dispose of it as likewise of the businesse of Ireland as may give to them and both Kingdoms just satisfaction not doubting also but to give good contentment to His two Houses of Parliament in the choice of the Lord Admirall the Officers of State and others if His two Houses by their ready inclinations to Peace shall give Him encouragement thereunto Thus His Majesty having taken occasion by His just impatience so to explain His intentions that no man can doubt of a happy Issue to this succeeding Treaty If now there shall be so much as a delay of the same He calls God and the World to witnesse who they are that not only hinder but reject this Kingdoms future happinesse It being so much the stranger that His Majesties coming to Westminster which was first the greatest pretence for taking up Arms should be so much as delayed much lesse not accepted or refused But His Majesty hopes that God will no longer suffer the malice of Wicked men to hinder the Peace of this too much afflicted Kingdom Given at the Court at Oxford the 15 of January 1645. For the Speaker of the House of Peers pro tempore To be Communicated to the two Houses of Parliament at Westminster and the Commissioners of the Parliament of Scotland CAn Subjects desire more or to have their King offer more then is here tendred sure no good Christian Subjects can desire so much or be content to have their King recede so far from Himself for their sakes But by this and the preceding Messages we see what the King hath bidden for the purchase of Peace and a Treaty with them now we shall have a glimpse of what they thought fit to aske of Him for their leave to let Him come and speak with them after they had fasted prayed and fought five years to fetch Him to His Parliament for immediately after His sending this last most gracious Message there came to His Majesties hands as the effect of His Four former and the reward of His forty daies waiting this insuing Paper which contains only a parcell of such scandalous and crosse speeches as shamelesse women are wont to cast up against those they raile upon and mean to live in Contention with which notwithstanding the world supposed to be as void of Reason as themselves are of Religion must interpret an Humble Addresse unto His Majesty for Peace because it begins with May it please your Majesty we your Humble and Loyall Subjects for 't is one of those Addresses which in the beginning of their late Declaration they say the world well knows to have been so fruitlesse wherein they have yeilded up their wills Affections Reason Iudgment and all for obtaining a true peace or good Accommodation it follows in these very words May it please your Majesty WE Your Humble and Loyall Subjects of both Kingdoms have received Your Letters of the 26 and 29 of December last unto which we humbly return this Answer That there hath been no delay on our parts but what was necessary in a businesse of so great consequence as is expressed in our former Letter to Your Majesty Concerning the personall Treaty desired by Your Majesty There having been so much innocent bloud of Your good Subjects shed in this War by Your Majesties Commands and Commissions Irish Rebels brought over into both Kingdoms and endeavours to bring over more into both of them as also Forces from Forraign parts Your Majesty being in Arms in these parts the Prince in the head of an Army in the West divers Towns made Garrisons and kept in Hostility by Your Majesty against the Parliament of England There being also Forces in Scotland against that Parliament and Kingdom by Your Majesties Commission The War in Ireland fomented and prolonged by Your Majesty whereby the three Kingdoms are brought neer to utter ruine and destruction We conceive That untill satisfaction and security be first given to both your Kingdoms Your Majesties coming hither cannot be convenient nor by us assented unto Neither can we apprehend it a means conducing to Peace That Your Majesty should come to Your Parliament for a few daies with any thoughts of leaving it especially with intentions of returning to Hostility against it And We do observe That Your Majesty desires the Ingagement not only of the Parliaments but of the Lord Mayor Aldermen Common-Councell and Militia of the City of London the chief Commanders of Sir Thomas Fairfax's Army and those of the Scots Army which is against the Priviledges and Honour of the Parliaments those being joyned with them who are subject and subordinate to their Authority That which Your Majesty against the freedom of the Parliaments inforces in both Your Letters with many earnest expressions as if in no other way then that propounded by Your Majesty the Peace of Your Kingdoms could be established Your Majesty may please to remember that in Our last Letter We did Declare That Propositions from both Kingdoms were speedily to be sent to Your Majesty which We conceive to be the only way for attaining a happy and well-grounded Peace and Your Majesties assent unto those Propositions will be an effectuall meanes for giving satisfaction and security