SOME FEW OBSERVATIONS upon his majesty's late Answer to the Declaration, or remonstrance of the Lords and Commons of the 19 of May, 1642.  

Pag. 1. Or of following the advice of our council of Scotland.  
OUr case is not as Scotland's was in all points, though in many it be very like, for our malignant party here is far greater and stronger, and more enraged against us, by their own greatness, and more animated by our weakness. Yet we desire but the same satisfaction which Scotland had, without so much reluctance given them by the King. For their Militia, and all other subordinate power in that kingdom, is settled in such hands as are publicly confided in, and yet this is utterly denied us. And our holding Hull is not like their holding Newcastle, yet their Honour is saved, whilst we are called unpararaleled Traitors, and they are restored to all demanded rights and securances, whilst we are charged of unpardonable Rebellion, and satisfaction is not offered to us, but required from us, in the most approbrious language that can be, yet still we will not refuse the council of the Scots Lords, in yielding to a pacification, nor depart from the example of them, in the manner of securing the same.   

Pag. 2. That we should fancy and create dangers to ourself.  
We have little cause to think that the same malignant party which hath shed so much Protestant blood in Ireland, and about the same time plotted a villainous massacre in Edinburgh, hath been supinely snorting in England all this Parliament, since their vigilance is more concerned here, then in either of these kingdoms; and since they have advantages to do mischiefs in England, far greater than in Scotland, and almost as great as in Ireland, and for the Plots themselves, divers of them have not been invisible, and yet if the King had not concealed, and did not yet conceal, some passages (as being below him) they had been more visible; but jealousy in such cases is not unpolitique, and the less jealous the King is, the more we have cause to be so: Ireland a few days before its ruin, had less ground of fear than we have had; some of our Treasons here have not been planted in trains and Mines, so deep and dark, nor so much resembled the Cockatrice eye, as that of Ireland, and if the King be not privy to the Plots, yet as long as the Plotters having aims beyond him, plow with his heifer, and act by his power, our condition is the more desperate and remediless, and since the King cannot see into the breasts of those his followers, whom we suspect, he ought not so far to despise the public jealousies of whole Nations, or the distractions or insecurity of such considerable multitudes as he doth; but the King appeals to God's all-searching eye, and we do the same, imploring of him to be the more vindicative in this case, the more destitute▪ we all are of any other recourse or redress upon earth.   

Pag. 5. Wherein they usurp the word Parliament.  
The King frequently vows to maintain Parliaments in their privileges, yet his Papers many ways derogate from them; For first if he please to sever himself, those great counsels are not to be named Parliaments. Secondly, whatsoever name is due, the virtue of public representation is denied them, they are not to be looked upon as the whole kingdom, and this is destructive to the essence of Parliaments. Thirdly, if the concurrence of both Houses, Nullo contradicente, be of some sanctity and authority, yet the major part of both Houses is not so vigorous as the total, and here is another device to frustrate all Parliaments. Fourthly, if the majority shall bind, and the minority acquiesce therein, yet if it be objected that some few factious spirits mislead and befool the majority, all is void, Parliaments thus are made ridiculous Assemblies, and all Justice at the last resort is to be expected from the King's sole breast, or else nowhere; for if the King will withdraw himself, all Courts as well as Parliaments are thus defeated and disabled, and then if the King assumes not sole power to himself, all Government is expired, and no way is left for the kingdom to preserve itself, and what can be more unnatural? In policy then, if we are grown weaty of Parliaments, and will dissolve them into nothing, we ought to erect some other Court above them, or in their stead, or else to resign all into the King's sole boundless discretion, for any form of Rule is better than none at all; and before we demolish old structures, we ought to be advised of the fashions of new.   

Pag. 6. And whose advice we are resolved to follow.  
