offensive and defensive war against the King and Kingship but to oppose the Kings interest and Title to that Kingdom * setled on Him his Heirs and Successors for ever by an express Act of Parliament made in Ireland 23 H. 8. c. 1. and by the Statute of 1 Jac. c. 1. made in England yet unrepealed and the Protestant remaining party there adhering to and proclaiming acknowledging him for their Soveraign lest his gaining of Ireland should prove fatal to their usurped Soveraigntie in England or conduce to his enthroning here And by what Authority those now sitting can impose or with what Conscience any loyal Subject who hath taken the Oaths of Supremacy Allegiance and Covenant can voluntarily pay any Contributions to deprive the King of his hereditary right and undoubted Title to the Kingdoms and Crowns of England and Ireland and alter the frame of the antient Government and Parliaments of our Kingdoms * Remonstrated so often against by both Houses and adjudged High Treason in Canterburies and Straffirds cases for which they were beheaded and by themselves in the Kings own case whom they decolled likewise without incurring the guilt of perjury and danger of high Treason to the loss of his life and estate by the very laws and Statutes yet in force transcends my understanding to conceive Wherefore I neither can nor dare in conscience law or prudence submit to this Contribution The 3d. end of this Tax and more particularly of this new Tax of Jan 26. 1659. of one hundred thousand pound the Month for 6 months space after a former Tax levied before hand for the self-same Months is the maintenance of the Armies and Navyes raised and continued for the defence of the twice dissipated Anti-Parliamentarie Conventicle and their Utopian Common-wealth and the necessary and urgent occasions thereof now propounded and insisted on by the sitting Members as the only means of Peace and Settlement both in Church and State when as in truth it hath been is and will be the onlie means of Unsettlement and new divisions wars oppressions confusions in both to their utter ruine and desolation if pursued Which I shall evidence beyond contradiction 1. This project to metamorphoze our antient Hereditary famous flourishing Kingdom into an Helvetian and Vtopian Common-wealth by popular Tumults Rebellion and a prevalent party in Parliament was originally contrived by Father Parsons and other Jesuites in Spain in the year of our Lord 1590. recommended by them to the King of Spain to pursue and was principally to be effected by Jesuites to destroy and subvert our Protestant Monarchs Kingdoms and subject them to the Tyranny and Vassallage of the Jesuites and Spaniards as you may read at large in William Watson his Quodlibets printed 1602. p. 92 94 25 286 389 310 330 332 333 334 322 323 in his Dialogue between a Secular Priest and a Lay Gentleman printed at Rhemes 1601. and in William Clarke both Secular Priests his Answer to Father Parsons Libel p. 75 76 c. 2ly After this it was particularly and by name recommended by Thomas Campanella an Italian Monk and Arch-Machivilian to the King of Spain in the year 1600. as the principal means to sow the seeds of Divisions and Dissentions amongst the English themselves and to engage England Scotland and Ireland in inextricable wars against each other to divert the English from the Indies and his Plate Fleet and reduce them under his universal Temporal and the Popes Spiritual Monarchy at last as you may read at large in his Book De Monarchia Hispanica c. 25. now translated into English 3ly It was again set on foot and vigorously prosecuted by the Jesuites and Cardinal Richelien of France in the years 1639 1640. as you may read in my Romes Master-piece and Epistle to A Seasonable Legal and Historical Vindication c. of the good old fundamental Liberties Laws c. of all English Freemen printed 1655. And specially recommended to the French King and Cardinal Mazarin his Successor at his death Anno 1642. vigorously to pursue and accomplish by the Civil Wars raised between Scotland and England and the late King and Parliament as a Historia Conte de Galeazzo Gualdo Priorato part 3. Venotiis 1648. p. 175 176. and was accordingly prosecuted by the Spanish and French Agents and the Jesuites and Popish Priests and their seduced Proselytes of the Juncto and Army as I evidenced at large in my Speech Dee 4. 1648. and the Appendix to it my soresaid Epistle and True and Perfect Narrative May 1659. by evidences past all contradiction 4ly It is evident That the Jesuites and Jesuited Papists in England Scotland and Ireland with all the b Sectarian Party of Anabaptists Quakers Enthisiasts and Sectaries of all sorts headed by disguised Jesuites Monks Fryers and Popish Priests have been the chiefest Sticklers of all others for this New projected Commonwealth against the King and Monarchy and the only means to extirpate our established Protestant Ministry with their Maintenance Tithes Glebes and embroyl us in endless confusions and revolutions of Governments Wars Distractions till we be beggered destroyed and made a prey to our forein Enemies 5ly The King of Spain was the first of all forein Kings and States who owned couâ—ted and entâ—ed into a League of Amity with our new Common-wealth after the Kings beheading as a Creature of his own in opposition to our King and Kingship and engaged us in a war against the Dutch to make himself Monarch over us both according to Campanella his advice De Monarchia Hisp. c. 25 27. which our Republicans punctuallie pursued from 1649 till 1653. almost to the ruine of us both by the Spaniards Gold and policie 6ly That the French Cardinal Mazarin and other Popish Kings and States complyed and confederated with our Republicans and late Protectors in opposition to our Hereditary Protestant King and Kingship purposely to ruine us and our Religion at home and the Protestant Churches abroad engaged by their policies in unchristian wars against each other 7ly That we have all visibly seen and sensibly felt by twelve years wofull experiment that this Jesuitical project and chymera of a Free-state and Common-wealth was propounded by the c Army-Officers and the sitting Juncto as the only means of our present and future peace and settlement both in Nov. 1647 1648 1649. and yet it hath proved as I then predicted in my Speech and Memento a perpetual Seminarie of new Wars Tumults Combustions Changes Revolutions of Government and Governours Anti-parliamentarie Conventicles Factions Schisms Sects Heresies Confusions and endlesse Taxes Oppressions Ataxies ever since both in Church State Court and Camp almost to our inevitable destruction and of necessity it will and must do so still And is it not then a worse than Bedlam follie and frenzie for our Anti-parliamentarie Juncto Swordmen and Republicans to enforce and impose it on us by mere armed violence against our Judgements Reasons Consciences Experiments and
compel us to maintain Armies and Navies by this New insupportable Tax to set up this Romish Babel which hath been is and will be the most certain Remora and Obstacle of our Peace and Settlement and most apparent Jesuitical Romish Spanish Engin to create more and greater Confusions Distractions than before and effect our inevitable destruction both as men and Protestants 8ly That this pretence of erecting a Common-wealth was first pretended by Cromwell and carried on with specious pretexts to blind the credulous people onlie to make way for his own tyrannical and ambitious usurpation of a more than Regal and Monarchical power over our Kingdoms and settle it on himself and his posteritie in conclusion which he effected by degrees And what intelligent person discerns not the self-same design now couched under it in other ambitious Grandees now in power most eagerly crying up a Free-state and Common-wealth upon the same account 9ly The Anti-parliamentary Unchristian Atheistical if not Diabolical means by which this Utopian Republick was at first endeavoured to be erected established and now again re-edified must needs draw down the full vials of Gods wrath and furie upon it and all its Projectors and our 3. Nations too if they voluntarily submit unto it It was first ushered in by ambitious treacherous perjurious rebellious Army-Officers seduced by Romish Emissaries and their Confederates in the Commons House forcibly secluding securring and ejecting the Majoritie of their Fellow-Members 4. parts of 5. at least only for their Vote to proceed to settle the peace of the Kingdom upon the Kings Concessions after 7. years intestine wars By the close imprisonment of sundry of them in remote Castles for divers years without examination hearing or cause expressed by their suppressing voting down the whole House of Lords without hearing or impeachment over whom they had no Jurisdiction by murdering their Protestant King in a strange Court of Highest injustice by exiling and disinheriting his royal Issue and right Heir to the Crown to make way for their own Usurpation of Soveraign Power by subverting the fundamental Government of the Kingdom and the constitution rights privileges of English Scotish Irish Parliaments and their Members by seising upon disposing and dissipating all the Crown Lands Revenues Customs Forts Forces Navies of our three Kingdoms by imprisoning disinheriting sequestâ—ing exiling destroying murdering manie thousands of their Protestant Brethren and Allyes of England Scotland Ireland Holland merely for their Loyalty and Allegianee by keeping a perpetual Army to over-awe our 3. Nations as conquered Vassals bond-slaves and governing them by armed lust tyrannie militarie Committees High Courts of Justice Major Generals and fleying off their verie Skins by giving a boundlesse libertie to all Religions Sects Heresies Blasphemies Jusque datum seâ—leri c. against all laws of God and Man the fundamental Laws Statutes Liberties Franchises of the Realm the Oaths of Homage Fealty Supremacy Allegiance the Protestations Vows Solemn League and Covenant they had frequently taken themselves and prescribed to others yea against many hundreds of Votes Orders Ordinances Acts Declarations Remonstrances they had successively made and published to the World and all sorts of civil and sacred Obligations to God their King Country the Trusts reposed in them by their Indentures and Commissions as Members or Souldiers by exercising a more lawlesse Tyranny and boundlesse Military power than the worst of all our Kings in any age exacting vaster sums of mony sroÌ„ the exhausted people in lesse than 10. years space than all our Kings since the Norman Conquest And it now carried on again after so many sodain strange admirable demonstrations of Gods indignation against our new Babel-Builders and their Posterities by his various and successive Providences beyond all human apprehensions by the self-same violent exorbitant unrighteous courses unbeseeming Englishmen or Christians and now by re-excluding and ejecting all the old secured and secluded Members by armed force and injurious Votes without accusation hearing crime or impeachment against all rules of Law Justice and Parliamentarie Presidents and of the whole House of Lords against the expresse Letter of the Act by which they pretend to fit By bidding open defiance to the Addresses and Desires of the generality of the Nobility Gentry Ministry Freeholders Commoners Citizens Burgesses of most Counties Cities and Boroughs of England declaring for a Free-Parliament or restitution of all the Secluded Members by imprisoning some * Gentlemen Souldiers of Quality for delivering such Addresses to their Speaker by putting far higher affronts and force upon the City and Common-Council of London after all their former Obligations to them than ever they received from the worst of our Kings in any age before the least hearing or legal conviction of them as Delinquents by moving in the House That all who have declared or made Addresses for a Free Parliament shall be disabled to elect or be elected Members By taking away the peoples freedoms of Election by prescribing new illegal Qualifications against * all Laws and Statutes concerning Elections and all forms of antient Writs both for the persons electing and to be elected to recruit their empty House of which themselves alone not the people will be the only Judges before they shall be admitted when chosen whereby they will like Cromwell and his Council of State keep out any the people shall elect that is not of their confederacy and admit none but when and whom they please to perpetuate the Parliamentary Power and all places of Trust and Gain in themselves and their Creatures And because few or none but Novices shall sit amongst them in Parliamentarie affairs whom they can easily over-reach and rule at their pleasure being Strangers to each other and Parliament proceedings they have voted out all the old Secluded Members though twice their number and disabled them to be new elected or if elected to be re-admitted unless they will fully submit to the Test of their new * Qualifications and Engagements Which will re-seclude all or most of them if elected and prove fatal to the Peoples freedom in their Elections and to all Parliaments and Members in succeeding Ages if submitted to For if a combined Majority of the Commons House who have violated all their primitive Oaths Trusts Protestations Covenants Remonstrances Declarations and so * disabled and disfranchised themselves from sitting any more as Members or the peoples Trustees may without any new election at all by the people after their renuntiation and nulling of their first elections by destroying and engaging against that Regal power by which they were first elected and sitting only by power of the Sword without any Qualifications prescribed to themselves which they impose on others and would seclude most of them from being Electors or Elected Members having gotten forcible possession of the Commons House by armed Tyranny and Usurpation after so many Declarations and bloody wars for the defence of the Privileges Rights and Members
post facto assent to some particulars against my knowledge judgement conscience Oaths of Supremacy Allegiance Pâ—otestation and Solemn League and Covenant taken in the presence of God himself with a sincere heart and real intention to perform the same and persevere therein all the dayes of my life without suffering my self directly or indirectly by whatsoever combination perswasion or terror to be withdrawn therefrom As first That there may be and now is a lawfull Parliament of England actually in being and legally continuing after the Kings death consisting only of a few late Members of the Commons House without either King Lords or most of their Fellow-Commons which the very Consciences and Judgements of all now sitting that know any thing of Parliaments and the whole Kingdom if they durst speak their Knowledge know and believe to be false yea against their Oaths and Covenant Secondly That this Parliament so unduly constituted and packed by power of an army combining with them hath a just and lawfull authority to violate the Privileges Rights Freedoms Customs and alter the Constitution of our Parliaments themselves imprison seclude expel most of their Fellow-Members for voting according to their Consciences to repeal what Votes Ordinances and Acts of Parliament they please erect new Arbitrary Courts of War and Justice to arraign condemn execute the King himself with the Peers and Commons of this Realm by a new kind of Martial law contrary to Magna Carta the Petition of Right and Law of the Land dis-inherit the Kings posterity of the Crown extirpate Monarchy and the whole House of Peers change and subvert the antient Government Seals Laws Writs legal proceedings Courts and coin of the Kingdom sell and dispose of all the Lands Revenues Jewels Goods of the Crown with the Lands of Deans and Chapters as they think meet absolve themselves like so many Antichristian Popes with all the Subjects of England and Ireland from all the Oaths and Engagements they have made TO THE KINGS MAJESTY HIS HEIRS AND SUCCESSORS yea from their verie Oath of Allegiance notwithstanding this expresse clause in it which I desire may be seriously and conscienciously considered by all who have sworn it I do believe and in Conscience am resolved that neither the Pope nor any person whatsoever hath power to absolve me of this Oath or any part thereof which I acknowledge by good and full authoritie to be lawfully ministred unto me and do renounce all pardons and dispensations to the contrary and to dispence with our Protestations Solemn League and Covenant so lately and * zealously urged and injoyned by both Houses on Members Officers Ministers and all sorts of People throughout the Realm to dispose of all the Forts Ships Forces Offices and Places of Honour Power Trust or Profit within the Kingdom to whom they please to displace and remove whom they will from their Offices Trusts Pensions Callings at their pleasures without any legal cause or trial to make what new Acts Laws and reverse what old ones they think meet to insnare inthrall our Consciences Estates Liberties Lives to create new monstrous Treasons never heard of in the world before and declare real Treasons against King Kingdom Parliament to be no Treasons and Loyalty Allegiance due Obedience to our known Laws and consciencious observing of our Oaths and Covenants the breach whereof would render us actual Traytors and perjurious Persons to be no lesse than High Treason for which they may justly imprison dismember disfranchise displace and fine us at their wills as they have done some of late and confiscate our Persons Lives to the Gallows and our estates to their new Exchequer a Tyranny beyond all Tyrannies ever heard of in our Nation repealing Magna Charta c. 29. 5 E. 3. c. 6. 25 Ed. 3. c. 4. 28 Ed. 3. c. 3. 37. E. 3. c. 18. 42 E. 3. c. 3. 25 Ed. 3. c. 2. 11 R. 2. c. 4. 1 H. 4. c. 10. 2 H. 4. Rot. Par. N. 60. 1 E. 6. c. 12. 