Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A26599
|
An Alarm to the officers and souldiers of the armies of England, Scotland, and Ireland
|
|
1660
(1660)
|
Wing A835; ESTC R8339
|
8,386
|
14
|
his designs to perfect maturity And that the same was designed in Scotland long since Observe how peaceable they are there and how the Irish Army have proceeded answerable to himself And besides say some of them being Officers of the late Kings Army who had been with him since his coming to London and offered their service to him which they said he accepted and told them he would before it were long be in a capacity to give them imployment much more of that nature which for brevity sake I omit onely this one thing more which very much increases their hopes and that is say they what signifies the peaceable return of the Kings friends from their Exile as Alderman Bonch and many others who had been so long fugitives if the return of the King was not likewise intended And further what doth signifie that proviso in that Act of dissolution concerning the Lords being a part of the Parliament of England if there must be a Commonwealth As for the sober Presbyterians they do of late begin to suspect the said General whom say they gives so much advantage to Charles Stuart and to his old and new rigid Cavaliers who for certain truth are at this juncture of time at work in arming themselves in all parts of the three Nations and will upon a sudden come like a flood upon you and the rest of the engaged party in the Nations and so conquer all by force of Arms and then what must or can be expected to follow but onely absolute ruine for undoubtedly say they Charles Stuart will bring with him Archbishops Bishops and the rest of that Hierarchy and we shall then be accounted no other by them but Sectarians and Phanatiques and be in the same predicament or worse for service than those who are so called and say they must not expect to be better used than they And besides his Mother the Queen will come which infallibly will bring with her Jesuits Priests and Monks of all sorts whereby Popery will cum privilegio be again re-admitted in the Nation so that they consider that if the General and your selves do not speedily prevent the same that the Cause so much contended for together with the interest of good people will sink and be utterly lost and so your Harvest will end in chaffe and you and them be carried back through a red Sea of blood in the land of Bondage and misery there to serve and bear the heavy yoke of one who will not forget that which hath as well been acted against his late Father the King as against himself it being the common talk of the Cavaliers that the Presbyterians brought his Father to the Block and the Independents cut off his Head As to your best friends which have bled with you and prayed for you and who have been constant assertors of the cause and interest of the good people of these Nations against Kingship single persons house of Lords they all of one voyce conclude that under God there is no other Bulwork of defence against the return of Monarchy but the Army which now they see to be absolutely designed for destruction by disbanding and reducing or else what meaneth the new Militia now setled and intrusted in the hands of persons almost all enemies to a Free-state Government several of the secluded Members both in the House and out of the House speaking it openly as likewise several of the Commissioners of City and Country which have been heard in their Cabals affirm that as soon as their Militiaes are setled they will quickly break the Rogues meaning you to whom they can scarce afford so good language and moreover they hope that the Supreme Authority being once devolved in the Councel of State as now it is that the said Councel will by subtil means and practises with the General gain him to condescend to the disbanding most of you to the end that the intended new Parliament may be able with more facility to bring the design now in hand to perfection which in plain English is to bring Charles Stuart to be King And that which your said friends do thereupon apprehend to follow in order to yours and theirs destruction is First if you can be perswaded by your enemies to admit Charles to be King upon any conditions then rest assured that he will not want an Army and specially such an one as brought his Father to the Block and kept him in Exile so many years therefore the first work will be to disband you and so leave you to the mercy and cruelty of those that by force you have subdued who in revenge will without any doubt take opportunity afterwards to hang many of you and banish others as Rebels and Traytors or at least cast you in noysome Dungeon but that onely will not satisfie their cruelty but be sure they will have all your estates and destroy your Wives and Children and persecute you and your friend unto death you may therefore say they with ease discern whether it be your interest or security to bring the Nation back under the old bondage of Kings or else to maintain and defend a Commonwealths Government the difference is plain the one will destroy you and your friends and the other will protect you both and you will be sure under a Commonwealth not to want as long as any of you shall live nor your Wives and Children And you will be sure also not to become your enemies slaves Secondly If you should be so fooled as to be perswaded to admit of the said Charles to return upon any termes then you will be reputed the most perfidious Army