Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	esquire_n	richard_n	sir_n	17,658	5	7.1902	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A88228	The opressed mans opressions declared: or, An epistle written by Lieut. Col. John Lilburn, prerogative prisoner (by the illegall and arbitrary authority of the House of Lords) in the Tower of London, to Col. Francis West, Lieutenant thereof: in which the opressing cruelty of all the gaolers of England is declared, and particularly the Lieutenant of the Tower. As also, there is thrown unto Tho. Edwards, the author of the 3 vlcerous Gangrænes, a bone or two to pick: in which also, divers other things are handled, of speciall concernment to the present times.	Lilburne, John, 1614?-1657.	1647 (1647)	Wing L2149A; Thomason E373_1; ESTC R201322	33,049	40

return you a more ful answer to this then I did before to you which is this That I for my part for all the gold in London would not give just cause to be counted so base and unworthy to do upon deliberation that action that I would not justifie to the death But if I should in the least step aside I should contract unto my self that guilt which I am confident all the enemies I have in England are not able in the least to fixe upon me For I understand by the Law of this Kingdom that he that is committed to prison for Felony or Treason although really and truly he be guilty of neither yet if he break prison and be taken again he shal dye like a Fellon or Traytor that is legally convicted 1. E. 2. de frangentibus prisonam See Cookes 2. part instit fol. 590 591. For his slight in the eye of the Law argues guiltinesse And besides my friend and I had a horn Lanthorn and Candle which put all out of suspition of going out in the dark But thirdly what ground have you vpon any pretence what ever framed by your self to lock me up in my chamber as soone as candels are lighted seeing I am in a moated and double-walled Prison where you have not only a Train-bond but also great store of your Warders to secure me And therefore I tell you plainly I shal never condescend to bee locked up sooner then that convenient hour of 8. a clock the accustomed hour of the place which is much sooner then they are in other prisons that I have been in Fourthly if under pretence of your security I should give way for you to confine or lock me up in my chamber at candle-light which then was before five a clocke may not you as well and as groundedly upon the same pretence if you please to say it is for your security keep me locked vp in my chamber till 12. a clocke yea the whole day if you please And if I should suffer this in the least what am I lesse then traitorous to my selfe and to my liberties to give you a power by your own meer will to make and impose a Law upon me whensoever you shall please to say that it s for your securitie when the Law provides and enjoynes you no more but to keep me in safe custodie within your prison and to use me and all that come to me civillie and with all humanitie and leaves me not in the least to your will but only in some extraordinarie cases as in doing or offring violence to the Goaler or Goalers or to my fellow-prisoners to the apparent breach of the peace of the prison and yet in this the Law is extraordinarie tender of the prisoners safetie but none of this I have not in the least done either to you or the poorest boy belonging to you not by Gods assistance wil not but yet on the contrarie before you shal make me a slave to your will you shal have the heart-bloud out of my body Now in the last place I wil compare the fees taken and demanded in the Tower with those the Law gives and what they are you may fully read before Now by the Author of Vox Plebis who to mee seemes to bee a knowing man in the practises of the Lieutenants of the Tower who in his 48 49. pages saith That there is demanded for the admittance of an Earl 100. l for a Baron 80. l for a Knight and Baronet 70. l for a Baronet 60. l for a Knight 50. l and for an Esquire 40. pound and 30. s a week of every prisoner for liberty to buy and dresse his owne diet and 10. s 15. s 20. s per weeke for their Chamber-rent and of some more For Sir Richard Gurney sometimes Lord Mayor of London now prisoner in the Tower hath paid as I have heard him aver it 3. l a week for his chamber-rent and in the time of a Predecessour of yours dieted 3 weeks at the Lieutenants table for which hee had the impudencie to demand of him for it 25. l per week ô horrible and monstrous extortion and oppression and yet this is not all for the last mentioned euthor in his 48. pag. saith There is a new erected Office and an intruded Officer called the Gentleman Goaler one Yates a busie fellow who pretends to a fee of 50. s to be paid him at the going away of every prisoner pag. 51. ibim But yet this is not all for in p. 49. of the late printed book called Regal Tyrannie discovered he saith that the Gentleman Porter demands for his fee 5. l and a mans upper garment 40. s to the Warders 10. s to the Lieutenants Clarke 10. s to the Minister and divers of my fellow-prisoners tell me that their Keepers have and do demand of them either their diet or 5. s a week for locking them up at night in their Chamber and opening their chamber-dores O horrible and monstrous injustice oppression and crueltie to demand and take these fees whereas by Law there is not one