Basiliká the works of King Charles the martyr : with a collection of declarations, treaties, and other papers concerning the differences betwixt His said Majesty and his two houses of Parliament : with the history of his life : as also of his tryal and martyrdome.

His MAJESTY's Declaration to all His Loving Subjects, in Answer to a De∣claration of the Lords and Commons upon the Proceedings of the late Treaty of Peace, and several Intercepted Letters of His MAJESTY to the QUEEN, and of Prince RUPERT to the Earl of Northampton.

Oxford, 3. June, 1643.

THough His Majesty be assured, it cannot but be of great Advantage to Him to have such an occasion as is now given Him by the late Declaration of both Houses, to shew to all His good People who it is that is really in fault, that the last Treaty, so much desired by His Majesty, and only begun upon His Desire, broke off so abruptly (as He doubts not to do, if those who govern in the remaining part of both Houses have but so much ingenuity left, as to suffer what He says to be equally freely published to His People;) yet His Majesty cannot without great grief of Soul see that Treaty, which He hoped and expected should have begot the settled Peace and Happiness of His Subjects, in stead thereof beget nothing but Disputes and Declarations: yet it will be some Cordial to Him, when He shall be forced to see the Desolation of this Kingdom and the Misery of His People, that not only it is not He that hath made that Desolate and them Miserable, but that He is able to demonstrate to all the World, that He hath used His utmost and most earnest endeavours to prevent it, as will appear at large by the following state of the Case.

After that the Conspiracy of some Persons against the present establisht Govern∣ment both Ecclesiastical and Civil had made means to infuse into part of the People (by publishing unheard-of Declarations, obtain'd and past in a new and unheard-of manner, sometimes but by eleven Voices after seventeen hours sitting, and that but in one House) strange Fears and Jealousies of the other House and of His Majesty, and by them given the Rise to those insufferable Tumults and Seditious unparliamentary Petitions at once to and against the Lords, which they afterwards avowed publickly to

protect and encourage, and forced the Lords House, by fearing them, to seem to fear with them, and to joyn with them first in requiring, and next in forcing no less se∣curity for those Fears from His Majesty (who was then in condition to have most real Cause of Fear Himself) than almost all that Power which the Law had tru∣sted to Him for the security of the Crown and the Protection of His People; after that His Majesty and most of the Members were forced away from the Parliament; and that His share in making new Laws was denyed to Him in any case in which they would pretend Necessity, and every Subject that would not submit to any new, extravagant, extemporary, legislative Declaration or Order of one or both Houses, against the antient known Law of the Land, was become sent for up, and imprisoned as a Delinquent, and whosoever would assist them, against the known Law, was not only-protected by them in that, but in any other Case (although they were of them who had been most apparently active in those former Pressures upon the People, which they now afresh impute to His Majesty) so that to be of their side was now become a known Sanctuary; after that nothing was left undone or unsaid that might render His Majesty both weak and odious, and that all that He could say or do to clear Himself was either supprest, or interpreted in a contrary and impossible sense (so that His very offer to venture His Royal Person against the Irish Rebels was voted to be an Encouragement to that Rebellion;) after that from declaring of Law they came to declaring of Thoughts, and forgetting that the Hearts of Kings are inscru∣table, presumed to dive into His, and without Apparence, and contrary to Truth, had declared that He meant to make War upon His Parliament, and made that Decla∣ration a ground to levy a real War against Him, and then made that War a ground to begin to make War upon His People, forcing away the Arms and Money of all such as they pleased to suspect of the Crimes of Allegiance and Loyalty; after that they had so far exprest and discovered the true end of all these Actions, as to propose the total Change of the present Government, both Ecclesiastical and Civil, in the Nineteen Propositions, as the only way to Peace; and that His Majesty might by all this have been sufficiently perswaded, that it was impossible for Him to obtain Peace from them but either by Submission or by the Sword: yet after all this His Majesty was so averse to the latter Course, as to descend to so great a degree of the former, as from Nottingham to propose to and desire from them a Treaty for Peace; and being there twice openly and absolutely refused it, yet did then declare, that He would notwithstanding be ready to receive it whensoever they would propose it. And to shew that these Offers proceeded not from His Condition but from His In∣clination, after His Victory at Edge-hill, and after that the Earl of Essex had so far forgot his Errand, as to return to London alone, in stead of bringing up His Majesty, and those His good Subjects whom they call'd Delinquents; His Answer at Colebrook will shew to all the World, that He was still of the same mind as when He sent His Messages from Nottingham; and His Message so carefully sent from Cole∣brook to prevent all mis-construction of that march of His which they had necessitated to Brainceford, and His pressing still that a Treaty might go on in that and several other Messages, all slighted and neglected, shewed sufficiently who really was desi∣rous of, and who were averse to Peace. But when the Petition of so many Citizens, that a Treaty might be accepted, finding so little countenance or acceptance from the House of Commons, and the Injuries and Imprisonments which the Petitioners suf∣fered for it from Alderman Pennington and others, finding so much countenance from them, did so far begin to open the eyes of the People, that the Aversion to Peace began to be imputed to them who were truly guilty, and that they found this Discovery made men generally unwilling to part with their money to make themselves misera∣ble, and that again encouraged many of the Members to appear for Peace too, and that consequently their too open and avowed desire of War would but render them unable to continue it, they thought it necessary to make some Propositions which might deceive the People so far as to make them believe they desired Peace, and yet resolved to make them so unreasonable, as they might notwithstanding be sure to be out of all danger of effecting Peace by them, and sent those down to His Majesty. Which though they pretend now to be such as no indifferent man will find any thing contained in them but what was necessary for the maintenance and advancement of the true Protestant Religion, the due execution of Justice, the Preservation of the Liberty and Property of the Subject, and the establishment of the Kingdoms Peace and Safety; yet His Majesty is confident that even those who are not very indifferent are yet able to see, that no Propositions could be more unreasonable than those Fourteen, except the former Nineteen.

To pass by the Preamble, (in which most unnecessarily they lay most heavy and most unjust Charges upon His Majesty, and yet draw an Argument of His Aversion to Peace from those known Truths which either His defence or the matter in question, Crimes being impossible to be spoken of but as Crimes, did after extort from Him) would not any man have expected, that had observed with what violence this War was begun and prosecuted against His Majesty, to have found in the Propositions for Peace the De∣mand of at least some, and those very important, Rights which were withheld from them before the War, and so had given some colour for it? But of these there appears not so much as one: and yet till all these are granted and performed, they do as much as say in Terms plain enough in their Conclusion, that they have not any hope, nor will use any endeavours, that His Majesty and His People may enjoy the Blessings of Peace and Justice; which was certainly by terrour of Arms to demand new Laws, and as great a Proof that they did so, as they seem to confess it unparliamentary if they had done it. Is not the taking away of the Bishops, Deans and Chapters, and indeed the whole establisht Ecclesiastical frame of Order and Government, a new Law? yet un∣less His Majesty will yield to take it away (though there were but five Lords present when the Bill past, and though no other form be yet offered or shewed to Him, but the Presbyterians and Independents are left to fight it out among themselves what shall succeed in the place,) His Majesty is told, He must not hope for Peace. And the di∣vision likely to ensue between different Parties, what shall after be introduced, shews sufficiently what hope there should be of Peace if He should pass it.

Are not the Bill against Scandalous Ministers (in which most of their own Faction are appointed Commissioners, that they may make way for and introduce a new Cler∣gy of their own;) the Bill against Pluralities, (which makes no difference of conditi∣ons, or merits of Persons, or of value of Livings, and looks not only forwards, but extends to the immediate dispossessing of present Incumbents of what is vested in them for their Lives by the Law of the Land;) the Bill for the Consultation of Divines (Persons of their own choice, and most of them of their Faction, and of no esteem but with themselves, hardly at all bounded as to the matter, and absolutely unlimited as to the time of their consultation,) all news Laws? Is not the settling of the Mi∣litia both by Sea and Land, and the Forts and Ports, in such a manner as shall be agreed on by both Houses (in which His Majesty is expected with a blind implicite Faith to trust them with the whole Power of the Kingdom, and with His only means of defending Himself and protecting His Subjects, though into what hands or for what time or in what manner they will order or dispose of it is so far from ap∣pearing to Him, that it doth not yet appear that both Houses know themselves, and how they have already used that Power is known to all the World) both a new and a strange Demand? Are the Earl of Bristoll's Removal and Exclusion from all possibility of Employment, (a Person uncondemned, unimpeacht and unsummoned, no crime or error either proved or but named against him,) or the choice of the Judges and Master of the Rolls, the change of Commissioners of the Peace and Oyer and Terminer, or the restoring of Members of the Houses, even to such menial places of Ser∣vice as required a personal attendance, and who had yet refused to attend upon com∣mand, or the assenting to whatsoever Acts He shall be advised for paying of Debts con∣tracted upon the publick Faith, that is, by the Authority of both Houses (by which His Majesty must allow Himself to be no no part of the publick, and must directly allow, and, as it were, ratifie that Rebellion which this Money was raised to foment) either due to them by Law, or reasonable in themselves? Doth the directing His Ma∣jesty with whom and how far to make Alliances belong to them? (or was that at all necessary, His inclination to the strictest bands with Princes and States of the Protestant Religion being by the Match of His Daughter sufficiently expressed?) And yet till all this be done, and unless He will pardon all that have born Arms against Him, and leave those that have assisted Him to their Mercy who have none, they will not promise any hopeful endeavours for Peace and Justice.

