Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
kingdom_n	lord_n	parliament_n	time_n	3,250	5	3.6307	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89494	A soveraigne salve to cure the blind, or, A vindication of the power and priviledges claim'd or executed by the Lords and Commons in Parliament, from the calumny and slanders of men, whose eyes (their conscience being before blinded) ignorance or malice hath hoodwinckt. Wherein the fallacie and falsity of the anti-parliamentary party is discovered, their plots for introducing popery into the church and tyranny into the state are manifested: the pretended fears of danger from seperatists, Brownists, &c. blowne away. And a right way proposed for the advancing the just honour of the King, the due reverence of the clergy, the rights and liberty of the people: and the renewing a golden age. by J. M. Esquire.	Milton, John, 1608-1674, attributed name.	1643 (1643)	Wing M47B; Thomason E99_23; ESTC R18398	38,493	44

A SOVERAIGNE SALVE TO CVRE THE BLIND OR A Vindication of the Power and Priviledges claim'd or executed by the LORDS and COMMONS in PARLIAMENT from the Calumny and Slanders of men whose eyes their Conscience being before blinded ignorance or malice hath hoodwinckt Wherein the fallacie and falsity of the Anti-parliamentary party is discovered their plots for introducing Popery into the CHURCH and Tyranny into the STATE are manifested The pretended fears of danger from Seperatists Brownists c. blowne away And a right way proposed for the advancing the just Honour of the King the due reverence of the Clergy the Rights and Liberty of the people and the renewing a GOLDEN AGE By J. M. Esquire Salus populi est Lex suprema Salus Parliamenti supremum privilegium LONDON Printed by T. P. and M. S. 1643. REader if thou expectest here a polite stile or fluent phrase thou wilt be deceived in thy expectation it is not Rhetorick but reason can satisfie the judgment which this Author intended the former may cozen the conscience and dazle simple men the latter onely can satisfie the Wise and lead to truth A rough Diamond is precious when the best wrought glasse is despicable the painted Oratory which best pleaseth the vulgar ill suits with the well becoming gravity of a Statist The right stating of many questions in the insuing Treatise hath necessitated the dilating of some sentences more then may stand with a pleasing stile yet it is not doubted but the lovers of Truth will find that performed which is promised Farwell SO many excellent Treatises as have been sent abroad to unblind the hoodwinkt world and all clearing this truth That the Parliament is and ought to be supreme Judge might make this seem needlesse but as for a sturdy sore many plaisters are but sufficient so will it not be mis-spent time by the clear demonstrations of truth and right reason to beat down that wall of the too-much-loved-ignorance which hitherto hath kept the divine light of the truth from entring into the dark therfore miserable souls of those deluded ones who with so much earnestnesse lay out their estates expose their families to a thousand miseries nay spend even their dearest bloud to inslave themselves and posterity Love and duty to religion and my countrey now flaming with the fire these men have kindled yet give fuell to yea even pitie to these men hath inforc'd a pen ever before still to expose it selfe to publike censure and if by this poor labour of mine any of these ignorantly erring men may be reduced I have my end as for those who inraged with malice willingly oppose the truth God hath provided her another champion even the sword to vindicate her selfe from the violence of those men on whom the power of reason hath no effect To attain this our end what readier way have we then 1. To discover the falsity of those pretences by which those men are deluded the miseries they bring themselves and posterity into if they yet persist 2. To discover the way to regain our now almost lost liberty and religion 3. To free us from the pretended fears of the invasion of our liberty by the Parliament or of our religion by Brownists Anabaptists and the like And here so many of these men who hitherto through ignorance passion and mistake have been enemies to the Parliament and in them to their religion countrey and themselves I say so many of these as by Gods providence this little Treatise shal com unto are wished out of due care love to the Protestant Religion so desperately undermined by Jesuiticall plots out of love to their poor countrey laws and liberty now at the last gasp as it were either to stand or fall out of pitie to themselves and their posterity designed even to Turkish slavery they would lay aside all prejudicate thoughts and seriously lay to heart the evidences of truth love and labour to defend it wheresoever they find it and in hopes they will do this I will proceed according to the method proposed which was first to discover the deceit of that sophistry by which these truth-haters delude their followers to clear the proceedings of the Parliament from all aspersions of wrong or injustice but because their arts of deceiving are many and it would require too much time to answer particulars therefore I shall endeavour to draw them to some few generals The first then we have