Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	king_n	lord_n	parliament_n	20,596	5	6.9552	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93064	The dignity of kingship asserted: in answer to Mr. Milton's Ready and easie way to establish a free Common-wealth. Proving that kingship is both in it self, and in reference to these nations, farre the most excellent government, and the returning to our former loyalty, or obedience thereto is the only way under God to restore and settle these three once flourishing, now languishing, broken, & almost ruined nations. / By G.S. a lover of loyalty. Humbly dedicated, and presented to his most Excellent Majety Charles the Second, of England; Scotland, France and Ireland, true hereditary king.	G. S., Lover of loyalty.; Searle, George, attributed name.; Sheldon, Gilbert, 1598-1677, attributed name.; Starkey, George, 1627-1665, attributed name.	1660 (1660)	Wing S3069; Thomason E1915_2; ESTC R210007	99,181	247

by setling the Nition into a Free Common-wealth for the attaining speedily firmly establishing and best ordering of which you give your judgement and that in some things Paradoxall but as you conceive the most necessary and best expedient to procure much good to and preventing much mischief in and managing affairs most wisely and experiencedly for the good of the Common-wealth And that is that the Grand Council of the Nation should sit perpetually of which you shew the good and conveniency on the one hand and the dammage and inconvenience of the contrary on the other hand which you illustrate by instances confirm by reasons and shew some Stumbling-blocks you would have avoyded in following your advice and Rules to be observed namely not to harbour any such fond conceit in our Republique as is the Duke in the Venetian or the Prince of Orange and House of Nassan in the Netherlandish Common-wealths Thus in order you come again to compare a Republique so contrived with Monarchy to admire the one and decry the other by shewing the Justice Freedome Plenty and Peace of the one and the difficulties uncertainties and impossibilities of the like injoyments under the other You proceed then more particularly to compare them together in their allowing or disallowing spiritual freedome or Christian liberty and herein also you give the priority to a Common-wealth concerning the promoting of which you adde some thoughts of your own concluding it an absolutely necessary thing for the obtaining or continuing Civil peace and will allow no Government so inclinable to favour and protect it as that of a Free Common-wealth but on the other hand you shew the unlikelihood that Kingship should ever give way to it as you instance in Queen Elizabeths not induring Calvinisme or the Presbyterian Reformation should be so much as proposed to her during all her Reign lest it should diminish Regall Authority Between which Queen of happy memory and our most pious Prince you make a short but scurvy scurrilous comparison impudently affirming him to be bad Principled from his Cradle trained up and governed by Popish and Spanish Councils and on such depending hitherto for subsistence From spirituall you come to Civil Freedome which consists in the Civil Rights and advancement of every person according to his merit and for the attaining of this end also you conclude a Common wealth far to excell in opposition to Kingship And for the reaping the larger benefit in this kind you propose an expedite way in your opinion By having Legall Jurisdiction without Appeal in each County providing also for such Controversies which shall happen between men of severall Counties that they may repair to the Capital City to conclude which head having vomited forth much of your filth against monarchy you close your discourse with a Patheticall Peroration to the People in which you do briefly hint and seem to wipe away what Objections may be made against a Free Common-wealth and so draw to this Conclusion That if we do return back to Kingship on that score that Jewes would have returned into Egypt for the sake of Onyons Garlick and Flesh-pots trading to wit which by our casting off Kingship hath been decayed our condition is unsound and rotten and that we are in the Road-way of all Nationall Judgements and Calamities You seem at last to fear the successe of what you have written only hope the best that though these lines should move most men no more then stones or stocks yet they may out of some of these stones raise up Children to Liberty That what you have spoken is the Language of the Good old Cause intended for the Conviction of Backsliders and if possible to give a stay or stop to our ruinous proceedings and to the general defection as you conceive of the abused and misguided multitude This Sir is a short or summary Epitomy of what I understand by reading your discourse but how far wide it comes from Truth and Reason I doubt not but before I end to make manifest and shall shew your intended Modell to be unpracticable by us if ever we expect peace and settlem●nt in these at present distracted Nations Your first stating of the Case is brief and might pass for current among such who are and have been strangers to the transactions of this Nation or whose memories are so short as not to be able to recollect how matters have been carryed on by and from the beginning of this Parliament but to others the fallacy may appear at the first reading Was it the Parliament of England that abolished Kingship and Kingly Government Where were the Lords Did they concurre in that action Certainly no for they by the same power and Authority if that can be called Authority which wants Justice to support it were abolished likewise about the same time and by the same Engagement afterwards that excluded Kingship cut off from having any share in Government And if they concurred not in that Act how can any man without impudence affirm that it was the Parliament of England that abolished Kingship Or can the Parliament of England consist without a House of Lords It is most evident that at the first sitting of this Parliament it consisted of both Lords and Commons who yet made no Parliament without him with whom they were to parly or consult and that was the King But it is not my task to discourse as a Lawyer but as an Orator intending to inquire into the truth and Reason of things and not to determine how the Case stands in point of Law Though Lords had been uselesse and unnecessary to sit as a House and assist in Government yet they were absolutely of use to the making of an English Parliament or else shew me any Parliament that ever was in England without them You confesse that the Parliament of England was assisted by a great number of faithfull Adherers to them in the defense of Religion and Civil Liberties and were not they as well the Peers as the Commons By what Power were Armies first raised Commissions granted and Moneys levyed but in the name of both Houses If the first making of Warre which judicious and conscientious men judge Rebellion but I shall wave that Enquiry nor hereafter meddle with it were for the defence of Religion c. the Lords as an House can claim as great a share in the glory of it as the House of Commons Yea if to have the honour of first kindling the fire deserve prayse One Peer with Five Commoners must share together Was not the case of Kimbolton once accounted of as high merit as that of Hoslerig and his fellow-partners And the Priviledges of Parliament equally pretended to be concerned in the defending of them all Or if the management of the Warre deserve commendation which you call the assistance of the Faithfull did not the Lords personally act as highly and adventure as far as any Commoner Or did not the faithfullest for I observe you use

