Act of Parliament but as I believ'd not the Statutes no further confirmation that I know of appearing more then by the same Commissioners who review'd our Colledg-Statutes which as far as I knew there was as good ground to believe were confirm'd by Parliament as those of the University He further added that that which I charg'd as a fault upon him viz. the relying upon his own wisdom I was chiefly guilty of it my self in preferring a Petition of my own head without first asking the advice and consent of the Fellows who did not appear any way to own it to all which allegations of his my answer directed to the Chairman of the Committee was as followes SIR I acknowledg it may to this grave Assembly seem strange perhaps something smelling of presumption that in a business wherein the good of the whole Colledg is pretended to one man onely should appear to own it he neither the first nor second Senior of the Colledge nor yet publickly employed by the Society for the making of such attempt But I hope if the high consequence of the matter presented and greatness of the person or rather interest to be opposed and how unwilling men of prudent and suffering spirits have always been to engage themselves in high contests and how loath modest men are to ask that which they think may probably be denied them be well considered this wonder will soon cease And to take away the imputation of presumption I have onely this to say that had I known of any man that would have taken upon him this task I should most willingly according to that mans directions either have sitten still or seconded him in the meanest of services tending to the advancement of this cause But I knew of none and besides had above the rest of the Society these speciall engagements obliging me to this endeavour 1. First at the time of my presenting the Petition I was one of the Deans of the Colledge an Officer intrusted by the Founder not onely as an assistant to the Master in the Colledge-Government but likewise as one of the Ephori of Sparta a Supervisor and Censor of his actions in some cases to admonish him if need were and in case of his obstinate standing out against admonitions to complain of him to a Superiour Justice Secondly our Colledge-statute requires every member of the Colledge even after his departure much more during his abode that in way of a grateful acknowledgment of that much good he hath received there he should endeavour the preservation of the Colledge-rights to the utmost of his power Now there having been one of my own name and Family the third or fourth successour to the Bishop of Ely that founded the Colledge a great Benefactor to it though the particulas wherein appear not and my self coming now in a more peculiar manner and by a strange cast of providence to partake of the good fruits of his bounty I held it a double obligation upon me to a performance of this clause of our Statute by endeavouring somewhat which posterity might reap the benefit of which being at present not in a capacity to do by gift of Lands or any considerable sum of Money all I had left within my power was â—â—â—ly to appear here as the Colledges servant in the vindication of our common-liberties then which ingenuous spirits know not a more precious treasure upon Earth Thirdly 'T is a thing well known to all I have ever converst with that I have ever since the first beginning of these civill wars and that in the most hazardous times when the generality even of the Parliaments party stood inclinable to a defection been to my poor ability and in my narrow sphere a zealous assertor of the Nations liberty against the prerogative of the supreme Officer of State then in War against us And therefore if upon the same principle I now shew my self more then ordinarily forward in asserting the liberties of our particular Common-wealth against a parallel tyranny I hope my boldness will find the easier pardon This I have been necessitated to premise in answer to those evill surmises which you hear have been rais'd and objected as of great consequence against the title of the Petition and more might be added but seeing this Committee hath been so just and honourable as waving all respect of persons to take the matter it self into your grave considerations I shall now wholly apply my self to the matter in hand The Petition is large but may in summe be reduc't to these two heads First a Preamble consisting of a Concatenation of divers motives for enforcement of the Petition Secondly The Prayer of the Petition it self The Motives are many and of great weight You have in them First a generall Proposition of those great mischiefs which the common experience of all ages places and Nations teaches us do arise from the chief Officer of any Corporations being intrusted with a power distinct from and superior to that of the community 'T is both the true characteristicall badge of slavery and the chief fomenter of jealousies and contentions For wheresoever 't is so there 's alwayes a particular interest of the governing power set up distinct from and most what contrary to that of the publike then which nothing can be more destructive to the welfare of any Community the truth of which Maxime we have had a feeling proof in the sad series of those evills which have lately sprung up in this Nation from the claime and exercise of this power by the chief Officer of Englands great Corporation 'T was that which had like first to have plung'd us into the depth of slavery and did afterwards ingage us in a bloudy war the justice of which war can never be solidly maintained by the asserters of a Negative