But is there any thing else that is due by Law, which was before denied and is here demanded, that can in any degree justifie or extenuate that ever Peace was broken and Justice destroyed? Not so much as one tittle. Did His Majesty give any Commissi∣on till they had mustered many men? Or did He so much as take any Guard to Him, till both they had a much greater many months, and had of their own Authority orde∣red a Serjeant-Major-General of their City Forces, and till His Magazine and Town were by Arms kept against Him, though He were provoked to it before by all the other Indignities and Injuries which Insolence and Injustice could devise? Was not

Sir John Hotham, for all his known Treason refused to be left by them to Justice and the trial of the Law, before ever any that was but call'd a Delinquent was protected by His Majesty? And was not His Majesty then denied that which themselves confess to be the due and right of the meanest Subject, and do so far expect, as to look upon it ra∣ther as a scorn than a satisfaction now His Majesty offers it to them? Was any one Papist armed by His Majesty before many of that Religion (and multitudes of persons against whose Recusancy the Law is as severe as against theirs) were armed against Him; or than either, until their mere being of that Religion made them without colour of Law be plunder'd and imprison'd in all parts, and some of them fly into His Army for pro∣tection? Did not His Majesty before of himself often offer to vindicate the Privi∣leges of Parliament from any imaginable breach of them in the business of the Lord Kimbolton and Five Members? and did He not offer to wave their Charge, wil∣lingly submitting it to the publick Peace? So that the obtaining that demand, or the disbanding of the Army, or the disarming of Papists, or the trial of Delinquents, though they make some such shew as they are set in this place, yet not any of them were any grounds of this their War: And all that is due in these Demands having been offered before the War, or occasioned or necessitated by it, and being still to be had without it, the whole People cannot but see, that nothing but Fears and Jealousies have been the fumes with which they have so intoxicated His seduced Subjects, as to contribute to their own Misery, to obtain no one Right, how small and inconsidera∣ble soever, denied to them by His Majesty, and that the maintenance and advance∣ment of Religion, Justice, Liberty, Property and Peace, are really but their Stalking-Horses, and neither the Ground of their War nor of these Demands; which will appear to any indifferent Man that shall duly weigh them, as far from being moderate as from being necessary.

Yet such was His Majesty's most earnest desire to catch at any thing that by producing a Treaty might settle a Peace, and so far were any such Enemies of it (as are supposed by this Declaration (from being prevalent with Him against this desire, that His Majesty proposed that persons should be appointed by His Majesty and both Houses to Treat even upon these very Propositions, and such other as His Majesty proposed, which were only De∣mands according to or in behalf of the Law establisht, and which more concerned His Subjects than Himself. And His Majesty cannot but appeal to all the World, whether not only any of their Propositions did, but whether any other Propositions that could be devised could express more desire of the maintenance and advancement of the true Pro∣testant Religion than His Majesty's Fourth Proposition, (in which His readiness to con∣sent to the execution of all Laws made, and to any good Laws to be made, for the sup∣pressing of Popery, His desire that the Laws already made to preserve the Common-Prayer from the scorn and violence of Sectaries be backt and fortified, and His Offer at the same time that tender Consciences be eased by it, are so clearly and carefully exprest and united;) or of the due execution of Justice than His Majesty's Fifth Proposi∣tion, (which refers all such Delinquents as should by the Treaters be excepted in the Par∣don, to the usual course and known Law of the Land;) or of the preservation of the pub∣lick Liberty and Property, (for His Majesty conceives that He hath a Property too, with∣out maintaining of which He will be never able to defend His Subjects) than His First, Second and Third; or of the Peace of the Kingdom, than His Sixth Proposition, which by restoring His Subjects by a Cessation to a short Trial of the quiet and benefit of Peace, would have rendered them so far in love with that almost-forgotten Happiness, that seeing nothing demanded by them that was worth a War, they would have had a hard work to have engaged them again into so unprofitable a Madness. And His Majesty is so confi∣dent of His advantage in all these, that He conjures His Subjects seriously to read, consi∣der and compare what He and what they demanded, and by their indifferent Proposi∣tions to judge of their several Intentions.

And indeed, the violent party both in the City and the Houses (which, for all the publick Fears and Jealousies they pretend, inwardly and really are fearful and jealous of nothing so much as of Peace) dislike nothing more in His Majesty's Propositions than the Moderation; and suspecting that the reasonableness and unreasonableness of what His Majesty and what they askt would but too generally appear by the Discussion of both in a free and open Treaty, and so might in despight of them produce a Peace, earnestly and openly oppose the Treaty, and so far oppose His Majesty's Proposition of Cessation, that it sufficiently appeared by their aversion to the Shadow of Peace (as themselves call it) how much and how heartily they were averse to the Substance it self. But when they found that they could perswade no Man to joyn with them in rejecting all imaginable

manners of Treaty and Cessation, that did not joyn with them in abhorring any imagi∣nable manner of Peace, they reserved their Authority to enable them to break off both, upon somewhat more plausible difference in the Circumstances and Conditions.

A safe Conduct is demanded by the Houses, and their first Art is to get the Lord Say named in that Demand for a Treater, which they knew certainly (he having born Arms against His Majesty, and been excepted in one of His Proclamations of Pardon) His Majesty must except against: but when they could not perswade even both Hou∣ses (who well remembred an example of no elder date than since His Majesty was at Colebrook, when the same exception at the person of. Sir John Evelyn was made by His Majesty, and not excepted at by both Houses) that this exception was so unparallel'd a breach of Priviledge, as to deserve to hinder the Treaty from going on, their next Arts are so to bound and limit their Committee, both in the Matter, Manner, Time and Power as might wholly render it uneffectual: And to that end they first obtain that their Committee should Treat with none but with His Majesty, (a Course which how lofty, how advantagious, and how unreasonable soever, yet His Majesty, out of His earnest desire of Peace, contrary to their hopes and expectations, was con∣tented to admit;) and next obtain that they should not Treat upon any point but of the Cessation, till that were concluded, and for that allowed but four days, and that at twice, (in hope that some matter of Advantage might happen in the time of that de∣lay) and allow them no Power (without still sending to the Houses upon every occasion) to conclude farther than the Papers they brought down or delivered, or so much as to ex∣plain or new-word any thing in them, (a new and a strange way of Treating, and by which at that distance it was wholly and plainly impossible that any thing should be con∣cluded:) and when His Majesty had quitted all wherein Himself or His Army were solely concerned, and yielded almost to all that they proposed, and at last insisted upon no∣thing but that they might not make use of the leisure of their Army, occasioned by this Cessation, to force what Sums they would from what Countries they pleas'd, (for they neither would nor could name any other bound of their Taxes than their pleasure, when they imputed that assertion to His Majesty) and so extremely burthen His Subjects, and advantage and enable themselves against His Majesty, (in contradiction to the Prin∣ciple lay'd down by themselves, and approved of by His Majesty, That by the very nature of a Cessation, matters should be preserved in the state they are in, and neither party have liberty much to advantage himself;) nor yet insisted any further upon that neither, than to leave room still for satisfaction (if any Reason could be offered against so reasonable a Limitation) by a continuance of the Treaty concerning it; they vouch∣safed Him no offer of any such Reason, nor allowed their Committee any farther Time or Power to Treat concerning it, without expressing any better cause for so abrupt an end of so important a Debate, than to avoid the Wast of Time: though His Majesty could not conceive that could be called a Wast, or how time could be better spent, than to settle such a degree of publick Peace, as might reduce the minds of all Men to such a Temper as might make a full Peace much more probable.

