themselves for their Allegiance to their King following of the Scripture their Consciences and the known Laws of the Land were notwithstanding their many Petitions and Importunities several years whilst their estates were Sequestred and taken from them kept in a starving Condition before they could be heard to litle purpose where Sons and too well descended to be so unworthy were invited to accuse their Loyal Aged Parents whom the Jewes would have rent their Clothes to have seen encouraged and made to be sharers in the spoyl of their Father Not like the Committee or Court improperly called at Salters-Hall for relief of Creditors against their imprisoned Debtors where some of those Judges and Committees if not wronged by printed Complaints were in good hopes to have made some preparations to sell the Debtors Lands to their Friends or Kindred at good Penniworths Nor like the Committee for Plundring rather than Plundred Ministers who to take away all the Benefices of England and Wales from the Tribe of Levi and confer them upon the Tribe of Issachar and their Factious and Mechanique guifted Brethren and keep out the Orthodox and learned Clergy could make their costly orders for the trial of them that were more Learned then themselves concerning the Grace of God and their utterance for Preaching of the Gospel with private and deceitful marks and litle close couched or interposed Letters hid or put under or over some other Letters whereby to intimate to their Subcommittees in the Countries that howsoever the men were without exception and found to be so upon Certificates and Examination they were to be delayed and sent from Post to Pillar and tired boâ—h in their Bodies and Purses and be sure never to be instituted and inducted But was a Court compos'd of grave learned knowing and worthy Masters of the Wards such as William Marquesse of Winchester William Lord Burghley and his Son the Earl of Salisbury and many other who made not the Court or any of the businesse thereof to Lacquy after their own Interest Had for Attorney Generalls of that Court who sate as men of Law and Judges therein and assistants to the Masters of the Wards Richard Onslow Esq afterwards Speaker of the House of Commons Sr. Nicholas Bacon Knight afterwards a most learned Lord keeper of the great Seal of England and a great Councellor of Estate to Queen Elizabeth Sr. Henry Hobart afterwards Lord cheif Justice of the Court of Common-pleas Sr. James Ley Knight and Baronet afterwards Lord cheif Justice of the Court of Kings Bench after that Earl of Marleborough and Lord Treasurer of England Sr. Henry Calthrop Knight Sr. Rowland Wandesford Knight and Sr. Orlando Bridgeman Kt. now Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common pleas all very eminently learned Lawyers and of great estates honour honesty and worth in their several generations who upon any difficult or weighty matter of Law to be discussed in that Court did usually intreat the presence and had the assistance of the Lord cheif Justices Lord cheif Baron or of any of the other learned Judges of the Land whom they should please to invite unto them where a variety of learning grave deliberations a great care of Justice and right reason most lively and clearly represented have left to posterity as guides and directions for after ages those conclusions and resolutions of cases of great learning and weight in that Court reported by the Lord Dier Cook and other learned Sages of the Law Nor were the Masters of the Wards Attorneys Auditors or Escheators loosely tied by Oaths as some of the Committee Jurisdictions were when they did swear only in general faithfully according to their best skill and knowledge to discharge the trust committed to them and would not for favour or affection reward or gift or hopes of reward or gift break the same Or as little restraining them from Acts of Oppression or Injustice as the Oath of the Controlers for the sale of the Kings and Queens lands ordered by that which called it self a Parliament 17. July 1649. The Oath of the Commissioners for managing the estates of Delinquents Sequestrations at Haberdashers-Hall Ordered by no better an Authority the 15 of April 1650. or that which by that which would be called an Act of Parliament of the 10 of December 1650. for establishing an high Court of Justice within the Counties of Norfforlk Suffolk Cambridge and Huntington for the Tryal of Delinquents was only ordered was to be taken by those that were to be the Judges that they should well and truly according to the best of their skill and knowledge execute the several powers given unto them Which bound them not from doing wrong to those whom they made to bear the burdens of all the cruelties which they could possibly lay upon them But were compassed and hedged in by Oaths as warily restraining as they were legal for the Master of the Wards was by Act of Parliament enjoyned to swear to minister Justice to Rich ond Poor to the best of his cunning and power to take no gift or reward in any Case depending before him and to deliver with speed such as shall have to do before him The Attorney was sworn truely to counsel the King and the Master of the Court and with all speed and diligence to endeavour the hearing and determination indifferently of such matters and causes as shall depend before the Master of the Wards and shall not take any gift or reward in any matter or cause depending in the same Court The Auditors sworn to make a true allowance in their Offices to every person which shall be accomptant before them and not to take or recieve of Poor or Rich any gift or reward in any matter or cause depending or to be discussed in the Court but such as shall be ordinarily appertaining to their Offices and the Escheators to treat all the people in their â—ayliwicks truely and righteously to do right to every man aswell to poor as to rich do no wrong to any man neither for promise love nor hate nor no mans right disturb do nothing whereby right may be disturbed letted or delayed and shall take their Enquests in open places and not privy And might better content the people Then when in former ages the Wardships and their disposing were left to the care and order of the Chancellour as to Thomas Bâ—cket in H. 2. time or to Hubert de Burgh Chief-Justice and Earl of Kent in the Reign of H. 3. sometimes to the Treasurers or Chamberlains most comonly let to farm by Escheators sometimes by under-Sherifs or when the next Wardships or Escheats that should happen were before hand assigned towards the payment of some of the Kings Debts as to William de Valence Earl of Pembroke in the Reign of E. 1. or that the Wardships and Escheats which should happen in 6 or 7. Counties were before hand granted to some particular man And can
shillings for a whole Knights Fee and after that rate proportionably ibm 35. If the Guardian maketh a Feoffement of the Wards Lands he shall have a Writ of Novel disseisin and upon recovery the Seisin shall be delivered to the next friend and the Guardian shall loose the Wardship 3. E. 1. ca. 47. Usurpation of a Church during the minority of the Heir shall not prejudice him 13 E. 1.5 Admeasurement of Dower shall be granted to a Guardian and the Heir shall not be barred by the suite of the Guardian if there be collusion 13 E. 1.7 Next Friends shall be permitted to sue if the Heir be â—loyned 13 E. 1.15 If part of the Lands be sold the services shall be apportioned Westmr. 3.2 Escheators shall commit no waste in Wards Lands 28 E. 1 18. If Lands without cause be seised by the Escheator the Issues and Mesne profits shall be restored 21 E. 1.19 where it is found by Inquest that Lands are not holden of the King the Escheator shall without delay return the possession Stat de Escheatoribus 29 E. 1. Escheators shall have sufficient in the places where they Minister to answer the King and his People if any shall complain 4 E 3.9.5 E. 3 4. Shall be chosen by the Chancelour Treasurer and chief Baron taking unto them the chief Justices of the one bench and the other if they be present and no Escheator shall tarry in his office above a year 14 E. 3.8 A Ward shall have an action of waste against his Guardian and Escheators shall make no waste in the Lands of the Kings wards 14 E. 3 13. Aid to make the Kings Son a Knight or to marry his Daughter shall be in no other manner then according to the Statute thereof formerly made 25 E. 3 11. Traverses of offices found before Escheators upon dyings seised or alienations without licence shall be tried in the Kings Bench 34 E. 3 14. An Escheator shall have no Pec of wood fish or venison out of the wards Lands 38 E. 3 13. An Idempnitate nominis shall be granted of another mans Lands seised by an Escheator 37 E 1.2 No Escheator shall be made unless he haue twenty pounds Land per annum or more in Fee and they shall execute their offices in proper person the Chancellor shall make Escheators without any Gift or Brokage and shall make them of the most lawful men and sufficient 12 R. 2.2 An Escheator or Commissioner shall take no Inquest but by such persons as shall be retorned by the Sheriff they shall retorn the offices found before them and the Lands shall be let to farm to him that tendereth a Traverse to the office 8 H. 6.16 Inquisitions shall be taken by Escheators in good Towns and open places and they shall not take above forty Shillings for finding an office under the penalty of forty pounds 23 H. 6 17. Women at the age of fourteen years at the time of the death of their Ancestors without question or difficulty shall have Livery of their Lands 39 H. 6.2 No office shall be retorned into any of the Kings Courts by any Escheator or Commissioner but which is found by a Jury and none to be an Escheator who hath not forty markes per annum above all reprises the Jurors to have Land of the yearly value of forty shillings within the Shire the Forman of the Jury shall keep the Counter part