ENGLANDS WANTS OR SEVERAL PROPOSALS Probably beneficial for ENGLAND Humbly offered to the Consideration of all Good Patriots IN BOTH Houses of Parliament By a true lover of his Country LONDON Printed for Jo. Martyn 1667. ENGLANDS WANTS OR Several Proposals probably beneficial for England humbly offered to the Consideration of all good Patriots in both Houses of Parliament ALthough the Kingdom of England doth abound with many blessings which other Nations want yet doth it want many which others enjoy It is recorded That an eminent foreign Ambassador after a long Residence in England sayling homeward did cast his eye back upon this Land and said in his own language O Isola felicissima c. The happyest Country upon the face of the Earth did it not want publick Spirits amongst them The want of publick Spirits hath occasioned the want of many Publick works of Peity and Charity works necessary or commodious for the people or of ornament for the Kingdom I. To supply this want That by such easie wayes and means as are hereafter mentioned there may be raised a publick Stock to be put into the hands of Commissioners nominated by both Houses of Parliament approved by the King and accountable to them for the same II. For raising such publick Stock it is proposed first That according to the practice of neighbour Nations upon all such Commodities as occasion either Excess or Luxury Wantonness Idleness Pride or Corruption of Manners there may be laid a large Impost as upon all Wines all strong Drinks Tobacco Coffee Chocolatte Sugars Spices Plums all sorts of Sweet-meats Oranges c. Upon all Silks Laces Ribbons Jewels Feathers Perruques Fringes c. Upon all fine Linnens Camolets upon Cards Dice Tables Bouls c. upon all Coaches Chariots Litters Sedans upon all Pictures Perfumes Paints for the Face c. Moreover a third part of all the gettings of Comedians Ropedancers Mountebanks Lotteryes Shewes c. III. That according to the practice of the Primitive Christians whose Devotion was such that they thought no Testament well made unless some considerable portion was thereby added to Christs Patrimony that no Testament henceforth should be valid unless a 20 th part of the Legacies were given to these after-named publick and pious uses IV. That for these uses there may be reserved as was anciently practised in the Roman State a tenth part of the profit of all Lands given by the Husband to the Wife or coming from the Wife to the Husband there being no Issue between them alive V. That a 40 th part of all things recovered by Law may be as once among the Romans assigned for publick usses VI. That there be paid out of all marriage Portions Six pence in the Pound and something proportionably paid at the death and birth of every person not living on Almes VII That every one to be made free of a Trade or licenced to practice in Law or Physick may pay proportionably to these publick uses VIII That all Contracts in Writing all Decrees Judgments c. may have a small Seal on the top as is practised in divers other Countreys for which a smal Tax to be paid c. IX That in all Churches as in Holland at every solemn Assembly the Churchwardens with a long Staff Bag and Bell during the Sermon receive the charitable benevolence of the whole Congregation where every person that desires to honour God not onely with his Soul and Body but with his Substance as God commands and the primitive Christians punctually observed at their Church-meetings throwing in but his Mite it is incredible by this constant course at every Assembly to what a sum it will amount in one year Now the Moneys of this publick stock may be employed in these publick uses following X. For building Work-houses in all convenient parts of this Kingdom for making Rivers navigable for building or repairing Bridges Highways Sea-banks Havens Moles Land-marks Aquaeducts for setting up poor Youths after an Apprentiship served for marrying poor Maids for relief of aged impotent decayed People for maintenance of sick and maimed Souldiers for redemption and relief of Captives and Slaves in Turky for building and repairing of Churches whereof there is great want in this Kingdom more especially in the Suburbs of London where not a fourth part of the Parishioners can at once enter into their Parish Church at least not well hear Divine Service to the great shame of the Protestant professors who since the Reformation have as our Adversaries observe erected scarce one considerable solid Structure for the worship of God For repairing the Mother-Church of the Mother-City of this Kingdom to the Glory of God and Honor of this Nation for the speedy promoting whereof both King and Parliament City and Country Clergy and Laity High and Low stand all engaged to lend their helping hands For erecting in London and other great Cities banks or mounts or Piety as have been long used in Italy in Flanders and other Countreys whereby the intollerable oppression of publique and private Brokers and Pawn-takes that grinde the faces of the poor scruing out of them 40 or 50 per Cent. may be utterly abolisht For erecting Hospitals in London and other Citys as there is at Paris and Rome for to receive all little Infants exposed or found whereby many poor Innocents destroyed in the womb or at the Birth might be preserved from Murder as well as the unnatural Mothers from hanging For building of