Selected quad for the lemma: justice_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
justice_n	cause_n	court_n	king_n	3,548	5	4.0704	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75331	The several arguments at lavv of Col. Eusebius Andrewe at his tryal, before John Bradshaw, president of the pretended high court of justice shewing the illegality of their proceedings, and passing sentence of death against him. Published by Francis Buckley, Gent. who was assistant to Mr. Andrewe in the time of his imprisonment, and an eye witness to all the said most bloody and execrable proceedings.	Andrews, Eusebius, d. 1650.; Bradshaw, John, 1602-1659, attributed name.	1660 (1660)	Wing A3117A; ESTC R231612	53,671	79

be any such hath and have right and interest and he humbly claims his right accordingly Fourthly That by he Remonstrance 15 of December and the Declaration 17 January 1641. The benefit of the Laws and ordinary Courts of Justice are the subjects Birth-rights By the Declarations of the 12th July and 16th October 1642. the preservation of the laws and the due administration of justice are owned to be the justifying cause of the warr and the ends of the Parliaments affaires managed by their swords and Councils And Gods curse is by them imprecated in case they should ever decline those ends By the Declaration of 17 Apr. 1646. promise was made not to interrupt the course of Justice in the ordinary Courts thereof By the Ordinance or Votes of non-addresses Jan. 1648. it is assured on the Parliaments behalf That Though they lay the King aside yet they will govern by the laws and not interrupt the course of Justice in the ordinary Courts thereof And thereupon the Respondent humbly inferreth and affirme●h That The constitution of this Court is a Breath of that publick faith of the Parliments exhibited and pledged in the Declarations and votes to the Freemen of England And upon the whole matter the Respondent saving as aforesaid doth humbly affirme for law and claime as his right That this Court in defect of the validity of the Act by which it is constituted hath not power against him or to press him to a farther Answer That by vertue of Magna Charta the Petition of Right and the before recited Remonstance and Declarations he ought not to be proceeded against by this Court but by an ordinary Court of Justice and to be tryed by his Peeres And prayes That this his present Answer and Salvo may be accepted and registred and that he may be tryed by his Peeres accordingly EUS ANDREWE Answer 2 The farther and second Answer of Eus Andrewe Esq to the Honorable the High Court of Justice presented the 16th day of Aug. 1650. THe said Respondent with the favour of this Honorable Court reserving and praying to be allowed the benefit and liberty of making further Answer if it shall be adjudged necessary in all humbleness for present answer offereth to this honorable Court That by the letter and genuine sense of the Act entituled An Act for establishing an High Court of Justice the said Court is not quallified to try a free man of England and such the Respondent averreth to be for life in case of Treason First For that 1. The said Court is not constituted a Court of Record and but upon Record cannot at all have that accompt of their freeman which Kings were wont to have of their Ministers of Justice 2. The Free man and such who are and may be concerned in him can have no Record to resort unto by which to preserve the rights due to him and them respectively viz of 1. A Writ of Error in case of erroneous judgment due by the Presidents Pasch 39 Ed. 3. fol of Gaunts case 4. Ed. 3. Rot. Parl. Num. 13. Count de Arundels case 42. Ed. 3. Rot. Par. Nu. 23. Sr. Jo. of Lees case 2. A plea of anterfoyes acquit in Case of new question for the same fact the right to which and the necessity of such Record appears by Wetherel and Darlyes Case 4. Rep. 35. Eliz. Vaux his case ibidem 33 Eliz. 3. A being enlarged upon acquital as is the free-mans due by the Stat. 14. Hen. 6. and the Case thereupon grounded Dyer fol. 120 and abridg fo 33. 