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A93371
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A letter from Edinburgh, concerning the difference of the proceedings of the well-affected in Scotland from the proceedings of the Army in England.
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J. S.
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1648
(1648)
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Wing S40A; Thomason E536_11; ESTC R203454
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8,839
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15
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devolved upon those that now mannage it and Providence did so order it that this transaction fell out neer about the time when the Commissioners of Parliament were to be chosen and changed of course according to the Lawes and constant Practice of this Kingdome which is every yeare at Michaelmas whether there be a Parliament to sit or not Here then you see what that proceeding is upon which the pretence of an example to be taken from us is grounded and what appearance there is 〈◊〉 any such ground here all the Practices of our well-affected Party are necessary and commendable in all circumstances and most warrantable by all the Laws of God and man in this land as well Natural as Civill and Ecclesiasticall here all particular grievances are referred by all sides to be determined by a free Parliament here all the fundamentall Laws are entirely preserved here every thing hath been carried openly and professedly from the beginning to the end above board without any subtile undermining practices and here the least offer is not made by any for the faults of some to change and alter the frame of Government in the whole By all which if you consider matters ingenuously I suppose you will say that nothing will be found in your case parallel unto ours almost in any circumstance For if matters are carried amongst you as you intimate and others informe us and as by some papers may be conjectured they are or will be shortly I dare sadly prognosticate your fate that you will have the most disorderly and confused State that is this day in the world your condition will be worse then ours for though we were sadly oppressed and wickedly involved into an unjust engagement against England to our owne confusion yet the authors of our ruine were those that had some stamp of authority lawfully conferred upon them and there were lawes knowne and wayes practiceable and Instruments in a readinesse to redresse their exorbitances but if you fall under the power of those that are so farre from having right to authority that they can have no true stamp but that of servants woe be unto you the men that did disorder us were yet men of some sence and reason although they did drive their designes to the utmost furiously but no furie is like that of a combined unreasonable multitude whose interest is to have no rule standing what your lawes are to finde a redresse or what wayes you may have practiceable and what Instruments to follow them for your good I am not capable to judge but this I may guesse that the Leaders of your Army and their Agitatâ—rs that lie under deck having gone so farre will not cease and in all likelihood will resolve to stick at nothing that may stand in their way of racing the present foundations that they may stand alone The old Maxime of Caesar is sad one Si violandum est jus Regnandi causa violandum est in caeteris Pietatem colito When men have not the feare of God before their eyes it is naturall for them to deifie themselves and whatever they imagine then subordinate to that end which they have set up to themselves and for themselves as best and supreme they thinke that only good and lawfull and every thing else abominable upon this ground they will easily dispense with themselves and their consciences to do evill that good may come of it And because the good which they seem to aime at is a Libertine not properly Government but correspondencie and equality that they will sacrifice if they be true to their Principles all matters of Rule and Order both divine and humane and all Obligations and engagements both naturall morall and conscionable unto this Idoll And in so doing they will thinke themselves not only justifyable but glorious And because the way of power is only left unto them to compasse their glorious designes they will think all lawfull what can be done that way and the more glory due to themselves the more they can crush others but I pray God these Predictions may never prove true in those men whom you know I have truly counted worthy of esteem and for whose miscarriages I should be much afflicted in many respects partly for their great and many good parts partly for their deserts in a good cause and the honour they have merited hitherto of all the well-affected thereunto and particularly of us here of late in Scotland which I would not have them stain with any disorderlinesse partly and especially lest their miscariages in this kind give the greatest wound unto Religion that can be given by any in this age This would grieve me to the heart And when I think on what I begin to see and hear from you and others and remember that they are but men as others I tremble at the presages of my grief But these sad and passionate considerations do make this Letter too big and have made me almost forget the Parallel which I was about to make or rather to leave unto you to make if any such thing can be found between the late proceedings of our Worthies here and the present undertakings of your Army there For whether your consider the persons that are Actors in the businesse on both sides here and there or the Actions which they undertake or the way and manner of their proceeding therein or the things which they professedly aim at or the means which they use to bring the same to passe I am sure there will be nothing found in our men that hath any resemblance to yours and consequently nothing that can give them an example for what they do or any ground in comparison with us to alter your State The persons who acted with authority our affairs here on the one side were a Quorum of nine Committee-men and those that have right to authority among you are none but the Parliament And what difference there is between that great body of Representatives and our Nine men judge ye On the other side here the Actors were the Peeres and Noblemen of the Kingdome joyned with the Commissioners of Shires and Burroughs whom the Covenanters protected from danger as they were bound to do And the Actors on the other side with you are the Officers Souldiers of your Army Now what difference there is in the right of the one the other to act in cases of publike grievance against those that are in Authority judge ye by what I have formerly laid concerning our Lawes and by this That no Souldiers or Army in the world can have any right or lawfull calling before God or the world either to be together or to act in any thing otherwise then as they are the Servants of those that have chosen them to be an Army which is with you the Parliament Our Noblemen Commissioners and Covenanters acted defensively according to Law for the redresse of disorders ruinous to the State but your Army is in a way of
