yourself, and that is in that false and malicious aspersion of Popish and Spanish counsels which you cast on the present king. For it is well known to all the world, he hath preferred his conscience before three crowns, and patiently endured to live so many years in exile, rather than change his religion; which if he would have done, or been moved with such counsels, he might long since have procured all the forces of the catholick world upon us; whereas it cannot be denied of his greatest opposers, that they are so jealous of their ill-gotten purchases bought with their crimes, that rather than be in danger of losing a pig, they would, with the Gergesenes, desire Christ to depart out of their coasts. After this said, he moved the assembly that I might be desired to deliver my judgment upon the book, as he and others had done, which being immediately past, I knew not, though unwilling, how to avoid it; and therefore, I told them as briefly as I could, that that which I disliked most in your treatise was, that there is not one word of the balance of propriety, nor the Agrarian, nor Rotation in it, from the beginning to the end; without which, together with a Lord Archon, I thought I had sufficiently demonstrated, not only in my writings but publick exercises in that coffee-house, that there is no possible foundation of a free commonwealth. To the first and second of these, that is, the Balance and the Agrarian, you made no objection, and therefore, I should not need to make any answer. But for the third, I mean Rotation, which you implicitly reject in your design to perpetuate the present members, I shall only add this to what I have already said and written on this subject, that a commonwealth is like a great top, that must be kept up by being whipped round, and held in perpetual circulation, for if you discontinue the Rotation, and suffer the senate to settle, and stand still, down it falls immediately. And if you had studied this point as carefully as I have done, you could not but know, there is no such way under heaven of disposing the vicissitudes of command and obedience, and of distributing equal right and liberty among all men, as this of wheeling, by which, as Chaucer writes, a single fart hath been equally divided among a whole convent of friars, and every one hath had his just share of the savour. I told them, I could not but be sorry to find so learned a man so ignorant, in the nature of government, as to make disproportionate parallels of councils as you do, where you compare the senate of Rome with the grand council of Venice, between which there is no analogy at all; for the senate of Rome was never the supreme power of the people, as the grand council of Venice is, but merely a council of state. But I wondered most of all, at what politick crack in any man's scull, the imagination could enter of securing liberty under an oligarchy, seized of the government for term of life, which was never yet seen in the world. The Metropolitan of all commonwealths, the Roman, did but once adventure to trust its whole power and authority, in the hands of one council, and that but for two years, and yet they had like to have lost their liberty for ever; whereas they had frequently in all ages left it wholly in the power

of a single person, and found it so far from danger or inconvenience, that the only refuge they had in their greatest extremity was, But I could not but laugh, as they all had to create a dictator. done, at the pleasantness of your fancy, who suppose our noble patriots, when they are invested for term of life, will serve their country at their own charge: This, I said, was very improbable, unless you meant as they do, that all we have is their own, and that to prey and devour is to serve; in which they have appeared so able and industrious, as if they had been made to no other pur-pose, but, like lobsters, were all claws and belly. For though many laugh at me for accounting 300,000 pounds in wooden ware, towards the crecting of a free-state, in my Oceana, but a trifle to the whole nation; because I am most certain that these little pills the ballots are the only physick that can keep the body politick soluble, and not suffer the humour to settle, I will undertake, that if the present members had but a lease of the government during life, notwithstanding whatsoever impeachment of waste, they would raise more out of it to themselves in one year, than that amounts to; beside the charge we must be at in maintaining of guards to had keep the boys off them, and before half the term be expired, they would have it untenantable. To conclude, I told them, you made good your title in a contrary sense; for you have really proposed the most ready and easy way to establish downright slavery upon the nation that can possibly be contrived, which will clearly appear to any man that does but understand this plain truth, that wheresoever the power of proposing and debating, together with the power of ratifying and enacting laws, is intrusted in the hands of any one person, or any one council, as you would have it, that government is inevitably arbitrary and tyrannical, because they may make whatsoever they please lawful or unlawful. And that tyJ. H. ranny hath the advantage of all others that hath law and liberty among the instruments of servitude.

