Selected quad for the lemma: parliament_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
parliament_n	act_n	king_n	title_n	3,788	5	7.4113	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91153	A brief necessary vindication of the old and new secluded Members, from the false malicious calumnies; and of the fundamental rights, liberties, privileges, government, interest of the freemen, parliaments, people of England, from the late avowed subversions 1. Of John Rogers, in his un-christian concertation with Mr. Prynne, and others. 2. Of M: Nedham, in his Interest will not lie. Wherein the true good old cause is asserted, the false routed; ... / By William Prynne of Swainswick Esq; a bencher of Lincolns-Inne.	Prynne, William, 1600-1669.	1659 (1659)	Wing P3913; Thomason E772_2; ESTC R203220	47,789	64

Conclusions from it or else henceforth disclame the Army-Officers Army and their formerly suppressed now revived Parliament 11ly Admit his Paradox true that the King by his war against the Parliament actually ceased to be a King c. yet his Inference thence that the Parliament was not dissolved by his death but continued after it is most false yea the contrary thence inevitably follows that it was wholly dissolved long before his death so soon as he ceased to be a King and became a private person and that by the expresse resolution of the whole Parliaments of 22 R. 2. and 1. H. 4. rot Parl. n. 1 2 3. in a case most like to ours * Henry Duke of Lancaster raising a great Army to lay Title to the Crown King Richard the 2d bringing an Army to suppresse him the King finding his forces over-weak and the Dukes too potent for him having seised Bristol and other sorts thereupon a Parlee was had between them and agreed King Richard should summon a Parliament at Westminster wherein he should resign his Crown renounce his Kingship and the Duke to succeed him Upon this he accordingly summoned a Parliament where he formally resigned renounced his Kingship and was actually deposed of it by sentence and Henry the 4. who claimed the Crown upon his resignation declared King Which done it was resolved declared both by the Parliament King Lords Commons Judges that this Parliament was actually dissolved by King Richards deposing to all intents and a new Parliament ordered to be summoned by King Henry in his own name wherein he was declared crowned King and the resignation deposing of Richard the 2. ratified and recorded Therefore by the resolution of both these Parliaments by Nedhams own position if true the last Parliament of King Charles was so farr from being continued only by his wars even after his death which else would have dissolved it without dispute that it actually dissolved it in his life time six years before his death by degrading him from his Kingship and making him a private person And then his Westminster Juncto sitting from 1648. to 1653. and now again cannot have the least shadow of right law reason to sit act as any part of the last Parliament summoned by the King neither could the whole Parliamentary and supreme power descend or be transferred to them alone by any Law or colour of right whatsoever by the Kings war death or our seclusions as he most absurdly concludes 12ly The sum of all Nedhams discourse to support his present Parliaments and Republikes right title is but this That in civil wars and commotions the conquering or prevailing party gains a legal Supreme Authority and Parliamentary power over over the whole That the Kings royal authority devolved by conquest to the Parliament the whole Parliamentary Authority to his Juncto by their forcible seclusion of the Majority of the Commons and suppression of the House of Lords And if so then by the self-same consequence the whole Kingly and Parliamental Authority was lawfully devolved on the Lord General Fairfax and Army-Officers when they seised the King secluded the Members suppressed the Lords and placed Guards on those that sate in 1648. Or at least to such of them as were then Members of the Commons House not to the Juncto since or now sitting That afterwards it descended devolved to General Cromwell when he conquered and turned the Juncto out of doors April 20. 1653. as he and the Army-Officers then argued who thereupon after some Moneths exercise thereof by making New Laws and imposing New Taxes at Whitehall Anno 1653. afterwards transferred it by deed to their Litle Conventicle elected by them in September part of which resigning back their Supreme power to Cromwell he thereupon claimed it as wholly and absolutely vested ia himself without any limits as he declared in his printed Speeches 1654. and 1657. whereupon he detained it under the Title of A ROYAL PROTECTOR till his death then delegating it to his Son Richard who by this original Title enjoyed it till overpowred by his Brother Fleetwood and other Army-Officers who by this right of the Long Sword alone unprotectored him and then called in the remainder of the Old Juncto to sit and act as a Parliament under them So that by Nedhams Doctrine the Supreme Regal and Parliamental power is legally residing in those Army-Officers who have conquered all the rest till some other greater stronger power shall be able to conquer them and his Westminster Conventicle is but their Substitute to act vote what they shall prescribe And by the self-same principle as the Army-Officers by rebelling against and suppressing the Parliament and their Masters who raised waged them for their defence contrary to all Laws of God man their own Oathes Commissions thereby gained a just and legal Title as he argues to the Supreme Regal and Parliamental Authority of the Nation not the people in whom they pretended it to be vested so any Traytor by killing or dispossessing his lawfull Soveraign any Son by killing or disseising his Father any Servant by imprisoning killing or turning keeping his Master out of doors every Theef plunderer in the world able by force to take away any persons purse goods house lands or shall by power make himself a Judge Justice Magistrate or take away another mans wife shall have a just and legal Title against the owners and all others and Nedhams Parliament and new Republike can neither condemn nor execute any Thief Pirate Murderer Plunderer Adulterer Ravisher nor punish any disseiser or wrong-doer whatsoever that was stronger than the party injured since they all may justifie their force actions to be lawfull against the letter of the 6 7 8 9 and 10 Commandements by the self-same Law Divinity Saintlike Title of the longest Sword the greatest might and prevailing party I hope by this time he and all others clearly discern the desperate fatal consequences of his Jesuitical position and that his Interest will not lie is but a meer sink of Lies and destructive paradoxes If all this will not help to prop up the legal Soveraign Authority of his present Parliament and Republike he hath 3. other Pillars to support them p. 37. 