Fire nor the Roman Catholiques by reason of the Oath of Supremacy the Halter Whereupon it was again desired by the Houses that Treason might be reduced into a certainty according to the Statute of the 25 of Edw. the 3. which was accordingly so enacted the 2. of Phil. and Ma. And all these three Statutes 25 Edw. 3. 1 Hen. 4. and 2 Phil. and Ma. are yet in force In which the attempting of any thing against the Kings Person the adhering to the Kings Enemies the leavying War against the King The seizing of any of his Forts or his Ships Royal The Counterfeiting of the Kings Hand or his great or privy Seal with many other particulars are so explicitely and clearly enacted to be high Treason That whosoever should be guilty of the Fact would have as ill a Plea to plead That â—unius Brutus Buchanan or any of our new Doctors did hold and maintain by their writings That it is lawfull in such and such Cases to take Armes against the King and so consequently in all the other particulars specified in the said Statute As a Felon that had rob'd upon the high way would have to plead that Theft by the Law of God is not punishable by death for which he would not want likewise his * Authors But such as have been acquainted with the Courses held with those that have been Indicted and Arraigned for Treason will know That to be proceeded against only upon the plain and clear letter of the Law is to have favourable Iustice And he shall have the Kings Atturny and the learned Counsel with Eloquence and great strains of Wit by Deductions and Inferences as though they had lost the day if the Accused should be acquitted stretch the litteral Text beyond what it can rationally or honestly bear and speaking as they say for the King no man dares reprove or restrain them But to suppose that any Allegation of Conscience or the Opinion of learned Authors nay if it were Texts out of Scripture against the explicite letter of the Law would be heard or admitted were a great Ignorance But he would be told as I know some have been That all other things were Matters dehors Nothing to the purpose The issue was only factum or non factum And truly wofull experience had taught me to be wary in humane prudence not to imbarque my self in a Business wherin my Conscience was not only altogether unsatisfied but if I should ever be brought to a legal Tryal upon it mine own Judgment told me I could have nothing to say in mine own Defence of Justification or that could preserve my Self and Posterity from total Ruine and Destruction but Prevailing and Victory Which at the most could but protect but could not make a bad Cause good But besides humane Prudence and fear of Punishment there is a Conscientious Tye of obeying the Law we being taught to obey not only for wrath but for Conscience sake S. Paul saith That if there had been no Law there had been no sinne which sheweth That the breaking of just Laws and legally established is sin For the supream Powers therein are chiefly disobeyed who are supposed to command more Authoritatively by their Laws than by their Verbal Commands Further as the Laws are so positive against Resistance and taking Arms against the King so likewise have the Laws been as carefull to Protect and thereby to Incourage the Subject to adhore unto their King for it is provided by the Stat. 11 of Hen. 7. Cap. 1. That from henceforth no manner of person or persons whatsoever he or they be that attend upon the King and Soveraign Lord of this Land for the time being in his Person and do him true and faithfull service of Allegience in the same or be in other places by his Commandement in his Wars within this Land or without That for the said deed true duty of Allegeance he or they be no wise Convict or Attaint of high Treason nor of other offences for that Cause by Act of Parliament or otherwise by any Process of Law whereby he or any of them shall lose or forfeit Life Land Tenements Rents Possessions Hereditaments Goods Chattels or any other things but to be for that deed and service utterly discharged of any Vexation Trouble or Losse And if any Act or Acts or other Process of the Law hereafter thereupon for the same happen to be made contrary to this Ordinance That then that Act or Acts or other Process of the Law whatsoever they shall be stand and be utterly void Provided alwaies That no Person or Persons shall take any benefit or advantage by this Ast which shall hereafter decline from his or their said Allegeance So that if they that have served the King with Fidelity according to the Law shall by their prevailing fellow-Subjects be attainted and their Estates forfeited and disposed of at their pleasure It must be by some such Transcendent Power as must be above all Laws For as by the Law no Subject ought either to be attainted or lose his Estate for serving the King in his Wars so can no Confiscations by the Law belong to any but unto the King or such as derive their Right from him It is true in the Heat and Contestation of War it is usual that whatsoever Goods or Wealth the souldier can lay hands upon is de facto esteemed good Purchase But after the War is ended the Law useth then to recover her Force And setled Inheritances in all former Civill Wars in England have never been disposed of by the Arbitrary Power of the prevailing Party although they were Kings claiming the Crown by Title and might have Right to Confiscations but by legal Convictions and due course of Law much more in the Case of Subjects taking Arms against their King which is alwaies in the beginning stiled and proclaimed Rebellion by the King that they Oppose untill Success or Treaty qualifie that Name That they should not content themselves with a General Pardon and Act of Oblivion and the settlement of the Government for the future to their reasonable Content and Security for themselves and their Estates But that Inheritances must be confiscated and disposed of by them and such persons as they shall please without legal Tryal and as it were by Proscription or Decimation be by a Vote designed to loss of Life and Estate without Pardon or Mercy What greater Cruelty could have been used towards them if they had faln into the hands of the Turk or most merciless Conquerour especially if it shall be considered that in this Case no Neutrality could be admitted nor the most peaceable-minded man avoid the being ingaged For as by the Law it is Treason to take Armes against the King by the above-recited Statutes so by the Statute of the 19 Hen. 7. It is loss of all Honours Castles Lordships Mannors Lands Tenements and other Hereditaments c. not to take Armes for the King and
by some of the Kings Ministers in the House of Commons That if the King were not supplyed by Parliament he must and would betake himself to new Counsells The plain English whereof was understood to be That the King would find out some other Course for his supplies without making use of his People in Parliament And this Opinion that Parliaments would for some time be laid aside gave Boldness and Incouragements to all Promoters and Projectors to set on foot many Monopolies and Projects which were still countenanced by the colour and pretence of Law And amongst the rest and indeed striking at the Root of the Subjects Propriety was that of the Ship-mony brought forth * And the Attorney Noy hath the name to have been the Father of it He was in his time held to have been a great Oracle of the Law and had been in former Parliaments a great Patriot and Propugner of the Subjects Liberty and his Opinion was of high Authority in point of Law with the King and with all Men He assured the King that there might be means found out of the Kings own especially in times of Necessity for him to supply himself justly and according to the Law And so propoundeth this Project of the Ship-mony The King relyed not upon the single Opinion of his Attorny But as a good Prince ought to do He took the further Advice of the Judges who are his proper Counsel in matters of the Law and with whom he ought to Consult And they are sworn to Counsell him faithfully The Major part of them which involveth the rest approved this Project as legal But the King would not content himself with their Verbal Advice But required the then Lord Chief Justice and the Judges to set down the Case and their Opinions of it under their hands which they did accordingly So that it being to be presupposed that the King mote than in the points of administring Justice cannot have a distinct knowledge either of the Extent of his own Prerogative or the abstruse Cases of the Law In a point so much concerning him as the relieving of him in his great wants by ways avowed to him to be just and legal what more upright or prudent Course could a Prince take than to be advised not by young Men or Favorites at Court but by his learned Counsell and his grave Judges sworn to advise him faithfully according to their best skill who if they have behaved themselves wickedly or corruptly upon their heads let Judgement light But let the King and his Throne be free But many Men conceiving and not without Reason That this private and extra judicial Opinion of the Judges was not to be a binding Rule did not acquiesce therin but did refuse the Payment of the Ship-mony and did indeavour to defend this their refusal by a due and legal way of Process and particularly Mr. John Hamden And the Business was brought to an Issue and to a publique Tryal in the Exchequer-Chamber which is the highest and supremest Judicature under the Parliament which the Kingdom of England knoweth in point of Law for it is a Court composed of all the Judges of the several Tribunals for the ending of such difficult and dubious Cases as have not been formerly over-ruled or wherein there is found a difference in Opinion amongst the Iudges themselves And herein the Counsell on both sides whether the Case be betwixt Party and Party or the King and Subject do not only plead but argue the Case in Law and the Iudges do commonly before they give Sentence argue themselves the Case in point of the learning of the Law All which solemnities passed in this Case without any interruption by the King And after divers daies hearing and arguing Iudgment passed for the King by Plurality of Votes for the fewer Votes are involved in the Iudgment of the Major part as there is a Necessity they should be in all Counsells and Iudicatures otherwise Controversies could not be ended unless there were an unanimous Agreement in all that had Votes which seldom happeneth But in this Case three parts of fower Agreed in the Iudgment for the King So that if the Iudges have erred now in Iudicature being sworn to do equal Justice betwixt the King and the Subject as they did before in their Advice unto the King being sworn to Counsell him faithfully the greater is their fault and Offence But I must confess I am not able to set out the Kings Transgression This Case yet passed further For it being brought into the Parliament by way of Grievance the Iudgement was not only reversed all Records burnt and all Courses given way unto by the King which the Houses themselves could think on That no such Excesse might be attempted again in future times But the Lord Keeper and the Iudges were without any Interposition of the King left unto the Justice of the Parliament And the Lord Keeper and divers of them were by the House of Commons impeached of high Treason So the King having no hand in the setting it on foot nor in the erroneous Iudgement nor having protected the Parties culpable from Punishment But the Grievance being redressed and sufficient Caution and Provision assented unto by the King for the preventing of the like for the future I could not deduce from hence any Argument of the Kings intention to subvert the Law or of any justifiable ground of taking arms against him And what is said in this Case of the Ship-mony doth likewise hold in the Cases of Monopolies which are alwaies suggested to be for the good of the Subject as well as legal and beneficial to the King who never granteth any of them without Reference In point of Conveniency or Disâ—dvantage to the Subject they are usually referred to some of his privy-Counsell In point of Law to some of his learned Counsell In point of his Benefit to some Officers of his Revenew Who if they have erred or were corrupted and the King by their ill Advice drawn to pass any unfit or illegal thing I have known the Parliament for the space of these forty years address themselves by Petition unto the King for Redress but unto the Referrees for the Fault and the Causers of the Grievances And if they could get the said Grievances redressed and the Referrees brought to punishment they alwaies esteemed it so gracious a Proceeding from the King towards them that usually it was acknowledged with the return of some Gift or Supply But that any Argument should be deduced from thence of any Intention in the King to subvert the Laws I never knew it Neither have I known that the King hath ever proceeded in matters of this kind but in the manner here set down And in this Parliament all Projects and Monopolies were put down and all men that either had a Hand or Interest in them unless it were such as the House of Commons thought fit for Causes known unto themselves to
them any Right to which they laid Claim But if the making of Ordinances without the King of equal Authority with Acts of Parliament to which the Royal Assent had passed The keeping in their hands the Militia Forts and Navy exclusively to the King The altering of Church-Government established by Law without the Kings Consent The making a new Great Seal The proscribing of the Kings loyal Friends and Servants to loss of life and estates without pardon or mercy before either Summons Tryal or Conviction The taking to themselves the sole Power of pardoning and disposing of Confiscations If the setting unto sale the Lands and Revenew of the Church for so many hundreds of years appropriated unto it by their single Arbitrary Power without the Kings Consent who is Founder of all the Bishopricks and which he was sworn to preserve If the abolishing of the Court of Wards and discharging the Subjects of their Tenures and so consequently of their service to the Crown If the deteining of the Kings Children from him the breeding of them and the future Mariage of them belongeth unto them If the Power of injoining new Oaths upon the Subject contrary to all Law and without the King If the making what they please Treason ex plenitudine potestatis â—s the * harbouring of the King c. notwithstanding that the Law hath determined what shall be adjudged Treason and nothing else If the sending to and treating with forein Princes of War and Peace or the nominating of Judges Sheriff and the Officers of the Crown and many things of this kind If they lay Claim unto these as their Right I must confesse I have not known any satisfaction offered unto them by the King Only in the point of his Servanâ—s he hath alwaies protested that he would protect no man whatsoever so that he might be brought to a Legal Tryal according to the due Course of Law which he is bound to see afforded to all his Subjects But for the rest of the above specified particulars I do not know that the King hath indeavoured their satisfaction Neither can it be supposed by any rational man that they will ground their defensive War upon any Claim they will make unto them For although de facto in the Contestation of War they have seized and possessed themselves of them yet they will not pretend that they have right unto them de jure And it is Right that constitutes the Iustness or Uniustness of the entring into a War Success protecteth and may establish for the future but cannot rectifie or make good an unjust beginning And it must be their future proceedings by which the most probable Iudgement can be made of their former intentions For now that they have overcome all oppositions If they shall return to a peaceable legal Settlement and leave to use Arbitrary Government which they may pretend they have been inforced unto during an Actual War and shall only retain their just Liberties and Privileges with such additions and inlargements of Graces and Immunities as the King being free and without constraint shall be contented to grant together with prudent Cautions for their own Indempnity and Security for the future which in Cases of this Nature must ever be supposed that rational Men will indeavour and successfull men that have the Power in their hands will expect If they will let the Subject have the comfort and security of a general Pardon and an Act of Oblivion not force the consciences of their fellow subjects by new Oaths which they themselves have acknowledged to be contrary to the Law and against the Petition of Right If they will endeavour really the settlement of Religion by a moderate Reformation and not by a total ruine of the most Orthodox and flourishing Church of Europe and so restore the King to what is undeniably his and make the known Law the Rule of Government These will be the strongest Arguments that Defence was rather intended