of England at their Coronations Indamage the King in his other Râ—galities as in the Cinque Ports finding fifty ships upon occasion of Warr and many reservations of Honor and profit upon Tenures in Capite Knight Service and Socage in Capite which if revived and well looked after would almost raise an Army and furnish a great part of the Provisions thereof The King upon occasion of Warr shall never be able to erect his Standard but will be left to hire and provide an Army out of the Rascalâ—ity faithless unobliged rude deboisht necessitous and common sort of people If a Warr should break forth before a Rent-day or Excise money can be gathered will never want misfortunes and distresses and the King thereby failing of an Assistance at Land may loose also the help of his Navy at Sea May have his Money and his Rents seised as his late Majesties Magazines and Rents were in the beginning of the late Warrs Can have no manner of assurance in a Sedition or Commotion of the people that men will for a small pay adventure their lives and limbs for many times no better a reward then the lamentable comforts of an Hospital and the small charities and allowance usually bestowed upon maimed Souldieâ—s Destroy the hopes of the Bishops ever sitting again in the House of Peers as a third Estate or if restored to those their just rights so weaken the ground and foundation of that most antient Constitution as they may again be in danger to be divested of them which the inconveniences of prescriptions interrupted and Customs altered may perswade us to take heed of Disable the King and his Successors from recovering Forreign Rights succouring Allyes and making an Offensive or diversive Warr. Shake or dislocate if not take away that great Fundamental Law and Ancient Constitution of the Baronage and Peerage of England and their Rights of Sitting in the House of Peers in Parliament who sit there as Tenants in Capite and per Baroniam and are summoned thither in fide homagio in the faith and homage by which they are obliged which Proviso's not always arriving to their ends or intentions or a Saving of the Rights of Peerage of Sitting in the House of Peers in Parliament will not be able to insure or give them a certainty to be left in as good a condition as they were before Disfranchise the Counties Palatine of Lancaster Chester Durham and the Isle of Ely which relate unto Palaces of Kings not Plows and are no where in the Christian world to be found holden by any other Tenure then in Capite Make our Nobility and Gentry to hold their lands by no better Tenures then the Roturiers or Paysants of France do theirs and in Socage which as Sir Henry Spelman saith Ignobilibus rusticis competit nullo feudali privilegio ornatum feudi nomen sub recenti seculo perperam abusu rerum auspicatum belongs only to rusticks and ignoble men and being not intituled to any feudal priviledge hath of late times improperly and by abuse gained the name of Fee Loosen the foundation of such ancient Earldoms and Baronies as have been said to consist of a certain number of Knights Fees holden of them Hazard the avitas consuetudines ancient Rights and Customs belonging to Tenants in Capite and by Knight-Service Take away or lessen as to the future the fame and honour of the Nobility and Gentry of the English Nation which in feats of Chivalrie not Socagerie extended as far as the Roman Eagles ever flew and had no other bounds then the utmost parts of the earth Render them in Tenure and that which at first made them by their virtue and imployment Superiors in degree aswell as in their Lands and Revenues to the common sort of people to be in that particular but as their equals Will not be consistent with the honour of England to have Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service retained in Ireland and Scotland and not in England and to lessen the honour and strength of the English Nobility and Gentry in England by reducing their mesne Tenures into free and common Socage whilst the better and more Noble Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service shall be enjoyed in those inferior and dependent Kingdoms Or if taken away in Ireland and reduced into free and common Socage will in all probability meet with as many inconveniences as the like may do in England and lose the Kings of England that Service which by reason of the Tenures in Capite was always in a readiness and made use of by their Progenitors upon all occasions of War and necessity as well in England as Ireland And if the like shall be done in Scotland where the people too much accustomed to infidelity and a Rhodomontading where they are not resisted are best if not only to be Governed by their dependencies upon their Superiors and Benefactors and holding their Lands by Military and Knight-Service as that Kingdome it self doth in Capite of England as it was stoutly asserted by our King EDWARD the First and His Baronage of England there will happen such a dissolution or distemper of that body politique as will exceed all or any imagination before hand and the inferior sort of people will by such an alteration of their Tenures be like hunger bitten Bears let loose to as bad if not a worse kind of levelling then our Phanaticks would not long ago have cut out for the three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland now happily conjoyned under their rightful King and Soveraign Will greatly derogate from the honour of the English Nation and make them who excelled in their Laws and Constitutions all or most of the Nations and Kingdoms of the Christian world and had more of right reason in them to be as a reproach to other Nations and seperated from the use of those ancient and Regal Rights Customs Powers and Regalities which all Monarchies in Christendom do use and will be as inconsistent with the honour of England as it would be to have their Kings in a complaisance of a troublesome and unquiet part of the people not to be Crowned nor Annointed not to use a Scepter or have a sword born before Them not to make Knights or not to do it in the ancient and usual manner which the Kings of other Nations and Kingdoms have ever done and enjoyed or to have the Earls of England as if they were only Comites Parochiales Governors of Villages mentioned by Goldastus or Dijck Graven or men of small honour in Holland appointed to look to their Sea-banks not to wear their Circulos Aureos Coronets of Gold Will not accord well with the Rules of Justice to take away Knights Fees or Tenures by Knight-Service from the mesne Lords without a fitting Recompence But break the Publique Faith and Contracts of those that hold of the King or them The recompence of 150000 l. per Annum will not be adequate to the loss
