Roundheads was applied to the defenders of popular rights by
their royalist adversaries.
See ROUNDHEADS.
ENGLAND: A. D. 1641 (November).
The Grand Remonstrance.
Early in November, 1641, the king being in Scotland, and news
of the insurrection in Ireland having just reached London, the
party of Pym, Hampden, and Cromwell "resolved on a great
pitched battle between them and the opposition, which should
try their relative strengths before the king's return; and
they chose to fight this battle over a vast document, which
they entitled 'A Declaration and Remonstrance of the State of
the Kingdom,' but which has come to be known since as The
Grand Remonstrance. ... The notion of a great general document
which, under the name of 'A Remonstrance,' should present to
the king in one view a survey of the principal evils that had
crept into the kingdom in his own and preceding reigns, with a
detection of their causes, and a specification of the
remedies, had more than once been before the Commons. It had
been first mooted by Lord Digby while the Parliament was not a
week old. Again and again set aside for more immediate work, it
had recurred to the leaders of the Movement party, just before
the king's departure for Scotland, as likely to afford the
broad battle-ground with the opposition then becoming
desirable. 'A Remonstrance to be made, how we found the
Kingdom and the Church, and how the state of it now stands,'
such was the description of the then intended document (August
7). The document had doubtless been in rehearsal through the
Recess, for on the 8th of November the rough draft of it was
presented to the House and read at the clerk's table. When we
say that the document in its final form occupies thirteen
folio pages of rather close print in Rushworth, and consists
of a preamble followed by 206 articles or paragraphs duly
numbered, one can conceive what a task the reading of even the
first draft of it must have been, and through what a storm of
successive debates over proposed amendments and additions it
reached completeness. There had been no such debates yet in
the Parliament."
_D. Masson,
Life of John Milton,
volume 2, book 2, chapter 6._
"It [The Grand Remonstrance] embodies the case of the
Parliament against the Ministers of the king. It is the most
authentic statement ever put forth of the wrongs endured by
all classes of the English people, during the first fifteen
years of the reign of Charles I.; and, for that reason, the
most complete justification upon record of the Great
Rebellion." The debates on The Grand Remonstrance were begun
November 9 and ended November 22, when the vote was taken:
Ayes, 159.--Noes, 148.--So evenly were the parties in the
great struggle then divided.
_J. Forster,
History and Biographical Essays,
volume 1: Debates on the Grand Remonstrance._
The following is the text of "The Grand Remonstrance," with
that of the Petition preceding it:
"Most Gracious Sovereign: Your Majesty's most humble and
faithful subjects the Commons in this present Parliament
assembled, do with much thankfulness and joy acknowledge the
great mercy and favour of God, in giving your Majesty a safe
and peaceable return out of Scotland into your kingdom of
England, where the pressing dangers and distempers of the
State have caused us with much earnestness to desire the
comfort of your gracious presence, and likewise the unity and
justice of your royal authority, to give more life and power
to the dutiful and loyal counsels and endeavours of your
Parliament, for the prevention of that eminent ruin and
destruction wherein your kingdoms of England and Scotland are
threatened. The duty which we owe to your Majesty and our
country, cannot but make us very sensible and apprehensive,
that the multiplicity, sharpness and malignity of those evils
under which we have now many years suffered, are fomented and
cherished by a corrupt and ill-affected party, who amongst
other their mischievous devices for the alteration of religion
and government, have sought by many false scandals and
imputations, cunningly insinuated and dispersed amongst the
people, to blemish and disgrace our proceedings in this
Parliament, and to get themselves a party and faction amongst
your subjects, for the better strengthening themselves in
their wicked courses; and hindering those provisions and
remedies which might, by the wisdom of your Majesty and
counsel of your Parliament, be opposed against them.
