A LETTER FROM A GRAVE GENTLEMAN once a Member of this House of COMMONS, to his friend, remaining a Member of the same House in LONDON.  
CONCERNING HIS REASONS WHY he left the House, and concerning the late Treaty.  
Printed in the Year, 1643.   

SIR,  
I Am extremely glad that in this time of general Distraction and Ruin, (of which pragmaticalness and want of Charity are both the effect and the cause) there is yet so much Leisure and kindness left, even in the most busy and most ill-natured place, to admit a thought of a Person no more considerable, and to afford a letter to a Malignant and a Cavalier, and that you put me not out either of your Memory or Your Care, when those you live with put me out of the House. And truly, if you could, in despite of the Infection of Your Climate, have as well preserved your Logic as your good Nature, either you might have brought me to your Opinions, or have left me hopes that I might persuade you into mine; Whereas now I see no probability of either, your way of arguing being so different from your own usual rational way, that you seem to me to have burnt your Aristotle's Organon, and to have learned a new manner of making Syllogisms from Mr Gordon and Serjeant Wild. Sir, I assure you, that though you have there inflicted a Punishment upon me, which in the beginning of the Parliament would have broke my Heart, and that for no other cause (for aught appeared to you) then for having business at York, when you had banished the King from London, yet I am more troubled with the decay of Reputation which both Houses suffer by such unreasonable and unjust Votes, then for my own Concern in their unreasonableness and Injustice, being sufficiently comforted against my share in them, by the Company you have given me, having expelled whole Shoals (sometimes twenty in a morning) of Gentlemen, first chosen and still esteemed by their Countries, for continuing in, and demeaning themselves according to the same Principles, by which they had obtained that Choice and Estimation.  
1. You know Sir, you and I were, both at once, both committed about the Loans, and put out of the Commission of the Peace for opposing Shipmoney, and how sensible We after found the Parliament of all men's sufferings in that kind, and for those causes. And did either of us then think to have lived to have seen any so much as discountenanced by both Houses of Parliament for refusing a loan, though it were called a Contribution, or opposing an Ordinance as illegal as that Writ, grounded upon a Necessity as hard to be discovered as that which was then pretended? How often have you told me (when you have heard the Courtiers argue that without such a Power in the Crown, no Parliament sitting, the Kingdom might be avoidable destroyed) that with▪ or without that Power We should be liable to mighty dangers, but the Wisdom of the Law had avoided those most that were likely to come oftenest; That now besides, the Question was not what was best to be Law, but what was Law; That Arguments from Convenience are good considerations in framing of Laws or founding of States, but that the State being framed it was most ridiculous and dangerous to retire from the Law to a disputable convenience or Necessity, and put ourselves back again into the same Maze of Debates and Questions, which Laws were framed to be rules to us to deliver us from; And yet then, Sir, We might have known this present fundamental (and indeed only Law now left) of nature and Necessity, And Salus Populisuprema▪ Lex▪ was a sentence that was no stranger to Us, and these are sure better Pretences for one Estate, when the other two are not in being, then for two Estates in the presence and in the despite of the Third.  
2. You and I, Sir, were both of that Parliament in which my Lord of bristols dispute with my Lord Duke of Buckingham, and our dislike of my Lord Duke got my Lord of Bristol all those that disliked the other, to labour to assist and protect him, and you know how studious most men were in that work, when my Lord of Bristol was accused of Treason by the King's Attorney in the Lord's House, and yet the accusation stood received till the end of the Parliament. And could We ever have then believed, that an Accusation in the same manner, by the same Officer, in the same Court, before almost all the very same men (no difference in the case but between Bristol and Kimbolton) should be voted a high breach of Privilege, should be a Reason to censure the Attorney, and the main and most sufficient Pretence for most necessary and defensive Arms, at least for a horrid Rebellion under that Title?  
3. You and I were both of that Parliament in which my Lord of Arundel being Committed, you know how both Houses laboured his Discharge. You know how tender we were then of Our Privileges, and how much more likely to claim a Privilege that we had not, then to quit a Privilege we had, and how many able, honest, judicious Lawyers we had of the House, that would not have suffered us to have overseen Our Right. And when in that Parliament a Petition framed by both Houses did admit their Privilege of Parliament not to extend to Cases either of Treason, Felony, or refusing to give sureties for the Peace, could we ever have thought to see it claimed as a Privilege, that no member be restrained without order of the House, though in case of Treason to be immediately acted upon the King's Person? And could we ever have thought to have seen the People, engaged by Order of the House of Commons alone, and under Pretence of an uncommanded Protestation, to have assisted all such as should be so restrained, in despite of this Declaration of both Houses, and in Opposition to the known Laws of the Land?  
4. You and I Sir have been of many other Parliaments, and when we saw so many Bills offered, and some passed, and others laid by, sometime with Our sorrow, but never with our complaint, when we all acknowledged, with the old▪ Act of Parliament, that is was of the King's Regality to grant or deny them, and no one of us so much as whispered to any friend, that the King had done illegally in doing so, or broke the Oath taken at His Coronation, because of the Clause, Quas vulgus Elegerit, could we ever have thought then to have seen the whole frame of Monarchy destroyed, by seeing the King's Negative voice denied Him, and He called by consequence a perjured man, for not consenting to any public Bill from both Houses, though it were to depose Himself?  
