come with them to sach Convocation often times and commonly be arrested molested and inquieted the King willing gratiously in that behalf to provide for the security and quieâ—ness of the said Prelates and Clergy at the supplication of the said Prelates and Clergie and by the assent of the great men and Commons in Parllament assembled did ordain and establish that all the Clergy hereafter to be called to the Convocation by the Kings writ and their servants and familiars should for ever hereafter fully use and enjoy such liberty or defenee in coming tarrying and retorning as the great men and commonly of the Realm of England called or to be called to the Kings Parliament did enjoy or were wont to enjoy or in time to come ought to enjoy In the 23. and 24 th year of the Raigne of that King the Commons in Parliament did pray the King that every person being of the Lords or Commons House having any assault or fray made upon him being at the parliament or coming or going from thence might have the like remedy therefore as Sir Thomas Parre Knight had which shews that in those days they did not endeavour to punish any breach of their priviledges by their own authority but made their addresse by their petitions unto the King as their Soveraigne and Supreme for his Justice therein To which the King answered the Statutes therefore made should be observed In the 28 th year of the said Kings Raigne It was at the request of the Commons in parliament for that William Taylebois of South Lime in the County of Lincoln Esq would in the Parliament time have slain Ralph Lord Cromwell one of the Kings Councel in the Pallace of Westminster Enacted that the said William Taylebois should therefore be committed to the Tower of London there to remain one year without bayle baston or Mainprize and that before his delivery he should answer unto the same In the 14 th and 15 th year of the Raign of King Edward the 4 th William Hide a Burgess of Parliament for the Town of Chippenham in Wiltshire being a Prisoner upon a Writ of Capias ad satisfaciendum obtained a Writ out of the Chancery to be delivered with a saving of the right of other men to have Execution after the Parliament ended notwithstanding the Pâ—ecedent of Sir William Thorpe Knight Speaker of the house of Commons in the 18 th year of the Raigne of the Raigne of King Henry the 6 th taken in Execution for a debt of 1000 l. at the suit of Richard Duke of York betwixt the adjournment and recess of that Parliament and could not be released so as a new Speaker was chosen in his place which may well be conjectered to have been so carried by the then overbearing power and influence of that Duke and his party great alliance and pretences to the Crown which that meek and pious King was not able to resist For in the 17 th year of the raigne of King Edward the 4 th at the petition of the Commons in Parliament the King with the assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal granted that John Atwill a Burgess of the City of Exeter condemned in the Exchequer during the Parliament upon eight several informations at the suit of John Taylor of the same Town should have as many Writs of Supersedeas as he would untill his coming home after the Parliament In the 35 th year of the Raigne of King Henry the 8 th Trewyniard a Burgess of Parliament being imprisoned upon an Utlary in an action of debt upon a Capias ad satisfaciendum was delivered by priviledge of Parliament allowed to be legal by the opinion of the Judges before whom that case of his imprisonment and release was afterwards debated and their reasons as hath been before remembred given for the same with which agreeth the precedent in the case of Edward Smalley a servant of Mr. Hales a member of Parliament taken in Execution in the 18 th year of the Raigne of Queen Elizabeth in the Report whereof made by the Committee of Parliament for his delivery it is said that the said Committee found no precedent for the setting at large any person in arrest but only by writ and that by diverse precedents on Record and perused by the said Committee it appeared that every Knight Citizen and Burgesse of the house of Commons in Parliament which doth require priviledge hath used in that case to take a corporal oath before the Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the great Seal of England for the time being that the party for whom such writ is prayed came with him to the Parliament was his servant at the the time of the arrest made whereupon Mr Hale was directed by the house of Commons to make an oath before the Lord Keeper as aforesaid and to procure a warrant for a Writ of priviledge for his said servant howbeit the Lords in Parliament did in the Raigne of Queen Elizabeth usually of their own authority deliver their Servants out of Execution if arrested in Parliament time In the 27 th year of her Raigne a Member of the house of Commons having been served with a Writ of Subpaena issuing out of the Chancery and the house signifying to the Lord Keeper that it was against their priviledge he retorned answer that he could not submit to any opinion of the house concerning their priviledges except those priviledges were allowed in Chancery and would not recall the Subpaena With which accordeth Mr. VVilliam Pryn too violent an undertaker in the late times of usurpation to assert their phantosme or feigned soveraignty whereof he was then and since his Majesties happy restoration untill his death a member who having by the keeping of the Records in the Tower of London found the way to a better weighed and more sober consideration and cause enough if he would have well inspected himself and what he had formerly written to retract those many errors which an overhasty reading and writing had hurried him into hath in his animadversions upon Sir Edward Cokes 4 th part of his Institutes declared that the house of Commons in Parliament had untill the later end of the last Century assumed no Jurisdiction to themselves or their Committee of priviledges to punish breaches of priviledges but onely complained thereof to the King or the Lords in Parliament And therefore King James in an answer to a Petition of the House of Commons in Parliament in Anno Dom. 1622 was not in an error when he said that although we cannot allow of the stile calling your priviledges your antient and undoubted rights and inheriiance but could rather have wished that you had said that your priviledges were derived from the grace or permission of our Ancestors and us for most of them were from precedents which shews rather a tolleration then inheritance yet we are pleased to give you our royal assurance that as long as you contain
a certificate for Sir Gilbert Houghton Knight one of the Kings Servants enumerating Particular Priviledges for every of the Kings Servants viz. Not to be arrested without leave first obtained not to be warned or summoned to attend at Assizes or Sessions not to be impannelled upon enquests or juries not to serve in the Train bands nor to be chosen in Offices c. In the year 1637 a warrant for the apprehension of Francis Grove of Southwark Grocer upon the complaint of the Earl of Morton Captain of the Guard for sending his warrant being in Commission for the New Corporation for certain Yeomen of the Guard in Ordinary to compell them to serve in Person with their Arms. The like for the apprehension of Isaac Walter in Kent upon the complaint of Henry Hodsal a Yeoman of the guard for undue molestation of him by suing of him to the Utlary and seeking satisfaction in extremity upon his Goods and Chattels without detaining his person The like against Ezechiel Johnson Clerk and John VVilcox an Officer of the Lord Mayor of London for an Arrest of Master Grimsdich of the Great Wardrobe without leave A warrant for the apprehension of Alderman Andrews and of Kenelme Smith and John VVright Officers of the Sheriffs of London for the arresting of Mr. Laurence Hilliard Smith and VVright being thereupon Committed to the Marshalsea And in the same year a Petition of one James Goodland against John All of VVapping concerning a Debt of 400 l. pretended to be owing to him by the said John All was answered by the said Lord Chamberlain in these words I desire Mr. Reeve to call John All before him and to enjoyn him to take some speedy course for the satisfaction of this debt for which if he cannot prevail with him he is to