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For preventing whereof, and the better information of your
Majesty, your Peers and all other your loyal subjects, we have
been necessitated to make a declaration of the state of the
kingdom, both before and since the assembly of this
Parliament, unto this time, which we do humbly present to your
Majesty, without the least intention to lay any blemish upon
your royal person, but only to represent how your royal
authority and trust have been abused, to the great prejudice
and danger of your Majesty, and of all your good subjects. And
because we have reason to believe that those malignant
parties, whose proceedings evidently appear to be mainly for
the advantage and increase of Popery, is composed, set up, and
acted by the subtile practice of the Jesuits and other
engineers and factors for Rome, and to the great danger of
this kingdom, and most grievous affliction of your loyal
subjects, have so far prevailed as to corrupt divers of your
Bishops and others in prime places of the Church, and also to
bring divers of these instruments to be of your Privy Council,
and other employments of trust and nearness about your
Majesty, the Prince, and the rest of your royal children. And
by this means have had such an operation in your counsel and
the most important affairs and proceedings of your government,
that a most dangerous division and chargeable preparation for
war betwixt your kingdoms of England and Scotland, the
increase of jealousies betwixt your Majesty and your most
obedient subjects, the violent distraction and interruption of
this Parliament, the insurrection of the Papists in your
kingdom of Ireland, and bloody massacre of your people, have
been not only endeavoured and attempted, but in a great
measure compassed and effected. For preventing the final
accomplishment whereof, your poor subjects are enforced to
engage their persons and estates to the maintaining of a very
expensive and dangerous war, notwithstanding they have already
since the beginning of this Parliament undergone the charge of
£150,000 sterling, or thereabouts, for the necessary support
and supply of your Majesty in these present and perilous
designs. And because all our most faithful endeavours and
engagements will be ineffectual for the peace, safety and
preservation of your Majesty and your people, if some present,
real and effectual course be not taken for suppressing this
wicked and malignant party:--We, your most humble and obedient
subjects, do with all faithfulness and humility beseech your
Majesty,
1. That you will be graciously pleased to concur with the
humble desires of your people in a parliamentary way, for the
preserving the peace and safety of the kingdom from the
malicious designs of the Popish party:
For depriving the Bishops of their votes in Parliament, and
abridging their immoderate power usurped over the Clergy,
and other your good subjects, which they have perniciously
abused to the hazard of religion, and great prejudice and
oppression of the laws of the kingdom, and just liberty of
your people:
For the taking away such oppressions in religion, Church
government and discipline, as have been brought in and
fomented by them;
For uniting all such your loyal subjects together as join
in the same fundamental truths against the Papists, by
removing some oppressions and unnecessary ceremonies by
which divers weak consciences have been scrupled, and seem
to be divided from the rest, and for the due execution of
those good laws which have been made for securing the
liberty of your subjects.
2. That your Majesty will likewise be pleased to remove from
your council all such as persist to favour and promote any of
those pressures and corruptions wherewith your people have
been grieved, and that for the future your Majesty will
vouchsafe to employ such persons in your great and public
affairs, and to take such to be near you in places of trust,
as your Parliament may have cause to confide in; that in your
princely goodness to your people you will reject and refuse
all mediation and solicitation to the contrary, how powerful
and near soever.
3. That you will be pleased to forbear to alienate any of the
forfeited and escheated lands in Ireland which shall accrue to
your Crown by reason of this rebellion, that out of them the
Crown may be the better supported, and some satisfaction made
to your subjects of this kingdom for the great expenses they
are like to undergo [in] this war. Which humble desires of
ours being graciously fulfilled by your Majesty, we will, by
the blessing and favour of God, most cheerfully undergo the
hazard and expenses of this war, and apply ourselves to such
other courses and counsels as may support your real estate
with honour and plenty at home, with power and reputation
abroad, and by our loyal affections, obedience and service,
lay a sure and lasting foundation of the greatness and
prosperity of your Majesty, and your royal prosperity in
future times.
