the Army and on the other with the dangerous Positions of the Adjutators and the Levelling party both in Camp and City in which last John Lilburn was Chief of the Faction who decryed Monarchy and all former forms of Government having something which Ireton spread by the by as it were among the Souldiery in projection on purpose to stave off all manner and means of settlement This at last came to a Systeme or Consistency and was styled an Agreement of the people and was now the onely darling of the Army and the Sectaries being a mixture or miscellany of Politique Notions no way practicable among English-men being a deformation or destruction of all things but an establishment of nothing a meer temporary expedient and shift of design except always their Arrears Indemnity and the Period to the Parliament and this shape Cromwell assumes also confessing and acknowledging the excellence acquity and goodnesse of the same the only fault in it was the unseasonablenesse for as yet it was not his time and his cue to appear so publiquely against the King and this his Character of it was drest out and enlarged with such taking Saint-like Language as the Phanatick rabble might best be surprized and not suspect any of his own venemous designs to be lurking under the leaf of His holy and sacred pretences Withall when his Plot against the King vvas ripe for Execution he caused a Fast to be published in the Army a certain forerunner of mischief with him where he was as usually observed to howl and cry and bedew his Cheeks with the Tears of Hypocrisie cruelty and deceit and after this mock-duty performed he and the rest of the Officers pretended to confesse their iniquity and abomination in declining the Cause of the people and tampering with the King and then in the presence of the All-seeing God acknowledge the way of an Agreement of the People to be the way to peace and freedom The King was in the mean while by the fallacious advice of Whalley and the practises of Cromwell who had caused frequent rumours to be whispered of some Assassinate intended by the Levellers against his person frighted
but all those hazards and necessities being pass'd the Council of Adjutators was abolish'd the Officers now abhominating to suffer the Soldiers to sit Cheek by Jole with them any longer the Expedition for Ireland absolutely concluded on without satisfaction of Atrears the Engagement slighted and the right of Petitioning which the Army claimed as Freemen denyed by their Officers who put them upon impeaching the 11. Members for that very reason And because a neer total Defection of the Army followed upon this soon after the Engine which Cromwell had used to subvert the Government being likely to prove his own Ruine Nec Lex est Justior ulla Quam necis artifices arte perire sua though the Fates and his Treachery narrowly prevented it it will be requisite to show you the sense of the Army upon the present State of the Usurpation in this following Petition To his Excellency Thomas Lord Fairfax and his Councel of Officers May it please your Excellency and youâ— Councell of Officers We have lately made out humble Address unto the peoples Representators in Pâ—rliament concerning some relief to our selves and the Commonwealth by way of Petition the meannest and lowest degree of an Englishmans Freedome that we know of and yet the same to our astonlshment hath much distasted and imbittered divers of our Superiour Officers in this Councel convening against us as we perceive and that even unto death We therefore being willing to avoid all occasion of offence and division and to clear our selves of all imputations thereof that in Justice and Reason may be convinced against us desire that you would be pleased to consider that we are English Soldiers engaged for the Freedoms of England and not outlandish Mercenaries to butcher the people for pay and serve the pernicious ends of ambition and will in any person under Heaven That we do not imagine our selves absolved from the solemn Engagement at Newmarket Heath but to be still obliged before God and the whole world to persue the just ends of the same and you may remember the many promises and Declarations to the people upon that account which like the bloud of Abel cryes for justice upon the persitious infringers and pervereâ—rs thereof in this Army You may farther remember that it hath been a principle by you asserted and avowed that our being Soldiers hath not deprived as of our Right as Commoners and to Petition the people in Parliament we do account in the member of our Birthrights and you may remember that in the time of the domination of the 11. Members you complained against their then radevour to suppresse the liberty of the Soldiers to petition as an insufferable infringement of the right of the Army and people and we hope you did not then condemn it in them to justifie it in your selves when the power was theirs it was then condemned