let me understand so much whereupon I will take further Order In the year 1638 a Warrant was granted by the said Lord Chamberlain for the apprehension of Thomas Tyrrill Gent. VVilliam Wrynne his servant Thomas Parker a Constable Thomas Drew a Bricklayer and Edward Spooner all of the Town of Newington upon the complaint of Tucker one of the Yeomen of the Guard for being by them set in the Stocks Granted a warrant for the apprehension of Marriot Hewes and Carter Marshall's men for the arresting of one Mr. Beiston His Majesties Servant without leave And the like for the apprehension of Robert Howse and Christopher Bagehot Constables in VVare Thomas Swinsteed Post Master and George his Brother for setting Robert Redbury Harbinger for the Huntsmen of the Buck-hounds in the Stocks who appearing were committed and afterwards Released In the year 1639 a warrant was granted by the said Lord Chamberlain for the apprehension of VVilliam Barker and other Bayliffs for the arresting of Robert Vnderwood a VVarder of the Tower of London and Ordered to pay him charges which they consented unto The like against Ralph Atkinson of Brainford and Edward Rabone a Marshals man for arresting of Mr. Thomas Lisle the Princes Barbor Extraordinary And the like against Edmond Griffin of Cheapside and Richard Stersaker for arresting of Mr. VVilliam Harbert In the year 1640 a warrant was granted by the said Lord Chamberlain for the apprehension of Jeoffrey Sharpe Hugh Osborne and William Sympson upon the complaint of Mr. Man one of the Kings Chaplains for an arrest The like to apprehend Humphrey Lea Ralph Reason and Henry Wickliffe for arresting and taking in Execution the goods of David Porrel without leave And the like for the apprehension of Charles Steward and William Wyamford upon the complaint of William Lenet a Yeoman of the Guard for an abuse and affront in the Streets That Excellent Prince under whose authority he acted being not only careful to maintain His Servants just Priviledges but to avoid any ill consequences which might happen by any abuse thereof being in the year of our Lord 1631 informed that one Thomas Barnes having been sworn one of the Grooms of His Majesties Chamber in Ordinary upon a pretence that he was one of the Company of Players who had a licence to Practice under the name of the Queen of Bohemia's Players whereas in truth the said Barnes was by Profession a Carpenter nor did profess the quality of a Stage Player but was dishonestly and sinisterly obtruded upon the said Lord Chamberlain by the false and fraudulent Suggestion of one Joseph Moore that followed business in the name of the said Company out of a corrupt end to derive unto himself a benefit by entitling the said Barnes unto the Priviledge and Protection of His Majesties Service and did most Injuriously seek to defraud men of their just debts had drawn men to be bound with him for great summes of money and exposed them to the danger of Imprisonment to the end therefore that His Majesties Service might be purged from the stain of so dishonest and foul proceedings the said Lord Chamberlain was commanded by His Majesty to call the said Barnes and discharge and dismiss him and cause his name to be blotted and razed out of the list of His Majesties Servants All or many of which upon due consideration had may shew the necessity aswell as legality of the cares of the said Chamberlain by and under His late Majesties Authority Anciently and by a long prescription of many ages vested in his and other the Honourable Offices of the Kings most Honourable Houshold And might more fully have been manifested if many of the Books of State Court Memorials and Records had not in the latter end of the Raign of King James been lost by the fire which at that time burnt the Signet-Office and other buildings and Repositories thereof at Whitehall and by other Books of that most Honourable House If those Sons of Spoil Plunder and Rapine the godless party of pretending holiness in the late confusions and Rebellion when the Frogs not by the hardening of our late blessed Kings heart but his too much trust and condescentions and the Almighties permission did go up and come into that house and into our Kings Bedchamber and into the houses of his servants and upon his people When our England was a valley of slaughter all the beauty of the Daughter of our Zion was departed the grievous revolters and those which walked with slanders and our adversaries were the chief in that desolate and by them misused palace had not left any more then three little Books of the Lord Chamberlains Registry against their wills conceal'd and rescued from the year 1625 being the first year of the Raign of His late Majesty of blessed Memory until the year of our Lord 1641. When our miseries and troubles began to craul and ingender In which small remains those most just and necessary priviledges of the Kings Servants contained which reason of State the Soveraignty of Princes can neither want nor suffer to be disused do amongst other things appear to have been so moderately
have been permitted or are to Ride or come into the Castle Gate with his Hat on or covered Those vast Empires of the Ottoman or Turk Persians Mogor and King or Emperour of Japan are not without thosâ— or the like Reverences not only by their profound silences and observations more then ordinary in their Apartments and Retirements but by other Demonstrations of Honour and acknowledgements of Respect to their Soveraign Princes Houses or Palaces Nor are such or the like Reverences or Respects due to the Houses or Courts of kings unknown or disused even amongst the more Heathen and Barbarians who although they are too much conversant with Ignorance Rudeness and Incivilities are notwithstanding by the Principles Law and light of Nature guided and directed unto it In the City and Countrey which was the Queen of Sheba's the people do use such Reverence to the Kings Houses or Palaces as although the Gates do stand open no man dares presume to enter or to touch them Before any do come to the Court or Tent of Prete John Emperour or King of Ethiopia or the Abassines they do alight of their Horses and begin to do their accustomed Reverences stooping down with their right hand unto the ground and betwixt the Prete or Kings Tent and the Tent of the Judges no man passeth on Horse-back in Reverence to the King and his Justice but all do alight and go on foot When any do come to the first Hall of the King of the Maldives Palace who is King of thirteen Provinces and One thousand Isles where His guard are No Lord or Plebeian man woman or child dare go further except the Domestical Officers of the King and Queens and their Slaves and Servitors At the King of Achens Court in the East Indies before any man can come into the Kings Presence he must put of his Hose and Shooes hold the Palms of his hands together lift them above his head and bow with his body Amongst the rude and fierce Tartars he that hath been present with one that died was not to come into the house of the Mangu Chan within a year after The Barons and people who do come unto his Court do within half a Mile where the great Chan Resides make and continue a great silence a sign or token in the Eastern Countries of great Reverence every Baron carrying a little fair vessel to Spit in and after Covers it none daring to spit in the Hall into which before they do enter they put off their Buskins and put on Furre Buskins of white Leather giving the other to their Servants In the City of Nanquim is a Table of Gold wherein is written the Kings name in Memory of his Residence there which stands in the Palace Covered and being to be seen upon some of their Festival days covered all the Nobility of the City do go to do it Reverence In China and at Pequin they which are to pass by the Kings Palaces do descend and alight from their Horses and go on foot until they be passed Yea although the King doth not there reside and they do at other times make their Reverences unto the Kings Empty Throne And so much by the light of nature and the dusky and obscure glimmerings of it were the Palaces and Residences of their Kings and Princes Reverenced by the Mexicans a Populous Nation in the West Indies as all that were to come or appear before Montezuma their King or Emperour were except some Princes his kinsmen to come bare-foot Such therefore and so great Honours