Germany and other Kingdomes and Principalities of Christendome the Republique of Venice and that Corporation of Kings the States of Holland and the united Provinces greater Improvements of Lands and prices for the fruits of the Earth then former ages ever saw or attained unto ten to one more Cattel Sheep Swine and Poultry fed and sold in England then formerly a freedome from the Popes and Romes former and many daily heavy Taxations carrying away much of the Revenues thereof the universality of the people 10 or 20 times richer in moveables and household Furniture then ever their Forefathers were every man of 10 or 20 l. Land per annum now having one if not many pieces of Plate in his house heretofore not to be found but in the houses of the Nobility or persons of great quality many Alehouse-keepers a piece of Plate if not as many as his occasions call for instead of Black poâ—s every Artizan a piece or more of Plate and many of the richer sort of Citizens Merchants and Retayloâ—s do take themselves to be disparaged the Sons of contempt if they have not half and others almost all their Table-service in Silver Plate their Dyning Rooms and Lodging Chambers richly hung with Tapestry of 30 40 or 60 l. a suit too many of their Wives hung with Pearl Neck-laces Diamond Lockets and the most costly sort of Jewels and little Tablets of their Husbands Pictures richly enameld or set in gold at the charge of 25 or 20 l. a piece to hang at the outside of their hearts and some of the retailing part of them think they come to farre behind their betters if they have not a kind of Sâ—ate or Carpets to spread within their Chambers or Apartments or shall not be enough talked of or looked upon if they have not an Indian Foot-boy with a Coller of Silver about his neck to attend them and their delicacies and wantonness better attended then the afterwards destroyed and vagabond Jews ever had when the Almighty sent his Prophets to preach and inveigh against their excessive pride and wickedness a greater by many degrees more then heretofore increase of Trade untill our long and accursed Rebellion spoyled it more money put by Countrymen and such as were not Traders to Interest and Usury which may shew how great an overplus many have beyond their necessary expences then former ages were acquainted with as much Wood and Timber sold in our late times of prodigality as would have bought the Fee-simple and Inheritance of all or the greatest part of the Lands of the Kingdome many Rivers made navigable and Havens repaired the loss of Cattle and damage by Inundations and some unruly Rivers prevented by several Statutes oâ— Commissions of Sewers Depopulations prohibited many an unjust Title in concealed Lands made good after sixty years quiet possession Interest for money lent reduced to a lower rate then formerly and Brocage forbidden divers Statutes restraining Aliens not being denâ—zend to Trade or keep Shops the bringing of silver Bullion into England by our Merchants encouraged transportation of Gold and Silver prohibited Merchants of Ireland and Aliens ordained to employ their moneys received in England upon the Commodities thereof many great Factories and Trades erected and encouraged the Lands of Wales greatly improved and freedome formerly denyed had of Trade and Commerce with them the Marches of Wales secured from the Incursions of the Welch and the Northern Counties from those of the Scots abundance of Markets and Fairs granted more then formerly great store of Cattle brought in yearly from Ireland and Scotland and many a good and beneficiall Law and Act of Parliament made to remedy the peoples grievances and better enabling them to performe those very ancient and legall duties of Pourveyances or Compositions for them Which may with us be understood to be the more reasonable when the Pourveyance or Compositions for them in England if they did yearly charge the people or amount unto as they did not fifty or sixty five thousand pounds per annum or thereabouts did not yearly draw out of their Puâ—ses or Estates so much as that which is yearly laid out in their buying of Babies Hobby-horses and Toyes for their Children to spoyl as well as to play withall or in the yearly charge of the Counties in the amending of the High-wayes Treatments given to Harvest folk Expences of an Harvest Goose or Seed-Cake given to their Plowmen and keeping a Wake or Parish Feast every year or the monies which the good women in every Parish and County do gladly rid themselves of in their Gossipings at the Birth of their Neighbours Children and many other most triviall chearfull and pleasing disbursements and nothing near so much as this last years excess in the wearing of Perrukes or Periwigs some at three pounds others at five or ten pounds price which Clerks and the smallest size of Tradesmen and Journymen Apprentices Baâ—beâ—s and Vintners boys must of necessity have to hide their heads and little wit is Or in the womens long needless Trains or unreasonable length of their Gowns every Lady or Gentlewoman or many ridiculous proud Citizens Wives being certainly not Dutchesses or Countesses or allowed to have their Trains carried up to shew the length of their vanities and informe the Common people who do with abhorrence behold them how much better it would be to bestow that ten or twenty pounds per annum so foolishly expended upon the Poor in charity and almes deeds then to make their tails the Beesoms or Deputy-Scavengers of the streets or places where they walk or the mony which hath been lately expended in altering or putting too many of the Common people into the low crowned little Hats or flat Caps to cover the folly of every Absalom or Inhabitant in a hideous bush of hair or Periwig or their adorning them with as many Ribbons as the vanities they are guilty of or in the yearly or never murmured at charges or expences of almost all sorts of people as well in the Countries as Cities in the exchanging or following of Fashions as if they were to make all the hast possible they could to purchase them lest there should not be fools enough in the Nation or that the ridiculous French Ape should not have enough to be of his Livery or Retinue And as to the severall kinds of all those severall particulars would make the foot of the Accompt to be a great deal more then that of the Pourveyance or Compositions for them which was so easie and petit as in most of the Counties of England it was many times not singly rated or assessed but was joyned with some other Assesse And in Kent where ten or twenty times more being gained by the Kings residence at Westminster more was paid then in any one County of England was so little felt and regarded as a Tenant paying One hundred pounds rent per annum for his Land did not think it worth his care
of his burdens as he and his Royal Progenitors have done unto them in any of the complained of burdens of them and their Forefathers by many times laying to sleep some good Laws Constitutions which though at the making thereof they were most just and rationall would now by the rise of silver two to one more then formerly the change of Times and Customes be very prejudiciall and burdensome unto them As King Henry the First did by no Law or Act of Parliament but his own good will and promise calculated only for that present Age or Reign but since observed by all his Successors in the change of his rent provisions into Rents of money many of which being now and ever since paid in small quit-rents made that part of the People very great gainers and that King and his Heirs and Successors to be loosers more then Fifty thousand pounds per annum or the greatest extent of the Nations yearly charge for the Royall Pourveyance or Compositions for them did ever amount unto And as the Asise of Bread Bear and Ale in 51 H. tertii which holds no proportion with the now Assize or rules for Bakers and Brewers but very much differs from it and exceeds it was not for many ages past and in some plentifull years in our memory kept when Corn Wheat and Malt did fall within the virge or direction of that Act of Parliament or Ordinance rather of the King without an Act of Parliament Nor did hold those kind of Trades to the Assize made and appointed by King Henry the 7 th nor by any Act of Parliament or otherwise restrain the Shoemakers to the prices appointed by the Statute of 25 Ed. 3. repealed in the 5 th year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth when there was an allowed transportation of Leather and scarcely half so many Cattle bred in England and brought from Ireland and Scotland nor any Leather at all imported from Russia as it is now in great quantities when they do now by their own and the Tanners knaveries and enhaunces take for a pair of shoes which in the Reign of King Edward the 2 d. might be bought for the use of a good Knight or Gentleman for a groat and in Yorkshire for some of the best Gentry of that County in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth but for little more where also a pair of shoes for a Lady of a good Extraction and Quality were in the begining of the Reign of King James sold for sixteen pence and a pair of shoes for a man in the memory of middle aged men were made and sold in London for two shillings six pence and eight groats a pair no less then four shillings eight pence at the lowest and many times five shillings and six pence or six shillings a pair which as Mr. Richard Ferrour hath judiciously and ingeniously observed doth yearly cheat and cozen the people besides the inconveniences by ill wrought and half tanned Leather six or seaven hundred thousand pounds or a Million Sterling per annum which might well have been spared or better employed And be as willing to ease his burdens and grievances as Queen Elizabeth that mirrour of Women and Princes was in theirs by the repealing of so much of the Statute for limiting the wages of labourers in the 25 th year of the Reign of King Edward the Third when Churches Castles and Abbies weâ—e wont to be built as concerned the wages of Labouâ—ers that Master Masons Carpenters and Tylers should take but three pence a day and others of that Trade but two pence a day a Tylers boy a peny per diem that none other should take above a penny for a days work for mowing five pence for reaping of Corn in the first week of August two pence and in the second week and unto the end of that moneth not above three pence And by the making of an Act of Parliament that the wages of Artificers and Labourers then six times more then they were at the time of the making of the said Act of Parliament in the 25 th year of the Reign of King Edward the Third should be yearly assessed by the Justices of the Peace and Magistrates in every County City and Town corporate at their Quarter-Sessions with respect unto the