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A50375 An epitomy of English history wherein arbitrary government is display'd to the life, in the illegal transactions of the late times under the tyrannick usurpation of Oliver Cromwell; being a paralell to the four years reign of the late King James, whose government was popery, slavery, and arbitrary power, but now happily delivered by the instrumental means of King William & Queen Mary. Illustrated with copper plates. By Tho. May Esq; a late Member of Parliament.; Arbitrary government displayed to the life. May, Thomas, ca. 1645-1718. 1690 (1690) Wing M1416E; ESTC R202900 143,325 210

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General Monk whom he had a desire to send further from him But before this last Fight the Parliament called by Cromwell under his Hand and Seal directed to each man such as he picked out godly men as he calle● them fit for his turn about One hundred and forty-two of them in all assembled at White-Hall on the Fourth of July where they chose one Mr. Rous a Cornish man Speaker one that had been by the la●e Parliament made Provost of Eaton Cromwell in a set Speech declares to them the occasion of their Meeting with his old way of Canting full of Scripture To these men a company of obscure fellows most of them 〈◊〉 Phanaticks the Council of State surrender 〈◊〉 their Power that they might afterwards give it to Cromwell These Adjourn themselves to Westminster where they sit and call themselves the supreme Authority of the Nation and begin to form Committies for the dispatch of Business But this Parliament called Barebones Parliament from a Leatherseller a Member thereof and consisting as I have said of such obscure Persons that most of them were hardly known in the Counties where they were born began to make such ridiculous Acts and so displeasing to the people that some thought Cromwell had called together this little Parliament to bring Parliaments into contempt the better to devolve the Ruling Power on himself as a Monarch One of their Acts was that none should be married without a Justice of Peace and the Banes asked in the Market-place three several Market-daies Thus the Priesthood was invaded and placed in the Civil Magistrate Then they took off the Penal Law of the Engagement to acknowledge the late Rump whereby it was ordered that no man should be admitted to sue in Law in any Court that had not taken it They voted against Tythes and the Universities as Antichristian They also were going in hand with cancelling the Law and all Law Books and so make a new Code more besitting their own turns and for the establishing of the Saints as they called themselves They were also upon making an Act that one Parliament should upon their dissolving have power to call another and so to make Parliaments perpetual This was not to be endured by the Oliverian Party who expected now to solace themselves under the shadow of his greatness And on the twelfth of December this Party in the House with the Speaker made a Motion for their dissolution declaring that their sitting any longer would not be for the good of the Nation Many of the Committee Blades hardly warm in their seats were startled at it these began to stand up stifly pleading for the Cause of God as they called it and shewing they could not leave the Commonwealth and the People of God committed to their charge so soon which would leave them to utter ruine and Harison and Squib a great Sequestrator were very zealous in defence of their own Authority But Oliver's Party being the greater arose and with their Speaker Rous left the House and the Fifth-monarchy Saints sitting in it who having sought God resolved to continue sitting Rous in the mean time with the Mace before him and his Followers go to Whitehall and there resign to Oliver the Instrument of Power he had given them that made them a Parliament with notice how they had left their fellows sitting Oliver returns them his thanks and kindly receives their Present and presently dispatches a Confident of his Colonel White with a Guard of Red-coates to turn the fag end or Rump of this little Parliament out of the House who entring the House commanded them in the name of the General to depart declaring them to be dissolved but they told him they were upon earnest business and therefore desired that he would not disturb them for they were seeking God to which he replied pish is that all 't is to no purpose for God has not been within these walls this twelve years and so fairly compelled them to go out of the House and to seek God somewhere else About four days after the Officers of the Army had prepared an Instrument of Government on which foundation they erected their new Dominion in a single Person entreating their General to accept of the Government under the Title of Protector of the Commonwealth of England Scotland and Ireland and thus a Rotation is made from a Republick to a single Person and Arbitrary Tyranny not the Monarchy is restored and instead of the many Tyrants one as boundless is constituted by a Military Power Good man with his usual dissimulation and Hypocrisie he refused it with much seeming modesty what he so long had sought and ambitioned but being pressed and by being made sensible of the great necessity of it for the upholding the Nation he at last accepts it and is installed with great pomp in Westminster Hall attended by the Lords Commissioners of the great Seal all the Judges in their Robes the Serjeants and learned Counsellors at Law