The King's Commissioners Paper, 10. Feb.
[ CXLVI] WE have given your Lordships our Reasons why we are not satisfied with your Ar∣guments, that His Majesty had not Power to make the Cessation; and as upon the perusal of the Statute we can find no ground for that Opinion,* 1.1 so your Lordships in your whole Debate have not insisted or mentioned one clause in that Statute (though often desired) which makes it good, neither have your Lordships given us any Argu∣ment from the Common-Law, other than by telling us, That it is against the Common-Law, because the private Interest of the Subscribers for Money, was concerned in it. To which we give this Answer, That their Interest was conditional upon Payment of their Moneys for the maintenance of the War, which was not performed; and that if they had paid their Moneys, yet this Cessation was rather for the advance of that Interest, there being (as it appears by the* 1.2 Papers) no other visible means of preservation of the Army in Ireland; and that the Statute which gave that private Interest, doth not take away the Kings Power of making a Cessation; and we conceive that Argument of In∣terest was waved. But if your Lordships shall insist upon it, we again desire, as we did formerly, that a Case may be made of it, and that the Debate may be again resumed. Nei∣ther do we know that any Argument was used by your Lordships from the Proceedings in Parliament; and if you shall give any, we shall be ready to answer it. And we conceive that the Advice given to his Majesty from the Lords Justices and Council of Ireland, and the Testimony of the Officers of the Army, expressing the miserable condition of that Kingdom, and inability to bear the War, should appear to your Lordships to be just grounds for His Majesties assenting to the Cessation. One of the Letters delivered by us to your Lordships, bearing date the fourth of April, 1643. was sent by the Lords Justices and Council of Ireland, to Mr. Secretary Nicholas, in which was inclosed their Letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons, of which your Lordships have likewise an Extract, and a Remonstrance of the Officers of the Army to the Lords Justices and Council there; and the other Letter of the fifth of May 1643. to His Majesty, was from the Lords Justices and Council of that Kingdom: All which (if your Lordships please) shall be examined by you, with the Originals. And we are therefore of opinion, that our Answer formerly delivered, is a good Answer to the point of Cessation in question, and that it was not unfit for His Majesty to agree to that Cessation, nor destructive to the Protestant Religion, nor for the advantage of the Popish Rebels; but much for the advantage of the Protestant Subjects there, who were in apparent hazard of Destruction by Force and Famine, occa∣sioned by the want of Supplies which had been promised to them, as we have formerly said. And we shall give your Lordships a further Answer to your other Propositions con∣cerning Ireland, when the time comes again for that Debate.