Answer to a Book, Part 1
I. Upon the Kings calling this last Parlament.
THat which the King layes down heer as his first foundation, and as it were the head stone of his whole Structure, that He call'd this last Parlament not more by others advice and the necessity of his affaires, then by his own chois and inclination, is to all knowing men so apparently not true, that a more unlucky and inauspicious sentence, and more betok'ning the downfall of his whole Fabric, hardly could have come into his minde. For who knows not that the inclination of a Prince is best known either by those next about him, and most in favor with him, or by the current of his own actions. Those neerest to this King and most his Favorites, were Courtiers and Prelates; men whose chief study was to finde out which way the King inclin'd, and to imitate him exactly. How these men stood affected to Parlaments, cannot be forgott'n. No man but may remember it was thir continuall exercise to dispute and preach against them; and in thir common discours nothing was more frequent, then that they hoped the King should now have no need of Parlaments any more. And this was but the copy which his Parasites had industriously tak'n from his own words and actions, who never call'd a Parlament but to supply his necessities; and having supply'd those, as suddenly and ignominiously dissolv'd it, without redressing any one greevance of the people. Somtimes choosing rather to miss of his Subsidies, or to raise them by illegal courses, then that the people should not still miss of thir hopes to be releiv'd by Parlaments.
The first he broke off at his comming to the Crown; for no other cause then to protect the Duke of Buckingham against them who had accus'd him, besides other hainous crimes, of no less then poysoning the deceased King his Father; concerning which matter the Declaration of No more addresses, hath sufficiently inform'd us. And still the latter breaking was with more affront and indignity put upon the House and her worthiest Members, then the former: Insomuch that in the fifth year of his Raign, in a Proclamation he seems offended at the very rumor of a Parlament divulg'd among the people: as if he had tak'n it for a kind of slander, that men should think him that way exorable, much less inclin'd: and forbidds it as a presumption to prescribe him any time for Parlaments, that is to say, either by perswasion or Petition, or so much as the reporting of such a rumor; for other manner of prescribing was at that time not suspected. By which feirce Edict, the people, forbidd'n to complain, as well as forc'd to suffer, began from thenceforth to despaire of Parlaments. Whereupon such illegal actions, and especially to get vast summs of Money, were put in practise by the King and his new Officers, as Monopolies, compulsive Knight-hoods, Cote, Conduct and Ship money, the seizing not of one Naboths Vineyard, but of whole Inheritances under the pretence of Forrest, or Crown Lands, corruption and Bribery compounded for, with impunities granted for the future, as gave evident proof that the King never meant, nor could it stand with the reason of his affaires, ever to recall Parlaments; having brought by these irregular courses the peoples interest and his own to so direct an opposition, that he might foresee plainly, if nothing but a Parlament could save the people, it must necessarily be his undoing.
Till eight or nine years after, proceeding with a high hand in these enormities, and having the second time levied an injurious Warr against his native Countrie Scotland, and finding all those other shifts of raising Money, which bore out his first expedition, now to faile him, not of his own chois and inclination, as any Child may see, but urg'd by strong necessities, and the very pangs of State, which his own violent proceedings had brought him to, hee calls a Parlament; first in Ireland, which onelyonly was to give him four Subsidies, and so to expire; then in England, where his first demand was but twelve Subsidies, to maintain a Scotch Warr, condemn'd and abominated by the whole Kingdom; promising thir greevances should be consider'd afterward. Which when the Parlament, who judg'd that Warr it self one of thir main greevances, made no hast to grant, not enduring the delay of his impatient will, or els fearing the conditions of thir grant, he breaks off the whole Session, and dismisses them and thir greevances with scorn and frustration.
