THE LORD DIGBIES SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, To the Bill of Attainder, of the Earl of STRAFFORD, the 21 of APRIL, 1641.  
Printed in the year 1641.   

THE LORD DIGBYES Speech in the House of Commons, to the Bill of Attainder of the Earl of Strafford, the 21. April. 1641.  
Master Speaker,  
WE are now upon the poin● of giving (as much as in us lies) the final Sentence unto death or life, on a great Minister of State and Peer of this Kingdom, Thomas Earl of Strafford; a name of hatred in the present age by his Practices, and fit to be made a terror to future ages by his punishment.  
I have had the honour to be employed by the House in this great business, from the first houred that it was taken into consideration: it was a matter of great trust, (and I will say with confidence) that I have served the House in it with industry, according to my ability, but with most exact faithfulness and secrecy.  
And as I have hitherto discharged my duty to this House and to my Country, in the progress of this great Cause; so I trust I shall do now in the last period of it, to God and to a good conscience.  
I do wish the peace of that unto myself, and the blessings of Almighty God to me and my posterity, according as my judgement on the life of this man, shall be consonant with my heart, and the best of my understanding in all integrity.  
I know well Master Speaker, that by some things I have said of late, whilst this Bill was in agitation, I have raised some prejudices upon me in the cause.  
Yea some (I thank them for the plain dealing) have been so free as to tell me, that I suffered much by the backwardness I have shown in this Bill of Attainder of the Earl of Strafford, against whom I had been formerly so keen, so active.  
Master Speaker, I beg of you and the rest but a suspension of judgement concerning me, till I have opened my heart unto you freely and clearly in this business.  
Truly Sir, I am still the same in my opinions and affections, as unto the Earl of Strafford, I confidently believe him the most dangerous Minister, the 〈◊〉 insupportable to free subjects that can be charactered.  
I believe his practices in themselves as high, as tyrannical, as any subject ever ventured on, and the malignity of them hugely aggravated by those rare abilities of his, whereof God hath given him the use, but the Devil the application. In a word, I believe him still that grand Apostate to the Commonwealth, who must not expect to be pardoned it in this world, till he be dispatched to the other. And yet let me tell you Master Speaker, my hand must not be to that dispatch. I protest as my conscience stands informed, I had rather it were off.  
Let me unfold unto you the Mystery, Master Speaker.  
I will not dwell much upon justifying unto you my seeming variance at this time from what I was formerly, by putting you in mind of the difference between prosecutors and Judges.  
How misbecoming that fervour would be in a Judge which perhaps was commendable in a prosecutor. Judges we are now, and must put on another personage.  
It is honest and Noble, to be earnest in order to the discovery of Truth, but when that hath been brought as far as it can to light, our judgement thereupon aught to be calm, and cautious.  
In prosecution upon probable grounds, we are accountable only for our industry or remissness, but in judgement, we are deeply responsable to God Almighty, for its rectitude or obliquity. In cases of life, the Judge is God's Steward of the party's blood, and must give a strict account for every drop.  
But as I told you Master Speaker, I will not insist long upon this ground of difference in me now, from what I was formerly.  
The truth on't is Sir, the same ground whereupon I (with the rest of the five to whom you first committed the consideration of my Lord of Strafford) brought down our opinion, that it was fit he should be accused of Treason, upon the same ground I was engaged with earnestness in his prosecution, and had the same ground remained in that force of belief with me, which till very lately it did, I should not have been tender in his condemnation. But truly Sir, to deal plainly with you, that ground of our accusation, that spur to our prosecution, and that which should be the basis of my judgement, of the Earl of Strafford, as unto Treason, is to my understanding quite vanished away.  
This it was Master Speaker.  
His advising the King to employ the Army of Ireland, to reduce England.  
This I was assured would be proved, before I gave my consent to his accusation. I was confirmed in the same belief, during the prosecution, and fortified in it most of all since Sir Henry V●in●s preparatory examinations, by the assurances which that worthy member Master Pymme gave me, that his Testimony would be made convincing by some notes of what passed at the I●nto concurrent with it, which I ever understanding to be of some other Counsellor, you see now prove but a Copy of the same Secretary's notes, discovered and produced in the manner you have heard, and those, such disjointed fragments of the venomous part of discourses, no results, no conclusions of Counsels, which are the only things that Secretaries should register, there being no use at all of the other, but to accuse and to bring men into danger.  
But Sir, this is not that which overthrows the evidence with me, concerning the Army of Ireland; nor yet that all the rest of the 〈◊〉 upon their oaths, remember nothing of it.  
But this 〈◊〉 I shall tell you, is that which 〈…〉 me under favour, to an utter overthrow of his evidence, as unto that of the Army of Ireland? Before, whilst I was a prosecutor, and under tye of Secrecy; I might not discover any weakness of the cause which now as a judge I must. Master Secretary was examined thrice upon oath, at the preparatory committee.  
The first time he was questioned to all the Interrogat●●●…, and to that part of the seventh which condemns the Army of Ireland, he said positively in these words, I cannot charge him with that. But for the rest, he desires time to recollect himself, which was granted him.  
