to my self that our seri Nepotes some others hereafter walking recto tramite in the like search and path of truth as I have done might add more assistance thereunto and may be permitted to say as St. Paul in another case did of himself that if I have had in so long an age and perambulation of time any acquaintance or conversation at all with my self mine own heart and Actions which many that have known me so long in my various careful and sorrowful passages of life occasioned by many the ingratitudes and ill dealings of some great families and others that should have dealt better with me in may testify my always constant and adventurous Loyalty to my Soveraigns without any the least fainting or haesitation will or may believe that I have neither lied or sought for preferment or any thing that could look otherwise than the sincerity of my heart and an unshaken and unbiassed love to Truth and Loyalty to my King and Countrey And can truly say and aver with many witnesses to confirm it that my long observations ever since the year 1628. until now compleating almost full 46 years of the said persecutions disloyalties misusages and sufferings of King Charles the Martyr in order and design to his Murder and the many Plots afterwards intended against his late Royal Majesty King Charles the second and his now Sacred Majesty and my Researches into the Records and Antiquities of this and other Nations concerning the Just Rights and Praerogatives of our Kings and Princes for the publick good and the avoiding the manifold miseries and damage that attend the Witchcraft and Madness of Rebellion and to the end that I might recal into the right way of truth those very many Noble learned grave and pious men that perfectly hated Rebellion and yet by fear or force going along with the Tide to secure themselves and Estates as well as they could and with the Vulgus and Rabble that had cut the reformed Church of England into no less than 160 Sects or new fashioned Religions and so far strayed from their Mother the reformed Church of England as they ran out of their Wits as much as their Religion so that they could not stop themselves in that their mad Career until they came to an opinion that it was Religion to be Rebellious and that Rebellion or Sedition for any thing called Religion was or at least ought to be warrantable by some or other word of God when by his new light they should be enabled to discover it hath given me like old Barzillai no quiet until I had done my duty unto God my King and my Countrey and posterity and brought what help I could unto our much injured and persecuted David in these now published Truths wherein I have as carefully as I could without the purchase of other mens Writings or Manuscripts at Auctions as too many our Lurching yet Learned enough Authors have done weighed all particulars in the Ballance of Truth Law and Right Reason and without any opiniatrete have left my self to the Judicious throughly impartial Readers and Tryers of those my carefully considered Labours wherein I shall be willing to rectify and submit to any truths when justly and rationally proved and be ashamed in the least to imitate those impudent Contrariants of truth and Right reason our Laws Annals and Records who although in their Books and Writings against our ever maintainable truths whilst they are in the acting and perpetrating the greatest Injuries imaginable unto them can offer to forsake their evil Impostures grounded Fancies and Opinions yet can after they have been publickly examined tryed and convicted of several gross Impostures and falsifications by the undeniable evidence of the Records themselves which they cited and referred themselves unto not like to those better men of Confessions and Retractations but being unwilling it seems either to perform their promises to their Readers or imitate the more honest examples of better men have thought it to be more correspondent unto their evil designs not to discourage their Disciples to persist in their egregious falshoods and unlearned foolish reasonless senseless and inconsequential arguments because they have wickedly made it their Interest and business to advocate the Devils cause by his and their evil Methods and Impostures And may find that they have by a Factious and Seditious Ignorance and over-bold adventure enticed many good men and Lawyers out of the paths of truth into an horrid Confusion and Rebellion for which they may suffer in the next World unless they can furnish their gross mistakes with some invisible or misinterpreted Record that every man may fancy and frame a new and better Government of the Kingdom and carve and make his own Religion and Idocize and propagate their own vain imaginations and selflreated ignorant Fancies instead of Laws and Records And should do better to stand and consider that the advice of the Prophet Jeremy that should not be thought to have spoken vain untrue or foolish Councel to stand upon the old ways and enquire after the ways of truth was not to do what you can to blind or sophisticate truth put her into disguises and transform her into as many shapes as may consort with the ugly designs of Faction and Rebellion and call to mind better than they do how diffusive and infectious the sin of Rebellion is that every of our evil Examples Doctrines or Perswasions tending thereunto such an evil especially as Sedition or Rebellion are by God chargeable also upon their accompt And that at the great Audit before an all knowing God there will be a multitude of consequential Evils besides their own particular sins which may be enough charged upon them when it will be too late to say one unto another as St. Paul did to his Innovators O ye foolish Galathians who hath bewitched you And amongst those many motives and obligations of Duty and Loyalty Oaths of Allegeance and Supremacy to my Soveraign and compassion unto those multitudes that have erred and gone astray to the end that I might give an accompt of the trust reposed in me particularly and solely by his late Majesty under his sign Manual bearing date the 30th day of September in the 28th year of his Raign with full power and Authority to search and take Copies of all or any might be found concerning his Royal Rights which was seconded by an order of the Right Honourable Arthur Earl of Anglesey then Lord Privy Seal Mr. Henry Coventry and Sir Joseph Williamson his then Secretaries of State and Sir George Carteret being all of his Majesties Privy Council who did by their order dated the 3d. of July 1677. direct and authorize Sir William Dugdale since Garter King at Arms Elias Asbmole Esquire and my self in pursuance of his Majesties Order dated the 23. of February 1675. authorizing the aforesaid Lords of his Councel to examine the State and Condition of the Records in the Tower of London and consider what is
visit to his Tomb. The King thus vanquished by Clemency and hopes to out-reason their detestible Rebellion with all the secresie imaginable retired out of Oxford with a too much over-trusted Groom of his Bed-chamber riding out as the man with Mr. Hudson an Orthodox Loyal Minister their Journey being designed for London where the King was informed that the City Train Bands were to muster the next day after he should reach thither unto whose Protection not of the Scotch Army then quartered at Newcastle upon Tine he intended to place the safety of his Person whilst he should Treat further with his Parliament Rebels who being sufficiently infected with their Parliamentary Rebellious never to be warranted Principles would have given him as little an assistance whereof the Rebels being informed before hand by their Colonel Rainsborough that granted the King his pass and did too well understand who was the treacherous Groom of the Bed-chamber mans Master when the Loyal Party were afraid what was become of the King the Rebels could answer they would shortly hear of him who coming near unto London finding himself disappointed by the Training put off was enforced to coast about betwixt Branford and Highgate and from thence resolve to take his way to the Scotish Army and cast himself into their Protection after that he had before met with so bad an effect of their contrary Loyalty whither being come they as if they had had no manner of Intelligence of it before write their Letters to their Brother Parliament Rebels of their great amazement to see the King come unto them and desire that he may be brought home to his Parliament over which they had such an influence as they almost governed them in honour and safety who fail not to do it in promises but would have him delivered to them and sent to an house of his own at Holmby in the County of Northampton where he should not want a guard of their own whereupon the Scotish Commanders having fallen into a deeper than ordinary consideration how they could with Honour Loyalty and gude Conscience deliver their Native King into the hands of his Enemies and going to voting two great Commanders that in muckle manner had been obliged to their King for many great favours and might have ballanced the Vote with a great deal of facility in the Negative were mightily suspected to have gone privately along with them that they were certain would make up the Majority for delivering of the King up to his Parliament Adversaries but took by all means an especial care for themselves to Vote against the delivering of the King into the hands of those that would love their own ends more than any of his Rights or their Duty and a bargain came so to be made as the King was put into the mercy of the English Parliament and 200000 l. Sterling which amounted unto something more than Judas Iscariots thirty pieces of Silver for betraying Jesus Christ. And as Mickel as the 200000 l. were above the Scotch Marks or 13 d. half-penny english none or very little of it could ever after find the way to the Pockets of the Scotch Plads or blew Caps and he had not been long at Holmby but he was in a Morning betimes fetcht out of his Bed by Cornet Joice a Fanatick Tayler with some Troops of Horse sent by Cromwel and Fairfax into their Army Quarters and tossed from place to place until after 25 Treaties Letters and Messages for Peace they had from Treachery to Treachery and Villany to Villany contrived his execrable Murder The 2d of June 1642. the Lords and Commons in Parliament did offer their humble Petition and Advice having nothing in their thoughts and desires as they pretended next unto the Honour and immediate service of God more than the faithful performance of their Duty to his Majesty and this Kingdom as the most necessary and effectual means thereof to grant and accept the 19 Propositions ensuing viz. 1. That the Lords and others of his Majesties Privy Council and all such great Officers and Ministers of State either at home or abroad or beyond the Seas may be put from your Privy Council and have no Offices or Employments excepting such as shall be approved of by both Houses of Parliament and that the Persons put into their Places and Employment may be approved of by both Houses of Parliament and that Privy Councellors shall take an Oath for the due execution of their Places in such form as shall be agreed upon by both Houses of Parliament 2. That the great Affairs of the Kingdom may not be concluded or transacted by the advice of private men or by any unknown or unsworn Councellors Sir Robert Cotton a great Antiquary with a well furnished Library being often consulted with by King James and that Prince in special matters but that such matters as concern the publick and are proper for the High Court of Parliament which is his Majesties great and supream Court may be debated resolved and transacted only in Parliament which was contrary to the Fundamental Laws and Constitutions of Parliaments in this and all other the Kingdoms of the Christian World whereby the matters and business of Monarchy and the Regal Government were limited and restrained unto arduis non omnibus arduis sed quibusdam and not elsewhere and such as shall presume to do any thing to the contrary shall be reserved to the censure and judgment of Parliament and such other matters as are proper for his Majesties Privy Council shall be debated and concluded by such of the Nobility and others as shall from time to time be chosen for that place by approbation of both Houses of Parliament which would have Incorporated and Associated the House of Commons in Parliament with the House of Lords which never was nor ought to have been otherwise than inferiour unto the House of Peers in Parliament and therefore stiled the lower House of Parliament and that no publick Act concerning the Affairs of the Kingdom as are proper for his Majesties Privy Council may be esteemed of any validity as proceeding from the Royal Authority unless it be done by the Advice and Consent of the Major part of his Council Attested under their hands and that his Council may be limitted to a certain number not exceeding 25 nor under 15. And that if any Privy Councellors place happen to be void in the intervals of Parliament it shall not be supplied without the assent of the Major part of the Council which choice shall be confirmed at the next sitting of Parliament or else to be void 3. That the Lord High Steward of England Lord High Constable of England which by Marriages and Descent had been Incorporated in the Royal Line Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal Lord Treasurer Lord Privy Seal Earl Marshal Lord Admiral Warden of the Cinque Ports Governour of Ireland the Chancellor of the Exchequer Master of the Wards
ad loquendum or as King Henry the 3d. in the 36th Year of his Reign did call the Londoners to Westminster about taking upon them the Cross and attending him in those Wars representing in that particular only their own Estates or Qualities When in a Parliament holden by the Queen and her Councell in his absence in France in the 38th year of his Reign though Mathew Paris and Mr Daniel have given us no intimation of a Parliament then holden wherein do not appear to have been any Commons or House of Commons the Lords gave an aid by themselves the Clergy doing the like as is evidenced by the 2 following Records in these words viz. Rex dilecto fideli suo Willielmo de Oddinggeseles salutem Cum Venerabilis pater B. Cantuariensis Archiepiscopus Episcopi provinc Cant. R. Com. Cornub. frater noster R. Com. Glouc. alii Com. Barones in quindena sci Hillarii jam praetoriti apud London coram dilecta Regina nostra Consilio nostro Commorante in Anglia constituti nobis promiserunt liberaliter benigni facere auxilium decens perutile viz. quidam prelati in propriis personis quidam in pecunia Comites vero Barones in propriis personis suis potenter contra Regem Castelliae qui terram nostram Vasconiae in manu forti in quindena Pasche proxime futur hostiliter est ingressurus vos ex toto corde requirimus quod sicut supradicti Commites Barones nobis promiserunt quod erunt London A die Paschae prox futur in tres septimanas parati bene muniti sine ulla dilatione versus Vasconiam ad nos personaliter movere vos ad dictas diem et locum modo consimili veniatis omni occasione dilatione postpositis ad tendendum versus portesmum cum praefatis Magnatibus ad transfretandi cum eisdem ad nos in Vasconiam et hoc in fide qua nobis tenemini vobis firmiter injungimus sicut honorem nostrum indempnitatem corporis nostri diligitis T. per Reginam 5. die Febr. Et mand est per Henr. 3 Regem in An. 38. regni sui Archiepiscopis et Episcopis totius Angliae quatenus cum festinatione omni convocent omnes Abbates et Priores suae Diocesis cujuscunque sint ordinis inducentes modis omnibus quod nobis in praesenti necessitate subveniant manu lar 〈…〉 lua ne per defectum ipsorum vel aliorum corporis incurramus periculum et terrae nostrae jacturam quod absit quia id verteretur in vestrum ipsorum opprobium sempiternum sic igitur vestra vigilet discretio circa praedictum auxilium tam a vobis deferendum quam a subditis vestris per quirendum quod futuris temporibus vobis ipsis simus non immerito obligati Proviso quod praefatum auxilium habeamus apud Westmonasterium in quindenam Pasche proxime futuram sine defectu hoc sicut nos honorem nostrum nec non indempnitatem corporis nostri diligitis non omitatis Dirigitur etiam litera ista Archiepiscopo Cantuar cum hac clausula quod ordinariam jurisdictionem exercetis vacante sede in Episcopatu Linc. vos requirimus affectuose quatenus officiariis vestris et Archiediacono ejusdem Episcopatus scribatis attente quod tempestive convocent omnes Abbates Priores ejusdem Episcopatus cujuscunque sine ordinis ad certos dies locum abducentes eos nudis omnibus quod in hoc necessitate vestrae concilium nobis faciant subventionem And the failing to perform Military services was afterwards by the Statutes of 6. E. 1. ca. 4. 13. E. 1. ca. 21. made so Penall and fixed upon them as after a Cessavit per Biennium in the performing of their service the King or Chief Lord might by writs ordained to be granted out of the Chancery demand and prosecute to recover the same and such Tenants after Judgments had against them were to be for ever barred to demand or enjoy the same and where either the King demands Escuage of his Tenants or the mean Lords demands Escuage of their Tenants it was to be assessed in Parliament and Proved or disproved by Certificate of the Marshall of the Kings Host who is enabled thereunto by his Roll kept for that purpose When in Parliament the members of the house of Commons either holding Lands in Capite or of mesne Lords by Knights Service were not upon denying to grant Subsidies or Aydes to the King to forfeit or lose their lands according to the aforesaid Acts of Parliament or otherwise And such kind of Courts for lands holden in Capite or by Knights service should not by the most ordinary and mean Capacities be understood to be one and the same with the great Court or Councell of Parliament which many times by the Power and Authority of the King in that his Highest Court corrects and rectifies the defaults of the other Our high Courts of Parliament having the Judges of the Land subordinate to their Prince whether they have lands holden in Capite or no land summoned by his writs to give their Councell and advice as to matters of Law and the ancient customs of the Kingdom wherein the King is attended with his great Ministers or Officers of State as the Lord Chancellor Treasurer Privy Seal great Chamberlain of England Lord Steward and Chamberlain of his houshold and Lord Admirall whether of the degree of Barronage or holding of him in Capite or not with other great solemn formalities becoming the honour and State thereof with which that most honourable assembly is accompanied greatly different from those lesser Courts or Councell of summoning and calling together those that were only proper or obliged to actions of war or to know how their services were performed when our Parliaments being summoned to treat and advise of matters concerning peace and the defence of the Church and de quibusdam arduis only and have sometimes no matters of war consulted thereon Those military Councells anciently summoned for service in war and defence being in a very different form from Parliamentary Councells as for further satisfaction may be manifested by the writs aforesaid And was no more then what every Earl and Baron had in their Courts and Jurisdidictions when they summoned the Tenants holding of them by Knights service to their Courts of honour or their honorary Possessions which were in our records frequently stiled as the honors of Eagle Eye Leicester Hedingham Penerel Arundel c. to which purpose they had their Escheators Feodares and Stewards to preside or officiate therein subordinate unto them when they called their Tenants together either to ayd ride or go along with them in the wars and service of their Prince and Country or to pay them their reliefs or ayds pairfile marier which the Law Interpreteth to be only the elder or to make the eldest Son a Knight or to do their
