THE LATE PROCEEDINGS AND VOTES OF THE PARLIAMEMT of SCOTLAND Contained in an ADDRESS Delivered to the KING Signed by the Plurality of the Members thereof Stated and Uindicated Scilicet res ipsa aspira est at vos non timetis sed inertia mollitia animi alius alium expectantes cunctamini videlicet diis immortalibus confisi qui hanc rempubl in maximis saepe periculis servavere At non votis neque suppliciis muliebribus auxilia deorum parantur Vigilando agendo bene consulendo prospere omnia cedunt ubi socordiae tete atque ignaviae tradideris nequicquam deos implores irati infestique sunt Cato apud Salust GLASGOW Printed by Andrew Hepburn Anno Dom. 1689. THE LATE Proceedings and VOTES OF THE PARLIAMENT OF SCOTLAND c. TO remain silent under the Aspersions which some busy but either weak or ill Men are endeavouring to fasten not only upon the Proceedings but upon divers of the most Honourable and Loyal Members of Parliament were to be no less treacherous to his Majesty than careless of the Reputation of that whole Illustrious Body as well as of the Integrity of those Persons who are said to have so much influenced the Transactions of it and whose chief Crime with those that Malign and Traduce them is their having expressed so much Affection and Zeal for His Majesty's Person and Service And as the representing their Actions in a true Light is all that is needful both to justify and commend them so whosoever will be at the pains to examine them will find them adjusted to all the Rules of Law Religion and Policy And as it is not to be doubted but that whensoever the Parliament Assembles they will both vindicate their Proceedings in Customary and Legal Methods and exert that Authority which is essential to them over those of their own Members by whom they have been slandered so all that is now to be endeavoured in their behalf is to vouchsafe unto the English Nation to whom they have been misrepresented such a brief Account of their Transactions with the Occasions Reasons and Motives of them as may not only manifest the Wisdom and Loyalty of that Parliament but demonstrate beyond all contradiction that the only design they have been pursuing was to preserve and maintain His Majesties Honour secure and establish him an Interest in the Love and Hearts of his People and make His Throne firm and durable It is too evident either to be denied or Apologized for that all the Laws Priviledges and Rights of the Kingdom of Scotland have under the Late Reigns been not only Usurped upon and Invaded but Subverted and Overthrown For by gradual Inlargements of the Prerogative beyond what was allowed by the Rules of the Constitution and the Statutes of the Realm the legal and regular Monarchy of the Nation was swelled into an Arbitrary and Despotick Power So that all the Franchises and Rights which by Original Contracts and Subsequent Laws had been reserved unto the People were either overthrown or enjoyed precariously And we are compelled to say that the Coalition of Scotland with England under one Monarch without a Union between the Two Nations into one Legislative Body and Civil Government hath given great advantages to our Late Princes of treating us with a Rigour and Loftiness that our Ancestors were not accustomed unto And though a small Acquaintance with the Politicks might have instructed the English that whatsoever received a first Impression amongst us would sooner or later obtain a second Edition amongst them yet they seem'd either not to have foreseen or at least not to have resented it until the Original of King Jame's Absolute Power in Scotland which all Men were bound to obey without reserve was copied over in England in his Claim of Soveraignty in dispensing with those Laws that were the Fence about their Safety It was from the unconcernedness which the English have too often testified not to say the countenance they have given in Relation to the Usurpation of our late Kings over the Laws and Liberties of Scotland that those Princes have despised the Applications made unto them as well by Parliaments as by the Nobility and Gentry for redressing their Grievances and that the Nation remained so long discouraged from relieving it self in those Methods that were left it And as the Scots did for many Years sadly feel and experience into what Excess their Kings grew up in Usurping upon their Laws and Liberties from a hope and confidence of being justified and supported in those Invasions by the Strength and Treasure of England So the English cannot be altogether insensible how Charles the Second not only confronted their Bill of Exclusion in England with an Act in Scotland for the Hereditary Succession of his Brother but what large Breaches he was encouraged to make upon their Rights and Priviledges after his having obtained an Assistance of 22000 Men to be enacted and granted unto him by Law in Scotland and those to be used in what places and upon what occasions he should please to imploy them Nor are we able sufficiently to express our Obligations to His Present Majesty who being extremly sensible that our remaining disunited in our Governments and two distinct Monarchies though link'd together under one Monarch hath been one of the great Occasions and chief Sources of our common Miseries and Oppressions and being desirous both to redeem us from the illegal Sufferings we have already felt and to obviate those which might break in upon us under future Reigns hath therefore invited the Nations to such an Union of strength Councils and Legislative Authority as may render them a Defence to each other and not Instruments and Tools of enslaving one another and a mutual Prey Which as all wise and good Men do earnestly long for so the common Interest of the two Nations obliges them speedily to endeavour But we are forced to add that besides the Encouragement which our late Princes have assumed unto themselves of Usurping