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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29573	An apologie of John, Earl of Bristol consisting of two tracts : in the first, he setteth down those motives and tyes of religion, oaths, laws, loyalty, and gratitude, which obliged him to adhere unto the King in the late unhappy wars in England : in the second, he vindicateth his honour and innocency from having in any kind deserved that injurious and merciless censure, of being excepted from pardon or mercy, either in life or fortunes.	Bristol, John Digby, Earl of, 1580-1654.	1657 (1657)	Wing B4789; ESTC R9292	74,883	107

quae sito colore upon no pre●●se whatsoever to take arms against their lawful Soveraign yet taking it for good and Orthodox Divinity I conceive there needeth no other Argument but the reciting of his Tyrant to make good my Assertion that the Case would no way concern the King But the Wickednesse Malice and Danger of this Tenent besides the falseness of ir is That having once constituted a Position That by the people the Prince may be hostilelie resisted in such and such Cases and being in such and such a degree wicked and the people likewise therof to be the Judges there is a latitude left to every Sect to every mans Passion or to every mans Interest to fancy to himself that what disliketh him is Impiety Heresie or Oppression And to judge of the measure of his Princes wickedness or if he be not wicked enough yet to resist him by way of prevention lest he should become such For he saith not long after That Tyranny is like an Hectique Feaver which at the beginning is easie to cure but hard to discover but afterward is easily known but is become incurable and therefore must be timely prevented But leaving the wickedness danger and falsenesse of this Doctrine to be considered of admitting it were good and true as is before said let us examin how it is applicable to our present Case He supposeth his Tyrant to be an Enemy to God and Man with so many other Attributes of wickedness and impiety That Nero Caligula Domitian Iulian the Apostate Phalaris and Dionysius may well be ranked in his middle number of Princes that were not of the worst And I conceive that Treason and Malice it self will abhor the applicarion in any sort of his description of a Tyrant unto the King and so consequently of this new Doctrine to our present Case For my self I must avow it that by what I have read in the above-cited Author in Buchanan in Suarez and Mariana and what our Countryman Bishop Bilson hath written I was much confirmed in my Opinion of the unlawfulness of taking Armes against the King * For all rules with Exception confirm in all things but in the things excepted And all these Authors write with great strength against Resistance and taking Armes against the Prinre but only in the Case of Tyranny and the Romanists in case of the Popes deposing of them The latter whereof neither being nor admitted if it were I shall lay aside And shall only shew how far the King is from any of these Wickednesses and Impieties of which they compose their Tyrant I well know that Kings are Men made of the same Paste of flesh and blood with others and subject to the same weaknesses and to the same passions And as Brutus saith our reason can no more be severed from our said passions and infirmities than the soul can be from the Body whilst the man is yet living And thereupon saith We must not expect to have Princes against whom nothing can be said but we must think that all goeth well with us if they be moyennement bons Middlingly good And Commines saith That a Prince whose virtues exceed his vices ought to be esteemed and stiled a good Prince And of Princes it is a good rule Optimus est qui minimis urgetur He is best that hath the fewest faults for some faults being Men they will all have And certainly whosoever shall rightly know the King and be acquainted with his irreprovable Course of life his constant and dayly practice of devotions of Piety will not deny him the Title of a right good Prince And so notwithstanding his misfortunes and the unsuccessfullness of his affairs he will be esteemed when he shall be rightly known and considered without prejudice as he is unto me by reason of my long and near attendance about his Person and of whom I will be bold to say without flattery That having by the space of almost Forty years been conversant in most of the Courts of the Princes of Christendom as a publique Minister and been no uncurious observer of the Deportments of the Princes of my time I never knew any Prince or scarcely any private man in whose life there hath been less reproveable And what is here said I conceive will be abundantly sufficient to shew that if this new Doctrine of hostile Resistance were admitted for good it would in no kind justifie it in this present Case It being only applicable to the worst of men when here it must be made use of against an exemplary good Man and who may be justly numbred amongst the best of Princes As I doubt not but it will clearly appear when the truth of many things which have been suggested against him shall be faithfully set down As there will be occasion to do in the following Discourse And so I shall pass to the next religious