Principal Flower of the Crown which being not used to be made-up or grow out of Grievances Cannot be disparaged by those clamours and crys which have more then needed been made concerning the Earl of Downes concealed Wardship and the inconveniences arising thereby which did not the tenth part of that prejudice to his Revenue and Estate which his prodigality and other Extravagancies afterwards brought upon it and might how soever have been prevented if his mother in law or any other of his friends upon the several Requests of the Master of the Court of Wards and the Officers of that Court would have petitioned and compounded for his Wardship and not have made those many Traverses and Denyals in those many Suits of Law and pursuits which were afterwards made to compell them to it Nor will that or any other which are pretended grievances be ever equal or come up to those farr exceeding real and certain grievances which too many of the Fathers in law of England into whose hands and custody most of the Wardships or Guardianships are endeavored to be more then formerly put will if those Tenures shall be taken away bring upon fatherless children and will in a short time do more harm to the childrens Estates of the first husband then ever yet happened by Wardships to the King and mesne Lords Which the case of one that twelve years ago had the Revenue of an Infant amounting unto above 700l. per Annum charged with no more then 1000 l. debt and a great personal Estate committed to his Trust hath to this day paid none or a very small part of it but keeps the Rents and profits allowing a small exhibition to the Infant to his own advantage Of another that hath sold and wasted Woods and Timber of a Minors to the value of Ten Thousand pounds sterling And many more sad deplorable Experiments which abundantly induce to believe as well as lament them are not to be found in those well-ordered easie way of the Grants and Dispositions of Wardships which happened by Tenures in Capite by Knight-Service Which may appear to be the better established upon greater grounds of Law right Reason Justice and Equity when as many of the Lords of Manors and Copy-hold Estates who do now enjoy by those Tenures many Rights Seignories and commands with view of Frank-pledge Deodands Felons Goods Wrecks Goods of Out-lawed persons and retorna Brevium granted and imparted to their Ancestors by the bounty and favor of his Majesties Royal Progenitors who did not think it to be a grievance to have Abby or religious Lands which were freely given or cheaply granted to them held in Capite and by Knight-Service though there were at the same time a Tenth of the then true yearly value reserved would not upon the pretence and clamours of some Copy-holders concerning Fines incertain and the rigours and high demands put upon them by some Lords of Manors who have 5 or 600 Copy-holders in some Manors belonging unto them and can ask 13 s. 4 d. per Acre for some Lands and 10 s. per Acre for others to permit them to take their Estates hereafter at a reasonable Fine certain and whether poor or rich indebted or not indebted and charged with children or not will seise their Herriots and take as much as they can get upon the admissions of the Heir or the out cries against the many costly and vexatious Suits which have tired Westminster-Hall and some Parliaments concerning Fines incertain be well contented That their power of rating and taking Fines should be restrained or that they should be ordered upon the admittances of their Copy-hold Tenants by Act of Parliament to permit their Tenants without such Fines as they usually take to surrender and alien two parts in three for the advancement of their Wives payment of debts or preferment of Children as the Kings of England and mesne Lords have limited themselves or should be tyed upon the death of every Tenant and admission of his Heir as King James was pleased to limit him and his Heirs and Successors That upon consideration of Circumstances which may happen in assessing Fines either by reason of the broken Estate of the deceased want of provision for his wife his great charge of children unprovided for infirmity or tenderness of the Heir incertainty of the Title or greatness of Incumberances upon the Lands there shall be as those or any other the bike Considerations shall offer themselvs used that good discretion and conscience which shall be fit in mitigating or abating Fines or Rents to the relief of such necessities Or to release and quit all their Royalties in their Manors nor would think it a good bargain to have no Compensation or Recompence at all for them or no more then after the rate of what might Communibus Annis one year with another be made of them or that they could with justice and equity lay the burdens and payments of the Copy-holders upon the Free-holders and Cotagers Which if they do not now take to be reasonable in their own cases may certainly give every man to understand how little reason there will be to take away the dependencies and benefits by Tenures in Capite and Knight-Service holden of the King and mesne Lords Or to abridge the King of that harmeless power never before denyed to any of his Ancestors to create Tenures in Capite and by Knight service or in grand Serjeanty for the defence and honour of the Kingdom