they would heighten still the king's displeasure against you. These proceedings are a brand upon the ministers, and I would have them pay for it. Col. Birch. This Message must plainly be a late result. Whoever put the house upon this question, could not expect a smooth Answer; they could not but expect a negative on this of Money. Some of the king's council are good, and I am apt to believe some are bad; and you have said so. There are twins in the womb. If you adjourn till Monday, there is the same snare still, if we have no more light, neither Peace nor War.-The previous question for adjourning the debate passed in the negative, 178 to 177. The King's angry Answer to this Address.] May 11. p. m. The house attended the king with the Address, to which his majesty was pleased immediately to return this Answer: "This Address is so extravagant, that I am not willing speedily to give it the Answer it deserves." The King makes a Speech to the Lords, and prorogues the Parliament.] May 13. His majesty prorogued the parliament till May 23. Before the commons were sent for up to the lords house, by the black rod, the king spoke thus to the lords: "My lords; I have received an Address of such a nature from the house of commons, as I cannot but resent very highly, from the ill consequences I have lived to see from such Addresses. I intend therefore to prorogue them for some short time, in hopes they will consider better what they ought to do at their return. I have chosen to tell this to you first, because I would have you know I ain very well satisfied with the dutiful behaviour of this house, and you will by that time be more enabled to give me your Advice." SIXTEENTH SESSION OF THE SECOND PAR LIAMENT. The King's Speech on opening the Session.] May 23. The parliament met again, when the king opened the session with the following Speech to both houses: to save Flanders, either by a war or a peace, which way soever I shall find most conducing towards it; and that must be judged by circumstances, as they play from abroad. For my own part, I should think, being armed, were as necessary to make peace, as war; and therefore, if I were able, would keep up my army, and my navy at sea, for some time, till a peace were concluded, if that must be; but, because that will depend upon your Supplies, I leave it to you to consider whether to provide for their subsistence so long, or for their disbanding sooner, and to take care, in either case, not to discourage or use ill so many worthy gentlemen and brave men, who came to offer their lives and service to their country upon this occasion; and in pursuit of your own Advices and Resolutions. I must put you likewise in mind of a branch of my Revenue, which is now expiring; and of another greater, which is cut off by a Clause in the Poll Bill; as also of the 200,000l. taken up upon the credit of the Excise at your request. And I desire your Resolutions may be speedy, because the present necessity requires it. And I shall consent to any reasonable Bills you offer me for the good and safety of the nation. -My Lords and Gentlemen; I shall say no more, but only to assure you (whatsoever some ill men would have believed) I never had any intentions but of good to you and my people, nor ever shall;~ but will do all that I can for your safety and ease, as far as yourselves will suffer me. And since these are my resolutions, I desire you will not drive me into extremity, which must end ill both for you and me, and (which is worst of all) for the nation, which we ought all to have equal care of; therefore I desire we may prevent any disorders or mischiefs that may befal them by our disagreement; and in case they do, I shall leave it to God Almighty to judge between us, who is the occasion of it.-One thing more I have to add; and that is, to let you know, That I will never more suffer the course and method of passing laws to be changed; and that if several matters shall ever again be tacked together in one bill, that bill shall certainly be lost, let the importance of it be never so great. The rest I leave to my Lord Chancellor." The Lord Chancellor Finch's Specch.] Then the Lord Chancellor made this Speech follow "My Lords and Gentlemen; When I met you last, I asked your Advice upon the great conjunctures abroad. What return you gentlemen of the house of commons made me, and whether it was suitable to the end I in-ing: tended (which was the saving of Flanders), I "My lords; and you the knights, citizens, leave it to yourselves, in cold blood, to consi- and burgesses of the house of commons; That der. Since I asked your Advice, the conjunc-which remains to be said by his majesty's tures abroad and our distempers (which in- command will fall under these considerations; fluenced them so much) have driven things the present State of Christendom in reference violently on towards a peace; and where they to a general peace, then the influence that will end, I cannot tell; but will say this only peace is like to have upon us; and the necesto you, that I am resolved, as far as I am able, sity of returning to some better kind of intelligence amongst ourselves than we had when we parted last.--The advances which have been made abroad towards a peace, though they may have been hastened by some late occurrences, yet they were long since meditated and prepared there; for when the States This Answer is not entered in the Journals of the house, but is preserved in sir Thomas Webster's "Collection of certain Extracts of this Session," and is also confirmed by sir John Reresby, in his Memoirs, p. 62. VOL. IV. 3 R we have made for war, and the prohibitions we have made of trade, we have given no small provocations to a mighty king, who may be at leisure enough to resent them if he strengthen ourselves, both at home and abroad, that it may not be found a cheap or easy thing to put an affront upon us.