1. The Law of Necessity a pretty bull when as the old proverb resolves Necessitas non habet legem I am sure it will now admit of no Law Justice Conscience Equity 2. Did not the beheaded King plead this Law for Ship-money Excise and other illegal projects yet the long a Parliament adjudged necessity in these cases to be no Law nor Plea at all And shall those very Members plead it in their own case now who then judged it no Law nor Plea in his 3ly This Law was pleaded by Cromwel and the Army-Officers in April 1653. for the dissolution of those now sitting who together with Nedham p. 40. resolve it no Law or Plea at all and can it be justly urged now for their restitution 4ly

antient Writs of this kinde and their returns with the expresse words of these Oathes resolve with the Protestation League Covenant and manifold Declarations Votes Remonstrances of both Houses to which those sitting from 48. to 53. and now met again gave their full free consents and subscriptions as well as the secluded Members Let heaven earth our whole 3. Kingdoms and our Accusers themselves then now resolve whether I and my secluded Companions who constantly loyally strenuously in the forecited vote and all other our proceedings pursued those Trusts Oathes Duties in despite of all Oppositions or those unsecluded sitting and re-sitting Members and Army-Officers who have most apparently perfidiously violated it in every branch by and since our seclusions to the destruction of our King Kingdoms Kingship Parliament Church all rights and jurisdictions of the Crown and subversion of the Liberty Property Privileges of their fellow Members and all other subjects be the Greatest Trust-breakers Traytors and which of us best deserve to lose not only our right of sitting any more in the House but our very lives heads liberties estates in point of justice and conscience All that is or can be objected against us with any shadow of reflection is the a Vote of January 11. 1648. made upon the Armies Answer touching our securing Jan 3. That the House doth approve of the Substance of the Answer of the General Council of the Officers of the Army to the Demands of this House touching the securing and secluding of some Members thereof And doth appoint a Committee of 24. or any 5. of them to consider what is further to be done upon the said Answer and present the same to the House But doth this Vote fix any breach of trust upon us for which we deserved perpetual seclusion without any hearing impeachment trial Surely not in the least degree For 1. it approves only the substance of the Armies Answer which is general and indefinite 2ly It is not touching the securing and secluding of all the Members then secured or secluded by the Officers but only of some of those Members who were secured as well as secluded without naming any one of them in particular most of them being released before this vote Therefore it can fix no guilt or crime upon any one particular Member of us unlesse those some had been nominated 3ly This Vote was past behind our backs without hearing any of us before it passed 4ly A special Committee was appointed to consider further of their answer and report what was further to be done therein which they never did 5ly This Vote was made above a full Month after our secluding and securing when all the Members but 42. were secluded or driven thence and the rest sitting under the Force Guards of the Army and so by their own Votes and Ordinance of August 20. 1647. this Vote with all their other proceedings were mere Nullities 6ly Ten of those who passed this Vote were the very Army-Officers who made the Answer the chief Contrivers Authors of our seising securing and chief Accusers Therefore most unfit to be our Judges or passe any Vote against us behind our backs especially since they promised to conferr with us at Wallingford House the Evening they seised us and yet lodged us all night on the bare boards in Hell After which they promised to conferr with us the next morning 9. a clock at Whitehall and there kept us waiting in the cold till 7. at night without once vouchsafing to see us sending us away thence through the dirt guarded on every side like Rogues to the Kings head and Swan in the Strand where they promised several times to conferr with us but never came to do it Now whether there can be any credit given to their Votes or Answer who so frequently brake both their trusts words faiths promises to us before this their Answer let the world and our greatest Enemies determin Finally the chief Authors of and instruments in this our Accusation and seclusion were the very self-same Army-Officers and Members who in April 1653 dishoused dissolved those now sitting and then accused branded them twice or thrice in print as farr greater Infringers of their trusts than we as for the House of Lords secluded suppressed by them a there was never the least breach of trust objected against them Neither had the Army b or smaller Garbled remainder of the Commons house the least right or jurisdiction to seclude or eject the Majority of their fellow Members much lesse the whole House of Peers Upon all which premises I here appeal to all the Tribunals of Men on Earth and Gods Christs Tribunals in Heaven before which I summon all our Old and New Accusers whatsoever to judge Whether this Great Charge of breach of our trusts ever justly could or henceforth can be objected against us civilly or criminally without the greatest scandal and whether this could be a lawfull ground for any to justifie our first or last seclusion The 3d Question is this Whether the last Parliament summoned by King Charles his Writ assembled at Westminster 3. Nov 1640. was not totally and finally dissolved by his beheading January 30. 