the Crown of Scotland amongst which was Erick King of Norway and received the homage of the King thereof and in his Claim to the Superiority strongly Asserted it when the Pope had by his Letter unto him mediated on the behalf of the King of Scotland and claimed that Kingdom And was so watchfull over his own Rights and what belonged to his Crown and Dignity as upon an appeal from John Baliol King of Scotland and his Parliament to the Parliament and Court of the K. of England unto which when he was Summoned personally to appear before him appearing sate with him in Parliament was Suffered no longer to sit by him but untill the Cause came to be heard when he was cited by an Officer to leave his Seat and Commanded to stand at the Barr appointed for pleading which he having no mind to do craved leave to answer by his procurator but was denied and as a Feudatory made to arise and descend to the Barr and defend his own Cause before him as his Superiour Which by the Ancient feudall Fundamentall Laws of England without the assistance of any other of our Laws concerning Treason might have excused and Justified our excellently virtuous Queen Elizabeth in her unwilling Tryall Condemning Beheading and putting to Death Mary Queen of Scotland her Feudatory not only for Usurping the Arms and Title of the Crown of England but plotting after her flying for Refuge unto her and her Kingdom of Scotlands Superior for Resuge to bereave her of her Kingdom of England and the Dominions thereof by her intended Marriage of the Duke of Norfolk for which he was likewise condemned and Executed for Treason In the same Year by his Writ commanded to be arrested Susurrones publicos predicatores contra personam Regis In the 7th year of his reign upon occasion of false rumours sent his Commissioners into severall Counties of the Kingdom ad inquirendum qui dicebant Regem inhibuisse ne quis blada sua meteret vel prata sua falcaret quod omnes tales sine dilatione in prisona custodiantur douec authores suos invenerint tunc liberent authores in prisona custodiant donec pro deliberatione corum mandatum habuerint Speciale In the 13th Year of his Reign for a fine of 20 Marks paid by W. gave him a respite de se militem faciendo Et a pres il fut amerce per les Justices itinerant parceo q'il ne leur monstre son Charter In the 10th Year of his Reign granted authority to Signify his assent to a future Abbot And in the same year impowred Edmond Earl of Cornwall to admitt in his name the Mayor of Oxon when the commonalty of the town should present him and the like for the Mayor and Sheriffs of London In the 12th Year of his Reign granted to the Citizens of London power to make Sheriffs of London and Middlesex In the 13th Year of his Reign directed his Writts to the Sheriffs in the words ensuing cum de consuetudine regni qui habent 20 libratas terrae vel feodum militis valens 20 libratas terrae vel feodum militis valens 20 libratas per annum distringerentur ad arma militaria suscipiendum nos ob servitium c. in Wallia a communitate regni nostri volumus quod non habentes tantas libratas terrae non distringantur Ordained that in Parliament certain Bishops Lords and Other their Assistants should be named of that Honourable Assembly of Parliament at the very beginning thereof which for many Ages after hath been duly observed to be receivers and tryers of the Petitions Complaints and Desires of his People to be exhibited therin whether properly to be there determined or in the Courts of Justice in Westminster-Hall or other inferior Courts In the 14th and 16 Years of his Reign made his cousin Edmund Earl of Cornwall custos regni Spared not in his Court of Kings-bench Robert the Son of William de Glanvile and Reginald the Clark of the said William for delivering at Norwich a Panell of the Kings Writs which the King 's Coroner ought to have brought Banished his Son Prince Edward from his Court Presence for 6 Months for giving reproachfull words to a great Officer of his Court or Houshold Caused the Prior of the Holy Trinity in London and Bogo de Clare a man of great power and reputation to be arrested at his suit by Peter de Chanet Steward of his houshold and Walter de Fancourt Marshall of the King for citing Edmond Earle of Cornewall to appear before the Archbishop of Canterbury as he was passing thorough Westminster-Hall to the Parliament whereupon the Prior and Bogo after some pleadings in the said case submitting themselves uuto the King's Grace Will and Pleasure were committed to the Tower of London there to remain during his Will and Pleasure and being afterwards Bailed the said Bogo paid to the King a Fine of 2000 Marks and gave security to the Earl for 1000. which by the interposition of the Bishop of Durham and others of the King's Councell was afterwards remitted unto 100 l. and the Prior was left to the Judgment and process of the Court of Exchecquer In the 20th Year of his Reign praecepit singulis vice Comitibus per Angliam Justic. Cestr. quod proclamari facerent quod omnes qui habent 40. libratas terrae in feodo haereditate sumerent militaria arma In that and the Year following seized the Lands of those that would not take that Degree and made speciall respites to some during their lives Caused his Justices to certify into the Exchecquer at the return out of their Circuits by particular Rolls under their own Names the Fines and amerciaments set imposed and forfeited upon Actions of trespass rescous deceit attaints non est factum or salse Pleas untrue avowries appeals of Murder felony manslaughter meyheim Contempts and attachments upon process out of any of his Courts of Justice abuse of the Law Fictitious actions and vexatious Suits Non-suits in Actions reall and personall or when but part was found for the Plaintiff or Defendant which were in those Days as much for the advance and well ordering of Justice as they were for the Kings profit who took such a care not to have it neglected as by his Writ without an Act of Parliament he prefixt his Justices certain times for the causing the said Monies to be levied when their own then little Wages or Salaries were to be paid out of it which made them to be so exact therein as there was no fault deserving a Just Punishment could escape the Eyes and Ears apprensions and Watch of his regulated Justices insomuch as Offenders were Fined or amerced pro falso clamore or quia non invenerunt pleg for Deceipts Sheriffs for not returning of Writs Jurors for not appearing or pro falsa appretiatione or giving verdicts before
of his Aerarium or Treasury without which no King or Prince can be safe or great and protect and defend himself and his people from Injuries and Contempt which put all together may give Gods appointed watchman of our Israel besides their more weighted and occasional business in Parliament scarcely time to slumber or sleep or enjoy his natural refreshments or divertisements without the addresses and Importunities of his almost always wanting and complayning Subjects which they that will be at leisure to peruse all the orders of himself and his privy Councel and treasury References upon Petitions in the Secretary of State and Master of the Requests Books and the Reports and Returns thereof with all that are contained in the patent close Rolls fine and liberate Rolls of every year besides the Writs Remedial granted out of the Chancery from which no man as our Laws say is to return sine Remedio those of the Common or Ordinary sort in every year amounting to no smaller a number than eighty Thousand in a year which by Law were anciently intended not to have been granted but by immediate Petitions to the King howsoever are now dispatched of Course as it hath long been by his Majesties not a few subordinate Officers very much to the ease and relief of his People who have so long enjoyed those benefits and accommodations as those Writs of Course without the trouble either of our Kings or their more especial Court of Parliaments as Anciently as King Canutus Raign who began his Raign in the year of our Lord 1016. and from thence so continued until the Raign of King John wherein a Writ of Novel diseisin is noted in the Margin of a Roll to be de cursu from whence the Cursistors in Chancery have taken and do yet keep their Name not a Cursitando as Fleta who wrote about the Raign of King Edward the 2d terms them Juvenes pedites little Lads who carried and fetcht Writs to and from the Great Seal but Clerici de Cursu mentioned in the Oath ordained to be given unto them in Parliament in Anno 18. E. 3. Insomuch as when Simon de Montfort that Married the Sister of King John and either his Father or himself had about that time been the destruction of the Protestant Albigenses and Waldenses in France did in the time of the Imprisonment of King H. 3. and his Son Prince Edward whom he and his Rebellious Partners had taken Prisoners in the Battle at Lewes take an especial care that in the absence of Thomas de Cantilupo the Kings Chancellor the Kings great Seal being committed to the Trust of Ralph de Sandwich Keeper of the Kings Wardrobe assisted by Hugh le Despencer Justiciar of England and Peter de Montfort two special Rebels to be kept until the return of the Chancellor and that the said Ralph should Seal brevia de Cursu but those which were de praecepto were to be Sealed in their presence And when that Rebellion was afterwards broken and Simon de Montfort and the most of his Rebel partners were slain at the more fortunate Battle at Evesham and the King restored to his Regality and Rights of government he and his Successors afterward did in all their Parliaments enjoy the power and authority of Monarchs in their great Councels or Assemblies of Parliament wherein by reason of their great and important affairs in War a in France Scotland and Wales they could not be able to be personally present but summoned and held their no long lasting Parliaments by their Lieutenants or Guardians of the Kingdom for the short continuance thereof § 31. That our great Councels or Parliaments except Anciently at the three great Festivals viz. Christmas Easter and Pentecost being ex more summoned and called upon extraordinary emergent occasions could not either at those Grand and Chargeable Festivals or upon Necessities of State or Publick Weal and preservation ex natura rei continue long but necessarily required Prorogations Adjournments Dissolutions or Endings FOR extraordinary occasions being not common or ordinary and the Summons or calling of fit and well capacited Persons to those venerable or great Councels of Parliament for purposed sometimes especily Limitted and Declared to be for Advice and Aid not in omnibus arduis only but in quibusdam arduis concerning the defence of the King his Kingdom and the Church always howsoever declared by the King himself or such as he appointed and there being other great and little Courts enough in the Kingdom to dispatch and administer Justice it could not but put our Kings and Princes in mind not to trouble their highest Court for small and trivial Affairs but to believe that Canutus an Ancient King of this Nation who began his Raign in Anno Domini 1001. had reason by an express Law to prohibit the troubling of him or his Parliament or greatest Councel with small matters when they might with more ease less delay expences and attendance be determined at home or in their proper Courts or Places in these words videlicet neme de injuria alterius Regi quaeritur nisi quidem in Centuria Justitiam consequi aut impetrare non potest Centuria autem Cominus quisque ut quidem par est intersit aut saltem debito absentiam luat supplicio and that Law might well be said to have been made by that King sapientum Concilio which might occasion the use of Receivers and Triers of Petitions constantly appointed by the King or his House or Councel of Peers until our late times of Rebellion and Confusion that great Councel or Court never being intended by our Kings or their Laws to be a standing often or continual Court for ordinary Affairs The wisdom of our Kings and their House of Peers having often rejected and not given any Remedies to Petitioners that might more properly be relieved in Inferiour Courts For King Offa in the year 787. after the Incarnation of our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ had a 2d Session in his great Councel And therefore as all Parliaments have had very urgent and necessary causes of Calling and Summoning them by their Kings so they were to have their continuance and duration proportionable to the Business and Affairs for which their Advice Assent or Approbation were required and even in the Ecclesiastical Councels begun as early after the Incarnation of our blessed Redeemer Jesus Christ as the year 446. The many Secular Businesses as making of Laws and redressing of Grievances in and by the Presence and Assistance of our Kings and many of the Nobility continued until the Norman Conquerour who separated the Ecclesiastical and Civil Jurisdictions one from the other and the Attendance upon Parliaments were not a little troublesom and chargeable to the Spiritual and Temporal Baronage and therefore the Ancient Custom of our Saxon Kings was more easy and less burdensom unto the Prelates and Nobility when it required their constant and annal Attendance
