Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/135

 needed. The House of Commons had in the early stages of the war been indebted to the Merchant Adventurers for loans. See Journal for Jan. 12, 1643/4, Feb. 23., etc., III, 364, 405. September 11, 1643, the House of Commons had confirmed their monopoly and their right to administer an oath such as should be approved by both Houses, and to imprison their members for certain offenses against the company. A proviso accompanied the confirmation expressly saving all rights depending on ancient charters or acts of Parliament. Journal, III, 237. The amended ordinance passed both Houses in October.

There is a very able discussion of the economic results of the Merchant Adventurers’ cloth-exporting monopoly in Innocency And Truth Justified, pp. 48 ff., apparently based on a book called A Discourse for free trade. Lilburne maintained that the monopolists as a class had been supple to tyranny such as Strafford’s. He quoted Pym’s declaration that debasing the spirits of the king’s subjects was more treasonable than debasing his coin; and argued that such was the effect of a monopoly. He objected to the Adventurers’ power of imposing an oath of fidelity to their officers and statutes. He emphasized the saving clause in the parliamentary ordinance quoted above, showing that it could be used to root up the whole monopoly. If, as Parker had insisted, rulers were intrusted with power for the good of the ruled, what right had Parliament to make men slaves by a law, as they had done in the case of the Adventurers? Parliament’s action afforded Lilburne one more text for his sermon that the law must be in accord with reason. A pamphlet of January 26, 1645/6, A Plea for Free-Mens Liberties, by one, Thomas Johnson, followed the same line of reasoning. E. 319 (1).