Selected quad for the lemma: justice_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
justice_n	king_n	law_n	right_n	3,390	5	7.1155	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A88241	Rash oaths unwarrantable: and the breaking of them as inexcusable. Or, A discourse, shewing, that the two Houses of Parliament had little ground to make those oaths they have made, or lesse ground to take, or presse the taking of them, being it is easie to be apprehended, they never intended to keep them, but onely made them for snares, and cloaks for knavery, as it is clearly evinced by their constant arbitrary and tyranicall practices, no justice nor right being to be found amongst them; by meanes of which they have declaratorily, and visibly lost the very soule and essence of true magistracy, (which is, the doing of justice, judgement, equity ... In which is also a true and just declaration of the unspeakable evill of the delay of justice, and the extraordinary sufferings of Lievtenant Colonell John Lilburne, very much occasioned by M. Henry Martins unfriendly and unjust dealing with him, in not making his report to the House. All which with divers other things of very high concernment, are declared in the following discourse, being an epistle, / written by Lievtenant-Colonell John Lilburne, prerogative prisoner in the Tower of London, to Colonell Henry Marten, a member of the House of Commons of England ... May 1647.	Lilburne, John, 1614?-1657.	1647 (1647)	Wing L2167; Thomason E393_39; ESTC R201615	53,968	58

people for no other end in the world but to provide for their weale and happinesse and to redresse their mischiefs and grievances unfortified at all by the established knowne and declared Law of the Kingdome degenerate from your trust destroy their Liberties and trades overthrow their Lawes and the Bounds that establish meum tuum and tyrannize over their persons ten times worse then ever the King did or his wicked and evill Ministers of Justice the Judges and Patentee Monopolizers especially all of whom you cannot deny but he at the beginning of your Session surrendred up to you to be punished by you according to Law Justice which in them you extreamely perverted and tooke bribes for the acquitting the capitallest of them and otherwise made use of them to do more mischiefe since to the Common-wealth then ever they had done before by assuring any thing for Law that you would propound to them by meanes of which you with your wicked and unbounded Priviledges have dared to exercise the absolutest and grandest tyranny over the lives liberties trades properties and estates of the Freemen of England that ever was I dare positively aver it since it was a Nation governed by an established and declared Law to your eternall and everlasting shame I speake it so that truly if the Freemen of England seriously look upon all your late publike and to us visible actions and compare them with their former enjoyments they may justly take up Miach's lamentation and say with him to you The good man is perished out of the earth and there is none upright amongst you men they or you all lie in waite for blood they or you hunt every man his brother with a net that they or you may do evill with both hands earnestly the Prince asketh and the Judge asketh for a reward and the great man he uttereth his mischievous desire so they wrap it up therefore woe unto the Parliament for the best of them is as a briar the most upright is sharper then a thorne hedge the day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh now with a vengeance shall bee their perplexity therefore O all ye understanding Commons of England in reference to your Parliament Trustees trust ye not in a friend put ye no confidence in a guide for your enemies are the men of your owne House Micah 7.2,3,4,5,6 Therefore M. Martin I professe it before you and all the world that were I rationally able I would make no scruple of conscience to help forward with my sword in my hand the distruction of every lawlesse tyrannicall treacherous man amongst you that I should groundedly know to be a ring-leader in the fore-said transcendent vilenesse then I should to help to destroy so many rats or devouring vermin and by your owne fore-mentioned Principles Declarations Protestations Oathes Actions and doings it will undeniably be justified to be lawfull for all the Commons of Englands to do the same towards you But now Sir let us come to some particulars in the first place the 29. Chap and the most excellent Petition of right which I call the English-mans legall treasure doth clearly condemne all the pract●ses amongst you for they expressely say that no Freeman shall be taken and imprisoned or be disseized of his freehold or liberties or free-customes or be out-lawed or exiled or any otherwise destroyed nor we will not passe upon him nor condemne him but by lawfull judgement of his Peers that is to say equalls or men of his owne condition or by the Law of the Land We will sell to no man we will not deny or defer to any man either iustice or right and that no man be imprisoned without cause shewed or expressed in his Warrant of Commitment nor no man refused Habeas Corpus's for any cause whatever nor no man taken by Petition nor suggestion made to our Lord the King nor his Counsell unlesse it be by Indictment or Presentment of his good and lawfull People of the same neighbourhood where such deeds be done 25. E. 3.4 in due manner or by Processe made by Writ Originall at the common Law nor that none be put out of his Franchises nor of hi● Free-holds unlesse he be duly brought in to answer and fore-judged of the same by th● course of the Law and that no man hereafter be compelled to make or yeeld any guift bond benevolence taxe or such like charge without common consent by Act of Parliament Now compare your daily and hourly actions to those good just and unrepealed Laws and blush for shame But to wipe all this off you will it may be say the same that is said in your Declaration of the 17 of Aprill 1645 Booke Decl. 2 part pag. 879. That the end of the Primitive institution of all government is the safty and weale of the people which is above all Lawes and therefore the Kingdome being imbroyled in warre necessitated nacessitie compells you to doe many actions contrary to the knowne Lawes of the Land without the doing of which actions wanting the puntillo of the Kings consent you could not save your selves nor the kingdome will admit all this for a truth I pray then why doe you impose such illegall devilsh impossible to be kept contradicting Oaths and Covenants upon all the Freemen of England upon such sever penalties that all men must be disfranchised or destroyed that will not take them and in them without any provisoes eautions limitations or declared exceptions and reservation tye them to maintaine the Law of the Land and the lawful● rightes and liberties of the Subjects of England is not this to force men to sweare to contradict and oppose to the death all your actions and to destory you for doing those actions because they are contrary to the Law and Liberties of England O yee forsworne men for so I may call you all that have taken these illegall damnable hellish and soule insnaring Oaths because ye do your selves and suffer to be done daily such things as tends to the absolute distruction of the Lawes and the lawfull Liberties of the freemen of England which by all these Oaths you have sworne to maintaine and defend with all your might and yet there is not one just nor righteous man amongst you that dare avowedly and publiquely to the whole Kingdom protest against all the rest but by parsilent patient and constant seting there owne approve of all their actions O ye unworthy forsworne men in the highest degree for this may too justly be the stile and title of all and every one of you without exceptions in the condition of the visablest best of whom for Millions of Gold I would not be for if perjuries swearings and false swearings be so odious abominable and detestable unto God as in Scripture he declares they are read Exod 20.7 Lev. 19.11.12 Num. 30.2 Deut. 23.21.22.23 Psal 15.4 Eccl. 5.4.5 Ezek. 17.13.14.15.16.17.18.19 Jer. 24.10 Zek. 5.3.4.9.8.16.17 Then woe wee and vengance upon earth is your vadoubted