to Your Kingdoms will assure a firm Vnion between the two Kingdoms as much desired by each other as for themselves And settle Religion and secure the Peace of the Kingdom of Scotland whereof neither is so much as mentioned in Your Majesties Letters And in proceeding according to these just and necessary grounds for the putting an end to the bleeding Calamities of these Nations Your Majesty may have the Glory to be a Principall Instrument in so happy a Work and We however mis-interpreted shall approve our selves to God and the world to be reall and sincere in seeking a safe and wel-grounded Peace Westminster 13. Jan. 1645. Signed in the name and by warrant of the Commissioners of the Parliament of Scotland BALMERINOTH Grey of Wark Speaker of the House of Peers pro tempore William Lenthall Speaker of the House of Commons For Your Majesty THeir silence was bad and shewed great insolency but their Language is far worse and speaks much more for their stile and matter in this Paper declares them to be men most unreasonable even such as the Apostle praies God to be delivered from and shews clearly on which side the obstruction to peace lies we see herein upon what Conditions the King might have been admitted after so many Messages into the presence of His Humble and Loyall Subjects if He would but have owned the guilt of that innocent bloud themselves had shed bin content to be dawbed with their crimes laid down His Armes given up His Garrisons call'd in His Commissions deserted His Friends and deliver'd up Himself absolutely without any security into their Hands with such a submission as they should prescribe which should have been no other then might have spoke His approbation of all they have said or done against Himself and this
Lord for thou beholdest mischief and spight to requite it with thine hand O keep not long silence therefore be not far off from thine Anointed Stir up thy self and awake to his Judgment and unto His cause thou art his God thou alone art his Lord Judge thou for Him according to thy righteousnesse and let not these miscreant men triumph any longer over Him let them not say in their hearts Ah! so would we have it Let them not say we have swallowed him up let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together that rejoice at his hurt yea let them be cloathed with shame and dishonour that magnifie themselves against Him but let them shout for joy and ever have cause to be glad that favour His righteous cause yea let them say continually Let the Lord be magnified which hath pleasure in the prosperity of His servant Amen Amen His Majesty at last having waited two months for Answer was sufficiently informed by their silence how vainly He laboured in soliciting for His Chaplains and thereupon forbears to be further importunate in that businesse it concerned His own particular self and comfort and He can more easily desist in pursuing a thing of that nature then in seeking for a blessing which more immediately concerns His people and therefore though His request for Peace had been rejected thirteen times already in lesse then thirteen months yet He cannot hold from renewing that yea though they had frustrated His expectation a long time in not sending such Propositions as they had promised or given Him hopes to receive for His more full and clear understanding their sence in the former and did also keep His Person in so unworthy so unheard of and so provocative a Condition as might have swell'd with stoutnesse the mildest heart and awaken'd passion had it not been dead in a very Martyr yet with the greatest meeknesse and sweetnesse of stile that can be imagined doth He write unto them again and sends most gracious Answers to their former unreasonable Propositions after He had diligently endevoured and studied divers moneths how to make them such as salva conscientia might be most agreeable to the likings of His Parliaments His words are these His Majesties sixteenth Message His Majesties most gracious Message for Peace from Holdenby with His Answer to the Propositions CHARLES R. AS the daily expectation of the comming of the Propositions hath made His Majesty this long time to forbear giving His Answer unto them so the appearance of their sending being no more for any thing He can hear then it was at His first comming hither notwithstanding that the Earl of Louderdale hath been at London above these ten daies whose not coming was said to be the onely stop hath caused His Majesty thus to anticipate their coming to Him and yet considering His Condition that His Servants are denied accesse to Him all but very few and those by appointment not His own Election and that it is declared a crime for any but the Commissioners or such who are particularly permitted by them to converse with His Majesty or that any Letters should be given to or received from Him may He not truly say that He is not in case fit to make Concessions or give Answers since He is not master of those ordinary Actions which are the undoubted Rights of any free-born man how mean soever his