of the Inquisition and the Escheator must receive the Inquisition found by the Iury as also the offices or Inquisitions shall be received in the Chancery and Exchequer 1 H. 8 ca. 8. Lands shall be lâ—t to farme to him that offereth to traverse the office before the offices or Inquests retorned or within three Months after 1 H. 8 ca. 10. the respite of Homage of Lands not exceeding five pounds per Annum to be but eight pence the yearly value of Lands not exceeding twenty pounds per annum to be taken as it is found in the Inquisition except it by examination otherwise appear to the Master of the Wards Surveyer Atturney or Receiver General or three of them or that it shall otherwise appear and be declared in any of the Kings Courts No Escheator shall sit virtute officii where the Lands be five pounds per annum or above the Escheator shall take for finding of an office not exceeding five pounds per annum but six Shillings eight pence for his Fee and for the writing of the office three Shillings four pence for the charges of the Jury three Shillings and for the officers and Ministers of any Court that shall receive the same Record two shillings upon pain of five pounds to the Escheator for every time so offending the Master and Court shall have power to moderate any Fines or Recognisances 33 H 8.22 The Heir of Lands not exceeding five pounds per annum may sue his General Livery by warrant only out of the Court of wards although there be no Inquisition or office found or certified The Interest of every lesser Tenant for Term of years Copy-holder or other person having interest in any Lands found in any office or Inquisition shall be saved though they be not found by office The Heir upon an aetate probanda shall have an oustâ—e le maines and the profits of his Lands from the time that he comes to age and if any office be untruely found a Traverse shall be allowed or a Monstrans de Droit without being driven to any petition of right though the King be entitled by a double matter of Record A Traverse to an office shall be allowed where a wrong Tenure is found an ignoramus â—ound of a Tenure shall not be taken to be any Tenure in Capite and upon a Traverse a Scire facias shall be awarded against the Kings Patentee 2 and 3 E 6. ca. 8. And if there had been any certain or common grievances or so much as a likelyhood of any to have risen or happened by such Tenures and benefits which many were the better for and had no reason at all to find fault with w ch many more were striving to deserve of the Kings of England the Nobility great men of this Kingdom the Parliaments that have been ever since the 8 th year of the reign of H. 3. would not have made so many Acts of Parliament for their establishment or tending to their preservation if we should believe as it cannot be well denyed that Parliaments have been sometimes mistaken and enacted that which they have afterwards thought fit to repeal Yet it comes not within the virge or compass of any probability that Parliaments where all grievances are most commonly represented should for almost four hundred years together in a succession of many Kings Parliaments enact or continue grievances instead of remedies neither find those Tenures to be inconvenient or not fit to be continued or so much as complain of them but as if they were blessings of a
that in a Parliament holden in the 14 th year of the raign of King Richard the 2 d. the Lords and Commons did pray the King that the Prerogative of Him and his Crown may be kept and that all things done or attempted to the contrary may be redressed and that the King might be as free as any of his Progenitors were which the King granting gave to it the force and power of an Act of Parlaiment And consider that the innovation of Laws or change of Customs are dangerous and as St Augustine saith non tam utilitate if there were any profit in them prosunt quam Novitâ—â—e perturbant do more hurt than good by their Novelty that it will be unsafe to take away or dig up foundations that where the inconveniences in the old Laws are not apparant and the conveniences to come by the new not infallible or not likely to deceive our expectation of them it will be perilous to change our Laws more perilous when they be many and most of all when they be fundamental That the more Power and Might is in the King to defend us the better will be the Ends which by the Means is intended and that therefore in the Parliament of 7 E. 1. the Prelates Earls Barons and the Commonaltie of the Realm did acknowledge that to the King it belonged of his Royal Signory streightly to defend force of Armour and all other force against the Peace and to punish them which shall do contrary according to the Laws and usages of the Realm and thereunto were bound to ayd their Soveraign Lord at all Seasons when need shall be that to make a Captain of a Cripple or a Constable which should keep the Peace in a Parish and be ready to repell any violence which should be offered to the Inhabitanâ—s to be blind or Bed-rid would not answer the End or bâ— for the Safety of those that expect it from him And that his Majesties opinion expressed in his Message or Declaration from Breda before his return into England is and ever will be a maxime composed of very great reason and truth that his Majesties just rights are the best preserver of the peoples Liberties And may believe before it be too late that to take away Tenures in Capite and introduce the inconveniences before mentioned will be but as a Prologue or usher to Levelling and the gate or entrance to the Agrarian Devices and the supposed Saints taking possession of the Estates of those which they call the wicked And that the laying by of Tenures in Capite and their services and making use of Mercenary and Mechanick Souldiers may help us to as many miseries and follies as we have pertaked of in our late troubles from our Servants make them to become our Masters and by inureing them to insolencies against others teach them how to domineer over the people which shall be their pay-Masters after that over Parliaments garbling and purging the House pulling out and putting in whom they please turn Legislators and Remonstrance makers from their head quarters make themselves not the Repairers of Breaches but the makers and causers of them ingrosse all the places and imployments of the Kingdom throw down Laws and Government create out of themselves and their own Party Mayors Generals to tyranize awe the people and abuse their Laws and Liberties and play the fools at Coffee-Houses with disputing and discoursing of Rotas and Balloting Boxes and which of their Whimsies and ignorant contrivances would best make a Government Committ Perjuries in abundance and make their oaths more changeable and lesse to be trusted then the Wind or Weather or a Lillies Almanack and make it their only businesse to enslave and insult over the people and Metamorphose them into as many shapes of baseness perjuries Hipocrisies dissembling and wickednesse as poverty hope of gain or to get or preserve estates though it be but to have Poliphemus his curtesie to be last of all ruined fear or flattery or an accursed ambition to raise an estate out of other mens miseries could perswade or draw them unto That the taking away of Tenures in Capite by Knight service is not desired by any universal or general Petition at all of the People that not one in every 20 of those that are concerned hold by those Tenures nor one in every 100 of those that hold by other Tenures and are not concerned do desire it That the injudicial and inconsiderate desires of a very few of the common people who doe sometimes as they have many times done in our late troubles and too late repented it out-do Children in asking Stones instead of Bread and Serpents for Fishes are not to be hearkened unto that the Surfets upon Liberty are many times very dangerous may prove as fatal unhappy though granted or asked with the best of intentions as that of giving great Sums of money to the Scots in the begining of our unhappy Wars calling their invasion a brotherly assistance or that of giving Liberty to the long Parliament not to dissolve without their consent That if Augustus Caesar when by his great Prudence he had put the broken peices of the Roman Republick which was Civilibus Discordiis lacerata wofully torn with civil Discords into a well composed Monarchy and blest the Empire a great part of the World with an universal Peace could find no better a way to fix and make it lasting then to put many of the Souldiers under a Gratitude and Concernment to love and cherish it by giving them Lands for Life or Inheritance to engage them to their former Duties when occasion should happen which saved the Charge and Trouble on all sides as well to the conquered as the conquering in maintaining Roman Legions made up of a Medley or Gallimausry of all manner of Nations It cannot now be good when the long lasting Monarchy of England hath been lately and lamentably torn into peeces to make up a Common-wealth could never be agreed upon to alter or take away a Course of constant and ordinary defence which hath been for so many Ages past the happy Support of this Antient Monarchy And that it could not have been any bad or likely to be unsuccessefull Policy but a means of an Establishment of our late Souldiers and Controullers had in the Allowance of their cheap purchases been tyed to Tenures by Knight Service for the Defence of the Kingdom as the late King of Sweden was to hold of the Empire by the Treaty of Munster And if that Bracton who was a Lord Chief Justice in the Reign of King H. 3. was of opinion that by a paâ—tition of Earldoms and Baronies deficeret Regnum quod ex Comitatibus Baronijs dicitur esse constitutum would ruine the Kingdom which is constituted of Earldoms and Baronies he would now certainly foresee greater Mischiefs and Inconveniencies in the taking away of Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service or changeing
