The CASE AND Circumstances of Paper-making IN ENGLAND TRULY STATED.  
And by the PAPER-SELLERS Humbly Offered to the Consideration of this Present PARLIAMENT, As REASONS against the Passing of a BILL, entitled An Act for the Encouragement and better Establishing the making of White-Writing and Printing-Paper.  
The same being Misrepresented in a Paper styled, The Case of the Company of White-Paper-makers.  
THAT the Art of making White and Brown-paper was brought into England by Sir John Spelman a German, to whom King James I. in the Second year of his Reign granted a Patent for fourteen years, and also for his encouragement to settle the Trade in this Kingdom gave him an Estate of 200 l. per Annum at Dartford in Kent, where he erected a Paper Mill, which is to this day employed in making of White and Brown-paper.  
That White Writing and Printing Paper is but a degree of goodness from Courser Sorts, and the making thereof no New Invention.  
That the Grant to the Pretended Inventors for their sole making of White Paper, upon which the intended Act is grounded, is a Monopoly and against Law; and all such Grants are declared to be void in Law, and all bodies Politic and Corporate are disabled to exercise any such by the Statute, 21. Jac. cap. 3.  
That the same Grant was obtained through their specious pretences of supplying the whole Kingdom, and employing of Fifty Mills, which they have not performed, nor can, for that in fifteen years since they had their First Patent, they have employed but five Mills; and if they had more, cannot procure Materials sufficient for making of a twentieth part of the quantity of White Paper used in England; and their want of such materials is most evident by their using their Mills, designed for White Paper, in the making of very great quantities of Brown.  
That whereas they have insinuated that vast sums of money have been sent out of this Nation yearly to France for Paper, by a computation taken thereof, there is not above 50000 l. worth of Paper in a year imported from Germany, Holland, France, Italy, and other places, and a great part of that is the Returns of English Manufactures and Merchandizes, and of great advantage for the employment of English Shipping; the Freight, by reason of the Bulk thereof, being very considerable.  
That Foreign Paper was not brought into England, because the like was not, or could not be made here, but because Materials proportionable to the quantity required, could not be had here to make a sufficient supply, and that it was made abroad at a cheaper rate; so that the prohibiting the importation of French Commodities, as was done by an Act of the last Parliament, whereby the prizes of such Paper is advanced, is encouragement sufficient for the Paper Makers in general to make▪ and they now employ themselves in making of such Papers, and having above a hundred Mills in England, can make greater quantities than the new Pretenders thereto, who have but five: and if the Paper-makers in general, and not a select Company, do exercise the same, they will endeavour to exceed one another, and by that means such Paper will be made better, and sold cheaper than otherwise, and the English Nation better supplied, and the same, or a greater number of Poor maintained.  
That the Importation of French Paper being already prohibited by the last mentioned Act, there is no benefit can accrue by this intended Act to the Nation or Trade of Paper-making, nor can such Act answer the Title given it: For instead of encouraging, it will discourage ingenuous Workmen, who through servitude are free of the Trade, to serve others who have no right to it, and dividing the Trade will ruin it, and not establish it.  
That the intended Act is not to make all the Paper Makers a Corporation or to Regulate the Trade, or to furnish the Makers with Materials, or to limit the Work only to English men, and such as have served Apprenticeships, or to ascertain the goodness, or prizes of Paper, or for the like good purposes, as other Societies of men have been incorporated; but to subject the whole to the power, and for the benefit of some particular men, as evidently appears by their Proposals added to their Case; which Proposals can be of no Advantage to the Subscribers, unless the persons concerned, by imposing upon Owners of Mills, to have them at small Rents, and by paying small Wages, and exacting great prizes for their Paper, design to make their gain out of other men's Estates, and poor men's Labours.  
That if the said intended Act should pass, it will allow of a Monopoly, which is repugnant to the Act 21. Jac. which expressly saith amongst other things, that all Grants for the sole making of any thing within this Realm shall be void, and that all Bodies Politic and Corporate shall be disabled to put in ure any such Monopoly.  
That thereby also above a hundred Paper Mills and all dependants thereupon will be destroyed, and divers Paper-makers who have taken long Leases, and are in Bonds and Covenants to pay great Rents will be disabled to pay the same, to the Ruin of them, and of above a thousand Families.  
That the same will also be a bad Precedent, and of dangerous Consequence to all other Crafts; for some men pretending to a greater Excellency in any Craft than others, may by the like means strip all the rest of their Freedoms, Trades, and Livelyhoods, and then impose upon all that shall work, or buy of them at their pleasure.  
That the Case of the Paper makers, doth much concern the Paper Sellers? for that as the Makers have truly set forth the making of Brown Paper alone will not pay the Charges; and that if (as by the intended Act) they shall be Limited in making White Sort of Paper, their Mills will be their Ruin; and then by Consequence, no Paper of any Sort can be made but by the Patentees, and, there being no other Market to go to, may Sell it when, where, in what manner, and at what prize they please; by which means all the Paper Sellers in London, who are very numerous, and have served Apprenticeships to, and brought up in that Trade, which is a distinct Trade of itself, will be deprived of their livelyhoods, and many of them and other Families impoverished.  
It is therefore manifest (by the small Number of Mills now employed by the said New Pretenders, as also by the small quantity of Materials to be found for making White paper, the advance of their price being already more than double) that it is unreasonable as well as against Law; for some few persons to have the sole privilege of making Writing and printing Paper, which will most certain●● ruin very many of the Ancient Paper makers, and be a very great detriment to the many Traders in Paper; and how mischievous it 〈◊〉 to establish a Monopoly, for engrossing an Ancient English Manufacture, is Humbly Submitted to your Honour's Consideration.  
This Sheet is the Common Printing Paper made by the Old Paper Makers.