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
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
fortunam fremere Pelli potes capi caedi perimi vinci autem nisi manum extuleris non potes neque ornamentis tuis spoliari cum quibus quocunque ieris civis patriae Principum unus eris Sorrow I am unjustly driven into banishment Reason What hadst thou rather than be justly banished For as touching the heap of injuries whereof thou speakest it is taken in the contrary part and now thou hast justice to be thy companion which shall be a comfort unto thee in thy unjust banishment which forsaking thy unjust Countrymen hath chosen rather to follow thee into exile Sorrow I am banished unjustly Reason Hath the King banished thee or a Tyrant or the people or an enemy or thou thy self If the King either thy banishment is not unjust or he himself is not just and so by consequence no King If a Tyrant rejoyce that thou arâ— banished by him under whom good men are exiled and Theeves are set in authority If the people they use their old manner they hate the virtuous among whom if this many-headed Tyrant had found any like themselves they would never have banished him Think not therefore that thou art expulsed thy Country but removed from the fellowship of wicked persons and that thou art not driven into exile but received into the Country of good Citizens If an Enemy acknowledge the lightness of the injury for he hath not dealt extreamly with thee he that could take from a man all that he hath and hath taken but his Country hath left him hope But if thou thy self the cause is that falling into misliking of the people or Tyrant thou hast chosen to depart not only because thou wouldest not be sorry but also vaunt thy self for preferring the honour of thy Country So that now thou hast not a miserable but an honest cause not of exile but of absence hateful to the wicked and grateful to the virtuous Pythagoras voluntarily forsook Samos and Solon Athens and Lycurgus Lacedemon and Scipio Rome Sorrow I am driven from my Country Reason Being driven away of the worst insinuate thy self into the Company of the best sort and make it evident by good proofs that thy Country was unworthy of thee and not thou of thy Country Let it perceive what it hath lost and know thou how that thou hast lost nothing Let the evil Citizens want the wearisomness and also the hatred and suspition of thy presence and let the good persecute thine absence with love and desire and with their eyes and minds follow after thy departure let them be sorry for that thou hast forsaken them Sorrow I am sent into exile Reason Nay rather to try thy self Beware how thou behave thy self in thy exile if thou faint then art thou a very banished wight if thou stand stoutly thy banishment will ennoble thee as it hath done many other before thee who passed invincibly honourably through difficulties to the end they might shew the right way to them that came after Let Tyrants rage let the people chafe let thine Enemies and Fortune fret and fume thou maist be driven away taken beaten slain but thou canst not be overcome unless thou yield up thine hands nor yet be despoiled of thine Ornaments by means whereof whithersoever thou goest thou shalt be a Citizen and one of the Princes of thy Country The Certain incertainty of Fortune who crowns Coblers and beheads Kings Advice to the prosperous to beware Insolency and to take heed lest they fall Comfort to the miserable to keep them from despair with several remedies to cure the maladies of a troubled minde being Physick for both Fortunes good or bad HAving sheltered the banished from the tempests of a forraign exile Let us arme him against the Changeling Fortune Constant only in inconstancy according to mellifluous Ovid. Passiâ—us ambiguis Fortuna volubilis errat Et manet in nullo certa tenaxque loco Sed modo lecta manet vultus modo sumit acerbos Et tantum constans in levitate sua est She wandereth about the Earth making all men Tenants at will of their possessions and as a whirlwind bloweth up dust on heaps then scattereth it about so she puffeth riches to a man then puffeth both man riches away together Quem dies vidit veniens superbum hunc dies vidit fugiens jacentem Whom the rising Sun saw as glorious as himself in the morning the setting Sun often seeth as low as himself in the evening Therefore let not them glory in their prosperity who raign in the palace of Fortune triumph over their enemies and have success to crown their actions whether they be just or unjust Nempe dat quodcunque libet Fortuna rapitque Irus est subito Qui modo Craesus erat Fortune dealeth with men as a wheele with its spoaks turneth those lowest which even now were highest She throweth down Kings and setteth up Beggars he who even now was but a servile Cobler is by and by metamorphosed and translated into his Soveraign Master Ex humili magna ad fastigia rerum Extollit quoties voluit Fortuna jocari It is her sport to promote fools to lift the Peasant from the plough to the Throne to set the frogg upon