BY vertue of two Commissions dated at Hague, 5. June 1649. directed to us from our dread Soveraigne Lord, CHARLES, of that name the SECOND, by the grace of GOD, KING of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Defendor of the Faith: Whereby we were injoyned to make our speedy repaire to the Isle of Man, and there to give our best assistance both in Counsel and Personall Service, to the Right Honourable, JAMES, Earle of Darby, the true and noble Lord thereof, in keeping of that Island for His MAJESTIES service, wherein was sweetly and consequently involved, the de­fence of the true Protestant Religion, in substance and forme as it was professed in the daies of Queen Elizabeth, King James, and King Charles the First, Princes of blessed and glorious me­mory; the establishing His Majesty in His Thrones, invested with His just Power and Greatnesse, from which He is most injurious­ly and trayterously kept; the restoring Parliaments to their an­tient Priviledges, which are most violently broken; the mainte­nance of the fundamentall Lawes most strangely violated, and redeeming the people, now most barbarously vassalaged, to their antient Freedome; and lastly, the bringing to justice the Murde­rers of the KING His Father, which horrid and salvage act, we protest before God and the whole world, we abhorre from our soules, and tremble to heare of: In obedience to which high Command, and at the serious perswasions of our judgments and consciences, with all convenient speed, we made our repaire to the Isle of Man. Where we found the Right Honourable, the [Page 2] Earle of Darby (who gave us very respective and cheerfull en­tertainment) and whose fidelity, and loyalty, we must ever ac­knowledge and admire; contesting and strugling with the tedi­ous temptations & importunate solicitations of one Henry Ire­ton, who pretends himselfe to be Commissary Generall to that Army under the Command of Thomas, Lord Fairfax, to whom, in the name of the Parliament of England, as he is pleased to call that Juncto at Westminster, he required this Island to be delive­red; and for his Lordships encouragement therein, he was pro­mised an Act of Indempnity for what he had formerly acted, in relation to His late Majesties service, and to be repossessed of his whole Estate without Composition: In assurance of his Lordships scorne and odium whereof, his Lordship was pleased to shew us the Copie of a Letter, which two daies before our arrivall, he had return'd by Ireton's Messenger for their finall An­swer: which Letter, (the testimony of his honour and loyalty) we read over with very much alacrity: and advised his Lordship to print it together with a Declaration, for satisfaction of His Majesty and His three Kingdomes; and to cleare his honour of that blemish, with which some malecontented persons might possibly endeavour to staine it.

In pursuit of which counsell, his Lordship was pleased forth­with to draw up a Declaration, which, together with the fore-mentioned Letter, was speedily dispatched to London and com­mitted to the Presse, where, as appeares by some of them, that have since come to our hands, it was printed without the least adulteration; and, whereas to our griefe we have since heard, that there are some that have not been wanting, with very much confidence to report, that it was a meer fiction, contriv'd by some Mercury, to delude the people, and was no whit the sence of the Earl of Darby: To which we here declare, that we verily believe, that report to be framed in the Juncto, or by some of their Ad­herents, to deceive the people, (whom his Lordship was preten­ded to delude) that so they might encourage their Abettors, and discourage His Majesties loyall Subjects from repairing hither to our assistance: And though it is very probable, that our Ene­mies will by the same device endeavour to darken the credit of this our present Declaration, yet they shall assuredly find the [Page 3] contents of both fulfilled in our faithfull keeping this Island for His Majesties best advantage, and their worst offence; and we hope, that though our Enemies doe find encouragement in their misbeliefe hereof, yet our loyal-hearted Friends will be no waies over-swayed by doubt or the credit of their report, but will with speed & chearfulness repaire hither to an unanimous conjunction with us, where they shal find such incouragement as his Lordship promised, and with magnanimity and honour we will resolutely unite our daring Spirits to the finall overthrow of the Rebels in­terest, and their tyrannicall power both by Sea and Land.