5. When in those Parliaments We saw so little prevalency in the Puritan party, that they were never able to pass a Bill, even in the House of Commons, for such an ease of weak consciences in the point of indifferent Ceremonies, as I always wished them, and as the King hath now often professed Himself ready to join in, (which Profession would sure have been more readily entertained, if they had not feared, that this would have been so full a satisfaction to so many, that their side would have been much weakened by it) could we then ever think to have lived to see the Common-Prayer Book totally neglected, and publicly affronted, and those neglects and affronts not only connived at, but as publicly countenanced and encouraged by that honourable Assembly, and to see a Bill passed both Houses, for the total extirpation of Bishops, Root and Branch, and this Bill offered to His Majesty among Propositions for Peace?  
6. In those Parliaments though some of us often expressed our dislike of some illegal Clauses, in the Commissions given to, and executed by Lords and Deputy. Lieutenants, yet did we ever hear, or look to hear of the least pretence, that the Militia of this Kingdom was either not under the King's Command, or under any Command but His? And did both Houses so much as suspect themselves upon any pretence, or in any time, to have any Right to order and dispose of it?  
7. In those Parliaments though we have often humbly represented to His Majesty some things, wherein we supposed there was some failour in His Ministers in those particulars which we then all confessed the Law had solely trusted to Him, as of Ships not set out, or Forts ill guarded, or the like; yet did we ever think it possible both Houses should ever pretend to such a supervisorship over that Trust, that whensoever they would say He did not discharge it as He ought, they might legally lay hold on it themselves, and having seized His Ships, Forts, Magazines, etc. take up Arms to maintain what they had done, and to keep this their Trust Paramount in perpetual execution?  
8. In those Parliaments did we ever see the same things several times pressed to the Lords House by the House of Commons (after they had been upon mature advice rejected by them) as if they had meant to say, Deny it if you dare; and at last passed there with the People's help, either a thin House being watched for, or some of the Lords out of anger, and some out of▪ fear absenting themselves?  
9 In all those Parliaments did we ever see any Declarations of both Houses against the King, or of one House against the other, Printed and published to the people, calling them to their assistance, and laying before them their destruction if they assisted not?  
10. In all those Parliaments, did we ever see when any thing had been proposed to, and rejected by the House of Lords, the House of Commons notwithstanding proceed in it, and express their minds of it to the people, as in the point of the Bill for the Protestation, or when the House of Lords had published an Order for the established Law, as they did now upon the ninth of September, did we ever see the House of Commons oppose them and the Law together, and disgrace the one, and endeavour to suppress the other, as they did now by a Printed Order to the contrary, of the same Date?  
11. Did we ever see the House of Commons in all those Parliaments so invade the Privilege of the House of Lords, as first to question particular Members for words spoken in that House (as my Lord Duke and my Lord Digby) and next to question the whole House by bringing up and countenancing a mutinous and seditious Petition, which demanded the names of those Lords, who consented not with the House of Commons in those things which that House (that is the Major part of it) had twice denied, and joining with them in that Demand?  
12. Did We ever see Petitions brought by armed Mechanics countenanced by the House of Commons, the Assaults made by them upon their own Members, though complained of, not enquired into, and these multitudes termed their Friends by the principal Governors, the House of Lords refused to be joined with in their modest desire, only of a Declaration against the like for the future, the guard against the like placed by virtue of a Writ, issued by command of the Lords House, discharged, the justice of Peace that placed them committed, & the ordinary legal Inquisition upon Riots stopped and hindered by an order of the House of Commons alone?  
Sir, some of these things having been done in former Parliaments so contrary to what is now done, & so many things now done, which were never attempted in (and if they had been thought of would have been condemned by) those former Parliaments; you must pardon me if I think that charge of Apostasy (which under other men's names you yourself lay upon me) to be very injurious, and I appeal to any man that shall consider and examine my Action and these particulars, whether I left the Houses till they left the Law, and whether to quit the place and retain the principles, or to quit the principles, and be only constant to the place, be the greater and the truer Apostasy.  
The next Objection you make is this, That whereas We here pretend to stand for Law, yet it is only for such a Law, of which we Ourselves will only be judges, refusing to stand to the judgement of the supreme judicatory of the Kingdom, both Houses of Parliament. And truly Sir, if this objection were made by a stranger only made acquainted with the general Scheme of the Constitution of the Kingdom, & neither with the particular Laws, nor the particular Occurrences, I should not wonder; but from one who hath been a constant Member of the Parliament, I wonder to receive it. First, Sir, I appeal to you, whether you do not believe, that suppose, (which were hardly possible to be supposed) that both Houses (in the fullest and freest condition of Parliament that is imaginable) should declare, that by the Law of the Land, The King's Crown and the Subjects Property and Liberty were to be disposed of by them, and should take up Arms to make this good for Law, and declare that by Law all the Subjects of the Land were obliged to assist their Arms thus taken up; Suppose this, I say; Do you not believe, that their being the Supreme judicatory could not satisfy Our consciences (who have taken the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy) in a judgement as contrary to those Oaths and the known Law, as it is known that by the Law both Houses have Power to judge in any other Cases, or that there are at all two Houses of Parliament? And sure this is now (as to what is done, though not as to their condition who do it) either the Case, or very near it. Indeed, Sir, till the Parliament was made perpetual, such a Case was absolutely unimaginable, for being a dissoluble Body, kept them from invading the known Rights either of King or Subjects, of neither of which they need now to have the same apprehension, having strengthened themselves by a Bill against the one, and by an Army against the other.  
