ye worthie Trustees Let not your ears be any longer deaf to our importunate cries let not our destruction be worse then that of Sodom which was overthrown in a moment Let us not pine away with famine and be worse then those who die by the sword Oh dissolve not all Government into the prime Laws of Nature and compel us to take the naturall remedie to preserve our selves which you have declared no people can be deprived of (bb) (bb) See your Declaration of the 19 of May 1642. 1 book Declarat pag. 207. And your Declaration of Novemb. 1642. pag. 690. 726. 728. as also pag. 150. See the Armies book of Declarat p. 39. 40. O remember that the righteous God standeth in the Congregation of the mighty and judgeth among the gods and saith How (cc) (cc) Psal 82.1 2 3 4. long will ye judge unjustly and accept the persons of the wicked Defend the poor and fatherless do justice to the afflicted and needy deliver the poor and needy and rid them out of the hands of the wicked And your Petitioners shall ever pray c. Now judge O Heavens and give your verdict O ye sons of men where the Treason is in this Petition for which M. Wildman and I as the chief prosecuters thereof deserved seven months imprisonment as Traitors therefore or rather doth it not declare that Cromwel and the rest of his fellow-hinderers of the promotion and accomplishment of the just things therein contained the establishing of which would have in the eye of reason prevented all the late Wars and all the desperate hazards that were run thereby are as grand enemies to the Liberties and Freedoms of England as any of those ever were whom they have destroyed and as grand Traitors to their trust as ever piss'd against a wall meerly soly and only seeking themselves and their own tyrannicall domination by all their actions their pretences being but meer stalking-horses thereto as most cleerly appears by CROMVVEL'S own Majors Impeachment of him to the Parliament the copy of which thus follows Sundry REASONS inducing Major ROBERT HUNTINGTON to lay down his Commission Humbly presented to the Honourable Houses of PARLIAMENT 2 August 1648. HAving taken up Arms in defence of the Authority and Power of King and Parliament under the command of the Lord Grey of Warke and the Earl of Manchester during their severall imployments with the Forces of the Eastern Association and at the modelling of this Army under the present Lord General having been appointed by the honourable Houses of Parliament Major to the now Regiment of Lieutenant General Cromwel in each of which imployments I have served constantly and faithfully answerable to the trust reposed in me And having lately quit the said imployment and laid down my Commission I hold my self tied both in duty and conscience to render the true reason thereof which in the generall is briefly this Because the Principles Designes and Actions of those Officers which have a great influence upon the Army are as I conceive very repugnant and destructive to the honour and safety of Parliament and Kingdom from whom they derive their Authority The particulars whereof being a Breviate of my sad Observations will appear by the following Narrative First That upon the Orders of Parliament for disbanding this Army Li. Gen. Cromwel and Commissary General Ireton were sent Commissioners to Walden to reduce the Army to their obedience but more especially in Order to the present supply of forces for the service of Ireland But they contrary to the trust reposed in them very much hindred that service not only by discountenancing those that were obedient and willing but also by giving incouragement to the unwilling and disobedient declaring that there had been much cruelty and injustice in the Parliaments proceedings against them meaning the Army and Commissary Generall Ireton in further pursuance thereof FRAMED THOSE PAPERS AND WRITINGS THEN SENT FROM THE ARMY TO THE PARLIAMENT AND KINGDOM saying also to the Agitators that it was lawfull and fit for us to deny disbanding till we had received equall and just satisfaction for our past service Lieutenant-Generall Cromwell further adding That we were in a double capacity as Souldiers and as Commoners and having our pay as Souldiers we have something else to stand upon as Commoners And when upon the Rendezvouz at TRIPPLE-HEATH the Commissioners of Parliament according to their Orders acquainted every Regiment with what the Parliament had already done and would further do in Order to the desires of the Army the Souldiery being before prepared and notwithstanding any thing could be said or offered to them by the Commissioners they still cryed out for Justice Justice And for the effecting of their further purposes advice was given by Lieutenant Generall Cromwel and Commissary Generall Ireton to remove the Kings Person from Holdenby or to secure him there by other Guards then those appointed by the Commissioners of Parliament which was thought most fit to be carryed on by the private souldiery of the Army and promoted by the Agitators of each Regiment whose first businesse was to secure the Garrison of Oxon with the Guns and Ammunition there from thence to march to Holdenby in prosecution of the former advice which was accordingly acted by Cornet Joyce who when he had done the businesse sent a Letter to the Generall then at Kyton acquainting his Excellency that the King was on his march towards Newmarket The Generall being troubled thereat told Commissary Generall Ireton that he did not like it demanding withall who gave those Orders He replyed that he gave Orders only for securing the King there and not for taking him away from thence Lieutenant-Generall Cromwel coming then from London said that if this had not been done the King would have been 〈◊〉 away by the Order of the Parliament or els Colonel Graves by the advice of the Commissioners would have caryed him to London throwing themselves upon the favour of Parliament for that Service The same day Cornet Joyce being told that the General was displeased with him for bringing the King from Holdenby he answered that Lieut. Gen. Cromwel had given him Orders at London [a] [a] And I John Lilburn have heard from very good hands I will not now say from the Cornets own month that it was delivered to to him in Cromwels own Garden in Drury-lane Colonel Charles Fleetwood being by to do what he had done both there and at Oxford The person of the King b] b] And yet see the Generals Letter from Cambridge of 6 June 1647 of the Kings providential or accidentall coming to them without the privity of him or any of his Officers Armies book of Declarat p. 22. being now in the power of the Army the businesse of Lieutenan-Generall Cromwel was to court his Majesty both by Members of the Army and several Gentlemen formerly in the Kings Service into a good opinion and belief of the proceedings of the Army as
Speaker I shall draw towards a conclusion but being that which followed is printed at large in the 17 18 19 20 22 c. pages of the forementioned Book Calleda Whip for the present House of Lords I for brevities sake shall here passe it over and refer the Reader if he pleases to the perusing of it there where also he will find I was like to be murthered at the House door by their Guard because I would not go to prison but by vertue of a Warrant made according to that forme the law requires all Mittimusses to be but being overpoured with drawn Swords and bent Muskets I was forced to the Tower as a pretended Traytor And therefore to record to posterity the despâ—rate and inveterate malice and hatred of Cromwel and his associats against the Liberties and freedoms of England who to the breadth of an haire are like those wicked men in Christs time unto whom in Mat. 23 13. he thus speaketh But wo unto Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites for ye shut up the Kingdom of Heaven against men for ye neither goe in you selves neither suffer ye them that are entring to go in Even so traiterous bloody and ambitious Cromwell and his wicked associats wil neither do good themselves in settling the Liberties of England nor suffer those that would to doe it therefore woe unto them hypocrites and painted Sepulchers who for all their fair pretences hate the Liberties of England more then they do the Devil and rather then the people shall enjoy any real good for all the cost and hazards in seaven yeares wars for their Liberties and Freedoms and so rid themselves of their Lordly and tyrannicall yoaks they wil shake Kingdoms and Nations and hazard all yea their own lives by dint of Sword in new and bloody Wars rather then the people shall enjoy their Liberties or those without an imprisonment for Traytors that fairely and justly prosecute them the last war in this Nation and all the innocent blood shed therein lying principally upon Cromwel and Iretons sâ—â—re for breaking all their faith promises and engagements made unto the Kingdom for their glorious sâ—tling of their Liberties which they not only failed in but begun to set up a selfish and Tyrannicall Interest of their own and persecuted unto death and bonds the zealous sticklers for the peoples welfare liberties and freedoms which begot heart burnings and divisions and thereby put the people into fury and madnesse which brought in an inundation of bloudshed For the demonstrating this in part take here A Copy of the Petition for promoting of which M. Iohn Wildman and I were imprisoned a matter of seven months as Traytors which thus followeth To the Supream Authority of England the Commons assembled in PARLIAMENT The earnest Petition of many Free-people of this Nation SHEWETH THat the devouring fire of the Lords wrath hath burnt in the Bowels of this miserable Nation untill it s almost consumed That upon a due search into the causes of Gods heavie judgements we find a) a) Ezek. 24.6.8.9.10 Amos 5 9 10 11 12. Mic. 2.2 3. 3.3.4 9 10 11 12. Nahum 3 1.2.19 Hab. 1.3.4 6. 2.8.11 12 17. Joe 3.6 7 8. that injustice and oppression have been the common Nationall sinnes for which the Lord hath threatned woes confusions and desolations unto any people or nation Wo saith God unto the oppressing City Zeph. 3.1 That when the King had opened the (b) (b) by Ship-mony Loane-mony Coat conduct mony Patents Monopolies c. Flood-gates of injustice and oppression (c) (c) See the Remonstrance of the State of the Kingdom Decem 1641. p. 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 14 15 upon the people and yet peremptorily declared that the People who trusted him for their good could not in or by their Parliament require any account of the discharge of his trust and when by a pretended negative voice (d) (d) See the Kings Answer to the Petition of Right and also the Parlia Remon of May 19. 1642. 1 part Book Dec. pag. 254 284 285. See the Kings Answer to the Par. Dec. of May 26. 1642. p. 298. to Laws he would not suffer the strength of the Kingdom the Militia to be so disposed of that oppression might be safely remedied and oppressours brough to condigne punishment but raised (e) (e) See the Ord. for Militia 1641. 1 Book Dec. p. 89. 105. 106. 114 126. 175 176. 182. 243. 283 292. a War (f) (f) See the Par. Votes May 20. 1642. 1 part Book Dec. 259 See also p. 465. 509 576. 580. 584. 617 618. to protect the Subverters of our Laws and Liberties and maintain Himself to be subject to no accompt even to such oppâ—essions and pursuing after an oppressive power the Judge oâ— the earth with whom the Throne of iniquity can have no fellowship hath brough him low and executed fierce wrath upon many of his adherents That God expects justice from those before whose eyes he hath destroyed an unjust generation Zeph. 3 6 7. and without doing justly and relieving the oppressed God abhor fastings and prayers and accounts himselfe mocked Pro. 15.8 Isa 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17. 29.13 14. 58.41 5 6 7. 66.2 3. Jer. 6.19 20. 7 9 10 11 14. Amos 5.6 7.15.21 22 23. Mich. 6.6 7 8. That our eyes fall with looking to see the foundations of our Freedome and peace secured by this Honorable Hâ—â—â—e and yet we are made to depend upon the Will of the King and the Lords which were never chosen or betrusted by the People to redresse their grievances And this Honorable House which formerly declared that they were the Representatives of all England and be trusted with our estates liberties and lives 1 part Book of Decla 264. 382. do now declare by their practice that they will not redresse our grievances and settle our freedoms unlesse the King and the Lords will That in case you should thus proceed Parliaments will be rendred wholy uselesse to the People and their happinesse left to depend solely upon the will of the King and such as he by his Paâ—ents creatâ— Lords and so the invaluable price of all the precious English bloud spilt in the defence of our freedoms against the King shall be imbezelled or lost and certainly God the avenger of bloud wil require it of the obstructors of justice and freedom Judges 9 23. That though our Petitions have been burned and our persons imprisoned reviled abused only for petitioning yet we cannot despair absolutely of all bowels of Compassion in this Honorable House to an enslaved perishing people We will nourish some hopes that you will at last consider our Estates are expended the whole trade of the Nation decayed thousands of families impoverished and mercilesse Famine is entring into our gates and therefore we cannot but once more essay to pierce your ears with our dolefull cries for Justice and Freedom before your delays wholy consume