have taken it for an addition of Honour and not any lessening to be knighted And had no cause at all to dislike such military Tenures which were not called vassalage as Common People may now mistake the word but from vassus or Cliens qui pro beneficio accepto fidem suam autori benificii obligat or from Gesell a German word which signifieth Socius or Commilito a fellow Souldier the name and profession reason and cause of it being so honourable and worthy Or to deem them to be burthens which were at the first intended and taken to be as gifts and favours which none of the sons of men who are Masters of any sense or reason do use to find fault with but may well allow them to be very far distant from Slavery when as Servitude is properly quum quod acquiritur servo acquiritur Domino when that which is gained or acquired by the servant is justly and properly the Lords and a freeman is contra-distinguished by quod acquirit sibi acquirit in that which he gaineth is his own or hath a property in it and that among the Southern Nations a more gentle and merciful bondage being paternd by that of Abraham and his successors the Patriarchs and allowed by the rules and government of God dura erat servitus Dominorum imperia gravia service or the condition of Servants was hard and the severity of Masters great who had potestatem vitae necis power of life and death over their Servants who having nothing which they could call their own but their misery were put to maintain their Masters out of their labours and enduring vilissima et miserrima ministeria all manner of Slaveries ab omni Militia arcebantur were not suffered to know or have the use of Arms apud Boreales tamen gentes justior suit semper servitus et clementior but amongst the Northern Nations there was a more just and gentle usage of their Servants for that they did devide their Lands Conquests amongst their Souldiers and Servants pactionibus interpositis inter Dominum et servientem de mutua Tutela upon certain agreements betwixt them for mutual defence Which made our English as well as other Nations abundantly contented with it as may appear by the acquiescence of them and the Normans under the Norman and next succeeding Kings and of Edward the Confessors Laws and other English customes retaining them the reckoning of it amongst their liberties fighting for them and adventuring their lives and all that they had at the making of Magna Charta and in the Barons wars wherein those great spirits as Mr. Robert Hill saith so impatient of tyranny did never so much as call in question that great and antient prerogative of their Kings or except against Tenures escuage releifs and other moderate and due incidents thereof The care taken in the Parliament of 52 H. 3. to prevent the deceiving of the Lords of their wardships by fraudulent conveyances or Leases of 18 E. 10. in the making of the statute of Quia emptores terrarum that the Feoffees or Purchasers of Lands holden of mesne Lords should hold by such services and Customes as rhe Feoffor did hold the Registring and Survey of Knights Fees by H. 2. H. 3. E. 1. E. 3. and H. 6. Escuage Aydes and Assessements in Parliament and the Marshals Rolls in time of War and necessity The esteem antiently held of the benefits and liberties accrewed by them insomuch as many have by leave of their Lords changed their Socage Tenures into Knights service and thought themselves enfranchised thereby The value put upon them by the Commons of England in the Parliament of 6. H. 4. when they petitioned the King in that Parliament that all Feoffements of Lands and Tenements holden by Knight service and done by Collusion expressed in the Statute of Marlbridge might upon proof thereof be utterly void The opinion of Chief Justice Fortescue in the raign of H. 6. in his Book de laudibus legum Angliae commending them as most necessary as well for the Common-wealth as for those and their Heirs who held their Land by such Tenures The retaining of it by the Germans who did as most of the Northern Nations saith Bodin libertatem spirare only busie themselves to gain and keep their liberty and from the time of their greatest freedom to rhis present and now also could never tell how to find any fault with them Their Princes Electors of the Empire and the Emperial Cities or Hanse townes who take thrmselves to be as free as their name of freedom or liberty doth import not at this day disdaining or repining at them the Switzers in their greatest thoughts of freedom taking their holding of the Empire in Capite to be no abatement of it The use of them by the antient Earles and Governours of Holland Zealand and West-freezland who having been very successful in their Wars without the use of Tenures in Capite or knights service but finding that ipsa virtus amara alioqui per se atque aspera praemiis excitanda videretur simul uti fisco ac Reipublicae consulerâ—tur saith Neostadius that the hardship of vertue needed to be sweetened with some rewards that the old custom of the Longobards in creating and reserving Tenures in Capite and by knights service would be not only a saving of Charges to their Treasury but a good and benefit to their Provinces or Common-wealth did create and erect such or the like Tenures And to this day by the Scotish Nation in a time and at the instant of their late obtaining if they could be thankful for them of all manner of liberties and freedom do sufficiently evince them to be as far from Slavery as they are always necessary Wherein if the primitive purpose and institution of Tenures in capite knight service and Socage be rightly considered every man may without any violence or Argument used to his reason or Judgment if self-conceitedness and obstinacy doe not choke or disturb his Intâ—lâ—â—ctuals Easily conclude whether if it were now 〈…〉 Choice he would not rather take Land by a Service or Condition only to go to warr with the King or his mesne Lord when Wars shall happen which in a Common course of accidents may happen but once or not at all in his life time then not tarry with him above forty days or less according to his proportion of Fee or Land holden to have escuage of his own Tenants if they shall refuse to go also in person with him and to have his heir if he chanced to die which in times of less Luxury happened not so often but once perhaps in three or four descents to be left in his minority to be better educated than he could have been in his life time married without disparagement and himself as well as his own Childrens estates protected Or accept of a Mannor freely granted him
vel quibuscunque illatis a multis retroactis temporibus et omnia inquisita sub sigillis suis inclusa secum coram Baronagio ad tempus sibi per breve praefixum Four Knights men of known worth and wisdom loving and beloved of their Countryes to enquire what grievances or oppressions the smaller sort of people suffered by the greater and also of all injuries and â—â—ongs done by any person whatsoever either lately or formerly and to certifie it under their Seals to the Barronage which what ever they were or if ever or never recorded for they have not for ought appears been certified or recorded no Record or Historian of that or the after times have said that Tenures in Capite and by Knights service were thereupon retorned to be oppressive or so much as inconvenient Neither are to be found amongst any of those huge heaps of evils which Mathew Paris that sower and honest Monk of St. Albons who lived in those times and especially remarked them hath delivered to posterity The 24 Reformers or Conservators of the Kingdom in that Kings Reign appointed by the Baronage never intimated any thing of their dislike of that honourable institution It was not complained of upon the refusal of Roger Bigod Earl of Norfolk Marshall of England Humphry Bohun Earl of Hereford and Essex Constable of England and Gilbert de Clare Earl of Glocester and Hertford great and mighty men and of Princely Estates to go at the Command of King E. 1. unto his Wars at Gascony upon pretence that the warning was to short whereby the Kings displeasure was so much incurred aâ— Bohun and Clare to escape the Seisure and forfeiture of their Lands and to purchase his favour again were glad each of them to marry one of his Daughters without any Dowry and surrender their Earldoms Honors Offices and Lands unto him take back Estates thereof in Tayle to them and the Heirs of their Bodies upon their wives to be severally begotten and Bigot surrendring also to him his Earledom and Marshals rod together with all his Lands and taking Back a grant of an Estate for life in his honors and Lands the reversion to the King if he should not have any Issue of his Body begotten the King in Parliament pardoned them and John de Ferrariâ—s and other Earls Barons Knights and Esquires and all other of their fellowship confederacy and Bond and all that held twenty pounds Land Per annum whether in chief of the King or other that were appointed at a certain day to pass over with him into Flanders their rancour and evil will and all other offences committed against him Were not in the Roll of general grievances which the Arch-Bishops Bishops Eaâ—ls Barons and Commons sent him when he was at the Sea side ready to take shipping into Gascoigne concerning his Taxes and other impositions Neither any vestigia or footsteps to be found of any grievance by them in that grand search or inquiry by the Commissions of Traile Baston in or about the 33 of E. 3. after intruders into other mens Lands exactions and oppressions or in the presentments in the Eyres when the Justices thereof in several Kings reigns carefully travailed into the several Counties and places of England and found out and returned the complaints and oppressions of every County and where the Natives themselves the witnesses cannot be supposed to be so much their own enemies