Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	england_n	king_n	people_n	13,931	5	5.0853	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52125	An account of the growth of popery and arbitrary government in England more particularly, from the long prorogation of November, 1675, ending the 15th of February, 1676, till the last meeting of Parliament, the 16th of July, 1677.	Marvell, Andrew, 1621-1678.	1677 (1677)	Wing M860; ESTC R22809	99,833	162

An Account of the GROWTH OF POPERY AND Arbitrary Government IN ENGLAND More Particularly from the Long Prorogation of November 1675 Ending the 15th of February 1676 till the Last Meeting of Parliament the 16th of July 1677. AMSTERDAM Printed in the Year 1677. An account of the Growth of POPERY and Arbitrary Government in England c. THere has now for diverse Years a design been carried on to change the Lawfull Government of England into an Absolute Tyranny and to convert the established Protestant Religion into down-right Popery than both which nothing can be more destructive or contrary to the Interest and Happinesse to the Constitution and Being of the King and Kingdom For if first we consider the State the Kings of England Rule not upon the same terms with those of our neighbour Nations who having by force or by adresse usurped that due share which their People had in the Government are now for some Ages in possession of an Arbitrary Power which yet no Presciption can make Legall and exercise it over their persons and estates in a most Tyrannical manner But here the Subjects retain their proportion in the Legislature the very meanest Commoner of England is represented in Parliament and is a party to those Laws by which the Prince is sworn to Govern himself and his people No Mony is to be levied but by the common consent No than is for Life Limb Goods or Liberty at the Soveraigns discretion but we have the same Right modestly understood in our Propriety that the Prince hath in his Regality and in all Cases where the King is concerned we have our just remedy as against any private person of the neighbourhood in the Courts of Westminster Hall or in the High Court of Parliament His very Prerogative is no more then what the Law has determined His Broad Seal which is the Legitimate stamp of his pleasure yet is no longer currant than upon the Trial it is found to be Legal He cannot commit any person by his particular warrant He cannot himself be witnesse in any cause the Ballance of Publick Justice being so dellicate that not the hand only but even the breath of the Prince would turn the scale Nothing is left to the Kings will but all is subjected to his Authority by which means it follows that he can do no wrong nor can he receive wrong and a King of England keeping to these measures may without arrogance be said to remain the onely Intelligent Ruler over a Rational People In recompense therefore and acknowledgment of so good a Government under his influence his Person is most sacred and inviolable and whatsoever excesses are committed against so high a trust nothing of them is imputed to him as being free from the necessity or temptation but his Ministers only are accountable for all and must answer it at their perills He hath a vast Revenue constantly arising from the Hearth of the Housholder the Sweat of the Laboures the Rent of the Farmer the Industry of the Merchant and consequently out of the Estate of the Gentleman a larg competence to defray the ordinary expense of the Crown and maintain its lustre And if any extraordinary occasion happen or be but with any probable decency pretended the whole Land at whatsoever season of the year does yield him a plentifull Harvest So forward are his Peoples affections to give even to superfluity that a Forainer or English man that hath been long abroad would think they could neither will nor chuse but that the asking of a supply were a meer formality it is so readily granted He is the Fountain of all Honours and has moreover the distribution of so many profitable Offices of the Houshold of the Revenue of State of Law of Religion of the Navy and since his persent Majesties time of the Army that it seems as if the Nation could scarse furnish honest men enow to supply all those imployments So that the Kings of England are in nothing inferiour to other Princes save in being more abridged from injuring their own subjects But have as large a field as any of external felicity wherein to exercise their own Virtue and so reward and incourage it in others In short there is nothing that comes nearer in Government to the Divine Perfection then where the Monarch as with us injoys a capacity of doing all the good imaginable to mankind under a disability to all that is evil And as we are thus happy in the Constitution of our State so are we yet more blessed in that of our Church being free from that Romish Yoak which so great a part of Christendome do yet draw and labour under That Popery is such a thing as cannot but for want of a word to express it be called a Religion nor is it to be mentioned with that civility which is otherwise decent to be used in speaking of the differences of humane opinion about Divine Matters Were it either open Judaisine or plain Turkery or honest Paganisme there is yet a certain Bona fides in the most extravagant Belief and the sincerity of an erroneous Profession may render it more pardonable but this is a compound of all the three an extract of whatsoever is most ridiculous and