ENGLAND'S PETITION TO THE TWO HOUSES Assembled in PARLIAMENT.  
OR, An humble Petition of the distressed and almost destroyed Subjects of England To the TWO HOUSES.  
Containing (in the judgement of the wise) the very sense of all the true hearted of the Kingdom; but because the way to their Highness' ear is stopped, it was sent to OXFORD, and there Printed, and afterwards presented to the HOUSES,  
By N. R.  
Know ye not yet that our Canaan is destroyed?  Exod. 10.7. 
Printed at London, and Reprinted at Oxford. M.DC.XLIII.   

TO THE TWO HOUSES ASSEMBLED IN PARLIAMENT. The humble Petition of the distressed and almost destroyed Subjects of the Kingdom of England.  
RIGHT HONOURABLE,  
IT is a double grief to our souls, that we should be contrained to beg for our lives at Your (our fellow Subjects) hands, who are bound by the Law of God and nature, and by the Oaths & Protestations that you have taken, to preserve them; and that we should be forced to entreat you to spare our estates (which you have nothing to do withal) Liberties and blood, whose honour and strength depends so much on these our enjoyments: But extremity prevaileth, and drives us to You (the grand Court of England) and casteth us here prostrate at your feet; and let not your Greatness be offended, if we speak more plainly then usually becometh us, for necessity hath no Law: It is for our lives and more, and therefore blame us not to speak, our Friends, our Wives, our Children, our wants, our dangers, our Country, our blood, do all pierce our ears and hearts with their daily and doleful cries: O that our requests could find as quick access to yours!  
Surely, it is impossible that you (being so many) should All be ignorant of the doleful condition His Majesty's two Kingdoms are in: Do ye not know that our houses are plundered, and the fruit of our long labour taken from us? That men who have heretofore relieved hundreds of the poor, have not left them a Bed to lie on, food to sustain them, or a house (except it be a Gaol) to put their heads in? And the poor they were wont to relieve, are become Soldiers, and rob us (even at noon day) by Your authority? Know you not how many thousand distressed souls cry to God day and night in their anguish and misery, while they see you (who have undertaken to relieve them) having no compassion on them? Oh, where are now those Heroic and renowned Spirits that have formerly sat in your Seat? They were wont to beat down Heresy and Schism, to relieve the oppressed, to settle Peace, to suppress Vice, and to endeavour a general Reformation both in Church and State; but now you foster Heretics and Schismatics in your bosom, You send Knaves to oppress us and rob us of all we have, and then imprison our bodies, where many thousand able and Religious men are ready to starve for want of sustenance. You break the Peace and beget Rebellion and Confusion in all places. You countenance Vice and Sin (how ever you would make the guled people believe that you are mighty religious, whilst you zealously pull down Cross●s, and Pharisaically debar men from works of charity, yea, necessity upon the Lord's day, which is to strain at Gnats and swallow Camels: You have brought in a general Deformation over the whole Kingdom. They were wont to take order for the relief of poor oppressed Prisoners at home, and Galley-slaves abroad, but now the loathsome Prisons of London, Lambeth, Cambridge, Norwi●h, Ipswich, Yarmouth, Colchester and other places, are filled with their miserable, starved, diseased bodies, who (some of them) would think themselves half freemen, were they Turkish Galleyslaves, such is their cruel usage.  
Know you not how our Lands lie untilled, whilst your Soldiers take away our Horses, and tolerate our servants to run from us? And what can follow this but extreme Famine? Know you not how much precious blood is spilt, and the dead bodies of the King's Subjects, yea, many of his Nobles scattered as dung upon the face of the earth? Have not many of your eyes seen it, and your ears heard the groans of the wounded gasping for life? Is all this nothing in your eyes? To whom should we go but unto You, who have taken upon you to relieve us in our distresses? You have disabled His Majesty from relieving of Himself; You have bewitched (or by force kept back) his Subjects every where from coming to His help; we have tried all other known means, and profess in the sight of God, we know none but you, that can deliver us without more blood and desolation; and the World knows you may do it if you will, and do it easily, and do it with increase of your Honour, of your Loyalty, of your Honesty, of your and the whole Kingdom's safety and happiness. What if it were to part with some thing of your own wills, and quietly to yield up the bodies of some few Delinquents and known Traitors to His Majesty, and enemies to the Peace, to save all the rest of the Kingdom?  
