have in the making of other Laws from time to time been careful upon all occasions to erect and build to help to guard and protect their Liberties Rights and Priviledges together with the very great care which the Judges restraining all non obstantes of Acts of Parliament and Regal Dispensations unto what the Law allows or to the King 's particular Concernments do take in all their Judgments and Decisions Expositions Applications and Interpretations of Laws to assist and support the just Rights and Proprieties of the Subjects in their Lands and Estates and not in the least to prejudice them in their Common Assurances by Fines and Common Recoveries The Severity used by divers of our Kings in the Punishment of Briberies Extortions or Byassed and Illegal flattering Opinions of Judges The Oaths of the Lords and others of the King 's Privy Council who are usually the Greatest Noble and most concerned Men of Estate and Interest of the Nation Oath of the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England well and truly to serve the King and his People and to do right to all manner of People according to the Law and Usages of the Realm Oaths of the Judges to do equal Law and execution of Right to all the King's Subjects rich and poor without having regard to any Person to deny no man Common Right by the King's Letters nor none other Mans nor for none other Cause Oaths of the King's Serjeants at Law well and truly to serve him and his People and as duly and hastily speed such Matters as any Man shall have against the King in the Law as they may lawfully do without delay or tarrying the Party for his lawful Process The Oaths of other Serjeants at Law well and truly to serve the King and his People and truly Counsel them Oaths of the Justices of Peace to do equal right to the Poor as to the Rich after the Laws and Customs of the Realm and Statutes thereof made Oaths of the Sheriffs to do right to Poor as well as Rich in all that belongeth to their Office to disturb no Man's Right nor to do wrong to any Man And the Oaths of the Escheators Clerks of the Chancery and Coroners with the Oaths of the Officers of Courts Under-Sheriffs and Bailiffs well and to execute Justice All which several Degrees of Men in the Nation would be as unwilling as any others to have the Lives Liberties and Estates of themselves and their Posterities or dearest Relations sacrificed to a lawless and unlimitted Power of their Kings and Princes And the Oaths of our Kings at their several Coronations to conserve the Liberties of the People and observe all the good Laws made by their Royal Progenitors and Predecessors with the Impossibility that ever the Lords and Commons in Parliament Assembled will consent to the abrogating of any of the aforesaid Laws and reasonable Customs be felones de se or deliver up themselves and their Posterities to the absolute Will and Pleasure of their Succeeding Kings and Princes may abundantly evidence how safely and securely the Property and Liberties of the People until Rebellion foolishly fancied Fears and Jealousies with their Discords distrust and plundering of one another shall put them under such another yoke as Oliver Cromwell had cheated them into may rest and are like inviolably to continue for ever protected against any the Incroachments of Arbitrary Power whilst they live under their King 's ancient Government Of which His late Majesty was so careful and so willing to dislodge all manner of Jealousies out of the Minds of his Subjects as he did in the Third year of his Reign give his Royal Assent as they call'd it unto their Petition of Right and made it an Act of Parliament wherein he not only Confirmed their Magna Charta and Charta Forestoe but the Act of Parliament assented unto by King Edward the First De Tallagio non Concedendo The Act of Parliament made in the First year of the Reign of King Edward the Third cap. 6. The Act of Parliament made in the 25 th year of the Reign of the aforesaid King That no Man should be compelled to make any Loans to the King against his will The Statutes of the 28 E. 3. ca. 3. 37 E. 3. ca. 18. 38 E. 3. ca. 9. 42 E. 3. ca. 3. 11 R. 2. ca. 9. 17 R. 2. ca. 6. and 1 R. 3. ca. 2. Charged all his Officers and Ministers to serve him according to the Laws and Statutes of the Realm as they tendered the Honour of his Majesty and the Prosperity of the Kingdom Banished as he hoped for ever all their Fears of the Infringing of their Liberties and given cause of Content to them and that Parliament to such a satiety such a fulness and nè plus ultra as unless they would have been Consortes Imperii and require to have a share in his Regality and Government there was no more to be asked or requested of him or granted by him Imprisoned shortly after in the Tower of London John Earl of Clare and the greatly Learned Selden for but having Copies in their Custody of some Florentine and Foreign Laws and Customs proposed by Sir Robert Dudley a Titular Duke of Tuscany to be imitated by him here in England as a means to raise Money by Impositions laid upon the People and caused his Attorney General to exhibit a Bill against them in the Star-Chamber for Disquieting his Subjects with Fears and Jealousies And was so ready from time to time to Condescend to their Infirmities and give Satisfaction to them in all their Concerns and Scruples as he suffered those two great Cases of the Habeas Corpus and the Ship Money wherein his necessary Prerogative for the good of himself and his People was not a little concerned to be publickly and solemnly argued in the Course and Method of the Laws in foro Contradictorio before the Judges and shewed no displeasure afterwards but much kindness unto Justice Hutton and Justice Croke who in the Case of the Ship Money had in their Arguments and Opinions delivered thereupon against him in the Exchequer Chamber dissented from all the rest and greater number of the Judges And His now Royal Majesty treading the good old Paths of Queen Elizabeth his Grandfather King James and his Royal Father doth in all Matters of difficulty in the absence of Parliaments where the Laws and Justice of the Nation are likely to be more than ordinarily concerned consult and advise with the Judges hath not long ago Superseded one of them for some harsh usage and discontent given to the Countrey in his Circuits and takes all the care he can to choose and make Judges and his Learned Council at the Law out of the most able honest experienced and eminent practisers of it and hath but lately in several of his Speeches in Parliament declared and promised that he would give his consent unto any good Laws
