Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	time_n	word_n	write_v	4,884	5	5.4567	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44227	Vindiciæ Carolinæ, or, A defence of Eikon basilikē, the portraicture of His Sacred Majesty in his solitudes and sufferings in reply to a book intituled Eikonoklastes, written by Mr. Milton, and lately re-printed at Amsterdam.	Hollingworth, Richard, 1639?-1701.; Wilson, John, 1626-1696.	1692 (1692)	Wing H2505; ESTC R13578	84,704	160

Alij diutius Imperium tenuerunt nemo tam fortiter reliquit Tacit. Histor Lib. 2. c. 47. p. 417 VINDICIAE CAROLINAE OR A DEFENCE OF ἘΙΚΩΝ ΒΑΣΙΛΙΚΗ THE Portraicture of his Sacred Majesty in his Solitudes and Sufferings IN REPLY To a BOOK Intituled ἘΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΑΣΤΗΣ Written by Mr. Milton and lately Re-printed at Amsterdam Vere magnum habere fragilitatem hominis securitatem Dei Seneca London Printed by J. L. for Luke Meredith at the Angel in Amen-Corner MDCXCII THE PREFACE OUR Author has forespoken his Reader with a long Preface and Custom has so obtain'd that not to take notice of it were to allow it for Truth yet as long soever as it is I may be the shorter in mine in regard there are some things we shall not much differ about As when he begins to discant on the Misfortunes of a Person fallen from so high a Dignity who has also paid his final Debt both to Nature and his Faults is not of it self a thing commendable And I come so near him that I deem it in no wise commendable much less to defend a Party by whose Injustice he fell For Revenge and Envy stop at the Grave and however our Lives are at the Mercy of others even Fortune herself has no Dominion over the Dead But when he says And his Faults and that it is not the intention of his Discourse I referr my Reader to this of mine wherein from the Ordinances of that time and the Law of the Land I have I hope acquitted the King and for the other whatever his intention might be prov'd his Book contrary to what he gives out here He further supposes it no Injury to the Dead but a good Deed rather to the Living to better inform them by remembring them the Truth of what they themselves know to be mis-affirm'd And I agree with him for if a Man may not make the Blind to go out of his way there is this Charity due to a Short-sighted Multitude to point them at least where they first went astray and by bringing them back to the old Paths both shew them how they lost their Way and set them right for the future Yet agree as we will we must part at last for instead of not discanting on the Misfortunes of his murther'd Sovereign and of better informing the People of what he slily insinuates themselves know to be mis-affirm'd by the King the whole drift of his Book is to blast the one and spread a Mist before the other whereas mine is to vindicate the King and what in me lies to clear the Air of that Pestilent Vapour In the mean time and until I come to it I shall briefly consider the matter of his Preface and the manner of putting it together As to the former it is an abstract of his Book written in Scandal to the King's Book and himself And saith he for their Sakes who thro' Custom Simplicity or want of better Teaching have not more seriously consider'd Kings than in the gaudy name of Majesty in behalf of Liberty and the Commonwealth That is to say Licentiousness and Democracy words altogether foreign to the English whose Constitutions know nothing but an Hereditary Imperial Monarchy recognizing no Superiour under God but only the King unto whom both Spiritualty and Temporalty are bound and owe a Natural Obedience Unto which his Notions are directly contrary for if the Soveraignty lay in the People the King were not Supream but himself subject to that Power which is transcendent to his as appertaining to them and then the State of England were Democratical if it lay in the Nobles then were it Aristocratical or if in either or all of them it were in no wise Monarchical which both the Common-Law and Statute-Law of England have ever declar'd this Kingdom to be as shall be shewn in its proper place And yet he doubts not to impose upon his Reader That the People heretofore were wont to repute for Saints those faithful and couragious Barons as he calls them who lost their Lives in the Field making glorious War against Tyrants for the common Liberty As Simon de Monfort Earl of Leicester against Henry the Third Thomas Plantagenet Earl of Lancaster against Edward the Second And truly Siqua est ea Gloria England wants not wherein to Glory though I think neither of these comes under his Character For the first of them a Frenchman by Extraction ran into open Rebellion against Henry the Third whose Sister he had first vitiated then Married Took the King Prisoner and carried him about in the Army as Cromwell did this King and made him own all his the Earl's Actions as the Parliament but ineffectually endeavour'd it also and was at last slain in actual Rebellion at the Battle of Evesham by the Prince our English Justinian the Man who by rescuing oppress'd Laws taught the Crown of England not to serve and first deliver'd it from the Wardship of the Barons These Barons the Descendants of those where the Devil in the Father turn'd Monk in the Son for being conscious to themselves that whatever they had whether of Honour or Possessions had been commenc'd