1648. notwithstanding the statute of 17 Caroli c. 7 In this my 2. new Antagonists are divided Rogers p. 7. confesseth it to be dissolved and that I have learnedly proved it in my Narrative p. 24 to 34. Adding How Néedlesse that long Discourse is to prove what we never denied But though he and his wee denied it not yet those who sate from 1648. till 1653. by pretext of their first writs elections and of this Act as they then affirmed in and by their Speeches Declarations Mr. Abbot and Purefoye in their Prynne against Prynne both of them Members and one of them now sitting with their President John Bradshaw who condemned the King and sundry denyed it yea most now sitting denyed it by words and action therefore I unanswerably refelled them and satisfied most others by that long Discourse Therefore it was not needless as this Critick rashly censures it Nedham p. 35 36 37. though he confesseth That according to Law the Parliament was dissolved by the Kings death and that whiles the old Constitution of Parliaments remained without disturbance it is reason this Law should be retained for the reasons I have rendered Yet in this particular case by reason of the warr between King and Parliament he will by no means yeeld the Parliament to be dissolved by the Kings death but to remain intirely in the Members sitting at his death and that it is now again revived in them after above 6. years interruption to prove which strange Chymaera by stronger Mediums he * spends some pages to convince and satisfie all Contradictors I shall a little examin his absurd and most dangerous Principles from whence he draws his Conclusion His main Principle to prove it is this That the King by his actual war against the Parliament did

thereupon forfeit his Kingship and Crown and became a private person and enemy dissolved the Constitution both of the Kingdom and Parliament and not only violated all Law in the branches but plucked up the very root of it in destroying the Parliamentary Establishment as much as in him lay and thereby introduced another Law of Arms From whence he deduceth 3. Conclusions 1 The Justice of secluding the Members 2ly The Sufficiency of the authority that condemned and executed the King 3ly The Legality of the remaining Members continuing and sitting as the Parliament and Supreme Authority of England which after the Kings beheading and other Members and Lords seclusion descended and was transmitted to them by the Law of war for the people This he determines to be Law and Reason too sufficient to convince both Royallists and Presbyterians of the Lawfulnes of the Power and present sitting acting as a Parliament by those few Members at Westminster secluding all the rest To which I answer 1. That if the Kings death by Law Reason dissolved the Parliament in an orderly cause because his writs of summons abated by his death they could not treat with him concerning his and his Kingdoms affairs nor he consent to any Bills after his decease Which he freely grants Then by the self-same Reason Law his violent death must dissolve this Parliament as I have largely proved 2ly If the Kings levying war against the Parliament did actually dissolve the very Constitution Law of the Parliament and Kingdom and made him no King at all but a private person which he layes for his foundation then it must necessarily dissolve the Parliament and Kingdom too and make them no Parliament no Kingdom at all as well as himself no King For how can the Parliament continue when its very Constitution is dissolved 3ly By this Position it inevitably follows that we had neither King Parliament Kingdom nor any Laws at all but only of Warr from the beginning of the wars or first battel at least between the Kings and Parliaments forces many years before his death But this the King kingdom Parliament the sitting as well as secluded Members both Armies and our whole 3. kingdoms ever denied in all their Votes Orders Ordinances Declarations Remonstrances Petitions Treaties Propositions whatsoever from 1641. till December 1648. and Nedham himself in his Diurnalls and Mercuries In all which the Parliament both Houses and Army-Officers stiled him their KING and the King and his party ever stiled them the Houses of Parliament Therefore this position must be a most Notorious Falshood wherein Interest doth grosly lie 4ly Those he stiles the honest faithfull Members in their very Votes of Non addresses passed by force and fraud in their Knack for the Kings tryal● Impeachment Proceedings Sentence of condemnation against him after our seclusion in their Declaration of 17 Martii 1648. after his death and sundry other Papers ever stiled and acknowledged him TO BE KING and ENGLAND HIS KINGDOM notwithstanding the wars between him and the Parliament Therefore the very war did not Vnking nor make him a Private person nor dissolve the Constitution of the Kingdom and Parliament else there could not be a war against or between the King or Parliament if the war it self unkinged him unparliamented them and dissolved all their constitutions 5ly No person by the a Law of God Nature Nations the Great Charter Laws Statutes of England and Votes of Parliament ought actually to forfeit or to be ipso facto deprived of his Office Freehold Liberties Estate Life without a legal proceeding tryal conviction judgement attainder Much less then the King himself the Supreme Magistrate and Governor of the Realm in whom all have a common interest unkinged and made a private person or publike Enemy and totally deprived of his Crown and Soveraignty Therefore his actual levying war against the Parliament without before any legal impeachment conviction or sentence of deposition could not unking nor make