Nor did His Majesty find in the Treaty it self that the Committee were any better ena∣bled, (though to avoid delay, and that a Conclusion might be made possible) His Maje∣sty often desired it. They were limited twice to four days, and once to seven: they were bounded to two Propositions, and to their bare narrow Instructions concerning those: nor had they so much as any Power or Instructions at all concerning that most important part of their own Proposition, so often prest by themselves, His Majesty's Return to His Parliament. So that resolving (as it will be afterward shewed they did) to yield no far∣ther to His Majesty's Proposition than with such Limitations as would in effect retain what they seemed to give up, they expect that His Majesty should entirely yield to theirs without any Limitation, and (to invert their own words upon another occasion) should yield to that which would have produced to them an absolute Victory and Submission, under pretence of Agreement and Peace: It being evident to all Men, that His Rights forced from Him by Violence being not absolutely restored, His Army being disbanded, and He returned to London, the Members of both Houses for dissenting from them and assisting of Him remaining expelled, no security from Tumults for the rest of the Mem∣bers being given, and all good Subjects being totally discouraged by so absolute a Preva∣lence of the Factious and Rebellious, His Majesty were as much in the disposal of the Five Members as if they had him in the Tower, and He ought His Crown wholly to their Grace and Favour if they did not Depose Him. And yet they would be thought to desire nothing, in desiring that the Armies should be upon these Terms disbanded, but only that the Kingdom might be eased of their Burthen, and the spring of these Calamities might be stopped.

His Majesty demands, That His own Revenue, Magazine, Towns, Forts and Ships, taken by Force, be restored to Him. The Revenue (which they could easily pay back out of other Mens Purses) they easily agree about; but to part with such strengths which had and did help to enable them to leave no Subject any more of his Right, than they had to the detaining of these, they can by no means endure. And therefore they propose such Limitations as in effect limit away all, and yet may seem to the vulgar or to the careless not to signifie much: to wit, That these Strengths may be put into such hands as they will confide in, and that no less than three years; That the Commanders may, during that time, not admit of any Forces upon whatsoever occasion without Consent of the Houses, and they, and all Generals and Commanders of the Armies on either side, may swear to preserve the Peace of the Kingdom against all Forces raised without consent of both Houses, and this for no limited time. His Majesty, who had asked nothing but what was His by Law, and who in order to Peace had not asked so much, as by Law was due to Him, (to wit, the punishment of those who had taken these things from Him) could not but wonder to see such things asked of him, to which by Law there was no Pretence: He therefore endeavours to limit their Limitations to the Law of the Land; He names those Persons to this Custody whom the Law had named first, and ex∣prest Himself most willing that they should be put out at the same door they came in at; that the Law, which had vested them, might eject them, if they had offended against it: But expected not that the Injury done Him, of taking these things from Him and them contrary to Law, should be a reason why any new conditions or Limitations should be laid upon Him or His Ministers, which the Law laid not. To this the Committee re∣plies, not denying what the King asked to be legally His, or to have been illegally ta∣ken from Him, nor making any legal, or so much as colourable, or at all any Excep∣tions, against the Persons legally vested in those Places, (and without any Cause shewed, it would have ill become His Majesty to have devested His Servants of their Rights, in the instant when some of them are venturing their Lives for his Service) but retire to their old inaccessible Fort of Fears and Jealousies. To this His Majesty rejoyns, shews what he had done to prevent and destroy Fears and Jealousies in them, intimates what they had done to create Fears and Jealousies in Him; that having by Force taken these things from Him when He had them, He had more Reason to have insisted upon further Security to inable him to keep them, than simply to desire them to be returned to Him, (and much more than to grant them more hold of them, to enable them the better to wrest them from Him again:) represents to them, that by the same Reason, upon the same ground, they may ask Him all His Legal Power, since all the Power vested in Princes, for the necessary Protection of their Subjects, may possibly be employed for their hurt; and concludes, in His Opinion, with a very wholesome Advice against that dangerous (and now too Epidemical) Disease of Fears and Jealousies, and prescribes to them to make the Law their Rule and Measure, as the best Antidote and Cure for that Disease.

This insisting upon this Answer, as His Majesty for these Reasons thought to be most reasonable, so He likewise thought it most necessary; First, because themselves having told Him in the Debate about Cessation in the point of Ships, that for them to allow Him the Approbation of Commanders, was to give Him up the Strength, He could not want Logick so much as not to draw this Conclusion from these Premises, That for Him to allow them the Approbation of the Commanders, both of Magazines, Towns, Forts and Ships, was in that to give all back to them, which they would seem to restore to Him. Secondly, because his Majesty by now consenting upon the ground of Jealousies to such Demands, as exceed those (which before they had joyned the injustice of forcing these things from Him, to the unreasonableness of demanding them) His Majesty in His weakest Condition denied to them, He must appear to justifie those Jealousies, to ap∣prove of those Demands and of that Injustice, and to condemn Himself as guilty of the woful effects of that Contention, for not having sooner consented to them. Thirdly, be∣cause He must condemn the Lords House of the same Crime, for having twice refused to joyn in that demand, and having had no Jealousies as long as they had no Tumults. Fourthly, because He must either quit, during the lives of these several Persons required to be sworn, and at least for three years (when the Militia in their own Bill was asked but for two) His known Right of sole raising Men, and without the consent of both Houses (even although no Parliament were sitting, for the Bill that says it may continue, does not say it must) He must neither be able to discharge His Duty to Himself by His own Defence, nor make good His Oath, by the protecting of his Subjects against any sudden, dangerous Rebellion or Invasion; or the Commanders of all His Ships, Towns,

Forts and Magazines, and all the Commanders of both Armies (that is, the most con∣siderable Militia of England) must according to this new Oath oppose any opposition He shall make, and must be equally obliged by it to fight against His Forces, as against those of the Rebels or Invaders. Fifthly, because if He should give them so a great a Prero∣gative, for so long a time, as this share in the choice of men to places of so high Power and Trust, the Dependance of Subjects upon the Crown would be much diverted and He could never expect to be faithfully served, when no other Crime of theirs appearing to Him, He should so farr devest the present Proprietaries of their legal Right, as to sub∣mit it a new to the Arbitrariness of their Confiding, who have given His Majesty no greater Cause to confide in their Choice. Sixthly and lastly, because if He should allow them that power for that time upon that Reason, He cannot doubt but against that time were ended, the Sweetness of Power being once tasted, they would be so unwilling to quit it, that the same powerful violent party would not want the like Fears to beget the like De∣mands of the same or greater interest, in the choice of the same or greater Places; and the same Consequences would not likewise fail to follow, if these Demands were not consented to, and even His good Subjects seeing it the most prosperous, might be induced to think Faction and Sedition the wisest Course; and when they saw His Majesty give such an En∣couragement to Rebellion, might think it pity He should ever be without one. And His Majesty conceives, Fear and Jealousie may be a good reason to make Him cautious how He parts with His Right, though a very insufficient justification of their forcing that from Him, to which they could pretend none.

But still His Majesty hoped that they only insisted upon such Limitations of his Pro∣position, till they saw what Limitations he would offer to theirs; and therefore to reduce them to Moderation by His Example, He proposes to the Houses (for the Committee had no Power or Instruction to treat of the principal point of it) no other Limitations than were both due by Law and necessary in themselves, and offers as soon as he was sa∣tisfied in His first Proposition, (to which if they would have put Him in mind of any such Objection in the Treaty,* 1.1 He would never have required that the exact Computa∣tion of his Revenue taken from Him should be agreed on before Disbanding, which is now objected to Him, not as an Injustice, but as a purposed Delay) as soon as the Hou∣ses were restored to that Condition in which they were before the Tumults, and these Distractions forced the Members from thence, and as soon as He and those Houses were secured from Tumults (only adding His own opinion, That adjourning twenty miles from London could only effect it, and offering them the choice of any place at that di∣stance in His whole Kingdom) He would immediately disband, and return to His Par∣liament; and expected much more that this Message when it was received at London should have met with Bells and Bone-fires, than have received neither Approbation nor Answer.

But that violent Party which looks upon Peace like a Monster, fearing lest if the Treaty should any longer continue, so fair an approach to Peace might by degrees steal it on up∣on them before they were aware, prevail to return no other Answer, than immediately to send for their Committee from Oxford, and to send the Lord of Essex to Reading. His Majesty waits awhile,* 1.2 and again in a Message He had occasion to send to the Houses concerning Ireland, He takes occasion to put them in mind of that former Message, and to renew the expressions of His Desire of Peace: But this Message had no better luck than the other, for no Answer hath been sent to it, only in stead of an Answer, the same vio∣lent Party makes a shift to go a step or two higher, and to prevail in the House of Com∣mons to vote Excises upon Commodities, and the making of a new Great Seal, though the making of it will be Treason by the Statute of the five and twentieth of Edward the Third (and an Order of the House of Commons will be but an insufficient Plea against that Statute) and though they might have remembred, that it is by the old one that both most of them hold their Lands, and all of them are called to that House. But since His Majesty would not allow them a share in making of Peers (as they ask'd him in their Nineteen Propositions) nor allow of their choice of Justices of the Peace (as they ask'd Him in their Fourteen) and did still pretend to making of Sheriffs (which they have denied Him by their Votes) it seems they thought it necessary to make that which (if it could be made legal by Voting) would make all those, and to end the Dispute a∣bout His Majesty's Negative Voice, by passing by Commission what new Bills they plea∣sed, and so to obtain as absolutely an unlimited Power over their fellow-Subjects as over their Sovereign Himself.

