most of their servile works without money and paid them besides an annual Rent in corn and other houshold provisions was to quiet the ruined English and by intermarriages of them and the Normans and Forreigners and other establishments to assure what was gained to their posterities the plenty and abundance whereof continuing through the reigns of King Stephen and King Henry the Second who greatly inlarged his Dominions by the Dutchy of Aquitain Earldomes of Aniou Main Poictou Touraine and other Provinces and parts of France the Lands of Henry de Essex his Standard-bearer by inheritance forfeited for the treason of throwing it down and flying and reporting that he was slain the Earldome of Lincoln Earldomes being then and long after not without great Possessions and Revenues belonging to them the Lands of William Peverell Lord of Nottingham Conquest of Ireland and whole Counties and Provinces thereof comming to be the Kings Demeasnes and the forfeitures to Richard the First of many of his Nobility and others who had taken part with his Brother John in his usurpation of the Regall authority All which with the Escheats and Forfeitures of the Terra Normanorum in England upon the losse of Normandy by King John unto the French confiscated Lands of a great part of the English Nobility and Gentry after the misfortune of Henry the Third in the unquietness of many of his Barons and People his better fortune in the battel of Evesham and subduing them in the forty ninth year of his Reign the accession to the Crown of the Earledoms of Derby Leicester Salisbury and the County Palatine of Chester with the vast Territories and Estates which belonged unto them and many other lesser Escheats and Forfeitures the Forfeiture of Roger Bigod Earl of Norfolk and his Earldome and great Possessions with divers other Escheats and Forfeitures the Principality of Wales and the Conquest of Scotland in the Reign of King Edward the First confiscating of the lands of inheritance for from the making of the Statute de Donis or Entails in Anno 13. of Edward the first untill Anno 5 6 of Edward the sixth Lands entailed were not forfeited for Treason of Thomas Earl of Lancaster Lincoln and Derby Humphrey de Bohun Earl of Hereford and Essex of the Lords Clifford Warrein Lisle Tutchet Cheney Mowbray Teyes Aldenham Badlesmere and Gifford and many other men of great note and eminencie to King Edward the second the lands of Mortimer Earl of March Edmund Earl of Kent and the Escheat of the great Estate and Inheritance of Hastings Earl of Pembroke to King Edward the third with several other confiscations and forfeitures and his Conquest of a great part of France the forfeitures of Robert de Vere Duke of Ireland Michael dela Pooli Earl of Suffolk of the Duke of Gloucester Earles of Arundel and Warwick and divers other great Inheritances to King R. 2. the marriage of John of Grant fourth son to King Ed. 3. to Blanch the sole daughter and heir of Henry Duke of Lancaster Earl of Derby Leicester and Lincoln making that of Lancaster to be as a Principality or little Kingdome which by Henry 4 5 6 and 7th Kings of England coming afterwards to attend the Royal Dignity accompanied by the forfeitures of the Dukes of Exeter and Albemarle Mowbray Earl Marshal Earles of Kent Salisbury Huntington Northumberland Stafford March and Worcester Owen Glendour Lords Hastings Despencer Falconbridge Bardolph and many others to King H. 4. and the lands of the Earldome of Oxford long detained by him confiscation of the lands of the Prior Aliens and all France conquered and in possession and many other great Estates coming to Hen. 5. by the Attainders of Richard Earl of Cambridge Earl of Northumberland Henry Lord Scroop the lands of Widevill Earl Rivers and divers other Barons the Dukedomes of Exeter and Somerset and Earldome of Devonshire and many other Lands and Inheritances forfeited to King Edward the Fourth the Lands and Estate of Henry Duke of Buckingham Earl of Stafford and Northampton and Lord of Brecknock and Holderness Henry Earl of Richmond and Jasper Earl of Penbroke with some other to King Richard the Third accumulated by the great and Princely Inheritance of Richard Duke of York and all the partakers of him and King Edward the fourth his brother with the Lands and great Inheritance of the Countess of Warwick gained by King H. 7. his fortune at Bosworth-field and the marriage and inheritance of the Royal and principall heir of the white Rose the confiscations of the lands of John Duke of Norfolk Earls of Surrey Warwick Lincoln Lords Lovel Welles Audley and divers others like many great rivers running into the Ocean of the Crown revenues made its Lands and Estate to be as vast in Demeasnes and Service as they were Princely and honourable Which being likewise abundantly enlarged by King Hen. 8. by the unprosperous dissolution of the Abbey and religious Lands which the envy of the Laity in the reign of King H. 4. had over and above as they said what would serve for the remaning Clergy computed to be sufficient and enough to maintain fifteen Earles which after the rate of Earls in those dayes and their grand revenues could not be a little fifteen hundred Knights six thousand two hundred Gentlemen and an hundred Hospitals besides twenty thousand pounds per annum to be given to the King which was then more then one hundred thousand pounds per annum is now and were at their dissolution six hundred forty and five Abbeys Priories and Nunneries ninety Colledges one hundred and ten Hospitals and two thousand three hundred seventy and four Chanteries and free Chappels then valued at one hundred-eighty six thousand fifteen pounds eight shillings penny farthing per annum And together with the forfeited Lands and Inheritance of Empson and Dudley George Lord Rochford Edmond de la Poole Duke of Suffolk the Duke of Buckingham Earl of Surrey Lord Dacres and divers others and the confiscation of his two great Favourites Wolsey and Cromwell the former of which left him the stately Palaces of Hampton-Court and Whitehall and the recontinuing of divers liberties withheld from the Crown by the Lords Marchers of Wales made so great an accession and increase as the Court of Exchequer was not thought to be comprehensive enough for the care and governance thereof without the short-lived Courts of the Survay and Augmentation and First-fruits erected by Act of Parliament for the separate management of the Ecclesiasticall Revenues By the dissolution whereof shortly after and not trusting the Exchequer with the better care thereof the regal revenues if Mr. Christopher Vernon a late antient and expert Officer of that Court hath not been mistaken or miscast it were not so little damnified as six hundred thousand pounds sterling or if plenty had not as it most commonly useth introduced profusion and carelesness might otherwise have been saved Which with the Lands and Inheritance of the Duke of
had forfeited unto him can by an unheard and not easily to be believed ingratitude after his Act of Oblivion and Free-pardon neither deserved nor purchased and preferments bestowed upon them fall into such an oblivion as nature abhorres and humanity must needs blush at and not offer any thing in a benevolence ordered by Act of Parliament instead of a Tax or Subsidie And very many of those which did give any thing some loyal and right-hearted excepted having obtained of the King to give away the principallest Flower of his Crown by releasing of his Tenures in Capite and by Knights service and promised him Tenures in Corde in part of satisfaction would not be pleased to find the way afterwards to give him so much as the twentith part of their yearly vain and unnecessary expences towards the relieving of the publick and his private necessities For the better information therefore of all such who are unwilling to part with a Fancy that the Revenues of our Kings of England are immense or largely sufficient for their occasions and to dispose them to the duty which the Laws of God and Men have commandded and directed and evidence the reason and necessity which the King now hath to demand a supplement of his Revenue and for his good people of England not to deny it him and that the decayes and ruins thereof have not been occasioned only by an heretofore ill-management of the Finances but by time and an age of many ages multiplicity of expences indulgences to the people and necessity of affirs and government which exhausting the radicall heat and moysture have so spent the spirits of the body politick as they have brought it to that feinting languishing and weak condition it is now in It will not be inconvenient from the mountains and hills of time to look down into the valleys of the ages past and take a short view for a longer would better become the designe of a Volume then what is here briefly to be represented of the Revenues of our Kings of England before and since the Conquest CHAP. I. Revenues of the Kings of England IN the Prospect whereof it will be more then a conjecture that those of the Saxon race before the Norman Invasion had in their Heptarchy except Wales and the barren and mountainous part of our Britain to which the distressed Reliques of that Nation had for shelter and safety retired the most part of the Lands and Revenues of the British Kings that Egbert King of the West Saxons and Alured and after them Edgar sole Monarch of Albion and the Saxon Dominions and his Successors having possessed themselves of all the other Kings Estates could not probably be without very large Demeasnes and Revenues and that not only they but all the succeeding Saxon Kings have made the support of themselves Regality Government and Affaires in and by the constant and certain Revenues and profits of their Lands in Demeasne and Service which as a Sacrum Patrimonium and concomitant of the Crown may by the ancient Charters of many of our Kings before the Conquest the grant of the Manor of Malling in the County of Sussex by Egbert King of the West Saxons in An. Dom. 838. distinction of Crown Lands and Terra Regis a great part of which were no other then what was since and is now called Antient Demeasne mentioned and recorded in Doomesday book that Liber censualis and grand Register or Survey of the Lands of the Kingdome precedented by the Book or Roll of Winchester made by King Alfred or Alured a resumption of some of the Crown Lands in the reigns of King Stephen Henry the Second and Henry the Third and several of their Successors the Articles enquired of in the succeeding Eyres a Judgment in 6 Edw. 1. against the Abbot of Feversham for some of the Crown lands which were aliened by King Stephen And the opinion of Bracton a Judg in the later end of the reign of King Henry the Third lib. 2. de legibus consuetudinibus regni Angliae that Est res quasisacra res fiscalis quae dari non potest nec vendi nec ad alium transferri a principe vel a rege regnante quae faciunt ipsam coronam communem utilitatem respiciunt may be understood to be unalienable And by the casuall and uncertain profits revenues of the Crown Jure superioritatis which to such as shall acquaint themselves with the Saxon Lawes Customes and Antiquities will appear to be Escheats and Forfeitures Mines Royall Herriots Reliefs upon the deaths of Tenants in Capite and by Knights Service which in those more gratefull times amounted to very much the benefit of Tolls and Customes Manbote Bloodâ—ite with many other Wita's and Wera's Capitis estimationes mulcts penalties and fruits of the Kingly Prerogative which then and with Wardships Liveries Profits of Annum diem vastum Fines Assart lands and Fines for Incroachments Purprestures and divers other things in many Kings reigns after the Conquest were used to be exactly and carefully collected by the Comites or Earles and Governours of the Shires or Provinces who had the third penny then accounted so much as to become an honourable allowance for their collecting it and the Praepositi Shire Reeves and other Officers of the Crown and in the Courts of Justice as well great as small and the Iters and Circuits of the Justices and that when the sinnes and miseries of our Saxon Ancestors had enriched William the Conqueror and entitled him to the Directum Dominium of all and the utile Dominium of the greatest part of the lands and possessions of England and he had given away much of it to his great Commanders Friends Allies Souldiers many of whom were not without their own patrimonies and great possessions in Normandie and other transmarine parts and glutted them with the spoils and inheritance of the English and had to those large Territories and Demeasnes which he reserved to himself and the Terra Regis and antient Demeasnes of King Edward the Confessor which he united to the Crown a further increase by the no small Estates and Inheritances of some of his after unquiet great Nobility as Edwin Earl of York Ralph Earl of Suffolk William Fitz-Osberne Earl of Hereford Edric surnamed the Forrester Howard le Exul Waltheof Earl of Northumberland and divers other of the English and Normans That which most concerned him and his successors in the reigns of William Rufus and Henry the First the former of whom had his Estate augmented by the temporalties and vacancies of Bishopricks Abbies and Priories and the later by the Attainders and great Estates and Inheritance of Robert Mowbray Earle of Northumberland Robert de Belesme Earle of Arundell and Shrowsbury William Earle of Mortaigne and Cornwall both of them having much in demeasnes and a great deal more in service for Aydes in warre holden of them their Coloni or Glebae adscriptitii socage Tenants which did
Somerset and others attainted added by King Edward the sixth the forfeitures of the Duke of Northumberland William Parr Marquess of Northampton John Earl of Warwick Sir Thomas Wyat and others to Queen Mary the Lands of the Duke of Norffolk Philip Earl of Arrundel the Earls of Westmerland Essex and Southampton Sir John Perrot Leonard Dacres and others in the reign of Queen Elizabeth and hers as well as King Edward the sixth's ill advised and unhappy clypping and lessening the Lands and Revenues of many Bishopricks Deans and Chapters forfeitures of the Lord Cobham Sir Walter Rawley and of Winter Grant and other the Gunpowder Traytors the great revenues of the Earles of Tyrone and Desmond and other large confiscated Escheats and forfeited Estates in Ireland which came to King James for before his reign and the subduing of Tyrone that Kingdome as to the publick was a greater charge then profit addition of Scotland and all the Appennages and Lands of the royal Brethren and Princes of the blood of England in their several times and ages falling into the Regal Revenues would have made a plentifull support for the Crown of England if they had tarried as they did not one for another and continued unwasted and unaliened CHAP. II. Supplies and Additions to the Royall Revenues and the many cares taken therein by Parliaments and otherwise WHich could not be prevented by a thousand sixty one pounds and three half pence per diem revenue ex justis reditibus which William the Conqueror had in daily revenue after his Knights Fees and his large gifts and rewards given to his friends and followers which in the now value of money and rates of provision would a great deal more then treble that summe as Ordericus vitalis who was born in his reign and died in the beginning of the reign of King Stephen hath informed us exceptis muneribus regiis reatum redemptionibus aliisque multiplicibus negotiis quae Regis Aerarium quotidie aduagebant besides Gifts Presents Confiscations and other things which did daily increase his riches nor by sixty thousand pounds sterling 〈◊〉 by him in his Treasury his Censas Nemorâ—m rents or profits of Woods Escheats and incidents of Tenures in Capite and by Knight service Hidage Danegeld Sponte oblata for all Grants or Favours which passed from him Cambium Regium or benefit of Exchanges rating of the Fees of the Officers of his Household to a certainty per diem taking accounts upon oath for all his monies issued out or imprest for repair of his Castles and Houses and fines for granting of Priviledges and Liberties Contributions to William Rufus towards the building of Westminster-Hall three shillings upon every hundred Acres or Hide of Land in England to King Hen. 1. and his providence in making every third year a survey of his Woods and Forrests changing of the penalites of mutilation of members into pecuniary mulcts turning of his rents which were formerly paid in corn and other houshold provisions into money and six pence overplus in every pound for any loss or abatement which might happen in the value of money which being then by reason of his often absence and residence in Normandy reckoned to be good husbandry proved shortly afterwards by the change of times dearer