and a Regiment of the train-bands of Foot to be for a guard unto him caused the oath of Allegiance to be administred unto them But the Parliament thereupon Vote that it appeared the King seduced by wicked Counsell intended to make a war against them and til then if their own Votes should be true must acquitt him from any thing more then an intention as they call it to do it And whosoever should assist him are Traitors by the fundamentall Laws of the Kingdom The Earl of Essex Lord Chamberlain of the Kings Houshould and all other of the Kings Houshould Servants forbid to go to him and the Kings putting some of them out and others in their places Voted to be an injury to the Parliament Messengers were sent for the apprehending of some Earls and Barons about him and some of his Bed-Chamber as if they had been Fellons The Lord Keepers going to him with the great Seal when he sent for him Voted to be a breach of priviledge and pursued with a warrant directed to all Mayors Bayliffs to apprehend him Cause the Kings Rents and Revenues to be brought in to them and forbid any to be paid him Many of his Officers and Servants put out of their places for being Loyall unto him and those that were ill affected to him put in their Rooms and many of his own Servants tempted and procured by rewards and maintenance to tarry with them and be false and active against him The twenty sixt day of May 1642. a Declaration is sent to the King but printed and published before he could receive it That Whatsoever they should Vote is not by Law to bee questioned either by the King or Subjects No precedent can limit or bound their proceedings A Parliament may dispose of any thing wherein the King or peopl have any right The Soveraign power resides in both Houses of Parlament The King hath no Negative voyce The levying of Warre against the personall commands of the King though accompanied with his presence is not a levying of Warre against the King but a levying War against his Laws and authority which they have power to Declare is levying of War against the King Treason cannot be committed against his person otherwise then as he was intrusted They have power to judge whether he discharge his trust or not that if they should follow the highest precedents of other Parliaments Paterns there would be no cause to complain of want of modesty or duty in them and that it belonged only to them to judge of the Law 27 Of May The King by his Proclamation forbids all his Subjects and trayned bands of the Kingdom to Rise March or Muster But the Parliament on the same day Command all Sheriffs Justices of the Peace and Constables within one hundred 50 miles of York to seize and make stay of all Armes and Amunition going thither And Declaring the said Proclamation to bee voyd in Law Command all men to Rise Muster and March and not to Muster or March by any other Authority or Commission and the Sheriffs of all Counties the morrow after Commanded with the posse Comitatus to suppress any of the Kings Subjects that should be drawn thither by his Command Secure and seize upon the Magazines of the Counties Protect all that are Delinquents against him make all to be Delinquents that attend him and censure and put out of the House of Peers nine Lords at once for obeying the Kings summons and going to him 3 June 1642. The King summoning the Ministers Gentry and Free-holders of the County of York declared to them the reasons of providing himselfe a guard and that he had no intention to make a War and the morrow after forbad the Lord Willoughby of Parham to Muster and train the County of Lincolne who under colour of an Ordinance of Parlament for the Militia had began to do it 10. June 1642. The Parlament by a Declaration signifying That the King intended to make a War against his Parlament invited the Citizens of London and all others well affected as they pleased to miscall them within eighty miles of the City to bring money and plate into the Guild-Hall London and to subscribe for Men Horses and Arms to maintain the Protestant Religion the Kings Person and Authority free course of Justice Laws of the Land and priviledges of Parlament and the morrow after send 19 propositions to the King That the great affairs of the Kingdom and Militia may be mannaged by consent and approbation of Parlament all the great Officers of Estate Privy Councell Ambassadors and Ministers of State and Judges to be chosen by them that the Government Education and Marriage of the Kings Children be by their consent and approbation and all the Forts and Castles of the Kingdome under the Command and Custody of such as they should approve of and that no Peers to be made hereafter should sit or vote in Parliament without the consent of Parliament with several other demands which if the King should have granted would at once in effect not onely have undone and put his subjects out of his protection but have deposed both himself and his posterity and then they would proceed to regulate his Revenue and deliver up the Town of Hull into such hands as the King by consent and approbation of Parliament should appoint But the King having the same day before those goodly demands came to his hands being a greater breach of his former priviledges then his demanding of the five Members and Kimbolton it it had not been lawfull for him so to doe could be of theirs granted a Commission of Array for the County of Leicester to the Earl of Huntington and by a letter sent along with it directed it for the present onely to Muster and Array the Trained Bands And 13. June 1642. Declared to the Lords attending him at York That he would not engage them in any War against the Parliament unless it were for his necessary defence whereupon the L. Keeper Littleton who a little before had either been affrighted or seduced by the Parliament to vote their new Militia The Duke of Richmond Marquess Hartford Earl of Salisbury Lord Gray of Ruthen now Earl of Kent and divers Earls and Barons engaged not to obey any Order or Ordinance concerning the Militia had not the Royal assent to it And fourteenth of June 1642. Being informed That the Parliament endeavoured to borrow great summs of money of the City of London and that there was great labour used to perswade his Subjects to furnish horse and money upon pretence of providing a guard for the Parliament By his letter to the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Sheriffs of London disavowing any purpose of making a War declared That He had not the least thought of raising or using of Forces unless he should be compelled to doe it for his own defence and forbiddeth therefore the lending of money or raising