Yet His Majesty would take no notice of all this,* 1.3 but sends once more, a third Message, to desire an Answer to His first (which had then lain in their hands above a Month.)

This pressing for Peace appears so intolerable to them, that the House of Commons (as the best way to make a final end of all such Messages, and indeed to cut off all Enter∣course) is prevailed with by these men to commit the Messenger, and the next day to impeach His Majesties Royal Consort of High Treason, as if they would give Him a fair warning how He trouble them about Peace again, lest His turn be next, and they im∣peach him too. But though they vouchsafe His Majesty no Answer, yet the People is still thought worthy of some satisfaction: and that produces this Declaration, which pre∣tends fully and sufficiently to shew, that in the Treaty their Demands were such and so moderate, as was fit and necessary for them to make, and just and reasonable for His Ma∣jesty to assent unto; and His Majesty's were such as had neither Reason nor Justice, ei∣ther in the matter or manner of them, and such as left the People no hope or expecta∣tion to see an end of their present Calamities; and charge the King through His Coun∣cellors in many Circumstances, before it and during it, to have laboured to interrupt the Treaty, and to have appeared averse to Peace: and in this Question His Majesty is con∣tent to accept of the Arbitrator they themselves have chosen, and to refer it to the People to judge.

Their First Argument is, That this Treaty is for the disbanding of the Armies and Forces in opposition to each other; that these Towns, Forts and Ships are a great part of their Forces, so that for them to restore them absolutely to the King, would be for them to disband totally, and for His Majesty's Forces to continue. To this His Majesty answers, That this Treaty was intended by Him to be in order to a firm and settled (that is a just) Peace, and never to be such wherein a pretended Equality should exclude evident Justice. Let Equality determine the manner of the disbanding of the Armies raised upon these Distractions, but let Justice restore what Violence hath taken, and determine of known undoubted Rights; since by this Argument, if any Prince seize upon any Strength that belongs to His stronger Neighbour, and Arms be taken up upon it, the stronger must ne∣ver in a Treaty, when the Armies are to be disbanded, expect to have His Strength resto∣red to him, lest the other return to be what He was and what He ought to be, that is, the weaker of the two. Secondly, His Majesty answers, That by the same reason of Security, other Power and Prerogatives being Strength as well as Forces, and neither more vested in Him, nor less possible to be used for the Peoples hurt, they may as well require a share and interest in those too, and, that things may be made sufficiently equal between the sides, may expect to be as much Kings as He. Thirdly, in their own opinion and by their own confession (as it appears by their Argument used in the Cessation in the point of Ships) if they be but allowed the Approbation of Commanders, His Majesty gives up this strength to them, and not they to Him, and it will be their Forces, and not His, which are to continue undisbanded, and that that they say to be contrary to Equality, and (as they came by these Forces) it is evident to be contrary to Justice. Fourthly, His Majesty answers, that these Forces are not so great, or so great a Strength of the side that shall possess them, but that the Arts, Union, Industry and Violence of that Party was so much too strong for His Majesty when He had that Strength, as to take that Strength from Him; and therefore His Majesty wonders they should make any difficulty to restore what it may appear by so fresh experience that they are so able to resume: and therefore His Majesty hopes His People will attribute it to His great Desire of Peace, that He did not demand some farther security to enjoy that which is not denied to be His Majesty's. And His Majesty observes that both this and the second Answer were given by His Ma∣jesty to the same Arguments made upon the same occasion by their Committee in the Treaty, and yet this Declaration repeats the same Arguments without replying to those Answers. Fifthly, His Majesty desires that the Difficulty with which His Majesty raised His Army, and the Ease with which they raised theirs, may be considered; how impossible it would have been for Him to have raised Forces, if they had not raised first, and how much slowlier (this Army being disbanded) He could raise a new one, and how quick and ready their Body of fierce, eager Sectaries and Schismaticks would be to return in∣to an Army upon the least Call, and how conveniently they inhabit for so speedy a meet∣ing, being to continue most of them in or so near London, that their Quarters in War were usually much more distant than their Dwellings in Peace: and then His Majesty doubts not but it will appear, that in this respect too the real and total Disbanding is of His Majesty's part only, and that in effect the Continuance of Forces is still of theirs.

Their Second Argument, why His Majesty should admit of their Limitations, is a bundle of Precedents. To which His Majesty replies, First, that the Records which are here quoted for these are now in the same hands as his Majesty's Magazines, Towns, Forts and Ships, and therefore knows not how He can either have their Truth sufficiently con∣sidered

and examined, or without it conside in their Quotations. Secondly, all the par∣ticular Circumstances both of matter and time, what induced it, and what followed it, do not herein appear (though very necessary to be known, that they may be possible to be answered.) But this His Majesty can find upon view, That some of them concern not any part of what is now demanded, but one of them concerns a Chancellor, Trea∣surer, and Privy-Seal, and another concerns Privy-Councillors, and another the Pro∣tectorship, another the choice of some without whose Advice, or of four of them, nothing should be done by the King, (which it seems they have an eye upon demanding too, which made them run so much in their heads who collected these as to put them in here:) That some concern not the Persons now demanding, but conclude only for the Merchants to chuse an Admiral, and not for the Houses to confide in him; which Prece∣dent may be of some use to the Common-Council, but of none to the Parliament: That some are of no concern at all, as only about appointing of Clarks for payment of Wages (yet put in to encrease the bulk:) That hardly any of the Precedents that concern any of the things in Question, concern any more than part of those which are altogether deman∣ded in the Limitations desired; some concerning only the Command of Ships (and those too not granted by Act, but by Commission, and that, for ought appears, only during pleasure;) some extending but to one Town or Place, as Berwick or Jersey: That most of these Precedents appear to have been when the Kings were in Minority and under Protectors, some when they were in extreme Age and Impotency, some in the Reign of a King who was shortly after deposed, in Parliament too, (an unlikely Circumstance to invite His Majesty at this time to follow that Example) others in His Reign who succeeded Him, and (having no Right to the Crown but the Criminal Consent of both Houses) had Reason to deny them nothing who had given Him All. And of some of the Precedents now quoted, the Inconveniences are known to have been so great and so suddenly found, that they were so speedily revoked in Parliament (with no less a Brand than as being contrary to the Customs of the Realm, and to the blemishing of the Crown) that if they had ingenuously added those Circumstances, these Precedents would more have justified His Majesty for not yielding, than them for either asking any thing to∣wards those, or but for quoting them at all. But doth any of these Precedents tell us that these Parliaments claim'd any Right in any of these, or that any King yield any de∣gree of Power in any one of these Points to both Houses, when they had first taken them from Him by Force, and rais'd an Army by Ordinance against Him, and He was in a condition to resist what they had raised? And if either any of these Kings were so much in their Power, that his Consent was as much forced from Him as these Particulars were forced from His Majesty, or if they were so far out of Danger of any farther Encroach∣ments upon their Power, that He could have no cause of Fears and Jealousies, in grant∣ing some of these to them; nay that their advice in the Choice arose wholly from His Majesty's Desire, and not their Demand, then the Precedents fit not this Case, and so make nothing for their purpose. But now that the Perpetuity of this Parliament hath so far encouraged those, who by Arts and Violence have gotten Power over it, that they may probably hope to make this Power as perpetual as it, and have given so sufficient Evi∣dence what further use they would make of any Power, His Majesty supposes Himself to have more reason to be cautious in that Point than any of His Predecessors, who were content to share any part of this Power but for once, with but a temporary Assembly; especially since their several Propositions have shewed how much more they wish, and M. Prinne's Books (printed by Order of a Committee of the House of Commons, sig∣nified by Warrant under M. White's hand) have shewed how much more they pre∣tend to; and since any Grant of His is desired by these Men, but to enable them to obtain the rest of their pretences or desires; what he yielded to them concerning my Lord of Essex and Sir John Conyers being Lieutenants of Yorkshire and the Tower, being prest in these very Precedents as an Argument to Him, why he should grant all they ask now. On the other side, if his Majesty should make use of their own kind of Weapon, and do the same or as great things, or make them the like or as great demands, as their Predecessors have tacitely approved of, or directly assented to, when they were done or made by His, (as in the just Famous time of Queen Elizabeth, in the Case of Stanhope and Savile, or in the same time in Wentworth's Case, or in the Reign of Henry the Eighth, in the Power given to Him to dispose of the Kingdom by His Will and Testament, and others of the like and near as high kinds) He believes both Houses would think what others then did, to be no Argument to perswade them either to approve or consent, but would rather for ever wave all Arguments from Precedents, than direct themselves by the same Rule.

