quod ministeriales praedicti de hospitio Domini Regis debent interesse in Curiâ Domini Regis cum Paribus Franciae ad judicandum Pares tunc praedicti Ministeriales judicaverant praedictam Comitissam Flandriae cum Paribus Franciae Wherein our Ancestors without any Arrest or Decree of Parliament did rather give than take the Pattern when their Bishops as Chancellors of our Kings very often and in a continued Series from the Raign of King Edward the Confessor who was not without his Reinbaldus Regiae dignitatis Vice-Câ—ncellarius when Maurice Bishop of London was Chancellor to William the Conqueror in the first Year of his Raign and other Bishops have in that high and great Office severally from thence succeeded unto the 29th of Edward the First and not a few of the other Bishops have been Treasurers and Secretaries of State and by that Right alone besides their Spiritual Rights and Temporal Baronies did sit as Peers in that great Assembly together with the Lord Privy-Seal Constable Marshal and Great Chamberlain of England Lord Steward Chamberlain of the Houshold with the Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts and Barons of England which do Illustrate that greatest of our Kings Councels attended with such of the Judges and other Assistants as their Soveraigns shall be pleased to call or permit to Sit therein Neither could those grand Officers claim a Right to be accounted by them or any others Equal or Co-ordinate with them or their Superiours or to have any Vote in the House of Peers in Parliament by their sitting there it being in the Act of Parliament made in the 31st Year of the Raign of King Henry the Eighth Entituled How the Lords in Parliament shall be placed wherein it being expressed That it appertained to his Prerâ—gative Royal to give such Honor Reputation and Place to his Câ—uncellors and other his Subjects as shall be seeming to his excellent Wisdome It was specially mentioned That the Lord Chancellor Lord Treasurer Lord President of the King's Councel Lord Privy-Seal or Chief Secretary that shall be under the degree of a Baron of the Parliament are to give no Assent or Dissent in the Parliament And it is likewise remarkable That in the Title of that Act of Parliament and all along and thorough the Body thereof the House of Peers is only stiled the Parliament and no mention is therein at all made of the House of Commons in Parliament nor any Care or Order taken for their Degrees or sitting in Parliament Neither do any of our Parliament Rolls Records or Authentick ancient Historians mention that our Kings were in those their great Councels limited or accustomed to call all their Barons thereunto Nor until the latter end of the Raign of King Richard the Second had voluntarily obliged themselves to Summon thither the Dukes Marquesses Earls and Viscounts unto those their great Councels And when it hath been truly said that Omne Majus continet in se Minus it will not be easy to believe That the Minus doth or should Continere in se Majus For in Anno 23 Edward the First there were but Sixty-three Earls and Barons Summoned and in the same Year upon another Summons but 45. King Edward the Second did not Summon all the Earls and Barons In the 6 E. 3. the like M. 22 E. 3. 6 R. 2. 11 R. 2. the like King Edward the 3d. in the 9th Year of his Raign Summoned but five Earls and Eleven Barons In the 10th E. 3. the Parliament Writs of Summons were directed but unto Fourteen of the Temporal Barons with a Memorandum entred that Brevia istis Magnatibus immediatè praescriptis directa essendi ad Parliamentum praedictum remissa fuerint concilio Regis pro eò quòd quidam ex eis in partibus Scotiae quidam ex eis in partibus transmarinis existant adnullanda 15 E. 3. there were Summoned but 26 of all sorts 16 E. 3. But a very few 21 E. 3. but 22. 45 E. 3. but thirteen Earls and Barons and not many to diverse Parliaments after the great Commune Generale Concilium rightly understood being but Synonyma's of the word Parliament and of latter times they which were in the King's Displeasure have had their Summons but with a Letter from the Lord Chancellour or Lord Keeper commanded not to come but to send a Proxy In Anno 46 E. 3. and diverse years in the Raign of King Henry the 5th few Earls and Barons were Summoned for that many of them were then busied in the Warrs of France But in the Parliament in the Raign of King Charles the Martyr John Earl of Bristol being denyed his Writ petitioned to the House of Peers for it whereupon he had it without any intercession of the House of Peers but withal a Letter from the Lord Keeper signifying his Majesties Pleasure that he should send his Proxy and forbear to come whereupon he petitioned the Parliament again shewing That that Letter could not discharge him from coming for that the Writ commanded him to come upon his Allegiance but that point was not then debated for the said Earl was presently sent for as a Delinquent and charged with High Treason the Majores Barones being men of the best Estate Extraction and Abilities and better sort of the Tenants in Capite by antient Law and Custome of the Kingdom being to be only Summoned according to the very old custome of the Romans probably learnt from thence who as Sigonius writes did in legenâ—o Senatores make choise of them according to their Birth Age Estate and Magistracy well exercised and performed And could be no less then well warranted by a constant well experimented long approved and applauded Usage thereof for more than fourteen hundred Years attested by the industrious Labours of Mr. William Pryn and others and for the times before the Conquest and the Learned Collections of Sir Robert Filmer and others since the Norman Invasion fortified by such Records which in themselves are never found to lie as the teeth of devouring Time hath left us seconded by unquestionable antient authentick classical Authors which might silence those disputes Factious and Foolish opinions and cavils which in the latter part of this last unquiet Century or age have been stirred up against that very Antient and Honourable Assembly or House of Peers which all the former ages neither durst or did lift an hand or heel against or so much as maligne or bark at So greatly are our most degenerate wickedly hypocritical worser Times altered from what they were or should be and the only Recital of whose long and Antient Successions through their so many several gradations may abundantly satisfie any that are not before so prepossessed as to resolve never to be satisfied with any thing that looks but like Truth or Reason if they shall but read as they ought to do the ensuing Series or Catalogue Wherein they may find that in the Bud or Blossom of
