Selected quad for the lemma: end_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
end_n	law_n	people_n	safety_n	1,280	5	9.1725	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41185	A letter to Mr. Secretary Trenchard discovering a conspiracy against the laws and ancient constitution of England : with reflections on the present pretended plot.	Ferguson, Robert, d. 1714.	1694 (1694)	Wing F752; ESTC R32026	71,664	47

those impious and illegal Courses to uphold In order to whic● I premise three Things or rather propose them as Postulata which command an assent as soon as men●ioned The First is That whatever ●here was of an Original Contract between former K●ngs and the free People of these Kingdoms yet it is undeniable there is a very fo●mal and ex●li cite One between K. Willi●m and them And to declare ●ny Opinion freely without Reserve or Disguise I do know o● none ●efore besides that which was couched and im●lied in the Constitution And as it is impossi 〈…〉 e to produce or shew any other so the very Supposition of one is not only inconsistent with the Doct●ine both of our Churchmen and Lawyers but re●ugnant to ●he Drift and Tenure of all our Laws and directly opposite to the express Words as well as the Sense of a great many Statutes For what can be more irreconcileable than a Contract by which K●ngs are made deposible or an● way judicially censurable for Miscarriages in their Governmen● And tho●e several Acts o● Parliament that do not only declare our Pr●nces to be unaccountable to their People whether taken collectiv●ly distributively or repesen●atively but which do make it Treason To take up Arms against them on any Pretence whatsoever And to imagine it either lawful or practicable to Abdicate forfeit or Depose Kings without a Liberty allowed of taking up Arms against them is a Contradiction that none will pretend to reconcile but they who are either Lunatick or deeply Hypocondriacal And as for that Contract if it might be called one which was involved and ●●citly wrapt up in the Constitution the whole Import of it was to declare the Ends for which our Princes were to rule namely the Safety Peace and Prosperity of their People and to teach and instruct them that they were to govern us by Laws but it no ways provided that they should be accountable unto or arraignable by their Subjects if they did not leaving them for that only responsible to God and no ways punishable here saving by the Stings and Twinges of their own Consciences But the Case is much other wise between K. William and U● For as by his countenancing the Abdication and laying aside of K. James upon pretended Miscarriages in his Government he declared upon what Terms he was willing to succeed him and that he was contented to be accordingly dealt with if he should prove guilty either of those or the like so there wa● upon his Admission to the Crown bo●h an Enumeration made of Grievances by those tha● con●erred it which they demanded that he would redress and a D●linca●●on of Measures in and by wh●ch they did as it were stipulate how he should be bound to govern 'T is true that they in Scotland were more explici● and formal in what they did in this matter and k●nd than we were Yet there was enough done here to instruct him that he is no otherwise King than as he is upon his Behaviour And that he holds the Crown as the Judges do their Places Quam diu benese gesserit And he may be ●ure that they who could extort and wrest from the Constitution which gave no such Allowance and much less Authority a Power and Right to dethrone K. James and transfer their own and the Peoples Allegiance from him upon Allegations which were never examined as to their Weight and Importance nor proved as to their Reality and Truth will be ready and forward enough when the Humor and Caprice takes them to treat him in case of Miscarriages after the same Rate and will have that bo●h to warrant the doing of it and to justify it when it is done which they wanted before For besides the Precedent they have made with his Allowance and by which he has taught them that it is lawful as well as practicable 't is but for the People when ●●etted and ●nraged by disappointment of their Hopes loss of their Estates invasion upon their Liberties and Rights and their having their Lives brought into hazard wi●hout leg●l cause and provoca●ion to have ●ecour●e to ●he Contract and Stipulation between him and them and thence to furnish them●elves with Reasons upon those F●uls in the Administration which you Sir more than any other make it your Business daily to commit both for legitimating and authorising another Revolution The Second is this That through the not punishing any of the Ministers of the late Reign who were by Law the only Persons accountable for Mi●carriages in the Government you have made K W. and him alone responsible for the pol●tical Crimes of his Civil Officers The Wisdom of our Ancestors made it an Axiom of our Gove●●ment and State That the King could do no Wrong and that therefore no Accusation● of him could be justified and much less any Force against him lawful And indeed this was the Basis of our Constitution and the chief Source of Peace between the Sovereign and the Subjects That the King th●ugh cloathed with the supream Authori●y and vested with all the executive Power of the Government yet that doing all Things by his Ministers he could thereupon himself do no Inj●oy but that they whom the Law had entrusted with the Execution of Matters under him were to answer and be liable to Punishment for all that was illegal and oppressive It was upon this weighty Ground and Foundation that Sir John Markham told Edward the 4th as is reported by Judge Huss●y who was Chief-Justce under Hen. 7th That he 〈◊〉 not arrest a Man either for Treason or Felon as a Subject might because if the Party so arrested had thereby Injury done him he could have no Satisfaction against him To which I might add many other Authorities as that 16. H. 6. Tit. 1. Jurans de suite 22 H. 6. Naton when it was solemnly adjudged That the King cannot command any one to be arrested but an Action of false Imprisonment lies against him that arrests him For hence it is that the King is said to do no Wrong because he does nothing immediatly himself but does every Thing by his Officers of Justice State or War And therefore tho it never be allowed either to Officers or People to resist be the King'● Commands what they will yee they are permitted and 't is a Duty they owe both to God and to him in some Cases to refute to obey For when the thing required of Ministers is either immoral or illegal it is not only extreamly laudable in it self but the best Service they can render their Master both as to his Honour and Interest modestly to excuse themselves from executing what either through Passion Misleading Ignorance of his Duty or by mistaking wherein his own Glory and his Peoples Happiness consists he was pleased to enjoin For as a Prince's Salvation hereafter as well as Great and Honourable Fame here depend more upon his wise Administration and good Government than upon his private Morals and

