for we know full well from the practise of all former parliaments that seeing the three States are subordinate unto the king p. 48 in making lawes wherein the chiefest power consisteth they may propound and consent but it is stil in the kings power to refuse or ratifie and I never read that any parliament man till now did ever say the contrary but that if there be no concurrence of the king in whom formally the power of making of any law resideth ut in subiecto to make the law the two Houses whose consent is but a requisite condition to compleat the kings power are but a livelesse convention like two cyphets without a figure that of themselves are of no value or power but ioyned unto their figures have the full strength of their places p 19 20 21 which is confirmed by the viewer of the Observations out of 11. Hen. 7.23 per Davers Polydore 185. Cowell inter Verbo prerog Sir Tho. Smith de republ Angl. l. 2. c. 3. Bodin l. 1. c. 8. for if the kings consent were not necessary for the perfecting of every act then certainly as another saith all those Bills that heretofore have passed both Houses The Letter to a Gentleman in Gloucester shite p 3 and for want of the Royall assent have slept and beene buried all this while would now rise up as so many lawes and statutes and would make as great confusion as these new orders and ordinances have done And as the Lawyers tell us that the necessity of the assent of all three states in Parliament Lamberts Archeion 271. Vid. he Viewes p. 21. is such as without any one of them the rest doe but loose their labour so Le Roy est assentus câ—o faict un act de Parliament and as another saith Nihil ratum haâ— betur nisi quod Rex comprobarit nothing is perfected but what the King confirmeth But here in the naming of the three States I must tell you that I find in most of our Writers about this new-borne question of the Kings power a very great omission that they are not particularly set downe that the whole Kingdome might know which is every one of them and upon this omission I conceive as great mistake in them that say the three States are 1. the King 2. the House of Peeres 3. Which hee the three States of England the House of Commons for I am informed by no meane Lawyer that you may find it upon the Rowles of Hen. 5. as I remember and I am sure you may find it in the first yeare of Rich. 3. where the three States are particularly named and the king is none of them for it is said that at the request Speed l 9 c 19 p. 712. Anno 1 Ric. 3 and by the assent of the three estates of this Realm that is to say the Lords Spirituall the Lords temporall and Commons of the Land assembled it is declared that our said Soveraign Lord the king is the very undoubted king of this realm wherein you may plainly see the king that is acknowledged their Soveraigne by all three can be none of the three but is the head of all three as the Deane is none of the Chapter but is caput cepituls and as in France and Spaine so in England I conceive the three estates to bee 1. the Lords Spirituall that are if not representing yet in loco in the behalte of all the Clergie of England that till these anabaptisticall tares have almost choaked all the Wheat in Gods field were thought so considerable a party as might deserve as well a representation in Parliament as old Sarum or the like Borough of scarce twenty Houses 2. The Lords Temporall in the right of their honour and their posterity 3. The Commons that are elected in the behalfe of the Countrey Cities and Burroughs and what these three States consult and conclude upon for the good of the Church and kingdome the king as the head of all was either to approve or reiect what he pleased and though we finde with some difficulty as the viewer of the Observations saith where the Parliament is said to be a body consisting of King Lords and Commons ergo without the king there is no Parliament yet herein the king is not said to be one of the three states but the first and most principall part that constitutes the body of the parliament p. 2â— 25. H 8 21. but John Bodin that had very exactly learned the nature of our parliament both by his reading and conferring with our English Embassador as himselfe confesseth saith the States of England are never otherwise assembled no more then they are in the Realmes of France and Spaine then by parliament write and the states proceed not but by way of supplications and requests unto the king Bodin de repub l. 1. c. 8 and the states have no power of themselves to determine or decree any thing seeing they cannot so much as assemble themselves nor being assembled depart without expresse commandement from the king In all this and for all the search that I have made I finde not the king named to be one but rather by the consequence of the discourse to bee none of the three but as I said the head of all the three states for either the words of Bodin must bee understood of two states in all the three kingdomes which then had beene more properly termed as we call them either the two Houses or the Lords and Commons or else they must be very absurd because the three states if the king be one of them can not bee said to be called by parliament writs when as the king is called by no writ nor can hee be said to supplicate unto himselfe or to have no power to depart without leave that is of himself Therefore it must needs follow that this learned man who would speake neither absurdly nor improperly meant by the three states 1. The Lords Spirituall 2. The Lords Temporall 3. The Commons of the kingdome and the King as the head of all calling them consulting and concluding with them and dismissing them when he pleased And Will. Martyn saith King Hen 1 at the same time 1114. devised and ordained the manner and fashion of a Court in Parliament appointing it to consist of the three estates of which himselfe was the head so that his lawes being made by the consent of all were not disliked of any these are his words And I am informed by good Lawyers that you may finde it in the preambles of many of our Statutes and in the body of some other Statutes and in some Petitions especially one presented to Queene Elizabeth for the inlargement of one that was committed for a motion that he made for excluding the Bishops out of the House of peeres Such is the difference betwixt Queene Elizabeths time and our times the three states are thus particularized and the Lords Spirituall are nominated
should demand why we suspect any Traytors or false Counsellors to be in Kings Courts I answer because Saint Paul saith Oportet esse hareses and I beleeve the purest Court hath no more priviledge to be free from Traytors then the Church from Heretiques and you know there was one of eight in Noahs Arke and another of twelve in Christ his Court and he that was so neare him as to dip his hand with him in the dish was the first that flew in his face and yet with a hayle Master and with a kisse two fair testimonies of true love Therefore let no King in Christendome thinke it strange that his Court should have Flatterers Traytors or evill Counsellors let not us be blamed for saying this and let not Pym so foolishly charge our King for evil Counsellors for certainly did he know them I make no question but he would discard them or could I or any other informe his Majestie who they are and that it were an easie matter dicier hic est we would not be affraid to pull off their vails and to say as Christ did to Judas Thou art the man but their Meandrian windings their Syrens voices and their Iudas kisses are as a faire mantle to conceale and cover Ioabs treason even perhaps to betray some of the wisest in the Parliament as well as some of them have betrayed the King In such a case all I can say is this Memento diffidere was Epicharmus his Motto the honest plaine dealing man that doth things for Religion not for ends is the unlikeliest man to betray his Master and few Counsellors are not so apt to breed so many Traytors as a multitude it was the indiscretion of Rehoboam that lost him ten parts of twelve to preferre young Counsellors before the ancient * Seldome discretion in youth attendeth great and sudden fortunes In vita Henric. 3. and if we may beleeve that either paupertas or necessitas cogit ad turpia or the fable of the ulcerated traveller They that are to make their fortunes are apter to sell Church and State and to betray King and Kingdom rather then those that have sufficiently replenished their coffers and inlarged their possessions But I assure my selfe the mouth of malice cannot deny but that our King hath been as wary and as wise in the choice of his Servants Officers and Counsellors so far as eyes of flesh can see in all respects as in any Prince in Christendom and more by man cannot be done And for the second Their designe to change the Government of the State shewed that is their designe to change the Government of the State and to work the subversion of the Monarchie he evinceth it 1 By that Declaration upon the Earle of Straffords suffering 1. Way that this example might not be drawn to a president for the future because they thought that themselves intending to do the like and to become guilty of the same crimes might by vertue of this Declaration be secured from the punishment if things should succeed otherwise then they hoped 2 By the pulling down of so many Courts of Justice 2. Way which may perhaps relieve the Subjects from some pressures but incourage many more in licentiousnesse and prove the Prodromes to the ruine of our Monarchie 3 By those 19. 3. Way Propositions whereby the King was in very deed The Letter p. 11. demanded to lay downe his Crowne and to compound with them for the same because as another saith therein there was presented to him a perfect platforme of a totall change of Government by which the Counsellors indeed were to have been Kings and the King in name to have become scarce a Counsellor and nothing of the present State to have remained but the very names and titles of our Governours 4 By that expression so little understood by many men 4. Way and yet so much talked of in many of their papers of a power of re-assuming the trust which is falsly pretended to bee derived unto his Majestie by the meere humane pactions and agreement of the politique body of the people which I shewed unto you to be a most false and a meere invented suggestion 5 By their pretending to 5. Way and according to this doctrine their usurping of the power of the Militia both by sea and land 6 By their actuall exercising of this power 6. Way in disposing of Offices Generals Colonels Captains and the like places of command in War and appointing their Speaker Master of the Rolls and other Officers of Peace 6 By the expression of one of them to Sir Edward Dering 7. Way while he was yet of their Cabinet Counsell that if they could bring down the Lords to the House of Commons and make the King as one of the Lords then the whole worke were done that is to make the Government of this Kingdom popular 8 I may adde to these 8. Way as another unanswerable Argument of this Designe the licencing of Master Pryn's Book of The soveraigne Authoritie of Parliaments and suffering the same to passe unquestioned to this very day because that Booke devesteth the King of all his Soveraigntie and maketh our Government Aristecraticall And this subversion of our Monarchicall Government was the last Designe if not the grand Designe of this Faction not that all the Members which have voted all or most of those things that tended to this change or be still remaining in either House did intend any ill either to Church or State for I know many especially my ever honoured Lord the Earle of Pembroke and Montgomery who I dare avouch it in truth and honestie did ever and as I beleeve doth still bear a most upright heart and as sincere intentions how soever perhaps by a misunderstanding his Lordship and the rest of those well meaning men may be misguided as were those honest men that followed Absolon both to Gods Service the Kings Honour and the happinesse both of Church and Common-wealth as any man in the Kingdom but that a Faction it may be very few at first have insensibly seduced the rest to effect their own Designe and this Faction is all that I mean by the name of Parliament throughout this whole Treatise because their subtiltie hath prevailed over the plain integritie of the other well-minded men to make up the major part of the House both of the Lords and Commons which thing hath often happened both in Generall Councels and great Parliaments as in the Councel of Constans and Trent and many others and that Parliament which was branded with the name of Parliamentum insanum and the other somewhat like this Tempore Hen. 3. in quo jngulum Ecclesiae atrociùs petebatur and the like for otherwise I do both honour and reverence this Parliament rightly understood and every Member of the same as much as any discreet Member can desire And therefore having thus discovered and displayed the Plots and practices of