but not the English for they were the Kings Subjects and are to be reckoned as Traytors not strangers And the Parliaments own advice to the King to suppress the Irish Rebels that ploughed but with their own Heyfer and pretended as they did to defend their Religion Laws and Liberties and the opinion also of Mr. President Bradshaw as Sir John Owen called him in his late sentence given against the Earls of Cambridge Holland and Norwich Lord Capel and Sir John Owen whom he mistakenly God and the Law knows would make to be the Subjects of their worfer fellow-Subjects may be enough to turn the question out of doors But lest all this should not be thought sufficient to satisfie those can like nothing but what there is Scripture for we shall a little turn over the leaves of that sacred Volume and see what is to be found concerning this matter Moses who was the meekest Magistrate in the world and better acquainted with him that made the fifth Commandement than these that now pretend Revelations against it thought fit to suppress the rebellion of Corah Dathan and Abiram as soone as he could and for no greater offence than a desire to be coordinate with him procured them to be buried alive with all that appertained unto them When Absolom had rebelled against his father David and it was told him That the hearts of the men of Israel were after him David a man after Gods own heart without any message of peace or Declaration sent unto his dear son Absolom or offering half or any part of his Kingdome to him sent three several Armies to pursue and give him battell When Sheba the sonne of Bichri blew a Trumpet and said We have no part in David every man to his tent O Israel and thereupon every man of Israel followed after him and forsook their King David who knew that Moses would not make a War upon the Amorites though he had Gods commandement for it without offers of peace and messengers sent first unto them said to Amasa Assemble me the men of Judah within three daies and when he tarried longer said unto him Take thou thy Lords Servants and pursue after him lest he get him fenced Cities and escape us For they that would take heed of Cocatrices have ever used to kill them in the shell And diligenti cuique Imperatori ac magistrains danda est opera saith Bodin ut non tam seditiones tollere quam praeoccupare student For sedition saith he once kindled like a span of fire blown by popular fury may sooner fire a whole City than be extinguished Et tales igitur pestes opprimere derepenté necessâ— est Princes and Soveraigns who are bound to protect and defend their Subjects are not to stand still and suffer one to oppress another and themselves to be undone by it afterwards But put the case the Parliament could have been called a Parliament when they had driven away the King which is the Head and Life of it or could have been said to have been two Houses of Parliament when there was not at that time above a third part of the House of Peers nor the half of the House of Commons remaining in them and what those few did in their abfence was either forced by a Faction of their own or a party of seditious Londoners for indeed the Warre rightly considered was not betwixt the Parliament and the King but a War made by a factious and seditious part of the Parliament against the King and the major part of the Parliament and had been as it never was nor could be by the Laws and Constitutions of the Kingdom coordinate and equal with the King and joint-tenanâ—â— of the Kingdom it would have been necessary to make â— War as just as they could and to have done all that had been in order to it and therefore we hope they which pretend so much to the Justice of the Kingdom will not be offended to have the Justice of their Wars somthing examined CHAP. IV. Suppose the Warre to be made with a neighbour-Prince or between equals Whether the King or Parliament were in the defensive or justifyabie part of it PLâ—rique saith learned Grotius tres statuunt bellorum justas causas defensionem recuperationem punttionem For any defence the Parliament might pretend a necessity of The King neither assaulted them nor used any violence to them when they first of all granted out their Propositions and Commissions of War unIess they can turn their jealousies into a Creed and make the Kings demanding the five Members and Kimbolton being done by warrant of the Law of the Land and the Records and precedents of their own Houses appear to be an assaulting of them Or if any reasonable man knew but how to make that to be an assault or a necessary cause of War for them to revenge it the Kings waving and relinquishing of his charge afterwards against them might have certainly been enough to have taken away the cause of it if there had been any howsoever a Warâ— made onely to revenge a bare demand or request of a thing and was neither so much as forced or a second time demanded of them but totally laid aside and retracted can never be accounted just As for the recovery of things lost or taken away The Parliament it self had nothing taken from them for both they and the people were so far from being loosers at that time by the King as the Remonstrance of the house of Commons made to the people 15. December 1641. of the Kings erroun as they please to call them in the government but indeed the errours rather of his Ministers and themselves also in busying him with brawles and quarrells and denying to give him fitting supplies mentions how much and how many benficeial Laws the King had granted them And so the Parliament and People being no loosers and the King never denying them any thing could in honour oâ— conscience be granted them That part of the justifying of a War will no way also belong to them But if the punishment for offences and injuries past if they could be so properly called being a third cause of justifying a War could be but imagined to be a cause to justifie the Parliaments war against the King Yet they were to remember another Rule or Law of War Ne nimis veteres causae accersentur That they do not pick quarrels by raking up past grievances that it be not propter leviusculas injurias or for trifles For when the King who if he had been no more then coordinate with them had called them to Councell to to advise him followed their advice in every thing he could find any reason for taken away all grievances made a large provision to prevent them for the future by granting the Trienniall Parliament and so large an amends for every thing they could but tell how to complain of there was so little left to the
People and the Parliament to quarrell for as they were much behind in thankfulness for what they had got of him already Or if any other causes or provocations should be imagined as misusing the Parliaments Messengers or the like we know the King unlesse it were by his patience and often Messages for peace was guilty of no provocations but on the contrary though hee had all manner of scornes and reproaches cast upon him and his messengers evil entreated by them could never be brought to return or retaliate it to any of theirs But nothing as yet serving to excuse them It will not be amiss to examine the causes as they are set down by themselves to justifie their war and so we may well suppose there are no other A war against the King for safety of his own Person was needless and then it comes within that rule of war and law of Nations Ne leves sint causae beâ—li not to make a warre unnecessary for the King would look to that himself and as they were his Subjects they as well as every honest Subject were bound to defend and assist him but not whether he would or no and in such a way of defence as would tend to his ruâ—ne rather then his safety For â—urely should any stranger of another Kingdom or Nation have casually passed by Edge-hill when the Kings and the Parliaments 〈◊〉 were in fight and have been told that the King shot at them for the safety of his own Person and that they also shot against hiâ— for the safety of his own Person and being aâ—ked which of the two parties hee believe did really or most of all intend the safety of it we cannot tell how to