rates of provision to be the contrary and a great disadvantage to his Successors one hundred thousand pounds in money besides Plate and Jewels left by him in his Treasury and possest by King Stephen resumption of divers Lands aliened from the Royal Revenue reforming of the Exchequer by Hen. 2. revoking of all Grants of Lands aliened from the Crown of the Castles of Clebury Wigmore and Bridgnorth from 〈◊〉 Mortimer City of Gloucester and Lands belonging unto it from Roger Fitz Miles Earl of Hereford Castle of Scarborough from William Earl of Albemarle with many other Lands Towns and Castles and from William Earl of Mortain and Warren base Son to King Stephen the Castle of Pemsey and City of Norwich notwithstanding that himself had granted them to the said William Earl of Mortaign in his agreement with King Stephen alledging that they were of the Demeasnes of the Crown and could not be alienated calling of certain of his great Ministers of Estate to account and imposing a Tax of two pence upon every yoke of Oxen in Ireland and two pence in the pound by Act of Parliament of every mans Lands and goods in Normandy to be paid in the year 1166. and a penny in every pound to be paid for four years following for the relief of the Christians in the Holy warre enquiring by his Justices Itinerants and Articles in Eyre in England of the rights of his Crown and Exchequer taxing in the 32. year of his reign all his Dominions in France with the Tenth of the Revenues for that year of all as well Clergy as Laity but such as went in person to the Holy warre the tenth of all their moveables as well gold as silver and the tenth of the moveables of two hundred of the richest men in London and of one hundred in York banishment of William de Ipre Earl of Kent with his Countrymen and followers when they grew to be a burden to the Kingdome nine hundred thousand pounds in money besides Plate and Jewels inestimable left in the Treasury to his Son King Richard the first great summes of money gained by him by renewing Charters and Fines imposed upon Sheriffs and Accomptants and such as had taken part with his Brother John in his usurpations the tenth of all moveables granted to him and the City of London giving him a voluntary contribution towards his voyage into the Holy Land banishment of Otho Earl of York the Son of his Sister and all the Bavarians a fourth part given him by Parliament of all spirituall and temporall Revenues as much for moveables and twenty shillings for every Knights Fee resumption of many Grants of Lands and Annuities two shillings of every plough land taken for preparation of a journy to Normandy examination of the Accounts of his Exchequer Officers five shillings laid upon every plough land for another forrain voyage and a general survey made of his Lands and Profits Three shillings for every plough land granted by Parliament to King John for his affairs in Normandy one hundred thousand pounds taxed upon the Clergy towards his charges in Ireland a thirteenth of all Spirituall and Temporall mens goods twenty six shillings eight pence for every Knights Fee two shillings upon every plough land an Ayde of twenty six shillings and eight pence of every Knights fee towards his warres in Wales with Escauge of such as held of him besides Benevolences Escheats and Americiaments twenty shillings of every Knights see towards his charges in Normandy forty shillings at another time and an Ayde for the marriage of his Sister Isabel to the Emperor Frederick The fifteenth part of every mans moveables to King Henry the third for a confirmation of
of twenty shillings upon every Knights Fee twelve pence of every man and woman that could dispend twenty shillings per annum above reprises by their Lands and so proportionably according to their land revenues twelve pence of every one whose goods were valued at twenty pounds and proportionably to what it exceeded gran-to King Henry the fourth seven hundred thousand pounds found in King Richard the second 's Treasury two fifteenths of the Commons in the sixth year of his reign a tenth and a half of the Clergy and of the Commons two fifteenths in the ninth a Subsidie by the Laity and half a mark a piece of the Stipendary Priests and Friars in the tenth a Subsidie to be levied through the Realm and in anno 11. a fifteenth a resumption of many Grants and Annuities regulation of his Houshold and banishment of the Gascoigners and Welsh impoverishing him and the Kingdom by Petitions and Suits Great summes of money given to King Henry the fifth by the Clergy a Subsidie by the Clergy and Laity a double Disme and a fifteenth by the Laity and in the 9th year of his reign two tenths of the Clergy and a fifteenth of the Laity and another fifteenth in the same year his Crown Royall and Jewels pawned and a resumption of divers Lands and Annuities granted to unworthy persons To King Henry the sixth in anno primo of his reign a Subsidie of five Nobles upon every sack of wool transported for three years forty three shillings of every sack of wool carried out by Merchant strangers a Subsidie of twelve pence in the pound of all merchandize imported or exported 3. shillings upon every Tonne of wine for three years granted by Parliament in 〈◊〉 3. a Subsidie of three shillings upon every Ton of 〈◊〉 and of all other Merchandize twelve pence per pound except woolfell and cloth or every Benefice of ten marks per annum ten of that parish to pay six shillings and eight pence of every Benefice of ten pounds per annum ten parishioners to pay thirty shillings and four pence and so rateably for every Benefice And of the Inhabitants of Cities and Boroughs every man worth twenty shillings above his Housholdstuff and his own and wives Apparrel four pence and upwards after that rate or proportion in anno 8. a Disme and fifteenth of the Laity Great summes of money raised by King Edward the fourth by penal Lawes and Benevolences resumption in the seventh year of his reign of all manner of gifts which he had given from the first day of his reign A Subsidie in anno 8. of two fifteens and a half and in anno 13. a Subsidie Some Taxes laid upon the people by King Richard the third and a resumption of all Lands and Estate granted to Elizabeth Grey Queen of England A Subside to Henry the seventh in an 2. of his reign at a tenth of every mans goods towards the setting forth an Army into Britain anno 4. two fifteens of the Laity and two Dismes of the Clergy Poll-money of every Duke ten marks every Earle five pounds every Baron four pounds every Knight four marks of every one worth forty shillings twelve pence of every one that took wages twelve pence of every man above fifteen years old four pence anno 6. great Benevolences anno 11. a Subsidie towards his warres in Scotland anno 〈◊〉 Benevolences and great Fines upon penal Lawes 〈◊〉 â—â—ghteen hundred thousand pounds left in his Treasury say the Historians but as the Loâ—d Treasurer Cecil Earle of Salisbury informed King James four Millions and a halfe Divers Subsidies granted to King Henry the eighth in anno 6. of his reign and in anno 14. another Subsidie upon goods a years value for one year of all the Clergies spiritual livings a great summe of the Laity in the Parliameat following anno 25. a Subsidie of four pence per pound in goods from twenty shillings to five pound from five pounds to ten pounds eight pence from ten pounds to twenty pounds sixteen pence from twenty pounds and upwards two shillings of all strangers double of all Strangers not Inhabitants four pence a head of every one that had Lands Fees or Annuities eight pence the pound from twenty shillings to five pounds and so doubled according as they did for goods by several proportions and of the Clergy three shillings in the pound great sums of money and treasure by the confiscation of Cardinal Wolsey Anno 26. tenths and first-fruits of the Clergy formerly paid to the Popes granted unto him An. 36. a Benevolence An. 37. a Subsidie of six shillings per pound of the Clergy two shillings eight pence of the goods of the Laity and four shilligs per pound of Lands tenths of all Abby and Religious Lands reserved upon his Grants two hundred thousand pounds paid by the Clergy of the Provinces of York and Canterbury to be excused from a Praemunire and the vast and inestimable treasure in Money Plate Shrines Jewels Copes and rich moveables upon the spoil of the Abbies and Religious Houses An Ayde given by Parliament to King Edward the sixth in the 2d year of his reign of twelve pence per pound of the goods of his naturall Subjects two shillings per pound of Strangers for three years of every Ewe kept in several pastures three pence of every Weather two pence of every Sheep kept in the Commons three half pence and eight pence per pound of every woollen Cloth made for sale throughout England anno 6. Commissions given out for sale of Church goods an 7. one Subsidie and two fifteens granted by Parliament and the gain for some years made by the Coynage of Bullion sent from Sweden and returned in Merchandise One Subsidie of the Laity given to Queen Mary in anno 2. of her reign eight pence in the pound from five pounds to ten pounds from ten pounds to twenty pounds sixteen pence per pound and of all strangers double To Queen Elizabeth in anno primo a Subsidie and two fifteens of the Clergy and a tenth of the Temporalty Anno 5. a Subsidie of the Clergy and two fifteens of the Temporalty Anno 8. a Subsidie of the Clergy and a subsidie fifteenth and tenth of the Temporalty Anno 13. a Subsidie of the Clergy one subsidie two fifteenths and a tenth of the Temporalty anno 18. a subsidie of the Clergy two fifteenths and tenths of the Temporalty Anno 23. the like Annis 27. 29. the like Anno 31. two subsidies of the Clergy and three subsidies and six fifteens of the Temporalty Anno 39. three subsidies of the Clergy and Temporalty and six fifteens of the Temporalty An. 43. four subsidies of the Clergy and four subsidies and eight fifteens of the Temporalty the pawning of many of her Jewels and mortgaging divers of her Lands A Subsidie of Poundage and Tonnage Wools Woolfels and Leather anno primo Jac. two parts of Recusants Lands convicted in anno 3. four Subsidies in the pound by
the Clergy and three entire Subsidies and three Fifteenths and tenths and three hundred and fifty thousand pounds for Subsidies unpaid to Queen Elizabeth Anno 7. an Ayd to make his Son Prince Henry a Knight Anno 18. two Subsidies of the Laity and three of the Crergy Anno 21. three Subsidies and three fifteens of the Temporalty and some Subsidies of the Clergy Primo Car. primi three entire Subsides by the Spiritualty 3. Car. five entire Subsidies granted by the Spiritualty and as many by the Temporalty great sums of money raised by Ship-money and by an Act of Parliament for Poll-money pawning all his Jewels and the benefit for some years of Coynage of two hundred thousand pounds of Spanish Bullion and returning the value in English Commodities All which being great supplies and easements to the charges and burdens of our severall and successive Kings and Princes and were not without some charge in the collection would have been much greater if the people of England keeping close to a long custome of not only getting all that they can from their Kings and Common Parents but returning as little as they could of their Aydes or Thanks unto them would have permitted them to arrive to a just or true valuation or any more then a small part of what they should be content to rate one another at having by an Act of Parliament in 6. Ed. 3. obtained of the King that from henceforth all Aydes should be taxed after the old manner and not otherwise the Subsidies being most commonly rated but at two shillings eight pence in the pound for goods and four shillings in the pound for lands with consideration of debts and other diminishing circumstances and put in the Ballance and compared with that which was given to the people by the Confirmations of divers Kings and Queens of Letters Patents and Lands given therein Coronation Pardons the General Pardons of 21 Jac. those in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and of some of our later Kings and Princes for in the Reigns of many of the former they were not so frequent general or usuall The Act of Parliament of 21 Jacobi Regis for debarring the Kings Title to concealed Lands after sixty years possession where nothing within that time had been answered or paid to the Crown or was in super and the last all-surpassing Act of Indemnity and General Pardon granted by King Charles the second would be farre surmounted by those and many other beneficiall Acts of Parliament granted in every King and Princes reign of liberties and benefits to the people And were not enough or sufficient to repair the decayes of the Regal Revenues or keep them from a consumption occasioned by their vast charges of our Kings as well in times of warre as peace to keep their people in safety peace and plenty nor to cure the Revenue of a Hecticque Fever of almost 500 years continuance though some of our Kings and Princes took some parts of Trade into their own hands to supply their necessities as the Wool by King Ed. 1. Tinne by Ed. 3. that and corn by Hen. 6. and Beer transported by Queen Elizabeth and notwithstanding the care and provision of divers Parliaments to have the Crown Lands not alien'd or wasted and the care of the Laws of England that the grants of the King shall be void where he is deceived or not truly informed The Ordinance in the 21 of Richard the second that whatsoever should come to the King by Judgment Escheat Wardship or any otherwayes should not be given away That of primo King H. 4. ca. 6. that in a Petition to the King for Lands Offices or any Gift the value thereof shall be mentioned and of that also which they have had of the Kings gift or of other his Pregenitors or Predecessors before and in case it be not their Grants shall be void and repealed the Ordinance of 21 R. 2. that the Procurer of any gift should be punished continued untill 7 H. 4. untill the King should be out of debt under penalty of forfeiting the double value for moving or procuring any such suit The Statute of 4 of H. 4. cap. 4. that the King grant no Lands or other Commodities but to such as shall deserve them and if any make demand without desert he shall be punished by the Councell and not obtain his suit In 11 Hen. 4 That Petitions for any such Grants delivered to the King be examined by his Privy Councell lest the Kings wants should light upon the Commons and in 2 H. 6. That all the profits by Wards Marriages Reliefs Escheats and Forfeitures should be expended in helping to defray the charges of the Kings Houshold an account of the Kings Revenue in 1. Hen. 6. in England Ireland Wales and Aquitaine and of his charges and expences delivered into Parliament by Ralph Lord Cromwell Lord Treasurer of England and the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester and divers of the Lords of the Kings Councell appointed to consider thereof the Acts of Parliament in 18 and 43 Eliz. That the Queen should be answered for the overplus of the value of Lands granted by her Letters Patents after the rate of threescore years purchase The abating in several Kings Reigns the expences of Houshold and of their Retinue Favourites Gifts and Rewards and lessening of charges in Warre by Tenures in Capite and Knight Service Aydes to make their eldest Sonnes Knights and for the marriage of their eldest Daughters Profit of Annum diem vastum Aides and Assistances by Grand and Petit Serjeanties Aurum Reginae or something presented to the Queen in former Kings Reigns upon Grants of Lands or Estate Licences to Trade with prohibited Merchandize raising their Customes and sometimes farming out their Ships Fines upon licences of Alienation or Pardons Espargne of the Royall Revenue by the Marriages of the Heirs of the Nobility and Gentry of great Estates and transplanting and inoculating of great and Noble Families and Estates into one another not only for their good and advancement but the peace and welfare of the Kingdome and the checque which King James gave to suits and importunities at Court after that he had given away too much of his English Crown Lands to his craving Countreymen of Scotland publickly declaring what kind of Suits or Requests might be demanded of him and what he would not grant his orders to have once in every quarter of a year Certificates or Accounts of moneys issued for his Houshold Wardrobe Jewel-house Chamber Navie and Stables and his care and advice with his Privie Councel for supplies of his Revenues and regulating his expences for that the Exitus was every year by affairs troubles and cares of State disturbances and accidents often happening a great deal more then the Introitus the disbursements farre exceeding the incomes the ordinary receipts coming farre short of the ordinary disbursements and the extraordinaries very much out-going the ordinaries CHAP. III. Ruine and Decay
