to have done amiss when in Compassion or Justice in the case of the Kings Servants he shall moderate the furies and unjust pretences of unrighteous and unreasonable Creditors or Complaynants and according to the Laws and reasonable Customs of England and the Kings most Honourable Houshold give them and the Kings Servants a just and fitting protection respite or time of Respiration the rather if he find that some of their wants and distresses either would not or could not so quickly or heavily have fallen upon them if the publique necessities and occasions had not for the Protection and safeguard of those very Creditors or Complainants comprehended in the universality of the people drawn away from the King the Money which might have enabled him to a more Regular and Ordinary way of paying them their Wages Salaries or Pensions And should if right be done unto it give a less cause of disturbance to the Will or Fansies of those who would have it otherwise than the course generally well approved and now holden in the City of London in the Lord Mayors Court called the Court of Requests or Conscience Indulged at the first by no greater Authority then an Act of Common Council made by the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common Council of that City about the ninth year of the Raign of King Henry the eight continued by some other Acts of their Common Council and strengthned by some Subsequent Acts of Parliament where upon any Action Commenced in the Sheriffs Courts of Guildhall London whereby any debt under forty shillings is demanded of any Freeman of that City the Defendant may before or after Verdict mark it as it is there Termed in a Clarks book attending for that purpose the Lord Mayor in his house and by that manner of transferring the Actions or proceedings before his Lordship in his Court of Conscience procure as much of it as he shall be able to obtein with an Order in case of Poverty or weakness of estate to pay it by Six pence or twelve pence a Week or some other small manner of payment the Plaintiff being to be Arrested or Attached if he shall disobey or transgress his Lordships moderation therein And such or the like Moderations may Aswell be allowed to the Lord Chamberlain and other great Officers of the Kings most Honorable Houshold in the case of the Kings Servants as it is and hath been to the Judges of the Courts at Westminster in the case of all the Subjects of England where in Order to the Salvo Contenemento the saving the Reputation and support of failing or fainting Debtors or Defendants and the Moderata Misericordia Moderation in punishments which in the reconciling of Justice and Compassion is not only Injoyned and Pattern'd by our many Excellent Laws and reasonable Customes since the Norman Conquest but ordained by a Law of King Canutus many years before in his direction to his Judges Vt in mulctà Irrogandâ adhibeatur moderatio ut ad divinam Clementiam temperata hominibus tolerabilis esse videatur that in Punishments or Penalties there be such a moderation as may resemble the Divine Clemency or compassion and be the more Tolerable for men to bear it from whence or the like Dictates of Right Reason have Issued and been warranted the Authority of those Sage Expounders of our Laws and distributers of Justice in their Remission of Penalties of Bonds and Obligations Moderation of Costs and Mitigation of Penalties stay of Posteas Verdicts and Executions Arrests of Judgments granting Imperlances Lessening of Fines incertain in Copyhold estates and giving them a reasonable Time of payment disappointing of Rigors Extremities and Oppression by the relieving of the Oppressed wherein the wisdom of our Laws and the discretion and Office of Judges and Courts do very often in some or other of those and very many other the like well regulated Acts of their prudence care and authority which might be here instanced bless and make happy this Nation Such or the like Princely Cares of our Kings and Princes for their Domestiques or Servants faithfully serving and attending upon their Soveraign giving us the reason why above three hundred and forty years ago when Fleta wrote his Book It was the Custom of the Aula Regis the Kings Palace si de aliquo familiari i. e. famulari Regis fiat querimonia if a Complaint should be made of any of the Kings Servants or Houshold he should be summoned to answer and if he came not at the day prefixed he should be Attached which is by sureties or pledges or some of his Goods or Chattels taken whereby to compel him to appear and another day prefixed and if he did not then appear his body should be taken if he were personally summoned within the Virge and should be brought before the Steward and the Marshal having him in his custody videlicet sub tali loco partito secundùm Legem consuetudinem Hospitii in a place to that purpose according to the Law and Custom of the Kings Houshold appointed was to be answerable for him quòd nisi de corpore respondeat de petitione satisfacere tenebitur supposito quòd de corpore fuit seisitus but if the Marshal did not keep him in Custody whereby he might have his body forth coming he should if he was ever seised of his body make satisfaction to the party complainant But where any person who is not of the Kings Servants or House should desire to sue or prosecute a Debtor in the Court of the Kings Palace before the Steward thereof he was to produce the Bond wherein the Debtor obliged himself ro their Jurisdiction and in that case the Debtor was to be destrayned until he found pledges to answer the Action Et si Pleg invenerit quinquagesimum diem litis receperit illo die non comparuerit and if he should find pledges and not appear within fifty days after for so many days it seems was then allowed unto him he was to be Arrested and detained until he gave Bail it being also as reasonable that a like or a greater time should be given to one of the Kings Servants complained of before the Lord Steward or Lord Chamberlain or other great Officers of the Kings Houshold to whose Jurisdiction it belongeth for in those more Reverential Times and acknowledgments of Superiority It was a Rule as well as an Ancient Custom that mitiùs agendum cum familiaribus servientibus Regis dum tamen Domestici sint Regis Collaterales the Kings Servants in Ordinary and Domestiques were to be more gently and respectfully dealt with then strangers quòd primò debent per Mariscallum summoniri quam si supersederint tum primò Distringantur tertiò si necesse fuerit Attachientur and ought first to be summoned by the Marshal and if then they did not appear they were to be Distreined and at or after the third distress if need were should
King hath been accompted and is and ought to be the Interest of all the People of England and that the Servants and retinue of a Soveraign Prince who hath given and permitted to his Subjects so many large Liberties Immunities Exemptions Customs and Priviledges should not want those Exemptions Immunities Customs and Priviledges which are so Justly claimed by them Chap. XXI 587 Errors of the Printer PAge 22. line 2. dele now intersere after p. 34. l. 25. dele to p. 43. l. 4. dele and intersere by p. 52. l. 22 dele feirce and incult intersere rude and uncivill p. 61. l. 25. intersere always p. 62. l. 2. intersere in p. 88. l. 26. dele not p. 111. l. 28. dele yet p. 137. l. 23. dele not p. 159. interscribe Baile p. 166. l. 4. dele as p. 197. l. penult dele or interscribe as p. 217. l. 28. dele the Corsaires p. 219. l. 22. dele not p. 241. l. 6. dele unto p. 265. l. 10. dele during the and interline in a more â—itting place p. 416. l. 13. r. Aevo p. 423. l. 17. r. Conquestorem 549. in margin r. Cromwell p. 453. l. 2. intersere pleg l. 4. r. distringas l. 14. intersere them p. 460. in margin r. Valentinus l. 16. r. nobiles p. 461. in margin r. Cassanaeus l. 10. r. noblemen p 475 l. 2. r. Commons p. 527. l. 19. intersere of Westminster p. 552. from thence to page 555. mispaged in p. 543. l. 4. intersere it p. 596. l. 27. interline of p. 614. l. 20. dele an Asilum or intersere a which with some other literal faults redundancies omissions of particles and Errors of the Press are desired to be amended and excused The Reasons aswell as Law of the Priviledges and Freedom of the Kings Servants in Ordinary from Arrests and Troubles of and in their Persons and Estates before Leave or Licence obtained of the King their Royal Master and Soveraign IF the Rights of Soveraignty and Majesty and it's Legal Rational and necessary Protection and Preservation of the People in their several Interests and Priviledges That due care which they ought to take of him and the means wherewith he should do it the Honour of the King and the support and maintainance of it the Reverence and Respect which they should upon all occasions manifest to their Prince and Common Parent and the influence which all or most of his affairs have or may have in their successes and consequences Good or Evil upon all or the greatest part of the Affairs of the People were not enough as it is abundantly sufficient to perswade them to an abstaining or abhorrency from the Incivility of late practiced to Arrest or Trouble the Persons or Estates of the Kings Servants in Ordinary before Leave or Licence obtained of the King their Royal Master and the Soveraign aswel of the one as the other For he that hath not been a very great stranger to reason and the Customes and Laws of this Nation aswell as others may without any suspicion of Error acknowledge that it is and will be a due to Majesty and the Servants of it Yet the Civility long ago in Fashion and not yet abolished in the Neighbourhood and Custom of Mankinde one towards the other might invite them unto it When it hath been heretofore a part of the Law of Nations Nature Christianity Neighbourhood Civility and the Practice thereof which no Law or Good Custome hath yet repealed not to Arrest or bring into question at Law a Neighbours Servant for a Debt due or Injuries received without an Intimation or Notice first given or a kind of Licence obtained to or from that Servants Master to the end that the Love and Respect which ought to be betwixt them might not be dislocated or disturbed and the offending Servants Masters attendance Business or Affairs prejudiced And being constantly held and observed betwixt Friends Relations Kinred Neighbours and even Strangers where any Respect was thought fit to be tendered did probably give a Rise or beginning to that long and experimented Adage or Proverb Love me and Love my Dog Insomuch as a Neighbours Dog causing some mischief or Inconveniences by killing of Sheep or biting such as he supposed were not well willers to the Family and came to his Masters house is not troubled or put into any danger of Beating or Hanging without a Complaint first made to his Master thereof for where the Master hath any respect his Servants and all that do belong to his Family do not seldom partake of it From all which or some of those Causes or Grounds Rights of Soveraignty and duty of the People tacito rerum antiquitatis consensu by a long usage and consent of time and Antiquity came that hitherto uncontroul'd usage and Custom allowed and Countenanced by our Common Laws and reasonable Customs not contradicted or abrogated by any Act of Parliament or Statute Laws That the Kings Maenial Servants and Officers in Ordinary should not be Taken Imprisoned Arrested or Compelled to appear in any Courts of Justice in Civil Actions or Causes without a Petition for Leave or Licence obtained First delivered unto the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings Houshold or other great Officer of the Kings under whose more Immediate Jurisdiction such servant or Officer is whereupon after a Citation of the party and if for debt or otherwise a short and reasonable time as six moneths or something less which in the Ordinary course of Process and Proceedings at Law and the vacations and absence of the Terms is not seldom as soon as they could by Arrest or Compulsion arrive or come unto their Ends and many times a moneth or a Fortnights time prefixed for satisfaction is as easily procured as asked SECT I. That there is a Greater Honour due unto the Palace and House of the King then unto any of the Houses of his Subjects FOr we may well believe that our Laws Reasonable Customs and the Practice of our Forefathers were not out of the way or mistaken in their Respects to the Servants of their Prince when his Aula House or Court wherein he and they Inhabited as a place separate from Common uses or Addresses tanquam Sacra had a Majestatem quandam certain awe or Majesty belonging to it which was as Ancient as the days of King Ahasuerus that great Monarch of Persia and Media who Raigned from India unto Ethiopia over an hundred and twenty seven Provinces when Esther as we are informed by Sacred Writ could alleage that all the Kings Servants and the People of the Kings Provinces did know that whosoever whether man or woman should come unto the King into the Inner Court who is not called there is one Law of his to put him to death Except such to whom the King shall hold out the Golden Scepter that he may live And none might enter into the Kings Gate clothed with sackcloth Tiridates the great King of Armenia
expresly provided that the Testimony of Servants should not be allowed in Criminal Matters there was an exception for the better sort of the Kings Servants King Ina who Raigned here over the West Saxons about the year of our Redeemer 712 amongst his Laws Suasu Heddae et Erkinwaldi Episcoporum suorum omnium Senatorum et natu majorum Sapientum populi sui in magna servorum dei frequentia by the advice of Hedda and Erkenwald his Bishops all his Senators Elders and wise men of his people and Commonalty attended by many of the Clergy did ordain several degrees of Mulct or punishment for breach of peace in Towns according to the qualities of the owners or Lords thereof videlicet in oppido Regis vel Episcopi pacis violatae paena 120 solidorum in oppido Senatoris seu Ealdormannes ruptae pacis 80 solidorum in oppido Cyninges Thegnes seu ministri Regis 60 solidorum et in oppido custodis pagant cujuscunque predia possidentis pacis tributae multa 35 solidorum censeatur that is to say In every Town of the King or a Bishop for breach of the peace 120 shillings in the Town of a Senator or Alderman 80 shillings in a Town of a Servant of the Kings 60 shillings and in the Town of the Bayliffe or Reeve of any other man having Lands 35 shillings Charles the great or Charlemain Emperor of the West and King of France who began his raign in the year 768 and after him the Emperor Lodovicus by his goodness and Piety sirnamed Pius or the Godly considering that in viros animosos plus honoris posse quam opum remunerationem that to men of Courage and Spirit Honor was more in esteem then Riches edicto mandaverunt ut ipsis in tota ditione sua honor haberetur did by their Edicts which in those more obedient times when Subjects were not so Critical as too many of us now are in their Princes Commands by a Torture of farre fetched or Irrational Interpretations put upon their just Authority in order to the Weal-Publick provide that in all their Dominions an Honour and respect should be given to their Domesticks or Servants And therefore Antiquity and the Learned Bignonius were not guilty of any Error when they adjudged that Dignitas Domestici the Dignity of the Kings Houshold Servants fuit non contemneâ—da was not to be contemned but was greatly honoured under the Raigns of the first and second Kings of France and about the Raign of Clodoveus or Lodovicus the 12th King of the first Race of the Kings of France who Raigned about the year of our Lord and Saviour 648. Inter praecipuos Regni ministros saepe enumerantur Comites Consiliarii Domestici et Majores Domûs c. Amongst the principal of whom were reckoned the Lord Steward Earls Counsellors of Estate Chancellor and Chamberlane the most Honourable and great men of the Kingdome who did sometimes in the Court attend the King in the hearing and determining of Causes and were with those great Officers of the Houshold accounted to be de Honestate palatii seu specialiter ornamento Regali a part of the Honor of the Kings Palace or Court and an Ornament to the Royal Dignity and the Domesticks and Servants of that great and vertuous Charlemain had that respect given unto them which a just consideration of the Honor of their Soveraign and concernment of the Weal-publique in his business or affairs had procured for them as Solebant subditi non modo reâ—ipere missos et legatos Principis Comites Duces et etiam ministros verum et viaticum eis pro unius cujusque dignitate praestare the people did use not only to receive the Kings or Princes Earls Dukes and their Attendants but to give them Entertainment according to their several degrees or qualities it having been ordained by him ut de missis suis vel de caeteris propter utilitatem suam Iter agentibus nullus mansionem eis contradicere praesumat that no man should presume to deny lodging and entertainment unto any imployed in his service King Alfred or Alured who began his Raign here about the year of our Lord 870 and had resident in his house the Sonns of many of his Nobility which did attend him did in that time of the more incult and fierce behaviour of the old English and Saxons and their Neighborhood with their Enemies the usurping Danes take care in the League or peace which he was constrained to make with King Guthrun the Dane to provide that in case of a Minister Regis incusatus as the Version or Translation renders it any Servant of the Kings accused for Homicide Et id Juris in omni lite and the same Law to be in every other Action or Suit there should be a Jury of 12 of the Kings Servants or if the party grieved should be the Servant of another King non nihil inferior not much inferior to the Kings probably intended of King Guthruns it should be tryed by undecim sui equales unumque Ministrum Regium by eleven of his Peers or Equals and one of the Kings Servants added unto them And it was then accompted such an honor to serve the King as our Learned Selden informs us he that that had a House with a Bell a Porters Lodge and was fit to be sent on his Princes Message or had a distinct Office in the Kings Court was accompted in those early daies as a Thainus or Nobilis a person or Honor. King Edward the Confessor whose Laws the vanquished English after the Conquest took to be so much a blessing as they hid them for preservation under the high Altar at Westminster and by the importunity of their prayers and tears procured King William the Conqueror to confirm and restore them did ordain that the Earls and Barons Et omnes qui habuerint sacham et socam Theam et Infangthiefe etiam milites suos et proprios servientes scilicet dapiferos pincernas Camerarios pistores et Cocos sub suo friburgo habeant et si cui foris facerent et Clamor vicinorum de eis assurgeret ipsi tenerent eos rectitudini in Curia sua And all those who had Courts Leete or Baron amongst their Tenants a priviledge granted by the King to have a Jurisdiction over their Tenants and to fine or Amerce such as failed to make good their Actions try and punish Theeves taken in their Mannors or Liberties to have Villains and Bond-men and a propriety in their Villains Lands or Goods and to have subject to their Mannors those that held of them by Knight-Service or were to attend them in the Warrs and their Domestique Servants as Sewers Butlers Chamberlains Bakers and Cooks should upon any wrong done to their Neighbors or Complaint made of them see right to be done unto them in their Courts and certainly he that gave them those Liberties to hear and determine
