by Sir Edward Coke (m) 4. Instit p. 12.1 Inst p. 69.2 Inst 7 8. Preface to ninth Report beyond all bounds of Truth and Modesty as also the great mistake of our learned judicious Antiquary (n) Archaion p. 257. Mr. Lambard and (o) Doderidge of the Antiquity of Parliaments others of great note who affirm that the true original Title and Right of all our ancient Cities and Burroughs electing and sending Burgesses and Citizens to our Parliaments is Prescription time out of mind long before the Conquest it being a Privilege they actually and of right enjoyed in Edward the Confessor's time or before and exercised ever since Indeed the whole series of the great Councils in the Saxon Danish and Norman Kings Reigns to the Forty Ninth of Henry the Third evince the contrary As to the Wages of the Knights Citizens and Burgesses The Wages of Knights Citizens and Burgesses it being a thing now obsolete though not out of force by those that would claim them I shall only note that the first Writ for them is coeval with our Kings first Writs of Summons and the reason given in the Writ is That whereas the King had summoned two Knights c. and they had stayed (p) Ac iidem Milites moram diuturniorem quam credebant traxerint ibidem propter quod non modicas fecerint expensas Cl. 49 H. 3. m. 10. dorso longer than they believed they should do by reason of which they had been at no small Expence therefore the King appoints the Sheriff by the counsel of Four lawful Knights to provide for the Two Knights of the Shire their reasonable Expences The Writ of the 28 Ed. 1. (q) Rot. Claus 28 E. 1. m. 12. dorso commands that they have rationabiles expensas suas in veniendo ad nos ibidem morando inde ad propria redeundo their reasonable Expences in coming to the King staying there and returning to their homes The like we find for the Citizens and Burgesses in the 1 Ed. 2. there was Four Shillings a day allowed for every Knight and Two Shillings for every Citizen and Burgess Mr. Prynne (r) Brief Parliamentary Writs part 4. p. 4. gives many good reasons why these Wages were allowed some of which I shall recite As first that all Laws allow Sallaries for Services and those being public Servants and Representatives or Atturneys for the Counties Cities Burroughs to consult about the great and arduous Affairs necessary Defence Preservation and Wellfare of the King and Kingdom and theirs for and by whom they were intrusted it is reason as they receive the benefit of their good Service in giving their good Advice towards the redressing of Grievances and making wholsom Laws that they should have allowed their necessary Expences Secondly It appears in ancient times there was no such ambition to be Parliament-men as of late but the Persons elected thought it a burthen therefore lest being elected they should neglect to repair to the Convention they had Sureties called Manucaptors for their Appearance Thirdly This obliged the Counties Cities and Burroughs to be carefuller in electing the discreetest ablest fittest and most laborious persons who would speediest and best dispatch all Public business which occasioned the shortness of Sessions Fourthly It begat a greater confidence correspondence and dependance betwixt the Electors and Elected Fifthly It kept poor petty Burroughs unable to defray the Expences of their Burgesses from electing or sending Members to our Parliaments and oblig'd some to Petition to be eased of the Charge whereby the number of Burgesses was scarce half so many and Parliaments were more expeditious in Councils Aids Motions and their Acts and Debates and so the Sessions were much shortned the Elections were then fairer and for the most part unquestionable the Commons House less unwieldy Privileges of Parliament less enlarged beyond the ancient Standard abuses in Elections Returns and Contests about them by reason of the Mercenary and Precarious Voices less troublesom whereas now in every new Parliament a great part of the time is spent in the regulating Elections But Mr. Prynne hints little upon one great cause of that usage which was that in Burroughs as well as Cities most what the persons elected were the Inhabitants in the Cities and Burroughs Merchants Tradesmen or the most popular Burghers as will appear to whoever peruseth the Chronological Catalogue Mr. Prynne (s) P. 900. to 1072. with no small pains hath collected into his Fourth Part of his Brief Register where I believe one can pitch upon no City of Burrough from the time of Ed. 1. to the 12 Ed. 4. but he will find by the very names that they were such as I have mentioned I am well assured of it for Yorkshire and particularly for the City of York they being generally such as we find in the List of their Mayors Beverly hath Four of the Sirnames of good Families and Kingstone upon Hull hath (t) 8 E. 3. William a S. Pole from whom the great Family of Suffolk sprung but it is well known he was a Merchant there Now since every part of the Country abounds with Gentlemen of Plentiful Fortunes Why wages not now paid to Knights Citizens and Burgesses Generous Education such as are versed in Affairs of their Country as Justices of the Peace Deputy Lieutenants and have been Sheriffs Members of Parliament and born Publick Offices there can be no expectation or Fear that those that are Candidates for Parliament Men for Burroughs will expect any Sallary or Reward so long as they chuse them There being generally Competitors who instead of expecting Wages are generally obliged now to vast expences to purchase the Votesâ— of the Electors so that now the Honourable House of Commons is quite another thing than what it was wont to be in elder Ages when they were summoned principally to give Assent to what the King and the Lords did to assent to Aids and Taxes and apportion their own Taxes bring up their Petitions concerning Grievances to be redressed by the King and his Council or the King and Lords and draw up Impeachments against great Offenders and such like Having thus considered the Writs of Summons to the Members of the House of Commons before Henry the Seventh's time in all its branches Copy of VVrits of Summons now used to the Sheriffs I shall give a Transcript of the Writ of Summons used at this day whereby may be seen how much of the old form is continued which I shall insert in Latin and English that the Emphasis of the Original may not be lost REX Vicecomiti Salutem c. Quia de advisamento assensu Concilii nostri pro quibusdam arduis urgentibus negotiis nos statum defensionem Regni nostri Angliae Ecclesiae Anglicanae concernentibus quoddam Parliamentum nostrum apud c. die c. proxime futuro teneri ordinavimus ibidem cum Praelatis
Xenoph. de Rep. Athenarum Thucyd. lib. 3. this is a Mart wherein voices are bought and sold poverty and ignorance driving the crowds to null that to day which they have eagerly pursued the day before scarce forbearing the same day to condemn and absolve nothing being done amongst them but in tumultuary ferments and an high boyling fret or a dead torpidness and irresolution the Ebbings and Flowings of the Ocean being more regular than theirs whereas all Government according to the (b) Polit. l. 4. c. 4. Philosopher subsists and is established in firmness and constancy by every mans knowing what is his right to enjoy and his duty to do or as (c) Coeius hominum Juris consensu utibitatis communione sociatus De Civitate Dei c. 23. St. Augustine calls it a society of Men incorporated for common benefits by the agreement of Laws It is a grave saying of (d) Populus negligit rempublicam magnitudine nimia communium curarum expers 1. Hist Privata cuique stimulatio vile decus publicum 2. Annal. Tacitus That the common People neglect the affairs of the Common-weal by their over-bulkiness void of publick spirit and care and in another place That the incentives to their private profit produce a disregarding neglect of the publick (e) Quod omnia aetatis membra familiasque singulas in unum corpus cogit De Rep. lib. 1. Bodinus compares a Common-wealth or Government to a Ship and well observes that without the Keel which unites the Stern and Fore-castle Ribs c. it would be but informe lignum So a Community without Government which unites the members of all Ages and all Families in one body can no ways deserve the name of society Such a People headless is not worthy to be called a Body Politick for Government no ways consists in the number of Persons or the heads of Citizens but in the combination of them under one Soveraign Power The unwieldy bulk of numerous Armies wanting Conduct and Discipline rarely effect any glorious enterprise In the Tumults of Naples the Rascality were forced to set up an Head though it were but the frothy boisterous Thomas Anello So were Cade Ket Tyler and others in our popular Rebellions set up as the Captains Leaders and Idols of the Clowns From whence we may learn that even such people as rose up as they pretended to suppress Magistrates Monarchy or Tyranny level Estates and set all at liberty yet once imbodied were forced to chuse Captains to lead them to whose Orders there was a necessity of submission If we thoughtfully consider How Superiority and Government founded in Nature we shall find that Government is founded in nature in which state there is no such thing as equality for the Parent by priority of natural cause must be superior to the Children Yea if we should believe People to be Juvenes ab Aquilone creati like Grashoppers or Locusts or like Cadmus his men sprung up at once out of the Earth underived from any pre-existent Parent all of them having equal Origin and Power yet a short converse one with another would have necessitated them to embody in Societies We Christians believe God made Man after his own Image Dominion given to Man and gave him dominion over all the Creatures of our sublunary world and it is not reasonable to think that he endowed him not with faculties necessary for the administration of that great Empire not only over the Brutes but over his own Species For the Philosopher (f) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. Polit c. 5. notes that nature hath made some fit to command and others to obey or serve of which we have many and great Instances So Julius Caesar and others whose great actions are recorded in History manifested more sublime Spirits than any of those who were subdued by them Some born to Empire and when those great Heroes were dead though their Officers and Soldiers survived by whose prowess and valour they had effected those wonders yet we read of a suddain degeneracy as if the soul had expired and left the carcass only of an Army The Orator observes that no Nation was ever so Barbarous No Nation so Savage wherein some Government hath not been as to be wholly void of Religious Worshippers since every where some Deity or other hath been acknowledged Even so we may affirm that never any People were so rude wild and savage but they found a necessity of Government of which they had at least in their first embodying some unpollished Model and some sort of Institutes appointed by and coeval with their Governours by which their political interests and private concerns were regulated without the infinite disorder which would happen to all publick transactions which should be the product of tumultuous votes where every meeting would be a jumble of great and small The Mischiefs of tumultuous voting and want of Magistrates soft and hard sculls a pudling of business and putting all things to chance and blundering in a maze till at last some Mens wisdom formed them into order How then is that condition of a People to be wailed which Tacitus (g) Ea demum libertas Romae est non Senatus non Magistratus non Leges non Mores Majorum non Instituta Patrum 1 Annal. describes to be the Roman State of liberty wherein there was no Senate no Magistrates no Laws no Ancient Usage no Institutes of the Fathers From all which we may conclude that the same nature that ordered societies gives them prudence to know that to preserve the Society and the peace of it it was necessary that there should be one or some who laying aside private advantage and particular Interest should imploy their minds bend all their thoughts and direct their actions for the publick good and by the sinews of power hold all so fast united as they should guide them to the same end and we must determine that Government is absolutely necessary for the being and well-being of a People though there be servitude in it which made Seneca comparing Augustus's times with the preceding irregular ones say Salva esse Roma non potuit nisi benesicio servitutis The City could not have been safe without the benefit of servitude CHAP. III. That the People are not the Original of Authority and Government BEfore I proceed to treat of the several forms of Government I judge it requisite to examine some positions made use of by Republicans so long at least as they argue against Monarchical Government or till they obtain their ends in the subverting of it One of which is that supreme power is originally and fundamentally in the People for whose benefit all Government was established Secondly That there is a tacit reservation of power in them to vary the form of Government and change the Persons when the people finds it convenient for them The Law of Nature as they say justifying any attempt