Voice For my own part this was to me the great convincing argument of the Scots apostasie from their first principles and from the cause they were with using ag'd in when I saw them in their Manifesto plead so openly for the upholding of this great branch or rather stock and bulk it self of the royall Prerogative 2. You have for confirmation of this truth the judgment of the whole Representative of England and those that have most cordially appear'd with them in this cause especially of the now governing power which hath always declared this power in the King of a most dangerous and destructive nature to the weale publike and inconsistent with the Nations freedom And the Army in particular when we were not yet attained to that wise and generous resolution of removing the Kingly Office as well as his Person did in their grand Remonstrance propound it as a necessary caution for the securement of our Liberties that whosoever should upon the removall of the late King be admitted though but by election to succeed him should before his admission disavow all claim to a Negative Voice 3. You have presented to your
THE PETITION AND ARGVMENT OF Mr. Hotham Fellow of Peter-Housâ— in Cambridge before the Committee for Reformation of the Universities April 10. 1651. Against the Masters Negative Voice of that Colledge and for a remedy tâ— be granted the Colledge against the usurpations of Doctor Seaman the present Master agreeable to what was granted by Parliament to the City of London An. Dom. 1648. for the better enabling them in case of need to act as a free Body without their chief Officers concurrence Published for satisfaction to such of the University as may possibly be desirous of a true knowledge of that days proceedings London Printed for Giles Calvert and are to be sold at the Black-spred-Eagle at the West-end of Pauls 1651. To the Honourable the Committee for Reformation of the Universities Right Worthy Senators THough by reason of a subrustick pudor and love of ease the two Cardinal vices of my Constitution I have been alwaies averse from action never but by strong enforcement of duty appearing in publique view And though I was never so well pleased with ought I could ever yet say or do as to think it worth a rehearsall much less of publication especially in these Pamphleting times wherein the glut of Books hath rendred all mens Palats nauseous of what is not in its kind excellent and extraordinary Yet have I been lately by a strong desire of removing those pressures our Colledge hath long groaned under rouzed up out of my dearling rest and native shamefastness to appear a petitioner before you in some causes of our common concernment in all which though wearyed with the discouragement of continuall frustrations which put both all those engaged with me and others that would have otherwise appeared into a resolution of no more addresses yet could not I sit still as despairing till I had made this one assay more and delivered my self of this last parturience This masculine birth was no sooner exposâ—â— to the light in your presence but it was as you may well remember by Doctor Seaman whose prerogative it was born to oppose endeavoured to be stifled with a deluge of vulgar slanders viz. Malignity to his person ambitious desire of private promotion enmity to the establisht Laws and Government of the Vniversity from all which the Petition was I think before your selves sufficiently asserted but those light aspersions being easilyer born away on the wings of common Fame then that weight of reason I laid before you for its vindication I held it convenient to send after them this particular memoriall of that dayes proceedings that so his Calumnies and this Narrative being both heard speak together the Vniversity which I know never yet esteemed me an enemy to its Government may be the better enabled to give a true judgement But above all being convinced by some present at that debate that what I then delivered before you if published might possibly prove both a serviceable light and incentive to some generous spirits to the contribution of their endeavours to that good reformation by you rosolved upon I could not being a most devoted servant to that publique end but give way to their Counsels though putting my slow Pen to the great pennance of extorting from my weak memory and transcribing into a form fit for the Press that rude draught of materials I had prepared for this work together with an intersertion here and there of some few pertinencies in that tumultuary dispute either omitted or forgotten I must confess I expected that having the state of the Controversie and great need then was of determining it so clearly laid open before you 1. In Doctor Seamans great unwillingness so much as to answer whether he laid claim to a negative voice 2. In his open discovery when more pressly urged to it of his avowance and claim to it 3. In a full and satisfactory answer to all those Pleas he could produce in justification of this claim That a Declaration of your senses against his negative voice with some certain provision against the use of it for the future would have been the narrowest result of that dayes consultation And I further hoped that some Gentlemen of worth would so far have espoused a Common wealth quarrel as that if the abolition of the Masters supremacy in calling of meetings and proposing of questions at his own pleasure were not in the Committees power the matter being of a high and publique concernment should have been speedily reported to the house to provide a remedy But I will not make any foolish expectation of mine