as to take upon them a power to depose and powr out the sacred blood of their lawfull Soveraign Yet is there no such power in rerum natura It is the off-pring of the Devil The cloak Sanctuary and refuge of Treason Rebellion and Tyranny to blinde the people taking advantage of their ignorance and lead them hood-winckt into everlasting destruction unless the God of mercy prevent not With this new upstart Doctrine have our Apochryphal Dogmatists in England led the rascal rabble of the people about like a Dog in a string buzzing in their ears that the Monarchy of England is composed of three kinds of Commonwealths and that the Parliament hath the form of an Aristocracy the three estates of a Democracy and the King to represent the state of a Monarchy which is an opinion not only false absurd fond foolish and impossible but also worthy of the most severe punishment For it is high treason to make the Subject equal with the King in authority and power or to joyn them as Companions in the Soveraignty For the power of a Soveraign Prince is nothing diminished by his Parliament but rather much more thereby manifested The Majesty of a Prince consists in the obedience of his Subjects and where is the obedience of the Subjects more manifested then in his Parliament where the Lords and Commons the Nobility and Comminalty and all his Subjects from the highest Cedar to the lowest Shrub with bended knees and bare heads do cast down themselves at his feet and do homage and reverence unto his Majesty Humbly offering unto him their requests which he at his pleasure receiveth or admiteth So that it plainly appeareth that if the Parliament be not extravagant and leap over the bounds limited by the laws of God and our Realm of England the majesty and authority of our Soveraign is not decreased by the assembly of Parliament but rather augmented and increased For the Peers cannot assume Aristocracy nor the Commons Democracy without violation of their Oaths with which they are tyed in obedience to their Soveraign as well as with the Laws Indeed our Prince doth distribute places of command Magistracy and preferments to all his Subjects indifferently and so the Government is in a manner tempered with Democracy But yet notwithstanding the State doth continue a pure and simple Monarchy because all authority floweth and is derived from the King and the Soveraignty doth still continue in him as the fountain from whence those streams of power run and the Parliament is so far from sharing in this Soveraignty that the whole current of our acts of Parliament acknowledge the King to be the only Soveraign stiling him Our Soveraign Lord the King And the Parliament 25 H. 8. saith This your Graces Realm recognizing no superior under God but your Grace c. And the Parliament 16 Rich. 2.5 affirmeth the Crown of England to have been so free at all times that it hath been in no earthly subjection but immediately to God in all things touching the Regality of the said Crown and to none other And without doubt these Parliaments and many others had as much might and right though not so much Knavery as our Anabaptists and Puritans and other Sectaries have now who pretend that the Government originally proceedeth and habitually resideth in the people but is cumulatively and communicatively derived from them unto the King and therefore the people not denuding themselves of their first interest but still retaining the same in the collective body that is to say in themselves suppletive if the King in their Judgement be defective in the administration or neglect the performance of his duty may question their King for his misgovernment dethrone him if they see cause and resuming the Collated power into their own hands again may transfer it to any other whom they please These men would make themselves extraordinary wise or else our Ancestors extraordinary fools for surely if there had been such a power residing in the people as these men blab of it would have been preached up before these new-lights ever saw the light some busie-head like themselves would have awakened it and not let it sleep so long But it is impossible and a meer foppery to think that such a power should be for suppose that the people had at first Elected their Governour and gave him Soveraignty over them could they with justice and equity dethrone him again Surely no. For sive electione sive postulatione vel successione vel belli jure princeps fiat Principi tamen facto Divinitus potestas adest Let the King be made by election lot succession or conquest yet being he is a King he hath Divine power And therefore they have no power to take away that which God hath given The Conceit of a mixed Monarchy that the supreme power may be equally distributed into two or three sorts of Governours is meerly vain and frivolous because the supreme power being but one must be placed in one sort of Governors either only in Monarchy or only in Aristocracy or only in Democracy Our Parliaments of England never until now claimed either Aristocracy or Democracy Therefore as hitherto it hath been granted so the Government must of necessity still be Monarchical And the gracious Concessions of our Soveraign not to make Laws without a Parliament do not make the Parliament sharer or his equal in the Soveraignty because as I shewed before the Parliament hath no power but what is derived from the King His limitation of his Prerogative doth no way diminish his Supremacy God himself who is most absolute may notwithstanding limit himself and his power as he doth when he promises and sweareth that he will not fail David and that the unrepentant Rebels should never enter into his rest so a man that yieldeth himself to be bound hath his strength restrained but not lessened neither is any of it transferred to them who bound him So our Soveraign doth limit his power in some points of his administration and yet this limitation neither transferreth any power of Soveraignty unto the Parliament nor denyeth the Monarchy to be absolute nor admitteth of any resistance against him Monarchy is either Lordly or Royal. Adam proved to be the first King and made by God in Paradise not by the people All Kings are made by God The Son hath more right and it is more pleasing to God for him to murther his Father the Wife her Husband and the Servant his Master than it is for the people to kill their King Though in truth he be wicked The Kings institution and authority declared by Divine and Humane Writers The Horrible Labyrinth of sins which Regicides plunge into with their guilt The most famous Nations in the World have and do live under Monarchy Englands glory and love to Kings in times past and her Apostacy in times present Pater familias were petite Kings and how little Kingdoms grew great Kingdoms The Kings power is
have the supreme power over the people is proved in Adam and testifyed by the Law of God the Law of Nations The Law of Nature The Law of Reason The Law of the Realm and by the Oathes of all English men aswel Parliament men as other Magistrates though since broken by our Saviour by the Apostles by all the Fathers of the Church and by all Christian People and Religion The glory of the Martyrs which have sacrificed their lives in this just cause shall live for ever and the Rebells shall go out with stink like the snuffe of a Candle The Majesty and power of the King described Good subjects commended and the punishment of Traytors with Korah Dathan and Abiram manifested The sad effects if the people should have the supreme power and proved by reason that no Government could stand nor any man whatsoever live if the people had power to question the King or other their Governors Two supreme powers cannot stand together Trayterous Tyrants alwayes pretend Liberty and Religion with which they blinde the ignorant people The Oath of Supremacy by whom taken and by whom broken with all Gods Commandments with it How the People of England deal with their King HAving satisfied all but those whose profit it is to believe the contrary who have no other grounds for their belief than other mens grounds and estates that Kings receive their power from God and not from the people and are independent from all but the Almighty I shall now shew 1. That they have the Supreme power over the people 2. That they are above the Law 3. That they are not to give account of their actions to the people but only to God and so conclude that there can be no just cause for the subjects either to take up armes against their Soveraign to call him to the bar to accuse him to condemn him or to kill or murther him First with the first That the first King was made in Paradice your have already heard and that there he received his dominion and power but from whom did he receive his power from God hath not God therefore greater power than the Kingâ— he hath From whence do the people derive their power from the King Hath not the King therefore more power than the people he hath Constituens Constituto potior The Constituent is better and higher in place and dignity than the Constituted But the power of God Constituted the power of Kings Ergo the power of God is greater than the power of Kings And quod efficit tale magis est tale that which maketh any such or such is in it self much more such or such But the King giveth power to the people Ergo the power of the King is higher than the power of the people The King is the only fountain from whence all the streams of authority flow to the people It is he that is the Magazine from whence they derive their power And Derivativa potestas non potest esse major primitiva a Derived power can not be greater than the primitive Therefore those men who place Soveraignty in the palace of the peoples breasts must needs be more knaves than fools for so great ignorance cannot roust in their pates who are so worldly wise But let them glosse the text with what false Commentaries they please make white black and black white and muster up dark clouds of jugling riddles to dazle the purblind sight of the Rascal rable of the people who think the Gown makes the Lawyer That that must needs be Law which the Judge saith esteem all things by their exterior apperances and only know how to be ignorant whose deceived foolishnesse is the Chariot on which our men of war ride triumphant from one degree of wickednesse to another Yet notwithstanding Legibus eversis rerum natura peribit the Law of nature shall perish and the Heavens and Earth shall passe away before Lex Terrae the Law of the Land shall deny this Oracle Omnis sub Rege ipse sub nullo nisi tantum sub Deo All men are under the King and the King is under none but God this is that Divine sentence quod nec Jovis ira nec ignes Nec poterit ferrum necedax abolere vetustas which neither angry Jove nor fiery Vulcan neither devouring age nor the bloudy sword a worse devourer than that shall ever expunge out of our Law-Books or explode out of the memory of every pious man This is that which many worthies have written with their blouds and sealed with their lives To this have many died Martyrs whose fame shall out-live the Sun and their memories be engraven upon the marble of everlasting monuments whilest others their opposers would be glad to have the stench of their ignominious names buried in the grave of oblivion where leaving them let us return to our King For nullum tempus occurrit Regi It is alwaies seasonable to do allegiance to the King whose power like the Ocean is boundlesse and his authority like the wind goeth where it listeth he only can proclaim war and he only can conclude peace he only can call Parliaments and dissolve them when he pleaseth he appointeth what Magistrates he pleaseth and turneth out whom he pleaseth all Laws Customs Privileges and Franchises are granted and confirmed to the people by him He raiseth men that are dead to life again for those that are condemned to die by the Judges are dead in Law but the Kings pardon reviveth them again He hath the sole power of ordering and disposing all the Castles Forts strong Holds Ports Havens and all other parts of the Militia He is the breath of our Nostrils the life head and authority of all that we do Supremam potestatem merum imperium apud nos habens having the Supreme power and meer empire over our bodies members lives and estates he doth whatsoever he pleaseth to be short he is our King And where the word of a King is there is power and who may say unto him what dost thou Eccle. 8.3 4. But so greedy is humane nature of dominion and covetous to rule that we have some amongst us who professe themselves to be born Kings they are Kings by birth nay greater than Kings are here For Par in parem non habet Dominium one King cannot command another King But these men use Kings as Children do birds in a string give him what Liberty and Authority they please clip his wings lest he should fly too high for them put pins in his eyes to make sport with him and clip off his head too to make known their authority But doubtless these men were never bred in Christs University Did they ever hear of him If they did it is the worse for them For they which know the will of God and do it not will fare never the better for their knowledge It is better to be an ignorant fool than a cunning knave Reddite quae sunt Caesaris
with a sure foot Though King David was a man after Gods own heart yet could he not please the people for Absolom his own Son made a conspiracy against him and forced him to flye for his life But mark the end of this Traytor though the earth did not open her mouth and swallow him up yet the very Trees took vengeance and caught him up by the head so that he hung between heaven and earth as unworthy to go to heaven or to live upon the earth 11 Sam. 18.9 Then how dare these Pulpit Hunters blaspheme God and prophane his Word and Sanctuary so much as to preach that Rebellion is obedience nay a necessary duty commanded of God and a great means to carry on the work of Salvation inciting the people to cry out for justice accounting all things injustice unless that they have their wicked ends So Absolom did steal the hearts of the people who had controversies telling them that there was no man deputed of the King to hear them 11 Sam. 15.4 And Absolom said moreover O that I were made judge in the Land that every man which hath any sute or cause might come unto me and I would do them Justice A true Lecture of a Traytor for you shall never find Traytors without Law and Justice on their sides to colour their actions The King hath not deputed a man say they to distribute Justice He is popishly given and would bring into the Kingdome the popish Religion He infringeth your Charters breaketh the Laws and destroyeth your Rights and Liberties But O that we were made Judges in the Land how equally and impartially would we give justice to all men we would not take away your Charters nor encroach upon your Liberties The preservation of the Law and Religion is the only cause for which we take up arms But when with their charms and sorcery they have intoxicated the people got the hilt of the sword into their own hands and a power to do what they list then down goeth both Law and Religion and the King too like Jonas must be thrown down from the stern of Government to appease the tempest of the multitude And then and not untill then like the head of a Snail or a Tortoise out of it's shell not seen before doth appear their own cause and indeed the only cause for which they took up arms which is their own private interest and the destruction of the whole Kingdome with their own bodies and souls hereafter Hor. Suis ipsa Roma viribus ruit And Englands own Sword destroyeth poor England But let Traytors pretend what they will yet this is a Principle whose original is the Bible confirmed by our Saviour and the Apostles by all the Fathers of the Church and by all Christian people by all reason and Religion That Kings have the Supreme power over their people and consequently the people no power to resist them either to save their Laws Religion or for what other pretence soever For Rex si supra populum optimatesve agnoscat proprie non est Rex He cannot be a King which hath not the supreme authority and Soveraignty Divisum imperium cum Jove Caesar habet It is God and the King to whom Soveraignty belongeth the people are their Vassals and not sharers in so high a dignity Our Saviour alone was both God and Man and it is a thing impossible for the people to be both king and Subject too at one time But why should I seek stars to light the noon day or press that with arguments to be true to them who with their oaths have confirmed it for a truth swearing I William Lenthal do utterly testify and declare in my conscience that the Kings Highness is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm and all other his Highness Dominions and Countries aswell in all spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or Causes as Temporal And that no forein Prince Person Prelate State or Potentate hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority Pre-eminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spâ—ritual within this Realm And therefore I do utterly renounce and forsake all forein Jurisdiction Powers Superiorities and Authorities and do promise that from henceforth I shall bear faith and true allegiance to the Kings Highnesse his heirs and lawfull Successors and to my power shall assist and defend all Jurisdictions Privileges Pre-eminences and authorities granted or belonging to the Kings Highnesse his heirs and Successors or united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of the Realm So help me God and by the Contents of this Book What greater exemplification confirmation or demonstration of the kings Soveraignty can there be than this Sacred Oath of Supremacy For this is the thing which the Lord hath commanded saith Moses Num. 30.1 2. If a man Vow a Vow unto the Lord or swear an Oath to binde his soul with a bond he shall not break his word he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth And is there any English-man so impudently wicked and prophane as presumptuously to break Gods Commandement break his own vows and impiously turn perjured Traytor vix ipse tantum vix adhuc credo malum scarce I even I who have seen it with my own eyes can yet hardly believe so great a villany can be perpetrated Haec facere Jason potuit Could the betrothed do this Heu pietas Heu prisca fides Alas the antient piety Alas the fidelity of old time Debuit ferro obvium Offerre pectus I would have dyed first Quid non mortalia pectora cogis Auri sacra fames What doth not gold more sacred to them than their oathes compel mortals to atchieve Vid. 1. Eli. cap. 1. That the Kings power is above the Law is demonstrated by reason and proved by authority In the beginning were no Laws but the Kings will and pleasure Adams absolute power The King can do no wrong It is better and more profitable that one King than many Tyrants do what they lift with us The King hath no Judge but God That place in learned Bracton which Bradshaw and others used as an authority to kill the King explained and their damnable opinion and false Commentary upon him confuted The King is bound to observe Gods Law yet absolute King That God not the people instituteth kings and that the House of Commons which is but the tail of the Parliament nor any whole Parliament can have power over the king or disinherit him HAving made it evidently manifest that the King hath the supreme power and Soveraignty over the people I will now ascend a step higher and make it as manifest that he hath the supreme power and Soveraignty over the Laws as well as over the people Quidvis facere id est regem esse saith Salustius To do what one will is to be a King Cui quod libet licet Qui legibus solutus est Qui leges dat non accipit proiude qui omnes judicat a nemine
should put to death Traytors and Conspirators against his State should be also counted a Tyrant And indeed how should good Princes be assured of their lives if under the colour of Tyranny they might be slain of their subjects by whom they ought to be defended Then what madness is that Nation intoxicated with who throw down a pious good and religious Prince to promote a multitude of lawless Tyrants whose little finger is heavier than the whole loynes of their Lawful native Soveraign The King as I said is the Husband of the Commonwealth and the Wife is not greater than her Husband because she had once power to chuse whom she would and because the man could not have been her Husband without her consent It is no argument that she hath power to turn away her Husband because she made him her Husband No it is God who giveth the Marital power he gave her the Husband and gave him power over her so that she cannot tâ—rn him from her though he prove never so wicked So though the people chuse them a King and are the cause sine qua non yet it is God who is the author of his royal power And the people can no more dethrone him and elect another than the wife can her Husband And it is as good an argument to hold that the wife hath power to put away her Husband and chuse another because she made him her Husband As it is that the people may cast off their obedience to their Soveraign and set up another because they made him their King The Cardinals make the Pope and the Clerks the Bishop but it would be a strange thing to them if one should tell them that therefore the Cardinals and Clerks might degrade them when they pleased Suppose the Souldiers should chuse them a General would not the General think it strange Logick to argue that therefore the Soldiers might turn him out of his office when they pleased Indeed where the superior makes an Inferior officer he may deject him at his pleasure As in a Prineipality which is nothing else but an Aristocracy or Democracy where the people create a Magistrate to rule so long as they please they may turn him out at their will because they alwaies tetain a power of Constituting and rejecting him when they think fit So the King may turn out Parliaments when he will because they depend upon him and their power is inferior to his But when the woman hath taken a Husband when the Commonwealth is married and subjected to a King then the Commonwealth hath no power but all her power is ttansmitted to her Husband the King For Omnia quae sunt uxoris sunt ipsius viri non habet uxor potestatem sui sed vir All that the wife hath is the husbands and the wife hath not power over her self but the husband The people by their election denude themselves of all their power and transfer it to the King so that he is the only fountain from whence they draw every drop of power they have As when Valentinian was desired of his people to admit of a consort in his Empire he answered them In eorum fuisse potestate priusquam eum ad imperium vocarent id non facere jam vero vocato imperatore eos non posse nec ab eo impetrare quod nefas crederet illis concedere That before they had elected him it was in their power either to elect him or another but now he being elected they had no such power neither ought they for to ask that which he thought not fit to grant them It is a prejudice to a royal mind to be compelled to any thing compulsion diminisheth the worth of a voluntary goodness It is against the nature of Royalty to be restrained which makes Kings say Licet Legibus soluti sumus attamen legibus vivimus Though no man hath power to compel us to live according to the Laws Yet we will For Decet tantae Majestati eas servare leges quibus ipse solutus esse videtur It is the part of a royal Prince nay very decent and becoming so great Majesty voluntarily to observe those Laws from which he is free German vates Nihil ut verum fatear magis esse Decorum Aut regale puto quam legis jure solutum Sponte tamen legi sese supponere regem But if our Prince should not rule his life according to the Laws yet it is our duties so to do and we are commanded to obey him and acknowledge him our King though he be never so wicked For we are his Servants Nay his Servants by birth and therefore enjoyned by a command to serve him 1 Pet. 2.18 Servants be subject to your Masters with all fear not only to the good and gentle But also to the froward For this is thanks worthy if a man for Conscience toward God indure grief suffering wrongfully Nullus nascitur liber ab imperio No man is born exempted from the subjection of Government Our Saviour himself as man was not free from this for he was subject to his Father and Mother Luke 2.51 and also to the King though he is the King of Kings and all earthly Kings are only dependent upon God and Christ whose vicegerents they are I admire with what impudence our terrae filii these screeching Oules the men of our pale-face'd times can blasphemously give the Almighty the lye and say per nor reges regnant by us Kings reign we give Kings and take them away When God plainly telleth them and all the world per me Reges regnant By me Kings reign I give Kings and take them away and doubtless these Quacksalvers have as great authority and warrant from the Scripture to say By us the Sun ruleth the day and the Moon the night and we gave the heavens and the earth their being as they have to maintain this their detestable opinion viz. that the Kings power is radically in the people and derived from them to him For nemo est Dominus suae vitae no man hath power over his own life and therefore none can give that to another which he hath not in himself God only hath power over life and death and he hath given this power to Kings as he hath evidently declared in his holy writ And I am sure God who hath said that by him Kings reign is true Rom. 3.4 And every man who saith the contrary is a Lyar. Then if God only instituted and gave Kings God can only take them away For Eodem modo quo quid constituitur dissâ—lvitur Things are dissolved as they are contracted Therefore every man should say with the French Bishop mentioned in Greog Turon Hist 4. lib. 5. Si quis de nobis O Rex Justitiae tramites transcendere voluerit a te corripi potest si tu vero excesseris quis te corripiet loquimur enim tibi sed si volueris audis si autem nolueris quis te damnabit
who was it that murthered the King Was it the people Every man knoweth that it was neither the people nor the Parliament But a Company of Jesuitical treacherous Rebels and damnable Usurpers Who flaming the people in the mouth with a tale that the supreme power was in the people made use of this power themselves against the wills of the people as an Engine to perform and bring to passe all their wicked and horrible designs But say they we are the peoples Representatives chosen by the people and so what we do they do Catch a Knave without a Knaves answer and he will give you leave to hang him I must confesse if this were true they might have somewhat the more colour though not the more honesty for what they do But this is as false as themselves For the people chose them to sit in Parliament and act according to the Kings Writ as part of the Kings Parliament according to the Laws of the Realm But since the Parliament is destroyed for what Parliament can there be without a King and House of Lords such a headlesse Monster was never seen untill of late Consequently their power which they derived from the people is gone also Neither are the Commons in Parliament the representative body of the whole Kingdom or people For they do not represent the King who is the head nor the Lords who are the nobler and higher part of the body of the Realm the Commons only represent the Inferior and lower sort of the people but if they did as they do not represent the whole body yet did not the people ever give them any power to cut off their Kings head For the Lords voted it unlawful all the honest Commons forsook the House and the people were all displeased except a few of their own hatching up and every one else murmured against it The Nobility mourned The Gentry were amazed The Common people wept and men women and Children did cry The Heavens cloathed themselves in black And the Sun hid his face The Lion King of Beasts died at the â—ight of his royal blood And the wild foules came wondering to see this execrable fact on the Scaffold And if the Thundering and Lightening of the Almighty be a true sign of Gods Angry Deity Then even from this we may conclude that these Regicides took too much upon them and very much provoked his wrath For Diespiter Igni coruseo nubila dividens Plerumque per purum tonantes Egit equos volucremque currum The Heavens roared with thunder which made the earth shake and the darts of fiery lightening threatened the ruines of both And who can think upon this worse than Gunpowder-Treason plot for then was but intended that which now is put in Execution viz. The murther of our gracious King and the subversion of all Laws and Religion with him and not justly expect all the Plagues of Aegypt and the punishment of Sodom and Gomorah to fall upon him and the whole people For Hor. Hoc fonte derivata clades In patriam populumque fluxit From the death of the King as from a fountain did flow the slaughter of the Nobility and people with the ruine of the Glory and freedom of the English Nation Tantae molis erat perversam condere gentem Such and so great villanies were perpetrated to raise this generation of Vipers Yet forsooth they will tell you that the supreme power and Soveraignty is in the people and that they act under them O grand Delusion Did the people turn out the long Parliament Did the people set up Oliver Protector Did the people turn out Dick his son Did the people foist up again the Rump of the long Parliamene Or did they hunt them out again Did the people sanctifie the Committee of Safety over them Or did they hunt in the Rump again Or have they made all the Revolutions and Choppings and Changings amongst us No neither the people nor their Representatives But the Devil his Representatives have been the cause of all our subversions For as the people have not so neither did the twentieth part of them ever challenge or claim the supreme power But have alwaies acknowledged the Soveraignty to be only in their King and only Soveraign only under God Reader take notice that in many places of this Book by the word Parliament is meant those Traytors the House of Commons who have unjustly usurped the name of Parliament For by the known Laws of the Land there can be no Parliament without the King Therefore let every one of the Regicides repent and pray to God to open his eyes and that the scales of blindnesse may fall from them that he may see his duty which is so evidently written in the Scripture and all other pious Writers which is to fear God and to honour his King which is acceptable in the sight of the Lord. And so I shut up my discourse with these verses which I would have the Reader get without book for his Edification Astra Deo nil majus habent nil Caesare terrae Sic Caesar terras ut Deus astra regit Imperium regis Caesar Deus astra gubernat Caesar honore suo dignus amore Deus Dignus amore Deus dignus quoque Caesar honore est Alter enim terras alter astra regit Cum Deus in coelis Caesar regâ—t omnia terris Censum Caesaribus Solvile vôta Deo A Tyrant without a Title set out in all his Colours and proved by the Laws both of God and man by the sentence of all honest and wise men by the vote of Antiquity and several Examples That it is most lawfull and glorious for any man either publique or private to fall upon Tyrants and kill them without Examination according to the usual forms of Judicature Where the consent of the people after Vsurpation makes an Vsurpers Title good and where not That the assent of the people cannot ratify any Government without him so long as their King liveth though banished but all their acting is Illegal How Tyrants pretend the safety of the people only for their own safe-guard and how they delude the people with specious names for their Magna Latrocinia their great villanies and robberies The Devil was a Rebel so are they and like Satan they have their power only by permission with an incitement to all men to execute them for these are not the Dignities we should obey LEt us now take our Swords in our hands and arme our selves to incounter with this Tyrant sine Titulo a Tyrant without a Title That bird of prey that beast of the game Orbis flagellum that scourge of the world that Devourer of Mankind Fulmen belli that Thunderbolt of war that Maule of the earth Poliâ—rcletes that destroyer of Cities that Hangman that Murtherer that great Robber whose might is his only right whose multitude of thieves makes him formidable builds himself up with honest mens blood feared by all men and fears