signified to the Speaker of the House of Commons that in some things they had spent more time then needed but she perceived some men did it more for their satisfaction then the necessity of the thing deserved Misliked that such irreverence was shewed towards her Privy Councellors who were not to be accompted as Common Knights and Burgesses of the House that are Councellors but during the Parliament whereas the others are standing Councellors and for their Wisdom and great service are called to the Councell of State Had heard that some men in the case of great necessity and aid had seemed to regard their Country and made their necessities more then they were forgetting the urgent necessity of the time and dangers that were now eminent she would not have the people feared with reports charged them that the Trained Bands should be ready and well supplied thanked them for their subsidies and assured them that if the Coffers of her Treasure were not empty and the revenues of the Crown and other Princely ornaments could supply her wants and the charge of the Realm she would not in the words of a Prince have now charged them or accepted what they gave After which the Queen sitting in her Chair of State amongst other things speaking of the injustice of the King of Spains Wars and the Justice of her own said I heard say that when he attempted his last Invasion some upon the Sea coast forsook their Towns flew up higher into the Country and left all naked and exposed to his entrance but I swear unto you by God if I knew those persons or any that shall do so hereafter I will make them know and feel what it is to be so fearfull in so urgent a cause Declared unto them that the subsidy which they gave her was not so much but that it is needfull for a Prince to have so much allways lying in her Coffers for your defence in time of need and not to be driven to get it when we should use it Upon which the Clerk of the Parliament having read the Queens acceptance and thanks for the subsidies given did upon the reading of the pardon pronounce the thanks of the House in these words les Prelates Seigneurs Communes en ce Parlement assembles au nom de toutz vous autres Subjects remerc erent tres humblement vostre Majesty prient a Dieu que il vous donne en sante bonne vie longue The assent of the Sovereign is never given to a bill of subsidy because it is the guift of the Subject nor to an Act of generall pardon for that is the Kings free guift after which ended followed the dissolution of the Parliament in these words Dominus Custos magni sigilli ex mandato dominae Reginae tunc praesentis dissolvit praesens Parliamentum The names of the Knights Citizens and Burgesses are at the beginning of the Parliament delivered to the Clerk of the Crown who always attends in the House of Lords and entred into his book After the Lord Keepers speech ended her Majesty calling him unto her commanded him to give the Lower House Authority to choose their Speaker and present him the Thursday following unto which day he adjourned the Parliament At which day Sr Edward Coke Knight being chosen and admitted Speaker the Queen allowed his petitions for access unto her Majesty privileges and liberty of speech with a caution that they should not speak irreverently either of the Church or State and then the Lord Keeper by the Queens command adjourned the Parliament untill the Saturday following When the House of Commons being again assembled Mr Peter Wentworth and Sir Henry Bromley delivered a petition to the Lord Keeper therein desiring the Lords of the Upper House to be supplicants with them of the Lower unto her Majesty for the entailing of the Succession to the Crown whereof a bill was ready prepared With which her Majesty being highly displeased charged the Councell to call the parties before them whereupon Sr Thomas Heneage sent presently for them commanded them to forbear going to the Parliament and not to go out of their severall lodgings and the day after they were called before the Lord Treasurer Burleigh the Lord Buckhurst and Sr Thomas Heneage who informing them how highly her Majesty was offended told them they must needs commit them Mr Wentworth was sent prisoner to the Tower Sir Henry Bromley and one Mr Stevens to whom he had imparted it and Mr Welch the other Knight of the shire for Worcestershire to the Fleet. A bill being offered by Mr Morris Attorney of the Court of Wards against the usage of Ecclesiasticall discipline by the Prelates with an intent that the House might be suitors to her Majesty to allow it he was sent for to the Court and committed to the keeping of Sir John Fortescue a Parliament man And she sent for the Speaker and by him sent a message to the House of Commons which he did not omit to deliver in her very words that it was in her and her power to call Parliaments it was in her power to end and determine the same and it was in her power to assent or dissent to any thing done in Parliament And her Majesties pleasure being by the Lord Keeper delivered unto them that it was not meant that they should meddle with matters of State or causes Ecclesiasticall she wondred that any should be of so high a Commandment to attempt a thing contrary to that which she had so expressly forbidden and therefore with this she was highly displeased and charged the Speaker upon his Allegeance that if any such bill be exhibited not to receive it An Act was sent up by the Commons to the Lords who amended somewhat therein but what they amend cannot be altered by the Commons but the Lords will give their reasons for such their amendment The Commons complaining of a Breach of Privilege that the Lord Keeper did in the behalf of the Lords give answers unto their messages and did not come down unto hose that were sent to the Bar after a great debate and much advice and consultation it was resolved that the Lord Keeper or Lord Chancellour ought to sit in his place covered when he gave them answers and that if it had been lately otherwise done it was by error and mistake but ought not which then Lordships by Mr Attorney Generall and Serjeant Harris signifying to the Lower House desired them to send some of their House to receive their Lordships answer whereunto they seemed to assent and returned some of their Knights and Burgesses with those that beâ—ore demanded satisfaction to receive their answer which being declared unto them they by the mouth of Sr William Knolles one o◠〈◊〉 House of Commons protested that they had no Commission to receive an answer in that form after which upon a conference betwixt both Houses upon great debate and arguments it was resolved that the order and
of France until he were absolved and had confirmed unto them their Liberties whereupon the King much against his will was constrain'd to submit to the present pressure and necessity sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the other Bishops who were yet in France promising them present restitution and satisfaction under the Hands and Seals of 24 of his Earls and Barons undertaking for the performance thereof according to the form of his Charter and Agreement made and granted in that behalf and the better to prepare them to give him their assistance directed the ensuing Letter to meet them in these words Rex Venerabili in Christo Patri S. Dei gratiâ Cant ' Archiepiscopo totius Angliae Primati sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Cardinali omnibus suffraganeis suis Episcopis cum eo existentibus Johannes eadem gratiâ Rex Angliae c. mandamus vobis quòd cùm veneritis in Angliam scientes quòd jamdiù vos expectavimus adventum vestrum desideravimus unde in occursum vestrum mittimus fideles nostros Dominum H. Dublin ' Archiepiscopum J. Norwici Episcopum W. Com' Arundel Mattheum filium Herberti W. Archidiaconum Huntindon rogantes quatenùs ad nos venire festinetis sicut praedicti fideles nostri vobis dicent T. meipso apud Stoaks Episcopi primo die Julii Whereupon Pandulphus with the Archbishop and the rest of the exiled Clergy upon his confiscation of their Estates forthwith came over and found him at Winchester who went forth to meet them and on his knees with Tears received them beseeching them to have Compassion on him and the Kingdom of England and being thereupon Absolved with great Penitence Weeping and Compunction accompanied with the Tears of the many Beholders did Swear upon the Evangelists to Love Defend and Maintain Holy Church and the Ministers thereof to the utmost of his Power that he would renew the good Laws of his Predecessors especially those of King Edward abrogating such as were unjust would Judge all his Subjects according to the just Judgment of his Court which was then and for many Ages before composed only of the King and his Nobility Bishops and Lords Spiritual with his great Officers of State and such Assistants as he would please to call unto it and that presently upon Easter next following he would make plenary satisfaction for whatsoever had been taken from the Church Which done he went to Portsmouth with intention to pass over into France committing the Government of the Kingdom to the Bishop of Winchester and Jeffrey Fitz-Peter Justiciar a man of a Generous Spirit Learned in the Laws and Skilful in Government who were also to take the Councel of the Archbishop of Canterbury The Souldiers being numerous and wanting Money to attend him desired to be Supplied out of his Exchequer which he refusing to do or wanting it in a great rage with his private Family took Shipping and put forth to the Isle of Jersey but seeing none of his Nobles and others followed him according to their Tenures and Homage was forced having lost his opportunity of the Season to return into England where he gathered an Army with intention to Chastise the Lords who had so forsaken him having for the like Offence some years before taken by way of Fine a great sum of Money Quòd noluerunt eum sequi ad partes transmarinas ut haereditatem amissam recuperaret But the Archbishop of Canterbury followed him to Northampton urging him that it was against his Oath taken at his Absolution to proceed in that manner against any man without the Judgment of his Court to whom the King in great wrath replyed that he would not defer the business of the Kingdom for his pleasure seeing Lay Judgment appertained not to him and marched to Nottingham The Archbishop followed him and plainly told him that unless he would desist he would Excommunicate all such as should take Arms against any before the releasing of the Interdiction and would not leave him until he had obtained a convenient day for the Lords to come to his Court which shortly after they did And a Parliament was assembled at St. Pauls in London wherein the Archbishop of Canterbury produced the said Charter of King Henry I. whereby he granted the ancient Liberties of the Kingdom of England according to the Laws of King Edward with those emendations which his Father by the counsel of his Barons had ratified upon the reading whereof gaudio magno valdè saith Matthew Paris they greatly rejoyced and swore in the presence of the Archbishop that for those Liberties viso tempore congruo si necesse fuerit decertabunt usque ad mortem Archiepiscopus promisit eis fidelissimum auxilium suum pro posse suo sic confederatione facta inter eos colloquium solutum fuit The Pope advertised of those disturbances by his Bull directed Baronibus Angliae but not to those Bishops displaying the Banner of his supposed Authority which had encouraged and animated and caused them to persist therein stiling those Quaestiones novitèr suscitatas grave dispendium parituras did prohibit under the pain of Excommunication all Conspiracies and Insurrections from the time of the Discords inter Regnum Sacerdotium which had been quieted Apostolica autoritate admonished them Regem placare reconciliare exhibentes ei servitia consueta which They and their Predecessors had done unto Him and his Predecessors and if they had any thing to require of him they should not ask it insolenter sed cum reverentia preserving his Regal Honour and Authority that so they might the more easily obtain what they desired and assured them that he would desire the King that he should be kind to them and admit their just Petitions But the Barons persisting in their armed Violence and Rebellion against the King notwithstanding that weather-beaten Prince had for shelter taken upon him the Cross and War for the recovery of the Holy-Land then so called the Pope in July following sent his Bull to the universality of the Barons Bishops and Commonalty of England wherein reciting that the Barons had sent their Agents unto him and that he had commanded the Archbishops Bishops and Archdeacons ut conspirationes conjurationes praesumptas from the the time of the discords inter Regnum Sacerdotium that they should Apostolic à autoritate forbid them by Excommunication to proceed any farther therein and enjoyn the Barons to endeavour to pacifie the King and reconcile themselves unto him and if they had any thing to demand of him it should be done conservando sibi Regalem Honorem exhibendo servitia debita quibus ipse Rex non debebat absque Judicio spoliari And that he had commanded the King to be admonished and enjoyned as he would have remission of his sins graciously to give them a safe conduct and receive their just Petitions ita si quod fortè non posset inter eos concordia provenire
being crowded into King John's Charter were never either granted or confirmed by King Henry III. Edward I. or any of our succeeding Kings nor as Sir Henry Spelman repeating the same omissions saith is therein that of paying the Debts of the Deceased probably of those that died leaving their Heirs in Ward to the Jews and others although Matthew Paris so much mistakes as to affirm that those Charters of King John and his Son Henry III. were in nullo dissimiles Which well-interpreted could signifie no more than that King John in his great necessities and troubles pressing upon his Tenants in capite the great Lords and others by taxing them proportionably according to their Knights Fees they endeavoured by those Charters all that they could to restrain him from any such Assesments which should go further then a reasonable aid unless in the cases there excepted and aim'd at no more then that a Common-Councel which was not then called a Parliament should be summon'd not annually of all Archbishops Bishops Abbots Earls and greater Barons and all the Tenants in capite being those that were most concerned therein nor as our Parliaments now but only as to their aids and services as Tenants in capite were upon forty days notice to appear at the same time and place given in general by the King's Sheriffs and Bailiffs sic factâ submonitione negotium procedat ad diem assignatam secundum consilium eorum qui prae sentes fuerint quamvis non omnes submoniti venerint and could not be intended of our now House of Commons in Parliament many years after first of all and never before introduced or constituted that praefiction of Forty days probably first creating that opinion which can never arrive unto any more then that every summons of such a Councel or Meeting was to be upon so many days notice or warning which Mr. Pryn upon an exact observation of succeeding Parliaments hath found to be otherwise much of the boisterousness haughty and long after unquiet minds of some of those unruly Barons being to be attributed to the over-strained promises and obligations of William the Conquerour before he was so to his Normans and other Nations that adventured with him upon an agreement and Ordinance made in Normandy before his putting to Sea which the King of France had in the mean time upon charges and great allowances made unto him undertaken to guard and long after by the command of King Edward III. then warring in France in the 20th year of his Reign was by Sir Barth Burghersh and others sent from thence in the presence of the Keeper or Guardian of England and the whole Estate declared in Parliament as a matter of new discovery and designs of the French happened in the traverse and success of those wars which probably might make the Posterity of some of them although the Ancestors of most of them had been abundantly recompenced by large shares of the Conquest Gifts and Honours granted by the Conquerour to a more than competent satiety extended to the then lower Ranks of his Servants Souldiers or Followers as that to de Ferrariis the Head afterwards and chief of a greater Estate and Family in England than they had in Normandy and might be the occasion of that over-lofty answer of John de Warrennis Earl of Surrey in his answer to some of the Justices in Eyre in the Reign of King Edward I. when demanded by what warrant he did hold some of his Lands and Liberties he drawing out a rusty Sword which he did either wear or had brought with him for that purpose said By that which he helped William the Conquerour to subdue England so greatly to mistake themselves as to think which the Lineage of the famous Strongbow Earl of Pembroke and some eminent Families of Wales in the after-Conquest of Ireland never adventured to do that the Ancestors of them and others that left their lesser Estates in Nòrmandy to gain a greater in England to be added thereunto had not come as Subjects to their Duke and leige-Leige-Lord but Fellow-sharers and Partners with him which they durst not ever after claim in his life-time or the life of any of his Successors before in the greatest advantages they had of them or the many Storms and Tempests of State which befel them but might be well content as the words of the Ordinance it self do express That they and their Progenies should acknowledge a Sovereignty unto the Conquerour their Duke and King and yield an Obedience unto him and his far-fam'd Posterity as their first and continued Benefactors And those their Liberties and Priviledges freely granted by those Charters and not otherwise to be claimed were so welcome and greatly to be esteemed by the then Subjects of England as they returned him their gratitude and thankfulness for them in a contribution of the fifteenth part of all their Moveables with an Attestation and Testimony of the Wiser more Noble and Powerful part of the Kingdom viz. the Archbishop of Canterbury Eleven other Bishops Nineteen Abbots Hubert de Burgh Chief-Justice Ten Earls John Constable of Chester and Twenty-one Barons men of Might and great Estates amongst which there were of the contending and opposite Party Robert Fitz Walter who had been General of the Army raised and fighting against his Father the Earls of Warren Hereford Derby Warwick Chester and Albemarl the Barons of Vipont and Lisle William de Brewere and Gilbert de Clare Earl of Gloucester and Hertford who afterwards fought against that King and helped to take him Prisoner That those Charters were given and granted unto them and other his Subjects the Free-men of his Kingdom of his own free will and accord And as to that of being not condemned without Answer or Tryal which in the infancy of the World was by the Creator of all Mankind recommended to its imitation as the most excellent Rule and Pattern of Justice in the Tryal and Sentence of Adam and Eve in Paradise are not to be found enacted or granted in King Edward the Confessor's Laws or the Charters or Laws of King Henry I. the people of England having no or little reason much to value or relie upon the aforesaid Charters of King John gained indirectly by force about two years after his as aforesaid constrained Resignation of his Kingdom of England and Dominion of Ireland to hold of the Pope and Church of Rome by an yearly Tribute being not much above Thirty years before and not then gone out of memory SECT V. Of the continued unhappy Iealousies Troubles and Discords betwixt the discontented and ambitious Barons and King Henry III. after the granting of his Magna Charta and Charta de Forestâ ALmost two years after which the King in a Parliament at Oxford declaring himself to be of full age and free to dispose of the affairs of the Kingdom cancelled and annulled the Charter of the Forests as granted in his