But, Sir, I cannot allow you so much, The Houses now are neither full nor free; Really the Major part of the Commons, and evidently the Major part of the Lords, do not, cannot, dare not come to you. How much you were wont to mislike Tumults, appears to me by your former bitterness against them, when they came down to press even those things, for the passing of which you had been very earnest in the House, and you may remember you apprehended them so much, that I had much ado, during the time they lasted, to persuade you to venture yourself any nearer to Westminster, than your Chamber in Fleetstreet, and that you answered me, when I told you that you needed not fear, for those People took you for their Friend, that a Brickbat was an ill distinguisher of friends, and that you saw enough of those Gentlemen out of your Window as they passed along the streets, to make you not desire to keep them company without a Wall between you. Sir, if a few within, shall have power to draw a multitude from without, to awe the rest, and make them either retire, or judge as they please, and then judge so (as in the point of the Militia, Hull, and taking up of Arms) as with safety of Conscience no man can rest in their judgements, nor with safety of Purse and Liberty oppose them, and shall keep themselves still by this means the Major part to judge on as they have begun, and yet may still retain the Authority of the Supreme judicatory, then really, Sir, it must of necessity follow, That the Subjects will still be in the power of the seditious & factious, and it is not the men but the Walls that make the two Houses of Parliament. No, Sir, it is you, who refuse to secure the Parliament from Tumults where it is, or to remove it thither where it may be secure, that refuse to have it tried what is Law by the Supreme judicatory of the Kingdom, all you say now is but the same, as if the Lord Chief justice of the King's Bench, out of Parliament time, should by force drive away his Brethren of the same Bench, and then judge there, that none of those other judges were more than His mere Assistants in that Court, & then find fault with them for not submitting to that judgement as made and delivered by the highest Court of justice.  
But, Sir, foreseeing this Objection of the Tumults would come strongly upon you, you prepare the Ward for that Blow, and tell me that though some disorders indeed there were, yet this was but the pretence of Our absence, for the Tumults did precede Our absenting Ourselves by many weeks, in which time We came often to the House, and securely opposed the sense thereof. The disorders, Sir, you speak of were such, and did so awe the Members, that you know some discourse, in order to doing of that which this put really in execution, was voted Treason by Our House, but the same awing of the Parliament, when it is done by the well-affected, and countenanced by the worthy Members, and the good Lords is, it seems, but disorder, and no Treason: These Tumults first caused Our infrequent meeting at the House, who differed from their Opinions that had such Satellites abroad, and this Infrequency gave leave to the rest to command such things as our Consciences would not allow us to obey. If We took not up Arms in obedience to your Ordinance of the Militia; If We would not live and die with my Lord of Essex etc. you would punish and imprison us; If We did, the known Law, agreeing with His Majesty's Proclamation, told us, We were Traitors, and the Protestation We had taken to defend the King's just Rights, told us, We were forsworn; If We joined together to over-vote you in it (for as long as We came and opposed you not, or opposed you and carried it not against you, or carried only that which was not much material, I confess we were safe enough) the precedent Tumults had sufficiently told us, That they would beat out our Brains; So what was left for us to do, but to be gone? And yet We could not go till We could go somewhether, and therefore were to bear our Condition as well as We could, till His Majesty were in Posture to give us that Protection which He ought us by the Law. And this was the true Cause both why We went, and why no sooner.  