Some days after, he was examined a second time, and then deposes these words concerning the Kings being absolved from rules of government, and so forth very clearly. But Being priest to that part, concerning the Irish Army, again can say nothing to that.  
Hear we thought we had done with him, till divers weeks after, my Lord of Northumberland and all others of the junto, denying to have heard any thing concerning those words of reducing England by the Irish Army, it was thought fit to examine the Secretary once more, and then he deposes these words, to have been said by the Earl of Strafford to his Majesty: you have an Army in Ireland, which you may employ here to reduce, (or some word to that sense) this Kingdom.  
Master Speaker, these are the circumstances which I confess with my Conscience, thrust quite out of doors that grand Article of our charge, concerning his desperate advice to the King, of employing the Irish Army here.  
Let not this I beseech you, be driven to an aspersion upon Master Secretary, as if he should have sworn otherwise then he knew or believed, he is too worthy to do that; only let thus much be inferred from it, that he who twice upon oath with time of recollection, could not remember any thing of such a business, might well a third time misremember somewhat: and in this business the difference of one Letter, here for there, or that for this, quite altars the case, the latter also being the more probable, since it is confessed of all hands, that the debate than was concerning a war with Scotland, and you may remember that at the Bar he once said to employ there. And thus Master Speaker, I have faithfully given you an account what it is that hath blunted the edge of the Harchet or Bill with me towards my Lord of Strafford.  
This was that whereupon I accused him with a free heart, prosecuted him with earnestness, and had it to my understanding been proved, should have condemned him with innocence. Whereas now I cannot satisfy my conscience to do it.  
I profess I can have no notion of any body's intent to subvert the Laws treasonably, but by force; and this design of force not appearing, all his other wicked practices cannot amount so high with me.  
I can find a more easy and more natural spring, from whence to derive all his other Crimes, then from an intent to bring in Tyranny, and to make his own posterity, as well as us, Slaves; as from revenge, from Pride, from Avarice, from passion, and insolence of nature.  
But had this of the Irish Army been proved, it would have diffused a complexion of Treason over all, it would have been a With indeed, to bind all those other scattered and lesser branches, as it were into a faggot of Treason.  
I do not say but the rest may represent him a man as worthy to die, and perhaps worthier than many a Traitor. I do not say but they may justly direct us to Enact that the like shall be Treason for the future.  
But God keep me from giving judgement of death on any Man, and of ruin to his innocent Posterity, upon a Law made, à Posteriori.  
Let the mark be set on the door where the Plague is, and then let him that will enter die.  
I know Master Speaker, there is in Parliament a double power of life and death by Bill, a Judicial power; and a Legislative: the measure of the one, is what's Legally just; of the other, what is prudentially and politicly fit for the good and preservation of the whole. But those two, under favour, are not to be confounded in Judgement. We must not piece up want of Legality with matter of convenience, nor the defailance of prudential fitness, with a pretence of legal Justice.  
To condemn my Lord of Strafford judicially as for Treason, my conscience is not assured that the matter will bear it.  
And to do it by the Legislative power, my reason consultively cannot agree to that, since I am persuaded, neither the Lords nor the King will pass the Bill, and consequently that our passing it, will be a cause of great divisions and combustions in the State.  
And therefore my humble advice is, that laying aside this Bill of Attainder, we may think of another, saving only life, such as may secure the State from my Lord of Strafford, without endangering it, as much by division concerning his punishment, as he hath endangered it by his practices.  
If this may not be harkened unto, let me conclude in saying that unto you all, which I have throughly inculcated to mine own conscience upon this occasion. Let every man lay his hand upon his heart, and sadly consider what we are going to do with a breath, either justice or murder; justice on the one side, or murder heightened and aggravated to its supremest extent. For as the Casuists say, that he who lies with his sister commits incest, but he that marries his sister sins higher, by applying God's Ordinance to his crime: So doubtless he that commits murder with the sword of Justice, heightens that crime to the utmost.  
The danger being so great, and the case so doubtful, that I see the best Lawyers in diametral opposition concerning it; Let every man wipe his heart as he does his eyes, when he would judge of a nice and subtle object. The eye if it be pretincted with any colour, is vitiated in its discerning. Let us take heed of a blood-shotten eye of Judgement.  
Let every man purge his heart clear of all passions, (I know this great and wise body politic can have none, but I speak to individuals from the weakness which I find in myself.) Away with all personal animosities, away with all flatteries to the people, in being the sharper against him, because he is odious to them; away with all fears, lest by the sparing his blood they may be incensed; away with all such considerations, as that it is not fit for a Parliament, that one accused by it of Treason should escape with life.  
Let not former vehemence of any against him, nor fear from thence, that he cannot be safe while that man lives, be an ingredient in the sentence of any one of us.  
Of all these corruptives of judgement, Master Speaker, I do before God discharge myself to the uttermost of my power,  
And do with a clear Conscience wash my hands of this man's blood, by this solemn protestation, that my Vote goes not to the taking of the Earl of strafford's life.  
FINIS.