than a Conquest But if Armies shall be reteined when there are no Enemies and by them an Arbitrary Power held up over mens Lives Liberties and Estates and the King kept in the nature of a subdued and useless Person little will be believed of any Intention of taking only defensive Arms CHAP. X Shewing a particular Tye of Gratitude by the Generousness and Reconcileableness of the Kings Disposition THere was yet a further Tye of Gratitude put upon me by the Generousness and Reconcileableness of the Kings Disposition a virtue ever to be wished but not often found in offended Princes For I having been so unhappy as to have fallen very highly into his Disfavour and to have remained many years under a Cloud of his heavy Displeasure yet not long before the beginning of this Parliament having the opportunity of accesse unto him at the great Counsel at York And then being imployed as Prolocutor in the Commission for the Treaty with the Scots at Rippon for a Cessation and afterwards for the Peace at London he was pleased to receive so good satisfaction concerning me and all my former proceedings that he did graciously pass by whatsoever offence he had conceived against me and did not only call me to his Counsel-Table where in regard of my many years service under his Father he might have judged me usefull unto his service but out of a Confidence and Trust which to fail in even amongst Heathens would be held odious admitted me to the place of the nearest Attendance about his Person as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber who besides the Privileges of Access in all places have the Honor to sleep by him in the night in his Chamber and to be trusted alone with the safety of his Person as I have often been And this place is accompanyed with a particular Oath of distinct services Of attending upon his Person of not Acting or Concealing any thing to his Prejudice and other things of particular service more than other subjects do swear unto And I must confess that if all the above alleged Reasons had been laid aside and that there had been no other Tye but this new Obligation of the Kings Reconciliation and of his trusting and confiding in me knowing him to be so free not only from all things that might justifie the taking Arms against him but from all things of doing wrong or oppression if other mens errors or corruptions were not put upon his Score That if all the misfortunes that have befallen me and my Family had been foreseen by me and might have been prevented by my forsaking of my Master only because he was in distress I would rather have embraced this poor and exiled condition than to have lived in any Estate of plenty whatsoever reproaching to my self daily and hourly my Infidelity and Ingratitude CHAP. XI A Brief Summary of the Reasons formerly set down for the not taking Arms against the King THese are the Reasons that have reteined me in that Duty which I conceived my self
if it should but so happen which God of his goodness avert That mutually Forces and Armies should be raised Jealousies and Fears would be so much increased thereby that an Accommodation would be rendred full of difficulty and length and the very charge of maintaining them whilst first a Cessation of Arms and then a general Accommodation were in treating the Wealth of the Kingdom would be consumed And of this we had lately a costly Example for in those unhappy Troubles betwixt us and Scotland after there was a stop made to any further Acts of Hostility and a desire of Peace expressed on both sides Commissioners nominated and all the Articles propounded yet the keeping of the Armies together for our several Securities whilst the Cessation at Rippon and the Peace at London where in treating cost this Kingdome not much lesse than a million of pounds And if two Armies be once on foot here in England either a suddain Encounter must destroy one of them or the keeping of them on foot must destroy the Kingdom I hope therefore we shall make it our endeavour by Moderation and Calmnesse yet to put a stay to our so near approaching miseries and that we shall hearken to the wise advice of our Brethren of Scotland in their late Answer to the King and Parliament wherein they earnestly entreat us That all means may be forborn which may make the Breach wider and the Wound deeper and that no place be given to the evill Spirit of Division which at such times worketh uncessantly and resteth not But that the fairest the most Christian and compendious way may be taken by so wise a King and Parliament as may against all Malice and Oppositions make his Majesty and Posterity more glorious and his Kingdom more happy than ever And in another place they say That since the Parliament hath thought meet to draw the Practice of the Parliament of Scotland into Example in point of Declaration They are confident that the Affection of the Parliaments will lead them also to the Practice of that Kingdom in composing the unhappy Differences betwixt his Majesty and them and so far as may consist with their Religion Liberties and Laws in giving his Majesty all satisfaction especially in their tender Care of his Royal Person and of his Princely Greatness and Authority Certainly MY LORDS this is wise and brotherly Advice and I doubt not but we are all desirous to follow it We must not then still dwell upon generals for generals produce nothing But we must put this Business into a certain way wherby particulars may be descended unto And the way that I shall offer with all humility is That there may be a select Committee of choise Persons of both Houses who may in the first place truely state and set down all things in difference betwixt the King and the Subject with the most probable way of reconciling them Secondly to descend unto the particulars which may be expected by each from other either in point of our supporting of him or his relieving of us And lastly how all these Conditions being agreed upon may be so secured as may stand with the Honor of his Majesty and the satisfaction of the Subject When such a Committee shall have drawn up the heads of the Propositions and the way of securing them they may be presented unto the Houses and so offered unto his Majesty by such a Way as the Parliament shall Iudge most probable to produce an Accommodation MY LORDS What I have said unto you hath been chiefly grounded upon the Apprehensions and Fears of our future Dangers I shall say something of the unhappiness of our present Estate which certainly standeth in as much need of Relief and Remedy as our Fears do of Prevention For although the King and People were fully united and that all men that now draw several waies should unanimously set their hand to the work yet they would find it no easie task to restore this Kingdom to a prosperous and comfortable Condition If we take into our Consideration the deplorable Estate of Ireland likely to drain this Kingdom of Men and Treasure if we consider the Debts and Necessity of the Crown the Ingagements of the Kingdom the great and unusual Contributions of the People the which although they may not be so much to their Discontent for that they have been legally raised yet the burthen hath not been much eased let us likewise consider the Distractions I may almost call them Confusions in point of Religion which of all other Distempers are most dangerous and destructive to the Peace of a State Besides these publique Calamities let every particular man consider the distracted discomfortable estate of his own Condition for mine own part I must ingenuously profess unto your Lordships That I cannot find out under the different Commands of the King and the Parliament any such Course of Caution and Wariness by which I can promise to my self Security or Safety I could give your Lordships many instances of the Inconsistency and impossibility of obeying these Commands But I shall trouble you with only one or two The Ordinance of Parliament now in so great agitation commandeth all Persons in Authority to put it in execution all others to obey it according to the Fundamental Laws of the Land The King declareth it to be contrary to the Fundamental Laws against the Subject and Rights of Parliament And commandeth all his Subjects of what sort soever upon their Allegeance not to obey the said Ordinance as they will answer the contrary at their perils So likewise in point of the King commanding the Attendance of divers of us upon his Person whereunto we are obliged by several relations of our Services and Oaths in case we comply not with his Commands we are liable to his displeasure and the loss of those places of Honor and Trust which we hold under him if we obey his Commands without the leave of the Parliament which hath not been alwaies granted we are liable to the Censure of Parliament And of both these we want not fresh Examples So that certainly this cannot but be acknowledged to be an unhappy and uncomfortable Condition I am sure I bring with me a ready and obedient Heart to pay unto the King all those Duties of Loyalty Allegeance and Obedience which I owe unto him And I shall never be wanting towards the Parliament to pay unto it all those due Rights and that Obedience which we all owe unto it But in contrary Commands a Conformity or Obedience to both is hardly to be lighted on The Reconciliation must be in the Commanders and the Commands and not in the Obedience or the Person that is to obey And therfore untill it shall please God to bless us with a right understanding betwixt the King and Parliament and a Conformity in their Commands neither the Kingdom in publick nor particular men in private can be reduced to a safe or comfortable Condition I
in their Propositions to the King at Oxford when without Summons Hearing or Conviction I was censured to be made incapable of holding of any place or imployment in the Kingdom or to come within the Verge of the Court without laying the least Crime or Delinquency to my charge and since in the Propositions at Uxbridge their severity increasing towards me they added much to their former Censure I am sure without any further Crime or Provocation on my part having before that time with the Kings leave retired my self from the Court with intention to have passed the rest of mine age in a private life which the War not permitting me at my House at Sherbone I did at Exeter for the space of more than 2 years with as much privacy as was possible for me Yet was I so unfortunate that although their former desires of my being removed from Court were accomplished by my voluntary Act neither time did allay their displeasure nor my absence from Court restrain their further severitie towards me But I was voted in those Propositions prepared to be offered to his Majesty and afterwards sent unto him to be in the number of the most high and capital Offenders who were not to expect Pardon or Mercy either concerning Life or Fortune Yet herewith was not my Patience and resolution of Silence overborn conceiving this Exception could signifie nothing more than that such Excepted Persons upon whom the displeasure of the Houses was highly fallen should not be admitted to that general Pardon of Course which joyned to some pecuniary Mulct or Composition should be a Discharge and indempnity to others that had born Armes without further Tryal or Impeachment But that the Excepted Person should be reserved to a particular strict Legal Tryal and being after a fair hearing legally convicted of those presupposed hainous and foul Crimes the suggestions whereof induced the Houses to lay this heavy mark of Distinction upon them They being so condemned should have the severity of Law and Justice to pass upon them and be excepted from Pardon as far as lay in the houses to except them But I did not conceive that the intention of the Houses was or could be to except them from a legal Tryal or fair Hearing nor from being acquitted or cleared if they were innocent For no man could entertain so hard or prejudiced an opinion of the two Houses or of the Scotish Commissioners who concurred and assented to the Propositions and the Exception that they should upon the transferring of such Persons as the House of Peers should nominate of their Body or the House of Commons of their Members or of the Body of the Commons or the Scotish Commissioners of their Kingdom condemn implicitely or Proscribe in compliance one to the other without distinct knowledge of the Person or the Crimes so many noble Personages and Families to totall ruine and destruction without hearing or due processe of Law Besides their demanding of the Kings assent to pass their Condemnations and Incapacities by Act of Parliament must needs imply a due preceding Tryal and Conviction to be intended for the satisfying of the King of the Crimes and guilt of the Persons For it cannot be presupposed of the Houses that either in regard of piety or reason they could expect that the King should involve himself in so merciless a sentence of shedding so many mens blood and destroying so many good Families implicitely upon trust of other men without distinct information and satisfaction of his own Conscience And this against Persons who have been most Loyal and their Crime and Delinquencie only for having faithfully adhered to him according to the Law and their Oaths So that my Opinion then was That the intention of the Houses could be no other but that whereas some were admitted to a pecuniary Composition for their pretended Delinquency the Excepted Persons should not be admitted thereunto but be reserved to the severity of Justice without mercy but first be admitted to a legal Tryal And herein I was further confirmed by divers Treaties made with their General upon the laying down of Armes and the surrendring of Cities unto them and particularly of Excester where I was and was to have injoyed the befit of those Articles by which it was permitted unto me and unto all other Excepted Persons to endeavour by the space of four moneths to make our Peace and Composition And this would never have been condescended unto by their General and ratified by the Votes of both Houses if they intended their Vote of Exception as a final Sentence irrevocable and unalterable which they have likewise by their own Acts declared to be otherwise For that upon mediation and further information they have been pleased to several Persons to remit the severity of the Vote of Exceptions and have admitted them to Composition Upon all these preceding Reasons being confident that some such fitting season would be offered either by way of Petition or by way of being called to a fair and Legal Trial That I should be heard and after a particular Charge of all such Crimes as could be laid against me I should be admitted to a just defence Upon this ground I have hitherto remained silent and made no Answer to those so many most unjust and untrue Calumnies and Aspersions which have been cast upon me both in Print and otherwise And now by the said Treatie of Excester I supposed a fair opportunitie given me to address my self unto the Houses to attain that which was ever in my desires which was to be admitted unto an Hearing That they might judge distinctly of my Case after a full Information of all that concerned me And thereupon I addressed my humble Petition to the House of Peers That I might receive so much Favour and Justice from them That since I was by the Treaty admitted to use my best indeavours so far to satisfie the Houses that I might be left in the Condition of other men that had served the King I might be heard by them And in case I should not upon hearing give the Houses satisfaction of not deserving to be a Person Excepted I would not decline any thing whatsoever the Houses should order concerning me And in Case that it should not be seasonable in regard of their many great Affairs at that time to afford me such a Tryal That I might remain privately at mine House ingaging my self to do nothing to the prejudice of the Houses either by Act or Correspondence And to make my appearance whensoever I should be summoned and to abide their Order This Petition had likewise an humble Request unto the Lords That the said Petition might be communicated with the House of Commons in such sort as their Lordships in their wisdom should think fit For I might not being a Peer make my addresses but by them or their particular leave Yet knowing that the Proposition of Exceptions was by the joint Vote of both Houses and that no