Much less therfore did hee call this last Parlament by his own chois and inclination; but having first try'd in vaine all undue ways to procure Mony, his Army, of thir own accord, being beat'n in the North, the Lords Petitioning, and the general voice of the people almost hissing him and his ill acted regality off the Stage, compell'd at length both by his wants, and by his feares, upon meer extremity he summon'd this last Parlament. And how is it possible that hee should willingly incline to Parlaments, who never was perceiv'd to call them, but for the greedy hope of a whole National Bribe, his Subsidies, and never lov'd, never fulfill'd, never promoted the true end of Parlaments, the redress of greevances, but still put them off, and prolong'd them, whether gratify'd ot not gratify'd; and was indeed the Author of all those greevances. To say therfore that hee call'd this Parlament of his own chois and inclination, argues how little truth wee can expect from the sequel of this Book, which ventures in the very first period to affront more then one Nation with an untruth so remarkable; and presumes a more implicit Faith in the people of England, then the Pope ever commanded from the Romish Laitie; or els a natural sottishness fitt to be abus'd and ridd'n. While in the judgement of wise Men, by laying the foundation of his defence on the avouchment of that which is so manifestly untrue, he hath giv'n a worse foile to his own cause, then when his whole Forces were at any time overthrown. They therfore who think such great Service don to the Kings affairs in publishing this Book, will find themselves in the end mistak'n: if sense and right mind, or but any mediocrity of knowledge and remembrance hath not quite forsak'n men.
But to prove his inclination to Parlaments, he affirms heer To have always thought the right way of them, most safe for his Crown, and best pleasing to his People. What hee thought we know not; but that hee ever took the contrary way wee saw; and from his own actions we felt long agoe what he thought of Parlaments or of pleasing his People: a surer evidence then what we hear now too late in words.
He alleges, that the cause of forbearing to convene Parlaments, was the sparkes which some mens distempers there studied to kindle. They were indeed not temper'd to his temper; for it neither was the Law, nor the rule by which all other tempers were to bee try'd; but they were esteem'd and chos'n for the fittest men in thir several Counties, to allay and quench those distempers which his own inordinate doings had inflam'd. And if that were his refusing to convene, till those men had been qualify'd to his temper, that is to say, his will, we may easily conjecture what hope ther was of Parlaments, had not fear and his insatiat poverty in the midst of his excessive wealth constrain'd him.
Hee hoped by his freedom, and their moderation to prevent misunderstandings. And wherfore not by their freedom and his moderation? But freedom he thought too high a word for them; and moderation too mean a word for himself: this was not the way to prevent misunderstandings. He still fear'd passion and prejudice in other men; not in himself: and doubted not by the weight of his own reason, to counterpoyse any Faction; it being so easie for him, and so frequent, to call his obstinacy, Reason, and other mens reason, Faction. Wee in the mean while must beleive, that wisdom and all reason came to him by Title, with his Crown; Passion, Prejudice, and Faction came to others by being Subjects.
He was sorry to hear with what popular heat Elections were carry'd in many places. Sorry rather that Court Letters and intimations prevail'd no more, to divert or to deterr the people from thir free Election of those men, whom they thought best affected to Religion and thir Countries Libertie, both at that time in danger to be lost. And such men they were, as by the Kingdom were sent to advise him, not sent to be cavill'd at, because Elected, or to be entertaind by him with an undervalue and misprision of thir temper, judgment, or affection. In vain was a Parlament thought fittest by the known Laws of our Nation, to advise and regulate unruly Kings, if they, in stead of hearkning to advice, should be permitted to turn it off, and refuse it by vilifying and traducing thir advisers, or by accusing of a popular heat those that lawfully elected them.
His own and his Childrens interest oblig'd him to seek and to preserve the love and welfare of his Subjects. Who doubts it? But the same interest, common to all Kings, was never yet available to make them all seek that, which was indeed best for themselves and thir Posterity. All men by thir own and thir Childrens interest are oblig'd to honestie and justice: but how little that consideration works in privat men, how much less in Kings, thir deeds declare best.
He intended to oblige both Friends and Enemies, and to exceed thir desires, did they but pretend to any modest and sober sence; mistaking the whole business of a Parlament. Which mett not to receive from him obligations, but Justice; nor he to expect from them thir modesty, but thir grave advice, utter'd with freedom in the public cause. His talk of modesty in thir desires of the common welfare, argues him not much to have understood what he had to grant, who misconceav'd so much the nature of what they had to desire. And for sober sence the expresion was too mean; and recoiles with as much dishonour upon himself, to be a King where sober sense could possibly be so wanting in a Parlament.