-The first step in order to this is, to preserve a state of peace and unity at hotne, which is now more necessary than ever: he that foments divisions now, does more mischief to his country than a foreign enemy can do, and disarms it in a time when all the bands and all the hearts we have are but enough to defend us -No fears of arbitrary government can justify, no zeal to religion can sanctify, such a proceeding.—It bath been so stale a project to undermine the governiment, by accusing it of endeavouring to introduce popery and tyranny, that a man would wonder to see it taken up again.-Have we forgotten that religion and liberty were never truly lost, till they were made a handle and pretence for sedition? Are we so ill historians as not to remember when prelacy was called popery, and monarchy tyranny; when the property of nobility and gentry was held to be destructive of liberty; and that it was a dangerous thing for men to have any sense of their duty and allegiance?-Do we know all this, and suffer men without doors to hope by our divisions to arrive at the same times again? Can we endure to see men break the act of oblivion every day, by reviving the memory of forgotten crimes in new practices?-If fears and jealousies can ever become wise and good men, it is only then when there is danger of a relapse. No caution can be too great against the returns of that fatal distemper from which we have been so lately recovered, especially when some symptoms of it begin again to appear in printed libels, and in several parts of the nation.-It might perhaps be worth our while to consider, whether we do not bring some kind of scandal upon the Protestant religion, when we seem so far to distrust the truth and power of it; that, after so many laws that have been passed to guard it, after all the miraculous deliverances from the attempts which have been made against it, we should still be afraid of its continuance.-It is, no doubt, a duty which we owe to God and to ourselves, to the present age, and to posterity, to improve the opportunities God gives us of fencing our vineyard, and making the hedge about it as strong as we can. And the king hath commanded me to tell you, that he is ready to concur with us in any thing of this kind, which shall be found wanting, and which the Christian prudence and justice of a parliament can propose as expedient.-But why then do we suffer those abroad to complain of the dangers of religion, who complain only for complaining sake? Hath not the late act made it General did perceive, that though they had strained themselves to the utmost, and exceeded all the proportions which by their Treaty they were bound to furnish, yet the Spaniards failed them in every point, not only in the Sub-please. And therefore it will import us so to sidies they were obliged to pay, but in the very strength and forces they stood engaged to set out; insomuch that all their towns and garrisons were so far from being in any tolerable posture to receive an enemy, that they remained as perfectly defenceless as if they were intended to be abandoned; the States resolved to seek all the occasions they could of coming out of the war and to lay hold on the first that should offer itself.-To this end, they did all the last year solicit his maj. to endeavour a peace; and they would then have taken such a peace as now they seek. But his maj. thought he had done great service to the Christian world, when he had gained two points upon them; first, to model and concert with him the Terms and Articles of a better peace; and then, in prospect of that peace (and without which it could never have been gained), to enter into a League Offensive and Defensive with his majesty, to obtain that peace by force, if it could not be had otherwise.-And while things stood upon this foot, and some preparations were making towards it, there was no small hopes of putting a considerable stop to the Growth of the Power of France. For though the Dutch were still inclined to accept of peace, and were hearkening after the French Propositions at Nimeguen; yet such were his majesty's resolutions to hold them to their league, and so constant were all his refusals to hearken to such a peace, or to have any part in it, that they must of necessity at last have been obliged to continue in the war some way or other.-But when once it was heard abroad, that this league, which was the only thing by which his majesty could oblige the States, had been so ill understood at home, as to meet with some very unfitting and very undeserved reflections; as soon as it had taken air, and they understood that there was a resolution to give no money until satisfaction given in matters of religion, which in all countries are the longest debates that can be entered upon, and at this time above all others should least have been stirred; and when at last the king had received an address which they took to be of such a nature as was never seen or heard of before in any state or kingdom in the world, and had proceeded so far as to express his resentment of it:-Then they concluded with themselves, that it was in vain to rely any longer upon England, for England was no longer itself: then all sides began to wish for peace, even Spain as well as Holland; and if the cessation which is endeavoured to be made in order to it take effect, as in all likelihood it will, we may conclude that the peace will soon follow.-The influence such a peace will have upon our affairs is fitter for meditation than discourse; only this is evident, that, by the preparations 1 impossible,absolutely impossible, for the most concealed Papist that is, to get into any kind of employment? And did ever any law, since of the government itself.