impious in them incorporated with more peculiar absurdityes of its own in which those were deficient and all this deliberately contrived knowingly carried on by the bold imposture of Priests under the name of Christianity The wisdom of this fifth Religion this last and insolentest attempt uppon the credulity of mankind seems to me though not ignorant otherwise of the times degrees and methods of its progresse principally to have consisted in their owning the Scriptures to be the word of God and the Rule of Faith and Manners but in prohibiting of the same time their common use or the reading of them in publick Churches but in a Latine translation to the vulgar there being no better or more rational way to frustrate the very design of the great Institutor of Christianity who first planted it by the extraordinary gift of Tongues then to forbid the use even of the ordinary languages For having thus a book which is universally avowed to be of Divine Authority but sequestring it only into such hands as were intrusted in the cheat they had the opportunity to vitiate suppresse or interpret to their own profit those Records by which the poor People hold their salvation And this necessary point being once gained there was thence forward nothing so monstrous to reason so abhorring from morality or so contrary to scripture which they might not in prudence adventure on The Idolatry for alas it is neither better nor worse of adoring and praying to Saints and Angels of worshipping Pictures Images and Reliques Incredible Miracles and plapable Fables to promote that veneration The whole Liturgy and Worship of the Blessed Virgin The saying of Pater Nosters and Creeds to the honour of Saints and of Ave Mary's too not

have been respited again as it had in former Sessions and for the whole long Prorogation But their House was farr from such Obstinacy And the news being come of the taking both of Valenciennes and St. Omar with the defeate of the Prince of Orange at Mont-Cassel so that now there was no further danger of preventing or Interrupting the successes of the French-King this Campagn at last therefore upon the 11 of Aprill this following answer was offerred to their House from his Majesty by Master Secretary Coventry C. R. HIs Majesty having considered your last Addresse and finding some late alteration in affaires abroad thinks it necessary to put you in mind That the only vvay to prevent the dangers vvhich may arise to these Kingdoms must be by putting his Majesty timely in a Condition to make such fitting preparation as may enable him to do vvhat may be most for the security of them And if for this reason you shall desire to fit any longer time his Majesty is content you may Adjourn novv before Easter and meet again suddenly after to ripen this matter and to perfect some of the most necessary Bills novv depending Given at our Court at White-Hall the 11. of April 1677. Somewhat was said on both these matters but the Greater debate of them was Adjorned till next day and then reassumed Then it was moved that the House should Adjorn till after Easter and then meet again with a Resolution to enable the King to make such preprations as should be thought necessary and also passe some necessary Bills for the Kingdome which if they did not the blame of the neglect must rest upon themselves and it would be observed they had not sat to any effect this four yeares and that now they had a session and had given a Million they did take little care to redresse Greviances or passe Good Laws for the People and that they should not be able to give any account of themselves to their Neighbours in the Country unlesse they should face them down that there was no Greviance or Mischeife in the Nation to be Redressed and that the King had stopped their mouths and laid it to them by offering to them to sit longer Others said they should perfect the two money Bills and give the King Ease and take another time to consider further of Religion Liberty and Property especially seeing all Bills now depending would be kept on foot the Intended Recesse being to be but an Adjournment that they had very good Laws already and would give their shares in any new ones they were making to be in the Country at the present time that it was necessary for them to be there the 10th of May to Execute the Act for 600000 l. c. And some time was to be allowed for their Journyes and rest after it that the passing some necessary Bills came in the end of the Kings Message and by the by For his Majesty saith That if for this Reason that is for making of preparations c they should desire to sit longer and if so then also take the opportunity of passing such Bills So the sence and inclination of the House was to rise before Easter as had been before intimated and expected Then they fell upon the main consideration of the Message and to make a present Answer The Secretary and other Ministers of State said that the Alteration of Affaires which his Majesty took notice of was the successe of the French against the Prince of Orange in the Battel and their proceeding to take Cambray and St. Omars Thus by Inches or rather great measures they were taking in Flanders which was reckoned the Out-work of England as well as Holland and they said plainely nothing could put his Majesty in a condition to make fitting preparations to preserve the Kingdom but ready money To this it was answered that it was not proper nor usuall to aske money at the end of a Session and it