may be returned to the custody and disposing of those persons of whose faithfullnesse and wisedome in managing thereof you have had great experience and that none may be put out of Command in the Trained Bands or Auxiliaries who have been and are of known good affection to the Common wealth All which we humbly intreat may be speedily and effectually accomplished according to the great necessity and exigency of these distracted times and as in duty bound we shall pray c. And having presented it in writing a day two or three after they presented it publiquely in print to the members of the House the issue of which as I have it out of your own Diurnall was thus Die Mercuris 2 Junii 1647 A Petition stiled the humble Petition of many thousands of well affected people was this day read The question being put whether an answer shall be given to this Petition at this present the house was devided the yeas went forth Sir John Evelin of Wilts Sir Michael Levisay tellers for the yea with the yea 112. Mr. Hollis Sir William Luis tellers for the no with the no●s 128 so that the qu●stion past with the negative But the Petitioners going up s●me few dayes after for an answer to their petition and being extreamly in base provoking and insufferable language abused by that worshipfull Gentleman Major Generall Massie c. which provoked divers of them to send in a paper to Mr. Speaker as their last farewell the copy of which thus followeth Mr Speaker divers Citizens have been here attending for an answer of a Petition delivered by Sir William Waller on Wednesday last their desire is that the house may be acquainted that the petitioners have seen the Vote of the House and have discharged themselves from further attendance for the present and will notwithstanding still seeke just and equitable meanes for to ease the grievances of this poore distracted Kingdome and comfortably put an end to the groanings of this miserable distressed nation And having sent it in away they came and now in my apprehension have no other course to take but to remonstrate and justly to declare to all the Commons of England and the Army the unpartaleld illegall and tyrannicall dealing of the House of Commons with them and to presse them by force of Armes to root up and destroy these tyrants which without any scruple of conscience they may doe if it were lawfull for the two Houses to levie warre against the King for tyranny declared by them seeing I am sure there is a hundred times greater and more visibler and if it be true as Sir Simon Synod and the John of all Sir Johns now cryes out and sayes that it is not lawfull in any case to fight against the legall Magistrate then I am sure Sir John and Sir Simon are a company of grand Traytors and ought principally to be hanged for being the chiefe Incendiaries in their Pulpets c. to the by past warres against the King who I will justifie it upon the losse of my life by the established law of England the declared government thereof is a thousand times more fenced about and secured so farre as Law can secure then the unjust law and liberty destroying Lords and Commons assembled at Westminster are And secondly I will justifie it that if the principalls or law of reason and nature for preservation take be a sufficient ground to take up Armes against the King and his party as the H●… Parliament have declared they are then the Kingdome and Arm have much more true grounds to take up Armes against them for tyranny visibly avowedly and professedly acted a hundred times more higher and transendent then ever he did that is yet declared And a most reall difference there is betwixt the action of them two in this particular I clearly find by all that J can yet read of either side published to the view of the Kingdome and J thinke that I have read and wayed almost all that is extant that the King by the law of his will did not impose Monopolies and Ship money c. vpon the free men of England but was made to beleeve by his Judges and Counsell at Law being those helpes or assistance that the law of the Kingdom had appointed him to be counselled by out of Parliament that he might impose those things by right or force of the Law of the Kingdome See the dispute in Mr. Hamdens case of Ship-money in the latter end of Judge Huttons Judge Crookes arguments against Ship money pag. 2 3. 4 5 printed by authority of this present Parliament and the Declarations of both sides 1. and 2. part Col. Decl. And indeed to speake according to the declared Law of England the Iudges and his counsell at Law were principally to be blamed and not the King See your own Remonstrance of the 19 May 1642. 1. part book Decl. pag. 199. 304. and the reason in Law is because the Law commands the Judges and Justices of peace and all the rest of the Administrators of it not to delay or disturb common Iustice and right for any command from the King for any other signified by the Great Seale or privie Seale or any other wayes and though such commands doe come the Iudges and Iustices shall not therefore leave to doe right in any point but shall doe common right according to the common Law as though never any such command had been see the 29 chap of Magna Charta and 2. E. 3 8. and 14. E. 3.14 and 11. R. 2.10 And to performe this in every particular every Iudge and Iustice of peace is sworne as appeares by their oathes recorded in Poultons book of Statutes folio 144. and made in the 18. yeare of Edward 3. Anno 1344. which also you may verbatum read in the 29 pag. of a late printed book called Rega● tyranny And it was the duty by law that this Parliament ought to the whole Kingdome to have made all those false and wicked Ship-money Judges examples of terror to future generations As King Alfred before the conquest did for as Andrew Horne in his miror of Iustice pag. 296. saith that Iudges and their Ministers who destroy men by false judgement ought to be destroyed as other murtherers which King Alfred did who hanged in one yeare 44. Iudges as murtherers for their false judg●ments against the Law whose particular crimes and names he specifieth pag. 296. 297 298 299 300. c. But to your everlasting shame be it spoken you took bribes of some of them after the King had surrendred them up to your justice and after that you had impeached them of high Treason and imprisoned them you set them at liberty to sit upon the seat of justice * Which if they had bin made examples of terror you would have got no Iudges to have executed your arbitrary illegall and tirannicall commands to passe sentence upon the lives liberties and properties of the free-men

