and You that grace which will teach and enable Us to want as well as to weare a Crowne which is not worth taking up or enjoying upon â—ordid dishonourable and irreligious tearms Keep You to true principles of piety vertue and honour You shall never want a Kingdome A principall point of Your honour will consist in Your deferring all respect love and protection to Your Mother My Wife who hath many waies deserved well of Me and chiefly in this that having been a means to blessâ— Me with so many hopefull Children all which with their Mother I recommend to Your love and care She hath been content with incomparable magnanimity and patience to suffer both for and with Me and You. My prayer to God Almighty isâ— whatever becomes of Me who am I thank God wrapt up and fortified in My own Innocency and his Grace that he would be pleased to make You an Anchor or Harbour rather to these tossed and weather-beaten Kingdomes a Repairer by Your wisdome justice piety and valour of what the folly and wickednesse of some men have so farre ruined as to leave nothing entire in Church or State to the Crown the Nobility the Clergy or the Commons either as to Lawes Liberties Estates Order Honour Conscience or lives When they have destroyed Me for I know not how farre God may permit the malice and cruelty of My Enemies to proceed and such apprehensions some mens words and actions have already given Me as I doubt not but My bloud will cry aloud for vengeance to heaven so I beseech God not to poure out his wrath upon the generality of the People who have either deserted Me or engaged against Me through the artifice and hypocrisie of their Leaders whose inward horrour will be their first Tormenter nor will they escape exemplary judgments For those that loved Me I pray God they may have no misse of Me when I am gone so much I wish and hope that all good Subjects may be satisfied with the blessings of Your presence and virtues For those that repent of any defects in their duty toward Me as I freely forgive them in the word of a Christian KING so I believe You will find them truly Zealous to repay with interest that loyalty and love to You which was due to Me. In summe what good I intended doe You performe when God shall give You power much good I have offered more I purposed to Church State if times had been capable of it The deception will soone vanish and the Vâ—zards will fall off apace This maske of Religion on the face of Rebellion for so it now plainly appears since My Restraint and cruell usage that they sought not for Me as was pretended will not long serve to hide some mens deformities Happy times I hope attend You wherein Your Subjects by their miseries will have learned That Religion to their God and Loyalty to their King cannot be parted without both their sin and their infelicity I pray God blesse You and establish Your Kingdomes in righteousnesse Your Soule in true Religion and Your honour in the love of God and Your people And if God will have disloyalty perfected by My destruction let My memory ever with My name live in you as of Your Father that loves You and once a KING of three flourishing Kingdomes whom God thought fit to honour not onely with the Scepter and Government of them but also with the suffering many indignities and an untimely death for them while I studied to preserve the rights of the Church the power of the Lawes the honour of My Crowne the priviledge of Parliaments the liberties of My People and My owne Conscience which I thank God is dearer to Me than a thousand Kingdomes I know God can I hope he yet will restore Me to My Rights I cannot despaire either of his mercy or of My Peoples love and pity At worst I trust I shall but go before You to a better Kingdome which God hath prepared for Me and Me for it through My Saviour Jesus Christ to whose mercies I commend You and all Mine Farewell till We meet if not on Earth yet in Heaven Meditations upon Death after the Votes of Non-Addresses and HIS MAJESTIES closer Imprisonment in Carisbrooke-Castle AS I have leisure enough so I have cause more than enough to meditate upon and prepare for My Death for I know there are but few steps between the Prisons and Graves of Princes It is Gods indulgence which gives Me the space but Mans cruelty that gives Me the sad occasions for these thoughts For besides the common burthen of moâ—tality which lies upon Me as a Man I now bear the heavy load of other mens ambitions fears jealousies and cruell passions whose envy or enmity against Me makes their owne lifes seem deadly to them while I enjoy any part of Mine I thank God My prosperity made Me not wholly a Stranger to the contemplations of mortality Those are never unseasonable since this is alwaies uncertaine Death being an eclipse which oft happeneth as well in clear as cloudy daies But My now long and sharp adversity hath so reconciled in Me those naturall Antipathies between Life and Death which are in all men that I thank God the common terrors of it are dispelled and the speciall horrour of it as to My particular much allayed for although My death at present may justly be represented to Me with all those terrible aggravations which the policy of cruell