Selected quad for the lemma: england_n
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A96998
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The remonstrance of the Commons of England, to the House of Commons assembled in Parliament. Preferred to them by the hands of the speaker.
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England and Wales. Parliament. House of Commons.
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1643
(1643)
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Wing W382C; Thomason E92_5; ESTC R5886
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8,040
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16
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to take away the function and very being of Church-Governours as Bishops and their Assistants the Deans Chapters so to take away the preferments of learned men and the encouragements of learning In the name of God let the abuses be taken away but not the good uses also 5. For the rectifying of matters amisse in Church Discipline and some things in Doctrine also as is pretended an Assembly of Divines is propounded to bee convocated and consulted with the matter is right but the manner is surely amisse and so wee are likely to lose the benefit of the substance for the errors in the circumstance which is That in this intended Convocation the Divines are not nominated by Divines who can best judge of their abilities which is the legall way the greatest part of those who are named are knowne or justly suspected to be persons ill disposed to the peace of the Church and addicted too much to Innovation you your selves being all Lay-men are to be the onely Judges of what shall be propounded and what determined the Divines but your assistants and the King is totally to be excluded from having any Voice or hand in it And as it is propounded this is to be a perpetuall Convocation if the Houses of Parliament so please 6. Under the colour of freedome of Preaching seditious Sermons are preached daily even in the hearing of many of your selves who traduce the Kings sacred Person slander His Government and in expresse termes encourage the maintaining and continuing of this unnaturall and unchristian civill Warre and yet none are punished for it which makes us feare that this is and long hath been made by some to be the the principal engine to kindle this fire of hell to the just scandall of all good men slander of our Religion this doctrine comming so close to that of the Jesuites 7. And divers worthy learned and painfull Preachers have been committed to prison by you for delivering their consciences freely and religiously and preaching obedience to their Soveraigne These things we observe unto you as tending mainly against the maintaining and propagation of the true Protestant Religion Touching that part which concerneth the maintaining of the Laws we shal observe also some things unto you wherein your own practice differs much from your professions a preposterous way to perswade us or any other by-standers 1. Ye assume that power to your selves that ye by a bare Vote without an Act of Parliament may expound or alter a known Law whereas the Commons house formerly assumed to themselves no such power but in order towards the making of a new Law nor did the House of Peeres chalenge any such thing But they having the power of Juarcature as Judges they proceed according to the rules of the known Lawes and upon their honours are answerable for the justnesse of their Judgements as other Courts are upon their oathes 2. You make your own orders and ordinances to be as Laws and compell them to be observed and with a stricter hand which may binde the members of your House in their priviledges but have not nor ever had the force of Laws untill by both Houses and the Kings consent they were confirmed 3. And for your own observation of the Laws of the Landye take your selves to be so far above the reach of them that by your orders and ordinances ye enjoyne the Judges and Ministers of justice to forbear contrary to their oaths to proceed in their ordinary courses where ye please 4. Ye make an Ordinance to put the Militia of the Kingdom into such hands as ye please and shall confide in and this without the King and expressely against His Command 5. Ye possesse your selves of the Navy Royall and appoint Admiralls and other Officers by Sea without the King and use those ships against the King himselfe 6 Ye take the Kings Castles Forts and Ports the places of greatest strength in the Kingdome and keepe them against the King himself as Hull and Portsmouth and Windsore Castle and these three last actions appeare to us to have beene done by Define for 7 The pretence at first was for the preservation of the kingdome against some forreigne Enemy but when none appeared in many monethes and we now beleeve none such in truth ever were a warre for the Parliament against the King himself was raised for the preservation of the King 8 And those who refuse to joyne in this warre with you or to contribute unto it with giving or lending of money horse armes c. ye proscribe as Malignants and persons ill affected to the Common-wealth although we see not how it can be lesse then Treason against the King to joyne with you therein 9 But to all those who are your Commanders or Officers of your Army ye give large and even profuse entertainments and rewards but out of our purses who give you little thankes for it Thus much may suffice to give a taste how the Laws are and are likely to be maintained in the course we are now in And for the Liberty of our persons and Propriety of our Estates we shall say a little in the next place and by a few particulars judge what we may hope for therein 1 Ye take the Kings Treasure ye intercept his revenue possesse his houses of accesse and all these for his own service if any attend him or assist him they are condemned as Malignants Popish evil Counsellors and Enemies to the State 2 Ye have by messages endeavoured to perswade our Brethren of Scotland to joyne with you in your Rebellion against your Soveraigne and this was not done by some private men alone but ordered by the Votes of your House 3 Ye condemne the Rebells in Ireland and that very justly for their horrid rebellion there and yet your selves doe greater and more horrid acts of barbarous hostility against your King even in his own person in England and when yee have beene charged with it ye would excuse it by saying that it was not your fault but the fault of the King himselfe and of the Counsellors and Cavaliers about him that he went himselfe in person into the battel which he did with that magnanimity and Kingly courage as will adde to his honour and your shame whilst the world endureth Thus your action is become odious to God and Man and your excuse for it ridiculous 4 And as if ye had shaken off all subjection and yourselves become a State independant ye have treated by your Agents with forreigne States Such an usurpation upon Soveraignty as was never yet attempted in this Kingdome 5 Ye command your owne orders ordinances and Declarations to be printed published cum privilegio But if any thing come from the King which may truely informe and disabuse the people ye forbid those to be published and commit them to prison who do it 6. That monies advanced by gift or adventure or act of Parliament and souldiers prepared for Ireland to