Philosopher confesseth it had been better for the Law-givers at the first so to have attempered the Commonwealth that they might have had no need of such a Medicine Miltiades had done the Athenians great Service at the Battle of Marathon against Darius Of Ingratitude to Miltiades yet after by this ingrateful People he was cast into Prison and fined fifty Talents Where his weak and wounded Body having broken his Thigh at the assault against Paros being not able to endure the one nor his Estate the other after a few days he ended his Life and this was occasioned by the Envy of Xantippus Father of Pericles This Envy of the better sort against each other by their private Factions assisted by unthankful and witless People brought the Athenians not many years after from a victorious and famous Commonweal to a base Subjection and Slavery I might instance in Aristides Cimon and many others but shall pass to Phocyon The ill Treatment of Phocyon who had been Forty five times without ever suing for the place chosen Governour of Athens He had been in good esteem with King Philip and by King Alexander was presented with two Hundred Talents in Silver and the choice of one of four Cities of Asia but refused those and other Gifts howsoever importunately thrust upon him resting well contented with his honest Poverty During his Government having given his Promise for Nicanors's safe coming to the Piraeus to treat with the Athenians and his safe return about their joining with Cassander or Polypserchon and finding that the Athenians practised with Dercillus to take Nicanor Prisoner he was nothing pleased with such a trick of politick Dishonesty and so did quietly permit him to depart at which the Athenians were so incensed that he was forced to save himself by Flight with some others whom Polypserchon sent to Athens where neither he nor the rest were suffered to speak for themselves but were condemned to dye by the unjust Judgment of wicked Men by drinking Poyson which saith Sir Walter Raleigh Lib. 4. c. 3. sect 15. by the just Judgment of God so infected the City of Athens as from that day forward it never brought forth any worthy Man resembling the Vertue of their Ancestors It is not to be expressed what Honours the Athenians gave to Antigonus and Demetrius his Son The Ingrati◠the Athenians to 〈◊〉 metrius when they assisted them in their necessities and declining Fortune but when after his Fathers defeat and death at the Battle of Ipsus Demetrius fled to Athens for succour they sent their Embassadors to meet him with a Decree of the People that no King should be admitted into their City Which example I the rather mention that the difference may be observ'd betwixt the generousness of Princes and such Commonweals for when soon after Demetrius reduced Athens to his Obedience they being almost Famished and yielding to his Mercy he did not take away the Lives of these unthankful Men but gave them Food and placed such for Magistrates as were acceptable to the People yet a second time when Demetrius was overcome by Pyrrhus and Lysimachus the Athenians were as ungrateful as ever The ill usage of Sophocles and Phthiodorus Sophocles and Phthiodorus the Athenian Generals were condemned to Exile by the People pretending they had taken Money for making Peace in Sicily whereas indeed there was not any means of making War And Alcibiades with Nicias chuse rather to banish themselves than undergo the Judgment of the incensed multitude and adventure their Estates Honours and Lives upon the Tongues of shameful Accusers And though saith the same excellent (w) Idem Lib. 3. c. 8. sect 8. Historian it is the part of an Honest and Valiant Man to do what reason willeth and not what Opinion expecteth and to measure Honour and Dishonour by the assurance of his Conscience rather than by the malicious Report and Censure of such yet they are to be excused as having before their Eyes the Injustice of the People knowing that a wicked Sentence is infinitely worse than a wicked Fact as being held a Precedent and Pattern whereby Oppression beginning upon one is extended as warrantable upon all The Insolence of the Athenians having after this expedition wearied some of the principal Men of Athens Ingratitude to Alcibiades four Hundred of them got so far the Power into their Hands that what they had agreed upon in private was only propounded to the People for their consent but this lasted not long For their Fleet and Army which was then at Samos revoked Alcibiades from Banishment who had lived in Sparta the other famous Commonweal where in Council and good Performances he so far excelled all the Lacedaemonians that all their good success was ascrib'd to his Wit and Valour yet there he began to be envied and so withdrew to Persia Being now called home some of those four Hundred would have resign'd their Government yet the most of the Faction laboured to obtain Peace of the Lacedaemonians desiring chiefly to maintain their own Authority This Alcibiades won many Victories for the Athenians and was made high Admiral yet he was forced afterwards to banish himself only because his Lieutenant contrary to the express Command of Alcibiades fighting with the Enemies in his absence had lost a great part of the Fleet. I shall add one Story more and so pass to the Romans The Athenians having appointed ten Captains over their Fleet The ten Athenian Sea-Captains wherewith they beat Callicratidas the Lacedaemonian Admiral yet six of these Captains were put to Death upon in formation that they had not rescued some Citizens who were lost by the breaking of their Vessels by a Storm which happened when those Captains were obliged to follow the Enemy and two of them had like to have been shipwracked themselves and besides they offered in their own defence that they left a sufficient number of Ships to have succoured those that were wracked But one that escaped in a Meal-tub having told the People that those that were drowned had charged him to desire the People to revenge their Deaths upon the Captains this was a sufficient incentive to the People precipitately to put them them to death The absent Captains escaped and when the Fury of the People was over the Sentence against the rest was revoked too late All these ingrateful usages of such great Commanders is ascribed to the violence of the People But we may suppose if it had not been for the Arts of such Magistrates as were Enemies to those Worthies and envied them the Glory of their great Atchievements the People had been better Instructed Hower it shews the tendency of such a complex Body of Magistrates and People and though Athens had as much of the Popular Government called Democratical as any else in Greece yet the source of all was from the Texture of the Republic Government in general I shall now pass to the
Romans Concerning the Roman Ingratitude and onely single two or three of the many Examples of their Ingratitude to their deserving Chiestains to illustrate That Rewards were not bestowed as they ought to have been even to such as were the greatest Preservers of their Country and such as raised the Glory of the Roman Name to the highest pitch of Glory T. Martius Coriolanus called Coriolanus had conquered the Volsci and Aequi yet under pretext that he had advised to sell Corn in time of Dearth at an higher Rate than was convenient he was banished Yet he took not that Revenge he might have done in joyning with the Volsci Furius Camillus subdued the Falisci Furius Camillus but was banished the City upon a Suggestion of some Inequality of dividing the Spoil and retired to ARdaea from whence when the Gauls under Brennus had got all Rome but the Capitol he forgetting the Ingratitude of his Country drew an Army together with which he fell upon the dispersed Gauls and so saved his Country The two Scipio's strangely enlarged the Roman Empire The Two Scipio's by conquering every place where they were employed Publius Scipio the elder Brother overthrew Hannibal and subjected the whole State of Carthage by which he deservedly had the Style of Africanus as his Brother had that of Asiaticus by conquering the Kingdom of Macedon and giving Laws to all Greece and other Territories in Asia Concerning the elder the Senate was unwilling he should carry the War into Africk But the People were earnest for it Concerning Publius Scipio the elder Brother Upon which the Learned (x) Sir Walter Raleigh l. 5. c. 3. sect 18. Historian and Statesman observes That it is often found in Councils of State that the busie and obstinate Heads of a few do carry all the rest and many times Men make a surrender of their own Judgments to the Wisdom that hath gotten it self a Name by giving happy Directions in Troubles by-past therefore he that reposeth himself upon the Advice of many shall often find himself deceived The Counsel of the Many being wholly directed by the Empire of a Few that oversway the rest For here Q. Fabius was accounted the Oracle of his time for his wary Nature suited well with the Business that fell out in the chief of his Imployment therefore others adhered to him that was grown old in following one Course from which they would not shift as the change of Times required But the People who though they could not well advise and deliberate yet could well apprehend embraced the needful Motion of Scipio and furnished him with all Supplies and Furtherance they could From hence I may note the Inconvenience of this Government wherein sometimes the Senators shall be led by one or some few one way and then by others and sometimes the People shall over-rule the Votes of the Senate For though this may be fortunate at some times yet at others it may be as fatal The great Success of Scipio was celebrated with that excess of Joy and deservedly as Rome perhaps never shew'd the like and his Brother L. Scipio's Triumph was not much less than it Yet these two so famous Brothers afterwards were called one after another by two Tribunes of the People to Judgment in probability by the instigation of some of the Faction of the Senate against them The African could not endure that