TOM NASH HIS GHOST, OR, THE CURRYING OF CROP-EARE, &c.
IN this Mad, Sad, Cold Winter of discontent. About the end of October last 1643, The Moone being near hir change, and obscure in our Horison, not one Starre appearing, the skie (like an Ebon Canopie) muffled up the Hemisphear in an universall sable robe of Melancholly black, so that darknesse was made a Maske which hid the Mournfull visage of our Mother Earth; In and at such a time, when nothing was waking or walking, but Thieves, Lovers, Carefull mindes, Owles, Batts, Ghosts, Witches and Goblins &c. About the Waste or Navel of the night, Drowsie Somnus came stealing to me, and with his Leaden Mace arrested me, at the suite of my old Lady Nox, which Arrest I obeyed by untying, unbuttoning, and quite undoing my selfe, and to bed; Where suddainly I winck'd at the faults of all the world, shutting up the two shop windowes of my Microcosme, & (like a nimble Clothworker) I presently set a Nappe upon my Thredbare eyes. I had not layne long in this silent pleasing Embrace of Mounsieur Morpheus but there appeared unto me a poore olde swarty fellow, with starcing haire, Neglected beard, Ashy Gastly look, with a black Clo [...]th Cloak upon his back, which hee had worne as thin as if it had been Searge, whereby I conceiv'd him [Page 2] to be a Poet) I begun to be puzled with this strange Apparition, & ask'd him whom he was, and what his businesse was with me.
Quoth he, my name is Thomas or Tom Nashe, who when this Ayerie shadow of mine had a corporeall substance, I had a yerking, firking, jerking, Satiricall and Poeticall veine, Pegasus was my Palfrey, the Muses were my Minions, Tempe, Aganipp [...], the Thespian, Helliconian and Castalian Fountaines did yeeld me Diarnall and Nocturnall Tributary Nectar: Fame and Defame were my Vassalls, and I could make them both wait on whom I list, I knew Honour, and I Honoured it, spurnd at Flattery, I lov'd Truth, I despised Riches, yet I liv'd and dyed Rich enough to be a Poet. And so much shall suffice to tell the what I was.
Now in the next place Il'ecertifie thee whence I came, and what mine errend is: know this, that about the 30 th year of the Raigne of Renouned Queen Elizabeth, She and the Protestant Religion (which She defended and Maintaind) were oposed and troubled with Heritiques, Papists, Schismatiques, Separatists, Brownists, Annabaptists, Familists, and Atheists; All of these disagreeing, yet all against the Church, and Government Ecclesiasticall and Civill here established. Amongst those innumerable Locusts that then were spewd from the Bottomlesse Pit, there crawl'd and swarm'd over the Kingdome, a Crew of Rascalls called Martinists; whose Laxative Purity did most shamefully in printed toyes, Pamphlets, and Lying Libells, besquitter all England over with such poynts of Doctrine, as was never known by Christ and his Apostles. And these Martins Intituled their Pasquills by the Impudent and sawcie names of Martin Mar Prelate. These scandalous Railings of theirs were then answered by as Grave, Wise, Learned, and Reverend men as England yeilded, and they were (by Scriptures, Fathers, Counsells, Divinity, Humanity, Learning, Wit, Wisdome, Truth, Sense, and Reason) Confuted; but none of these were available, for like Anvills, the more knocks they had the more obdurate they were; insomuch that those Martins like Caterpillers encreased most pestiferously,
I perceiving, that wisemen could do no good with those Vermin Began to take them in hand my selfe, & (whetting my Wits) I put some Aquafortis and Gall into my Inckhorn, with which I wrote a delicate discourse of Martin Mar tone, and Mar to ther and with [Page 3] a messe of Papp [...] with a Hatch [...], I made the Nest of Mischievous, Malevolent, Malignant Martins take their flight from hence into the Low Countries.
But the venom of these Vipers was so disperst and scatterred in sundry places of this Land, that though my Satires whip had lash'd their leaders from hence, yet the Impostumated Matter of theirs was never thorough Ripe till now of late▪ for now thou see'st they have Perfited their hellish plots, their Pennes and Pulpits, have (under the pretence and shew of Religion and Law,) almost overthrown both.
Wherefore, my well-wishing and beloved friend Iohn Taylor, my Ghost hath made a short scape from Elisium, to stirre thee up to Nip, and Whip, strip and Snip, these Matchlesse, Headlesse, Heedlesse Rebells, who are devided into three parts, Burtonians, Prinnians, and Bastwickians; for ti's certaine that from Burtons Divillity, Prinnes Illegall Law, and Bastwicks poysoned Pills and Pamphlets, the most part of all the Horrid and Barbarous Impieties and Cruelties have proceeded, wherewith this Afflicted Kingdom is most miserably opprest and over run.
Concerning William Prinne, he hath lately writ two damnable and detestable Books, stuft with as much Hipocrysie Villany, Rebellion and Treason as the Malice of the Divell, and his own mischievous braine could invent. The one is partly Titled THE SOVERAIGNE POWER OF PARLIAMENTS. The other, is called THE OPENING OF THE GREAT SEALE. Jack, (kind Jack) I Conjure thee to take this Railing fellow in hand, look upon his wicked workes, veiw his villanies, squeese the Quintessence of his eighty and odde sheets of printed Confusion into 12 leaves in Quarto, that the abhominable charge of his worthlesse high priz'd Volumes, (at ten or twelve shillings) may by thee be Epitomized▪ Abreviated, and Curtall'd in Bulk, and price to six-pence a peece. Feare not, go on Boldly, I will leave my Genius with thee, which shall Inspire thee, and infuse into thee such Terrible, Torturing, Tormenting, Termagant flames and flashes as shall Firk, Ferret, and force Prinne and his partners run quite out of that little wit that is left them▪ and desperatly save the Hangman a Labour, farewell.
This being said, the Ghost vanished, whereat I started up, put [Page 4] on my cloathes, fell to reading the aforesaid bookes at large, & with my pen made this short following abstract.
Roome for an old empty Pageant, drawne by the Trojan (or Graecian Horse) or rather by Sinon, the inventer of that wodden Palfrey. But this Beast claimes his pedigree from Bucephalus, and hath had his eares twice Crop'd, to bring him into the Capitall Roundnesse of the Fashion, and (known to be so full of mettle) was mark't (least he should be stolne,) with two brands in the cheeks; he braggs further to be descended from Baalams Asse, and overdoes his Predecessor in Imitation, for that Asse did reprove but, one Prophet (for which he had a large Commission) but this animall, (Sawcily) reproves all the Prophets without Wit, Reason, Sense, Order or lawfull Commission. This worthily mark't Iennet (like the Egyptian Asse that carried the Goddesse Isis) so all the usurping Major Penningtons Magazin are inclosed in Prinnes four bookes (or parts) of the Soveraigne power of Parliaments, Ordered to be printed by the Fornicating Brownist M. Iohn White, and confirm'd by the New broad Scale, (lately opened by himselfe) And although three of those partes of his foure (being eighty six sheets) printed close in large Quarto; hath been soberly, solidly, and fully answered in lesse then one leafe in Quarto, by too worthy a writer for him to Reply upon, yet he still Brayes alowd, (like Apulcius his Asse) cries out, no man dares or can answer him, because it is done by Weight and not by Number, like a Scold at Billinsgate, is ready to cry for anger, because no body will scold with him; wherefore, to salve or plaister the poore scorned wranglers credit, as also to save his longing for this once, who desires to see his own picture by Reflection in a looking Glasse, Sirrah Boy, bring me hither my pensill, for I have all the foure feet of the Beast sure enough in the Trammels, that he can doe no hurt, with Kicking, and his mouth is muzzled with his new Great (or Broad) Scale, that he is sure enough for Biting, and therefore let him frisk, and wince, and bray as long and loud as he list, I will rub the Gall'd jade till he be sensible, and either cure him, or make him see that there is no way but one for him, and that ere long his skinne must come to Gregory the whit tayer; and to that purpose like a Dutch Limmer, I thus draw my first line in the just Simmetry; and therefore have at the foreleg of the beast on the neare side, as it is delineated in his first part [Page 5] of his Soveraigne or Power of Parliaments.
First, Sir to ommit your Imbost swolne Tiles (to your four good parts) which are like the Gates of Mindus, large enough for the whole towne to run out at. I come to the preface of your first part, wherein you say That some Members of Parliament Induced you to enlarge that part of your Discours, In this you are beleivd, for by you it was produc'd; by them you were Induc'd, and by the Divell you were seduced both to begin, prosecute, and finish the whole frame and form of your formlesse falsities and fooleries, besides it is not to be imagined that any true Christian, Protestant, or Loyall Subject, would either have induced, encouraged, approved, and rewarded your impious Studies and Voluminous paines taking, but only some of the sweet Members: thus farre I allow you.
In the thirty second line of the preface, you Protest before the Great Iudge of Heaven & Earth, that you have wittingly maintaind nothing, but what your judgement and Conscience both, Byassed to no Sinister ends: Rub, Rub, hold Biasse, that which followeth, will shew the Reader what your Bias'd IUDGEMENT, CONSCIENCE, is. And in the sixty first line he protests againe, That the effecting and restoring of a blessed Harmony of Peace and Quietnesse, throughout our Kingdom, was one principall end of this his Labour. The end of your Labour, will certifie us the care you have in observing the truth of your great protestations. And so much for your preludium, face, or preface; Now I proceed to the first of your 4. Good parts.