but now it is yours how comes it to be justified In the point of Petitioning we expectal your Encouragement and not to have manâ—cles and fetters laid upon it it is not the bure name or shadow thereof will satissie us while we are gulled of the essence of it It is a perfect freedom which we desire not therein to be subjected under the Gradual Negative voices of a Captain a Collonel your Excellency or your Countel to passe the test from one Negative voice to another for its approvement we account as the most vexations Labyrinth of thraldome that in this point can be devised worse then all oppositions and infringements of the 11 Members we had rather that in plain terms you would deny us our right of petitioning and pronounce and proclaim us absolute Slaves and Vassalls to our Officers then secretly to rob us of the right it self God hath in some measure opened our eyes that we can see and perceive and we desire plain dealing and not to be met half way with smooth expedients and Mediums facing both ways with specious and fair pretences to overtake our sudden apprehensions and unawares steal upon us and so be defeated as too often we have been to the we and misery of the people and of us but The burnt child dreads the fire Further we desire you to consider That the strength the honour and being of the Officer yea and of this Councel under God doth consist in the arm of the Soldier Is it not the Soldier that endureth the heat and burthen of the day and performeth that work whereof the Officer beareth the glory and name For what is it the Officer can do without the Soldier If nothing why are they ashamed to deny us our right to petition We have long waited in silence even while we perceived any hopes of any real redresse from them But now finding the Military power in an absolute usurpution of the Civil Jurisdiction in the place of the Magistrate executing that Authority by which the sword of war is incroached into the self same hands under one Military head which we disclaim and abhor as not having any hand or assent therein at all And we find a strange and unexpected constitution of a Councel of State Such as neither we or our forefathers were ever acquainted with intrusted with little lesse then an unlimited power and with the whole force both of Sea and Land in which is combined the most pernicious interests of all Tyrannies And which hath already swallowed up half our Parliament and we sear to be an expedient to cut off our Parliaments for ever for if this Councel of State survive the Parliament how shall we obtain a new Representative if the Parliament sit but till a new one be ready to take their places farewel Parliaments farewel Freedoms Further we find the just and legal way of trial by twelve men of the Neighborhood in criminal cases â—ttexly subverted in this new constitution of an High Court a Precedent for ought we know to frame all the Courts of England by and to which our selves may be as well subjected as our enemies And considering not one oppression is removed not one vexation in the Law â—bated nor one punctilio of freedome restored or any fair hopes at all appearing but oppression heaped upon the back of oppression double cruelty upon cruelty we therefore from those many considerations betook our selves as Englishmen to make our Addresse unto the Parliament as the proper refuge and authority of the people for our and their Addresse in which by birth we challenge a right as also by the price and purchase of our hazard and blood and our Civil Rights we cannot yeild up we shall first rather yeild up our lives And thus after the weak measure of our understandings we judge we have given a rational and full accompt of the occasion and reason of our Petitioning and we hope satisfactory to your Excellency and this Councell humbly praying that you will make a charitable and fair construction thereof And we further desire that you will take special notice of
Impiety and zeal to Christ or his Worship for he had lately struck a Bargain with the Jews that deny him but the Ministers who were to dispute with Ben Israel their Agent dissenting from his covetous project He only gulled them of their earnest mony By this mixture of subtlety with Cruelty and Rapine of all sorts he had so establish'd himself and his formidable greatness engaging in a forraign War with the French against the Spaniard in Flanders whither he sent Commissary General Reynolds with 6000 men who joyntly took in St. Venant Mardike in the close of the Summer 1647 the latter being put into English hands that the Royal party began truly to dread his mischievous power the effects whereof were felt also in very remote parts of the World in the Polish and Danish War by his partaking with and assisting to the King of Sweden when he pretended a Mediation between them having dispatcht Mr. Rolt of his Bedchamber and Colonel Jephson to Carolus Gustavus and Mr. now Sir Philip Meadows to