in Conquest and Rapine what better way of securing both than by siding with the People who had by this time forgotten they were the Posterity of those who had beggar'd their Ancestors And for the other of Lancaster he also was taken in a like Rebellion against Edward the Second and being thereof Convicted was Beheaded at Pomfrect nor other than Rebellion do I find any Remark of him but that his Name was Plantagenet and the Mobb call'd him King Arthur And therefore the most that can be said of them is what Aaron of his Calf These be thy Gods O Israel And having laid this Foundation for Matter who could expect his manner of doing it should be better more than that Grapes may be gathered of Thorns or Figs of Thistles Nor has he in the least deceiv'd me in it when though there 's a decency of Language due to the meanest of Men and Mankind insults not over a Slave in Misery yet neither in his Preface or his whole Book do●s he ever mention the King or his ●ctions without that irreverence as would put a modest Man to the Blush in reading it What the particular Expressions are I forbear to mention them where I may possibly avoid it and referr the Reader to them as they every where occur lest otherwise I be like him that pretends to answer a Seditious Book and Prints that with his answer that it may be remembred cum Privilegio However this from the whole though the Scripture calls Princes Gods that Prince is yet to be born whose some action or other did not confess Humanity and require Candour Moses was King among the Righteous and David a Man after God's own Heart and yet it cannot be said of either of them In nullo erratum est And therefore instead of raking the Graves of Princes we

times at what time it pleas'd God in Mercy to these Kingdoms to restore King Charles the Second to the Throne of his murther'd Father but that they yet expect the Advancement of the Sceptre and that as obstinately as the Jews their Messias were there no other Argument the very re-impression of this Book may seem sufficient to evince especially if we consider the following Circumstances 1. That it bears the Impress from Amsterdam a Popular State to the freedom of whose Presses we are beholding for many things we had otherwise miss'd However whether it were that Amsterdam or another of the same Name in or near London as Printers have a way to themselves it matters not its Principles are altogether Republican and whoever he were that thus shuffled it into the World took the right course in chusing darkness rather than light because his Way was evil To have offered at a Commonwealth directly had been Madness and yet who knew how he might turn it about by a Side Wind 2. That a Book which from its first impression had been Waste-Paper and never read by any good Man without Contempt should after an interval of two and forty Years be raked out of its forgotten Embers if the design at bottom had not been to re-mind the People of the days of old and hint to them how the same Cards may be play'd over again as God shall enable them i. e. as opportunity shall offer And if this be not the drift of it let any Man judge when in bespattering that good King it represents to them by a false Glass what they may expect from other Kings and in effect tells them A Lyon is still a Lyon and tho' his laws be pared they 'll grow agen 3. That as if there had been some private agreement between them it was seconded by another to the same Tune intituled A Letter from Major General Ludlow to Sir E. S. which whether it were his or his Name only made use of to serve a turn will not be much in the Case tho' it confirm the Design The name is yet a popular name among that Faction and himself a daring Man witness his late regress into England and that not Incognito but in the face of the Sun in Westminster-Hall a Parliament and Judges then sitting where once he sate Judge himself and had there been a third of Mr. Jenkins's to have rung All-in What wonder if the Sheep had followed their Bell-weathers And if this were not the Design strange it seems and no small breach of Politicks to have thrust it on the World at a time when three of the Grand-Children of that King are yet Living and two of them in possession of the Throne It was one of Milton's Sarcasms to Salmatius Patrem defendis ad fillum mirum ni causam obtineas You defend the Father to the Son no wonder if you carry the Cause But on the other hand how can any of His Posterity think themselves secure while the murther of the Grandfather is yet mention'd without abhorrence When in a manner it hints the Faction with the Proverb Stultus qui patre caeso pepercit liberis tandem aliquando patriae necis futuros vindices He 's a Fool that kills the Father and spares the Children who some time or other will be sure to revenge it But malicious and nothing but malicious could be the Printing the Advertisement at the end of his Preface grounded it seems upon a Memorandum of the Earl of Anglesey's Viz. King Charles the Second and the Duke of York did both in the last Session of Parliament 1675. when I shewed them in the House of Lords the Written Copy of this Book meaning ●con Basilica wherein are some corrections and alterations written with the late King Charles the First 's own Hand assure me That it is none of the said King 's compiling but made by Dr. Gawden Bishop of Exeter which I here insert for the