the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Recorder of London in their Scarlets and all the chief Officers of the Army Being seated in a great Chair of State and the Instrument read unto him this Oath was administred I promise in the presence of God not to violate or infringe the Matters and things contained in the Instrument but to observe and cause the same to be observed and in all things to the best of my understanding govern the Nation according to the Laws Statutes and Customes thereof and to seek their peace and to cause Justice and Law to be equally administred But how well he kept this Oath you may perceive by the sequell of his Reign Having taken this Oath putting on his Hat the Commissioners surrender into his Hand the great Seal and the Lord Mayor the City Sword and Cap of maintenance which he respectively returned to them again and then returned in the same pomp to Whitehall The chief Heads of this Instrument as they called it of Government were First That a Parliament should be called every three years Second That the first should assemble the third of September 1654. Third That no Parliament should be dissolved till they had sate five Months Fourth That such Bills as should be offered to the Protector by the Parliament if he assented not in twenty dayes should be Laws without him Fifth That his Council should not exceed the number of twenty one nor be less than thirtee● Sixth That immediately after the death of the present and succeeding Protectors the Council shall choose another Protector before they rise Seventh That no Protector after the present should be General of the Army Eighth That the Protector should have power to make War or Peace This they denyed to the King Ninth That in the Intervals of Parliaments the Protector and his Council may make some Laws that should be binding to the Subject Here is a prerogative granted beyond any of the Kings of England Tenth That in the Parliament should be
3 d. July 1649. his Arrears amounting to 25000 l. order'd him and 1000 l. per annum Land to be setled upon him and his Heirs To Collonel Feilder 1300 l. To Scobel their Clark once a poor Clark in Chancery and wrot for 2 d. a sheet a Pension of 500 l. a year and an Employment in the sale of publi●k Lands worth 1000 l. a year and 6 s. 8 d Fee for every Order taken forth More given to Bradshaw Somerhill belonging to the Earl of St. Alben's To the Lord Brohill 2000 l. I am afraid I have tyred my Reader in going about to enumerate the many Gifts they order'd one to another but tho I might name much more this may suffice to shew what this Parliament did with the Kingdoms monies to gratifie one another and to share the prey among themselves of the Kingdom who groaned under Taxes and of the Kings Queens Princes and Bishops Lands of Malignants Estates Composition Excise c. The like never was read in History and therefore you may not wonder that these men should be so unwilling to leave their Seats and disband but to sit to advantage themselves if they could By what you have read it plainly appears also what sort of men they were most of them or very many of them of the scum of the people upstarts of mechanical breeding sordid covetous Wretches Hypocrites pretending Religion and making Godliness their gain I have done with them and shall name but one or two more Dr. Dorislaus who was Kill'd in Holland had been formerly a poor School-Master in Holland whence he came to Oxford and read the History-Lecture there in which he then decry'd Monarchy was complained of and forgiven by the King's Benignity He then became Judge-Advocate in the King's Army against the Scots and had the like Employ afterwards against the King under Essex and then under Fairfax gaining well in his employment and by that of drawing up the bloody Charge against the King for which some Cavaliers some say Irish others Scotch-men in revenge of Hamilton's Death kill'd him His Wife and Children had allowances by the Parliament but I cannot here forbear to mention Haselrig's bloody proposition upon his Death who moved That six Gentlemen of the best quality Royalists might be put to Death in Revenge of Dorislaus to deter men from the like attempt hereafter This was a Rumper's Justice and may serve for his Character a blind Zealot furious hot-headed rash unjust and an hypocrite a great Commonwealths-man and an Enemy to Oliver Harison was a Fifth Monarchy-man a great Speaker after his Canting way acted with Cromwell till he saw he set up himself instead of King Jesus and his Saints such as himself then a stiff Opposer of Monarchy and would again have brought in Anarchy and Confusion a man of no extraordinary Parts but resolute and turbulent ever heading a faction and dyed impenitent adhering to his wicked Principles Lambert was a good Soldier had a great designing head Ambitious but outwitted by Cromwell of great Power in the Army and beloved by the factious Sectaries some have thought he was then a Papist for he prov'd one since and carried on the Jesuits designs Fleetwood was a person of a pretended great Devotion but of a secret and violent Ambition and it was thought glad of Richard's fall hoping to succeed but fool'd by Lambert as well as formerly by Cromwell and though General had not the resolution of a man in his place and therefore called the meek Knight Jones was a flattering Sycophant Desborow a sordid Clown Pride an upstart Dray-man Hewson a Valiant Cobler Whaly a Merchant Sir Henry Mildmay an unworthy Turncoat and Rebel The rest much of the same stamp They had