his Majesty before he was crowned King But it was clearly resolved by all the Judges of England that presently by the descent his Majesty was compleatly and absolutely King without any essential ceremony or act to be done Ex post facto and that Coronation was but a royal ornament and outward solemniation of the descent And this evidently appeareth by infinite Presidents and book cases where such execrable opinions have been no sooner hatched than destroyed and if the Judges of our age had been so honest as to have cropped in the bud such like opinions broached by the Rebells Charls the first had still been our King and we a flourishing and happy Kingdom Although the King of England hath two Capacities the one by Nature the other by Policy yet ligeance is due to the King in his natural capacity and his natural and politick body make but one indivisible body Plo. 213. The Oath of Alligeance is made to the natural person of the King so is the Oath of Supremacy and all Inditements of Treason when any do intend or compasse mort◠et destructionem Domini Regis the death and destruction of the Lord our King which must needs be understood of his natural body for his politick body is immortal and not subject to death the Inditement concludeth contra ligeantiae suae debitum ergo the ligeance is due to the natural body vid. Fitt Justice of Peace 53. Plo. Com. 384. in the Earl of Leicesters case It is true that the King in genere dyeth not but no question in individuo he dyeth as for example Charls the first dyed yet the King is not dead because Charls the second whom God preserve is still alive For by the Laws of England there can be no interregnum within the same lib. 7.11 And to affirm as the Traytors now do that the Kings power is separable from his person is high Treason by the Law of the Land hear the Oracle of the Law tell you so lib. 7.11 In the Reign saith he of Edward the second the Spencers the Father and the Son to cover the Treason hatched in their hearts invented this damnable and damned opinion that Homage and Oath of Ligeance was more by reason of the Kings Crown that is of his politick capacity than by reason of the person of the King upon which opinion they inferred execrable and detestable consequents 1. If the King do not demean himself by reason in the right of his Crown his Lieges are bound by Oath to remove the King 2. Seeing that the King could not be reformed by Sute of Law that ought to be done by aspertee that is by force 3. That his Lieges be bound to Govern in aid of him and in default of him All which were condemned by two Parliaments one in the Reign of E. 2. called exilium Hugonis le Spencer and the other in Anno 1 E. 3. cap. 1. If the opinions of the Spencers were so wicked and detestable what then are the actions of the Rebells of our age who have put in practice what was but intended by the Spencers and that they might reform the King according to their minds cut off his head because he was a headhigher than they O Monstrous Reformers Did I not know that the Euthusiasts of our times do by their diabolical interpretations subvert even the Holy word of the Almighty making themselves absolute Kings over the Scripture to do what they please with it though they will not permit their King to have Soveraignty over themselves his Vassals And like the raging torrent of the foaming flouds which running down the lofty Hills demolisheth and carrieth away all opposites in its roaring Streams or as the violent fury of a Masterless headstrong multitude who hew down Kings as well as Royal Subjects in their tempestuous fury so these men set upon the Bible and stretch every Text of Scripture to their own meaning although there is as great a distance between their meaning and the Scripture as there was betwixt the Glutton in Hell and Lazarus in Abrahams Bosom in Heaven else should I wonder how they could seem to make the very Letter of the Law speak against the very Letter and like the Philosophers stone which turneth all things into Gold so the tongues of these men turn the sense of all the Lawbooks into their golden meaning and cite those books as authorities on their sides which are so contrary and opposite against them as if they had been purposely prepared to encounter and confute them For where is the Kings Soveraignty more fully demonstrated and evidenced than in Reverend Bracton and what book so much abūsed as his For lib. 2. cap. 24. speaking of Liberties and who had power to give them Quis saith he who hath power he answereth that the King hath For Sciendum quòd ipse dominus Rex qui ordinariam habet jurtsdictionem et dignitatem et potestatem super omnes qui in regno suo sunt habet enim omnia jura in manu sua quae ad coronam et laicalem pertinent potestatem materialem gladium qui pertinet ad regni gubernaculum habet etiam justitiam et judicium quae sunt jurisdictiones ut ex jurisdictione suae sicut dei minister vicarius tribuat unicuique quod suum fuerit Habet enim ea quae sunt pacis ut populus sibi traditus in pace sileat quiescat ne quis alterum verberet vulneret vel male tractet ne quis alienam rem per vim roberiam auferat vel asportet ne quis hominem Mahemiet vel occidat Habet enim coercionem ut delinquentes puniat coerceat Item habet in potestate sua leges constitutiones assisas in regno suo provisas et approbatas et juratas ipse in propria persona observet et subditis suis faciat observari nihil enim prodest jura condere nisi sit qui jura tueatur Habet igitur Rex hujusmodi jura five jurisdictiones in manu sua And again in the same Chapter ea quae jurisdictionis funt pacis ea quae sunt justitiae paci annexae ad nullum pertinent nisi ad coronam dignitatem regiam nec a Corona separari poterunt cum faciant ipsam Coronam The sum of which in English is this the King hath supreme power in all civil causes the Law floweth solely from him he is super omnes above all men in his Kingdom all jurisdictions are in him The material Sword of right belongs to him and whatsoever conduces to peace that the people committed to his charge may live peaceably and quietly The power of holding Assizes is derived from him and of punishing Delinquents for it would be in vain to Enact Laws if there was not some body enabled to protect us by defending them c. And the same Author saith lib. 2. ca. 9. Potentia vero omnes sibi subitos praecellere parem autem habere
own stipendaries and cast out of the pack as an unprofitable Member He incouraged the Souldiers to fight against the King dedicated his Volumes to their chief Commanders loaded them with high Commendations and incomparable praises and made them believe that they could do God no better service than to go on vigorously in their Rebellion So that it may be truly said that his paper pellets did more harm than the roaring Guns or cutting Swords He laboured night and day to glorifie and vindicate the Parliament in their wicked proceedings at home and as his books will manifest he spared many hours from his natural rest to promote the unnatural Warrs abroad Yet now nec invideo he prosecuteth them with reproaches as much as he did then with praises himself being become hatefull to them all verifying the Proverb of Solomon cap. 24.24 He that saith unto the wicked thou art righteous him shall the people curse Nations shall abhorre him Therefore I once more advise him as a friend to write a book of Retractations The Lord be merciful unto us the men of our times would make one believe that there never was a King in the World Nay they would seem to make the Kings so highly esteemed of by God all the Prophets and Apostles in Scripture but meer white walls the empty shadows of the people and the Bible but a bundle of Fables as if God never took no more notice of a King than of an ordinary Porter How Judas sirnamed the Long Parliament betrayed and murthered Charles the first The best of all Kings and contrary to all Law and Religion and the common interest of the people Banish Charles the 2d our only lawful King and Governour The mystery of their iniquity laid open and that they are the greatest and most wicked Tyrants that ever dwelt upon the face of the Earth and the Child which is unborn will rue the day of their untimely birth Of what persons a Parliament consisteth No Parliament without the King The Original institution of Parliaments and that the House of Commons which now make themselves Kings over King and people were but as of yesterday have no legal power but what is derived from the King and never were intrusted with any power from the people much lesse with the Soveraignty which they now Tyrannically usurpe The Kings Soveraignty over Parliament and people copiously proved King Charles his Title to the Crown of England To him only belongeth the Militia the power of chusing Judges Privy Counsellors and other great Officers c. He is head in Ecclesiastical causes and our sole Legislator Our Ancestors alwayes found and accounted Monarchy to be the best of Governments and most profitable for us yet these 40 or 50. Tyrants contrary to all Antiquity and common sense and feeling sit and vote Monarchy dangerous and burthensome That all persons put to death since the murther of Charles the Martyr by the power of our new States-men have been murthered and their Judges Murtherers and so it will continue until they receive their power and authority from Charles the 2d and that we shall never enjoy peace or plenty until our King be restored to his Kingdoms which a pack of Tyrants and Traytors not the People keep from him How the Law abhorreth to offer violence to the King and how these Rebels transgresse all Laws both of God and Man to uphold themselves in their unparallel'd Villanies A History which commandeth the serious contemplation of our age and worthy of the observation of all the people in the World and of all future Generations not that they might imitate but detest and loath these Perfidious and Rebellious transactions Perlege deinde scies HAving sufficiently prov'd out of our Law books that by the Common Law of the Realm the King hath the Soveraign power over Parliament and People and ought not to be questioned for his actions by any of his Subjects taken either distributively or collectively in one intire body because he hath no Superiour on Earth but God Almighty Let us now take a brief view of the Statutes and Acts of Parliament which have from Age to Age confirmed what I have said as an undoubted inviolable and indisputable truth And since there are those amongst us who talk much of a power in the Parliament as they call the two Houses which they pretend to be above and Superiour to the King Let us examine what this high and mighty Creature is whence and when it had its original what is its true natural and legal power and of what persons it doth consist The Kings high Court of Parliament consisteth of the Kings Majesty sitting there as in his Royal politick capacity and of the three Estates of the Realm viz. 1 Of the Lords spiritual Arch-Bishops and Bishops being in number 24 who sit there by succession in respect of their Counties or Baronies parcell of their Bishopricks which they hold also in their politick capacity 2. The Lords temporal Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts and Barons who sit there by reason of their Dignities which they hold by descent or creation being in number 106. And every one of these when the King vouchsafeth to hold a Parliament hath a Writ of Summons The third Estate is the Commons of the Realm which are divided into three parts viz. into Knights of Shires or Counties Citizens out of Cities and Burgesses out of Borroughs All which the King commandeth his Sheriffs to cause to come to his Parliament being respectively Elected by the Shires or Counties Cities and Burroughs and in number 493. It is called Parliament because every Member of the Court should sincerely and discreetly Parler la ment for the general good of the Common-wealth This Court of Parliament is the most high and absolute the supremest and most antient in the Realm it Maketh Enlargeth Diminisheth Abrogateth Repealeth and Reviveth Laws Statutes Acts and Ordinances concerning matters Ecclesiastical Capital Criminal Common Civil Martial Maritine c. to be short so transcendent is the power and jurisdiction of the Parliament as it cannot be confined either for Causes or Persons within any bounds Of this Court it is truly said Si antiquitatem spectes est vetustissima si dignitatem est honoratissima si jurisdictionem est capacissima Yet notwithstanding this Almighty power as I may say of the Parliament do but cut off the Kings head or any ways take away the King and it is nothing Then a petty Court of Pypowders hath more power and jurisdiction than that The King is the Soul of the Parliament and without him it is but Putre Cadaver a stinking Carcasse for as my Lord Coke observeth of this Court the King is Caput principium et finis And it is a baser and more odious part then the Rump of a Parliament which wanteth all these and as in a natural body when all the Sinews being joyned in the head do joyn their forces together for the strengthening of the body
the due course of Law smote the Shepherd and so the sheep of the Protestant flock were all scattered abroad Bradshaw indeed that Pontius Pilate pressed the King very earnestly and by subtil and crafty inventions thought to have wrought upon the King to have submitted to their summa injuria their Arbitrary High Court of Injustice and pleaded So that his Example might have been urged as an irrefragable precedent against the lives and liberties of the whole Kingdome and that after ages might cite King Charles his case as an authority to kill Kings But the King foreseeing their delusive and abominable intentions rather than he would betray the lives and liberty of his free born subjects to the Arbitrary Lusts of these Tyrants told them of the great wickednesse they were about and shewed to his people how these Traitours endeavoured to inslave the whole Realm and so patiently suffered himself to be murdered dying a most true Martyr both for our Lawes and Religion but for plea he said nothing So Bradshaw more wicked than Pilate for instead of washing his hands he impudently bathed them in his Masters innocent blood gave the sentence of their wicked wills against him and delivered him over to the blood-thirsty to be crucified who spit upon him threw Tobacco pipes at him mocked him cryed out Away with him away with him Crucifie him Crucifie him cut off his Head with their wicked Engines and then cast lots for his Garments and Estate giving each Souldier a part But instead of writing over his head This is Charles the King of the Jews his true Title or rather the King of the Devils they writ over his head Exit Tyrannus Regum ultimus anno libertatis Angliae restitutae primo although in truth the best of Kings then went out and the greatest Tyranny under the Heavens then entred into our England comming far short of the Jews in all that is good but exceeding them in all wickednesse treachery perfidiousness and villany Now all this impious Council sought false witnesse against the King to put him to death but found none Therefore that they might do nothing without wickedness but proceed in all their Actions contrary almost to the very colour of Justice and make themselves the greatest and most illegal Tyrants that ever the world heard of they made themselves both Judges Jury Witness Party and Accuser in their own quarrel against the King For whereas by the Laws of the Land our gracious King alwayes made the Judges of the Land Arbitrators between his Subjects and himself in all cases from the lowest offence and trespass to the highest offence Crimen laesae Majestatis High Treason This Amalekite the House of Commons made part of themselves the Judges of the King who had committed the greatest Treason against the King and by the Laws of the Land deserved rather to hang at Tyburn than sit in the Chair of Justice likewise they made the Souldiers his Judges who professed themselves to be the Kings inveterate Enemies by their Remonstrances and Speeches and that they desired nothing more than his Blood and Life fought against him with their Guns and Swords Yet forsooth of this Hotchpotch of Traytors was their high Court of Justice made up Most of them being Collonels of the Army and other Souldiers who fought against him abroad and others Parliament men who conspired his ruine at home By the Laws of the Land it is a just exception to any Jury man who is to try the basest or poorest Felon and a legal challenge for which he must be withdrawn That he is a professed Enemy and Prosecutor who seeks his life and therefore no lawful nor indifferent tryer of him for it yet these bloody Butchers who professed themselves to be the Kings greatest Enemies and Prosecutors seeking after nothing so eagerly as the Kings life were both the Judges and Jury-men too to try the King Perjured O. Cromwell who then intended and afterwards effected to have the supreme power over these three Kingdoms was one of the Tryers to judge whether the King or himself with the rest of his brethren in iniquity deserved death and whether the King and his Royal Progeny ought not to be distroyed and Oliver and his stinking stock take possession O unparraleld lump of impiousness Aliquis non debet esse Judex in propria causà It is a Maxim in Law that no man ought to be Judge in his own cause Yet these villains made themselves the only Judge whether they committed Treason against the King or the King against them Nemo tenetur prodere seipsum No man is bound to accuse himself and it would have been a wonder indeed if these Rebels should have spoke the truth and said that they had committed high Treason against the King Therefore for fear the Law should punish them according to their deserts they thought good to prevent that mischief punish the King as they pleased according to their lusts And that they might make themselves the greatest Tyrants and the people the basest Slaves in the world they took upon them the Governing power which by Law only belongeth to the King 2. The Legislative power which likewise belongeth to the King with the concurrence of the upper and Lower House And 3. The Judicative power which belongeth to the Judges who are known Expositors and Dispencers of Law and Justice in all Causes brought before them So that these Trayterous Tyrants by their boundless and arbitrary wills put us to death when they please for what cause they please and take away our Estates when they see occasion And yet they have the impudence to tell us and many the sottishness to believe that the Parliament having the Supreme power doth all these villanies by Law O Abominable How these Tyrants mock the people with the name of a Parliament the Parliament consisteth of the King the head and about 600 of his Subjects and there were not above 50 or 60 of the Parliament who caused the King to be murthered and ruined his people yet these Schismaticks call themselves a Parliament and so having nothing good but their name Tyrannize over us They may as well say that the parings of the nailes of the toes are the whole man and have the power of all the other members as say that they are the Parliament or have any lawfull power they being nothing but the dregs and lees of the inferiour House from whom we must never expect any thing pleasing to any honest mans palate If the Parliament had power to depose the King yet what power can these few Gaol-Birds have who are scarce the tenth part of the Parliament and no Representatives of the People but only of their own Devilish ambitions By what authority do these Ignes fatui abolish Kingship and the House of Lords as dangedangerous and useless which all our Ancestors have found most profitable and glorious for our Kingdom These Currs have several times been kicked out of
are called of God to be Kings as his Vicegerents they have power to look to and have a care of the Church that the word be preached and the Sacraments administred by fit persons and in a right manner else how should Kings be Nursing Fathers to the Church had they not a Fatherly power over it Therefore many Acts of Parliament in several Kings Reigns and the whole Current of Law Books resolve and affirm the King to be head and have Supreme Jurisdiction in Ecclesiastical causes In the first year of Edward the sixth a Statute was made That all Authority and Jurisdiction both Spiritual and Temporal is derived from the King So in the Reign of Edward the Confessor was this Law ca. 17. The King who is the Vicar of the highest King is ordained to this end that he should Govern and Rule the Kingdom and People of the Land and above all things the Holy Church and that he defend the same from wrong doers and destroy and root out workers of mischief But since Reverend Coke in the fifth part of his Reports De jure Regis Ecclesiastico hath with luculent examples and impregnable lawes made it so clear that no man can gainsay it that the King ought and the Kings of England ever since before the Conquest until the Reign of Queen Elizabeth at which time he writ have had the supreme power and jurisdiction in all Spiritual and Ecclesiastical causes I referre you to his Book only reciting part of his conclusion viz. Thus hath it appeared as well by the antient Common Lawes of this Realm by the Resolutions and Judgments of the Judges and Sages of the Lawes of England in all succession of ages as by authority of many Acts of Parliament antient and of later times that the Kingdome of England is an absolute Monarchy and that the King is the only supreme Governour as well over Ecclesiastical persons and in Ecclesiastical causes as temporal within this Realm And in another places fo 8. he saith And therefore by the antient Lawes of this Realm this Kingdome of England is an absolute Empire and Monarchy consisting of one head which is the King and of a body politick compact and compounded of many and almost infinite several and yet well agreeing Members All which the law divideth into two several parts that is to say the Clergy and the Laity both of them next and immediately under God subject and obedient to the head Also the Kingly head of this politick body is instituted and furnished with plenary and intire power prerogative and jurisdiction to render justice and right to every part and member of this body of what estate degree or calling soever in all causes Ecclesiastical or Temporal otherwise he should not be a head of the whole body Now he that looketh upon these Authorities and yet saith that the King is not above both Parliament and people nor hath soveraign power over them will likewise look upon the sun in the Heavens and yet say that it is not above but below the earth and when he is in the midst of the sea say that there are no waters in the world If then the King hath the supreme power over Parliament and people as most certainly he hath how then could the Parliament or people much lesse sixty of them question or judge their King For no man can deny but that the greater power ought to correct and judge the lesser not the lesser the greater How could they did I say Why vi armis by violence and injury not by law So may I go and murther the King of Spain or the King of France and then tell them that their people have the supreme power over them The case is all one only these Rebels murthered their natural Father and King to whom nature and the Lawes of God and man had made them subjects but I should murther a forein King whom I ought not to touch he being the Lords annointed It is easie to prove the Soveraignty of the Kings of England by their Stiles unlesse our anti-monarchical Statists will say they nick named themselves Their several stiles since the Conquest you may see in the first part of my Lord Coke's Institutes Fo. 27. Therefore I will not trouble you with a recital of them as for the styles before the Conquest take one for all which you may find in the Preface of Co. li. 4. and in Davis his Irish reports Fo. 60. In a Charter made by Edgar one of the Saxon Monarchs of England before the Danish Kings viz. Altitonantis dei largiflua clementia qui est Rex Regum dominus dominantium Ego Edgarus Anglorum Basileus omniumque rerum Insularum Oceani quae Britanniam circumjacent cunctarumque Nationum quae infra eam includuntuâ— Imperator et dominus Gratias ago ipsi Deo omnipotenti Regi meo qui meum imperium sic ampliavit exaltavit super Regum patrum meorum Qui licet Monarchiam totius Angliae adepti sunt a tempore Athelstani qui primus Regum Anglorum omnes Nationes quae Britanniam incolunt sibi armis subegit nullus tamen eorum ultra fines imperium suum dilatare agressus est mihi tamen concessit propitia Divinitas cum Anglorum imperio omnia regna Insularum Oceani cum suis ferocissimis regibus usque Norvegiam maximamque partem Hiberniae cum sua nobilissima Civitate de Dublina Anglorum regno subjugare quos etiam omnes meis imperiis colla subdare dei favente gratia coegi By which you may observe the first Conquest of Ireland and that the Kings of England are Emperours and Monarchs in their Kingdom constituted only by God the King of Kings and Lord of Lords not by the people And so did many other Kings of England stile themselves as for example Etheldredus totius Albionis Dei Providentia Imperator and Edredus Magnae Britanniae Monarcha c. But that our preposterous Commonwealths men might make themselves most ridiculous as well as impious in all things they would argue the King out of his Militia and have him to be their Defender yet they would take away his sword from him O Childish foppery What a Warriour without arms a General without souldiers why not aâ— well a Speaker without a mouth such Drollerâ— was never heard of in the world until the Infatuation of these infandous Republicans hatcht it Nay but there shall be a King over us cryed the Israelites that we also might be like all the Nations and that our King may judge us and go out before us and fight our battels 1 Sam. 8.19 Anâ— what should he fight without the Militia should the King be over the people judge them and go out before them to battel yet ought the people tâ— have power to array arm and muster the souldierâ— at their pleasure ought they to appoint whaâ— Officers and Commanders they thought fit surely no For he will saith Samuel verse 12.