pray That Lieutenant Colonel Lilburn and Master Iohn Wildman may be forthwith enlarged our selves secured and with the test of our Countrymen encouraged in a peaceable manner to make their addresses to this Honorable House and to render fruitlesse the practises of all such as under any coate shall seek to sow discord between you and yours And your Petitioners shall pray c. Iames Worts Roger Sawyer Henry Giding Tho. Chapman Valent. Elsign Dennis Liddall George Brown Edward Pardo Tho. Goddad Tho. Culles Tho. VVilliams Iohn Merihust Mich. Reeve Iohn North. Iohn VVells Ed. Floyd Rob. Bagesse Iohn Sowden Rob. Levite Andrew Dedman This Petition thus subscribed was as I remember delivered to the House of Commons the very same week Master Wildman and my self was first imprisoned as Traytors in reference to the foresaid Petition but this Petition was to no purpose nor took no effect which rightly weighed is a clear demonstration we were not imprisoned for miscarriage in mannaging the Petition but meerly and barely out of malice and hatred at us for promoting zealously a Petition that tended effectually to the ease of the People of their grievances and make us really Free-men and therfore from hence c. And let all unbiased people judge whether Cromwel and his Associates or my selfe and those he hath nicknamed Levellers be the real Traytors disturbers of the peace and the malicious and wicked hinderers of the Settlers of their Freedoms but to fill up this sheet and so to conclude I shall because I often use it here insert the Charge against the King which thus followeth The CHARGE of the Commons of England against CHARLES STVART King of England Of high Treasâ—n and other high Crimes exhibited to the High Court of Justice Saturday the 20 of January 1648. The Court being sate and the prisoner at the Barr M. Cook Solicitor General spake thus My Lord In behalf of the Commons of England and of all the people thereof I do accuse Charles Stuart here present of High Treason and high Misdemeanors And I do in the name of the Commons of England desire the Charge may be read unto Him Which the Clerk then read as followeth THat the said CHARLS STUART being * * Then his induction is better then theirs that come in by absolute conquest and now govern us by the sword as slaves admitted King of England and therein trusted with a limited Power to govern by and according to the Laws of the ††But H. Peters saith there is now no Law but the sword and the wil and pleasure of those that now rule by it See his discourse with mee 25. May 1649. p. 4. 5. Land and not otherwise And by his Trust Oath and Office being obliged to use the power committed to him for the good and benefit of the People and for the preservation of their Rights and Liberties Yet nevertheless out of a wicked Design to erect and uphold in himself an unlimited and tyrannical power to rule according to his ‖ ‖ Cromwels and the rest of the great Sword-mens constant practice will and to overthrow the Rights and Liberties of the People Yea to take away and make void the foundations thereof and of all redress and remedy of mis government which by the fundamental Constitutions of this Kingdom were reserved on the peoples behalf in the right and power of frequent and successive Parliaments or National meetings in Councel He the said Charles Stuart for accomplishing such his Designs and for the protecting of himself and his adherents in His and Their wicked practices to the same Ends hath trayterously and maliciously levied VVar against the present Parliament and the People therein * * And so hath Cromwel and Ireton c. which I will prove upon my life and therefore as traitors ought to dy much more then the King who till now hath by Parliaments c. themselves been often declared not to be subject to the penall part of the Law Represented Particularly upon or about the 13 day of June in the yeer of our Lord 1642 at Beverly in the County of York And upon or about the 30 day of July in the yeer abovesaid in the County of the City of York And upon or about the 24 day of Aug. in the same yeer at the County of the Town of Nottingham when and where he set up his Standard of war And also on or about the 23 day of October in the same yeer at Edg-Hill and Keinton-field in the County of Warwick And upon or about the 13 day of Novemb. in the same yeer at Brainford in the County of Middlesex And upon or about the 30 day of Aug. in the yeer of our Lord 1643 at Cavesham-Bridg neer Reading in the County of Berks And upon or about the 13 day of October in the yeer last mentioned at or neer the City of Glocester And upon or about the 13 day of Novemb. in the yeer last mentioned at Newbery in the County of Berks And upon or about the 31 day of July in the yeer of our Lord 1644 at Cropredy-Bridg in the County of Oxon And upon or about the 30 of Septemb. in the yeer last mentioned at Bodmin and other places neer adjacent in the County of Cornwal And upon or about the 30 day of Novemb. in the yeer last mentioned at Newbery aforesaid And upon or about the 8 day of June in the yeer of our Lord 1645 at the Town of Leicester And also upon the 14 day of the same month in the same yeer at Nasâ—â—y-field in the County of Northampton At which several times and places or most of them and at many other places in this Land at several other times within the yeers aforementioned and in the yeer of our Lord 1646 He the said Charls Stuart hath caused and procured many thousands of the free people of the Nation to be slain and by Divisions Parties and Insurrections within this Land by invasions from forrain parts endeavoured and procured by Him and by many other evill wayes and meanes He the said CHARLES STUART hath not only maintained and carryed on the said War both by Land and Sea curing the yeeres before mentioned but also hath renewed or â—â—used to be renewed the said War against the Parliament and good People of this Nation in this present (*) (*) Of which years war Cromwel Ireton by their cheating jugling hindering the setling the liberties of the Nation are were mâ—re guilty of by thousands of degres then the King or any of his party and if they had been but honest to their primitive engagements the wars had never been upon whose heads alone principally all the blood shed in those wars lyes say I Iohn Lilburn year 1648. in the Counties of Kent Essex Surrey Sussex Middlesex and many other Counties and places in England and Wales and also by Sea And particularly He the said Charles Stuart hath for that purpose Given Commissions to his son the Prince and others whereby besides multitudes of other persons many such as were by the Parliament intrusted and imployed for the safety of the Nation being by him or His Agents corrupted to the betraying of their Trust revolting from the Parliament have had intertainment and Commission for the continuing and renewing of war and hostility against the said Parliament and People as aforesaid By which Cruel and Unnaturall wars by him the said Charles Stuart levyed continued and renewed as aforesaid much Innocent blood of the (*) (*) But I am sure the chief prosecutors of this charge have made us now perfect slaves and are most superlatively 〈◊〉 of all that in the next words followeth Free-People of this Nation hath been spilt many Families have been undone the Publick Treasury wasted exhausted Trade obstructed and miserably decayed vast expence and damage to the Nation incurred and many parts of the Land spoyled some of them even to desolation And for further prosecution of His said Evill designs He the said Charles Stuart doth still continue His Commissions to the said Prince and other Rebels and Revolters both English and Forrainers and to the Earl of Ormond and to the Irish Rebels and Revolters associated with him from whom further Invasions upon this Land are threatned upon the procurement and on the behalf of the said Charles Stuart All which wicked designs Wars and evill practises of him the said Charles Stuart have been and are carryed on * * mark this well for the advancing and upholding of the personall interest of Will and Power and pretended Prerogative to Himself and His Family against the Publick Interest Common Right Liberty Iustice and Peace of the People of this Nation by and for whom he was entrusted as aforesaid By all which it appeareth that He the said Charles Stuart hath been and is the Occasioner Author and Contriver of the said Unnaturall Cruel and Bloody Wars and therein guilty of all the Treasons Murthers Rapines Burnings Spoiles Desolations Damage and Mischief to this Nation acted or committed in the said wars or occassoned thereby And the said Iohn Cook by Protestation saving on the behalf of the (*) (*) Which as they carry their businesse they judge to be no more but Cromwel Ireton Bradshaw Haslerig all the rest being really their slalves in several degrees People of England the liberty of Exhibiting at any time hereafter any other Charge against the said CHARLES STUART and also of replying to the Answers which the said CHARLES STUART shall make to the Premises or any of them or any other Charge that shall be so exhibited doth for the said Treasons and Crimes on the behalf of the said People of England Impeach the said Charles Stuart as a Tyrant Traytor Murtherer and a publick Implacable Enemy to the Common wealth of England And pray That the said CAARLS STUART King of England may be put to answer all and every the Premises That such Proceedings Examinations Tryals Sentence and Judgment may be thereupon had as shall be agreeable to Justice FINIS
AN IMPEACHMENT OF HIGH TREASON AGAINST Oliver Cromwel and his Son in Law Henry Ireton Esquires late Members of the late forcibly dissolved House of Commons presented to publique view by Lieutenant Colonel Iohn Lilburn close Prisoner in the Tower of London for his real true and zealous affections to the Liberties of his native Country In which following Discourse or Impeachment he engageth upon his life either upon the principles of Law by way of indictment the only and alone legall way of all tryals in England or upon the principles of Parliaments ancient proceedings or upon the principles of reason by pretence of which alone they lately took away the Kings life before a legal Magistracy when there shal be one again in England which now in the least there is not to prove the said Oliver Cromwel guilty of the highest Treason that ever was acted in England and more deserving punishment and death Then the 44 Judges hanged for injustice by King Alfred before the Conquest or then the Lord chief Justice Wayland and his associates tormented by Edw. 1. Or then Judg Thorpe condemned to dye for Bribery in Edw. 3. time Or then the two dis-throned Kings Edw 2. and Rich. 2. Or then the Lord chief Justice Tresillian who had His throat cut at Tyburn as a Traitor in Rich. 2. time for subverting the Law and all his associates Or then those two grand Traytorly subverters of the Laws and Liberties of England Empson and Dudley who therefore as Traytors lost their heads upon Tower-hill in the beginning of Henr. 8. raign Or then trayterous Cardinal Wolsey who after he was arrested of Treason poysoned himself Or then the late trayterous Ship-Money Judges who with one Verdict or Judgment destroyed all our propertie Or then the late trayterous Bishop of Canterbury Earl of Strafford Lord-Keeper Finch Secretary VVindebanck or then Sir George Ratcliff or all his Associates Or then the two Hothams who lost their heads for corresponding with the Queen c. Or then the late King Charls whom themselves have beheaded for a Tyrant and traytor In which are also some Hints of Cautions to the Lord FAIRFAX for absolutely breaking his solemn Engagement with his souldiers c. to take head and to regain his lost Credit in acting honestly in time to come in helping to settle the Peace and Liberties of the Nation which truly really and lastingly can never be done but by establishing the principles of the Agreement of the Fâ—â—â— People that being really the peoples interest and all the rest that went before but particular and selvish In which is also the Authors late Proposition sent to Mr Holland June 26. 1649. to justifie and make good at his utmost hazard upon the principles of Scripture Law Reason and the Parliaments and Armies ancient Declarations his late actions or writings in any or all his Books Ier. 5.26 27 â—8 29. For among my peoyle are found wicked â—en they lye in wait as he that setteth snares they set a trap they catch men As a cage is full of Birds so are their houses full of deceit therefore they are become great and waxen rich They are waxen fat they shine yea they overpass the deeds of the wicked they judg not the cause the cause of the Fatherless yet they prosper and the right of the needy doe they not judg Shall I not visit for those things saith the Lord Shall not my soul be avenged of such a Nation as this Imprinted at LONDON Anno Dom. 1649. The Author to the Courteous Reader COurteous Reader There wanting room at the conclusion of this Discourse to make a Postscript I am necessitated to make it upon the back of the Title page that being the last printed and to acquaint thee that divers weeks agoe this discouse was all in a manner printed which I have been necessitated to keep in ever since by reason of a little liberty I obtained of the day time to visit my sick and distressed family which by sicknes have been sorely afflicted by the wise hand of him that dispenseth all his dealings to those that truly know him in mercy and loving kindnesse with the bowels of a loving father yea in afflictions his seeming frowns hath that end in them to draw the souls of his nigher and closer to himself and that thereby they may truly and substantially see that in the naked injoyment of himself that is not to be found in all earthly or creature objects or delights and his wise hand having thought it fit to exercise my faith and patience by taking away both my Sons from me who were the greatest part of my earthly delight in this world and brought my wife and daughter even to deaths door which affliction I must truly acknowledge made me unfit to think almost of any earthly thing and became unto me a greater tryall of my dependence upon God then ever I had in my life especially being not alone by my self but a company like Jobs with many other bitter ones but my sweet father letting me see his hand in it and being merciful to me in sparing and recovering my wife and daughter and hath as it were brought my spirit to its selfe which hath made me wait for a righteous and hoped for composure betwixt my unrighteous adversaries and my self and which if it had come I had burnt this discourse in whose promises I constantly find nothing but meer delusions and therefore am compelled in my own spirit to let this fly and the rather because Sir Arthur Haâ—â—erig and Colonel Fenwick treacherously and theevishly have not only without any pretence of Law and Justice but their meer wills seized upon above 1000l of my estate in the North but also most maliciously detaine it in their hands and are so resolved to do which action tends to the apparent ruine and destruction of me and the rest of my Family remaining alive whose wickednesse in this particular c. I have hinted at in the following discourse pag 6. 8. as also in the 12 page of the late second edition of my Book Entituled The legall Fundamentall Liberty of the People of England revived the 2 last pages of which I also intreat the Reader carefully to peruse which with other grand oppressions both general and particular remaining upon me in severall particulars and also seing no rationall hopes of any just composure I am resolved being I am in manner a weary of any thing I can see abroad through the assistance of God to be as prodigall of my pen and life for the future as my bloody and tyrannicall adversaries are of their oppression cruelty tyranny and blood-thirstines and so I rest this present August 1649. as much as ever IOHN LILBURN To all the Affectors and Approvers in England of the London Petition of the eleventh of September 1648. but especially to the owners of it by their subscriptions either to it or any other Petition in the behalf of it and particularly to the