1 Mar. c. 1. The Petition of Right 3 Caroli the Statutes made in the begining of the Parliament 16 Caroli c. 1 7 8 10 12 14 20. and laying all our * Laws Liberties Estates Lives in the very dust after so many bloody and costly years wars to defend them against the Kings and others invasions raise and keep up what forces they will by Sea and Land impose what heavy Taxes they please and renew increase multiply and perpetuate them on us and on Scotland and Ireland too which no English Parliament ever did before as often and as long as they please to support their own encroached more then Regal Parliamental Super-transcendent Arbitrary power over us and all that is ours or the Kingdoms at our private and the publick charge against our wills judgements consciences to our absolute enslaving and our three Kingdoms ruine by engaging them one against another in new Civil wars and exposing us for a prey to our Forein Enemies All which with other particulars lately acted and avowed by the Imposers of this Tax and sundry others since by colour of that pretended Parliamentary Authority by which they have imposed it I must necessarily admit acknowledge to be just and legal by my voluntary payment of it on purpose to maintain an Army to justifie and make good all this by the meer power of the Sword which they can no waies justifie and defend by the Laws of God or the Realm or the least colour of reason justice honesty religion conscience before any Tribunal of God or Men when legally arraigned as they may one day be Neither of which I can or dare acknowledge without incurring the guilt of most detestable Perjury and highest Treason against King Kingdom Parliament Laws and Liberties of the people and therefore cannot yield to this Assesment Thirdly the principal ends and uses proposed in the prâ—tended Acts and Warrants thereupon for payment of this Tax and other Taxes since are strong obligations to me in point of Coùscience Law Prudence to withstand it which I shall particularly discusse The First is the maintenante and continuance of the prâ—sent Army and Forces in England under the Lord Fairfax Cromwell and other Commanders since To which I say First as I shall with all readinesse gratitude and due respect acknowledge their former Gallantry good and faithfull Services to the Parliament and Kingdom whiles they continued dutifull and constant to their first Engagements and the ends for which they were raised by both Houses as far forth as any man so in regard of their late monstrous defections and dangerous Apostacies from their primitive obedience faithfulnesse and engagements in disobeying the Commands and levying open war against both Houses of Parliament keeping an horrid force upon them at their very doors seising imprisoning secluding abusing and forcing away their Members printing and publishing many high and treasonable Declarations against the Institution Privileges Members and Proceedings of the late and being of
all futurâ— Parliaments imprisoning abusing arraigning condemning and executing our late King against the Votes Faith and Engagements of both Houses and dis-inheriting His posterity usurping the Regal Parliamental Magistratical and Ecclesiastical power of the Kingdom to their General-Council of Officers of the Army and Anti-Parliamentary Conventicles as the supreme swaying Authority of the Kingdom and attempting to alter and subvert the antient Government Parliaments Laws and Customs of our Realms And upon serious consideration of the ordinary unsufferable Assertions of their Officers and Souldiers uttered in most places where they Quarter and to my self in particular sundry times * That the whole Kingdom with all our Lands Houses Goods and whatsoever we have is theirs and that by right of Conquest they having twice conquered the Kingdom That we are but their conquered Slaves and Vassals and they the Lords and Heads of the Kingdom That our very lives are at their mercy and courtesie That when they have gotten all we have from us by Taxes and Free-quarter and we have nothing left to pay them then themselves will seize upon our Lands as their own and turn us and our Families out of doors That there is now no Law in England nor never was if we believe their lying Oracle Peters but the Sword with many such like vapouring Speeches and discourses of which there are thousands of witnesses I can neither in Conscience Law nor Prudence assent unto much lesse contribute in the least degree for their present maintenance or future continuance thus to insult inslave and tyrannize over King Kingdom Parliament People at their pleasure like their conquered Vassals And for me in particular to contribute to the maintenance of those who against the Law of the Land the privileges of Parliament and liberty of the Subject pulled me forcibly from the Commons House and kept me Prisoner about 2. months space under their Martial to my great expence and prejudice and since that close Prisoner near 3. whole years in Dunster Taunton and Pendennis Castles and thrice forcibly excluded me and other Members out of the House May 7. and 9. and Decemb. 27. 1659. without any particular cause pretended or assigned only for discharging my duty to the Kingdom and those for whom I served in the House without giving me the least reparation for this unparallel'd injustice or acknowledging their offence and yet detain some of my then fellow-Members under custody by the meer power of the Sword without bringing them to Trial would be not â—â—ly absurd unreasonable and a tacit justification of this hâ—rrid violence and breath of Privilege but monstrous unnatural perfidious against my Oath and Covenant 2. No Tax ought to be imposed on the Kingdom in Parliament it self but in case of necessity for the common good and defence thereof against forein Enemies or Domestique Traytors and Rebels as is clear by the Stat. of 25 E. 1. c. 6. all Acts for Taxes Subsidiâ—s Tenths Aydes Tonnage and Poundage Cooks 2 Instit. p. 528. Now it is evident to me that there is no necessity of keeping up this Army for the Kingdoms common Good but rather a necessity of disbanding it or the greatest part of it for these reasons 1. Because the whole Kingdom with Scotland and Ireland are generally exhausted by the late 18. years Wars Plunders and heavy Taxes there being more monies levyed on it by both sides during these 18. last years than in all the Kings Reigns since the Conquest as will appear upon a just computation all Counties being thereby utterly unable to pay it 2. In regard of the great decay of Trade the extraordinary dearth of cattel corn and provisions of all sorts the charge of relieving a multitude of poor people who starve with famine in many places the richer sort eaten out by Taxes and Free-quarter being utterly unable to relieve them To which I might adde the multitude of maimed Souldiers with the widows and children of those who have lost their lives in the Wars which is very costly 3. The heavie Contributions to support the Army which destroy all Trade by fore-stalling engrossing most of the Monies of the Kingdoms and enhancing their prices keeping many thousands of able men and horses idle only like moths and locusts to consume other labouring mens provisions estates and the publick Treasure of the Kingdoms when as their employment in their Trades and Callings might much advance trading and enrich the Kingdoms 4. There is now no visible Enemy in the field or elsewhere and the fitting Members boast there is no fear from any abroad their Navie being so Victorious And why such a vast Army should be still continued in the Kingdom to increase its debts and payments when charged with so many great Arrears and Debts already to eat up the Countâ—y with Taxes and Free-quarter only to play drink whore steal rob murther quarrel fight with impeach and shoot one another to death as Traytors Rebels and Enemies to the Kingdom and Peoples Liberties as of late the Levellers and Cromwellists did when this was written and the Lambardists and Rumpists since for want of other imployments and this for the publick Good transcends my understanding 5. When the King had two great Armies in the Field and many Garrisons in the Kingdom this whole Army by its primitive Establishment consisted but of twenty two thousand Horse Dragoons and Foot and had an Establishment only of about Fortie five thousand pounds a month for their pay which both Houses then thought sufficient as is evident by their o Ordinances of Febr. 15. 1644. and April 4 1646. And when the Army was much increased without their Order sixty thousand pounds a month was thought abundantly sufficient by the Officers and Army themselves to disband and reduce all super-numeraries maintain the Established Army and Garrisons and ease the Country of all Free-quarter which Tax hath been constantly pain in all Counties Why then this Tax to the Army should now be raised above the first Establishment when reduced to twenty thousand whereof sundry Regiments are designed for Ireland for which there is thirty thousand pounds a month now enacted beside the sixty for the Army and this for the common good of the Realm and that the Taxes since should be mounted to 120. thousand pounds each month and now again to one hundred thousand pounds for those 6. months for which they have paid in 35. thousand pounds 9. months since before hand only to murther our Protestant Brethren and Allies of Scotland and Holland destroy and oppresse each other and keep up an Anti-Parliamentary Conventicle of Tyrants and Vsurpers to undo enslave and ruine our Kingdoms Parliaments and their Privileges against all their former Oaths Protestations Declarations Covenants is a riddle unto me on rather a Mystery of Iniquity for some mens private â—â—â—re 〈…〉 than the publick weal 6. The Militias of every County for which there was so great contest in Parliament with the late King and
of Parliament shall be quietly permitted without any legal impeachment hearing tryal or cause alleged but only for one just single Vote Decemb. 4. 1648. carryed in a full House after long debate without any division forcibly to seclude and Vote out the greatest part of their Fellow-Members of greatest integritie interest ability and faithfulness to the Publick against all rules of Law Justice and Parliamentarie proceedings and their Electors wills and by new heterogeneal Writs derived from another power and varying in form from those by which themselves were chosen to enforce whole Counties Cities and Boroughs to elect new Knights Citizens and Burgesses to recruit their empty House upon such pernicious Qualifications and Engagements as themselves prescribe both to the Electors and Members to be elected of which themselves will be the only Judges ere they admit them to sit when chosen on purpose to carry on their own private designs and force what Government they please upon the people against their publick Interest and desires to perpetuate our Confusions Oppressions Unsettlements and to disable whom they please to elect or be elected without any publick opposition by the secluded Members and people then endeavoured then farewell Parliaments Laws and Liberties for ever Fourthly The coercive power and manner of levying this contribution expressed in the Act is against the law of the Land and libertie of the Subject which is threefold First Distresse and sale of the Goods of those who refuse to pay it with power to break open their Houses which are their Castles doors chests c. to distrain which is against Magna Chart. c. 29. The Petition of Right 3 Car. The Votes of both Houses in the case of Shipmony 1 R. 2. c. 3. and the resolution of our Judges and Law-books 13 Edw. 4 9. 20 E. 4. 6. Cook 5 Report f. 91 92. Semains case and 4 Inst. p. 176 177. Secondly Imprisonment of the bodie of the party till he pay the Contribution which is contrarie to Magna Charta c. 29. The Petition of Right The resolution of both Houses in the Parliament of 3 Caroli in the case of Loans and 17 Caroli in the case of Shipmony the judgement of our Judges and law-books collected by Sir Edward Cook in his 2 Inst. p. 46 c. the Statute of 2 H. 4 rot parl. n. 6. 16 Car. c. 1 8 10 12 14 20. most expresse in point Thirdly Levying of the contribution by souldiers and force of arms in case of resistance and imprisoning the person by like force adjudged High Treason in the case of the Earl of trafford and a levying of war within the Statute of 25 Ed. 3. by the last Parliament for which he lost his head and proved to be High Treason at large by Master St. John in his Argument at Law at the passing the Bill for his attainder Printed by order of the Commons House Fourthly which heightens the illegality of these illegal means of levying it if any person whose goods are distrained or person imprisoned for these illegal caxes shall bring his Action at Law or an Habeas Corpus for his relief or action of false imprisonment as he may justly do not onely those who now stile themselves Judges forgetting the cases of Judge Thorp Tresilian and others of old and the impeachments of the late Shipmony Judges in the beginning of this Parliament with Mr. St. Johns Speech and Declaration against them worthy their perusal will deny or delay to right and release them for which they deserve Thorps and Tresilians punishments but if these fail them at least wise the new illegal Committee of Indempnity will stay his legal proceedings award costs against him commit him anew till he pay them and release his Sut es at Law and upon an Habeas corpus their own sworn Judges created by them without any Oath to do equal Justice c. to all but onely to be true and faithfull to their new ereâ—ted State and sitting amongst them as Members dare not bail but remaund him against Law An oppression and Tyranny far exceeding the worst of the Beheaded Kings under whom the Subjects had Free-Liberty to sue and proceed at Law both in the cases of Loans Shipmony and Knighthood without any Council-Table or Committee of Indempnity to stop their sutes or force them to release them and therefore in all these respects so repugnant to the Laws and Liberty of the Subject I cannot submit to these illegal Taxes but oppugn them to the uttermost as the most Destructive to our Laws and Libertie that ever were Fifthly The time of the imposing of this illegal Tax with these unlawfull wayes of levying it is very confiderable and sticks much with me it is as the imposers of it declare and publish in many of their new kind of Acts and devices in the first year of Englands Liberty and redemption from thraldom this last after its new revival after 6. years interruption and inter-regnum by Oliver his Son Richard And if this unsupportable Tax thus illegally to be levied be the first fruiâ—s of our first years Freedome and redemption from thraldom as they stile it how great may we expect our next years thraldom will be when this little finger of theirs is heavier by far than the Kings whole loins whom they beheaded for Tyranny and Oppression 6ly The Order of this first Tax if I may so term a disorder or rather newnâ—ss of it engageth me and all lovers of their Countries Liberty unanimously to withstand the same It is the first I find that was ever imposed by any who had been Members of the Commons House after a Parliament dissolved the Lords House voted down and most of their fellow Commoners secured or secluded by their connivance or confederacy with an undutifull Army at first and this latter the first doubled Tax upon the people for the very moneths they advanced â— aid in beforehand by the expresse command and orders of the sitting Members to exclude the secluded ones not only out of the House it self but Lobby too into which the meanest Footboyes and Porters have free accesse Which if submitted to and not opposed as illegal not onely the King or Lords alone without the Commons but any forty or fifty Commoners who have been Members of a Parliament gaining Forces to assist and countenance them may out of Parliament now or any time hereafter do the like and impose what Taxes and Laws they please upon the Kingdom and the secluded Lords and Commons that once sate with them and on Scotland and Ireland too being encouraged thereto by such an unopposed president Which being of so dangerous consequence and example to the constitution and Privileges of Parliament and liberties of the people we ought all to endeavour the crushing of this new Cocâ—atrice in the shell lest it grow up to a Fiery Serpent to consume and sting us to death and induce the imposers of it to lâ—de us with new and
