A Perambulatory Word TO Court, Camp, City and Country: OR, AN ARROW Shot at random, to teach some, and to reach others, but to ruin none, save such as are resolved to ruin all to set up one.  
LONDON: Printed by J. C. for L. Chapman. 1659.   

A perambulatory Word, to Court, Camp, City, &c.  
THe fear of God( saith the Wiseman) is the beginning of wisdom: so that it may be thence inferred, that no project can be profitable or prosperous which crosseth Piety. Indeed the Sun of success may as soon shine upon a wicked design as on a ●ood and sometimes sooner; yet it's ●eldome seen, but that such Sun-shine ends in shane: we may see something in our l●te Court-projects and practices; and we shall ere long we hope experience, that truth and plain-dealing is delivered, and freed from flattering, false, and feigned friends, whose crooked Counsels, and plausible persw●sions, had almost chea●ed u● out of our Good old Cause. But seeing it is a maxim both false and dangerous, to think it beneath a wise man to alter his opinion, let no man judge he goes backward in his word, who goes forward in his work: truth and sound judgement may at any time be fairly embraced in the exchange of falsehood: he changeth not for the wors●, who( upon mature deliberation) pitches upon what is no● onely practicable, but piously public and profitable.  
But some who sit still in these shaking trying times, soothe themselves under a shadow of seeming safety, whilst( like a chippe in porridge) they live and die unprofitable, having( like Servilius in Rome) satisfied no side: whereas the true Pa●riot pawns the all of his private, to promote any little part of a public import. In this sense, what may we not see and say▪ in and of those now newly return'd, and we hope true asserters of that Cause of God and their country crucified, betwixt those two State-Thieves, Ambition and Avarice; wherein who would not be sharers with them in their wants and hazards, as otherways ready to reward their worth, deserves to be disinherited of all they have and hold; being little better in practise or speculation, then was that Monster of Mankind caesar Borgia, the Legend of whose life leaves him a most practical Atheist; and I know not what he or they can have to make them more immortally miserable.  
Now that I may draw nearer to what I intend to retrieve, and what( for these five years last) we have lost, to wit, our Laws and Liberties, our Credit and Consciences; Let us take notice by the way of those ecclesiastical, Civil, and Military Apostates, who hitherto have thought to make themselves happy by making us miserable. Is not now their success likely to prove suitable to their sin? and will they not be sooner defeated then detected? how tottering stand the Thrones erected by Treason or Usurpation? who can love or cherish the best remainders of such as by their Treacheries and Cruelties, have in this kind constrained us unto fear or hate? Let then such dependants perish with their principal, as in the compass of their contrivances, have no other point but what ●ends to the East of their own ends: Let such cannibals to their country loose their lustre before they end their lives, who call light darkness, and darkness light, and would destroy Bees to indulge Drones. Shall not Crowns, sceptres, painted sepulchres, and parasitical Pageantries perish, or rather perpetuate the memory of their perfidious practices, whilst every passenger shall with a pointing-finger proclaim, There lies a filthy carcase under a fair ston, or an English Monster under a Marble monument? To such, gay and glorious sepulchers are but marks of infamy, whilst every good man's tongue and pen's the true Patriot's Elegy and Epitaph: but the pain abated( which by sense of loss brought paleness into so many faces) we expect an interrupted circulation of the life-blood of our Liberties refluxing into its former channel; so that surely now the condition of all our new obligations runs not for selfish sovereignty, but for the Good old Cause, and the executing of all our former oaths and Engagements. It will now be expected( if ever) that all projects of profit and preferment, must rather be partend with then stooped unto: We are not now for, but against any single sovereign, and we doubt not ere long it will be inadvertency( even in their own understandings) for any drawling Cavaliers to contest further for their King against a Common-wealth. Summa cadent subito. Men highest raised are soonest ruined. It was the saying of Phocas( who of a saucy Centurion was made Emperor) Fortune is easilier catched then kept. They who are red in Divine and other Histories, may remember for what actions men were un-Christian'd in the one, and un-King'd in the other. Let Countreys, &c. consider the case 'twixt Saul and Samuel; and what became of King Canutus his ●●attering Courtiers. How thrived herald after his perjury in William the Co●querours Case at the battle of Hastings? K. Stephen, and our third Richard▪ are sad examples in this sense: We red what politic Jeroboam got by Treason and Idolatry; his debauched son lost, and was rooted out with all his Family by force. Memorable is that story of Pope Paul the 4. who destroyed 150000 persons under pretext of Religion; but after his death, in detestation of his cruelty, his Statua was beheaded and tost into tiber Thus fell Sejeanus favourite to Tyberius, and by his ob●iquities brought his son and daughter to a disgraceful death. Ambition and Usurpation are ever of a self▪ consuming nature: such are often more glorious in Hearse then History; and their memories rather want an Elegy, then their graves an Epitaph, or their names read Letters in times anniverse. O miserable and wretched estate of mankind, who cannot model his deepest designs to secure himself or any of his curiously contrived cobwebs, against one counterblast of providence! For whilst Politicians think they s●opt all gaps, and closed all chinks and crannies, they leave a whole door open for Divine providence to enter in and undo whatever they have done. Oh Jehu, thou wast a Razor with a sharp edge. Thus O. C. his two-edged sword cut fast for Gods glory, but faster for his own preferment; yet pieceing out necessity and providence with his own carnal policy, like a greedy Gamester( having all in his own hand) he stolen a needless carded to win the stake, and so lost all. Thus Pride and Ambition makes many shining lights prove smoking firebrands, that their posterity( Actaeon-like) may be eaten up of their own hounds; and that Historians pens( being long kept fasting) may feed more mercilessly on their memories. Such Usurpers and perfidious betrayers of their country, in the end want a Guard to guard them from their guard. For every King of hate, is a slave of fear: how then in vain do they seek to fence themselves without, whose greatest Enemies are within? how do such patch up sleep? Surely they seldom sleep soundly, who have blood for their bolster. A traitor or a Tyr●nts Conscience knows no night of rest; his fancy presents him with Masques, wherein onely feuds and suryes are Actour●; his fears are prophetical, and virtue becomes him worse then 'vice, because he counterfeits it onely for his own ends: a private hand, or public insurrection, constrain him to die intestate, who had his will all his life.  
