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peace_n constable_n justice_n warrant_n 3,871 5 9.8211 5 true
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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A41185 A letter to Mr. Secretary Trenchard discovering a conspiracy against the laws and ancient constitution of England : with reflections on the present pretended plot. Ferguson, Robert, d. 1714. 1694 (1694) Wing F752; ESTC R32026 71,664 47

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if they will not vouchsafe to hear and relieve the whole Kingdom may understand both how precariously every Man possesseth all that is valuable unto him and how little care particularly their Representatives take of them But I hasten to another Grievance which the Subject groaneth under in reference to his Liberty and which maketh the Sixth Illegality in the execution of your Office and in your Administration of the Affairs of the Government and this is That your Messengers do often search Houses and that by Night as well as by Day without the Presence and Company of a Constable or a Headborough So careful is the Law in relation to our Liberty and preservation of the Free-hold that every one has in it that as it will not suffer the House of a Peer to be searched nor his Person there apprehended without the Presence of a Justice of Peace so it doth not allow the breaking into and searching the House of the meanest Commoner without the Aid and Assistance of a Constable or one of parallel Character tho in some places otherwise stiled Those whom the Court calls Messengers are no civil Officers nor does our Law know them by any Title that empowereth them to meddle with Mens Persons or Goods farther than as they are Secretary-Office and Council-Chamber Porters to carry Warrants and Orders from thence to the Justices of Peace or Constables to get them executed Neither have the very Secretaries any Authority or Jurisdiction over the Liberty of the Subject in the Quality and under the Figure of Secretaries but merely as they are themselves Justices of the Peace Tho I know that in their own single Persons as well as towards others Mr. Secretary doth often supplant Mr. Justice and usurp over him Yet this I do affirm that according to our Laws all that they can pretend unto and claim under that Character is to write Letters hand the Peoples Petitions to their Master and his Answers to them and the like but they have no power to diseize Men of their Liberties or take away their Papers c. otherwise than as being Justices of the Peace 'T is true there is another Thing very much in Fashion which for what I pretend to understand either of Matters of Law or State their Jurisdiction may extend unto and I am sure that some of them thro the Profit they make by it find their Interest in it and that is the supplying your Gazetteers and Writers of News-Letters with Cargo of Intelligence the Honour whereof I do no wise envy those that practice it being in my Opinion no better nor other than the furnishing Wind at a certain Price to the Speaking-Trumpets and Cra●k-Farts of the Nation But Sir besides the Tyranny you exercise over us by authorizing or by countenancing your Messengers to break into and search our Houses without their being accompanied with a Legal and Civil Officer for all Power that the Law allows not is tyrannous and usurped how many particular Mischiefs are we subjected and enslaved unto by this one Method of your administring your Office For your Messengers being Fellows that most People are wholly Strangers unto and whom very few know by Face and least of all they whom they are usually heunded out upon how liable are we to be robb'd by such as they may either in Friendship lend their Badges unto or by those that may counterfeit them that being every way as feasible as counterfeiting the publick Coin is which is every day practised Nor while this Course is allowed are we out of danger of being murdered by Ruffians charactering themselves Messengers and furnished with the Passport of a Badge And this is the more easily practicable because those who are real Messengers carry many times only Blank Warrants and at other times especially towards meaner People refuse to produce and shew any at all But let us suppose that none do come to our Houses but such who truly are what they vouch themselves tho we can never be sure of it while the Method I have been mentioning is allowed or connived at yet if they exceed their Bounds and copy Sir W. Waller's Originals Pray in that case how shall we be redress'd or whom shall we attach for Reparations For it is upon that account as well as to keep the Peace that the Law ordains and requires the Presence of a Constable and of such a one as is of the Neighbourhood that if we be either pillaged or otherways injured we may know whom to sue and make responsible And I am very suspicious what your Messengers may do in fingering and detaining what they ought not to meddle with unless they be under the Inspection and Restraint of a Civil Officer since the time that I heard a very odd and ungentile Story of your self which I have made that just Inquiry into that I undertake for the Truth of it Namely That upon your being informed that a certain Gentleman about this Town had the Picture of the Prince of Wales which certainly is as lawful for any one to buy and keep as it is the Pictures of the Emperour Leopol● and K. William you sent for him I suppose by that Authority which you conceive vested in you as Secretary and having questioned him about it and demanding a sight of it upon his obeying your Command and gratifying your Request you put it immediately into your Pocket and have not to this Day restored it again Now pray what is this but to rob by virtue of the Seals of your Office and to teach those under you to do the like by your Example But it may be it was design'd for you as a Pledge of K. James's Grace and Favour and of your own Reconcillation to him and that the manner of your getting into Possession of it was only Artifice to conceal the Mystery of your having made your Peace with that Exiled Prince and to cover your remaining in the Post you are about K. W. in order to betray him of which your whole Administration seems strongly to smell But I hasten to another Miscarriage in your Management which as much declares your acting with Arbitrariness and Illegality as any of those can do which I have mentioned already and that is while you pretend to seize Papers of Treasonable and Seditious Importance your Officers take and carry with them the Deeds of Men's Estates their Books of Accounts relative to Trade and their Letters of private Conversation with their Friends All which as they ought to be preserved Secrets which none should presume to pry into without Consent of the Owners so the Law allows no Man a Right and Authority to meddle with them The disordering Men's Letters in reference to common and private Business may sometimes be an Inconveniency not easy to be redressed and the penetrating into the State and Condition of their Civil and Secular Affairs may come so to affect their Credits that the Wrong is for ever Irreparable There are