in stead of proving a Keeper to the Trayterous Keepers he hath approved himself a glorious Dâ—â—ender of our Liberties for which Trophies of honour shall be erected to his eternal renown neither will our King spare heaping of rewards upon his so memorable merits at his return to his own house which the General hath swept for him and turned out them who made it aden of thieves On Tuesday the 21. day of February 1659. a day which deserveth more solemnization than Gunpowder Treason day for then we were delivered from those who only intended to destroy King and Parliament but now we are delivered from those who actually did destroy both King and Parliament and so consequently the whole Kingdome General Monk our famous Patron conducted the secluded Members to the House of Commons where according to their former agreement with the General they voted themselves in a short time to be dissolved and a free Parliament to be elected Now I hope no man will presume to conceive the General so insipid as to think there can be a free Parliament without the King and House of Lords No it is ridiculous to think so for a free Parliament without the King would be but like salt which hath lost his favour thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast out and to be troden under foot of men Mat. 5.13 It would be but a Rump fatned and grow bigger For we are all sick of the Kings Evil therefore nothing but the touch of his Sacred Majesties hands can cure us And I may with confidence and truth affirm that every one of that infinite number of people which so much rejoyced at the destruction of the Rump and at the voice of a free Parliament would mourn and cry at their sitting if they do not bring with them the good tidings of restoring their King the hopes whereof only made them rejoyce And indeed they would have more cause to bewail a free Parliaments sitting without the King than the sitting of the Rump for this we may be sure of that the King will come in either by fair means or by soul if by soul that is by war then the war will be greater with a free Parliament and so consequently more grievous to the people than with the Rump because a free Parliament will have greater force and power to levy a war than the Rump and so the combustible matter being more the flame will be the higher But it is Atheism to think that a free Parliament will withstand the King therefore I will not taint my Paper with such detestable words I let fall a blot of ink upon Mr. Prynne's Soverain Power of Parliaments and Kingdomes a Book which I am sure deserves a greater blurre But Mr. Prynne hath since repaired his credit and got the applause of the people by writing for the King and against the Rump and other sectaries Therefore to give him his deserts there is no man in the Nation hath so much merited as himself in pulling down the many Tyrannies over us since the murther of Charles the Martyr He hath been our Champion whose pen hath fought against the scriblings and actings of the Traytors and Rebels for which I shall ever love and honour him and without doubt our Gracious King will sufficiently reward him if he continueth constant in his loyalty which God grant he may And although the Presbyterian held the head of Charles the Martyr to the block by his hair whilst the Independent cut it off yet now I hope the many evils which we have sustained by that royal fall for which he shewed the first play will teach the rigid Presbyter moderation and make him confesse notwithstanding his violent Covenant against that Apostolical constitution of Bishops that Episcopacy is the best form of Church Government and the only way to extirpate and keep down those infinite number of s31y'sects and factions which have taken root and budded since Episcopacy was rooted up and blasted No Bishop No King was the Symbole of our Solomon King James who I think was as wise and as much a Christian as any of our Lay-Elders therefore in vain do the Presbytery think of enjoying Monarchy unlesse they first resolve to lay aside all their schismatical Tenets and stick to Episcopacy For as the same King sayes A Scottish Presbitery and Monarchy agree as God and the Devil Our Soveraign Charls the Martyr in his sacred writings hath so clearly approved and vindicated Episcopacy from the false aspersions of the Presbiterian faction and also laid open the absurdities of Presbitery so fully that it would be arrogance in me to say any thing after him and not only ignorance but impudence in any man to look upon his writings and still remain a Presbiterian Therefore O Heavenly Father asswage the pride and open the Eyes of these rigid Zelots that in seeing they may see and in hearing they may hear and understand and not professe themselves wiser than our Saviour that great Bishop and his Apostles which were Bishops and appointed successive Bishops as you may read in the Epistles of St Paul to Timothy and Titus c. And the Government of Bishops hath been the universal and constant practice of the Church so that as Charls the Martyr writeth ever since the first age for 1500 years not one example can be produced of any setled Church wherein were many Ministers and Congregations which had not some Bishop above them under whose Jurisdiction and Government they were Therefore let not the aspiring currish Presbiterian who would pull down a Bishop in every Diocesse but set up a Pope in every Parish no longer spet venom against the Reverend Bishops And truly I think their grounds are so slender against Episcopacy that if the King would but make them Bishops they would then be as violent for Episcopacy as they are now against it Therefore rest content Presbiter for though not thy deserts yet State Policy may in time make thee a Bishop The Antipodes indeed viz. the Long called Parliament who acted all things contrary to all Law and Religion voted that Bishops should never more vote as Peers in Parliament But why was it not because the Religious Bishops should not withstand their Irreligious and Blasphemous proceedings in Murthering the King Destroying the Church and all our Laws and Religion with them Surely no man can deny but that was the only reason Que enim est respublica ubi Ecclesiastici primum non habeant locum in Comitiis publicis de salute Reipub Deliberationibus For which is that Commonwealth where the Ecclesiastical persons had not the first place in all meetings and publique consultations about the Welfare of the Commonwealth Surely none but the Utopian Commonwealth of these Rebels For it is the practice of all Nations nay the Rebels themselves who voted it unlawful for Bishops and other grave Prelates of the Church to meddle the least in Civil Affairs could approve it in their new
non usu valet argumentum But they all unanimously resolve and report the contrary Reader I Would not have thee imagine as some men through malice or ignorance do most impudently assert that when we say The King is absolute and above the Law that thereby is intended that the King is freed from and hath power to act against Gods Laws when he pleaseth No this is but their false glosse and interpretation For non est potentia nisi ad bonum hability and power is not but to good There is no power but what is from God and therefore no mortal man can have a power to act against God To sin and break Gods commandements is impotency and weakness no power For the Angels which are established in glory do far excel men in power yet they cannot sin The Law of God is above the King and he is bound to God to keep it yet neverthelesse he is an absolute King over men because God hath given him the Supreme power over them and hath given no power to men to correct him if he transgresse But God only whose Law only he can transgresse can call the King to an account Hoc unum Rex potest facere quod non potest injuste agere the King only is able not to do unjustly is a rule in Commonlaw and the reason is because the people do not give Laws to the King but the King only giveth Laws to the people as all our Statutes and Perpetual experience hath taught us Therefore how can the King offend against the Laws of the people or be obnoxious to them when they never gave him any Laws to keep or transgresse and then how can the people punish him who never offended their Laws Therefore the King must needs be absolute over the people and only bound to God not to the people to keep those Laws which God not the people gave him and as God is above the Laws and may alter them at his pleasure which he gave and set over the king so is the King above and may alter at his pleasure those laws which at his pleasure he gave set over the people still observing that he is free from all Laws quo ad coactionem in respect of any coaction from the people but not quo ad obligationem in respect of obedience to God by his obligation Therfore well might Solomon counsel us to keep the Kings commandement saying Eccles 8.2 I counsel thee to keep the Kings Commandement and that in regard of the Oath of God Be not hasty to go out of his sight stand not in an evil thing for he doth whatsoever he pleaseth Where the word of a King is there is power and who may say unto him what dâ—st thou These words are the words of God which King Solomon did speak by infusion of the Spirit In which you may see that the King doth what he pleaseth And we are commanded not to stand in an evil thing that is according to Iunius and Tremel translation perturbatione rebellione quae tibi malum allatura esset ageret tecum arbitratu suo sive jure sive injuria We must not murmur and rebel against the King though he deal with us unjustly He may be just when we think he is unjust The Kings heart is in the hands of God the searcher of all hearts as the Rivers of Water not in the hands of the people Therefore God not the people can turn it whether soever he will Prov. 21.1 King David was filius Dei non populi The Son of God not of the People Psalm 89.26 It was God who made him higher than the Kings of the Earth verse 27. not the People He was neither chosen of the People nor exalted of the People For I have exalted one chosen out of the people saith God verse 19. The exaltation was Gods and the choice not of but out of the people For I have found David my Servant with my holy oil have I anointed him saith God verse 20 Kings are the Children of the most high not of the people Psalm 82. Therefore who can say unto the King what dost thou If the people of England have power to depose and make Kings Why are they usurpers who by the power of the people destroy the lawfull King as did Richard the third and by the consent of the people established himself in the Government They are Kings de facto but not de jure as all our Books agree For the people have not the Soveraignty but the King Surely the people of England thought so when by act of Parliament they ordained that none should be capable to sit in Parliament before they had Sworn it vide 1 Eliz. 1.5 Eliz. 1.1 Jac. 1. And I am sure that the breaking of the Oath can give the Parliament no new Authority It is declared by the Lords and Commons in full Parliament rot Par. 42 E. 3. nu 7. Lex consuetudo Parliamenti 4 Inst 14. upon demand made of them on the behalf of the King that they could not assent to any thing in Parliament that tended to the disherison of the King and his Crown whereunto they were Sworn And it is strange to think that the House of Commons which is but the tail of a Parliament should have that power which both Lords and Commons had not But since there can be no Parliament without the King 4 Inst 1 2.341.356 We may conclude that these men being Traytors Rebels and Tyrants will take upon them to do any thing Defensive War against the King is illegal or the Great question made by Rebels with honest men no question Whether the people for any cause though the King act most wickedly may take up arms against their Soveraign or any other way by force or craft call him in question for his actions Resolved and proved by the Law of God the Law of Nations the Law of Nature the Laws of the Realm by the rules of all Honesty Equity Conscience Religion and Piety by the Example and Doctrine of our Saviour Christ all the Prophets Apostles Fathers of the Church and all pious Saints and holy Martyrs That the peoplâ— can have no cause either for Religion or Laws or what thing soever to levy War against the King much lesse to murther him proved in Adam The manner of the Government of the King Gods Steward and Stewart when he cometh described The Bishops Lords Prayer and Common Prayer Book must then be restored with their excellencies now abused He will lay down his life before he will betray his trust and give his account to any but God as did our last great Stewart his Father The blessednesse of the people when the King shall come and rule over them declared his Majesty The Christians duty towards their King laid open and warranted by the Death and Sufferings of Christ and multitudes oâ— Christians The madnesse of the people in casting oâ— the Government of a gracious King and submitting
Almighty hath said that ye are Gods and I will not say that ye shall die like men The radiant beams of your Countenance declare you more than mortal For in the light of the Kings countenance there is life saith Solomon Prov. 16.15 Neither is their voice like the voice of other men For A divine Sentence is in the lips of the King and his mouth transgresseth not in judgement Prov. 16.10 Therfore I will conclude that the King is a sacred Deitie A day in his Courts is better than a thousand I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of the King than be a Protector c. and reign in the tents of wicked Traytors For the Kings Throne is established by righteousnesse and mercy but Traytors reign by their Villanies and raise themselves up by the bloud and downfall of their superiors But God hath given his judgements to the King and his righteousnesse unto the Kings son and he will judge the people with righteousness and the poor with judgement Therefore kiss the son lest he be angry and ye perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little blessed are all they that are trusty and faithfull unto him I counsel thee to keep the Kings commandment and that in regard of the Oath of God Be not hasty to go out of his sight stand not in an evil thing for he doth whatsoever he pleaseth Rejoyce greatly O daughter of Zion shout O daughter of Jerusalem behold thy King cometh unto thee he is black but comly he is just and will be a nursing father to the people his Queen shall be a nursing mother For God hath made him our King And our King cannot be made glad with our wickedness But our lies and hypocrisie grieve him to the heart The King by Judgement shall establish the Land It is abomination to Kings to commit wickednesse neither is it for Kings to drink wine Mercy and truth preserve the King and his Throne is upholden by mercy Therefore thrice happy would the people be if they did not rebel against the Lords anointed who is righteous and pious For when the righteous are in authority the people rejoyce but when the wicked beareth rule the people mourn Rebellion is as the sin of Witchcraft and stubornnesse is as Iniqvity and Idolatry and an evil man only seeketh Rebellion Therefore a cruel Mâ—ssenger shall be sent against him For if ye rebel ye shall be devoured Therefore Rebel not against the Lord nor the King But when he cometh salute him Hail King but not of the Jews for you professe yourselves Christians Therefore learn of Christ obedience to the King But sâ—ppose you were Jews the Jews abound with reverence to their King and loath to be so wicked as to murther their King For when Pilate said Behold your King shall I Crucify your King They answered We have no King but Caesar accounting it a most barbarous and worse than Jewish act for any people to crucifie their King though in a way of publique justice Therfore even of the Jews let Christians learn their duty to their King and rejoyce at his coming as the Bribe doth at the approach of the Bridegroom The Husbandmen indeed in the Gospel killed the servants and when the son came to demand the fruits of his Fathers Vineyard they conspired against him and said This is the Heir come let us kill him and the Inheritance shall be ours But they were wicked and their Judgement and doom was miserably to be destroyed to have their Vineyard taken from them and to be let out to others who would yield better obedience and render the fruits in their seasons Therefore let all men take heed that they doe not perish in the gainsaying of Core and with those wicked Idolaters Isa 8.21 Curse their King and their God and look upwards Whose reward is Hell where the Devil shall curb them and rule over them for ever because they would not let their King whom God placed over them be as in truth he was and is their only lawfull Soveraign It is so well known to every one who knoweth any thing how the Heathens did honour their Kings as Gods not onely when they were dead but also whilst they were living that it would not only be losse of inke and paper but also expence of time which is better to relate the particulars But pudet heu their obedience and allegiance may shame aswell as be a pattern to the Christians of our age who wander so far from the path their Lord and Master went in And if any one be desirous to know how God hath alwayes esteemed of Kings and with what reverence Gods people have alwayes obeyed them I refer him to the Bible Where I may with confidenee speak it there is no duty more commanded and prest upon the people than obedience and no sin so much punished as Treason and Rebellion And the chiefest end of their obedience to the King is not only for God his glory and the Kings honour but also for their own good praise and profit For for this cause did the Apostle exhort the people to pray for Kings and all that are in authority That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour 1 Tim. 2.2 O Melilaee Deus nobis haec otia fecit Virgil could tell that the welfare of the King brought Tranquillity and Peace upon the Land and therefore he calleth him a God Nay he will therefore honour him as a God Namque erit ille mihi semper Deus saith he And I fear his allegiance and due obedience will rise in Judgement to condemn many who profess themselves Christians yet by their actions are worse than Infidels who Judas like pretend loyalty to their Soveraign whilest they plot and contrive with a kisse to betray him But Judas hanged himself and if these men do not hang themselves It is a great mercy beyond their deserts if some body else do not do it for them before they live out half their dayes For in the fifth Commandment which as Divines hold is most obliging We are commanded to honour our Father and Mother by which words are meant Kings Princes and other Magistrates That our dayes may be long upon the Land which the Lord our God giveth us which is the first Commandment with promise as St. Paul observes Ephes 6.2 But this promise is not absolute lt is upon this condition that we honour and obey our Soveraign and if we do not perform our parts God is not tyed to perform his If we break his Commandments he may well break his promise which was made only on that condition that we should obey and if we had loved him we should have kept his Commandments But whosoever breaketh one one of them it were better for him that a milstone were hanged about his
neck and that he were drowned in the depth of the Sea Therefore he who getteth a kingdom by the breach of Gods Commandements hath no cause to bragg of his gettings For what will it profit a man to lose his own soul and to gain the whole world Let every one be subject unto the higher powers For there is no power but of God The powers that be are ordained of God Whosoever therefore resisteth the power resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive damnation saith St. Paul Rom. 13.1 Behold here the duty of a Subject and the reward of a Rebel There is no power hut of God saith the Text Therefore he that resisteth the King resisteth the Ordinance of God for which he shall receive damnation What then if an unjust King robb us of all we have ravish our wives before our eyes dash out our Childrens brains against the wall set up Idolls and command us to worship them May we not resist him Nonne oportet Deo magis obedire quam hominibus Ought we not to obey God rather than man I answer That ye ought to obey God rather than man Yet may you not with violence resist your King We must not do evil that good might come thereon God hath in many places commanded us to obey and pray even for the worst of Kings Yet you cannot finde so much as a spark of warranty for any subject either Magistrate or private man to rise against his Soveraign in the whole Bible or to call him to an account for any of his actions God hath reserved that to himself as his own peculiar prerogative Magistratus de privatis Principes de Magistratibus Deum de Principibus judicare saith M. Aurelius Magistrates are to judge private men Kings are to judge Magistrates but none are to judge Kings but God The only means which subjects have to reform Kingdoms is that which the Apostle prescribeth 1 Tim. 2.1 Let prayers saith he and supplications be made for Kings and all that are in authority that we may lead a Godly life Prayers must be the only weapons of Subjects against their Kings Let them look into their own breasts and reform their own hearts which many times are the only causes of a Judgement on the Nation Let them amend their own lives and with fervent supplications implore him who hath the Kings heart in his hand and turneth it whithersoever he will to reform the King according to his desire Christiani hominis esse patienter ferre potius quicquid injuriarum ac molestiarum infertur quam ut adigi se sinat ad peccandum contra Deum It is the part of a Christian rather to suffer patiently what injury or persecution soever is laid upon him than to offend God saith Stephanus Szegedinus Interea tamen non esse illicitum si quis vim injustam vel avertere vel fugere vel aliquousque mitigare possit modo id fiat rationibus haud illicitis Quod si id fieri non potest Cavebit Christianus ne illatam vim contrariâ violentiâ retundere conetur sed tolerabit potius omnia nec de vindicando se cogitanit sed vindictam jâ—sto Judici permittet saith the same Author Yet it is not unlawfull if a man can to avert an unlawfull violence to flie from it or otherwise mitigate it so he doth not doe it by unlawful means But if he cannot do it by lawful means a Christian will take heed and not endeavour to repell an unjust violence offered with an unjust force No he will rather suffer all things first neither will he so much as think of revenge but will leave that to God the just Judge to whom vengeance belongeth O vocem verè Christianam O speech most worthy of a Christian If Herod be wroth and send forth and slay all the Children that are in Bethlehem and in all the coasâ—s thereof so that there be lamentation and weeping and great mourning Rachel weeping for her children and will not be comforted because they are not yet will he flie into Egypt with our Saviour and stay there until Herod be dead rather than he will rebell against his Soveraign resist Gods Ordinance so damn his own soul If Saul send messengers to bring him up to him in the bed that he may slay him or pursue him with 3000. chosen men of Israel yet will not he put forth his hand against his Soveraign for he is the Lords anointed Nay if it be in his power and he is counseled to kill him yet with holy David he will cry out The Lord forbid that I should doe this thing unto my master the Lords anointed to stretch forth my hand against him seeing he is the anointed of the Lord. His heart will smite him if he cut off his skirts but he will suffer all things before he will cut off his Kings head for who can do that and be guiltless If the King persecute him in this City he will flie into another Hee hath learned of his Master to be subject to his Soveraign not only for wrath but also for conscience sake He is good and the rulers are not a terror to him The evil and wicked will murder their Soveraign for fear his justice should reward them with death according to their deserts But he will not like those filthy dreamers speak evil of dignities and despise Dominion his tears are his arms and patience his revenger Levius fit patientia Quicquid corrigi est nefas Though it be unlawfull for him to gather Soldiers with force arms to correct and take his Soveraign from his evil Counsellors yet patience shall both assist and give him the victory St. Ambrose and he are alwaies in one time saying I have not learned to resist but I can grieve and weep and sigh and against the weapons of the Soldiers and the Gothes my tears and my prayers are my weapons otherwise neither ought I neither can I resist If the King saith God do so and more also to me if the head of this follow shall stand on him this day and likewise send a Messenger to cut it off yet with Elisha he will only shut the door against him and offer no other violence though it lie in his power If a multitude come out with swords and staves against him lay hold on him and lead him away to the Rulers who condemn him and deliver him to the wicked soldiers to be crucified yet in imitation of his Lord and Master he will say nothing rather than revile them though they spit upon him he will meekly wipe it off If they crown him with thorns hee will patiently suffer it If they give him Vinegar mingled with gall to drink hee will tast it If they crucifie him he will voluntarily spread forth his humble hands to be nailed on the Crosse and will not resist the higher Powers for the Lords sake If they saw him in pieces he will
But these men with their practice most wickedly affirm it King Henry the 7 â— h and many Burgesses and Knights of the Counties being first attainted by Act of Parliament of high Treason against Richard the 3d. The question was in H. the 7 ths Parliament How this Act of Attainder should be reversed and made void It was resolved by all the Judges That those Knights and Burgesses which were attainted should not sit in the House when the Act of Attainder was to â—e reversed But when that Act was reversed then they might come again and sit in Parliament But as for the King it was unanimously agreed and resolved by all the said Judges that ipso facto when he took upon him to be King that he was a person able and discharged of the Attainder for said they the King hath power in himself to enable himself without a Parliament And an Act for the reversal of the Attainder is not at all necessary See 1 H. 7.4 Com. 238. Parliament B. 37. and 105. In which case you may see the power of a King of a King that was attainted of the greatest offence viz. High Treason Here likewise you may view the power of a Parliament of a Parliament who had asmuch right to dethrone their King as ever the long Parliament or any other had Here likewise you may hear the voyce of the Law of the Common law not since repealed by any subsequent Statute But as it was then so it ought to be now the Resolution of all the Judges in England That the King hath power to take pardon and ought not to crave pardon of the people for his offences The Crown once gained taketh away all defect is the Sentence of the Law and an Adage amongst all honest Lawyers If the people had the Supreme power why was not the Attainder of the King in this precedent case reversed by Act of Parliament as were the Attainders of the other Members If the King be but an Officer of trust deputed by the people and receiveth his power from them Why was not the King in this case freed from his offence by the people What would they entrust a person attainted of so great an offence as high Treason with the highest place in the Common-wealth And yet not permit others guilty and attainted of the same offence not so much as to fit and Act as Members of the Parliament without they were first purged of their offence It doth not stand with reason that the highest Offender should exercise the highest office And doubtless if the people had had power the Parliament would have cleared King H. the 7th from his crime before he should have Officiated his Office of Kingship But that Parliament well knew that the feet were not higher than the head and that the Inferiour Members could not impose Laws on the King their Soveraign They knew with Bracton that the King Parem non habet in Regno suo had not in his Kingdom any single man or the people his equal Therefore since it is the Law of the land Magna Charta 29. That no mâ—n shall be judged but by his Peers and being the King hath no Peer or Peers in his Dominions They resolved not to judge their King nor to commit so great a vanity as to reverse the Attainder For can a King be attainted or can the people who have no authority but what they have from him have authority to correct and revise their King O foolish imagination Horac Caelo tonantem credidimus Jovem Regnare praesens Divus habebitur Augustus adjectis Britaunis Imperio Jove governs Heaven with his Nod King Charles he is the earthly God Great Britain being his lawfull Inheritance Our King Augustus high and mighty Solus Princeps qui est Monarcha Imperator in Regno suo Davis Irish Rep. fo 60. Our only Prince who is both Monarch and Emperor in his kingdom hath only authority and the only right to govern the Britains who though long since have been accounted Rigidi hospitibus feri rigid and cruel to strangers yet that they should ever so much degenerate as to be rigid and cruel to their own natural King and kill their natural Soveraign is such a wonder and murther that never entred into the thoughts of former ages and will be a bugbear and scar-crow to all succeeding generations for by robbing their King of his Crown and Life they have robbed the Turk of his cruelty Judas of his treachery and all the Devils of their malicious wickedness For the Turks cruelty Judas his perfidious treachery and the Devils malicious villanies do all conjoyn to make up and center in an English Rebel one of those beasts who like the Enemies of King David Psal 102.8 Have sworn together against their King are mad upon him and revile him all the day long Yet that they may seem religious even when they commit Sacrilege they like the Devil when he tempted our Saviour taking him up into an exceeding high mountain and shewing him all the kingdoms in the world and the glory of them saying unto him All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me Mat. 4.9 will promise fairly and as if they were resolved diametrically to oppose St. Peters Doctrin who commands them 1 Pet. 2.16 Not to use liberty for a cloak of maliciousness they use the liberty of the people as a Wolf doth the Lambs skin to destroy poor Lambs as the only cloak and cover for all their malicious wicked prodigious and damnable actions For if you ask them for what cause did they murder the King Their answer is for the liberty of the people For what cause do they make themselves Governours and Lords and Masters over all that we have For the liberty of the people For what cause do they subvert the Laws expell and throw down the orderly and holy Clergie and all Religion with them For the liberty of the people For what cause do they enslave the whole Nation For the liberty of the people Nay these men are so well furnished with godly pretences and wicked intentions that even whilst they cut the peoples throats they make them believe they give them a blessing And as the man who swore that the Coat of the true owner was another mans only because he might have the use of it himself So these men have the impudence to swear though not without perjury that the Supreme power is in the people only because they might throw down our royal Government with all goodnesse with it and use that Supreme power themselves which they protest is in the people O delusive Mountebanks Was there ever such a jugling deceit acted by any Jugglers or Quacksalvers in the world Surely there was not And did not every one nay they themselves very well know the truth of what I have said I might easily make it clear and evident even to the blind with multitudes of Examples For