to deal withall is this The soveraigne power claimed by the Lords and Commons in Parliament to provide for the Kingdomes safety is an intrenching on His Majesties just Rights and contrary to the knowne Lawes say those deceivers To answer this and in this the whole bulk of their objections against the Parliament I shall first propose this to your consideration Whether if the King having his royall name and authority abused by those about him or misled by his own passion or mistake do command and act things pernicious and destructive to the people religion liberty and lawes contrary to the end and trust of the first institutors of this Monarchy and to the contract at his coronation and convert the power of the people it self to back and carry on those designes refusing to hearken to the petitions of his people or Remonstrances of the great Councell of the Kingdome if in this case the people be remedilesse consider whether the condition of a free nation be not worse then that of a most miserable slave and whether the framers of this Monarchy have not provided better for the means then for the end it self the peoples welfare which is the end of all government For first being before in a free and happy estate every way it must bring it self into servitude and each man make one another mutually and those he holds dearest and his Countrey it self slaves and must expose his own life that he may take the lives of whosoever refuseth slavery Secondly besides thus each man being one anothers mutually and all their countreys executioners each must be bound to expose all he hath and his life as much as In him lieth to procure or advance the means of damnation of those he holds dearest nay of innumerable others and of himselfe Religion being part of the case Thus whereas it seems sufficient to the constitution of a slave not to have power to dispose of himself or of what he hath in a passive way onely in this case men must be positively active against themselves Thirdly and lastly a whole Nation cannot fly or run away from a condition so miserable and by any other meanes unavoidable as a particular slave may More might be said in this point but what needed thus much were not their Judgements with whom we deale as turbu●ent as the waters they have troubled which sort a possibilitie of delusion that yet may partly hoodwinke them must distinguish from the other part among them whom malice hath made utterly reason and

by representation such power to be exerted and used when it judges necessarie and that if the nature of the occasion so requires with the suspension of the power of the supreame ordinary Delegate or Magistrate during that parenthesis of state for the kingdome having entrusted the Parliament with all it holds precious the effect of the Commission upon the matter being that it provide ne quid respublica detrimenti capiat it hath consequently trusted it with its power which is the supreme that it may be enabled to perform and execute the trust when it judgeth this cannot be made good without using that power But to return the Law saith also That the King can do or doth no wrong but it denieth not but ill Counsell about him may or perhaps the Law intends the king as he is in his great Counsell where he is as Sol in Leone or any Planet as they say in his proper house of farre greater vertue and power then otherwise But however Reason tells us that a Prince or a few of his Cabinet counsell may far more easily erre in judgement or possibly in point of will then the multitude of a Parliament so many whereof are selected out of the whole Kingdom by the people in point of Judgement much more of will or well willing to the publique whereof themselves are so great a part and this much the rather in that it is to be feared that oftentimes those privadoes of the Prince finding out cunningly the Princes will inclination or humour before they advise and further to ingratiate themselves seconding it much that there is agitated becomes to be upon the matter the judgement or will but of the Prince alone Well I hope we are now come safe to this passe that the Parliament may and ought in our case to defend the people or kingdoms rights use the peoples power which is the supreame as others have proved to cleare passionate men rather then to satisfie any judicious man who will not require proofs in a point plain enough of it self ever resident in the people and so in the Parliament though dormient till it be by the Parliament thought fit to be wakened which should it not now be done such a seeming-secure and supine sleep might have proved a mortall lethargy But here these Sophisters think to enter upon us and to take the benefit of their own wrong for seeing they have brought the Kingdom to this passe that unlesse the Parliament take the power of the kingdom into the kingdoms or its own hands it cannot defend it self or the kingdoms rights or rather rescue them they would cunningly prepare those whom they intend to make slaves by first making them such fools as to beleeve that the Parliament intends a change of the Monarchicall form of government and to oppresse King and people by I know not what new kind of Arbitrarie tyrannicall government I beleeve the King and Parliament will soon be attoned if any can shew the Parliament by what