these infernall instruments to insinuate their assistance unto the Scots and their allurements of them to invade our Kings Dominions to ensnare the Irish and to provoke the Papists to such a Rebellion as hath been the utter ruine and destruction of many millions of men to obscure the glory of this noble Kingdome to alter the Discipline and corrupt the Doctrine of the most glorious and the purest Church that professeth the Name of Christ and to bring us all and all our posteritie to extreme miseries to suffer yet more then we have endured or that can be hitherto imagined and considering those bloody Treasons that have beene publikely uttered and openly practised against the sacred Person of our Soveraigne I may justly say that as the sinnes of the Israelites and their impetuous calling for a King moved the Lord to send them a King in his anger so our sinnes and our impatient crying for a Parliament made our God to send us a Parliament in his wrath that will never turne for our blessing till we returne to God from our sinnes for when I consider on the one side the pietie and goodnesse of our King the justnesse of his cause and the most ready and cordiall valour as well in the common Souldiers as the Commanders of a full and sufficient Armie and on the other side the multitude of disloyall and seduced Subjects the vigilancie and subtiltie of their Commanders with their unlimited wayes to get monies and on both sides the desire of too many not for the honour of the King nor the peace of the Kingdome to end the War but to continue the same for their own advantage untill the wealth of Lawyers Clergy and Gentrie be transplanted to the possessions of other Masters I am affraid it wil prove an heavie judgement and therfore lest our obstinacie in our sinnes should procure the continuance of Gods anger which being removed will soone remove all our miseries let me perswade all conscientious men especially the Gentry and all other understanding men howsoever the Citizens that deceive the Kingdome of their wealth delight to be deceived in their faith that would not be cheated of their Religion by these factious Mountebankes and that would not provoke God to say I have no pleasure in them to turne from their rebellious courses to listen no longer to those furious fire-brands that out of their now Divinity contrary to the Doctrine of all the ancient Fathers and all the Orthodox and grave Preachers of this Kingdome do incite the People unto this unnaturally bloody War and to slander the foot-steps of Gods Anointed because they know him not and to remember the Oathes of their Allegiance and Supremacie together with their late Protestation whereby they stand obliged to their uttermost power to maintaine his Majesties Royall Person Crowne and Dignity against all treacherous practices that may any waies dishonour or impaire them and then I presume their consciences will disavow the proceedings of these Projâ—ctours protest against all their Ordinances that are made against or without the Kings consent advise all the Knights and Burgesses to Vote no more against their Soveraigne and to make no further use of the trust they reposed in them to murder us and our fellow Subjects under the pretence of shedding the bloud of the ungodly or if they still goe on to abuse that trust to make us yet more miserable to withdraw themselves and their trust and power of representation from them and to joyne their uttermost assistance unto his Majesty to protect him that he may be enabled to protect us and to overwhelme the Robels into the same pit which they have made for us And this may be by dissolving the knot of factious members wherein we see our miseries involved and to make elections of new members into their places that with the rest of the Lords and Commons which were faithfull both to the Church King and Kingdome shall call them to a strict account for betraying our trust interrupting our peace opposing his Majestie and violating all our ancient liberties Or if a better way may be found let us follow the same to Gods glory and to produce the peace and happinesse of this Kingdome lest if we persist obstinately in this wilfull rebellion to withstand Gods Ordinance to oppose his anointed and to shed so much innocent blood we shall thus fighting against heaven so far provoke the wrath of the God of Heaven as that the glory of Israel shall be darkned the honour of this nation shall be troden under foot and be made the scorne of all other nations round about us and the light of our Candlestick shall be extinguished and we shall all become most miserable because we would not hearken to the voyce of the Lord our God which I hope we will doe and do most earnestly pray that we may doe it to the glory of God the honour of our King and the happinesse of this whole Kingdome through Iesus Christ our Lord to whom be praise and dominion both now and for ever Amen AN APPENDIX THe man of God speaking of transcendent wickednesse Deu. 32.2 saith Their Vine is of the Vine of Sodome and of the fields of Gomorrah their Grapes are grapes of Gall their Clusters are bitter their Wine is the poyson of Dragons and the cruell venome of Aspes and I beleeve never any wickednesse desâ—rved better to be clad with this elegant expression then that threefold iniquity 1. The unparallel'd Vote 2. The intolerable Ordinance 3. The damnable Covenant which the rebellious faction in Parliament have most impiously contrived to make up the full measure of their impiety since the writing of my discoveries for 1. Omitting that horrible practice of those rebellious blood-thirsty Soul lie's that did their best to murder their owne most gracious Queene this faction seeing how God prevented that plot voted this most loving and most loyall wife to be impeached or High Treason for being faithfull to doe her uttermost endeavour which will be her everlasting praise to assist her most deare and Royall husband their owne Liege Lord and Soveraigne King in his greatest extremities against a virulent mighty faction of most malicious Traytors the strangest Treason that ever the world heard of 2. They made an Ordinance for the composing and convocating of such a Synod whereof I said somewhat before of Lay men ignorant men factious men traiterous men and such concretion of heterogeneall parts like Nebuchadnezzars image gold brasse and clay all mixed together and all so ordered limited and bridled as it is expressed in the 5. and 6. page of their Ordinance by the power of both Houses where there are such abundance of Schismaticall and seditious members that I should scarce put the worst sensitive soule to professe that erraticall faith or any bruit beast to be guided by that Ecclâ—…asticall discipline that such factious Traytors as some of thâ—… are like to be proved should compose or cause to be coâ—posed 3. They composed a forme of a sacred Vow or Covenant 〈◊〉 they terme it or as it is indeed the Covenant of Hell a Covenant against God to overthrow the Gospel of Christ under the name of Christ which Covenant is the Oyle that swimmâ—… uppermost upon the waters that is the Oyle of Scorpions or as Moses saith the poison of Dragons so lately wringed and dâ—…fused farre and neere to defile and destroy millions of soules when forgetting their faith to God and the Oathes of their Allegiance so often and so solemnely taken by many or most of them to be faithfull unto their King they shall be compelled which is one degree worse then the vow of them that bound themselves with a curse neither to eate nor drinke till they had killed Paul so hypocritically so perjuredly so rebelliously 〈◊〉 horribly and so bloodily to make such a fearefull Vow and such an abominable Covenant so wickedly contrived that without great and serious repentance spitteth forth nothing but fire and brimstone and can produce nothing else but hell and damnation to all that take it especially to them that will coâ—pell men to be thus transcendently wicked as if they would send them with Corah quicke to Hell All which triplicity of evil I shal leave to some abler and more eloquent pen to be set forth more fully in the right colours that being suffâ—ciently displayed they may be throughly detested of all good men Amen O Lord have mercy upon us and incline our hearts to to keepe thy Lawes ERRATA Page 24. lin 11. for malicious read heavy pag. 98. lin 1. reaâ— somewhat like him c. FINIS
THE DISCOVERY OF MYSTERIES OR The plots and practices of a prevalent faction in this present PARLIAMENT To overthrow the established Religion and the well setled Government of this glorious Church and to introduce a new framed Discipline not yet agreed upon by themselves what it shall be to set up a new invented Religion patched together of Anabaptisticall and Brownisticall Tenents and many other new and old errors And also To subvert the fundamentall Lawes of this famous Kingdome by devesting our King of His just rights and unquestionable Royall prerogatives and depriving the Subjects of the propriety of their goods and the Liberty of their persons and under the name of the Priviledge of Parliament to exchange that excellent Monarchicall government of this Nation into the Tyrannicall Government of a faction prevaling over the major part of their well-meaning brethren to Vote and Order things full of all injustice oppression and cruelty as may appeare out of many by these few subsequent collections of their proceedings By GR. WILLIAMS L. Bishop of Ossory Printed in the Yeare M.DC.XLIII TO THE KING'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTIE Most Gracious Soveraigne THough the wisest man in all the Kingdome of Persia saith great is the truth and stronger then all things yet the father of lies hath now plaid his part so well that as the Prophet saith truth is fallen in the streete and equity cannot enter in and your Majestie whom the God of truth hath anointed his sole vicegerent to be the supreame protector of them both in all your dominions hath accordingly listed up your standard against their enemies and I may truly say of you as Menevensis saith of that most noble King Alfred Si modò victor erat ad crastina bella pavebat Si modò victus erat ad crastina bella parabat Neither doe I beleive that Lucans verse can be applied to any man better then to your Majestie Non te vidère superbum Prospera satorum nec fractum adversa videbunt As the height of your glory and prosperity never swelled your pious heart so your greatest crosses and adversities never dejected your royall spirit But as the Prophet saith of the Captaine of