their Herculesses honest men and men of honour ready to die for their Countrey if need require judging such a death infinitely to be preferred before the lives of the chiefest of these should they obtaine what they seeke But let us end this patheticall flying out though it be hard for the inferiour faculties sometimes not to stirre when the understanding somewhat inlightened hath inflamed the will On the other side so divine a gift as this Parliament thankfully recognized and made use of duely and the just power and dignitie of the Parliament and therein all our happinesse wisely and manfully now once asserted moderation and mediocritie induced the Monarchy duely tempered may be in humaine probabilitie perpetuall and all the surfet become Physicke And this violent Feaver of the State having amazed and drawne to an head all the malignant humours before dispersed all over the body and lying dangerously hidden and set on fire consumed and expelled them like the filth of an house swept into an heape and burnt the whole body may be much clearer sounder and better disposed then had not such a distemper ever beene I hope it appeares already were there no more then these presented weake reasons to an ordinary rationall man if far better from others be too meane for his Majestie what way he is to take that all may be well and seeing but one side can be trusted with the power of the Kingdome which of them is most unlikely to tyrannize or reduce all to arbitrary government or which will most probably use it to the publique good onely or whether in such extraordinary times it doe not most safely repose where it is originally naturally inherent viz. in the peoples owne hands and so in the Parliaments Nay were the case hitherto dubious yet since libertie first made appointed limitted prerogative for they confine together as the people in whom is the radicall primary supreame power and who made Kings not Kings people thought best when it first made choice of or instituted this one forme of government among divers others which we call Monarchy and whereof there are sundry degrees in sundry States some more some lesse trusted or limited as the first founders pleased els why are they not all equall since free and voluntary agents worke or doe onely so much or so far as they please and the various subordinate degrees or kinds of the creatures prove the divine Majestie to be agens liberrimum els the creatures would be all equall an involuntary or naturall agent as Philosophy termes it ever working as much as it can or to the utmost extent or sphere of its power and activitie and so an equalitie in the effects since I say libertie or the people first created as I may say Prerogative and that so tempered modified or graduated as it thought most conducible to its owne happinesse for the supreame power ever worketh for it selfe rather then for the subordinate or inferiour as being the end the efficient and finall causes being here co-incidents it is just that this namely libertie judge and give law to that and that this if an unnaturall jarre fall out gaine and prosper rather then the other and since the people reserved ever in its owne hands and saved to it selfe upon the trust to the Monarchy what priviledges right of Parliament or liberties c. parcell 〈◊〉 the originall power naturally in the people and which may draw backe to the fountaine the derivative power as the bloud and spirits to the heart when there is cause it thought best surely it must doe this with purpose to see them conserved as safely as may be and upon occasion to make use of them and enjoy them which could not be surely done without a power reserved to judge of the state of them and when they were to be used and the like for if the Prince be trusted touching the keeping himselfe within his limits he may even as well be trusted absolutely without limits nor such power to judge of them is to any purpose as above-said without power to execute what is judged hereupon fit So the Parliament judgeth in this case as the first authour and superintendent of the intent and is not as a partie to be judged Further were the matter yet dubious yet seeing the Protestant Religion the power being in the Parliaments hand is far more out of the reach of danger then the other way even without calling his Majesties good meaning into question therein as I hope anon will appeare it ought to put it out of all question how wee are to range our selves in these times The Parliament having our case so standing such power as is deduced whatsoever would seeme to oppose that power and stand in their way as they defend and assert the publique good so invaded must be voidable and usuall ordinary known lawes or customes made or in use supposing or whilest the Prince kept duely within his bounds which the King speakes so much of saying that he will ever governe by them and hold all to them but ever intending the publique good are no way to bound or tye up the transcendent power of the Parliament when it shall encounter new and never before heard of exorbitances or invasions of the publique good which the times that made those knowne Lawes never heard of so never provided against But by proportion of reason this Parliament may and ought as well provide by new Ordinances or orders for such new evills as they encounter as the former did for what they then met with for they had their originall also ex malis moribus bonae leges and had those times had such causes offered as these have they would have provided remedies of a nature like those this Parliament hath done the power and generall intentions of all times or the universall ground being still the same that is to defend and vindicate or procure the publique good and to tye them to the knowne or old