been offered them since the Pacification But to add to the Grievances of that oppressed Nation the King committed two of their Commissioners to Prison In April 1640 the King called a Parliament in England not to seek Counsel and Advice of them but to draw Countenance and Supply from them resolving either to make the Parliament pliant to his Will and to establish Mischief by a Law or else to break it The Scots wrote a Justification of their Proceedings to this Parliament and advised them to be wary in vindicating their own Laws and Liberties this Parliament being procured to no other End but to arm the King against his Scotish Subjects and by that VVar to enslave both the Nations That after so many Violations and Dissolutions of Parliaments in England this was not called to redress Grievances but to be so over-reach'd if they were not careful that no possibility should be left for the future of redressing any That some dangerous Practice might be well suspected when at the same time a Parliament was denied to Scotland tho promised by the WORD OF A KING granted to England when not expected and obtruded upon Ireland when not desired The Parliament met the 13th of April when the King required a Supply to carry on his VVar against the Scots with a Promise that he would afterwards redress the Kingdom 's Grievances To which it was answered by many That redress of Grievances was the chief End of assembling Parliaments and ought to precede granting of Subsidies That the People had no reason to pay for that which they neither caused nor desired and which could not prove to their Good but quite contrary to the great detriment of the whole Kingdom That they would more willingly pay to prevent that unhappy VVar That the VVar would make the Breach wider and the Remedy desperate That THE BEST JVSTICE VVOVLD BE TO FILL VP THE PITS VVHICH VVERE MADE TO INTRAP OTHERS VVITH THE BODIES OF THOSE THAT DIGGED THEM Upon the 5th of May the King to the great grief of both Kingdoms * Upon the News of the Dissolution of this Parliament Cardinal Barberini intituled The Protector of England though he greatly affected Arch-Bishop Laud declared That he feared he would cause some great Disturbance in England and that certainly for his sake and by his means the King had dissolved this Parliament which he feared Scotland and most part of England would take very ill dissolved this Parliament finding them no way disposed to countenance the War But he PROTESTED HE WOULD GOVERN ACCORDING TO LAW as if the Parliament were constantly sitting And yet the very next day to the extream Grief of the People he was seen to break his Word for he commanded the Lord BROOKS Study and Pockets to be searched and Mr. Bellasis Father of the present Earl of Fanomberg Sir John Hâ—â—haâ— and Mr. Crew Members of the House of Commons were imprisoned And the King published a false and scandalous Declaration against the Commons He then betook himself to other Courses to carry on this VVar The CLERGY contributed freely to it and Collections were made among the PAPISTS Great Loans were attempted to be drawn from the City and for not complying therein Sir Nicholas Rainton Sir Stephan Soumâ— and other eminent Citizens were imprisoned Nay he went further and had it under consideration to â—oin 400000 l. of BRASS MONEY A Precedent for what the late King James did in Ireland The Scots taking Alarm at the Breach of the English Parliament and at the King's Preparations and finding themselves bereaved of all possibility of satisfying him by any naked Supplication they provided for their own Safety and resolved to enter England with a Sword in one hand and a Petition in the other The King marches his Army Northwards but the Common Souldiers were found sensible of Publick Interest and Religion though many Commanders and Gentleman seemed not to be so They declared their aversion to the War and questioned whether their Captains were not Papists Upon the 28th of August 1640 the Scots marching towards Nowcastle the English Army encamped to intercept their Passage but many of the Souldiers not liking the Cause forsook their Commanders However the Horse engaged the Scots but received a Repulse some on both sides being slain and Colonel VVilmot with Sir John Digby and Oniale both Captains of Horse and PAPISTS were made Prisoners Hereupon the Scots became Masters of Newcastle and Durham The King by Proclamation summoned all the English Nobility with their Followers and Foroes to attend his Standard at York upon the 20th of September against the Scots But about twenty Peers considering the great Calamity into which the King 's rash Proceedings had thrown the Kingdom framed and sent his Majesty an humble Letter representing the Mischiefs attending his wicked War the Rapines committed by his Army wherein Papists were armed though the Laws permit them not to have Arms in their Houses c. and they humbly entreated him to summon a Parliament The King thereupon summoned all the Lords to appear at York upon the 24th of September and then declared to them that OF HIS OWN FREE ACCORD he had determined to call a Parliament and sixteen Lords were agreed upon to treat with the like number of the Scots and at length a Cessation of Arms till the 16th of December was agreed upon and that during that time the Scots should be paid 850 l. a day and they allowed Winter-quarters in England Both Nations hereupon rested in assured Confidence that the Parliament would put a Period to this War which could never have been begun but for want of a Parliament They were also confident that the Freedom which the Fundamental Laws allow to Parliaments could not be denied to this to which the King WAS NECESSITATED and upon which THE PEOPLE had set their utmost Hope whom it seemed not safe after so many and often repeated Oppressions to provoke any further So much for the Scotish Affairs Now it may be thought that I have too long digressed therefore to return to you Reverend Doctor Hollingworth We will try what Inferences may be raised from this Melancholy History to render it useful to the English Reader I have declared that King Charles the First was an insufferable Tyrant you affirm him to have set a Pattern for the best of future Princes and that King William and Queen Mary are daily imitating him And the last thing you said was That when the Parliament met in November 1640 He frankly told them that he was resolved to put himself freely and clearly on the LOVE AND AFFECTION OF HIS ENGLISH SUBJECTS Now I have been taking a great deal of pains to set this Matter in its true Light and to shew whence this sudden Fit of Love to our Nation with an exclusion of Scotland arose And with your leave Sir here are two or three Vses of Information or Instruction from what hath been said 1. That this Declaration of
though they retracted their Opinions both Houses of Parliament voted and his Majesty at length acknowledged it to be an illegal and unjust Exaction Yet that Guilt soon were off and we never heard that thereby or by any other of the almost innumerable Oppressions of his People no nor by his destroying the poor Protestants of Rochel the Quiet of his Mind was any way disturbed Now in the Case we are upon here was a fair and most solemn Trial The Lords and Commons voted the Crimes Treason The King's Counsel and Judges avowed the same The Bishops MARK THAT DOCTOR pick'd the Thorn out of his Conscience Nevertheless his passing this Bill violated the Peace of his Mind all the days of his Life To offer something towards the enlightning you in this Matter allow me to remind you what you have before read When the Duke of Buckingham was impeached for Treason this same King told the Parliament THAT BVCKINGHAM HAD NOT INTERMEDLED NOR DONE ANY THING CONCERNING THE PURBLICK BUT BY HIS SPECIAL DIRECTIONS Now I have a strong fancy that the unhappy Earl of Strafford ' s Case was the same with the Duke's 'T is a mischievous Conscience with whom one good Deed is so hard to pass down as to endanger almost a choaking and bad Deeds without number tho as big and as bulky as the Buin of three Kingdoms go down currently without straining and that it disturbed the Quiet of the King's Mind that he could not preserve this as he had done his other Servant in the execution of his own Commands And no marvel it stung his Conscience to adjudg to death those Misdeeds whereof himself had been the chief Author In the next place good Doctor you inform us That the King signed a Bill for a Triennial Parliament which certainly was as great a condescention as was ever made by a Prince I Why now 't is very unlucky Doctor that when you think your self certainly in the right you are most undoubtedly in the wrong for this Act for a TRIENNIAL PARLIAMENT did not extend to so much as by Law the Parliament ought to have required there being at that time two Statutes of Edward 3d in force for a Parliament to be holden once a Year But now you bring me to an Act of superabundant Grace Pag. 6. you say That he passed an Act for the Parliament to sit during pleasure This was something indeed we must therefore examine what Reasons the Parliament had to insist upon this Bill and what the Motives were that brought the King to comply herein It appeared most evidently to both Houses by the Examinations and Confessions of several of the Criminals that sometime before the passing of the Bill for the continuance of the Parliament which was upon the 10th of May 1641. The KING had been tampering with the Army which he had raised against the Scots and which lay undisbanded in the North to bring them up to curb the Parliament and subdue them to his Will Many great Men were found to be engaged in this Conspiracy viz. Mr. Piercy Brother to the Earl of Northumberland Mr. Henry Jermin the Queen's Favourite afterwards Earl of St. Albans Mr. Goring eldest Son to the Lord Goring Mr. Wilmot the Lord Wilmot's eldest Son Sir John Suckling Colonel Ashburnham Pollard Oneal an Irish Papist and many others these had taken an Oath of Secrecy among themselves To joyn with this Army and strengthen the Plot a French Army was to be landed at Portsmouth which Town for that purpose was to be put into Mr. Jermyn's hands and the * The Parliament had addressed the King to disband this Army but he answer'd That he would not allow of the disbanding the Irish Army for divers Reasons best known to himself Irish Army consisting of 8000 almost all Papists was to be brought over Upon the Discovery of this horrid Plot Piercy †Jermin after this Discovery went off with a Pass under the King 's own Hand which commanded the Governour of Portsmouth to provide with all speed a Ship to carry him to any Port of France Jermin and Suckling fled into France Goring being taken made an ingenuous Confession and so was discharged Oneal Wilmot Ashburnham and others were committed to the Tower from whence Oneal was permitted to make his Escape Mr. Piercy by a Letter from beyond the Seas to his Brother the Earl of Northumberland dated the 14th of June confessed much of this Conspiracy in particular the taking the Oath of Secrecy And that they had agreed to engage the Army to stand by the King against the Parliament in The preserving the Bishops Functions and Votes The not disbanding the Irish Army till the Scots were disbanded The endeavouring to settle his Revenue to that proportion it was formerly That he imparted all this to the King and perceived that he had been treated with by others concerning something of the Army which did not agree with those Proposals BUT INCLINED A WAY MORE HIGH AND SHARP NOT HAVING LIMITS EITHER OF HONOUR OR LAW That Goring and Jermin were acquainted with the other Proceedings and that the King pressed Mr. Piercy to admit them to consultation To which he having yielded and sworn them to Secrecy acquainted them what he had proposed but HE FOVND THEIR PROPOSALS DIFFERED FROM HIS IN VIOLENCE AND HEIGHT Colonel Goring confessed upon his Examination that Jermin carried him to the King who asked him If he was engaged in any CABAL concerning the Army To which Goring answering That he was not The King said I command you then to join your self with Piercy and some others whom you will find with him at his Lodgings That he thereupon went and found with Mr. Piercy Wilmot Oneal and others That he and Jermin having first taken the Oath of Secrecy which the others had taken before Mr. Piercy made his Propositions viz. That the Army should presently be put into a posture to serve the King and then should send up a Declaration to the Parliament of these Particulars That nothing should be done in Parliament contrary to any former Act of Parliament and the King's Revenne be establish'd That Jermin propounded that the Army should be immediately brought to London and they SHOVLD MAKE SVRE OF THE TOWER and he confessed that he himself urged these things to shew the Vanity and Danger of the other Propositions without undertaking these Lieutenant Colonel Ballard and Capt. Chudleigh confessed that the French that were about London were to be mounted and would join with the Army and that the Clergy would raise 1000 Horse to assist them And Chudleigh added that the Queen had sent down Money to fortify PORTSMOUTH Further that Mr. Jermin ask'd him if he thought the Army would stick to their Officers in case the King and Parliament should not agree It further appeared by the Confessions of Sir Jacob Ashley Sir John Conniers and Capt. Legg eminent Commanders in the King's Army that Oneal the Papist was a
Confidence were begot betwixt your Majesty and your Parliament whose grave and loyal Counsels are we humbly conceive the visible way under God to put a speedy end to the Troubles of Ireland and establish your Throne in Righteousness We most humbly supplicate that we may represent our Vnfitness to become Judges betwixt your Majesty and Parliament in any thing or dispute the Authority of either which we humbly conceive do fortify each other We shall be ready to maintain your Majesty's just Rights the Priviledges and Power of Parliaments and the lawful Liberties of the Subjects I have now shown you Doctor that the King wanted not Invitations to return and live in Honour and Safety at London The Parliament importunately press'd it the Gentlemen and Freeholders of Yorkshire humbly supplicated it But nothing is more certain than that instead of hoping to cool the Heats at London by retiring to York 't was his sole purpose and intention to put that Country and the whole Kingdom into a Flame as he quickly did and pursuant to that Design having rejected with Scorn the Petitions I have mentioned he persisted in his former way of raising Forces and made Proclamation requiring all Gentlemen and others of that County to attend him in Arms. The Lords and Commons wisely foreseeing the impending Mischief and observing the Clouds to gather so fast and threaten a Storm they as wisely endeavoured to prevent it and therefore passed a Vote May 20 1642 That it appears the King seduced by wicked Counsel intends to make War against the Parliament who in all their Consultations and Actions have proposed no other end unto themselves but the Care of his Kingdom and the performance of all Duty and Loyalty to his Person 2. That whensoever the King maketh War upon the Parliament it is a Breach of the Trust reposed in him by his People contrary to his Oath and tending to the Dissolution of the Government 3. That whosoever shall serve or assist him in such War are Traitors by the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom and have been so adjudged by two Acts of Parliament and ought to suffer as Traitors 11 Rich. 2. 