THAT whereas, after the Addresses of many thousands of these actions, faithfully promising to establish me on my Fathers usurped Seat, and protesting before God to live and die for me, whom they stiled their Jo­shua, appointed by God to compleat that happinesse to the Saints which was begun by my Father, whom they called Moses, that had brought them out of Aegypt and the Wildernesse unto the borders of Canaan, of which number you of the Army were not the last, nor least part: Yet notwithstanding you forgeting your Promises and Engagements, were guilty of such insolent and contrary proceedings as to turn me out of my place before I was well warm, under the specious pretence of setting up the Good old Cause, which then you interpreted to be the Refuse, or (as it's commonly called) the Rump of the long Parliament; which piece of a Parliament you had no sooner established, and vowed your selves by a solemn Oath their faithfull and constant Servants, but you turn'd them to grasse before they had leisure to fleece the Commonwealth. Yet for all this, you still prosecute the Good old Cause, which since it hath so many Colours, I know not how to define it otherwise then a meer cheating of the Publick: But to let that passe, you devised a thing called a Committee of safety, which being a Crew of Sword-men, with some others of your own Faction, appointed unto themselves a certain time to produce a mo­del or form of Government, which time being expired, they ended as safely as they began, their pregnant womb being not delivered of so much as a Mouse.

These things considered, and since you are now at a non plus, not knowing which way to turne your selves, I humbly beg of you (Gentlemen) to let me appear once more upon the Stage, beseeching you to restore me unto my former dignity of being your Protector: It may be you'l say, I am altogether uncapable of so great a trust: For answer; If you'l believe my Mother, I am the Son of Oliver, and think my selfe as wise as some of you, and much honester then the best of you. What though I was pictur'd with an Owls head and a Fools Coat? I'me sure my Brother-in-law Fleetwood (your titular General) deserves it as well as my self; for although he had so much wit as to depose me, wherein he shewed himself more then Fool: yet when he set up the tail of the long Parliament, and afterwards suffred them to be cast out by the ambition of Lambert, he savor'd more of the later. But I pray Gentlemen consider what profit and advantage will acrue to your selves as well as the Nation, in case you readvance me to the Government; for I will call such a Parliament as shall raise money for the satisfying of all Soldiers Arrears, and take a course that they be dayly paid for the future, and you your selves shall be my privy Councellors, provided you be more acute in consulting the affairs of Government then you have been lately in forging one. And for the good of the Commonwealth in generall, we will countenance and encourage the two main props of a State, viz. Magistracy and Ministry: But as for the dull City of London, we may ride it to death if we please; she hath been long sick of a Consumption, but will not go to the charge of a purgation whereby she might be rid of those humors that obstruct her welfare, occasioned by a surfeit she took of too much of the fish call'd a Lobstar, which diet my Father fed her withall. But to speak of her Lord Mayor, he is the very same to you, as his horse to him, who with all his furr'd gang of Aldermen are alwayes ready to comply with any power whatever at its first appearance, and will ever be your enchained slaves, for all their dayly consultations at Guild-Hall. These are the Golden Calves which the City worships, and will do till it be utterly beggar'd by their sloath, who had rather live in perpetuall bondage then hazard their vast estates to purchase the freedome both of themselves and their posterity; for if the present Lord Mayor had as much wit as Frier Bacon's brazen head, and would but say, Time is, the businesse would be done, and the whole City be freed from that oppression which they have for so many years groaned under; but as long as they are led by the nose by their Lord Mayor, and he by the Officers of the Army, hang but one Red-coat on the top of Pauls steeple, and 'tis enough to keep the City in awe, though there were never a Soldier in it.

But whilst I was penning this, there came one and told me that you had set out a Proclamation of a Parliament to be called on the 24. of January next, without a single Person, or House of Peers: which thing I suppose you never intend, but only to delude the People with a bare pretence, the very name of a Parliament being a pritty bable to still and quiet the childish rage of the City. However, if you do perform what you say, it will be a Parliament of your own stamp, which will bring more discontent to the People, then what they now suffer: Besides, you will utterly crosse the design of your grand Master in politicks, Lambert, who when he hath done with Monke, will be as new to begin again what he aim'd at, as he was before he turn'd out the Epitome of the long Parliament. Where­fore my Masters I beseech you consider what you go about, and go the safest way to work, which will be by lifting up me again to the Protectorship: and to this end, call to minde the discontented Frogs, who would not have the Log to be their King; but when Jupiter set the Stork to rule over them, which exceedingly devour'd them, then they prayed him to restore their King Log. Take heed (Gentlemen) that you do not run the same fortune as did the Frogs, lest with them you repent too late; but hearken to this seasonable, and (indeed) reasonable advice of your Quondam Master, though now poor Petitioner.

To conclude, (my Masters) if you will be pleased to suffer me once again to mount into the saddle of Supremacy, I protest unto you that I will not be cast out of it but with the losse of my life. Before I will be fo befool'd as I was, I'le drive on as furiously as my Father when he turn'd Coach-man in Hide-Park, and had like to have broken his neck for his labour: And rather then I will so sneakingly be thrown down from the very Pinacle of honour,