freedom and privilege of debating any matter or business, which shall be propounded or debated in either of the said houses, or at any conference or committee of both, or either of the said houses of parliament; or touching the repeal, or alteration of any old, or preparing any new laws; or the redressing any public grievance; but that the said members of either of the said houses, and the assistants of the house of peers, and every of them, shall have the same freedom of speech, and all other privileges whatsoever, as they had before the making of this act; both which orders were passed as previous directions unto the committee of the whole house, to whom the said bill was committed, to the end that nothing should remain in the said bill, which might any ways tend towards the depriving of either of the houses of parliament, or any of their members, of their ancient freedom of debates, or votes, or other privileges whatsoever; yet the house being pleased, upon the report from the committee, to pass a vote, That all persons who have, or shall have right to sit and vote in either house of parliament, should be added to the first enacted clause in the said bill, whereby an oath is to be imposed upon them as members of either house; which vote, we whose names are underwritten, being peers of the realm, do humbly conceive, is not agreeable to the said two previous orders; and it having been humbly offered and insisted upon by divers of us, that the proviso in the late act, intitled, An act for preventing dangers that may happen from popish recusants,' might be added to the bill depending, whereby the peerage of every peer of this realm, and all their privileges, might be preserved in this bill, as fully as in the said late act; yet the house not pleasing to admit of the said proviso, but proceeding to the passing of the said vote; we do humbly, upon the grounds aforesaid, and according to our undoubted right, enter this our dissent from, and protestation against the same:

This was their last protestation; for, after this, they altered their method, and reported not the votes of the committee, and parts of the bill to the house, as they passed them; but took the same order as is observed in other bills, not to report unto the house, until they had gone through with the bill, and so report all the amendments together. This they thought a way of more despatch, and which did prevent all protestations, until it came to the house; for the votes of a committee, though of the whole house, are not thought of that weight, as that there should be allowed the entering a dissent of them, or protestation against them.

The bill being read over at the committee, the lord keeper objected against the form of it, and desired that he might put it in another method; which was easily allowed him, that being not the dispute. But it was observable the hand of God was upon them in this whole affair; their chariot-wheels were taken off, they drew heavily; a bill so long designed, prepared, and of that moment to all their affairs, had hardly a sensible composure.

The first part of the bill that was fallen upon, was, "whether there should be an oath at all in the bill;" and this was the only part the court-party defended with reason. For, the whole bill being to enjoin an oath, the house might reject it, but the committee was not to destroy it. Yet the lord Hallifax did with that quickness, learning, and elegance, which are inseparable from all his discourses, make appear, that as there really was no security to any state by oaths; so also no private person, much less statesman, would ever order

his affairs as relying on it: no man would ever sleep with open doors, or unlocked-up treasure or plate, should all the town be sworn not to rob; so that the use of multiplying oaths had been most commonly to exclude or disturb some honest conscientious men, who would never have prejudiced the government. It was also insisted on by that lord and others, that the oath, imposed by the bill, contained three clauses; the two former assertory, and the last promissory; and that it was worthy the consideration of the bishops, whether assertory oaths, which were properly appointed to give testimony of a matter of fact, whereof a man is capable to be fully assured by the evidence of his senses, be lawful to be made use of to confirm or invalidate doctrinal propositions; and whether that legislative power, which imposes such an oath, does not necessarily assume to itself an infallibility? And, as for promissory oaths, it was desired that those learned prelates would consider the opinion of Grotius, "De jure belli et pacis," who seems to make it plain, that those kind of oaths are forbidden by our Saviour Christ, Matt. v. 34, 37*; and whether it would not become the fathers of the church, when they have well weighed that and other places of the New Testament, to be more tender in multiplying oaths, than hitherto the great men of the church have been? But the bishops carried the point, and an oath was ordered by the major vote.