a rule whereby to judge of the resolutions of wisâ—r men That Order you were pleased to make that day of having a view taken of the Statutes of the whole Vniversity and every particular Colledge was a noble and a generous Resolve and to suffer your selves from the representation of a particular places grievances to be awakened into a positive activity towards an universall reformation was a thing becoming men of enlarged spirits and that Archipoimenall power you are entrusted with And in that subsequent Order of those Gentlemen of the Sub Committee Dated April 25. I cannot but with all due reverence applaud their wise admittance of an intermixture of the experience of men best knowing in Colledge affairs with their own particular wisdoms in this Reformation you gaining by this means a threefold advantage First The due praise of your Honourable Condescent in not asserting us to our lost freedoms by an absolute power till there first appear in our selves a dislike of our former Metamorphosis and willingness to be restored Secondly A true knowledge of the condition and temper of the Vniversity in the Genius of its particular members and how it stands affected to the principles of freedom And thirdly Many considerable discoveries which your selves out of the bare Theory could never have made of great subserviency to the clearing of your understandings not only in this point of freedome but in all the other parts of your intended Reformation Yet give me leave in my rough Northern Dialect to present before you some grand obstructions which as to our Colledge for I desire not to intermeddle further may possibly hinder such due concurrence as might justly be expected The first is the Master of the Colledges residing at London who though at that distance from his Charge he ought to be lookt at as a non significant Cypher yet hath he thereby opportunity by his great interest and acquaintance with many of your members to cast the prejudices of a private and partial information against whatsoever we shal present especially if intrenching upon his prerogative Secondly Though himself should sit still and say nothing yet his known Agent that grave Seigniour who stands alwaies at your elbow and hath been permitted more then once to intermeddle in our Colledge affairs even in the time of your private debates when we of the Colledge who are most concerned were commanded to withdraw and who by
perswaded of my souls candor in the attempt and that none of those by-respects our Malignant and ungodly Master charged me with but only the publike good was my sole and sincere aym both in this and other transactions wherein I have appeared cross to his designs And so whatever error I might commit in the management of this affair I promised my self from you whose censure I only valued an easie pardon Yet in all this prosecution of our cause of liberty you see I have hitherto acted with such tenderness to him I opposed as to aym only at the removall of his hurtfull prerogative not his person but seeing he hath to his former miscarriages added this Capitall transgression of seeking to cast a publike disgrace upon the President and whole Society whose honour and immunities he was bound to defend I hope it will not be thought injustice if that personall charge against him which if produced before would have come in only as a needless supernumerary motive to the enforcement of my Petition being reserved as yet intire be in its due time when some formalities yet wanting shall be ready produced against him to his amotion And if it should ever be our good hap to discharge our selves of so unnecessary a burthen I see for my own part no reason why the Kingly Office in Peter-House may not well be abolished and he who shall a◠President be elected yearly to supply the place content himself for his pains with the stipend allowed by the Founder and so the State become exonerated of the charge of that augmentation Nor do I see why we should distrust that Government in our Corporation of which all the Corporations throughout the whole Nation have such ample experience especially we having found by a more then six years experience of our own that all the good ends of Government have been attained with us by a President and Fellows in the Masters absence much better then in his presence Yet I speak not this at all in relation to other Colledges whose Constitution may be different from ours and who have perhaps found great benefit redounding to their Communities from their severall Masters vigilancy and faithfulness to the common interest But I hope the Master of our Colledge will be so wise in his generation as to cut off the Clue from these remote designs by making use of that old Statute de promotis together with that present interest he hath in many members of the honourable Committee to rid me first out of his way a thing most of you know he hath oft threatned me with but could never yet by such means get me to bate him one Ace of my open opposition to his designs where my judgement engaged me to it I know moreover what obstructions he is able to lay in my way without once being seen in it himself whensoever I shall come to lay claim to my Lancashire inheritance but it is my resolution God willing to go on as justice shall call straight forward without looking aside either to the right hand or to the left Nor shall the hazard either of my fellowship or five or six hundred pounds a year to boot deter me from doing ought wherein I may advance a publike good with respect to that worthy Society to whom I shall while I enjoy life endeavour to approve my self A most