Frederick King of Denmark to the diverting the German Emperour to the care of his own Dominions and by that means depriving the Spaniard of his aid and consequently frustrating all His Majesties designs of recovering his rights to these Kingdoms I must omit his Successes by Blake at Porta Ferina and Sancta Cruz for which the English valour was famous as also Sir Richard Stayners taking and Spoyling 7. Galleys from the West Indies laden with Plate which were substantial Tropnies and made his power dreadful And therefore now he thought it time to shew his Son Richard to the World whom to â—avoid the Suspicion of designing the Soveraignty to be Hereditary in his Family and to amuse Lambert who would not brook other Successor then himself His Kival if not Superiour now in the affection of the Army He had kept in the Country in Hampshire where he had married the Daughter of one Major of Southampton with a very plentiful fortune the support and maintenance of him now among the Conveâ—e of the Centry Royaâ—sts to insinuate into their affections and good liking by some kind of Offices and Civilities he procured from â—ourt and by his own debonair and affable Dispositions The first publiâ—ue Honour done him was the Chancellorship of Oxford in which he was â—emnly invested after his Father had purposely resigned it at Whitchall next he was â—worn a Pirvy Councellor and made a Colon I in the Army to have an interest in all parties and parts of the body politique and not long after in the next Parliament after their recesse the first Lord of the other House and now styled the most noble Lord Richard and rife discourses there were of Richard the Fourth but it proved no more then the story of Queen Dick. His Son Harry Cromwell lately married to Sir William Russells Daughter he likewise sent in the â—lity of Lord Lieutemant to succeed his Son Law Fleetwood in Ireland only Scotland could not be taken from General Monk and disposed in the hanâ—s of his more consident Relations Flectwood or Desborough being designed for that Government â—s Daughters likewise were all married Elizabeth his Darling before his late Greatnesle to a private Gentleman one Mr. Cleypoâ—e of Warwickshire his Daughter Mary to the Lord Viâ—count Falconbridge the noble Family of the Bellasis and his younger Daughter Frances to Mr. â—obert Rich eldest on to Robert Lord Rich and â—randson to Robert Earl of Warwick all three whereof dyed within one year after this unfortunate and unglorious Match So that he thought he had established his House but the Foundation being laid in Sand tempered with Blood the next gust and boy sterous Wind blew it like Chaffe and seattered and dispersed it to nothing From this haughty confidence he was invited to call another Parliament and to assume from thence the long awaited result of his Ambition the Crown Imperial of England All other things moreover did â—eâ—m to comspire to the same purpose except the Levelling Fifth Monarchy party and Lambert for the Presbyterian and other Sectâ—ries vvho had their hands full of Sacrilegious and Treasonable Penny-vvorths of Ecclesiâ—stical and Crovvn and Delinquents Lands vvere most eagerly desirous of a settlement of the Government by Law that might secure and confirm their purchases the more indifferent Royallists preferred any Legal no manner how or what Authority rather then be continually tisked and oppressed by the outragious unlimited violence of the Major Generals whom Cromwel had on purpose set up as he did the little or foolish Parliament to make another Title he gaped at more acceptable to the people As to the Fifth Monarchy men he had neerly pried into that danger and seized and took the chief of that party among whom was Venner the Wine-Cooper being engaged somewhat after in a Plot in a house in Shorditch where some Arms were taken and and an Ensign with a Lyon couchant of the Tribe of judah painted in it having this Motto Who shall raise him up And hereupon Harrison Carew Rich Vice-Admiral Lawson Courtney Portman Day and the like were imprisoned in remote places as Col. Overton Major Holms and others of the same party had been seized in Scotland and disbanded by Gen. Monck according to Cromwell's Order and sent up Prisoners to the Tower of London As to the Levellers he had lately discovered their practices and combinations against him and had likewise clapt up the chief of them one Major Wildman in order to his Tryal being taken at Marleborough inditing and drawing Declarations against him so that they were at a stand and a loss which â—ay to proceed to the unsetling and overthrow of his Tyrannical power procured by so many tricks and cheats put upon them by him so that afterwards when they began private Subscriptions to Petitions and Addresses to the Parliament against the Kingship he peremptorily upon their peril forbid them to intermeddle with their Consultations and so awed and dashed them that they never offered