Their third Argument is, That His Majesty had formerly exprest that His Forts and Castles should be only in such hands as both Houses might safely confide in. And His Majesty ex∣presseth still as much; and till some just legal cause be shewed him why the Persons now in those Commands cannot be safely Confided in by them, He conceives they might safely confide in them if they pleas'd. But His Majesty did likewise once say, He would put all those places, both of the Forts and Militia, into such hands as both Houses should ap∣prove or recommend, unless such were named against whom He had just and unquestio∣nable Exceptions. To which His Majesty replies, That His Offer not giving them satis∣faction then, (for they would then limit no time for the Militia, which was the Con∣dition of that Offer of His Majesty's) and since it seems it would give none yet, (for they now ask no less for the Ships than for those, and more for both, as to the time and other Circumstances, than He then offered for these) and they, by forcing those Places from Him since, and some of the Persons legally vested in those Places, by their faithfulness to him in this War, having given Him so much more cause not to yield to it now, He conceives the case to be so altered by all these differences, that though, out of His earnest desire to satisfie them as long as He thought them capable of satisfaction by it, He then intended what He spoke, yet He may insist upon what He now insists, without being said to have receeded from His Word. Did not they refuse to accept of four Per∣sons named in His Majesty's Bill concerning the Militia, which themselves had but newly offered Him in their Ordinance concerning it? And had those Persons in that time given them so great cause for that refusal as His Majesty hath had given Him for this? And yet will they confess that ill Counsel prevail'd with them to recede from their Words, and that therefore His Majesty had the more cause to be farther secured?

Their fourth Argument is, That unless these Limitations be granted, those secret and wicked Councellors, that have been Instruments of the present Miseries, will have the disposing of those Places, and His Majesty carry but the Name. To this His Ma∣jesty replies, That knowing who have been the Instruments of these Miseries, He should by that believe the secret and wicked Councellors spoken of, to be the active part of the close Committee; for if He have any wicked Councellors about him, He confesseth they have cause to call them Secret as well as Wicked, since they have not only wholly con∣cealed themselves from Him, but He having often press'd to have some named, could never obtain from them the Name so much as of one, nor since hath heard so much as one proof or charge either of being wicked Councellors, or of any Legal Crime against any of His Servants whom they have named, though they have publisht them withal to be incapable of Pardon: However He finds, that if what they say were true, the ends of these Councellors and of their violent Party is but just the same, that is, to dispose of these Places, and that His Majesty may only carry the Name.

But they have found a Letter of His Majesty's to the Queen, which shews that the great and eminent Places of the Kingdom are disposed of by Her Advice, (and then con∣clude from Her Religion, that they are by consequence disposed of by the advice of Pa∣pists and Jesuits) and that the Persons there named, even during the sitting of Parlia∣ment, are either all impeacht by them, or bear Arms against them. To this His Majesty replies, First, That He cannot but deplore the condition of the Kingdom, when Letters of all sorts, of Husbands to Wives, even of His Majesty to His Royal Consort, are inter∣cepted, read, brought in Evidence, and publisht to the World. Secondly, That if they will remember how far many of those Persons of both Sexes, who have received most no∣table marks of Favour from Her Majesty, are, even in their own Opinion, from so much as inclining to Popery, they must confess her Favours and Recommendations not to be disposed of by Priests and Jesuits. Thirdly, That the Places there named, in which Her Majesty's Advice may seem to be desired, are not places (as they call it) of the Kingdom, but private menial places, a Treasurer of the Household, a Captain of the Pensioners, and a Gentleman of the Bed-chamber: That concerning the other more publick Places, His Majesty absolutely declares Himself, without leaving room for Her Advice; which seems to prove the contrary to that which by this they intend to prove. Fourthly, That of the Persons there named there is not one that either is a Papist, or so like one, that a Jesuit may be thought to have recommended him, nor any one (except the Lord Digby) that was either impeacht or otherwise taxt, or that could appear to His Majesty to have ever been in any degree dislik'd by both or either House, before assisting His Majesty against a Rebellion did lately become Treason; and whoever considers the Time and other Circumstances even of that Impeachment, and that their Eyes were then so dazled with Fears and Jealousies as to take a Coach and six Horses for an Army raised against them, will hardly look upon that Impeachment with that reverence which

hath usually been paid to Accusations of that kind. And for their bearing of Arms in such a Time wherein all His Majesty's Subjects do either bear or assist Arms, either for or against Him, He supposes that it will not be thought strange, if He chuse Persons for such Places as are in His own Disposal, rather out of the first Sort than out of the second.

And as His Majesty hath fully answered their Observations upon His Letters, so He believes that one thing more (though unobserved by this Declaration) cannot but be observed out of them by His People; and that is, That in His Majesty's most private Letters to the Person nearest to Him, wherein He cannot (as by some in His publick Declarations He is) be suspected to say any thing out of Design or Policy, His own clear perswasion that the Rebels, and not He, have been the cause, and are the fosterers of this War and universal Distraction, and His Sense of it, and His Desire of the end of it, are so plainly exprest, that they will by this Accident be much satisfied with His Majesty's Innocence and Reality, and believe that the reading this in such a Letter, is the very next Degree to reading it in His Heart.

Their fifth and last Argument is, The attempts of Force and Violence against the Kingdom and this Parliament, and they instance in four. The first is, a Design many years since to bring into this Kingdom the German Horse, to compel the Subjects to submit to an Arbitrary Government. And to this His Majesty replies, That He esteems His Condition more miserable than that of any of His Subjects, when He sees a few Fa∣ctious persons have obtained that power, as to be able to publish to all His People, in the name of both Houses, a Charge which (coming forth with the semblance of such Au∣thority) may much work with them against Him, and yet do not (which is certainly because they cannot) tell any one proof or particular either whence, whether, when, by whom, or by whose Design these Horse should have been brought. They confess it is many years since, and it seems it is so many that these particulars are all worn out of the memory of man.

The second is, the endeavour to bring up the Northern Army by Force and Violence to awe the Parliament. To this His Majesty hath so often answer'd, and received so little Reply, that He will only now briefly say, that according to the Evidence they have publish'd themselves, (and that before hearing the persons concern'd in it, after so long a time of the Houses leisure and their attendance, whose Answer it was perhaps feared would have cleared it more) it doth not appear that there was ever any Endeavour used in it, nor any thing further than a mere motion, which died as soon as it was conceived; and it doth appear that His Majesty absolutely dislik'd it as soon as by way of Discourse it was but named to Him: But if it had been really endeavoured, it had been but an En∣deavour towards that which was directly put in Execution by the Tumults, and those countenanc'd by the Refusal of the House of Commons, not only to punish them, but so much as to joyn with the Lords in a Declaration against the like for the future, and by the stopping the legal Proceedings against Riots by a single Order of the House.

The third is, His Majesty's coming in Person to the House of Commons with many armed men to demand their Members to be delivered up. His Majesty confesseth He came; He denies that (to His knowledge) He came accompanied with any men other∣wise armed than with His Guard and Pensioners, in the same manner as He usually came to the House of Lords, and with some Gentlemen (as His Train when He goes to any publick place is always so waited on) with their usual Weapons, their Swords. And if they had been as careful to publish what Persons of Quality (as Serjeant-Major Ashly for one) testified upon their knowledge and Oath, as what mean, unknown and unsworn Persons delivered upon their bare Credit or upon hear-say, it would have ap∣peared to His People how little Violence was intended by any who came with Him how∣ever armed, and what Care He took, and what Orders He gave to be sure to prevent any that possibly might have happened. His Majesty likewise confesses, that He de∣manded the Members He had accused of High Treason; but puts them withal in mind, that the House of Commons had hardly left him any other Course, having by their single Order, the night before, intercepted all ordinary proceedings of Justice against them, forbidding all Officers to attach any Member for any Crime without the Consent of the House, and encouraging the People in that case to assist them against any Officer; though their Privileges had been confess'd by a late Petition of both Houses not to ex∣tend to Treason; and though this Order were as illegal and unjustifiable, as not only His Majesty's coming to the House, but even as any thing they would have had the People believe that He intended when He came. But whatever Breach of Privilege there was in this, His Majesty did not offer to justifie it by their preceding breach of Law, but offe∣red them often Reparation and Satisfaction for it: but it seems nothing but the Ships,

Forts, Ports, Magazine and Militia of the whole Kingdom would appear to them a Re∣paration for a single, and (this Circumstance considered) perhaps a disputable, Breach of Privilege.

The Fourth is, the Treason of the Earl of Strafford, to bring over the Irish Popish Ar∣my to conquer the Kingdom. To this His Majesty replies, That whatever the Earl of Strafford could have said (for this Army He is sure was never brought, nor, that He ever heard, was ever endeavoured to be brought over, either to that or any other purpose) His Majesty cannot see why it might not have remained buried with him, or why any other satisfaction should be given for it, or other security against the like, than the Pu∣nishment he hath already undergone.