of England and if I mistake not one of them continues a Judge in your Commission to this very day by meanes of which base and wicked practises of yours I meane the two Houses this poore Kingdome under the pretence of Law hath bin by you fild ●th more oppression injustice then ever it underwent in so short a time since the Norman Conquest there being neither pure Iustice nor Right to be had according to law at the hands either of your Iudges or Iustices of peace being in every particular as corrupt as either the House of Lords or Commons Tyburne or at least to row at Oares as slaves being the fittest portion for the most part of them there being never such out-cryes in the Kings time against has Judges and Justices as you●s denying dayly the benefit of Magna Charta and the Petition of Right to any free-man that a knavish Parliament man appears against as I could easily enumerate divers instances if it were seasonable but I will keep it in banke for a representation for the Army or the next Parliament where I hope they will take speciall care what ever they doe with the present base Judges and Iustices of peace to provide an act of Parliament that we may have our lawes where they a●e ambigues and doubtfull made as plaine as can be made and all our proceedings in law in English briefe and short in plain English words and quick●y to be discided And that it shall be treason in any Iudge or Iustices by vertue of any command whatsoever to pervert the Common law and the Common Iustice of the Kingdome and without such a law and an Annuall Parliament to see it executed the constitution of which in point of Elections had extraordinary need to be amended for now some Counties chusing about 50. As Cornewell and others none as the County of Durham and their corporations many times made by bribes given to corrupt Courtiers to obtaine the Kings Letters patents which meerly flowes from his will to inable them to chuse two Burgesses for Parliament in divers of which petty and paultery Corporations throughout the Kingdome any base fellow for 20. or 30 I may by so many voices as will make him a Burgesse of Parliament and divers of th●se corporations consisting for a great part of Inns and Ale houses will be sure to chuse no other Parliament men but such as are given to deposednesse expensivenesse wickednesse and drinking or at least some Ninnie and Grose wrictor by a great man that as Dr. Bastwick saith hath no more wit in him then will reach from his nose to his mouth And this is the true reason why our Parliament men in all ages have so little regard to the Common and iust liberties of the Kingdome or to the iustice and equity of the lawes they make And therefore as I said in the 54. pag. of Londons Liberties so I say now to you that it would be more rationall and a great deale fuller of justice and equity to destroy all these illegall Corporations and fix upon them the certain number of Parliament men be they 600. 500. or 400. or more or lesse as by the common consent shall be thought most fit and equally to proportion to every Country to chuse a proportionable number sutable to the rates that each County by their bookes of rates are assessed to pay towards the defraying of the publique charge of the Kingdome and then each County equally and proportionably by the common consent of the people thereof to divide it selfe into Divisions Hundreds or Weapontacks that so all the people without confusion or tumult may meet together in their severall divisions and every free man of England as well poore as rich whose life estate c. is to be taken away by the law may have a Vote in chusing those that are to make the law it being a maxim in nature that no man iustly can be bound without his own consent and care taken that this may be once every yeare without faile and to hold for a certain number of dayes without which this Kingdome will never be free from warres misery and commotions but from this present Parliament I neither looke for good to my particular selfe or the Kingdome in generall the constant and uninterrupted serious of all your visible actions being a visible and cleare demonstartion to the eyes of every unbiosed impartiall and rationall man in England of an absolute violation of the lawes and liberties of England and setting up a perfect tyranny declaring thereby both in the sight of God and man that you have sold and given up your selves to worke and act all manner of wickednesse and impietie admitting no other rule either of reason law or justice to square your actions by but your own perverse and crooked wills being an absolute kind of monsters of the Divells but not of Gods creation who never made any man lawlesse as you avowedly professe your selves to be robbing and poling the poore Kingdome by all manner of illegall taxations Excise c. and then sharing it amongst your selves making nothing of fifty thousand pounds at one breakfast in one morning for ten of your owne Members viz. Mr Denzel Hollis Mr Walter Long c. and for all your Hypocriticall cheating and selfe denying Ordinance within a little while after as I am informed in state Mr. Long as I am told worth five thousand pounds per Annum viz. the Register of the Chancery and make the two Speakers both of whom have been impeched if not of treason yet of high misdemeanors were never yet iustly cleared and acquitted keepers of the great Seale of England to raise up their justly lost repute with the people thereby declaring that it is your study and delight to make use of the corruptest and basest of men amongst you to tyrannize over the people and yet the worst amongst you are so pure and holy that you must not be touched questioned or called to an account for any thing that you say or doe so that your pretence to all our liberties estates trades proprieties and lives is not the law of the kingdome * For Col. Burch a Member of the House of Commons before another Member and the Lieutenant of the Tower did aver before them the other day to iudge Ienkins when he questioned the legality of their proceedings that they did not stand upon the Law nor warrant their actions thereby but saith he we have conquered you by the Sword and by the Sword we will hold it Therefore looke about you Free men of England give the Tyrants their deserts but your owne inherent corrupt lusts and unbounded wills so that the d●fference betwixt you and the King is visible enough and that we have got by our exchange of our former government for your tirannicall domination for I never read not heard that the King in the worst of his raign within it selfe simply considered was I thinke bad enough

and die without Mercy And yet the present Parliament gives authority to divers persons to doe both the forementioned things that is to say to take horses and goods away by force against the wills and minds of the Owners and that before they be legally convicted of any crime which although they sweare to maintaine the Law yet this is absolutly against the Law as Sir Edward Cooke there owne magnified author in his third part instituts chapter 103. folio 228. declares which Booke is published by their own authority and command and he there expressely saith that regalarly the goods c. of any Delinquent cannot be taken and seized to the Kings use before the same be fofited Secondly the same cannot be inuentoried and the Towne charged therewith before the Owner be indicted of record And amongst other authorities as Britton Fleta Bracton c. which he there makes use of he fites the 1 Richard the third chapter 3. by which it is inacted and declared that neither Shriffe Escheater Bayliffe of franchise or any other person take or seize the goods of any person arrested or imprisoned for suspiton of fellony before he be convicted or attaint of the fellony according to the lawes of England or before the goods be other wise lawfully forfeited upon paine to forfit double the value of the goods so taken to the party grieved From which and the other Authorities he there makes use of he saith these two conclusions are manifestly proved First that before indictment the goods or other things of any Offender cannot be searched inventored or in any sort seized nor after indictment seized and removed or taken away before conviction or attainder Secondly that the begging of the goods or state of any Delinquent accused or indicted of any treason fellony or any other offence before he be convicted and attainted is utterly unlawfull because before conviction