introduced amongst us that Distinction long after about the Raign of our King John of the Barones majores those that were Ministri Regis and held great Possessions only of the King for long before the Conquest they were called Thaines Barons or Lords who were Honorary and the Minores middle Thaines or Valvasores who were only feudal and held all or much of others or lesser parts of the King and by Canutus's Laws there appears to have been in those times Thani infimae conditionis In Germany saith Schwederus there are two sorts The First that do hold of the Empire immediately The Second mediately of others and that in the diversity of Opinions amongst the Learned whether the word Baron be derived from the Hebrew Greek Latine Spanish or French the Germans have been content with theit own word or original Baar which signifieth Frey or liber homo Barones are liberi Domini Frey Heeren Et Baro signifieth virum dignitate praecellentem So as that exquisitely Learned Du Fresne in his Gloss upon the words Barones Parliamenti saith In Anglia Scotia qui vulgò Lords of Parliament vocantur ij sunt ex Majoribus Baronibus qui à Rege undè pendent ad Parliamentum sive concilium publicum diplomatibus Regiis evocantur nam constat in Anglia ut in Francia non omnes qui à Rege praedia sua immediatè tenebant ad Parliamenta admissos nam nimius esset numerus eorum sed illos tantum qui proximi essent a Rege dignitate vassallorum numero caeteros anteirent prout etiam in ipsis Baronum feudis factitatum And defining a Barony saith it is Praedium à Rege nudé pendens vel maius praedium vel feudum Cassanaeus taketh it to be Quaedam dignitas habens quandam praeeminentiam inter solos simplices Nobiles Tiraquel by good Authority of rectified experimented Reason Laws and ancient Customs saith Leges sanciri debent a Principibus etiam Nobilium concilio quod plane ostendit Virgilius de Aceste Rege loquens Gaudet regno Treianus Acestes Indicitque forum Patribus dat Jura vocatis Id est Leges sancit Jura distribuit vocatis ad id Patribus id est Senatoribus L'Oyseau defining Seigneuries saith they are Publique ou prives and that les droits praerogatives des grandes Seigneuries a scavoir les Duchez Marquisats Comtez Principautez dont le premier est qu'elles ne relevent que du Roy encore que de leur nature elles deuvoient relever immediatement de la Couronne C'est pourquoi les Feudistes les appellent Feuda regalia ou Regales dignitates tit ' de Feud encore non tant pour ce qu'elles participent aux honeurs des souverainetez que de leur d'autant qu'elles sont vrays Fieffs du Roiaume ne pouvant relever d' autre Seigneurie Et tout ainsi que ces Capitaines s' aydoient de leurs vassaux en la guerre aussi faisoient ils en les Justices principalement aux causes d' importance qu' ils Iugoient par leur advis pour ceste raison ils les appelloient Pairs Cour C'est a dire Pairs au Compaignons de leur Cour de Justice Saith le Seigneurie privee n' induit point de puissance publique and concludeth and proveth it to be un Erreur d' penser qu' aux livres de Fieffes Valvasores Regni seu Majores valvasores fussent ceux qui tenoient leurs Fieffs a Capitaneis Regni nempe a ducibus Marchionitibus And were had in such a Veneration and Respect as when in the first Year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth an Act of Parliament was made that every Member of the House of Commons should before the Lord Steward of the King Queen or her Successors Houshold or his Deputy for the time being before they sit or be admitted by his Oath taken upon the Holy Evangelists testify and declare That the Queens Majesty is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm and of all other Her Highnesses Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual and Ecclesiastical things or causes as Temporal and renounce all Foreign Jurisdiction of any Foreign Prelate Prince or Potentate whatsoever And promise that from henceforth I shall bear Faith and true Allegiance to the Queens Highness her Heirs and Lawful Successors and to my Power shall assist and defend all Jurisdictions Priviledges Preheminences and Authorities granted or belonging to the Queens Highness her Heirs and Successors or United and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm From the taking of which Oath the Lords Temporal and all of or above the degree of a Baron were by that Act of Parliament of 5. Eliz. exempted for that the Queens Majesty is otherwise sufficiently assured of the Faith and Loyalty of the Temporal Lords of her High Court of Parliament Although of that High and Honourable Assembly of the House of Peers all that hold Offices under our Kings as the Lords Chancellour Treasurer Steward great Chamberlain and Chamberlain of the Houshold Constable Earl Marshal Lord Privy-Seal Secretaries of State and all that receive Creation-Money of him as Earls Viscounts Marquesses and Dukes and all the Assistants as Judges Masters of Chancery and the Barons in that high Court of Judicature Subordinate to the King may find themselves comprized and obliged in and by that Act of Primo Eliz. ca. 1. as the Arch-Bishops and Bishops are For it may everlastingly with great assurance of Certainty and Truth be affirmed That our Parliaments or great Councells have in their Constitutions Formes Customes and Usages altogether or for the most part followed and imitated those of the Almans Saxons and Ancient Francks when Marculfus who lived in the Year after the Incarnation of our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ Six Hundred and Sixty now something more than One Thousand Years when Clodouaeus the Son of Dagobert of the Merovignian and first Race of the Kings of France ruled as it will be Evident by the Writ of Summons thereunto Entituled Prologus de Regis Judicio cum de Magna re duo causantur simul in the form or words ensuing or the cause of Summoning or Calling the Parliament as our Kings have many Times done in their Writs of Summons to their Parliaments Viz. Cui Dominus regendi curam Committit cunctorum Jurgia diligenter examinatione cum rimari oportet ut juxta propositionum vel responsionum alloquia inter alterutrum salubris donetur sententia quo fiat ut nodos causarum vivacis mentis acumen coerceat ubi praelucet Justitia illuc gressum deliberationis imponat Ergo nos in Dei nomine ibi in Palatio nostro ad universorum Causas recto Judicio terminandas una cum Dominis Patribus nostris Episcopis vel cum plurimis Optimatibus Nostris patribus illis Referendariis illis
the horrible Murder and Cruel death of my Lord and Father my Brother Rutland and my Cosen of Salisbury and others And I thank you right heartily and I shall be unto you by the grace of Almighty God as Good and Gracious a Soveraign Lord as ever was any my noble progenitors to their Subjects and Leigement and for the faithful and loving hearts and also the great labour that you have born and sustained towards me in the recovering of my Right and Title which I now possess I thank God with all my heart and if I had any better to reward you withal than my Body you should have it the which shall alwaies be ready for your defence neither sparing nor letting for no Jeopardy praying you also of your hearty assistance and continuance as I shall be unto you very righteous and loving Leige Lord. And the bloody Wars betwixt the two great contending Families of York and Lancaster those Factions tired on both sides and the Attainders and Confiscations on both sides in the Raign of King Edward the fourth with the Marriage of King Henry the seventh with the Daughter and heir of King Edward the fourth his two Sons being Murdered by their Uncle Richard the third who died without Issue and King Henry the eight his quarrelling with the Pope and confiscating the monasteries and Abbies gratifying many of the Nobility with much of their Lands and much obliging them thereby and enriching many of the Tenents and making them and their families to be Gentlemen that durst not own or approach that Title before and the short Raigns of King Edward 6. and Q Mary busied by the one in the setting up of the Protestant Religion and the other in reducing Popery to its former Station gave a long tranquility from State disturbances augmented by Q. Elizabeths 44 years glorious peaceable Raign not only in the propagation defence of it here but in many