Complaints against any of their Menials and Servants cannot rationally be supposed to be willing or intend to abridge himself of the like William the Conqueror in his Law entituled de hominum Regis privilegio of the priviledge belonging to his Tenants ordained That si qui male fecerint hominibus illius Ballivae et de hoc sit attinctus per Justitiam Regis which for a great part thereof was then administred in his House or Palace foris factura sit dupla illius quam alius quispiam foris fecerit That if any one should do wrong unto them and be thereof Convict by the Kings Justice the forfeiture of the Offender should be double to what should be paid upon the like offence unto any other who being afterwards known by the name of Tenants in antient Demeasne were so exempt from being retorned as Jury men either at Assizes or Sessions as where they were so retorned in the 26 year of the Raign of King Edward the first they did recover every man forty shillings damage against the Bayliffe that retorned them Et Domus Regis and the House of the King saith King Henry the first in his Laws is where he is Resident Cujuscunque feudum vel Mansio sit whose ever the Land or the House be and that wise King who for his wisdome had the Character or name of Beauclerk as an Affix to his Royal Title did not then take it to be derogatory to the beloved Laws of Edward the Confessor or his grand design of pleasing a lately discontended and subdued people or setling the English Crown unjustly detained from his elder Brother Robert upon himself and his posterity to allow the Exchequer Priviledges quód de Scaccario residentes Clerici et omnes alii ministri ibidem ministrantes sive enim de Clero sint sive Regia Curia assident ex mandato ad alias quaslibet causas extra scaccarium sub quibuscunque Judicibus non evocenter That the Officers of the Exchequer which was then kept in the Kings House or Palace and many of them and the Clerks thereof as Sir Henry Spelman saith his menial and domestick Servants Clerks and all other the Ministers there whether belonging to the Clergy or the Kings Court or which do sit there by his Command shall not be cited or compelled to appear for any causes whatsoever out of the Exchequer or before any Judges or Judge Etquod iidem de Communibus Assises sect Comitat. hundred et Cur. quibuscunque tam de et pro dominiis suis quam de et pro feodis suis Ac etiam de Murdris scutagiis vigiliis et Danegeld And that they should be freed and exempted from common Assizes suit of County Courts hundred Courts or any Courts whatsoever as well for or concerning their Demesn Lands as for their Fees or Lands which they held of others which would otherwise after two years have made a forfeiture and could not have been dispensed withal Murders Escuage Watch and ward and Danegeld publique Taxes which were not but by special favour to have been acquitted Et quod Barones et qui ad Scaccarium resident de quibuscunque provision seu provisoribus et aliis solutionibus nomine consuetudinis pro quibuscunque victual suae domus in quibuscunque urbibus Castellis et locis Maritimis empt Ac de solutione Theoloniae sive Toluet liberi et quieti esse debent and that the Barons and those which reside in the Exchequer should not be charged with the payment of Toll in any City or place Et quod non debent implacitari alibi quam in Scaccario quamdiu idem Scaccarium fuerit apertum and that they should not be impleaded any where but in the Exchequer when it shall be open which is not only all the Term times but eight daies before every Term. Si vero judex sub quo litigant sine sit Ecclesiasticus sive forensis legis hujus ignarus ab jam dicta die convocationis ad Scaccarium citaverit quemlibet eorum et absentem forte per sententiam possessione sua vel quonius Jure spolaverit authoritate principis et ratione sessionis revocabitur in eum statum causa ipsius in quo erat ante citationem But if the Judge whether Ecclesiastical or of the Common Law being ignorant of the opening of the Exchequer should cite any of them and in their absence give sentence against him and take away from any of them any of their Rights or Possessions by vertue of the Kings Authority and their sitting the Cause or sentence shall be forthwith revoked and reduced into the State it was before the Citation And were so greatly favoured and taken care of as si quilibet etiam magnus in regno in consulto animi calore conviciis lascesserit If any great man of the Kingdome should rashly or in anger revile any of them he was to pay a fine for it or if any other should reproach or doe them any wrong they should be punished and when that King had been ill advised and perswaded to charge the Lands of the Barons of the Exchequer with the payment of Taxes in regard that they as was by some envious persons then alleag'd did receive Salaries and Wages or Liveries or diet at the Court for their sitting and that some of them pro officio suo fundos habent et fructus eorum hinc ergo gravis jactura fisco provenit having Lands and Revenues given them also for it which was a great loss to the Kings Treasury or Exchequer But the King afterward experimenting that evil Counsel and growing weary of it et nil ducens Jacturam modici aeris respectu magni honoris and not valuing the loss of a little mony so much as the loss of a great Honour ordained that Jure perpetuo by a constant Law and decree they should as formerly be free from Taxes and in his Laws for the good of the Kingdome declaring his Kingly Rights and Prerogative which he solus et super omnes homines habet in terra sua as King of England had and was to enjoy and above all men in his Kingdome commodo pacis et securitatis institutione retenta reserving a fit provision for the publique peace and security did amongst many of his Royal Prerogatives mention de famulis suis ubicunque occisis vel Injuriatis the punishment of such as any where should slay or injure any of his Houshold Servants in any place whatsoever Et qui in Domo vel familia regis pugnabit such as should fight in the Kings House And limiting the extent of the Jurisdiction of the Marshall of his Houshold declared it in these words nam longe debet esse pax Regis a porta sua ubi residens erit the peace of the King ought to extend a great way from the gate of his House where he shall be resident not much unlike that of the 12 miles circuit of the Verge
contrary to the Common Law of the Land and in despite of the King refused to obey it The Parliament acknowledging the aforesaid Rights and Customs of the said Clerks of the Chancery and the contempt of the King did ordain Que breif soit mandez a Maior de Londres de attacher les divz Viscontes autres quont este parties maintenours de la guerele dont ceste bille fait mention per le Corps destre devant le Roy en sa dite Chancellerie a certein jour a respondre aussibien du contempt fait a nostre Seigneur le Roy ses mandements prejudice de son Chanceller come al dit Clerk des damages trespas faites a lui That a Writ should be awarded and directed to the Mayor of London to arrest by their Bodies the said Sheriffs of London and others which were parties and maintainers of the said evil action to answer before the King in his Chancery at a certain day as well for the contempt done to the King and his Commands and prejudice of his Chancellor as also to the said Clerk for his damages and wrong sustained And that King by a Statute made in the 36 year of his Reign forbidding under severe penalties any Pourveyance to be made but for the King and Queen and their Houses and to take any such Pourveyance without ready Money there is a pain or penalty to be imposed as Sir Edward Coke upon view of the Record thereof hath observed upon the Steward Treasurer and Controller and other Officers of the Kings Houshold for not executing that Statute which need not to have been if the cognisance of the Offences therein mentioned had not by that Act been thought fit to have been left unto them And was so far from being perswaded to release the constant Attendance of the Justices of the Kings Bench as when the Commons in Parliament in the 38th year of his Reign Petitioned him That the Kings Bench might remain in some certain Place and not be removed he answered in the negative That he would not do so And where the Court Marshal was so anciently constituted for the Placita Aulae sive Regis Palatii for Pleas Actions and Controversies concerning the Servants of the Royal Family when any should happen to arise amongst them and retained in the Kings House and Attendance and the Court of Common Pleas was designed and delegated to do Justice unto all the Common People in Real and Civil Actions in certo loco a certain place assigned in the Kings House or Palace for then and long after until our Kings of England made Whitehall their Palace or Residence it is probable that the Bars Benches and Tribunals of the Courts of Chancery Kings Bench Common Pleas Exchequer and other Courts since inhabiting that great and magnificent Hall of Westminster were movable and not so fixt as they now are and allowed not to travel with the King and his Court or to follow it and the Court of Exchequer to take care of the Royal Revenue in its Income Receipts and Disbursments It cannot without some affront or violence done to Reason be imagined that our Kings who would have that Court of the Marshal to be neerer their Persons than any other of their Courts of Justice always attending and resident for the concernment properly of their Houshold and Servants and because they should not be inforced from their daily Service to pursue their Rights or seek for Justice before other Tribunals should ever intend or be willing that their Servants and necessary Attendants should as Defendants and at the suit of Strangers and such as are not the Kings Servants be haled to Prison diverted from their Service or obstructed in it when as Justice in the old more dutiful and respectful way might as cheap and with lesser trouble be had against them at the Fountain or Spring of Justice by the King himself the Alpha or beginning of it and Omega the Dernier Resort or last Appeal where his ordinary Courts of Justice fail and cannot do ir And where some of our late Kings and Queens of England not to be wanting unto the Cries and Complaints of their People for want of Justice did afterwards appoint and allow another Court in the Reigns of King Henry the seventh Henry the eighth Edward the sixth Queen Mary Queen Elizabeth called and known by the name of Curia Supplicatioâ—um Libellorum the Court of Petitions and Requests where those that were honoured with the Title and Offices of Judges and as Commissioners and Masters of Requests for those particular Causes and Cases were Bishops or Barons Lords Stewards of his Houshold and other Great Officers thereof Deans of the Chappel and Doctors of Law and Divinity were stiled or called Concilium Regis that Stile or Title and Masters of Requests as Synonyma's then signifying one and the same thing And a Mastership of Requests was so highly esteemed in the seventh year of the Reign of Q. Elizabeth as there was besides Walter Haddon Doctor of the Laws and Thomas Seckford Esq a Common Lawyer the Bishop of Rochester a Master of Requests and in the 22. year of her Reign Sir William Gerrard Knight Lord Chancellor of Ireland was during the time of his being in England made a Master of Requests Extra-ordinary and by the Queens Letter of Recommendation to the other Masters of Requests ordeined to sit amongst them and their Decrees were sometimes signed by the King himself with his Sign Manual and in the tenth year of King Henry the eighth divers Bills were exhibited unto Thomas Wolsey Archbishop of York Chancellor of England and Cardinal and Legate a Latere to granr Process for the Defendents appearance to answer before his Grace and others of the Kings most Honourable Council in Whitehall but at other times before and since were constrained to appear before that Council by Writ or Process of Privy Seal or a Messenger of the Kings that Court as it may be observed by the Registers and Records thereof coming to be called the Court of Requests only about the beginning of the Reign of King Edward the sixth And such care was taken by King Henry the seventh to hear and redress the Grievances and Laments of his People as in the ninth year of his Reign he assigned and enjoyned them certain months and times diligently to attend unto that business the greatest Earls and Barons having in those times been made Defendants to several Bills and Petitions many of the Learned Serjeants of the Law there pleading for their Clients and Sir Humphrey Brown Kt. one of the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas in the sixth year of the Reign of King Edward the sixth being made a Defendant in this Court where the Plaintiff after 12 years delays in Chancery and an Appeal from that Court unto this obtained a Decree against him and yet no Pleas and Demurrers are found to be put in