the memory of man upon a meer supposition that there might possibly have been a loyal or good grant or commencement for them every little Manor of those multitudes of Manors and Franchises which the Commons in a Parliament of King Edward the third complained off and proportions of Lands in England many of which are called Manors by supposed Titles or reputation only as so many little Seigniories Jurisdictions or Royalities as they are improperly called have Courts Leet and Baron and free warren some of whom enjoy the honor and profit of the King in trying and executing Felons and many using all manner of inferiour justice upon the Tenants correction of the Affize of Bread and Beer have Tolles Fairs Markets Fishings Waives Estraies Felons goods and of persons outlawed and waived Issues Fines and Amerciaments Wrecks of Sea Deodands Mortuaries Treasure Trove and punishment of breach of the peace c. granted or claimed as belonged to them The not having a Clerk for the King besides the Clerks of the Assizes to keep a Roll of all Fines Amerciaments and Profits due to the King in the Iters or Circuits to estreat and certifie them into the Exchequer as was usual in the Reigns of Henry the third Edward the first and the elder Kings and many of the Justices of peace not duly certifying their Recognizances The letting the Greenwax to Farm with defalcations of such as the King shall grant away which breeds no smal neglect in the payment or gathering of it the not duly making or sending the originall Roll of the Chancery into the Exchequer the posting off many of the Kings Farms and debts de anno in annum by some of the former Clerks of the Pipe not holding the Sheriff to a strict opposal nor inforcing them to pay the monies levied of the Kings before their discharge or departure out of the Court not drawing of debts down into the Cedule Pipae being a more forcible process the heretofore Stewards and Bayliffs of Manors belonging to the Crown not justly accompting in the Exchequer as they ought the not awarding as there shall be occasion Commissions to worthy Gentlemen of every County to enquire of the Kings debts not levied and of the Sheriffs and other his Officers false Accomps ordained by the Statutes of 3 E. 1. c. 19. and 6 H. 4. cap. 3. neglect of the former Clerks of the Estreats and many other abuses crept into evil customes by some Officers or Clerks of that Court and in anno 1641. discovered and published by Mr. Vernon the superfluous number and charge of many Stewards Bayliffs and other Officers imployed which besides the many deceits used by some of them to the King and exaction upon the people did as was informed in their annuall Fees paid and allowed by the King yearly exceed three thousand pounds more then what they accompted for the selling or granting away and dismembring many Hundreds Wapentakes and liberties from the Crown and bodies of the Counties which the Statutes of 2 and 14 Ed. 3. doe prohibit to be aliened The falshood of such as did formerly make kind and easie particulars to such as were to buy or have any of the Kings Lands given them knavery and abuse of Under Sheriffs carelesnes and covetousness of the High Sheriffs in appointing them and not looking better to the performance of their own oathes as well as theirs The not duly accompting for prizes taken at sea and other maritime profits the heretofore sleepiness or slugishness of Justices of Peace in all or most Counties and Cities who being intrusted by the Law to take care of the observation of some scores of Statutes and Acts of Parliament would though their eyes and ears might almost every day perswade them to a greater care of their oathes and the good of their Country too often suffer grosse and numberless offences to increase and multiply and neither punish molest or trouble them or so much as give any information of them and too many of the Clerks of the peace Clerks of the Market and others not duly recording or certifying their Estreates The customes which in all civilized Nations and even amongst the Heathen are de jure Gentium to be paid to Kings and Princes and by the Laws of England and Parliament assent are due to the King who is the Soveraign of the Sea keeps the keyes of his Ports gives safe conduct to forrein Merchants to come hither and by his power friendship and treaties with his Allies neighbour and other Princes obtains the like with many priviledges for his own Merchants to goe and trade thither prevents with no small charges by his Ambassadours kept in their Dominions all injuries procures them right and justice and in case of deniall forceth it are now so daily cosened and put up into other Pockets as notwithstanding all the care taken in the farming or collecting of them though the people upon the retaile are sure to pay them to the full the King as it is believed doth not receive above a third part thereof by reason of the treachery and connivance of the former Searchers or Waiters and the Merchants defraying as they can sometimes confess the pompous charge of their City and Country Houses Wives and Coaches with their purloined Customes and that the cosenning of the King in his Excise yeilds them many times more then their Merchandise and their Apprentices now not taken under three or four hundred pounds a peice can live more like Gentlemen then Servants and purchase all kind of vanities vice and pride with what they likewise filch and take from him and when the Customes are let to farm though the Farmers take them as they are capable of such kind of losses can abuse their consciences and perswade themselves that they do no wrong to the King who is to have onely his Farm or Rent And that howsoever the more they cozen him the better they may be enabled to trade and the more they trade the more may be his Customes The not improving of their Lands other Revenues by raising of their Rents and rates according to the rise of money and provisions which the Subjects have exceedingly and to their great advantage done in their own Estates and Revenues and ten to one more then what was formerly The heretofore demising and letting to farm very many of the Kings Manors and Lands at the old and small Rents for three lives 21. 31. or 40. years in Reversion bespeaking a continuall wasting and weakening of his Revenues before hand Discoveries of information of deceipts or wrong done to his Revenues seldome made and then not without an allowance or gratification craved of three parts in four or a great share to begiven to the discoverers or prosecutors Many mens pretending service to the King but doing all they can to enrich themselves and deceive and lessen him and having by indulgence or cunning escapes from punishment made vice
in his houshold expences as formerly now that his Pourveyance is taken away looseth two hundred and fifty thousand pounds per annum by the loss of his Tenures and Pourveyance is at eighty thousand pounds per annum charge for the maintenance of the Garrison of Dunkirk above five hundred thousand pounds per annum for the Navy and Land forces hath to procure a publick quiet paid many hundred thousand pounds of the Arrears of the Navy and Army employed against himself and left in Arrears by his Enemies must be ten times a giver if he should grant every ones Petition to one that he shall be a gainer or receiver discontents himself to content others and forgetting that old rule and practice of the world sibi proximus is enforced to provide for others and not for himself and in the midst of his own necessities is to be the rewarder of virtue and still as well as he can the raging waves of the multitude is the Asylum or refuge of all that are distressed and bears or lessens their burdens out of his own Revenues And when Neighbour Princes are not usually without ambitions and taking all opportunities to enlarge their power and Dominions by the weaknesse of others or to weaken and oppress any of their Neighbours and make advantages of their troubles and necessities doe seldome want pretences of titles or revenging Injuries done to them or their people by Kings or their people and can lay aside their sworn Leagues and Confederacies as soon as their Interest or Designs shall invite them thereunto when the French King hath by computation an ordinary yearly Revenue of above twenty millions of Crowns which makes above five millions sterling per annum besides his extraordinaries which by Taxes and Tallages in the late warres being now by a habit and custome grown something easie and familiar to them may be raised to vast yearly sums of money and more then treble the ordinary when the King of Spain aboundeth in his Revenues in his Dominions in Christendom besides his extraordinary Aids Assesments and vast treasures and supplies from the West Indies which is a ready or rich pawn or credit for borrowing of monies upon all extraordinary emergencies occasions or necessities of State affairs The City of Venice with her Territories hath above a million sterling per annum in her yearly Income besides extraordinaries and a treasure of money enough to pay six Kings ransomes with Jewels and Plate unvaluable And the Dutch have one million and two hundred thousand pounds sterling per annum yearly ordinary Revenue out of Amsterdam besides what they have yearly out of all other Cities Towns and Places by their huge Excises and Assessments upon all the seven United Provinces And the King of England who was wont to be Arbiter totius Europae hold and keep the Ballance of Christendom even and if he do not it cannot be either safe or well for his own Kingdomes and People and their Trade and Commerce must pine and wither away languish and groan under so great expences and necessities whilest he is to preserve himself and people in peace plenty and safety and hath so little to doe it withall when at home all men do seem to love and serve him very many doe ask and get what they can from him and too many deceive him And as that prudent and great Statesman Cecil Earl of Salisbury Lord Treasurer of England observed to the Parliament in the Reign of King James it is a certain rule that all Princes are poor and unsafe who are not rich and so potent as to defend themselves upon any sodain offence and invasion or help their Allies and Neighbours Hath a small Revenue to govern an unruly People one part of them ready to runne mad with mistaken opinions in Religion and too many of the residue overgrown with vice and luxury a burden of burdens laid upon him the burdens of his people and the burdens of his Ancestors by their bounties expence and necessities and are by so much greater or heavier then theirs as his Revenues are consideratis considerandis a great deal lesser CHAP. I. The Remedies WHich a small or ordinary repair will not help but requires new and more sollid and lasting foundations endeavoured seriously and attempted by King James about the seventh year of his Reign by the advice of his Parliament and Privy Council but not then or any time since brought to perfection And may in a legall and well pleasing way to the people without the unwelcome raising of the Tenths of the Abbie and religions Lands to the present yearly value which may be of dangerous consequence and the Tenths and First-fruits of the Bishops and Clergy of England who have been over much pared already or a Resumption of the Crown Lands which unless it be of such wherein the King or his Father have been grossely deceived and the first money paid for the purchase upon an account of the mesne profits and interest satisfied will hugely disturb the Interest and House-gods of too many of the Nobility Gentry and rich men of the Kingdome and without any new or forreign devices or Talliages to raise monies and Fricasser or tear in pieces the already too much impaired estates of a Tax-bearing tired people which that Monarch of virtues and blessed Martyr King Charles the first did so abhorre as he caused Mr. Selden Mr. Oliver St. John to be imprisoned in the Tower of London a bill to be exhibted in Star-chamber against them and the Earl of Clare and others for having only in their custody and divulging a Manuscript or writing of certain Italian projects proposed to him by Sir Robert Dudley a Titulado Duke in Tuscanie and with out the gawling grating and most commonly unsuccesfull way of Projects which if set up will be thrown down again by the after Complaints and discontents of the people or hunting and vexing them with informations or calling their Lands and Estates in question to the ruine of them and their Families upon defective Titles or by Monopolies or a trebling abuses by pretending to reform them or Essayes of new wayes of profit framed or found out by such as designe more to themselves then for the good either of King or People and either know not or cannot or will not foresee the many evills and sad consequences which may as effects from causes fatally and unavoidably follow such or the like attempts which the necessities of Kings or want of competent revenues may either put them or their servants and followers upon Be as is humbly conceived prevented by severall Acts of Parliament to be made upon the propositions following which will not only encrease the Kings Revenues but encourage and make the People very willing and well contented therewith when as what they shall for the present loose thereby shall at the same time by enacting of some good Laws for them be abundantly repenced By a generall inclosure of
all wast Lands Commons belonging to the Kings Queens and Princes revenues in England and Wales allotting equall and reasonable proportions for satisfaction of Commoners and by disafforrestation of some Forrests and Chases remote from London or the Kings ordinary Residences the imbanking and taking in of all Lands infra fluxum refluxum Maris high and low watermarks derelicted and forsaken by the Sea or brought thither by Alluvion and added to the firme Land and together with the Lands and Revenues now belonging to the Crown of England never to be aliend rent-charged or leased more then for 21 years or three lives which besides the addition of revenues and profit to the King will very much adde to the livelyhood and industry of many of the people who will be maintained thereby better the Lands and increase subsidies when there shall be occasion And causing the like to be done by a generall inclosure of all that now lies wast and in common in particular and private mens Revenues in England and Wales amounting to some millions of Acres will produce the like benefits to the owners and Commoners who in a gratefull acknowledgement thereof may out of their severall allotments as freewill-offerings to their King pay yearly three pence per Acre to him and his Heirs and Successors That Banks or Mount Piete's be erected in several places of England and Wales as at London York Durham Golchester Norwich Ludlow Denbigh where mony may be lent and Pawns or Securities taken not exceeding the Interest of twelve per cent for a year or proportionably for greater or lesser times and that Commissioners in the manner of a Corporation or otherwise may in every of those places be from time to time appointed by his Majesty his Heires and Successors to order and supervise the management thereof for which his Majesty his Heires and Successors may out of the increase and profit of the said Interest receive and take forty shillings per cent no one particular person being permitted to imploy or put into the said Bank at interest above the sum of five hundred pounds and that no private or particular person putting their monies into the said Bank shall have and receive above the sum of the current or usual Interest in the Kingdom or any other gift or reward whatsoever whereby the intollerable oppression of publick and private Brokers those Baptizati Judaei and Pawn-takers which like Wolves gnaw and devour the poor as sheep when as driven to them by their necessities they are inforced to come to them for succour and give after the rate of fifty or sixty per cent which the hate of Jews to Christians never arrived to and a Christian and Protestant Kingdome ought not to countenance That by sumptuary Lawes concerning Apparrel to be worn by all degrees and orders of people the excess thereof may be regulated and abated with great penalties to the infringers thereof which Athens Sparta and Rome being heathen Common-wealths and England heretofore by sundry good Laws and Statutes unhappily repealed in anno 21 Jac. Spain by Pragmatico's and France by a late Reiglement have found to be an universall good and the Common-wealth of Venice held it to be necessary Nè civium patrimonia nimia intemperantia abliguriantur to keep their Citizens from wasting and spending