think any man such a stranger to nature reason or understanding as to think the King should not fight as the Dictates of nature perswaded him to or that the King could tell how to fight against those that fought for him or that if he should be so hugely mistaken in that one year or Battell he should be in severall â—â—her years and Battells after To 〈…〉 the deâ—ence of the Religion establishâ—d as they made also the people believe that was as needless when the King offered to do every thing might help to promote it and they are so little also to be credited in that pretence as we know they did all they could from the beginning to ruine it took away Episcopacy the hedge and bounds of it brought in Presbytery to preach up and aid their Rebellion and when their own turnes were served encouraged Conventicles and Tub Preachers to â—ud down the Presbytery And being demanded at the Treaty at Vxbridge by the Kings Commissioners what Religion they would have the King to establish were so unprovided of an answer as they could not resolve what to nominate nor in any of their propositions afterwards sent to the King though often urged and complained oâ— oy the Scottish Commissioners could ever find the way to doe it but have now set up an Independent extemporary enthusiastick kind of worshiping God if there were any such thing in it or rather a religious Chaos or gallimaufry of all manner of heresie errours blasphemies and opinions put together not any of the owners of which we can be confident will subscribe to that opinion that Wars may be made for Religion or that Conscience ought to be forced by it As for the restrictive part of the Lawes to keep the people in subjection we can very well perswade our selves no such War was ever made yet in the world nor any people ever found that would engage in a War for that they obeyed but against their wills And for that part of the law that gives them the Kings protection priviledges immunities and certainties of deciding controversies which are more fitly to be called the Liberâ—ies of tbe people than to have 45. of the house of Commons or a Faction to make daily and hourly Lawes and Religion and Government and vote their estates in and out to pay an Army to force their obedience to it if we had not outlived the Parliaments disguises and pretences saw them now tearing up by the roots that there may be no hope of their growing up again and setting up their own as well as the ignorant and illiterate fancies of Mechanicks and Souldiers in stead of them we might have said that also had been needless when the King had done abundantly enough already and offered to grant any thing more could in reason be demanded of him And as touching their priviledges of Parliament they that understand but any thing of the Lawes of England or have but looked into the Records and Journals of Parliament can tell that all priviledges of Parliament as King James said were at first bestowed upon them by the Kings and Princes of this Kingdom That priviledges of Parliament extended not to Treason or Felony or breach of the Peace That 32 Hen. 6. Sir Thomas Thorp Speaker of the House of Commons being arrested in execution in the time of the prorogation of the Parliament the Commons demanded he might be set at liberty according to their priviledges wherupon the Judges being asked their Councel therein made answer That general supersedeas of Parliament there was none but special supersedeas there was in which case of special supersedeas every member of the House of Com-of Commons ought to enjoy the same unles in causes of Treason Felony or breach of the Peace or for a CondeÌ„mnation before the Parliament After which answer it was determined that the said Sir Thomas Thorp should lie in execution and the Commons were required on the behalf of the King to choose a new Speaker which they did and presented to the King accordingly That Queen Elizabeth was assured by her Judges that she might commit any of her Parliament during the Parliament for any offence committed against her Crown and Dignity and they shewed her precedents for it and that primo tertio Caroli Regis upon search of precedents in the several great cases of the Earls of Arundel and Bristol very much insisted and stood upon the House of Peers in Parliament allowed of the exception of Treason Felony and breach of the Peace For indeed it is as impossible to think there can be any priviledge to commit Treason as to think that a King should priviledge all his Nobility and every one of his Subjects that could get to be elected into the House of Commons in Parliament to commit Treason and to take away his life in the time of Parliament whensoever their revenge or malice or interest should finde the opportunity to do it or that if it could be so any King or Prince would ever call or summon a Parliament to expose himself to such a latitude of danger or give them leave to sit as long as they would to breed it or that priviledges of Treason can be consistent with the name or being of a Parliament to
consult or advise with the King for the defence of Him and his Kingdome or that when Felony and breach of Peace are excepted out of their priviledge Treason that is of a far higher nature consequence and punishment should be allowed them or if there could have been any such priviledge and a meaner man than their Soveraign had broke it a small understanding may inform them they could not without breach of the Peace have fought for it against a fellow-subject and then also could not their priviledges have reached to it but the King might have punished them for it and if they cannot upon a breach of priviledge as it was adjudged in Halls case without the Kings Writ and the cause first certified in Chancery deliver one of their own setvants arrested It is not likely any warrant can be found in Law to inforce the King to reparation though he himself should have broken it but to petition the King for an allowance of that or any other priviledge as well in the middle as any other time of their sitting in Parliament as they alwayes doe at the presenting of their Speaker in the beginning of it Wherefore certainly the people never gave the Parliament Commission if they could have given a Commission to make a War against their Soveraign to claim that was never due to them or to fight for that was never yet fought for by any of their Fore-fathers nor ever understood to be taken from them much less for their ayrie innovated pretences rather than priviledges which have since eaten up all the peoples Lawes and Liberties as well as a good part of their lives and estates with it and are now become to be every thing their Representatives will and and arbitrary power have a mind to make it who have so driven away their old legal priviledges by setting up illegal and fantastick kind of Priviledges as they are pleased to call them instead of them as there is nothing left of the Parliament like a Parliament neither matter nor form nor any thing at all remaining of it For the upper and lower Houses have driven away and fought against the King who was their Head the the lower after that have driven away the upper and 45. of the House of Commons whereof eleven are great Officers and Commanders of the Army have after that imprisoned and driven away four hundred of their fellow-members And from degenerate and distemperate piece of a Parliament brought