upon the Rights and Liberties of Scotland from an expectation of being supported in it by the Power and Wealth of England There is another Cause unto which much of their Invasion upon the Scot's Priviledges is to be ascribed and unto which we are forced to resolve many of our Miseries as the Spring whence they have flowed For upon the Succession of our Kings to the Crown of England and their fixing their Royal Abode and Regal Seat in that Kingdom they are thereupon fallen into a Method of deriving their knowledg of Scotish Laws and Customs of being informed of the Grievances of that Nation and of receiving Impressions of Persons and Things from one or two Ministers chosen to reside about them and in order thereunto advanced into Places of Honour and Trust and who too often have been found to want either the Honesty Wisdom or Courage requisite in those upon whom so much comes to be devolved Surely the World hath had sufficient Evidence in
the Ministry of the late Duke Lauderdale what Mischiefs a Person in his Post about the King may be instrumental in bringing upon the Kingdom of Scotland For tho he was endowed with too much Wit and Courage to be either hector'd or wheedl'd to be any Man's Tool and Property yet through lack of Probity on the one hand and excess of Ambition on the other he was easily prevail'd upon to become an Instrument of ruining and enslaving his Country What may Scotland then dread if a Person should be honoured with the Character and Trust of Secretary for that Kingdom in whom all the Qualifications for so considerable a Station were the sighing decently the entertaining one with a grave Nod or if you please a Grimace instead of a sold Reason the making those whom he judgeth Court-Favourites his unerring Oracles and learning the Customs Rights and Laws of his Nation from them that never did nor were obliged to know them the recommending those to be Privy-Councellors to the King who withstood his being so the favouring those in obtaining the Office of prosecuting Nocents who stand accused for endeavouring to subborn Witnesses for destroying the Innocent and as an Addition to all those Accomplishments should be so swallowed up in the immoderate Love of the World that instead of having his Thoughts exercised about the Service Grandeur and Safety of his Master should be wholly imploy'd how to ingross the considerable Places of the Kingdom for inriching his Family Into what Inconveniences may the best Prince be easily drawn if his Secretary be unable to advise him what he may legally do and what he may not With what Facility is a weak and easy Person in that Post misled by an English Minister of State who has a mind to be revenged upon Scotland for rejecting Episcopacy How may a Crafty and Treacherous Courtier that hath a purpose to play an after-game for the late King influence a Scots Secretary unskilled in the Politicks to imbroil his present Majesty with his People in Scotland and all for this that the Abdicated Monarch may have a new Throw for his Crowns again Suppose but one Person in Office about the King for the Affairs of Scotland and him to be extreamly timerous What fatal Councils under the fear of the Whip may he be prevail'd upon to suggest and give Hence it is evident what Disadvantages those of that Nation lie under of having both their Persons and Actions misrepresented and their Rights and Liberties undermined and invaded and that as well by reason of the King 's residing constantly at so great a distance from them as because of his having no more Counsellors usually about him in reference to their Affairs than who as a French King was pleased to express it may all ride upon one Horse Now as it was the Oppression and Slavery under which we had been brought that rendred His Majesties Undertaking in coming into these Kingdoms with an armed Force in order to redeem them both honourable and just So it was the hope of being delivered by him from Misery and Bondage that encouraged us first to invite and then to co-operate with him in the Prosecution and Accomplishment of his glorious Design It was the Invasions upon our Laws that we complained of and from which we desired and endeavoured to be relieved nor had we any Quarrel with the late King's Counsellors save as they were Advisers unto and Instruments of overthrowing them So that if what the Parliament of Scotland desires to have redressed be not something wherein their Laws have been invaded and their Rights violated they are to blame for insisting upon it as a Claim of Right and should rather crave it as an Act of Grace if they find the want of it prejudicial to the Nation But if what is required do either appear to have been wrested from the Nation or that through their not obtaining it they will be upon all occasions obnoxious to be oppressed and inthralled we may then assure our selves that His Majesty is too just as well as good to deny them For as His Majesty doth generously acknowledg in his Declaration emitted at the Hague for the restoring of the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom of Scotland That they who are concerned in the Laws Liberties and Customs established by Lawful Authority in a Nation are indispensibly bound to endeavour to preserve and maintain the said Laws Liberties and Customs so he doth in the same Declaration sacredly promise that upon being prosper'd in what he was then undertaking he will not only free that Kingdom from all hazard of Popery and Arbitrary Power for the future and deliver it from what at that time did expose it to both but settle it by Parliament upon such a solid Basis as to its Religious and Civil Concers as should most effectually redress all the Grievances under which it had groaned And therefore as we are not to imagine that a Parliament which in the whole course of its Proceedings hath testified so much Love Loyalty and Zeal for His Majesty