-It takes away the king's negative voice in a manner, and forces him to take all or none, when sometimes one part of the bill may be as dangerous for the kingdom as the other is necessary.-It takes away the negative voice of the house of peers too by the same consequence; and disinherits the lords of that honour they were born to, the liberty of debating and judging what is good for the kingdom.-It looks like a kind of defamation of the government, and seems to suppose the king and house of lords to be so ill affected to the public, that a good bill cannot carry itself through by the strength of its own reason and justice, unless it be helped forward by being tacked to another bill that will be favoured.-It does at last give up the greatest share of legislature to the commons, and by consequences the chief power of judging what laws are best for the kingdom.--And yet it is a privilege that may be made use of against the commous, as well as by them; for, if this method hold, what can hinder the lords at one time or other from taking advantage of a bill very grateful to the commons, and much desired by them, to tack a new clause to it, of some foreign matter, which shall not be altogether so grateful, nor so much desired; and then the commons must take all or none too. at last; and one chief end of calling parliaments, the making of good laws, shall be wholly frustrated and disappointed; and all this by departing from that method which the wisdom of our ancestors prescribed on purpose to prevent and exclude such inconveniencies. These the reformation, give us so great a security as this?-As little cause there is to be jealous of our liberties and properties; nor do they believe themselves, who pretend to be afraid of either. Can there be a greater evidence of the moderation of a prince, and his tenderness of the subjects, than to suffer, as he does every day, so much licentious and malicious talk to pass unpunished. If there be not one instance to be found in a whoe reign of a man that hath suffered against law, and but very few examples of those that have suffered by it, shall we endure them that dare say, in coffeehouses, and in other public places, that the nation is enslaved?-Let it be lawful to provoke and challenge the most discontented and the most unsatisfied spirit in the kingdom, to shew that time, if he can, since the world be gan, and this nation was first inhabited, wherein there were fewer grievances, or less cause of complaint, than there is at this present; nay, give him scope enough, and let him search all ages, and all places of the world, and tell us, if he can, when and where was ever found a happier people than we are at this day. And if malice itself ought to blush when it makes this comparison, what strange ingratitude both to God and man are they guilty of, who behave themselves so, as if they could be ill at ease under so temperate a government?--Thus every good bill shall be dearly bought My Lords and Gentlemen; The king will not suffer himself to believe it possible that you should ever forsake him, when any difficulties or distresses are near him; and therefore he doth with great assurance expect your care to preserve him in the affections of his people, as well as your concurrence to his present Sup-innovations the king resolves to abolish; and plies.-The forces which have been raised, and hath commanded me to say to you, State the ships which have been set out by your ad- super vias antiquas.'-My Lords and Gentlevice, have been at a vast charge; and yet it tlemen; There never did, there never can will be no small expence to disband them again, so much depend upon the happy success again, and to pay them till they be disbanded. of any one nieeting, as there does upon this.-That two hundred thousand pounds which If this session do not repair the misfortunes, was borrowed at your request remains as a and amend the faults of the last, it will look debt upon the king, unless you acquit your like a fatality upon the nation. If we do not selves of the obligation which lies upon you to now strengthen the hands of the government, pay it. That branch of the revenue which ex- and shame the enemies of it, by banishing all pires next month will leave the crown in great manner of distrust, we shall be in danger to want, if it be not continued; and yet the con- become, not only the most miserable, but the tinuance of it will not prove so considerable a most unpitied nation under Heaven.-Let not support as it ought to be; for the Poll Bill the whispers, or evil surmises, of those who hath extinguished the duty upon French wines, lie in wait to deceive, make any man the unand all other customs arising upon trade with happy occasion of endangering the safety of France; and it is worthy of the care of a par- the government, by mistrusting it. He whose liament, to make this up some other way, that house is destroyed by fire, would find but litso his majesty may see and know that nothing the consolation in saying the fire did not begin can be lost by trusting his parliament.-But by his means; but it will be matter of perpethe king hath so far expressed himself this day, tual anguish and vexation of heart to rememthat it is evident the manner of your proceed-ber, that it was in his power to have extinings is to him as considerable as the matter; and that he will not accept a good bill, how valuable soever it may be, unless it come to him in the old and decent method of parliaments.