birth be And certainly he would still be silent as to this subject untill His Condition were much mended did He not prefer such a right understanding betwixt Him and His Parliaments of both Kingdoms which may make a firm and lasting Peace in all His Dominions before any particular of His own or any earthly blessing and therefore His Majesty hath diligently imployed His utmost indevours for divers moneths past so to inform His Understanding and satisfie His Conscience that He might be able to give such Answers to the Propositions as would be most agreeable to His Parliaments but He ingenuously professes that notwithstanding all the pains that He hath taken therein the nature of some of them appears such unto Him that without disclaiming that Reason which God hath given him to judge by for the good of Him and His People and without putting the greatest violence upon His own Conscience He cannot give His consent to all of them Yet His Majesty that it may appear to all the World how desirous He is to give full satisfaction hath thought fit hereby to expresse His readinesse to grant what He may and His willingnesse to receive from them and that personally if His two Houses at Westminster shall approve thereof such further Information in the rest as may best convince His judgment and satisfie those doubts which are not yet clear unto Him desiring them also to consider that if His Majesty intended to wind Himself out of these troubles by indirect means were it not easie for Him now readily to consent to what hath or shall be proposed unto Him and afterwards chuse His time to break all alleaging that forc'd Concessions are not to be kept surely He might and not incur a hard censure from indifferent men But maximes in this kind are not the guides of His Majesties actions for He freely and clearly avows that He holds it unlawfull for any man and most base in a King to recede from His promises for having been obtained by force or under restraint wherefore His Majesty not only rejecting those acts which He esteems unworthy of Him but even passing by that which he might well insist upon a point of honour in respect of His present condition thus answers the first Proposition That upon His Majesties coming to London He will heartily joyne in all that shall concern the Honour of His two Kingdomes or the Assembly of the States of Scotland or of the Commissioners or Deputies of either Kingdome particularly in those things which are desired in that Proposition upon confidence that all of them respectively with the same tenderness will look upon those things which concern His Majesties Honour In answer to all the Propositions concerning Religion His Majesty proposeth that He will confirm the Presbyteriall Government the Assembly of Divines at Westminster and the Directory for three years being the time set down by the two Houses so that His Majesty and His Houshold be not hindred from that form of Gods Service which they formerly have And also that a free consultation and debate be had with the Divines at Westminster twenty of His Majesties nomination being added unto them whereby it may be determined by Hâ—s Majesty and the two Houses how the Church shall be governed after the said three years or sooner if differences may be agreed Touching the Covenant His Majesty is not yet therein satisfied desires to respite His particular answer thereunto until His coming to London because it being a matter of conscience He cannot give a resolution therein till He may be assisted with the advice of
to receive any from Him no commerce must He have with any Creature but only such as were His tormenters and tempters subservient to them or allowed by them in brief they would not let Him be Master of those ordinary Actions which belonged to any free-born man of how mean a birth soever insomuch that His Majesty may surely say He had to do with Beasts at Holdenby in the shape of men and fought with them as Saint Paul did at Ephesus But behold for all this though they forgot themselves to be Subjects and indeed men yet He remembers Himself still to be the Father of His People and though His Condition under them might make Him silent and His usage by them might harden His heart against them and stir His spirit to plot revenge upon them and to this end to study the winding Himself out of His Troubles by indirect means and that were as Himself tells them by consenting readily to what had or should be proposed unto Him and chuse a time afterward to break all and alleage that forced Concessions are not to be kept which he is confident He might do without incurring any hard censure from indifferent men But His Majesties spirit is too Kingly and divine to practice according to such maximes for though indeed no compulsions or violence shall be able to wrest from Him any Concessions against Conscience or in clear reason against the good and welfare of His people yet He avows freely and cleerly that He holds it not only unlawfull but base to recede from His promises if once passed for having been obtained by force or under