being so deservedly due to the Houses and Habitations of Kings and Princes the Affairs or business of the Soveraign Acted either within or without it are not certainly like Esau to be deprived of it's Blessing or what is appropriate or belonging to it but it ought as a very great truth to be subscribed unto by every one that will not abjure his own Reason the Laws and Reasonable Customes of England Prudence and Practice of all other Nations of Christendom and where ever the Light of Reason and Divine Wisdom have imparted their Glories that the business and affairs of the Kings-Servants in Ordinary are to be preferred and Take Place of the Affairs of any Subject or Private Person SECT II. That the Business and Affairâ— of the King about which any of His Servants or Subjects are Imployed are more considerable and to be Regarded then the Business and Affairs of any of His People WHen the General and Universal consisting of all the parts of a Body Politick and the Safety Care and Concernment of the whole must needs surmount any one or two or any Particulars or some Private mens necessities or occasions The brawls and controversies betwixt the Herdsmen of Lot and the Righteous Abraham for Pasture for their Flocks and Cattel were understood in that Particular to be no less then their Masters own Concernments And the Servants of every Master and consequently their business are by God himself and his never Erring Wisdom justly reckoned in the Tenth Commandment or Decalogue as a part of the Masters goods and Estate The Civil Law allows us to conclude that Servi rerum appellatione comprehenduntur Servants are accounted to be a part of the Masters Estate familiae significatione Servi includuntur and in a family Servants are included Familia continentur liberi homines bona fide servientes in a family are contained and intended Freemen aswel as Villains or Bond-men which serve therein Et familia unum quoddam Corpus constituit inde patimur Injuriam etiam per liberos uxorem servos etiam mercenarios nostros for a Family makes and constitutes a certain body and thereupon the Master of it may be said to be wronged in his Wife Children and Servants and sometimes in those which are hirelings And it was neither forbidden or disallowed by the Civil Law in Ancient times before better and more convenient Securities by Pactions and Obligations were found out Servos Ancillas tanquam bona Catalla oppignorare to Pawn or Deliver in Pledge their men Servants or maid Servants Our Saxon Laws intended no less when they did Ordain that every Lord or Master should be obliged to bring his Servant to Justice Our liber Censualis or Doomesday Book made about the 16 th year of the Raign of William the Conquerour as an Inquisition or extent of every mans Estate in the Kingdom both Real and Personal doth therein Reckon Servos Ancillas villanos as well Men-servants and Maid-servants as Villains or Bond-men And our Laws do allow an Action in the Masters name for the beating or wounding of a Servant per quod servitium servientis sui amisit whereby he lost the use or service of his Servant By the Laws of the Old Almains uniusquisque pacem habere debet ad ducem veniendo de illo revertendo Et nullus praesumat hominem de
contrary to the Common Law of the Land and in despite of the King refused to obey it The Parliament acknowledging the aforesaid Rights and Customs of the said Clerks of the Chancery and the contempt of the King did ordain Que breif soit mandez a Maior de Londres de attacher les divz Viscontes autres quont este parties maintenours de la guerele dont ceste bille fait mention per le Corps destre devant le Roy en sa dite Chancellerie a certein jour a respondre aussibien du contempt fait a nostre Seigneur le Roy ses mandements prejudice de son Chanceller come al dit Clerk des damages trespas faites a lui That a Writ should be awarded and directed to the Mayor of London to arrest by their Bodies the said Sheriffs of London and others which were parties and maintainers of the said evil action to answer before the King in his Chancery at a certain day as well for the contempt done to the King and his Commands and prejudice of his Chancellor as also to the said Clerk for his damages and wrong sustained And that King by a Statute made in the 36 year of his Reign forbidding under severe penalties any Pourveyance to be made but for the King and Queen and their Houses and to take any such Pourveyance without ready Money there is a pain or penalty to be imposed as Sir Edward Coke upon view of the Record thereof hath observed upon the Steward Treasurer and Controller and other Officers of the Kings Houshold for not executing that Statute which need not to have been if the cognisance of the Offences therein mentioned had not by that Act been thought fit to have been left unto them And was so far from being perswaded to release the constant Attendance of the Justices of the Kings Bench as when the Commons in Parliament in the 38th year of his Reign Petitioned him That the Kings Bench might remain in some certain Place and not be removed he answered in the negative That he would not do so And where the Court Marshal was so anciently constituted for the Placita Aulae sive Regis Palatii for Pleas Actions and Controversies concerning the Servants of the Royal Family when any should happen to arise amongst them and retained in the Kings House and Attendance and the Court of Common Pleas was designed and delegated to do Justice unto all the Common People in Real and Civil Actions in certo loco a certain place assigned in the Kings House or Palace for then and long after until our Kings of England made Whitehall their Palace or Residence it is probable that the Bars Benches and Tribunals of the Courts of Chancery Kings Bench Common Pleas Exchequer and other Courts since inhabiting that great and magnificent Hall of Westminster were movable and not so fixt as they now are and allowed not to travel with the King and his Court or to follow it and the Court of Exchequer to take care of the Royal Revenue in its Income Receipts and Disbursments It cannot without some affront or violence done to Reason be imagined that our Kings who would have that Court of the Marshal to be neerer their Persons than any other of their Courts of Justice always attending and resident for the concernment properly of their Houshold and Servants and because they should not be inforced from their daily Service to pursue their Rights or seek for Justice before other Tribunals should ever intend or be willing that their Servants and necessary Attendants should as Defendants and at the suit of Strangers and such as are not the Kings Servants be haled to Prison diverted from their Service or obstructed in it when as Justice in the old more dutiful and respectful way might as cheap and with lesser trouble be had against them at the Fountain or Spring of Justice by the King himself the Alpha or beginning of it and Omega the Dernier Resort or last Appeal where his ordinary Courts of Justice fail and cannot do ir And where some of our late Kings and Queens of England not to be wanting unto the Cries and Complaints of their People for want of Justice did afterwards appoint and allow another Court in the Reigns of King Henry the seventh Henry the eighth Edward the sixth Queen Mary Queen Elizabeth called and known by the name of Curia Supplicatioâ—um Libellorum the Court of Petitions and Requests where those that were honoured with the Title and Offices of Judges and as Commissioners and Masters of Requests for those particular Causes and Cases were Bishops or Barons Lords Stewards of his Houshold and other Great Officers thereof Deans of the Chappel and Doctors of Law and Divinity were stiled or called Concilium Regis that Stile or Title and Masters of Requests as Synonyma's then signifying one and the same thing And a Mastership of Requests was so highly esteemed in the seventh year of the Reign of Q. Elizabeth as there was besides Walter Haddon Doctor of the Laws and Thomas Seckford Esq a Common Lawyer the Bishop of Rochester a Master of Requests and in the 22. year of her Reign Sir William Gerrard Knight Lord Chancellor of Ireland was during the time of his being in England made a Master of Requests Extra-ordinary and by the Queens Letter of Recommendation to the other Masters of Requests ordeined to sit amongst them and their Decrees were sometimes