plenty and scarcity of the time and other circumstances necessary to be considered for that as the praeamble thereof declared the wages and allowances limited and rated in former Statutes were in divers places too small and not answerable to that time respecting the advancement of the prices of all things belonging unto Artificers and Labourers that the Law could not conveniently without the great grief and burden of the poor Labourers and hired men be put in execution and to the end that there might be a convenient proportion of wages in the times of scarcity and plenty Which was the cause that King James by an Act of Parliament made in the first year of his Reign upon compleynt that their wages were not rated and proportioned according to the plenty necessity and scarcity and respect of the time as was politiquely intended by the said Queen Elizabeth did amongst other provisions give a further power authority to the Justices of Peace in every County at their Quarter Sessions from time to time to limit and regulate the wages and hire of Labourers and Artificers although their wages and hire were then much encreased and are since very excessive and immoderate which by an Act of Parliament made in the third year of the Reign of King Charles the Martir being continued untill the end of the first Session of the then next Parliament is for want of continuance expired and did repeal as Queen Elizabeth and other of our Kings also did many an Act of Parliament in regard of Inconveniences or damages arising to the people or because they did not answer the expectations of the makers thereof And may as little grudge the King his Pourveyance or Compositions for them though the richer part of the people who are only contributory to the Pourveyance or Compositions for them may by their own excessive raysing of all manner of prices of houshold provisions and their unreasonable gains by it seem to be something more then formerly burdened with it as they did the late King Charles the Martyr his indulgence to them and dispensing with a Decree made in the Starre-Chamber in the 11 th year of his Reign by the Lords of his Privy Councel and other the Judges of that Court after consultation had with Judge Hutton and Judge Croke who were well known to be very great well-wishers to the peoples just and legall liberties and the other reverend Judges and divers Justices of the peace of the Kingdom confirmed by the Kings Letters Patents under the great Seal of England which did forbid the Vintners to dress any meat for their Guests or Strangers and limited the Inkeepers of London and
troublesome to give a Guard of 4000 Archers of Cheshire with their Bows bent and their Arrows hocked ready to shoot Bouche of Court to wit meat and drink and wages of six pence a day then accompted a very great pay Or that King Henry the 7 th then whom the Kingdom of England never had a more thrifty Prince did the morrow after Twefthtyde in a great Solemnity keep a Feast in Westminster Hall where he being set at a Table of Stone which remained untill the middle of our late Rebellion accompanyed with the Queen and many Embassadours and other Estates 60 Knights and Esquires served 60 Dishes to the Kings Mess and as many to the Queens and served the Lord Mayor of London at a Table where he was set with 24 dishes of meat to his Mess. And our succeeding Kings understood to be so much for the good and welfare of the people as King Edward the Sixth that great Blossome of prudence and piety and all manner of Princely virtues when a surfeit of Church Lands and Revenues had like the coal carried into the Eagles nest reduced the Royall Revenues into a consumptive and languishing condition had by the advice of his Privy Council suppressed but with no advantage to the Revenue or curing the diseases of it as it then and hath since happened in many of those pretended rather then really effected dishonorable Espargnes witness the putting down of fourteen Tables at once by King Charles the Martyr which gained in one year Thirty thousand pounds to some few of his Officers who did advise him to do it but nothing at all for himself the Tables formerly appointed for young Lords the Masters of Requests and Serjeants at Armes c. he did not howsoever think fit to diminish or lessen any more of the Royall Hospitality And King James when he had by an over-great bounty to his Countrymen the Craving Scots and their restless importunities brought himself and Revenue into many streights and was contented to seek out wayes of sparing did in the inquest and seeking to abate the charge of his housekeeping in his Letters to the Lords of the Councel bearing date in November 1617. and pressing earnestly to have it done to the end that he might equall his charges to his Revenue direct them to abate superfluities in all things and multitudes of unnecessary Officers and to do things so as they might agree with his honor but concluded that there were twenty wayes of abatement besides the House if they be well looked into Which may give us a Prospect which a larger Treatise of the Antiquitie legality reason duty and necessity of Prae-emption and Pourveyance for the King or Compositions for his Pourveyance as they were used and taken for the provision of the Kings Houshold the small charges and burden thereof to the People and many great mischiefs and inconveniences which will inevitably follow the taking of them away will more fully evidence how great a damage the King susteyneth by the want of them How unbecoming the Majesty and Honor of a King and his many Princely affairs and occasions it will be that the people should deny him that granted or continueth their Profits in Fairs and Markets the benefit of Prae-emption which all Princes as well Christian as Heathen do enjoy and is but conformable to the Tenor and meaning of the Fifth Commandement in the Decalogue and the Honour due unto common Parents and Magistrates enjoyned thereby How unsafe to the peoples consciences when they do by their Oathes of Allegeance and Supremacy swear to maintain and defend his Regall Rights and Jurisdictions not to allow his Prae-emption 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or forecheapum and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Saxon Times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying ante 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 prendere which is Prae-emption and was then as it hath been ever since so just and legall a part of the Kings Prerogative as King Ina who reigned here in the year 720. did by a Law prohibit that Fore fang or Captio obsoniorum in foris aut nundinis non ab aliquo fit priusquam minister Regis ea ceperit quae Regi fuerint necessaria the taking or buying of Houshold provisions by others in Fairs or Markets before the Kings Minister or Pourveyor should take those things which were necessary for the King And was not then any Novel constitution or acquired Right or Praerogative or without a Divine pattern but so inhaerent in Monarchy and Kingly Government and so becoming the duty and gratitude of Subjects as we may find the Vestigia or Tracs of it in the morning of the restored not long before drowned and washt world when Joseph that great and happy Minister of State under Pharaoh King of Egypt did by the help of that Royal Right of Praeemption keep the Lean Kine from eating up the Fat and save that Kingdome and many other neighbouring Nations from an irresistible famine and ruine And how contrary it will be unto the duty of Subjects to refuse him their Carts to convey his Carriages unless they may have two parts in three more then formerly when the Earl of Rutland and Countess Dowager of Pembroke and many other of the Nobility have not only their Pourveyances but can have their Tenants Boon Carts upon any of their occasions for nothing and every Lord of a Manor or Parson of a Parish do seldom fail of as much or greater curtesies or respects from their Tenants or Parishioners or that the Kings Harbingers should from some of the Tribe of Naball receive uncivill and churlish answers that they are not to loose the advantage of six pence more which may be given by any other or that his Pourveyors should not have the benefit of Praeemption as one of them lately was refused in the buying of a Salmon or be wrangled with and have Fowl taken out of their hands as one lately did and when he was told it was for the King could say he cared not a turd for him or that his Officers should be exposed to the humours or incivilities of Clowns Quakers or disaffected persons And that strangers who have commonly and usually seen forreign Princes travailing in any parts of Christendome out of their own Territories and Jurisdictions to be by a generall and never intermitted custome honourably and respectfully received in all Cities and Places of note and presented with Wine Fish and other provisions such as the place and season of the year afforded which even those Commonwealths States and Places of incivility Trade and selfishness such as Holland and Hamborough do never omit should see the King of Englands Servants and Officers so little respected in their attendance upon him in his Journeys or Progresses as not to be trusted with a small hire of a Cart unless like some beggars in the streets buying an halfpenny or a farthing worth of pottage at a Cooks Shop they do first
