W. H. Hart

“ Because nothing can tend more to the Advancement of any City or Country than the having wise and good Magistrates; and that so long as the great expence of Shrievalties continue, the City must (as this Act suggests) have an Eye to Wealth, more than Parts or Vertue, in the choice of their Sheriffs; and that such as their Sheriffs are, such will the Court of Aldermen be: and therefore as necessary for the good Government of this great City, the charge of Shrievalties ought to be reduced to such an Order and Method, as may be an Encouragement to Men of more Honesty than Riches to serve the Place. ”

“ On March 28th, 1642, the House of Commons resolved that this Diurnal, printed by Robert Wood, was false and scandalous to the King and the parliament, and contained in it "divers seditious passages and of dangerous consequence," and that Wood should be sent for as a delinquent by the Serjeant at Arms for printing this Diurnal; and it was resolved that whoever should print or sell any act or passages of that house under the name of a Diurnal or otherwise without particular licence "should be reputed a high contemner and breaker of the privilege of parliament, and so punished accordingly." ”

“ Clement Danes, aforesaid, say, pronounce, and publish falsely, scandalously, maliciously, profanely, blasphemously, and heretically these false, scandalous, profane, blasphemous, and heretical words in the presence and hearing of divers liege subjects of the said lord the King, viz.—I rather believe in Muggleton that stood on the Pillory, than in Jesus Christ, I have power to damn and to save, and if thou (meaning a certain Gilbert Soper then and there present) art not damned I never desire to see the face of God. I do believe in that Muggleton, that stood on the Pillory, next to God Almighty. ”

“ Benjamin Keach, you are here convicted of writing and publishing a seditious and scandalous Book, for which the Court's judgment is this, and the court doth award, That you shall go to gaol for a fortnight, without bail or mainprise; and the next Saturday to stand upon the pillory at Ailsbury for the space of two hours, from eleven o'clock to one, with a Paper upon your head with this inscription, For writing, printing and publishing a schismatical book intitled, The Child's Instructor, or a new and easy Primmer. ”

“ Dutton the Minister should be forthwith committed a prisoner to the Gatehouse, during the pleasure of the House for carrying himself in a scornful manner in the House, and for, as much as in him lay, justifying the foulest and most scandalous pamphlet that ever was raised or published against the Parliament. ”

“ The Pretences of Tyranny and Popery being grown Stale; the Popish Plot drawn almost to the Dregs, and the Eyes of the People so far open'd, that they begin to see their Friends from their Enemies; to the Disheartening of All True Protestants, and the Encouraging of the sons of the Church, We your Majestie's Dissenting Subjects, being thereby brought unto so low a state, That without a timely Relief, we the Godly People of the Land must Inevitably perish ”

“ The first mentioned book was directed against Noye, the Attorney General, who, it was made out, was visited with a judgment from heaven whilst laughing at Prynne as he stood in the pillory. For writing and publishing these books, the latter of which was styled "a pernicious damnable scurrilous invective and libel," an information was exhibited in the Star Chamber against the author, and on the 14th June, 1637, he was sentenced to lose his ears in the Palace Yard at Westminster, to be fined £5000 to the King, and to perpetual imprisonment. ”

“ Israel; as if the King were a Tyrant, bidding as it were every man to take his Sword and Armor; and oppose all Authority whatsoever, obeying no Law but that of their owne humour and will; what can there be more said, but that it was very plaine, but that this Walker did by those words labour to instigate and stir up the King's Subjects to a mutiny, and to cause tumults to arise in this Kingdome, nay, in the heart of this Kingdome, in the City of London too ”

“ A treatise of the execution of justice, wherein is clearly proved that the execution of judgment and justice is as well the people's as the magistrate's duty, and if the magistrates pervert judgment the people are bound by the law of God to execute judgment without them and upon them. 1663.
For printing this book, John Twyn of London, stationer, was tried at the Old Bailey on February 20th, 1663, and being convicted received sentence as in cases of high treason, and was executed accordingly. ”

“ But saith, He doth not find, in Scripture, where Jesus Christ is called the Most High God, or God from Everlasting to Everlasting.
"Being asked, Whether God be confined to a certain Place; saith, this is not to the Hope that is in a Christian: Therefore there is no necessity lying on him to answer.
"Being asked, Whether God have a bodily Shape; saith, He hath answered sufficiently to that already."
It was thereupon ordered that Biddle should be committed prisoner to the Gatehouse in Westminster. ”