Fourth the Commons shewing to the King that Comme les Juggements du Parlement appurteignont seulement au Roy as Seigneurs nient as Commones si noun en case que sil plest au Roy de sa grace especile leur monstrer ses ditz Juggements pur ease d' eux que nul record soit fait en Parlement encontre les ditz Communes que sont ou serrent partyes as escunes Juggementz donez ou adonees ou apres en Parlement A quoi leur feust respondu per l' Ercevesque de Canterbire de commandement du Roy 〈…〉 ment mesmes les Commones sont Petitioners demandeurs que le Roy les Seigneurs de tout temps ont eves averont de droit les Juggementz en Parlement en manere come mesme les Comones ount Monstrez sauvez quen Statutz Affaires ou en Grauntez subsides ou tiel choses Affaires pur comon profit du Royalme le Roy voit avoir especialment leur Advys Assent que cel ordre de fait soit tenuz gardez en tout temps adveniz And the Earls and Temporal Barons were by vertue of their Tenures and Summons of Parliament since the beginning of the Raign of King Richard the Second said to be Conciliarij nati of the King and Kingdom and the Bishops to sit there then and long before by reason of their Baronies which no Member of the House of Commons is or can claim to be in our King 's great Councels or Parliament until the framing of that aforesaid novel Writ to Elect Knights Citizens and Burgesses in the time of the Imprisonment of King Henry the Third and after his Release was discontinued and no more made use of until the 22d Year of the Raign of King Edward the First his Son and the Heirs by ancient Customes of that Court under and by the Kings Authority do exercise in Causes and Complaints brought before them a judicial and decisive Power And in the preceding Times and Ages until that new Writ of Elections was contrived and imposed upon that distressed and much injured Prince Certissimum est saith that learned and judicious Antiquary Sir henry Spelman that the Nobility and Barons which did hold immediately of the King in Capite judicijs praefuêre Aulae Regiae did usually sit and determine Causes or Controversies in the King's Court or Palace as the Barons of the Coife in the Exchequer who were heretofore Earls and Barons do at this day judge and determine of Matters touching the King's Revenues And as the Lords of Mannors in their Courts Barons do admit none to be Judges in those their little Courts but their Tenants who are Free-holders and do hold of them and being stiled and said to be of the Homage do subserviently manage the Affairs of their Lords therein who did very anciently use to act therein Concilio prudentum hominum militum suorum by their Presentments Advice and Judgements and are therein not much differing from the Customs and Laws of the Longobards where their Emperor commanded that Nullus Miles nobiscum saith Sir Henry Spelman Liber homo sine certâ convictâ culpâ suum beneficium perdat nisi secundum consuetudinem Antecessorum nostrorum et judicium Parium suorum In which saith Sir Henry Spelman Th 〈…〉 is an Idea of our Magna Charta the Free-holders in the Hundred Courts being thither also called Conformable to the League made by King Alfred with Guthrun the Dane wherein Homicide sive de crimine alio quod quatuor marcas excederet postularetur per duodecim ex paribus reliquos autem subditos per 11 Pares unumque ex Baronibus Regis fore judicandos And to the Laws of our King Henry the First wherein it was ordained That Unusquisque per Pares judicandus est si quis in Curia sua vel in quibuslibet agendorum locis placitum tractandum habet convocet Pares vicinos suos si inter compares vicinos sint querelae conveniant ad divisas terrarum suarum qui prior queremoniam fecerit prior rectum habeat si alias ire oporteat in Curiam domini sui eant si unum dominum habeant Soca sit ejus illic eos amicitia congreget aut sequestret judicium And may seem to be derived from the Laws and Customs of the Germans where by the Court of Peers are understood Causarum feudalium Judices à Caefare constituti qui sine provocatione cognoscebant to be Judges appointed by the Emperor to hear and determine without appeal Matters concerning their Lands and Territories where the like usage and term of Peers in their Judicatures Great Councels or Diets is at this day used the Princes of the Empire being Paribus cu 〈…〉 ae and such are those of our House of Peers in Parliament being the highest Court of the Kingdom of England where none were admitted or did administer Justice Nisi qui proximi essent à Rege ipsique arctioris fidei homagij vinculo conjuncti but such as were near unto the King and held of him in Capite which kind of Tenures howsoever they were most unhappily Dissolved by a late Act of Parliament in His now Majesties Raign for converting Tenures in Capite into free and common Socage were by an Exception and Proviso in the said Act of Parliament as to the Rights and Priviledges of the Peers in Parliament specially saved and reserved unto them who were heretofore Capitanei regni as Sir Henry Spelman saith Captains of the Kingdom and Peers obliged and bound unto their Kings by Homage and Fealty in that highest and most honourable Court of the Kingdom wherein the Judicative Power of Parliament under their King their Head and chief Resides which high and honourable Assembly reverencing and taking Care for their Head and Soveraign the only under God Protector of themselves the Church and all their worldly Concernments and Liberties Was so much used in France as saith Conringius Proceres temporibus Francorum temporibus antiquissimis Concilio interfuisse plurimis quidem testimonijs in proclivi est and cites a Book written per Theganum Chorepiscopum Trevirensem de gestis Ludovici Imper ' Ca. 6. ubi de Carolo Magno Imperatore legitur Cùm intellexisset appropinquare sibi diem obitus sui vocavit filium Ludovicum ad se Episcopis Abbatibus Comitibus loco positis habuit grande colloquium cum ijs Aquisgravi eodem spectat procul dubiò Hinckmari who was a Bishop and Councellor of Charlesmaynes illud concilium Lodovico Baldo datum epistolam ut rempublicam administret ex Procerum aut Principum consensu nusquam Plebis mentione factâ unde epistolam illam claudens Ca. 10. Scribit de generalibus Ecclesiae Regni negotijs fine generali Procerum regni consensu concilio secretum dare concilium nefas etiam
his Subjects Untill in that much mistaken Erroneous Act of Parliament said to have been made in Feb. 1645. by some of the Lords Commons of that which should not have been called a Parliament when they made War had like strange Subjects and Advisors beaten away their King neither had there been any design of abrogating the Tenures in Capite or of that kind in all the Brittish Roman Saxon Danish or Normam times to annull or dissolve so strong and solid a Foundation as our Feudall Laws nothing in the Rebellion Force and strange unkingly restrictions Articles and agreements put upon King John at Running Mede no grievance by the Tenures in Capite or by Knight-service certified upon any the Writs sent by King Henry the 3. unto all the Sheriffs of the Counties and Cities of England and Wales to Elect 4 Knights of every County and City to certify to the King and his Baronage their Grievances nothing in the forced Parliament and Oaths upon King Henry the 3. and his Son Prince Edward in the 42. Year of his Reign nothing in his direfull procession and waâ—king with his Parliament of Praelates and Nobility throuâ—h Westminster Hall unto that Abby Church with burning Tapers Curses and Anathema's against the Infringers of Magna Charta and Charta de Forresta then and yet holden in Capite with many of our Liberties Fundamentall and Feudall Laws therein contained nothing desired or ordered to be taken away of them or any of them no mention of them in the arbitration or award made by the King of France betwixt that King and his Rebell Barons or when Simon Montfort and his Partners kept him in their powerfull Army a Prisoner about a Year or a Quarter no Complaints or grievances against those Tenures in Capite in all those multitudes of other supposed grievances nothing in the Petition of Right and 30 times confirmation of Magna Charta and Charta de Foresta as if they could never have enough of them nor Reformation desired in and through all the Clownish Rebellions and Insurrections in England in the Times of Wat Tiler John Ball Jack Cade Ket and others And therefore whilst these Underminers of our long lived Monarchy and in that their own happiness have gratified their fond feavourish fancies in procuring a Dissolution of as many as they could of our Tenures in Capite for all if any they could not with the Costly expence of 48. Millions sterling in mony besides an uncomptable and unvalued damage of four hundred thousand Men Women and Children slain or Massacred whole families ruined or for ever Crpled Heaven angry and incensed Hell gaping Religion torn in more then one hundred pieces and all for want of the Care Provision and Protection that the despised Mother Church of England like the Voice that was heard in Ramah Rachel mourning for her Children that they were not our Shames Published in the Streets of Gath and Askalon in the Time of its peace and the Sins of Rebellion and Witchcraft have as the Egiptian Locusts covered overspread the face of our heretofore fruitfull Island And the Protection and Provision usually made by our Tenures in Capite for Younger Children as well as the Eldest affords them no better a care then to leave them when the Mother is after the Fathers Death by some Debaucht Rooking or Gamiug Coxcomb made a fool of and Married again as very often they will are like Lambs left as a Prey unto the Wolves or Foxes the Second Husbands who if the Mother have Children by him will be as too many are well content to help to Fricasse the first husbands Children to make Portions or Estates for the Second so as if it be Enquired where is now the Court of Wards and Liveries which hath been so pretendedly without any Just Cause at all complained of they may find every where a Court of Wards and Liveries lamentably governed by the Fathers in Law of England Wales and Ireland They might do well to make more hast then they have done to repentance consider how much more then nothing at all the Nation was beholding to those overtures as much as they could of the Monarchy Tenures in Capite have been to those Commonwealth Erecters have deserved of the People and those whom they pretended to represent in Parliament when instead of bread they have given them Stones and of Fishes Scorpions and to shew the profoundness of their wisdom did as wisely as those that attempâ—ed to drown the Eel when upon a great serious consult they may Easily discover no better effects or fruit of their overchargeable expences enforced upon the people to their own great and Villanous gain and the ruin spoil and inestimable damage of our 3 before that most happy flourishing redoubtable Kingdoms When that Act of Parliament for taking away the Tenures in Capite doth but as much as it could convert them into Free and Common Socage without any mention of pro omnibus servitiis and the Law made by King Ina who Reigned here from the year of our Savior 923. untill after some part of the Year 940. which is not specially repealed by that Act of destroying as much as it was able the Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service did ordain that Scutarorum nullus ex pelle ovina Scutafabricatur qui secus fecerit 30 solides mulctator pro singulo quoque aratrobinos alat quisque ornatos atque instructos Equites and in a Tenure in Free and Common Socage Fealty is a duty and service inseparable as Littleton saith and signifieth although as he putteth the Case is in the Ceremony of the doing thereof sometimes different from homage for when the Tenant doth fealty unto his Lord he shall hold his hand upon a Book and shall Swear that he shall be faithfull and true to his Lord and shall bear him faith for the Lands which he holdeth of him and fealty is derived a fidelitate Feltman bestowing upon an originall of the like nature a fide and Escuage draweth unto it homage and Homage draweth unto it fealty for fealty is incident to every manner of Service unless it be in the Tenure of Franck-Almoigne and the Tenures in Capite and by Knights Service some only excepted being transferred into Free and Common Socage without saying per fidelitatem tantum pro omnibus servitiis may notwithstanding the forebidding or rejection of of Homage and all other Incidents of Tenures in Capite and by Knights Service render the fealty incident unto free and Common Socage by our Laws to amount unto as much as that which the framer of that Act of Parliament hoped to extinguish by Converting those Tenures in Capite as much as he could into Tenures in pede which should have been beleived to have been very fundamental and dangerous to alter when the wisdom of the English and Scottish Commissioners authoris'd by an Act of Parliament in the Reign of King James
direct and plead their causes and was with us in England the originall of our Serjeants at law and pleaders mentioned in the Statute made in the 3d year of his Reign with great penalties to be inflicted upon them for any falshoods or deceits which should be committed by them which in the 3d year of the Reign of King Edward the 2d came to be so much in use and reputation much more since augmented by the grace and permission of our Kings and Princes into an eminent State and degree as they are only to be made and constituted by the King's writs appointed for the people to help them to Justice in their causes or actions either as to Prosecute for their Rights or defend them from wrongs and oppressions and intimate and shew unto Judges what the laws do require to be done according to Justice and equity and must needs be gratefull to the people who were so thereby freed from maintenance champerty and quarrels too frequently haunting the courts of Justice as it was enough for an advocate or Lawyer in discharging himself from actions brought against him for Champerty or maintenance to plead that he is Homo legis and was retained by his Client Although the word Narrator or Narratores pleaders have been found to have been used in the later end of the Reign of King Henry the 3. which might either proceed from the Civill or Caesarean Laws whereof the Lawyers of those Times would have been ashamed to have been such profest Enemies as some of ours are pleased to be because they do not or cannot afford to understand their excellencies or from the use or misapplication of some newly Devised Verba Novata by some rash or inconsiderable Authors or Writers unto some long before by gone and past ages such as Hint Sham c. not at all in those Times made use of or understood which have produced great Digladiations and Disputes both amongst Writers and Readers and made many that otherwise would not or should not go to Cuffs in the Dark for little or nothing And to satisfy his Subjects in the grand concernments of their Laws and Liberties Lives and Estates and to cause them to be fully kept and Executed sent his Writs to his Justice of Chester and the Sheriffs of all the Counties of England in these Words viz. Cum propter communem utilitatem totius Regni nostri meliorationem populi nostri relevationem de Communi concilio Praelatorum Magnatum Regni ejusdem no Knights or Citizens and Burgesses for the Commonalty being then present or believed to have been necessary quasdam provisiones quaedam Statuta cum magua diligentia ordinari postmodum sigillo nostro signari fecerimus tam a nobis quam a ministris nostris quibuscunque quam ab ipsis Praelatis Magnatibus nostris ac tota communitate Regni praedicti then understood to be included in the advice of the Prelates and Nobility ad perpetuam memoriam rei gestae inviolabiliter observand vobis mandamus in fide dilectione quibus nobis tenemini firmiter injungentes quod provisiones Statuta illa in pleno Com. Cestr. in singulis Hundredis ejusdem comitatuus Civitatibus Burgis Villis Mercatoriis locis aliis ubi expedire videritis legi publice solempnitor proclamari ea in omnibus singulis articulis suis ab omnibus de baelliva vestra futuris temporibus juxta tenorem corundem firmiter inviolabiliter observari provisionibus Statutis illis sic proclamatis ea in singmlis locis infra ballivam vestram ubi expediri videritis distinct aperte conscribi ea fidelibus nostris locorum illorum sic Scripta sine dilatione liberari vobis ac ballivis fidebus nostris habere cum eis indigueritis ostendenda quatuor vel duobus militibus de fidelioribus discretioribus militibus Comitatus praedicti de assensu totius communitatis tradâ— faciatis those Knights only and no Citizens or Burgesses trusted therein ad Securitatem dictae communitatis Cusiodiend it a vos habeatis in hoc mandato nostro exequendo ne nobis seu aliis per vos vel vestros seu vobis per defectum vestrum vel vestrorum imputari possit vel debeat quod ea quae in dictis provisionibus Statutis continentur vel corum aliquae in balliva vestra minus plene observentur hoc vobis universitati Comitatus praedictitenore presentium significamus T. R. apud Westm. 28 die Mar. consimiles literae diriguntur singulisVice comitibus per Angliam which needed not to have been said there if there had then been an House of Commons in Parliament or any such comprehension or representation of Commons by Commons in Parliament as the Authors of their supposed Sovereignty have fondly imagined And at the instance of John de Cobham altering the tenure of some of his Lands in Gavel-kind did it by his Charter in these Words ad Regis celsitudinis potestatem pertinet officium ut partium suarum leges consuetudines quas justas utiles censuerit ratas habeat observari faciat inconcussas illas autem quae regni robur diminuer potius quam augere conservare abolere convenit aut saltem in melius commutare Directed his Writ to Roger de Seyton and other his Justices Itinerant at the Tower of London in these Words viz. Rex dilectis fidelibus suis Magistro de Seyton Sociis suis Justiciariis Itinerantibus apud Turrim London Salâ—tem Sciatis quod per dominum H. Regem patrem nostrum nos ac Consilium nec non alios fideles suos qui cum eodem patre nostro convenerant apud Marleberge provisum fuit quod si coram quibuscumque Justiciariis Itinerantibus appellum vel querimonia fieret de roberia pace fructa vel homicidio aut aliis commissis tempore guerrae nuper suborte versus eos qui fuerunt contra eundem patrem nostrum vel alios aut dc hujusmodi commissis presentationes fierent sicut ad Capitula Coronae fieri solent nullus ea occasione amitteret vitam vel membra aut penam perpetui Carceris incurreret set alio modo de dampius amissis vel ablatis transgressionibus fieret Judicia castigatio secundum discretionem Justiciariorum dicti patris nostri insuper diligenter attenderent observarent ea que continentur in dicto de Kenilleworth Et habeant Justiciarii in singulis Itineribus suis transcriptum dicti prefati Ita quod de his quae per alios Justiciarios ipsâ—â—s patris aostri ad hoc assignatos termina fuissent seu terminari deberent nichil facerent Justiciarii dicti patris nostri Itinerantes sine speciali mandato suo si forte sibi idem pater noster aliquid injungeret sciendum quod tempus guerrae
