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vine and fig-tree, and all under his Majesty's protection, refresh himself, with the sweet fruits of peace? Which I beseech the lord of peace to make perpetual to both nations.

And, to that end, my earnest desires are, that all our best studies and endeavours may be employed, for some time, in contriving and establishing such wholesomelaws in both kingdoms, whereby, as much as in us lies, the opportunity and occasion of producing the like calamities, as lately threatened both nations, may, for the future, be prevented, if in any age hereafter such miscreants shall go again to attempt it.

It is, my lords, notorious, that the late incendiaries, that occasioned the great differences betwixt his Majesty and his subjects, took much advantage and courage by the too long intermission of the happy constitution of parliaments, in the vacancy of which they, by false informations, incensed his Majesty against his loyal subjects, and by their wily insinuations extorted from his Highness proclamations for to yield obedience to their innovations in the kirk, and patents for projects, whereby the poor subject was both polled and oppressed in his estate, and enthralled in his conscience; and thus, by their wicked practices, his Majesty was distasted, and his subjects generally discontented, insomuch that, had not the great mercy of God prevented them, they had made an obstruction betwixt his Majesty, and his liege people, and had broken those mutual and indissoluble bonds of protection and allegiance, whereby, I hope, his Royal Majesty, and his loyal and dutiful subjects of all his three kingdoms, will be ever bound together. To which let all good subjects say, Amen.

My Lords, the distaste of his Majesty, nor discontents of his subjects, could never have come to that height they did, nor consequently have produced such effects, had not there been such an interposition, by these innovators, and projectors, betwixt his Majesty our glorious sun, and us his loyal subjects, that his goodness appeared not, for the time, to us, nor our loyalty and obedience to him. For no sooner was that happy constellation, the parliament in England, raised, and thereby those vaporous clouds dissipated, but his Majesty's goodness, his good subjects loyalty, and their treachery evidently appeared.

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Our brethren of England, my lords, finding the intermission of liaments to be prejudicial and dangerous to the state, have taken care, and made provision for the frequent holding of them; whose prudent example my motion is may be our pattern forthwith to obtain his Majesty's royal assent, for doing the like here in this kingdom. By which means his Majesty may in due time hear, and redress the grievances of his subjects, and his subjects, as need shall require, chearfully aid and assist his Majesty; and not only the domestick peace and quiet of each kingdom be preserved, but likewise all national differences, if any happen, may be, by the wisdom of the assemblies of both kingdoms, from time to time composed and reconciled, to the perpetuating of the happy peace and union betwixt both nations.

THE EARL OF STRAFFORD

CHARACTERISED,

IN A LETTER SENT TO A FRIEND IN THE COUNTRY.

Printed in 1641. Octavo, containing eight pages.

I

Noble Sir,

AM inforced to complain of your impetuous commands, and the tax you impose upon me, above all the rest of your vassals, but especially of this of my Lord of Strafford's; as though I alone were inspired with an illumination, beyond the wisdom of the parliament, which on so long consultation hath not yet determined the articulate point of your question; yet thus much I shall positively deliver as a part of my belief: That, howsoever my Lord of Strafford be cried up for a most incomparable and accomplished instrument of state, yet he is human, and subject to such infirmities as were incident to our first progenitors; and this is a particular of my faith, not of my opinion.

But, if it may satisfy your curiosity to be informed of the general conceptions, I shall then present you with as various a collection of votes and censures, as there are fancies in the several factions daily raised by the work of art and time, which qualifieth poison, mollifieth flints, and changeth the face of all things from their first beings and appearances, which have much befriended my Lord of Strafford. But, whether his lordship be guilty of high treason, I cannot determine.

Sure it is, many foul things stick upon him by manifest proofs, which neither his fineness of wit, nor all the fig-leaves in paradise can

cover.

True it is, the house of commons stand stiff to make good their first charges, which are now inforced and prosecuted to the last article, this very day, which, should it not prove treason, on joint rehearsal of the house, and so adjudged by the lords, it would then seem to me to be a strain of popular fury, rather than the legitimate issue of a court of parliament.

True it is, that before the quarter-part of the accusations were charged upon him, he was by way of prejudication acquitted by many of both sexes, and favoured not of a few of both houses, and some of his Majesty's council, and the papistical party, his friends, and followers, and generally by ladies.

The first reasons are best known unto themselves.

By the second, for respects due to their patron.

By the third, for interests and obligations of dependency.

By the fourth, if well considered, for many feminine and affected considerations. As the natural pity and consideration of women sympathising with his afflictions, with the sadness of his aspect, their facility with his complacences, their lenity with his pathetical oratory. On the other side, there is a rigid, strong, and inflexible party, that say, if he be not found a traytor, the parliament must make him so for the interest of the publick.

And so I shall present you with the inclinations of another party, and of no despicable number of account, which pretend to have more solidity of judgment than to be carried away with private interest, partial respects, which seem to be touched with the King's, and the commons safety, and to be sensible of the commons sufferance.

And these commonly rip up his life and conversation together, with the progress of his estate and fortunes, and all concluding for his descent and family to be of the noblest and highest rank of gentry, under the degree of baronage; his patrimony so plentiful, as that it equalises most of the barons of the land; his education noble, and to these of his own acquisition of strong and able natural parts.