But your next Objection is of all other the most unreasonable, That you have discovered by this Treaty, That the King is averse to Peace. And in the name of God, whereupon is this discovery founded? It is well known that in all several Conditions, the King hath equally pressed for Peace, and the Rulers of the House of Commons have equally opposed it; And probably they would have gone further, and used their old Arts to have stopped the consent to this Treaty by violence too, if they had not looked upon their appearing so to break it, when so many desired it, as too great a burden of Envy, and known their Interest to be enough to be able to break it before it could be concluded, with less disgust than at that time, as being easier to persuade the people, that any individual Peace was not good for them, then that no Peace at all was, which a Totall rejection of all Treaty did clearly imply. And did they not (when the sense of their misery had given their followers Courage to over-vote them in this) clog the Treaty as much as possibly they could; First, with a Resolution that their Committee should Treat only with His Majesty, (which He might well, and so they hoped He would refuse) then with such Limitation of Articles to two, and of days to four, and of Instructions to hardly any, That they might have sent down their Papers by Edgerley the Carrier to His Majesty, and he might as easily have concluded a Peace with Him, as with so bounded and untrusted a Committee? But in the Treaty what did the King ask or deny that shown so little desire of Peace▪ If He had asked together with His Ships, Forts, and Castles, the Lives of those who took them from Him, (which if He had, He had asked no more than belongs to Him by Law, as the proper Security that the like violence should be offered Him no more) and if He had required an end of the whole Treaty before He disbanded, (which is yet the usual course of Treaties) you might have had some Colour for what you object; But now the whole Objection is this, His Majesties own Ships, Forts, Magazines, etc. were by violence, and that of Subjects, taken from Him, and this unreasonable, unpeaceable, bloodthirsty Prince desires to have them again. An excellent Argument of Aversion to Peace. When the Cessation was in Debate, the King demanding the Approbation of the Commanders of the Ships, It was replied, That this Demand was to desire the strength of one party to the other before the difference were ended; and upon this Reason the King receded from that Condition, never expecting that they would so soon have forgotten their own Logic, and have demanded, That when Differences were ended, this Approbation, that is this strength should for three years continue in them. And sure the King is in a miserable Condition, if neither a Cessation nor a Treaty be a fit time or means for Him to recover his Own. But say you the Fears and jealousies of the People must be satisfied. Say I, the People must be satisfied, That there was Cause of Fears and jealousies. And one Cause of their Demand is, That these things would appear to have been taken without Reason, if they were restored without Conditions. But this may be an Argument to them to ask it, I am sure it can be none to the King to grant, for then by the contrary Argument the King is necessitated to insist that they be restored without Limitations or Conditions, because He can never confess that they were taken from Him with any Reason or Colour.  
Sir, though you have great Abundance of Fears and jealousies, yet you have not hoarded them so up, but you have given some to the King, certainly if when these things were in his Hands they were wrested by you from Him, you may do it with much greater case, if you have more than half the Hold (as you confess in the Point of the Ships, that the allowing of Approbation of the Commanders gives up the strength.) And nothing can be more ridiculous then for you to pretend to fear Him when He shall have those, whom you did not fear when He had them. Certainly if you had apprehended this Power as you pretend, you would never when he was vested in it have offered Him such injuries, and denied Him such Rights, as you never offered or denied to His Predecessors, at least you would have thought that Power if not able to punish you, yet able to defend itself, and you would never have attempted so hard a work as to take it from Him. This, Sir, is the truth, and that most visibly; These Powers are so fare from enabling Him to oppress you, That the least Colour of such an intention after a Peace would be the same as delivering them up to you again; They were your Levies that made His; It was you that raised Him an Army when you gave Him the Law of His side, and He will not be able to raise another if He have once disbanded this, till you give Him again the same Advantage, and you will be able to oppress Him if He shall give it you. For to fear that He shall conquer England with three or four small Garrisons, when those who now assist Him (that is almost all the Gentry of England) must look upon Him as the most perjured man alive, and upon themselves as dispensed with by Him from any Obedience or Loyalty to Him, is so hypochondriacal a fancy, that it is either to be mad, or to resolve that He is so. Nothing else can so puff Him up with some Ships, and a few Forts (which without money to Man and pay them, are but so many Hulks, and but bare walls) as not rather to be inclined to comply in any reasonable thing with the only Legal Root and spring of Money, the House of Commons, that He may live in Glory and Peace, then without Money to hope to begin and conquer in an unjust War, Who hath found it so difficult to defend Himself in so visibly a just one. There is yet another reasonable Fear & jealousy for the King to apprehend, The Nineteen Propositions (in which there was presented to Him a perfect Platform of a total change of Government, by which the Counsellors were to have been Kings, and the King to have become scarce a Counsellor, and nothing of the present State to have remained, but Eadem Magistratuum vocabula) cannot easily get out of the King's Head, or appear to Him not to be still in theirs, who were the framers and Contrivers. And He hath great cause to be very wary after such an instance of some men's ends and designs (this Parliament being by Law perpetual, and a Triennial one being however to be) not to give any Ground to any such Power in both Houses as may make this submitting of His known Rights, in the choice of these particulars, to their Approbation, a ground to continue these, and draw on more of the same kind, and to divide at least that Dependence with them which the Law (for excellent and necessary Reasons) meant only to the Crown; If Fears and jealousies be so rewarded, I doubt I shall see new ones at the Three years' end, that this share in conferring of Places of Power and trust may be rather increased then lost. And there could not be a greater justification and fortification of this jealousy, then to see a new Book printed by order of a Committee of the House of Commons with a Members (john White's) hand to it, whole Title is, The Sovereign Power of Parliaments and Kingdoms, asserting the Parliament and Kingdoms Right and Interest in, and power over not only the Militia, Ports, Forts, & Ammunition of the Realm, but likewise to make choice of the Keeper, Treasurer▪ Privy-seal, Privy-Councellors, judges and Sheriffs of the Kingdom, and denying the King's negative Voice to such public Bills as both Houses deem necessary and just; And if all this belong to both Houses, I wonder what is left to belong to the King, but to give Warrants for Bucks, without consent of Parliament.  