Lawes in this case where the letter might kill were irrationall for so the first breaker of the Lawes might take the priviledge of the Lawes and advantage of his owne wrong and under the colours of the Lawes fight against and overthrow them or the rule reason or intention that caused them at first If it be said nothing was done by the King of publique consequence but by advice of the Judges it may be answered that the Parliament is the onely competent Counsell Judge in cases neerely concerning the publique and people in generall which the King is entrusted upon such occasions to call that the whole people may not but upon extraordinary causes be troubled to elect for Parliaments and attend that service But in such a case as ours by virtue of the legislative power residing in the Parliament it may make new Ordinances at least for the time as it sees occasion and judges to be in order to that supreame and immutable Law or Law of Lawes and end of them
this case is remediable for by such having recourse to force or warre though but defensive he challengeth and assumeth all the power from the people to himself making himself supreme Judge of all upon the last resort of which somewhat more shortly But the King cannot be so in our present case in which he is a party in as much as the evill proceeds from ill counsell prevailing with him For to bring the hypothesis to a Thesis and not to stand alway on supposition taking it as a supposition that a king seduced may de facto make such attempts as are above put it is more evident of it self then that we need look on the fall of Liberty in France if not from the King nor Counsell about him consequently then whence is the remedie for our losse from the Judges what ever their will may be they want power and notwithstanding they still were present the mischief grew on It must be then from the two Houses of Parliament onely unlesse you would have the whole Nation assemble personally as in the Vale of Jehosaphat if you suppose it possible and if possible fit for any thing but confusion except perhaps force the king having to speak with what reverence we can in this case excluded himself and the Clergie justly being excluded from such temporall distractions that it may attend the better and advance the celestiall and ecclesiastick more then enough to take up the ablest men wholly and not a little hindered and discredited by their so great greedinesse after worldly matters let them do their dutie let them teach truly live exemplarily like professors of mortification this will render the people so devoted to religion to them that they may securely trust the Parliament with all that touches them and safely make it their proxy themselves being absent and whilest thus spirituall matters are the better served and attended these and the temporall both receive the greater blessing but such diffidence and suspition in the Clergie if it should not be present in Parliament argues ill deserving since the justice and wisdom of the Parliament as principles of this government ought not to be questioned but how much more is the Clergie to receive at the hands of the Parliament that fuora i. preti i.e. Priests void the roome used by that Councel in Venice of which Bodin in the third book De republicâ the 3. Chapter then when they shall be found in life and doctrine unsound ill affected to the publick good accessarie to the evill to be remedied nay ardent to bring in or maintain either Papistry and idolatrie or at least a most scandalous symbolizing with it in temporall pride riches and greatnesse and even Antichristian domination through the breaches and ruins of their Countrey rather then even a Parliament shall question it The Parliament then and under this notion of the two Houses in these times understood being our onely remedie or rather Physitian it follows it may and is to be Judge of the danger or disease and that of power which is to remedie if it be so is to try whether it be so for without judgement or knowledge of the disease how can there be remedie or how shall the Physitian know what when and how to apply If it be the onely competent Judge of this our dangerous disease and of the meanes to meet with or expell it the knowledge of the remedie depending essentially upon the knowledge of the Maladie and receiving thence its Judications it hath consequently power to execute or act or cause to be executed or acted what it hath or shall judge or ordain necessary for the cure else such power to judge were vain and it would still return that the people were remedilesse But WISDOM or Judgement and POWERS as they are divine coincidents and all one really and naturally where they are supreme and essentiall as in the Divine nature it being but our weaknesse of understanding to conceive them disjoyned so for principles of one facultie questioned are to be enforced from an higher facultie even in this supreme power on earth which as farre as frail mortalitie can bear imitates and represents that above they ought not to be by us apprehended separate but mutually presupposing or inferting one the other Let as adde to make up this terrestriall trinity Goodnesse which last may be understood in our present case a doing no unjust or dishonourable thing but wholly intending the publick good according to the peoples trust And it were an arch heresid in the policy of this Monarchy to disjoyn in out beleef or opinion the third from the two former And the Law saying no dishonourable thing is to be conceived of the Parliament it seems all one as to have said in other termes that it is the supreme Judge of the last resort and that even without the king if he hath excluded himself as above which is more then if he were far personally absent or otherwise casually