PETITION TO HIS MAJESTY CHARLES I, FROM THE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT

Carried to his Court at Colnbrooke, by the Earl of Northumberland and the Earl of Pembroke

We your Majesy’s most loyal subjects, the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled, being affected with a deep and piercing sense of the miseries of this Kingdom, and of the dangers to your Majesty’s person, as the present affairs now stand; and much quickened therein with the sad consideration of the great effusions of blood of the late battle, and of the loss of so many eminent persons; and farther weighing the addition of loss, misery, and danger to your Majesty and to your kingdom which must ensue, if bother armies should again join in another battle, as without God’s especial blessing, and your majesty’s concurrence with your Houses of Parliament, will probably not be avoided: we cannot but believe that a suitable impression of tenderness and compassion is wrought in your Majesty’s royal heart, being yourself an eyewitness of the bloody and sorrowful destruction of so many of your subjects; and that your majesty doth apprehend what diminution of your own power and greatness will follow, and that all your kingdoms will thereby be so weakened as to become subject to the attempts of any ill-affected to this State.

In all which respects we assure ourselves, that your majesty will be inclined graciously to accept this humble petition, that the misery and desolation of this kingdom may be speedily removed and prevented. For the effecting whereof, we humbly beseech your Majesty to appoint some convenient place not far from the city of London, where your Majesty will be pleased to reside, until committees of both Houses of Parliament may attend your majesty with some propositions for the removal of these bloody distempers and distractions, and settling of the state of the kingdom in such a manner as may conduce to the preservation of God’s true religion, your Majesty’s honor, safety, and prosperity, and to the peace, comfort, and security of all your people.