Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	common_a	court_n	matter_n	4,363	5	5.8066	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52047	A plea for defensive armes, or, A copy of a letter written by Mr. Stephen Marshall to a friend of his in the city, for the necessary vindication of himself and his ministerie, against that altogether groundlesse, most unjust and ungodly aspersion cast upon him by certain malignants in the city, and lately printed at Oxford, in their Mendacium aulicum, otherwise called, Mercurius Aulicus, and sent abroad into other nations to his perpetual infamie in which letter the accusation is fully answered, and together with that, the lawfulnesse of the Parliaments taking up defensive arms is briefly and learnedly asserted and demonstrated, texts of Scripture cleared, all objections to the contrary answered, to the full satisfaction of all those that desire to have their consciences informed in this great controversie.; Plea for defensive armes	Marshall, Stephen, 1594?-1655.	1643 (1643)	Wing M768; ESTC R15835	25,154	32

Churches of England I must acknowledge this made me to think that the Parliament had just cause to be jealous of great danger But when His Majesty returned from Scotland discharged the guard which the Parliament had set for their own safety and an other denied except under the charge of the Queens Chamberlain and His Majesty himself entertained divers Captaines as a super-numerary guard at Whitehall went to the House of Commons after that manner to demand the five members to be delivered unto Him The Earle of Newcastle now General of the Armie of Papists in the North sent to Hull attempting to seize it and the Magazine there his Majestie according to the Lord Digbies letters retiring from the Parliament to a place of strength and the Queen going beyond Sea to raise a partie there I must have shut my eyes if I had not seen danger and thousands of thousands would have thought the Parliament altogether senslesse if they had not importuned his Majesty as they did to settle the Militia all former settlings of it by Commissions of Lievtenancy being confessedly void His Majestie refusing this in that manner as they thought necessary for security they voted the putting of it into the hands of persons whom they thought the State might confide in though alas many of them since have discovered to us how vaine is our hope in man And secured the Town of Hull and the Magazine there soon after this his Majesty in the north seised New-Castle and under the name of a guard begun to raise an army all this was done before the Parliament voted that his Majesty seduced by wicked councell c. And when his Majesties Army was more encreased he then declared that he was resolved by strength to recover Hull and the Magazine and to suppresse the Militia After this indeed the Parliament began to make vigorous preparations by their propositions for Plate Money Horse c. This being the true progresse and state of the businesse I saw clearly all along the Kingdome and Parliament were in danger that it was therefore necessary to have the Militia and Navie in safe hands which His Majesty also acknowledged That he refused to settle it for a time in the way they conceived necessary and that by the judgement of both Houses when they were full they had power by the fundamentall Laws of the Kingdome to settle it especially for a time upon His Majesties refusall That His Majesty raised force and declared it was to suppresse the Militia and recover Hull and the Magazine is as clear and made pregnant preparations both at home and beyond the Seas And the civill Lawyers say that pregnant preparations are the beginning of a War The onely Question remaining was whether the Parliament did justly in ordering the Militia and securing the Magazine and Navy in a confessed time of danger upon such his Majesties refusall What the Kings power and perogative and what the Parliaments power was for securing the Militia in time of danger according to the Laws of England was out of my profession and in great part above my skill But certainly unlesse I vvas bound rather to beleeve the Votes of the Papists and other Delinquents about his Majesty vvho hitherto had prevailed to bring upon us all the miseries that vve have laine under then the Votes and Judgements of the highest Court of Judicature in England which so far as I have heard was never by Common Law or Statute Law presumed to be guilty of or charged with the overthrow of the Kings prerogative or the Lawes and Liberties of the Subjects untill now and who have given us so much evidence of their wisdome watchfulnesse and faithfulnesse I vvas bound to be concluded under their Testimony and so consequently that His Majesty was seduced c. And surely if men vvho serve upon Justice betvveen Prince and People party and party in matters of Life or State may rest in the resolution of the learned Judges that this or that is law vvhen themselves knovv it not vvell might I rest in the judgement and resolution of that Court which is the Judge of all the Judicatures in the Land And in case I were unsatisfied to whom should I appeale in whose judgement I might more safely rest especially when I savv their Vote agreeable to that which is the supreme Law of all Nations namely that