A SECOND DEFENCE OF King Charles I. BY Way of Reply to an Infamous Libel CALLED LUDLOW'S LETTER to Dr. Hollingworth Let the lying lips be put to silence which cruelly disdainfully and despitefully speak against the righteous Psal. 31. As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness 1 Pet. 2. LONDON Printed for S. Eddowes under the Piazza's of the Royal Exchange and are to be Sold by Randal Taylor near Stationers-Hall 1692. TO THE Most Reverend and Right Reverend Fathers in GOD the Lords Archbishops and Bishops of the Provinces of Canterbury and York to the Nobility Gentry Clergy and Commons of England who have any Honour for the Pious Memory of King CHARES the First My Lords and Gentlemen c. THE Dutiful and Devoted Children of the Church of England having in the late Reign with so much Zeal and Courage as well as with such variety of Learning defended the Doctrines and Reasons of the Reformation against all the Accusations of her Romish Adversaries and some of them also exposing themselves to great Dangers rather than truckle to Will and Power against the Laws and Liberties of their Country did together with many others think when their Present Majesties came to the Throne that great Numbers of those who had sucked in Prejudices against the Church by reason of their Education would either have come into her Communion as now being convinced the Clamours against her were false or else at least would have treated her and her Members with a greater Civility and Respect then through their false Conceits of Things they did before but we quickly found ourselves mistaken and that the AEthiopian could not change his Skin nor the Leopard his Spots for presently hoping they had an opportunity to play over their Old Game again out comes two Books the one against Diocesan Episcopaty and the other against Liturgies two things they themselves knew the most moderate amongst us that are honest will not part withal these Books were carried up and down in Triumph and the poor Church of England had met with a Blow that not only stunn'd her but quite knocked her on the Head but in a convenient time they had their just Doom and were I may with great Truth say unanswerably answered the one by Dr. Comber the present Dean of Durham the other by the late Dr. Maurice Professor of the Chair at Oxford After this that the State might have a state of their Civility and Breeding as well as the Church a leud Pamphlet against King Charles the First was sent out into the World under the name of Ludlow whom an Act of Parliament calls one of the most detestable Traytors that ever was and this dedicated to Sir E. S. Kt. which Libel was spread abroad and cried up with all the Zeal imaginable and according as it was designed it had its effects and the Party who have left the Communion of our Church in all Places and Companies opened their wide Mouths against the Name and Memory of that excellent Prince upon hearing of which both in my own private and accidental Conversation and from many of my Friends whose Reports I durst credit I having by Reading the Actions and Sufferings of that King received other Impressions of him was resolved if no better Pen prevented me to vindicate that Great Man and accordingly the latter end of the last Year put out a little Book in the Defence of that Prince having nothing more in my eye then by so doing to preserve the Honour and Safety of the Present Government in Church and State which Book no sooner was spread but I was loaden with a thousand Reproaches which I thank God I was the less affected withal because of the Cause I was engaged in and withal because I had provided myself against them and within three Months after as if Hell had broke loose out comes a Letter under the same Name of the Traytor Ludlow directed to myself and as pretended occasioned by my honest Defence which Letter when I seriously read over I could not contain myself from wonder and amazements yea I found myself in various Passions to wit of Anger and Grief I of Ioy too not I assure you for the sin of the Book for that I abhor but that by the Book the Government might see the Spirit of the Party and how far to trust and when to suspect them Now My Lords and Gentlemen c. you would admire to hear how this Libel was brought up lent from one hand to another with the Character of a delicate and unanswerable Book and the well-meaning Author of King Charles's Defence was a Knave and a Fool and utterly lost as to his Credit and Interest in the New and True Friends of King William and Queen Mary and the Good Old Cause was now revived and upon its Legs again and glorious Days are coming and all by Virtue of the Influence of this Letter from Ludlow Well in a few days I set myself to a more close Consideration of the Book and presently found the Author an Imposer upon his Reader and that he had belyed King Charles in plain Matters of Fact upon which I was resolved to expose him and in a convenient time by a close application I drew up this Reply which I now present to you hoping thereby to have done something to prevent the spreading of this vile Man's Poyson And now my Lords and Gentlemen c. give me leave to be so plain as to tell you That if this Spirit be not discouraged but once again get within the Walls of St. Stephen's Chappel back'd and assisted with Power it will my Lords Spiritual Vote you presently out of the House of Peers and soon after out of your Bishopricks and afterwards will vindicate its barbarous usage of you by declaring you the Catterpillars