all men an enemy to every honest man and every honest man an enemy to him a monster more hideous than ever the Poets could feign and more noysome and destructive to humane kind than any beast the world ever bred a Devil in humane shape If you do not yet conceive his nature I will give you a further description of him A Tyrant without a Title who indeed is most properly called a Tyrant is he who levieth war against his King killeth him and takes the Government upon himself or who of his own authority against the will of the people without election or right of succession neither by lot by will by gift by just war nor speciall calling of God doth take upon him the Soveraignty Take notice Reader by he way That the Subject can have no just war against his King A forein Prince may have a just cause to levy war and if he conquer his Title is good and just by the Law of Conquest So if ones own natural Prince be kept out of his Country by the Rebellion of his Subjects and he afterwards come with a forein Army nay with fire and sword as we say that is putting all to the sword who resisted him and burning up all that they have yet if he subdue the Traytors he is no Tyrant But if any man without any right or title usurpeth the Government and aspireth unto the Soveraignty though afterwards he squareth his life according to the rules of moral honesty and liveth as one may say according to the Lawes Yet notwithstanding he is a Tyrant for all this A Thief when he hath taken a mans purse from him will in company stand upon his Terms of honesty as much if not more than an honester man Yet this after sanctity will not purge a Tyrant from his former sin He must restore home that which he wrongfully and unjustly keepeth before he can be a true penitent and nothing but true Repentance can wash away the guilt of former sins Therefore Equo ne credite Teucri trust him no further than you can see him before he hath cast off the unlawfull robes of Soveraignty and put on the honest habit of a true Subject Eor Latet anguis in berba Let his outside be never so Religious he is a knave in his heart his pretentions and his intentions are seldome of affinity But may any private hand stick this wild boar may any publick or private man stab or otherwise destroy this Tyrant before he be tried according to the Common course of the Law Grounding upon the Law of God the Law of Nations the Law of Nature and the Common Law of the Realm I give judgement against him that as a stroyer of humane kind and society every man may lay violent hands on him and execute him For which according to the Laws and writings of antient Fathers he deserveth perpetual honour propounding to every one who should kill such a Tyrant most ample rewards viz. honourable Titles of Nobility and prowesse arms statues Crowns and the goods of the Tyrant as to the true deliverer of his Countrey By the Law of God Whosoeuer sheddeth mans blood by man shall his blood be shed Gen. 9.6 And what Tyrant ever was there who did not shed mans blood Nay by the Law of God That man who will do presumptuously and not hearken to the law is to be cut off that the evil may be put away from the Land Deut. 17.12 Exod. 21.14 All the Civil Lawyers do unanimously give judgement against him and esteem that man as one who doth God and his Countrey good service who shall rid the world of this viper By the law of nature every man is obliged to preserve himself And what better means can he use for his preservation than to destroy this elf this Wolf amongst men For who can say any thing is his own who can say his life his goods or estate is secure so long as a Tyrant reigneth By the Common Law of the Realm if any one set upon me to rob or take anie thing away from me I may lawfullie pistol him stab him or otherwise destroy him and by the same reason and law for ubi eadem ratio ibi idem jus I may destroy a Tyrant for the onely difference betwixt a common highway man or Burglar and he is their strength and might the one is a little thief the other a great one As when Diomedes a pirate was taken and brought before Alexander saith he Ego quia uno navigiâ— latrocinior aâ—cusor pirata tu quia ingenti classe id agis vocaris imperator si solus captivus esses latro cris st mihi ad nutum populi famulentur vocarer Imperator I because I rob with one poor ship am accused as a Pirate thou because thou robbest with a great Navie art called an Emperor If I had as great and strong a companie of robbers with me as thou hast and thou wast alone and a Captive as I am then thou wouldest be the thief and I the Emperor So may every common thief high-way man cutpurse or Burglar say to the Tyrant when he is brought before him For mutato nomine Fahula de te narratur When the Tyrant murthereth any honest man and taketh away his estate he pretends it is for the safety and good of the Common-wealth calling him Traytor to the State So it is for the safety of a thief to kill the man he intendeth to rob But the Tyrant he dazles mens eyes with new invented names for his magna latrocinia his great thefts having nothing honest in them but the very names For when he exerciseth his robberies and sendeth some of his messengers who are indeed no better than thieves to rob men that he calleth Excise So when he setteth upon the whole Nation he compelleth them to make a purse for him that he calleth Taxes And this kind of thievery is so much the more remarkable because he maketh the owners like fools gather the monies for him themselves Nay such is the stupidity of these Dromedaries that if they have scarce monie enough to buy themselves bread or to pay their Landlord his just Rents yet they will trot about to gather monies for this Tyrant their common enemie before they will lift up a hand against him They will let their Churches drop down for want of repair and Law and Religion and all fall to the ground before they will let the Tyrant misse of a farthing of his demands Tanta est insania mundi So great is the madnesse of men And the reason why the Law alloweth every man to kill a Tyrant and take that vengeance which in other cases is reserved to God and the Magistrate is because there is no other remedy and Gods Lawes cannot be otherwise executed for the Tyrant maketh himself above all law possesseth himself of all Forts strong Holds Garisons and the Magazine of all Armour so that by the greatnesse of his villanies
hath no Peer in his Kingdome for so he should lose his Empire since Peers or Equals have no command over one another much more then ought he not to have a superiour or mightier for so he should be inferiour to those who are subject to him and inferiours cannot be equal to superiours Now saith Mr. Prynne according to the old Jesuitical distinction The meaning of Bracton is That the King is above every one of his subjects and hath no Peer nor superiour if they be taken particularly and distributively as single men but if we take them collectively in Parliament as they are one body and represent the whole Kingdome then the Subjects are above the King and may yea ought to restrain and question his actions his Male-administrations if their be just cause By which meaning of Bracton as he calleth it but in truth only his own Mr. Prynne would prove the Parliament to have the Soveraign power over the King and Kingdome Truly I think the very recital of what Bracton hath written and what Mr. Prynne writeth is Bracton's meaning is enough to convince and make appear even to the blind that Mr. Prynne is worse than a false Commentator and an absurd deceiver But howsoever I will examine them and let the world judge how they agree The King hath no Peer in his Kingdome saith Bracton But the Parliament and people the Kings Subjects are in his Kingdome Ergo neither the Parliament nor people collectively or distributively are the Kings Peer or equal But why hath the King no Peer in his Kingdome Because then he should lose his Empire So he should if the Parliament was his Peer and Bracton did never intend that the King should lose his Empire for he saith the King ought by no meanes to have a superiour or mightier Mr. Prynne saith he ought by all meanes to have the Parliament his superiour and mightier But wherefore ought not the King to have a Superiour because saith Bracton so he should be inferiour to those who are subject to him The Parliament and People confess themselves to be the Kings Subjects yet Mr. Prynn would have them to be the Kings Superiour Expressly against Bractons words and meaning and a meer nonsensical Contradiction And the reason why Mr. Prynne saith Bracton did only mean that any single man was not the Kings Superiour or Equal not the Parliament is because Bracton saith Rex non habet parem nec Superiorem in regno suo seing Parem and Superiorem in the singular number I pray what Latine would Mr. Prynne have Bracton speak could he have expressed himself better and too Mr. Prynne pretendeth the Parliament to be only the Kings Superiour not Superiours Therefore doth not the singular number fully answer Mr. Prynne in all points but Mr. Prynne may hear Bracton confute him in the plural number too if he please as I have already shewed saying Rex habet potestatem et jurisdictionem super omnes qui in regno suo sunt and again Potentia vero omnes fibi subditos praecellet Where is Mr. Prynns almighty Parliament now Bracton telleth him if they be in the Kings Dominions that the King hath power over and above them and Mr. Prynne must find out some Utopia for them in the air to inhabit before he can prove either by Law or Gospel that the Parliament is above of hath Soveraign power over the King Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo et sub Lege quia Lex facit Regem saith Bracton but the King himself ought to be under the Parliament saith Mr. Prynne and why not under the women for if Mr. Prynne will say that the Parliament is not comprehended in the word Homine so likewise may he say that neither are women Bracton saith that the King ought to be under none but God and unless Mr. Prynne can make his Parliament a God Almighty he can never make out that the King is under it For according to Bractons Doctrine the King is under none but God Omnis quidem sub rege et ipse sub nullo nisi tantum sub Deo Which is sufficient testimony that the King is under no mortal man or men yet he is sub Lege under the Law because the Law maketh the King Ergo saith Mr. Prynne The Parliament maketh the King and Governeth him with the Laws which the Parliament first made O Grand Imposture Can any man but Mr. Prynne forge such a consequence Rex solutus a Legibus quò ad vim coactivam subditus est legibus quo ad vim directivam propria voluntate The King indeed is under the Law because he will be ruled by the Law but if he will not no man hath power to compel or punish him according to the opinion of Thomas Aquinas The King is free from the Coercive power of the Law but he may be subject to its directive power yet according to his own will and inclination that is God can only compell and command him but the Law and his Courts may direct and advise him Every honest man is bound to perform and fulfill his word and the King is so much under and subject to the Laws which he maketh that he will perform and fulfill them but if not Dominum expectet ultorem which is the only punishment for Kings And satis sufficit that is enough too according to Reverend Bracton But that the Parliament therfore maketh the King and may question his actions according to Mr. Prynns Sophistry is a meer non sequitur The Law indeed maketh the King for he hath a legal Title to his Crown he is made our King by the Law of God and the Law of the Kingdom which cannot be without a King but that the Law of the Parliament or that the Law by the Parliament made the King is such a Chimaera that is no where to be found but in Mr. Prynnes unsetled brain For the King of England was made a long time before Parliaments were invented or thought on The King indeed first made Parliaments and gave them their being who now have unmade their King and took away his living O ungrateful Servants who rob their Master O ungracious Children who murther their Father which begot them So much for Mr. Prynne and his pestilent book the prodigious offspring of a revengeful head whom I would not have mentioned but to vindicate the truth for which I will both live and dye One thing Reader I recommend to thee worthy of the observation of all Christians and as a just judgement of the Almighty God Psal 33.10 who bringeth the Counsel of the Heathen to nought and maketh the devices of the people of none effect Which is that Mr. Prynne who was the only Champion to fight against the truth with his pen as the Rebels did with their Swords to maintain and applaud the long Parliament in their Treason and Rebellion against their Soveraign was afterwards ill intreated by his
the shame of this impiety Providence bestoweth her blessings with blinde hands Prosperity doth not alwayes joyn hands with goodness neither is Adversity a true sign of illegality Good Kings may perish whilest wicked Rebels flourish David was forced by ungodly Traytors to flee from his Country Therefore our King may be a man after Gods own heart yet wrongfully driven from his own HAving given the unfortunate an Antidote Let us apply this Cordial That goodness is not an unseparable incident to prosperity success is no invincible argument that the cause is good Goodness and greatness are not alwayes companions Though Foxes have holes and Birds of the air have nests yet our Saviour the King of Kings had not where to lay his head King David though a man after Gods own heart was not without his troubles but had many infoelicities Though the subtile Foxes with their deceitful wiles banish our King from his Sacra Patrimonia his sacred Patrimony for so the possessions of Kings are called and make him wander up and down like a Pelican in the wilderness yet this is but like Jobs afflictions to make him the more glorious The top which is most scourged spinneth the better and the blustering windes make the Tree take the deeper root The Camomile the more it is trodden on the better it groweth and the Palm depressed riseth the higher so the afflictions of our Soveraign shall extol his renown the higher and like a ball thrown against the ground shall rebound and fly with more lofty Majesty For why his goodness doth increase by his misery and his Royal virtue like grass after a shower shall florish more gloriously God let Daniel be thrown into the Den to encrease his honour and chasteneth the Children which he loveth onely for their good What though cross gales drive us from our intended Haven And our hearts fail of all our desired injoyments so that blinde Fortune only striveth to make us miserable in prohibiting us from all our pleasing wishes Yet is this no argument that we are sinfull or that our desires are prophane What though a man be born blinde and so continue from his birth to his death Yet neither may this man have sinned nor his parents But that the John 29 works of God might be made manifest Can any one have the impudence to say that the King is wicked and that his cause is naught because the multitude of reprobates prevail and through the mightiness of their villanies subdue all that is good So may they argue that the Jews were Saints when they murthered our Saviour and that the Devil was an Holy Angel when he spoiled Job No God correcteth the pious that he may preserve them and permitteth the designs of the wicked to coach them to their own destructions He letteth Rebels dethrone their Soveraign and pull the earthly Crown from off his head that he may crown him in Heaven with everlasting glory The meanness of the case doth not diminish the lustre of the Jewel and Christ was a King though in the manger Seneca in Hyppolito Res humanas ordine nullo Fortuna regit spargitque manu Numera caeca pejora fovens Fortune doth not alwayes signally attest the design of such a party or the justnes of such an action to be righteous by permitting it to prosper and taper up into the world the Sun shines upon the bad aswell as the good and the rain makes their corn to grow oftentimes more plentiful than the righteous mens which makes the wicked glory in their actions and scorn all those as Atheists who will not Canonize them for Saints Honesta quaedam scelera successus facit If success doth but attend their enterprises let them be never so impiously wicked all the Logick and Rhetorick in the world cannot perswade them but that they are most sacred and righteous such is their profound ignorance and blind zeal That if the Devil put it into their hearts to murder their lawful King and Soveraign and likewise assist them to effect it they think they do God good service and punish all those with an Egyptian slavery who will not be of their opinion although expresly against God his Commandments viz. Fear God honour the King 1 Pet. 2.17 They make God to be even altogether such a one as they are in crying that it is Gods cause even when they commit the greatest Sacriledge Persperum ac faelix scelus virtus vocatur a mischief neatly effected is one of their chiefest virtues This indeed made King David to stagger nay his steps had wellnigh slipt when he saw the prosperity of the wicked when he considered that they were not in trouble as other men nor plagued like other men Their Eyes stand out with fatness they have more than heart could wish This made him cry out Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my hands in innocence But when he went into the Sanctuary of God Then understood he their end For Surely thou didst set them in slipery places Thou castedst them down in destruction How are they brought into desolation as in a moment they are utterly consumed with terrors as a dream when one awaketh So O Lord when thou awakest thou shalt despise their image was his next vote Prov. 1.30 They would none of my Counsell they despised all my reproof Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way and be filled with their own devices for the turning away of the simple shall slay them and the prosperity of Fools shall destroy them Thus you see that prosperity is sometimes a curse and no blessing To those beasts we intend to kill we commonly allow the best pasture And surely those men are better acquainted with Mahomets Alchoran than our Saviours Gospel who will not be convinced but that temporal happiness is the true index of Divine favour God scattereth his outward blessings upon the wicked aswell as on the good because if Virtue and Religion should only appropriate riches more men would become virtuous and religious for the love of mony and wealth than out of any love they did bear either to Virtue or Religion Maro O fortuna potens quam variabilis Tantum juris atrox quae tibi vindicas Evertisque bonos erigis improbos Nec servare potes muneribus fidem Fortua immeritos auget honoribus Fortuna innocuos cladibus afficit Justos illa viros pauperie gravat Indignos eadem divitiis beat Haec aufert juvenes retinet senes Injusto arbitrio tempora dividens Quod dignis adimit transit ad impios Nec discrimen habet rectaque judicat Inconstans fragilis perfida lubrica Nec quos deseruit perpetuo premit Therefore let not those despair whom blind Fortune hath kicked into any mishap nor measure the justness of their actions by the quantity of success Though the voyce of the world censure it For it is not the event which makes it good or bad Careat successibus opto Quisquis
nor detract the Magistrate 1 Pet. 2.17 Fear God honour the King Prov. 30.31 A King against whom there is no rising up Eccles 10.20 Curse not the King no not in thy thought 1 Sam. 24.6 The Lord forbid that I should do this thing unto my Master the Lords anointed to stretch forth mine hand against him seeing he is the anointed of the Lord. From which premisses none unless those who deny the Scripture can deny these Consequences That the jura regalia of Kings are holden of Heaven and cannot for any cause escheat to their Subjects That active obedience is to be yielded to the King as Supreme in omnibus licitis in all things lawfull But if God for the punishment of a Nation should set up a Tyrannical King secundum voluntatem pravam non rationem rectam regentem governing by his depraved will against reason and commanding things contrary to the word of God we must not by force of arms rebel against him but rather than so if not prevailing by Petition unto him or escaping by flight from him patiently submit to the losse of our Lives and Estates and in that case Arma nostra sunt preces nostrae nec possimus nec debemus aliter resistere Our prayers and tears should fight and not our Swords For who can lift up his hands against the Lords anointed and be guiltless This in Scripture we find practised by Gods people to Pharaoh Exo. 5.1 and the same people to Nebuchadnezzar a Tyrant were commanded to perform obedience and to pray for him Though there was no wickednesse almost which he was not guilty of His Successor Darius Daniel obeyed and said O King live for ever Dan. 6.21 For now no private person hath with Ehud Judg. 3.21 extraordinary commandment from God to kill Princes nor no personal warrant from God as all such persons had who attempted any thing against the life even of Tyrants Nil sine prudenti fecit ratione vetustas 2. The King hath his Title to the Crown and to his Kingly office and power not by way of trust from the people but by inherent bigthright immediately from God Nature and the law 1 Reg. Ja. ca. 1. li. 7.12 Calvins caâ—e 3. The Law of Royal government is a Law Fundamental 1 pars Jnst fo 11. 4. The Kings Prerogative and the Subjects Liberty are determined and bounded by the Law Bracton fo 132. Plowden fo 236 237. 5. By Law no Subjects can call their King in question to answer for his actions be they good or bad Bracton fo 5 6. Si autem ab eo petatur cum Breve non Currat contra ipsum locus erit supplicationi quod factum suum corrigat emendet quod quidem si non fecerit satis sufficit ei ad poenam quòd Dominum expectet ultorem Nemo quidem de factis suis praesumat disputare multo fortius contra factum suum venire If any one hath cause of action against the King because there is no Writ runneth against him his only remedy is by supplication and petition to the King that he would vouchsafe to correct and amend that which he hath done which if he refuse to do Only God is to revenge and punish him which is punishment enough No man ought to presume to dispute the Kings actions much lesse to rebel against him 6. The King is the only Supreme Governour hath no Peer â— his Land and all other persons have their power from him 3 Ed. 3.19 Bracton li. 1. cap. 8. Sunt etiâ—m sub Rege liberi homines Servi ejus potestati subjecti Omnis quidem sub eo ipse sub nullo nisi tantum sub Deo Parem autem non habit in Regno suo quia sic amitterit praeceptum cum par in parem non habeat imperium Item nec multo fortius superiorem nec potentiorem habere debet quia sic esset inferior sibi subjectis inferiores pares esse non possunt potentioribus Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo sub lege quia Lex facit Regem The King hath no superior but the Almighty God All his people are inferior to him he inferior to none but God 7. The King is Caput Reipublicae the Head of the Commonwealth immediately under God 1 Jnst 73.1 h. 7.10 Finch 81. And therefore carrying Gods stamp and mark among men and being as one may say a God upon Earth as God is a King in Heaven hath a shadow of the Excellencies that are in God in a similitudinary sort given him Bracton fo 5. Cum sit Dei vicarius evidenter apparet ad similitudinem Jesu Christi cujus vices gerit in terris That is to say 1. Divine Perfection 2. Infinitenesse 3. Majesty 4. Soveraignty and Power 5. Perpetuity 6. Justice 7. Truth 8. Omniscience 1. Divine perfection In the King no imperfect thing can be thought No Laches Folly Negligence Infamy Stain or Corruption of blood can be adjudged in him 35. h. 6.26 So that Nullum tempus occurrit Regi 2. Infiniteness The King in a manner is every where and present in all Courts And therefore it is that he cannot be non-sute and that all Acts of Parliament that concern the King are general And the Court must take notice without pleading them for he is in all and all have their part in him Fitz. N. B. 21. H. 25. H. 8. Br tit Non-sute 68. 3. Majesty The King cannot take nor part from any thing but by matter of Record and that is in respect of his Majesty unless it be a Chattle or the like Because De minimis non curat Lex 5. Ed. 4.7 4 E. 6.31 2 H. 4.7 4. Soveraignty and Power All the Land is holden of the King No action lyeth against him For who can command the King He may compel his Subjects to go out of the Realm to war Hath absolute power over all For by a clause of Non-obstante he may dispense with a Statute Law and that if he recite the Statute Though the Statute say such dispensation shall be meerly void 7 E. 4.17.21 H. 7.2 H. 7.7 Calvins case Bracton Rex habet potestatem jurisdictionem super omnes qui in regno suo sunt ea quae sunt jurisdictionis pacis ad nullum pertinent nisi ad Regiam dignitatem habet etiam coercionem ut delinquentes puniat coerceat And therefore ought to have the Militia 5. Perpetuity The King hath a perpetual succession and never dyeth For in Law it is called the demise of the King and there is no Inter-regnum A gift to the King goeth to his Successors though not named For he is a Corporation of himself and hath two capacities to wit a natural body in which he may inherit to any of his Ancestors or purchase Lands to him and the heirs of his body which he shall retain although he be afterwards removed from his Royal estate and a body