the washing block and elevate him to the highest point of honour that she may break his neck down again Tolluntur in altum ut lapsu graviore ruunt They are lifted up for no other cause but that their fall might be the greater Therefore my advice is to all those if advice may have the honour to look upon them who have their hearts desire in all things and want nothing of this world to make themselves compleatly happy to remember in the midst of their prosperity King Craesus if they will vouchsafe to let a King come into their thoughts Who when he was esteemed the most happy of all mortals both for riches and peace was admonished by Solon Neminem ante cineres beatum dicendum quod quoad vivimus periculum sit ne instabilis hujus mundi foelicitas dolore aliquo contaminetur That no man before death could be said to be happy because whilest we live it is a chance but that the foelicity of this unstable world will be blotted out with the black pen of misery which sentence of Sclons the Calamity of Croesus did afterwards declare most true For he being conquered by Cyrus and chained to the stake to be burned remembring the wholesome saying of his friend Solon did cry out Solon Solon Solon at which Cyrus much wondering asked him which of the Gods or men he did invoke and what was his meaning Cyrus being informed of the whole matter and put in minde of humane vicissitudes delivered Craesus from the flame and ever afterwards had him in great esteem fearing lest the like calamity might fall upon himself so when Sesostris King of Egypt being drunk with good fortune and lifted too high with his great successes against his
Thou hast let fall a Snake out of thy hands take heed thou take it not up again O happy loss whereby thou hast saved thy soul vengeance belongeth unto God Forgiveness unto thee if thou intendest to be forgiven From this lost occasion take occasion never to have such an occasion of revenge to lose Hath thy friend forsaken thee Better he forsake thee than thee him for then thou hadst been guilty of his fault The loss of his friendship perhaps may make thee seek after Gods friendship which if thou finde thou hast made a good exchange Do thy people hate thee their Soveraign This beast is prompt to injury and slow to duty The Commons love is light and their hatred heavy There is nothing more forcible than the multitude of fools whereas publique fury pricketh forth the rage of every private person and the rage of every private person kindleth the publique frantickness and one of them enforceth another Beware there is nothing more dangerous than to fall into their hands whose will standeth for law and headlong outrage for discretion Art thou contemned Inferiours contemn their superiours thinking by casting dirt upon them they beautify themselves and some men have no other way to patch up their own credits than by picking holes in the credit of others If it be justly thou hast cause I confess to be sorry notwithstanding thou must endure it but if unjustly thou mayst laugh at it For there is nothing more ridiculous nor that hapneth more commonly than for a wise man to be contemned of mad men Dost thou complain that promisses made unto thee are late in performance words are cheaper than deeds Hence learn punctually to perform thy promisses to others nothing more debaseth a gift than an hard graunt and a slow performance bis dat qui cito dat Art thou subject to a Tyrant Thou fearest one he fears many God suffereth him like Pharaoh to scourge thee for thy instruction but for his perdition when he hath done he will burn the rod. Iniqua nunquam regna perpetuo manent Hast thou an unruly proud scholar Pride is an enemy to learning Whip out his arrogance o◠else for wit there will be no entrance If thou art not able to remove his pride from him remove him from thee Hale in thy sayles and go to shore Thou nourishest up a Serpent and tillest a venemous plant yea thy utter enemy Dost thou suffer an hard Father A hard Father maketh a soft and gentle Son correction is thy profit and chiding is thy gain remember that he is thy Father and thou art his Son It is his duty to chastise thee and thy duty to obey him he that spareth the rod spilleth the child Hast thou a rebellious Son If thou wast the cause thank thy self If thou wast his pattern consider what thy Father suffered by thee Amend him if thou canst if not love him because he is thy Son If not for that cause then for that he is a man if thou canst not love him pitty him as severity belongeth to a Father even so doth compassion Hast thou a malapert wife thou hast an evil thing Chastise her if chastisement will avail but if it be in vain arm thy self with patience and endeavour to love her There is nothing more comfortable than to do that willingly to which one is constrained levius fit patientia Quicquid corrigi est nefas Hath thy dying Mother forsaken thee She hath not forsaken thee but is gone before thee Thou hast yet another Mother who will not forsake thee if thou wouldest from the first thou canst and unto the second