of the Earth and the Locissts that ascend out of the bottomless Pit And for you my Lords Temporal Gentry Clergy and honest Commoners it will after it has branded you with the Names of Malignants Popish Counsellors and Adherents to the Interest of the Beast this Spirit I say when in the Chair will force you to Compositions Sequestrations Decimations Banishment Imprisonment and some of you to a Scaffold at Tower-hill or the Palace-yard and therefore I cannot but upon this Account open my whole Heart to you and tell you and I care not what Censures I undergo for it that next to the Eternal Laws of Nature and the Reasonableness and Excellency of the Christian Religion founded in and purchased by the Blood of Christ God Man I think we ought to be zealous in the Defence of this Great King upon whose Reputation or Dishonour and the Principles that maintain the one or those that propagate the other depend the Being and Well-being of our present Church and State and consequently of the Life and Preservation of our present King and Queen together with all their Successors in the English Throne and
there was for a War with so condescending and gracious a Prince and how little the Nation was beholden to those pretended Patriots who commenced a War which hath proved so destructive and fatal to the Nation the Effects of which not only we but our Posterity will feel also I fear for many Generations And now Sir I am ready to take my leave of you but before we part I must needs reckon with you upon the score of a Reflection you have made upon my self You are pleased to say You understand before I came to my Dotage I was a Presbyterian Minister in Essex which Words as often as I have read in the midst of my Sorrows for your scurrilous usage of King Charles have almost forced me to a smile and I cannot but believe that some crafty Knave finding you ready to pick up any Story whereby you might serve your Cause had a mind to put a trick upon you and to expose the Truth of the rest of your Books by this one so well known a Falshood And Sir let me tell you because since the late Persecution in Scotland by that Party of Men it is a greater Scandal to be called a Presbyterian than it was before and because I find abundance of Men have run away with such a Belief of me I will therefore give the World a true Account of myself I was betwixt four and five Years of Age when the Covenant was taken and Twenty one when the King was restored at which time I was a Student in Cambridge in 62 after I had taken time to consider the Nature and Terms of Conformity which by my former Education I was wholly a Stranger to I was Ordained by the Sacred Hands of Bishop Sanderson in the same Church in which I was baptized in 63 I was Licensed by the Bishop of London Dr. Sheldon to a Lecture in London upon the Personal Recommendation of the late Arch-bishop of York Dr. Dolben in which City I continued till 71 when I was presented by King Charles the Second to the Vicarage of Westham in Essex where how I acted like a Presbyterian let the four Tracts I writ and all in the Defence of the Church of England testifie from this place I was removed by Letters Pattents under the Broad Seal of England from King King Charles the Second to the Chaplain-ship of Aldgate which is so called in the Original Deed upon Record in the Rolls and for the Service of which the King has reserved out of the Impropriation an Annual Stipend where how I have lived and discharged my Duty in some sort I leave to the whole Parish to declare It is true Sir I have always been kind to Dissenters and have conversed with all sorts of Men with an equal Freedom and when the great Storm Eight and Nine Years ago fell upon the Dissenters in City and Country I preserved my own Parish from Charge and Trouble to the great endangering of myself which many of them have a grateful Sence of to this day tho' some others have quite forgot it but that is because they are too like your dear self for I never found Gratitude together with many other necessary Vertues amongst Men of your Kidney 't is no part of your Religion And now Sir what satisfaction will you make me for this scandalous Reflection Why truly all I expect is nothing but further Calumnies and Reproaches Backbiting and Slandering of me for that is the proper Trade and Employment of Antimonarchial Men but however Sir let me beg of you but to let the Memory of King Charles the First alone and then I will pardon as well as patiently bear all you can say against me and the more willingly because I think it an Honour to be abused by such Persons as you are Sir I am just upon concluding only spare me one word or two more Whereas you call me in your Epistle An hungry Levite I would have you know I scorn it and here tell you That the Goodness of the Cause I am engaged in carries me above the hopes of adding to what I have and above the fears of losing it all and whereas you say Mr. Love lost his Head upon Tower-hill which you are confident I will never do for any Cause Sir I tell you that by the Grace and Assistance of God had I a thousand Lives I would lose them all at Tower-hill or at another place which you have so long deserved before I would either compose or publish such an infamous Libel against the Piety the Honour and Memory of King Charles the First a Libel which I cannot think you could have writ unless you had been acted by Seven Devils worse than yourself and then I am sure they are Devils indeed And so Sir I take my leave of you praying the God of Heaven if he has