and attainder as hath been said nothing is forfeited to the King nor grantable by him And besides it either maketh the prosecution against the Delinquent more principitate violent and undue then the guiet and eqaall Proceeding of the Law and Justice would permit or else by some under-hand compossition and agreement stop or hinder the due course of Justice for examplary Punishment of the Offender And lastly saith he when the Delinquent is begged it dischargeth both Judge Jurour and Witnesse to doe their duty And yet for all this many times the Souldiers imployed by the Commanders of the Parliaments presents warre are commanded and inioyned be their Commanders authorised thereunto by authoritie derived from the Parliament to take away Horses goods c. for the supportation and preservation of the present forces which it may be at that time were in great necessitie and danger and the souldiers refusing in that particuler to obey his or there Commander might by the Articles of Warre made by Ordinance of Parliament hazard his life yea and it may be actually hanged first yet poore men when the Parliament have served their turnes of him or them to pay him his Arreares for all his hazards and dangers hee is by their Judges and Ministers made be the Parliament it selfe for the very fore-mentioned actions done in obedience to their commands arraigned indicted and hanged as a fellon therefore see the Marginall Notes of the second Apology of Sir Thomas Fairfax's Souldiers this is just as the builders of Noa's Arke were served for or after their making it Oh admirable Parliamentary Justice worthy for their praise to be recorded to future Generations as an everlasting memoriall of their unpresidented justice and gratitude and yet if any particular man of the Parliament or any of their vermine Catchpoles have a spleen at a man it is easie for him to get a Warrant from the Chaire-man of some particular private Committee to go and search such a mans house that never professed enmity against the just proceedings of Parliament and breake open his doors and take away at their pleasure so many or much of his proper goods as they please Oh pure Justice without spot or blemish Nay any of their Catchpole Rogues or Caterpillars can forceably enter any freemans house when n●ne is in it and load away divers Porters with his proper goods and that without the seeming Authority of any Law or Statute Order or Ordinance of Parliament nay without the Warrant of any private Committee though in Law such a Committees Order is not worth one straw ●ea and when this is complained of to a Committee of Parliament not one ●ram of justice can be had for it And truly Sir besides other instances of this I will onely aver it to be lately my owne for one of M. Corbets and Justice Whitakers Catchpoles Whitaker the Bookseller in Pauls Church-yard London did the very forementioned thing to me of which I complained at my last being before a Committee of your House but could not have one dram of Justice though 〈◊〉 pressed it hard see the relation of it in print called The resolved mans Resolution pag. 12. 13. Sir I pray is not this unspotted Justice and yet is it not as good as the generality of that which now adaies flowes from both Houses In the third place by the Statute of the 27. Eliz. Chap. 2. it is inacted that all and every Jesuites Seminary Priests and other Priests whatsoever marke the word whatsoever made and ordained out of the Realme of England or other her ●ighnesse Dominions or within any of her Majesties Realmes or Dominions marke well the word within by any Authority Power or Jurisdiction derived challenged 〈◊〉 pretended from the See of Rome since the first yeare of her Reigne shall within forty daies after the end of that Session of Parliament depart out of the Kingdome c. And be it further enacted That it shall not be lawfull to or far any Jesu●…e Seminary Priest or other such Priest Deacon or religious or Ecclesiaslicall person whatsoever being borne within this Realme or any other her highnesse Dominions and heretofore since the said Feast of the nativity of S. John Baptist in the first yeare of her Majesties Reigne made ordained or professed or hereafter marke the word hereafter to be made ordained or professed by any Authority or Jurisdiction derived challenged or pretended from the See of Rome by or of what name title or degree soever the same shall be called or known to come into be or remaine in anie part of this Realm c. mark the last sentence well after the end of forty daies otherwise then in such speciall cases and upon such speciall occasions onely and for such time only as is expressed in this Act and if he doe that then every such offence shall be taken and adjudged to be high Treason and every person so offending shall for his offence be judged a Traytor and shall suffer losse and forfeit as in case of high Treason And it is there further enacted That whosoever shall wittingly

They doe declare their high dislike of that Petition their approbation and esteem of their good Service who first discovered it and of all such Officers and Soldiers as have refused to joyne in it and that for such as have been abused and by the parswasion of others drawn to subscribe it if they shall for the future manifest their dislike of what they have done by forbearing to proceed any further in it it shall not be looked upon as any caus to take away the remembrance sence the houses have of the good service they have formerly done but they shall still be retained in their good opinion and shall be cared for with the rest of the Army in all things necessary and fitting for the satisfaction of persons that have done so good and faithfull service and as may be expected from a Parliament so carefull to performe all things appertaining to honour and justice as on the other side it is declared that all those who shall continue in their distempered condition and goe on in advancing and promoting that petition shall be looked upon and proceeded against as enemies to the State and d●sturbers of the publique peace Die Martis 30. Martii 1647. Ordered by the Lords assembled in parliament that this Declaration be forthwith printed and published John Brown Cler. Parliamentorum Now Sir to conclude the tyrannicall house of Lords having most illegally barbarously tirannically and unjustly committed me to prison and sentenced me under wh●se tyranny you are willing to suffer me to perish and then by your and their whifling and buking Curs to bespatter and reproach me in print thereby strongly indeavouring to m●ke me as odiou● in the eyes of the sons of men as Job was in all his botches and alasse pocre I must be kept in pri●… 〈…〉 without pen or inke accesse of friends or any 〈…〉 and so deprived of all means to vindicate my 〈…〉 ●…ce write in my owne behalfe and set my name to wi●… 〈◊〉 ●…ing alwayes ready to owne and iustifie my lines and to seale then with my 〈◊〉 blood yet my wife must be made a prisoner and fetched up to your arbitrary Committees for dispersing of my bookes and the book women in Westminster Hall that sell them must have then shops and houses searched and rob'd of all my bookes by your Catch poules and if you suspect any for printing of them they must be sure to be dealt worse wi●h then if they were Traytors and enemies to their Country and have their houses rob'd and spoyled of their goods and presses with which they earne bread for them and their families and carried away by force before any legall tryall or conviction of any crime contrary to the lawes of the land which possitively declares that no free man of England forfeits his lands goods or livelyhoods tell he be convicted of a crime 1 R. 3.3 Cookes 2. part institutes chap 103. fol. 228. 