for their justification sake yet to keep them from open Reproach I easily believe Mr Milton that nothing was wanting on the part of our Regicides that the same was not only meditated and attempted but brought to perfection and put in execution in France being begun as you say in Burdeaux and Paris But without doubt the protestant interest never had such a blow among Christians by profession as they had by this Act. How was this formerlie the blot of the Jesuits that they taught and allowed the murther of their Princes if once excommunicated by the Pope And yet how ashamed were the Papists ever to own such a tenent although they might consent to such a practise and be guiltie of it How were the Gunpowder Traitors branded by our divines and Professors with marks of infamy upon this score Yet now behold a Protestant King not treasonably conspired against but murdered and that not designed and brought about by a private unseen blow of Gunpowder or stab with a Dagger from a private hand as English King James was designed for destruction by our English Papists and French Henry was actuallie slain by a Ravilliack But stand amazed O ye Heavens for ye beheld it blush O thou great light of the day which then sawest it this Protestant Virtuous Picus KING was solemnly cut off at his own doore by his own Subjects who claimed then the name and usurped then the power of the Representative Body of the English Nation the PARLIAMENT or Supream Authority of ENGLAND Nor did they for this Action to excuse it plead such a thing as the Popes pardon or dispensation as the Papists did acknowledging in that such an act to be in it self unwarrantable and unjustifiable but they stile themselves the only true Assertors of the Peoples Libertie and the faithfullest part of Englands Representatives and therefore the Common wealths most constant and firm Patriots Nay no man could have any protection from the Lawes that did not by Engagement justifie this Act no Minister injoy his Living unlesse he give his post consent to that which but six years at most before he had to avoid the like penaltie Covevanted and entred into League Vowed and Protested against Solemnly and with hands lifted up to the most High God This a man may believe if he will be an Atheist to be Englands restitution to its Religious and Civill Liberties but he of discretion that reallie believes so may easilie be brought to yeild Light to be Darkness and Darkness Light Conscience and the fear of God expectation of happiness in Heaven and fear of Hell to be onlie juggles Now what Prince that is not mad would trust a Protestant in power nay tollerate him in his Dominions if these are Protestants indeed who are neither to be believed when they swear nor confided in if they can but get an opportunitie That will swear Alegiance to and murther the same King and that not secretlie but openlie nor seek to excuse it when done but justifie plead for extol and commend it as a performance worthy ren●wn and fit to be trasmitted down as an example to posterity But let all who truly fear the Lord say of these as Jacob of his two bloody Sons Simeon and Levi who kild only their Neighbour Idolatrous enemies who had deserved their hate by ravishing their Sister and were part of the Nations that were to be destroyed utterlie by Jacobs seed yet with whom they in colour at least were then about to make a league of friend-ship and among whom they lived peceably O my soul come not into their secrets and to their counsailes mine honour be n●t thou united for in their wrath they slew their Soveraign Lord the King and in their self will plucked up to their utmost the whole Royal root and dugge down the wall of Government and destroyed the foundations the Lawes Boast not then Mr. Milton how taking this example was with the like spirited Mock Protestants but really damnable Rebels in France for from such a spark as this was kindled that fire which formerlie wasted and consumed the Hugonites of Paris and of late the Waldenses in Piedmona and Savoy Guilty art thou O treacherous Perjured Apostate Rump of all this bloud the former of which thou hast justified and the latter been instrumentall in causing to be shed Blessed be God who hath clipt your wings Pared your Hornes Broken your Talons by which you soared above the reach of justice and pushed at and griped most horribly whoever durst but speak or write against your execrable murthers rapines and Sacrilegious Villanies And I hope that Christian Princes will in time be made to understand and given to see that this and the like actions of yours are not consonant to the te●●nts of any true Protestants Be confounded then and for ever silenced ye self-condemning wretches who when at the beginning of the warre such a design was charged upon you by the Royall l●yall partie you rejected it with imprecations and were sedulous with the rest of your fellow members of the Commons house and the whole house of Peers to acquit and clear your selves from such an aspersion as you then called it with detestation yea I am confident that then many of you before your consciences were since by monstrous impieties cauterized and rendred past feeling did cordially abhor what you since have acted and endeavoured to compel all men ministers especially to approve of and justifie and by a post engagement to consent to in opposition to former Covenants and Protestations to the contrarie I do verily believe I say that then you would have declard against it with horror and trembling however the Devil bad counsel and worldly gain have since insnared and corrupted many of you Come we from what you have done in our name to take a survey of what you have procured to us thereby for although the end is but a fallacious rule to judge actions by nor is it wisdome to determine concerning the thing done that it is good or bad by the event and success of it yet it is a perswading motive to repentance and amendm●nt of such courses which we are convinced to be evil when we find the smart of them and see evident our condition to be bad at present and worse and worse in likelyhood to be expected every day It is likewise a good conviction and very sutable to and seasonable for such who will not believe but these our present miseries are only the fore-running throwes of a glorious Birth and off-spring of which they seem to perswade ●hemselves and would have us to believe that we are not only in Expectation and certainty but in the present fruition and possession to wit Liberty both religious and Civil in respect of which Kingship is a Yoak of Bondage thraldome Vassalage slavery and infelicity Good Lord was ever such ridiculous folly such wilful madness known or seene Have we any Liberty in civil things but if we please

