Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	good_a	king_n	time_n	3,385	5	3.4149	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76827	An answer to the late scandalous and libellous pamphlet, entituled, A complaint to the House of Commons; and resolution taken up by the free Protestant subjects of the cities of London and Westminster, and the counties adjacent. Wherein 'tis proved, that the Lord Major of London doth not usurp his office; but is a legall major, and obedience ought to be given him. / By Peter Bland of Grays-Inne, Gent.	Bland, Peter, of Gray's Inne.	1643 (1643)	Wing B3160; Thomason E244_36; ESTC R4975	8,071	16

AN ANSWER TO The late Scandalous and Libellous PAMPHLET ENTITULED A COMPLAINT to the House of Commons And Resolution taken up by the free Protestant Subjects of the Cities OF LONDON and WESTMINSTER and the Counties adjacent Wherein 't is proved that the Lord MAjOR of London doth not usurp his Office but is a Legall Major and obedience ought to be given him By PETER BLAND of Grays-Inne Gent. London Printed for JOHN FIELD 1643. To the Right Honorable and the most worthy to be for ever honoured ISAAC PENNINGTON Lord Major of the honorable City of LONDON and one of the Members of the House of COMMONS in Parliament assembled My LORD POsterity will by experience finde the Religious care of your Country which you have so zealously and wisely discharged and I am confident that your Lordships Memory will never meete a grave in coming Ages And when those that are now enemies to our wished Reformation shall be made sensible of their errors they 'le be ready to free me from flattery I have endeavoured to give an Answer to that Libellous Pamphlet and it being but weakely performed I present it to your Lordship not for its worth but as an expression of that service I owe your Lordship for being so faithfull and dutifull a son to your distressed mother ENGLAND My Lord I beg no boon but your acceptance and lest your Lordship should suspect an insinuating end in this bold attempt I shall crave leave of your Lordship to go as I came that is to remain Your Lordships faithfull but unknown Servant The Answer to the Book entituled A Complaint to the House of COMMONS c. Complaint IN the third Page it is thus penn'd We have seen and perused many Remonstrances Declarations and Votes and Ordinances and our vote upon them all is That it had bin happy for us more advantagious to our Religion and more honourable to our Nation if they had bin strangled in the birth and never walked abroad in the light and that it will never be well with us or the Kingdom untill that they be buried in oblivion Answer The Author did here passe a Vote in the name of the Cities of London and Westminster with no lesse ignorance then impudence and blaming the PARLIAMENT he saith it had been happier for us and our Religion if they had not put out such Remonstrances or Votes and truely if I am not mistaken in the Author whom I guesse to be some Jesuit or Roman Priest or at least a Catholique I must confesse he is in the right for without doubt had not the Parliament bin it had bin better for the Roman Catholique cause which hath bin a long time in hopes of a good successe and which is daily endeavoured to be promoted witnesse the Queens practise with the Prince of Orange and others in Holland and other Countries besides the severall Commissions that the King hath given to severall Papists to authorize them for the raising of an army of their own Religion But for the honour which our Author sayes it had been to our Nation if those Declarations had never bin I believe hee meant if there had bin no just cause for those Declarations which have mentioned nothing but what was justified and proved either by writings signed with the Kings own hand or by oaths from men of credit which have received unlawfull commands from the KINGS owne mouth so that I may justly use those words which the Author uses in that third Page viz. There are Conjurers abroad which do the utmost of their skill to raise evill Spirits and that we shall never be at quiet till those Spirits are laid which can be done by no way now but the sword unlesse we should ground our peace upon the Kings word which like the laying of a spirit in all probability would endure but seven yeers at most Complaint In the third Page likewise these words are pennd viz. Our Estates were taken away under the gentle terms of Benevolences and Loanes where the choice was either to part with our Estates and Land or lye in Prison Answer 'T was a grosse mistake in the Author with whom none do joyne in complaint but such as possesse nought for the Honourable City of London which he abuseth by complaining in its name would never have bin so zealous for Gods cause if they had disliked the Parliaments proceedings but 't is commonly the cheators practise to go in an honest mans name to colour his falsehood besides our estates were never taken away 't was only the twentieth part of our Estates and if the Author had lookt back into former times he should have found this no new device for he should have found that at the Assembly of the States at Lambeth which was at the end of that yeer of the Parliament of Westminster which was in the sixteenth yeer of the then King that the King had the fortieth part of every mans goods given him freely towards his debts Besides Edward the first the son of Henry the third had in his third yeer given him the fifteenth part of all goods which is more then you are taxed at and yet this is for the King and Kingdom too In his eighteenth yeer he had the eleventh part of all moveable goods within the Kingdom in his nineteenth yeer he had the tenth part of all Church-livings in England and in the latter end of his three and twentieth yeer he had the tenth part of all goods of all the Burgesses and of the Commons And now likewise the Parliament do not free themselves from those taxes they put upon the Kingdom In the five and twentieth yeer of his Raign he had an eighteenth part of the goods of the Burgesses and of the people in generall the tenth part so then the Parliaments favoured themselves more then the people and their Countries and yet they were never murmured at as this Parliament is by the Author though in every taxe they bear an equall charge nay in some taxes this Parliament they have laid the greatest burden upon their own shouldiers Ordering that what Tenants paid their Landlords should bate it out of their Rent and if so then they being all Landlords must needs bear a greater part then others In the three and thirtieth yeer of his Raign he confirm'd the Great Charter of his own Royall Disposition and then he had given him for one yeer the fifth part of the revenues of all the land and of the Citizens the sixt part of their goods and divers other Presidents I could give you whereby you might see that other Parliaments in former times have not bin so fearfull of over-burthening the Subjects as this happy Parliament hath been Complaint In the fourth Page the Author goes forward viz. When we found this pressure we ran to the Law for protection but found by wofull experience that innocency was a worse crime then fellony for he that was committed for fellony was admitted to Bayle whilst he