the Pope no such Superior Jurisdiction Neither if he did are there any such Ecclesiastical Censures issued out against him as might warrant so much as his Catholique Subjects to take arms against him So that whatsoever Pretences may be in some Cases concerning such Princes as I have above specified wherein I shall not presume to deliver any Opinion yet in the present Case of King CHARLES there can be no colourable pretence of taking arms against him or of deposing him which I understand to be in effect when he is divested oâ— his just Regal Power Or of the imprisoning of his person which I understand to be not only when he is in Bonds or lockt up in a Room but when the liberty of going and the freedom of speaking is restrained to such places or persons as others shall please and he remain under the Guard of Armed men not of his own choosing but imposed upon him by others It must be acknowledged that the Kings of England derive their Title and Right from William the Norman who although he came in by Conquest yet his Successors considering that a Right acquired by Force may likewise be recovered by Force by those upon whom the forceable Intrusion was made were pleased by way of pact and stipulation to limit and qualifie that Imperium absolutum which is acquired by Conquest And the People of England thereupon did submit themselves to his Government and became his Subjects and his Liege-men And thereby was Constituted Imperium legitimum a just and Rightfull Soveraignty the Kings remaining with Supreme Power and the People with Common Right whereby they were freed from the Servitude of Conquest and remained under a free Subjection whereunto they had by their Consent submitted themselves The Kings likewise did recede from Absolute and Arbitrary Power and remained with Supreme but not with Absolute Empire By free Subjection I understand when a People live under Laws to which they have given a free Consent and not under the meer Will of the Prince And that they retain such a Propriety in that which is their own that without their Assent or legal forfeiture it cannot be taken from them And this is a true difference betwixt a Free Subject and a Slave or Servant Quicquid acquirit servus acquiritur Domino Liber quod acquirit acquirit sibi Whatsoever a servant getteth he getteth for his Lord Whatsoever a Freeman getteth he getteth for himself And so although that Dominion of all belongeth to the Prince Propriety belongs to every man Dominium totius apud Caesarem Proprietas apud singulos The Difference that I understand betwixt a Supreme and Absolute Empire is That in Absolute Empire the Rule of the Peoples Obedience is only the Soveraigns Will So it is in Turky Muscovia and all such Princes as retain entire the Right of Conquest and was in some sort under the Roman Emperor after the Lex Regia was established by the Peoples Consent whereby they transferred their entire Right unto the Emperor Supreme Empire I understand to be when a King hath a Supremacy and Soveraingnity over all but his Absolute Power is limited and restrained by reciprocal Pacts Laws and Stipulations betwixt Prince and People which is the Case of the Crown of England And to these Pacts the King and People are equally bound before God and Man And the King is as much bound to Iustice and to the protection of his Subjects and to the observance of the Laws not only out of Religion but out of Moral Honesty as the Subject is to Obedience And he is not only accomptable to God but his People have just and legal waies to seek Redress wherein he shall do Wrong notwithstanding that Axiome of our Common Law * That the King can do no Wrong which is very false in many senses and may be very well called fictio Iuris a kind of Metaphysical Fiction For Kings may do Wrong and be as wicked as other men and may commit Murther and lye with other mens Wives and wrongfully take take other mens Estates which no Fiction of the Law can make not to be Wrong although his Person be exempt from punishment And that abstract Consideration of the King for his just Power and Office as it hath been often ill used heretofore in way of Assentation So there hath been as ill use made of it in these troubles when the taking of arms and the fighting against him was pretended not to be against the King but against CHARLES STEWART But to speak in Terms intelligible a King both may do Wrong and the People may seek their redress in such sort as the Law of the Land alloweth And the difference betwixt King and Peoples failing in their reciprocal Duties is not but that they do Wrong alike offend God alike and are both of them liable to be questioned according to the extent of the Law by both their Consents established The Subjects transgressing the Law shall be punished according to the quality and measure of their Delicts Felony by loss of their Goods and Chattels and by a milder Death Treason by a more severe Death and Confiscation both of Goods and Inheritance But hereof they must be convict per pares by People of their own Condition and adjudged by a Superiour Iurisdiction which can be derived only and singly from the King So that the King not having his Peer or any of his own Condition cannot have a legal Tryal And having no jurisdiction superior to himself cannot be adjudged or sentenced by any For neither the Extent of the Law nor any Condition of the Pacts or Stipulation do reach to the punishing of the Person of the King or the forfeiture of his Dominion over us It is true that in civill things Tryals may be and often are brought against the King And Kings do give way That the Iudges be sworn to do equal Iustice betwixt them and their Subjects And in point of Oppression and Wrong we may Remonstrate our Grievances and challenge Redress by our Petitions Which if they be not condescended unto we may insist upon them as our right and claim them as a due and not as of grace And although we do it by way of Petition that is but a dutifull form of Subjects bringing their Plea against the King For in other sort he ought not to be impleaded Besides these Petions of Right we may as it hath been formerly said remonstrate enter our Protestations and take all those Courses which the Laws allow Neither ought the King to take Offence at these legal Contestations with him because by his assent unto the Laws he hath assented unto them Nay he ought in them to do us Right being bound thereunto by the Law of God and by his Oath and by moral Honesty and Iustice But if he fail in all these Duties our Jurisdiction reacheth not to his personal Punishment therein he is sub nullo nisi sub Dâ—o and the Law stoppeth there
break in amongst us we shall remain the Scorn or the Pitty of them I am far from thinking that any of your Lordships are less inclined to an Accommodation than my self but some body must be the mover And those miserable spectacles which mine eyes have of late years beheld in the Palatinate and in Germany make me zealous and importunate that they be prevented here if such be Gods holy will if not yet I shall have this particular Comfort what fortune soever shall befall me That as I am assured that I have had no hand in any those things which have caused the unhappy differences betwixt the King and his People so I shall appeal unto your Lordships if I have not been subservient unto your Lordships in all things that might have removed these misunderstandings and to have imployed my Indeavours and solicitation even unto Importunity for the setting on foot some way of Accomdation wherby only our unspeakable Calamities and very near at hand can be diverted from us Nineteen Propositions sent unto his Majesty the 2 of Iune 1642. 1. THat the Lords and others of your Majesties privy Counsell and such great Officers and Ministers of State either at home or beyond the Seas may be put from your Privy Counsel and from those Offices and Imployments excepting such as shall be approved of by both Houses of Parliament And that the Persons put into the Places and Imployment of those that are removed may be approved of by both Houses of Parliament And that Privy Counsellours shall take an Oath for the due execution of their Places in such form as shall be agreed upon by both Houses of Parliament 2. That the great Affairs of the Kingdom may not be concluded or transacted by the Advice of Private Men or by any unknown or unsworn Counsellors but that such matters as concern the Publique and are proper for the high Court of Parliament which is your Majesties great and supreme Counsel may be debated resolved and transacted only in Parliament and not elsewhere And such as shall presume to do any thing to the contrary shall be reserved to the Censure and judgment of Parliament And such other matters of State as are proper for your Majesties privy Counsel shal be debated and concluded by such of the Nobility and others as shall from time to time be chosen for that Place by Approbation of both Houses of Parliament And that no publick Act concerning the Affairs of the Kingdom which are proper for your Privy Counsell may be esteemed of any Validity as proceeding from the Royal Authority unlâ—ss it be doâ—e by the advice and consent of the Major part of your Counsell attested under their hands And that your Counsell may be limitted to a certain Number not exceeding twenty five nor under fifteen And if any Counsellors place happen to be void in the Interval of Parliament It shall not be supplyed without the Assent of the Major part of the Counsell which choice shall be confirmed at the next sitting of Parliament or else to be void 3. That the Lord High Steward of England Lo. High Constable Lo. Chancellor or Lo. Keeper of the Great Seal Lo. privy Seal Earl Marshal Lo. Admiral Warden of the Cinque Ports chief Governor of Ireland Chancellor of the Exchequer Master of the Wards Secretaries of State two chief Iustices and chief Barons may alwaies be chosen with the Approbation of both Houses of Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliaments by Assent of the major part of the Câ—unsel in such manner as is before exprest in the choise of Counsellors 4. That he or they unto whom the Government and Education of the Kings Children shall be committed shall be approved of by both Houses of Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament by the Assent of the Major part of the Counsell in such manner as is before exprest in the choise of Counsellors And that all such servants as are now about them against whom both Houses shall have any just exceptions shall be removed 5. That no Mariage shall be concluded or treated for any of the Kings Children with any forein Prince or other Person whatsoever abroad or at home without the Consent of Parliament under the penalty of a praemunire unto such as shall conclude or treat any Mariage as aforesaid and that the said penalty shall not be pardoned or dispensed with but by the Consent of both Houses of Parliament 6. That the Laws in force against Iesuits Priests and Popish Recusants be strictly put in Ececution without any toleration or dispensation to the contrary And that some more effectual Course may be enacted by authority of Parliament to disable them from making any Disturbance in the State or eluding the Law by Trusts or otherwise 7. That the Votes of Popish Lords in the House of Peers may be taken away so long as they continue Papists And that your Majesty will consent to such a Bill as shall be drawn for the Education of the Children of Papists by Protestants in Protestant Religiâ—n 8. That your Majesty will be pleased to consent that such a Reformation be made of the Church Government and Liturgy as both Houses of Parliament shall advise wherein they intend to have consultation with Divines as is expressed in their Declaration to that purpose And that your Majesty will contribute your best assistance to them for the raising of a sufficient maintenance for preaching Ministers thorought the Kingdome and that your Majesty will be pleased or give your Consent to Laws for the taking away of Innovations and Superstition and of Pluralities and against scandalous Ministers 9. That your Majesty will be pleased to rest satisfied with that Course that the Lords and Commons have appointed for ordering of the Militia untill the same shall be further setled by a Bill And that your Majesty will recall your Declarations and Proclamations against the Ordinance made by the Lords and Commons concerning it 10. That such Members of either House of Parliament as have during this present Parliament been put out of any Place and Office or otherwise have satisfaction for the same upon the Petition of that House whereof he or they are Members 11. That all privy Counsellors and Iudges may take an Oath the form whereof to be agreed on and setled by act of Parliament for the maintaining of the Petition of Right of certain Statutes made by this Parliament which shall be mentioned by both Houses of Parliament and that an Inquiry of all the breaches and violations of those Laws may be given in charge by the Iustices of the Kings Bench every Term and by Iudges of Assise in their Circuits and Justices of the Peace at the Sessions to be presented and punished according to Law 12. That all the Iudges and all the Officers Places by Approbation of both Houses of Parliament may hold their Places Quamdiu bené se gesserint 13. That the Iustice of Parliament may pass upon all Delinquents
whether they be within the Kingdom or fled out of it And that all Persons cited by either House of Parliament may appear and abide the Censure of Parliament 14. That the general Pardon offered by your Majesty may be granted with such Exceptions as shall be advised by both Houses of Parliament 15. That the Forts and Castles of this Kingdom may be put under the Command and Custody of such Persons as your Majesty shall appoint with the Approbation of your Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament with the Approbation of the Major part of the Counsel in such manner as before is expressed in the Choise of Counsellors 16. That the extraordinary Guards and Military Forces now attending your Majesty may be removed and discharged and that for the future you will raise no such Guards or extraordinary Forces but according to the Law in case of actual Rebellion or Invasion 17. That your Majesty will be pleased to enter into a more strict allyance with the States of the United Provinces and other Neighbour Princes and States of the Protestant Religion for the defence and maintenance thereof against all designs and attempts of the Pope and his Adherents to subvert and suppress it whereby your Majesty will obtain a great access of Strength and Reputation and the Subjects be much incouraged and enabled in a Parliamentary way for your aid and assistance in restoring your Royal Sister and her Princely Issue to those Dignities and Dominions which belong unto them and relieving the other distressed Protestant Princes who have suffered in the same Cause 18. That your Majesty would be pleased by Act of Parlia to clear the Lord Kimbolton and the five Members of the House of Commons in such manner that future Parliaments may be secured from the Consequent of that evill President 19. That your Majesty will be pleased to pass a Bill for restraining Peers made hereafter from sitting or voting in Parliament unless they be admitted thereunto with the Cansent of both Houses of Parliament H. ELSYNG CLER. PARL. D. COM. The Oath of Supremacy Cited page 31. I A. B. do utterly testifie and declare in my Conscience that the Kings Highness is the only Supreme Governor of this Realm and of all other his Highness Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as Temporal c. I do promise that from henceforth I shall bear Faith and true Allegeance to the Kings Highness his Heirs and lawfull Successors and to my power shall assist and defend all Iurisdictions Privileges Preheminences and Authorities granted or belonging to the Kings Highness his Heirs and Successors or united or annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm So help me God and by the Contents of this Book The Oath fa Privy-Counsellor Cited page 32. You shall swear to the uttermost part of your cunning wit skill and power you shall he true and faithfull to the Kings Majesty our most dread and Soveraign Lord and to his Highnesse Heirs and Successors Kings and Queens of England according to the Statute for the establishment of the Succession of the Crown Imperial of this Realm You shall not know nor hear any thing that may in any wise be prejudicial to his Majesty or to his Heirs and Successors in form aforesaid or to the Common Wealth Peace and Quiet of this his Majesties Realm but you will with all diligence reveal and disclose the same to his Majesty or to such Person or Persons of his Highness Privy-Counsel as you shall think may and will honestly convey and bring it to his Majesties knowledge You shall serve his Majesty truly and faithfully in the room and place of his Highness Privy-Counsel You shall keep close and secret all such matters as shall be treated disputed debated and resolved of in Counsell without disclosing the same or any part thereof to any but only to such as be of the Privy-Counsell And yet if any matter so propounded treated dispated and debated in any such Counsell shall touch any particular person sworn of the same upon any such matter as shall in any wise concern his fidelity and truth to the Kings Majesty you shall in no wise open the same to him but keep it secret as you would do from another person till the Kings pleasure be known in that behalf You shall in all things to be moved treated disputed and debated in any such Counsel faithfully and truly declare your mind and opinion according to your heart and conscience in no wise forbearing so to do for any matter of respect or favour love meed dread displeasure or corruption Finally you shall be vigilant diligent and circumspect in all your doings and proceedings touching the Kings Majesty and his Affairs All which points before expressed you shall faithfully observe fulfill and keep to the utmost of your power wit and cunning So God you help and by the holy Contents of this Book The Negative Oath Cited page 32. I A. B. do swear from my heart that I will not directly nor indirectly adhere unto or willingly assist the King in this War or in this Cause against the Parliament nor any forces raised without the Consent of the two Houses of Perliament in this Cause or War And I do likewise swear that my coming and submitting my self under the power and protection of the Parliament is without any manner of design whatsoever to the Prejudice of the proceedings of the two Houses of this Present Parliament and without the privity or advice of the King or any of his Counsel or Officers other than what I have now made known So help me God c. An Act of Parliament 1 Iac. cap. 1. acknowledging the Right of the Crown to him and his successors by inherent birth-right c. Cited page 19. We do upon the knees of our hearts agnize constant Faith Loyalty and Obedience to the King his Royal Progeny in this high Court of Parliament where all the body of the Realm is either in person or by representation We do acknowledge that the true and sincere Religion of the Church is continued and established by the King And do recognize as we are bound by the Law of God and man the Realm of England and the Imperial Crown thereof doth belong to him by inherent Birth-right and lawful and undoubted succession and submit our selves and our posterities until the last drop of our blood be spent to his Rule And beseech the King to accept the same as the first fruits of our Loyalty and Faith to his Majesty and his posterity for ever And for that this Act is not compleat nor perfect without his Majesties Consent the same is humbly desired A Declaration which Offences shall be adjudged Treason Anno 25 Edvv. 3. cap. 2. Cited pa. 35. Whereas divers Opinions have been before this time in what Case Treason shall be said and in what not The King at the request of the Lords and of the Commons hath
