JUS FECIALE ARMATAE DANIAE. With a short Demonstration Of the most Weighty Causes, WHEREUPON His Sacred Royal Majesty of Denmark, Norwey, the Vandals and Goths, etc. Urged by mere necessity, doth by His Herald, according to the Law of Nations, denounce War both by Land and Sea, AGAINST King CHARLES gustavus AND The Kingdom of Swedeland, After unsufferable Injuries and Damages done Us, and most equal conditions of Peace rejected by the Swedes; and doth renounce all Neighbourly friendship.  
LONDON, Printed and are to be sold at the Sign of the Star in St Paul's Churchyard. 1657.   

JUS FECIALE ARMATAE DANIAE. With a short Demonstration Of the most Weighty Causes, WHEREUPON His Sacred Royal Majesty of Denmark, Norwey, the Vandals and Goths, etc. Urged by mere necessity, doth by His Herald, according to the Law of Nations, denounce War both by Land and Sea, AGAINST King CHARLES gustavus AND The Kingdom of Swedeland, After unsufferable Injuries and Damages done Us, and most equal conditions of Peace rejected by the Swedes; and doth renounce all Neighbourly friendship.  
We FREDERICK the IIIᵈ by the grace of God King of Denmark and Norwey, the Vandals and Goths, etc. To all and every one that shall read and hear these present Letters, of what Degree, Nation or Condition soever they be, Greeting.  
OF our own natural Inclination, We have hitherto, according to the Domestic examples of our Ancestors, and those later footsteps of the most glorious King our Father, still followed Peace; and in all our Counsels have still aimed at the public tranquillity, never intending to have receded from this constant resolution of maintaining Peace, unless an inevitable danger from the Enemy had hung over our heads.  
God hath granted us Kingdoms and Dukedoms enough, hath enriched enough our subjects, without the injury of any one, so that they who understand their own good, need not to envy any of their neighbours.  
We have hitherto endured with patience and connivance the suspected attempts of our enemies, and of their Injuries against us, have thought fit wisely to dissemble some, others to remit at our own will and pleasure, expecting when the unbridled ambition of that Nation, should by the will of God be allayed, which could not choose at length but be weary to see whole Provinces imbrued in Christian blood, and thereby change their hostile minds so exasperated against their neighbours.  
At last when we had so often urged that they could no longer with any just pretence gainsay, a meeting was appointed at Copenhagen, where we laid open those grievances which chief molested us, namely, That we ought not to be so defrauded by the Swedes of our Toll; that our losses and injuries ought according to equity to be repaired: Immediately hereupon Magnus Durelius the King of Swedelands' Deputy and ordinary Ambassador among us, wanted Instructions to treat upon these Heads, and his King wanted Equity to supply those Instructions, and the satisfaction we have upon most equal conditions so often desired, he thinks to be derogatory to the rights of the Swedish Crown, and unexpectedly dissolves those Treaties which were begun by the friendly intercession of the Lord elector of Brandenburg: Neither have they taken notice of our desires of Peace so often offered and transacted by us, nor afterwards of our just Indignation expressed by our Letters of reprisal; but rather with an obdurate mind have refused all just and equal Proposals, remaining according to their custom most perverse and untractable.  
And now more clearly they begin to discover their hidden counsels, being become more insolent by the indulgence of Fortune toward them, and seeing many of their blind attempts, God conniving at their ways, have met with some success, they have now so far forsaken all consideration of Justice, that whatever their neighbour's dispute with them in point of right, they impiously think to decide it by cruel violence and the sword. We should have been glad utterly to have forgot that Invasion, by us as little expected as the falling of the skies, and also that remarkable loss, whereby they deprived the most glorious King our Father of so many large Provinces and Islands, and Us of the Archbishopric of Breme, and the Bishopric of Verden, had they not recalled it to our memory by their reiterated violence and their new practices against us. We were once in a fair way to peace at Bremsebroa, by the providence of God, and at the Intercession of the most Serene King of France and Navarr: the Swedes distrustful in a matter of greatest security, took care to have Hallands-ars delivered into their hands in pawn, an inestimable Province fortified with three strong holds, and this they did with so much the more obstinacy, because they thought themselves not to be obliged by these Covenants.  