and implacable enemies can put upon it affaires being drawn to the very dregs of malice yet I blesse God I can look upon all those stings as unpoysonous though sharp since My Redeemer hath either pulled them out or given Me the antidote of his Death against them which as to the immaturity unjustice shame scorne and cruelty of it exceeded whatever I can feare Indeed I never did find so much the life of Religion the feast of a good Conscience and the brazen wall of a judicious integrity and constancy as since I came â—o these closer conflicts with the thoughts of Death I am not so old as to be weary of life nor I hope so bad as to be either afraid to die or ashamed to live true I am so afflicted as might make Me sometime even desire to die if I did not consider That it is the greatest glory of a Christians life to dailyâ— in conquering by a lively faith and patient hopes of a better life those partiall and quotidian deaths which kill us as it were by piece-meales and make us overlive our owne fates while We are deprived of health honour liberty power credit safety or estate and those other comforts of dearest relations which are as the life of our lives Though as a KING I think My self to live in nothing temporall so much as in the love and good-will of My People for which as I have suffered many deaths so I hope I am not in that point as yet wholly dead notwithstanding My
Enemies have used all the poyson of falsity and violence of hostility to destroy first the love and Loyalty which is in My Subjects and then all that content of life in Me which from these I chiefly enjoyed Indeed they have left Me but little of life and only the husk and shell as it were which their further malice and cruelty can take from Me having bereaved Me of all those worldly comforts for which life it self seems desirable to men But O My Soule think not that life too long or tedious wherein God gives thee any opportunities if not to doe yet to suffer with such Christian patience and magnanimity in a good Cause as are the greatest honour of our lives and the best improvement of our deaths I know that in point of true Christian valour it argues pusillanimity to desire to die out of wearinesse of life and a want of that heroick greatnesse of spirit which becomes a Christian in the patient and generous sustaining those afflictions which as shadows necessarily attend us while we are in this body and which are lessened or enlarged as the Sun of our prosperity moves higher or lower whose totall absence is best recompensed with the Dew of Heaven The assaults of affliction may be terrible like Sampson's Lyon but they yeild much sweetnesse to those that dare to encounter and overcome them who know how to overlive the witherings of their Gourds without discontent or peevishnesse while they may yet converse with God That I must die as a Man is certain that I may die a King by the hands of My own Subjects a violent sodain and barbarous death in the strength of My years in the midst of My Kingdoms My Friends and loving Subjects being helplesse Spectators My Enemies insolent Revilers and Triumphers over Me living dying and dead is so probable in humane reason that God hath taught me not to hope otherwise as to mans cruelty however I despaire not of Gods infinite mercy I know My Life is the object of the Devils wicked mens malice but yet under Gods sole custody disposall Whom I do not think to flatter for longer life by seeming prepared to die but I humbly desire to depend upon him to submit to his will both in life death in what order soever he is pleased to lay them out to Me. I confesse it is not easie for Me to contend with those many horrours of death wherewith God suffers Me to be tempted which are equally horrid either in the suddennesse of a barbarous Assasination or in those greater formalities whereby My Enemies being more solemnly cruell will it may be seeke to adde as those did who Crucified Christ the mockery of Justice to the cruelty of Malice That I may be destroyed as with greater pomp and artifice so with lesse pity it will be but a necessary policy to make My death appeare as an act of â—ustice done by Subjects upon their Soveraigne who know that no Law of God or Man invests them with any power of Judicature without Me much lesse against Me and who being sworn and bound by all that is sacred before God and man to endeavour My preservation must pretend Justice to cover their Perjury It is indeed a sad fate for any man to have his Enemies to be Accusers Parties and Judges but most desperate when this is acted by the insolence of Subjects against their Soveraigne wherein those who have had the chiefest hand and are most guilty of contriving the publique Troubles must by shedding My bloud seem to wash their own hands of that innocent bloud whereof they are now most evidently guilty before God and man and I believe in their owne consciences too while they carried on unreasonable demands first by Tumults after by Armies Nothing makes meane spirits more cowardly-cruell in managing their usurped power against their lawfull Superiours than this the Guilt of their unjust Usurpation notwithstanding those specious and popular