other parts of Christendom and gave a peaceable entrance to King James her next Heir and Successor who met with two Grand Assaults of Treason the one of Sr. Walter Rawleigh and others who fetching that Lawless Doctrine and Peice of Law some hundreds of years before set up that allegiance is due to the Crown and not to the person of the King long before condemned in Parliament in the example of Hugh le Despencer in the Raign of King Edward the third and the other being the Gunpowder Treason was miraculously discover ed almost in the very instant of executing thereof and although villainously Wicked and Horrid fell much short of our last long Rebellion both as unto the length of time and Hypocrisy shedding of Blood Massacres abuse of God and the Holy Scriptures and the levelling and utter destruction of a most Ancient and Glorious Monarchy King James in the 22th year of his Raign over England departing this life not by taking an ill advised Medicine to expel an Ague as was villainously reported but upon a careful examination could never be proved to have been other than Innocent though recommended by the Earl of Warwick then as it after appeared none of our Monarchy Favorites King Charles the first his Son succeeding shortly after espoused the Lady Henrietta Mary Daughter of Henry the fourth King of France made a League Offensive and Defensive with the States of the United Provinces and besides two well exercised Regiments under English Commanders paid by the Dutch sent unto them four gallant Regiments more under the several Commands of the Earls of Oxford Essex and Southampton and Lord Willoughby of Eresby and a well Rig'd and Furnished Fleet against the King of Spain landed at Cales whence without doing the business designed they returned home The Duke of Buckingham and the Earl of Bristol in the mean time accusing in Parliament each other of Treason and Misdemeanors acted whilst the King as Prince was in Spain the one for the promoting the Marriage with the Infanta of Spain the other for hindering of it whereupon followed the imprisonment of the Earl of Bristol in the To wer of London and the King being put to great charges in his sending Embassadors and mediation in the obtaining a considerable part of the last Palatinate to be restored to his Brother in Law and to be made an eighth Elector to be joyned with the former seven and with the yearly payment of giving great pensions to the distressed King and Queen of Bohemia his four Nephews and two Neices under the burden of great Debts and Necessities much augmented by the costly furnishing out a Fleet of Ships and a gallant Army to invade the Isle of Ree in France to divert the King of France from subduing of Rochel the Inhabitants whereof had supplicated him for Aid which produced none other effect but the loss of all his hopes therein by the ill conduct of the Admiral to the loss of some gallant men yet was so unwilling to forsake those oppressed Protestants as he after sent two if not three other Fleets strongly furnished Ships with Men Arms and Ammunition to relieve them under more Skilful Commanders who endeavouring all that men could do were constrained to return home and leave those Protestants to the over-powering forces by Land of the King of France and in the midst of his own pressures and great wants of Money having no more of his own Royal Revenue to support these expences than about 800000 l. sterling per Annum for his Revenue much whereof by the usual Lickings and Cheats of his Trustees Officers and Receivers could never find the way to his Coffers And had been so incessant in his desires to help those oppressed Protestants of France as to procure Money to assist them in that his last attempt he sending to the Citizens of London to lend him 100000 l. They answered they could not for that they had heretofore lent unto his Father King James as much upon Privy Seals which had not been yet repaid although it was but lent by several Citizens to make up that some of Money but if his Majesty would give them a security by some of his own Revenues in Land to pay the first hundred thousand pounds with interest for it they would lend him another hundred thousand pounds and the particular mens names that lent the Moneys to make up the first 100000 pounds were expressed in a Schedule which done as will appear by the said Schedule which I have seen 12000 l. per Annum of old Rents of Assise in Richmondshire or in the County of York were by the King conveyed and granted absolutely unto some Citizens in trust for the City of London for the payment of the said two hundred thousand pounds with the Interest as aforesaid for the said one hundred thousand pounds lent unto King James the Wood and Timber only growing thereupon amounting unto as much as the aforesaid Sums of Money lent with the Interest which over-profitable bargain made by the City of London for
Rebellion with Montfort against him should bring his Action for the other Two Knight's Fees and an half From which most necessary and excellent Feudal Laws have proceeded those grand Honors fixed and appurtenant to our ancient Monarchy of England in our Kings and Princes Grant to several great Families in England in Fee or Fee-Tayl as to be Constable of England Earl Marshal of England Lord Steward of England Lord Great Chamberlain of England Chamberlain of the Queens of England Die Coronationis suae Butler to our Kings at their Coronations c. And likewise the Statute de Donis or Entailes the neglect whereof in leaving all the ruined Families of the Nobility Gentry and better sort of the English Nation to feigned Recoveries introduced about the Raign of King Edward the Fourth by an unhappy and unjust Trick of Law to make the Losers believe that they shall recover the Value of their Lands so Lost amounting in the whole unto the greatest part of all the Lands in England of the Bagbearer of the Court of Common-Pleas who in the Conclusion is only Vouchee to Warrants and to make it good out of his own Land and by the small Fees and Profits of his Office was never yet known to Inherit or to have been a Purchaser of ten Acres of Land yet walks about and is never molested or called to Account for those vast Sums of Money or his Land if he ever had or was re vera intended to have had any was to be liable by his being a Common Vouchee in all the Common Recoveries which are suffered in that Court It being in those more Obedient and Loyal Times esteemed no small Honour to serve our Kings or hold Lands by such a Kind of Tenure as it may be believed to have occasioned that Adage or Common saying in England before the ever to be lamented taking away of Tenures in Capite and by Knight-Service and Pourveyance No Fishing to the Sea no Service to the King and those Royal Services affixed unto Lands and Territories have been so immutable amongst other our Neighbor Nations as in the Aurea Bulla fastned upon the Empire of Germany about the 30th Year of the Raign of our King Edward the Third the Three Spiritual Electors viz. the Arch-Bishops of Mentz Cologne and Triers or Trevers do hold their Lands and Territories by their several Tenures of being Arch-Chancellors the First of Germany the Second of Italy and the Third of France the King of Bohemia to be Archipincerna Duke of Bavaria or Count Palatine of the Rhine Archidapifer Duke of Saxony Archimariscallus Duke or Marquess of Brandenburgh Archicamerarius of that Empire and might be with or amongst them exampled from our Pattern which was long before as also from the