AN ADDRESS TO THE Lord Mayor, aldermans, AND COMMON-COUNCEL Of the Honourable City of LONDON, And in particular to the Representatives thereof in the Parliament now Assembled.  
By Sir Francis Nethersole of Nethersole, in the County of Kent, Knight.  
Except the Lord build the House, they labour in vain that build it: Except the Lord keep the City, the Watchman waketh but in vain,  Psal. 127.1. 
He that loveth Father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me,  Matth. 10.37. 
London, Printed, Anno Dom. 1659.   

My Lord, and Gentlemen.  
Soon after the beginning of the late unnatural War between the King and his Parliament, the issue whereof hath proved destructive to them both, as I foretold the one of them that it would prove, before they, or some of them had destroyed the other; I was bold to dedicate certain considerations thereupon to the then Lord Mayor, and Aldermen of the City, together with a project for a Petition tending to a speedy accommodation of these unhappy differences, which some wise men have thought might have been of as good use as any other of the three then in agitation in the City; if it had found entertainment with them, who then were in authority therein. And in the year, 1648. when the said War was near to an end with us, and the than King and Parliament yet in being, I presumed to address certain Problems to the then Lord Mayor, aldermans, and Common-Councel, which I thought necessary to be determined by all, that either had, or had not taken part on either side in the said War, for the making of their peace with God, and the disposing of them to an hearty peace one with another, which I hope was no evil design, though for good reason I disguised myself in the making of that, as I had concealed myself in the former address. I shall now with open face make a third Address to your Lordship, the Aldermen, and Common-Councel, and in particular to the now chosen Members of Parliament for the City, when I shall first have given your Lordship and them a short account of my being as disinteressed a person in the sad divisions of the times as any other; which I cannot do more briefly, or more fully any other way, then by referring you to the annexed relations of my comportment in the late War towards both sides, written at the date of them upon the occasion of my having then been a Petitioner to the Committee of Coventry for liberty to have gone up to London, there to have compounded for a part of the estate of a Nephew of mine, a little before slain on the King's side, to which I was his heir at Law, but could not then obtain that favour, nor the year after neither, but upon the terms you may find in the addition to what hath passed between me, and the said Committee. By which relations, your Lordship and the rest may see, what my opinion of the said War was from the beginning to the end thereof, and that my behaviour was ever conformable to my opinion, the grounds whereof I have discovered in my said Problems. To which relations I have but this to add, that in many extraordinary occasions I have had since to examine my conscience, I never yet found cause to repent me either of my opinion, or of my behaviour in reference to the said War, and that my daily private prayers have been, and to this day constantly are agreeable unto them. In which among many other relating to this Church, and State, I do ever make one Petition to this purpose, That God would be pleased to forgive all the National and personal sins of the people of this Kingdom, but more especially those sins (certainly known to his Divine Majesty only) for which he did first dash the late King and his Parliament one against another, then raised up weak means by his Almighty power to destroy them both, and for which he hath already sorely shaken, and now threatneth utterly to ruin this Church and State. And how near they now are to utter ruin by our divisions at home, and War, and fear of more Wars from abroad; I would it were not too visible to every one that hath but half an eye. For the prevention whereof I humbly beseech your Lordship and the rest to give me leave to propound these few things to your mature consideration, and deliberate resolution.  
First, because it is impossible that we should ever be brought to any good and perfect agreement among ourselves (which if we once were again, we need be in no more fear of all the world besides then heretofore we were) until we have all made our peace with God, whether it may not be fit for your Lordship and the rest speedily to petition his Highness, and his Parliament (who this very day are keeping a Fast in their respective Houses) to join together in the proclaiming not of such a Fast as we have already kept too many, but such a one as was proclaimed in Niniveh by the decree of the King, and his Nobles, and observed by the people thereof, when perhaps that great City was not in greater danger than yours now is. And that as a necessary preparative thereunto, there may be a convenient number of godly, wise persons chosen, and commissioned by them to make a prudent, and diligent enquiry after all the most crying sins of this Kingdom, and those in special, which may have been committed by the late King and his Parliaments, and for which it may most probably be collected that God permitted the devil, and his instruments to stir them up to the making of such a War one against another, as I think is without precedent; till they were both destroyed: To which Commissioners, if by them commanded, I shall by letter, (for I am now too old for travels) freely declare the apprehensions which have been now a long time fixed in my profoundest thoughts.  
Secondly, whether it may not be, not only fit, but necessary for your Lordship, and the rest in the same Petition: humbly to move the Lord Protector and his Parliament, that by their Authority an Act may speedily be passed for the re-assembling of all the Members of both Houses, who constantly adhered to that Parliament of this Kingdom which was lately in War with their King, and which certainly was intended by the contrivers, and authorizers of the Solemn League and Covenant. For I humbly pray your Lordship and the rest, to weigh the force of this Dilemma in the balance of your most serious thoughts; That either that Parliament was dissolved by the late King's death, or it was not. If it were, than all the Acts and Ordinances of that piece of Parliament, which called itself a Parliament, and continued to sit after that time are Nullities, the many infallible consequences whereof I will not deduce. If it were not, then though it have been discontinued now a great while, yet is it not dissolved, this having been the peculiar right, and privilege of that Parliament, that it could not be dissolved, prorogued, or adjourned but by Act of Parliament, which right and privilege all that have entered into the said Solemn League and Covenant are thereby obliged in their several Vocations to endeavour mutually to preserve. And perhaps all you, my Lord and Gentlemen, I am sure the generality of the City (not to mention thousands in the Country, as well of the King's Party as of the Parliaments) have sworn that Covenant with hands lifted up to the most High God, who will not be mocked. And besides this, how the ancient and undoubted Liberties, and privileges of Parliament, which by the additional Petition and Advise the late Lord Protector, and all his Successors was, and are bound to preserve (as I humbly conceive) and not to suffer them to be broken or interrupted, can be preserved, and secured from being broken and interrupted: Or how the Rights and Liberties of the people of this Kingdom, which by the same additional advice every member of Parliament, as a Member of Parliament, is by his Oath bound to endeavour to preserve, can be preserved by any other means beside the recontinuing of that Parliament the contriver or contrivers, and the givers of that Advice might possibly comprehend, and so may the Members of the present Parliament (for so many quicksighted eyes may see much more than any one) but I will here freely acknowledge, that it is beyond the reach of my understanding.  