229. See the Petition of Right yea and their bodies imprisoned most tyrannicall and illegally without baile or maineprize although there be no collour in law for the pretended cause of their commitment nor no power in law for any Committee of your house to commit a printer or any other free man in England to prison See the law authorities mentioned in Judge Jenkins late printed papers And when the prisoner according to the law of the Kingdome sues for a Habias Corpus which legally cannot be denyed to any prisoner whatsoever and by vertue thereof be brought before the present Judges of the Kings bench Justice Bacon and Justice Rowles yet contrary to law and their owne oathes which oaths are before mentioned they refuse to deliver the prisoner so uniustly imprisoned or to take baile for his forthcomming but returne him back to prison againe there contrary to law and iustice to be kept without bail or maineprize Oh horrible tyrannie oppression and iniustice and yet as I am certainly informed this was the case of Mr. Thomas Paine a Printer the last tearme Nay your Catchpoules by their owne power can and have forceably entered and felloniously and illegally carried away my proper and truly com'd by goods to a large value for which though I complained to your Committee yet could I not obtaine from their hands one dram of Justice See my examination before them called the resolved mans resolution pag. 12. Nay this is not all for when your members and the Lords and their catchpoules creatures have sufficient railed at me and reproached me and tyed up my hands by depriving me of all meanes as they thought to publish any thing for my owne defence then they as I conce●ve ioyne together and git some lying Presbyter assemblie man or other for the Author concealing his name and I not able to find it out I apprehend and iustly conceive I have iust cause to lay it to them it being so sutable to the constant meanes they and their Creatures use to set up their new reformed Kingdome to frame contrive and publish to the view of the world a Recantation in my name that J my selfe though my name be to it had not the least finger in or knowledge of thereby to render me odious to the purpose and to declare me a weather cock follow and as fass●l and easie in changing my former avowed just principles as the Lords and Commons and assembly men at Westminster are to change theirs But Sir if God permit I shall take a more fi●t oppertunity to anotomize that grosse peice of Pa●l●…mentary assembly knavery And therefore I must plainly tell you seeing the Lords and Commons at Westm●nster have dealt so ●arb rously and illegally with 〈◊〉 as they have done * And not with me but also with M. Over●on his wife and brother and Mr. Larners man and maid who are all yet in person and can have nor obtain any iustice from either of your houses and are worse then the unrighteous Iudge that upon no importunity will doe me Justice I am now in good sober resolved earnest determined to appeale to the whole Kingdome and Army against them and it may be thereby come quittance with them and measure unto them as they have measured to me and doubt not but to make it evident that though some of your members call the Army Rebells and Traitors for contesting with those that gave them their power and authority that they themselves a●e reall Rebells and Traitors to the trust reposed in them by the free people of England their Empero●rs Lords and Masters And that the Army are really and truly a company of Rogues Knaves and traiterous Villains to themselves and their native Country if they should disband upon any tearmes in the world till they have brought them to examplary Justice and made them vomit up the vast sums of the publiques money that they have swallowed down into their devowring canniball mawes and firmly setled the peace and iustice of the Kingdome which that they may faithfully and cordially doe is and shall be the daily prayer of him that hath been and will be againe your true friend if you will repent of your remissenesse and slacknesse and manifest your selfe to be more firme active and valourous for the good of your Country Iohn Lilburn From my uniust Captivitie in the Tower of London for the visably almost destroyed Lawes and Liberties of England which condition I more highly prize though in misery enough outwardly then the visiblest condition of any member whatsoever that sits in either or both houses being all and every of them apparently palpably and transendently forsworne having all of them taken Oaths upon Oathes to mainetaine the lawes liberties and freedome of the land and yet in their dayly practice overthrow and destroy them of which sin and wickednesse they are all of them guilty in regard you all sit there in silence and doe not publiquely and avowedly to the whole Kingdome according to your duty manfully protest against and declare your dislike of their crooked uniust and Englands destroying wayes this 31. of May 1647. John Lilburne FINIS

Rash Oaths unwarrantable And the breaking of them as inexcusable Or A DISCOURSE shewing that the two Houses of Parliament had little ground to make those Oaths they have made or lesse ground to take or presse the taking of them being it is easie to be apprehended they never intended to keep them but onely made them for snares and cloaks for knavery as is clearly evinced by their constant arbitrary and tyrannicall practices no justice nor right being to be found amongst them by meanes of which they have declaratorily and visibly lost the very soule and essence of true Magistracy which is the doing of justice judgment equity and right and are become a dead carkasse In which is also a true and just DECLARATION of the unspeakable evill of the delay of justice and the extraordinary sufferings of Lievtenant Colonell John Lilburne very much occasioned by M. Henry Martins unfriendly and unjust dealing with him in not making his Report to the House All which with divers other things of very high concernment are declared in the following discourse being an Epistle written by Lievtenant-Colonell John Lilburne Prerogative-prisoner in the Tower of London to Colonell Henry Marten a Member of the House of Commons and Chaire-man to the Committee for consideration of the Liberties of the Commons of England May 1647. Eccles 5.2.4 Be not rash with thy mouth and let not thy heart be hasty to utter any thing before God but when thou vowest a vow unto God deferre not to pay it for he hath no pleasure in fooles pay that which thou hast vowed Numb 30.2 If a ●an vow a vow unto the Lord or sweare an oath to hind his soule with a bond hee shall not breake his word he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth Deut. 23.21 VVhen thou shalt vow a vow unto the Lord thy God thou shalt not slack to pay it for the Lord thy God will surely require it of thee and it will be sin to thee Jer. 4.2 And thou shalt sweare the Lord liveth in truth in judgment and in righteousnesse Ezek. 17.15,16,19 Shal● he break the Covenant ●nd be delivered As I live saith the Lord God surely in the place where the king dwelleth that made him king whose oath he despised and whose covenant he brake even with him in the midd●st of Babylon he shall die and my covenant that he hath broken even it will I recompence upon his own head Hos 4.2,3 By swearing and lying and killing and s●…aling and committing adultery they breake out and bloud toucheth bloud therefore shall the land mourn Ier. 6.19 Heare O earth behold I will bring evill upon this people even the fruit of their thoughts because they have not harkened to my words nor to my law but rejected it SIR When Israel degenerated from the Law of her Soveraigne Lord and King and followed her own crooked wayes the Lord himself as one that was not delighted in her destruction but rather