Scots who have to this day some of the like official Dignities annexed to their Lands and Estates and as in the Raign of our King Henry the First Count Tankervile was by Inheritance and Tenure of his Lands Chamberlain of Normandy And although not so ancient as the Customs of the Patroni and Clientes in the beginning of the flourishing of the vast Roman Empire which was so greatly advantageous both unto the greater and lesser part of the People the Patroni in their Popularities and Ambitions to gain and please them in their way of Advancements to Annual Magistracies not seldom exercising their Eloquence in pleading their Causes or Suits in Law before the Lawyers had for another kind of Advantages by the Gratifications of Fees and Rewards made it to be the greatest part of their Profession which before were principally employed upon seldom Occasions in matters of Difficulty in Jurisconsults and Decisions some of the more eminent sorts of them having about the Raign of the Emperor Augustus Caesar obtained Licenses of him ad respondendum Yet after the Irruption of the Goths Vandals Longobards and Hunnes with other Northern Nations into that Empire they found it to be more beneficial to do as the Germans and many other Northern Nations have done to be Feudalists and to have Lands given unto them and their Heirs to hold by Service of War and other necessaries under those grand Obligations of Interests Oaths Gratitude Homage and Fealty which proved to be better more certain and beneficial both for the Patroni and Clientes the poorer sort of the People alwayes or very often wanting the Aid and Protection of the greater from Wrongs and Oppressions like to be put upon them And the Patroni and Greater procuring to themselves thereby a more constant Observance of Duty Honour and Additions to their former Grandeur the greater and lesser thereby mutually supporting and assisting each other which in the Consequence was as it did likely to prove much better than the charge and trouble the Patroni were used to be as in the frequent courting and Humoring of the common People with their costly Epulae's and Ludi's not only to gain their own Preferments in their Annual poursuites of Offices of Magistracy but to keep the popular Votings from Mutiny and ruining them as much as themselves And howsoever that they with us in England by a great infelicity to our languishing Monarchical Government after an horrid Rebellion and murder of our late King Anno. 12. Car. 2. by an Act of Parliament made upon his now Majesties happy Restoration for the taking away the Court of Wards and Liveries Tenures in Capite and by Knight service and Pourveyance and for settling a Revenue upon His Majesty in lieu of a great part of the lands of England and Wales which the Rebels besides their great Estates had forfeited unto him which they were willing to retain to themselves and thank him as fast as they could with a more detestable Rebellion the Praeamble mentioning most unfortunately for want of a right Information and understanding thereof That the said Court of Wards and Liveries Tenures by Knight service in Capite holden of the King or others and Socage in Capite have been by consequence more praejudicial then beneficial to the Kingdome as if the Nerves and Ligaments of the Crown of England and the ancient Support and Defence of the Honour and glory thereof for more then one thousand years could any way deserve to be so Charactered and that after the Intromission of the said Court which hath been since the 24 th day of February 1645. when the Divel and his Reformation had made a large progress in the chasing Religion out of the Kingdom and washing over in blood the Blessed Martyr King Charles the first 3 Kingdomes of England Scotland and Ireland many Persons could not by their Will or otherwise dispose of their Lands by Knight Service whereby many Questions might possibly arise unless some seasonable remedy be taken to prevent the same Our Soveraign Lord by the Assent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled and by the Authority of the same did enact the taking away of the said Court
Nerves Sinews and Ligaments of the Crown and head of our body Politick and in the doing thereof also might have bereaved the Nation of the ancient and honourable assistance of the House of Peers in Parliament which of Ancient and long time Immemoriall have been as they should ought to be the firm strong pillars supports of our Monarchick Government had not the Earls of Oxford and Strafford Magnanimously as a Prologue to its Restauration come to the House then called the House of Commons in Parliament wherein that great Monck that Unus homo nobis qui cunctando restituit rem was then admitted a member guarded with his own so warily conducted Army out of Scotland before his Majesties happy Restauration and the way had been prepared for it and calling him unto the Door of that house demanded as Peers their Rights and priviledges to have their house of Peers doors opened which upon his Majesties Blessed Father's murther that so misnamed house of Commons in Parliament had shut up and Voted to be Useless and Dangerous which he instantly of himself Ordered to be opened without any Act Order or Vote of Parliament into which they went and sat untill they gained more of their Loyall Party to help to fill their House again which by Degrees was shortly after especially after his Majesties Landing and Coming to London Replenished and Restored as their King and Sovereign was And the Nation had notwithstanding by that Framer of that aforesaid ever to be deplored Act of Parliament been deprived of that only part of our Parliament Subordinate unto their King from the beginning of our very ancient Monarchy and as it ought ever to be till the 49th Year of K. Henry the 3. when he was a Prisoner unto Simon Montfort and his Army of Rebells and not before When some Commons were in that Rebellion Elected to be as a part of Parliament and to sit in a Seperate Lower House ad faciendum consentiendum iis which the King and Lords should think fit or necessary to Ordain had it not been rescued and prevented by the Care of the Lord Viscount Stafford and the Barons of Abergavenny and Dudley awakened by the Book a little before Printed and Published entituled Tenenda non Tollenda who caused a Proviso to be inserted in the said Act of Parliament that nothing therein contained should be extended or prejudiciall to the Rights and Priviledges and Honours of the Peers in Parliament or any that held by Grand Serjeanty c. And having by their good will left as few Spears or Swords as they could in our Israel to help to protect or defend it could notwithstanding readily find the way to that Ingratefull River Lethe and Sin of unthankfullness which God and all good men do not only Abhorr but the most fierce and Savage Beasts of the Field and Fowls of the Air do detest and could not be fully satisfied untill they could add unto the Kings evil Bargain the taking away of the Royal Pourveyance which amounted unto no Smaller a damage unto him then Ninety or One Hundred Thousand Pounds per Ann. it being in the 35th Year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth Estimated in the Saving of the houshold expences 25000 l. per Ann. communibus Annis in the 3. Year of the Reign of King James 40000 l. per Ann. And in the Reign of King Charles the Martyr at the most not above 50000 l. per Ann. Communibus Annis But whether more or less is not to be found in the receipt or Yearly Income of