Obligation whereby my Conscience hath been restrained from taking armes against the King which is the sacred Tye of the late Protestation and of so many solemn Oaths whereby I have engaged my self before God to bear him true Faith and Alleageance and to defend his Person and all his just Rights and Dignities CHAP. V. Setting down the Obligations and Tyes by solemn Oaths and Protestations of not taking Arms against the King IT will be easily assented unto by all sorts of Christians that Solemn Oaths established by lawful Authority and legally administred and in a matter that is not Malum in se absolutely wicked are the highest and strongest Obligations that can pass from Man to God from Nation to Nation from Subjects to their Prince or Prince to their Subjects or from Man to Man And this is not only so declared in Scripture but was undoubtedly part of that Natural and Moral Law which was by God planted in the heart of Man even from the Creation For we find it in practice before any written Law and by all Nations Heathens and Unciviliz'd and altogether ignorant of the Precepts either of the old or new Testament yet by the light of Nature they held Oaths the most sacred of all Assurances and Perjury amongst the most execrable and detestable of all Impieties Now the Oaths that I and the rest of the Kings Subjects have taken unto him for the serving of him with Loyalty with true Faith and Alleageance for the Adhering to him against all Persons for the defending of his Royal Person for the Maintaining and Upholding of all Rights Dignities and Prerogatives belonging to him or annexed to his Imperial Crown will be clearlyest exprest by setting down the Oaths themselves in terminis which shal be annexed hereunto for not interrupting too long the series of this Discourse Besides the Oaths formerly established by Law at the beginning of this Parliament There was a solemn Protestation propounded by the Houses of Parliament to be taken by themselves and so through the whole Kingdom And was allowed of by the King And this

as well as Iustice And is so expresly declared and annexed unto the King by the Stat. of the 27 H. 8. c. 24. The Revenues of the Church have been annexed unto it for the better part of one thousand years 7. The taking away of the Lands of Bishops and Cathedral Churches confirmed by many Charters from all our Kings have Prescription of many hundreds of years and are firmly annexed to the Church as Law Charters or Prescription can settle them Now if these Revenues shall be taken away and disposed of without processe of Law without the Kings consent who is sworn to uphold them and is founder of them all without the consent or forfeiture of the Possessors What man can think he hath a better Title to any thing he holdeth or assure himself of any Land or other thing he possesseth for one day longer than Houses shall please Besides it is against Magna Charta the Law and the Kings Oath and the Usance of the Kingdom in all times 8. The Court of VVard For the King to have Wardships is an inheritance and Right of the Crown approved by the Common Law of Enland and acknowledged and submitted unto in all Ages And the Court of Wards is setled and established by Act of Parliament in the time of H. 8 And it was indeavoured to be compounded for at a valuable consideration in the time of King Iames and by him refused because it was so great a flower of his Crown as was not fit to be severed from it And now if the Houses should force a Bargain at their own pleasure and their own price it were contrary to all Law all Reason and Moral Iustice and to the disherison of the Crown The detaining of the Kings Children under their governance 9. Touching the Kings children The ordering of their Education and their future Mariage cannot belong unto the Houses but unto the King by all divine human Laws and by the Law of Nature Neither is the contrary anywhere practised but by the great Turke No new Oaths can be imposed upon the Subject but by the warrant of an Act of Parliament 10 Touching imposing of new Oaths as is declared by the Petition of Right and is so setled by the Act of 3. Car. and hath been so declared during this Parliament by the two Houses upon occasion of the new Canons as appears in the Collection of their own Orders pag. 159.160.908.910 And we find the two Oaths of supremacy and Alleageance the first in 1. Eliz. the second in 3 Iac. were both framed and injoined to be taken in and by several Acts of Parliament and yet now do the Houses presse Oaths upon their fellow Subjects utterly inconsistent with the other legal Oaths which they have formerly taken and for the refusal of their Oath of Covenant and of their Negative Oath in expresse tearms to abjure their Alleagiance to their Soveraign they condemn them of Malignancy a new word of Art not formerly known to the Laws of England 11. Concerning Treason It is defined by the Act of the 25. Ed. 3. cap. 2. and afterward 1 H. 4. 