incepit a quarto die Aprilis Anno. Regni dicti patris nostri 48 quando vexillis explicatis exivit cum exercitu suo ab Oxonia versus Northt duravit continue usque Sextum decimum diem Septembris Anno Regni dicti patris nostri xl nono quando apud Wyntouiam pacem suam post bellum de Evesham in presentia Baronum suorum qui ibidem convenerant firmari fecit clamari no Commons or Knights or Burgesses representing for them Provisium fuit etiam ne aliquis amittteret vitam vel membra pro Roberiis aut homicidiis aut aliis commissis sub specie guerrae per illos qui contradictum patrem nostrum erant a quarto die Junii Anno Regni ejusdem patris nostri xlvii quando illi vexillis explicatis primo per terram suam incedentes roberias homicidia incarceraciones tam personis Ecclesiasticis quam secularibus fecerunt usque ad predictum tempus quo ab Oxonia versus Northt cum exercitu suo recessit De aliis autem quae tempore illo sub specie guerrae non fiebant haberetur tempus illus velnd tempus pacis A tempore autem supradicto quo apud Winton pacem suam firmari fecit clamari curreret Lex pro ut tempore pacis currere consuevit Ita tamen quod illi qui fuerint apud Axeholm sive apud Kenill vel Insula Elyens vel apud Cestrefeld vel postmodum apud Suwerk observaretur plene pax sua prout eam habere deberent sive per dictum de Kenileworth sive per privilegia sua de pace sua sibi concessa De illis autem qui cum Com. Gloverniae in ultima turbatione fuerunt observaretur pax facta inter dictum patrem nostrum ipsum Com. Ita quod a tempore quo dicto Comes recessit a Wall versus London usque ad diem quo recessit a Civitate praedict non procederent Justic. contra ipsum vel eos qui erant in parte sua Et hoc de illis tantummodo intelligeretur De depredationibus autem utrobique factis tempore praedicto observaretur hoc quod pace inter dictum patrem nostrum ipsum Comitem facta continetur Et ideo vobis mandamus quod hec omnia in prefato Itinere diligenter observari faciatis T. R. apud Kickleton xix die Marc. 6. E. 1. He commanded the Sheriffs to distrain every man that had 20 l. per Annum in Land or a whole Knights Fee of the liâ—e value and hold of him in Capite milites esse debent ad arma militaria within such a Time a nobis suscipiend which was like a Nursery for military affairs for the continuance of those gallant necessaries for publique Defence in and by the obligations of their Tenures wherein a great part of our Fundamentall Laws Oaths of Allegeance Loyalty and Duties of Subjects do subsist And by an Inquisition taken in the same Year at Launceston in Cornwall by a Commission out of his Court of Exchecquer it was found by a Jury that Dominus ratione Regiae dignitatis Coronae suae habet privilegium quod nullus in Regno suo aliquo qui sit de Regno Angliae alieni homagium sine fidelitatem facere debeat vel aliquis hujusmodi homagium vel fidelitatem ab aliquo recepire debeat nisi facta mentione de fidelitate domino Regi debita eidem Dominus Regi observanda Episcopus Exon adfuit contrarium c. Et in contemptu c. Et le Evesque mis a respond And like a second Justitian did cause John le Breton one of the Justices of the King's-bench Or as others have written Bishop of Hereford to compile in his name a Book of the Laws and Customs of England wherein the King directring the Book to all the People which were under his protection par la Soufrance de Dieu saith for that peace could not be without Laws he had caused those which had been heretofore used in his Realm to be put in Writing which he Willed and Commanded should be Observed in all England and Ireland en toutz pointz Sauve a nous de repealer de eunoiter d' amander a toutz les faitz que nous verron que bon a nous serra par l'assent de nos Countes de nos Barons autres de nostre Conceil Sauve les usages a ceux que prescription de temps oul autrement use en taint que leur usages soyent mys discordants a droiture in which Book and the Droits de Roy there is no mention made of the Election and Summoning of Knights of the Shires Citizens and Burgesses to Parliament By his Edict or Proclamation prohibited the burning of Seacole in London and the Suburbs thereof for avoiding its noysom Smoak and without any Act of Parliament divided Wales into Shires and ordained Sheriffs there as was used in England caused some London Bakers not making their bread as they ought to be drawn upon Hurdles and 3 men for rescuing a prisoner arrested by an Officer to have their right hands cut off by the Wrists Fined without advice or assent of Parliament which might well be so understood to have been so upon the Act of Parliament in Anno 3 of his Reign ordained that such offenders should be ransomed and Punished at the Kings Will and Pleasure Sr Ralph Hengham Chief Justice of his Bench 7000 Marks Sr John Lovetot Chief Justice of the Common Pleas 3000 Marks Sr William Brompton 6000 Marks Sr Solomon Rochester or Roffey 4000 Marks Sr Richard Boyland as much Sr Thomas Sodenton 2000 Marks Sr William Saham 3000 Marks Roobert Littlebury Clark Master of the Rolls 1000 Marks Roger Leicester no less Henry Bray Escheator and Justice of the Jews 1000 Marks Sr Adam Stratton Chief Baron of the Exchequer 34000 Marks and Thomas de Weyland being the greatest delinquent and of the greatest substance could not be so easily excused but was Banished and had all his Goods and Estate Confiscate to the King only John de Metingham Elias de Beckingham two of the itinerant Judges to their eternall honour saith Henry Spelman appearing Guiltless and Righteous in that severe and Kingly examination and Justice purged his Courts of Justice and the Officers and clarks thereof from Bribery and extortion banished the usury of the Jews hanged 297. of them for abusing the Coyn and Money of the Kingdom curbed the pretended Independent power of the Clergy Clipped their Jurisdictions and upon their refusall to pay Tallage towards his Wars Seized many of their Temporallities put them out of the protection of his Laws and Justice and caused them to be excluded out of one of his Parliaments untill their Submission whom he had by wofull experience understood to have had too great an Influence upon some of the unquiet Nobility Made himself the Arbitrator and Umpire betwixt the many great Pretenders to
Domino donante Rex non solum Mercor sum sed omnium provinciarum quae generali nomine Angli dicuntur did grant Cumberhto 10. Cassatas terrae cui ab antiquis nomen est indicum Husmerat juxta fluvium â—tur subscribed with ✚ Ego Aethelbald Rex Britaniae propriam donationem confirmavi subscripsi ✚ Ego Unor Episcopus consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Unilfridus Episcopus jubente Aethelbaldo Rege subscripsi ✚ Ego Aethelric subre gulus atque Comes Gloriosissimi principis Aethelbald huic donationi consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Ibrorsi magnus Abbatis consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Heardberht frater atque dux praefati Regis consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Ebbella consensum accommodans subscripsi ✚ Ego Onec Comes subscripsi ✚ Ego Oba consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Sigibrid consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Bercot consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Ealdoult consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Caila consensi subscripsi ✚ Ego Pedo consensi subscripsi And the meer consent of a Tenant to his Landlords or Lords grant by Attornment doth not encrease or enlarge his former estate but is only a consent and agreement unto that grant or as an obliging taking notice thereof And where an Archdeacon Dean and Chapter are Summoned to Parliament act tractandum they neither did do or can claim any other power beyond their obedience to what should be ordained by their Superiors The choice or Election of a Verdurer in a Forrest by the Kings Writ doth not make those that did it the owners thereof and the Election of a Coroner by the like Authority to collect and take care of the Kings rights and profits did never yet truly and rationally signify that the Electors were the Masters of them neither doth the assent of the Freeholders in a Court-Baron or Leet devest the Lord of the Manor or Court-Leet of any part of his Right Propriety or Jurisdiction therein For to assent in the aforesaid enforced Statute de Tallagio non concedendo without the assent of the Prelates Earls Barons and Commons of England viz. That Tallage or Aid shall be taken or leavied by the King or his Heirs in his Realm without the assent of the Arch-Bishops Bishops Earls Barons Knights Burgesses and other Freemen of the Land which Tallages were the prises as Walsingham mentioneth taken de bobus vaccis frumentis bladis coriis purveyance taken against his preparation for Warrs in Flanders de quibus tota Communitas Angliae gravabatur but was never granted and intended either in words express or tacite to give either unto the House of Peers or Commons Jointly or severally a Negative Vote or deniall or a Legislative power but only to free themselves from those Tallages and Prises complained of which had such a force and obligation upon them and placed in them such a reverence and awfull respect to their King and head as they did subordinately not seldom obtain their Kings Leters-Patents to license or impower them Talliare Tenentes suos de dominico suo And although the Commons in Parliament in the 2 year of the Reign of King Henry the 5th had in the Advantage which they suppose they might sasely adventure upon in a Time of Usurpation assumed and arrogated to themselves a Legislative co-ordinate power in the making of Laws which other then Petitionary as Subjects to their King none of their predecessors before or since the 48th year of the Reign of King Henry the 3. ever had or obtained untill the last Horrid Rebellion in 1642. when they would make heedless and headless ordinances instead of Statutes or Acts of Parliament without their King and would not forsake their madness untill they had Murthered that Blessed Martyr King Charles the I. yet the answer of King Henry the 5th to that Petition and claim did so manifestly deny to give any allowance thereunto as one of their greatest Champions and Underminers of our Fundamental manarchick Laws could afford without prejudice to his the grounded cause to give posterity that Kings answer thereunto but concealed it as a conviction not to be devulged to their seduced Proselites For in the making of a Bishop wherein the King is acknowledged by the laws of England truth and Right reason to be the only true and proper cause of making him a Bishop and the impositions of hands by some of the Presbyters Subservient unto him in his Diocess which was but Ceremoniall and much less then the ornaments of Aarons garments in his multifarious priestly Attire and could never make or ordain him a Bishop without the King or give him Livery of the Lands appertaining to the Bishoprick neither doth any Law or right reason of any Nation or the dictates of holy Writ enable any to believe that the assent of the Woman or Wife in the holy Rites of Matrimony could or should ever entitle her unto a command and superiority over her Husband or Annihilate the Decree of Almighty God in the framing and forming of Man and Woman kind and order of the subservient government of the World And it would be an Engine mathematicall or contrivance Worth the Enquiry or finding out if it could be possible how to settle or make our most excellently composed Monarchick Government usefull in its Legislative power if the Houses of Peers and Commons in Parliament should disagree who but their King and Superior can or could be able to reconcile their discording Votes Opinions or Resolves For our Records Histories Annals and National Memorialls have never yet found or so much as mentioned any Laws Statutes or ordinances made in Parliament or out without le Roy le voult or his fiat or grant or the grant and assent of the Custos Regni or his Lieutenant Commissionated by him made by an House of Peers or Commons or party of them as it were in Parliament untill the Devil in a Religious habit taught it unto the last most horrid of incomparable Rebellions or that any House or number of Peers ever did or attempted to do any such thing or matter without the Kings le Roy le veult fiat assent or ratification or that of his Castos Regni or Lieutenant Commissionated by him Except that which was done by Symon Montfort and his Rebell partners in Annis 48. 49. Henry the 3 against that distressed over powred Prince when they had taken and kept him a prisoner for more then a Year and by fear and by force issued out Writs in his name for an Original of an House of Commons in Parliament and owned and acted what they would have him or constrained him to do in his name and as by his sole authority neither as Ego Rex meus or Senatus populus quoÌ„ Anglicanus neither can the Eyes of any far-seeing Linx or Lynceus or any Perspicuity clearness or strength of sight or the greatest of industry search or scrutiny whatsoever of our