any more afterwards to hold up so much as a Finger against him Lambert was the only impediment and we shall see him neatly and quietly removed and discarded like the rest of his former Confidents This Olivarian Parliament brought together by these means was not lesse awed in its Election by the Major Generals they themselves and all their friends being returned for Members while the Gentry and other Honest men being confined or under some qualification or other could not or dared not appear particularly Col. Berkstead and Kiffin the Anabaptist by Voyces of Redcotes got themselves returned Knights of the Shire for Middlesex with Sir William Roberts and Mr. Chute 4 as the Instrument directed then in the Admission to the House where a Recognition of his Highness and the Government by a single person with a Guard of Soldiers was ready placed and unless each Member swallowed the one he might not pass the other by which means almost 200. were at the
together Death officiously removing this great impediment also so that by this time there was not an Officer left in the Army that did not acknowledge Cromwell's Sultanship the General himself being lulled and bewitched with the Syren Charms of his zealous insinuations The Presbyterian Party in the Parliament began now to be sensible whither these devices tended and therefore to Counterplot this Caball of Cromwells they resolved upon a new disbanding of some the Scots having friendly departed home and transporting of other Regiments for the service of Ireland for that the necessity of that Kingdome did require the Translation of the waâ— thither This the Independents presently perceived and gave Cromwell timely notice of who knowing himself to be principally aimed at caused it by some of his Familiars to be spread about the Souldiery that the Parliament by the major Vote of some corrupt Members had voted the disbanding of the Army to cheat them of their Arrears and then to send them in a necessitous condition into Ireland to be there knock'd 〈◊〉 the Head by the Rebells This presently put the Common Soldiers into such a rage who always judge by the first appearance that they â—lew out into most opprobrious and reviling Language against the Parliament but fury being no present remedy to this evil Ireton anâ— his instructed Pupills prescribe a Module never heard of or practised in War before of a Military Common-Council who should assemble 2 commission Officers and two private Soldiers out of every Regiment to consult for the good of the Army to draw up their grievances and present them to the General and he to the Parliament these to be called by the name of Adjutators Having thus made sure of the Army he thought it time now to make sure of the King whom the Parliaments Commissioners had brought to his Captivity at Holmby-house and therefore Ireton and he having sometime before acquainted themselves with the King in this his restraint and vowed and protested their readinesse to serve him to the ensnaring the Kings belief while they condoled the hard usage and unreasonable carriage of the Parliament towards him especially in point of Liberty of Conscience and the Worship of God His Majesties Chaplains having been obstinately refused him they judged it no difficult thing to get his person into their Custody and deceive his good nature with the same semblances of it in themselves only the manner was not presently resolved by them For without the Generals consent and command it could not be done in his name nor might it avowedly be done by the Councill of War for it would be a peremptory and hazardous enterprise and engage the whole Kingdome about their Ears but at last it was concluded betwixt them that this surprizal of the King should be fathered on the Council of Adjutators as the sense and Act of the Army Thus in all these pushes and puzzels of accidents did they extricate themselves by that Mungrill consistory a meer Chimâ—â—â— or Brainsick Idaea of a convention which was conversant only about shadowes and umbrages of things while Cromwell ran away with the substance This way being agreed upon one Cornet Joyce a busie pragmaticall person whom Cromwell his Familiar had tutoured in the Method of boldnesse and Rebellion was privately conferred with about it and after some familiar compellations hugged into the Conspiracy and immediately dispatch'd away with a party of 1000 Horse on the 4. of June to Holmby where he arrived late at Night but being very importunate to speak with the King was by his order admitted to whom he declared his â—â—â—and and being demanded by whose Authority whither by the Generall or Councell of War no other answer could be drawn from him but that it was from the Army adding that if the King should refuse to go along with him he must carry him away per force The King neverthelesse deliberated the whole night and consulted with the Parliaments Commissioners what was most adviseable for him