as to conceal the Countries oppressions the Jurors were solemnly charged to present them upon their Oaths and if they should omit to do it had the malice of their Neighbours to watch accuse their Perjuries and the severity of the Judges to punish any failings in their duty Or in the Reformation which the Lords Ordainers as they were afterwards called in or about the fifth year of the Raign of King E. 2. pretended to make in that unadvised Commission which he granted them for the Government of the Kingdome No pretence or so much as a murmur against them by the Reformers in Wat Tylers and Jack Straws commotion when they were so willing to overthrow and extirpate all the Nobility and Gentry which should withstand their rude and unruly designs of making all Bondmen free and taking away Villenage and of making Wat Tyler and several other of their party Kings in several Counties and to devise what Laws they listed Or by Jack Cade or Captain Mend-all as he falsely stiled himself when many a grievance was picked up to colour his Rebellion in the reign of King H. 6. but could find nothing of that for a garnish of his Roguery Or Robert Ket the Tanner in the reign of King E. 6. sitting in judgment amongst the Rabble under his tree as they called it of Reformation where Tenures and Wardships being so obvious and every where insisted upon they would not probably have omitted them out of the Roll or list of their complaints if there could have been but a supposition or dream of any grievance in them which being the more noble beneficial and better sort of Tenures may better deserve an approbation of the People and Parliaments of England than Tenures in Villenage which by an Act of Parliament in 25 E. 3.18 may be pleaded and a Villain seized though a libertate probaâ—dâ— be depending And it was enacted in the Parliament of 9 R. 2.2 that if Villaines fled into places infranchised and sued their Lords their Lords should not be barred thereby and by an Act Parliament in 8 H. 6.11 that a Villain should not be admitted or put to be an Apprentice in the City of London and by an Act of Parliament in 19. H. 7.15 If any Bond-man purchase Lands and convey away the Lands the Bond-man being â—estui que use of thâ—se Lands they shall be seised by the Lord. Nor did the Act of Parliament of 25 E. 3. which provided that none should be constrained to find men of Armes Hâ—blers nor Archers but by common assent and grant made in Parliament mistake when it inserted a saving and exception of all those that held by such services Neither did the Commons in the Parliament of 5 R. 2. upon the Repeal in Parliament of the Manumissions of Bond-men extorted from the King by Wat Tyler and his Rout or men of Reformation think they did themselves or those they represented any hurt when they cryed with one voyce that the Repeal was good and that at their request the Repeal was by whole assent confirmed Tenures in Capite and by Knights service were not complained of in the Parliament of 13 R. 2. though the Commons in Parliament had prayed and were allowed that euery man might complain of the oppression of what person or Estate soever without incurring the pain of the Statute of Gloucester which under great penalties prohibited false Newes and Lies of the Nobility and great men of the Realm Chancellor Treasurer Justices of both Benches and other great
to the King at Oxford to be treated upon by the Earl of Northumberland William Pierrepont Esq Sr. Wil. Armin Bulstrode Whitlock Esq their Commissioners There was nothing desired or proposed for the taking away of the Court of Wards or changing of Tenures but did conclude that if that which then was desired of the King should be granted the Royalty greatnes of his Throne would be supported by the loyal and bountyfull affections of his people their Liberties and Priviledges maintained by his Majesties protection and Justice They were no part of the Bills or Acts of Parliament sent to the King at Oxford in order to a peace in July 1648. No part of the Demands or Bills or Acts of Parliament proposed by the Parliament in the Treaty at Vxbridge betwixt them and the King 23 Novemb. 1644. And there was so litle of grievance or inconvenience or none at all to be found in Tenures in Capite and by Knight service by reason of any accidents for naturally or originally there can be none at all proved to be in them As notwithstanding the Vote of the House of Commons in Parliament made the 20 th day of September 1645. Which being less then an Embrio and no more then an opinion of the Major part of that House a recens assensio velleity desire or intention only which our Laws take no notice of was left to an after more mature deliberation when an Act of Parliament should be brought in upon it have gone through all its necessary requisites formalities and debates the Parliament it self were so litle resolved or beleiving any Grievance to be in them as the Lords and Commons by their Ordinance of the first day of November 1645. did ordain that the Master and Councel of that Court should proceed in all things belonging to the Jurisdiction of that Court according to Law And the House of Commons shortly after viz. the fourth day of November 1645. being informed that by reason of a Vote passed in that House the 20 th day of September 1645. that the Court of Wards should be taken away diverse Wardships Liveries Primer seisins and Mesne rates which theretofore fell and happened were not compounded for as they ought to be It was declared that all of them which have happened or shall fall or happen before the Court of Wards shall be put down by the Parliament shall be answered to the Common-wealth and the Master and Councel of that Court were required to proceed accordingly so as it extended not to any whose Auncestors being Officers or Souldiers have been slain or died in the service of the Parliament But the 24 th of February 1645. upon occasion of a debate concerning the Wardship of the Son of Sir Christopher Wray who dyed as they said in the service of the Parliament an Ordinance was brought in and made by the Lords and Commons for the taking away of Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service which saith one of their allowed Mercuries was first given to the Crown for defence of the Kingdom but the Parliament would take care for other supplies But that Ordinance notwithstanding was so little liked of as that without the giving satisfaction which they promised to the Nobility Gentry and Mesne Lords for the losse of their Tenures by Knight service and satisfaction to the most part of the Officers of the Court of Wards it was no more or not much thought of but lay from that time in a slumber untill the first of August 1647. when the mighty Mechanicques of the Army driven on by their ignorant and seditious Agitators who were but the Engines of Cromwell's lurking and horrid designs had by their Remonstrances like Wolves cloathed in Sheep-skins bleated and seemed to thirst only after godly and purified Reformations and Hewson the Cobler and Pride the Drâ—yman and others of the Colledge of their nâ—w â—apientia busying themselves in State as well as Parliament affairs and thombing the Scriptures and the English Translations of Livy and Plutarch at the wrong end thought every one of themselves to be no less than a Solon and Lycurgus admired Agrarian Laws and other old exploded grievances dreamed they were excellent Politiques and not knowing our good old Laws but suspecting them as well they might to be averse and no well-wishers to their ungodly and worse than Machiavillian devices did all they could to destroy them root and branch and at the same time when in their New-England Phrase they held forth a more than ordinary Care of the Kings Honour and Dignity and the freedom rights and interests of the seduced people proposed or commanded rather that the Ordinance for taking away the Court of Wards and Liveryes be confirmed by Act of Parliament provided his Majesties Revenues be not damnified therein nor those that held Offices in the same left without Reparation some other way Which howsoever it were to the remaining and small part of that Parliament who durst not say it but found themselves under a force which against many of their willâ— had undertaken to be their Guard and safekeeping a motive or spur enough to make them put that Vote and ordinance against the Court of Wards and Liveries inâ—o an Act as they would call it of Parliament after 10000 l. given paid to the Master of the Court of Wards for the loss of his place 5000 l. to Sr. Roland Wandesford Atturney General of that Court 6000 l. to Sr. Benjamin Rudiard Surveyer General 3500 l. to Charles Fleetwood late Governour of the destroying Committee of Safety for his supposed loss by the Receiver Generals place of that Court which he pretended he ought to enjoy by a Sequestration from Sr. Will. Fleetwood his Brother who was then attending his Master the King at Oxford and to Mr. Bacon 3000 l. for a pretended loss of his Office for the making and ingrossing of Licences or pardons for alienation all of them but Sir Roland Wandesford being Members of Parliament it did without any mention made or remedy provided for those only supposed Evils in Tenures in Capite and Chivalry in the Billsor intended Acts of Parliament which were sent to the King the 3 of March 1647. when he was at Holmby under a restraint fall asleep for many years after and left all other to expect their satisfaction upon the Parliaments promises and further proceedings And there was so little cause for putting that Sentence in execution against them in the judgment opinion of some of the most knowing sort of the Arraigners of antiquity and the actions of their more understanding fore-fathers as Mr. Nathaniel Bacon in his Historical discourses of the uniformity of the Government of England under the Britain Saxon Danish Norman and other Kings of this Isle until the reign of King E. 3. published in Anno 1647. and in his 2 part from King E. 2. until the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth printed in Anno 1651. in a