fallen upon the Orphans or fatherless Children of that part of the People and their Estates when the Wolves shall be made the Keepers of the Lambs and every indigent or wastfull father in Law shall be a Guardian to those whose Estates he makes it his business to spend and ruine or to transferre upon his own Children and the charge and trouble of Petitions at the Councell Board or more tedious Suits in Chancery to be relieved against them the pay of more Life-guards or a small standing Army to keep the People within the bounds of their duty and secure good Subjects from the mischief intended by the bad frequent Musters of the Trained Bands more then formerly and of an Army to be hired upon an occasion of an Invasion or the transferring the sedem belli or miseries of warre into an Enemies Country much whereof would not have needed to be if the Tenures in Capite and by Knight-service those stronger Towers and Forts of our David those Horsemen and Charriots of our Israel and alwayes ready Garrisons composed of the best and worthiest men of our Nation not hirelings taken out of the Vulgus nor unlettered unskilfull and uncivilized nor rude or debauched part of the people but of those who would fight tanquam pro aris focis as they and their worthy Ancestors ever used to do for the good and honour of their King and Country and the preservation of their own Families as being obliged unto it by the strongest tyes and obligations of law and gratitude which ever were or could be laid upon the fortunes Estates Souls and Bodies of men that would have a care but of either of them Or to put in the Ballance against the benefits which they had in the preservation of their Woods recording their discents and titles to their Lands and many a Deed and Evidence which would otherwise have been lost or not easie to be found and the help and ayd which their heirs in their infancies have never failed of in all their Suits and Concernments And the seldome abuses of some naughty Pourveyors and the complaints thereby do not any thing neer amount unto the immense gains of the people of some millions sterling per annum in their vast improvements of their Lands and Estates by the rack and rise of rents enhaunce of Servants and Labourers wages and all commodities in all parts of the Kingdome before and since the Reign of Queen Elizabeth when the Compositions for the Pourveyance were made and agreed upon may seem but a very small yearly Retribution to the King or his Royall Progenitors for permitting so much as shall be reasonable of it And the People of England might better allow him those small and legall advantages which are and will be as much for publique good as his own then they do themselves in many of their own affairs one with another in many of their particular private ends advantages wherein the will and bequests oâ— the dead their Hospitalls Legacies or Gifts to charitable uses are not nor have been so well managed as they ought to be As may be instanced in those multitudes of charitable Legacies or Gifts in lands originally cut out and proportioned to the maintenance of certain numbers of poor or for some particular uses which by the increase and improvement of Rents before and since the dissolution of the Abbies Religious Houses and Hospitals did very much surmount the proportions which were at the first allowed or intended for them And with more Reason and Justice then the City of London and many of their Guilds and Fraternities do now enjoy divers Lands which were given for Lamps and other superstitious uses for which they compounded by order of the Councell Board with King Edward the Sixth for twenty thousand pounds and more then that which that and many other Cities and Towns do take and receive for Tolls which being many times only granted for years or upon some temporary occasions are since kept and retained as rights besides many Gifts and Charitable Uses since the dissolution of the Abbies and Religious Houses amounting to a very great yearly value which by the improvement and rise of Rents beyond the proportion of the Gifts or the intention of the Givers have been either conveyed by Jâ—yntures or leases to wives or children or much of the overplus which came by the improvement or concealed Charitable Uses converted by the Governours of many a City and Town Corporate to the maintenance of themselves the Worship of the Corporation and many a comfortable Feast and Meeting for the pretended good of the 〈◊〉 people thereof who are but seldome if at all the better for it Some of which not to mention any of greater bulk or value may appear in a few instances instead of a multitude of that kind dispeâ—sed in the Kingdom as two Closes of Land or Meadow Ground lying in the Parish of Shoreditch in the County of Middlesex given by Simon Burton Citizen and Merchant-Taylor of London in the year 1579. unto St. Thomas Hospital upon condition that the Governors of the said Hospitall should yearly give unto 30 poor Persons of the said Parish on the 21 22 or 23 dayes of December for ever the summe of eight pence a piece Mr. William Hanbury Citizen and White-baker of London did by a Surrender in the year 1595. give unto Elizabeth Spearing certain Copihold Lands in Stebuâ—heath and Ratcliffe in the said County to pay the Parson and Church-wardens of the said Parish for ever to the use of the poor People there two and fifty shillings yearly which by consent of the Parish is by twelve pence every Wednesday weekly bestowed upon the Poor abroad And Mrs. Alice Hanbury Widow by her will did in the same year give unto Mr. George Spearing a Tenement in the said Parish wherein William Bridges a Taylor then dwelled upon condition that the said George Spearing his Heirs and Assignes should yearly pay to the Churchwardens of the said Parish and their Successors to the use of the poor and impotent People thirteen shillings and four pence And that whether the King be enough recompenced or not at all recompenced for his Pourveyance it would be none of the best bargains for the Subjects of England or their Posterity to exchange or take away so great and nâ—â—â—ssary a part of his Prerogative or support of Majesty as the Pourveyance or Compositions for them were which in the Parliament in the 4 th year of the Reign of King James were held to be such an inseperable Adjunct of the Crown and Imperiall dignity as not to be aliened and some few years after believed by that incomparable Sir Francis Bacon afterwards Lord Chancellor of England to be a necessary support of the Kings Table a good help and justly due unto him And the Learned both in Law and Politiquâ—s in other Nations as well as our own have told us that such Sacra
his men wear the same colour of Livery that the Kings servants did Or that it was ill done by the Parliament in the 14 th year of the Reign of that King when they petitioned him that the Prerogative of him and his Crown might be kept and that all things done to the contrary might be redressed Or that the Lords Spirituall and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled in the 16 th year of the said Kings Reign did not well understand the good of the Kingdom when upon a Debate and consideration of the Popes Usurpation and Incroachments upon the Kings Regalities and his Holiness Provisions made for Aliens and Strangers by the benefices of the Church of England they did unanimously declare that they and all the Leige Commons of the Realm would stand with the King and his Crown and Regality in the cases aforesaid and in all other cases attempted against him his Crown and Regality in all points to live and to dye Or that our forefathers were not to be imitated in their stout assertions of the Rights of their Kings and their Regalities when in their zeal thereunto Humphry Duke of Glocester when the Pope had wrote Letters in the Reign of King Henry the Sixth in derogation of the King his Regality and the Church-men durst not speak against them he did throw his Letters and Missive into the fire and burn them Or that it can be well done by us to withhold from him that small retribution of Pourveyance which is a Duty established by a fourfold obligation composed of a Right or Duty a very antient Custome backt by the Laws of God Nature and Nations the Oaths of Allegeance and Supremacy and a contract made and continued by the people to their Kings built upon the best and greatest of considerations which the Prophet David in the 15 th Psalm if it had not been as it is beneficiall to the people but to some loss or damage adviseth not to be broken and enforce him for want of it to give over his Housekeeping and deprive him of that Loadstone which might amongst many other of his daily graces and favours attract and draw unto him the love and affections of his people the most iron rusty hearted Clowns or leave our Trajan no wall for his â—erba Parietaria sweet smelling flower to grow upon Or that it can be any honour for our Lords and Ladies who received their honour from the King and his Progenitors and were in the Saxon Times called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lords and Ladies from their Hospitalities and giving of bread to see and not seek or help to remedy the greatest dishonour which in the consequence of it was ever put upon the Fountain of honour and a King of England in Solio in his Throne and full possession of his Kingdome and so much the more and without an example because it is not in the Time of a Rebellion but a happy Restauration and in the time of Peace after an end or conclusion of an intestine and barbarous Warre and so notorious as it hath been told in the Streets of Gath and Askalon and stirred up some unmannerly fancies and pictures made by some of our envious Neighbours in reproach of it Or that there can be any reason that those that think it reason that the King should recompence them for their losses and damages susteyned in his service in doing their duty unto him should not be as willing to give him an ease in his losses by any agreement made with them which proves to be prejudiciall or a damage unto him or that we may not give our selves in assurance that the Baronage of England who in a Parliament in the 20 th year of the Reign of King Henry the Third refused to consent to an Act of Parliament for the legitimation of such children as were botâ— before marriage to Parents afterwards married and clapping their hands upon their swords cryed una voce with one voice nolumus mutare leges Angliae we will never consent to change the laws of England would now if they were living say more and bewail the downfall of the Honor of their King and Country And not only they but all the then hospitable Gentry and Commonalty of England Lament to see so good and gracious a King allied to all the greatest Houses and Princely Families of Christendome by a discent farre beyond the most antient of them and an extraction of blood equalling if not surpassing the greatest of them and as well deserving of his People want the means to support a Magnificence as high and illustrious as any of his Royall Progenitors and not to be able for want of his Pourveyance to give his Servants Diet or Wages and that some of the principall of them as the Treasurer and Comptroller being sworn by the Orders of the House that all things in the Kings House be guided to the Kings most worship and that they search the good old rule worshipfull and profitable of the Kings Court used before time and them to keep and better if they can should have so much cause as they have to weep as the Priests did at the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem and complaining that the beauty is departed from the Kings house his Servants are become like Harts that find no Pasture and they that did feed plentifully are desolate in the Streets Wonder what wild Boar out of the Forrest or Fox out of the Wood have so destroyed and laid wast the Vineyards and the Gardens the Beds of Spices the Roses of Sharon and the Lilies of the Vallies that some of our Temples should be gloriously re-edified and our Zion repaired and yet the glory of our Solomon and his housekeeping not restored but his Servants ruined and their names as to their pay and maintenance blotted out of the Registers that the Winter should be past the Rain over and gone the Flowers appear on the earth the time of the singing of the Birds come and the voyce of the Turtle heard in our Land and the State and Magnificence of our Solomon and his Royall housekeeping which would have heretofore astonished a Queen of Sheba should be now most needlesly exchanged for a desolation and bear all the marks upon it of a languishing Honour That the Courts and Palace of our most gracious King Charles the Second by a mischance of quitting his Rights of Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them should as to many of its Attendants have all the year turned into an Ember week and be about Noon or Dinner time like the silence and want of Company at Midnight or a representation of the middle Isle of the Cathedrall of St. Pauls in London destitute of all its Walkers or Company but such as had nothing to buy their Dinner withall which heretofore begot the reproachfull adage or saying usually cast upon such men of distress
