A Bloody Independent PLOT DISCOVERED. PROSECUTED By the open Malice and Fury of divers Agitators, Levellers, Anabaptists, Brownists and other Sectaries and London Agents. 1 To Murder the King. 2 To Divide the Army. 3 To Level the Nobility and Gentry. 4 To Abolish the Protestant Religion. 5 To Act any Design that shall be destructive to all these; accounting it a wilful sin against God if they do it not, if their Consciences shall dictate it unto them. Those five were committed by the House of Commons, Nou. 25. for prosecuting these most horrid Designs before mentioned. (Viz.) Thomas Prince, Cheesemonger. Samuel Chidley, Stocken-seller committed to the Gatehouse. jeremy Jves. Wil: Larner. Book-binder. And Thomas Taylor. Committed to Newgate Printed in the year of the Saints Treason, 1647. A Bloody Independent Plot. AS a ship whilst it is upon the main sea, is in a manner a Castle, or Commonwealth by itself, and having all the sails hoisted up, and swollen with the wind, and the Banners displayed, with a lofty show danceth upon the waves, and allureth every eye to behold the pride thereof: But when it comes into the Haven, it is strait ransacked by the Searcher, forced to pay custom, the sails and banners taken in, the ship lieth at Rode, and is little regarded. So this Ship without a Pilot, this Parliament without a King, this body without a head so long as it sails upon the surges of worldly vanities, and follows the tide of a consciensllesse course, may range uncontroled, having many favourable gales to waft them for war, and honours and pomp to set them onward to their journey's end, so long they may be admired and looked on by the people; but whensoever they come into the Haven, they must expect Searchers, they must cast Anchor, pay customs, their sails gathered in, their glory disgraced, or little or nothing set by. So long as we enjoyed all blessings, plenty of peace, plenty of the Gospel, plenty of bread, plenty of all things, we were free from Sects, Schisms, Rebellions, Murders, and the like, than we were admired by all nations, but when we were once driven by contrary winds upon the raging surges of the People, Discensions, Schismy, and the like, we were quickly shipwrackt, drove upon a Rock, and split, and soon became a Prize for the merciless waves. This is England's case at this day for these enemies of all our blessings may fitly be compared to the Libard, that bears so deadly a hatred unto man, that at first sight it flies in his face; to avoid the rage thereof, the custom is to show him a man's Picture, which he no sooner seethe, but he rendeth and tareth, showing thereby how eagerly it is bend against man itself, whose Image it cannot abide, So it is with these Anabaptists, Levellers, and Sectaries, when they cannot break their cursed malice against the King to murder him, than they seek to rend and divide that Army, which should be his chief strength and defence. 1. For their cruel and cursed intentions to murder the King. I could explain myself at large, and tell you of the man hired to do that bloody and abhorred act, tell you their meetings about the same at Aldersgate at the sign of the Mouth, at the Windmill Tavern at Old-Jury end, in Foster-lane, and Friday-street where they conspired his death, and made no question of engaging Master Peter and Master del therein; who had often termed him a Dead Dog: For justification of this I refer you to the Letter sent to His Majesty, to desire him to provide for the safety of his person. May it please your Majesty, IN discharge of my duty I cannot omit to acquaint you that my brother was at a meeting last night with eight or nine Agitators who in debate of the obstacle which did most hinder the speedy effecting of their designs, did conclude it was Your Majesty; and as long as your Majesty doth live you would be so; and therefore resolved, for the good of the Kingdom, to take your life away; and that to that action they were well assured that Master del, and Master Peter's (two of their Peachers) would willingly bear them company, for they had often said to these Agitators, Your Najesty is but a dead Dog: My prayers are for your Majesty's safety; but do too much fear it cannot be whilst you are in those hands. I wish with my soul Your Majesty were at my house in Broadstreet, where I am confident I could keep you in private till this storm were over, but beg Your Majesty's pardon, and shall not presume to offer it us an advice, it is only my constant zeal to Your Service, who am, Your Majesty's dutiful Subject, Novemb. 9 1647. E. R. 2. For their pernicious Plot to divide the Army, it was carried on with a desperate Resolution, the working of it by the London Agents, shown how active they were to effect the same, I will refer you for the truth hereof to Sir Thomas Fairfax, his Letter to the Lords and Commons written with his own hand, verbatim, from the Rendezvous near Hartford. SIR, I thought it my duty to give you an account of our Rendezvouz yesterday near Hartford, where I have given order for my own Regiment of Horse, the Lieutenant's General Regiment of Hose, and some other Regiments of Horse and foot (to the number of seven) to appear) but Colonel harrison's Regiment of Horse were so abused by some London Agents, that contrary to order, they came to the Rendezvouz in a very tumultuous manner, and with papers in their Hat, called, The agreement of the people, and on the out side, in Capital Letters was printed, England's Freedom, Soldiers Rights. Colonel lilburn's Regiment of Foot, was also exceedingly abused by