signed by the King himself with his Sign Manual and in the tenth year of King Henry the eighth divers Bills were exhibited unto Thomas Wolsey Archbishop of York Chancellor of England and Cardinal and Legate a Latere to granr Process for the Defendents appearance to answer before his Grace and others of the Kings most Honourable Council in Whitehall but at other times before and since were constrained to appear before that Council by Writ or Process of Privy Seal or a Messenger of the Kings that Court as it may be observed by the Registers and Records thereof coming to be called the Court of Requests only about the beginning of the Reign of King Edward the sixth And such care was taken by King Henry the seventh to hear and redress the Grievances and Laments of his People as in the ninth year of his Reign he assigned and enjoyned them certain months and times diligently to attend unto that business the greatest Earls and Barons having in those times been made Defendants to several Bills and Petitions many of the Learned Serjeants of the Law there pleading for their Clients and Sir Humphrey Brown Kt. one of the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas in the sixth year of the Reign of King Edward the sixth being made a Defendant in this Court where the Plaintiff after 12 years delays in Chancery and an Appeal from that Court unto this obtained a Decree against him and yet no Pleas and Demurrers are found to be put in
to London about His Majesties special Service and that being performed to return without any their let molestation or Impediment The eighteenth of November 1626 in the case of Robert With and Susan His Wife who had Petitioned him for leave to take the benefit of His Majesties Laws against one Mr Burton and obteined his Lordships Order for their Relief therein if he gave them not satisfaction within three moneths after the sight thereof yet being after given to understand that the said Mr. Burton who was but a Surety and in that respect deserved some Commiseration had offered them very reasonable satisfaction which was refused his Lordship being desirous to understand the Nature of the debt with the qualities and reasons of Master Burtons offers and their refusal did refer the Examination thereof unto Sir Robert Rich and Sir Charles Caesar Knights two of the Masters of the Chancery to mediate an Accord betwixt them or otherwise to Certifie and Report the true state of the business betwixt them and in the mean time required them as they would answer the contrary at their peril that they forbear to make use of his former Order or any other whatsoever the which for that purpose he did utterly revoke and annihilate The three and twentieth of November 1626 being the second year of the Reign of that pious King Charles the Martyr John Durat and William Garnat were by the said Lord Chamberlains warrant apprehended by a Messenger of the Kings upon the complaint of Thomas Wadlow The sixth day of December in the same year the said Lord Chamberlain granted his Warrant for the apprehension of Henry Cartar Bayard a Serjeant and John Wright his Yeoman upon the complaint of Mr. Simpson the Queens Jeweller The ninteenth day of January in the same year Thomas Marten Haberdasher of London was by the like Authority apprehended at the Complaint of Captain Fortescue The eighth of May 1627 in the third year of His said Majesties Reign James Palmer of Leicester was by a like Warrant apprehended upon the complaint of Henry Stanford a Yeoman of the Guard The sixteenth of July 1627 a Warrant was granted by the said Lord Chamberlain to apprehend Francis Hawker a Cook and William Fulk Servant to Mr. Howard upon the Complaint of Joane Hewet whose husband being Servant to Mr. Boreman His Majesties Locksmith and employed by him in His Majesties Service was by them hurt and wounded The seventeenth of July 1627 the said Lord Chamberlain sent his Letter unto Mr. Atkinson for the respiting of an Order probably for a Licence to take his course at Law against one Mr. Thomas Wood until the end of Michaelmas Term 1627 withal advising him to forbear all further Prosecution against the said Master Wood or that he should hear further from his Lordship The fifteenth of September 1627 a Warrant signed by the said Lord Chamberlain was directed unto all Mayors Sheriffs Bayliffs c. not to hinder or molest Dixi Hickman Esq Gentleman Usher to the Queen of Bohemia whilst he was here Imployed about Her Service The thirtieth of September 1627 a Warrant was granted by him for the apprehension of William Wiltshire Under Sheriff of Hampshire and Robert Prime aliâs Island a Bayliff upon the complaint of Sir George Hastings and being the tenth of November following thereupon committed to the Marshalseys and endeavouring to procure his release by an Habeas Corpus the said Lord Chamberlain Issued out another Warrant bearing Date the nine and twentieth of that November to detein him with Certificate that his first Commitment and that warrant for his Commitment was by his Majesties Special Commandment The twelfth day of October in the aforesaid year granted his Warrant for the apprehension of one Andrews a Constable of Petty France upon the complaint of one Ward Yeoman of the Guard The two and twentieth of January next following for the apprehension of Francis Foster and divers others for Arresting of John Smith His Majesties Girdler The tenth of March next following wrote his letter to the Lord Mayor Sheriffs and Recorder of York in the behalf of Robert Metham a sworn Messenger in Ordinary appointed to attend upon the Receiver of Yorkshire upon his Complaint for being there Arrested without leave In the year of our Lord 1628 granted his Warrant for the apprehension of Richard Harris Thomas Rosse of Leaden-hall-street London Merchants John Offley of Hampshire and a Servant to the Clerk of the Peace for Middlesex upon the Complaint of Francis de Champer Did write his letter to the Lord Mayor of London acquainting him with the Arrests and Imprisonments of Mr. George Morgan and others of his Majesties Servants and desired his Lordship to give notice to the Sheriffes of London and other Officers in London that they forbear to Arrest or Imprison His Majesties Servants without acquainting his Lordship therewith who promised upon such occasions to do Justice Grant a Warrant for the apprehension of Robert Armstrong for the Arresting of the Post Master of Saint Albans And the like to apprehend William Martin of Itham in the County of Kent upon the Complaint of Anthony Hobbes one of the Yeomen of the Guard for an Attachment of his Horse and a Warrant or Letter to discharge the Apprentices of the King and Queens Watermen from being Imprest for Sea Service in these words viz. Whereas I understand that some of the Apprentices and Servants of the King and Queens Water-men have lately been Imprest for His Majesties Service at Sea These are to require you Immediately upon the sight hereof to cause them to be released and discharged And that hereafter you forbear to Imprest them the said Water-men or their Servants they being Obliged unto a daily Attendance upon His Majesties Person and the Queens And for so doing this shall be your Warrant And the sixteenth day of February in the same year after His Majesties assent by Act of Parliament unto the Petition of Right which was the six and twentieth day of June in the year aforesaid upon an abuse committed upon the Persons of Mr. Nicholas Laneir and other His Majesties Servants in Ordinary by haling them to Prison in an unwarrantable and barbarous manner the Lords of His Majesties Privy Council amongst which was the Lord Keeper Coventrey did by their Letter to Sir Richard Deane then Lord Mayor of London greatly blame him for the permitting of the same in the words following viz. AFter our Hearty Commendations to your Lordship Whereas it is come to the knowledge of His Majesty and this Board that upon a light Affray or Breach of Peace fallen out in the Exchange wherein Master Nicholas Laneir and other His Majesties Servants in Ordinary mentioned in the Petiâ—ion which we send you inclosed happened to be interessed That the Constables and other Officers who came under pretense of Keeping the Peace did by colour of their Office notwithstanding they knew them to be His Majesties Servants in an unwarrantable