Hospitals to accommodate therein all poor Women as is done at Paris neer the time of their Travel to enter and there to be carefully delivered and remain afterwards till they are in a condition to return home and follow their work For providing stipends for Physicians Surgeons and Apothecaries as at Rome to give gratis their Advice Pains Medicines and Salves to poor sick or wounded people allowed in forma pauperis to require their assistance who otherwise perish for want of timely and due helps For erecting Colledges in London as is done in Holland where old men deprived of Wife and Children may for a reasonable sum of Money be neatly accomodated during life with Diet and Lodging and pass the rest of their days without care or trouble in a comfortable society with men of like condition and age And the like for old Women For erecting Colledges wherein Virgins and Widows of the Protestant Religion resolving not to marry as the Begains in Holland Brabant Flanders c. may for a certain summe of money deposed be maintained and live in a retired vertuous and religious Society their Teaching and Educating in Vertue and Piety the Female youth of this Nation whereof there is now more need then ever and such young Virgin-Scholars may there remain constantly till their marriage day before which time very many by too much liberty are now corrupted and debauched and that the said Virgins and Widows of the Society may with the forfeiture of the said Money deposed and leave
Nation and once banisht out of England by an Act made 2 R. 1. that in case of Shipwrack though all persons perished yet that all the goods which escaped should be carefully preserved for the owners or next of kin if they come within a year and a day onely allowing something to those that helpt to save the goods and preserved them afterwards XVI That by a Law the Fees of Lawyers may be regulated according to the moderation of other well policed Countreys where usually is given but a third or fourth part of what is expected in England And that if any Lawyer presume to take more then the Fees by Law allowed he may be rendred uncapable to practice any more and forfeit four-fold of what he hath so taken as is provided by the Civil Laws XVII That as in the reign of Edward the Second the number of Attorneys was regulated and 140 declared to be sufficient to serve this whole Kingdom so now that the number of Lawyers and Attorneys may be regulated and some things in their Pleadings reformed What a shame to our Nation is it that so many evil and rapacious Lawyers should be permitted to plead in behalf of vitious persons and of manifest oppressors and in causes notoriously unjust should be permitted to make a trade not to minister Justice but to heap up riches and devour all the fat of the Land XVIII That provision may be made to mitigate all such Laws which by the change of things and times are now become over severe and rigorous much beyond the intent of the Law-makers As that stealing to the value of 12 d. should still be Felony whereas when that Law was first made what was then sold for 12 d. which when the ounce of Silver was but 20 d. was as much as 3 s. now is now sold for above 40 s for in 51 of K. H. 3. eight Bushels of wheat was then sold but for 12 d so that the man that stole but seven Bushels committed but petty Larceny whereas now he that steals but a Peck may be found guilty of Felony unless the Jury will forswear themselves as commonly they do and bring in Eleven pence stoln when sometimes it is Eleven shillings as if the life of Man in our days were of a smaller and viler price then in those days So in the time of H. 2. the stealing of Oxen and Horses were counted inter minuta furta which Lawyers call Parvum Latrocinium or Petty Larceny Now why should the body of Man that Divinae imaginis vehiculum be destroyed for trifles why should Christians now be more cruel then the Jews or then Christians in former ages for in the middle ages of Christianity Paenarum ratio in multis potius quam in sanguine necesita fuit They them allowed a compensation even for killing of a man called Wergeld quasi viri moneta sive praetium which was with great justice paid partly to the King for the loss of his Subject and partly to the Lord whose Vassal the slain party was but especially to the next Kindred of the person slain and this custom seemed to derive it self from Moses Law Exod. 21. 30. Our Ancestors in this Kingdom before they were Christians had this Custom then thinking it against reason that when one man was killed and the King thereby had lost a subject that another should be put to death and so the King lose another subject and the Kindred of the slain no way recompensed for their loss as now is used And after they were converted to Christianity and did believe that penitent Christians went to Heaven they thought it more against reason when a man was slain to send the penitent man-slayer forthwith from this miserable world to a place of everlasting bliss but rather that he should by a corporal or pecuniary mulct be made miserable in this life it being much more suitable to the ends of Government that a criminal should live in perpetual ignominy slavery or misery rather then be taken quite away because a living condemned wretched Criminal will be a spectacle in others eyes will in time be convinced of his Crime will justifie his