And now we cannot but expresse, with how deep a sence of our Native Countries miseries our soules are affected, nor can we but lament the condition of posterity, whose Fathers have shamefully forfeited the antient and glorious Liberty which was purchased by their Fore-fathers; and left them bound in the fetters of a most miserable bondage: nor can we believe but that many of those men, who were, in the beginning of these un­happy Divisions between KING and Parliament, carried away from their Loyalty by an overmuch credulity to their faire and plausible pretences, have been long since sensible that it was their owne ambitious ends they then prosecuted, and not the welfare of the now miserable Kingdome; nor can we but admire, nor could we have believed, (had we not been the fad Witnesses thereof) that any men could be so strangely impudent, as to act so flat contrary to all their Oathes, Covenants, Vowes, Protesta­tions and Declarations, to continue the Government of the Kingdome, and the just Power and Prerogative of the KING and His Posterity, in the perfect fulnesse of their due glory and splendour; and yet notwithstanding all this, overthrow the very foundation of Government, decapitate the KING, and cashiere His Posterity; and with salvage barbarity declare and proclaime [that it shall be lawfuull for any Man to surprize and kill our present dread-Soveraigne the KING, and His Princely Brother the DUKE of Yorke, as Traytours and Spies, wherever they shall meet them within the limits of these Kingdomes] such a piece of Treason, as we are confident, the most horrid, monstrous, and execrable Traytours that ever trod upon the face of the Earth would have blushed to have owned; nor is this all, but even in [Page 4] the first yeare of Englands Freedome, (according to their owne stile) after they have drained the Kingdome of its treasure, by their strange and unheard-of waies for the raising of monies, and notwithstanding the many and great Compositions which they have and daily doe receive, the sale of the Jewels and other or­naments of State, the King, Queen, Dukes, Bishops, Deanes and Chapters Lands, besides His Majesties Customes, yet to continue the Excise, and beyond all that, to impose and continue an ille­gall Tax; and so great as was never yet imposed in the time of most urgent necessity since the Norman Conquest; and beyond all this, have brought in a most arbytrary and tyrannicall Go­vernment, in taking away the Lives of their Soveraign and His Peeres by new and illegall Courts; and have drawne the Free­borne People of England in to a most miserable bondage and sla­very, far worse than the Turks, or any Nation under the Sun.

And as in State they have overthrown all good & wholsome Government, so likewise in Church they have shut out all decent and uniforme order, and let in a generall and loathsome confu­sion; having imprisoned & sequestred all the Reverend, learned, and orthodox Divines, and suffer in their places, none but a pee­vish ignorant, and factious Clergy, who flatter them in their ini­quities, and delude the people in abusing the sence of holy Writ, and preaching nothing but Rebellion and sedition; so that in stead of the antient Rites of the Church, the Divine Service, wholsome Doctrines and holy Sacraments, which they have quite cast out as Popish, Superstitious, and Antichristian, they have introduced nothing but factions, seditions, schismes, heresies, and unparalell'd blasphemies both against the Lord & his Anoin­ted, and have granted a generall toleration of all Religions, and (as we heare) have not only permitted, but ordered the Turkish Alchoran to be printed in English: and notwithstanding the ma­ny scandals that they have often cast upon His late Majesties re­putation for upholding the Irish Rebellion, they have entred into a League & Confederacy with Owen Roe Oneale, that barbarous and bloody Rebell, to destroy all the honest and loyall Prote­stants; so that the world may plainly see that they have cheated them with their hypocriticall pretences to Religion, Fastings & Thanksgivings, not regarding Oathes, Covenants, Protestations [Page 5] nor Declarations, nor caring what damnable designes they passe to the support of their rebellious interest: so that by Sacriledge, Rebellion, Murder, Perjury, Theft, Oppression, Tyranny & Regi­cide, they have couzened the people of their antient Lawes and Liberties, and subjected them to the miserable slavery of their tyrannicall wills.

And now we doe declare, that in the beginning of unhappy differences being fully satisfied of the justnesse of His late Maje­sties cause, in our judgements and conscience, according to our duty and allegiance we tooke up Armes on His Majesties Party, where we continu'd faithfully, acting to the utmost of our power what ever might make for His Majesties advantage, and have since manifested our unstained Loyalty in our patient sufferings, not having neglected any thing even in our most clouded condi­tion, which might renew His Majesties interest in the Field: and we doe protest in the presence of Almighty God, that we shall alwaies use the same fidelity and industry in the trust reposed in us by our present dread Soveraigne, holding our selves bound in the same bonds of fealty to His Majesty that we were to the late King His Father, of ever blessed yet bleeding memory; nor shall we lay down Armes, but by Gods assistance faithfully and reso­lutely pursue His Majesties Enemies, till we have reduced all that are in Rebellion to their due obedience, brought the Murderers of His late Majesty to speedy & impartiall justice, and absolutely destroyed their interest both by Land and Sea: nor can we ima­gine but that all honest men who have any sence of His Majesties sufferings, their owne loyalty, and their Countries misery, will chearfully give their assistance both in purse and person, in carry­ing on this pious & honorable Ingagement, wherein is so deeply concerned maintenance of the true Protestant Religion, the pre­servation of His Majesties Royall Person from murder, together with His just Rights and Prerogatives, the Priviledges of Parlia­ments, the Law of the Land, the Liberty of the Subject, and the suppression of Rebellion; not questioning but that God will at length owne his owne cause, and remove all those clouds which have hitherto darkned the splendor thereof, that so its true luster may plainly & fully appear to the eye of every mans judgement, to his own glory, His Majesties honor, & the good of the people.

From Douglas in the Isle of Man. August the 5. 1649.