of their subjects, as well in the case of the public magistrate as of private persons, and lastly to be utterly resolved to exercise this power only for public and necessary uses; to spare them as much and often as were possible; and that they never be wantonly vitiated or misapplied to any private pleasure or person whatsoever? This being indeed the very only means to preserve, as may be said, the chastity of these levies, and to recommend their beauty so far forth to the subject, as being thus disposed, it is to be justly hoped, they will never grudge the parting with their monies.... "Perhaps it may be asked, where shall so great a sum be had? My answer is, procure it from the subjects of England, and profitably for them too. By this means preventing the raising upon them a land army for defence of the kingdom, which would be by many degrees more chargeable; and hereby also insensibly gain a precedent, and settle an authority and right in the Crown to levies of that nature, which thread draws after it many huge and great advantages, more proper to be thought on at some other seasons than now." It is however remarkable that, with all Strafford's endeavours to render the king absolute, he did not intend to abolish the use of parliaments. This was apparently the aim of Charles; but, whether from remains of attachment to the ancient forms of liberty surviving amidst his hatred of the real essence, or from the knowledge that a well-governed parliament is the best engine for extracting money from the people, this able minister entertained very different views. He urged accordingly the convocation of one in Ireland, pledging himself for the experiment's success. And in a letter to a friend, after praising all that had been done in it, "Happy it were," he proceeds, "if we might live to see the like in England, everything in its season; but in some cases it is as necessary there be a time to forget, as in others to learn; and howbeit the peccant (if I may without offence so term it) humour be not yet wholly purged forth, yet do I conceive it in the way, and that once rightly corrected and prepared, we may hope for a parliament of a sound constitution indeed; but this must be the work of time, and of his majesty's excellent wisdom; and this time it becomes us all to pray for and wait for, and when God sends it, to make the right use of it."[98]