and them odious not only to the Countrie and Kingdom but to all Officers and Souldiers who had any civilitie in them and be a disparagement to the General by whose Proclamation he ought to be present with his Company to keep them in good order under pain of cashiering And therefore I expected and required Justice and Reparations at his hands the rather because I was informed by some of his own Souldiers and others that they had not been so barbarouslie rude but by his incouragement which if he refused I should complain of him to his Superiours and right my self the best way I might After some expostulations he promised to make them examples and cashier them and to remove them forthwith from my house but the only right I had was that more of his Company repaired thither making all the spoil they could and taking away some Brasse and Pewter continued there till near four of the clock and then marched away only out of fear I would raise the Country upon them many of whom profered me their assistance but I desired them to forbear till I saw what their Officers would do who instead of punishing any of them permitted them to play the like Rex almost in other places where they quartered since marching but three or four miles a day and extorting what monies they could from the Country by their violence and disorders Now for me or any others to give monies to maintain such deboist Bedlams and Beasts as these who boasted of their villanies and that they had done me at least twenty pounds spoil in Beer and Provisions drinking out five barrels of good strong Beer and wasting as much meat as would have served an hundred civil Persons to be Masters of our Houses Goods Servants Lives and all we have to ride over our heads like our Lords and Conquerors and take Free-quarter on us amounting to at least a full years contribution without any allowance for it and that since the last Orders against Free-quarter and Warrants issued for paying in this Tax to prevent it for the future is so far against my Reason Judgement and Conscience that I would rather give all away to suppresse discard them or cast it into the fire than maintain such gracelesse wretches with it to dishonour God enslave consume ruine the Country and Kingdom who every where complain of the like insolencies and of taking Free-quarter since the ninth of June as above two hundred of Colonel Cox his men did in Bath the last Lords day who drew up in a Body about the Maiors house and threatned to sâ—ise and carry him away for denying to give them Free-quarter contrary to the New Act for abolishing it Lastly This prâ—tended Act implies that those who refuse to pay this contribution without distresse or imprisonment shall be still oppressed with Free-quarter And what an height of oppression and injustice this will prove not only to distrain and imprison those who cannot in Conscience Law or Prudence submit to this illegal Tax but likewise to undo them by exposing them to Free-quarter which themselves condemn as the highest pest and oppression let all sober men consider and what reason I and others have to oppose such a dangerous destructive president in its first appearing to the world In few words As long as we keep an Army on foot we must never expect to be exempted from Free-quarter or Wars or to enjoy any peace or settlement and as long as we will submit to pay contributions to support an Army we shall be certain our new Lords and Governors will continue an Army to over-awe and enslave us to their wils Therefore the only way to avoid free-quarter and the cost and trouble of an Army and settle peace is to deny all future contributions Ninthly The principal end of imposing this Tax to maintain the Army and Forces now raised is not the defence and safety of our ancient and first Christian Kingdom of England its Parliaments Laws Liberties and Religion as at first but to disinherit the King of the Crown of Engl. Sootl and Irel. to which he hath an undoubted Right by the Laws of God and Man as the Parliament of 1 Jacob ch. â— resolves and to levy War against him to deprive him of it To subvert the antient Monarchical Government of this Realm under which our Ancestors have alwaies lived and flourished to set up a New-Republick the oppressions and Grievances whereof we have already felt by increasing our Taxes setting up arbitrary Courts and Proceedings to the taking away the lives of the late King Peers and other Subjects against the fundamental Laws of the Land creating new monstrous Treasons never heard of in the world before and the like but cannot yet enjoy and discern the least ease or advantage by it To overthrow the antient constitution of the Parliament of England consisting of King Lords and Commons and the Rights and Privileges thereof To alter the fundamental Laws Seals Courts of Justice of the Realm and introduce an Arbitrary Government at least if not Tyrannical contrary to our Laws Oaths Covenant Protestation a publick Remonstrances and Engagements to the Kingdom and forein States not to change the Government or attempt any of the Premises All which being no lesse than High Treason by the Laws Statutes of the Realm as Sir E. Cook in his * Inst. Mr. St. John in his Argument at Law upon passing the Bill of Attainder of the E. of Strafford both printed by the Commons special order have proved at large by many Presidents reasons records and so adjudged by the last Parliament in the Cases of Strafford and * Canterbury who were condemned and executed as Traytors by judgement of Parliament and some of those now sitting but for some of these Treasons upon obscurer Evidences of guilt than are now visible in others I cannot without incurring the Crime and Guilt of these several High Treasons and the eternal if not temporal punishments incident thereunto voluntarily contribute so much as one penny or farthing towards such Treasonable and disloyal ends as these against my Conscience Law Loyalty Duty and all my Oaths Covenants and Obligations to the contrary Tenthly The payment of this Tax for the premised purposes will in my poor judgement and conscience be offensive to God and all good men scandalous to the Protestant Religion dishonourable to our English Nation and disadvantagious and destructive to our whole Kingdom hindering the speedy settlement of our peace the re-establishment of our King Laws the revival of our decayed Trade by renewing and perpetuating our bloody uncivil Wars engaging Scotland Ireland with forein Princes and Kingdoms in a just War against us to avenge the death of our late beheaded King the dis-inheriting of his Posterity and to restore his lawfull Heirs and Successors to their just undoubted Rights from which they are now forcibly secluded who will undoubtedly molest us with continual Wars what-ever some may fondly
sword-men whom we had already found to be men of no very tender conscience And do not the Speaker and all Lawyers and others now sitting in their own Judgments and Consciences and to their friends in private believe say and confess as much that they are no Parliaments and yet have the impudency and the insolency to sit act and Tax yea seclude and imprison us at their pleasures as a real legal and absolute Parliament O Atheisme O Tyranny and Impiety of the worst Edition If then these leading swaying members of the new pretended purged Commons Parliament and Army deemed the Parliament even before the Kings beheading a Mock-parliament a mock-power a pretended Parliament yea no Parliament at all and absolutely resoved to pull it up by the roots as such then it necessarily folows First That they are much more so after the Kings death and their suppression of the Lords House and purging of the Commons House to the very dregs in the opinions and consciences of those now sitting and all other rational men And no wayes enabled by Law to impose this or any other new Tax or Acts upon the Kingdom or to create any new Treasons Confiscations Sequestrations and Penalties and being themselves in truth the worst and greatest of all Traytors and Tyrants Secondly that these grand Saints of the Army and Steersmen of the pretended Parliament and all Gown-men confederating with them knowingly sit vote and act there against their own judgments and consciences for their own private pernicious ends Thirdly that it is a baseness cowardize and degeneracy beyond all expression for any of their fellow-members now acting to suffer these Grandees in their Assembly and Army to sit or vote together with them or to enjoy any Office or command in the Army under them or to impose any Tax upon the people to maintain such Officers Members Souldiers who have thus vilified affronted their pretended Parliamentary Authority and thereby induced others to contemn and question it and forcibly excluded and imprisoned the greatest part of the Members and whole House of Peers in order to their own future exclusion and as great a baseness in them and others for to pay it upon any terms Secondly he there affirms that d d P. 26 27. Oliver Crumwel by the help of the Army at their first Rebellion against the Parliament was no sooner up but like a perfidious base unworthy man c. the House of Peers were his onely white boys and who but Oliver who before to me had called them in effect both Tyrants and Usurpers became their Proctor where ever he came yea and set his son Ireton at work for them also insomuch that at some meetings with some of my friends at the Lord Whartons Lodgings he clapt his hand upon his breast and to this purpose professed in the sight of God upon his conscience THAT THE LORDS HAD AS TRUE A RIGHT TO THEIR LEGISLATIVE Note and JURISDICTIVE POWER OVER THE COMMONS AS HE HAD TO THE COAT UPON HIS BACK and he would procure a friend viz. Master Nathaniel Fiennes should argue and plead their just right with any friend I had in England And not onely so but did he not get the General and Councel of War at Windsor about the time that the Votes of no more addresses were to pass to make a Declaration to the whole world declaring THE LEGAL RIGHT OF THE LORDS HOUSE and THEIR FIXED RESOLUTION TO MAINTAIN and UPHOLD IT which was sent by the General to the Lords by Sir Hardresse Waller and to indear himself the more unto the Lords in whose house without all doubt he intended to have sate himself he required me evil for good and became my enemy to keep me in Prison out of which I must not stirre unless I would sloop and acknowledge the Lords jurisdiction over Commoners and for that end he sets his agents and instruments at work to get me to do it yet now they themselves have suppressed them Whence it is most apparent 1. That the General Lieutenant General Cromwel Col. Ireton Harison and other Officers of the Army now sitting as Members and over-ruling all the rest * * See my Plea for the Lords and House of Peers yea all other Lawyers Members sitting with them have wittingly acted against their own knowledges Declarations Judgments Consciences in suppressing the Lords House and depriving them of their Legislative and Jurisdictive Right and power by presuming to make Acts pass sentences and impose Taxes without them or their assents in Parliament contrary to the express Acts of 16 17 Caroli c. 1. 7 8 12 14 20. and hundreds of Ordinances Remonstrances Declarations the Protestation Vow and Solemn League and Covenant made this Parliament by the Votes of most now sitting 2. That this Tax enforced upon the Commons and Kingdom for their own particular advantage pay and enrichment and to suppress the House of Lords is in their own judgments and conscience both unjust and directly contrary to the Laws of the Realm being not assented to by the Lords and therefore to be unanimously and strenuously opposed by all the Lords and other Englishmen who love their own or Countries Liberties or have any Nobility or Generosity in them Thirdly he e e Pag. 34. 39 40. 56 47. there asserts in positive terms in his own behalf and his confederates That the purged Parliament now sitting is but a pretended Parliament a mock-Parliament yea and in plaine English NO PARLIAMENT AT ALL but the shadow of a Parliament That those Company of men at Westminster that gave Commission to the high Court of Justice to try and behead the King c. were no more a Parliament by Law or Representatives of the people by the rule of Justice and Reason then such a company of men are a Parliament or Representative of the People that a company of armed Thieves choose and set apart to try judge condemn hang or behead any man that they please or can prevail over by the power of their Sword to bring before them by force of arms to have their lives taken away by prâ—tence of JUSTICE grounded upon rules meerly flowing from their VVills and Swords That no Law in England authoriseth a company of servants to punish and correct their Masters or to give a Law unto them or to throw them at their pleasure out of their power and set themselves down in it which is the Armies case with the Parliament especially at Thomas Pride's late purge which was an absolute dissolution of the very Essence and being of the House of Commons to set up indeed a MOCK-POVVER and a MOCK-PARLIAMENT by purging out all those that they were any way jealous of would not Vote as they would have them and suffering and permitting none to sit but for the Major part of them a company of absolute School-boys that will like good Boys say their Lessons after them their Lords and Masters and vote what they would have
m. 24. dorso n 49. E. 3. 18 19. 21. H. 7. 4. Brook Customs 6. 32. * The 1. part of the Parliamentary writs p. 411 to 422. Cooks 4 Instit. 75 76 1 Iac. c. 1 2. Iac c. 3 4. 7 Iac. c. 1. 12 Car. c. 17. Object Answ a See my Plea for the Lords and House of Peers and Historical Collection of the Great Councils and Parliaments and Fundamental Rights Laws and Libertiâ—â— of all English Freemen b Printed by it self and in a Declaration of the Engagements and Remonstrances c. of the General and General Councill of Officers of the Army London 1647 p. 107. 108. 1 Is there not a greater longer force and violence offered to both Houses ever since Dec 1648. by aimed souldiers than that by the unarmed Apprentices but for a few hours 2 How can you dispence with your self to fit since Dec. 6. passing Votes to seclude exclude the Lords your fellow Members and to Tax them at your pleasure not believe them voyd null * Nor yet by those now sitting against the Lords and our forcible exclusion but new votes in justification thereof 3 The Army could not with all their power and menaces inforce the sâ—cluded Members to Vote against their Judgements Consciences ec 4. 1648. 4 Why hav and do you yet serve the Juncto in a false and Anti-Parliamentary way near as many years more to abuse and deceive them 5 Have you not done it since in the highest degree by High Courts of Justice securing secluding imprisoning banishing disanheriting thousands and imposing Taxes and Excises on them against all our Laws 6 Have you nor conscientiously observed them by secluding ejecting the Lords and your fellow Members by subverting all Rights Privileges of Parliament and Liberties of the Subject 7 Why do you not now much more absent your selves upon the same account 8 If it was so great a crime to lock and keep them in the House Was yea is it not a far worse and gâ—eater crime in you and your Juncto to lock the Lords and your fellow Members and keep them forcibly oâ—t of the Houses for so many years till you have passed what new Vores and set up what new Government and imposed what Tixes you please upon them against their wills 9 And is it not a greater breach of ptivilege for you to vote out most of the Members without hearing them 10 The Major Vote therfore Dec. 4. 1648 ought to carry it as well as then 11 Did you not far worse in seeuring â—â—cluding imprisoning ejecting the majority of your fellow-Members onely for voting against the minority Dec. 4 12 And can you discharge them by sitting now when the Majority of the Members Lords are secluded and forcibly kept out by your Orders and not permitted to sit with freedome safetie 1 Was not the armea sorce secluding and keeeping away most of the Members since 1648. sar worse than this 2 Why have not the Army-Officers most Members subscribing this Engagement and making and commending this resolution kept this resolution but apostatized from it ever since December 6. 1648. and acted quite contrary to it 3 Therefore now much more by the Members acting and continuing force upon the majority 4 They have been faithlesse more than once or twice to the secluded Members and the Iuncto too since this 5 Did you really perform this Engagement by ordering the Army to secure and seclude the Majority of youâ— fellow-members and whole House of Lords heretâ—fore twice of late 6 Have not the Armie most of those sâ—bseribers since Dec. 6. 1648. laid the greatest reproach 〈◊〉 sorce upon the Nation brought offered greater contempts to the Honour 〈◊〉 esteem Privileges Members of parliament than the Apprentices or the 〈…〉 men in any age 7 Is not this the case of the secluded and excluded Members in respect of their Electors and the Kingdom 8 Is not this the speech and answer of the secluded Lords Commons to the Kingdom and people 9 Is not this the true stile and Character of all thâ—se since forcibly secluding the Lords and their fellow Members 10 The secluded Lords and Commons now tâ—ust so too 11 Most Counties now begin to do it for their secluded Members restitution or a New Free Parliament without limitation * Now sitting as a Commoner 1 That on Dec. 6 7. 1648 and since that till now hath been worse longer and more unparalleld 2 And doth it not gainsay the Armies Officers Professions Commissions Protestations Declarations and other Obligations to protect the Parl. and Secluded Lords Commons 3 The force since on the Houses hath effected it 4 Do not the Officers Members deserve to be so served for securing secluding us * The Armies Declaration p. 120 c. wo Is it not Arrse for the Mmy and sitting bloembers to dock up the thors against me Lords and most of the Comisons and to oeep them fut of the houses or sundry years 2 Was not the Armies seising secluding pulling and keeping those out who gave their Votes against their Designs Dec. 6. 1648. shutting them out ever since imprisoning some of them sundry years far worse than this 4 It was far worse to fill them with Soldiers Troopers Dec. 6 7. and since to seelude the most of the Members by force 5 And now six times more of them are driven away by the Army 5 Do not the people esteem the secluded Members suâ—h and are not they the supreme Authority by the Armies sitting Members own Votes Jan. 4. 1648 * They went not to them till thus â—â—â—ited 6 And ought not the Army and English Nation thus to engage much more to the now secluded Lords and Members 7 It is usual and legal in the Speakers absence or sicknesse 8 And aâ—e you not and the Kingdom too now much more convicted of this truth 9 And are not all since Dec. 6. 1648. till now much more null and void for the same reason * Is not yours of Dec. 27. Jan. 5. 1659. far more unparalleld to the Parliament and all the free-born Subjects 10 Much more then now the excluding Members 11 And ought not the Army and â— Monk nâ—w to do the like 12 Are not the sitting secluders of the Lords and majority of the Commons far greater Delinquents deserving greater punishment 13 Remember and fulfill these Promises now at least to the Parliament King Kingdom which Crosse your Engagements Abjurations of King and Kingship to set up an Utopian Commonwealth * Ne dhams Interest will not but lye * And more since their secluding and securing Dec. 6. 7. 1648. * Therefore all since Dec. 6. till now are void by the self-same reasons * See my Pâ—ea for the Lords p. 371 to 419. * Par in paâ—em non habet Imperium vel Jurisdictionem Bracton l. 5. c. 15. f. 412. Object Answ * Exact Collection p. 5 6. ¶ 61.