England by Inheritance And their mutual Rancors and Displeasures with the grand Contests of them and their Parties to procure the Statutes of Articuli super Chartas de Tallagio non Concedendo were not healed without the Aids and Subsidies of his People The mis-government and mis-leading of King Edward the Second by his several Favorites Peirce Gaveston and the Spencers did not hinder him from the Supplies of his People King Edward the Third after a fifteenth of the Temporalty a twentieth part of the Goods of the Cities and Burroughs and a tenth of the Clergy granted unto him by Parliament in the Eighth year of his Reign having consumed much Treasure in his Wars made for the Kingdom of France which he claimed as his Inheritance wherein the English Nation more than for the Grandeur and Honour of their Prince were not much concerned but were jealous until an Act or Declaration of the King in Parliament was procured to the contrary that the Conquest of France might have caused England to have been afterwards dependant upon that greater Crown and Kingdom was notwithstanding the seizure and taking into his hands the Goods and Estates of three Orders of Monks viz. The Lombards Cluniacks and Cistertians and all the Treasure committed to the Custody of the Churches through England for the Holy War forced to revoke divers Assignations made for Payment of Moneys though he had received Three Millions of Crowns of Gold for the Ransom of John King of France whom his Son the Black Prince had taken Prisoner and was not put to lose any of his Honour Friends Estate or Interest for want of the necessary Assistance of his Subjects who for the maintenance of those and other his Wars were howsoever well content to give him half of the Laieties Wool and a whole of the Clergies and at another time the ninth Sheaf the ninth Fleece and ninth Lamb for two years and after many other Taxes and Aids granted in several Parliaments of his Reign and a Commission sent into every Shire to enquire of the value of every man's Estate The Treasure of the Nation being much exhausted found the People so willing to undergo that and other Burdens which those successful Wars had brought upon them as the Ladies and Gentlewomen did willingly Sacrifice their Jewels to the Payment of his Souldiers That Unfortunate Prince Richard the Second his Grandchild tossed and perplexed with the Greatness Ambition and Factions of his Uncles and the subtil underminings of John of Gaunt Duke of Lancaster the most powerful of them fatally continued and pursued by Henry of Bullingbrook his Son Duke of Hereford was not in all those his Distresses so unhappy but that although the Commons in Parliament had by their Petitions unto him complained That for want of good Redress about his Person and in his Houshold and Courts the Commons were daily pilled and nothing defended against the Enemy and that it would shortly undo him and the whole Estate yet they were so mindful of their Soveraign and themselves as they not only afforded him very great Aids and Assistances but in the Fourteenth year of his Reign the Lords and Commons in Parliament did Pray That The Prerogative of the King and his Crown might be kept and all things done or attempted to the contrary might be redressed and that he might be as free as any of his Royal Progenitors were And in the Fifteenth year of his Reign did in Parliament require him That He would as largely enjoy his Prerogative as any of his Progenitors notwithstanding any Statute and namely the Statute of Gloucester in the time of King Edward the Third the which Statute they utterly repealed out of their tender affection to the King King Henry the Fourth Fifth and Sixth although well understood to have been Kings de facto not de jure for so not seldom have been the Pleadings at the Law of their Acts of Parliament and although the later of those Kings being Crowned King of France in his Infancy and in Possession of that Kingdom was by his Meek and Pious rather than Prudent Government a great part of the Cause of the Bloody Contests betwixt the Two Houses of York and Lancaster which ruined very many of the Nobility and Gentry by taking their several Parties and were by their Discords the loss of all the Kingdom of France but Calice And that Richard Duke of York had in Parliament so claimed and wrestled for the Crown as he was declared Protector of the Kingdom of England enjoyed notwithstanding the care and good will of their Subjects upon all occasions either at home or abroad in times of Peace or War by their Contributions of Subsidies King Edward the Fourth in the brunt and hottest of the long continued bloody Contentions of the two great Houses and Families of York and Lancaster after nine Battels won by himself attested by his Surcoat of Arms which he wore therein hung up as a Trophy in the Cathedral Church of St. George at Windsor and his many struglings with King Henry the Sixth and his Party in losing and gaining the Crown again War with France and compelling the crafty Lewis the 11 th the King thereof to demand a Peace and consent to pay him 75000 Crowns towards his War Expences and a Tribute of 50000 Crowns yearly during the life of King Edward notwithstanding that he had in the second year of his Reign sate in a Michaelmas Term three days together in his Court of Kings Bench and gathered great Sums of Money of the People of England by his Privy Seal towards his Wars with the Scots and in the Seventh year of his Reign resumed by Act of Parliament all the Grants which he had made since he took Possession of the Realm raised great Sums of Money by Benevolences and Penal Laws had in the Eighth year of his Reign granted him by Act of Parliament two fifteens and a Demy and in the Thirteenth year of his Reign a Subsidy towards his Wars with France when the Actions Courage and Wisdom of Parliaments were so incertain as there was in the space of half a year one Parliament Proclaiming King Edward an Usurper and King Henry a Lawful King and another Proclaiming King Edward a Lawful King and King Henry an Usurper King Henry the Seventh although that he sometimes declared That he held the Crown as won in Battel by Conquest of King Richard the Third and at other times by his better Title from the House of York and his Marriage with the Lady Elizabeth the Daughter of King Edward the Fourth and avaritiously took all the ways possible for the enriching of his Treasury had divers great Aids and Subsidies granted unto him by Parliament King Henry the Eighth notwithstanding that he had after many great Subsidies and Aids both as to the Money and manner of Collecting it granted unto him his Heirs and Successors by several Parliaments and the first Fruits and Tenths of