THE

QUALIFICATIONS OF PERSONS,

DECLARED CAPABLE BY THE

RUMP-PARLIAMENT,

To elect, or be elected, Members to supply their House.

Printed in the year 1660: Quarto, containing sixteen pages.

THE representative of the parliament of England, having for many years employed their constant endeavour, to impose freedom and liberty on the three nations; notwithstanding their ob

stinate reluctancy and opposition thereunto, who would take upon, them, against all right and reason, to be their own judges; and being now, after two scandalous ejectments, and as many signal restorations, happily returned to discharge the remaining fragment of their trust; do find, to their unspeakable grief, the red-coats, in whom they always loyally acquiesced, failing of their pay, to fail likewise of their trust, and, seduced by evil counsel, to adhere unto the common enemy; that is to say, the said three nations, in complying with their desires and addresses, which are, to have this present representative dissolved, and a free parliament speedily convened, which they tremble to think upon, or the secluded members re-admitted, which they equally abominate, or the present house supplied with new elections, which their bowels sigh to reflect on. Nevertheless they have, after serious and mature deliberation, resolved upon the last, that is to say, to fill up their house, as being, though of dangerous consequence, less horrible and dreadful to themselves, than any other way. And to the end the persons to be elected may be of as near a condition as may be, to match the present members, and so, possibly, go hand in hand with them, in carrying on the said work; they have agreed upon these following qualifications, and do enact, and be it hereby enacted, that no person whatsoever presume to clect or be elected, under pain of confiscation of his estate, and sale of his person, that is not allowed capable thereof, by the said qualifications, in which they do profess, before the Searcher of all Hearts, that they have freely discovered the naked truth of all their intentions, as, if their breasts were to be opened, and their hearts taken out, which God defend, it would manifestly appear to all the world.

Qualification I-Whosoever hath at any time been known to take the name of God in vain, that is, to swear or forswear himself for nothing, without advantage to the publick, or his own particular concernments, but merely out of rash and needless prophanation, is hereby declared utterly incapable to elect, or be elected, as a member to serve in this present parliament. For oaths have been found, by experience, to be wonderful expedients in state-affairs; and ought not to be made or broken, but with great and serious consideration.

Qualific. II.-Whosoever is noted to be a sabbath-breaker, or prophaner of the Lord's day, is declared incapable to elect, or be elected, &c. For he that cannot one day in seven observe, at least in shew, one commandment in ten, that costs nothing the keeping, nor gains any thing by being broken, is not fitly qualified to sit in this parliament: For all such sins, as have no immediate relation to the service of this house, must be openly detested, that there may be the less notice taken of such as are for the advantage and interest thereof.

Qualific. III.-Whosoever hath at any time, within the spaceof these twenty years last past, been observed to be disguised in drink, unless he can bring testimony that it is his usual custom to drink himself drunk in private alone, to avoid giving evil example,

or in secret and well affected company, without healths; is declared incapable to elect or be elected: Provided that surfeit and gluttony be not included within this incapacity, nor such other alterations as may fall upon the spirit of a man, at thanksgiving dinners.

Qualific. IV.-Whosoever doth live in adultery, or fornication, or hath at any time had carnal copulation with the wife, sisters, or daughter, of any member of parliament, now sitting, without the consent or satisfaction of the said member; or hath been seen, in the day-time, to resort to houses of evil fame, or frequent the company of common women; is declared incapable to elect or be elected, &c. Provided, that this do not extend to any person, that hath kept a concubine or concubines so long, that now there is no no, tice taken thereof, or to such as by the loss of their eyes or noses, botches in their skins, or aches in their bones, can bring proof of their repentance, and resentment of their former lives; as it hath been allowed in the cases of William Lord Viscount Monson, Sir Henry Martin, Mr. Secretary Scot, William Heveningham, Esq; and others.