were baffled and the Rump re-enters upon the Stage with as much scorn contempt and disgrace as Ballad-makers and idle Pamphleters could devise but these things they minded not Money they wanted and were resolved to have it Quo jure quâve injuriâ they made no matter and having outwitted and baffled Lambert Fleetwood Desborough and the rest of the too petulant Army Grandees thought it now easie for them to bear all down before them with violence and on this perswasion begun to be rough and resolute with the City The Citizens on the other hand now at last wearied to the very soul with the constant Oppressions Rapines Exactions and cruelties of this abominable Fagge-end of Authority and finding the Purses and desires of their Masters to be bottomlesse never filled nor satisfied although themselves were almost quite exhausted and ruined and perceiving that their villanies would alwayes create new troubles and the fears of them would call for new expenses daily Heroickly resolved to see a legal Authority in being before they would contribute any more Moneys at the demand of any Usurped pretended Power under Heaven To curb these and reduce them as they called it to obedience Generall Monke was imployed in odious dirty hatefull services and unheard of villany was plotted against as many in the City as loved loyalty whose bloud and plunder if not the flame of the City was resolved upon to be offered as a sacrifice to some Infernal Furies that sate in the Rump However the Posts and Chains of London were demolished several Aldermen and Common council men were imprisoned and to make a compleat Tragedy the most active Aldermen were as report gave it out credibly appointed to be hanged one at each Gate of the City Yea to fill up the measure of their impiety to amazement as well as detestation Praysegod Barebone a Fanatique leading Zealot appears with a cursed Petition to abjure not only our Martyr'd Kings whole Royal Posterity but the whole Family of King JAMES and to have the motion for or defense of Regal Government made a Capital Crime and that irrevocably according to the Law of the Medes and Persians not repealable by any future Parliaments but the propounding such a thing though in Parliament to be adjudged Treason and the Offendor to suffer losse of life and forfeiture of Estate as in case of high Treason for the same For which pious Petition in which this must not be omitted that he would have no Minister preach nor Schoolmaster teach Scholars and in a word none to be admitted to any place of profit or trust either civil or military but such only who could dispense with his conscience so far as to take that Oath of Abjuration and actually did the same for this I say he had by the Order of the House the Speakers hearty thanks while two Noble spirited Gentlemen Members Elected of the same Parliament but by force secluded the force of the Rebellious Army as the self-condemning Rumpers long time pretended and still by force kept out for a sober Petition to their Imperious Fellow-members for re-admission delivered in behalf of themselves and the rest who lay under that forcible restraint from discharging the trust committed to them by the people at the time of their Election were committed Prisoners to the Tower Then at last God saw it good to hear and answer the multitude of Prayers put up to him by the oppressed languishing Nation in generall and his faithfull Servants in particular and restrained the residue of the Rumps fury having glorified his Name wonderfully by so much of it as he did permit by which the Nation in generall and the guilty in particular saw their sin at first committed against their Liege and gracious Soveraign in the Looking-glasse of its deserved and long continued punishment Which was and hath been by farre so much the more grievous plague then the pestilence it self wherewith formerly to correct our lesse horrible sins God in justice mixed with mercy sometimes visited us as it was more afflictive to fall into the hands of mercilesse men then into the hands of a gracious God and therefore the latter was chosen by David rather then either the former or Famine Yet the pestilence is a sharp scourge but far to be chosen before being sold to and oppressed by a Forain Enemy although this last be lesse grievous then to be subjected and inslaved domineered over and kept under by the viler and baser sort of our own chosen Representatives who were elected and intrusted to stand for our liberties and with their Lives and Fortunes to maintain them which yet they perfidiously and perjuriously betrayed and joyned with the most unconscionable rebellious part of the Army to wit the mercenary Soldiers who being raised impowered and payed to defend the Liberties of those who made use of them contrariwise imployed their own Moneys and the Weapons with which they were armed to inslave and subject those who thus armed and payd them and as much as in them lay to perpetuate this bondage and slavery to posterity unto a few sordid degenerate Gentlemen and Peasants after all that were Noble and Honourable were thrown away and layd aside This was our long continued Plague often varying its symptoms but still appearing worse and worse till at last mortal tokens as I may call them began to be visible Then all were instructed each man in his place with Gods high hand that the mist raised by factious seditious spirits at the beginning of the War made his gracious Majesty to appear to his cordially loyall subjects not as he really was but his actions were scandalized and his intentions misconstrued by such Boutefeus of State who desired only to kindle an unquenchable fire as well in the spiritual as in the temporal Government which God to punish our sins permitting them they villanously brought to passe Boast no more I pray you Sir how free this City hath been since these overturning times from the Pestilence which in probability might have roosted the Rumpers out of their nest in which they sate so long hatching mischief and perfidious villany and so instead of a plague might have proved a blessing to this unhappy Nation but themselves and such who took occasion to Vsurp by their complyance and breach of Faith and trust with the Nation being indeed tenfold the more cursed plague and God for our sins judging it fit to continue this worst of miseries next to utter desolation for a long season upon this sinfull rebellious Nation whom no Oaths formerly taken could keep firm to our Loyalty but even the Pulpits the places of Divine Messages sounded of nothing but arms bloud and confusion kept off the contagious Pestilence and continued with various changes between whiles our bondage to Vsurpers as well as Rebells for a long time nigh Twelve years by this judgement of his to convince us each in our place of our sins in generall and in particular our sin of