gave them a Caution for the future to believe that whatsoever is subject to a publick Exposition cannot be good And the Parliaments in her long and glorious Reign were so unwilling to give any disturbance to her Great and Renowned Actions for the defence and good of her Self and her People and all the Protestant Concernments in Christendom As in the First year of her Reign a Parliament granted her Two shillings eight pence in the Pound of Goods and Four shillings of Lands to be paid in several Payments In her Sixth year one Subsidy was granted by the Clergy and another by the Laiety together with two Fifteenths and Tenths in the Thirteenth year of her Reign towards the Charges of Suppressing the Northern Rebellion a Subsidy of Six shillings in the pound by the Clergy and by the Temporalty two Fifteens and a Subsidy of Two shillings and eight pence in the Pound in her Six and twentieth year had granted her by the Clergy two whole Subsidies and by the Laiety three besides Six Fifteenths and Tenths with a Proviso that that great Contribution should not be drawn into Example in her Fortieth year had granted by the Clergy three entire Subsidies and as many by the Laiety with Six Fifteens and Tenths and in the 42 th year of her Reign to furnish Money for the Irish Wars had Commissions granted to confirm the Crown Lands of Ireland to the Possessors o◠defective Titles And all little enough when in the same year Sir Walter Raleigh a Member of the House of Commons declared unto them That the Moneys lent unto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet unpaid her Jewels and much of her Lands sold and she had spared Money out of her own Purse and her Apparel for her Peoples sake And yet when in the Eighth year of her Reign the Parliament had offered unto her four Subsidies upon Condition that she would declare her Successor she magnanimously refused it and remitted the fourth Subsidy saying It was all one whether the Money was in her own or in her Subjects Coffers Our King James being born and bred in the Kingdom of Scotland where their Laws are mingled with some Neighbour English Customs drawn out of our Glanvil brought thither by their King James the First who lived some time here in England and afterwards so much Compounded and over-born by the Civil Law brought out of France long after by King James the Fifth which with some part of their Common Law makes them to be so overmuch Civil and Canon and a Miscellany of them as they are very much different from ours had so great an affection to the Civil Laws and those of his own Countrey before he had understood the Excellency of ours that shortly after his coming to the Crown of England he earnestly recommended to the Parliament of England not only an Union of both the Kingdoms and the Subjects thereof but of their Laws also And so much savoured the Civil Laws as he complained in a Speech to the Parliament of the Contempt of them allowed or was much taken with the Comedy of Ignoramus and Dulman which was purposely framed to expose the Professors of our Common Laws to a Derision of the People and render them guilty of an Ignorance of good Letters and Learning which all of them witness our great Selden and some other of his Coaevals could not justly be charged with and suffered it to be Acted before him at Cambridge with great Applause and to be afterwards Printed and Published without any murmur or jealousie of the English Nation that he endeavoured to introduce an Arbitrary Power who manifested no unwillingness to give him Subsidies and Aids in Foreign as well as Domestick Affairs when he had occasion to require them All which the Cares and doings of our Ancestors for the Publick and Common good joined with their Duty and Allegiance to their Soveraign Kings and Princes may afford us convincing Reasons and Arguments out of concluding Premisses that the Weal and Woe of Kings and their People are like those of Hippocrates's Twins partaking each with other and that the Fear of God Honour of the King Self-Preservation and Oaths and Duty of Allegiance will be more than enough to enjoyn every good Christian and Subject where the welfare of the King and Publick are concerned to be as willing to help the King as he would himself And it cannot be deemed to be either unadvisedly or ill done by our English Fore-fathers or Predecessors in the House of Commons in Parliament in the Seventh year of the Reign of King Richard the Second when being required of the King to give their Advice concerning a Peace to be made with the King of France And the Chancellor then said That the King of himself could well do it yet for good will he would not without their Knowledge or Consent And it could not be Concluded without a Personal Interview of the King of France which for his Honour required great Charges whereof he Charged them of their Allegiance to consult and give him Answer unto which they answering That it becomed not them to Intermeddle their Council therein And therefore referred the whole Order thereof unto the King and his Council And being urged again to answer whether they desired Peace or War for one of them they must choose They answered Peace But when they understood that the King of France desired that the King should hold Guyen of him by Homage and Service they knew not what to say only they hoped that the King meant not to hold of the French Calice and other Territories gotten of them by the Sword whereunto when the King replied That otherwise Peace could not be granted and therefore willed them to Choose They in the end rather desired Peace But Peace not ensuing or being to be had and the King by his Chancellor the next year after in Parliament informing them how that the King was Invironed with the French Spanish Flemmings and the Scots who were Confederate and had made great Preparations to destroy him and his People which was like to ensue unless some means were used to resist it That the King Intended to hazard his own Person to whatsoever Peril which might justly encourage all Estates willingly to offer themselves and what they had to such defence And declared unto them the falshood and treachery of the French in their Treaty of Peace at Calice when they finding the English inclined to it had departed from their Offers The Lords and Commons when they found the Honour of the King and Safety of the Nation so deeply Ingaged granted unto the King two Fifteenths Conditionally that a Moiety of the Fifteenth granted in the last Parliament be part of it and so as if the King go not in Person or that Peace be made the last Fifteenth might Cease Can the sullen rude and ungodly Dutch the most of whose Religion is Trade and all that can be gained by it to maintain their Incroachments