Dread Senators, We beseech you consider, what hath His Sacred Majesty done that deserves this from you? Is it because He hath relieved you from oppressing Courts (a Grace beyond precedent) and biting Taxations? Is it because He hath condescended to the calling of a Triennial Parliament (a thing never heard of in former ages) and granted His Royal Assent to the continuance of this as long as you please? Ought we not all of us for these singular, and unheard of Acts of Grace, to lay down our lives at His feet? Is it because He hath ever yielded to the punishment of those that are called Delinquents (though it may be his best friends) and supposed enemies to the Kingdom? If you were a Court of justice, as you are the Highest Court, you would do the like to those among you, that have deserved it But can those be friends to you and worth the defending, that are enemies to the King and Kingdom? And for His Forts and Navy which you have taken from him, were they not most of them bought with His own money? And yet were they not always employed for the Kingdom's good? And are not you the Kingdom Representative (yet not so as if there were but two— Wise men in a County and all the rest Fools?) And will you wrong that Trust that we have reposed in you? 'Tis true, His Majesty cannot possibly manage all in His own Person but by His Ministers, and those chosen by Council, and it hath been always judged that none have been more able, impartial, and faithful to advise Him then His Parliament: but what? shall we call you a Parliament, when your Head and most of your best Members have deserted you? He offered not to stir from you till absolute necessity constrained Him, till He saw Ireland in Rebellion, the Rebels threatening England, the same Spirits as malignant and active at home, 
White-Hall.  even at His own house, where His own life (we tremble to think of it) was in present apparent jeopardy, and your consent (since His constrained departure from you) to all His most gracious Messages denied. We cannot but see the same Counsels among you setting you on against His Majesty now, which have caused His so long discontinuance from you, (that they in the mean time might work their own ends) that caused the Shipmoney and other illegal (though not so known to His Majesty) Taxations, which caused the late innovations in Church and State, which caused the war with Scotland, which broke up the last Parliament, and have caused so many invective Declarations against His Majesty in the very language of the present times. We cannot possibly conceive what His Majesty can do now to remedy any of these miseries: We patiently abide your long sitting in vain; the offenders among you Legally proceeded against, are defended from His Majesty, yea, those that yourselves (if you durst (for fear of one another) speak your minds) do know to be such: that is denied His Majesty which is yielded to every Subject in every lowest Court of justice, viz: to have a fair trial. We persuade ourselves (by those many promises, and deep Protestations His Majesty hath made, that He desireth nothing more (if it might be done with His safety) then to be present with you, and concur with you, and if your minds had not been so haughty, and your thoughts so soaring as we find they are, there would not have been so long a distance. Neither is there any visible means left, but either give up our States, Liberties, Lives and Religion to the dispose of your too long tried secret Counsels and Close Committees, and make your mere Will the only Law (as you have done ever since the King left you) and so prove disloyal to our Sovereign, betray our Country and the Trust committed to you (which God forbidden) of else defend ourselves (as you do) by the Sword.  
And for us the King's Liege people what have we done that we are made a common spoil? Would you have us perfidiously to betray His Majesty into your laud's? Would you have us prove disloyal unto Him, who hath always been so faith full unto us? to endanger Him, whom God hath appointed to save us? Should we be such unnatural members as to offer violence to our Head? Then should we be the disgrace of the English Nation, the reproach of posterity, the very shame of nature, and should presently expect some strange judgement of God according to the strangeness of our offence.  