Patriots as you call them of our liberty the Rumpers I mean with their own valour and wit upon their own Charges have defeated the King and all who should appear for him upon the score of the expensiveness burdensomenesse uselesnesse and dangerousnesse of his Office and publiquely avowed this to be their quarrell I le grant you then their actings might have been justifiable upon the title of Conquest and a posteriori for Originally they could not be so considering the paucity of their number but when it is evident that not they but the major part of the Nation many by actuall appearing in Arms all by Countributing Moneys carryed on the War from the beginning to the end now at last for them by complyance with a corrupt mutinous Souldiery to imploy the Victory to other nay clean contrary ends then for which Arms were first taken and Moneys raised to turn out all that with them for Eight years together carryed on the War joyntly because at last they could not in Conscience and would not joyn with them in so detestable perjurious actings to murder destroy and plunder as many as durst oppose these palpable Praevarications if I say these actions do not point out Saints in grain the most barbarous of Murtherers to wit Regicides the most abominable sort of Thieves to wit Sacrilegious Robbers the most damnable of Professors to wit Hypocrites the most corrupt of English Commoners to wit Rumpers I shall leave it to any of their friends to consider at least if ever God should open his or their eyes or they come upon their Death-bed I am sure no Cordiall unprejudiced English-man can think of those unheard of practises but with the like affection wherewith Aeneas at the Request of Queen Dido made relation of his past miseries which he with his Countrey suffered Infandum Regina jubes renovare dolorem Yea I question not Mr Milton but succeeding ages will esteem of it next to the rejecting and crucyfying the Lord of Life Jesus Christ the most detestable example that ever any people who were really or desired to be reputed the people of God acted or abetted But Sir whatever you have said as to this Argument I shall have occasion to meet with and speak to in proving my own assertions and therefore I shall with as much brevity as perspicuity will admit discourse of and by solid reasons confirm the same Kingship I affirm to be the only desirable government in the world and of all sorts of Kingly Governments or Monarchies ours of England was most exquisitely composed equally tempered and suited to a Nation really free and yet truly Subject where Majesty and subjection made a true harmony and the most inferiour members were as equally necessary to the good of the whole as the chief In it the King was Supreme the head of Law and Justice and yet himself never had power to make or to execute any Law the governed people propounded formed and modelled such Lawes by which they were to be ruled The peers who also had a share in subjection yet a degree advanced above the Commons they had likewise a hand in Laws that were to be enacted to whom therefore they were brought for approbation And being thus formed and approved they were lastly presented to the King for his Royall confirmation Thus the Commons propounding and framing the nobles approving and Consenting the King signing and confirming Lawes were made Where now is flavery where the bondage and vassallage which you made so great a noyse concerning Was it in having any Laws at all Truely Mr Milton however you palliate things I believe verily there lyes the knot that troubles you there your shooe pinches I find generally such Christian Libertines as your writings shew you to be one of come at last to throw off all externall coercive or binding lawes and desire only to be governed by the Law within them which in truth is a spirit of Lawlesnesse To this your doctrine of divorce seems to incline therein you complain much of bondage and thraldome vassalage and what not only for standing indispensably obliged to your wife after the Covenant of God mutually passed between you what wonder then if you account it vassallage to be held by an Oath of Allegiance But as there have been and are many who account themselves at a much greater liberty being engaged in an inviolable bond to a loving wife considering the frailty of their nature cannot abide a single life so I question not but thousands of sober spirits Judged themselves farre more free when we had our KING and kept our Oaths by which we were indispensably ingaged to him Conscientiously and firmly then since by Hypocrisie Perjury and Rebellion we have gained this much talked of Libertye But to return to our former and not by humane Art amendable form of Government if you will yeild it convenient to have any Laws what can be better then those of the Peoples own making they propounded they framed them unless you would have their Resolves to be Laws without any Concurrence of Nobles or Consent of the KING If so what monstrous Liberty would you have when virtually two thirds of the Nation must be content with what the Commons do or as the Proverb is turn the buckle of their girdle behind them and seek their amends where they can get them The KING his Family and Posterity had a Revenue of their own for which he was not engaged to the present people He had lands by due title as any Commoner in England and was suable in case he detained any mans Land or other of his estate illegally and the Law equally free against as for the King Now the Royalties which belonged to him as supream viz. Customes c. were his by descent and antient prescription in wrong of no Subject or if any thing did pinch upon any Subject as the forfeitures of felons goods wrecks c. these had the Commons with the Lords adjudged them a burthen might easily have been taken away and the King would willingly have been content with a more equitable income of the like value The Nobles also had very large Estates and Revenues And so had likewise the Bishops and such who attended the se●vice of God who had great possessions Who should represent these in a bare house of Commons Experience shews us that no sooner were the Bishops c. put down by these reformers but their Lands were all alienated from the Church and sonld and turned to impious uses namely to reward the Souldiers for what English bloud they have shed and this done by those who never had the piety to give any thing to the Church But of such Church robberies I shall be silent hereafter because the lands thus ravished away from the true use to which they were intended were publique lands but being once dedicated to God many good Christians could have wished they had still been reserved to the same ends though perhaps the