without arbitrary power most men of a late edition allow it in Aristocracy and Democracy Why then not in Monarchy If it be Tyranny for one man to govern according to his will Why should it not be far greater Tyranny for a multitude of men to govern how they please without being accountable or restrained by Law But though silent leges inter arma Yet Rex est viva Lex as our books say The king is a living Law Indigna digna habenda sunt Rex quae facit Those things which are unlawfull for the subject are lawfull for the king to do Imperatorem non esse subjectum legibus qui habet in potestate alias leges ferre saith B. Augustine The king cannot be subject to the Laws because he hath power to make other Laws What then after he hath established a Law That his subjects shall quietly injoy their estates may the king legally without offending God take away their estates and break that Law Because his will is a Law I answer he may But distinguenda sunt tempora causae The King hath a Conscience aswell as another man which must be ruled according to Gods Law and Equity otherwise God to whom vengeance only belongeth will judge him It is lawful for the king ad supplendam reipub necessitatem supportandam regiam majestatem to supply the necessity of State and to support his Royal Majesty notwithstanding any former Law to take away the estates of his subjects without their leave and that legally too because in that case his will makes a Law And therefore doth the common Law of England allow him many prerogatives which to explain would require a volume of it self and are very copiously in our Law books demonstrated But the summe of them is The king upon just cause may do what he please both with his subjects and their estates and no body is to be judge whether that cause be just or no and take vengeance but only God his own conscience If it be unjust Habet Deum Judicem Conscientiae ultorem injustitiae He hath God the Judge of his conscience and the Revenger of his injustice And satis sufficit ei ad paenam quod Dominum expectet ultorem It is punishment enough for him to think that God will take vengeance on him saith Bracton doth Bracton say so Why there are some a amongst us who make Bracton the only instrument and authority to kill kings But to vindicate the Law and Reverend Bracton I will make bold to tell them for veritas audentes facit truth makes a man bold that they belye Bracton and scandal the Law and their profession And that it may appear it is not my opinion only I will recite that warrant out of Braston li. 2. c. 16. fol. 34. which they build upon and the answer to it of the Lord Bishop of Osory a man worthy of eternal renown both for his Law Learning and Religion for saith he Yet because this point is of such great concernment and the chiefest Argument they have out of Bracton is that he saith Rex habet superiorem legem curiam suam Comites Barones quia Comites Dicuntur quasi socii Regis qui habet socium habet Magistrum ideo si Rex fuerit sine fraeno id est sine lege debent ei fraenum ponere nisi ipsimet fuerunt cum rege sine fraeno And all this makes just nothing in the World for them if they had the honesty or the learning to understand it right For what is above the King the Law and the Court of Earls and Barons But how are they above him as the Preacher is above the King when he Preacheth unto him or the Physician when he gives him Physick or the Pilot when he sayleth by Sea that is quo ad rationem consulendi non cogendi they have superioritatem directivam non coactivam For so the teacher is above him that is taught and the Counseller above him that is counselled that is by way of advice but not by way of command And to shew you that this is Bractons true meaning I pray you consider his words Comites dicuntur quasi socii they are as fellows or Peers not simply but quasi And if they were simply so yet they are but Socii not superiours And what can Socii do not command For par in parem non habet potestatem that is praecipiendi otherwise you must confess habet potestatem consulendi Therefore Bracton adds qui habet Socium habet Magistrum that is a Teacher not a Commander and to make this yet more plain he adds si Rex fuerit sine sraeno id est sine lege If the King be without a bridle that is saith he lest you should mistake what he means by the bridle and think he means force and arms the Law they ought to put this bridle unto him that is to press him with this Law and still to shew him his duty even as we do both to King and people saying this is the Law this should bridle you but here is not a word of commanding much less of forcing the King not a word of superiority nor yet simply of equality And therefore I must say hoc argumentum nihil ad rhombum And these do abuse every Author So much the Bishop and I think this answer will satisfy every reasonable man And I add further that it would be very strange that Bracton should say in this place that the King hath a Superiour when he denyes it in several other places of his book and presseth it with arguments that he hath not saying Omnis quidem sub eo ipse sub nullo nisi tantum sub Deo All are under the King and the King under none but God Rex non habet superiorem nisi Deum The King hath no superiour but God Nemo quidem de factis suis praesumat disputare multo fortius contra factum suum venire Let no man presume to dispute against the Kings actions much less withstand his actions with force and arms and rebel against him fol. 6. Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo The King is under none but God Exercere Rex debet potestatem sicut Dei vicarius in terra Minister quia ea potestas solius Dei est The King ought to exercise power as the Vicar and Minister of God because he receiveth his power from God only Therefore they who would fain have Bracton say that the Law and the people are the Kings Superiours would make him as uncertain as themselves and do very much abuse that venerable Author and no man can finde so much as scintilla legis a spark of Law in all the Law books that ever the People or Law were above the king so as to punish him and doubtless if there had been any such thing the learned Lawyers would have reported it to posterity And A
to a Multitude of Tyrants and the dreadfull events if the Tyrants do not restore the King to his own again The murder of the late King Charles is proved to be most illegal and how the Rebels use the liberty of the people only as a Cloak for their wickednesse and their Knavery discovered in pretending the supreme power to be in the people whereas they use it themselves and so Tyrannize over us The Laws of England described and proved that our Soveraign Charles the 1. was unjustly killed against the Common Law Statute Law and all other Laws of England WE have already clearly proved that Kings are by Divine institution that they have their power from the Heavens and not from terrestrial men and that their power is above the people and Laws We are now come to see whether the people the Kings subjects have power to destroy and put assunder that which God hath thus created and joyned together It is a sound conclusion which naturally and of necessity floweth from the premisses that they have not and having shewed 1. That God made the first King Adam in Paradise 2. That there he received his regal power from God not from the people And 3. That there he arbitrarily made Laws according to his will where he had reigned a Monarch for ever as Divines hold had not he transgressed Let us now see what became of him after his transgression for King Adam did transgress and he must give an account of his Stewardship But to whom must he give his account To man he cannot for the King hath no superiour on earth Therefore he must to God who in the 19 th verse of Gen. cap. 2. challengeth his praerogative And the Lord God called unto Adam and said unto him Where art thou No sooner did Adam hear God call but he presently gave an account of himself saying verse the 10. I heard thy voyce in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid my self Where note That God taketh an account chiefly of the king for his subjects offences The king is Gods Steward and God will reckon with him God sent him from Paradise out of the garden of Eden to till the ground Therefore that he may make a good account he must Parcere subjectis debellare superbos cherrish the flowers and root up the weeds He must be a nursing Father to his loyal subjects but he must batter down the swelling pride of Traytors The true Protestant Religion must florish as the best flowet in his Garden But the Anabaptists Independents Presbyterians Papists Jesuits and other wicked Sectaries must be pulled up as weeds lest they overspred and choak the good flower They must be extirpated by the root whilest they are young lest theâ— grow up and seed and their seed be sowen up and down in the whole World He must set the Bishops again in their natural soyl which is now grown over with these weeds and rubbish That that stone which these new builders refused may become the head stone of the Corner and the Bishops Lands which they did not refuse must be given to the Church again The Common Prayer Book now rejected as fit for none but the use of Papists He must bring in and make those Papists read it who now reject it as Popery for no other cause but that there is no Popery in it He must turn the Horses and other unclean beasts out of his Sanctuary now made a Stable St. Pauls c. and put in holy Bishops and reverend Pastors in their room And since our Saviour hath commanded it He must make the Lords Prayer current amongst us That our Ministers may leave off piping what they list and pipe the true tune which the Lord of life the best Musician taught them that all Gods people may dance For how can we dance when the instrument is out of order and the wrong tune is piped Good God! what a superstitious and Papistical age do we live in when we account it superstition and Popery to say the Lords Prayer the Common Prayer the ordinary means of our salvation O blessed Iesus Hast not thou commanded us not to use vain repetitions But when we pray to pray thus Our Father c Dost not thou know what we want better than our selves and hast thou not prescribed us a set form of prayer to ask it with And shall we cast thy prayer behind our backs and presume to come before thee without it are we wiser than the Lord of life or is there any nearer way to Heaven than that which he hath taught us shall we present the Lord with our own husks and trample on the Manna which he hath prepared for us Is there any other spirit to teach us to pray than the Spirit of the Lord which taught us in his Gospel When we petition to any of our superiours on earth then we premeditate and cull out filed and curious words worthy of his personage But when we should pray to the Almighty then any thing which lyeth uppermost is shot out at him like water out of a squirt and what pleaseth our foolish phantasies that we pretend to be the Spirit of the Lord. O God arise vindicate thy own cause Let not the soul of thy Turtle Dove be given into the power of the wicked For how is the Mother reviled by her Children and it grieveth thy servants to see her stones lye in the dust But rege venienti hostes fugierunt It is Gods Steward otherwise called Stewart with must remedy all this He must turn our spears into pruning hooks and our swords into plow-shares and so consequently our sword-men into plow-men The love of his Subjects must be the Magazine of his Artillery and their Loyally and obedience must be their chiefest good and honour O fortunatos nimium sua sâ— bona norint O happy multitude if they did but know their summum bonum their chiefest good which is loyalty and due obedience to their Soveraign For he will not break the Charters of their Corporations nor invade their rights and liberties He will not distrain for excessive Taxes nor impose great burdens on his Subjects The Law shall be to him as the apple of his eye and the true Protestant Religion as his dearest heart Learning shall florish and the Vniversities shall not be destroyed He will not murder the Prophets nor massacre the Citizens before their own doors He will not contrive plots with his Impes and Emissaries to catch honest men with their estate Justice shall run down the streets like streams and peace shall make the Land flow with milk and honey Every man shall eat the fruits of his vineyard under his own vines and enjoy the presence of his family with the absence of a Souldier He will not build up his throne with bloud nor establish his royal state with lyes and dissembling Flatterers will he abandon from his Court and those who keep other mens estates
will he banish from his Realm But suppose that he should eat of the forbidden fruit do what was right in his own eyes and evil in the Lords To whom shall this great Steward give an account shall he give his account to the Inferiour servants of his Lord That would be an audacious and wicked attempt of them A high prejudice to the Lord and a great dishonesty and disgrace to the Steward in his Office For the Lord would be extremely offended The Inferiour servants severely punished for exacting an account which only belonged to their Lord And the Steward would be dismissed of his Stewardship as dishonest and unfaithful Therefore every just and pious Steward will dye before he will so much wrong his Lord and Master of his right as to give an account of his Stewardship to them to whom it doth not belong and although they are so unjust and dishonest to require it yet he will give them his life before he will be corrupted For he is accountable to none but unto the Lord who will require it as his due For the Lord called unto Adam and said unto him where art thou And he said I heard thy voyce in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid my self But what is this all Must the King give an account only of himself No he must answer for his subjects too Of him to whom much is given much shall be required For Adam said The woman whom thou gavest to be with me she gave me of the tree and I did eat Where note that the subject may cause the Soveraign to sin and the sin of the subjects often times pulleth down judgments on their Soveraigns head aswell as on their own and the King must be their Accomptant Eve first sinned But Adam must be first called in question Yet he was a King and therefore none must call him in question but God who only was his Superiour But when Adam fell did not his Soveraignty fall with him No Adam was a King after his fall and had his Soveraignty confirmed to him by God for ever For Gen. 3.16 And thy desire shall be to thy Husband and he shall rule over thee so that Adam did still retain his superiority But was not this Soveraignty personally fixed in Adam and so dyed with him No God did declare it transmissible from Adam to the first born For Gen. 4.7 God said to Cain the first born speaking of his younger brother Abel sub te erit appetitus ejus dominaberis ei Unto thee shall be his desire and thou shalt rule over him So that from Adam it doth appear 1. That Kings are ordained by God not by the people 2. That God gave them their regal power 3. That that power is above the laws 4. That they have no Superiours but God And 5. That God only hath power to call them in question and punish them if they offend For Crimine ab uno Disce omnes From that one great offence which Adam the King committed and was not accountable neither did he account with any but with God leaâ—n all that the King cannot commit any offence so great as to give his Subjects just cause to call him in question or to take up arms and with force to resist him Which I shall prove with luculent authorities and pregnant examples both human and divine I think it is received by all for a truth That the King is Pater Patriae the Father of his Country Maritus Reip the Husband of the Commonwealth and Dominus Subditorum the Master of his Subjects I remember that Roffensis de potestate Papae asketh this Question An potestas Adami in filios ac nepotes adeoque omnes ubique homines ex consensu filiorum ac nepotum dependet an à solo Deo ac natura profluit Whether the power of Adam over his Children and nephews and so over all the men in the world doth depend on their consent or whether it doth not flow from God and Nature I have already made it clear that his power doth not depend on their will and consent but is instituted by God and Nature If so then I ask this Question Whether the sons of Adam have any power either from God or Nature violently to resist and oppose the King their Father Which Question I conceive may be as truly resolved that they have not For first there is nothing so fairly written and so deeply impress'd in Nature as Obedience You may see it in every creature every brute beast will teach you the obedience due from children to their parents and the soveraignty of the parents over their children Vipers indeed will destroy their parent but it is a monster in Nature and therefore not imitable by any but those of a viperous brood Behold the natural love and obedience of the pious Storks towards their parents who feed their feeble and impotent parents when they are old as they fed them being young And lest Obedience should lose a reward the Aeâ—yptians so esteemed this bird that they laid a great penalty on him that should kill it You may read of many beasts and fowls that with bloudie strokes will beat away and banish their young from them But so great is the natural love allegeance of their young that as if it had been high-treason for them so to doe they will not so much as resist their parents but flie from them teaching every subject his true obedience towards his Soveraign and that in this case only when the Soveraign would unjustly punish him it is most honourable and the greatest argument of a valiant man to run away Would not it be a most hideous and detestable thing for a son to murder his own Father Nay suppose the Father should draw his sword at his Son would that be a just ground for him presently to run in upon his Father and stab him surely I think every mans nature will teach him to speak better things than these and to be so far from approving it that he will account nothing more horrible and worthie of so much punishment Pater quamvis legum contemptor quamvis impius sit tamen pater est Patri vel matri nullo modo contradicere debemus dicant faciant quae volunt saith Origenes We ought to contradict our Father or Mother by no means let them say or doe what they please for be they good or bad they are our Father and Mother But behold a greater than thy Father is here It is thy King whose Sword commandeth fear whose Crown importeth honour whose Scepter requireth obedience whose Throne exacteth reverence whose Person is sacred his Function divine and his Royal Charge calleth for all our praiers O quam te mâ—morem virgo namoue haud tibi vultus Mortalis nec vox hominem sonat O Dea certe O King with what terms of honour shall I style thee Is it lawfull to call thee a Man The
nisi qui se pronunciavit esse justitiam If any of us offend the King thou mayest correct us but if thou shalt exceed who shall correct thee we may speak unto thee and if thou wilt thou mayest hear us But if thou wilt not none can condemn thee but he who is Justice it self Therefore every one should endeavour to be that true obedient described by St. Bernard Verus Obediens non attendit quale sit quod praecipitur hoc solo contentus quia praecipitur He that is truly obedient regardeth not what is commanded being content only with this that it is commanded We should be as diligent to obey and preserve our King as the apple our eye and take asmuch delight in him as we do in the light for he is worth ten thousand of us Therefore the Israelites would not let David their King adventure himself in the war against his rebellious Son and their reason was Thou art worth ten thousand of us so in the war against the Philistines They swear Thou shalt no more go out with us because they esteemed him as the light of the Kingdom and say 2 Sam. 18.31 That thou quench not the light of Israel if he should miscarry they accounted themselves to be but in darkeness And if we were true Israelites indeed in whom there was no guile we should have the same estimation of our dread Soveraign nulli pietate secundus who is a second David But suppose he was as he is not a Tyrant were it not better for us to serve one hard yet honourable Master than a hundred domineering yet base â—red Tyrants Si pereo manibus hominum periisse juâ—abit If we must be killed and made slaves of let the King who is our superiour do it and not our servants who have no greater pedigree than anâ—ient servants and no other cause of their promotion than their wickedness Praestat timere unum â—uam multos It is better to fear one than many Better one woolf than many to put our lives in continual hazard It is a Maxime in Law that the King shall have the estates and protection of their persons who are non compos mentis Ideots c. May not the King then justly and with good title by this rule challenge both our estates and our persons Surely he may for if we were not worse than mad men and fools we should never expel a gracious and merciful Soveraign and subject our selves to a company of the Lord knows what A monster without head or tayl more wonderful than Chimaera they would and they would not they themselves cannot tell what to make of themselves neither can any man tell where to have them like empty clouds and foggy mists they are blown about with every winde But it is to be feared that the Devil will catch them at the long run who now drink bloud like sponges and only know how to be wicked oppressing both Law and Religion Did the King demand Ship-mony as by the Law in extraordinary cases he might and was he condemned and vilifyed as unjust and a breaker of the peoples liberty What are they then who against all Law and Equity take away all that we have only to satisfy their own ambitions Atheistical appetites and to maintain themselves in their most wicked devillish and incomparable villanies Did the King demand five treacherous Members of the Parliament whom the Law would have condemned guilty of high Treason And was he adjudged an Enemy to Parliaments and an Infringer of their freedoms What are they then to be adjudged who do what they list hang or draw our Members and persons and play with Parliaments as Children do with Rattles or as Butchers their slaughtering axes throw them away when they have done with them and dismount and thrust out that * what do you call it * Quondam Parl. which first gave them their being O viperous brood who destroy that viper which ingendred them But since by the Law of the Land Mad men shall not be punished for committing of Felony or Murther Lest we being mad-men and fools as I have said before should murther our King and think to excuse our selves by pleading non compos mentis Let me tell you that though one that is not of his right mind shall not be punished if he commit Felony Murther petite Treason c. Yet if he kill or offer to kill the King it is high Treason and he shall suffer punishment as other Traytors ought to do let Cook the Oracle of the Law give the reason li. 4. fo 124. Car le Roy Est Caput salus Reipublicae a Capite bona valetudo transit in omnes pur cest cause lour persons sont cy sacred que nul doit a eux offer violence mes il est Reus criminis laesae Majestatis pereat unus ne pereant omnes For the King is the head saith he health of the Commonwealth upon whom the safety of all doth depend and for this cause the Kings person is so sacred that no man can offer violence to the King but he is guilty of high Treason for which he shall die For it is better that one perish than all And since it lyeth in my way this will I speak for the credit of the Common laws of our Realm That though the Law of God the Civil Law and all other Laws do as it were strive to excel each other in maintaining and defending the Prerogative of Kings yet doth not our Common Law which is founded on the Law of God come behind any of them For I should want words to expresse and Paper to contain the many privileges and just immunities which the Law giveth its Soveraign the King and if the Judges had been as just to execute the Law as Dunn the Hangman is The head and feet had still injoyed their proper Functions and there would as there ought still have been a difference betwixt the Servant and the Master the Subject and the Soveraign But silent leges inter arma our law-books like broken Vessels are laid aside and our Laws like Cobwebs are not taken notice of except it be to wipe sweep them away that the Corruption of one thing is the perfection of another is a rule in Philosophy And do not the Sophistical Philosophers of our times prove and approve this rule by practice who perfect themselves by the ruine of the Laws The Sword is their pruning-hook by which they lop others to make themselves grow the better they bait all their designs with Liberty and Rellgion and so catch the people into Hell when they think to go to Heaven The principal end of Government is the advancement of Godâ— honour but these men make the safety of the people the sole and only end of Government only that they might murther their King the Shepheard make a prey of the sheep his subjects and so feed the cruel appetite of themselves the
person of any Tyrant Pax â—um hominibus bellum vitiis but I hate his Tyyrannie I freely forgive them all the injuries they have done to me or any of my friends and for their good I have written this Treatise but they are Gods enemies and God would be offended if we should let them sleep in their villanies Our Laws and Religion ought to be more dear to us than all things in the world for without them we should be worse than beasts and who more subverteth our Laws and Religion than Tyrants Vt imperium evertant libertatem preferunt cum perverterunt ipsam aggrediuntur saies Tacitus That they may pervert the legal Government they pretend liberty for the people and when the Government is down they then invade that libertie themselves Auferre trucidare rapere falsis nominibus imperium atque ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellent To rob to murther to plunder Tyrants falsely call to Govern and to make desolation they call to settle peace These are they which God sayes Hosea 8.4 Ipsi regnaverunt sed non ex me They have reigned but not by me They have made Princes and I knew it not and have cast off the thing that is gâ—od There is no power indeed but of God but the abuse of power is from the Devil These men do not rightly use but abuse the power and as Satan is called the Prince of the world so these men are called Governors of the Realm not because they are so by right but by Treacherie Rebellion and Treason their power is by Gods permission not by his Donation Therefore these are not the Dignities and higher powers which the Apostle commands us to be subject to for then we must be subject to the Devil too for Tyrants and Devils have powers both alike lawfull and both by Treason and Rebellion No we should resist and arm our selves against these enemies it is Disobedience to obey them Rebellion not to rebell against them and Treason not to plot Treason against them Therefore let everie one be readie with his dagger like Jodes to stab this devourer of mankind Bad Kings must be converted onelie with praiers and tears but Tyrants must be subdued with clubs and swords for Quis constituit te virum Principem Judicem super nos Exod. 2.14 Who made them Princes and Judges over us the King we know and the Kings son we know but who are they They are not of Gods making but of Beelzebubs their Master and their own making Therefore let everie good Christian arm himself against these Caterpillers devotion and action must go together let him not bribe his Conscience with self interests but take courage and fight the good fight that so he may deliver himself and his Countrie from slaverie and bring the Tyrants to the Rope their best winding sheet All other Governments are but the corruption and and shreds of Monarchy which is the most glorious and most profitable of all sorts of Governments when and how Aristocracy and Democracy begun rather by Gods permission than institution The proper Character of a Common-wealths man or the Definition of an English Changeling with his flexible and mutable qualities The absence of our King is the cause of the presence of our many sins and divisions IF you remember in my Division of Governments I made mention of Aristocracy and Democracy c. which indeed had their first Original from the corruption of Monarchy and are but shreds of Monarchy as all Politicians hold Therefore I will not spend time and paper to abuse your patience with anie thing but a Description of them For Virg. Verum haec tantum alias inter caput extulit urbes Quantum lent a soleni inter viburna cupressi Monarchy doth as far excell all other sorts of Government in glory profit conveniencie for the people and in all other good qualities as the Sun doth the Moon or the Moon the twinckling stars and is like the lofty Cedar amongst the servile shrubs Hence it cometh that even the Republicans who hate a King because he is their Soveraign Master are compelled to suffer and use Petite Monarchies as one may say under them as one Master over everie Familie one Maior over everie City one Sheriff over everie Countie one Rector over everie Parish Church one Pilot over every ship one Captain over everie Troop one Admiral over the Fleet and manie other Offices of trust and places wherein Pluralitie of persons would prove most obnoxious But Monarchie is and alwaies hath been proved and approved the best and most absolute lie good Aristocracy is the Government of a Common-wealth by some select number of the better sort of the people preferred for their wisdome and other vertues for the publick good Oligarchy is the swarving or distortion or Aristocracy or the Government of a few rich yet wicked men whose private end is the chiefest end of their Government tyrannizing over Law Religion and the people Democracy or popular estate is the Government of the multitude Where the people have the supream power and Soveraign autority Ochilocracy or a Common-wealth is the corruption and deprivation of Democracy where the rascal Rabble or viler sort of the people govern by reason of their multitude These kinds of Government were not heard of a long time after Monarchy began and the impulsive causes of them were contention and confusion and were rather permitted than ordained by God as the bill of Divorce was by Moses For non erat sic ab initio there was no such Government at the beginning for God did not create it as he did Monarchy when he made all things but the people being stragled up and down in the world and so in processe of time became out of the knowledge of their lawfull King rather than they would indure the miserable effects of Anarchy for Plebs fine Rege ruit there can be no family no society indeed no living without rulers they reâ—igned up their whole power and libertie to some few select men or else to many who made Laws for them and so tied up the hands of the unrulie and wicked and defended the just from the violent tempests and storms of the unjust to which before they lay open and naked which God seeing that it was better for them to have such a Government than none at all did allow of it but it hath no comparison with Monarcâ—y becuase that was instituted by Gods primarie Ordinance and the further men go from Gods original institution they have the more corruption Nay if compared to Monarchy it is a curse for Solomon saith Prov. 28.2 For the transgressions of a Land many are the Princes thereof but by a man of understanding and knowledge the state thereof shall be prolonged summo dulcius unum Stare loco sociisque comes discordia regnis How sweetlie doth the Poet sing when he saith that it is most sweet for one to govern for a companie of Governors