themselves to be but a representative or journey-men-voters to a Councel of their own mercenary and mechanick Army and may sit another eight yeares before ever they shall be able to find a reason to satisfie any man is not a fool or a mad man or a fellow-sharer in the spoiles of an abused and deluded Nation Why the Kings demanding of the five Members and Kimbolton by undeniable warrant of the land and the Records and precedents of their own houses upon a charge or accusation of Treason for endeavouring amongst 〈◊〉 other pieces of Treason to alter the Government and subvert the fundamental Lawes of the Kingdome which the Parliament and they themselves that were accused have more than once declared to be Treason should be taken to be so great a breach of priviledge in the King their Soveraign when the forcing and over a wing the Houses of Parliament by the Army their servants and hirelings demanding the eleven Members and imprisoning and banishing some of them upon imaginary and fantastical offences committed against themselves or they could not tell whom shall be reckoned to be no breach at all of priviledge and the forcing of the Houses by the same Army within a year afterwards by setting guards upon them violently pulling two of the Members of the House of Commons out of the House and imprisoning them and 39 more of their fellow-members all night in an Alehouse and leading them afterwards to several prisons with guards set upon them as if they had been common malefactors can be called mercies and deliverances and a purging and taking away rotten Members out of the House of Commons But now that we can find nothing to make a defensive or lawful nor so much as a necessary War on the Parliaments part for causa belli saith Besoldus correspondere debet damno periculo the Parliament feares and jealousies were not of weight enough to put the people into a misery far beyond the utmost of what their feares and jealousies to them did amount unto we shall do well to examine by the rules and laws of War and Nations the ways and means they used in it Injustum censetur bellum si non ejus penes quem est Majestas authoritate moveatur a war cannot be just if it be not made by a lawful authority Armorum delatio prohibitio ad Principem spectat It belongs to the Prince to raise or forbid Arms and the Records of the Parliament which we take to be a better sense of the House then their own purposes can inform them that the Prelates Earls Barons and Commonalty of the Realm did in the seventh year of the reign of King Edw. the First declare to the King That it belongeth and his part is through His Royal Signorie streightly to defend force of Armour and of Armour and all other force against his Peace when it shall please him and to punish them which shall do the contrary according to the Laws and usages of the Realm and that thereunto they were bound to aid their Soveraign Lord the King at all seasons when need shall be How much ado then will they have to make a War against their Soveraign to bee Lawfull or if by any Warrant of Laws Divine or Humane they could but tell how to absolve themselvs from their oaths of Supremacy Allegiance and their very many protestations and acknowledgements of Subjection to the King find a Supream authority to be in the People at the same time they not only stiled themselves but all those they represented to be his Subjects Or how will they bee able to produce a warrant from the People their now pretended Soveraigns till they shall be able sufficiently to enslave them to authorize them to make a War to undo them when they elected them but to consent to such things as should be treated of by the King and his Kingdom Or how could a tenth part of the people give warrant to them to fight against the King and the other nine parts of the people Or can that bee a good warrant when some of them were cheated and the other by plunderings and sequestrations forced to yield to it Or could the pretence of a War for defence of the Kings person and to maintain the Religion Laws and Liberties of the people be a warrant to the Parliament which never sought any for the King and People but to take away the Soveraignty from the one and the Liberties of the other to do every thing was
battell of Naseby insomuch as their fellow Rebells the Scotch Commissioners did heavily complain of it were at severall times trifled away and spent before any propositions could be made ready though those which they sent to Oxford Uxbridge New-castle and Hampton Court were but substantially and materially the same with their nineteen Propositions which they made unto the King before the Earl of Essex was made their General and in all the Treaties made Propositions for themselves and the Soveraignty and great offices and places of the Kingdome but would neither for Gods sake or their Kings sake or their Oaths or Conscientes sak or the Peoples sake or Peace sake which the People petitioned and hungred and thirsted for alter or abate one Jota or tittle of them but were so unwilling to have any peace at all as six or seven Messengers or Trumpeters could come from the King before they could be at leisure or so mannerly as to answer one of them but this or that Message from the King was received and read and laid by till a week or when they would after and the Kings Commissioners in the Treaties must forget their due titles of Earles Lords or Knights because the King had made them so since the beginning of the War or else must be neither Treaty nor Peace there At Uxbridge the time of the Treaty limited for 20. days and at New-Castle for 10. and though the King and his Commissioners at Uxbridge almost petioned for a cessation in the interim of that which was at Oxford it could not be granted nor have a few dayes added to it and if the King could in honor and conscience have granted all the other parts of the Propositions must grant them an act not only to consiscate the Estates of his Friends and those that took up armes to save his Life and Estate but to take away their Lives also and not only that but to condemn of high Treason attaint their blood when they that fought against them were only guiltâ— a thing so unfitting and unusually stood upon as it was never asked in any treaty or pacification among the civilized or mor barbarous heathen and amounts to more then Adonibezeks causing the thumbs and great toes of his captive Kings to be cut off and making them to gather the Crumbs from under his table or Benhadads demand of Ahabs silver and gold his wives and Children and whatsoever was pleasant in his eyes which the Elders and people of Israel perswaded Ahab not to consent unto but was a thing purposely contrived and stood upon to hinder a peace was not to be asked or granted by any that could but intitle themselves to the least part of reason or humanity a demand Bajazet would not leave his Iron-Cage to yield unto a thing nature it selfe would abhor and the worst of Villains and Reprobates rather loose their lives then yield to would never be demanded by any nor granted by any but his Equalls And if their desiring of a War more then a peace and to keep the King out of his own had not been the onely cause of such unnaturall and barbarous propositions it may well be wondred why they that have made to themselves for we cannot believe they have found any law or warrant to ground it upon a power to take away the