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A78747 His Majesties declaration to all his loving subjects, upon occasion of his late messages to both Houses of Parliament, and their refusall to treat with him for the peace of the kingdome. Charles R. Our expresse pleasure is, that this our Declaration be published in all churches and chappels within the kingdome of England and dominion of Wales, by the parsons, vicars, or curates of the same. England and Wales. Sovereign (1625-1649 : Charles I); Charles I, King of England, 1600-1649.; England and Wales. Parliament. aut 1642 (1642) Wing C2259; Thomason E126_47; ESTC R19891 12,955 16

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HIS MAJESTIES DECLARATION To all His Loving Subjects Vpon occasion of his late MESSAGES to both Houses of PARLIAMENT And their Refusall to treat with Him for the Peace of the KINGDOME Charles R. OUr expresse pleasure is That this our Declaration be published in all Churches and Chappels within the Kingdome of England and Dominion of Wales by the Parsons Vicars or Curates of the same Printed by His Majesties Command at Oxford by Leonard Lichfield Printer to the Universitie 1642. His Majesties DECLARATION To all his loving Subjects upon occasion of his late Messages to both Houses of Parliament and their refusall to treate with him for the peace of the Kingdome IF it had not evidently appeared to all men who have carefully examined and considered Our Actions Messages and Declarations how far We are and have been from begetting or promoting the present Distractions and that the Arms wee have now taken are for the necessary safety and defence of Our life being not taken up by Us till our Town and Fort of Hull were kept from Us by force of Armes Our Navy imployed against Us to keep all forraigne supply of Arms and Mony when Our owne here was seized and detained from Us and an Army raised in pay and marching against Us yet the late reception of Our Message of the 25. of August sent by Persons of Honour and Trust will sure satisfie the World that we have omitted nothing on Our part that a gracious and Christian Prince could or can do to prevent the effusion of Christian Blood but that the Malignant party which have with great subtilty and industry begot this misunderstanding between Us and Our good Subjects resolve to satisfie and secure their malice and ambition with the ruine of the Kingdome and in the blood of Us and all Our good Subjects When they had forced Us after the neglect of Our Message from Beverley by raising a great Army and incensing Our Subjects against Us to erect our royall Standard that Our Subjects might be informed of Our danger and repaire to Our Succour though Wee had no great reason to believe any Message of Ours would receive a very good entertainment if those men might prevaile who had brought all these miseries upon the Kingdome to satisfie their own private end yet observing the miserable accidents which already befell Our good Subjects by the Souldiers under their command and well knowing that greater would ensue if timely prevention were not applyed and finding that the malice and cunning of these men had infused into Our People a Rumour that Wee had rejected all Propositions and offers of Treaty and desired to engage Our Subjects in a Civill War which Our Soule abhors wee prevaile with Our selfe for a full expression of Our desire to prevent the effusion of Blood to send a gracious message to both Our Houses of Parliament on the 25. of August in these words His Majesties gratious Message to both Houses of Parl. sent from Mottingham 25. Aug. 1642 By the Earls of Southhampton and Do●set Sir I●hn C●lpepe Chancellor of the Exchequer and Sir William ●●edall VVE have with unspeakable grief of heart long beheld the distractions of this Our Kingdom Our very soul is full of anguish untill We may find some remedy to prevent the Miseries which are alredy to overwhelme this whole nation by a civil War And though all Our endeavours tending to the Composing of those unhappy differences betwixt Us and Our two houses of Parliament though pursued by Us with all Zeal and Syncerity have been hitherto without that Successe We hoped for yet such is our constant and earnest care to preserve the publike Peace that We shall not be discouraged from using any Expedient which by the blessing of the God of Mercy may lay a firm foundation of Peace and happinesse to all Our good Subjects To this end observing that many mistakes have arisen by the Messages Petitions and Answers betwixt Us and Our two Houses of Parliament which happily may be prevented by some other way of Treaty wherein the Matters in difference may be more cleerly understood and more freely transacted We have thought fit to propound to you That some fit persons may be by you inabled to treat with the like number to be authorized by Us in such a manner and with such freedom of debate as may best tend to that happy Conclusion which all good men desire The peace of the Kingdom Wherein as We promise in the Word of a King all safety and encouragement to such as shall be sent