to His MAJESTY at Hampton-Court the 15 th day of October 1689. TO THE KING'S Most Excellent Majesty The Humble Representation of the Lords and Commissioners of Shires and Burroughs of the Kingdom of SCOTLAND Under subscribers and Members of this Current Parliament now Adjourned till the Eight of October next NOthing save the great and general Surprize of this long distressed and at present unsettled Kingdom upon the late Adjournment of Your most Loyal Parliament for so long a time and in so critical a season with the deep Concern of Your Royal Interest therein could possibly have induced us to this so necessary a Petition But the visible Consternation and Discouragement of thousands of Your good Subjects delayed in the Relief and Comfort which at this time they assuredly expected with the Advantages that We apprehend Your Majesties Enemies both within and without the Kingdom may think to reap by such an Interruption being our only Motives We cannot We dare not be silent And therefore to prevent these evil Consequences We in the first place most solemnly Protest and Declare in the Presence of God and Men Our constant and inviolable Fidelity and Adherence to Your Majesties Royal Title Right and Interest so frankly and chearfully recognosced by Us in this Current Parliament wishing and praying for nothing more under the Sun than Your long and prosperous Reign as that wherein the Security of all our Lives and Liberties and also of our Holy Religion more dear to Us than both is infallibly included It was the Perswasion we had of the Justice as well as the Necessity of Your Majesty's Heroic Undertaking for the Delivery of these Kingdoms with the Conviction of the Divine Confirmation that appeared in its Glorious Success that moved most if not all of Us to endeavour and concur most heartily in the late Meeting of Estates for the Advancement and Establishment of Your Majesty upon the Throne when some discovered their Disaffection and were too open Retarders and Obstructers of that good Design And it is from the same true Affection and Zeal that we do now most heartily make the above-mentioned Protestation to obviate all the Misconstructions Your Enemies may make in this Juncture Nor are we less assured of Your Majesties most sincere and gracious Intentions to perform for us to the utmost all that the Estates of the Kingdom have either demanded or represented as necessary and expedient for securing the Protestant Religion restoring their Laws and Liberties and redressing of their Grievances according to Your Majesties Declaration for this Kingdom Neither can it be imagined that so wise and just a King as Your Majesty will ever be perswaded that so Loyal a Parliament as this can be induced either to wish or design any Prejudice to or Diminution of Your true Interest and Prerogative but such as have slavishly served and flattered Arbitrary Power and Tyranny will be always studying for their own sinister Ends to state a separate Interest betwixt King and People a Practice which we are confident Your Majesty abhors But that we may clear our selves upon this present occasion to Your Majesty's full satisfaction and refuting of all Misrepresentations we can incur on any hand we shall briefly rehearse to Your Majesty the Votes pass'd in this present Parliament to which the Royal assent is not given with such short Reflections as we hope may tend to the better Vindication of all concern'd The First Act upon which the Vote of Parliament has pass'd is That declaring the Priviledge of the Estates of Parliament to Nominate and Appoint Committees as they shall think fit and excluding therefrom the Officers of State unless they be chosen And omitting what the Parliament hath already represented to Your Majesty as reasons of their Vote it is humbly conceived that this Act is exactly framed to the extent of that Grievance which together with the rest is desired in the Instrument of Government to be redressed unto us in Parliament The Second was an Act Abrogating the Act of Parliament 1669 asserting the Kings Supremacy over all Persons and in all Causes Ecclesiastical and this Act is so exactly conform to the Second Article of the abovementioned Grievances and the foresaid Act of Supremacy in it self is so dangerous to the Protestant Religion as well as inconsistent with the Establishment of any Church-Government that we doubt not Your Majesty will ever approve all that voted to it The Third is an Act anent Persons not to employed in publick Trusts and all the Ruins and Distresses of this Kingdom have so certainly flowed from the Persons therein noted especially such as by their contriving of and concurring in the Dispensing Power have thereby eminently indangered our Religion and overturned all the Fences of our Liberties and Properties which we have good Ground to believe the Parliament would have extended but to few Persons And your Majesty in Your Declaration hath so justly charged the same upon evil and wicked Counsellors the only Persons pointed at in this Act that we are perswaded that You will find it absolutely necessary for attaining all the Ends of Your Majesty's glorious Undertaking for our Relief The Fourth is an Act concerning the Nomination of the ordinary Lords of Session and the Election of the President To wit that in a total Vacation they be tryed and admitted or rejected by Parliament and in a particular Vacation they be tryed and admitted or rejected by the other Lords And that the President be chosen by the Lords themselves conform to our old Practique