the hoast of the Lord so I say to you that are his Lieutenant ride on with your honour or ride prosperously because of the word of truth of meekenesse and righteousnesse the people shal be subdued unto you and because the King putteth his trust in the Lord and in the mercy of the most highest he shall not miscarry especially while he fighteth as he doth the battaile of the Lord in defence of the Church of Christ who hath promised to be his shield and buckler which is the daily faithfull prayer of Your Majesties most loyally devoted Subject and most faithfully obliged servant GR. OSSORY To the Nobility Gentry and Commonalty of ENGLAND Most deare Christian Brethren and fellow Subjects I Call God for a record upon my soule that I have proceeded in this Discovery of Mysteries to discharge my duty as my conscience directeth me and if I perish Iperish the Lord hath hitherto most mercifully preserved mee I have read of an ingratefull begger that when a pious man seeing his nakednesse and having a full web of cloth did freely give him as much as was requisite to make him a faire garment yet he was no wayes satisfied therewith but would have violently snatched all the web in despite of the right owners teeth and shall we that have so freely received so many acts of grace from our King more then ever any other King hath granted exact so much more as to make him no King In the life of Henry 3. presented to King Iames pag. 29. Choron Santh Albam or a King of no power like Henry the 3. in the Parliament at Oxford where the good King met so many undutifull demands that he was forced to render up to their rebellious will his royall power and when others managed the State he was left a cypher alas who hath bewitched us when men do rent the regall justice they make themselves of so many Subjects whilst they live in duty totidem tyrannos when they have left their loyalty and promises made by men which can not say they are at liberty are weake when force hath no power to make a just interest Therefore let not a faction prevaile to destroy us all I assure my selfe most of our two Houses of Parliament are very noble and very pious and many of them would willingly yeild to His Majesties perswasions for accōmodation but our Saviour saith a little leaven leaveneth the whole lumpe and a small faction may insensibly seduce if it were possible the very elect I will appeale to your owne consciences if we have not a most religious and a most gratious King if he hath not aboundantly granted his favours to all this Kingdome if the faction doth not still demand what he may lawfully and ought justly to deny then I beseech you let me not become your enemy for speaking truth let not the kingdome be made more miserable and the Church more despicable by your assisting of such a faction to the new moulding of them and let it not be thought strange that we beleeve one seditious schismatique in a Parliament may prove a treacherous rebell against his King and this Traytor may possibly seduce many those many not unlikely to prevaile to infect the major part of both Houses and if so * Shall we deeme them a Parliament and thinke it fitter to have them Jvdged by themselves then by the knowne lawes of the land then the first plotters of so great a mischeife having so far transcended the limits of truth and justice to wound their consciences and to confound the State that they know not how to retire and thinke they can not finde grace is it any wonder that such men with Iudas run on from bad to worse from worse to worst of all till at last they come to the highest step that hell can teach them But we being Gods olive though some of the Branches be broken off Rom. 11.17 yet I hope God hath not cast away his people and therefore if you take not pleasure in wickednesse and love not to become more miserable let us all feare God honour the King forsake the rebels and defend the Church so the God of all mercy will yet be mercifull unto us that we shall finde grace both with God and our King which is the hearty prayer of Your most affectionate Christian brother that doth most heartily wish your happinesse GR. OSSORY Christian Reader AS this Treatise was ready for the Presse I lighted upon Os ossorianum wherein I saw neither learning nor truth nor modesty nor honesty nor any one thing worth reply but a most distempered rage and moody choler that transported the silly man beyond his sence for omitting those his rarest passages which some discreete welwiller of the man collected in
Hannibal could not invent to effect this hard talke what to perswade mildnesse to become severe or to cause a just and most clement Prince so full of mercy so prone to pardon where there is a fault and so loth to punish but where he must by the Law of Justice the greatest fault to yeeld to put him to death that was in many things so excellent in his life the taske was to procure his assent to passe this Bill and how shall this be done as the Man of God could not be perswaded by any man but by a Man of God a Prophet by a Prophet so now the Bishops that were good men men of conscience and set apart by God to resolve and satisfie weake and tender consciences are thought fit to be sent unto this good King to perswade him as men supposed that to prevent a greater mischiefe he might justly passe this Bill and either 6. or 4. of the prime Prelates are requested by the Lords to goe unto the King to assay how far they can prevaile with him herein and so they went and how they dealt with His Majestie I do not fully understand but am informed by some that went that they assured him he ought to satisfie himselfe in point of Law by his Judges and of State by his Councell how they did any otherwise in any other thing rectify his Conscience in point of divinitie which belonged unto themselves I cannot tell But though I thinke no man can justly lay the least tittle of blame upon the just King no not the Earle himselfe as himselfe professed for yeelding to such and so earnest perswasions of I know not how many reverend Bishops wise Counsellours grave Judges and the flower of all his people to passe that Bill whatsoever it was Yet to say what I conceive with their favour The Bishops right to vote in any cause of my brethren the Bishops in the prosecution of this cause I am perswaded that they had no reason to withdraw themselves from the House and to desert their owne right when the Bill or the Iudgment was to passe against the Earle upon this slight pretence alleaged against them by the haters of the Earle and no lovers of the Bishops that a Clergie-man ought not to have any vote or to be present at the handling of the cause of bloud or death for they might know full well when my Lords grace of Yorke did most clearely manifest this truth that the first inhibition of the Clergy to be present and assistant in causa sanguinis or judicio mortis in the Canon of Innocent the third as I remember for I am driven to fly without my bookes was most unjust onely to tie the Bishops to his blinde obedience to the apparent prejudice of all Christian Princes by denying this their service unto them and it is no wayes obligatory to binde us that are by the Lawes of our Land not onely freed but also injoyned to abandon all the unjust Canons that are repugnant to our Lawes and derogatory to our Kings and to renounce all the usurped authority of the Pope for I would faine know what Scripture or what reason Pope Innocent can alleadge to exclude them from doing that good service both to God and their King which in all reason they can or should be better able to do then most others and I am sure that neither in the old nor in the new Testament nor yet in the Primitive Church untill these subtle Popes began thus to incroach upon the rights of Princes to take away the prerogatives of Kings and to domineer over the consciences of men this exclusion of them from the highest act of Justice was never found The Prophets and Apostles judged in the case of life and death for did not Moses Joshua Samuel Eliah Elizaus Jehoida and others of the Priests and Prophets of the Old Testament and S. Peter also the Prince of the Apostles in the New Testament judge in the case of bloud and pronounced the sentence of death against Malefactors as when Ananias and Sapphira were suddenly brought unto their end by the judgement of the Apostle and if they be able and fit to judge of any thing then why not of this If you say Ob. because they are the advocates of mercy the procurers of pardon the preachers of repentance and men that are made to save life and not to put any one to death or to bring any man unto his end I answer Sol. that they are therefore the fittest men to be the Judges both of life and death for who can better and more justly judge me to death then he that doth most love my life It is certaine he will not condemne me without just cause even as God that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the father of mercies and even mercy it selfe is the fittest and most righteous Judge that can be found both of death and damnation because his mercy and goodnesse towards his creatures will not permit his severity against sinne though never so detestable to his purity Clergy how fit to be Judges to doe the least injustice to their persons so our love of mercy and pitty will not suffer us to doe any thing that shall transcend the rules of justice and equity and as our inclination to mercy prohibits us to condemne the innocent so our love to justice and our charge to preserve it will not permit us to justifie the wicked for the Scripture teacheth us that he which justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the innocent that calleth the evill good and the good evill that spareth Agag and killeth Naboth are both alike abominable unto the Lord. And therefore notwithstanding this unjust Canon I never finde in any of our Histories that the Bishops did ever withdraw themselves and quit their votes in this case either before or after save onely from the 10th yeare of Richard the 2d unto the 21th yeare of the raigne of the same unfortunate King which they did not because they could not justly be present but because they had just reasons to be absent as you may finde it in the Annales of his time therefore I know not how to palliate their facility of yeilding way to those Non-Canonicall Lords to produce those non-obliging Canons Non Canonicall Lords which they abhorred in all that made not for the furtherance of their designe to exclude them from doing this which was one of their chiefest duties for who knoweth not the Lord Say and Lord Brooke and others of the Lords to hate all Canons even the old Canons of the Apostles as inconsistent with their new rules of independent government and yet herein to exclude the Bishops votes in the judgement of this man and the passing of this Bill which being admitted might perhaps have turned the scales they will take hold of the unjustest Law and alleadge one of the worst of Canons a Canon against reason and most repugnant
