which that Tacit principle of having frequent Parliaments was litterally explain'd by subsequent Statutes made in the time of Edward the 3d and ascertain'd to the having Annual ones And now Sir when you have made all these suppositions in your mind I am confident you have very much of the model and platform of our Government Tu. If this he our Constitution I cannot wonder at your being so much in love with it for certainly it provides for all Interests with the greatest Justice and Equity in the world and to me it seems evident that though the convocating the Estates and bringing them into existence has such a formal dependance on the Kings Writ as you have declared yet existing and when convocated they work by an innate Authority and by the priviledges of their original Institution their Acts then being not Commissionated like those of other Courts but proceeding in conjunction with the Kings which makes me the better understand that usual clause in our Acts of Parliament which tells us that such and such a thing is enacted c. not only by and with the advice of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in Parliament Assembled but also by the Authority of the same But you 'l say I ought not to comment upon a Text I have learnt so lately therefore pray proceed for I cannot doubt but you have yet more to say upon this Subject Pu. What would you have more does not this Scheme of our Government give you full satisfaction Tu. By no means Sir except it includes something that is not literally exprest for though our Ancestors have taken care that there shall be frequent meetings of the Estates yet if they have not provided for the continuance of their Sessions when met that so their coming together may possibly answer its end what does all the rest signifie and therefore pray tell me your opinion in that point Pu. Nay hold a blow there good Tutor I had rather you had ask't me all the hard questions in Euclid not so much for any difficulty in the solution as because it 's an ill time of the year to discourse of such matters therefore I think we had best stop here And yet I find I am a little like Sir Martin now my hand is in I can't forbear fumbling with the strings though I don't care to play out wherefore I will not promise you an Answer but when I have said what I think convenient if you please you may give your self one there are wise and learned men and who upon a good occasion may be spoke with that do conceive there is a Statute made in the time of Richard the Second See the Statute verbatim with the Clause Roll. and now in being though not in Print which provides that no Parliament shall be dismist till all the Petitions are answered which I think comes home to the point Bills in those days many times appearing in the form of Petitions as not long since we had an excellent Law made called the Petition of Right subsequent to this Statute and particularly in the Reigns of Henry the 4th Henry the 5th and Henry the 6th it was usual for Proclamations to be made in Westminster-Hall before the end of every Sessions that all those that had any matter to present to the Parliament should bring it in by such a day for otherwise the Parliament at that day would determine And all this being bare matter of fact there can be no other Question about it but whether it be so or no. But for discourse sake Let 's suppose this Statute and subsequent practise all out of doors and that there is no memorial of Record extant of any such matter and then it will be impossible in this or any other like case to make a true Judgment without having recourse to some fixed and standing Rule which in matters of Government where positive Laws are silent can be no other than the fundamental Architecture and original frame of the Constitution some particulars whereof relating to our present discourse I must be forced to call over again upon this occasion you must mind then that our wisae Ancestors in modelling our Government had not only an eye to the Power and Authority of the Monarch but also to the Liberties and Properties of the People things easily consisting in themselves and mutually aiding and assisting each other and foreseeing that the most exact prudence could not make particular provision for all occurrences that might happen and that if time that great Innovator as the Lord Bacon calls it would of course and knavery and folly by their influence by degrees make things worse and worse and if wisdom and counsel were not as constantly watchful to make them better and better the best founded Government in the world must in tract of time infallibly come to ruin they therefore laid it as the Basis of our Policy that there should be frequent meetings of the States to supply all defects and stop up all Crannies or violent Fractions as they should happen to the prejudice of the original Constitution In the next place consider what part the Monarch was to bear in these Conventions not to have a sole power but to go in conjunction with the Nobles and Commons all acting by the principles and authority of the first Institution and what that Learned Prince King Charles the 1st says of Royal Power in general may be well applied to it in this particular viz. the Law is the measure of the Kings Power and if it be the measure of it then is the Power limited by it and the fundamental Law saying There shall be Conventions of the Estates to encounter and provide against publick and destructive mischiefs whenever they happen By necessary consequence a time for them to meet and a convenient time of sitting to do something when they are met are included according to the known Rule in your Schools He that commands a thing to be done does with the same breath command all such circumstances as without which the thing commanded cannot take effect And indeed common reason speaks the same and because time of meeting and a convenient time of sitting are necessary to the very ends and beings of Parliaments therefore must the Execution or bringing them into Act be lodged somewhere and though with the best Decorum and convenience it fell to the share of the chief Magistrate to be intrusted with the honorary and formal part of Summoning and pronouncing the Dissolutions of Parliaments yet the Law which is his rule as well as ours has plainly enough determined how and when he shall do it In the last place the design and wisdom of the first Architects of our Government is very apparent in contriving a Monarchy in the Prince mixed with Aristocracy in the House of Peers and Democracy in the House of Commons whereby all the advantages were secured and inconveniences avoided which are ordinarily to be found in