It's true we are forced (and it is high time too) to look about us, and (if we can) to save our throats from the violence of some desperate persons among you, but we beseech you call not this a bearing Arms against the Parliament, it is against our wills (God knows) as it is against His Majesties. But if any of your party be so respective of His Majesty's Royal authority established by Law, so truly tender of His Person and Honour, so hearty desirous of a happy Reformation as we, then let not God prosper our proceed, but cause us to fall before you, and give us up into your hands: We are fallen upon by the cruel, and because we will not give the Nineteenth (according to His Majesties Presage) with the Twentieth part of our estates, and break our Oath of Allegiance, and go contrary to our Protestation, and turn Rebels to His Majesty, and so damn our souls, we are counted Traitors to the State and Enemies to the Commonwealth. We beseech you consider in the presence of God (if you have not forgot that there is a God) if any one of the Lords should run upon any of you of the Commons with his drawn sword, whether would you suffer death without resistance, or take the sword pro tempore out of his hand, and yet neither be averse to his honour and person (if you can possibly think any of them more Honourable than yourselves) or his propriety in his weapon? And may not the King much more sack to defend Himself against you His Subjects that have taken up Arms against Him? Doth not nature teach us the preservation of ourselves? will not the eye wink without deliberation, and the smallest worm turn bacl if you tread upon it? Yet the argument is stronger, for He is not a mere man, one of your fellows; but a King, the Lords Anointed against whom there is no rising up, Pro. 30.31. Be He never so ill conditioned (as we are sure you cannot say ours is) it is damnation to resist Him being offended by him, Rom. 13.2. But against these Precepts some are wont to bring examples of Rebellion, and so argue a facto ad jus, and say in effect, that it is lawful for the Subject to rise up against their Sovereign because they find some have so done: Pray mark it; We are peremptorily commanded in holy Scripture not to Touch the Lords Anointed, or to resist Him being offended by Him, we find that some Rebels have transgressed these commands, and have unnaturally risen up against their Sovereign, therefore we will do so too; which conclusion I leave to your understandings to judge how fair it is, for you are— wise. But you war not you'll say against His Majesty, you Honour and love His Person and labour to make Him Great, your only aim is against His wicked Counsellors and cursed Cavaliers: Truly (let them be what they will be) but if you should come to one of us, and protest so much, that you love us dear and wish us well, and in the mean time Plunder our house, drive away our wife, keep our children from us, imprison our servants, and undo all that take our part; We think so well of ourselves as to think that there are very few of us (except some fools that will let you cut their throats if you please) that durst believe you.  
But if all this were nothing, what an unmatched Act of Grace was it in His Ma.tie to call a Parliament first, & then to assent to the continuance of it during your pleasure? (yet not so as if He than resigned all his Power into your hands, giving you leave to do what you will, for He is still your Head: & hath his negative voice, and can affirm or deny whatsoever is voted by you) and will you be so unnaturally, so unmannerly ungrateful, (et si ingratum dixeris omnia dices) as to restrain His Power, who hath given unto you yours? He hath given you one end of the staff into your hand, & will you now pluck the other out of His? He hath made you Men, will you make no body now of Him? You could do nothing without Him before, and will you do all things without him now?  

— Pudeat haec opprobria vobis,  
Et dici potuisse & non potuisse refelli.   
But it's confessed on all sides, that the Major part hath the authority of the whole; & if so, pray tell us, hath not the Head (the King) the Soldiers (the Nobleses, most of them) the Heart (the Learned and Religious Clergy) the Arms and Hands (the valiant and well skilled Soldiers) have not most of these deserted you? And we are sure if this be not the Major part, it is the Melior, and that's better. And for the Common inferior parts, we would fain know how many are agents in your Cause; are not all things done by ten or twelve Sticklers, whilst all the rest (more for fear of the rod, then for love to the Cause (God knows) sit with their finger in their mouths, and say and do just nothing?  