On his first part of his Soveraigne power of Parliaments. In the second pag. 'tis said that by A Declaration in Parliament (that is by a Faction in Parliament) Commissions are granted to Papists against Law to secure the King in these Warres. And pag. 3. that it is unsafe for his Maiesty to put Armes into the hands of papists, and make use of them to protect the Kings person or Crowne. The Declaration we confesse was out, but neither in nor out, by, or from, any power or Authority of a Parliament; for all the world knowes that a Parliament is the highest and most Supream Court, of greatest power, Veneration, Dignity and Authority, to which all other Courts must submit, and from which Court there is no appeale on Earth. Furthermore a Parliament doth Consist of a King, all the Peeres & Barons of the Land, with the Knights & Burgesses of every County, [Page 6] Burrough and Towne in the Kingdome; such a Parliament hath Soveraigne power, whereof, and wherein the King is the Heade, & the two Houses of Lords & Commons are the Body, which as long as the Head and Body are joyned, is the only highest and Superlative Court, and hath the whole Soveraigne power in it; and such an honourable high, (yea highest) Court and Senate was this, till such time as some Factious Members, by suffering Clamours, Routes, disloyal demeanours, and Tumultuous Assemblies and meetings, drave away the head to escape danger & seek safety, whereby partes of the honourable and Loyallest Members followed, leaving behind them a few Factious, Ambitious, Rebellious Sectaries, who having no Head, or scarce a good limbe, doe with headlesse and heedlesse impudence presume to call themselves a Parliament. And you Sir, with your Inck-squittering Treacherous Pamphlets are the maine proppe and piller to uphold the soveraign unsavoury power of their Factious Conventicles. And thus have I breifly shewed thee what is, and what is not a Parliament. And therefore the Declaration aforesaid, is from the power of no Parliament, but that the King (by their leave) may make use of His Popish subjects, as the pretended Parliament did (without the Kings leave) of Ireish Rebells slaine at Worcester, and their popish Walloones, maintain'd to have Masse at Fulham, but according to your Rule (M. P.) one must aske his fellow if he be a theife, let you and your abetters be your own Iudges, & hange ye all if you condemn your selves, the case is altered, when Ploydens Bull is in the pound. I would have thee know that a papist is a thing that would live, and hath the sense to flee from danger and some wit to avoyd it, he hath also the skill, meanes, and courage to fight and defend himselfe, and he holds it better to serve his King, under whom he hath security and shelter, (as long as he is Loyall) then to be inthral'd by you, from whom he can expect nothing but Ruin and destruction.
Concerning your long Treatise which you call the Treachery and Disloyalty of papists against their Soveraignes. Me thinks their old treacheries should be no presidents for you or any man or Members whatsoever to be Rebells and Traytors. For as those Crimes in them do seem odious to you, so your Villanies (transcending theirs) cannot be made Amiable by any of your Sophisticating Legerdemaine Meanders. The powder Plot, I confesse was Hells Maister [Page 7] piece, but you have done your best (amongst you) to out-do it; They that had a hand in it, (to the perpetuall brand and infamy of that Religion) did all professe to be Roman Catholiques, but let impartiall Truth be the Iudge, and it will be found that the Contrivers and Actors in that horrid Plot, were of no Religion at all, and that they usurped the name and stile of Christians, (as you and your Crew do the Titles of Protestant and Parliament) for the chiefe of them had run out of faire Estates, by riotous feasting, drinking, drabbing, gaming, and all manner of profuse licenciousnesse, which when all was gone, and themselves involved and precipitated into bottomlesse Debts, then they grew melancholy desperate, and to raise their broken Fortunes upon the ruines of this mother Kingdome that nursed and bred them, devised that abhorred and detestable Plot; some there were of good estates and shallow capacities, who were seduced to aid with mony and meanes, by the perswasions of Garnet and others, (for such a Treason, or scarce any other mischiefe cannot be plotted without the brain of a Jesuit, which makes very understanding heads conjecture that Prinne, and his Faction doth hold correspondency with them in these their abhominable unparalleld Treasons.) Never was it heard or read that any, that professe to be Christians, did contrive or attempt so cruell, bloody, barbarous and execrable a Designe; therefore I conclude them neither Christians or Roman Catholiques, but meere Atheists, Libertines, and incarnate Devils. But by this I may be drawn into some suspition, that I am popishly addicted or affected; to which I answer, that the true Church was once at Rome, for Saint Paul, Rom. 1. 8. gave God thankes through Jesus Christ for them all that their Faith was spoken of (in some Translations) famous, or published throughout the whole world: that faith Rome is fallen from, and in the stead thereof, she hath a Faith and Religion, so intermingled with humane Traditions and inventions of men, which is unsafe for a Christian to liue and die in. But for all this a Protestant must not cast away all that is used at Rome, for they have God's Word there, they have the Scriptures there, which though they abuse, yet we have free liberty to use; and it is not their Religion, or ours that are Protestants, or any other who hold the Fundamentall points, grounds, and Articles of the Christian Faith, that can be compulsively thrust into the soules of [Page 8] men, for an enforced Religion takes no root in the conscience, a perswasive may, which made the Patriarch Noah, Gen. 9. 27. say, God perswade thee Japhet to dwell in the Tents of Shem; here is a Prayer for God's perswasion, not for mans inforcing the conscience.
I have been the longer about this argument concerning the Papists, because my nimble Antagonists doth Cuckoo-like play upon the same tone and tune. So much in answer to Prinnes first argument.
The second is page 5. & 7. The Papists have exercised a greater power over Kings than this Parliament doth; therefore this Parliament may do what it doth. Well, confest, shake hands with the Pope, and be friends, we see these Round-headed Boatmen row the same way with the Romish Rebells, howsoever like Cut-purses they seem to quarrell one against another, that they may make a fray in the midst of a crowd unspied.
The third and fourth Arguments are, page 7. & 9. Some Kings have been forced to call Parllaments, and have been deposed by their Subjects; therefore all Kings may be forced to the like, and be deposed by Parliaments. Well, bold Brother, now we begin to perceive how your judgement and conscience is biassed. Why couldst thou not as well justifie the Devill? Lucifer did rebell, therefore all may rebell, but I will helpe thee to a more concludent and significant Argument.
Penury was tried legally at the Assises, and hanged in Queen Elizabeths time, for lesse Treason than this, therefore Prinne ought to be tried legally, and hanged in King Charles his time for this Treason. Also in the seventh Page and thirteenth line he mentions the deposing and death of Vortigerne, (a wicked King) to bolster out Treasons, and colour Rebellions against a good King; also how Sigebert King of the West Saxons, was deposed and murdered; and Ofred King of Northumberland likewise deposed; Ethelred his next Successour slain by his Subjects at Cobre, and how the People expulsed Bernard and Ceolwulph Kings of Mercia, and the like they did to Edwin King of Northumberland: these seventh and eighth Pages are sufficiently stuffed with Treasons of great Antiquity, some of them a thousand, and some twelve hundred yeares old, which were done by wicked Subjects against most wicked [Page 9] Kings, some of them Pagans, and not any of them a good Christian, and some usurpers that came to the Regall Dignity, by murdering the lawfull Heires; so that these presidents are incerted by Prinne out of the damnable, inveterate, impertinent malice of his heart, for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. And it is an inscrutable Quere, what mischiefe Prinne would not do, to do the King a mischiefe.
Page 5. line 39. He calls this our present Protestant Parliament. It is approved by lamentable experience, that the word [ present] is too true, but as for the Parliament, it is past any good Subjects understanding to know where it is; it is confest, that it was at Westminster, but Rebellion hath scattered and shattered it into so many places, that upon the matter it is in no place, but of this I have spoken of before. It is also a transcendent ignorance and impudency in this fellow, to call this seditious Conventicle a Protestant Parliament; I pray thee, which way Protestant? Do they hold any Grounds, Maximes, or Tenets of the Protestant Religion? 'Tis most manifest that the six yeares Persecution of the Protestants in the bloody Reigne of Queen Mary never destroyed and ruinated halfe so many Protestants, as those Brownisticall, and Anabaptisticall, bloody, tyrannicall Sectaries have done within these two yeares, for none but Protestants have and do suffer, and no Religion but the Protestants is despised, derided, disgraced and trampled under foot, therefore neither Protestant Parliament, or Parliament, or Protestant.
Now, Sir, to your fifth and sixth Arguments, from p. 19. to 32. you affirme that Popish Parliaments, Lords and Subjects, have by force of Armes compelled their Kings to confirme their Liberties, &c. and have affirmed, that when a Parliament was once met together, by lawfull Summons, it might not be dissolved or discontinued again at the Kings meere pleasure, and therefore this Parliament may do and defend the like.
Proceed with your Popish practices and positions, and fulfill the iniquity of your forefathers, yet you do not so politickely as you were wont, to let the People see whence you derive your pretended Authority for abusing your present Prince, Take heed, least they take up the Proverbe, We have put down one Pope and set up many. Moreover in pag. 27. line 7. It was told King Richard the Second [Page 10] that if he absented from the Parliament forty dayes, not being sicke, they might by Law rise or breake up. Though you have no more power to dissolve than call a Parliament, I pray, who forbids you to take the benefit of that Law? who holds you but you may rise and break up? It cannot be said but you have risen, (with a witnesse) to such an height of impiety and Rebellion, as no age or Nation can parallell; and for your breaking up it hath been superlative, for there is no Law of God, or Nature, or Nations but you have broken up and down too; and if Treason, Murder, Burglary, Felony, were accounted any breaking of Lawes amongst you, and that you should all have legall Trials for those Crimes, The Lord have mercy upon you, there are but few of you that could be saved by your Book; therefore let your factious Conventicle rise, and go home to their houses when they please; the King hath been absent from them more than five times forty dayes, for it is almost two yeares since they drove Him from them, therefore they may rise, and yet never break up any Parliament. I remember in pag. 28. line 15. the Cheshire men are much beholding to Master Prinne for calling them Rude and beastly People, (I wish you would go in person thither and tell them so) because they tendred themselves as a Guard for the person of King Richard the Second, in a time of Rebellion, for which they are honoured ever since with the Proverbe of Cheshire chiefe of men.
Pag. 33. to p. 42. His Arguments are concerning the power of Parliaments, and that the whole Parliament is greater than the King alone. They are such absurd equivocations, as (although he still followes the footsteps of his Fathers the Papists) yet his Brethren the Jesuites would be ashamed of such kinde of arguing; and therefore he doth wisely to conceale their Association; for who knowes not, that the Parliament, that is to say, the King, the Head, and the two Houses, the Members assembled together, have a Soveraigne and transcendent Power, and excelling Dignity; but it followes not therefore, that the two Houses considered apart from their Soveraigne, much lesse a few Members (a small parcell of that part) are of like eminency and authority, no more than it followes, Master Burton a Divine, Doctor Bastwicke a Phisitian, and Master Prinne an utter-Barrester stood all on the Pillory, and lost their eares, in one and the same houre, for one and the same Crime, [Page 11] of railing, slandering, and seditious libelling, therefore Master Burton, Doctor Bastwicke, and Master Prinne have all three one and the same soule, suffered all in one and the same Body, Bastwicke and Burton lost their eares for Prinne, by way of sympathy or co-ordination, (because Prinnes Eares were lost long before) and so se invicem supplent: and any two of them have all the capacities of all three; the Divine and Phisitian make a Lawyer, the Lawyer and Phisitian make a Divine, and the Divine and Lawyer make a perfect Phisitian, this is Prinnes Logicke, by which he may prove his halfe Eares to be whole ones, and the Five Members to have as much power as both Houses.