not given you over for your past Sins and Provocations to a Reprobate Sence that he would open your Eyes and soften your Heart and cause you to see the evil of your ways that so you may return to him with weeping and fasting and more particularly if you live so long upon the next Thirtieth of Ianuary And hoping this Prayer will not be in vain I subscribe myself Your Soul's Well-wisher Richard Hollingworth Postscript READER WHen thou meetest with any Expressions or Reflections that look too sharp and severe in this Reply I must beg of thee to consider who it is I write against one that has behaved himself thoroughout his whole Libel rather like a Beast of Prey or an infernal Fiend than either a Man or a Christian And what Man can avoid Indignation and suitable Resentments when he accounts with a Monster who is so lost both to Truth and Good Manners as to call that Excellent and Pious Prince and Martyr a proud Nimrod an hardened Pharaoh and a merciless Tyrant READER There is an excellent Book called Vindicae Carolinae an Answer to Milton's scurrilous Book against K. Charles which came out the last Year worthy to be in every good and true English-man's hand And withal there is another Book called A Vindication of King Charles Printed in 48 by that true and steady Divine Mr. Edward Symmonds to whom the King committed the Correcting and Publishing his Incomperable Book which deserves a new Edition and which if no Man's Property for there is none mentioned in the Title-page I will take care to see it Re-printed in which Book there is an admirable Defence of the King and Queens Letters taken at Naseby from p. 174 to p. 185 which I will take care if the Executor of Mr. Royston or any other who has the Right to the King's Works will give me leave to Print some of the King's Declarations to Print with them And Reader I hope I shall have the Assistance of some better Pens than my own for this Cause must not be starved for I am sure upon it depends the Being and Well-being of King and Queen Church and State and every thing else that belongs to a true Lover of Old England indeed FINIS The Armies Petition Ibid. p. 563.
you who had overturned the Government and violated all the Laws of the Land and I wish he had seen them before that he might have escaped those Punishments which made such a noise and turned to so bad an Account in the Kingdom and therefore I shall say no more upon this matter but this That the great mistake the Nation was then in and many are to this very day is that these three Men suffered for pure Religion for being severe Christians in their Lives and Conversations and standing up for the Cause of Christ whereas it appears throughout the whole Story it was for Libelling the Government and putting Indignities and Affronts upon the then Legal Administrators such as no Government that values itsself and its Honour upon the face of the Earth would bear without just Resentments and sutable Punishments Christian Religion teaches Men to be modest and peaceable and with all patience to suffer for well doing and to acknowledge God's Justice when his Rod is laid upon their Backs for evil doing And so much by way of Answer to that part of your Book by which you have endeavoured to blacken the good King's Reign and to run down the Reputation of Bishop Laud and to express your Indignation against me for saying other ways he was a good Man which I still say and have a very good Man to back me namely Judge Whitlock a Man of a clear Credit and sound Judgment who as his Son tells us in his Mem. said of him That he had too much fire but was a just and good Man And truly Sir I think it is more like a Christian to speak well of a Christian Bishop than to call him by such spiteful and reproachful Names as you have done in your scurrilous Book I come now to make some Reflections upon your Scotch Story which you have told with so much Venome and Partiality that you have every ways acted like your malicious and ungodly self and shewn you are a Man so resolved for a Party that rather than not serve it to purpose you will call Darkness Light and Light Darkness You begin with a Relation of Bishop Laud's composing a Common-Prayer-Book for them and tell us how the Mutinies and Disturbances in Scotland sprung from thence which truly I am very sorry for for I am sure it had been better for them and the Christian Religion professed amongst them if they had submitted to the Usage of the Book and continued it ever since The Worship of God would have been performed with Order and Decency and in a way suitable to his Divine Nature and Perfections and consequently could not have been exposed to the Contempt and Scorn of Men wickedly and atheistically inclined nor yet have been nauseous to the soberly wise and seriously devout part of that Kingdom as now it is by reason of those rude and undigested Addresses those extempore and unpremeditated Expostulations with God those bold and saucy Applications that for want of a good Book or a well framed Form of Prayer of their own before-hand and committed to Memory are so commonly made use of in their Pulpits too many of the Accounts of which we have lately since the Great Turn in Scotland received from very good Hands and undeniable Testimonies I but this bold-face says This Liturgy was not only composed by Bishop Laud but sent by him to the Pope and Cardinals for their approbation and this Story I must not dare to deny But with your good leave Mr. Modesty I will venture upon the piece of Confidence as to tell you I do not