Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	act_n	king_n	queen_n	2,864	5	7.0730	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A88153	The afflicted mans out-cry, against the injustice and oppression exercised upon; or, An epistle of John Lilburn, gent. prisoner in Newgate, August 19. 1653. to Mr. Feak, minister at Christ Church in London.	Lilburne, John, 1614?-1657.	1653 (1653)	Wing L2078; Thomason E711_7*; ESTC R212915	13,792	15

up by saying to the Root We mean you good and do but lay you bare that so you may the more behold and more admire our justice in the end when all the boughs and branches shall be gone that do but hinder all your Prospect I must but touch and glance there is a Trinity which all our laws do seem to worship here on earth estate liberty and life And in pag. 175. Mr Sadler saith I need not speak how curious our Fathers were in all their process touching life the way was still as punctual as cleer and plain as was the end they loved to be just and to do justly Doth our Law condemn any man without hearing or due Summons to judgment I hope it never will A great man of a good name standeth upon Record as by Parliament condemned to death without hearing or legal Summons But there is a Bl●sh or a Vail of Oblivion drawn upon it by good Writers as a stain and a shame to the Parliament Rolls yet as a just judgment on him that had first moved that another might be so condemned and he so perished by that law which he would have made for others This seemeth also to be written in the law of Nature and doubtless the sins of Sodom were as notorious to God in Heaven as any others can be to men in Parliament and yet he would and did go down to hear and see and proceed in a judicial way nor would he condemn or execute before he had not onely cleared his justice in himself or to his Angels but also to Abraham Lot and other lookers on that he still might be justified both when he judgeth and is judged for he still did and will put his actions on mans judgment as we shall more fully cleer hereafter This Processe also towards Sodome is by many of our old Lawyers brought for the pattern of our laws in that especially that none may be condemned without a legal hearing And in this and divers other things doth Bracton and Fleva borrow much in the laws of Henry the first And be the matter of Fact never so notorious yet there may be some plea that no man can fore-see or ought to fore-judge before he heareth For all men may plead necessity or force upon themselves as well as right and law for any thing they do amisse And for this and other Reasons the law doth suppose all men to be just or excusable till they be legally heard and adjudged This difference there is between the Judges and the Law-makers for these they say do suppose all men to be evil but the Judges should suppose all men to be good till they be proved to be evil The Charge and Accusation by the law of Nature ought to be cleer distinct and particular with time and place or other circumstances else the party accused cannot discharge himself Universals do not presse or oppresse at all Generals do not presse at all or else they are apt to oppresse The Witnesse and the Evidence must also be so cleer that those must condemn rather then the Judge who si●teth as Councel for the party Accused That so he be not oppressed by or against law And besides the Judge in most Cases and in those also of life in Scotland there is Councel allowed by law which may and ought to be heard in particulars of law or what ever may be justly disputable as Treason is by Statute so that of all Crimes by expresse Acts of Parliaments it ought to have no Tryal but clear and plain according to the course and custom of the common law In such Cases therefore should the Judges both in Law and Conscience sit and be in stead of Councel to the party and this they owe to every subject though they had a special Obligation to the King Who to his own Rights and therefore to his Wrongs was ●n Infant in Law and so expresly declared in the old Mirrou● B●sid●s other Books His Politike Capacity never but his Person ever in Nonage or supposed so in law for it may be a child or a woman not able to know the lawes and therefore alwayes had by law a legal mouth assigned in Councel of law And so might any man else of old it seemes for matter of demurs before judgment or for framing of a leg●l appeal by Writ of Error or some other way from any judgment whatsoever But our last King professed himself to know the lawes so well that it seemeth the Judges and others did hold themselves to be excused from speaking for him as else they would or should or might have done In this I might speak too plainly but I may be pardoned It is also the law of this kingdome and of Nature That although there be no Councel assigned yet may any in a good manner move the Court to keep the party from injustice or the Court from errour as Stanford and the third part of Institutes Cap. 2. fol. 63. 