The odium and offences which some mens rigour, or remissness iu Church and State had contracted upon his Goverment, hee resolved to have expiated with better Laws and regulations. And yet the worst of misdemeanors committed by the worst of all his favourites, in the hight of thir dominion, whether acts of rigor or remissness, he hath from time to time continu'd, own'd, and taken upon himself by public Declarations, as oft'n as the Clergy, or any other of his Instruments felt themselves over burd'n'd with the peoples hatred. And who knows not the superstitious rigor of his Sundays Chappel, and the licentious remissness of his Sundays Theater; accompanied with that reverend Statute for Dominical Jiggs and May-poles, publish'd in his own Name, and deriv'd from the example of his Father James. Which testifies all that rigor in superstition, all that remissness in Religion to have issu'd out originally from his own House, and from his own Autority. Much rather then may those general miscarriages in State, his proper Sphear, be imputed to no other person chiefly then to himself. And which of all those oppressive Acts, or Impositions did he ever disclaim or disavow, till the fatal aw of this Parlament hung ominously over him. Yet heerh ee smoothly seeks to wipe off all the envie of his evill Goverment upon his Substitutes, and under Officers: and promises, though much too late, what wonders he purpos'd to have don in the reforming of Religion; a work wherein all his undertakings heretofore declare him to have had little or no judgement. Neither could his Breeding, or his cours of life acquaint him with a thing so Spiritual. Which may well assure us what kind of Reformation we could expect from him; either som politic form of an impos'd Religion, or els perpetual vexation, and persecution to all those that comply'd not with such a form. The like amendment hee promises in State; not a stepp furder then his Reason and Conscience told him was fitt to be desir'd; wishing hee had kept within those bounds, and not suffer'd his own judgement to have binover-borne in some things, of which things one was the Earl of Straffords execution. And what signifies all this, but that stil his resolution was the same, to set up an arbitrary Goverment of his own; and that all Britain was to be ty'd and chain'd to the conscience, judgement, and reason of one Man; as if those gifts had been only his peculiar and Prerogative, intal'd upon him with his fortune to be a King. When as doubtless no man so obstinate, or so much a Tyrant, but professes to be guided by that which he calls his Reason, and his Judgement, though never so corrupted; and pretends also his conscience. In the mean while, for any Parlament or the whole Nation to have either reason, judgement, or conscience, by this rule was altogether in vaine, if it thwarted the Kings will; which was easie for him to call by any other more plausible name. He himself hath many times acknowledg'd to have no right over us but by Law; and by the same Law to govern us: but Law in a Free Nation hath bin ever public reason, the enacted reason of a Parlament; which he denying to enact, denies to govern us by that which ought to be our Law; interposing his own privat reason, which to us is no Law. And thus we find these faire and specious promises, made upon the experience of many hard sufferings, and his most mortifi'd retirements, being throughly sifted, to containe nothing in them much different from his former practices, so cross, and so averse to all his Parlaments, and both the Nations of this Iland. What fruits they could in likelyhood have produc'd in his restorement, is obvious to any prudent foresight.
And this is the substance of his first section, till wee come to the devout of it, model'd into the form of a privat Psalter. Which they who so much admire, either for the matter or the manner, may as well admire the Arch-Bishops late Breviary, and many other as good Manuals, and Handmaids of Devotion, the lip-work of every Prelatical Liturgist, clapt together, and quilted out of Scripture phrase, with as much ease, and as little need of Christian diligence, or judgement, as belongs to the compiling of any ord'nary and salable peece of English Divinity, that the Shops value. But he who from such a kind of Psalmistry, or any other verbal Devotion, without the pledge and earnest of sutable deeds, can be perswaded of a zeale, and true righteousness in the person, hath much yet to learn; and knows not that the deepest policy of a Tyrant hath bin ever to counterfet Religious. And Aristotle in his Politics, hath mentiond that special craft among twelve other tyrannical Sophisms. Neither want wee examples. Andronicus Comnenus the Byzantine Emperor, though a most cruel Tyrant, is reported by Nicetas to have bin a constant reader of Saint Pauls Epistles; and by continual study had so incorporated the phrase & stile of that transcendent Apostle into all his familiar Letters, that the imitation seem'd to vie with the Original. Yet this availd not to deceave the people of that Empire; who not withstanding his Saints vizard, tore him to peeces for his Tyranny. From Stories of this nature both Ancient and Modern which abound, the Poets also, and som English, have bin in this point so mindfull of Decorum, as to put never more pious words in the mouth of any person, then of a Tyrant. I shall not instance an abstruse Author, wherein the King might be less conversant, but one whom wee well know was the Closet Companion of these his solitudes, William Shakespeare; who introduces the Person of Richard the third, speaking in as high a strain of pietie, and mortification, as is utterd in any passage of this Book; and sometimes to the same sense and purpose with some words in this place, I intended, saith he, not onelyonly to oblige my Friends but mine enemies. The like saith Richard, Act. 2. Scen. 1,
I doe not know that Englishman alive.