Judg and continually repent his own folly And therefore even since the Norman Conquest for Treason or foul Felonies the guilty were oft condemned to have their eyes pulled forth or their Testicles cut out that there might be no more of the breed or else that their hands or feet should be chopt off that so each foul Felon might remain truncus vivus as a living monument of his Felonious fact for deterring others and have time to bewail his own sins and misery But because in England too much severity is used against Theft and yet not enough to restrain it sufficiently and because the wisdom of Prevention is better then the wisdom of remedy XIX That to prevent Thievery the like course may be taken in England which is used in Holland especially in that most populous City of Amsterdam where as God commanded the Jews Deut. 15. 4. Non est Indigens nec Mendicus inter illos benedicit illis Dominus There is not a Beggar amongst so many hundred thousand To effect which they do three things they take especial Order that all Youth be bred up not onely in the knowledge of God but of some Trade or Profession They provide work for all sorts of People and Thirdly they compel all such as are not willing to work By this policy in Holland it is rate to see an Execution for Robbery and yet if a man could but see at once all the Criminals Young and Old Male and Female that have been hanged in England in one year onely for stealing what Horror and Amazement it would strike and how would a Hollander justly blame the policy of this State for Non minus turpia sunt Principi multa supplicia quam Medico multa funera XX. That for redressing those high Crimes so accounted by all Gods people heretofore though now in England little conscience is made thereof of wilfully robbing God or the King the one in his Tythes and the other in his Tributes Customs or Revenues it may be made absolute Felony for the future and very severe punishment inflicted as it is now in other Countreys and was anciently in this Kingdom To cozen the King but of Treasure Trove was antiently as affirmeth Glanvile and Bracton an offence punisht with death And 31 of Eliz. it was judged meet by the whole Parliament to make it Felony for any man to embezil but the worth of Twenty shillings of the Ammunition or Victuals provided by the Queen for her Souldiers XXI That according to the Law of God according to Christian Clemency Gentleness and Mercy according to the Laws of other Christian States and according to the antient Laws and Customs of this State no person hereafter may for any new Debt be cast in prison but rather that his Estate may be seized and the
person left at liberty to work himself out of Debt by his Industry Trade or Profession to which end if Creditors did proceed onely by Summons after which legally served at the Debtors House and no appearance made then presently proceed to have a Judgement against the Debtor as if he had appeared and then to Execution and thereupon to seize not his person but Estate and in case he hath no Estate yet to forbear till by his industry he hath gotten somewhat for imprisonment is not only too severe a punishment of the Body a torment of the Mind a dying daily a loss of Reputation and alienation of Friends a separation from Wife and Children and a great occasion of being ever after debaucht and dishonest but it is also clearly against the Creditors profit and advantage for the Debtor being cast in prison must there lie at much more charges then at home and yet find less opportunity to work or earn any thing which makes him commonly hold faster what is in his hands which else he would have parted with towards the satisfaction of his Debts and endeavoured by his Work or Trade to have maintained himself and Family Besides by imprisoning the body of a Debtor the State loseth a Member which at liberty or compelled to work might be of some use XXII That some Provision be made according as is excellently provided by the Civil Law against that Unchristian Custome of arresting the body of a deceased Debtor or of any his Relations whilest they accompany the body to the Grave Also against that vexatious and superstitious custome of stopping any dead body in its passage through any Town or Lordship and demanding some Fee or Toll for the same before the body pass further on XXIII That the Admiralty and all Ecclesiastical and Civil Law Courts may enjoy their due Jurisdictions That those Jurisdictions may be declared and known that so no man when he hath brought his suit almost to a Tryal may by a Prohibition be constrained to begin all again in a new Court to his horrible vexation expences and charges XXIV That according to the ancient Custom of this and all other Christiain States all Ecclesiastical Judges may have a power to proceed Ex Officio That way of Enquiry being exceeding necessary for correcting of vice and sin which otherwise will daily go unpunished Insomuch that by the Civil Law it is called Nobile Judicis Officium and was never opposed but by the Factious Puritanical part of England out of design to disturb the English Church Government such enquiry and proceeding Ex Officio without an Accuser but onely upon publick fame strong Presumption c. being approved by sundry examples of Scripture as well as by all Canon Civil and Common Laws It is true that by the Constitutions at Common Law it hath not