other way it can discharge its trust and dutie in this constitution of the times without the power it hath assumed But what if it shall appear I should make scruple to use the word shall as if it did not appear alreadie without these weak offers had we not to do with such as seem to have found out some new kind of reason or having antiquated the old which differenced man from irrationall creatures to have substituted passion or idle phantasie in the roome of it the best method indeed for them afterward on as good or the same proportion of reason to advance the power of the King into the place of the power of the whole people or Kingdom it is their own manner of speech and practise as sound and good as their own Method to make such distinction and difference betwixt King and kingdom what if it shall appear time bringing every day truth to light and perhaps even to there men some dilucida intervalla that there is not the least probabilitie that the Parliament can have such a thought of usurpation as these men would impose or seem to suppose much lesse was it ever heard that any free Parliament actually made any the least attempt to that effect so far is it that ever it effected it Whereas on the other side ill Counsell about Princes have attempted oft and de facto sometimes performed the turning of a well poysed or tempered Monarchy into an arbitrarie tyrannicall power and publique oppression by which change such ill instruments appear the onely gainers and the malignant spleen swels in a miserable consumed bodie the head not exempt and yet the very swelling a dangerous disease even to the spleen it self at last Unlesse such monstrous times did priviledge it were high presumption to think it were not all sufficient to stop such mouthes to say it is a Parliament and it were dishonourable for it to do as they calumniate and therefore not to be imagined This maxime or ground being no more to be denied or questioned in this Monarchy then that the earth is round in naturall Philosophy as neer as morrall Philosophy may arrive at naturall in point of certitude though should we grant them that a Parliament may erre nay do wrong to Prince people or particulars yet that would not follow upon this which they would maliciously inferre and ayme at for none but it self or another Parliament were to correct or rectifie what a Parliament should have done amisse and not the King or any other persons any way whatsoever much lesse by force or warre for he that is allowed to judge or correct is allowed thereby at least an equall if equality for such an intent can be conceived sufficient possibly but such equality of power in two distinct Magistrates for so we must distinguish King and Parliament here of different natures and touching one and the same point or matter in controversie cannot be in one and the same state then such a corrector must be allowed superiour and the corrected subordinate but such the King cannot be in our case as above is partly shewed and shall be further afterwards How then can force or warre on his side for this cause be rationall and just nay though it should be but defensive much lesse if offensive or inferred Since even bare resisting the ordinances of the Parliament is or presupposes an assuming of the supreme power to judge and condemne such resistance being the execution of the sentence But we shall not carry it away so easily that the Parliament will not be unjust to any holding such power strong temptations of profit corrupt too oft where one or a few are ordinary Judges as a little water standing sooner is putrified but multitude of these Judges are like the Sea incorruptible But moneys received profits and emoluments accrewing it were a shame not without a certain mixture of presumption to insist on such base imputations here had not frontlesse and monstrous

challenge at this present amounts to no lesse in effect as shall appeare the Parliament yet in vigour what then may we expect if they should prevaile by force which now their fallacies and deluding reasons are plainely discovered they flie unto What but that the Court and Parasites of it should wallow and revell in all licentiousnesse luxury excesse with pride avarice and tyranny proportionable whilest the rest languish under oppression slavery poverty disgrace perpetuall indignities or feares accompted as their bea●●s to labour for them and so mediocritie a State which the wisest of men prayed for no where to be found but a deluge of vices fro● co●trary causes till generall ruine involve altogether vertue and the glory of the Nation before extinct For we must not thinke tha● these which love their Countrey so well for which to doubt to dye were dishonour that they will not be quiet and sit still to save it for this much onely may suffice from the multitude of them the heads and leaders excepted nay can be content to ruine the glory libertie safetie of it even with the hazard of their estates lives honours soules so they may in some proportion share the spoiles of their Countrey and grow fat with the bloud and teares of the oppressed people We must not thinke they can doe thus but to the end to have greater meanes and power to beget more monstrous in all villany if it were possible These can fight against their Countrey to make themselves