Kings life upon a colour or pretence of an unread as well as unheard of piece of Justice should need to strive so hard with the King to give them a power to do that they are now so bufie to do of themselves and as if they had been afraid all this would not be enough to keep the doors of Janus or the Devill open for fear lest the King should trouble them with any more offers or Messages of Peace a vote must be made in February 1647. that it should be treason in any man to bring or receive any more Messages from him without consent of Parliament But suppose that which is not that the Parliament could have but found any thing but some what like a cause or justification of a War against their Soveraign for notwithstanding all their hypocriticall pretences so as it was at first intended and so it hath been proved to be ever since to whom their Masters the People we mean as to the house of Commons had sent them to consult with not to make a War against him they might have remembred that saying of Cicero if they had found nothing in the Book of God and their own Consciences to perswade them to it That duâ— sunt genera decertandi unum per disceptationem alterum per vim ad hoc confugiendum non est si uti superiori licebit There are other wayes to come by pretended rights than by a War and we ought never to make use of a War which is the worst of all remedies if we may obtain it by a better Hen. 2. King of England was made a Judge between the Kings of Castile and Navarre The Rebellious Barons of England in the Reign of King Hen. 3. referred their controversies to the decision of the King of France and his Parliament at Paris And the blood of this Kingdome which ran so plentifully in those unhappy differences was by that meanes onely stopped Charles the 4. Emperor was made a Judge of the differences betwixt the English and the French Kings For as Albericus Gentilis saith well Intelligendum eos qui diffugiunt genus hoc decertandi per disceptationem ad alterum quod est per vim currunt illico eos a justitia ab humanitate a probis exemplis refugere ruere in arma volentes qui subire judicium nullius velint They that rush into a War without assaying all other just meanes of deciding the controversie for which it is made and will judge onely according to their own will and opinion doe turn their backs to Justice Humanity and all good Examples And in that also the Parliament will be found faulty For the French King and the Estates of the united Provinces did by more than one Request and Embassy severally and earnestly mediate to make an accord betwixt the King and his Parliament and desired to have all things in difference left to their Arbitrement but their Ambassadors returned home again with a report how much they found the King inclined to it and how satisfactorily he had offered and how much the Parliament was averse to their interposition and altogether refused it But we have tarried long enough among the Parliament party from thence therefore for it is time to leave the company of so much wickedness we shall remove to the Kings party and yet that may cause a Sequestration and examine for a fuller satisfaction of that which by the rule of contraries is clear enough already if he were not on the defensive and more justifiable part of the business The King as he was Defensor Protector subditorum suorum
in the matter of fact hath hitherto among the wisest Princes and Commonwealths in the World been reputed a just and warrantable cause of War Homicide by the Lawes of England shall be excused with a fe defendendo when the assaulted hath but simply defended himself or retired in his own defence so far till by some water or wall he be hindred from going any further Death and destruction marching towards the King Hull fortified and kept behind him and all manner of necessitie compassing him in on every side could then doe no less then rouze him up to make his own defence and he must be as much without his senses as care of his own preservation if he should not then think it to be high time to make ready to defend himself and necessity enough to excuse him for any thing should be done in order to it The Parliament and He as this case stood could not be both at one and the same time in the defensive part For they had all the Money Arms Ammunition and strength of the Kingdom in their hands and multitudes of deluded people to assist them and so hunted and pursued from place to place as it was come to be a saying and a by-word among the apprentices and new levied men at London they would goe a King-catching and were not likely therefore to be guilty of so much patience as the King who was so much in love with peace and so thirsted after it as that and his often sending Messages and Propositions for it would not suffer him to make use of any victories or advantages God had given him Twice did he suffer the Earl of Essex to attempt to force him from Oxford and Sir Thomas Fairfax once to beleager him when he had Power enough to have made London or the associate Counties the Seat of the War and it would be something strange that he who when he had raised forces against his Scottish Rebels and found himself in the Head of so gallant an Army as he had much adoe to keep them from fighting and his enemies so ridiculously weak as he might have subdued them but with looking upon them but a fortnight longer could not be perswaded to draw a Sword against them would now begin an offensive warre without any power or strength at all against those that had before-hand ingrossed it or what policy or wisedome could it be in him to begin a War without Money or Men or Armes to goe through with it or to refuse the assistance of his Catholique Subjects and Forrain Friends and Forces or to spend so much time in Messages and offers of Peace to give them time and ability to disarm him and arm themselves if he had not utterly abhorred a War and as cordially affected peace as he offered fair enough for it Or if we could but tell how to say that the King did begin the War when what he did was but to preserve his Regality and the Militia and Protection of his people which the Parliament in express terms as well as by Petitioning for it acknowledged it to be his Own being but that which every private man that had but money or friends would not neglect to do Did he any more in seeking to preserve his Regality then to defend and keep himself from a breach of trust they fought to make him break Or did he any more then seek to defend himself against those did all they could to force him to break it or could there be a greater perjury or breach of trust in the Kingly office than to put the Sword which God had given him into the hands of mad-men or fools or such as would kill and slay and undo their fellow-subjects with it or to deliver up the protection of his people into the hands of a few of their ambitious fellow-subjects did as much break their own trust to those they represented in asking of it as the King would havedone if he had granted it or why shall it not be accounted an inculpata tutela in the King to preserve and defend that by a War the Laws of God and Man his Coronation-Oath Honour and Conscience and a duty to Himself and his Posterity as well as to his people would not permit him to stand still and suffer to be taken away from him But if the King by any manner of construction could be blamed or censured for denying