both in advancing Him unto and maintaining Him in the Throne will abridg and lessen any of the just and legal Prerogatives of His Crown or challenge any Priviledg Right or Immunity which their Ancestors have not been possessed of under the best and most Glorious as well as Ancient Reigns so it were unpardonable to think that a Prince of so much Wisdom Goodness Honour Justice and Truch as His Majesty is known to be should either insist upon the detaining from His People what some of his Predecessors have by Fraud and Violence ravished from them or should so far depart from His Princely and Sacred Word as to frustrate the Expectations of His Leiges of having those Grievances redressed which His Parliament have condescended upon as necessary to be remedied But as His Majesties delaying to gratify the desires of His People is not the effect of Choice and Inclination but the result of a Force put upon him through the sinistrous Representations given him of their Demands both as illegal and as incroachments upon the Royal Authority So we do not wonder that the same Person should misreport the Actions of a Parliament and insinuate into his Master unjust and false glosses of their Votes who hath had both the Impudence and Treachery to endeavour to Possess the King with Disloyal Characters of his most dutiful best and useful Subjects And seeing his Capacity both as a Lawyer and His Majesties Advocate hath not served to instruct him of the danger nor to restrain him from Leasing-making which is Treason by the Law of Scotland it is to be hop'd that the Persons whom he hath criminally slandered will have the courage to Impeach him and that the Parliament will have the Justice to condemn him to the Punishment that the Law adjudgeth him unto Nor can it be matter of Astonishment to any to find a Person imposing upon His Majesty in reference to the Laws
three Estates or shall seek or procure the innovation or diminution of the Power and Authority of the Three Estates or of any of them shall be guilty of Treason Yet when the Present Parliament had declared the sense of the ancient Laws to be that the King in a total Vacancy could not appoint Judges without their being admitted by Parliament the advance that had been made against our Laws in His Majesties assuming a Right of Electing and Authorizing them hath been seconded with an impugning despising and subverting that Authority of Parliament which we have been speaking of Nor hath the Invasion upon Parliamentary Rights and Priviledges terminated here but there hath been a further assault made upon them both by the Councils assuming the Cognizance of that which was lodged before the Parliament and by their Actings determining in it contrary to the Vote and Declaration of the Estates who are the Supream Judicature and in conjunction with the King the one Legislative body of the Kingdom For it is an unquestioned Maxim That when a matter is once brought and tabled before the Parliament so as they have laid their hands upon it it is not afterwards to fall under the Cognizance or Determination of the Council or of any inferior Judicature unless remitted expresly unto them by the Parliament it self And therefore the Parliament having given a stop to the opening of the Signet and to the sitting of the Session till the King 's further pleasure was made known to them and until that matter should be brought to such an Accommodation as was consistent with the preservation of the Laws of the Kingdom it was a high Invasion upon the Authority and Jurisdiction of the Parliament for the Council to meddle in it But this they were aw'd unto by those who had given the King advice to chuse the Lords of Session and President and who knew no way to justifie one illegality but by another Yea our Ministers in order to make the first Act of Invasion upon the Laws which they had thrust the King upon successful and to prevent their receiving a baffle upon their first setting out on the road of Arbitrariness sent menacing Letters to those that were nominated Lords of Session threatning them with ruin if they did not sit at the time that they were appointed and had it not been for those Letters several had forborn to act as knowing they could not lawfully do it And as the sending those Letters sheweth that the Ministers here were convinced that they had counselled the King to an illegal Thing but which was to be supported in the same manner So these Gentlemen of the long Robe who contrary to their own Judgment were influenced to sit and to transgress known Laws have declared how Unworthy and Unqualified they are to be received and approved by Parliament as Lords of the College of Justice And to Crown all these Miscarriages in Government with one more his Majesties Ministers being fully sensible that they whom they call Lords of Session were neither legally appointed nor could legally meet and sit they therefore resolved forcibly to support what they had unjustly begun and done and accordingly against the day and time those Gentlemen were to sit they ordered all the Forces which were drawn in unusual Numbers about Edenburgh to be in a readiness upon beat of Drum that what they had Arbitrarily begun might be Violently maintained Which as it was an applying and using of his Majesties Troops upon a much differing Design than that for which the Parliament had consented to their being raised and paid So it had been much more for his Majesties Honour and the Benefit of his Kingdom that they had been all imploy'd against Cannon who is still making Inroads and committing Robberies upon several of his Majesties Loyal Subjects and who by the ill Conduct and treasonable Counsel of some of his Majesties Ministers seems to have been connived at and forborn since the last defeat that was given him for no other reason but that there may be a stand for other Rebels in due time to go unto But that which I