“ On July 14th, 1645, this book was brought before the notice of the House of Commons by the Assembly of Divines, and its scope was stated to be, "that true believers, how weak soever in faith, should not be oppressed or perplexed in heart by anything whatever befals them either in sin or afflictions." ”

“ In a letter from John Locke to Carleton, dated July 11th, 1624, the writer says "A poor man is in trouble for printing a book called Votiva Angliæ; the Commission Court were about to liberate him, when the king ordered him to be remanded and to pay £1000 fine, as he was said to have gained £1000 by the book." ”

“ In quoquidem libello continentur hæc falsa ficta et scandalosa verba sequentia, And as all Addresses of this nature tend to render the King, who ought to reign in the hearts of all his people, the Head meerly of one party and that a very inconsiderable one if compared with the bulk of the Nation; so they only serve to publish to all the world the distractions of the Kingdom, and to proclaim in the face of the Sun the weakness of the Government. ”

“ For the prince is a person of authority and trust, to imploy the goods of the people, for their common good, either in maintayning order among themselves, or in repelling the enterprises of their enemies: neyther can they possibly be preserved by the prince, if they withdraw theire owne endeavour and supply. ”

“ For printing this work a prosecution was instituted against James Cottrell, a printer of the parish of St. Sepulchre in London. The information charges that he, being a pernicious person, and contriving and maliciously intending to create discord and scandal between the King and his people, and the nobles of the kingdom, did on the twenty sixth day of March [270] in the thirty second year of the reign of King Charles the Second, at the parish of St. Sepulchre in the City of London publish and cause to be published a false scandalous and malicious libel intituled England's Alarm, &c. ”

“ As wee conceive ourselves obliged by the Law of God, the Law of the Land, by the Dictates of Nature and reason to maintaine all these; so by God's grace assisting us, we hope we shall not be terrified or compelled to yeeld any active obedience to any dis-joyned part of Parliament without the consent of the whole (which we heartily desire may be united) or to any uncertaine Debates, Votes or Ordinances, that are not digested or setled into Lawes ”

“ A pamphlet of which there is a copy in the British Museum Library. It commences thus:—
"In the spacious Theater of the Universe, the singular conditions of singular Persons are directly articulated in some expresse place. Wherefore the Round-heads, whose Pricke-eares are longer than their Haire, have erected an Image of their own Imaginations; a Synagogue, or a convenient place conduceably to the obscured secrecy of their Conventicles: and they gave a plausible appellation to it, calling it Round-heads' Hall. ”

“ Also, that the foul aspersions in the said Libel, cast upon Major General Skippon, tended to blast him in his Reputation, to raise Mutiny and Sedition, and to stir up the Hatred of the People against him, thereby to render him useless in these distracted Times, he being a Person of such eminent Worth." And it was finally resolved that these Votes should be forthwith printed, and set up in the most publick Places of the City, "to discover to the People the wicked Designs of these Libels; and to vindicate Major General Skippon in his Honour, from the false Calumnies thereby cast upon him." ”

“ Again they asserted the Infanta's claim by the House of Portugal, and maintained on the same bottom the title of the Dukes of Parma and Braganza, from Philippa, the daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, whom they make to be his eldest daughter by his wife Blanch; whereas Frosard, who was a courtier at that time, proves (fol. 169 of the second part of his history) that his eldest daughter was Elizabeth, wife to John Holland, afterwards Duke of Exeter, from whose loins proceeded a large race of nobility, all the kingdom over. ”

“ After the Restoration of King Charles the Second, this book was called in by proclamation, and burnt by the Common Hangman. John Goodwin, the author, was chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and a Nonconformist, but of a different stamp to the generality of them. He had a clear head, a fluent tongue, a penetrating spirit, and a marvellous faculty in descanting on scripture, and must be owned to have been a very considerable man. [153] A copy is preserved in the British Museum Library. ”