such unworthy Men should question him of purloining from the common Treasure or of being hired by Antiochus to make an ill Bargain for his Country When therefore the Day of Answer came he appeared before the Tribunes not humbled as one accused but followed by a great Train of his Friends and Clients with which he passed through the midst of the Assembly and having Audience told the People That upon the same day of the Year he fought a great Battel against Hannibal and finished the Punic War by a signal Victory In memory of which he thought it no fit Season to brabble at the Law but intended to visit the Capitol and there give Thanks to Jupiter and the rest of the Gods by whose Grace both on that day and at other times he had well and happily discharged the most weighty Business of the Commonweal and that if from the seventeenth Year of his Life until he now grew old the Honourable Places by them conferred on him had prevented the Capacity of his Age and yet his Deserts had exceeded the Greatness of those Honourable Places that then they would pray That the Princes and Great ones of the City might still be like to him So all followed him except the Tribunes and their Slaves and one of the Cryers by whom ridiculously they cited him to Judgment until for very shame as not knowing what else to do they granted him unrequested a longer Day But after when he perceived that the Tribunes would not let fall the Suit he willingly withdrew from that unthankful Rome that could suffer him to undergo such Indignities and so spent the rest of his time at Linternum Concerning Lucius Scipio the younger Brother The same Tribunes proceeded more sharply with his Brother Lucius Scipio the Asiatick whose wise Conduct and Valour had subjected Greece and Macedonia to the Roman Yoke and extended their Empire over those rich Countries They propounded a Decree unto the People touching Money received of Antiochus not brought into the Common Treasury that the Senate should give Charge unto one of the Praetors to inquire and Judicially determine thereof And Matters were so carried against him that he was condemned in a Sum of Money far greater than his Ability and for non-payment his Body should have been laid up in Prison but he was freed from the Rigour of this by Gracchus the Tribune and his Estate being confiscated when there neither appeared any Sign of his being beholden to Antiochus nor there was found so much as he was condemned to pay then fell his Accusers and all whose Hands had been against him into the Indignation of the People It is observed That Cato the elder who had been his Treasurer was a Promoter of this A Man saith Sir Walter Raleigh of great but not perfect Vertue Temperate Valiant and of singular Industry Frugal of the Publick and of his own who though not to be corrupted with Bribes yet was unmerciful and unconscionable in increasing his own Wealth by such means as the Laws did permit Ambition was his Vice which being joyned with Envy troubled both himself and the whole City And some write That Fabius Maximus out of some private displeasure countenanced these Proceedings From these and other Examples it may well be noted Summary of the Reman Discords how this famous Commonweal was pestered with Faction the want of sufficient Imployment were Sparks that help'd the kindling of the Fire of them which now began to appear and first caught hold of those great Worthies to whose Valour and Conduct Rome
and Death is owned by the (g) Pater vitae necisque potestatem habebat in filios Cicero Orator in his time to remain when he saith The Father had the Power of Life and Death over his Children So that what Brutus the first Consul did in beheading his two Sons in not taken by most to be done qua Consul but as Parent for that the Consuls never had any Regal Power without leave of the People If we consider the Scope of (h) Numb 11. Moses's Expostulation with God Almighty Why layest thou the burthen of all this People upon me Have I conceived all this People Have I begotten them must from hence infer That if He had been their common Parent he ought to have had the Charge and Government of them so natural seems the Connection betwixt Fatherly Authority and Filial Obedience and that this was an Original Truth the Philosopher cites (i) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Odyss 11. Homer who saith That every Father to his Children and his Wives gives Laws This kind of Power seems to be confirmed in Scripture concerning Cain Abraham sacrificing Isaac Thamar and Jephtha But in after times when Fathers abused that Authority it was judged expedient to deprive them of it and place it in the hands of the more publick Father the King Having thus cleared the point The Antiquity of Monarchy from History and Testimony That Monarchy is according to the Institution of Nature I come now to speak of the Antiquity of it (k) Vide Stillingfleet 's Origines Sacrae Sanconiathan of greater Antiquity than any Greek Historian gives a large account of the Phoenician Monarchy the like Manetho gives of the Aegyptian and the true Berosus of the Babylonian So * Polit. lib. 5. c. 11. Aristotle speaks of the long Duration of the Molossiac Kingdom which began in Pyrrhus Son of Achilles and according to (l) De Antiquis Familiis Regum Reinerus lasted nine Hundred and Fifty years and the Lacedaemonian according to Plutarch Eusebius and others continued near upon as long The Philosopher (m) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 L. 1. c. 1. advanceth the Origin of Kingly Government as high as the Heathen Religion or Philosophy could carry him when he saith That the very Heathen Deities were under this Form and Regimen So what Herodotus saith of the Egyptians may as truly be said of all other Nations That they could not live without Kings So Isocrates saith Before Democracy and Oligarchy the barbarous Nations and Cities of Greece obeyed Kings Therefore the Philosopher (n) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ibid. saith At first Kings governed Cities and now Nations So Salust (o) In terris nomen Imperii primum fuit saith The name of Empire was first known in the World and Justin (p) Principio rerum Nationumque omnium imperium penes Reges erat Lib. 1. most expresly In the beginning of all things and Nations the Power and Government was solely and absolutely in Kings So (q) Certum est omnes Antiquas Gentes Regibus paruisse Lib. 3. de LL. Cicero saith That it is certain that all Ancient Nations did obey Kings If we consult Homer Plato Lucretius Diodorus Siculus lib. 2. Josephus lib. 4. c. 1. or any Historian Greek or Latin we shall find no Tract of Time nor Society of Men without Kingly Government The first Popular State we read of The first Common-wealths is that of Athens after the Reign of Erixias Anno Mundi 3275. and after that several other Cities of Greece as Sparta Corinth c. followed their examples expelling their Kings and in their Rooms erected little Commonwealths but great Tyrannies being in a continual broil either among themselves about their Magistrates or with their Neighbours for Preheminence till the time of Alexander the Great and the Macedonian Monarchy when the Country returned to their pristin Government and might so have continued if the Roman Arms and Ambition had not overthrown it As to Rome it self it was two Hundred and Fifty Years under Kings and Kingly Government was found under Lavinius when the Trojans came from that little Kingdom of Pergamus Therefore (r) Vrbem Romam a principio Reges habucre 1. Annal. Tacitus tells us That the City of Rome from the beginning had Kings to govern it Their Commonwealth began upon the Regifugium So that saith a Judicious (s) Dr. Nalsâ—n's Common Interest Author for three Thousand Years Monarchy possessed an Universal and Uninterrupted Empire over all the Affairs of the Universe so that the Sun the glorious Monarch of the day does not in all his Travels round the earthly Globe behold any spot of Ground inhabited by any thing but Brutes where Monarchy either is not at present or hath not been the Antient Original and fundamental way of Government From the consideration of this Naturalness of Monarchy Authors deducing Monarchy from a Divine Original and the Venerable Antiquity of it we may conclude the reason why the best and Ancientest Writers have adorned it with such Eulogiums deducing its Original from the Divine Being So Hesiod (t) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theog v. 91. saith Kings are from Jove and (v) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hymn in Jovem Callimachus adds that none are so Divine as they So in Homer (w) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ihad 6. v. 277. as well as in Hesiod they are stiled nourished of God and born of God not as deriving their Pedigrees but Kingly Honours from Jove as Eustachius notes and from Homer's making the Scepter of Agamemnon to be the Gift of Jove though a late (x) Absolute Power p. 63. Author contemptuously compares it to a Constables Staff He (y) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iliad 4. v. 738. saith The King hath both his Scepter and Jurisdiction from God Of which the curious Reader may see more Authorities in the learned Tract of Archbishop Vsher's Power of Princes (z) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato according to Synesius de Regno makes the Regal Office to be a Divine Good among Men and a King to be as it were a God among Men And (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Politico Diotogenes the Pythagorean saith that God hath given him Dominion Others have stiled them Gods which a late (b) Absolute Power p. 66. Author saith may be allowed for want of a better in Hobs's State of Ignorance and Atheism and would have him have the Epithete of Optimus as well as Maximus Thus some take a Liberty to ridicule all things most Sacred and Venerable But I shall have occasion to enquire into such Mens Principles afterwards and at present shall only say That no Mans Hyperbole or Expression is further to be understood than as it makes the Kingly Original from God and makes Kings his Viceroys upon Earth Therefore I shall not balk such Authorities (c) 2. de LL. Plato affirms Monarchy to be the