upon our Brittish Seas obstinate Pride and the greatest of Ingratitudes Drown and lay under Water a great part of their Countries to preserve the remainder from the fury of their Enemies endure the Assaults both by Sea and Land of two of the mightiest Princes of Christendom suffer their undrowned Cities to be Taken and Garrisoned and their People to lie under all the Miseries of a Conquering Over-running and Ruining Army by Land Behold and see their Banks of Treasure with their formerly great Riches and Credits for which they had Circled the Terrestrial Globe floating upon the Seas and like the Dead Bodies of the Slain of their People suddenly disappearing and sinking whilst the Inhabitants weeping as they work were scarcely able when their numerous over-burdening Taxes were paid to support their sad Souls in the Lodgings of their languishing and care-wasted Bodies with what was lest them of their Gains And shall not the Subjects of England for the Vindicating of their Soveraigns and the Nations long ago confirmed and allowed Rights in the Brittish Seas for the Honour and Safety of the King and themselves Protection of our Isles and our Ships which are not only the wooden Walls but glory thereof and the Girdle of Strength encompassing them lay aside their too often causeless Fears and Murmurings and out of their Luxury Pride Peace and Plenty spare that which may well be contributed towards his and their own Aid and Assistance Shall our Brittannia that was wont triumphantly to sit upon her Promontories looking into her Brittish Seas viewing her Glories and enriching many Nations with her Merchandize now like one affrighted tremblingly look back and behold the Divisions of her People at Land ready to make her and themselves a Reproach and Hissing to all Nations small and despicable in the eyes of those which were accustomed to honour her Shall the Tears lie upon her Cheeks Shall she cry out that her Friends have dealt Treacherously with her and are become her Enemies Shall she recount unto them how our Discords at Land heretofore made the Romans Masters both of our Seas and Land where the Conquerors confessed That Dum singuli pugnant omnes vincantur That their greatest Advantage was the Disagreement of the Conquered And will it not now be high time to believe what the Lords and Commons in Parliament declared in their Petition to King Charles the Martyr for our Religion Laws and Liberties in the fourth year of his Reign That Jealousies and Distractions are apparent signs of God's displeasure and of ensuing Mischiefs And that the Distempers and Fermentation thereof more and more increasing may recall to our remembrance How little those Fears and Jealousies did profit Mr. Pryn or his Adoring the Soveraignity as he once called it of Parliament when he was afterwards pull'd out of the House of Commons made a Prisoner and driven to an utter Detestation of their Arbitrary Power Or of how little avail they were to the restless spirit of Levelling John Lilburn when he was after as much out of love with the Republicans or Cromwellians as he was once with them and wrote his Book entituled if my memory fail me not Of the Oppressed Men in Chains And after his Cashiering out of the Army Imprisonment Bafflings and Trials at Law lugged and carried about with him Sir Edward Coke's Comment upon Magna Charta and other English Law-Books to no purpose The Fears and Jealousies which had gotten Possession in the head of Alderman Andrews Lord Maior of London in those wickedly pernitious Times could not rescue him from the Title of Anti-Christ bestowed upon him by some of his own Party And Oliver Cromwell before he took upon him the Title of Protector of his herd of Villains Regicides Murtherers and Felons was fairly threatned or attempted to be Indicted for High Treason by Cornet Day against the foolish Fancies of their Wat Tiler Jack Cade John of Leyden or Massianello rowling confounding and never-resting Common-wealth Or how much did those Fears and Jealousies benefit the City of London or advance their Trade or Riches when in the late Rebellion they forfeited all their Charters and the Liberties which they had in more than 600 years last past obtained of their Indulgent Soveraigns Perjured themselves ruined much of their Estates by being some Good and Loyal Citizens excepted who could not be without great Sufferings Instrumental in the Ruine of many of the Nobility and Gentry their Debtors and Customers betook themselves to Plunders and Sequestrations of honester Men than themselves Purchased with others the Palaces and Lands of the King Queen Prince Bishops Nobility and Delinquents as they stiled them for fighting against His late Majesty when they fought for him Bought at cheap Rates his Pictures and sold the Ornaments of his Chappels Plate Copes and Vestments not sparing the Coats of his Guard of Halberdiers pull'd down his Statue at the Royal Exchange with the basest and vilest Declaration put in the place of it Exit Tyrannus Regum ultimus took away or spoiled the Statues of William the Conqueror and all the succeeding Kings of the English Monarchy which the love which they ought to bear to Monarchy might e're this time have perswaded them to have supplied When the Mercers Company of London had Revenue sufficient lest in Lands by Sir Thomas Gresham Knight that Prince of Merchants the Founder of that Royal Exchange for the constant Reparation thereof And to how little benefit and small accompt did their fears and wilfulness come unto when in the late Dreadful London Fire when they might at the first in a little time have quenched it by Blowing up with Gun-Powder less than Sixteen Houses or half a Street they did suffer it to rage and do what it would from the later part of the Saturday Night until the latter part of the Wednesday Night next following until it had Burned in that City and its large Suburbs little less than Twenty thousand Houses with St. Paul's Cathedral and almost a Hundred Churches and had not been so unhappy if the Owners and Neighbours had taken the Advice or hearkened to the earnest Perswasions of His Majesty who on foot laboured even at the Pumps and cryed out for Help amongst them and did all he could to perswade them to take that better course to stop that Fire but with other that gave the same advice was answered as the Duke of York was at his quenching the Fire at the Temple commanding an absent Gentleman's Chamber to be Broken up to preserve his Books and Writings and preserve the contiguous Building from Burning that to blow up Houses or break open Doors was against Magna Charta and they might have Actions brought against them And in the interim whilst they were so distracted with their Fears as all the Care they took was to lugg and carry away their Goods into the Fields or Churches in the latter whereof the one helped to burn the other and leave their own