Qualific. V.-Whosoever hath suffered for his conscience, either by imprisonment, sequestration, or sale of his estate, or hath refused to take any oath imposed by this parliament, howsoever contradictory to any former oath, by him taken: Or hath gained nothing by the ruin of his native country, nor is liable to suffer by any revolution, that may tend to the general settlement thereof, but, being unbiassed by any party, is at liberty to promote the proper and natural interests of the nation in general: Or hath subscribed any petition or remonstrance for a free parliament; or for the re-admission of the secluded members to their right of sitting; or, at a time to be prefixed, to determine the sitting of this present parliament, or any thing else against the sense of this house, in order to the settlement of the nation: Or hath declared against taxes, excise, free-quarter, plunder, arbitrary government, the perpetuation and supremacy of the present parliament, continuation of the distractions, decay of trade, and slavery of the English nation. Any, and every such person, is hereby declared not only incapable to be elected a member of this present or any future parliament, or of bearing any office, or place of trust, in this commonwealth, but shall suffer such farther punishment, either by sequestration, or sale of his estate or person, as to the wisdom of this house shall seem expedient.

Qualific. VI.-Whosever hath been engaged in the late rebellions of Sir George Booth, Bart. or Lambert Symnell, Esq; or any way aiding or assisting thereunto: Or hath sat or acted in, or under the late committee of safety, or had any hand in the late disturbances of this present parliament; is, beside such other punishment as this house shall judge fitting, declared incapable to elect, or be elected, to serve in this or any future parliament: Provided that this shall not extend to such members of this house, as were engaged in the said insurrections. For, if all such should be im

peached before the house be full, there would not be a quorum left to make it a parliament.

Qualific. VII.-Whosoever hath called Charles Stewart king, or drunk his health, or prayed God to restore him to his right, and every honest man to his own, or used any malignant and treasonable expressions: Or hath called the present parliament Rump, Arse, Bum, Tail, or Breech: Or hath rejoiced at the interruptions thereof, or wished it at an end: Or hath sued, arrested, reviled, beaten, kicked, cuckolded, trepanned, or refused to trust any of the members thereof, during the intervals: Or hath action of debt, or bill of complaint against any member now sitting; and doth refuse to give the said member a full discharge, and general release; any, and every such person, is declared utterly incapable to elect, or be elected, to serve in this present or any future parliament, or of bearing any office or place of trust in this commonwealth.

Qualific. VIII.-No man shall be judged qualified, nor admitted to sit in this house as a member thereof, that doth not first acknowledge this parliament to be a free parliament, unfounded by the laws of God or man; that all things are exposed to the will of the members thereof, who may freely dispose of the estates, persons, consciences, and lives of men, as they please, and afterwards make it lawful. That this house hath a greater power in civil affairs than the Turk, and in spiritual than the Pope, for it is head of churches, not yet in being, and Judge more of faith, than all the general councils ever were. That it can damn, and save, and bind, and loose in this world, in despight of the next; make what it pleases holy or profane, true or false, scripture or apocrypha, and no man dares to question its infallibility; and that every member thereof can vote and swear contradictions, and make others do so too, or pay them for it.

Qualific. IX.-No man shall be judged rightly qualified, nor admitted to sit in this house, until he hath engaged to use his christian endeavour to carry on a thorough reformation of the calendar, that the English nation may no more use the Julian account, nor reckon by the year of our Lord, but by the Roman indiction, according to the custom of the christians in ancient times; that is, reckon the year by their taxes, and not their taxes by the year: A reformation, which this parliament made some progress in before their late interruption, when they drew the whole year within the compass of four months, and do intend, by God's help, to bring to perfection with all convenient expedition.

Qualific. X.-Whosoever makes profession of godliness and holiness of life, although he be commonly reputed to be both a fool, and a knave, a notorious villain, and diabolical hypocrite; shall, nevertheless, be allowed, if duly elected, to be rightly qualified to sit in this present parliament. Provided that this capacity do not extend to Charles Fleetwood, Esq; John Desbrow, Yeoman; and Sir Henry Vane, Knight, lately elected; or John Hewson, Cord, wainer, of the city of London.