In pag. 42. for his Answer to the Objection concerning the Kings absence from Parliament, affirming, that He is absent as a man, but present as a King; it is as learned as that is loyall which justifies the shooting bullets at Him in his personall capacity, yet obeying Him in his Regall capacity, and I believe both had their originall from the same Master of Sentences, The Spirit of the Aire which rules in the hearts of such children of disobedience.
In pag. 44. & 45. Concerning his Arguments from Scripture, I will say no more, but when the Fox preaches, beware your Geese, for I am sure the Devill had his Scriptum est, (it is written) as well as he wrests, mangles, and misapplies it as ill as ever did the Devill. If any Diraan please to search, he shall finde that the Devill hath but his due in this triall, betwixt Master Prinne and himselfe.
Pag. 46. to 112. As for his Law and Law-bookes, let him look them over again, (if he took them not upon trust) as he doth the rest of his Learning, from Indexes, Glossaries, Covels Interpreter, Lexicon Juris, &c. And he shall finde, that they never attributed the most absolute and supremest Power of Head and Bodie (to use his own phrase) to the Parliament, but when it is a perfect true Parliament, consisting of the Head, the King, as well as of the Bodie, the Houses; nor would any man that is not as headlesse as Prinne is earlesse, have been so heedlesse in his own Authours, let all men that mean to be coozened become Prinnes Clients, he shall vouch Book-law enough, but not one law-case to the purpose; witnesse his instances of the Parliament lawfully deposing the King; and of the Parliaments power to dispose the Kingdome to what Family [Page 12] they please, and the like; he that wants a Kingdome, let him come to Prinnes market, he will affoord large penniworths, now he sets Kingdomes to sale, any man may buy one, or if he misse, he shall be sure to have Bulls enough at a cheape rate.
Pag. 51. & lin. 33. He saith, King Edward the Confessour, took his Oath at his Coronation upon the Euangelists, and blessed Reliques of S. S. (what is all that to King Charles?) indeed Prinne and his Members are worthy to have a King that will sweare by Reliques, for with a most treacherous diffidence, they will not believe a most gracious Christian King, that hath often sworne and protested by the true Almighty God to defend and maintain the true Protestant Religion, the Lawes of the Land, the Subjects Libertie and Right, with all the Priviledges of Parliaments, all which Oathes and Protestations his Majesty hath never broke, though a crew of perfidious Villaines do slander Him most traiterously, with the aspish venome of their viperous Tongues, the pestiferous poyson bawl'd, belch'd, and vomited from hireling Schismaticall Preachers, and the Presses being opprest with printing of infamous Lyes, and Libells, for which (no doubt) but your great Master (the Burgesse of Barathrum, as sure as George Peard is Burgesse of Barstaple) who set you on worke, will not faile to pay you your wages.
In pag. 52. that William Conquerour took his Oath before the Altar of the Apostle S. Peter: this is as suitable stuffe as the rest, but me thinkes Prinne should not name an Altar, without an H. and if the Apostle knew you gave him his just Title of Saint, it is unknown how kindly he would take it; but diminitive mighty Isaak with your Task-masters (the Members) that set you on worke would utterly dislike your utter Barrestership, for daring to Saint any Apostle or Saint whom they by their Votes have unsainted.
Pag. 79. He urges the deposing of King Edward the Second, and in pag. 80. he makes another traiterous president of the deposing of King Richard the Second, but he never mentions the mischiefes that this Kingdome endured by those wicked paracidicall Villanes, I will reckon a few of them.
First, Parson John Ball with Wat Titler, Jack Straw, and Jack Shepheard, arose in rebellion, &c. Anno 1379. murdered Simon Sudbury [Page 13] Archbishop of Canterbury, for which insurrection and murder 1500. Rebells were hanged in severall places, look to it Prinne one place will serve your turne.
Anno 1450. One Blewbeard was a Captain of Rebells, but they were quickly foil'd, some hanged, and some taken, and for a token of remembrance, James Fiennes Lord Say, then Lord Treasurer of England, was found guilty of many Treasons, and handsomely hanged, in the 29. yeare of King Henry the Sixth.
After that, Jack Cade a Bricklayer, and withall a counterfeit Mortimer, did then, as some of his Tribe do now, tax the King with evill Counsellours; thus Cade raised an Army of Rebells, which were not supprest without the losse of 5000 men, besides other outrages committed.
Anno 1454. As the Battaile of S. Albans, betwixt the Yorkifts, and Lancastrians, King Henry the Sixth lost 8000 men, and the Duke of York 6000.
At Blore-heath field in Shrop-shire, 1459. between the King and the Earle of Warwick 4000 men slain, the 38 yeare of Henry the Sixth.
At the Battaile of Northampton, 3000 men were slain, between Queen Margaret and the Barons, and there King Henry the Sixth was taken prisoner.
At the Battaile of Wakefield Queen Margaret told Richard Duke of Yorke and beheaded him, 4000 men slain.
Anno 1460. At the Battaile of Towton, Queen Margaret brought into the field 60000 men, and King Edward the Fourth had 49000 in which fatall Battaile 36000 men were slain.
Anno 1462. At the Battaile of Exham in the North, between Queen Margaret and the Lord Marques Mountacue 16000 men were slain.
Anno 1467. At the Battaile of Banbury, the 7. of King Edward the Fourth, between William Herbert Earle of Pembroke, and Queen Margarets Forces 7000 slain.
In the 9. of Edward the Fourth, at the Battaile of Lose-coatesfield in Lincoln-shire betwixt the King and the Barons 10000 slain.
At the Battaile at Teuxbury, Prince Edward eldest son to King Henry the Sixth was stabb'd and murdered, and 3000 slain.
[Page 14] And lastly, at the Battaile at Barnet betwixt King Edward and the Earles of Warwick and Oxford, who were both killed and 10000 slain, the King being Victor.
This I have inserted by way of digression, to shew how the Divine vengeance was the reward for the deposing of a lawfull King, for so all the world knowes Richard the Second was; above eighty yeares was this wofull Land an unnaturall bloody Theatre, wherein English-men against English-men did act all manner of unchristian cruelties, in which Dissention more than 60 of the Blood Royall were slaine, besides others in abundance of Nobility and Gentry, as also more than 125000 common Souldiers, as our Histories relate, and to such a passe as this hath Master Prinne and his Faction done their best to bring it to againe, as within these three yeares they have prettily begun and prosecuted.
Page 87. He quotes the falling away of the ten Tribes from Rehoboam for a president for Rebellion, page 88. all along he mentions the deposing of wicked Popes, page 9. he repeates the words of Caiphas, That it was expedient that one should die for the people, (though a King, yea Christ the King of Kings) that the whole Nation perish not, rather then the whole Nation perish for him. O thou blasphemous beast, Doest thou so farre hate the Lord's Anointed, as to justifie the crucifying of our Saviour, in expression of thy malice to thy Soveraigne? Good Sir, there is no such necessity that either the King or Subject should die one for another, or that they should so much as distaste each other, nor had this lamentable Distraction been between them, but that your delicate Master the Devill hath, by your meanes, set them at Division. In his 91. page he speakes some Truth, That the King hath not power to tyrannize over his Subiects, or to oppresse them with perpetuall irremediable slavery. Good Master Gandergoose, 'tis confest, that the King hath no such power, nor ever did he exercise any such Tyranny as you talke of, but you and your Accomplices have usurped a Traiterous power to your selves, whereby yee have tyrannized over his Majesties Subjects in more savage and barbarous manner than Turkes or Tartars would have done. page 92. Prinne speakes a parcell of non-sense in capital Letters, It is lawfull for the people (submitting themselves) to subscribe the King and his Successours what Law they please. [Page 15] O! what might this fellowes Head be worth at a hard Siege, when one of his Brothers Heads was sold at Samaria for 80 pieces of Silver, 2. King. 6. 25.
Pag. 97. he saith, that King Edward the sixth, and Queen Elizabeth did hold their Crownes by Parliamentary title rather then by the course of common Law. Baw waw, indeed their Legitimacie was objected against by some opulent Papists, because their Father the King had married the Lady Katherin, who was first his Brother Arthurs wife, and after 21 yeares marriage, the King caused her to be divorc'd from him, and he marrying other wives in her life time, the Childrens Right (by birth) was by some Malignants questionable; to cleare which doubts, the King caused their Legitimacie to be confirmed by Act of Parliament, and so much in Answer to that absurd Treason.
Pag. 101. he saies, Charles the third, Emperour was deposed by the Princes, Dukes, and Governours of Germany because he was mad. Surely thou art not well in thy wits, to meddle with that mad Emperour, whose madnesse or deposing concernes neither thee nor thy mad Cause thou pratest and liest so in; then he talkes of Wenceslaus the Emperour, and Childerick King of France, how they were both depos'd; And yet in the 104 pag. he confesses, the King hath no Peere, He is not to have a Superiour, and that the King ought not to be under man, but God. If Justice be demanded of him by way of Petition, (because no Writs runnes against him) if he doe not Iustice, this punishment may be sufficient to him, that God will revenge it; and yet presently again he saies, the Parliament is above the King. Thus you see how sometimes the Devill gives him leave to speake truth against his will, though presently he fall from it againe, as being not toothsome; was ever such a Crop-eard Asse, that would thus contradict himselfe? In the 106 pag. he saies, the Emperours had not highest power in Rome, and yet he cannot deny that Saint Paul appeal'd to Caesar, from whom there was no appeale.
In the 112 and last page, he calls the Rebells that the Kings Forces took at Ciceter, good People, he complaines much of their hard usage, (I think he meanes because they were not hanged) it was winter, he saies, and that they were forced to goe barefooted in Triumph to Oxford, truly we are beholding to your Faction for the kind entertainment you have given to the Kings good Subjects when [Page 16] you have taken them, you have either lovingly cut their Throats in cold blood, or courteously hang'd thē, or hospitably famish'd them, freely imprisoned them, bountifully rob'd and plunder'd them, and favourably banish'd, ruin'd, and undone them, and all this and more you have done for the Liberty of the Subject, by the command of the Publique Faith. Moreover he saies that the good People from Cirencester were Chain'd together with Ropes; that's a Bull, Sir, I doubt not, but there will come a time, when young Grigge shall teach thee in a trice (with a trick that he hath) what the difference is betweene a Chaine and a Rope; and so I leave Repeating and Paraprasing any more on Prinnes most matchlesse, first of his foure Proditorious parts.