pretensions of Justice against Delinquents applied onely to disguise at first the monstrousnesse of their designes who despaired indeed of possessing the power and profits of the Vineyard till the Heire whose right it is be cast out and slaine With them My greatest fault must be that I would not either destroy My selfe with the Church and State by My Word or not suffer them to doe it unresisted by the Sword whose covetous ambition no Concessions of Mine could ever yet either satisfie or abate Nor is it likely they will ever think that Kingdome of brambles which some men seek to erect at once weak sharp and fruitlesse either to God or man is like to thrive till watered with the Royall bloud of those whose right the Kingdome is Well Gods will be done I doubt not but My Innocency will find him both My Protectour and My Advocate who is My onely Judge whom I owne as King of Kings not onely for the eminency of his power and majesty above them but also for that singular care and protection which he hath over them who knows them to be exposed to as many dangers being the greatest Patrones of Law Justice Order and Religion on earth as there be either Men or Devils which love confusion Nor will he suffer those men long to prosper in their Babel who build it with the bones and cement it with the bloud of their Kings I am confident they will find Avengers of My death among themselves the injuries I have sustained from them shall be first punished by them who agreed in nothing so much as in opposing Me. Their impatience to beare the loud cry of My bloud shall make them think no way better to expiate it than by shedding theirs who with them most thirsted after Mine The sad confusions following My destruction are already presaged and confirmed to Me by those I have lived to see since My troubles in which God alone who onely could hath many waies pleaded My cause not suffering them to go unpunished whose confederacy in sinne was their onely security who have cause to feare that God will both further divide and by mutuall vengeance afterward destroy them My greatest conquest of Death is from the power and love of Christ who hath swallow'd up death in the victory of his Resurrection and the glory of his Ascension My next comfort is that he gives Me not onely the honour to imitate his example in suffering for righteousnesse sake though obscured by the foulest charges of Tyranny and Injustice but also that charity which is the noblest revenge upon and victory over My Destroyers By which I thank God I can both forgive them and pray for them that God would not impute My bloud to them further then to convince them what need they have of Christs bloud to wash their soules from the guilt of shedding Mine At present the will of My Enemies seems to be their onely rule their power the measure and their successe the Exactor of what they please to
the satisfaction to have destroyed my Soul with my Body of whose salvation while some of them have themselves seemed and taught others to despaire they have only discover'd this that they do not much desire it Whose uncharitable and cruell Restraints denying me even the assistance of any of my Chaplains hath rather enlarged than any way obstructed my accesse to the Throne of Heaven Where thou dwellest O King of Kings who fillest Heaven and Earth who art the fountaine of eternall life in whom is no shadow of death Thou O God art both the just Afflicter of death upon us and the mercifull Saviour of us in it and from it Yea it is better for us to be dead to our selves â—nd live in thee than by living in our selves to be deprived of thee O make the many bitter aggravations of My death as a Man and a King the opportunities and advantages of thy speciall graces and comfâ—rts in My Soule as a Christian. If thou Lord wilt be with Me I shall neither feare nor feel any evill though I walke through the valley of the shadow of death To contâ—nd with death is the worke of a weake and mortall mâ—n to overcome it is the grace of thee alone who art the Almighty and immortall God O My Saviour who knowest what it is to die with Me as a Man make Me to know what it is to passe through death to life with thee My God Though I die yet I know that thou my Redeeâ—er livest for ever though thou slayest Me yet thou hast incouraged me to trust in thee for eternall life O withdraw not thy favour from me which is â—â—tter than life O be not farre from me for I know not how neer a violent and cruell death is to me As thy Omniscience O God discovers so thy Omnipotence can defeat the designes of those who have or shall conspire my destruction O shew me the goodnesse of thy will through the wickednesse of theirs Thou givest me leave â—s a man to pray that this cup may passe from me but thou hast taught Me as a Christian by the example of Christ tâ— adde not My will but thine be done Yea Lord let our wills be one by wholly resolving mine into thine let not the desire â—f life in me be so great as that of doing or suffering thy â—ill in either life or death As I believe thou hast forgiven all the errours of my life so I hope thou wilt save me from the terrours of my death Make me content to leave the worlds