of his Reign for the punishment of such as committed Murder or Man-slaughter in the Kings Court or did strike any man there whereby Bloodshed ensued the Trial of such Offenders was not thought fit to be within the Cognisance or Jurisdiction of any of the Courts of Westminster-hall or of any Court inferior unto them but ordained to be by a Jury of 12 of the Yeomen Officers of the Kings Houshold before the Lord Steward or in his absence before the Treasurer and Comptroller of the Kings Houshold And the Parliament in the first year of the Reign of Queen Mary repealing the aforesaid Act of the 32 year of the Reign of King Henry the Eighth did touching the Great Master of the Kings House notwithstanding understand it to be reasonable that the Name Office and Authority of the Lord Steward should be again established And so little the Priviledge of the Kings Servants in Ordinary seemed to be a Grievance or illegal to be first complained of to the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings Houshold which Honourable Office and Place about the King appears to have been before that Great Office of Chamberlain of England by the mention of Hugoline Chamberlain to King Edward the Confessor and the Subscription of Ralph Fitz Stephen as a Witness to a Charter of King Henry the Second granted unto the Abby of Shirburn before they were to be subjected to Arrests or Imprisonments for Debt and other Personal Actions before Execution or Judgment had against them upon their appearance and not claiming or pleading their Priviledge for then or in such a case they have not sometimes been priviledged although the cause and reason of their Priviledge was as much after Judgement and Execution as before which a submission to the Jurisdiction of another Court and not claiming their Priviledge should not prejudice or take away no more than it doth in the Case of Members of the House of Commons in Parliament and their Servants who by their Priviledge of Parliament are not to be disturbed with Executions or any manner of Process before and after Judgment as Queen Mary did in a Case depending in the Court of Common Pleas betwixt Huggard Plaintiff and Sir Thomas Knivet Defendant direct her Writ to the Justices of that Court which was but as one of the old and legal Writs of Protection or something more especial certifying them That the said Sir Thomas Knivet was by her command in her Service beyond the Seas and had been Essoined and therefore commanded them That at the time appointed by the said Essoin and day given for his appearance he should not have any default entred against him or be in any thing prejudiced which the Judges were so far from disallowing as having before searched and finding but few and that before-mentioned Privy Seal in the 35 year of the Reign of King Henry the Sixth in the Case of the Kings Yeoman of the Buttery being held by them to be insufficient but declared not whether in substance or Form howsoever there may be some probability that it was allowed by the entring of it upon Record they did as the Lord Chief Justice Dier hath reported it advise and assist in the penning and framing of the Writ for Sir Thomas Knivet whereby to make it the more legal Queen Elizabeth who was as tender of her Peoples Liberties as of her own yet was upon some occasion heard to say That he that abused her Porter at the Gate of her House or Palace abused her did cause a Messenger of her Chamber to be sent unto a Defendant in the Court of Requests commanding him in her Name not to vex sue or trouble the Complainant but suffer him to come and go freely unto that Court until such time as other Order be by the Council of the said Court taken therein And in the second year of her Reign an Injunction was awarded to the Defendant commanding him to permit the Complainant to follow his Suit in that Court without Arrest upon pain of one hundred pounds In the same year Sir Nicholas Bacon that great and well-experienced Lawyer and Statesman Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England and a man highly and deservedly valued both of Prince and People did in the Case between Philip Manwaring Complainant Henry Smallwood and others Defendants so well understand the aforesaid Priviledges of the Kings Servants to be just and legal as upon a Bill exhibited in Chancery by the Plaintiff to stay a Suit in the Marches of Wales he ordered That if the Complainant should not by a day limited bring a Certificate from the Officets of the Queens House or otherwise whereby the Court might credibly understand that his Attendance in the Queens Service was necessary that Cause should be determined in the Marches of Wales In the eighth year of her Reign Thomas Thurland Clerk of the Queens Closet being Plaintiff in the Court of Requests against William Whiteacres and Ralf Dey Defendants an Order was made That whereas the Complainant was committed to the Fleet by the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas upon an Execution of 600 l. the Debt being only 300 l. it hath been given this Curt to understand by divers of the Queens Highness most Honourable Privy Council that Her Majesties pleasure is to have and use the present and speedy Travel of the said Thomas Thurland in and about divers of Her Highness weighty affairs in sundry places of England and Wales for and about the Mineral Causes there to the very likely Commodity and benefit of Her Majesty and all her Subjects It is therefore Ordered and Decreed by Her Majesties Council of this Court that the said Thomas Thurland shall and may with his Keeper appointed by the Warden of the Fleet Travel into any part of the said Realm about the affairs aforesaid without the disturbance Let or Interruption of the said Defendants And to that purpose an Injunction is granted against the said Defendants their Attornies and Solicitors upon pain of one Thousand pounds and commanded that neither they nor any of them shall vex sue trouble molest or implead the said Complainant or Richard Tirrel Esq Warden of the Fleet or any other person whatsoever for the Travelling or departing of the said Thomas Thurland from the said Prison of the Fleete with his Keeper appointed as aforesaid from the day of the making of this Decree until the feast of all Saints next ensuing if the said Complainant so long shall have cause to attend about the said affairs And many Cases might be instanced where that great Supporter of Monarchy Regality and Honour in Her best of Governments would not suffer the Just Priviledges of Her Court and Servants to be violated but would be sure severely to punish the Contradictors and Infringers of them About the eighteenth year of her Raign the Earl of Leicester Master of the Horse unto that Excellent Queen and great preserver of Her Peoples
Liberties did commit to Prison one that had Arrested one of Her Servants without leave and the Creditor being shortly after upon his Petition released by the said Earl who blaming him for his contempt and misdemeanor therein and being answered by the Creditor that if he had known so much before hand he would have prevented it for that he would never have trusted any of the Queens Servants was so just as to inforce that Servant of the Queens to pay him presently or in a short time after the said debt And told him that if he did not thereafter take a better care to pay his Debts he would undo all the other of the Queens Servants for that no man would trust them but they would be constrained to pay ready money for every thing which they should have occasion to buy In the six and twentieth year of Her Reign Henry Seâ—kford Esq one of the Grooms of Her Majesties Privy Chamber being Complainant against William Cowper Defendant the Defendant was in open Court upon his Allegiance enjoyned to attend the said Court from day to day until he be otherwise Licenced and to stay and Surcease and no further prosecute or proceed against the Complainant in any Action at and by the Order of the Common Law And about the Seven and twentieth year of Her Reign some controversies arising betwixt the Lord Mayor and Citizens of London and Sir Owen Hopton Knight Lieutenant of the Tower of London concerning some Liberties and Priviledges claimed by the Lieutenant and his refusal of Writs of Habeas Corpora and that and other matters in difference betwixt them being by Sir Thomas Bromley Knight Lord Chancellor of England the Earl of Leicester and other the Lords of the Council referred unto the consideration of Sir Christopher Wray Lord Chief Justice of the Queens Bench Sir Edmond Anderson Knight Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas and Sir Gilbert Gerrard Knight Master of the Rolls they did upon hearing of both parties and their allegations Certifie under their hands that as concerning such Liberties which the Lieutenant of the Tower claimeth to have been used for the Officers and Attendants in the Tower some of them being of the Queens Yeomen of the Guard and wearing Her Livery Coates and Badges as they do now the Kings as not to be Arrested by any Action in the City of London and Protections to be granted unto them by the Lieutenant and his not obeying of Writs of Habeas Corpus They were of opinion that such Persons as are dayly Attendant in the Tower of London Serving Her Majesty there are to be Priviledged and not to be Arrested upon any plaint in London But for Writs of Execution or Capias Vtlagatum's which the Law did not permit without leave first asked the latter of which by the Writ it self brings an Authority in the Tenor and purport of it to enter into any Liberties but not specifying whether they intended any more than Capias Vtlegátum when it was only after judgement or such like they did think they ought to have no priviledge which the Lords of the Council did by an Order under their hands as rules and determinations to be at all Times after observed Ratifie and Confirm And our Learned King James well understanding how much the Weal Publick did Consist in the good Rules of Policy and Government and the support not only of His own Honor and just Authority but of the respects due unto his great Officers of State and such as were by him imployed therein did for the quieting of certain controversies concerning Precedence betwixt the younger Sons of Viscounts and Barons and the Baronets and others by an Ordinance or Declaration under the Great Seal of England In the tenth year of His Reign Decree and Ordain That the Knights of the Most Noble Order of the Garter the Privy Councellors of His Majestie His Heires and Successors the Master of the Court of Wards and Liveries the Chancellor and under Treasurer of the Exchequer Chancellor of the Dutchy of Lancaster the Chief Justice of the Court commonly called the Kings Bench the Master of the Rolls the Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas the Chief Baron of the Exchequer and all other the Judges and Barons of the degree of the Coife of the said Courts Now and for the Time being shall by reason of such their Honourable Order and Imployment have Place and Precedence in all Places and upon all occasions before the younger Sons of Viscounts and Barons and before all Baronets any Custom Vse Ordinance or other thing to the Contrary Notwithstanding In the four and thirtieth year of Her Reign Sir Christopher Wray Knight Lord Chief Justice of Her Court of Queens Bench Sir Edmond Anderson Knight Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas and the rest of the Judges of the aforesaid Courts seeming to be greatly troubled that divers Persons having been at several Times committed without good cause shewed and that such Persons having been by the Courts of Queens Bench and Common Pleas discharged of their Imprisonments a Commandment was by certain great Men and Lords procured from the Queen to the Judges that they should not do the like thereafter all the said Judges together with the Barons of the Exchequer did under their hands Exhibit unto the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Burghley Lord Treasurer of England their Complaint or Remonstrance in these words viz. We Her Majesties Justices of both Benches and Barons of the Exchequer desire your Lordships that by some good means some Order may be taken that her Highness Subjects may not be Committed or detained in Prison by Commandment of any Noble Man or Counsellor against the Laws of the Realm either else to help us to have access unto her Majesty to the end to become Suitors unto Her for the same For divers have been imprisoned for Suing Ordinary Actions and Suits at the Common Law until they have been constrained to leave the same against their Wills and put the same to Order albeit Judgement and Execution have been had therein to their great losses and griefs For the aid of which persons her Majesties Writs have sundry Times been directed to sundry Persons having the custody of such Persons unlawfully Imprisoned upon which Writs no good or Lawful cause of Imprisonment hath been returned or Certified Whereupon according to the Laws they have been discharged of their Imprisonment some of which Persons so delivered have been again Committed to Prison in secret places and not to any Common or Ordinary Prison or Lawful Officer or Sheriff or other Lawfully Authorised to have or keep a Goal So that upon Complaint made for their delivery The Queens Courts cannot tell to whom to Direct Her Majesties Writs And by this means Justice cannot be done And moreover divers Officers and Serjeants of London have been many Times Committed to Prison for Lawful Executing of Her Majesties Writs Sued forth
Spanish Ambassadors not long ago in Holland and a little after in England the cares which Princes to whom they are sent have taken to give them satisfaction or to prevent their jealousies or discontents their gifts and presents unto them their Secretaries and principal of their Servants personal and peculiar honours and favours to Ambassadors distinct from a greater to their Soveraign and their sometimes bold and resolute refusals where they found any diminution or neglects of which Bodin Besolus our learned Doctor Zouch and Sir John Finet in their learned Books de Marsellaer Albericus Gentilis Legatis Legationibus concerning Embassies and the Relation of the Earl of Carlisle's stout and prudent management of his Embassies into Muscovy will afford plenty of instances and examples With the more than ordinary civilities and respects used by divers Princes Cities Common-wealths to Ambassadors of Princes and States in League or Friendship with them in their passage to the Princes to whom they are sent or return from their Embassies when the character or representation of their Prince being laid by they are but little more than what they were in their former degrees or qualities as our Sir Daniel Harvey sent to Constantinople and the Earl of Winchelsea in his coming home from the like Imployment can testifie And the great care which hath been taken by the Law of Nations and all civilized Kingdoms States and Commonwealths of Christendom of the Priviledges of Ambassadors which at the highest esteem that can be given them are no other than Extraordinary Servants which for their great abilities in Learning State affairs or Foreign Languages were made choice of by their Soveraign sometimes out of the Subjects and Nobility not immediate Servants and at other times some of the Servants and Officers in Ordinary as of the Privy-Chamber and Bed-Chamber held by the Custome of the wiser and more prudent part of Nations to be so sacred and inviolable as the Emperor Augustus made the putting to death of his Ambassadors and Heralds Titurius and Arunculeius by the Germans to be the cause of a War made against them and swore never to cut the hair of his head and beard untill he had punished them for that misdemeanor And the Greeks and Romans those great Masters of wisdom prudence and civilities and the Persians and many other Nations made it to be some of their greatest concernments to vindicate any the least indignities or injuries offered or done unto their Messengers or Ambassadors And our Laws have informed us that in the 22 th year of the Reign of King Edward the 3 d. one John at Hill was condemned for High Treason for the Murder of A. de Walton Nuncium Domini Regis missum ad mandatum Regis exequendum the Kings Ambassador for which he was drawn hanged and beheaded for saith Sir Edward Coke Legatus ejus vice fungitur a quo destinatur honorandus est sicut ille cujus Vicem gerit Legatos violare contra jus gentium est and Ambassador represents him that sent him and is to be honoured accordingly for it is against the Law of Nations to violate or wrong an Ambassador Et honor Legati honor mittentis est Proregis dedecus redundat in Regem the honour of an Ambassador is the honour of him that sends him and any dishonour done unto him redounds unto his Prince or Superiour For it was in the Reign of King Richard the second adjudged in Parliament to be High Treason to kill or violate an Ambassador of any Prince or Commonwealth in the Case of John Imperiall an Envoy or Ambassador from Genoa slain by the malice of some of his Adversaries and declared in Parliament que le case eslant examine dispute inter les Seigniors Commons puis monstre al Roy en pleine Parliament estoit illonques nostre Seignior le Roy declares determinus assentus que tiel fait coupe est Treason crime de Royall Majesty blemye en quel case il ne doit allower a nullui priviledge del Clergie that the Case being examined and debated betwixt the Lords and Commons and afterwards shewed to the King in full Parliament it was then before the King determined and agreed that the act was Treason and a crime in derogation of Royal Majesty in which no Priviledge of Clergy was to be allowed The great Gustavus Adolphus not long ago victorious King of Sweden made the neglect and slighting of his Ambassadors by Ferdinand the second Emperor of Germany a Justification or Proem of his after most famous and notable exploits against him in Germany and his Ambassadors to be had in such regard as they could safely travel through Fields of his subdued Enemies blood conquered Towns Cities sacked and Armies ready marshalled to act and execute the direfull Tragedies of Battel and Bellona and to be every where protected and not injured And within a few years last past Don Mario the then Popes Brother being guilty only of an affront given at Rome to the Duke de Crequy the French Kings Ambassador by the Corsairs the Popes Guards the Popes Nuntio was in great displeasure sent away from the Court of France and a War so threatned as that imagined Spiritual Father of the Popish part of Christendom was with great loss of reputation enforced to submit to such Conditions as the King of France claiming to be the eldest Son of the Church would besides the punishment of the Delinquents impose upon him and suffer a Pillar to be erected in Rome to testifie the outrage and the severe punishment inflicted for it to the wonder of many Nations and people coming thither that he who sold so many Millions of Pardons to the living and dead should not be able to obtain of the Most Christian King a pardon and forbearance of that Pillar of Ignominy which continuing some years was lately as a signal favour to the See of Rome permitted to be taken down and no more to be remembred And it was not without cause that our Royal Soveraign did in October 1666. by his Letter to the Estates of Holland and the United Provinces justly charge upon them amongst other the causes of his War with them injuries done unto him and his Subjects by the imprisoning of the Domestick Servants of his Envoy and likewise of his Secretary and putting a Guard upon his House And was so necessary an observance amongst Princes and Republiques as howsoever they then faltred and misused their Wisdoms therein that Nation and their Union of Boores Mariners Artificers and others although many of them could hardly find the way to put off their hats or use civilities unto their great and Princely Protectors the Illustrious Princes of Orange have deemed it to be a part of the Subsistence and Policy of that now flourishing Republique to be strict observers of all manner of civilities and respects to the Ambassadors of Princes And the Swisses