the Moyety of the dayly ceasing pretended Recompence by the Excise arising unto no more then one Hundred and Fifty Thousand Pounds deducting the no little charges in the Collection thereof and in taking away of that 50 l. per Ann. for the Royall Pourveyance brought upon the King no less a Damage then One Hundred Thousand Pounds per Ann. And cannot by the most Foolish of the People Lunaticks out of their Intervalls Ideots very small Infants and Children only excepted be with any manner of Colour or Shadow of reason believed to be any thing near a Compensation singly for the Pourveyance and a great deal less for that inestimable Jewell of the Crown the Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service the later a principall part of the support of the Sovereignty and the former of the Crown For that the Power Might and Majesty that resideth therein is unvaluable and not to be Ballanced by any thing that is not as much the Pourveyance being in the Fourth Year of the Reign of King James held to be such an Inseparable adjunct of the Crown and Imperiall Dignity and some few Years after believed by the Incomparable Sr Francis Bacon Lord Chancellor of England to be a necessary support both in Law and Politiques in other Nations as well as our own hath told us is such a Sacra Sacrorum as Baldus and Individua as Cynus termeth them which Jurisconsultorum Communi quodam decreto by an uncontroverted opinion of all Lawyers nec cedi nec distrahi nec abalienari a Summo Principe cannot as Bodin saith be granted or released nor by any manner of way aliened or witholden from the Sovereign Prince nec ulla quidem temporis dinternitate praescribi posse nor by any length of time prescribed against him and therefore by Besoldus called Imperii Majestatis Jura bona Regni conjuncta incorporate seu Coronae unita quae princeps alienare non potest the Rights and Empire of Majesty and the goods and part of the Crown so Incorporate and annexed unto it as the Prince cannot alien which for the Subjects to attempt would not be much different from an endeavour to restrain a Prince by Law against the Law of God bonos more 's which by the opinion of the Learned Bacon the Lord Chief Justice Hobart and Judge Hutton would be Void and of none Effect for the presents and good will of Inferiors to their Superiors is one of the most ancient and Noble Customs which mankind hath ever practised and began so with the Beginning and Youth of the world as we find the Patriarch Jacob sending his Sons to his then unknown Son Joseph besides the Mony which he gave them to buy Corn a Present of the best Fruits of the Country a little Balm a little Honey Spices Mirrh Nutts and Almonds The Persians in their Kings Progresses did munera offerre neque vilia neque exilia neque nimis pretiosa nec magnifica bring them Presents neither Pretious nor Contemptible from which etiam Agricolae Opifices Workmen and Plowmen were not freed in the bringing Wine Oxen Fruits and Cheeses and the first Fruits of what the Earth brought forth quae non tributa sed doni loco consebantur which were not accompted to be given as tributes but oblations and free Gifts which made the poor Persian Synetas when he met with Artaxerxes and his
expresly prohibited cannot be supposed to be the concern or interest of all the People deserving or requiring satisfaction or especially provided for by Law to have satisfaction unless it could by any probability or soundness of Judgment be concluded that all the People of England besides Wives Children or near Kindred and Relations the necessity of publick Justice and deterring Examples are or should be concerned in such a never to be fancied Appeal of the People And it will be very hard to prove that one or a few are all the People of England or if they could be so imagined are to be more concerned than the King who is sworn to do Justice unless they would claim and prove a Soveraignty and to be sworn to do Justice which though they had once by a villanous Rebellion attacked until Oliver Cromwel their Man of Sin cheated them of it for God would never allow them any such power or priviledge or any Title to the Jesuits Doctrine which some of our Protestant Dissenters their modern Proselites have learned of them that the King although he be singulis major is minor universis And it is no denial of Justice in the House of Peers to deny the receiving of an Impeachment from the House of Commons when they cannot understand any just cause or reason to receive it and the Records Rolls Petitions and Orders of Parliament will inform those that will be at the pains to be rightly and truly directed by them that Petitions in Parliament have been adjourned modified or denied and that in the Common or Inferior Courts of Justice Writs and Process may sometimes be denied superseded or altered according to the Rules of Justice or the circumstances thereof And our Records can witness that Plaintiffs have petitioned Courts of Justice recedere a brevi impetrare aliud And it cannot be said that the King doth denegare Justitiam when he would bind them unto their ancient legal well experimented forms of seeking it in the pursuing their Rights and Remedies hinders them in nothing but seeking to hurt others and destroy themselves For Justice no otherwise denied should not be termed Arbitrary until there can be some solid reason proof or evidence for it When it is rather to be believed that if the Factious Vulgar Rabble might have their Wills they would never be content or leave their fooling until they may obtain an unbounded liberty of tumbling and tossing the Government into as many several Forms and Methods as there be days in the year and no smaller variety of Religions And by the Feudal Laws which are the only Fundamental Laws of our Government and English Monarchy those many parts of the Tenants that held of their Mesne Lords in Capite could not with any safety to their Oaths and Estates Authorise any of their Elected Members of the House of Commons in Parliament to accuse or charge any of the Baronage of England in the House of Peers in Parliament although every Tenant in his Oath of Vassalage to his Mesne Lord doth except his Allegiance to the King and would be guilty of Misprision of Treason if he should conceal it by the space of twenty and four hours and if any of the Elected would or should avoid such Misprision of Treason in the not performance of his Duty and Oath of Allegiance it would require a particular Commission to his own Elected Members and is not to have it done by way of a general Representation when there is not to be discerned in the Kings Writ or in the Sureties or Manucaptors matters or things to be performed or in the Indentures betwixt the Sheriff and the Electors and Elected any word of Representation or any thing more than ad faciendum consentiendum iis to assent and obey do and perform such things as the King by the Advice of the Lords in Parliament shall ordain and if they would make themselves to be such Representers were to have a particular and express Commission to charge or impeach any one of themselves or of the House of Peers with Treason or any other high Misdemeanours And they must be little conversant with our Records that have not understood that the Commons have many times received just denials to their Petitions and that some have not seldom wanted the foundations of Reason or Justice That many of their Petitions have adopted the Concerns and Interests of others that were either Strangers unto them or were the Designs