would observe Thirdly and in the last place is That his Majesty for his own Honour and Safety and for the Peace and Welfare of his People ought to make some Change and Alteration of his Ministers For it is evident That they who are imployed as Instruments of Oppression Rapine and Murder under an ill Government can never be of use unto nor for the reputation of a good It is evident That he is betrayed nor is it so difficult to know by whom and how For Things speak when Men either dare not or will not And Advices are not to be judg'd of by the Quality and Profession of the Persons that give them but by the tendency of the Counsels that are given For example They cannot design well unto his Majesty who tell him That he must not make haste to conquer his Enemies until he have first screw'd up his Prerogative and that he is to improve the dread his People are under of King James for wresting from them what he can before he attack him Again they cannot intend his Majesties Interest who would have him overlook the Crimes and Treasons that are daily committed against him seeing the conniving at Rebels can only be to incourage Rebellion Again they who advise him to be King only of a Party and not of the whole People have a mind he should be King of none And to counsel him either not to use those in his Service who are both willing to serve him and would do it with the utmost Fidedelity or to use those whose Carriage speaks them to be in the Interest of his Enemies it is to have him betrayed instead of being served Nor can they be for his Continuing upon the Throne who would have hindred his Ascent unto it And whosoever embarrasseth him with his Parliaments and by it retards Succours for the Support of the War can mean no less than that his Majesty and his Kingdom should become a Prey to King James and to his Brother of France And they who counsel him to go on where his Predecessor left off have a mind to see a new Abdication though they were not for the Old. But what might be said upon this Head requireth rather an intire Discourse than to be confined unto a short Remark And therefore all I shall add is That as his Majesty must be infallibly lost without a speedy Change as to some of his Ministers so he needs not to fear them if they be but once thrust out of his Councils seeing all the hurt that they are able to do him is through their being there And if he will but own himself and assert his own Interest he will have enough of those to stand by him who have no Interest but what is his FINIS AN ADDRESS Sign'd by the greatest Part of the MEMBERS of the Parliament OF SCOTLAND AND Deliver'd
Rights and Castoms of His Country who has had the Impudence as well as Malice to brand those for Republicans by whose Power Zeal and Interest the Crown came to be conferr'd upon the present King. But they must be Persons of a very short Prospect who do not perceive that they who are endeavouring to restore King James account it expedient to blast those in his present Majesties Esteem under the reproachful name of Republicans who have the Loyalty and Courage to venture their whole for his Crown and Dignity and to withstand those ill Men in what they are about And I will venture to say it freely that as it is not Names but Things which wise Men seek and pursue So there is no more required to the freeing both Scotland and England from the Common-wealths Men and from all Republican Principles but that His Majesty persevere in preserving unto his People their Rights and Liberties Esteem Parliaments as well his great Council in Arduous Affairs as the Suppliers of him in his Necessities with Mony and that he make the known Laws the Measure and Standard of his Government While on the contrary it is in the Power of ill Ministers if His Majesty hearken unto them to withdraw nine parts of ten of the People in six Months from their Love of Monarchy and to force them upon wishing for a Common-Wealth And had it not been for the view which the Nations under the last Reign had of their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princesse of Orange and the assurance they entertained of enjoying their Laws and Priviledges under their Government and Authority the Methods which the late King took and the Counsels he followed would instead of the Translation of the Crown to Their present Majesties have put an end to the Monarchy Nor can any thing so affright considering Persons from addictedness to Monarchy as the leaving the Nations under the Power Conduct and Authority of those very Men by whose Counsels and Management the late King came to forefault His Crown seeing some will be so peremptory as to imagine that it cannot be upon personal liking that they come to be used but because the nature of the Government requires them or at least Persons of their Principle and Political Complexions But forasmuch as the present Embarrass of His Majesty with his Parliament of Scotland is wholly caused by the Advocate 's abusing His Majesty in the Account he hath given him both of the Rights and Jurisdictions of the Estates in Parliament Assembled and of the Laws and Customs of the Kingdom I shall therefore in Order to the disparaging of him with all the Wise and Loyal part of Mankind and the debarring him the King's Ear and attracting upon him the Royal Indignation Publish the Principle upon which he builds all the Advices he communicateth to his Master and with which he seeks to poyson and corrupt His Royal Mind And this is That the King hath a separate Interest from his People which he ought to pursue in distinction from theirs And this we may be sure he doth not fail of insinuating either immediately unto his Majesty or at least to those about him seeing he had the Folly as well as the Impudence both to assert and to seek to justify it in open and full Parliament Now whosoever gives himself the trouble of examining the tendency of this