nothing that I may come really tâ— enjoy all in thee whâ— hast made Christ unto me in life gaine and in death advantage Though my Destroyers forget their duty tâ— thee and me yet doe not thou O Lâ—rd forget to be mercifull to them For what profit is there in my bloud or in their gaining my Kingdomes if they lose their owne Sâ—ules Such as have not onely resisted my just Power but wholly usurped and turned it against my self though they may deserve yet let them not receive to themselves damnaâ—ion Thou madest thy Sonne a Saviour to many that Crucified Him while at once he suffered violently by them and yet willingly for them O let the voice of his bloud be heard for My Murtherers louder than the cry of mine against them Prepare them for thy mercy by due convictiâ—ns of their sinne and let them not at once deceive and damne theiâ— owne Soules by fallacious pretensions of Iustice in destroying me while the conscience of their unjust usurpation of power against me chiefly tempts them to use all extremities against me O Lord thou knowest I have found their mercies to me as very false so very cruell who pretending to preserve me have meditated nothing but my ruine O deale not with them as bloud-thirsty and deâ—eitfull men but overcome their cruelty with thy compassion and my charity And when thou makest inquisition for My bloud O sprinkle their polluted yet penitent Soules with the bloud of thy Sonne that thy destroying Angel may passe over them Though they think my Kingdomes on earth too little to entertaine at once both them and me yet let the capacious Kingdome of thy infinite mercy at last receive both me and my enemies When being reconciled to thee in the bloud of the same Redeemer we shall live farre above these ambitious desires which beget such mortall enmities When their hands shall be heaviest and cruellest upon me O let me fall into the armes of thy tender and eternall mercies That what is cut off my life in this miserable moment may be repaied in thy ever-blessed eternity Lord let thy Servant depart in peace for my eyes have seen thy salvation Vota dabunt quae bella negârunt FINIS
on our purpose to amend When thou hast vindicated thy glory by thy Iudgments and hast shewed us how unsafe it is to offend thee upon presumptions afterwards to please thee Then I trust thy mercies will restore those blessings to us which we have so much abused as to force thee to deprive us of them For want of timely repentance of our sinnes Thou givest us cause to Repent of those Remedies we too late apply Yet I doe not Repent of My calling this last Parliament because ô Lord I did it with an upright intention to Thy glory and My Peoples good The miseries which have ensued upon Me and My Kingdomes are the Iust effects of thy displeasure upon us and may be yet through thy mercy preparatives of us to future blessings and better hearts to enjoy them O Lord though thou hast deprived us of many former comforts yet grant Me and My people the benefit of our afflictions and thy chastisements that thy rod as well as thy staffe may comfort us Then shall we dare to account them the strokes not of an Enemy but a Father when thou givest us those humble affections that measure of patience in repentance which becomes thy Children I shall have no cause to repent the miseries this Parliament hath occasioned when by them thou hast brought Me and My People unfeignedly to repent of the sinnes we have committed Thy Grace is infinitely better with our sufferings then our Peace could be with Our sinnes O thou soveraigne goodnesse and wisdome who Over-rulest all our Counsels over-rule also all our hearts That the worse things we suffer by thy Iustice the better we may be by thy Mercy As our sinnes have turned our Antidotes into Poyson so let thy Grace turne our Poysons into Antidotes As the sins of our Peace disposed us to this unhappy Warre so let this Warre prepare us for thy blessed Peace That although I have but troublesome Kingdoms here yet I may attaine to that Kingdome of Peace in My Heart and in thy Heaven which Christ hath purchased and thou wilt give to thy Servant though a Sinner for my Saviours sake Amen 2. Vpon the Earle of Straffords death I Looked upon my Lord of Strafford as a Gentleman whose great abilities might make a Prince rather afraid then ashamed to employ him in the greatest affaires of State For those were prone to create in him great confidence of undertakings and this was like enough to betray him to great errours and many enemies Whereof he could not but contract good store while moving in so high a spheare and with so vigorous a lustre he must needs as the Sun raise many envious exhalations which condensed by a popular odium were capable to cast a cloud upon the brightest merit and integrity Though I cannot in My Judgment approve all he did driven it may be by the necessities of times and the Temper of that People more then led by his owne disposition to any height and rigour of actions yet I could never be convinced of any such criminousnesse in him as willingly to expose his life to the stroke of Justice and malice of his enemies I never met with a more unhappy conjuncture of affaires then in the