The Reader may wonder why I spend no more Paper about the first part, and I doubt all his whole Book is not worthy of so much. But I assure you when I had surveyed every limbe of the Monster, and pared of the excrescences, I had much adoe to finde thus much considerable matter in it, yet I am resolved to doe him the honour, and afford him the patience, to view his second part, if it be but for love to his new Hebrew word (the Militia) for if his Brethren understood that it were Latine, the language of the Beast, they would never endure the use of it.
An Answer to Prinnes second Part of his Soveraigne Power of Parliament.
IN his Preface he complaines of Ignorance, (ah ungratious Boy dost thou raile against thy Mother!) in such as understand not a Parliament, and that his Books (he hopes) will be get a firme Peace; Indeed he that made light out of darknesse, is able to produce good out of evill; but how Prinnes Bookes (stuffed as full of lies as lines) wherein every word breathes Treason, every syllable incites to Rebellion, and the whole Chaos and confused masse of it is an unshap'd lump of all the Villanies, Assassinations, Murders, Treasons, Rebellions, Deposings, Imprisonments, and all the calamities that hath befalne to infortunate Kings and Princes, in all Nations, either Christians or others, since the worlds creation; at least as much as his [Page 17] treacherous studious search could finde out, he hath pack'd and hudled together, purposely to root out and ruinate His sacred Majesty and Royall Posterity, to raise a never ending Contention, and to make His Majesties Dominions perpetuall fields of blood; these are the marrow, pith, and intention of M. Prinnes sweet Peacemaking Bookes. At the latter end of his Preface, he uses a piece of the Letanie, saying, Good Lord deliver us. But I wish him to take heed that it come not to the hearing of the Members, or the Close Committee, that he spake such words, for then he will be mistaken for a Protestant, and so excluded from all grace, favour, and community with the godly.
Pag. 3. In this second part you may finde out of Prinnes owne Confession. First, conveniency, second necessity, and thirdly custome; all concurring for the Kings ordering of the Militia. Take heed M. Prinne what you say, for if M. Saint-Johns, and your Masters of the highest lower House heare you, they may perhaps occasion a conference betwixt you and Tom Nash his Ghost, to be cryed up and downe the streets, as they dealt with your betters before you; and if your good Mistresses in London understand it, farewell all further Contribution, your late Triumphant Bayes, will be turn'd to Funerall Ewghe, and if you can mend the matter no better, then you doe, by begging the Question and arguing so barrenly, to wit, that it must be granted, that the whole power of his Majesty, and his Predecessors, in the Militia, was derived from the Parliament. This stuffe he treates on, from the third pag. to the twelfth, wherein he crosses all that he saies in the third pag. formerly repeated, but if you can confirme your fine flourishes no better then by Equivocations, Amphibologies, and mysticall Sophisticall Fallacies, by one while taking the Parliament for King and People, (as in the usuall sense it ought to be taken and the Lawes made by them all;) And another while making use of the word Parliament, in your owne sense onely, for the two Houses in contradiction to the King; your Grant must be onely, to have and to hold, sixe foot in Knaves Acre, under an overthwart beame, for you hate the name of the Crosse, on the highest Promontorie in the Province of Foolciana; or if it light in the line of Communication, as a speciall part of that Province is scituated neare to them, then your Grant may be to have as much roome for your Quarters as you had for your Eares, and that [Page 18] your Head may be mounted on London Bridge, and made one of the overseers of the City, which by your writings seemes to be a speciall part of your Ambition, I am sure a just Reward of your most unmatchable undertakings.
Pag. 12. As for the consequence of denying His Majesty the Militia, and of the Parliaments seizing upon Hull, with other Ports, Forts, the Royall Navy, Armes, Ammunition, Revenues, and detaining them still from His Majesty, which you say, His Majesty and all Royalists must necessarily yeild, nay you should have entreated to have them yeilded out of curtesie, for else you can never inforce them, are not his, but the Kingdomes, in point of Right and Interest, they being first transferd to, and placed in his Predecessors, and himselfe by Parliament. Here is an excellent proofe.
Weaker then that of Tenterton Steeple being the cause of Goodwine Sands, for say those Logitians, there were no such dangerous Sands, before that Steeple was built, or sunke, so that Steeple was the cause of those Sands, but I can conclude more directly and contrariò, as thus;
The Kings of England had alwayes power over the Militia, ever since England had a King there;
But there was a King of England, before there was any Parliament, and so soon as there is story of any people in England;
Therefore the Parliament gave not the King of England power over the Militia.
If the story of Brute be true, my Maior cannot be false, if any Chronicle of England be true, my Minor will not faile; how then the conclusion can be denyed I perceive not, except in the disputation betwixt the Collier and the Divell, which I leave to Prinnes Logick to resolve, and reduce the Contradictory by Impossibility, which if he doe not in Celarent, he cannot escape doing it in Bocardo, where I leave him to read over his Fleta, it may teach him more Law and Conscience then to excuse the Rebellion in England, by a Rebellion in Ireland of their owne making, as that is the best colour which yet this Brazen face can cast upon it.
Pag. 25. and 26. he comes upon us with a drove of Bulls, of his owne usuall Breeding; That the Parliament (meaning the two Houses onely) cannot be guilty of Treason; secondly, that the Statutes against Treason extends not to them; thirdly, that they are greater [Page 19] then the King; fourthly, that the Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy bind onely in Relation to the Pope and Forreigne States, but not with reference to the Houses; or onely out of Parliament time, not whilest the Parliament is sitting; These are such Mockado Fustian Non sense, and such silly Childish shufflings, as that the sense in plaine English, is to say, That the King hath Authority against other Princes, but no power over his owne Subjects, or that those in his owne Realmes are his Soveraignes, and other Soveraignes are his Subjects; or when he consults the most carefullest for the good of his Kingdomes, he desires to be required by being unking'd by them; such strange Paradoxes, absurd Solesismes, and monsters of Policy, Morality, Reason, Nature and Religion, are the off-spring of this new State Emperick; who perhaps expects other applause, or, at the least, Approbation, as he is assured of his owne Narcissian admiration, onely because he sees but the shadow, understands not the substance of what he superficially delineates, by a Pen that drops Poyson instead of Inke, to support the pretended Feares and Iealousies, by an enumeration and malitious interpretation, of all the acts of Iustice since the third yeare of his now Majesties Raigne, upon those who were restrained from bringing this Rebellion sooner to the Birth; give Prinne but such another Fee as he had at his Triumphall Returne to London, and he will be an Advocate for those in the third of Iacobi, and for those in the 13 of Queene Elizabeth; yea for Ravilliac, Iudas, and Lucifer, for all were but Rebells and Traitors, onely one was a little elder then the other; Thus from the 25 pag. to the 40. he reckons up a pack of grievances, wherewith the Subject was charged, which were all redressed, long agoe, assoone as His Majesty was rightly certified of them; but no Acts of Grace can procure an expiation from inexorable Master Prinne.
But why trouble I my selfe to satisfie one, whom Reason cannot satisfie, one, whom no Protestations, or Oathes of Princes, no Acts of Grace or Statutes past in Parliament can satisfie, and therefore let him rest unsatisfied till he be hanged. He is ill to trust who will trust no body, the Proverbe tells us▪ yet for this once, let him goe on give him Rope enough, and he will hang, himselfe; In his 40 pag. he saith, the King hath no power to chuse his Privy Councellors; but Prinne and his Magnificent Members, would have the chusing [Page 20] and authorizing of new Privy Counsellors, and Officers of State, for those, he tells us, his Ʋtopian Parliament hath power to appoint, (yet the King may not chuse or appoint any of them their servants) he should have added in time of Rebellion. In pag. 41 to 64. and so from thence to 65 and 79 he prates (to little or no purpose) that the King hath no Negative Voyce, but what the undeceived Majesty of the vulgar, Captaine Highshoes, and Colonell Mawworme, and their companions please to propose must be granted; who, till those can agree whether the Lord Say or the right horrible Kimbolton shall be Protector: his Excellency or the Lady Waller high Constable of England, Pym, or Prinne (for I hope he will not plead all this while for other folkes and forget himselfe) Lord Keeper of the new great Seale, Sergeant Wilde, or Speaker Lenthall, Master of the Rolls, Burton or Marshall Archbishop; for that calling would be as lawfull in one of their hands, as the Court of Wards was when the Lord Say was Master of it,) Peard, Glinne or Prideaux chiefe Iustices; Feilding or Stamford, (for they are both vertuous and thrifty men) Lord Treasurer; I would entreat Warwicke, to provide for his owne and their security in the Admirall Ship of Fooles, and wish a faire Gale for them as farre as New-England, till they shall learne more sincerity in Religion, more loyalty to their Soveraigne, more charity to their Christian Brethren, and Prinne cease falsifying and perverting Records, Presidents, and Allegations; and then a Property maker hath promised to restore his Eares againe; in the meane time, let him confesse himselfe worthily Branded for Falsifying, Lying and Slandering (even Scandala Magnatum) Forgerie, False witnesse bearing, Perjury, and all manner of Villany, with which his Bookes swarme as thick, as the lower House doore did with Brownists & Anabaptists at the beginning of this Parliament, or as Westminster-Hall and the Pallace yard did with Tumults before the death of the Earle of Strafford, or the putting the Bishops out of the House, or as the high wayes and streets, did with Puritan Punks, when Prinne and his fellowes (S t Rebells) return'd from Limbo to be Canoniz'd at London, which City they have ever since transform'd to be a Hell upon Earth.
Further (to roote the seduced people in dislike of his Sacred Majesty, and to make them Irrevocable Rebels, as also to blast the Integrity of his Majesties Royall Person, his Honourable Councellours [Page 21] and Servants,) he names Ganestone and the Spencers, Empson and Dudley, and others that were displaced by Parliaments for Delinquencie; 'tis right William, but those Parliaments had proofes for what they did, and the King was with them, and confirm'd their censures: but you are not so much as the bares Skelliton of a Parliament, which if it were a full Body, yet it wants a head, therefore all your Votes and censures are Headlesse.