I, but there are a world of Papists and other Malignants in His Majesty's Army, and 'twere a wonder if they should sighed for the Protestant Religion: It were indeed, but no wonder at all that they should seek to defend themselves being persecuted, this nature teacheth Papists as well as Protestants; as for the Protestant Religion, we never yet heard it called into question, His Majesty hath with so many Promises, Protestations and Execrations upon Himself & Children vowed the preservation of It, that we do not so much as fear any alteration of It. But whilst you fear the bringing in of Popery, blame us not we beseech you, to fear likewise (whilst we see no contradiction appear to Prins, Burtons', with innumerable other anonomicall, Seditious, Traitorous, and Blaspheamous Pamphlets, sold openly and read and sung under your very Noses) the introduction of Atheism, Rebellion, and all kind of Profaneness.  
Nobles and Gentlemen, many of both your Houses did sit a long time with you after the King had left you, but after they descried your ways & discovered your Plots (your plots are then discovered as well as others) and took notice of your Close proceed, How you delude the People with vain hopes; How you hire men with large rewards to come posting in (when you mean to go a begging for another sum) all besmeared with dirt and mire from such and such places, 
I pray Sa●…  with such news as will please the people, when as they have never stirred foot out of Town, when they discerned how you transported the Wealth of the Land whilst your Soldiers starve; How you aim altogether at your own ends, not caring for the Distraction and Destruction of the Kingdom; How whilst (to please the people) you pretend to beat down Popery, you set up profaneness and open a door to Libertinism and Licentiousness; How Lose and Luxurious, how Blaspheamous & Atheistical many of yourselves are, they then thought it high time to look about them, and to come out of Babel, lest they should be consumed with you in all your sins: Oh, that the Lord would make it your Case, and glorify His mercy on you and us, in making known to you the things concerning our Peace, and not His justice in hardening you to destruction! That it may be never read in our Chronicle by the Generations to come, that England had a 〈…〉 that sought the desolation of the King and Kingdom. But although you will not suffer His Majesty to be your King, yet know there is a King and a judge above yo●● before whom you must very shortly stand, & give an account of that trust which we have reposed in you. We desire you in the presence of God, to think and think seriously, and think again and again, how sad it will be to have all this blood cha●ged upon your souls. Can you think of this with comfort when you are dying 〈◊〉 those few stickling Counsellors which have put you on, then bring you as safely o● Your Greatness may despise what we say, and cast a way our Petition, & i●p●ison us who had a hand in it (if you can catch us) & count us your Enemies because we are the King's friends, and tell you the truth, & speak as dying men in the sorrow of our souls; but you cannot so put by Divine justice nor quiet conscience at the last. As true as the Lord liveth before whom you stand, you will one day know that Blasphemers, Whoremasters, Schismatics and Traitors are not Gods friends, nor do they fight His cause, but plain dealers, who do assure you the way you take tends to the utter ruin & desolation of yourselves & Kingdom. And can your Heart's 〈…〉 can your Hands be strong in the day the Lord will reckon with you for this 〈◊〉. People, whose charge you have taken out of His Majesty's Hands? Oh, suppos● that you heard the blood of this People, already spilt, crying in your ears, and saw the many thousands yet living a life worse than death, lying in their sorrows at your feet crying for Pity, Help, Oh Help, or we lose our Liberties, Laws, 〈◊〉 and Religion, Help that yourselves, who have in this time hoarded up men 〈◊〉 Estates, come not to want and Beggary; help as ever you would have God help you in the day of Death and judgement, when yourselves shall cry for help and pity; help that Redemption come not some other way, that we be not all destroyed by some Foreign Nation. The Lord God of our hopes, who hath for our sinne● most justly afflicted us in You, give you all discerning eyes, holy and tender hea●●, to yield to the Petition of His Majesty's distressed Subjects, to concur with His Majesty, and the rest of your Assembly, that God and man may forget your Mistake▪ that His Majesty may be once again a Blessed Prince. yea the blessedest 〈◊〉 reigned in our Land, the Terror of all His real Enemies, the joy of His 〈◊〉, and the Glory of Posterity: Such shall be the Daily and hearty Prayer of,  
Your Fellow-Subjects throughout th● whole Kingdom.