with her preservation cries out again her to make her ashamed of the evill of her wayes How is the faithfull city b●…come a harlot it was full of judgement righteousnesse lodged in it but now murd●…ers Thy silver is became drosse thy wine mixt with water Thy Princes are rebellio● and companions of theeves every one loveth gifts and followeth after rewards th● judge not the fatherlesse neither doth the cause of the widdow come unto them Therefore saith the Lord the Lord of hosts the mighty one of Israel ah I will ease me of my adversaries and avenge me of my enemies Isa 1.21,22,23,24 Sir an enemy to you he is not that shall cordially and heartily tell you of your faults with a desire to reclaim you from the evill of your wayes by so doing Ps●… 141.5 which task though unpleasant in it selfe he that never in his life knew ho●… to flatter nor play the hypocrite and dissembler is urgently necessitated now 〈◊〉 his own preservation to undertake And therefore Sir to give you your due and right I must ingenuously a●… knowledge that I have for a long time looked upon you as one of the great p●…lars of the Liberties of the Commons of England and your name amongst all ju●… and unbiassed men hath been extraordinary famous this present Parliament therefore and for this you suffered an expulsion of the House and a reproachfull a●… unjust imprisonment in the Tower of London by the guilded men of the time who you then discovered carried two faces under one hood many monet●… if not some yeares you continued an ejected person from your just place in th●… House And since your re-admission again have there in your Speeches behave● your selfe so gallantly for your Countrey that your name and fame hath loud been spread abroad by it Yea give me leave to tell you that one of your own Members esteemed very honest but by me too prudentiall that is to say too cowardly and too much for himselfe and his selfish interest in a time when a No●thern tempest was likely to arise told me in the Tower that the true lovers 〈◊〉 their Countrey in England were more beholden unto M. Henry Marten for h●… sincerity uprightnesse boldnesse and gallantry then to halfe if not all tho●… that are called conscientious men in the House And truly Sir having had th● happinesse for so I esteemed it often to be in your company I have admire● those gallant discourses for the Liberty of this Nation that have flowed from yo● so that when I first made my appeale to the House of Commons the 16. of June 1646. and heard that my businesse was referred to a Committee where M. Ma●ten had the Chaire I was not a little refreshed being even where I would hav● wished and desired to be thinking that you of all the men in the House 〈◊〉 Commons would have been the most sensible of me and my condition But must deale truly with you I found it otherwise For after by the earnest soll●… citation of my wife and friends you and the Committee had examined my bu●nesse and passed as I was informed gallant and excellent Votes upon it but yet you by your negligence and delay if not wilfulnesse exasperated the spirits of the House of Lords against me and exposed me to their mercilesse fury and devouring indignation by delaying my Report And truly Sir I must give this commendation of them That the tender mercies of the House of Lords are cruelty For upon your examining my businesse and not reporting it they tooke courage to themselves and lock'd me up most illegally barbarously and tyrannically in New gate above three weeks close prisoner from the society of my wife children or friends and would neither suffer me to receive either meat drink money nor any other necessaries from the hands of my wife maid or friends nor suffer my wife to come into the Prison-yard to speake with me before my Keepers out of my window the story of which you

may more fully read in the 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30. pages of my late printed Book called Londons Libertie in chaines discovered and in my Speech before your selfe at the Committee now in print and called An Anatomie of the Lords tyrannie pag. 3 4 5 6. and in the second Edition of the Outcries of oppressed Commons pag. 21 22 23. All this while my wife and friends following you day by day with all the importunity in the world to beg and intreat of you to make my Report for want of which I was likely to be destroyed by the devouring House of Lords but you would not do it so that in some sense I may complaine with Iob in reference to you and the rest of my timorous friends in the House My kinsfolke have failed me my familiar friends have forgotten me and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me Job 19.13,14 which did hearten the tyrannicall House of Lords further to go on with their cruelty and tyrannie towards me and then upon the 11. of July 1646. at their Barre past a most lawlesse illegall and unjust sentence against me To pay foure thousand pound to the King to be seven yeares a prisoner in the Tower of London and for ever to be uncapable to beare any Office or Place in military or in civill government in Church or Commonwealth as more at large you may read in the Sentence it selfe printed in the 30 31 32 33 34. pages of a little book called Vox Plebis and what illegall cruelty and tyrannie I have since suffered and indured in my imprisonment in the Tower of London even to the hazzard of my life and being and the destruction of my wife and helplesse children you may largely read in severall printed Books as Liberty vindicated against Slavery pag. 16 17 18 19 22 23. Londons Liberty in chaines discovered pag. 31 32 33 34. Regall tyranny discovered pag. 1 47 48 49 62 63 to 78. but especially in my late Epistle to Col. West the Lievtenant of the Tower called The oppressed mans oppressions declared And after the fore-mentioned Sentence being committed to the Tower there to be kept onely in safe custody for seven yeares as by the Warrant you may read printed in Vox Plebis pag. 34 35. I was by the Lievtenant thereof with out ground or cause most illegally divorced from the society of my wife fir●… by himselfe who afterwards obtained by his owne solicitation an Order for his indemnity from the Lords the severity of which by him was executed upon me for above eleven weeks together as by the fore-mentioned Books you may fully understand and when by my wives Petition and my owne both of which yo● may read in the 65 66 67. 68 69 71 72. pages of my Book called Londons Liberty in chaines I had obtained the just priviledge to be heard before a Committe● appointed by the House of Commons on purpose where you your selfe again● to my then great refreshment was in the Chaire before whom I had two hearings upon two severall dayes and I must ingenuously confesse I had as faire an● just play before you as any man in England could desire having free liberty with out interruption to speake whatsoever I in my owne understanding conceive● might be for my benefit and advantage to your praise and honor in that particular of your well doing I desire to speake it and my last discourse then with you and the Committee was so abundantly satisfactorie and well pleasing unto you that your selves by speciall order the 6. Novem. 