2 Ma. that Act was confirmed and enacted That nothing should be adjudged Treason but what is declared to be so by the Statute of the 25. Ed. 3. or should be afterwards declared to be Treason by Parliament which is understood to be by Act of Parliament which cannot be without the Kings Royal assent and therefore in the Reign of H. 8. we find several Treasons enacted to be so by Parliament which afterwards were all repealed by that of the 2 Mar. And again in the Reign of Queen Mary Queen Eliz. and King Iames new Treasons declared by new Acts of Parliament in their several times But now in this present Sessions the two Houses in many several Cases singly of themselves without the solemnity of an Act by an Ordinance only have ordered that men should die as Traitors and lose their whole Estates without pardon or mercy for such supposed crimes as formerly were so far from being Treason as that they are not legally crimes or misdemeanors as may be instanced in divers particulars out of their own Coll. of Orders The treating with forein Princes and States 12. The treating with forein Princes and Sta●es the making of Peace and War and the sending of Ambassadors or Messengers to those purposes are Acts meerly regal and inherent in the Crown and never questioned till now By the Statute of 2. H. 5. cap. 6. The breaking of Truce and Safe-Conducts is enacted to be Treason so much it importeth the Honour of the Crown The King may out of doubt conclude Peace or proclaim War without his Houses of Parliament But to contribute to the maintenance of a forein War the Assent of the Houses is necessary it being in their free liberty to give or not to give Subsidies or other Aides to that purpose But for the making of Peace or War they have no Votes but it is in the sole power of the King Yet doubtlesse Kings do the more prudently when they take the advice and affections of their people along with them in those weighty affaires especially in making a War with a forein Prince or people otherwise they shall hardly have the Assistance of their purses 13. The nominating of Judges Sheriffs Justices c. without which the Kings of England can hardly make or maintein a War to their Advantage The nominating of Iudges Sheriffs Iustices of Peace c. was never pretended unto by the Parliament but in tumultuous and rebellious times and the Kings of England for some hundred of yeers last past have nominated and appointed them by their Writs or Commissions under their great Seal And by the Acts of 9. Ed. 2. the Statute of Lincoln and 12. R. 2. cap. 2. it is appointed how the choice of Sheriffs and other publique Ministers of Iustice shall be recommended to the King and that the King hath the sole appointing of them And it is so setled by Act of Parliament the 37. H. 8. That such nominations do and shall wholy belong unto the King and his Successors c. By these Animadversions it will clearly appear That the particulars which are mentioned in the 57 and 58 pages of this Discourse are meerly usurped and intruded upon by the Houses but de jure do solely and wholly belong unto the King or can have no life without him which was thought fit rather to be added by this Appendix than by inserting them in the Discourse it self for not interrupting the Series thereof FINIS See the Speeches made for Accōmodation before the War was actually begun in Append pag. 1. 9. Proofs out of the old Testament * Deut. 24.16 Ezech. 18.20 2 Kings 14.6 * Psal. 82. v. 6. * Deut. 1.17 2 Chro. 19. v. 6. Proofs out of the New Testament * Rom. 13. v. 2. See the Propositions in Append pag. 13. Vide Stat. 1. Jacobi cap. 1. in App. pag. 18. wherin the Soveraignty of the King is fully set down Lib. 5. Orat. in Auretium Epist. ad Demetrianum Niceph lib. 7. cap. 6. Tertulliun in Apologetico * Mat. 26.53 54. * 2 Kings 6. v. 16 17 18. c. Act. 12. v. 11. Act. 27.24 Act. 16.26 36. The Protestant churches declare against Subjects taking Arms against their Princes Confessio A●gust 〈…〉 6. Gallia Art 40. Helvet Art 26. Scot. Art 24. Anliae Art 27. Osor de Iur. Majest. fol. 140. Pierre 〈…〉 in his ●●●fence of 〈◊〉 Faith Pag. 3.4 Admitting all the Positions either by Protestants or Papists were true which allow Subjects to take Arms against their Princes yet they agree not with the present Case Shewing that the Tenents of Roman Catholiques are not applicable to the present Case Sheweth that the opinions of such Protestants as allow in some cases of subjects taking of arms against their Prince if they were true yet are not applicable to the present case * Exceptio firmat Regulam in non exceptis In Appendice page 17. In Appendice pag. 18. See the Stat. in Append. pag. 19. * ● Lod. Vives If all sin be the transgression of some Law I would be satisfied how men are become Delinquents that have transgressed against no law The most miserable condition of the Kings Loyal Servants by no prudence to be prevented nor they by any Innocency to be preserved * In what sort the Project of the Ship-mony was set on foot the fault wherof cannot with any Iustice be attributed to the King The fault of Monopolies not to be attributed to the King but to evil Ministers and Referrees A Princes Religion ought not to be a ground of Rebellion or disobedience 〈…〉 Hen. 3. King of Fr. by Iacque 〈◊〉 Hen. 4. King of by Fr. by 〈…〉 The Prince of 〈◊〉 by 〈…〉 The Non-conformists them●selves 〈◊〉 out 〈◊〉 P●●tell a●● 3 ●●c 1605. 