made a Declaration in the manner as hereafter followeth That is to say when a man doth compasse or imagine the death of our Lord the King or if our Lady his Queen or their eldest Son and Heir or if a man do violate the Kings Companion or the Kings eldest Daughter unmarried or the Wife of the Kings eldest Son and Heir or if a man do levy War against our Lord the King in his Realm or be adherent to the Kings Enemies in his Realm giving to them aid and Comfort in the Realm or elswhere and thereof be proveably attainted of open deed by people of their Condition And if a man Counterfeit the Kings great or privy Seal or his money and if a man bring false mony into this Realm counterfeit to the money of England as the money called Lushburg or other like to the said money of England knowing the money to be false to merchandise or make paiment in deceit of our said Lord the King and of his people c. Certain Articles taken out of a Protestation of the Kings Supremacy made by the non-conforming Ministers which were suspended or deprived 3 Iac. Anno Dom. 1605. Cited page 51. Art 4. We hold that though the Kings of this Realm were not Members of the Church but very Infidels yea and Persecutors of the truth that yet those Churches that shall be gathered together within these Dominions ought to acknowledge and yield the said Supremacy unto them And that the same is not tyed to their Faith and Christianity but to their very Crown from which no Subject or Subjects have power to separate or disjoin it Ar. 6. We hold that no Church or Church-Officers have power for any Crime whatsoever to deprive the King of the least of his Royal Prerogatives whatsoever much lesse to deprive him of his Supremacy wherein the height of his Royal Dignity consists Ar. 9. We hold that though the King should command any thing contrary to the word unto the Churches that yet they ought not to resist him therein but only peaceably to forbear Obedience and sue unto him for Grace and Mercy and where that cannot be obtained meekly to submit themselves to the punishment Animadversions upon some particulars set down in the 57 58 pages of this Discourse there referred to this Appendix for not interrupting the Series thereof here expressed more fully If Ordinances without the Kings assent 1. That Ordinances of the two Houses without the King have not the power of Acts of Parliament should have the force of Acts of Parliament our Lives Estates and Laws might be Arbitrarily disposed of by the two Houses for that Acts of Parliament have undeniably Power over them all If Ordinances have power of Acts of Parliament the King hath no negative Voice which hath been acknowledged in all times and that no Act of Parliament bindeth the subject with out the Kings assent neither is it otherwise a Statute 1â—H 7.24 H. 8. cap. 12.25 H. 8. cap. 21. This hath likewise been acknowledged several times at the heginning of this Parliament before the Doctrine of Coordination was hatched as will appear by their books of Ordinances and Declarations 1 par fol. 727. 1 Iac. cap. 1. 1 Car. 1 Cap 7. If the King hath not his negative Voice he were the only Slave in his Kingdom for that he alone should be tyed to Laws to which he had not assented whereas all other men either by themselves or their Representatives give their Consents to the Laws they live under which is the true mark betwixt Slavery and free Subjection Slaves living under the will of the Prince free Subjects under Laws to which themselves or their Ancestors have assented And the King only shall be bound and sworn to those Laws which are imposed upon him without his Consent which were irrational as well as illegal Ordinances were never pretended but only pro tempore 4 part Inst. fol. 23.48.292 2 part Inst. fol. 47 48. Rot. Paâ— 1 num 4 Ed. 3. 2. â—â—at the ordeâ—â—â—g of the Militia appertainetâ— to the K. The Militia belongeth to the King as unseparable from the Crown without which he cannot protect nor punish withstand Enemies or suppress Rebels The Lords and Commons cannot assent in Parliament to any thing that tends to the disherison of the Crown 4 Par. Inst. fol. 14.42 Ed. 3. The Law doth give it him Stat 7 Ed. 1. with many other Statutes besides practice of all times and custome of the Realm Cook 4 part Inst. 51.125 The Forts and Navy Royal are his and to seize any of them is Treason 25 Ed. 3. 1 Ma. c. So declared by all the Iudges of England in Brookes Case 3. That the great Seal appertaineth only to the King The great Seal being the Power by which the Kings Royal Commands are legally distributed and conveyed cannot be severed from the Crown without the overthrow and destruction of Soveraignty 2 part Inst. 552. And to counterfeit the great Seal is high Treason 25 Ed. 3. 1 H. 4. cap. 2. 1. Marsess 2. cap. 6. For the Church Government The Houses have sworn the King to be the only Supreme Governor in all Causes and over all Persons as well Ecclesiastical as Civil 4. The Church Government The two Houses of Parliament may humbly offer to the King such Alterations and Reformations in Government as they shall think fit But to overthrow and change the Government without the Consent of the sole Supreme Governor nay contrary to his expresse Command and publique Declarations is against natural Reason and Common Law as well as against the said Oath The two Houses are as they say the Kings great Counsel which is true of the House of Peers The House of Commons Writ is only ad faciendum consentiendum But admitting them to be the Kings great Counsel it is a great absurdity and Non-sense that Counsellors should compel consent The Government of the Church is established by Law and by many Acts of Parliament To advise the repealing of the said Acts the Houses may do But without the Kings assent by force to endeavour the Change of the Government either in Church or Estate is high Treason so acknowledged by Mr. St. Iohns at the Arraignment of the Earl of Strafford and so declared by several Laws And was one of the Charges of Treason against the Lord of Canterbury Ir is contrary to all Divine and humane Laws that any Man should be condemned unheard or untryed 5. The prescribing of their fellow Subjects without tryal And the Law of the Land in Magna Charta ordereth That no man lose Life or Estate but per judicium parium aut legem terrae And the Stat. 2. Phil. Ma. that all Tryals for Treason be by Course of the Law Petition of Right 3 Car. It is an Inherent flower of the Crown 6. To grant Pardons belongeth only to the K. And by the Common Law Mercy belongeth to him
AN APOLOGIE OF JOHN EARL OF BRISTOL CONSISTING OF TWO TRACTS IN THE FIRST He setteth down those Motives and Tyes of Religion Oaths Laws Loyalty and Gratitude which obliged him to adhere unto the King in the late unhappy Wars in England IN THE SECOND He vindicateth his Honour and Innocency from having in any kind deserved that injurious and merciless Censure of being excepted from Pardon or Mercy either in Life or Fortunes Printed in the Year 1657. TO THE COVNTESSE of BRISTOL MY BELOVED WIFE HAving by the space of almost forty years lived comfortably together and God having been pleased to give us Children and a Posterity to whom instead of Plenty which they might have expected I might have left unto them I am now like to leave nothing but the same want and poverty which is already befallen my self I have sent unto you and them the best Legacy that I can think of to leave amongst you which is a Discourse consisting of two Parts In the first the Motives of Honour Loyalty and Religion are set down which deterred my Conscience from taking Armes against the King In the second I endeavour a Vindication of my Honour and Innocency from that severe and injurious Sentence of Exception of the Houses whereby they have declared me a Delinquent that must not expect Pardon or Mercy either in point of Fortune or of Life which must of necessity insinuate me unto the World and unto Posterity to have been a Malefactor of a more hâ—gh and horrid Nature than the Generality of those that have served the King in this War I wish you and they may have as much Comfort in the reading of it as I had in the writing of it which I believe to have been greater notwithstanding my Banishment and Want in my old Age than hath remained in the Breast of any of those that have made us so miserable Although you may communicate it with your Children and Family and near Friends yet I would not have it generally divulged or made publike for although it commeth to you in Print That is only because I wanted the means of transcribing it and I found here a great Conveniency of Printing it And it is not the more divulged thereby for that there is not any one Copy thereof but such as remain in my hands And this unto you is the only one that I have yet parted with The last request you made unto me with Tears when I departed from you and left the kingdom was That I would set down in writing mine own Proceeding and the unavoidableness and Iustifiableness of the Cause for which we have suffered and whereof I had so often discoursed unto you And truly such hath been in all kinds your great Deserving from me That I have taken this pains chiefly for your Satisfaction as I should do much more in any thing that I should judge might be to your Comfort and that might remain as a Testimony of my Kindness Affection and Value of you BRISTOL THE CONTENTS OF THE SEVERAL Chapters contained in the first part of this Discourse Chap. 1. THe Introduction and Motives of Writing this Discourse page 1. Chap. 2. The particular Reasons of adhering unto the King in this Cause and the Method observed in this Discourse 10. Chap. 3. Reasons deduced from Scripture 12. Chap. 4. The Doctrin and Practice of the Primitive Church of not resisting their Princes notwithstanding they were Heathens or Apostates 19. Chap. 5. Setting down the Obligations and Tyes by Solemn Oaths and Protestation of not taking Arms against the King 31. Chap. 6. Setting down the unlawfulness of Hostile Resistance drawn from Humane Laws 34. Chap. 7. The Motives deduced from Honor Honesty and Gratitude of not forsaking the King in his Troubles 38. Chap. 8. A Vindication of the King against that false and injurious Aspersion of unsettledness in his Religion 44. Chap. 9. Shewing the War not to have been begun by the King but that he condescended to all things that could in reason be demanded of him for the preventing of it 51. Chap. 10. Shewing a particular Tye of Gratitude by the Generousness and Reconcileableness of the Kings Disposition 59. Chap. 11. A brief summary of the Reasons formerly set down for the not taking Arms against the King 61. Chap. 12. All the former Reasons applyed to the present Case of King CHARLES with a positive opinion thereupon 63. CHAP. 1. The Introduction and Motives of writing this Discourse I NEVER more unwillingly took pen in hand than at present to set down the subsequent Discourse for mine own Vindication against so many unjust and untrue aspersions as have been cast upon me and so great severities as have been used towards me For it was in my hopes that rather some publique and legal Tryal should have given me the means of clearing my self to the World than my pen Neither could I but in reason expect that whether by Treaty or by Force this unatural War should be extinguished such only as had been accused of illegal Oppressions or such as had been the Inventors to set on foot or the Instruments to act those things which were the cause of those unhappy mis-understandings and divisions betwixt the King and the People should have been reserved to the highest and severest punishments But that others who neither were nor could be charged with any other Crime but their adherence to either party according as they were guided by their Consciences might after some such moderate sufferings as the less successfull party are usually liable unto or after some legal Trial have been admitted to an Act of Oblivion whereby those general animosities which this War hath raised might have been allayed and by little and little have grown to be forgotten and those naturall and near relations betwixt man and wife parents and children friend and friend which this War by difference in opinion and part-taking hath destroyed might together with the peace of the Kingdom have been restored And in expectation of some such happy accord or some moderate reducement when that all mens Cases might have been calmly considered of and that the great Successes of the Houses in their war would have been seconded by their Acts of the greater and clearer Iustice And that such as had made their humble addresses unto them should have been admitted to the means of informing them and not to be censured or condemned unheard especially such as Petitioned for and submitted to the Justice of the Kingdom Upon this hope and expectation I passed by more than twenty printed aspersions full of infamy bitterness and detraction but void of all Truth These I neglected although I saw the operation they had of raising a hatred and detestation in the People who fetched their intelligence from them and grounded their opinions of prejudice upon them But that which I was far from neglecting but lay'd to my heart with great sadness and grief of mind was The severe Censures of the Houses