was fit that Alliances should be first made and that they should Adjourn rather till that were done for they ought not to give money till they knew for what and it was clearely spoken and made out to them that if there were no Summers War there was money enough given already It was replyed That they had not direction from his Majesty as to what he had resolved and it might be not convenient to discover and publish such things but they would offer their Guesse and Ayme at some things if there were any Approaches towards War though they ought to consider and compute like him in the Gospel whether with such a force they could encounter a King that came against them with such a force they should think of providing a Guard for the Isle of Wight sersey Carnsey and Ireland and secure our Coasts and be in a defensive posture on the Land we might be Attaqued in a night Also there would be a necessity of an extraordinary Summer Guard at Sea his Majesty did use to apply 400000 l. vearly out of the Customes upon his Fleets the very harbour Expence which in Anchorage Mooring Docks and Repaires c. was 110000 l. per annum and he was now setting forth 40 Ships for the Summer Gard but if there were a disposition towards War there must be more Shipps or at least those must be more fully manned and more strongly appoynted and furnished the more especially if the Breach were sudden for otherwise our Trading Ships at Sea as well as those Ships and Goods in the French Ports would be exposed Now it is reasonable that the remander which was above and beyond the Kings ordinary Allowance should be supplyed by the Parliament and the Extraordinary preparations of this kind for the present could not amount to lesse than 200000 l. It was answered that it was a Mealancholy thing to think Jersey c. Were not well enough secured at least as well as in the year 1665 when we alone had War with the French and Dutch too and yet the Kings Revenue was lesse then than now That the Revenue of Ireland was 50000 l. per annum beyond the Establishment that is the Civill Military and all payments of the Government which if not sent over hither but disposed there would suffice to defend that Kingdom and they remember that about a moneth ago they were told by some of these Gentlemen that the French King would not take more Townes in Flanders if he might have them but was drawing off to meet the Germans who would be in the field in May and therefore it was strang he should be represented now as ready to Invade us and that we must have an Army raised and kept on our Islands and Land No they would not have that it would be a Great matter in the Ballance if the Kings Subjects were withdrawn from the French service and applyed on the other side and tell that were done that we did continue to be Contributary to the Greatnesse

a measure to be taken in those things and it is indeed to the great reproach of Humane Wisdom that no man has for so many Ages been able or willing to find out the due temper of Government in Divine Matters For it appears at the first sight that men ought to enjoy the same Propriety and Protection in their Consciences which they have in their Lives Liberties and Estates But that to take away these in Penalty for the other is meerly a more Legal and Gentile way of Padding upon the Road of Heaven and that it is only for want of Money and for want of Religion that men take those desperate Courses Nor can it be denied that the Original Lavv upon which Christianity at the first was founded does indeed expresly provide against all such severity And it was by the Humility Meekness Love Forbearance and Patience which were part of that excellent Doctrine that it became at last the Universal Religion and can no more by any other meanes be preserved than it is possible for another Soul to animate the same Body But with shame be it spoken the Spartans obliging themselves to Lycargus his Laws till he should come back again continued under his most rigid Discipline above twice as long as the Christians did endure under the gentelest of all Institutions though with far more certainty expecting the return of their Divine Legislater Insomuch that it is no great Adventure to say That the World was better ordered under the Antient Monarchies and Commonvvealths that the number of Virtuous men was then greater and that the Christians found fairer quarter under those than among themselves nor hath there any advantage acrued unto mankind from that most perfect and practical Moddel of Humane Society except the Speculation of a better way to future Happiness concerning which the very Guides disagree and of those few that follow it will suffer no man to pass without paying at their Turn-pikes All which had proceeded from no other reason but that men in stead of squaring their Governments by the Rule of Christianity have shaped Christianity by the Measures of their Government have reduced that streight Line by the crooked and bungling Divine and Humane things together have been alwayes hacking and hewing one another to frame an irregular Figure of Political Incongruity For wheresoever either the Magistrate or the Clergy or the People could gratify their Ambition their Profit or their Phanfie by a Text improved or misapplied that they made use of though against the consent sense and immutable precepts of Scipture and because Obedience for Conscience sake was there prescribed the lesse Conscience did men make in Commanding so that several Nations