that the Orders concluded in Parliament were not observed in the levying and disposing of the Subsidy and over-strict courses had been taken in the valuation of mens Estates William Valence the Queens Uncle was grown the only man with him and nothing was done without him the Earl of Provence his Father a poor Prince was invited to come into England to participate of the Treasure and Riches thereof Symon de Montfort a French man born banished out of France by Queen Blanch was entertained in England preferred secretly in marriage with the King's Sister Widow of William Earl of Pembroke the great Marshal made Earl of Leicester and Steward of England in the right of his Mother Amice Daughter of Blanchmains Earl of Leicester Which incensing many of the Nobility and in them not a few of the common people did begin to raise a Commotion wherein they procured Richard Earl of Cornwal Brother to the King and Heir-apparent the King having then no Child to head their Party and manage their Grievances which amongst many pretended were That he despised the counsel of his natural Subjects and followed that of the Pope's Legate as if he had been the Pope's Feudatory Upon which harsh Remonstrance the King having sent to sound the affections of the Londoners found them to be against him Summoned a Parliament in the 22d year of his Reign at London whither the Lords came armed both for their own Safety and to constrain him if he refused to the keeping of his promises and reformation of his courses wherein after many debatements the King taking his Oath to refer the business according to the order of certain grave men of the Kingdom Articles were drawn sealed and publickly set up under the Seals of the Legate and divers great Men But before any thing could be effected Symon Montfort working a Peace for himself with the Earls of Cornwal and Lincoln with whom he and the other Barons had been before displeased the Earl grew cold in the business which the other Lords perceiving nothing more was at that time done Symon Norman called Master of the King's Seal and said to be Governour of the affairs of the Kingdom had the Seal taken from him and some others whom the Nobility maligned displaced And in the same year an Assassinate attempting to kill the King as he was in Bed instigated thereunto by William de Marisco the Son of Jeffrey de Marisco was for the Fact drawn in pieces with Horses and afterwards hang'd and quarter'd And some years after the King having a Son born his Brother the Earl of Cornwal having likewise Issue did by permission of the State which before he could not obtain undertake the Cross and with him the Earl of Salisbury and many other Noblemen The Earl of March the Queen-Mother and certain Lords of Poicteau incited the King to make a War with France to which some of the English who claimed Estates therein were very willing but the matter being moved in Parliament a general opposition was made against it the great expences thereof and the ill suceess it lately had and it was vehemently urged That it was unlawful to break the Truce made with the King of France who was now too strong for them notwithstanding many of the Peers in the hopes of recovering their Estates so prevailed as an Aid demanded for the same was granted but so ill resented by others as all the King's supplies from the beginning of his Reign were particularly and opprobriously remembred as the Thirteenth Fifteenth Sixteenth Thirtieth and Fortieth part of all mens Movables besides Carucage Hydage Escuage Escheats Amerciaments and the like which would as they said be enough to fill his Coffers in which considerations also and reckonings with the Pope's continual exactions and the infinite charge of those who undertook the Holy War were not omitted besides it was declared how the Thirtieth lately levyed being ordered to be kept in certain Castles and not to be issued but by the allowance of some of the Peers was yet unspent the King no necessary occasion for it for the use of the Commonwealth for which it was granted and therefore resolutely denyed to grant any more whereupon he came himself to the Parliament and in a submissive manner craving their aid urged the Popes Letter to perswade them thereunto but by a vow made unto each other all that was said was not able to remove their resolutions insomuch as he was driven to get what he could of particular men by Gifts or Loans and took so great a care of his poorer Subjects at or about the same time as he did by his Writ in the 23d year of his Reign command William de Haverhul and Edward Fitz-Odo That upon Friday next after the Feast of St. Matthias being the Anniversary of Eleanor Queen of Scotland his Sister they should cause to be fed as many Poor as might be entertained in the greater Hall of Westminster and did in the same year by another Writ command the said William de Haverhull to feed 15000 Poor at St. Peters in London on the Feast-day of the Conversion of St. Peter and 4000 Poor upon Monday next after the Feast of St. Lucie the Virgin in the great Hall at Westminster And for quiet at home whilst he should be absent in France contracted a marriage betwixt his youngest Daughter Margaret and Alexander eldest Son of Alexander III. King of Scotland but his expedition in France not succeeding his Treasure consumed upon Strangers the English Nobility discontented and by the Poictovins deceiving his Trust in their not supplying him with money he was after more than a years stay the Lords of England leaving him constrained to make a dishonourable Truce with the King of France and to return having been relieved with much Provisions out of England and Impositions for Escuage a Parliament was in the 28th year of his Reign assembled at Westminster wherein his Wars the revolt of Wales and Scotland who joyned together and the present occasions of the necessary defence of the Kingdom being pressed nothing could be effected without the assurance of Reformation and the due execution of Laws whereupon he came again himself in person and pleaded his own necessities but that produced no more than a desire of theirs to have ordained that four of the most grave and discreet Peers should be chosen as Conservators of the Kingdom and sworn of the Kings Council both to see Justice observed and the Treasure issued and ever attend about him or at least three or two of them That the Lord Chief-Justiciar and Lord Chancellor should be chosen by the general voices of the States assembled or else be of the number of those four and that there might be two Justices of the Benches two Barons of the Exchequer and one Justice for the Jews and those likewise to be chosen by Parliament that as their Function was publick so should also be their Election At which time the
Bathenia propriae familiae omnem indignationem omnem rancorem quem erga ipsum Henricum pro quibuscunque transgressionibus usque ad diem Dominicam proximam post festum translationis beati Thomae Martyris anno c. tricesimo quinto ita tamen quod pro remissione illa dabit nobis praedictus Henricus duo millia marcarum unde solvet nobis ducentas marcas per annum videlicet in Festo Sancti Michaelis anno eodem cent ' marc ' ad Pasch ' prox ' sequen ' cent ' marc ' sic de anno in annum ad eosdem terminos cent ' marc ' donec praedicta duo millia marc ' nobis fuerint persoluta si forsitan contigerit quod praefat ' Henr ' medio tempore in fata concesserit antequam praedicta pecunia nobis fuerit persoluta haeredes sui eandem solutionem facient ad eosdem terminos sicut praedictum est perdonationis eidem Henr ' amerciamentum in quod incidit per attinctam quam Thomas de Muleton arramavit versus ipsum de ten ' in Holbech Querpilan ' idem etiam Henr ' juri omnibus de eo conqueri volentibus etiam nobis in Curia nostra secundum Legem Consuetudinem Regni nostri in cujus c. Teste Rege apud Wodestock octavo die Julii T. Johanne Mansel Richardo Fil Nicholai In the mean time Lewis King of France warring in the Holy-Land and being taken Prisoner the Pope solicited him to take upon him the Cross to rescue him Alphonsus the King of Castile undertaking to accompany him and the captive King offering to restore Normandy to the King of England for his assistance which the French disdaining and undertaking themselves to procure his Ransom upon the Pope's granting a Tenth to be leavied upon the Clergy and Laity for three years the King undertakes notwithstanding the Cross upon the hopes of getting the money which saith Matthew Paris being collected would have amounted unto 600000 l. as was then believed more than to perform his promise Whereupon shortly after a Parliament was holden about the Tenth granted by the Pope for the recovery of the Holy-Land where the Bishops notwithstanding that he had for the ease of his Subjects severely accused in Parliament Henry de Bathonia one of his Justices for receiving of Bribes were first dealt withal absolutely denied it and the Lords alledging they would do as the Bishops did the City of London was again compelled to the contribution of 2000 l. The Gascoigns likely to revolt if a speedy remedy were not provided general Musters were made and command given that every one that could dispend 13 l. per annum should furnish out an Horseman which together with his extreme wants occasioned another Parliament who finding it to be better for the people to do it in the usual way than force him to those extravagant as they call'd them courses which he took were after fifteen days consultation in the 37th year of his Reign although they could not be then ignorant that he had but lately grievously punished and expelled the Caursini the Pope's Bankers or money-Collectors and Brokers and could not deny his own wants which appeared in the pawning of his Jewels and Ornaments and in the end as Sir Robert Cotton if he were the Author of the short view of that King's Life and Reign hath recorded it had not means to defray the diet of his Court but was constrained to break up House-keeping and as Mat. Paris saith with his Queen cum Abbaâ—ibus Prioribus satis humilitèr hospitia prandia quaerere to satisfie the King's necessities but so as the reformation of the Grievances and ratification of their Laws might be once again solemnly confirmed A Tenth was granted by the Clergy for three years to be distributed by the view of certain Lords and three Marks Scutage for every Knights Fee to be charged upon the Laity for that year insomuch as those often-confirmed Charters were again agreed to be ratified in the most solemn and religious way that Relion and State could ever devise to have it done after this manner viz. the King who in all Excommunications was with the Lords Temporal by the Laws and reasonable Customs of England to give their assent before it could sortiri effectum or have any validity with many of the great Nobility of England all the Bishops and chief Prelates in their Reverend Ornaments with Candles or Tapers in their hands walking in a direful Procession through Westminster hall into the Abbey-Church of Westminster there to hear the terrible Sentence of Excommunication pronounced against the Infringers of the aforesaid Charters granted by him At the lighting of which Candles the King having received one in his hand gave it to a Prelate that stood by him saying It becomes not me being no Priest to hold the Candle my heart shall bear a greater Testimony and withal laid his hand upon his breast the whole time that the Sentence was reading which was pronounced autoritate de omni potentis c. Which done he caused the Charter of King John his Father granted by his free consent to be likewise openly read and the rest of the company throwing away their Candles which lay smoaking on the ground all cried out So let them who incur the Sentence be extinct and stink in Hell The King with a loud voice saying as God me help I will as I am a man a Christian a Knight a King Crowned and Anointed inviolably observe those things which Ceremony ended the Bells rung out and all the people shouted with joy But it is not to be forgotten although Matthew Paris Samuel Daniel and all other Writers but Mr. William Pryn make no mention of it in this astonishing and dreadful Ceremony in the like whereof never were Laws saith Mr. Daniel amongst men except the Decalogue from Mount-Sinai promulgated and pronounced with more Majesty of Ceremony to make them heeded reverenced and respected than were those that wanted Thundring and Lightning from Heaven acompanied with an Earth-quake shaking the very Foundations thereof The King did not desert his own regal Rights and Preheminencies but did at the same time when in that dreadful manner he joyned in the Pronunciation of that Sentence of Excommunication with his own mouth publickly except out of it all the Ancient and Accustomed Liberties of the Realm and the Dignities and Rights of the Crown and the same day caused a Record thereof to be made yet extant in the Tower of London in these words viz. Noverint Universi quòd Dominus Henricus Rex Angliae Illustis R. Comes Norf. Marshallus Angliae H. Comes Horeford Essex J. Comes de Warren Petrus de Sabaudia caeterique Magnates Angliae concesserunt in sententiam Excommunicationis generaliter latam apud Westmonasterium tertio decimo die Maii Anno Regni Regis predicti 37. in hac forma scilicet quòd vinculo
his to come into England but such only as the King and the Lords should like The Poictovins landing at Boloign had much-a-do to gain passage into their own Countreys by reason that Henry de Montfort Son to the Earl of Leicester whose power was very great in France had followed them thither Rumours were spread amongst the people in England that the Earl of Gloucester was attempted to have been poyson'd and one of his Servants executed upon no other proof but presumption and every one that would complain of the Poictovins wanted no encouragement Richard Gray whom the Lords had made Captain of the Castle of Dover intercepted as much as he could of what the Poictovins carried over and enriched himself thereby The new Chief-Justice Hugh Bigod Brother to the Earl Marshal being chosen in the last Parliament by publick voice procured an order that four Knights in every Shire should enquire of the poor oppressed by great men and certifie the same to the Baronage under their hands and seals which were never found to have been certified And made an Order that no man should give any thing besides Provisions for Justice or to hinder the same and that both the corrupter and corrupted should be grievously punished Notwithstanding which pretended care the Lords enforceing the service of the King's Tenants which dwelt near unto them were as totidem Tyranni furnished the especial Fortresses of the Kingdom with Garrisons of their own sworn to the common State and took the like assurance of all Sheriffs Bailiffs Coroners and other publick Ministers with strict Commissions upon Oath to examine their behaviour And to make the King and his actions the more odious and their own more popular it was rumoured that the King's necessities must be repaired out of the Estates of his people and he must not want whilst they had it Whereupon the King to defend himself from such scandals was constrained to publish his Declaration to desire the people to give no credit to such false suggestions for that he was ready to defend all Rights and Customs due unto them Howsoever Montfort Gloucester and Spencer who had by the late constitution of the twenty-four Conservators drawn the entire managing of the Kingdom into their hands enforced the King to call a Parliament at London where the authority of the twenty-four Conservators was placed in themselves and order taken that three at the least should attend at the Court to dispose of the custody of Castles and other business of the Kingdom of the Chancellor Chief-Justiciar Treasurer and all other Officers great and small and bound the King to release to them their legal Obedience whensoever he infringed his Charter In the mean time the Earl of Cornwal King of the Romans being dispossest of that Kingdom or not well liking it returning into England the Barons send to know the cause of his coming and require of him an Oath before he should land not to prejudice their late established Orders of the Kingdom which he sternly refused saying He had no Peer in England being the Son and Brother of a King and was above their power and if they would have reformed the Kingdom they ought first to have sent for him and not so presumptuously have attempted a business of so high a nature The Lords upon return of such an answer sent to guard the Ports came strongly to the Coast prepared to encounter him and the King Queen and their Son Edmond in a more loving manner go to Dover to receive him but neither they nor the Earl of Cornwal were by them permitted to enter into the Castle for that it was the chief Fortress of the Kingdom But finding the Earl of Cornwal's Train small they suffered him to land and