farthing taken of all these fees due to be paid by the prisoner but one bare great at most and that given away by an oppressing and incroaching law upon our antient and just liberties as is before truly observed And yet prisoners are detained in prison by your will after they are legally discharged because they will not pay these undue and unjust fees which at this very day is Sir Henry Andersons case and hath formerly been others as the Author of Vox Plebis truly observes although the arrantest Rogue Thief that ever breathed had or hath as true a right to any purse that ever he did or shal take from an honest man upon the high-way by force and violence as you or any other hath to any of the fore-mentioned fees O yee proud and impudent man that dare assume unto your selfe of your own head more then a regal power to levie and raise mony by the law of your own will vpon the free people of England Sir let me tel you this very thing was one of those things that was the Earl of Straffords great Crimes for which hee paid very dear and it is not impossible but you and others that use it may pay as dear for it in conclusion therefore look to it and thinke of it And if you please to read the Petition of Right made by the Lords and Commons unto this King in the 3. of his Raign you shall find in the beginning of it they shew him that by the statute of the 34. E. 1. called Statutum de tallagio non concedendo that no tallage or aid shall be laid or levied by the King or his Heires in this Realm without the good will and assent of the Arch-bishops Bishops Earles Barons Knights Burgesses and other the free-men of the Commonalty of this Realm and by authority of Parliament holden in the 25. E. 3. it is declared and enacted

the hopes of my being freed from my close imprisonment but your falling so heavily upon me as you did struck me to the heart and made me beleeve it was possible I might have been destroyed before I should have an opportunity publickly to cleare my own unspotted innocency in reference to the Lords and to anatomize their tyranny both of which my soul thirsted after and therefore if I had been able I would have purchased an opportunity to have done it though it had cost me 20. l a week And-truly Sir I have done my doe and in despite of all the Lords published and truly and faithfully stated my cause to the view of the whole Kingdome First in my Wives Petition delivered by her to the House of Commons Septem 23. 1646. which I pen'd and framed my selfe without the help or assistance of any Lawyer in England And secondly in my Book called Londons Liberty in Chains discovered And thirdly twice before the Committee of the Honorable House of Commons The last discourse of which I published to the view of all the Cōmons of England and called it An Anatomy of the Lords tyranny And besides some of my friends or well-wishers have done it excellent well for me in those two notable Discourses called Vox Plebis and Regall Tyranny discovered which will live when I am dead and be I hope as good as winding-sheets unto the Lords and therefore I am now ready for a Dungeon or Irons or Death it self or any torture or torment that their malice can inflict upon me and seeing that I cannot by any means I can use get my report made to the House of Commons and so enjoy justice and right at their hands which I beg not of them as a Boon but chalenge of them as my due and right by reason of the Lords and the rest of their Prerogative Co-partners influence into the House Commons to divert them from the great affaires of the Kingdome in doing justice and right unto the oppressed and putting them upon making Lawes Edicts and Declarations to persecute and destroy the generation of the righteous and so bring the wrath and vengeance of heaven and earth upon them and theirs Read Mr. Thomas Goodwins Sermon preached before them Feb. 25. 1645. called The great Interest of States and Kingdomes and also lay a great blot of reproach upon them by all the rationall men in the world for endevouring to destroy a generation of peaceable and quiet-minded men that have contributed all they had and have in the world for their preservation and by whose undaunted valour and blood-shed as principall instruments they enjoy liberty at this day to sit in the House of Commons and to be what they are Sure I am the Spirit of God saith That he that rewardeth evill for good evill shall not depart from his House Prov. 17.13 And yet for any thing I can perceive the best reward is intended these men from those they have done so much for is ruine and destruction that so that Antichristian office and function of Priesthood newly transformed into a pretended godly and reformed Presbyter may again be established although by the second Article of the Covenant now more magnified by the sonnes of darknesse add blindnesse then the Book of God they have expresly sworn to root up that Function by the roots The words of the Covenant are That we shall in like manner without respect of persons endevour the extirpation of Popery Prelacy that is Church-government by Archbishops Bishops their Chancellors and Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-Deacons and all other Ecclesiastical officers depending on that Hierarchy superstition heresie schisme prephaneness c. Mark the sentence And all other Ecclesiasticall Officers depending on that Hierarchy In