after be compelled to make or yield any gift, loan,
benevolence, tax, or such like charge, without common consent by Act of
Parliament. And that none be called to make answer, or to take such
oaths, or to be confined or otherwise molested or disputed concerning
the same, or for refusal thereof. And that no freeman may in such
manner as is before mentioned be imprisoned or detained. And that your
Majesty would be pleased to remove the said soldiers and mariners, and
that your people may not be so burthened in time to come. And that the
commissions for proceeding by martial law may be revoked and annulled,
and that hereafter no commissions of like nature may issue forth to any
person or persons whatsoever to be executed as aforesaid, lest by colour
of them any of your Majesty's subjects be destroyed and put to death,
contrary to the laws and franchises of the land. All which they humbly
pray of your most excellent Majesty, as their rights and liberties,
according to the laws and statutes of the realm. And that your Majesty
would also vouchsafe to declare that the awards, doings, and proceedings
to the prejudice of your people in any of the premisses shall not be
drawn hereafter into consequence or example. And that your Majesty would
be pleased graciously for the further comfort and safety of your people
to declare your royal will and pleasure, that in the things aforesaid
all your officers and ministers shall serve you according to the laws
and statutes of this realm, as they tender the honour of your Majesty
and the prosperity of the kingdom."

[Sidenote: The Petition of Right.]

It was in vain that the Lords strove to conciliate Charles by a
reservation of his "sovereign power." "Our petition," Pym quietly
replied, "is for the laws of England, and this power seems to be another
power distinct from the power of the law." The Lords yielded, but
Charles gave an evasive reply; and the failure of the more moderate
counsels for which his own had been set aside called Eliot again to the
front. In a speech of unprecedented boldness he moved the presentation
to the king of a Remonstrance on the state of the realm. But at the
moment when he again touched on Buckingham's removal as the preliminary
of any real improvement the Speaker of the House interposed. "There was
a command laid on him," he said, "to interrupt any that should go about
to lay an aspersion on the king's ministers." The breach of their
privilege of free speech