upon new Grants of Lands or Favours especially when â—s His Majesty that now is did by His Declaration of the thirtieth of November last concerning the establishing and quieting the Government in the Kingdom of Ireland which hath been since very much liked and approved by the Parliament of that Nation insert a Saving of the Tenures of the Mesne Lords and ordained Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service upon the Lands which shall be set out to the Souldiery for their Arrears Or that Tenures in Capite not by Knight-Service with all petit Serjeanties which as Sir Edward Coke saith is a Tenure as of the Crown that is as he is King and the Profits and Reservations upon them which if well gathered would make some addition to the Royal Revenue should by the pattern of Olivers so called Act of Parliament be taken away when there are no Wardships incident thereunto and that aid to make the Kings eldest Son a Knight or marry his eldest Daughter should be taken away in the Capite and Knight-Service Tenures and left to remain in the former Socage Tenures or how little it will be for the good of the people if the intended Act of Parliament shall order the Tenures in Capite by Socage to pay double their former quit Rents or other Rents or Incidents belonging thereunto or to pay for a Relief double their petit Serjeanties or other Duties reserved When as Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service
of the Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service which nothing but the Kingdome of England it self can balance and which the King of France or the King of Spain in their several Dominions would not for an yearly Revenue of many hundred thousand pounds part with but would think it no bad bargain to be re purchased after the same or a greater rate It will be as unsafe as unusual to turn into a Rent that which was intended for the defence of the Kingdome And to charge all mens Lands with recompence to be made for it will be against Justice Equity and Reason and make nineteen parts in twenty of the people to bear the burden of the twentieth Or if by Excise upon Ale Beer will do the like lay the burden of the rich upon the poor extend it to Children Servants Day-labourers Coblers Apple-women and all manner of the lowest ranks of people which are as unlikely to be Tenants in Capite as all the Colledges in the Universities and Hospitals of England are whose expences will be also enlarged by it Will be a seminary and complication of Grievances May be afterward legally taken away by Petitions to Parliaments or illegally which God forbid by an Insurrection or Mutiny of the common people as in Naples France c. Will not be an honourable Revenue nor ever be well setled without the help of Garrisons Troops of Horse and Companies of Foot The people will be double charged by the Brewers and Ale-men and inforced to pay 250000 l. per Annum for 150000 l. per Annum And whether Excise or not Excise the King when the Tenures shall be taken away and Ship-money shall be denied him because as Mr. St John argued in the case of Ship money he had the Tenures in Capite allowed for the defence of the Kingdome Or the miseries of an actuall War shall overwhelm or oppress Him shall be told as His Royal Father was by that part of the Parliament which sate at VVestminster in 1642. That He ought not to put in execution His Commissions of Array because His Tenures in Capite were for the defence of the Kingdome And that by several Statutes and Acts of Parliament in the Raign of King E. 3. it shall be said that he is restrained not to Imprest Hoblers which were as our Dragoons or Archers or Foot-men who are thereby not to go out of their Counties but in case of necessity and coming in of Forreign enemies Or shall have need to succour His Allies make a diversive War or embroyl an Enemy shall be answered That they are quit of all Services but the holding their Lands of Him by doing of fealty which they will be apt to interpret according to their Interest the humor of their faction or party or as their designs or better hopes in a change shall direct them Must be enforced for the safety of His people if the Tenures shall be taken away to raise and maintain a standing Army And a standing Army and standing Assesments to maintain it will be certainly more prejudicial and chargeable to all the people in general then that which without any ground or reason the Tenures in Capite have lately been supposed to be to any in particular It will derogate from the honour of the King who is Pater Patriae not to be trusted with the protection of Orphans so much as the Dutch who have a Court of Orphans Or as the City of London who by ancient Custom have an absolute Court of Wards called a Court of Orphans which may by overthrowing the Kings Court of Wards come under the like fortune Be a means to defraud Creditors and Purchasers who cannot for want of Offices or Inquisitions found after the death of Tenants in Capite and by Knight-Service so well as formerly know how the Debtors Lands are setled or what is in fee simple to charge the Heir Be against the peoples Oaths of Supremacy to desire the diminishing or taking away the Kings Rights or Jurisdiction Take away His Power and Means of protecting and defending them and to perform his Coronation Oath and when the assistance and help of Tenures in Capite have like Sea walls and banks proved not strong enough to withstand and keep out the Floods of Sedition it cannot now surely be for the good and safety of the people either to weaken as much as may be the strength which was before in them or to have none at all Draw a Curse upon the Posterities of those that hold under those Tenures and shall endeavor contrary to the faith and promise of their Ancestors to subvert them Make the common people insolent and teach them hereafter to find fault with every thing that fits not their Interest or humor and by such a largeness of liberty having before surfeited upon lesser to be like the waves of the Sea