of some of the grand Nobility who thought them as necessary to their purposes as Wind Tide and Sails are to the speeding of a Ship into the Port or Landing-places of their Designs For upon their exhibiting in a Parliament in the 28 year of the Raign of King Henry the Sixth abundance of Articles of High Treason and Misdemeanours against William de la Poole Duke of Suffolk one whereof was that he had sold the Realm of England to the French King who was preparing to invade it When they did require the King and House of Lords that the Duke whom not long before they had recommended to the King to be rewarded for special services might be committed Prisoner to the Tower of London the Lords and Justices upon consultation thought it not reasonable unless some special Matter was objected against him Whereupon the said Duke not putting himself upon his Peerage but with protestation of his innocency only submitting himself to the Kings mercy who acquitting him from the Treason and many of the Misdemeanours and for some of them by the advice of the Lords only banished him for five years And that thereupon when the Viscount Beaumont in the behalf of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal required that it might be Inrolled that the Judgment was by the Kings own Rule not by their Assent and that neither they nor their Heirs should by this Example be barred of their Peerage No Protestation appears to have been made by any of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal for or on the behalf of the Commons Or by the Commons for themselves So as a different manner of doing Justice can neither truly or rationally be said to be an absolute denial of Justice and was never believed to be so by the Predecessors of the House of Commons in Parliament in our former Kings Raigns when some hundreds of their Petitions in Parliament have been answered There is a Law already provided or let the old Law stand or the King will provide a covenable or fitting remedy And is not likely if it were as it is not to be any Arbitrary Power or any temptation or inducement thereunto to produce any Rule or incouragement to the exercise of an Arbitrary Power in the Inferiour Courts when there is none so weak in his Intellect but may understand that different Courts have several Boundaries Methods and Forms of Proceedings and that the Kings extraordinary great Court and Councel in His House of Peers although very just and
the order of the House of Commons who returning to their places again ordered that their Serjeant should go to the Sheriffs of London to demand the delivery of their Burgess without any Writ or Warrant albeit the Lord Chancellor offered to grant them a Writ which they refused as being of opinion that all commandments and orders of their House by their Serjeants only shewing of his Mace the Ensign of their Soveraigns authority without a Writ would be authority sufficient but before the Serjeant came into London the Sheriffs having intelligence how heinously the matter was taken better bethought themselves and delivered the Prisoner but the Serjeant according to his command charged the Sheriffs to appear the next morrow in the House of Commons bringing with them the Clerks of the Compter and the said White was likewise taken into Custody whereupon the next morning the said Sheriffs and Clerks together with the said White appearing were compelled to make Answer without Councel and with the Sheriffs and the said White were committed to the Tower of London and the Officers and Clerks to Newgate where they remained for some days and were after delivered not without the humble suit of the Lord Mayor of London and divers of their friends But a debate and questions arising in the House of Commons which lasted 9 or 10 days together how to preserve the debt of the Creditor whilst they enjoyed the priviledge of Parliament by delivering Mr. Ferrers out of prison upon an execution and some being of opinion that it was to be salved only by an Act of Parliament and not well agreeing also thereupon the King being advertised thereof summoned to appear before him the Lord Chancellor and the Judges and the Speaker of the House of Commons and other the gravest persons of that House who after his Judicious arguments concerning the extent and warrantableness of the priviledge of Parliament and his own more especially in the granting thereof touching the freedom from Arrests which all the Judges assented unto none speaking against it commended notwithstanding the intention of his Houses of Parliament to have an Act to preserve the Creditors debt who he said deserved to have lost it the Act of Parliament was consented unto by the Commons but passed not the House of Lords by reason of the sudden dissolution of the Parliament Upon the report made by Mr. Attorney of the Dutchy of Lancaster Chairman or principal of the Committee of the House of Commons for the delivery of Edward Smally a Servant of Mr. Hales a Member of Parliament arrested in Execution that the said Committees found no President for the setting at large by the Mace and if they had it had but denoted the Kings sole Authority for that it was his Mace and his Serjeant at Arms that carried it and none of their Mace or Serjeant any person in Arrest but only by Writ and that by divers precedents of Record perused by the said Committee it appeareth that ever Knight Citizen and Burgess of the House of Commons in Parliament which doth require Priviledge hath used in that case to take a corporal Oath before the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the great Seal of England for the time being that the party for whom such Writ was prayed was his Servant at the time of the Arrest made And thereupon Mr. Hall was ordered by the House that he should repair to the Lord Keeper and make Oath in form aforesaid and then to proceed to the taking of a Warrant for a Writ of Priviledge for his said Servant according to the said report and it so appears by the Journal of the House of Commons and saith Mr. Elsing the Writ of Priviledge being so easy to be had what needed any Petitions to be made by the Commons to the King and the Lords for the same and as there is no precedent for this in the times of Edward the third Richard 2d H. 4. nor H. 5. so there are none to the contrary There being then no such opinions as have been since indulged and seditiously enough espoused by some that would go so far beyond Truth and Reason as to believe that the Members of the House of Commons that are or shall be have a Charter of Ordination or which is more of a never to be prov'd Commission from an unintelligible power of Soveraignty of the People And a man might wonder himself almost into an Extasy or Inanition how or by what magical or strange artifice Sir Edward Coke in the latter end of his Age and Treasury of Law and good Learning if he had ever Studied and read as he ought to have done the Feudal Laws which were our Fundamental Laws and the Original of our once and I hope may be again happy government and might before he came to be over-credulously infected with the Impostures of the modus tenendi Parliamenta and mirrour of Justice have well understood that they were no other than those which are and long have been the Laws of the Britains Saxons Germany France and Spain the Goths Vandals and Longobards Denmark Norway Sweden Hungary Bohemia Holland and West Freizland Gelderland Savoy Transilvania Silesia Moldavia Walachia Navarre Catalonia and the Republicks of Geneva and