Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A88204
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The just defence of John Lilburn, against such as charge him with turbulency of spirit.
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Lilburne, John, 1614?-1657.
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1653
(1653)
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Wing L2123A; Thomason E711_10; ESTC R207124
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13,471
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11
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may appear I was so far from what would in me have been interpreted turbulency that I contended not till in my own particular I was assaulted and violated Neither did I appear to the Parliament in their prime estate as a turbulent person though under as great suffering as ever since but as none grievously injured contrary to the Laws and Rights of England and as one deserving their protection and deliverance out of that chraldom wherein I was and of large and ample reparation as they did of Mr. Buâ—lon Mr. Pryn and Dr. Bastwick and which their favourable and tender regard to persons in our condition gained them multitudes of faithful friends who from so just and charitable a disposition appearing in them concluded they were fully resolved to restore the Nation to its long lost liberty without delay Being delivered by them and understanding their cause to be just the differences between them and the late King daily increasing I frequently adventured my self in their defence and at length the controversie advancing to a war I lest my Trade and all I had and engaged with them and did what service I was able at Edge-hill and afterwards at Branford where after a sharp resistance I was taken prisoner and refusing large offers if I would renounce them and serve the King I was carryed a pinioned prisoner to Oxford where I endured sorrows and afflictions inexpressible yet neither by enemy nor friend was ever to that time accounted turbulent though I there insisted for my Rights as earnestly and importunately as ever and as highly disdained all their threats or allurements and again found so much respect from the Parliament as when my life was most in danger to be once more preserved by them though then not so freely as at first but upon the earnest and almost distracted solicitation of my dear wife violently rushing into the House and casting her self down before them at their Bar for now their hearts were not so soft and tender as at first but so far was I then from this new imputation of turbulency either in City Country Parliament or Army that I had every ones welcom at my return and my Lord General Essex to express his joy and affection to me though he knew me a noted Sectary a people he was so unhappy to disaffect that he gave me no less then betwixt 200 and 300l in mony and offers of any kindness which I shall ever thankfully remember to his just honour But Col. Homsteed and all non-conformists Puritans and Sectaries being daily discouraged and wearied out of that Army and the Earl of Manchester Major General of the associate Counties giving countenance unto them I put my self under his Command my then most dear friend as much honored by me as any man in the world the now Lord General Cromwel being then his Lieut. General what services I performed whilst I continued under their command will not become me to report I shall onely say this that I was not then accounted either a coward or unfaithful nor yet of a turbulent or contentious spirit though I received so much cause of dislike at some carriages of the said Earl as made me leave the service and soon after coming for London discovered so great a defection in the Parliament from their first Principles as made me resolve never to engage further with them until they repented and returned and did their first works from which they were so far as that there had not been any corrupt practice formerly complained of either in the High-Commission Star-Chamber or Councel-Table or any exorbitancies elsewhere but began afresh to be practised both by the House of Lords and House of Commons without any regard to those Antient fundamental Laws and Rights for the violation of which they had denounced a war against the King Nor did they thus themselves but countenanced and encouraged the same throughout the Land illegal imprisonments close-imprisonments examinations of men against themselves everywhere common and upon Petitions to Parliament in stead of relief new Ordinances made further to intangle them and all still pointed against the most Conscientious peaceable people such as could not conform to Parliament-Religion but desired to worship God according to their own Judgements and Consciences a just freedom to my understanding and the most just and reasonable and most conducing to publick peace that could be and in the use whereof I had in some yeers before enjoyed the comfortable fruition of a gracious God and loving Saviour and which occasioned me so soon as the Controversie about liberty of Conscience began to appear with my pen in its just defence against my quondam fellow-sufferer Mr. Pryn as a liberty due not onely according to the word of God which I effectually proved but due also by the fundamental Laws of the Land which provide that no man