for he is no such thing but is meerly a great Tyrant standing by the power of his own will and a strong sword born by his vassals slaves and creatures having no commission to be General either from Law the Parliament or from the prime Laws of Nature and Reason For First where he was first made General by both Houses of Parliament it was expresly against the letter of the Law which action cannot be justified either before God or man but in case of extream necessity and for the accomplishment of a universall righteous end viz. The redeeming setling and securing the peoples rational and just Rights and Freedoms and not in the least for setting up any particular selvish or factious interest But secondly in refusing to disband c. he hath rebelled against his Parliament commission and thereby destroyed and annihilated it And at New-Market Heath the fifth of June 1647. betook himself to the prime Laws of Nature and by common consent of his Officers and Souldiers became their General and entred into a solemn and mutuall ingagement before God and one another for the accomplishment of those righteous ends therein contained for the good of the Kingdom and themselves by subscribing his name or at least expresly assenting thereunto and approving thereof with solemn ingagement as is at large Printed in the Armies Book of Declarations p. 23 24 25 26. by the very letter of which he nor his Officers could not govern the Army jointly or severally by the former Rules or Articles of Martiall Law no nor so much as make an Officer of the meanest quality nor put forth any publike Declaration nor treat with nor conclude with any in reference to the Army but by the joynt advice and approbation of their new erected and established councel of Adjurators which for order and methods sake the General was betrusted to convene and call together as the King formerly was Parliaments or the Lord Mayor of London Common Councels and yet notwithstanding he and his Officers like a generation of most perfidious false and faithless men broke all this ingagement to pieces within less then twenty dayes after it was made and so annihilated and destroyed his power authority or commission flowing from the consent of the Souldiers before he had really accomplished any one thing he or they ingaged for and hath since two severall times put a nullity or force upon his originall Creators Lords and Masters the Parliament And that he and his Officers broke their forementioned solemn ingagements in so short a time I prove fully out of their own book of Declarations in which page 36. to 46 I finde a Declaration dated the 14. of June 1647. made and published by his Excellency Sir Thomas Fairfax with the Officers and Souldiers of his Army mark it well for in the very words of it it is in Excellency worth all the Declarations that ever the Army made since and in page 47. to 50. I finde a generall charge against the eleven Members with a paper delivered with it to the Parliaments Commissioners at St. Albans the 17. June 1647 by the appointment of his Excellency Sir T. Fairfax and the Soldiers of the Army under his command but in the following pages viz. pag. 51 52 53 54. I finde that the 21 22 25. of June 1647. his Excellency and his Councel of War alone without the Councel of Adjutators representing the Souldiers according to their ingagement writ letters to and entered into a Treaty with the Lord Mayor and Common-Councel of London which was a base perfidious treacherous act and an absolute breach of their solemn ingagement yea in page 57. June 23. 1647. The General and twenty eight Grandee and creature Officers publish a Remonstrance to the Kingdom and that in the name of the Army in which base and abominable apostacie they continued without ever wiping their mouths or recanting what they had so unjustly done as the whole tenor of their Book of Declarations doth declare yea when the particular charge against the eleven Members comes from them it comes onely in the name of the General and his Councel of War page 94. yea and all this with ten times more as I beleeve the world will shortly and fully see was done in despite of the Adjutators or consent of the Regiments Troops or Companies for all those two grand and lying Apostates Cornet Den and Parson John Can a late cheat at Amsterdam confident affirmations to the contrary in their late Printed lying books intituled the Levellers Design page 4 5. and the second part of the Discoverer page 5. 6. where they aver That the councel of Adjutators established by the Armies solemn ingagement was dissolved and made null by the same power by which they had their constitution and that it was done by a Petition to the Generall from most of the Regiments c. But although I iudg the two forementioned lying base Apostates to be so abominably vile that I judg not my excrements mean enough upon equal terms to ballance against them yet knowing the affairs of the Army then so extraordinarily well as I do I will ballance life against life that neither they nor any man breathing can produce a Petition so much as from one single Troop or Company much less from a Regiment and therefore much less from the greatest part of the Regiments both of Horse and Foot for calling home the Adjutators before the Gen. and his Officers had as is before mentioned broke in pieces the solemn engagement again and again and invasion of Rights and Priviledges was the true declared ground and cause of all the late wars with the late beheaded King and is really the originall ground of most if not all the cruell wars in the world But if the Souldiers had made such a Petition which they never did it were not much materiall I think for they ingaged something to and for the Kingdom in reference to the setlement of their Liberties and Freedoms which I am sure they in no one title ever accomplished or performed and therefore till that be done they can not rationally or justly absolve themselves from the true intent or meaning of that engagement But I wish those Champions for lies and Apostasie would instance the place where the time when and the Regiments that subscribed and delivered such a Petition and deal ingeniously with the world whether it were a free act or a compulsive one wrought underhand by all the snares policies tricks gins and slights that possible the Officers could invent without or below a visible and compulsive force which can never of right unty that knot Sure I am divers of the Adiutators c. sent severall complaints to me c. to the lower from St. Albans immediatly after the solemn ingagement was made complaining that Cromwel Ireton c. one of which two pen'd this engagement would needs then by force and frowns totally break and dissolve it of which baseness though then we
upon them unto the distressed and oppressed Commons or people of this Nation yea the setling of which principles is that that will thereby make it evident and apparent unto all rationall and understanding people in the world that the reall and hearty good and welfare of the people of this Nation hath cordially and in good earnest been that that their souls have hunted for and thirsted after in all the late bloody civill wars and contests All the Contests of the Kings party for his Will and Prerogative being meerly Selvish and so none of the peoples interest and the contest of the Presbyterians for their â—â—ke-bate dividing and hypocriticall Covenant no better in the least and the present contest of the present dissembling interest of Independents for the peoples Liberties in generall read the following Discourse pag. 27 28 29 meerly no more but Self in the highest and to set up the false saint and most desperate Apostate murderer and traytor Oliver Cromwel by a pretended election of his mercinary souldiers under the selfe name of the godly Interest to be King of England c. that being now too too apparently all the intended Liberties of the people that ever he fought for in his life that so he might rule and govern them by his Will and Pleasure and so destroy and envassalize their lives and properties to his lusts which is the highest treason that ever was committed or acted in this Nation in any sense or kinde either first in the eye of the Law or secondly in the eye of the ancient but yet too much arbitrary proceedings of Parliament or thirdly in the eye of their own late declared principles of reason by pretence of which and by no rules of Law in the least they took away the late Kings head and life which it there were any Law or Justice in England to be had or any Magistrates left to execute it as in the least there is not I durst undertake upon my life plainly evidently and undeniably to make good the foresaid unparalleld treasons against the foresaid Ol. Cromwel upon against all the three forementioned principles viz Law Parliament and Reason yea and to frame against him such an Impeachment or Indictment which way of Indictments is the true legall and only just way of England to be tried at the Common Law higher and greater then all the charges against the fourty four Judges hanged for false and illegal Judgments by King Alfred before the conquest which with their crimes are recorded in the Law Book called The mirror of Justice Printed in English for Matthew Walbank at Grayes Inn gate 1646. page 239. 240. 241. 242. 243. 244. 245. See also page 196. 197. 207. ibid. Or then the impeachment or accusation Of the Lord chief Justice Wayland and the rest of his brother Judges and Lawyers tormented in Edward the first his time and mentioned in Speeds Chronicle fol. 635. Or then the impeachment in Parliament against Judg Thorp who for taking small bribes against his oath was condemned to die in Edward the third his time of whom you may read in the 3. part Cooks Institut fol. 155 156. and in Mr. Pyms Speech against the Earl of Strafford in the Book called Speeches and Passages of Parliament pag. 9. Or then the impeachment 〈◊〉 a charge of the dethroned King Edward the second in full Parliament the maner of whose dethroning you may notably read in Speeds Chronicle fol. 665. Or then the many Articles of impeachment of the dethroned King Richard the second in full Parliament recorded at large in the Chronicles or History of Will. Martin fol 156. 157. 158. 159. the 8. 10. 12. 15. 21. Articles of which I conceive must remarkable as to the people which are extraordinary well worth the reading for in them the King himself in those dark days of Popery is charged To have perverted the due course of the Law or Justice and Right and that he destroyed men by information without legal examination or tryal and that he had declared the Laws of the Kingdom were in his own Erest just the same thing do Mr. Peters and other mercenary Agents of the Grandees of the Army now constantly declare of them and that by himself and his own authority just Cromwel and Ireton like onely much short of them he had displaced divers Burgesses of the Parliament and had placed such other in their rooms as would better fit and serve his own turn Or then the impeachment of the Lord chief Justice Trisâ—lian who had the worship or honor in Richard the second his time in full Parliament to be apprehended in the forenoon and hanged at Tiburn in the afternoon with his brother Judges viz. Fulthorp Belknay Care Hot Burge and Lockton or their associates Sir Nicholas Bramble Lord Mayor of London Sir Simon Burley Sir William Elinham Sir John Salisbury Sir Thomas Trevit Sir James Bernis and Sir Nicholas Dodgworth some of whom were destroyed and hanged for setting their hands to Judgments in subversion of the Law in advancing the Kings will above Law yea and one of them banished therefore although a dagger was held to his brest to compel him thereunto Or then the indictment of those two grand and notorious traitorly subvertors of the Laws and Liberties of England Empson and Dudley Privy Counsellors to Henry the seventh recorded in Cooks 4. part Institut fol. 198. 199 read also fol 41. ibid. and 2. part Instit fol. 51. Or then the impeachment of that notorious wicked and traiterous man Cardinal Woolsey by King Henry the eight his Privy Councel recorded in the 4. part Cooks Instit fol. 89. 90. 91. 92. 93. 94. 95. Read especially Artic. 17. 20. 21. 23 25 26. 30. 31. 33. 35. 38. 42. in all which he is charged with Arbitrariness and subversion of the Law Or then the impeachment of the Shipmoney Judges who in one judgment did as much as in them lay destroy all the Properties of all the men in England read the notable Speeches against them in Speeches and Passages Or then the impeachment of the Bishop of Canterbury in the late Parliament Or then the impeachment of the Lord Keeper Finch Earl of Strafford Secretary Windebank Sir Richard Bolton Lord Chancellor of Ireland John Lord Bishop of Derry Sir Gerrard Lowther Knight Lord chief Justice of the Common Pleas in Ireland and Sir George Ratcliff all whose impeachments are recorded in a Book intituled Speeches and Passages of Parliament from November 1640. to June 1641. Pag. 76. 77. to 83. and 117. 118. to 143. and 174. and 256. 257. 258. Or then the Articles or charge against the two Sir John Hothams the elder of which kept the King out of Hull the beginning of these Wars when the House of Commons durst not command him positively to do it although they were effectually put upon it by a motion from the younger then sitting in the House and yet they were both beheaded as Traytors for but endevoring to