the broaching of this project ever adventure to ask or give such demands any room or entertainment in their imaginations and is more then the Athenians and Romans ever aimed at who in all their popular and restlesse turmoils seditions and agitations by the people or their Tribunes concerning the Agrarian Laws and making and changing of many other Laws and several forms of Government did never seek to take away or root out those long lasting monuments of benefits and the acknowledgements and returns of gratitude which ought to be made of them More then the people of France in those hard Conditions which they would have put upon the Daulphine of France afterwards Charles the fifth of France in the troubles and imprisonment of his Father King John in England in the Raign of our King Edward the third and the strange and insolent behaviour of the Citizens of Paris towards him when the Provost or Mayor put his own hood half blew half red upon his head compelling him to wear his Livery did all that day wear the Daulphines being of a brown black embrodered with gold in token of his Dictatorship did ever demand nor did in those great afflictions wants which were upon Charles the seventh when he was reproached by his Subjects and the English had so much of France in their possession in the Raign of our King H. 5. and King H. 6. who by their numerous Armies and the gallantry of their nobility and Tenants in Capite and by Knight Service were Masters of the Field as well as of that Crown as he was in disgrace called the King of Berry being a small Province wherein he made what shift he could to defend himself when his Table failed him so that he eat no more in publick but sparingly in his Chamber attended by his domestical Servants had pawned the County of Gyan for mony ever require to be discharged of their Homages and Tenures and the duties and incidents which belonged to them Neither did the Justices or domineering Officers of State in Arragon in their height and extravagancy of power which for some time until by its own weight their Tyranny or the subtile politique patience of their Kings it came to be dissolved into the Royal proper Rights of that Crown Government they excercised over their Kings ever make that to be any part of it nor did the wants of John King of Arragon when he had pawned the County of Roussilion to Lewis the eleventh King of France nor of Ferdinand the Second Emperor when within these forty years in those devouring and destroying Wars of Germany when the pale horse of death and the red of destruction rid up to the bridles in blood he pawned Lusatia and Silesia to the Duke of Saxony and the upper Palatinate to the Duke of Bavaria beget any such motion of the people or Condiscention of their Princes And that unhappy project and design had in all probability no more disquieted our old Albion or Brittain sitting upon a Rock mediis tranquilla in undis in the midst of all our late Storms and Tempests which had broken the bag of Eolus getting loose vied with the raging waves of a distempered Sea who should be most destructive and play the Bedlam Had not a necessity of the Parliament in An. 1645. and their want of mony to maintain their Wars put them again in mind of that way of raising mony all other that could be almost thought upon as far as the mony which should be spared by one meal in every family in a week having been before put in Execution so dangerous and of fatal consequence are sometimes but the attempts or beginning of designs and then as the vote tells us the house of Commons having received the report from the grand Committee which was ordered to consider of raising of monyes for supply of the whole Kingdom after some debate thereupon ordered that the Court of Wards and Liveries with the Primer Seisins Oustres les maines and all other profits arising by the said Court should be fully taken away and be made null and voyd And that the Sum of one hundred thousand pounds per Annum should be raised in this Kingdom instead of the Revenue thereof to be disposed for the good of this Kingdom and that the proceedings of the said Court should continue Statu quo prius untill an Ordinance for taking away the said Court and paying the yearly Sum of 100000 l. be brought in and past both Houses Which might well have been forborn when no general or extraordinary and not otherwise to be prevented evils but only want of mony for ought yet appears did or could perswade them unto it for a Subversion of so grand a Fundamental of the Government Regality and Laws will never be able to avoid the dangerous consequences which will inevitably follow thereupon and though it should be done by Act of Parliament will but produce and usher in many numberlesse mischiefs and inconveniences to the King Kingdom Nobility Gentry and the most substantial and considerable part of the people And will never be recompenced by the benefits hoped for or which may happen by the intended dissolution of that Court and alteration of those Tenures which in the prospect or event will appear if so many to be no more than these Chap. V. The Benefits or Advantages which are expected by the people in the putting down of the Court of Wardes and Liveryes and changeing the Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service into free and common Socage BY taking away the Service of Warre without the Kingdom when the King or his Lieutenant goeth to warre for forty dayes bearing the Charge of a man and Horse and the payment of Escuage to be assessed by Parliment if he neither go nor send one in his place Respites of Homage petit Serjeanties Fines for Alienation Wardships and payments of Fines for the marriage of the Heirs in minority a rent for the Lands in the interim Reliefs primer seisins Oustre les maines Mesne Rates Liveries and assignment of Widdow Dower The troublesome and powerfull process of the Exchequer costly and long pleadings of their Evidences to avoid seisures for not sueing out Licences of Alienation thereby enforcing them to procure pardons and to plead them Costly Attendance upon Escheators and Feodaries finding of Offices or Inquisitions post mortem producing and finding if the party hath a mind to it of their Evidences Compositions chargeable passing and obtaining grants of the custody of the body and Lands of Wards Trouble and charge of Writs of diem clausit extremum quae plura melâ—us inquirendum Processe of privy Seals Messengers Informations Bills Demurrers as the Case may happen Answers Traverses Replications Rejoynders Commissions Examinations Depositions of Witnesses Orders Hearings Decrees Injunctions all which are but to help to recover or defend the Wards rights and if not in that Court would be
with as much or more cost and trouble as in other Courts Extents Seisures Accompts before Auditors Surcharges and Exceptions Fees to Auditors and their Clarks Concealment of Wardships vexatioâ—s chargeable hunting after them and the cunning search and Inquisition which is made after them by the Escheators Feodaries or Informers busie and malicious Adversaries which is not often and but where the parties endeavour to deceive the King and the Court and evade the Law and the extremities put upon them by granting it and the Mesne rates to the fierce discoverers or such as seek profit out of other mens troubles and afflictions Restraints from felling of Timber without Licence of the Court begetting the charges of motions the attending upon the Court and their many Officers A constant and certain yearly Revenue of eighty thousand pounds per annum or so much more as the Revenue shall fall short of twenty thousand pounds per annum which the alienation office now yields to be added to it will be duely answered and paid to his Majesty which will with all charges expences deducted as is alleaged be as much as was yearly gained to the Crown by the Court of Wards and Liveries or any dependances thereof against which if there shall be opposed and put into the other end of the ballance these inconveniences following they will weigh very much the heavier CHAP VI. The great and very many Mischiefs and Inconveniences which will happen to the King and Kingdom by the taking away of Tenures in Capite and Knight Service FOR that Lands in Socage will if the Mothers be alive during the minority of the heirs most commonly fall until the age of fourteen years into their Guardianships who as all women which have an estate considerable either real or personal in their own right or their Childrens do more then nine in every ten unleâ—â— which seldome happens they shall be such good women and loving as for their love to their Children and dead Husband to deny themselves their expected content by a second Husband by the temptations and flatteries of younger Brothers or men of decayed Estates transire ad secundas nuptias marry again all too often within the first year which the Civil Law reserved for the time of their mourning or retirednesse from worldly pleasures and do too commonly bring the Childrens Estate to be as a Sawce to the hungry enough appetite of a Father in Law who being many times as good a Guardian to the Children as the Woolf or Fox is to the Lambs will be sure if he do not spend both the Mothers and Childrens Estates and bring them to beggery to be gnawing and put many a lurch and trick upon them Which might be the Reason that the prudent Romans were so little willing that the Mothers of any Children should after their Husbands death be the Guardians of them as they had a Custome that the Mothers themselves should be in perpetua Tutela in a perpetual Wardship or Guardianship for Cicero would have it that Mulieres propter infirmitatem Consilii Women though of full Age should by reason of their unfitnesse to govern