businesse of that unfortunate Earle when between My owne unsatisfiednesse in Conscience and a necessity as some told me of satisfying the importunities of some people I was perswaded by those that I think wished me well to chuse rather what was safe then what seemed just preferring the outward peace of My Kingdoms with men before that inward exactnesse of Conscience before God And indeed I am so farre from excusing or denying that complyance on My part for plenary consent it was not to his destruction whom in My Judgment I thought not by any cleare Law guilty of death That I never bare any touch of Conscience with greater regret which as a signe of My repentance I have often with sorrow confessed both to God and men as an act of so sinfull frailty that it discovered more a feare of Man than of God whose name and place on Earth no man is worthy to beare who will avoid inconveniences of State by acts of so high injustice as no publique convenience can expiate or compensate I see it a bad exchange to wound a mans owne Conscience thereby to salve State sores to calme the stormes of popular discontents by stirring up a tempest in a mans owne bosome Nor hath Gods Justice failed in the event and sad consequences to shew the world the fallacy of that Maxime Better one man perish though unjustly then the people be displeased or destroyed For In all likelyhood I could never have suffred with My People greater calamities yet with greater comfort had I vindicated Strafford's innocency at least by denying to Signe that destructive BILL according to that Justice which My Conscience suggested to Me then I have done since I gratified some mens unthankfull importunities with so cruell a favour And I have observed that those who counselled Me to signe that Bill have been so farre from receiving the rewards of such ingratiatings with the People that no men have been harassed and crushed more than they He onely hath been least vexed by them who counselled Me not to consent against the vote of My owne Conscience I hope God hath forgiven Me and them the sinfull rashnesse of that businesse To which being in My soule so fully conscious those Judgements God hath pleased to send upon Me are so much the more welcome as a meanes I hope which his mercy hath sanctified so to Me as to make Me repent of that unjuâ—t Act for so it was to Me and for the future to teach Me That the best rule of policy is to preferre the doing of Justice before all enjoyments and the peace of My Conscience before the preservation of My Kingdomes Nor hath any thing more fortified My resolutions against all those violent importunities which since have sought to gaine alike consent from Me to Acts wherein my Conscience is unsatisfied then the sharp touches I have had for what passed Me in My Lord of Strafford's Businesse Not that I resolved to have employed him in My affaires against the advise of My Parliament but I would not have had any hand in his Death of whose Guiltlesnesse I was better assured then any man living could be Nor were the Crimes objected against him so cleare as after a long and faire hearing to give convincing satisfaction to the Major part of both Houses especially that of the Lords of whom scarce a third part were present when the Bill passed that House And for the House of Commons many Gentlemen disposed enough to diminish My Lord of Straffords greatnesse and power yet unsatisfied of his guilt in Law durst not Condemne him to die who for their Integrity in their Votes were by Posting their Names exposed to the popular calumny hatred and fury which grew then so exorbitant in their clamours
call Justice while they flatter themselves with the fancy of their owne safety by My danger and the security of their lives designes by My Death forgetting that as the greatest temptations to sinne are wrapped up in seeming prosperities so the severest vengeances of God are then most accomplished when men are suffered to compleat their wicked purposes I blesse God I pray not so much that this bitter cup of a violent death may passe from Me as that of his wrath may passe from all those whose hands by deserting Me are sprinkled or by acting and consenting to My death are embrued with My bloud The will of God hath confined and concluded Mine I shall have the pleasure of dying without any pleasure of desired vengeance This I think becomes a Christian toward his Enemies and a King toward his Subjects They cannot deprive Me of more than I am content to lose when God sees fit by their hands to take it from me whose mercy I believe will more then infinitely recompence what ever by mans injustice he is pleased to deprive me of The glory attending my death will farre surpasse all I could enjoy or conceive in life I shall not want the heavy and envied Crownes of this world when my God hath mercifully crowned and consummated his graces with glory and exchanged the shadows of my earthly Kingdomes among men for the substance of that heavenly kingdome with himself For the censures of the world I know the sharp and necessary tyranny of my Destroyers will sufficiently confute the calumnies of tyranny against me I am perswaded I am happy in the judicious love