But what if the major and better part of the privy council concur with the King, if Parliaments must down, that Rule is better than Anarchy; But hitherto neither both Houses, nor the Judges, nor the Lords of the council have concurred, but if the concurrence of Parliaments be not necessary, how can any other seem but unnecessary, and at mere discretion, hath not the King the same right to shake off inferior counsels, as that which is supreme, or shall he have cause to confide in the knowledge of less Honourable Courts, more than of that which is the quintessence of all his subjects, which is indeed the very Throne itself whereon he sits so sure, and whose consent and council is that very Diadem which inriches his Temples, and that Mace which arms his hands; who would have thought in time of Parliament to have heard the name of Privy councillor cited to the lessening of Parliaments, yet here nothing but the very name too is cited, nor no compsiance promised but arbitrary; so many ways are Parliaments blown away like bubbles, yet none is so much insisted on, as that which seems most incredible, that Master Pym, and four or five of his consorts should besot and stupefy two or three hundred Gentlemen chosen out of the flow●e of the kingdom, when as the King hath in Parliament some spirits as mercurial, and heads as watchful, and hearts as resolute, without some extremely violent magic, may seem incredible, nay, were it certain that Master Pym were the greatest necromancer living, and the deepest read in black infernal arts, I should hardly trust the efficacy of his spells in such expedients.   

Pag. 8. That those Rebels publicly threaten the rooting out of the name of the English.  
That the Irish Rebels by their success are now intentive to root out the English, is probable, but their first aim and cause of commotion might be some other more particular inducement, for the English Government was long before in the same manner irksome to them as now, but some other invitation now happened of shaking it off, and not before.   

Ibidem. As they have invaded that power of ours over the Militia.  
The Question is not to be put indefinitely, whether or no the King ought to order the Militia in times of no extraordinary danger; our case is now upon supposition, if the King in extraordinary danger will not yield to such a Posture as the kingdom thinks most safe, whether the Parliament may not order that Posture of themselves, so the Parliament puts it. But the King puts it thus. If the Parliament invades his power over the Militia causelessly, whether they may not as well seize any subject's estates. That question than which must decide all, is this, whether that Posture which the Parliament chooses, or that of the Kings, be most safe for the kingdom at this time, and who shall judge thereof most properly. Till now that the ancient Pillars of Law, and Policy were taken away, and the State set upon a new basis, no evil was to be presumed of the representative body of the kingdom, nor no Justice expected from a King deserting his grand council, but now every man may arraign Parliaments, & they which understand no reason, must have reason, not authority to rely upon; no King was ever yet so just but that Parliaments have in some things reduced them from error, nor no Kings so unjust that Parliaments did seduce into error, yet Parliaments are now charged of being enemies to Religion, laws, liberties. And the King to preserve these, absents himself from Parliaments, but since we must dispute for Parliaments; first we say they must in probability be more knowing then any other privadoes; Secondly, in regard of their public interest, they are more responsible than any other, and less to be complained of in case of error. Thirdly, they have no private interest to deprave them, nothing can square with the Common council but the common good, and if 500 of the nobility and gentry should aim at an aristocratical usurpation, or any other power of oppression, they could never compass their ends, it were folly in them. Some such objections have been made against this Parliament, but finding little credit, at last some few of the Parliament are pitched upon, as if it were credible that all the kingdom in whose hands all real natural power consists would enslave themselves to 500 or those 500 voluntarily become slaves to five men. (good God) the King is presumed to have the hearts of the majority, and to be trampled upon by some few, and yet the magical incantation is so strong, that neither the King's authority, nor the justice of his cause, nor the oppressed commonalty can prevail against the Parliament, or the Parliament itself, against such an inconsiderable number in Parliament. O that some Mercury would reconcile my understanding in this Court logic, or give me some clew of thread to disengage me out of this blind Labarinth; but to come more particularly to the Militia itself, now settled by the Parliament, the King excepts against the Parliaments ordinance, for two reasons, first because it excludes him for the disposing of it, and secondly from determining it at his pleasure, but we must know that the kingdom trusts the King with arms as it doth with the laws, and no otherwise, and since the King in Person is not most fit always, nor can in all places be present, to execute either military or judicial offices, therefore the main execution in both is entrusted to substitutes; the end of all Authority in substitutes is, that the kingdom may be duly and safely served, not that the King's mere fancy may be satisfied, and that end is more likely to be accomplished where the kingdom, than where the King chooses, but whosoever chooses the substitutes, the King is not excluded thereby, for the King hath more cause to confide in men recommended by his highest Court, than the people have in men preferred merely by the King, against