so many Laws that call them Traitors Tu. No more of that I beseech you let 's now come to the short Liv'd Parliament here at Oxford at the beginning of which the Houses were Advised to make the Laws of the Land their Rule as the King was Resolved they should be His and Liberty was given them to put the Administration of the Government into protestant hands in case the Crown should deseend upon a Popish Prince and yet the Commons could not forbear falling upon the Succession though the King had told them his pleasure in that matter beforehand Pu. If Parliaments in their Legislative capacity were so Tyed up to the Laws in being as not to have power to Repeal any Old or make any New ones how came we to have any Acts of Parliament at all or how could they provide suitable Remedies for the Occurrences that happen in every Age which was one main end of their Institution It 's true indeed the executive power of the King is Restrained to Laws already made as is evident Vi Termini for there cannot be an execution of what has not an Actual Existence and I am confident this Legal course will at long Run be most for His Majesties service whatever some Bankers may have suggested to the contrary since the shutting up of the Exchequer As to the matter of the Succession I shall say the less because more has been said already both within and without doors than any one hitherto has been pleased to answer and if upon just grounds the Parliament has power in a Legislative way to Attaint any Subject whatsoever of Treason which cuts off the Man and Inheritance at one blow their mercy sure in sparing you Life cannot be thought an excess of their power and that the D. T. succeeding to the Crown in an ordinary way is inconsistent with the welfare of the Nation is even confest by the Opposers of the Bill by their pretending to an Expedient which as it was proposed in my poor Opinion is the greatest Riddle in the world For the giving a solitary and empty Name of King to one man and placing the Execution of the Kingly Power in the hands of another does not only divide the Office from the person and consequently Revive that decrved destinction between the Natural and Politick Capacity but strikes at the very Being of Monarchy it self For if the naked Stile and Title of a King will satisfie the Notion of being a Monarch and all the Authority and Power may be translated to one other hand by consequence they may to more than one or to many hands whereby you may have a Monarchy in Name but in Effect and Reality an Aristocracy or Common-wealth and so the Expedient becomes Felo de se and supplants that Government it pretends to support Tu. Alas poor Monsieur Expedient why hark you Pupil a By-stander would think you hired me to make objections on purpose that you might answer them but what say you to the business of Fitz Harris and disagreement of the Houses about it Pu. Ay the business of Fitz Harris Tutor hinc illae Lachrimae now you touch a sore part indeed which gives me just occasion to observe and adore the boundless mercy and goodness of Almighty God not only in giving warning to this sinful and ingrateful Nation of a Damnable Popish Plot against it but also in carrying on the Discovery from Time to Time to the conviction of Infidelity it self and eternal Reproach of all that Power and Artifice that have been made use of to conceal and suppress it And now at last in this business of Fitz Harris we have as it were one Risen from the Dead to Preach Belief to Infidels A known Papist comes in and tells us he can no longer bear the Burden of his own Guilty Knowledge and is therefore forc'd to confess that what the Protestant Witnesses have said is True and that Sir Edmund Eury Godfrey was Murdered by Papists That the Dutch War and Black heath Army had an ill aspect upon the Protestant Interest He tells us of great preparations of men and money in Forein parts to carry on this cursed Design And that Ambassadors from abroad and Persons of the first Rank of Subjects here at home are engaged in the Conspiracy and who knows but a prudent management of such a Witness might produce a Discovery of yet higher Importance therefore the House of Commons thought fit to take the Cause of Fitz Harris into their own hands and to be Eye-witnesses of his Innocency or Guilt as to the Crimes objected against him that so they might satisfie themselves and all the world in the matter of his Evidence And if such a Cause as this during our present Circumstances be not fit to be heard in the Highest Judicatory of the Nation I shall despair of ever hearing of any that will not be too little for its cognizance As to the Debitum Justitiae or Right of the Matter I shall say the less because some of the Noble Lords themselves in their late Protestation have said so much on the Commons side But pray consider that the Lords were first in the disagreement for they Rejected the Impeachment without any previous Conference to give or receive any Reasons which manner of proceeding in common conversation is very unusual amongst good Neighbours and what followed after in the House of Commons I conceive did not in the least exclude them from giving or receiving satisfaction in the matter in difference but rather made way for a Conference in order to it the good effects whereof would no doubt have been suitable to the wisdom of both Houses had they continued longer together And now good Tutor if this be all you have to object I hope you will not take Advantage of the Dead nor make the Venerable Ghost of an House of Commons stand up in a Sheet and do Pennance in your Churches FINIS