101. and in such Cases it may be excused and not censured for rash Zeal if some do or shall appear where or when it may be thought they be not called Neither can the whole Parliament of England I suppose make any Court to condemn without lawful Accusers or lawful Witnesses which by expresse Acts of Parliament is most especially provided in Case of Treason in King Edward the sixth and Queen Maries Reign and Tryal of Treason most expresly tyed to the Course and Custome of the Common-law Nay in full Parliament of Henry the Eighth it was declared That attaint of Treason in or by Parliament was of no more force or strength then it was or ought to be by the Common-law or then as good and strong as that by Parliament Nor can the whole Parliament I think by the law of Nature and right Reason make any children Ideots or all others whatsoever to be so much as Accusers or Witnesses That I say not Indictors Tryors or Judges By expresse Acts of Parliament in Philip and Mary Edward the sixth Hen. 8. Hen. 4. Hen. 1. for to him doth the Mirrour and his lawes lead us as to a cleer Christal Fountain of our Law-process as was shewed before None shall suffer for Treason or other Crime but by lawful Accusers and lawful Witnesses before those that by law might receive Indictments Which with all Inquests are to be made by honest lawfull able men Neighbors to the Fact And in pag. 179. he saith He should mispend his time to shew it to be the great law of the Kingdom as well as of Nature that none may be Judges and Parties in their own Cause Which may ere long be found perhaps to be the reason of the th●ee Estates and very much of our Common-law which is punctual in nothing more then in providing for a cleer distinction of Accusers Witnesses Indicters Tryers and Judges especially in Cases of Treason which upon divers motions of the Commons in Parliament have been so often enacted and

the self-same moment of time and yet though about this very businesse he was as a man might easily then see sufficiently shamed and branded for a lying and false man yet after this when I was ready to leave England was he the principal man that caused to be preferred in Parliament against me about this very businesse of the Isle of Axholm a most notorious and false unjust and lying Petition as upon the utmost hazard of my life now I am come into England I do ingage to make it evidently appear And yet more then all this this very Attorney General Prideaux was one of the most violent and furious and unjust sticklers that Sr Arthur Haslerig had in the whole Parliament against Iosias Primate mentioned in the Act upon which I am indicted and was the chief Actor in misleading and misguiding the House against the light of Truth and plain Evidence to passe their Votes against Primates honest and just businesse and as by common fame but not o●herwise it is said and to passe certain Votes against me upon which the pretended Act upon which the Indictment against me is founded and yet must he now come to be a violent Judge upon my life to take it away upon an unjust Act and unjust proceedings made in a great measure by himself for which he rather deserves like Empson and Dudley to be hanged as a Traytor for subverting all the Foundations of all the fundamental laws of England and thereby cutting in pieces as much as in him lies all the bonds and ties and ligiaments of humane society in the English Nation and thereby leaving no man now in England any thing else for the security of his life liberty and property then absolute Will lust and unbounded pleasure then in the least to be justified in his so doing but yet this is not all For besides to render him uncapable to be at liberty to execute any office in the least much lesse to be my Judge or any mans else he is a legally and formally impeached Traytor in the Upper Bench upon Record before the Lord chief Justice Rolls by Thomas Elslist Esquire which said Esquire as his own mouth hath informed hath entered into great bonds before the said Lord chief Iustice Bolls to prosecute the said Charge of High Treason against the said Prideaux unto which the said Elsliot doth avow the said Prideaux dare not appear but stands in absolute contempt and defiance of the law for which the said Esquire being a legal man of England hath already as he avers to me almost brought him to an Outlary in all which considerations I appeal to your conscience and judgment and all rational and ingenuous men that shall read this Epistle whether in law equity or conscience the said Attorney General Prideaux be not altogether unfit in any kind to be my Iudge and whether all the premises seriously considered they be not cleer palpable and evident demonstrations that the Lord General whom upon very good grounds I look upon to be my grand and principal prosecutor and thirster after my innocent blood hath nothing in crime law or justice to lay unto my charge but onely endeavors to take away my life by will force power and palpable injustice for a deliverance from which I most earnestly and heartily desire your publique and private prayers to the Lord Iehovah my assured and undoubted Rock of Salvation and the utmost of all just righteous and lawful means that lies in your power for which I with my poor afflicted wife and babes with all the honest single-hearted people of England shall be much ingaged unto you so with my unfeigned love and hearty respect presented to you I rest Yours faithfully in those undesolvable bonds of Vnion and communion in the Lord Iesus Christ Iohn Lilburn From my sore bodily affliction yet soul-rejoycing captivity in Newgate this 20 of August 1653.