Page. 48. his running head talkes of a Parliament in Running Mead, (near Windsor) wherein King John Assented to such Acts of setling and securing Magna-Charta, and all other good Lawes and Liberties formerly granted. I tell thee Prinne, that King Iohn did well in so Assenting to his Peeres and Commons, for then and there their requests were just and Lawfull; neither did King Charles (a more Christian and surer Titled King, then King Iohn) ever deny his Royall Assent to any just request for the Redresse of greivances, releife of His Subjects, and Tranquillity of his Kingdomes.
Page 55. He hath a fling at Alice Pierce, King Edward the Third's Concubine, 'tis marvell that Rosamond and Jane Shore scap'd him, and it had been as congruent for him to have brought in Lais, Thais, Faustine, Messalina, and all the rabble of royall and base Whores that have been since the Creation; for what though Alice Pierce (being her selfe proud of the favour of so puissant a King) did sometimes, with impudent and uncivill behaviour intrude her selfe to sit with the Iudges on the Bench, to countenance and preferre some private Causes for her own ends or her friends; to which I answer, that the Iudges were either bribed Knaves, or timorous Fooles, in suffering such a Coapesmate to sit with them upon any termes of right or wrong. But to what purpose this Gentlewoman (who was dead and rotten 250 yeares before King Charles was borne) should be raked up as a Testimony against Him now, this is a meere Riddle to me, and is a taske for an Oedipus onely to unfold.
Page 75. The King cannot by his Prerogative lay the least Tax upon any of his Subjects; but, I pray, what authority or Prerogative have you, and your potent Members to rob, spoile, and plunder the King and all his good Subjects, who is so just, mercifull, and chaste, that neither the Devill nor any of the Members have dared to say the contrary? there's a bone for thee to picke.
[Page 22] Page 78. Prinne (like an unmannerly Fellow) calls the famous Generall Jack Cade Rebell and Traitour; I pray Sir, moderate your passion, for me thinkes, fellowes should agree, and when Thieves fallout, &c. You know the Proverbe.
In page 79. That the affirming the Petition of Right, the Bills for Trienniall Parliaments, the continuance of this, the Acts against Ship-money, Forest bounds, illegall, new-invented grievances and oppressions, the Statutes for suppression of Star-chamber, High Commission, Knighthood, Bishops Votes: although the King hath done all these and more, yet this Scarrab Cadworme sayes, that The King's Grace is not eclipsed, to say. They are no Acts of Grace, but Acts of Oath, Duty, Law, and Conscience. Thus doth this filthy Varlet most traiterously beslubber the goodnesse and gracious favours of a matchlesse and unparalleld Christian King.
And thus you have the summe and substance of his second part of the Soveraigne Power of Parliaments.
Vpon his third part of the Soveraigne Power of Parliaments.
ALthough his third and fourth parts are already answered by the learned Sir John Spelman Knight, Doctour Fearne, and Master Digges, too reverend and able Pennes to take notice of the name of such a prinnified, prurigenous Puppy, from whom he stole his rationall and Theologicall Passages, nothing being his own, but the outfacing with a multitude of pretended Testimonies, haled in, as he teacheth his Clients to hire Knights of the Poste, to witnesse that which they know nothing of, saving (I say) that there is nothing that concernes England, but the same again (quoth Mark a Belgrave) to the Tune of Anthony, now, now, the old Song still; like the last houre and halfe of a Puritan Sermon, or one of his long-winded Traverses of Burton's Apology, or Bastwickes Letany, in stead of a plea or answer, withouten that the aforesaid Henry Burton at Friday-street aforesaid, in the manner and forme aforesaid, did beate his wife aforesaid, by reason of the independent sister aforesaid, to beat out the evill spirit aforesaid, and (withouten that) it was for the lust aforesaid, or withouten that the said John Bastwicke Doctour of Phisicke aforesaid, was so over-run with the Morbus [Page 23] Gallicus aforesaid, that when he was a Captain in the Rebellion aforesaid, at the Newarke in Leicester aforesaid, he was not able to get up to his horse aforesaid, without a stoole aforesaid; and withouten that, William Prinne aforesaid, in the Church-lane there aforesaid, in the Assembly of Adamites aforesaid, exercised his gifts aforesaid, to the edification of the Sisters aforesaid, who gave him the Gold aforesaid, and (in the feare of God) joyned in the Rebellion aforesaid, as they will be ready to averre and maintain, but never to prove any thing, if those his Bookes have not sufficiently proved it; yet for all this I will afford him the honour to shame him, in answering of his third part, and thus I begin.
This third part he begins to magnifie Treason in his delicate Dedication, most loyally to three Arch-Rebells, namely, the Lord Fairfax, and the two Knights Williams, Waller and Breerton, wherein he stiles them, Deservedly Renowned Worthies, calles their valour, zeale, activity, and industry, incomparable; (you should have said their Rebellion too;) 'tis confest, that their invisible Victories have been many and miraculous, and their being often beaten hath been apparently perspicuous and manifest, for which they have been jeared with Publique Thankesgivings, as Master Prinne makes himselfe merry with mocking them, in his foisting Epistle; and it is not possible that these three Worthies should be so threedbare in their understandings, or that their wits should be so stupified, as not to perceive this fellowes flouting flattery; as for their Victories we do rather pitty than envy; and concerning the Worthies, I have seen nine of their Figures or Pictures in Haberdashers Shops and Tavernes, hanged up to garnish the roomes, but Master Prinnes three Worthies shall not be hanged up in a private roome or shop, a large field is fittest for such mighty Martialists. And for the valour of those three Worthies, it was never known that the Lord Fairfax struck a blow, except it were to his Tailer or his Footman; and for Sir William Waller he hath been so happy that he was never wounded, but onely in his reputation. But O, O, Sir William Breerton! noble, valiant, singular, supereminent, couragious Sir William Breerton, I could laugh heartily, were I once so happy as to see him within halfe a mile of a Battaile, O sweet face, most amiable Sir William Breerton.
In his Preface to the Reader, he saith, he hath been alwayes a [Page 24] cordiall endeavourer of Peace ( as right as my legge John Jarret) you might as well have said Rope-ye-all, Halter-ye-all, as cordiall.
In his third Page he seemes to invite his Majesty to visit the Parliament, and tells Him (and all loyall Subjects) by an old President, what kinde entertainment He might expect, for he saith, that Julius Caesar was, in the Capitol, stabbed, and murdered by the Senate, with no lesse than twenty three wounds. Sir, your kinde invitation shall not be forgotten, & I assure you, it is one of most the significant passages and explanations of your Loyaltie in all your whole Books.
Page 5. That the King hath denuded himselfe of all Regall Authority; this shall passe for one of your small Treasons, wherein you shew the denuded nakednesse of your Byass'd Judgement and conscience. page 3. This liberall Gentleman, proclaimes liberty, and plenarily leave to rebell, He releaseth all his Majesties Subjects from their Allegiance; surely, thou hast made a League with Sin, Death, and Hell, and they have blinded thee so, that thou canst neither see what thou sayest, or understand what thou writest. Thou givest the King's Subjects leave to cast off their Allegiance, and they give thee leave to be hanged to requite thy curtesie; but thou and thy Members (of Maintenance) must and shall know that all the King's loyall Subjects do understand, that the Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy, made to their Soveraigne, is such a tye, and security, as it is the onely chain upon earth, except love, to binde the consciences of men, and to hold humane society together; from which Oathes though Master Prinne (with Papall Authority) would dispence withall, yet his Majesty hath good and faithfull Subjects enough, who scorne and deride your foolish, traiterous dispensations, and doubt not (by God's assistance) to mould you and your seduced Rabble of Rebells into better fashion.
Page 13. If the King himselfe shall introduce Forreigne Forces and Enemies into his Realme to levy Warre against it, or shall himselfe become an Enemy to it. This doubtfull supposition is so idle and triviall, that the best Answer to it is to laugh at it. page 14. he talkes how King Henry the second of France was casually slain at a Tournament by the Lord Montgomery, and then he tells us of Sir Walter Tirrell's Arrow (glancing against a Tree) slew King William the second of England; presently he makes a step into France again, and brings us word, that King Charles the first, being mad there, was deprived [Page 25] and kept clsoe, and that the deaths and deprivations of these Kings was then proved to be no Treasons, because they were done out of no malitious intents. This is Bombast to stuffe out his big-wombe Book, and as neare the matter as Braseol and Banbury. Page 17. He playes the Huntsman, and compares the Keeper of a Parke, and the Deere in it, to a King and his People. Suppose this Comparison were granted, then you must also grant, that you have rebelliously broken down the Parke pale, or wall, so that the Deere are scattered and divided, the best of them (I am sure the truest Harts) do keep within their bounds, and live under the protection of their Keeper, whilest you have got all the whole Heard of Rascals amongst you, and much good may do it you with them. In Page 22. he makes a leape from hence into Asia, and relates strange Newes, how Tamberlane conquered Bajazet, and put him in an ironcage; then you are sure it was not a Pillory, but if a time of Peace were, (were it not for depriving the Hangman of his due) I would begge thee, and shew thee in Fates and Marts, for a Motion, whereby thee and I could not chuse in short time but be without abundance of money. From page 23. to page 60. he tautologically talkes Naturall Non-sense, and Artificall Impertinencies, which in page 60. he saith, he gathered from one Albericus Gentilis. page 61. he stumbles upon Truth again, and sayes, That it is out of controversie that no man ought to resist against the King. Page 63, 64. he cites 32 Arguments of Scripture to maintain the Cause, the chiefe of them is Daniel in the Lions Den, he might as well have brought in Jacob's Well, and the Woman of Samaria.