Principle will find the natural Consequences of it to be That the Prince and People must not only Live in a constant jealousy and dread of one another but must always be imbark'd in an intestine War. Nor is it to be avoided unless either by the King 's arriving at the height of Tyranny and the Peoples sinking into the Abyss of Slavery or by the Subjects grasping the whole Power and Authority and leaving unto the King an empty Name Yea it is a destroying of the very end for which Government was ordained of God and submitted unto by Men seeing that was nothing else but that the whole Society comprehending Ruler and Ruled might have but one Common Political Interest for the Defence and Security whereof each of them were to have their respective Duties alloâ—ted unto them Nay the very Prerogative acknowledged to belong unto the King is nothing save a Power trusted with him in Relation to some Cases that may emerge by which he may be the better enabled to preserve the safety of the Community and to provide for the benefit of the Publick Nor could Sir J D le take a more effectual Course to supplant the King in the Hearts of his People and to possess them with a Horror of and an Alienation from his Government than by his Proclaiming within the Parliament Walls That the King hath a separate Interest from that of his People and by Consequence that he is to promote and maintain it with the Neglect if not the Ruine of theirs neither is there any thing more propable than that the Advocate vented it in Treachery to his Majesty whom out of a Love to the late King and a Desire to have him restored he seeks to undermine and betray For he hath hereby so alarm'd the People in reference to His Majesties Government and fill'd them with those dismal Apprehensions of what they are to expect in case the King have a separate Interest from Theirs that it will be difficult either to allay their Fears or to recover them to an intire Trust in his Majesties Justice and Goodness without removing that Man both from about his Majesties Person and out of his Councils who hath given them that frightful Idea of his ensuing Reign However from this of the Advocate as well as from innumerable Observations to be made from the present Behaviour and Conduct of those who are received into his Majesties Councils and Service after they had not only ministered to King James through the whole Course of his Reign but co-operated with him in most if not all the Methods of his Tyranny we may rationally venture at this Reflection to wit That they are either endeavouring to justify the former Reign by seeking to expose and disgrace this Or that they are studying to cover themselves from what they are obnoxious unto for their Crimes under the last Government by reacting and repeating the same under the Connivance and Indulgence of the present And as by the First they evidently shake his Majesties Throne so by the Second they not only abuse the Mercy of the Government but despise its Justice By the Last they render the Government Vile and Cheap and by the former they pursue its Subversion It must with all lay a great Prejudice upon the Opinion of those that disswade his Majesty from gratifying his People in these Demands about which so much noise has been made here as well as there that they were judged necessary for his Interest as well as the Kingdoms Safety by in a manner the Unanimous Vote of the whole Parliament and of which it may
Therefore we complain not of His Majesty for the delaying the Satisfaction that his People waited for but we complain of those ill Men who told him That to part with the Lords of the Articles was to throw away the brightest Jewel of his Crown Whereas it appears from what hath been said that there is nothing desired whereby His Majesty's Legal Prerogative can be diminished and lessened but that all which is humbly craved is the redeeming his Parliament and People from an ignominious and burthensom Yoke and their being reliev'd from the Invasion and Usurpations made upon their Laws and Customs by the Craft and Violence of some of their Monarchs Nay the very contending for the continuing the Officers of State as Supernumerary in their Committees without the being Elected unto them by the Estates in Parliament in both an Aspersion upon the Wisdom of the Parliament as if they knew not how to pay the respect and deference due to those Officers till compell'd unto it and a Reflection upon their Loyalty as if no Persons could be tender or regardful of His Majesties Interest among the Committees of Parliament unless received into the King's immediate Service and brought under the Influence of Honours and Emoluments But whosoever suggests this unto the King must be one that is accustomed to draw other Mens Pictures by his own Original and who by acting in all things himself as a Mercenary strives to represent the rest of Mankind as equally Base and Villanous Nor can that Advice insinuated into His Majesty of having the Officers of State Supernumerary in the Committees of Parliament be supported by any reason but what borders upon Treason which is the King 's having and being obliged to pursue a separate interest from that of his People and as nothing would more Universally lose His Majesty the Hearts of his People than the being wrought into a belief of it so whatsoever is likely to tempt them into such a persuasion is at all times but especially at this to be industriously avoided by the King. The only thing remaining wherein His Majesty's Parliament of Scotland seems to be misunderstood by him is their Vote concerning the Nomination of the ordinary Lords of the Session and the Election of the President For that which they propose both as required by and agreeable unto their Laws and as necessary in order to the equal Administration of Justice is That the ordinary Lords being in a total Vacation nominated by the King they