to grant the Militia which was the first pretence of beginning of the War by those that sought to take it from him for till the besieging of Hull the 16. of July 1642. after many other affronts attempts of as high a nature put upon him the most malicious interpretation of the matter of Fact cannot find him so much as at all to have defended himself as to have done any one act of War or so much as like it who shall be in the fault for all that was done after when he offered to condiscend to all that might be profitable for his people in the matter of Religion Lawes and Liberties Or was it not a just cause of War to defend himself and his people against those would notwithstanding all he could doe and offer make a War against him because he would not contrary to his Oath Magna Charta and so many other Laws he had sworn to observe betray or deliver up his people into their hands to be governed or rather undone by a greater latitude of Arbitrary power then the great Turk or Crim Tartar ever exercised upon their enslaved people and put the education and marriage of his own Children out of his power was never sought to be taken out of the hand of any Father who was not a fool or a mad-man nor yielded to by any who would have the credit to be accounted 〈◊〉 wise or because he would not denude himself of the power of conferring honours or vilifie or discredit his great and lesser Seals and the Authority of them from which many mens Estates and Honours and the whole current of the Justice of the Kingdome had their original and refused to perjure himself by abolishing Episcopacy which Magna Charta and some dozens of other laws bound him to preserve Or if that be not enough to justifie him in his own defence had he not cause enough to deny and they little enough to ask Liberty of Conscience and practice to Anabaptists Blasphemers of God denieâ—s of the Trinity Scriptures and Deity of Christ when the Parliament themselves had taken a Covenant to root them out and made as many of the people as they could force to take it with them or had he not cause enough to deny to set up the Presbyterian Authority would not even have taken away his own Authority but have done the like also with the Lawes and Liberties of the Nation and the ruling part of that they now call the Parliament utterly abhor or if all that could not make the War be made to be defensive
lâ—st the English land in the Island of Hispanola without any opposition and seeing no enemy near them think themselves sole Masters of the Indies They having marched a many miles through the woods are ready to perish with faintness and for want of water and now the Spanish Negros fall upon them and miserably kill them with little resistance drive them out of the Iland the remainder of those that escaped this Buchery possess themselves of Jamaica now G. Blake with a little better success being come before Tunis demands reparation for the losses sustained from Turkish Pyrates but being answer'd in scorn by the Dye of Tunis fired 9. Ships and came off with little loss but much glory to himself notwithstanding the former ill successes of the Royal party are sent to the Tower upon suspition of Treason The Lord Willonby of Parham and the Lord Newport The Illustrious Duke of Glocester having staid for some times with his sister the Princess Royall â—â— at Hague was now resolved to go to his Brother Our most gracious King then at Cullen being come thither with his Sister they stay till after the Fair at Franckfort to which place they made a progresse of State and pleasure being attended with the Marquesse of Ormond Lord Goring Lord Newburrough and Lady Stanhop c. As they passed through every Princes Country they were complemented by their Chief Officers of state and saluted by all the great Guns from all their Towers and Castles in an especiall manner The Prince Elector of Ments sent his grand Marshall to invite them to his Court whereupon the Lord Newburrough was sent back to desire to excuse them at present promising to wait upon them at his return being arrived at Franckfort and hearing that Queen Christiana of Swedn was coming that was in her journy to Italy his sacred Majesty sent one of his Lords to her signifying his desire to wait upon her at what place her Majesty should be pleased to Nominate the place appointed for this Interview was Collingsteen a Village near Frankfort where his Royall Majesty was received by her with much respect he had Private conference with her about half an hour then the Duke of Glocester and then the Lords that attended his Majesty Lord Jermyn and other English Lords Takes his Journey to Flaunders where at that time our dread Soveraign did reside at the Kind invitation of Don John of Austria then Governour of the Low-Countries let us now leave our King a little and look a while into his dominions where Cromwell notwithstanding his ill success in the last Parliament through his necessities is compelled to call another to meet at Westminster 17 September where the Navy Commanded by General Mountague lying to intercept the Spanish plate coming from the West Indies obtained a great victory over the Spaniard near Cadize six hundred thousand pieces of eight taken besides many ships fired and many other rich prizes taken This Parliament being met on the day appointed petition and advise Cromwell to take upon him the name and Title of King which his tender conscience could not swallow because he was affraid of some of his aspiring Officers and now a desperate attempt against the life of Oliver is found out and one Miles Sindercomb is apprehended and presently after tried and condemned to be hanged drawn sty As they came from Frankfort the Elector of Mentz renewed his civilities provided all manner of Accommodations for them as they passed thorow his Territories meeting them himselfe a great part of the way he brought them to one of his Pallaces where he entertained them after a sumptuous and splendid manner for two or three days after which they returned to Collen four Burgo Masters being appointed to wait on them and welcome them homâ— About the beginning of November 1656. A peace is concluded by Cromwell with the French the principall condition of this Treaty was the exclusion of our Royall Soveraign with all his relations and adherents out of the King of France his Dominions The thrice Noble Heroick and truly Valiant Duke of Yorke notwithstanding his great Command in the King of France his Army which was Lievetenant Generall is now advertized to depart the Kingdome by a prefixed time which act the French may perhaps hereafter have cause enough to rue which now being come he takes his leave of the King and Court of France being attended by the and quartered but he on the day appointed for his execution saves them that labour by making away himself by snuffing up some poysonous powder into his head whereupon it was ordered that he should be dragged naked at a Horses heels from the Tower to the scaffold on Tower hill and there buried having an Iron stake thrust into his belly c. In April 1657. several fifth Monarchy-men are apprehended for having a design to subvert this grand Tyrant and his Government Major General Harrinson Lawson and others are apprehended but nothing could positively be proved against them Now according to conditions of agreement betwixt England and France the French King desires Auxiliary