Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	act_n	law_n	parliament_n	2,185	5	6.6353	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27546	The world's mistake in Oliver Cromwell, or, A short political discourse shewing that Cromwell's mal-administration, during his four years and nine moneths pretended protectorship, layed the foundation of our present condition in the decay of trade.	Bethel, Slingsby, 1617-1697.	1668 (1668)	Wing B2079; ESTC R2682	14,027	24

hath in the World will not be found to have its Foundation in sence or reason but proceeding from Ignorance and Atheisme From Ignorance in those that takes all that was done by him as a Servant and whilest under the direction of better Heads than his own to be done by him alone And from Atheisme in those that thinks every thing lawfull that a man doeth if it succeed to his advancement But they that shall take an impartial View of his Actions whilest he was a Single Person and at liberty to make use of his own Parts without controll will finde nothing worthy Commendations but cause enough from thence to observe that the wisedom of his Masters and not his own must have been that by which he first moved and to attribute his former performances whilest a Servant as is truly due to the Judgement and Subtilty of the Long Parliament under whose Conduct and Command he was And now from Cromwells neglecting to live in peace as if he had pleased he might have done with all the World to the great enriching of this Nation The improvement of our Victory over Holland in his peace with them His being the Cause of the losse of our Spanish Trade during all his time Of the losse of 1500 English ships in that War besides by it breaking the Ballance of Europe Of the expence of the Publick Stock and Stores he found with the contracting a Debt of Nineteen hundred thousand pounds according to his own accompt which for ought I know he left behinde him but am apt to think the Debt was not altogether so great though made so to his Sonne Richard's Assembly as a means to get the more Money from the poorer people And lastly of the dishonourable overthrow we met with at Hispaniola It may well be Concluded that he lay the Foundation of our present want of Trade to what we formerly enjoyed and that the reason why his miscarriages were not sooner under observation is because our Stock of Wealth and Honour at his Coming to the Government being then unspeakably great stifled their appearance untill having since had some unhappy additional Losses they are now become discernable as first Losses to a Merchant who Concealedly bears up under them are afterwards discovered by the addition of second Losses that sincks him When I contemplate these great Failings I cannot but apprehend the sadd Condition any people are in whose Governour drive on a distinct contrary Interest to theirs for doubtless Cromwell's over-weening Care to secure his particular Interest against His Majesty then abroad and the Long Parliament whom he had turned out with a prodigious Ambition of acquiring a glorious Name in the World carried him on to all his Mistakes and Absurdities to the irrepairable losse and dammage of this famous Kingdom To prove the second Assertion That Oliver's Time was full of Oppression and Injustice I shall but instance in a few of many Particulars and begin with John Lilburne not that I think him in any kinde one that deserved favour or respect but that equal Justice is due to the worst so well as best men and that he comes first in order of time 1. John in 1649. was by Order of the then Parliament tryed for his Life with an intent I believe of taking him away but the Jury not finding him Guilty he was immediately according to Law generously set at liberty by those that had quarrell enough against him This Example in the Parliament of keeping to the Laws in the Case of one who was a professed implacable Enemy to them ought to have been Copied by Cromwell but in the contrary to shew that there was a difference betwixt his and his Predecessors the Long Parliaments Principles when the Law had again upon a second Tryal occasioned by Oliver Cleared Lilburne the Parliaments submitting to the Law was no Example to him For contrary to Law he kept him in Prison untill he was so far spent in a Consumption that he onely turned him out to dye 2ly Mr. Conyes Case is so notorious that it needs little more than naming He was a Prisoner at Cromwells Suit and being brought to the Kings Bench Barr by a Habeas Corpus had his Counsell taken from the Barr and sent to the Tower for no other reason than the pleading of their Clients Cause an Act of Violence that I believe the whole Story of England doth not parallel 3ly Sir Henry Vaine above any one Person was the Author of Olivers Advancement and did so long and cordially Espouse his Interest that he prejudiced himself in the opinion of some by it yet so ungratefull was this Monster of Ingratitude that he studied to destroy him both in Life and Estate because he could not adhere to him in his Perjury and Falseness The occasion he took was this He appointing a Publick Day of Humiliation and seeking of God for him invited all Gods people in his Declaration to offer him their advise in the weighty affairs then upon his shoulders Sir Henry taking a rise from hence offered his Advise by a Treatise called The Healing Question But Cromwell angry at being taken at his word Seized Imprisoned and indeavoured to proceed further against him for doing only what he had invited him to do and some may think that Sir Henry suffered justly for having known him so long and yet would trust to any thing he said 4ly In Richards Assembly certain Prisoners in the Tower under the then Lieutenant and some sent thence to Jersey and other places beyond the Sea complained of false Imprisonment Their Goalor was sent for and being required to shew by what Authority he kept those persons in hold produceth a Paper all under Olivers own Hand as followeth Sir I pray you seife such and such Persons and all others whom you shall judge dangerous men do it quickly and you shall have a Warrant after you have done The nature of this Warrant was by Richards Assembly debated and having first Richards own Counsells opinion in the Case as Serjeant Maynard c. they Voted the Commitment of the Complainants to be Illegall Unjust and Tyrannical and that first because the Warrant by which they were Committed was under the hand of the then as they called him Chief Magistrate who by Law ought not to commit any by his own Warrant Secondly because no Cause was shewn in the Warrant And Thirdly in the Case of those sent out of the reach of a Habeas Corpus which in Law is a Banishment because no English-man ought to be Banished by any less Authority than an Act of Parliament And therefore for these reasons they Voted farther that the Prisoners should be set at Liberty without paying any Fees or Charges but the turning out and punishing the Lieutenant by the Assembly for obeying so unjust a Warrant was prevented by their sodain dissolution 5ly The Tyrany in the decemating a party restored to common Priviledges with all others and the publick Faith given