that breaths in breaking the engagements promises you have made to the contrary and so render all the blood spilt and treasure exhausted of no effect and thereupon give cause to the children unborn to curse such a generation of men as then you would be reputed But sayes your friends If you do withstand it and leave the success to God then you will have done your parts as English men and Christians and will in after Ages be esteemed faithful Patriots and Assertors of your Countrie Liberties and consequently of yourselves and posterities And say they when the late King had near a hundred thousand men in Field and Garrison you were not afraid and whensoever you encountred with any part thereof God strengthned your hearts and hands and gave you several Victories to the absolute overthrowing of them all in the three Nations therefore they wish you courage and blessing from on High and do heartily pray that God may go along with you in disappointing your enemies who as yet make no use of weapons save of their venemous and lying tongues Thirdly If you should be so deluded as to admit the said Charles Stuart to be King then your friends desire you further to consider that besides the foresaid ruine upon yourselves and them what further ruine will attend the three Nations by such
admission First his late Fathers numerous debts which he contracted in the War which he so violently prosecuted against the Parliament from the year 1641. till his death together with all the Arrears of his Armies and salaries of his Court-officers and meneal servants which without doubt will amount to as much or more as the Parliament expended in their defence in that War must be paid and satisfied Secondly The said Charles Stuarts own debts contracted here and in Scotland France and Flanders during the space of about seventeen years with likewise the salaries of his Court-officers and meneal servants together with the Arrears of his Armies which he had in Scotland and afterwards at Worcester all which will be expected to be paid and which without doubt will far exceed the debts of his Father Thirdly The Queen his Mother with the salaries of her Officers and servants besides her great Dowry and Arrears thereof must likewise be paid and satisfied Fourthly All the debt of his Brother and Sister Fifthly His Court and theirs with all dependences must be set up anew here furnished and maintained with all sorts of rich Furniture and Jewels gold and silver plate of all sorts and all other utensils as glorious as ever his Father Sixthly Those Dukes Earls Lords Knights Gentlemen and other of his and Fathers party whose estates real and personal have been sold and disposed by Authority of Parliament either must be restored or satisfaction given them for the same but specially for the personal estate which can never be returned All which cost and charges if duely considered together with all manner of debts owing by the said Family and carefully calculated must amount to many Millions so that if the Taxes and other Impost now yearly paid in the three Nations should be doubled for twenty years to come together would not be sufficient to satisfie and answer the same Lastly Whereas the Cavaliers do say That if the Lands of the late King Queen c. and of their party should be restored that it would answer a great part of the said Court expences and satisfie those persons to which it is answered admitting the same could be effected yet none of those debts could thereby be satisfied for it cannot be expected a possibility ever to settle these three Nations upon any condition of a lasting peace if there be any ravilling and questioning the titles of those Lands sold and disposed by Parliament considering in what manner the Proprieties have been altered since those sails or disposals either by buildings inclosures and joynings their Lands to them by Mortgages Intails and other settlements upon Marriages and otherwise that the present occupier of most part thereof were never ingaged in the War having paid for the same fourteen fifteen and sixteen years purchase in ready money which if taken away or restored will kindle a more violent fire of War in the three Nations than the first And before I give you my advice and so conclude Give me leave to tell you my particular observations as one who daily is conversant with persons of divers judgements First I have certain knowledge and your selves if not prevented will finde it too true that the now Militia of London do intend to bring in Charles Stuart one before they do it as I have divers times and very lately heard some of them boast that they will serve you who are quartered among them as the Danes were of old that is in the night in your beds cut your throats and in immitation of that act they make no question but the Country will execute the like upon your fellows quartered with them And truly I have heard several of the Commissioners of the Country say as much Secondly What meaneth the Officers of the Militia when upon the Guard to go to Tavern and there drink the Kings health c. Thirdly If you do not stop your ears you may as well as my self understand and take notice of the daily threatning of the Enemy when their King is come what they will do to your selves and friends but specially to those faithful Patriots which under God have been a strong Bulwark against their raged fury their villanies committed and acted before your faces upon the 11. and 21. of February at night in London and afterwards in most places of the Nation may serve to