have little else to shew for their Christiainity which requires Instruction only and Example but a pracell of sever Laws concerning Opinion or about the Modes of Worship not so much in order to the Power of Religion as over it Neverthelesse because Mankind must be governed some way and be held up to one Law or other either of Christs or their own making the vigour of such humane Constitutions is to be preserved untill the same Authority shall upon better reason revoke them and as in the mean time no private man may without the guilt of Sedition or Rebellion resist so neither by the Nature of the English Foundation can any Publick Person suspend them without committing an Errour which is not the lesse for wanting a legall name to expresse it But it was the Master-peice therefore of boldnesse and contrivance in these Conspiratours to issue this Declaration and it is hard to say wherein they took the greater felicity whither in suspending hereby all the Statutes against Popery that it might thence forward passe like current money over the Nation and no man dare to refuse it or whether gaining by this a President to suspend as well all other Laws that respect the Subjects Propriety and by the same power to abrogate and at last inact what they pleased till there should be no further use for the Consent of the People in Parliament Having been thus true to their great designe and made so considerable a progresse they advanced with all expedition It was now high time to Declare the War after they had begun it and therefore by a Manifesto of the seventeenth of March 1672 the pretended Causes were made publich which were The not having Vailed Bonnet to the English Yatch though the Duch had all along both at home and here as carefully endevoured to give as the English Minestrs to avoid the receiving of all satisfaction or letting them understand what would do it and the Council Clock was on purpose set forward lest their utmost Compliance in the Flag at the hour appointed should prevent the Declaration of War by some minuts The detaining of some few English families by their own Consent in Surynam after the Dominion of it was by Treaty surrendred up to the Hollander in which they had likewise constantly yielded to the unreasonable demands that were from one time to another extended from hence to make the thing impracticable till even Banister himself that had been imployed as the Agent and Contriver of this misunderstanding could not at the last forbear to cry shame of it And moreover to fill up the measure of the Dutch iniquity they are accused of Pillars Medalls and Pictures a Poet indeed by a dash of his Pen having once been the cause of a Warre against Poland but this certainely was the first time that ever a Painter could by a stroke of his Pencill occasion the Breach of a Treaty But considering the weaknesse and invalidity of those other allegations these indeed were not unnecessary the Pillars to adde strength the Meddalls Weight and the Pictures Colour to their Reasons But herein they had however observed Faith with France though on all other sides broken having capitulated to be the first that should do it Which as it was no small peice of French Courtesey in so important an action to yield the English the Precedence so was it on the English part as great a Bravery in accepting to be the formost to discompose the State of all Christendom and make themselves principal to all the horrid Destruction Devastation Ravage and Slaughter which from that fatal seventeenth of March One thousand six hundred seventy tvvo has to this very day continued But that which was most admirable in the winding up of this Declaration was to behold these Words And vvhereas vve are engaged by a Treaty to support the Peace made at Aix la Chapelle We do finally Declare that notvvithstanding thé Prosecution of this War We vvill maintain the true intent and scope of the said Treaty and that in all Alliances vvhich We have or shall make in the progress of this War vve have and vvill take care to preserve the ends thereof inviolable unless provoked to the contrary And yet it is as clear as the Sun that the French

and distrusting all Parliamentary Advice to take Counsel from themselves from France and from Necessity And in the meane time they fomented all the Jealousies which they caused They continued to inculcate Forty and One in Court and Country Those that refused all the mony they demanded were to be the onely Recusants and all that asserted the Libertyes of the Nation were to be reckoned in the Classis of Presbyterians The 13th of October came and his Majesty now asked not only a Supply for his building of Ships as formerly but further to take off the Anticipation upon his Revenue The House of Commons took up again such Publick Bills as they had on foot in their former sitting and others that might either Remedy Present or Prevent Future Mischiefs The Bill for Habeas Corpus That against sending men Prisoners beyond Sea That against raising Mony without Consent of Parliament That against Papists sitting in either House Another Act for speedier convicting of Papists That for recalling his Mejestys Subjects out of the French service c And as to his Majestys supply they proceeded in their former Method of the two Bills One for raising 300000 l. and the other for Appropriating the Tunnage and Poundage to the use of the Navy And in the Lords House there was a good disposition toward things of Publick Interest But 300000 