Michaelmas Term by a Select Grand Jury of the County of Middlesex cause an enquiry to be made although it were to be wished it might be after the antient manner by Articles delivered unto them in Writing to be distinctly answered unto Offences committed against the King and his Crown and Dignity of all Confederacies Champerties Maintenance Trespasses Extortions and Grievances done to the King's Subjects by any Arch-Bishops Bishops Dukes Earls Barons Servants Officers Coroners and Ministers of the King or by any other whatsoever of breach of the Peace denying of Bail on those who ought to be Bailed and of all manner of Oppressions and Grievances of the People When the numerous Justices of Peace in every County being as too many of them Baronets Serjeants and Men of Law Knights Elquires and Gentlemen of good Quality Families Estates and Education are Sworn and imployed not only to be Guardians and Conservators of the Peace of the King and his People to suppress Felonies Riots and the lower and most Common sort of Exorbitancies and Misdemeanors but to take Care of the Execution of many Laws and Statutes committed to their Trust and with the Method and Order appointed by our Laws and Ancient and reasonable Customs of presenting an Inquiry of Grievances by our many Court-Leets Sheriffs Tournes and County Courts Subordinate one under the other to the Superiour Courts of Westminster and they unto their Supream Authority the King It will be the Peoples own fault and neglect of their own Concernments if any Grievances or Oppression pass undiscernable uncomplained of or unpunished or if any Arbitrary Power or Extravagances do invade or break in upon the Nation who by the fence and care of our Laws and many times Confirmed Liberties which for more than 500 years last past have been building repairing and polishing to a perfection more than the Hebrew Greek or Roman Laws did ever attain unto the Laws which God himself made for that peculiar people only excepted And may if by our Sins and Provocations of God Almighty the Inspector of our unparallel'd Misdeeds and Punisher of them when his wrath shall be kindled and have no longer patience the Walls of our Happiness shall not be demolished our Liberties put to the Sword and our Laws led into Captivity be as safe as Humane Prudence and Laws can possibly make them More especially when our Courts of Justice at Westminster-Hall are governed by Judges and Men of great Wisdom and Integrity Sworn to observe the Laws and Judge according to their Direction and our Lawyers at the Bars freely permitted with fitting reference rightly to inform and plead their Clients Cases And the King 's high Court of Chancery the Officina Justiriae under the Teste me ipso of the Watchman under God of our Israel Superintending over them giveth Writs remedial to all that ask for them with helps for extraordinary Emergencies or to allay the Severity of Laws and makes it its business to punish and forbid Frauds and Oppressions The Masters of Chancery Annually stipended by the King formare Brevia originalia remedialia and to be Assistants subordinately to that High and Honourable Court in matters of Accompt and References The Rule of Chancery being ever since the Statute of Westm ' the second made in the 13 th year of the Reign of King Edward the First quod nullus recedat à Cancellaria sine remedio Concordent Clerici and the Officers and Clerks of the Chancery thereunto appointed are from time to time to do their utmost endeavours to provide Remedies for all that Complain Nè Justitia deficeret Conquerentibus And as to lesser Matters of Complaints and often Emergencies Pensioneth by good yearly Salaries 4 Learned and venerable Men of worth called Masters of Requests or Supplicationum libellorum who by turns and courses each Master being deputed to his Month have their audience Twice or oftener in that Time of the King to give Answers to their Petitions And the King in matters wherein any of his Rights and what appertaineth unto him are concerned gives his People leave by Petition or monstrans du droit Traverses oustre les mames c. to obtain what they can prove to be due unto them and where any of his Letters Patents are grievous and against the Law suffers them to be repealed by Writs of Scire facias brought against the Patentees And if any of the People should be so unhappy in the Intrigues or Difficulties of their Cases as they cannot be relieved by any of those provided Remedies from any supposed Arbitrary Power of their Prince or any Illegal oppressing Actions of one Subject against another they have the Liberty of Appeals from the Inferior Courts of Justice to the Superior and in Matters concerning breach of the Peace and of Misdemeanors within the Cognisance of the Justices of Peace may appeal from them to the Justices of Assize and from them to the King and his Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England and if not by any of those ways to be relieved are in Cases not concerning Free-hold not debarred their Appeals to the King and his Privy Council where they are the King himself being very often present judiciously and deliberately heard upon all the Pleas and Arguments which the Councel Learned in the Law on both sides can make one against the other And Remedies also against all the Assaults of Grievances are not difficult to be come at in the Ecclesiastical Courts and Courts of Admiralty where when the Subjects Complaints cannot be remedied they do easily obtain the King's Commission of Delegates to other Judges and if that do not answer their Expectations may have a Commission of Adjuncts to other Judges to be added unto them And in these or other Courts where the Potency of the one part and the Poverty of the other hath disabled the weaker from attending the formalities of Justice or croud of many other Causes he may have a Commission ob lites dirimendas granted by the King out of his High Court of Chancery to some good and wise men to endeavor as much as they can a more speedy Remedy The Dermier Resort last Appeal ultimum refugium of the People in their seeking for Justice being so necessarily Inherent in the Crown as none but they that wear it can justly claim any Right unto it but have always been enjoyed not only by our British Saxon and Danish Kings before the Norman Conquest but all our Kings which Succeeded them And if there they find no help are like enough if therebe cause of Justice in their Complaints not to fail of Relief by Petition to the King when he is assisted with the advice of his Lords and Commons in Parliament All which with many other Laws and reasonable Customs Priviledges and Liberties like so many Cittadels Block-houses Out-works and Strong Castles and Forts which divers of our ancient and reasonable Customs and Acts of Parliament