Anno 1630. Herbert Croft Batchelor of Divinity now Bishop of Hereford and did not refuse divers of the Sons of the Nobility who sought to partake of the honour of access unto his Majesty and the more select rooms of State in his Court which in that of the Kings of Spain is not thought fit to be communicated but to some of their especial Attendants to be sworn Gentlemen Extraordinary of his Privy-Chamber as in the year 1631. the Lord Matravers eldest Son to Thomas Earl of Arundel and Surrey and Sir William Howard Knight of the Bath now Viscount Stafford his Brother and in the year 1638. the Earl of Kildare the first Earl of Ireland who could not be blamed for their inclinations or tendency to the center of Honour when as long before the Conquest or fatal period of our Saxon Ancestors King Alfred had many of the Sons of the Nobility educated and brought up in his Court and that noble and well becoming custom received and met with in many ages after so great an encouragement as the young Lords or Nobility had a constant Table or dyet in the Court untill in the Reign of King Edward the 6th the perswasions of a needless and unhappy parsimony did put an end to that part of the Royal munificence which King Henry the 3d. in some hundred years before would not in his greatest wants of daily necessaries occasioned by some of his unruly Barons when he took such relief as some Abbeys would afford him quit that part of the honour of his Court or Houshold nor did our late King of blessed memory deny the like honour of his Privy-Chamber to divers Gentlemen of note or great esteem in their Countries as Sir Arthur Capel Knight aâ—terwards Lord Capel that heroick and loyal Martyr for his King and the Fifth Commandment of his Heavenly King charged upon all Mankind in the Decalogue Sir Thomas Richardson Knight Son of Sir Thomas Richardson Knight Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Kings-Bench or Sir Thomas Roe Knight a learned and well experienced Embassador to the Mogor or Mogull that great Prince in the East-Indies and to several States and Kingdoms in Christendom Sir Fulk Hunkes Knight and Sir Ferdinando Knightley Knight two well experienced Commanders in the English Regiments in the Netherlands or United Provinces Sir Edward Dearing Knight one of the Members of the House of Commons in Parliament in the year 1641. and unto Sir William Waller Knight who afterwards bitterly repented the vain-glory of being a Conqueror of some of his Soveraigns Forces endeavouring to defend him and their Laws and Liberties in the late Rebellion and to some others who could afterwards stain their formerly more loyal Families in that horrid Rebellion and imploy their time and Estates against their King which had â—o much honoured them or to admit into his service as a Servant Extraordinary Edmond Cooper a Drummer John Houghton a Chirurgeon or some excellent Picture-drawer as the famous Sir Anthony van Dike or some Foreign curious Engineer Gunsmith or other excelling Artificers who without some such encouragements would not have benefited our Nation with their skill and residence and was in that Prince of blessed memory and will be in our gracious Soveraign no less allowable than iâ— was in King David to take into his Family as an Extraordinary when his affection and gratitude prompted him unto it Chimham the son of the good old Barzillai when many of the Yeomanry of England have besides their Servants in ordinary some that are as extraordinary and work a great part of the year with them And the Nobility and Gentry of England sincâ— their restraint of giving Liveries by several Acts of Parliament to prevent the too freequent use of that in making of parties and factions in one of which viz. that of the first and second year of the Reign of King Henry the 4th cap. 21. it is provided as hath been mentioned That the King may give his Honourable Livery to his menial Knights and Esquires and also to his Knights and Esquires of his retinue who are not to use it in their Counties but in the Kings presence and the Prince and the Nobility coming unto the Court and returning from thence were specially excepted are not at this day debarred the moderate use of Liveries or some as extraordinary Servants to be imployed upon several occasions to retain unto them as the Lord Mayor of London is not without the attendance of Livery-men of the Companies or Fraternities of Trade or such as he shall select out of them in some grand Solemnities as the meeting or welcoming of the King to his City or Chamber of London at his return from a Progress or from Scotland to conduct into the City a Russian or Persian Embassador and it hath been ever accounted to be a Royal or honourable way of Espargne to have some to be extraordinary Servants without the charge of Bouche of Court or annual salaries to be alwayes in readiness at grand festivals or occasions and those Citizens of London and men of the Mysteries of gain and Trade who have aggrandized their Credits and Estates by the Sun-shine and warmth of the residence of the King and his Courts of Justice can when a little before they could busie themselves in needless murmurs and complaints against the Priviledges of the Kings Servants in ordinary and extraordinary think themselves to be no mean men in their Parishes and Companies if they can procure the favour to be admitted the Kings Servants extraordinary as he shall have occasion to be cozened in such Manufactures or Wares as their Trades afford in so much as it is become the preferment and ambition of one of every Trade great or little some few only excepted in the City of London to be entituled to be the Kings Servant as the Kings Grocer Brewer Apothecary Mercer Draper Silk-man Taylor Printer Stationer Bookseller Girdler a Trade now altogether disused Shoomaker Spurrier c. and are well contented to enjoy all the Priviledges appertaining to the Kings Servants as not to bear Offices in their Parishes or Custard-cram'd Companies and not to be arrested without licence And their Wives swelling into a tympany of Pride will be apt enough to think their former place and reputation too far beneath them and not let their Husbands purse have any rest or quiet untill they can be fine enough to go to the Court and see the Lords and Ladies their Husbands fellow Servants And they which cannot attain to that honour to be such a Servant of the Kings extraordinary for they cannot be truly said to be any thing more than the Kings Servants extraordinary when as he as to many of them hath no daily or but a seldom and occasional use of them and where he hath most it is not constantly or often do think it to be worth the utmost of their endeavours to obtain the honour and priviledge of being the Queens
of King Henry the sixth the Commons in Parliament were so unwilling that their own concernments should hinder any of the Kings affairs as they did petition him That John Lord Talbot purposing to serve the King in his Warrs in France a Protection with the Clausa volumus might be granted unto him for a year and that by Parliament it might be ordained that it it be without the exception of Novel disseisin and to be put under the Great Seal of England with other Immunities whilst he be so in the Kings service which the King granted Provided that the said John Lord Talbot and Margaret his Wife Edward Earl of Dorset and others named should not enter upon any Lands whereof James Lord Barkly and Sir William Barkley his son were seised the first day of that Parliament or bring any Action concerning the same And so little desired the heretofore too powerfull Clergie of England to extend their power where they legally and inoffensively might do it CHAP. XIII That the Clergy of England in the height of their Pride and Superlative Priviledges Encouragements and Protection by the Papal over-grown Authority did in many cases lay aside their Thunderbolts and power of Excommunications appeals to the Pope and obtaining his Interdictions of Kingdomes Churches and Parishes and take the milder modest and more reverential way of petitioning our Kings in Parliaments rather than turn the rigors of their Canon or Ecclesiastical Laws or of the Laws of England against any of the Kings Officers or Servants AS they did in the 14th year of the Reign of King Edward the third although by the Statute made in the 28th year of the Reign of King Edward the first making some Actions and Injuries which they then complained of