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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	king_n	time_n	2,805	5	3.3508	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53490	Historical memoires on the reigns of Queen Elizabeth and King James	Osborne, Francis, 1593-1659.	1658 (1658)	Wing O515; ESTC R23008	34,729	132

Father and Brother and therefore farre more unbecoming the person of a Woman the cause a Declaration was not long after issued out to shew in what senses it was to be understood And to prove they more intended the limitation of the Roman power then to secure themselves from Tyranny at home an Act was passed inabling the Queene and Commissioners for the time being to alter or bring what Ceremontes or Worship they thought decent into the service of God without excepting that formerly exploded whereby a returne likelyest to be made use of or a farther remoove was left arbitrary at the will of the Queene whose successors not being mentioned in the Act left roome to question It ought to be no longer in force then her life For whose gratification alone her Privy Counsell that did then and indeed almost all her time governe Parliaments had intended it But King Iames and the Bishops finding the Advantage it brought the Crowne no lesse then the Church did not only owne it amongst the Statutes unrepealled and in force but did print it with a Proclamation to strengthen it at the beginning of the book of Common Prayer Neither had the high Commission any better vizard to face the Tyranny daily practised by the Clergy but what the authority this Act did afford which may one day tempt the people to a new if not a more dismall Reformation after experience hath taught them how pernitious it is to intrust either Prince or Priest with any power capable of abuse yet to the honour of this Princesse it may justly be said that she never made use of her owne liberty to inslave the nation but repaid or rather exceeded in thanks and acknowledgments all power they gave her an Art lost in these latter times or thought unkingly But I leave this her wisdome to be justified by the happy successe 4. After the Queen had in Parliament cleansed her birth from all the spots the poyson of tongues had aspersed her with and received for the future from the Houses in the name of the three Estates a promise of Assistance together with an Oath of Obedience by which she might rest secure from within her next indeavour was to line and fortify her out-workes In the prosecution of which she was forced through Reason of State upon a deeper ingratitude then I believe any thing but an impulsive necessity could have cast her into For after a firme settlement she became the severest Scourge to Spaine that it ever had since emancipated from the Moors The occasion of which some lay at the haughty and proud Gate of the Spaniard who grew implacable after he found he was deluded of his hope to marry her others to a nature residing in all Princes not to acknowledge any friends or kindred but what are allied to a capacity of doing them some future good which Philip the second was not likely to do upon any remoter occasion then the possession of her person his ends being intent upon an absolute Monarchy which obliged not only England but all the Princes in Europe to oppose him Nor could any favour received in the relation of a private person bind her more to requitall then greater injuries did to revenge Therefore since she forgave the latter when she had power to have taken it without danger she seemes more excusable in omitting the first which could not have beene done without losse and exposing her subjects to a visible inconvenience if not a totall rume Yet this is manifest in the histories on both sides that the Queene did by way of mediation long indeavour for a milder Governing of his Dutch Subjects of whose oppression both Heaven and Earth ape witnesses before a Sword was drawne in their defence And for the Treasure taken at Sea and at first owned but as borrowed it was not more then the Faith of England might have been a sufficient security for without being made the subject of a warie Nor did the Catholike King remaine long in a condition able to distresse the affayres of England his power being diverted through a malecontented party that stood up for Religion in the Netherlands at first fomented by France and after more cordially assisted by our Queene who delighted more from her first assumption to power in raising broyles and making her selfe an arbitrator of others differences then in any quarrell contracted of her owne by which she did not only keep her selfe in plight at home by sparing mony harder parted with by the English then bloud but gained so much reputation abroad as no publique or private indeavours of his holinesse could stop other nations already scandalized at his base and unworthy Iugling in the Council from confirming or making new or straighter Leagues with England then formerly they had done looking upon her Defection as a president they might one day be forced to follow in case the Court of Rome continued still her Contumacy towards Princes And therefore likelier to meet her with comfort and assistance then any force to oppose her From whence his Holinesse was necessitated in vindication of his honour to imploy the Iesuits his owne emissaries by Artifice Poyson or the Knife to bring about that his sword was not able to execute so as the peace of her Kingdome was at first more interrupted through privy Conspiracies then open force which according to the guise of all unsuccessefull Treasons turned to the disadvantage of themselves and their party the poore Catholickes against whom nothing in relation to the generality remaines upon due proofe sufficient to justify the severity of the Lawes daily enacted and put in execution against them wherewith they were ground in pieces between the Popes Obstinacy and a Ielousy these practises bred in there naturall Prince by whom they were without question prosecuted rather out of feare then malice which his Holinesse at length perceiving did offer what he denied which was to confirme her Title and ratify the use of the Common-Prayer with the most of what the Parliament had confirmed upon her provided she would receive them as favours from the Apostolicall Sea But after this his too late compliance had cast him into their condition that have unadvisedly out stood the Market he in no shallower Malice then dispaire cast not only the person of the Queene but the whole Nation under a bottomlesse Interdict which was thundered out at Rome and hung like squib by one Felton upon the Bishop of London's Gate where after the execution of the party that did it all other malignancy ceased but what fell upon his owne creatures who till then were not forbidden to communicate in publique service with the Church of England and so harder to be discovered then since this open rupture Nor was the Queene of Scots whose Tragicall History is to be found every where written at large more obliged to her Catholick Father through whose inoouragement she was tempted to assume the Title and Armes of England very unseasonably during