restraint wherefore His Majesty not only rejects all those Acts which He esteems unworthy of Him but even passeth by that point of Honour which He might well insist upon in respect of His present Condition and consents as we see so far to all their Propositions as in Conscience and Reason He conceived might possibly be done in order to His peoples welfare though to the great diminution of His own undoubted prerogative and most just rights for example He knows well and acknowledgeth as we see the power of the Sword is intrusted to Him by God and the Law to Protect and Govern His people and is absolutely necessary to the Kingly Office yet to secure the Kingdome of peace on His behalf and the performance of agreements on His part which by reason of the wrongs done Him was so much suspected He not only offers the whole power of the Militia both by Sea and Land to be in the whole disposall of the two Houses of Parliament for ten years space but also intreats them after all this their ill usage of Him and conjures them as English-men and lovers of Peace by the duty they owe Him as their King and by the Bowels of Compassion which they have to their fellow-Subjects to accept of this His offer whereby the joyfull news of Peace may be restored at length to this languishing Kingdom Nay and further as we see in this Message notwithstanding they had grieved His spirit by their unparalleld abuses and offended Him above seventy times seven times and never hitherto so much as said it repenteth us yet doth His most gracious Majesty even urge upon them for the prevention of new disorders and future troubles to accept of a pardon at His Hand for all the wrongs which they had done Him and to admit of an Act of oblivion as the best bond of peace only He would have them deny their Corruptions so far as to cease thirsting for the bloud and totall ruine of those of their Christian Brethren whom they had well nigh undone already for their love and adherence to Himself according to their duties as Gods Word the Law their Consciences Oaths of Allegeance and Protestation did command them He desires in effect that their spleens may rest satisfied with the wrongs already offered to these persons and their families lest their discontent might haply prove fewell to new dâ—sorders He would have the Act of Oblivion to include them too Yea He would have these men who indeed only need it to consent that it might reach to all the people of the Land in generall this is all He desires of them that so from henceforth we might live together like Christians and not like Heathens like savage Creatures or rather like devils any longer as alas we have done to the unspeakable disgrace of the Gospell and of our Nation since these men domineered And to the end that there might not be the least face or question of His Majesties restraint to blemish this agreement to their disadvantage in after-times He earnestly desires that Himself might presently be admitted to His two Houses after all this His complyance to perfect the same And now surely we must needs conclude that here was enough to still the Clamour of these men against their King had they not been far worse then beasts to have conquered their spirits even to everlasting But they were resolute in their way all this was nothing in their esteem for indeed the established and fundamentall Laws of the Land are so severe against such as go in those waies and courses which these have travailed so far in against the King and their fellow-subjects that they dare not trust either to his mercy or their forgivenesse be the same never so strongly confirmed unto them nor can any Act of Oblivion in their conceits be ever able to obliterate the same and therefore as if He had offered nothing at all they still cry out that His Majesty is averse to Peace and never yet pleased to accept of any Tender sit for them to make nor to offer any fit for them to receive and thei Preachers are still set a work by them to pray before the people that God would incline the Kings heart to come unto His Parliament But these men not knowing how to answer His Majesty saving their own stubborn resolutions or to say any thing to these His so large and gracious tenders they even suffer Him after their old wont to wait and to live in expectation And yet we found or at least supposed at that time that His Majesties Answer to some of these Propositions viz. to those that concerned Religion or Church Government had some effect upon the Independent party whose boyling discontents about this time began to vapour forth more furiously then before against their Presbyterian Brethren whose Government and Directory His Majesty had here promised to confirm for three years the time set down by the two Houses so that Himself and His might not be hindered thereby in serving God the old and true way now upon this the untamed Heighfers of this other faction altogether unaccustomed to the yoak having observed that their Brethrens little singer was like to prove heavier then the Bishops loynes were horribly loath to come under the sence of their Scorpions and therefore began to cast about for themselves