1646. commanded me to brin● it in unto you in writing upon the 9. of Novem. next which I accordingly did and since printed it not doubting then but within fourteen daies after I should have been a freeman freely set at libertie as unjustly imprisoned and against th● good and knowne Law of England for as high as this if not higher I hav● been informed was the result of the Committee then and the temper of you● House towards justice a thousand times better then now it is Sir I must confesse I desired you then upon some weighty reasons which gave you to forbeare the Report foure or five daies but when I see that thing fell not out according to my expectation I sent immediately to you with al● earnestnesse speedily to make my Report and you gave those I sent to you very faire words which truly I must tell you would no●… the bellies of me my wife nor children nor procure us money to buy bread to doe it whereupon having high thoughts of your honesty and your gallant integrity to the love of the Liberties of the Commons of England grounded as I conceived upon a good foundation and backed with high and resolved resolutions I did not onely with all the honourable respect I could send my wife unto you to beseech and intreat you to be sensible of my trying condition and to doe me and all the Commons of England who were and are not a little concerned in me that justice and right as without further delay to make my Report to the House for me but I also sent unto severall of my friends in the House and City in the most candidest manner I could that I knew had a familiar acquaintance with you earnestly pressing them to improve all their interest in you to get you to make my Report and when I could not prevaile with you that way I writ a few importuning lines to you and the like to others of my friends which I knew were dear unto you and when that would not doe I sent some of your owne Countrey-men unto you whose Commissioner and representer you are to improve their utmost interest in you and I also gave you a gentle touch or two in print of my great suffering by your neglect Sir in short wanted I a wife I should not I am confident of it use so much wooing to the fairest and vertuest woman in England though with a rich portion in Lands and money to obtaine her for my wife as I have done to you to make my Report having I protest it before the presence of God left no just meanes and others though I perish I will never take unattempted that all the wits and braines I have could think of to obtaine this peece of reasonable justice at your hands to make my Report for me to the House which you are bound in duty conscience justice and honour to doe for mee long since without one tenth part of that importunate solicitation that I for the greatest part of a yeare together have used to you Sir I pray remember the 29. Chap. of Magna Charta which requires you not only to doe impartiall justice but speedie justice without delay the unrighteous Judge though at last he did justice yet he is called the unrighteous Judge because he would not do it speedily but suffered the poor widdow to pump and importune him for it but say I to you I

wish my Judges were not worse then the unrighteous Judge But Sir seeing it is to no purpose I can no longer now forbeare but must write you my mind to the purpose cost it what it will being now at present as carelesse of you as you are and have been of me and my long but I will not say unsupportable sufferings though I might truly say it if it were not that I had a full faithfull and soule-satisfying God to rest and rely upon and the distresses and hardly to be undergone portion of my wife and little infants But Sir I beseech you give me leave before I lansh into the deep a little mildly to expostulate with you in a friendly way before we fall out and to demand this question of you what I have said or done to you to give you any tolerable cause to deale thus with me as you have done as by your delay of your duty to destroy me and given me too just cause in reference to you to say with David Psal 55.12,13,14 For it was not an enemy that reproached me then I could have borne it neither was it he that hated me that did magnifie himself against me then I would have hid my self from him but it was thou ah man mine equall my guide and mine acqaintance we took sweet counsell together And truly Sir the evill doings of a friend are the most piercing and wounding and the least to be indured and the most odious to God and detestable amongst all rationall and gallant men Jer. 9.4 to the 9. Ch. 12.6 and Ch. 20.10,11,12 But Sir if you have nothing to lay to my charge in reference to your self I desire to know if you have any thing to accuse me of in reference to the publike have I deerted my interest or betraid the Liberties of my fellow Commons of England or have I been sluggish slothfull or cowardly in mannaging the businesse I have in hand or have I been impatient in my sufferings by my madness and folly destroyed my business or given grounded advantage to my adversaries If all or anie of these can be justly laid to my charge I desire not to be spared But Sir if you can say nothing against me by way of miscarriage to you in particular or the publike in generall then I pray you give me leave to demand of you this question What have you to say for your selfe that you have thus delayed to make my report and thereby over and over againe and againe have hazzarded my destruction and utter ruine contrary to law honesty justice reason and conscience If you should say it is not seasonable and that the temper of your House is such that to make it it would do me nor the Kingdome no good but rather a mischief in hazzarding the confirmation of the Lords tyranny towards me by a vote of your House whose spirits are extreamly exasperated against me above all men in England To answer which what do you else then hereby give me too just cause to say of your House in which so many that professe honesty sit though it bee but little demonstrative by their actions that you are a corrupted and degenerated generation of men that are fallen from doing of Justice to the executing of Tyranny and from maintaining defending and protecting according to your duty and the end of your sitting where you do the Lawes and Liberties of the Commons of England to the betraying subverting and destroying them and so have all of you forfeited your trust and your Parliamentary power which as you your selves say 1. par Book Decl. p. 150. was given you to provide for the Peoples weales but not for their woes and have thereby absolutely absolved and discharged the people from all subjection to you and given them cause that sent you to call you home and chuse honester men in your places to call you to a strict accompt for all your tyranny oppression and trechercy and know what you have done with all their money which they may justly by your own arguments against the King do See the second Edition of the Outcries of oppressed Commons p. 4 5 6 7 14 15 16 17 18. And in case of disobedience from you to your trusters and impowers the severall Shires Countreyes and Corporations that choose you what do you else then thereby give them cause to look upon you as you have this foure or five years looked upon the King and deale by you as you have dealt with the King even to wage war against you for betrayers of your trust which they and the whole Kingdome reposed in you who are now degenerated from a just House of Parliament the end of calling of which by the Law is to redresse mischiefs and grievances that daily happen 36. E. 3.10 but not to augment and wholly increase them into a conspiracy and consederacy of lawlesse unlimited and unbounded men that have actually destroyed the Lawes and Liberties of England and that will have no rule to walke by but their owne corrupted and bloody wills and thereby have set up the highest Tyranny that can be set up in the world against which by your owne principles the Kingdome may justly rise up in Armes as one man and destroy all the fore-said conspirators without mercy or compassion as a company of devouring Lions ravening Wolves and crafty Foxes that would destroy the poore flocks of lambs and sheep of this distressed Kingdome the people and Inhabitants thereof for take away Law as the Parliament in a transcendent measure hath done and deny us justice and right as is constantly in a great measure done unto us by the Parliament And what are we now better then the brute beasts of the field the weakest of which are torne in pieces devoured and destroyed by the strongest for remedie● 〈◊〉 which the Parliament against the King took up Armes and when they h●d no Law of the Kingdome to warrant them in so doing they make use of the law of nature and reason and tell the King Book Dec. 1 part pag. 207. That this Law is as old as the Kingdome that the Kingdome must not be without a meanes to preserve it selfe but in which of our Statutes this is writ I never yet could heare see nor read of and am very sure it is no where but in their own Declarations and ingraven in the heart of man as a principle of nature and reason which as they very well and justly say teacheth a man or Kingdome to preserve its selfe 1 part Book Dec. pag. ●4 93 94. 