THE REMONSTRANCE OF THE COMMONS OF ENGLAND To the House of COMMONS Assembled in PARLIAMENT Preferred to them by the hands of the SPEAKER Printed Anno Dom. 1643. THE REMONSTRANCE Of the Commons of England to the House of Commons assembled in Parliament preferred to them by the hands of their SPEAKER Master Speaker PRejudge us not we pray you because the title of this paper is a Remonstrance not a Petition the cause is for that Petitions have had ill successe of late yet the matter will be the same though the forme differ We send this whatsoever ye will call it to the Honourable House of Commons who are the representative Body of the whole Commons of England and we desire to present it by you who are the Speaker of that House The end of our desire is Peace and we hope we shall not erre in the way when we intreat you to be our Mediatour Master Speaker all that we desire of you is to deliver this to the House to procure it to be read and to obtain as good an answer unto us as you may And now we addresse our selves to the honourable House it selfe VVHen this Parliament was called after several unhappy breaches of some former we comforted our selves with a hope of a redresse of all our grievances and we made choice of you for our Knights Citizens Burgesses to serve for us there and we did put our confidence in you and beleeved that you according to our trust without any by respects would have studied onely the peace and good of the Kingdom and we cannot be yet out of hope but that ye will performe in the end But you must not take it amisse if as persons grieved we tell you where our griefes lie And to prepare our Cure the better we must desire you to call to your remembrances 1. That we are still the true body of the Commons of England you but the representative 2. That wee have not so delegated the power to you as to make you the governors of us and of our estates you are in truth but our Procurators to speake for us in the great Councell 3. That in right we ought to have accesse to those whom we have thus chosen and to the whole House as there shall be cause to impart our desires unto you and you ought not to refuse us 4. That by involving our votes in yours we had no purpose to make you perpetuall Dictators 5. That we never intended that you should have that latitude of power as to imbark us all in a Civil War to the destruction of us and our posterities 6. Much lesse had we a thought that by any your votes ye would or could draw us into any Acts of disloyalty or disobedience against our naturall Leige Lord to whom by the lawes of God and man we doe owe and will pay all allegiance and fidelity Wherefore we must claim this freedome which belongs unto us as free-borne Subjects and as persons interessed in the good and safety of this Kingdome as well as your selves that ye will speedily take those things into your wise and Religious Considerations which belong to our peace and which we out of the deep sence of our present miseries and of the apparent ruine of us all if not timely prevented do now offer unto you None of which shall be any new fancies or dreames of distempered braines but shall be such as have their grounds upon apparent truth and a cleere evidence For first we doe professe to all the world that wee are resolved with our lives and fortunes to maintaine the true Protestant Religion established by the Laws in this Church of England To maintain our well setled Government under a Monarchie according to the knowne Laws of this Land To maintaine the just libertie of our persons and Property of our Estates acording to the Rule of those Laws To maintaine the just priviledges of Parliament without which our Laws can hardly be continued And in the asserting of these we beleeve we have the concurrence of both the Houses of Parliament for such have been their daily Protestations from time to time And for the Kings Majesties Opinion herein he hath by many declarations solemne protestations and religious vows before God and Man declared himselfe so fully and so freely that it is his unchangeable Resolution to live and die in the maintainance of all these that we hold our selves bounden in reverence to his person and in Christianity to beleeve that he will faithfully performe his word with his people And we have this further assurance thereof in that he hath descended so low from his Throne as to acknowledge some errours which have slipt him in his by-past government and to undertake not to give way to the like hereafter We wish with all our hearts that you would with the same ingenuity acknowledge your errors also and amend them so might we soone by Gods blessing have our peace restored again and by your industries made a happy Nation Let us then cleerely and freely expresse in what things wee finde our selves grieved which have beene voted ordered and acted by you during this Parliament whereby the cure intended is become worse then the disease under which we formerly languished and we must with as much clearnesse and freedome protest against them if they be not speedily reformed and remedied The particulars are these 1. That under the colour of advancing the true Protestant Religion encouragement is given to Anabaptists Brownists and all manner of Sectaries which multiply in every Corner which must be reformed or our true Religion is lost 2. Under the pretence of hatred of Popery which we also detest as far as their superstitions idolatrous tenets are inconsistent with the true reformed Protestant Religion the book of Common-Prayer which is established by Law is cryed down by many and all decent orders in Gods outward worship and every man left to the dictate of his private spirit but let the Laws against Papists and Sectaries the two extreams be put in due execution we shall thank you for it 3 Under the colour of regulating the Ecclesiastical Courts and taking away the High Commission Court all spirituall Jurisdiction for the coërcive part thereof which is the life of the Law is taken away so that now no heinous crimes inquirable by those Courts as Adultery Incest c. can be punished No Heresie or Schisme reformed No Church can be inforced to be repaired No Church-officeâ—… as Church-Wardens c. are compellable to take upon them their offices or performe their duties no not to provide Bread and Wine for the Communion No Parsons or Vicars can be inforced to attend their Cures or to give satisfaction for the paines of them who doe No Tithes can be recovered by their Law nor other Church Duties We beseech you think what will be the end of these things at the last 4. Under the name of reforming the Church Government ye endevour