the said London Agents, so that they came also contrary to order in a mutinous manner, and had driven away all their prime Officers, the chief Officer conducting them being a Captain Lieutenant, who is secured to be tried by a Council. A great number of the papers before mentioned were dispersed, but upon command the Soldiers pulled them out of their Hats; divers private soldiers of the chief Mutineers of Colonel lilburn's Regiment were taken, and three condemned by a Council of war and one by lot sh●t to death at the head of the Regiment, Coll. Rainsborough delivered a Petition in the names of many, which had engaged against the command. Every one praying, that the agreement of the People annexed thereto might be promoted, etc. Major Scot, a Member of the House was there very active, and secured, and sent up to the Parliament. These things being a little over, the General made a Declaration in the head of each Regiment, and they cheerfully, and unanimously declared again. That they would serve the Parliament, and b● obedient to the old way of Discipline, under His Excellency, signed Hartford, Nou. 18. THO. FAIRFAX. For their design to beguile the Common people and soldiers under pretence of Liberty: I refer you to their engagement, which I here insert for your better satisfaction therein. An Agreement of the People, for a firm and present Peace upon Grounds of Common Right and Freedom. HAving by our late labours and hazards made it appear to the world at how high a rate we value our just freedom; and God having so fare owa●d our cause, as to deliver the Enemies thereof into our hands. We do now hold ourselves bound in mutual duty to each other, to take the best care we can for the future, to avoid both the danger of returning into a slavish condition, and the chargeable remedy of another war: for as it cannot be imagined that as so many of our Country men would have opposed us in this quarrel, if they had understood their own good, so we may easily promise to ourselves that when our Common Rights and libertyes shall be cleared, their endeavours will be disappointed that seek to make themselves our Masters; since therefore our former oppressions and scarce yet ended troubles hath been occasioned, either by want of frequent Nationall meetings in Counsel, or by rendering those meetings ineffectual. We are fully agreed and resolved to provide that hereafter our Representatives be neither left to any uncertainty for the time, nor made useless to the ends for which they are intended: in order whereunto we declare. 1. That the people of England, being at this day very unequally distributed by Counties, Cities and Burrouhs for the election of their Deputies in Parliament ought to be more indifferently proportioned according to the number of the Inhabitants; the circumstance whereof, for number, place, and manner, are to be set down before the end of this present Parliament. 2. That to prevent the many inconveniencies apparently rising, from the long continuance of the same persons in authority, this present Parliament be dissolved upon the last day of September, which shall be in the year of our Lord, 1648. 3. That the people do of course choose themselves a Parliament once in two years, viz. upon the first Thursday in every second March as shall be prescribed before the end of this present Parliament, to begin to fit upon the first Thursday in April following at Westminster, or such other place as shall be appointed from time to time by the preceding Representatives; and to continue till the last day of September, than next ensuing and no longer. 4. That the power of this and all future Representatives of this Nation, is inferior, only to theirs which choose them, and doth extend without the consent or concurrence of any other person or persons to the enacting, altering, and repealing of Laws, to the erecting and abolishing of Officers and Courts, to the appointing, removing and calling to account Magistrates and Officers, of all degrees: to the making War and Peace, to the treating with foreign States. And generally, to whatsoever is not expressly, or implyedly reserved by the represented to themselves. Which are as followeth. 1. THat matters of Religion and the ways of God's Worship, are not at all entrusted to us by any humane power, because therein we cannot remit or exceed a tittle of what our Consciences dictate to be the mind of God without wilful sin: nevertheless the public way of instructing the Nation (so it be not compulsive) is referred to their discretion. 2. That the matter of impresting and constraining any of us to serve in the wars is against our freedom; and therefore we do not allow it in our Representatives; the rather, because money (the sinews of war) being always at their disposal they can never want numbers of men apt enough to engage in any just cause. 3. That after the dissolution of this present Parliament, no person be at any time questioned for any thing said or done, in reference to the late public differences, otherwise then in execution of the judgements of the present Representatives, or House of Commons. 4. That in all Laws made or to be made, every person may be bound alike and that no Tenure, Estate, Charter, Degree, Birth, or place, do confer any exemption from the ordinary course of Legal proceed, whereunto others are subjected. 