Here, after some very indifferent usage, the Parliament
pursued a farther treaty with him, and all points were agreed but
two: the entire abolishing Episcopacy, which the king declared to be
against his conscience and his coronation oath; and the sale of the
Church lands, which he declared, being most of them gifts to God and
the Church, by persons deceased, his Majesty thought could not be
alienated without the highest sacrilege, and if taken from the uses
to which they were appointed by the wills of the donors, ought to be
restored back to the heirs and families of the persons who bequeathed
them.
And these two articles so stuck with his Majesty, that he ventured
his fortune, and royal family, and his own life for them. However, at
last, the king condescended so far in these, that the Parliament voted
his Majesty's concessions to be sufficient to settle and establish the
peace of the nation.
This vote discovered the bottom of all the counsels which then
prevailed; for the army, who knew if peace were once settled, they
should be undone, took the alarm at this, and clubbing together in
committees and councils, at last brought themselves to a degree
of hardness above all that ever this nation saw; for calling into
question the proceedings of their masters who employed them, they
immediately fall to work upon the Parliament, remove Colonel Hammond,
who had the charge of the king, and used him honourably, place a
new guard upon him, dismiss the commissioners, and put a stop to the
treaty; and, following their blow, march to London, place regiments of
foot at the Parliament-house door, and, as the members came up,
seize upon all those whom they had down in a list as promoters of the
settlement and treaty, and would not suffer them to sit; but the rest
who, being of their own stamp, are permitted to go on, carry on the
designs of the army, revive their votes of non-addresses to the
king, and then, upon the army's petition to bring all delinquents to
justice, the mask was thrown off, the word all is declared to be
meant the king, as well as every man else they pleased.
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