But say you, If the King would have named persons to them, He should have seen how moderate you would have been in your Exceptions. Truly, Sir, what you would have been perhaps neither of us know, but by your refusing to make the Law your Rule, it seems you intended to give a very arbitrary Approbation. And though you now say (as we always hear much of the moderation intended by you, whensoever a Treaty is either broken or diverted) that you would have excepted against none but impeached persons, yet I am sure in the Bill for the Militia, the King offering you the same Persons, whom within a few Weeks before you had offered Him for the same employments, you yet excepted against four, my Lord Marquis of Hertford, my Lord of Cumberland, my Lord of Derby, and my Lord of Lincoln, because in the Interim they did not accept of a Command over the Militia without the King's consent, (who could only Legally give it them) and yet since, the last (having so much submitted his Conscience to Power, that from being unsatisfied with raising Arms, without the King, He is come to make no scruple of bearing Arms against Him) is now again so fully confided in by you, that Respect to the King, and Reverence to the Law appear to be the Qualities you cannot confide in, and the King after such an instance hath great Reason to be wary, how He either approve of your confiding, or confide in your Approbation. And if they really meant, only to except against impeached Persons, why did they not say so much in the Treaty, to have made the breach of the Treaty, on their side, somewhat more popular? And since to direct their Exceptions they knew who were Legally vested in those Places, (for the King only named those whom the Law had named first) Why did they not except at such of them as were impeached, and give that as a Reason, or make some other (at least colourable) exception against them, which upon debate and mutual reasoning might have produced either their satisfaction or the Kings, unless an agreement were not that effect of their Treaty, which they aimed at most. Truly I am very confident the King knew not (and I am the more confident of it, because I am certain, I knew nothing of it myself) that any Persons now in those Commands had ever been impeached, and then sure the King had no Reason to take it so fare for granted, that any deserved to be excepted at against whom He knew no exceptions Himself, as without a present Charge to dispossess them of those Commands to which they had a present Right. And God forbidden, Sir, That a mere Charge not proved, nor yet answered to, should dispossess men of their Rights, especially in a time in which a Charge comes so easily, that men are voted Traitors for assisting the King against a Rebellion against Him. You instance only 〈…〉 men Will: L●gg, and Mr G●ring. And for the first, I pray, what is he charged with, only for being employed by the King as a mere messenger in the delivery of a Petition, which having been Printed ever since the twelfth of August, I could never yet hear either publicly or privately any objection made against it, and which I am sure must appear very just, humble, and modest, even to the most passionate, if they compare it to the Petition of Hertfordshire, or to that of the Thousands of poor People about London, or to diver●… others which received the Countenance of one House, and Thanks from both. And sure if the Crime had been so great as you would now intimate, you would never for so long a time have suffered him to have gone whether he pleased upon Bail. For the second Person I am not enough of his Acquaintance to be able to answer for him▪ but certainly you can lay nothing but Loyalty to his Change, since to the very Minute of his declaring for the King, when Arms were raised against His Majesty, you confided so much in him, that I am credibly informed you meant to have made him (Lieutenant General of your whole Army, and I am sure when I left London, he was esteemed by you an excellent Patriot, one who had saved the Kingdom from a greater than the Gunpowder Treason, and was the very Darling and Favourite of the Commonwealth.  
This is, Sir, the true state of the case, after that the House of Lords (whereof the major part by above twenty, there being then hardly any Bishop in Town uncommitted, and not one Popish Lord left in Town, had twice refused to join in ask the Militia, Forts, Ports, etc. of the King) were forced by the threatening Petitioners, and the Countenance given to them by the House of Commons, to join with them perforce in their fears and jealousies, and in that Demand which was grounded upon them, and after that in an humble pursuance of these desires, these things (with the Magazines and Ships to boot) are forced from His Majesty, (whom & His Ancestors the Law had as irrevocably vested in them, as it hath any man in England in his House, Goods, or Land) it is thought an Aversion to Peace in the King, that He will not by now assenting condemn Himself as guilty of this War, for not having rather at first then now assented to these Desires, which were their ground of it; That He will not by this Assent condemn the Lords House for not having sooner discovered the Causes of fears and jealousies, (which occasioned, and, as they say, did necessitate the continuance of those Desires) till their Eyes were opened by the Threats and Tumults of the People; That He will not justify these forcible proceed against Himself in taking these things from Him, by submitting to any Conditions or Limitations whatsoever to recover them again, but doth pertinaciously insist to have His own restored to Him, and thinks to put them off with justice, and with the Law of the Land. For though the Militia were not named either in the Proposition of both Houses, or in the Kings, yet even that too is hooked in in their Limitations in such a manner as the People may not see it, and not only they deliver not what is the Kings to Him, but, as it were demand satisfaction from Him for having taken it, and not only (without any regard to the Right of the Persons legally vested, or offering any legal or colourable Exception against them) require still that such be named in those Places as they may confide in, (though We may