to be Felony they might without their petitioning in Parliament have had ample and easie remedies petition the King in Parliament against some grievances and oppressions done by some of the Kings Servants to people of holy Church by his Purveyors and Servants amongst which were the abuses done by his Purveyors in taking the Corn Hay Beasts Carriage and other goods of the Arch-bishops Bishops Parsons and Vicars without the agreement and good will of the Owners and did thereupon obtain the Kings Letters Patents under the Great Seal of England which in the Parliament Roll is called a Statute and is as an Act of Parliament printed among the Acts of Parliament did declare That he took them and their possessions into the especial Protection of him and his Heirs and Successors and that they should not be any more so charged nor to receive into their houses Guests nor Sojourners of Scotland nor of other Countreys nor the Horses nor Dogs Faulcons nor other Hawks of the Kings or others against their will saving to the King the services due of right from them which owe to the King the same services to sustain and receive Dogs Horses or Hawks In a Parliamant in the first year of the Reign of King Richard the second although divers Laws in force had provided them remedies of course which needed no petitioning they did petition the King That they were upon every temporal suggestion arrestâ—d into the Marshalsea and paid for their discharge 6 s. 8 d. where a Layman payeth only 4 s. unto which the King did answer Let the party grieved complain to the Steward of the household and they shall have remedy And did in that but follow the patterns of Loyalty Prudence and self preservation cut out and left unto all true hearted Englishmen by their worthy and pious Ancestors and Predecessors who when the Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service which obliged all the Nobility and many thousands of the best part of the Gentry to follow their Prince to his Warrs abroad or defend him and his honour at home did in their duty to him and the care of their own estates and concernments with their numerous well-wishing and dutifull Tenants attending them follow him into the Warrs and Voyages Royal and remained there by the space of forty dayes at their own charges and afterwards as long as they lasted at the the Kings which must needs be a great obstruction to many mens Action or the recovery of their Debts or Rights and much better understand that universal Axiom and Rule of the Laws of Nature Necessity and Nations then the late ill advised Lord Mayor and some Citizens of London did who in the late dreadfull fire in the year of our Lord 1666. did to save the pulling down of a few houses to prevent the fury of a most dire and dismal fire and not a seventh part of their goods did see but too late the necessity of pulling down some houses and when they might have endeavoured it would allow it to be warrantable by the Lord Mayors order but not the Kings and in that fond dispute and his Timidity most imprudently suffer and give way to the burning down of many thousand houses and converting into ashes almost all that once great and flourishing City that privata cedere debent publicis every mans private affairs were to be laid aside and give place to the publick being the best way of self preservation And did not as they would do now rush upon Arrest or Imprison either the Kings Servants or such as were imployed by him or unto whom he had granted his Writs of Protection without asking leave of him but with a modesty and reverence becoming Subjects plicate him for a Revocation or if they did not or could not purchase it that way did sometimes become Petitioners in Parliament for some regulations in Protections granted upon some special and temporary imployments to such as were not his Servants in ordinary not for a total abolition or to take away that part of the Kings Prerogative in order to the Government and their own well being the answers whereunto shewed as much care in the King and his Councel as might be to give them content and satisfaction and at the same time not to depart from or lessen the Rights of the Crown more than was meerly necessary or in grace or savour for that particular time occasion or grievance to be granted or remitted unto them And no less carefull were the Judges in former ages in their delegated Courts and proceedings in Justice to pay their respects to the service of the King and likewise to his Servants or any other imployed therein CHAP. XIV That the Judges in former times did in their Courts and proceedings of Law and Justice manifest their unwillingness to give or permit any obstruction to the service of the King and Weal Publique WHen Bracton declares the Laws and Usage of the Kingdome to be in the Reign of King Henry the third and King Edward the first that Warrantizatur Essonium multipliciter quandoque per breve Domini Regis ubi non est necessitas jurare cum Dominus Rex hoc testatur per literas suas quod
holden at the good will and pleasure of our Kings and Princes And Time in his long Travels hath not yet so let fall and left behind him those reverential duties and personal services of our Dukes Earls and Baronage as to invite a disuse or discontinuance of them when they have of late time not only when Summoned perform'd several Ministerial Offices as at the Coronation of our Kings but at other great Solemnities and Festivals as at the Feast of Saint George Where in the year 1627. being the third year of the Reign of King Charles the Martyr the Lord Percy afterwards Earl of Northumberland carryed the Sword before the King the Lord Cavendish and Wentworth bearing up his Trayn the great Basin was holden by the Earls of Suffolk Devonshire Manchester and Lindsey the Earl of Devonshire the same day serving as Cupbearer the Earl of Cleveland as Carver the Lord Savage as Sewer none of the Knights of the Garter that day officiating In the year of our Lord 1638. the Earls of Kent Hartford Essex Northampton Clare Carlisle Warwick Dover St. Albans and the Viscount Rochford were summoned by the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings houshold to attend at the instalment of the Prince Knight of the Garter and in the year 1640. amongst other young Noblemen appointed to attend the King at his going to the Parliament the Duke of Buckingham Earl of Oxford and Lord Buckhurst did bear up his Trayn The Earls of Leicester had the Office of Steward of England distinguished from and not so antient as the Steward of the Houshold who injoyed but an incertain estate of during pleasure annexed to the Earldom of Leicester and accounted as parcel of it William Marshal Earl of Pembroke to be Earl Marshal of England Bohun Earl of Hereford and Essex to be Constable of England and to hold some principal part of their Lands and Estates by Inheritance in Fee or in Tayl by the Tenure of those very honourable Offices and Services as the Manor of Haresfield in the County of Gloucester per servitium essendi Constabular Angliae by the Service of being Constable of England and the Offices of Earl Marshal and Constable were distinct and antiently exercised in the Kings Court as Marescalcia Curiae Constabularia Curiae were afterwards as the Learned Sir Henry Spelman conceived by some extent and enlargement gained of their Jurisdictions or rather by the Tenure of some of their Lands separately stiled Constable and Earl Marshals of England leaving the Office or Title of Sub-Marshal or Knight-Marshal to exercise some part of the Office of the Earl-Marshals Jurisdictions as more appropriate to the Kings House or Courts of Justice some antient Charters of our Kings of England before the Reign of King Henyy the second and some in his Reign after his grant of the Constableship of England was made by him to Miles of Gloucester informing us by the Subscriptions of Witnesses that there was a Constable during the Kings pleasure and sometimes two besides the Constable of England who claimed and enjoyed that Office by Inheritance The Custody of the Castle of Dover and the keeping of the Cinque-Ports were granted by King Henry the sixth to Humphrey Duke of Buckingham and the Heirs Males of his body The Earls of Oxford for several Ages and the now Earl of Lindsey descending from them as Heir General now being Stewards Keepers or Wardens of the Forest of Essex and Keepers of King