disenabled and as much as if no king at all were for the time where all appeals are to rest and determine all men to acquiesse binding all from questioning what is there done and inferres the supreme power there to reside as being the whole kingdome in which it is radically and fundamentally by representation such power to be exerted and used when it judges necessarie and that if the nature of the occasion so requires with the suspension of the power of the supreame ordinary Delegate or Magistrate during that parenthesis of state for the kingdome having entrusted the Parliament with all it holds precious the effect of the Commission upon the matter being that it provide ne quid respublica detrimenti capiat it hath consequently trusted it with its power which is the supreme that it may be enabled to perform and execute the trust when it judgeth this cannot be made good without using that power But to return the Law saith also That the King can do or doth no wrong but it denieth not but ill Counsell about him may or perhaps the Law intends the king as he is in his great Counsell where he is as Sal in Leone or any Planet as they say in his proper house of farre greater vertue and power then otherwise But however Reason tells us that a Prince or a few of his Cabinet counsell may far more easily erre in judgement or possibly in point of will then the multitude of a Parliament so many whereof are selected out of the whole Kingdom by the people in point of Judgement much more of will or well willing to the publique whereof themselves are so great a part and this much the rather in that it is to be feared that oftentimes those privadoes of the Prince finding out cunningly the Princes will inclination or humour before they advise and further to ingratiate themselves seconding it much that there is agitated becomes to be upon the matter the judgement or will but of the Prince alone Well
I hope we are now come safe to this passe that the Parliament may and ought in our case to defend the people or kingdoms rights use the peoples power which is the supreame as others have proved to cleare passionate men rather then to satisfie any judicious man who will not require proofs in a point plain enough of it self ever resident in the people and so in the Parliament though dormient till it be by the Parliament thought fit to be wakened which should it not now be done such a seeming-secure and supine sleep might have proved a mortall lethargy But here these Sophisters think to enter upon us and to take the benefit of their own wrong for seeing they have brought the Kingdom to this passe that unlesse the Parliament take the power of the kingdom into the kingdoms or its own hands it cannot defend it self or the kingdoms rights or rather rescue them they would cunningly prepare those whom they intend to make slaves by first making them such fools as to beleeve that the Parliament intends a change of the Monarchicall form of government and to oppresse King and people by I know not what new kind of Arbitrarie tyrannicall government I beleeve the King and Parliament will soon be attoned if any can shew the Parliament by what other way it can discharge its trust and dutie in this constitution of the times without the power it hath assumed But what if it shall appear I should make scruple to use the word shall as if it did not appear alreadie without these weak offers had we not to do with such as seem to have found our some new kind of reason or having antiquated the old which differenced man from irrationall creatures to have substituted passion or idle phantasie in the roome of it the best method indeed for them afterward on as good or the same proportion of reason to advance the power of the King into the place of the power of the whole people or Kingdom it is their own manner of speech and practise as sound and good as their own Method to make such distinction and difference betwixt King and kingdom what if it shall appear time bringing every day truth to light and perhaps even to these men some allucida inter valla that there is not the least probabilitie that the Parliament can have such a thought of usurpation as these men would impose or seem to suppose much lesse was it ever heard that any free Parliament actually made any the least attempt to that effect so far is it that ever it effected it Whereas on the other side ill Counsell about Princes have attempted oft and de facto sometimes performed the turning of a well poysed or tempered Monarchy into an arbitrarie tyrannicall power and publique oppression by which change such ill instruments appear the onely gainers and the malignant spleen swels in a miserable consumed bodie the head not exempt and yet the very swelling a dangerous disease even to the spleen it self at last Unlesse such monstrous times did priviledge it were high presumption to think it were not all-sufficient to stop such mouthes to say it is a Parliament and it were dishonourable for it to do as they calumniate and therefore not to be imagined This maxime on ground being no more to be denied or questioned in this Monarchy then that the earth is round in naturall Philosophy as neer as morrall Philosophy may attive at naturall in point of certitude though should we grant them that a Parliament may erre nay do wrong to Prince people or particulars yet that would not follow upon this which they would maliciously inferre and ayme at for none but it self or another Parliament were to correct or rectifie what a Parliament should have done amisse and not the King or any other persons any way whatsoever much lesse by force or warre for he that is allowed to judge or correct is allowed thereby at least an equall if equality for such an intent can be conceived sufficient