undeceiving others in this point by attesting so much under my hand Anglesey And that the Earl might have left such a Memorandum as is said I do not doubt because I have heard of it so often but what end the first Publisher of it had I cannot devise unless it were to Crucifie his Lord again and by putting in his Stab to His Memory expose him a second time which the more merciful Jews did but once to our Saviour with a Behold the Man and yet notwithstanding all this I doubt not to evince it to every unbiass'd Man that this The Portraiclure of his Sacred Majesty King Charles the First in his Solitudes and Sufferings was an Original drawn by Himself and not by any other Hand or Pencil For 1. He was able to do it as having been early bred up to Letters in design if Prince Henry had lived to be King for the Archbishoprick of Canterbury To which if it be said He had some little difficulty of Speech I answer Jer. 1.6 Exod. 4.10 Nescivit Jeremias loqui and Moses himself was Impeditioris Linguae And what of that It is the Office of a Steward to see the Provision be good and that the Family have it in due Season but I think no Man will say to Cook it himself 2. These Meditations are written feelingly and carry with them the Sense and Language of a Person under such Circumstances Jeremiah in his Prophecy denounceth Judgments to others and speaks with the Tongue of him that sent him but in his Lamentations we see him in distress himself and his Stile is as mournful as the City he bewails And he that reads Job with due consideration instead of doubting whether he wrote it himself cannot but sit down and weep with him Especially taking this with it that the Holy Ghost in his Pen labours more to describe that affliction than ever it did the Felicities of Solomon 3. Neither the Thought nor Stile are in the least like that of Bishop Gawden nor is it to be doubted if he had been the Author of so well a design'd Service to the Memory of a distress'd Father but that he might on the Son's Restauration have reasonably deserv'd a better Bishoprick than that of Exeter especially when so many of those Vacancies were fill'd with Covenanters Whereas on the other hand do but compare this Icon with his Majesty's Speeches in Parliament with his Discourse about Religion with the Marquess of Worcester His Papers with Henderson touching Episcopacy His Letters to the Queen Those his frequent tho' fruitless Messages to both Houses from Hampton-Court and the Isle of Wight when he was under restraint debarr'd of every one that might assist or comfort Him and the Company obtruded upon Him was more sad than any Solitude could be compare I say this Icon Icon. Bas● 195. and them together and then tell me whether they do not all breathe the same Soul and consequently whether they can justly be denied to have proceeded from the same Pen. And for

what the Memorandum further says That King Charles the Second and the Duke of York did assure him it was none of the said King 's compiling c. An Earl it is said wrote it and I dispute it not but this I say That neither the King nor the Duke could speak it of their own knowledge but as by report from others because the King then Prince of Wales from his Expedition into the West with General Ruthien from whence he went off to France could not have seen His Father in near four Years before His death and therefore it seems improbable that the King should have shewn him a Letter To the Prince of Wales and at the same time told him it was not of his own compiling when yet the Letter says Id. I●●n 221. Son if these Papers come to your hands c. and concludes Farewel till we meet if not on Earth yet in Heaven And if the King did not tell him so then what he assured the Earl could not be of his own knowledge And for the Duke of York he was under Thirteen at the Surrender of Oxford from whence he was brought to St. James's where he made his Escape for Dort so that except when he saw his Royal Father at Hampton-Court which could not be often he could not have seen him in two Years and an half before his Death Nor seems it probable that the King should communicate his Thoughts with a Person of those Years albeit a Prince and his Son but not his next Heir But on the contrary more probable for both that what they so spake was but by report which young Princes are but too apt to take up from those who to cover their own Ignorance perswade them it smells too strong of the Pedant for a King to take up a Pen when yet the greatest of former Ages are oftner remmembred by their Pens than their Swords Caesar yet lives in his Commentaries M. Aurelius in his Philosophy and we may read Trajan by his Epistles to Pliny But to come nearer home Our Henry the first is as well known by the Name of Beauclerke as of King of England Henry the Eighth's Pen not his Sword gave him the Title of Defender of the Faith And this the Royal Portraict of our murther'd Sovereign shall outlast every thing but it self and Time Lastly And if there yet want some living credible Testimony of that time or matter of Record since Sir William Dugdate an indefatigable Searcher of our English Antiquities and perfect Master of the Transactions of his own Time gives us this gradual account viz. That these Meditations had been begun by His Majesty in Oxford long before he went from Oxford to the Scots under the Title of Suspiria Regalia That the