With whom my soule is any jott at odds,
More then the Infant that is borne to night;
I thank my God for my humilitie.
Other stuff of this sort may be read throughout the whole Tragedie, wherein the Poet us'd not much licence in departing from the truth of History, which delivers him a deep dissembler, not of his affections onelyonly, but of Religion.
In praying therfore, and in the outward work of Devotion, this King wee see hath not at all exceeded the worst of Kings before him. But herein the worst of Kings, professing Christianism, have by farr exceeded him. They, for ought we know, have still pray'd thir own, or at least borrow'd from fitt Authors. But this King, not content with that which, although in a thing holy, is no holy theft, to attribute to his own making other mens whole Prayers, hath as it were unhallow'd, and unchrist'nd the very duty of prayer it self, by borrowing to a Christian use Prayers offer'd to a Heathen God. Who would have imagin'd so little feare in him of the true allseeing Deitie, so little reverence of the Holy Ghost, whose office is to dictat and present our Christian Prayers, so little care of truth in his last words, or honour to himself, or to his Friends, or sense of his afflictions, or of that sad howr which was upon him, as immediatly before his death to popp into the hand of that grave Bishop who attended him, for a special Relique of his saintly exercises, a Prayer stol'n word for word from the mouth a of Heathen fiction praying to a heathen God; & that in no serious Book, but the vain amatorious Poem of Sr Philip Sidneys Arcadia; a Book in that kind full of worth and witt, but among religious thoughts, and duties not worthy to be nam'd; nor to be read at any time without good caution; much less in time of trouble and affliction to be a Christians Prayer-Book. They who are yet incredulous of what I tell them for a truth, that this Philippic Prayer is no part of the Kings goods, may satisfie thir own eyes at leasure in the 3 d. Book of Sir Philips Arcadia p. 248. comparing Pammela's Prayer with the first Prayer of his Majestie, deliverd to Dr. Juxion immediatly before his death, and Entititl'd, A prayer in time of Captivity Printed in all the best Editions of his Book. And since there be a crew of lurking raylers, who in thir Libels, and thir fitts of rayling up and down, as I hear from others, take it so currishly that I should dare to tell abroad the secrets of thir Aegyhtian Apis, to gratify thir gall in som measure yet more, which to them will be a kinde of almes (for it is the weekly vomit of thir gall which to most of them is the sole meanes of thir feeding) that they may not starv for me, I shall gorge them once more with this digrsestion somwhat larger then before: nothing troubl'd or offended at the working upward of thir Sale-venom thereupon, though it happ'n to asperse me; beeing, it seemes, thir best livelyhood and the only use or good digestion that thir sick and perishing mindes can make of truth charitably told them. However, to the benesit of others much more worth the gaining, I shall proceed in my assertion; that if only but to tast wittingly of meat or drink offerd to an Idol, be in the doctrin of St. Paul judg'd a pollution, much more must be his sin who takes a prayer, so dedicated, into his mouth, and offers it to God. Yet hardly it can be thought upon (though how sad a thing) without som kindof laughter at the manner, and solemn transaction of so gross a cousenage: that he who had trampl'd over us so stately and so tragically should leave the world at last so ridiculously in his exit, as to bequeath among his Deifying friends that stood about him such a pretious peece of mockery to be publisht by them, as must needs cover both his and their heads wth shame, if they have any left. Certainly they that will, may now see at length how much they were deceiv'd in him, and were ever like to be hereafter, who car'd not, so neer the minute of his death, to deceive his best and deerest freinds with the trumpery of such a prayer, not more secretly then shamefully purloind; yet giv'n them as the royall issue of his own proper Zeal. And sure it was the hand of God to let them fal & be tak'n in such a foolish trapp, as hath exposd them to all derision; if for nothing els, to throw contempt and disgrace in the sight of all men upon this his Idoliz'd Book, and the whole rosarie of his Prayers; thereby testifying how little he accepted them from those who thought no better of the living God then of a buzzard Idol, fitt to be so servd and worshipt in reversion, with the polluted orts and refuse of Arcadia's and Romances, without being able to discern the affront rather then the worship of such an ethnic Prayer. But leaving what might justly be offensive to God, it was a trespass