〈…〉 clear to this point Vide Art 4 6 9. in Ap. pag. 19. The King caused Pr. Charles his Son and Heir to become a Suter unto the Houses for the saving the Earls life who came in person and propounded it as the first Request he had ever made unto them but could not obtain it In ●ppendice pag. 1. A. The Right of all th●se specified particulars from the l●tter A. to the Letter B. are fully shewn to belong unto the King and that the Houses can have no colour of pretence unto them In App. pag. 20. * Dic Lun●e 4 Ma●i 1646. O●dered that whosoever should ●a●●our or conceal the King and not 〈◊〉 it c. should be proceeded 〈◊〉 as a Traitor and d● without mercy B. * Phil. 3. v. 6. * 1 Tim. 1 v. 13. John 16.2 Matth. 7.12 * Le Roy ne fait to●t is only to be understood in the ordinary course of justice which the King administring by his Ministers and not in Person it is they that are the wrong doers and not the King and the subj●ct against 〈…〉 his Remedy Wisd. 6. v. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Matt. 7.12

not to follow him in his Wars against his Enemies or his Rebels which the Subject de bene esse is to understand to be such as the King proclaimeth to be Traitors Not that a Proclamation maketh them so but the Subject is so to esteem them until they be brought to a legal Tryal So that there never was a harder Condition nor more unavoydable than this of the Kings present Loyal Subjects who should have been Traitors by the Law if they should have taken Armes against the King and should likewise lose ther Lands Honours Castles c. if they did not fight for him And yet contrary to the Law Providing that no man should forfeit Life or Estate for serving of the King He shall by an Arbitrary Power of his fellow Subjects be condemned to lose both without Pardon or Mercy for doing that for which he must have lost legally both Life and Estate and his Soul to boot if he had not done it CHAP. VII The Motives deduced from Honour Honesty and Gratitude of not forsaking the King in his troubles BEsides the Obligation formerly set down deduced from the Law of God and the positive Law of the Kingdom there is a third Law which hath a great Authority in the hearts of all generous and noble-minded Men which is the Law of Honour and Gratitude which Law I conceive to be a Branch of the Original and first Law The Law of Nature For it hath had and still holdeth a Value and Reverence through all Religions as it hath done through all times I must confess this Law hath been and is in some kinds too high lifted up and is become the Idol of many mens fancies who pay unto it a more exact Obedience and are more carefull not to transgress against it than they are not to offend God or the Laws they live under whereof we have daily too many Presidents when men rather than to be failing in point of Honour will upon frivolous provocations decline all duties to God and Man and sacrifice to this Idol oftentimes the hazard of their Lives and Fortunes together with their Souls But this is an Excess and Excrescency of Honour and Courage in the justification whereof I know nothing that can be said In the excuse of it it is to be hoped that in so generally-received an Error whereby men become Infamous and scarce fit for honest company that comply not therein Custom and Universallity may allay and mitigate the Offence But that Honour which I speak of is better exprest by plain moral Honesty and Gratitude when neither Fear nor Disadvantage shall drive us or withold us from just Duties nor the Misfortunes or Distresses of those to whom we have had former obligations make us leave and forsake to be assistant and serviceable unto them in all just and lawfull things although it be to our own Hinderance or that we can expect no further good or advantage by them And herein my Case is different from the common Cases of Subjects being more particularly bound unto Gratitude by many Benefits and unto Honesty Affection and Fidelity by my Service in places of greatest Trust about the King both for nearness to his Person as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber and as a Servant confided in as a privy Counsellour As for Ingratitude it hath been at all times so detestable That to the Reproach of being ingratefull nothing can be added And the betraying or forsaking of a mans Master in his Distress hath so great a Rellish of the Judas that no noble and generous Heart would for any earthly Respect do any thing that might seem to be like it or be in hazard of being mistaken for it For mine own part I do ingenuously confess that had I no Precepts of the Law of God no Tyes by the Law of the Kingdom nor Horrour of Conscience for breaking those sacred Obligations into which I was entred by taking so many solemn Oaths Yet Gratitude and Honour singly should have been unto me of so high Recommendation That no Respect of my Life Fortunes or Posterity should have made me lift up my Hand against my King or to have forsaken my Master in his Miseries and Distress I have had the Honour to have served this King and his Father by the space of more than forty years and was by his Father from a younger Brother of a Gentlemans Family raised by his Goodness above my Merit to the Dignity of an Earl and a Conveniency of Subsistance in that Quality I was trusted by him in seven Ambassages and called to his privie Counsel recommended unto the Prince his Son as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber and which was above all these Obligations I was admitted to more than an ordinary measure of his Trust and Confidence And certainly these great Obligations from the Father could not but imprint Gratitude in my Heart towards the Son especially He being now become my King and Master And so by all the Oaths that I had taken to the Father I was likewise by him obliged to them as his Successor But besides these Tyes of Gratitude I must Protest that weighing and considering impartially the Kings Actions either as they relate to his Government as a King or his personal Deportments as a Man setting Conscience aside and that I had not been thereby restrained I could never find any thing that could satisfie my judgement in point of Moral Justice or right Reason for the taking Arms against him I must and do confess that some things and too many w●●● ill done by the Kings Ministers and the Subjects Propriety and Liberty might have run great hazard under an ill Prince by those waies that were then set on foot For to speak freely my sense by the Principles then received all was put into the Kings hands for Necessity was made Master of all and of that Necessity the King was made the sole Judge and Princes may easily mistake their own private Wants for publique Necessity But from this Excess little of the fault can with Reason be charged upon the King and less ground for the taking of Arms For it is well known the King having been unseasonably imbarqued in War both with France and Spain his Treasure was wholly exhaust and he was reduced to great streights The King called divers Parliaments but they proved so unhappy that two or three of them were dissolved in great disorder and the Kings Wants were not relieved but the King and his People parted with little satisfaction on either side The King then being enforced to use all indeavours for his Relief in these his great VVants consulted with the Officers of his Revenew and his learned Councel what course was to be taken for his Supply without calling a Parliament For it had been voted at the Councel-Table That the Calling of a Parliament was not then fit or seasonable And at the breaking off of the last Parliament before this An. 1640. It had been declared

them any Right to which they laid Claim But if the making of Ordinances without the King of equal Authority with Acts of Parliament to which the Royal Assent had passed The keeping in their hands the Militia Forts and Navy exclusively to the King The altering of Church-Government established by Law without the Kings Consent The making a new Great Seal The proscribing of the Kings loyal Friends and Servants to loss of life and estates without pardon or mercy before either Summons Tryal or Conviction The taking to themselves the sole Power of pardoning and disposing of Confiscations If the setting unto sale the Lands and Revenew of the Church for so many hundreds of years appropriated unto it by their single Arbitrary Power without the Kings Consent who is Founder of all the Bishopricks and which he was sworn to preserve If the abolishing of the Court of Wards and discharging the Subjects of their Tenures and so consequently of their service to the Crown If the deteining of the Kings Children from him the breeding of them and the future Mariage of them belongeth unto them If the Power of injoining new Oaths upon the Subject contrary to all Law and without the King If the making what they please Treason ex plenitudine potestatis ●s the * harbouring of the King c. notwithstanding that the Law hath determined what shall be adjudged Treason and nothing else If the sending to and treating with forein Princes of War and Peace or the nominating of Judges Sheriff and the Officers of the Crown and many things of this kind If they lay Claim unto these as their Right I must confesse I have not known any satisfaction offered unto them by the King Only in the point of his Servan●s he hath alwaies protested that he would protect no man whatsoever so that he might be brought to a Legal Tryal according to the due Course of Law which he is bound to see afforded to all his Subjects But for the rest of the above specified particulars I do not know that the King hath indeavoured their satisfaction Neither can it be supposed by any rational man that they will ground their defensive War upon any Claim they will make unto them For although de facto in the Contestation of War they have seized and possessed themselves of them yet they will not pretend that they have right unto them de jure And it is Right that constitutes the Iustness or Uniustness of the entring into a War Success protecteth and may establish for the future but cannot rectifie or make good an unjust beginning And it must be their future proceedings by which the most probable Iudgement can be made of their former intentions For now that they have overcome all oppositions If they shall return to a peaceable legal Settlement and leave to use Arbitrary Government which they may pretend they have been inforced unto during an Actual War and shall only retain their just Liberties and Privileges with such additions and inlargements of Graces and Immunities as the King being free and without constraint shall be contented to