Manuscript it self written with his own Hand being lost at Naseby was restored to him at Hampton-Court by Major Huntington who had obtain'd it from Fairfax That Mr. Thomas Herbert who waited on His Majesty in his Bed-Chamber in the Isle of Wight and Mr. William Levett a Page of the Back-stairs frequently saw it there and not only read several parts of it but saw the King divers times writing farther on it And that that very Copy was by his Majesty's direction to Bishop Duppa sent to Mr. R. Royston a Bookseller at the Angel in Ivy-Lane the 23d of December 1648. who made such Expedition that the Impression was finish'd before that dismal 30th of January on which the King was bereft of his Life As may be better read from himself Sir W. Dugd●●●'s Short View c. p. 380 381. in his Short View of the late Troubles in England And this further I speak of my own Knowledge That the very next Morning after that horrid Act I saw one of them and read part of it under the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which it now bears And for matter of Record and that the World may the more undeniably be convinc'd that both King Charles the Second and King James the Second did believe this Book was written by their Royal Father let him that doubts it but look upon Reliquiae Sacrae Carolinae Printed it the Year 1662 or any Impression of this Book since that time and he will find prefix'd to them a Privilege or Patent of King Charl● the Second to the said Mr. Royston his Executors c. for the sole Printing and Publishing the Book intituled Reliquiae c. and all other the Works of his said Royal Father and mo● especially mentions these most excellent Meditation and Soliioquies by the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And it so happening that most of that Impression in 1662. coming to be lost in the Fire of London whereby the Book became very dear an● scarce to be had King James the Second upon his coming to the Crown reciting those former Letters Patent grants him the like Privilege for the Printing and Publishing the said Book as it had been in the Year 1662. And now what shall an honest Man do in such a Case s●a● he give Credit to a bare Memorandum of what another said and as 't is most probable by report only or say the Circumstances before were not of weight to two Records For my part I take the King's Certificate to be of high nature yet I should hardly believe th● King himself against any one single Record against which the Law of England admits no Averrment and therefore I think no Man ought to make more of a Posthumous Memorandum than what the Law makes of it In a word these Pathetick Meditations no sooner came abroad than the Nation was undeceiv'd concerning the Author the Scales were fallen from their Eyes and they religiously look'd on Him whom in the simplicity of their Hearts they had pierced These our Pharisees saw and confest it themselves but said they if we let it alone the Romans will come and take away our City And therefore finding they could not suppress them they made it their Eusiness what in them lay to blot them Nay to that impudence they were arrived that and I saw it my self this Icon was exposed to Sale bound up with the Alcoran III. What end I proposed to my self in making this Reply And that 's easily shown nor is it forbidden any Man to burn Incense where the Air 's infected That this Royal Martyr has been calumniated is but too visible but how justly I am coming to examine In which I have this advantage to my hand That Time the Mother of Truth has justified her Daughter concerning Him and might have stopt the Rancour of his most inveterate Enemies but that nothing how evident soever can affect those that have a secret against blushing To be short my end is to vindicate this Good this Just however Unfortunate Prince to blow off that Froth that has been thrown on his Memory and according to my strength deliver him to the World as he was A great if not the only steddy

That all Kings are the Lord 's Anointed it were yet absurd to think that the Anointment of God should be as it were a Charm against Law I know not what he means by that all Kings Saul was David was and particularly laments the fall of Saul As if he had not been anointed with Oil. 2 Sam. 1.11 And I never found any reason to doubt but that all Christian Hereditary Kings are the same too and consequently exempt from the Law forasmuch as concerneth the coactive force of the Law though not forasmuch as concerneth the directive Power of the Law Lord ●le●me●'s post ●●ti 106. Subjects are bound to fullfil the Law by necessity of Compulsion but the Prince only by his own Will in regard of the common good For seeing the Law is but a kind of Organ or Instrument of the Power that governeth Hist of the World 29● it seems saith Sir Walter Rawleigh that it cannot extend it self to bind any one whom no humane power can controul or lay hold of And therefore till I find better Authority for this his Iustice than he has yet given I shall look upon it as I do on the rest of his Book a thing meerly stuffed out to deceive the People If Subjects also by the Law of the Church so much approv'd by this King be invested with a Power of Judicature both without and against their King it will be firm and valid against him though pretending and by them acknowledg'd next and immediately under Christ Supream Head and