Having given what Reasons they can to justifie their Limitations of His Majesty's Propositions, this Declaration in the next place attempts to satisfie that Reason insisted on by His Majesty, That it is His Right by Law, (to which they should have added, and contrary to Law forced from Him;) and not being able to deny that, and yet being willing to deny something, they quarrel at the Phrase, and deny that this Power of dis∣posing these Commands is by Law absolutely vested in His Majesty, and that because He is trusted with them for the Defence and Safety of the Kingdom. His Majesty still justifies what He said Himself, and yet confesses all that they say too, but only denies the Con∣sequence; for no Man is absolutely vested in any thing, if being trusted with it to some end hinder him from being so. The House of Commons is trusted with a Preparatory, the House of Lords is trusted with a Judicatory, the King, Lords and Commons are trusted with a Legislative Power, and all these have those Trusts vested in them for the publick Good; and are not yet all these Trusts absolute, that is, subject to the Control of no other Power? Is no Man absolutely vested in his Goods, because all we have we are trusted with for the Glory of God? His Majesty meant only that this was so absolute∣ly vested in Him by Law, as nothing but a new Law could without Breach of Law take or hold it from Him.

But the Declaration is content to admit that too, only denies it to be a Reason why His Majesty should deny to alter that Law, when by Circumstance of Time and Affairs that Power becomes destructive to the Commonwealth and Safety of the People, the Preservation whereof is the chief End of the Law. And His Majesty is equally ready to confess that it is no Reason, but doth absolutely deny that this is the Case, (insisting that the circumstances of Time and Affairs hare made this Power more necessary than ever to remain in His Majesty for the protection and safety of His People;) and He claims Himself to be as absolutely trusted by Law with the final Judgment, whether it be the Case or no, and with a Power of rejecting any such Alteration upon any such Pretence, if it appear but a Pretence to Him, as either House is trusted to propose any such Alte∣ration to the other, or both to Him, if it appear to them necessary and convenient.

But, says this Declaration, the two Houses of Parliament being the Representative Body of the Kingdom, are the most competent Judges thereof: And says his Majesty, the Representative Body of the Kingdom is indeed, and that is the King, Lords and Com∣mons; else either the Head is no part of the Body, or at least will be no longer than the Body please. Indeed the two Houses in some sense represent the Kingdom, in any Action which the Law (which is the Rule of the Kingdom) hath intrusted and enabled them to do; but either one House or His Majesty do equally represent it in any thing which the same Law hath entrusted and enabled Him or them to do: And for those Actions in which the Law requires the Consent of all three, every one is to be allowed their own several distinct Judgment, for themselves only, and any one without the o∣ther two have as much Right as any two without the third, to represent the Kingdom, and to be competent Judges of the Case. And His Majesty cannot be take notice how much Reason He had, not to yield to this Demand, since the grant of this De∣mand would be received as an Admission of this Case, and it would Logically enough follow, That if His People cannot be safe and He retain this Power, He doth not deserve to retain any: And if their Demands were granted, and the Armies upon their Demands disbanded, this Consequence in all Probability would soon be both perceived and prest.

But His Majesty may without Prejudice admit both Houses to be the most competent Judges in this particular, and then put them in mind, that before so many things had been done by the violent Party to turn the Tide of Fears and Jealousies, before they had involved the King and Subject in a common Suffering, and equally destroyed all the Property of the one and Prerogatives of the other by Orders and Ordinances, and so there then appeared less necessity that this Power should remain in the Crown, either

for the preservation of it Self, or of the People, and little danger appeared to the People if this Power were thus shared; the House of Lords did then twice deliver their Judg∣ment, That this Power in His Majesty was not become destructive to the Common∣wealth and Safety of His People, nor the Alteration of this Law necessary, by twice denying to joyn with the Commons in their desire, That part (for the Ships and the Time were not then named) of this Power might be shared, and of this Law altered: by which denial the Commons were forced to Petition for it by themselves. Nor did they only deny it, but both times in full Houses, after long and free debates, it was carried upon the Question above Twenty Voices, and that at a time when all the Pa∣pist Lords had left the Town, and hardly any Bishops were left uncommitted (Twelve being at once clapt up upon an Accusation of Treason, which they themselves have since been ashamed of enough to wave) who were then the Persons usually represented to the People to be the evil Councellors of the Lords House, and to whose prevalence it was imputed in the first Remonstrance of the House of Commons, that their good and necessary Motions did not pass in that House. And as they denyed it twice, so they would have denyed it till now, if the Petition of many thousand poor People about London (who certainly did not then believe the Lords to be competent Judges) and the Demand of the House of Commons joyned to it, to be told the Names of those Lords who denyed it, and the direct Threats of so many Petitioners (to which the former Tumults gave sufficient credit that they would be really executed upon them) had not made many of the Lords to be of his Mind, who would not dispute with him who commanded thirty Legions, and give way to the potent Minor part to appear the Major, by absenting themselves, and suffering them to pass what they pleased. So that neither the Votes which then past to desire these particulars, nor the Execution of these Votes and seizing these particulars with a Violence yet greater than obtained the Votes, nor the multitude of Consequences of the same kind built upon that Foundation, can at all be said to have had the Authority of both Houses; though most of those Actions have been such, as the Authority even of both Houses, how full and free soever, would not be sufficient to justifie. And this Opinion of the necessity of altering the Law in these points, was even then at most but the Opinion of the House of Commons, awed by a few Members assisted by the Common People, and together with them awing the Lords.

They next pretend heartily to wish, that the Laws and Statutes of the Kingdom may be the Rule of what is or what is not to be done; but how little fruit hath been gathe∣red from this Tree, they say let the Experience of the last Eighteen years judge. To this His Majesty replies, That it is true in some sense, they are willing these Laws should be His Rule, that is, that He go no farther (though they will by no means allow Him to go near so far) but almost all their Actions, and most of their Demands, and particularly these, do sufficiently shew, that they will not admit of these Laws and Statutes to be any Rule to them. And how much better fruit they have graffed than they found growing, and whether they have not made use of the Cure and Remedy of Grievances, a Parliament, to impose more of all kind of Grievances upon the People in eighteen Months, than can be objected to his Majesty or Ministers upon the breach and in the Intermission of Parliaments during those eighteen years, let Experience be Judge. And it cannot but appear strange to His Majesty (if any thing could still appear strange to Him) that the Illegalities under which His Subjects suffered by some of His Ministers in some part of His Reign, should be now, and by them, laid as a Charge upon Him, when not only the People have suffered far greater Illegalities and Pressures upon the same, if not less, pretences, by those who charge Him, with them; but when He hath by His Acknowledgments, by His ample Satisfactions, by the submitting the Offenders to Punishment, how great or near so ever to Him, and by His many and solemn Pro∣testations, given security to His People that they shall never suffer the like under Him; and when they on the other side as good as profess to the People, that they think them∣selves obliged to maintain (and consequently are likely to continue) what they have done, because they have done it, and that their Actions shall not be retracted, lest some reflection or dishonour fall upon both Houses, and lest they may seem to pronounce a sentence of injustice and rashness against themselves: This being one of the Reasons given by them, why they cannot re-admit the Members they have expelled. And His Majesty is confident that His People, when they shall consider both His Ministers Actions and theirs, and after compare His Ingenuity with their Principles, will easily conceive under whose Government they are most likely to return to the known Rule of the Law, and to find that ease, and to be continued in those Rights in and to which

they were born, and of the Exorbitance of whose Power they have most reason to have any Fears and Jealousies, and against whom they have most reason to desire to be se∣cured that they shall enjoy their Rights.

Nor do they with more colour oppose His Majesty's Limitations and Conditions than they defend their own. They object against His Majesty's Demand or Limitation of being satisfied in His first Proposition, That if His Ships, Forts, &c. were to be delive∣red before disbanding, it must after be left to the pleasure of the Papists, and other evil Councellors about His Majesty, whether thay would disband or not. But His Majesty replies, That He made not His Limitation in these terms, As soon as His first Pro∣position should be wholly granted to Him, but, As soon as He should be satisfied in His first Proposition; which left room enough upon debate, to have agreed either upon the time of delivery, or upon sufficient caution, that after the delivery the dis∣banding should unavoidably follow. Nor can His Majesty look upon this Objection otherwise than as a jest, since if after the performance of part of the Conditions He had refused to perform the rest, He is perswaded that so open a breach of Faith would have given them a far greater strength than they had parted with in the Ships, and Forts, and have raised against Him a far greater Army than He should have refused to disband.

