Part 11

The Lord General suddenly after brings in the long excluded Members to sit in Parliament, being persons of great judgment, and formerly enforced from sitting therein by the soldiery, and connivance of those who stiled themselves the godly part of the Parliament. These honourable patriots presently voted his Majesty's coming into England, and so he did in May 1660. But because Charles the Second, now (1667) King of England, Son of Charles the First, grandchild to James the First, King of Great Britany, was so miraculously restored, and so many hundreds of years since prophesied of by Ambrose Merlin, it will not be impertinent to mention the prophecies themselves, the rather because we have seen their verification.

AMBROSE MERLIN'S PROPHECY WROTE ABOUT 990 YEARS SINCE.

He calls King James, The Lion of Righteousness; and saith, when he died, or was dead, there would reign a noble White King; this was Charles the First. The prophet discovers all his troubles, his flying up and down, his imprisonment, his death; and calls him Aquila. What concerns Charles the Second, is the subject of our discourse: in the Latin copy it is thus:

Deinde ab Austro veniet cum Sole super ligneos equos, & super spumantem inundationem maris, Pullus Aquilæ navigans in Britanniam.

Et applicans statim tunc altam domum Aquilæ sitiens, & cito aliam sitiet.

Deinde Pullus Aquilæ nidificabit in summa rupe totius Britanniæ: nec juvenis occidet, nec ad senem vivet.

This, in an old copy, is Englished thus:

'After then, shall come through the south with the sun, on horse of tree, and upon all waves of the sea, the Chicken of the Eagle, sailing into Britain, and arriving anon to the house of the Eagle, he shall shew fellowship to them beasts.

'After, the Chicken of the Eagle shall nestle in the highest rock of all Britain: nay, he shall nought be slain young; nay, he nought come old.'

Another Latin copy renders the last verse thus:

Deindè pullus Aquilæ nidificabit in summo rupium, nec juvenis occidetur, nec ad senium perveniet. There is after this, percificato regno omnes occidet; which is intended of those persons put to death, that sat as Judges upon his father's death.

THE VERIFICATION.

His Majesty being in the Low-Countries when the Lord General had restored the secluded Members, the Parliament sent part of the Royal Navy to bring him for England, which they did in May 1660. Holland is East from England, so he came with the sun; but he landed at Dover, a port in the south part of England. Wooden-horses, are the English ships.

Tunc nidificabit in summo rupium.

The Lord General, and most of the gentry in England, met him in Kent, and brought him unto London, then to White-hall.

Here, by the highest Rooch, (some write Rock,) is intended London, being the metropolis of all England.

Since which time, unto this very day I write this story, he hath reigned in England, and long may he do hereafter. 10th December, 1667.

Had I leisure, I might verify the whole preceding part concerning King Charles. Much of the verification thereof is mentioned in my Collection of Prophecies, printed 1645. But his Majesty being then alive, I forbore much of that subject, not willing to give offence. I dedicated that book unto him; and, in the conclusion thereof, I advised his return unto Parliament, with these words, Fac hoc & vives.

There was also a Prophecy printed 1588, in Greek characters, exactly decyphering the long troubles the English nation had from 1641 until 1660; and then it ended thus:

'And after that shall come a dreadful dead man, and with him a Royal G.' [it is Gamma in the Greek, intending C. in the Latin, being the third letter in the alphabet,] 'of the best blood in the world, and he shall have the Crown, and shall set England on the right way, and put out all heresies.'

Monkery being extinguished above eighty or ninety years, and the Lord General's name being Monk, is the Dead Man. The Royal G. or C. is Charles the Second, who, for his extraction, may be said to be of the best blood in the world.

These two prophecies were not given vocally by the angels, but by inspection of the crystal in types and figures, or by apparition the circular way, where, at some distance, the angels appear, representing by forms, shapes, and creatures, what is demanded. It is very rare, yea, even in our days, for any operator or master to have the angels speak articulately; when they do speak, it is like the Irish, much in the throat.