take it for a curse or do things worse Some would have children those that have them mone or wish them gone What is it then to have or have no wife But single thraldome or a double strife Our own affections still at home to please is a disease To crosse the sea to any forein soil perils and toil Wars with their noise affright us when they ceasâ— we are worse in peace What then remains but that we still should cry Not to be born or being born to die The King of Englands Soveraignty proved and approved by the Common Law to be above both Parliament and people inferiour to none on earth but God Almighty and that neither the people of England nor any other his Subjects either distributively or collectively in one intire body ought to call the King in question for his actions though they be never so wicked The sweet harmony and concordance of the Law of God and the Law of the Realm in maintaining the Royal Prerogative of our Soveraign manifested The Kings Coronation is onely a Ceremony no part of his Title How the Changeling Statesmen of our times who will not endure that the King should have Soveraignty over them his vassals make themselves absolute Kings over the Scripture and Law books and make the Law and the Gospel speak in what sense their wicked wills and lusts vouchsafe Resistance of the power unlawfull The Subjects duty to their Soveraign Their Reward and remedy if they be punished wrongfully Reverend Bracton cleared from Mr. Pryns false aspersions Mr. Pryns Character his Book entitled the Soverâ—ign Power of Parliaments and Kingdomes arraigned convicted and condemned and his confident averment therein That it was not Saint Pauls nor the Holy Ghosts meaning to inhibit defensive wars of the Subjects against their King proved to be Apocriphal and that Saint Paul like an honest man spoke what he meant when he said Let every soul be subject to the higher powers though Mr. Pryn would have his words and his meaning two things How Mr. Pryn worshipped the long Parliament heretofore as a Sacred Deity when it acted wickedly and now despiseth it as idolatry and an Advertisement to him to write a book of Retractations To go about to prove that the King of England c. hath the Supreme power over the Parliament and people deserveth as much derision as to go about to prove that the Sun shineth at noon day or that the heavens are above the earth yet since there are those amongst us who like the Sodomites grope for light in the clearest day and have the iâ—pudence to publish for truth that which their conscience telleth them is false I will give you a tast of our Lord the Kings Soveraignty which lieth dispersed and scattered about in our Law books Jus Câ—ronae The Law of the Crown is the principal part of the Laws of this Realm Co. Lit. 11.b. 15. b 344. a 25 E. 3 cap. 1. Register inter jura Regia 61 c. For since the Common Law of the Land is common usage expressed in our books of Law and judicial Records Co. Lit. 344 a. Plowden 195. Finch 77a. The Government of this Kingdome by a Royal Soveraign is become a Fundamental Law being as antient as history it self and used from the time whereof the memory of antiquity is not to the contrary And since that the ligeance faith obedience of the Subject is due unto the King by the Law of nature Co. l. 6. fol. 12. as well before as after the municipal and Judicial Laws were made our Law-books like faithfull Subjects being the Magazine of law from their Alpha to Omega could preach no other Doctrine than Allegeance faith and due obedience to their Soveraign the King whom they all confesse and testifie to be the Supreme lord and head of the Common-wealth immediately under God above all persons in all causes Finch in French fol. 20. in English 81. Co. lib. 2.15 Le Roy est caput salus Reipublicae à capite bona valetudo tranfit in omnes lib. 4.124 the King is the fountain of Justice tranquillity and repose Plowden 242. Therefore Nil desperandum Rege duce Auspice Rege Nothing can come amisse to us the King being our guide and Soveraign Reges sacro aleo uncti spiritualis jurisdictionis sunt capaces Kings being the Lords Anointed are nursing Fathers to our Church The King of England est Monarcha Imperator in Regno suo Davis Irish reports fol. 60. the Almighty hath said that they are gods and our common laws of England being founded on the laws of God do likewise attribute to them a shadow of the Divine excellencies viz. VVingates Maxim fol. 301. 1 Divine perfection 2 Infinitenesse 3. Majesty 4 Soveraignty 5. perpetuity 6. Justice 7. Truth 8 Omniscienc Of which I have already treated Nay as God is a King in Heaven so the King is stiled a God upon Earth Finch 81. He is the Head Father Physician and husband of the Common-wealth He is Gods Lieutenant Deputy Vicegerent receiving his Commission from God not from the people These are the titles which the Common Laws of England give to the King A Divine sentence is in the lips of the King his mouth transgresseth not in judgement Prov. 16.10 saith Gods word Therefore the Law receiveth it for a Maxim That the King can do no wrong Co. Lit. f. 19. He is Rex gratia Dei non populi King by the grace of God not of the people The most high ruleth in the Kingdom of men and giveth it to whomsoever he will Dan. 4.17 Therfore all the Lands and Tenements in England in the hands of Subjects are holden mediately or immediately of the King but the King is Tenant to none but God 8 H. 7 12. Co. Lit. 1. For Praedium Domini Regis est Directum Dominium cujus nullus author est nisi Deus Only God is the author and Donor of the Kings Dominions Therefore the possessions of the King are called sacra Patrimonia Dominica Coronae Regis The King is the Lords anointed 1 Sam. 10.1 Therefore the Law giveth reverence to his Person and maketh him supreme in Ecclesiastical causes The villain of a Lord in the presence of the King cannot be seized because the presence of the King is a protection to the villain for that time 27 ass Pla. 49. Is it fit to say to a King thou art wicked and to Princes ye are ungodly Job 34.18 Therefore no Civil much lesse Criminal action lyeth against the King if he doth unjustly the only remedie against the King is by petition and supplication for who shall command the King Stamford Praer fol. 5. Bracton fol. 5. Flera fol. 17. Finch 13. The Prerogative which the Common-law giveth the King is so large as Sir Henry Finch saith that you shall find that to be law almost in every case of the King that is law in no case of the Subject Finch fol. 85.
And therefore Sir John Davis in his preface confidently averreth that the Common-law doth excel all other laws in upholding a free Monarchy which is the most excellent form of Government exalting the Prerogative royal and being tender and watchful to preserve it and yet maintaining all the Ingenuous liberty of the Subject Nay so carefull is the law of the Kings Soveraignty that in all cases from the highest to the lowest it demonstrateth the Kings supreme power and dignity The law will not permit any Subject to come so near the King as to be jointenant with him for if Lands are given to the King and a subject or if there be two Jointenants and the Crown descend to one of them the Jointure is severed and they are Tenants in Common for no Subject is equal with the King Co. Lit. 190. Plowd Com. in Seig. Barkleys Case Nay rather than the Suâ—â—ect shall be equal with the King in any thing he shall lose all for the King being Tenant in Common of entier Chattel personal he shall have the whole as if an Obligation be made to two or two possessed of an horse and one is attainted the King shall have the whole duty of the Obligation and the horse 13 El. pl. 322. Finch 178. To instance all particular cases is endlesse and impossible all land is holden of the King immediately or by means himself not having any higher upon earth of whom to hold 50 Ass pl. 1. 18 Eli. Pl. 498. For it would be against Common right and reason that the King should hold of any or do service to any of his subjects saith Cook lib. 8.118 Because he hath no Superior but God almighty Cook Lit. 1. Escheats of all Cities appertaineth unto the King all mines of Gold and silver or wherein the gold and silver is of the greater value appertain unto the King 8 E. 3. Escheat 12. 1 El. Plo. 314. The King is Anima legis he governeth and defendeth the law all Writs and Processe run in his name and receive authority onely from him and all persons have their power from him and by his Writ Patent or Commission The King hath the sole Government of his subjects The body Politick and the natural body of the King make one body and not diverse and are inseparable and indivisible Plo. 234 242.213 lib. 7.12 Rex tuetur legem lex tuâ—tur jus We muâ— be for God and the King because by his laws we are protected and it is a miserable case to be out of the Kings Protection Co. Lit. 129. All Jurisdictions and the punishment of all offenders against the Laws belongs to the King And Treasons Felonies and other Pleas of the Crown are propriae causae regis For why The King is viva Lex a living Law who only hath power to give Laws and therefore he only ought to punish those who break them Not the Parliament as it is called viz. the two Houses or either of them singly because they without the King can make no Law and therefore they are murtherers because they have put to death many worthy Innocents having no other Law but their own wicked wills And for my part if any one should tell me that the Law of England is nothing but the will of the King I could not disprove him for what are the great volumes of our Statutes but the Monuments and Repertory of the Kings will What is the reason that it is a Law that the King cannot make new or alter old Laws but in Parliament with the consent of his Lords and Commons Because the King was pleased to will it so for it was not so from the beginning The King was long before Parliaments and therefore did most certainly make Laws without them What is an Act of Parliament but the will of the King Nay what is Magna Charta but a Roy le veilt All our Rights and Liberties we enioy are by the gracious concessions of our Soveraign Lord the King who esteemeth our good and freedom his best praerogative and happinesse Omnium domos illius vigilia defendit omnium otium illius labor omnium delitias illius industria omnium vacationem illius occupatio The King by his watch and diligent care doth defend and keep every mans house in safety his labour doth maintain and defend every mans rest and quiet his diligence doth preserve and defend every private mans pleasure and delight his businesse doth maintain and defend every mans leasure So that as Manwood hath it even as the head of a natural body doth continually watch and with a provident care still ook about for the safety and preservation of every member of the same body Even so the King being the head of the body of the Commonweal doth not only continually carry a watchful eye for the preservation of peace and quietnesse at home amongst his own Subjects but also to preserve and keep them in peace and quietnesse from any forein invasion Therefore if the Rebells since the murther of our gracious King Charles the first have taken the freeborn Subjects of this Nation and imprisoned them like Slaves without any just cause or due processe of Law If they have violently driven us from our Lands and Livelyhoods possessing themselves of them and taken away our free Customs and Liberties If they have unjustly deprived us of the benefit of the Law banished us out of our Country and destroyed us with their high Courts of Injustice without the verdict of our equalls contrary to the Law of the Land if they have delayed Justice and Right denyed it to all men and granted it to no man but to those who would buy it Blesse God for Charles the first and pray for the restauration of Charles the second Praise God for their noble Praedecessours who have been our Nursing Fathers and their Queens our nursing Mothers who have willed and enacted Magna Charta ca. 29. Nullus liber homo capiatur vel imprisonetur aut dissisietur de libero tenemento suo vel libertatibus vel liberis consuetudinibus suis aut utlagagetur aut exuletur aut aliquo modo destruatur nec super ibimus nec super eum mittemus nisi per legale judicium parium suorum vel per legem terrae nulli vendemus nulli negabimus aut differemus justitiam vel rectum That no man should be arrested imprisoned disseised of his Free-hold of his Liberties or free customes or out-lawed bâ—nished or otherwise destroyed but by the verdict of his equals and the Law of the Land neither should Law and Justice be delayed sold or denyed to any man but the King in judgment of Law is present in all his Courts of Justice repeating these words We will sell deny nor delay Justice and right to no man Inst 2.55 O Magnificent blessed and golden Oration It proceeded from the lips of Kings and we shall never hear such Doctrine preached again in any of our Courts of Justice untill our King be
restored to his own and sit Judge amongst us It was King Charles the first who granted that the burthen of excise should not be laid on the shoulders of his Subjects but the Rebels with their intollerable and monstrous Excises new found impositions and other unspeakable grievances have beggered the Subjects and undone the whole Kingdome both in their Estates and Reputation To be short whatsoever they voted unlawfull for the King to do they have done that and ten thousand times worse so that though we want not bodies to feel the miseries which they have brought upon us yet we want tongues to expresse the wofulnesse of our Condition and the incomparable wickedness of these Traytors And what greater pretence have they had for their actions than to say that the King was not the Supreme Governour over his Subjects A contradiction in it self but we will proceed further to manifest their error Sir Thomas Smith in his common-wealth of England saith cap. 9. By old and antient Histories that I have read I do not understand that our Nation hath used any other general Authority in this Realm neither Aristocratical nor Democratical out only the royal Kingly Majesty who held of God to himself by his Sword his People Crown acknowledging no Prince on Earth his Superiour and so it is kept holden at this day which truth is sufficiently warranted in our Law-Books The state of our Kingdome saith Sir Edward Cook li. 4. Ep. ad lectorem is Monarchical from the beginning by right of inheritance hath been successive which is the most absolute and perfect form of Government excluding Interregnum and with it infinite inconveniences the Maxim of the common Law being Regem Angliae nunquam mori That the King of England never dyeth then doubtlesse the Rebels could not by Law mortifie both the natural and politique capacity of the King And in Calvins case li. 7. The weightiest case that ever was argued in any Court than which case according to my Lord Cokes observation never any case was adjudged with greater concordance and lesse variety of opinions and that which never fell out in any doubtfull case no one opinion in all our books is against that judgment In this case it was resolved amongst other things Fo. 4. c. 1. That the People of England c. were the Subjects of the King viz. their Soveraign liege Lord King James 2. That Ligeance or obedience of the Subject to the Soveraign is due by the Law of Nature 3. That this Law of Nature is part of the Laws of England 4. That the Law of Nature was before any judicial or municipal Law in the world 5. That the Law of Nature is immutable and cannot be changed From which resolutions we may conclude that the Subjects of the King of England unlesse they like God Almighty could alter the Law of Nature They could not alter their obedience and subjection to their Soveraign Lord King Charles For if by the Law of Nature obedience from them was due to the natural body as I shall further prove of King Charles and if the Law of Nature is immutable as most certainly it is Bracton lib. 1 ca. 5. D. Stu. ca. 5. 6. then could not they have any cause whatsoever as altering their Religion banishing or killing of them a sufficient ground for them to take up arms against him and put him to death For by this they go about to change the Law of Nature which is impossible for mortals to do But say some by the Law of Nature we may defend our selves and therefore leavy war against the King for our own defence I answer that by the Law of Nature we are bound to defend our selves yet must we use no unlawfull means for our defence for the Subjects to levy war against their Soveraign is forbidden both by the Laws of God and Nature Therefore vain and foolish is that excuse as well as all others which the Rebels make use of to defend their Rebellion Ligeance is a true and faithfull obedience of the Subject due to his Soveraign It is an obligation upon all Subjects to take part with their Liege Lord against all men living to aid and assist him with their bodies and minds with their advice and power not toft li up their arms against him nor to support in any way those who oppose him This ligeance and obedience is an incident inseparable to every Subject of England and in our Law-books and many Acts of Parliament as in 34 H. 8. cap. 1. 35 H. 8. cap. 3 c. The King is called the liege Lord of his Subjects and the people his liege subjects Every Subject of England taketh the Oath of ligeance which is only due unto the King yet doth not the ligeance of the Subject to the King begin at the taking of this Oath at the Leet For as it was resolved in Calvins Case so soon as the Subject is born he oweth by birth-right ligeance and obedience to his Soveraign Lord the King Because ligeance faith and obedience of the Subject to the Soveraign was by the Law of Nature written with the Finger of God in the Heart of Man before any municipal or judicial Laws were made 1. For that Moses was the first Reporter or writer of Law in the World yet government and subjection was long before Moses 2. For that it had been in vain to have prescribed laws to any but to such as ought obedience faith and ligeance before in respect whereof they were bound to obey and observe them Frustra enim feruntur leges nisi subditis obedientibus You may read likewise in Calvins Case That the King of England hath his title to the Crown by inherent birth-right by descent from the blood royal from God Nature and the Law and therefore not by way of trust from the two Houses of Parliament or from the People Neither is his Coronation any part of his Title but only an ornament and solemniation of the royal descent For it was then resolved that the title of King James was by dessent and that by Queen Elizabeths death the Crown and Kingdom of England descended to his Majesty and he was fully and absolutely thereby King without any essential ceremony or act to be done Ex post facto So in the first year of the same Kings reign before his Majesties Coronation Watson and Clarke seminary Priests and others were of opinion that his Majesty was no compleat and absolute King before his Coronation but that Coronation did adde perfection to the descent and therefore observe saith my Lord Cook their damnable and damned consequent that they by strength and power might before his Coronation take him and his royal Issue into their possession keep him prisoner in the Tower remove such Counsellors and great Officers as pleased them and constitute others in their places c. and that these and others of like nature could not be treason against
non debet nec multo fortiùs superiorem and a little after in the same Chapter Exercere Rex debet potestatem juris sicùt dei vicarius in terra et minister quia ea potestas solius Dei est The King doth excell all his Subjects in power He hath no Equal much lesse a Superiour because his power is from God only he is Gods Vicar Therefore not the Peoples And again li. 1. ca. 8. Item in temporalibus sunt Imperatores Reges et Principes in hiis quae pertinent ad regnum et sub eis Duces Comites Barones magnates sive Vavasores et Milites et etiam liberi et villani et diversae Potestates sub rege constitutae And a little after sunt etiam sub Rege liberi homines et servi ejus Potestati Subjecti Et omnis quidem sub eo et ipse sub nullo nisi tantum sub Deo Parem autem non habet in regno suo quia sic amitteret praeceptum cum par in partem non habeat imperium Item nec multo fortius superiorem nec potentiorem habere debet quia sic esset inferior sibi subjectis et inferiores pares esse non possunt potentioribus ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub Homine sed sub Deo et sub Lege quia Lex facit Regem Dukes Earls Baronets Knights the Worthies of the Land Free-Men and Villains all are under the King and the King under none but God He hath no Peer in his Realm because then he would lose his command for amongst Equals there can be no Empire therefore much lesse hath he any Superiour or more powerfull than himself because then he would be inferiour to his Subjects and Inferiours as the Subjects are cannot be equal with the more powerfull as the King is But the King ought not to be under man but under God and the Law because the Law makes him King But what if the King should swerve from the Rules of the Law destroy his Subjects and their Estates without a cause May the Subjects take up arms against their Soveraign and compell him by force to do that which they cannot perswade him to by fair meams No saith Bracton li. 1. ca. 8. Si autem ab eo petatur cum breve non currat contra ipsum locus erit supplicationi quòd factum suum corrigat et emendet quod quidem si non fecerit satis sufficit ei ad paenam quod dominum expectet ultorem Nemo quidem de factis suis praesumat disputare multo fortius contra factum suum-venire No Enditement of high Treason c. lieth against the King our only remedy is to Petition his sacred Majesty but if he will not hearken to our just and reasonrble requests satis sufficit Nay his punishment is more than enough for he must render an account one day to him who judgeth righteously who will give us all a hearing the Beggar as well as the King But let not men in the mean time presume to question the deeds of the King much lesse Rebel against him and undoe by force what the King shall do though not according to right And that you may know that Bracton fully meant that the Subjects ought not to rise against the King though he acted unjustly He repeats his mind in other places li. 5. Tract 3. de defaltis cap. 3.3 where he puts the case that if the King should do injury and will not suffer the Law but his will to take place Quo casu cum dominus Rex super hoc fuerit interpellatus in eadem perstiterit voluntate quod velit tenentem esse defensum injuria cum teneatur justitiam totis viribus defensare ex tunc erit injuria ipsius domini Regis nec poterit ei necessitatem aliquis imponere quòd iâ—laâ— corrigat et emendet nisi velit cum superiorem non habeat nisi deum et satis erit illi pro paena quòd deum expectat ultorem If the King who is bound to administer justice to his utmost power being Petitioned will not recall and amend the wrong he did he injures his Subjects but no body can force him to do right because he hath the Supreme power he hath no Superiour but God and it is punishment enough for him to expect that God to whom vengeance only belongeth will take vengeance on him To every point which I have cited out of Bracton doth Fleta unanimously agree What man then so impudently wicked What hand so wilfully audacious what pen can there be so repugnant and contradictory to all truth as to affirm and publish to the world that Bracton writeth and is so to be understood viz. That the people have the Soverainty over the King and may call him in question for his actions so punish him for his offences O Traytor to the King and Sycophant of Bracton Mr. Willian Prynne of Lincolns-Inne is the man who with his Hand and Pen I cannot say Heart hath promulged this false Doctrine to the World in his Book called The Soveraign Power of Parliaments and Kingdoms Wherein according to Mr. Sandersons expression in his History of King Charls the 1st fo 117. Prynne pretends to overthrow all Scripture proofs against killing Kings and Princes For my part I bear not the least grudge or animosity to the mans person But his book is such a rapsody of nonsense a bundle of Rebellion and Treason a Pamplet so Seditious Pernicious Sophistical Jesuitical Trayterous and Scurrulous that I want Mr. Prynnes Epithites to give his own book its deserved Odium Wherein as Mr. Fuller in his Church History lib. 11. fol. 152. well observeth he delighteth more to be numerous with many than ponderous with select quotations which maketh his Books to swell with the losse of tentimes of the Reader sometimes of the Printer and his pen generally querulous hath more of the Plantiff than of the Defendant therein I mention Mr. Prynne and his book here only to put him in mind of the wrong which he hath done both to our Soveraign the King and the whole Kingdom He being the greatest if not the only Champion who rook upon him to vindicate and applaud those treacherous damnable and rebellious proceedings and unchristian inhumane and unnatural Warr against the King of that Monster called the Long Parliament whom now he laboureth as much to vilifye as he did then to promote O Trayterous Offspring which killeth his Mother only because she will not give him suck If he repent why doth he not write a book of retractations If he looketh upon his book intituled The lawfulnesse of the Parliaments necessary defensive War both in point of Law and Conscience I am sure he will have cause enough to repent of his writing if he hath any Law or Conscience in him And he hath no way better to redeem his credit than by a publique Confession God may pardon him and the King may pardon him if