their Estates being Laws now more then ever wanting in England when as that which wil quickly undo private or particular Families which by their universality do make a Kingdome is so frequent and every where almost to be found in a daily practise and pursuit of pride and that cheating one another to maintain it is the most of the peoples cares and consciences every house almost as to the excess of their vanities and expences beyond their Estates hath a Mark Anthony and Cleopatra in it and too many men and women though not so good or well able to bear it as King William Rufus doe think their clothes not costly enough many of the Nobility and Gentry have wasted and spent themselves almost quite out of themselves and left themselves little more then their Titles and Pedigrees The Citizens doe all they can to our-doe them infolly the Farmers Yeomanry and Countrymen all they can to overtake them and the Servants to come as near as they can to their Masters Ladies or Mistresses And they that first spend themselves to nothing or very near it are like to quit the race to those that come after and they which come last to the brink of ruining their fortunes which will be probably the common and lower ranks of the people are likely to learn by those that ruined themselves before them to stay where they left be Masters of the others Estates And that such as shall wear any habits or kinds of Apparrel forbidden be rated in all publick Assessments according to the estate and quality of such persons as are allowed to wear the like that whosoever shall not be of the degree and quality to keep a Coach or live in the Country not farre distant from the Parish Church and keepeth one shall forfeit and pay 5. l. for every year in which he shall so keep it that the Justices of Peace in every Country be the Collectors of all the penalties concerning Apparel Habits and keeping of Coaches and to have a â—ourth part of the forfeitures upon the receipt conviction or recovery thereof that the Masters and Mistresses of Servants trangressing that Act shall out of the wages due to such Servants pay and answer every of the penalties forfeited by the Servants not exceeding their said wages and stop and detain the same and for their care therein have and receive to their own use one third part in four to be divided of the said penalties and that the residue of all the said penalties ordained and forfeited by the said Act shall be collected and answered to the use of the King and his Heirs and Successors Whereby that grand improvement of all Sins and Wickedness which hath now overspread the Kingdome that consumption of Estates and destruction of good Manners And that high unparralleld and inordinate excess of Apparel and pride which being the canker of all honesty and virtue ruined Rome the Conqueror and Mistress of all the World and as Histories have told us never failed to undo many other Kingdoms permitting or allowing it which our Ancestors and former inhabitants of England would have abhorred and blushed at may be restrained and those sinfull necessities and plenty of all manner of knaveries dishonesties Cheatings and villanies to maintayne it depressed and extinguished which the book of God danger of Sinne Hell and Damnation and all that can be said and done by the Bishopps Ministers Preachers and men of holy Church without the assistance of such sumptuary Lawes can never as experience hath sufficiently told us be able to beat downe extirpate or lessen Which the pretended loss of the Kings Customes by Silkes
them that the Church-wardens or Governours of every Parish as is usually done in Holland where by their excellent orders and care of their Poor very few are to be seen either wandring or miserable may upon poverty happening to any Family or the death of a Father or Mother of children goe or send to their houses as the Commissioners de aflictis at Amsterdam usually do lift up the broken hearted and enquire what are their necessities or what there is to maintain them and accordingly make provision for them by relieving the aged sick or impotent providing work for such as are able and putting out of children at fitting ages to be Apprentices or to service or some other imployments wherein we may well hope for those good effects which the like courses in France by the erecting of the Hospitals de dieu or other Hospitals in or about Paris have lately assured that the encrease and decrease of the poor in every Parish and the Collections and Assessments for them and Legacies and charitable uses given to the poor be yearly certified to the Clerk of the Peace of every City County at the Quarter Sessions to be holden after Michaelmas to be by him entred into fair Books with Calenders and Tables fitted thereunto publickly read before the Justices at the next Quarter Sessions after to the end that the Justices there assembled may duly consider thereof and make such further orders and Provisions as shall be fitting and requisite And that when the English Captives at Algier shall be released and no more likely to be in that condition the one pound per cent granted by Act of Parliament for that purpose or the like allowance and proportion for seven years to be allowed out of the Custome-house may be imployed to relieve and make a stock for the Poor of England And in regard that such as sue at Law in forma pauperis notwithstanding all the cares which have been hitherto taken by the Courts of Justice in assigning them Counsel and Attornies and ordering that no Fees should be taken they doe for want of money and those cares and diligences which are only purchased and procured by mony many times but tire themselves to no purpose and after many years expence of time and labour in trudging to and fro with their foul and tatered Bundles and Papers wither away die in the hopes of that which for want of a due assistance and vigorous prosecution they could never bring to pass That an Utter-Barrister or Councellor at Law be once in every three years appointed by the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the great Seal of England for the time being and to continue for that time and no longer in the high Courts of Chancery and the Courts of Kings Bench Exchequer and Dutchy of Lancaster and a Sergeant at Law in the Court of Common-pleas to be for the like time nominated and appointed by the Lord chief Justice of the Court of Common-pleas for the time being to be of councell assistant for all rights and duties of men and women suing in forma pauperis and as Counsel to assist and help the poor of the respective places in the prosecution and recovery of all Legacies and charitable uses given to them or penalties given or ordained by any Statute to be had or levied for their use or any Parish collections and assessements withheld from them for which they shall take no Fees but in a reasonable manner upon the recovery thereof or end of the said Suits And for their better encouragement may in all the Courts of Justice of this kingdom according to their said several nominations and appointments as well Superior as Inferior have a prae audience in those other causes next to the Councel learned of the Kings and Queens of England and the Prince or Heir apparent That in every County and City there be a publick Work-house to imploy the Poor in the manufacture of Woollen or Linnen cloth making fishing Nets or other Manufacture and that for their better encouragement they may as they doe in Holland after a competent number of hours in every day imployed in the work of the Publick be allowed two hours in a day to work for their own advantage notwithstanding that their lodgings diet and fitting apparrel be defrayed out of the Publick and that the Governours thereof may for their encouragement have the benefit and liberty of Exportation and Importation of any the said commodities without any Custome to be paid for the same upon the Certificate of the next Justice of Peace of such County or City upon the oath of every such Governour that the said quantities to be exported were made or wrought at the said publick Workhouse and upon the oath of such Governour that the commodities imported are to be imployed and used only in the said publick Workhouse And that the kindred of Poor living in any part of England and Wales not taking almes or overburdned with poverty may be sought out and enforced to a reasonable contribution according to their abilities towards the maintenance or providing for such Poor and decayed as within the eighth degree are of their own blood and lynage and where it may be put them into such a way of living as may exempt them from the fate of common servants or people taking almes or from being placed in common Workhouses that by such means and provisions to be made for the Poor which our Acts of Parliament and the careless and many times purloyning Collectors and Overseers of the Poor in severall Parishes have not yet performed And that all Nobility Gentlemen and others excepting such whose constant and necessary attendance upon the persons of the King Queen or Prince shall not permit the same having an Estate of Lands of Inheritance of the yearly value of one hundred pounds per annum or more above reprises and their houses of residence in any Parish of England or Wales not keeping their Christmas in the said house or Parish shall at every of the said Feasts pay unto the Poor of the said parish the sum of forty shillings or proportionably according to that rate of his or their Lands lying or being in the said Parish besides their other payments to the Poor collected and assessed in the said Parish That so the multitude of Beggars in England may no more be a Byword amongst other Nations that there may be no complaining in our streets nor such dismall and sad spectacles as the leprous blind lame and aged people and young children crying out for bread and ready to starve for want of food or clothing nor so many counterfeits or tricks to make an ill use of charities to uphold their lazy and ugly condition of life That the Clerks of the Peace and Assizes and every Justice of Peace shall take their oathes not to release or discharge or respite any Fines Issues Recognizances and Amerciaments forfeited due to the King
but carefully and duly estreat and certifie them every half year into the Exchequer in the Terms of Easter and St. Michael which the example of Hengham a Judge in the Reign of King Edward the first who for reducing an Amerciament or Fine of thirteen shillings four pence to six shillings eight pence in favour and pitty of a poor man was grievously fined and ordered to provide at his own charge the great Clock at Westminster may perswade them not to violate That the Ballance and In and Out of forraign Trade may be observed and reduced into Books to be yearly brought into the Exchequer but not with Blanks fair Seals Covers and Labels as they have used to be to little purpose That the more to encourage Merchants to an honest accompt and payment of their Customes to the King and to deal better with him it may be enacted that where any Ships of any Merchants and their goods and lading shall be taken in times of hostility with any other Prince so as it be not by the carelesness and neglect of the Merchants in carrying prohibited goods or the Captain or owner of the Ships in not making so good a defence or not arming or providing themselves so well as they ought the losses of such Merchants and shipowners duely estimated and proved before the Judges of the Admiralty shall be refunded out of the next Prizes which shall be taken from that Nation Prince or Enemy that took it the accustomed allowances to the Lord high Admiral and others first deducted That the wages of Servants now trebled more then what it was twenty years agone and of Labourers and Workmen very much increased by reason of the intollerable and unbecomming pride of clothes now in fashion amongst them by licence and imitation of times of pride disobedience disorder and rebellion and the folly of some of their Masters and Mistresses enjoyning them to wear clothes too high for them may be limited and ordered to be as they were before these last twenty years that every Master or Mistress that giveth more shall forfeit double the value to the King and that no Servant who hath formerly served in any other place be received or taken into service without a certificate or testimony of their good behaviour from their Maister or Mistress where they last served if they shall not appear to be unreasonable or for malice or any sinister ends to deny the same That the Tenths of all the Fishing in the British or English Seas by Barks or Busses now beginning to be instituted and taken into consideration which in part was intended to be had by King Edward the sixth upon the coasts of Wales Ireland and Baltimore by building a Fort or Castle upon the streight to command as Captain John Smith relates in his discourse of the benefits of Fishing in our English Seas a tribute for Fishing and if industry fail not is like if we but imitate the Hollanders who have hitherto enjoyed that which was none of their own and enriched themselves by our carelesnes to grow up to a great and not to be estimated National profit be paid and accompted for to the King and his Heirs and Successors who may well deserve it when as besides his Soveraignty of the Sea and the guard and protection of them by his Navie and Shipping he hath of late in the midst of his own wants and necessities for the better encouragement of his people to seek their own good and that which our British Seas will plentifully afford them given all his Customs inward and outward for any the returns to be made by the sale of Fish in the Baltick Seas Denmark and France for seven years for the first entrance into the Trade of Fishing That the rivers in England and Wales not yet navigable and fit to be made navigable may by a publick purchase of the Mills or Wears standing upon them and pulling down the Wears Kiddels hindring it attempted in the Reigns of King Henry the third and Edward the third by several Statutes made for the taking of them away be made navigable and a reasonable Toll or Custome upon every Vessell and Fraight paid to the King his Heirs and Successors That for the better support of our Nobility and the honours which they enjoy and that as starres in our firmament they may be able to attend the Sun their Soveraign and not suffer such Eclypses in their Estates and Revenues as too many have lately done that the Lions which should guard the Thrones of our Kings may not pine away or languish and the stately columns and pillars thereof moulder into ruins and decay and have small or unbecoming Estates to maintain them in the splendor of their Ancestors and the Royal Revenue not to be troubled or lessened by suits or requests to supplie them they may according to the intent and custome of the Fewdall Laws and the locality which ought to be in Earldoms and Baronies not be without some honorary possessions which was so usual and frequent in England as through the three first Centuries after the Conquest the Lands belonging to Earldomes and Baronies were accompted to be parcels and members thereof and the word Honor so comprehensive as it conteined and comprised all the Lands belonging thereunto as well as the Earldomes Baronies and Title which did in sundry of of our former Kings reigns grants pass and comprehend the Land as well as the Titles And that according to that laudable and ever to be imitated example of Thomas late Earl of Arundel and Surrey in obtaining an Act of Parliament in the third year of the Reign of King Charles the Martyr for the annexing of divers Baronies and Lands to the Castle and Earldome of Arundel inseparable and unalienable in contemplation of the poverty and small Estates of the then Lord Stafford and some other of the antient English Nobility wetherbeaten and wasted by the injuries of time or the luxuries and carelesness of their Ancestors The Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts Barons and Baronets of England leaving some other Lands to their own disposing for the preferring of younger children payment of debts and supply of necessities which accidents may cast upon them may be ordered to settle annex by like Acts of Parliament the Capita Baroniarum and chief Castles Manors and Lands belonging to their Earldomes Baronies or Estates competent and sufficient to keep up and sustain the honour and dignity thereof from the gripes or defilements of poverty and Adversities not to be aliened or separated from their Earldomes Baronies or Dignities as long as it shall please God to continue them That the antient use of the Exchequer be restored and the Kings revenues carefully collected and answered and that the Justices in Eyre of the Kings Forrests and Chases on this side and beyond Trent Clerkes of the Market and Commissioners and Clerks of the Commissioners of Sewers do duely certifie into the