for it by a Law made to that end by the then powers in being is sufficiently shewed in the mentioning of it only there is this aggravating Circumstance in it That Cromwell who was the principal Person in procuring that Law when he thought it for his advantage not to keep it was the only Man for breaking it But to the honour of his first Assemblie next following it may be remembred that they no sooner came together than like true English-men who are alwayes jealous of the Rights and Priviledges of the people damned the Act of Decemation as an unjust and wicked breach of Faith The third Assertion of Cromwells knowing no honesty where he thought his particular Interest was concerned is made good First though therein he mistook his Interest in his odious and unjust Warr with Spain without the least provocations meerly out of an ambitious and covetous design of robbing that Prince of his Silver and Gold Mines and because he judged it for his Credit to disguise his unlawfull desires he proceeded in it by imploying his Creatures in the City to draw the Marchants to complain of Injuries done them by Spain and to Petition for Reparations but by a cross Providence his Project had a contrary Success for instead of answering his seekings the Marchants remonstrated to him the great prejudice that a Warr with Spain would be to England and shewed that that King had been so farr from Iujuring us that he had done more for Compliance and preventing a Breach with England than ever he had done in favour of any other Nation But when Oliver saw his Method would not take he called the Remonstrators Malignants and begun the Warr of his own accord in which he was highly ingratefull in designing the ruine of that Prince who all along had been most faithfull to his Party Secondly His Falseness and Ingratitude appeared superlatively in turning out his Masters who had not only advanced him but made themselves the more odious by their partial affection towards him and in his doing it with the breach of a positive negative Oath taken once a year when made a Counsellor of State besides the breach of all other Ingagements Voluntary Imprecations Protestations and Oaths taken frequently upon all occasions in Discourse and Declarations and yet further when he had turned them out and left them void of Protection and exposed them to the Furie of the people in pursuing them with false reproachful Declarations enough to have stired up the rude multitude to have destroyed them wherever they had met them Thirdly His want of Honour so well as Honesty appeareth yet further in that having by a long series of a seeming pious deportment gained by his dissimulation good thoughts in his Masters the Long Parliament and by his Spiritual gifts winded himself into so good an opinion with his Souldiers men generally of plain breeding that knew little besides their Military Trade and Religious Exercises that he could impose in matters of business what belief he pleased upon them he made use of the credit he had with each to abuse both by many vile practices for making himself popular and the Parliament and Army odious to one another and because the Artifices he used are too many to innumerant I shall but instance in some few As his slie complaining Insinuations against the Army to the Parliament and against them to the Army His being the chief Cause of the Parliaments giving rewards to his Creatures and then whispering Complaints amongst his Officers of their ill Husbandry His obstructing the House in their business by long drawling Speeches and other wayes and then complaining of them to his Souldiers that he could not get them to do any thing that was good His giving fair words to every one without keeping promise with any except for his own advantage and then excusing all with forgetfullness And his deserting his Major Generalls in their decimations crying out most against them himself when he only had set them at work because questioned by his Assembly is not to be sorgotten c. I would not be understood to remember any thing here in Favour of the Long Parliament for what might be Wicked in him might be Just as to them And though if what he did had been for the Restauration of his Majesty he might have been excused yet being for his own Single Advancement it is unpardonable and leaves him a Person to be truly admired for nothing but Apostasie Ambition and exceeding Tyberius in dissimulation I am not ignorant that some thinks it matter of praise in him that he kept us in peace four years and nine months but that hath little in it his Majesty having done the like almost double his time since his Return with one fifth part of that number of Souldiers which he Commanded though he hath also had the trouble of pressing and sometimes forcing Uniformity in Religion which he found under severall Forms whereas Oliver kept the Nation purposely divided in opinions and himself of no declared Judgement as the securest way of ingageing all severall perswasions equally to him which Artifice together with his leaving the Church Lands alienated as he found them were all the true Principles of Policie that I know of which he kept unto The Honesty of these Principles I referr to the judgement of every mans Conscience but if we may judge of things by experience and success they seem to have been very happy in the world For in comparing the Condition of the Protestant Countries at present to what they were in times of Popery we shall find them abundantly more considerable now than formerly for in taking a true Survey of the Reformed Dominions we shall discover them to bear no proportion at all in largeness to the Popish and that there is nothing that keeps the Ballance betwixt the two parties but the advantage that the first hath in being free from the Bondage of the Church of Rome and the latters being under it For as the Church of Romes mercies are by their Principles Cruelties so had they power answerable to the naturall richness of the Soyl of their Countries and extent of their Territories they would long ere this have swallowed up the Protestant Churches and made Bonefires of their Members but as God in his Mercy and Wisdome hath by his Over Ruling Hand of Providence preserved his Church so for the Romish Churches inabilitie to effect that which they have will and malice enough to carry them on to do there are these natural reasons First There being generally of the Popish Countries above one Moyetie belonging to Churchmen Monks Fryars and Nunns who like Droans spends the Fat of the Land without contributing any thing to the good of mankind renders them much the less considerable Secondly Marriage being forbidden to all these Sorts and Orders occasions great want of people every where they being uncapable of any Children but those of darkness except in France which is an