and Mountainous petty Cantons or Republiques who not long ago having massacred all their Nobility and eternally as they hope prohibited the race of them from enjoying any Offices or Imployments in their Armies or Republiques and can boastingly answer inquisitive strangers or passengers with nos non habemus Nobiles we have no Nobility can notwithstanding all their Military Barbarities pay those fitting and well-becoming civilities and due regards to the Ambassadors of Foreign or Neighbour Potentates And may give us to understand that the honours given to Ambassadors do not conclude that there are no respects due to the Servants in ordinary of the Kings and Princes which sent them But that the honour and respect of the Kings manifested in the respect to their Servants is not the cause and foundation of that which is so punctually required and given to Ambassadors When it is as certain that great and often discontents and quarrels have been raised and kindled in the affairs and businesses not only of Nobility and men of great Estates and Eminency but of the vulgar and meaner sort of people for injuries done to their Servants who have been very unwilling to bear or put it up Which the Civil Law and the Custom of many Nations believed to be warranted by that Axiom or Rule that Domini pati dicuntur injurias qui suis fiunt servis Masters do partake and suffer in the injuries done to their Servants And amongst the Jews as their Rabbins expound their Laws were for the time they dwelt with them â—undi instar as setled a Propriety as the Lands which they enjoyed From which our Laws of England do not dissent when they adjudged that injuriam patitur quis per alios quos habet in familia sua sicut per servientes servos in contumeliam suam fuerint verberati vulnerati vel imprisonati quatenus sua interfuerit operibus eorum non caruisse that a man may have wrong done him in those of his Family as in the reproach done unto him by the beating wounding or imprisoning of his Servants whereby he loseth their service A due consideration whereof and that the honour and respect of Kings is and ought to be manifested in the respect to their Servants probably was the cause which made William Walworth that valiant and brave Lord Mayor of London in the Reign of King Richard the second not able to withhold his loyal passion and indignation from knocking down with his Mace Wat Tyler the Rebel in the head of a mighty and unruly Army of Clowns for abusing and making Sir John Newton Knight one of the Kings Servants sent on a Message to him to stand bare before him on foot whilst he sate on horseback So as the people of England may in a less light than the New Lanthorn or Light men do now pretend unto discern a reason for a greater respect to be given unto the Kings Servants in Ordinary than of late they have given when it is to no other or no less than the Servants of Gods Vicegerent some of which enobled by their Birth or Creation others by their Offices Enobleissantaes enobling them as the Treasurer or Comptroller of the Kings most Honourable Houshold who when they do happen as many times not to be of the Nobility are ipso facto at the instant of the conserring those Offices upon them or shortly after made to be of the Kings Privy Councel and with the Lord Chancellor or the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England President of the Kings Councel Lord Privy Seal Great Chamberlain Constable Marshal and Admiral of England Great Master or Steward and Chamberlain of the Kings most Honourable Houshold have in this Kingdom as hath been used in other Nations been stiled the Officers of the Crown And our King Henry the 7th taking a care that his Servants should be as well born as virtuously educated did call and elect to the service and attendance of his Privy Chamber the Sons of his Nobility and Gentlemen of the best houses and alliance in most of the Shires of England and Wales And King Henry the 8th his Son did by his Ordinances for Regulation of his Houshold called the Statutes of Eltham made by the advice of his Privy Councel in the 17th year of his Reign command That no Servant be kept by any Officers within the Court under the degree of a Gentleman and that none be admitted into his Majesties service but sueh as be likely persons and fit for promotion and that it should be lawfull to all the Kings Counsellors the King and Queens Chamberlains Vice-Chamberlains and Captain of the Guard the Master of the Horse and Henchmen and the six Gentlemen of the Kings Privy Chamber to keep every of them one Page to attend upon him in the Court so alwayes that he be a Gentleman born well apparelled and conditioned That the six Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber should be well languaged expert in outward parts and meet and able to be sent on familïar Messages or otherwise to outward Princes as the case shall require and charged the Great Officers of his Houshold in their several Offices and Places that none should be admitted into any Place within his House and especially those which beginning in low rooms and places and are accustomed by course to ascend into higher but such as be of good towardness likelihood behaviour demeanour and conversation and as nigh as they could should have respect that they be Personages of good gesture countenance fashion and stature so as the Kings House which is requisite to be the mirrour and example of all other within his Realm may be furnished of Ministers elect tryed and picked for the Kings Honour as to good reason and congruence doth appertain And by other Orders made in the 33th year of his Reign That no Officer of the Houshold should keep any Servant within the House under the degree of a Gentleman and such as should be honest and of good behaviour And by his Proclamation commanded That no Vagabonds Masterless Rascals or other Idle persons should come and harbour in the Court. And as he had a great respect for his Great Officers of State so he had no small one for his more inferiour Servants when in the Orders appointed for his Tables at meat in his Royal House he did ordain that the Lord Great Chamberlain at his three Messes of meat should have sitting with him the Vice-Chamberlain Captain of the Guard Cup-bearers Karvers Sewers to the King Esquires of the Body Gentlemen Huissers and Sewers of the Chamber The Master of the Horse to have the Equirries and Avenors to sit with him and Gentlemen Pensioners as many as can sit And Queen Elizabeth in the first and third year of her Reign intending as the Preamble thereof declared to follow the Godly and Honourable Statutes of Houshold of her Noble Progenitors did by her Proclamation streightly charge and command That
three four or five of them are yearly to set the prices of Wines And upon refusal to sell after those rates the Mayor Recorder and two antient Aldermen of the City of London not being Vintners shall enter into their Houses and sell their Wines according to those rates By an Act of Parliament made in the 7th year of the Reign of King Edward the 6th no person having not Lands or Tenements or which cannot dispend above 100 Marks per annum or is not worth 1000 Marks in Goods or Chattels not being the Son of a Duke Marquess Earl Viscount or Baron shall keep in his house any greater quantities of French Wines then 10. Gallons By an Act of Parliament made in the same year the offenders in the Assise of Wood and Fuell if they be poor and not able to pay the Forfeiture may be by a Justice of Peace or any other of the Kings Officers put on the Pillory By an Act of Parliament made in the first year of the Reign of Queen Mary if the Justices of Peace do not put the Act of Parliament in execution touching the repair of the Causway betwixt Sherborn and Shaftsbury in the Counties of Dorset and Somerset the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper shall upon request grant Commissions to certain discreet persons to do it And by an Act of Parliament made in the 43th year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth the mis-imployment of Lands Goods Chattels or Money given to Hospitals and Charitable uses are to be reformed by the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England and the Chancellor of the Dutchy of Lancaster for the time being in their several Jurisdictions Which amongst many other may be some of the causes or reasons that the People of England and Commons in Parliament giving in former times as they ought to do those grand and more then ordinary respects and many more not here repeated unto the Great Officers of the Crown Royal Houshold and other the Servants of our Kings and Princes and lodging so many of their grand concernments in their care and trust did not trouble themselves or any of our Parliaments with any Petitions there being none to be found amongst the Records thereof against those antient rational just and legal Priviledges of the Kings Servants in Ordinary nor any Lord Steward Lord Chamberlain or other Officers of the Kings most Honourable House for allowing or maintaining it although there were some against Protections granted to some that were not the Kings Servants in Ordinary nor hath there been any Statute or Act of Parliament made to take away or so much as abridge those well deserved Priviledges which have in all ages and by so good warrant of right reason Laws of Nations and the Laws and reasonable Customes of this Kingdom appeared to be so much conducing to the Weal publique and the affairs and business of the Head or Soveraign For surely if there had been but the least suspicion of any Grievance in them meriting a remedy there would not have been such a silence of the peoples Petitioning or Complaints against it either by themselves or their vigilant and carefull Representatives in the Commons House in Parliament which heretofore seldom or never omitted the eager pursuit and Hue and Cry after any thing of Grievance which molested them And if there had been any such Petitions and Complaints in Parliament that Great and Honourable Court not giving any order or procuring any Act of Parliament against the Priviledges of the Kings Servants is and may be a convincing argument that such Complaints or pretended Grievances were causeless unfitting or not deserving the remedies required and will be no more an evidence or proof against what is here endeavoured to be asserted then the Petition of the Commons in Parliament in the 21th year of the Reign of King Edward the 3d. against the payment of 6 d. for the seal of every Original Writ in Chancery and 7 d. for the sealing of the Writs of the Courts of Kings Bench and Common Pleas which hath ever since been adjudged reasonable and fitting to be paid then the many Petitions against the antient legal and rational payment of Fines upon Original Writs in Chancery then the Petitions of Non-conforming Ministers then the many designed and desired Acts of Parliament not found to be reasonable or convenient and therefore laid by and miscarried in the Embrios or multitudes of other Petitions in our Parliaments or then the many late Petitions for an imaginary liberty of Conscience can or will be for what was desired and not thought fit at those or any other times to be granted Which antient Priviledge of the Kings Servants not to be Arrested without leave was not so limited to their Persons but that their Lands Estates and Goods participated also of that Privilege not to be molested by any Process or Suit of Law without Licence first obtained of the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings most honourable Houshold or unto such other great Officers therein to whose Jurisdiction it belonged CAP. IV. That the Priviledges and Protections of the Kings Servants in Ordinary by reason of his Service is and ought to be extended unto the Priviledged parties Estate both Real and Personal as well as unto their persons FOr if we may as we ought believe antiquity and its many unquestionable authorities and our Records which as to matters of fact judgements pleas writs therein allowed Records of Parliament and the Grants of our Kings by their Letters Patents under the Great Seal of England being the Publique Faith of the Kingdome from and under which most of the peoples Real Estates and Priviledges have had their originals and establishments not the falsely called Publique Faith which afterwards proved to be Bankrupt and was until then the Medea or Witch of the late incomparably wicked Rebellion were alwayes so impartial and credited as not to have their truth so much as suspected That Priviledge was not only indulged and allowed to their Persons but to their Lands and Estate also as will plainly appear by the course and Custome of the Law in former ages and amongst many others not here enumerated was not understood to have been either unusual or illegal in that which was granted to Sir John Staunton Knight By King Edward the 3 d. in the 29th year of his Raign in these words Omnibus ad quos c. Salutem considerantes grata laudabilia obsequia tam nobis quam Isabellae Reginae Angliae Matris nostrae charissimae per dilectum fidelem nostrum Johannem-de Staunton impensa proinde Volentes personam ipsius Johannis suis condignis meritis exigentibus honorare ipsum Johannem Camerae nostrae militem familiarem quoad vixerit tam tempore quo extra curiam nostram absens quam tempore quo ibidem presens fuerit duximus retinendum Ac de gratia nostra speciali ipsum Johannem Terras Tenementa
being all three of them with fifteen dayes betwixt the Testes and Retorns first and successively to be retorned as now the manner of retorning them of course is usually before any Exigent can be awarded in order to an Utlary if the Defendant do not appear before unto the Action whether Civil or Criminal to prevent it which so often repeated process and warnings the Law doth so strictly enjoyn as in the Reigns of King Henry the 4th and King Henry the 6th Utlaries have been reversed for that the Exigent was awarded to Utlaw the Defendants upon the second Capiaâ— There cannot be any just or legal possibility of Utlawing of them although they be neither Great Officers of State nor of the Kings Privy Councel or of the Baronage who by reason of their eminencies high degrees and qualities are alwayes to be excepted from those ordinary kinds of Process For if any of the Kings Servants in ordinary should be wronged by any such false Retorns which must necessarily fore-run and open the doors of the Process of Exigent the Prologue or Ushers to an Utlawry they are and ought to be as justly entituled as any of the common people of England are to an Action of the Case against the Sheriff or any other who shall make or cause to be made any false Retorn quod nichil habet that he had nothing when as many of them have good or great or some Estates in Lands and Freehold in the County or place where the Action is laid or quod non est inventus was not to be found in his Balywick the later of which was in former ages used to be so ill resented as in the Reign of King Edward the 3d. an Action was brought against one for retorning upon a Writ quod non est inventus that he was not to be found whereby a Capias or Writ to arrest him was awarded against him And as much against the mind of the Law it would be and a very great distance from truth and reason that the King in the usual process and proceedings unto or towards an Utlary should cause an Original Writ to be directed unto the Sheriff of Middlesex who is by Law to execute no Writ in his Court or Palace to command one of the Kings Servants to pay a Debt demanded by the Plaintiff or if he did not to summon him to appear before his Justices of the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster to shew cause why he did not when his own Officers of his most Honourable Houshold upon leave obtained to prosecute the Debtor in the Court of Common Pleas were more properly to have made that summons should upon a nichil habet nec est inventus that he hath nothing or is not to be found retorned upon such an Original Writ by Clerks or Attorneys of course without the warrant or privity of the Sheriff in whose name it is retorned and to whom it is directed suffer a Capias in his Name and under his Seal to arrest or take his body to be issued out against his Yeoman of the Robes or his Physicians in ordinary or some other of his Servants in ordinary necessarily attending him not by courses as many other are by the indulgence of his Royal Majesty for the ease of his Servants permitting them to officiate by turns which within a few weeks or months brings them again into their duty and places of attendance but constantly every day and night in the year And should