is not long since the Army or the leaders thereof charged divers of your principal members as traytors therefore as appears in their Book of Declarations page 83. 85. the liberty of which they reckon amongst the prime Liberties of this Nation for the pretended preservation of which there hath been almost eight 〈◊〉 bloody wars as appears largely in their forementioned pages but especially page 44. 118. yea and waged war with the Parliament their Lords Masters and Impowrers for abridging them thereof as clearly appears in their own Declarations which makes it plain and evident that such a Declaration made by the House of Commons against their Petition as the House made 27. March last against one they supposed me to have a hand in was the original and first declared cause of all the Armies contest with and rebellion against the Parliament But that I should not only be imprisoned for nothing but close imprisoned sometimes from the very society of my wife and children and ever since the ninth of May 1649. to be debarred the society and visits of my friends and acquaintance which the very Pagan Romans would not do to Paul that pestilent fellow and a turner of the world upside down as Tertullus accused him to be yea to be mewed up close in my lodging with a Padlock upon my door and Sentinels set thereat night and day that I shall not so much as speak at a distance with any of my fellow prisoners and worse dealt with besides then the Canibals do with their poor imprisoned Captives who feed them fat with good cheer against the day of slaughter or then the States of Holland do their intended to be executed theeves traytors or murderers whom they largely and plentifully provide for in their imprisonment yea or worse then King Charls whom you have beheaded for a Tyrant did by his prisoners in this very place unto the meanest of whom out of the Exchequer he allowed three pound a week for their maintenance during their imprisonment in this place yea and to divers of your very members that were men of great estates and possessed them peaceably in the third four fifth c. years of his raign he allowed them four pound and more at week apeece for their diet when things were cheap to what they are now and ye for much of my time you proffered me never a peny and when you do you do in a mock and scorn proffer me at most but twenty shillings a week which will do little more then pay for the necessary attendance in the close and extraordinary condition you have put me in which I confess I refused with as much scorn as it was sent me which close and extraordinary tormenting condition in the heat of Summer without permitting me to step out of my lodging to take a little Air admit you were as unquestionable a power as ever was in England and that I had really committed treason cannot in the least by the Law of England he justifiable the equity and justice of which Law abhors any torture or torment whatsoever to any prisoners though never so criminous least that his pain or torture or torment should take away his reason and constrain him to answer otherwise then of his free will torture forcing many times the innocent person to tell lies which Law and Justice otherwise abhor and therefore that never enough to be magnified Lawyer Sir Edward Cook saith That there is no one opinion in all our Law Books or Judiciall Records that he hath seen and remembers for the maintenance of torture or torments c. persons being meerly instituted by Law for safe keeping in order to a speedy triall but not in the least for punishment or torment as is most excellently declared by him in the 1. Part Instit fol. 260. 2. and 2. Part fol. 42. 43. 186. 315. 316. 589. and 3. Part fol. 3435. and 4. Part fol. 168. And all this present unjust usage of me to come not onely from the hands of my large pretended friends whose just interest according to their own published Declarations I have with all faithfulness in the midst of many deaths for many yeers together faithfully served and advanced with all my might But also of those that would seem to abhor and abominate the Ruling and Governing by will and Arbitrary power as the wickedest and detestablest thing in the world and so declare it to be 1. Part. Book Declarations pag. 172. 195. 214. 264. 281. 342. 464. 492. 494. 496. 498. 663. 666. 690. 699 728. 750. And that have raised and maintained a bloody war for seven yeers together principally for the pretended preservation of the Laws and Liberties of England that have pulled down the Star Chamber High Commission Councel Table and House of Peers for oppression and arbitrary injustice nay and beheaded the King the quondam glory of some of your great ones eyes * * As is undeniably demonstrated in my following impeachment of Lieutenant General Cromwel and his son Ireton at the Bar of the House of Commons the 19. Janu. 1647. And offered again and again there upon my life to make it good as cleerly appears by Putney projects Mr. John Wildemans Truths Triumph pag. 7 8. and Major Huntingtons charge delivered to the Parliament August 2. 1648. against Lieutenant General Cromwel c. pretendedly for Tyranny and Oppression as your selves state his Case in your notable Declaration about Non-Addresses dated the 11. of Febr. 1647. and your remarkable Declaration of the 17. of March 1648. Yea and have suffered your Solicitor General Mr. John Cook notably in Print to state his Oppressions yea and to draw most notable pregnant and cutting inferences from them as he doth in the 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 11 14. 15. 17. 20. 22. 26. 31. 36. 39. 42. pages thereof two of which onely I shall now make use of The first is in pag. 22. where he arguing of the right execution of Trusts saith That when any is intrusted with the sword for the protection and preservation of the people if this man shall imploy it to their destruction which was put into his hands for their safety by the Law of that Land he becomes an enemy to that people and deserves the most exemplary and severe punishment that can be invented and this is the first necessary and fundamental Law of every Kingdom Which if it be true as you cannot contradict it it being your own doctrine then it is easie to make Application a majore ad minus The second is in pag. 42. where he declares That in pronouncing Sentence against the King and executing Justice upon him you have not onely pronounced Sentence against one Tyrant alone but against Tyranny it self therefore saith he there if any of them meaning the High Court of Justice and the Parliament shall turn Tyrants or consent to set up any kinde of Tyranny by a Law or suffer any unmerciful domineering over the Consciences Persons and Estates of
of the people would joyne in the Petition and act to save themselves with vigour and strength there might then be some encouragement for us once againe to joyne in acting with them but for any thing could be perceived the generality of the people were as willing to be slaves as any were to have them so and having been so often jaded had set down with a kind of a resolution to stir no more come what would come therefore we being but a small number to the whole our striving in this case was but to sow the wind Unto which Mr Speaker it was answered much to this effect That the great end wherefore God sent man into the world was that he should do good in his generation and thereby glorifie God in his generation and it is said of Christ that he made it his worke to go up and down to do good unto all that he could meet with and therein he was declared to be like unto his Father the immitating of which he had required of al of us that should do good to all men and how did we imitate him in this if our friends our Country-men our brethren were ready to perish and in their sottishnesse were ready to be destroyed and God had opened our eyes to see it and yet we would not do the best we could to save and preserve them though they were unwilling to save and preserve themselves Nay Mr Speaker it was there further pressed that to sit stil in such a universall perishing case as this is was so far below a Christian that it was beneath and below the very light of nature and selfe-preservation that was evinced after this manner as I am an individual I am a part of the whole Nation and if it perish in the eye of reason I and mine must perish with it But the whole Nation is in danger of an universal destruction by oppression injustice and decay of Trade which would speedily bring famine and that would bring all manner of confusion by the poor peoples rising up to cut the throats of the rich-men to get their estates and monies to buy them bread and to preserve nature and in this horrible confusion we should be a prey to every forraigne enemy that would first invade us and if such a thing should happen we must become an Aceldoma a desolation a wildernesse a field of bloud And I clearly see all this before my eies and yet I wil sit stil and do nothing towards the publique safety in which I am transcendently concerned and involved because the far greater part of my neighbours sit down in silence and are like sots resolved or ready to perish in their sottishnesses and I must perish with them am I not guilty of mine owne ruine and destruction if when I see it before me and sottishly sit downe and use not my uttermost indeavours to preserve the whole in the preservation of which I am preserved because the rest of my neighbours and friends wil not joyne with me to do it Nay Mr. Speaker it was further pressed that in such a case as this is which is now the case of the Kingdome I am bound and tied in conscience and duty to my selfe with vigour and strength to act although my neigbour refuseth salvation or preservation by me and commands me not to save him And it was further illustrated in this manner my neighbours House is on fire and I clearly see if it be not quenched mine is likely to be burned by it whereupon I go to my neighbour and proffer him my helpe to quench it and he being it may be in a fright a fullennesse a sottishnesse a mase a distemper or a revengefull maliciousnesse refuseth my help yea and commands me not to helpe him but threatens me if I doe yet notwithstanding all this I am bound in duty to selfe and universall preservation to help to do it whether he wil or no yea to pull down his house to help to quench the fire to keep my owne and my neighbours from being burnt whereas if none of this were but that his house were standing and in no such danger for me then against his wil and mind to set my foot over his threshold I am a transgressor and an incroacher upon my nighbours rights and properties In the second place Mr Speaker it was answered That in case my neighbour were a drowning of himself and I see it I were bound by the Law of God and Nature whether he would or no to save him nay but much more if in his drowning I were likely to be drowned with him were I bound to save him if I can although he laid a thousand commands upon me to the contrary And hereabouts as I remember it was further objected That the people all over the Kingdom were generally very ignorant and malignant and hated the Parliament and us whom they called Roundheads Independents c. for our cordiall adhering to them under whom they groan under greater oppressions and burthens then before the Parliament and for all their expences and fightings were never a bit the freer either at present or in future grounded hopes and therfore for us that were for the foresaid reason so faithfull to the generality of the people to act in this petition they would but contemn it for our sakes and be provoked to rise up against us Unto which Mr Speaker my self c. answered to this effect The people are generally malignant and more for the King then the Parliament but what 's the reason but because their burthens are greater now then before and are likely to continue without any redresse or any visible valuable consideration holden out unto them for all the bloud and treasure they had spent for their liberties and freedoms and the reason why they were so ignorant and did so little inquire after their liberties and freedom was Mr Speaker because that though the Parliament had declared in generall that they engaged to fight for their liberties yet they never particularly told them what they were nor never distinctly held forth the glory and splendour of them to make them in love with them and to study how to preserve them and for want of a clear declaring what was the particulars of the Kings Rights and the nature of his office and what was the Parliaments particular priviledges power and duty to the people of the Kingdom that chused and trusted them and what particularly was the peoples rights and freedoms they were hereby left in blindnesse and ignorance and by reason of their oppressions because they knew no better doted implicitly upon the King as the fountain of peace justice and righteousnesse without whom nothing that was good could have a being in this Kingdom So I told them Mr Speaker it was no marvail that the poor people in this particular were in FOGS MISTS WILDERNESSES AND DARKNESSE considering that this House in their Declarations had so plaid at fast and loose