Proceeding therein could be but by joint concurrence of both Houses I judged this the most proper Expedient of making my addresses unto them both I accompanied this my Petition with a letter of much Respect unto the Speaker of the House of Peers with many Motives to induce them to condescend to my Petition I received Answer by letter bearing date the 10. day of Iune 1646. from the Earl of Manchester Speaker pro tempore in the name of the House as followeth My Lord The House of Peers have received your Letter and have commanded me to return your Lordship this Answer That they leave your Lordship to take the benefit of the Articles of Excester which they will carefully observe c. Hereupon having the Articles of Excester confirmed I came up in person unto London and exhibited my second Petition to the House of Peers with the same Request I had formerly made That it might be communicated with the House of Commons And by a letter signified unto the Speaker of the House of Commons my being come to London upon the publique faith of the Treatie of Excester The particular safe-Conduct of their General under his Hand and Seal and his letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons and the assurance of the House of Peers That the said Articles should be carefully observed by them My second Petition was That I might without offence sollicit my Cause and use my indeavours to give satisfaction to the Houses I received Answer by the Earl of Manchester That the Lords thought it reasonable that I might take the full benefit of the Articles and use my best indeavours in solliciting my Cause in Person to my best advantage But the next day after I had received this permission from the Lords to follow my Cause I was notified and served with an Order by the Serjeant at Armes of the House of Commons That notwithstanding it was agreed by the Articles for Rendring up of Excester Oxford c. That the Excepted Persons might come to London to endeavour to make their Peace and Composition with the Parliament the House of Commons was resolved to admit them to no Composition notwithstanding the said Articles And therefore it being to no purpose for them to use any further indeavours in that kind the Serjeant at Arms of that House was from time to time to give notice unto all such Excepted Persons That they should immediately depart without the Line of Communication and Parts adjacent and not to return c. I conceived this very derogatorie to the House of Peers that I should be ordered by the House of Commons without the Concurrence of the Lords especially in a matter wherein the Lords had declared themselves before Herein I thought it fit to have recourse unto the Lords and sent the Copie of the said Order unto divers of them who seemed to find it very strange and wished it might be offered unto the House the next morning which was accordingly done But having been read after some time of a general silence another business was set on foot and this laid by so that I found little relief was to be had where I might so justly have expected it But in regard the Serjeant at Arms had told me He could return no Answer to the House of Commons but his dutie was only to notifie the Order and to give an accompt if obedience were not given to it I wrote a letter unto the Speaker conteining some few modest and necessary requests But nothing would be heard concerning me but that I was to depart the Kingdom within the limited time by the Articles of Excester which being within very few daies to be elapsed I was constrained to make all the haste I could to the sea side and there to imbarque my Self and Companie and horses in a small boat with three Mariners only and one Boy having used all possible means to have my time enlarged only for some few daies for the providing of fitting Transportation but could not obtain it so that two daies before the expiration of the time limited by the Articles of Excester I imbarqued at Weymouth and passed into France The Reason of my leaving the Kingdom of England was First for that I was assured that the time of the Treatie being expired I should be seized as a Prisoner of War and so I might have been proceeded against by Marshal law or an Arbitrarie Power instead of a legal Tryal according to the law which neither then I did nor will at any time decline The second was That notwitstanding by the 21. Article for the surrendring of Excester it was agreed That no Oath Covenant Protestation or Subscription should be imposed upon any Person whatsoever comprised in the said Articles Yet the House of Commons ordered 2 of June 1646. That no Person should come to reside in the Parliament Quarters which was then all England but he should take the National League and Covenant and the Negative Oath notwithstanding any Articles that had been or should be made by the Army neither of which I thought could stand with my Loyaltie or the Oaths or Protestation which I had formerly taken Besides I did conceive that no Person could live with comfort or safetie under such a Power that so avowedlie broke the Publique Faith of their own Armie and General whom though I found very desirous to have his Capitulations punctually performed yet were they in all things broken by the Houses or their Committees whensoever it was for their benefit For the General having given me his Letters and Protection under his hand and seal for the injoying and disposing of my goods for the space of four months according to the Articles yet the Committees of Dorset-shire slighted the said Articles and Generals latters being both shewed unto them and sold the said goodâ— for a third parr of their value for their own or friends advantage By this manner of proceeding I having fallen from all hope or possibilitie of clearing my self by being brought to a legal Trial or publick Hearing And being loath to go to my grave from whence I cannot be far branded with that black Mark of not being capable of Pardon or Mercie neither for Life nor Fortunes which must insinuate me to the world to be some horrid pernicious and wicked Malefactor find my self obliged in that I owe to my self in Vindication of mine Honor and Innocencie as likewise to my Familie and Posteritie who will find themselves left to want and misery to let them see that it hath been an inevitable necessity and adhering to my Loyalty and Conscience that hath involved me in that general Calamitie that hath be fallen the Kings overborn Partie and the particular indignation of others and no particular wickedness or demerit of mine that hath assigned and severed me to that severe and merciless Sentence of Unpardonable Destruction If I could have had any hope of being admitted to a publique or Legal Proceeding I should
never have betaken me to any other way of clearing my self although I am not ignorant upon how great disadvantage and hazard any man is brought to a Tryal upon the Impeachment and pursuit of the Houses Neither had I any reason to slatter my self with any indulgency towards we Yet withall I had and have so great confidence of my own clear Innocency in point of not meriting to be excepted from the same course of proceeding afforded others That I was never more desirous to attain any thing than I was and am to be admitted to an equal and fair Hearing and Legal Tryal As for the point of having served and adhered to the King I shall neither deny or evade it but my Case is in that the same with many Thousands and I should be too indulgent to my self not to expect the same misfortunes and suffering with others But now almost despairing of ever to be so happy as to see mine own Country again in regard of my Age and Infirmities and in less hopes of ever being admitted to a fair Hearing since the very ways of Addresses or Petitions unto them are debarred me and the using of any further indeavour to satisfie them is voted down And since their Sentence is already before either Examination Tryal or Conviction put in execution in as much as concerneth Fortunes or Estates by their actual possessing and disposing of them So that having nothing left unto me but an exiled Life present wants and an expectation of greater poverty I shall indeavour to bear those heavy visitations which God hath been pleased to send upon me and my Family with that Constancy of mind and pious submission to Gods holy will as befitteth a good Christian and leave unto my Family and Posterity the subsequent Discourse where in the first place I shall set down those Reasons that induced me to adhere unto the King being as I conceive thereunto bound in Honour and Conscience by the Law of God and of the Land by many solemn Oaths by natural Allegiance as a Subject and by Honesty and Gratitude as a sworn Servant both to his Father and to himself Of which several Obligations I shall speak in the first part of this Discourse And in the second part I shall make so true and faithfull a Narration of my Proceedings as I doubt not But to appear to have been a Faithfull Loyal and Affectionate Servant to the King my Soveraign and Master But to have had no hand in any of those Exorbitancies which caused those misunderstandings betwixt the King and his People To have been no Incendiary betwixt the King and the Houses But on the contrary to have used all possible indeavours as far as in me was to have put those unhappy breaches and differences into a way of Accommodation whereby a Civil War might have been prevented and since the War there never was any Overture or hope of Peace to which I did not contribute both my prayers and all the furtherance that was in my power And so not to have deserved that merciless Sentence of Unpardonable Destruction CHAP. II. The particular Reasons of adhering unto the King in this Cause and the method observed in this Discourse MY intention is not in this Discourse wherein the Vindication of mine own Honour and Innocency and the setting down of those Reasons which deterred my Conscience from taking Armes against my King is the main scope to write a defence of the Cause in general or to dispute the Question of Subjects taking Armes against their Soveraign It will require a large and elaborate Tract aparr which may not be interrupted by any thing of the proceedings of a particular man Neither will I censure or judge other men nor fix upon others though of a contrary way any thing that may seem opprobrious notwithstanding the Stile of Traitor and notorious Traitor hath often been my Title in Print although that detestable name in this Case doth not make me blush I know mens Consciences may by different Principles be carried different waies Neither will I censure so many men of all Qualities and Conditions and religious Professions of so much Impietie as to have broken through all Tyes of Allegiance and Loyaltie and so many Oaths their Consciences unconsulted and without conceiving they had found something to ballance their Judgements against so many precise and clear Duties I shall only set down the motives and inducements of mine own Conscience which ought to be to each Christian his Guide against which as he can do nothing well so even good Actions become evil if they be done with an unsatisfied or dubious conscience The Rules of Scripture being That we be fully perswaded in our minds Rom. 14.5 That he is happy that condemneth not himself in the thing he alloweth vers. 22. That he that doubteth is damned And that all things that are not of faith are Sin ver. 23. So that as it will be easily agreed That to all Christian men Conscience ought to be the strongest and most unresistable guide and of so great and binding authoritie with us That it should over-rule all considerations of Safetie Profit Ambition Revenge or other Interest whatsoever So it behooveth each Christian man to seek out the best and most unfallible marks and directions for the guiding of his Conscience in the right way And this I may with truth declare and take God to my witness in it That when I did see that no Industry wherein I omitted nothing that was in my power for the stopping allaying or reconciling of those differences and violences which breaking in like a floud prevailed over mine and all other peaceable minded mens indeavours could produce any good effect And that there was now nothing left to any man but in an unevitable War to make choice of the juster side as his Conscience towards God in the first place and his other civil duties and obligations should dictate unto him I did after many Conferences with learned men of the other way much studie and reading of all that I could find to have written in favour or excuse of Subjects taking Arms against their King resolve contrary to all worldy or prudential Interests of my own to adhere to the King according as my Conscience was satisfied I was bound to do By the law of God By the doctrine and practice of all Christian Churches and in all times By many Oathes By the laws of the Kingdom By my natural Allegiance as a Subject And by Gratitude and Fidelity as a sworn Servant both to his Father and Himself Of each which several Obligations I shall speak in the subsequent Discourse in the order that is here set down CHAP. III. Reasons deduced from Scripture AS it will be easily assented unto that Conscience ought to be the guide of our Actions so the most infallible Rule whereby to guide Conscience to a Christian ought to be the Principles of Religion and those Principles are above all other
quae sito colore upon no preâ—â—se whatsoever to take arms against their lawful Soveraign yet taking it for good and Orthodox Divinity I conceive there needeth no other Argument but the reciting of his Tyrant to make good my Assertion that the Case would no way concern the King But the Wickednesse Malice and Danger of this Tenent besides the falseness of ir is That having once constituted a Position That by the people the Prince may be hostilelie resisted in such and such Cases and being in such and such a degree wicked and the people likewise therof to be the Judges there is a latitude left to every Sect to every mans Passion or to every mans Interest to fancy to himself that what disliketh him is Impiety Heresie or Oppression And to judge of the measure of his Princes wickedness or if he be not wicked enough yet to resist him by way of prevention lest he should become such For he saith not long after That Tyranny is like an Hectique Feaver which at the beginning is easie to cure but hard to discover but afterward is easily known but is become incurable and therefore must be timely prevented But leaving the wickedness danger and falsenesse of this Doctrine to be considered of admitting it were good and true as is before said let us examin how it is applicable to our present Case He supposeth his Tyrant to be an Enemy to God and Man with so many other Attributes of wickedness and impiety That Nero Caligula Domitian Iulian the Apostate Phalaris and Dionysius may well be ranked in his middle number of Princes that were not of the worst And I conceive that Treason and Malice it self will abhor the applicarion in any sort of his description of a Tyrant unto the King and so consequently of this new Doctrine to our present Case For my self I must avow it that by what I have read in the above-cited Author in Buchanan in Suarez and Mariana and what our Countryman Bishop Bilson hath written I was much confirmed in my Opinion of the unlawfulness of taking Armes against the King * For all rules with Exception confirm in all things but in the things excepted And all these Authors write with great strength against Resistance and taking Armes against the Prinre but only in the Case of Tyranny and the Romanists in case of the Popes deposing of them The latter whereof neither being nor admitted if it were I shall lay aside And shall only shew how far the King is from any of these Wickednesses and Impieties of which they compose their Tyrant I well know that Kings are Men made of the same Paste of flesh and blood with others and subject to the same weaknesses and to the same passions And as Brutus saith our reason can no more be severed from our said passions and infirmities than the soul can be from the Body whilst the man is yet living And thereupon saith We must not expect to have Princes against whom nothing can be said but we must think that all goeth well with us if they be moyennement bons Middlingly good And Commines saith That a Prince whose virtues exceed his vices ought to be esteemed and stiled a good Prince And of Princes it is a good rule Optimus est qui minimis urgetur He is best that hath the fewest faults for some faults being Men they will all have And certainly whosoever shall rightly know the King and be acquainted with his irreprovable Course of life his constant and dayly practice of devotions of Piety will not deny him the Title of a right good Prince And so notwithstanding his misfortunes and the unsuccessfullness of his affairs he will be esteemed when he shall be rightly known and considered without prejudice as he is unto me by reason of my long and near attendance about his Person and of whom I will be bold to say without flattery That having by the space of almost Forty years been conversant in most of the Courts of the Princes of Christendom as a publique Minister and been no uncurious observer of the Deportments of the Princes of my time I never knew any Prince or scarcely any private man in whose life there hath been less reproveable And what is here said I conceive will be abundantly sufficient to shew that if this new Doctrine of hostile Resistance were admitted for good it would in no kind justifie it in this present Case It being only applicable to the worst of men when here it must be made use of against an exemplary good Man and who may be justly numbred amongst the best of Princes As I doubt not but it will clearly appear when the truth of many things which have been suggested against him shall be faithfully set down As there will be occasion to do in the following Discourse And so I shall pass to the next religious Obligation whereby my Conscience hath been restrained from taking armes against the King which is the sacred Tye of the late Protestation and of so many solemn Oaths whereby I have engaged my self before God to bear him true Faith and Alleageance and to defend his Person and all his just Rights and Dignities CHAP. V. Setting down the Obligations and Tyes by solemn Oaths and Protestations of not taking Arms against the King IT will be easily assented unto by all sorts of Christians that Solemn Oaths established by lawful Authority and legally administred and in a matter that is not Malum in se absolutely wicked are the highest and strongest Obligations that can pass from Man to God from Nation to Nation from Subjects to their Prince or Prince to their Subjects or from Man to Man And this is not only so declared in Scripture but was undoubtedly part of that Natural and Moral Law which was by God planted in the heart of Man even from the Creation For we find it in practice before any written Law and by all Nations Heathens and Unciviliz'd and altogether ignorant of the Precepts either of the old or new Testament yet by the light of Nature they held Oaths the most sacred of all Assurances and Perjury amongst the most execrable and detestable of all Impieties Now the Oaths that I and the rest of the Kings Subjects have taken unto him for the serving of him with Loyalty with true Faith and Alleageance for the Adhering to him against all Persons for the defending of his Royal Person for the Maintaining and Upholding of all Rights Dignities and Prerogatives belonging to him or annexed to his Imperial Crown will be clearlyest exprest by setting down the Oaths themselves in terminis which shal be annexed hereunto for not interrupting too long the series of this Discourse Besides the Oaths formerly established by Law at the beginning of this Parliament There was a solemn Protestation propounded by the Houses of Parliament to be taken by themselves and so through the whole Kingdom And was allowed of by the King And this