4. A Writ of Conspiracy against those who have practised the betraying the life of the Respondent not to be brought before acquital no acquital but upon Record as appeareth by The Poultiers Case 9 Rep. fol. 55. This Court is to determine at a day without accompt of their proceedings have power to try judg and cause execution but not to acquit or to give enlargment so that the nocent are thereby punishable the innocent not preservable the injured and betrayed not vindicable which are defects incompatible with a Court of Justice and inconsistent with Justice it self and with the Honours of a Christian nation and Common-wealth Secondly for that the members of this Court are by the Act directed to be sworne 1. Not in conspectu populi for the freemans satisfaction 2. Not in words of indifferency and obliging to equallity 3. In wo●ds of manifest Partiallity viz. You shall swear that you shall well and truely according to the best of your skill and knowledg execute the several powers given unto you by this Act. The Respondent humbly offers That 1. The Court in their capacity of Tryers ought in reason to have been appointed by their constitution to have been sworn as Tryers in full Court according to the practise in all equall wayes of Tryall 2. The Court as Commissioners of Oyre and Terminer being authorized by the Act to hear and determine should in like reason be appointed an oath such as is usual for persons so qualified as provided 18. Edw. 3. viz. You shall swear that well and lawfully you shall serve our Lord the King and his people mutatis mutandis in the office of Justice c. and that you deny to no man common right c. Or some Oath equivalent at least to that of a Justice of Peace Dalton fol. 13. I A. B. do swear that I will do equall right and according to my best wit cunning and power after the laws and customes of the land and the Statutes thereof made c. 3. The Court in the capacity of tryers should in reason be obliged by an oath of as equitable sence as that usually administred to Jurors viz. You shall well and truly try and true deliverance make between our Soveraigne Lord the King mutatis mutandis and the prisoner at the Barr so help you God Whereas when this Court shall as it is now constituted have condemned the freeman the Respondent or other by applying their skill and knowledg to their power whether justly or not the oath by them taken is not in the letter broken as to be exactible by man though God will provably have a better accompt And therefore upon the whole matter premised the Respondent saving as before offers for law and reason that the honorable Court the high Court of Justice is not by the letter and proper sence of the words of the Act by which it is constituted qualified in respect of the preobjected defects to pass upon him for his life upon a charge or crimination of high Treason And humbly prayes that this his second Answer and Salvo may be received and registred and that he may be tryed as in his former answer he prayed EUS ANDREW Answer 3 The farther and third Answer of Eusebius Andrewe Esquire to the Honorable the High Court of Justice presented the 16 day of Aug. 1650. THe said Respondent with the favour of this honorable Court reserving and praying to

to come as the trace of a Swallow in the Air which is inconsistent with the honour and justice of any Kingdome or of any Christian Commonwealth For that you have only by this Act a bare and single power to adjudg R●ades Case D●ar fol. 120. 10 Edw. 4. fol. 19. 14 Hen. 6. 1. Oath of a Juror and cause execution to be done in case you shall judg it to appertain to justice but you have no power if you think it appertain to justice to acquit and upon acquittal to discharge the person tryed as is the law expresly in my Lord Diar and in the year-book of Edw. 4. grounded upon the Statute of Henry the 6th 14 of his reign Ca. 1. That Justices of Nisi prius who are Commissionary Justices shall have power of all the cases of felony and of Treason to give their Judgment as wel where a man is acquit of felony of treason as where he is thereof attainted at the day and place where the Inquisition Inquest and Jury shall be taken and then from thenceforth to award execution to be made by force of the same judgments which in an acquitted mans case can only be enlargement But my Lord you have only power if you can to reach my life if in your opinion deserving it but not to reach me out of Prison so that if you kill me not here with the sword of Justice you must leave me in worse hands to be buried alive in restraint and want Which all is against the laws of Nature and Nations and particularly of this land that are all so ballanced and poysed as that they have equall regard to the delivery and freeing the Innocent as to the condemnation of the nocent And Isadore in his Etimologies sayes of a law thus Erit autem lex honesta justa possibilis secundum naturam et consuitudinem patriae Loco temporique conveniens necessaria et utilis manifesta quoque nê aliquid incantum per obscuritatem captione contineat nullo privato commodo sed per