whereof was by his own Confession an Irish Popish Priest and by the Assistance of their over-pow'ring Army voted down suppressed and shut up the House of Peers as useless and dangerous inforced themselves into a Republick and the Nation who by the Laws of God and the King and their Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy were bound as well as themselves to the contrary to Ingage never more to admit of a King and House of Lords and in some of their Answers to their Brethren of Scotland who urged and taxed them with some of their Promises concerning His late Majesty said that they hoped they would not make their Promises to be Obligations And in their Declaration Printed and Published to give Satisfaction to all the World that would believe them of the Reasons of their Actions and turning themselves into a Common-wealth endeavoured to assert that in all Promises a Tacite Condition and Proviso was ever to be understood as annexed unto them So always that they did not prejudice or inconvenience the Party promising And forgetting that they had prosecuted the late Earl of Strafford and caused him to be put to Death upon a pretence of his Subversion of Laws which he never did but they themselves really and frequently did Murdered their King Banished His now Majesty the Prince and the rest of his Children and used their utmost endeavors to Extirpate all the Royal Progeny scorned and abused the Laws tumbled tossed and ploughed up the Liberties Proprieties and Estates of the Loyal Party and made some Ignotos and invisible they themselves never knew and who were less to be understood than King Oberon and his Fairy Queen to be stiled the Keepers of the Liberties of England voted the Courts of Chancery King's-Bench Common Pleas and Exchequer to be dissolved and ordered the Records thereof to be destroyed and thrown into the River of Thames and were not all that while in dread of any Arbitrary Power and a Standing Army when to the great Charge of the People they could not think themselves safe without it But tamely suffered Oliver Cromwel their Man of Sin and greatest of Hypocrites to put a trick upon them and teach them the Truth and Doctrine of Divine Retalliation by dissolving the Reliques of the over-long Parliament pulling out the remaining Members with Soldiers and Musquettiers and shutting up the Doors of that House of Commons and could for the Preservation of their ill-gotten Estates like Isachar bow down unto the burden and be well content to believe it to be no violation of the Privileges of Parliament no Arbitrary Power or Introduction to it nor any Destruction of the Liberties of the People and suffer him upon the 16 th of December 1653. in the presence of the Commanders and Officers of his Army attended by the miscalled Lords Commissioners of the pretended great Seal of England Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the City of London divers of the over awed Judges of the Land and many other Persons said to be of Quality to declare himself by an Instrument in Writing of his own framing Protector of the Common-wealth of England Scotland and Ireland Disannul and Abrogate the antient form of Parliaments constitute a New and Ordain that the Persons Elected to be Members for ever afterwards should be approved by the major part of his Council and the succeeding Protectors who were most of them Major Generals and Commanders in his Standing Army of Oppressors That an yearly Revenue should be raised settled and established for the maintaining of Ten Thousand Horse and Dragoons and Twenty Thousand Foot in England Scotland and Ireland for the Defence and Security thereof and a Convenient Number of Ships for guarding of the Seas besides Two hundred thousand Pounds per Annum for defraying the other necessary Charges and Expences of the Government Which Revenues were to be raised by the Customs and such other ways and means as should be agreed upon by him and his Council That the Lands Tenements Rents Royalties Jurisdictions and Hereditaments which remained unsold and undisposed by Acts or Ordinances of Parliament belonging to the Common-Wealth except the Forests and Chases and the Honors and Mannors appertaining thereunto the Lands of the Rebels in Ireland and the four Counties of Dublin Cork Kildare and Caterlaugh the Lands forfeited by the People of Scotland in the late Wars and the Lands of Papists and Delinquents in England who had not then Compounded should together with the Debts Fines Issues Amerciaments Penalties and Profits certain and casual due to the Keepers of the Liberties of England by Authority of Parliament be vested in the Lord Protector and his Successors Lord Protectors of the aforesaid Nations not to be aliened but by consent of Parliament which made him no less an yearly Revenue as some of his own Party did calculate it then Eighteen hundred Thousand Pounds sterling per Annum That for the preventing of Disorders and Dangers which might fall out both at Sea and Land he should have Power until the meeting of the first Parliament which was to be once in every Three years to raise Money for the purposes aforesaid And to make Laws and Ordinances for the Peace and welfare of these Nations which should be binding and in force until order should be taken in Parliament concerning the same That the exercise of the Chief Magistrate and the Administration of the Government over the said Countries and Dominions should be in the Lord Protector assisted with a Council not exceeding Twenty one or less than Thirteen That he should in the Intervals of Parliament dispose and order the Militia and Forces of the Three Nations for the Peace and good thereof with the advice and consent of the major part of his Council That the Number of 60 Elected and chosen or approved as aforesaid being easie enough to be tempted by Preferment or over-awed by a standing Army should be deemed a Parliament for the Three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland That he and every successive Lord Protector should take an Oath that he would not Violate or Infringe the matters and things contained in that Instrument of Government And when afterwards to prevent the Juries Scruples of Conscience and unwillingness to give their Verdicts against the Law and the King 's Loyal Party as he would have them erected in Westminster-Hall his High Court of Justice or Shambles as some of the People not unfitly termed it adorned with Red and Blood-demonstrating Colours to Try and Condemn such Innocent Persons as he should call Offenders not according to the Law but the unbounded rules of his vulgar Reason of State guided by a standing Army of 30000 Horse and Foot baffled and disgraced the Laws and reasonable Customs of England maimed and cut off as much as he could of it as Adonizedek did the Thumbs and Toes of his Captive Kings altered and destroyed all he could the form and rationality of the Proceedings thereof and caused the Writs and