minxerit in patrios â—ineres as one who had pisssed upon his Fathers or Countries Ashes and as Murderers or Adulterers denyed them the Sanctuary if they sought it of the Church And when the Kings Royal Progenitors have taken so much care to prevent the decay of Tillage as by the Statute of 25 H. 8. cap. 13. to ordain that no man should keep more then two hundred sheep upon any land taken to farme and for the increase of Tillage plenty and cheapness of Corn did by the Statute of 2 Ed. 6. cap. 13. ordain that no Tithes should be paid for wast or Heath ground improved unto Tillage untill seaven years after the improvement by the Statute of 4 Jac. cap. 11. made a Provision for Meadow and Pasture and the necessary maintenance of husbandry and tillage in the Manors Lordships and Parishes of Merden alias Mawerden Boddenham Wellington Sutton St. Michael Sutton St. Nicholas Marton upon Lugg and the Parish of Pipe in the County of Hereford by the Statute of 7 Jac. cap. 11. That none should spoil corn and grain by untimely Hawking and by another Statute in the same Parliament That Seâ—-sands might in Devonshire and Cornwall be fetched from the sea to manure Lands paying reasonable duties for the passage through or by other mens Lands with Boats and Barges And the Assize of Bread throughout the whole Kingdome is by the Statute and Ordinance of 51 H. 8. to be yearly made and regulated by the Baker of the Kings house do take all the care they can that the Bread for his Houshold and Oats and Provender for his horses may be at the dearest rates and a great deal more then any of his Subjects do pay And although he and his Royal Progenitors and Predecessors have made the best provisions they could for the breed of Cattle and cheapness of meat by the Statute of 24 H. 8. cap. 9. forbidding the killing of weanling Calves under the age of two years That a milch Cow by the Statute of 2 3 Philip and Mary should be kept for every sixty Sheep and a Calf reared for every 120 Sheep By an Act of Parliament in 8 Eliz. cap. 3. That no Sheep should be transported and by several Acts of Parliament and otherwise encouraged the drayning of huge quantities of Fenne Lands and the imbanking of Marshes and Lands gained from the Sea and his now Majesty hath of late to help the breeders and sellers of Cattle in their reasonable prices thereof prohibited by an Act of Parliament the bringing in of any Cattle which were heretofore usually and yearly brought into England in great heards out of Scotland and Ireland and doth yearly by his Royal Edicts and Proclamations as many of his noble Progenitors Kings and Queens of England have usually done enjoyned the strict observation of the Lent will notwithstanding for want of his Pourveyance or much of his houshold Provisions as they ought to be served in kind constrain him to pay in ready money intollerable dear rates and prices for that which his Officers have occasion to buy for the Provision of his Household Who speed no better when they buy or provide his Fish of those who might have had so much duty and honesty as to afford it cheaper when his Royall Predecessors by the Statutes of 13 E. 1. cap. 47. and 13 R. 2. cap. 19. ordained severe penalties upon those that do take and destroy Salmons Lampries or any other Fish at unseasonable times or destroy the spawn of Fish By the Statute of 22 Ed. 4. cap. 2. That Salmons Herrings and Eâ—les be duly packed By the Statute of 11 H. 7. cap. 23. That Englishmen may import and bring into England Fish taken by Forreigners By the Statute of 2 Ed. 6. cap. 6. that no Officer of the Admiralâ—y should exact any thing of them which travailed for Fish By the Statute of 5 Ellz. cap. 6. Fishermen and Mariners shall not be compelled to serve as Souldiers upon the Land or upon the Sea but as Mariners except in case of Enemies or to subdue Rebellions By the Statute of 13 Eliz. cap. 10. allowed Sea-fish and Herring to be transported in English Ships with cross sails without payment of Customes By the Statute of 39 Eliz. cap. 10. ordained Aliens to pay for salted Fish and salted Herrings to be brought by them into England such Customes as shall be imposed in forreign parts upon the salted Fish and Herrings brought thither by Englishmen And our now gracious Soveraign mainteyns a great Navy to assert and defend his Dominion and his Subjects sole right of Fishing in the British Seas and hath of late in the midst of his own wants for the better encouragement of his People to seek their own good and that which our British Seas will plentifully afford them given all his Customes inward and outward for any the retorns to be made by the sale of Fish in France Denmark and the Baltick Seas for seaven years from the first entrance into the intended Trade of Fishing And when the Mayor of Kingstone upon Hull or his Officers can at the same time obteyn of them better penyworths and according to the directions of the Statute of 33 H. 8. cap. 33. have so good a Pourveyance allowed them as they can take of all Fishermen priviledged for every last of Herring xxd. for every hundred of salt Fish iiii d. for every Last of Sprats viii d. of every person not priviledged for every Last of Herring iâ— s. iiii d. for every hundred of Salt-fish iiii d. and for every Last of Sprats viii d. as they did before the making of the said Statute And when our Laws which have their life and being from the King and his Royall Progenitors have by the Statutes of 3 and 4 Ed. 6. cap. 22. and 2 and 3 Philip and Mary cap. 5. provided that the prices of Butter and Cheese be not enhaunced nor any transported without licence That the prices of Ale and Beer shall bâ—â—he Statute of 23 H. 8. be assessed at reasonable rates and the Barrels and Kilderkins gauged That Spices and Grocery Ware shall by the Statute of 1 Jac. cap. 19. be garbled and not mingled That Woods by the Statute of 35 H cap. 17. 13 Eliz. cap. 5. shall not be converted into Tillage or Pasture And by the Statutes of 7 Ed. 6. cap. 7. 47. cap. 14. that an Assize shall be kept as to the measures only of Coal Tallwood Billeâ—s and Faggots And some of our Princes have given by their Charters many great Liberties Immunities to the Companies of Brewers and Woodmongers And King James did in or about the 11 th year of hâ—s Râ—ign upon his granting of some priviledges to the Town and Colleries of Nâ—wcastle upon Tyne cause the Host-men or Oast-men of Newcastle to covenant to and with the King which they have seldome or never at all observed yearly to serve the City of London and places adjacent with Sea-coals
the Prince should often appear unto his People in Majesty and that the Courtiers should keep good houses And if they will do no more to do but as much as the Beasts and Birds being irrational creatures do by their bodies natural make it their greatest care to protect and preserve the Head of our Body Politique and the honor and dignity of it and keep it above water And now that by his gracious Government and return to us like the Sun to dispel the cold and uncomfortableness which the Winter of his absence had almost for ever fastned upon us Cum fixa manet reverentia patrum Firmatur seâ—ium juris priscamquè resumunt Canitiem leges when our Parliaments and our just and ancient Laws are again restored Claustrisque solutis Tristibus exsanguâ—s andent procedere leges and released from their former affrights and terrors Not endeavour to abridge or endanger the hopes of our future happiness by being to sparing unto him that was not so unto us Jam captae vindex patriae Ut sese pariter diffudit in omnia regni Membra vigor vivusquè redit color urbibus aegris and redeemed our happiness from its Captivity But rather imitate the Clergie of the Bishopricks of Gloucester Chester Oxford Peterborough and Bristol who in the fourth year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth finding those Bishopricks to be much impoverished by the Earl of Leicester and some other who in their vacancies had gotten away a great part of the Revenues thereof did by their Benevolences for some years after enable the Bishops thereof in some tolerable degree to maintain their Hospitalities And our long ago departed Ancestors who took it ill in the Reign of King John with whom they had so much and more then they should contended for their Liberties that Hubert Arch-bishop of Canterbury should keep a better House and Feast at Easter then the King And that Cardinal Woolsey in the Reign of King Henry the Eight should keep as great a state at Court as the King exercise as great an Authority in the Country for Pourveyance as the King and forbid Pourveyance to be made in his own Jurisdictions which made an addition to the Articles of High Treason or great Misdemeanors charged upon him by the Commons in Parliament brought up to the House of Peers by Sir Anthony Fitz-Herbert afterward a learned Judge of the Court of Common pleas So that our King may not for want of his antient rights of Pourveyance or an Allowance or Compositions for them the later of which as a means to make so unquestionable a right and priviledge of the Crown of England to be alwayes gratefull and welcome to them was fiâ—st designed set on foot contrived by Sir David Brook Serjeant at Law unto King Henry the Eighth and Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer in the Reign of Queen Mary and happily effected or brought to perfection in or about the 4 th year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth be necessitated to retrench or lay down his Royal Housekeeping and Hospitalities or deprived of his means of Charity and Magnificence which Jacob Almansor the learned Arabian King who lived in Anno 654. and conquered Spain was in his swarthy Dominions so carefull to preserve as after that he had given audience unto Suitors which were some dayes in every