possibly but such equality of power in two distinct Magistrates for so we must distinguish King and Parliament here of different natures and touching one and the same point or matter in controversie cannot be in one and the same state then such a corrector must be allowed superiour and the corrected subordinate but such the King cannot be in our case as above is partly shewed and shall be further afterwards How then can lorce or warre on his side for this cause be rationall and just nay though it should be but defensive much lesse if offensive or inferred Since even bate resisting the ordinances of the Parliament is or presupposes an assuming of the supreme power to judge and condemne such resistance being the execution of the sentence But we shall not carry it away so easily that the Parliament will not be unjust to any holding such power strong temptations of profit corrupt too oft where one or a few are ordinary Judges as a little water standing sooner is putrified but multitude of these Judges are like the Sea incorruptible But moneys received profits and emoluments accrewing it were a shame not without a certain mixture of presumption to insist on such base imputations here had not frontlesse and monstrous malice been so incredibly audacious as actually to raise them may make a dividend sufficient to draw to some uniust act each man or the maior part of such a multitude very likely and to draw the more matter of profit we see how by frequent orders they invite private causes and do they give any publique account of the moneys they receive from the people more then the Malignants could have done for Ship money But we erre they give publique account but it is to get credit onely with the people that they may be in their sinister practises and machinations the lesse suspected and better served But stay how can they have ill ends at all on foot or in agitation since of all their particular actions and proceedings of most moment from time to time they by their Declarations or the like give no lesse then of the moneys an account to the world except they be evident of themselves Should they do that they cannot give reason for but such malicious vigilance as we deal with when it might in particulars charge them and article against them upon truths would never be driven to the base and miserable shifts of these generals and the like most ridiculous impudent transparent calumnies for want of matter to work on and did not the people see clearly they have reason and that their ends are meerly the publique good it would desert them loosing patience upon the sence of the present evils which like the sicknesse which even the best phisick before it can induce a finall setled state of health works in a patient chiefly if disorders during the cure also foment the peccant humours through the malignant traverses of our Calumniators both people
all Salus populi suprema lex and that power even of making new Lawes is ever upon the matter in both Houses of Parliament and that even when the King keepes himselfe within his due bounds and is assistant in Parliament how much more then as before is shewed if he shall by exorbitating dangerously bring himselfe within the compasse of our case and that the Kings consent to what the Parliament propounds to him to be enacted for Law ought not to be denyed may appeare by comparing this following part of the Oath which the Kings of England at their Coronation take or ought to take cited in the Remonstrance of the 26th of May in haec verba Concedis justas leges confuetudines esse tenendas permittis per te eas esse protegendas ad honorem Dei corroborandas quas vulgus elegerit secundum vires tuas Respondebit Rex Permitto concedo Comparing this part of the Oath with the clause of the preamble of a Statute there also cited intimating that the King is bound by his oath to remedy by Law such inconveniences as the Kingdome may suffer in the future as well as to keepe and protect Lawes already in being for then either those Latine words here cited or some part of them and that the latter namely Quas vulgus elegerit are to be understood of Lawes futurely to be made or else it cannot be shewed by what part of the Oath as the said preamble affirmes the King is bound by Law to remedy the mischiefs that happen from time to time to his Realme Nor will the Lawes of Grammer or use of speech or custome of phrase tolerate that Elegerit without the conjunction Si or the like preceding or regulating it though we passe not by unconsidered the rude speaking of those times can ever be taken for Elegit the preter-perfect tense but as it stands in the fore-cited place must of necessitie participate a future nature and signifie precisely shall have chosen that is that the King assumeth to confirme such Lawes as the people shall have chosen it being to be conceived that the people or Parliament first amongst themselves must have debated of chosen and agreed upon them before they present them to the King to be confirmed Besides if those cited words Et permittis per te esse protegendas ad honorem Dei corroborandas quas populus elegerit should not referre to future elections but to past onely they were superfluous and vaine the words precedent Concedis justas leges consuâ—tudines esse tenendas which presuppose necessarily and cannot be understood without a precedent election and consent of the people to them expressing sufficiently Lawes and customes elected already confirmed and in use And the Kings answer to these cited words being bimembris or two-fold Concedo permitto all the other answers of the King to the other Questions in the Oath cited in the said Remonstrance because the questions are meerely simple and single conteined in one word only as to one question