communi civium ultilitate conscripta And as laws should be so should Courts and the dispense●s of laws be But my Lord if this Court must be granted to be a Cour● your selves can make no more of it then a Court ex parte and set up to serve a particular end with the privation of the common utility and liberty however usher'd with a preamble of an other stile of preservation of peace and prevention of warr but Thucidides will tell you my Lord in his fourth book That Turpius est his qui impia tenent insidiare honesto pertextu quam insidiosâ mallevolentiâ uti nam violentia videtur aliquid Juris habere propter potentiam â fortunâ datam sed frans tantum ab injustitia oritur The Third Argument BUt my Lord if your Lordship be in your judgment and conscience satisfied that the Act it self in and as to its constitution is good and valuable and impowereth you sufficiently to proceed against me some way then Argumenti ergo dato sed non juris ergo concesso that it is a law or an Act and that all those Ordinances are out of doores yet I pray your Lordships leave that I may make evident to your Lordship that you are not hereby constituted a Court capable in defect of the very letter of the Act to pass upon any man and consequently not upon me in matter of life or where life may may be the concernment 1. For reason you are not constituted a Court of Record Wetherel and Darly's Case 35. Eliz. Apeal de mur●er convict de Homocide bon b●r ●l endictment per murder Affirme quo ho●re ne doit m●t●e presua vic Deux fois per unchosen which is absolutely necessary having life and forfeiture of lands in your charge First For the State that they may have an account not in their Council-chamber but upon Record what is become of the matter in issue and of the person put upon his Tryal 2. For the Freeman of England that in case he be acquitted of the crime wherewith he shall stand charged before this Court he might at all times resort to the Record upon any new question for the same Fact in any other Court holding Pleas of that nature by which Record to plead his Auterfoyes acquitte and to make his defence as also to preserve his estate Si non legalment aquitte en le Poulters Case 9. R. Benegist demant acquittal nul req si non de Record as also my benefit a writ of Conspiracy 17 Car. Act for abolishing Star-chamber To come nearer our own times the like cause to complain and the same redress is given in the Act for abolishing of the Star-chamber upon the grounds and reasons drawn from these Laws the Innovations and Invadings upon which as being Fundamentals was a great part of the substance of the grand Remonstrance communicated to the whole World against the late King by the Press Articles contra Strafford Art 1 2. partis 1. 14 parti secundo The charges against the Earl of Strafford and the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury The interest of the Subject in these laws was cryed up to be so precious as that it had influence even to the absolving of all old Oathes and the imposing of new and to bring to adventure Estate and Life and soul rather then to be usurped or in the least intrenched upon Declar. D●c 15. 1641. Jan. 17. 1641. Four several Declarations of the present Parliament have entitulated the subject to them and to the benefit of the ordinary Courts of Justice as their Birthright I have owned the preservation of them to be the Cause of the War July 12. 1642 Oct. 23. 1642. and the ends of their affairs managed by their Swords or Councels and Gods curse is by them imprecated in case they should ever decline the Ends. Declar. April 17. 1646. My Lord We have the Parliaments word and promise not to interrupt the course of Justice in the ordinary Courts Jan. 1648. And in the Ordinance of Non addresses to the late King they say Though they lay the King aside yet they will Govern by the Laws and not interrupt the Course of Justice in the Ordinary Courts thereof My Lord I am entitulated to all these Laws and these Promises and Declarations and if this Court proceed against me those notwithstanding the Ordinary Courts of Justice being open and unobstructed I am robbed and divested of them all and in me the Freemanry of England are all despoyled at the Parliaments will according to this president disployleable and may with Mr. Stampford in his Pleas of the Crown take up this saying It will serve for a Lamentation Misera servitus est ubi jus est vagum incognitum The Fourth Argument THomas Acquinus who though a Papist is not the less worthy to be vouched where not Religion but Pollicy Beat. Thomas 1. 2. Q● 90.