upon a non est inventus retorned of course as aforesaid when the time or day prefixed in that Writ of Capias is expired suffer in his Name and under his Seal another Writ of alias Capias to be made to the said Sheriff commanding him to arrest or take the said Yeoman of his Robes or any other of his Servants in ordinary whom he knows not to be absent from his service or affairs and upon a like feigned and false retorn of course upon that Writ when the time prefixed for to arrest him is expired cause or command a Writ of pluries Capias to be made or issued out against him and upon the like feigned and false retorn made upon the said Writ of pluries Capias when the time prefixed to arrest him is expired cause a Writ of Exigent to be issued out commanding the Sheriff in five several County Court dayes to call the said Yeoman of the Robes or such other his Servant in ordinary and if he appear to take him if not to retorn him Utlawed and should likewise at the same time issue out at the request of the party Plaintiff his Writ of Proclamation directed to the Sheriff of the County where his Family resided to be proclaimed at two several County Court dayes and a third time at the Parish Church door upon a Sunday immediately after Divine Service ended commanding the said Yeoman of the Robes or such other his Servant to appear and render himself to the Sheriff otherwise to be Utlawed when he knows he was at that instant of time and would be at other times prefixed busie and imployed in a near attendance upon his Person or that the Yeâ—man of his Robes or such other Servant in ordinary should be Utlawed upon an intendment or supposition in Law that after so many iterated contempts of the King and his Process or Writs being twelve in number that is to say a contempt upon not appearing upon the Original Writ three several contempts upon the Capias Alias and Pluries five other contempts in not appearing at the five Husting dayes if the Action had been laid in London or five County Court dayes if the Action were laid in any County and three several contempts in not appearing upon the Proclamation when he either knew not of the Process as it very often happens or if he did take notice of them refused to appear to the said Action because his business about the Kings own person and affairs would not permit him And should thereby subject him to all the mischiefs and inconveniences of an Utlawed person and that fierce Process of Utlary called a Capias Vtlegatum and command a Sheriff to enter into any Liberties as if he intended such Servants might be taken in his Bed-Chamber or his Court which no Law or Custom hath hitherto permitted or held fitting or reasonable and seize his Person Lands and Goods and Lease and Demise away his Lands to the Plaintiff untill he shall appear and answer the Action and the King for the Contempts in not appearing thereunto when as it was the Kings own necessary affairs and business that hindred him and he was at that instant of time busied in his duty and attendance upon his person and cannot be restored unto the benefit of the Laws and the Birth-right of a Subject untill he shall have reversed the Utlary by Plea or Error or as the usage of the Law was in the time of King Henry the 4th and long after that the
Utlawed person could not be restored till he had been by the Court committed to the Prison of the Fleet for his contempts purchased and pleaded his Charter of Pardon from the King under the Great Seal of England and appeared to the Action when the King and his service and attendance was the only cause that he did not or could not attend or appear thereunto or put in Bayl to answer it when there was no danger of his absence or flying away from the Kings Service which is or ought to be not a little advantageous or beneficial unto him And when the Plaintiff at whose instance such a prosecution was made might with as much ease and as little charge and a far less expence of time have petitioned the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings Houshold and obtained a license to have taken his course at Law against him And if the Lord Chamberlain had given the Defendant a reasonable time or prefixion for the Plaintiffs satisfaction as his Lordship usually doth it would probably not have exceeded the time of six months which is by our Laws the shortest time wherein a Defendant can be Utlawed which as Bracton saith ought not to be suddenly done but to have five months warning or time given in regard of the severity thereof when a man is Utlawed and is thereby to forfeit bona catalla patriam amicos his Goods Chattels Countrey and profits of his Lands to be as an exile or banish'd man was not to be received or entertained by his Friends could not bring an Action for any thing due unto him untill the Utlary be reversed but was as antient as the Saxon times accounted to be a Friendless and Lawless man And it would be a great piece of incivility to prosecute such a Servant of the Kings in ordinary so busied and imployed about his person and not first of all to Petition for his license when in an ordinary way and with no great charge and a great deal sooner than the Defendants appearance to his Action can be enforced by an Utlary it might have been so easily procured and possibly the Kings great occasions and expence of money for the Publick and their defence and protection wherein the good and safety of that Plaintiff was amongst the rest included might be the cause that he could not pay such Servant in ordinary his wages and that such Servant could not so soon as he otherwise would have satisfied the party prosecuting there being no reason to be assigned by any whose exuberant phancies have not altogether divorced them from it that one that is but imployed upon a seldom and temporary imployment of the Kings and is not his Servant in ordinary nor the business he is imployed in so continually near and relating to his person should during that his temporary imployment and of a far less concernment as to go on a Message for him or in company of some Ambassador be priviledged during his absence in his Person Goods and Estate and a Servant in ordinary continually attending his Sacred Person should be only protected in his Person but not in his Estate or that the priviledges and immunities so antiently due and appropriate to his Servants in ordinary and near his person should be curtailed and have less allowed them than Strangers and such as are only imployed for some small time or occasion Or that the Utlawing of any of his Servants in ordinary should forfeit their so just Rights and Priviledges when as by the Law and reasonable Customs of the Kingdom they are not to be Utlawed or put in Process of Utlary without license or leave first asked and no man should be Utlawed or punished for a default of not appearing or have any Process of arrest or contempt awarded against him where he had a reasonable excuse or impediment or cause of Essoyne as by Inundation of Waters being sick or in the parts beyond the Seas or so great a one as the Service of the King for if Utlaries in such a case unduly obtained should cause a forfeiture of just and legal Customs and Priviledges any that had a mind to do a mischief to a supposed adversary might as well contrary to the Priviledges of Parliament in the time of Parliament find or make a pretence to Utlaw any of the Members of either of the Houses of Parliament and make that to be as it were a forfeiture of their Priviledges and a justification which they can never make out of the infringing of them and the Parliament-men of the House of Commons might be Utlawed persons which the Law forbids and by tacite and many times undiscerned Utlaries might lose and be deprived of their Priviledges And the parties offending or endeavouring such breaches of Priviledge should not take advantage de son tort of their own wrongs or tortious doings which our Common Law maxime doth abhorr and the Civil Law doth as little like or allow when its Rule is that Nemo commodum consequi debet ex suo delicto no man is to take profit by his offence against the Law For in vain should the Kings Servants be by the Constitution of Clarendon in the Reign of King Henry the second freed from Excommunications or the Ministers or Priests be by the Act of Parliament in the 50th year of the Reign of King Edward the third and the first year of the Reign of King Richard the second exempted from being arrested in the Church or Church-yard if an Utlary which being very antiently used in Criminal matters but not in Civil in Bractons time in the Reign of King Henry the 3d. taught the way and manner of it in Civil should be able to forfeit it or take them away for in and before that Kings Reign Bracton saith Videtur nulla esse Vtlagaria si factum pro quo quis Interrogatus est Civile sit non Criminale pro quo quis vitam amittere non deberet vel membra it seemeth there ought to be no Utlary where the Defendant or party is prosecuted for any Civil matter not Criminal wherein he was not to lose either life or members And very unbecoming the Majesty and Honour of a King it would needs be to have any of his Servants Utlawed and pursued with Process of Utlary whilst they are attending upon him and made to be as the out-cast and reproach of the people and not be able to protect them in their just Rights and Liberties or that any of our Kings Servants should Lupina capita gerere be as men wearing Wolves heads which was the antient mark or note of infamy of such as were Utlawed in Criminal matters instead of honourable Liveries or marks of the Kings Servants in ordinary When in the 6th year of the Reign of King Henry the 4th Roger Oliver the Son of John Oliver being in obsequio Regis in Comitiva Johannis Lardner Capitanei Castri de Oye in partibus Piccardiae pro munitione
out of his place for Bribery and Extortion it was in the Sentence or Judgment given against him said that Sacramentum Domini Regis quod erga Populum habuit custodiendum â—regit maliciose false Rebelliter quantum in ipso fuit he had falsly malitiously and traiterously as much as in him lay broke or violated the Kings Coronation Oath which demonstrates that although he had at the same time violated his own Oath made unto the King when he was admitted into his Office or Place yet his fault was the greater in breaking the Kings Oath and that part of his Justice with which he was trusted For the Grants of the Judges Places by the King durante bene placito or quamdiu se bene gesserint during the Kings pleasure or as long as they do wel behave themselves the Kings Commissions of Oyer Terminer Et Gaola deliberanda of Gaol Delivery and to hear and determine Causes in their Circuits their Oathes besides their Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy taken at their admittance into their Places prescribed and directed in the 18th year of the reign of King Edward the third and administred by the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keepers of the Great Seal of England for the time being That they the King and his People in the Office of Justice shall not counsel or assent to any thing that may turn unto his damage shall take no Fee or Robes of any but the King himself nor execute any Letters from him contrary to the Law but certifie him and his Councel thereof and shal procure the profit of the King and his Crown in all things that they may reasonably do the same in an Act of Parliament made in the 20th year of the Reign of that King they are expresly mentioned to be Deputed by the King to do Law and Right according to the usage of the Realm the Kings Writs directed unto them stiling them no otherwise then Justitiariis suis and those Courts the Kings Courts the acknowledgment of the Judges themselves in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and their readiness to obey all her lawful commands in the Case of Cavendish and that of Sir Edward Coke that the Judges are of the Kings Councel for proceedings in course of Justice their assisting the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England upon request or sending for some of them out of their own Courts into the Chancery their attending upon the King in his House of Peers in Parliament to assist and advise in matters of Law there debated when required but not with any power of Vote or decisive Judgment their often meetings out of their Courts altogether upon any of the Kings commands or references in causes difficult by Petition or Appeal to the King and their Opinions humbly certified thereupon and attending upon the King and his Councel upon matters doubtful wherein the ayde and advice of the Regal Authority was required and whether their Patents or Commissions be durante bene placito or quam diu se bene gesserint during the Kings pleasure or as long as they shall well behave themselves are void per demise le Roy by the death of the King that granted their Patents or Commissions and to be renewed at the pleasure of his Successor may abundantly evidence that they may not claim or justly be beleived to be independant Soveraign absolute or without an Appeal to their King and Soveraign who granteth amongst many other Offices in the said Courts the Office and Place of Warden of the Fleet by the Name of the Keeper of the Kings Pallace at Westminster aad the Office thereby to attend by him or his Deputy the Courts of Chancery Common-Pleas and Exchequer and keep in safe Custody the Prisoners committed by them when all the Writs and Process of those Courts are issued under his Name and Seal and all but the Chancery which are honoured by his own Teste are under the several Testes or Subscriptions as the Law intendeth of the Chief Justices or Judges thereof together with the Exemplifications of Fines Recoveries Verdicts and other Records in the Court of Common-Pleas and the Court of Kings-Bench and in their several and distinct Jurisdictions are subjected unto and dependant upon the Regal Authority Crown and Dignity And cannot be otherwise understood to be when our Kings have sometimes fined Judges for Extortion or Bribery as King Edward the first did Sir Ralph de Hengham and diverse other Judges in the 16th year of his Reign when the Judges in the â—aid Courts cannot ex officio pardon or discharge a fine or punishment imposed or inflicted by them upon Offenders nor without his Writ of Error amend or correct Errors committed by themselves after the Term ended wherein they were committed are if they exceed their bounds subject by his Writ punishment of Praemunire to a forfeiture of all their Lands Goods Estate of their Lands in Fee-Simple or for Life to have their Bodies imprisoned at the will of the King to be out of his Protection and when he as he pleaseth commandeth the Rolls and Records of the Courts of Chancery Kings-Bench and Common-Pleas to be brought into his Treasury or the Tower of London for safety adjourneth those Courts upon occasion of Pestilence or other reason of State or Warre as King Edward the first did to York where they continued for some years after that the Judges are by Office of Court to stay surcease in many things where they do perceive the King to be concerned either in point of profit or other concernment untill they have advised with the Kings Serjeants or Councel learned in the Law when the Writs of Prohibition frequently granted by the Court of Common-Pleas or Kings-Bench in his name do signifie that he hath haute Justice power and authority over those and the inferior Courts of Justice and by his Supreme Authority doth by his Legal Rescripts and Mandates issuing out of his High Court of Chancery upon any defects in his Subordinate Courts for want of power and authority consonant or agreeable to the rules of right reason and equity moderate the rigors of his Laws correct Errors and provide fitting remedies for all manner of Contingencies or Disorders happening in the course execution or manage of his Laws or Justice testified by his Injunctions out of the Chancery to stay the rigors and proceedings in the Courts of Common-Law Commissions of Trail Baston more rightly ottroy le Baston granted by King Edward the first to inquire of and punish misdemeanours riots extortions c. which the Courts of Justice then in being had cognisance of might have upon complaint punished redressed many other Commissions of that kind made out by that other of our Kings with Commissions of Assise Association cum multis aliis or the like the Writs of Rege in consulto