The Commons in this present Parliament assembled, having with
much earnestness and faithfulness of affection and zeal to the
public good of this kingdom, and His Majesty's honour and
service for the space of twelve months, wrestled with great
dangers and fears, the pressing miseries and calamities, the
various distempers and disorders which had not only assaulted,
but even overwhelmed and extinguished the liberty, peace and
prosperity of this kingdom, the comfort and hopes of all His
Majesty's good subjects, and exceedingly weakened and
undermined the foundation and strength of his own royal
throne, do yet find an abounding malignity and opposition in
those parties and factions who have been the cause of those
evils, and do still labour to cast aspersions upon that which
hath been done, and to raise many difficulties for the
hindrance of that which remains yet undone, and to foment
jealousies between the King and Parliament, that so they may
deprive him and his people of the fruit of his own gracious
intentions, and their humble desires of procuring the public
peace, safety and happiness of this realm. For the preventing
of those miserable effects which such malicious endeavours may
produce, we have thought good to declare the root and the
growth of these mischievous designs: the maturity and ripeness
to which they have attained before the beginning of the
Parliament: the effectual means which have been used for the
extirpation of those dangerous evils, and the progress which
hath therein been made by His Majesty's goodness and the
wisdom of the Parliament: the ways of obstruction and
opposition by which that progress hath been interrupted: the
courses to be taken for the removing those obstacles, and for
the accomplishing of our most dutiful and faithful intentions
and endeavours of restoring and establishing the ancient
honour, greatness and security of this Crown and nation.
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The root of all this mischief we find to be a malignant and
pernicious design of subverting the fundamental laws and
principles of government, upon which the religion and justice
of this kingdom are firmly established. The actors and
promoters hereof have been:
1. The Jesuited Papists, who hate the laws, as the obstacles
of that change and subversion of religion which they so much
long for.
2. The Bishops, and the corrupt part of the Clergy, who
cherish formality and superstition as the natural effects and
more probable supports of their own ecclesiastical tyranny and
usurpation.
3. Such Councillors and Courtiers as for private ends have
engaged themselves to further the interests of some foreign
princes or states to the prejudice of His Majesty and the
State at home. The common principles by which they moulded and
governed all their particular counsels and actions were these:
First, to maintain continual differences and discontents
between the King and the people, upon questions of prerogative
and liberty, that so they might have the advantage of siding
with him, and under the notions of men addicted to his
service, gain to themselves and their parties the places of
greatest trust and power in the kingdom. A second, to suppress
the purity and power of religion, and such persons as were
best affected to it, as being contrary to their own ends, and
the greatest impediment to that change which they thought to
introduce. A third, to conjoin those parties of the kingdom
which were most propitious to their own ends, and to divide
those who were most opposite, which consisted in many
particular observations. To cherish the Arminian part in those
points wherein they agree with the Papists, to multiply and
enlarge the difference between the common Protestants and
those whom they call Puritans, to introduce and countenance
such opinions and ceremonies as are fittest for accommodation
with Popery, to increase and maintain ignorance, looseness and
profaneness in the people; that of those three parties,
Papists, Arminians and Libertines, they might compose a body
fit to act such counsels and resolutions as were most
conducible to their own ends. A fourth, to disaffect the King
to Parliaments by slander and false imputations, and by
putting him upon other ways of supply, which in show and
appearance were fuller of advantage than the ordinary course
of subsidies, though in truth they brought more loss than gain
both to the King and people, and have caused the great
distractions under which we both suffer. As in all compounded
bodies the operations are qualified according to the
predominant element, so in this mixed party, the Jesuited
counsels, being most active and prevailing, may easily be
discovered to have had the greatest sway in all their
determinations, and if they be not prevented, are likely to
devour the rest, or to turn them into their own nature. In the
beginning of His Majesty's reign the party began to revive and
flourish again, having been somewhat damped by the breach with
Spain in the last year of King James, and by His Majesty's
marriage with France; the interests and counsels of that State
being not so contrary to the good of religion and the
prosperity of this kingdom as those of Spain; and the Papists
of England, having been ever more addicted to Spain than
France, yet they still retained a purpose and resolution to
weaken the Protestant parties in all parts, and even in
France, whereby to make way for the change of religion which
they intended at home.