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and according to the Use of the Country for that the Barbarous Nations were more prone to Servitude than the Grecians and the Asiaticks endured with less trouble than the Europeans that Command which he calls Absolute as of Masters over Servants This he calls in reality 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tyrannical Government but Kingly also in that it is firm legitimate and according to the Use of the Country For that he (s) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Polit. lib. 3. cap. 10. Hâ—insii saith Citizens or Subjects defend Kings but Guards of Strangers are employed by Tyrants Kings commanding lawfully over the willing and Tyrants over the unwilling and without Rules of Law The third kind he calls that which among the Grecians was styled the Aesmynetian And this he (t) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Optiva tyrannis i. suffragio 〈◊〉 saith was an Elective Tyranny either perpetual for Life or for a time And this because it was a Command over the Willing such Persons being elected he styles a Kingly Government and instanceth in the Mitylenians who chose Pittacus to be their King against Alcaeus and Antimenides who were banished Such (u) Halicarnassâ—us lib. 5. Dionysius makes the Roman Dictators Such the Cumaeni by an honester Name styled their Tyrants and such were the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Athens Such a Kingdom Timolio held at Syracuse which he as well as Pittacus spontaneously resigned and did not convert into a Tyranny as Dionysius did or as Sylla and Julius Caesar did at Rome and Aratus at Sicyon according to the (w) Lib. 3. de Officiis Orator The last kind he calls (x) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lib. 3. Polit. c. 10. Heinsii Heroic because it was used in the Heroick Ages and had three Characteristicks of true Kingly Government That it was a Power exercised over the Willing Fatherly and Legitimate For he saith the first Kings either for the Benefits they conferred on the Multitude by Invention of Arts Conduct in War or leading them out in Colonies or supplying them with Lands governing those who lonies or supplying them with Lands governing those who freely yielded to obey were in that esteem and had that Power and Authority which was requisite These had command in War and in things sacred where there were no Priests and did determine Causes and all these things some Kings administred without Oath others were sworn to the observation of them by the lifting up the Scepter and (y) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ibid. concludes that in ancient times Kings had Rule and were Lords over all affairs of the City and those at home and abroad From whence and from what the Philosopher delivered in the beginning of this work and elsewhere (z) Commâ—nt in lib. 1. Polit. initic Giphanius with Thucydides concludes That these Hereditary Kings had such a Power as was restrained by certain Laws and they did not Reign as they listed and at their Pleasure but by certain Prescripts of Laws such we may presume as they ordained This was that Monarchy which was known in the first Ages of the World All People in all Ages and all places having by constant Experience found it most conducive to their Happiness and well-being For had there been any other form under which Mankind could have rationally promised themselves more or more certain Happiness than under this all humane care would long e're this have hit on it and there would have been an universal Regifugium But supposing we should quit these Topicks of Monarchy Other commendable Qualifications of Monarchy being according to the Law of Nature and that it is venerably for its Antiquity there are other Commodities wherein it excells other Forms As first that it is freest from the Canker of Faction which corrodes and consumes all other Governments Hence the most judicious (a) Tacitus 1. Annal. Historian tells us what Asinius Gallus replied to Tiberius That the Body of the Empire is one and so is to be governed by one Soul and in (b) Arduum sape eodem loci potentiam concordiam esse Idem another place tells us how difficult it is to find Concord among Equals in Power especially where not only as at Sparta there were two races of Kings governing at once but as many of them as there were Senators or Magistrates which by Bands and Confederacies are restlessly making Parties against each other whereby the Administration rowls from one Faction to another whereas Kingly Government is uniform and equal in it self and when by Factions Commonweals have been brought almost to utter ruin a (c) Omnem potestatem ad unum conferri pacis interfuit Tacitus 1. Histor single Persons Conduct hath restored all As (d) Perculsum undique ordinavit Imperii corpus quod ita haud dubie nunquam coire consentire potuisset nisi unius Praesidis nutu quasi anima mente regeretur Lib. 4. c. 3. Florus writes of Augustus Caesar that he ordered the shaken and distracted Body of the Empire which without doubt could never have been united in one Form again unless by the Direction of one President as a Soul and Spirit Even so we experienced in his late Majestie 's admirable yea miraculous Retauration which effected as great Blessings to these Islands as that of Augustus to the Roman Empire Besides it is a strong Argument for the Preference of Monarchical Government to all sorts of Republics that in all popular States we find all great affairs managed by some one leading Man who by the dexterity of his Address Power of his Eloquence or the Strength of his Arguments induceth so many as are necessary to join with him to effect them unless when by contrary renitency they are dissolved into Faction So when the Senate of Rome was in a most critical Debate An delenda esset Carthago Cato shewing them the Grapes which a few Years before grew there illustrated from thence the dangerous vicinity of so potent and opulent a State as had contended with them for the universal Empire and wanted only the skill of an uti Victoria to have effected it By which he cooled the warm Debates of the Senate and brought them to an affirmative Determination So Cicero often prevailed so Demosthenes and so the Daemagogues in popular States who are (e) Nalson's Common Interest pro tempore Monarchs the very head of every Faction in a Republic being a King in Disguise or a Tyrant in the dress of a Private Man The single Government being freed from the prime Cause of all intestine decay viz. Faction It necessarily follows that it must be of longer Duration Monarchy more durable as being built upon stronger and firmer Foundations than any other Model Ambitions Aemulations Hostile Parities popular Insolencies Senatorian Tyranny tumultuous Elections and infinite causes of Discords are the inseparable Associates and close Conomitants of all other Forms But in Monarchy hereditary
Fifthly They were wont to be excused from personal Attendance in War nor did they pay Taxes with the rest Such Priviledges we find the (h) Num. 1.48 Ezra 7.24 â—evites among the Hebrews enjoyed Sixthly As to Civil matters they were in such Honour as they determined almost all public and private Controversies and as (i) Magno praeterea apud omnes Galiâ—s in honore sunt nam fere de omnibus controversiis publicis privaâ—isque constituunt si quod est admissum facinus si caedes factae si de Haereditate de sinibus controversia iidem decernunt praemia poenasque constituunt De Bello Gallico 1.7 Caesar saith if any great Wickedness be done any Murther be committed if there be any Controversie about Inheritance or Boundaries they do judge and appoint Rewards and Punishments I sometimes think Facinus may be interpreted any great or noble Enterprize done because Caesar saith They appoint Rewards whereas to none of the other particulars Rewards are due But this obiter Seventhly These saith the same Caesar at a certain time of the Year in the Confines of Carnutum Chartres according to Ortelius which is esteemed the middle of France sit in a consecrated place and thither from every part those who have any Controversies meet and they obey their Judgment and Decrees From whence Ramus thinks That the Druids were dispersed through France as the Priests are now and the Principal of them carried the Controversies of their Citizens to this general Council where the High Priests of the Druids presided * Pausanias in Phocicis Druids in Britain and that this was like the Convention of the Amphictyons f of Delphos when Greece was at Freedom and he thinks this Power of the Druids was Kingly not only over every private Person but over the whole People I have enlarged thus far of the French Druids which some may say appertains not to the Britans but if we will believe (g) Gallorum disciplina in Britannia reperta atque inde in Galliam translata esse existimatur Et nunc qui diligentius eam rem cognoscere volunt plerumque illo discendi causa proficiscuntur Caesar lib. 6. Caesar we shall find that the Discipline of the Druids came from Britain to the Gauls for speaking of them he saith That the French Discipline i. e. the Arts c. taught by the Druids was found in Britain and from thence is believed to be transmitted into Gallia and now saith he those that will more diligently know it for the most part go thither i. e. to Britain to learn it I know Ramus faintly opposeth this because Caesar speaks elsewhere of the Gauls making a part of Britain and that of the Britans the Gauls are the most civil all which may be true and yet the Doctrine have its Original here and Ramus concludes from this That the Discipline or Learning of the Britans and Gauls were both one I shall refer the curious to what Pliny saith of the Misleto The Druids Ceremony in cutting the Misleto from the Oak with how great Ceremony it was cut by the Druid Magicians as he calls them there being present two white Bulls the Priest climbing the Tree in a white Garment and cutting the Misleto from the Oak with a Golden Pruning-knife and receiving it in a white Cassock and then the Bulls were sacrificed Britain being so famous for the best Oaks and the word Druid coming from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Oak we may safely rely upon Caesar's Testimony for the bringing the Learning of the Druids from Britain to France That which I infer from this Discourse is that there were Laws in Britain and that the Druids were the Lawyers and Judges but how the Laws were made or what they were among the Britains is not in my reading to inform the curious how and for what cause the Druids were extirpated I shall speak hereafter The other Member of the honourable part of the Gauls Of the Equites or Nobility were the Equites under which are to be comprehended the Princes and Soldiers (w) Lib. 6. Faâ—â—ionum Principes sunt qui summam Authoritatem eorum judiâ—io habere existimantur quorum ad Arbitrium judiciumque summa omnium rerum conciliorumque redeat Caesar tells us That not only in every City and every Territory for so I interpret Pagus but also almost in every Family there were Factions and they are the Princes of the Factions who in their Judgment are esteemed to have chief Authority to whose Arbitriment and Judgment the Supremacy of all Matters and Councils are remitted This he saith was invented that the common People might not want some to defend them for every one would hinder his own People from being oppressed or circumvented and if in that they failed them they lost their Authority over them and this Caesar saith was the manner throughout all Gallia From hence x concludes the Government was a Timocratia or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Aristotle (n) De moribus vet Gall. p. 116. which he and Plato so commend and which was used in Greece and Italy while free where there was a mixture of Kingly Government in Annual Magistrates or of longer Duration and of Aristocracy in the Senate and Democracy in the Authority of the People in chusing or abdicating their Authority all which he concludes from the last Clause That if the Princes of the Factions did not protect those under them they lost their Authority I rather judge these Princes of Factions The Princes Heads of Clans or of the Pagi to be the Heads of such as we call Clans in the Highlands and Ireland for I see no shadow of that Polity Ramus speaks of in this Description and I believe the Government both of Gaul Germany and Britain was rather in several Circles and Destricts than that any one Monarch was over all only in time of War one or more were chosen by common consent to be their Captain General or where the Romans could prevail they established a Commonwealth Government As to the first and second we have the Authority of (k) In pace nullus communis Magistratus sed Principes Regionum atque Pagorum inter suos Jus dicunt controversiasque minuunt Caesar speaking of the Germans with whom the Gauls are all along compared by Ramus hâ— saith In time of Peace the Princes of the Country and of the Pagi give Law among their own People and take order to end their Controversies and then there is no common Magistrate but when there is a War either made by or upon the City Magistrates are chosen who have the command of the War and have Power of Life and Death Such a like choice we find by a Common Council of several Kings and Princes in (l) Comment lib. 5. Britain was made of Cassivillan to manage the War against Julius Caesar That the Gauls by a Common Council at Bibracte chose