Nations who were the Mediators for Peace at Cologne emboldened by our home Divisions and want of Supplies lengthened it self beyond all Expectation And hath notwithstanding in the Interim by his Protections Royal and many other Cares taken done as much as he could to keep the Bankers from Arrests Imprisonments and other Ruines impendant often happening and falling upon Men indebted Although if Reports and the Laments of some that were concerned be not much mistaken a great part of that Money was belonging to many of his own Servants who by his Bounty and Places of Profit under him had easily gained it and many of those who so heavily complained of that detention of their Moneys had for their own advantages intrusted it to the Bankers who by an Imaginary Credit far exceeding their own Estates furnishing one man with another man's Money and paying out that which was but the same day or a little before come in had inticed a great part of the Money of the Nation into their hands And some if not many of the Owners did well enough understand that they did not only furnish them and their Credits upon all Emergent occasions of Profit or Accommodation by that kind of alluring much of the Money of the Nation into their Custody but his Majesty also at an high and intollerable Usury which if a strict enquiry were made by His Majesty or Order of Parliament of the particular Owners of the Money brought into the Exchequer by the Bankers and from thence borrowed and made use of by his Majesty upon his Publick and most urgent Affairs would plainly appear And it will be as manifest that he afterwards gave no respite to his Royal Cares and Intentions of Repaying it with the Legal or as much Interest as the Bankers were to pay for it And finding that the Fee Farm Rents amounting unto Seventy thousand pounds per annum sold at Sixteen years Purchase which nothing but a grand Necessity could enforce him to Alien for that many of them being the Tenths were by two several Acts of Parliament annexed to the Imperial Crown of England for the maintenance thereof and were as so many Ties and Obligations which made the Owners of these Lands to be dependant upon the Crown would not reach to a Satisfaction of his other Debts and Expences which having been longer due were more importunate than those of the Bankers did lately in a Speech to the Lords and Commons in Parliament make it his earnest Request that they would take the Necessity and speedy Payment of the Bankers into their Considerations And when nothing of help could be obtain'd for that purpose did by his Letters Patents under his great Seal with great difficulty and hardship order a part of his burdened Revenue to be assigned for the due and orderly payment of the Interest until the Principal Moneys should be justly satisfied and paid So as his doings therein or making use of that Money if impartially and judiciously weighed in the Ballance of Truth and Judgment is not to be called a seizure or forcible taking of the Bankers Money or to be ranked either as to the necessity or the thing it self or the number of the persons concerned with what King Edward the First a Wise and Prudent Prince did do when he in the 22 year of his Reign seized into his hands upon occasion of supplying the Publick Necessities all the Wools in the Kingdom as the Merchants were lading them in the Ports giving them Security for Payment at his own Rates and a long day and a short price and transported them to his own best and readiest Sale and at another time upon a like necessity seized all the Pope's Moneys which had been Collected for him by the Clergy of England amounting to very great Sums of Money towards the Wars of the Holy Land gave Protections to those that had the Custody of it and retain'd and made use of it for his then pressing Publick Affairs two years and more notwithstanding that the Pope had in the mean time sent unto him then hugely formidable threatning Bulls and Letters for it Or the like done by King Edward the Third in the 12 th year of his Reign with all the Tynne or with what King Henry the 6 th did by way of Purveyance of great Store of Grain and Corn and transporting it into Gascony where it was very dear or by Queen Elizabeth of a great deal of Beer Transported and sold to her use beyond the Seas and by defraying a great part of the Charges of her Wars in Ireland with Moneys Coined of Tynne with a promise to make a Satisfaction for it with Moneys made of Silver which was justly performed by her and King James her Learned Successor Concerning all which matters fears and jealousies I can be confident your Sentiments and mine will so little disagree as your Judgment of the Ages past and observations of the rise and progress of our late Troubles and Miseries which brought the greatest Shame and Scandal to the Protestant Religion profest in England and Scotland that ever it had or could have laid upon it and cast an unhappy Reflection upon those that were in the parts beyond the Seas will not refuse me your Company in the Opinion of a Truth so experimented that the fruit of all those Artifices rather than any just cause of any such fears or apprehensions have yielded no better Effects than the Ruine and Confusion of the former Glory and Honour of our Nation by setting up a Rebellious part of the People the Offspring as to some of their Levelling Principles of Wat Tiler and Jack Cade to undo and Rule over the better sort of the People and the Poor to Plunder and rob the Rich. And that therefore they which have been the cause of so many Mischiefs and Evils which their and our Seri Nepotes will have reason enough bitterly to bewail and without God's great Mercy will scarcely live to see eradicated ought better to consult their Conscience the Precepts and Examples of Wisdom Salus Populi Interest of the Kingdom and Honour of the King and Nation and abandoning their former Follies and false Lights which led them and their partakers into so great Sins and made them to be the Causes of so many National Miseries not run themselves and others into the fear of one or two incertain Evils but an Hundred which will be most certain and can never be recalled And I cannot but assure my self that you will be ready to conclude with me that there is no Rational or just Cause of Fear that we can have by any Infection contracted from the now Laws and manner of Government of France under His most Christian Majesty For until their Civil and Intestine Wars and Ill Usage of Charles the Fifth and Charles the Seventh their Kings in their greatest Distresses that Nation had Liberties more than at present they have or are likely to enjoy And that our