was condemned repented themselves saying We have sinned in that we have betrayed Innocent blood and were all of them ready to hang themselves But it was not out of any love or allegiance they did bear to the King but because they could not have those ends upon the King which they intended They would have had the King buckled to their bent and it grieved them to see the Independents c. out-knave them foâ— the greatest part of the religion of these factions consists in their animosities one against the other not only the Presbyterians but also the Independents Anabaptists c. are both almost and altogether such as the proud Pharisees were Therefore their greatest care and study is to domineer and master it one over the other which makes the prevalent faction alwayes outragious and that which sinketh alwayes envious So that the Presbyterian being at this time undermost he would fain insinuate himself into the favour of the honest Royalist and because he hath not force to be so much Knave as he would be therefore he is compelled to be honest against his will and would have his injured King to rule over him again But get thee behind me Dagon what hast thou to do with peace Didst thou not in thy youthfull age revile thy Innocent King with thy mouth and persecute him with thy bloudy hand and wouldst thou now in thy old age serve him Thy service is Hypocrisie and thy words but the vapours of a deceitfull head Let the Presbyterians rigid actions judge the rigid Presbyterians Having related of what persons the Parliament doth consist viz. of the King above all and the three Estates sharing no more with the King in the Soveraignity than the body doth with the head and how King Charles the first was most traiterously murthered by those who have the impudence to call themselves a Parliament though in truth they are nothing else but a den of Tyrannical Traytors and Rebels I will further proceed to explicate the Soveraignity of the King and the legal power of the three Estates with their first institution and creation Sapiens omnia agit cum consilio saith Solomon a wise man doth nothing without counsel Pro. 13.16 Therefore the King of England Ex mero motu et speciali gratia out of his meer good-will and special favour hath vouchsafed his Subjects that honour as to make them his Counsellours not only concerning Ardua Regni but also arcana imperii even in his most privie affairs wherefore As my Lord Cook observeth the King is armed with diverse Councills one whereof is called Commune Concilium and that is the Court of Parliament and another is called Magnum Concilium this is somtimes applyed to the upper House of Parliament and somtimes out of Parliament time to the Peers of the Realm Lords of Parliament who are called Magnum Concilium Regis Thirdly as every man knoweth the King hath a privie Council for matters of State The fourth Council of the King are his Judgâ—s of the Law for Law matters as appeareth in our Law-Books This word Parliament was never used in England untiâ—l the time of William the Conquerour who first brought it in with him For as King David called a Parliament when he intended to build an house for the name of the Lord 1 Chro. 28. and assembled all the Princes of Israel the Princes of the Tribes and the Captains of the Companies that ministred unto the King by course and the Captains over the thousands and Captaines over the hundreds and the Stewards over all the substance and possession of the King and of his Sons with the Officers and with the mighty men and with all the valiant men unto Jerusalem And when they were assembled the King himself shewed the cause of calling that Parliament for then David the King stood up upon his feet and said Hear me my Brethren and my People as for me I had in my heart to build and House of rest for the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord and for the footstool of our God and had made ready for the building c. Whereupon all the people offered their Gold and Silver willingly towards the work which made the People and David their King rejoice exceedingly with great joy as you may there read So the Kings of England from the beginning in all extraordinary cases when they intended to make new Laws or abolish old have always convoked an assembly of their Subjects what persons and of what number they thought fit Not because they could not do what they pleased without their Subjects consent but because their Subjects best knowing what shooes would fit their own feet might as they often did by Petitions humbly supplicate his Majesty to grant what they shewed him was most convenient and necessary for them by their requests which he refused or granted at his pleasure Which Councils and Conventions they called Witenage Mote Conventus sapientium Michael Smoth Michael Gemote c. that is to say the great Court or meeting of the King To which the King convened only the Nobles and Bishops The Rustick Commons were not then admitted into the presence of the King And doubtlesse they had then small hopes and lesse thoughts that they should ever take the Regal Diadem from off their Soveraigns head and become Lords Paramount ruling both King and People by no other Law than Hoc volo sic Jubeo stat pro ratione voluntas by their own lusts and unstable except to do mischief wills But I have seen servants upon Horses and Princes walking as Servants upon the Earth saith Solomon And pray who hath not seen as much as Solomon of this For behold Tinkers Taylors Spicket and Fosset makers and those who were Servants even to the basest of the people having murthered their Soveraign Lord the King doe take possession of his sacred Patrinomy and now sit Lords over all ruling and domineering in his Palace at Westminster Feign that the people did intrust the King with his Royal Office yet why should it escheat to these Hypocrites why not to the people And if his Office with the Lands which he held Jure Coronae yet by what Law do they seise upon those Lands which he held in his natural Capacity and those Lands which he purchased For if a man forfeit an Office he only forfeiteth those Lands which belonged to the Office But if all his Lands escheat by what Law do they detain and keep the Queens Dower from her By what Law did I say By that Law whereby they subdue all things to themselves to wit their own wicked Appetites Ambition and Covetousnesse which is all the Law they can shew for any of their Actions to which we must be Slaves so long as they command over us Pro. 30.21 For three things saith Solomon the earth is disquieted and for four which it cannot bear For a Servant when he reigneth and a Fool when he is filled with meat For and
own again which these most unjustly keep from him We cannot serve God and Mammon both at one time Good and evil cannot stand both together If the King come in and rule these men must fall If we serve the King as we ought we cannot serve these at all If God re-establisheth his Anointed Lucifer must call down his Children wickednesse must be abolished when righteousnesse takes place therefore the Gaolers of the Liberty of England must down when Charles the Second our only lawfull Soveraign is restored to his Crown and Kingdome Which they very well know therefore they would fain keep as long as they can their Empire which cost them their Souls and Reputation But let us return to our King When the Conquerour came in He got by right of Conquest all the Land of the Realm into his own hands the whole Kingdom was his direct and proper inheritance in demeasn so that no man can at this day make any greater title than from the Conquest to any Lands in England for the King being owner and sole Lord of the whole Land and the People therein did as he lawfully might dispose of the Land and people according to his will and pleasure he gave out of his hands what Lands he pleased to what persons he pleased and reserved what tenures and services he pleased So that in the Law of England we have not properly Allodium that is any Subjects Land that is not holden We all hold our Lands mediately or immediately of the Crown neither have we any right to our Lands any longer than we are faithfull and loyal to the King who first gave us them upon that condition for by the Laws of the Realm if we take up arms against the King imagine his death or commit any other offence which is high Treason we forfeit our estates to the King so that they return from whence they were first derived the greatest and highest title or property which a Subject hath to his Lands is Quod talisseisitus fuit in dominico suo ut de feodo Now though this word Feodum doth as Littleton teacheth legally signify inheritance and so Feodum Simplex signifieth a lawfull or pure inheritance yet it is apparently manifest that Feodum is a derived right and doth import with it a trust to be performed which trust broken forfeiteth the Estate to the King who only hath as Camden observeth Directum imperium cujus nullus est Author nisi Deus For all the Lands within this Realm were originally derived from the Crown and therefore the King is Soveraign Lord or Lord Paramount either mediate or immediate of all and every parcel of Land within the Realm 18 E. 3.35.44 E. 3.5 48 E 3.9.8 H. 7.12 Therefore though in other places he which findeth a piece of Land that no other possesseth or hath title unto entreth into it gaineth a property by his entry yet in England property to Land cannot be gained any such way for the Subject can have no property but what was first by the Kings grant therefore those Lands are still appropriated to the Crown which the King did not give away to his Subjects as if Land be left by the Sea this Land belongeth to the King and not to him that hath the Lands next adjoyning or to any other but the King Caelum Caeli Domino terram autem dedit filiis hominum All the whole Heavens are the Lords the Earth hath he given to the Children of men for which he only reserved their service as an acknowledgement of his bounteous liberality so the whole Kingdom is the Kings but the Land therein he hath given to his Children the people for which he only reserved their allegiance and service as a remembrance and recognition of his Royal bounty in which reservation the King as my Lord Bacon writeth had four institutions exceeding politick and suitable to the State of a Conquerour First Seeing his people to be part Normans and part Saxons the Normans he brought with him the Saxons he found here he bent himself to conjoyn them by Mariages in Amity and for that purpose ordains that if those of his Nobles Knights and Gentlemen to whom he gave great rewards of lands should dye leaving their Heir within Age a Male within 21 and a Female within 14 years and unmaryed then the King should have the bestowing of such Heirs in Mariage in such a Family and to such persons as he should think meet which interest of Mariage went still imployed and doth at this day in every Tenure called Knights service The Second was to the end that his people should be still conserved in Warlik exercises and able for his defence when therefore he gave any good portion of Lands that might make the party of Abilities or strength he withall reserved this service That that party and his Heirs having such lands should keep a Horse of service continually and serve upon him himself when the King went to Warrs or else having impediment to excuse his own person should find another to serve in his place which service of Horse and Man is a part of that Tenure called Knights service at this day But if the Tenant himself be an Infant the King is to hold this land himself untill he come to full Age finding him Meat Drink Apparel and other necessaries and finding a Horse and a Man with the overplus to serve in the Warrs as the Tenant himself should do if he were at full Age. But if this Inheritance descend upon a Woman that cannot serve by her Sex then the King is not to have the Lands she being 14. years of Age because she is then able to have an Husband that may do the service in person The Third institution that upon every gift of Land the King reserved a Vow and an Oath to bind the party to his Faith and Loyalty that Vow was called Homage the Oath of Fealty Homage is to be done kneeling holding his hands between the knees of the Lord saying in the French tongue I become your Man of Life and Limb and of earthly honour Fealty is to take an Oath upon a Book that he will be a faithful Tenant to the King and do his service and pay his Rents according to his Tenure The Fourth institution was that for Recognizance of the Kings bounty by every Heir succeeding his Ancestor in those Knight service lands the King should have Prâ—mer seisin of the lands which is one years profit of the lands and untill this be paid the King is to have possession of the land and then to restore it to the Heir which continueth at this day in use and is the very cause of suing livery and that as well where the Heir hath been in ward as otherwise Many other Tenures with services did the Conquerour institute as Grand Serjeanty Petit Serjeanty Tenure in Burgage Soccage Escuage c. which being holden of the King are called Tenures in capite which
his Common-Counsell they are but only Ministerial Servants and by the Writ it is clear that they are no part of the great Counsel of the Kingdom they are but the grand Inquest and general Inquisitors of the Realm to find out the grievances of the people and Petition to the King for redress the Burgesses and Citizens to present the defects in their Trade and the Knights of the Shires the burthens and Sores of their Counties they ought not nor are not admitted into the House before they have sworn that the Kings Majesty is the only and supreme Governour over all persons in all causes This oath did every Member of the long Parliament take before they set foot into the House of Charls the Martyr whom they afterwards murthered and took possession themselves of all that he or his royal progeny had or should have let the world judge how faithfully these Keepers kept their Oathes and Covenants Now forsooth none must come into the House but those who first swear that the King who is is not but that they who are not are the only supreme Governours over all persons in all causes And will these oaths be kept 'T is perjury to keep them Thus they joyn hand in hand and oath to oath but it is but to do wickedness for like King Davids Rebels they make a Covenant against their King and would murther him as they did his Father if they could catch him but nulla pax malis the wicked cannot hold together long though they unite their forces into one intire body yet it is but like Samsons Foxes by the tailes only to set the world on fire When the Commons have taken the oath of Supremacy and met together in a body collective in the house they have not so much power as a Steward in his Leet or a Sheriff in his Tourn for they cannot minister an oath imprison any body but themselves nor try any offence whatsoever much less try their King and assume the Legislative power At a conference the Commons are always uncovered and stand when the Lords sit surely these are no marks of Soveraignity They indeed chuse their Speaker but after their choice the King may refuse him at his pleasure and make them chuse another and Lenthal himself as all other Speakers do did when he was presented to the King disable himself as a person unworthy to speak before the King yet now he is styled the Father of our Country How the world is turned up-side down These Parliamentiers heretofore were wont to be arrested by any common Person and lyable to all Sutes and punishments as other men untill the King graciously passed an Act for their indemnity 4 H. 8. ea 8. So that they are nothing but what the King made them nor have nothing but by his grant and all that the King did make them appeareth by the Writ which is to do and consent to such things as the King with his Common-Counsell should ordain Then stay Reader and behold stand still with thy head and hands lift up to the heavens and admire with what impudence and oppression tyranny and usurpation the long Parliamentiers are fraught with who never had any other legal power than by the Kings Writ and have lost that by the Kings death yet tyrannize over three kingdoms calling themselves the Representatives of the whole Kingdom and that they were intrusted by the People with the Supreme and Legislative power which God and all the world knoweth is as false as the Almighty is true For first they do not represent the King the head nor the Peers who are the higher and nobler part of the kingdom therefore they are not the Representatives of the whole kingdom neither were they ever entrusted by the People with the Supreme and Legislative power Nay the people did never confer any power on them at all for by their Election the people did but design the person all the power the Commons have proceeded from the King which is contained in the Writ by which they were called As Free-holders worth forty shillings a year and free-men of Cities and Borroughs would make very unfit Electors of Supreme Magistrates so never did they they cannot make any Election of their Commons untill the King commandeth and giveth them power they have no power so to do of their own much less to authorize supreme Legislators The King giveth liberty to Towns and Cities to make choice of Burgesses which had no such power before the Kings grant so that all the power which the Commons have floweth from the King not a drop of it from the people Therefore if the Commons exceed their commission to wit the power given them by the Kings Writ it is illegal and their actings void in Law and since the power given them by the Writ is extinguished by the Kings death the Long Parliament is by Law dissolved and all the power which they take upon them since is usurped illegal and Tyrannical and contrary to the Lawes both of God and man And to make their Tyranny the greatest under the Heavens they protest to the world that the Representatives of the people ought to have the Legislative power yet they give Lawes as they call them to Scotland and Ireland not having so much as one Member from both Kingdomes in their representative body nor the eighth part of the Representatives chosen by the Counties Cities and Burroughs in England So that no Tyrants since the Creation of the world did ever equallize these either in cruelty or absurdity wickednesse or foolishnesse yet forsooth in 1649 they made an Act that it should be High Treason for any one to affirm the present Government to be Tyrannical Usurped or Unlawfull or that these Commons are not the supreme Authority of the Nation So thieves may murther the Father and take away the inheritance from his Children and then make a Law that it shall be high Treason for any one to call them thieves or usurpers or to say they had not the supreme Authority Thus they defend Tyranny with Tyranny and one sin with another Unumquodque conservatur eodem modo quo fit Things impiously got must be impiously kept They got their authority by blood and by blood it must be kept they juggled themselves by lyes into the supreme self-created authority and we must lye and say they are the supreme authority only because they do otherwise we shall be executed for high Treason against this infamous conventicle So that of necessity we must displease God if we please them and live no longer than we sin for they have made it a capital offence to speak truth I must confesse most men amongst us are frighted with this scarr-Crow not only to lye and affirm the long called Parliament to be the legal supreme authority but also with St. Peter forswear and deny their persecuted Lord and Master the King accounting no weather ill so they be by their warm fire
but it was fifty or sixty rotten tainted Members of the lower House small in number but great in transgression So may the Tayl nay a piece of the Tayl destroy the whole body and reign sole Lord Paramount Oh what multitudes of impieties can the wicked accomplish in an instant Seneca Nullum ad nocendum tempus angustum est malis In no longer space than betwixt the Father and the Son did these Horse-Leaches subvert our fundamental Government destroy King and Kingdom Parliament and People and all our Laws and Religion so that the question is not whether the Parliament be above the King but whether a little company of great Traytors and Usurpers the Dregs and Lees of all Tyranny be above both King and Parliament For the Parliament as you see by the joyfull recognition made to King James c. enacted and most humbly acknowledged the King to be above both Parliament and People and the Crown to be hereditary to the King and his Royal Progeny but these men and only these who by violence make themselves above both King and Parliament defending their persons from the Justice of the Law with Armed Red-Coats and the greatness of their villanies These are they who deny it though the Laws of the Realm and all Histories and all Kingdoms teach them otherwise God calleth himself a King in several places of the Scripture to note and signifie his Soveraignity which surely he would not do was the King the Peoples vassal or under Officer as the Bedlam franticks of our age feign Thou art my King O God saith David Command delâ—verance for Jacob. The King and the Power to command are Individua He is a Clout no King which cannot command And who should be under his command What The People taken particularly and distributively as single men and not collectively as the whole Kingdom according to the fanatick opinion of our Lunaticks Why is he not then called King of single men If he be King of a Kingdom then all the People jointly or severally in his Kingdom are under his command and if under his command then he only hath power to give them Laws be they in one collective body as in Parliament at the Kings house or simple bodies at their private dwellings Le Roy fait les leix avec le Consent du Seigneurs et Communs et non pas les Seigneuns et Communs avec le consent du Roy is the voice of the Common Law The King makes Laws in Parliament with the consent of the Lords and Commons and not the Lords and Commons with the consent of the King Virg. 7 Eneid Hoc Priami gestamen erat cum jura vocatis More daret Populis And 5 Eneid Gaudet regno Trojanus Arestes Indicitque forum patribus dat jura vocatis The Lords and Commons have power only to propound and advise it is only the Kings Le roy le veult which makes the Law their propositions and advice signifie nothing if the King saith Le Roy se avisera They have not power to grant him any subsidies untill the King saith Le Roy remercieses loyaulx et ainsi le veult Therefore much less the Soveraignity It would be strange if the assembling of the Subjects together should make them Masters over the King who gave them power to assemble and hath power to turn them home again when he pleaseth Legum ac edictorum probatio aut publicatio quae in curia vel Senatu fieri solet non arguit imperii majestatem in Senatu vel curia inesse saith Bodin de Rep. li. 1. ca. 8. The publishing and approbation of Laws and Edicts which is made ordinarily in the Court of Parliament proves not the Majesty of the State to be in the said Court or Parliament It is the Kings Scepter which giveth force to the Law and we have no Law but what is his Will The King surely would never call his Subjects to bind him with Laws against his will much lesse to take his Dominion from him and make himself a Vassal and Officer to his two Houses or either of them who were not capable themselves of any Office without his Gift and Licence The Kings of England have called many Parliaments yet the Government hath alwayes continued Monarchical and the King not under but above the people inferior only to God even Forein Polititians will tell you so Let famous Bodin who tanketh our Kings amongst the absolute Monarchs speak for all lib. 1. cap. 8. Habere quidem Ordines Anglorum authoritatem quandam jura vero Majestatis imperji summam in unius Principis arbitrio versari The States saith he of England have a kind of authority but all the rights of Soveraignty and command in chief are at the will and pleasure of the Prince alone Learned Cambden in his Britannia fo 163. teacheth us As touching the division of our Common wealth it consisteth of a King or Monarch Noblemen or Gentry Citizens freeborn whow we call Yeomen and Artisans or Handicrafts-men The King whom our Ancestors the English Saxons called Coning and Gining in which name is implyed a signification both of power and skill and we name contractly King hath Soveraign power and absolute command among us neither holdeth he his Empire in Vassalage nor receiveth his investure or enstalling of another ne yet acknowledgeth any superiour but God alone Now if Reason and the Judgement of our Ancestors would satisfie our frenzy upstarts what greater authority would they have But that they are troubled with so many visions and false revelations of their own I would commend to them a true vision in the Reign of Edward the Confessor viz. One being very inquisitive and musing what should become of the Crown and Kingdom after King Edwards death the blood Royal being almost extinguished he had a strange vision and heard a voyce which forbade him to be inquisitive of such matters resounding in his ears The Kingdom of England belongeth to God himself who will provide it a King at his pleasure But now forsooth it belongeth to the people and they will provide it a King at their pleasure It is the people now which make the King if so why ever had we any Kingdoms why were they not called Peopledoms The Kings of England with them of France Jerusalem Naples and afterwards Scotland were antiently the only anointed Kings of Christendom And as the Kings in Scripture as Asia Jehoshaphat Hezechiah c. so the Kings of England have alwayes had the supremacy in Ecclesiastical causes Reges sacro oleo uncti sunt capaces spiritualis jurisdictionis 33 Ed. 3. Rex est persona mixta cum Sacerdote habet ecclesiasticam et spiritualem jurisdictionem 10 H. 7.18 And although Kings ought not to be Ministers of the Chutch so as to dispense the word and Sacraments For No man taketh this honour unto himself but he that is called of God as was Aaron Hebrews 5.4 Yet since they
time hunted the distressed King and his Royal party pretending to be set on only by their Master Rebels the Commons but it seems they had a game to play of their own which on the sixth of December 1648. they begun to shew And therefore when the Trayterous Commons had obtained what they could ask or desire of their Soveraign then their Prisoner at the Isle of Wight being such Concessions which never any King before him granted nor Subjects ever demanded So that shame compelled them to vote them satisfactory Then the bloody Souldiers thinking themselves lost if the King and Parliament should find a peace went up to the House of Commons and by force kept out and imprisoned those who voted the Kings Concessions satisfactory which the militant Saints pleased to call purging of the House so that body is purged which hath poyson left in it and nutriment taken out of it by the purge yet this purge would not do the Lords must be turned out too and only 40. or fifty packt Members of the House of Commons who had sworn to be as very if not worse Knaves than the wicked Souldiers would have them to be were only left in the House who presently took upon them what power their own lusts could desire or the over-ruling Sword help them to Murthered the King and the chiefest of the Royal Party and yet to colour their Tyranny caâ—led themselves a Parliament by which name blowing up King Lords Spiritual and Temporal and all our Lawes and Religion with them they still Domineer and Rule over us yet not so but that the Army Rule them as the Wind doth a weather-cock turning them which way and how they please sometimes up and sometimes down and no doubt but that shortly they will be cast down for altogether for the wicked shall not last but vanish as a shadow Blessed art thou O Lord when thy King is the Son of Nobles Eccles 10.17 But alas Servants have ruled over us and there is none that doth deliver us out of their hands Lamen 5.8 The Crown is fallen from our head Wo unto us that we have sinned Verse 16. For now they shall say we have no King because we feared not the Lord What then should a King do unto us Hosea 10.3 ENGLANDS CONFUSION OR A True Relation of the topsy turvy Governments in mutable England since the Reign of Charls the Martyr The Tyranny of the Rump further manifested And that we shall never have any setled State untill Charls the second whose right it is injoy the Crown Though frantick Fortune in a merriment hath set the Heels above the Head and gave the Scepter unto the Shrubs who being proud of their new got honour have jarred one against the other during the Interregnum Yet Charls the second shall put a period to this Tragedy and settle our vexed Government which hath changed oftner in twelve years than all the Governments in the whole world besides Oh the heavy Judgment when Subjects take upon them to correct their King AS a distracted Ship whose Pilate the rageâ—ng violence of a tempestuous storm hath cast down headlong from the stern staggereth too and fro amongst the unquiet waves of the rough Ocean somtimes clashing against the proud surly Rocks and somtimes reeling up and down the smoother waters now threatening present Shipwrack and Destruction by â—nd by promising â— seeming safety and secure arrival yet never setled fast nor absolutely tending to the quiet and desired Haven So the vexed Government of frantick England ever since the furious madnesse of a few turbulent Spirits beheaded our King and Kingdom threw down Charls the Martyr our only lawfull Governour from the stern of Government and took it into their unskilfull and unlawfull hands it hath been tossed up and down somtimes falling amongst the lawless Souldiers as a Lamb amongst Wolves or as a glass upon stones and somtimes happening amongst Tyrants calling themselves a Parliament who are so much worse than the Souldiers by how much wickednesse covered with a colour of Justice is worse and more dangerous than naked villanies Yet in all our Revolutions although many gaps have been laid open that way hath not the Government steered its course directly to Charls the second it s only proper right and quiet Haven to which until it come we must never expect to have the Ship of our Common-wealth so secure but that Tempests and Storms will still molest and trouble if not totally ruine it Though it stand so fast one day that it seemeth impossible for humane strength to remove it yet the next day it moultereth away to nothing I vouch every mans experience to warrant this truth And were not our blind Sodomites intoxicated with Senselesse as well as Lawlesse Counsels They would never gape after preferment nor hope for continuance in their imaginary Commonwealth where the greatest one hour is made least the next and they themselves swallow up each the other never having rest or peace no not in their own House And can this divided Monster which is the cause of all our divisions cloze up our divisions and settle our Nation in peace and happinesse 'T is madnesse to think it So fire may quench fire and the Devil who was the first Author of wickedness put an end to all wickedness Examine the condition of the times since the Reign of Charls the first and you may see what times we shall have until the Reign of Charls the second Tyranny and Usurpation Beggery and Slavery Warrs and Murthers Subversion of our Laws and Religions changing the Riders but we must alwayes be the Asses Hunger and Famine Guns and Swords Drums and Trumpets Robberies and Thieveries Fornication and Adultery Brick without Straw Taxes although no bread These must be the voices which will alwayes sound in our Ears untill we cast off this old man of Sin viz. The Long called Parliament and submit as we ought to Charls the second our only lawfull King VVe may read of many Kings who have been suddainly killed by the rash violence of an indiscreet multitude who in the heat of Blood do that which they repent of all their life after mad Fury being the only cause of their unjust Actings But to commit sin with reason and piety to kill their King with discretion formally and solemnly is such a premeditated Murther that the Sun never saw until these Sons of perdition brought it to light For a long time before the fact they machinated and plotted the Kings death and contrived how they might with the best colour and shew of Justice effect it At length as if their Votes were more authentique than all Srcipture they passed amongst others this Vote Die Jovis Jan. 4. 1648. viz. That the People under God were the original of all just power This was the foundation upon which the superstructure of all their murthers and villanies which they call just Judgments were built which granted it consequently followeth that all