the consent of his highest Court; and if it were not so, yet the confidence and assurance of the people, in times of distractions, is more requisite than the Kings, but in this new Militia, the King is not so much excluded from his general superintendance, and supreme influence, as he is in subordinate Courts of Justice, and yet even in the King's Bench, where the King in Pleas of the crown may not sit as Judge, he may not be said to be excluded, neither is it any prejudice to the King in the second place, that he cannot determine these new Commissions at his pleasure without public consent, except upon misdemeanour, for though all men naturally desire absolute command, and to be uncontrollable in things that are bad as well as things that are good, yet this is but the exorbitant desire of corrupted nature, and wise men do not seek always to satisfy it, but rather to suppress it. In case of misdemeanour no man's commission shall justify him agains the King, and where no misdemeanour is, what would the mere power of determining the commission avail the King. For we see in divers Monarchies and free States, some Princes which are limited from evil are not the more disabled from good, and if they be sometimes, that nation is perhaps happier, which entrusts Princes too little, then that which entrusts them two far, and yet nevertheless I desire to see no innovation in our English Monarchy, neither if this King shall upon this or that emergent occasion yield to some temporal restraint, would I wish to see it perpetual, except in things only tending to evil, for example, the King had a Prerogative to discontinue and dissolve Parliaments at pleasure, and the abuse of this Prerogative was the cause of all our late sufferings, but this Prerogative being restrained, what injury is likely to follow either to the King or State, for in such restrictions, which are from greater evils, but from less good, the King ought not to be difficult, and in such restrictions which may disable from good, as well as evil, the people ought not to be importunate; but it is further objected that by the same power Parliaments may disseise both the King and subjects from their estates, as they make ordinances for the Militia, but in truth is not this a strange result, the Parliament have power to do good offices by the consent of the people, & therefore they may have power to do ill offices against the consent both of King and People, it is of dangerous consequence to suppose that Parliaments will do any injustice, it loseth one of the firmest ●inewes of Law to admit it; but to conclude that Parliaments can do such injustice as may oppress both King and People, from whom all their power is derived, is unnatural: and whereas the King claims an interest in the Militia as legal and proper as ours are, in our Lands or Tenements, we must avoid mistakes herein; for in our goods and inheritances we have not so pure and additional a right, but that it is inconsistent with the common right also, and in this respect the King's possessions are not privileged more than a subject, for the state's propriety cannot be excluded out of either, the same man also may have several proprieties in several things, for that propriety which the King hath in a subject, is not the same, nor so entire as that which he hath in his horse, for that right which he hath as a Prince, is by way of trust, and all trust is commonly limited more for the use of the party trusting, than the party trusted; in some cases also there are mutual proprieties, and so the King owns us as his subjects, and we own him as our King, but that ownership which we have in him as our King, is of a far more excellent and high nature than that ownership which the King hath in us as his subjects; that occasional interest which the Scots had in Newcastle, or the Parliament in Hull, did not wholly drown the King's interest, nor the Particular owners, such temporary possessions may sometimes happen without the utter disseisin or dissinherison of each other, and we see in a breach of peace, the Constable by force takes my sword from me, and in such manner as he may not take my cloak, although my interest in my Sword is as good as in my cloak, and yet my property in my Sword is not altered by that property which the officer seizes to himself; and doubtless had the same arguments been pressed against disseisin of Lesley, as have been since against Sir John Hotham, they would have been held much more impertinent than now they are, so much more are we vilipended and harder treated than other nations are; let not common sense then be so much baffled as to make this temporary possession of Hull taken by Sir John Hotham, upon an extraordinary necessity of State so declared by the Judgement of Parliament, for the preventing of civil war; and consequently for the preventing of great disservice, both to King and State; the same thing, as the violent intrusion of a private disseizor upon the just inheritance of his Neighbour: he which confesses, That the King hath a true and perfect interest in the Kingdom, doth not deny, That the Kingdom hath a more worthy and transcendent interest in itself, and in the King too: This is so far from contradiction, that he is far from reason, that so conceives it. And he which doth not conceive that that which is the judgement of the major part in Parliament, is the sense of the whole Parliament; and that which is the sense of the whole Parliament, is the judgement of the whole Kingdom; and that which is the judgement of the whole Kingdom, is more vigorous, and sacred, and unquestionable, and further beyond all appeal, then that which is the judgement of the King alone, without all council, or of the King, with any other inferior Clandestine council, most raze those rocky Foundations, upon which, this State hath been so happily settled, for so many ages now past.  