We are hearty sorry that these firm beginnings of Peace at Bremsebroa, by which the public quiet of the North was so strengthened, being so fare removed from their sight and minds should be so shaken, and that our Royal Authority should be so immodestly contemned and neglected: Since therefore they bear with an ill mind even our most moderate counsels, at length through their means, We call the whole world and all honest Nations to witness, all Peace was given over as quite hopeless. And therefore We also, this way not succeeding, proceed another way, and having both the Law of God and man on our side, with a sincere and quiet conscience, appeal to the Lord of Hosts and that supreme Tribunal of Nations where all matters are justly decided, and according to the Law of Nations, have recourse to our just Arms, for the defending our Kingdoms and Dukedoms, and protecting Ourselves and subjects from the Injury of the Swedes; that at length by the decree of Divine Providence, and the aid of our Confederates, an honest and secure Peace may be established and confirmed. The friendship therefore which hath hitherto been observed between the two neighbouring Nations, so often rashly infringed and violated by the Swedes, both we for our parts give over, and against the most High Prince the Lord Charles Gustavus King of the Swedes, Goths and Vandals, the Kingdom of Swedeland, and all his subjects, by the Law of God, and by the council of the worthy 
* The Peers of the Realm.  Senators of the Kingdom, and by the unanimous aid of all our subjects, We according to the Law of Arms denounce War both by Land and Sea.  
But since we ought to prove this Expedition allowable before God and our own conscience, with both which we made peace, before we made war with the Swedes, they being guilty of all that bloodshed, and those calamities which render wars so vexatious, and also to submit ourselves to the judgement of the universal and Christian world, who will altogether assent unto us, when they shall hear those high aggravations and weighty motives by which we are urged, and will free us from all imputation of unlawful revenge and invasion.  
I. It is already well known to all the world, that the Swedes in the year 1643, invaded our Archbishopric of Breme and Bishopric of Verden, when as by the permission of both parties which were then in war, and by a most solemn exemption we were to have been Neuter and Secure, forasmuch as by the Authority and subscription of Caesar, the Royal and faithful promises both of the Queen and Peers of Swedeland were confirmed, and without any default on our side constantly observed. When we had recovered the Castle of Vorden, a Cessation of Arms was agreed on between us and the Swedish Army, on condition that pay and provision should be allowed to our Garrison Soldiers out of the Archbishopric; but these Covenants which they yielded unto for their profit, they afterwards receded from, as thinking they would not prove so profitable unto them as they expected; so that in the same thing we are again deceived in the truth of the Swedish promises. Also, At the Peace at Bremsebroa, the restitution of the Archbishopric, at the mediation of the French Ambassador, and with the large promises of the Swedish Deputies, was referred to other Treaties to be renewed at Stockholm in presence of the Queen of Swedeland, nevertheless we ourselves, being then Archbishop, as also our Officers and servants, with every one's goods, were inserted into the 38th Article. But what secret designs they fostered under these promises, they afterwards more openly declared; when contrary to Conditions agreed on, by which we were freed and exempted from the attempts of both parties, & both the Cessation of Arms forbidding, and the Peace at Bremsebroa gainsaying, at that very time when our Ambassadors at Stockholm treated with the Swedes according to agreement, they invaded the Castle of Vorden and took it by siege, and at length inserted the Bishoprics that were to be restored, in the satisfaction which they proposed at Osnabrugg, that so they might the better keep, to our prejudice, those things which they had gotten with injury and violence.  
II. It was most wholesomely agreed on by the 35th Article, for a renewing of friendship and mutual alliance between the two Kings, and that each of them should hinder whatsoever might hurt the Person, Government, Realms and Provinces of the other: This Agreement they utterly neglecting, connived at Corfitz Ulefeld unworthily dealing with us, who published an injurious Pamphlet in divers Languages, that, to the ignominy of our Royal Person, which by every honest subject is always held inviolable, and to the contempt of our blameless and laudable government, he might spread it so much the farther, notwithstanding that the Agreement at Stetin decreed such slanderous detraction a capital crime. And when we complained of this injury, they neither much regarded it, nor made us any reparation, so that Ulefeld was confirmed in his malicious design; and after he had been earnestly accused by us, was admitted to his defence by the Queen and the Senators, our Ambassador not without some disgrace being invited to hear a defence of the same Apology, wherein by a scandalous example, he wronged both Us and the Senators of our Kingdom, and wherein a bad Cause was covered with worse pretences, that he might take some advantage in a void and fruitless process. Neither are the Swedes ashamed, impiously to force new Oaths upon those Ministers of State who are bound to Us by Oath, and being unabsolved and called to defend themselves, to use their service and assistance.  