affaires of that necessity the enclosed is the epitome the treachery of my betrayers and mine and my innocent friends sufferings by the inflexbility of those under whose immediate power I am hereby fallen are extendible into no small volume I am therefore compelled Fontem petere and wanting the opportunity of a familiar to make use of this extraodinary way of address which I hope will meet such goodness in you as will not need a larger apology Pardon I pray that I press your Honour in sence of honour and piety to present the inclosed as the humble representer of my sad condition and in my intendment humble desires And when it shall come to be by that grave Assembly taken into consideration that your self and those honorable persons would reflect upon me however clouded under my present though nothing justifiable crimination as upon a Christian and a Gentleman and of that in it self honorable long Robe though sullied by my wearing I will not multiply your distubance by an impertinently long Epistle knowing I am easiely understood and hoping to find a propensity in your honor to afford what favour may be lawfully extended to Honor'd Sir Your Honors most humble servant EUS ANDREWE Tower 20 July 1650. The Petition to the Parliament followes To the High and Honorable the Parliament of England The humble Petition of Eusebius Andrewe Esquire close prisoner in the Tower of London Sheweth THat your petitioner hath been by a confederate pack of setters wrought into actions which abstracted from their circumstances render him liable to your justice and this done not without their further hope that your petitioner as they supposed had interest to have drawn divers persons of quallity and fortune into the same entanglement That failing of that part of their aime the said confederates did betray your petitioner to the honorable Council of State by whose warrant he hath bin 16 weeks a strictly close prisoner without a fortune of his own the access of friends or means of substance allowed and is like to perish by his wants before it be distinguisht by a publick Tryal whether he be a fitter object for the applying of your justice or your mercy That he is hereby disabled to be accountable to the service of God the duty to his family and friends and to those who give him credit for bread And in case he should be call'd from such his close restraint to his tryal must be destitute and deprived of all fair means of making his reasonable defence which however it may sute with pollicy will not be consistent with Religion and Honour Your petitioner having for releif in the premises by all opportune addresses and by four petitions importunely solicited and sought the said Council of State without answer In the deep sence of his pressing sufferings humbly appealeth to this high Court casting himself wholly thereupon and as humbly prayeth 1. That you would prevent your Justice by your mercy and admit him to sue out his pardon upon security given for his future good demeanor to the State in this Commonwealth 2. That if that be too great a favour you would grant him licence to depart the Common wealth he engaging not to act or contrive ought to the disservice of the State 3. That if he be not thought capable of either but that he must receive a publick tryal he may have a convenient time of preparation after a quallifying of his imprisonment 4. That in the mean time he may have the liberty of the Tower and resort of his friends and that by your order his debt for livelyhood incurred in his close restraint may be discharged In all which your petitioner is ready to submit to the will of God whose providence hath put Justice and mercy into your present dispensing And shall ever pray Answer 1 The humble Answer of Eusebius Andrewe Esquire in his defence to the proceeding against him before the Honorable the High Court of Justice presented 16th day of Aug. 1650. THe said respondent with the favour of this honorable Court reserving and praying to be allowed the benefit and liberty of making further Answer offereth to this honorable Court First That by the Statute or Charter stiled Magna Charta which is the fundamental Law and ought to be the standard of the Laws of England confirmed above thirty times and yet unrepealed it is in the 29th Chapter thereof Granted and Enacted 1. That no freeman shall be taken or imprisoned or be disseised of his free hold or liberties or free custome or be out-lawed or exiled or be any otherwise destroyed nor we shall not pass upon him nor condemn him but by a lawful Judgment of his Peeres and by the Laws of the Land 2. We shall sell to no man nor deferr to any man Justice or right Secondly That by the Statute of 42 of Edward 3d. Cha. 1. 