onely Servabo to another onely faciam being also single and in one word argues the question to be double as is said And that the King is not bound onely in generall thus to remedy the particular wayes or meanes left to his choice see the said Remonstrance folio 8. which ought to have it selfe sufficed without such poore gleanings as these or the like If then by these and other better reasons which others have presented the Parliament hath such a legislative power even where the King dischargeth his office as upon the matter to make such Lawes as it judgeth best for the publique good where through the prevalence of ill men about him it is not done but the contrary and so the danger is from him shall not power be in them to make new Ordinances or provisionall Lawes for the timely remedying such publique mischiefs at least for the time and to suspend some of those in being if they judge fit How much more then to judge of declare or interpret those that seeme dubious ranging and making all to be subservient to the supreame Law Salus populi the rule and reason of all Lawes as was ever intended at the making of all particular Lawes Hath not even the Lord Chancellour a little touch of such a power upon the Common Law What then may we thinke a Parliament hath and that when the very publique is in danger And if the whole people unanimously consenting upon a Princes not performing what he is bound unto may possibly change the very forme of that limitted government which it first instituted how much more may it conserve or defend that temper or kinde of government which it hath erected by regulating the enormities of the Prince by maintaining and holding what they have reserved out of that which was all theirs at the first or their owne rights How many degrees then are they off from being bound to become themselves the instruments to overthrow them how strongly are they bound to the contrary And indeed were not the Parliament the supreame Judge in all the said questions or of like nature if we may call it a Parliament at all not having this power it could not possibly save the people when ill men prevailing upon the King would oppresse it for while they carry on by degrees and mature by little and little such their mysticall and pernicious designes which must be met with betimes in such tender and jealous matters before they advance and grow strong when caution comes too late and opposition out of season doth but exasperate and increase the evill they will cause the King by fit instruments for the purpose to pronounce judge or interpret each such degree or gaining a new and further point still lawfull and not subject to question however dangerous to the people in it self and of worse consequence till the mysterie at last unmask and all be desperate It may be superadded that should the Parliament be more jealous of the Prince then there were reason which yet as I hope hath appeared is not to be imagined of the wisdom and Justice of the Parliament yet it were the farre lesse evill that the Prince being but for the people should somewhat suffer by such the Parliaments jealousie which were but peccare in meliorem securiorem partem then that by the Parliaments too much security and beleeving in the Prince the people or whole kingdome should be endangered or oppressed for whose good they both are ordeined as means for the end Besides that the authority and politique infallibilitie of the Parliament must be by all that love their Countrey not blemished but held sacred and inviolate as supreame The King indeed saith he will defend and maintain the Laws Liberties properties of Subjects just priviledges of Parliament but even in saying this he seems to violate them if he thereby assume the supreame Judgement of them to himself which as already partly
the world and so complaint be made to the Parliament thereof if it were to any end to complaine there of that which hath already passed without punishment But seeing the Parliament hath power the case standing as before hath been shewed to doe in all things as they see cause by good consequence their speeches necessarily preparing discussing agitating concluding what is so to be done cannot be subject to any limitting questioning or accompt abroad nor in reason therefore are to be divulged in that sence this being incompatible with such power But then these haters of our Law-makers and Lawes say Many of both Houses are away and so the acts lesse valid but be the number remaining little yet the acts of the Major part of that number are still good For neither the King that calied them away or countenanceth them that desert their stations may alledge this nor the Members that voluntarily not upon trust in those that remaine or leave obtained abandon their places there and duties are to take the benefit either of their owne wrong whether negligence in such Members or worse perhaps nor of their owne unworthinesse as Cowardise to oppose what they liked not which feare admitting such could be argues still that they that feared were the lesser number though what needed they feare to speake freely a dissenting lesser number being ordinary and sometimes a very few perhaps scarce enough to make a number dissenting openly from the rest of the whole House without any inconvenience It being allowed for any to speake their minds whilst a matter is in agitation before it be settled If they say they goe away that they may not seeme to allow what would passe though they were present then the Major part concurres to what is done by their owne confession els why stay they not to oppose it If they say so many are gone without leave of the Houses as put together would make the Major part supposing this were true either such a Major part went away at once in