ut the poor Malefactor sending his
Wife to tell him that if he did not save him he must be hanged to
morrow, and that he must confess who set him on: His Master very civilly
sent him this Message; _Prithee suffer thy self to be hanged this once
to do me a Courtesie, and it shall be the better for thy Wife and
Children._

'But that which makes amends for all, says our Author, is the Kings
resolution to have frequent Parliaments. Yet this, it seems, is no
amends neither: for he says Parliaments are like Terms, if there be Ten
in a Year, and all so short to near no Causes, they do no good.'

I say on the other hand, If the Courts will resolve beforehand to have
no Causes brought before them, but one which they know they cannot
dispatch; let the Terms be never so long, they make them as
insignificant as a Vacation.

_The Kings Prerogative, when and where they should be call'd, and how
long they should sit, is but subservient, as our Friend tells us, to the
great design of Government; and must be accommodated to it, or we are
either denyed or deluded of that Protection and Justice we are born to._

My Author is the happiest in one faculty, I ever knew. He is still
advancing some new Position, which without proving, he slurs upon us for
an Argument: though he knows, that Doctrines without proofs will edifie
but little. That the Kings Prerogative is subservient, or in order to
the ends of Government is granted him. But what strange kind of Argument
is this, to prove that we are cheated of that Protection to which we are
born. Our Kings have always been indued with the power of calling
Parliaments, nominating the time, appointing of the Place, and
Dissolving them when they thought it for the publick good: And the
People have wisely consulted their own welfare in it. Suppose, for
example, that there be a Jarring between the three Estates, which
renders their sitting at that time Impracticable; since none of them can
pretend to Judge the proceedings of the other two, the Judgment of the
whole must either reside in a Superiour power, or the discord must
terminate in the ruine of them all. For if one of the three incroach too
far, there is so much lost in the Balance of the Estates, and so much
more Arbitrary power in one; 'Tis as certain in Politiques, as in
Nature; That where the Sea prevails the Land loses. If no such discord
should arise, my Authors Argument is of no farther use: for where the
Soveraign and Parliament agree