Judge, and faid, ' He should have the fame was • mentioned above, if he would but permit and • fuffer them to put in print, That he did own • and acknowledge their Power to be lawful and • just, and would not gainsay it.' To this he answered, That he would not connive at their • so doing, for all the Money they had robbed • the Kingdom of, and should they be so impu• dent to print any fuch Matter, he would fell his • Doublet and Coat to buy Pens, Ink and Paper, • and would set forth the Commons-House in their

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proper Colours." (That is, would make them appear to be scandalous, impudent, and lying Rebels). When they found him fo firm, one of the Committee used this Motive, You have a • Wife and nine Children, who all will starve if ' you refuse this Offer, so confider, for their • Sakes, they make up ten preffing Arguments

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for your Compliance." What, (faid the Judge) • did they defire you to press me in this Matter? • I will not say they did, (reply'd the Committeeman) but I think they press you to it without speaking at all. With that the old Man's Anger was heighten'd to the utmost, and he in Pafsion said, Had my Wife and Children petition'd

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you in this Matter, I would have look'd on her as a Whore, and them as Bastards.' Upon this the Committee departed, and he continued in Newgate till the Restoration; after which I am informed that this most Heroical and Loyal Judge died, whose Memory and Doings ought never to be forgotten by loyal Men.

But to proceed to the Examination of Mr. Neal's fourth Volume: He acknowledges, that upon the King's Death, the legal Government was dissolved, and that all that followed till the Restoration of King Charles the Second, was no better than an Usurpation: And yet he cannot forbear discovering a more than common Approbation of this Ufurpation,

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tion, and Dislike to the Restoration of the antient legal Form of Government.

N. p. 1. The House of Commons, (says he) if it may deserve that Name, after it had been purged of a third Part of its Members, relying upon the Act of Continuation, called themselves the Supreme Authority of the Nation.

Mr. Neal magnifies the Number of the Members that conftituted the (k) Rump Parliament: For according to Mr. (1) Echard, not above a fifth Part of the Commons were left: And another Writer observes (m), That three Parts of four at least of • the Members were forcibly detained, and de• terred from fitting in the House of Commons." So that the Modellers of the Rump, from their garbling of that House, might justly be compar'd to that Man (n) who would never cease to whet • and whet his Knife, till there was no Steel left to • make it useful.'

N. p. 2. The House of Lords was voted useless. And fo indeed it was: and tho' some few Lords

(notwithstanding their (0) Disability to fit in that House) House) ignominiously vouchsafed to fit with the Rump, (and these were the Earl of (p) Pembroke, the Earl of Salisbury, and the Lord Howard of Escrigg). (q) Yet the Peers in general highly refented the Indignity, and in a Proteftation published in the Names of all the Peers and Barons in the Realm, they asserted their Privileges and the fundamental Laws of the Nation, and disclaimed all (r) Acts, Votes, &c. of the said Members of the Commons House, for erecting of (s) New Courts of Justice, to try or execute the King, or any Peer or Subject of this Realm, for altering the

' under a new kind of Seal, fince the King's beheading, as the Earl of Pembroke, and the Lord Edward Howard, uncapable of being Burgefl's by the • Common Law, as was adjudged in the Lord Camoy's Cafe, Clauf Dorf. 7. Rich. 2. m. 32. and afferted by Mr. Selden's Titles of Honour, part 2. chap. 5. p. 737. seconded by Cook's 4 Inst. p. 1. 45, 46, 47, 49.' The Writ in Selden's Titles of Honour, 2d Edit. p. 737. as follows: Rex Vicecomiti Surria, Salutem. Quia ut accepimus Thomam Camoys, Chivaler, qui Bannerettus eft, ficut quamplures antecefforum fuorum extiterunt, ad effendum unum militum venientium ad proximum Parlamentum noftrum, pro communitate Comitatus prædi&ti, de affenfu ejusdem Comitatus, elegifti; nos advertentes, quod bujusmodi Banneretti, ante hæc tempora in Milites Comitatus ratione alicujus Parlamenti eligi minime confueverunt, ipfum de Officio Militis ad dictum Parlamentum pro communitate Comitatus prædiéti, venturi, exonerari volumus; ideo tibi præcipimus quod quendam alium Militem idoneum & discretum, Gladio cinctum, loco ipfius Thomæ eligi, & cum ad diem & locum Parliamenti prædieti venire facias, cum plena & fufficienti potestate ad confentiendum biis, qua in Parliamento prædicto fient juxta tenorem primi Brevis noftri tibi pro Electione bujufmodi Militum directi, & Nomen ejus nobis fcire facias. Tefte Rege apud Westmonafterium octavo Die Otobris. Where Mr. Selden observes, That this Writ may not be understood of any other Banneret, than a Par liament Baron, or Banneret of that Time.

(p) Whitelock observes, (Memorials p. 396.) ‘That the Earl of Pembroke • was returned Knight of the Shire for Berks, Prima Impressionis. And in another Place, (p. 439.) That his Son fat in the House after his Death. And for an Honour (says he, Mem. p. 426.) to the Earl of Pembroke, and • of Salisbury, and the Lord Howard of Efcrigg, Members of the House of • Commons, 'twas ordered, that they might fit in all Committees of which ' they were before the House was dissolved."

