Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	justice_n	king_n	parliament_n	2,583	5	6.8838	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43512	A briefe relation of the death and sufferings of the Most Reverend and renowned prelate, the L. Archbishop of Canterbury with a more perfect copy of his speech, and other passages on the scaffold, than hath beene hitherto imprinted.	Heylyn, Peter, 1600-1662.	1644 (1644)	Wing H1685; ESTC R212372	21,500	34

the same day the fourth of Ianuary in which they passed this bloudy Ordinance as if therein they would cry quittance with His Sacred Majesty who on the same accused the six guilt Members they passed another for establishing their new Directory which in effect is nothing but a totall abolition of the Common-prayer-booke and thereby shewed unto the world how little hopes they had of setling their new forme of worship if the foundation of it were not laid in bloud The Bill being thus dispatched in the House of Lords if still they may be called the Lords which are so over-loaded by the Common people there wanted yet the Kings Assent to give life to it which they so far contemned they had more reason to despare of it that they never sought it They had screwed up their Ordinances to so high a pitch that never Act of Parliament was of more authority and having found the subjects so obedient as to yeild unto them in matters which concerned them in their goods and liberties it was but one step more to make triall of them whether they would submit their lives to the selfe same tyranny And this they made the first experiment in this kind both of their own power and the peoples patience he being the first man as himselfe noted in his speech which words are purposely omitted in Hindes Copy of it that was ever put to death by Ordinance in Parliament but whether he shall be the last further time will shew Certaine it is that by this Ordinance they have now made themselves the absolute masters of the Subjects life which they can call for at their pleasure as no doubt they will and left him nothing but his fetters he can call his owne Just as it was observed by our Gracious Soveraigne upon occasion of the Ordinance for the 20th part that the same power which robbed the Subject of the twentieth part of their Estates had by that only made a claime and entituled it selfe to the other nineteene whensoever it should be thought expedient to hasten on the generall ruine In which His Majesty hath proved but too true a Prophet And though perhaps some of the people were well pleased with this bloudy Ordinance and ran with joy to see it put in execution yet all wise men doe looke upon it as the last groane or gaspe of our dying liberty And let both them and those who passed it be assured of this that they who doe so gadly sell the bloud of their fellow Subjects seldome want Chapmen for their owne in an open Market And here as it was once observed that the predominant party of the Vnited Provinces to bring about their ends in the death of Barnevelt subverted all those fundamentall Lawes of the Belgick liberty for maintenance whereof they took up Arms against Philip the 2 so would I know which of those Fundamentall Lawes of the English Government have not beene violated by these men in their whole proceedings for preservation of which Lawes or rather under colour of such preservation they have bewitched the people unto this Rebellion It is a Fundamentall Law of the English Government and the first Article in the Magna Charta that the Church of England shall be free and shall have her whole Rights and Priviledges inviolable yet to make way unto the condemnation of this innocent man and other the like wicked and ungodly ends the Bishops must be Voted out of their place in Parliament which most of them have held farre longer in their Predecessors then any of our noble Families in their Progenitours And if the Lords refuse to give way unto it as at first they did the people must come downe to the House in multitudes and cry No Bishops no Bishops at the Parliament doores till by the terrour of their tumults they extort it from them It is a Fundamentall Law of the English liberty that no Free man shall be taken or imprisoned without cause shewne or be detained without being brought unto his Answer in due forme of Law yet heere wee see a Free-man imprisoned tenne whole weekes together brfore any Charge was brought against him and kept in prison three yeeres more before his generall Accusation was by them reduced into particulars and for a yeere almost detained close prisoner without being brought unto his answer as the Law requirer It is a Fundamentall Law of the English Government that no man be disseised of his Freehold or Liberties but by the knowne Lawes of the Land yet here wee see a man disseised of his Rents and Lands spoyled of his Goods deprived of his jurisdiction devested of his Right and Patronage and all this done when hee was so farre from being convicted by the Lawes of the Land that no particular charge was so much as thought of It is a Fundamentall Law of the English Liberty that no man shall be condemned or put to death but by lawfull judgement of his Peeres or by the Law of the Land i. e. in the ordinary way of a legall tryall and sure an Ordinance of both Houses without the Royall Assent is no part of the Law of England nor held an ordinary way of triall for the English subject or ever reckoned to be such in the former times And finally it is a Fundamentall Law in the English Government that if any other case then those recited in the Statute of King Edward 3. which is supposed to be Treason doe happen before any of His Majesties Justices the Justices shall tarry without giving judgement till the cause be shewne and declared before the King and His Parliament whether it ought to be judged Treason or not yet here wee have a new found Treason never knowne before nor declared such by any of His Majesties Iustices nor ever brought to be considered of by the King and His Parliament but onely voted to be such by some of those few Members which remaine at Westminster who were resolved to have it so for their private ends Put all which hath been said together and then tell me truly if there be any difference for I see not any betweene the ancient Roman slaves and the once Free-born Subject of the English Nation whose life and liberty whose goods and fortunes depend on the meere pleasure of their mighty Masters But to returne unto our Story the passing of the Ordinance being made knowne unto him he neither entertained the newes with a Stoicall Apathie nor wailed his Fate with weake and womanish lamentations to which extreames most men are carried in this case but heard it with so even and so smooth a temper as shewed he neither was afraid to live nor ashamed to die The time betweene the Sentence and the Execution he spent in prayers and applications to the Lord his God having obtained though not without some difficulty a Chaplaine of his owne to attend upon him and to assist him in the worke of his preparation though little preparation