been held fit that any person should be examined upon Oath against himself touching a Crime whereby his Life or any of his Limbs may be endangered and the reason is for fear of occasioning Perjury because most men probably would rather hazard an untrue Oath although no good Christian ought so to do then either their Lives or their Limbs But yet in Criminal matters not Capital handled in Chancery the Oath of the party is required against himself onely there is an Accuser and an Accusation of Bill of Complaint and not a meer insinuation of fame as in the proceeding ex Officio sometimes But then it is to be considered that the Complainant to find out the truth may stuff his Bill full of Lyes because he is not sworn to the Truth of the Bill as the Defendant is to the Truth of his Answer And what is this less then the proceeding Ex Officio when the Defendant is forced in his Answer which is alwayes upon Oath to accuse himself Besides in dangerous Crimes against the Person of the King or Peace of the Kingdom it hath alwayes been held necessary and lawful Policy to torture such persons against whom good probabilities and strong presumptions lie to make them confess although it be capital against themselves and others in the highest degree And is it not of as great equity in high Crimes against the King of Heaven and Earth and in Crimes of no less secresie as Atheism Apostacy Adultery Incest c. to use the means of the Parties Oath especially where no Capital no Corporal punishment is intended but onely a fatherly and spiritual correcting and reforming of the Party for his souls health Moreover the proceeding Ex Officio is not as many vainly imagine onely the ministring of an Oath to the suspected party against himself in a Cause Criminal for there may be proceeding Ex Officio Judicis though the Oath be not at all urged nay sometimes it may not be urged as in case of Life or Limb endangered thereby Now if there should be in England no means for an Ecclesiastical Judg to take cognizance nor to proceed but upon the voluntary prosecution and accusation of some party how many execrable offences most displeasing to God Almighty scandalous to the Godly dangerous to mens Inheritances and to the souls health of the offenders yea some that are the very bane of all Religion and Christianity would through want of discovery and by impunity in a few years spread themselves over this whole Church and State before any Accusers will be found As Atheism Apostacy from Christianity Heresie Schisme Errors in matters of Religion Sacriledge Perjury Blasphemy Subornation of Perjury Swearing Polygamy Adultery Incest and other Uncleanness Drunkenness excessive Usury Symony Forgery Usurpation of the Holy Ministry Conventicles ungodly Libelling and many other abuses For who commonly are privy to such sins but men of like humour and affection who can never be presumed to be likely to accuse but rather to conceal such horrid offenders and therefore since that power of thus proceeding was by that most pernicious over-ruling Faction in the Long Parliament extorted from the Church How have all those formentioned Impieties like a general Deluge overwhelmed the Manners of English men XXV That it may by a Law be provided according to the practice of other well-policed States that an obstinate debaucht Son may be punisht by the Magistrate as the Father shall reasonably require and that in some certain Cases as is ordained by the Imperial Laws Liberi a potestate patria liberati in potestatem redigantur ut si fuerint ingrati vel insignitèr injuriosi in parentes suos c. XXVI That no man til he attain to the age of 25 according to the Custom of our Southern Neighbours where men are sooner ripe may be enabled to sell or alienate his Lands considering that in England very many Estates have been most foolishly spent and sold after the age of 21. which by the same persons arriving to their Wits before 25. would have been preserved XXVII That according to the Policy of William the Conquerour for assuring of
enacted for the encrease of Tillage where more people may be set on work and they rendred more strong and stout for service of their Country against an Enemy And likewise the Laws made for encrease of Fishing whereby more people may be fitted for Sea-service whereof this Kingdom surrounded almost with the Sea will ever have special occasion XLI That according to the good Policy of our Ancestors all the married Nobility and Gentry of England without special leave of his Majesty to do otherwise may be obliged to keep house in the Country every one at his own Manerium so named a Manendo of abiding there Vt semper presto essent ad Servitia Regis Patriae per implenda to be ready there to serve his King and Country and by a laudable Hospitality to gain the affections and dependances of the Peasantry XLII That according to antient Canons of the Church and according to divers other Reformed Churches and according to the custom of the Primitive Christians no dead body may be hereafter interred in any Church especially in London or the Suburbs thereof but either in some Vault or else in the Church-yard or rather in some decent enclosed place without the City To bury in Churches is to the dead but a superstitious custom first brought in by the Franciscan and Dominican Fryars about the year One thousand one hundred when Superstition was