to do though the sway of his judgement in 〈◊〉 him to the Army Custody from a just 〈◊〉 of the sullennesse and Rebellious obstinacy of the Parliament who had by Joyce offered him as the last and chief Artifide of Cromwell to all 〈◊〉 of ranks and persons the liberty of Conscience with other specious and dutiful pretences From Holmby therefore next morning the King was carried to Childersly then the head quarters of the Army though the King desired to go to Newmarket his own house as perswading himself in some greater degree of Royalty then in the Parliaments Tuition but this was at first denyed and a complementary amends made him by the Generall and more particularly by Cromwell that His Majesty could no where be safer or more regally honoured then in their quarters which were the only Sanctuary of his person This daring presumption of seizing the King gave light to the World what this Oliver would at last appear though no certain Conclusions could be made what the mischief did presently signify It was sufficient to Cromwell's design to amuse the World and let them guesse at the danger he had readily prepared beyond any sudden remedy And therefore he now personates the Kings Interest professeth himself exceeding sorry to have mistaken the quarrell intimates and insinuates to the King that there were a corrupt party meaning the Presbyterians in Parliament who alone withstood his Resolution and that He and all the power and friends he could make were resolved to assert his Rights and vindicate them from those unreasonable injuries of the Juncto as he spared not frequently to own the same Honesty to the Kings friends then admitted to attend Him particularly He declared to Collonel John Cromwell a Commander in the States Service in Holland then in England That he thought the King of England was the most injured Prince in the World and clapping his hand to his Sword in some passion said Cousin This shall right him to the very great Contentment of that Loyal Subject whom we shall have further occasion in this Discourse and from this Passage to mention In the mean while the King is at his earnest desire which Cromwell seemed most officiously to study conveighed to Newmarket House and thither his friends and Chaplains without any restriction admitted and such a sudden change made in the condition of the King as to his Liberty and Honour that most of his party were dazeled with the shews of it and could not foresee the Treason that was hid under those fair Umbrages Nor could the King himself so cunningly Cromwell carried it give any true judgement of this his Surprizal more then that the Examples and rules of all Policy generally resolved him That the Person of a Prince in whosoever hands it remaineth addeth Strength and Authority to that Party The King being thus in Olivers hands as he had declared upon Joyces telling him that he had the King in Custody that he had the Parliament then in
his Pocket so his next Main Work was to perform his word and to this intent he never ceased exasperating the King against the Presbyterian Members in Parliament thereby indisposing the King to any accommodation with them though the Terms or Propositions sent his Majesty were so unreasonable that they needed no disswasion to his Assent but this Ambodexter so invisibly managed both the injustice of the Juncto and the indignation and resentment of the King that he was look'd upon no otherwise then as a partial Spectator and Wellwisher to the Kings Fortunes Nay so far had he proceeded in this Dissimulation and Treachery the more detestable by how much the simple confidence of so innocent a Prince was abused and deceived that he stuck not sundry times voluntarily and of his own accord to assure the King that if the Parliament failed in their duty and did not speedily restore him and settle the Kingdome the Army should do it without them and that to that very purpose the newly constituted Council or Court of Adjutators were now proceeding and that speedily his Majesty should see the effect of his Faithfulness and Allegiance while he the more indiscernably sought and most nefariously practised his Ruine The Presbyterians in Parliament were hastily alarum'd at these Transactions of Cromwell and therefore the Army having assumed to themselves by decree of this their Court of Adjutators a right of Petitioning as English Freemen as being no mercenary Souldiers resolved as was partly hinted before to divide the Army and send part of it to Ireland and forthwith to Cashiere Cromwell and his Chief Partizans and to run parallell with his designs to send propositions to the King at the same time as the Army had hammered out some proposals of more equall and of fairer pretences then theirs that the King acknowledged the justâ—â— dealing of the Army with which satisfaction of the King Cromwell seemed very much delighted assuring His Majesty that more then that now proposed which yet plainly