[1661/1/296]¹

Act for the pardon of penal statutes

Our sovereign lord, considering that the precise and rigorous exaction of the pain, arbitrary and pecuniary, abjected to penal statutes heretofore made, would prove a burden to his majesty's lieges, heavy and unsupportable if, by his majesty's grace and favour, they should not be eased and liberated of the same; in consideration whereof his majesty, being willing to give ease and relief to his subjects of the foresaid burden, has therefore been graciously pleased, with consent of his estates of parliament, to discharge freely, pardon and remit and, by this act, discharges, freely pardons and remits all contraveners of any of the said penal statutes for all deeds done by them contrary to the tenor of the same statutes in time bygone, except only the statutes concerning the unlawful taking of usury, transporting of silver and gold and slaying of red and black fishes, which are in no way discharged by this present act nor comprehended under the same.