all other things being fully agreed His Majesty will give full satisfaction to his Houses concerning that Kingdom And although His Majesty cannot consent in Honour and Justice to avoid all His own Grants and Acts past under His Great Seal since the 22 of May 1642. or to the confirming of all the Acts and Grants passed under that made by the two Houses yet His Majesty is confident that upon perusall of particulars He shall give full satisfaction to His two Houses to what may be reasonably desired in that particular And now His Majesty conceives that by these His offers which He is ready to make good upon the setlement of a Peace He hath clearly manifested His intentions to give full security and satisfaction to all Interests for what can justly be desired in order to the future happinesse of His people And for the perfecting of these Concessions as also for such other things as may be proposed by the two Houses and for such just and reasonable demands as his Majesty shal find necessary to propose on His part He earnestly desires a Personall Treaty at London with His two Houses in Honour Freedom and Safety it being in His judgment the most proper and indeed only means to a firm and setled Peace and impossible without it to reconcile former or avoid future misunderstandings All these things being by Treaty perfected His Majesty believes His two Houses will think it reasonable that the Proposals of the Army concerning the Succession of Parliaments and their due Elections should be taken into consideration As for what concerns the Kingdom of Scotland His Majesty will very readily apply Himself to give all reasonable satisfaction when the desires of the two Houses of Parliament on their behalf or of the Commissioners of that Kingdom or of both joyned together shall be made known unto Him CHARLS R. From the Isle of Wight Novemb. 17. 1647. To the Speaker of the House of Peers pro tempore to be communicated to the two Houses of Parliament at Westminster and to the Commissioners of the Parliament of Scotland WE see at the beginning of this Message that His Majesty conceived Himself to be at much more freedome and security in that place then formerly Had the Governour there been a true Gentleman in the least degree he would rather have lost his life then crossed His Majesties opinion in that particular but we are confirmed by Him in what we knew before that swordmen in these dayes are not all men of Honesty nor yet of Honour His Majesty being now in His own apprehension at more freedome renews His motions for the purchase of peace that his jealous and hardhearted Chapmen if possible might be cured of all their feares in seeing now that His profers before were not the fruits of restraint but of Hearty will and Affections to His languishing and distressed Kingdomes And first His Majesty in this Message declares His Conscience and Reasons why He cannot consent to the totall Alteration of that Church Government which He had sworn to maintain and they without any Conscience or Reasons at all would force Him to destroy Doubtlesse if there were a necessity that it must be as they would have it yet would it better become them to endeavour His Majesties satisfaction in the matter and to Answer His Reasons then to urge him with violence to goe against both when they see He dares not for offending God yet to bawl and clamour against Him without shame or Honesty as if He made no Conscience at all of His Oath taken at His Coronation But what necessity is there of pulling up this pale of Government save only to let wild beasts into Gods vineyard surely if his Majesty were not confirmed in His Judgement that this pale was of the Apostles setting and cherished in all Christian Churches since their times till this last Century of years and upheld in this particular Church since the Reformation as the speciall preserver of Doctrine and order in Gods Worship and if He had not taken an Oath at His Coronation to maintaine it and though the rights of the Church were not so woven as they be in the great Charter of the Kingdome with the Liberties of the rest of His Subjects yet as He is a King and protector of Christs Religion as He is a nursing Father of His Church beholding the present destruction and vastation of both by those swarms of Hereticks and Schismaticks which have abounded within these seven years since the Execution of this Government hath been suspended He ought in Conscience and Prudence to endeavour the continuance of it it being by the confession of its greatest Adversaries viz. the Smectymnists first established to suppresse and prevent these very mischiefs His Majesty will see that Bishops doe their duties and that all abuses in the Government be amended which no question but the Tryenniall Parliament will also look unto if the Kingdome might but be blessed with it And that the present Enemies of this Government may have both time and occasion to think better of their own demands in their cooler temper His Majesty