any of his owne Subiects though they were Papists You tell me the Author of those Queries is learned in the Lawes pray get him to shew you one Law whereby the Papists are inhibited to serve their Soveraign against a Rebellion because Papists may not come neere the Court without the Kings leave or weare Armes may not a Papist ride post to tell the King of a Designe to murther Him or being present take away a sword from that man who atempts to kill Him Sure there is no law hath prohibited the Allegiance of the Papists and because they will not come to Church forbid them to be Subiects If a Fleet arived from France or Spaine to invade us were it not lawfull for a Papist to endeavour to destroy that Fleet and must he sit still in a Rebellion and see his Soveraigne and the Lawes of the Land in which he hath an equall interest with any other Subiect in imminent visible danger to be destroyed and must not assist either Yet observe now how much soever you seeme to be scandalized at it what you your selves have done towards the raising this Army of Papists and indeed if there be such an Army whether your selves have not raised it without breaking your owne Iest and saying 't is raised by the power of both Houses as yours is by the Kings Authority you seize upon all the Papists estates plunder their Houses imprison their persons without the least colour of Law leaving them no place to breath in but under shelter of the Kings Army and thence you would have the King drive them to for being Papists You suffer Mr. Griffith to raise a Troop of that Religion for your service and when they cashiere their Captain and come in to his Maiestie you would have him disband them because they are Papists For Gods sake get one one of your Orators to make a Speech for the King to a Papist who shall say to him Sir I have lived modestly and dutifully at my owne house without assuming to my selfe any Licence which the Law gave me not I have humbly submitted to the penalties imposed on me and contented my selfe with what the Law hath left me I am driven from thence by force of Armes my Estate taken from me my liberty endeavored to be so to I am your Subiect you are my King vouchsafe me the Protection you owe me What answer shall he make Sir you are a Papist and you shall not come neere me or Sir I am content you shall be under the shelter and security of my Forces but upon your life use no weapon bear no Arms help them not though they are in danger to be cut in pieces before your face Let a sober man find a way to get out here to be a King and not protect them And after all this what a goodly Army of Papists hath his Maiestie got together not to compare with you for you say 't is no matter what number of Papists you have because there are no feares and iealousies of your favouring of Popery I am confident and I have my Information from no ill hands that in all his Maiesties Armies the Papists cannot make one good Regiment Get but the honest sober true Protestants once of your mind and my life upon it you shall not see the Papists grow above the reach of the Law Here is an end of your Author a word now to your owne Letter I find you much transported with the apprehension of Gods wonderfull Blessings upon the proceedings of both Houses that their progresse and successe hitherto hath not beene lesse then miraculous Indeed there are negative Miracles as well as affirmative for God to forbeare what according to his Iustice and goodnesse and other attributes We might expect from him by the way of punishment revenge is a miracle of his mercy in this sence the world which hath seene your Treason and Rebellion your Acts of Iniustice Cruelty and Inhumanity your Lying and Blasphemy your profannesse and Sacriledge if your Divines have left you the apprehension of such a Sinne and by the way if they have pray send me word what they meane by it they who have observed the ill Arts you have used to compasse things in themselves lawfull and the wicked Arts you dayly use to compasse things unlawfull and see that stones in the streets have not risen up against you and fire from Heaven hath not consumed you must say you tempted God so far so insolently that less then a Miracle could not preserve you baâ—e me this one Miracle and tell me if the hand of God hath not bin upon you and pursued you from the first houre you entred into Rebellion are you not fallen from your universall Interest and reputation with the people to that degree of hatred that they curse you to your face Are you not shrunke from the honour and reverence due to a Parliament to the Imputation of a vile crowd of meane guilty seditious persons Doe not your friends every day forsake you and those persons of quality whom you mislead with more bitternes fall from you then your first Delinquents Are not your own Weapons turned upon you and are not you afraid of those Petitioners whom with so much skill and Industry you taught to Petition Is not your owne Army raised and maintained by your selves growne so undevoted to you that some Commanders every day leave you and others are committed by you for feare they will do so too Are you not brought to that strait as to feare a Mutiny for want of pay