did upon his promise to take the propounded Oath bring him and the King into the Chapter-house at Canterbury where the Earl of Gloucester standing forth in the midst in the presence of the King called forth the Earl not by the name of King but Earl of Cornwal who in reverend manner coming forth took his Oath That he would be faithful and diligent with the Barons to reform the Kingdom by the counsel of wicked persons over-much disordered and to be an effectual Coadjutor to expel Rebels and disturbers of the same under pain of losing all the Lands which he held in England After which both parties strengthening themselves all they could the King for the assurance of the King of France ex praecepto consilio Domini Regis Angliae totius Baronagii sent the Earls of Gloucester Leicester Peter de Subaudia John Mansel and Robert Walerand to the Parliament of Paris de arduis negotiis Regna Angliae Franciae contingentibus carrying with them a resignation of the Dutchy of Normandy and the Earldoms of Anjou Poicteau Turaine and Mayne for which the King of France was to give him three hundred thousand pounds with a grant of all Guyen beyond the River of Garonna all the River of Xantoigne to the River of Charente and the Counties of Limosin and Quercy to him and his Successors dong his Homage and Fealty to the Crown of France as a Duke of Aquitain and a Peer of that Kingdom After whose return Montfort as he had incensed others so had he those that animated him against the King as Walter Bishop of Worcester and Robert Bishop of Lincoln who enjoyned him upon the remission of his sins to prosecute the cause unto death affirming that the peace of the Church of England would never be established but by the Sword But the people being oppressed and tired at length with those commotions part-takings and discords which by the provisions wrested from the King at Oxford and so many mischiefs and inconveniencies had harassed and almost ruined them and did help to increase rather than decrease those troubles and controversies which afflicted the Nation it having never been easie to bring those that were to be governed to rule with any modesty or moderation those that had enjoyed a governing power in authority established and appointed by God in a well-temper'd Monarchy and succession for many Ages or those that were to govern to obey the giddy and unjust dictates of those who were to obey them or to unite in any contenting harmony the various ambitions envies revenges hatreds partialities self-interests and designs of many or a multitude or such enforcements and contrivances to be lasting durable or pleasing and that all could not well rule or agree how to do it The King and Queen keeping their Christmas in the Tower of London cum suis consiliariis saith Matthew Paris elaboratum fuit tam à Regni Angliae pontificibus quam à Regni Franciae ut pax reformaretur inter Regem Angliae Barones ventumque est ad illud ut Rex Proceres se submiserunt ordinationi Regis Franciae in praemissis provisionibus Oxoniae nec non pro depraedationibus damnis utrobique
themselves if not commanded or otherwise by their Tenures obliged be willing to do as that Learned French Lawyer Brissonius well observeth Qu'en la necessitie de Guerre toutes les Gentilz hommes sont tenus de prendre les Armes pour la necessitie du Roy which by our Laws of England is so to be encouraged as it is Treason to kill any Man that goeth to Aid the King and is no more than what the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy do bind every English-man unto although they should tarry in the Camp more than Forty Dayes or not have Escuage or any Allowance of their Charges from their own Tenants And the People of the Counties and Cities as well as the smaller Towns or Boroughs which were to delegate or commission them and make them wise enough to give their Assent in that great and solemn Assembly and Councel of the King and His Prelates Baronage Lords Spiritual and Temporal unto what they should ordain in quibusdam not in omnibus arduis high and extraordinary Matters concerning the King Church and Kingdom not in ordinary or common were only or more especially to take into their Consideration and inform the State Commerce Interest and Affairs Abilities or Disabilities of the Countries Places to supply their Soveraign's occasions some of those Burgesses Elected and sent from poor Fisher-Maritime-Towns the most prudent Observers of whom might have done Aristotle good service in his Enquiries not of the Politicks but of the ebbing and flowing of the Sea or some of the lesser Genery or over-grown Yeomanry as might instruct Varro or Columella in the design of writing their Books de Re Rusticâ or the well lined plausible Dweller in some inconsiderable Villes or a small number of Houses little better than Cottages with a fair Inn with two carved or gilded Sign Posts and a St. George on Horse-back unmercifully killing the Dragon and the Inhabitants Men of no more Language Wit or Learning than was scarcely sufficient to manage their vulgar mechanick Employments might have been more useful in the Parliament of the Twenty-Seventh Year of the Raign of King Edward the Third when the Statutes of the Staple and the Staple Cities and Towns so greatly concerning the after happening Golden-Fleece-flourishing-wollen-Trade and Manufacture in England and the enriching those Cities and Towns were made and enacted And the Consent or Advice therein of the vulgar or ignoble part of the Free-holders might have been more requisite in the making and framing the Act of Parliament in the Twenty-Third Year of the Raign of the aforesaid King touching Labourers and Servants or that long after made by Queen Elizabeth in the Fifth Year of her Raign limiting the Wages of Servants Artificers and Workmen as being likely to be more sensible and to give good Instructions in their own Concernments than in those of their Superiours their Land-lords viz. The King Nobility Bishops Gentry irelgious Houses Colledges Universities Deaneries Praebendaries Hospitals Corporations and Companies of Trades c. Those that were Boroughs were not then so many or half so big as they have been since by our King 's Royal Favours in the granting of Fairs and Markets unto them with divers other Immunities and Priviledges c. Nor had gained so great Additions to their Buildings and former extent by their Scituation or Neighbourhood to some great Town or City of Trade and the Inhabitants of them Men only conversant in the evil Arts of Trade and with Demetrius the Silver-Smith ready to do more for Diana's Temple than St. Paul's Preaching and lay out that little Understanding that they have in taking some Lands to Farm near adjoyning and being as little acquainted as may be with State-Policy or any thing out of the reach of their Neighbourhood will be as unfit to know or discern wise Men as the Corydons Hobby-nolls country Carters or Mechanicks are or would be to Elect or give their Votes or Suffrages for the taking of the degrees of Doctors Masters or Batchelors of Arts in our Universities or as Brick-laiers would be to give their direction and advice in the Building Rigging Tackle Steering and Sailing of a Ship Or to give a liberty to the Boys to choose their School-Master and direct what Methods he should use in the governing of them or to the Common People to elect and choose the King 's Privy Council or to have Votes or Suffrages in the making or repeal of such Laws as the variety of their Humours Interests Envies Ambitious Ignorances and Whimsies should perswade them to obey or be ruled by or such as may consist with all of them together or as much as for that very instant or moment of Time may agree with every Man 's particular Fancy Interests Occasion Advantage Will or Pleasure or of those that shall awe flatter bribe delude fool or seduce them Or in the Hurry and Distraction which Rebel-Armies and Gatherings of a misled or cheated Part of the People in such a Collection use to be might probably think it necessary and greatly conducing to their present self Advantages to procure them that were under the influence of their Power then very formidable or of the Tenancy or dependance of themselves or the rest of the Baronage whom they were labouring by Force Fear Flattery or other seducing and evil Arts to entice and draw into their Party to consent for the present to the Advice or Petitioning for the Confirmation or Establishment of the constrained Provisions made at Oxford and their Conservatorships which the King of France had not long before solemnly in his aforesaid Arbitration condemned and annulled For the Engine or Knack of the Twenty-Four Conservators to govern them and the King and Kingdom Twelve as it was sometimes proposed to be chosen by the King and Twelve by the victorious Rebels after confined to a much smaller Number as their Power and usurped Authority in a short time after gave them the Liberty and Occasion could never be thought to be with any intention to continue that new Model or Frame of Parliament any longer than pro hâc vice until the imprisoned King and Prince should be released and the Disturbances of the Kingdom quieted as those Writs of Simon and Peter de Montfort's own framing and putting under the King's Name and Seal did if they might be credited seem to import But were rather convened for Simon de Montfort's particular Ambition and Establishment nor could otherwise be interpreted to amount to any more than the most likely to have been the dismal Effects thereof the Destruction of the King and his Family Subversion of the ancient fundamental Laws and Customs of the Nation and Change of our ancient Monarchy into an Oligarchy And must either be understood not to have known at all the fundamental Usages Customes Priviledges of the Praelates Nobility and Great Men of the Realm in their King 's great Councels or Parliaments when they were thereunto Summoned
introduced amongst us that Distinction long after about the Raign of our King John of the Barones majores those that were Ministri Regis and held great Possessions only of the King for long before the Conquest they were called Thaines Barons or Lords who were Honorary and the Minores middle Thaines or Valvasores who were only feudal and held all or much of others or lesser parts of the King and by Canutus's Laws there appears to have been in those times Thani infimae conditionis In Germany saith Schwederus there are two sorts The First that do hold of the Empire immediately The Second mediately of others and that in the diversity of Opinions amongst the Learned whether the word Baron be derived from the Hebrew Greek Latine Spanish or French the Germans have been content with theit own word or original Baar which signifieth Frey or liber homo Barones are liberi Domini Frey Heeren Et Baro signifieth virum dignitate praecellentem So as that exquisitely Learned Du Fresne in his Gloss upon the words Barones Parliamenti saith In Anglia Scotia qui vulgò Lords of Parliament vocantur ij sunt ex Majoribus Baronibus qui à Rege undè pendent ad Parliamentum sive concilium publicum diplomatibus Regiis evocantur nam constat in Anglia ut in Francia non omnes qui à Rege praedia sua immediatè tenebant ad Parliamenta admissos nam nimius esset numerus eorum sed illos tantum qui proximi essent a Rege dignitate vassallorum numero caeteros anteirent prout etiam in ipsis Baronum feudis factitatum And defining a Barony saith it is Praedium à Rege nudé pendens vel maius praedium vel feudum Cassanaeus taketh it to be Quaedam dignitas habens quandam praeeminentiam inter solos simplices Nobiles Tiraquel by good Authority of rectified experimented Reason Laws and ancient Customs saith Leges sanciri debent a Principibus etiam Nobilium concilio quod plane ostendit Virgilius de Aceste Rege loquens Gaudet regno Treianus Acestes Indicitque forum Patribus dat Jura vocatis Id est Leges sancit Jura distribuit vocatis ad id Patribus id est Senatoribus L'Oyseau defining Seigneuries saith they are Publique ou prives and that les droits praerogatives des grandes Seigneuries a scavoir les Duchez Marquisats Comtez Principautez dont le premier est qu'elles ne relevent que du Roy encore que de leur nature elles deuvoient relever immediatement de la Couronne C'est pourquoi les Feudistes les appellent Feuda regalia ou Regales dignitates tit ' de Feud encore non tant pour ce qu'elles participent aux honeurs des souverainetez que de leur d'autant qu'elles sont vrays Fieffs du Roiaume ne pouvant relever d' autre Seigneurie Et tout ainsi que ces Capitaines s' aydoient de leurs vassaux en la guerre aussi faisoient ils en les Justices principalement aux causes d' importance qu' ils Iugoient par leur advis pour ceste raison ils les appelloient Pairs Cour C'est a dire Pairs au Compaignons de leur Cour de Justice Saith le Seigneurie privee n' induit point de puissance publique and concludeth and proveth it to be un Erreur d' penser qu' aux livres de Fieffes Valvasores Regni seu Majores valvasores fussent ceux qui tenoient leurs Fieffs a Capitaneis Regni nempe a ducibus Marchionitibus And were had in such a Veneration and Respect as when in the first Year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth an Act of Parliament was made that every Member of the House of Commons should before the Lord Steward of the King Queen or her Successors Houshold or his Deputy for the time being before they sit or be admitted by his Oath taken upon the Holy Evangelists testify and declare That the Queens Majesty is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm and of all other Her Highnesses Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual and Ecclesiastical things or causes as Temporal and renounce all Foreign Jurisdiction of any Foreign Prelate Prince or Potentate whatsoever And promise that from henceforth I shall bear Faith and true Allegiance to the Queens Highness her Heirs and Lawful Successors and to my Power shall assist and defend all Jurisdictions Priviledges Preheminences and Authorities granted or belonging to the Queens Highness her Heirs and Successors or United and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm From the taking of which Oath the Lords Temporal and all of or above the degree of a Baron were by that Act of Parliament of 5. Eliz. exempted for that the Queens Majesty is otherwise sufficiently assured of the Faith and Loyalty of the Temporal Lords of her High Court of Parliament Although of that High and Honourable Assembly of the House of Peers all that hold Offices under our Kings as the Lords Chancellour Treasurer Steward great Chamberlain and Chamberlain of the Houshold Constable Earl Marshal Lord Privy-Seal Secretaries of State and all that receive Creation-Money of him as Earls Viscounts Marquesses and Dukes and all the Assistants as Judges Masters of Chancery and the Barons in that high Court of Judicature Subordinate to the King may find themselves comprized and obliged in and by that Act of Primo Eliz. ca. 1. as the Arch-Bishops and Bishops are For it may everlastingly with great assurance of Certainty and Truth be affirmed That our Parliaments or great Councells have in their Constitutions Formes Customes and Usages altogether or for the most part followed and imitated those of the Almans Saxons and Ancient Francks when Marculfus who lived in the Year after the Incarnation of our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ Six Hundred and Sixty now something more than One Thousand Years when Clodouaeus the Son of Dagobert of the Merovignian and first Race of the Kings of France ruled as it will be Evident by the Writ of Summons thereunto Entituled Prologus de Regis Judicio cum de Magna re duo causantur simul in the form or words ensuing or the cause of Summoning or Calling the Parliament as our Kings have many Times done in their Writs of Summons to their Parliaments Viz. Cui Dominus regendi curam Committit cunctorum Jurgia diligenter examinatione cum rimari oportet ut juxta propositionum vel responsionum alloquia inter alterutrum salubris donetur sententia quo fiat ut nodos causarum vivacis mentis acumen coerceat ubi praelucet Justitia illuc gressum deliberationis imponat Ergo nos in Dei nomine ibi in Palatio nostro ad universorum Causas recto Judicio terminandas una cum Dominis Patribus nostris Episcopis vel cum plurimis Optimatibus Nostris patribus illis Referendariis illis