and its deep tossed and beating one against another by the winds of those inticements or factions which for their own wicked ends shall blow upon them And by such an easiness of granting away so great a part of the just and legal power of the King Nobility and better part of the people over the most rude and not easie without it to be either governed or perswaded invite them to take up their not long ago designs and projects of taking away Copy-holds which they lately as foolishly as falsly called Norman slaveries and of enforcing their Lords to take two years purchase for them and that Landlords might be stâ—nted and ordered to take what the factiously well-affected Tenants should call reasonable in the leasing and renting of their Lands Carry along with it and abolish the Royal Pourveyances which being in use amongst the people of Israel were never in that glorious and ever commended Raign of King Solomon nor in that long after pious order and Government of the good Nehemiah found to be a grievance nor taken to be so amongst the Greeks Poles Romans ancient Brittains Franks and Germans those great Assertors of Liberties or the most of the Nations of Europe not cast unhappily into Common-wealths where they only dream of freedom but cannot find it but were used in the West-Indies long before the Spanish curtesies and care of their conversion had ingrossed their gold destroyed the most of their Natives and made the relidue their slaves And in China and most parts of the habitable World And being a Jus Gentium and a part of right Reason so universally allowed and practised were as Oblations or recompences for tolls or pre-emption or for some other confiderations chearfully paid to our Kings of England so butted and bounded with good Laws and so easie as the Tenants did neither care to provide against it in their Leases or reckon to their Landlords those little and seldome payments and charges which were occasioned by them And by throwing the Purveyance into the same Bill or intended Act of Parliament for taking away the Tenures
Kings hospitality which the surplusage of his Tables plenty in his Kitchings and Cellars and every where else to be found in all the places and offices of his Court did not only cause an admiration to strangers but yield a comfort and relief to many sorts of neighbor-inhabitants streets and villages adjacent and a great support of the poor who in the Raign of King Henry the Third were besides the dayly crumms fragments and reliques of his houshold provision not infrequently fed and Treated by that King who as our publique Records can tell us did several times send out Warrants and Writs to provide Victuals ad alendos pauperes in Westminster-Hall for as many poor as it could containe being a better kinde of expence then those vaine unnecessary and costly Treatments which our young Gallants and some Tradesmen do now too often make their Gentlewomen and Mistresses in Hide Park and Spring Garden to shew them how little at present they value money and how much they may want it hereafter And at the same time can think every publique duty to be a grievance and every little too much which they contribute to their Prince Who if Pourveyances shall be taken away will not be able to hinder or keep off those many inconveniencies which will obstruct his House keeping Hospitality nor those many hardships disgraces and ruines which will fall upon many of his Servants and Attendants who like the Priests in the desolation of the Temple bewailing the former glory and present necessities of their Masters Court and house may weep between the Gate and the more retired places thereof and wish that a Queen of Sheba as shee that came once out of the South to see King Solomon may never come to view their Princes Court the manner of his Servants sitting at their Tables and eating of their meat the attendance of his Ministers and their apparrell Take away not only the honor but the publique benefits and feudall Rights of the Tenures in Capite by Knight-Service and per Baroniam which are justly and highly esteemed in all Kingdoms and Principalities which are so happy as to live under Monarchy the best of Governments and deprive our selves of those nerves and sinews which fix and consolidate the fidelity peace and welfare of Monarchies and the best part also of those feudal Laws wherein are contained many of the Laws and Rights of Kingdoms Marquisates Earldoms Baronies and their dependencies Tenures in libero communi Soccagio per fidelitatem tantùm pro omnibus servitiis in free and common Socage by Fealty only for all services so universally extended as to make all the English Tenures to be in that condition will be dangerous rather then profitable to the King and people whose good and safety consists in a due obedience of the people to their Prince and not in that which may invite and incourage Sedition and Rebellion is fitter to be trusted to a Kingdom of Angells which was once not without a Lucifer a pretender to great Light his rebelling partie then to a people many of whom being not fully cured of a disobedience more then ordinarily acted to the ruine of their King and his three Kingdoms are now in a full career of all manner of vice and wickedness running over all the Laws of God and man and wholly given up to their pride and Luxury and an interest and care to maintain them They that could then mis-interpret Scripture abuse the plain and genuine sense and meaning of all our Laws clearly exprest and fully to be understood and make an ill use of a not to be as they thought dissolved Parliament rebell and fight against their King multiply Grievances under colour of remedying them destroy him and endeavour to do the like to his Children and Successors and all the loyal Nobility and Gentry which according to their Allegiance and Tenures of their Lands made hast to his Standard and Defence will now think they have gotten better Fig-leaves either to cover any thing they shall attempt against their King and Soveraign or for abiding