The next thing in consideration, was about the persons that should be enjoined to take this oath; and

* Notandum hic est obiter, quod in Christi præceptis, et apud Jacobum de non jurando dicitur, proprie non ad assertorium juramentum, cujus apud Paulum apostolum exempla extant aliquot, sed ad promissorium futuri incerti pertinere. Ostendit hoc evidenter oppositio illa in verbis Christi: "Audistis dictum antiquis, non pejerabis, sed reddes Domino juramentum. Ego vero dico vobis, ne jurate omnino." Et ratio quam Jacobus adjicit: un s Tóxçiσ wέonle, id est "ne fallaces inveniamini." Nam eum sensum vox Toxiσews apud Hellenistas habet...... Idem evincit illud in Christi verbis ἔσω δὲ λόγος ύμων, ναὶ ναὶ, ού, ο, quod sic Jacobus explicat, ἔτω δὲ ὑμῶν τὸ ναὶ ναὶ, καὶ, τὸ οὐ οὐ, . . . . . . Nam prius vai et où promissum significat, posterius ejus implementum, &c. De jure belli et pacis, lib. II. cap. xiii. § 21.

those were to be "all such as enjoyed any beneficial office or employment, ecclesiastical, civil or military;" and no farther went the debate for some hours, until at last the lord-keeper rises up, and with an eloquent oration, desires to add privy-counsellors, justices of the peace, and members of both houses; the two former particularly mentioned only to usher in the latter, which was so directly against the two previous votes ; the first of which was enrolled amongst the standing orders of the house, that it wanted a man of no less assurance in his eloquence to propose it. And he was driven hard, when he was forced to tell the house, that they were masters of their own orders, and interpretation of them.

The next consideration at the committee was the oath itself; and it was desired by the country lords that it might be clearly known, whether it were meant all for an oath, or some of it for a declaration and some an oath? If the latter, then it was desired it might be distinctly parted; and that the declaratory part should be subscribed by itself, and not sworn. There was no small pains taken by the lord-keeper and the bishops to prove that the two first parts were only a declaration, and not an oath. And though it was replied, that to declare upon one's oath, or to abhor upon one's oath, is the same thing with, I do swear; yet there was some difficulty to obtain the dividing of them, and that the declaratory part should be only subscribed, and the rest sworn to.

The persons being determined, and this division agreed to; the next thing was the parts of the declaration; wherein the first was, "I A. B. do declare, that it is not lawful, upon any pretence whatsoever, to take up arms against the king." This was liable to great objections; for it was said, it might introduce a great change of government, to oblige all the men in great trust in England to declare that exact boundary and extent of the oath of allegiance, and enforce some things to be stated that are much better involved in generals, and peradventure are not capable of another way of expression, without great wrong on the one

side or the other. There is a law of 25th Edward III. that "arms shall not be taken up against the king, and that it is treason to do so;" and it is a very just and reasonable law. But it is an idle question at best, to ask, "whether arms in any case can be taken up against a lawful prince;" because it necessarily brings in the debate, in every man's mind, how there can be a distinction then left between absolute and bounded monarchies, if monarchs have only the fear of God, and no fear of human resistance to restrain them. And it was farther urged, that if the chance of human affairs in future ages should give the French king a just title and investiture in the crown of England, and he should avowedly own a design by force to change the religion, and make his government here as absolute as in France, by the extirpation of the nobility, gentry, and principal citizens of the protestant party; whether in such, or like cases, this declaration will be a service to the government, as it is now established. Nay, and it was farther said, that they overthrow the government that propose to place any part of it above the fear of man. For in our English government, and all bounded monarchies, where the prince is not absolute, there every individual subject is under the fear of the king and his people; either for breaking the peace, or disturbing the common interest that every man hath in it; for if he invades the person or right of his prince, he invades his whole people, who have bound up in him, and derive from him all their liberty, property, and safety; as also the prince himself is under the fear of breaking that golden chain and contexture between him and his people, by making his interest contrary to that they justly and rightly claim. And therefore neither our ancestors, nor any other country free like ours, whilst they preserved their liberties, did ever suffer any mercenary or standing guards to their prince, but took care that his safety should be in them, as theirs was in him.

Though these were the objections to this head, yet they were but lightly touched, and not fully insisted upon, until the debate of the second head, where the