laid by a Foreign Prince some English Merchants Estate had been destroyed or had their Ships or Goods taken at Sea by the Subjects of another Prince and only desired a Protection from the many times Unchristian-like fury of their Creditors untill by Letters of Reprisal or otherwise they might enable themselves to make them a just satisfaction and did but in the mean time like the innocent Doves fly to the shelter of the Rock of their Soveraign from the cruelty of the pursuing Hawk or when any imployed in the service of the King or for the good of the Nation although he be at the present neither protected or priviledged was by feigned or malicious Actions sought to be hindred or endamaged upon some reason or necessity and in all or either of those kinds have also been sparingly granted by King James and King Charles the Martyr unto some few particular men as to Philip Burlamachi and Pompeio Calandrini Natives and Merchants of Italy denizen'd and resident in England who had imployed in their services not only at home but in the parts beyond the Seas in the important affairs of ayding the Kings Allyes all the Estate and Credit which they had or could procure some if not many of which sort of Protections have not been nor are unusual in our Neighbour Countreys and in Brabant adversus Creditorum multi juges vexationes assultus to protect a Debtor against the cruelties assaults and vexations of some unmercifull Creditors quoties vel inclementia maris vel infortunio graviori demersi ad certum tempus solvere non possunt when by some great misfortunes by Sea or at Land they are not at the present able to pay whereof Hubert de Loyens in his Treatise Curia Brabantiae munere Cancellarii ejusdem of the Court of Brabant and the Office of the Chancellor of that Province gives the reason quoniam Reipublica interest subditos non depauperari sicut nec Principem cujus cum illis annexa causa est because it concerns the Weal-publick not to suffer the people nor likewise the Prince whose good or ill is annexed to theirs to be impoverished by which the poor Debtor obtains some respite and time either to pay or pacifie their enraged Creditors a custom and usage conveyed to them by Antiquity and deduced from the wisdom of the Grecians and Romans in their well ordered Governments and Commonwealths But those who might rest well satisfied with the wisdom as well as practice of our Laws are so unwilling to be undeceived and to quit their stubborn ignorance and affected errors as they will like some Garrison willing to maintain a Fort and hold out as long as they can when they can no longer defend it seek and hope to march out with better advantages in relinquishing or parting with it then they could by keeping of it and therefore will be willing to allow unto Strangers or those which the King imployeth upon Foreign or Extraordinary occasions and are not his Menial or Domestick Servants the Priviledges aforesaid so as they may exclude those that are immediately attending upon his service or the greater concernments of his person CHAP. IX That the Kings granting Protections under the Great Seal of England to such as are his Servants in ordinary for their Persons Lands and Estate when especially imployed by him into the parts beyond the Seas or in England or any other of his Dominions out of his Palace or Virge thereof or unto such as are not his Domesticks or Servants in ordinary or extraordinary when they are sent or imployed upon some of his negotiations business or affairs neither is or can be any evidence or good argument that such only and not the Kings Servants in ordinary who had no Protections under the Great Seal of England are to be protected or priviledged whilst they are busied in his Palace or about his Person WHich the men of Israel could so highly value as they disswaded King David from going in person with the Army against Absalom saying thou shalt not go forth for if we flee away they will not care for us neither if half of us dye will they care for us but now thou art worth ten thousand of us or as they shortly after said in their loyal contest with the men of Judah we have ten parts meaning the ten Tribes in the King which just esteem caused Davids three mighty men or Worthies think they had cause enough to adventure their lives to break through the Host of the Philistines and draw water out of the Well of Bethelem to bring it to David to satisfie but his thirst or longing to asswage it For if reason may be the guide or hold the Ballance and the cause be any thing of kin to the effect the more worthy and the greater is to be more respected than the less and the more necessary than that which is not so much necessary the heart and nobler parts more than the inferior and the person health and welfare of the King more than any Foreign Message or Imployment or any private mans concerns in any particular affair and that which is to be every day and night and continually more to be taken care of than that which is but accidental or temporary or upon seldom occasions for the salus populi cannot be suprema Lex nor the good and safety of the people be maintained or provided for if the King who is the Law-giver and by his Ministers and subordinate Magistrates the Laws executer and the Laws and peoples protector and defender be not so attended as he which is the Hâ—ad and better part of the Body Politick may be kept and preserved in safety and if Lex be summa ratio the quintessence or chief of reason and semper intendit rationem alwayes intends that which is reason we may not think it to be a paradox or any stranger to reason that the Persons and Estates of the Master of the Robes the Gentlemen and Grooms of his Majesties Bed-Chamber Gentlemen of his Privy Chamber Esquires of the Body Physicians in ordinary Gentlemen Vshers Gentlemen Pensioners Yeoman of the Robes Gentlemen and Yeomen of his Guards and those many other sorts of Servants and Attendants which are as the learned Causabon terms them servi ad manum or de interioribus Aulicis necessary Servants unto his person and often and daily attendants upon him or are otherwise necessary and becoming the Majesty of a King as the Great Officers of State Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England Lord Privy Seal Lord Treasurer Lord Chamberlains the Lords of his most Honourable Privy Councel Secretaries of Estate Masters of Request c. being as Pasquier a learned French Advocate saith a la suitte le Roy joignantes a la personne de Prince attending the person of the King and should neither be absent or receive any impediment in their service should be as much
both Horse and Foot Garrisons and Commanders of Castles Towns or Forts and was believed to be necâ—ssary in the time of Justinian the Emperor Qui statuit milites conveniri tam in causis Civilibus quam Criminaelibus coram ducibus suis quod miles nisi a suo judice coerceri non possit that Soldiers should be cited and tryed aswell in causes civil as criminal before their Captains or Commanders And that a Soldier should not be compelled to appear before any other which was not in that time any new Edict or Ordinance but a Declaration of an antient law and custome in use amongst the Romans in the Infancy of their mighty Monarchy some hundred of years before the birth of our Redeemer as may be evidenced by Juvenal and what was in use and practise and accompted to be of antient institution in his time which was not long after the birth of our Saviour when he saith Legibus antiquis Casâ—â—erum more Camilli Servato miles ne vallum litiget extra Et procul a Signis justissima Centuriorum Cognitio est igitur de milite By antient laws and customes sacred held By great Camillus Soldiers were not to be compel'd To appear in Courts of Justice but in the Campe to abide And by their own Commanders to be try'd And from the like causes and considerations of the Kings service and safety of the Kingdome are allowed by our reasonable laws and customes the priviledges and franchises of the Cinque Ports that the Inhabitants within the liberties thereof do sue and are only to be sued in the courts thereof and the Kings ordinary Writs and Process do not run or are of any 〈◊〉 therein and such as are in certain special cases are only to be directed to the Constable of the Castle of Dover and the Warden of the Cinque Ports and those franchises were so allowable by law as the Abbot of Feversham in his time a man of great power and authority and armed with many and great priviledges of his own both Spiritual and Temporal being imprisoned by the Warden of the Cinque Ports for an offence committed therein for which the Arch-bishop of Canterbury citing the Kings Officers there into his Ecclesiastical Court the Record saith Quia secundum consuetudinem regni approbatam ratione juris Regii ministeri Regis pro aliquibus quae fecerunt ratione officii trahi non debeant Rex prohibuit Archiepiscopo Cantuar. ne volestari faciat ministros suos Dover de eo quod Abbatem de Feversham pro delicto suo incarcerassent per considerationem Curiae quinque portuum de Shepway in regard that by the custome of the Kingdome approved and the right and prerogative of the King the Kings Officers are not to be compelled to appear in other Courts the King prohibited the Arch-bishop of Canterbury that he should not molest or trouble his Officers or servants at Dover for that by a judgement of the Court of the Cinque Ports holden at Shepwey they had imprisoned the Abbot of Feversham for an offence by him committed From the like causes and considerations of the Kings service and good of his household and servants the multitude of tenants heretofore of the Antient Demesnes of the Crown which were in the hands of King Edward the confessor or William the Conqueror for that as Sir Edward Coke saith they plowed the Kings Demesnes of his Maners sowed the same mowed his Hey and did other services of Husbandry for the sustenance of the King and his honorable household to the end that they might the better apply themselves to their labors for the profit of the King had the priviledge that they should not be impleaded in any other of the Kings Courts for any their lands or in actions of accompt Replevin ejectione firmae Writs of Mesne and the like where by common intendment the realty or title of lands may come in question are to be free and quit from all manner of Tolls in Fairs and Markets for all things concerning their husbandry and sustenance of Taxes and Tallages by Parliaments unless the Tenants in Antient Demesnc be specially named of contributions to the expences of the Knights of the Shire for the Parliament and if they be severally distreined for other services they may all for saving of charges joyne in a Writ of Monstraverunt albeit they be several Tenants and where they recover in any action are by the Laws of William the Conqueror to have double costs and damages From which Spring and fountain of priviledges in relation only to and for the concern of the Prince and Son and Heir apperant of the King of England and his revenue hath been derived those of the Court of Stanneries or jurisdiction over the Tyn Mines where by the opinion of Sir VVilliam Cordell Knight Master of the Rolls Sir James Dier Knight Cheif Justice of the Court of Common Pleas and Justice Weston no Writ of Error lyeth upon any judgment in that Court and by an act of Parliament made in the 50 th year of the raigne of King Edward the third and the grant of that King all Workmen in the Stanneries are not to be constrained to appear before any Justice or other Officers of the King his Heirs or Successors in any plea or action arising within the Stanneries unless it be before che Warden of the Stanneries for the time being Pleas of land life or member only excepted nec non recedant ab operibus suis per summonitionem aliquorum ministrorum seu heredum nostrorum nisi per summonitionem dicti custodis and should not depart from their said works or labors by reason of any Summons of the Officers of the King or his Heirs unless it be by the Summons of the aforesaid Warden were to be free as to their own goods from all Tolls Stallage Aides and Customes whatsoever in any Towns Havens Fairs and Markets within the County of Devon and that the VVarden aforesaid should should have full power and authority to administer Justice to all that do or should work in the Stannaries or any forreigners in and concerning any plaints trespasses contracts or actions except as is before excepted arising or happening within the Stannaries and that if any of the workmen be to be imprisoned they shall be arrested by the said Warden and kept in the prison of Lydeford and not else where untill according to the Law and custome of England they shall be delivered All which before mentioned Exemptions and Priviledges as effects flowing and proceeding from their true and proper causes may justifie those more immediate and proximate of the Kings Servants in Relation to his person and a greater concernment more especially when so many of the people of England can be well contented to enjoy not a few other immunities exemptions and priviledges which have had no other cause or foundation then the indulgence and favour
Regibus obnoxium for what ever any Magistrates or Judges do is subject to his controll or superintendency Quicquid potâ—statis ditionis impâ—rii nacti sunt id receptum benignitati Regum praestare tenentur in quorum praesentia non sâ—cus evaneseit quam in meridiano sole stellarum fulgor quae coruscant in tenebris lucidissimis radiis mirum in modum scintillantes apparent Whatever Power or Jurisdiction they had was to be attributed to the Grant and Favor of the King in whose Presence it doth vanish and disappear as the brightness of the Stars which shine in the dark do at the shining or glory of the Sun Quemadmodum enim illae praesenti quicqued habent luminis soli foenerantur Ita Magistratuum potestas omnis vis imperium ubi praesto Rex est ad eum redit aquo profectum est for as they do borrow their light from the Sun so all the Power Force and Rule which the Magistrates have when the King comes or acts in his own Person do return to him from whom they received it and that if Kings do abstinere non tantum a sententiae dictione sed a foro ne Regiae dignitatis splendore judicum oculi perstringantur forbear from intermedling in their Courts of Justice it is that by the lustre of their Presence the Business of the Judges may not be hindred or disturbed Non igitur abs re tribunalia creatis a se Magistratibus relinqunt idque solemne Reges habent ut nunquam in orchestra conspiciuntur nisi quid momenti gravioris inciderit quod ipsorum authoritate absoluta summaque ditione potestate numine decidatur Wherefore it was not without cause that they did leave their Tribunals to Judges or Magistrates made or created by them and made it to be as a Custom duly to be observed not to appear themselves in their Courts of Justice unless some great matter of weight or moment hapned which required the aid or assistance of their supream and absolute Authority and that notwithstanding that James the fourth King of Scotland did in imitation of what he had learnt in France Institute a kind of supream Court and call'd it The Court of Sessions for determination of Causes like that of the Parliament of Paris and in Criminal matters made it to be without Appeal Quaedam vero quae majoris Exempli sunt regis cognitionem desideranâ— quae Scotorum Jurisperitorum vulgus puncta vocat sive Capita Coronae reservata cujusmodi sunt Majestatis raptuâ— incendii id genus aliorum But yet there were certain matters or things which the ordinary sort of Lawyers amongst the Scots called Points or Pleas of the Crown especially reserved to the Determination and Judgment of the King himself such as Treason Rape burning of Houses or the like which being in the Year of our Lord 1581 when Mr. Ad. Blackwood wrote that Loyal and Learned Treatise not denied to be good Law and right Reason in Scotland and of as long a Date or Original as about 300 years before the Incarnation of Jesus Christ was although it hath since the time that Mr. Blackwood wrote strangely deviated into the sullen surly and unwarrantable Doctrines and Practice of a factious and domineering Presbytery and other the heretofore Corahs Dathans and Abirams of Scotland Omnium regnorum perpetua lege more consuetudine receptum A received and well approved Law and Custom amongst all Nations and may seem to have been derived from the Council which Jethro many Generations after that an inundation of Sin had in the grand and most universal punishment of the Deluge washed away all Mankind but Noah and his Sons and Daughters in all but eight Persons and left them to tremble and stand amazed at his Justice and adore his Mercy gave to Moses his Son-in-law to ease himself of his continual toil and tiring labors From the Morning untill the Even in determining the Controversies of the People by constituting Judges over them and reserve to his own Decision and Judgment every great Matter Wherein it can not well accord with the rectified Reason of Mankind that Jethro had in that his Council any the least design to diminish the Superiority Right or Authority of Moses or that Moses by hearkning unto it did intend thereby to bereave himself of the dernier ressort ultimate Appeal and Authority with which God had entrusted him And those not to be contradicted sacred Records of the Almighty can assure us that not onely King David who is therein said to have been a Man after Gods own heart Solomon the wisest of Kings and the succeeding Kings of Israel and Judah but Ezra and Nehemiah who were but as Governors or Stadtholders under Artaxerxes over the remnant of the Captivity of the Jews did come close up to that advice of Jethro and adhere to those eternal Laws of right Reason Superiority and Rules of Government ever since observed in all or the greatest part of the Kingdoms of the habitable Earth amongst which our Kingdom of England and her early as well as later Inhabitants alterius orbis of this our other World for the Reasons and Authorities herein before declared and that which shall be added hereafter in confirmation thereof and the excellent and incomparable constitution and method of her Monarchy and Government which will manifest it self and be plainly evidenced to any who shall rightly inspect it is to be ranked and reckoned And may reduce to a better understanding all those who have taken up those Opinions on trust or a sleight or no examination that such a pattern of the Divine wisdom in his Theocraty and Monarchical Government of the promised Seed of Abraham is no way repugnant to those Rules of Government which have been not onely approved and practised by our British Saxon and Danish Kings before the Norman Success and Victory but continued by their Successors When King Canutus taught by the no seldom Petitions Appeals and Complaints of the People was about the Year 1016. enforced to make a Law That Nemo injuriis alterius Regi quaeratur nisi quidem in Centuria Justitiam consequi impetrare non potuit no Man should complain to the King of any wrong or injury done unto him unless he could not in the Century or Hundred-Couâ—t obtain any Remedy In that great and remarkable Pleading for three days together in the Reign of William the Conqueror at Pinnendene in Kent in the grand Controversie betwixt Lanfrank Arch-bishop of Canterbury and Odo Bishop of Bayeux the Kings half Brother for divers Mannors Lands and Liberties of that Arch-bishoprick of which the Bishop of Bayeux had disseised him although that King did upon special occasions sometimes hold his Commune Concilium or Parliament the King Prâ—cepit Comitatum totum absque morâ— considere homines comitatus omnes Francigenas praecipue Anglos in Antiquis legibus câ—nsuetudinibus peritos in unum