1 Hen. 4. But I must hear you Pag. 10. Sir upon this Point of the first beginning of the unnatural and bloody War you suggest that he was forced to raise an Army which was after the Parliament had voted a Necessity of a War with him Will you never leave your L Doctor The Parliament did not vote a necessity of a War They indeed voted as I told you but now That it appeared that the King intended to make War against them and it was near two Months afterwards viz. the 12th of July 1642 that the Lords and Commons finding his Majesty to persist in that Intention voted that an Army should be forthwith raised for the Safety of the King's Person Defence of both Houses of Parliament and preserving of the true Religion the Laws Liberty and the Peace of the Kingdom That the Earl of Essex should be General and that they will live and die with him in this Cause and that the Earl of Bedford should be General of the Horse Nevertheless they resolved that a Petition should be presented to his Majesty by the Earl of Holland Sir John Holland and Sir Philip Stapleton to move the King to a good Accord with his Parliament to prevent a Civil War which was to the effect following Although We your Majesty's most humble and faithful Subjects the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament have been very unhappy in many former Petitions to your Majesty and with much Sorrow do perceive that your Majesty incensed by many false Calumnies and Slanders doth continue to raise Forces against us and to make great Preparations for War both in the Kingdom and from beyond the Seas yet such is our earnest desire of discharging our Duty to your Majesty and the Kingdom to preserve the Peace thereof and to prevent the Miseries of Civil War That notwithstanding we hold our selves bound to use all the Means and Power which by the Laws and Constitutions of this Kingdom we are trusted with for Defence and Protection thereof and of the Subjects from Force and Violence We do in this our humble and loyal Petition prostrate our selves at your Majesty's Feet beseeching that you will forbear and remove all Preparations and Actions of War That you will come nearer to your Parliament and hearken to their faithful Advice and humble Petitions which shall only tend to the Defence and Advancement of Religion your own Royal Honour and Safety the preservation of our Laws and Liberties And we have been and ever shall be careful to prevent and punish all Tumults and seditious Actings Speeches and Writings which may give your Majesty just cause of Distaste or apprehension of Danger And we for our Parts shall be ready to lay down all those Preparations which we have been forced to make for our Defence And for the Town of Hull and the Ordinance concerning the Militia as we have in both these Particulars only sought the preservation of the Peace of the Kingdom and the Defence of the Parliament from Force and Violence so we shall most willingly leave the Town of Hull in the state it was before Sir John Hotham drew any Forces into it delivering your Majesty's Magazine into the Tower of London We shall be ready to settle the Militia by a Bill in such a way as shall be honourable and safe for your Majesty most agreeable to the Duty of Parliament and effectual for the Good of the Kingdom that the Strength thereof be not employed against it self and that which ought to be for our Security applied to our Destruction And that the Parliament and those who profess and desire still to preserve the Protestant Religion both in this Realm and in Ireland may not be left naked and indefensible to the mischievous Designs and cruel Attempts of those who are the profess'd and confederate Enemies thereof in your Majesty's Dominions and other Neighbour Nations To which if your Majesty's Courses and Counsels shall from henceforth concur We doubt not but we shall quickly make it appear to the World by the most eminent Effects of Love and Duty That your Majesty's personal Safety your Royal Honour and Greatness are much dearer to us than our own Lives and Fortunes which we do most heartily dedicate and shall most willingly imploy for the support and maintenance thereof And now Sir I appeal to you and to all the World Whether these Men talk'd here as though they were resolved to make War and engross all into their own Hands let what would become of the King as a certain Aldgate Doctor of Divinity falsly accuses the Lords and Commons Thanks be to God Sir John Holland as well as Sir John Prattle is yet alive in Norfolk in perfect Health and Understanding and is ready to give the same account I have here given you to any Man that asks
KING JAMES AND PRINCE HENRY HIS SON CAME TO A TIMELY DEATH YEA OR NO Some Parliaments have been but short-liv'd when there was but a muttering that enquiry should be made of their Deaths It would search to the quick to know WHETHER ROCHEL and all THE PROTESTANTS in it were not betrayed into the hands of their Enemies AND BY WHOM It would go to the quick to find out WHETHER THE IRISH REBELLION was not plotted promoted countenanced and contrived in England AND BY WHOM Now I hope Reverend Sir that you will not have the face to deny but Mr. Love was a Consciencious and Pious Divine and I will finish this Head in telling you though a little out of course that the Earls of Northumberland Pembroke Salisbury and Denbigh with the Lord Wainman Sir Henry Vane Mr. Pierepont Mr. Holles Mr. Prideaux Mr. St. John Mr. Whitlock and Mr. Câ—â—w Commissioners for the Parliament in the Treaty we have been talking of were as well as you boast the King's Comnissioners to have been Men of Honour and Honesty Men of Fortunes and Estates Men of great Parts and Endowments who understood the Business they went about and were very fond of healing the Nations Breaches and putting things into such a posture as might settle the King upon his just Rights and the People upon their ancient Priviledges Well Sir for my own Comfort if not for yours I purpose to trouble my self at least at this present with but one thing more in your Tract You say That the Scots notwithstanding all their Promises and Obligations SELL THE KING TO THE ENGLISH PARLIAMENT 'T is a Divine Truth Men are not only ignorant because they cannot but because they will not know the Truth And I cannot conceive that you believe what you here assert Therefore that my Country-men may be undeceived and our Brethren of Scotland vindicated I will set this Matter in its true Light The King had fled to the Scotish Army at Newcastle then in the Parliament's Service and Pay there Propositions for Peace were made unto him which he rejected The War being happily ended the Parliament were in arrear to the Scots for their assistance in it Four hundred thousand Pounds It was agreed that half that Sum should be presently paid upon receipt whereof the Scots were to deliver up not the King but Berwick Newcastle and Carlisle to the Parliament 'T is far from Truth that this was the Price of the King for the Parliament freely granted to the Scots that they might carry him if they pleased to Edinburgh But they refused it affirming that by his Presence in an unsettled Nation new Commotions might arise They rather desired which was also the King's desire that he might be carried into the Southern parts of England and live in some of his Palaces near London which they thought more convenient for treating of a Peace So that in all the whole Debate they seemed to contend not who should have the King but who should not have him Nevertheless to cast a slander upon both Nations for certainly 't is as wicked a thing to buy as to sell such Merchandize You Sir will have it that the Scots sold him the English bought him but WILFULNESS EVER WAS THE GREATEST BLINDNESS Reverend Sir I shall for the present discharge you and my self from further trouble You think I suppose that you make me a very merciful Offer That if I will repent and do so no more I may hope to live in Peace and you will not further lash me with any more such Scourges as I have been but now tortured with but if I shall persist and appear incorrigible you have more Rods in Piss and will pay me off You have much more to say in the behalf of King Charles the First 't is well if you have for I am sure 't is very little that you have hitherto said and you assure me I shall have it and resolve That as long as you can hold a Pen in your Hand you will not drop his Cause There 's no Remedy then but I must abide your Fury for I resolve never to ask Forgiveness and promise to do so no more But on the contrary to write on as I have leisure and you give me occasion in the defence of the Laws and Liberties of my Country Upon which Subject I have much more to say and if you will not be quiet you shall have it I love the Cause too well to drop it and will wear my Steell Pen to the stumps in its defence And Now seeing we are eternally to differ in this Point I desire to settle two things with you for the more orderly Prosecution of this dreadful War 1. That we as Duellists agree the length of their Weapons may resolve how often to trouble the World with our Impertinencies I think once or if you will have it so twice because there are TWO MADDING-DAYS in a Year may suffice 2. That after you have fairly answer'd this and my former Letter by falsifying which as a Preliminary I shall expect from you the many particular Instances I have brought to shew that your admired Prince was a Tyrant or else to prove that they are not Acts or Evidences of Tyranny you would then in the further Prosecution of that Defence which you have undertaken and indeed of Criminating one of the greatest and best deserving Parliaments that even England saw lay aside your loose and general way of discoursing and come to Particulars when you shall so proceed and are failed of a clear Answer then and not till then the day will be your own For tho throughout your whole Discourse which I have been examining you Rebellize the Lords and Commons and fly in the Face of the Parliament with the King 's gracious MESSAGES SAYINGS c. Othâ—â—s may upon better grounds sum up the humble condescending convincing PETITIONS MESSAGES DECLARATIONS c. of the Parliament and dash them all into your Face than you can those Messages and Sayings of the King into the Faces of all who declare that he was a proud Nimrod a hardened Pharaoh in plain English A MERCILESS TYRANT Lastly To encourage you to further Conversation with me the some Men are so impudent as to say that it is not Day when the Sun it self doth shire you shall see that I am not resolved against Conviction but that being under the Command of good Manners I rest not satisfied in the Confession which I made in the beginning of this Letter of an Error committed in my former in relation to the Noble Lord Conway sometime Secretary of State to King Charles the First but shall more fully do it in this place Being misguided by the Printer's Mistake in Rushworth's first Collections from whence I took it I was led to say in my last Year's Letter pag. 7. That the Lord Conway said in Parliament that he never hated Popery whereas his words were that he ever hared it and I have now certain ground
to say that those words were not only consonant to his Speech then made in Parliament but agreeable to the constant Tenour of his whole Life even unto the last Period His Father and Mother lived and died pious Protestants such was his Religious Lady and such are his Grand-Children at this day This Lord Conway was Knighted at the taking of Cadiz in Spain in the time of Queen Elizabeth he was afterwards for many Years Governour of the Brill in Holland where he and his Family lived as became zealous Protestants and greatly beloved and esteemed by the Protestant Magistrates and Ministers of that Town He was greatly favoured by the never to be forgotten MOST PIOUS PRINCE HENRY When the Brill and other Cautionary Towns were delivered to the Dutch upon his return into England he was imployed to Jersey to compose some Differences there which he performed to so much Satisfaction that the good Protestants of that Place always mentioned him with Honour He was then sent Ambassador to Germany in behalf of the King and Queen of Bohemia and was very acceptable to those UNHAPPILY DESERTED Protestant Princes Upon his return to England the Spanish-Match was warmly press'd against which he spake with so much Reason and Courage that the Duke of Buckingham who for particular ends resolved to ruin that Project introduced him as a proper Instrument for that purpose to be Principal Secretary of State In that Station he refused many great Gifts tendred to him by particular Persons and 10000 l. Sterling offer'd and press'd upon him by the Spanish Ambassador In the beginning of King Charles I. Reign at the opening of one of those Parliaments and according to the Custom then the Holy Communion being to be received by both Houses of Parliament by the Contrivance of some LAUDEANS the SACRAMENT was offered to the Lords in Henry the Seventh's Chappel NOT IN BREAD BUT IN WAFERS This Lord Conway was one of the Lords who refused the Wafers and caused them to be taken away and Bread to be brought * He that would not make the necessary Advances to Rome was to be neither Secretary nor Minister of State to King Charles I. Not long after K. Charles I. sent for the Seals of the Secretary's Office from him which as the Lord imployed in that Message would often say the Lord Conway delivered with an admirable Generosity becoming indeed one that in that Ministry of State had served the Publick with extraordinary Ability and Integrity had performed many noble Offices to particular Persons without Injury to any and left that Place and some others of great Profit without one Farthing advantage to the State of his Family When he was upon his Death-Bed a Lady of great Wit who was turned Papist and was the Widow of a near Relation of his Lordship very subtilly and earnestly press'd upon him concerning his Religion whereupon he strengthened himself and made full Profession of his firm Stedfastness in the Reformed Protestant Religion caus'd the Servants to convey this Lady out of his House and commanded them not to suffer any of that Religion to come to him And now Doctor I assure you at parting That as fast as you shall convince me of any Error or Mistake committed in my Scriblings about your Martyr I shall as openly and frankly retract it as I have now done this which relates to my Lord Conway Might I be made so happy as to find a sutable return from you and that you would give a free and impartial Liberty to the use of your own Reason I would yet hope that we might mutually conclude as I now do Your Friend in and for the Truth Edmund Ludlow Amsterdam Jan. 30 1691 2. FINIS A Table of some remarkable Things in this Book KIng Charles I. favouring Popery and dispensing with the Laws c. Page 3 His Bishops cherished Popery and discountenanced conformable Orthodox Ministers Page 3 Montague one of his Chaplains endeavoured to reconcile England to Rome made a Bishop Page 4 The King 's lending Ships to the French to destroy the Protestants of Rochel Page 4 Ship-Money Loan Coat and Conduct-Money required and the Refusers imprisoned and impress'd to serve at Sea Page 4 Archbishop Abbot suspended and confined By Williams disgraced and imprisoned Page 5 Sir Randolph Crew Lord Chief Justice displas'd Page 5 Tonnage and Poundage levied against Law Page 5 Earl of Bristol confined Page 6 Earl of Arundel imprison'd Page 6 Duke of Buckingham protected against the Parliament Page 6 Members of Parliament imprison'd Page 6 Sir John Elliot's Death in the Tower Page 7 The King 's threatning Speeches in Parliament Page 7 His Speech at the Meeting of the Parliament Nov. 1640. Page 11 Bishops obtruded upon Scotland against their Laws Page 12 Laud framed a Common-Prayer for Scotland and sent it to be approved by the Pope Page 12 The Scots protest against it Page 13 King James I. took the Scotish Covenant in the Year 1580. Page 13 The Scots renewed that Covenant in the Year 1638. Page 13 14 The Scots require to have the Liturgy abolished and to have a National Synod Page 14 A Synod called and dissolved by the King the Scots protest against the Dissolution and continue it Page 14 The King resolves upon a War against Scotland Page 14 That War called Bellum Episcopale Page 15 The Scots raise an Army Page 15 A Pacification concluded the King soon after burns it by the Hangman's hands Page 15 Scotish Commissioners sent to the King imprisoned Page 16 A Parliament called in April 1640 and dissolved Page 16 Members imprisoned Page 17 Clergy and Bapists contribute to a second War against Scotland Page 17 Sir Nicholas Rainton Sir Stephen Soame and other eminent Citizens imprison'd for refusing a Loan Page 17 The Scots possess themselves of Newcastle and Durham Page 17 The Lords at York petition for a Parliament Page 18 Cessation of Arms with the Scots Page 18 Star-Chamber and High-Commission-Courts suppress'd by Act of Parliament Page 21 Poll-money granted Page 21 Dr. Leighton's Censure in the Star-Chamber Page 22 Mr. Pryn's Dr. Bastwick's and. Mr. Burton's Censures and horrid Oppressions by Archbishop Laud. Page 24 25 Those Sentences declared illegal in Parliament Page 27 Ship-Money illegal Page 27 Lord Keeper Finch impeach'd of High-Treason about Ship-Money and flies Page 28 The many Exorbitances and Oppressions of the Bishops Page 28 Twelve of them impeach'd of Treason and all removâ—â— from the Lords House Page 29 The Earl of Strafford impeach'd and attâ—inted of Treason Page 30 Bills for Triennial Parliaments and for continuing the present Parliament passed Page 31 Conspiracy to bring the Army against the Parliament discovered Page 32 The King had a Million and half of Money in the first Year of the Parliament 1640. Page 35 The Remonstrance of the State of the Kingdom Dec. 1641. Page 35 The Tumults and Riots in 1641. Page 37 An Account of the occasion of those Tumults Page 41 The King accuses the Lord Mandeville and five Members of Treason Page 37 He goes to the House of Commons with an armed Force and demands the five Members Page 37 The Commons demand a Guard Page 38 The Case of the five Members discussed Page 38 The King leaves White-hall Page 42 The Parliament petitions him at Theobalds to return Page 42 They send a Declaration to him to Newmarket praying his return and the putting the Militia into safe hands Page 43 His Answer about the Militia Page 46 His sending to the King of Denmark for Aid against the Parliament Page 47 He invited the Scots against them Page 47 The Queen buys Arms in Holland Page 47 Names of the Peers recommended by the Parliament to be entrusted with the Militia Page 47 The Lords and Commons petition about the Militia Page 48 Their Ordinance for ordering the Militia Page 48 The Proceedings of the Parliament with King Richard the Second Page 49 The Lords and Commons petition the King at York to return Page 50 The King summons the Gentry to York and requires them to raise him a Guard Page 50 They petition him to return to the Parliament Page 50 Petition of many thousand Freeholders of Yorkshire Page 50 The King requires the Gentlemen c. of Yorkshire to attend him in Arms. Page 51 The Lords and Commons vote that the King Intends to raise War and that it is a Breach of his Trust and that such as assist him in that War are Traitors Page 52 They vote the raising an Army to be commanded by the Earl of Essex Page 52 Their Petition to the King to return Page 52 The King's Speech at the head of his Army Page 54 The Petition of the Parliament sent by the Earl of Essex Page 56 The Preparations made by the King for War Page 58 The Opinion of above sixty Essex Ministers of the Parliament War Page 59 The Uxbridg-Treaty Page 61 Heads of Letters between the King Queen and Marquess of Ormond about the Uxbridg-Treaty and for procuring a Peace with the Irish Rebels to bring them against the Parliament Page 63 The vulgar Error of the Scots selling the King refuted Page 67 A Vindication of the Lord Conway Page 69
