1 VVHEREAS it hath seemed good, just, and equitable, to his Excellency, the Lord Fairfax, Legitimate Captain Ge­nerall, by Conquest and Commission, of all the Parlia­ment Forces in England and Wales, (upon the humble ten­der of a Petition presented to his Excellency, by the hands of certain Collonels of the Reformadoes, subscri­bed thereunto, and consented unto by many thousands of the rest) not only to grant their Petition in point of Arrears, but also nobly to look upon them with a chear­full eye of Remembrance, and reflexion, to their former good service done, as being the first breakers of the Ice, in this great change of Reformation, the primitive in­struments of the Parliaments safety, and their Coun­tries good. And now the distressed (nay deserted) Or­phants of the Warlike Essex, his magnanimous prede­cessor: and hath consequently been pleased to receive into his care, favour, and protection, as many as shall be found faultlesse, trusty, loyall, and can justifie their in­tegrity. Wee therefore the said Petitioners, Subscrib­ers, and consenters, doe, by this our present Remon­strance manifest to the open world in the first place, our [Page 2] obedience, thanks, and ingagement to his Excellency, and His Councell of Warre, and doe hereby assure him and them, our best assistance, service, and compliance in his Designes, against his Enemies, the Kingdomes Ene­mies, and the Enemies of the Crosse of Christ: And that with our utmost power, maugre all opposite pow­er whatsoever, whether homebred, or forraigne.

2 But secondly, forasmuch as we the said Reforma­does, have for this long while (through Envy and Mi­sprision) lain under the goring lash of Malignity, the brand of Calumny, the sting of jealousie (afflictions farre more bitter, more miserable, then want, Iron grates or slavery) and so have, consequently, falne into the ill opinion of the Army, the sleighting of the Parliament, the generall contempt of both Foes and Friends, the distrust of the people, to the sad ruine of our former re­putation, and our utter undoings, having none to stand up for us, either in the mediating for our dues, or vin­dicating our honours. Therefore in the second place, we now at last exhibit this Remonstrance (being as it were set at liberty, and got under the Sun-Beames of his Ex­cellencies protection) thereby doe shew unto the eyes of all men, both our sincerity, fidelity, and constancy in the generall good cause, as also the indignities of inju­ries, abuses, aspersions, and unchristian requitals, cast up­on us after all our faithfull service to the State and peo­ple, in which Narration wee will bee as succinct as the consequence of so great a matter will possibly admit.

3 In the beginning of these civill, but unnaturall bick­erings, the King & Parliament first drew no other blood but what dropt from the black-mouthed quill, or was shed from the Presse in the clash of pens. The one high­ly [Page 3] asserting his Prerogative, and absolute Supremacy: The other as stiffely maintaining their priviledges, and Independent Immunities: Till at last, being weary of their pens they fell to their Pikes, and so the controver­sie came to be decided by the Logick of the Sword and loud Canon, in the open Schoole of Mars, the field of blood. Hereupon both sides began to List Champions, Assistants, and partners in their Quarrell, some Prest, and some Voluntier, some for pay take up Armes, some for conscience, and some for both. Old Souldiers flock hither from beyond Sea, new Souldiers were here made, and many (whom wee neither own nor commend) were Souldiers of Fortune, rather then the Cause.

Now then in this great triall of men & minds, the God that searcheth the reines put it into our hearts freely, and conscientiously to venture life, honour, estate, and all on the Parliaments side, in case the War should goe on, And to that purpose did wee cordially tender our service, and were as honourably received, to fight in the quarrell of justice, Common right, Reformation of a­buses, and the peoples Liberty, never fore-dreaming their revolt from their principles, or our ejection from their service.

4 But fourthly to goe on, behold the martiall dis­pute grew hotter, and hotter, and the Noble Essex was chosen Generall on this side, we according to the ho­nest dictates of our soules, being by the eye of reason and Religion convinced of the excellency of the Cause, and by the call of Conscience summoned to the undertak­ing of the work, grew confident of the gallantry of our Leader, and two credulous of the honesty of our State-Masters, and forthwith as became the souldiers of Christ [Page 4] (whose quarrell wee made it, more then our owne or theirs) we accordingly fell to worke, and that many of us at our owne charges, mounted upon our owne horses, fired our owne Pistols, and relying upon our owne Pro­visions, divers having laid out hundreds, nay thousands of pounds without receiving one penny back, many of us, and that the Major part being men of quality, Gentle­men, and old Commanders by Sea and Land, wanting then neither money nor imployment, but freely discert­ing houses, lands, wives, children, friends, livelihood, and all for the grand good worke in hand, which wee undertooke resolvedly, and performed as valiantly, and successively. Tride men, whereof many thousands lost their lives, and many others now better knowne by their Scars, then their Scarffes, for wee flincht not, wee betrayed not our trust, wee sided not with our Enemies, unlesse the Parliament was our Enemy, wee faild not in our duties, wee fell not in our principles, wee fought the good fight, and that for foure long years, in many a hard and desperate fight, the theatre of the whole world being witnesse.