to Us if you shall choose the place where we are for the Treaty which We wholy leave to you presuming of your like care of the safety of those We shall imploy if you shall name another place So We assure you and all Our good Subjects that to the best of Our understanding nothing shall be therein wanting on Our parts which may advance the True Protestant Religion Oppose Popery and Superstition Secure the Law of the Land upon which is built as well our just Prerogative as the Propriety and Liberty of the Subject Confirme all just Power and Priviledges of Parliament and render Us and Our People truely happy by a good understanding betwixt Us and Our two Houses of Parliament Bring with you as firm Resolutions to doe your duty and let all Our good people joyne with Us in Our prayers to Almighty God for his blessing upon this Work If this Proposition shall be rejected by you We have done Our duty so amply that God will absolve Us from the Guilt of any of that blood which must be spilt and what opinion soever other men may have of Our Power We assure you nothing but our Christian and Pious care to prevent the Effusion of blood hath begot this Motion Our Provision of Men Arms and Money being such as may secure Us from farther violence till it shall please God to open the eyes of Our People Our Messengers were not suffered to sit in the Houses and one of them the E. of Southampton against whom there was not the least colour of exception or so much as a vote not suffered to deliver Our Message but compelled to send it by the Gentleman Vsher and then commanded to depart the Town before they would prepare any Answer which they shortly sent Us in these words The Answer of the Lords and Commons to his Majesties Message the 25. of Aug. 1642. May it please Your Majesty THe Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled having received Your Majesties Message of the 25. of August doe with much griefe resent the dangerous and distracted state of this Kingdom which we have by all means endeavoured to prevent both by our severall advices and Petitions to Your Majesty which have been not onely without successe but there hath followed that which no ill counsell in former times hath produced or any age hath seen namely those severall Proclamations and Declarations against both the Houses of Parliament
whereby their Actions are declared Treasonable and their Persons Traitors And thereupon Your Majestie hath set up Your Standard against them whereby You have put the two Houses of Parliament and in them this whole Kingdome out of Your protection so that untill Your Majestie shall recall those Proclamations and Declarations whereby the E. of Essex and both Houses of Parliament and their adherents and assistants and such as have obeyed and executed their commands and directions according to their duties are declared Traitors or otherwise Delinquents And untill the Standard set up in pursuance of the said Proclamations be taken down Your Majestie hath put us into such a condition that whilst we so remain we cannot by the fundamentall priviledges of Parliament the publique trust reposed in us or with the generall good safety of this Kingdome give Your Majestie any other Answer to this Message Joh. Browne Cler. Parliament H. Elsinge Cler. Parl. D. Com. THis strange Answer might well have discouraged Us from any thought of proceeding further this way and informed Us sufficiently what spirit still governed amongst those few who continued still in both Houses otherwise after so many bitter and invective Messages and Declarations sent to Us and published against Us We should not have been reproched with Our Proclamations and Declarations set forth by Us as the effect of such evill Counsel as was unparallel'd by any former Examples We beleeve indeed such Proclamations and Declarations have never been before set forth but were former times ever acquainted with such intolerable provocations were there ever before these Twelve months Declarations published in the name of either or both Houses of Parliament to make their King odious to the People Have either or both Houses ever before assumed or pretended to a Power to raise Arms or levy War in any Cause or can both Houses together exercise such a Power Are those Actions which the Law hath defined literally and expresly to be Treasonable or such Persons to be Traitors not so because they are done by Members of either House or their appointment And must not We declare such who march with Arms and Force to destroy Us to be Traitors because the E. of Essex is their Generall Those whom We have or doe accuse We have named together with their crimes notorious by the known Law of the Land a favour not granted to our evill Counsellors and appeal to that known Law to judge between Us And now that by this we should have put the whole Kingdome out of Our Protection in whose behalfe We doe all that We have done is a corrupt Glosse upon such a Text as cannot be perverted but by the cunning practices of such who wish not well to King or People yet that no weak persons might be missed by that Imputation upon Us