of the ablest and best of my Subjects who doe not onely pity and pray for me but would be content even to die with me or for me These know how to excuse my failings as a man and yet to retaine and pay their duty to me as their King there being no religious necessity binding any Subjects by pretending to punish infinitely to exceed the faults and errours of their Princes especially there where more then sufficient satisfaction hath been made to the publike the enjoyment of which private ambitions have hitherto frustrated Others I believe of sofâ—er tempers and lesse advantaged by my ruine doe already feel sharp convictions and some remoâ—se in their consciences where they cannot but see the proportions of their evill dealings against me in the measure of Gods retaliations upon them who cannot hope long to enjoy their owne thumbs and toes having under pretence of paring others nailes been so cruell as to cut off their chiefest strength The punishment of the more insolent and obstinate may be lâ—ke that of Korah his Complices at once mutining against both Prince Priest in such a method of divine justice as is not ordinary the earth of the lowest and meanest people opening upon them and swallowing them up in a just disdaine of their ill-gotten and worse-used Authority upon whose support and strength they chiefly depended for their building and establishing their designes against Me the Church and State My chiefest comfort in death consists in my peace which I trust is made with God before whose exact Tribunal I shall not feare to appeare as to the Cause so long disputed by the Sword between me and my causlesse Enemies where I doubt not but his righteous judgment will confute their fallacy who from worldly successe rather like Sophisters than sound Christians draw those popular conclusions for Gods approbation of their actions whose wise providence we know oft permits many events which his revealed Word the onely cleare safe and fixed rule of good actions and good consciences in no sort approves I am confident the Justice of my Cause and clearness of My Conscience before God toward my people will carry me as much above them in Gods decision as their successes have lifted them above me in the Vulgar opinion who consider not that many times those undertakings of men are lifted up to Heaven in the prosperity and applause of the world whose rise is from Hell as to the injuriousnesse and oppression of the designe The prosperous winds which oft fill the sayles of Pirats doth not justifie their piracy and rapine I look upon it with infinite more content and quiet of Soule to have been worsted in my enforced contestation for and vindication of the Laws of the Land the freedome and honour of Parliaments the rights of my Crown the just liberty of my Subjects and the true Christian Religion in its Doctrine Government and due encouragements then if I had with the greatest advantages of successe overborne them all as some men have now evidently done whatever designes they at first pretended The prayers and patience of my Friends and loving Subjects will contribute much to the sweetning of this bitter cup which I doubt not but I shall more cheerfully take and drink as from Gods hand if it must be so than they can give it to me whose hands are unjustly and barbarously lifted up agaâ—nst me And as to the last event I may seem to owe more to my Enemies than my Friends while those will put a period to the sinnes and sorrows attending this miserable life wherewith these desire I might still contend I shall be more than Conquerour through Christ enabling me for whom I have hitherto suffered as he is the Authour of Truth Order and Peace for all which I have been forced to contend against Errour Faction and confusion If I must suffer a violent death with my Saviour it is but mortality crowned with martyrdomeâ— where the debt of death which I owe for sinne to nature shall be raised as a gift of faith and patience offered to God Which I humbly beseech him mercifully to accept and although death be the wages of my owne sinne as from God and the effect of others sinnes as men both against God and me yet as I hope my own sinnes are so remitted that they shall be no ingredients to imbitter the cup of my death so I desire God to pardon their sins who are most guilty of my destruction The Trophees of my charity will be more glorious and durable over them than their ill-managed victories over me Though their sin be prosperous yet they had need to be penitent that they may be pardoned Both which I pray God they may obtain that my temporall death unjustly inflicted by them may not be revenged by Gods just inflicting eternall death upon them for I look upon the temporall destruction of the greatest King as far lesse deprecable than the eternall damnation of the meanest Subject Nor do I wish other than the safe bringing of the ship to shore when they have cast me overboard though it be very strange that Mariners can find no other means to appease the storme themselves have raised but by drowning their Pilot. I thank God my Enemies cruelty cannot prevent my preparation whose malice in this I shall defeat that they shall not have