humane expectation as he hath done of late and I trust he will sâ—dainly do again to the rejoycing and reviving of all good men Which is the hope and expectation of thine and his Native Countries true Friend and Servant William Prynne Lincolns Inne Feb. 12. 1659. A Legal Vindication of the Liberties and Properties of all ENGLISH FREEMEN Against ILLEGAL TAXES OR REASONS Assigned By WILLIAM PRYNNE c. BEing on the 7th of this instant June 1649. informed by the Assessors of the Parish of Swainswicke that I was assessed at 2 l. 5 s. for Three Moneths Contribution by virtue of a pretended Act of the Commons assembled in Parliament bearing date the seventh of April last assessing the Kingdom at Ninety thousand pounds Monthly beginning from the 25 of March last and continuing for Six moneths next ensuing towards the maintenance of the Forces to be continued in England and Ireland and the paying of such as are thought fit to be disbanded that so Free-quarter may be taken off whereof 3075 l. 17 s. 1 d. ob is monethly imposed on the County and 4 l. 5 s. 3 d. on the small poor Parish where I live and being since on the fifteenth of June required to pay in 2 l. 5 s. for my proportion I returned the Collector this Answer That I could neither in Conscience Law nor Prudence in the least measure submit to the voluntary payment of this illegal Tax and unreasonable Contribution after all my unrepaired losses and sufferings for the publick Liberty amounting to six times more than SHIP-MONEY the times considered or any other illegal Tax of the late beheaded King so much declaimed against in our three last Parliaments by some of those who imposed this And that I would rather submit to the painfullest death and severest punishment the Imposers or Exactors of it could inflict upon me by their arbitrary power for legal they had none than voluntarily pay or not oppose it in my place and calling to the uttermost upon the sâ—me if not better reasons â—â— I oppugned a Ship-money Knighthood and other unlawful Impositions of the late King and his Councell heretofore And that they and all the world might bear witness I did it not from meer obstinacy or sullenness but out of solid real grounds of Conscience Law Prudenoe and publick affection to the weal and liberty of my native Country now in danger of being enslâ—ved under a new vassallage more gâ—ievous than the worst it ever yet sustained under the late or any other of our worst Kings I promised to draw up the Reasons of this my resusal in writing and to publish them so soon as possible to the Kingdome for my own Vindication and the better Information and satisfaction of all such as are any wayes concerned in the imposing collecting levying or paying of this strange kind of Contribution In pursuance whereof I immediately penned these insuing Reasons against that Taxe in 1649. which I augmented with some new additions against the hundred thousand pound Tax each month imposed on us by our worse then Egyptian Tax-Masters now for those very six ensuing months space they payed in long since before they became due by their forced Exactions and Distresses against all rules of Justice Law Conscience and presidents of former times which I humbly submit to the impartial Censure of all conscientious and judicious Englishmen desiring either their ingenuous Refutation if erroneous or candid Approbation if substantial and irrefragable as my conscience and judgement perswade me they are and that they will appear so to all impartial Perusers after full examination First By the fundamental Laws and known Statutes of this Realm No Tax Tallage Ayd Imposition Contribution Loan or Assessement whatsoever may or ought to be imposed or levied on the free men and people of this Realm of England but by the WILL and COMMON ASSENT of the EARLS BARONS Knights Burgesses Commons and WHOLE REALM in a free and full PARLIAMENT by ACT OF PARLIAMENT All Taxes c. not so imposed levyed though for the common defence and profit of the Realm being unjust oppressive inconsistent with the Liberty and Property of the Subject Laws and Statutes of the Realm as is undeniably evident by the express Statutes of Magna Charta cap. 29 30. 25. E. 1. c. 5 6. 34. E. 1. De Tallagio non concodendo c. 1. 14 E. 3. Stat. 1. c. 21. Stat. 2. c. 1. 15. E. 3. Stat. 2. c. 1. Stat. 3. cap. 5. 21. E. 3. Rot. Parl. n. 16. 25. E. 3. c. 8. Rot. Parl. n. 15. 27. E. 3. Stat. 2. c. 2. 36. E. 3. Rot. Parl. n. 26. 38. E. 3. c. 2. Rot. Parl. n. 40. 45. E. 3. Rot. Parl. n. 42. 51. E. 3. Rot. Parl. n. 25. 11 H. 4. Rot. Parl. n. 10. 1. R. 3. c. 2. The Petition of Right and Resolutions of both Houses against Loans 3. Caroli The Votes and Acts against Ship-money Knighthood Tonnage and Poundage and the Star-chamber this last Parliament Ann. 16. 17. Car. c. 8. 12. 14. 20. And fully argued and demonstrated by Mr. William Hackwell in his Argument against Impositions Judg Hutton and Judg Crook in their Arguments and Mr. St. John in his Argument and Speech against Ship-money with other Arguments and Discourses of that subject Sir Edward Cook in his 2 Instit. published by Order of the Commons House pag. 59. 60 c. 527 528 529 532 533 c. with sundry other Records and Law-books cited by those great Rabbies of the Law and Patriots of the Peoples Liberties But the present Tax of Ninety Thousand pounds a Moneth now exacted of me An. 1649. and this of an Hundred thousand pounds each moneth now demanded was not thus imposed Therefore it ought not to be demanded of or levied of me and I ought in conscience law and prudence to withstand it as unjust oppressive inconsistent with the Liberty and Property of the Subject Laws and Statutes of the Realm even by the Junctoes Knack of Oct. 11. 1659. To make good the Assumption which is onely questionable First This Tax was not imposed in but out of Parliament the late Parliament being actually dissolved above two moneths before this pretended Act by these Tax-imposers taking away the King by a violent death as is expresly resolved by the Parliament of 1 H. 4. Rot. Parl. N. 1. by the Parliament of 14 H. 4. and 1 H. 5. Rot. Parl. N. 26. Cook 4. Institutes p. 46. and 4 E. 4. 44. b and I have largely and irrefragably proved in my true and perfect Narrative 1659. For the King being both the Head beginning end and foundation of the Parliament as Modus tenendi Parliamentum and Sir Edward Cooks 4 Instit. p. 3. resolve which was summoned and constituted onely by his writ now actually abated by his death and the Parliament as is evident by the clauses of the several Writs of Summons to c the Lords and for the election of the Knights
and Burgesses and levying of their wages being only PARLIAMENTUM NOSTRUM the Kings Parliament that is dead not his Heirs and Successors and the Lords and Commons being all summoned and authorized by it to come to OUR PARLIAMENT there to be personally present and confer with US NOBISCUM not Our Heirs and Successors of the weighty and urgent affairs that concerned NOS US and OUR KINGDOM of England and Knights and Burgesses receiving their wages for Nuper ad NOS ad PARLIAMENTVM NOSTRUM veniendo c. quod sommoneri FECINUS ad tractandum ibidem super diversis arduis Negotiis NOS Statum REGNI NOSTRI tâ—ngentibus as the tenor of the d Writs for their wages determines The King being dead and his Writs and Authority by which they were summoned with the ends for which they were called to conferre with US about US and OUR KINGDOMS affairs c. being thereby absolutely determined without any hopes of revival the Parliament it self must thereupon absolutely be determined likewise especially to those who have disinherited HIS HEIRS and SUCCESSORS and voted down our Monarchy it self and they with all other Members of Parliament cease to be any longer Members of it being made onely such by the Kings abated Writ even as all Judges Justices of peace and Sheriffs made only by the Kings Writs or Commissions not by his Letters Patents cease to be Judges Justices and Sheriffs by the Kings death for this very reason because they are constituted Justiciarios Vicecomites NOSTROS ad Pacem NOSTRAM c. custodiendam and he being dead and his Writs and Commissions expired by his death they can be Our Judges Justices and Sheriffs no longer to preserve OUR Peace c. no more than a wife can be her deceased Husbands Wife and bound to his obedience from which she was loosed to his death Rom. 7. 2 3. And his Heirs and Successors they cannot be unlesse he please to make them so by his new Writs or Commissions as all our e Law-books and Judges have frequently resolved upon this very reason which equally extends to Members of Parliament as to Judges Justices and Sheriffs as is agreed in 4 E. 4. f. 43 44. and Brook Office and Officer 25 Therefore this Tax being clearly imposed not in but out of and after the Parliament ended by the Kings decapitation and that by such who were then no lawfull Knights Citizens Burgesses or Members of Parliament but only private men their Parliamentary Authority expiring with the King it must needs be illegal and contrary to all the forecited Statutes as the Convocations and Clergies Tax and Benevolence granted after the Parliament dissolved in the year 1640. was resolved to be by both Houses of Parliament and those adjudged high Delinquents who had any hand in promoting it as the Impeachments against them evidence drawnup by some now acting 2. Admit the late Parliament still in being yet the House of Peers Earls and Barons of the Realm were no wayes privy nor consenting to this Tax imposed without yea against their consents in direct affront of their * most antient undubitable Parliamentary Right and Privileges these Taxmasters having presumed to vote down and null their very House by their new encroached transcendent power as appears by the title and body of this pretended Act entituled by them An Act of THE COMMONS assembled in Parliament Whereas the House of Commons alone though full and free have no more lawfull Authority to impose any Tax upon the People or make any Act of Parliament or binding Law without the Kings or Lords concurrence than the Man in the Moon or the Convocation Anno 1640. after the Parliament dissolved as is evident by the expresse words of the fore-cited Acts the Petition of Right it self the Acts for the Triennial Parliament and against the proroguing or dissolving this Parliament 16 Car. c. 1 7. with all our printed Statutes f Parliament-Rolls and g Law-books they neither having nor challenging the sole Legislative power in any age and being not so much as summoned to nor constitutive Mâ—mbers of our h antient Parliaments which consisted of the King Spiritual and Temporal Lords without any Knights Citizens or Burgesses as all our Histories and Records attest till 49 H. 3. at soonest they having not so much as a Speaker or Commons House till after the beginning of King E. the third's reign and seldom or never presuming to make or tender any Bills or Acts to the King or Lords but Petitions only to them to redress their grievances and enact new Laws till long after R. the seconds time as our Parliament Rolls and the printed Prologues to the Statutes of 1 4 5 9 10 20 23 36 37. and 50 Edw. 3. 1 Rich 3. 1 2 4 5 7 9 11 13 Hen. 4. 1 2 3 4 8 9 Hen. 5. 1 2 3 4 6 8 9 10 11 14 15 29 28 29. 39 Hen. 6. 1 4 7 8 12 17. 22 Ed. 4. and 1 Rich. 3. evidence which run all in this form At the Parliament holden c. by THE ADVICE and ASSENT OF THE LORDS SPIRITUAL and TEMPORAL and at THE SPECIAL INSTANCE and REQUEST OF THE COMMONS OF THE REALM BY THEIR PETITIONS put in the said Parliament as some Prologues have it Our Lord the King hath caused to be ordained or ordained certain STATVTES c. Where the advising and assenting to Laws is appropriated to the Lords the ordaining of them to the King and nothing but the requesting of and petitioning for them to the Commons and that both from King and Lords in whom the Legislative power principally and before 49 H. 3. originally and solely resided as is manifest by the printed Prologue to the Statute of Merton 20 Hen. 3. The Statute of Mortemain 7 E. 1. 31 E. 1. De Asportatis Religiosorum the Statute of Sheriffs 9 Ed. 2. and of the Templers 17 Ed. 2. to cite no more Therefore this Tax imposed by the Commons alone without King or Lords must needs be void illegal and no wayes obligatory to the Subjects 3. Admit the whole House of Commons in a full and free Parliament had power to impose a Tax and make an Act of Parliament for levying of it without King or Lords which they never once did or pretended to in any age yet this Act and Tax can be no waies obliging because not made and imposed by a full and free House of Commons but by an empty House packed swayed over-awed by the chief Officers of the Army and their Confederates in the House who having presumed by mere force and armed power against Law and without President to seclude the major part of the House at least eight parts of ten who by Law and Custom are the House it self from sitting or voting with them contrary to the Freedom and Privileges of Parliament readmitting none but upon their own terms of renouncing their own forme Votes touching the Kings
these illegal Taxes or the undue manner of imposing them without the Lords concurrence had they been present And I my self being both an unjustly imprisoned and secluded Member and neither of the Knights of the County of Somerset where I live present or consenting to these Acts or Taxes both of them being forced thence by the Army and sitting Members and one of them now dead and the other excluded I conceive neither my self nor the Countie where I live nor the Borough for which I served nor the people of these Kingdoms in the least measure bound by these Acts or Taxes but clearly exempted from them and obliged with all our might and power effectually to oppose them If any here object That by the custome of Parliament forty members onely are sufficient to make a Commons House of Parliament and there were at least so many present when this Tax was imposed Therefore it is valid obligatory both to the secluded Members and the Kingdome I answer First That though regularly it be true that forty members are sufficient to make a Commons House to begin praiers businesses of lesser moment in the beginning of the day till the other Members come and the House be full yet 40. were never in any Parliament reputed a competent number to grant Subsidies Taxes passe or read Bills or debate or conclude matters of greatest moment which by the constant Rules and usage of Parliament were never debated concluded passed but in a free and sull House when all or most of the Members were present as the Parliament Rolls Journals Modus tenendi Parliamentum Sir Edward Cooks 4 Institutes p. 1. 2. 26. 35. 36. Cromptons Jurisdiction of Courts f. 1. c. 39. E. 3. 7. Brook Parliament 27. 1 Jac. c. 1. and the many Records I have cited to this purpose in my Levellers Ievelled my Plea for the Lords and Memento p. 10. the exact Abridgement of the Records in the Tower p. 11. 13 14. 19. 31. 36. 43. 46. 50. 51. 66. 69. 73. 74. 78. 90. 92. 96. 105. 120. 144. 152 154. 167. 169. 173. 182. 188. 193. 195. 202. 281. 286. 287. 290. 298. 308. 318. 318. 331. 335. 371. 373. 392. 426 427. 428. 430. 439. 440. 450. 454. 555. 464. 465. 665. 750. abundantly prove beyond contradiction for which cause the Members ought to be fined and lose their wages if absent without special Licence as Modus tenendi Parliamentum 5 R. 2. Par. 2. c. 4. 9. H. 8. c. 16. and A Collection of all Orders c. of the late Parliament p. 224. 