We sent a Reply to that Answer in these words His Majesties Reply to an Answer sent by the two Houses of Parliament to His Majesties Message of the 25. of August concerning a Treaty of Accommodation VVE will not repeat what meanes We have used to prevent the dangerous and distracted estate of the Kingdom nor how those means have been interpreted because being desirous to avoid effusion of blood We are willing to decline all memory of former bitternesse that might make Our offer of a Treatie lesse readily accepted We never did Declare nor ever intended to Declare both our Houses of Parliament Traitors or set up Our Standard against them and much lesse to put them and this Kingdom out of Our Protection Wee utterly Professe against it before God and the World And further to remove all possible Scruples which may hinder the Treaty so much desired by Us We hereby Promise so that a day be appointed by you for the revoking of your Declarations against all Persons as Traitours or otherwayes for assisting of Us Wee shall with all cheerfulnesse upon the same day recall Our Proclamations and Declarations and take down Our Standard In which Treaty We shal be ready to grant any thing that shall be really for the good of Our Subjects Conjuring you to consider the bleeding condition of Ireland and the dangerous condition of England in as high a degree as by these Our offers We have declared Our Self to do And assuring you that Our chief desire in this is to beg●t a good understanding mutuall confidence betwixt Us and Our two Houses of Parl. This Message produced an Answer little differing from the former like men who had no other measure of the Justice of their cause then their Power to oppresse Us forgetting their own duties they sharply informe Us of Ours in these words The humble Answer and Petition of the Lord and Commons Assembled in Parliament unto the Kings last Message May it please Your Majesty IF we the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled should repeat all the wayes we have taken the endeavours we have used and the expressions we have made unto Your Majestie to prevent those distractions and dangers Your Majestie speaks of likely to fall upon this Kingdome we should too much inlarge this Reply Therefore as we humbly so shall we onely let Your Majestie know that we cannot recede from our former Answer for the reasons therein expressed For that Your Majestie hath not taken down Your Standard recalled Your Proclamations and Declarations whereby You have declared the Actions of both Houses of Parliament to be Treasonable and their Persons Traitors And You have published the same since Your Message of the 25. of Aug. by Your late Instructions sent to Your Commissioners of Array which Standard being taken downe and the Declarations Proclamations and Instructions recalled If Your Majesty shall then upon this our Humble Petition leaving Your Forces returne unto Your Parliament and receive their faithfull advice Your Majestie will find such expressions of our fidelities and duties as shall assure You that Your Safety Honour and Greatnesse can onely be found in the affections of Your people and the sincere counsels of Your Parliament whose constant and undiscouraged endeavours and consultations have passed through difficulties unheard of onely to secure Your Kingdoms from the violent Mischiefs dangers now ready to fall upon them and every part of them who deserve better of Your Majestie and can never allow themselves representing likewise Your whole Kingdome to be ballanced with those persons whose desperate dispositions and counsels prevaile still so to interrupt all our indeavours for the relieving of bleeding Ireland as we may fear our labours and vast expences will be fruitlesse to that distressed Kingdom As Your presence is thus humbly desired by us So is it in our hopes Your Majestie will in Your reason beleeve there is no other way then this to make Your Self happy and Your Kingdom safe Joh. Brown Cler. Parl. VVIthout any bitternesse or reprehension of their neglect of Us and the publique Peace to expresse Our deep sense of the Calamities at hand We yet once
neglect any proper means of curing the distempers of the Kingdome and closing the dangerous Breaches betwixt Your Majesty and Your Parliament according to the great Trust which lies upon us and if Your Majesty shall now be pleased to come back to Your Parliament without Your Forces we shall be ready to secure Your Royall Person Your Crown and Dignity with our Lives and Fortunes Your presence in this Your great Councell being the onely means of any Treaty betwixt Your Majesty and them with hope of Successe And in none of our desires to Your Majesty shall we be swayed by any particular mans advantage but shall give a clear Testimony to Your Majestie and the whole world that in all things done by us we faithfully intend the good of Your Majesty and of Your Kingdoms and that we will not be diverted from this end by any private or selfe-respects whatsoever Joh. Brown Cler. Parl. THey will not beleeve We have done all that in Us lyes to prevent and remove