him a private person as the cases of Edward the 2. and Richard the 2. and the b Parliaments which deprived them of their Kingships after their resignations clearly resolved against this Jesuitical new Doctrine 6ly If the King by his bare levying war against the Parliament actually lost his Kingship and became a meer private person before any sentence of deprivation then by the self-same reason law every Traitor levying war or conspiring against the King every Murderer Theef Felon corrupt Judge Justice Mayor Sherif Inferior Officer by the very committing of Treason Murder Felony Adultery Bribery Injustice and breach of their respective trusts should be actually attainted of those offences their Lands Offices presently confiscated without any Indictment trial verdict judgement against them yea every act of Adultery by any Husband or Wife should actually dissolve the bond of marriage for ever without and before any Sentence of divorce between them which * Mr. Wheatly publikely recanted as a dangerous error And how destructive such new Nedham Interest Law would prove to all mens lives liberties estates yea to every mans soul since every act of sinne by like consequence should actually damn and make even Saints themselves to fall totally and finally from Grace and Gods favor let all judicious men resolve 7ly If this be Law then had the King and Parliament upon any Treaty after the wars accorded he ought to have been new proclamed installed crowned King again and the Parliament resummoned by new writs 8ly He confesseth this to be the very principle of Barclay the Jesuit from whom he borrows it p. 34. Therefore his present Parliament and Republike built thereon are purely Jesuitical by his own confession 9ly This Jesuits position is not so bad as his He speaks not of every Civil war made by a King upon his Subjects for which there may be just occasions but only of a King warring upon his people of purpose to extirpate and destroy them which he saith it seems almost impossible any King should be so mad as ever to attempt Which the King in his war against the Parliament by his victories proceedings against the Prisoners Members Towns he took during the wars in sparing all their lives actually really and oft times verbally and professedly disclamed in all his Proclamations Speeches Remonstrances Messages to and Treaties with the Houses Therefore his war against them did neither unking him nor make him a private person and publike Enemy by this Jesuites resolution 10ly If the Kings war against the Parliament did really unking him then certainly the Generals Army-Officers and Armies actual levying war upon both Houses of Parliament by secluding securing the Members and King did really uncommission and unarmy them and made them no Officers no Army at all but a rebellious rout and all Members concurring with them therein no Members no Parliament at all The sequel is infallible Therefore Nedham must either now disclaim this desperate Jesuitical position with all his 3. Treasonable

violence to no man neither accuse any falsly and be content with your wages The 4. is Rom. 13. 7 8. Render therefore to all their dues c. Owe nothing to any man but love one another The 5. is Prov. 24. 21. My Son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with those who are given to change The 6. is Ps. 4. 8. Whatsoever things are true whatsoever things are honest whatsoever things are just whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are of good report do And if he can found his present or former Parliament Republike or Interest will not lie and forecited Conclusions on these Principles I shall be his Proselyte till then I cannot I dare not but renounce them I shall not follow him in his Wild-goose chase any further to prove the old Parliament undissolved and now revived what he writes of * Cromwels Parliaments and Conventions during the preternatural dead Interval from April 53. to May 59. That they had not the legal force and vertue of Parliaments That they were nothing in Law of themselves being creatures of another extraction though he writ the quite contrary in his life-time That the Members of this revived Parliament sitting in them did not own them for legal Parliaments That their sitting in them as Parliaments could not prejudice nor conclude the Body now sitting becanse a body of men in equal power and right cannot be concluded by particular acts done by their own Members without consent of the rest And that though they did not own those Parliaments nor the power that called them yet their many and great complaints of their being secluded from them by force or new Oathes as an infringement of the Peoples right in Parliament were just and they might well complain because their complaint of violation was grounded only upon the General Right inherent in the People will fully manifest the Parliament of King Charles to be fully dissolved by his death notwithstanding any private Members sitting in it afterwards his pretended Parliament of Commons then and now sitting to be no Parliament at all nor yet revived in Law or verity that yet M. Prynne and other Members might justly complain of their forcible seclusion from it in the peoples general inherent right as themselves did when secluded from Cromwels Parliaments which they held void and null And that if it be still in being and was only suspended by Cromwels 6. years force in respect only of the actual exercise of their power not their inherent right which is now revived All the secluded Members Lords and Charls Stewart too ought in right and justice to be recalled and remitted to their rights from which they were forcibly interrupted as well as those now sitting having no legal power ground nor colour to seclude them as I have already proved To cloze up this Question I shall propose this Dilemma to my dissenting Opponents If the old Parliament were totally and finally dissolved by the Kings death as Rogers confesseth and Nedham grants in point of Law and Reason Then those few Commons sitting after his death and now again cannot possibly be a Parliament nor Committee of Parliament in any sence 