Burgesses resorting to continuing at and returning diversis vicibus the Parliament was thrice adjourned from one day to another before it sate by reason that sundry Sheriffs had not returned their Writs divers of the Lords and Commons were not come and there arose a great quarrell betwixt the Duke of Lancaster and the Earl of Northumberland who came attended with many Thousand armed men of his Tenants and followers to the Parliament which caused the King to adjourn it from Monday to Tuesday thence to Wednesday and from thence to Saturday untill all were come and the quarrell being pacified betwixt those great Lords from the 8th Nov. to 15 Decemb. by reason of the approach of the feast of Christmas and the Queens arrival from beyond the Seas for her intended marriage from thence to the 24th of January many of them in the mean time returning home thence untill Monday following and from that time untill the 23d of February Before the 1st Writ of Summons could be executed a 2d came to prorogue that Parliament In 7. R. 2. a Parliament being Summoned to meet at new Sarum on the 20th day of Aprill being Fryday it was twice adjourned untill the Wednesday and Thursday following because divers of the Lords were not come and many of the Sheriffs had not returned their Writs 21. R. 2. The Parliament was adjourned from Westminster to Shrewsbury began the Monday next after the Exaltation of the Holy Cross at Westminster and at Shrewsbury the 15th of St Hillary In 1st H. 4. The Writ for the Election of Commons had this clause Nolumus autem quod tu seu aliquis alius Vicecomes Regni nostri seu aliquis alius homo ad legem aliqualiter sit electus whence it was called the Lay-mans Parliament or indoctum Parliamentum By the Statute of 7 and 8. H. 4. a clause was added in the Writ Et electionem tuam in pleno Comitatu tuo factam distincte aperte sub sigillo tuo sigillis eorum qui electioni illi interfuerunt nobis in Cancellaria nostra not into the House of Commons or House of Peers ad diem locum in brevi contentum certisices indilate The Receivers and Tryers of petitions in Parliament which were nominated in the beginning of every Parliament were Prelates Nobles and Judges and sometimes the Lord Chancellour and Treasurer and if need required antiently the Clerks of the Chancery In two Parliaments of King Henry the 6th the Chancellours place was supplied by the Kings verbal Authority In 9. H. 6. The Chancellour to whom it appertained ratione officii sui to declare the cause of the Summons of Parliament being sick the Duke of Gloucester the Kings protector appointed Dr Linwood a Doctor of Civill and Canon Law to declare the cause of the Summons of that Parliament In the Title of the Act of Parliament 18. 23. 27. 31. 33. H. 6. E. 4. And 14. E. 4. It is mentioned to be by the advice and assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporal and the Commons and in 20. H. 6. By the advice of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and at the request of the Commons as it had been in the 25 of H. 6. where Bristoll was exempted by a Charter of King Henry the 6th from sending any more then 2 Homines or Burgesses to Parliaments 7 or 8 Ports Summoned and in like manner admitted by the only Writ to Summon the Cinque Ports 1. H. 7. Acts of Parliament were mentioned to have been made by the assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and Commons 2. H. 7. By the advice of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and Commons In 3 4. H. 7. the like 11. H. 7. By the assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and Commons Anno 12 the like 19 the like In the r. 3. 4. H. 8. Acts of Parliament were said to have been made by the assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and Commons and in 5. 6. 7. 14. 15. 23. H. 8. 1. H. 8. The Abbot of Crowland was licensed to be absent by the Lord Chancellour and Lord Treasurer signifying the Kings pleasure And howsoever that the Kings verbal license was sufficient yet they that had obtained that favour had for the most part a formal license under his hand and if not ready to be produced testimonialls thereof by some Lord or others that could witness it And so continued untill 28 or 31. H. 8. But afterwards neither licenses or testimonialls were required only it satisfied that the proxies or procurations mentioned the Kings license which no man could be presumed to do unless he had had it Anno 1. Henrici 8. Ex mandato Domini Regis Quia Domini Spirituales absentes in convocatione occupati sunt continuavit Parliamentum usque in diem Crastinum the Lord Chancellor being then a Bishop and absent also and although some one or two of the Temporall Lords then sate in the House of Peers it was but to receive Bills Which continued untill 7. H. 8. In which Year the Lord Chancellour did the day before continue the Parliament unto the day after In the same Year 30 November Dominus Cancellarius propterea quod Domini Spirituales in convocatione in crastino die occupandi continuavit praesens Parliamentum usque in diem lunae and many of the Parliament Rolls and Journalls of King Henry the 8th being not to be found And from the 17th H. 8. untill the 25th there does not appear to have been any Journalls although severall Parliaments sate in the 21. 22. 23. 24 Years of his Reign 20. H. 8. No mention was made of the advice or consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporall or Commons The like in 25 and 26. 27. 28. 31. H. 8. 25. H. 8. There is a memorandum in the Journalls of the House of Peers Decretum est quod Domini Spirituales in convocatione diebus Martis Veneris prox sequen ex tunc die Veneris donec secus melius videtur versari possent proceres sequentibus diebus sine impedimento quotidie circa dimiâ—ietat horae octavae ante meridiem in locis consuetis simul convenirent ad tractandum consulendum circa Republicae negotia And after in the same Parliament the Fryday was changed into the Wednesday in every week Eodem Anno In the Reign of H. 8. Wednesday being a Starr-Chamber day and Friday a convocation of the Bishops of the house of Peers was by the Chancellor adjourned to the Saturday following and in Queen Elizabeths days when the Starr-Chamber days were setled to be upon Wednesdays the Parliament did not sit upon those days in the Term time which was constantly observed says Mr Elsing all the time of King James untill the 18th Year of his Reign when upon Tuesday the 24th day of Aprill upon a motion made in the House of Peers that there was a great cause in the middle
King that now is touching Pourveyors and the other Statute made in his time and the time of his Progenitors be firmly kept and maintained in all points and be duly Executed according to the Law and that Writs be granted to every one who will sue upon every point contained in what Statute soever And if any Justice or Minister be dilatory to any Statute thereof made that so much as he hath done to the contrary be held for nothing and erroneous To which was answered Il plest au Roy. And yet notwithstanding that Petition was thus absolutely granted and agreed upon the Statute made thereof cap. 1. is only that Magna Charta and all other Statutes shall be kept and duly Executed omitting all the test Anno 45. E. 3. n. 14. They Petition that King that it please him of his Grace and Majesty to command charge and ordain that the great Charter and the Charter of the Forest be kept and held in all points and that the Franchises Customs and Liberties heretofore used be held and kept in form as they were granted or used To which was anwsered Re Roy le voet And yet in the Statute thereon cap 1. is no more than thus It is ordained that the great Charter and the Charter of the Forest be held and kept in all points and omitteth all the rest Anno 2. R. 2. n. 27. cap. 1. The Statute is penned much larger for the Liberties of the Church than is in the Petition or Answer and the salvo for the Kings Regality is wholly omitted Anno 3. R. 2. n. 26. cap. 1. They agree for the Liberties of the Church but Magna Charta and Charta de Foresta are wholly omitted in the Statute Anno 3. R. 2. n. 37. cap. 3. Touching Provisions the special abuses of the Pope are omitted Anno 13. R. 2. n. 40. cap. 3. In the Oath which the Justices are to take the words duly and without favour are omitted Anno 25. E. 1. cap. 5. 7. Touching Aids Taxes and Prises granted to the King but not to be taken for a Custom And a release for Tole taken by the King for Wooll and a grant that he will not take the like without common consent and good will were agreed by the Lords and Commons in that Parliament sealed with the Kings Seal and the Seals of the Archbishop and Bishops who with the Kings Councel were voluntarily sworn to the performance thereof Anno 28. E. 1. cap. 2. The saving was added by the King and his Councel at the drawing up of the Statute as appears by the words therein viz. The King and his Councel do not intend by reason of the Statute Item cap. 20. At the conclusion was added a saving for the King 5. R. 2. cap. 5. For Preachers without the Commons Assent repealed 1 E. 6. 12. 1 Eliz. 1. The Assent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament one or both expressed included or implied in that of King E. 3. or H. 4's grant of the Dutchy of Cornwal and annexing Lands thereunto do as in the many antient grants of the Saxon Kings signify no more than an approbation and confers neither jus in re or potestatem dandi vel concedendi And so in the case of the entailed and restored Lands and the Honour and Earldom of Oxford granted by King R. 2. to Awbrey de Vere in the 16th year of his Raign n. 151. And the like may be believed where some things have been done or Grants or Charters said and entred in the Parliament Rolls to be Authoritate Parliamenti which as the Judicious Mr. Noy hath observed do not without other circumstances prove a common Assent of Parliament for that some of the Answers to divers Petitions of the Commons in Parliament temporibus R. 2. H. 4. were put upon the Files only and not entred in the Parliament Rolls And the same words are in divers Acts of Parliament mentioned to be inrolled in the Parliament Rolls of 4 7 of H. 4. Anno 4. H. 4. The Commons pray that the most sufficient Welshmen of every Lordship be chosen to keep the Peace and to answer for all Felonies c. as they were wont to do unto the Conqueror of Wales in the time of King Edward To which the King answered let this Petition be committed to the Councel to be thereof advised and the same Councel have power to provide Remedy therein according to their discretion by Authority of Parliament In the 7th year of the Raign of the said King the Commons prayed the King that certain Petitions exhited by Bartholomew Verdon and his companions might graciously be exploited per authoritatem Parliamenti whereupon the King by the Advice and Assent of the Lords in Parliamenr and at the request of the Commons granted the said Petition as by the Endorsement thereof filed amongst the special Petitions may appear But afterwards Anno 8. H. 5. n. 12. The Commons perceiving those words Authoritate Parliamenti often used by the Lords alone in their Answers to Petitions exhibited to the Receivers appointed by the King whereby the parties complained of were oftentimes constrained to answer Causes determinable at the Common Law before the Kings Councel or in the Chancery exhibited the Petition ensuing viz. Praying the Commons in this present Parliament that if any man sue a Bill or Petition with these words authoritate Parliamenti and the Answer be made let this Bill or Petition be committed to the Councel of the King or to the Councellors of the King to execute and determine the contents thereof whereas the said Bill or Petition is not by the Commons of the Land required to be affirmed or assented unto that no man to such a Bill or Petition unless the Assent or Request of the Commons be endorsed be bound to answer contrary to the Laws of the Realm Unto which was answered soit aviser per le Roy. At the foot of many Charters and Writs have been indorsed per ipsum Regem totum concilium in Parliamento and sometimes per ipsum concilium suum in Parliamento and at other times per petitionem in Parliamento Anno 6. H. 6. 1. Part pat n. 1. Pro Abbate conventu de Welhow de avisamento Dominorum ad supplicationem Communitatis Et Teste Rege apud Westmonasterium per petitionem in Parliamento pro 10 l. solut in Hanaperio Anno 4. H. 4. n. 116. The Commons pray that whereas one Thomas Taynleur Approver had appealed divers honest men very falsly for which he was drawn and hanged it would please the King to grant out Writs of the Chancery unto the Justices to cease all process against the party so falsly appealed which was granted assensu Praelatorum Procerumque c. And the form of the Writ there set down and underneath was written per petitionem in Parliamento In publick Ordinances the words of ceremony are seldom expressed only the matter agreed upon is
themselves they with a parcel of conscience not of God did treat with the particular Lenders of the Money to King James and for ten l. or a very little in every hundred comed and took up their Privy Seals but were unwilling to trouble the King with the thoughtâ—s thereof to the damage of him and disherision of the Crown of England and being taken notice of and complained of a Commission was granted unto the Lord ottington Sir Henry Vane and Sir Charles Harbord the Kings Surveyor to enquire thereof and certify the King thereof wherein they were so kind hearted and the matters so managed as noâ—hing more was heard thereof but the City of London continueth in possession of the said Manors and Lands or have spent the same in assisting the late horrid Rebellion against him and together with it the CityOrphans Mony for which it hath been reported they are willing to pay them by composition after the rate of 6d per. ponnd caused a Bill to be exhibited by his Attorney General in his Court of Starr Chamber against John Earl of Clare and Mr. Selden for having only in their Custody two Books or Manuscripts directed unto him by Sir Robert Dudley an Englishman living in Florence and stiling himself a Titular Duke of that Countrey endeavouring to instruct him in the method of raising Money by a Tax upon all the Paper and Parchment to be used in England caused Sir Giles Allington to be fined in the High Commission Court for Incest and the Lord Audley Earl of Castlehaven to be arraigned in the Court of Kings Bench for Sodomy whereupon after Tryal by his Peers he was Condemned and Beheaded suffered a great Arcanum Imperii in his Praerogative in taxing or requiring an Aid of Ship Money or for setting out a Navy of Ships when the Kingdom was in danger to be disputed in the Exchecquer Chamber by Lawyers and Judges which King Henry the fourth of France by a constant Rule in State Policy would never yeild to have done imitated by Queen Elizabeth who in some of her Charters or Letters Patents as unto Martin Forbisher a great Sea-Captain declared de qua disputari nolumus upon the case or question of 10 s. charged upon Mr. Hamdens Estate in Buckinghamshire of 4000 l. p. Annum wherein all that could be raked out of or by the Records of this Kingdom was put together by Mr. Oliver St. John and Mr. Robert Holborn theformer being after made Cheif Justice of the Court of Common Pleas by Hambden and the Rebel party and the later taking Arms for the King faithfully adhered unto him whereupon that cause coming to be heard all that could be argued for the not paying or paying of it of twelve Judges that carefully considered the Arguments and gave their opinions there were ten concurred in giving Judgment for the King and only two viz. Justice Hatton and Justice Crooke who having before under their hands concurred with all the other and suffered their subscriptions to be publickly inrolled in their several Courts at Westminster could find the way to be over-instrumental in setting our Troy Town all in Flames whilst that pious Prince being overburdened with his own more than common necessities did not omit any part of the Office of a Parens Patriae but taking more care for his People than for himself too many of whom proved basely and wickedly ingrateful called to accompt Lionel Cranfield whom he had made Earl of Middlesex and Lord Treasurer of England fined him in vast sums of money ordered him during his life never more to sit in the House of Peers in Parliament received a considerable part of his Fine and acquitted him of the residue And being desirous as his Father was to unite the Kingdom of Scotland in their Reformed Religion as the more happy Church of England was both as unto Episcopacy and its Liturgy that attempt so failed his expectation as a mutiny hapned in the Cathedral Church