In pag. 66. be brings in the story of Ioram, 2 Kings 6. how he sent a messenger to the Prophet Elishaes house to take away his head, and that the Prophet did cause the doore to be shut, to keep out the King's messenger: from whence the learned logicall Prinne inferres, that because the Prophet did not obey the King, but shut his doore against the Messenger, therefore King Charles his Subiects may oppose, resist, and rebell; a very trim Argument. From thence to page 73. he repeates old fusty businesse over and over, and there he runnes for more luggage headlong into the Red-Sea, and dragges the memory of crowned Pharaoh, [...] example of God's iudgements on that obdurate and impenitent King: this was somewhat to the purpose, but I cannot perceive where or how. Page 81. The King [Page 26] with the Lords and Commons in Parliament, have the whole Realme entrusted with them, of which great trust the King is onely Chiefe and Soveraigne: now I agree with you, Sir, if your writings had been all such as this, and your Members and Committees, Votes and Orders, correspondent, then we had had no Rebellion, and your high prized Bookes would have been iustly valued, to be worth nothing. A little after he sayes, The King is the supreme Member of the Parliament, (thou ill bred Fellow, thou mightest have said HEAD) and that contrary to the trust and duty reposed in Him, through the advice of evill Counsellours, wilfully betrayes this trust, and spoiles and makes havocke of his People and Kingdomes: these are but the old lyes, feares, jealousies, doubts, ifs and ands, newly revived and furbushed: as in page 86. he hath another, which is, If the King should command us to say Masse in his Chappell, to which I answer, If the Skie fall, &c. and the one of those ifs is as possible as the other. Page 108. He musters up 51 of the ancient Fathers to lend him their hands to defend his falsities, wherein he hath wrested and abused their integrity sufficiently, but I observe that he meddles with neither of the Gregories, either the Great, or Nazianzen, his policy is not to mention them, because then young Gregory herhaps may be put in minde of him; for Prinne is crafty and observes the Proverbe, He must have a long Devill, that eates with a spoone.
Page 92. He hath wrested the sword out of the hands and cut off the heads of all his opposite Goliahs. 'Tis well bragg'd, but if it be true, that you have cut off all the heads of your opposites, you have been bloudily revenged for the losse of your eares; I prithee, when thou diest, bequeath one of thy law-bones to be kept amongst the dreadfull Weapons and Ammunition of the Members Magazine, it may do strange things amongst a Crew of Philist [...]ms.
Pag. 134. He contradicts himselfe with Statutes of King Henry 8. Ed. 6. and Qu. Eliz. That words against the King (even in preaching) are high Treason, as well as raising Armes: very right, and those Statutes being yet in force, what would become of all your reverend railing Pulpit-men? (I will not slander them to call 'em Preachers) upon my conscience thy destiny and theirs would be all one, (if the said Statutes were duely executed) and you would all leave your old Trades, and deale in the two rich [Page 27] commodities of Hempe and Timber, till your last gaspes. Pag. 142. he railes at the King again, as if he were hired to it, or that he had nothing else to do; also he be labours the Cavaliers ex tempore, by the Titles of Cut-throates, bloudy, inhumane, and barbarous, with other such pretty names, as the Gentleman pleases to bestow upon them, for which I hope they will not all die, till some of them be out of his debt. Page 143. Christians did not resist persecution under Pagans, ergo, Christians must not resist Christians, and because Subjects are Christians as well as Kings, therefore Christian Kings must not resist Rebells. In his last Leafe, he hath waded through this weighty Controversie, and proved that both by Law and Conscience this Rebellion is justifiable; and thus the Reader may perceive how Prinnes Judgement and Conscience is biassed.
Vpon Prinnes fourth Quarter, or part of his Soveraigne Power of Parliaments.
IN page 13. he brings in a messe of musty Presidents, like the mouldy Bread, ragged Cloathes, and clouted Shooes of the Gibeonites, when they deceived Joshua; as for allowing or not allowing the King's meniall Servants: 'Tis no doubt but the King should be well served if such a Coxcombe as Prinne had Authority to chuse his Servants. Page 15. Parliaments have power above Magna Charta: I believe Parliaments have power if there be cause to repeale Statutes either in Magna Charta, or any other Lawes; but though Parliaments have this power, yet I would have Master Prinne to understand, that Conventicles and factions Assemblies have no such Authority, except they steale and usurpe it. Page 24. he falls to his old vomit, and taxeth his Majesty with English, Irish, Scottish, French, and Germane Papists, and that they are whole Armies of them maintained by his Majesty, against his good Subjects, (of which you are none, therefore you need not feare.) Page 32. The Parliament hath unwillingly taxed and plundered men: your Votes, Imprisonments, Banishments, and Robberies committed dayly on the persons and goods of such as were his Majesties loyallest Subiects, (they being all firme Protestants) and your Mandates and large rewards to the Thieves and Plunderers, with your Receits and sale of the [Page 28] stolne goods, to strangers, Amster-damnable Iewes, other forraigners and unnaturall Natives, who have either bought the said goods for money (with which mony you have maintained this Rebellion) or truckd and barterd it for other Commodities, as you have done lately with the Hollanders, for Butter, Cheese, Fish, &c. by these Practices of Robbery and Tyranny, it is apparent how unwillingly this Thing, called a Parliament, hath, and dayly doth, Tax and plunder.
In his 33. Pag. he speakes truth, That by the same power the Parliament had to raise an Army without the King, by the same power they may raise mony to maintaine it, which is as much as to say, by the same power they had to be Rebells, by the same power they might Murder, Rob, Plunder, Ransack and ruinate His Majesties true Leige people, and by the same power you have made bold to doe the like with all his Majesties Honours, Mannours, Royalties and Revenues; all which you have done by the same power, and liberall grants of that bountifull Potentate who offered to give all the Kingdomes of the world to our Saviour. Pag. 34. He taxeth His Majesty with placing of Popish Governours in his Garrisons, and such Commanders in his Armies; indeed you are not to be blamed much for your being greived at those Governours and Commanders, because through God's assistance by them and their good directions, you have been often times greivously beaten, and questionlesse they are not quite out of your debts (except you mend your manners) they are such just paymasters, that they will pay you all: also every body will not beleive that all are Papists whom you please to call so.
Now I come to the survey of his ample Appendix; wherein at the first, he rakes up Romes Foundation, and to small purpose, he hales Romulus, Remus, Numa Pompilius, and all the Heathen Kings, and Emperours out of their Ʋrnes and Tombes; then he hath a bout with the East and Westerne Empires, and all their wicked Emperours with their Tragicall ends. In his 11. Pag. he blaspheamously outfaceth S. Paul, and his Doctrine both, Rom. 13. 1. to 6. That Kings are Subjects, to the highest powers, which highest powers Prinne interpretes to be the people; take heed, though you have the pestilent art to make Law to be no Law, and stealing to be no theft, yet it is dangerous to pervert or juggle with holy writ. [Page 29] But why doe I cast away admonition upon an Atheisticall railing Rabshekah, who hath perverted, wrung, wrested, construed and mis-applied the Patriarks, Prophets, Apostles, yea Christ himselfe. Pag. 12. he presents the miseries of the unfortunate and perfidious King. Zedechias, how his children were murdered before his face, his eyes put out, and after, how he was carried Prisoner in Chaines to Babylon. Also he mentions many other deplorable deaths and disasters, that fell upon divers Kings and Princes. All which Testimonies and presidents are so applyed, as nothing else but Treason and Villany can be found in the applications. In the 14. pag. he is saild into Sparta, amongst the Kings of the Lacedemonians, and there he makes enquirie how many of them have been brought to untimely ends. In pag. 15. he tells us how the Sabeans confined their Kings to their Pallaces, and used to stone them if they went out of their bounds without leave. But your Scholars (the Tumultuous Rabble) did in Routes and Roguish Assemblies with cudgells, march with their Tatterdmallians against White-Hall when his Majesty was there last.
Pag. 18. 19. and so to pag. 51. He runs through all the History of France, to finde proditorious presidents, to prove Treason to be Lawfull in England. pag. 51. he makes a skip into Spaine, and doth as much there. pag. 60. he hath found out a Kingdome of Oreida, and that there many of the Kings were deposed, or Murdered. pag. 62, and 63. he travells Aragon and Navarre, and from thence into Castile, Portugall, Cordova, Vallencia, Granado, Gallicia. pag. 80. he is got into Hungaria. pag. 82. he is in Bohemia. pag. 85. you may have him in Poland. pag. 89. he is making a privy search in Denmark. pag. 98. he forrageth through Sweden. pag. 99. he makes a step into Assyria, Cyprus, Lombardia, Naples, and Venice, and in the 100. pag. he is come backe into Scotland, and there he tarries raking up all the Treasons in that Kingdome, from the raigne of Fergusius (their first King) till these mad bad times; which theam he followes to the 112. pag. Then he postes into Asia amongst the Kings of the Gentiles, Israel, and Iudah. He is now in Persia, feasting with Ahasuerus; and presently you have him in Babylon, eating Grasse (like an Asse) with Nebuchadnezzer, from whence he makes a spirt to see King Darius, and kindely he visites Daniel in the Lyons Den. Thus you may perceive how nimble and active [Page 30] this Gentleman hath been, to play the Kennell-raker in grubling in all the nasty common Sewers, and contagious Dung-hills of damnable Treasons, and perfidious Treacheries in all the Kingdomes of the World, malitiously and purposely, to defend, maintaine, and countenance this odious Rebellion, now on foot in England. And, it is to be conceived that he could never have Travelled from Region to Region, and from Realme to Realme, with such Celerity and Subitorie quicknesse, but that he had the helpe of some Mephostophilus or Familiar, or else he bought, begged, or stole some Windes from a Lapland Witch; without which aydes from the Instruments of his Grand Maister ( Don Diabolo) he could never have flowne to and fro, to so many Territories to fetch mischiefe hither.
Pag. 125. He saith, David was made King by Gods Appointment, and the Peoples Election; I tell thee, (thou Owleiglasse) if thou didst understand what thou sayest, thou wouldest say somewhat more understandingly to be understood; for if thou note, what God himselfe saith to David, by the Prophet Nathan, 2. Sam. 12. 7. Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee King over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hands of Saul; where is the peoples Election here? God saith he chose him from the sheepfold, to be a King, Psal. 78. 71. and seeing God did chuse and anoint David King, I must crave M. Prinnes leave, to beleeve the people did it not, but it is certaine that David was made King by Gods onely Assignation; and that he that made the Peoples hearts, did also give them grace with unanimous consent to be obedient to his Ordinance; so that with loud shoutes, and acclamations of Ioye, the people exprest their Loyalties and loves at Davids Coronation, in which they had no Election at all, as this pretender pretends. Pag. 127. That God, and Davids designation of Solomon to the Crowne, did not take away the Peoples Liberty, Right, and Power to elect and nominate their Kings, my sweet Stercucian prudent Prinne, neither God or David did ever take that Liberty, Right and Power from the People, for the people never had any such priviledge or prerogative to elect and nominate, and therefore such Right and Power which they never had, was never taken from them. Pag. 146. he names Zimri, Omri, and other Parricides and Homicides, Vsurpers, Rebells and Castawayes, these he brings in to fill up the [Page 31] measure. Pag. 149. is cram'd as full of Treasons and Revileings, as he was able to put in, till he comes to the 153 pag. and there he tells me old newes, How Darius set Princes over his Kingdomes and Provinces; And that Nebuchadnezzer, set Daniel over the Province of Babylon; let the Reader judge if Prinne doth not give himselfe the Lie. How dares this Varlet alleadge that King Charles hath not Power to set Deputies and Lievtenants over His Dominions and Provinces, or to chuse His Privy Councellors, Officers of State, Trust, and Meniall Servants, and yet he confesseth that two Heathen Kings, Darius and Nebuchadnezzar, had power to doe it, and did it, and (for any thing that I can perceive) those Kings had power so to doe, and did use that power without asking their Subjects leave or consent.