III. Nor could they satisfy their insatiable ambition by those Provinces and Islands obtained at the Agreement at Bremsebroa, but against the express words of that Treaty, they seized upon two Parishes belonging to Aggershuse, Irn and Zern, which they yet retain, notwithstanding that we have very often but in vain required the restoring of them. We required that a day might be appointed for the deciding of the Controversy, which was appointed by agreement; at which day when ours appeared, the Swedes in a contemptuous manner delude us, and come not at the time appointed, as altogether mistrusting the justice of their cause.  
iv They transgressed that rule and order which our Toll-gatherers were to follow as a certain course in the gathering of their Toll. They intruded themselves into that employment contrary to the dictate of right and reason, for that being strangers they so confounded all things, as if uncertainty and fraud had been their chief aim: to manage these violent and irregular affairs, they put unexperinced boys in office, and that they might make us the more contemptible among foreign Nations, they employed women also. The immunity from Toll granted at Bremsebroa to Swedish Ships and Goods, they by false Bills of Lading and other cunning devices, made common to other Nations which were subject to pay Toll, owning them as Swedish Ships and Goods, and so letting them pass under that notion, and those forms framed in express words in our Treaty with the State's General of the United Provinces, out of which the Toll-gatherers were perfectly informed of the quality of Wares, and of Ships both free and tributary, they by persuasion and authority extorted from Foreigners; at once endeavouring, with a rash desire, as much as in them lay, to spoil us of this our chief Prerogative. Instead of these they for greediness of gain, framed certain Notes or Bills, wherein at pleasure they inserted matters of small moment. Out of the Accounts of the Customehouse we can prove with undeniable certainty, that in the year 1642, (while yet the Livonians paid Tribute) the Cities of Riga and revel, brought in an Account in the name of their Citizens, for Wares valued scarcely at the rate of ten thousand Rixdollars, but that in the year 1655, in the space of one year, when the Swedes had obtained the Immunity granted at Bremsebroa, they sold in the name of the said Cities, divers Wares amounting to the value of Six hundred and fifty thousand Rixdollars, of which the greater part doubtless was properly the Tribute of other Nations, and so unjustly gaining the shorter way, they were let pass through the Sound. We contradicted, but in vain, for it was gainful for them to counterfeit false Papers or Writings, which without shame they many ways multiplyld; and the oftener also whenas the business was again referred to the arbitrement of the Lord elector of Brandenburg. They have always so carried themselves as if from them nothing belonged to us but scorn, not contented unless having hitherto injured us, they abused also our patience. Neither could we hope better things from them, whenas the Treaty written at Bremsebroa, while it was yet scarce dry, nothing regarded, they were so far indulgent to their vain Imaginations, that they used all endeavour in behalf of the State's General of the United Provinces of the Low Countries, that their subjects also might obtain a freedom from the tribute of the Sound. But they chose rather to purchase immortal glory by their constant integrity, and the keeping of their faith unbroken, then to seek an infamous gain out of these suggestions. With the same malicious Intentions they intruded themselves into those matters controverted between Us and our beloved Neighbours and Kindred, which things being undecided, they endeavoured, had the adverse Party assented, to hasten immature execution by the Sword and wont violence of the Swedish Army, that thereby they might deter us from prosecuting our own right.  
V The 42d Article wherein the liberty of Dantzick and of Traffic is asserted, they have utterly rejected, lest there should remain any thing, that might obstruct that Dominion which they have so long arrogated to themselves over the Baltic Sea. They imposed with accustomed Swedish insolence a Tribute upon our Subjects Ships at the mouth of the Weyssel, endeavouring to force the Weyssel out of its naurall into an unwonted channel, and at once to offer violence both to Nature and Commerce. By this very act, Our Royal Authority is greatly injured, whereby partaking of the peace at Bremsebroa, we are both obliged and also fully resolved, God assisting, to vindicate our right to our Crowns, Commonwealths and Cities. They also infringe our Rights upon the Baltic Sea, sufficiently witnessed to the whole world, which have been derived to us from our Royal Ancestors, without the controversy of any of our Neighbours. From hence also we sustain very great loss, in regard Commerce being hindered, our ordinary Revenues from the Customs cease, so often do they endamage us even in one thing.  