and not to dare to pay for feare of a Disbanding Have you not by blood and Rapine with the curses of all good men gotten the treasure of the Kingdome into your hands and wasted it so that your wants are as notorious as your Crimes Lastly are you not so iealous so divided amongst your selves that if your Army prevailed to morrow you were as far from compassing your own ends as when you began your desperate undertaking your principall Commanders being as far from their ends who conzened them into this Rebellion as the prime Cavaliers in the Kings Army excepting only their affection to the Kings Person There is the Miracle on your parts see now what God hath done for his Anointed Call back your memory to the 10. of Ianuary look upon Him driven furiously from Whit-hall with his Wife and Children for feare of His life whilest His owne Servants for their security durst not be neere him looke upon him at Hampton Court scornfully accused of levying Warre against himselfe and the Sheriffes and Constables appointed to disperse his Army Remember Him at Windsor without ordinary necessary support thinke of the 20th of Ianuary when you would not vouchsafe to tell Him what you would have requiring nothing but His submission to your Counsells Remember Him at Yorke and Beverly after you had possessed your selves of all His Arms Castles Forts Townes and ships and seized upon all
Law againe for Gods sake let us have sense restored to us and not grow Beasts in our understanding as well as in our Liberty it will make us love mankind the worse to see men with sad browes as if they believed themselves seriously urge things in publique which in privat would make friends quarrell for the scorne and Indignity offered to reason such is all your discourse of Priviledges and Delinquents But you have at last found a prety obligation upon your selves to Rebell against Law and Reason your late Protestation requires all this at your hands in the behalfe of the Priviledges of Parliament which by that you are bound to defend and so you rescue your selves from the duty of Allegiance to which you have regularly and legally sworne by a voluntary Protestation to doe somewhat you doe not understand If there be any thing by that Protestation enioyned to be done which was unlawfull to be done before the Protestation was taken 't is no more to bee iustified by that Act then any other unlawfull thing is by a rasâ— and wicked Vow entred into by a Person who desires to doe mischiefe If there bee nothing in it but what before was the duty of every man there needs no Argument from the Protestation the truth is though I like not the use hath beene made of it to poyson and mislead simple people nor the irregularity to call it no worse of compelling men to take it when no law requires it I know nothing promised or undertaken in that Protestation which every honest man doth not and alwayes did hold absolutely to be his duty no man being obliged by it to doe any thing but as farre as lawfully he may And would not a stander by think a man mad that should sweare to defend the Kings Person and to maintaine the Priviledges of Parliament and immediately draw His sword upon the King whose Person he knew in the behalfe of somwhat he is told is Priviledge of Parliament we are gotten againe into the old circle of folly and madnesse Your last Scruple I will be serious with you in 't is that however throwne among the people malitiously and indeed against the Conscience of the Contrivers which I know startles many well meaning and well-wishing men you are afraid of the Papists and that if the King prevailes that Religion will have too great a countenance and growth to the scandall of ours Indeed if this feare were well grounded you would have so many Partners with you in your trouble that you would even be satisfied in your company and by that think your selfe secure against your feares what makes you doubt this an inclination in the King himselfe Let His Life be examined His continued publique Acts of Devotion examples indeed for a through Reformation His understanding the differences betweene the Church of Rome and us and so not onely utterly dissenting from them but knowing why he doth so and he will be found above the reach of Envie or Malice and indeed above your owne feares and iealousies Take a list and survey of His servants and Counsellors who are suspected to have the least interest in His favours and inclinations you will not find a man under the least taint that way and most of them till your dishonest uncharitable distinction of Popish and popishly affected was throwne among the people thought eminent advancers of the true Protestant Religion established And let me tell you if there should be a breach made upon that Religion these men would stand in the Gap when halfe your Zelots would submit to an Alteration if it brought any satisfaction to their worldly Ambition But you say the Queene is of that Religion and She hath a great interest and power over his Affections and you think it an un-Kingly thing to be a good Husband and whilst your selves are guided and swayed by other mens Wives for 't is not Women you are angry with you allow them whole sharers with