BEing satisfied in our Judgements and Consciences of the present necessity to take up Armes for the defence of our Native Rights and Freedoms, which are wholly invaded and swallowed up in the Pride and Ambition of OLIVER CROMWEL Esq who calls himself Lord Protector of ENGLAND, and hath rendred all English-men no better than his Vassals: We expect to be branded with the infamous name of Rebels and Traytors, or to be mis-represented both to the Army, City, and Country, as Common Enemies, Disturbers of the Publick Peace, Arbitrary Cavaliers, or under some other odious notion, that may provoke the Army and People to endeavour our destruction: But if we may prevaile to be heard before we be Condemned and Executed, We shall submit our cause, and the righteous end we seek, to the judgement of the Army, and every honest English Man, and if the Army it selfe (according to their many engagements) will undertake (and their strength be sufficient) to redeem Us from Our present slavery, and settle that Right and Freedome, unto which Our birth gave Us title, we shall readily lay downe our present ARMES.

The whole Christian world knowes that our English Earth hath been drunk with Blood these twelve yeares, through the great contest for Right and Freedom, and the whole Treasure of the Nation exhausted in that quarrell. How then can any Man, whose Hand or Heart hath been ingag'd in that Bloody contest, either acquit himselfe to God, his Conscience, or his Countrey, in yeilding up tamely and silently all the Lawes, Rights and Liberties of England, into an Usurpers hand? We have for many yeares patiently borne all kindes of Oppression, Arbitrarinesse and Tyrannie, and suffered under such heavy burthens of Excise and Taxes, as England never knew in former ages, having been fed by him that now calls himselfe Lord Protector, and his Army, with specious preten­ces, and most alluring promises (seconded with many Appeales to God for their integrity of heart in them) that true English Liberty, should be setled and secured, Impartiall Justice provided for, Arbitrary Power abolished, and every yoak of Oppression broken, and every Burthen eased: And we did believe, as they told us, that our present sufferings, were onely like a rough stormy passage, to the Haven of Justice, Right, and Freedome: We cou'd not suspect these ambitious designes in Cromwell, and his Confederates, that are now proclaimed to the World: We could not thinke it possible, that a Man of such meane Quality and Estate as he, should aspire to make himselfe an absolute Lord and Tyrant over three potent Nations: But above all, his pretended zeal for God and his People, his high professions of Godlinesse, Simplicity, and Integrity, his Hypocriticall Prayers, and dayes of Fasting to seek the Lord, his dissem­bled humility and meekness, and his frequent compassionate teares upon every occasion, We say, These things, together with his Ingagements publique and private, his most Solemne Protestations, with Imprecations of Vengeance upon Himselfe and Family, if he dissembled, and his most frequent Appeales to God for the truth of his Professions and Declarations; That he designed nothing but the securing the Liberty of Gods people, and the administration of Imparti­all justice, and sought no Power, Honour, Riches or Greatnesse to Himselfe or any particular Party or Interest: We say, these things rocked us asleep, with the pleasant Dreames of Liberty and Justice, untill he hath made a Sacrifice of all our Lawes, Liberties, and Properties, unto his owne Ambition. And now he is not afraid to owne what he before disclaimed, and Declared against; He that formerly Protested before the Dreadfull God, and to the Long Parliament, That He and his Army should be wholly subject to their Civill Authority, and that whosoever should attempt any violence against them should make their way through his Blood, He now ownes the breaking them in pieces with scorne and contempt. He that declared so much Humility and Selfe-denyall, claims and owns a Power supreame to Parliaments, and exerciseth an Absolute Dominion over the Lawes and Estates of Three Nations: He that seemed so zealous for Liberty, now dares owne every private English Man his Vassall, and their Parliaments his Slaves: He publisheth in Print in his owne Speeches to his Parlia­ments, that the benefit that all English Men have in the execution of any Lawes amongst them is from Him, and that the Authority which their Parliaments have, and shall have, is onely derived from Him: He hath published in the whole world, that he hath dissolved all civill Government, and that He had in him­selfe alone, an absolute unlimited Arbitrary power, without check or controle, untill He put some limits upon Himselfe (if he may be believed in his paper of Government.) Now what Patroon in Algier, ever claimed more Mastery over his Slaves bought in the Market, then this claime of Cromwells extends unto over Us: If We have the benefit of the execution of no Laws but from Him, then all the Rights, Priviledges, and Estates we have, are enjoyed by his mercy only, and without the execution of Lawes, no man hath more right to Lands, or Goods, then another, nor is any mans life under any security, if another be stron­get than he. So that Cromwell ownes and professeth, that the bread that every man eates is by his Mercy: And if his Power was without limit (as he saith) untill he had put some bounds, then 'tis of his Grace and Favour onely, that all English Men have now a seeming right in their Wives, Children, Servants, Lives, and Estates, if his owne limits of his Power gives any such right: And if he please to throw away, (or burne by the hand of the Hangman) his Limits in his paper of Government, who can trouble him? He may doe what he list with things of his owne making; 'Tis the old English proverb, he that can binde can loose; And he may doe what he list also with the Authority of Parliaments, if it be as he sayes, of his owne giving: Now wherein doth a Patroons Power over his purchased Slave, exceed this which Cromwell ownes over Us? The Patroone can but give the Slave his Lawes, his Cloaths, his Meat, his Life, and all this Cromwell ownes to have given us, onely he speaks it in such language as sounds not so harshly.