their Clergy too of the same Cloth as the Post-Priest Vavasor Powel the Fool Cradock The Incendiary John Goodwin Love Jenkins of both sorts Presbyterians and Independents who served their turns to trumpet forth Sedition to the People and to extoll their Acts for which they shared in the prey But above all the rest was the notorious and blasphemous wretch Pander and Buffoon Hugh Peters and because he was Chaplain in Ordinary to two great Potentates Lucifer and Oliver Cromwell I care not if I give you a little larger account of the man His Father was a Minister of the Church of England living near Foy in Cornwales where his Son Hugh was born and bred up by him at School instructed well in the Principles of the Protestant Religion sent thence to Cambridge and admitted into Jesus College but was soon Expelled the University for his lacivious life He gets to London and there turns Player in Shakespear's Company usually acting the Jester or Fool but weary of that by means of a Gentleman he became acquainted with he got a Free-School with the Stipend of 24 l. a year at the Gentleman's dispose in Essex After some time this Pedant growing familiarly acquainted with a Gentlewoman near who liked his Drolling discourse and used to entertain him being one that had an Estate he so ordered his business that he one night surprised her in Bed and getting in to her had a Comrade that came and surprised them before the strugling Gentlewoman could get forth of his Arms who saluting them Man and Wife caused the trepanned Woman to avoid the shame to consent to marry him After this he takes Holy Orders and was by Doctor Mountaine Bishop of London Ordained Priest and Deacon giving the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy to him which he took And now beginning to Preach he grows popular and was much applauded among the females whom he ever sought to please so that he got to be Lecturer of St. Sepulchres in London and continued there near Twenty years Here he turns Independent and his Wife being dead he lead so beastly and scandalous life that being detected and prosecuted at Law for many Misdemeanors he flyes over to Amsterdam where continuing the like pranks he goes at last to New-England where he Marries another Wife but that not keeping him Chast he began to grow odious amongst the Brethren and the Wars then breaking forth in England he returns and is entertained as a rideing Parson in the Army and at last becomes the Parliaments great Zany Preaching for the Cause and jugling the Women out of their Thimbles and Bodkins by which means he became Oliver's great Privado and with Ireton was admitted of the Cabal in contriving his late Majestie 's Death for which and his other good Services being a Col. under Oliver in his Irish Expedition he had given him 300 l. per annum out of the Lord Worcester's Lands in the Woulds in Worcester-shire and as they say the King's Library at St. James's and was Chaplain in Pay to fix Regiments But at last had a more deserved Reward an Halter being taken in Southwark was at last Executed for his Treasons and dyed like a Sot I shall conclude with him and now proceed to the second
by his Writ to confer with him as his Parliament Arduis negot●is or about urgent Affairs was Resolued 1 Hen. 4. Rot. Parl. n. 14.14 Hen. 4. Cook 4 th Institut p. 46. c. For it is not natural to suppose and impossible That the Lords and Commons should be a Parliament and make Acts and Laws without the King as for a Body to move and Act without an Head and therefore had there been any such thing intended to have been Enacted it was void because impossible for the Kings Royal assent could not be had after his Death and there is no Clause in the Act that obliges his Successor to Consent which clearly shews they never had any such intention at the making of this Act. And therefore on the death of the King all Commissions both of the Judges and others cease and all Proceedings determined tho the King is said to sit in the Court of the Kings-Bench in his politick Capacity which indeed never dyes so as to cause an Interregnum but other wayes as to the Continuance of Commissions Writs c. which must be renewed Consider also that if these men after the Death of the King could be a Parliament they must be so either by the Common Law and Custom of Parliaments which is clearly against them or by this Statute which as little Countenances them for they would then be another thing distinct from the Parliament which was summoned in the Kings Life for the Country had no Power to elect their Representatives but by the King 's Writ and therefore could receive no more Power from them than the Tenour of the Kings Writ granted which determining with the Kings Life their Representative-Power was also determined and by Consequence they could be no longer a Parliament If it could be thought they could be yet so by that Act then it follows That a Parliament by their Act might create another Parliament to exist after themselves were dissolved which is most absur'd and alters the Root and Foundation of all the Liberties of the Subject for they become no longer their Representatives but a Parliament by their own Act and it will never be thought that the people intended to entrust them with their Authority to change the Government and deprive them of their Fundamental Priviledges The Parliament cannot De jure do any thing against natural Equity quia jura naturae sunt immutabilia And also by the judgement of a Parliament this could not be being against the Law and Custom of