Governour But what King or Queen of England besides Henry the Eighth Edward the Sixth and Queen Mary for her two first Years ever us'd that word Head Or in what Age was it that the Church of England ever pretended a power of Judicature both without and against their Kings He says if they are invested with such a Power but shews not that they are and instead thereof tells us that St. Ambrose excommunicated Theodosius the Emperour which he calls a Spiritual putting to death The like did St. German by Vortiger And two other Kings of Wales excommunicated by their respective Bishops Subjects of those Kings And admitting it I never heard that any of those Bishops ever perswaded the People that it was lawful to Murther those Kings or how does it make out this his Iustice against the King 'T is a shrewd sign a Man is sinking when he takes hold of Twigs Then he comes up with the particular Laws and Acts of Greece Athens Sparta Rome c. But what 's that to England must we be govern'd as they were Their Laws were for it the Laws of England directly against it Nor is there any Country whatever but has its particular Laws or Customs If a Man steal an Oxe or a Horse in the Isle of Man it is no Felony 4 Inst 285. for having no Woods the Offender cannot hide them but if he steal a Capon or a Pig he shall be hang'd for it But what need we saith he search after the Laws of other Lands for what is so fully and so plainly set down lawful in our own Where antient Books tell us Bracton Fleta and others that the King is under the Law and inferiour to his Parliament As for Bracton the Words that he means may be perhaps these Rex habet Superiorem Deum scilicet Item Legem per quam factus est Rex Item curiam suam viz. Comites Barones The King hath a Superiour to wit God But doth not say Superiours in the Plural Number Also a Law by which he is made King i. e. He hath a Law but says not a word of Punishment Also his Court to wit his Earls and Barons Not a Court as if it were of some others Constitution but a Court of his own Where the word habet in Propriety of Latin is necessarily understood 1 Inst 1. Or otherwise he would be contradictory to himself when he saith Omnis sub Rege Bra. l. 4. c. 24. S. 5. c. Every Man is under the King and he is under none but God He is not inferiour to his Subjects and hath no Peer in his Realm But saith no where that he is under the Law and inferiour to his Parliament which word his sufficiently denotes where the Superiority lies And for Fleta he saith Lib. 1. c. 17. f. 16. None can judge in Temporal Matters but only the King and his Substitutes Id. F. 66. And he hath his Court in his Council in his Parliaments c. And for the Mirrour of Justice a Book written in Edward the First 's time that says Mir● 232. Jurisdiction is the chief Dignity that appertains to the King And for what concerns the King's Oath it has been several times altered since that And what this King's Oath was I have particularly shewn before Chap. 6 Those objected Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy we swore not to his Person but as it was invested with his Authority The same said the Spencers in Edward the Second's time but it was condemned for Treason by two Acts of Parliament 7 Coke 11 12. And Sir Edw. Coke calls it a damnable detestable and execrable Treason For Corps natural le Roy politique sont un Corps Plowd 213.234.242 and are inseparable and indivisible for both make but one King 4 Inst 46. The death of the King dissolve● a Parliament Now if this referr'd only to his politick Capacity the Parliament would continue after his Death because a Body Politick never dies And now as the Covenant once help'd the Houses at a dead lift it must do our Accuser the like Job at parting or this his Iustice will be little beholding to it Certainly no discreet Person can imagine it should bind us to him in any stricter Sense than those Oaths formerly And truly I must approve him when he deals ingenuously no certainly it did not for they broke all three The intent of the Covenant as it was to extirpate Prelacy to preserve the Rights of Parliament and the Liberties of the Kingdom so they intended so far as it might consist with these to preserve the King's Person and Authority but not otherwise for that had been to swear us into Labirynths and Repugnancies We vow'd farther to bring Delinquents to open Tryal and condign Punishment So that to have done so by the King hath not broke the Covenant but it would have broke the Covenant to have sav'd him the chief Actor as they thought him at the time of taking that Covenant Ye have heard what he says and I leave it to every Man to apply it as he pleases But because this matter has already taken up a whole Chapter between us I referr my Reader to what I have there said Chap. 14 And now to close all and if there be any Man has a Mind to learn how to break Oaths by Providence and forswear himself to the Glory of God To say Grace to the action be it never so ungodly and give Thanks for the Success be it never so wicked To carry on a Design under the name of Publick Good and make the slavery of a Nation the liberty of the People Or in a word to hold forth any useful though notorious Untruth with convenient Obstinacy until he believes it himself and so renders it no Sin let him read this Book of Mr. Milton's and if he does not improve upon it he may thank God for it FINIS