I have fully shewed and I would all Kings would read it in the Grand Rebellion But I see no reason why it may not and why it should not be retracted and annulled That the act should be annulled when the Houses shall be purged of that Anabaptisticall and Rebellious faction that contrived and procured the same to passe for these three speciall reasons 1. 1. Reason Because that contrary to all former precidents that Bill for their exclusion was as it is reported at the first refused and after a full bearing among the Lords it was by most votes by more then a dozen voices rejected and yet to shew unto the world that the factions maltee against the Bishops had no end their rage was still implacable at the same Session which is very considerable immediatly assoone as ever they understood it was rejected the House of Commons revived it and so pressed it unto the Lords that if I may have leave to speake the truth contrary to all right * For I conceave this to be an approved maxime that no light not proved forfitea by some of fence can be taken away wuhout wrong 2 Keasom In His Majesties answer to the Petition of the Lords and Commons 16 of July p. 8. it must be againe received and while the Bishops were in prison it was with what honour I know not strangely confirmed 2. Because this Bill had the Royall assent after that a most riotous tumult many thousands of men with all sorts of warlike weapons both on land and water most disloyally had driven His Majestie to fly from London that most Rebellious City not without feare for his owne safety even for the safety of his life as himselfe professeth and when they had so cunningly contrived their plot as to get some of the Kings servants and friends that were about him and imployed in the Queenes affaires to perswade Her Majesty to use all her power with the King for the passing of this Bill or else Her journey should be slaied as formerly they had altered her resolution for the Spaw and at Rochester she should understand the sense of the House to stop Her passage unto Holland whereas the passing of this Bill might make way for Her passage over and many other such frights and feares they put both upon the King and Queene to inforce him full sore against his will as we beleive to passe this harsh Bill for the exclusion of the spirituall Lords out of the House of Peeres and of all the Clergy from all Secular Judicature But Master Pym will tell us he did Ald. Gar. speech at Guild hall that it was the opinion of both Houses there was no occasion given by any tumults that might justly cause His Majesties departure To whom I answere with the words of Alderman Garroway if the Houses had declared that it had beene lawfull to beat the King out of Town I must have sate still with wonder though I should never beleive it but when they declare matters of fact which is equally within our own knowledge and wherein we cannot be deceived as in the things we have seene with our eyes if they dissent from truth they must give me leave to differ from them as if they should declare they have paied all the money that they owe unto the city or that there was * For now I understand it is pulled down no Crosse standing in Cheapside we shall hardly beleive them And therefore seeing we all remember when the alarme was given that there was an attempt from Whitehall upon the City how hardly it was appeased and how no babies thought the designe of those subtle beads that gave that false alarme was no lesse then to have caused Wite hall to be pulled downe and they that loved the King and saw the Army both by Land and water which accompanied the persons accused to Westminster the next day after His Majesties departure as if they had passed in a Roman triumph conceived the danger to be so great that I call Heaven to witnesse they blessed God that so gracioussly put it in the Kings heart rather to passe away over night though very late then hazard the danger that might have ensued the day following The meaning therefore of both Houses may be that there was nothing done which they confessed to be a tumult and no mervaile because they received incouragement as we beleeved from their defence and no reproofe that we found was made for this indignity offered unto the King but if I be constrained and in danger it is not enough for me that I am voted free and safe for if that which lookes as like a tumult as that did or as the representation of my face in the truest glasse is like my face doth come against me and incompasse me about though I may be perhaps in more safety yet I shall thinke my selfe in great feare and in no more security then His Majestie was at Edge-hill 3. 3 Reason p. 7 Because as the veiwer of the Observat hath very well exprest it no act of Parliament can prevaile to deprive the King of His right and authority as an attainder by Parliament could not barre the title to the Crowne from descending on King Hen. 7. nor was an act of Parliament disabling King Hen. 6. to re-assume the government of his people of any force but without any repeale in it selfe frustrate and void 7. rep 14. Calvins case an act of Parliament cannot take away the protection or the Subjects service which is due by the Law of nature 11. rep Sur de la Wares case William de la Ware although disabled by act of Patliament was neverthelesse called by Queene Elizabeth to sit as a peere in Parliament for that it seems the Queen could not be barred of the service and councell of any of Her Subjects 2. H. 7.6 a statute that the King by no non obstante shall dispence with it is void because it would take a necessary part of government out of the Kings hand and therefore I se not how this act can deprive the King of the service and councell of all his Bishops and clergy but that it is void of it selfe and needeth no repeale or if otherwise yet seeing that besides all this 13 of the Bishops were shut in prison when this act passed and their protestation was made long before this time and it was so unduly framed so illegally prosecuted and with such compulsive threats and terrours procured to be passed I hope the wisedome of the next Parliament together with their love and respect to the Church and Church-men will nullifie the same CHAP. VI. Sheweth the plots of the faction to gaine unto themselves the freindship and assistance of the Scotts and to what end they framed their new protestation how they provoked the Irish to rebell and what other things they gained thereby ANd thus the Sectaries of this Kingdome and the faction in
Act of Pacification for their assistance to withstand their King and to overthrow our Church it is apparent to all the world how perfidiously they dealt with God and man and how treacherous their thoughts were from the beginning both to the King and Kingdom Yet as we found our Brethren of Scotland howsoever these men bevaved themselves in their secret intentions to have carried themselves none otherwise than as wise rationall and religious men in all the Treatie so I assure my selfe they will hereafter still continue both faithfull unto God and loyall unto their King and as they perceived not their intentions at the first so they will not now joyne with them in any Association of Rebellion to withstand their own Liege Lord and to change the established Lawes and Religion of our Kingdom but will rather live in peace and happinesse in their own Land than by forsaking their enjoyed quietnesse to involve themselves in the unhappinesse of a desperate War in another Countrey 2. 2. The compelling of all people to â—…ak their new â—amed Protestation After they had thus endeared themselves unto their Brethren of Scotland they framed a Protestation to maintain and defend as farre as lawfully they might with their lives powers and estates the True Reformed Protestant Religion his Majesties Royall Person honour and estate the power and priviledges of Parliament the lawfull rights and liberties of the Subjects and every person that should make the same Protestation in whatsoever he should do in the lawfull pursuance of the same and to their power and as farre as lawfully they might to oppose and by all good wayes and meanes endeavour to bring to condigne punishment all such as shall either by force practise counsels plots conspiracies or otherwise * Which word is like the c. in the Canonical Oath do any thing to the contrary of any thing in the said Protestation contained and neither for fear hope nor other respect to relinquish this promise vow and protestation In which Protestation though no man can espie the least shadow of ill prima facie at the first reading thereof yet if you look further and search narrowly into the intentions of the composers the frame of the Protestation and the practise of these Protestors ever since the framing of it you shall finde that Desinit in piscem mulier formosa supernè these men are no Changelings but as like themselves as ever they were for 1. As it was intended so it succeeded 1. To terrifie the Papists and to raise a rebellion in Ireland it terrified the Papists and made them so desperate as almost to despair of their very being as concerning the place where or the manner how they should live which thing together with many other harsh and hard proceedings against many of them and the small countenance which they shewed unto a very moderate Petition that the Papists exhibited unto them hath driven abundance of them into Ireland whom I saw my selfe and there consulting with the Irish which were then also threatened by the Agents of this faction there that ere long they should be severely handled and brought to the Church whether they would or no or pay such a mulct as should make them poor what course they should take in such a desperate condition wherein they were all like to be ruined or to be rooted out of all the Kings Dominions they concluded what they would do to defend themseves by a plain Rebellion So this course against them hath been the leading card as some of them confessed of that great Rebellion which being kindled as some Sectaries in England expected they thought they would so much the more weaken the King by how much the more combustion should be raised in each one of his Dominions and therefore notwithstanding all the Kings gracious Messages and wishes unto the House of Commons which I wish all men would remember how affectionately he desired it to hasten to releeve that bleeding Kingdom yet still they protracted and neglected their redresse and at last passed such Votes made such Orders and procured such Acts as rather respected themselves and their posteritie to get all the land and goods of the Rebels to themselves that were the Adventurers than the relieving of us that were distressed and would as I told some of the House of Commons rather increase the Rebellion than any wayes quench that destroying flame And this was as it succeeded and as you see hereby most likely intended a most detestable plot for the kindling of that Rebellion and continuing of that bloody War in Ireland without which they knew this Rebellion in England could never have gained so much strength as it hath 2. 2. To gaine all Sectaries to their side By their large expression of what religion they protested to defend not the Protestant religion as it is established by Law and expressed in the 39 articles of the Church of England but as it is repugnant to popery and taught perhaps by Burton Burges Goodwin Burrowes or the like Amsterdamian schismatickes they opened the gap so wide and made Heaven gate so broad that all Brownists Anabaptists Socinians Familists Adamites and all other new England brood and outlandish Sectaries what soever that opposed popery might returne home and joyne with them as they have done since to overthrow our established Church and state And this plot to increase their own strength was as craftily don and is as Detestable as the other which to weaken the King in England caused a rebellion in Ireland 3. 3. To descry their owne strength By their illegall compelling and forcible inducing of all the people in the Kingdome to take the same or to be adjudged ill affected and popish and after the Lords had rejected the imposing of it they by their Declaration which shewed that what person soever would not take it was unfit to beare office either in Church or Common wealth prevailed in this plot so that they descried the number of their owne party they understood their own strength and they perceived thereby many things which they knew not before for now they had with David numbred Israel and so far as the wit and policy of the Devill had instructed them they had searched into the secrets of all hearts 4. 4. To insnare all the simpler sort to adhere unto them Having compelled the people to take it they have hereby insnared all the simpler sort and tender consciences to sticke unto them when they tell them and presse it upon their soules that they have made a Protestation to maintaine the priviledges of Parliament and the Liberty of the Subject and therefore they are bound to adhere to the Parliament to the uttermost of their power and so by this equivocall Protestation they have seduced thousands into their Rebellion and led them blindfold unto destruction Butto let you see not the syncerity of their hearts The mystery of their iniquity but the mystery