and express Statute And this Act is so agreeable to Practique Laws and Acts of Parliament and so necessair for the true and equal Administration of Justice the great security of all Kingdoms that Your Majesty will unquestionably approve it The Fifth and last is an Act Ordaining the Presbyterian Ministers yet alive who were thrust out since the First of January 1661 for not Conforming to Prelacy and not complying with the Courses of the Time to be restored And this Act is in it self so just and so consequential from the Claim of Right and agreeable to Your Majesties Declaration that less in common Equity could not be done And here Your Majesty may be pleased to consider That tho' Prelacy be now by Law abolished yet these few Ministers not exceeding Sixty tho' restored as they are not for want of the Royal Assent to the foresaid Act would be all the Presbyterian Ministers legally established and provided for in Scotland It is not unknown to Your Majesty what have been the sad Confusions and Disorders of this distressed Country under Prelacy and for want of its ancient Presbyterian Government and now the whole West and many other Parts of Scotland are at present desolate and destitute having only Ministers called by the People upon the late Liberty without any Benefice or Living or convenient Place to Preach in It is also certain that there are many Hundreds of forefaulted and sined Persons who are yet waiting to be restored and refounded according to the Claim of Right and Your Majesties Gracious Instructions thereanent It is true the last Thing proposed by Your Majesties Commissioner in Parliament was a Supply of Money for Maintenance of the Forces so necessary for our present Defence and We should have proven our selves ungrateful to Your Majesty and false to our own Interest and Security if We had absolutely refused it But there being a sufficient and certain Fund to maintain all the Forces and support all other incident Charges of the Government for some Months all that we demanded was That some things visibly necessair for Satisfaction of the Country and the better enabling and disposing them to pay the said Supply might be first expeded We are confident that the Vote of Parliament which was only for a short Delay will not give Your Majesty the least ground of Offence And now having presumed to lay these Things before Your Majesty with all humble Submission purely out of Duty for preventing the evil Constructions of Your Majesties Enemies and for our own just Vindication We most humbly beseech Your Sacred Majesty Graciously to Consider what is here represented and in Prosecution of Your Majesties Acceptance of the Claim of Right and Your Declaration emitted for this Kingdom to take such Courses as You in Your Royal Wisdom shall think fit for Passing the foresaid Acts of Parliament and Redressing all our other Grievances And We Your Majesties most humble Petitioners and faithful Subjects shall as in Duty bound every Pray for Your long and prosperous Reign over Us. FINIS
THE LATE PROCEEDINGS AND VOTES OF THE PARLIAMEMT of SCOTLAND Contained in an ADDRESS Delivered to the KING Signed by the Plurality of the Members thereof Stated and Uindicated Scilicet res ipsa aspira est at vos non timetis sed inertia mollitia animi alius alium expectantes cunctamini videlicet diis immortalibus confisi qui hanc rempubl in maximis saepe periculis servavere At non votis neque suppliciis muliebribus auxilia deorum parantur Vigilando agendo bene consulendo prospere omnia cedunt ubi socordiae tete atque ignaviae tradideris nequicquam deos implores irati infestique sunt Cato apud Salust GLASGOW Printed by Andrew Hepburn Anno Dom. 1689. THE LATE Proceedings and VOTES OF THE PARLIAMENT OF SCOTLAND c. TO remain silent under the Aspersions which some busy but either weak or ill Men are endeavouring to fasten not only upon the Proceedings but upon divers of the most Honourable and Loyal Members of Parliament were to be no less treacherous to his Majesty than careless of the Reputation of that whole Illustrious Body as well as of the Integrity of those Persons who are said to have so much influenced the Transactions of it and whose chief Crime with those that Malign and Traduce them is their having expressed so much Affection and Zeal for His Majesty's Person and Service And as the representing their Actions in a true Light is all that is needful both to justify and commend them so whosoever will be at the pains to examine them will find them adjusted to all the Rules of Law Religion and Policy And as it is not to be doubted but that whensoever the Parliament Assembles they will both vindicate their Proceedings in Customary and Legal Methods and exert that Authority which is essential to them over those of their own Members by whom they have been slandered so all that is now to be endeavoured in their behalf is to vouchsafe unto the English Nation to whom they have been misrepresented such a brief Account of their Transactions with the Occasions Reasons and Motives of them as may not only manifest the Wisdom and Loyalty of that Parliament but demonstrate beyond all contradiction that the only design they have been pursuing was to preserve and maintain His Majesties Honour secure and establish him an Interest in the Love and Hearts of his People and make His Throne firm and durable It is too evident either to be denied or Apologized for that all the Laws Priviledges and Rights of the Kingdom of Scotland have under the Late Reigns been not only Usurped upon and Invaded but Subverted