the number of which are those pretended reformed presbyter-Ministers that either sit in the Assembly or are in any other place in the Kingdom that officiate by vertue of their Ordination which they had from the Bishops or any by vertue of their Authority And I will maintain it with my life that he is a forsworn man whether he be Parliament-man or other that hath taken the Covenant and doth contribute any of his assistance to maintain preserve and uphold that Ordination of the Presbyterian Ministers that they received from the Bishops or punish any man for writing preaching or speaking against it or any other wayes endevouring the destruction or extirpation thereof For the expresse words of the Covenant are that we must endevour the extirpation of all Officers without exception depending on that Hierarchy part of which all the fore-mentioned Ministers are being ordained Priests and Deacons by the Bishops and have no other Ordination to this very day but what they had fro them But if they shal say they were ordained by them not as Bishops but as Presbyters I answer This is a simple foppish distinction For as well may the Bishops say They were not ordained by the Pope or his Bishops quatenus as Pope or Bishops but quatenus as Presbyter or Presbyters and so are in every particular as lawfull Ministers as any of these men that have their ordination from them and yet have endevoured to draw the whole Kingdom into a Covenant sinfully to extirpate them that are Christs Ministers upon their own Principles as really truly and formally as any of themselves But in the second place if they were ordained Presbyters by the Bishops not as Bishops but as Presbyters then are these present reformed Ministers lesse then Presbyters For the Author to the Hebrewes chap. 7. v. 7. saith Without all contradiction the lesse is blessed of the better or greater And I desire the learned Presbyters to shew me one example in all the New Testament that ever any Officer ordained another Officer in the same Office and Function that he himselfe was in Thirdly I desire to know of these reformed Presbyterian Ministers that seeing as they themselves confesse the Bishops Office and Function was and is Antichristian how is it possible their Ministeriall Function or Ordination can be Christian that like a streame flowed from them the fountain Sure I am Job demands this question Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean And by the same Spirit of God he answers Not one Job 14.4 And James interrogates saying Doth a Fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter Or can the Fig-tree my brethren beare Olive-berries either a Vine Figges Therefore in a positive negation he concludes that no Fountain can both yeeld salt water and fresh And therefore seeing THOMAS THE GANGRENA the Rabshakeh Champion of the new sprung-up Sect in England of Presbyters who may more truly and properly be called Schismatickes then any of those he so brands for they have separated from their Ghostly Fathers the Bishops and yet are glad to hold their ordination and are therefore schismaticall And therefore seeing in his last GANGRENA he hath fallen so point-blank upon me for no

other Presbyterian books licenced by publike authority and others sold without controule there be no more said to justifie and maintain that which Gangrena calles Vtopian Anarchy then in any bookes whatsoever published by these he calles Sectaries Thirdly whether or no that out of my own words in my booke called INNOCENCIE AND TRVTH JVSTIFIED there can any thing be drawn to justifie the Lords in that which now I condemn them in as Gangrena affirmes pag. 157 158. For the first see what the ninth Chapter of Magna Charta saith No freeman shall he taken or imprisoned or be disseised of his free hold or Liberties or free Customes or be outlawed or exiled or any otherwise destroyed nor we will not passe upon him nor condemn him but by lawfull judgment of his PEERS or by the Law of the Land See the 3. of E. 1. ch 6. And that no City Borough or Towne nor any man be amerced wiithout reasonable cause and according to the quantity of his trespasse 9. H. 3. 14. that is to say every free man saving his freehold a Merchant saving his Merchandise a villain saving his waynage and that by his or their Peers Now here is the expresse Law of the Land against the Lords jurisdiction over Commons in criminall cases Now in the second place let us see what one of the ablest expositors of the Law that ever writ in England saith of this very thing and that is Sir Edward Cooke in his exposition of Magna Charta 2. part institutes which book is published by two speciall orders of the present House of Commons as in the last page thereof you may read who in his expounding the 14 Chapter of Magna Charta p. 28. saith Peers signifies Equalls and pag. 29. he saith the generall division of persons by the Law of England is either one that is noble and in respect of his nobility of the Lords House in Parliament or one of the Commons of the Realms and in respect thereof of the House of Commons in Parliament and as there be divers degrees of Nobility as Dukes Marquesses Earles Viscounts and Barrons and yet all of them are comprehended within this word PARES so of the Commons of the Realme there be Knights Esquires Gentlemen Citizens Yeomen and Burgesses of severall degrees and yet all of them of the