with Gilead beyond Jordan and not coming to help or assist him in regard that for all manner of services they are only to do him Fealty which they may disguise according to their several humors and interests Will unhinge the Government and take away the Tyes and Obligations which were betwixt the King and his Subjects the Nobility and better part of the people and the more common and inferior sort of them untie their bonds of Obedience and let them loose to a liberty of ruining and undoing themselvs by not obeying their Soveraign which is not to be hazarded upon the hopes of Tenures in Corde when the impression and remembrance of Benefits are as frail and little immortal as Gratitudes or the love and kindness of many friends or children which hardly survives dayes or moneths or a few years and at the most do not outlive the first Receivers but do most commonly within a few dayes if not hours after wax faint and languish and though they did at the first really mean and intend the thankfulness they promised can as quickly as the Scots did by the late Kings extraordinary favours and concessions even to the giving away almost all that hee had in Scotland or as some of their Brethren in England did in their undertakings to make him a glorious King forget what they promised or should do and having got power into their hands be most rigid and severe in the exercise and imployment of it and their liberties against those which granted them Make the head of our English Body Politique not to be as a head in the body natural strongly fixed and resting upon those many Bones Joints Arteries Muscles and Veins which in that line of Communication do serve and attend the motions and directions of the head and principall part for the well being of the whole body but to be set in such an unfixed unsafe and unusuall order as it shall neither be able to protect it self or those who depend upon it and have no other ligaments but Fealtie and the too often broken oaths of Allegiance Supremacy which can never attain to those great Obligations of Homage and Service of Warr which being annexed to the Land it self had besides the Bond of Loyaltie another also of Gratitude attending upon it and as a threefold cord not easily to be broken must of necessity farr surmount that so small a one as Fealtie which being little more then our modern ill used dayly Complements will prove such a small something as when Interest Profit Humors or Factions shall either altogether or apart stand in the way of them or any of them will be made to be little more then nothing Mutilate and lame our Ancient best regulated and unparalleled Monarchy and make it to be as paralitick on the right side and wanting the natural and right use of its right Arm and Legg
pride and vices which have made our Burdens twenty times exceed any payments or charges by Wardships which are when they happen sufficiently recompenced by the care and priviledges of the Court of Wards preserving the Wards Wood and Timber binding in great Bonds those which are trusted to make true and just accompts calling them if need be often to accompt as in the Duke of Buckinghams case once in every three years and redressing wrongs done to them either in their real or personal estates The Hundred thousand pounds and above spent the last year in Coaches and Feathers extraordinary and One hundred and fiâ—ty thousand pounds at the least spent this year in Ribbons must be no grievance but a quarter of either of the summs spent in Wardships which in Scotland in the raign of their King Malcombe the Second which was before the Conquest was not unwillingly yielded to be the Kings Right nè non suppeterent Regiae Majestatis facultates to the end the King should have wherewithall to defend the Kingdom which Master St John in the case of Ship money and the Parliament so called in An. 1642 were content should be allowed the King for the same purpose must be intolerable Or like those which let their sacks of Wool fall into the water and finde them to be much heavier then they were if our Land be as the shaking of the Olive-tree and as the gleaning Grapes when the Vintage is done and we cry Our leanness Our leanness and finde a disability more then formerly to perform those Duties Services which were never denyed to be due unto our Prince in support of his Royal Dignity and the Welfare and happiness of his people the cause is allunde comes another way and ariseth from our unlucky Reformations publick Taxes and Assessments to assist the ungodly attempts of those who designed and continued our intestine warrs from those grand Impositions which most of the people have laid upon themselves in the purchase of pride and superfluities which those who have made it to be so much their business may know how to free themselves of And if the Lands which are holden by such beneficiary Tenures so antient so honorable for the King and safe for him and his people and so legal rational cum totius antiquitatis et multorum seculorum concensu from generation to generation through many generations well and thankfully approved usage and custome of them shall be now taken to be burdens the owners of those Lands may easily save the labour and trouble of complaining and free themselves of those undeservedly called burdens by restoring of the Lands according to the rules of right reason law and equity to those or their heirs which did at first freely give them and had the faith and promise of those that received those no small favours cum onere to perform the Services and Duties which the Law and a long and reasonable custome have charged upon them or those which afterwards purchased them Or if that will not be liked and we must think we do nothing unless not in a Desart but a Land of Canaan we out-do the murmurings of the sadly punished Israelites with Quails in their mouthes when all shall be done as some people would have it and that Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service and the Royal Pourveyances shall be sacrificed to their