From pag. 154. to 160. he brings in Chimeraes, Whimseyes and meere Connundrums in such store, as they would furnish sixe French and Italian Mountebanks to vent their sophisticated Oyles, Ʋnguents, Drugges, Album Greaka, or black white Dogges da [...]es; Pag. 177. he saies, that a Prince or Lord of a Country are not Princes without Subjects; very right, if a King hath no Subjects, then he is no bodies King, but you and your Comrades, would have no King, and therefore, by that rule you are no Subjects, or (I am sure no good ones.) From pag. 177. to 186. he makes a long Relation of the causes why the Netherlandish Provinces fell from the King of Spaine; as suitable to his purpose as Mustard and Mince-pye together, and then he brings in Julian the Apostate, slaine by a Christian Souldier; Pag. 188. That the Pope and Prelates alone, (without the consents of Parliament, Peeres, or People) have deposed and judged Hereticall and Tyrannicall Kings to death, and devote them to Assassination. This is but crowding upon the old fidle, because the Pope hath done so to wicked Kings, therefore you will take a devillish power (somewhat worse then a Popish) to supplant and ruinate a Just King and His Posterity. Pag. 189. he presents Tarquin, Nero, Vitelius, their banishments and deathes. Pag. 204. That Queen Elizabeth did ayde and succour Protestants that lived in other Countries, and that the King of Spaine did the like for Romane Catholiques; This is Prinnes Foble Boble, as plaine as a Packstaffe; I wish that he and his Tribe would imitate that good Queen, and succour the Protestants, and not destroy and begger them dayly, [Page 30] [...] [Page 31] [...] [Page 32] as they doe. Pag. 208. he swells and blisters out his Volum, with the sentence of degradation and deprivation of Wenceslaus the Emperour, as much pertinent as the fift wheele in a Coach. Pag. 216. he is vehement in perswading men to be Loyall Rebells, to be Valiant true Traitors, to persist in their execrable disobedience, for which he promises everlasting felicity; and lastly, he peremptorily concludes all Temporall and Eternall losse, dishonour, and perpetuall torments, to be the Portions of all true Subjects; and then he closes with zealous Prayer, and Invocation, for the continuance, maintenance, and prosperity of Treason and Rebellion. And thus have I delineated, or rather Anotomiz'd and disected the foure Quarters of this Monster. Now I proceed to his Head, and the workes of his Head-peece, his Opening of the New Great Seale.
William Prinnes, Opening of his New Great Seale of ENGLAND.
ADulterate Presidents, are (very seldome) Parents to Legitimate Consequences. This New Great Seale is Begotten, and Borne into the World, lick'd into fashion by Committees, Members, Votes and Ordinances, and Nurst, Cherish'd, Drest, Trick'd and Trim'd by M. Prinne, who hath painfully searched through the very Bowells of Antiquity to finde out the originall of Seales, and whence his New Seale may lineally derive its first being and pedigree.
To begin which goodly piece of service, he loades his Margine with Notes and Testimonies of Scripture; The first marke whereby you may know from whence this Babye is descended, he quotes, the Signet which Judah left with his daughter in Law, Tamar, as a Pledge when he had committed Incest (or Adultery) with her, as it is in Gen. 38. A very faire beginning, to prove this Seale lawfully borne and bred from Judah's Signet, which was left in pawne as a token for Bawderie.
The second descent of it he proves to be from Theft, Covetousnesse, and Murder, as 1. Kings, 21. 8. How Jezabel stole Ahabs Seale, and with it sealed counterfeit Letters (in the Kings name) whereby Naboth was perjuriously accused, and Murthered, and [Page 33] Ahab had the Vineyard. And from that Seale, and the notable effects which it produced, M. Prinne derives his New Seale, and presageth what worthy acts it may produce.
I will name but one more of his Marginall Testificandums, Estber. 3. and 12. there he mentions King Ahsuerus his Ring, which he delivered to Haman, wherewith he sealed an Edict, that all the whole Nation of the Iewes, young and old, that liv'd in the Kings large Dominions (127. Provinces) should all be slaughtered in one day. But I desire the Reader to take notice, that though Haman was a proud ambitious man, yet he did use no counterfeit Seale, nor usurped any power but what he had from the King; but M. Prinne and his Maisters, have neither the Kings Seale, leave or power, to destroy His Subjects, and Ruinate His Kingdome, but I would not have them to forget, (and make application too) that Haman was hanged although his fault was not Treason. But this is another strong Argument, what shall become of the Protestants, and His Majesties Loyallest Subjects, if M. Prinnes new founded Seale were in force and vigour. And thus, out of his owne Annotations, he hath proved his Seales originalls, from Adulterous Incest, Theeving, Avarice, Murder, Perjury, and Destruction; and what can be expected, but the like mischiefes, and miseries from this Newborne, Counterfeit, Adulterated Mungrell.
His very Title of Opening of the Great Seale, puts me into some suspition of Blasphemy in it, as alluding to the Lambes, opening the Seale in the Revelation, (but I omit that, as too serious for this manner of Encounter.) And I have spyed a Crosse in his second page, to begin withall, which makes me ready to crye out Popery, Popery, and I thought it would have frighted him out of the Court, but I perceive the Devill is Elder, and M. Prinne is more impudent then the Legend tells us, (and I am sure that Legend is as true as most of Prinnes writings are.) The Devill was in Saint Christophers dayes, for then he ran aside at the sight of the Crosse, for feare of him that dyed on it; But now Prinne goes on in despight of both, (though indeed) somewhat like the Devill, all on one side, and tells us a Tale of Crosses, pag. 3. and at length of Seales, though it be a long time er'e he could find that English Kings had any, event ill the Raignes of Offa and Edwin. Nor any Broad Seale till Edward the Confessor; The best is, he there by grants, that the Kings grant is good under [Page 34] his Signe Manuall, or Signet, yea (if need be) under his hand without any Seale, (but this I leave to Lawyers.) And when the Broad Seale came into use, it was the Seale of our Lord the King, or the Kings Broad Seale, and the Chancellors were called the Kings Chancellors (not the Peoples, nor the Parliaments) pag. 10 and 11. that the Kings from time to time ordered, and altered the Great Seale at their pleasures, and that King Richard the first, pretending that the Great Seale was lost, when Roger his Vicechancellour was drowned before the Isle of Ciprus, and that the King caused a New Seale to be made. All this is granted, but no part of this doth say that a Parliament made that Seale, ('tis said the King caused it to be made) besides, that was not a counterfeit Seale made by a Faction, without the Kings Consent, or, which is more, against Royall Commands and Proclamations, to the contrary. Then he goes on honestly, that our Kings have altered their Seales with various Inscriptions, Stiles, and Armes, but alwayes of their owne, and in their owne names, never of the Parliaments. (For I thinke their Armes and Motto, except it should be A Beast with many Heads, are yet to seeke.) Nor was it ever medled with in Parliament, but for the Kings behalfe, in the Kings name, by the Kings Authority, and according to his will, as even those two Instances of a New Broad Seale, made for Edward the first, pag. 18. 19. Whilst he was absent militating in the Holy Land; And for Henry the sixth, when he was an Infant of nine mouthes old, and his Ʋnkle the Protector, doe more then manifestly convince, directly contrary to what he produceth them to prove. Nor were there any proportion or paralell betwixt an absent, and a present King, betwixt an implicite Consent, and an expresse Command to the contrary, betwixt the state of a Child, and a Mature experienc'd King; if the intents of our Parliaments were as Loyall as those appeared to be, (Whereas indeed the contrary is apparent,) but that he presumes that all his Geese shall passe for Swannes, and that he can perswade the People that the Moone is made of the same Calves skin, that his new broad Seale shall be affix'd unto.
Yet the better to secure himselfe, and his Associates, from high Treasons in this point (for they are deepe enough in other matters) I would advise them to be contented to make use of the other Seales, which he saith were made by their Authority, (but I must [Page 35] tell him, not without the King) and may be new-made by themselves, viz. the Seale for Statutes, Merchants, in certain Corporations, the Seale for the Hundred, Rape, or Wapentake, City, or Burrough, left to the discretion of the Iustices of Peace (if they have any) or to the keeping of some honest good man of the County (M. Pym was once reputed fit to have been the Keeper of this Seale) p. 20. this Seale is great enough yet to have the stoned Horse carved in it for the bearing, which Pym's father bequeathed to Aguis, or the Seale of Alnegers and Collectours, &c. or that leaden Seale for cloathes (which he insists upon as if it were as authentique as the Popes Bull) or the Seale of the Customers Office (which they are well skilled in improving for themselves, though they rob the King of it) and the seales of cloath of Gold, Silver, Velvet, Damaskes, Chamlets, Silkes, Tobacco, and Tobacco-pipes, and of as many trinkets as are enumerated in their late Book of Excise and Rates; and let them take in the Seales of Yarmouth and Linne-wosted-makers to boot; but let them not meddle with the Dutchy Seale, the Exchequer Seale, the Seale of the Court of Wards and Liveries, not the Seale of the Augmentation, (which he spends so much wast paper about, in his pag. 21, & 26.) for feare of a Premunire, especially if they have any cares to lose, as some of them have hitherto; but above all, meddle not with the Great Seale, it is not Prinnes Assertion, that the Parliament is uncapable of Treason, and out of the intentions of the Statutes concerning Treasons of that kinde, which can protect you against a Tiburne Pole-axe, except you can procure the King's consent, as a part of the Parliament, as the case was in the Times of King Edward the first, and King Henry the fixth, (which he repeates again, for no other purpose but to manifest how his Noddle is furnished with the Art of Memory to insert things over and over to the purpose aforesaid, as much as in the totall comes to nothing;) but these remembrances are of small validity to make way for Master Prinnes pardon; as the whole Parliament was forced for a lesse Rebellion than this, in the time of Richard the second. Or unlesse you be resolved to make good your Speakers promise at the beginning of this Parliament, To make his Majesty the richest King in Christendome, against your wills, by forfeiting your Estates, Lands, and Lives, and having let the Kingdome in combustion, you fall (like Phaeton) for prosuming [Page 32] [...] [Page 33] [...] [Page 32] [...] [Page 33] [...] [Page 34] [...] [Page 35] [...] [Page 36] to guide that Chariot whose lustre dazled your eyes, and whose sublimity astonisheth, yea confounds your understandings: And so confounded be all they that exalt themselves against God, and against the King. Let their lives be [...]bsome, and their deaths Herodian lowsie and virmiculated, Let their mouthes be sealed up with the speechlesnesse of their selfe guilt. And let their eyes be picked out by the Ravens of the valleys, and eaten by the young Eagles. But let the King ever rejoyce in the strength of the Lord, and be exceeding glad in his salvation. Mat. 22. 12. Prov. 30. 17. Psal. 21. 1.