because the Passions and Inclinations of K W and hi● Ministers are of a disti●ct kind from those of K. James and travel in a different Road from what his did But if the former King did in some things exceed the Bounds which the Law had chalked out as the Measures of his Government that he might thereby have brought all his People to stand upon ●he same level of Capaci●y in reference to civil and military Employs and in order to putting a Period to Persecutions for matters of meer Conscience and revealed Religion without damage to the Church by Law established either in it's Dignities Properties or Jurisdictions they were so Noble and Royal Ends as might have served to excuse if not to justify the little irregular Excesses taken and persued for compassing of them Whereas we have since the Revolution not only seen the principal Offices of Honour and Trust rightfully due only to natural Subjects conferred and bestowed chiefly upon Foreigners but have had the Misfortune to be often arbitrarily rob'd of our Liberties which is both the leaving us no legal bottom at all to stand upon and infinitely worse in it self than the having our Countreymen Fellow-Christians and Neighbours brought in the things fore-mentioned and practised under K. James's Reign to live upon the square with our selves And the Invasion upon our most essential Right as well as the first and most inseperable and valuable Property which is that of the Freedom of our Persons and Safety of our Mansion-Houses has been so daring notorious and often repeated that the Ministers of K. W. have been forced to solicit and procure divers Acts of Parliament sometimes to legitimate them beforehand to commit Rapine upon ou● Liberties as in the dispensing oftner than once with the Habeas Corpus Act and at other times to indemnify them for the Violences they had perpetrated without a previous Allowance And as we have had the same or the like Oppressions and Grievances renewed which we pretended to be under and so much complained of before so there are two very ill-favoured Aggravations attend the latter wherewith the former were no ways accompanied One is That we have increased our Disease where we expected our Remedy and that those who set up for our Physicians have enlarged our Wounds in the stead of curing them and that we have Poyson administred to us in the room of healing Medicines All Men know with what different pre-apprehensions in many of the People K. James and K. W. came to the Crown and the first as much exceeded our hopes as the last has disappointed them The other is That whereas K. James erred upon Example in most Things without seasonable and temperate Caution given him in any and upon the Authority of the Judges whose Office it was to expound the Laws to him in some The Illegallties of this Reign are in Contradiction to Promises in violation of Stipulations in defiance of Warnings without the Countenance and Concurrence of the Judges and with the Improbation of the Parliament registered in divers of their Addresses From which it is very obvious for peevish People to draw a couple of unfriendly but very natural Consequences namely that as by repeating the worst of Things chargeable upon King James's Government as well as by perpetrating those of a more mischievous nature than any it could be accused of you have ridiculed all the Motives of his Abdication and made it an Act of insolent Disloyalty and perverseness of Will and not of Zeal to preserve our Laws and vindicate our Liberties tho had that been as real is it was pretended it would not have justified the doing of it So the Ministers of K. W. by doing both the one and the other have not only given occasion for and provocation unto another Revolution but have made it vastly more needful as well as more vindicable than that which was before Now tho the Illegalities and Miscarriages whereof you are guilty in your Ministerial Administration and Conduct do ex●end to all the Parts and Branches of your Office both as you are a Privy Councellor and a Secretary of State and be of no less compass than the vast Latitude of Affairs wherein you have occasion to interpose under the one Capacity as well as t'other yet I shall not only confine my self at present to those Offences Transgressions and Crimes whereof you are accusable as Secretary of State but even narrow them to such as meerly relate to your seizing detaining treating Men while in hold and prosecuting of them upon pretended criminal Allegations of Treason or Misdemeanor against the Government And these are so variou for their Quality and many for their Number that I shall have both sufficiently represented you and done what becomes me to awaken and alarm the Kingdom before I have gone through them which I purpose to do with all the Brevity imaginable And the First of this Sort whereof I not only accuse and publish you Guilty but consign you over to the Parliament to be impeached and prosecuted for it is your hounding out the Messengers of the Government armed with Blank-Warrants by which they take upon them to apprehend and make a Prey of whom rhey will which is in effect to furnish them with a Pretence if not to cloath them with an Authority to bid every one Stand and Deliver whom they meet with And were not the Jacobites more tame as well as peaceable than you would have them be believed to be they would long e're this without becoming guilty by Law either of Man-slaughter or Murder have stab●'d or pistoled some of your Officers who have assaulted and hall'd them to Prison under the Countenance of your Hand and Seal without the least mention of Names by which they ought to have been individually pointed forth as the Perso is to be apprehended For what is this but to commissionate your Officers to go a Mucking which au●ho●zeth those that first can to knock them on the Head in order to secure the publick Peace and to prevent their going about as priviledged Assassinates of out Laws and Freedom For a Badge and Blank-Warrant do according to our Laws and those of all Nations besides no more restrain me from resisting and thereby defending and vindicating the Liberty of my Person than the Blew Cloak and Case of Pistols of a Dutch Trooper do forbid my drawing upon him when he violently assaults me in the Street or Road. Nor does the issuing out of such Warrants import any thing less than the furnishing Fellows with a License to rob Men seeing those whom they once seize must before they recover their Liberty pay down a Ransom for it Which to express it with all the Modesty I can is the transforming the Office of a Secretary of State into that of Licenser for Picking of Pockets And as it is a Rule among a certain Tribe of Men that the Holder and Receiver is to have Shares with the Diver and Taker