of Edenburgh and an old Wife sitting upon a Stool or Crock crying out that she smelt a Pape at her Arse threw it at the Ministers Head whereupon a great mutiny began and after that an Insurrection which to pacify the King raised a gallant Army of Gentry and Nobility with all manner of warlike provision and marched unto the Borders but found them so ill provided for defence as they appeared despicable yet the almost numberless Treacheries fatally encompassing that pious King persuading him not to beat or vanquish them when he might so easily have done it he returned home disbanding his Army and a close Favourite of Scotland was after sent to pacify them but left them far more unruly than before shortly after which Philip Nye a Factious Minister that should have been of the Church of England but was not with some other as wicked Persons were from England delegated to Scotland to make a Coâ—enant of Brotherly Rebellion against the King and accordingly the Scots being well assured that their Confederates in England would not hurt them marched into England with a ragged Army with Petitions to the King and Declarations of Brotherly Love unto too many of their Confederates seised by the cowardise or carelesness of the Inhabitants the Town of Newcastle upon Tine notwithstanding a small Army ill ordered was sent to defend it better than they did so as the Scotch Petitioning Army quartering there and in the Northern parts the King hastening thitherwards with Forces was persuaded to summon at Rippon a great Council of many of his Nobility whither too many of them that came being more affected to the Scotch Army that came like the Gibeonites with old Shoes and mouldy Bread were allowed to be free-quartered and a Parliament suddenly to be summoned at London whereby to raise money for the discharge of their Quarters Army charges in the mean time the Scotch their Commissioners with their Apostle Alexander Henderson have license to visit London where they are lamented feasted and visited and almost adored as much as St. Paul was amongst the Macedonians or the Brethren who cryed up their holy Covenant and Religion to be the best the Church of England with her Ceremonies Common Prayers and Potage not to be compared unto it the Parliament would help all and the Scots Commissioners were so popular and in request as they seemed for that time to govern both the City of London and Parliament and by their peace pride and plenty had generated Sedition and Faction and that combustible matter in England burst into a Fire which could not be quenched the Kings Privy Council could not please the five Members nor Kimboltons Ambition and Envy be satisfied without being made a great Officer of State but proved after to be a general of some associated Counties against the King God might be worshipped with a thriving Conscience and the people taken care for by plundering Sequestration Decimation Killing Slaying or Impoverishing the Common Wealth or Weal Publick Pym
the provisions Derogatory to Kingly Government made at Oxford in the Raign of King Henry the third and constrained of King Edward the second And might have happened into a question unanswerable what mischief our Magna Charta or Charta de Foresta had done unto our Nation or upon what other cause or reason those excellent Laws were granted by our King Henry the 3d and so dearly beloved as they thought themselves utterly undone if they had not with the 15th part of their Moveables obtained them eisdem modo forma without any substraction or addition the same which have been continued confirmed by their several Kings and Princes above thirty times and was such a caution in one of their Parliaments as the Bishops in their several Diocesses were impowered to Anathematize all the Infringers thereof and King Henry the 3d in that direful Procession was constrained to walk through Westminster-Hall the Abby-Church of Westminster with all the Bishops Earls Barons and Nobility of England and Wales holding burning Tapers in their hands the King only refusing after the reading of the aforesaid Magna Charta's freely granted by that King and likewise that enforced upon King John his Father and throwing down their Tapers wishing that the Souls of the Infringers thereof might so burn and fry in Hells everlasting fire being such a cursed obligation as was never enforced upon any King or Prince by their people in any Nation of the World and might if Right had been done unto that distressed King have been deeply censured in foro Animae gratitudinis And if those Magna Charta's have been such a darling of the people as they seemed to value it as their Blood and Estates how could they fall so much out of their love as they would do all that they could to be rid of them as if they had been Circe's Swine tearing them in peices when they are for the most part a compleat System or figure of our Antient Monarch Feudal Laws and every Chapter therein loudly proclaim them to be no otherwise And what have we got in Recompence of the overturning of our beneficial and ever to be praised Feudal Laws but the forfeitures of all our Lands and Estates if God and the King should be extream and mark what is done amiss Or can any man of Learning Reason or Understanding or any but one that is or hath been mad without Lucid Intervals believe that St. Edward the Confessors Laws have not deduced their Original for the most part if not all from the Feudal Laws when by the solemnest and greatest Jury of the World impannelled by King William the Conqueror they appeared sine dolo malo ingenio to be no other than our Feudal Laws by which the Soveraignty did appear to be in the King not the People by which our Kingdom had been Governed and did bear as near a resemblance thereunto as one Hen Egg doth or can unto another in shape or figure And what strange kind of Imaginary Soveraignty radically or otherwise at any time was believed to reside in the people when the Pope and his Legate Pandulphus made our affrighted King John to do homage by laying down his Crown and Scepter at the feet of his Legate multum dolente Archiepiscopo Cantuariensi saith Matthew Paris nor was the Tribute paid or thought fit to be paid thereupon for the Kingdoms of England and Ireland though demanded of King Henry the third his Son or Edward the first his Grandson but by all our Kings and Princes neglected it being an allowed Maxime in our Law that Angliae Rex nunquam moritur which could not be if all the People had been understood to have been Soveraigns Or can any man believe that our English Ancestors did not think St. Edward the Confessors said Laws to be tantum sacrae when they hid them under his Shrine in the Church of Westminster-Abby and afterwards precibus fletibus obtained of him to be Governed by them Which William the Conqueror would not have granted until he had by the aforesaid grand Jury examined and compared them per sapientes viros in Lege eruditos and the People of England and Wales have ever since being about 619 years never believed their Lives Estates and Posterities to be in any kind of safety if the Conqueror and all the succeeding Kings and Princes did not at their several Coronations take their Oaths to observe most especially St. Edward the Confessors Laws which they never failed to do and hath been so taken both by his late Majesty and this our present King And it would be a strange forgetfulness of Duty and our Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy upon which and no other our Feudal Laws are built to forget them and the care of our Souls which the Britaignes in Armorica in France could never do since the dread and fear of the cruel Invasion of the Scots and Picts making them forsake their Native Countrey of England and retire where they now are where they yet retain their Antient Feudal Customs used in England which is that Ligeance est ordinaire en tous fiefs la quelle de sa nature emporta obeyssance du vassal foy homage autre les droits devoirs contenus en l'infeodation anciens advouz tenures L'homage lige ce fera en ceste forme scavoir que le vassal l' Espee Esperons ostez teste nue ayant les mains entre celles de son Seigneur se enclynant dira telles paroles mon Seigneur Je deviens vostre home Lige pour telles choses lesquelles Je releve tien de vous ligement en tiel vostre fief Seigneurie lesquelles choses me sont advenues par tels moyens a cause de quoi Je vous doy la foy homage lige vous promittes par ma foy serment vous estre Loyal feable porter l' honneur obeysance envers vous me gouverner aynsi que noble homage de foy lige doit faire envers son Seigneur Le Seigneur respondra come sensuit vous devenus mon home pour rayson de tales choses par vous dites de choses en tel me promittant que vous me serra feal obeysant home vassal si que vostre fief le requier le Subject respondra Je le promets ainsi lors le Seigneur dira Je vous y recen sauf mon droit de l' autrui Insomuch as when all the aforesaid concurrences of the Laws of God and Man Records and Annals Truth and rectified Reason shall be united and laid together he must be an ill Subject and a very great INfidel that cannot with great assurance believe that the Blessed Martyr King Charles the first and his late Royal Majesty and our now Gracious Soveraign have been much wronged in their Regal Rights Revenue and Authority and had as their Blessed Father been made likewise Martyrs if
ruine all those that really and heartily wishout any other ends than that of duty and endless Loyalty came to help her and not by so many Plots and Conspacies against your Government and Monarchy and the lives of your Majesty and Royal Brother give a far greater disturbance thereunto than the unhappy severely punished Corah Dathan and Abiram did to the Government of Moses and Aaron who did but only murmure against them saying Ye do take too much upon you but did not plot or contrive Treasons Conspiracies or Rebellions against or to Assassinate or Murder them From all which disturbances and troubles that God will be pleased whilst you are on Earth enjoying a happy life amongst an unquiet as unto too many of them never to be contented people to free your Majesty your Heirs and Successors shall as it hath ever been be the prayers of Your Majesties always Constant and Obedient Subject FABIAN PHILIPPS THE PREFACE TO THE READERS THey that have read and duly considered though but with an ordinary compassion and sense of humanity the dismal Effects of Wars Rebellions and Discords in Kingdoms and Republicks and the little gain more than a Sacrifice to the Devil and the Ambition Revenge Self-Interest and the Ruine of Kingdoms Commonwealths Families and Estates might if there had been no other evidence have clearly and lamentably seen it in those once very famous Republicks of Athens and Sparta in the Peleponesian Wars ingaging most of the little Republicks of Achaia to run the adventure with them and did in the conclusion bring them all together under the Tyranny of the Ottoman Empire in those also of the Merciless Proscriptions of Sylla and Marius at Rome and the bloody Pharsalian Fields or Battels fought betwixt Julius Caesar and Pompey too nearly allied to have made such a quarrel or bustle to disturb so great a part of the World for Empire that of the Guelphes and Gibelines happening near about the time of our King John when the Pope so domineered over him as he constrained him to do homage unto him for England and Ireland and pay him a then great yearly Tribute that of our two great contending Families in England York and Lancaster under the several Badges or Liveries of the White Rose the Red to the destruction of many of the Nobility and Gentry taking their several parties that of the German Wars betwixt the Duke of Saxony and the Emperour Charles the 5th that of the Sicilian Vespers that of the King of Spain and the Netherlands or united Provinces of the Holy League in France and the cruel Massacre of so many thousand Protestants in Ireland and that our Incomparable late Rebellion of all the Rebellions the Devil had ever abused and Cheated a Nation withal the most hypocritical horrid and abominable and the just care that every pious and good man ought to have of his King and Oaths of Allegeance and Supremacy and the Blessings of God to attend his posterity might cause them to make as much hast as the dumb Son of King Craesus did to save the life of the King and therein prevent the Ruine of his Countrey And therefore I may hope that a Minimus Apostolorum one of the least Professors of the Law though of an ancient standing may be permitted without the reproach of Arrogance or scribling quiddities or Impertinences or troubling the World with the Idea's of Plato Aristotle Solon Licurgus or the unquiet Commonwealth of Rome until they were after the Experiments of divers sorts of Governments constrained to be more quiet and content with that of the Empire and Monarchy or Theocracy ordained by God be permitted to lay or bring before the Reverend Judges and Sages of the Laws of England and the Professors and Students of the Laws therein what may be found in the Records Annals and approved Authors and Historians concerning the ancient Feudal and Monarchick Government thereof without any Additions Omissions wtested Interpretations Forgeries Impostures or the fond and often abused credulity of Monkish and feigned lying Manuscripts may incite others to approve and like better of it than they have done that have to the hazard of their Estates in this World and the World to come done all that they could to pull in pieces that ancient Government upon which all our Laws reasonable Customs and Constitutions with Remedies for publick grievances have been built and founded which Sir Edward Coke hath before the dissolution of our Tenures in Capite the Ligaments of the Crown of England and the nerves sinews and strengths thereof when he was better pleased with his Soveraign not unjustly called the Quintessence of all Laws expended very near 1000 l. Sterling in my labours and travails therein and other matters concerning the Government without any penny profit or recompence either from or by the Stationers or any others more than an Employment as Deputy Comptroller of the Law Tax wherein I endeavoured all I could to serve his late Majesty and the Farmers thereof and may hope it was acceptable when his Majesty not long before his departure out of this World was by his principal Secretary of State Sir Leoline Ienkins Knight graciously pleased to declare that he had a particular regard for me and was sensible of the many Services which I had done unto the Crown which in the greatest of truth humility and modesty I might have said was done by me one of the smaller sort of the Atoms in his Kingdoms as an oblation of Duty when besides my no small loss and damage in the late horrid Rebellion I did adventure with the late learned George Bate Dr. of Physick and Mr. Nicholas Odeart sometimes Secretary to Sir Edward Nicholas principal Secretary to the murthered King did when the Rebels had refused to allow him in his own defence the assistance of his own or any other Councel learned in the Law at that they falsly called his Tryal when the Intercession of the French and Dutch Embassadors the Scots their Rebel partner Commissioners and some of the London factious Ministers could not prevail to rescue his sacred life did with great danger and hazard of our lives and Estates cause a small paper of Advice to be secretly delivered unto him not to acknowledge any jurisdiction to be in their highly wicked misnamed Court of Justice never before heard of or made use of in England or in any other Nation of the World And I did also after that wicked of wickedest sentence of death pronounced against my Soveraign Write and cause to be Printed and affixed upon the Posts and publick places in or about the Cities of London and Westminster a Protestation in the name of all the Loyal people of England against that most abominable sentence and did within a short time after Print and publish a Book in Justification and defence of him and the first as I believe that in print justly stiled him a Martyr for his people with some assurance