Edward the Confessors antient Palace of Havering at the Bower in the said County to him and his Heirs claimed and enjoyed from a Daughter and Heir of the Lord Badlesmere and he from a Daughter and Coheir of Thomas de Clare And some of our Nobility believed it to be no abasement of their high birth and qualities to be imployed in some other Offices or Imployments near the person or but sometimes residence of the King as to be Constable of his Castle or Palace of Windsor as the late Duke of Buckingham was in the Reign of King Charles the Martyr and Prince Rupert that now is or Keeper of the Kings house or Palace of VVoodstock and Lieutenent of VVoodstock Park as the late Earl of Lindsey was for the term of each of their natural lives And some illustrious and worthy Families as that of the Marshals Earls of Pembroke Butler now Duke of Ormond the Chamberlains antiently descended from the Earl of Tancarvil in Normandy who was hereditary Chamberlain of Normandy to our King Henry the first and our Barons Dispencers have made their Sirnames and those of their after Generations the grateful Remembrancers of their very honourable Offices and Places under their Soveraign it being accounted to be no small part of happiness to have lands given them to hold by grand Serjeanty some honourable Office or attendance upon our Kings at their Coronation as to carry one of the Swords before him or to present him with a Glove for his right hand or to support his right hand whilst he held the Virge Royal claymed by the Lord Furnivall or to carry the great Spurrs of Gold before him claymed by John Hastings the Son and Heir of John Hastings Earl of Pembroke or to be the Kings Cupbearer claymed by Sir John de Argentine Chivaler And some meaner yet worthy Families have been well content to have Lands given unto them and their Heirs to hold by the Tenures of doing some personal Service to the Kings and Queens of England at their Coronations the Service of the King or Prince being in those more virtuous times so welcome to all men and such a path leading to preferment as it grew into a Proverb amongst us not yet forgotten No Fishing to the Sea no Service to the King And was and is so much a Custome of Nations as in the German Empire long before the Aurea Bulla the Golden Bull or Charter of Charles the 4th Emperour was made in the year 1356. being about the middle of the Reign of our King Edward the third and not a new Institution as many have mistaken it as is evident by the preamble and other parts of that Golden Bull which was only made to preserve an Unity amongst the seven Electors and better methodize their business and Elections The Princes Electors were by the Tenure of their Lands and Dominions to perform several services to the Emperor and his Successors As the Prince Elector or Count Palatine of the Rhine was to do the service of Arch Sewer of the Empire at the Coronation of the Emperour or other great Assemblies the Duke of Saxony Stall Master or Master of ths Horse the Marquess of Brandenburgh Chamberlain the King of Bohemia Cup-bearer and in Polonia at this day Sebradousky the now Palatine of Cracow claimeth and enjoyeth by Inheritance the Office or Place of Sword-bearer to the Crown or King of Poland And so highly and rightly valued were those Imployments and Offices as they that did but
a Caesare constituti qui sine provocatione cognoscebant the Judges appointed by the Emperour to hear and determine without appeal matters concerning their Lands and Territories in the House of Peers in Parliament being the highest Court of the Kingdome of England none were there admitted or did administer Justice nisi qui proximi essent a Rege ipsique arctioris fidei homagii vinculo conjuncti but such as were near unto the King held of him in Capite and were therefore called Capitanei Regni as Sir Henry Spelman saith Captains of the Kingdome and Peers being obliged and bound unto him by Homage and Fealty that highest and most honourable Court of the Kingdome wherein the Judicative Power of Parliament under the King their Head and Chief resides for the lower house or Representative of the Commons are but as a Court of grand Enquest to exhibit the grievances of the Nation and the People who did choose them to represent them as their Procurators give their consent to the raising of moneys for publick occasions and benefit and the making of good Laws intended to be obeyed by them being constituted by the King their Head and Soveraign the Prince or Heir apparent Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts Barons Arch-bishops Bishops and some of the greater Abbots and Pryors holding their Lands and Possessions of the King in Capite until they were dissolved the Lord Chancellor or Keeper of the great Seal of England Lord President of the Kings Councel Lord Treasurer Lord Privy Seal Lord Admiral Lord Chamberlain of England and of the Houshold Grand Master or Steward of the Kings house and the Kings Chief Secretary though no Barons assisted by the Learned and Reverend Judges of the Law and Courts of Justice at Westminster Hall who have no vote Masters of Chancery Clark of the Crown and Clark of that more Eminent part of the Parliament sitting in their several and distinct places according to their qualities and degrees upon benches or woolsacks covered with red cloth before the Kings Throne or Chair of Estate attended by the Kings Senior Gentleman Usher of the Presence Chamber called the black Rod to whom for or by reason of his attendance upon that honourable Assembly is and hath been antiently allowed annexed for his better support the little Park of Windsor with an house or lodge thereunto belonging of a good yearly value Serjeants at Arms Clarks of that higher house of Parliament as the members reverencing taking care for their Head and Soveraign the Only under God Protector of themselves and all their worldly concernments laws and liberties in which high and honourable Assembly the Archbishops and Bishops do enjoy the priviledge and honour of being present by reason of their Baronies which howsoever given in Frank Almoigne and as Elemosinary are holden in capite debent interesse judiciis curiae regis cum Baronibus are not to be absent saith the constitution or Act of Parliament made at Clarendon by K. Henry the second and that honourable Tenure being Servitium Militare a tye of duty and service to them as well as to the other Baronage any neglect therein was so penal unto them as the Lords in Parliament saith William Fitz Stephen cited by the learned Selden did in the Reign of King Henry the Second notwithstanding that Arch-bishops plea and defence wherefore he did not come to that great Councel or Parliament when he was commanded condemn the Ruffling and domineering Arch-bishop Tho. Becket in a great sum of money the forfeiture of all his moveable goods and to be at the Kings mercy guilty of high Treason for not coming to that high Court when he was cited and the reason given of that judgement for that ex reverentia Regiae Majestatis ex astrictione ligii homagii quod Domino Regi fecerat ex fidelitate observantia terreni honoris quemei Juraverat for that in the reverence and respect which he ought to have shewed to the Majesty of the King and by his homage made unto him and his Oath of Fealty sworn to observe and defend his Honour he ought to have come but did not and a Fine was afterwards likewise obout the Reign of King Edward the second imposed upon the Lord Bello-monte or Beaumont for not attending when he was summoned ad Consulendum Regi to give the King his Advice or Councel And certainly those great and many singular privileges and immunities given by our Kings the Fountains and Establishers of honours and the Offices and Imployments about their Sacred Persons appurtenant unto that noble and very Antient Degree and Titles of Episcopacy may easily invite the order of Bishops not to think it to be a disparagement to their Hierarchy when the dignity Royal of our Kings do as the Roman Emperours since the time of Constantine the Great necessarily require by turns or sometimes in every year the attendance of the Bishops in their Courts or Palaces and they are to be a la Suite du Roy pour honorer sa Majeste to be near the King for the honour of his Majesty when the King is the Guardian and Head of the Church and the Arch-bishop of Canterbury his Apocrisiarius which was an antient Office