In the third place my humble request to your Lordship and the rest is, that either by a Petition from yourselves, in the name of the whole City to his Highness the Lord Protector, or by a motion from those chosen by the City to serve in this Parliament, or by both, as to your wisdoms it shall seem most expedient, you would be pleased to move, that all Members of both Houses of this, and of all future Parliaments may take that Oath, which with the Bill to that purpose hereunto annexed, was by me drawn up in the third year of the Reign of the late King, by the advice of the Lord Cook, and by me offered to the then House of Commons, after I had therein made the speech hereunto annexed, which I had before that showed by a friend to a Peer of this Kingdom, then, and yet of greatest reputation for wisdom, and had his approbation thereof; Or if that Oath shall be found either defective, or inconvenient in any respect, than some other Oath of their own framing to the same purpose. The chief of the Aldermen who served in that Parliament for the City (whose name I have now forgotten) was pleased to second me very affectionately, when I brought in that Bill, yet, by the occasion I have touched in the adjoined Advertisement, after a second Reading it was so committed, that it hath been a close prisoner ever since. For though it were by me since put into the hands of a Member of the House of Commons, soon after the opening of the late long Parliament, with a desire to have had the Act first turned into an Ordinance, and then passed by the Upper House unto the late King for his Royal Assent, which no doubt his Majesty would most gladly, not only have given, but have taken the same Oath himself, if that had been humbly desired of his Majesty, and that, by God's blessing, might have been a means to have prevented the great misunderstanding between his Majesty and that Parliament at first, afterwards set on fire, and blown up into the flame of a most unnatural War by Jesuitical counsels, given on both sides so craftily, that they who gave these counsels were never discovered on either side. For the men of that Sect have been long versed in the trick, to set up a pack of Cards in such a manner, that all the Diamonds (I mean Puritans) from the Ace to the Ten, shall by tales suggested to them, seem to be they that throw down all the Coat Cards of that colour, when in truth the knave of Clubbs is the first mover of the Bunch. But that Member of the House of Commons conspired with the formerly intimated, to keep the said Bill close in his own hands, for aught I know, why he knoweth best. I have therefore now set it at full liberty, and do hereby humbly recommend it not only to your Lordship, and the rest of the Gentlemen to whom it is addressed, but under their good favour, and with due submission to the consideration of all the Members of both Houses of the present Parliament. From whom if it, with the rest I have now taken the boldness to offer to you, my Lord, and Gentlemen, shall be so happy as to pass to his Highness the Lord Protector, I can therefore have no doubt of his Highness assent thereunto, because to the best of my poor understanding, no humane means can tend more to the settling of his Highness, and of this, and the neighbour Kingdoms too in a happy condition. Wherein, after some months (I might say years) debate thereupon with myself, and as long continued prayers to God night and day for the assistance of his holy Spirit of wisdom, which he hath promised to give to them that want and ask it, I am grown so confident, that if I were as much and nearly interested in his Highness' prosperity, as his Consort and children are, and in the prosperity of these Kingdoms as himself is, and had the honour to be as high a favourite of his affairs, as Cardinal Wolfey sometime was to King Henry the eighth; I would give his Highness the same council I have now presumed in all humility to propound to your Lordship, and the rest, but with this caveat, that the matter might be so managed by his wisdom, that it might be given to him by others, and not be known to have been either given by me, or taken by himself.  
Whereunto I have but this to add in the fourth and last place, that you my Lord Mayor, aldermans, and Common-Councel, and by your persuasion, the whole City would withal be pleased unanimously to resolve, and as unanimously to declare your full resolution, to stand by his highness with your lives and estates against all opposition whatsoever, if it may please his Highness to re-continue the said long Parliament (which heretofore stood chief by your support under God) according to the tenor of your Petition to his Highness, or his Parliament, or rather to them both. And that your Lordship, and the City, which payeth most by much in all imposed taxes, would in that respect, do yourselves the honour, and right to be the first to move in the House of Commons, that a sufficient supply may be by them presently granted and sent up to the Other House, and without any delay tendered to his Highness for the supply of the many great and urgent occasions of the State at home, and abroad, till the already longest Parliament that ever met may be reassembled, and continued so much longer only, till now this extremely discomposed and disordered Church and State, may be by them through God's blessing reduced to some good settlement upon righteous foundations (no other being durable) which if I may live to see, I shall then joyfully sing my Nunc dimittis, this being the seventy third Year of my age. The God and Lord of the Spirits of all flesh put such thoughts and resolutions into the heart of your Lordship, and of all those to whom these poor papers are addressed, and of all other into whose hands they may come, as may tend most to the advancement of his own honour, and of the weal of this Church and State, according to the prayer of  
My Lord and Gentlemen, Your Lordships, and theirs, and the Cities most humble servant. FRANCIS NETHERSOLE. From my Cell at Polesworth in the County of Warwick, this 27. of Jan. 1658.  
FINIS.