a body and then it was their fault not to stay for then they being the Major part had prevailed or they went by little and little and then still it was a Major part of the remainder that concurred to what was done els it had not passed and so the acts still good If they fly to say that they who thus deserted the House out of feare did it not as fearing the Parliament but the people granting these men this which is not their due that such had cause to feare the people and that such base feare when as they pretend they were to stand for the King Countrey Lawes Liberties Religion and did not render them utterly unworthy their places it may be answered briefly they that remained and carried matters might feare the King as much or more but their cause was noble and good but these or the like Cavils will no more hoodwinke the people their onely course were to produce some publique act of Parliament that might certifie the world that the King and both houses have long since unanimously concurred to dissolve this Parliament else Sophistry will not carry it against the manifest truth By the premisses or rather by diverse excellent Tractates published by others to the same or the like effect I hope it is even as cleare that the Parliament is and ought to be the supreame Judge in publique matters now in question in England as what it is it hath judged and ordered touching these things by so many publique orders declarations and the like and consequently that reason wills that they be sacred in our esteeme and punctually obeyed and executed and so no need of warre and whosoever goeth against reason and truth goeth against God himselfe who is Prima summa pura ratie and it will concerne him nearely to looke to it whether he be stronger then God goeth against himselfe if he be a man and shall first finde a civill warre in himselfe before he can cause it in his Countrey upon such grounds and for his Majestie he cannot as he is a King but judge that that man thinks dishonourably of him who goeth about to perswade him that that can be for his good that is not for the good of his Kingdome and so sever what is so excellently joyned or that the great Counsell of the Kingdome is not the onely at least the very best and the onely sure and securing way without all doubt for that Prince to follow that intends the publique good and which will ever assuredly concurre with him to that end nor in opposing an arbitrary power which ill men about him for their owne private and wicked ends would induce Doth the Parliament any thing but disenable a Prince or rather those about him from doing ill or more properly from usurping such power which to what end is it in a good Prince which he will or can never reduce to act or use but the false or pretended Mother of the childe who would have it divided whom the wisdome of the King may discerne will whisper there is no thankes or glory to doe good unlesse he might have done evill and so did good freely since free will onely merits I beleeve they hold merits it seemes these malignants setched not this Doctrine from heaven for there we may finde that confirmation in grace in the Angels and blessed spirits of just men whereby compleat free will or the remaines of it which free will argues but imperfection and mutabilitie power to sinne being but impotency and the King of Kings God himselfe who is perfection it selfe being above and without all power or possibilitie of doing any evill yet rather therefore I should say omnipotent in or for good that confirmation in grace I say by which free will is transfigured and sublimed into a state divine and Posse non peccare into non posse peccare is a transcendent blessing if not the very essence of celestiall beatitude where these suggest such a condition is to be declined though with ruine of all But howsoever the Divines of our times may not allow the explication or application of this point we may hope his Majestie out of his Princely care of the good of his people though both himselfe and it may beleeve well of his good intents to that purpose will be far from judging such a puntiglio of arbitrary power for however it may fill and tickle the phantasie yet deeply and duely penetrated into by judgement it appeares to resolve even into no more if a puntiglio be any thing or least it might possibly be thought he would or might have done evill had he not been restreined from it when he cannot violate such just restrictions without first doing the greatest evill of all to the publique from judging I say such a puntiglio a just and sufficient cause to destroy the people by a civill warre when were this power indeed justly belonging to him yet true love to his people might judge
all the bloud and miseries which this unnaturall monstrous warre may cause a means suitable indeed to the end they force themselves to compasse nor can unpartiall posteritie judge of them otherwise then as Parricidae patriae and damnatae momoriae if all this be not of force with them to descend deeply into themselves and to weigh whether they be in state fit for death every moment at least they may deigne this last motive the honour of a deep and sad thought or two whether thus obstinately persisting they contract not before God another way a guilt to contribute or be accessary to the endangering or perdition of their owne and innumerable soules in another kinde and more directly and highly there being aliquid sacri in hoc morbo and Religion sharing the hazard as abovesaid but if the premisses have not power to inferre thus much with them yet I hope at least they are not so irrationall so extravagant as that these men can truely beleeve that they are onely to be consuted and those that maintaine such tenents to be instructed by a civill warre