yielding up the Claim of Ship-Money to be an Act of pure Grace for very able Lawyers gave their Opinion that the King might exact it by Law and so I have told you did as able and no less knavish Divines But hearken I beseech you what the Wisdom of Parliament told him They declared it a new and unheard of Tax they voted it a most illegal Taxation and unsufferable Grievance they look'd into the Carriage of those Judges who advised the King in this matter and found that Sir JOHN FINCH a Gentleman of good Birth of an high and imperious Spirit ELOQUENT IN SPEECH tho in the knowledg of the Law not very deep in the Year 1636 when Ship-Money was first plotted and set on foot was made Lord Chief Justice of the Common-Pleas and it appeared that by his Brokage and Sollicitation and that with Threats and Promises several of the Judges were wrought upon to give it under their hand that the King might by Law exact Ship-Money Thereupon an Impeachment of High Treason was drawn up against him and the great Lord FAVLKLAND tho an Admirer of the Church as you tell me presented it to the Lords with a very pithy and sharp Oration against Finch but he being at this time Lord-Keeper not daring to abide the Test took his Wings and fled in a disguise to Holland In Conclusion the Arbitrary Power pretended to be in the King of taxing the Subject without Consent in Parliament was not only declared to be against Law by the Judgment of both Houses but also by Act of Parliament Thus we rid our Hands of SHIP-MONEY And Now indeed Sir you come to that which might well raise your Choler and stir your Indignation The King passed a Bill to remove the Bishops out of the House of Lords he also passed a Bill for attainting the great Earl of Strafford which offered Violence to the Peace and Quiet of his Mind all the days of his Life To tell you the Truth Doctor the Parliament found the Bishops of that day to be the Troublers of the State and that it was by consequence become most necessary to abridg their immoderate Power usurped over the Clergy and other good Subjects which they had most maliciously abused to the hazard of Religion and great Prejudice and Oppression of the Laws of the Kingdom and just Liberty of the Subject They had cherish'd Formality and Superstition as the probable Supports of their own Ecclesiastical Tyranny and Vsurpation they had multiplied and enlarged the Differences between the common Protestants and those whom they called Puritans under which Name they included all those that desired to preserve the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom and to maintain the true Protestant Religion They had been designing a Conjunction between Papists and Protestants in Doctrine Discipline and Ceremonies only it must not yet be called Popery They had triumphed in the Suspensions Excommunications Deprivations and Degradations of divers learned and pious Ministers in the Vexation and grievous Oppression of great numbers of the People whereby many thousands were impoverished and others were so afflicted and troubled by them that great numbers departed into New-England and other parts of America others into Holland The most of the Preaching that was allowed was degenerate into railing against Parliaments and Puritans because they were tenacious of just Liberty and true Religion crying up Absolute Authority Passive Obedience c. Streins of Wit fitter for a Stage than a Pulpit After the Dissolution of the Parliament in May 1640 They continued the Convocation and by unheard-of Presumption they made Canons contrary to the King's Prerogative to the Fundamental Laws of the Realm to the Right of Parliaments to the Property and Liberty of the Subject thereby establishing their own Vsurpations justifying their Altar-Worship and other Superstitious Innovations which they had formerly introduced without Warrant of Law they imposed a new Oath on the Subjects for maintenance of their own Tyranny and laid a great Tax upon the Clergy And now to sill up the measure of their Iniquity the House of Lords upon the 30th of December 1641 at a Conference with the Commons told them that the Bishops by a Protestation which they made to the King and Lords had deeply intrenched upon the Fundamental Priviledges and Being of Parliament whereupon the Commons impeached twelve of them of High-Treason in endeavouring to subvert the Fundamental Laws of the Realm and the very Being of Parliaments and they were by the House of Peers sequestred from Parliament committed to the Tower and shortly after by Act of Parliament most deservedly deprived of voting in the House of Peers I hope good Doctor you will acquiesce in the Reasons which I have here offered for the passing this Bill of Exclusion but the other Bill for attainting the great Earl of Strafford you say offered Violence to the Peace and Quiet of the King's Mind all the days of his Life This great Man who had long run on in a full Career to establish Tyranny trampling down the Peoples Liberties leaping the Hedges of the Laws or making Gaps through them was impeached by the Commons in many Articles some whereof were for ruling Ireland or which he had been Lord-Lieutenant in an Arbitrary way against the Fundamental Laws which he had endeavoured to subvert For abusing his Power to the increase and encouragement of Papists for maliciously endeavouring to stir up Hostility between England and Scotland for labouring to subvert Parliaments and incense the King against them for levying Money by force of Arms for imposing an Oath upon the Subjects That they should not protest against any of the King's Commands for telling the King That he had an Army in Ireland which his Majesty might imploy to reduce this Kingdom to Obedience Upon this Impeachment the Earl was brought to Trial before the Lords which lasted from the 22d of March with but few days intermission till the midst of April After this long Trial the Commons voted him guilty of High-Treason in divers Particulars and drew up and passed a Bill of Attainder against him but 59 dissenting This Bill being carried to the Lords the King's Sollicitor General made it good by Law to the satisfaction of almost all that heard him The Judges also delivered their Opinions That the Matters proved against him amounted to Treason and so the Lords passed the Bill The King having after this called all the Judges to deliver their Opinions before him and also sent for FOUR BISHOPS TO RESOLVE HIM UPON SCRUPLE OF CONSCIENCE He at length gave the Royal Assent to this Bill Prithee now Doctor tell me what ail'd your Martyr's Conscience at this time There must be something extraordinary and not commonly taken notice of in this Matter that must as you affirm offer Violence to the Peace and Quiet of his Mind all the Days of his Life You know he exacted the Ship-Money without scruple of Conscience upon the Advice of some Lawyers And
Whitehall being under apprehensions of Affronts design'd to be offer'd to his Person if not something worse The Story of these pretended Tumults and Riots dear Doctor is so intermixt with another relating to the greatest Violation of the Privileges of Parliament that ever was committed that 't is most necessary to talk of both together About the beginning of January 1641 the King sought nothing more than to begin a Quarrel and to support himself therein he employed Emissaries to cajole the young Gentlemen of the Inns of Courts to make offer of their Service to him as a Guard of Defence and divers of them to ingratiate themselves repaired to the Court and were highly caressed by the King and Queen He at the same time ordered Canoneers and other Assistants into the Tower and removed the Lieutenant thereof He fortified White-hall with Men and Munition in an unusual manner And about the same time Colonel Lunsford and others gathered Troops of Horse at Kingston upon Thames where the Magazine of Arms for that part of the County of Surrey lay Matters on his part being thus prepared upon the third of January not only against the Priviledg of Parliament but the common Liberty of every Subject he commanded the Chambers Studies and Trunks of the Lord Mandeville a Member of the House of Lords Grandfather to the present Noble Earl of Manchester who inherits as well the Vertnes as Honours of that great Patriot and of Denzel Holles Esq since known by the name of the great Lord Holles Sir Arthur Hasterig Mr. J. Pym Mr. John Hambden Grandfather to that highly deserving Gentleman who at this day bears his Name and in whom his Vertues do live and flourish and Mr. William Strode Members of Parliament * These were all Gentlemen of great Esteem and Reputation in the House Two of them Mr. Holles and Mr. Strode having before suffered many Years of sharp and harsh Imprisonment from the King after the Dissolution of the Parliament in the fourth Year of his Reign for Matters done in Parliament contrary to the Priviledges of that high Court to be sealed up Upon the next day the King came with about 300 Souldiers Papists and others to the House of Commons armed with Swords Pistols and other Weapons and there demanded the said five Members to be delivered to him upon a pretended Charge of High-Treason His Followers at the same time thrusting away the Door-keepers and Attendants of the House held up their Swords and some their Pistols ready cock'd saying I am a good Marks-man I can hit right I warrant you Others of them said A Pox take the House of Commons a Pox of God confound them and violently assaulted and by Force disarmed some of the Servants of the Members and said WHEN COMES THE WORD and afterwards declared that questionless if the Word had been given they should have fallen upon the House of Commons and HAVE CUT ALL THEIR THROATS which Doings the Commons declared were A TRAITEROUS DESIGN against the King and Parliament and that they could not sit any longer without a sufficient * They petitioned the King to allow them a Guard to be commanded by the Lord Chamberlain of his Houshould but could not obtain it Guard wherein they might confide wherefore they adjourned to the Tuesday following having appinted a Committee to sit in the mean time at Guildhall London to consider of all things that might concern the Good and Safety of the Kingdom and the Relief of Ireland And I am to tell you Doctor that the great Lord Falkland was the fourth Person named to this great Committee The Commons further declared That they were so far from protecting any of their Members that should in a due manner be prosecuted according to the Laws of the Kingdom and the Rights and Priviledges of Parliament for Treason or any other Misdemeanours that none should be more ready and willing than themselves to bring them to a speedy and due Trial. And upon the 15th of January they ordered the Attonrny-General who had preferred the Articles of Treason against the Members to bring in his Proof and make them good if he could Whereupon the King sent a Message that HE NOW FOUND CAUSE wholly to dosist from proceeding against them and had commanded his Attourny-General to proceed no further therein nor to produce nor discover any Proof concerning the matter Also BOTH HOUSES petitioned the King for the speedy proceeding against the accused Members IN A LEGAL WAY whereby they might be brought to condign Punishment if guilty or discharged from so heavy an Accusation if innocent The King giving an evasive Answer to this Petition the Lords and Commons apply to him again by a second Petition praying that the Parliament might be informed before Friday then next ensuing what Proof there is against them that they may be called to a Legal Trial. A Petition of about two thousand Freeholders of Backinghamshirs was presented to the King setting forth that Mr. Hambden Knight of their Shire a Gentleman in high Esteem with them and the whole Kingdom was accused of Treason that they believed it to be the Malice which his Zeal to his Majesty's Service and the State had contracted in the Enemies to the King the Church and the Common-wealth had occasioned this foul Accusation and they prayed that he and the other Members might enjoy the Priviledg of Parliament The City of London also petitioned that the Lord Mandeville and the five Members might not be restrained of Liberty or proceeded against otherwise than according to the Priviledges of Parliament To which Petition the King answered that AS HE ONCE CONCEIVED he had ground enough to accuse them so now his Majesty finds as good Cause wholly to desert any Prosecution of them Do you hear this DOCTOR If you ever had till now you would not surely have assumed the Confidence to have said as you do Pa. 11 12. That nothing less would satisfy the Parliament than that he must be obliged AS IT WERE and IN EFFECT to beg the Members Pardon for wronging them with what he thought and COVLD BY GOOD EVIDENCE PROVE MATTER OF TRVTH Now I do AS IT WERE think that you ought not only IN EFFECT but in earnest to humble your self to the Descendents of these honourable and never to be forgotten PATRIOTS for the horrid Slander which you here lay on their great Names and Families For tho the King gave up the Cause saying that HE FOUND GOOD REASON wholly to desist from proceeding against them and at another time that he found GOOD CAVSE wholly to desert any Prosecution of them Yet you forsooth must keep up the wicked Clamour and falsly inform this Generation that his Majesty GOOD MAN had pregnant Evidence to prove them guilty of Treason But to put you to shame if possible 't is what you threatned me with Reverend Sir I shall add a few words more upon this occasion The Lords and Commons told the King