112 123. 202. 465. 466. 726 728. see 2. Edition of the Outcries pag. 12 13. And if this Doctrine be true as you avouch it is then it will much more serve against your selves then the King because the King is so fenced about with the Lawes of the Kingdome that it is impossible for a man or Magistrate to bee more and if you are but a betrusted power impowered protempore by the

take all or any of your fore nentioned unwarrantable Oathes for he that hath said Thou shalt not kill hath also said thou shalt not in that manner swear And I would fain know of you what confidence the Parliament upon sollid grounds can put upon any men in England that are so ready and willing to swallow your oat●es that now are become nothing else but cloaks of knavery and breeders of strife and mischief therefore for shame say them all down and presse them no more upon any man whatsoever for he that consciensiously maks nothing of an Oath will make as little of breaking his Oa●h whensoever it shall make for his profit ease or preferment whereas to h●m that conscienciously scruples an Oath his bare word promise or ingagement is the sencerest tye in the world which he would not willingly violate for all the earth But Sir to return to your forementioned grand Objection That your Houses are not in a temper to hear my report and to do me justice upon it I pray Sir what is the reason of it Is it because there is a Faction of great men in it that hates my person and therefore though my cause be never so just yet they will do me no right and if so then I tell you plainly without fear they are a company of Factious knaves and not a company of righteous Judges who ought in judgement to be so impartial that they should not regard or respect persons but the justnesse of their cause Or Secondly it is because I have not the Law of the Land sufficiently on my side and if so it is the easier judged against me but why did you receive and approve of my appeple to your house at first but know Sir that although I be no Lawyer yet I dare throw the gantlet to all the Lawyers in England and against them all before any Legall Barre in England will plead my own cause my selfe and justifie and prove the Lords proceedings with me to be point blanke against the good old and unrepealed Law of England and this I will do at my at most perrell yea let the Lords in the front put their lying Champion William Prinn the basest and lyingest of men who in less then eight lines hath told and printed twelve or thirteene notorious lyes against me see Inocencie and truth justified page 4. 5. 6. and hath such a firey zeale to my distruction that in his late booke called The Sword of Christian Majestracy supported hee would have the two Houses without Law by the power of their owne wills to hang me for no other cause in the world but for being zealous and couragious in standing for the Laws and Liberties of England which you and he have sworne vowed and covenanted to maintaine preserve and defend and for which you have shed at least in pretence so much English blood Oh brave Prinn a fit man indeed to be a Privy-Counseller to the great Turke whose will is his Law Or in the third place it is because the Lords are so great that you dare not do me justice and right for feare of displeasing them and if so why doe you not tell the Kingdome so for it is not a ●…t●le conserned in the contest betwixt the Lords and my self that we may follow your former pattren to know the names of them among them that are enemies to our Liberties and just Free some and so indeavour to give them their just defer●s For I read in the 547 548. pages of the first part book Declaration that upon a lamentable Petition of many thousands of pore people in and about the City of London the House of Commons appoynted a conference with the Lords where Mr. Hollis whose actions demonstrats thereby his ambition is not to be lesse then a Duke or a petty King though not in title yet in power and domination one of the chiefest stickler then against the King in the whole house and one of the chiefest Beginners Causers and Promoters of the by-past warres against the King pressed the Lords at there Barre to joyne with the house of Commons in their desire about the Militia and further with many expressions of the like nature desired in words to this effect that if that desire of the House of Commons were not assented too those Lords who were willing to concur in would find some means to make themselves knowne that it might he knowne who were against them and they might make it knowne to them who sent them yea in page 557 ibim it is positively aver'd that he required the names of all those of that House which would not discharge that they then ●alledther Kingdom se the Juncto● notable Declaration at Oxford the ninteenth of March 1643. page 10. 11. 12. and Mr. Hollis his owne printed Speech and if this fore recited practis were just then it is also in the like case just now yea and the rather because our case is ten times worse now then it was then and our Lawes and Liberties principally by the House of Lords means and their Arbitrary confederates in the House of Commons are now a giving up to the eyes of all rationall and knowing impartiall men their last breath yea and verily there is but one step betwixt Us the Commons of England and perfect and absolute slavery which I for my part had rather be hanged if it were possible ten thousand times over then indure but Sir remember that you in your excellent Declaration of the 19. May 1642. 1. part book Declaration pag. 207. tell us that this law is as old as the Kingdom that the Kingdom must not be without a means to preserve it self and I say by your own declared principles that if you our ordinary and legall means will not preserve us but rather destroy us we may justly by extraordinary and rationall means preserve our selves and destroy you our treacherous destroyers Or lastly is it be cause your House hath already done the last Act of Justice that ever they intended to doe for the Commons of England there Impowerers Lords and Masters and therefore I cannot expect the making of my report indeed Sir I ingniously confesse unto you I think this is the true reason indeed though you do not in plain English words tell us as much yet by your actions you undeniablely declare it for truly many say that there is no Iustice nor right to be had at your hands and for our Laws they only serve you to destroy us at your pleasure or to serve your ends when your hot burning malice is incensed against us which if they serve for your ends they shall be your engines tu undoe us But they do not in the least serve to defend or protect us against you but when we should use them against any of you as justly we may See your own excellent Declaration of the 26. May 1642. 1 part book Declar. p. 278. Sir Ed. Cookes 4. part institut chap. of the High Court of