“To return to those ill consequences which relate to the trade of your kingdoms, we beg leave to observe to your Majesty, that though this treaty revives, and renders your Majesty a party to the fourteenth and fifteenth articles of the Treaty of Munster,[19] by virtue of which, the impositions upon all goods and merchandises brought into the Spanish Low Countries by the sea, are to equal those laid on goods and merchandises imported by the Scheldt, and the canals of Sass and Swyn, and other mouths of the sea adjoining; yet no care is taken to preserve that equality upon the exportation of those goods out of the Spanish provinces, into those countries and places, which, by virtue of this treaty, are to be in the possession of the States; the consequence of which must in time be, and your Commons are informed, that in some instances it has already proved to be the case, that the impositions upon goods carried into those countries and places, by the subjects of the States General, will be taken off, while those upon the goods imported by your Majesty’s subjects remain:  by which means, Great Britain will entirely lose this most beneficial branch of trade, which it has in all ages been possessed of, even from the time when those countries were governed by the house of Burgundy, one of the most ancient, as well as the most useful allies to the crown of England.

[Footnote 19:  Concluded June 30th, 1643.  See note in vol. v., p. 150, of present edition. [T.S.]]

“With regard to the other dominions and territories of Spain, your Majesty’s subjects have always been distinguished in their commerce with them, and both by ancient treaties, and an uninterrupted custom, have enjoyed greater privileges and immunities of trade, than either the Hollanders, or any other nation whatsoever.  And that wise and excellent treaty of the Grand Alliance, provides effectually for the security and continuance of these valuable privileges to Britain, in such a manner, as that each nation might be left, at the end of war, upon the same foot as it stood at the commencement of it:  but this treaty we now complain of, instead of confirming your subjects’ rights, surrenders and destroys them; for although by the sixteenth and seventeenth articles of the Treaty of Munster, made between his Catholic Majesty and the States General, all advantages of trade are stipulated for, and granted to the Hollanders, equal to what the English enjoyed; yet the crown of England not being a party to that treaty, the subjects of England have never submitted to those articles of it, nor even the Spaniards themselves ever observed them; but this treaty revives those articles in prejudice of Great Britain, and makes your Majesty a party to them, and even a guarantee to the States General, for privileges against your own people.