with them for though Mr Speaker this House voted to this effect That the King seduced by evil councel had made War against the Parliament and people and that they are traitors that assisted * 1 part Book Decl. pag. 259 260 508 509 576 722 914. him And further declared That he had set up his Standard against the Parliament and people and hereby put the whole Kingdom out of his protection contrary to the trust reposed in him contrary to his oath dissolving Government thereby and that he in his own person marched up in the head of an Army by force of Arms to destroy the Parliament and in them the whole Kingdom their Laws and ‖ 1 part Book Decl. pag. 580 584 587 617 639 690. Liberties And yet Mr Speaker with the same breath declared The King is the fountain of justice and that he can do no †1 part pag. 199 304. wrong and forc'd the people to take Oaths and Covenants to preserve his person and yet at the same time gave the Earl of Essex and all those under him Commission To fight with kill and slay all that opposed them and declared the King in his own period marched in the head of an Army to oppose and destroy them and yet gave them a Commission to fight for King and Parliament So that Mr Speaker here is riddle upon riddle and mysterie upon mysterie which doth even confound and amaze the people and put them into Woods and Wildernesses that they could not see or know where they are or what to think of themselves or of the Parliament or of the King only this they very well know that their burthens are greater now then ever they were before and that they have been made fools in pretendingly fighting for liberty which hath brought them into bondage And that though it was formerly declared the King had no Negative voyce or Legislative power but is bound by his Oath to passe all such Laws as the people folk or Commons shall * 1 part Book Decl. pag. 205 â—06 208 268 269 270 705 706 707 708 710 713 714. chuse Yet now the Parliament send unto him again and again for his concurrence to their acts as though the giving of life soul and power to their actings were indiâ—putably and inseparably inherent in him and as though now their consciences told them they must crave pardon of him for all the actions they have done without him and against him O riddles and unfathomable mysteries sufficiently able to make the people desirous to be ignorant of their liberties and freedoms and never to hear of them more especially considering they have paid so dear pretendedly for the injoyment of them and yet after five years fighting for them know not where to find one of them But Mr Speaker they were told that in this petition the people had clearly held out unto them and that upon the undeniable principles of reason and justice the Kings Rights the Parliaments and their own and that the two former were and of right alwaies ought to be subservient to the good of the latter and they were told it was not so much persons as things that they doted upon and therfore undoubtedly those that should really hold out justice and righteousnesse unto the people was those that they would be in love with and therfore in mercy to our selves and in love and compassion to our native Country it was pressed that every man that desired to fulfill his end in coming into the World and to be like unto his Master in doing good should vigorously promote and further this just and gallant Petition as the principall means to procure safety peace justice and prosperity to the Land of our Nativity and knit the hearts and spirits of our divided Country-men in love again each unto other and in love unto us which they could not chuse but afford when they should visibly see we endeavoured their good as well and as much as our own there being all the principall foundations of freedom and justice that our hearts could desire or long after in this very petition And if our greatest end were not accomplished in our prosecuting of this petition viz. the Parliaments establishing the things therein desired yet the promoting of it would beget understanding and knowledge in the people when they should hear it and read it and discourse upon it and if nothing but that were effected our labour would not be totally lost for nothing did more instate Tyrants in the secure promotion of tyrannie then ignorance and blindnesse in the people And therfore for the begetting of knowledge it was requisite it should be promoted as also for healing of the divisions amongst the people and knitting them together in love that so their minds might be diverted from studying the destruction each of other to study the destruction of Tyrants that would in time destroy them all And Mr Speaker there was one in the company that made a motion to this effect That he did conceive it was more requisite at present speedily to second the Armies Declaration with a petition to encourage this House vigorously to go on to prosecute their late gallant Votes of Non-Addresses for so they were called to which was answered That in this petition was contained more then was in all all their Votes for it struck at the very root of all that Tyrannie that had enslaved and would enslave us viz. the Negative voyce in King and Lords both which the Votes did not and it was impossible that there could be an active Member in the House of Commons but knew that this petition was promoting all over the Kingdom which did abundantly declare greater encouragement to all those Members of the House that really intended good unto the Commonwealth then possible could be in a single complementall petition signed with 4 or 5000 hands such a petition being rather fit to puff them up then upon reall grounds to strengthen and encourage them fully to mind the peoples good and there was never a Member of the House whose design in the largest extent was no more then the pulling down of the King that so he might be a King himself but of necessitie he must receive more satisfaction and encouragement from the knowledge of the promoting this gallant unparallel'd petition which is a clear demonstration to the Parliament that those that promote it clearly understand that the King and the Lords Tyrannie and their liberties are inconsistent then he could do from a bare complementary petition which would also be dangerous to our selves in quashing the vigorous prosecuting of this that contained the ultimate of our desires and the sum of all those things that in this World we desired to make us happy But Mr Speaker it was again objected That seeing this petition struck so much at the House of Lords as it did who lately it was said had concurred with this House in their gallant Votes against the
our selves that it was impossible for all the professed enemies we had in England to have put such a mischievous division amongst us the bitter fruites of which we had lamentable experience of every day in that it deprived us of the vigorous pursuing of al effectuall meanes to preserve and secure our selves from that eminent ruine and destruction that is even at our very thresholds And therefore it behoved us with all our might to presse hard forward according to the marginall note of our Petition to get our Lawes so strictly setled as though it were impossible that ever an honest man should be borne into the world to be an executor or administrator of them we having found it too true a maxime by experience in Lieut Gen CROMWELL alone that whosoever meanes to settle good Laws must proceed in them with a sinister or evil opinion of all man-kind and suppose ESPECIALLY AFTER HIS GROSSE APOSTACY that whosoever is not wicked it is for want of opportunity and that no State or People can be wisely or securely confident of any publick minister whatsoever continuing good longer then the rod is over his head And Mr Speaker it was further declared that though he might now seeme to face about and to intend just and righteous things to the Kingdome by reason of his late forwardnesse in the late Votes against the King for no more Addresses to Him Yet what rational man could groundlesly judge that he thereby intended a reall good to the Kingdome especially considering that in the very neck of those Votes he and his faction that he hath at command at the head-quarters published a Declaration to the whole Kingdome to maintaine the House of Lords in all their tyrannicall usurpations the continuance of whose Law-making interests is perfect vassalage and bondage to the whole Nation as I have before undeniably and fully proved or the rather may not any rationall knowing man conclude that Lieut Gen Cromwel's and his Son Ireton's late spight against the King did procceed only from animositie and revenge against the King because he had forsaken them and accepted of a better bargaine from the * For so saith Mr John Wildman in his Truths Triumph 7. 8. and he was conversant then at the Head-quarters and knew almost all secrets See also his Putney projects Scots who for their preservation it may be were not onely willing to give Him His Negative voice and an hereafter possession of the Militia but a present right in it and possession of it the which if he enjoyed the Army-Grandees and their accomplices could not reigne over the people as they intended to do for undoubtedly if the King would have taken and accepted of their conditions and stuck close to them and imbrace no other lovers they would never have been so angry with Him but withall their hearts have helped Him to His Crown Throne againe which is evident and clear from Iretons transcendent pleading for Him and new Addresses to Him in this House and the open Councels at Putney c. and Mr Speaker while they accused Mr Hollis and Sir Philip Stapleton c. for high Treason for under hand tamperings with the King they themselves out-stript them at that very time in that which they declared a crime in them for Mr Speaker their under hand tamperings with the King were but petty ones to those grand ones these apostates had for Mr Speaker as I said among my friends I do now aver at this Bar having my relation from so knowing good hands upon the place that I dare ingage at my utmost peril before this House at this Bar to prove by exceeding good testimony to this effect That when the proposals of the Army had past the great or Generall Councell of the Army for so themselves called it and therefore I wil give it the same name Commissary General Ireton declared to diverse of the chief Officers he would send a copy of them to the King which being opposed by them he replied that he was engaged by promise to send a copy to the King and therefore he would send one though the General hanged him for so doing And Mr Speaker he did send one to the King and that by the hands of Cromwels own Major viz. †Which Major Huntington confesseth and averreth in the 6th and 7th pages of his printed reasons for laying downe his Commission which by way of impeachment against Cromwell and Ireton he delivered into both Houses of Parliament August 2. 1648. which because of the pertinency of it to prove the most of my charge against him and because it comes from one that then lay at his very heart and was his choice agent and instrument in most of his underhand negotiations with the King then the joy of his heart and the delight of his eyes I shall incert it verbatim at the last end hereof and intreat the judicious Reader to peruse it seriously as as true a piece I believe as ever was Printed in England and so I often declared it to be in my thoughts to diverse of Cromwels owne friends when it was first delivered to both Houses though I could not joyne with Huntington at that time in the prosecution of it for Duke Hamiltons hostile invasions sake though I was often solicited to it by great ones and I believe then in my lownesse might have had money enough to have done it but I abhorred it as Mr Cornelius Holland with other present Parliament-men very well knowes and also my reasons therefore Major Huntington who then was the bosome and indeared darling of both Iereton and his Father Cromwell and it viz. the Copy of the proposals was delivered to the Kings owne hands who read it over and WITH HIS OWNE HANDS BLOTTED AND RASED OUT WHAT HE MOST DISLIKED and enterlined it with His own hand in some places which very Copy thus curtail'd and guelded the King sent back to Ireton and IRETON CAVSD THIS GVELDED COPY OF THE KINGS TO BE PRINTED TO THE VIEW OF THE KINGDOME AS THE ARMIES ‖ The Anatomy of which by Mr. John Wildman you may fully read in Putney's Projects pag. PROPOSALS when as indeed in truth Mr Speaker they were no other then the Proposals of the King and himself and therefore no wonder the King to the Parliament so pressed to Treat upon these Proposals as He did so that here was once declared affection enough to the King But Mr. Speaker I do further aver and upon my life profer at your command to produce at this Bar a Gentleman of good quality and of very much integrity and a man of much repute amongst all the honest men in the Army who comming from London to Westminster with me not long since voluntary and freely told me to this effect wâ—â—h avowed confidence to justifie it That Cromwels Son that commands the Generals Life-guard taking notice of his aversenesse to his fathers designâ—s in his continuall crossing him and his
creatures laboured to draw him over to a compliance with his father telling him how great a man his father was likely to be in the Kingdome and thereby able to promote all those that would comply with him for saith he I speake it with confidence as a thing already done that the King himself hath wholly cast himself upon my father and my brother Ireton to make His tearmes for Him and restore Him to His Throne againe * Which Major Huntington in his foresaid charge avers to be a truth pag. 7. he himselfe being the King's messenger to Ireton with it which he delivered to him at Colebrook who received it with joy and returned by him to the King this answer that they should be the veriest knaves that ever lived if in every thing they should not make good whatever they had promised to the King because the King in not declaring against them had given them great advantage against their present adversaries which was the Parliament then sitting at Westminster And Mr. Speaker I know the Gentleman that told me this is a man of so much gallantry and honesty that I am confident that he will scorne for all the Cromwels in the world to deny one sillable he told me and therefore againe Mr. Speaker I do offer upon my credit and life if this House please to produce him at this Bar and upon his oath and life to justifie before you the effectuall substance of what in this particular I have declared unto this Honourable House But Mr. Speaker whether it was the Kings forsaking of Cromwel and Ireton and running over to the Scots as those that had bid most for him it may be being necessitated thereunto for their owne preservation from the fear of an after ruine from the King and Cromwell if the King should come in by the means of Cromwell that had a powerful Army at his command who both of them it may be they thought might be glad of a fit opportunity to chastise them for all their iniquities committed against them and their afforonts put upon them I say Mr. Speaker whether it was the Kings forsaking of Cromwell that made him face about and to be now of late so high against Him for pure love to Justice and the universall good of his Country it could not be or that lost condition he might apprehend himself to be in by his apostacy in the affection of all his old and faithful friends which it may be he might fear might produce him a great deal of danger and mischief especially his perceiving the Kings staggering in his confidence of him if not prevented by his speedy fancig about or at least pretending to justice and righteousnesse amongst men once againe I say whether of these two it were that had the strongest impression upon him to worke so speedy a change in him I know not But this Mr Speaker I said unto my friends and do aver unto you that I was told by a very honest understanding Godly man as I judge him and one that is a very great honourer and doter upon Lieutenant Generall Cromwell and one that hath had many bickerings with me for contesting with him †The man is Mr. Hunt by name now this present July 1649. living