affectionate and faithfull Servant Ch. Hotham Vicesimo Octavo Februarii 1648. An Act of the Commons of England in Parliament assembled for removing Obstructions in the proceedings of the Common-Councel of the City of London THe Commons of England in Parliament assembled do enact and ordain and be it enacted and ordained by the Authority aforesaid that in all times to come the Lord Maior of the said City of London so often and at such time as any ten or more of the Common-Councel men do by writing under their hands request or desire him thereunto shall summon assemble and hold a Common-Councel And if at any time being so required or desired he shall sail therein then the ten persons or more making such request or desire shall have power and are hereby authorized by writing under their hand to summon or cause to be summoned to the said Councel the members belonging thereunto in as ample manner as the Lord Maior himself usually hath done And that the members appearing upon the same summons being of the number of forty or more shall become a Common-Councel And that each Officer whose duty it shall be to warn in and summon the members of the said Councel shall perform the same from time to time upon the Warrant or Command of ten persons or more so so authorized as aforesaid And it is further enacted and ordained by Authority aforesaid that in every Common-Councel hereafter to be assembled the Lord Maior of the said City for the time being or in his absence such Locum tenens as he shall appoint and in default thereof the eldest Alderman present if any be and for want of such Alderman or in case of his neglect or refusal therein then any other person member of the said Councel whom the Commons present in the said Councel shall chuse shall be from time to time President or Chair-man of the said Councel and shall cause and suffer all things offered to or proposed in the said Councel to be fairly and orderly debated put to the Question Voted and determined in and by the same Councel as the maior part of the members present in the said Councel shall desire or think fit and in every Vote which shall pass and in the other proceedings of the said Councel neither the Lord Maior nor Aldermen ioynt or seperate shall have any negative or distinct Voyce or Vote otherwise then with and among and as part of the rest of the members of the said Councel and in the same manner as the other members have And that the absence and withdrawing of the Lord Maior or Aldermen from the said Councel shal not stop or preiudice the procéedings of the said Councel And that every Common-Councel which shall be held in the City of London shall sit and continue so long as the maior part of the Councel shall think fit and shall not be dissolved or adiourned but by and according to the order or consent of the maior part of the same Councel And that all the Votes and Acts of the said Common-Councel which was held 13. Januarii last after the departure of the Lord Maior from the same Counsel And also all Votes and Act◠of every Common-Councel hereafter to be held shall be from time to time duly Registred as the Votes and Acts of the said Councel have used to be done in time past And be it further enacted and ordained by the authority aforesaid that every Officer which shall sit in the said Councel shall be from time to time chosen by the said Councel and shall have such reasonable allowance or salary for his pains and
like those Medicamenta maledicta emunge the body of the University of some of their most essentiall and fundamentall priviledges As for example The choice of a Vice-Chancellor which was before in the whole body of Regents they got in this Reformation a Monopoly of it to themselves so as the body of the University hath only left them a bare superficies of election but the substance they got into their own hands for by this new Reformation they got themselves the nomination of two one of which the University is necessitated to elect and if they doubted of him whom they desir'd to have elected 't was but nominating some one distasted or contemn'd man for a stale and then they were sure to carry it for such one of those two nominated as they should think fittest 2. Another great priviledge whereof they depriv'd the Body of the University was the interpretation of Statutes which before except in a few cases was as well as the making of Statutes in the body of the University but in this new Modell the heads got a Monopoly of it intitely to themselves And if I mistake not that strange Statute of the Caput Senatus consisting of the Vice-Chancellor and five others chosen by the heads of Colledges and the two Scrutators out of fifteen persons nominated by the Vice-Chancellor and Proctors and all this without the least advice or privity of either of the two Houses and these five men entrusted every one with more then a Negative voice for nothing be it never so just or necessary to the common good or of particular persons can be so much as propounded to the Houses till every single man of these hath given his positive consent is of the same date If but one of these deny though giving no reason the concurring voices of the Vice-Chancellor and the other four are of no force the motion is stiffed in the very cradle a thing of not care practise among us Now this Stature if considered in its full latitude will I think be found of no longer standing then that new model Something there was of a like nature before but if compared with this will be found vastly different For that had for its object onely tempus formam but this Concessions of all natures in that the negative