-The late way of tacking together several independent and incoherent matters in one bill, seems to alter the whole frame and constitution of parliaments, and consequently guished it. Let the world now see, that your zeal to preserve the government is the same it was when you were ready to die for its restoration; and know, it is an act as meritorious, and an act of as great duty and loyalty to stand between the king, and all those practices of libelers which tend to create a misunderstanding between him and his parliament, as it is to fight for him in a day of battle. Em-solved, "That it is the opinion of this house, bellish the history of this parliament, by shew- that all the Forces that have been raised since ing us the healing virtue of this session. So the 29th of Sep. last, except those which have shall your service be acceptable to the king, been sent to the Plantations, be forthwith paid who never forgets any thing but injuries; so off and disbanded." shall you recommend yourselves to posterity, by transmitting to them the same peace and happiness you are trusted with. And the God of peace and unity prosper all your consultations to the honour and happiness of the king, and the joy and comfort of all his good sub-what will not vitiate the Petition. jects." Vote for an Address to the King to declare War against France.] May 25. A motion was made for an address to the king, to know whether we shall have Peace, or War. After a long debate, a motion was made, to adjourn; which was carried in the affirmative, Yeas, 195. Noes, 176. May 27. The commons agreed to the following Vote, which was sent to the king by the members of the privy council; "Resolved, That this house, taking into consideration the state of his majesty's affairs, and the great charge and burden that his majesty and the nation lies under by the Army now in being, are humbly of opinion, that if his majesty pleases to enter into a War against the French king, this house is, and always will be, ready to support and assist him in that war: but if otherwise, then they will proceed to the consideration of providing for the speedy disbanding of the Army." The King's Answer.] May 28. Mr. Sec. Coventry delivered to the house the king's Answer to yesterday's Vote, as follows: "C. R. His majesty having perused the Vote of this house of the 27th hath thought fit to return this Answer; That the most Christian king hath made such offers for a Cessation, till the 27th of July, as his majesty does not only believe will be accepted, but does also verily believe will end in a general peace: yet since that is not certain, his maj. does by no means think it prudent to dismiss either fleet or army before that time; nor does he think it can add much to the charge; because the raising the money, and paying them off, would take as long a time as that, although the spee- | diest disbanding that is possible were intended. That, in the mean time, his majesty desires that some Supply may be provided for their subsistance; that as hitherto they have been the most orderly Army that ever were together, they may be encouraged to continue so. That there is another thing which presses his maj. with very great inconveniences in his domestic affairs; which is the want of the 200,000l. you promised to repay him at your next meeting after: and which does affect that whole branch of his revenue, by having a fifth part taken out of every payment, which should be applied to the necessary uses of his houshold: he does therefore desire you will immediately apply yourselves to the repayment of that money to him," On the receipt of this Message the house re Debate on an Affidavit annexed to an Election Petition from Aldborough.] Sir Tho. Littleton. I have a Petition concerning Aldborough. There is annexed to it an Affidavit, which is rather a work of supererogation, but Sir Rd. Temple. We are not to receive Affidavits here. I would have it struck out. The Speaker. If the Affidavit be fixed to the Petition, if you receive the Affidavit you receive the Petition. Sir John Talbot. If a member can aver, that he knows the hands that have subscribed the Petition, or if any without doors will aver it, you may receive the Petition. But you cannot receive an Affidavit of the subscription of the Petition. Sir Tho. Littleton. I know the hands very well. Sir Tho. Meres. Sir Wm. Wentworth undertakes that Mr. Wentworth will prosecute the Petition, and I would have the Petition read, but not the Affidavit. Sir Wm. Coventry. The matter of the Petition becomes already very burthensome to the corporation. The other day a petition was delivered, and it was a question whether it was not signed all by one man's hand; now here is an Affidavit of the subscriptions sent with the petition, by the mistaken zeal of the gentleman. If we are not impowered to receive Affidavits here, it is no affidavit, and you may receive it. If they lapse any more time in their petition, they may be nonsuited again, as they have been twice already, and so their business is done for this parliament. I would therefore have the clerk read the Petition, and connive at the Affidavit. The Speaker. If you will put the sitting member (sir John Reresby) to these unnecessary disturbances, and admit every irregularity, &c. Sir Tho. Lee. I would publish rules, that all persons must come from all parts of England to avow Petitions, and so weary men out, that the mayors and bailiffs will chuse you all the parliament-men. The case of sir James Langham, for Northampton. He was first chosen by the commonalty, and secondly by the mayor and aldermen, and thirdly by both, and yet he missed it at last. There was something of a communion-table in the case. Mr. Powle. Whilst we are gratifying a particular gentleman, let us not lose an essential privilege; that whenever a member avers the Petition, you never refuse it. Sir Wm. Wentworth tells you, he knows the hands, and un This was a Petition of several of the burghers, setting