desires or wishes they will then make no better a Bargain of it then those who repining grumbling at the charge of maintaining Sea-walls and Banks have aftewards found by wofull experience that it was farr less charge and damage then to have the Sea break in upon their Marshes and Lands drown and carry away their Cattel and be at a greater charge then formerly in making them up again and maintaining of them Or as those that found fault with the Surplice did when by their unquiet ignorances they opened the door to an Army of Fanaticks and Locusts which did almost eat up every green thing in the fields of our Religion Or as those Murmurers who thinking Twenty shillings to be a heavie Taxe for Ship-money Guard of the Seas and Defence of the Kingdom to be laid upon 7 or 800l. per Annum for that was all which was in a year or half a year laid upon the unhappy Mr Hamdens Lands were afterwards for many yeares together enforced to pay the fifth part of their Rents and Revenues to help to destroy the King Laws and Religion kill their Debtors Husbands and Children and near Relations And then the next thing will be to desire that they might have the farr heavier burden of Taxes and Assessments taken off which if Tenures in Capite by Knight-Service shall be taken away can no more be avoided then he that wilfully shuts out the light of the Sun or the Day unless he will like Democritus sit and grow wiser in the dark can save the greater charges and expences of candles and other lights And will at the last learn to believe that when Salus privatorum omnia bona Civiuin in salute Patriae continentur every private mans good and safety depends upon the Kings and the Weal publick it will not be for the good and safety of the people to take away the Lions meat enforce him to seek his prey or take it himself or to suffer the head to languish in hope that the members or the rest of the body should be the better for it who when they are called to the Council or Parliament of the body natural are to lay aside all their own Interest and Concernments and every one doe what they can to cure and help the wants of it And that if those Lands which are holden in Capite and by Knight-Service had been at the first purchased at the true and utmost value and the charges now incumbent upon them had been since imposed upon them when other Lands were free and not charged with them there might be reason enough to call them burdens But being that they were not at the first purchased but freely and frankly given upon those Conditions which were by Agreement promised to be performed by those that thankfully received them and would be so now by the greatest maligners of them or inveighers against them there can be no manner of reason cause or ground to esteem them to be burdens oppressions or Norman servitudes as Ordericus Vitalis and Mathew Paris the later whereof wrote his History in the Raign of King H. 3. since which time many Indulgences have been granted to those kinde of Tenures have been pleased to mistake them when our Magna Charta and all our Acts of Parliament have in every age ranked them amongst the peoples Liberties and confirmed and made many an Act of Parliament to support those Regalities And when the Parliament of Imo Car. I mi in their great care of their Liberties and the taking away of all that might but disturb them did call them a
can certainly have no pretence of Grievance in them for they are only pretences and causeless clamours that have of late cast them into an odium or ill will of the common sort of people or such as do not rightly understand them but may be made to be more pleasing unto them by this or the like Expedient IF the Marriage of the Wards and Rents of their lands during all the time of their minorities computed together shall be reduced to be never above one years improved value which will be but the half of that which is now accounted to be a reasonable Fine and frequently paid by many Copy-hold Tenants whose Fines are certain and would be most joyously paid by those which are by Law to pay Fines incertain at the will of their Lords That the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and those other few mesne Lords who by antient exemption and priviledge are to have the Wardships of Tenants holding of them by Knight-Service in their minorities though they hold other Lands in Capite and by Knight-Service of the King may be ordained to do the like favors That all that hold in Capite and by Knight-Service be freed from all Assesments touching Warr of their demesne Lands holden in Capite and by Knight-Service as in all reason they ought being a Libertie or Priviledge amongst others granted to them by the Charter of King Henry the First the Original of a great part of our Magna Charta in these words Militibus qui per Loricas terras suas defendunt terras dominicarum carucarum suarum quietas ab omnibus geldis ab omni opere proprio dono meo concedo ut sicut tam magno gravamine alleviati sunt in Equis Armis se bene instruant ut apti parati sint ad servitium meum ad defensionem Regni mei that the Knights which hold by Knight-Service and defend their own Lands by that Tenure shall be acquitted of all geldes and taxes of their Demesn Lands and from all other works upon condition that as they being freed from so great a burden they be at all times ready with Horses and Arms for the service of the King and defence of the Kingdom Which being long after found out produced and read by Stephen Langton to the Earls and Barons of England and Abbots and others of the Clergy assembled in St Pauls Church in London in the great Contest which was betwixt King JOHN and His Barons about their Liberties Gavisi sunt gaudio magno valde saith Matthew Paris juraverunt omnes in presentia dicti Archi-Episcopi quod viso tempore congruo pro hiis libertatibus si necesse fuerit decertabunt usque ad mortem They greatly rejoyced and did in the presence of the said Arch-Bishop swear that if need were they would contend even to death for those Liberties