1. The first effect and evidence of their recovery and
strength was the dissolution of the Parliament at Oxford,
after there had been given two subsidies to His Majesty, and
before they received relief in any one grievance many other
more miserable effects followed.
2. The loss of the Rochel fleet, by the help of our shipping,
set forth and delivered over to the French in opposition to
the advice of Parliament, which left that town without defence
by sea, and made way, not only to the loss of that important
place, but likewise to the loss of all the strength and
security of the Protestant religion in France.
3. The diverting of His Majesty's course of wars from the West
Indies, which was the most facile and hopeful way for this
kingdom to prevail against the Spaniard, to an expenseful and
successless attempt upon Cadiz, which was so ordered as if it
had rather been intended to make us weary of war than to
prosper in it.
4. The precipitate breach with France, by taking their ships
to a great value without making recompense to the English,
whose goods were thereupon imbarred and confiscated in that
kingdom.
5. The peace with Spain without consent of Parliament,
contrary to the promise of King James to both Houses, whereby
the Palatine's cause was deserted and left to chargeable and
hopeless treaties, which for the most part were managed by
those who might justly be suspected to be no friends to that
cause.
6. The charging of the kingdom with billeted soldiers in all
parts of it, and the concomitant design of German horse, that
the land might either submit with fear or be enforced with
rigour to such arbitrary contributions as should be required
of them.
7. The dissolving of the Parliament in the second year of His
Majesty's reign, after a declaration of their intent to grant
five subsidies.
8. The exacting of the like proportion of five subsidies,
after the Parliament dissolved, by commission of loan, and
divers gentlemen and others imprisoned for not yielding to pay
that loan, whereby many of them contracted such sicknesses as
cost them their lives.
9. Great sums of money required and raised by privy seals.
10. An unjust and pernicious attempt to extort great payments
from the subject by way of excise, and a commission issued
under the seal to that purpose.
11. The Petition of Right, which was granted in full
Parliament, blasted, with an illegal declaration to make it
destructive to itself, to the power of Parliament, to the
liberty of the subject, and to that purpose printed with it,
and the Petition made of no use but to show the bold and
presumptuous injustice of such ministers as durst break the
laws and suppress the liberties of the kingdom, after they had
been so solemnly and evidently declared.
12. Another Parliament dissolved 4 Car., the privilege of
Parliament broken, by imprisoning divers members of the House,
detaining them close prisoners for many months together,
without the liberty of using books, pen, ink or paper; denying
them all the comforts of life, all means of preservation of
health, not permitting their wives to come unto them even in
the time of their sickness.
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13. And for the completing of that cruelty, after years spent
in such miserable durance, depriving them of the necessary
means of spiritual consolation, not suffering them to go
abroad to enjoy God's ordinances in God's House, or God's
ministers to come to them to minister comfort to them in their
private chambers.
14. And to keep them still in this oppressed condition, not
admitting them to be bailed according to law, yet vexing them
with informations in inferior courts, sentencing and fining
some of them for matters done in Parliament; and extorting the
payments of those fines from them, enforcing others to put in
security of good behaviour before they could be released.
15. The imprisonment of the rest, which refused to be bound,
still continued, which might have been perpetual if necessity
had not the last year brought another Parliament to relieve
them, of whom one died [Sir John Eliot] by the cruelty and
harshness of his imprisonment, which would admit of no
relaxation, notwithstanding the imminent danger of his life,
did sufficiently appear by the declaration of his physician,
and his release, or at least his refreshment, was sought by
many humble petitions, and his blood still cries either for
vengeance or repentance of those Ministers of State, who have
at once obstructed the course both of His Majesty's justice
and mercy.