conquered Ramus complains That the Roman Conquest made the Gauls lose their own Native Language while not only the Roman Laws but their Legions setling there compelled the Gauls to speak their Language besides he saith There were public Stipends allowed by the Roman Emperors to have the Language taught Therefore we in Britain may well presume the same befel us But the banishing and utter exterminating the Druids is to me a strong Argument that the British Laws were also expunged which I shall now give a short Account of (h) Idem p. 95 96 97. Why the Druids were abolished with their wicked Rites Diodorus tells us of the Druids sacrificing Captives to the Gods and Caesar tells us They used Human Sacrifices without which they thought the immortal Gods could not be appeased Diodorus saith The Saronidae when they consulted about great matters they killed a Man with the Sword and from the manner of his falling the flowing of his Blood and other things they prognosticated future Events and (i) Lib. 5. Comment Caesar tells us That he who comes last to the Council armed in the view of the Multitude was put to death by Torments Strabo saith That in their Temples they sometimes shot a Man to death with Arrows as he hung upon a Cross and out of Artemidorus That in Britain Sacrifices were made to Ceres and Proserpina after the manner of the Samothracians Caesar and Strabo both speak of their making great Figures or Colossuses of Twigs and Wands or Wood covered over with Hay which they filled with living Men and Beasts of several sorts and so burnt them together Although Ramus in extenuation of these brings some parallel Sacrifices done by the Romans and ascribes them rather to the influence the Gentile Devils had over People in making those atrocia horrenda Sacrificia than that it was peculiar to the Druids yet I think there is no Apology to be made for them That of Lucan being true of them Et vos Barbaricos ritus moremque sinistrum Sacrorum Druidae positis repetistis ab armis Solis nosse Deos Coeli numina vobis Aut solis nescire datum (k) Tiberii Caesaris Principatus sustulit Druidas Gallorum Hist Nat. l. 30. c. 1. Pliny tells us That in the Princedom of Tiberius the Druids of Gaul were taken away which Lipsius well notes That it referred only to Rome in such sence as Suetonius speaks of forbidding it in the Cities But in Claudins's time the Religion of the Druids was wholly abolished among the Gauls by reason of its cursed cruelty which in Augustus's time was only forbid to be practised in Cities Druidarum (l) Sueton. Claud. c. 25. Religionem apud Gallos dirae immanitatis tantum Civibus sub Augusto interdictam penitus abolevit It may well be imagined that the taking of it away in Gaul extended also to Britain as far as the Romans were Masters of it which was both the Mother and Nursery of it This exterminating the Religion made (m) Non jam illustres istas Druidum scholas sed clandestinas in specu abditis saltibus efficit Mela who lived under Claudius say That it made the Schools of the Druids not to be public but secretly kept in Caves and obscure Groves it being now spoiled of its Honour and as Lucan agrees with Pomponius Nemora alta remotis Incolitis Lucos No doubt this prohibiting of these Holy Rites of the Druids made the Nations governed by them in point of Law as the Gauls and Britans were not so respectful of them as before they were and so they became more prone to receive the Laws of Rome which had prohibited the Reverence before given to them and having conquered them would enjoyn them the observance of their Laws That the Romans imposed their Laws in such parts of Britain as they had conquered is manifest by sundry good Inferences from antient and approved Authors The Romans imposed their Laws where they conquered which (n) De magnitudine Romana lib. 1. c. 6. p. 28. Vid. A. Gellium lib. 16. c. 13. Lipsius hath gathered who positively affirm That whereever the Romans conquered were it Town or Nation they used to carry some part of the People to Rome and leave other parts behind but so as they mixed the Romans with them to have the Custody and Government of them and those so sent they called Coloni and the places (o) Hic denique populus Colonias in omnes Provincias misit ubicunque vicit Romanus habitat Seneca ad Albinum c. 7. Colonies The Triumviri divided to them their shares of Land and ordered the Laws and Government of the Town which was head of the Colony and the Jurisdiction of it so (p) Sic tamen ut omnia Romam urbem matrem referrent Id. Lipsius that all might resemble the Mother City Rome even in Market places and all places of public Congress Capitol Temples Courts c. the Duumviri being in most places instead of Consuls and the Aediles and Decurions for the Senate (q) Colonia Camalodunum ducitur valida veteranorum manu in agros Captivos ut esset subsidium versus Rebelles imbuendis sociis ad officia Legum Lib. 12. Annal. Dio Hist lib. 60. Tacitus tells us That at Camalodunum now Maldon in Essex there was a Colony sent to be a Defence against Rebels and to cultivate the conquered admitted now into Confederacy with Rome in the Offices of the Laws So that here we find the Socii to be instructed in the Roman Laws which evidently demonstrates That the British Laws were not allowed to be used That Courts of Judicature were also here Tacitus confirms when he tells us that under (r) 14. Annal. Externos fremitus in Curia eorum auditos Suetonius Paulinus strange noises were heard in the Courts of Judicature there Gruteri Inser Lips ad lib. 12. Tacit. num 75. So we read of a Temple built to Claudius which was Art or as Lipsius Arra aeternae dominationis an Altar or Earnest eternal Command The Officers sent abroad by the Remans into the Provinces and Colonies so an old Inscription remembers one Aurelius Bassus Censitor civium Romanorum Coloniae Victricensis quae est in Britannia Camalodunum This Censitor or Censor for they are promiscuously used by Vlpian was one who did not only tax all to the public Contributions but was a Judge in the Courts corrected all misdemeanors of manners had Power over Senators and in many other things acted Juridically We find two alterations made in the Officers sent abroad into the Provinces and Colonies of the Romans the one in Augustus his time and the other by Constantine the Great Before Augustus his Reign the greater Provinces were ruled by Proconsuls the lesser by Praetors and Questors the Provincial Praetors were Judges gave Sentence according to Law and we may be sure that was the Roman Law In Augustus time those
Malton in Yorkshire had no Summons that are yet found from 26 E. 1. to 12 E. 4. Now whether this were by the King 's special Directions the Desire of the Places as not being willing to be at the Charge of paying their Burgesses Wages which were in that Age exacted or the Carelesness of the Sheriffs is a Question not easily to be determined though it is certain it might be by any of these Causes That Poverty was a principal Cause appears in the numerous Returns of the Sheriffs of Lancashire (y) Id. p. 236. when Lancaster and Preston before 33 E. 3. used to return Burgesses but from thence till after the Reign of King Edward the Fourth we find the Return to be Non est aliqua Civitas neque Burgus in Balliva mea And the Reason is given in the Return 38 E. 3. Propter eorum debilitatem seu paupertatem inopiam paupertatem or paupertatem debilitatem throughout the whole For it was anciently really reputed a great Burthen for poor and small Burroughs to send Burgesses to Parliament they being bound to defray their Charges (z) Pat. 42 E. 3. par 1. m. 8. So the Bailiffs and Commonalty of Toriton did repute it and petitioned the King in Parliament to free them from this Burthen as likewise did the Abbat of Leicester Anno 14 E. 3. the Prior of St. James without Northampton Anno 12 E. 2. by reason (a) Selden's Titles of Honour p. 730. ad 734. Coke 4. Instit p. 44 45. of their Poverty and extraordinary Expences in repairing to Parliaments to be exempted from all future Parliaments they not holding by Barony and obtained their Request So the Abbat of St. Augustine in Bristol Pat. 15 E. 3. p. 1. m. 13. Mr. Prynne (b) Brev. Parl. rediviva p. 240. owns That the King by his Letters Patents may exempt a Burrough unduely charged by the Practice of Sheriffs or others to send Men to Parliament against Right and common Usage but not (c) 15 E. 3. Stat. 2. c. 6. such as by Duty and Custom ought to send and find Burgesses Under this Head we may consider the Temporary (d) 5 R. 2. c. 4.23 H. 6. c. 15. See more at large for this Prynne's Animadversions on Sir E. Coke's Instit p. 32. Exemption of R. 2. 6 Regni to the Burgesses of Colchester for five years in consideration of the new building and fortifying their Walls yet this did not exempt them for it was against the Statute made 5 Ric. 2. (e) 5 R. 2. Parl. 2. c. 5. wherein it is expresly provided That all Persons and Commonalties which shall from henceforth have Summons to the Parliament shall come in the manner as they be bound to do and have been accustomed within this Realm of England of old time And the Sheriffs are punishable who leave out of the said Returns any Cities or Burroughs which be bound Sheriffs punishable that omâ—t summoning and of old times were wont to come to the Parliament And in (f) C. 15. 23 H. 6. it is said That divers Sheriffs of the Counties have sometimes returned none of the Knights Citizens and Burgesses lawfully chosen but such which were never duly chosen and other Citizens and Burgesses than those which by the Mayors and Bayliffs were to the said Sheriffs returned and moreover made no Precepts to the Mayors or Bayliffs for the Electing of Citizens and Burgesses to come to Parliament Which makes Mr. Prynne (g) Brev. Parl. rediv. p. 241. Sheriffs formerly took liberty what Places to send Writs to infallibly resolve that Sheriffs did before these Acts arbitrarily issue out their Precepts to what Cities and Burroughs they pleased which they might the more freely do because the Precept to them was indefinite de qualibet Civitate quolibet Burgo used in all Writs since the 23 (h) Membr 4. dorso E. 1. without designing the particular Cities or Burroughs by name By which means Sheriffs might use a kind of Arbitrary Power according as their Judgment directed them or their affections of favour partiality malice or the solicitations of any private Burrough to them or of Competitors for Citizens or Burgesses places within their County swayed them which opinion of Mr. Prynn's as also that no new Burroughs by the Kings mere Grant or the House of Commons Order can be legally created or old long discontinued Burroughs be enabled by Vote of the House of Commons to chuse and return Burgesses to our English Parliaments I shall leave to the discussionof those it may concern There was one Custom anciently used which was taken away by the Statute of the 36 H. 6. Knights Citizens and Burgesses elected at the County-Court the same day that in many Counties the Knights Citizens and Burgesses were elected on the same day in their County Courts by the Suitors or others resorting to it or by four or five Citizens and Burgesses only whereof the Mayor Bayliffs or chief Officer was usually one sent from every City and Burrough to the County Court there to elect their Citizens and Burgesses so soon as the Knights were chosen returning them often in one (i) Brev. Parl. rediv. p. 176. Indenture or the Knights alone and the Citizens and Burgesses in another under the Seals of the Citizens and Burgesses electing them as appears by the Indenture for Cumberland 2 H 5. and that of Kent 12 H. 4. of Wilts 1 H. 5. and Bedford 2 H. 5. Before I dismiss this head I shall note out of the great (k) Ibid. p. 223. Collections of Mr. Prynne How many Cities and Burroughs anciently that the total number of the Cities Burroughs and Ports either summoned by the Sheriffs Precepts or Writs to Elect and Return or actually electing and returning Citizens Burgesses or Barons of the Cinque Ports from King Edward the First 's Reign to the end of Edward the Fourth were but a Hundred and Seventy and no more whereof Seven never sent after E. 1st's time and Twenty of them but once during these Kings Reigns and Thirteen of our Abbats and Twenty Seven of our Priors were summoned to our Parliaments but once and several Burroughs but twice thrice four or five or six times all the whole time else being omitted and as some were thus neglected New Burroughs erected in several Kings Reigns so new ones supplied the number In Edward the Second's time Nineteen new Burroughs being added and as many in Edward the Third's time During the Reignâ— of Richard the Second Henry the Fourth and Fifth no new Burroughs created at all and during the Forty Nine Years Reign of Henry the Sixth but Five new Burroughs and in Edward the Fourth's time but one He saith that Fourteen new Burroughs have been made in Cornwal since K. Ed. 4. (l) Idem 230. By which is discovered the Error of the Compiler of the absurd gross late Imposture Intituled Modus tenendi Parliamentum so magnified