5 But behold on a sudden, such is the unsearchable, uncontrolable working of the divine hand, behold the Martiall Sceane was changed, and new actors Martial­led for the stage of War, exit Generall Essex, enter Ge­nerall Fairfax, now were wee forced to face about to quit our ground, and resign our places to the new mod­dell, having this only comfort left us, after al, that a faith­ful gallant people were our successors, and this our grea­test misery, that wee might not be intrusted fellow act­ors, and fellow-sufferers with them.

6 And now in this great wonder, wee appeared as [Page 5] men in a mist or a maze, wee knew not well on what ground wee went, or stood, nor where wee were, what friends, what foes wee had, wee onely knew our Con­sciences cleare, and our arrears as due as our birth-right; but how to obtaine that or this, wee knew not.

Our Generall being dead, our hopes were still in God, and the Parliament, and truly had the first faild us, as the second did, the grave long since, through mere want, had bin the portion of at least ten thousand honest, gallant, fighting soules, such as dare bid defiance at this instant, and in this present cause, to twice as many of the Ene­mies of the heroicke Fairfax, or any other upon the face of the earth.

7 But to bee briefe, notwithstanding our old good service, our inviolated fidelities, our constant perseve­rance, wee became, like chimnies in Summer, or at least, kept against the winter of a hard time, their slaves at a dead lift: For wee were not so forgotten, or so sleigh­ted, as to be absolutly flung aside, for then wee had been in part happy, wee had faced about, and lookt out for a livelihood elsewhere, but that which was far worse then disbanding, they hold us by the noses in a neate smoake of delusion from time to time at the Parliament doore, there wee danced after an ignis fatuis in a trieniall mist gallantly foold for three full yeares with words, meere words and empty papers, which they gave most freely, and oft would they lay us aside for further debate, re­spited from yeare to yeare, month to month, week to weeke, day to day, but to as much purpose at last as was at first, and at first as was at last; yet however wee pe­titioned, and still they gave us words, sometime faire and sometimes foule, according as the Army (their law [Page 6] and terror) moved nearer or further from London.

They made many orders indeed for payment, but took none to see us paid, nay would the world think it, there was some in Parliament that tooke a course to prevent it, for say they, hold the bone out but give it not, that wee may have the Curres at a becke and a whistle, and then said some others, if wee prevent the gluing of the two Armies, wee shall as easily disguard Fairfax and his tattered Regiaments, as a begging Souldier from our doore with a two penny peece, or a crackt groat, and their plot was sure, for so might they raise a new and third power of their owne, when the old and new mod­dell was extinct.

8 In the mean time our miseries, scornes, enemies and wants increast as fast as our friends fell, and our scores risse, wee languisht even to the gates of death, in ex­pectation of performance from promise of the Parlia­ment, but yet no comfort came, but airie complements, and some time in course language, bid us sow up the mouthes of our children if they wanted bread, what should wee doe? the rugged Catch pole, and the hauk-eyed Serjeant lay hovering in every corner, my Landlord at the red lettice would no longer trust on score, the white chalke must be paid; our estates gone, our horses sold, our Swords, Cloaks, Buffs, Pistolls pawned, and all our credit gone out, like the snuffe of a candle with a twang in the end, so that at this instant not 6 of 6000 are able to keep house, or the woolfe from the doore, or show their heads for feare of arrests: nay divers Com­manders, men formerly of good fashion and quallity, starved in prison, their wives and children left to the mercy, or rather misery of the wild world, and many at [Page 7] this instant languishing in prison, ready there to perish for want of bread, and the rest in perpetuall perill to taste of the same cup, and this was Parliament pay.

9. Yet could not all this, we blesse God, once shake the foundation of our first love, the cause we fought for, as we had fought the good fight before, we had we confesse both many and strong Invitations with Horse, Armes, Monie, and high promises, from Kent, Essex, Sussex, Surrey, and the City, to side this Summer with the Enemy against our faithfull brethren, this coura­gious and victorious Army, But behold neither want, nor wealth could work upon our spirits, for God still dwelt in our hearts by his fear, to the abhorring and utter renouncing of all offers, sollicitations, pretences, preferments or any overtures, which might in the least sort tend to the hazarding of our first principles, to the infringing of the peoples rights, or to the prejudice of this Army, which we, by calling, carriage, and suc­cesse, have reason to beleeve that they are the Army of God.