you in your mischiefes you cannot endure He should so much as advise with His own indeed I cannot blame you to desire to keep Him from any conversation with one you have used so ill But how comes this melancholly upon you now Is She more a Catholique now then She was fifteen yeares since Why did not these Feares and Iealousies break out into Rebellion when he was first married before the Nation knew any thing of Her but Her Religion After the experience of so many yeares after the enriching the Kingdome with so hopefull and numerous an Issue after the obliging all sorts of people with Her favours without dis-obliging any body that I have heard of after fifteene yeares living here with great expressions of Love and Affection to the English Nation without any other activity in Religion then to live well and wish well to Her owne with equall esteeme of those who are not of the same Profession to desire to break and interrupt that excellent Harmony in Affections is an ingratitude an impiety worthy the contrivers of these bloody distempers Looke into the Persons who have received the greatest testimony and evidences of Her favours you will not find them to be Popish or Popishly affected but in the list of your own Religious Men and godly Women If you will convert Her Let your Charity and Humility the Principles of true Religion let your Obedience and Loyalty the effects of true Religion be an evidence to Her that yours is the right the course you take will rather fright good people from any then invite them to yours She is a Lady too well understands Her owne share and Her owne adventure in the publique distractions not to endeavour with Her soule a reconciliation of them I would your Ladies were like Her She is as farre from revenge of Iniuries and Indignities as from deserving them You have the advantage in your Provocatiâ—ns you have met with tempters as apt to forgive as you are to offend who are as unlimited in their mercy as their enemies are in their insolencies make good use of it set your hearts upon Peace and you will easily finde the way to it be once ingenious and you will be quickly safe But oh the great Army of Papists if that were disbanded your feares and iealousies would infinitely abate that 's well pray observe how these Papists come together Remember Nottingham when you had a formed Army of 10000. men and His Maiesty not 800. Muskets at his Command in all His Dominions If you had then fallen upon Him and destroyed Him as if Your Pride had not been greater then your Loyalty you had done you meant to strip Him by Votes and Ordinances of all Succours and assistance that He should be compelled to put himselfe into your hands for Protection and so confesse your Army to be raised for his defence Wou d not now all Christian Princes have thought His Maiesty guilty of His owne undoing who would not suffer Himselfe to receive Ayd from
the Armes of the Kingdome stopped His Rents and incensed the people in all parts against Him Oh think upon Him at Nottingham when you would not vouchsafe to treat with Him onely giving your great Generall power of receiving him to mercy when you had reduced him to that condition that He had neither Armes Men or Money or knew as you thought where to have any and this at a time when you had a want on flourishing Army of 10000 men within two dayes March of him to bring Him back to London here is an Argument for a Miracle observe Him in a moment as if Regiments fell from the Cloudes hasting his owne March to the place where he was expected without staying to be called upon at Shrewsbury view Him at Edgehill with a handfull of men and if they were more imagine how he got them finding out his formidable Army and dispersing them Himself taking as much pains to save those who came to destroy him as others had done to seduce them Instead of being brought up by the Earle of Essex as by the vote of both Houses He ought to have been See Him making his own way scattering those at Reading and showing himselfe at Brainceford that if indeed He were so much desired at London and might be worthyâ—y received there they might have their wish Beleeve it Sir His Maiesty hath not so great a Iourney to the conquest of Spaine as he had from Nottingham to Brainceford If you cannot suddenly find how this Army was raised enquire how it hath been kept together a fit of Loyalty and Affection a litle dislike and indignation to see a good King ill used might procure a present supply but that this Army raised without Money and Armed without weapons should live and grow six moneths together that no Souldiers should starve for want of Meat or murmur for want of pay that the King should have a Magazine and you want Armes that the King should pay his Souldiers and you have no Mony is such an instance of the power and presence of the Almighty that if any such Argument were currant with you your principall Members would no longer have tempted God in this Kingdome but have sought him in a strange Land Improve all these instances by your own observations and tell me sadly on whose side the Miracles have appeared You would know my opinion what the Burgesse of D. should doe and you tell me his Honour will not suffer