In this respect will not the people now understand their own power, and use it aright against our Goats of Lu●, tigers of Cru●l●y, Apes of Religion, and Basi●isks of Envy, who have hitherto canceled our Laws and Liberties with the same swords which first defended, and we hope will now reinforce them from all infringement●? But poor Souldiers, take heed of la●i●g to● great a stress● o● trust on those whose alliances and greatness put them upon a temptation of studying, rather to make away their Creditours then to pay their debts; if they can Ca●ole you to new engagements in their old O●●hoffice ●o keep you under, all your victories shall not excuse you, nor all the laurel wreaths on your head● keep ●●ur neck● from the Ax or hal●er: and m●ch better is it for you so to ●uffer, then to behold, abet, or bear a part in the e●sla●ing of your country. In the interim, at how cheap a rate have th●se U●●rper▪ bought the swea● of your brows, and the price of your blood? how advantageous to them are our intolerable taxes? Bu● now will not Liberty and Settlement prove true doctrine to all for●s of professors? It's probable that in Noahs Ark the Wolf agreed with the Lamb▪ and all creatures drow●ed their antipathy, whilst all were in danger of drownin●: so why may not all our several opinions make up one Common-wealth, to oppose that one Common E●emy ready to rush in to our ruin? Oh is it not high time for the Cow to find her horns, when State-Caterpillers( not content to suck her milk) seek to eat out her bowels, thereby to deprive her of any being or abode in the land of the living? But providence may please to make all Traytors and Time-servers ●s low in their attainments, as they have been high in their attempts; and the Grandees we hope will ere long see their error & desire no longer to hold that staff, which they may perceive( if our faithful inferior Officers and Souldiers cleave close to what they have declared) they have taken by the wrong end. Our Camp-court creatures going about to bridle the Army, have given them just occasion to take the bit into their own teeth: thus the lingering lion roused, appears less stubborn then valiant: herein the union of a few honest hearts is a Gordian knotable to make Alexanders sword turn edge.  
Then let not England measure her armies loyalty by the success of these last 5. yeares: None lays the unexpected rubs in the Alley to the Bowlers fault, who takes good aim, though he misses the mark: It's known with whom they and we had to deal: As his life of late was a mirror of perfidious hypocrisy( who by acting the white devils part did undo us) so was his death, of Gods patience: Indeed it is strange his tragical acts should have a comical end; or that he who sent so many to their graves in wrath, should go to his own in peace: but Gods justice on offenders goes not ever in one and the same path or place; he is not pardoned for his fault, who is for a while reprieved from the punishment. Sometimes the Guest in the inn goes quietly to bed before the reckoning is paid. But now to prevent all despairings, let none truly penitent fear a pardon from the good old Parliament. Let onely such as still oppose it, the purging of the Army, and the reinvesting of our good old faithful officers, fear what shall follow or befall them; so that if yet we dare be honest and resolute, freedom will fall upon its feet: we have been often foiled, but we shall never be defeated: Down then with all selfish and irreconcilable designers; trample under foot their Mushroom honours, who to advance their personal power, and to paint the plumes of present oppressors, would rob us of the price and purchase of our bloody and dear-bought Liberties: They must now no longer act 'vice its part in virtues apparel; what they have hitherto held by force and fraud, shall shortly fall from its greatest height headlong, not meeting with any medium in its declination. Will then these Eagles of our new Court-aery( who have impt their wings with the plumes of oppression and perjury) soar over us all as erst they have done? No surely( under God) we have som● in our Athens, some Lycurguse's in our Sparta, some Sisca's or Christian Castriots in our Camp, who dare die in their Countreys defence.  
Thus dear Friends and countrymen, you have his waking ●estimony, who hath but a dreaming utterance. Remember, Liberty is a beauty to be wish●, not a Blackmore to wash our hands of. But ● shall now be silent as is the nightingale when she hath hatched her eggs, and say no more of the which so many had rather have then hear of. In the incerim, ostrich feat●ers fit not Wrens wings. For a farewell, let all private spirits repent that they have loved their carcases better then their consciences, and the Court better then their country. Farewell then you faithful inferior English Officers and Souldiers: it Julius Scaliger for rescuing the Roman Eagle in the imperial Standard, was Knighted by Maximilian the Emperour, and had his golden spurs put on with the Emperours own hands; what wreaths of honour and palms of victory will you wear, for rescuing your country from such enacted and intended enslavings, by such as have hitherto onely counterfeited vir●u●, that they might the more easily act 'vice, for their own advantage. Surely then we are all Asses, if we are not Lions.  
FINIS.