5. That as the Laws ought to be equal, so they must be good, and not evidently destructive, to the safety and well-being of the People. THese things we declare to be our native Rights, and therefore are agreed and resolved to maintain them with our utmost possibilities, against all oppositions whatsoever, bring compelled thereunto not only by the examples of our Ancestors, whose blood was often spent in vain for the recovery of their Freedoms, suffering themselves through fraudulent Accommodations, to be still deluded of the fruit of their Victories, but also by our own woeful experience, who having long expected, and dearly earned the establishment of these certain rules of Government are yet made to depend for the settlement of our peace and freedom, upon Him that intended our bondage, and brought a cruel Wardage upon us. If you truly and impartially ponder this engagement, called an Agreement of the people for present peace upon grounds of Commonwealth and Freedom. Be pleased therefore to consider, that these are those, that whilst they cry out Liberty, Liberty, Freedom, Freedom do bring silly souls into Captivity, Thraldom and Bondage, by their subtle wiles and insinuations, even whilst all you have become a prey unto their unsatiable Consciences, that will (if they should prevail (as God forbidden) Lord it over you with more tyranny than the very Turks and Infidels that never knew God. Therefore first let me desire you to know what people these are that pretend peace upon grounds of Common-Rights & Freedom, and you shall find they are even pernicious and factious spirited Sectaries, Anabaptists, Brownists, and the like, that never were good to any body, but their own Fraternity or Faction; and are a people so throughly jesuited in their destructive Principles, that they stick not to murder any, though Christian Kings, or any else that are without, as they term it: One example is yet fresh in our memories, of a most bloody and inhuman Massacre committed upon the body of one Master Loyonell Danel, by one of their Brethren named Deane, and others of the zealous Independent Cluster; when after they had dogged him a long way, and coming into Elbowlane, most barbarously knocked him down with a Poul-axe, and after with a knife cut his throat; in a mockery, calling out, Lights, Lights ho, and when the people arise to their windows, and asked the reason of their so calling out; They made answer, Here's a thing like a man, has lost his soul, and cannot see which way 'tis gone: And so (as they thought) fled from the hand of deserved justice to Oxford, into the King's quarters for refuge, which no sooner was made known unto his Majesty, but most Christianly, and justly he caused them presently to be apprehended, and delivered up, being a King that never would pardon Murder and hated to protect such blood thirsty Homicides; From the profane nursery of Oxford, they were removed to their native Collodge of Newgate; and after commenced (for so barbarous an act) at Tyburn, at Doctor Stories Cap, which makes the rest of their Il-dependent Brethren ever since cry out against, and so eagerly strive to pull down humane Learning; Thus much to show you the nature of them all, even from Cromwell to Lilburne, from Jreton to Overton, and so over all the rest of these Gunpowder Saints; how many Christians think you has that Town Bull of Ely (in his foaming zeal) gored to death with his rebellious Horns? was it not a right Christian part think you of the Defender of the Faith, John Lilburn after his soldiers had surprised that honest and godly Christian Gentleman, Master William Hagar, as he was walking after evening prayer on the Lord's day in his Garden, stripped him to the bare skin, and so drove him before them ten miles, till he came in the presence of this holy Colonel, who was so void of all Christian Compassion, that he espying a Ring upon the Gentleman's finger, he checked his soldiers that they took it not off: They making answer, they could not get it off, it having been so long worn by the Gentleman, that the flesh had overgrown it; john Lilburne makes answer, Then take off finger and all. This was but for a Ring; think you not then, that if john and his holy Brethren will cut off a finger for a Ring, that they will not kill a King for less than a Crown. 3. For levelling the Nobility and Gentry, is as apparent as the Sun, for do they not intent the destruction of the Nobility, when they seek to take away their negative voice, and to make the supreme power to be in the Common-people; they intent also to level all Estates, and people, and to that end they bring this Argument in defence thereof. In the beginning (say they) God made man perfect, and gave him Paradise, where he had abundance of all things, but after he fell, man was cursed, and then he was to eat his bread in the sweat of his brows, etc. Then where's the blessing for the Children of God, except it be to have the abundance of all things as at the Creation. For the Curse of the wicked is, with labour, and industry of body to get their live. Ergo. The righteous are not under the Curse, therefore must in joy abundance of all things. 