therefore if we have any regard of our goods that God hath given us we have great reason to look about us for these are the greatest Cheaters in Christendome and as they have made us Malignants so they will make us reprobates when they please that they may enjoy those things that we have 3. They thinke themselves free from all sin Numb 23.21 Tit. 1.15 3. Because Balaam saith God beheld no iniquitie in Jacob and the Apostle saith To the pure all things are pure they teach their proselytes that in them which are the holy Brethren there is no sin and their adulterie drunkennesse cozenage and the like odious crimes are no crimes because God loving them so tenderly as a fond mother seeth no fault in her untoward childe so he takes no notice of any offence that they commit but for the ungodly their Prayers are sinnes their Almes are odious and whatsoever commendable dutie they do performe To the unbelieving nothing is pure Titus 1.15 God accounteth their best actions to be heinous trangressions and to adde the more weight of punishment to their damnation which Doctrine how abominable it is to God and how destructive to all men to make these holy Brethre and their sanctified Sisters senslesse in all sinnes uncapable of repentance Matth 9.12 when the whole hath no need of the Physician and to discourage all other ignorant men from doing good duties when the performance of them shall multiplie their stripes is so apparent to all men that I need not stand to confute it for if Coniah though he wear the signet upon my right hand Ier. 22.24 or as the apple of mine eye doth offend I will cut him off and if the wicked forsake his wickednesse Ezech. 33.15 and do that which is just love mercie and speak truth he shall be accepted and the Lord will not call light darknesse nor good evill in any one 4. 4. They allow the women to offend while their husbands slâ—ep Ioh 11.11 1 Cor. 7.39 Because our Saviour saith Our friend Lazarus sleepeth when as indeed he was dead and the Heathens say Sleep is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brother of death they take this colour to hide their adulteries that while the husband sleepeth the wife is as free from him as if he were dead a foolerie so ridiculous that the naming of it is a sufficient confutation of it and yet you shall hardly withdraw our London Anabaptists from it 5. 5. They justifie many kindes of lyes and equivocatious Gen. 12.13 Acts 23.5 Because Abraham said that Sara was his sister and Saint Paul said I wist not brethren that he was the high Priest they hold it as an Article of their Creed that for officious lyes and equivocations being for the furtherance of their cause the good worke which they pretend they may and ought to use them to swallow them down like water they make no bones of them and therefore it is dangerous to treat and weaknesse to give credit without sufficient pledges to the faith of these men whose profession may as lawfully deceive us as their Religion teacheth them to destroy us and I believe the experience which his Majesties Officers had of them in the performance of their promises and conditions of departure from Winchester Reading and other Townes surrendered unto them may sufficiently confirme this equivocall point of their Publique Faith 6. 6. They would root out all those that they terme wicked Deut. 7.2 1 Sam. 15.23 Psal 58.8 Because the Lord straitly charged the Israelites to root out the wicked Canaanites and the rest of those cursed Nations and translated the Kingdom of Israel from Saul unto David because he spared Agag and our Saviour bids us succidere ficum to cut down that unprofitable tree which bare no fruit they are so filled with such unmercifull crueltie towards all those they terme wicked and judge Malignants that they had better fall into the hands of heathen Tyrants than of these their holy brethren who embruing their hands in the blood of so many faithfull Christians do sing with the Psalmist The righteous rejoyce when they see this vengeance they shall wash their feet in the blood of the ungodly for as Solomon saith The tender mercies of the wicked are meer crueltie Prov. 12.10 And I believe the first inventers of that Designe to root out all the Papists in Ireland and to get that Act to purchase all the Lands of the Rebels had tasted too much of this bitter root of such destructive Doctrine whereby you see how the Religion of these men robbes us of our Estates keepes no faith with us and takes away our lives 7. Though among the workes of God 7. They would have a paritie among all men both in Church and Common wealth Gal. 5.6 Col. 3.11 every flower cannot be a Lillie every beast cannot be a Lion every bird cannot be an Eagle and every Planet cannot be Phaebus yet in the School of these men this is the Doctrine of their to be new erected Church that with God there is no respect of persans and neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but whether they be bond or free masters or servants few or Gentile Barbarian Scythian a countrey Clown or a Court Gallant rich or poor it is all one with God because these Titles of Honour Kings Lords Knights and Gentlemen are no entities of Gods making but the creatures of mans invention to puffe him up with pride and not to bring him unto God and therefore though for the bringing of their great good worke to passe they are yet contented to make the Earle of Essex their Generall and Warwicke their Admirall and so Pym and Hampden great Officers of State yet when the worke is done their Plot perfected and their Government established then you shall finde that as now they will eradicate Episcopacie and make all our Clergie equall as if all had equally but one talent and no man worthier than another so then there should be neither King Lord Knight nor Gentleman but a paritie of degrees among all these holy Brethren and to give us a taste of what they mean as the Lords concurrence with them inabled them to devour the Kings power so they have since with great justice prevailed with the House of Commons to swallow up the Lords power and have most fairly invaded their priviledge when they questioned particular Members * As my Lord Duke and my Lord Dighte for words spoken in that House and then the whole House when they brought up and countenanced a mutinous and seditious Petition which demanded the Names of those Lords that consented not with the House of Commous in those things which that House had twice denied 8. 8 They would have no man to pray for temporall things Mat. 6.33.34 Matth. 6.11 Because our Saviour saith Seek ye first the Kingdom of of Heaven and the righteousnesse thereof and all these
so truly religious and void of hypocrisie in their profession as she most gracious Queene is in her religion then they say the Bishops are all Papists Deanes and Prebends are of the same stampe and all the Kings Chapleines that were preferred by the Archbishop were either close papists or profest Arminians which are but Cosen germanes unto the other Arminianism being but a bridge to passe over unto popery And with these and the like false slanders against the King Queene and Clergy they so bewitehed most of their well meaning brethren of the same house and amazed all the simplet sort of people of this Kingdome with these feares and filled them with such jealousies with those pamphlets that they caused to be printed and dispersed every where that they were at their wits end for feare of this lamentable alteration of their religion and deprivation of their liberties 2 2. The Cure The disease being thus spread like a gangrene over all the parts of the body of this Kingdome they like skilfull Physitians devise the cure and that is the preparation of a Militia and this militia they would have put into such hands as they pleased such as they might confide in and I wish the whole Kingdome knew who those men were and who they are that they doe confide in for I know 1. Some of them are poore men of most desperate fortunes if bankrupters may be termed such 2. Others to be most factious and scismaticall men addicted to Anabaptisme and Brownisme and other worser sects as amongst the London Commanders Ven Manwaring Fawlke Norington Bradly Bast and the rest whereof there are twise as many schismaticall and as it is conceived beggarly sectaries as are right honest men among them and if we looked among their Lords and all the rest of their nomination throughout the Kingdome I doubt we shall find some of them to be just of the same condition And because the King to whose care and trust God had committed all the people of this Kingdom and not to them that are called by the King and chosen only by men and that only for this time and of whom he will require an account of the lawes and religion whereof he made him keeperand defender and not of them thought most rightly that this Militia should be commited rather to such men as he might confide in as it was in the raigne of Queene Elizabeth and His Father of ever blessed memory rather than to any that they should name which was to disrobe himselfe of all his regall power of the chiefest garland of his royall prerogatives without which he could hold his Crown by no better a tenure then durante beneplacito and to put the sword out of his owne hand into the hands of them that could not love him because they could not trust him as they alleaged and what reason had he to trust them that were causelesly so distrustfull of him they startled at this deniall And because the King of heaven had by this time opened the Kings eyes God openeth the Kings eyes to let him see what hitherto he could hardly imagine that these men to whom he had granted for the good of his Kingdome so many acts of grace and favour as never any King of England did before and had very graciously offered to commit to the hands of their owne choosing so large a share of the Militia as might have rendered the whole Kingdome most secure if security in a iust and legall way had beene all that they sought for had their intentions far otherwise then they pretended and that not only the government of the Church was intended to be altered and the governours thereof destroyed but himself also was hereby disrobed of those rights which God and the lawes of the land had put into his hands and the Kingdome brought either into a base tyranny or confused anarchie when all things shall be done according to the arbitrary power of these factious and schismaticall men therefore he utterly refused to grant their desires and most wisely withstood their designe Whereupon these men put their heads together How they strengthened themselves to make their ordors firm with out the king to consult how they might strengthen themselves and make their ordinances firme and binding without the King and to that purpose having by their former doings gotten too great an interest as well in the faith as in the affections of the people in confidence of their owne strength they came roundly to the businesse and what they knew was not their right as their former Petitions can sufficiently witnesse they resolve to effect the same by force but as insensibly as they can devise as 1. To seize upon the Kings Navie to secure the Seas 2. To lay hold upon all the Kings Magazin Forts Townes and Castles 3. To with-hold his moneyes and revenues and all other meanes from the King 4. To withdraw the affections and to poyson the loyalty of all his Majesties Subjects from him And hereby they thought and it must have beene so indeed Psa 30 6 except the Lord had beene on his side they had made their hill so strong that it could not be moved and the King so weake and destitute of all meanes that he could no wayes subsist or relieve himselfe as a member of their owne House did tell me for 1. 