publick safety is the highest and deepest Law and that it is requisite that every State have a povver in time of danger to preserve it self from ruine and no Lavv of England more knovvne then that the Parliament is the highest Court from vvhence there is no appeal This satisfaction I had then and since by the Declarations and Remonstrances of the Parliament concerning these Military matters and by other Books lately published it is most apparent that they have not usurped upon His Majesties prerogative but what they have done is agreeable to the practice of former Parliaments In putting the Militia Forts and Navy into safe hands in these times of danger And that it vvas therefore lavvfull for them yea necessary to take up these Defensive Armes and consequently to call in for supply from all such vvho should share with them in the benefit of preservation and to disable such from hurting them who were contrary minded I spend no time to answer the Objections that some make that His Majesty could not tarry at London with safety of His Person that the Lords and Commons that are vvith Him were driven away by popular Tumults and could not enjoy freedome of their Votes c. Because I thinke these things are now beleeved by none but such as would beleeve no good of the Parliament though one should rise from the dead again Thus Sir you have a just account of the grounds that first induced me to owne this Cause you desire to know whether I see not yet reason to repent of what I have done I confesse I never undertooke any thing but I saw cause to repent of my miscarriage through the corruption which cleaves to me and great cause I have to bewaile my many failings in this great Worke but for the Worke it self I as solemnely professe I never saw cause to repent of my appearing in it the Cause is a right cause the Cause of God my call to it a cleare call and though the Work prove harder and longer then at first it was thought yet the Cause is far clearer then at the first The work indeed is harder then I expected for whoever could have beleeved he should have seen in England so many Lords and Commons even after their solemne Protestation to defend the Priviledge of Parliament and their owne Vote that His Majesty seduced by wicked councell intended War against the Parliament so shamefully to betray the trust committed to them so many of the Protestant Profession joyning with an army of Papists under pretence of maintaining the Protestant Religion against a Protestant Parliament to fight

beginning of these unhappy differences I had both learned and taught to this purpose First That it is agreeable to Gods will that in all Countreys especially when and where the people are numerous Magistracie be set up with a sufficiencie of power and authoritie to rule for the publick good and that even among them who are under the scepter of Christ against the Anabaptists Secondly That among the divers kinds of lawfull governments Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy no one of them is so appointed of God as to exclude the other from being a lawfull government Thirdly That the bounds and limits of the Magistrates lawfull power of commanding and the subjects necessary obeying must be found and taken out of the severall Laws Customes and Constitutions of those severall States and Commonwealths There are scarce two formes especially of Regall government in the world but they differ one from the other and that in matters of moment Now I say what the power of Magistrates in one Countrey differs from the power of Magistrates in another Countrey and how the duty of Subjects differs in each must be found only in the Laws of the respective places that no mans right must be detained from him that Caesar should have rendred to him the things that are Caesars and all people the things that are their own the Scripture and Laws of all nations doe determine But whether for instance in England Ship-money be the Kings right and so to be yeelded or denyed whether this house or inheritance be this or the other pretenders to it must not be determined by any Law but by the Law of England go therefore to the Lawes and learned Lawyers and from them alone you shall learn what is the Prerogative of the Prince and both the Duty and Liberty of the Subject But then fourthly comes in Religion or the command of God and binds the consciences of Magistrates to rule and of Subjects to obey according to those Lawes And fifthly in particular of Subjects it requires these four things First to render to their Governours next under God the greatest fear and honour as being Gods vicegerents as having the greatest beams of his authority put upon them and therefore called Gods and all of them the children of the most High Secondly Loyaltie to their persons and office that is obedience according to Law and patient subjection when we cannot actively obey willingly for conscience sake to submit to the penalty of the Laws when for conscience sake we cannot observe the Laws themselves Thirdly maintenance with payment of all lawfull Customs Tributes and impositions Fourthly all manner of supplications prayers intercessions and giving of thanks their usefulnesse being great their temptations many their fall like that of great Cedars the crushing of many and the shaking of the earth