but if folly and defect of that reason that should governe men or a violent forcing tyrannizing and enslaving their reason and conscience by enormous and monstrous passions and sinnes the two originall causes of slavery be by no art to be severed from these men but they must and will by still persisting apply these two said generall causes of servitude particularly and expresly or in a specrall manner now to draw it upon them it is not unlikely most of them and their posteritie and friends may finde and prove the effect as inseperable from the causes thus redoubled and enforced as the causes from themselves should they be so unhappy as to carry what they by such meanes so pursue and however some dequoy indulgence may be used towards them to draw others till all be in the power of the principall malignants the like we may say of their cunning enforcing themselves not yet to declare all the depth of their malicious intentions towards those they disarme or any way get within their power using them as stalking horses till by seeming for the present to leave these in a tolerable condition they may make others stand out lesse resolutely or warily and so drawing still to them make all sure at last and at their discretion though even whilest matters are yet dubious the infernall are of malice hate crueltie jealousie and the like which is in their hearts sometimes cannot but flash out in divers enormous words or acts such present indulgence I say notwithstanding of the malignant partie let not these men thinke that it having all once at its dispose and made sure will judge it may securely repose on such of the Nation as have violated wittingly willingly the greatest tye on earth by being traytors to their Countrey or on those that loving their Countrey have been violently or fraudulently disarmed or on them that not intending the disservice of their Countrey but seduced by specious pretences have voluntarily assisted the malignant partie when time and plaine experience shall have disabused these two sorts and afford meanes of redeeming their Countrey and themselves will not the malignants rather have recourse to forreigne protection or forces an usuall refuge of an arbitrary or tyrannicall government especially succeeding and having usurped libertie of the Subject as abovesaid under colour of being guards garrisons auxiliary forces joyned in league or the like as France useth the Switzers the French Nation forsooth not populous or warlike enough It is true the Spaniard though not governing at discretion as the French useth the Switzers also but not upon jealousie and diffidence of their own people for ought I find as France doth but for want of men or some other reason of State and may not many strangers already here also be imployed then may these Zelots of the Malignants share largely in contributing to the wages of their forreigne Masters and be put to maintain their own servitude as they stood to bring it in with all their power But God be praised these men unlesse they speedily come in and make their peace are on the point rather of falling under the sword of Justice in the hand of the Parliament and it is not to be doubted but God himself whom they have by sundrie passages too notorious if we may so speak made a party against themselves these Atheists belike thinking he is grown old and impotent and cannot drown these Egyptians in a red sea of their own blood if they with diabolicall obstinacie go on as Lucian that old Atheist said of the Pagan gods in his time because they begot no more sons and daughters will resist and defend himself and his were humane meanes wanting against these publique oppressors of the people in intention and endeavour which they ought to expose their lives to defend and protect And for those that stand alreadie for that Palladium of their Religion and Countrey the Parliament as they are herein duely sensible of themselves and honour so out of the same feeling they cannot but so lively ardently and speedily concurre with all their power if need require when all their fortunes and all that is dear to such men lie at stake and which now nobly and bravely asserted and vindicated may for ever be secured and the roots of dangers pluckt up that the Scots assistance be not the second time needed though in all presumption readie it being the common cause to our exceeding charge nay dishonour as if others were more apprehensive of our honour then our selves and we needed others to protect or defend our Liberty or take and manage our quarrels And now howsoever we may not share in the putting a period to the disorders of the State yet let us think of doing it to this disordered discourse wherein though there may not appeare manifestly one continued beatch tracke of coherent passages to bring you readily to the truth yet I hope you have incountred a few points here and there not induect nor impertinent thereto like Posts of direction for Travellers at each miles end in some of our English deserts to give you ayme that you may hold the right way or rather like race posts quickly to be run over lest it might seem to pretend it self worthy to hold you long And you may the rather passe by the imperfections in regard whilest it was endeavoured to have ordered and compleated it and to make all yet clearer the Antiparliamentary partie hath so in the interim unmasked it self in sight of the world and given such attestation in plain matter of fact a stronger testimony then out of the mouth of the adversarie to the prospective and next to prophetick prudence and Judgement of the Parliament so long since having penetrated and shined on the secret corners of their designes and deeds of darknesse and exposed them to view that there is little need of any further