us assurance that you have no thought but of Peace and Justice to your People must be some real Effect of your Goodness to them in granting those things which the present Necessity of the Kingdom do inforce us to desire And that you will be graciously pleased to put from you those mischievous Counsellors which have caused all these Dangers and Distractions and to continue your own Residence and the Princes near London and the Parliament which we hope will be a happy beginning of Contentment and Confidence betwixt your Majesty and your People and be followed with many succeeding Blessings of Honour and Greatness to your Majesty and of Security and Prosperity to them These are brief Heads good Doctor of the Declaration which you mention to be read to the King at Newmarket and you with very little regard to his Majesty's Honour do affirm that after the hearing this Declaration read he expostulated in these words What would you have Have I violated your Laws Pag. 8. Were you so well read in the History of that Day as you pretend to be this his strong Expostulation with the Lords and Commons would never have found room in your Defence of the King for his high violation of the Laws were too well known to the whole World to be denied and you his Majesty's Defender would never have revived the thing had you remembred the short but most pertinent Reply which both Houses made thereto in these words We are heartily sorry we have such plentiful matter of an Answer to that Question HAVE I VIOLATED YOUR LAWS You proceed Pag. 9. Sir saying That the Applications from the two Houses at this time were for NOTHING LESS than the MILITIA You are out again Doctor and would I use the Royal Language wherewith the Earl of Holland was intterrupted by the King in reading the Declaration to him at New-market I might with more Truth than he did say THAT' 's FALSE THAT' 's A LIE For in recounting some Particulars of the Declaration I have demonstrated that their Application was also for other and less Matters than the Militia they humbly petitioned him to put away his wicked Counsellors and to return to his Parliament You add That the King continuing stedfast to his Resolution and DEAF TO ALL THEIR IMPORIVNITIES The want of Ears I must tell you Reverend Sir cost him his Head at last telling them That he would nor part with his Militia for an Hour I must help you a little in this part of the Story too The Earl of Pembrook ask'd him Whether the Militia might not be granted as was desired by the Parliament for a time HIS MAJESTY SWORE BY GOD NOT FOR AN HOUR This shews him a little more stubbornly stedfast than you would tell the World however you told too much in this place or his Majesty resolved and swore too fast for afterwards you say That at the Treaty at Vxbridg Pag. 20. He consented that the Militia for three Years should be in the Hands of twenty Commissioners the one half to be nominated by the two Houses Your next words are these THE MILITIA THEY MUST HAVE Pag. 9. OR THE NATION IS UNDONE The State of the Kingdom at that Day considered there never fell from your Pen a greater Truth than what you have here delivered for besides the particular Instances which I have already given you of the King's Invasion of the Priviledges of the Parliament of the Rights of the People and of his Prâ—â—â—â—ations for War against them I must here inform you that in the beginning of the Year 1641 a time when the King was in appearance transacting Matters amicably with the two Houses and we seemed to be in a deep Peace a time when he declared that he had received no other carriage from his Parliament than what he professed himself satisfied with and that if the Bills he had past were again to be offered he should chearfully and readily assent unto them even then he dispatched away Letters and an Agent to the King of Denmark complaining of the Parliament and asking Supplies from thence AD PROPVLSANDOS HOSTES you know the English of that is to subdue his Enemies and declared himself in these words ☜ ad alia Consilia Animum convertendum duximus VVe resolve to betake our self to new Counsels the very words he used to the Parliament in the Year 1628. Further upon the Discovery of his Plot to bring up the English Army against the Parliament he turned to the Scotish Army then at Newcastle and baited his Temptation with a rich Reward not only to have 300000 l. in hand and the Spoil of London but four Northern Counties to be made Scotish Moreover to encourage them to joyn with him he declared to them that he was to have Money and Horse from Denmark and that he would made York the place of his Residence for the better Accommodation of both Nations or fuller Revenge upon London He also gathered Men in London under pretence of raising Forces for Portugal who were to possess themselves of the Tower The Queen in Holland was buying Arms and his Majesty had actually raised Forces in divers Counties The Parliament was all this time petitioning in Peace And for the Reasons now assigned amongst many others They humbly besought him that he would be pleased to put the Tower of London and the Militia into the hands of such Persons as should be recommended to him by both Houses of Parliament The King seemed to comply herein and by his Answer promised them that the Militia should be put into such hands as they should approve of or recommend to him hereupon both Houses nominated Persons of the greatest Honour as fit for that Trust to give you the Names of some of them the Earls of Holland Rutland Bedford Bullingbrook Salisbury Warwick Pembrook Leicester Stamford Essex Clare Northumberland Lincoln Suffolk c. Lords Paget North Strange Roberts Grey of Werk Chandois Dacres Mandeville Wharton Spencer Brook Herbert Fielding Littleton Lord Keeper c. Men eminent in all Quallifications of Honour and Sufficiency were recommended for several Counties and the King was desired to agree thereunto as he had promised upon his delaying to give a satisfactory Answer they again petition him to give such an Answer as might raise in them a Confidence that they should not be exposed to the Practices of those who thirst after the Ruin of the Kingdom and the kindling that Combustion in England which they had effected in Ireland That nothing could enable them to suppress THE REBELLION IN IRELAND and secure England but the granting of their humble Petition which they find so absolutely necessary for the preservation of the King and Common-wealth that the Laws of God and Man injoyn them to see it put in Execution They again by a Petition presented at Theobalds March 1 1641. intreated him that he would at last be pleased to grant their necessary Petition concerning the
A LETTER FROM General Ludlow TO Dr. Hollingworth Their Majesties Chaplain AT St. Botolph-Aldgate Defending his former Letter to Sir E. S. which compared the Tyranny of the first Four Years of King Charles the Martyr with the Tyranny of the Four Years of the late Abdicated King And vindicating the Parliament which began in Novemb. 1640. Occasioned by the Lies and Scandals of many bad Men of this Age. Veritas emerget Victrix I acknowledg it were better if we could have Job's Wish That this Day should perish that Darkness and the Shadow of Death should cover it that it should not see the dawning of the Day nor should the Light shine upon it It were better to strike it out of our Kalendar and to make our January determine at the 29th and add these remaining Days to February Dr. Burnet Bishop of Salisbury his Sermon at St. Laurence Church London January 30 1680. AMSTERDAM Printed Anno Dom. 1692. To all sincere Lovers of OLD ENGLAND Inhabiting in the Parish of St. Botolph-Aldgate London Dear Countrymen 'T Was a great Man's Saying That EVERY CLERGY-MAN is not qualified to sustain the Dignity of the Church's Jester That therefore before Men be admitted to so important an Employment it were fit that they underwent a severe Examination and that it might appear 1. Whether they have ANY SENSE for without that how can they pretend and yet they do to be Ingenuous Then Whether they have ANY MODESTY for without that they can only be SCURRILOUS and IMPUDENT Next Whether ANY TRUTH for true Jests are those that do the greatest Execution And lastly 'T were not amiss that they gave some Account too of their CHRISTIANITY For the World has always hitherto been so uncivil as to expect something of that from the CLERGY in the Design and Stile even of their lightest and most uncanonical Writings But With very little regard to these two dull Books have been lately obtruded upon the World by one and the same Author as I am assured The one under the Title of A DEFENCE of King Charles the First OCCASIONED by the Lies and Scandals of many bad Men of this Age By RICHARD HOLLINGWORTH D. D. THEIR MAJESTIES CHAPLAIN at St. Botolph-Aldgate The other called A VINDICATION of their Majesties Wisdom in the late nomination of some Reverend Persons to the vacant Arch-Bishopricks and Bishopricks OCCASIONED by the scandalous Reflections of unreasonable Men By A MINISTER of London Now This Author having sought these OCCASIONS to be troublesome and declaring a doughty Resolution that he will be further so rather than lose the Lechery of his Scribling and the vain Glory of his Pedantry 't is fit that such an arrogant Levite who seats himself in * Epistle Dedicatory to the Defence a Juncto with their Majesties to consult wisely how to preserve them from a People who mean them no Harm should be a little animadverted upon which task I undertook after I found that Persons of better Ability would not trouble themselves with such contemptible Pamphlets I had prepared and did purpose to have sent with this some Remarks upon the pretended Vindication of their Majesties Wisdom but finding that my Notes upon the Doctor 's Defence of King Charles the First are swell'd beyond the Bulk which I intended I have laid aside those Remarks till I have occasion to write again to this mighty Vindicator When I wrote to Sir E. S. this time twelve-Month I only discours'd of the King 's first Four Years and did intend if ever I wrote further upon that Subject to have proceeded regularly with the succeding Years of his Tyranny but having engaged my self to follow the Doctor in his Ramblings I could not at present pursue my Intention but may hereafter do it Having resolved to make this Address to you my honoured Countrymen I will take the liberty to observe two or three things which are omitted in my Letter to the Doctor He saith pag. 3. That great Numbers call this King a Tyrant and A PAPIST too though he so stronuously asserted and pleaded the Protestant Cause as it is professed by THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND That means THEIR PARTY Now that he highly favoured POPERY is most evident and to what I have already offered to evince the Truth of that Charge I do add these Instances I have told the Aldgate-Chaplain that this King by a Letter to the Pope saluted Antichrist with the Title of Most holy Father That Letter from the beginning to the end savours of Popery For 1. He professes therein that nothing could affect him so much as AN ALLIANCE with a Prince that had the same apprehensions of THE TRUE RELIGION with himself That was the KING of SPAIN A NOTABLE PROTESTANT 2. He calls Popery THE CATHOLICK APOSTOLICK Roman RELIGION all other NOVELTY and FACTION 3. He protests he did not esteem it a Matter of greater Honour to be descended from great Princes than to imitate them in the Zeal of their Piety who had often exposed their Estate and LIVES for THE EXALTATION OF THE HOLY CROSS 4. He solemnly engaged to the Pope to spare nothing in the World and to suffer all manner of Discommodities even TO THE HAZARDING OF ESTATE AND LIFE for to settle a thing so pleasing to God as UNITY WITH ROME Behold what a good Sign of PROTESTANTISM here hangs at the King's Door Moreover when the Pope's Nuncio delivered a Letter to him from the Pope wherein PROTESTANTS are called MONSTERS of HERESIES and the King was invited to return the Possession of these most noble Isles to the PRINCE OF THE APOSTLES He expressed himself in these words I KISS HIS HOLINESS FEET for the Favour and Honour he doth me so much the more esteemed by how much the less deserved of me HITHERTO And HIS HOLINES SHALL SEE WHAT I DO HEREAFTER So that his Holiness shall not repent him of what he hath done He was as good as his word here passed to the Pope as all the World afterwards saw Tho that most horrid IRISH REBELLION broke out the 23d of October 1641. the Lords and Commons who complained that it was framed and cherish'd in England could not obtain a Proclamation to declare those blcody Miscreants Traitors till January ensuing and then the following Warrant went to the King's Printer from his Secretary of State IT is his Majesty's Pleasure that you forthwith print in very good Paper and send unto me for his Majesty's Service forty Copies of the Proclamation inclosed leaving convenient space for his Majesty to sign above and to affix the Privy Signet underneath And HIS MAJESTY'S EXPRESS COMMAND IS THAT YOU PRINT NOT ABOVE THE SAID NUMBER OF FORTY COPIES and forbear to make any further Publication of them till his Pleasure be further signified for which this shall be your Warrant Whitehall January 2 164â— Edw. Nicholas See here what special care was taken that a few only should come to the knowledg of this Proclamation which was at that time more
observable by the late contrary Practice against the Scots who were in a very quick and sharp manner proclaimed and those Proclamations Forthwith dispersed with all imaginable diligence throughout the whole Kingdom and ordered to be read in all Churches accompanied with Publick Prayers and Execrations But his Aversion to the proclaiming and proceeding against the Irish Rebels is not to be much admired at for they called themselves THE QUEEN'S ARMY and declared that they rose to maintain the KING'S PREROGATIVE and the QUEEN'S RELIGION against the PARLIAMENT And he had no sooner yielded to issue this Proclamation than to obstruct the quelling these Rebels and give them time to increase and strengthen themselves the King withdrew from the Parliament and began Domestick Dissentions Having given these slight Touches at the King 's favouring Popery and at his Accession to the Irish Rebellion I do now leave it to you to make a Judgment whether he were so STRENUOUS AN ASSERTER OF THE PROTESTANT CAUSE as your DOCTOR insituates and I care not if once for all I do acknowledg that THE CLERGY may with good pretence to Reason say that HE DIED THEIR MARTYR for his being wrought upon by JESUITICAL COUNSELS to impose a Liturgy upon the Scots who had no such thing before did very much contribute to the bringing him to the FATAL BLOCK I shall now for my own Vindication entreat you do remember that I never call this King A PAPIST and I have ever esteem'd it a piece of Artifice in OUR PRIESTS to amuse the People with the Suggestion that he is falsly charged with Popery thereby to Induct them to disbelieve or forget his Crime which was most visible to all Men the Violation of the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom I have therefore chosen to decline the Dispute about his Religion and am sire 't will be found that I have not unjustly tax'd him with the Crimes of his Misgovernment which did so plainly and inexcusably appear to all And why should we not think that such things were cause enough to be stood upon by the Parliament and to justify their Quarrel before God As if the Almighty did not abhor INJUSTICE OPPRESSION AND TYRANNY unless Profession of Religion were also depraved Nay be abhori it more in that place where the purest of Profession is That this King intended to bow or break us to perswade or force us to Slavery is so clear by the whole course of his Reign that 't is amazing that Men even of the highest stamp of TORYISM should have Front enough to deny it The Parasitical Court-Priests did then preach That we were bound to obey whatsoever the King commanded without questioning the Lawfulness And why did they vent such stuff but to flutter and please the King And how could he be delighted with it unless he thought it true and agreeable to his Designs And that he honoured those false Teachers above the Prophets of the Lord is evinâ—â— both by his advancing them and suffering those Sons of Chenaariah to smite those Michaiahs and to push them with Horus of Iron that they might consume them The great Philosopher Themistius did say with equal Truth and Wit that Flattering Clergy-men did not worship God but the Imperial Purple and 't is a sad Truth that in our day they have been SETTING THE PEOPLE ON MADDING and the low Dejection and baseness of Mind in too many of this Generation is to be ascribed to their PULPITSTUFF which has been the Doctrine and perpetual Infusion of Servility and Wretchedness to their Hearers The Case being thus it becomes necessary to expose such Men as these for 't is intolerable that your Doctor in his dull way of Calumniating should as he doth censure reproach and blacken the Actions and Memories of so many excellent Persons both Lords and Gentlemen and also very learned and pious Divines And on the other hand a Reputation is to be won for King Charles the First of Wisdom by Wilfulness and subtile Shifts of Goodness by multiplying Evil of Piety by endeavouring to root out true Religion I have therefore in the ensuing Letter taken some little pains in comparing his fair-spoken Words with his far-differing Deeds for 't is most certain that the World ever looks more at real Actions than verbal Protestations I am sensible my good Friends that I now write to Men endued with Reason let not the Goose quill of a Chaplain at Aldgate make you all Ganders and a sound of Words bewitch you his Tracts which I have mentioned look like pieces of Flattery compiled by A HUNGRY LEVITE gaping after a Deanary or Chaplainship at Whitehall He by his Counterfeit Colours sets off a deformed Cause to gull you Have you read this King in his Actions and shall experimental Knowledge be confuted by this Doctor 's bare Assertions Should we esteem Truth by Words how many Romances would be accounted as Authentick as our Bibles 'T is Truth only which conquers the wise to be captivated by ought else argues Folly My last Request to you is that I may be rightly understood I protest that no intent in trample on the Dead or dishonour his Dust but a Desire to vindicate the Liberties of my Country moved me to this undertaking this unhappy King's Miscarriages and Crimes should have lain buried in Oblivion if ECCLESIASTICAL MAKE-BATES did not rake all up again into fresh Remembrance whether we will or no. I am not conscious to my self that by what I have wrote I have loaded his Memory with other than Matter of Fact and Truth which will be too hard for the greatest Doctor of them all I am Gentlemen Your affectionate Country-man and Servant Edmund Ludlow A LETTER from General LUDLOW to Dr. HOLLINGWORTH their Majesties Chaplain c. MIne to Sir E. S. most Eximious Sir bore date upon your last MADDING DAY Another being now come I esteem my self obliged to justify what I asserted in my last Year's Letter To the end that I may keep my Country-men and in particular those of your Coat right in their Senses and inculcate into the Men of this Generation a due abhorrence of Tyranny and a just Veneration for English Parliaments Having come to this Resolution and that upon the reading your Jewel of a Book which you stile A Defence of King Charles the First occasioned by the Lies and Scandals of many bad Men of this Age which came to me as a New-Year's Gift from an endeared Friend in London I suppose you will readily allow me to pretend to a title to an Acquaintance and Correspondence with you For though in the conclusion of my last to Sir E. S. I gave a Challenge to DOCTOR P. who occasion'd that to * Tho I neither have nor do think that I ever can be convicted of one Falshood in my former Letter or in this which I am writing yet I will confess one Error committed this time twelve-month 't was this I following a very faithful Historian