round about them and all this we owe nor onely to the King as Supream but in proportion to all inferiour Governours who are sent by God also for the punishment of evill doers and for the praise of them that do well they being all the ministers of God for our good and this is the first Commandment with promise But sixthly if our Governours whether supream or inferiour leave to rule according to Law and set up their own will contrary to Law there is no word of God acquitting them from sin in Gods sight but severely threatning them for abusing his name which they bear nor any word binding the consciences of their subjects therein to yeeld them any active obedience Thus farre we have all sides agreeing in all the particulars except only a few Court flatterers who and that especially of late have endeavoured to cry up Monarchy as the only ordinance of God for the Government of States as if the other forms of Aristocracy and Democracy were not approved by him Yea and have cryed up the power and authority of princes to be such as that they are absolved from all laws and that whatsoever the Subjects enjoy under them is only by the princes favour which if they please to recall how justly or unjustly soever the subjects are bound to yeeld all unto them and have no plea against their Prince only in the Court of heaven no law no judge no Court here below having any authority to say unto him What dost thou This Divinity hath of late been preached and as sweet enchanting musicke often chanted in the ears of our Princes and no doubt was one great occasion of these heavie yokes we have of late groaned under But these absurdities need no refutation Egyptian Pharaoh claimed not the wealth of his people till he had bought it And Ahab himselfe who durst not lay claime to Naboths vineyard without purchase or colour of confiscation proclaims their ignorance sufficiently to the world And among our selves the constant proceedings of our princes even in their most heavie illegall exactions borrowing alwayes a colour of law and the known laws of the land enabling the meanest subject to maintain his Propriety even in a two-penny matter against his Soveraigne And the innumerable verdicts in all Courts passing for the Subject against the King assure me that unlesse God for our sins should give up our Parliament and State to the vassallage which this Popish Army would bring it to we shall hear no more of this Divinity The only Question now is about passive obedience they who cry down our defensive Arms confesse that the Magistrate cannot require any thing but by law and that the subject need not yeeld up his right but by Law no tie lies upon the conscience of Naboth to let Ahab have his vineyard but if a Saul will by force take away our sonnes to care his ground and our daughters to be his Confectioners Cookes and Bakers if he will by force take our fields even the best of them and give them their servants we have no help in that day but preces lachryma to cry unto our God but no liberty to defend our selves by Armes against such tyrannie if we do say they we resist the ordinance of God and must receive to our selves damnation But if this opinion be weighed in the ballance of Reason how much lighter than vanity will it be found how absurd a thing is it that these men wil allow me if the king pretend Law in any thing I may try it out with him and not when he or his Instruments come with open violence If the king will sue me and by pretence of Law seek to take away my coat my house my land I may defend these from him with all the strength of Law I can but if he come with armed violence to take away my liberty life religion I must yeeld up these without making any resistance I may secure that which I have nothing but lexterrae to plead my propriety in viz. my money which I may give away and in the mean time my liberty life religion which are mine by the laws of God and

man I may not secure with a good conscience True it is if in case it do upon circumstances duely weighed appear that our receding from our right and not resisting wrong will tend to the promoving of a greater and a more generall good or the preventing of a greater and a more generall evill it is agreeable to right reason and our Saviours rule Mat. 5. 39. that we should both remit of our right and submit to wrong whether sued or ensued whether to superiours or inferiours or equals But that men should give a liberty of defence in Law and yet absolutely condemne defence against unlawfull violence is such an {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} such an absurdity as you shall seldome meet with But give me leave to weigh it a little further if the Subjects defending themselves by Armes against the violence of oppressing Governours and their instruments be unlawfull either it must be because their Prince hath by conquest spoiled them of that liberty which God and nature gave them at the first Or secondly because they or their Ancestors having submitted by Covenant and Consent to him to bee their supream Ruler according to Law they must therefore be interpreted to have yeelded up all their Liberty so far as to be now unable with a good Conscience to defend themselves against his violence though contrary to Law Or thirdly because God hath lifted up Princes so far above all