1. Because never summoned by any writ to any such Parl. as this 2. Because never elected intrusted by the people who elected thē in the old Parliament to sit in this or any other Parliament without a King and House of Lords 3ly Because not new elected by their old electors or any other Counties Cities Boroughs since the Kings death to sit alone as then or now they do 4ly Because permitted desired to sit at first only by the Army-Officers their former mercenary Servants and now invited to sit again only upon some of their motions having no pretence of Law or right to elect or create them a Parliament or Representative of the People of England much lesse then of Scotland and Ireland 5ly Because they are not the fifth part of a Commons House for number or quality by our old Laws Statutes or the new Instrument or Advice most Counties Cities Boroughs of the Nation having not so much as one Knight Citizen or Burgesse in it to represent them and Scotland Ireland none at all and so by the Armies own Declaration at St. Albans their own Agreement of the People and own Votes for An Equal Representative can be no Parliament at all but the highest archest usurpers over the whole Kingdoms Rights and Privileges In the * Parliament of 15 E. 2. in the Act for the Exile of the two Spencers Cl. 15 E. 3. m. 32. dorso the Parliaments of 4 E. 3. rot Parl. n. 1. 28 E. 3. n. 9 10. 21 E. 3. rot Parl. n. 21. 21 R. 2. rot Par. n. 15 16. 22 R. 2. rot Par. n. 3. Plac. Coronae n. 7 to 16. it was adjudged resoved declared by the King and Parliament that the accroaching and usurping of REGAL POWER by the ' two Spencers Roger Mortymer Earl of March the Duke of Glocester Arundel Archbishop of York the Earls of Arundel and others by keeping the Lords Great Men and Counsel of the King from his presence the Parliament and Council by placing and displacing publike Officers at their pleasures By condemning executing Lords and others of the Kings Subjects without his privity by might and power both in and out of Parliament By not permitting the King to hear the petitions and complaints of his Nobles and People and to do them justice against these usurpers oppressions to their own and the Kings disinheriting By compelling the King to grant pardons to Rebells and others who slew his faithfull Lords and Subjects By seising disposing of the Kings Treasure and Revenues at their pleasures and enforcing the King to grant them a Commission to manage his Royal affairs trust and revenues in restraint and derogation of his royal power and prerogative was no lesse than High Treason by Law For some of which encroachments of Regality some of them were Banished others of them Beheaded and Executed as Traytors and their Estates confiscated by Iudgements and Acts of Parliament If then the encroaching and usurping of REGAL POWER in any of these particulars be no lesse than HIGH TREASON by the resolution of these Parliaments then questionlesse the usurpation exercise not only of Regal power in the highest degree in calling creating dissolving Parliaments giving the royal assents to Bils Pardons executing Lords Commons creating publike Officers making new Seals issuing out Writs Commissions making Warr and Peace coyning Money c. but also of Parliamental power too in making new Laws Acts Treasons repealing altering old Lawes and forms of Processe imposing new Taxes Excises Forfeitures Militiaes erecting new Courts Judicatures neither of all which the King can do by his regal Power but in and by the Parliament only wherein both the Power of the King in its highest orb and of all the Lords Commons are united concentred must needs be the highest Treason that

and Inheritances * most principally and specially above all other wordly things consist and rest whereupon they have most carefully and vigilantly ‖ provided for the security of the Kings royal person succession heirs successors the rights privileges jurisdictions prerogatives lands revenues of the Crown and Kingly Government against all Treasons conspiracies insurrections rebellions attempts whatsoever to destroy disinherit suppresse alter subvert impair them or any of them by sundry successive Acts of Parliament sacred Solemn Oathes Obligations Securities of all kinds in all ages till 1648. and the last Parliament of Kings Charls whereof most now sitting were Members by more solemn † printed Oaths Protestations Vows National Leagues Covenants Petitions Votes Remonstrances Declarations Ordinances than any or all precedent Parliaments whatsoever as I have elswhere proved at large and the imprisoned and secluded Members too in their Vindication 3ly Because the manifold incessant intestine and forein Wars Insurrections Tumults Divisions Factions Revolutions Alterations Subversions of Governments Parliaments Republikes Legal Processe proceedings the unconstant fluctuating condition of our State and Civil affairs the intollerable doubled trebled quadrupled Taxes Excises Imposts Militiaes and other Exactions amounting under our former and present Free State to one intire subsidy every week in the year when as our former publike Taxes under our Kings exceeded not usually one subsidy or fifteen in 2. or 3. years space the infinite unspeakable Oppressions Rapines Plunders Sequestrations Confiscations Forfeitures of our Offices Lands Estates Imprisonments close Imprisonments Confinements Banishments illegal Restraints Executions of our persons ransacking of our Houses Studies Writings and other grievances outrages violences we have suffred by Unparliamentary Conventicles arbitrary tyrannical Committees new High Courts of Injustice Army-Officers Souldiers Sequestrators Excise-men and other Instruments of Oppression the Sales dissipations of all the Crown Lands Rents and standing publick Revenues of our 3. kingdoms which should defray the ordinary expences of the Government of Bishops Deans Chapters and many thousands of Delinquents lands estates woods timber without any abatement of publike Taxes the impoverishment destruction of most of the antient Nobility Gentry Corporations throughout our 3. Realms the infinite decay of all sorts of Trade by