all Ecclesiastical Promotions and Benefices overturned the then established Religion of the Kingdom seized and took into his Possession the great yearly Revenue of 600 Abbies Priories and Nunneries most of the Hospitals and Colleges which had been given to Religious Uses with Anathema's with as many other dreadful Curses and Imprecations as the Minds of Men could imagine to fall upon the Violaters thereof amounting in the then yearly value unto something more than One hundred and Ninety thousand Pounds sterling per Annum being at a then low and undervalued rate scarce the 20 th Peny of the now since improved yearly value excluded the Founders from their Reversions and Legal Rights thereof when the uses unto which they were first ordained should be altered or otherwise applied Confiscated the very many rich Shrines Chalices Plates Copes Jewels Pearls Precious Stones Gold and Silver not only found in those Religious Houses but in all the Cathedrals and Churches in England the Riches of all which could amount to no less than many Millions of Money Sterling more if not equal unto the vast and admired Reserves and Treasures of the Venetian Republick or that of many Popes Provisions reported to have been laid up in the Castle of St. John de Angelo at Rome in case of any Invasion or War of the Turks and unhappily wasted expended and gave away not only a great part of those immense Riches and Land Revenue but all the Eighteen hundred thousand Pounds sterling which were left him in his Father's Treasury debased some of his Gold Coin and made it Currant for a greater value than in truth it would yield And the better to gentle and pacifie the People who stood amazed at it promised and undertook that they should never more be troubled with Aids or Subsidies Was notwithstanding when afterwards the Publick Occasions required Aids or Supplies neither foreclosed by his Promise or denied the assistance of his People But the Lords and Commons in Parliament did in the 35 th year of his Reign assent to an Act of Parliament for the remitting unto him all such Sums of Money as he had borrowed of them or any other by way of Impress or Loan by his Privy Seals sithence the First day of January in the 33 th year of his Reign and if he had paid to any Person any some of Money which he had borrowed by Sale of Land or otherwise the same Person his Heirs Executors or Administrators should repay it again to the King and if any Person had sold his Privy Seal to another the Seller should repay the Money to the Buyer thereof And for a further Supply did in the last year of his Reign grant unto him one Subsidy with two Fifteenths and Tenths by the Temporalty and one Subsidy by the Clergy Whose Successors and Posterity have ever since not refused to Subscribe to those Laws of God Nature and Nations That Children are obliged to assist both their Political and Natural Parents The contrary whereof would be against the Rules of Humanity and Mankind Judge Hutton a greater Friend unto the Law then Ragioni di Stato Reason of State or Government declaring in his Argument in the Exchequer Chamber against the Ship-Money in the latter end of the Reign of King Charles the Martyr That an Act of Parliament that a King should have no aid or help of his Subjects would be void and of none effect King Edward the Sixth after the many Seditions and Troubles which assaulted his Infant Government and excellent endowments of Virtue and Piety by the Wars with Scotland quarrellings of the Protector and Admiral his Uncles on the Mother's side and the Plots of Dudley Duke of Northumberland was although he had taken into his hands all the Lands Houses and Tenements formerly given under dire Imprecations and Curses for the quiet and welfare as the People then thought of the Souls of their Ancestors Children Friends and Benefactors departed out of this World and gone into the next together with the Colleges given to Superstitious Uses free Chappels Fraternities and Guilds with all their Lands Goods and Estates seizure of Church Goods in Cathedrals and Parish Churches and such as had been imbezil'd with Jewels Gold and Silver Chalices ready Money Copes and other Vestments reserving to every Church one Chalice and one Covering for the Communion Table was not grudged in the last year of his short Reign one Subsidy with two Fifteens and Tenths granted by the Temporalty and a Subsidy by the Clergy Queen Mary being a profess'd Catholick renversed the Protestant Religion put many to Death Banished and Persecuted all the Eminent Professors thereof Married Philip the Second King of Spain and thereby endangering if she had any Issue by him to have brought England under the Laws and Yoke of his Spanish Dominions with the Bloody and Cruel Inquisition to boot began to restore the Lands of the Abbies and Monasteries and intended to relinquish all her right therein Lost Calice which had been in the English Possession ever since the Conquering of it from the French by King Edward the Third Made severe Laws against the Protestants Abrogated all those that were made against the Catholicks shook and tottered the Estates of many of the Protestants great Nobility in their Lands which had belonged to their Monasteries and Religious Houses and of many Thousands of considerable Families of the Kingdom who had those kind of Lands either given them by King Henry the Eighth or King Edward the Sixth or had Purchased them of others who might well have foreseen their not Enjoyment of them if she had but a little longer continued her Reign to perfect the entire returning to the Church of Rome of her self and as many of the People as she should be able to force into it was not in her short Reign without the Aids and Assistance of the People when the Publick Affairs called for them Richard the Third though for his Cruelties and ill obtaining of the Crown he merited not the Title of a King after his stabbing King Henry the Sixth whereof he died in the Life-time of King Edward the 4 th and after his Death procuring himself to be made Protector of the Kingdom during the Minority of King Edward the Fifth his Nephew whose Guards when he had made to be dismissed and enticed him and his Brother into the Tower of London upon a counterfeit pretence of Safety and Honour he procur'd to be Murthered Did the like to his own Elder Brother the Duke of Clarence whom he contrived to be drowned in a But of Malmsey made himself King and in the setling of his wrongful Title and wicked Usurpation made some good Laws was notwithstanding in the Second year of his Reign besides the great Confiscations of divers of the Nobility and other great Men not refused an Aid or Imposition Queen Elizabeth Inheriting the Courage of her Father King Henry the Eighth and the Wisdom and Prudence of her