take a measure by what Rule they will confide, by the Precedents I quoted before) and not only they require this for once at first, but if any die within three years they must confide again, and indeed that is a fair time taken to be sure by that time to have more fears and jealousies ready made to keep up the perpetuity, and to extend the Power of confiding; But yet farther these Officers and the Admiral and others must take an Oath to suppress all Forces that shall be raised, during that time, without the consent of both Houses▪ so that by this, His Majesty, even in Case this Parliament should end sooner (if perhaps they have not resolved it shall not, and have prepared this as a Reason why it should not) and in case never so great a Rebellion should rise, or never so terrible an invasion should come in upon us, must neither increase his Garrisons, nor raise other Forces to resist them, unless a Parliament both be, and be willing to afford Him their Consent, and His Majesty having sworn to protect His Subjects must quit the old legal way of doing it Himself▪ and (at best) be obliged to call upon others to help Him not to be foresworn. Truly, Sir, unless like one that hath been so long in the dark, that he takes a Rush Candle for the Sun, you have now so long kept unreasonable Company▪ that you think any thing on this side the Ninteen Propositions to be reasonable, you would never approve a demand which doth thus slyly and by the by divest the King of that sole Power over the Militia (& that for a year longer than your own Bill asked it) which was the first and chiefest Dispute between the King and the Commons, (for the Lords had had no jealousies, if they had had no Fears) and which is so principal a Prerogative of the Crown, as without it He will hold the Crown itself by no better a Tenure, then durante bene placito. Nor could you expect that He should grant you that (together with such other things) having an Army at Oxford, which alone and naked He refused at Hampton-Court and Windsor. What else do you except at in the Treaty? Why say you the King pretends to ask nothing but what is Law, why doth He require us to adjourn from London? Sir, He never required it. He required a security from Tumults and violence for Himself and both Houses, and this sure is due to Him by the Law; the other course He only proposed, as that which in his Opinion could only effect it, and truly if the minds of the Rabble of London be not much altered since I left it, I must be much of his mind.  
But say you, The King was ever offered that; He was indeed, Sir, but at the same time they defended, that there had been no Tumults, so that the King could not receive so much of Security from their Offer, as the Tumults must needs receive of encouragement from their Defence, the sense of what they said put together being only this, That they would secure Him and us from any thing which they would confess to be a Tumult. But for my part if I be constrained & in danger, it is not enough for me that you vote me free and safe; Call them Tumults or not, as you please, if there be that which looks as like Tumults as the last did, I shall be, though perhaps in more safety, yet in no more security then at Edgehill.  
But say you, what an ungrateful thing were it of the Parliament to desert that City from which they have received so large Assistance? Truly, Sir, the Country (God forgive it) hath contributed not a little to your Assistance too, and aught to have some part of your Care, and for the City itself (besides that Allegiance is a duty as well as Gratitude, and a precedent Bond to this) in my Opinion even for their sake you ought to consent to this advice▪ Do you think That City will be able to bear that burden of Envy which must fall upon them from all the rest of the Nation, if they see you for this consideration expose them to all the miseries of War, rather than remove twenty miles from thence, though the King allow you your own Choice of a place out of all the whole Kingdom besides? Nay, do you think, that if the Armies were disbanded, the Peace again begun, and the whole Parliament now met at St Alban, that the City would not find both their charge much diminished, and their Trade and get much increased, and a miraculous change of their condition to the better? Nor can any inconvenience come by it, unless you think Freedom not only not essential to, but not consistent with such meetings, and unless it be your opinion, that no Tumults, no Parliament.  
But say you, suppose the King in justice might ask and refuse all He does; Were it not yet prudent for the King rather to consent to part with some of His Right then to venture all the rest; And were it justifiable in Him to destroy His Kingdom and so many Innocents', by not ending the War when now He may? Sir, I am confident since you are able to say nothing against it (or if you are, why do you not?) you would as well have granted as have supposed this, if you had not feared Sr Robert Pies fortune, That your Letter might have been read at the close Committee; and till you give me Reasons why you cannot grant it, I must assume it as if you did. And then truly, I must tell you, that this Logic will in all times render the wise and the welnatured a Prey to the unreasonable and the furious, and that as there are some outward medicines for the Stone and the Gout, which only stupifying and not removing the Cause give only a little ease for the present, but make the fits both more frequent and more fierce; so the accepting of such Conditions might ease us for the present of this Rebellion, but (when it were seen that to seize and usurp all the King's Rights, and peremptorily to resolve rather to destroy the Kingdom then to give them up again, were the way to persuade Him to relinquish a good part of them) it may so fare encourage future Rebellions, that We may doubt they would be hereafter as Triennial as Parliaments, till the King by this Logic and little by little, have given so much to appease them, that nothing will be left Him either to give or to keep, and out of His Care of His People He have made them none of His, and have engaged them besides into the miseries of many Wars, by paying so dearly for the end of this.  