also more then usual against human right, which commands that every Author should have the property of his own work reservd to him after death as well as living. Many Princes have bin rigorous in laying taxes on thir Subjects by the head, but of any King heertofore that made a levy upon thir witt, and seisd it as his own legitimat, I have not whom beside to instance. True it is I lookt rather to have found him gleaning out of Books writt'n purposely to help Devotion. And if in likelyhood he have borrowd much more out of Prayer-books then out of Pastorals, then are these painted Feathers, that set him off so gay among the people, to be thought few or none of them his own. But if from his Divines he have borrow'd nothing, nothing out of all the Magazin, and the rheume of thir Mellifluous prayers and meditations, let them who now mourn for him as for Tamuz, them who howle in thir Pulpits, and by thir howling declare themselvs right Wolves, remember and consider in the midst of thir hideous faces, when they doe onelyonly not cutt thir flesh for him like those ruefull Preists whom Eliah mock'd; that he who was once thir Ahab, now thir Josiah, though faining outwardly to reverence Churchmen, yet heer hath so extremely set at nought both them and thir praying faculty, that being at a loss himself what to pray in Captivity, he consulted neither with the Liturgie, nor with the Directory, but neglecting the huge fardell of all thir honycomb devotions, went directly where he doubted not to find better praying, to his mind with Pammela in the Countesses Arcadia. What greater argument of disgrace & ignominy could have bin thrown with cunning upon the whole Clergy, then that the King among all his Preistery, and all those numberles volumes of thir theological distillations, not meeting with one man or book of that coate that could befreind him with a prayer in Captivity, was forc'd to robb Sr. Philip and his Captive Shepherdess of thir Heathen orisons, to supply in any fashion his miserable indigence, not of bread, but of a single prayer to God. I say therfore not of bread, for that want may befall a good man, and yet not make him totally miserable: but he who wants a prayer to beseech God in his necessity, tis unexpressible how poor he is; farr poorer within himself then all his enemies can make him. And the unfitness, the undecency of that pittifull supply which he sought, expresses yet furder the deepness of his poverty.
Thus much be said in generall to his prayers, and in special to that Arcadian prayer us'd in his Captivity, anough to undeceave us what esteeme wee are to set upon the rest. For he certainly whose mind could serve him to seek a Christian prayer out of a Pagan Legend, and assume it for his own, might gather up the rest God knows from whence; one perhaps out of the French Astraea, another out of the Spanish Diana; Amadis and Palmerin could hardly scape him. Such a person we may be sure had it not in him to make a prayer of his own, or at least would excuse himself the paines and cost of his invention, so long as such sweet rapsodies of Heathenism and Knighterrantry could yeild him prayers. How dishonourable then, and how unworthy of a Christian King were these ignoble shifts to seem holy and to get a Saintship among the ignorant and wretched people; to draw them by this deception, worse then all his former injuries, to go a whooring after him. And how unhappy, how forsook of grace, and unbelovd of God that people who resolv to know no more of piety or of goodnes, then to account him thir cheif Saint and Martyr, whose bankrupt devotion came not honestly by his very prayers; but having sharkd them from the mouth of a Heathen worshipper, detestable to teach him prayers, sould them to those that stood and honourd him next to the Messiah, as his own heav'nly compositions in adversity, for hopes no less vain and presumptuous (and death at that time so imminent upon him) then by these goodly reliques to be held a Saint and Martyr in opinion with the People.
And thus farr in the whole Chapter we have seen and consider'd, and it cannot but be cleer to all men, how, and for what ends, what concernments, and necessities the late King was no way induc'd, but every way constrain'd to call this last Parlament: yet heer in his first prayer he trembles not to avouch as in the eares of God, That he did it with an upright intention, to his glory, and his peoples good: Of which dreadfull attestation how sincerely meant, God, to whom it was avow'd, can onelyonly judge; and he hath judg'd already; and hath writt'n his impartial Sentence in Characters legible to all Christ'ndom; and besides hath taught us, that there be som, whom he hath giv'n over to delusion; whose very mind and conscience is defil'd; of whom Saint Paul to Titus makes mention.