10 And therfore in all reason towards this Army as our proper Center do we now tend, there to coagulate and incorporate with them, for like as in the beginning of this second rebellion, we did exhibit an unanimous and generall petition to the Parliament, shewing that wee might be imployed in the defence of them and this Ar­my, against the adverse party, but that petition proved as fruitlesse, as our severall petitions for Arrears, nay, more particularly, even as within these few months di­vers of us did singly, and that eagerly petition and im­plore Lenthall the Speaker, but for poor 20 l. a man, and some for fewer pounds, and some for a few shillings, [Page 8] and that out of our own Arrears, of some 100 some 2 3 or 400 l. due to a man, to the intent, that we might furnish our selves as Troopers for the assistance of the General, then before Colchester, or to have had meanes to defray the ordinary charges of the way for our ho­nest conveyance down, there at least to have traild a Pike, as some of our honest Majors and Captains did, but our suit was denied and we deluded, partly by the cold fallacie of the Speakers grant, and partly by the ruffe Baffles of the two Treasurers, Pocock and Greenhill Treasurers for the Reformadoes payments, and then having in their hands enough and enough again, to have satisfied so poor, so easie a request, for by the way, this Pocock a Draper made double his gaines, to the double­ing of our losse, for by reserving from time to time the Cash in his owne Coffers, and forcing many of us (ta­king advantage upon our necessities) to a payment in cloath, at 20 s. 15 s. or lesse per yard, being put to our choice, that or nothing, but however to let that passe for the present, we consequently say, that as our Trustees deserted us and our persons, we desert them and their persons, neither should the late apprehended Members take it amisse, or the residue of the still remaining Re­presentative thinke our desertion a wonder, for they turning from us and our petitions, have taught us to turn from them, and so in all right turn our Petition to him, whom we lately and so often petitioned them, that we might serve, therefore now have we faithfully and cor­dially made our addresses to receive us as his, to releive us in our distresses, to own us after our long and sad re­jection, and so to insert us into the body, from which we were as branches broken of, that others might be in­grafted [Page 9] in, for our case is not much unlike that of the Jew and the Gentile, mentioned by the Apostle in the 11. of Romans vers. 11, 12, 13, &c. because as they are to make up one entire Communion of Saints, under one Head Christ Jesus, even so we hope to make up one imbodied Army under one Leader, as our General con­duct under Jesus Christ.

11. Peculiarly therefore to him we adhere, next un­der Christ our refuge and our Buckler, the man of ju­stice and mercy, that David over the scattered and contemned Troops, who hath now made those churlish Nabals (the sons of folly) taste of hell even there, where so often, so long they had been a hell to us, as their quondam safety, their primitive Champions, keepers, 1 Sam. 25. 3, 6, 10. 15, 16, 21, 22. and deliverers, who brought peace to them, peace to their house, and peace to all they had, who were a wall of defence to them by day and by night, while they sate consulting in the shadow of death, in a very wilder­ness of fears and dangers.

Cruel and uncivill after all were their requitalls, and so adieu to our Enemies. That Gideon hath been pleas­ed to bee our recompence who past over the wide Ri­ver at Rochester, who tooke the Princes of the Mi­dianites at Colchester, Oreb, and Zeeb, and there slue Judg. 7. 24, 25. them; who hath humbled the Princes of Succoth and their City, who hath taught the Elders thereof, even threescore and seventeen men with thornes and bryers of the Wildernesse for upbraiding his men, nay worse, for refusing to send bread, relief, and payment to the faint Souldier, while he was pursuing after Zeba and Judg. 8. 4, 5, 6, 14, 15, 16. Zalmunna, (the Kings of the grashoppers) those Coun­ty Midianites, and Scottish Amalekite, even proud Go­ring, [Page 10] and treacherous Hamilton; This Gideon therefore will we follow, and towards him we advance our Co­lours as our Captain.

12. But stay, our march is stopt, a Lyon is in the way, or at least a stumbling block which must hence be removed, before we can advance a step further, for it will be objected, and that to our faces, how can we make good our Covenant touching King and Parlia­ment, and quit the name of Traitor or Revolter? To this we answer in brief, there are as we conceive four prime materiall things, from any one of which four, a Parliament doth receive a denomination, and is accord­ingly called a Parliament, sometimes truly, sometimes fallaciously, which fallacy or wrong name of Parliament layes the ground for all Faction, sides, and parties, (viz) the persons, the cause, the Laws, and the Authority of Parliament, of each a word in their order.