slaves to a few above them that the rest of their oppressed Countrey may be slaves to them slaves of slaves but I doubt not but these monsters unlesse reason transforme them shall meete with their Herculesses honest men and men of honour ●eady to die for their Countrey if need require judging such a death infinitely to be preferred before the lives of the chiefest of these should they obtaine what they seeke But let us end this patheticall flying out though it be hard for the inferiour faculties sometimes not to stirre when the understanding somewhat inlightened hath inflamed the will On the other side so divine a gift as this Parliament thankfully recognized and made use of duely and the just power and dignitie of the Parliament and therein all our happinesse wisely and manfully now once asserted moderation and mediocritie induced the Monarchy duely tempered may be in humaine probabilitie perpetuall and all the surfet become Physicke And this violent Feaver of the State having amazed and drawne to an head all the malignant humours before dispersed all over the body and lying dangerously hidden and set on fire consumed and expelled them like the filth of an house swept into an heape and burnt the whole body may be much clearer sounder and better disposed then had not such a distemper ever beene I hope it appeares already were there no more then these presented weake reasons to an ordinary rationall man if far better from others be too meane for his Majestie what way he is to take that all may be well and seeing but one side can be trusted with the power of the Kingdome which of them is most unlikely to tyrannize or reduce all to arbitrary government or which will most probably use it to the publique good onely or whether in such extraordinary times it doe not most safely repose where it is originally naturally inherent viz. in the peoples owne hands and so in the Parliaments Nay were the case hitherto dubious yet since libertie first made appointed limitted prerogative for they confine together as the people in whom is the radicall primary supreame power and who made Kings not Kings people thought best when it first made choice of or instituted this one forme of government among divers others which we call Monarchy and whereof there are sundry degrees in sundry States some more some lesse trusted or limited as the first founders pleased els why are they not all equall since free and voluntary agents worke or doe onely so much or so far as they please and the various subordinate degrees or kinds of the creatures prove the divine Majestie to be agens liberrimum els the creatures would be all equall an involuntary or naturall agent as Philosophy termes it ever working as much as it can or to the utmost extent or sphere of its power and activitie and so an equalitie in the effects since I say libertie or the people first created as I may say Prerogative and that so tempered modified or graduated as it thought most conducible to its owne happinesse for the supreame power ever worketh for it selfe rather then for the subordinate or inferiour as being the end the efficient and finall causes being here co-incidents it is just that this namely libertie judge and give law to that and that this if an unnaturall jarre fall out gaine and prosper rather then the other and since the people reserved ever in its owne hands and saved to it selfe upon the trust to the Monarchy what priviledges right of Parliament or liberties c. parcell of the originall power naturally in the people and which may draw backe to the fountaine the derivative power as the bloud and spirits to the heart when there is cause it thought best surely it must doe this with purpose to see them conserved as safely as may be and upon occasion to make use of them and enjoy them which could not be surely done without a power reserved to judge of the state of them and when they were to be used and the like for if the Prince be trusted touching the keeping himselfe within his limits he may even as well be trusted absolutely without limits nor such power to judge of them is to any purpose as above-said without power to execute what is judged hereupon fit So the Parliament judgeth in this case as the first authour and superintendent of the intent and is not as a partie to be judged Further were the matter yet dubious yet seeing the Protestant Religion the power being in the Parliaments hand is far more out of the reach of danger then the other way even without calling his Majesties good meaning into question therein as I hope anon will appeare it ought to put it out of all question how wee are to range our selves in these times The Parliament having our case so standing such power as is deduced whatsoever would seeme to oppose that power and stand in their way as they defend and assert the publique good so invaded must be voidable and usuall ordinary known lawes or customes made or in use supposing or whilest the Prince kept duely within his bounds which the King speakes so much of saying that he will ever governe by them and hold all to them but ever intending the publique good are no way to bound or tye up the transcendent power of the Parliament when it shall encounter new and never before heard of exorbitances or invasions of the publique good which the times that