whose Printer by an unhappy omission of one Letter ran him and me by consequence into a great mistake and I relying upon that Print said That the noble Lord Conway had avowed in Parliament that he never hated Popery whereas his words in truth were that he ever hated it convict me of Falshood in any one Particular there charged upon his incomparable Prince yet I have not had one Word either from him or Sir E. S. Therefore in good Manners I dismiss them from further trouble as I might have done my self had you not fallen foul upon me But seeing you must be scribling and have taken up the Cudgels we must come to A TRIAL OF SKILL To begin You appear very warm at first and therefore not so civil as a Man might hope you would be found who profess so much Candour and Temper as you sometimes do You say 'T is A LEWD PAMPHLET which goes under the Name of LUDLOW Why Lewd dear Sir 'T is a received Opinion amongst your Acquaintance at Billingsgate that to call a Woman Whore and say you will prove her so will bear an Action otherwise not I shall not therefore prosecute you for that because 't is only your say so you neither undertake nor offer one word to prove it And indeed should I implead you upon it I perceive you have express'd your self with that Caution that I should be Non-suited For you add that it goes under the Name of Ludlow by consequence it may not be his Why thus unmerciful Doctor You will not allow me to be Author of my own Book or Letter and yet you declare it a barbarous Act in a certain Essex Doctor his Name I understand is Walker and his Vertues and Piety will I doubt not find a room in future Annals and Records 't is your own delicate Expression when yours will be forgotten I say you allow him not to deny that your Martyr was the Author of Eicon Basilice I meet Sir in the next place with a taste of your healing Spirit You treat me and those who believe the Truth that you are no way able to gain-say in a highly obliging and most endearing manner Pag. 2 3. A vile Brood a factious Crew We are say you I may not now betray my own Innocence so far as to suffer any thing of this to pass upon me without a Vindication I have asserted that your SAINT was a NOTORIOVS TYRANT and for ought you tell me to the contrary very fairly proved it and that by abundance of Instances Am I Unjust therein Why then do not you refute me Am I in the Right Why then will you set your self to out-face the Truth That you do so I shall demonstrate after I have minded you out of my former Letter what things you are either to falsify or justify for you must know that Railing no more than Persecution can ever make a Convert when you scrible again if you intend to convince any Man of an Error who believes that King Charles the First was a Tyrant And I must tell you that I am induced to make the Repetition which ensues because I cannot perceive by the reading your Tract that you have look'd beyond my Title Page for there you find the only thing you mention of mine and that with Indignation THE VILE BROOD you say call this Day THE MADDING-DAY I am most sure that you do not answer nor so much as cast a look towards any one Paragraph or Sentence of my Letter Therefore This informs you that amongst many others the following Acts of Tyranny are there enumerated and placed to your Martyr's Account I shall to oblige you begin with the Church for I know 't will please you to see that precede the State 1. THE KING we are talking of in a Letter which he wrote to the Pope saluted Antichrist with the Title of Sanctissime Pater Most holy Father HE procured the Pope's Dispensation for his Marriage which was solemnized according to the Ceremonies of the Romish Church HE agreed to Articles upon his Marriage that Papists should be no more molested for their Religion HE built Somerset-House Chappel with conveniency for Friars and permitted them to walk abroad in their Habits HE assumed to himself a Power to dispense with the Laws in favour of Popery particularly the 21th and 27th of Queen Elizabeth by granting Pardons to Jesuits and Papists which passed by immediate Warrant HE inhibited and restrained both Ecclesiastical and Temporal Officers to intermeddle with Papists which amounted to a Toleration Popish Jurisdiction was exercised and avowed in Ireland Monasteries and Nunneries were erected there and filled with Men and Women of several Orders HE made above an hundred Popish Lords and Gentlemen Lot as Lieutenants Deputy Lieutenants Justices of the Peace c. And his LORD TREASURER Weston died a Papist Are these my good Doctor any of the VERTVES and GRACES which King William and Queen Mary as you tell them in your Dedication do daily imitate 2. To pass on to the State of the Church of England in his Reign Well might Men cry in that day The Church O THE CHVRCH This King's Bishops generally speaking were unsound in their Principles they laid new Paintings on the Face of the old Whore of Babylon to make her shew lovely They countenanced and cherished Papists and depressed Orthodox Preachers how conformable soever in particular Archbishop Land whom you Doctor will have to be a tolerably good Man allowed Books which favoured Popery but denied to license Books that were written against it This King's CHAPLAINS endeavoured to reconcile England to Rome and scoffed at Preaching Bibles and all shew of Religion MOVNTAGVE one of his Chaplains being prosecuted in Parliament for Crimes of this nature your Martyr was incensed thereat granted him a Pardon and made him Bishop of Chichester And now Doctor pray tell me have our most Excellent King and Queen made any such Bishops or Chaplains as these 3. THIS KING in his first Year lent eight SHIPS which he equipp'd with Monies given for the Relief of his distressed Protestant Sister the Electress Palatine and the oppressed Protestants of the Palatinate TO THE FRENCH KING to fight against the distressed Protestants of Rochel These Ships were employ'd against the Rochellers and the French boasted that they mowed the Hereticks down like Grass Pray Sir your Opinion in the case Can you think their present Majesties will ever imitate their ROYAL GRANDFATHER in this Point 4. King Charles the First in the very beginning of his Reign took our Goods from us against our Wills and our Liberties against the Laws he raised an Army and required the Countries to furnish Coat and Conduct-Mony and against the known Laws put several to Death by Martial Law HE levied Money upon the Subject by way of Loan and menaced the City of London that if they would not advance him Money HE WOULD FRAME HIS COUNSELS AS APPERTAINED TO A KING That surely dear Doctor
could intend no other than such a one as France is now plagued with it may signify King in that Language In our plain English 't is downright Tyrant When it was urged that his requiring SHIP-MONEY was unprecedented His haughty Answer was That Precedents were not wanting for the Punishment of those that disobey the King's Commands and that State-Occasions were not to be guided by ordinary Precedents Those that refused to subscribe to the Loan were put out of the Commissions of the Lieutenancy and the Peace and also imprisoned and the Refusers of the meaner Rank were bound to appear and be enrolled for Souldiers to be sent for Denmark or were impressed to serve in the King's Ships Here now is a ready way not only for the raising of Money but also an Army for Flanders and Sailers for our Fleet. But all your Rhetorick Reverend Sir will not work upon their Majesties to imitate your good and great Man in these things neither 5. YOUR MARTYR suspended Dr. ABBOT Archbishop of Canterbury who was a Man that wholly followed the true Interest of England and that of the Reformed Churches in Europe so far as that in his time the CLERGY was not much envied here in England nor the Government of Episcopacy much disfavoured by Protestants beyond the Seas I say HE SUSPENDED this Excellent Person and also CONFINED him because to use his own words HE REFUSED TO MAKE THAT GOOD BY Divinity WHICH THE King HAD DONE AGAINST THE LAWS HE also thrust Dr. WILLIAMS Bishop of Lincoln from the place of Lord Keeper and his Presence and the Council-Table for appearing in Parliament against the Kingdom 's great Grievance the Duke of Buckingham and afterwards he imprisoned him in the Tower for speaking against the Loan for refusing to allow Proceedings against Puritans and prophesying that the Puritans would carry all at last I doubt Doctor that should the King and Queen imitate their Grandfather in these Practices you would find your self AS IT WERE overwhelm'd with Sorrow and that such Actions would swell your Grief above its usual Banks if not stir your Indignation 6. THE TYRANT resolving to subvert the Liberties and Estates of the Subjects to his Will and Pleasure removed that grave and learned Judg Sir Randolph Crew from the place of Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench because he had declared himself against the Loan and would not serve his turn in declaring that the King might legally imprison Men durante beneplacito My Life for yours Doctor their present Majesties will never follow this Example of your PATTERN FOR PRINCES 7. HE upon the 30th of JANVARY of all the days in the Year 1627 sent a Privy-Seal to the Treasury for the remitting 30000 l. into Holland to Burlemark a Merchant to be employed for levying Horse and Men to be brought into England to support his Tyranny And can you think their Majesties will ever write after this Copy 8. HE had no sooner passed the PETITION OF RIGHT into a Law than he was found to violate it by billeting of Souldiers and levying the Subsidies of Tonnage and Poundage which determined by his Father's Death and were never payable to any his Ancestors but only by special Act of Parliament And what Opinion have you of King William and Queen Mary in reference as this Point my good Doctor 9. HE kept the Earl of Bristol under Confinement near two Years without being charged with any Accusation or brought to Trial And HE committed the Earl of Arundel to the Tower in the time of Parliament without expressing any Cause of his Commitment in Violation of the Priviledges of the Peers Ple warrant you Sir you 'l never find their present Majesties at this Work 10. HE upheld and shelter'd the Grand Enemies of the Common-wealth When the Duke of Buckingham was prosecuted in Parliament as the principal Patron and Supporter of a Popish Faction set on Foot to the danger of the CHURCH and STATE THE KING interposed to rescue him When the Commons impeach'd him and by one of their Articles charg'd him in effect WITH THE MURDER OF KING JAMES THE KING told the House of Lords That to aprove Buckingham's Innocence HE could be a Witness to clear him in every one of the Articles HE told the House of Commons That he would not allow any of his Servants to be questioned amongst them much less such as were near him That he saw they aimed at the Duke but assured them he had not intermedied nor done any thing concerning the Publick but by his special Directions He added That he wondred at the FOOLISH IMPUDENCE of any Man to think that he should be drawn to offer such a Sacrifice HE dissolved three Parliaments when they were intent upon the prosecution of the Duke We are still at a loss good Doctor this will not pass with our King and Queen we shall never hear them speak or act at this rate 11. HE imprisoned several Members of the House of Commons during the Parliament for refusing to answer out of Parliament what was said and done in Parliament HE imprisoned others for managing a Conference with the Lords upon their impeaching the Duke HE in the time of Parliament sent Warrants for sealing up the Studies of other Members and he caused the imprisoned Members to be shifted and toss'd from Goal to Goal to deprive them by that wicked Artifice of the Fruit of their Habeas Corpus and of the Benefit of Free-born Subjects for the obtaining their Liberty thus were they long detained in Prison The brave Sir John Eâ—ios ended his days in the Tower not without suspicion of foul play I am sure Sir you will not recommend these vertuous Practices to the imitation of their Majesties 12. HE struck at the very Being of Parliaments he sent a threatning Message to the Commons that if he had not a timely Supply he would betake himself to NEW COUNSELS At another time he said to the Lords and Commons REMEMBER THAT PARLIAMENTS ARE ALTOGETHER IN MY POWER THEREFORE as I find the Fruits of them Good or Evil THEY ARE TO CONTINVE OR NOT TO BE. HE told the Parliment the 17th of March 1627 That if they should not contribute what the State needed he must use OTHER MEANS And his Lord Keeper added That if the King found the Readiness of their Supplies be might the better forbear the use of his Prerogative That the King those that way of Parliament not as the only way but as firtest not as destitute of others but AS MOST AGREE ABLE TO HIS DISPOSITIon You will readily agree with me dear Sir that King William hath not learn'd this way of speaking to Parliaments I have now Reverend Sir briefly run over my former Letter and thence presented you with a Bone to pick indeed a dozen as luck will have it and I could have doubled the number but for the present I conclude these may stay your Stomach this being a Fasting-Day I must now tell you
