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generally shut up, as if an enemy were at their gates; and the people in all places at a gaze. On the other side; they who had with the greatest courage and alacrity opposed all seditious practices, between grief and anger were confounded with the consideration of what had been done, and what was like to follow. But above all, the anger and indignation was very great and general, that to all the other oversights and presumptions was added, the exposing the dignity and majesty and safety of the king, in his coming in person, in that manner, to the house of commons; and in going the next day, as he did, to the Guild-Hall and to the lord mayor's, which drew such reproaches upon him to his face."--Clarend. Vol. 11. p. 377, 378.

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"The king quickly after this retired from London to Hampton-Court. The parliament received information, that George Lord Digby was in arms at Kingston upon Thames, attended with several officers: whereupon both houses use precautions to hinder the king from becoming master of Portsmouth, and sent Sir John Hotham to secure Hull. Both sides prepare for war."-Tindal's Sum. p. 124.

CHAP. VII.

Other arbitrary and oppressive measures; which were Invasions of the Nation's Rights, and subversive of the CONSTITUTION.

THE KING sent over 30,000 pounds to the Netherlands to raise German horse with arms to be brought to England for his service"-Echard, p. "Burlemack (by whom the money was remitted) being called before the house, confessed

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he had received the money by privy seal for the buying of horses; that a thousand of them were levied; that those horses and their riders were to come over, and arms provided for them in Holland." But this was timely prevented.-Rapin, Vol. x. p. 179.

"The counties throughout the kingdom, Lord Clarendon says, were so incensed, that they refused to suffer soldiers to be billetted upon them; by which they often underwent greater inconve niencies and mischiefs, than they endeavoured to prevent. The endeavour to raise soldiers by pressing, found opposition in many places, as being counted illegal. This produced a resort to martial law, by which many were executed; which raised an asperity in minds of more than the common people. Nor was there a serenity in the countenance of any man, who had age and experience enough to consider things to come."-Clarend. Vol. 1. p. 40.

"The king billetted soldiers upon private houses, contrary to the constant custom of England, where all but such as keep public houses have the privilege of not being obliged to lodge soldiers against their will. Those who showed backwardness to lend the king money, were not spared on this occasion; and the soldiers quartered on them took care to let them see what they exposed themselves to by disobeying the king. Moreover, such as were sufferers by these troublesome guests, could not summon them before the usual judges; but by the kings express order, they were obliged to apply to a council of war; so that the officers were the sole judges of their soldiers." -Rapin, Vol. x. p. 113. "In the year 1639 (above two years before the war betwixt the king and parliament broke out) the king's army being ordered to rendevous at York, in their march thi

ther many insolencies, robberies and murthers were committed by the soldiers, in the countries where they passed, to the further discontent of a great number of the king's faithful subjects."Whitelock's Mem. p. 29.

"He is a great stranger," says Lord Falkland (a very zealous royalist) "who knows not that this kingdom hath long laboured under many and great oppressions both in religion and liberty."Rush. Vol. IV. p. 184.

"The judges of the realm being all chosen by the court, and devoted to the king, omitted no opportunity to support the prerogative-royal, and raise it as high as the king desired. The parliament alone could cure these disorders, but the king was determined to call no more."-Rapin, Vol. x. p. 247. "The judges held their places during the king's pleasure; and when the prerogative was to be stretched above law, in any particular instances, Laud would send to them for their opinions before hand, by whom they were often put in mind that if they did not do his majesty's business to satisfaction, they would be removed."-Neal, Vol. 11. p. 157.

"Some constables and others, committed by the council, and bringing their habeas corpora, were removed from pursevant to pursevant, and could have no benefit of the law."-Whitelock's Mem. p. 13.

"The damage and mischief," says Lord Clarendon, "cannot be expressed, which the crown and state sustained by the deserved reproach and infamy that attended the judges, and the irreverence and scorn they were justly in there being no possibility to preserve the dignity, reverence and estimation of the laws themselves, but by the integrity and innocence of the judges.-In the business of ship money, and many other cases in

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the star-chamber and at the council-board, there were many impertinencies, incongruities and insolencies, in the speeches and orations of the judges, much more offensive, and much more scandalous than the judgments and sentences themselves."-Clarend. Vol. 1. p. 72, 73.

Finding parliaments a restraint upon his arbitrary measures, though an essential part of our constitution, he resolves to lay them aside, and "accordingly in 1628 publishes a proclamation declaring his royal pleasure that the spreaders of false reports shall be severely punished: that he will not overcharge his subjects with any new burdens, but will satisfy himself with the duties received by his royal father; which he neither can nor will dispense with, (though not granted by parliament) and whereas for ill ends the calling another parliament is divulged, his majesty declares, that the late abuse having for the present driven him unwillingly out of that course, he shall account it presumption for any to prescribe any time to his majesty for parliaments; the calling continuing and dissolving of which is always in the king's power.

"Here then was an end of the old English government by King, Lords and Commons for twelve years. England was now an absolute monarchy: The king's proclamations and orders of council were the laws of the land: The ministers of state sported themselves in the most wanton acts of arbitrary power; and the religion, laws and liberties of our country lay prostrate, being swallowed up by an inundation of popery and oppression."-Neal. Vol. 11. p. 199.

After twelve years interruption of parliament, the king is compelled by his second war with the Scots to call another. "It consisted, Lord Clarendon says, of men than whom more sober and dispassionate could never be hoped to meet in

that place. Though it had not sat above six or seven days, and had managed all their debates, and their whole behaviour with wonderful order and sobriety, the court was impatient that no advance was made towards a supply."-Clarend. Vol. 1. p. 139.-Ibid. p. 134. And the parliament not complying with the king's exorbitant demand, of twelve subsidies to be paid in three years, so readily as he expected, he hastily and most impoliticly dissolves them. "There could not," says the noble historian, "a greater damp have siezed upon the spirits of the whole nation, than this dissolution caused; and men had much of the misery in view, which shortly after fell out. Nor could any man imagine, what offence they had given which put the king upon that resolution."-Ibid. p. 139. But though the parliament was dissolved, the king, by a new commission, continued the convocation sitting; "A thing which was monstrous in the eyes of all those who had ever looked upon the law."-Hist. Stu. p. 148. "It made canons, which was thought it might do; and gave subsidies out of parliament, and enjoined oaths, which certainly it might not do: in a word, it did many things which in the best of times might have been questioned, and therefore was sure to be condemned in the worst, and drew the same prejudice upon the whole body of the clergy, to which before only some few clergymen were exposed."Clarend. Vol. I. p. 148. It injoined an oath upon all the clergy and their dependants, that they would never consent to alter the government of the church by archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, &c. for refusing which, Goodman bishop of Gloucester was suspended and committed to prison.--Fuller, B. xi. p. 171.

"In the reigns of Edward II. and Richard II, though the grievances of the nation were more in

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