Chap. VIII. The HIS T 0 R Y of the PuRITANS. fettlement, they agreed not to lay down their arms: They had fought K. Charles r. the parliament's battles, and therefore thought it unreafonable to be told ~ openly, if they would not comply with the presbyterian fettlement, they t..oo ' mu!l: expect to be punilhed as fec7aries, and driven out of the land. To avoid this, th ey treated feparat ely with the king, both before and Jftct they had him in their hands; and when they apprehended he did not deal fincerely with them, they made propofals to the parliament to elhbli{h the preiliyterian difcipline, with a toleration to all prote!hn ts, without him; but when they found the preiliyterians, even in their la!l: treaty with the king, in the year 1648. infi!l:ing upon preiliyterian uniformity, without making the lea ft provifion for that liberty of confcience they had been contending for, they were exafpe rated and grew outragious; they feized his majeity's per fon a fecond time, and having pu rged the houfe of commons, in a moft arbitrary manner, of all who were not difpofed to their defperate meafures, they blew up the whole confiitution, and buried king, parliament, and preiliytery, in its ruins. This was not in the ir original intention, nor the refult of any fet of religious prin ciples they embraced (as Rapin infinuates), but was a violence refulting from dejpair, to which they had been driven by a feries of diJ:1ppointments, and a train of miftaken conduCl: in the loyalifis and preiliyterians. We left the king the beginning of the fpring at his -houfe at Ho/mby, Controver.Jj, where he continued under an eafy reftraint from the I 6th of February to between tbe.: the 4th of June following. The war being ended, the houfes (lttempted ~;;:;.and to get rid of the army, by offering fix months pay, and fix weeks advance, to as many as would go over to Ireland; and by voting, that the remainder lhould be diilianded, with an aB: of indemnity for all hoilities committed by them, in purfuance of the powers vefted in them by parliament; but the army being apprehenfive that the preibyterians would make peKe with the king, upon the foot of covenant uniformity, and without a toleration, refolved to fecure this as a kind of preliminary point; for which purpofe they chofe a council if rjjicers, and a committee if a"i- C•_uncil of tators, confifiing of two inferior officers out of each regiment, to ~a- qffi;ers and nage their affairs ; thefe met in difiinB: bodies, like the two houfes ofi'{~~~s. parliament, and came to the following refolutions, which they fent to Vol. VI. Weflminjler by three of their number, who delivered them in at the barP· 485, 498;. of the houfe, " That they would not diiband without their arrears nor Rap~n6 " without full provifion for liberty if CO!!fcience; that they did no; look p. 3 •· " upon tbemfelves as a band of janizaries, but as voluntiers, that bad '' been fighting for the liberties of the nation, of which they were a " part, and that they were refolved to fee thole ends fecured." It w.as moved in the houfe, that the meffi:ngers might be committed to the :ro~IJer ;,
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