believe it and that because you assert it you whom I have proved already to falsifie and misrepresent every thing that you pretend written Authority for What! Bishop Laud send to the Pope and Cardinals for their Approbation of a Liturgy almost the same with our own Sure Sir you have forgot the hatred the Popes of Rome as well as the Dissenters have to our Church Common-Prayer-Book You have forgot the Bull of the Pope in the Tenth of Queen Elizabeth which commands all his pretended Catholick Children not to attend upon the Publick Liturgical Devotions of our Church and that under the severest Censure of the Apostolical Chair and you have also forgot but you have always a bad Memory for any thing that makes either for Monarchy or Episcopacy that the Papists upon that Account and by Virtue of the Authority of that Bull have declined our Publick Service ever since And therefore 't is very likely Bishop Laud should send a Liturgy to Rome for its approbation which hath so long stood condemned by the highest Authority that presides there In short Sir I cannot but conclude from this Story that you have got a Secret or else you would have blushed to have vented such an altogether improbable and yet so designedly a malicious Tale as this is and therefore notwithstanding your Marginal Caution I will say Leave your fooling and think not to abuse the good People of England with such Insinuations as will gain a belief from none but those who are resolved to believe all you boldly assert as Oracle against the clearest and brightest Reasons to the contrary Well Sir you say it was sent into Scotland pray let me ask you one Question In whose Name and by whole Authority was it sent Was it put upon them by a Rump Parliament an usurping Protector or by their lawful and undoubted Soveraign If by their Soveraign pray then Sir why if they did not like it did they not first submissively petition their lawful King and let him know how disgustful the Liturgy was to many of his Subjects in that Kingdom What must nothing serve these pure and refined Reformers but Fire presently called from Heaven must Clubs and Staffs and Old Womens Joynt-stools decide the Controversie betwixt their Soveraign and them Must they presently assault one of the Bishops the Earl of Traquaire the Lord Provost and Council of the City and threw down the Lord Treasurer going to the Council taking from him his Hat Cloak and White Staffe by violent Hands Good God! what dutiful what harmless and peaceable Subjects are these How much do they deserve such an Advocate as our Letter-Writer And what worst of things will not a Seditious Commonwealth's-man plead for when he will vindicate such Barbarities as these are But to go further with you Sir Must these Men of their own heads without any Warrant from the Legal Authority of the Nation enter into a Covenant without the King nay against his Will and Pleasure As they could not but know and that because they had entered into one with King Iames's Consent in 1580 to defend the Purity of Religion and the King's Person and Rights against the Church of Rome What are these two Covenants of one and the same Nature entred into by one and the same Authority a Covenant entred into by King Iames's Consent under his Hand and Seal and a Covenant entred
into by a faction against the Consent of King Charles a Covenant to defend themselves and their Religion against all the Usurpations of Rome and the other solemnly nay rather tumultuously and riotously taken against compliance with the Church of England the greatest Bulwark against Rome and all its Encroachments upon the true Government of Christ the Head which I think the Zeal Learning and Divinity of the Members of the Church of England did sufficiently demonstrate the last Reign Away Sir with such stuff as this is and do not fancy the whole Race of Mankind to be so blind as to be lead into such Ditches as such blind and malicious Guides as you are endeavour to seduce them Come Sir the Story is too long for my designed brevity in this Answer and therefore I will give you in short the Sence and Judgment of Mr. Whitlock upon it an Author I suppose none of you will disallow and then leave it to the Candid Reader to think whether this Scotch Rebellion deserves to be extolled and magnified at that rate you have done it He tells you pag. 26. Memor That the King studying tho highly offended at these Asfronts how to compose the Discontents sends Marquess Hamilton his High Commissioner for setling the Peace who when he came thither and asked them what they expected in satisfaction for their Grievances they answered after pretences of Loyalty as all Rebels ever have done till they got Power in their hands that they would sooner renounce their Baptism than their Covenant An admirable sign of their knowledge of the difference of Covenants And pag. 27. he tells you in the King's Name the Marquess proposed moderate and healing things for so I must call them which he contracted into two Proposals which you may read there he afterwards upon a further Consultation with the King to whom he posted came back with a Declaration of the Kings wherein he ordered the Service-Book to be nulled together with the Book of Canons and the High Commission with a great many other things mightily gracious and condescending in particular a General Assembly to be held at Glasgow Nov. the 8th and a Parliament at Edenburgh May 5th wherein all by-gone Offences should be pardoned and a General Fast indicted Yet all this would not satisfie these new