1. The Great Charter is commanded to be kept in all the points And 2. It is enacted that if any Statute be made to the Contrary that shall be holden for none which Statute is unrepealed The Respondent observeth that by an Act of the 26 of March 1650. Entitled an Act for establishing an High Court of Justice Power is given to this Court to Try Condemn and cause Execution of Death to be done upon the Freemen of England according as the Major number of any 12 of the Members thereof shall judg to appertain to justice And thereupon the Respondent doth humbly inferr and offereth for law That the said Act is diametrically contrary unto and utterly inconsistent with the said Great Charter and is therefore by the said recited Statute to be holden for none That it can with no more reason equity or justice hold the value and reputation of a Law the said Statute before recited being in force then if contrary to the second clause in that 29th Chap. of Magna Charta it had been also enacted that Justice and Right shall be deferred to all freemen and sold to all that will buy it Thirdly That upon premising by the Petition of Right 3d Car. that contrary to the great Charter Tryals and Executions had been had and done against the Subjects by commissions Martial c. It was therefore prayed and by the Commission enacted That 1. No Commissions of the like nature might be thenceforth issued c. and that done 2. To prevent least any of the Subjects should be put to death contrary to the Laws and Franchise of the Land The Respondent humbly observeth and affirmeth That This Court is though under a different stile in Nature and in the proceedings thereby directly the same with a Commission Martial the Freeman thereby being to be tryed for life and adjudged by the major number of the Commissioners sitting as in Courts of Commissioners Martial was practised and was agreeable to their constitution and consequently against the Petition of Right in which he and all the freemen of England if it be granted there

Christ they obtruded to him that they had a Law and by that law he ought to dye What they thought reasonable to claim when it served their turn to vent their Malice Jer. 26.6 Jehova justitia nostra will be I hope warrantable for me to lay hold on in a better sence for the vindication of Christ who suffers when Justice is a sufferer We have a law too and by that law I ought not to plead not to be tryed not to be judged The Laws of England were not unknown but mispractised when the Barons fought King John into a consent to the not new making bu● r●storement of the ancient Laws And Magna Charta it self Cook 1 part instit fol. 81 82. is but a confirmation or restitution of the Common ●aw and is become the Standard by which Laws are reduceable and is the foundation of all other Acts of Parliament It hath been at no time dismembred no part abrogated by any repeal It hath been confirmed above 30 times and commanded as often to be observed and put in Execution In the Act call'd Confirmatio Cartarum 25 Edw. 1. ca. 1. it is directed to be allowed as the Common Law in judgment in all points by all the Judges and dispensers of Law Bracton 414. 491. Flecta lib. 2. c. 48. lib. 3. c. 3 Mirror c. 2.18 Brit●on fo 177. or which have the law to guide It hath in former ages gained an honourable esteem in the old books Charta libertatum Communis libertas Angliae Charta de Libertatibus c. these are the Appellations It was a Noli me tangere 17 Henry 3. Rot. Cla. mem 1. 2 Rot. Proutrius M. 1. and for seeking a Reversal or Avoidance of it Hubert de Burgo was sentenced by the Barons and the sentence confirmed by King Henry the Third The great Hugh Spencer in the raign of Edward the second was banisht but for rashly counselling against the Encounter la forme de la granda Charter 14 Edw. 2. And to draw downwards yet one Kings Reign and to the point to which I would apply I find in the 42 year 42 Edw. 3. c. 1. this great Charter was not only barely confirmed and commanded to be kept in all the points for those are the words But to prevent any alteration of it is enacted That if any Statute be made to the contrary that shall be holden for none By this Magna Charta it is granted and Enacted too Cook 1 Justi● fol. 81. if my Lord Cook say true who saith it is a Statute as well as a Charter being made by Assent and Authority of Parliament That Ma. Cha. c. 29 No Freeman shall be taken or Imprisoned or be disseised of his Free-hold or Liberties or Free-customes or be outlaw'd or exiled or any otherwise destroyed nor shall not pass upon him nor condemn him but by lawfull judgment of his Peers and by the Law of the Land We shall sell to no man nor deferr to man either Justice or Right If this be Truth and Law which I have in these particulars promised to you then my Lord give me leave to take notice That by that Act by which you are constituted a Court of Justice you are authorized to try the Freemen of England not per Pares upon or for offences against Articles and the punishment to reach to life as the Major part of any 12 of the