homages or pay for the respite of them and to give the Lord to understand what alienations had been made of the lands holden of him whereby to Entitle him and those that did hold of him to the benefit of the Statute of Quia Emptores terrarum And altogether dissimular to that of the Parliament first begun with those few of the Commons which adventured to come unto it in Anno. 49. H. 3. when he was a Prisoner in the custody of Montfert Earl of Leicester a powerful rebell discontinued and interrupted as rebellious designs ought to be after his release untill King Edw. the 1. found it convenient to make use of that kind of writ of Summons to ballance the then swelling power of some of his over-Unweildy Baronage For in the former or those great Councells or Parliaments that were before the 49th Year of the Reign of King H. 3d. the Lords Spiritual and Temporall took upon them the care charge of the Commons as included in themselves as their Subjects they being by that then first kind of Writ only Elected to consent yield Obedience to such things as the Lords not themselves should ordain for had it been as it never was otherwise it would have been altogether ungatory and ridicule to allow a power to the Commons to ordain when they were impowred only to assent unto and obey and cannot at all be understood to obey and be subservient to that which themselves had Decreed the Lords Spirituall and Temporall untill the King had given unto what was advised by them his Royall sanction and assent being not at all obliged to any Obedience thereunto And untill the statute de Tallagio non concedendo without the Assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and the Commons in Parliament Assembled was by King E. 1. assented unto had nothing to do in the granting of ayds and subsidies in Parliament Concurrently with the Lords Spirituall and Temporall in the aforesaid Writ of 18. H. 3. is said to be for to supply their own necessities as well as the Kings But in the Military Courts which were as aforesaid Summoned by King John or any other of our Kings before 49. H. 3. the Knights or those that held in Capite or Knights-Service that should fail to do their Services was to forfeit their Lands so holden and be in the Kings Mercy or pay Escuage which though it were to be assessed by Parliament was not then Understood to be a Parliament Composed of an House of Commons but a Parliament after the Ancient way consisting only of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall the Kings Great Officers of State Judges and Councell Which our Kings and their Councell both generall and speciall were not ignorant of either as to its right use or necessity for publique good or preservation When King John being rightly informed and in fear enough of an Invasion intended by the King of France his profest and known enemy et de omnibus quae in transmarinis partibus agebatur edoctus did not only inbreviare omnes naves universis portubus totius Angliae per brevia sua sed alias literas universis Vicecomitibus regni sui misit et direxit sub hac forma Johannes Dei gratia Rex Angliae c. Summone per bonos Summonitores omnes Barones Milites omnes liberos homines servientes vel quicunque sint vel de quocunque teneant qui arma habere debent vel arma habere possint qui homagium nobis vel ligeantiam fecerunt quod sicut nos seipsos omnia sua diligunt sint apud Doveram ad Instans clausum Paschae bene parati cum equis armis cum toto posse suo ad defendendum caput nostrum capita sua terram Angliae quod nullus remaneat qui arma portare possit sub nomine Culvertagii perpetuae servitatis when both in England and France nihil magis quam opprobrium significavit Et unusquisque sequatur dominum suum qui terram non habent arma habere possint illuc veniant ad capiendum solidatas nostras tu omnem attractum victualium omnia mercata ballivarum tuarum venire facias ut sequantur Exercitum nostrum Ita quod nullum mercatum de ballivis tuis alibi teneatur tuipse tunc sis ibi cum predictis Summonitoribus scias quod scire volumus quomodo venerint de ballivis tuis qui venerint qui non videas quod tu Ita efforciate venias cu 〈…〉 equis armis haec Ita exequatis ut inde ad corpus tuum nos capere debeamus tu inde habeas rotulum tuum ad nos certificandum qui remanserunt Whereupon saith that Historian his ergo literis per Angliam divulgatis convenerunt ad maritima in locis diversis homines diversae conditionis et aetatis sed cum per dies pauces tantae multitudini victus defuisset remiserunt ad propria principes militiae ex inormi vulgo copiosam Multitudinem milites solummodo servientes liberos homines cum Balistariis sagittariis juxta maritima retinentes omnibus igitur congregati ad pugnam aestimati sunt in exercitu apud Barham dâ—nam inter milites electos servientes strenuos bene armatos sexaginta millium virorum fortium quibus si er ga Regem Angliae defensionem patriae cor fuisset anima una non fuisset princeps sub coelo contra quem regnum Angliae se non defenderet And it was no mervail to the people of England who then had not learned to be affraid or make Bug-bears of publique good or kick and winch at every thing that tended that way when King Edward the first in the 24th Year of his Reign Citari fecit omnes qui sibi servitium debebant caeterosque omnes qui viginti libratas terrae amplias tenebant ut parati essent Londoniis in festo sancti Petri ad vincula cum equis armis transfretaturi cum eo Regis stipendiis militaturi And do very much differ from a Writ to Summon the Lords Spirituall and Temporall to Parliament as ad colloquium or consulendum does from coming parati cum equis armis which the Ancient cares and usage of Parliaments since that over-powerfull and unhappy designs of some unruly Barons coming in Arms to the Parliament at Oxford in the 42. Year of the Reign of King Henry the 3. and the sad consequences thereof taught our Kings to take heed of it ever after by prohibiting the coming to Parliaments with Arms and differs no less from the purpose tenour or purport of the Writs or Commissions to elect Knights of the Shires Citizens and Burgesses which had their first Originall and Commencement to come to our Parliaments in Anno. 49. of King Henry the 3. when that King was a Prisoner to an Army of Rebells was not
of hearing to be heard in the Starr-Chamber the morrow after the Lords were content not to sit that Morning provided that it be not drawn into a precedent but that the House being the Supream Court may sit upon a Starr Chamber day notwithstanding the absence of the Lord Chancellor Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Treasurer the Lords of the Privy-Councell great Officers of State the two Lord Chief Justices and Lord Chief Baron who do use to attend that Court and the next Starr-Chamber day the other part of the Lords House did sit in the forenoon The Lords that were absent and could not appear upon Summons of Parliament were excused if they could obtain a license of the King otherwise they were amerced as in 31. H. 6. a Duke was to be amerced 100 l. an Earl 100 Marks and a Baron 40 l. If they came not upon Summons to Parliament If the King be present in person when the cause of Summons is declared the Lord Chancellour doth first remove from his place which is on the Kings Right hand behind the Chair of Estate and conferreth privately with his Majesty And that ceremony is ever to be observed by the Lord Chancellour or those that are appointed by the King to officiate in that particular for him before he speak any thing in Parliament when the King is present The cause of which ceremony saith Mr Elsing seeming to be that as none but the King can call a Parliament so none but the King can propound or declare wherefore it was called If the King be represented in Parliament by Commission the Lord Chancellor sits on the Wool-sack after the Commission read the Commissioners go to the seat prepared for them on the Right side of the Chair of Estate then the Lord Chancellour ariseth conferreth with the Commissioners returns to his place on the Wool-sack and there declareth the cause of the Summons or Commission as was done in 28 Elizabeth The Warrants of the King for the making of the Writs of Summons to Parliaments have been divers some times per breve de privato sigillo but commonly per ipsum Regem concilium Anno 32. H. 8. Acts of Parliament were said to have been enacted with the assent of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall and the Parliament was continued by divers short prorogations and was by his Graces Authority dissolved 33. H. 8. In the Acts of Parliament no mention was made of advice or assent 34. 35. H. 8. The like Proxies were in the 20th Year of the Reign of King James under the hand and seal of an absent Lord upon a lawfull impediment signifying the Kings license in the form ensuing pro se nomine suo de super quibuscunque causis exponend seu declarand tractand tractatibus quae hujusmodi mihi factis seu faciendis concilium nomine suo impendend statutisque etiam ordinationibus quae ex maturo deliberati judicio dominorum tam spiritualium quam temporalium in eodem Parliamento congregat inactitari seu ordinari contigerint nomine suo cousentiendum eisdemque si opus fuerit subscribend caeteraque omnia singula quae in praemissis necessaria fuerint seu quo modo libet requisita faciend exercend in tam amplis modo forma prout ego ipse facere possem aut deberem si praesens personaliter interessem ratum gratum habens habiturus quicquid dictus procurator statuerit aut fecerit in praemissis A proxy cannot be made to a Lord that is absent himself The Lord Latimer made his proxy which although the Clerk of the House of Peers received it was repealed by the Lord Chancellour for that the Lord Latimers deputy or procurator was absent for if he to whom the proxy is made be absent the proxy is void neither can it be transferred by the proxy to another as was adjudged in the case of the Lord Vaux 18 Jacobi Our Kings since the force put upon King Henry the 3d by some Rebellious Barons at a Parliament at Oxford in Anno 42 of his Reign at the beginning of every Parliament by publick proclamation did use to prohibit the coming with Arms. Not any of the Kings Serjeants at Law were Summoned to Parliament untill the Tenth of Edward the Third when Robert Parning William Scot and Simon Trevise Servientés Regis were Summoned by special Writs unto 2 Parliaments after which none were Summoned untill the 20th of E. 3. Robert de Sodington Capitalis Baro Scaccarii was the First and only Baron of the Exchequer who was Summoned to Parliament as one of the Kings Councell in 12. E. 3. The Kings Attorney Generalls whose Office and impolyment was as ancient as 7. E. 1. when William de Gisilham enjoyed it and Gilbert de Thorneton was in 8. E. 1. his Attorney Generall had their First Writ of Summons in the 21. 30. 36. Henrici 8. Those that succeeded them never wanting the like priviledges And the Kings Sollicitors generalls have been in like manner Summoned The Writs of Summons to the Lords are returned and delivered to the Clark of their House those with their Indentures for the Election of members for the House of Commons to the Clark of the Crown in Chancery The Clergy of the convocation in Parliament are Elected by virtue of the Kings Writs of Summons to the Bishops and their precepts but not by any from the Sheriffs The Master of the Rolls if not Elected a Member of the House of Commons in Parliament hath a Writ of Summons to attend in the House of Lords The Masters of Chancery as necessarily appertaining to the Lord Chancellour or Keeper of the Great Seal of England have neither Writ nor patent yet do there attend The Bill or Act of Parliament signed for the Beheading the Earl of Strafford much against the will of King Charles the Martyr was by Commission And divers adjournments and prorogations in the Reign of King Charles 2d have been sometimes by Commission and at other times by proclamations The Commons were never Elected to come to Parliament before the 49th Year of King H. 3. and his imprisonment and then and from the 21st Year of the Reign of King E. 1. did but as the Lesser lights follow that greater of the Sun and could not possibly be sent for or caused to be Elected without the Peers then Summoned and convened for that they were only to consent unto and do such things as the King by the advice of the Lords Spirituall and Temporall should there ordain if the Lords were not Summoned to be there at the same time or sitting The Chamberlain of the Kings Houshold was Summoned to sit in the House of Peers in 25. 27. 28. E. 3. Masters of Ships and some Scots have for advice been Summoned to attend the House of Lords Ever since the making of the Statute of 5. Eliz. every Knight Citizen Burgess and Port Baron Elected or to
custome of the House of Lords was that when any Bills or messages were sent to them the Lord Keeper and some of the Lords were to â—rise from their places and from thence to go unto the Barr and receive the said Bills or messages but contrarywise when any answer is to be delivered by the Lord Keeper in the name and behalf of the Lords the Commons sent were to stand at the Barr and the Lord Keeper is to receive the Bills or answer the messages with his head covered and all the Lords were to Keep their places with which the Lower House was satisfied and the same order hath been ever since observed accordingly Anno 39. Eliz. There being in former times a custom in the house of Commons to have a bill read before the house did arise the same could not now be done at that time because her Majesty and the upper House had adjourned the Parliament untill Saturday Sennight at Eight of the Clock in the Morning which being signified by their Speaker he said all the Members of the House might depart and so they did Eodem Anno. At the ending of the Parliament after they had given the Queen subsidies and prayed her assent to such laws as had passed both Houses she gave the Royall assent to 24 publick Acts and 19 private but refused 48 Bills which had passed both the Houses Anno 43. Eliz. John Crook Esq. Recorder of London being chosen Speaker of the House of Commons in Parliament disabling himself desired the Queen to command the House of Commons to choose another but his excuse received no allowance The Lord Chief Justice of the Queens bench and Common pleas together with the Lord Chief Baron and Attorney Generall were ordered to attend a Committee of Lords and Bishops Sr John Popham Lord Chief Justice Francis Gaudy one of the Justices of the Kings bench George Kingsmill one of the Common pleas Dr Carew and Dr Stanhop were constituted Receivers of petitions for Gascoigne and other lands beyond the Seas Sr Edmond Anderson Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common pleas Sr William Peryam Lord Chief Baron Thomas Walmisley one of the Justices of the Common pleas Dr Swale and Dr Hone. Tryers of petitions of England the Archbishop of Canterbury Marquis of Winchester Earls of Sussex Lord Marshall Lord Admirall and Steward of the Queens Houshold Earls of Nottingham and Hertford Bishops of London Durham and Winchester Lords Zouch and Cobham calling unto them the Lord Keeper Lord Treasurer and the Queens Serjeants at Law Great fault was found by many of the House of the factouring and bribing of too many of the Justices of the Peace and it was by one of the members alleadged that the five bills â—arely passed against Swearing Drunkenness and for the making of good Ale would be as much worth to those kind of Justices of the Peace as a Subsidy and two Fifteens Mr Conisby Gentleman Usher of the House of Peers complained that forasmuch upon the breach of any Priviledge of that House he only was to be employed and not the Serjeant at Arms the House ordered a Committee to consider of Presidents and settle it a motion was made by the Lord Keeper and approved of by the Lords that the Ancient course of the House might be kept by certifying the Excuses for the absence of any of the Peers by the Peers and not by others The House being offended with Sr Walter Rawleigh for some words and crying to the Barr Mr Brown a Lawyer stood up and said Mr Speaker par in parem non habet Imperium we are as members of one body and we cannot Judge one another whereupon it being put to the question it was resolved in the negative that he should not stand at the Barr. The Speaker of the House of Commons at the ending of the Parliament of 44. Eliz. humbly desired of the Queen that certain Acts may be made Laws by her Royall assent which giveth life unto them Unto which the Lord Keeper answered that as touching her Majesties pioceeding in the making of Laws and giving her Royall assent that should be as God directed her Sacred Spirit and delivered her Majesties commandement that as to the Commons proceedings in the matter of her Prerogative she is persuaded that Subjects did never more dutifully observe and that she understood they did but obiter touch her Prerogative and no otherwise but by humble petition but she well perceived that private respects are privately masked under publique pretences Admonished the Justices of the Peace some whereof might probably be of the House of Commons that they should not deserve the Epithetes of prowling Justices Justices of Quarrells who counted Champerty good Conscience Sinning Justices who did suck and consume the good of this Commonwealth and likewise all those who did lye if not all the Year yet at the least Three Quarters of the Year in the City of London Anno 43. Eliz. One Mr Leigh of the House of Commons complained that whilst the Speaker of the House of Commons was presented to the Queen he was denyed entrance into the House of Peers which the Lords excused by saying it was the ignorance of some of the Grooms or attendance in the choosing of a Speaker Mr Knolls the Comptroller alleaged that it was not for the State of the Queen to permit a confused multitude to speak unto her when it might often happen that one or some might move or speak that which another or some or many would contradict or not allow The Queen being sate in her State in the House of Lords the House of Commons were sent for to present their Speaker who in a modest pretence of disability prayed her Majesty to command the House of Commons to choose one more able but had it not allowed And she in her grant of freedom of speech gave a caution not to do it in vain matters verbosities contentions or contradictions nor to make addresses unto her but only in matters of consequence and prohibited their retaining or priviledging desperate debtors upon pain of her displeasure and desired a Law might be made to that purpose Which done the Lord Keeper said for great and weighty causes her Highness's pleasure was that the Parliament should be adjourned untill the Fryday following At which time the House of Commons did appoint a Minister every morning before the House sate to officiate and use a set form of prayer specially ordained to desire Gods blessing upon their Councells and preserve the Queen their Sovereign The Ancient usage of not coming into the House of Commons with spurs was moved by the Speaker to be observed others moved that they might not come with Boots and Rapiers but nothing was done therein Sr Robert Wroth a Member of the House of Commons did in his own particular offer 100 l. per Annum to the Wars Sr Andrew Noel Sheriff of Rutlandshire having returned himself to be a Knight of the shire for that