1 Earl of Warwâ—ck made vice Admirall They get the Earle of Warwicke to be appointed Vic-admirall of the Sea and to commit all the Kings Navie into his hand and to take away that charge from Sir Iohn Pennington whom most men believed to be farre the better Sea-man but more faithfull to his King and the other purer to the Parliament 2. 2 Sir Iohn Hotham put to Hull for the Magazine They fend Sir John Hotham a most insolent man that most uncivilly contemned the King to his face to seize upon the Kings Magazine that he bought with his own money when they might as well take away my horse that I paid for and to keepe the King out of Hull which was his owne proper Towne and therefore might as well have kept him out of White-hall and was an act so full of injustice as that I scarce know a greater 3. 3 They detained the kings moneys Esay 1 23. Because moneyes are great meanes to effect any worldly affaire and the sinews of every warre when as men and armes and all other necessaries may be had for money some of them and their followers shew themselves to be just as the Peeres of Israel companions of thieves meere robbers which forcibly take away a mans money from him they take all the Kings treasure they intercept detaine and convert all the Kings revenues and customes to strengthen themselves against the King 4. Because their former Remonstrances framed by this faction 4 They labour to render the king odious by lyes of the ill government of this Kingdome though in some things
true which the King ingeniously acknowledgeth and most graciously promiseth to redresse them yet in all things full of gall and bitternesse against the King could not so fully poyson the love and loyalty of the Kings Subjects as they desired especially the love of those that knew his Majestie who the better they knew him did the more affectionately love him and the more faithfully serve him they thought to doe it another and a surer way with apparent lyes palpable slanders and abominable accusations invented printed and scattered over all the parts of this Kingdome by their trencher Chaplaines and parasiticall Preachers and other Pamphleters some busy Lawyers and Pettifoggers to bring the King into an odium disliked and deserted of all his loving Subjects And what created power under heaven was able to dissolve that wickednesse which subtiltie and malice had thus treacherously combined to bring to passe Hereupon after many threatning votes 1 Lye that he intended to war against his Parliament and actuall hostility exercised against his Royall person the King is forced to raise a guard for the defence of himselfe and those his good Subjects that attended him then presently that small guard that consisted but of the chiefe gentry of the Countrey was declared to be an army raised for the subversion of the Parliament and the destruction of our native liberties an invincible army is voted to be raised the Earle of Essex is chosen to be their Generall with whom they promise both to live and die the Earle of Bedford Generall of the Horse moneyes are provided and all things are prepared to fetch the King and all delinquents or to be the death of all withstanders and that nothing might hinder this designe though the King in many gracious Messages attested by the subscription of many noble Lords that were upon the place assured them he never intended any warre against his Parliament yet they proceed with all eagernesse and declare all those that shall assist the King either with Horse money or men to be malignants and enemies unto the King and Kingdome and such delinquents as shall be sure to receive condigne punishment by the Parliament Hoc mirum est hoc magnum And among the rest of their impudent slanders this was their Master-piece which they ever harped upon that hee countenanced Papists and intended to bring Poperie into this Kingdom and to that end had an Armie of Papists to assist him But to satisfie any sensible man in this point I would crave the resolution of these two Questions 1. Two questions to be resolved Whether every Papist that is subject to his Majestie is not bound to assist and defend his King in all his dangers 2. Whether the King should not protect his Subjects that are Papists in all their dangers so farre as by the Law he ought to do it 1. All Papists bound to assist their King and accept of their service when himselfe is invironed with dangers For first I believe there is no Law that inhibiteth a Papist to serve his King against a Rebellion or to ride post to tell the King of a Designe to murder Him or any other intended Treason against Him or being present to take away a weapon from that man that attempted to kill the King because his not comming to Church doth not exempt him from his Alleageance or discharge him of his dutie and service unto the King and therefore if a Fleet from France or Spain or any other forreigne part should invade us or any Rebellion at home should rise against his Soveraigne and seck to destroy those Lawes and Liberties whereof himselfe and his Posteritie hath as good an interest as any other Subject I say he is bound by all Lawes to assist his King and to do his best endeavour both with his purse and in his person not onely to oppose that externall Invasion but also to subdue as well that home-bred Rebellion as the forreigne Invasion 2. 2. The King bound to protect dutifull Papists If a Papist should be injured his estate seized upon his house plundered and his person if taken imprisoned not because he transgressed any other Law but that he dispenceth not with the Law of his conscience to be no Papist and being thus injured should come unto his King and say I am your Subject and have lived dutifully I did nothing which the Law gives me not leave I have truly paid all duties and humbly submitted my selfe to all penalties and yet I know not why I am thus used and abused by my neighbours I am driven from my house by force of Armes and I have no place to breathe but under your Majesties wings and the shelter of your power therefore I beseech you as you are my King and are obliged to do your best for the safetie of your true Subjects let me have your protection and you shall have my service unto death I would fain know what the King should do in such a case denie his protection or refuse his service the one is injustice the other not the best wisedom especially if he needed service for as the Law of nature and of nations requireth all Subjects to obey their Kings and faithfully to serve them of what Religion soever their Kings shall be so Lege relationis every King is bound to protect every faithfull Subject that observeth his Lawes or submitteth to their penalties without corrupting of his fellow Subjects of what Religion soever he is because they are his Subjects not as they are faithfull Christians but as obedient men and he is to rule not over the faith of their soules but the actions of their bodies and it is an Axiome in Divinitie that Fides non cogenda and if Kings cannot perswade their Subjects to embrace the true Faith they ought not to cut them off so long as they are true Subjects and therefore with what reason can any man blame the King either for protecting them in their distresses or accepting their sevice in his own extremities I cannot understand And yet for the goodly companie of Papists which his Majestie entertaineth in all his Armies they cannot all make up so much as one good Regiment as an Officer in his Majesties Armie confidently affirmeth but it will serve their turne to taxe the King to lay imputations upon him even the very things that belong unto themselves as the whole summe of those things that are expressed in Englands Petition to their King Pag. 10. mutatis mutandis might truly be presented to the two Houses that have now almost destroyed us all and to make them mightie faults in him which are no faults at all in themselves because there is no fear of their favouringPoperie though as they have very many so they should have never so many more in their Armie 3. Lye that he caused the Rebellion in Ireland Another Slander they not onely whispered but also dispersed the same farre and near among the
people to make the King still the more odious unto his Subjects that he was the cause of the Rebellion in Ireland and that the Rebels there had his Commission under the Broad Seal to plunder the Protestants and to expell them thence that so the Gospell being rooted out of Ireland Poperie might the easier be transported and planted here in England whereas themselves in very deed were the sole causers of this Rebellion as I have shewed unto you before The cause of this stander and the colour of this stander was that the Rebellion being raised the Ring-leaders of those Rebels the sooner to gain the simple to adhere unto them perswaded them to believe that they had the Kings command to do the same and to that purpose shewed them the Broad Seal which they had taken from Ministers and Clerkes of the Peace and others whom formerly they had plundered and taken their Seales from them which they cunningly affixed to certain Commissions of their own framing as M Sherman assured me he saw the Broad Seal that was taken from one M. Hart that was Clerke of the Peace in the Countie of Tumond and was found in the pocket of one of the chief Leaders of the Rebels when he was killed by the Kings Souldiers yet this false and lewd practice of these Rebels in Ireland was a most welcome newes to this Faction in England to say this imputation upon the King that he was the cause of this Rebellion which themselves had kindled and were glad to finde such a colour to impute it unto him that it might not be suspected to be raised by them Many other such falsehoods Lyes and impudent slanders hath the father of lyes caused these his Children most impudently to father upon the King but as the Philosopher saith Non quia affirmatur aut negatur How things are in deed res erit aut non erit things are not so and so because they are said to be so neither can they be no such things onely because they are denied to be such as Gold is not Copper because ignorant men affirme it to be so nor a drunken man sober or a vitious man vertuous because they deny him to be good and blazon him abroad for one of the sonnes of Belial but as Gold is Gold and Brasse is Brasse so godly men are good wicked men are evill and Rebels are none other than Rebels let men call them what they will and so our King is not such a man as they say because they affirme it but he is indeed a most just virtuous and most pious Prince let them say what they will Their tongues are their own and we cannot rule them and so all his followers are better Protestants in deed and lesse Papists in all points of faith than the best of them that terme us so by false names God forgive them these slanderous accusations CHAP. XI Sheweth the unjust proceedings of these factious Sectaries against the King eight speciall wrongs and injuries that they have offered him which are the three States and that our Kings are not Kings by election or covenants with the People ANd yet for all these strange courses contrary to all humane thoughts which is marvelous in our eyes Psal 118.23 Esay 46.10 the Lord of Heaven whose counsell shall stand and whose will shall be done hath them all in derision dissipates all these devices and turnes all the counsell of Achitophel against his own head when he opened the eyes of many millions of the Kings true Subjects to behold and detest these unfaithfull dealings and disloyall proceedings against so gratious a King and therefore petitioned and subscribed that his Majestie standing upon his Guard and defending himselfe from such indignities as might follow they would hazard their lives and fortunes to assist him to repell those more than barbarous injuries that were offered unto Him Therefore now Memoriae proditum est I finde it written that without fear of God without regard of Majestie without justice without honestie they are resolved rather than to repent of their former wickednesse to involve the whole Kingdom in an unnaturall civill War and to maintain the same against the will and contrary to the desires both of the King and Kingdom and it is almost incredible what wicked courses and how unjust and insufferable Orders and Ordinances you shall finde recorded that they have made 1. Against the King 2. Against the Subjects 3. Against the Law Which are all said to be exceedingly abused by them for 1. 