in Mr. Hollands lodgings at White-hall and as great a creature of Lieut Gent Cromwels now as ever he was in his life and now as intimate and familiar with him aâ— ever to this effect That there was an honest stout gallant and godly Gentleman of this House for so he stilâ—â— him to me and one that had been right for the Parliament and his Country all along who being lately upon very good grounds in his apprehension told and informed by a Lady of quality in this Kingdom that a bargain was struck betwixt Lieut Gen Cromwel and the King AND THAT CROMWEL WAS TO BE MADE EARL OF ESSEX and since I have heard from other good hands a confirmation of iâ— AND THAT HE WAS TO HAVE BESIDES A GEORGE AND A BLEW RIBBON AND BE MADE A KNIGHT OF THE GARTER c. AND HIS OWN SON BEDCHAMBER-MAN TO THE PRINCE AND HIS SON IN LAW IRETON WAS EITHER TO BE LORD DEPUTY OF IRELAND OR AT LEAST FIELD MARSHALL GENERALL OF IRELAND And this Member of your House as he told me entring into the serious consideration of these things and believing they might be too true was even confounded and amazed in himself that England's Liberties and the protecters and preservers thereof should at once be betraid and as it were bought and sold and that by Lieutenant Generall CROMWEL a quondam bosom friend that he that sometimes had been the glory of English-men for professed honesty publiquely upon the house top should now become the scorn and basest of his Nation in under-hand and under-board while he pretended friendship to honest English-men and their liberties to stab them to the heart by betraying them to the King against whom for the preservation of them they had been fighting all this while was that Mr Speaker that confounded and amazed the gallant Gentleman to think with himself that if this under-hand bargain betwixt the King and Cromwel should be true for it seems he believed it was all the honest men in England that in the integrity of their hearts had adhered to the Parliament and vigorously acted against the King where destroyed and undone and the liberties of England now in a worse condition then they were before any of this late bloud shed for them for by this bargain if the King were restored upon it he would have the interest and power of the Army at his beck and command besides his own party by means of which he would be enabled to cut off the head of every honest gallant English man in England that he had a mind to destroy and for ever to subdue their laws and liberties and make the survivers perfect vassals and slaves The serious consideration of which with a hot burning zealous indignation so fired his soul and elevated his spirit that he by an unresistable force concluded that necessarily one man must perish to save the whole Nation and therfore resolved with himself that he would be the man that would play the part of a second FELTON was by an inward compulsion resolved to go to Windsor then the head Quarters and wherever he met Lieutenant Generall Cromwel either with his pistol or dagger to dispatch him as a desperate apostatized Traitor to the liberties of his Country though he were destroyed when he had so done And truly Mr Speaker as I understand this had been vigorously attempted by him if he had not revealed his intention to a Friend of his another Member of this House who stop'd him by force in a Chamber atWhite-hall And this Gentleman that told me the story speedily hearing of it wrote a large and pithy Letter to the Lieutenant Generall of almost a sheet of paper wherein to my understanding he acquitted
himself not only as a Christian but also as a faithfull English man for Mr Speaker he came to my lodging in * Then at the Sarazens head in Friday street with Mr John Wildman my then bosom Friend and zealous and bold asserter of Englands freedoms though now he hath not only lost all his seal but I am afraid his honesty and his principles and is closed with familiarity and design with Cromwel although no man in England knows his knavery better then he London and told me the effectuall substance of this story and read unto me the copy of his large Letter and took the opportunity thereof to presse me to a patient expectation of the issues of things and to moderate my heat against the Lieutenant Generall for he was confident there would be in him a speedy visible change and he hoped it would be for the good of the Kingdom the fruit of which he doubted not but I in my particular might come speedily to reap And truly Mr Speaker I have perceived a kind of a change in Lieutenant Generall Cromwels visible actions ever since but I wish my understanding could be groundedly satisfied it were upon reall and just principles viz. for the good of the Commonwealth And now Mr Speaker if the House do question the truth of this relation I do believe within a little time I shall be able to procure a copy of the Letter but if I cannot do that now I will engage my credit and life to produce my Author at this Bar who I am confident hath so much honesty in him that he will not deny the truth of what he told me But truly Mr Speaker as for the Gentlemans name of this House that should have been the Second FELTON I was not told it though I confesse so many circumstances were hinted to me that I believe at the first guesse I could name him but I cease that now And desire further to acquaint this House that for all the late seeming changes in Lieutenant Generall Cromwel I press'd them they should not be too credulous in believing him till they see him to be an active instrument really and effectually to do some transcendent thing that was for the universall good of all the Commons of England which I could not fully apprehend in these late Votes of Non-Addresses simply in themselves considered for as yet I could see nothing further in them then a kind of revenge to pull down the King because he had withdrawn his affections from them and at present given them to the Scots by means of which they were deprived of their large hopes of rule and domination over the people under him their sole and only true end enclosing with him and therfore were now necessitated for the obtaining the declared ultimate of their desires viz. the setting up themselves to pull down him And if in there Votes they had intended reall good unto the generality of the people they would have with them instated them in the possession of some just and gallant freedoms and priviledges worth their engaging again with and for the Parliament in a new War and so to have made them in love with the House for their justice and goodnesse handed out unto them that their lives nor estates might not have been dear to them but with willingnesse they might have freely adventured all they had in opposing those that opposed them Whereas now with these Votes they had nothing that was of generall good holden out unto them but the likely hood of a new War in provoking afresh to the highest all the Kings party the Scotch and the Zealots amongst the Presbyters yea and so passing their Votes that in themselves rightly considered they signified nothing for if the Parliament fac'd back again and un-voted them the next Week as it is possible they might these Votes were but a snare to hazard the future destruction of those men that at present should rejoyce at them and in them And Mr Speaker they were desired to consider that if we implicitly and hand over head without first groundedly knowing what should be the prize of all our hazards and bloud should again engage against the King and also against the Scots who had declared so much enmity as to root up by the roots all that would not concur to their every thing and nothing Presbyterie under the names of Heretiques and Sectaries who were now likely upon the Kings interest to invade the Kingdom what should we get by it It 's true we might be the occasion of shedding much bloud but in the conclusion it was possible our own might be shed But suppose we were Conquerours and the Army by our means did overcome the Scots what better were we then nay were we not worse then then now we are and more likely to be made slaves then now we are For seeing the Grandees in the Army and Parliament have declared so much bitternesse and enmity of spirit against all those principles of righteousnesse and justice that we have promoted and proposed without the firm establishment of which it is impossible for us ever to be any other then vassals and those that rule over us perfect Tyrants and if implicitly we should help them to subdue the Scots we should but thereby the more easily enable them to make the more perfect slaves of us when we had whom we might easily see by their malicious and bloudy prosecuting of our late Friends in the Army did not anew begin to court us out of any love to us or out of any free disposition to do us or the Kingdoms good but meerly because they had need of us and did not well know how to go through their work at present * Which I have undeniably proved in my late Book of the 8 June 1649. pag. 34 35 36 37 38. to be their only design in all their courting of us in the day of their distresse and that there is no more truth in the promises and engagements they then made then in the Devils who I will never hereafter believe in whatsoever they say or swear without us For truly Mr Speaker as I told my Friends I was afraid that the interest of the generality of the Officers in the Army but especially the Grandees was not peace righteousnesse justice and freedom but wars fightings and †Which is fully witnessed for a truth by Major Huntington Cromwels quondam darling in the 11 page of his foresaid charge where he declares Cromwels great rejoycing after his first breaking of the Parliament and getting the remaining part to own the Army and settle pay upon them Now saith Cromwel we may for ought I know be an Army so long as we live and that he was as able to govern the Kingdom as either Stapleton or Hollis c. which he declares to be the principall thing in all his contests with the Parliament he sought after catchings and without the continuance of which I conceived they
See Sir Edward Cook in his 1 part Inst l. 3. c. 13. Sect. 701. fol 368. Where he positively declares it was the native and ancient rights of all Englishmen both by the Statutes and common Law of England to pay no Fees at all to any administrators of Justice whatsoever See also 2 part Inst f. 74 176 209 210 and 176. And he there gives this reason why Judges should take no Fees of any man for doing his Office because he should be free and at liberty to doe justice and not to be fettred with golden Fees as setters to the subversion or suppression of truth and Justice Right be restored to us which is now also the price of our blood that in any Court whatsoever no moneys be extorted from us under pretence of Fees to the Officers of the Courts or otherwise And that for this end sufficient salaries or pensions be allowed to the Judges and Officers of Courts as was of old out of the common Treasury that they may maintain their Clerks and servants and keep their Oathes uprightly wherein they swear to take no Money or cloaths or other Rewards except meat and drink in a small quantity besides what is allowed them by the King and this we may with the more confidence claim as our Right seeing this honorable House hath declared in case of Ship-money and in the case of the Bishops Canons that not one penny by any power whatsoever could be levyed upon the people without common consent in Parliament and sure we are that the Fees now exacted by Judges and Clerks and Jaylors and all kinde of Ministers of Justice are not setled upon them by Act of Parliament and therefore by your own declared principles destructive to our property (s) (s) See the Articles of high Treason in our Chronicles against Judg Tresilian in Richard the seconds time and the judgment of Iustice Thorpe for taking money in Edward the Thirdâ— time 3 part Cooks Instit fol. 145 146 147 163 164 165. therefore we desire it may be enacted to be death for any Judge Officer or minister of Justice from the highest to the lowest to exact the least moneys or the worth of moneys from any person whatsoever more then his pension or salary allowed from the common Treasury And that no Judg of any Court may continue above three years 7. That whereas according to your owne complaint in your first Remonstrance of the (t) (t) See 1 part Book Dec. p. 9 state of the Kingdom occasion is given to bribery extortion and partiallity by reason that Judiciall places and other Offices of power and Trust are sold and bought that therefore for prevention of all injustice it be forthwith Enacted to be death for any person or persons whatsoever directly or indirectly to bay or sell or offer or receive moneys or rewards to procure for themselves or others any Office of power or Trust whatsoever See for this purpose 12 R 2. c. 2. 5. 6 Ed 6. c. 16. 1 part Cooks Institutes fol. 3â—6 fol. 233 b. and 234 a. 8. Whereas according to Justice and the equitable sense of the Law Goals and Prisons ought to be only used as places of safe custody untill the constant appointed time of speedy tryals (u) (u) See Sir Ed. Cook 1 part Instit l. 3. c. 7. sect 438. fol. 260. a. who expresly saith Imprisonment must be a safe custody not a punishment and that a prison ought to be for keeping men safe not to punish them See also 2 part Institut f 43. 315. 589. 590. 591. 3. part fol. 3â— 35. 4 part 168. and now they are made places of torment and the punishment of supposed offenders they being detained many years without any Legall tryals that therefore it be Enacted that henceforth no supposed offender whatsoever may be denyed his Legall tryall at the first Sessions Assizes or Gaol-delivery after his commitment (w) (w) See the Statute of the 4 E. 3 2. 12 R. 2. 10. and that at such tryal every such supposed offender be either condemned or acquitted 9. Whereas Monopolies of all kindes have been declared by this Honorable House to be against the fundamentall Lawes of the Land and all such restrictions of Trade doe in the consequence destroy not only Liberty but property that therefore all Monopolies whatsoever and in particular that oppressive Company of Merchant-Adventurers be forthwith abolished and a free Trade restored and that all Monopolizers may give good reparation to the Commonwealth and to particular parties who have been damnified by them and to be made incapable of bearing any Office of power or trust in the Nation and that the Votes of this House Novemb. 19. 1640. against their sitting therein may be forthwith put in due execution 10. Whereas this House hath declared in the first Remonstrance of the (x) (x) See 1 part Book Declar. page 14. state of the Kingdome that Ship-money and Monopolies which were imposed upon the people before the late Warre did at least amount to 1400000 l. per annum and whereas since then the Taxes have been double and treble and the Army (y) (y) See the Armies last Representation to the House hath declared that 1300000 l. per annum would compleatly pay all Forces and Garrisons in the Kingdom and the Customes could not but amount to much more then would pay the Navie so that considering the vast summes of moneys raised by proposition-money the fift and twentyeth part sequestâ—ations and compositions excise and otherwise it is conceived much Treasure is concealed that therefore an Order issue forth immediatly from this Honourable House to every parish in the Kingdome to deliver in without delay to some faithfuâ—l persons as perfect an accompt as possible of all moneys levyed in such Town City or Parish for what use or end soever since the beginning of the late Warre and to return the severall Receivers names and that those who shall be employed by the severall Parishes in every Shire or County to carry in those accompts to some appointed place in the County may have liberty to choose the receiver of them and that those selected persons by the severall parishes in every County or Shire may have liberty to invest some one person in every of their respective Counties or places with power to sit in a Committee at LONDON or elswhere to be the Generall Accomptants of the Kingdom who shall publish their Accompts every month to the publick view and that henceforth there be onely one Common Treasury where the Books of Accompts may be kept by severall persons open to the view of all men 11. Whereas it hath been the ancient Liberty of this Nation That all the Free-born people have freely elected their Representers in Parliament and their Sheriffs and (z) (z) 28 Edw. 1. Chap. 8. 13. See 2 part instit fol 174 175 558 559. where Sir Ed. Cook positively declares that in ancient