Father of many Nations and his seed should be innumerable like the stars of Heaven or the sand upon the Sea-shore but at last and upon the change of hi●●ame he assures him that Kings should come out of him not only that his seed should be many his posterity innumerable but as an addition of happinesse they should be advanced to the Majesty of a great and mighty Kingdome all which was fulfilled in Gods due time With what face Mr. Milton can you brand that estate with the base titles of Slavery Bondage Vassalage and Servileness which God added unto Abraham as a corollary of temporall blessings faecundity even to innumerablenesse as the Starres of Heaven or as the sand upon the Sea-shore he had promised him before yet still he remained Abraham but when he ads this to his former blessings that his posterity should flourish into a Magnificent Kingdome then he alters his name into Abraham Whose other Sonne Ishmael when Abraham groaned out his desires to the Lord Oh that Ishmael may live before thee God answers him likewise concerning him Of him will I make a great Nation I will multiply him exceedingly and for an addition or rather fulness of his earthly blessings Twelve Princes shall he beget So concerning Esau the brother of Jacob from whom sprang the blessed seed the Scripture mentioning his temporall felicity for Isaack had blessed him also with the fatness of the earth records what Dukes sprang out of his Loyns and what Kings reigned over Edom before any King reigned over Israel Which makes it evident that Kingly Government is the most honourable majesticall Government and argues a greater portion of Gods blessing powred forth upon the Nation that injoyes it then where any other inferior and more Contemptible Government is had It is a poor Sophisme that you use Sir that God gave Israel a King in wrath and imputed it a sin to them that they asked one if it be certain that God had before blessed Abraham with the promise of Kings to come out of his loyns and the Government of the seed of Jacob was to be by a Scepter and this to spring out of Judah and the King of Kings God for ever blessed was to be cloathed with humane flesh from one that lineally descended of King David and his Grandfathers to be a continual succession of Kings It argued only that they asked unseasonably and in unbelief for whoever believes makes not haste but patiently waits the accomplishment of Gods Promises in his time they asked also upon a wrong principle and for a wrong end not to have the blessed Promise of God accomplished but to be like other Nations Nor did they consider that then God was their King Samuel ruling over them and judging them who was known from Dan unto Beersheba to be a Prophet of the Lord and to have frequent Dialogues with his Maker This was their sin and God to convince them of it gave them their desire a King in his wrath whom he after took away in his displeasure 'T is strange that God should make his Covenant with David even an everlasting Covenant which was so inviolable that sooner should the Covenant of the Day and of the Night be broken then it had he adjudged Kingship a Government not so well-pleasing to him as that of a Common-wealth Yet at that time and before the Sanedrim or grand Counsell of the Seventy Elders were in being neverthelesse of none of them nor of any of the Priests though the order of Aaron was Sacred and Noble would Christ vouchsafe to come but only of the Kingly stock of the house of Judah Two of whom David and Salomon were immediate Types of him and Prophets Divinely inspired Certainly Mr. Milton this will argue something for Kingship or Kingly Government But to proceed orderly in what I intend I shall recapitulate some things and then proceed through the whole History of Gods People the Jews urging what may be necessary to my present purpose and this very briefly afterwards I shall come to the times that have been since Christ and shall take notice of some instances both modern and ancient which have been delivered us by Historians concerning other places especially Republicks or Common-wealths First let us begin with Abraham the Father of the Faithfull the first to whom the promises which in his seed were extended to all Nations were made This Abraham was a great Prince as was acknowledged by the Sons of Heth so great that when the five Kings of Sedom Gomorrah Admah Zeboim and Zoar were overcome by the four Kings who came against them and Lot among the rest was taken Prisoner he with his Confederates Aner Eshcol and Mamre went out gave them battle overcame them and rescued Lot This Abraham was so absolute a Monarch that God testified of him I know that he will command his Family and his Children after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgement See here absolute command and absolute subjection without tyranny on one band or Vassallage on the other The same power descended from him to Isaac and successively to Jacob and by him being Divinely directed it was intayled upon Judah and his Offspring over all their brethren untill the coming of Shiloh which Promise was accomplisht with the blessing thereof in the Anoynting of David especially when he was confirmed King over all Judah and Jerusalem During which interval of time for the space of four hundred and thirty years they were Sojourners and in Bondage in Egypt But when the time of deliverance came God sent them a Captain and a Redeemer even Moses who was a Prince in Jeshuron or Israel concerning whom God said That Aaron should be unto him as a Mouth and he should be unto the people as or in the stead of God What was this but a KING or Chief Ruler or Judge as Stephen expounds it in the Acts This Moses saith he whom they refused saying Who made thee a Judge or Ruler over us the same did God send to be a Ruler and Deliverer He under God immediately conducted gave Lawes to yea he judged and determined Controversies between them And when the Seventy were chosen by the advice of Jethro Moses Father-in-law it was for his case that he might not be worn out by sitting all day to judge between them to hear and determine their Controversies with a Reserve still or an Alwayes provided as our Lawes have it that the greater and more difficult and weighty matters be brought unto Moses by which it appears that he under God was their Supreme Judge Captain Leader and Conducter After Moses death Joshua succeds him of whom first it is testified that the Spirit of Moses rested upon him that is he was the Peoples Chief Captain and Judge though the Sanedrim still continued for that remained an Ordinance in Israel till the coming of the Messiah although perhaps with some variation yea it is further added that