week he usually caused a publique cry to be made that all of them as well rich as poor should stay and take their refections and to that end furnished Tables for them with such abundance of provisions as became the house of so mighty a King And that if any forreign King or Prince should as Cecily Sister to the King of Sweden and Wife to the Marquess of Baden did by a far a long Voyage come from the North into England to visit our Queen Elizabeth and see the splendour of her Court which as to her Charity splendour and Hospitality though so over-sparing in other things and so unwilling to draw monyes out of her Subjects purses as she lost the fair hopes and opportunity of regaining Calais which was so much desired by her was very plentifully and magnificent and with the allowance of many more Tables then have been in the times of her Successors they may return into their Country as that Princess did with a wonder at it and not be constrained to say as was once said of the glory of the Temple of Jerusalem Who is left amongst you that saw this house in her first glory and how do you see it now and that returning into the former good wayes manners and custome of England we may not be damnati fatâ— populi but virtute renati And that to that end we shall do well to leave ouâ— new and untrodded By-wayes of Error made by the Raiser of Taxes and the Filchers of the Peoples Liberties in the Glory of anothers Kingdome now we have so wofully seen felt heard and understood so very many mischiefs and inconveniences already happened and if not speedily prevented are like to be a great deal more and hearken unto the voyce and dictates of the Laws of God and Nature the Laws of the Land and Nations Reason and Gratitude and let our Posterity know that the honor of our King and Country is dear unto us and that whatever becomes of our own Hospitalities we shall never be willing to let the Vestaâ— Fire of the British and English Hospitalities although most of our own are either extinguished or sunk into the Embers go out or be extinct in our King Palaces or to abjure or turn out of its course so great part of the Genius of the Nation but that we shall continue the duties of Praeemption and Pourveyance which are as old as the first Generations of Mankind and as antient as the duty of reverence of Children to their Parents Dent Fata Recessum FINIS Accompts inter Evidentia Comitis Oxon. Stows Survey of London Sieur Colberts Remonstrance of the benefit of the Trade to be driven by the French in the East-Indies Lessius de Just. Jur. lib. 2. cap. 21. n. 148. Cokes 4. part Institutes 12 Ed. 4. c. 8. 25 H. 8. cap. 2. Epist. Rom. 6. Speed Hist. of England Heylin hist. Ecclesiae Anglicanae domes reformatae Waler Max. lib. 8. cap. 5. Cicero in oratione pro Muroena Gervasius Tilburiensis Assisa panis cervisiae and a Statute for punishing the breach thereof by Pillory and Tumbrell Anno 51 H. 3. Rot. Fin. 11 E. 2. Cokes 1. part Institutes 70 Rot. parl 25 â— 3. m. 56. Inter Recorda in Recept Scaccarii inter Fines de tempore H. 3. Speed Hist. of Great Britain M. S. in custodia Gulielmi Dugdale Spelman Annotat. ad Concilia decreta leges Ecclesiastica 349. Asser Menevensis de gestis Alfredi 19. 23. Henry Huntingdon and William Malmesbury de gestis regum Angliae Speed History of England Stows Survey
Servants and the Children Friends and Kinred of many of those which do contribute towards the Pourveyance or Compositions for them and that which is so misimployed serves instead of some other largesses allowances or connivencies which are usually in Kings Houses and whether well spent or mispent being Oblations and Offerings of duty made by the People to their Sovereign are not to be denyed or retrenched no more then the misbehaviour of the Sons of Ely with which the Almighty was so much offended would have been any just cause of the Children of Israels forbearing to bring their Offerings It being no Paradox but certain enough that those seeming but not reall grievances to the People by the Kings Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them have no other source or originall then the rise and enhance of the Markets and all Victualls and Provisions by which all the selling and richer part of the People are ten to one more gainers by the Kings Pourveyance or Compositions for them then they can be loosers and are better able to bear it and the poorer sort of the people were less grieved when it was not taken away then they are now by the Excise of Ale Beer c. which comes in the place or pretended recompence of it that the Gentry and Landlords of the Lands in the Nation who by heating of those Lands that were cold drayning and drying of those that were wet and moist watering of such as were dry and sandy and planting of Wood and Fruit have brought their lands to a greater increase and fertility not yet come to its Acme or just height then the former ages and a thousand years knowledge or practise of our Forefathers the Inhabitants of this Nation could before this last Age or Century wherein we are now ever reach or attain unto and the Landlords of Houses Innes Taverns Shops or Stalls in London who have now by the increase of Tradesmen rather then Trade raised their rents ten or twenty to one more then what they were One hundred years agoe might in some measure or moderation have taken their advantages of the improvements of their Lands Rents Houses and Shops without such an overstretching their Rents as the Tenants where they have no Leases but at will or from year to year in some Counties of England should be enforced as many have lately been to throw up and forsake their Bargains And that all or any of that over-high racking the Rents of Lands and Houses or a supposed plenty of money which in the time of the greatest enhance and rack of rents rates and prices which ever England did see or endure is now so scarcely to be found as the universality of the people do heavily complain of the want of it and the product or consequence of that evil in a like enhance of rates and prices by the Freeholders and Copyholders who pay no rents as Farmers do and by the Tenants of the King Queen Prince or Bishops some of the hospitable and well minded Nobility and Gentry the Tenants of the Church and Colledge Lands and of Lands belonging to Cities Corporations Companies and Hospitals who have cheap and comfortable Estates and Bargains and yet do all they can to imitate them although they have no cause to do it which would be much higher If all the Copihold Estates in England and Wales were at as great a rack of rent as the Lands of the most of Farmers If all the Privileges and Rights of Common Estovers and Turbary Modus decimandi and Exemption from the payment of Tythes and Tolls were abrogated And if the King should keep the same rule and measure of high rating and racking of his Revenues certain or casuall as many Landlords do Or make our East-India Merchants pay for their licence or priviledge of trading to the East-Indies all others being excluded for one and twenty years a share or proportion amounting in the whole very near a Million sterling money as the Dutch have made their East-India Company to do could not be the only proper or efficient causes of that long-strided and swift progresse and increase of the rates and prices not only of victuals and all houshold provisions but of all manner of commodities apparel and necessaries either for use or ornament So as we shall not conclude without premisses or be thought to want a ground or foundation of an irrefragable truth that Lucifer the great Merchant and furnisher of our sins and excess and of the great and intollerable pride of all the degrees and ranks of men women children and servants in the Nation as far beyond the former ages as a Giant is to a Pigmee or Pauls Steeple in London when it was highest to the Pissing Conduit as they call it in Cheapside and the avarice of the people to maintain it together with the necessities attending their pride and vanities have been no small part of the cause of it for otherwise it would have been some difficulty to find or give a reason why we should not in England a Kingdome untill our late times of confusion of the greatest peace and plenty in Christendome be able to afford victuals and all manner of provisions for the belly and back as cheap as in France where notwithstanding the heavy oppressions and burdens of the Paysants who do fare hard and are ill clad and by reason of the frugality of most of the Gentry a Partridge may be bought for â—our pence and a Gentleman and his horse at night be very well entertaind for four shillings or as in Spain where a Bando is yearly made by the Corrigidores of every City and Place which the Civil Law doth allow and direct and our Laws of England do as to victuals also intend setting yearly the rates and prices not only of all victuals and houshold provisions for the belly and of fruit and Apples but of all Commodities as Linnen and Woollen Cloth Silk Knives Haâ—s c. where notwithstanding their continuall Warres and multitudes of heavy Taxes to mainteyn them there is a cheapness of victuals and such an absence of deceit as a child or the most ignorant way as to measure weight and prices buy and not be deceived Or as is in the same manner done at Rome Naples Florence Milan and most of the Principalities of Italy not so freed from publick Burdens as our more happy England is at this present which neither would nor could be there ever submitted unto and obeyed as it is if the pride and necessities or avarice of the Landlords and the pride of the Tenants which the Pragmatico's forbidding the pride and excess of apparel do in Spain very much eradicate were not less then ours and their frugalities more and such restrictions and reglements thereby made to be the more tolerable and contenting And those that do like it more then they should and shall be content to imploy their times in the pursuit of vanities and means to