simple and uncompounded States for here is a single person endued with a sufficiency of Power for Dispatch and to discharge the executive part without danger of a long lasting Tyranny many Councellors in whom the Scripture says there 's safety Nobles and Commons coming from all quarters of the Land as eye-witnesses of the several Exigencies of the State and tied up to all imaginable sincerity by their own interest I say the Prince has these to assist and join with him in the Deliberative and Legislative part without danger of ambitious Factions too frequent in simple Aristocracies or disordered confusion which many times happen in simple Democracies each of these Estates by the wisdom of our Government moderating and restraining from excess the Power of the other Now therefore whatever shall destroy this Coalition and Mixture and place the whole ballance of all things in any one of the Powers can you think it warranted by the Policy of our Constitution And whether a single Power chusing whether ever a Parliament shall sit or no or if assembled whether it shall continue a convenient time to do any thing or no does not amount to as much is highly worth your consideration Tu. I remember you told me that Statutes have been made for the Annual sitting of Parliaments suppose that heretofore those Laws were litterally put into execution for several years successively Writs went out at the day the Counties and Corporations thinking to build up a Sanctuary for their hopes and fears cheerfully neglected their Seeds-time and harvest and with great charge and trouble made their Elections the elected members left their Families and Estates behind them and made long pilgrimages in order to attend upon the publick Service but had scarce ever time to pull off their boots before they were dismist again by a Prorogation or Dissolution would the true intent of those Statutes be thus satisfied And did the Legislators intend nothing more by them than that the Lords and Commons should have an opportunity of coming up to the Parliament-house purely for the sake of going down again Pu. Upon my word Tutor you are finely come on in a little time me thinks you begin to speak warmly of these matters but a little excess of zeal is natural to a new convert or is it because your Pupils are all gone into the Country whereas a walk to Heddington or Shot-over hill might have serv'd the turn as things fell out afterwards Had a Towns-man made such remarks I should have thought the cold meat stuck upon his hands and that he had been out of humor for the loss of his Boarders But however the case be with you good Tutor have a care of extreams and by way of Antidote let me advise you to resume your old temper a little though it be but for discourse-sake and let 's hear how you use to comfort your selves upon such an occasion Tu. Very well Sir I 'm very glad you can be so merry and though your discourse has made a greater impression upon me than you are aware of yet for once I 'le comply with your humor and tell you what we generally say in vindication of the late and former Dissolutions To begin therefore with the last Parliament but one did it not open with all imaginable expressions of grace and favour from the King that any good Subject could desire either for the preservation of Religion his liberty and property at home or for supporting our Neighbours and Allies abroad nay did not the King invite the Houses to use all means for their security excepting only the matter of the Succession and when in order to these ends and for the preservation of Tangier a supply was ask't not one penny would be granted Pu. I have heard of some general Acts of Pardon that at first sight make a great shew of Grace and Indempnity but when a Transgressor comes to look over the exceptions he is commonly bilkt in his expectations and you would do well to consider whether the preferring the ordinary course of Succession to the security of Religion c. be not much of the same nature and I would willingly learn how it 's possible for a zealous Papist to be a good Defender of the Protestant Faith but I reserve my self in this point till you give me farther occasion As to other matters pray Sir consider that we have long laboured under a damnable Popish Plot and that from Coleman's Papers and what witnesses have sworn it plainly appears that the Conspirators do chiefly rely upon the French King for the carrying it on to effect Now Tutor Money is a real thing and will certainly do either good or hurt expressions may do neither and by Parliament-calculation which by the way I think more authentick than the Cabals we can tell the time when a great sum of money raised to supply extraordinary occasions was imployed to make war upon a Protestant State and to advance the Interest of this same French King and that another round sum was given for making an Actual War with France and yet I have not heard of many men lost in the quarrel I am sure the then Treasurer D. must needs think the Monsieur a very sweet-natur'd Gentleman that was likely to lend a vast Treasure to his Enemies Flagrante Bello Therefore pray let 's not run too hard upon the House of Commons now we know they cannot speak for themselves for it 's two to one but they saw cause to take care of old England before they could come to provide for that hopeful Nursery at Tangier and to make our selves stand firm at home before they could hope to support our Friends abroad Tu. I don't well understand you but I say instead of giving the King money they ply'd him with strange Addresses some say rather like Remonstrances than Answers to his demands which no man could think would be as currant as money nor likely to give the King half so much satisfaction Pu. Really Tutor if by the Constitution of our Government a Parliament had only been designed to be a Conduit-Pipe for the Peoples purses to run out at your last Objection would be unanswerable but as the case stands they are to give the King Advice as well as Money ay and to make that Advice Authoritative and obligatory to the People And though it 's certainly the Duty of all good Subjects to consult the King's pleasure in all things that are really for his Service and the common good of the Nation yet under Favour I think the house of Commons having a Fundamental share in the legislative part Guardianship of the Government are bound in Conscience to make the publick good their chiefest aim and if for that end they were forc'd modestly to remember the surreptitious gaining of Orders for the continuance of Popish Officers the procuring new Commissions for known Papists the assassinating of some procuring the turning out of other Protestant Magistrates for doing