asserted the Regall and Monarchall right should in time be brought about and that he might be confident in him as his most Dutifull and Faithful Subject Thus practiced he with the King by Delusion and Treachery but against the Parliament he proceeded in a more forcible way for his party therein had tryed all wayes to overreach the Presbyterian with finesse and Artifice but found them so vigilant and sensible of their proceedings and being also far the Major part of the House that no issue was to be expected from debates and disputes with them for a Declaration was now published forbidding the Souldiers to Petition the Parliament as being under their pay and command and for disobedience hereunto Sir Philip Stapleton and Mr. Hollis had drawn their Swords upon one Major Tuleday and committed another one Nicholas Tâ—w to Newgate in the month of May and a private resolution had been taken to secure Cromwell then in Town and not suffer him to return to the Army now full of Rebellious mutiny against them which might have put an end to this grand conspiracy and the mischiefs ensuing but Oliver having sudden intimation of the design got secretly and hastily out of Town and upon a Flea-bitten nag without stop or stay arrived at the Rendezvouz at Triploe Heath June the 5. his Horse all in a foam and there was welcomed with the Shouts of the whole Army to whom he declared the actions and designs of the Parliament And here was made that pernicious and destructive engagement of perpetuating the Army till their desires that is till Cromwell's devices should be attained and this for his better security he caused to be confirmed at another more generall Rendezvouz June the 14. at New-market where he himself was the first man alighting from his Horse at the head of his Regiment and lying upon his Belly that subscribed it which was in severall Parchment Rolls universally Followed I must not omit one further remarque on this occasion one Edward afterwards better known by the name of Collonel Sexby and one Lazingby both of the Councill of Adjutators were ordered by the said Councill to attend the Lieut. General Cromwell then quartering near Colchester in Essex with a draught of the engagement every word whereof was privily dictated by himself Ireton yet at the receipt hereof Cromwell very angerly rising up in his bed demanded how they durst presume to give him any Papers they replyed it was the sence of the Army and that they were commanded to deliver it Be you well assured of that saith he in the same rage and presently thereupon read it instantly changing his Countenance to a mild and devout aspect said It is a most just thing God prosper it I will stand by the Army with it to the utmost of my life and Fortunes and so after many familiar Caresses dismissed them it being his constant custome afterwards during this Intrigue to take the meanest Souldier by the hand clap him on the Shoulder or box him lightly on the Ear thereby to ingratiate himself into their affections and it accordingly succeeded in this bold attempt and enterprise upon the Parliament For immediately hereupon an Impeachment is drawn up and presented to and approved by this Councill of Adjutators against 11. Members of the House of Commons the chief of the Presbyterian party viz. Sir William Waller Collonel Massey Sir John Clotworthy Mr. Deâ—â—ill Hollis Collonel Long Mr. Anthony Nichols Sir Philip Stapleton Mr. Glyn c. the main of which charge was that they had been the obstructers and prejudicers of several Petitions to the Parliament for redresse of publique greivances retarded the settlement of the Kingdome and had shared the Revenue thereof among themselves and last of all had underhand complyed with the King Imputations of all sorts to make some thing stick and to catch one parties or others belief of their criminal Suggestions This was accordingly with impudence enough presented to the House of Commons though they had expressely declared against this unparallel'd violence and straightways the Army advanceth nearer to London resolving not to desist their march till they were superseded the House which affront was most abjectly suffered by the Parliament and the said Members after some frivolous debates suspended sitting till they had cleared themselves and now Cromwell having thus awed the Parliament and abused the King was come to a fair prospect of his aspired greatnesse making good that praesagious saying of his upon the seizing of the King by Joyce there remained now nothing to hinder the facilitating of the residue of his Plot but the City of London and we shall see him cajole and Baffle them worse and more insolently then the Parliament But before we mention that we must return to the King now traversing the Countrey with the Army and shewed to the people in great State and received and welcomed every where by them with all demonstrations of joyfull Allegiance and in like manner yet Complemented