Parliament for Ro. Parl. 42. E. 3. no 7. it is declared by the Lords and Commons in full Parliament upon demand made of them in the behalf of the King That they could not assent to any thing in Parliament that tended to the Disherision of the King and his Crown to which they were Sworn Now this Act of the 17 th of Caroli Primi is expresly against the Kings Successors Prerogative to call his own Parliament and therefore they could not make such an Act to the Disherision of his King and Crown A Parliament may be three ways Dissolved by the Declaration of the Kings pleasure or for want of entring their Continuances or by the Kings death whereby the Kings Writ which gives them their Authority is determined These words That this Parliament shall not be Dissolved unless by Act of Parliament is a general Negative which cannot extend to all Causes of Dissolution but have a respect only to that most usually hapning the Pleasure of the King till the pretended Grievances of the time were satisfied Now in all Times the judges have excepted particular Cases out of the general Negative or Affirmative Words of Statutes By the Star of Magna Charta C. 11. 'T is enacted That Common pleas shall not follow or be sued in the Kings-Bench which is a general Negative yet it is holden to be clear in Law That the King is not within these general Words and may sue in his Bench or any other Court at his Pleasure The Statute of Winchester is a general Statute That the Hundred c. shall make Satisfaction for all Robberies and Fellonies within the Hundred yet it is Resolved That the Hundreds shall make no Satisfaction for the Robberies of an House because the House was the owners Castle and he might have defended himself and preserved his Goods Besides this Clause in the said Act That all and every thing done or to be done for the Proroguing or Dissolving of this present Parliament contrary to this present Act shall be utterly voyd and of none Effect By which it appears That the cause of Dissolution which they intended to prevent was something that should consist in Action by the words Thing or Things done or to be done which words can only be applicable to an Actual dissolution by the Kings pleasure And the King's death is not a thing done but a Cessation of his personal being and of the Dependants thereupon And is not an Action but a Termination or Period So that it is most Clear these men could no longer by any the least Colour of Law or Reason pretend to sit and Act as a Parliament But alas What are Arguments to them who had usurp'd the Throne and Power of their Soveraign and had the vain and idle Hopes to keep it And to the strengthening themselves with all the Arbitrary and Tyrannical ways imaginable they proceed First they issue out their spurious Act before mentioned against proclaiming the King tho by the Law of the Land instantly upon the King's decease the imperial Crown of the Kingdom of England was by his inherent Birthright and by an undoubted Succession and Descent Actually vested in our now Soveraign eldest Son to the murthered King and next Heir of the Blood to his Royal Father and that before any Ceremony of Coronation as by Stat. of 1. Jacobi Ch. 1. And that all Peers of the Realm Majors Sheriffs and other chief Officers in all the Cities and Corporations of England are oblig'd by their places and Allegiance to proclaim him under pain of High Treason and forfeiting their City and Corporation Charters And notwithstanding the Junto's Prohibition there were several Proclamations printed and scatter'd about the City which proclaimed and asserted the Right of the Prince as next Heir to the Crown and by Birthright to be the lawful King of Great Britain c. Dated the 1 st of February Then also in like manner was privately scatter'd about another Paper in which were four Propositions briefly declaring That the House of Commons had no Power of themselves alone and without the Concurrance of the King and House of Lords to make any Act of Parliament Ordinance or to impose any Tax Oath Forfeiture or Capital Punishment on any Secondly That the few Members now sitting were no Court of Justice in themselves and could Erect no such Court for the Tryal of any person nor had Power to hear and determine any Civil or Criminal Causes and that
George Booth being also ill armed were soon defeated at Northwich August 19 Captain Edward Morgan was slain upon the place Egert●n fled but was pursued and taken Sir Tho Middleton got over sea Sir George Booth escaped as far as Newport Pannell where he was taken in disguise and soon after committed close pris'ner to the Tower of London for committing Treason in learying war against the common Wealth and Sir Hen. Vane and Sir Arth. Hazlerig sent to him to take his examination Lambert retakes all places that they had taken in and by an order of Parliament disarmes the Counties They send him 1000 pounds for a gratuity which he having other aims distributes among his souldiers Then they give order for a day of Tanks giving for their suceess-and presently prepare a new Oath of Abjuration not thinking the Engagement sufficient to be inforced upon the nation wherein they are to abjure the whole line of King James and tell the people they will now set themselvs to doe something extraordinary towards the setlement of the Government But Mony the Diana of the Ephesians and the Idol of the filthy Rumpers is that they want and therefore now impose a new tax upon the people of 200000 pounds a month confirm the Excise fine those that failed to supply