Protestation was by my self taken in the House of Peers and subscribed by me wherein I Promise Vow and Protest in the presence of God as far as lawfully I may with my Life Power and Estate according to the Duty of my Alleageance to Maintain and Defend his Majesties Royal Person Honour and Estate Now how the taking arms against him and the assailing and pursuing of him in Battel can be for the defence of his Royal Person or the seizing of all his Revenew for the Maintenance of his Estate or the divesting of him of all Power and Authority with so many other sad things that against him have been said and done and which my Pen blusheth to set down can be for the Defence and Maintenance of his Honour or how the Stile of Majesty which in this Pootestation we give him the Usage of him considered can be otherwise judged of but as a Scorn and Derision I understand not sure I am that I took the said Protestation in earnest and with an Attestation of God that I would faithfully perform it And so by his holy Assistance I will ever do according to the express words in the said Protestation with my Life Power and Estate Neither am I in any kind able to conceive how it is possible for any Christian Man that hath taken the former Oaths and Protestation of Adhering Defending and Assisting of the King against all Persons whatsoever to swallow much lesse to digest the new Negative Oath which in the subsequent words I A. B. do swear from my heart That I will not directly nor indirectly adhere unto or willingly assist the King in this War or in this Cause against the Parliament c. I am likewise as much unsatisfied of the late National Covenant how it may stand or be reconciled to these former Oaths and Protestation But in regard that is a Businesse of great Consequence and length I will set down in a Tract apart those Scruples which hitherto have deterred my Conscience from venturing upon it That these Oaths have been established by lawfull Authority they were made and enjoined by free and unquestionable Parliaments whose Acts I speak not of Ordinances but of Acts wherein the Royal Assent hath concurred are of that high and Soveraign Authority that the Law admitteth of no Plea nor averment against them And this I am confident will be by all acknowledged They have likewise been legally administred by the Ministers that by the said Acts have thereunto been appointed and ordained and for the Justness and Righteousness of them the Confirming of them by so many several Acts of Parliament by which Laws no person can have a Voice in Parliament but stands to all intents and purposes as a person that had not been elected or returned if he sit in the House before he have taken the said Oaths And the continuing of the enjoyning of them by the Houses unto this day must clear all Dispute or Question of that kind For the Houses do not admit of Members unto their Houses nor Officers into their places until they have first taken the said Oaths in such sort as by the Statutes is ordained So that it is clear that they are aswell as others satisfied in the goodnesse of them Besides the subject matter of these Oaths is just and righteous in it self being only in pursuance of those duties of Obedience which are commanded us both by the Law of God and the Land and which are extra juramentum obligantia obliging in themselves though there were no Oath It is further to be observeed That besides the legal penalties that may be injoyned for the refusing or breaking of rhese Oaths they contain something further than temporal Punishment can reach unto they carry with them The heavy Iudgement of God declared in Scripture against the breakers of solemn Oathes And in this Case there is yet much more added for we accompany the breach of them with the most horrid and fearfull Execration that any Christians can draw upon themselves renouncing the Help and Protection of God Almighty and the Benefit of our Reemption contained in the Holy Gospel if we fail in the performance of them which I understand to be quantum in nobis est if we do not indeavour to do the utmost in our power to keep them But voluntarily for Fear or Interest not only to break them but to do that which by the very plain words is contrary to the said Oaths and is contrary to that sence in which I took them as I understand the taking of armes against the King to be with many other things of necessity following thereupon I durst not adventure upon that which my Conscience judged so great an Impiety CHAP. VI Setting down the unlawfulness of Hostile Resistance drawn from Humane Laws HAving thus set down those Reasons which deterred my Conscience from making Hostile Resistance unto the King which have been deduced out of the Word of God the Doctrine and Practice of holy Men and the Obligation of sacred Oaths I shall now propose my Scruples drawn from humane Laws but especially from the Laws of our Kingdom By the Common Law of England many things were Treason But because the Common Law is not composed in one intire body or Text and it was difficult for the unlearned and Lay-People to inform themselves exactly and distinctly what was Treason and what was not the goodness of the King and the wisedom of the Parliament in the time of Edw. the 3. was such that for the avoiding of the insnaring of the People in so high a Penalty and Destruction as followeth the being convicted of Treason It was thought fit that all those things which for the future should be esteemed or adjudged Treason should be particularly and distinctly set down in one Law and exclusively to all things else which was accordingly done in the Statute of the 25 Edw. 3. And in case it should so fall out that any matter should arise besides those particulars specified in the said Statute No judgement should passe thereon but it should be reserved till the next Parliament But for those Cases in the said Statute expressed they were enacted to be Treason and so to be adjudged by the ordinary course of Iustice And in regard that in the troublesome and disorderly time of Richard the 2. the prevailing party which still swayed the Parliament had made and unmade many several Treasons as suited to the Designs and Interests of those that had the Power In the first year of Hen. the 4. all those newsprung-up Treasons were revoked and abolished and Treason again reduced to the Statute of 25 Edw. the 3. The like inconveniences growing in the Wars betwixt the Houses of York and Lancaster and afterwards by the fierceness of Hen. the 8. who upon the alterations he had made in Religion had so insnared the Subject that the Protestants of the reformed Religion could not by reason of the six Atticles escape the
not to follow him in his Wars against his Enemies or his Rebels which the Subject de bene esse is to understand to be such as the King proclaimeth to be Traitors Not that a Proclamation maketh them so but the Subject is so to esteem them until they be brought to a legal Tryal So that there never was a harder Condition nor more unavoydable than this of the Kings present Loyal Subjects who should have been Traitors by the Law if they should have taken Armes against the King and should likewise lose ther Lands Honours Castles c. if they did not fight for him And yet contrary to the Law Providing that no man should forfeit Life or Estate for serving of the King He shall by an Arbitrary Power of his fellow Subjects be condemned to lose both without Pardon or Mercy for doing that for which he must have lost legally both Life and Estate and his Soul to boot if he had not done it CHAP. VII The Motives deduced from Honour Honesty and Gratitude of not forsaking the King in his troubles BEsides the Obligation formerly set down deduced from the Law of God and the positive Law of the Kingdom there is a third Law which hath a great Authority in the hearts of all generous and noble-minded Men which is the Law of Honour and Gratitude which Law I conceive to be a Branch of the Original and first Law The Law of Nature For it hath had and still holdeth a Value and Reverence through all Religions as it hath done through all times I must confess this Law hath been and is in some kinds too high lifted up and is become the Idol of many mens fancies who pay unto it a more exact Obedience and are more carefull not to transgress against it than they are not to offend God or the Laws they live under whereof we have daily too many Presidents when men rather than to be failing in point of Honour will upon frivolous provocations decline all duties to God and Man and sacrifice to this Idol oftentimes the hazard of their Lives and Fortunes together with their Souls But this is an Excess and Excrescency of Honour and Courage in the justification whereof I know nothing that can be said In the excuse of it it is to be hoped that in so generally-received an Error whereby men become Infamous and scarce fit for honest company that comply not therein Custom and Universallity may allay and mitigate the Offence But that Honour which I speak of is better exprest by plain moral Honesty and Gratitude when neither Fear nor Disadvantage shall drive us or withold us from just Duties nor the Misfortunes or Distresses of those to whom we have had former obligations make us leave and forsake to be assistant and serviceable unto them in all just and lawfull things although it be to our own Hinderance or that we can expect no further good or advantage by them And herein my Case is different from the common Cases of Subjects being more particularly bound unto Gratitude by many Benefits and unto Honesty Affection and Fidelity by my Service in places of greatest Trust about the King both for nearness to his Person as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber and as a Servant confided in as a privy Counsellour As for Ingratitude it hath been at all times so detestable That to the Reproach of being ingratefull nothing can be added And the betraying or forsaking of a mans Master in his Distress hath so great a Rellish of the Judas that no noble and generous Heart would for any earthly Respect do any thing that might seem to be like it or be in hazard of being mistaken for it For mine own part I do ingenuously confess that had I no Precepts of the Law of God no Tyes by the Law of the Kingdom nor Horrour of Conscience for breaking those sacred Obligations into which I was entred by taking so many solemn Oaths Yet Gratitude and Honour singly should have been unto me of so high Recommendation That no Respect of my Life Fortunes or Posterity should have made me lift up my Hand against my King or to have forsaken my Master in his Miseries and Distress I have had the Honour to have served this King and his Father by the space of more than forty years and was by his Father from a younger Brother of a Gentlemans Family raised by his Goodness above my Merit to the Dignity of an Earl and a Conveniency of Subsistance in that Quality I was trusted by him in seven Ambassages and called to his privie Counsel recommended unto the Prince his Son as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber and which was above all these Obligations I was admitted to more than an ordinary measure of his Trust and Confidence And certainly these great Obligations from the Father could not but imprint Gratitude in my Heart towards the Son especially He being now become my King and Master And so by all the Oaths that I had taken to the Father I was likewise by him obliged to them as his Successor But besides these Tyes of Gratitude I must Protest that weighing and considering impartially the Kings Actions either as they relate to his Government as a King or his personal Deportments as a Man setting Conscience aside and that I had not been thereby restrained I could never find any thing that could satisfie my judgement in point of Moral Justice or right Reason for the taking Arms against him I must and do confess that some things and too many wâ—â—â— ill done by the Kings Ministers and the Subjects Propriety and Liberty might have run great hazard under an ill Prince by those waies that were then set on foot For to speak freely my sense by the Principles then received all was put into the Kings hands for Necessity was made Master of all and of that Necessity the King was made the sole Judge and Princes may easily mistake their own private Wants for publique Necessity But from this Excess little of the fault can with Reason be charged upon the King and less ground for the taking of Arms For it is well known the King having been unseasonably imbarqued in War both with France and Spain his Treasure was wholly exhaust and he was reduced to great streights The King called divers Parliaments but they proved so unhappy that two or three of them were dissolved in great disorder and the Kings Wants were not relieved but the King and his People parted with little satisfaction on either side The King then being enforced to use all indeavours for his Relief in these his great VVants consulted with the Officers of his Revenew and his learned Councel what course was to be taken for his Supply without calling a Parliament For it had been voted at the Councel-Table That the Calling of a Parliament was not then fit or seasonable And at the breaking off of the last Parliament before this An. 1640. It had been declared