But, Sir, I pray turn your Argument on the other side. Both Houses have not Kingdoms of their own to see destroyed by the War, but they have Rights as Houses, and Estates as Persons▪ which being their all, is to be prudentially of the same Concern to them; And suppose the King did ask them to part with some of their Rights or Estates, were it prudent or justifiable in them by the same reason to venture all their Rights, rather than part with some, and to destroy their fortunes, the Kingdom and so many Innocents' by not ending the War when they might? But Alas! how much more imprudent and unjustifiable is it in them, to venture all and destroy the Kingdom, and so many Innocents', by continuing this War▪ rather than to grant to the King what is justly and notoriously His own, or forbear to insist, that He should grant that to them, which you do not so much as pretend in justice to belong to them? And do you think whether the People will not be excellently satisfied, and whom they will adhere unto in it, when they see the cause of the Continuance of this miserable War thus shortly, truly, and clearly stated and laid open? Can you, Sir, pretend any longer to be thought one of the moderate, (by any other title then by living among those who are somewhat madder than yourself) if you can believe that the requiring much that is neither reasonable, nor theirs, argue Inclination to Peace in both Houses, & the Kings ask but somewhat that is reasonable and his own, show an Aversion to it in His Majesty, & if you continue to blame the King for not granting what you only suppose it Prudence to grant, & continue to join with, & assist those against your Allegiance, and against Him, who insist upon that, which the same Rule of Prudence doth oblige them not to insist upon, and the Rule of justice obliged them not to have asked; Especially since, If your Assistance, and that of such as you are, did not give them their strength, there were then no Colour of any Argument left so much as from Prudence, to persuade the King to grant what they now ask Him, and Peace itself is not more desirable, than the Conditions of it would be reasonable, which would then be had from them.  
But Fears and jealousies keep you still on that side. And to this I can only answer; First, that of the King there is no ground of Fears and jealousies, If there be, they must be both of His Will and of His Power, and I can see no pretence for either. Here have been during His Government many and great Illegalities suffered and committed by His Ministers. But was He ever bred in any of the Inns of Court, and then is it reasonable to lay the fault of that to His Charge, which as He often knew not to be done at all, So He never knew to be illegally done? Did He not ever leave the trial to the laws? Did He ever Solicit or threaten any judge to say that was Law which was not? Did He ever offer to protect any from this Parliament, that had either offended against Law, or Judged amiss of Law, though in the Cases most to His own advantage? And hath he not given all possible Personal Satisfaction for other men's faults, both by public acknowledgements (a thing unusual for Princes to descend to) of things past, by extraordinary Provisions for the future, by the Punishment of His nearest and most trusted Setvants in no ordinary way, by quitting many Rights pretended to by His Ancestors, and many more confessed to be Legally in Him, by frequent and Solemn Protestations and Execrations (which are much strengthened by the Person of the Protestor, known to be neither revengeful, nor guilty of any of those Crimes, or liable to any of those temptations, which most usually engage men into breach of so public a faith) And last (which should most work with them who are most wrought upon by that) Is it not evident that His Interest joins with His Conscience in the requiring this observance from Him, and that for Him to break what the promises to His whole Kingdom, and in the observance of which the whole Kingdom is concerned, were the way to turn the Cavaliers into Roundheads, and the same thing as for Him to mediate a League between His Friends and His Enemies against Himself? The King, Sir, hath had great Experience by what means the Court lost their Interest in the People, and (by the Advantage that hath been since made out of it upon Him) of what Consequence that Interest is, and He is more to be trusted that He will never hazard the like loss by the same way, than any new Prince in whose time there had been no misgovernments and misfortunes. He cannot but know that a Kingdom is like a Torch, which having been once on Fire, though after put out, will take Fire again much more easily, than another which was never kindled.  
Secondly, I answer, That the King hath reason to have Fears and jealousies, not only in Case He accepted of their Propositions, but although His own Propositions were granted to Him, if His care of His People did not prevail with Him above them. For both the Will and the Power of others doth sufficiently appear, by what hath been already attempted and effected both by them and against Him. And when His Army is once disbanded with no fuller satisfaction in their Pay (and perhaps with much less to some of their Hopes) than He is able to give them, He will be so much more unlikely to be able to raise another, if a Necessity of it should come again; and the zeal of their Army of Separatists is so well known, and in how short warning upon the least sign they would flock together again; And how much they are the more Plotting, more united, more industrious, and more violent Party of the Houses and of the Kingdom, and what influence Arts, union, Industry and violence have upon the People to misled, carry away or bear down the divided and the indifferent, that is the Major part of the rest, is so well known too, that whether by beginning a new war if they see Cause, or by awing the Parliament again, (for they will be ready to travail farther than twenty miles in so good an errand) or by perpetual Diligence in the House observing and complying with the Interests and affections of the Members to gain them over, or in watching when the House is emptiest and fittest for their Turn, or by any other Art that can conduce to their ends with the People, first to seduce, and then to inflame them, they are likely to have no small advantage of His Majesty, and are most unlikely not to improve to the uttermost any Advantage they shall have.  
Thirdly, I answer, That the Kingdom hath as much Cause as the King to have Fears and jealousies of the same Persons; And that in those points which are most dear and most important to them. Doth Alteration of the Religion established deserve a jealousy? What Printing, Preaching and violence do we daily hear and see against the Government and Liturgy of this famous Protestant Church? Do they not avowedly fight to take it away? What swarms of Lay Tub-Preachers, what strange unheard of Innovations daily arise among us? Nor are those Innovations only about words or Actions in themselves indifferent, (as calling a Table an Altar, a Minister a Priest, or receiving the Communion rather at the window, then in the middle of the Chancel, Innovations, which yet you know, Sir, I never approved) nor yet about opinions merely speculative, (as some of those are which have formerly troubled Parliaments) but in such opinions as disorder all Government and dissolve civil society in order to setting up jesus Christ in a Throne, in which no History can tell us that ever he sat yet, throughout any one Province, or in any one Parish. And all this I will not say how unpunished, but how countenanced, and by whom, but by those men, who make use of Your Authority to produce none of your ends.  