forces from England to help him in his Wars against the Spaniard in Flanders which was readily granted by Cromwel 6000. Foot are accordingly sent over under the command of Col. Reynolds who are no sooner landed but suddenly they take the strong Fort of Mardike After Cromwel had given his final answer that he could not accept of the Title of King he was by the Parliament instated Lord Protector in a most solemne manner June 26. Cromwel having now as he thought setled his Throne bethinks himself of advancing his nearest friends and relations to that end he sends for his eldest Son Richard out of the Country to enure him to a Court life and that he might have some insight into State affairs designing him for succession in the Protectorship which the University of Oxford fore-seeing send their Proctors to elect him their Chancellor in which honour he was solemnly installed at Whitehall His Second Son Henry he created Lord Lieutenant of Ireland his two youngest Daughters he matched the eldest to Mr. Robert Rich Grand-child to the then Earl of Warwick The younger to the Lord Faulconbridge the Nuptials of them both was celebrated with much Splendor at Whitehal Hampton Court scarse was the mirth of these solemnities over but the Court is allarmed with the death of Gen. Blake Vice-Admiral Badiley and Lieutenant General Brain presently after Col. Reynolds and his Company were cast away by Goodwin Sands coming from Flanders The Parliament so called having adjourned themselves from the 6 th of June untill the 20 th of January following and now those other Members were admitted who formerly were excluded There is also another House of Parliament so called chosen by Cromwel consisting most part of Officers of the Army with some of the old Nobility this latter being as it were a House of Peers But this other House would not down with the House
Religion and take away the Laws and Liberties of the People and many other the like seditious delusions the People so much as their misery will give them leave have now found out the way to laugh at either came from the Parlament party or were cherished and turned into advantages by them For they had found the way and lost nothing by it to be ever jealous of the King And whil'st he did all he could to shew them that there was no cause for it they who were jealous without a cause could be so cunning as to make all the hast they could to weaken him and strengthen themselvs by such kind of artifices But he that could not choose but take notice that there were secret ties and combinations betwixt his English and Scortish Subjects the latter of whom the Earl of Essex and Sir Thomas Fairfax themselves understood to be no better then Rebells and therefore served in places of Command in his Majesties Army against them That Sir Arthur Haselrig had brought in a Bill in Parlament to take the Militia by Sea and Land away from him saw himselfe not long after by a printed Remonstrance or Declaration made to the People of all they could but imagine to be errors in his Government arraigned and little less then deposed The Bishops and divers great Lords driven from the Parlament by tumults Was inforced to keep his gates at Whitehall shut and procure divers Captains and Commanders to lodge there and to allow them a Table to be a guard for him and had been fully informed of many Traiterous Speeches used by some seditious Mechanicks of London as that it was pity he should Raign and that The Prince would make a better King was yet so far from being jealous or solicitous to defend himselfe by the Sword and power which God had intrusted him with as when he had need and reason enough to do it he still granted them that he might not seem to deny what might but seem to be for the good of his people every thing they could reasonably ask of him or he could but reasonably tell how to part with though he could not be ignorant but an ill use might be made of them against himself As the putting down of the Star-Chamber and high Commission Court the Courts of Honour and of the North and Welch Marches Commissions for the making of Gun-powder allowing them approbation or nomination of the Lievtenant of the Tower and did all and more then all his predecessors put together to remove their jealousies And when that would not do it He stood still and saw the game plaid on further many Tumults raised many Libells and scandalous Pamphlets publickly printed against his person and Government and when he complained of it in Parlament so little care was taken to redress it as that the peoples coming to Westminster in a Tumultuous manner set on and invited by Pennington and Ven two of the most active Mechanick Sectaries of the House of Commons it was excused and called a liberty of Petitioning And as for the Libells and Pamphlets the Licensing of Books before they should be printed and all other restraint of the Printing Press were taken away and complaints being made against Pamphlets and seditious Books some of the Members of the house of Commons were heard to say the work would not be done without them and complaints being also made to Mr. Pym against some wicked men which were ill affected to the Government He answered It was not now a time to discourage their friends but to make use of them And here being as many Jealousies and fears as could possibly be raised or fancied without a ground on the one side against all the endeavours could be used on the other side to remove them We shall in the next place take a view of the matter of Fact that followed upon them and bring before you CHAP. II. The Proceedings betwixt the King and the Parlament from the Tumultuous and Seditious coming of the People to the Parlament and White-Hall till the 13. of September 1642. being 18. days after the King had set up his Standard at Nottingham WHen all the King could do to bring the Parlament to a better understanding of him did as they were pleased to make their advantage of it but make them seem to be the more unsatisfied that they might the better mis-represent him to the People and petition out of his hands as much power as they could tell how to perswade him to grant them and that he had proofs enough of what hath been since written in the blood and hearts of his People that the five Members and Kimbolton intended to root out Him and His Posterity subvert the Laws and alter the Religion and Covernment of the Kingdom and had therefore sent his Serjeant at Arms to demand their persons and Justice to be done upon them instead of obedience to it an order was made That every man might rescue them and apprehend the Serjeant at Arms for doing it which Parlament Records would blush at And Queen Elizabeth who was wont to answer her better composed Parlaments upon lesser occasions with a Cavete ne patientiam Principis laedatis and caused Parry a Doctor of the Civill Laws and a Member of the house of Commons by the judgement and advice of as sage and learned a privy Councill and Judges as any Prince in Christendom ever had to be hang'd drawn and quartered for Treason in the old Palace of Westminster when the Parlament was sitting would have wondred at And 4. of January 1641. desiring onely to bring them to a Legall tryall and examination went in person to demand them and found that his own peaceable behaviour and fewer attendants then the two Speakers of the Parlament had afterwards when they brought a whole Army at their heels to charge and fright away eleven of their fellow members had all manner of evil constructions put upon it and that the Houses of Parlament had adjourned into London and occasioned such a sedition amongst the people as all the train bands of London must guard them by Land when there was no need of it and many Boats and Lighters armed with Sea-men and murdering pieces by water and that unless he should have adventured the mischief and murder hath been since committed upon him by those which at that time intended as much as they have done since it was high time to think of his own safety and of so many others were concerned in it having left London but the day before upon a greater cause of fear then the Speakers of both Houses of Parlament in July 1647. to go to the Army retires with the Prince his Son whom the Parlament laboured to seize and take into their custody in his company towards York 8. January 1641. A Committee of the House of Commons sitting in London resolved upon the question That the Actions of the City of London for the