or give Counsail be in Tutorum Potestate have Tutors assigned them and the Judicious Cato declared it openly in publicae Concione in a publique Speech concerning the Oppian Law that Majores nostri nullam nè privatam quidem rem agere Faeminas â—ine Auctore vâ—luerùnt Their Ancestors did not permit Women to meddle not so much as in private affairs without a Director or Overseer And Vlpian tells us that Lege Atilia sancitum ut mulieribus et pupillis Tutores non habentibus a Praeâ—ore et majore parte Tribunorum darentur It was enacted by the Atilian Law That the Praetor or Lord Chief Justice and the greater part of the Tribunes should appoint Guardians to such Women and Children as had none And if the Mothers should either make themselvs or be allowed by the Magistrate as one way or the other it will be most likely to be the Guardians before the Heirs age of 14. or if at 14 the Children should be left as they must to chuse their Guardians themselves the Fear and Awe of the Mothers or their second Husbands Inticements and Kindnesse but for that instant will in all probability induce them to chuse no other so whether before the age of 14 or after it is likely to be no otherwise but that where the Mothers are living marryed again the self-seeking and purloyning Father in Lawes of the Kingdom will be the Guardians and where there are a second Brood of Children which will not be seldom the Estates of the Children of the first Husband shall be sacrificed by the Mothers Consent or permission to the benefit of the second Children whose Father making much of the Mother or flattering her finds it to be no hard matter to make her as willing to it as himself and if she would hinder or doth not like it can but steal her sighs and weep and lament in a Corner for that which she may wish wer otherwise but cannot help it when she is Sub potestate viri Under the Power of a second Husband And if not granted to the Mother or her second Husband but to the Friends of that side which cannot inherit which where the Mother is not an heir must of necessity be to her kindred it will not then also escape another common often and sadly experimented fault or evil that the affections and care which doth usually assist and incourage honest and fair Dealings will not be so much in the kindred on the Mothers side which is but taken out of their Family and transplanted into that of the Fathers where the Mother her self is to forget her Fathers house and kindred nor equal that affection care and obligation which is on the part of the Fathers kindred to preserve that Family which weares their Name as well as their Blood And whether the Guardian in Socage shall be Tutor Testamentarius ordained by the Fathers last Will and Testament or a Pretore datus appointed by a Judge will not arrive to any better Fate or Condition than that where there be Executors or Administrators in personal Estates or Trustees in Real or Personal for Children and minors or for payment of debts who can many times neglect and forget the dying requests of Parents on their death Beds to to be careful of their Children and their own imprecations that God should do so and so to their own Children if they should not perform the trusts and let out their Consciences Hackney to the Devil to find ways to deceive and wrong them of whom and many other such Guardianships and faithlesse performances of trusts our Courts of Law and Equity do dayly heare more Complaints of fraudes and cosenings than they can either easily find out or remedy Which with that also of Father in Laws do in a woful experience exceed
prove to be of evil consequence if any of our new Socage men should like the Snakes thinking themselves the younger by casting off their Skins fancy in their old or the next factious humour they shall meet with that they are only to pay their rent and doe the services belonging to their Lands but are not bound to pay that principal part of their natural as well as sworn Allegiance to take Armes to defend the King and the Kingdome more especially when they shall hold their Lands in libero et communi Socagio et pro omnibus servitiis per fidelitatem tantum in free and common Socage by fealty for all services which may be more than a litle prejudicial to the Kingdome and the salus populi safety of the people so much fought for as was pretended to exchange the men of Armes and such as are fit for war as the Tenures in Capite doe truly and not feignedly import for those that shall claim exemption from wars and are by all nations understood to be the unfittest for it when those that by Tenure of their Lands and by reason of their Homage and Fealty were alwayes ready and bound to doe it and those that by a fealty not actually or but seldome taken will suppose themselves not to be bound at all unto it but being most disloyal will as some thousands of Phanatiques have lately done imagine themselves to be most faithful and where the Knight Service men were to forfeit their Lands so holden if they did not doe their service within two years or pay Escuage assessed by Parliament if they went not when they were summoned or sent another in their stead the new or old Socage men shall be under no manner of penalty of forfeiture at all Which may seem to be the cause that England and all other Civilized and well constituted Nations Kingdoms did put that value upon Homage of which there is some likeness of Fealty also in that of the Princes mighty men of Israel and all the Sons likewise of King David submitting themselvs at his command unto Solomon giving the hand under Solomon as the margent renders like that Oath of Abrahams Steward as they understood it to be of the Essence of Soveraignty the great Assistant and preserver of it and the Bond of Obedience fixed and radicated in the interest of mens Estates kept in and guarded by their fear of loosing them And made our Kings so highly prize the Homages of their Subjects and conceive them to be the Liaisons or fastenings that kept their Crowns fast upon their heads as King H. 2. when he had unadvisedly made his Son Henry King in his life time caused the English Nobility to do Homage unto him and R. 1. returning out of Captivity had found that his Brother Iohn had almost stollen into his Throne caused himself to be Crowned the second time and took the Homages of his Nobility and our Kings have been heretofore so careful as alwayes at their Coronation to take the Homages of their Nobility and after a vacancy of a Bishoprick not to restore the Temporalties until the succeeding Bishop shall have done his Homage And appears to be no lesse valued by Foreign Princes when as Phillip King of France would and did to his cost refuse to receive the Homage of our King E. 3. by proxie but compelled him to do it in his own person for the Dutchy of Aquitain and an Arch-Duke of Austria was constrained in person to do his Homage to the King of France between the hands of his Chancellor for Flan-Flanders and the now Emperor of Germany hath lately and most industriously travailed through many of his Dominions and Kingdoms to receive the personal Homages of the Princes and Nobility thereof and not omitted to go to Gratz and Carinthia to have it as formally as really done unto him And was such a Jewel in their Crowns as they could sometimes to pacifie the greatest of their troubles by the Seditions and Rebellions of their Subjects find no greater or fitter a pawn or security to assure the performance of their promises and agreements than an absolving their Subjects from their Homage and Obedience which were as Synonimes or of one and the same signification in case of Breach of promises as our King Henry the 3 d. did in his necessities to Richard Marshal Earl of Pembroke that he should be freed from his Homage Si rex pactum suum violaret if the King should break his agreement and as the Antient Earls of Brabant are said to have done in their Reversals or Grants to their Subjects if they should infringe their Liberties or Privileges Which the seditious party that deposed King Richard the 2 d. knew so well to be a grand Obligation or Tye which Kings had upon their Subjects as they put themselves to the trouble of inventing a new trick of Treason solemnly in the name of the three Estates of the Kingdom viz. Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons to renounce their Homages Fealties and Allegiance and all Bonds Charges and Services belonging thereunto which would have been to as little purpose as it was contradictory to all the Rules of Right Reason and Justice if they had not forced the distressed imprisoned King by a publick instrument upon Oath to absolve all his Subjects a Juramento fidelitatis homagiis omnique vinculo ligeanciae from their Oaths of Fealty and Homage and all Bonds of Allegiances and to swear and promise never to revoke it and is so precious inestimable of so high a nature so useful and of so great a value as nothing but the Kingdom it self can be equivalent unto it And our Nobility did so esteem of the Homage and Service of their Tenants and build as is were their Grandeur and Power upon it as they did antiently grant one to another Homagium Servicium of such and such Tenants Maud the Empresse gave to Earl Alberick de vere servicium decem militum the Service of ten Knights An Earl of Leicester gave to Bygod Earl of Norfolk ten Knights Fees which after the manner of those times may with reason enough be conceived to be only the Homage and Service of so many for the purchase of the Office of Lord high Steward of England and John Earl of Oxford in the Reign of H. 7. did at his Castle of Hedingham in Essex actually receive the Homages of many worthy Knights and Gentlemen that held of him May very much prejudice in their Dignities and Honors as well as Estates the antient Earls and Barons of this Kingâ—om by taking away Tenures in capite changeing them and Knight service Tenures into Socage when as the Earls of Arundel do hold the Castle and Rape of Arundel which is the Honor and Earldom it self by the Service of 84. Knights Fees the Earldom of Oxford is holden by the Service of 30 Knights Fees and that by a modus