Commissioners shall judg to appertain to justice Laying these together a Posting Rider may Read that these Lawes are diametrically opposite and consequently inconsistent The latter hath its doom inherent by its innate contrariety to the former and is a building a superstructure so unsutable to the foundation that if it had not a double edged support it need no help to be demolisht but would fall I know not whether to say sua mole or sua pensilitate The Constitutors of this Law are Gladiis cincti and therefore as I am not in opportune place to speak to them so there is somthing of danger to speak too freely to them but my Lord your Lordship as you are in this place are I am sure ought to be like the Escochions of Princes with their addopted Supporters Knowledg and Conscience and if you are I am confident you will doubt of your Commission or warrant to proceed against me and compel me to preserve an inch of life by giving away mine and my Countrymens Liberty in condescending to a Plea and Tryal in this contra-legal way and by power of this Act. The second Argument My Lord I Shall further beg leave to call to your memory the Petition of Right which was made the business of the Parliament Petition of Right 3 Car. at the time when it was preferred and received the Royal assent must never be forgotten by those who hold in esteem the care of Parliaments and gracious concessions of Kings In the Proeme or leading part of that Petition the Statute of Magna Cha ta is instanced as to this particular tryal for life by proper Courts with other the Laws and Statutes some of which I have cited and the rest shall upon another point in their place and as it is complained that proceedings had been by Commissioners Martial when and where if by the Laws and Statutes of the land they had deserved death by the same Laws and Statutes also they might and by no other laws ought to have been judged so is it prayed and accordingly enacted That no Commissions of like nature may be henceforth issued to any person or persons whatsoever to be executed c. and this to prevent least by colour of them any of the Subjects should be destroyed or put to death contrary to the laws and franchize of the Land My Lord 1. The Commissions Martial were not evil in respect of the persons commissioned being as this power is to you so those alwayes given to persons of quality and learning but the evil of them were their Proceedings by their own will and opinion being themselves the Judges and the Jury offices incompatible and inconsistent with the peoples Liberties by the former Laws become their rights when your Lordships shall read the Act by which you now sit I am confident you will grant this power to be of the same nature though not under the same name and consequently in that Petition complained of in supposition that such might be and enacted against in Terminis that none such shoul● be 2. For that you are called by the Act Commissioners and yet have no Commission but the Act it self whereas you should in regard you are not a Court of Record in your selves have Commissions returnable at a day into some Court of Record where your proceedings might be extant and visible as you are now constituted you have a day prefixed to determine in but that being come you are to vanish your vestigia will be as inperceptible to the times and men

Art 1. is the thing in question Sayth That Lex est regula mensura actuum agendorum vel omittendorum not Actorum and Omissorum And St. Paul says Concupiscentiam nesciebam nisi lex diceret non concupisces Rom. 7.7 My Lord your Authority is in two several places to proceed against as Traytors such who have broken the Articles before they were made viz. Whosoever hath or shall Plot Contrive or Endeavour Art 2. Art 7. c. Whatsoever Officer c. hath or shall desert their trust c. shall dye without mercy And thus my Lord the end of Laws and Law-makings is perverted which are not meerly to punish offenders but to prevent offences which amongst Christian men was never otherwise done but by way of premonition by laws first Interdictory and then Subpenatory The Earl of Strafford did and very reasonably take it unkindly and so exprest himself upon his Trial That a neglected Law should lie moulding amongst old parchments 200 years unused and unexercised and at last brought out to measure his passed Actions by or to use his own words To lye like a Coal raked up in the ashes to be at pleasure blown into a flame and to make him and his family the first fewel to feed it Truly if he had seen these Articles as he felt after somwhat like them he would have cried out and but modestly enough That it is not the mending of the fault but the destruction of the person which is manifestly designed in these Articles of Retrospection Disusage of a law is some excuse for him who falls into a transgression but the non existence of a Law is a Justification