and sworn to see the Law executed had not the Sword nor his Authority committed to him in vain And if he had had no manner of just cause of fear either in his own Person or Authority or no cause given him in re laesae Majestatis the imprisoning of his Subjects and plundering and taking away their estates from them long before he had either armed himself or had wherewithal to doe it had been cause as sufficient as to cause a Hue and Cry to be made after a Fâ—lon or raise the posse Comitatus to bring him to Justice and might by the same reason doe it in the case of more and by the same reason he might do it by the help of one nothing can hinder but by the same reason he might doe it by the help of more When Nathan came to David with a parable and told him of the rich man that had taken the poor mans only sheep he that understood wel enough the duty of a King was exceeding wroth against the man and said As sure as the Lord liveth this man shall surely die And can any man think that the King when he saw so much Sedition and Treason among the people countenanced cherished tumults grow up into outrages outrages to parties and warlike assemblies propositions made to bring in Horse and Money to maintain an Army against Him and many of his Subjects daily imprisoned sequestred undone or killed can be blamed if he had a great deal sooner gone about to defend both himself and his people For who saith St. Jerom did â—ver rest quietly sleeping neer a viper Est lex una perpetua salutem omni ratione defendere haec ratio doctis necessitas Barbarts mos gen ibus feris natura ipsa praescripsit haec non scripta sed nata lex saith Tully that great master of morality Reason Necessity Custom and Nature it self have made self-preservation to be warrantable Nemo exponere se debet pericuâ—is sed obviâ—m offensioni eisudum â—non mâ—do quae est in actu sed quae est in potentia ad actum â—ustus metus justum facit bellum say the Civil Lawes and where there was not nuda cogitatio or a bare intention onely to ruine the King but so much over and over again acted as might well occasion more than a fear and apprehension in him of what hath since been brought to pass against him no man certainly without much blindness or partiality can think it to be a fault in him to seek to defend himself when the Parliament did not only long before he raised any forces to defend himself but at the same time when he was doing of it make the people believe his Person was in so much danger as they must needs take up Arms to defend Him And how much more warrantable then must it be in the Kings case when it was not only an endeavour to defend himself but all those that have been since slain and undone and ruined for want of power enough to do it Defence is by the Civil Lawyers said to be either necessary profitable or honest Nec distingui vult Baldus sive se sua suosve defendat sive prope sive posita longè A man is said to defend himself when it is but his own goods estate or people whether neer or further off Necessaria defensio ejus est factum ad necessariam defensionem contra quem veniat armatus inimicus ejus contra quem inimicus se paravit It must needs be a necessary defence against whom an armed Enemy is either marching or preparing Vtilis defensio quum nos movemus bellum verentes ne ipsi bello petamur when we make a war to prevent or be before-hand when war or mischief is threatned or likely to come upon us for as Nicephorus the Historian saith He that will live out of danger must occurrere malis impendentibus atnevertere nec est cunctandum aut expectandum c. meet and take away growing evils and turn them another way and not to dâ—lay and be slack in it Honesta defensio quae citra metum ullum periculi nostri nulla utilitate quaesita tantum in gratiam aliorum suscipitur When for no fear of danger to our selves and for no consideration of profit to our selves but meerly in favour or help of others the war is undertaken Wherefore certainly when the King may be justly said to tarry too long before he made the second and third kinds of defences either to prevent the danger and fury of a War against himself or to help those that suffered and were undone in seeking to defend himself and was so overmuch in love with Peace as he utterly lost it and could never again recover it and was so much mistaken in the love and religion of his Subjects and Parliament promises and the impossibilities of such horrid proceedings against him as all his three Kingdomes were in a flame of War and strong Combinations made by two of them and the Pulpit every where flaming Seditious exhortations against him his Navy Magazines Ports Revenues Mint strongest Towns and places seized on Armies marching against him and he onely and a few friends and followers pend up in a corner had an enemy and a strong Town at his back ready every day to surprize him and several Armies marching and in action before and round about him before he granted out any Commission for War or had or could make any preparation for it and had so many to help and defend besides himself it would be too much injury and too great a violence to all manner of reason and understanding to deny him a Justification upon the first sort of defences if the two latter will not reach it for the first cannot by any interpretation goe without For haec est necessit as saith Baldus quae bellum justificat quum in extremo loco ad bellum confugitur Or if with Grotius we look upon it another way and make the Justice of War to consist 1. in defensione 2. in recuperatione rerum 3. in pâ—uitione The King before ever he went to demand Hull or before ever he desired a guard of the County of York had cause enough and enough to doe it and it would be hard if a great deal less then that should not be able to deliver him from the censure or blame of an offensive or unnecessary War When that which was made by David upon the children of Ammon and that of the late glorious King of Sweden against the Emperour of Germany the former for misusing the latter for encroaching upon him and not receiving his Ambassadors found warrant and necessity enough to doe it But what could the King doe more in his endeavours and waiting for a Peace or less in his preparations or making of a War when the least or one of the hundred provocations or causes we dare say plainly here set down