They object against His Demand of the restitution of Members, that in His De∣mand no distinction is made of Persons or Offences; when the reason thereof is, that really no distinction can be made, they being all equally innocent, and all equally inju∣riously expelled, not only for committing no Crime, but for that Duty and Loyalty which deserves both approbation and reward. And if they could make any distinction in this point, or any Objection in any other, which might possibly have satisfied His Majesty, why did they not continue the Treaty, and there offer it to and debate it with His Majesty, rather than break off the Treaty without giving any Answer to any part of His Majesty's Message, and to turn themselves wholly to the People, from whom no re∣turn could possibly be made that might be in order to Peace?

They object against the Reason of this Demand, [That these Members have been ex∣pelled only for adhering to His Majesty] That the same Reason may be used for the Judges who adhered to Him, by furnishing Him with great Sums by Illegal Judgments about Ship-Money and Monopolies; and that He may as well require the Houses to re∣peal the Impeachments and Proceedings against them. To which His Majesty replies, That by never having appeared at all in the favour, excuse, or extenuation of the fault of those Judges (who are to answer for any unjust Judgment, in all which His Majesty left them wholly to their Consciences, and whensoever they offended against that, they wronged His Majesty no less than His People) and by His being yet so careful of these Lords and Gentlemen, it may appear that His Majesty conceives, that those only ad∣here to Him, who adhere to Him according to Law. And whether the remaining part of the Houses be not more apt to repeal their own Impeachments and Proceedings against those Judges (if they conceive they may be made of use, and brought to adhere to them) then His Majesty is to require they should, may appear by their requiring in their Four∣teen Propositions, that Sir John Brampston (impeacht by themselves of so gret Misde∣meanors) may be made Chief Justice, and by their freeing and returning Justice Bark∣ley (accused by themselves of High Treason) to sit upon the Bench, rather than free and imploy Justice Mallet, who was not legally committed at first, but fetcht from the Bench to Prison by a Troop of Horse, and who after so many Months Imprisonment remains not only unimpeacht, but wholly without any knowledge of what Crime he is suspected.

They next object against the Persons in whose behalf the Demand is made. And to this His Majesty replies, That to shew how far He was from having raised this Army, or from intending to imploy it to destroy this Parliament, or the Act for the continuance thereof, as is falsely and maliciously charged upon him; to avoid the Objection made against him, as if He only pretended to desire to rule by Law, but would really be the only Judge of Law Himself, and deny all Judgment to both Houses; to shew how wil∣ling He was that both Houses should be the Judges of what belonged to them to Judge, whensoever they might be in that full and free condition in which it belonged to them to be; and to avoid the Destruction of the Kingdom, which would be occasioned by the delay of Disbanding, if that were not ended before all the present Differences; His Ma∣jesty proposed this way of a full and free Meeting in Parliament, and to refer those many Differences between Him and the remaining part of both Houses (on which He might with Justice have insisted, and which in themselves were necessary to be settled) till

they might be settled in that Meeting, and insisted for the present only upon that which was necessary for the setling of such a Meeting. And in such a Convention, if the Persons now in question should upon debate have appeared guilty of such Crimes wherewith this Declaration charges them, as to have deserted the House, (when into∣lerable Tumults and unjustifiable Votes drove them from it) to have disobeyed and con∣temned the Authority of the House, (for not having submitted their Allegiance to that Authority) to have neglected the Trust reposed in them, (for staying no longer where they could not with freedom discharge it) and to have by Practices and Hostility endeavoured to destroy both Parliament and People, (for having assisted His Ma∣jesty, and defended His Person against an Army raised and fighting against Him;) His Majesty would have been very well contented, if the Houses should then judge so, that they should have been finally expelled, and that the People might enjoy their in∣terest and freedom of Choice and Election, when it should have been justly devolved to them. But by their declining of this course, it is evident that they well know, in such a full and free Meeting, who would appear by most voices to be the innocent, and who the guilty, who the deserters, and who the drivers, and that then and there they would as little be able to justifie their own Votes as to condemn these Persons; and therefore having by Force got sole possession of the Place, are wisely resolved to admit none to judge there of what is Law, but only such of the major part of whose Judgments they are secure, as having been made instruments to violate it.

To His Majesty's demand of security from such Tumults as formerly awed the Houses, they only answer, That what is said of awing the Members is a high and dangerous aspersion, raised without doubt to invalid the Acts and Proceedings of Parliament; but to the known Particulars urged by His Majesty they are wholly silent; and neither deny such Tumultuous assemblies to have been, nor the Lords to have twice in vain com∣plained of them, and desired the House of Commons to joyn with them in a Declara∣tion against them; nor can they deny but the Lords added this Reason, Lest such As∣semblies might be derogatory from the good Acts made and to be made in this Parliament; all which Acts nevertheless that House undoubtedly did not intend to invalid, either by that desire or by that reason. Nor can any Man, that hath seen what Protestations His Majesty hath taken, (all which He doth now again renew) for maintaining of the Laws consented to by His Majesty this Parliament, but sufficiently free His Majesty from the aspersion of having rais'd this to invalid those. But if they mean by their Proceedings, the Votes, Orders, Ordinances and Declarations, wherewith they have almost dayly opprest His Subjects and defamed His Majesty since those Tumults, if they mean the countenance they have given by personal Contributions, by Oaths, by Commissions of Generalship and the like, to the present Rebellion raised against Him; He then con∣fesseth, not that He raised this Aspersion, but that He declared this Truth, as an argu∣ment of the more evident invalidity of their present Proceedings, which those Tumults, (and apprehensions of the like, and of an Army now in the City to boot) rather than the inclination of both Houses, may appear to have produced. And this appears to be no less their Opinion too, by their being so infinitely unwilling to suffer the Members to meet in so secure a manner, that they may be hindred by no awe from declaring to all the World whether they were awed before or no; and thence the World may judge of these Mens aversion from all Agreement, when in order to so blessed a thing as Peace, they refuse so just a demand as Security.

They next Object against adjourning twenty Miles from London: And in the first place they object against it, That in making that a Condition of Disbanding to which by Law they are not bound to consent, His Majesty requires a new Law by Arms. In which they are wholly deceived, for His Majesty never made it a condition: To have Security for Himself and both Houses from Tumults (which they cannot deny to have been, and against which notwithstanding they do not offer any other kind of Security) His Ma∣jesty did demand as a Condition, (and Security is undoubtedly His Majesty's due by Law) but the Adjournment was only expressed as that which His Majesty only con∣ceived to be the only Security; not but if they could find a better or but another way, His Majesty would as readily approve of it. But His Majesty appeals to the World, whether His Majesty ought to have done less for His Safety and that of the Members, and the freedom of their Votes, than to demand Security against Tumults; whether He could do more for Peace, than to be ready to accept any sufficient Security that they should offer, and withal to be industrious to find out a fit means for that Security Himself, and to propose it in so large a manner to them, as to leave them to chuse their own place out of all the rest of England; and whether on the other side they could do less toward either,

than not to grant the Security, when they cannot deny the Danger, and not only not to seek after and offer any one way that might secure, but so absolutely to refuse that rea∣sonable way of Security which is offered to them; whether the inconvenience of re∣moving Records twenty miles ought to be in any balance with the Miseries of a War; whether the avoiding of this (but tacite) confession of that Truth, (which they call a Scan∣dal, but can never prove one) that His Majesty was forced for His Safety to withdraw from His Parliament, (of which the Army raised without His consent, to bring in triumph to the Houses Persons accused of High Treason by Him, were alone a sufficient testimony) and that the Members were awed (when their Names were sometimes demanded, and some∣times posted, their Persons laid hands on, and the Tumultuous multitude neither punish'd nor discountenanc'd so much as by a Declaration;) whether the fear lest London (in which and by a part of which all this was done) should seem to suffer under a Charge; and lastly, whether the Doubt, lest in any place out of London His Majesty should again come to the House of Commons with armed men, (upon what appearance of Right, after what orders against his known Right, and with how little either intention, offer or colour of Violence He came thither, having been shewed before) can appear a sufficient Reason for their Resolution against such an Adjournment, in order to the publick Peace: and whether, although there were no necessity of it but His Majesty's Desire, (Who out of compliance with them hath put the absolute Power out of His own hands, not only of Adjourning the Parliament whither, but of Dissolving it when He pleased) it might not seem no unreasonable Request after so large a Grant.

Their third part is, to prove His Majesty's aversion to Peace by several Circumstances. The first is, His having denied to receive their Petitions: which His Majesty never did. For if they mean (which was all He ever did towards any refusal) His refusing to receive any from or by any Person accused of High Treason by Him, (when they had other and more direct ways of sending to Him (as they did then by the Earl of Essex, if they had not gone out of their way out of desire to have it refused) they may as well say, He hath refused all that have ever since come to Him from them, for He continued always to make that Exception: and if their hope of present and total Vi∣ctory had not made them insist upon that before Edge-hill which they quitted after, the Petition offered to have been sent from my Lord of Essex from the head of his Army had been then received too by any other kind of hand; though, if His Majesty were rightly informed of the Contents of that Petition, neither their offer of such a Petition could shew any inclination to Peace in them, nor could His absolute resusal have shewed any aversion to it in His Majesty.