Now after the expence of so much Christian blood, for the setling the Rights and Liberties due unto Us, as Men and Christians; when he that was trusted with an Army for that purpose, hath so unworthily betrayed his trust, spilt Innocent Blood like Water, falsified all his Declarations, Promises, Protestations and Oaths, and assumed to himselfe such a dominion over our Countrey, as is destructive to all Right and Liberty, and renders Us and Our Posterities, Slaves to him and his Successors, with a payment of a Fifth (or thereabouts) of our Estates certain in Taxes to be intailed upon our Posterities, besides other burthens We ap­peale to the Conscience of every honest Man, whether a present Necessity, and an incumbent Duty be not upon us to Arm our selves in defence of our antient Lawes, and dearest birthrights, against the present Impostor and Ʋsurper: And we hope most of the present Army have not extinguished their Love to their Countreyes Freedome (although Cromwells Hypocriticall professions, Prayers and Teares, have much deluded them) but that they will readily concurre with Ʋs, and other honest English men in our present attempt, by force of Armes to redeem our Countrey out of the Ʋsurpers bonds, and to seek those righte­ous ends, which we doe hereby declare to be those, for which we now hazard our Lives, and with which we shall rest satisfied, and returne to our homes in peace: And they are these following. viz.

• I. That all Assumed and Ʋsurped Powers and Authorities over our Country may be utterly abolished.
• II. That the Government may be setled upon a just Basis, with the due Bounds and Limits to every Magistrate.
• III. That the Ancient Liberties of ENGLAND setled by Magna Charta, the Petition of Right, and other Lawes, may be secured inviolably: That no mans per­son may be molested, imprisoned, restrained or touched, without a Legall cause shewn in the Warrant, whereby he is molested or restrained, (and that also in a due course of the Laws known proceedings, without countermands from the will of any man) whereas now mens Persons are troubled and restrained at will, and destroyed by long Impri­sonments, no man knowes for what: And also that no mans Estate may be lyable to any disposall or prejudice, but by the known Laws of the Land, and the lawfull judg­ment of his Equals.
• IV. That Free Successive Parliaments may be setled, with times of their Beginning and Ending, and with their Ancient Power and Priviledges: And that the Jurisdictive Power which Parliaments have taken upon them to exercise in these times of Warre and Distraction, (by taking upon them the judgement of particular Causes concerning mens Persons and Estates, sometimes by their Committees, and sometimes by themselves, contrary to the knowne proceedings of the Law) That such Power (we say) may be Declared against, and secure Provision made against the same: That thereby Parliaments may be free from the temptations of Profit, Friend­ship, and all private Interests, by which onely they can be corrupted.
• V. That the Militia of the Nation may be so disposed, that no man may be able to be Absolute Master of Parliaments; And also that secure provision may be made, That no Parliament shall make it selfe Perpetuall, and inslave the People to them.

And that such a Settlement may be made of Right and Freedome, and these our ends obtained, and a Peace firmly established, we know no means, under God, but a truly FREE PARLIAMENT.

Now for the defence of these our Rights and Liberties, we are resolved to expose our Lives to the utmost hazards; And we shall neither wrong nor op­pose any man who doth not joyne himselfe to the present Ʋsurper to destroy or prevent these our righteous ends: And though we have reason to belive, That no person fearing GOD, or of Conscience, Honour, or Reason, can satisfie himselfe to shed our innocent blood for seeking these things, yet however we shall commit our selves and our just cause to the tuition of the righteous God, and hope in his mercy, That our indeavours may procure Justice, Freedome, Peace, and Settlement unto this distracted Nation.