et not uncivilly. "Surely, Mr Milton, you speak not as you
think. I am indeed one of those who believe that God hath reserved to
himself the censure of kings, and that their crimes and oppressions are
not to be resisted by the hands of their subjects. Yet can I easily
find excuse for the violence of such as are stung to madness by grievous
tyranny. But what shall we say for these men? Which of their just
demands was not granted? Which even of their cruel and unreasonable
requisitions, so as it were not inconsistent with all law and order, was
refused? Had they not sent Strafford to the block and Laud to the Tower?
Had they not destroyed the Courts of the High Commission and the Star
Chamber? Had they not reversed the proceedings confirmed by the voices
of the judges of England, in the matter of ship-money? Had they not
taken from the king his ancient and most lawful power touching the order
of knighthood? Had they not provided that, after their dissolution,
triennial parliaments should be holden, and that their own power should
continue till of their great condescension they should be pleased to
resign it themselves? What more could they ask? Was it not enough that
they had taken from their king all his oppressive powers, and many
that were most salutary? Was it not enough that they had filled his
council-board with his enemies, and his prisons with his adherents? Was
it not enough that they had raised a furious multitude, to shout and
swagger daily under the very windows of his royal palace? Was it not
enough that they had taken from him the most blessed prerogative of
princely mercy; that, complaining of intolerance themselves, they had
denied all toleration to others; that they had urged, against forms,
scruples childish as those of any formalist; that they had persecuted
the least remnant of the popish rites with the fiercest bitterness of
the popish spirit? Must they besides all this have full power to command
his armies, and to massacre his friends?

"For military command, it was never known in any monarchy, nay, in any
well ordered republic, that it was committed to the debates of a large
and unsettled assembly. For their other requisition, that he should give
up to their vengeance all who had defended the rights of his crown, his
honour must have been ruined if he had complied. Is it not therefore
plain that they desired these things only in order that, by refusing,
his Majesty might give them a pretence for war?