1. As for the persons in Parliament, they are not a Juncto of Machiavels, a Pack of brethren in iniquity, a company of young raw-heads, or old Achitophels, a bunch of Factions made up of Royalists, State Pres­byters, or silken Independents, it is not a Trienniall Monopoly of power, laws, estates, and succession from father to son till doomesday; but the proper persons in Parliament, are a select number of pious and righteous men, the Trustees put into power by the wisedome of their Country, or thus; they are the People elected for their goodnes not their greatnes, as the Representatives in full of the people electing; the electors and the elect­ed being as inseparable and correllative to each other as soul and body, head and heart, and so together make up one individuall people, the one represented, the o­ther [Page 11] representing, as being the signifiers, the expresse let­ter and image of the people, as the whole people are in one essence the image of God.

2. The cause in Parliament, is the full adequate end, the main intent and fundamentall purpose of convoking a Parl. which cause in this present Parliament, was in the hopes and thoughts of good men, the Cause of Christ, namely a thorough, generall Reformation, with justice, truth, and freedome, for the publicke good: But it seems in the hearts and plots of Knaves and Pretenders, it was the Cause of the Devill and Mammon, namely money, with freedome, safety, and honour, for none but their own good, making the good Cause a shelter and pre­tence to the bad, and thereby attracting, inveigling, and deluding thousands both good and bad, to their owne end.

5. As for the Lawes in Parliament, They are not Com­mittee snares, double faced Orders, or equivocall papers devised for selfe ends; but those sound, just, plaine, and wholesome Decrees, debated, examined, confirmed, and plainly published, by the authority of the said intrusted conscientious persons, and that for the sole entire good of the people, not their own profit; binding both them­selves and us, the elected and the electing equally to o­bedience, so long as the said Decrees stand suitable and convenient, to the sound temper, health, weale, and con­stitution of the Common body, and no longer.

4 As touching the authority of Parliament, it is not the clubbing humour of a partiall Committee, not the wry looke of the Speaker, nor the bare pleasure of a re­vengefull Malignant Member, nor yet the arbitrary will of imperious Lords, and avaritious Commons to sweare [Page 12] men, to presse men, to imprison men, ad placitum, [...]et du­nante placito, their will being their law: But authority of Parliament, is next under Christ, the solemne repre­sented power of the people, as it is a people, or more plainly, the authority of Parliament, is the sacred invio­lable both sword and scale of justice, derived into the hands of faithfull men pro tempore, and that by the pro­vidence of God, as Stuards of his rights for him, and next by the election of the people, as Trustees, for their right for them, to alter, make, repeale, examine and ordaine, for Gods onely honour, and the peoples good, and so it followes that God is authour of the people, the people, are authours of the Representatives to chuse them, mend them, or make them a new, in case they abuse their au­thority, or betray their trust, for in so doing they have wronged their Authors, God and the People, and con­sequently forfieted, their place, power, and authority, that sat before as Gods, but now they must die as men.

13 Now then (having fully and clearly stated the point) to the grand question in hand, wee reply and say, wee ever were and still are for KING and PARLIAMENT, that is, in referrence, sence, and order to the first funda­mentall cause thereof, for which wee tooke up armes, (viz.) Justice and Freedome, but by no means, as Idola­trous Reverencers of the persons in Parliament, quatenus persons, under that name and notion, as being members of the Houses. Pell mell, for better for worse, for as touching persons, and Members, every tub must stand up­on his own bottome, and let the saddle be set upon the right Horse; God and the Law, bring to account both the guilty hypocrite, and the fearfull looker on, actors and connivers, be they who they will bee, high or low, [Page 13] if some betray their trust, or if the rest through fear or favour wink at the betrayors of the trust, wee renounce both the one and the other, for they did fear man more then God, whose presence is daily in the midst of all their wayes and councells. When wee therefore say we are for the Parliament, wee mean the originall cause it self, which is good, just, honest and perpetuall: But as for the Persons, they are Changeable, Moveable, Trieni­all, and perhaps Diurnall men: if they bee good, and their Lawes wholesome, and correspondent to their primitive principles, wee are for them; if not, wee re­linguish them, nay wee remonstrate against them, for how can wee serve two masters God & Mammon; neither will wee staine our banners, or abuse our swords in the cause of the wicked, their money, their dignities, their pretended cause, their lawes and their authorities perish with their Lordly persons; But for a good cause, good lawes, sound authority, righteous persons, wee will even dare to dye, if wee perish wee perish.

14 And now lastly to bring up the Reare of our Re­monstrance, that the whole world, our friends, our foes, may fully know how clear our judgement is in this mat­ter, and how sound our hearts, we do here confirme the particulars of the precedent Remonstrance, with this ad­ditionall Protestation, and free Covenantiall Vow, as a lasting memoriall of our faiths, both of this age, and the ages to come.