also into a disaffection and dislike of the proceedings of Parliament pretending to shew that his Majesties Interest would far better suit with the Principles of Independency then of Presbytery And when the King did alledge as many times he did That the power of Parliament was the Power by which we fought Lieutenant-Generall CROMVVEL would reply That WE WERE NOT ONELY SOULDIERS BUT COMMONERS promising that the Army would be for the King in the Settlement of his whole Businesse if the King and his party would sit still and not declare nor act against the Army but give them leave onely to mannage the present businesse in hand That when the King was at New-market the Parliament thought fit to send to his Majesty humbly desiring that in Order to his safety and their addresses for a speedy settlement he would be pleased to come to Richmond contrary hereunto resolution was taken by the aforesaid Officers of the Army That if the King could not be diverted by perswasion to which his Majesty was very opposite that then they would stop him by force at Royston where his Majesty was to lodge the first night keeping accordingly continuall Guards upon him against any power that should be sent by Order of Parliament to take him from us And to this purpose out-Guards were also kept to preserve his escape from us with the Commissioners of whom we had speciall Orders given to be carefull for that they did daily shew dislike to the present proceedings of the Army against the Parliament and that the King was most conversant and private in discourse with them His Majesty saying that if any man should hinder his going now his Houses had desired him upon his late Message of the 12 of May 1647. it should be done by force and by laying hold on his Bridle Which if any were so bold to do he would endeavour to make it his last But contrary to his Majesties expectation the next morning when the King and the Officers of the Army were putting this to an issue came the Votes of both Houses to the King of their compliance with that which the Army formerly desired After his Majesty did incline to hearken to the desires of the Army and not before Whereupon at Caversham the King was continually sollicited by Messengers from Lieutenant-General CROMVVEL and Commissary-General IRETON proffering any thing his Majesty should desire as Revenues Chaplains Wife children servants of his own visitation of Friends [c] [c] Sir Edw. Ford a professed Papist and one that had broken prison out of the Tower of London was at that time Iretons constant bed-fellow at whose lodging constant royall Cabals was held and yet at the same time Ireton c. impeached Hollis and Stapleton for high Treason for private correspondence with the King Armies Book of Declar. pag. 81 82 83. accesse of Letters and by Commissary-General Ireton that his Negative Voice should not be medled withall and that had hee convinced those that reasoned against it at the Genarall-councell of the Army as also all this they would doe that His Majesty might the better see into all our Actions and know our principles which lead us to give him all those things out of Conscience For that we were not a people hating His Majesties person or Monarchicall [d] [d] Yet read Iretons c. Remonstrance from St. Albans and you shall finde the quite contrary yea and that the things here they plead for they there condemn as the highest Treason as evidently there appears pag. 15 16. 17 22 23 24 32 48 50 62. Government but that we like it as the best and that by this King saying also That they did hold it a very unreasonable thing for the Parliament to abridge him of them often promising That if his Majesty will sit still and not act against them They would in the first place restore him to all these and upon the settlement of our own just rights and Liberties make him the most glorious Prince in Christendome That to this purpose for a settlement they were making severall Proposals to be offered to the Commissioners of Parliament then sent down to the Army which should be as bounds for our party as to the Kings businesse and that his Majesty should have liberty to get as much of those abated as be could for that many things therein were proposed only to give satisfaction to others which were our friends promising the King that at the same time the Commissioners of Parliament should see the Proposals His Majesty should have a copy of them also pretending to carry a very equall hand between King and Parliament in order to the settlement of the Kingdom by him which besides their own Judgment and conscience they did see a necessity of it as to the people Commissary Generall Ireton further saying That what was offered in these Proposals should be so just and reasonable That if there were but six men in the Kingdom that would fight to make them good he would make the seventh against any power that should oppose them The Head-Quarters being removed from Reading to Redford His Majesty to Woâ—orâ—â— the Proposals were given to me by Commissary Generall Ireton to present to the King which his Majesty having read told me be would never treat with the Army or Parliament upon those Proposals as he was then minded But the next day his Majesty understanding that a force was put upon his Houses of Parliament by a tumult sent for me again and said unto me Goe along with Sir Iohn Barkley to the Generall and Lieutenant Generall and tell them that to avoid a new war I will now treat with them up on their Proposals or on any thing els in Order to a Peace only let me be saved in honour and conscience Sir Iohn Barkley falling sick by the way I delivered this Message to Lieutenant Generall CROMWELL and Commissary Generall Ireton who advised me not to acquaint the Generall with it till ten or twelve Officers of the Army were met together at the Genenerals Quarters and then they would bethink themselves of some persons to be sent to the King about it And accordingly Commissary Generall Ireton Colonel (e) (e) Who I am sure daubed jugled not as the others did but spoke his mind freely for in the tower he gave me I. Lilburun a full account of that businesse yea and sufficiently then told Sir I. Maynard Commissary Coply c. of Iretons c. Base jugling and underhand dealing daubing and dissembling with the King Rainsborough Colonel Hamond and Col Rich attended the King at Woborne for three houres together debating the whole businesse with the King upon the Proposals upon which debate many of the most materiall things the King disliked were afterwards struck out and many other things much abated by promises whereupon his Majesty was pretty well satisfied Within a day or two after his Majesty removed to Stoke and there calling for me told
me he feared an Engagement between the City and the Army saying he had not time to write any thing under his hand but would send it to the Generall after me commanding me to tell Commissary Generall Ireton with whom he had formerly treated upon the Proposals that he would wholly throw himself upon us and trust us for a settlement of the Kingdome as he had promised saying if we proved honest men we should without question make the Kingdom happy and save much shedding of blood This Message from His Majesty I delivered to Commissary Generall Ireton at Colebrook who seemed to receive it with joy saying That we should be the veriest Knaves that ever lived if in every thing we made not good what ever we had promised because the King by his not declaring against us had given us great advantage against our Adversaries After our marching throug London with the Army his Majesty being at Hampton Court Lieutenant Generall Cromwel and Commissary Generall Ireton sent the King word severall times that the reason why they made no more hast in businesse was because that party which did then sit in the House while Pelham was Speaker did much obstruct the businesse so that they could not carry it on at present The Lieutenant Generall often saying Really they should be pulled out by the ears and to that purpose caused a Regiment of Horse to Rendezvouz at Hide-Parke to have put that in execution as he himself expressed had it not been carryed by Vote in the House that day as he desired The day before the Parliament Voted once more the sending of the Propositions of both Kingdoms to the King by the Commissioners of each Kingdom at Hampton Court Commissary Generall Ireton bade me tell the King that such a thing was to be done to morrow in the House but his Majesty need not to be troubled at it for they intended it to no other end but to make good some promises of the Parliament which the Nation of Scotland expected performance of and that it was not expected or desired his Majesty should either Sign them or Treat upon them for which there should be no advantage taken against the King Upon the delivery of which Message His Majesty replyed he knew not what Answer to give to please all without a Treaty Next day after this Vote passed the Lieutenant Generall asked me thereupon If the King did not wonder at these Votes I told him no For that Commissary Generall Ireton had sent such a Message by me the day before the Vote passed to signifie the reason of it The Lieutenant-Generall replyed that really it was the truth and that we speaking of the Parliament intended nothing else by it but to satisfie the Scots which otherwise might be troublesome And the Lieutenant Generall and Com. Gen. Ireton enquiring after His Majesties Answer to the Propositions and what it would be Nota bene it was shewed them both privately in a Garden-house in Putney and in some part amended to their own mind But before this the King doubting what answer to give sent me to Lieutenant Generall Cromwell as unsatisfied with the Proceedings of the Army fearing they intended not to make good what they had promised and the rather because his Majesty understood that Lieutenant General Cromwel and Commissary Generall Ireton agreed with the rest of the House in some late Votes that opposed the Proposals of the Army that they severally replyed that they would not have his Majesty mistrust them for that since the House would goe so high they only concurred with them that their unreasonablenesse might the better appear to the Kingdom And the Lieutenant Generall bade me further assure the King that if the Army remained an Army his Majesty should trust the Proposals with what was promised to be the worst of his conditions which should be made for him and then striking his hand on his brest in his Chamber at Putney bade me tell the King he might rest confident and assured of it and many times the same Message hath been sent to the King from them both but with this addition from Commissary Generall Ireton that they would purge and purge and never leave purging the Houses till they had made them of such a temper as should do his Majesties businesse And rather then they would fall short of what was promised he would joyn with French Spaniard Cavalier or any that would force them to it Upon the delivery of which Message the King made Answer that if they doe they would doe more then he durst doe After this the delay of the settlement of the Kingdom was excused upon the Commotions of Colonel Martin and Colonel Rainsborough with their adherents the Lieutenant General saying That speedy course must be taken for putting them out of the House and Army because they were now putting the Army into a Mutiny by having hand in publishing several Printed Papers calling themselves the Agents of five Regiments and the Agreement of the People although some men had encouragement from Lieutenant Generall Cromwel for the prosecution of those (f) (f) See Putneys projects and the 2 part of Englands new Chains discovered pag. 6. Papers and he being further prest to shew himself in it he desired to be excused at the present for that he might shew himselfe hereafter for their better advantage though in the Company of those men which were of different judgments he would often say that these People were a giddy-headed Party and that there was no trust nor truth in them and to that purpose wrote a Letter to Colonel Whaley that day the King went from Hampton Court intimating doubtfully that His MAJESTIES PERSON was in danger by them and that he should keep an Out-guard to prevent them which Letter was presently shewed to the King by Col. * * The designe of which letter was twofold 1. Under pretence of reall good to the King whom they now desired to be rid of as having made all the use of him they could being the Scots had bid more for him then they would give to get him into a new snare which in my judgment they plainly confesse in their late Remonstrance of 16 Nov. 1649. pag. 53. The second was To destroy the new nick-named Levellers for a generation of bloody men that sought to murder the King who stood also in the way of their intended tyrannicall Reign which was a main invention of Cromwels own brain with the base assistance of my Brother Henry Lilburn as I long since truly declared in two of my Books viz. The Peoples Prerogative pag. 52. And A Plea for an Habeas Corpus pag. 12. See also The second part of Englands Chains pag. 6. Whaley That about six dayes after when it was fully known by the Parliament and Army that the King was in the Isle of Wight Commissary General Ireton standing by the fire-side in his Quarters at Kingston and some speaking of an agreement likely to