16. Upon the dissolution of both these Parliaments, untrue and
scandalous declarations were published to asperse their
proceedings, and some of their members unjustly; to make them
odious, and colour the violence which was used against them;
proclamations set out to the same purpose; and to the great
dejecting of the hearts of the people, forbidding them even to
speak of Parliaments.
17. After the breach of the Parliament in the fourth of His
Majesty, injustice, oppression and violence broke in upon us
without any restraint or moderation, and yet the first project
was the great sums exacted through the whole kingdom for
default of knighthood, which seemed to have some colour and
shadow of a law, yet if it be rightly examined by that
obsolete law which was pretended for it, it will be found to
be against all the rules of justice, both in respect of the
persons charged, the proportion of the fines demanded, and the
absurd and unreasonable manner of their proceedings.
18. Tonnage and Poundage hath been received without colour or
pretence of law; many other heavy impositions continued
against law, and some so unreasonable that the sum of the
charge exceeds the value of the goods.
19. The Book of Rates lately enhanced to a high proportion,
and such merchants that would not submit to their illegal and
unreasonable payments, were vexed and oppressed above measure;
and the ordinary course of justice, the common birthright of
the subject of England, wholly obstructed unto them.
20. And although all this was taken upon pretence of guarding
the seas, yet a new unheard-of tax of ship-money was devised,
and upon the same pretence, by both which there was charged
upon the subject near £700,000 some years, and yet the
merchants have been left so naked to the violence of the
Turkish pirates, that many great ships of value and thousands
of His Majesty's subjects have been taken by them, and do
still remain in miserable slavery.
21. The enlargements of forests, contrary to 'Carta de
Foresta,' and the composition thereupon.
22. The exactions of coat and conduct money and divers other
military charges.
23. The taking away the arms of trained bands of divers
counties.
24. The desperate design of engrossing all the gunpowder into
one hand, keeping it in the Tower of London, and setting so
high a rate upon it that the poorer sort were not able to buy
it, nor could any have it without licence, thereby to leave
the several parts of the kingdom destitute of their necessary
defence, and by selling so dear that which was sold to make an
unlawful advantage of it, to the great charge and detriment of
the subject.
25. The general destruction of the King's timber, especially
that in the Forest of Deane, sold to Papists, which was the
best store-house of this kingdom for the maintenance of our
shipping.
26. The taking away of men's right, under the colour of the
King's title to land, between high and low water marks.
27. The monopolies of soap, salt, wine, leather, sea-coal, and
in a manner of all things of most common and necessary use.
28. The restraint of the liberties of the subjects in their
habitation, trades and other interests.
29. Their vexation and oppression by purveyors, clerks of the
market and saltpetre men.
30. The sale of pretended nuisances, as building in and about
London.
31. Conversion of arable into pasture, continuance of pasture,
under the name of depopulation, have driven many millions out
of the subjects' purses, without any considerable profit to
His Majesty.
32. Large quantities of common and several grounds hath been
taken from the subject by colour of the Statute of
Improvement, and by abuse of the Commission of Sewers, without
their consent, and against it.
33. And not only private interest, but also public faith, have
been broken in seizing of the money and bullion in the mint,
and the whole kingdom like to be robbed at once in that
abominable project of brass money.
34. Great numbers of His Majesty's subjects for refusing those
unlawful charges, have been vexed with long and expensive
suits, some fined and censured, others committed to long and
hard imprisonments and confinements, to the loss of health in
many, of life in some, and others have had their houses broken
up, their goods seized, some have been restrained from their
lawful callings.
35. Ships have been interrupted in their voyages, surprised at
sea in a hostile manner by projectors, as by a common enemy.
36. Merchants prohibited to unlade their goods in such ports
as were for their own advantage, and forced to bring them to
those places which were much for the advantage of the
monopolisers and projectors.
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