City Justice; OR, True Equity Expos'd.
Being an Humble Petition to the King, of Eight Grandees of one Party, against Four of another.
Faithfully turn'd into Verse dogril, by as Real a Well-wisher to them, as they are to Monarchy.
To the Tune of Packingtons Pound.
I.
YE Sages of London, of states high and low,
I sing an Exploit late contriv'd in the City,
And that you its Wit, and its Justice may know,
I now have dispers'd it, compos'd in a Ditty;
Eight Grandees of power
Against three, and one Moor,
Complain'd to the King of some Fines that lay sore;
And fram'd a Petition, to heighten the Crime,
Which wanting good Reason, I've put into Rhime.
II.
The stile began thus, Mighty Sir, you must know,
In the year eighty three, we all guilty were found
Of a damnable Riot, and no one knows how,
Were sawcily Fin'd above four thousand Pound:
That by the vile power
Of those three, and one Moor,
We were all forc'd to pay the said Fine, or to scowr,
And only for Acting like true English-men,
Our Zeal for the Monarchy being most plain.
III.
But now since our happy and strange Revolution,
Those errors by Parliament all were dispers'd,
And at your Petitioners wise prosecution,
That Judgment illegally giv'n, was revers'd;
That the Fine rais'd before,
By those three, and one Moor,
Your Majesty's liable now to restore;
But that all such Crimes you may rightly condemn,
We hope Sir, to pay us, you'll take it from them.
IV.
For since that our Rights, and our Nations defending
From Tyranny, was of your coming the cause,
No other design of Subversion intending,
But Relief of the Church, and establishing Laws,
Which altho have no power
On those three, and one Moor,
To make 'em refund, on a true Legal score;
Yet if you'll be pleas'd Sir to break one for us,
We shan't, and we hope none will say 'tis unjust.
V.
We think 'tis unfit, you that came to protect it,
Should your self in the least feel the scourage of the Law,
But rather those Criminals should be rejected,
That such bloody Fines from our Purses could draw,
That the summ nam'd before,
Rais'd by three, and one Moor,
Their substantial Estates should be pawn'd to restore,
And in Parliamentary method be taken.
And so let your Majesty save your own Bacon.
IV The PRAYER.
We therefore, Great Sir, do most humbly beseech ye,
To Except the said four in the next Act of Grace,
Not that we have any design to o're-reach ye,
But through a deep sentiment of our own Case;
For the three, and one Moor,
As I told you before,
Won't refund it but by a Parliamentary power,
Which if you'll be pleas'd to effect, in our way,
As always we us'd, we will zealously Pray.
FINIS.