is willing to let them for their own parts to try three years how well they can thrive without it hoping that their Mistris Experience may have taught them by that time in the want of this Government the necessity of the use and continuation of it but to consent to the totall abolition of that which to Himself and all sober men is evident to be the most speciall mean to preserve the life being and beauty of Christs Church no men but these that drive Satans designe if they well consider of it can or will desire it 2. His Majesty plainly declares that he dares not be a partaker in that Sinne of the highest Sacriledge by consenting to the Alienation of Church-lands nor venture upon the Curses which hang over the heads of such profane violaters as those are and will be that shall deal in such merchandize for His Majesty feared God Nor can He be induced so much to prejudice the publick good or to damnifie so many of His Subjects who farme these Lands as now held at far easier rates then they are like to doe if they should become the possessions of private men for the King loves His People Nor lastly will He ever be such an ill friend to learning and industry as to consent to the taking away of those rewards which excite and courage thereunto the meanest persons for our Soveraign Lord Honours Learning so much that in relation to that He will provide and keep maintenance in store for the Children of His lowest Subjects Nay should His Majesty yeeld to this Sacriledge were it not the next way to destroy Religion as well as Learning Iulian the Apostate one of the greatest and subtillest enemies that ever Christianity had thought it was And therefore he endeavouring to extirpate the same made an Ordinance for the sale of Church lands or the taking
of Reason And now I would know what it is that is desired Is it Peace I have shewed the way being both willing and desirous to performe my part in it which is a just compliance with all chiefe interests Is it Plenty and Happinesse they are the inseperable effects of Peace Is it Security I who wish that all men would forgive and forget like Me have offered the Militia for my time Is it Liberty of Conscience He who wants it is most ready to give it Is it the right administration of Justice Officers of trust are committed to the choice of my two Houses of Parliament Is it frequent Parliaments I have legally fully concurr'd therewith Is it the Arrears of the Army upon a settlement they will certainly be payed with much ease but before there will be found much difficulty if not impossibility in it Thus all the world cannot but see my reall and unwearied endeavours for Peace the which by the grace of God I shall neither repent me of nor ever be slackned in notwithstanding my past present or future sufferings but if I may not be heard let every one judge who it is that obstructs the good I would or might doe What is it that men are afraid to hear from me It cannot be Reason at least none will declare themselves so unreasonable as to confesse it and it can lesse be impertinent or unreasonable Discourses for thereby peradventure I might more justifie this my Restraint then the causers themselves can do so that of all wonders yet this is the greatest to me but it may be easily gathered how those men intend to govern who have used me thus And if it be my hard Fate to fall together with the liberty of this Kingdome I shall not blush for my selfe but much lament the future miseries of my People the which I shall still pray to God to avert what ever becomes of me CHARLES R. BEhold here all English-men and you of Scotland Wales and Ireland in whose manly Breasts doth yet remain any true sparks of right Religion or Auncient Honour Behold your King the breath of your Nostrils the Anointed of the Lord under whose shadow you dwelt in peace injoying wealth many years together whose yoak was easie and sweet unto you Behold behold He is taken and snared in a pit see how sadly He sits in darknesse and hath no light hearken how He complains unto you out of Prison that He is layed aside or become like a broken vessel forgotten as it were like a dead man out of mind shall it be as nothing to you All you to whom this Appeal is made this Declaration sent that your Protector your Defender the Glory of Christians and Mirrour of Kings is thus used Have you no feeling of His sufferings no share in His sorrows is it not for your sakes that He indures all these hard and heavy things can there be named any other reason for them then because He will not yeild you up to be slaves and bond-men is He not divested of all His power stript of His whole Authority deprived of all His Comforts barr'd from the sight of Wife and Children denied Liberty of going whither and conversing with whom He desires because He will not consent that you without rule or reason should be handled and used in this manner He will not wound His Conscience and Honour in betraying the trust reposed in Him by Almighty God over you He will not deliver you up into those hands which have already so much abused