Rebellion with Montfort against him should bring his Action for the other Two Knight's Fees and an half From which most necessary and excellent Feudal Laws have proceeded those grand Honors fixed and appurtenant to our ancient Monarchy of England in our Kings and Princes Grant to several great Families in England in Fee or Fee-Tayl as to be Constable of England Earl Marshal of England Lord Steward of England Lord Great Chamberlain of England Chamberlain of the Queens of England Die Coronationis suae Butler to our Kings at their Coronations c. And likewise the Statute de Donis or Entailes the neglect whereof in leaving all the ruined Families of the Nobility Gentry and better sort of the English Nation to feigned Recoveries introduced about the Raign of King Edward the Fourth by an unhappy and unjust Trick of Law to make the Losers believe that they shall recover the Value of their Lands so Lost amounting in the whole unto the greatest part of all the Lands in England of the Bagbearer of the Court of Common-Pleas who in the Conclusion is only Vouchee to Warrants and to make it good out of his own Land and by the small Fees and Profits of his Office was never yet known to Inherit or to have been a Purchaser of ten Acres of Land yet walks about and is never molested or called to Account for those vast Sums of Money or his Land if he ever had or was re vera intended to have had any was to be liable by his being a Common Vouchee in all the Common Recoveries which are suffered in that Court It being in those more Obedient and Loyal Times esteemed no small Honour to serve our Kings or hold Lands by such a Kind of Tenure as it may be believed to have occasioned that Adage or Common saying in England before the ever to be lamented taking away of Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service and Pourveyance No Fishing to the Sea no Service to the King and those Royal Services affixed unto Lands and Territories have been so immutable amongst other our Neighbor Nations as in the Aurea Bulla fastned upon the Empire of Germany about the 30th Year of the Raign of our King Edward the Third the Three Spiritual Electors viz. the Arch-Bishops of Mentz Cologne and Triers or Trevers do hold their Lands and Territories by their several Tenures of being Arch-Chancellors the First of Germany the Second of Italy and the Third of France the King of Bohemia to be Archipincerna Duke of Bavaria or Count Palatine of the Rhine Archidapifer Duke of Saxony Archimariscallus Duke or Marquess of Brandenburgh Archicamerarius of that Empire and might be with or amongst them exampled from our Pattern which was long before as also from the Scots who have to this day some of the like official Dignities annexed to their Lands and Estates and as in the Raign of our King Henry the First Count Tankervile was by Inheritance and Tenure of his Lands Chamberlain of Normandy And although not so ancient as the Customs of the Patroni and Clientes in the beginning of the flourishing of the vast Roman Empire which was so greatly advantageous both unto the greater and lesser part of the People the Patroni in their Popularities and Ambitions to gain and please them in their way of Advancements to Annual Magistracies not seldom exercising their Eloquence in pleading their Causes or Suits in Law before the Lawyers had for another kind of Advantages by the Gratifications of Fees and Rewards made it to be the greatest part of their Profession which before were principally employed upon seldom Occasions in matters of Difficulty in Jurisconsults and Decisions some of the more eminent sorts of them having about the Raign of the Emperor Augustus Caesar obtained Licenses of him ad respondendum Yet after the Irruption of the Goths Vandals Longobards and Hunnes with other Northern Nations into that Empire they found it to be more beneficial to do as the Germans and many other Northern Nations have done to be Feudalists and to have Lands given unto them and their Heirs to hold by Service of War and other necessaries under those grand Obligations of Interests Oaths Gratitude Homage and Fealty which proved to be better more certain and beneficial both for the Patroni and Clientes the poorer sort of the People alwayes or very often wanting the Aid and Protection of the greater from Wrongs and Oppressions like to be put upon them And the Patroni and Greater procuring to themselves thereby a more constant Observance of Duty Honour and Additions to their former Grandeur the greater and lesser thereby mutually supporting and assisting each other which in the Consequence was as it did likely to prove much better than the charge and trouble the Patroni were used to be as in the frequent courting and Humoring of the common People with their costly Epulae's and Ludi's not only to gain their own Preferments in their Annual poursuites of Offices of Magistracy but to keep the popular Votings from Mutiny and ruining them as much as themselves And howsoever that they with us in England by a great infelicity to our languishing Monarchical Government after an horrid Rebellion and murder of our late King Anno. 12. Car. 2. by an Act of Parliament made upon his now Majesties happy Restoration for the taking away the Court of Wards and Liveries Tenures in Capite and by Knight service and Pourveyance and for settling a Revenue upon His Majesty in lieu of a great part of the lands of England and Wales which the Rebels besides their great Estates had forfeited unto him which they were willing to retain to themselves and thank him as fast as they could with a more detestable Rebellion the Praeamble mentioning most unfortunately for want of a right Information and understanding thereof That the said Court of Wards and Liveries Tenures by Knight service in Capite holden of the King or others and Socage in Capite have been by consequence more praejudicial then beneficial to the Kingdome as if the Nerves and Ligaments of the Crown of England and the ancient Support and Defence of the Honour and glory thereof for more then one thousand years could any way deserve to be so Charactered and that after the Intromission of the said Court which hath been since the 24 th day of February 1645. when the Divel and his Reformation had made a large progress in the chasing Religion out of the Kingdom and washing over in blood the Blessed Martyr King Charles the first 3 Kingdomes of England Scotland and Ireland many Persons could not by their Will or otherwise dispose of their Lands by Knight Service whereby many Questions might possibly arise unless some seasonable remedy be taken to prevent the same Our Soveraign Lord by the Assent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled and by the Authority of the same did enact the taking away of the said Court
and testify that the Land is holden of them and that without taking away the Fealty and repealing the Oaths of Allegeance and Supremacy the Duty and Oaths of the Subjects remained as they did whilst they held their Land in Capite and by Knight Service Which probably as may sadly be lamented could never have hapned if the later men of the Law in England had not by the space of something more then Forty Years last past leaped over as it may be feared they have overmuch done the successive learned labours and Books in a long process of Time in the Reign of our Regnant Kings and Princes divers Judges and Sages of our Laws Recording from Time to Time Cases Judgments Decrees and Dicisions maturely and Deliberately adjudged therein But too much neglected those guidings better guides and faithfull Directors the Civill and Feudall Laws and suffred their Studies and practice to be imployed and incouraged in the Factious Seâ—iâ—ious Rebellious principles of those Times by following the gross Mistakes of Sr Edward Coke in his Discontent malevolence and Ill will unto the necessary and legall Regalities of the Crown and Idolizing as he did those grand parcells of forgery and Imposture entitled the Mirrour of Justice and the Modus tenendi Parliamentum and their neglecting the readings of Glanvile Bracton and Britton and other good Authors And the Civil Law was the Parent and Mother of many of the maximes and principles of that which is now called our Common Law And those men of the Law who without Books subsistence or Estates when they went beyond the Seas with their Sovereign and had not there the opportunities of the Knowledge or help of the Records of the Kingdom that might have been their best Instructers were for the most part but Young Gentlemen Born and Bred in the times of our Distempered Parliaments as those were that Tarried here who walked along with the Rebellion too much adhered unto them and came Weather-beaten again with his Majesty had understood as they might have done the Originall Foundation and Continuance of our Monarchick Government But King Edward the 1. who had passed over and overcome so many Hardships Difficulties Misfortunes and Storms of State was so unwilling to be afraid of a part of his Unquiet Baronage or to Humour the popularity and ignorance of any of the Common People or to be in fear of them or of any their Factious or Seditious Machinations making what hast his affairs would permit to return into England where his father having by his Death escaped the restless conflicts of a long and troublesome Reign and his Exequies and Ceremonies of buriall performed Róbertus Kilwarby Cantuariensis Archiepiscopus Gilbertus de Claro Comes Gloverinae a man that had been in Armes and opposite enough against his father and himself in the former convulsions of State and John Warren Earl of Surrey saith Samuel Daniel went up to the High Altar cum aliis Praelatis ac Regni proceribus Londiniis apud novnm Templum convenerunt Edwardum absentem Dominum suum Ligeam recognoverunt paternique Successorem honoris ordinaverunt assensu Reginae non Populi and before his return into England John Earl Warren and Gilbert de Clare Earl of Gloucester in the Abby Church of Westminster sware unto him Fealty without asking leave of the People and proclaimed him King although they knew not whether he were Living or Dead caused a new great Seal to be made and appointed six Commissioners for the Custody of his Treasure and Peace whilst he remained in Palastine where by an Assassin feigning to Deliver Letters unto him he received 3 Dangerous Wounds with a poysoned knife then said and believed to have been cured by the Love of his Lady that Paragon of Wives and Women who sucked the Poyson out of the Wound when others refused the adventure and after 3 Years Travail from the time of his setting forth many conflicts and Disappointments of his aids and Ends left Acon well fortified and manned and returned homewards in which as he travailed he was Royally feasted by the Pope and princes of Italy whence he came towards Burgundy where he was at the foot of the Alpes met by Divers of the English Nobility and being Challenged to a Tournament by the Earl of Chalboun a man of extraordinary Renown Successfully hazarded his Person to manifest his valour thence came again into England with the great advantages of his Wisdom Courage and Reputation assisted by the memory of the fortunate Battle at Evesham and his Actions in the East SECT XVIII Of the Methods and Courses which King Edward the 1. held and took in the Reformation and Cure of the Former State Diseases and Distempers KIng Edward the 1st was together with his Queen Crowned at Westminster by Robert Archbishop of Canterbury Alexander King of Scotland and John Duke of Britanny attending that Solemnity which being finished he shortly after forced Leoline Prince of Wales who had taken part with Montfort against his Father King Henry the third to do him Homage and after a Revolt imprisoned and beheaded him did the like to his brother David and United Wales as a Province to England made the Statute of Snowden considered and perused their Laws allowed some repealed others collected some and added new as he well might there do for the Prince or King which Governed Wales had always used so to do and appointed one to give his assent to the Election of Bishops and Abbots And when The Pope demanded 8 yeares arreares for the rent or tribute of the Kingdoms of England and Ireland enforced from King John did by his letter answer that his Parliament was dissolved before it came and that sine Praelatis et Proceribus communicato concilio sanctitati suae super praemissa non potuit respondere et Jurejurando in coronatione suam praestito fuit obstrictus quod jura Regni sui servabit illibata nec aliquod quod diadema tangat Regni ejusdem no such clause or promise being in the Coronation Oath ut nihil absque illorum requisito concilio faceret Sent to Franciscus Accursius Docto of laws resident at Bononia in Italy the son of the famous Accursius the Civil lawyer to come with his wife family into England by his writ to the Sheriff of Oxfordshire commanded him to deliver unto the said Doctor Accursius the King 's manor house and castle of Oxford then no mean place for him and his wife to Inhabit Did so imitate the wisdom and providence of the Roman and Caesarean laws as Augustus Caesar and other of the Succeeding Emperours had done as he gave unto men learned in the laws which was more for the peoples good then in their suits and actions at law to court and live under the protection and humours of their popular Patroni's libertatem respondendi to give councell and advice to their clients in their concernments at law and