Land and Sea of publick and private justice truth honesty integrity charity amity civil society hospitality neighbourhood friendship the inundation of all sorts of vices treachery perjury hypocrisie cheating lying dissimulation subornation of perjury false accusations forcible ejectments detainers robberies murders treasons destruction of Houses Timber Parks Woods Ponds Forests with other miseries tending to publike desolation we have felt suffred groaned under without intermission or any hopes or probability of redresse with sundry other incroachments upon the City and Country in the Freedom of their Elections of Mayors Aldermen Officers Knights Citizens Burgesses and the frequent securing secluding of Parliament Members forces upon Parliaments themselves to interrupt dissolve them ever since the abolishing of our Kings Kingly Government the erection of a pretended Free State or Commonwealth and prologues thereunto compared with Judges 17. 6 c. c. 18. 1 c. c. 21. 25. Ezech. 19. 12 13 14. c. 21. 27. c. 29. 14 15. Hos. 3. 4. c. 10. 3 7 15. Are an infallible experimental sensible evidence and demonstration that Kings and Kingly Government are Englands true only publike interest as Men That it is so as Christians is apparent 1. By Gods own promise to his Church and people under the Gospel * That KINGS shall be their nursing Fathers and QUEENS their nursing Mothers more particularly † KINGS OF THE ISLES chiefly verified of our Island as I have evidenced in my Narrative p. 84. and Sir Henry Spelman in his Councils and Epistle to them and none other kinde of Governors expressed by name but they in sacred Writ 2. By the 1 Tim. 2. 1 2 3. I exhort therefore that First of all supplications prayers intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all men for KINGS and for all in eminent places under them that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour Compared with Ezra 6. 10. c. 7. 23. Jer. 9. 7. Which duty of making Supplicatious prayers intercessions for Kings and Emperors whether Pagan or Christian Heterodox or Orthodox Protectors or Persecutors the Churches Christians Saints of God in all ages places kingdoms have constantly conscientiously practised as their Interest and the principal means prescribed by God himself for their quiet peace good welfare safety prosperity increase in godlinesse honesty and well-pleasing unto God their Saviour whose * loving kindnesse is better to them than life and their greatest felicity as I intend to evidence in a particular Treatise Neither hath the Church and people of England been inferior to any others in this duty as I could abundantly evidence by ancient Canons Missals Processionals Liturgies the a Clause Rolls in the Tower and other testimonies with the praiers used at our Kings Coronations before the Reformation of Religion which I pretermit and shall give you only a brief touch of their loyalty and practice since we became Protestants At the respective Coronations of King Edward the 6. King James and King Charles there were sundry excellent servent Prayers and supplications powred out to God with ardent affections on their behalfs wherein all the Prelates Clergy Nobility Gentry people present at this solemnity prayed frequently for the KINGS long life health wealth honor safety prosperous reign victory over all his Enemies increase of all royal graces b vertues for all temporal spiritual blessings and eternal glory in heaven c. to be abundantly powred forth upon his own royal person and likewise for the increase and succession of his royal posterity in the throne in all ages in these ensuing words in 3. several praiers Establish him in the Throne of this Realm Visit him with increase of children that his children may be Kings to rule this Kingdom by succession of all Ages Let the Blessings of him that appeared in the bush descend upon his head and the fulness of his blessings fall upon his children and posterity Let his horn be exalted as the horn of a Vnicorn by which he may scatter his enemies from the face of the earth The Lord which sitteth in heaven be his Defender for ever and ever through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen After sundry such prayers and his Coronation all the Spiritual Temporal Lords present kneel down and do their Homage to him in these words I become your Man and shall be faithfull and true and troth bear unto you our Soveraign Lord and to your heirs Kings of England of life and limb and of earthly worship against all men that now live and die And I shall do and truly knowledge the service of the Lands which I claim to hold of you So God help me

possibly can be committed both against the King Kingdom Parliament Lords Commons People all injured usurped on tyrannized over dishonored and oppressed thereby in the highest degree Which should discourage deterr all those who have any dread of God Men or love to Parliaments and their Native Country from usurping such a power as well for their own as the publick weal If the long Parliament be still in being and now revived as Nedham pleads but proves not at all his own principles evincing the contrary then all the Lords and secluded Members ought in right and Justice to be freely admitted for the premised reasons else those now sitting and acting without them will incurr the guilt of High Treason for Usurping both Regal and Parliamental power by meer force without any Act of Parliament which an express Act of Parliament made by assent of all the 3. Estates cannot transfer unto them as the Statute of 1 H. 4. c. 3. and Parliament of 1 H. 4. rot Parl. n. 25. expresly resolve and I have proved in my Narrative p. 22 23 24. since the Highest regal and Parliamentary trusts for the publike good safety reposed in many by the people cannot be transferred nor delegated unto a few nor the Parliament power trust assigned over any more than the * Regal Having dispatched these grand questions I shall be briefer in the 4th being only this Whether the Oathes of Supremacy Allegiance and Homage to the late King his Heirs and Successors were finally determined by and expired at his death Nedham p. 41 42. and