mainteyn it and forsaking the old and good wayes and seeking gain do sacrifice unto their nets and burn incense unto their drags may have that said unto them which the Apostle St. Paul did â—n another case to the Romans what fruit have the intollerable pride and excess of the Nation and the high racking of Rents to mainteyn it brought unto those that have taken pleasure in it And they that have so much delighted in it may now if they please or at one time or another understand whether they will or no that the overmuch raising and stretching of the rents of the Lands and houses in England since an excessive pride and folly of the people is come to be so much in fashion amongst us have been no gain to the Nobility and Gentry but will be a great loss and damage unto them by that time that the wastfull and prodigall part of them have bought and furnished their Houshold provisions at the dear rates of their Tenants and others of whom they do buy them and their apparel and other the Merchandises of their follyes of the Citizens and Trades-men and not only therein bear the burthen of their own but of the intollerable pride and gallantry of the Citizens Tradesmen Mechanicks Artificers and their Wives and Children and in all that they do buy of them do contribute to the costly Pearl Neck-laces Diamond Lockets and other Jewels satten and cloth of silver Peticoats plush Gowns Embroderies Gold-lace Gorgets of threescore pounds a piece and Lace of twenty or forty pounds a yard worn by the Merchants Drapers and Mercers Wives and the Silk-Gowns Hoods Laces and over-costly Apparel of the Mechanick and Artificers Wives in their desires and ambition to live like the Nobility and Gentry when no man can tell they are any or ought to be That the enhance of all provisions of victuals brought to London out of the Countries hath made the Country people proâ—der then they should be and the City Wares and Commodities dearer then otherwise they would be and made the Citizens in the pursuit of pride and luxury run out of their wits and estates to purchase it That it was better in former times for the Artificers and Day-labourers whose more moderate expences in their â—â—veral conditions and qualities made them heretofâ—re with a fourth or fifth part of what they do now earn greater gainers by their labours then now they are and better for servants whose far lesser wages then now they will be contented with did amount unto more or as much as they do now gain by reason of their former smaller expences in clothes and apparel The Tenants and farmers lived better when they plowed their Landlords lands mowed reaped and helped in with their Harvests carried home their wood and paid small rents then they have or can do now that they are strained to the highest those labours and services coming far short if they were at the now rates to be hired or paid for of the addition which time and change of manners and customes have since made to their antient and unimproved rents That the people of England if there had been no other ground or reason for it might well have afforded to have given the King so much as they were yearly charged with the Pourveyance or Compositions for them for an acquital of more then twenty years arrears of it by the Act of Oblivion That if an estimate could be made of those Millions or summes of money sterling which the enâ—hanced prices and rates of victuals and houshold provisions did amount unto yearly since the 24th year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth and what the rise of victuals and houshold provisions have come unto yearly since the Pourveyance and Compositions for them were laid down and what it may more be stretched unto if pride and price not like Castor and Pollux to bring our Ship into the Port but to ruine it should go on in that carreer it is now in and private and particular interests more mighty and prevalent then all those imaginary monsters which Hercules is saâ—â— to have subdued and of a greater force then that Devil and his heard called Legion which our blessed Saviour did dislodge out of the man possessed with them shall be ayders and abetters of it There is no man that hath not bid defiance to his reason and understanding but will acknowledge that the people of England had better give ten times or more the yearly rate or value of the Pourveyancees or Compositions for them then endure the Impositions which they have or shall put one upon another whilest every man will seek to save himself and make his labour or commodity afford him as much as he can to recompence him for it That the unreasonable rates and prices put upon all the Kings occasions or services by Land and Sea are and will be the cause of Taxations and Assessements in times of peace three to one more then formerly And the Levies of monies to hire Souldiers and raise and maintain mercinary Armies will amount unto and charge the Publick ten or twenty to one or more than when by the help and ready ayds of Tenures in Capite and by Knight service our gallant and well-armed Nobility and Gentry could upon any occasions of warre or distress either at home or abroad be sodainly summoned and made to appear from Ireland as well as from all parts of England and Wales And so readily as King William Rufus sitting at dinner in Westminster Hall and hearing that Mayne a Town in Normandy was much distressed by a sodain Siege laid unto it by the French King and resolving in the greatness of his mind not to turn his back towards it untill he had relieved it could cause the wall to be broken down on the South side and passing towards the sea coast command his Nobility and Knights speedily to follow him That the unparrallel'd pride of almost all rancks and degrees of the people not permitted in France Spain and other Neighbour Nations brings our Forreign Trade almost to nothing by the adulterating of our Commodities and making them false and slight and causing the charges to be much more then formerly in the work and making of them pay of our Mariners and greater rates of victualling so as we being not able to make our manufactures so cheap as other Nations and making them slight and false our Trade must of necessity more and more decay and will never increase or be advanced if the Dutch were banished out of the world or ordered to trade only in the Bottom of the sea and leave all the Surface or Top unto us the cheap diet and clothing of their Common people the neat and frugall diet and the apparel of the Burgers and those that they call the Gentry giving them the advantage of under-selling us For we may be sure that there will never be cheapness of victualls or houshold provisions or good trading
Westminster and within ten miles distance thereof unto six pence for a day and night for Hey for a horse now â—â—shamefully and unconscionably raised by themselves unto eight pence and six pence for a peck of Oats not measured by Winchester measure but the knavish peck of the Ostlers to whom the dying horses might well bequeath their Halters at the rate of eight groats a bushell when they have many times bought them in the Market at Twelve pence a bushell or less And directed that that Ordinance should continue in the County of Middlesex untill it should appear unto the Justices of the Kings Bench and in other Counties and Places to the Justices of Peace that because of the increase of prices in the parts adjoyning greater rates should be necessary to be permitted and that thereupon other rates should from time to time be set and being set were commanded and enjoyned to be strictly and duly observed untill they by the like authority should be altered And might be as little troubled at his Pourveyance as they were with his Royal Fathers remission or not putting in execution the Assise in imitation of one which was made in anno 12 H. 7. made in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth by the advice of the Lord Burghley and other of the Lords of her Privy Counsell of Flesh Fish Poultry butter and most sorts of Victuals and houshold Provisions as also of Hey and Provender and another likewise set and made by the Judges of the Kings Bench in or about the first year of his Reign by the advice of all the other Judges of England at the instance of Mr Noy his Atturney-Generall Which might perswade us to be something kind to our selves and our posterity in being kinder unto him for that the losses and damage to the King and his People without the addition of their losses by the taking away of the Tenures in Capite are and will be so very great and evident and the loss of the King may by a necessity of their supplying of it be in the end a means of doubling or trebling the losses of the people and should therefore deterre us from any endeavours to eclipse our Sun and bereave our selves of the light and comfort of it and diswade us from the purchase of so many mischiefs and inconveniences as have already happened and are like to multiply upon us by making our selves the most unhappy Instruments of the dishonour of our King and Country in the diminution of the accustomed grandeur and magnificence of his Court and Hospitality wherein plenty and frugality largess and providence satiety and sobriety honour and hospitality were so excellently and rationally combined and confederated as the best of Oeconomies and the greatest vigilance daily care and inspection in the most methodicall and best ordered House and Family of England or any other the Kings Dominions consisting of 10 or 20 persons or a lesser number a few being commonly the easiest governed could never arrive unto 〈◊〉 â—erfection of government and good order of the Kings Houshold consisting of a numerous Retinue of above One thousand or twelve hundred persons and many of them of the best extraction and noblest houses of the Kingdom where besides the charge of his most pious and devout yearly Maundy or washing as many poor mens feet every year upon the Thursday before Easter as he is years old giving unto each of them a Jowl of Salmon a Poll of Ling 30 red Herrings and as many white 4 six peny loavs of bread Cloth for a Gown and a Shirt a pair of new Shoes Stockings a single penny and a 20 shillings piece of Gold Two pence a piece was given to poor people every day at the Gate besides the Kings Alms-dish every meal from of his Table and the fragments carefully gathered up from the many Tables of his Servants put into an Aâ—mes-basket and daily distributed unto them by two Officers yearly kept in pay and pension for that purpose Six Mess of Meat 240 Gallons of Beer and as many of loaves of Bread with a liberal proportion of Sack and Claret as wast and entertainment for all comers for the Kings honour where were great yearly Festivals the Lord Stewards Table completely and more then ordinarily furnished during all the time of the sitting of the Parliaments to entertain such of the Lords and Commons as would come thither to dinner and where when the Nobility and Persons of quality in the absence of Parliaments came either to attend the King or petition him in any of their Affaires they were made the Guests at some of the Tables of his great Officers as well as those of meaner ranks were at the Table of the lesser And the Chambers and Galleries searched for 〈◊〉 strangers and fit persons as might deserve to be inviâ—ed to the Tables and Diet of his Servants to the end that any that were fitting to partake of his hospitality might not be omitted Embassadors which came sometimes two at once from severall forreign Princes found themselves royally enterteyned for certain days out of the diet and provision of the Kings house and nothing of State or Provision wanting at