As to the impeachment of the fix Members of Parliament, 
Pag. 10. 11. That no retractation made by us, nor no actions since that time committed against us, and the Laws of the Land, under pretence of vindication of privileges, can satisfy the contriver of that Declaration.  the King pleads retractation & satisfaction, his retractation is an acknowledgement, that it was a casual single mistake; yet in form only; for the grounds of his charge when they shall be published, he assures us, will satisfy the world; But in the mean time, these grounds are kept unpublished, contrary to the desire of the Parliament, and the whole Kingdom, and till that publication the world remains unsatisfied, nay it is most wonderful, that so desperate and horrid a plot, as that yet seems to be, should be so long neglected, to the King's vast disadvantage, and the people's miserable disquiet, if clear satisfaction could be so easily given, every man sees, that the charge, if it had not good grounds did stab furiously at the heart of all Parliaments, and at all Liberties in Parliament, but till publication of these grounds be, no man will presume to judge; yet it is of great concernment to His majesty's honour, and the kingdom's peace, that it be not too long delayed. But in the next place, the King conceives, That the Parliament hath been injurious to him in Vindication of Parliament privileges, and therefore ought to be satisfied; the Parliament still begs for that publication, for nothing else can make them appear to have been injurious; and till they appear to have been injurious; they ought not to be condemned as injurious, for de non entibus & de non apparentibus eadem est ratio; As for the Kings coming into the House of Commons so armed, till publication of the cause of that coming, the circumstances cannot be duly weighed.  
By this Law the Subjects of England might not use any defensive force against an Officer in any case, 
Pag. 12. Such a Minister might be punished for executing such Authority.  though of the most undoubted privileges, or rights, by a kind of after game, he must seek remedy in the future; but for the present, he is remediless, But if this be Law, I think every man sees that the English man's liberty, and share in the grand Charter, is a thing easily deseasable, for it is as likely, That the King may justify and protect His Ministers, after the execution of unjust commands, as to urge them by undue Warrants to the same, and if so, then where is the Subjects of England, freedom and Patrim●●●; what is it still but held upon the King's mere courtesy.  
It's known to the King, 
Pag. 15. And if such be about us, or any against whom any notorious malicious crime can be proved, if we shelter or protect any such, let our injustice be published to the world.  who hath incensed Him against His Parliament, and who have given council derogatory to the honour, and destructive to the essence of all Parliaments, and to the Parliament this is utterly unknown; yet the King desires evidence of these things from the Parliament; Nay, though he disavow the sheltering of ill Ministers, yet he conceals such as have traduced and slandered the Parliament in some things notoriously false; and yet to an ordinary understanding, it is the same thing to conceal, as to shelter a Delinquent; and if it be below a King to reveal a traitorous Incendiary, that hath abused His ear with pernicious calumnies, It is below him too to leave him to justice being otherways revealed.  
He which will not accuse the King for want of zeal against the Irish Rebels; 
Pag, ibid. They have employed our connivance, as want of zeal against the Rebels in Ireland.  yet may truly say, there is not the same zeal expressed, as was against the Scots, though the case be far different, for the Scots were Protestants, and had been greatly aggrieved, and were not imbrued willingly in blood, and yet the English Nation against their wills, were most rigorously hastened, and enforced to Arm against them; but now, when the English Nation and Scots too, were moved to indignation, and horror, against the most bloody perfidious ingrateful villains in the world; their proffered supplies are retarded, and opportunities are neglected, and nice exceptions framed, and the cursed reproaches of the Rebels themselves, calling the Parliament disloyal and traitors, are countenanced and seconded.  
