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A Third Address directed to his Excellency the Lord Generall CROMWELL, and the Right Honourable the Councell of State sitting at WHITE-HALL: Being, The humble Petition of Lieutenant-Colonell John Lilburne Prisoner in Newgate.
THat since your Petitioner in the confidence of your goodness and righteousness cast his life at your feet, he hath truly shewed by his humble Addresses to your Honours, that whilst he lived in banishment, his life was no better then a constant dying unto him, besides other straits and extremities; his life being daily sought for, and exposed to constant and desperate hazards by his enemies. And upon that ac∣count, together with the unwearied importunities and tears of his tender Wife, he was induced to come into England, being neither in the least invited nor incouraged thereunto by any other but she alone. Only he believed it better and more safe for him to cast his life (notwithstanding any prejudices of spirit whatsoever against him) upon the mercy and favour of those, who zealously profess the fear of the Lord, and faith in the tender mercies of God in Christ, and had engaged in the same publike Cause with him against Tyrannie and Oppression; then to be at the mercy of his false, cruel, and bloody Enemies beyond the Seas, who have no such bonds upon their spirits.
Yet to his grief, he finds no effect of his former addresses but his Imprisonment, in the most dishonorable Goal; and as he is informed, an Order for his speedy Trial upon the Act for his Banishment; without any the least no∣tice taken of what he hath humbly offered to your Honours in his said former addresses, concerning the illegality of the said Act and all the proceedings thereupon.
That upon a most serious search into his own actions, and the very intentions of his heart, your Petitioner can∣not find the least cause why he should be rendred a person so abominable, that he is unfit to live or breath in this Commonwealth; only he feares that his intentions in comming hither in this juncture of time may be misrepresented to your Honours. Whereas he doth seriously and really profess as in the sight of the Lord (that searcheth all hearts) that he hath herein truely and in the integrity of his soul, without deceit or guile in the least, clearly declared the occasion of his coming; and that he had no designe, end, or intention, but meerly to crave the protection of the present Power in all humility, and a peaceable and quiet submission to their Government, and to endeavour in all peaceable ways, that the justice of the sentence passed against him might be legally and judicially examined, and the judgement revoked, that he might quietly live a private life, and enjoy the fellowship of his Christian friends, and the society of his dearest wife, and tender babes: and unto this kind of life he is ready most solemnly to bind and ingage himself, and he believes many of his friends will free∣ly ingage for his truth and integrity of real performance of his promise therein; and that he shall neither di∣rectly nor indirectly disturb, or in the least molest the present Power and Government.
That your Petitioner having never in the least been charged nor accused of any Capital Crime in reference to his banishment, humbly craves your Honours seriously to consider, wherein God shall be dishonoured, or the Commonwealth damnified, or any honest member thereof prejudiced by his living and breathing in England; for whose real welfare, and the honest Inhabitants thereof, and their true tranquility, he hath for many years toge∣ther run most real and apparent hazards, and that without eying in the least any mercinary or pecuniary advan∣tagious ends unto himself.
And likewise he most humbly intreats you seriously to consider, wherein God shall be glorified, and his peo∣ple comforted, the Commonwealth advantaged, or any Capital offenders terrified, by shedding your Petitioners innocent bloud, upon the breach of the said Act for his banishment. And therefore if God shall so incline your hearts, he humbly prays,
That all Proceedings against him upon the said Act may forthwith be suspended; and that he may have free liberty to make his humble Addresses in a peaceable submissive manner to those that are and shall be intrusted with the Supreme Authority, for the repealing the said Act. And that in the interim he may be freed from his chargeable Imprisonment, upon his most solemn engagement and security to live peaceably and quietly with his poor Family, in all obedience and submission to the present Power and Government.
Newgate, this present Monday, being June the 20. 1653.
And he shall pray, &c. JOHN LILBURNE.