357. with the frequent summoning and fining absent Members evidence Secondly though forty Members onely may peradventure make an House in case of absolute necessity when the rest through sickness and publick or private occasions are voluntarily or negligently absent and might freely repair thither to sit or give their Votes if they pleased yet forty Members never yet made a Commons House by custome of Parliament there being never any such case till now when the rest being above four times their number were forcibly secluded or driven thence by an Army raised to defend them through the practice connivance or command of those forty or fifty sitting of purpose that they should not over nor counter-vote them much lesse an House to sequester or expell the other Members or impose any Tax upon them Till they shew me such a Law Custome or President not to be found in any age all they pretend is nothing to purpose or the present case 3ly The visible horrid armed force upon both Houses of Parliament suppressing and secluding the whole House of Peers a against their undoubted hereditary and most ancient right to sit and vote in all Parliaments of England ratified by the first Act made this Parliament 16 Car. c. 1. and the Act for the continuance thereof 17 Car. c. 7. by pretext whereof the Members now sit their forcible seclusion of the far greatest part of the House of Commons onely for their Vote of Dec. 5. 1648. to settle the peace of the Kingdoms after a long-lasting intestine war upon most safe and honourable terms by the Army raised for their defence to sit and vote in safety as it totally subverts all the rights Priviledges and Constitution of our Parliaments so it utterly nalls all their Votes Orders Ordinances Taxes and Impositions whatsoever to all intents as I shall evidence beyond contradiction 1. By b the Declaration of WILLIAM LENTHAL Esquire SPEAKER of the Honourable HOUSE OF COMMONS Printed July 29. 16 7. by his direction then and rising up in Judgement gainst him and all his sitting Conventicles ever since the forcible exclusion of the most of their fellow-Members and the Lords by their expresse order and confederacy A Declaration of William Lenthall Esquire Speaker of the Honorable House of Commons ALthough it may happily be contrary to the expectation of some that I attend not the service of the House of Commons at this time as I have constantly done for 7. years last past yet can it not be reasonably expected by any that well consider the 1 violence offered to both Houses of Parl. and to my self in particular on Monday last insomuch that I can safely take it upon my conscience and so I doubt not may all the Members of both Houses also they sate in continual fear of their lives and by terrour thereof were compelled to passe such Votes as it pleased an unruly multitude to force upon them which as I did then openly declare in the House so I cannot but believe that they are all void and null being extorted by force and violence and in that manner that they were and 2 I cannot any longer dispence with my self to be an instrument in passing such Votes or to give any colour or shadow of Parliamentary authority unto them which are not the Votes of the representative body of the Kingdom but of a tumultuous multitude as those must needs be accompted that seemed to passe the House on Monday last and which shall passe hereafter untill better provision be made for the safe and free sitting of the Houses of Parliament there being no effectual * course taken by the City since the last adjournment of the Houses to prevent the like tumults for the future no nor so much as a Declaration from them to shew their dislike thereof But on the contrary it is generally voyced in the Town that there will be a far greater confluence of Apprentices Reformadoes and others on Friday at the Parliaments doors and particularly notice was given to me that after they 3 had made the House Vote what they please they would destroy me I had likewise information given me that there would be a great number of Apprentices of a contrary Opinion and affections to the other about the Parliament doors on Friday morning which I fore-saw must of necessity cause a great combustion and in probability occasion much blood-shed
service of the Parliament And whereas those Members of the House could not return to sit in safety before Friday the 6. of August It is therefore declared by the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled that the Ordinance of Monday the said 26. of July for the repealing and making void of the Ordinance of the 23. of the said July for the setling of the Militia of the City of London being gained by force and violence And all Votes Orders Ordinances passed in either or both Houses of Parliament since the said Ordinance of the 26. of July to the said 6. of Aug. * are null and void and were so at the making thereof are hereby declared so to be the Parliament being under a force and not free Provided alwaies and be it ordained that no Person or Persons shall be impeached for his or their actions by or upon or according to the foresaid Votes Orders or Ordinances unlesse he or they shall be found guilty of contriving acting or abetting the aforesaid visible or actual force or being present at or hearing of the said force did afterwards Act upon the Votes so forced c. John Brown Cler. Parliamentorum This force mentioned in all these 5. Declarations Engagements and Protests against it by the Army-Officers fugitive Members was far inferior and no waies comparable to the force upon the secured and secluded Members but far inferior thereto in these respects 1. That force was only by a few unarmed tumultuous London Apprentices who had neither Sword nor Musquet nor Pike nor Stick in their hands This upon the secluded Members was by whole Regiments Troops Companies of Horse and Foot armed with Swords Musquets Pikes Pistols 2. That force was upon this account only to presse the Houses to repeal an Ordinance surreptitiously procured to settle the Militia of London without their privities to the disservice of the City and Parliament passed but 3. daies before Theirs to prevent a settlement of the Peace of the Kingdom upon our vote touching the Kings Answer to the Propositions of both Houses for the publick Peace Safety and honour of the Parliament and three Kingdoms 3. Their tumult and force lasted but a few houres and part of one day and then vanished That secluding and securing the Members continued sundry years and ever since the Junctoes two last sittings till this present 4. That force neither secluded nor secured not drove away any one Member from the Houses during its continuance but only kept them tumultuously in the House till the Ordinance of July 23 was repealed by them and then vanished This was purposely imployed to secure above 40. and seclude the Majority of the Members of the Commons House and whole House of Peers by violence against their Privileges Trusts and our Laws and is still continued for that end 5. That force caused some few eminent Members only to absent themselves from the Houses and repair to the Army 3. or 4. daies after the force was ended upon the Armies invitation being the far lesser part of both Houses This force secured imprisoned and actually kept out and drove away 5. parts of 6. from the House and that by practice and combination of some Members of the House to seclude the rest lest they should over-vote them and since by their expresse Orders and Commands kept out by armed guards for that end 6. This force was by such who were never raised commissioned waged to preserve the Houses and Members from violence that they might freely sit and vote without disturbance This by Souldiers specially raised commissioned intrusted paid to defend their persons and Privileges freely to sit and vote without interruption or seclusion 7. That force was condemned disowned by all the Members of both Houses as well those who remained sitting or those who absented themselves This justified approved commanded even by those now sitting though they condemned it as Treasonable and Criminal in these Apprentices and in Cromwel Lambert and other Army-Officers since in their own cases 8. This inconsiderable force nulled and made void all Votes Acts Ordinances passed not only during the continuance of this horrid actual visible force upon the Houses on July 26. but likewise from that day till the 6. of Aug. only because those few Members invited to the Army were forced as they affirmed to absent themselves from the service of the Parliament and could not return to sit in safety before that day though there was neither force nor guards during that space upon either House to deter or drive them thence Therfore upon all these Considerations The Ordinance made for this first Tax of 90000. and now for 100000. l. a month during the forcible securing secluding of the whole House of Peers and Majority of the Commons House must much more be null and void and were so at the time of their making to all intents the Parl. and Houses being under a more horrid insolent visible and actual force before and at the making of them keeping out the Major part of the Members than ever the Apprentices or any age were formeâ—ly guilty of and so no waies obliging the excluded Lords Members or any others whatsoever our secluders themselves and these their Resolutions being Judges which do all justify the Protestation published in their names though not owned by them Dec. 11. 15 8. to be no jâ—st cause â—â—t their Ejection by the pretended Ordinance of Dec. 5. made by 3. Lords and 45. Commoners only whiles both Houses were under the Armies force and so be null and void to all intents Fourthly Neither forty Members nor a whole House of Commons were ever enough in any age by the Custom of Parliament or Law of England to impose a Tax or make any Act of Parliament without the King and House of Lords as I have already proved and largely and irrefragably evidenced in my Plea for the Lords and House of Peers My Levellers Levelled The 1. and 2. Part of my Register and Survey of Parliamentary Writs My true and perfect Narrative and full Declaration of the state of the Case of the secluded Members much lesse can they do it after they ceased to be Members by the Parliaments dissolution through the Kings beheading Neither were they ever invested with any legal power to seclude or expel any of their fellow Members especially if duly elected for any Vote wherein the Majority of the House concurred with them or for voting against or differing in their consciences and judgements from them nor for any other cause without the Kings and Lords concurrence in whom the ordinary judicial power of the Parliament resides as I have undeniably proved by presidents and reasons in my Plea for the Lords p. 305 to 428. and Ardua Regni which is further evident by Claus. Dors. 7 R. 2. M. 32. Mr. Seldens Titles of Honour p. 737. Banneret Camoys Case discharged from being Knight of the Shire by the Kings Writ and judgement alone
without the Commons vote because a Peer of the Realm the practice of expelling Commons by their fellow Commons only being * a late dangerous unparliamentary usurpation unknown to our Ancestors destructiue to the Privileges and Freedom of Parliaments and injurious to those Counties Cities Boroughs whose Trustees are secluded the House of Commons it selfbeing no Court of Justice to give either an Oath or final Sentence and having no more Authority to dismember their fellow-Members than any * Judges Justices of the peace or Committees have to disjudge dis-Justice or discommittee their fellow-Judges Justices or Committee-men being all of equal authority and made Members only by the Kings Writ and peoples Election not by the Houses or other Members Votes who yet now presume both to make and unmake seclude and recall expel and restore their fellow-Members at their pleasure contrary to the practice and resolution of former ages to patch up a factious Conventicle instead of an English Parliament Therefore this Objection no waies invalids this first Reason why I neither can nor dare submit to this illegal Tax in conscience law or prudence which engage me to oppose it in all these Respects If any Object That true it is the Parliament by the common Law and Custom of the Realm determines by the Kings death but by the Statute of 17 Caroli c. 6. which enacts That this present Parliament now assembled shall not be dissolved unlesse it be by Act of Parliament to be passed for that purpose continues the Parliament still in being notwithstanding the Kings beheading since no Act of Parliament is passed for its dissolution The only pretext for to support this continuance of the Parliament since the Kings violent death To this I answer That it is a Maxime in Law That every Statute ought to be expounded according to the intent of those that made it and the mischiefs is intended only to prevent as is resolved in 4 Edw. 4. 12. 12 Edw. 4. 18. 1 H. 7. 12 13. Plowd Com. fol. 369. and Cooks 4. Instit. p. 329 330. Now the intent of the Makers of this Act and the end of enacting it was not to prevent the dissolution of this Parliament by the Kings death no wayes intimated nor insinuated in any clause thereof being a clear unavoidable dissolution of it to all intents not provided for by this Law but by any Writ or Proclamation of the King by his Regal power without consent of both Houses which I shall manifest by these Reasons First From the principal occasion of making this Act. The King as the COMMONS in their * Remonstrance of the state of the Kingdom 15 Decemb. 1641 complain had dissolved all former Parliaments during his Reign without and against both Houses approbation to their great discontent and the Kingdoms prejudice as his Father King James had dissolved others in his Reign and during their continuance adjourned and prorogued them at their pleasure Now the fear of preventing of the like dissolution prorogation or adjournment of this Parliament after the Scotish Armies disbanding before the things mentioned in the Preamble were effected by the Kings absolute power was the only ground and occasion of this Law not any fear or thoughts of its dissolution by the Kings untimely death then not so much as imagined being before the Wars or Irish Rebellion brake forth the King very healthy not antient and likely then to survive this Parliament and many others in both Houses judgement as appears by the Bill for triennial Parliaments This undenyable Truth is expresly declared by the Commons themselves in their foresaid Remonstrance Exact Collection p. 5 6 14 17. compared together where in direct terms they affirm The abrupt dissolution of this Parliament is prevented by another Bill by which it is provided it shall not be dissolved or adjourned without the consent of both Houses In the Bill for continuance of this present Parliament there seems to be some restraint of the Royal power in dissolving of Parliaments not to take it out of the Crown but to suspend the execution of it for this time and occasion only which was so necessarie for the Kings own security and the publick peace that without it we could not have undertaken any of these great charges but must have left both the Armies to disorder and confusion and the whole Kingdom to blood and rapine In which passages we have a clear resolution of the Commons themselves immediately after the passing of this Act that its scope and intention was only to provide against the Kings abrupt dissolution of the Parliament by his mere royal power in suspending the execution of it for this time and occasion only and that for the Kings own security not his Heirs and Successors as well as his peoples peace and safety Therefore not against any dissolution of it by his natural much lesse his violent death which can no waies be interpreted an Act of his Royal power which they then intended hereby not to take out of the Crown but only to suspend the execution of it for this time and occasion and that for his security but a natural impotency or unnatural disloyalty which not only suspends the Kings power for a time but utterly destroys and takes away him and it without hopes of revival for ever Secondly the very title of this Act An Act to prevent Inconveniences which may happen by the UNTIMELY adjourning proroguing or DISSOLUTION of this present Parliament intimates as much compared with the body of it which provides as well against the adjourning and proroguing of both or either Houses without an Act of Parliament as against the dissolution of the Parliament without an Act. Now the Parliament cannot possibly be said to be adjourned or prorogued in any way or sense much lesse untimely merely by the Kings death which never adjourned or prorogued any Parliament but only by his Proclamation writ or royal command to the Houses or their Speakers executed during his life as all our Journals ¶ Parliaments Rolls and * Lawbooks resolve though it may be dissolved by his death as well as by his Proclamation Writ or royal command And therefore this title and Act coupling adjourning proroguing and dissolving this Parliament together without consent of both Houses by Act of Parliament intended only a Dissolution of this Parliament by such Prerogative waies and means by which Parliaments had been untimely adjourned and prorogued as well as dissolved by the Kings mere will without their assents not of a dissolution of it by the Kings death which never adjourned nor prorogued anie Parliament nor dissolved any formerly sitting Parliament in this Kings reign or his Ancestors since the death of King Hen the 4th and King James the only Parliaments we read of dissolved by death of the King since the Conquest and so a mischief not intended nor remedied by this Act Thirdly The prologue of the Act implies as much Whereas great sums