“ Nor shall we ever yeeld ourselves such Slaves, or so betray the liberty purchased by our Forefathers blood, and bequeathed unto us as to suffer our selves to be swayed by any Arbytrary Government whatsoever, or stand with too much contention of Spirit to cast off the yoake of our Tyrany to endure many worse. ”

“ England's Alarm: or, a most humble declaration, address, and fervent petition to his most Excellent Majesty Charles the Second, King of Great Britain and Ireland; and to his most honourable and grand Council the Parliament of England; as also to the City of London, and the whole nation in general. Concerning the great Overtures, Catastrophes, and Grand Occurrences about to inundate and pour in upon us, as the Judgments of Almighty God upon Antichrist and his adherents, and the Pride, Nauseancy, and Errour of Professors, in the years 1680 and 1681. ”

“ And if when little was spent besides the growth of our own Country, Beer and Ale being then their drink, they thought it their wisdom to set bounds to Luxurious Profuseness, there is much more reason for it now, when Debauchery is come to that height, that the fifth part of the charge of a Shrievalty is in Wine, the growth of another Country. ”

“ Michael, Cornhill, London, falsely, unlawfully, wickedly, maliciously, scandalously, and seditiously cause to be printed, sold, and published a certain, false, scandalous, and defamatory libel, intituled The Impartial Protestant Mercury, containing among other things as follows:—There has been a fresh rumour of a Parliament like to be called to meet on the twenty-eighth of the next month, but we cannot find any foundation for that report, more than that a Person of Quality lately arrived from France relates, that he was told of such a thing at Paris. ”

“ Will you murther me because I will not bely myself and others? Several other such like expressions they heard spoken as by one in great Agony. About four of the clock the next morning, the Prisoners that lay in a Place above the hole, heard the same cry again two houres, and on Saturday Morning again, and about Eight a Clock that morning a person I employ'd to spy out the truth of that affair, did see the Turn keys carrying a Bed into the hole, she asked whoe it was for, they told her, it was for Prance, who was gone Mad, and had tore his bed in pieces. ”

“ That whereas, this present Parliament, through the Blessing of God upon their Endeavours, and the incomparable Grace and Goodness of his Majesty's Royal Condescensions, have proved the happy Instruments of repairing the Breaches of this Kingdom; restoring the ancient Foundations; and passing many good and wholsome Laws, for the Safety and Quiet of the People ”

“ Upon this indictment Curtis was tried on February 14, 1683/4, found guilty, and on April 21, 1684, sentenced to stand in and upon the Pillory in Bloomsbury Market between the hours of eleven and one o'clock, with a paper on his head denoting his offence in large letters, and at the same time the libel was to be burned by the Common Hangman. He was also sentenced to pay a fine of £500, to be committed to the Marshalsea until payment, and to find security for good behaviour during life. ”

“ And therefore it cannot properly be called the Nations or Peoples Parliament, but Col. Pride's and his associates, whose really it is; who although they have beheaded the King for a Tyrant, yet walk in his oppressingest steps, if not worse and higher. London, Printed in the grand yeer of hypocriticall and abominable dissimulation. ”

“ On the title page of this curious tract (of which there is a copy in the British Museum Library) there is a woodcut which represents four men seated at a table after a meal, and listening to one who appears half an idiot, and is named "simple Robin"; on the right is a man kissing a woman, and saying, "A little in [92] zeale good sister Ruth." ”

“ And tho' we would fain persuade ourselves that they are persons of more honour and integrity than to make reprisals upon the Lives of Peers for the injury which they suppose was done them; yet the imprisoning my Lord Shaftsbury upon the credit of Witnesses whose testimony they refused to believe in the case of my Lord Stafford, doth not a little surprize the thinking part of mankind. ”

“ For having liberty and being strong of spirit, through high fare, they are so zealously impudent that they would go toot in the streetes; but I will conclude with good man Greene's Hebrew Exhortation, Quicquid liber cuquodlibet,—away with the Liturgy, and so say I."
On June 15th, 1642, the House of Commons ordered that Nicholas Vavasor, who dispersed this pamphlet, should be forthwith summoned and brought in safe custody to answer to the House ”

“ It is his Majesty's pleasure that you take into your custody the person of Francis Smith, Stationer, for having a hand in printing and compiling dangerous books, and that you keep him close prisoner till further order from his majesty, and for so doing this shall be your warrant. ”