pass by were left unto the Iustice of the Parliament without the Kings Protecting or Interposing for any one of them CHAP. VIII A Vindication of the King against that false and injurious Aspersion of unsettledness in his Religion THe second main and important point that hath been made use of to the Kings Disadvantage and by which the Hearts of the People have been most alienated from him was chiefly by ill informed Ministers in the Pulpit who have most untruly suggested an unfirmness and unsettledness in the King in point of his Religion and an inclination in him to overthrow the true reformed Protestant Religion established by the Laws of the Kingdom and to introduce Popery This I must confess was so far from planting in me any thing to the Kings Prejudice That by so much the more it confirmed me in my Duty and Affection towards the King by how much of mine own knowledge this wicked Aspersion was false and injurious For in that point of the Kings Religion few men living had the Cause or could have the means to be so perfectly informed of it as my self For besides that from his Youth upward I had been an eye-witness of his Education being in the King his Fathers time admitted as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber I was for divers years imployed in the Treaty of a Mariage for him with a Princess of a differing Religion And was to that purpose his Fathers Ambassador in Spain when the King then Prince arrived there in Person And it is true that the Spaniards had conceived great hopes of his becomming a Romish Catholique wherein there wanted not incouragement both from divers in England and from some about him and for the effecting of it there was no industry omitted by them but the learnedst men in Spain were imployed to satisfie him And he was by Artifice brought to set a Conference with the said Divines upon Tearms of great Disadvantage For one Wadesworth that had been an English Minister and was then become a Romish Catholique was put upon him for his Interpreter neither had he the Assistance of any learned man with him Yet gave he so good an Account of his own Religion and answered so pertinently the Objections of the others as was much beyond the expectation of all that were present at the said Conference But seeing himself still pressed in that kind Although the King of Spain assured him that with this one thing all difficulties were overcome and that he would sign him a Blanck in all things else yet not to entertain them with any further hopes he positively declared his Resolution to remain unremoveable in his own Religion and would afterwards admit of no more Conferences in that kind and certainly if any earthly consideration could have been prevalent with him he had then such Motives as might have wrought upon him For besides the Disgrace of failing in his first Enterprice especially an Enterprise of Love and in his own Person the Princess was of that Merit and her Value of him such And his satisfaction of her Virtue and his Affection to her Person so great that nothing but point of Religion could have made him leave her behind him For it was declared unto him that in Case he would conform himself in point of Religion no Dispensation from the Pope would be then needfull but the Mariage should be consummate without any further expectation from Rome as soon as he should desire it But he thereupon declared that he would rather expect the Dispensation and resolved to imploy his indeavours that way and so presently sent one Mr. Andrews a Servant of his to Rome to cause Mr. George Gage that was then there solliciting of the Dispensation to procure the dispatch thereof with all possible diligence and Letters were written unto him by the Princes Order to desire him that if there were at Rome any Opinion of the Princes becomming a Roman Catholique and upon hope thereof any Retardment of the granting the Dispensation he should undeceive them in that point and press the Dispensation upon the Articles of Religion agreed upon The Prince was then moved by the Spanish Ministers to write unto the Pope in answer of some Letters which the Pope had sent unto him and to move him for the granting of the Dispensation and the Letters were brought ready drawn unto him and some passages there were from which some hope might be gathered that in time when it might be thought more seasonable than at the present lest it might be thought he had changed his Religion for a Wife he would not be unwilling to receive further satisfaction in the Catholique Religion all which he strook out and wrote only a Letter of Civility such a one as he thought fit to write to one from whom he was to receive favour in a Business that he most desired and without whom there was no possibility of obteining it unless he would have conformed himself in point of Religion which he being resolved not to do he thought it fit to apply himself unto the Pope by all fair and amiable means and particularly in promising not to be severe against those of his Religion thereby to facilitate with the Pope the granting of the Dispensation All which Diligences he might have excused by his Conformity for then no Dispensation would have been needfull And hereby no further hope remaining in the Court of Spain or at Rome of his altering his Religion the Dispensation was granted upon the Articles formerly agreed on in point of Religion These Letters have been published and translated into several Languages which though I cannot say corruptly yet strained as much as might be to his disadvantage And it is probable that the like Letters of Complyance to the Pope may have been procured in the Treaty of the Match with France wherein the Popes Dispensation was likewise held necessary But all are Arguments of the Kings firmness in his Religion when he would rather undergo the trouble and delay of the Dispensation than by his Conformity to have effected what he desired without any difficulty or further hazard and this hath been fully confirmed ever since by his profession and living in the Reformed Religion established in the Church of England from which no man can say with truth that he hath prevaricated in the least tittle Besides this great proof of his firmness and settledness in his Religion his constant and daily Practice both in Publique and Private in the exercise of his Devotions may and ought to give satisfaction to all that consider him without prejudice For his resorting twice every day to Publique Prayors and twice a week at least to Sermons and his frequent receiving of the Holy Sacrament is publiquely known unto all but his private Devotions to those only that are of nearer Attendance about his Person who well know that he never faileth morning nor evening to retire himself to his private Prayers and upon Occasions in the day time
due to their Kings upon any colour or pretext of Religion For as no private man doth forfeit his Inheritance or free-hold by Impiety or Atheism although he may forfeit his Soul unless he commit some legal Crime So a Prince that holdeth his Crown by unquestionable Right of Succession cannot forfeit his Temporal Inheritance by the erroniousness of his Religion his Soul must only answer that forfeit And although some have gone so far as to admit a lawfullness of the Subjects taking Arms against their Prince for the defence and maintenance of their Laws and Religion yet no man hath adventured so far as to allow the taking Arms for bringing in of new Laws and a new Religion contrary to the established and that by force and without consent of their Soveraign which is the present Case CHAP. IX Shewing the War not to have been begun by the King but that he condescended to all things that could in reason be demanded of him for the preventing of it THere is yet one further Objection wherwith I have heard some indeavour to countenance and justifie their taking Arms against the King which was That he first made War against his Parliament meaning by force to introduce an Arbitrary Power in Church and Common-Wealth And that the War on their side was only defensive and for the maintenance of their liberties proprieties privileges and Religion The steps and progress of this unhappy War are so well known unto me even from the first misunderstandings betwixt the King and People and the improvement of them by Tumults and several Artifices untill they broke out into Acts of open hostility that nothing did so much terrifie my Conscience from taking Arms against the King or more confirmed me in my Duty of adhering unto him than the certain and infallible knowledge I had of the Kings hearty and unfeigned Desires and Indeavours to have prevented this War and to that end to have done and was ready to do all things that had been or should be with justice or reason propounded unto him for the satisfaction of his Parliament which I conceive to all unpreoccupated Iudgments will be easily most apparent when it shall be considered how many things he hath done besides the easing of just grievances whereunto he is indeed obliged which were meerly Acts of Grace and which if he had denied he should have done no wrong And for the doing whereof the wit of man can find no other reason or inducement but his desire to satisfie his Parliament and the keeping of things from extremities For besides the giving way to the putting down of the Court of Starchamber the High Commission and the regulating of his Councel-Table many other things he hath done which some Kings would rather have adventured a War than have parted with any of them As the consenting to have his Privy-Councel that had been sworn to secrecy to be examined upon Oath concerning those things that had passed in his Presence in his most secret Cabinet Councel The giving his Assent in such conjuncture of times to the taking away the Bishops Votes in Parliament And the divesting of himself of the Power to dissolve the Parliament notwithstanding that the evil Consequences that might happen to him thereby were represented unto him in my hearing And I conceive that no man will be so partial but they do beleeve that howsoever the King might be satisfied in point of Conscience by the Bishops and Iudges and the joint authority of both Houses for giving his Assent to the passing of the Bill for my Lord of Straffords Attaindure yet no man but beleeveth he would have saved his Life at a great Ransom But hoping therby to have allayed the rage of his people aswell as to have given full satisfaction to his Houses with a sad and afflicted heart he signed the Warrant for the Earls execution For he was then made beleeve that with his giving way to his death and his consenting to the Bill for not adjourning or dissolving of the Parliament but with the Concurrence of the Houses all misunderstandings betwixt him and his Parliament would be removed and all things return to a calm and orderly way of Proceeding Now if the King had had any secret Intention of making of a War would he have done so many things so prejudicial to himself and so against his heart only for the preventing of it and although his hopes of a quiet settlement by the passing of these two Bills failed him he yet gave not over the doing of all further things which he thought might renew a right understanding betwixt him and the Houses So likewise when that unhappy and unseasonable Act of his going to the House of Commons in Person happened he indeavoured to redeem it with such Acts of acknowledgemeot submission nay I may say asking forgiveness as were never done by any King unto his Subjects So likewise in the particular of his Attorneys accusing of the Lord Kimbolton and the five Members notwithstanding he had a President for it in his own time of Sir Robert Heath his then Attorneys impeaching of my self of High Treason which Impeachment was received and admitted of by the House of Peers and Arraignment and due process of Law was by the said House ordered and awarded thereupon yet the King finding the Houses therewith displeased did not only command prosecution to be withdrawn but left his Attorny to the Iustice of the Parliament And I conceive that it will be acknowledged by all Laws and Religions That the very excesses and errors of Soveraign Princes if reparation and satisfaction may be obtained by Petition and Remonstrance as in these Caâ—es they have been Recourse ought not to be had by Subjects to Arms or Hostile Resistance and I am deceived if this be not also the Opinion of the severest of our new Doctors Where wrongs are done if the party offending shall upon demand make reparation and give satisfaction to the party offended and yet he shall notwithstanding make War it is He that is the Agressor that maketh the offensive War Melior causa ad partem poenitentem transit And the party first offending by his penitency and satisfaction brings over the Right and Iustice to his Cause and if this be betwixt Independent States betwixt whom such as write de Iure Belli say a legitimate War can only be for War being defined to be publicoâ—um Armorum justa contentio Subjects are not allowed as lawfull Enemies opposed to their Soveraign for want of supreme and publique Authority How much more ought such Acknowledgment and Reparations as have before been set down have satisfied Subjects in the behalf of their King so far humbling of himself as certainly would have pacified a modest Conqueror After the King had found himself disappointed of his expectation and that by his former yieldings and complyances the misunderstandings were little allayed but greater appearances grew every day that other of unquietness and troubles
bound unto towards the King The sum of them being briefly thus 1. I understood Hostile Resistance against the King to be expresly prohibited by the word of God both in the old and new Testament 2. I should have gone against the Doctrine and Practice of the Primitive Church and against the present Tenents and Confessions of Faith of all the Reformed Churches 3. Admitting the Maxims of those hot-headed men either Romanists or Protestants that have written in favour of Subjects taking Arms against their Prince to be true as they are false and condemned by their own Churches respectively yet in this Case they could be no Arguments to me For that their Doctrine and Principles are in no kind applicable to the present matter in Fact 4. I should have directly broken all those solemn Oaths which I had so often taken of Fidelity and Allegeance to the King 5. I should have gone against the Laws of the Kingdom by which to take Arms against the King or to adhere to his Enemies c. is made Treason 6. I should have been failing in the Obligations of Honor and Gratitude 7. I should have transgressed against Moral Honesty and natural Iustice to have fought against the King as an unjust and an irreligious Man whom I knew to be in more than an ordinary measure Iust and Religious So that if I should have broken through all these Duties of Religion of Oaths of Loyalty of Laws of Gratitude and Moral Honesty by doing presumptuously against my Conscience how could I but have feared to be made as miserable in the next World as I should have remained despâ—cable in this And howsoever this may be judged a severe Censure ' It is only against my self as I say in the beginning of this Discourse Men may upon differing Painciples go differing waies And I cannot be so uncharitable as to think so many grave learned and noble Personages would break through so many plain Duties under which they had formerly lived And unto which they had not only sworn but conformed themselves But that they had either found out or had had revealed unto them some such things for the satisfaction of their Consciences as God hath not yet been pleased I should attain unto If I may see them in writing I shall peruse them willingly And if I shall find in them but so much Reason as may induce me to believe that upon their own Principles and not by Fear Interests or likelyhood of prevailing their Consciences may have been perswaded that way Although I disapprove their said Principles and still retain mine own yet I shall say Bonâ intentione mali sunt which though it doth not justifie an evill Action yet it doth in some measure excuse and lessen the Offence St. Paul was a great * Persecutor of the Church But because he did it out of abundance of Zeal * He obtained Pardon for that he did it ignorantly Our Saviour saith to his Disciples The time will come that whosoever killeth you will think they do God good service And those very Murtherers would have been in much better Case than I should have been that should have sinned presumptuously and against the perswasion of mine own Conscience whereas they had the Glory of God for their end though upon false Principles And certainly presumptuous sins being as it were a defying of God are of greater Provocation And I shall recommend unto those whose Consciences have led them another way that Imborn Charitable principle of the Law of Nature as well as of the Gospel Quod tibi fieri non vis alteri ne feceris Whatsoever ye would that men should to do you do ye even so unto them And if Conscience shal be a discharge or supersedeas unto them against known Duties against Oaths and Established Laws Let Conscience in me grounded upon so many Reasons as in this Discourse are set down be likewise pleadable for the doing of those Duties to which I conceived my self obliged both by the Law of God and Man and which hitherto both they and I have practised CHAP. XII All the former Reasons applyed to the present Case of King Charles with a positive opinion thereupon THese have been the Motives of setling my Conscience in the Opinion that I shall briefly here set down deduced from the Principles of this Discourse which upon this individual Case is That neither upon pretext of Religion Personal Vices Excesses in Government nor any other Colour or Pretext whatsoever the Subjects of the Crown of England may withdraw their Obedience or make Hostile Resistance to King CHARLES the present King Being by Right of Inheritance justly possessed of the Crown His Title no way depending either upon his Divine or Moral Vertues And the said Subjects having received him and acknowledged him for their only Supreme Governor done him Hommage and sworn to him Faith and Allegeance absolutely and without Condition As for other Kings or Potentates whether Elective Kingdoms or Kingdoms that at the Erection of them were received by the first King upon Express Covenant and only with a Conditional Obedience as is pretended by those of Aragon and others of these I shall not speak Neither shall I adventure to speak of those Catholique Kings and Princes which acknowledge in spiritual matters a Superiour Iurisdiction in the Pope over them And he pretendeth as hath been before set down by necessary Relation and Dependency of the Temporal upon the Spiritual to have a Temporal Power over them in ordine ad spiritualia and hath often put this his Claim in Practice by accompanying his spiritual Censure of Excommunication with the Sentence of discharging Subjects of their obedience to their Princes and so consequently of deposing them Herewith I shall not meddle None of these cases being applicable to the present Case of King CHARLES who is no Elective King but holdeth his Crown by an unquestionable Title of Succession derived to him by Descent from his Ancestors for the space of more than six hundred years Neither was there ever any Pact or Condition with him or any of his Ancestors of forfeiture in Case of misgovernment or wickedness And breach of Covenants forfeiteth not an Ordinary Estate unless there be an express Clause and Condition of forfeiture which in this Case neither was nor ever can be pretended It is true that his Ancestors and himself have limited and restrained their Legal Right by many Concessions and Laws in some Cases as The making of Laws without Consent of Peers and People and the levying of Mony c. which he cannot violate without great Injustice as shall be after shewn But no such Pact or Covenant can be produced or pretended whereby upon breach he forfeiteth his Soveraignty or maketh it justifiable for his Subjects to take Arms against him or to inflict Punishments upon his Person either by deposing Death or Imprisonment The Case likewise of Catholique Princes no way concerneth him who acknowledgeth in