advice whereupon after four days deliberation with the Lords fearing the lengthning of the Wars by Truces refused to advise touching the same The King on the other side received their Petitions but answered them not and therefore the next Parliament the Commons petitioning for Answers conditioned with the King in their grants of the Subsidy to have Answers to their former Petitions and those also which were delivered in the present Parliament and although they were entred in several Rolls as if they had been answered in each Parliament they were all answered in the latter And the use and practice was to enter none but such as had been read In the 6th year of the Raign of King E. 3. it being demanded of the Lords and Commons on the behalf of the King whether he should stay until the business of Parliament were finished or take his Journey in hast into the North they advised him to go hastily into the North and to appoint another time for the dispatch of the business of the people upon their Petitions The Parliament giving a very great Subsidy to the King a condition was assented unto that the Petitions of the Commons should be granted upon which requests and conditions by Commandment of our Lord the King by the assent of the Praelates Earls Barons and Commons a Committee of Praelates Earls Barons the Treasurer some of the Judges and ten Knights of the Shires six Citizens and Burgesses whom the Commons should chuse to sit from day to day as also concerning the Petitions of the Clergy and put the same into a Statute The which Archbishops Bishops and others having heard and tried the said requests by Common assent and accord caused the Points and Articles to be put into a Statute the which our Lord the King by the assent of all in the said Parliament commanded to be ingrossed sealed and firmly to be kept throughout the whole Realm Divers things are entred in the Parliament Rolls which had not the consent of the Commons for that they might have been concluded by the King and the Lords without them yet none such could have been entred but those which were determined in the open house and not privately at a Committee The Answers to the Commons were appointed to be read Sedente Curia and a Committee appointed to prepare the Answers to the rest after Easter and so the Clerk having only read those that were answered the Parliament ended saith the Record in Lent Shortly after upon the examination of the Subsidy that it would not answer the expectation he hastily summoned a Magnum concilium in Octabis Trin. following Where after a further grant of a Subsidy the Petitions which were not answered the last Parliament being read before the King Grands and Commons the King gave them leave to depart and so ended the Councel One of the last Parliament against Impositions upon Woolls without assent of Parliament is made into a Statute And happily it was answered at the Councel and not at the Parliament And if that very age interpreted it to be legally done we must do so also saith that learned Commentator Anno 47 E. 3. where the Commons having delivered their Petitions and desired Answers it was told them that it pleased the King if any of them would stay to attend and have Answers of their Petitions that the rest might depart and it was not unusual in those times for the Commons to have leave to depart and yet the Lords to stay and dispatch business afterwards and the same reputed to be done in Parliament prout Anno 6. E. 3. Gregory n. 16. 6 E. 3. Hill n 7. in fine 1 R. 2. n 41. 137. The Commons did pray the King that he would advise to do that ease unto his people which he may well do And Anno 18. E. 3. do pray that the Statute of Westminster the 2d may be declared to which the King answered Let the Justices and other Sages be charged to advise of this point until the next Parliament They pray that the Statute for the Kings presentment within three years c may stand Whereunto it was answered probably by the Lords let the King be advised and do further by advice of his Councel that which he shall will to be done Eodem Anno they do pray that sufficient men be made Sheriffs and abide but one year as hath been ordained and that the said Office be not granted for life or in fee. Whereunto the King answered as touching the first point let the Statute be kept as touching the 2d the Councel will advise the King that it be not done for they be advised that it is against the Statute And note saith that learned Observator that the King was then beyond the Seas and the Lords would not give a direct answer in his absence to what concerned his power to grant an Office in fee. The Commons shew that the Scots entred England in the Kings absence and pray that the Prisoners taken in the Battel at Durham may be so ordered as the damage and danger happen not again To which was answered the King will advise therein with his Grands and by their advice ordain that which shall be for the best and so do as the Commons shall be out of doubt of that which they suppose by the help of God Which being a matter of State the Lords would not conclude without the King but leave it to himself and his Privy Councel They pray that no Royal Franchises Lands Fees Advowsons which belong to the Crown or are annexed to it be given away or severed Unto which was answered The King will advise with his good Councel that nothing shall be done in this case unless it be for the honour of himself and the Realm Eodem Anno they do pray whereas holy Church ought to have free Elections the Pope doth now begin to give Abbies and Pryories by Resignations c. That the King would ordain Remedy therein by advice of his Councel Whereunto was answered the King will advise with his good Councel The Commons do shew that whereas the men of the Navy have assented to all Taxes currant in the Land yet their Ships are taken and many lost in the Kings Service without any recompence given unto them Wherefore they pray that the King would be pleased to ordain thereof Remedy To which was answered Le Roys ' avisera Which being a Petition coram Rege concerning him and their Wages and Recompence the Lords referred it wholly unto his Majesty Anno 22. E. 3. they do pray that no Appeals be received of any Apellors of Fellony done out of the County where he is imprisoned To which the King answered that will be to make a new Law whereof the King is not advised as yet Anno 25. E. 3. they Petition against the payment of Tithe-Wood Unto which was answered the King and his Councel will advise of this
the King to have the Answers to their Petitions in writing in manner of a Patent under the great Seal of England for every County City and good Town one Patent for the comfort of the People which the King granted by the advice of the Praelates and Grands most of which were the Judges Officers of State and Privy Councellors of the King which Patent was sealed and entred in the Patent Roll under which was written la Charter ensealer pour les Communs After which the King summoned three Parliaments in 20 21 and 22. But no Statute was made in either of them The next Statute was made in Anno 25 E. 3. in which year the King had two Parliaments and Statutes made but mention nothing by whom they were made only the Commons do pray that the Petitions reasonably prayed by the Commons be granted confirmed and sealed before the departure of the Parliament And in the same Parliament n. 43. The Commons praying that the Statute made the last Parliament touching Reservations be published and put in Execution Unto which the King answered Let the Statute be viewed and recited before the Councel and if need be in any point let it be better declared and amended as the Statute of the King and the Realm be kept By which it appeareth that the Councel penned the Statutes Anno 27. E. 3. The King summoned a great Councel whither many Commons were sent and it was agreed that the Ordinances of the said Councel should be recited in the next Parliament Anno 28. E. 3. n. 16. The Commons prayed that the Ordinances of the Staple and all the other Ordinances made at the last great Councel which they have seen with great deliberation be affirmed in this Parliament and held for a Statute to endure for ever Unto which the King and Lords agreed with one mind so always that if any thing be to be put out let it be done in Parliament when need shall be and not in any other manner And accordingly there is an Addition at the end of the first Chapter against Provisors as in the Statute Roll and Print but not in rot Concilii Anno 27. nor yet in the Parliament Roll de Anno 28. E. 3. That whole Addition seeming to be added by the Councel alone and yet shewed to the Parliament for their consent before the said Statute was published And it is observable by that of 27 E. 3. n. 43. and this of 28 E. 3. n. 16. That the Statutes were most usually made long after the Parliament ended although in the Parliaments of 14 15. and 18 E. 3. they were engrossed and sealed in the time of Parliament sedente curia Statutes were made when some of our Kings were beyond Sea which happened often in the Raigns of E. 3. and H. 5. Anno 25. E. 1. a Parliament was held at London when the King was in Flanders by his Son Edward and the Statute made therein was put into the form of a Charter or Patent Anno 13. E. 3. were two Parliaments whilst the King was beyond the Seas but no Petitions or Statutes in either Anno 14. E. 3. a Parliament was holden in the Kings absence beyond the Seas by his Son Edward Duke of Cornwal Guardian of England but no Petition of the Commons nor Statute Anno 23. E. 3. a Parliament was held in the Kings absence by Lyonell the Kings Son Guardian of England and divers Petitions of the Commons were then answered but no Statute made thereof Anno 51. E. 3. the King could not be present at the beginning of the Parliament but granted a Commission to Richard Prince of Wales to begin the same Et ad faciendum ea quae pro nobis et per nos facienda fuerint And yet the Lords went to the King lying sick at Sheene the day before the Parliament ended where he gave his Royal Assent unto the Answers made unto the Petitions and commanded them to be read the next day in full Parliament but yet no Statute was made thereon notwithstanding the Commission for the Commission was but for matters to be done in Parliament as the words Ibidem facienda fuerint do import Anno 8. H 5. a Parliament was held in England by Humfrey Duke of Gloucester the King being then beyond the Seas wherein the Commons petitioned n. 16. That whereas it had been told them by divers Lords in this Parliament that the Petitions to be delivered to the Duke of Gloucester Guardian of England shall not be ingrossed before they be first sent beyond the Seas to our Soveraign Lord the King to have therein his Royal Assent and Advice wherefore may it please the said Lord Duke to ordain by authority of this present arliament That all the Petitions delivered by the Commons to the said Duke in the Parliament be answered and determined within this Realm of England during the said Parliament and if any Petition remain not answered and determined during the said Parliament that they be held for void and of none effect and that this Ordinance be of force and hold place in every Parliament to be held in the Realm in time to come To which was answered Soit avise per le Roy. Howsoever it may be conceived that all the Petitions with the Answers were sent to the King for his Advice and Assent which of them should be in the Statute and which not for in that Statute consisting of three Chapters which was made that year there are only two of the answers to their Petitions determined that is made into the said Statute viz. pet n. 4. in the 2d cap. and pet n. 7. in the 3 cap. The Commons did not Petition for any thing contained in the 5th cap. neither is there any thing recorded thereof in that Parliament Roll although one other of the Commons Petitions n. 15. for Women Aliens the Widows of Englishmen to have Dower was granted absolutely and the Petition n. 8. against Retail of sweet Wines altogether and the Petition n. 9. That Gascoign Wine should not be sold for above 6 d. the Gallon were granted with be it as is desired if it please the King Yet neitheir of these Petitions are in the Statute The usual time for making the Statutes was after the the end of every Parliament yea after the Parliament Roll was engrossed Anno 3. R. 2. The Temporal Lords met in the great Councel after the Parliament was ended where the Clerk read unto them the Enrolment of the Ordinance in that Parliament touching the power of the Justices of the Peace At which time it is probable the Statute was made and that Ordinance quite altered Anno 11 H. 4. n. 28. and 63. The Petitions and their Answers agreed on in Parliament are entred in the Roll with the rest which past into the Statute of that year and in the margent was written with another hand Respectuatur per dominum Principem concilium and neither of those are in the
unarbitrary in their procedures is so always ready to succour the Complaints of People as it never willingly makes it self to be the cause of it And cannot misrepresent the House of Peers to the King and his People in the Case of Mr. Fitz Harris or any others when that honourable Assembly takes so much care as it doth to repress Arbitrary Power and doth all it can to protect the whole Nation from it and many of the House of Commons Impeachments have been disallowed by the King and his House of Peers in Parliament without any ground or cause of fear of Arbitrary Power which can no where be so mischievously placed as in the giddy multitude whose Impeachments would be worse than the Ostracisme at Athens and so often overturn and tire all the wise men and good men in the Nation as there would be none but such as deserve not to be so stiled to manage the Affairs of the Government subordinate to their King and Soveraign To all which may be added if the former Presidents cited to assert the Kings Power of Pardoning as well after an Impeachment made by the Commons in Parliament as before and after an Impeachment made by the Commons and received by the Lords in Parliament or made both by the Lords and Commons in Parliament be not not sufficient that of Hugh le Despenser Son of Hugh le Despenser the younger a Lord of a great Estate which is thus entred in the Parliament Roll of the fifth year of the Raign of King Edward the Third ought surely to satisfie that the Laws and reasonable Customs of England will warrant it Anno 5 E. 3. Sir Eubule le Strange and eleven other Mainprisers being to bring forth the Body of Hugh the Son of Hugh le Despenser the younger saith the Record A respondre au prochein Parlement de ester au droit affaire ce de liu en conseil soit ordine mesuerent le Corps le dit Hugh devant nostre Seigneur le Roi Countes Barons autres Grantz en mesme le Parlement monstrent les L'res Patents du Roi de Pardon al dit Hugh forisfacturam vite membrorum sectam pacis homicidia roborias Felonias omnes transgressiones c. Dated 20 Martii anno primo Regni sui Et priant a n're Seigneur le Roi quil le vousist delivrer de las Mainprise faire audit Hugh sa grace n're Seigneur le Roi eiant regard a ses dites L'res voilant uttroier a la Priere le dit Mons'r Eble autres Main pernors avant dit auxint de les Prelatz qui prierent molt especialment pur lui si ad comande de sa grace sa delivrance Et voet que ses Menpernors avant ditz chescun d'eux soient dischargez de leur Mainprise auxint le dit Hugh soit quit delivrers de Prisone de garde yssint si ho'me trove cause devors lui autre nest uncore trove quil estoise au droit And the English Translator or Abridger of the Parliament Records hath observed that the old usage was that when any Person being in the Kings displeasure was thereof acquitted by Tryal or Pardon yet notwithstanding he was to put in twelve of his Peers to be his Sureties for his good Behaviour at the Kings pleasure And may be accompanied by the Case of Richard Earl of Arundel in the 22 year of the Raign of King Richard the Second being Appealed by the Lords Appellant and they requiring the King that such Persons Appealed that were under Arrest might come to their Tryal it was commanded to Ralph Lord Nevil Constable of the Tower of London to bring forth the said Richard Earl of Arundel then in his custody whom the said Constable brought into the Parliament at which time the Lords Appellants came also in their proper Persons To the which Earl the Duke of Lancaster who was then hatching the Treason which afterwards in Storms of State and Blood came to effect against the King by the Kings Coommandment and Assent of the Lords declared the whole circumstances after the reading and declaring whereof the Earl of Arundel who in Anno 11 of that Kings Raign had been one of the Appellants together with Henry Earl of Derby Son of the said Duke of Lancaster and afterwards the usurping King Henry the Fourth against Robert de Vere Duke of Ireland and Earl of Oxford and some other Ministers of State under King Richard the Second alledged that he had one Pardon granted in the Eleventh year of the Raign of King Richard the Second and another Pardon granted but six years before that present time And prays that they might be allowed To which the Duke answered that for as much as they were unlawfully made the present Parliament had revoked them And the said Earl therefore was willed to say further for himself at his peril whereupon Sir Walter Clopton Chief Justice by the Kings Commandment declared to the said Earl that if he said no other thing the Law would adjudge him guilty of all the Actions against him The which Earl notwithstanding would say no other thing but required allowance of his Pardons And thereupon the Lords Appellant in their proper Persons desired that Judgment might be given against the said Earl as Convict of the Treason aforesaid Whereupon the Duke of Lancaster by the Assent of the King Bishops and Lords adjudged the said Earl to be Convict of all the Articles aforesaid and thereby a Traytor to the King and Realm and that he should be hanged drawn and quartered and forfeit all his Lands in Fee or Fee-tail as he had the nineteenth day of September in the tenth year of the Kings Raign together with all his Goods and Chattels But for that the said Earl was come of noble Blood and House the King pardoned the hanging drawing and quartering and granted that he should be beheaded which was done accordingly But Anno 1 Hen. 4. the Commons do pray the reversal of that Judgment given against him and restoration of Thomas the Son and Heir of the said Richard Earl of Arundel Unto which the King answered he hath shewed favour to Thomas now Earl and to others as doth appear The Commons do notwithstanding pray that the Records touching the Inheritance of the said Richard Earl of Arundel late imbezelled may be searched for and restored Unto which was answered the King willeth And their noble Predecessors in that Honourable House of Peers the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament long before that videlicet in the fifth year of the Raign of King Edward the Third made no scruple or moat point or question in Law whether the power of pardoning was valid and solely in the King after an Impeachment of the Lords in Parliament when in the Case of Edmond Mortimer the Son of Roger Mortimer Earl of March a Peer of great Nobility and Estate the