And is at this day so little misliked in France as an ancient Counsellor of Estate of that Kingdom in the Reigns of the Great Henry the Fourth of France and his son Lewis the Thirteenth in his discourse of the means of establishing preserving and aggrandising a Kingdom is of opinion that those Fieffs Nobles and Tenures by Knight Service ought to have an exemption as they there have of all manner of Taxes and Impositions for that they are to hazard their lives pour la defence de l'Estat for the defence of the Kingdom If where Lands are holden in Socage of the King or any other Person and there be a Wardship by reason of the said lands holden of the King in Capite or pour cause de garde of some other that holds in Capite and is in minority the lands which are found to be holden of the King or any other mesne Lord in Socage being taken into consideration only as to the Fine for the marriage may not be put under any Rent or Lease to be made by that Court but be freed as they were frequently and anciently by Writs sent to the Escheators now extant and appearing upon Record That Primer seisins be taken away and no more paid That the King shall in recompence thereof have and receive of every Duke or Earl that dieth seised of any Lands or Hereditaments in Capite and by Knight-Service the sum of two hundred pounds of every Baron two hundred marks of every one else that holdeth by a Knights Fee proportionably according to the quantity of the Fee which he holdeth twenty pound for a Reliefe That incroachments upon wast grounds and high ways which are holden in Capite shall be no cause of Wardship or paying any other duties incident to that Tenure if it shall upon the first proof and notice be relinquished That in case of neglecting to petition within a moneth after the death of the Tenant in Capite or otherwise concealing any Wardships or not suing out of Livery if upon information brought issue joyned and witnesses examined or at any time before Hearing or Tryal of the Cause the Party offending or concerned shall pay the prosecutor his double costs and satisfie the King the Mesne rates he shall be admitted to compound That only Escuage and service of Warr except in the aforesaid cases of the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and some few others and all other incidents except Wardships due by their Tenants which hold of them by Knight-Service be reserved to Mesne Lords that the Reliefs of five pounds for a whole Knights Fee or proportionably according to the quantity of Lands of that kinde of Fee holden shall be after the death of every such Tenant Twenty pounds and proportionably as aforesaid That to lessen the charges of Escheators and Juries for every single Office or Inquisition to be found or taken after the death of every Tenant in Capite by Knight-Service the time of petitioning within a moneth after the death of the Ancestor may be enlarged to three moneths and the Shire Town City or principal place of every County be appointed with certain days or times for the finding of Offices to the end that one and the same Meeting and one and the same Jury with one and the same charge or by a contribution of all parties concerned may give a dispatch thereunto That the unnecessary Bonds formerly taken in the Court of Wards at 2 s. 6 d. or 3 s. charge upon suing out of every Diem clausis extremum or Writ to finde an Office obliging the prosecution thereof may be no more taken when as the time limited for petitioning to compound for Wardships and the danger of not doing of it will be ingagement sufficient That Grants Leases and Decrees of the Court may not to the great charge of the people be unnecessarily as they have been at length Inrolled with the Auditors of that Court when as the same was done before by other Officers in other Records of that Court to which the Auditors may have a free access and at any time take extracts out of
them That a severe Act of Parliament be made against such as shall mis-use or waste any Wards Estate Lands Woods and Timber committed or granted to them or any personal Estate which belongeth unto them or shall not give them fit education or shall disparage them in their Marriages or marry them without any competent portion or shall not within a moneth after the death of such Ward or coming to his age of One and twenty years make a true accompt and payment unto the said Ward or his Heirs or Executors of all that shall be by them due and payable to him or them by reason of the said Wardship upon pain of forfeiture to the use of the said Ward his Heirs or Executors besides the said moneys due and payable to the use of the said Wards double costs and damages expended or sustained therein And that if any thing of grievance shall appear to have been in the compositions for Royal Pourveyances or in Cart taking which that which was called a Parliament did shortly after the death murder of the King very much mistake when in their Declaration sent into all the parts of the world of the causes and reasons of their erecting a Commonwealth they were pleased to averr that which the people of England know how to wonder at but not to make affidavit of that they exceeded all their Taxes and Assessments laid upon the people And that if the manage of those antient customes should require some better order to be taken there may be such a reiglement as may consist with his Majesties Honor and Profit and the ease and good of his people Or if a Tryal and experiment be to be given the people or those who like children will trouble a kinde and tender hearted Parent with Requests and Importunities to give them stones instead of bread and Scorpions for Fishes of the Inconveniences of taking away of antient Land-marks and good old Lawes and Customs tryed and approved in this Nation for more then One Thousand years and a great deal more in others and the greater and more to be feared Inconveniences of Excises losses and damage to the Royal Revenue and committing the Tutelage protection and ordering of the best