was in three here in any one And lastly to fill up the measure of their iniquity they did likewise as much as in them lay defraud those Societies where the Founders had inricht them with that unvaluable treasure of their precious liberties and with their spoyls sacrific'd to their own ambition made every Master of a Colledge and absolute Monarch and the Societies their Vassals Thus miserably were the poor Fellows of Colledges deluded and oppressed but to complain was no boot These mens potency at Court was such and such was the reverend esteem had of them there that to have spoken ought in derogation of them or their proceedings would have been deemed blasphemy but especialy for one of no higher condition then a Fellow of a Colledge to have appear'd in publick in his Russet-Coat against these grand silken Rabbies had been to have expos'd himself only to laughter or ruine But the Court-prerogative the root of all these oppressions being now dig'd up these excrementitious branches will I hope be thought fit to be removed with it besides nature teaches us than each evill is best cured by its contrary therefore it having been laid open clearly before you how the Monarchs connivence at the fraud and corruption of its Representatives was the cause of this distemper'd mutation We hope for cure from the vigilant sincerity of our true Republical-Magistrates by the anulment if need be of that Statute and restauration of each Colledge to at least that ancient wholesome Crasis of Liberty it was created in by its first Founder I speak not this to cast any the least prejudice upon that good work of Reformation in Religion for which I cannot but say the Nation owes much thanks to the endeavours of all those Reverend Divines that were so happy instruments in it But we see the experience of that proverbial sentence Nullum magnum ingenium sine mixturâ insaniae The best of men are but men This whole World and the heart of every man in it is nought else but a Champaigne where good and evill light and darkness contend for victory and so where God hath his Church the Devill will erect his Chappel as a Fort to lay battery against it So in all Reformations the greatest instruments in it will alwayes if they be not by themselves or others narrowly look't to carry on some design of their own private an attendant at least if not corrivall to that of the publick Besides we know how the people of God who immediatly upon their deliverance from Pharaoh and the Red-Sea did nothing but in humility of heart worship and sing praises to God their Deliverer were observ'd afterwards upon a little prosperity to have forgotten God to have waxen fat and kick'd And of our Reformers about that Decade it may justly be question'd Whether thein zeal in preserving the Reformation begun were more to be commended or their ambition in obstructing its further progress and perfection to be condemn'd But above all I desire to be understood not to intend any the least reflection of blame upon those reverend Gentlemen and Ministers the present Heads of Colledges in our University for as they had no hand in procuring of those incroachments so neither that I know of have they ever made ill use of that power vvhich their Predecessors ambition had purchas'd to their hands For though they have by the last Statute I told you of the full power of interpretation of Statutes within themselves and there was a time when they might have used it with applause in that excellent interpretation of our University Oaths whereby mens consciences indanger'd to perjury upon every penal statute were much eas'd yet to my best remembrance they did not assume to themselves but yielded to the whole body of the University the honour of alleviating this grievance Nay this I must needs say to the honour of all those Heads of other Colledges except our own that I conceive 't is nothing but their honest and prudent carriage in their several charges which is the cause that none of the University none having the like particular cause of complaint appear as yet in this cause to desire those provisions against Tyranny petition'd for in our Colledge For 't is not evils in posse though of the nearest probability but those in esse that stir up the generality of men to the invention of remedies In other Colledges where the Masters have by statute or custome a negative voyce yet they have chosen rather to wave sometimes their own not interest onely but judgment too then make use of it and in the very propositions of questions to be swayed by the publick reason of their
Societies And if our Head had behav'd himself with the like candor and moderation in his trust you had not I think been troubled with these tedious disputes at this day but our Head though as you have heard denyed a negative voice by our Law-giver will yet usurp it propounding onely what he pleases himself and after the vote past following his own not the common prudence of the Society as shall be amply proved if need be in its proper place Besides we having in the general course of this mans Government observ'd nothing of a publike Spirit ayming at the common good but rather a constant tenor of close dissimulation and greedy intentiveness upon all advantages of not onely holding fast in every punctillo but advancing still further the grand interest of his power and profit and that as far as humane wit could guess of mans heart by its fruits the two great poles of his whole revolution were dominion and covetousness of which upon many sinister dealings of his there 's not three men of all our Society that have been the constant observers of his