1. Their proceedings against the King Against the King it is registred to Posteritie that they have proceeded besides many other things in all these particulars 1. 1. Wrong Matth. 8.20 They possesse all the Kings Houses Townes and Castles but what he gets by the strength of his sword and detain them from him so that we may say with our Saviour The foxes have holes and the fowles of the aire have nests but the King of England hath not an house allowed him by the Houses of Parliament wherein to put his head and they take not onely his Houses but also his rents and revenues and as I understood when I was in Oxford his very clothes and provision for his Table that seeing they could not take away his life by the sword they might murder him with cold or famine when he should not have the subsistence if they could hinder him to maintain life and soul together which is the shame of all shame and able to make any other men odious to all the world The complaint to the House of Commons Pag. 19. thus maliciously and barbarously to deal with their own most gracious King neither doth their malice here end but they with-hold the Rents of the Queen and seize upon the Revennes of our Prince which I assure them my Countrey men takes in great scorne and I believe will right it with their lives or this Parliament Faction shall redeem their errours with no small repentance when as we finde no Prince of Wales was ever suffered by his Subjects to have such indignities offered him by the greatest Pecres of England And here I cannot omit what Alderman Garroway saith of the reproach of Master Pym touching the maintaining of the Kings other Children which he professeth made his heart to rise and hoped it did so to many more Is our good King fallen so low Alderman Garroway his Speech that his Children must be kept for him It is worth our inquirie who brought him to that condition We hear him complain that all his own revenue is seized and taken from him Is not his Exchequer Court of Wards and Mint here his Customes too are worth somewhat and are his Children kept upon Almes How shall We and our Children prosper if this be not remedied And I pray God these things rise not up in judgement against them and this Nation but hereby they intended to verifie that disloyal Speech which
seemes they did unto Master Pym when an Order passed under his sole teste for taking away the Rayles from the Communion Table for this is a course we never heard of in former times 9. 9. The multiplying of their Priviledges When their Priviledges are so infinitely grown and inlarged more than ever they were in former Parliaments and so swelled that they have now swallowed up almost all the priviledges of other men so that they alone must do what they please and where they will in all Cities and in all Courts because they have the Priviledge of Paliament 10. When according to the great libertie of language 10. Their speaking and sâ—…ing in other Courts which we deny them not within their own wall they take the Priviledge to speak what they list in other places and to governe other Courts as they please where as they did in Dublin and do commonly in London they sit as Assistants with them that are priviledged by their Charters to be freed from such Controllers 11. When above all that hath been or can be spoken 11. Their close Committee they have made a close Committee of safetie as they call it which in the apprehension of all wise and honest men is not onely a course most absurd and illegall but also most destructive to all true Priviledges and contrary to the equitable practice of all publique meetings that any one should be excluded from that which concerneth him as well as any of the rest and this Committee onely which consisteth of a very few of the most pragmatical Members of their House must have all intelligences and privie counsels received and reserved among themselves and what they conclude upon must be reported to the House which must take all that they deliver upon trust and with an implicite Roman faith believe all that they say and assent to all that they do onely because these forsooth are men to be confided in upon their bare word The greatnesse of this abuse when their House hath no power to administer an Oath unto any man in the greatest affaires happinesse or destruction of the whole Kingdom for this is in a manner to make these men Kings more than the Roman Consuls and so as great a breach of Priviledge and abuse of Parliament as derogatory to his Majestie that called them to consult together and as injurious to all the people as can be named or imagined CHAP. XIV Sheweth how they have transgressed the publike lawes of the Land three wayes and of foure miserable consequences of their wicked doings 2. 2. Against the publike laws of the land FOr those publike written and better known laws of this Land they have no lesse violated and transgressed the same than the other and that aswell in their execution and exposition as in their composition for 1. 1. In the execution of the old lawes When they had caused the Archbishop of Canterbury to be committed to the Tower Judge Berkeley to the Sheriffe of London sir George Ratcliffe to the Gate-house for no lesse crimes than high Treason and many other men to some other prisons for some other faults yet all the world seeth how long most of them have beene kept in prison some a yeare some two some almost three and God onely knoweth when these men intend to bring them to their legall tryall which delay of iustice is not only an intolerable abuse to the present subiects of this kingdome to be so long deprived of their liberty upon a bare surmise but also a far greater iniury to all posterity when this president shall be produced to be imitated by the succeeding Parliaments and to iustifie the delayes of all inferiour Iudges 2. 2 In expounding the lawes Whereas wee believe what judge Bracton saith and Judge Britton likewise which lived in the time of Edward the first Si disputatio oriatur justiciarii non possunt eam interpretari sed in dubiis obscuris Domini regis erit expectanda interpretatio voluntas cum ejus sit interpretari cujus est condere Citatur a Domino Elism in post-nati p. 108 if any dispute doth arise the Judges can not interpret the same but in all obscure and doubtfull questions the interpretation and the will of the King is to be expected when as he that makes the law is to bee the expounder and interpreter of the law yet they have challenged and assumed to themselves such a power that their bare Vote without an act of Parliament may expound or alter a knowne law which if it were so they might make the law as Pighius saith of the Scripture like a nose of wax that may bee fashioned and bended as they pleased but we doe constantly maintaine that the House of Commons hath no power to adjudge of any point or matter but to informe the Lords what they conceive and the House of Peeres hath the power of Iudicature which they are bound to doe according to the rules of the knowne established lawes and to that end they have the Judges to informe them of those cases and to explaine those lawes wherein themselves are not so well experienced though now they sit in the House for cyphers even as some Clergie did many times in the Convocation and if any former Statute be so intricate and obscure that the Iudges cannot well agree upon the right interpretation thereof then as in explaining Poynings Act and the like either in England or Ireland the makers of the Act that is the King and the major part of both Houses must explaine the same 3. 3. In composeing and setting forth new laws Whereas we never knew that the House had any power to make Orders and Ordinances to bind any besides their own members to observe them as lawes yet they compell us to obey their orders in a stricter manner than usually we are injoyned by Law and this course to make such binding ordinances as they doe to carry the force though not the name of an Act of Parliament or a Law is a mighty abuse of our lawes and liberties for Sir Edward Cooke tels us plainly that as the constitution of our Government now standeth neither the House of Commons and the King L. Cooke in the preface of the Stat. of Westminster the second Lamberts Archeton 27.1 can make any binding law when the Peeres dissent nor the Lords and King when the Commonalty dissenteth nor yet both Houses without the Kings consent but all three King Peeres and Commons must agree before any coactive law can be composed Nay more it is sufficiently proved that dare jus populo or the legislative power being one principall end of regall authority was in Kings by the law of nature while they governed the people by naturall equity long before municipall lawes or Parliaments had any being for as the Poet saith Remo cum fratre Quirinus jura dabat Virgilius Hoc Priami gestamen erat cum jura
