Selected quad for the lemma: love_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
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A44288
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An honest commoner's speech
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Honest commoner.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing H2580; ESTC R6146
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10,142
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9
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AN Honest Commoner's SPEECH WHere the King ends his Speech I will begin mine Since his Majesty himself tells us That we have such an opportunity now to settle the future Quiet and Prosperity of these Kingdoms and all Europe as we can never hope to see again We ought I think to believe him and apply it the best we can to a common Safety Give me leave therefore to say and press you by all that is dear to you your Liberties your Honour your Posterity that having but one throw more for your Lives for your All you trifle not you mistake not you misuse not this opportunity Charity begins at home it is a sensible Proverb and never more seasonable and to instruct our selves the best we can allow me to look back a little into former Reigns The struggle that has been in these Kingdoms since the latter end of King James the First 's Time between the Court and Countrey Party cannot I am sure it ought not to be unknown to any Member that has the Honour of Sitting in Parliament for nothing is more Instructive and Accomplishing to the Persons that compose it We shall find an endeavour in the Court to grow upon the Rights and Priviledges of the People and a most flattering Clergy ever ready to stamp all these Attempts under the Banner of Prerogative with their Jure Divino I will not run into their History that of the Star-Chamber shall prevent me to be had at every Book-sellers there cannot be a worse nor a truer It leads me to pity Kings and excuse them for their Errors of their Government are rarely their own they see and hear by other Mens Eyes and Ears and as they are interested Kings are abused and Royal Authority dishonourably employ'd It has been the Endeavour as well as Duty of the Sovereign Counsel of this Kingdom to give a check to these Abuses by representing freely to their Kings the Law the Constitutions what they may and may not do what is his and what is theirs their Consistency and Dependency and the dangerous Consequence of their adhering to such Counsels and persisting in those Courses And to the Honour of the Constitution and Wisdom of our Parliaments be it spoken those Kings have left the fairest Characters to their Names that have lived best with their Parliaments and you will find that they have been the ablest and valiantest of our Princes that have seen them oftenest and followed their Advice most but Three great opportunities we have lost which I will but hint at that you may encrease your Zeal by remembring them to improve this only one that is left us by which to retrieve the loss of them and save all The First was the Concessions of King Charles I. to the 19 Propositions presented to him in the Isle of Wight by the Parliament 1647. which the K. himself assures us were not the Constraint but Illumination of his Afflictions for after a series of Successes against him the Houses only prayed their antient Rights of him that though Personally in their Power they desired ever to be under his legal Authority and al horred to be thought to have their King at their Mercy but that they only redeemed him from the ill Counsel of Merciless and Mercenary Men. This opportunity was lost by the interruption of their own victorious Army which influenced by a few superiour Officers that found not their Account by the Peace had always the Means and Methods to discontent their Followers against their Masters and so turned their Swords upon those that paid them and from that time fought for their Leaders rather than their Countrey though in this the Men were possibly out-witted and abused The ill Consequences of this Oversight or rather Violence were many and terrible First That King 's Tragical Death not only a Dishonour to the Nation but a beheading of the Government a preposterous disabling of the Constitution as well as an unlawful Action Secondly From this sprung new Wars with Scotland and all over this Kingdom in Kent Essex Wales and Lancashire especially at Dunbar Preston and Worcester and though the Veins that were opened a fresh upon this sad occasion bled freely and largely every where and put all parts of the Kingdom into Mourning more perishing in two Years of this second Civil War than in the seven Years of the first yet the fatalest part of the Business was the Banishment of the young Princes for when they were compelled to seek their Bread among Strangers they learned their Customs and suck'd in with foreign Air outlandish Principles and this naturally led them to dislike the Government as well as the People of their own Countrey which very consideration has sometimes obliged me to make allowances in my own Reflections upon the Conduct of the Brothers who perhaps were more Unhappy than Faulty and much of that owing to us our selves I will close this Remark with saying We had saved our King our Allegiance our Honour our Blood and Treasure and a better Thing our Government if we had improved that Isle of Wight opportunity But some will say this was not the Act of the Kingdom but of a few ambitious Men true but the Consequences were as bad and for that Reason let us have a care of Victorious Armies and their Ambitious Leaders while they are in our Power there is at least that Instruction in it But our next Instance shall be of an opportunity as extravagantly lost and with a sort of universal Neglect if not Consent and that was the Restauration of his Son King Charles II. For he that would have Married Lambert's Daughter and returned upon almost Republican Principles would certainly have thought it Duty and Religion to have submitted to and performed his Royal Father's Commissions to the Priviledges of the People and Power of Parliaments but this opportunity was slipt too our Extreams were so great in Love and Hatred that we could not find in our Hearts to observe any mean for the real Good of Prince and People We would be Debauch'd in spight to the preciseness of the Party we hated and the King should return unconditional that we might be even with them for their Unmonarchical Principles It was Rebellion now to fight by his Authority against his Person and Treason to disinguish his politick from his personal Capacity and Parliaments themselves might be Disloyal for we were told That our Kings being Sovereigns they had no Superiour but God and their People neither Collectively nor Representatively could so much as put the least Restraint upon the Person of their King and that such Attempts were Treason within the 25 Ed. 3. and much more to alter the antient Frame of the Government But about 66 being awakened out of our excesses of Joy and Revenge by the nature of Things we repented too late and after 78 we would have given half our Estates and as much of our Blood too for such an opportunity as what we