and be admitted Turn the Tenures in Capite which are only so called from the duty of Homage and the acknowledgement of Soveraignity and Headship in the King into a Tenure in Socage which is so far from acknowledgeing the King to be chief or to ingage as the other doth their Lands to do him service as it is but a Tenure as it were a latere is no more then what one Neighbour may acknowledge to hold or doe to another for his Rent or money be a Lease for a Life or one or more years or as Tenant at will and levels and makes rather an equality then any respect of persons which if ever or at all reasonable or fit to be done is in a democratical or popular way of Government but will be unexampled and is not at all to be in Monarchy may make many of the people which are not yet recovered out of a gainful Lunacy to beleive they were in the right when they supposed themselves to be the Soveraigns Ireland which in the subverting Olivers time was to have their Swords by the like Tenure turned into Plow-shares though their warres and taxes were never intended to leave them was to pay but 12000 l. per annum to turn their better Tenures Conditions into worse will if they be not come again to their wits expect the like prejudicial bergain Bring many inconveniences and mischiefs to the Nobility and Gentry of Scotland if their Tenures in Capite and Knight service and those which are holden of them as Mesn Lords shall as ours be taken away with their services and dependencies Licences of Alienation benefits of Investitures infeodations and the like it being amongst others as a reason given for Wardships in that Kingdom in the Laws of Scotland in the reign of their Malcombe the 2. which was before the Conquerours entring into England Ne non suppeterent Regiae Majestatis facultates to the end that the King should have where-withall to defend the Kingdom And a letting loose of a fierce and unruly people who are best of all kept in awe order by a natural long well enough liked subjection to their Mesne Lords and Superiours into a liberty which cannot be done without a disjointing and over-turning all the Estates of the Nobility and Gentry of that Kingdom and may like our late English Levellers either endeavour to do it or bring themselves and the whole Nation to ruine by a renversing of the fundamental Laws and that antient order and constitution of that Kingdom wherein the estates and livelyhood of all the Nobility and Gentry and better part of the people are hugely concerned And besides a great damage to the King in his Revenues and profits arising out of such Tenures if not recompenced by some annual payment Will howsoever take away that antient Homage and acknowledgement of Superiority which from that Kingdom to this of England cannot be denyed to be due and to have been actually and antiently done and presidented and not in one but several ages fidem obsequium ut vassallos Angliae Regibus superioribus dominis jurejurando promisisse to have done their Homage and Fealty as vassals to our English Kings and bound themselves by oath thereunto as namely to Alfred Edgar Athelstane William the Conqueror William Rufus Maud the Empresse Henry the second and Edward the first the later of whom with all the Baronage of England in a Letter to the Pope did upon the search of many Evidences and Records stoutly assert it Will be no small damage and disturbance to the Kings other Regalities and Prerogatives and in the Tenures of the Cinque Ports who are to provide fifty ships for the guarding of the Seas and the Town of Maldon in Essex one the Town of Lewis in Sussex as the Book of Doomsday informeth where King Edward the Confessor had 127 Burgesses in dominio eorum consuetudo erat si Rex ad Mare custodiendum sine se suos mittere voluisset de omnibus hominibus cujuscunque terrae fuissent colligebant 20 sâ—lidos hos habebant qui in manibus arma custodieâ—ant had 127 Burgesses in his demeâ—ne of the King and when he sent any of his men to guard the Seas they were to gather 20 s. a man which was to be given to those that manned the Ships in Colchester where the custom then was that upon any expedition of the Kings by Sea or Land every house was to pay six pence ad victum soldariorum Regis towards the quarter or livelyhood of the Kings Souldiers and likewise prejudice him in his grand and Petit Serjeanties and many thousand other reservations of honour and profit by and upon Tenures in Capite and Knight service which revived and called out of their Cells wherein those that are to do and pay them are content they should sleep and take their rest for ever would go near to make and maintain an Army with men and Provisions The King when the Tenures in Capite shall be taken away shall never be able to errect his Standard and to call thereunto all that hold Lands Fees Annuities and Offices of him to come to his assistance according to the duty of their Tenures and the Acts of Parliament of 11 H. 7. chap. 18. And 19. H. 7. chap. 1. of forfeiting the Lands and Offices holden of him under the penalties which was the only means which the late King his Father had to protect as much as he could himself and his Subjects or to manifest the justice of his Cause in that War which was forced upon him and was very useful and necessary heretofore for the defence of the Kings of England and their People and proved to be no otherwise in the Bellum Standardi so called in the reign of King Stephen where some of the Barons of England and some of the English Gentry gathered themselves to the Royal Standard and repelled and beat the King of Scotland and in several Kings reigns afterwards repulsed the Scotch and Welch Hostilities and Invasions and at Floddon Field in King H. 8 ths time when the Duke of Norfolk and his Son the Earl of Surrey and diverse of the Nobility and Gentry which accompanied them vanquished and slew the King of Scots The benefit whereof the Commons of England had so often experimented as in diverse Parliaments they Petitioned the King and Lords to cause the Lord Marchers and other great men to repair into their Counties and defend the borders and was so necessary in France to assemble together the Bans and Arrierebans which were but as our Tenants in Capite as it helped King Charles the 7 th of France to recover that Kingdom again out of the hands and possession of our two Henries the 5. and 6. Kings of England And if any Rebellion or Conspiracy shall hereafter happen When Cum saepe coorta Seditio saevitque animis ignobile vulgus Fury and Rage of
punished for it hath been clearly asserted by eminent and learned Judges and Sages of the Law as the Lord cheif Justice Hobart Sr. Francis Bacon and Sr. Jonh Davis Attorney General to King James in Ireland that the Superlative power of Parliaments above all but the King is in some things for restrained as it cannot enact things against Right Reason or common Right or against the Lawes of God or Nature that a man shall be Judge in his own Case as that the King shall have no Subsidies whereby to defend himself and his people that Children shall not obey their Parents and the like And that Tenures in Capite and by Knight service are of so transcendent a nature and so radically in the Crown and Fundamental Lawes as no Act of Parliament can take it away or alter it and are so inseperable as Sr. John Davis saith that in a Parliament holden in England in the latter end of the raign of King James it was resolved by the House of Commons that the Wit of man could not frame an Act of Parliament whereby all Tenures of the Crown might be extinguished And Judge Hutton who in the Case of the Ship-money would allow the King no more Prerogative then what could not be denyed him did publicquely deliver it for Law which in that great and learned Assembly of Judges and Lawyers was not contradicted that Tenures in Capite are so inseperable in the Crown as the Parliament will not nor cannot sever them and the King cannot release them And such is the care for the defence of the Kingdome which belongeth inseperably to the King as Head or supream Protector so as if any Act of Parliament should enact that he should not defend the Kingdome or that he should have no aides from his Subjects to defend the Realm such Acts would not bind but would be void because they would be against all natural Reason And Judge Crooke also doth in his Argument against the Ship-money wherein he concurred with Justice Hutton alleage that if a statute were made that a King should not defend the Kingdome it were void being against Law and Reason And when a Parliament is called by the Kings Writ to preserve his Kingdom and Magna Charta so little intends that any future Parliament should alter or take away any Liberties granted or confirmed thereby or any fundamental Laws which are incorporate with the essence of Government as it hath been by several confirmations of it enacted that all Laws hereafter to be made to the contrary shall be Null and void and with good reason as to the King and Mesne Lords in the changing of their Tenures into Socage when as ex contractu obligatio and ex obligatione Actio should as well hold in those benificial pactions which were in the Creation of those Tenures betwixt the King Lords and Tenants as in Bonds Bills and Assumpsits or any other contracts whatsoever And is so great a part of right Reason in the opinion of Forreigners and according to the Law of Nature and Nations as in the German Empire though it hath heretofore lost much of its power and authority by the greatnesse of some of the Princes and the many Liberties and Priviledges granted to Cities Towns its remaining Prerogatives notwithstanding are said to be Jura Majestatis instar puncti divisionem non recipientia adeoque