grant together with prudent Cautions for their own Indempnity and Security for the future which in Cases of this Nature must ever be supposed that rational Men will indeavour and successfull men that have the Power in their hands will expect If they will let the Subject have the comfort and security of a general Pardon and an Act of Oblivion not force the consciences of their fellow subjects by new Oaths which they themselves have acknowledged to be contrary to the Law and against the Petition of Right If they will endeavour really the settlement of Religion by a moderate Reformation and not by a total ruine of the most Orthodox and flourishing Church of Europe and so restore the King to what is undeniably his and make the known Law the Rule of Government These will be the strongest Arguments that Defence was rather intended than a Conquest But if Armies shall be reteined when there are no Enemies and by them an Arbitrary Power held up over mens Lives Liberties and Estates and the King kept in the nature of a subdued and useless Person little will be believed of any Intention of taking only defensive Arms CHAP. X Shewing a particular Tye of Gratitude by the Generousness and Reconcileableness of the Kings Disposition THere was yet a further Tye of Gratitude put upon me by the Generousness and Reconcileableness of the Kings Disposition a virtue ever to be wished but not often found in offended Princes For I having been so unhappy as to have fallen very highly into his Disfavour and to have remained many years under a Cloud of his heavy Displeasure yet not long before the beginning of this Parliament having the opportunity of accesse unto him at the great Counsel at York And then being imployed as Prolocutor in the Commission for the Treaty with the Scots at Rippon for a Cessation and afterwards for the Peace at London he was pleased to receive so good satisfaction concerning me and all my former proceedings that he did graciously pass by whatsoever offence he had conceived against me and did not only call me to his Counsel-Table where in regard of my many years service under his Father he might have judged me usefull unto his service but out of a Confidence and Trust which to fail in even amongst Heathens would be held odious admitted me to the place of the nearest Attendance about his Person as a Gentleman of his Bed-chamber who besides the Privileges of Access in all places have the Honor to sleep by him in the night in his Chamber and to be trusted alone with the safety of his Person as I have often been And this place is accompanyed with a particular Oath of distinct services Of attending upon his Person of not Acting or Concealing any thing to his Prejudice and other things of particular service more than other subjects do swear unto And I must confess that if all the above alleged Reasons had been laid aside and that there had been no other Tye but this new Obligation of the Kings Reconciliation and of his trusting and confiding in me knowing him to be so free not only from all things that might justifie the taking Arms against him but from all things of doing wrong or oppression if other mens errors or corruptions were not put upon his Score That if all the misfortunes that have befallen me and my Family had been foreseen by me and might have been prevented by my forsaking of my Master only because he was in distress I would rather have embraced this poor and exiled condition than to have lived in any Estate of plenty whatsoever reproaching to my self daily and hourly my Infidelity and Ingratitude CHAP. XI A Brief Summary of the Reasons formerly set down for the not taking Arms against the King THese are the Reasons that have reteined me in that Duty which I conceived my self

bound unto towards the King The sum of them being briefly thus 1. I understood Hostile Resistance against the King to be expresly prohibited by the word of God both in the old and new Testament 2. I should have gone against the Doctrine and Practice of the Primitive Church and against the present Tenents and Confessions of Faith of all the Reformed Churches 3. Admitting the Maxims of those hot-headed men either Romanists or Protestants that have written in favour of Subjects taking Arms against their Prince to be true as they are false and condemned by their own Churches respectively yet in this Case they could be no Arguments to me For that their Doctrine and Principles are in no kind applicable to the present matter in Fact 4. I should have directly broken all those solemn Oaths which I had so often taken of Fidelity and Allegeance to the King 5. I should have gone against the Laws of the Kingdom by which to take Arms against the King or to adhere to his Enemies c. is made Treason 6. I should have been failing in the Obligations of Honor and Gratitude 7. I should have transgressed against Moral Honesty and natural Iustice to have fought against the King as an unjust and an irreligious Man whom I knew to be in more than an ordinary measure Iust and Religious So that if I should have broken through all these Duties of Religion of Oaths of Loyalty of Laws of Gratitude and Moral Honesty by doing presumptuously against my Conscience how could I but have feared to be made as miserable in the