to the greatest offence And my Lord as you are to look backward to Actions done before the Law made so you are to take Cognizance of offenders against two former Acts which make the Crimes therein certain in the matters of fact fault and punishment and if they be lawes they must be deemed part of the lawes of the Land and desireable and dispensable by the ordinary Courts of the Land in cases Criminal for extraordinary Courts of that kind have long since even by the Parliament of which this is the surviving part been denied And although it is true that when some particular fact is committed by some one or more particular persons against the laws Criminal it often falls and properly enough that especial Commissions of Oyre and Terminer are for some urgent and expedient reason issued to try the matter and men yet those Commissions do not restrain the Commissioners to proceed only against those persons and upon those particular crimes which the common fame hath rendred Hac vice to be Tryable but run in general terms and with general enablement to try all manner of Treasons Felonies c. And the Reason is 1. For that it might possibly fall out that a grand Jury will not find the Bill against Jo. at style and if not the Commissioners are sent down without their arrant if only directed to try J. S. 2. It may fall out that where there are Treasons or Felonies commited by Jo. St. they may be accompanied with misprisions or misdemeanors in Jo. O. And if the particular crime of Treason and the particular person of J. S. be only authorised to be enquired of then the Commissioners can do but half their work And therefore this Commissionary power of yours My Lord the ordinary Courts being not obstructed and you limited to particulars is so far against the Common Law and usage that it is against common and vulgar reason and pardon that I must say it savours more of a Snare then of a Law and more of a warrant of Arbitrary Execution then of an enablement to and for a judicial and legal Proceeding or Tryal The Fifth Argument MY Lord In all Courts of Justice as there is supposed to be an equality intended to such as shall fall under their Cognizance and Enquiry which is a principle of morality innate as well as a practical Policy so there have always in this Nation at least beyond memory or indeed record to the contrary Not sworn been certain Oaths Obligatory and of indifference administred to Persons either enquiring of or passing judgment against or upon the Subjects in all cases whatsoever and the same thing is but necessary in your Lordships and this Court to be done if at all you will proceed in so weighty a matter as life against which I make this exception 1. If you are at all sworn you are not sworn in Conspectu and if you will be my Jury and my Judges also I ought to have a satisfaction that you are so sworn Had you been only my Judges and constituted after the ordinary manner and to ordinary ends I would have taken your being sworn for granted 2. If you are sworn and to no other words of an oath then what are comprised in the Act which my self and all men else will easily believe you are not then you are not sworn to any manner of Equality The words are You shall swear that you shall well and truly The Oath of the Commissioners according to the best of your skill and knowledge execute the several powers given unto you by this Act. I beseech your Lordship 18 Edw. 3. that I may compare these words with the Oath of Judges in England when it was a Kingdome The words Pertinent only are these You shall swear that well and lawfully you shall serve our Lord the King and his people in the office of Justice Oath of Justices c And that you deny to no man common Right by the Kings letters or none other mans nor for none other cause c. I A. B. do swear that I will do equal right Dalton J. P. fol. 13. c. according to my best Wit Cunning and Power after the Laws and Customs of the Land and the Statutes thereof made c. My Lord these will concern you as my Judges to consider how little the stiles agree how far your Oath is in respect of these unobligatory and consequently unsatisfactory to the persons which are or shall be concerned 1. As to the first yours contains no such words of Equality 2. As to the second oath yours hath such words as skill and knowledg holding some resemblance with those of wit cunning and power But my Lord if your words were as well usher'd and as well paged as those it were some satisfaction viz. To do equal right according c. After the laws and customes of the Land and the Statutes thereof made My Lord as you are my Tryers also as well as my Judges I beseech you to observe the oath of a Juror and the difference in sence in letter I know for the dignity sake it ought to differ You shall well and truly try and true deliverance make between our Soveraigne Lord the King Oath of a Juror and the prisoner at the