Imperatoris personae cohaerent ut nec volens ijs se abdicare aut alium in consortium vocare possit so inseperable as they are capable of no division and do so adhere unto the Emperors person as he cannot if he would renounce or transferre them over to any other And Bodiâ— that understood France very well saith that Si Princeps publica praedia cum imperio aut jurisdictione eo modo fruenda concesserit quo ipse fruetur etiam si Tabulis jura Majestatis excepta non fuerunt ipso jure tamen excepta judicantur if the King shall grant any of his Lands to hold as freely and with as much power and jurisdiction as he himself enjoyed it the jura Majestatis or Regalities are always adjudged and taken to be excepted though there be no reservation or exception in the Letters Patents And the Parliament of Paris were so careful of the Kings Rights in Governing as when Francis the first had granted to the Queen his Mother a Commission to pardon and restore condemned persons it declared that such a grant quum sine Majestatis diminutione communicari non possit seeing it could not be granted without diminution of his Royal Authority was void thereupon the Queen Mother intermedled no more therein The Conclusion WHen all therefore which can be but pretended against Tenures in Capite and by Knight service shall be put together and said and done they will come to no more then this The general Assessements for men and Horses and necessaries for War whether men will or no are a service incumbent upon every mans estate though they bought and purchased their Lands the Knight service which is now complained of is but where their Lands were given them for that purpose and ex pacto voluntate by Agreement For it hath allwayes been accompted to be no less than reason that qui sentit commodum sentire debet et onus the Rose and the Prickle must goe together and he that hath the profit may be well contented to doe something for it especially when it is no more then what he did agree to doe and beleived it to be a favour And if they now take those Lands to be a burden may if they please give themselves an ease by retorning of them to those that gave it And should not be murmured at or complained of when as those that live near the Sea doe live under a Charge or Imposition which is annual and sometimes very great upon all And in Holland are commanded and ordered yearly by the Dijck Graven or Magistrates appointed for that purpose to repair and amend their Sea walles Or as it is also in England by Direction of Law and Commissions of Sewers and doe but in that though their Lands were dearly paid for and not freely given as those doe which hold their Lands by Knight service and defend themselves by defending others And it will ever be a Rule and Maxime in Loyalty as well as in Law and right Reason that by the Lawes of God Nature and Nations as well as of England there is and ought to be a natural Allegiance to the King that Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy doe enjoyn every Subject to defend his Prince and his just Rights and Jurisdictions And that the safety of every man in particular and his own discretion should advise him to it unless they will think it to be wisdome in the Citizens of Constantinople who in the Seige thereof would rather keep their money and riches for the Turks to plunder then help
Officers of the Bench made in the second year of the King Nor was there so much as an Apprehension of any evil in them in the Parliament of 4 H. 4. where the Commons pray that The Act of Parliament of the 1 of E. 3. that none shall be distrained to go out of their Counties but only for the Cause of necessity of suddain coming of strange Enemies into the Realm and the Statute made in the 18 th year of the Reign of the said King That men of Armes Hoblers and Archers chosen to go in the Kings Service out of England shall be at the Kings wages from the day that they do depart out of the Counties where they were chosen and also that the Statute made in the 25 th year of the Raign of the said King that none be compelled to find Men of Arms Hoblers nor Archers other than those which hold by such services unlesse it be by common assent and grant made in Parliament be firmly holden and kept in all points it was upon the granting of their desires and an Act of Parliament made for that purposâ— as the Declaration of the Lords and Commons in Parliament against the Kings Commission of Array in an 1642 mentioneth especially provided that by force or colour of the said supplication nor of any Statute thereupon to be made the Lords nor any other that have Lands or Possessions in the Counties of Wales or in the Marches thereof shall in no wise be excused of their Services and Devoires due of their said Lands and Possessions nor of any other Devoier or things whereunto they or any of them be especially bound to the King though that the same Lords and others have other Lands and Possessions within the Realm of England nor that the Lords or other of what Estate or Condition soever they be that hold by Esâ—uage or other Services due to the King any Lands and Possessions within the said Realm be no way excused to do their Services and Devoirs due of the said Lands and Possessions nor that the Lords Knights Esquires nor other Persons of what Estate or Condition they be which hold and have of the Grant or Confirmation of the King Lands Possessions Fees Annuities Pensions or other yearly profits be not excused to do their Services to the King in such manner as they are bound because of the Lands Possessions Fees Annuities Pensions or Profits afâ—resaid And might challenge their quietus est or Proclamation of acquittall when there were no complaints made against them in the former ages when there were so many Taxes laid upon Knights Fees as 20 shillings then a great sum of money as much almost as 20 markes is now upon every Knights Fee imposed by King R. 1. toward his ransome 26 s. 8 d. upon every Knights Fee by King Iohn and another also of the same sum towards his expedition into Wales 20 s. upon every Knights Fee towards his Charges in Normandy an Escuage of 20 s. upon every Knights Fee to be paid the one half at Easter and the other at Michaelmas besides the Escuage which he had upon the marriage of his Sister Isabel to the Emperor Frederick two Escuages imposed by H. 3. and an Escuage upon the marriage of his Daughter the Lady Margaret to Alexander King of Scots 20 s. of every Knights Fee by H. 4. the many services in person done by those which held in capite and Knights Service in forinseco servitio in all the expeditions and Wars in France from the time of the Norman Conquest to the end of the Raign of E. 4. and at home in the Wars betwixt England and Wales and betwixt England and the Scots where very many Inhabitants of the Counties of Cumberland Westmeâ—land and Northumberland that held by Cornage a kind of Knight Service to blow a horn upon the invasion or incursion of the Scots and to help to repell them and had their Lands sometimes at the Will of the Lords conferred and given to the younger and more lusty Sons who were able to undergo that service could before King James his accession to the Crown of England the pacification of the English and Scottish hostilities placing them under one obedience scarce rest in their beds by reason of the Scots sudain or nightly alarmes and depredations driving or stealing their Cattell and spoiling all that they had And in all the troubles of England before and since the Barons Wars upon any Rebellions and inquietudes of the people when those that held by Knight service were frequently and hastily summoned to come to the King cum Equis Armis and the great charges trouble hazard and expences which the Lords Mâ—sne were put unto by Assessements of Escuage and otherwise And that immediately upon the death of the Kings Tenants in capite by Knight Service the Escheators did usually seise not only the Lands of the greatest of the Nobility Gentry and meaner men But the Stock and Cattell upon their grounds and the Goods in their Houses insomuch as their Executors were many times constrained to Petition and obtain the Kings Writs and Allowance to have the Stock and personal Estate delivered unto them And yet no complaints made at all against those Tenures or necessary defences of the Kingdome nor against Tenures by grand or Petit Serjeanty in the thirty confirmations of our Magna Charta upon as often Breaches to be supposed of it Never complained off in the making of thirty six Acts of Parliament concerning Wardships and Tenures in the several times and Ages from 8 H. 3. to this present nor at the making of the Act of Parliament in 32 H. 8. for the erection of the Court of Wards Nor in so many thousand Petitions which have been in 186. several Parliaments for almost four hundred years last past or before 9 H. 3. or ever since this nation could remember any thing either in our Parliaments Micel-gemots Wittena-gemots conventus sapientum or Magna Concilia where all the Grievances and Complaints of the people not to be remedied else where came as to the Pool of Bethesda for help and relief and wherein if any in some one or more Parliaments should so much neglect their duty and the more than ordinary business and concernments of their Kings themselves and Countries with which they were intrusted and to which their Oaths of Allegiance if nothing else must needs be their Monitors it cannot without a supposition and belief which will never be able to find entertainment in any rational mans understanding be imagined that the whole Nation for so many Ages past and in so many Assemblies of those that should be the Sons of Wisdome should be bound up under such a fate of Stupidity or Ignorance as to represent those that were sick and not know of it or that all or any of them should propter imbecillitatem vel pernegligentiam by a to be pitied weakness or negligence not either seek or