THe Knights, Citi­zens, and Burges­ses of the House of Commons, having taken into consideration, the present estate and condition of this Kingdome, they find it surroun­ded with variety of pernitious, and destructive Designes, practises, and plots, against the well [...] [Page 4] after he had fought a good fight, & overcome all his Enemies, Or as the shocke of wheat which commeth in due season to fill our Gra­naries with corne, uphold our lives with the staffe of bread. For Parliaments are our Panis quotidianus, our true bread, all other wayes are but Quelques choses, which yeeld no true nourishment, nor breed good bloud.

This very Parliament which hath sate so long, hath but beat the ayre, and striven against the streame, I may truely say, the wind and tide hath still bin against us.

The same ill Counsels which first raised the storme, and almost shipwrack't the Common­wealth they still continue, they blow strong like the East wind, that brought the Locusts o­ver the land. These counsels crosse our De­signes, cast difficulties in our way, hinder our proceedings, and make all that we doe to bee fruitlesse & ineffectuall. They make us not to be Masters of our businesse, & so not Masters of mony, which hath bin the great busines of this Parliament, that we might pay the armies according to our promises and engagement.

For, my Lords, our not effecting of the good things, which we had undertaken for the good of the Common weale hath wounded our repu­tation, and taken off, from our credit.

Is it not time then (my Lords) that wee should unite and concentrate our selves, in re­gard [Page 5] of the Antiperistasis of hurtfull and ma­licious intentions and practises against us.

My Lords. It is most agreeable to nature, and I am sure most agreeable to reason, in re­spect of the present conjuncture of our af­faires: for one maine engine, by which our enemies worke our mischiefe is by infusing an opinion and beliefe into the World, that we are not united among our selves, but like Sampsons Foxes, we draw severall wayes, and tend to severall Ends.

To defeat then the Counsell of these Achi­tophels which would involve us, our Religion, our being, our lawes, our liberties, all that can be neare and deare unto an honest Soule in one universall and generall Desolation, To Defeate I say, the Counsell of such Achi­tophells, the Knights, Citizens, and Burges­ses of the house of Commons, knowing them­selves to be specially entrusted with the pre­servation of the whole, and in their conscien­ces perswaded that y^e dangers are so imminent, that they will admit of no delay, have thought fit to declare their united affections by en­tring into an association amongst themselves, and by making a solemne Protestation and vowe unto their God, that they will una­nimously endeavour to oppose and pre­vent the Counsels, and the Counsel­lours, which have brought upon us all these miseries, and the feares of greater. [Page 6] To prevent the ends, and bring the Authors of them to condigne punishment, and thereby discharge themselves both before God and Man.

The Protestation your Lordships shall have read unto you; together with the grounds and reasons which have induced the House of Com­mons to make it, which are prefixed before it by way of Preamble.

Then the Protestation was read by Ma­ster Maynard.

And thereupon concluded his Message to this effect, That the house of Commons had com­manded him to present unto their Lordships this Protestation, That every Member in that house had made it, no one refusing it, and that they sent it to your Lordships, with assurance of your Lordships concurrence in the same Zeale and affection for the publique safety: That it is their desire your Lordships should likewise make the same Protestation, which we humbly leave to your Lordships wisedomes, and there made an end of the conference.