that you are certain that from the beginning of the Long Parliament Novemb. 4. to the day of his Death he did every thing ALMOST that deserved a better Reception than it met withal and made such various Offers and Condescontions as would have pleased any sort of Men but those who were resolved to be Masters of his whole Crown and Dignity c. 'T is something unhappy good Doctor when you seem to speak with assurance that you dare not adventure to do it without a Reserve your ALMOST in this place abates much of the Glory of this Paragraph He did every thing ALMOST he made Offers and Condescentions what those were I suppose you intend to inform me by and by when I see them we will talk about them and then should it be found that they were such as were not satisfactory to the Lords and Commons in that great Parliament you will deserve to be TOPHAMIZ'D for slandering the Representative Body of the English Nation and truly I think you merit something beyond that Punishment for saying that their most Excellent Majesties King William and Queen Mary do daily imitate the Vertues and Graces of a King who yâ—â—â—gree might have committed some Mistakes in his Government in his first sixteen Year's Reign and yet did every thing with an unlucky ALMOST to redress such things as his Male-Administration had put out of order SO FAR AS HE COVLD BE SATISFIED THEY WERE OVT OF ORDER For to the eternal Honour of their present Majesties and to the unspeakable Comfort of all good Englishmen we see them daily acquiescing in the Wisdom of their great Council and redressing not only ALMOST but ALTOGETHER the Disorders and Grievances of two or three unhappy Reigns In the next place you affirm That when the Parliament sat down in 1640 the King purposed and resolved to consent to every thing they could offer which might be really for the good of his Kingdom You are Sir too general herein for my Conversation you talk as tho you had been one of his Privy-Council or at least a Chaplain to Archbishop Land I cannot say what his Purposes or Resolutions were but when we come to Particulars shall endeavour to weigh them by his Actions Pursuant to what he purposed and resolved Pag. 5. say you he tells them frankly in his first Speech that he was resolved to put himself freely and clearly on the Love and Affection of his ENGLISH SVBJECTS and withal promises them to concur so heartily with them that all the World may see that his Intentions HAVE EVER BEEN and shall be to make THIS a glorious Kingdom Having said this you are running on Doctor but with too much speed for me you instantly add I think c. Well so you may and I intend to hear what that is anon for now and not till now you have cut me out Work and I must intreat you to pause a little and hear what I observe upon what you but now declared He told them he resolved to put himself freely and clearly on the LOVE AND AFFECTION of his ENGLISH SVBJECTS Can this be true Doctor Did he in earnest say so Why he was born at Dumferling how then can you represent him abdicating his Ancient Kingdom and renouncing the Love and Affection of the Scotish Nation Seeing you are silent in this matter I must it seems take the pains to examine it and I promise to supply your Omission with Impartiality and all imaginable regard to Truth And in doing it shall shew with what brevity I can not only the reason why your Martyr did at this Juncture caress and cajole an English Parliament but how our Nation became so happy as to see one assembled when our Fathers had almost forgot the Name of a Parliament The Story is this The Reformation of England had never abrogated nor scarce shaken the Prelatical Dignity in any Parliament but in Scotland it was quite rooted out by Law that Church having been ever much addicted to the Reformation of Geneva By degrees it was restored by the extraordinary Interposition of the Power of King James the first yet not without many Difficulties not without great Reluctancy of the Nobility Gentry and most of the Ministers of that Nation They suffered a great Diminution of their Temporal Liberties by the Introduction of Episcopal Jurisdiction the Bishops using rigorous Proceedings against Gentlemen of Quality by Fines Imprisonments c. And the whole structure of Ecclesiastical Policy so long used in Scotland and established by so many Acts of Parliament was at one blow thrown down their Consistories Classes and Presbyteries were held in the nature of Conventicles and all Decision of Ecclesiastical Controversies confined to the Tribunal of a Bishop Dr. Hollingworth in his Tract called A Vindication of their Majesties Wisdom c. p. 9. saith that Laud was A VERY GOOD MAN the Book of Sports excepted for ought I know he meant this Scotch Book for it made Sport with a witness if he did not I am sure this deserved an Exception also I am sensible of the Doctor 's Infirmities that he is addicted to rash and inconsiderate Railing therefore tho I will not humour him in reciting the Authority which I have for this black Story of his otherways very good Man because I have in his Works no more than his bare word for what he asserts my good Nature prompts me to advise him not to give me the Lie in this matter for I know those who have been at Rome and I can produce a most reputable Member of the Church of England for what I here charge upon that very ill Man Laud. After this friendly Caution the Doctor may deny it if he dares That fierce cruel insolent and Popishly-affected Archbishop Laud was the main Instrument in this fatal Work He in the Year 1637 composed a Common-Prayer Book for Scotland and desiring to demonstrate his great Affection to the Court of Rome sent it thither to be approved by the Pope and Cardinals they returned it with Thanks for his Respect to them but sent him word that they thought it not fit for Scotland The GOOD MAN thereupon further to ingratiate himself with his ELDER BROTHER alter'd some things in it and made it more harsh and unreasonable and then instigated the King to send it to the Scots with an express Command to have it read in their Churches It varied from the English Common-Prayer Book but the Alterations were for the worse especially in the Lord's-Supper it was expresly commanded that the Altar so called should be situate to the Eastern Wall together with many Postures of the Minister whilst he officiated And in the consecrating Prayer those words which in the English Liturgy are directly against Transubstantiation were quite left out in that Book and instead of them such other words as in plain sense agreed with the Roman Mass-Book viz. Hear us O most merciful Father and of thy Omnipotent Goodness grant so to
your Martyr's that he would put himself on the Love and Affection of his English Subjects was to draw them in to support him in his wicked War against the Scotish Nation whom at the same time he called Rebels and urged their Expulsion tho he was under an Agreement for a Cessation of Arms and to allow them 850 l. per diem and Quarters in England till their Complaints might be weighed in this Parliament 2. Information That he appeared an exorbitant and outragious Tyrant in his Attempts upon that People This appears in many Particular to recount some of them briefly 1. In overturning their Church-Government established by many Acts of Parliament and obtruding upon them Laud's Liturgy and Popish Ceremonies 2. In denying them the undoubted Right of all Subjects to petition for Redress of their Grievances 3. In dissolving their Synod and Parliament burning the Pacification made with them by the Hangman's Hands and imprisoning the Lords sent by them to petition him to perform his solemn Promises and redress their Grievances 4. In levying Armies against them and raising a Civil War to justify himself in the violation of their Laws A CIVIL WAR it was said the great Lord Digby seeing we are of the same Religion and under the same King And 5. In the very thing for which you Doctor are now magnifying him I mean in attempting to make use of the Love and Affection of the English to enslave and ruin the Scotish Nation 3. Information That the Scotish Covenant was not a new Invention or Innovation but established by the Law of Scotland and taken by King James the First seventy Years before King Charles the Second took it 4. Information That Bishops and Clergy-men in Conjunction with Papists abetted and assisted this Tyrant in the Violation of the Laws when the bulk of the Nobility Gentry and People of England appeared undauntedly in defence of the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom 5. Information That Popery hath greatly spread in Scotland over since Land 's Superstition was introduced there their number then not exceeding 600 and therefore Presbytery being now restored there by Law it may be reasonably hoped that it will reduce many who have been deluded into that Idolatry 6. Information That PRINCES ARE NOT ALWAYS TO TRUST TO THE Insinuations and Suggestions of Scotish Bishops seeing that when they instigated King Charles the First to dissolve the Synod and Parliament he was seduced by them into a Belief that the Scotish Covenanters were a contemptible number and that THEIR PARTY in Scotland was sufficient to deal with them 7. Information That the Scots were not Rebels in taking Arms to assert their Rights and vindicate the Laws and Liberties of their Country For my Noble Lord Russel the Honour of our Age was most undoubtedly in the right when the day before his Murder he wrote in his Paper left behind him the following words I cannot deny but that I have been of Opinion that a free Nation like this might defend their Religion and Liberties when invaded and taken from them the under pretence and colour of Law I do â—â—firm this was his Orthodox Opinion and these the words he wrote tho they were left out of the Print and in that day there might be reason to omit them But to bethink my self Reverend Sir and to return to what we were upon I lest you thinking at our last parting I will now hear what your Head run upon I think say you he that rends the first half Year's Transactions betwixt King Charles and this Parliament Pag. 5. will find he made his Word good to a tittle for whatsoever they offered to him by way of Bill which the Nation groaned under before as a real nay but as a fancied Burden he PRESENTLY posses it To shew that Against Experience you believe And argue against Demonstration Pleas'd that you can your self deceive And set your Judgment by your Passion We must have a little Chat about this half Year which has exercised your Thoughts and I shall shew you the Reasons wherefore I dissent from your Opinion That your Martyr READILY PASSED whatsoever Bills the Parliament affored for the Redress of the Nation 's Grievances Now a cannot remember one Instance in the whole History of his Reign of a willing and ready Compliance with his People in any one Act of Grace or Justice Every thing of that kind in the whole course of his Life was wrested from him by the universal Outory of the Kingdom against his high Oppressions which did never avail but when the extremity of his Affairs wrought his stubborn Mind to a Compliance And most sure I am that you are mistaken in the sew Instances you bring You say That he PRESENTLY pass'd the Bills for putting down the Stan-Chamber and High-Commission-Coures But I affirm the contrary and do thus prove it The Parliament could never bring him to make a fair Bargain with them they bought every thing at a very dear rate and when they had come to his Price they were ever in danger of being wick'd They came to a Contract with him to yield up those two accursed Courts of Oppression and Tyranny and agreed to a POLL BILL wherein every Duke was assessed at 100 l. a Marquese at 80 l. Earls 60 l. Viscounts and Barons 40 l. Knights of the Bath and Baronets 30 l. nother Knights 20 l. Esquires 10 l. every Genduriam dispending 100 l. per Annum 5 l. and all others of Ability to pay a competent proportion and the meanest Head in the whole Kingdom was not excused I hear there is now a Poll-Bill on foot in this present Parliament and therefore from the high Affection and Duty which I hear and shall ever pay to those excellent Princes who do so happily fill their Grandfathers and Fathers Throne I do here remember my Country men at what rate and for what they were thus assessed in 1640. Then they were forc'd to buy off the Encroachments of a TYRANT who had sworn to maint ain their Laws and Liberties but now they at lower rates are only to enable the hest Princes that ever sway'd the English Scepter to vanquish the worst of Tyrants Well This Bargain was struck and the Parliament resolving very honestly to stand to it they prepared the Bills but finding the King begin to falter declaring that he would take their Money but would not at that time pass the Bills to put down the Star-Chamber and High-Commission-Courts They voted that he should pass all the three Bills or none at all However Neither the Contract nor their Vote could hold him he trick'd them here and upon the 2d of July pass'd the Poll-Money Bill but demurred upon the other two The afterwards finding that the matter was very ill taken and that it was not seasonable to displease the Kingdom at that time he passed the other two Bills And now hope that you are convinced that he did not so PRESENTLY pass Bills for Redrese
of Grievances as you inconsiderately suggested To proceed Sir you say Pag. 5. That THE STAR-CHAMBER had been complain'd of as a Grievance and therefore he signs the Bills to take it away The HIGH-COMMISSION was a Court that most Mens Moths were opened against and he consents to take that away two Very good We have settled the Fact these Courts were taken away I have told you in what manner and for what Consideration I will now take leave to inform you what great Reasons there were to put them down Archbishop Land and divers of his Brethren had cast off all Humanity and were metamorphos'd into ravenous Wolves and these Courts were under their management The Star-Chamber had abounded in extravagant Censures whereby the Subjects were oppressed by grievous Fines Imprisonments Stigmatizings Mutilations Whippings Pillories Gags Banishments c. And the High-Commission was grown to such excess of Sharpness and Severity as was not much less than the Spanish Inquisition To repeat two or three of the many Instances of the horrid Oppression and barbarous Cruelty exercised in these Tyrannical Courts Upon the 17th of February 1629 Dr. LEIGHTON coming out of Black-friars Church it seems then he was no Conventicler was seized by a Warrant from the HIGH-COMMISSION-COURT and drag'd to Bp LAVD's HOUSE from thence without any Examination he was carried to Newgate and there clap'd into Irons and thrust into a nasty Hole where he continued from Tuesday night till Thursday noon without Meat or Drink They kept him in that loathsom place where Snow and Rain beat in upon him fifteen Weeks not permitting his Wife or any Friend to come near him and denied to give him a Copy of his Commitment then they brought him into the STAR-CHAMBER-COURT where an Information was exhibited against him for publishing a Book called SION'S PLEA AGAINST THE PRELATES By his Answer he confessed that when the Parliament was sitting in the Year 1628 he drew up the Heads of that Book and having the Approbation of five hundred Persons inter their Hands whereof some were Members of Parliament he went into Holland to get is printed That he printed but between five and six hundred only for the use of the Parliament but they being dissolved he returned home not bringing any of them into the Land but made it his special Cate to suppress them The Doctor being charged by the Information with these words in the said Book We do not read of greater Persecution of God's People in any Nation professing the Gospel than in this our Island especially SINCE THE DEATH OF QVEEN ELIZABETH He confessed the words and answer'd That the thing was too too true as appeared by the Prelates taking away Life and Livelihood from many Ministers and private Mens of whom many were pined to death in Prison and many wandred up and down their Families being left desolate and helpless That besides this the Blood of Souls had been endanger'd by the remoul of the faithful Shepherds from the Flock This was a cutting Truth And LAVD being enraged desired the Court to put the highest Censure that could be put upon him That they did to his Content condemning him to have his Ears cut his Nose slit to be branded in the Face whipp'd at a Post to stand on the Pillory to pay 10000 l. Fine tho they knew he was not worth so much and to be perpetually imprison'd The grateful Sentence being past Laud pull'd of his Cap and holding up his Hands gave Thanks to God who had given him Victory over his Enemies A Knight moved one of the Lords about the dreadfulness of the Censure intimating that it open'd a Gap to the PRELATES to inflict such disgraceful Punishments and Tortures upon Men of Quality That Lord replied That it was but in terrorem and that he would not have any one think that the Sentence should ever he executed Nevertheless Laud had his design for upon the 26th of November 1630 the Censure was executed in a most cruel mamner his Ears were out his Nose slit his Face branded with burning Irons he was tied to a Post and whipp'd with a treble Cord to that cruel degree that he himself writing the History thereof ten Years after affirmed that every Lash brought away the Flesh and that he should feel it to his dying day He 〈◊〉 lastly put in the Pillory and kept there near two 〈◊〉 in Frost and Snow And then after this most barbarous Usage not permitted to return to his Quarters in the 〈◊〉 in a Couch provided to carry him but compelled In that sad Condition and severe Season to go by Water After this was kept ten weeks in Dirt and Mire not being sheltered from Rain and Snow They shut him up most closely 22 Months and he remained a Prisoner ten or eleven Years not suffered to breath in the open Air until the Parliament of November 1640 most happily delivered him When he came abroad to prosecute his Petition in that Parliament he could neither go see nor hear Now surely Dr. Hollingworth for I do not forget to whom I and writing this dismal Story had flip'd your Memory when you said Vindication of their Majesties Wisdom p. 9. The Bishop Laud was a very good Man save in the Matter of the Book of Sports and some other as you fancy for you say you are tender of judging unnecessary Innovations But you must put on Patience to hear something more of this bloody Villain 's Barbarity Upon the 1st of February 1632 Laud procured Mr. Pryn to be sent close Prisoner to the Tower There he lay till the 21st of June 1633 when an Information was exhibited against him in the Star-Chamber for publishing a Book concerning Interludes intituled * Note that no particular Passages in the Book were mentioned in the Information Histriomastix WHICH WAS LICENSED BY A Chaplain of Dr. Abbot's Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Upon the 17th of Feb. 1633. he had this heavy Sentence pass'd upon him To be imprison'd for Life pay 5000 l. Fine be expelled Lincolns-Inn disabled to exercise the Profession of a Barrister degraded by the Vniversity of Oxford of his Degree there taken and that done to be set in the Pillory at Westminister and have one of hâ—s Ears there cut off and at another time to be set in the Pillory in Cheapâ—ide and there have his other Ear cut off Tho many of the Lords never dreamt of the Execution of this horrid Judgment Nay tho Queen Henrietta Maria which deserves an honourable mention and she shall have it for fire was their present Majesties Royal Grandmother earnestly interceded with the bigotted cruel and merciless King he shall have that too with your leave Doctor for he was a Tyrant to remit its execution yet on the 7th and 10th of May it was fully executed with great rigour Mr. Pryn remained sundry Years in the Tower upon this Censure and in that time Dr. Bastmick in the Year 1635 was brought into the High-Commission