be questioned or molested or put to answer for any thing but wherein he materially violates the persons goods or good name of another and however strange the defence thereof then appeared time hath proved that it is a liberty which no conscientious man or woman can spare being such as without which every one is lyable to molestation and persecution though he live never so honestly peaceably and agreeable to the Laws of the Land and which every man must allow that will keep to that golden rule to do as he would be done unto And though my ready appearing also for this my native Right and the Right of every man in England gained me many adversaries for men will be adverse to the best and justest things that ever were till through time and sound consideration the understanding be informed yet neither for this was I accounted turbulent or of a contentious spirit My next engagement was as a witness against the Earl of Manchester upon Articles exhibited by his Lieutenant-General Cromwel wherein I being serious as knowing matters to be foul opened my self at large as thinking the same was intended to have been thorowly prosecuted but the great men drew stakes and I was left to wrestle with my Lord who what by craft as setting his mischievous Agent Col. King upon my back and the Judges of the Common Pleas and upon that the power of the House of Lords as got me first an imprisonment in New-gate and after that in the Tower Against which oppression for urging the fundamental Laws of England against their usurped and innovated powers I then began to be termed a factious seditious and turbulent fellow not fit to live upon earth For now by this time both House of Lords and House of Commons were engaged in all kindes of arbitrary and tyrannical practices even to extremity So that I must pray the judicious Reader well to mark the cause for which I was first accounted turbulent viz. for urging the fundamental Law of the land against those that thought themselves uppermost in power and above the power of Law as their practices
intentions towards me and having not consciences to go back they now fill all mens mouthes whom they have power to deceive that I am of so turbulent a spirit that there will be no quietness in England except I be taken off But dear Country-men friends and Christians aske them what evil I have done and they can shew you none no my great and onely fault is that as they conceive I will never brook whilst I live to see and be silent the laws and rights of the Nation trod under foot by themselves who have all the obligations of men and Christians to revive and restore them They imagine whilst I have breath the old law of the land will be pleaded and upheld against the new against all innovated law or practice whatsoever And because I am and continue constant to my principles upon which I first engaged for the common liberty and will no more bear in these the violation of them then I did in the King Bishops Lords or Commons but cry aloud many times of their abominable unworthiness in their so doing therefore to stop my mouth and take away my life they cry out I never will be quiet I never will be content with any power but the just God heareth in heaven and those who are his true servants will hear and consider upon earth and I trust will not judge according to the voice of self-seeking ambitious men their creatures and relations but will judge righteous judgement and then I doubt not all their aspersions of me will appear most false and causless when the worst I have said or written of them and their wayes will prove less then they have deserved Another stratagem they have upon me is to possess all men that all the souldiers in the Army are against me but they know the contrary otherwise why do they so carefully suppress all petitions which the souldiers have been handing in my behalf indeed those of the souldiers that hear nothing but what they please of me either by their scandalous tongues or books may through misinformation be against me but would they permit them to hear or read what is extant to my vindication I would wish no better friends then the souldiers of the Army for I am certaine I never wronged one of them nor are they apt to wrong any man except upon a misinformation But I hope this discourse will be satisfactory both to them and all other men that I am no such Wolfe Bear or Lyon that right or wrong deserves to be destroyed and through the truth herein appearing will strongly perswade for a more gentle construction of my intentions and conversation and be an effectual Antidote against such poisonous asps who endeavour to kill me with the bitterness of their envenomed tongues that they shall not be able to prevaile against me to sway the consciences of any to my prejudice in the day of my trial Frailties and infirmities I have and thick and threefold have been my provocations he that hath not failed in his tongue is perfect so am not I. I dare not say Lord I am not as other men but Lord be merciful to me a sinner But I have been hunted like a Partridge upon the mountains My words and actions in the times of my trials and deepest distress and danger have been scanned with the spirit of Jobs comforters but yet I know I have to do with a gracious God I know that my redeemer liveth and that he will bring light out of this darkeness and cleer my innocency to all the world FINIS