and paid into such hands as they shall appoint and such part thereof not exceeding the sum of two hundred thousand pounds be destributed by his Majesty to the suffering and Loyal English who took Armes for him or his Royal Father and never deserted their Loyalty or to their Wives and Children surviving them as his Majesty under his sign Manual shall direct and some other part of the said moneys not exceeding the sum of one hundred thousand pounds arising out of the said Assessements be imployed for satisfaction without allowance for Interest which should not be for wickedness or sinfull contracts of such Wives and Children of Purchasers or the Purchasers of Purchasers which have yet received no satisfaction according to his Majesties Declarations by the Bishops Deanes and Chapters or Prebends or out of his Majesty or his Royal Mother the Queens Revenues or which have not been Purchasers by false Debenturs and the other remaining undisposed moneys as aforesaid of the said two years Taxe to be and remain to his Majesty his Heirs and Successors as a sacred Patrimony unalienable to be annexed inseparably to the Crown of England not to be Leased or Rent charged further then for one or two Lives or one and twenty years That after the end of five years next ensuing there be another monthly Tax or Subsidy of 120000 l. more for two whole years then next ensuing to be raised as aforesaid and disposed of by such as the Parliament shall appoint for his Majesties use of which if his Majesty shall please there may also be issued by Warrant under his Majesties sign Manual such moneys as his Majesty shall think fitting not exceeding the sum of two hundred thousand pounds to be imployed for the further relief of such of the Loyal suffering party in England for his Majesty or his late Royal Father as his Majesty shall appoint and that the residue of the monys to be collected and raised by the said monethly Tax or Assessement for two whole years be as soon as conveniently it may laid out and disposed for the purchasing of an honorable Revenue in Land for the King his Successors unalienable as aforesaid and to no other use or purpose which they that could pay as much and a great deal more to uphold a Slavery may be better contented to pay to establish a redemption and freedom And that after the end of three years next after the said two years there be a like monethly Tax gathered and collected for two whole years next ensuing to be disposed of by such as the Parliament shall appoint for the buying of an honorable and Princely Revenue in Lands of inheritance for the King and his Heirs and Successors never to be aliend from the Crown of England other then as aforesaid And although it may seem to be a great sum of mony in the Total to be raised out of the people yet it being the more probable and easie way and a great deal more necessary then what hath been done for worser ends and occasions and being to be born by so many Cities Towns Counties and people as are to contribute thereunto in several yeers and with several respirations will the eby not onely free them from many of the like publike Taxes and Assessements hereafter and save them in their purses and estates as much or more then that will amount unto by some good Laws and provisions to be made for the freeing of them from many of the gripings and oppressions of one another but entail our happiness and a greater then formerly freedom quiet and safety upon themselves and their posterity For there was is and ever will be a necessity of power strength and riches to be in a King that intends either to protect or make happy himself and his people as well as to have their love and affection and though David when he was in his private condition could before he was King of Israel rescue a Lamb of his flock slay a Lyon and a Bear and with a sling and a peeble stone kill the dreadful Goliah and that Nathan the Prophet no flatterer but a man of God had after he was a King said unto him The Lord is with thee and brought him a message from God that His house and Kingdom and throne should be established for ever yet neither he nor his subjects the men of Judah and Israel could believe him or themselves to be in any condition of safety without his mighty men of war Militia Captaines of thousands and Captains over hundreds nor did son Solomon after God had given him a large and understanding heart and a portion of wisdom beyond that which ever was granted to mankind with a promise likewise of riches and honor suppose it to be any policy to neglect his Tributes and Presents the improvement and well ordering of his Revenues and putting an honorable order in his houshold to build Cities of Store and Cities for his Chariots and Cities for his Horsemen and a Navy of Ships in Ezion Geber and send them to Ophir to fetch Gold Nor can it be certainly for the good and safety of the people to do by their earthly King who untied the chains and fetters of their folly restored them to their Laws and Liberties and as a balm of Gilead cured and healed the wounds of those that never could do it themselves Nor accord well with their gratitude or the many protestations and promises which they made of sacrificing their lives and fortunes and all that they had in order to his happiness Or with the repentance and satisfaction which makes repentance efficacious of those that were the causes of his twelve years misery and affliction greater longer and sharper then any of his own hundred and eight Royal Progenitors ever endured enough to have turned his youth into the gray hairs and infirmities of an old and decrepit age To doe by him as they doe by their heavenly King take get and receive all they can from him but return as little as they may for it or by the earth their common feeder and nourisher in their lifetimes and the receiver and entertainer of them at their deaths by making furrows on her back and enforcing it to serve all their designs and business and for all her fruits and kindness doe not so well by her as the Heathen who could sacrifice to Tellus and Ceres but think they do enough if in the moneths of April and May they shall be pleased to admire her beauty and beat Harvest well contented to fill their Barns with her bounty And will be as likely to be for their good as for children to have their parents so poor and impotent as not to be able to protect them or for those that are to go a Sea Voyage to have the ships ill or not at all victualled or to adventure in a War or Garrison when the Commander in chief or the General upon whose wisdom valour strength and conduct the
safety of all dependeth shall be every day to seek for victuals to feed them or himself Ammunition or Weapons to defend and mony to pay them Unless they could be assured by no doubting Oracle that it would be for the good honor peace and plenty of the Kingdom to have the head faim languish want its necessary support Food and that the members in the body natural although never so warmely clad or made much of can thrive whilst the Head is sick and infirme Or unless they would be as wise as the Citizens of Constantinople who rather then they would impart any of their Riches to their Emperor for the most necessary defence of their City Estates and Religion against the Turk when their City was besieged by him would reserve it for a prey to their enemies and a perpetual slavery for themselves and their posterities or as our late men of Reformation and murmerers at their own happiness did in their complaints and taking away Ship-money and exchanging it for more miseries then ever any of their Ancestors endured when afterwards they were enforced to call their slavery a happiness and to pay and pray and give God thanks for it When as the great charge of Government in times of peace and the quietest imaginable and the necessity of the peoples Aids and Taxes to support it may the better be believed when Augustus Caesar notwithstanding the enjoyment and full possession of the Empire or greatest part of the world with the riches and spoils thereof laid up in the publike Treasuries and their Capitol enough besides what Julius Caesar had in the civil Wars consumed to make it the greatest that ever was together at one time above ground and his great frugality and care in managing his Revenue by keeping a book or memorials as Tacitus saith wherein Opes publica continebantur quantum Civium sociorumque in armis quot classes Regna Provinciae Tributa vectigalia necessitates ac largitiones and had as Bodin saith received Immanem pecuniarum summam ex Testamentis great Estates of Inheritance from those very many that made him their Heir could not subsist without Tributes and Taxes but though the bloody and expenceful Bellona was laid to sleep and there was nothing likely to disturb that happy and grateful calm of peace with which the world was then blessed found a necessity to Tax all the world and even Joseph with Mary the mother of the Redeemer of it must go up to Bethlehem to be taxed and pay Poll-mony and for all that with all his care and providence in governing that Empire having spent two paternal Patrimonies ceterasque hereditates in Rempublicam and much of his own Estate upon the Commonwealth left but a small and inconsiderable Revenue to his heir And when as the King by his inestimable charges great and daily expences for the protection and good of his people and necessary maintenance of his Royal Dignity is in a worse condition then any of his Nobility or Gentry who may when their necessities enforce them strike sail if they please and measure their expences by their Estates Because he cannot defend himself without defending his people must do like a Prince and live like a Prince and it cannot be for the good safety and honor of them that he should either live or do otherwise But should rather believe as King James the fifth in Anno 1540. his Majesties great Grandfather did when in a preamble to an Act of Parliament in Scotland for the annexation of Lands inseparable to the Crown he did declare that it Was understood and weill advisedly considered be the Kingis grace and the Estates of his Realm beand assembled in Parlement that the patrimony of his Crown and Revenues thereof beand angmented is the great weill and profit baith to the Kingis Grace and his Leiges and that King James the sixth his Majesties Grandfather and his Parliament of Scotland in Anno 1600. did not erre in the preamble of an Act Of Annexation of forefaulted Lands and others to the Crown wherein they did declare That it is clearly understand by the Kings Majesty and Estates of the Realm that the augmentation of the patrimony and Revenues of the Crown not onely serves for the forth setting and maintenance of his Highness Honor and Royall Estate but alsorelieves greatly his Subjects of divers charges and heavy burdings And when after his coming to enjoy the Crown of England he did in his Declaration in the year 1619. Declaring what things he would be moved to grant to his servants and suitors by way of bounty and what he would not signifie his desire not to cast himself and his posterity into these wants or straits which might drive them to lay burdens on the people Nor should the people of this nobler and better natured Nation who have in the times of Monarchy been blest with a greater freedom then France Spain Holland Venice or any Christian or Heathen people or Kingdom were ever owners of be unwilling to imploy as much of their care and well wishes in setling the Kings Revenue now so much weakened by age and kindness and ruined for want of repairs and being repaired will be but to help to protect and defend themselves as they usually and commonly do in the repairing and building a new their owne houses amending or making new their Clothes when they perceive them to decay or refreshing or bringing to heart again their Lands which by doing them good have needed it When as those who contrived and assented unto Olivers Instrument of Government as it was called who was one of the greatest of Villians and Tyrants in the Christian world and not only murdered his King but did all he could to destroy the Bodies Estates and Souls of his good people did more resemble Antichrist then either Pope or Turke highly deserve a burying place under the Gallows all that Ignomany could devise to lay upon him and was of neither Royal or Noble Birth or breeding and could be well contented to allow him Ten thousand Horse Dragoons twenty thousand Foot and the Navy to be maintained by a constant yearly Revenue to be raised for that purpose with the remainder of the Kings Queens and Princes Revenues not disposed of except Forests and Chases and the Mannors thereunto belonging all the Lands of Delinquents in Ireland in the Counties of Dublin Kildare Clare and Katerlaugh the forfeited Lands in Scotland which were great and considerable the two parts of Recusants Lands in England not compounded for and all Debts Fines Penalties Issues and Casual Profits belonging to the Keepers of the Liberties of England so miscalled with two hundred thousand pounds per annum yearly Revenue for the Administration of Justice and charge of Government to be and remain to that Minotaure or Protector so called and his successors and the Framers of that which was called the Petition and Advice could afterwards in the year 1656. by
a fancied Authority of Parliament not onely confirm unto him that Revenue in Land setled upon him with the Casual profits belonging to the Crown of England but intreat him to accept of ten hundred thousand pounds per annum yearly Revenue to be raised upon the people without a Land Tax for the maintenance of the Army and Navy with such other supplies as should be needful to be raised from time to time by consent of Parliament and three hundred thousand pounds per annum in like manner to be raised for his support of the Government Need not repine or think that or a greater Revenue to be too much for the highest born Prince in Christendom and the Heir of a Succession of Kings for more then one thousand years last past who could suffer their Regal Power and Authority so to be bound with the Cords of love to their people and the rules of right reason as the Sun in all his Travails hath never yet beheld a people enjoying better or so good Laws and Liberties and less Taxed or burdened with their Princes occasions And when as there is not any City or Town Corporate in England but have received and enjoyed their Charters and Liberties from the King or his Progenitors not any of the Nobility or Gentry but have had their honors priviledges and dignities and all or some of their Lands and Estates from them nor any kinred or family in England which either by him or some of his famous Progenitors or the many Josephs and Mordecai's in every age advanced by them have not mediately or immediately been preferred and advanced and had all that they have or enjoy by their bounty and munificence or had much kindness or Royal favors shewed unto them and like the lesser Trees or Shrubs in the Forest have comfortably grown up and been protected and shadowed by Druinas Royal Oak for which in the care of their own good and safty which are involved in his they are as their forefathers were more then ordinarily obliged by those eternal Bonds of gratitude which time or adversity should never be able to break or obliterate to contribute all they can to his wellfare and this our once most famous Monarchy That so our Hercules may not want his Club to defend Himself and his people that the cry of Debts and people wanting their mony being the worst of Anguishes to a virtuous and generous mind may no longer afflict him that the looking upon a small Revenue may not dishearten him to take the accompts of it and that a greater may now our Janus Temple is shut put him in mind to do as Augustus Caesar did when all the world was at quiet keep an Exact account of his Revenues and Expences That he who hath builded up our wasts and raised up the former desolations may be at rest from his sorrows and all the people in his Dominions break forth into singing praises to the Most High which hath made him an Instrument to do wonderful things and like the Dove sent out of Noahs Ark to bring us the Olive Branch which the Deep and the rage of many waters had covered FINIS §. 1. §. 2. §. 3. §. 4. §. 5. §. 6. §. 7. §. 8. §. 9. §. 10. §. 11. §. 12. §. 13. §. 14. § 15. §. 16. §. 17. §. 18. §. 19. §. 20. §. 21. §. 22. §. 23. §. 25. §. 26. § 27. § 28. §. 1. §. 2. §. 3. §. 4. Brewers Merchants Wine-Coopers and Vintners Bakers §. 5. §. 6. §. 7. §. 8. §. 9. §. 10. § 11. §. 12. §. 13. §. 14. § 15. §. 16. §. 17. §. 18. §. 19. §. 20. §. 21. §. 22. §. 23. §. 24. §. 25. §. 26. §. 27. §. 28. §. 29. § 30. § 31. §. 32. §. 33. §. 34. §. 35. §. 36. §. 37. §. 38.