forth, "That sir John Reresby had procured himself to be returned for that borough, though he was not duly elected." dertakes they will prosecute the petition. If any member presents a petition to abuse you, and the petitioners will not avow the petition, it is in your power to punish that member, and send him to the Tower. A member has sat here four years, and the petitioners say he has sat wrongfully. Let us not begin new customs to hinder complaints of people coming to us. Let the petition be read, but not the Affidavit. Mr. Sec. Coventry. By this Petition, the town complains of one that sits, that is not a representative of them, as a grievance. It must be owned by somebody, and I would have it now. Sir Edm. Jennings. Since the Petition is insisted upon, I must say something, that I otherwise would not: I believe it to be fictitious. That letter could not come to Mr. Wentworth till Sunday morning, and he lives 20 or 30 miles from Aldborough, and sending to and again that Affidavit, which was made at Wakefield on Monday, and this is 26 miles farther, how it is possible this Affidavit could be made in such a time, I leave you to consider. Sir Wm. Coventry. It is no compliment to your member to be the hander of a fictitious Petition to you. I presume the member has had caution. If it be fictitious, I wonder gentlemen should call for adjourning, and not enquire into it every scrivener may else put these slurs upon you, and by calling it fictitious, and not proving it, the corporation may be slurred out of their right too. I would therefore refer the enquiry into it to the committee of privileges. The question being put, That the Petition be read, it passed in the affirmative, 139 to 115, and the Clerk was ordered to blot out the Affidavit. The Petition was referred to the committee of privileges. May 31. Resolved, "That a Supply be granted to the king towards the paying and disbanding of all the Forces raised since the 29th of Sept. last." A Supply given to disband the Army by a certain Day.] June 4. The commons voted 200,000l. to be raised by a monthly tax, in six months, after the Land-tax, then in being, should be expired; with an appropriating clause, that this should be for disbanding the Army by the end of the present June: they also voted 200,000l. towards defraying the Expences of the Fleet; and seemed inclinable to throw in such another sum for the king's extraordinary occasions. A Message from the King to prolong that term.] June 7. His majesty sent them another Message, signifying "That his mind was still the same with what he delivered in his Speech the 23d of May last, viz. That the Army and Fleet ought to be kept up till the expected peace be concluded: and he further recommended to their consideration, whether it were not dishonourable for him to recall his Forces in Flanders, from those towns which he had taken into his protection, before they could provide themselves of other succours." Resolution to admit no farther Motions for new Supplies.] The reason assigned in this Message was irresistible; and produced a Resolution to extend the time, as to the Forces in Flanders, till the 27th of July: but shortly after, viz. the 15th, as if an apprehension began to prevail, that the house was falling back into its old complaisance, it was moved, "That, after the Tuesday following, which was the 18th, no motions should be made for any new Supplies of Money, till after the next recess;" and carried in the affirmative: the courtiers losing the previous question by six, and the question itself by 9 voices: 314 members being present at the first division, and S17 at the last. Debate on sir S. Swale's Conviction of Popery.] June 8. Sir Solomon Swale sent the Speaker a letter to excuse his attendance on the house, by reason of a quartan ague, that had reduced him to great weakness. He desired to be heard by his counsel, at the bar, by reason of his unwarrantable prosecution to conviction of Popery, at the sessions at the Old Bailey. Mr. Williams. Dismembering a member is a very tender point. It is suggested that Swale is a convicted Recusant. The question before you is, not whether he be convicted, or not convicted, of recusancy, but whether he be truly convicted or not in the exchequer, or king's bench; and till it be voided there, it is a legal conviction. That a Popish Recusant cannot be a member, you have determined in sir Tho. Strickland's case. Sir Wm. Coventry. It is said to be done by matter of record, which is always credited here. If a man come with the record of his return, he sits here by that record, and you can hear no counsel in Swale's case. No man sits here upon a false return, till first the Record be mended: and because you have not the trial of conviction of a member before you, the law has made this of recusancy easy. For he may be taken off, by his conformity. The Test of the new Act is not required to take off conviction, for that is only for offices. If he takes the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy, and conforms to the Church, &c. that is easily taken off. But to have counsel, in a thing that is not judgeable here; I would not have you meddle with it. Sir Tho. Clarges. I would have the officers of the exchequer acquaint you how the thing stands, as to Swale's conviction. Suppose a member, after he is chosen, &c. takes not the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and he petitions you to sit here, without taking them. I would have the officers of the exchequer bring you the record of the process. The clerk of the crown brought in the Record of the Conviction at the Old Bailey, but this gave no satisfaction, and so the Exchequer officers were cailed for, but were not at the door. The Speaker. The method here of Swale |