and Overthrown For by gradual Inlargements of the Prerogative beyond what was allowed by the Rules of the Constitution and the Statutes of the Realm the legal and regular Monarchy of the Nation was swelled into an Arbitrary and Despotick Power So that all the Franchises and Rights which by Original Contracts and Subsequent Laws had been reserved unto the People were either overthrown or enjoyed precariously And we are compelled to say that the Coalition of Scotland with England under one Monarch without a Union between the Two Nations into one Legislative Body and Civil Government hath given great advantages to our Late Princes of treating us with a Rigour and Loftiness that our Ancestors were not accustomed unto And though a small Acquaintance with the Politicks might have instructed the English that whatsoever received a first Impression amongst us would sooner or later obtain a second Edition amongst them yet they seem'd either not to have foreseen or at least not to have resented it until the Original of King Jame's Absolute Power in Scotland which all Men were bound to obey without reserve was copied over in England in his Claim of Soveraignty in dispensing with those Laws that were the Fence about their Safety It was from the unconcernedness which the English have too often testified not to say the countenance they have given in Relation to the Usurpation of our late Kings over the Laws and Liberties of Scotland that those Princes have despised the Applications made unto them as well by Parliaments as by the Nobility and Gentry for redressing their Grievances and that the Nation remained so long discouraged from relieving it self in those Methods that were left it And as the Scots did for many Years sadly feel and experience into what Excess their Kings grew up in Usurping upon their Laws and Liberties from a hope and confidence of being justified and supported in those Invasions by the Strength and Treasure of England So the English cannot be altogether insensible how Charles the Second not only confronted their Bill of Exclusion in England with an Act in Scotland for the Hereditary Succession of his Brother but what large Breaches he was encouraged to make upon their Rights and Priviledges after his having obtained an Assistance of 22000 Men to be enacted and granted unto him by Law in Scotland and those to be used in what places and upon what occasions he should please to imploy them Nor are we able sufficiently to express our Obligations to His Present Majesty who being extremly sensible that our remaining disunited in our Governments and two distinct Monarchies though link'd together under one Monarch hath been one of the great Occasions and chief Sources of our common Miseries and Oppressions and being desirous both to redeem us from the illegal Sufferings we have already felt and to obviate those which might break in upon us under future Reigns hath therefore invited the Nations to such an Union of strength Councils and Legislative Authority as may render them a Defence to each other and not Instruments and Tools of enslaving one another and a mutual Prey Which as all wise and good Men do earnestly long for so the common Interest of the two Nations obliges them speedily to endeavour But we are forced to add that besides the Encouragement which our late Princes have assumed unto themselves of Usurping upon the Rights and Liberties of Scotland from an expectation of being supported in it by the Power and Wealth of England There is another Cause unto which much of their Invasion upon the Scot's Priviledges is to be ascribed and unto which we are forced to resolve many of our Miseries as the Spring whence they have flowed For upon the Succession of our Kings to the Crown of England and their fixing their Royal Abode and Regal Seat in that Kingdom they are thereupon fallen into a Method of deriving their knowledg of Scotish Laws and Customs of being informed of the Grievances of that Nation and of receiving Impressions of Persons and Things from one or two Ministers chosen to reside about them and in order thereunto advanced into Places of Honour and Trust and who too often have been found to want either the Honesty Wisdom or Courage requisite in those upon whom so much comes to be devolved Surely the World hath had sufficient Evidence in
by Acting in the Incroachments mentioned in the Articles of the Claim of Right which are declared to be contrary to Law or who have shewed Disaffection to the happy Change by the Blessing of God now brought about by acting in Opposition thereunto since the time that the King and Queen now Reigning were Proclaimed or who hath been a Retarder or Obstructer of the good Designs of the said Estates viz. The securing the Protestant Religion the setling the Crown the establishing the Rights of the Leiges and the redressing their Grievances by Acting contrary to these good Designs since the time that they became publick by Votes and Acts of the Meeting be allowed to possess or be admitted into any Publick Trust Place or Imployment under Their Majesties in this Kingdom I suppose the Reader by this time surprized at the unreasonableness of the Age we live in that there should be Men found so void of Sense and Understanding as to spy out any thing here that deserves to be clamour'd against or which is worthy to be complain'd of Every Line breathes of that Lenity and Moderation that it savours rather of a defect of Justice than of any excess of it and the utmost hereby designed is only a disabling a few wicked Men