their anew molded Militia with 〈…〉 under color of a sanctimonious care of the poor they make an inspection into the r●venue of all Hospitals prohibiting the Masters and Governors of them to renew any Leases General Monk upon the riseing of Sir George Booth was in a readyness to have marched but was provented by their being so suddenly suppressed the Rump had some jealousie of it but he had caried his design so closely and discovered it to so few that nothing could be made appear against him He was not a little troubled at these disasters and finding the Junto busie in displaceing those he most trusted at Col. Daniel Governor of St. Johnstong and many others fearing he should at last be outed by them of his command and hopeless of doing good as he intended he sends up a letter to the Parliament for a dismission from his command This letter was by his friends in London who had intimation thereof suppressed for some time and his friends in the House so ordered it that when it was delivered to the Speaker the reading of it was deferred for ten days till a packet came from Scotland to contradict it tho' Vaine and others who hand an incling of it called often to have this letter read which they suspected But the Speaker being persuaded to it by his friends under the color that if it were read and that they should take him at his word it would cause a general defection in the Scotch armie among whom the famous Monk was so wel beloved and might ruine their affairs he being also true to their interests tho' discontented at the displaceing his Officers This prevailed with the Speaker wholy to suppress that Letter and so the buisness passed over the Junto being extream busie about many matters In the mean time Lambert and his Armie being aflote upon their late success are provideing other employment for the Rumpers Quos Deus perdeie vult de●ent The whole Nation had long wish'd for the ruine of ●ot● and now their own dissentions will make way for it Lambert whom Cromwell had laid aside for his ambition had his heart still full of the same He keeps a mo●k Fa●● with his Officers an infallible token that some gran● design was hatching he had still a mind to the Protectorship and in reference to that he and his complices remonstrate the necessity of the Armies being g●verned by general Officers as it was before the Speaker had made himself General and requested or petitioned that Fleetwood whom Lambert doubted not to serve as Cromwell had done Fairfax might be made Lord General and that himself might be Leiutenant General and Desberow Major General of the Horse and Monk Major General of the Foot till he might have a good opportunity of laying him a side This Remonstrance being drawn up into form and signed was sent up to London to the general Councel of Officers whether Lambert was privatly gon and by some of them the Junto came to hear of it who were startl'd at it how ever they dissemble with the Officers and order Ashfeild Cobbet and Duckenfeild to attend the House with the petition which they did After the reading of which they adjourned till next morning when assumeing the debate they vote That to have any mere Generall Officers in the Armie than are already setled by the Parliament is needless chargeable and dangerous to the Common Wealth and that Fleetwood should acquaint them with this Resolve This was ill ressented by the Armie and tho' for the present they seemed to ac●uiesce because their design was not fully ripe and helped the Junto in a friendly manner to devour a Thanksgiving dinner at the Cittys cost and charges which was then govern'd by Ireton and Tichbourn and their gang yet it was not long before they presented a new Address to the same purpose on the 5 th of October by Desborow and many Officers attending him To this the Rumpers very gravely answer checking them for not submitting to their judgment formerly declared 〈◊〉 ●hat case but knowing that the armie Officers would not be so satisfied and expecting no less than another interruption they passed an Act against raising of monys on the people without their consent in Parliament declareing all such persons as should assess levie collect gather or receive contrary to this Act to be guilty of high treason and withall vacateing and disannulling all Orders Ordinances and Acts made by any pretended authority since Oliver turn'd them out of doors in 1653 unless allowed and confirmed by them And now having given such a killing blow to the souldiery and made the breach irreconcileable they-voted that the Commissions of Lambert Desborow Berry Kelsey Ashfeild Cobbet Pucker Barrow and Creed all Colonels excepting the last who was a Major to be voyd and constitute 7 Commissionners to govern the Armie Viz. Lieutenant General Charles Fleetword Lieutenant General Edmond Ludlow General George Monk Sir Arthur Hazelrig Col. Val. Walton Col. Herbert Morley and Col. Rob. Overton any 3 or more of them to of the Quorum They were incouraged to this by a privat message they had received from General Monk who had constant intelligence of all that hap'ned and of which he wisely made his advantages which was that if the Parliament would be resolute in asserting their own authority against the Armie he would assist them in it and if required thereto he would march into England in their defence This made them very brisk and now beleiving there might be some opposition made by the Armie they cause Morly's and Mossel's Regiments to be drawn up into the Palace yard for a Guard to the Parliament It was now high time for