the present Distractions because of the oppressions Rapines and the like committed upon Our good Subjects by Our Souldiers Let them remember who have compelled Vs and against Our Soules desire forced Vs to raise those Souldiers and then if the oppressions and Rapines were indeed such as are falsely pretended Our poore Subjects who suffer under them will looke on them and onely on them as the Authors of all the miseries they doe or can undergo We confesse with grief of heart some discords have and many more may befall Our good People by Our Souldiers but We appeal to all those countyes through which We have passed what care We have taken to prevent and what Justice We dayly inflict upon such Offenders neither hath the least complaint been ever made to Vs of violences and outrages which We have not to Our utmost Power repayred or punished however those false and treasonable Pamphlets are suffered which accuse Vs of giving warrant for plundring of Houses Our Mercy and Lenity is so well known to the contrary that it is usually made an excuse by those who against their Consciences assist this Rebellion against Vs that they chuse rather to offend Vs upon confidence of Pardon then provoke those Malignant Persons who without charity or Compassion destroy all who concur not with them in faction and opinion How far We are from Rapine and Oppression may appear by Our Lenity to the Persons and Estates of those who have not only exercised the Militia the seed from whence this Rebellion against Vs hath growne but contributed Money and Plate to the maintenance of that Armie which now endeavours to destroy Vs As of Nottingham Leicester and many other places through which we have passed many of whom then were and now are in that Army to let passe Our passing by Chartly the house of the E. of Essex without other pressures then as if he were the Generall of Our owne Army and Our expresse Orders to restraine the Liberty our Souldiers would otherwise have used upon that place and his Estate about it How contrary the proceedings are of these great Assertors of the publique Liberties appears fully by the sad instances they every day give in the pundring by Publick warrant the Houses of all such whose Duty Conscience and Loyalty hath engaged them in our Quarrell which every good man ought to make his owne By their declaring all Persons to be out of the Protection of Parliament and so exposing them to the fury of their Souldiers who will not assist this Rebellion against Vs their anointed King by the dayly outrages committed it Yorkshire when contrary to the desire and agreement of that County signed under the hands of both partyes they will not suffer the Peace to be kept but that the distractions and Confusion may be universall over the whole Kingdom direct their Governour of Hull to make Warr upon our good Subjects in that County and so continue the robbing and plundring the Houses of all such who concur not with them in this Rebellion Lastly by the barbarous sacrilegious Inhumanity exercised by their Souldiers in Churches as in Canterbury Worcester Oxford and other Places where they committed such unheard of outrages as Iewes and Atheists never practised before God in his good time will make them examples of his vengeance We never did nor ever shall desire to secure the Authors and Instruments of any mischiefs to the Kingdom from the Iustice of Parliament We desire all such Persons may bee speedily brought to condigne punishment by that Rule which is or ought to be the Rule of all punishment the known Law of the Land If there have seemed to be any interruption in proceedings of this nature it must be remembred how long Persons have been kept under generall Accusations without tryall though earnestly desired that the Members who were properly to judge such Accusations have by violence been driven thence or could not with honour and safety be present at such debates that notorious Delinquents by the knowne Lawes were protected against Us from the Iustice of the Kingdom and such called Delinquents who committing no Offence against any knowne Law were so voted onely for doing their Duties to Us and then there will be no cause of complaint found against Us. And for the Priviledges of Parliament We have said so much and upon such reasons which have never been answered but by bare positive Assertions in Our severall Declarations that We may well and doe still use the same expression That We desire God may so deale with Us and Our Posterity as We desire the preservation of the just Rights of Parliament the violation whereof in truth by these desperate Persons is so cleerly known to all men who understand the Priviledges of Parliament that their rage and malice hath not been greater to Our Person and Governement then to the Liberty Priviledge and very being of Parliaments witnesse their putting in putting out and suspending what Persons they please as they like or dislike their opinions their bringing down the Tumults to assault the Members and awe the Parliament their posting and prosecuting such Members of either House as concurred not with them