almost at the height invented to get Money perswading the people that to be buried within the Church or near the High Altar was more availeable to their souls and to the Living it is not onely chargeable but most unwholesome that so many putrified Carcasses should be so near under their Noses all the time of their Devotion XLIII That as all Clergy-men are by Common Law exempted from all inferior Offices as Bailiff Bedel Constable c. to serve neither per se nec per alium to the end that they may attend their function so that they may according to meer reason and according to a Statute 8. H. 4 num 12. in the unprinted Parliament Rolls be exempted from arraying and mustring of Men or Horse for the War For their Glebe Lands and Spiritual Revenues being held in Pura perpetua Eleemosyna i. e. in Frank Almoyne ought by Magna Charta to be exempted from all such burthens And as for their persons they serve their Countrey otherwise and for that service ought to be counted worthy as well if not better then the Levites of old of their Spiritual Profits and Revenues and also worthy of the Kings Protection not only for their Service but also in that they pay to the King the first years Profits and every year the Tenth of all Spiritual Benefices Besides the Clergy being by their Function prohibited to wear swords may neither serve in person nor can be capable of any Honour as Knighthood usually conferred on Warriours XLIV That as nullum tempus occurrit Regi no Custom nor prescription may be pleaded to the prejudice of the King so also with much more reason that no Custom nor Prescription may be pleaded to the prejudice of the King of kings That all Compositions or Customs of paying a little money for a great Tythe may be every where abrogated and all Tythes taken again in kind or a new Composition according to the present value which is but justice and more concerns this Parliament to do for the Church then it concerned the Parliament 18 of Eliz. to do for Colledges by obliging their Tenants to pay onethird part of their old Rent in Corn. XLV That all Lands antiently belonging to the Knights Templars Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem or to the Order of Cistercian Monks which by Popish dispensation were antiently exempted from paying Tythes may de novo be obliged as all other Lands in England to pay Tythes at least all those Lands given to those Orders since the time they were so exempted as by all Law and Justice they ought to do XLVI That our Ecclesiastical Officers as Chancellours Commissaries Officials c. may be in Holy Orders as the Canonists and modern Legists in the Romish Church are for the most part that so neither the Romanists on one hand nor Presbiterians on the other may have so much reason to except against them in the matter of Excommunication as executed by Lay Hands Vtcunque illi non assumunt clavium potestatem sed tantummodo poenam Canonis declarant infligunt ob contumaciam XLVII That Registers may be setled in every Hundred or in every County at least and all Lands and Houses may be entred into that Book and therein all Alienations to be set down in Alphabetical Order and none to be authentick if not there entred that so no man hereafter may be cheated by a Premorgage or any other way but that all men may be satisfied in what they possess and what they may call their own XLVIII That as among the Jews whereby immediate Divine appointment the chief Clergy man Aaron was Brother to the Supream Magistrate Moses and the Priests and the Levites were all of Noble stock and as amongst Christians even here in England antiently and at this day in forreign Christian States the chief Clergy have been oft of Noble and sometimes Royal bloud and the ordinary Priests usually sons of the Gentry whereby they come to be more highly Honoured and their just Authority better obeyed so now in England that the two Archbishops may be if possible of the Highest Noble if not Royal bloud of England and all the Bishops of Noble bloud and the inferior Priests sons of the Gentry and not after the example of that wicked Rebel Jeroboam and our late Republicans to make Priests of the lowest of the People whilst Physick and Law Professions inferior to Divinity are generally embraced by Gentlemen and sometimes by persons Nobly descended and preferred much above the Divines Profession XLIX That as in the Universities all Heads of Colledges if their Founders intentions were rightly observed and all Fellows of Colledges are obliged communi jure so long as they hold those places to abstain from Marriage and the carnal knowledge of Women so in the Church that not only Archbishops and Bishops but all others that take any Ecclesiastical Benefice may by a Statute be obliged so long as they hold those Benefices to abstain in like manner and as without a Dispensation no man can hold two Benefices with Cure of Souls so no beneficed man should take a wife without either Dispensation in some few cases to be allowed or resigning his Benefice To say they cannot abstain or shall be occasioned for want of Wives to do worse all Fellows of Colledges who commonly there pass the very heat of their Youth might with much more reason plead the same and yet would be derided for their pains By which abstinance the Clergy would be enabled to be much more hospitable and charitable and so better beloved they would