de Sabaudia J. Filius Galfridi Jacobus de Audel Petrus de Monteforti vice totius Communitatis praesentibus Literis sigilla nostra apposuimus in Testimonium praedictorum So that it is plain it was not Peter de Montefort that signed vice Communitatis but they all did it and he was a great Baron himself the Head of whose Barony was Beldesent Castle in Warwickshire I think it not amiss here to offer my Opinion concerning this Question and the great Controversie betwixt Dr. Concerning the Commons first summoning to Parliament Brady and Mr. Petyt and those that are so earnest to find the Commons summoned to Parliament before the 49 H. 3. before King John granted his Charter wherein he grants that he will cause to be summoned the Archbishops Bishops Abbats Earls and greater Barons of his Kingdom singly by his Letters and besides (i) Et Praeterea faciemus submoneri in generali per Viâ—ecomites Ballivos nostros omnes alios qui in Capite tenent de nobis Matt. Paris fol. 216. Edit ult num 20. will cause to be summoned in general by his Sheriffs The Tenents in Capite in stead of the Representative Commons as now and Bayliffs all others which hold of him in Capite at a certain day there is no doubt but the Tenents in Capite such of them at least as were eminent for Parts or as the King pleased were summoned to the great Councils and it being in that Charter said that the cause of the Meeting should be expressed in the Summons and that Forty days warning should be given and in the same Charter that the City of London should have all its ancient Liberties and free Customs and that all other Cities Burghs and Villa's which was of the same import as a Free Burrough as we find in Pontefract which is always stiled Villa Some summoned from Cities and Burroughs before King John's time but not as our Citizens and Burgesses now by Representation and the Inhabitants Burgenses who held a certain Land called Burgage Land and the Barons of the Cinque Ports and all the Ports should have all their Liberties and their Free Customs ad habendum commune concilium Regni de Auxiliis c. that is as I suppose to have some of their Members at the great Councils where Aids were to be granted to the King other ways than in three cases before excepted that is to redeem the Kings body to make his Eldest Son a Knight and to marry once his Eldest Daughter excepting which three Particulars reserved before in his Charter he had granted that no Scutage nor Aid should be laid on his Kingdom unless by the Common Council of his Kingdom From whence I think may be inferred that such Cities Burroughs and Villa's which held in Capite or the Lord that was principal owner of them by his Praepositus Ballivus or some that held immediately under him and so some for the Dominicae Civitates Burgi Regis might be summoned with the lesser Barons or the other Tenents inc Capite But this doth not prove them to come by way of Representatives nor that they had any more Power than the Knights Citizens and Burgesses had in after-times which as I have made it apparent by the several expressions in the Summons was only to hear and assent to what the King and Magnates ordained Since there are now extant no Summons in King John's time or before the 49 H. 3. except some few that are about the Tenents in Capite aiding the King in his Wars the subsequent Practices are the best Expounders of ancient Usages Upon the whole I do judge that before King John's Charter there were many of the Tenents in Capite summoned to the great Councils but so as the King had his liberty to summon whom he pleased and that some from Cities Burghs Villa's and other Ports did come to the great Council but still at the Kings pleasure and that in King John's time the body of the Kingdom siding with the Lords that so often rebelled against him the Lords thinking to make their Party stronger got the Clause for other Tenents in Capite to be summoned by general Summons After King John's Charter the Tenents in Capite so numerous as might be reputed an House of Commons Now whatever number were convened before King John's Charter this general Summons must greatly encrease the House of Commons as I may call it and there needs no such strife about the want of Freemen in these Councils for after this Charter all who were properly Freemen were capable the other were generally Tenents to them and Homagers which was a Tenure that though it might free their Persons yet their Lands were obnoxious to forfeiture upon every breach of Homage and their Lords had the power of taxing them so that in some sense they were their Tenents Representatives and as long as they were Freeholders themselves and were a more numerous body if they all appeared as for any thing I see they might do if not hindred by Impotence Nonage or the Kings service they far exceeded the number of Representatives in the Reigns of King H. 3. E. 1. and E. 2. So that it amounts to the same thing as to the general Freedom of the Nation when all these were Members of the Great Councils Who properly Freeholders in Kâ— John's time whether the common Freeholder were represented or not as now which Dr. Brady hath so nervously confuted every where in his Introduction that they were not that I think the Freedom Mr. Petyt Mr. Pen and others make so great a coyl about no ways impaired by Dr. Brady who like a judicious Person would have us use propriety of Speech and rather be thankful for the Freedom we now enjoy and our Ancestors have from time to time obtained by the grant of Kings than to make such Claims to native Freedoms and Liberties as Mr. Pen would have it that our Ancestors contended for as if their Ancestors had enjoyed them before we had any Kings and stipulated with their Kings for them before they admitted them to Soveraignty which no considering person that will impartially read ancient History either of our Country or others can find any certain footsteps of To return now to the business which the foregoing observation gives some light to I conceive as the Thegns the Kings Prepositi and Reeves As the Thegns in the saxon-Saxon-times so the Praepositi Reeves c. of Burroughs after by reason of their Imployments about the Kings Demesn Lands governing of Burroughs Stewards of Hundreds Wapentakes and men employed in other civil Affairs of the Kingdom did meet in the Saxon Councils so from Cities and Burroughs where great Lords had Fees as most if not all of them may be easily proved to have been held immediately of the King or of some of the very great Barons there might come before King John's time some Members to the great
Second as they found it in the Latin (o) Cl. 1. R. 2. m. 44. Records therefore before I apply those it is needful to note the Latin which as we find it 1 R. 2. was this Capto per Archiepiscopum Cantuar. Sacramento Dom. Regis Corporali de concedendo servando cum sucra confirmatione Leges consuetudines ab antiquis justis Deo devotis Regibus Angliae Progenitoribus Plebi Regni Angliae concessas praesortim leges consuetudines libertates a gloriosissimo sanctissimo Rege Edwardo Clero Populoque Regni praedicti concessas servando Deo Ecclesiae Sanctae Domini Cleroque Populo pacem concordiam integre in Deo juxta vires suas de faciendo fieri in omnibus judiciis suis aequam rectam Justitiam discretionem in misericordia veritate otiam de tenendo custodiendo justas Leges Consuetudines Ecclesiae de faciendo per ipsum Dom. Regem eas esse protegendas ad honorem Dei corroborandas quas vulgus juste rationabiliter elegerit juxta vires ejusdem Dom. Regis This is an additional Clause This is verbatim the Latin for the preceding French except in the additional Clause and the Conclusion which makes the just Laws and Customs both to relate to those of the Church and those that the Vulgar shall have justly and reasonably chosen The like we find (q) Rot. Parl. 1 H. 4. num 16 17. 1 H. 4. and in the Pontificale of the Archbishops and Bishops and it is added after the King hath King Henry the Fourth's Oath as before expressed answered to the Proposals Pronunciatis omnibus confirmat Rex se omnia servaturum Sacramento super Attari praestito coram cunctis i. e. that the King by his Oath taken upon the Altar before all present to observe these confirms them The Solemnities and Ceremonies used at the Coronation of King Richard the Second may be perused at large in Tho. (r) Hist Aug. fol. 194 195. Juravit coraem Archiepiscopo Proceribus qui ibi aderant quoniam ipsi solum ejus Juramentum audire potuerunt Walsingham and he saith he swore before the Bishops and Nobles there present for they only could hear his Oath that he would permit the Church to enjoy its Liberties and would honour it and its Ministers that he would hold right Faith and would forbid Rapines and all Iniquities in all their Degrees 2ly That he would make to be kept every where the good Laws of the Land and especially the Laws of St. Edward King and Confessor who was buried in that Church and would make all evil Laws to be abrogated 3ly That he would not be an accepter of Persons but would make right Judgment betwixt man and man that especially he (s) Praecipue misericordiam observaret sicut sibi suam indulgeat misericordiam clemens misericors Deus would observe Mercy as the Clement and Merciful God might grant Mercy to him Having thus given an account of these Coronation Oaths I come to the Objections First They (t) Prynne's Treachery and Disloyalty Answer to the Objections about the Words Quas vulgus elegerit say that the word Vulgus doth signifie the two Houses and the word elegerit is to be taken in the Future Tense so that the King is obliged to consent to such Laws as the two Houses especially the Commons do chuse It is a wonder to me how men that pretended to any reading or learning in Antiquities or in the Constitution of the Government could defend their Cause with such pitiful Reasonings especially against King Charles the First who neither had taken such an Oath nor many of his Predecessors before him The Latin Translation of two French words gave all the