in a third Petition that notwithstanding his Majesty found good cause wholly to desert any further Prosecution of the accused Members yet they remained still under that heavy Charge so imputed unto them And that by two Acts of Parliament viz. 37 and 38 Edw. 3. it was enacted That if any Person whatsoever make Suggestion to THE KING HIMSELF of any Crime committed by another the same Person ought to be sent with the Suggestion before the Chancellor or Keeper of the Great Seal Treasurer or the great Countil there to find Surety to pursue his Suggestion which if he cannâ—t prove he is to be imprisoned till he satisfy the Party accused of his Damages and Slander and made Fine and Ransom to the King Wherefore the Lords and Commons beseeched the King that he would be pleased to send the Person or Persons that in this Case made the Suggestions or Informations to him against the said Members together with the Suggestions or Informations to the Parliament that so such Fruits of the said good Laws may be had as was intended by them and the Rights and Priviledges of Parliament may be vindicated WHICH OF RIGHT AND JVSTICE OVGHT NOT TO BE DENIED Notwithstanding this Petition no Authors nor Witnesses were ever produced to avow the heavy Charge and Accusation of the noble Lord Mandeville and the five Members till now that fifty Years are elapsed You unhappy Doctor are trumping up good Evidence though for want of just Matter which yet never came to light the King let the Business fall of his own accord And see now how neatly you have noos'd your self for by your idle Dedication to their Majesties you have made this false Suggestion TO THE KING HIMSELF and so are fallen into the Mercy of the noble Earl of Manchester and become liable to the severe Penalties in the Statutes of King Edward the Third To dispatch this Head Was it not a Crime against the Law of Nature against the Rules of Justice that innocent Men should be charged with so great an Offence as Treason in the Face of the highest Judicature in the Kingdom without Witness without any possibility of Reparation even in point of Innocency Such was the Case of these great Men for the King denied to discover their Accusers and yet would not pass a Bill for their Discharge unless in the Narration they would desert the avowing their own Innocency Nay was it not an Act of Tyranny beyond Parallel He accused them and yet would produce no Witness he confess'd them clear in his own Judgment yet they must not profess their own Innocency for fear of wounding his Honour We will proceed now Reverend Doctor to what remains to be said about the terrifying Tumults and Riots which frighted his Majesty from VVhitehall You said that he withdrew from thence through Tumults and too much countenanc'd Riots being under apprehension of Affronts design'd to be offer'd to his Person IF NOT SOMETHING WORSE When you return me an Answer to this Letter dear Sir you will infinitely oblige me if you will tell me in plain English what you intend by SOMETHING WORSE than that the Mob would affront his Majesty's Royal Person For according to my present Apprehension you seem to insinuate that HE ABDICATED WHITEHALL under a dread that these wicked Rioters would have forced his COMFORTABLE IMPORTANCE or perpretrated some Act so highly Villanous that you could not find a Name for it For the present till I have better Light herein I will lay before you my Thoughts in this Case In the doing whereof we must examine how things stood at that time whereby 't will be seen whether there were any such Tumules and if there were whether the King himself did not cause them He had tempted the ENGLISH ARMY with no less Reward than the Spoil of the City of LONDON to come up and destroy the PARLIAMENT He had in an unexcusable and hostile manner made a most high Invasion upon the Priviledges of BOTH HOVSES Hereupon many Citizens unarmed resorted to Westminster to present their Petitions and express their stedfastness to the Parliament whose Lives and Safeties by more than slight Rumours they doubted to be in Danger the King having fortified VVhitehall and entertained Armed Men not a few planted them at the * The first Blood that was drawn in this Cause was in that very place where the King 's own Blood was afterwards shed Gate of his Palace where they reviled menaced and with drawn Swords actually wounded many of the Citizens as they passed by in a peaceable manner whereof some died Nay they went farther and were come to that height of Boldness as to give out insolent and menacing Speeches against the Parliament it self and to imbrue their Hands in the Blood of the King's Subjects in VVestminster-Hall and at the Doors of the Parliament as well as at his own Gate And when the Parliament and People complained and demanded Justice for those Assaults 1 K. 21 19. he justifyed and abetted his own Crew in what they did Now the passing by of a multitude of the King's Subjects armed with no other VVeapons than Petitions could neither be justly called Tumults nor could the Parliament have forbid them without breach of the Peoples Freedom Vnarmed Petitioners surely could not be formidable to any And I must remember you Doctor that a very short time before his Majesty pretended to dread these tumultuary Citizens The City entertained feasted and conducted him to Whitehall with at pompous Solemnity and costly Expressions of Love and Duty as ever had been known Nay did he not the very next day after his irruption in the House of Commons than which nothing had more exasperated the People go in his Coach unguarded into the City Did he receive the least Affront much less Violence in any of the Streets but rather humble Demeanours and Supplications He knew the People so full of Awe and Reverence to his Person as to commit himself single amongst the thickest of them at a time when he had most provoked them This shews beyond doubting that all his fear of Tumults was but a meer Pretence and Occasion taken of his resolved absence from the Parliament that he might turn his Slashing at the Court-gate to Slaughtering in the Field Well The King retires first to Hampton-Court commanding his Servants who were Members of Parliament to leave their Service there and to give their Attendance upon his Person Shortly after the QVEEN passes into Holland carrying with her all or the greatest part of the Crown-Jewels which she immediately pawn'd and with the Money bought Arms and Ammunition for the VVar which was not yet begun But I had almost forgot my self Reverend Sir I must attend to what you say in the Case Pag. 8. 'T is this I see The King though withdrawn yet ceases not to call upon the Parliament to consider the Nation 's Good and the settling it upon such Foundations as neither the
Militia and declared that if he refused to do it in these times of Distraction they must be inforced to dispose of it for the Safety of the Kingdom in such manner as had been propounded to his Majesty They followed him with the same humble Supplication in his several Removes to York but HE HAVING ABDICATED the Parliament and BEING DEAF as you most ingenuously confess TO ALL THEIR IMPORTUNITIES they declared that there had been of late a most desperate Design upon the House of Commons which they had just cause to believe was an Effect of the BLOODY COVNSELS of PAPISTS and other ill-affected Persons who had already raised A REBELLION IN IRELAND and by reason of many Discoveries they could not but fear they would proceed not only to stir up the like REBELLION AND INSVRRECTION in this Kingdom but also to back them with Forces from abroad and thereupon both Houses made an Ordinance for the ordering the Militia of England and Wales there appearing an urgent and inevitable Necessity for putting his Majesty's Subjects in a Posture of Defence for the Safeguard of both his Majesty and the People And they RESOLVED that in this case of extream Danger and of his Majesty's refusal the Ordinance agreed to by both Houses for the Militia doth oblige the People and OVGHT TO BE OBEYED by the Fundamental Eaws of this Kingdom They further about that time RESOLVED That the King's Absence so far remote from his Parliament was not only an Obstruction but MIGHT BE A DESTRVCTION to the Affairs of Ireland And now Sir having laid before you the Grounds of the Parliament's proceeding as they did in the business of the Militia I will shew you how much higher our Fore-fathers went than we did in 1641. They were of that Courage and Severity of Zeal to Justice and their Native Liberty against the proud Contempt and Mis-rule of their Kings that when RICHARD the Second departed but from a Committee of Lords who sat preparing Matters for the Parliament they required the King then withdrawn no further off than the Tower to come to Westminster WHICH HE REFUSING THEY FLATLY TOLD HIM THAT UNLESS HE CAME THEY WOULD CHOOSE ANOTHER KING So high a Crime it was accounted then for a King to absent himself much less would they have suffered that a King should leave his Regal Station and the whole Kingdom bleeding to Death of those Wounds which his own unskilful and perverse Government had made Yet WE IN OUR DAY went not their length THE KING HAD ABDICATED our Religion Lives and Liberties were threatned with most imminent Danger from intestine Enemies and Foreign Force WE only made a most necessary Provision that our own Swords should not be imployed to the Destruction of all that was dear unto us And pray what harm what Rebellion was there in all this The next thing we meet with in your Defence Pag. 10. REVEREND DOCTOR is this Before the War actually broke out the King was gone to York hoping thereby to COOL THE HEATS that were AT LONDON and in some little time TO BE INVITED thither to live with more Honour and Safety than he did before The King in truth went to York in a high Chafe hoping for something beyond and contrary to what you intimate 't was in hopes that to enable himself the better for that dismal War which he had resolved upon he might possess himself of Hull a Town of great Strength and most advantagiously situated both for Sea and Land Affairs and which was at that time the Magazine of all the Arms which he had bought with Money most illegally extorted from his Subjects to use in a causless and most unjust Civil War against his Subjects of Scotland Did he hope for an Invitation back to London Why he had that very often made to him in a most humble and earnest manner in particular by a Petition of the Lords and Commons presented to him at York the 26th of March 1642. They humbly advised and beseeched him that FOR THE RECOVERY OF IRELAND and securing this Kingdom he would be graciously pleased with all convenient speed to return to London and to close with the Counsel of his Parliament where he should find their dutiful Affections and Endeavours ready to attend him with such Entertainment as should not only give him just cause of Security in their Faithfulness but other manifold Evidences of their Intentions and Endeavours to advance his Majesty's Service Honour and Contentment and to establish it upon the sure Foundation of the Peace and Prosperity of his Kingdoms EXPRESSIONS surely Doctor THAT DO NOT IN THE LEAST SAVOUR OF REBELLION AND TREASON The deaf King instead of hearkning to this dutiful Petition and Invitation summoned the Gentry of that County to attend him at York where he made the most bitter Invectives against the Parliament and stirred them up to raise Horse and Foot for his Service His Majesty found but six Gentlemen to comply with his Demand of raising Men tho made under the pretence of a Guard The greater part of the Gentlemen and divers thousands of Freeholders gave him an Answer under their hands to this effect We humbly beseech your Majesty to impart the grounds of your Fears and Jealousies to your High Court of Parliament OF WHOSE MOST LOYAL CARE AND AFFECTION TO YOVR MAJESTY'S HONOVR AND SAFETY WE ARE MOST CONFIDENT and WHATSOEVER SHALL BE ADVISED BY YOVR GREAT COVNCIL we shall most willingly imbrace and give our Concurrence and Assistance to it as shall become us And WE ARE MOST ASSVRED that your Royal Person shall be secure in the general Fidelity of your Subjects of this County without any extraordinary GUARD The King was presented the next day with a Petition from many thousands who justly stiled themselves peaceably affected Subjects in the County of York in which they speak thus That many of them in their late Desires of petitioning your Majesty were denied Access kept back with Violence and affronted by some who had Dependance on your Majesty and were threatned that WHEN YOVR MAJESTY'S ARMY SHOVLD BE ON FOOT those should be first pillaged that refused to subscribe to the raising of Forces which we humbly conceive are POSITIVELY CONTRARY TO YOVR MAJESTY'S OWN EXPRESSIONS c. We humbly supplicate your Majesty to cast your Eye upon the present State of this your Kingdom We are confident that no so absolute and hearty Observance to your Majesty's just Commands can be demostrated as what your Majesty in Parliament shall declare which IF IT BECOME DIVIDED as God forbid our Hearts even tremble to consider the Dangers and Diminution of the Honour and Safety your Majesty's Posterity and Kingdoms will unavoidably be put upon Since it is clear to every Vnderstanding that IT IS NOT A DIVIDED PART OF ONE OR SEVERAL COVNTIES THAT can afford that Honour and Safety to your Majesty AS THE WHOLE KINGDOM WHICH YOV MAT COMMAND no ground of Fear or Danger remaining if a good
him about it What say you next Pag. 10. Mr. Chaplain at Aldgate Why To let the World see what the King aimed at He does assure the Gentlemen whose Loyalty engaged them early on his Side and does promise them in the Presence of Almighty God and as he hopes for his Blessing and Protection that he would to the utmost of his Power defend and maintain the true Protestant Religion establish'd in the Church of England You almost provoke me Doctor to draw up a Petition to your Right Honourable and Right Reverend Diocesan to suspend you from writing DEFENCES till you swear to do them honestly then and not till then we may hope for the Truth the whole Truth and nothing but the Truth I am credibly informed that there was something more in this Speech than you are willing to acknowledg 'T is the same I take it for granted that his Majesty made at the Head of his Army between Stafford and Wellington the 19th of September 1642. He then had these Expressions also The time cannot be long before we come to Action You shall meet with no Enemies but TRAITORS MOST OF THEM â—ROWNISTS ANABAPTISTS AND ATHEISTS These were the Words of a King I shall not therefore reflect further upon them than to ask you upon the Oath which you are to take Whether you do in your Conscience believe that the Great the Good the pious King spoke Truth here Whether he had not more Atheists and Papists in his Army than the Parliament had Brownists and Anabaptists in theirs Your next Effort is this Pag. 12. You fall upon the Consideration of the Steps his Majesty made towards Peace and thus express your self Truly I think ACCORDING TO MY POOR JVDGMENT he now Acts according to what he always pretended and solemnly avowed to wit as a true Father of his Country for be proposes That HIS REVENVE MAGAZINES TOWNS SHIPS AND FORTS may be restored to him and all should be well Now I will readily agree that there is here and there found a Doctor nay a Chaplain too of a poor Judgment but one would think that he that is conscious of his own Weakness and Incapacity should not assume the Arrogance to judg in Matters of Right between Princes and their People And I will here tell you what better Heads than you or I ever wore said upon this Point The Opinion of the Parliament was That his Majesty's Towns were no more his own than his Kingdom is his own and his Kingdom is no more his own than his People are his own And if the King had a Propriety in all his Towns what would become of the Subjects Property in their Houses therein And if he had a Propriety in his Kingdom what would become of the Subjects Property in their Lands throughout the Kingdom or of their Liberties if his Majesty had the same Right in their Persons that every Subject hath in his Lands This ERRONEOVS MAXIM being infused into Princes THAT THEIR KINGDOMS ARE THEIR OWN and that they may do with them what they will AS IF THEIR KINGDOMS were for them and not they for their Kingdoms is the Root of all the Subjects Misery and of the invading of their just Rights and Liberties whereas INDEED THEY ARE