cry for bread; our lives are a burden to us, divers of us having 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 in family, and we cannot get bread for one of them by our labor.  Rich men’s hearts are hardened; they will not give us if we beg at their doors.  If we steal, the Law will end our lives.  Divers of the poor are starved to death already; and it were better for us that are living to die by the Sword than by the Famine.  And now we consider that the Earth is our Mother; and that God hath given it to the children of men; and that the Common and Waste Grounds belong to the poor; and that we have a right to the common ground both from the Law of the Land, Reason and Scriptures.  Therefore we have begun to bestow our righteous labor upon it, and we shall trust the Spirit for a blessing upon our labor, resolving not to dig up any man’s propriety until they freely give us it.  And truly we have great comfort already through the goodness of our God, that some of those rich men amongst us that have had the greatest profit upon the Common have freely given us their share in it ... and the country farmers have profered, divers of them, to give us seed to sow it; and so we find that God is persuading Japhet to dwell in the tents of Shem.  And truly those that we find most against us are such as have been constant enemies to the Parliament Cause from first to last.

“Now at last our desire is, That some that approve of this work of Righteousness would but spread this our Declaration before the great Council of the Land; that so they may be pleased to give us more encouragement to go on; that so they may be found amongst the small number of those that consider the poor and needy; that so the Lord may deliver them in the time of their troubles ... and our lives shall bless them, so shall good men stand by them, and evil men shall be afraid of them, and they shall be counted the Repairers of our Breaches, and the Restorers of our Paths to dwell in.  And thus we have declared the truth of our necessity, and whosoever will come in to labor with us, shall have part with us, and we with them, and we shall all of us endeavour to walk righteously and peaceably in the Land of our Nativity.

“Richard Smith, John Avery, Thomas Fardin,
Richard Pendred, James Pitman, Roger Tuis,
Joseph Hitchcock, John Pye, Edward Turner.

March 12th, 1649 (1650).”

By some means or other this Declaration seems to have reached the Council of State; for we find the following reference to it in Whitelocke, p. 448, under date April: 

“A Letter sent from the Diggers and Planters of Commons for Universal Freedom, to make the Earth a Common Treasury, that everyone may enjoy food and raiment freely by his labor upon the Earth, without paying Rents or Homage to any Fellow Creature of his own kind, that everyone may be delivered from the Tyranny of the Conquering Power, and so rise up out of that Bondage to enjoy the Benefit of his Creation.

     “The Letters were to get money to buy food for them, and corn to
     sow the land which they had digged.”