What further concerns his Majesty, will more fully be evident about 1672 or 1674, or, at farthest, in 1676. And now unto my own actions in 1660.

In the first place, my fee-farm rents, being of the yearly value of one hundred and twenty pounds, were all lost by his Majesty's coming to his restoration: but I do say truly, the loss thereof did never trouble me, or did I repine thereat.

In June of that year, a new Parliament was called, whereunto I was unwillingly invited by two messengers of the Serjeant at Arms. The matter whereupon I was taken into custody was, to examine me concerning the person who cut off the King's head, viz. the late King's.

Sir Daniel Harvey, of Surry, got the business moved against me in great displeasure, because, at the election of new knights for Surrey, I procured the whole town of Walton to stand, and give their voices for Sir Richard Onslow. The Committee to examine me, were Mr. Prinn, one Colonel King, and Mr. Richard Weston of Gray's-Inn.

God's providence appeared very much for me that day, for walking in Westminster-Hall, Mr. Richard Pennington, son to my old friend Mr. William Pennington, met me, and enquiring the cause of my being there, said no more, but walked up and down the hall, and related my kindness to his father unto very many Parliament men of Cheshire and Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cumberland, and those northern countries, who numerously came up into the Speaker's chamber, and bade me be of good comfort: at last he meets Mr. Weston, one of the three unto whom my matter was referred for examination, who told Mr. Pennington, that he came purposely to punish me; and would be bitter against me; but hearing it related, viz. my singular kindness and preservation of old Mr. Pennington's estate to the value of six or seven thousand pounds, 'I will do him all the good I can,' says he. 'I thought he had never done any good; let me see him, and let him stand behind me where I sit:' I did so. At my first appearance, many of the young members affronted me highly, and demanded several scurrilous questions. Mr. Weston held a paper before his mouth; bade me answer nobody but Mr. Prinn; I obeyed his command, and saved myself much trouble thereby; and when Mr. Prinn put any difficult or doubtful query unto me, Mr. Weston prompted me with a fit answer. At last, after almost one hour's tugging, I desired to be fully heard what I could say as to the person who cut Charles the First's head off. Liberty being given me to speak, I related what follows, viz.

That the next Sunday but one after Charles the First was beheaded, Robert Spavin, Secretary unto Lieutenant-General Cromwell at that time, invited himself to dine with me, and brought Anthony Peirson, and several others, along with him to dinner: that their principal discourse all dinner-time was only, who it was that beheaded the King; one said it was the common hangman; another, Hugh Peters; others also were nominated, but none concluded. Robert Spavin, so soon as dinner was done, took me by the hand, and carried me to the south window: saith he, 'These are all mistaken, they have not named the man that did the fact: it was Lieutenant-Colonel JOICE; I was in the room when he fitted himself for the work, stood behind him when he did it; when done, went in again with him: there is no man knows this but my master, viz. Cromwell, Commissary Ireton, and myself.' 'Doth not Mr. Rushworth know it?' said I. 'No, he doth not know it,' saith Spavin. The same thing Spavin since had often related unto me when we were alone. Mr. Prinn did, with much civility, make a report hereof in the House; yet Norfolk the Serjeant, after my discharge, kept me two days longer in arrest, purposely to get money of me. He had six pounds, and his Messenger forty shillings; and yet I was attached but upon Sunday, examined on Tuesday, and then discharged, though the covetous Serjeant detained me until Thursday. By means of a friend, I cried quittance with Norfolk, which friend was to pay him his salary at that time, and abated Norfolk three pounds, which we spent every penny at one dinner, without inviting the wretched Serjeant: but in the latter end of the year, when the King's Judges were arraigned at the Old-Bailey, Norfolk warned me to attend, believing I could give information concerning Hugh Peters. At the sessions I attended during its continuance, but was never called or examined. There I heard Harrison, Scott, Clement, Peters, Hacker, Scroop, and others of the King's Judges, and Cook the Sollicitor, who excellently defended himself; I say, I did hear what they could say for themselves, and after heard the sentence of condemnation pronounced against them by the incomparably modest and learned Judge Bridgman, now Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England.