l. was so insipid a thing to those who had been continually regaled with Millions and that Act of Appropriation with some others went so much against stomack that there wanted only an opportunity to reject them and that which was readiest at hand was the late quarrel betwixt the House of Lords and the Commons The house of Commons did now more peremptorily then ever oppose the Lords Jurisdiction in Appeals The Lords on the otherside were resolved not to depart from so essentiall a Priviledge and Authority but to proceed in the Exercise of it So that this Dispute was raised to a greater Ardure and Contention then ever and there appeared no way of accomodation Hereupon the Lords were in consultation for an Addresse to his Majesty conteining many weighty Reasons for his Majestyes dissolving this Parliament deduced from the nature and behaviour of the present House of Commons But his Majesty although the transaction between the two Houses was at present become impracticable Judging that this House might at some other time be of use to him chose only to Prorogue the Parliament The blame of it was not onely laid but aggravated upon those in both Houses but especially on the Lords-House who had most vigorously opposed the French and Popish-Jnterest But those who were present at the Lords and observed the conduct of the Great Ministers there conceived of it otherwise And as to the House of Commons who in the heat of the Contest had Voted That vvhosoever shall Sollicity or prosecute any Appeal against any Commoner of England from any Court of Equity before the House of Lords shall be deemed and taken abetrayer of the Rights and Liberties of the Commons of England and shall be proceeded against accordingly Their Speaker going thorow VVestminster Hall to the House and looking down upon some of those Lawyers commanded his Mace to seize them and led them up Prisoners with him which it is presumed that he being of his Majesties Privie Councill would not have done but for what some men call his Majesties Service And yet it was the highest this of all the Provocations which the Lords had received in this Controversie But however this fault ought to be divided there was a greater committed in Proroguing the Parliament from the 22th of November 1675 unto the 15th of February 1676. And holding it after that dismission there being no Record of any such thing done since the being of Parliaments in England and the whole Reason of Law no lesse then the Practise and Custome holding Contrary This vast space betwixt the meetings of Parliament cannot more properly be filled up then with the coherence of those things abroad and at home that those that are intelligent may observe whether the Conspirators found any interruption or did not rather sute this event also to the Continuance of their Counsells The Earl of Northampton is not to be esteemed as one engaged in those Counsells being a person of too great Honour though the advanceing of him to be Constable of the Tovver was the first of our Domestick occurrents But if they could have any hand in it 't is more probable that lest he might perceive their Contrivances they apparelled him in so much Wall to have made him insensible However men conjectured even then by the Quality of the Keeper that he was not to be disparaged with any mean and vulgar Prisoners But another thing was all along very remarkable That during this Inter-Parliament there were five Judges places either fell or were made vacant for it was some while before that Sir Francis North had been created Lord Cheif Justice of the Common Pleas the five that succeeded were Sir Richard Rainsford Lord Chief Justice of the Kings Bench. Mountagne Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer Vere Bartie Barrister at Law one of the Barrons of the Exchequer Sir William Scroggs one of the Justices of the Common Pleas. And Sir Thomas Jones one of the Justices of the Kings Bench. Concerning all whom there it somthing too much to be said and it is not out of a figure of speech but for meer reverence of their Profession that I thus passe it over considering also humane infirmity and that they are all by their Pattens Durante Bene Placito bound as it were to the Good Behaviour And it is a shame to think what triviall and to say the best of them obscure persons have and do stand next in prospect to come and sit by them Justice Atknis also by Warping too far towards the Laws was in danger upon another pretense to have made way for some of them but upon true Repentance and Contrition with some Almes Deeds was admitted to Mercy And all the rest of the Benches will doubtlesse have profited much by his and some other example Alas the Wisdom and Probity of the Law went of for the most part with good Sir Mathevv Hales and Justice is made a meere property This poysonous Arrow strikes to the very heart of Government and could come from no Quiver but that of the Conspirators What French Counsell what standing Forces what Parliamentary Bribes what National Oaths and all the other Machinations of wicked men have not yet been able to effect may be more compendiously Acted by twelve Judges in Scarlet The next thing considerable that appeared preparatory for the next session was a Book that came out by publick Authority Intitled Considerations touching the true vvay to suppresse Popery c. A very good design and writ I beleive by a very good man but under some mistakes which are not to be passed over One in the Preface wherein he