And, if the adage be true, that, Multa ex vultu dignoscuntur; and though they mark him for a wise and promising face, yet they unhappily observe in him a dark and promiscuous countenance, clouded, unlovely, and presaging an envious and cruel disposition. And this general query is made of him:

What was that, which he would have had, who, suspicion excepted, might have been a king at home, had not restless ambition, habituated in his nature, interrupted the course of his repose, and disordered the many helps he had to have lived in plenty, and died in felicity?

But disquieted, as all ambition is turbulent, in his cogitations, and in his first exposition, agitated by the blasts of his own aspirings, it is said of him that in his own country he was transported by the violence of his will to carry all before him, and, come what would of it, to overthrow all that withstood him.

Of such predominant a pitch he was in his own constellation, and propension, which could not rest there, but must break out into a wider extent, for his thoughts soared so high, as men who knew him well affirmed, that he held himself injured by the state, that he came no sooner to the helm.

Whither to come, he journied through a wilderness of popular acclamations, and affected the dangerous name of fame, of being sovereign protector of the commonwealth.

For which he so much pretended, that in all parliaments he became another Jacques de Ortinel. And they aver it for truth, that, in those times, his intimate friends and associates thought it wisdom to shun his conversation, so forward he was in taxing the motions of the King and

state.

And, as it is said, not without a malignant humour, and a repugnant spirit, always withstood the King's profit, and stinted the parliamentary contributions, at his own will and pleasure, crossing the designs of

state, and infusing, by his stubborn example, a spirit of contradiction in the assemblies of these times; which how fatal they have been to ours, I leave to your judgment, and which hath ever since bred an aversion in his Majesty towards his people and his parliaments.

An office wherein they say he did far more mischief, than in this for which he stands now arraigned for his life.

And this is the description or abstract of the first part of his life, as he was the minion of the people, which, they say, he esteems as the folly of his youth.

May you now be pleased to receive something of his second act, as he was a minister of the King's, into whose service, as they say, and I think not untruly, he was purchased and bought from the affections of the people, at a higher price than all the privadoes of Edward the Second, and Richard the Second. For that this only man hath cost, and lost the King, and kingdom, more treasure and loyalty than Pierce, Gaveston, and the two Spencers, and the Marquis of Dublin, did ever cost, their being all put together.

And sure I am, it is the common opinion of the kingdoms, that should he be taken out of the hands of justice, and the revenge of the publick made frustrate, and the expectations of the three kingdoms disappointed, who hath invaded the whole, by the power of his counsels, and the parties, by the grievous oppressions of his Majesty's good people, wheresoever he had to do, they say, that his Majesty's dominions stand in greater danger and hazard, than ever; and, as it may fall out, to be of a more lamentable consequence than is fit to be expressed.

How fatal may one man's ambition be, and his exorbitant humour, work towards the distraction of a state, which they do thus demonstrate by way of suspicion:

First, admitting the King's affections may be disposed, together with the great party, which he hath in the upper house, to acquit him and others.

And that, thereby the house of commons should hold themselves bound by the interest committed unto them by their countries, to make protestations against the lords.

What then may become of a divided body? Secondly, it is questioned, Whether any future subsidies will be granted, customs and impositions be paid the king, without any insurrection?

Thirdly, Whether the Scots will depart the kingdom; and, if they should, whether on good cause, they may not return, when they shall see a division tend to a fatal confusion, both in the heart of the state, and in the body of the kingdom, rather than they will give opportunity to the papists and libertines to come in for a share?

Wherefore, it is generally concluded by the best and most impartial judgments, That there is no proportion between the riddance of a few monstrous and exorbitant members, and the general safety of the King and his kingdoms.

That there is a necessitated policy, that my Lord of Strafford, the bishop, and some others, should be given up as a just sacrifice, to ap

pease the people, and to make a compensation for the injury done to them and the publick.

And thus have you the second act of the great vice-roy's progress, with the opinion of all and the best judgments here about the town, which I find to be suitable to yours in the country.

A DISCOURSE

SHEWING

In what State the three Kingdoms are in at this present.

Printed in the Year 1641. Quarto, containing eight pages.

SIR,

S the faces of all Britain shew their hearts and inclinations, so if

of the future; were not the representive body of the state careful to cure the present malady, purge the distempered humours, and save the much gangrened body, by cutting some rotten and putrified members off, which infect, infest, and invade the republick; this makes me chearful to discover the conceptions of the wise, and not as an orator, but relate their opinion as their auditor: I hope it will take away from me ostentation, and trouble from the reader, even to give case of discourse.

Their profound sighs, and earnest prayers, might quicken my ingeny, better than the sound of excellent instruments can revive the spirit; to present this with all obedience to my sovereign, and faith to the country, and declare what is convenient to be done at this time, submitting myself modestly to head and body.

Now if those streams of tears, and sweet perfumes, make not my pen fruitful and odoferous, pardon my rudeness, and consider the state we are now in.

When our miserable condition perceived, before the access of the universal body, by the wrinkles put on the brow of ruined affairs, counsel weakened, and reputation of state blasted, that the people cry out against such instruments; What miserable condition are we brought to? Oh God! suffer not ill counsellors to be as a bad spleen, to swell so big as to make lean the commonwealth, that our empty purses be not filled with blood, though with tears; wherefore, I humbly beseech the head to produce such effect, as the sun on moist and cold grounds; to reduce the general capacity, to such an influence of justice, peace, religion, and liberty; and that, in lieu thereof, the people may make a rich and potent king.

VOL. IV.

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