Thus have I (with lesse than Herculean labour in six dayes) cleansed this Augean Stable of all the noysome filth that Prinne had raked in many weeks, from all the dung-hils in the world, all which Merdur [...]nous Mucke I have laid at the doores of the right Owners, viz. Master Prinne and his Members; I have been fain to encounter with him in the darke, for his Margins hath been so thatched with abused and wrested Authours, that as the Grand Signior had so many thousands of Arrowes to shower at once upon the Christians, that they obscured the Sunne, and darkened the Firmament, yet there was roome enough under the shadow of those Arrowes to fight (in a good Cause) and foile the Turkes; so I, in the Cymerian umbrage of this Cloud of Testimones, have cop'd with him, and in the Combate so bruised him, that three of his small guts are dislocated, the Vertigo taking possession of his pulsive Brain-pan, and (as I was certified) he takes a Diet next his heart every morning five spoonfull of warme Cow-dung mixed with Earwigs, compounded Caterpillers, and the Marrow of a Salt Bitch, so that there is some hope that he will recover, but never be his own man again, yet he may live longer than a Cat, or a Dogge, or a better thing.
If I had had any correspondency with him, I could have furnished him, with Authours, Testimonies, Witnesses, and Proofes more suitable for his foure Parts, and his Great Seale too, as Laz [...]ill [...] de Tormes, Don Quixot, Gusman de Alfarech, Bevis of Hamp [...]on, The mirrour of Knighthood, John Dorry, the ancient Bards, Druides, Peripatetickes, Stoickes, Epicureans, and Gymnosophists: these learned Thebanes would have been so suitable to his writings, that their authentique Assertions had like a Torrent over-whelmed me, so that I had been quite drowned before I could have answered halfe his Soveraigne Powers, and for his Great Seale, [...] been as [Page 37] farre from my knowledge, as he and it are from Truth and Realities.
I [...] how to mannage and husband this New Great Seale, the cheapest and thriftiest way, for as yet it is of small force and lesse virtue, People do begin to perceive [...] they have been coozened with Publique Faith, and large promises for great summes, which have been (and must be) paid invisibly, and now that (by beggerly experience) they see how the Game and Geare goes, they are unwilling to be sealed for fooles, and pay for the sealing too. Therefore because it is like to proue a dead market with the New Great Seale, and that wax is deare, I advise to save that charge, and seale with Butter; I have heard of Obligations sealed so in the Welch marches; or if that thrifty device faile, your Seale will make an excellent mould to make Wafer Cakes, or cast well kneaded Ginger- [...]read in. There are divers other necessary uses which it may be put to, which I leave to thy grave and ingenious, studious consideration.
How now, my running-witted, tolling-headed, taling tongu'd, rattle-brain'd Round-head? How likest thou this ve [...]ie? Wilt thou have another bows? If thou darest but take up the cudgels once more, as good as thou thinkest thy selfe at Defensive Armes. Ile fetch thee about like a Iack-an-apes, over and under his Chaine, so that all the Gentlemen Spectatours, (who shall be Iudges) shall not onely passe their sentence on my side, that I have sufficiently dry-bast [...]d thee; but I will let thy humours bloud for the Simples in the head-vein and break thy, Mazz [...]rd, so soudly, that all the world shall see that thou hast but a craz'd Pericranium; and so, somewhat commiserating thy distracted condition, I in a small degree of true charity, leave thy excessive imaginary zeale to farewell, and behang'd. What should any man say more to his Friend.
A Prophecy.
A Prophecy concerning the precedent Answer, found in a Whirle-poole, three Leagues below the bottome of the Ocean, by a diver, who was sent thither in these times of necessity for Pym's purse, which because he found guarded by Hampden's Ghost, he could not bring, for that had been enough to have redeemed all this Isle, (except himselfe) but he brought this from a pennon whereon it was hanging, whilest the Neiades and Nereides were busied about an Ephemerides, for perpetuating Bookers Almanacke, till Naworths honest just-dealing Prognostication shall make a Comment upon Haly by the last yeares successe, and till the Puritan manner of canting Ass-trologers (like that of Scriptures) shall appeare out of Guido Benatus, wherein having told a tale of their troublesome Army, he leaves out, BUT THE KING SHALL PREVAILE IN THE END. And railes upon the Licencer, because he put the rest out, upon discovery of that his jugling, and also they sate in Consultation about proroguing the Confutation (if it could be) of Prinnes legislative Soveraigne Power of Parliaments, and opening the New Broad Seale, and divers other speciall pieces of that Minnion and Favourite of Aeolus, Neptune, Proserpine, yea and the Grand Signior Pluto himselfe, all which have speciall influence into the occurrents of these Times.
In the third yeare of the Grand Session of the infernall Plebeians spirits, and in the second yeare of the Pigmies Giant-like warring against Heaven, when the Furies shall be in Conjunction, Beelzebub and Jezabel in a Quartile Aspect, Asmodeus ascendant, Judas in the second House, Lucifer culminant, and Balaam Lord of the Assembly, the North Pole shall be translated to Troynovant, the Constellation called Corona shall be assaulted by Mars, and great endeavour shall be to draw it beneath the Moon, and one Prinne (son of the Centaures) mounted to the Spheare of Mercury, shall perswade [Page 39] the middle world (made giddy with lately running round) that all is reduced to the Naturall Motion, and the great Platonique yeare returned: but Charles Waine (driving a contrary way) shall force Ixions Wheele to become retrograde, and cause a motion of Trepidation in all the Circulatours and Roundheads of Thule, and the greatest Antick Island; and when this son of the Centaure hath lead the World through foure times foure Signes by an Ignis fatuus more dangerous than that of Phaeton, and maintained worse Paradoxes than Copernicus, reaching at loves Scepter with the hands of Briareus, and scorning Iuno more than Niobe did, and seemes to rest secure, onely laughed at by Logicians, hissed at by the Searchers of Clioes Records, and despised by the Priests of love, by reason of his false quotations, disunderstandings, mis-applications, blasphemy against God, Treasons against the King, Arguments drawn from absurdities, generall Conclusions drawn from particular examples, and from most notable Non-sense, that in the Times and Acts of Rebellion, parallelld for the most part from, and in the Nadir (or Altitude) of his Pride, shall write with the Rayes of a Comet, that he hath copiously confuted all Royallists, Malignants, Papists, clamorous Objections, and Primitive Exceptions, against the Proceedings of this present Parliament, in foure severall Treatises, lately published concerning the Soveraigne Power of Parliaments, and Kingdomes, which hath given good satisfaction to many, and silenced the Tongues and Pennes of most Anti-Parliamenteers, who have been so ingenious as seriously to peruse them; then shall a holy water Clerke of Thetis contract his Iliades into a rotten nut-shell, and inspired with ability rightly to interpret that old Saw of Rabbi Selimon, Answer not a foole according to his folly, (or according to his manner) lest thou also be like him. Aptly apply the inverted opposite Maxime, Answer a foole according to his folly, or according to his deserving, least he be wise in his own conceit: and although Lilbourne the Libeller, or a Mushrom hatched by this blazing star in the blacke Night of Sedition, and that sincere upright verst man Withers with the rest of the Rabble of railing Poets be retained in fee by the Rebells to write weekly Lyes for them; yet Tom Nash his Ghost returning to this Charon, with some distilled wilde-fire-water in an inke-horne, shall provide such a whip for this proud Horse, such a Bridle for this senselesse Asse, and such [Page 40] a rod for this mad fooles backe, as shall tame Cerberus, whose Triple head sounded nothing but the three-syllabled and the three-letterd Lords, and barked against the radiant beames of Majesty, and shall cause the many heads of Hydra to be mortified and expire—in confusion, like the Heteroclitall monstrous Body of Five Members, shrunke into three, and one of them halfe withered too: all which shall happen before the end of the first Olympiad of the Lesbian expedition, and the Glasconian refining of Reformation: this is decreed by the three fatall Sisters, confirmed by the three infernall Iudges, and entred into the Bookes of the foure times three Sybills, in the Publique Hall of Contingency, 7000 yeares before the imagination of Eternity.
POSTSCRIPT.
I Would not have Prinne, or his dismembred (divided) Masters Memorable Memberhoods, to imagine me so sterill as to be all this while pumping to answer his Traiterous lying Pamphlets, but let him and them know, that this my Booke was written in October last, 1643. when their Saviour Pym was alive, (which had he then been dead, I had not mentioned) many alterations have happened since my writing, and the printing part of it before the end of December last, but I being extremely stroken lame, and the Presse and Printers full of worke of greater consequence than to curry Crop-ear'd Iades, till now; and as I have formerly handled Booker, the Proditorious Prediction-monger, and M r Prinne the unutterable utter Barrester, (or rather the Kingdomes Common Embarrater) so have I also written Answers to the nimble, villanious, quicke, pretty, little witted Mercurius Britanicus, the Scottish Dove, (Pigeon or Widgeon) the Scout, and all the Rabble of lying railing Rascals and Rebells, all these things are laid (like rods in pisse) till I can get them printed: and could I but have meanes, and the Presse leasure, I dare undertake with my poore Goose quill, to stop the mouthes or cut the throates of all the seditious Pulpitteers, and roguish Pamphletteers in England, or else I would lose my labour.