you He will not abandon you to the unlimited power of the two Houses for ever He will not grant them His lâ—ave to levy Land and Sea sorces from among you by violence and to maintain them continually upon you at your cost and Charges and against you to keep you under without either Law or Limitation in a word He will not consent that you should be kept in perpetuall Beggery and made Vassals to your equals and fellows and for this cause are all these miseries heaped on Him Read over again and view well His many Gracious Messages and offers together with their unreasonable demands and Propositions and remember withall how uncomfortably how chargeably nay how miserably every way you have lived sinâ—e these men who would alwaies rule have exercised power over you Oh how is your Gold become dim since your King hath bin in darknesse How is your sine Gold changed since He hath been excluded the pretious stones of the Sanctuary how have they been defiled made as Common and poured out in every street since He the most pretious of all hath been refused by these new Mushrom Master-Builders the most Honourable Sons of Sion the Children of your Princes comparable to fine Gold how are they esteemed in these daies as earthen pitchers how have your most Heroick Nobles been vilified and debased your most Gallant Gentry been trod and trampled under Your free-borne Yeomanry the sinews of the Kingdome how have they been tyranniz'd over in their own houses and how many of all sorts have been begger'd butcher'd and destroy'd since these unhappy men who would for ever sit aloft have domineered How hath the most reverend learned Clergie the servants of the most high God been despised persecuted and defamed How is that rich and renowned City London become as a Widow in the absence of her Husband by the meanes and operation of these new usurpers How hath her most eminent Magistrates her Maiors and Aldermen been imprisoned Her wealthy Merchants impoverished her Commons of all sorts been baffled and deluded How hath the lustre of her excellent order and flourishing government been darkned and obscured She was so great among the Nations while her Soveraignes influence shined upon her that for her Beauty Freedome and Splendour above the rest she was reckoned a Princesse among all the European Provinces being as rich in Treasures as she was in People But now alas how is she become a Captive and a Tributary to her owne servants She now weepeth sore at least she hath cause so to doe and that as well in regard of her deception and her sin as of her misery for that among all her lovers whom she so foolishly and so wickedly doted on she hath none to comfort her for all those her friends whom she trusted in have dealt treacherously with her and are become her enemies yea her most vexatious Tormenters And because our most Christian King is not willing to signe a Bill of perpetuity for the continuation of these sad Calamities upon her upon you and upon us all for ever therefore is He tortured in that manner as we see and hear therfore is His Princely Honour blasted His Royall good name defamed His Regall power Authority and Revenues taken away and kept from Him His pious Conscience assaulted His sacred person imprisoned and every day in danger to be massacred and murdered O may it not well be asked and said Was there ever
c. Now our young Dolman or Walker for that is the wisemans name supposing that all those people were alive still that were old men 54. yeers agoe like a true Transcriber without the variation of a letter affirmes it confidently in pag. 43. of his Edition that many are yet living in England that have seen the severall Coronations of King Edw. the 6. Queen Mary and Queen Eliz. to which he also addeth King James and King Charls because they were crowned since and this we confesse is new in him Now by this very booke alone though much more we might say to this purpose t is very evident that these Children of Abaddon love the Iesuites Doctrine well enough so it comes not out in the Iesuites owne name if it be but authorized by themselves or those appointed to publish and Licence books for the Parliament O then 't is very excellent good and Orthodoxall And now shall not these doings so palpably vile and grosse inflame your spirits O English-men and quicken you up to free your selves from their thraldome who thus abuse you will you suffer them still to proceed till they have stubbed up and quite o'rthrowne Christianity from among you you now see plainly enough what they meant at first by Roote and branch it was not Episcopacy only Roote and branch but Monarchy also Roote and branch the King and his Posterity Roote and branch the Nobility and Ancient Gentry Roote and branch Peace and prosperity honesty and Loyalty Roote and branch with Protestant profession it selfe and all that good is which in your Protestation generall you vowed to maintaine ' â—is fit you should observe it All the particulars in the said Protestation save onely one are already averted and welnigh destroyed the Religion and worship of