Heart and yet I thanke God I have not found among the many any one sinne which deserves death by any knowne Law of this Kingdome And yet hereby I charge nothing upon my Iudges for if they proceed upon proofe by valuable witnesses I or any other innocent may be justly condemned And I thanke God though the weight of the sentence lye heavie upon me I am as quiet within as ever I was in my life And though I am not only the first Archbishop but the first man that ever dyed by an Ordinance of Parliament yet some of my Predecessors have gone this way though not by this meanes For Elphegus was hurried away and lost his head by the Danes and Symon Sudbury in the fury of Wat Tyler and his fellowes Before these Saint Jon Baptist had his head danced off by a lewd woman and Saint Cyprian Archbishop of Carthage submitted his head to a persecuting Sword Many Examples great and good and they teach me patience for I hope my Cause in Heaven will looke of another dye then the colour that is put upon it here And some comfort it is to me not only that I goe the way of these great men in their severall generations but also that my Charge as fowle as 't is made lookes like that of the Jewes against Saint Paul Acts. 25.3 For he was accused for the Law and the Temple i. e. Religion And like that of Saint Stephen Acts 6.14 for breaking the Ordinances which Moses gave i. e. Law and Religion the holy place and the Temple verse 13. But you will say doe I then compare my selfe with the integrity of Saint Paul and Saint Stephen No farre be that from me I only raise a comfort to my selfe that these great Saints and Servants of God were laid at in their times as I am now And 't is memorable that Saint Paul who helped on this Accusation against Saint Stephen did after fall under the very same himselfe Yea but here 's a great Clamour that I would have brought in Popery I shall Answer that more fully by and by In the meane time you know what the Pharises said against Christ himselfe If we let him alone all men will beleive in him Et venient Romani and the Romans will come and take away both our place and the Nation Here was a causelesse Cry against Christ that the Romans will come And see how just the judgement of God was they crucified Christ for feare lest the Romans should come and his death was it which brought in the Romans upon them God punishing them with that which they most feared and I pray God this Clamour of Venient Romani of which I have given no cause helpe not to bring them in for the Pope never had such a Harvest in England since the Reformation as he hath now upon the Sects and Divisions that are amongst us In the meane time by Honour and dishonour by good report and evill report as a deceiver and yet true am I passing through this world 2 Cor. 6.8 Some particulars also I thinke it not amisse to speake of And first this I shall be bold to speake of the King our gracious Soveraign He hath bin much traduced also for bringing in of Popery but on my Conscience of which I shall give God a very present accompt I know Him to be as free from this Charge as any man living and I hold Him to be as sound a Protestant according to the Religion by Law established as any man in this Kingdome And that he will venture His Life as farre and as freely for it and I thinke I doe or should know both His affection to Religion and his grounds for it as fully as any man in England The second particular is concerning this great and Populous City which God blesse Here hath beene of late a fashion taken up to gather hands and then goe to the Great Court of this Kingdome the Parliament and clamour for Iustice as if that great and wise Court before whom the Causes come which are unknowne to the many could not or would not doe Iustice but at their appointment A way which may endanger many an Innocent man and plucke his bloud upon their owne heads and perhaps upon the Citie 's also And this hath beene lately practised against my selfe the Magistrates standing still and suffering them openly to proceed from Parish to Parish without checke God forgive the setters of this with all my heart I begge it but many well meaning People are caught by it In Saint Stephen's case when nothing else would serve they stirred up the People against him and Herod went the same way when he had killed Saint James yet he would not venture upon Saint Peter till he found how the other pleased the People But take heed of having your hands full of bloud for there is a time best knowne to himselfe when God above other sinnes makes Inquisition for bloud and when that Inquisition is on foot the Psalmest tells us That God remembers but that 's not all He remembers and forgits not the Complaint of the Poore that is whose bloud it shed by oppression vers. 9. take heed of this 'T is a fearefull thing to fall into the hands of the living God but then especially when he is making Inquisition for bloud And with my Prayers to avert it I doe heartily desire this City to remember the Prophesy that is expressed Jer. 26.15 The third particular is the poore Church of England It hath flourished and beene a shelter to other neighbouring Churches when stormes have driven upon them But alas now 't is in a storme it selfe and God onely knowes whether or how it shall get out and which is worse then a storme from without it 's become like an Oake cleft to shivers with wedges made out of it's owne body and at every cleft prophanenesse and Irreligion is entring in while as Prosper speakes in his second Book De vitae contemptu cap. 4. Men that introduce prophanenesse are cloaked over with the name Religionis Imaginariae of Imaginary Religion for we have lost the Substance and dwell to much in Opinion and that Church which all the Iesuits machinations could not ruine is fallen into danger by her owne The last particular for I am not willing to be too long is my selfe I was borne and baptized in the bosome of the Church of England established by Law in that profession I have ever since lived and in that I come now to dye This is no time to dissemble with God least of all in matter of Religion and therefore I desire it may be remembred I have alwaies lived in the Protestant Religion established in England and in that I come now to dye What Clamours and Slanders I have endured for labouring to keepe a Vniformity in the externall service of God according to the Doctrine and Discipline of this Church all men know and I have