if we had all sworn allegiance to them They rid furiously but in a short time the Breech being too heavy for this new Head they moltered away to nothing Though the Rump had for a time hung down its tail betwixt its Leggs yet at length it begun to wagg it and whilst the Safety of the Committee of Safety was marched into the North under its Father Lamberts Conduct the Currish Rump stole into the House again by night seven times a Devil worse than before where now they ride Triumphant and without the peoples consent or liking make what Laws they list and Assesse what Taxes they please send their mercenary Souldiers who would fight for the Devil if he would give them mony into the City in the night time and take the Citizens mony away from them pretending that the Citizens provide it for Charls Stuart but when the Citizens prove the contrary then they tell them they will secure it for them So Burglars and Thieves take away mens purses from them and then tell them they will secure them for them These are the Keepers of our Liberty These are they who stood so much for the privileges of Parliament and for the peoples free election of their Representatives Now they account it a great Breach of Privilege of Parliament to petition to them for a free Parliament and imprison them that are for it So Robbers may account it dishonesty for those who are robbed to ask for their own and imprison them as disturbers of the Commonwealth Although these Tyrants have built themselves great houses and filled their baggs and coffers with the estates of their Masters whom they murthered and with the unparallel'd impositions which they have laid upon the people yet do they still resolve to rob the spittle and have newly made an Act for the Assessement of six hundred thousand pounds Oh that the English should provide monies to maintain their devourers Though we have not bread to suffice our own hunger yet must we find dainties and moneys to fulfill their lusts though they take away our straw yet we must still provide a greater tale of bricks so that of all the Tyrants in the world which History or men acquaint us with these are the greatest There was Justice in Phalaris his bull but these men have only the colour of Justice Other Tyrants were but shadowes these are the Quintessence of all Tyranny and perdition I will not plunge my self into such a bottomlesse Labyrinth as to attempt to particularize all their villanies Non opus est nostrum I am not able nay the quickest pen of a ready writer would come farre short of so great a task The Histories of after ages will resound with these Turpia Dictu the people of our age have only time to feel and indure the miseries of this Tyranny subsequent generations will have leisure to tell the story Et haec olim meminisse juvabit Methinks I already hear the Post-nati those who will be born thousands of years hence relating one to the other the marvellous Tyranny which happened to our Nation after the Reign of Charles the Martyr and in what manner the King was murthered and how Charles the second was afterwards driven into an un-christian Exile and likewise rehearsing what persons they were which acted all these villanies so end with a Te Deum laudamus blessing God for the tranquillity peace and plenty which they enjoy under their Gracious Soveraign Lord the King The Persian Law commanded that at the death of their Kings there should be a suspension of the lawes a lawlesse liberty for the space of five dayes that the subjects might know the necessity of Government and learn to prize it better by being bereft of the benefit of it for a time Sure I am a lawlesse liberty hath reigned amongst us ever since the murther of Charles the first therefore I hope our present torments for want of a King will sufficiently prohibit all future ages to think of offering violence to their Kings and teach them to know that a bad King much morâ— a good King as was Charles the Martyr is an unvaluable blessing if compared to the Government of that many headed Monster the People or their Representatives in Parliament The peoples eyes were all fixed upon General Monk as their Moses to deliver them from this iron yoke of Egyptian bondage But Omne malum nobis ex Aquilone venit From the Cold North Comes all Ill forth Monk prov'd worse than Pharaoh himself and instead of relieving of our distressed Jerusalem which he might have done in the twinkling of an eye without one drop of bloudshed and thereby have gotten eternal renown and glory as well amongst all Nations as in his own native Country he heaped misery to misery and executed such a grand piece of Tyranny that none in the world unlesse those Harpies his Master Rebels at Westminster could invent On Thursday the ninth day of February 1659. In perpetuam rei memoriâ—m he drew up all his souldiers into the City with their matches lighted in a warlike posture doubled his guards and tore down all the gates â—nd posts of the City neither did his intoxicated malice stay upon the gates but leapt upon the Aldermen and other Citizens whom he presentâ—y cast into prison so that now he is become odious and stinks in the nostrils of all the Citizens and People and whereas he was the common hopes of all men he is now the common hatred of all men as a Traytor more detestable than Oliver himself who though he manacled the Citizens hands yet never took away the doores of their City whereby all manner of beasts as well the Wolves at Westminster as other out-lying Foxes and Birds of prey may come in and destroy them when they please So that now iniquity followeth iniquity and the wicked joyn hand in hand and oath to oath to persevere in their Rebellion And although no sacred Oaths Protestations Vowes or Covenants could keep them in lawful subjection to the King they now think with unlawful oaths to tye one the other fast to their usurped Tyranny So that the Kings righteous cause is now in a seemingly worse condition than before and he may complain with Holy King David That the Rebels have cast their heads together with one consent and are confederate against him But why art thou cast down O my soul or why art thou disquieted within me Cannot God who permitteth these Rebels to reign as easily cast them down Knowest thou not this of old since man was placed upon earth that the triumphing of the wicked is short and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment Though his Excellency mount up to the heavens and his head reach unto the clouds yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung they which have seen him shall say where is he He shall flee away as a dream and shall not be found yea he shall
be chased away as a vision of the night The eye also which saw him shall see him no more neither shall his place any more behold him because he hath oppressed and hath forsaken the poor because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not Job 20. ENGLANDS REDEMPTION OR The Peoples rejoicing for their great deliverance from the Tyranny of the long called Parliament and their growing hopes for the restauration of Charls the second whose absence hath been the cause of all our miseries whose presence will be the cause of all our happinesse The prosperity of Rebels and Traytors is but momentary As Monarchy is the best of all Governments so the Monarchy of England is the best of all Monarchies Therfore God save King Charls the second and grant that the proud Presbyterians do not strive to make themselves Kings over him as they did over his Father by straining from him Antimonarchical Concessions and by Covenanting to extirpate his Bishops c. that they might set up themselves which was the primary cause of our late unnatural and inhumane wars Mr. Prynne commended Episcopacy is the best form of Church Government The Votes of the Clergy in Parliament The Arrogance of the Presbyterian faction who stand upon their Terms with Princes and make Kings bend unto them as unto the Pope OH the inscrutable judgments of God! Oh the wonderful mercy of the Almighty Oh â—he Justice of our Jehovah No sooner had I written these last words of the momentary prosperity of the wicked out immediately the same hour news was brought me that General Monck and the City were agreeed and resolved to declare for a free Parliament and decline the Rump Obstupui stetteruntque comae vox faucibus haesit I was strucken with amazement joy made me tremble and the goodnesse of the news would scarce permit me to believe it when I considered the crying sins of our Nation which deserved showers of vengeance not such sprinklings of mercy then all such conceipts seemed to me as vain and empty delusions but when I considered the infinite mercy of the Almighty then why might not God spare our Nineveh and send joyfull tydings into our discorsolate City Surely his mercies are greater than our great Sins Therefore to resolve this doubt I went up into the City where instead of Tears as formerly I had like to have been drowned with the Streams of joy and rejoycing The Bell rung merrily the Streets were paved with mirth and every house resounded with joyful acclamations I had do need then to ask whether the newâ— I heard in my Chamber were true or no both Men Women and Children Old and Young Rich and Poor all sung forth the destruction oâ— the Long called Parliament the whole City was as it were on fire with Bonfires for joy And now those who formerly threatned the firing of the City were burnt at every door for all the people cryed out let us Burn the Rump let us roast the Rump A suddain change History cannot tell us of its parallel No lesse than thirty eight Bonfires were made between Pleet-Conduit and Temple-Barre To be short there was scarce so much as one Alley in the whole City wherein there were not many Bonfires so that so great and general joyfulnesse never entred into the Walls of the City since it was built neither will again untill Charls the second be restored to his Crown The hopes whereof only caused the fervency of those joyes The Pulpits on the morrow being Sunday and all the Churches ecchoed forth Praises and Thanks to God and private devotion was not wanting neither was this joy confined only within the walls of the City but being a publique mischief was removed a publique rejoycing overspread the whole Kingdom and all the people with one heart and voyce shouted clapped hands and poured out joyful thanks for this great deliverance So the wearyed Hare is delighted and cheereth her self when she hath shook off the bloody Hounds and so a Flock of Sheep are at rest and ease when the Ravenous Wolves have newly left them Oh therefore let our distracted England be a warnin-gpiece to all Nations that they never attempt to Try and Judge their King for what cause soever And let all Traytors and Tyrants in the World learn by the example of our English Rebels that their Prosperity and Dominion though it seemeth never so perpetual is but momentary and as the wind which no man seeth For who so much applauded and look'd upon as the Long Parliament when they first took upon then to correct and question the King and who now so Ridiculous and Scorned They were them admired by the People as the Patrons Vindicators Redeemers and Keepers of their Liberty Nay I may most truly say that the people did worship and adore them more than they did God But now although they were as wicked then and did as much destroy our Laws and Liberties as they do now they are become a by-word the Scorn and Derision both of Men Women and Children and hooted at by every one as the greatest and most shameful laughing-stock in the World Who then can think upon our late most graciour King Charls the Martyr without Tears in his Eyes and contrition in his heart who can remember his patient Suffrings without Amazement and mourning who can look upon his Prophetical and Incomparable Book without Admiration and Weeping Rejoycings especially upon that Text in the 26 Chapter of his book viz. Vulgar complyance with any illegal and extravagant wayes like violent motions in nature soon grows weary of it self and ends in a refractory sullennesse Peoples rebounds are oft in their faces who first put them upon those violent strokes This needs no Commentary for every one knoweth with what zeal the Rabel of the people did at first stick to the Trayterous House of Commons in their Grand Rebellion and how they are now weary of them and with refractory sullennesse rise up against them and are ready to fly in their Faces who first taught them to Rebel and fight against their King Nay the Apprentices of London whom formerly these Rebels made instrumental to carry on their wicked designs against the King are now most vehement against them For why a noysome House is most obnoxious to the nearest Neigbours and the stinking House of Commons that sentina malorum doth most annoy this neighbouring City It is the nature of foxes to prey furthest from their holes but these unnatural foxes in sheeps clothing make all their prey both at home and abroad All is fish which comes to their net And that these Rebels may still have freedom to persevere in their villanies they cry up a free-State as the best of all Governments yet mark the nature of the beast a free-State say they is most beneficial for the people yet not so free but that they may and will qualifie and engage the persons chosen by the people according to
Kings gracious Concessions each Member of the house of Commons ought to be respectively elected out of the Shires or Counties Cities or Boroughs by the Kings Writ ex debito Justitiae Now would it not strike a man with admiration and make his hair stand an end to hear that the House of Commons should claim the Legislative power and protest to the world that they were greater in authority and Majesty than the King who raised them from nothing surely 't is but a dream which troubled the head a while with strange Chimaeras and then vanish'd it is but a Phantasm which fanatick distempers raised in lunatick brains and so perish'd after ages will account it but an Ovids Metamorphosis or as a Fable told more for mirth and novelty than for any truth or reality for why are the pots greater than the Potter or doth he who ought for to obey give Laws to him whose right it is to command The King sayeth to the House of Commons come and they come and he sayeth to them go and they go whatsoever the King commands that they cannot chuse by Law but do Nay the Lords their Masters are but the Kings Servants the King is the head and they are but the servile Members it is the property of the Head not of the Members to command the inferiour Members are all at the will and nod of the Head the feet run the hands work and the whole body moveth at the pleasure of the head but without the head the whole body is but a dead trunck and neither hands nor feet have power to move so the Members of the Parliament without the King their head have not power to sit much less to Act there is no body without a head nor no Parliament without a King they cannot move nor convene together without his Royal Summons neither can they dissolve themselves being convened without his command the King assembles adjourns prorogues and dissolves the Parliament by Law at his pleasure and therfore it is called in our Statutes and Law-bookes Parliamentum Regis Curia Regis et Concilium Regis and the Acts of Parliament are called the Kings Laws and why not the Kings Laws doth not he make them The whole body and volumes of the Statutes proclaim the King the sole Legislator What is Magna Charta but the Kings will and gift The very beginning of it will tell you 't is no more viz. Henry by the grace of God c. Know ye that we of our meer and free will have given these Liberties In the self same style runs Charta de foresta In the Statute of escheates made at Lincoln 29 Edw. 1. are these words At the Parliament of our Soveraign Lord the King by his Council it was agreed and also commanded by the King himself That c. The Statute of Marlebridg 52 H. 3. runs thus The King hath made these Acts Ordinances and Statutes which he willeth to be observtd of all his Subjects high and low 3. Edwardi primi The title of the Statute is These are the Acts of King Edward and afterwards it followeth The King hath ordained these Acts And the first Chapter begins The King forbiddeth and commandeth That c. 6. Edw. 1 It is said Our Soveraign Lord the King hath established the Acts commanding they be observed within this Realm And in the 14 Chap. the words are The King of his special grace granteth That c. The Statute of Quo Warranto saith Our Lord the King at his Parliament of his special Grace and for affection which he beareth to his Prelats Earls and Barons and others hath granted that they who have liberties by prescription shall enjoy them 1. Ed. 3. To the honour of God and of holy Church and to the redresse of the oppression of the people our Soveraign Lord the King c. At the request of the Commonalty of his Realm by their Petition made before him and his Counsel in the Parliament by the assent of the Prelats Earls Barons and other great men assembled in the said Parliament hath granted for him and his heirs c. But wherfore evidences to prove that which no man can deny The styles of the Statutes and Acts printed to the 1 H. 7 are either The King willeth the King commandeth the King provideth the King grants the King ordains at his Parliament or the King ordaineth by the advice of his Prelats and Barons and at the humble Petition of the Commons c. But in Henry 7 his time the style altered and hath sithence continued thus It is ordained by the Kings Majesty and the Lords spiritual and temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled And why do the Lords and Commons ordain Is it not only because the King doth It is so they do because the King doth which only denotateth their assent for the Kings Majesty giveth life to all as the Soul to the Body for did ever the Lords or Commons make an Act without the King Never they cannot the Lords advise the Commons consent but the King makes the Law their Bills are but inanimate scriblings untill the King breaths into their nostrils the breath of life and so that which was but mould before becometh a Law which ruleth living Souls and as Sr. Edward Coke observeth In antient times all Acts of Parliament were in form of Petitions which the King answered at his pleasure now if it be the duty of the Parliament to Petition and in the power of the King to receive or reject their Petitions at his will judg you who hath the supreme power Neither doth the King only make the Laws but he executeth them too for all executions which are the life of the Law receive their force and vigour from the King Car la ley le roy et les briefes le Roy Sont les choses per que home est Protect et ayde saith our Father Littleton Sect. 199. There be three things whereby every Subject is protected Rex Lex rescripta Regis The King commandeth his commands are our Laws and those Laws are executed only by the Kings Writs and Precepts and although the King Moses-like deputeth subaltern Judges to ease himself of some part of the burthen of administring Justice yet what they Judge are the Kings Judgments the Law is the rule but it is mute the King judgeth by his Judges and they judging are the Kings speaking Law The Judges are Lex loquens the Kings mouth the Commons are his eys and the Lords his ears but the Kings head is Viva Lex the fountain of Justice to whom God hath given his Judgments and we have none but what the King Gods Vicar giveth to us and why not the Kings judgments Quod quisque facit per alterum facit per se The Kings Patent makes the Judges the power of pardoning offences only belongeth to the King He may grant conusance of all pleas at his pleasure within any County
or Precinct to be holden there only and remove the Courts at Westminster to what place he pleaseth and adjourn the Terms as he sees cause this is book-Law 6. H. 7.9.6 Eli. Dier 226. But I pray what Law set up the new slaughter-house in England viz. the high Court of Justice Doubtlesse it was not the Kings Law and if not his Law it was no Law for England never heard of any other but the Kings Laws You have already heard that the King was before Parliaments that the King first instituted Parliaments not Parliaments the King that the House of Commons is but as it were of yesterday and that both Houses are nothing else but what the King made them Let us now see what the King did make them with what power this Idol the House of Commons is invested since they have nothing else to shew for what they are than the Kings Writ that being their Basis and only legal authority Take a view of the Writ The King to the Vicount or Sheriff Greeting WHereas by the advice and assent of our Counsell for certain arduous and urgent affairs concerning us the State and defence of our Kingdom of England and the Anglican Church We have ordained a certain Parliament of ours to be held at our City _____ the _____ day of _____ next ensuing and there to have conference and to treat with the Prelats Great-Men and Peers of our said Kingdom We command and strictly enjoyn you that making Proclamation at the next County Court after the receit of this our Writ to be holden the day and place aforesaid you cause two Knights girt with Swords the most fit and discreet of the County aforesaid and of every City of that County two Citizens of every Borough two Burgesses of the discreeter and most sufficient to be freely and indifferently chosen by them who shall be present at such Proclamation according to the Tenor of the Statute in that case made and provided and the names of the said Knights Cittizens and Burgesses so chosen to be inserted in certain Indentures to be then made between you and those that shall be present at such Election whether the parties so elected be present or absent and shall makâ— them to come at the said day and place so that the said Knights for themselves and for the County aforesaid and the Citizens and the Burgesses for themselves and the Cominalty of the said Cities and Burroughs may have severally from them full and sufficient power to do and to consent to those things which then by the favour of God shall there happen to be ordained by the Common Counsel of our said Kingdom concerning the businesse aforesaid So that the businesse may not by any means remain undone for want of such power or by reason of the improvident election of the aforesaid Knights Citizens and Burgesses But we will not in any case that you or any other Sheriff of our said Kingdome shall be eâ—ected And at the day and place aforesaid the said Election being made in a full County Court you shall certifie without delay to us in our Chancery under your Seal and the Seals of them which shall be present at that Election sending back unto us the other part of the Indenture aforesaid affiled to these presents together with the Writ Witnesse our self at Westminster This Writ is the foundation of the Parliament upon which the whole fabrick of their power and proceedings is grounded It is that which setteth up a Parliament Man and is the only Commission which distinguisheth him from another man for without that every man in the Kingdom hath equal right and authority to sit and vote in Parliament Now by Law no man ought to exceed his Commission Therefore if the Lords or Commons act beyond the bounds of their power limited in this Writ their only Commission they are transgressors and incur the punishment of Malefactors The Writ telleth you that both Houses are but as it were the production of the Privy Council for though the King ordaineth the Parliament yet it is by the advice and assent of his Council why then may not the Kings privy Council being prius tempore lay claim to the Soveraignty as well as his Common Council surely both have like right The Lords are only enabled by their call tâ— Conferr and Treat and that not without but with the King It is their Counsel to advise not their power to authorize which the King requireth For why had not the King ordained a certain Parliament to be and there to â—ave Conference and to treat with them they â—ad not come to give him Counsel and as they â—annot come but when the King commands them â—o neither can they chuse but come when the King â—oth command except the King excuse them â—nd being come they are but as Judge Jenkinsâ—ith â—ith Consiliarii non Praeceptores Counsellors â—or Commanders for to Counsel is not to Comâ—and They are only to advise not to controul â—r compel the King The Parliament is ordained â—y the â—ing as appeareth by the Writ only for â—ertain arduous and urgent affairs 1. Touching â—he King 2. The State of the Kingdom â— The defence of the Kingdom 4. The â—tate of the Church And 5. The â—efence of the same Church Though it â—e arduous yet not urgent occasion to destroy â—ingship To condemn the King to death and â—unishment is not touching the King but a Maleâ—ctor To kill the King is to destroy the kingdom â—ot to defend it and his death is the death of â—e Church and Religion O how have the Long â—arliament swarved from the true ends for â—hich Parliaments were ordained Indeed the Lords not as the upper House of â—arliament but as a distinct Court of the Kings Baâ—ns have power to reform erroneous judgeâ—ents given in the Kings Bench But there is first Petition of Right made to the King and his anâ—wer to it viz. Fiat Justitia The Court of Parliament is only the House of Lords where the King sitteth and they are his common-Counsel it belongs to them to receive all Petitions to advise his Majesty with their Counsel and to consent to what Laws the King shall make by their advice Not to speak of the qualities of the persons of the House of Commons being most of them to wit Citizens and Burgesses Tradesmen brought up in their Shops not in any University or Academy of Law and Learning and as fit to Govern and make Laws God wot as Cows are to dance The rest of them being Knights of Shires chosen commonly rather for their Mony than their Wit having greater wealth than head-pieces I pass from their education to the authority which the King vouchsafed to bestow upon them which is only what is contained in the Writ viz. facere consentire to do consent but to what Not unto such things which they shall ordain but unto such things which are ordained by the King and