shalt thou return The first gave thee house roomth the space of a few months the other shall give thee lodging the space of many years the one of these gave thee thy body the other shall take it away but as from the first so from the second shalt thou arise Dost thou weep for the death of thy son If thou wouldest have wept at his death thou shoulst also have wept at his birth for then he began to dye but now he hath done Thou knewest thou shouldest get a mortal Son and dost thou now repent it he stept before thee happy wert thou if thou hadst stept before him Is thy friend dead bury him in thy remembrance and so shall he live with thee for ever O happy friendship which continued untill the end Hadst thou lost him by any other means than by death then hadst thou not lost a friend but a false opinion of friendship Dost thou mourn because thou didst narrowly escape shipwrack Rejoyce rather that thou didst escape and hereafter since thou art an earthly creature learn to keep the earth and rather to affect Heaven than the Sea though thou dost suffer shipwrack both of thy body and goods in thy voyage to Heaven yet if thy sould do safely arrive thou shalt have no cause to mourn Did thy harvest miss and thy land lye barren one year Let the barrenness of thy land put thee in minde of the barrenness of thy soul if thou sowest but one seed and reapest not ten fold for it thou mournest God soweth much and reapeth nothing what shall he do It is the plenty of thy fins which causeth the barrenness of thy land Dost thou dwell in a narrow little house great Princes have been born in small cottages thy heavenly Soul dwelleth in a little house of clay think upon the narrowness of thy grave and thy house will seem very large Art thou shut up in an unworthy prison death will set thee free and we are all Prisoners till then· Better is an unworthy prison than unworthy liberty and happier is the innocent prisoner than the corrupt Judge who put him there Dost thou fear thou shalt lose the victory thou art half conquered already fear is always an evil guest of the minde but a much more worse companion in warr There is no greater incouragement to an army than a fearful enemy Hast thou lost a Tyranny O happy loss O happy people where Tyrants are dismounted and Thrones lawfully established Prosperity enters when Tyranny hath it's Exit It is a burden to the Commonwealth most grievous to the Tyrants dangerous to no good man profitable hurtful to many odious unto all men and comfortable only in it's brevity for violenta nemo imperia continuit diu Have thy subjects betrayd thee Not subjects but Rebels They have undone themselves by doing thee out of thy Kingdom They have betrayed thee but cast away themselves pricked thee but they are wounded and in spoiling thee have slain themselves For perchance thou hast lost thy Kingdome or thy wealth but they have lost their souls their fame the quietness of Conscience and the company of all good men The Sun shineth not upon a more wicked thing than is a Traytor whose filthyness is such that they which need his craft abhorre the craftesman and others which would be notorious in other sins shunne
with all Religions but be sure to lead the Van in the most prevalent it matters not whether it be true or false let them look to that who intend to obtain eternal advantages of it we look no further than to enjoy the temporal A Bird in the hand is worth two in the bush It is the greatest obstacle to generous actions not to personate that Religion which will serve ones purpose best be it Canonical or Apocrypha and doubtless that Religion which brings the greatest profit and largest incomes is the most sacred and most consonant to Scripture But why should I blur my paper with the Description of this deceitfull Parliament the Theory whereof is become practical almost in every City Let us therefore lament at the funeral of our Laws and Religion and throw one sprig of rosemary into the grave where all our Rights Libertyes are buried That Son giveth cause of suspition of his Legitimation who will not mourn at his Mothers death And surely he was never a true born Son of the Church or Law that will not shed a tear when they are both fell to ruin Some though very few good Eleazors amongst us have lost their heads and lives for our Laws and Religion And although I am not worthy to dye a Martyr for them Haud equidem tali me dignor honore Yet whilst I live it living tears shall fall from mine eyes for them For Qâ—is talia fan do Mrmidonum Dolopumve aut duri miles Vlyssis Temperet a lacrymis Who what Puritan Independent Anabaptist Presbyterian Quaker c. Or Red-coat as bad though not worse than any of them can restrain his Adamantine heart from grief and his eyes from tears when he considers the deplorable conditions which they have brought upon our Kingdom Who as it now plainly appeareth had no other quarrel against King than because they were not Kings themselves nor no other reason against Episcopacy than because each of them was not a Bishop They could never yet produce