Act at Dalkeith the said 19. of December, that you would present our Petitions to his Majesties Royall consideration, and that without prejudice of the Declinator given in by us the said supplicants; whereupon we should be heard at place and time convenient, And in the mean time should receive no prejudice, as the said Act in it selfe beareth. And whereas we your Lordships supplicants with a great deale of patience, and hope also, grounded on sundry promises, were expecting an answer to these our humble desires, and having learned that upon some directions of His Majesties anent our supplications and complaint unto your Lordships of the Secret Councell, your Lordships admits to the consulting and judging anent our supplications, and His Majesties answere thereunto, the Archbishops and Bishops our direct parties, contrarie to our Declinator first propounded at Dalkeith, and now renewed at Sterling; and contrarie to your Lordships Act aforesaid at Dalkeith, and contrarie to our Religion and Lawes, and humble supplications. Therefore lest our silence be prejudiciall to this so important a cause, as concernes Gods glorie and worship, our Religion, Salvation, the Lawes and Liberties of this Kingdome, or derogatorie to the former supplications and complaints, or unanswerable to the trust of our Commission; out of our bound dutie to our God, our King and native Countrey, we were forced to take instruments in Notaries hands, of your Lordships refusall to admit our Declinator, or remove these our Parties, and to protest in manner following: First, That we may have our immediate recourse to our sacred Soveraign, to present our grievances, and in a legall way to prosecute the same before the ordinarie competent Judges, Civill or Ecclesiasticall, without any offence offered by us, or taken by your Lordships. Secondly, We protest that the said Archbishops and Bishops, our Parties complained upon, cannot be reputed or esteemed lawfull Judges to sit in any Judicatorie in this Kingdome, Civill or Ecclesiasticall, upon any of the supplicants, untill after lawfull tryall judicially they purge themselves of such crimes as we have already laid to their charge, offering to prove the same whensoever His Sacred Majestie shall please to give us audience. Thirdly, We protest that no Act nor Proclamation to follow thereupon, past, or to be past in Councell or out of Councell, in presence of the Archbishops and Bishops, whom we have already declined to be our Judges, shall any wayes be prejudiciall to us the supplicants, our persons, estates, lawfull meetings, proceedings, or pursuits. Fourthly, We protest that neither we nor any whose heart the Lord moveth to joine with us in these our supplications against the foresaid Innovations, shall incurre any danger, in life, lands, or any Politicall or Ecclesiasticall paines, for not observing such Acts, Bookes, Canons, Rites, Judicatories, Proclamations, introduced without or against the Acts of Generall Assemblies, or