and telleth us satis sufficit ei ad poenam quòd Deum habet ultorem It will be a sufficient punishment to him that he hath God for an Avenger Yet are we not altogether left without remedy For Kings although they be Gods Vice-gerents yet they cannot work as God worketh saying Fiat and it was done Kings must work by mediate Instruments And if they Command illegal things the Executioners of them are responsable and must make satisfaction to the Parties injured And therefore the King ought not immediately to imprison nor in Person to execute any thing because that in Case of wrong-doing the Subject would be left without Remedy in regard the Kings Person is not to be impleaded by Law I know the usual Objections In Case Kings will do that which they ought not to do and will by their own immediate Warrants Commit and be the Personal Actors of the Injuries or not suffer the Executioners of their unlegal Commands to be legally proceeded against shall the Subject be left wholly without Remedy and the People be debarred of the benefit of that Right of Nature in-bred in all Creatures of self preservation Yes We must be contented with that Condition wherein God hath placed us and wherein by our own Consents and Stipulations of subjection we have placed our selves and may only right our selves by those means which by the laws whereunto we have given our assent are permitted unto us Neither is our native Liberty hereby ravisht from us but as we have parted with it by our own Consent and Agreement So we cannot resume it but by those waies which we have reserved in the Stipulations of our submission And besides that herein there is no Injury for that Volenti non fit Injuria It would be more hurtfull to mankind if it were otherwise For there is a necessity that in all sorts of Governments aswell as in Monarchy there should he an Impunity and Power somewhere of not being questioned else all would presently fall into Anarchy and Confusion Neither could there be a final ending of Controversies if there were not a Dernier Ressort and last Appeal wherein we are bound to acquiesce And this Power must be trusted in some hand and that must of necessity be where the Soveraign Power remaineth else there mstu be supposed a Superiour Power to that Soveraign Power and so in infinitum untill we come to some such Power that hath nothing above it and then that must be trusted and must be submitted unto without being accomptable to any but to God because on earth there can be to it no Superiour Iurisdiction And this Power is in the King of England in all things except such wherein he himself or his Ancestors have by Lawes and Stipulations limâ—ted their Absolute Power as hath been above set down As enacting or repealing Laws without his Parliament levying of Moneys and many other things wherein He and his Ancestors have restrained their Power And this we are by the Law of God and of the Land bound to obey and not to make any resistance but what the Law alloweth us We must in the rest have recourse unto God if our Princes be wicked Neither may we mutiny or repine at God when we have ill Kings more than when he sendeth Diseases Plagues Caterpillers Blightings or Blasts For wicked Kings are but Blastings of the People that God is pleased to punish Neither must we think our Condition worse than that of wicked Kings notwithstanding their temporall Impunity For certainly it is much better both in regard of Punishment in the World to come and commonly in this For the next World As their Sin is greater So it is declared that their Punishment shall be greater Heare o ye Kings and understand c. Because being Ministers of Gods Kingdom you have not judged aright nor kept the Law nor walked after the Counsel of God Horribly and speedily shall he come upon you for a sharp Iudgment shall be to them that are in high places For mercy will soon pardon the meanest but mighty men shallbe mightily tormented Wheras Subjects which suffer with patience because they are so commanded by God make him their Debtor by their sufferings and he alwaies payeth faithfully who saith that if we suffer with Christ we shall also reign with him And for this World Their Wickednesse and Oppression is ever accompanyed with those Fears Distractions and Horrours of Conscience which have ever been unseperable from Tyrannies by which their lives are rendred more uncomfortable than the unhappiest of their Subjects And for the most part their ends are as miserable as their lives For what they fear and by their Tyrannie seek to prevent doth commonly fall upon them Their People do Revolt and Rebel And although they be never so well Catechâ—zed in the points of Obedience yet their Natural Inclination to return to Liberty much more to cast off unjust Burthens and Oppressions is such that slight and weak Arguments will easily perswade them to that whereunto they are so strongly inclined and the least pretence of Religion or colour of Reason or Lawfulness countenancing or tolerating the freeing themselves from Subjection in any Case will be more prevalent with them than the most positive Precept of Gods Word injoining Obedience And if in any Case taking of Arms be admitted Theirs shall ever be that case And if the wickedness of their Prince shall be allowed as a ground for Rebellion Their Prince shall ever be the most wicked And of this all Ages have produced many examples and especially these latertime through all the Estates of Christendom And although the Christian churches of all Professions as before is shew'd declare against the Doctrine of Resistance Two or Three hot-headed-men writing or preaching suitable to their Affection Desires will prevail against the Authority of all the Churches of Christendom And wicked Princes will find that Precepts in this Case will not serve the turn But it wil be in this point of Resistance as Tacitus saith of Divinations in Rome which was a wickedness that had been and ever would be forbidden yet ever would be reteined semper vetabitur semper retinebitur And so Princes that will highly oppress and make their Will and not the Laws the Rule of their government though to resist be a wickedness and that it is against the Law of God and Man to do it yet where the wrongs are great and a fair opportunity offered of prevailing It will be ever done For that amongst men there are a Thousand for One that prefer their own Interests or Inclination before Duty or Conscience And certainly a prudent and foreseeing Prince that will impartially examine things cannot but expect it should be so For why should he suppose that other men wil be more honest or more religious than himself And when he breaketh through all the Bonds and Tyes of Oaths of Divine Precepts and Moral Iustice only to stretch and extend
as well as Iustice And is so expresly declared and annexed unto the King by the Stat. of the 27 H. 8. c. 24. The Revenues of the Church have been annexed unto it for the better part of one thousand years 7. The taking away of the Lands of Bishops and Cathedral Churches confirmed by many Charters from all our Kings have Prescription of many hundreds of years and are firmly annexed to the Church as Law Charters or Prescription can settle them Now if these Revenues shall be taken away and disposed of without processe of Law without the Kings consent who is sworn to uphold them and is founder of them all without the consent or forfeiture of the Possessors What man can think he hath a better Title to any thing he holdeth or assure himself of any Land or other thing he possesseth for one day longer than Houses shall please Besides it is against Magna Charta the Law and the Kings Oath and the Usance of the Kingdom in all times 8. The Court of VVard For the King to have Wardships is an inheritance and Right of the Crown approved by the Common Law of Enland and acknowledged and submitted unto in all Ages And the Court of Wards is setled and established by Act of Parliament in the time of H. 8 And it was indeavoured to be compounded for at a valuable consideration in the time of King Iames and by him refused because it was so great a flower of his Crown as was not fit to be severed from it And now if the Houses should force a Bargain at their own pleasure and their own price it were contrary to all Law all Reason and Moral Iustice and to the disherison of the Crown The detaining of the Kings Children under their governance 9. Touching the Kings children The ordering of their Education and their future Mariage cannot belong unto the Houses but unto the King by all divine human Laws and by the Law of Nature Neither is the contrary anywhere practised but by the great Turke No new Oaths can be imposed upon the Subject but by the warrant of an Act of Parliament 10 Touching imposing of new Oaths as is declared by the Petition of Right and is so setled by the Act of 3. Car. and hath been so declared during this Parliament by the two Houses upon occasion of the new Canons as appears in the Collection of their own Orders pag. 159.160.908.910 And we find the two Oaths of supremacy and Alleageance the first in 1. Eliz. the second in 3 Iac. were both framed and injoined to be taken in and by several Acts of Parliament and yet now do the Houses presse Oaths upon their fellow Subjects utterly inconsistent with the other legal Oaths which they have formerly taken and for the refusal of their Oath of Covenant and of their Negative Oath in expresse tearms to abjure their Alleagiance to their Soveraign they condemn them of Malignancy a new word of Art not formerly known to the Laws of England 11. Concerning Treason It is defined by the Act of the 25. Ed. 3. cap. 2. and afterward 1 H. 4. 2 Ma. that Act was confirmed and enacted That nothing should be adjudged Treason but what is declared to be so by the Statute of the 25. Ed. 3. or should be afterwards declared to be Treason by Parliament which is understood to be by Act of Parliament which cannot be without the Kings Royal assent and therefore in the Reign of H. 8. we find several Treasons enacted to be so by Parliament which afterwards were all repealed by that of the 2 Mar. And again in the Reign of Queen Mary Queen Eliz. and King Iames new Treasons declared by new Acts of Parliament in their several times But now in this present Sessions the two Houses in many several Cases singly of themselves without the solemnity of an Act by an Ordinance only have ordered that men should die as Traitors and lose their whole Estates without pardon or mercy for such supposed crimes as formerly were so far from being Treason as that they are not legally crimes or misdemeanors as may be instanced in divers particulars out of their own Coll. of Orders The treating with forein Princes and States 12. The treating with forein Princes and Staâ—es the making of Peace and War and the sending of Ambassadors or Messengers to those purposes are Acts meerly regal and inherent in the Crown and never questioned till now By the Statute of 2. H. 5. cap. 6. The breaking of Truce and Safe-Conducts is enacted to be Treason so much it importeth the Honour of the Crown The King may out of doubt conclude Peace or proclaim War without his Houses of Parliament But to contribute to the maintenance of a forein War the Assent of the Houses is necessary it being in their free liberty to give or not to give Subsidies or other Aides to that purpose But for the making of Peace or War they have no Votes but it is in the sole power of the King Yet doubtlesse Kings do the more prudently when they take the advice and affections of their people along with them in those weighty affaires especially in making a War with a forein Prince or people otherwise they shall hardly have the Assistance of their purses 13. The nominating of Judges Sheriffs Justices c. without which the Kings of England can hardly make or maintein a War to their Advantage The nominating of Iudges Sheriffs Iustices of Peace c. was never pretended unto by the Parliament but in tumultuous and rebellious times and the Kings of England for some hundred of yeers last past have nominated and appointed them by their Writs or Commissions under their great Seal And by the Acts of 9. Ed. 2. the Statute of Lincoln and 12. R. 2. cap. 2. it is appointed how the choice of Sheriffs and other publique Ministers of Iustice shall be recommended to the King and that the King hath the sole appointing of them And it is so setled by Act of Parliament the 37. H. 8. That such nominations do and shall wholy belong unto the King and his Successors c. By these Animadversions it will clearly appear That the particulars which are mentioned in the 57 and 58 pages of this Discourse are meerly usurped and intruded upon by the Houses but de jure do solely and wholly belong unto the King or can have no life without him which was thought fit rather to be added by this Appendix than by inserting them in the Discourse it self for not interrupting the Series thereof FINIS See the Speeches made for AccoÌ„modation before the War was actually begun in Append pag. 1. 9. Proofs out of the old Testament * Deut. 24.16 Ezech. 18.20 2 Kings 14.6 * Psal. 82. v. 6. * Deut. 1.17 2 Chro. 19. v. 6. Proofs out of the New Testament * Rom. 13. v. 2. See the Propositions in Append pag. 13. Vide Stat. 1. Jacobi cap. 1. in App. pag. 18. wherin the Soveraignty of the King is fully set down Lib. 5. Orat. in Auretium Epist. ad Demetrianum Niceph lib. 7. cap. 6. Tertulliun in Apologetico * Mat. 26.53 54. * 2 Kings 6. v. 16 17 18. c. Act. 12. v. 11. Act. 27.24 Act. 16.26 36. The Protestant churches declare against Subjects taking Arms against their Princes Confessio Aâ—gust 〈…〉 6. Gallia Art 40. Helvet Art 26. Scot. Art 24. Anliae Art 27. Osor de Iur. Majest. fol. 140. Pierre 〈…〉 in his â—â—â—fence of 〈◊〉 Faith Pag. 3.4 Admitting all the Positions either by Protestants or Papists were true which allow Subjects to take Arms against their Princes yet they agree not with the present Case Shewing that the Tenents of Roman Catholiques are not applicable to the present Case Sheweth that the opinions of such Protestants as allow in some cases of subjects taking of arms against their Prince if they were true yet are not applicable to the present case * Exceptio firmat Regulam in non exceptis In Appendice page 17. In Appendice pag. 18. See the Stat. in Append. pag. 19. * â— Lod. Vives If all sin be the transgression of some Law I would be satisfied how men are become Delinquents that have transgressed against no law The most miserable condition of the Kings Loyal Servants by no prudence to be prevented nor they by any Innocency to be preserved * In what sort the Project of the Ship-mony was set on foot the fault wherof cannot with any Iustice be attributed to the King The fault of Monopolies not to be attributed to the King but to evil Ministers and Referrees A Princes Religion ought not to be a ground of Rebellion or disobedience 〈…〉 Hen. 3. King of Fr. by Iacque 〈◊〉 Hen. 4. King of by Fr. by 〈…〉 The Prince of 〈◊〉 by 〈…〉 The Non-conformists themâ—selves 〈◊〉 out 〈◊〉 Pâ—â—tell aâ—â— 3 â—â—c 1605. 〈…〉 clear to this point Vide Art 4 6 9. in Ap. pag. 19. The King caused Pr. Charles his Son and Heir to become a Suter unto the Houses for the saving the Earls life who came in person and propounded it as the first Request he had ever made unto them but could not obtain it In â—ppendice pag. 1. A. The Right of all thâ—se specified particulars from the lâ—tter A. to the Letter B. are fully shewn to belong unto the King and that the Houses can have no colour of pretence unto them In App. pag. 20. * Dic Lunâ—e 4 Maâ—i 1646. Oâ—dered that whosoever should â—aâ—â—our or conceal the King and not 〈◊〉 it c. should be proceeded 〈◊〉 as a Traitor and dâ— without mercy B. * Phil. 3. v. 6. * 1 Tim. 1 v. 13. John 16.2 Matth. 7.12 * Le Roy ne fait toâ—t is only to be understood in the ordinary course of justice which the King administring by his Ministers and not in Person it is they that are the wrong doers and not the King and the subjâ—ct against 〈…〉 his Remedy Wisd. 6. v. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Matt. 7.12