Doth the danger, or rather the destruction of the Property and Liberty of the Subject deserve a jealousy? Is not all they have or as much as is thought fit, taken from them by Orders of both Houses, who have no more right to that power then a Grand-jury? Are not men committed in an arbitrary way, no cause expressed nor Legal cause known, by both Houses, and then in despite of all Habeas Corpuses retained? Nay, Are not they ordinarily committed by the House of Commons alone, which till of late, never pretended to any right of committing any Body but the Members of their own House, or such out of it as had broken some Privilege of theirs? Nay, is not the public Liberty given up into the Hands of Committees and strangers delegated by them, and all this done by the Power of these men?  
Doth the Alteration of the Civil State, and of the very frame and Constitution of Parliaments deserve a jealousy? Have not the Arts, Industry and violence of those Men, and of their Party so wrought and framed both Houses, as to prevail with them to oppose and usurp all the Rights and Power of the King? Have not they since with great Justice to the Lords House, prevailed with the House of Commons (with the help of the Common People, and Common-council) as wholly to swallow up the Lord's Power, as their Lordship's former concurrence had enabled them to devour the Kings? And have they not again squeezed that Power into a close Committee, and thence again into a sub-Committee yet closer than that, that is in to themselves? And by their sole Orders, and to their sole ends is not this whole Commonwealth upon the matter wholly governed and disposed? Do they not not only justify all this to be Law in time of War, (though indeed they only offer such Reasons for it, as will as well justify any unpaid Soldier in their Army to Plunder Legally, according to the same fundamental Laws of Nature and Necessity) but even as to the unjustifiable Illegal Votes and Actions published and committed before the War, do they either make any acknowledgement or Retractation of, or give any satisfaction for what is past, or offer any such security against the like for the future, as the King hath done for those things for which the jealousies are still pretended to continue against Him? And therefore if you be jealous still of the King, and they having done all this, and in this manner, you are notwithstanding not jealous that they will continue the same things as long as they continue in the same Power, I cannot but wonder to see you so jealous on the one side, and so secure on the other, unless perhaps what I imply they will do be a thing so evident to you, that you count it the object rather of foresight, then of jealousy.  
Fourthly I answer, That supposing you had no grounds to be jealous of them, and had grounds to be jealous of His Majesty, yet this were no sufficient excuse for the Countenance you give by your Presence, and for the Assistance you give by your Purse, to those Arms which upon no stronger a ground are raised against Him; For it is not justifiable in you to violate your duty, for fear lest another may not discharge his. Consider this as seriously as the matter deserves, and you will be of my opinion, that when that sin shall be laid to your charge at the day of judgement, it will be then found that a future possible Tyrant will not excuse a present certain Rebel.  
But, Sir, I will count all this cast away upon you. I will be confident that since in order to Peace, and immediate disbanding of the Armies, the King desires nothing but what is Law, and denies nothing that is so; since He asks not all that by Law He might ask, but only that so much as was by violence taken from Him, before the War, may be now quietly restored to Him, and submits all the other Injuries He hath received, and all those Delinquents He hath been so charged to protect, to be considered and tried in a full, peaceble and secure convention in Parliament; since after this offer nothing can be so impudent, as to pretend your Arms to be any longer necessary and defensive; since you can say nothing to persuade the King to yield to what they ask, but only that unless He will yield to what you will not say is reasonable, they are unreasonable enough to choose to destroy the Kingdom by continuing the War, I will be confident, that suppose this unreasonableness seem a Reason for the King to take their Conditions, it can appear none to you to take their Parts, and you will never continue with those men of whom you have those thoughts. No, Sir, you are too much a Lover of unity and Government, too good natured, too much a Gentleman to be a ROUNDHEAD, that is to fight to introduce nothing but Brownism, Independance, Insolence, hardheartedness and Parity, and to put the Kingdom into such hands, as before this business began, were known to few men in it. I know you were engaged into this insensibly and by degrees, and (though you had then both a worse Opinion of the Court, and a better of the House of Commons, than their different demeanours since hath by this time persuaded you to have) yet if you had ever guest it would have come to this, you would as soon have meddled with a Serpent as with the Militia, and would have left them as soon as I did. I know nothing but the unjustifiable shame of confessing a past Error to avoid a perpetual one, hath since kept you with them, and therefore doubt not but you will now submit to that shame (as a punishment due for the fault of having been ashamed to do your duty so long, and as a trouble that will bear no Proportion to the delight of having at last satisfied your Conscience) and leave those, who in my Conscience love those among you who stay with them, and are not of them, worse than they do any evil Counsellor in Oxford, and who, when you have sufficiently established their Power for them, will sufficiently show it. And in confidence (upon these Reasons) that you will bring me a sudden Answer to this Letter yourself, I remain  
SIR, Your much pleased and very humble servant. Oxford, Oriell College the 4. of May, 1643.