are to be Tryed and Admitted or Rejected by Parliament and that in a particular Vacation being likewise nominated by the King they are to be Tryed and Admitted or Rejected by the other Lords of Session and that in both cases the President be chosen by the Lords of Session themselves Now this being the great Matter wherein His Parliament is represented unto him as endeavouring to encroach upon and subvert His Royal Prerogative and it being the particular in reference unto which he hath been prevailed upon to exert an Authority to that height and degree that there seems no room left for any expedient but that either the Parliament must depart from their Vote or that His Majesty would be pleas'd to part with those who through abusing his Goodness have misled him into an exercise of Royal Power which the Laws cannot justifie It will be absolutely needful that the Reader in order to his being inabled to form a Right and impartial Judgment of this perplexed and intangled Affair should be first made acquainted with the Vote it self as well as afterwards be informed of what is to be said in the Vindication of it The Words therefore of the Vote are as followeth The King and Queen's Majesties considering That by the Laws of the Kingdom when the place of an Ordinary Lord of the Session doth Vacate it is to be supplied by the King's Nomination of a fit and qualified Person for the said Office and presenting him to the rest of the Lords to be tryed and admitted or rejected by them And that there is now a total Vacancy of the Lords of the Session by the happy change through the Blessing of God now brought about so that there can be no such Tryal by the Lords and that when such total Vacancies have fallen out the Lords were either nominated by King and Parliament jointly or if they were nominated by the King the nomination was approved and the Lords so nominated were admitted by the Parliament Therefore Their Majesties do Declare That they will nominate fit and qualified Persons to the said Offices and present them to the Parliament to be tried and admitted or rejected by them Like as Their Majesties with the advice and consent of the Estates in Parliament Statute and Ordain that in all time hereafter when any such total Vacancy shall occur the nomination of the Lords of the Session shall be by the King or Queen for the time being and in case of their minority by their Regent they nominating fit and qualifiad Persons to the said Offices and presenting them to the Parliament to be tryed and admitted or rejected in manner aforesaid Like as Their Majesties with the advice and consent aforesaid ratify and approve the 93 d Act of the Sixth Parliament of King James the Sixth anent the admission of the Ordinary Lords of Session and Reformation of certain Abuses therein And the 132 d Act of the Twelfth Parliament of King James the Sixth anent the Jurisdiction Presentation Qualities and Age of the Lords of the Session in the whole Heads Clauses and Articles thereof and particularly the Clause contained in the said two Acts Declaring that in all times thereafter when any place should be vacant in the Session that His Majesty should nominate and present thereunto a Man fearing God of good Literature Practick Judgment and Vnderstanding in the Laws of good Fame having sâ—fficient Living of his own worth Twenty Chalders of Victual of yearly Rent and who can make good expedition and dispatch in matters touching the Lieges of the Realm and likewise that Clause contained in the 93 d Act of the Sixth Parliament of King James the Sixth Declaring that the President of the College of Justice shall be elected by the whole Senate thereof being a Man of the Conditions and Qualities above-written for chusing and electing of whom the King's Majesty and Estates dispence with that first part of the Institution of the College of Justice anent the Election of the President Declaring that in case of the absence of the Chancellor and President for the time it shall be lawful for the Lords to chuse and elect any one of their own number whom they think qualified and worthiest who shall be called Vice-President for using of the said Office ay and while the Return of the said Chancellor and President Like as Their Majesties with advice and consent aforesaid Statute and Ordain that the whole Qualifications abovementioned be duly observed in the admission of
in the quality of a Civil Officer under Charles II. Nor is there a Man in the whole Kingdom of Scotland who hath been more accessary to the Robberies and Spoils and who is more stained and died with the Bloody Measures of the Times than this Lord S who his Majesty hath been impos'd upon to constitute again President of the College of Justice And as an aggravation of his Crimes he hath perpetrated them under the vail of Religion and by forms of Law which is the bringing the Holy and Righteous God to be an Authorizer and Approver of his Villanies and the making the Shield of our Protection to be the Sword of our Ruin. But there being some hopes that the World will be speedily furnished with the History of his Life I shall say no more of him but shall leave him unto the expectation and dread of what the famous Mr. Robert D foretold would befal them him in his Person and Family and of which having tasted the first Fruits in so many astonishing Instances he may the more assuredly reckon upon the full Harvest of it And the Method he hath lately begun to steeer is the most likely way imaginable to hasten upon him and his what that Holy and I might say Prophetical Man denounced against them For whereas the Nation would have been willing upon his meer withdrawing from Business and not provoking their Justice by crouding into the Place in which he had so heinously offended to have left him to stand or fall at the great Tribunal and to have iâ—â—â—mpnify'd him as to Life Honour and Fortune here upon the