The depositions taken concerning bringing up of the Army, 
Pag. 17. When with our privity the Army was in agitation.  do not evince beyond all doubt, that any such agitation was with the King's privity; but according to human judgement, which do not always proceed upon certain appearances of things. Some such things were in agitation, and some presumption there is of the King's privity, and if in other cases such presumptions as these do not always pass, for good and strong proofs; yet I in my experience, did never here before, that they were rejected as light discourses, though the King now contemn them so; Neither is the mere miscarriage of the plot without the prevention of the Parliament, any good argument that no such plot was, for so the Irish may be excused in all those places, which they failed to surprise, for treason were no treason, if it were not more obscure and hard to be discovered, and that as well by the ill as good success of it.  
As for those tumults about Westminster, 
Pag. 19 We will have justice for those tumults.  how far the Londoners were engaged in them, offensively, and defensively, and how far the soldiers which were entertained at Whiteball, were raisers of them, and how far thieves, and boutifures intermingled themselves for rapines sake, rests yet in judgement; and I conceive the Parliament is as desirous to have justice seasonably done therein, as the King; But sure, the English Nation, nor the City, nor the Parliament, cannot be suspected of having any intent to raise Arms against the King's Person, or His Children: this were a great scandal and unmerited, and if the King's flight was for fear of any cursed Assassinates; for which the English have not been infamous, His ordinary Guard had been as safe to him here, as it is at York.  
Here it is supposed, 
Page 21. Where is every man's property, every man's liberty, if a major part of both Houses declare, That the Law is, That the younger Brother shall inherit, what becomes of all the families and estates in the Kingdom▪  that Parliaments may make an Ordinance contrary to Law, Nature, Reason, sense; and it is inferred therefore, That they are dangerous, and may bring the life and liberty of the Subject to a lawless, and Arbitrary subjection; this supposition is inconsistent with one of the most sacred and venerable pillars of all Law and policy; and yet here it is insisted upon, Let all Chronicles be searched, and let one Story be cited of any Parliament, which did tyrannize over King and subject, or ordain any thing to the mischief of both; yet Kings I think will not make the same challenge, the best of them have done Acts of oppression, and the Reasons are apparent for it; but no Reasons can be given why Parliaments should usurp, or how they can usurp; yet the King's inference runs against all Parliaments: He doth not say this Parliament tyrannizeth, and therefore he resides from them, and pronounces their Votes invalid, but because Parliaments may tyrannize; therefore they have no power in their Votes at all, at any time whatsoever, further than the King ratifies them. The Parliament says not so much; they say he is now seduced by wicked council, and therefore rejects their requests, to the danger of the State: In such cases they conceive there is a power in them to secure the State without his concurrence: At other times, when the Kings are not seduced, they ought to do nothing without their consent; for non recurrendum est ad extraordinaria in iis quae fieri possunt per ordinaria: Whether this or that Doctrine enwraps the greatest danger, let all the world judge.  
As for seditious Preachers and pamphleteers, 
Pag. 27. Seditious Pamphlets and Sermons.  the Parliament will not protect any, when greater matters are provided for, the Law shall have a free course against them; and account shall be given by all which have favoured them. In the mean time the Parliament only desires, That it may not be put is these times of general extremity, to intend universal enormities, and in the le●all pursuance thereof be made Informers, Solicitors, Witnesses, and Judges, and that they may not be bound to give an account for all misdemeanours, or to remedy all men's abuses in an instant, and not withstanding all opposition, give general satisfaction to all the world, or aspire to a condition above man.  