the same time in the Kings own Court or House and attended with as great or more plenty solemnity then many of their Kings Princes had at home where no Country Gentleman or Yeoman which had contributed to the Pourveyance but at one time of the year or other had upon all occasions of business at the Court either with the King or his Servants a large part or share of what he had contributed And was so gratefully and well accepted as some have anciently when gratitude and thankfull respects were more in fashion than now they are so highly esteemed the respects and favours of the Kings Servants and Officers when they had occasion of business to his Court as Robert de Arsic a man of great note and eminency in the County of Oxford did give Lands in Newton by a Fine levyed thereof unto one Robert Purcell and his Heirs who was then one of the Porters at the Gate of the Kings House or Court by inheritance upon condition that whensoever he and his Heirs should come unto the Court the said Robert Purcell and his Heirs whilst they should be the Kings Porters should attend their coming come out of the gate to meet them and walk before them with his rod or staffe unto the Kings Hall and at their return or going out of the gate call for their horse or Palfrey and hold their stirrup whilst they got up or mounted and if the said Robert Arsic or his Heirs should send any Messenger to the Court should as much as in them lay and according to their ability with their good word and well wishes faithfully assist him And was so unwilling to loose that Service or Duty as upon the refusall or omission thereof by the said Robert Purcell he did in the 11 th year of
the Reign of King Henry the 3. bring an Assise or Action against him for it for as for our Industrious Speed setting forth in his History of England that Rhese ap Gruffith Prince of Wales coming out of Wales as far as Oxford to treat of a Peace with King Richard the First did take it in so high a scorn and indignation that the King came not in person to meet him as he returned home into his own Country without saluting the King though Earl John the Kings only Brother had with much honour conducted him from the Marches of Wales thither and that by that means the hopes of the expected peace vanished and came unto nothing hath observed that the meanest from whom love or service is expected will again expect regard And therefore the care of our Kings was not a little imployed in that way of imparting of their favours and increasing and cherishing the love and good will of their people when King Henry the Seventh whose troubles and tosses of fortune before he came unto the Crown had together with his learning and princely education made him a great Master in Policy and good Government and one of the wisest Kings that ever swaied the English Scepter did in his prudent Orders concerning his Court and Houshold and the State and Magnificence which he desired to be observed therein communicated unto me by my worthy and learned Friend William Dugdale Esquire Norroy King at Armes out of an ancient Manuscript sometimes in the custody of Charles de Somerset Knight Lord Herbert and Gower Chamberlain unto that King amongst many other Orders for the honour of the King and his House ordain that If any straunger shall come from any Noble-man or other the Gentilmen Huysshers ought to sette him in suche place convenient within the Kyngs Chamber as is mete for hym by the discrecion of the Chamberlain and Huyssher and to comaunde service for hym after his degree and the sayd Huyssher ought to speke to the Kings Almoigner Kerver and Sewer to reward hym from the Kings Board this is to say if the said Straunger happen to come whan the Kyng is at dynner Item The Gentilman Huyssher if there come any honourable personnes to the Kyng at any other tyme they ought to call with thaym the sayd personnes to the Seller Pantry and Buttry and there to commaund forth such brede mete and drynke as by his discretion shall be thought metely for thaym and this in no wise not to be with sayd in noon of thies Offices aforesayd It is to the Kings honor Item that no Gentilman Huyssher bee so hardy to take any commaundement upon him but that it may be with the Kings honor by hys discretion in these matiers to myspende the Kings vitail but where as it ought to be and if he doo he is nat worthy to occupy that rowme but for to abide the punishment of my Lord Chamberlain Item A Gentilman Huyssher ought to commaund Yeomen Huysshers and Yeomen to fetche bred ale and wine at afternoon for Lords and other Gentilmen being in the Kings Chamber whan the caas soâ— shall requyre Which and the like Magnificences of Hospitality in the Houses and Courts of our Kings and Princes supported by the Pourveyances without which the elder Kings of England before the Conquest could not have been able to susteyn the charge of their great and yearly solemn Festivals at Christmas Easter and Pentecost when ex more obsequii vinculo antiquissimo as that great and learned Antiquary Sir Henry Spelman hath observed by duty and antient custome the Lords and Barons of England did never fail to come to the Kings Palace where the Magna Concilia wittena gemotes conventus sapientum now called Parliaments were at those times to be holden and kept cum ad Curiam personam ejus exornandum tum ad consulendum de negotiis regni statuendumque prout fuerat necessarium providere de rebus illis Rex solebat corona redimitus profastu Regio se in omnibus exhibere for the honor of the King and his Court who then with his Crown upon his head and other Princely habiliments did use to shew himself unto the people and advise what was necessary to be done for the good of the Kingdom And was such an attendant upon the Grandeur and Honour of their Monarchy as it began with it and continued here amongst us till the Councill of some foolish and factious Shrubs had by a fire kindled in our then unhappy Kingdome overturned our Cedars of Libanon and made an accursed and wicked Bramble their Protector and was so necessary to the Government and Authority of our Kings and the encrease and preservation of the love and obedience of the people as we find it neither repined nor murmured at in the Reign of King Alfred who being of an almost unimitable piety and prudence and to whom this Nation ows a gratefull memory for his division of the Kingdom into Shires and Hundreds and for many a Politique Constitution did now almost 800 years ago keep a most Princely and magnificent House and a numerous company of Servants gave enterteynment of diet and lodging to many of the sons of his Nobility who were therein trayned up to all manner of Courtly and honourable exercises had three Cohorts or Bands of Life-guards every Cohort according to the ancient computation consisting if they were Horse of 132 and of Foot of a great many more the first Company attending in or about his Court or House night and day for a moneth and returning aftewards home to their own occasions tarried there by the space of two moneths the second Cohort doing likewise as the first and the third as the second by their turns and courses and had a good allowance of money and victualls in the House or Court of the King who had his ministros nobiles qui in curio Regio vicissim commorabantur in pluribus ministrantes ministeriis noble and great Officers in his Court which attended in their courses and took so much care also for them as in his last Will and Testament he gave cuilibet Armigerorum suorum to every one of his Esquires 100 marks Or that King Hardi Canutus caused his Tables to be spread four times every day and plentiously furnished with Cates and commanded that his Courtiers Servants and Guests should rather have superfluities then want any thing That William Rufus when he had built Westminster Hall 270 foot in length and 74 in breadth thought it not large enough for a Dyning Room King Richard the Second kept a most Royall Christmas where was every day spent 26 or 28 Oxen 300 Sheep with Fowl beyond number and to his Houshold came every day to meat ten thousand people as appeared by the Messes told out from the Kitchin unto three hundred Servitors and was able about two years before when the Times began to be
of England of permitting their Officers and Servants to take what the King pleased out of Forreign Commodities and Merchandize brought into England upon payment of such rates as he pleased which amount unto no small yearly profit for an Exchange and grant by the Merchants Strangers of three pence per pound now called the Petit Customes of all forreign Merchandises imported except Wines for every Sack of Wool forty pence for every 300 Wolfels forty pence and for every last of Leather to be exported half a mark over and above the Duties payable by Denizens were but rightly estimated Or the benefits which the Subiects of England have had and received by the Act of Parliament made in Anno 14 Ed. 3. granting that all Merchants Denizens and Aliens may freely and safely come into the Realme of England which before they could not or durst not adventure to do without speciall licence and safe conduct under the great or some part of the Seal of England with their Goods and Merchandize and safely tarry and return paying the Subsidies and Customes reasonably due together with the ease and benefit but to the great loss and damage of the Crown which the Merchants of England as well as those of forreign Parts have by the loss of Calais since Queen Maries time and the remove of the Staple from thence whither all Goods Exported out of England were to be first brought a Custome Inward the second time paid and for so much which may be believed to be the greatest part as was again from thence Exported into other Countries the Customes a third time paid which made the Customes and Subsidies only for Goods Exported in the later end of the Reign of King Edward the Third and during the Reigns of King Richard the Second Henry the Fourth Henry the Fifth and the beginning of the Reign of King Henry the Sixth as appeareth by the Records of the Exchequer to amount unto threescore or threescore and ten thousand pounds per annum which according to the valuation of mony at this day saith Sir John Davies the ounce of Silver being raised from twenty pence unto five shillings would amount unto two hundred thousand pounds sterling per annum And the difference betwixt the payment of Customes and Subsidies then paid three times over for one and the same thing and the payment of it but once as is now used with many other great benefits beyond a valuation not here particularized And consider how unworthy it would be for the Natives and People of England after many Knights Fees and Lands freely given and granted by the Kings Royall Progenitors to their Forefathers and their Heirs to be holden