consideration of his having co-operated in the late Revolution and of his having attended upon his Majesty in his coming over to rescue and deliver the Kingdoms from Popery and Slavery He seems resolved to hasten his own Fate and through putting himself by new Crimes out of the Capacity of Mercy to force the Estates of the Kingdom to a punishing of him both for them and for the old But to return to what we are upon about the Right of Electing a President of the Colledge of Justice It is excepted to what hath been said in proof that the Power is by Law in the Lords of Session to choose their own President that Sir John G was upon King Charles the Second's nomination approved and confirmed in Parliament Anno 1661. which was a divesting of the Lords of Session of it and a vertual rescinding all the Laws by which that Power had been settled upon them To which I have several things to reply that will discover both the Impertinency of the Objection and the Treachery of those who have insinuated it to the King. First It is acknowledged in the very Exception that the sole Choice of Sir John G as President was not in King Charles seeing the Parliament had the Approving Allowing and Admitting of him which makes that case to differ very much from the Present In which the choosing of the President is not only taken away from the Lords of the Session but the approving and admitting of him is denyed to the Estates of the Nation in Parliament assembled Secondly What was done in Ordaining Sir John G President was not a repealing of the Laws by which the Choosing of the President is vested in the Lords of the Session but was at most only a dispensing with them in that extraordinary case of a total Vacancy and in reference unto a Person of a most unspotted Integrity and unpaâ—allelled Knowledge in the Laws Nor will any Man pretending to acquaintance with Parliamentary Customs and Proceedings reckon that a Law is therefore rescinded and abrogated because the Parliament hath seen reason to supersede it in a single Instance and in a particular case Laws once Enacted and established are never accounted to be abrogated unless by particular future Laws formally repealing them or by posterior general Statutes inconsistent with and destructive of them Nor do Two or Three particular Instances varying from and repugnant unto them bring them so much as into disuse and desuetude but even in order to that there must be immemorial Prescription against them and that without being disallowed or complained of in Parliament Thirdly What the Parliament did Anno 1661. in the Case of Sir John G it was not properly done by them in their Legislative capacity but as a part of the Supream Authority of the Kingdom concurring with the King in an Act and Deed of the Supremum imperium and illimited Power of the Government which the appointing of Judges for the equal administration of Justice came to be at that season and conjuncture by reason of the total Vacancy and the impossibility that thereupon ensued of Choosing and Ordaining the Lords of Session whereof the President is always one in the ordinary Legal and Established Methods What the King and the Estates of Parliament did in the case of that Vacancy of the Colledge of Justice was much of the Nature of and parallel unto what the Estates alone have done upon the late Vacancy of the Throne wherein they acted not in the way of a Legislative Body but in the Vertue of that illimited Power which resided in them as Representatives of the whole People and who knew no other Measures whereby to act but what lay most in a tendency to the Publick Safety Fourthly The King 's having a Right to choose the President of the Session is disclaimed and ridicul'd by those very Persons that have advised him to challenge it For my Lord S in whose Favour and in pursuance of whose Advice his Majesty hath claimed a Right and exerted an Authority of appointing a President hath by the Method of his entring upon that Office and Station renounced the Legality of his Majesty's acting in that particular and declared that he holds not his Place by vertue of the King's Choice and Designation For after he had prevailed upon the King to elect and send him down President of the Session the first thing he did at their Meeting and that in order to the throwiag the blame upon his Majesty of all that had been transacted before was to wheedle that over-aw'd and pack'd Bench to choose him for President of the Colledge of Justice which as it shews the Disloyalty and Treachery of the Man so it testifieth and publisheth his Folly. For how could they be in a capacity as Lords of Session to choose him for a President that were not antecedently legally tryed and approved themselves And who knowing their own unqualifiedness both as to Literature and good Fame made his Majesty's having nominated them an excuse from their undergoing a Tryal For though it be both required by the Laws and was accordingly given out all along here that they should be tryed yet Five of them being conscious unto themselves how little they answered the Qualifications prescribed in the Statutes refused to submit to be examin'd under a Pretence that they would not thereby weaken his