convenire Commanded the whole County without any delay to assemble together as well French as English and more especially such of the English as were skilful in the ancient Laws and Customs of England ubi Goisfredus Bishop of Constance in loco Regis saith the Leiger Book of Rochester vel vice Regis saith Eadmerus fuit Justiciam illam tenuit â—at Judge for or in the place or stead of the King as his Commissioner Hujus placiti multis testibus multisque rationibus determinatum finem postquam Rex audivit laudavit laudans cum consensu omnium principum suorum which could not be the Commons in Parliament as it is now formed or the then Commune Concilium the Parliament consisting of his Nobility Bishops and Peers who could not all of them be stiled Princes but were rather such of his greater sort of Nobility as were then attending upon him in his Court assembled and met together by his Command in that great and more than ordinary County-Court confirmavit ut deinceps incorruptus persevâ—raret â—irmiter praecepit the end of which Trial made by many Witnesses and Reasons being certified to the King he greatly approved it and by the consent of all his Princâ—s confirmed and strictly commanded it to be inviolably observed In the Reign of William Rufus his Son the Delegated Justice of the King in his Courts was so little believed not to be the Kings or the Judgments thereby or therein given not owned or understood to be given by the King as it was the Opinion as well as Complaint of Anselme Arch-bishop of Canterbury how justly or unjustly the Men of that Age when the Church-men were unruly and did not seldom forget themselves and their Benefactors did best know quod cuncta Regalis Curia pendebant ad nutum Regis nilque in ipsis nisi solum velle illius considerari That all matters in the Kings Court depended upon his Will and his onely Will was the Director thereof and whether the particular Interest of that stout and pious Prelate had therein misled his Judgment or no they must be too much unacquainted with our Laws reasonable Customs Annals Memorials Records and Accompts of Time and Transactions bigane and past as well as those of other Nations and the right origination or signification of the word Curia or Court and the no infrequent usage or acceptation thereof if they do not acknowledge that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nuncupatur potestas Dominium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 qui potestate fretus est judiciumque exercet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quasi habitacula Domini That Curia signifieth Power and Dominion and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he that exerciseth that Power in giving Judgment therein and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Habitation or Place of Residence of the Lord or Superior dicebatur autem Curia saith the judicious Sr. Henry Spelman primo de Regia seu palatio Principis inde de familia Judiciis in ea habitis ritu veterrimo it being at the first or more especially called Curia or the Court and took its Denomination by a most antient Usage or Custom from the Kings House or Palace and afterwards from their Houshold or Family and the Place where Kings did administer Justice And so untill Courts for the distribution of Justice were allow'd for the ease of Princes and better accommodation of their People out of their Houses or Palaces it will not be easie or possible to espy any essential difference as to the Place of doing Justice betwixt Curia Regis and Camera Regis the Court or Chamber of the King for after that some of our Courts of Justice in England by the indulgence of their Soveraigns ceased either to be ambulatory or resident in their Palaces those that have not bid a defiance to that universally allowed and entertained Maxim by all or most part of Mankind Qui facit per alium facit per se He that doth by another is truly and rightly said to have done it himself and are not resolved to encounter or be adversaries to all the right Reason which they can meet with or to pick up such weak and incogent Arguments as may make a shadow rather than substance of Truth or right Reason ought to confess that there is no real difference between the Kings doing of Justice in his own Person and cauâ—ing it to be done by others or betwixt the hearing of Causes or doing of Justice in the Hall or his Privy Chamber or any other Room of his House or Palace and that before and from the Conquest untill after the thirty eighth Year of the Reign of King Edward the Third whilst the Chief Justice of the Court of Kings Bench attended our Kings as well in their Courts as Progress to assist him in matters of Law and the Decision of Pleas of the Crown and such matters of Law as were not appropriate to the Decision of the Court of Common Pleas as it was then and hath been since constituted which did not leave the Kings Court or Palace untill King Henry the Third commanded it in the twentieth Year of his Reign to abide at Westminster Our Kings of England have in their own Persons heard some or many Causes and given divers Judgments in Aula in their Court or Palace in some Causes wherein they had the assistance of the Lord Chief Justice of the Kings-Bench and when they did not do it personally by reason of their frequent Divertisements Addresses of Ambassadors from Foreign Princes or in respect of the many great Affairs and Cares of State and Government which could not afford them the time or leisure to do it did cause it to be done by their Authority and by their constituted Justices who Vicaria Potestate by as it were a Deputation Lieutenancy or Assignation to those onely purposes represented them and were impowered to do it the Courts of Justice in William the Conquerors time being called Justicia Regis the Justice of the King and the Judges or Justices in the Reign of King Henry the Second Justiciae Regis in the abstract the Kings Judges or Justices For the Kings Justice or Superiority was never yet by any Law or Reason absolutely or altogether conâ—ined to his delegated Courts or authorized Judges or Justices or to any certain or determinate Place as that froward and powerful enough Anselme Archbishop of Canterbury could not but acknowledge when in a Parliament or Great Council holden in the Kings Court at Winchester by the Command of King William the Second or William Rufus in the Contest betwixt him and that King concerning that Archbishops resolution oâ— going to Rome and the Kings refusing to give him Licence divers of the Lords and Bishops passed in and out betwixt them and at last the Archbishop himself went in unto him to expostulate and debate the Matter with him And in the making of the Constitutions of Clarendon in
under His Seal and Teste Me Ipso directed to all His Courts of Justice And are as Bracton saith Formata ad similitudinem Regulae Juris framed by and according to the Rules of Law whiâ—h warranting many of the Proceeding thereof are in the Assize betwixt Wimbish and the Lord Willoughby in Trinity Term in the sixth year of the Reign of King Edward the Sixth said and not denyed to be Law and the Act of the King but not of the Chancellor So as they who shall endeavour to impose upon other men that the King is not by Law presumed to be present in his Court of Kings Bench where the Records do mention the Judgements given therein to be coram Rege before the King as if he were personally present with the Judges of that Court who are assigned to assist Him may as to the Kings Power in matters of Justice and over the Judges and Courts delegated by Him do well to seek a reason which is justly to be feared will never be found why it should be Law or Reason for King Alfred in the discords or ignorance of his Subordinate Judges in the distribution of Justice to hear and determine the Causes Himself or for King Canutus long after to judge the Causes of such as complained unto him when our Bracton doth not at all doubt of it when he saith that the Judges nullam habent Authoritatem sed ab alio i. e. Rege sibi Commissam cum ipse qui delegat non sufficiat per se omnes Causas sive Jurisdictiones terminare they have no Authority but what they are intrusted with by the King who granted it when as he who delegated them is not able or sufficient by himself to hear aad determine all Causes in every Jurisdiction unto which our Register of Writs that Pharmacopeia Director and Magazine of Medicines and Remedies for many a Disease in the Estates and Affairs of the People which Justice Fitz Herbert in his Preface to his Book De Natura Brevium of the Nature of Writs calleth The Principles of the Law and the Foundation whereupon it dependeth and in Plowdens Commentaries is as to many things truly said to be the Foundation of our Laws and so Authentique as Brown Justice in the Case betwixt Willon and the Lord Barkley in the third year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth declared that all Writs were to pursue the Forms in the Register and it was enough to alledge so is the Register will easily assent and all our Books of the Law all the Practice and Usage of our Courts of Justice all our Records Close and Patent Rolls and our Kings hearing and determining of Differences betwixt the Common Law and Ecclesiastical Courts and Jurisdictions and their making of Orders to reconcile the Proceedings of the severall Judges thereof and the like betwixt the Admiralty Court and the Courts of Common Law ordered decided and agreed before King Charles the First and His Privy Council in the ninth year of His Reign the Judges in criminal Matters not seldom attending the King for a Declaration of His Will and Pleasure where a Reprieve Pardon or Stay of Execution shall be necessary will be as so many almost innumerable powerful and cogent Arguments to justifie it And a common and dayly Experience and the Testimony of so many Centuries and Ages past and the Forme used in our Writs of Scire Facias to revive Judgements after a year and a day according to the Statute of Westminster the 2. with the words Et quia volumus ea que in Curia nostra rite acta sunt debite executioni demandari because we would that those things which are rightly done in our Courts should be put in execution c. may bear witness of that Sandy Foundation Sir Edward Coke hath built those his great mistakings upon and those also that the King cannot propria Authoritate Arrest any man upon suspition of Treason or Felony when the Statute made in the third year of the Reign of King Edward the First expresly acknowledgeth that the King may Arrest or cause men to be Arrested as well as His Chief Justice without distinction in ordinary and civil or criminal matters and when by the beforemention'd Opinions of Sir Christopher Wray Lord Chief Justice of the Queens Bench Sir Edmond Anderson Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common-Pleas and of all the Judges of England delivered under their hands in the Four and thirtieth year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth it was acknowledged that She or the Lords of Her Privy Council might do it And in the before recited great Case of the Habeas Corpora in the Reign of King Charles the Martyr there was no question made but that the King might lawfully do it with a cause expressed in the Warrant And many a Nobleman and others hath in several of our Kings Reigns either upon suspition of Treason or Flagranti Crimine in or very near the acting of it or upon great Misdemeanors been Arrested by our Kings and Princes onely Command and sent Prisoners to the Tower of London As the Great Mortimer Earl of March by King Edward the Third the Pompous Cardinal Wolsey and Queen Ann of Bulloin by King Henry the Eighth the Duke of Northumberland by Queen Mary the Duke of Norfolk and Earl of Essex by Queen Elizabeth for Treason Robert Earl of Somerset and his Lady committed for Felony Sir Tho. Overbury for refusing to go Ambassador when he was sent by King James Henry Earl of Oxford for striking up a Great Lords heels in a Solemnity of a great Feast when the French Ambassador was entertained in Westminster Hall for presuming to offer to wash his hands after the King had washed in the Basin which as Lord Great Chamberlain of England he had holden to the King Thomas Earl of Arundel for marrying the Lord Matravers his Son to the Sister of the Duke of Lenox and Richmond without his Licence and Philip Earl of Pembroke and the said Lord Matravers for striking and scuffling with one another in the House of Peers in Parliament and some others by King Charles the First and some by His now Majesty and our Parliaments have many times in some Charges brought against offenders of the Weal Publique petitioned our Kings and Princes to do it and many others have been so committed in the Reigns almost of all our Kings and Princes of which every Age and History of this our Kingdom can give plentiful Examples which we may believe to have been done by good and legal Warrant when in all our many Parliaments and Complaints of the People therein such Arrests and Imprisonments have not been in the number of any of their complained Grievances for otherwise what Power Writ Authority or Warrant of a Judge or Justice of Peace could have seiz'd upon that Powerful Mortimer and taken him in Notingham Castle out of the amorous Embraces of Queen Isabel the
operate or deserve to be a Cause to Priviledge themselves their Estates or Maenial Servants from Arrest or disturbance and such a Priviledge in Parliament in the time of an Adjournment which hath sometimes continued for several Months should be allowed and thought reasonable when their business which was the cause of it was all that time in suspence or abayance and that the King who granted and allowed those Priviledges should not enjoy the like for his own Servants who are dayly busied in the Safety Honour and attendance of his Person and the great Affairs of the Kingdom and that such a Cause should produce that effect for them and their Servants and the King who desireth but the like effect or production from one and the same Cause should not enjoy it for his own Servants and that â—adem ratio should not in the Kings Case as well as in the Case of any of his Subjects produce and be a Cause of the like Law or Liberty who doth not claim the Hearing of those causes where the Plaintiffs are not his Servants as the King of France who by his Commissions of Commitimus Impowers a Court to hear and determine Causes and concernments of his Servants but only that they should ask leave before they proceed against them in any of his Courts of Justice which the Plaintiffs shall make choice of Shall the Generall or Commander of the Armies or Guards Forts or Garrisons of the King and the Admirall of a Navy or Ships have a power not to permit any of their Officers or Souldiers to be Arrested or Imprisoned without Licence first obtained and shall the Servants of the King in the attâ—ndance upon his Sacred Person in the Watch and Care of them and the Publick Welfare as well in the time of War and Peace which not seldome disapoints the horrid effects of a people-tormenting War not have a like Priviledge Are the superiour Courts of Justice not blamed when the Judges thereof by the Kings Authority can supersede Actions in Inferiour Courts many times but upon the pretence of Actions depending in their Superiour Courts as to reverse an Utlary or the like in eundo redeundo when it is not every day or all days or but some hours business or can the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas Priviledge the Serjeants at Law and forbid that they should be Sued in any other Court when they do plead at other Courts as well as in the Court of Common Pleas and are so numerous as if one by an Arrest or Impriment should not be able to move or plead his Clients business the Client having all the Writings in his own or his Attorneys custody may have and retain another Serjeant at Law who can as well understand his business to look