him too apparantly to recede from those with whom he hath kept so much company I know not what Counsell to give you upon that principle If his Honour and his Innocence have not a care of each other neither can be safe Me thinks the King himself hath given you a rare pattern of Modesty in that point he did not satisfy himself with coÌ„senting to new laws but acknowledged passed errors Reparation is as soveraign a thing as bounty and except there be this Ingenuity Reformation can never be perfect you say he doubts what he hath done formerly will be more remembred then what he hath since done or shall doe for the future Hee is too blame He hath not a generous nor a Christian mind who thinks ill services may not bee throughly repaired by future duty I am so farre from that opinion as though his mistakes have been of as ill consequence to the publike as most mens I beleeve he hath so good an opportunity by some eminent service to repaire himselfe that he may even lay an obligation of Gratitude upon the King not only to forgive but reward his Affection There is no such way to have what he now does not valued as by Iustifiing what he hath done so contrary to this 't is no scandall to be deceived lesse to confesse he was so Let him take the same pain to oppose and suppresse unreasonable Persons as he doth to perswade others to consent to what himselfe thinks unreasonable and the worke is done As he hath a taske to doe somewhat that is noble so he hath a faire game before him having done it I know nothing of yours unanswered you must give me leave hereafter not to beleive you if you stumble any more at these strawes rather consider what he is to answere to God the King his Country and Posterity that sits Idle without resisting the violence and indignity offered to all foure that is content to see this pretious game of Religion Liberty and Honour played at other mens Charges and possibly in hazard of being lost for want of his assistance Consider whether you and the rest who first excercised the Militia in Gloucester-shire so discomposed the Government and first taught the People a new obedience have not to Answere for all the miseries and pressures which have since befallen that poore Country Let those who have contributed to the raising and maintaining of that Rebellious Army think sadly whether they are not guilty of all the blood-shed on either side in this Meditation that vertuous Lord who had long since been starved but for the Kings meat and bin naked but for His clothes may find himselfe guilty of the murther of his Father Remember the blessed condition we were in 18 Moneths since and be proud if you can of the State you have now brought us to Think of the firm stable happines our Auncestors enjoyed and resolve there cannot be security but by the same Rule 'T is not laying down Arms makes a Peace but such a Vnion of affections that neither party unpleasantly remembers the way to it If King or People be enforced to give away that which properly belongs to them it will produce rather rest then peace and the memory therof will be so grievous to the loser that perpetuall Iealousies and discontents will be between them Insist upon your Rights let all doubts which may concern Religion Libertie and Propertie be cleared and secured let Parliaments recover their good old Priviledges these are all our Birthrights and hath bin that which hath made the happines and freedom of the English Nation loved and envied through Christendome We will not part with a tittle of them but when they shall be in danger will ioyne with you in their defence But let us rest here press not the King to part with what properly helongs to Him 't is our right to see that He enioyes His the houre that he growes lesse a King we have lost a part of our freedome if the power of Subiects be once inlarged we are losers by it and affect an Authority will destroy us Do not think the Kings love of Peace can invite Him to part with the benefits of Peace what would the World think of him if after the taking up Arms for the defence of his own he should upon condition he might lay them down againe part with that for the maintenance of which he took them up Would he not iustifie what hath bin done against him if he yeelded that now which if he had 8. months since all this confusion they will say might have bin prevented and will he not leave an excellent Encouragement to Posterity to tread in their Fathers steps and to follow the example of their prosperous wickednesse Doe not think a Iewell plucked out of the Royall Diadem can keep its brightnesse and lustre in any other place 't is a losse to the Nation which cannot be repaired by an access of Power to private hands If this be Reason Let not the folly and madnesse of other people make you quit it Warre it selfe is not halfe so grievous as the Iurisdiction of these men who would have you resigne your understanding to their fury and madnesse Let them shift for themselves and you shall quickly see what a contemptible People they will prove Let Religion Reason Law Iustice and Honour be your guids the Kingdome will flourish and we shall againe be happy in each other From my Quarter this 10. of April 1613. FINIS