COMMONS of the Realme and as every of the Nobles is one Peere to another though he be of a severall degree so is it of the Commons and as it hath been said of men so doth it hold of Noble-women either by birth or by marriage but see hereof Chap. 29. And in Chap. 29 pag. 46. Ibim he saith no man shall be disseised that is put out of ●eison or dispossessed of his freehold that is Lands or livelihood or his liberties or free Customs that is of such franchises and freedoms and free Customs as belong to him by his birth-right unlesse it be by lawfull judgment that is verdict of his equalls that is men of his own condition or by the Law of the Land that is to speake it once for all by the due course and processe of Law No man shall be in any sort destroyed to destroy id est what was first built and made wholly to overthrow and pull downe unlesse it be by the verdict of his equalls or according to the Law of the Land And so saith he is the sentence neither will we passe upon him to be understood but by the judgment of his Peers that is equalls or according to the Law of the Land see him page 48. upon this sentence per judicium Parium suorum and page 50. he saith it was inacted that the Lords and Peers of the Realme should not give judgment upon any but their Peers and cites Rot. Parl. 4. E. 3. nu 6. but making inquiry at the Record-Office in the Tower I had this which followes from under the hand of Mr. William Colet the Record-Keeper Out of the Roll of the Parliament of the fourth yeare of Edward the third THE FIRST ROLL Records and Remembrances of those things which were done in the Parliament summoned at Westminster on Munday next after the Feast of Saint Katherine in the yeare of the reigne of King Edward the third from the Conquest the fourth delivered into the Chancery by Henry de Edenstone Clerk of the Parliament THese are the Treasons Felonies Wickedensses The judgement of Roger de Mortimer done to our Lord the King and his people by Roger de Mortimer and others of his confederacie First of all whereas it was ordained at the Parliament of our Lord the King which was held next after his coronation at Westminster that foure Bishops foure Earles and six Barons should abide neere the King for to counsell him so alwayes that there may be foure of them viz. one Bishop one Earle and two Barons at the least And that no great businesse be done without their assent and that each of them should answer for his deeds during his time After which Parliament the said Roger Mortimer not having regard to the said assent took upon himself Royall power and the government of the Realm and encroacht upon the State of the King and ousted and caused to be ousted and placed Officers in the Kings House and else-where throughout the Realm at his pleasure of such which were of his mind and placed John Wyard and others over the King to espy his actions and sayings so that our Lord the King was in such manner environed of such as that he would not doe any thing at his pleasure but was as a man which is kept in Ward Also whereas the Father of our LORD the KING was at Kenilworth by ordinance and assent of the Peeres of the Land there to stay at his pleasure for to be served as becommeth such a Lord the sayd Roger by Royall power taken unto himselfe did not permit him to have any money at his will and ordered that hee was sent to Barkly Castle where by him and his he was traiterously and falsly murthered and slain But that which is to my purpose is Roll the second being the judgement of Sir Simon de Bereford which verbatim followeth thus THE SECOND ROLL ALso in the same Parliament our Lord the King did charge the said Earles and Barons to give right and lawfull judgement as appertained to Simon de Bereford Knight who was aiding and counselling the said Roger de Mortimer in all the treasons felonies and wickednesses for the which the foresaid Roger so was awarded and adjudged to death as it is a known and notorious thing to the said Peeres as to that which the King intends The which Earles Barons and Peeres came before our Lord the King in the same Parliament and said all with one voyce that the foresaid Simon was not their Peere wherefore they were not bound to judge him as a Peere of the Land But because it is a notorious thing and known to all that

upon And good Mr. Gangrena is it not as just and as man-like in me if I be set upon by you when I have no better weapons to cudgell you with then your own to take them from you knock your pate as to make use of my own proper weapons to cut you soundly or any other man that shall assault me to the hazzard of my Being this is just my case that you count such a disgrace unto me But say you there I have owned their legislative power and their judicative power over Commons Therefore you draw an inference to condemn me from mine own practise Alas man may not I lawfully seek or receive a good turn from the hands of any man and yet as lawfully do my best to refuse a mischief from him But secondly I answer what though the 4. of May 1641. I stooped to a tryal at the Lords Barre upon an impeachment against me by the King doth that ever the more justifie their Authority or declare me to be mutable and unstable No not in the least for you cannot but know the saying of that most excellent Apostle Paul 1 Cor. 13.11 When I was a child I spake as a child I understood as a child I thought