unto it and not only protect them but the Clerks of the Serjeants at Law and in the Vacation and at their Chambers far distant from Westminster Hall when the business of the Law and Courts of Justice are laid to sleep and take their rest and that the Justices of that and other the Superiour Courts can by the Kings and not their own immediate Authority Priviledge Prothonotaries and all other Officers and Clerks of their several Courts and their Clerks when they have or may have other Clerks to do their business And the Warden of the Fleet Cryers and Tipstaves in times of Vacation and as there shall be occasion Unattach Goods and discharge Bonds and Sureties given for Appearance when there cannot be any just cause or necessity untill the Term ensuing for their attendance and Priviledges and keep from Arrest by the Inferiour Courts their Attorneys who are no Members of their Superiour Courts and even the Attorneys Clarks And not only allow that Priviledge to the immediate Officers of their Courts but extend it unto their Clarks that are subservient unto them and not deny it as hath been before remembred unto a Filacers horskeeper Their Writs of Priviledge in the Kings name declaring and publishing that such breaches of Priviledge are in nostri â—ontemptum curiae nostrae in Contempt of the King and his Court that such Priviledged person eundo redeundo in going and coming to his Courts oâ— Justice is and ought to be sub protectione nostra under the Kings protection tam ex Regia dignitate quam ex antiqua consuetudine as well in regard of his Dignity as by antient Custom is to be Ptiviledged Did Justice Vernon one of the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas in the time of Vacation when a man indebted having to an Action given special Bail before him at his Chamber in Serjeants-Inne in Chancery-lane and coming out of the Gate was Way-laid and Arrested by some Serjeants at Mace or Catchpoles of London and Arrested upon some other mans Action lay down made an Out-cry and refused to be their Prisoner of which the Judge being informed commanded the Catchpoles and Prisoner to be brought to his Chamber where they being something Surly and refusing to deliver him he threw of his Gown and taking one of them by the shoulder whereof I was an eye Witness did so shake him and threaten to commit him and his fellow Catchpoles as he enforced them to release the Prisoner and suffer him to escape And shall not the King who is the Constituent Principle and primum incipiens the only cause suppoâ—t and maintenance as well as giver of all Immunities Exemptions Franchises and Priviledges of the Kingdom Not be able to do as much as those unto whom he hath granted and permitted it and protect and Priviledge his Domestick Servants or men imployed by him but like an old Isaac over liberal to a Craving Jacob have nothing in reserve of Priviledges or Favors for his Servants who have attended our David when he was in all his Troubles and deserved better than many a participation of his Blessings or shall his Subjects like the Sullen and Selfish Nabal have so little regard of him or his Servants that do help to guard their flocks as to receive his Benefits and make notwithstanding their grumbling Ingratitude and refractory Humours the only Retorn or acknowledgment of them Hath he and his Royal Progenitors and Predecessors as the Grecian Monarchs and Common-Wealths antiently used to do from whence the Romans after they had shut their Temple of Janus and made their Military Glories impart some of their Honour to the more Civil Imployments and gown also learned it taken such a care to protect Honour and Priviledge his Ministers of Justice and their subordinate Officers in the Courts thereof whilst they officiate in his Service therein Did the Wisdom of our King and Parliament in the 32d year of the Reign of King Henry the 8th think it no inconvenience but a benefit to the people that the greater and more necessary concerns should give may to the lesser when they Ordained which hath been ever since
peace in the said University as much as in him is And give Councell and help to the Chancellor ond Schollars of the same University to punish the disturbers and breakers of the peace there after the priviledges and Statutes of the University at all times when it shall be needful and put his help with all his Strength to defend the priviledges liberties and Customs of the said University and give the like oath unto his Undersheriffes and other his ministers when he shall come to the Town and Castle of Oxford in the presence of any who shall be deputed by the said University unto the which things the King will that his said Ministers shall be arcted and compelled The like Oath being to be taken by the Sheriffs of Cambridge and Huntington for the conversation of the rights and priviledges of the University of Cambridge Do the Jnns of Court or houses of law which for some Ages or Centuries past were appropriate and set apart for the Study of the Common lawes of England and other necessary parts of learning and endowments proper and fit to bear the sons of our Nobility and Gentry company within their houses and precincts claim and enjoy as they ought to do according to the law of Nations and the priviledges of all the Universities and places of Study in the Christian world A just and legal priviledge of a freedom from any Arrest or disturbance by the officers of any Subordinate Magistrate in matters not Capital or more then ordinary criminal And the Inner and Middle-Temples and Lincolns-Jnn being besides entituled to the like Exemption priviledge by a particular Immunity and Exemption granted anciently by some of our Kings of England long before they were Societies of law to the Owners and Proprietors of the Mannor of the New Temple then so called the old one being before scituate in or near Holborn and as well as the new one sometimes part of the possessions of the Knights Templers now containing the Inner and most part of the Middle-Temple and likewise the outer Temple without Temple-Bar extending it self as far as to part of Essex house garden and into New-street now called Chancery-Lane and Ficket or Fickelscroft now Lincolns-Inn fields upon part whereof Lincolns-Inn was built To be held sub eadem forma in the same manner as the honor or Earldom of Leicester and the Lands thereunto belonging were antiently holden with an Exemption or priviledge that no Justices Escheators Bayliffs or other Ministers or Officers of the King should enter or intermeddle therein of which the Successors and Owners and those as honourable as useful Collegiate nurseries of law and learning although they do not as our Universities and those which are in the parts beyond the Seas claim a conusance in causes and controversies at law wherein their Schollars Students and officers are concerned have been so careful to preserve those their Antient and necessary priviledges as they have upon any the least violation or attempt to bereave them thereof sallied out like so many young Lions and appeared to be the stout Propugnators and defenders thereof rescued such as have been Arrested within their Liberties whether any or none of the Society beaten and pumped the Catchpoles Serjeants at Mace or Bailiffs ignominiously shaved their heads and beards Anointed them with the costly Oyl or Syrrup of their houses of Offices or Jakes and at the Temple for a farewell thrown them into the Thames Do all men that have Liberties and Priviledges appertaining to their Estates or Persons or any Offices or Places which they hold Summon the best of their Cares and Industry to maintain them and shall it be a crime or disgrace to the Kings Servants either to be entituled unto or endeavor to Assert them Shall it be deemed just Legal and Rational that the City of London should be so carefull of their Customs and Liberties granted not only by King Henâ—y the first but confirmed by divers Kings and Queens of England and many of their Acts of Parliament as no longer ago than in the year of our Lord 1669. to Claim in their Act or common Councel that no Citizen is to be compelled to plead without the Walls of their City and their Freemen are bound by Oath as well as by many Acts of Common Councel of that City not to Sue one another out of the City where they may have remedie in their own Courts and to maintain the Franchises and Liberties thereof and that the Warrant of leuetur quaerela for the removing of any Action or Plaint depending in any of the Sheriffs Courts of that City into the Mayors Court brought by a Serjeant at Mace and Ministers of the Mayors Court shall not be refused or shall it be taken or beleeved to be inconvenient for that City or their Freemen to be drawn or enforced to Plead or be Prosecuted out of their own Courts And shall it not be as reasonable for the King in the case of his own Houshold and Domestick Servants to protect them from being disturbed in his Service by any Arrests without his Licence Doth every Sheriff of England and Wales at his admission into his Office swear that as far as hâ— can or may he shall truly keep the Kings Rights and all that belongeth unto the Crown and shall not assent to decrease lessen diminish or conceal any of the Kings Rights or his Franchises and whensoever he shall have knowledge that the Kings Rights or the Rights of his Crown be withdrawn be it in Land Rent Franchises or Suits or any other thing he shall do his power to make them to be restored to the King again and if he may not do it shall certifie the King or some of his Councel thereof and can any Sheriff of England and Wales without the acknowledgment of a gross ignorance with any safety of their Oaths or Consciences knowingly Arrest or cause to be Arrested any of the Kings Servants against the Will of his or their Sovereign Doth a Custom or civility so far prevail with the Sheriffs of London and their Clarks as when any Action is entred against any Alderman of the City or the Sword-bearer or other Officer of the Lord Mayor they will not Arrest an Alderman man or take away the Lord Mayors Sword-Bearer from before him untill they have given them a civil and private notice thereof whereby to prevent the disgrace or give them time to provide against it or procure a Truce or quiet And shall the Servants of their Masters Master if they were not more justly than they entituled to their Antient and Legal Priviledges not be so much respected which his late Majesty thought to be as undecent as Inconvenient when upon some disrespects shewed by some of that City in their endeavors to inforce upon some of his Servants the Office of Constable or Church-warden he demanding of the Lord Mayor of London whom he had caused to Attend him upon that Complaint and
obtained and would be no loosers but greater Gainers by it Do the Might and greatness of Princes and their power to give aids and Assistance where Alliance Interest or Leagues do require it or to retalliate Wrongs or Injuries done and received perswade a Priviledge and Civility to the Persons and Goods of the Embassadors and their Servants and retinue of one another although not bound thereunto by any Laws or Rules of Subjection or Allegiance And shall not a just fear Duty and Reverence of Subjects to their Kings and Princes Civility good Manners Gratitude Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy Fear and Command of God and a dayly protection by the Kings Power Laws and Justice of themselves and their Estates Honour Reputation and all that can be of value unto them from Forreign and Domestick dangers wrongs or oppressions invite them to a forbearance of that Barbarous and undutifull way of Arresting any of his Servants without a complaint first made or licence procured to do it Or how can such a one or any of his Children without shame or confusion of Face beg or hope for Mercy or Pardon from the King for man-slaughter or some other offence mischance or forfeiture when but a week or a little before they have had so small a care of their Duty and respect unto him or their many Obligations as to disturb his Service and necessary Affairs and disparage his Servants and do all they can to ruine and undo them by an Arrest or Imprisonment without licence When at the same time they would readily subscribe to the reasonableness of the Kings delivering and freeing from Arrest the Lord Mayor of London punishing those that should do it If for permitting in the Strand or any other place out of his Liberty that the Cities Sword the Ensign or Mark of Honour given unto it within its proper Jurisdiction to be carri'd up he should be Arrested or if he or any of the Sheriffs or Aldermen should in their Passage to Whitehall to attend the King when he commanded them be Arrested upon any other Action Will not a Tenant to a Lord of a Mannor who receives not so great a protection from him nor hath so great a need of him as every Subject hath of the Kings Grace and Favour be thought by all his Neighbours to be more than a little out of his Wits that should adventure his displeasure by Arresting the Steward of his Court Valet de Chambre Coachman Butler Brewer Hors-keeper or any of his Servants without leave or licence or denial of Justice upon his Complaint first had And will they not be deemed to be more Mad that shall so far forget themselves and their duty to the King as to Arrest without licence any of the Servants of their Soveraign which is the only Rock of defence and Succour which they have to flee unto in all their distresses or for Mercy which is not seldome needed upon any Offences or transgressions against him or his Laws May not the King punish Contempts and breaches of Priviledges as well as those that do subordinately Act by the Authority of Him and His Laws or not cause as much to be done in Order to the proâ—ervation of their Authority and Jurisdictions as they usually do unto any that should disturb the necessity and duty of their places Or may not the King as supreme Magistrate cause any that shall transgress the limits of their obedience in Arresting his Servants without licence to be Arrested or Imprisoned for such an affront or contempt of Majesty and the Supreme Power when it hath been ordinarily done and justified by some Lords of Mannors and Liberties in the Case of Sheriffs and Bailiffs presuming to Arrest any man within their Liberty without a Writ of non Omittas propter aliquam libertatem or special Warrant where the Lord of the Mannor hath neglected to do it Or must the King when any wrong or injury shall be done to his Servants suffer such contempt to be remedyless and only say why do you do so who when he doth cause the undutifulness and unmannerliness of such Offenders to be punished by a few days gentle restraint cannot with any truth or Reason be said to have given away their Debts when at the most it is but a small delay and doth many times occasion them to be sooner and less chargeably paid than it would be with an Action or Suit and the many Animosities Vexations and Heats which do usually attend Actions or Suits at Law Did our Magna Charta prohibit or give away any of the Liberties and Priviledges of the King and his Servanâ—s which are necessary for the Support and just means of Government and that high Authority with which God and the Law have intrusted him Can the King by his Writ cause a man or his Cattel or Goods to be Arrested and taken in Withernam untill the person of a man or his Cattel or goods wrongfully Arrested be delivered or freed from restraint and shall it not be as lawfull for the King by Arresting or Imprisoning the Party that did or procured it to enforce the delivery of a Servant wrongfully or unduly Arrested without his leave or licence first obtained Is the Kings Service the only cause of the Priviledge of Parliament so operative and powerfull in its effects as a Member of the house of Commons newly elected is so entituled to his Priviledge as before his admission or Oath taken the Infringers thereof have been severely punished as it was upon great debate and Examination adjudged in Parliament in the Case of William Johnson a Burgesse of Parliament in the first year of the Reign of Queen Mary and the like for Arresting upon an Execution Sir Richard Fitzherbert Knight a Member of Parliament in the 34th year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and that kind of Priviledge so Watched and Guarded and in all its parts and circumstances so taken care of and inviolably kept As it may not be renounced or quitted by any one Member without a breach of Priviledge to all the rest nor is any leave to be given upon Petition or any the most urgent necessities of a Plaintiff or Creditor to molest or Imprison any of them or their Servants during the Session of Parliament and the time of Priviledge allowed them before and after them And cannot the people of England be well content and think themselves to be in a better Condition when in the Case of the Priviledge of the Kings Servants they may in the time of Parliament or without have licence upon a reasonable time prefixed for satisfaction to take their course and proceed at Law against them Shall the Vallies rejoyce in their Springs and pleasant Fountains and the Spring or Fountain it self that distributeth those living and refreshing Waters have no part thereof Hath the Chamberlain of the Lord Mayor or City of London Power to commit a Freeman of that City to Ward So that he do