occasion of dispute for that which is called Communate is rendered Plebs and Vulgus and aura eslu is translated elegerit whereas were it to have been understood in the Future Tense it should have been eslira and agreeable to that in all the Authentick Records of the Exchequer the word elegerit is Englished in the Preterperfect Tense Thus much may suffice as to the word elegerit Dr. Brady's Glossary will satisfie the Curious about the import of the word it self Concerning the word Vulgus one solid (u) Freeholders Grand Inquest b. 46. What meant by Vulgus according to the Opinion of some Author saith That we may be confident that neither the Bishops Privy Council Parliament or any other whosoever they were that framed or penned this Oath ever intended in this word the Commons in Parliament much less the Lords they would never so much disparage the Members of Parliament as to disgrace them with a Title both base and false It had been enough if not too much to have called them Populus the People but Vulgus the Vulgar the rude multitude which hath the Epithete of ignobile vulgus is a word as dishonourable to the Composers of the Oath to give or for the King to use as for the Members of the Parliament to receive therefore he judgeth that by Vulgus must be meant the Common People not the Lords and Commons But then saith the same Author the doubt will be what the Common People or Vulgus out of Parliament have to do to chuse Laws In answer to which the preceding word is to be considered Consuetudines quas Vulgus elegerit the Customs which the Common People have chosen If we observe the nature of Custom Customs chosen by the Vulgar or Common People it is the Vulgus or Common People only who chuse Customs Common usage time out of mind creates a Custom and the commoner the usage is the stronger and the better is the Custom No where can so common an usage be found as among the Vulgar who are still the far greatest part of every multitude If a Custom be common through the whole Kingdom with us it is all one with the Common Law of England which is often called Common Custom so that to protect the Customs which the Vulgar chuse is to swear to protect the Common Laws of England Agreeable to this is what the learned Dr. Brady (w) Glossary p. 36. notes That upon the whole it signifies no more than that the Community had chosen that is owned submitted to and desired still to use their Old Customs which by use time out of mind they had enjoyed for the better management of Affairs and Conveniency betwixt Man and Man all the Nation over or in any particular County Hundred Town City or Burrough such long practices being the foundation of all Customs but these are to be just which intrench not upon the Government or Laws and by permission and sufferance only become Laws But the same (x) Id. p. 35. Author judiciously affirms That the Community here intended was the Community of the Bishops What meant by the Community Abbats Priors
the Nation but are drawn to promote private Animosities under (h) King's Speech 6 March 1678. pretence of the Publick and are so far from proceeding calmly and peaceably to curb the motions of unruly Spirits that endeavour to disturb them that they expose the King to the Calumny and danger of those worst of men who endeavour to render him and his Government odious to the People I shall now touch upon some of the Artifices used to bring in such Members in the Parliament of 1678. and some succeeding ones whereby their Conventions were rendred useless for the King and People and inglorious to themselves though they pretended to as much Loyalty and Publick good as those in 1641. did at their first sitting The King having dissolved the long Parliament and summoned this to sit the 6th of March 1678. The Artifices used by designing People to get such as they desired to be elect ed. the industry of the Dissenters Male-contents and we may suppose Common-wealths men was extraordinary great as now hoping they should be able to chuse such Members as would be more favourable to them They had been long instilling into the Peoples Heads The Characters they gave Men of the Court-party that in the former House there had been a Court and Country Party the former were for Arbitrary Government fleecing the People Persecution and such as gave no great credit to the Tragical representation of the Popish Plot The latter were moderate men and not so much for Ceremonies as the purity of Religion would stand for the Peoples Liberties and Properties by riding night and day about the Villages and trudging about Corporations and the weekly Conventicles they spread this Character abroad and with all the Arts imaginable endeavoured to proselyte (i) Address part 2. p. 2 3. all that were not sharp-sighted enough to pierce into their designs If any seemed not to believe those Characters or declared himself for the Government Civil or Ecclesiastical established by Law and neither for Popery or Arbitrary Government nor yet for a Commonwealth or Dissenters they run them down with noise traduced them behind their backs as Papists in Masquerade and men of Arbitrary Principles Papists in Masquerade And if any were so bold as to scruple the coherence of the Narratives of the Popish Plot he was vilified as a Defamer of the Kings Evidence as stifler of the Plot and from hence they concluded to insinuate into the Populace that those Loyal Gentlemen who had been Members of the late long Parliament had joyned with the Court to hinder the Discovery of the Plot and if any gainsaid them they used such questions What Are you for Popery Will you give your Voice for a Papist Are you willing to have your Throat cut Are you for Arbitrary Government By which means they won over too many to joyn with them Excluding Loyal and Orthodox Gentlemen to exclude many Loyal and Orthodox Gentlemen from being chosen Members of Parliament Their design was advantaged because some were their friends of old others had come the half way over to gain the reputation of moderate men others had been disgusted by the Government The Conventicle Teachers rallied up their Flocks and they all joyned to slander the Clergy as if they had a kindness for Popery in their hearts though they durst not discover it for the present And generally blasted all the Loyal Gentry as Popishly affected the Court-Party Pensioners c. So that if any one bore any Publick Office Military or Civil he was eo nomine to be rejected The Persons they recommended to the People to be chosen were first all those Gentlemen who called themselves the Country (k) Idem p. 5. Party who had appeared most zealous against his present Majesty the Queen Dowager and Ministers of State To these they added as many as they could of the reliques of the old Rebellion or their Children and made up the number out of the moderate and discontented Gentlemen Burgesses and Tradesmen It was sufficient recommendation if the Government had displaced any for these were looked upon as not to be corrupted or bought off and here and there they took in an honest Gentleman in hopes to win him to their side by this kindness After the dissolution of this Parliament when his late Majesty issued out his Writs for another to convene 17 Oct. 1679. they added to their former Arts the loud clamours against French Pensioners French Pensioners Popery Arbitrariness and all those who voted against the Bill of Exclusion as Popishly affected or downright Papists traducing his Majesty the Court the Ministers of State and almost all the Loyal Gentry and Clergy for endeavouring to have those men chosen The second advantage they made was the pretended discovery of (l) Address part 3. p. 5. Sir Stephen Fox of the Pensioners of the late long Parliament which discovery being hastily made and no Record of it being entred Pensioners to the King they took the confidence to add to it whomsoever they pleased to have so thought They made the People believe they knew who would be Pensioners likewise and led the diffidence to that height as to exclude as far as they could possibly not only all the Courtiers and other Persons who had any places of profit and advantage under his Majesty but their Relations too and wanted not much that they had excluded all those who bore any Honorary Imployment So that nothing recommended a man so effectually for a Parliament man as that he had not been thought fit to be trusted in the least by his then Majesty or their Neighbour Gentry these they cried up as true Friends to the Protestant Religion and the Country and he was an hard-hearted Man in their Dialect who called the Sincerity of their Loyal Intentions in question However by their Actings many of them have been discovered to be but cold Friends to the Government But Intending to discourse more fully of the several Arts us'd by designing Men in the Chapter of Factions I shall at present quit this Subject and only desire Kings to consider that they can condescend no lower to gratifie Importunities of Parliament or People in yielding up any of their Privileges The Philosopher of old hath noted how Kingly Authority was lessened among the Grecians which was no ways profitable to them He speaking of Kings in the Heroick times (m) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Polit. l. 3. c. 14. That then they had the Government and Administration of Matters in the Cities and the adjoyning Territories within their Dominions and what extended without the Limits of the Empire viz. to preserve and protect their Subjects against their Enemies make War and Peace c. But after partly by the spontaneous Concessions of the Princes and partly by the Encroachment of the People they came to be lessened in Power and in some Cities had only the Power of Sacrificing left in others
Representatives using all their industry to make the Subjects believe they were the only Patriots and Liberators They pass Votes conformable to the Petitioners desire animate them to search for more and especially to fix them upon Persons they were mindful to remove out of places of trust Then they begun to impeach several Ministers of State and the Judges that they might weaken the King in his Councils and terrifie others into compliance always taking care to charge the misdeeds upon the Kings evil Counsellors magnifying the Kings Natural Goodness and declaring That if he would consent to redress those Grievances and to punish the Authors they would make him a richer and more glorious King than any of his Predecessors Seditious (t) Address Pamphlets daily came out and the Printing-Press laboured Night and Day to abuse the King and his Ministers and bring the Government Ecclesiastical and Civil into obloquy Their Preachers in the mean time like so many Demagogues plied their business so effectually blowing the Trumpet as they phrased it for the Lord and Gideon that by them the Houses Interest prevailed every where especially in the Populous City which was in a manner wholly at the Houses devotion Having removed the Great and Noble Earl of Strafford by great Industry and Art and the Midwifery of Tumults and got themselves by as strange an Art as oversight perpetuated they set themselves to Remonstrate in which they odiously recount all the miscarriages as they called them in the Blessed Kings Reign charging him though covertly with them and all the very Misfortunes of his Reign They revive the Bill against the Bishops sitting in the House of Lords which had been rejected and in a Parliamentary way ought not again to be set on foot that Session the better to effect which they cause the Rabble and their Confederates to menace and assault them and other Loyal Members of the House they Post up several names of Lords and Commons who opposed their proceedings and having driven the King and his whole Family away by most outragious Tumults they declare their Ordinances to be binding during their sitting and assume the Power of interpreting and declaring what was Law and by all these Arts they brought the People not (u) Culpae vel gloriae socii Tacit. 