time as shewing that God dwelt not but did then only Sojourn as it were with them sure til the time of Solomon then first among the Israelites was Religion not only in purity but also flourished Gods name was not only known to be great and holy but it also appeared most glorious Then did truth appear triumphant in the Beauty of Holynesse After Solomon in the hands of severall successive Kings the Government continued untill the Captivity although God to chastise the sinnes of Solomon according to his Covenant with David his Father in case his sonnes should forsake his Law rent tenne tribe from his Sonne Rehoboam and his seed yet continued he the Government of Kings till the Captivity unto them among whom some were more eminently good prosperous and famous as especially Hezekiah and Josiah others wicked and Idolatrous forsakers of Gods Lawes and therefore afflicted After the Captivity in the time of the second Temple the Jewes had many changes of Governours and Conditions as is largely related in the history of Flavius Josephus but flourished under none comparably to Monarchichal Government and although for a long time the High Priest was and ruled as their Prince however he changed not the Kingly Constitution into that of a Republique as Historians will fully satisfie any man that desires information therein Yea and during the second Temple before Christ it is certain that then was their time most troublesome their Condition most lamentable and to be pityed their distractions almost ruinous when the true succession from Shealtiel to Zerobabel c. was interrupted then were they sold as it were for a prey to the neighbouring Grecians and to other enemies who by frequent incursions and in a manner devastations of them almost ruined them only now and then God sent them Princes who were deliverers and famous Captaines such as the Machabes and others of whom Josephus in his H●story instituted de bello Judaico gives a cleer large and full account To this agrees that the Jewes alwaies did expect the Messaih to be a Prince a great Ruler and deliverer and to use the disciples words to Christ when he was about to leave the World One who should restore the Kingdome unto Israel And so although in another form then the Carnall Jews expected him Christ is come the true King of Jews which he denyed not unto Pilate when it was asked of him If or no he were a King but answered It was so and added that for this end he came into the World to bear witnesse unto the truth with truth the blind Jewes not perceiving rejected him and in him their own mercy yea they crucified him and in him their true KING the Lord of Glory And now Mr. Milton I am come to that which you seem most willing to be at viz. the Command and example of our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ which as you conceive expresly prohibits Kingship to any of his disciples branding it with the marke of Gentilisme Surely Sir the Proverb is in you veryfied None so blind as he that will not see I speak not this of your Corporall blindnesse for that God is my Judge I pity but of your better eyes viz. the understanding which methinks cannot be so palpably blinded as you would make appear it is We shall easily grant you that Christ there speaks of temporall dominion but he speaks to his Disciples or rather Apostles who were his family and houshold who to the very day of his assention knew not but that he intended at last to appear a temporall Prince Now Christs Kingdome was not of this World as he himself testyfied when he was betrayed if it had been his servants would have fought for him those daies of his converse upon earth were the daies of his humiliation in which his Kingdome though reall was invisible the Captain of our Salvation being to be made perfect by sufferings So that the check his Disciples received from him concerning their ambi●ious desire not only disalow Kingly Authority among them but all temporall power For it is apparent that the two Sonnes of Zebede by their Mothers intercession did not desire to be both Kings but only his chief favourites in his approaching Kingdome which they carnally imagined was near that one might sit at his right the other at his left hand therein Upon which he teacheth them the nature of his Kingdome that it was at present to be begun and carryed on with suffering Upon the indignation of the other tenne when they heard this follows this discourse of Christ in which he speaks not only of Kings that bear dominion but of those that are great and grandees and are therefore called gracious Lords Not unlike to the Hoghen Moghen Heer 's of Holland What you insinuate of a Free Common-wealth Comming nearest as you conceive this Pattern and Precept I conceive you would have it understood of our blessed Republique from 48 to 53. Wherein our humble Servants as you term them who were also if we be so mad as to believe them the servants of God served both God and the Nation whom they pretended equally to be serviceable to a scurvy trick and in an ill-favoured way breaking their Oaths and Vowes with one and their ingagements with the other But as for their serving at their own costs and charge I wish you would be so farre a friend to Church and State as to make that true I am sure for that lamentable service they did for God in silencing his Ministers and almost destroying his Worship they took from him whatever for many ages past had been piously dedicated to the maintenance of his service and for the never to be forgotten service done to the Nations they did what they could both to ruine and beggar Majesty undid the Nobility and most of the Gentry and squeezed the Commons till they wrung out from them their radicall moisture and almost their heart-bloud As for their walking the streets like other men it would be well for them as the case now stands blessed be God for it if they could do so having deserved so much hate and vengeance from all But to return to your Scripture you are not ignorant Sir I make no question that many things which Christ said to his Apostles and which he gave them in Precept was but for the time and suited to the present occasion as when he commanded them to go forth without Provision of Clothes Meat or Money or Staffe yet afterwards he commanded or rather advised them That he who had Money should make use of it and he who had no sword should sell his Garment and buy one He that expounds that precept of Christ as given to all Christians and to be perpetually binding which was by you cited I dare promise him he shall not stop at Kingly Government but upon the same rule shall in fine reject all Authority For at that time Mr. Milton you know many of the Gentiles were