in their Designes and so driving them from thence for the safety of their lives their denying Us against the known established Law and the Constitution of the Kingdome to have a negative voice without which no Parliament can consist their making close Committees from whence the Members of the Houses are exempted against the Liberty of Parliament and lastly resolving both Houses into a close Committee of seventeen persons who undertake and direct all the present Outrages and the managery of this Rebellion against Us in the absence of foure parts of five of both Houses and without the privity of those who stay there which is not onely contrary but destructive to Parliaments themselves By these grosse unheard-of Incasions and breaches of the Priviledges of Parliament and without them they could not have
done the other They made way for their Attempts upon the Law of the Land and the Introduction of that unlimited Arbitrary Power which they have since exercised to the intolerable damage and confusion of the whole Kingdome And We assure Our good Subjects the vindication of these just Liberties and Priviledges of Parliament thus violated by these men is not lesse the Argument of Our present quarrell and undertaking then Our owne Honour Interest and Safety those being no way so securely to be preserved as by preserving Parliaments and their just Priviledges Neither is there any Protestation to Our knowledge published in Our name of Our tendernesse of the miseries of Ireland and Our Resolution to maintain the Protestant Religion and Laws of this Kingdom that is not the Protestation of Our Soule and manifested in all Our Actions and We hope that false Scandall That divers of the Irish Traitors and Rebels the known favourers of them and Agents for them are admitted to Our presence with favour and imployed in Our service will gaine no credit with good men who remember well the notorious imputation so confidently and groundlesly heretofore cast on Us by M. Pym of which as there could never be the least proof so Wee could never receive any satisfaction for that high injury which might have been a warning to them to have published no more such untruths if they had not found that truth and their End cannot meet together For the Horses taken for Our service which were provided for the service of Ireland 't is true We were compelled for the bringing Our own wagons from Chester for the carriage of Our Munition to make use of them being few in number and of smal value after they were certified to be of no use for the service for which they were provided And for the clothes upon enquiry Wee finde that some few were taken by Our Souldiers but without order from Vs going to Coventry and as was probably beleeved for the reliefe of that place then in actual rebellion against Vs but how far We have beene and are from diverting any of those provisions made for the reliefe of that poore Kingdome the thought of whose miserable condition makes our heart bleede may appeare by our expresse command given for the speedy transportation of 3000. suites of clothes which we found provided at Chester but neglected to be sent and which no necessity of our own Army here could prevaile with Vs to seise And how bold soever the reproaches of that kinde have beene upon us VVe are consulent malice it selfe cannot lay the least probable imputation upon us for the neglect of our duty towards that Kingdome VVhat one thing in our power have wee neglected or omitted which might contribute to the assistance or ease of our poore Protestant subjects there VVe first recommended the case of that businesse to both our Houses of Parliament VVee condescended to all propositions made on the behalf offered to raise 10000. Voluntiers which if then accepted had shortned that work offered to venture our own person in the service what interpretation that offer of ours found is known to all the world VVe parted with our Interest in the Land of the Rebels to encourage such who were willing to adventure in that businesse and when money is raised by our consent for that sole purpose they have at once seized 100000. pound particularly appointed by Act of Parliament for the reliefe of Ireland our Army being ready to perish for want of it and employed it to maintain this unnaturall civill war at home They have levyed men and entertained Commanders for that service and then compelled them to joyne in this Rebellion and to march against Us and though they have complained of Our keeping the Lieutenant of Ireland some weekes with Us when in truth it was a season of extraordinary businesse after We had in vaine for many months pressed his dispatch yet themselves now detain him when his going is so necessary for the preservation of that Kingdom And no doubt these men and these alone by begetting this miserable distraction of England are guilty before God and Man of all the insupportable calamities that Our Kingdom of Ireland endures Let all the world judge where the desire of Peace is and upon whose account the blood and confusion which hath been shed and must follow shall bee cast And whether