(9) Echard's History of England, vol. 2. p. 652.

(r) Whitelock informs us, (Memorials, p. 473.) That the Ministers < about Dartmouth would not read any Act or Ordinance commanded by the Parliament. And elsewhere, (p. 488.) That there was an Agreement * of the Ministers of Somerset and Devon, to refuse the Engagement, and Orders of Parliament.'

(s) In the Trial of Colonel Axtel, (Trials of the Regicides, 4to. 1660. p. 185.) it is properly enough called, The High Court of Injustice. Elfing, Clerk of the Parliament, bravely (according to Whitelock, Memor. p. 364.) refigned his Poft, because he would have no Hand in the Business against the King.

Government, Government, Laws, Great Seal, &c. raising new Forces, and imposing new Taxes or Oaths; and likewife protested against the traiterous murdering of the late King, and disinheriting his Son the Prince of Wales, and particularly against the infolent and frantick Vote concerning abolishing the House of (t) Peers, as useless and dangerous: All which Votes, Acts and Orders they declared to be not only illegal, but detestable and destructive to the Rights and Beings of Parliament, the fundamental Laws of the Land, and the Lives, Liberties and Properties of the People.

N. Ibid. The Form of the Government for the future was declared to be a free Commonwealth : the executive Power to be lodged in a Council of State of forty Persons.

Mr. Whitelock fays, (u) That a Committee was • appointed to bring in the Names of Persons not • exceeding forty to be a Council of State. And in another Place, (Memorials, p. 381.) ' men• tions a Vote for thirty-eight to be of the Council • of State, and names their Names.' And Bishop Kennet says, ' (w) That the executive Power was

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put into the Hands of a Council of State, con• fisting of thirty-eight Persons, to act with full • Powers for one Year, the Qualification of every • Member of this Council of State, or Committee of • Estates, was to fubscribe unto approving of the • King's Execution.' Mr. Clement Walker gives the following Account of the Council of State (x) :

(t) Whitelock was appointed to draw up the Ordinance for abolishing the House of Peers. And tho' he declared his Opinion against it, (see Mem. p. 377.) yet he could not get excused. Nay, so subservient was this great Man to most of those Changes during the Anarchy, that the Writer of his Life says, (Lives of the Lord Chancellors, vol. 2. p. 362.) I know not • whether it was true that he waited upon the King after his Restoration to • beg his Pardon for all that he had transacted against him; and that his Majesty bid him go live quietly in the Country, and take Care of his Wife, and • one and thirty Children.'

(u) Memorials, p. 377. 2d edit.

(w) Complete History, 2d edit. vol. 3. p. 190. See Echard's History, vol. 2. p. 653.

(x) Walker's History of Independency, part 2. p. 186.

• Whitehall

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• Whitehall (fays he) is now become the Place of • a Hydra of Tyrants, instead of a King, where our Hogens Mogens, or Council of State, fit in much • State and Splendour, with their Rooms as richly hang'd (I wish they were so too) and furnish'd (if you will believe their licens'd News-Books) as any Lords States in Europe, yet many of • these Mushrooms of Majesty were but Mechanicks, Goldsmiths, Brewers, Weavers, Clothiers, Brew' ers Clerks, &c. whom scornful Fortune in a spiteful Merriment brought upon the Stage to • act the Parts of Kings.' And in another Place, (says he) (y) But I would gladly know by what • Authority a Pack of forty Knaves, calling them• selves a Council of State, and ufurping Regal • Power, shall take upon them to abolish our an• tient Form of Parliaments, contrary to the fun• damental Laws of the Land. And elsewhere, • (z) That amongst them were some Tradesmen • Soldiers, illiterate Lawyers, Parliament Mem• bers, Men already engaged over Head and Ears < in Sin, therefore to be confided in. To these, • or any nine of these they entrust the Admini• stration of this Utopian Commonwealth, and • these they would have us believe (without telling • us fo) are the Keepers (or Goalers) of the Li• berties of England.-(a) How come we to for

(y) Walker's History of Independency, part 2. p. 207.

(%) Ib. part 3. p. 10, 11. In a Tract intitled, Mercurius Impartialis, in Answer to Mercurius Militaris, quoted in a Tract intitled, The 29th of May, P. 34. penes me, are the following Words ; That that Court hath ever been

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had in high and honourable Eftimation for the Justice thereof, we are not • ignorant of; yet even from that Court, corrupted by malignant Members, has befallen this Kingdom more Mischief, Desolation and Ruin within these 8 Years, than ever it received from all the Parliaments that ever were • since their primitive Institution, or than all the succeeding Parliaments that • shall fit these many hundred Years shall be able to repair: And indeed the • present Parliament Priefts, and their Emissaries from their Pulpits and Presses, have added more Souls to the Number of the Damned, than ever the Devil, the Pope, and their subtlest Agents, with their most skilful and • pleasant Rhetorick, were more than fourscore Years before able to accom• plish.'