and blessed Reformers but as the King grants so they lay their Heads together and resolve to make further Demands and that they may encrease their Party Pag. 28. we find their Seditious Remonstrances Declarations and Pamphlets were dispersed and their Emissaries and Agents insinuated into the Company of all those who were any ways discontented or galled at the Proceedings of the State of England And withal he tells us particularly pag. 29. That the Gentlemen who were imprisoned for the Loan disrained for the Ship-money or otherwise disobliged had Applications made to them from the Covenanters and secretly favoured and assisted their Designs so did many others especially those inclined to the Presbyterian Government or whom the Publick Proceedings had any ways disgusted And afterwards when the King had justly raised an Army to suppress these notorious Disorders yet for all that he consents to a Treaty such was his inclinations to do good to his undeserving Subjects and Commissioners are appointed on both sides and they come to a conclusion agreeing upon Seven Articles which the Reader may find pag. 29 which were signed by the Scots Commissioners and a present performance on their part promised and expected though immediately notwithstanding the King as he tells us justly performed the Articles on his side The Scots publish a Paper very seditious and against the Treaty which as it deserved was burnt by the common Hangman and not with standing the first Article agreed upon was To Disband the Forces of Scotland within Twenty four hours after the first Agreement yet these perfidious Persons he tells us kept part of their Forces in a Body and all their Officers in Pay and kept up their Fortifications at Leith And now let the Reader judge by this how deserving these Men are such Commendations as this pestilent and bold Letter-Writer gives them And whereas this scandalizing Person has the Confidence to assert That the king when he came home burnt by the common Hangman the Pacification he had made I must tell him he talks as he hath done all along throughout his Letter falsely and against his own Reading and Knowledge And for this I appeal to Bishop Burnet in his Memoirs of the two Hamiltons where pag. 782. he acquaints us That the Scots published a false and scandalous Paper entituled Some of His Majesties Treaties with his Subjects of Scotland so untrue and seditious that it was burnt by the Hands of the common Hangman And are not you a base Person then to obtrude such a Lye upon the World as you have done but it is no wonder the Father whose Cause you have served in this rude and seditious Libel is the Father of Lies Well Sir after various Rudenesses and Assaults of the Peace and honour of His Majesties Government the Scotch Covenanters sent new Commissioners to the King who pag. 31. had great resort to them and many secret Councils held with them by the discontented English especially those who favoured Presbytery and were no Friends to Bishops I and those who inclined to a Republick had much correspondence with them and they courted all and fomented every Discontent and made large Religious Promises of future happy Days and after all these steady and zealous Enemies to Rome as you esteem them he tells you proclaimed their Discontents and implored Aid from the French King by a Letter under the Hands of many of their principal Actors which they the less doubted upon Confidence of Cardinal Richelieu Con the Pope's Nuncio which I think is much worse than sending a Civil Letter to the Pope as the King when Prince of Wales did and which considering in whose Country he was he could not safely avoid and which is more than you can charge the Memory of Bishop Laud withal but you know Some Men can better steal a Horse then others look on And it has been the Custom of your Party always to sanctifie the vilest of Actions Nay he tells you further that it was said they were encouraged to take up Arms from this Cardinal Richelieu by his Chaplain Chamberlaine whom he sent to them and by a Letter which Hepburn Page to his Eminency brought to divers both here and in Scotland And now Sir I appeal to all the ingenuous and considering to all the wise and unprejudiced part of this Age who read over this Story who were in fault the King or the Covenanters And whether His Majesty had not just reason after such Discoveries as these were to clap up some of them in Prison and whether he had been to blame if for such traiterous Correspondencies with a Popish Prince and a Popish Favourite he had chopt off some of
their Heads And this is all I think good to say by way of Answer to your Scotch Affairs and truly I think it is enough of all reason to convince the World what Defenders of the Christian Faith and the Rights and Laws of their Country these Covenanters were God bless the Kingdom of Scotland I and England to from such Reformers as these are and I hope the greatest part of the People of both Nations will say Amen to it with all readiness and cheerfulness And thus Sir without any Obligations on my side for as I Told you in my Defence I only would concern myself with the last Eight Years of King Charles I have run through and proved your Accusations spiteful and false which you have so liberally vented to defame this Great and Good Man and I hope I have given the World a just satisfaction how much you are to be credited as to all the other things you assert you I say who rather than you will not serve your Cause will offer to the World the greatest Lyes and