expresly prohibited cannot be supposed to be the concern or interest of all the People deserving or requiring satisfaction or especially provided for by Law to have satisfaction unless it could by any probability or soundness of Judgment be concluded that all the People of England besides Wives Children or near Kindred and Relations the necessity of publick Justice and deterring Examples are or should be concerned in such a never to be fancied Appeal of the People And it will be very hard to prove that one or a few are all the People of England or if they could be so imagined are to be more concerned than the King who is sworn to do Justice unless they would claim and prove a Soveraignty and to be sworn to do Justice which though they had once by a villanous Rebellion attacked until Oliver Cromwel their Man of Sin cheated them of it for God would never allow them any such power or priviledge or any Title to the Jesuits Doctrine which some of our Protestant Dissenters their modern Proselites have learned of them that the King although he be singulis major is minor universis And it is no denial of Justice in the House of Peers to deny the receiving of an Impeachment from the House of Commons when they cannot understand any just cause or reason to receive it and the Records Rolls Petitions and Orders of Parliament will inform those that will be at the pains to be rightly and truly directed by them that Petitions in Parliament have been adjourned modified or denied and that in the Common or Inferior Courts of Justice Writs and Process may sometimes be denied superseded or altered according to the Rules of Justice or the circumstances thereof And our Records can witness that Plaintiffs have petitioned Courts of Justice recedere a brevi impetrare aliud And it cannot be said that the King doth denegare Justitiam when he would bind them unto their ancient legal well experimented forms of seeking it in the pursuing their Rights and Remedies hinders them in nothing but seeking to hurt others and destroy themselves For Justice no otherwise denied should not be termed Arbitrary until there can be some solid reason proof or evidence for it When it is rather to be believed that if the Factious Vulgar Rabble might have their Wills they would never be content or leave their fooling until they may obtain an unbounded liberty of tumbling and tossing the Government into as many several Forms and Methods as there be days in the year and no smaller variety of Religions And by the Feudal Laws which are the only Fundamental Laws of our Government and English Monarchy those many parts of the Tenants that held of their Mesne Lords in Capite could not with any safety to their Oaths and Estates Authorise any of their Elected Members of the House of Commons in Parliament to accuse or charge any of the Baronage of England in the House of Peers in Parliament although every Tenant in his Oath of Vassalage to his Mesne Lord doth except his Allegiance to the King and would be guilty of Misprision of Treason if he should conceal it by the space of twenty and four hours and if any of the Elected would or should avoid such Misprision of Treason in the not performance of his Duty and Oath of Allegiance it would require a particular Commission to his own Elected Members and is not to have it done by way of a general Representation when there is not to be discerned in the Kings Writ or in the Sureties or Manucaptors matters or things to be performed or in the Indentures betwixt the Sheriff and the Electors and Elected any word of Representation or any thing more than ad faciendum consentiendum iis to assent and obey do and perform such things as the King by the Advice of the Lords in Parliament shall ordain and if they would make themselves to be such Representers were to have a particular and express Commission to charge or impeach any one of themselves or of the House of Peers with Treason or any other high Misdemeanours And they must be little conversant with our Records that have not understood that the Commons have many times received just denials to their Petitions and that some have not seldom wanted the foundations of Reason or Justice That many of their Petitions have adopted the Concerns and Interests of others that were either Strangers unto them or were the Designs of some of the grand Nobility who thought them as necessary to their purposes as Wind Tide and Sails are to the speeding of a Ship into the Port or Landing-places of their Designs For upon their exhibiting in a Parliament in the 28 year of the Raign of King Henry the Sixth abundance of Articles of High Treason and Misdemeanours against William de la Poole Duke of Suffolk one whereof was that he had sold the Realm of England to the French King who was preparing to invade it When they did require the King and House of Lords that the Duke whom not long before they had recommended to the King to be rewarded for special services might be committed Prisoner to the Tower of London the Lords and Justices upon consultation thought it not reasonable unless some special Matter was objected against him Whereupon the said Duke not putting himself upon his Peerage but with protestation of his innocency only submitting himself to the Kings mercy who acquitting him from the Treason and many of the Misdemeanours and for some of them by the advice of the Lords only banished him for five years And that thereupon when the Viscount Beaumont in the behalf of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal required that it might be Inrolled that the Judgment was by the Kings own Rule not by their Assent and that neither they nor their Heirs should by this Example be barred of their Peerage No Protestation appears to have been made by any of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal for or on the behalf of the Commons Or by the Commons for themselves So as a different manner of doing Justice can neither truly or rationally be said to be an absolute denial of Justice and was never believed to be so by the Predecessors of the House of Commons in Parliament in our former Kings Raigns when some hundreds of their Petitions in Parliament have been answered There is a Law already provided or let the old Law stand or the King will provide a covenable or fitting remedy And is not likely if it were as it is not to be any Arbitrary Power or any temptation or inducement thereunto to produce any Rule or incouragement to the exercise of an Arbitrary Power in the Inferiour Courts when there is none so weak in his Intellect but may understand that different Courts have several Boundaries Methods and Forms of Proceedings and that the Kings extraordinary great Court and Councel in His House of Peers although very just and
unarbitrary in their procedures is so always ready to succour the Complaints of People as it never willingly makes it self to be the cause of it And cannot misrepresent the House of Peers to the King and his People in the Case of Mr. Fitz Harris or any others when that honourable Assembly takes so much care as it doth to repress Arbitrary Power and doth all it can to protect the whole Nation from it and many of the House of Commons Impeachments have been disallowed by the King and his House of Peers in Parliament without any ground or cause of fear of Arbitrary Power which can no where be so mischievously placed as in the giddy multitude whose Impeachments would be worse than the Ostracisme at Athens and so often overturn and tire all the wise men and good men in the Nation as there would be none but such as deserve not to be so stiled to manage the Affairs of the Government subordinate to their King and Soveraign To all which may be added if the former Presidents cited to assert the Kings Power of Pardoning as well after an Impeachment made by the Commons in Parliament as before and after an Impeachment made by the Commons and received by the Lords in Parliament or made both by the Lords and Commons in Parliament be not not sufficient that of Hugh le Despenser Son of Hugh le Despenser the younger a Lord of a great Estate which is thus entred in the Parliament Roll of the fifth year of the Raign of King Edward the Third ought surely to satisfie that the Laws and reasonable Customs of England will warrant it Anno 5 E. 3. Sir Eubule le Strange and eleven other Mainprisers being to bring forth the Body of Hugh the Son of Hugh le Despenser the younger saith the Record A respondre au prochein Parlement de ester au droit affaire ce de liu en conseil soit ordine mesuerent le Corps le dit Hugh devant nostre Seigneur le Roi Countes Barons autres Grantz en mesme le Parlement monstrent les L'res Patents du Roi de Pardon al dit Hugh forisfacturam vite membrorum sectam pacis homicidia roborias Felonias omnes transgressiones c. Dated 20 Martii anno primo Regni sui Et priant a n're Seigneur le Roi quil le vousist delivrer de las Mainprise faire audit Hugh sa grace n're Seigneur le Roi eiant regard a ses dites L'res voilant uttroier a la Priere le dit Mons'r Eble autres Main pernors avant dit auxint de les Prelatz qui prierent molt especialment pur lui si ad comande de sa grace sa delivrance Et voet que ses Menpernors avant ditz chescun d'eux soient dischargez de leur Mainprise auxint le dit Hugh soit quit delivrers de Prisone de garde yssint si ho'me trove cause devors lui autre nest uncore trove quil estoise au droit And the English Translator or Abridger of the Parliament Records hath observed that the old usage was that when any Person being in the Kings displeasure was thereof acquitted by Tryal or Pardon yet notwithstanding he was to put in twelve of his Peers to be his Sureties for his good Behaviour at the Kings pleasure And may be accompanied by the Case of Richard Earl of Arundel in the 22 year of the Raign of King Richard the Second being Appealed by the Lords Appellant and they requiring the King that such Persons Appealed that were under Arrest might come to their Tryal it was commanded to Ralph Lord Nevil Constable of the Tower of London to bring forth the said Richard Earl of Arundel then in his custody whom the said Constable brought into the Parliament at which time the Lords Appellants came also in their proper Persons To the which Earl the Duke of Lancaster who was then hatching the Treason which afterwards in Storms of State and Blood came to effect against the King by the Kings Coommandment and Assent of the Lords declared the whole circumstances after the reading and declaring whereof the Earl of Arundel who in Anno 11 of that Kings Raign had been one of the Appellants together with Henry Earl of Derby Son of the said Duke of Lancaster and afterwards the usurping King Henry the Fourth against Robert de Vere Duke of Ireland and Earl of Oxford and some other Ministers of State under King Richard the Second alledged that he had one Pardon granted in the Eleventh year of the Raign of King Richard the Second and another Pardon granted but six years before that present time And prays that they might be allowed To which the Duke answered that for as much as they were unlawfully made the present Parliament had revoked them And the said Earl therefore was willed to say further for himself at his peril whereupon Sir Walter Clopton Chief Justice by the Kings Commandment declared to the said Earl that if he said no other thing the Law would adjudge him guilty of all the Actions against him The which Earl notwithstanding would say no other thing but required allowance of his Pardons And thereupon the Lords Appellant in their proper Persons desired that Judgment might be given against the said Earl as Convict of the Treason aforesaid Whereupon the Duke of Lancaster by the Assent of the King Bishops and Lords adjudged the said Earl to be Convict of all the Articles aforesaid and thereby a Traytor to the King and Realm and that he should be hanged drawn and quartered and forfeit all his Lands in Fee or Fee-tail as he had the nineteenth day of September in the tenth year of the Kings Raign together with all his Goods and Chattels But for that the said Earl was come of noble Blood and House the King pardoned the hanging drawing and quartering and granted that he should be beheaded which was done accordingly But Anno 1 Hen. 4. the Commons do pray the reversal of that Judgment given against him and restoration of Thomas the Son and Heir of the said Richard Earl of Arundel Unto which the King answered he hath shewed favour to Thomas now Earl and to others as doth appear The Commons do notwithstanding pray that the Records touching the Inheritance of the said Richard Earl of Arundel late imbezelled may be searched for and restored Unto which was answered the King willeth And their noble Predecessors in that Honourable House of Peers the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament long before that videlicet in the fifth year of the Raign of King Edward the Third made no scruple or moat point or question in Law whether the power of pardoning was valid and solely in the King after an Impeachment of the Lords in Parliament when in the Case of Edmond Mortimer the Son of Roger Mortimer Earl of March a Peer of great Nobility and Estate the
quod contra Communem Civilium ordinatio tenorem propter aliquam naturalis aequitatis rationem certa constituentium authoritate introductum est unde apparet saith Cicero quod Privilegium contra Jus naturae vel utilitatem publicam non magis sunt Privilegia quam Tirannis Privilegia ultra suam propriam naturam non extendi debet nec ad ea quae neutiquam prima sua origine sunt directa aliquin etiam ad incognita contra intentionem dantis extendi possent quod in Jure absurdum est Expressa Privilegia a re ex Jure proprio Majestatis superioritatis proprie privilegiorum concessio non tantum arguit superioritatem dantis inducit subjectionis speciem in persona impetrantis quidem Ita ut privilegium non subdito concessum Regulariter in contractum transeat sed soli Principi summo qui regalem dignitatem potestatem exercendi Jura principis quoad Subditos suos in suo territorio concessit competit per L. Vinc. de his qui a Princip Vac accep lib. 10. Privilegia Jus superioritatis stricte quidem Ita interpretari convenit ut semper intelligantur salvo Jure superioritatis concessa Privilegii enim Interpretatio non debet verti contra Autorem Ita quod per privilegia subditi desinant esse subditi sed quod tanto magis esse debent subditi cum Privilegia proprie non nisi subditis dantur quis dubitat eum qui Privilegium libertatis accipit leges alterius agnoscere cum privilegium non sit nisi exemptis a Jure Communi L qui singulare F. de L. And very often confirmed Priviledges that have been incroached or usurped may justly come within the compass of that Rule also of the Civil Law much allowed and made use of in our Common Law Quod ab initio non valet tractu temporis non convalescit Confirmatio ex certa Scientia quamvis det robur non tamen extenditur ad id quod in eo non includebatur secundum Bald. sing in l. 3. in fin C. Interpretatio privilegiorum ita siat necesse est nec torqueatur sed facto deserviat neque factum variare oportet ut Privilegio respondeat Privilegium debet esse observatum et clarum Michael Ant. Frances de veritigati aequivocum nihil operatur p. 564. in privilegiis mens concedentis attenditur cap. 51. n. 223. privilegium transit in contractum ex causa onerosa fieri dicitur nec revocatur cap. 30. et 294 et 304. p. 570. ex privilegiatis duobus quis sit praeferendis cap 10. p. 193. magis privilegiatus praecellere debet ratione dignitatis privilegium non extendit se ad ea quae de facili concedi non solent qualis est derogatio concilii cap. 28. n. 327. non datur res quae not sit cap. 28. 414. 415. p. 514. concessum ex causa ea cessante revocatur etiam si concedens ex alia causa ea concessisset cap. 28. n. 497. p. 510. Revocatur nova causa superveniente cap. 28. n. 428. p. 522. Non datur nisi aliquid particular concedat cap. 13. n. 26. p. 556. Privilegium Exemptio laedunt Jus Commune cap. 30. n. 17 p. 554. Privilegium ratione scandali revocatur cap. 30. n. 299. p. 570. And there were Priviledges that were more stable yet no Parliament Priviledges such as St Pauls was of being a Freeman and Citizen of Rome bought as he said with a great price and some Coloniae Mancipiae had the same Laws and Priviledges which Rome had the four great High Ways made by the Romans in Brittain to keep their Souldiers from Idleness as Watlinstreet c. had great Immunities and Priviledges as to have the persons and goods of such as travailed or dwelt therein freed from Arrest or Distress Et privilegia quae utilitati publicae sunt dannosa strictam interpretationem requirunt quia generaliter quicquid contra jus vel utilitatem publicam in quolibet negotio prefertur non valet l Jubeamus 10. C. des s. Ecclesiae 4. The Decree of the great King Ahashuerus that raigned from India to Ethiopia over 127 Provinces his Laws being holden to be irrevocable were as unto some part of them reversed for the preservation of the Jewish Nation upon the petition of Queen Esther and his holding out his golden Scepter to her And the House of Commons themselves did in a Parliament in the 21 year of the raign of King Richard the Second certainly so understand and believe it when they recommended to posterity their dutiful protestation to their King and Soveraign and request to have it specially Inrolled in these words Item les ditz Comes fierent protestation devant le Roi en plein Parlement ils vurroient monstrer declarer mesme le Jour en plein Parlement certeine matieres Articles deus queux ils fierent alors aviser entre eux accorder nient majus il fust est leur entent volunte percongie de nostre Seigneur le Roy de accuser empesther persone ou persones a tantes de foiz come leur sembleroit affaire durant le temps de cest present Parlement prierent au Roy lui pleiroit accepter leur dite protestation quil soit entrer en rolle de Parlement de record la quele chose nostre Seigneur le Roi leur ad ottroie commanda a destre fait and did think it not to be unbecoming their duty to require license of the King to charge or accuse any person or persons in that tempestuous Parliament nor did beleive that their accusations or impeachments should or ought to be so fatally mortal when in the first year of the Raign of King Henry the 4th by a patched contrivance of the Parliament in the Raign of King H. 4. the same Commons in Parliament desired that the Judgment given against the said Earl of Arundel whose Pardon but a little before had been rejected might be reversed and a restoration made of all his Lands Estate and Evidences And those their Priviledges being but personal and temporary and after they were allowed by our Kings a Speaker which was about the Raign of King R. 2. the House of Commons well knowing who was the only donor of them never fail'd at the Change Allowance of every of their Speakers to give him in charge to Petition in their behalf unto the King for the same no other Priviledges being necessary for the aforesaid Imployment Upon the violation of any whereof by any of their fellow Subjects they did so well understand the extent of those their Temporary Peculiar and Limited Priviledges with the obligations of their Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and that it neither appertained unto them nor was or could be in their power to cause or enforce a better observation thereof but it was only in the King