Majesty's Right and Authority in his having elected them And thus the King's Authority is doubly exposed by those who call themselves the Ordinary Lords of Session in excusing themselves from a Tryal which was never designed they should do seeing S M and N were both appointed and said to be in a capacity to examine them And then by him who is stiled President through its being made a Stale for his obtaining the Name and renounced for the Choice of the Bench as that which alone must give him a Legal Title Whereas if the King's Choice of him be not according to Law and sufficient to justifie his entrance upon his Office Why did he abuse his Majesty in telling him that it was And if it be the King 's Right and a part of his Prerogative to elect the President Why hath he sacrificed his Majesty's Honour and given away his Legal Power in the submitting to hold the Office by any other Tenure Howsoever we are come to be Gainers by this Carriage of S how much soever the King is a looser by it For his surendring from the King the Right of choosing a President is a Vindication of the Justice of the Parliaments Vote and Demand Besides here is an end put to that Pretence which they have been endeavouring to sham upon the World viz. That S was only restored to the Presidency of which he was violently dispossessed and that he was not chosen unto it as unto a Place whereunto he had not a Right So that either the Choice made at Edinburgh overthrows the Plea used at London about his beeing meerly restored or else that whereby they do here seek to justifie his Majesty's Proceedings in reference to S 's being President condemns what the Proteus hath there betaken himself unto of being elected by those called the Lords of the Colledge of Justice To which I shall only add That as he was never legally President before so he is as little President now His assuming the Office then when he was not chosen by the Bench as the Law ordains made him an Usurper and his entring upon the Place again upon the Choice of those that are not Judges by reason of their not being tryed as the Statutes appoint leaves him under the same Crime and Imputation So that having now dispatched all that is either Historical or Argumentative about the several Heads in difference between the Parliament of Scotland and a few unadvised or ill designing Men about His Majesty I shall shut up this Discourse with some Political Reflections upon the whole Whereof the first is That it is not the having barely a good King that renders a People happy but much of it must arise from his having good Ministers about him For no Nation had ever a better Prince than we at present have and yet we find there is cause of complaint by reason of the Ill Counsellors that possess his ear We do not think that he entertains them out of choice yet that will not give his People ease though it may for a while suppress their Murmurings His Majesties being so little acquainted with Men at his first coming over might lay him open to be misled in the choice of His Officers But to continue to use them after he hath had sufficient means as well as opportunity of knowing their Characters will leave an imputation not only upon his Goodness but upon his Wisdom For as the People have no other way of judging of the goodness of their Prince but by finding his Officers and chief Ministers to be such so if these be not they may possibly acknowledg William to be a good Man but they will never beleive that the King is so And Machiavel's observation That a wise King will always find wise Ministers is no more than what every Man is perswaded of upon the first Principles of Reason and of common sense I do acknowledg that ill Men have ways of thrusting themselves upon Princes which they that are vertuous think too unworthy and below them to use For whereas the later are always modest and seek no recommendations but from their own Merit the former are importunate can both flatter bribe Favorites to speak well of them It was a severe Prediction as well as Observation which the late Prince of Conde made upon the News of King Charles the Second's Death and of his Brothers succeeding him viz. That he was like to be well served through having none about him but his own Fools and his Predecessors Knaves How many Wise Men then imagine his Present Majesty is like to be served who though he hath not the Fools of the last Reign about him yet he hath both the Knaves of that and of the former Nor is it of any great advantage at least to Scotland to be delivered from the Fools of the last Government seeing there are weak Men enough besides those and some of them trusted with the chief conduct of the Scotch Affairs For how else could it be that of all the Publick Orders remitted thither there hath not been one which either the meeting of Estates the Parliament or the Privy Council have not voted to be illegal In reference unto which as we do acquit the King from all blame seeing he cannot be supposed to be acquainted yet either with the Scotch Laws or with their Forms and does only sign what others pepare for and offer unto him so we are not willing to ascribe it so much to the Treachery and Malice of his Minister as to his simplicity and weakness Who though he may possibly be an honest Man and indifferently versed in common Affairs yet he hath no great knowledge of the Laws and is but a Puny in the Politicks by reason of which he comes to rely upon other Mens advice who instead of instructing and assisting him to serve the King make him a Tool for promoting ends and designs directly opposite to His Majesties Service and Interest But then I should observe Secondly That one illegal stop doth lead to many Nor is one Arbitrary thing to be supported but by another It hath been hitherto taken for an undoubted Truth That though the Estates Assembled in Parliament have not alone a Legislative Power so as to enact Laws without the King yet that they have the Supream and Uncontrovertible Power of declaring the Meaning and Sense of those Laws that are already Enacted and Established So that when the Parliament hath once declared the Sense and Meaning of any Law all Courts of Judicature as well as particular Persons are bound to acquiesce in their explanation of that Law. And to divest the Parliament of this is to strip them of one of their chiefest Priviledges and to detract from and diminish their Authority which is Treason by the Law of Scotland For it is expresly declared by Act 130. Parl. 8. James 6. That whosoever in time coming shall take upon him to impung the Dignity and Authority of the