that was committed upon no cause was upon his habeas corpus remanded and committed to prison Answer The Author doth here accuse the Parliament most foolishly and unjustly for every one that knowes the Parliament meddles not with cases of Fellony they being summoned to treat of things of a higher nature and there being inferiour Courts for the punishment of such crimes must needs suppose that he means the Judges though he seeks to set the people in direct opposition to the Parliament but our English Subjects are not led away with good lines they all know the benefit of a Parliament and have ever found them the sure revengers of an injured cause and when Malignant Favourites have barred them from their appeal to their gracious and religiously meaning Prince the Parliament being not subject to delusion have alwayes been ready to receive their complaints And whereas he accuseth the Parliament of imprisoning those that are innocent 't is an unheard of impudence for him to make himselfe more able to discerne betweene guilt and innocency then the Parliament if he have it by relation onely or tradition that the Parliament do so hearesay will not appeare a sufficient excuse either to mittigate his punnishment or maintain his wisdome or if he speake in his owne cause onely as perchance he may let him know that wisemen will never owne him for a competent Judge And for the Squibb he puts upon the Lords he should have nominated them in particular and then every one would have known who he had meant But it seemes for those Lords that are here he aymed at none of them else he would not have stucke to name them as well as my Lord Maior and others which he hath named And for the Lords that are with the King t is likely he meant not them for he knows that a generall plunder will be sufficient to pay particular debts but which of either he meant the abuse of Peerage deserves a sharper revenge then those new Prisons which he saith the Lords have found out to make their sentences appeare more severe Complaint In the fift page it is thus penned viz. It afflicts us to think of the pressures we underwent by new Imposts and that involuntary dangerous president of 40. s. per tun upon Wine Answer By this 't is made apparent what life he leades and what conversation he is of could he find nothing worth his complaint but that and yet for the taking away of that his grievance can he shew no greater a signe of thankfulnesse to the Parliament then scandalizing their just proceedings endeavouring to render them odious to the Common people who are the onely evidences that the Common People can shew for their enjoyment of what they call their owne for how soone had those small possessions which the poore enjoy bin throwne downe to build great Pallaces for the reaching Pollititians in their rooms had not the Parliament like a brazen wall defended them against those Rebellious Traytors who quite forget that the Subjects giue nothing to the King for the Kingdomes use but with adjunction of their own Interests interlacing in one and the same Act His Majesties reliefe and their owne Liberties which they never doe out of suspition of the Kings Piety or out of a feare of any ill that the King will do but fearing what wicked Councell may by possibility perswade him to doe Complaint In the 6. page it is thus penned viz. If it had not beene thought otherwise fit by the States we should never have denied the Bishops a place in the Lords House in Parliament And though their Votes in Parliament be gone which for the manner of carriage in taking them away if all be true that we heare was not so well as we could have wished for the Honour of that great Court Answer What an abominable lye stands the Author guilty of for he saith the City of London could have wished the Bishopps might have still enjoyed their places in the Lords House when as the City Petition against them and Popish Lords is yet extant the King himselfe would no way justifie the Author in that particular though he hath not stood to accuse them all or some of them with Bribes o● in indirect dealing for He Himselfe did passe the Bill for taking away their Votes so that now t is become an Act or Law And let any knowing man judge how ignorant and immodest the Author is in speaking against that which is enacted it being contrary to the Order of the House to speake then besides the reasons were fully debated by both sides and in both the Houses and yet the Author hath shewed himselfe guilty of so little discretion as to tax both the King the Lords and the Commons for doing that and shewes not wherein they erred in doing it Onely he makes a hearsay ground for exceptions against the Superiour and highest Court that this world hath given us leave to appeale to Complaint The Author goes forward and in his 6. page saith in the name of the two Cities That our losses were not small if the losse of Property Liberty Life or Religion bee great Answer 'T is certaine the losse will be great if ever it happen but the two Cities are in a faire way thanks be to GOD and a good Parliament to keepe them Alas the danger of losing these is on tother sides prevailing for can any man be so mad as to suppose that this Parliament will give away that Liberty which some of these very Parliament Men have long since sweate for or at least their Ancestors with no little care procured why should we suppose that they are growne weary of their Estates or if they were have they not Children to ease them of that burthen or is it likely that they would envy they Children so much as to abridge them of the liberty they themselves have hitherto enjoyed as if they had surffeited and would free their Posterity from the like disease Complaint In the seventh Page of that Pamphlet it is thus penn'd viz. This Parliament to our thinking was called seasonably for our relief and the unhappy differences arisen in Scotland almost miraculously quieted and our Brethren of that Nation returned home peaceably but we must not forget that it cost us 300000. pounds which we could wish had bin spared Answer 'T is true that the calling of this Parliament was seasonable and so was the Act for not dissolving it but for the King to violate his own Act and dissolve this Parliament by force as is intended by his army were altogether untimely and though we are now in a greater distraction then ever yet the Parliament cannot be blamed by those of judgement for before thjngs were carryed according to the desire of those that caused them who being in authority did force an obedience from inferiour subjects none daring to oppose them till now this Parliament now the Parliament cannot so easily relieve us and correct those