vocatis more daret populis Because this was the custome of the Kings of Scythia Assyria Aegypt c. long before Moses and Pharonaus when municipall lawes first began to give lawes unto their people according to the rules of naturall equity which by the law of nature they were all bound to observe And though some Kings did graciously yeeld and by their voluntary oathes for themselves and their successors binde themselves many times to stricter limits then were absolutely requisite as William Rufus King Stephen Henry the fourth Richard the third and the like granted many priviledges perhaps to gaine the favour of their Subjects against those which likely had a better title to the Crowne than themselves or it may be to satisfie their people as the guerdon or compensation for the sufferance of some fore-passed grievances as Henry the first Edward the second Richard the second and the like yet these limitations being agreeable to equity and consistent with Royalty and not forcibly extracted ought in all truth and reason to be observed by them And hence it is that the Kings of this Realme according to the oathes and promises which they made at their Coronation can never give nor repeale any law but with the assent of the Peeres and People But though they have thus yeelded to make no lawes nor to repeale any lawes without them yet this voluntary concession of so much grace unto the people doth no wayes translate the legislative power from the King unto his assistants but that it is formaliter and subiectivè still in the King and not in them else would the government of this Kingdome bee an Aristocracy or Democracy and not a Monarchy because the supreame power of making and repealing Lawes and governing or judging decisively according to those lawes Cassan in catal glorlamundi are two of those three things that give being to each one of these three sorts of government Therefore the King of England being an absolute Monarch in his owne Kingdome as Cassaneus saith and no man can deny it the legislative power must needs reside solely in the King 22 Ed. 3.3 pl. 25. Vid. The view of a printed booke entituled Observations c. where this point is proved at large p. 18 19 21 22. ut in subjecto proprio and the consent of the Lords and Commons is no sharing of that power but only a condition yeelded to be observed by the King in the use of that power and so both the Oath of Supremacy and the form of all our ancient Statutes wherein the King speakes as the Lawmaker doe most evidently prove the same unto us Le Roy voit Neither durst any Subjects in former times either assume such a power unto themselves or deny the same unto their King for you may finde how the House of Commons denying to passe the Bill for the pardon of the Clergy which Hen. 8. granted them when they were all charged to be in a Premunire unlesse themselves also might be included within the pardon received this answer from the King that he was their Soveraigne Lord and would not be compelled to shew his mercy nor indeed could they compel him to any thing else but seeing they went about to restraine him of his Liberty he would grant a pardon unto his Clergie by his great Seale without them Sir Rich. ◠in vita Her though afterwards of his owne accord he signed their pardon also which brought great commendation to his judgement to deny it at first when it was demanded as a right and to grant it afterward when it was received as of grace And yet the deniall of their assent unto the King is more equitable to them and lesse derogatory to him then to make orders without him and this manner of compulsion to shew grace unto themselves is more tolerable than to force him to disgrace and displace his most faithfull servants onely because others cannot confide in them when no criminall charge is laid against them And therefore for the Lords and Commons to make Orders and Ordinances without the King and in opposition to the King is a meere usurpation of the Regall power a nullifying of the Kings power and a making of the Royall assent which heretofore gave life to every law to be an empty piece of formality which is indeed an intolerable arrogancy in the contrivers of these Orders and the makers of these Ordinances a monstrous abuse of the Subjects and a plaine making of our good King to be somewhat like him in the Comedy a King and no King And where as no Subject and under favour be it spoken not the King himselfe after he hath taken his Oath at his Coronation is free from the observation of the established lawes yet they make themselves so farre above the reach of Law that they freed him which the Lord chiefe Justice Bramston had committed to Newgate for felony in stealing the Countesse of Rivers goods they hindered all men as we found in their journall from proceeding against Sir Thomas Dawes they injoyned the Judges by their orders to forbeare to proceed in their ordinary courses in the Courts of Justice contrary to the eaths of those Judges and some Parliament men came to the Bench to forbid the Judges to grant Habeas Corpuses which is as great an iniquity and as apparent an injustice as ever was done by any Parliament And that which is a note above Ela The most abominable wickednesse of these factious Rebels above all that could be spoken whereas the Law of God and man the bonds and obligations of civility and Christianity tie us all to be dutifull and obedient unto our King in all things either actively or passively and no wayes for no cause violently to resist him under the greatest penalties that can be devised here and damnation hereafter yet these men contrary to all Lawes doe injoyne us and compell us as much against our consciences as if they should compell us with the Pagan tyrants to offer Sacrifice unto Idols to war against our most gracious Soveraigne whom we from our hearts doe both love and honour and they proscrible us as malignants and as enemies to the Common wealth if we contribute not money horse and armes to maintaine this ungodly war Ps 50.22 August contra Faust l. 22. c. 75.76 and so become deadly enemies unto our owne soules O consider this yee that forget God lest for tearing us he teare you in pieces while there is none to helpe you for considering what the Apostle saith Rom. 13.1.2 And what Saint Augustine saith ordo naturalis mortalium paci accommodatus hoc poscit ut suscipiendi belli authoritas atque consilium penes Principem sit and lest men should thinke they ought by force of armes to resist their king for religion he answereth that objection by the example of the Apostles isti non resistendo interfecti sunt ut potiorem esse docerent victoriam pro fide
veritatis occidi We conceive this to be so execrable an act and so odious to God and man that we are made thus miserable and abused beyond measure to have our Religion which is most glorious our Laws that in their own nature are most excellent The miserable consequences of their wicked doings 1 Mischiefe and our Liberties that make us as free as any Subjects in the World under false pretences and the shadows of religion lawes and liberties to be eradicated and fundamentally destroyed whereby 1. We are made a spectacle of scorne 1. Mischiefe and the object of derision to our neighbour Nations that formerly have envied at our happinesse and we are become the subject of all pitty and lamentation to all them that love us 2. As in the Roman civill wars in the time of Metellus 2. Mischife the the son did kill his own Father so now by the subtilty of this faction we are cast into such a war as is 1. A most unnaturall War the son against the Father and the Father against the Son the Earle of Warwick fighteth for the Parliament and my Lord Rich his Son is with the King the Earle of Dover is with the King and my Lord Rochford his Sonne with the Parliament so one brother against another as the Earle of Northumberland with the Parliament and his brother with the King the Earle of Bedford with the Parliament and his brother with the King Master Perpoiat with the Parliament and the Earle of Newark with the King Devoreux Farmer with the parliament and his brother Thomas farmer together with his brother in law my Lord Cockain with the King and the like and of Cosens without number the one part with the King and the other with the parliament and if they doe this in subtilty to preserve their estate I say it is a wicked policy to undoe the kingdom which all wise men should consider 2. A most irreligious war when one Christian of the same professed religion shal bath his Sword and wash his hands in the bloud of his fellow Christian and his fellow protestant that shal be coheire with him of the same Kingdome 3. A most unnaturall irreligious and barbarous Warre when the Subject shall shal take Armes to destroy or unthrone their owne liege a Religious and most gracious King 3. 3 Mischiefe The Service of God in most Churches is neglected when almost all the ablest gravest and most O thodox Divines and Preachers are persecuted plundered imprisoned and driven to fly as in the time of the Arian or Donatist which was worse than the heathen persecution from City to City to wander in Desarts from place to place to save themselves from the hands of these Rebels against the King and persecuters of Gods Church which is a most grievous and a most cruell persecution far more generall than that of the Anabaptists in Germany or of Queene Mary here in England the Lord of Heaven make us constant and give us patience to indure it 4. 4 Mischiefe The whole Kingdome is and shall be yet more by the continuance hereof unspeakably impoverish'd and plunged into all kind of miseries when the I'ravailer cannot passe without feare nec hospes ab hospite tutus the Carrier cannot transport his commodity but it shall be intercepted the Husbandman cannot till his ground but his horses as my selfe saw it shall bee taken from the Plough and his Corne shall bee destroyed when it is ready for the Sickle which must be the fore-runner of a famine that is ever the Usher to introduce the Plague and Pestilence and all other kind of grievous Diseases and these things put together doe set wide our gates and open our ports to bring forraigne foes into our Coasts to possesse that good Land whereof we are unworthy because with the Israelites we loathed Manna we were weary of our peace and happinesse we would buy armes and be voluntiers and every Town being too wanton would needs traine and put themselves into a posture of defence as they termed it to be secured from their owne shadows and though the King told them often there was no cause of their Jealousies and therefore forbade these disloyalties yet just like the Jewes they were willing to be deceived by this miserable faction that contrived that Act whereby they have persidiously over-reached both our good King and the rest of our wel-meaning brethren either to perfect their designe or else to make themselves perpetuall Dictators and to betray the felicity of all our people under the name of Parliament which though as I said before I honour and love as much as any of the truest Patriots of either House both in the institution and the right prosecution thereof that is as it was constituted to be the great Councell of the Kingdome graciously called by his Majesties writ considently to present the grievances of the people and humbly to offer their advice and counsels for their reformation yet I doe abhorre those men that would abuse the word Parliament only as a stalking-Horse to destroy all Acts of Parliament and I hate to see men calling the fanatique actions of a few desperate seditious persons the proceedings of Parliament and others making an Idol of it as if their power were omnipotent or unlimited and more than any regall power their judgement infallible their Orders irreprehensible and themselves unaccountable for their proceedings to be so besotted with the name of it that this bare shadow without the substance for it is no Parliament without the King and the Major part of both houses is either banished or imprisoned Ingeniosus ad blasphemiant or compelled to reside with his Majesty should so bewitch us as Master Smith blushed not to say nothing could free us from our dangers but the Divinity of a Parliament out of our owne happinesse to become more miserable then heretofore this Kingdome hath ever beene by any civill War for if you will consider the Treasons and rebellions the injustice cruelty and inhumanity the subtilty hypocrisie lying swearing blasphemy prophanesse and Sacriledge in the highest pitch and many other the like fearefull sins that have been committed since the beginning of this Parliament by the sole meanes of this faction and observe the ill acts that have beene used by them to compasse things lawfull and the wicked acts that have beene daily practised to procure things unlawfull when by bloud and rapine and the curses of many fatherlesse and widowes they have gotten the Treasures of the Kingdome and the wealth of the Kings loyall Subjects into their hands and wasted it so that their wants are stil as notorious as their crimes wee may admire the miracles of Gods mercy and the bottomlesse depth of his goodnesse that the stones in the streets have not risen against them or the fire from Heaven had not consumed these Rebels that thus far and thus insolently had tempted Gods patience and provoked him to