We hold Parliaments in England, 
Pag. 24. That such are continually preferred and countenanced by us, who are friends or favourers, or related unto the chief authors or actors of that arbitrary power heretofore practised and complained of.  as the Apples of our eyes; and we know all liberty must stand or fall with them; And we conceive Parliaments were never more endangered▪ nor by more conspiracies assailed, than they have been since this Parliament began: And the persons which possess the King against them we cannot nominate, but he knows, and favours, and employs them. If he have any councillors which suggest advice to him, as his late papers carry in them, they are the malignant party; and their study is, That some way may be found out, so to master and quell this Parliament, as that is may precedent future times to do the same. Nothing is more visible, than that Parliaments are odious to Court parasites; and the same disposition which discontinued them so long, and dismissed them so often, still labours to frustrate and ruinate them for ever. What parties have been framed in the Country, in the City, in the Parliament itself, in England, in Scotland, in Ireland, in other Nations, to blast this Parliament, and to make it scandalous; and yet we all see they are traitors, they are unheard-of paralleled traitors: for seeking their own defence, for entertaining any jealousies, or for mentioning any plots: what late change there is in the King, or alienation from the defendors of arbitrary power, is not evident by his papers; for if they do truly represent him and his councillors to us, we may doubt that Parliaments are not gotten into better grace at Court, than they were in my Lord of Straffords time; and yet it is undoubted, That if we suffer in the Rights of Parliaments, no other rights can be done us: And as we were better have no Parliaments, than Parliaments maimed in their privileges, so we had better have no being at all in England, than no Parliaments,  
The main thing begged by the Parliament, 
Pag. 27. We require no other Liberty to our wills, than the meanest of them do, we wish they would always use that liberty, not to consent to any thing evidently contrary to our conscience and understanding: and we have, and shall always give as much estimation and regard to the advice and counsel of both Houses  is the King's return, and that all subordinate power and honour (especially during our distractiors) may be put into men's hands as the generality is assured of: How this should be contrary to His conscience and understanding here, and not in Scotland, I do not see; and yet that which was there reasonable, is here treasonable; nay, and though we be denied in it, yet we must not believe cur eyes, for still it is pressed that the Parliament has done nothing for the King, and have been denied nothing from the King, in the least degree necessary to the peace, plenty, and security of the subject; and yet in public matters, conscience, and understanding are not always to be too far trusted, where we depart from Maior-parties, or such who are more to be trusted, than ourselves, few Cases are in Law or policy beyond all dispute and scruple; and if the King in disputable Cases will charge His Own Apprehension, rather than His other Judges and councillors, His breast must prove at last the sole unappealable Judge of all things.  
How the King is to given an account of His Royalty here, 
Page 27, 28. The office and dignity of a King, is not within their determinations, and of which we must give an account to God, and our other Kingdoms.  to His other Kingdoms, more than to this; or how it is beyond the cognizance of Parliaments, because he is accountable to God for it; I apprehend not, subordinate Magistrates are also accountable to God, and their power is derived from God, and yet it is not beyond human determination, but some Courtiers do suggest that all supreme dignities are so founded by God's immediate hand alone, as there remains nothing human in them, and that public consent of such, and such Nations, as to such and such limits, and conditions is nothing at all requisite; this is the ground of all Arbitary unbounded sway; for if Nations by common consent, can neither set limits, or judge of limits set to sovereignty, but must look upon it as a thing merely divine, and above all human consent or comprehension, than all nations are equally slaves, and we in England are borne to no more by the Laws of England then the Asanine Peasants of France are there, whose Wooden shoes and Canvas Breeches sufficiently proclaim, what a blessedness it is to be borne under a mere divine Prerogative; but I hope that Prerogative, in defence of which, the King intends to sacrifice his life, is that which is settled, and bounded by the known Laws of the Land, and whose surest▪ Basis is the common consent, and whose most honourable end is the common good, and not such a divine Prerog●ti●e; which none understand, but our ghostly councillors, which always express sufficient Enmity and Antipathy to the public Acts and Pacts of Men: It is generally believed, That these late expressions of the Kings had not been so sharp, if there had not been more of the divine, then either of the Lawyer or Statesman in them; But God send our scholars more grace to think more honourable of their Pulpits, that the Church may be more edified, and the State less pert●●●ed by them hereafter; 'twas heretofore Levi and Simeon the heads of the main Malignants, whose union breeds our disunion, were Papists and Hierarchists, they now are Hierarchists and Papists.  
FINIS.