him secluding all the rest by armed power make themselves an absolute standing Parliament for him his heirs and successors by vertue of this act than those few Commons sitting since his tryal death do or can do 6. The last clause of this act And that all and every â—â—ing or things whatsoever done or to be done to wit by the King or His Authority for the adjournment proroguing or dissolving of this present Parliament contrary to this present Act shall be utterly void and of none effect Now death and a dissolution of this Parliament by the Kings death cannot as to the King be properly stiled a Thing done or to be done by Him for the adjournment proroguing or dissolving of this Parliament contrary to this present Act which cannot make the Kings death utterly void and of none effect by restoring him to his life again Therefore the dissolution of the Parl. by the Kings death is cleerly out of the words and intentions of this Act especially so many years after its Enacting 7. This present Parl. every Member thereof being specially summoned by the Kings Writ by the particular name of CAROLVS REX not REX in general only to be His Parliament and Council and to confer personally with Him of the great and urgent affairs concerning Him and His Kingdom not his Heirs and Successors and these Writs and the Elections upon them returned unto Him and His Court by Indentures and the persons summoned and chosen by vertue of them appearing only in His Parliament for no other ends but those expressed in His Writs it would be both an absurdity and absolute impossibility to assert that the King or both Houses intended by this Act to continue this Parliament in being after the Kings beheading or death unlesse they that maintain this paradox be able to inform me and those now sitting how they can confer and advice with a dead beheaded King of things concerning Him and His Kingdom and that even after they have abjured his Heirs and Successors and Royal line and extirpated Monarchy it self and made it Treason to assert or revive it and how they can continue still His Parliament and Council whose head they have cut off and that without reviving or raising him from his grave or enstalling His right Heir and Successor in His Throne to represent His Person neither of which they dare to do for fear of losing their own Heads and Quarters too for beheading him This Tax therefore being imposed on the Kingdom long after the Kings beheading and the Parliaments actual and legal dissolution by it must needs be illegal and meerly void in Law to all intents because not granted nor imposed in but totally out of Parliament by those who were then no Commons nor Members of a Parliament and had no more authority to impose any Tax upon the Kingdom than any other forty or fifty Commoners whatsoever out of Parliament who may usurp the like Authority by this president to Tax the Kingdom or any County what they please yea the whole 3. Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland as they now presume and then levy it by an Army or force of Armes to the peoples infinite endlesse oppression and undoing This is my first and principal exception against the Legality of this Tax and others they shall impose which I desire the Imposers and Levyers of it most seriously to consider and challenge them all to Answer if they can for our 3. Kingdoms present and posterities satisfaction by other Arguments than Imprisonments close Imprisonments Pistols Swords and armed violence and that upon these important considerations from their own late Declarations First themselves in their own Declaration of the 9th of February 1648. have protested to the whole Kingdom That they are fully resolved to maintain and shall and will uphold preserve and keep the fundamental Laws of this Nation for and concerning the preservation of the Lives Properties and Liberties of the people with all things incident thereunto Which how it will stand with the former and this new Tax imposed by them out of Parliament or in a thin House under force or their Act concerning New Treasons I desire they would satisfie the Kingdom before they levy the one or proceed upon the other against any of their fellow-Subjects by meer arbitrary armed power against Law and Right Secondly Themselves in their Declaration expressing the grounds of their late proceedings and setling the present Government in way of a Free-State dated 17 Martii 1648. engage themselves 1. To procure the well-being of those whom they serve to renounce oppression arbitrary power and all opposition to the Peace and Freedom of the Nation And to prevent to their power the reviving of Tyranny Injustice and all former evils the only end and duty of all their Labours to the satisfaction of all concerned in it 2. They charge the late King for exeeeding all his Predeoeessors in the destruction of those whom he was bound to preserve To manifest which they instance in The Loans unlawfull Imprisonments and othec Oppressions which produced that excellent Law of the Petition of Right which were most of them again acted presently after the Law made against them which was most palpably broken by him almost in every part of it very soon after his Solemn Consent given unto it 1 His imprisoning and prosecuting Members of Parliament for opposing His unlawfull Will and of divers 2 worthy Merchants for refusing to pay Tonnage and Poundage because not granted by Parliament yet 3 exacted by HIM expresly against Law punishment of many 4 good Patriots for not submitting to whatsoever he pleased to demand though never so much in breach of the known Law The multitude of Projects and Mouopolies established by Him His design and charge to bring in 5 German-Horse to awe us into slavery and his hopes of compleating all by His grand project of 6 Ship-mony to subject every mans Estate to whatsoever Proportion He pleaseth to impose upon them But above all the English Army was laboured by the King to be engaged against the English Parliament A thing of that 7 strange impiety and unnaturalness for the King of England to sheath their swords in one anothers bowels that nothing can answer it but his own being a Foreiner neither could it have easily purchased belief but by his succeeding visible actions in full pursuance of the same As the Kings coming in person to the 8 House of Commons to seise the five Members whither he was followed 9 with some hundreds of unworthy debauched persons armed with Swords and Pistols and other Arms and they attending at the Door of the House ready to execute whatsoever their Leader should command them The oppressions of the Council-Table Star-Chamber High-Commission Court-Martial Wardships Purveyances Afforestations and many others of like nature equalled if not far exceeded now by sundry arbitrary Committees and Sub-Committee to name no
others in all manner of Oppressions and Injustice concluding thus Vpon all these and many other unparallel'd offences upon his breach of Faith of Oaths and Protestations upon the cry of the blood of England and Ireland upon the tears of Widows ond Orphans and childless Parents and millions of persons undone by him let all the world of indifferent men judge whether the Parliament you mean your selves only which made this Declaration had not sufficient cause to bring the King to Iustice And much more the whole Kingdom and secluded Lords and Members to bring you to publick Justice since you not only imitate but far exceed him in all and every of these even by your own verdict 3. Themselves charge the King with profuse Donations of Salaries and Pensions to such as were found or might be made fit Instruments and Promoters of Tyranny which were supplied not by the legal justifiable revenue of the Crown but by Projects and illegal waies of draining the Peoples purses All which mischiefs and grievances they say will be prevented in their free State though the quite contrarie way as appears by the late large Donations of some thousands to Mr. * Henry Martin the Lord Lisle Commissary General Ireton Cromwell and others of their Members and Instruments upon pretence of arrears or service and that out of the monies now imposed for the relief of Ireland and other publick Taxes Customs Lands and Revenues And must we pay Taxes to be thus prodigally given away and expended 4. They therein promise and engage That the good old Laws and Customs of England the badges of our Freedom the benefit whereof our Ancestors enjoyed long before the conquest and spent much of their blood to have confirmed by the great Charter of the Liberties and other excellent laws which have continued in all former changes and being duly executed are the most just free and equal of any other laws in the world shall be duly continued and maintained by them the liberty property and peace of the Subject being so fully preserbed by them and the common interest of those whom they serve And if those laws should be taken away all Industry must cease all misery blood and confusion would follow and greater Calamities then fell upon us by the late Kings Mis-government would certainly involve all persons under which they must inevitably perish How well they have performed this part of their Remonstrance let their proceedings in their High Courts of Justice the long Imprisoments and close Imprisonments of my self and other their Fellow-Members their acts for new Treasons and Delinquents and ejecting their Fellow-Members and Lords out of Parliament without the least Impeachment Tryal Accusation their Imprisonment of Sir Robert Pye the Kentish Gentlemen and others for demanding a Free Parliament fair and free elections restitution of the secluded Members c. determine 5. They therein expresly promise p. 26. To order the revenue in such away That the publick charges may be defrayed The Souldiers pay justlie and duly setled That free-quarter may be wholy taken away and the People eased of their Burthens and Taxes And is this now all the ease we feel to have all Burthens and Taxes thus augmented doubled trebled paid in near a year before hand and then new and greater Taxes imposed on them for those verie Months they have paid in their old proportion before hand beyond all Presidents of Tyranny and oppression in any age and that by pretended acts made out of Parliament against all these good old Laws and Statutes our Liberties and Properties which these worse than Aegyptian Tax-Masters have so newly and deeply engaged themselves to maintain and preserve without the least diminution and violation 6. That this very Juncto in their Act as they stile it made and published Octob. 11. 1659. intituled an Act against the raising of Monies upon the people without their common consent in Parliament enact and declare That no Person or Persons shall after the XI of October 1659. assesse levy collect gather or receive any customs imposts excise assesment contribution tax tallage or any sum or sums of mony or other Imposition whatsoever upon the People or Commonwealth without their consent in Parliament or as by Law might have been done before the 3. of November 1640. And it is further enacted and declared that every Person offending contrary to this Act shall be and is hereby adjudged guilty of High Treason and shall suffer and forfeit as in case of High Treason Which * some of them have declared to be the Fundamental and old Law of England against which no By-Law is to be made and one of the main Birth-rights of England Therefore themselves by assessing and imposing many former Customs Imposts Excises Assesments and contributions on the people and this of one hundred thousand pounds a Month for 6. Month Jan. 26. 1659. without Common consent in Parliament when and whiles 26. of the greatest Counties in England and 11. Shires in Wales 14. whole Cities and most Boroughs in England have not so much as one Knight Citizen or Burgess sitting with them to represent them and 9. English Counties no more but one Knight and but 4. Counties and 2. Cities alone and not above 3. or 4. Boroughs their full numbers of Knights Citizens and Burgesses sitting with them to represent them all the rest to the number of 420. Members besides the whole House of Lords being forcibly excluded or dead by the tenor of their own Act and Decl. are adjudged guilty of High Treason and ought to suffer and forfeit as in case of Treason and all those Commissioners named in their Act amounting to above one thousand and all Assessors Collectors and Treasurers under them who shall assesse levy collect gather or receive the same shall incur the guilt of Treason and suffer and forfeit as in case of High Treason and their real and personal Estates be confiscated to pay the publick debts and Souldiers arrears 7. That this Anti-Parliamentary Convention in their late Declaration of Jan. 24. have published and declared to the world That they are resolved to remain constane and immovable that the people of these Nations may be governed from time to time by Representatives of Parliament chosen by themselves That they should be governed by the Laws That all proceedings touching the Laws Liberties and Estates of the free-people of the Commonwealth shall be according to the Laws of the Land It being their principal care to provideagainst all arbitrarinesse in Government And that it is one of the greatest cares they have upon them how to give the people that ease from their present burthens which their undone condicion calls for Which how well and faithfully they have performed and not rather most notoriously violated let the whole world God Angels Men determin by their imposing a Monthly Tax of one hundred thousand pounds a Month for the 6. next Months they had paid and advanced before hand By ordering
