My defence against impeachment

MY LORDS - This day I stand before you, charged with high treason. My Lords, I have all along, during this charge, watched to see that poisoned arrow of treason, which some men would fain have feathered in my heart; but, in truth, it hath not been in my quickness to discover any such evil yet within my breast, though now, perhaps, by sinister information, sticking to my clothes.

They tell me of a two-fold treason - one against the Statute, another by the common law.

As to this charge of treason, I must and do acknowledge that if I had the least suspicion of my own guilt, I would save your Lordships the pains. I would cast the first stone. I would pass the first sentence of condemnation against myself. And whether it be so or not, I now refer to your Lordships' judgment and deliberation.

You, and you only, under the care and protection of my gracious master, are my judges. I shall ever celebrate the providence and wisdom of your noble ancestors, who have put the keys of life and death, so far as concerns you and your posterity, into your hands. None but your own selves, my Lords, know the rate of your noble blood; none but yourselves must hold the balance in disposing of the same.

If that one article had been proved against me, it contained more weighty matter than all the charges besides. It would not only have been treason, but villainy, to have betrayed the trust of His Majesty's army.

But, as the managers have been sparing, by reason of the times, as to insisting on that article, I have resolved to keep the same method, and not utter the least expression which might disturb the happy agreement intended between the two kingdoms. I only admire how I, being an incendiary against the Scots in the 23rd article, am become a confederate with them in the 28th article!

How could I be charged for betraying Newcastle, and also for fighting with the Scots at Newburne, since fighting against them was no possible means of betraying the town into their hands, but rather to hinder their passage thither! I never advised war any further than, in my poor judgment, it concerned the very life of the King's authority, and the safety and honour of his kingdom. Nor did I ever see that any advantage could be made by a war in Scotland, where nothing could be gained but hard blows.

For my part, I honour that nation, but I wish they may ever be under their own climate. I have no desire that they should be too well acquainted with the better soil of England. It is hard, my Lords, to be questioned upon a law which cannot be shown! Where hath this fire lain hid for so many hundred years, without smoke to discover it, till it thus bursts forth to consume me and my children? Must we be punished by laws before they are made?

Far better were it to live by no laws at all, but to be governed by those characters of virtue and discretion which Nature hath stamped upon us, then to put this necessity of divination upon a man, and to accuse him of a breach of law before it is a law at all! If a waterman upon the Thames split his boat by grating upon an anchor, and the same have no buoy appended to it, the owner of the anchor is to pay the loss; but if a buoy be set there, every man passeth upon his own peril. Now, where is the mark, where is the token set upon the crime to declare it to be high treason?

It is now full 240 years since any man was touched for this alleged crime to this height before myself. Let us now awaken those sleeping lions to our destruction, by taking up a few musty records that have lain by the walls for so many ages, forgotten or neglected.

My Lords, what is my present misfortune may be for ever yours. You, your estates, your posterity, lie at the stake.

My Lords! My Lords! My Lords! Something more I had intended to say, but my voice and my spirit fail me. Only I do, in all humility and submission, cast myself down at your Lordships' feet, and desire that I may be a beacon to keep you from shipwreck. Do not put such rocks in your own way, which no prudence, no circumspection, can eschew or satisfy, but by your utter ruin!

And so, my Lords, even so, with all tranquillity of mind, I submit myself to your decision. And whether your judgment in my case be for life or for death, it shall be righteous in my eyes, and shall be received with a Te Deum laudamus, we give God the praise.