Genoa Kingdoms of Naples and Sicily Dutchies of Lorrain Millian and Florence with some little small diversities and that all our multitudes of allowed Customs Usages and Priviledges by the Indulgence of our Kings and Princes and their Laws have had no other Fountain or Original and should confess that our Magna Charta and Carta de Foresta which were not only some Relaxations Liberties and Priviledges granted and allowed by our King Henry the third but were expressly granted to be holden of that King his Heirs and Successors in Capite and that both they and all our Acts and Ordinances made them to be no other than as their Patroni or foundation and that our Colloquia generalia or Magna Concilia or Curia as Brodon stiles them now or for many Ages past called Parliaments and even those beneficia and Laws were not unknown to the Brittains in the time of their valarous and great King Arthur and could tell how when he was a Member of Parliament in the third year of the Raign of King Charles the Martyr and one of the most eminent and busy to Name and Stile the Petition of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament Assembled their Petition of Right when that which they would there claim to be their Rights and Liberties had no Right Reason Law President true History or Record to back or assert what they desired the King to give his Royal assent or Fiat unto and was no more the Rights of the People truly understood than to desire a Liberty to pull down the House or Government upon their own heads carve out their own destruction and entail it or as little Children left alone in an House with a great fire
Ancient Form of Government who ought better to assert them and that the Coronation-Oaths of all our many Kings and Princes swearing to maintain the Laws of King Edward the Confessor which have for those many Ages past so highly satisfied and contented the Common People and good Subjects of England do enjoin no other than our Kings and Princes strict observation of the Feudal Laws and their Subjects Obedience unto him and them by their Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and his and their Protection of them in the performance thereof and from no other Laws or Customs than the Feudal Laws have our Parliaments themselves derived their original as Eginard Secretary unto Charles the Great or Charlemain who Raigned in the year after our blessed Saviours Incarnation 768. consisting of Lords Spiritual and Temporal if not long before had their more fixt beginning How then can so grave and learned a Professor of our Laws and after an eminent Administrator of the Laws and Justice of the Kingdom so either declare to the World that he hath not at all been acquainted with our Feudal Laws but gained a great Estate out of a small in a Government and Laws he knew no Original thereof and make many things to be grievances of the People which are but the Kings Just Rights and Authority and the Peoples Duty and their grievances in doing or suffering their Duties to be done as if disobedience which in our Nation hath too often hapned were a Franchise of the Land and a Right to be Petitioned for by the People But howsoever Mr. Will. Pryn being better awake could be so kind a Friend unto the truth as to give us notice that the Abridger of the Parl. Records left out much of what he should have mentioned viz. The Prelates Dukes Earls Barons Commons Citizens Burgesses Merchants of England in the Parliament Petitioned the King not only for a Pardon in general and of Fines and Amerciaments before the Justices of Peace not yet Levyed in special but they likewise subjoin a memorable request saith Mr. Pryn omitted by the Abridger that in time to come the said Prelates Earles Barons Commons Citizens and Burgesses of the Realm of England may not henceforth be charged molested nor grieved to make any Common Aid or sustein any charge unless it be by Common Assent of the Prelates Dukes Lords and Barons and other People of the Commons of the Realm of England as a Benevolence or Aid given to their King in his want of Money wh 〈…〉 h King Henry the 3d. sometimes had when he went from Aboey to Abbey declaring his Necessities and King Richard the Third that Murthered his Brothers Sons to Usurp the Crown flattered the People they should no more be troubled with when it was never 〈…〉 ked before the Raign of King Henry 3d or 〈◊〉 by any of our Kings or Princes until the urgent Necessities of our blessed Martyr for the preservation of his People caused him once to do it Or such as the imprisoning of some few wealthy Men as obstinately refused to lend him 〈…〉 e and small Sums of Money because they would force him to call such a Reforming and Ruining Parliament as that which not long before hapned in Anno 1641. Or such as their heavily complained of Charges levied upon the People by the Lord Lieutenants or Deputy Lieutenants in some seldom Musters or Military Affairs which a small acquaintance with our Feudal Laws might have persuaded the Gentlemen of the misnamed Petition of Right to have been lawful or that some imprisoned were not delivered upon Writs of Habeas Corpus when there were other just Causes to detain them at least for some small time of Advice And if they will adventure to be tryed by Magna Charta will be no great gainers by it for Magna Charta well examined notwithstanding the dissolution of the Tenures in Capite is yet God be thanked holden in Capite and loudly proclaims our Feudal Laws to be both the King and the Peoples Rights and disdains to furnish any contrivances against their Kings who were the only free givers and granters thereof And the Statute of 28 E 3. And all or the most of our Acts of Parliament do and may ever declare the usefulness of our Feudal Laws and that Reverend great Judge might have spared the complaints of Free-quartering of Land-Soldiers and Marriners or of punishing Offenders by Martial Law and will hardly find any to commend him or any Lawyer for their proficiency in their amassing together so many needless complaints And that in full Parliament The King then lying sick at Sheene whereof he died and divers of the Lords and Commons in Parliament coming unto him with Petitions to know his pleasure and what he would have done therein nor no Imposition put upon the Woolls Woolfels and Leather having as they might think as great an opportunity and advantage as the three great Barons Bobun Clare and Bigod had when they forced the Statute aforesaid de Tallagio non concedendo upon King Edward the first and would not suffer him to insert his Salvo Jure Regis or any the Annaent Custom of Wooll half a Mark and of three hundred Woolfels half a Mark and of one Last of Skins one Mark of Custom only according to the Statute made in the 14th year of his Raign saving unto the King the Subsidy granted unto him the last Parliament for a certain time and not yet Levied Unto which the King gave answer That as to that that no Charge be laid upon the People without common Assent The King is not at all willing to do it without great necessity and for the defence of the Realm and where he may do it with Reason For otherwise all Monarchies may be made Elective and the Will and great Example and Approbation of God disappointed where the Subjects and People will not be so careful of their own preservation as to help their King when his and their Enemy hath invaded the Kingdom and the People may as often as they please change or depose their Kings when they shall resolve to stand still and not help to aid him as the cursed and bitterly cursed Moroz did and be as wise to their own destruction as the Citizens of London were in the late general Conflagration of their City or a foolish fear of breaking Magna Charta which could never be proved to have been any cause of it they would to save and keep unpulled down or blown up ten houses and save some of their goods leave that raging and merciless Fire to burn twenty thousand houses in their City and Suburbs And it was no bad Answer also that that great and victorious King Edward the third as sick as he was made likewise unto that other part of their Petition that Impositions be not laid upon their Woolls without Assent of the Prelates Dukes Earls Barons and other People of the Commons of his Realm That there was a