Gen. Monk by a Vote of their Council of State at Whitehall afterwards ratisied by a Vote at Westminster when executed the 9. of this instant February to march with all his Forces into the City of London to seize and imprison 2. of their Aldermen and sundry of their Common-Council men in the Tower to pull down and destroy the Gates and Portcullesses of the City To discontinue null and void the Common-Council of the City of London for this year by ordering a Bill for the choice of another Common-Council with such Qualifications as the Juncto shall think fit which was accordingly executed and then ratified and approved by their Votes and by commanding him afterwards to demand the City Arms to disarm them by force if they deliver them not upon demands s and all because the Common-Council upon a Petition of the Citizens and Remonstrance of the Gentlemen Ministers and Freeholders of Warwickshire and other Counties Febr. 8. voted and resolved That no Person or Persons whatsoever might impose any Laws or Taxes upon the City and Citizens untill the Authority thereof be derived from their Representatives in a full and free Parliament And all this without and before the least hearing or examination of the City and Common-Council a Tyranny Indignity Dishonour and Ingratitude not to be paralleld and never offered in any age to the City and Citizens before by any of our Kings for the highest Treasons against them at least before hearing and convictiâ—â— much lesse only for demanding and claiming the benefit of those Fundamental Laws and Privileges for whose defence they had so lately expended so many Millions of Treasure and Thousands of their lives to defend them according to these their fresh Declarations and Acts encouraging them thereunto and that after all their former Obligations and Indearments to the City upon all occasions and the beheaded Kings free Confirmation of all their former Charters Liberties Privileges Militia and enlargements of the same at the Treaty in the Isle of Wight notwithstanding their taking up Armes against him in the Parliaments defence may now justly irritate and engage the City of London and all other Cities Boroughs Corporations and Counties of this Realm unanimously to oppose the present and all other Taxes and Excises whatsoever imposed on them by these Oppressors and put their own Act in vigorous execution against them as the worst of Tyrants and Invaders of their Liberties Thirdly Both Houses of Parliament joyntly and the House of Commons severally in the late Parliament with the approbation of all and consent of most now sitting did in sundry ¶ Romonstrances and Declarations published to the Kingdom not only Tax the King and his evil Counsellors for imposing illegal Taxes on the Subjects contrary to the forecited Acts the maintenance whereof against all future violations and invasions of the Peoples Liberties and Properties they made one principal ground of our late bloody expensive war but likewise professed * That they were specially chosen and intrusted by the Kingdom in Parliament and owned it as their duty to hazzard their own lives and estates for preservation of those Laws and Liberties and use their best endeavours that the meanest of the Commonalty MIGHT ENJOY THEM AS THEIR BIRTH-RIGHTS as well as the greatest Subject That every honest man especially those who have taken the late Protestation and Solemn League and Covenant since is bound to defend the Laws and Liberties of the kingdom against Will and Power which imposed what payments they thought fit to drain the Subjects Purses and supply those Necessities which their ill Counsel had brought upon the King and Kingdom And that they would be ready to live and dye with those worthy and true-hearted Patriots of the Gentry of this Nation and others who were ready to lay down their lives and fortunes for the maintenance of their Laws and Liberties with many such like expressions Which must needs engage me a Member of that Parliament and Patriot of my Country with all my strength and power to oppose this injurious Tax imposed out of Parliament though with the hazard of my life and fortunes wherein all those late secluded Lords and Members who have joyned in these Remonstrances are engaged by them to second me under pain of being adjudged unworthy for ever hereafter to sit in any Parliament or to be trusted by their Counties and those for whom they served And so much the rather to vindicate the late Houses honour and reputation from those predictions and printed aspersions of the beheaded King now verified as undeniable experimented truths by the Antiparliamentary sitting Juncto * That the maintenance of the Laws Liberties Properties of the People were but only gilded Dissimulations and specious pretences to get power into their own hands thereby to enable them to destroy and subvert both Laws Liberties and Properties at last and not any thing like them to introduce Anarchy Democracy Parity Tyranny in the Highest degree and new forms of arbitrary Government and leave neither King nor Gentleman all which the people should too late discover to their costs and that they had obtained nothing by adhering to and complyance with them but to enslave and undo themselves and to be at last destroyed Which royal Predictions many complain and all experimentally â—ind too trulie verified by those who now bear rule under the Namâ— and visour of the Parliament of England since its dissolution by the Kings decapitation and the Armies imprisoning and seclusion of the Members and Lords who above all others are obliged to disprove them by their Actions as well as Declarations to the people who regard not words but real performances from these new Keepers of their Liberties especially in this FIRST YEAR OF ENGLANDS FREEDOM engraven on all their publick Seals which else will but seal their Selfdamnation and proclaim them the Archest Impostors under Heaven and now again in their 3. Session after their two sodain and forcible Dissolutions Secondly Should I voluntarily submit to pay this Tax and that by vertue of an Act of Parliament made by those now sitting some of whose Elections have been voted void others of them elected by new illegal Writs under a new kind of Seal without the Kings Authority Stile or Seal and that since the Kings beheading as the Earl of Pembroke and Lord Edward Howard uncapable of being Knights or Burgesses by the Common-law or Custom of Parliament being Peers of the Realm if now worthy such a Title as was adjudged long since in the Lord Camoyes case Claus. Dors. 7 R. 2. m. 32. asserted by Mr. Selden in his Titles of Honor part 2. c. 5. p. 737. seconded by Sir Edward Cook in his 4. Institut p. 1 4 5 46 47 49. and I have proved at large in my Plea for the Lords and House of Peers As I should admit these to be lawfull Members and their unlawfull void Writs to be good in Law so should I tacitly admit ex
those Persons of interest and estates in every Shire or Corporation who have been cordial to the Parliament and Kingdom heretofore if put into a posture of defence under Gentlemen of quality and known integrity as they were under Sectaries Quakers and Anabaptists of late would be a far greater safer fitter Guard to secure the Kingdom Parliament against forein Invasions or domestick Insurrections than a mutinous mercenary Army of Sectaries or Persons and Souldiers of no fortunes and that with more general content and the tenth part of that charge the Kingdom is now at to maintain this Army a costly Militia besides and prevent all danger of the undoing pest of Free-quarter Therefore there is no necessity to keep up this Army or impose any new Tax for their maintenance or defraying rheir pretended Arrears which I dare aver the Free-quarter they have formerly taken in kinde and levied in money if brought to a just account as it ought will double if not treble most of their antient Arrears and make them much indebted to the Country And no reason they should have full pay and Free-quarter too and the Country bear the burthen of both without full allowance of all the Quarters levied or taken on them against Law out of their pretended Arrears And if any of the sitting Tax-Makers here object That they dare not trust the Militia of the Cities and Counties of the Realm with their own or the Kingdoms defence Therfore there is a necessity for them to keep up the Army to prevent all dangers from abroad and Insurrections at home I answer 1. That upon these pretences these new Lords may intail and enforce an Army and Taxes to support them on the three Kingdoms till Dooms-day 2. If they be real Members who make this Objection elected by the Counties Cities and Boroughs for which they serve and deriving their Parliamental Authority only from the People the * only new fountain of all Power and Authority as themselves now dogmatize then they are but their Servants and Trustees who are to allow them wages and give them Commission for what they act And if they dare not now trust the people and those persons of quality sidelitie and estate who both elected intrusted and impowred them and are their Lords and Masters not Slaves or Vassals yea the primitive and supreme power it is high time for their Electors and Masters the People to revoke their authoritie trusts and call them to a speedie account for all their late exorbitant proceedings in ejecting the Majority of their faithfull Fellow Members in whom the people most confided and for their mispence of the Kingdoms Treasure and no longer to trust those with their purses liberties safetie who dare not now to confide in them and would rather commit the safeguard of the Kingdom to mercenary indigent souldiers than to those Gentlemen Free-holders Citizens Burgesses and persons of Estate who elected them whose Trustees Servants and Attorneys only they professe themselves and who have greatest interest both in them and the Kingdoms weal and are those who must pay these Mercinaries if continued 3. The Gentlemen and Free-men of England have very little reason any longer to trust the Army with the Kingdoms Parliaments or their own Liberties Laws and Privileges safeguard which they have so oft invaded professing now * that they did not fight to preserve the Kingdom King Parliament Laws Liberties and Properties of the Subject but to conquer and pull them down and make us conquered slaves instead of Froe-men averring All is theirs by conquest which is as much as the King and his Cavaliers or any forein enemy could or durst have affirmed had they conquered us by Battel And if so then this Army is not cannot be upheld and maintained for the Kingdoms and peoples common good and safety but their enslaving destruction and the mere support of the usurped power authority offices wealth and absolute domination only of those Generals Officers Junctoes as we have found by sad experience who have exalted themselves for the present above King Parliament Kingdoms Laws Liberties and those who did entrust them by the help of this trusâ—breaking Army who have * lost and stained all the glory of their former noble Victories and Heroick Actions by their late degenerate unworthy treacheries practices and aâ—e become a reproach to the profession of a Souldier the Protestant Religion and the English Nation in all Christian Kingdoms and Churches The second end of this heavy Tax of April 7. 1649. is the support and maintenance of the Forces in Ireland for which there was only twenty thousand pounds a month formerly allowed now mounted unto thirty thousand To which I answer in the first place That it is apparent by the printed Statutes of 25 E. 1. c. 6. 1 E. 3. c. 5 7. 18 Ed. 3. c. 7. 25 Ed. 3. c. 8. 4 H. 4. c. 13. Cooks 2. Institutes p. 528. and the Protestation of all the Commons of England in the Parliaments of 1 Hen. 5. num 17. and 7 H. 5. num 9. That no Free-man of England ought to be compelled to go in person or to pay any Tax for or toward the maintenance of any forein War in Ireland or any other parts beyond the Sea without their free consents in full Parliament And therefore this Tax to maintain Souldiers and the War in Ireland neither Imposed in Parliament much lesse in a full and free one as I have proved must needs be illegal and no waies obligatory to me or any other 2. Most of the antient Forces in Ireland as the British Army Scots and Inchiqueen's towards whose support the twenty thousand pounds a month was designed have been long since declared Rebels Traytors Revolters and are not to share in this Contribution and those now pretending for Ireland being Members of the present Army and to be paid out of that Establishment there is no ground at all to augment but to decrease this former monthly Tax for Ireland over what it was before 3. Many of those now pretending for Ireland have been the greatest obstructers of its relief heretofore and many of those designed for this service by lot have in words writing and print protested they never intend to go thither and disswade others from going yet take Free-quarter on the Country and pay too under that pretext And to force the Country to pay Contribution and give Free quarter to such Cheaters and Impostors who never intend this service is both unjust and dishonourable 4. If the relief of Ireland be now really intended it is not upon the first just and pious grounds to preserve the Protestant party there from the forces of the bloodie Popish Irish Rebels with whom if report be true these sitting Anti-Monarchists seek and * hold correspondence and are now actually accorded with Owen Roe-Oneal and his party of bloudiest Papists declaring For their New Iesuitical Common-wealth and joyning with them in an
conceit to the contrary till they be setled in the Throne in peace upon just and honourable terms and invested in their just possessions Which were far more safe honourable just prudent and Christian for our whole 3. Kingdoms voluntarily and speedily to do themselves than to be forced to it at last by any forein Forces the sad consequences whereof we may easily conjecture and have cause enough to fear if we now delay it or still contribute to maintain Armies to oppose their Titles and protect the Invaders of them from publick Justice And therefore I can neither in conscience piety nor prudence ensnare my self in the guilt of all these dangerous treasonable consequences by any submission to this illegal Tax Upon all these weighty Reasons and serious grounds of Conscience Law Prudence which I humbly submit to the Consciences and Judgements of all conscientious and judicious persons whom they do or shall concern I am resolved by the Assistance and strength of the Omnipotent God who hath miraculously supported me under and carried me through all my former sufferings for the Peoples publick Liberties with exceeding joy comfort and tâ—e ruine of my greatest Enemies and Opposers to oppugn these unlawfull Contributions and the payment of them oâ— the uttermost in all just and lawfull waies I may And if any will forcibly levy them by distresse or otherwise without and against all Law or Right as Theeves and Robbers take mens Goods and Purses let them do it at their own umost peril being declared all Traytors and to be proceeded against capitally as Traytors by the Junctoes own late Knack and Declaration However though I suffer at present yet I trust God and men will in due time do me justice upon them and award me recompence for all injuries in this kind or any sufferings for my Countries Liberties However fall back fall edge I would ten thousand times rather lose my Life Libertie and all that I have to keep a good Conscience and preserve my own and my Countries native Liberty than to part with one farthing or gain the whole World with the losse of either of them and rather dye a Martyr for our Antient Kingdom than live a Slave under any New Republick or remnant of a broken dismembred strange Antiparliamental House of Commons without King Lords or the major part of the Knights Citizens and Burgesses of the Realm in being subject to their illegal Taxes and what they call Acts of Parliament which in reality are no Acts at all to bind me or any other Subject in point of Conscience or Prudence to obedience or just punishment for Non-obedience thereunto or Non-conformity to what they style the present Government of the Armies modeling and I fear of the Popes Spaniards Campanellaes Father Parsons and other Jesuites suggesting to effect our Kings Kingdoms and Religions ruine as I have * elsewhere clearly evidenced beyond all contradiction Psalm 26. 4 5. I have not sate with vain Persons neither will I go in with Dissemblers I have hated the Congregation of evil Doers and will not sit with the wicked WILLIAM PRYNNE SWAINSWICK June 16. 