At length we observe that by our patience and lenity, the Swedes are so much the more exasperated and offended, and that the friendship which is truly and sincerely observed between us and our neighbours, out of a secret hatred is perverted by them, maliciously judging, that by those Aids which according to the Agreement at Bremsebroa, we together with the High and Mighty States afforded to distressed Dantzick, and afflicted commerce, the Peace was broken at it were by a hostile Invasion. When by a most just demand we treated with them about repairing our Losses and Injuries, they with an offended mind answered, that this could not be done with safety of their Kings right, (as if the Law of Nations exempted Swedeland from equity toward their neighbours;) with fierce and oft repeated menaces they threaten Us, speak proudly of themselves and ignominiously of Us; and without ask leave of Us, they march with their Armies through the Duchy of Sleswick and Holstein, neglecting the rights of the Empire, and of the circuit of Saxony, and carry themselves so proudly as if we were already in their power and jurisdiction. Let all Christian Princes but remember this Insolence, and they will hold us the more excused. Many of them also have approved this expedition with their favourable suffrage, and with extraordinary Embassies, have friendly admonished us of this storm hanging over our heads from a neighbouring Kingdom, to which no doubt the rest will vigorously join.  
For with what dangerous Intents the Swedes rove out of their own Country, they have more openly declared among the Polonians, where with a more indulgent fortune, which the Swedes are not capable of, growing more insolent, and with a gainful boldness from time to time transgressing the bounds of honesty and right, they always gape greedily after their booty and profit; neither do they observe amidst this their blind rashness, that Poland abounds both with domestic and foreign forces; mainly endeavouring this, that having Prussia in their power, they may command the Baltic Sea and all commerce, and there fix themselves so firmly, as not to be shaken or disturbed by any, but may take upon them to be umpires in all things among their neighbours, to vary and dispense Fortune among them at their pleasure, and thence at a convenient season to overrun and infest the sacred Roman Empire.  
From these carriages of the Swedes, our faithful subjects are to be vindicated with the greater caution, because it would be a dangerous simplicity to repose any trust in old or new Covenants long since subverted by them, and which with minds enraged, they to the ruin of their Neighbours, the loss of their own Countrymen, and the prodigal effusion of blood, have designed in their minds, utterly to cancel and extinguish. And also our faithful subjects themselves, have by the singular guidance of the Eternal Providence, seasonably foreseen the tempest hanging over their Country, and with most humble obedience as is meet, have so diligently performed the office of good subjects, that we trust with God's favourable assistance, not only to defend our own Kingdoms and Dukedoms, but also to preserve our best neighbours, (who are concerned with the care of honesty, faith, and the maintenance of Peace) quiet and untouched; provided that they help to promote this most profitable design with their endeavours and authority; especially because those Germans under the Swedish jurisdiction, who, that they might redeem their Country from the tempest coming upon them, by a certain hazardous throw, were exposed to the Insolence and Tyrannous exactions of the Swedes, have been used in so hostile a manner by them, that they have often times implored help from God and us.  
We also, according to that inbred zeal derived to us from our Ancestors, shall use all diligence, that care may be taken for the good and quiet, as long as is possible, of the sacred Roman Empire whereof we are one of the principal members, and for the promoting of the more prosperous enlargement thereof. In this we have studiously followed our Ancestors, have so friendly carried ourselves toward our common Country, and are so conscious to have done well, that they will free Us from all Imputation of rash turbulence, and help our Intention with their counsel and aid; and on the contrary, strongly oppose those professed disturbers of the common Peace and quiet, resolved to repress that inhuman and barbarous Nation, that at length, God being our Leader, we may quell and utterly vanquish this fierceness of theirs, which grows so presumptuous in the midst of Arms. We shall thankfully acknowledge the help and assistance which the equity of our undertaken Expedition requires from all, and shall earnestly strive to deserve it, by our singular amity, and favourable propension of mind to them. And we shall also take care, that the most weighty Reasons which have moved us, of ourselves unwilling hereunto, be shortly made public in a more full Relation.  
God to whose protection we commend you with a pious and sincere heart, direct our Arms with his omnipotent hand to their right aim, and give judgement according to the equity of the Cause, to the glory of his eternal Majesty, that the oppressed neighbourhood may be vindicated, the liberty of interrupted commerce restored, and secure peace, happy, quiet and undisturbed rest may be renewed and established between Us and our neighbouring Kingdoms and Commonwealths. Farewell.  
Given under our Hand and private Seal at our Residence of Copenhagen, June 3d 1657. FREDERICK. L. S.