defectum ejus Et dixit D. Tho. qui. 1. P. 62. Quest. dixit Angelos quia peccare non possunt liberiores esse nobis qui pecca e possunt And Cicero defineth liberty to be potestas vivendi ut velint at non vivit ut velit qui juxta sensus carnis suae Cupiditatis sed is solummodo qui vivit juxta rationem Plutarchus Epictetus eandem Libertatis definitionem Nobis dederunt not that liberum esse debet dici cui nec impedimentum praeberi possit volenti nec vis inferri volenti but if none of the fancied vast liberties which the too many of our State or Government Menders would entitle their own evil designs and entail upon all that shall be so foolishly wicked as to be deluded by them and the costly searches of Mr. William Pettit amounting by his own Report unto more than five hundred pounds in all that could be found in any the Books and Manuscripts publick or private of England cannot reach or come so near as unto a probability that there ever were in the Brittish Roman Saxon Danish or Norman Raigns of our Kings and Princes and their many Royal Successors ever since or long before that since the Creation of the World either in Parliament or without any mention of a third Estate inherent in the people and they must be content to go a begging for a belief in some lately discovered Island where they may dream any such stuff may be sound either as their modus tenendi Parliamentum or a third Estate as Subjects at the same time governing their Kings and Princes when by their Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy they are bound alwaies to be obedient unto them as next under God their SupremeHead and Governor And may curse their fate that every thing their scrutinies can assist them with should not with wresting wringing and false and senseless Interpretations appear at all to be for their purposes but every thing clearly against them and sorrowfully repent that they or their Predecessors had so unhappily busied themselves in destroying so many Props of the Monarchick Government as the Court of Star Chamber wherein did sometimes sit as Judges the Lord Chancellor Lord Treasurer and the Chief Judges of both the Benches and the Barons of the Exchequer the Archbishop of Canterbury and divers of the Kings Privy Council who as Judges in seveveral Courts did sit there upon special occasions and the procuring the King to take away the High Commission Court in their miscarried designs of Levelling the Hierarchy and order of Bishops The want of which two very necessary and useful Courts hath suffred the Nation to be overflown with all manner of wickedness and Impiety And in that their over-hasty carreer of breaking our English Monarchy like a Glass into many small or little peices needed not to have been so hasty but have paused a little while have considered that as unto the circumstances of Time Place Number of Persons Usages and Customs in a variety of contingencies being the only ancient proper and efficient cause of summoning Parliaments adjorning or dissolving them there could not be a probability of a modus tenendi Parliamentum either in King Edward the Confessors Raign or before or after for that our Parliament Rolls and Records do una voce plainly declare against it and shew that many times Parliaments have been holden in the absence of our Kings by the Prince his Eldest Son or by some other of their Sons as Lieutenants or Guardians of their Kingdom or by the Queen Mother assisted by the Kings Justitary or other Commissioners during the Imprisonment of King Richard the first or by the Queen Consort of King John in his absence or by King Henry the 4th in his usurpation upon King Richard the second when he unjustly made use of a Parliament summoned by him And there could not be a third Estate in the Raign of King Charles the second when he had as aforesaid so unfortunately been ill advised to exchange the Nerves Sinews Strength and Honour of his Crown and Government for a mistaken Recompence of an Excise upon Ale Beer and Syder and then there were but two Estates viz. The Lords Spiritual and Temporal subordinate unto their Soveraign and it would be a difficulty insuperable to find any Truth Reason Evidence Probability or Possibility that there is or ought to be a Soveraignty inhaerent in the people or if such Improbabilities were or could be what Method or contenting Equal distribution could be made thereof amongst Learned and Unlearned Ambitious Rich and Poor Rude Ignorant or better tempered vicious or virtuous Women and Children or Fooles Madmen in their intervals or without when some have not improbably calculated the number of the Kings Subjects in England only to be not much under five Millions besides these vast numbers in Scotland and Ireland And who upon any or many discords like to happen should be the pacifying Reconciler Justiciary or Umpire betwixt them and what Charters Agreements or Surrenders should be contrived or put in writing betwixt them concerning the Right use or distribution of that never to be proved inhaerent Soveraignty in the people taking as Subjects the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy or that ever it was attempted before our English Rebellions either in England Scotland or Ireland or can they give us any reason or demonstration that it was ever allowed of or that any pact or Agreement was made to confirm it Neither is there any Modus tenendi Parliamentum or any such thing or matter as a three governing Estate in the solemn Recognition made in a Parliament at Clarenden in the Raign of King Henry the second of the Anitae Consuetudines or Laws used in the time or Raign of his Grand-Father King Henry the first which the Archbishops and Bishops verbo veritatis sine dolo malo Ing nio promised faithfully to obey and the Earls and Barons likewise And will be a Priviledge never taught to the Athenians sometimes the wiser part of Greece by their great Legislator Solon who after he had made them some Laws feigned a Voyage or Journey to Salamia and caused them to swear to observe them until his Return and absented himself the longer because he would not have them break them as Pisistratus the Tyrant did afterwards to his own advantage perswade them to do the Spartans under their great Legislator Lycurgus and the many other little Commonwealths of Achaia first fooled by Philip of Macedon afterwards by Alexander the Great his Son who conquered all that part of the World but Diogenes the Philosopher in his Tub now all into slavery the Ottoman Empire had long before better business to trouble their Heads with than the fond Imagination of a Soveraignty inhaerent in themselves although one of their most â—acred Laws in their Ten Tables was Slus populi sit Suprema Lex ne quid detrimenti res publica capiat Neither did