Untruths in Nature I come now Sir to apply myself Sir to the Defence of what I have said in my Book in the behalf of King Charles from your rude Impleadings of them and Reflections upon them And here Sir I will be plain with you I am not at leisure to play the Buffoon by making a Return to your Raillery and little Witticisms wherewith you entertain your Reader in the beginning of your Libel but will follow the Advice of a wiser and honester Man than either you or any of your Party are or will be that is King Solomon namely Not to answer a fool according to his folly least I be like unto him You say That those gracious Acts which I mention were bought of him And what then What hath been more usual ever since Parliaments had a Being in England Pray look into the Statute-Book and tell me what gracious Favours can you find bestowed by the several Kings of this Realm upon their People that those People have not made their Acknowledgments for them by presenting their Soveraigns with great Sums of Money And how comes this to be a fault in King Charles more than in all his Predecessors But buy these Acts did they Pray who had the disposal of the Money How was it laid out Was it given to the King to do what he lifted withal No Sir you know the contrary and that amongst the rest of the Uses it was put to you know a great part of it was bestowed upon the Scots for the good Service they did in rebelling against their King and putting two Kingdoms into a flame and they returned home by the Favour of your Friends loaden with the Nation 's Treasure when if they had had their deserts they had gone back with Halters about their Necks as a sign of what was due to them for so traiterously invading a Kingdom they had nothing to do withal But however to shew he did nothing willingly as to these condescending Acts you tell us when he past the Poll-Bill he demurred to the passing of the Bills for taking away the Star-Chamber and the High Commission And what then May not King's take time to consider as well as other Men Must they who considering the Charge God hath entrusted them withal ought to have better Eyes in their Heads than other Men must they I say only act like Bruits and do things without previous thoughts without a Why or Wherefore Who would sit in a Throne if the Condition of it must be the divesting himself of the Reason and Consideration of a Rational Creature But Sir I will answer this Aspersion in the King 's own Words to the Two Houses and then leave the Reader to judge whether you have done fairly to lessen his Grace upon this Account his Words are these I must tell you That I cannot but be very sensible of those Reports of Discontent that I hear some have taken for not giving my Consent on Saturday Methinks it seems strange that any one should think I could pass two Bills of that importance as these were without taking some fit time to consider of them for it is no less than to alter in a great measure those Fundamental Laws Ecclesiastical and Civil which many of my Predecessors have established And truly I hope this will satisfie tho' not you and such as you are yet any good Man who is not resolved for a Party as to this paticular Reflection Another thing you reflect upon me for is saying That his signing the Bill for taking away my Lord Strafford's Life offered violence to the peace and quiet of his Mind all the Days of his Life And here Sir I cannot but take Notice how you endeavour to make sport with this good Man's Conscience but let me tell you I have always observed that those Men who make sport with other Mens Consciences have none of their own and I am sure you have shewn none throughout this scurrilous Letter unless Lying ad Slandering be the signs of Grace ad Good Conscience in a Common-wealth's-man Pray Sir why might not the King scruple this Do not you know what unusual Arts and Methods were made use of before they could agree upon a Bill to take away this Great Man's Life Do not you know how many of the House of Commons protested against it how thin the House of Lords was when it passed there how the Rabble were brought down to threaten the House and in a clamorous way which you call peaceable to cry Iustice Iustice and how they posted up the Names of the Protestors in order to expose them to the fury ad danger of the discontented and designing part of the City And do not you know after all they were so little satisfied with the Legality of their Proceedings that they in the very Bill itself inferred a Clause that this should not be made use of as a Precedent for the time to come and after all this might not a pious and compassionate King scruple the signing of such a Bill from a very good Conscience Come Sir to answer this to the full and vindicate the King's scruple I will here present to the World for their satisfaction the Sence not of a House of Peers consisting of Seventeen or Eighteen Members nor of a House of Commons consisting of not many above an Hundred but the Sence of two full Houses of Lords and Commons who took off the Attainder of that Noble Earl the Words in the Act are those WHereas Thomas late Earl of Strafford was Impeached of High-Treason upon pretence of endeavouring to subvert the Fundamental Laws and called to a Publick and Solemn Arraignment and Tryal before the Peers in Parliament where he made a paticular Defence to every Article objected against him insomuch that the Turbulent Party then seeing no hopes to effect their unjust Designs by any ordinary way and method of proceedings did at last resolve to