be made between the King and Parliament now the Person of the King was out of the power of the Army Commissary Gen. Ireton replyed with a discontented countenance that he hoped it would be such a Peace as we might with a good conscience fight against them both Thus they who at the first taking the King from Holdenby into the power of the Army cryed down Presbyterian Government the proceedings of this present Parliament and their perpetuity and in stead thereof held forth an earnest inclination to a moderate Episcopacy with a new election of Members to sit in Parliament for the speedy settlement of the Kingdom and afterwards when the Eleven Members had left the House and marched thorow London with the Army the seven Lords impeached the four Aldermen of London committed to the Tower and other Citizens committed also then again they cryed up Presbyterian Government the perpetuity * * See their notable reasons and height of expressed zeal for frequent and successive Parliaments in their book of Decl. pag. 41. 42. 43. 44 129. 142. and in the first of their Proposals dated August 1. 1647. they six upon the certain period of a yeer for ending this Parliament yea and in their last Declaration from St. Albons in pag. 45. 46. complain most bitterly against a perpetuall Parliament and the ill constitution of this by Burrough-towns c yea also in pag. 65 ibidem propose and earnestly presse again for fixing a certain period to the dissolution of this and also in pag. 15. 52. 66. 67. propose many excellent things for the future constitution of sure and often successive Parliaments See my inferences upon all their c. premisses upon this subiect in my last book of the 8 of June 1649. from p. 43. to p. 59. Yea and in their first article accuse the King of treason tyranny in not keeping of frequent successive Parliaments See also his case stated p 7 11 14 17 18 20. See Bradshaws Speech against him at his tryal Jan 27 1648. p. 11. of this present Parliament Lieutenant Gen. Cromwel further pleasing himself with the great Summs of money which were in arrear from each County to the Army and the Tax of sixty thousand pound per Month for our maintenance Now saith he we may be for ought I know an Army so long as we live and since the sending forth the Orders of Parliament for the calling their Members together Lieutenant Gen. Cromwel perceiving the Houses will not answer his expectation he is now a gain uttering words perswading the hearers to a prejudice against the proceedings of Parliament again crying down Presbyterian Government setting up a single Interest which he calls an honest Interest and that we have done ill in forsaking it to this purpose it was lately thought fit to put the Army upon the chusing new Agitators and to draw forth of the House of Parliament 60 or 70 of the Members thereof much agreeing with his words he spake formerly in his Chamber at Kingstone saying What sway STAPLETON and HOLLIS had heretofore in the Kingdom and he knew nothing to the contrary but that he was as well able to govern the Kingdom as either of them so that in all his discourse nothing more appeareth but his seeking after the Government of King Parliament City and Kingdom for the effecting whereof he thought it necessary and delivereth it as his judgment that a considerable Party of the chief Citizens of London and some of every County be clapt up in Castles and Garisons for the more quiet and submissive carriage of every place to which they belong Further saying that from the rising of the late Tumult in London there should be an occasion taken to hang the Recorder and Aldermen of London then in the Tower that the City might see the more they did stir in opposition the more they should suffer adding That the City must first be made an example And since that Lieutenant Gen. Cromwel was sent down from the Parliament for the reducing of the Army to their obedience he hath most frequently in publick and private delivered these ensuing heads as his Principles from whence all the foregoing particulars have ensued being fully confirmed as I humbly conceive by his practice in the transaction of his last yeers businesse 1. That every single man is Judge of just and right as to the good and ill of a Kingdome 2. That the Interest of honest men is the Interest of the Kingdom And those onely are deemed honest men by him that are conformable to his judgment and practice Which may appear in many particulars To instance but one in the choice of Colonel Rainsborow to be Vice-Admiral Lieutenant General CROMVVEL being asked how he could trust a man whose Interest was so directly opposite to what he had professed and to one whom he had lately aimed to remove from all places of Trust He answered That he had now received particular assurance from Col. RAYNSBOROVV as great as could be given by man that he would be conformable to the judgment and discretion of Himself and Commissary Gen. IRETON for the managing of the whole businesse at Sea 3. That it is lawfull to passe through any forms of Government for the accomplishing of his end and therefore either to purge the Houses and support the remaining Party by force everlastingly Or to put a period to them by force is very lawfull and sutable to the Interest of honest men 4. THAT IT IS LAWFVL TO PLAY THE KNAVE WITH A * * Nay I Iohn Lilburn am confident from the whole series of his actions to prove that he holds it lawful for a man to commit any manner of wickednesse and basenesse whatsoever that can be named under the sun for the accomplishment of a mans proposed end whether in it self it be wicked or righteous yea to cheat break faith with and murder the nighest Relations a man can converse with yea and for that end onely to raise Wars upon Wars to the devastation of Kingdoms and Nations the peoples lives really and truly being of no more value with him then so many dead dogs serving him for no other end but to be his footsteps to climb up to the top of his Authority or Elective Knighthood KNAVE These Gentlemen aforesaid in the Army thus principled and as by many other circumstances may appear acting accordingly give too much cause to beleeve that the successe which may be obtained by the Army except timely prevented by the wisdom of the Parliament will be made use of to the destroying of all that Power for which we first engaged and having for above these twelve months past sadly and with much reluctancy observed these severall passages yet we have some hopes that at length there hereunto knowing that Resolutions were taken up that in case the Power of Parliament cannot be gained to countenance their Designes then to proceed without it I therefore chose to quit my self of my
Command wherein I have served the Parliament for these five yeers last past and put my self upon the greatest hazards by discovering these Truths rather then by hopes of gain with troubled minde continue an assistant or abbettors of such as give affronts to the Parliament and Kingdom by abusing of their Power and Authority to carry on their particular Designs Against whom in the midst of danger I shall ever avow the truth of this Narrative and my self to be a constant faithfull and obedient Servant to the Parliament of England Robert Huntington August 2. 1648. Courteous Reader Before these REASONS of Major Huntington's just after the end of the foregoing Petition in pag. 53. should have followed the Copy of another very pertinent to the illustration of Cromwel's and his creatures malice at the Liberties of England But in regard it was forgot take it here and it thus followeth To the Honorable the chosen and betrusted Knights Citizens and Burgesses assembled in PARLIAMENT The humble Petition of divers wel-affected Free-born people of England inhabiting in and about East-Smithfield and Wapping and other parts adjacent SHEWETH THat as this honourable House was chosen by the people to rednesse their grievances so we conceive it our native right to meet together to frame and promote Petitions for your better information of all such things as are by experience found burthensome and grievous to the Common-wealth That accordingly this honorable House hath declared that it ought to receive Petitions though against things established by Law That in the use of this our native acknowledged right we together with Lieutenant Col. John Lilburn and Mr John Wildman were met together in East-Smithfield upon the 17 of January last and discoursed upon these ensuing particulars viz. Some scrupled the very petitioning this House any more as a thing from whence notwithstanding their having hazarded their lives for their Freedoms they had hither to received nothing but reproaches and injuries and were answered by one of the persons before-named to this effect That it was their duty alwayes and their wisdome in this juncture of time to use their utmost diligence to procure the settlement of the Common-wealth and that warr famine and confusion could no other way in probability be prevented And it was generally concluded that the most visible interest of the people was to uphold the Honor of this House and to preserve it from contempt 2. There was likewise an occasionall Discourse about the Right of the Lords to the Law-giving power And herein was debated the danger of such an Arbitrary authority as that is in its own nature residing in any persons during life and much more of its descending as an inheritance from Generation to Generation and somthing was added from our sad experience of the mischiefs which have ensued hereupon In particular it was declared how their exercise of that claim might be charged in reason with all the precious blood that hath been spilt in the late War because the King had never had opportunity to Levie an Army against the people and Parliament if the Lords had not deferred so long after many sollicitations by the Commons to passe the Ordinance for setling the Militia 3. It was also accidentally wondred at why LIEUTENANT GENERALL CROMWELL and COMMISSARY GENERALL IRETON should now of late urge That no more addresses should be made to the King whereas they have formerly pleaded that he might be brought in even with his negative voice Whereupon Lieutenant Colonell Lilburn related a story That a member of the House of Commons having information from a credible person That the King had promised Lieutenant Gen. Cromwell a blue Ribbond with a George and the Earldome of Essex besides other places of honour and profit to his Son Commissary Gen. Ireton resolved to become another Felton rather then to suffer his Countrey to be so betrayed But the Gentleman being disswaded by Friends and intelligence hereof being sent to the Lieutenant Generall a Fast ensued at the Head quarters ' and so he concurred with the House in the late Vote against the King Neverthelesse in Mr. Wildmans opinion he was necessitated into such a Turn because THE SCOTS having bid HIGHER for the King then he had done his offer was rejected and they relyed on 4. Some consideration was had about proportionable assistances towards the charge of printing our Petitions 5. It being among other things enquired whether there were any truth in this rumour That the Lords had sent to Lieutenant Colonell Lilburne and offered him 3000 l. to desist in the large Petition now abroad The Lieutenant Col. answered That it was a false groundlesse report and that he knew no occasion for it unlesse it were because a Lord had sent to him to tell him he would send him a token of his love if he thought it would be accepted To which he answered That he would not be engaged to any Patentee Lord and some other words to that effect 6. There was a relation made by a person that some poor people in THE COVNTRY did meet together in Companies and did violently take away the Corn as it was going to Market saying that it was their great necessity caused them so to do whereupon we fearing lest the calamity might be more generall did ask how we should best preserve our selves in case of such Tumults because we bore the names of Round heads INDEPENDENTS c. for adhering to the Parliament and we satisfyed by Lieutenant-Colonel Lilburn to this purpose Friends The only way for you to be secured is to pâ—omote this Petition to the House that so when the people come to be enformed by the Petition of your reall intentions to the common good of the whole Nation as well as to your own you will be thereby safer then those which have blew Ribons in their hats that being the Generalls Colours and the moderne badge of Protection 7. It was lastly delivered as from a good hand That some LORDS were willing their Law giving power should not descend as an Inheritance to their Posterity and that they were willing to part with their Priviledge of freedom from arrests This being the summe and principall matter of what passed at the aforesaid meeting as we are ready to attest upon our oaths if we shall be thereunto called And understanding that our said dear Friends Lieutenant Colonel John Lilburn and Master Iohn Wildman who are therefore deare to us because they have manifested themselves faithfull to the Publique stand committed by this House in relation to the said Meeting as Treasonable and seditious practisers against the State We cannot but be extreamly troubled not only in regard of their particular sufferings and our own equall concernment especially upon the conseqâ—ence thereof as tending in a great measure to the disinfranchisement of the Nation from whom the Liberty of complaining must then be taken away when most cause is given them to complain Wherefore your Petitioners do most humbly