next World as I should have remained desp●cable in this And howsoever this may be judged a severe Censure ' It is only against my self as I say in the beginning of this Discourse Men may upon differing Painciples go differing waies And I cannot be so uncharitable as to think so many grave learned and noble Personages would break through so many plain Duties under which they had formerly lived And unto which they had not only sworn but conformed themselves But that they had either found out or had had revealed unto them some such things for the satisfaction of their Consciences as God hath not yet been pleased I should attain unto If I may see them in writing I shall peruse them willingly And if I shall find in them but so much Reason as may induce me to believe that upon their own Principles and not by Fear Interests or likelyhood of prevailing their Consciences may have been perswaded that way Although I disapprove their said Principles and still retain mine own yet I shall say Bonâ intentione mali sunt which though it doth not justifie an evill Action yet it doth in some measure excuse and lessen the Offence St. Paul was a great * Persecutor of the Church But because he did it out of abundance of Zeal * He obtained Pardon for that he did it ignorantly Our Saviour saith to his Disciples The time will come that whosoever killeth you will think they do God good service And those very Murtherers would have been in much better Case than I should have been that should have sinned presumptuously and against the perswasion of mine own Conscience whereas they had the Glory of God for their end though upon false Principles And certainly presumptuous sins being as it were a defying of God are of greater Provocation And I shall recommend unto those whose Consciences have led them another way that Imborn Charitable principle of the Law of Nature as well as of the Gospel Quod tibi fieri non vis alteri ne feceris Whatsoever ye would that men should to do you do ye even so unto them And if Conscience shal be a discharge or supersedeas unto them against known Duties against Oaths and Established Laws Let Conscience in me grounded upon so many Reasons as in this Discourse are set down be likewise pleadable for the doing of those Duties to which I conceived my self obliged both by the Law of God and Man and which hitherto both they and I have practised CHAP. XII All the former Reasons applyed to the present Case of King Charles with a positive opinion thereupon THese have been the Motives of setling my Conscience in the Opinion that I shall briefly here set down deduced from the Principles of this Discourse which upon this individual Case is That neither upon pretext of Religion Personal Vices Excesses in Government nor any other Colour or Pretext whatsoever the Subjects of the Crown of England may withdraw their Obedience or make Hostile Resistance to King CHARLES the present King Being by Right of Inheritance justly possessed of the Crown His Title no way depending either upon his Divine or Moral Vertues And the said Subjects having received him and acknowledged him for their only Supreme Governor done him Hommage and sworn to him Faith and Allegeance absolutely and without Condition As for other Kings or Potentates whether Elective Kingdoms or Kingdoms that at the Erection of them were received by the first King upon Express Covenant and only with a Conditional Obedience as is pretended by those of Aragon and others of these I shall not speak Neither shall I adventure to speak of those Catholique Kings and Princes which acknowledge in spiritual matters a Superiour Iurisdiction in the Pope over them And he pretendeth as hath been before set down by necessary Relation and Dependency of the Temporal upon the Spiritual to have a Temporal Power over them in ordine ad spiritualia and hath often put this his Claim in Practice by accompanying his spiritual Censure of Excommunication with the Sentence of discharging Subjects of their obedience to their Princes and so consequently of deposing them Herewith I shall not meddle None of these cases being applicable to the present Case of King CHARLES who is no Elective King but holdeth his Crown by an unquestionable Title of Succession derived to him by Descent from his Ancestors for the space of more than six hundred years Neither was there ever any Pact or Condition with him or any of his Ancestors of forfeiture in Case of misgovernment or wickedness And breach of Covenants forfeiteth not an Ordinary Estate unless there be an express Clause and Condition of forfeiture which in this Case neither was nor ever can be pretended It is true that his Ancestors and himself have limited and restrained their Legal Right by many Concessions and Laws in some Cases as The making of Laws without Consent of Peers and People and the levying of Mony c. which he cannot violate without great Injustice as shall be after shewn But no such Pact or Covenant can be produced or pretended whereby upon breach he forfeiteth his Soveraignty or maketh it justifiable for his Subjects to take Arms against him or to inflict Punishments upon his Person either by deposing Death or Imprisonment The Case likewise of Catholique Princes no way concerneth him who acknowledgeth in