Restauranda OR THE NECESSITY OF Publick Repairs By setling of a certain and Royal yearly REVENUE FOR THE KING OR The Way to a well-being for the KING and His PEOPLE proposed by the Establishing of a fitting Revenue for him and Enacting some Necessary and Wholsome Laws for the PEOPLE London Printed by Richard Hodgkinson for the Author and are to be sold by Abel Roper at the sign of the Sun over against Saint Dunstons Church in Fleetstreet 1662. REGI ET PATRIAE VERISQUE HONORIS ET FELICITATIS ANGLIAE CULTORIBUS HASCE VELUTI MATERIARUM SEDES DICAT DEDICATQUE FABIANUS PHILIPPS THE CONTENTS OF THE CHAPTERS CHAP. I. REvenues of the Kings of England Pag. 6 CHAP. II. Supplies and Additions to the Royal Revenues and the many cares taken therein by Parliaments and otherwise p. 14 CHAP. III. Ruine and decay of the Revenues p. 30 CHAP. IV. The Remedies p. 58 Some Errata's or faults escaped the Printer which the Reader is intreated to correct and amend in this manner PAge 2 line 15 dele by p. 7. l. 10 dele may p. 27 l. 26. for their read the p. 68. l. 14. interfere had in principio dele in fine p. 69. l. 5. for and worser or worse and l. 29. for which r. and p. 58. for Chap. l. r. Chap. IV. p. 81. l. 23. dele that p 83 l. 31. dele and and 〈◊〉 Restauranda OR The necessity of Publick Repairs by the setling of a certain and Royall yearly Revenue for the KING OR The Way to a well-being for the KING and his PEOPLE proposed by the establishing of a fitting Revenue for Him and Enacting some necessary and wholsome Lawes for the People A Long course of time Annosa vetustas which weares out and subdues the most stubborne Rocks and Marbles and crumbles into dust and ruin things of long duration together with the necessities cares and affairs which do usually busie Crowns and Princes and their Royall Revenues in the protection and welfare of themselves and the people committed to their charge may without the inconsiderate censures of those who think much of every Ayde and Contribution which they give towards the effecting or support of their own and their posterities happiness be well supposed to be no small cause of wasting and lessening those Royal supports or means which our Kings of England have heretofore had to do it withall and as streams running far from their springs and fountains without the help or company of other waters to augment or goe along with them may be allowed more then a little to drie up or languish and might silence the murmur and complaints of those who can be content to beg get all they can from the King and by too often by false pretences concealing the worth or value of what they ask of him doe gain thereby ten times more then they seem to request or he intends to give them and making no scruple to deceive him which our blessed Saviour never taught them when he commanded to give to Caesar that which was Caesars think it is Kingly to be cozened and that he can never give or be deceived too much yet when he comes to demand any help or assistance from them though it be but for a publick good and their own preservation can crie out burdens and oppressions and as if he were some Ocean never to be drawn drie or Mountain never to be digged down or exhausted an Elixir to transmute and enrich others without any wast or diminution of its self or the Sun in the firmament which can enlighten heat and nourish all things and be never the worse for it marvail how he can come to want and if they doe believe him to be in any necessity are ready to lay the cause or blame of it upon his Officers for taking more care of their own Estates then his and for a thriving way of Arithmetick by substracting from his to increase and multiply their own whilest many who have but lately tasted of his bounty or whose Fathers Grandfathers or Ancestors have lest them goodly Inheritances which were either of the guift of the King or his Progenitors or purchased and gained by beneficial offices and places or imployments under them can look upon every Subsidy Tax or Assessment as a blast or mildew of their corn some plague or epidemicall disease or a greater national calamity and give them no better an aspect or entertainment then the children of Israel did their Egyptian Tax-masters when they were commanded to make their Tale of Brick and gather the straw though they never repine or grumble at the same time at ten times a greater sum to a Merry-meeting or a Feast or spent in a horse-race a thousand or five hundred pounds lost in a night at dice three or four hundred pounds spent in a Treatment or Banquet or the large or sinfull expensive vanities of themselves and their wives and children And too many who would be thought to be better Subjects and Patriots then others can seem to hate a Civil warre shrink at the imagination of the miseries thereof tremble at a forreign Invasion Free-quarter Plunder and the Outrage of Souldiers complain of want of Trade or the guarding of the Seas boast of the ancient honour and glory due unto their Nation and take a pleasure to recount it to their children or read it in their Histories and not a few also who in our late twenty years rebellion and the spoils and afflictions which attended it could drive honester men then themselves into Taxes and Assessements and think a million and a half in yearly Assessements for some years together besides a fifth part of their real Estates a twentieth of their personal and many other of their Depredations amounting to more then all the Taxes and Aydes put together which for five hundred years last past were imposed by our Kings and Princes to be little enough to sacrifice to a mistaken godliness will notwithstanding doe as very little as they can to contribute any thing to the procuring and enjoying the blessings of peace and plenty or avoyd the contrary And do never so well esteem of their own policies as when they can by pretences of debts poverty or charge of children shift of necessary and publick duties and by undervaluing of their own Estates or overvaluing others make as smal an offering as they can to their oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy and necessities of their Prince and Defender of their Faith as well as their Estates And too too many whilst they cannot but acknowledge if Scripture and the Lawes of God and man may be their guide and directors that he hath lately by Gods mercy and a miracle redeemed them and their Laws and Liberties out of a slavery which stuck like a leprosie and was like to be entailed upon them and their posterities rescued Religion and gave them their Lands and Estates again which the just Lawes of the Land once called their Birthright
Magna Charta and Charta Foreste fortieth part of every mans goods towards the payment of his debts and a thirtieth part afterwards granted by Act of Parliament much of his Forrests and Woods converted to errable land his Parks of Woodstock and Gillingham ploughed many Grants made in his minority revoked his great Officers as Hubert de Burgh Earl of Kent Chief Justice of England and others called to account Ranulph Britton Treasurer of his Chamber fined in one thousand marks a great summe of money given by the City of London to be made Toll-free every one that could dispend in land fifteen pound per annum ordered to be knighted or pay a Fine great summes of money gained by composition with Delinquents at seven years value of their Lands by the DictuÌ„ de Kenilworth his houshold charges lessened a meaner Port kept less Almes given his Jewels and the Crown royal pawned Plate sold to pay his debts at no greater a value then the weight though the workmanship did cost as much and the golden Shrine of Edward the Confessor forty shillings for every Knights see twice assessed for his warres in Gascony great sums of money raised of the Iewes the banishment of the Poictouins and his half-brothers who had made it too much of their business to beg what they could of the Revenue and by his own sometimes sitting in the Exchequer to preserve it thirty two thousand pounds sterling received of Leolin Prince of Wales propaee habenda and a resumption of divers of the Crown Lands which had been aliened Nor by an Inquiry in Anno 4. of King Ed. 1 by Act of Parliament of the Castles Buildings Lead and Timber of the Kings his Demeasnes Parks Woods extent of Manors forrain Parks and Woods Pawnage Herbage Mills Fishings Freeholds Cottages Curtilages customary Tenants Patronages Perquisitâ—s of Courts Liberties Customes and Services a Subsidie in Anno 6. of his reign of the twentieth part of every mans goods towards the charges of his warres in Wales the Statute of Quo warranto in Anno 18. to inquire and seise into the Kings hands all liberties usurped a Subside in anno 22. of his reign upon Woolfels and Hydes transported a tenth of all goods the eighth of the goods of the Citizens and Burgesses a twelfth of the rest of the Laity and a moiety of the Clergy in anno 25. and in anno 26. the ninth penny of the Commons the tenth penny of the Clergy of the Province of Canterbury and the fifth of York taking away much monies from the Priors Aliens payment by the Clergy in anno 23 of all such summes of money which they had promised to pay to the Pope towards the maintenance of the Holy warres and half a years value of their Ecclesiasticall livings and promotions abased monies four hundred and twenty thousand pounds fifteen shillings and four pence raised from the Jewes and a farre greater summe afterwards contribution of ships and ship-money by the maritime Coasts and Counties in case of danger and invasion sixty five thousand marks of silver received for Fines of some corrupt Judges and great summes of money likewise for forfeitures by an Inquisition or Commission of Trail Baston A fifteenth of the Clergy and a twentieth of the Temporalty to King Edward the Second in anno primo of his reign the moveables and personal Estate of the Knights Templers in England Contribution of ships and ship-money by the maritime Counties a fifteenth in anno 6. and the great and rich confiscated personall Estates of the two Spencers Father and Son and an Ordinance made pro Hospitio Regis concerning the regulation of his Houshold Thirty thousand marks paid to King Edward the third in anno 2. of his reign by Robert Bruce King of Scots to release his Soveraignity to that Kingdom a tenth of the Clergy Citizens and Burgesses and a fifteenth of others granted in anno 6. of his reign Aids of ships ship-money by the Sea-coasts and in an 13. the tenth sheep of all the Lords Demeasnes except of their bound Tenants the tenth fleece of wool and the tenth lamb of their store to be paid in two years and that such of them or their Peers as held by Baronie should give the tenth of their grain wool and Lamb and of all their own Demeasnes and two thousand five hundred sacks of wool given by the Commons anno 14. the ninth of the grain wool and lamb of the Laity to be paid in two years the ninth of the goods of the Townsmen and the fifteenth of such as dwelt in Forrests and Chases anno 17. forty shillings for every Sack of wool over and above the old rate anno 18. a Disme by the Clergy of Canterbury for three years two fifteenths of the Commons and two dismes of the Cities and Towns to be levied in such wise as the last in an 20. two fifteens to be paid in two years anno 21. two shillings upon every Sack of wool granted by the Lords without the Commons in anno 22. three fifteens to be paid in three years All such treasure as was committed to Churches throughout England for the Holy warre all the goods of the Cluniacques Cistercians and some other Orders of Monks half the wools of the Laity and the whole of the Clergy the jewels of the Crown pawned imprisonment of his Treasurer abasing some of his 〈◊〉 and ordaining some of his Exchanges of money to be at London Canterbury and York monies abated in weight and made to pass according to former value and the profits which the forrain Cardinals enjoyed in England during their lives taken into his hands one hundred thousand pounds received for the ransome of John King of France great sums of money for the ransoming of David King of Scotland Philip afterwards Duke of Burgogne Jaques de Bourbon and many of the French Nobility fifty shillings granted by Parliament in anno 43. for every sack of wool for six years by which imposition only as the Trade of Wools and Cloathing then flourished the King as it was computed might dispend one thousand marks per diem fifty thousand pounds by the Laity and as much by the Clergy granted him by the Parliament in anno 45. to resume his right in France a Poll-money by Act of Parliament of four pence for every person of of the Laity that took not almes of every Clergy-man beneficed twelve pence and of every Religious person four pence in anno 50. and a resumption of divers of his Crown Lands A Subsidie in the first year of K. Richard the second levied upon the great men to spare the Commons Poll-money of every person above fifteen years old Fines of seaventeen shires in anno 21. and causing them to pay great summes of money for aiding the Duke of Gloucester and Earles of Arrundel and Warwick the Bohemians which pestered his Court banished and a resumption of divers of his Crown Lands A tenth of the Clergy and a Subsidie