Rogers p. 33. affirming they are because the old form of Kingly Government is lawfully as they say extinguished and a new form introduced and so the Oath impossible because the persons and things to whom they were made are at an end Which opinion having largely refuted in my Concordia Discors proving those Oathes to be still obligatory and binding by unanswerable Scripture-presidents and authorities to which neither of these Antagonists reply one syllable I shall briefly reply to what they object 1. That the frame of our Kingly Government was not legally dissolved but violently and trayterously interrupted only as he saith this Parliament and Republike were by Cromwels intrusion 2ly That by the resolution of our Statutes Judges Laws which admit no Interregnum we have still a Kingdom a King an Heir and Successor to the Crown in actual being though out of actual not legal possession to whom we may and ought to make good our Oathes 3ly That our fellow-members and subjects who took these Oathes as well as we can neither absolve themselves nor us by their perjury or treachery in violating them by their late forcible illegal proceedings and new Ingagement against the King his Heirs and successors 4ly That it is both possible just necessary safe honourable Christian for them and us and our 3. Kingdoms Churches Religion to call in the right heir and successor to the Crown upon honorable Terms there being no obstacle to it but only want of will or the covetousness rapine ambition guilt or fear of punishment in some particular persons in present power against the general desire and interest of our 3. whole Kingdoms Nations endangered embroyled oppressed and well-nigh totally ruined exhausted by his long seclusion 5. That these Objectors and others slighting neglecting violating absolving themselves and others from the conscientious obligation legal performance of these sacred Oathes obliging themselves in particular and the whole Kingdom in general to the late King his Heirs and Successors in perpetuity is no argument of their piety saintship religion fear of God honesty truth justice but of their avowed Atheism Impiety Injustice contempt of God and all his threats judgments denounced inflicted upon Perjured infringers of their Oathes Covenants to their King and others 6ly That for the violation of these Oathes the whole three Kingdoms have deeply mourned suffred in sundry kinds ever since 1648. and are now likely to be ruined by Taxes Contributions Oppressions of all sorts losse of trade unseasonable weather diseases epidemically reigning and other judgements 7ly That Abraham himself the father of all the faithfull swearing by God that he would not deal falsly with Abimelech nor with his Son nor with his Sons son but according to the kindness he had done to Abraham Gen. 21. 23 24 c. and his care to perform his Oath hath justified not only the lawfulness of all our Oathes to the King his heirs and successors but confirmed our Obligation to them all and how conscientiously we ought to perform them without fraud or falshood yea disowning all those from being of his faith or spiritual seed who make little conscience to perform them 8ly Thus as the Apostle resolves Gal. 3. 16 17. That the Covenant made by God to Abraham and his seed in Christ before the Law which was made 430. years after cannot disannull that it should make the Promise of no effect So the New Ingagement made taken after these two Oathes to our New Governors and their late Oath to be Constant as well as True and Faithfull to their new Republike without King or Single person or House of Lords obliging those who take it if binding not only to sundry Perjuries Treasons and constant perseverance in them without repentance cannot disannull these former Oathes to the King his heirs and successors and make them of no effect as Rogers tells us which I have elswhere proved 9ly John Rogers p. 9. informs us that Cleomines the Lacedemonian sware to his friend Archonides that he would do all things joyntly with him and Act nothing without his HEAD were in it After which watching his time he cut off his Companions head and to keep his Covenant after he had par boyled it he kept it by him honored and preserved it and upon every weighty matter or consultation would set his Scull by him and tell it what he purposed saying that he did not violate his Ingagement or break his Oath in the least séeing he did ever take counsel with the head of Archonides and did nothing without it Verily my Antagonists and those Members they plead for have dealt more falsly with the late King Lords and their fellow Members than Cleomines with Archonides they twice Swore Protested Vowed and Covenanted too over and over to be true and faithful to the King and to act all things Ioyntly with him the Lords and their fellow Commons in Parliament and transact nothing without their heads and advice were in it But though afterwards watching their opportunity they cut off the Kings head and some of the Lords as he did his Friends suppressed the whole House of Lords and secluded most of their fellow Commoners yet they do not set either their heads sculls or any of their seeming persons before them in the House when they consult upon every or any weighty matter nor tell them what they purpose And yet they and these their Advocates tell us and

