“Sir, I am a freeman of England, and therefore I am not to be used as a slave or vassal by the Lords, which they have already done, and would further do; I also am a man of peace and quietness, and desire not to molest any, if I be not forced thereunto, therefore I desire you, as you tender my good and your own, take this for an answer, that I cannot, without turning traitor to my liberty, dance attendance to their lordships’ bar, being bound in conscience, duty to God, myself, thine, and my country, to oppose their encroachments to the death, which, by the strength of God, I am resolved to do. Sir, you may, or cause to be exercised upon me some force or violence to pull and drag me out of my chamber, which I am resolved to maintain as long as I can, before I will be compelled to go before them; and therefore I desire you, in a friendly way, to be wise and considerate before you do that which, it may be, you can never undo. “Sir, I am your true and fair-conditioned prisoner, if you will be so to me, “JOHN LILBURNE. “From my cock-loft in the press-yard of Newgate, 23rd June, 1646.” Lilburne was eventually banished by the Rump Parliament; but in 1653 he returned to England, and threw himself upon the tender mercies of the Protector. Cromwell would do nothing, and left him to the law. Lilburne was then arrested, and committed to Newgate. At the next sessions he was arraigned, but refused to plead unless furnished with a copy of his indictment. He managed to put off his trial by various expedients till the next sessions, when he was acquitted by the jury. In Thurloe’s State papers it is stated that “John Lilburne was five times at his trial at the Sessions House, where he most courageously defended himself from Mr. Stale, the recorder’s, violent assaults with his old buckler, Magna Charta, so that they have let him alone.” “Freeborn John” was so popular with malcontents of all shades of opinion, that the authorities, from Oliver Cromwell downward, were really afraid of him. Oliver professed to be enraged against him, and anxious for his punishment, yet he privately paid him a pension equal to the pay of a Lieutenant-Colonel, and, as Thurloe says, “thought the fellow so considerable, that during the time of his trial he kept three regiments continually under arms at St. James’.” The jury which acquitted Lilburne were summoned to answer for their conduct before the Council of State. Yet there is little doubt that the court was overawed by the mob. For Thurloe says there were six or seven hundred men at the trial, with swords, pistols, bills, daggers, and other instruments, that, in case they had not cleared him, they would have employed in his defence. The joy and acclamation was so great after he was acquitted, that the shout was heard an English mile.