and Title of the Bishops afterwards appropriate to the Arch-bishop or Metropolitan who was in Palatio pro Ecclesiasticis negotiis excubare to oversee and take care of the Affairs of the Church in the Kings Court or Palace Capellanus Regis dictus omnibus praefuit negotiis ministris ecclesiae was stiled the Kings Chaplain presided and was under the King superintendent as to Ecclesiastical Affairs over all the business and Ministers of the Church and Chappel and in those things quae ad divinum Cultum in principiâ— aula pertinent precipua semper fuit cura atque sollicitudo Archiepiscopi which appertained to Gods worship in the Kings Palace the chief care and business thereof in the duties of Religion and holy Rites belongeth unto him and is in that particular but as the Kings special Chaplain not as Mathew Parker a learned and worthy Archbishop of that See in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth when the Papal inflations were out of fashion would make the reason of those privileges to be because the Kings and Queens of Enggland were ejus speciales atque domesticos Parochianos his more especial Parishioners and the whole Kingdome howsoever divided into distinct Diocesses was but as one Parish though he could not be ignorant that the Arch-bishop of York and his Suffragan Bishops in one and the same Kingdome were none of his Parish nor was as Doctor Peter Heylin a right learned and dutiful Son of the Church of England by antient privilege of the See of Canterbury supposeth him to be Ordinary of the Court of his Majesties houshold being reckoned to be his Parishioners or of his Peculiar wheresoever the same shall be the Chancellor
libertatis privilegij praedictorum laesionem manifestam to the prejudice of the rights of the Crown and violation of the liberty and priviledge aforesaid hujusmodi vijs modis quibus poterint praecanere libertatem privilegia sua praedicta manu tenere cupientes And that they were desirous by all the ways and means they could to hinder such doings so prejudicial unto them and were resolved to maintain the Liberties and Priviledges of the Crown And not be able to protect his Houshold and domestick Servants in whose daily service and continual attendance both our Kings and their Subjects were more concerned than they could be by any the service or attendance of the Officers or Clerks in the Court of Chancery Which the Lords in Parliament did so well understand to be a Right inherent and due unto Royal Majesty as in the three and fortieth year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth they did in the Case of William Huggen one of the Queens Servants arrested upon an Execution send the Gentleman-Usher attending upon their House to the Prison of the Fleet to bring him before them and upon view of Precedents of some of their own Servants delivered though none of any the Kings or Queens did in conformity to the reason thereof cause the Plaintiff upon the Defendants promise to pay him to release him and the Under-Sheriff being committed to the Fleet was three days after upon his Petition discharged And in the first year of the Reign of King James The Earl of Suffolk Lord Chamberlain of the Kings House did procure Nicholas Reading one of his Majesties Servants arrested by an Execution at the Suit of Sir Edward Hales to be brought before the Lords in Parliament by a Writ of Habeas Corpus and so by the Plaintiffs consent released the Order mentioning that such an Arrest was contrary to the honor and priviledge of that Court. Or that not only the Judges of the superior Courts the Justices of Peace can as they have done it antiently and commonly imprison men for Contempts of them or their written Orders or verbal Commands without which they power could not Tueri Jurisdictionem uphold that Authority which the King had given them but the Constables of every Parish in London whose Offices and Authority at the first were saith the judicious and learned Lambard but as the fingers to the hands or body of the Constable of England a great Officer of the King and his Crown can in their Night-watches command better men than themselves to the Compters or London Prisons there to lodge the remainder of the night among the debauched or unruly sort of people calld Rats or Night-walkers but for angring his worship or not believing that he is a Prince of the Night the Kings Image and none of the smaller parcels of mortality and shall have so much connivence at his no seldom committed Follies as no other Habeas Corpus shall be granted to the injured person thn a submissive paying of his Fees of imprisonment and procuring himself as well as he can to be discharged by the greater discretion of the Lord Mayor or an Alderman before whom he is the next morning to be brought with his not to be discerned Fault or offences and if he should seek afterwards to be recompenced for such an affront is to expect as little favour as may be for himself and as much as may be for his adversary And that the King under whose Power and Authority they acted should not be able by his own immediate command or the Warrant of some of the great Officers of his Crown or Houshold to punish by imprisonment any contempts committed against himself and his soveraign power by the arresting of his domestick and houshold Servants without Licence who are neare unto his person and imployed in his hourly or daily service or attendance or that his power and Authority should not be efficacious or valid in his own case or immediate concernment and should be valid and sufficient to punish such as either contemned or abused his Justices and Servants extraordinary who are more remote from his person in the administration of his Justice As when Eustace de Parles and his brother were by King Edward the first in the one and twentieth year of his Reign committed to the Tower of London for abusing and striking in Westminster Hall William de Bereford one of his Justices of his Court of Common-Pleas And King Edward the third by his Justices and Authority punished the Bayliffs of Ipswich by the Forfeiture and Loss of their places seised the Liberties of the Town and delivered the Custody thereof to another during the Kings pleasure and made the Bayliffs of the Town to deliver in Court their Staves of Office for that they had suffered an unruly multitude to feast and revel with certain Malefactors condemned by the Justices of Assize and after their departure made a Mock game of them in sitting upon the Tribunal and Fining them and their Clerks Or that any should think it reasonable or no disservice of the King or his not to be incumbred Affairs to arrest any of his Houshold Servants without a Licence first obtained And shall at the same time decry or declaim against the Arresting of a Judge sitting in his delegated Court of Justice or travelling in the Circuit by and under the Kings Commission at the Suit of any private person or the Arresting and Imprisonment of an Admiral or Vice-Admiral going to Sea or a Commander or Governor of a Castle Fort or Garison upon the like occasion and think it reasonable that the King in reference to the Weal-publique in those his affairs and concernments should by priviledge protect and shelter them A right understanding whereof and of that which hath been before alleaged and the reasons supporting those Judgments of the not ignorant or unworthy but very learned grave and upright Judges in those former Ages and Times and of the Duties Honor and Respects which were and ought to be paid to the Soveraignty just and necessary means of Government assented unto by our Lawes and reasonable Customs of England and in praxi observantia junioris Aevi in the practise and course of Law in the succeeding Ages not denied by any positive or well interpreted Law may grant a Proeibition and give a Checque or Restraint to those opinions so of late hatch'd and hug'd against too many of the Actions of Authority in order to Government and the Weal-publique the necessity of preventing Evils before they happen or diverting abating or lessening them after they are happened and invite them to forsake their overmuch adoration of Sir Edware Cokes aforesaid Errors and believe Sir Thomas Ridley a Doctor of the civil Lawes and no stranger to our Common-Lawes who no longer ago than the beginning of the Reign of King James in his Book intituled A view of the Civil Ecclâ—siastical and Temporal