College-tranfactions this seaven years but have at one time or other exprest their deep resentment this is that has occasion'd this extraordinary petition for a just restraint of this exorbitancy of an assum'd power within those bounds our Law-givers wisdom had prescribed to it with some concurrent helps for the surer execution of his declared will Ex malis moribus ortae sunt bonae leges 'T is the greatest glory of good magistrates that they can in imitation of him whose image they bear bring forth good out of evil light out of darkness and like the Sun in the Firmament produce good Laws out of an equivocal brood of corrupt manners These things I thought it convenient by way of diversion to suggest not that the cause stands in need of it but onely to open your eys that you might see how this Antichristian mystery of the negative voice began its working betimes even neer the Apostolick dayes of Reformation For to the very letter of the Statute as it stands I am not without a very satisfactory answer For it says not positively that all Concessions Elections c. shall be Null which want the Prefects consent but that in all Elections Concessions c. the Prefects consent is necessarily to be required Now we know that that word is of the same nature with Postulo in Latin and so implies rather that the Prefects consent is to be required of him de jure as a right then begg'd as an act of grace as if the Societies consent without his Le Roy le veult were of no force And this answer in these times wherein all Statutes ought to be interpreted in favour of liberty as they were formerly in favour of Prerogative might alone suffice But I shall add another of more convincing evidence Which is this That granting the intent of this Statute was to make the Masters consent a necessary ingredient to the composition of each Election or Concession c. yet it absolves them not from that obliging power which lies upon them by any of their local Statutes to consent to what is advis'd by the major part of their Societies but that by refusal of such consent they incur the guilt of perjury and breach of trust or such other penalty as their Founders providence hath allotted for the establishment of that Law and therefore this obligation to consent remaining still in full force supposes in the major part the Prefects consent legally involv'd and included As to compare the greater with our smaller controversies the Kings consent was always suppos'd to be legally included in the major vote even of the most petit Tribunal much more of the grand Judicatory of the whole Nation though never so much personally dissenting which principle hath been always esteem'd one of the main pillars of our cause upon which alone we might lay the whole stress of not onely the justice and lawfulness but even legality of our war But this man who no doubt hath more then once with our once-Brethren of Scotland voted the King a man of blood and guilty of all the bloodshed of this war for endeavouring but to assert this power to himself though far more favoured by the the standing Laws of the Kingdom at that time then with us by our Statute yet hath not scrupled to do the same thing himself both in his particular practice in the Colledge and by his appearance here with all his interest and wit to maintain this prerogative But to return to the point This point having been fully clear'd up to you out of our local Statute that our Master is bound to consent to the vote of the major part that expression of the University-Statute will now I hope create no prejudice And this answer may likewise satisfie another argument for the negative voice which may possibly be drawn from our Statute of Elections which requires Consensum Magistri major is part is sociorum and some others running in the same strain For the true sence of that Statute de ardius being now fully clear'd makes it apparent that in the consent of the major part of the Society the Masters consent always is or ought to be included And now having I hope removed all doubts and objections I shall now desire leave to speak a word to my sixth motive for granting my Petition viz. the danger lest this root of corruption left among us should hence spread it self again to infect the whole Nation This I confess may seem at first sight but a meer flourish of Rhetorick or far-fetcht strain of melancholy but I shall make it appear there 's much of reality in the assertion 'T is an humour you all know the most of mankind are much incident to to labour the promotion and propagation of the forms opinions and customes of those places where they live especially where they have been train'd up in their younger years and therefore it was the policy of the contrivers of our former Government as knowing that that Government could never be durable which had not its image stampt upon the peoples affections to set up the image of that universal Government of the State in every petty combination of men Hence as a reflected image of the then-present Government by King and Councel King and Lords or King and Parliament was set up that Government of Corporations by Maior and Aldermen Dean Chapter Master and Fellows and in Corporations Masters and Wardens of particular Companies all which were nothing but the general frame of the State-Government contracted as to the matter onely into a narrower compass and this was that that fixt the love of Monarchy so fast in the affections of most Corporations that had it not been that the King had displeased some of the greatest of them by hard impositions upon them in way of their Trade and withall let loose his Bishops to