1649. FINIS A POSTSCRIPT SInce the drawing up of the precedent Reasons I have met with a printed Pamphlet intituled An Epistle written the 8th day of June 1649. by Lieut. Colonel John Lilbourn to Mr. William Lenthal Speaker to the remainder of those few Knights Citizens and Burgesses that Col. Thomas Pride at his late purge thought convenient to leave sitting at Westminster as most fit for his and his Masters designeâ— to serve their ambitious and tyrannical ends to destroy the good old Laws Liberties and Customes of England the badges of our Freedom as the Declaration against the King of the 7th of March 1648. p. 23. calls them and by force of Arms to rob the people of their lives estates and properties and subject them to perfect vassallage and slavery c. who and in truth no otherwise pretendedly style themselves The Conservators of the peace of England or the Parliament of England intrusted and authorised by the consent of all the people thereof whose Representatives by Election in their Declaration last mentioned p. 27. they say they are although they are never able to produce one bit of Law or any piece of a Commission to prove that all the people of England or one quarter tenth huâ—dred or thousand part of them authorised Thomas Pride with his Regiment of Souldiers to chuse them a Parliament as indeed he hath de facto done by his PRETENDED MOCK-PARLIAMâ—NT and therefore it cannot properly be called the Nations or Peoples Parliameâ—t but Col. Prides and his Associates whose really it is who although they have beheaded the King for a Tyrant yet walk in his oppressiâ—gâ—st steps if not worse and higher This is the Title of his Epistle In this Epistle this late great champion of the House of Commons and fitting Junctoes Supremacy both before and since the Kings beheading who with his Brother a a His Petition and Appeal his Arrow of Defiance See Mr. Edwards Gangrena 3. part p. 154. f. 204. See My 〈…〉 for the 〈…〉 to Overton and their Confederates first cryed them up as and gave them the Title of The supreme Authority of the Nation The onely supreme Judicatory of the Land The onely formal and legal supreme Power of the Parliament of England in whom alone the power of binding the whole Nation by making altering or abrogating Laws without either King or Lords resides c. and first engaged them by their Pamphlets and Petitions against the King Lords and Personal Treaty as he and they print and boast in bâ— this Epistle and other late Papers Pag. 11 29 doth in his own and his parties behalf who of late so much adored them as the onely earthly Deities and Saviours of the Nation now positively assert and prove First That c c Pag. 34 35. Commissary General Ireton Colonel Harrison with other Members of the House and the General Councel of Officers of the Army did in several Meetings and Debates at Windsor immediately before their late march to London to purge the House and after at White-hall commonly style themselves the pretended Parliament even before the Kings beheading A MOCK PARLIAMENT a MOCK POWER a PRETENDED PARLIAMENT and NO PARLIAMENT AT ALL And that they were absolutely resolved and determined TO PULL UP THIS THEIR OWN PARLIAMENT BY THE ROOTS and not so much as to leave a shadow of it yea and had done it if we say they and some of our then FRIENDS in the House had not been the principal Instruments to hinder them We judging it then of two evils the least to chuse rather to be governed by THE SHADOW OF A PARLIAMENT till we could get a real and a true one which with the greatest protestations in the world they then promised and engaged with all their might speedily to effect then simply solely and onely by the will of
of the precious redeemed lambs of Christ are ready to starve for want of bread I cannot but wonder with my self whether they have any conscience at all within them or no and what they think of that saying of the spirit of God That who so hath this worlds goods and seeth his brother hath need and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him which he absolutely doth that any wayes takes a little of his little from him how dwelleth the love of God in him 1 John 3. 17. These actions and practises are so far from being like the true and real children of the most High that they are the highest oppression theft and murther in the world to rob the poor in the day of their great distress by Excise Taxations c. to maintain their pomp superfluities and debauchery when many of those from whom they take it do perish and starve with want and hunger in the mean time and be deaf and Ad mant-hearted to all their TEARS CRYES LAMENTATIONS MOURNFUL HOWLINGS GROANES Without all doubt these pretended Godly Religious Men have got a degree beyond those Atheists or Fools that say in their hearts there is no God Psal. 14. 1. and 13. 1 3. In quite destroying the peoples essential Liberties Laws and and Freedomes and in leaving them no Law at all as M. Peters their grand Teacher averred lately to my face we had none but their meer will and pleasures saving Fellons Laws or Martial Law where new Butchers are both Informers Parties Jury men and Judges who have had their hands imbrewed in blood for above these seven years together having served an Apprentiship to the killing of men for nothing but many and so are more bloody than Butchers that kill â—â—eep and calves for their own livelyhood who yet by the Law of England are not permitted to be of any jury for life and death because they are conversant in the shedding of blood of beasts and thereby through a habit of it may not be so tender of the blood of men as the Law of England Reason and Justice would have them to be Yea do not these men by their swords being but servants give what Laws they please to their Masters the pretended Law-makers of your House now constituted by as good and legal a power as he that robs and kills a man upon the high way And if this be the Verdict of their own Complices and Partizans concerning them and their proceedings especially touching their exhausting our Estates by Taxes and sharing them among themselves in the time of famine and penury as the great Officers of the Army and Treasurers who are Members now do who both impose what Taxes they please and dispose of them and all power honour profit to themselves and their creatures as they please without rendering any Accompt to the Kingdoms contrary to the practise of all former ages and the rules of reason and justice too are not all others in the three Nations especially the secluded Lords and Members bound by all bonds of conscience Law and Prudence to withstand their impositions and Edicts unto death rather than yield the least submission to them Sixthly He there avers proves and offers legally to make good before any indifferent Tribunal that the h h Pag. 2. 15 27 29. 33. 34. 35. 41. 53. 57 58 59 64 65. 75. Grandees and over-ruling Members of the House and Army are not onely a pack of dissembling Jugling Knaves and Machevillians amongst whom in consulation hereafter he would ever scorn to come for that there was neither faith truth nor common honesty amonst them but likewise Murtherers who had shed mens blood against Law as well as the King whom they beheaded and therefore by the same Texts and arguments they used against the King their blood ought to be shed by man and they to be surely put to death without any satisfaction for their lives as Traytors Enemies Rebels to and i i See Pag. 39. 52. conspirators against the late King whom they absolutely resolved to destroy though they did it by martial Law Parliament Kingdome and the peoples Majesty and Soveraignty That the pretended House and Army are guilty of all the same crimes in kind though under a new Name and notion of which they charge the King in their Declaration of the 17. of March 1648. That some of them more legally deserve death than ever the King did and considering their many Oathes Covenants Promises Declarations and Remonstrances to the contrary with the highest promises and pretences of good for the people and their declared Liberties that ever were made by men the most perjured pernicious false Faith and Trust-breakers and Tyrants that ever lived in the world and ought as many of you have been and now are by all rational honest men to be most detested and abhorred of all men that ever breathed by how much more under the pretence of friendship and brotherly kindnesse they have done all the mischief they have done in destroying our Laws liberties there being no treason like Judas his Treason who betrayed his Lord and Master with a kisse c. And shall we then submit to their Taxes and new Acts or trust them with our estates lives liberties and the supreme power or acknowledge them for our legal Parliament and soveraign Lords of the three Kingdomes if such now in their own late adorers eyes Seventhly He there asserts k k P. 57. 34. That whosoever stoops to their new change of Government and Tyrany and supports it is as absolute a Traytor both by Law and Reason as ever was in the world If not against the King PRINCE CHARLES heir apparent of his Fathers Crown and Throne yet against the peoples Majesty and Soveraignty And if this be true as it is that this purg'd Parliament IS NO PARLIAMENT AT ALL then there is neither legal Judges nor Justices of peace in England And if so then all those that are executed at Tiburn c. by their sentence of condemnation are meerly murthered and the * * Let our Gownmen sitting at Westminster and other places in high courts of Justice too there condemning and executing men consider it Judges and Justices that condemned them are liable in time to be hanged and that justly therefore for acting without a just and legal Commission either from TRUE REGAL OR TRUE PARLIAMENTARY POWER except in corporations only where they proceed by ancient Charters in the Anâ—ient Legal form And if this be Law and l l Luk. 19. 14. 27. c. 12. 13. 14. Gospel too as no doubt it is then by the same reason not onely all legal proceedings Indictments Judgements Verdicts Writs Tryals Fines Recoveries Recognisances and the like before any Judges and Justices since the Kings beheading in any Courts at Westminster or in their Circuits Assises or quarter Sessions held by new Commissions with all Commissions and Proceedings of Sheriffs are not only meerly void illegall coram non
judice to all intents with all Bills Decrees and Proceedings in Chancery or the Rolls and all Judges Justices Sheriffs now acting and Lawyers practising before them in apparent danger of High-treason both against King and Kingdom they neither taking the Oaths of Judges Supremacy or Allegiance as they ought by Law but only to be true and faithful to the new erected State without a King but likewise all votes and proceedings before the pretended House or any of their Committees oâ—sub-Committees in the Country with all their Grants and Offices Moneys Salaries Sequestrations Sales of Lands or Goods Compositions c. meer Nullities and illegal acts and the proceedings of all active Commissioners Assessors Collectors Treasurers c. and all other Officers imployed to levy and to collect this illegal tax to support that usurped Parliamentary Authority and Army which hath beheaded the late King dis-inherited his undoubted Heir levyed war against and dissolved the late Houses of Parliament subverted the ancient Government of this Realm the constitution and Liberties of our Parliaments the Lawes of the Kingdome with the Liberty and property of the people of England no less than High-treason in all these respects as is fully proved by Sir Edward Cook in his 3 Institutes ch. 1. 2. and by Mr. St. John in his Argument at Law at the attainder of the Earl of Strafford and Declaration and Speech against the ship-mony Judges published by the late Commons House order which I desire all who are thus imployed to consider especially such Commissioners who take upon them to administer a new unlawful Ex-officio Oath to any to survey their Neighbours and their own estates in every parish and return the true values thereof to them upon the new proun'd rate for the 3 last months contribution to fine those who refuse to do it a meer diabolical invention to multiply perjuries to damn mens souls invented by Cardinal Woolsey much enveighed against by Father Latimer in his sermons condemned by the express words of the Petition of Right providing against such Oathes and a snare to enthral the wealtheir sort of people by discovering their estates to subject them to what future taxes they think fit when as the whole House of Commons in no age had any power to administer any Oath in any case whatsoever much lesse then to confer any authority on others to give such illegal Oathes and fine those who refuse them the highest kind of Arbitrary Tyrany both over mens Consciences Properties Liberties to which those who voluntarily submit deserve not only the name of Traytors to their Country but to be m m Exod. 21. 5. 6. boared through the ear and they and their posterities to be made Slaves for ever to these new Tax-masters and their successors and those who are any ways active in imposing or administring such Oaths yea treasonable Oaths of the highest degree abjuring and engaging against King Kingship Kingdome and House of Lords and that with constancy and perseverance against their former Oathes of Homage Fealty Supremacy and Allegiance the Protestation Vow Solemn League and National Covenant the most detestable Perjury and High treason that ever mortal men were guilty of or assistant in imposing assessing collecting and levying illegal taxes by distresse or otherwise may and will undoubtedly smart for it at last not onely by Actions of trespasse false imprisonment Accompt c. brought against them at the Common Law when there will be no Committee of Indempnity to protect them from such suits but likewise by Indictments of High treason to the deserved losse of their Estates Lives and Ruine of their families and that by the Junctoes own Votes and Declaration Octob. 11. 1659. when there will be no Parliament of purged Commoners nor Army to secure nor legal plea to acquit them from the guilt and punishment of Traytors both to their King and Country pretended present forbid fear of imprisonment loss of Liberty Friends Estate Life or the like being no n n See 1. H. 4. Rot. Par. n. 97. excuse in such a case and time as this but an higher aggravation of their crime nor yet to exempt them from Hell it self and everlasting Torments in it for their Perjuries Treasons Oppressions Rebellions and actings against their Consciences out of fear of poor inconsiderable mortals who can but kill the body at most nor yet do that but by Gods permission contrary to the express commands of God himself Ps. 3. 6. Ps. 27. 1. Ps. 56. 11. Ps. 112. 7 8. Isa. 44. 8. c. 51. 7. 12. ler. 1. 8. Ezek. 2. 6. 12. 4. 5. Mat. 10. 28. 1. Pet. 3. 4. Heb. 13. 6. the o o Rev. 21. 8. FEARFUL being the first in that dismal list of Malefactors who shall have their part in the Lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death even by Christs own sentence JOHN 18. 34. To this end was I born and for this cause came I into the world that I should bear witnesse unto the truth FINIS * See Fortescue de Laudibus Legum Angliae and Sir Thomas Smith De Republica Anglicana 16 Car. c. 1. See Rastal Title Taxes Tallages The Acts for Subsidies of the Clergy and Temporalty * See My Memento to the pâ—esent Un-Parliamentary Juncto Prynne the Member reconciled to Prynne the Barresteâ— and True and perfect Narrative May 7. 9. 1659. a See my Humble Remonstrance against Ship-money Jan. 26. 1659. b See 1 E. â— cap. 7. Cook 7. Report 30 31. Dyer 165. 4 Ed. 4. 43 44 1 E. 5. 1 Book Commission 10 21. c Cromptons Jurisdiction of Courts fol. 1. Cook 4. Instit. c. 1. d 5 E. 3. m. 6. part 2. Dors. Claus. Regist. f. 192. 200. e 4 Ed. 4. 44. 1 E. 5. 1. Brook Commissions 19. 21. Officer 25. Dyer 165. Cook 7. Report 30. 31. 1 E. 6. c. 7. Daltons Justice of Peace c. 3. p. 13 Lambert p. 71. * See my Plea for the Lords and House of Peers f 14 R. 2. n. 15. 11 H 4. n. 30. 13 H. 4. n. 25. g 4 H. 7. 18. b. 7 H. 7. 27. Fortescue c. 18. f 20 Dyer 92. Bâ—ook Parliament 76 197. Cooks 4. Institut p. 25. h See the Freeholders grand Inquest My Plea for the Lords The 1 and 2 Part of my Register of Parliamentary Writs and exact Ab. idgement of the Records in â—â—e Tower my Historical Collection part 1 2. c. 3. See my Speech Dec. 4. 1648. and a full Declation of the true state of the Case of the Secluded Members i i Cooks 4. Institutes p. 1. 5 R. 2. Stat. 2. c. 4. * Populi Minor pars Populum non obigit Grotius de Jure Belli l. 2. c. 15. sect. 3. Alexander ab Alexandro Gen. dierum l. 4. c. 11. a Declarat Nov. 28. 30. 1648. l 39. Ed. 3. 7. 4. H. 7. 10. Brook Parl. 26. 40. Cook 4. Instit. p. 1. 25 26. 1 Jac. cap. 1. m Claus. 23. E. 1.