Duty and Allegiance they are obliged to attend their Soveraign and come to the General Consult of a Parliament so is it to be considered that the Speculator and Prorector of our Kingdom and Nation under God just allowances being always to be made of natural rests and refreshments and competent care of health cannot be Master if he could of much time whilst he is to encourage and maintain the Publick Good of his People and Guard them from any evils or inconveniences which do or might assail them in his care and distribution of Justice in all the complaints and Petitions of a numerous and mighty People in the issuing out of Writs Edicts and Proclamations which do every day and hour in the year almost imploy his Ministers of State and substituted in their several stations and qualifications Sundays and the grand Festivals in every year not always escaping and the not to be expressed almost perpetual cares of a Kingly and Monarchick Government largely attested by the many Patent Charter and Clause Rolls brevia Regis Rescripts Commissions Certioraris Writs of ad quod dampnum Inquisitions cum multis aliis in the Raigns of our Kings and Queens now lodged and preserved in the Tower of London the Exchequer and the Treasures thereof with the Records of the other Courts with what else could be rescued from the ravage of War and Time together with the Memorials of their Secretaries of State Privy Councel Table Books referrences and the returns thereof hearings of causes complaints and orders and redresses thereof with a necessary Inspection and Survey in and of all the affairs and conditions of his people and their well or ill being when the cares of government were so accompted to be an heavy burden for Moses in his conduct of an affrighted and oppressed people of Israel driven out of Egypt with six hundred thousand men on foot besides Women and Children with their Flocks and Herds in their travelling and unsetled condition through the wilderness towards their hopes in the Promised Land of Canaan with murmuring enough in the hearing and determining of their Suits and Complaints one against another raised in Jethro his Father-in-Law such a compassion of his Labour and Toil therein as he told him he would surely wear away both himself and the People and therefore Councelled him only to reserve hard matters unto himself and appoint out of the People able Men such as fear God and love the Truth hating Covetousness to Judge the People in smaller matters Wherein they that shall rightly consider the cares of Kings and Princes and the trouble of preserving and doing good to a far greater number of People not seldom as unto too many against their Wills may think themselves to be happy under the Protection of Gods Vicegerent and bound to obey with cheerfulness his Providence therein and that it was never intended by our less murmuring and more grateful Ancestors to make perpetual extraordinaries or a standing Court of Parliament which could not fall within the Reason Necessity or Practise of any good or rational Government and if it could as it never can must of necessity tear in pieces our happy best Established Monarchy and Sacrificing it to an inexorable misery leave our Posterities to be tossed and driven in and upon the Waters of Strife Self-interest and Vain Imaginations and in the fear without any cause of an Arbitrary Power of our Kings never like to happen over-hastily and madly run into the Arbitrary Power of a multitude or some prevailing Party of plundering and pretending Reforms amongst them many of which is and will be the worst of all Arbitraries of a Rude Ignorant Unreasonable and Senseless multitude with the greatest certainties of miseries as fatally as inevitably likely to happen §. 32. That Parliaments or great Councels de quibusdam arduis concerniug the defence of the Kingdom and Church of England neither were or can be fixed to be once in every year or oftner they being alwaies understood and believed to be by the Laws and ancient and reasonable Customs of England ad libitum Regis who by our Laws Right Reason and all our Records and Annals is and should be the only watchman of our Israel and the only Judge of the necessity times and occasion of summoning Parliaments FOR notwithstanding that by an Act of Parliament made in the 4th year of the Raign of King Edward 3. It was accorded that a Parliament should be holden once in every year and more often if need be And in an other Act of Parliament made in the 36th year of the Raign of the aforesaid King Edward it is said that for the maintenance of the Articles and Statutes made in the said Parliament of the 36th and redress of divers mischiefs and grievances which dayly happen a Parliament shall be holden as at other times was appointed by a Statute yet the latter Act of Parliament was but with reference to the former and that imparted no more than that a Parliament shall be holden once in every year and more often if need be and howsoever that in the 50th year of the Raign of that King the Commons renewed their petition that a Parliament might be holden that Knights of the Parliament might be chosen by the whole Counties and that the Sheriffs might likewise be without brocage in Court the King only answered to the Parliament there are Statutes made therefore to the Sheriffs there is answer made to the Knights it is agreed that they shall be chosen by common consent of every County and in Anno Primo R. 2. petitioned the King that a Parliament might be yearly holden in a convenient place to redress delays in Suits and to end such Cafes as the Judges doubt of which the Consequences after will shew were only to be at the pleasure and will of the King as his prudence care and necessity of himself and the publick good should necessarily advise if the true Interpretation of both those Acts of Parliament could as it never can bear any other signification for although that which next followed that Act of Parliament made in the 4th year of the Raign of that King was in the next year after yet that which succeeded that was in Anno 6 and not printed For the Parliament was for a few days Adjourned and being after holden at York was for a short time likewise Prorogued and afterwards the Assembly being not come was Adjourned until the 5th of St. Hillary next following at York and from thence again to a Reassembly at the same place at the end of which Re-assembly the Commons had License to depart and the Lords were commanded to attend him the next day at which time the Parliament was Dissolved The Duke of Cornwal the Kings Eldest Son as Guardian of England by the Kings Letters Patents held the Parliament at Westminster and a memorandum made to Summon the Parliament at the 5th of St. Hillary
that granted them and was to be vouched to warranty which was in common and ordinary matters very usual in our Laws and reasonable Customs and therefore to him only as the Grantor and Protector of their Parliament Priviledges and not to themselves the gratitude and acknowledment was only due And the House of Commons until this our present unruly Age or Century did not adventure to take upon themselves or endeavour by any pretended Authority of their own to punish any the violators of their aforesaid Priviledges but supplicated Aid of their Kings and Princes that were the donors and granters of them And therefore in the Raign of King Henry the fourth it was adjudged that as the Record witnesseth Videtur Cur. quod non For in Anno 8 H. 6. William Lark a Servant of William Wild Burgess of Parliament being arrested upon an Execution during the Parliament the Commons petitioned the King to give order for his discharge and that no Lords Knights Citizens or Burgesses nor their Servants coming to the Parliament may be Arrested during the Parliament unless it be for Treason Felony or Breach of the Peace The King granted the first part of the Petition Et quant al residue le Rei sa avisera The Commons prayed that Edmond Duke of Somerset Alice Poole the late Wife of William Poole Duke of Suffolk William Bishop of Chester Sir John Sutton Lord Dudley the Lord Hastings James de la Barre one of the Kings Secretaries and 20 or 22 Knights and Esquires particularly named amongst which was Thomas Kemp Clerk of the House of Commons which the Commons themselves and their own Clerk had not them found to be either a Liberty or Priviledge of their own to punish might be banished from the King during their Lives and not to come within twelve Miles of the Court for that the People do speak evil of them To which the King answered He is of his own meer motion contented that all shall depart unless only the Lords and a few of them whom he may not spare from his presence and they shall continue for one year to see if any can duly impeach them In Anno 31 H. 6. The Commons made a Request to the King and Lords that Thomas Thorp their Speaker and Walter Roil a member of their house who were in Prison might be set at liberty according to their Priviledges The next day after the Duke of York who was then a Rival for a long time but after a publick Competitor for the Crown and President of the Parliament came before the Lords not the Commons and shewed that in the vacation of the Parliament he had recovered damage against the said Thomas Thorp in an action of trespass by Verdict in the Exchequer for carrying away the goods of the said Duke out of Durham House for the which he remained in Execution and prayed that he might continue therein Wherein the Councel of the Judges being demanded they made Answer it was not their part to Judge of the Parliament which was Judge of the Law wherein surely they might rather have said what they should have most certainly have believed then as Sir Edward Coke did long after that the King was principium caput finis Parliamenti and only said that a general Supersedeas of Parliament there was but a special supersedeas in which case of special supersedeas every Member of the Commons House ought to enjoy the same unless in cases of Treason Felony Surety of the Peace or for a condemnation before the Parliament After which the Lords determined that the said Thomas Thorp should remain in execution and sent certain of themselves to the Commons who then had so little power to free themselves from Arrests and imprisonment as they could not deliver their own Speaker out of Prison but were glad to follow the direction of the King and Lords to chuse and present unto the King another Speaker the which they did and shortly after certain of the Commons were sent to the Lords to declare that they had in the place of the said Thomas Thorp chosen for their Speaker Thomas Charleton Esquire Walter Clark a Burgess of Chippenham in the County of Wilts being committed to the Prison of the Fleet for divers condemnations as well to the King as to others was discharged and set at Liberty at the Petition of the Commons to the King and Lords without Bail or Mainprise At the Petition of the Commons William Hill a Burgess of Chippenham aforesaid being in Execution in the Kings-Bench was delivered by a Writ of the Chancery saving the Plaintiffs right to have Execution after the Parliament ended It was enacted by the universal Vote and Judgment as well of the Commons as the Lords that John Atwil a Burgess for Exeter being condemned during the Parliament in the Exchequer upon 8 several informations at the suit of John Taylor of the same City shall have as many Supersedeas as he will until his returning home King Henry 8. in the case of Trewyniard a Burgess of Parliament imprisoned upon an Outlawry after Judgment caused him to be delivered by a Writ of Priviledge upon an Action brought against the Executors and a demurrer it was resolved by the Judges to be Legal George Ferrers Gent. servant of the King and a Burgesse of Parliament being arrested in London as he was going to the Parliament-house by a Writ out of the Court of Kings Bench in execution at the Suit of one White for the sum of 200 markes being the debt of one Walden which arrest being signifyed to Sir Tho. Moyle Knight Speaker of the House of Commons and to the Knight and Burgesses there an order was made that the Serjeant of the Mace attending the Parliament should go to the Compter and Demand the Prisoner which the Clerks and Officers refusing from stout words they fell to blows whereof ensued a fray not without hurt so as the said Serjeant was forced to defend himself with his Mace and had the Crown thereof broken off by bearing off a stroak and his Servant struck down which broil drawing thither the 2 Sheriffs of London who did not heed or value the Serjeants complaint and misusage so much as they ought but took their Officers parts so as the Serjeant returning without the Prisoner informed the Speaker of the House of Commons how rudely they had entertained him who took the same in so ill part that they all together some of whom were the Kings privy Councel as also of the Kings privy Chamber resolved to sit no longer without their Burgess but left their own house and went to the House of Peers and declared by the mouth of their Speaker before Sir Thomas Audley Knight then Lord Chancellor and all the Lords Judges there assembled the whole matter such no Estates they believed themselves to be who Judging the contempt to be very great referred the punishment thereof to