ingratitude to God for so many and so pious Princes succeeding each other the last exceeding the former their Reigns so long continued in which we enjoyed the Gospel of peace with peace and plenty and in this Royall Stocks multiplyed Branches we had almost confidence of the continuance of our happinesse to which sin of ingratitude we added the spirit of rebellion and perfidiousnesse and both they brought forth perjury but still in the act of villany to keep the shew of piety all the rest of our sins shrouded themselves under the cloak of hypocrisie Fasting many of us Monthly that with greater security by this shew of holynesse we might smite with the fist of wickednesse I speak not this of all the Nation God forbid as little of all the Parliament among whom I verily believe that six in seaven yea more were either cordially innocent or barely seduced by the pestilent pernicious wit and damnable diligence of a very few Incendiaries at first whose poyson spread as a Canker to the insnaring of many to act and uphold that in ignorant pious zeal which had they been nakedly uncased and discovered they would have abhorred But the monstrous impiety of the Rump hath blessed be God undeceived and opened the eyes of most if not all that were inconsiderately seduced in these three Nations some of the grand Villains only excepted to wit the eminent men who swayed the Rump who were indeed the true Incendiaries and detestable Causers of our so long continued sad calamities Concerning whose persons and pardon I shall advise nothing it being presumption in me to think such a thought only my opinion is that they are of the number of those wicked to whom if favour be shewed in a Land of Vprightnesse yet they will not take notice of the Majesty of God Let them be respited from deserved death with Shimei and pardoned to their own content yet they will through the just judgment of God deserve and come to a justly merited reward of their former Treasons by some after committed villany Now Sir as to the name of Rump which by-word as you term it you mislike give me leave to give a reason of my use of it How first it was given to them I shall not here inquire though perhaps I might satisfie the Reader in that but as for the reason of that denomination I think if weighed well it will be found too good a name for their bad deserts if the name of a Rump or Rumper may owe its Originall to and derive its signification from rumpo that so the title Rumpers may be deduced a rumpendo no notation can better agree to their nature and what they have done How have they broke their Vowes Oaths and Covenants with God their Engagements and promises to men the Priviledges of PARLIAMENT The lawes of the Land the hedge of all Government both Civill and Religious their words at all times with their friends Articles with their Enemies peace with their Christian Protestant Neighbours The Seals of both their lawfull King and usurping Protector the staffe of beauty and the staffe of bands by which the Nation formerly flourished and were united together The bond of Love both in reference to God and men The hopes of good men concerning them The endeavours of pious Christians and true loyall Members of these three Nations for the healing our breaches How did they by wicked Prevarication break off all Treatyes that were made between the King and Parliament toward the setling of a sure and well grounded Peace How did they impiously break their bounds and ingrossed into themselves by usurpation all the Power over these three Nations In a word what have they not broke that is either honourable or sacred which ought to have been kept inviolably They have broken their faith yea broken and trod down all tyes of Conscience boundaries of Law Parliament and King Nobles and Commons their own credit and other mens the estates of severall both Noble and Gentile yea that of the Widows and Fatherless The trade of the Nation and its repute both at home and abroad the Gates of the City their Posts and Chaines in a word all hopes in a manner of ever recovering out of this Condition they had certainly broken had not God raised up one and endowed him with a gallant heroick spirit who to be ever with these Rumpers hath happily broken their hornes and abated their Power broken their net and let out the Captive broken their Yoak and freed the oppressed and the rod of Pride and delivered the poor Nation that lay at the feet of their mercyless ambition broken their plot and defeated I hope for ever their counsell who otherwise had in short time broken the hearts of all that were not gifted with a base slavish spirit to submit to their lawlesse wils and cursed Lust and scorned to truckle under their highflown matchless Tyranny Here are Rumpers with a witness nay rather with a vengeance Though I conceive he who first was reported the Author of that name alluded in it to the Rump of a Sheep or Lambe which is but a small contemptible peice compared to the whole Loyne and is usually at Innes of Court the Cooks fee. So that if good it is of small value in respect of its bulk but if tainted is scarce good for dogs At a Gentlemans Table it is not of esteem and therefore granted to Cooks as an inconsiderable part of the Doyn which if left on addes nothing to the price or value of it and being cut off diminisheth not a whit from the worth thereof In any of which respects this fagge end of the House very well might be called the Rump for esteem of all the Commoners being the most contemptible especially when they are apparently tainted and might be followed by the sent of Perfidiousness Perjury Rebellion Treason Oppression Murther Sacriledge and what not that is odious either to be named or heard I think not of their personall vices but desire to be understood only concerning their Villanies committed as a body politick Their number also was so inconsiderable that being joyned to the other members they added but little of esteeme or repute to them the number being sufficient to make a considerable House without them but of them so small that they seldome exceeded much never doubled the quorum of a House of Commons and therefore they were compelled to make bold with the Law and fetch their fellows out of severall Gaoles lest the indisposition of some of the rest might make their House thinner then by the Law thereof its constitution would bear Some they adopted into their number right or wrong as five or six Esquires others they pluckt in by head and shoulders as for instance two or three Earls who among them seemed Mungril Neuters between Peers and Commoners Thus the English House of Rumpers may hereafter goe joyned to the three places which according to the Proverb refuse no body Hell