of the Revenues BY reason of the great charges and expences which the Kings of England were at through their severall Generations to protect and defend themselves and their people though some of them as in all other conditions and sorts of men were sound to be less provident then others and more easie to the flatteries of Courtiers or the necessities or importunities of Favourites or Followers as King Edward the second and King Richard the second sixty thousand Knights Fees or maintenance for them given away by William the Conquerour of which the Religious Houses then or in the near succeeding times came to be possessed of 28115. the yearly value of which number of Knights Fees if now they should be estimated but at ten thousand and valued but at the rate of twenty pounds per annum as they seemed to be at the making of the Statute of 1 Ed. 2. would be worth two hundred thousand pounds per annum and if at three hundred pounds per annum which is now the least of the improvement Sir Edward Coke reckoning eight hundred and others six hundred and eighty acres to a Knights Fee and others at the least allowing a large proportion would make three millions per annum sterling two hundred and eighty Manors given to Godfry Bishop of Constance which he left to his Nephew Moubray the Isle of Wight Earldome of Devon and Honour of Plimpton given by Henry the first to Richard de Ripariis or Rivers Earldome of Gloucester to Robert Fitz Henry great possessions given away by King Stephen to purchase love and fidelity the great Estates in Land which Maud the Empress was inforced to grant and her Son King Henry the second afterwards to confirme to divers of the great men and Nobility as the Earldom of Oxford to Awbrey de vere Earldome of Arundel to William de Albeney Earldome of Hereford to Miles of Gloucester and of Essex to Jeofrey Magnauile to forsake the usurping King Stephen and the great charge which those twenty years warres expended the wars of King H. 2. in France and with his own Sons there and at home and of seven and forty thousand three hundred thirty three pounds six shillings eight pence expended and given towards the warres of the Holy land great somes of gold and silver sent to the Pope charges of the voyage or expedition which King Richard the first made in person into Asia and the Holy Land and his ransome the Earldomes of Mortaigne Cornwall Dorses Somerset Nottingham Derby and Lancaster with all their great possessions being a great part of the Crown Revenues given to his brother John and a great part of the remainder sold The troubles of King John with his boisterous Barons the Stanneries Castles and Honor of Barkhamstead and County of Cornwall granted by King Hen. 3. to his Brother Richard his great warres and turmoils in the Barons warres which drove him to such wants and perplexities as he and his Queen as Matthew Paris tells us were somtimes enforced to seek their daily and necessary sustenance from Monasteries charge of endeavoring at a great rate and price though unsuccesfully to make his Son Edmond King of Sicily and furnishing his Son Edward afterwards King E. 1. with an Army to Jerusalem that of King Ed. 1. in his wars against the Scots and subduing that Kingdom the raising and advancing the unhappy Favorites Gaveston and the two Spencers Father and Son by King Edward the Second and his troubles great expences of Edward the Third in his Conquering of France the Dukedom of Cornwal and Earldoms of Chester and Flint setled upon the Black Prince his Son and the eldest Sons and Heirs of the Kings of England successively preferring of Lionel Duke of Clarence and his many other Sons restoring of Don Pedro to the Kingdom of Castile by the aid of the Black Prince the Earldom of Salisbury Isle of Man Castle and Barony of Denbigh given to Mountacute and one Thousand Marks Lands per annum besides to him and his Heirs for taking Roger Mortimer Prisoner at Nottingham Castle one thousand pounds per annum with the Town and Castle of Cambridge to William Marquess of Juliers and the Heirs of his body Honor of Wallingford and Earldome of Cornwall escheated given to John of Eltham his Brother the penalties and fines of Labourers Artificers and Servants in anno 36. of his reign given to the Commons for three years to be distributed amongst them the maintaining and humoring of severall Factions of the great Nobility by King Richard the second his voyage into Ireland and after misfortunes raising of John Beaufort Earl of Somerset and John Holland his half-Brother to be Earl of Kent and Duke of Exeter dissentions and troubles in the Reign of King Henry the fourth preferring another of the Beauforts to be Earl of Dorset and his establishment as well as he could in his own usurpations Chirk and Chirk Lands in Wales given by King Henry the fifth to Edmond Beaufort second Son of John Beaufort Earl of Somerset the charge of his Conquest of France the seeking to preserve and keep it by Henry the sixth long and bloody Factions and Warres of York and Lancaster Kendal and other great possessions given to John de Foix a Frenchman in marriage with Margaret the Sister to William de la Poole Duke of Suffolk the Earldome of Shrowsbury to the high deserving Talbot the Isles of Guarnsay and Jersey and the Castle of Bristol to Henry Beauchamp Duke of Warwick the charge of King Edward the fourth in his getting the Crown the Earldome of Pembroke given by him to William Lord Herbert the making of friends and parties by King R. 3. pacifying of Interests by King Hen. 7. his gifts and grants to Stanley Earl of Derby and the dying the white Rose into the Red or uniting of them the voyages and warres of King H. 8. in France preferring of Charles Brandon to be Duke of Suffolk Seymour to be Earl of Hertford Ratcliffe Earl of Sussex Thomas Manors Earl of Rutland Sir Thomas Bolein to be Viscount Rochford and Earl of Wiltshire his contest with the Pope and other great Princes large and great quantities of Religious and Ecclesiasticall Lands given away to divers of his Nobility many of whom had been the former Donors thereof and to divers of the Gentry to corroborate what he had done bring them into a better liking of that action and to be the more unwilling to leave those Lands which he had given them a remission of all debts without schedule or limitation in anno 21. of his Reign endowing six Bishopricks and Cathedrall Churches Pensions for life to many which were turned out of their Cloisters a perpetuall maintenance to the Professors of the Greek and Hebrew Tongues Civill Law Divinity and Physick in both the Universities and to twelve poor Knights at Windsor the warres of King Edward the sixth in Scotland creating of John Dudley Earl of Warwick Duke of
to the damage done by such attempts and Rebellions and the charge of suppressing them and defending themselves and their people to reconcile the Heirs Posteritie and Allies of such as had been attainted and induce them to a better obedience and love of their Country The no small charges susteined heretofore by granting yearly Pensions or Annuities to severall of the Nobility to serve extraordinary besides the ordinary duty of their Tenures with certain numbers of gens d' armes and Bowmen in times of warre or upon necessity the building and endowing of many Colleges and Halls in the Universities Eaton and Winchester Schools and endowing with great yearly Revenues the Famous Hospitalls of Bridewell and Christ-Church in London and St. Thomas in Southwark building and endowing a great part of the Cathedrals in England the Castle and Chappel of Windsor and Palaces of Sheene Woodstock Richmond repair of the Tower of London Castle of Dover c. Charges for the honour of the King and Kingdome in making and installment of Knights of the Garter and the costly ceremonies thereof and not seldome sending Ambassadours with it to forraign Princes expences in making of Knights of the Bath and in the reign of our more antient Kings for Furres and rich Vestments in making Knights Bachelors Charge of the Courts of Justice and Circuits to preserve the peoples Rights Properties and Liberties protect them from injuries and punish the transgressors now taking away yearly from the regal Revenue fifteen or sixteen thousand pounds per ann which in honester and cheaper times was in the Reign of Henry the sixth as much as worshipfully defrayed as the Record saith the expences of his then no small retinue and houshold with the greater charges now more then formerly in all other the necessaries and affairs belonging to the Kingly Office A daily and almost hourly distribution and giving of Royall favours and munificence and necessity of much of it when as that which amongst private men is accounted providence thrift and good husbandry would be an unbecoming sparing in Princes and an avarice and temptation to oppress the people and that which in others would be prodigality or a wast and consumptions of their Estates and reckoned as a folly is in Kings and Princes most necessary in their bounties and favours wherewith to satisfie and keep in quiet as well as they can multitudes of people whose numberless passions iniquities ill humors designs necessities and interests are by the Sword of Justice in one hand and the Royal Scepter of grace and Benevolence in the other to be kept in order by love honor obedience and loyalty the best increasers maintainers and preservers of publick peace and tranquility which those who have suffered in the want of it but some daies or moneths or a year or few years or our last twenty years folly and miseries may know how to esteem and value A dayly or very often craving and petitioning of some or many of his Subjects and the largeness of a royal heart and hand like an over indulgent Parent taking a pleasure and content to divest himself to enrich and give them content The vast difference betwixt the charges of Navies and Armies now more then formerly when a Hobler or Dragoon Horseman which was wont to be heretofore hired at three pence per diem now hath no less then two shillings six pence a Footman eight pence the pay of a Troop of horse cannot be under four thousand pounds per annum and of one hundred and eighty men in a Garrison three thousand six hundred pounds per annum The course of warre iâ— the later ages growing more and more tedious and chargeable and so immense as the Dutch notwithstanding their sout gelt or Tax upon salt their vectigal frumenti for corn grinded at their Mills the eighth part of the price of Pears and Apples a seventh of all Cattel sold to the Butchers an eighth for wood a Tax upon Candles and an Ezcise upon all things eaten drunk or worn upon Law Suits Servants Wages Ships Coaches and Carts a sixth penny upon all lease Lands Assessments upon demeasne Lands Gardens and planted Grounds an eighth upon Houses demised or let hooft gelt being a Dutch Floren for every poll or head scoorsâ—engelt a like payment for Chimney money with many other great Taxes besides their many profitable and succesfull depredations in the East and West Indies c. great aides from France and England of men and money for many years during their warres great riches got by the greatest commerce of Christendom and ransacking Sea and Land for it have been in sixty years warres with Spain left very much in debt at the end of the warres And are yet notwithstanding since the warres ended some millions of money in debt and so much as they were for many years after and are yet enforced to continue their Excise and most of their Assessments and Taxes upon the people When the King of Spain notwithstanding his vast Dominions twenty millions of Duckets which is above six millions of our sterling money yearly Revenues great exactions and impoverishing of his people by yearly Taxes and Assessments the golden Mines of Peru Mexico and Potozi and other inestimable treasures of the West Indies which Pâ—â—hero a Spanish Ambassadour in a brag or vie with the treasurie of Venice could say had no bottom and having the Sun for its Lord Treasurer daily to generate and increase its gold hath yearly for many years yeilded the Crown of Spain by and out of the Fifths sometimes ten and sometimes fifteen millions of gold and so much as in the year 1638. two hundred and sixty millions of gold did by the Records of the Custome-house of Sivill appear to have been in seventy four years then last past brought from the West Indies into Spain and from Potozi in nine years inclusivè from 1574. to 1585. one hundred and eleven millions of silver hath notwithstanding with his wars with the Dutch and a warr of late years with France chargeable bribes and intelligences and a thirst after an universal Monarchy consumed that and all that he could borrow besides from the Bankers of Genoa And France with all her Taxes and Gabells beggering and very much enslaving of her common people hath in a warre of thirty years last past with the Spaniards fought it self almost off its legs and into a consumption Which a long and late experience may forbid our wondring at when as the late long pretending but no performing Parliament could with the spoils of the Kings and Churches Revenues the Estates of the Nobility Gentry and good people in England Scotland and Ireland and more Taxes and burdens imposed by them and Oliver their man of sin in twenty years then our Kings of England in five hundred years last past all put together had before laid upon them could not leave their Oliver when their sins and his tricks had made him to be
their Master any more then three hundred thousand pounds sterling in Cash and ready money and that with that and such of the Royall Revenues as they left him and those vast Spoils Rapines Taxes Assessments and pillage of all that were not as bad as himself and his Predecessor Common-wealth Contrivers in the three Kingdomes of England Ireland and Scotland which amounted unto above forty millions he was not able in a few years wars with the Dutch and Spaniards to bring about his expences support the Protection as he called it of the people with it but died above three millions in debt which the debts of our famous King Edward the third and Henry the fifth who conquered France and the most of our indebted Kings never amounted unto When our English Kings and Princes having never received of the people by their Aides and Subsidies the twentieth penny towards their expences in the preservation of them and the honor peace plenty of the Kingdom could never do as the Field Marshals Stadt Holders or Generals in Commonwealths have done or as the late Princes of Orange did for severall successions in Holland and the united Provinces receive great allowances and Sallaries keep and greatly improve and increase their own Revenues and make the Publick bear and defray its vast charges as well in warres as the cares and defence of peace in the absence of it but did bear and sustein the brunt of all that was not extraordinary and the charge of many a warre abroad and suppressing of insurrections and rebellions at home out of their own Estates and Revenues and made many a hard shift even to the pawning of their Jewels and mortgaging of their Lands without an often calling to the People for Subsidies or other Aids or Assistance to preserve them and their Estates and Posterities Nor took to themselves the liberty which many Subjects doe to put into their Accounts and Bills of charges to their Princes their Damnum emergens damage happening by any service done for him or their Country and many times their Lucrum cessans gain or improvement lost though every mans particular in the defence of their King and Country is involved in the generall that the service was not altogether or immediately done or tendred to him or for the preservation of him or his Estate only and Posterity but as much if not more for their own concernments and think themselves to be ill dealt with if they be not speedily and abundantly rewarded To help on which consumption of the Royal Revenues came also the great charges which King Charles the first upon whom the decay of the Royal Revenues occasioned by the necessities and indulgences of his Predecessors at once falling might have made him crie out with King Henry the third as the Monk of St. Albans relates it seducor undique mutilatus sum Rex et abbreviatus was at in leagues and confederacies with forreign Princes maintaining Armies in the Palatinate and Germany aiding the Kings of Bohemia Denmark and Sweden engaging in a warre against Spain and sending a great Fleet and Army to invade him great expences in sending a Navy and Army to the Isle of Rhe and two others to aid the Rochellers to furnish part of which for it amounted to a great deal more he sold at once at too easie rates to the City of London above twelve thousand pounds Land per annum rent of Assize the payment of fifty thousand pounds per annum Pensions aud Annuities out of the Exchequer as it was industriously computed by that factious party of Common woe contrivers to diverse of the Scottish Nation many of whom did afterwards joyn with his enemies to ruine him the great and necessary yearly Pensions and Annuities paid to the King and Queen of Bohemia and their children charges of going with a great Army to the Borders of Scotland against the Covenanting Scots and maintaining another in England with the payment of 120000l principall money borrowed by his Father of divers Citizens of London with interest at 8. per cent Which with the many great cares troubles wants and necessities which compassed him in on every side whilst his great virtues for want of necessary supplies of money and treasure were not able to support or bear him up against the storms of an hideous Rebellion escape the snares and pursuit of a rebellious party or scour and cleanse that Augaean Stable which had ruined and weakned his Revenues made him a glorious Martyr for the Laws and Liberties of England and those that were the causers of it the great Examples of a Divine Justice overtaking them And enforced him to leave his troubles to descend upon his Son our most gratious Soveraign Charls the Second with a small and despoyled Revenue which by its fluidness and the gnawing and deflux of time was as to his Crown Lands brought almost to an Exinanition and his casuall and other receipts bearing no more proportion to his expences and disbursements then a Dwarfe or Pigmey doth to a Giant or Poliphemus could doe no less then bring the remainder of that little which was left into a Tabes and almost incurable consumption when there is so great a difference betwixt the rates of provisions and livelyhood and all manner of things bought or used in the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and what is now paid for them when he is at greater expences then any of his Progenitors and a less receiver receives at the old rate and buyes at the new his demeasn Lands besides his Pastures at Creslâ—w in Buckinghamshire which were hertofore imployed for the keeping of some Oxen for his household provisions and his parks and some adjacent Grounds to his Houses of residence and all his Land and certain Revenues are not above reprizes one hundred thousand pounds per annum and two parts of three of that consisting in Fee Farm Rents which admit of no improvement when his Customes which should now amount to as much or more then what they were in his late Majesties Reign by the addition of an Excise amounting to one hundred and forty thousand pounds per an now yeilds not near so much as it did formerly the Excise of Ale and Beer ill collected oâ— so chargeable in the gathering of it as it yeilds little more then the half of what the Parliament estimated and intended it to be great yearly Revenues Inheritances in Lands given to men of high deservings both of him and the Kingdom all the Confiscations of the late Traitors of a great yearly value with the benefit of the Post-Office Wine Lycences and many discoveries of personall Estates due to the King given to his Brother the Duke of York to make him a Princely Revenue When his ordinary expences doe so much exceed his ordinary receipts and his extraordinaries are six or seven to one of his ordinaries is sixteen hundred thousand pounds in debt spends more then as much again
