The Constitutional Documents of the Puritan Revolution. Samuel Rawson Gardiner
into so many parts and divisions as ye in your judgments shall think fittest. . . .
8. [Collectors to be nominated by the justices.]
9. That ye assure them in our name and in our royal word, which we will not break with our people, that we will wholly employ all the monies which shall thus be given unto us, to the common defence of the kingdom and not to or for any other end whatsoever.
10. That together with the monies ye collect, ye send a perfect roll of the names of all those who do thus contribute, and of them who shall refuse, if any such be, that we may be thereby informed who are well affected to our service, and who are otherwise, and what monies are given unto us . . .
11. And lastly that all this be instantly performed, for that all delays will defeat and overthrow our greatest counsels and affairs.
6.: Commission for raising Tonnage and Poundage with Impositions.
Charles, by the grace of God [&c.], to our Lord Treasurer of England, now and for the time being, the Commissioners of our Treasury for the time being, to our Chancellor and Under-Treasurer of our Exchequer, now and for the time being, to our Chief Baron and the rest of the Barons of our Exchequer [and others], greeting.
Whereas the Lords and others of our Privy Council have taken into their serious consideration the present state of our revenue arising by customs subsidy and impost upon goods and merchandise to be exported and imported out of and into this our realm . . . and finding that it hath been constantly continued for many ages, and is now a principal part of the revenue of our Crown, and is of necessity to be so continued for the supportation thereof, which in the two last Parliaments hath been thought upon, but could not be there settled by authority of Parliament . . . by reason of the dissolution of those Parliaments before those things which were there treated of could be perfected, have therefore . . . specially ordered, that all those duties upon goods and merchandizes, called by the several names of customs subsidy and imposts, should be levied . . . in such manner as the same were levied in the time of our late dear father King James . . . and forasmuch as, through the want of a parliamentary course to settle the payment of those duties, many inconveniences may arise, which would tend to the impairing of our revenue of that nature, if in convenient time some settled course should not be taken for the prevention thereof:—
Know ye therefore that we . . . by the advice of the Lords and others of our Privy Council, do by these presents declare our will and pleasure to be, that all those duties . . . shall be levied in such manner as the same were levied at the time of the decease of our said late father, and upon such accounts and forms as now the same are collected, or hereafter shall be by us appointed . . . all which our will and pleasure is shall continue until such time as by Parliament (as in former times) it may receive an absolute settling. And if any person whatsoever shall refuse or neglect to pay the duties . . . aforesaid . . . then our will and pleasure is, and we do further grant by these presents unto the Lords and others of our Privy Council for the time being, or unto the Lord Treasurer of England or Chancellor of our Exchequer, now or for the time being, full power to commit every such person to prison, who shall disobey this our order and declaration, there to continue until they . . . shall have conformed and submitted themselves unto due obedience concerning the premises . . .
Witness ourself at Westminster, the 26th day of July [1626]. Per breve a privato concilio.
7.: The Commission and Instructions for raising the Forced Loan in Middlesex.
Charles, by the grace of God [&c.], To our right trusty and right well beloved Counsellors George Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, Sir Thomas Coventry, Knight, Lord Keeper of our Great Seal of England, [and 40 others] greeting.
When the Imperial Crown of this realm descended first upon us, we found ourselves engaged in a war, undertaken and entered into by our late dear father of blessed memory, not willingly nor upon light or ill-grounded counsels, but by the many provocations of an ambitious enemy, and by the grave and deliberate counsels and persuasions of both the Houses of Parliament, upon promise of their continual assistance therein; and thereby not ourselves alone and our own people became thus engaged, but also our friends and allies, and amongst them and above all others our most dear uncle . . . the King of Denmark . . . whom in honour and in reason of State we may not desert, but by the advice of our Council are resolved to assist him presently with men and money, we evidently foreseeing that otherwise our common enemy will in an instant become master of all Germany, and consequently of all the ports and parts where the mass and bulk of our cloth is vented, and whence we must furnish ourselves of provision for our shipping, which how fatal it would be to us and our people may easily be discerned.
But when we came to enter into this great work, we found our treasures exhausted and our coffers empty, and our ordinary revenue hardly sufficient to support our ordinary charge, much less to undergo so great and extraordinary a burthen as a war will produce. Our affairs at home and abroad thus standing we, being willing to tread in the steps of our ancestors, with all the convenient speed we could, summoned a Parliament, but not finding that success therein which we had just cause to expect, we are enforced to this course we are now resolved upon; which was hastened the rather when our unavoidable necessities both at home and abroad multiplied upon us, when our enemies’ great and mighty preparations both by sea and land threaten us daily, and when the late disaster Ref. 017 (the chance of war) which hath fallen upon our dearest uncle the King of Denmark, to the endangering of his royal person, the hazarding of his whole army, and the utter disheartening of all our party, do at once call upon us, and cry in our ears, that not our own honour alone, and the ancient renown of this nation (which is dear unto us), but the safety and very subsistence of ourself and people, the true religion of God, and the common cause of Christendom professing that true religion with us, are in apparent danger of suffering irreparably, unless not only a speedy but a present stop be made to so great a breach, which cannot endure so long a delay as the calling of a Parliament.
We therefore, in a case of this extremity, after diligent and deep enquiry into all the ways and means possible which are honourable and just in cases of such unavoidable necessity, have at last, by the advice of our whole Privy Council, resolved to require the aid of our good and loving subjects by lending unto us such a competent sum of money to be speedily collected to our use as may enable us to provide for their safeties and our own; to be repaid unto them as soon as we shall be any ways enabled thereunto, upon showing forth of the acquittance of the collector testifying the receipt thereof. And these sums we are confident will readily and cheerfully be lent unto us by our loving subjects, when they shall be truly informed from us of what importance and of what necessity that is which we now require of them, and when they shall be assured by us, which we faithfully promise and undertake on the royal word of a King, (which we will be jealous not to break with our people), that not a penny of those monies which thus we borrow of them shall be bestowed or expended but upon those public and general services only, wherein every of them and the whole body of the kingdom, their wives, children and posterity, have their personal and common interest.
Know ye therefore that we, reposing special trust and confidence in your fidelities . . . appoint you to be our Commissioners, . . . and command you . . . that, all other occasions set apart, you or any three or more of you . . . do with all speed, after the receipt of this our Commission, . . . call before you all such persons within our county of Middlesex Ref. 018 and the liberties thereof as by our instructions (which we shall send unto you herewith) are appointed; and that ye acquaint them with this our will and pleasure, and see it . . . performed accordingly . . . And we authorise you or any two or more of you to minister an oath to such persons and in such cases as by our said instructions are directed.
. . . per ipsum regem [dated 23 Sept. 1626].
[Endorsed] A Commission to the Lords and others of His Majesty’s Privy Council and others, concerning the loan of monies to His Majesty within the county of Middlesex.
Instructions which our Commissioners for the loan of money are exactly and effectually to observe and follow.
First, with all speed, after