any argument sufficient unless the sword to prove that King or Bishop was not Jure Divino And now behold what the sword hath brought them unto I remember Cadmus sowed the teeth of a Serpent which sprung up armed men who presently destroyed one the other I will not determine that the seed of these men came from a Serpent but sure I am they cannot deny themselves but that they destroy each the other like Cadmus his men They kick the Government of our Kingdom about from one to the other like a foot ball And it will be marvail if some of them do not break their shins a swell as their consciences before the game is ended They make the Government Proteus-like to turn into what shape they please a true Common-wealth indeed being common to so many Rivalls And as the unruly Quadrupedes whirried about the Chariot Phoebus their lawfull Soveraign being absent untill they had set the whole world on fire so it is to be doubted that these headstrong Bears having cast away the rains of true obedience will not leave to wurry us untill they have brought us to utter ruine O England England Hei mihi qualis erat quantum mutatus ab illo How is thy fame besmeared and thy honour laid in the dust Once the envy of the whole world for the glory of thy Laws and Religion now become a by-word and a laughing-stock to all Nations Venit summa dies ineluctabile tempus The Sentence is already past and the decree is gone forth and nothing can avert the wrath of an angry Deity Tantaene animis caelestibus irae Can the Almighty be so passionate We want a Moses and we want an Aaron to intercede and make an attonement for us We want a Jonah to preach repentance And we want the hearts of Nineveh to entertain it We have done worse than to touch the Lords annointed and have killed his Prophets all the day long We have not reverenced his Sanctuary But have made it a den of Theeves and Stable for Beasts not altogether so bad as our selves O God why hast thou cast us off for ever why doth thine anger smoak against the Sheep of thy pasture O deliver not the soul of thy Turtle Dove unto the multitude of the wicked Forget not the Congregation of thy poor for ever Fuimus Trâ—es fuit Ilium ingens Gloria Toucrorum Remember thy old mercy and remember our former estate For though now like People like Priest The Prophets lye and the People would have it so Yet like Bethlehem we have not heretofore been the least amongst the Princes of the World We have had those who have thought it Melius tondere qaam deglubere oves better to trimm us than to flea us and Melius servare unum quam occidere mille better to preserve one than kill a thousand Who have been Tardus ad vindictam ad benevolentiam velox slow to do evill and revenge but swift to do good and reconcile Loving Pax bello potior peace better than war and esteeming it Pro patria mori pulchrum honourable to dye for their Country Which they have done and all Law Religion Justice and Equity with them Cum uno paricidio junxerunt juris divini naturalis juris gentium omnium legum publicarum privatarumque eversionem reipublicae perturbationem libertatis populi oppressionem Senatus abolitionem nobilitatis exterminationem innocentium damnationem peculatum aerarii publici direptionem solennis conventionis infractionem perfidiam jurisjurandi violationem statuum omnium confusionem immo subversionem Tempora mutantur nos mutamur in illis Sal. Therefore let no man be offended if I attend the funeral and say something on the behalf of the deceased It is a Christian duty and none will account it superstition to give an Encomium at burialls where it is due unless those who account it superstition to deserve well themselves De mortuis nil nisi bonum We must say nothing but good of the dead Therefore behold the Monument in these insuing political Aphorisms The Monument of the Laws or Regal and Political Aphorisms whereby the Prerogative of the King and the just liberties of the People are set forth and authorized by the Law of God and the Law of the Land KIngs are Jure Divino by Divine right to be obeyed and not by violent force of subjects to be resisted although they act wickedly Prov. 8.15 By me Kings raign Dan. 2.21 He removeth Kings and setteth up Kings Prov. 16.10 A Divine Sentence is in the lips of the King Prov. 21.1 The Kings heart is in the hand of the Lord. Job 34.18 Is it fit to say to a King thou art wicked and to Princes ye are ungodly Prov. 24.21 Fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with them that are given to change Eccl. 8.2 I counsel thee to keep the Kings Commandment Exod. 22.28 Thou shalt not speak evil of thy Prince
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
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
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
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
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.
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
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.
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