convince you that their sentences against you and them are already pronounced and want nothing but execution If you do not withstand them speedily your and their estates are already disposed of there wants but the Kings coming to put them in actual possession Have not you seen already a Catalogue of the names of several faithful Patriots printed and published and cried upon the Exchange and about the streets in order to prepare the Rabble to massacre them there is no doubt to be made but many of your selves and other friends to the publick Cause are designed for a Sacrifice at their Kings coming some of you may have fair promises made of being pardoned and rewarded If you will sell or rather betray the Cause and Liberties of your Country by admitting him but that you may not be decoyed or trappanned to trust your Enemy upon any promise of that nature let me relate a short and very true History of a Governour who had been entrusted with the command of a strong Frontier Garrison and the Enemy who very much aimed at it as being of great advantage of entrance into the Country caused some overture to be made to the said Governour for the betraying the same into their hands whereupon conditions were agreed by which the said Governour was not onely to have a great summe of money as a reward but likewise was promised to be continued in his Command and otherwise nobly rewarded the time being appointed for him to deliver the said Garrison the Enemy came and according to agreement the said Governour opened the Gates and gave entrance possession to the Enemy who being possessed in lieu of the reward promised caused forthwith a Gallows to be erected upon one of the Rampiers where the said Governour was brought and told by the chief of the Enemy that he loved Treason but hated the Traytor saying further If the said Governor could not be faithful to his own Masters for whom he had fought how could he expect he should be to him against whom he had so often ventured his life in several battels And so caused him to be hanged I shall leave the application to your selves which undoubtedly will be your case and reward if you betray your trust and Country Now for conclusion to save your selves and friends in the three Nations from ruine take this short Advice First Let all your Regiments Troops and Companies have Rendezvouzes and if you do not camp in the Field quarter close together and not so far asunder as now you do for you know that a bundle of Arrows divided asunder are easier broken than when bound together Secondly In immitation of former time when you and the cause of the Nation was in as great danger as at present And when many of your Officers had a hand in combining yours and the Nations destruction and that the same Game was then a playing which now is you may remember what you then did at Newmarket and Tripoly-Heath Rendezvouze you were not afraid of the Threats or frowns of any but like brave resolute English-men made there choyce of some of your faithful Officers and Souldiers to be your Agitators and to keep correspondency one with another and rejected such as would then have betrayed you do so now and speedily more need now than ever Thirdly When your Agitators are so nominated and appointed let them consider what is fit to be done and presented to your superiour Officers for their concurrence which I conceive must be to this or the like effect That is to say to frame an Engagement whereby you wil engage one to another not to suffer your selves to be disbanded or divided before such time as the Government of the three Nations may be established upon so firm fundamentals of freedome and safety as thereby the Properties and Liberties of the people thereof both as men and Christians may be asserted and secured by their duely qualified successive Representatives in Parliament assembled against and without a King single person or House of Lords and against all other the Enemies of the Commonwealth and in particular against the return of any of the Family or posterity of the late King James or King Charles Now for encouragement to you in that blessed work be assured you will have Gods blessing and for your aid and assistance all the faithful of the three Nations and although your Enemies by their tongues seem very numerous and bold yet fear them not for barking Curs never bites nor indeed are they yet in a capacity to hurt you as soon as they understand or hear any stirring among you their hearts faint they are better at hunting and hawking drinking healths and damnations cursing and whoring than they are at fighting you have hitherto found them so they are rather grown worse and more cowardly than ever It is seldome observed that an Enemy will ever stand before those that have so often beaten and conquered them when they were many thousands in Field and Garrisons you did not fear them therefore be confident Gods Omnipotency is the same now and for ever as at that time of calamity It was and you have the self-same Cause and I hope the same hearts and valour and besides in the eye of men far greater advantages by having all the Land and Sea Forces Garrisons and Ammunitions of War of all sorts which your Enemies have not all their noise and hopes will soon vanish If you will no longer dally with them therefore stand to your Arms and be doing or else you will never be able to hinder and escape the Roaps that are now a Twisting nor the Gallows that are setting up for the Executions of you and your friends Remember the Proverb Men Armed are seldome harmed FINIS