others They doe not violate their Protestations Vows Covenants nor yet break their Oathes Whether of them are the greatest Hypocrites Impostors let the world now judge The 5. Question between J. Rogers and me alone is this Whether the Jesuites and our forein Spanish French and other Common Popish Adversaries were the Original Plotters and Vnder-hand fomentors of the change of our antient Hereditary Kingship and Kingdom into a NEW COMMON-WEALTH and of the late Exorbitant violent Proceedings against the Kings Parliament and secluded Members to accomplish this their design Mr. Prynne hath abundantly proved the affirmative by punctual Testimonies out of Parsons Campanella Watson Clerke Richelieu's Instructions Conte Galeazzo the Lord Digbies and others Letters Mutatus Polemo and other Evidences by pregnant Reasons and Demonstrations both à priori et posteriori in his Speech Memento Epistles to his New Discovery of Free-State Tyranny Jus Patronatus Seasonable Vindication The Republicans Good Old Cause anatomized and in his Narrative p. 18 19 20. 40 to 64. 85 to 89. These Evidences a J. Rogers neither doth nor can deny in any particular only he contradicts the Conclusion as not sufficiently warranted by the premises when as most judicious Protestants of all professions and degrees who have seriously perused them are abundantly satisfied and conclude the contrary to this Johannis ad oppositum who bestows whole sheets and volumes of rayling Epithites Scurrilous scoffs unchristian a obscene Queres and sarcasmes upon me only upon this accompt that I have translated the Odium and guilt of the contriving fomenting the late Gunpowder Treason which blew up our King Kingdom Parliament Lords House and Kingly Government to erect a New Republike from the Protestants to the Jesuits and those of their religion who plotted the old one and would have fathered it on the Puritans had it taken the like effect as this hath done which I thought would have deserved thanks rather than such reproachfull usage from such a Zealet as he pretends to be But since he will needs appropriate the glory and honour of this last Powder-Plot transcending the former to those worthies for whom he pleads and to himself and his disciples and allow the Jesuites a many of whom he confesseth are doubtlesse in England under disguises and folding-dores p. 35. no share at all in its projection or execution I shall no waies envy them this new Garland wherewith he Crowns their Temples let them wear it in triumph to their graves or Tiburn I shall not envy them this new Crown of glory of which they are so ambitious that Rogers spends many leaves p. 27 to 37. to evade the Authors I quote to prove the Commonwealth a spurious issue of the Jesuits projection by his impertinent answers to them 1. He endeavours to evade my quotations of Parsons and Campanella the first projectors of turning our English Kingdom into an Holland Commonwealth by the agency of the Jesuits confederating with Anabaptists and other Sectaries agreeing with them in Antimonarchical principles by the help of a prevalent seduced party in the Parliament house when purged reformed after Parsons new model and by raising wars tumults in the Realm and then infusing this Principle into the Common Soldiers people and every Prec●pe or factious multitude getting the Title of a Publique State or Helvetian Commonwealth to examin their Soveraigns by what Title they hold their Crowns and to alter change the course inheritance and succession of the Crown and publike Government at their pleasures and disseise the right heirs general to the Crown and put them to their Formedon to recover them To which he answers 1. That these their Politicks were calculated to the State of the Nation as it was in Queen Elizabeths time when they writ to divide us with factions and divisions at home stir up the seeds of an inexplicable irreconcilable war between England and Scotland to deprive King James of the Crown of England to promote the Spaniards interest and hinder the English from infesting his Fleet and Indies Ergo the Jesuites were not the original projectors of turning our Kingdom into a Common-wealth though he produceth none else before or besides them nor yet prosecuted this design so long since laid afresh as I have proved they did in 1647. and 1648. for the self-same ends in substance by the self-same means and instruments 2ly He saith I should prove that This this is the same Commonwealth they plotted then in every circumstance I prove it produced by the same instruments means pattern they prescribed and that it pursued the same ends designs which is sufficient and punctual The rather because himself and those he pleads for are not yet agreed what form or kinde of creature their new Common-wealth shall be they being much divided about it as himself attests who spends some sheets against Mr. Harringtons and others Models of it 3ly He adds their design proved abortive in Qu. Elizabeths reign and in the powder-plot against King James What then Ergo they pursued it not since as I prove by late pregnant Testimonies and more than probable arguments is a meer inconsequent 4ly He objects the Jesuits Commonwealth admits no toleration of Religions never was against Kingship and the Office of it as theirs is nor hath any similitude with Jesuitism All false the Jesuits pleaded alwayes for i a free toleration of religion in England that themselves might be tolerated though they deny it elswhere they are k professed enemies to the office as well as persons of all Protestant yea and most Popish Kings and projected to make up a Common-wealth upon this account in opposition to Kingship it hath similitude with Iesuitism both in its principles witness those of Barclay and Mariana cited by Nedham whereon he founds it and in its practices of murdering Protestant Kings blowing up Parliaments absolving Subjects from their Oath and Allegiance c. by which it was founded supported revived What else he allegeth is but meer Froth of his wanton brain and scurrillous pen unworthy reply Only because he calls upon me for more evidence if I have it to prove his Good Old Cause and Commonwealth a Plot of the Iesuites I shall gratify him herein 1. Hugh Peters himself very well acquainted of late years with the Jesuits persons plots principles practices in his Letter to a great Army-Officer quoted by himself p. 12. stiles it A Cheat of the Iesuites put upon the Army and that with much regret of heart and spirit 2ly A grave Protestant Gentleman of the Temple last Trinity Term riding up to London meeting with a Popish Gent. of his acquaintance on the way they discoursing of these last Revolutions and changes of Government the Protestant told him that these alterations were but the Plots and productions of the Jesuites and those of his Religion who did but laugh at us in their sleeves to see what fools they made us At which the Papist growing somwhat angry He