4. That they intent the overthrow the Protestant Religion, it is evident; for all their Books express inveterat hatred and malice against the same, raving, railing and venting all spleen and malice against both it, the Ministers thereof, & against both Woship, Government and Discipline belonging thereto, impiously terming both It, and them Antichristian and Diabolical, etc. 5. If their Consciences shall dictate any thing to them, as to murder, rob, commit adultery, equivocate or the like, and act any thing, though never so evil, so it be destructive to those that are without, (as they term them) that is, That have no Community with them; they are bound to do it, because their Conscience dictates it unto them; Nay, they wilfully sin against God if they do it not, as their own tongues confess in their Areement with the People: And moreover in the last clause of the said Agreement, they do as good as tell us. That they have dear earned the establishment of their (pernicious and Traitorous) Rules of Government; and will no longer depend for the settlement of their Peace, and their Freedom upon Him, (King CHARLES) that b●ought Bondage a●d cruel War upon them, Though indeed these Sectaries have been the most Active for bloodshed in these abhorred wars, and like their elder brother Faux, (though more subtly) have under a pretence of Liberty and Freedom, blown us up into that ruin, misery and slavery, that no Nation or Age (since Christianity became a Profession,) ever groaned under the like Bondaage and Tyranny. How desperately bold and audacious these Incendiaries are let all reasonable people judge, when they do promote their seditious designs even to the very faces of the Parliament, in the name of the people as may appear by these votes following. Die Martis, 9 Novem. 1647. A Paper directed, to the Supreme Authority of the Nation, The Commons in Parliament assembled, and styled, the just and earnest Petition of those whose names are subscribed, in behalf of themselves, and all the Freeborn People of Englund; together with a printed Paper annexed, entitled, An Agreement of the People for a firm and present Peace, upon grounds of Common Right, were read. Resolved, etc. That the matters contained in these Papers, are destructive to the Being of Parliaments, and to the Fundamental Government of the Kingdom. Resolved, &c, That a Letter be sent to the General, and these Papers enclosed, together with the Vote of the House upon them; And that he be desired to examine the proceeding of this business in the Army, and return an account hereof to this House. Die Martis, 23. Novemb. 1647. A Petition directed, To the Supreme Authority of Englond, The Commons in Parliament assembled, and entitled, The humble Petition of many Freeborn People of England, sent in a Letter directed to Master Speaker, and opened by a Committee thereunto appointed, was read the first and second time. Resolved upon the Question. That this Petition is a seditious and contemptuous avowing and prosecution of a former Petition and Paper annexed, styled, An Agreement of the People, formerly adjudged by this House to be destructive to the Being of Parliaments, and Fundamental Government of the Kingdom. Resolved, etc. That Thomas Prince Cheesemonger, and Samuel Chidley, o● forthwith committed Prisoners to the Prison of the Gatehouse, there to remain Prisoners during the pleasure of this House, for a seditious and contemptuous avowing and prosecution of a former Petition and Paper annexed, styled, An Agreement of the People, formerly adjudged by this House to be destructive to the Being of Parliaments, and Fundamental Government of the Kingdom. Resolved, etc. That jeremy Jves, Thomas Taylor, and William Larner, be forthwith committed to the Prison of Newgate, there to remain Prisoners during the pleasure of this House, for a Seditious and Contemptuous avowing and prosecution of a former Petition and Paper annexed, styled, An Agreement of the People, formerly adjudged by this House to be destructive to the Being of Parliaments, and Fundamental Government of the Ringdom. Resolved, etc. That a Letter be prepared and sent to the General, taking notice of his proceed in the execution, according to the Rules of War (of a mutinous person) at the Rendezvous near Ware, and to give him thanks for it; and to desire him to prosecute the Examinations of that business to the bottom, and to bring such guilty persons as he shall think fit to condign and exemplary punishment. Since these Votes, the persons are juggld away, and not imprisoned, the Commons know they love the King, etc. Postscript. LET all good Christians, that are true Protestants be no longer blinded by these seditious Hypocrites, but Resolve to fetch bacl the Ark of our Israel from these ●ursed Philistin●s; to maintain the true Protestant Religion, professed in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and King james of famous memory, to defend our gracious Sovereign Lord King Charles (next under God, supreme head and Governor) from all execrable Attempt, and destructive plots of Brownists, Anabaptists, and other Heretics that have been prosecuted with so much fury for the ruin of both; to defend His honourable Crown and Dignity; the persons and estates of His Royal Consort and Princely Jssue, to restore His Majesty to all his just Rights, Power, Prerogative and Greatness; to maintain the just Privileges of Parliament, the just Liberties and Properties of the Subject, to reduce all matters to be tried by the known Laws of this Kingdom, and to live in all Christian obedience, and subjection to his Majesty, and be governed by him, (as our Allegiance bindeth us) according to the Laws. Let this be the Agreement of all the peole of England from the highest to the lowest; let them show themselves once more, Englishmen, after these seven years of blindness and bondage; and be no more cheated and deluded of all their happinesse-but steadfastly endeavour to settle a firm peace in all His Majesties Dominiout, that so we may take away that reproach that is cast upon us by all nations (by reason of these unnatural Divisions) and restore this Nation to its ancient Honour and Renown. FINIS.