I Did long since make my APPEAL in Parliament (as the fundamentall, Legal birthright of the People) for righteousness and justice, and might have expected, that after such glo­rious and unparallel'd Declarations, Covenants, Imprecations, Engage­ments, and actions; I should have had a Legal, righteous, Christian, Parliamentary, and impartial hearing, between the General and Me, according to the Ancient and just constitution of Authority in its first institution in Scripture, Deut. 1.16, 17. and according to the many obligations that lye upon you from the Commands thereof, Deut. 16.19, 20. Is not judge­ment wrested hitherto, when instead of a hearing I have a prison, and an illegal one too; contrary to the infallible and funda­mental Rights of the people, and of just Government. Thou shalt not wrest Judgment; Thou shalt not re­spect persons: That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, 2 Chron. 19.6 [...]7. The contrary is abhorred, and judg­ment denounced against it, Esay 1.23, 24 Jerem. 5.28, 29. & 22.16, 17, 18. & Amos 5.12. & 6.12, 14. [Page 2] Mich. 3.9, 11. Job 20.6, 7, 19. Though his Excel­lency mount up to the Heavens, and his head reach to the clouds; yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he, because he hath oppressed, Acts 10.34. James 2.9.

You have cut off the late King, A just, sub­stantiall and irrevocable Covenant, or Oath cannot be acted con­trary unto, without the guilt of perju­ry & unspeak­able dammage to the people. so arbitrarily and forcibly, violating the Lawes and Liberties of the People, you have solemnly Sworn and Covenanted to sight for, and maintain the Laws and Liberties of the people, and wished the wrath and vengeance of Hea­ven and Earth to fall upon you if you did not main­taine the laws and liberties, as I have declared in my third appeale for Common-wealth-Justice, which re­maines dead in your hands (as I heare) and he that de­livered it to you (viz. Cornet Cheeseman) was impri­soned by Lieutenant Generall Cromwel, &c.

By Arbitrarinesse, lawlessenesse, power, force, strength or the sword (for it will amount to no other as to men) the Lord Jesus the precious Sonne of the Most High, and the head of Saints was Crucified, butchered and massacred in his Liberties, Mat. 10.30. Freedoms and Rights of his humanity &c. as appeares by the whole Scriptures of his Life, the confessions of his Judge, and his sufferings. God, the People, the Laws and Conscience, Mat. 7.12. are to be accounted unto for the losse of the meanest Member, or of any person or persons unjustly destroyed; For the Lord and a just Law, ten­der innocent Bloud and the Liberties of his People; Christ the glorious Sonne of God perfectly declared the Laws of nature and justice.

You professe your selves Christians, yet in this you [Page 3]live beneath the Common principles of nature, and in the path of former Tyrants whose bloud you have spilt as water upon the ground; if you walke contrary to the Law of nature, by power you justifie the Cru­cifying, butchering and massacring of the Lord Iesus, &c. and so fill up more and more the measure of blou­dy abominations.

I have not only been stifled in the rights of nature according to the reason of God, If a mā should complaine to a Justice of Peace that such a man rob'd him or sought his life, would it be just that the Justice of Peace should commit the ac­cuser or com­plainer, and al­so to the Juris­diction of him that rob'd him &c. What Law, Scrip­ture, Princi­ples of God or nature is for this? and been dealt with contrary to the Scriptures, and sent to an unlawfull Prison, and to the Jurisdiction of him that hath dealt cruell y, barbarously, unnaturally, unchristian like, and tyrannically with me to my unsupportable dam­mage, losse and prejudice, as to humane considerati­ons; But the Warrant by which I am committed is contrary to Law, Generals being no crimes in Law; The Lord Cooks 2 part of Inst. fol. 52, 53.315.318.511.615.616. 1 par. Book Dec. pa. 38.77.20.845. and the Votes upon the impeachment of the eleven Members and the Petition of Right the third of King C. and the Act that abolished the Star-Chamber. And I am also committed (by the words of the Warrant) during pleasure; whereas if the Warrant had been legall it would & should have bin, Til delivered by due course of Law (righteousnesse or justice.) And here, after I have expended my selfe and wasted my precious dayes and time in the Common-wealth in expectati­on of a glorious issue of the bloud that hath been shed: I have been barbarously kept in prison without any humane consideration all the while for my subsisten­cy, far beyond the dealings of the late King, &c.