the severall Proclamations and Declarations published by Us have notbin extorted from Us by such unheard of Insolencies and Injuries which no former times ever produced neither can any sober man wonder when We are publickly reproached traduced and reviled to Our People a practice never known till this Parliament that We endeavour by a true relation and Declaration of Our Actions and Intentions and of their Conspiracyes who have vowed Our destruction to informe Our good Subjects of the cunning and malice they are to encounter with and when a Combination is entred into to destroy Us and to alter the Religion and Law of the Kingdome and to that purpose an Army raised and marching against Us that We proclaime the Generall of that Army and such who shall assist him in leavying a War against Us to be Traitors and have set up Our Royall Standard and requited all Our good Subjects to come to Our defence And yet both in that Proclamation and in all Our Declarations We have never accused Our Parliament but such factious seditious members of both Houses whom We have named and whom We are ready to prove according to the Rules of the known Law to bee guilty of High Treason We well know and all the Kingdome knowes that of neere 500. Members which the House of Commons contains there remains not now there 100. neither hath above such a number consented almost to any thing of which We have ever complained the rest have either been driven away by Tumults and Threats of the Persons whom We have accused or out of Conscience withdrawne themselves from their desperate consultations and of about 100. Peeres o● the Realme there are not above 15. or 16. who concur in these miserable Resolutions which disturbe the publique peace many of which being of desperate fortunes have no other support then the Commands now given them to make War upon Us and now these men must sit upon the lives and fortunes of all the Nobility Gentry and Commons of England and because We will not put Our selfe into the hands Government and disposall of them all Our good Subjects are envited and encouraged to Rebel against us yet We haue beene and are still far from accusing all that small number of both Houses who are yet left together VVe believe many of them are misled by the cunning and malice and frighted by the power of those men whom we have accused against every one of whom We have evidence of matter of fact that the knowne Law of the Land determines to be High Treason And now that all Our good Subjects may see how desirous these men and their adherents are to prevent the effusion of blood and the lasting miseries of a Civill War they will make themselves so considerable that except We will recall Our Proclamations and Declarations whereby particular men named for particular Actions which the Law hath defined to be Treason are so accused and others warned from involving themselves in their guilt and except We will take downe Our Standard that Our good Subjects may not repaire to Us for Our defence when so many Armies are raised against Us in severall parts of the Kingdom and ready to destroy Us and such of Our good Subjects who dare continue loyall to Us and except We will return to London from whence with violence We have been driven We must not be treated with or receive any Answer to so gratious a Message It can no longer be doubted by any man who hath not wilfully forsaken his understanding that it is no more a quarrell undertaken by the Parliament but contrived and fomented by the Persons We have named and now continued solely in their defence to whose Ambition Faction and malice the true reformed Protestant Religion the just Right Honour Safety and life of Us and Our Posterity the Law of the Land which hath so long preserved this Nation happy the Liberty of the Subject established by that Law and the glorious frame and constitution of this Kingdom must be sacrificed But as We have hitherto left no Action unperformed which in Honour Iustice and Conscience We were obliged to doe or in Christian Policy and Prudence We could conceave might probably prevent these Calamities so We thanke God he hath given Us a full Courage and Resolution to run the utmost hazard of Our life for the suppression of this horrible Rebellion in the which no disproportion of Power Armes or Money shall discorage Us And We hope that all Our good Subjects besides by the Common duty of Allegiance will be stirred up for their owne sakes for the preservation of the blessed Protestant Religion and for the upholding this whole admirable frame of Government which being dissolved all their private and particular Rights Interest must be immediately confounded to bring in their utmost power assistance unto Us in this desperate exigent And We doe declare that whosoever shall loose his life in this Service for Our defence the Wardship of his Heyre shall be granted by Us without Rent or Fyne to his owne use and VVe shall hold Our Selfe obliged to take all possible care for the support relief and protection of all their wives and Children who shall have the hard fortune to dye in this Service FINIS