by Knight-service and in Capite of which if the sixty thousand Knights Fees and more reckoned by antient Authors should be no greater a number then ten thousand and valued but at twenty pounds per annum as they were reckoned in anno primo Edwardi secundi they would amount unto two hundred thousand pounds per annum and if but at three hundred pounds per annum which is now the least â—mprovement would amount unto three Millions per annum besides great quantities of other Lands being twice or thrice as much more in the severall Reigns of his Majesties Royall Progenitors freely granted and given unto otheâ—s of them and their Heirs to be holden in Socage to endeavour to extinguish the right use of them and forget their Obligations to their Prince and Common Parent and his Royall Progenitors And in too many of their Actions and business cozen or beg all they can from him and in stead of saying Domine quid retribuam Lord what shall I render unto thee for all thy benefits make it the greatest of their care imployment and business not only to take but keep from him all they can even at the same time when they had obteyned of him an unparralleld Act of Indempnity and Oblivion and to to forget all their evil designes and offences intended or committed against him and his blessed Father and to pardon and give them as much as fifteen or sixteen millions sterling in the Arrears of his own Revenue and two or three hundred millions Sterling at least for the forfeiture of theirs And might have remembred how they promised him their lives and fortunes and to be his Tenants in Corde and with what a Princely and Fatherly affection he told their Representatives that he was sorry to see so many of his good people come to see him at Whitehall and had no meat to feed or entertain them and how ashamed and unwilling they are in their ordinary and daily Actions and Affairs to come behind or be upon the score one to another in their reciprocations retributions and retorns of gratitudes and take it to be a disparagement not to out-vie or undo one another therein how willingly they can part with their money to their children at School to make Oblations or Presents to their School-masters at their Intermissions or Breaking up of School at Christmas Easter or Whitsontyde a course newly invented by School-masters to better their Allowances and Incomes and chargeable enough to the Parents as may appear by the Offerings at a Christmas made unto some Capital School-Masters which have singly amounted unto five or six hundred pounds which with the Beds and Furniture and silver Spoons to be brought thither by the Boarders and left behind them at their departure do make as great or a greater charge to many Parents then what they were ever rated for the Pourveyance And how accustomed and willing an expence all people are desirous to put themselves unto pro honestate domus for the good and content of any Inne Tavern or Alehouse to make them some recompence for but coming into those houses upon any occasion or necessity of business And can notwithstanding so readily finde the way to that unchristian River of Lethe and sinne of unthankfulness which God and all good men do abhorre and the most fierce and savage of the Beasts of the field Fowls of the Ayr do scorn to be guilty of and make it their business to desire the King to foregoe his Pourveyance and take a seeming recompence of fifty thousand pounds per annum for it of the moyty of the Excise to be raised out of the Moans and Laments of the multitude which are the labouring and poorer sort of the people to free richer and better able from their heretofore small Payments or Contributions in Cattle and other Provisions for the Royall Pourveyance now that England enjoyeth a greater plenty then ever it did by some hundred thousand Acres of Fenne Lands drained many Forests and Chases deafforrested mâ—ny Parks converted unto Tillage or Pasture great quantities of other Lands inclosed and as much or more of Abby and Religious Lands retorned into Lay-hands fewer Taxes and publique Assessments by one to ten then are in the Kingdomes and Dominions of Spain France Empire of
unworthy sparing and avarice of Subjects in withholding their Oblations from his Deputies and disabling them from relieving the Strangers the Fatherless and the Widows And that the rates of his houshold provisions being much the same or very near unto those which were agreed upon by the Justices of Peace of every County who cannot be understood to be any Strangers to the rates and Market prices of every County might not be now as cheap afforded as they were then or when they were cheaper in the â—3 year of the Reign of King Henry the Eighth now not much above 130 years agoe when 24 great Bâ—eves were provided for a great and pompous Serjeants Feast at Ely house in London where the King Queen and many of the Nobility the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London were present such provisions being then probably at a greater price then ordinary for 26 s. 8 d. a piece from the Shambles a Carcase of an Oxe at 24 aâ—â— s. 10 d. a piece one and fifty great Veals at 4 s. 8 d. a piece four and thirty Porks at 3 s 8 d. a piece ninety one Pigs at 6 d. a piece Capons ten dozen at 20 d. a piece Kentish Capons nine dozen and a half at 12 d. a piece Capons course nineteen dozen 6 d. a piece Cocks of gross seaven dozen nine at 8 d. a piece Cocks course fourteen dozen and eight at 3 d. a piece Pullets the best at 2 d. ob a piece other Pullets 2 d. Pigeons thirty seaven dozen at 10 d. a dozen and Larks three hundred and forty dozen at 5 d a dozen if the Magistrates of England who are trusted by the Law with the Assiâ—e and correction of the rates and prices of victuals and houshold provisions and the punishment of Ingrossers Forestallers and Regrators did not sleep over their duty or too many of the Justices of Peace and Lords of Leets did not finde it to be more for their own advantages to improve and raise their Lands to the highest rack rather then reduce those now exorbitant rates and prices into that order which the Laws and Statutes of England do intend they should be There being no just cause to complain of our payments to the King for his Pourveyance or any other of his necessary affairs when the cry and daily complaints of our want of money is not so much by reason of our want of Trade as our want of wit by mispending that which should regularly and orderly maintain us and our Families and it is not our want of Trade but our too much trading in pride excess and superfluities which hath brought the Nation into that Hectique Feaver and almost incurable Consumption which hath now seised upon the vitalls of it and would be very evident if a strict accompt and view were taken of what hath been needlesly and vitiously spent within these last twenty or thirty years more then formerly in Apparrel Diet Wine Tobacco Jewels Coaches new Fashions greater Portions given with Daughters then our Forefathers could either have given or thought fitting increase of Servants Artificers and Labourers wages gaming by women as well as men great interest and Brocage paid for money and buying upon Trust to support their vanities and twenty millions sterling lately spent in the enterteynment of the Devil and a most horrid Rebellion and seeking for a Liberty to loose all our own Liberties and may give us to understand that if we had that money again which was so foolishly mispended those that could then lay it out and now want it might subscribe unto this undenyable truth that there would be greater riches and less necessities seen in England then in any other Nation and enough and more then enough to drive the Trade thereof and that whilst the back and belly have vyed who should be most inordinate and profuse the improvement of Rents Wages and Commoditâ—â—s have been to no better a purpose then to improve our vices and the Nationaâ—l as well as particular miseries and damage which are and will be the never â—aâ—ling concomitants and consequents of it For no reason can be given why we should not as chearfully submit to any thing that tends to the support of the King and the Honour 〈…〉 Nation as every Citizen of London and man of Trade will do to the furnishing of Pageants or publick 〈◊〉 for the honor and Reputation of their City or Company or as the Universities sometime do in an Entertainment of the King or their Chancellour though they did at the same time contribute to the Pourveyance or as the People of England did in the 5 th year of the Reign of King Edward the 6th when the Queen Regent of Scotlandâ—n â—n her return out of France thither desiring to take her Journy through England was by the City of London presented at her fiâ—st coming with Muttons Beefe Veals Poultry Wine and all other sorts of Provisions necessary for the Entertainment of her and her no small Train even to Bread and Fâ—well and when she departed to goe for Scotland was after great and Princely Entertainments by the King at Whitchall conducted by the Sheriffs of London to whose care the King had committed it as farre as Waltham and by all the Sheriffs of all the Counties through which she passed untill she came unto the Borders of Scotland her Enterteynment being provided by the Kings appointment at the charge of the Counties Nor can it be for the honour of the English Nation to come behind the Jews that stiffe necked and Rebellious Race of Mankind in their kindness and returns unto their Kings and Princes who notwithstanding that pedagoguy and hard hand of Government which the Almighty in his eternall Wisdome found necessary to put upon them in their releasing of Servants and letting their Lands lye untilled every seaventh year permitting their Debtors and Mortgagors or Venâ—ors in every Jubile or 50 year to enjoy their Lands and Estates and to be at liberty their many and many times Free-will and Thanksgiving Offerings Peace-Offerings Sin-Offerings costly Sacrifices Feasts unto the Lord and Journeys to Jerusalem the Offerings which were brought and prepared for the building of the Tabernacle in such aboundance a readiness and zeal not now to be found amongst us as formerly in the building of Churches or repair of the Cathedral of St. Paul as God directed Moses by a Proclamation to restrain them from bringing any more and their Males appearing three times in every year before the Lord not empty handed and their very large Offerings also at the Dedication of the Temple when Solomon their King invited them unto it and their Corban or money often given to the Treasury of it could not forget their respects and duty to their Kings in their Presents or Pourveyance for them and their Houshold When God would not suffer the Majesty of Kings shining as the beams reflections of his divine Majesty upon the face of Moses