mortall men that all hands are by him bound from daring to resist them The first I finde not many pleading that peoples being conquered makes it unlawfull for them to defend themselves against the unjust violences of their Conquerours or his Successours Most of them grant that the peoples right is to designe the person of their Prince And indeed it is the most absurd reasoning in the world that because a strong robber hath over-powerd me in my house in conscience I am tyed to be his servant or slave for ever Because Eglon hath mightily oppressed Israel for eighteen years it is unlawfull for them to shake of● his yoke when they are able to resist him Certainly whatever of mine another takes by violence from me let him keep it never so long it is but Continuata injuria a continued wrong till I consent to his holding it And all reason allowes me to recover it again as soon as I can And I fear not to say that had William sirnamed the conquerour taken and held this Crown only by his sword and ruled over the Nation only by force and all his successors to this day had no other claim to it all the reason in the world would allow us to redeem our selves from that yoke if we were able But though the sword begin the Conquest yet many times the Consent of the people comes in and makes their Conquerour their lawfull King and then so far as by Covenant or Laws they agree to be under him for the publike safety and good they are bound up from any resistance But that their parting with some of their liberty for the publike good should upon the usurpation of him whom they have trusted deprive them of that liberty which they never parted with is most abhorring to reason Suppose a free man indents with another to be his servant in some ingenious employment as suppose to attend upon his person and expresly indents that his master shall not have power to command him to rub his horse heels or fill his dung cart or the like If now this master shall usurp and command him to such sordid employment and by force seek to compell him to them some shew of reason at least there would be for the servant to plead that his master had forfeited all his power over him and that he was free from his service and might go seek another master but no colour of reason that the servant hath now forfeited that immunitie from sordid and drudgery works that he first covenanted and must thenceforth lie at his masters feet as wholly prostitute to all his Imperious humours Secondly can it be imagined by reason that a people submitting to a lawfull government should thereby be necessitated to that which may overthrow the end of all government that is inability to provide for their common safety That whereas when they were free and under no government at all they might by the law of nature defend themselves against injury now having submitted though upon good conditions they are utterly disabled to defend themselves if he that should be their Protectour would prove their Murtherer If he who both in himselfe and instruments should be onely for the punishment of evill and the praise of them that doe well will goe or send or suffer a company of theeves or murtherers to goe in his name and spoile and destroy them that do well can their being subjects in reason deprive them of their defence allowed them by the law of nature yea were they not guilty of self-murther in suffering such a thing For instance some of our Historians relate of King John that hee was transported with so deep a hatred against his Nobles and Commons that he sent an Ambassadour to Miramumalin entituled the great King of Africa Morocco and Spain wherein he offered to render unto him his Kingdome and to hold the same from him by tribute as his Soveraigne Lord to forgoe the Christian faith which he held vaine and receive that of Mahomet like enough some Court Chaplain may be the Clerk that went on the errand might warrantize the Kings conscience and tell him that it was the more shame for them who profest the Christian Religion to compell him to it But whether the King did lawfully or not is not our question but whether the subjects might lawfully have resisted that attempt of his and have stood for their Religion Lives and Liberty Thirdly is it not quite contrary to reason that whereas Kings and Rulers nothing differing by nature from their meanest subjects were at first constituted and are still continued for the protection welfare benefit yea and service of the people and who therefore should value their prerogatives scepters and lives no further then they may advance the publick good yet if they degenerate and will be destroyers the people should suffer all to be spoiled as if Kingdomes and people had been created by God for the will pleasure profit yea and lusts of Princes As if a Pilot purposely appointed for the safe wafting over of passengers who in stead thereof will dash the ship against the rocks Or a Generall purposely chosen and to whom the Souldiers have therefore sworne for the safetie of the whole Army should yet turn the Cannon mouth upon his own Souldiers or deliver them all up into the hands of the enemy the passengers and souldiers yea the officers in the ship and councell of war in the Army should be morally disabled from doing any thing to prevent their own apparent destruction By this