A LETTER FROM EDINBURGH Concerning The difference of the Proceedings of the Well-affected in SCOTLAND From the Proceedings of The ARMY in ENGLAND LONDON Printed in the Yeare 1648. A Letter from EDINBURGH Concerning the difference of the Proceedings of the Well-affected in Scotland from the Proceedings of the ARMY in England Dated the 19. of Decemb. 1648. SIR I Am much troubled and amazed at that which you relate concerning the late proceedings of your England ARMY but most of all at the pretences which are used to colour the same which are That they follow the example which hath been given them here in Scotland and that they act the Resolutions which our Marquesse of Arguile and your Lieutenant-Generall did conclude at their last meeting Which are things so far dissonant not only from truth but from all likelyhood that I dare confidently say nothing could have been devised either more falfly or with lesse appearance As for the Marquesse I dare pawn all that I am worth in this world that our Noble and faithful Marquesse who hath so freely and often hazarded himself and all that he hath for the true interest of Scotland in maintaining the National Covenant did never agree to any of those undertakings you mention your Army set upon which are most directly opposite to all the purposes and intents of our Covenant For in stead of the Reformation and settlement of Religion it is evident that your men intend to settle nothing but rather to unsettle all both in Church and State by an universal Toleration of all Religions In stead of maintaining the Priviledges of Parliament as the supreme Judicature of your Kingdome they break it in peeces and setling themselves as Judges over it over the King and over the whole Kingdom they effectively undertake to dissolve it Instead of defending the King and his Authority in the preservation and defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the Kingdoms they set themselves to destroy him and his Race and will have an elective King or none at all Thus the three first Articles of the Covenant are utterly made void In stead of bringing evil Instruments that hinder the Reformation of Religion and divide between the King and his people to condigne punishment their whole way is to overturn that which is setled in the Reformation of Religion and to make a Faction dividing the King from his people which is against the 4. and 5. Articles Nor can they by the principles which they follow be faithful to the 6. Article thereof which is to defend and assist the Covenanters but they rather will become the chief prosecutors of the same Now I am sure that neither my Lord of Argyle nor any of those that manage the publique affairs here at this time would ever give way to any designs from which such breaches of Covenant might ensue nay our zeal and sincerity for the Covenant and for the settlement of all things according to it will be found such That whatever the Kings concessions may be to you or us upon the ratification of a Peace nothing will be satisfactory except the whole matter of the Covenant be approved and the taking thereof be confirmed and enjoyned by Law not being left Arbitrary or to come in under an Act of Oblivion and except also Episcopacie be utterly extirpated root and branch for ever whereupon you seem not to stand much at this present These things are so unalterably determined in our Councels and such fundamental grounds amongst us that it is not possible that those Advices by which your men are acted can have had either their beginning or ever will have their approbation from us or from any that are faithfull to us such as we know the Marquesse of Argile to be As for the other pretence That this undertaking of your Army is done by our example in these our last troubles It is a most notorious falshood and a most injurious calumny against us For which cause I think my self bound to let you see the contrary and how far our actions differ from that which is related of your Army Be pleased therefore to take notice that in all our late proceedings the Party well-affected to the Covenant who were disaffected to the Engagement never made any violent or tumultuous opposition against the Councels of the Parliament but whiles matters were in deliberation the greatest part of the people of this Kingdom petitioned only against the designes of the major part of Parliament which did pursue an Engagement against England contrary to the Covenant and Treaties And when the thing was brought to a result the well-affected Members of Parliament dissented and protested according to the practise of this Kingdom against the engagement Nor did the well-affected here make ever any opposition to the Parliament it self whose Authority is sacred and supreme amongst us whiles they carried on maters which they had resolved Nor was there any opposition made to the councels of the Committee of Estates nor ever any wrong offered to them in their persons but all the opposition which was made was afterward made against a few persons of the Committee of Estates whose illegal proceedings and actual oppression being intolerable they were resisted not only in a way justifiable by the necessity of natural defence but even conformable to the Law of the Land Concerning the Persons which the Parliament nominated to be a Committee of Estates they were above an hundred but when the Parliament was ended Nine of those alone were packt to make a Quorum which could meet at all occasions and did over-rule the whole Kingdome most illegally and tyrannically First their illegal proceedings were such That contrary to all Law they took upon them to impede the execution of Acts of Parliament a power never given unto them nor that could be committed unto any for how can it be supposed that ever any Parliament would or lawfully could give to Deputies a power to alter or suspend the Lawes of the Kingdome and standing Acts of Parliament They caused divers Subjects to take the Oath ex Officio A thing wholly contrary to the Laws of this Kingdome They gave Order to denounce the Marquesse of Argile Rebel before any charge given in against him and other things of this nature were done by them to others whom they did processe for Treason upon a general accusation without setting downe the particulars and without producing any accusers which even the abetters of their owne Councellors were ashamed of Secondly Their actuall Oppressions were such that they caused Souldiers to quarter upon the well-affected with so much cruelty as that in the space of fourteen dayes they exacted in some places to the value of seven years rent by which meanes some families were dissolved and ruined yea they killed women that resisted their insolent and unruly carriages and offered violence to Ministers preaching in the Pulpit interrupting Divine-Worship All which was done without any hope of redresse when petitioned