charge of the Wards or others concerned therein be unnecessarily as they have been inrolled at length or otherwise with the Auditors of that Court when as the same was recorded before by other Officers of that Court to which the Auditors may have a free access and at any time take extracts out of them 13. That a severe Act of Parliament be made against such as shall misuse or wast any Wards Estate Lands Woods and Timber committed or granted to them or any personal Estate which belongeth unto them or shall not give the Wards fit education or shall disparage them in their Marriages or marry them without any competent Portion or shall not within a moneth after the death of such Ward or coming to his or her age of one and twenty years make a true accompt and payment unto the said Ward or his or her Heirs or Executors of all that shall be by them due and payable to him or them by reason of the said Wardship upon pain to pay to the use of the said Ward his or her Heirs Executors or Administrators besides the said moneys due and payable to the use of the said Ward double costs and damages expended or sustained therein That all Lands hereafter escheated and forfeited to his Majesty in cases where there shall be no restoration to the next in discent or remainder be inseparable and as a Sacrum patrimonium annexed to the Crown never to be aliened leased or charged with any Rent-charge or Annuity further then for life or one and twenty years That all Corporations of Trade may besides Fines and Amerciaments to be imposed and taken to their own use have also power to impose Fines and Amerciaments to the use of his Majesty and his Heirs and Successors and have no power to release or discharge any Penalties and Issues forfeited to the King And that the Town Clerks of Cities and Towns Corporate and Clerks of every Corporation or Company of Trade shall be bound by Oath and Recognizance to the King to certifie and estreat into the Exchequer all Fines Issues and Amerciaments forfeited and lost at two usuall Terms in every year that is to say Easter and Michaelmas That the By-lawes of every Corporation and Company of Trade and every City and Town Corporate which ought to be perused and approved by the Lord Chancellor of England and Lord Chief Justices of either Benches or Justices of Assize or any three of them and are not to be contrary to the Lawes may be according to the Statute of 19 Hen. 7. cap. 7. perused and allowed by them That upon every bloodshed or breach of the peace as by the Civil Law in forreign parts and heretofore was anciently used in England by the Common Law thereof a reasonable mulct or penalty be imposed to be gathered by the Magistrates as the Drossaerts do in many places in Holland and be answered to the King though the parties do agree or release and discharge one another That all Misericordia's which are now the only Vestigia's left of that antient Custome and Prerogative in Cases of Nonsuits and Pleas of Non est factums not verified may be put into certain reasonable penal sums duly collected and answered to the King his Heirs and Successors which besides an annual and casual profit to his Majesty will quiet and lessen contentions and bring a great ease to the people That in cases of Manslaughter there be before any pardon granted a reasonable satisfaction made according as it was heretofore practised in our Lawes of England both before and since the Conquest made to the wives and children of the Deceased or if none to the next of kindred unless the parties concerned shall otherwise agree their recompence or satisfaction and an Estimatio capitis or value of the party offending also paid to the King That upon convictions of Adulteries Fornication as was antiently used there be paid to the King a penalty proportionable to the offence and that in all Tryals for Manslaughter Murder or other crimes that hard and unreasonable custom now and heretofore used in England that witnesses may not be brought heard or examined against the King be abolished and that all good and lawfull testimonies which may tend to the discovery of the fact may be as in other Cases and Tryals heard and received That there be in every Circuit as antiently a Clerk besides the Clerk of the Assize appointed to enter in a Roll the Fines imposed by the Justices and to make Estreats thereof duly into the Exchequer That in all Actions of Trespass or any other Action to be brought in the Court of the Kings Bench at Westminster or by Quo minus in the Office of Pleas in the Court of the Kings Exchequer at Westminster or in the Court of the Marshalsea or Court of the Virge of the Kings Palace at Westminster whereupon any declaration shall be in debt there be upon the first Process or Writ such Fines paid to the King and in such manner as have been antiently and are now paid to the King upon actions of debt retornable in the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster And that upon every such first Writ the Plaintiffs Attorney doe in order thereunto indorse the just sum in debt which he intendeth to declare upon That every Merchant or Trader that shippeth any goods to be exported or unlades any imported shall under his hand attested or if need be upon his oath deliver unto his Majesties Farmers or Customers a true note or Cocquet of all such goods exported and imported and the true contents and value thereof And that whosoever shall wittingly or knowingly deceive his Majesty his Heirs or Successors therein shall for the first offence forfeit five times the value and for the second ten times the value and for the third to be disfranchised and never more permitted to trade And that every conviction of any such offence shall if pleaded be a bar to them in any Action to be brought commenced and prosecuted by them That once in every three years Commissions be issued to carefull and worthy men in every County and City uninterressed to enquire of all charitable uses and the imployments and abuses thereof and if need be to put a better order therein for the future and that the Arrears be also collected and paid the one moity to his Majesty and the other to be imployed to the charitable uses That Commissions be likewise issued now more then formerly necessary by the dissolution of Monasteries and Religious Houses and the great disuse of Hospitalities and Almes deeds to enquire and certifie the number of Poor requiring almes in every Parish in every County and City that all vagabond and wandring Beggars be returned to the several Parishes where they were born and where it cannot may be reduced to some Parishes in every County or City less troubled then others with poor and more able to maintain
Exchequer all Fines Issues Amerciaments imposed and forfeited That upon all manufactures made beyond the Seas and all things to be imported tending to excess and luxury as Tobacco Silks c. there be an Imposition more then ordinary which the wisdom of Neighbor Nations have ever thought expedient and was in the Reign of King James the prudent advice in Parliament of the Lord Treasurer Salisbury That in the deplorable Cases of wreck at Sea the Masters or Owners of such Ships not being Pirates or Robbers whether there be any living thing remaining or not in the Ship all and every part of the lading Tackle and Ship which shall be saved from the fury of the Sea or found on shore notwithstanding any detestable custome to the contrary may according to the Ancient Equitable Laws of Oleron be saved and preserved for the right Owners coming within a year and a day to claim the same and tendring such just charges and recompence as by two of the next Justices of Peace not interessed shall be found to be reasonable for those that were Instrumental in the preservation thereof that so the inhumane and unchristian customes of too many who live upon the Sea Coasts being in a Shipwrack as pittiless and cruel as the Winds and Seas taking away that which they left and rejoycing in the disasters and miseries of those that are afflicted may be abolished That Champerty and maintenance being now crept through the care and severity of all our former good Laws and Statutes made to prevent it into such a general practice and profit as in the confidence of dark contrivances and the impossibility or difficulty of discovery of them Some of our Gentlemen of the Gyges ring or invisible Estates in a way which they have found out to live aswell without a Revenue or other lawful means and professions as with them can like Nimrods or mighty Hunters by shares gained in the driving of Causes support an idle Gallantry by the spoil and oppression of others some women more wily then good can be Agitators or Retrivers of causes not concerning them for a part of the hoped for Booty and many Citizens and Tradesmen do buy pretended Titles and Interests and ingage and furnish money for no small parts to be had upon the success of Suites in Law and too many Attornyes Sollicitors and others can make it the best of their employments to deal in gross and by whole sale and will not as the Law enjoyns them make Bills or Tickets to their Clyents of their just and allowed Fees and disbursments Some good Laws and powerful restrictions may be made to prevent or punish those grand abuses and that if either the Plaintiff or Defendant in any Action shall require it an Oath or Oaths may be given at the Tryal or Hearing of such Suites or Causes to any who may discover such Champerties or Maintenance and if any shall be found offending therein either by disbursing of money to have any share or part of the thing inquestion on or by any pre-contract or other ingagement the Verdict may not be taken nor Judgement entered or if it shall be discovered and proved after the Verdict taken and Judgement entred before the end of the Term wherein such Judgement shall be entred the said Judgement be by the Judges of that Court arrested or made void and whether it be discovered and proved before Judgement entred or after the parties offending as well those that committed the Champerty and Maintenance as all their Abettors may every one of them forfeit and pay to the King and his Heirs and Successors the sum of one hundred pounds and be imprisoned without Bail or Maineprise untill they shall have paid the same and also forfeit and pay to the party greived his double Costs and Damage together with the moyety or half of the matter in question That there be no pardon or reversal of any Outlary in Civil aswell as Criminal Causes or Actions without five Marks first paid to the King in discharge of his Contempt and a Charter of Pardon as was anciently used first sued out under the Great Seal of England That all Sheriffs under-Sheriffs and their Deputies do at the entrance or admission into their Offices take an Oath not to imbrace any Juror or Juries or for any Fee or Reward or otherwise to nominate any at the request either of the Plaintiffs or Defendants or of any on their behalf and that they shall not make out or deliver or willingly or wittingly permit to be made in their names any Blanck Warrant or Precept to Arrest any person without a Writ under the Seal of the Court wherein such Action is laid or to be tryed first had and delivered unto them and that no Sheriff or under-Sheriff do crave allowance or respit for any debts of the Kings but upon just cause That every Juror if the Plaintiff or Defendant or their Attorneys shall before they besworn require it do also take an Oath that he hath not received any Instructions or Evidence before hand from the Plantiff or Defendant or their Attornyes or any on their behalf That all English Merchants trading into Foreign parts may be ordained to bring into England at or in their return a certain and reasonable quantity of Bullion or coin of Gold or Silver to be yearly certified and Registred in the Exchequer and that such as shall be brought in may not as it is now be bought and Registred in the name and for the use of the East Indian Company and that the East Indian Company to prevent any disguise which may be made use of betwixt them and the Merchants may also be ordered yearly to Register and Certifie into the Exchequer all such Gold and Silver Bullion or coin thereof as shall be imported by the said East Indian Company That all Foreign Merchants Trading into England or any the Dominions thereof be ordained to export at their returns English Manufactures and Commodities to the value of what they imported and not to make their returns in money or by Bills of Exchange as the Jews in great numbers trading hither are known now to do And that all Merchants Alien if they be not such as have houses and habitations here or if they have do at their first beginning to Trade enter into Recognizances of great penalties in Chancery not to Transport or cause to be Transported out of England as was in part provided for by the Statute of 2 H. 6. chap. 6. Or returned by Bills of Exchange any more then the sum of five pounds for their necessary charges upon pain of forseiting treble the value thereof That the many more then formerly used deceipts in the Shearing Tentering hot Pressing and false Dying of our English Clothes which do much or more endamage our Trade of Cloathing then the Transportation of Fullers Earth Sheeps Pelts with the Wool upon them or the Clothes in the Whites may