Families of the Kingdom and their Estates during their minorities to the prey and ill management of those that can get them and will never so well execute those Trusts as the King who hath not nor can as they have any private passions Interests or Concernments to carry him out of the waies of Justice And that if such or the like Regulations to be added by His Majestie or His Counsell will not be enough to perswade the people from being Pelo's de se or longing for their own ruines The Act of Parliament intended to take away Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service may be with a reservation of Escuage service in Warr and Homage without the incidents of Wardships and be but as a Probationer to continue untill three years and the next ensuing Parliament after that time expended which may either continue the Act or suffer it to expire Which with other Regulations which may be made in separating from the right use any abuses which may be found to have crept into those Seminaries of Honor that standing more noble and more obliged Militia that legal and antient Constitution or the management thereof and giving if need be some better Rules and Orders may preserve unto the King and his Successors that great part of his Regal Jurisdiction and power to defend himself and his people and to the People that most antient and fundamental Law which is attended by many other Fundamentals Customes Rights Usages in relation affinity to it not to be parted withall keep us from serò sapiunt Phryges the fate of those that would rather repent bitterly and too late then yield to those counsels or admonitions which might have prevented it and from a worse complaint by as much as the whole differs from a part made by Monsieur la Noüe that great Captain and Soldier of France in the Raigns of their Francis the First and our Henry the Eight and Edward the Sixth of the alienation and decay of the Feiffes Nobles and Arrierebans by granting them in Mortmaine and to Roturiers or men ignoble wherein he informs us that Francis the First and Henry the Second Kings of France did do all they could to reduce them to their former Order and was of opinion that Barbarians have better observed that policie in Government then Christians and that the Obligation of those Military Tenures sont bien estroites are very binding Et avec lesquelles les Roys de France par l'espace de sept cent Ans ont faites choses memorables and wherewith the Kings of France have for seven hundred years atchieved great things That the wings of our Eagle may not be clipped nor the paws of our Lyon which is to defend his Kingdoms and people lamed lessened or cut shorter that the common and poorer sort of people may not as they do begin already complain that the Nobility and Gentry have to ease themselves bound heavy burdens upon them that we may not as Bodin relates of Henry the Second King of France fall into his mistake who raising a great Taxe upon the people whereby to free them from the ravage and insolencies of the hired Soldiers found it afterwards to be an increase of their grievances That the people may not do by their fundamental Lawes which they were but lately much in love with and called their Birth-Rights as some young Prodigals do by their Fathers dearly gained Lands sell them for a mess of Potage with Coloquintida in it which would be a greater folly then the hungry Esau committed or as some young Gentlemen do when to get or save a little money they pull down their Ancestors antient great and hospitable Houses and sell the Timber Lead and materials thereof to put themselves in a more speedy way of ruine That our King who in extent of his Dominions and the Antiquity of his Royal Blood and Descent is superior to the most of Kings and inferior to none may not be lesse then they in his Tenures or the dependency of his people but be girt with as much power and majestie as his glorious Progenitors That the Mighty men and the men of Warr may continue that the Ensigne of the People nor the Watchmen upon Mount Ephraim may not be taken away that the Vintage may not fail and the gatherings not come that his Servants may not ask Where is the Corn and the Wine and not be known in the streets but may as King Solomons every man in his course lack nothing that their Children as it was of that wisest of Kings Servants when Nehemiah long after returned with the Children of Israel from Captivity may be found in the Registers that the Splendor Magnificence of the Kings of Englands Courts farr surpassing those of France Spain the Emperors of Germany and all other Christian Princes may not be impaired or diminished and that our Pathes and the glory of our Lebanon and Excellency of Sharon and the foundations of many Generations may be restored Casus Cassandra canebat FINIS Spelmans Glossar 261. 1 Reg. 10. 24 25. 2 Reg 4. 21 22 23. Nchem. 5. 18. Sigonius de Repub. Athen. lib. 4. 540. 541. Martin Cromerus lib. 2. de Regno Poloniae Bignonius in notis ad lib. 1. Marculfi 465. Rosinus de Antiquitat Rom. lib. 7. 14. 24. lib. 10. cap. 22. LL Wisigoth lib. 9. tit 6. LL Ripuar tit 65. Cujacius tit 48. ad 10. cod Iustinian 14 29 Tacitus in vita Ridley's View of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Law 9 H. 3. cap. 21. 2 Reg. 24. v. 20. 22. 1 Sam. 25. 10. Claus. 31 H. 3. Socage Copy-hold Northern Tenant-Right Lease-holders Free Socage Beraultus in Commentar Spelmans Glossar 261. in verb. leta 431. Trin. 18. E. 1. in placit inter Abbatem de Leicester Abbatem de Selby Escuage Homage Relief Primer Seisin Livery Mesne Races Marriage Rents Licences to Widdows holding in Capite by Knight Service to marry To compound with Copy-holders Fines taken by the Court of Wards upon the Grants of Lands in minority Bodin de Repub Coke in praefat 9. Relat. Instructions or Directions of King James to be observed in the Court of Wards Coke 1. part institut 126. Fitz Herberts N B. 82. 25. E. 3. cap. 11. Rot. Parl. 20. R. 2. n. 27. Mat. Paris 240 241. La Noüe Discours Politicques Bodin lib. 6 de Repub.