as a child but when I became a man I put away childish things So say I to you five or six yeares ago I knew nothing but the Lords Jurisdiction was as much more above the House of Commons over Commons as their Robes and Grandeur in which they sate was above them especially seeing at all Conferences betwixt both Houses I see the members of the house of Commons stand bare before the Lords for which action I now see no ground for especially having of late read so many bookes which discourse upon the Lords jurisdiction which was upon this ground about a moneth or six weeks A Gentleman a Member of the house of Commons and one that I believe wisheth me well bid me look to my self for to his knowledg there was a design amongst some of the Lords the grounds of reasons of which he then told me to clap me by the heeles and to fall so heavie upon me as to crush me in pieces or else make me at least an example to terrifie others that they should not dare to stand for their Rights And being thus fore-warned I was half armed which made me discourse upon every opportunity with any that I thought knew any thing of the Lords Jurisdiction and I found by a generall concurrence that the 29. Chap. of Magna Charta was expresly against the Lords Jurisdiction over Commoners in all criminall cases And upon that ground I protested against them and then upon further inquiry I found Sir Edward Cookes Judgment expresly against them and is before recited which book Mr. Gangraena I must tell you is published since my first tryall before the Lords and was not publikely in being when I then stooped unto their Jurisdiction and then coming prisoner to the Tower one of my fellow-prisoners very honestly told me of the fore-mentioned Record of Sir Simon de Bereford which presently with all speed under M Colets hand I got out of the Record-Office All which just and legall authorities and testimonie makes me so stiffe against the Lords as I am and I hope I shall continue to the death against them in the thing in question betwixt us as unmoveable as a brazen Wall come hanging come burning or cutting in pieces or starving or the worst that all their malice and the ulcerous Gangrena Priests put together can inflict For all that I principally care for is to see if the thing I engage in be just and if my conscience upon solid and mature deliberation tell me it is I will by the strength of God if once I be engaged in it either go through with it or dy in the midst of it though there be not one man in the world absolutely of my mind to back me in it But lastly admit in former times I had been as absolute a Pleader for the Lords Jurisdiction over Commons as now I am against them Yet truly a man of Mr. Gangraenaes coat is the unfittest man in the Kingdom to reprove me for it For his Tribe I mean of Priests and Deacons those little toes of Antichrist now called reformed Presbyters are such a Weather-cock unstable generation of wavering minded men as the like are not in the whole Kingdome For their Predecessours in Henry the 8. dayes were first for the Pope and all his Drudgeries and then for the King and his new Religion and then 3. in his time returned to rheir vomit again and then 4. in Edward the 6. dayes became by his Proclamation godly reformed Protestants and then 5. in Queen Maries dayes by the authority of her and her Parliament which Parliament I do aver it will maintain had as true a ground to set up compulsive Popery as this present Parliament hath to set up compulsive Presbytery became for the generality of them bloudy and persecuting Papists And then 6. by the Authority of Queen Elizabeth and her Parliament who had no power at all no more then this present Parliament to wrest the Scepter of Christ out of his hands and usurpedly to assume the Legislative Power of Christ to make Lawes to govern the Consciences of his people which they have nothing at all to do with He having made perfect compleat and unchangeable Lawes himself Esa 9.6 7 and 33.20 22. Acts 1.3 and 3.22 23. and 20.26 27. 1 Cor. 11.1 2. 1 Tim. 6.13 14. Heb. 3 2 3 6 became again a Generation of pure and reformed Protestants and have so continued to this present Parliament But now like a company of notorious forsworn men who will be of any Religion in the world so it carry along with it profit and power after they have for the generality of them taken and sworn six or seven Oaths that the Bishops were the only true Church-government and that they would be true to them to the death Yet have now turned the 7th time and ingaged the Parliament and Kingdom in an impossible-to-be-kept oath and Covenant to root up their ghostly Fathers the Bishops as Antichristian from whom as Ministers they received their Life and Being Yea and now the 8th time haue turned fallen from that Covenant and Oath by which they made all swear that took it not onely to root out Bishops but all Officers whatsoever that depend upon them in the number of which are all themselves having no other ordination to their Ministery but what they had from them and so are properly really and truly dependents upon them and yet now of late have by themselves and instruments as it were forced the House of Commons to passe a vote to declare themselves all forsworn that had a finger in that vote and so a people not fit to be trusted For by their late Vote no man what ever must preach and declare Jesus Christ