from ruining us for the future and not a punishing of them for what they have done for as there are none excepted as to Life so the few designed to be debarred from Offices are described and charactered after such a manner that the very employing them will Dishonour His Majesty and Disgrace his Government There is no abridging His Majesties Mercy only an endeavour to maintain the Justice of his Undertaking in coming to Deliver us For having charged the late King 's Evil Counsellors and them only with the Crimes upon which he grounded both the Righteousness and the Necessity of his Expedition Whosoever is so villanous as to advise him to use them can design no less than deriving an Aspersion upon his Wisdom Justice and Sincerity And if the Nations be not delivered from those against whom he declared how shall we be able to answer his Enemies who accuse his coming hither to have been upon another Motive For what his Friends affirm to have been bestowed upon him as the Reward only of his Expedition and of the Deliverance he wrought out for us his Adversaries will be encouraged both to believe and say was the Principal if not sole end of it Nor is it meerly needful in order to the Vindication of His Majesties glorious Undertataking in coming into Brittain That they who were the Instruments of our Slavery and Oppression under the former Government should be precluded from all share of the Administration under this but it is also necessary for the reconciling the Love and Obedience of the People to His Majesties Person and Authority Courtiers may fancy that if one be able he is qualified without other Ingredients to be a Minister of State But the most part of Mankind do always look for some degrees of Honesty in those advanced into the chief Offices in the Government Nor will People easily believe that they who betrayed their Laws Rights and Priviledges under one Reign will ever Administer Justice equally or defend them in their Properties under another Men may have present ease but they will be always in fear whilst they remain in the hands of their old Oppressors It is impossible to keep up in the minds of the Vulgar honourable Thoughts of King William's Government if he will chuse to work with King James's Tools Whosoever Counsels His Majesty to employ those that were the Instruments of the former Tyranny must intend to bring him under a Suspicion both of approving that and of designing the like No man envieth his Majesties pardoning the worst of his and the Kingdoms Enemies but we cannot avoid pitying him and bewailing our selves that he is persuaded to use them yea the Royal forgiveness ought to confine it self to limits and much more should a Prince set Bounds to himself in the Honours and Preferments which he is pleased to bestow Now having mentioned his Majesties Grace I 'll venture to say That after all the Mercy he hath exercised towards his own and his Peoples Enemies there is not one either Converted to his Interest by it or that reckons himself obliged to him for it But instead of attributing their impunity to His Majesties Grace they ascribe it to the Pusillanimity of the Government and in the room of being brought over to serve him they are emboldened to go on in their Conspiracies against His Person and Dignity Nor will they ever account themselves indebted to his Mercy till he hath made some of them the Objects of his Justice But to return to what I am upon should not such an easy Animadversion be inflicted upon those who have oppressed us as the being shut out from Trusts and Imploys in the Government We should both tempt them and others to repeat the same Crimes upon the first opportunity that is offer'd unto them Yea if instead of falling under such a gentle Mortification they should be preferred to the chief places of Honour and Profit in the Kingdom Villainy will be committed in order to Merit and Men of brutal and Profligate Principles will seek to exceed in Unjustice and Treachery that they may be thought to excel in Desert And though through the Moderation Goodness Wisdom and Justice of Their Majesties we may escape the Consequences of such a Method during Their Reign which I pray God may be long yet Posterity will lose most of the benefit of this Revolution for want of adjudging those to punishment that have been Traytors to Societies and Cannibals to Mankind in this Age whereby to deter others from being such in the next The Counsel given to Princes by the Supream Sovereign by whom they Reign is That they should punish exorbitant Offenders to instruct others to fear and forbear doing wickedly But the Advice thrust upon His Majesty by some ill Men about him is That he should cherish and advance them without regard to the effects that may attend it What a strange Idea will it give the World of our Government if the rewards of Vertue be made the recompences of Crimes And how shall we lift up our Faces to God or Men if the Malefactors under the last Reign not only escape under this without Chastisements but inherit the Preferments and Emoluments of it If what I have said be not sufficient to justifie both the expediency and equity of the forementioned Vote I hope the Experience the King hath had of that sort of People since he received them into his particular Favour and Principal Service will reconcile him unto a better Opinion of it and shew him the necessity of turning those out of Office whom his Parliament would have prevented his taking in Both the Nations are sensible of His Majesties being betray'd both in his Councils and in