HISTORICAL MEMOIRES ON THE REIGNS OF QUEEN ELIZABETH AND KING IAMES LONDON Printed by I. Grismond and are to be sold by T. Robinson Bookseller in Oxon. 1658. THE EPISTLE My dear Lucilius I Do here leave to your better Education another Daughter of my Brain that may not unpossibly pass with the less Scandal because chaste from any desire after new and forbidden Discoveries or of disturbing that huge Trade Antiquity and Custom drive the first amongst Scholars who think it a sufficient excuse in the justification of a stunted Knowledge to maintain an impossibility of transcending the Abilities of former Ages yet cannot gainsay a visible improvement in their own which haply would be greater were Learning left free to every ones sense and not confin'd to Patterns and old Forms harder many times to be imitated or made use of than new ones found which being our own would appear more natural and adapted to the present understandings in many things strangers to the Usances of the Ancients whereas the second serves as an universal Chain by which the generality are led to approve or dislike the Words Actions and Gessures of others Whose judgements as I have long since not much valued so have I a little wondred at Age to finde it so tetchy when Younger in years lay any claim to Knowledge Since the goodness of the Eye and advantage of Place and not a long poring discovers the Prospect more of London being surveyable in a minute from Pauls Steeple than can be seen in an age out of Cheapside There remaining nothing in this world Prescription hath a weaker title to than Wisdome the legitimate Daughter Experience brings forth to an able and active Understanding For though all things are found to own in process of time a publick vicissitude yet for the most part it is too flow and cunningly carried to be discerned at any distance especially in relation to the present which way it turns The ignorant Traveller may see by the Diall the Time is in a declension but without entring the Church or Court shall be never the wiser as to the knowledge of the true and proper Causer of the Motion For my self I confess I am more highly bound to Letters than any acquired advantage or natural endowment self-partiality or others indulgence hath hitherto been able to estate me in Now if some owners of such parts as I am conscious of the want of did prosecute the like study having a purse and will to purchase a sight of the Intelligence Negotiations Conferences and Transactions of all those that have resided in Embassy with our Princes they might no question be able to compose a more exact Chronicle than this Nation ever saw of her own and for Elegancy it would like honey drop out of the same leaves he gathered his Information from Epistles being the quintessence of the Writers judgment as they are undoubtedly the Elixir of his Rhetorick And he that desires a more exemplary manifestation of this infallible though for ought I ever observed seldome practised Truth may finde it in that learned Italian's History of the Council of Trent a Piece that challenges all the veneration our partial Modern Readers do or can offer at the Shrines of Antiqity a folly sure not so conversant in the world before Printing otherwise the most part of New Books from time to time had still been buried in their Swadling-clouts for want of Transcription which few or none would now foul their fingers ends about as not esteeming it worth the labour out of floth or contempt So far as the Stationers meer zeal to Gain rather than any propensity to the advancement of Learning did for a while keep Bacon Rawleigh and divers incomparable Spirits more from perishing at the bottome of Oblivion Good Books anciently written in the Bark of Trees and now running in their Progress so exactly the fate of Acorns that if their chance be to withstand the Swinish Contamination of their own Age and trampling into the dirt of Contempt they do not seldome afterwards become the Gods of the Nations and have Temples dedicated to their Worship As their Authors in this participate with other good men who attain not to a state of Glory till after this Life TRADITIONAL MEMOIRES ON THE REIGN OF QUEEN ELIZABETH LONDON Printed for T. Robinson Bookseller in Oxon. 1658. To the READER THough the study of History be an ancient Prescript for the avoiding of Ignorance and production of Knowledge and to this day far more in use than any other Politick Aphorisms Yet with reverence to this confessed excellent Dose of others approved Experiments I doubt not but Princes and men in Power might finde a readier if not a more infallible way to Prudence by being conversant in all sorts of Letters relating to Embassadors and such Spies and Ministers of Common-wealths especially as are employed abroad or at home in the Transactions of Treaties where all things appear bare-fac'd and at first hand not smutted with Interest or adulterated by the red and white paint of Envy Fear or Flattery Nor is the frequent opportuntty of discoursing with Contemporaries who having enjoyed a New Light cannot but have seen more than those by Time and Birth placed at a remoter distance any despicable Ingredient in the Composition of an exact Statesman of which I finde few that deserve in my judgement the title commonly forfeited to an over-remissness or excess in Sanctity or Profaneness or if you will to Hypocrisie or Scandal which at long running will meet both with the same Inconveniences To be sure my self have as little propensity as sufficiency in this Art being no less obstructed through mulcts received from Fortune than Nature the later of which is as uncapable of Amendment as the first is unlikely to finde it For after the death of a good Father being driven into a corner of the world by Injuries received from the nearest of Kindred and remotest of Friends I was not onely invited by Leisure but compell d through Necessity to feek these Diversions In which if I be mistaken the Pardon cannot be long in suing out since I hope they shall not meet with a severer Iudge than my self for whose Recreation alone they were intended Though the small insight I have had into Affairs did not seldome gratifie my spleen with as much delight as it may have not unpossibly affected less sanguine Complexions with fury or disdain to see the Valet brought into play where discretion called for an higher and more exact Courtier or to hear the People wrangle and cast about their mony through a phanatick desire to discard a present Government not foreseeing their hopes may possibly be deluded in the same if not a worse Stock than they make out and lay by often bartering a pack of Fools for a like quantity of Knaves and Mad-men The giddy multitude being far likelier to be out in their account then this advised Adage Seldome comes a better especially if