Sir, I have only this as my last unto you or your [Page 4]House (seeing I have been so much neglected by you in the cause of Justice, and consequently of the peo­ple, so that neither love to justice, nor importunity, hath moved you from me nor from others, neither for me nor for others) that you would move the House that I may have freedom from my oppressive and il­legal Imprisonment and bonds, and have reparations for the same according to declared principles of the Almighty God, Nature, Scripture, the splendid De­clarations of your selves and my Adversary, acknow­ledged reason, and the fundamentall Justice, Law, and Constitution of the Nation; and that I may have the undoubted freedom of a Commoner, a Christian, and member of the People, to follow my Appeal in freedom, temperance and judgment (which is cer­tainly to come, at which Felix trembled) and to have a lawful, impartial and publick hearing, according to the nature of Law, Righteousness, and the being and honour of Authority: and if neither wil be heard by your House, I desire you to acquaint them that the Nature of Justice, and the aforementioned principles do requre a just respect from them to me, and for my subsistency in prison (which the King him­self granted to his prisoners, and so was more just and merciful as to humane considerations) I having not had any just allowance from them since my bar­barous and arbitrary imprisonment; knowing that I have been cruelly and arbitrarily dealt with by the General, to my great dammage, as my third Appeal expresses. Which cruelty and injustice (considering my almost seven yeers Service in the Wars, for the cause of the kingdom) is one of the manifold occasions [Page 5]and engagements to an adamanine heart, much more to a true Patriot. And therefore now I will (the Lord willing) shut up my mouth, if I cannot have justice by this last Address, and will surrender up my Body, Spi­rit and Cause to the high and mighty God, Judg, and Father, before whom all things are naked & bare; and appeal to the next free Representative or Parliament, in whom I hope there wil be faithfulness, holiness, wisdom and justice. And however my enemies may deal with my body, whether by murther, or other­wise (I being under the illegal Jurisdiction of my Adversary, who hath dealt cruelly and unjustly with me) yet my Cause shall live in the presence of the Lord, and the Generations present and to come, and shall be brought forth in the eternal judgment, where my Adversary shall not appear in his gallant Equi­page, and where his large Summs and Lands of the Common-wealths, or being Generall of an Army (which should be the Peoples) shall be found too light; and where he shall have no Parliaments to ter­rifie from the doing of justice.

And if they do murther me, I shal go before, The Grandees of the Armie said in Deel of the 14. of June, That Justice is one of the wit­nesses of God in the earth. Be­ware. and they wil follow after. And moreover, let me tell you, Mr. Speaker, my blood may as sensibly rise, as living blood in the hearts (if not faces) of your House who have un­justly committed me to the Jurisdiction of my adver­sary, who, its probable, thirsts after my blood, aswel as to rob and deprive me of my liberties and rights. But I trust, the Lord wil make me willing to resigne up my blood aswel as my Liberties to satisfie his pleasure as­wel as the crueltie and inhumanity of Justice-ene­mies, for in a due and serious consideration it is the Lords and the Peoples. Sir, I hope you will excuse me, that I speak what I do, and consider that the Lord [Page 6]hath given me an opportunity to hold forth his Ex­cellency and Soveraignty against one that is called Excellency; and nature hath given me an occasion, as to my Country, and my self, and also that the Ty­ranny and cruelty I am under is no small force upon my spirit. So leaving you and your House to the judgment of the great day of the Lord, and the Lords faithful people in the Land, I take my last farewel, and rest,