great wrong or Male Tolt set upon Wooll be revoked and that this grant turn not into a Custom That the keeping of the Kings Wards Lands may be committed to the next of the kin of the same Ward That Remedy may be found against such as dying past away their Lands to defraud the Lords of their Wardships The Commons made answer that they knew and tendered the Kings Estate and were ready to Aid the same only to this new device they durst not agree without further conference with their Countries and so praying respite until another time they promise to travel to their Countries Sundry of the Lords and Commons being not come the Parliament was continued from day to day until the Thursday following The Archbishop of Canterbury having been in the Kings displeasure humbled himself and desired his favour and having been defamed desired his Tryal by his Peers to which the King answered he would attend unto the Common affairs and after hear others A Proclamation was made for such as would exhibit any Petitions and a day given therefore Anno 25 E. 3. The Commons pray that process of Outlawry shall be in debt Detinue and Replevin To which was answered the like motion was in the last Parliament which had the same Answer and was then reasonably answered Anno 45. E. 3. it was agreed that ever Petition now exhibited may be by some of the Lords considered The Commons pray that the Extracts of Greenwax may mention at whose suit such Amerciaments were lost in what Term and what Plea and between what parties To which was answered let the same be provided the next Parliament which was not summoned until in Anno 47. E. 3. In Anno 47. of his Raign after Subsidies granted the Commons prayed answers to their Petitions which was granted after the Chancellor had in the name of the King given them great thanks he willed that such of the Commons that would wait on their Petitions might so do and the rest that would might depart and so the Parliament ended They pray that Right may be done to every mans Petition To which the King answered let that be observed which toucheth every private person our Kings and Princes having ever taken time to answer the petitions of their Subjects §. 30. That in those affairs peculiar only to so great and venerable an assembly which should not be Trivial or proper to Lower and Lesser Jurisdictions assigned for the determining of Lesser matters for the publick Ease and Benefit Our Kings and Princes have a greater burden and care upon them as Gods Vicegerents besides that of Parliaments to manage and take care of the Kingdom for the benefit and good of themselves and their People FOR our Kings and Supream Magistrates having many other as well necessary as ordinary and Common affairs to look after and have regard unto as the care of Peace at Home and Abroad Defence and Protection of their People Commerce Intelligence and Correspondence with Allies and Neighbour Princes guard of the Seas and reducing of Parliament Councels to speedy Actions could not admit a long consult which in our former and more happy Parliament Assemblies were seldom above forty days and many times with lesser periods of time found to be sufficient to dispatch the great and Important occasions thereof For the care of three great Kingdoms and a multitude of Accidents dayly hourly or oftner happening ordering and disposing Competent Magistrates and Officers therein observation of their well or ill managing their trusts rewarding and encouraging the good and punishment of the bad with the administration of fit Remedies to all that complain of grievances and oppressions committed by or amongst such a multitude of people with the very great difficulties of keeping Peace abroad with Neighbour Princes and preserving their own Subjects from being Injurious to theirs or receiving wrong from others may put a Prince into a necessity of having in his own person more than Argus his Eyes or Briareus hands and give him no or a very small time of rest to ask of God what Solomon did when he took upon him the government of Israel being a great People that could not be numbred or counted for multitude give therefore thy Servant an understanding heart to Judge the people that he may descern betwixt good and evil for who is able to Judge so great a People And with greater reason as being to govern a stubborn and Rebellious people high minded and proud with the riches gained thereby many of whom have perplexed and troubled him and themselves with their needless and destructive Fears and Jealousies without which the burden would not be so heavy as it is And can never seem light if those Fault-finders and Quick-silver Brained State Polititians would but consider how great it is in the dayly exercise of that government have hitherto made kept us happy all which put together might be enough to load an Atlas and would never be so well done or prove so effectual for dayly and publick good if they should tarry either for the coming of Parliaments or for long and perpetual or disagreeing Parliaments And cannot be deemed to be of little moment or concernment if an estimate be taken of the cares charge and troubles to preserve the publick Peace both by Sea and Land Leagues and Alliances Intelligence Correspondence and Amity with Forraign Princes and States the least breach of Peace with whom might disturb our Peace and Commerce abroad and transport Invasions and War upon us at home with sending and receiving of Embassadors giving audiences dispatches to theirs and sending Instructions with ours besides their sitting in Councel with their Privy Councel commonly three times in every Week of extraordinary concernments make not some addition thereunto Sundays scarce excepted and not that day or every day in every Week besides can pass but he is troubled either with petitions for grants or favours protection from oppressions and redresses for greivances either delivered by the petitioners themselves or by one or both of the two Secretaries or the four Magistri Supplicationum Libellorum Masters as they are called of Requests who by their monthly turns of waiting have commonly an audience twice in every moneth of our Kings and Princes who are as the mercy seat upon Earth the Pool of Bethesda the Asculapius Temple the Balm of Gilead Asylum sanctuary or refuge to help all the distresses and calamities of their people And that in all our Parliaments since the beginning of the Raign of King Edward 3. they have inter their quaedam Ardua taken alwaies into their care not only those of England but of Ireland Scotland Gascogney Guernsey Jarsey and the Isles though they have no Burgesses or any other representing for them as England hath had since the 48th year of the Raign of King Henry the third which considered with the many cares of collecting and gathering in his Revenue and well ordering
Duty and Allegiance they are obliged to attend their Soveraign and come to the General Consult of a Parliament so is it to be considered that the Speculator and Prorector of our Kingdom and Nation under God just allowances being always to be made of natural rests and refreshments and competent care of health cannot be Master if he could of much time whilst he is to encourage and maintain the Publick Good of his People and Guard them from any evils or inconveniences which do or might assail them in his care and distribution of Justice in all the complaints and Petitions of a numerous and mighty People in the issuing out of Writs Edicts and Proclamations which do every day and hour in the year almost imploy his Ministers of State and substituted in their several stations and qualifications Sundays and the grand Festivals in every year not always escaping and the not to be expressed almost perpetual cares of a Kingly and Monarchick Government largely attested by the many Patent Charter and Clause Rolls brevia Regis Rescripts Commissions Certioraris Writs of ad quod dampnum Inquisitions cum multis aliis in the Raigns of our Kings and Queens now lodged and preserved in the Tower of London the Exchequer and the Treasures thereof with the Records of the other Courts with what else could be rescued from the ravage of War and Time together with the Memorials of their Secretaries of State Privy Councel Table Books referrences and the returns thereof hearings of causes complaints and orders and redresses thereof with a necessary Inspection and Survey in and of all the affairs and conditions of his people and their well or ill being when the cares of government were so accompted to be an heavy burden for Moses in his conduct of an affrighted and oppressed people of Israel driven out of Egypt with six hundred thousand men on foot besides Women and Children with their Flocks and Herds in their travelling and unsetled condition through the wilderness towards their hopes in the Promised Land of Canaan with murmuring enough in the hearing and determining of their Suits and Complaints one against another raised in Jethro his Father-in-Law such a compassion of his Labour and Toil therein as he told him he would surely wear away both himself and the People and therefore Councelled him only to reserve hard matters unto himself and appoint out of the People able Men such as fear God and love the Truth hating Covetousness to Judge the People in smaller matters Wherein they that shall rightly consider the cares of Kings and Princes and the trouble of preserving and doing good to a far greater number of People not seldom as unto too many against their Wills may think themselves to be happy under the Protection of Gods Vicegerent and bound to obey with cheerfulness his Providence therein and that it was never intended by our less murmuring and more grateful Ancestors to make perpetual extraordinaries or a standing Court of Parliament which could not fall within the Reason Necessity or Practise of any good or rational Government and if it could as it never can must of necessity tear in pieces our happy best Established Monarchy and Sacrificing it to an inexorable misery leave our Posterities to be tossed and driven in and upon the Waters of Strife Self-interest and Vain Imaginations and in the fear without any cause of an Arbitrary Power of our Kings never like to happen over-hastily and madly run into the Arbitrary Power of a multitude or some prevailing Party of plundering and pretending Reforms amongst them many of which is and will be the worst of all Arbitraries of a Rude Ignorant Unreasonable and Senseless multitude with the greatest certainties of miseries as fatally as inevitably likely to happen §. 32. That Parliaments or great Councels de quibusdam arduis concerniug the defence of the Kingdom and Church of England neither were or can be fixed to be once in every year or oftner they being alwaies understood and believed to be by the Laws and ancient and reasonable Customs of England ad libitum Regis who by our Laws Right Reason and all our Records and Annals is and should be the only watchman of our Israel and the only Judge of the necessity times and occasion of summoning Parliaments FOR notwithstanding that by an Act of Parliament made in the 4th year of the Raign of King Edward 3. It was accorded that a Parliament should be holden once in every year and more often if need be And in an other Act of Parliament made in the 36th year of the Raign of the aforesaid King Edward it is said that for the maintenance of the Articles and Statutes made in the said Parliament of the 36th and redress of divers mischiefs and grievances which dayly happen a Parliament shall be holden as at other times was appointed by a Statute yet the latter Act of Parliament was but with reference to the former and that imparted no more than that a Parliament shall be holden once in every year and more often if need be and howsoever that in the 50th year of the Raign of that King the Commons renewed their petition that a Parliament might be holden that Knights of the Parliament might be chosen by the whole Counties and that the Sheriffs might likewise be without brocage in Court the King only answered to the Parliament there are Statutes made therefore to the Sheriffs there is answer made to the Knights it is agreed that they shall be chosen by common consent of every County and in Anno Primo R. 2. petitioned the King that a Parliament might be yearly holden in a convenient place to redress delays in Suits and to end such Cafes as the Judges doubt of which the Consequences after will shew were only to be at the pleasure and will of the King as his prudence care and necessity of himself and the publick good should necessarily advise if the true Interpretation of both those Acts of Parliament could as it never can bear any other signification for although that which next followed that Act of Parliament made in the 4th year of the Raign of that King was in the next year after yet that which succeeded that was in Anno 6 and not printed For the Parliament was for a few days Adjourned and being after holden at York was for a short time likewise Prorogued and afterwards the Assembly being not come was Adjourned until the 5th of St. Hillary next following at York and from thence again to a Reassembly at the same place at the end of which Re-assembly the Commons had License to depart and the Lords were commanded to attend him the next day at which time the Parliament was Dissolved The Duke of Cornwal the Kings Eldest Son as Guardian of England by the Kings Letters Patents held the Parliament at Westminster and a memorandum made to Summon the Parliament at the 5th of St. Hillary
of a contrived Parliament to govern the King when that gentle fictitious modus is content to allow the King a Salvo dom Regi et ejus Consilio quod ipsi hujusmodi Ordinaciones of 6. 3. or 1. of the Committee Postquam scripta fuerint examinare emendare valeant si hoc facere sciant valeant Ita quod hoc fiat tunc ibidem in pleno Parliamento de assensu Parliamenti Et non retro Parliamentum which last clause saith Mr. Pryn quite spoils Altars and contradicts what the Community of twelve six or three had ordained And King Edward the confessor whom the many foregoing and after ages have justly and truly reported and esteemed to be neither Oliver Cromwel or the mistaken Sir Edward Coke with their several modi tenendi Parliamenta did not find either of them in his Recherches amongst all the Laws of the Mulumtians Mercian Saxon and Danish Laws and other ancient Customs used in England in his time when he was Monarch thereof and Vicarius Summi Regis ordained Laws concilio Baronum Angliae leges 68 Annos sopitas excitavit excitatas reparavit reparatas decoravit decoratas confirmavis confirmatas vero vocantur Leges Edwardi Regis non quod ipse primo eas adinvenisse dicitur sed cum praetermissa fuissent oblivioni penitus dedita a diebus avi sui Edgari qui 17 Annis regnavit ipse Edwardus quia Justa erant honesta a profunda Abyssu extravit as if he had pulled them out of some Holes Vauts or Cranyes eas revocavit ut suas observandas contradidit wherein there is nothing at all that may be subservient to the wildest kind of Interpretation of a modus tenendi Parliamentum which in the case of so great Rational and Fundamental general Councel as a Parliament could not be beleived to be omitted in the making and framing K. Edward the Confessors Laws nor can they be conceived or believed to be made at one time but at several times during his Raign and in these although there are extant a very great commendation of the usefulness of the Law of Friborghs or Tithings there is not a word or any thing to be understood of the Members of the House of Commons in Parliament being a third Estate For it appears in Anno 1244 in a Parliament holden at London the King consulted with the Bishops apart the Earls and Barons apart and the Abbots and Priors apart about the Popes not performing his promise concerning his removal of the grievances of the Kingdom where were none of the Common people either as a third Estate or otherwise which was before his imprisonment in the 48th year of his Raign by some of his Rebellious Barons and in all his Raign before there is often mention of his Bishops Earls and Barons Magnates and Grand Conseil but nothing at all of Commons or a formed House of Commons until the 49th year of his Raign and not long before at a Parliament assembled totam Nobilitatem Angliae For before the 42 year of that Kings Raign Nobiles Angliae tam viri Ecclesiastici quam seculares met in a Parliament at London Ita quod nunquam tam populosa multitudo ibi antea visa fuit where the King informing them of his necessities and requiring an aid they not any Commons but the Lords Spiritual and Temporal began to be very querelous and remembring old grievances as they called them demanded the Justiciary Chancellor and Treasurer might be chosen by the Common Councel of the Kingdom which by the Records and Annalists was never understood to be any other than the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament summoned to give their advice to the King as the greatest men of wisdom and Estates in whom that and the obedience of the Common people were Justly included the choice of which great Offices of State Sir Edward Cokes modus tenendi Parliamentum having not then peeped into the World to help to disturb it the Lords Spiritual and Temporal then alledged to appertain unto them not unto the Vulgar or Common people and had been Justly and anciently due unto them ab antiquo Justum consuetum which had no longer a date than the enforced Charter of King John at Running Mede and the collateral strange security at the same time given for the 25 Conservators of the Liberties of the people to maintain its antiquity than something less than 42 years before which propositions the King denying that Councel was dissolved without any Claim of the common peoples third Estateship or being an Essential or constituent part of the Parliament or to have votum decisivum therein There was no such Modus tenendi Senatum or Parliamentum then so stiled when the Roman Empire began its rise for shortly after though their Stile or Title was Senatus populusque Romanus yet their Historians tell us that they had their Patritii and Menenius Agrippa when the Rabble Vulgus or Common people had made an Insurrection or mutiny and gone tumultuously into the Mount Aventine knew better how to bring them again into their Wits by a pleasant well understood fable or Apologue of the head Members Belly and Paunch in their Bodies natural and our Republican 3 Estate men might read and understand that those Common peoples Votes or Dictates were able to reach no further than their Plebiscita and never could arrive unto a Senatus consultum that when Julius Caesar came into our Brittain before the Incarnation of our Redeemer and that Nation had planted Colonies here they left us no Modus tenendi Senatum neither did Agricola Governor here for the Roman Colonies who had taught our Nation the use of the Roman Gown and Civilities teach them the modus tenendi Parliamentum or Senatum which Sir Edward Coke dreamed of or inform them that the Common people were a third Estate or had an inhaerent Soveraignty in them In all the Laws of Dunwallo Mulumtius there was no mention of Law for a modus tenendi Parliamentum or in those of Mercia Regina Britonum or in the time of the Heptarchy of the Saxon Kings or of King Ethelbert who raigned here in the year after Christ 568. Neither in the Laws of King Ina who raigned in England about the year 712. Or in the Laws of King Alured who began his Raign in Anno 871. and ended in Anno 900. and declares that he had ordained collected and put them together Atque easdem literis mandavit quorum bonam certe partem Majores sui religiose coluerunt mulâ—a etiam sibi digna videntur quae sibi observari melius commoda videbantur ea consulto sapientum partim antiquanda partino Innovanda videbantur curavit At quoniam temeritatis videatur ex suis ipsius decretis quenquam literarum monumentis consignare tum etiam se quidem apud posteros Justitiae suae fidem quae se magni fecerit