that as you have happily begun so by means of the already convened Parliament which in few daies is to begin its sessions you may be instrumentall in the great work of setling these Nations once more upon a sure Basis of lasting peace and settlement England Scotland and Ireland call to you with stretched forth Arms not in a dream as the man of Macedonia did Paul but waking in affectionate addresses and sigh forth their desires groan out their wants before your Excellency saying come help us We are but as water spil upon the ground which cannot be gathered up again because the banish'd is not called back from exile nor the heir restored to his right we were robd my Lord of our King not legally deprived of him by such who usurped the Title and Authority of the supream power of England but upon examination were found not to be so but were proved Lyars we crave him in whom we al have an interest which yet we never forfeited however we were opprest in it by the audacious impiety of the Rumpers Now then what hinders but he may be restored to us and we to the enjoyment of him My Lord we beg humbly your assistance herein and blessed be God we find such incouragement and resolution both from your excellency and your officers together with the unanimous Consent of your whole Army viz. that you will acquiesce submissively in the determination and resolution of the Parliament Blessed be God who hath put such a determination in the heart of the General and such a concurring agreement in the whole Army That we once more find an Army acquiefcing in the resolves of not prescribing work and giving Lawes to the Parliament This next to God is to be attributed to the prudence and upright heartednesse of the Generall in whom these three Nations have already begun to be and I hope nay I question not will in due time be made under God compleatly happy For my part considering to what a height of malapert unrulyness the souldiery in England had arrived in these almost twelve years of Apostasy and Rebellion which was grown very familiar to most I seriously protest that I wonder so much toward settlement could possibly be performed in these Nations in so little time considering how many and great Commanders in the Army differ as much from the pious Principles of his Excellency the Lord Generall and the submissive truly Christian temper of his under Officers as light doth from darknesse by which is more then ordinarily confirmed that true saying of the Poet Regis ad exemplum totus componitur orbis My Lord England Scotland and Ireland and the neighbouring Nations take notice and we who are concerned desire gratefully to acknowledge the great difficulties and intricate perplexities God hath carryed your Excellency through in order to the bringing to passe what we see From whose high merits the fiery spirited friends to the Rump would detract and asperse you with unfaithfulness to them from whom you received a Commission We all know that are sober what you did and how they ingaged your honour in dishonourable pieces of service we know how your Excellencie declared against the force that lay upon them through the ambition of Lambert Desborough Fleetwood and other aspiring Army grandees and that if any other force lay upon them so as to render them not a Free Parliament you would endeavour to remove it This your excellency fully performed when you restored the secluded Members to liberty of sitting without excluding forcibly the worst deserving Rumper nor could it have been made good otherwise The Rumpers once layed the blame of the Members seclusion on the Rebellious Mutinous Army by whose means and power it is certaine that was first effected however since it appeared to be a plot of the fagge end of the Commons House with the rebellious Grandees of the Army who would be under no yoak None that was wise could expect other from your Excellency who was once one who hazarded your life in actuall defense of his Majesty Now my Lord I respect your excellency as so grave wise and judicious that you would not engage Life fortune reputation and all that was dear to you but where you were conscientiously satisfied of the J●stice of the Cause Yea and the worst of your Honors friends own that you continued to his Majesty actively or passively constant beyond being compelled or wonne by force or flattery so long as his Majesty had either hopes or any visibly appearing on his side But after when all was lost had you followed him with the rest into Exile you could have been but a burthen at least no advantage to his Majesty or his friends could have come thereby But as Hushai Davids friend pretending to stand for Absalon defeated for David the counsail of Achitophel yet did nothing but what became a pious honest man and faithfull Subject and friend So your Excellency by taking command of an Army after the War was ended with a resolution stil never to fight against his Majesty by managing also the Navy as Admirall against the Dutch and Spaniard by leading an Army in Ireland against the Rebels and in Scotland with an Army Governing the Nation with wisdome and in peace you have been made under God instrumentall to doe that in order to a true firm settlement without bloud which for above these twelve years hath been prayed for without answer and endeavoured in vain with the loss of the lives of many and the estates of thousands This is the Lords doing for which your Excellency deserves by a Statue of Brasse and a Monument of Marble to be made famous to all posterity I know the fame Soul lodgeth in your Noble Brest now as did then the same Loyall bloud runs in your veins and I am assuredly confident that so soone as interests can be so reconciled and pacified as that between his Royall Majesty and his Subjects who by sufferings have learned Wisdome to prize a good pious Prince for the future there may be no jealousie on either side there will be no obstacle remaining to hinder our long wayted for happinesse In hope and certain expectation of which I shall and I doubt not but all sober men in these three Nations will wait for the two Houses determination and I beseech God that all difficulty may vanish before the Parliament which is now shortly to fit as smoake is driven away and disappeares before a smart gale of wind or as snow melts before the Sunne so let all obstructing disputes I beseech God wast away to nothing AND thus Noble and Honourable Senators I am brought in Order to addresse my self unto your pious Wisdome and Religious Discretion having already made an acknowledgement to his Excellency the Generall for two Causes First because he under God was the immediate and next cause of this your Convention to the disappointment of the Rumpers who intended this last time to have Earbored the