3. Hist so much to joyn with as to conspire with them Then they pretend a necessity of putting the Kingdom into a posture of defence to secure it against Popery and Arbitrary Government and the Invasion of Foreigners which they pretend were to be brought in to assist these They single out the most confiding and daring in every County to be their Commissioners of the Militia so (w) Quanto quis audacia promptior tanto magis sidus rebusque motis potior babetur Idem 1. Histor much as every one was forwarder in boldness and more hardy by so much the more he was to be confided in and sitter to help forward the turbulent work they were about Having first got the Peoples affections to revere them as their Deliverers they the more easily obtained their Bodies Armour and Moneys and so prosecuted a Rebellious War openly yet with that shameful pretence that they were fighting for the King against his Evil-Counsellors and amongst hands court him with most Dethroning Propositions and success Crowning their arms they wholly destroyed that Monarchy they had all along pretended to establish upon surer foundations for the Honour of the Crown and benefit of the People than former Ages had known Instead of which they made themselves Masters of all their Fellow-Subjects seizing their Estates Imprisoning and Murthering their Persons altering the established Ecclesiastical Government and all the fundamental Laws enriching themselves and over-awing the Kingdom by a standing Army Thus I have drawn that in Miniture which was the Tragedy of many Years and the Subject of numerous Volumes and I shall tack to it something parallel in later Years to let all Posterity see what a Characteristick Mark it is of Turbulent and Factious Inclinations when Petitions against the Will of the Government are violently promoted The great mischief of tumultuous Petitions being considered by the Loyal Parliament The Act against Tumultuous Petitions upon the late Glorious King 's happy Restauration Provision was made that the number of deliverers of Petitions should not exceed ten that three of the Justices of Peace in the County or the major part of a Grand Jury at an Assize or General Sessions or in London the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Common-Council have the ordering and consent to such Petitions which shall be for alteration of things established by Law in Church or State by way of Petition Complaint Remonstrances Declaration or other Address to the King or either Houses of Parliament It cannot be forgot in the interval of a later Parliament how zealous and busy multitudes were to get Petitions with Hundreds and Thousands of Hands to the late King for the sitting of a Parliament before the King in his Wisdom thought sit This occasioned the King to issue forth a Proclamation against tumultuous Petitions and other Loyal Persons to express an abhorrence of such Petitions that would press the King to precipitate their Sitting Those that petitioned the King for convening of a Parliament could not but foresee the ungratefulness of such Petitions to the King yet the Designers gave it not over for they had other Ends. As first to engage Men by their Subscriptions to be more fast to them Secondly to try whether the People might be brought to Tumults Thirdly to incense the People more against the Government if their Petitions were denied Fourthly to shew in terroreon the number of their Adherents Fifthly That through every County the confiding and zealous might be known each to other and Lastly that whenever that Parliament should sit they might have their Thanks and by their Numbers the Parliament might be encouraged to proceed in such things as they desired knowing hereby the Strength of the Party When the House of Commons met nothing was so much clamoured against as the Proceedings upon the late Proclamation as if all the Liberties of the Subjects of England had consisted in this Therefore they vote that it ever hath been the undoubted Right of the Subjects of England See the Votes to Petition the King for the Calling and Sitting of Parliaments for redressing of Grievances and to traduce such Petitioning was a violation of Duty and to represent it to his Majesty as tumultuous and Seditious was to betray the Liberty of the Subject and contribute to the design of subverting the Legal ancient Constitution of the Kingdom and introducing Arbitrary Power and so a Committee called of Abhorrence was appointed to enquire of all such Persons as had offended against the Rights of the Subjects This was it that explained their Vote for all the Controversy was Whether a sew private Men might agree upon a Petition then send Emissaries abroad to
procure the Subscriptions and then tender them as it were by their number to affright the King to a Compliance or that the King to whom the Execution of the Laws or suspension in some measure surely appertains might not forbid such Petitions They singled out Sir Francis North then Lord Chief Justice of the Common-Pleas after Lord Keeper and Earl of Guilford Sir George Jefferies then Recorder of London now Lord Chancellor Mr. Justice Withins and others as Subjects of their displeasure for disliking and abhorring the irregular dangerous way of Petitioning But they received more Lustre and Regard in the Eyes of their Soveraign and all Loyal Subjects by their Censure than they did discredit by it It seems worth the while for Persons that have regard to the quiet and repose of the Subject to the Honour and Establishment of the Government and for the Tranquillity and Liberty of their Posterity to consider whether any mortal Man can either produce Precedent or Law to justify the Imprisonment of those Gentlemen Abhorrers of which I have spoken something before in the Chapter of Parliaments I shall now conclude with the last and formidablest sign of Sedition Of Tumults viz. Tumults which are but unarmed and Pen-feathered Rebellion They have the Mien and Standard of it only want the Artillery The fatal black Parliament disciplined them to be ready at any watch word and whatever they voted against the King or Church was ushered in by thousands of all sorts flocking out of the City and Country braving and threatning all along as they went by White-Hall and so in Sholes crowding to the Houses promising to stand by them and crying out for Justice They were so insolent and rude that they forced the Merciful King to withdraw from his Pallace to which he never returned till they brought him to his Barbarous Tryal and Murther That Blessed Kings Sence of them can be expressed by none so emphatically as by himself therefore I shall extract some of his feeling Expressions I (x) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 4. never thought any thing except our Sins more ominously presaging all those mischiefs which have followed than these Tumults And this was not a short Fitt or two of an Ague but a quotidian Feaver always encreasing to higher Inflammation impatient of any Mitigation restraint or remission Those who had most mind to bring forth Confusion and Ruin upon Church and State used the Midwifery of Tumults by which they ripped up with barbarous Cruelty and forcibly cut out abortive Votes to crowd in by force what reason would not lead Some Mens Petulancy was such as they joyed to see their Betters shamefully and outragiously abused So the Blessed King finding they invaded the Honour and Freedom of the two Houses and used such contemptuous words and Actions against him thought himself not bound by his Presence to provoke them to higher Contempt and Boldness For he saith it was an hardiness beyond Valour to set himself against the breaking in of the Sea being daily baited with Tumults he knew not whether their Fury and Discontent might not fly so high as to worry him and tear him to pieces whom as yet they played but with in their Paws Therefore thinks himself not bound to prostitute the Majesty of his Place and Person c. to those who insult most when they have Objects and opportunity most capable of their rudeness and petulancy Our late gracious Sovereign in later times when some Men were endeavouring to practise the same Methods found some offers of the like at Windsor a place of all others in which one would have thought he should have had the most Honour for the Benefits he did to that Town by his so frequent residence when first the Boys and then the Rabble were set on to shout for a Burgess of Parliament in opposition to a Loyal Person His Majesty favoured even in his own Presence The Prophetick Observation of the Martyred King is worth noting That he believes the just Avenger of all Disorders will in time make these Men and that City see their Sin in the Glass of their Punishment which needs no application but only to desire they would be so just to themselves and their Posterity as to follow no such Precedents and that none will encourage such outragious doings I shall dismiss this ingrateful Subject with the Description (y) Vâ—â—ibus truculentis strepere rursum viso Casare trepidare Murmur incertum atrox clamor repente quies diversis animorum moribus pavebaret terrebaâ—â— 1. Annal. Tacitus gives of the mutinous Tumult of Drusus's Soldiers That the Ring-Leaders when they looked to the multitude with outragious Voices made terrible noises but viewing Caesar shrunk again and of the whole multitude he saith an uncertain Murmur an horrible cry and suddenly a calm by divers emotions of Mind they feared and did affright CHAP. XLIV Prognosticks of Sedition and Faction BOdinus (a) Seditio semel accunsa quasi scantilla impetu populari repente agitatur ac totum prius inflammari solet quam extingui possit De Repub. c. 4. tells us That Sedition once kindled is suddenly fanned and blown by popular fury into a Flame which is wont to set all on Fire ere it can be extinguished The danger therefore of Faction is not to be sleighted but the Government should be watchful over the least Sparks which no Man can forbid or tell whence they may come or how far they may ravage when there is a Propensity to Faction Therefore Governours should not suffer matter of Trouble to be prepared or hatched but crush the Cockatrice in the Egg and the Monster in the Embryo especially (b) Vbi Respublica aegra quave vix cicatrices clade intestina acceptas obduxerit Clapm. de Arcanis dominationis lib. 3. c. 16. When Danger less when the Scars of late Wounds are not healed or hardned as after a Civil War when Factions are most dangerous The danger is less saith my Lord (c) Essays St. Albans when it springs only from the Discontent of the People being slow of Motion and the greater sort of small Strength without the Multitude can do little but the danger is greatest when those of higher Rank wait but for the troubling of the Waters So Jupiter by Pallas's Advice when the other Gods would have bound him sent for Briarous with his Hundred Hands an Emblem to show how safe it is for Monarchs to make sure of the Good Will of their People The motions of the greatest Persons in Government ought to be as the motion of the Planets under the Primum Mobile according to the old Opinion that every of them is carried swiftly by the highest Motion and slowly by its own Therefore when great Men in their own particular motion move violently Liberi usque ut Imperantium meminissent as Tacitus speaks It is a sign the Orbs are out of Frame Where Factions are not Combinations against the Government