and prudent King Edward the First when he did his Homage to the King of France for the Dutchy of Acquitaine carefully to except his ancient right to the Dutchy of Normandy and the French Kings denying his brave and victorious Grandchild Edward the 3. to do his Homage by proxy made him so Inquisitive into his own better Title unto that Kingdom as the French King paid dear for it and the English King at length the owner of that great and flourishing Kingdom When Fealty is conjoyned with the Oaths of Allgeance and Supremacy the true born only Legitimate Issue and Children of the Feudall Laws they will be like a 3 fold Cord not at all in Reason or Justice to be broken And in matters touching Inheritances Nobility Titles of Honour womens Dower of the 3 part of Lands and Tenements fees tenures in Capite and by Knight Service Rents Escheats Fines Felonies Forfeitures tryall by battell cum multis aliis c. our Laws being not only founded upon them but supported and guided by them It may be wondred it should be so unknown to our Common Lawyers whom a carefull reading of our Glanvil Bracton Britton and Fleta and a better acquaintance with their mother the Civill and Caesarean and Feudall Laws with a due inspection into the ever to be valued Records of the Kingdom might better instruct then the malecontent and ill affected Sr Edward Coke and some other of the later School or Edition of those which are called Common Saviors as not to believe with great assurance that that which they call so generally the Common Law is for the most part if not all the Feudall Law which they are pleased to call the Praerogativa Regis declared and acknowledged in Anno 17. E. 2. and likewise that of the view of Franck pledge the next Year ensuing and that it was therefore not unfitly wished by a Late Learned Author supposed to be a post-hume of Sr Henry Spelman that Some worthy Lawyer would diligently read the Feudall Laws and shew the severall heads from whence those of our Laws are derived wherein saith he the Lawyers beyond the Seas are diligent but ours are all for profit And An Act of Parliament in Anno 1662. made by King Charles the 2. for the Settlement of the Kingdom of Ireland wherein notwithstanding that it was in the â—3th Year of his Reign ordained that all lands and Tenements in England and Ireland should be holden of him his Heirs and Successors in Free and Common Socage there is a Proviso and Exception that all lands tenements and Hereditaments in Ireland setled or to be setled on the Soldiers who are out of said Act and not provided for shall be held of the King his Heirs and Successors by Knight Service in Capite and it is well known that our unruly Neighbours in Scotland that could never be satisfied with the Fat and plenty of our Land of Goshen untill the lean kine had eat up the fat and they had set our before happy Kingdom on fire with their Hypocriticall dissembling Illegall wicked Covenant did not in all the mischiefs and Miseries which they brought upon us and themselves in those their Rebellious Designs make it any part of their desires to change their ancient tenures in Capite and by Knight Service into free and Common Socage which by unhinging the Government would have set all the wild Beasts of the Forrests loose and at Liberty and made the otherwise unruly and never to be governed numerous vassalls so masterless as to tear in peices their Lords Lairds or Superiors and turn that Monarchy to do as well as it can amongst a herd of rudeness and Incivilities in their Plads and Blew Capps And the Hollandiae Zelandiae Frisiaeque principes terra marique potentes heretofore nullo externo usi milite ex veteri Longobardorum Consuitudine sub certa quadam feudalitiae necessitudinis lege hoc est mutuae inter dominicum patrocinum ac Fiduciariam Clientelam veluti pactionis nexu beneficiarii instituerentur qui Conceptis verbis interposita Juratae fidei religione pro beneficio accepto patrono suo militarem operam praeberent navarentque ut scilicet quoties usus posceret parati in armis essent id quod Jure Feudalistico proprium Feudatariorium munus atque officium est Et cum praediorum defectu in these Provinces which ingenio soli quod natura depressum ac uliginosium were naturally scituated cum incilibus passim fossis lacubusque ac paludibus intercussum haud sane faciles aditus ostentat confisa turbas Seditionum praemia converteret and therefore to untie those obligations betwixt the Lords and Tenants and enervate those strengths and promptitude to a confidence in their own Power Charles the 5th Emperour Edicto perpetuo Anno Domini 1518. officia haec militaria vulgo servitia dicta in universum abragavit vassallisque omnibus remisit Ea tamen lege ut fundi Clientelares functionibus publicis quibus hactenus Imunes fuissent in posterum non secus atque patrimoniales obnoxii existerent and having so farr inticed them out of their old into a much worse constitution with Taxes and the Spanish Inquisition managed by the Duke D'Alva in a most tyrannical arbitrary Goverment so desperated them as after a long time expended in Intercessions without any redress obteyned and those their discontents heightned and made use of by the Policies of their neighbours the English and French who had reason to fear the ambitious encrochments and evil designs of the King of Spain to oppress them that were his neighbours and by the assistance of his late Conquest of the West Indies with their Gold and Silver Mines endeavouring to make himself to be as it were the Atlas of the World and extend his Dominions to a Fifth Monarchy and a Ne plus ultra All which concurring and put together with the Conduct and Adventurous successfull care of the then Prince of Orange assisted by the united Seven Provinces whereof Holland Zealand and West Freisland were the greatest Incouragers of the other caused that faedus ultrajectinum which in a long series and continuance of Time of Years making those netherland Belgick Provinces to be a Campus Martius and field of Bloud hath with an intermission only of 12 Years Truce after that Centnry ended occasioned greater ruines effusion of blood then the Wars Joyned all together between Rome and Carthage and Caesar and Pompey in the Pharsalian Fields So long and fatall from the beginning to the ending hath been that unhappy project of the dissolving the Hollandish Zealand and West Freizland ancient Feud 〈◊〉 Laws by the altering their Tenures in Capite and by military service which howsoever they had so continued depressed during the heat and fury of that Spanish War been laid aside and intromitted saith Neostadius haec olim celeberrima Feudalis Curiae quam Oraculum Bataviae was wont to be called the Lords
the States of Holland West-Freisland did by a Publique Decree order that omnia Instrumenta Feudalia publica Feudalia Scrinia should be searched put kept in order And in his Epistle Ded. unto the Estates aforesaid Judges of the said Feudal Court Dated no longer ago then in the Month of Sept. 1665. from Alemar saith likewise that de qua Intromissa saepissime quaerebatur denuo instaurata fuisset adeo ut vos the Estates qui hoc tempore ejusdem reminiscentis Feudalis Curiae Senatores sive pares estis negligereaut aliis postponere non posse And yet they do think Themselves at this day to be as free a people as any in the World with an high and mighty Hoghen Moghen into the bargain And the Framers and Voters of that overturning as much as it could of our ancient Monarchy many of whom as House of Commons Members in that Parliament were Knights Baronetts Knights of the Bath and Knights Batchelors might have been something more cautious then they were and taken more care of the fatall Consequences that might and would inevitably happen yea more then by Chance by an unavoidable necessity or for the liberties of 10000 manors in England and Wales and a great many of manors liberties in Ireland which had no other originall or Foundation then Monarchy or the unrebellious Feudall Laws and it and their continuance for what could they imagine but Confusion and Villany would follow in the order of Baronetts Created by King James in the 9th Year of his Reign limited at the first unto the number of 200. now supernumerated unto almost 1500. to hold by the tenure of maintayning 30. foot-Soldiers at 8d per diem for 3 Years for the regaining of the Province of Ulster in Ireland what for any of the Honourable Knights of the Garter that have no priviledge of Peers in Parliament what for the Knights of the Bath that are to be made at the Creation of every Prince of Wales being the King of Englands eldest Son what for such as our Kings have honoured or shall be pleased to Dignify with the honor of Knighthood or the Sword or to be an Eques Auratus what care was taken in that levelling Act in the effect of turning the Tenures in Capite and by Knight Service into free and Common Socage for the honour and degree of Knighthood or of that more meritorious extraordinary one of Knight Banneretts Was it ever intended they should go all to Plow with some ill brewed Ale to wet their Whistles with their sword and guilt spurrs promiscuously some with blew or red Garters or ribbons and the rest without and could there be no Exception or proviso's inserted in that Act for those Honourable degrees which appertained so only to the Sovereign or a power derived from them as our Queens Regent in their Incapacities of wearing or brandishing a sword or personal fighting are by themselves or others commissionated by them only to grant or give those Priviledges which are not a Few and can have no other derivation or reason for their Commencement then a Militando not as Common Soldiers but ex strenua continuata militia tantum adipiscatur honor when by the Imperiall Laws Knights ex Jure concessione principis prescriptione consue 〈…〉 dine were anciently at the receiving of that honourable o 〈…〉 to swear not to reveal any thing by solemn Oath or Vow 〈◊〉 concerneth his Sovereign or his Countrey never to put on Armour against his Prince never to forsake his Generall never to fly the field of his Enemy c. had Jus Annulorum as the Equestris Ordo were amongst the Roman Knights used to be honoured with when at the Battle and overthrow of them at Cannes there were gathered amongst the slain 2 Bushell of Rings in England and other Northern Kingdoms had jus Imaginum Coate Armorius and besides what Sr Edward Coke cannot deny to be an ancient priviledge due unto Knighthood as hath been before said to be free ab omni Tallagio a Knight is not to have his Equitature or Horse distrained and taken in Execution although it be for the Kings Debt a Knight accused of any Crime Treason shall not be examined but before his Competent Judge against a Knight in warr no prescription runneth neither shall he be compelled to be Guardian to Children except they be the Children of Knights shall not suffer any Ignominious Corporall Punishment as hanging upon a Gibbet unless first Degraded nor be set at any ransome but such as he shall be able after to maintain his Degree And in time of peace hath been so much valued and esteemed as 3 Knights Associated in the Kings Commission of Oyer and Terminer might hear and determine forcible Entries and outrages in the same Country or Province A Coroner formerly an especiall officer of the Crown was to be a Knight a Sheriffs Certificate and return of the Tallies of the Kings Creditors and Monies paid as due unto them is to be accompanied with the hands of 2 Knights a Sheriff cannot remove a plaint out of an Inferiour into a Superior Court without the testimony of 4 Knights Knights and no other are to be sent by the Sheriffs to make the View de malo lecti the Knights of the shires elected to be members of the House of Commons in Parliament ought to be gladiis cincti and the Commons have in Parliament Petitioned the King and obteyned a grant that it might not be otherwise Ou autrement tiel notables Esquiers Gentilhomes del nation des mesmes les Counties come soyent ables d'estre Chivalier noul home destre tiel Chivaler que estoite enles degrees de vadlet ou Varlet saith Mr Selden de south an Infant holding his Lands in Capite or by Knight Service shall not be in Ward after he is Knighted a Knight inhabiting in any City or town Corporate shall not be Impannelled in a Jury for the Tayal of a Criminall in a Civil Action for Debt or the like wherein any of the Nobility are plaintiffs or defendents 2 Knights are to be Impannelled on the Jury A Knight shall not be distrained to serve in person for Castle guard although he do hold Lands by that Tenure A certain number of Knights are to elect a Jury in a Writ of grand Assize and none but a Knight should be permitted to wear a Coller of S. S. or Golden or Guilt Spurrs And the Dignity of Chivaler or Knight hath been in England so honorable as Earls besides their Greater Titles would many times use the Title of Chivaler only and at other times desire to receive the Honour of Knighthood from the King after they were Earls and our Kings have sometimes sent their Eldest Sons to be Knighted by other Kings And a Villain which Sr Edward Coke stileth a Sokeman or one that holdeth in Socage is not by the Law of Nations and Arms to
Secretaries of State two Chief Justices and Chief Baron not being to be ranked with the Peers may always be chosen by the approbation of both Houses of Parliament the House of Commons being never before accompted equal with the House of Peers in Birth Honour Wisdom Education Alliance or Estate and in the Intervals of Parliament by the Assent of the Major part of the Councel in such manner as was before expressed in the choice of Councellors which in a matter of a much less consequence in the Government of the Kings Houshold was so little endured by the Nobility of England in the 10th year of the Raign of King Richard the 2d as it was adjudged an incroachment upon Regal Authority and high Treason and some great Lords suffered in their Persons and Estates for it and others glad to receive their Pardons for being confederate or Privy thereunto 4. That he or they unto whom the Government or Education of his Children shall be committed shall be approved by both Houses of Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament by the Major part of his Council in such manner as was before expressed in the choice of Councellors and that all such Servants as are now about them against whom both Houses shall have any just exception shall be removed which before they had disclaimed as Mr. Rushworths Historical Collections Printed and allowed by them not long before had informed us 5. That no Marriage shall be concluded or treated for any of his Children with any Forreign Prince or any Person whatsoever abroad or at home without the consent of the Parliament under the penalty of a Praemunire unto such as shall conclude or treat any Marriage as aforesaid which they had as aforesaid disclaimed and the said penalty shall not be pardoned or dispenced with but by the consent of both Houses of Parliament that lower House never having before or since any power of pardoning or dispensation nor that higher without the Sanction or Authority of their Soveraign 6. That the Laws in force against Jesuits Priests Papists and Recusants be put in execution without any Toleration or Dispensation to the contrary and that a course may be enacted by Authority of Parliament to hinder them from making any disturbance in the State or Law by Trusts or otherwise 7. That the Votes of Popish Lords in the House of Lords may be taken away so long as they continue Papists and that his Majesty would consent to such a Bill as shall be drawn for the Education of Children of Papists by Protestants in the Protestant Religion which was to take away the Priviledge of Barons holding by Tenure without conviction for Treason and of Earls Viscounts Marquesses or Dukes which ever since the beginning of the Raign of King Richard the 2d were by that and all succeeding Kings Letters Patents to have vocem locum sedem in Parliamentis 8. That his Majesty would be pleased to consent that such a Reformation be made of the Church Government and Liturgy as both Houses of Parliament shall advise wherein they do intend to have consultation with Divines as is expressed in their Declaration to that purpose and that his Majesty will continue his best assistance unto them for raising of a sufficient maintenance for Preaching Ministers through the Kingdom when there was no want of the Orthodox more Loyal and better sort and that his Majesty would be pleased to give his consent to Laws for the taking away of Superstitions and Innovations and of pluralities and scandalous Ministers which in their accompt were only of the Church of England and Loyal 9. That his Majesty would be pleased to rest satisfied with the course that the Lords and Commons have appointed for the ordering of the Militia until the same shall be further setled by a Bill and that his Majesty would be pleased to recal his Proclamations and Declarations against the Ordinance made by the Lords and Commons concerning it which was to take away the Tenures the Power of the Sword and defence of his People 10. That the Members of either Houses of Parliament as have during the time of this present Parliament been put out of any Places or Offices may either be restored to their Place or Office or otherwise have satisfaction for the same upon the Petition of that House whereof he or they are Members 11. That all Privy Counsellors and Judges may take their Oath the form thereof to be agreed on and setled by Act of Parliament for the maintaining of the Petition of Right which was in many things more than ever they could claim or ever had or could by Law have any Right unto and of certain Statutes made by this Parliament which shall be mentioned by both Houses of Parliament as if they were in all Duty and Loyalty bound to make him a glorious King thought they could never have unking'd him enough and brought him to their murdering ever to be abhorred Tribunal and that an inquiry of all the Breaches and Violations of all those Laws may be given in charge by the Justices of the Kings Bench and by the Justices of Assize in their Circuits and Justices of the Peace at their Sessions to be presented and punished according to Law 12. That all the Judges and Officers placed by approbation of both Houses of Parliament may hold their places quam diu se bene gesserint 13. That the Justice of Parliament may pass upon all Delinquents whether they be within the Kingdom or fled out of it And that all persons cited by either House of Parliament may appear and abide the sentence of Parliament 14. That the general Pardon offered by his Majesty may be granted with such Exceptions as shall be advised by both Houses of Parliament 15. That the Forts and Castles of this Kingdom may be put under the Command and Custody of such persons as his Majesty shall appoint with the approbation of his Parliament and in the Intervals of Parliament with the Major part of the Council in such manner as is before expressed in the choice of Councellors 16. That the extraordinary Guards and Military Forces attending his Majesty may be removed and discharged and that for the future he will raise no such Guards or extraordinary Forces but according to the Law in case of Actual Rebellion or Invasion an Imposition and Vassalage was never put upon any thing that was like a King in Christendom for the Kings of Scotland whilst seperate from England and did homage to our Kings had when there was cause enough of fear and jealousie as now there was none no such unkingly Vassalage put upon him King David had 24000 men for his Guard who every Month came up to Jerusalem and our Saxon King Alured had his Guards by monthly courses 17. That his Majesty would be pleased to enter into a more strict Alliance with the States of the united Provinces and States of the Protestant Religion for the defence and