Christ established in the English Church how is that suppressed and persecuted His Majesties Person Honour and Estate how are they abused blasted and imbezelled the Priviledges of Parliament Laws of the Land and Liberties of the Subject how notoriously have they been infringed violated and overthrowne there remaines now but one particular to finish the whole worke of plucking up or abolishing the Protestation Roote and branch and that is breaking the union betwixt the two Kingdomes of England and Scotland which now also they are indeavouring to effect as appears sufficiently by their unfriendly nay reproachfull Declaration against the Scotch Commissioners and indeed against the whole Nation and no question but they will if they can force many of those whom they have made to sweare the contrary to joyne with them in this breach also as they have done in all the former if the Scots once begin to make conscience of their old oath of Allegeance and talke of their duty to their Soveraigne Lord the King His Crowne and Dignity of supporting His Power and Greatnesse according as they are bound by all Laws of God and nature then away with these fellows from the earth cry those that resolve to make no more Addresses to the King 't is not fitting they should live though they were our dear Brethren before yet now they are so no more but Malignants as well as other folks and fit for nothing but to have scorns obloquies and contempts cast upon them And here by the way let the Scottish Nation observe it well and they shall find upon tryall that those Loyall English who from the beginning have adhered to their King out of Conscience and Allegiance will be more carefull by all loving and friendly offices to preserve peace and unity betwixt the two Nations from that Common bond of Christianity and humanity which ties us all together then those others are or will ever be who have taken so many new Oaths and Covenants to that purpose all which as they are unwarrantable wanting Legality and life from the Soveraign so will they prove invalid and too weak to hold those who have ventured on them nor were they intended by those State-engineers who first devised them as Hen. Martin tells the world to bind the takers everlastingly to each other or indeed to any other end then to drive on present designes and to batter the Consciences and souls of poor men who are ingaged by them in very deed to nothing else but to Repentance But we return to those of our own Nation who now we think have fully seen the aymes scopes and endeavours of these miscreant persons that have slighted all their Oaths broken all parts of their Protestation and are guilty of all the crimes that can be named from the highest Treason to the lowest Trespasse what is now therefore to be done by you of this Anciently-noble English Nation but to stand up for your Religion Laws and Liberties to free your selves and Country from the insupportable Tyranny of these usurpers to bring these superlative Delinquents to condigne punishment to endeavour speedily your Soveraignes restoration to His Dignity and to venture your lives like good Christians and Gallant men to deliver Him that so many years protected and defended you and hath now undergone for your sakes such unparalleld sufferings as nothing is superiour unto but His incomparable vertues and which alas so many of you have ignorantly by the fraudulent suggestion of these perfidious men helped to bring upon Him Be you assured that all those Arguments and Reasons which they falsely urged to stir you up to combine with them against him are onely good and to be lawfully thought upon to perswade you to associate now against them Had the King been truely taxable of that they charged on Him yet Gods word Christian verity and the Law of the Land forbids Resistance but they all command the same against such as these though they were quite free from those other villanies which they abound in even because they are usurpers for there is a vast difference between usurpers of Authority and ill managers of lawfull Authority betwixt those that take power to themselves to doe mischiefe with it and those that exercise evilly that lawfull power entrusted to them Our Saviour in the dayes of his flesh would not so much as censure Pilate for his cruell and bloody act upon the Galileans when some did tempt him to it that he might not seeme to countenance any in so much as speaking evilly of lawful power authority though abused People when oppressed and wronged by their lawfull Superiour have allowance onely to cry unto God as 1 Sam. 8.18 and to sue for reliefe by way of Petition as the Israelites in Egypt did to Pharaoh when they were so cruelly used by his Task-masters But t is otherwise if men be usurpers and set up themselves as Abimelech the Bramble did Iudg. 9. or endeavour to destroy the Royall Family as Athaliah did if they oppresse or whether they oppresse or no all men are bound to rise up against them and to help that Royall Person or Family to their right that suffers wrong by them for fiat Iustitia