The second is, That their Committee must not, without a special safe Conduct and Protection from Him, have Access to Him; a Liberty incident to them not only as Members of the Parliament, and employed by both Houses, but as they were free-born Sub∣jects. To this His Majesty replies, That He never denied their Committee to have ac∣cess to Him without a safe Conduct, nor did He ever so much as mention any to them. The first motion concerning a safe Conduct, was in a Letter from the Lord Grey of Wark, Speaker pro tempore of the Lords House, to either of His Majesty's Secretaries, dated the third of Novemb. 1642. desiring one for that Committee, which after attended His Ma∣jesty at Colebrook; and the same was again desired for the Committee appointed to treat at Oxford, by a Letter from the Earl of Manchester, Speaker of the same House, to the Lord Falkland, dated the 28. of February. And must it not seem strange to all the World, that His Majesty's granting of that which both Houses in order to the Treaty ask'd of Him, should be after charged upon Him as a provocation laid in the way to interrupt or break off the Treaty? And since undoubtedly (and that reasonably) it would have been interpreted aversion in His Majesty from Peace, if He had denied this when it was as'd; His condition was very hard, when, it seems, He could not either way have a∣voided this imputation, whether he had denied or granted it. But His Majesty desires His Subjects to consider the great difference between what His Majesty hath cause to complain of, and what they do. Master Alexander Hampden, imployed by His Maje∣sty with an Olive-branch, a Message for Peace directed to both Houses, inclosed in a Let∣ter to the Speaker of the Lords House, having His Majesty's pass, testifying that He was so employed, having delivered this Message to the Lords House, and that House having recei∣ved it as a gracious Message, is committed by the House of Commons (notwithstanding the liberty of access said to be incident to all free-born Subjects) for not having a safe Con∣duct from their General, upon pretence of an Order of that House but lately made, and ne∣ver past the Lords, nor publish'd by themselves: and notwithstanding that the Lords at a Conference desired the Messengers release upon the aforesaid reasons, and that he was sent

to them, and that their own Messengers had divers times of late gone to Oxford in the same manner, and none of His Majesty's had come otherwise, yet the only Answer returned was, That they would stand to their own Order. Upon which His Majesty cannot but observe, First, that how great Authority soever both Houses expect to have with His Majesty, yet one House hath but a little with the other: Secondly, That the Privilege of that House is as little considered as their Intercession, since undoubtedly, if the Lords (who in many cases have power to commit, which the House of Commons hath not over more than their own Members, in any case but of breach of Privilege) had committed a Messenger sent to the House of Commons (especially from any to whose Messengers they paid half that respect which they owe to His Majesty's) upon an Order only of their own House, and having committed him without their consents, should not release him at their desire, it would have been look'd upon by them as no less a breach of Privilege than His Majesty's coming to their House: Thirdly, That by this His Majesty hopes that the Violent party doth now see better times are not far off, since He is told by this very Declaration, That evil Spirits do then rage most, when they think they must be cast out.

The grounds of their third and fourth (for such as have been taken notice of by the bye, and replied to before, need not to be repeated) are these. During the Treaty two Pro∣clamations issued at Oxford against Associations, and raising of Forces and Taxes by virtue of Ordinances, in which His Majesty charges a Traitorous and Rebellious Army of Brow∣nists, Anabaptists, and Atheists, (but not both Houses, as, for want of being charged, they charge themselves) to endeavour to take away His Life, and the Religion and Laws of the Kingdom. And some Letters were intercepted, by which, they say, it probably ap∣pears to them, that His Majesty had then designs upon Killingworth, Scarborough and Bri∣stol. But His Majesty thinks it strange that it should be expected, that this Treaty should have so much influence on one side, and so little on the other; that during the Trea∣ty Taxes may be illegally laid and levied, and His Majesty may not legally forbid them; that Souldiers of the Earl of Essex his Army daily rail against Episcopacy, break into Churches, pull down Organs and Monuments, tear Surplices and Common-Prayer-Books, and His Majesty may not call them Brownists; that that Army may go on daily during the Treaty in overt acts of Rebellion and Treason, and it must be an Interruption of the Treaty in His Majesty to call them Rebels and Traytors; that He may not say they endeavour to take His Life, who have shot at Him as often as He hath come within Cannon-shot of them; and that the Treaty should not oblige them from taking any Town or Castle of His Majesty's from Him, and yet His Majesty be obliged by it neither to regain any of His Towns, nor receive any of His own Castles; that Sir William Waller may really take Malmesbury and Tukesbury, and His Majesty must not so much as think of Scarborough or Bristol; upon which City as His Majesty doth avow to have had a Design to recover it from the Rebels, so He absolutely denies it to have been either bloody or barbarous, Epithets which they are plea∣sed to give it, but for what reason He cannot imagine, His Majesty abhorring all thought of what is printed at London, That it was intended, Man, Woman and Child should have been all killed in that Town, that had not such a Word or wore not such a Ribband: though some Word or Mark might well be agreed on, not with intention to kill all that had it not, but that more particular care might be taken of their protection that had it, not only from all danger, but from all disrespect. But the execution upon cold blood of some of the principal Citizens of that City for their Loyalty to His Majesty upon a single Order, without the least colour of any Legal proceedings, will appear to all men most barbarous and bloody, and such a Murther as His Majesty must not leave unrevenged, nor can His Subjects look upon otherwise, than as purposely now committed to make Peace yet more impossible, and as an earnest of that intolerable Arbitrary Government, which they must always expect to suffer under, if that Violent party should prevail.

Since therefore, notwithstanding these frivolous Objections, His Majesty's Desire of Peace (by His earnestness for it both before, and during, and after the Treaty) doth so fully appear; and since their inclination to the contrary, (by their most earnest and ut∣most endeavours to hinder both the beginning, continuance, and renewing of the Treaty) is no less evident; since in the Treaty His Majesty's main aim was the immediate disban∣ding of the Armies, and that Differences might be debated in a full and free Convention in Parliament, and that to that end the Parliament might be restored to the natural and genuine Condition, and all things only restored into that state wherein they were when the Houses were full and free; since His Majesty ask'd nothing that they could deny to be due to Him by Law, and His Majesty denied nothing that themselves could claim by Law to belong to them, nor any one thing of that publick necessity or value as deserves the shedding of one drop of that Sea of Blood, which will be spent in this un∣natural

natural Quarrel; since His Majesty made the last most reasonable Proposition, and they will never suffer it to be granted nor debated, and three Messages of His Majesty's can∣not obtain one Answer; His Majesty hopes that the scales will now fall from the eyes of His most blindly-seduced Subjects, and they will now be able do discern both their Duty and their Interest by so clear a Light, that it will be no longer in the power of this Violent party to ingage them to be Wicked that they may be Miserable, and by op∣posing Justice to destroy Peace. And His Majesty doth most earnestly conjure those whose fault hath hitherto proceeded rather from want of heat than want of light, who out of too much care of their private safety have been either lookers on, or have at once dislik'd and countenanc'd these Courses, that they at last rouze up their Courage to take part with their Conscience, and fear to be Damned more than to be Plundred, and con∣sider that if they will desert and oppose that Party whom their Tameness only makes considerable, and unite themselves with but half that industry to defend His Majesty, and the Religion and Law establisht, which the others use to destroy them all, they may avoid the One, and be in no danger of the Other, their numbers being such, that if they once but knew one another, by meerly joyning to appear to think as they do they might speedily end this (truly styled by them) the worst kind of War, both as it is of English against English, and of Subjects against their Prince. But if they shall still suffer them∣selves to be carried away with the Stream, they will by that suffer the Power of the Vio∣lent party to take so deep a root (by being seized of all the Arms, Ships, and strong places of the Kingdom) that if they should happen to prevail in this War against His Majesty, they will (in despight not only of them, but of their present Rulers, if they should be willing to divert them) extirpate the Law Root and Branch, alter the whole frame of Government, introduce Democracy, Independence and Parity, and leave nei∣ther King, Church nor Gentleman: And (besides that they will then appear to them∣selves guilty of this intolerable Innovation which they have not timely enough opposed) this Party will then forget that they did not oppose them at all, and remember that they did assist them but a little, will distinguish between those who assisted them out of Zeal and out of fear; and who are now call'd Moderate, they will then call Malignant, and the Inequality, Injustice and Oppression they will then indure, will too late discover to them to their Costs, that they have undone themselves with too much Discretion, and obtain'd nothing by their unjustifiable cautious Compliance but to be destroyed last.

Notes

• * 1.1

  In His Message of April 12.
• * 1.2

  His Mes∣sage of May 5.
• * 1.3

  Message of May 19.