ONLY INTRVSTED with their Kingdoms and with their Towns and with their People and with the Publick Treasures of the Common-Wealth and whatsoever is bought therewith and by the known Law of the Kingdom the VERY JEWELS OF THE CROWN are not the King 's PROPER Goods but are only intrusted unto him for the Vse and Ornament thereof as the Towns Forts Treasure Magazines Offices and the People of the Kingdom and the whole Kingdom it self is entrusted unto him for the Good Safety and best Advantage thereof And AS THIS TRVST IS FOR THE VSE OF THE KINGDOM SO IT OVGHT TO BE MANAGED BY THE ADVICE OF THE HOVSES OF PARLIAMENT whom the Kingdom hath trusted for that purpose it being their Duty to see it be discharged according to the condition and true indent thereof and as much as in them lies by all possible means to prevent the contrary Not to enquire what you Sir in your poor Judgment do think of this high Principle I will move with what speed I can to a Conclusion I told you not long since That the Lords and Commons voted the raising an Army to be commanded by the Earl of Essex and at the same time humbly but in vain supplicated the King for Peace and to return to his Parliament When the General marched with his Forces towards the Army raised against the Parliament and Kingdom He was instructed to fight at such Time and Place as he should judg most to conduce to the Peace and Safety of the Kingdom but was also commanded to cause a Petition of both Housâ—s to be presented to his Majesty wherein they thus expressed themselves We cannot without great grief and tenderness of Compassion behold the pressing Miseries the imminent Dangers the devouring Calamities which do extreamly threaten the Kingdoms of England and Ireland by the practice of a Party prevailing with your Majesty who by many wicked Plots and Conspiracies have attempted the alteration of the true Religion and the ancient Government of this Kingdom and the introducing of POPISH IDOLATRY AND SVPERSTITION in the CHVRCH and TYRANNY and CONFVSION in the STATE And for the compassing thereof have long corrupted your Majesty's Counsels abused your Power and by sudden and untimely dissolving of the former Parliaments have often hindred the Reformation and Prevention of those Mischiefs and being now disabled to avoid the Endeavours of this Parliament by any such Means have TRAITEROVSLY attempted to over-awe the same by Force And in prosecution of their wicked Designs have EXCITED ENCOVRAGED AND FOSTER'D an unnatural REBELLION in IRELAND and have drawn your MAJESTY to make War against your Parliament as if you intended by CONQVEST to establish an ABSOLVTE ILLIMITED I OWER over them And by YOVR POWER and the countenance of your Presence have SPOILED IMPRISONED MVRDERED divers of your People And for their better assistance in these wicked Designs do seek to bring over the Rebels of Ireland to join with them WE HAVE for the just and necessary Defence of the Protestant Religion of your Majesty's Person of the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom and the Priviledg and Power of Parliament TAKEN VP ARMS and appointed Robert Earl of Essex to be Captain General of all the Forces by us raised and to head and conduct the same against these REBELS and TRAITORS and them to subdue and bring to condign Punishment And do most humbly beseech your Majesty to withdraw your Royal Presence and Countenance from these wicked Persons and THAT YOVR MAJESTY WILL NOT MIX YOVR OWN DANGER WITH THEIRS but in Peace and Safety forthwith return to your Parliament and by their faithful Counsel and Advice compose the present Distempers and Confusions abounding in both your Kingdoms and
provide for the Security and Honour of your Royal Posterity and the prosperous Estate of all your Subjects And we do in the presence of Almighty God profess That we will receive your Majesty with all Honour yield you all due Obedience and Subjection and faithfully endeavour to secure your Person and Estate from all Danger and to the uttermost of our Power to procure and establish to your Self and to your People all the Blessings of a glorious and happy Reign You see Sir the LORDS AND COMMONS TALK'D LIKE CHRISTIANS They were grieved at the Miseries of the Kingdoms They detested the Romish Idolatry When they sent their Army against the Enemies of the King and Kingdom they supplicate his Majesty not to mix his Danger with theirs but to return in Peace to his Parliament and compose the Distempers of his Kingdoms and provide for the Security and Honour of his Posterity They IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD PROFESS that they would receive him with all Honour yield him all due Subjection endeavour to secure him from Danger and make his Reign Glorious and Happy WHICH WORDS CERTAINLY ARE NOT THE WORDS OF TRAITORS But all this would not do for he resolved to answer their Petitions in Blood and proclaimed the Earl of Essex Rebel Yet to blind the Eyes of the Multitude and disguise his pernicious and cruel Intentions under the semblance of Peace and Justice he made as you Doctor have observed divers solemn Protestations with fearful Imprecations upon himself and invocation of God's Holy Name That he intended nothing but the Peace and Welfare of his People the maintenance of Religion and the Laws of the Kingdom and for his own security only to raise a Guard for his Person and that he did from his Soul abhor the thought of making War against the Parliament or to put the Kingdom into a Combustion Nevertheless his contrary intentions were at that very instant manifested by these ensuing Actions and Proceedings before the Parliament voted the raising of their Army He put a Garison of Souldiers into Newcastle The * Upon the 27th of Septemb. 1642 he not only allowed but required the Papists of Lancashire to provide Arms for themselves their Servants and Tenants and all without doubt for the Service of the Church of England Papists in a peremptory manner in the King's Name demanded their Arms taken from them according to the Laws to be again restored to them He caused the Mouth of the River Tine to be fortified whereby the whole Trade of Newcastle for Coals was subject to be interrupted whensoever he should please A Ship laden with Cannon for Battery Powder and Ammunition was brought for him into the River of Humber which also brought several Commanders from Foreign Parts Also divers other large Preparations of Warlike Provisions were made beyond the Sea and shortly expected besides great Numbers of Gentlemen Horses and Arms were drawn from all parts of the Kingdom and all the Gentlemen of Yorkshire required to bring in their Horses for the King's Service Commissions for raising Horse were granted and divers Officers for his Army were appointed Upon the 4th of July the King rendezvouzed an Army of a considerable number of Horse and Foot and Beverly amongst whom there were divers Papists and other Persons of desperate Fortune and Condition ready to execute any Violence Rapine and Oppression He sent some Troops of Horse into Lincolnshire to the great Terror of the People They began to take away Mens Horses by force and to commit Acts of Hostility These are sad Truths Reverend Doctor and the King having thus contrary to his solemn Protestation begun the War the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament held themselves bound in Conscience to raise Forces for the preservation of the Peace of the Kingdom and Protection of the People in their Persons and Estates according to Law and for the Defence and Security of the Parliament and accordingly upon the 12th of July 1642 and not before as I have already told you they voted the raising an Army for these purposes Now in regard as I understand you were before your Dotage a Presbyterian Minister of Essex I would gladly set your poor Judgment right in this great Point of as well the Necessity as Justice of the Parliament War and in regard that I find you prejudiced against Dr. Seaman and Mr. Calamy I will not offer their Opinion to you but pray see what the learned and pious Mr. Daniel Rogers of Wethersfield Mr. Matthew Newcomen of Dedham and above sixty eminent Ministers of so many several Towns in Essex left under their hands in relation to this Controversy between you and me We say they call the God of Heaven and Earth to witness upon our Souls that it was not hatred to any Party or Person much less to the Person of OUR KING that first drew â—â—s to engage with and for the PARLIAMENT but clearly this some Years before the assembling of this Parliament we evidently saw the Affairs of Church and State in imminent and apparent hazardâ— many and great Alterations made in Doctrine Innovations in Worship the Power of Godliness disgrac'd true Religion undermined the faithful and conscientious Professors of it persecuted even to Bonds Flight and Imprisonment POPERY CONNIVED AT COUNTENANCED COURTED besides many grievous Oppressions of the Subjects in their Liberties and Properties These things we saw and signed for but had no thoughts of inviting any to make Resistance tho against the abused Name and Power of a misguided King whom we much pitied in his Miscarriages until it pleased God to bless us with A PARLIAMENT THE ORDINARY MEANS WHICH HE HATH APPOINTED IN THIS NATION FOR THE REDRESSING OF SUCH GROWING EVILS The Parliament meet declare their Apprehensions of the Danger of CHURCH AND STATE apply themselves to all humble and submiss ways by PETITIONS See the Remonstrance of the State of the Kingdom Decemb. 15. 1641. REMONSTRANCES c. speak nothing but honourably of the King lay the blame of all Miscarriages upon Evil Counsellors require them to Trial But God for our Sins and his shuts up his Majesty's Heart against these Addresses instead of yielding up those whom the Parliament demands he demands some of their Members seconds his Demand with a. Face of Violence And HERE BEGAN THAT MOST UNHAPPY BREACH the Parliament upon this desire a Guard the King apprehended OR PRETENDED Terror he leaves his Parliament upon it and UNDER SHADOW OF A GUARD for his Person RAISETH AN ARMY sets up his STANDARD c. The Story is too long and sad for us to relate but hence arose that Fire which since hath burnt almost to the very Foundation and who knows when it will be quenched The Parliament seeing which way the Counsels of the King steered apprehend a necessity of raising Arms FOR THE DEFENCE OF THEMSELVES AND THE KINGDOM When the War was first commenced their Army carried a Petition in the one hand as well as a
Sword in the other in which the Lords and Commons do IN THE PRESENCE OF ALMIGHTY GOD profess That if his Majesty will forthwith return to his Parliament c. they will receive him with all Honour yield him all due Subjection and Obedience and faithfully endeavour to secure his Person and Estate from all Danger and do the utmost of their Power to procure and establish to himself and his People all the Blessings of a glorious and happy Reign WE DID THEN VERILY BELIEVE AND YET DO that these were the sincere and cordial Intentions of the Lords and Commons and altho the King was so unhappy as to reject that Petition yet they persisted still in the same Loyalty of Intentions and Affections towards him as appears in their many Messages to himself and Declarations to the Kingdom Upon these Grounds we engaged in this CAVSE being called to it by a lawful Authority The TWO HOVSES OF PARLIAMENT BEING THE ORDINANCE OF GOD VNTO THIS NATION FOR THE PREVENTING OF TYRANNY AND THE REGVLATING OF THE EXORBITANCIES OF REGAL POWER and being convinced in our Judgments both of the Equity and Necessity of THE PARLIAMENT'S DEFENSIVE ARMS c. WE APPEAL TO GOD the Searcher of all Hearts to whom we must give an Account of all our Ways THAT THESE WERE THE GROVNDS OF OVR FIRST ENGAGEMENT Now Sir to look back to your Defence of the King I find you frequently glorying in his Majesty's oft-repeated Gracious Messages Offers Proposals and Condescentions for Peace and in relation to the Deportment of the Parliament you thus express your poor Judgment I cannot but perswade my self Pag. 17. they were resolved to continue the War and engross all into their own hands let what would become of the King But yet that they might pacify the Minds of a great number of the Nation who groaned under the Miseries of the War and began to see too much of a private Spirit under publick Pretences they consent to a Treaty at Uxbridg they did so and you declare that two Heads were agreed to be there debated viz. 1. Of Religion and Church Government 2. Of the Militia Now in reading the History of that Treaty I find that a third great thing was agreed to be also debated viz. The business of Ireland but that being a Point which you care not to touch I must not allow you to hide it To discourse a little about this Treaty notwithstanding the King for his Credit-sake and to satisfy his own Party weary of War yielded to a Treaty I cannot perswade my self but he was resolved to continue the War and if you appear not a Man of resolved Prejudices or else of profound and stupid Ignorance I do half think that I may bring you over to my Opinion in this matter For to let you see what disposed him to hearken to this Treaty take his own words in his Letter to the Queen in December 1644. I shall shew thee upon what Grounds I came to a Treaty to the end thou mayst the better understand and APPROVE of my Ways Then know as A CERTAIN TRVTH that all EVEN MY PARTY are strongly impatient for Peace which obliged me so much the more at all occasions to shew my real Intentions to Peace NO DANGER OF DEATH SHALL MAKE ME DO ANY THING VNWORTHY OF THY LOVE At the very instant of this Treaty which was had in February 1644 the King used all imaginable means to bring not only FOREIGN FORCES but the Irish CUT-THROATS against the Parliament to clear up this Point and also to evince how insincere he was in his pretended Intentions of Peace I will briefly present to your view his under-hand Transactions as well with Foreign Princes as those Rebels and in the first place I shall mind you of some Passages between Him and the Queen in relation to this and other Treaties In a Letter to her of January 9 1644 he writes thus The Scots Commissioners have sent to me to send a Commission to their General Assembly WHICH I AM RESOLVED NOT TO DO but to the end of making some use of this occasion by sending an honest Man to London and that I may have the more time for the making A HANDSOME NEGATIVE I have demanded a Passport for Phil. Warwick by whom to return my Answer At another time in the same Month he tells her that as for my my calling those at London * He had agreed to treat with them as a Parliament the Queen upbraided him for so doing and he thus vindicates himself A PARLIAMENT IF THERE HAD BEEN BUT TWO OF MY OPINION I had not done it THE CALLING DID NO WAYS ACKNOWLEDG THEM TO BE A PARLIAMENT upon which Condition and Construction I did it and accordingly it is registred in the Council-Books Nothing is more evident than that the King was steered by the Queen's Counsel in the Management of this Uxbridg Treaty and that which you call the Church of England THE BISHOPS was greatly her Care By Letter in January 1644 before the beginning of that Treaty She instructs him not to abandon those who have served him lest they for sake him in his need that SHE hopes he will have a care of her and HER RELIGION That in her Majesty's Opinion RELIGION SHOULD BE THE LAST THING UPON WHICH HE SHOULD TREAT for if he do agree upon Strictness against the Catholicks it would discourage them to serve him and if afterwards there should be no Peace he could never expect Succours either FROM IRELAND or any other CATHOLICK PRINCE In another of her Letters we find her writing thus Jan. 17 1644. It comforts me much to see the Treaty shall be at Uxbridg I RECEIVED YESTERDAY LETTERS FROM THE DUKE OF LORRAIN WHO SENDS ME WORD IF HIS SERVICE BE AGREEABLE TO YOU HE WILL BRING YOU 10000 MEN ABOVE ALL have a care not to ABANDON those who have served you AS WELL THE BISHOPS AS THE POOR CATHOLICKS By the King's Letters to the Queen in February when the Treaty at Vxbridg was depending he stiles the Parliament UNREASONBLE STUBBORN PERFIDIOUS REBELS presses her to hasten all possible Assistance to him particularly that of the Duke of Lorrain He tells her that the limited days for treating are now almost expired without the least Agreement upon any one Article wherefore I have sent for enlargement of Days THAT THE WHOLE TREATY MAY BE LAID OPEN TO THE WORLD and I ASSURE THEE THOU NEEDEST NOT DOUBT THE ISSUE OF THIS TREATY for MY COMMISSIONERS ARE SO WELL CHOSEN tho I say it that they will neither be threatned nor disputed from the Grounds I have given them which upon my word IS ACCORDING TO THE LITTLE NOTE THOU SO WELL REMEMBERS Be confident that in making Peace I shall ever shew my CONSTANCY IN ADHERING TO BISHOPS AND ALL OUR FRIENDS and not forget to put a short Period to this perpetual Parliament We find him in another Letter dated the 5th of March expressing himself in these