Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	authority_n	power_n	supreme_a	1,645	5	8.3158	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B11821	Horæ subseciuæ observations and discourses.	Chandon, Grey Brydges, Baron, d. 1621.; Cavendish, Gilbert.; Newcastle, William Cavendish, Duke of, 1592-1676.; Hobbes, Thomas, 1588-1679.	1620 (1620)	STC 3957; ESTC S105996	135,065	562

likely Rome should not haue beene suffered to haue encroched so fast on her neighbours Now we haue seene the times in which this Citie was built let vs next view how many Kings successiuely reigned ouer it and how long this gouernment continued ●●r●t Romulus began and there succeeded him after one yeeres interregency Numa Pompilius then Tullus Hostilius after him Ancus Martius his successor was Tarquinius Priscus next to him Seruius Tullius and last of all Tarquinius Superbus All whose reignes being gathered together amount to the number of 240. yeeres and hath beene compared by Florus to the infancy of a man and commonly accounted the infancy of Rome though I cannot finde that they were much vnder the Rod till this last Kings Reigne who to his cost found them already growne too stubborne The next gouernment of this State was Consulary Libertatem Consulatum Lucius Brutus instituit Liberty and the Consulship Lucius Brutus brought in Euery one that hath read the Roman Histories can tell how much this act of Lucius Brutus hath beene magnified insomuch as they instituted in the honour of it an Holiday by the name of Regifugium and how the imitation of it drew another of the same race and name into such another action who came not off with the like applause though otherwise with the like fate But I shall neuer thinke otherwise of it then thus Prosperū foelix scelus Virtus vocatur For it was but a priuate wrong and the fact not of the King but the Kings Sonne that Lucretia was rauished Howsoeuer this together with the pride and tyranny of the King gaue colour to his expulsion to the alteration of gouernment And this is by the Author entitled Liberty not because bondage is alwayes ioyned to Monarchy but where Kings abuse their places tyrannize ouer their Subiects and wink at all outrages and abuses committed against them by any either of their children or fauorites such vsurpation ouer mens estates and natures many times breakes forth into attempts for liberty and is hardly endured by mans nature and passion though reason and Religion teach vs to beare the yoke So that it is not the gouernment but the abuse that makes the alteration be termed Liberty This Consulary gouernment began about Anno Mundi 3422. not long after the beginning of the second generall Monarchy which was of the Persians amongst whom reigned Cambyses Xerxes and Artaxerxes all within the space of fiftie yeeres or thereabouts And in the Athenian State liued Themistocles and Aristides in those dayes famous Now during this Consulary gouernment there were others intermixt Dictaturae ad tempus sumebantur Dictators were chosen but vpon occasion This Magistrate for power was limited onely by his owne will For time hee had limits from the Senate and those so short that their power could doe little hurt and bred little ambition They had now authoritie like absolute Kings and by and by had no more then a King in a Play But when it came to the hands of such as could not easily be constrained to lay it downe they found it of that power that by the colour thereof the people were bereaued of their liberty and enthralled to Sylla during pleasure and to Caesar during life But the Dictatorship is not to bee accounted another forme of gouernment but onely an Office in the Common-wealth though for the time supreme Neque Decemviralis potestas vltrabiennium The Decemviri passed not two yeeres After the people had deliuered themselues from the authority of Kings and came themselues to vndergoe the cares of gouernment they grew perplexed at euery inconuenience and shifted from one forme of gouernment to another and so to another and then to the first againe like a man in a feuer that often turneth to and fro in his bed but finds himselfe without ease and sicke in euery posture They that could not endure one King were soone weary of ten Tyrants and for their extreame ambition vexation and cruelty as also because of the licētious and barbarous lust of Appius Claudius one of the number who for the satisfying of his appetite had iudged a free womā to slauery they soon extirped that authority but indeed the thing they most feared was that they saw those who possessed the power for the present would not giue it ouer but sought to make it personall and perpetuate it to themselues They were iealous of their liberty and knew not in whose hands to trust it and were often at the point to lose it but at this time licentious and inordinate lust gaue them once more an occasion to shake off the yoke As afore the Tarquins so now the Decemviri suffer for the same offence They for the rauishing of a Wife these for the intended deflowring a Virgin the first acted and her selfe reuenging it on her selfe by her owne hand the second purposed but preuented by a Fathers hand in the murther of his owne Daughter This alteration in gouernment began 58. yeeres after the expulsion of Kings about Anno Mundi 3500. And 19. yeeres after this time began the Peloponnesian warres In these times liued Pericles Alcibiades and Thucidides in the State of Athens Neque Tribunorum militum Consulare ius diu valuit Neither did the Consularie authority in Tribunes of the Souldiers remaine long in force After the Decemvirate they returned againe to Consuls they were not long content with them but bestowed the same authority on Tribunes of the soldiers and weary of these they had againe recourse vnto the Consulship For the State at that time being young and weake loued change variety of gouernments but the emulation of the Commons to equalize the Nobility did giue the principall occasion to these alterations For on whomsoeuer the commons conferred the supreme authority the Senate and Nobility still gained in all suites and offices to be preferred before them which was the cause of most of the seditions and alterations of the State Non Cinnae non Sullae longa dominatio The domination of Cinna Sulla did not long endure It is true that these men attained vnto supreme power by violence force but yet I cannot think that to haue beene the cause why their power was so soone at an end For though violence cannot last yet the effects of it may and that which is gotten violently may bee afterwards possessed quietly and constantly For Augustus also tooke vpon him the Monarchy by force and yet he so settled it as the State could neuer recouer liberty These tooke no order and it may be had no intention to reduce the State of the Commonwealth to a Monarchy more then for their owne times else they might peraduenture haue found waies how to haue mollified or extinguished the fiercer allured the gentler sort prepared the whole State to a future seruitude and what they had obtained by armes haue assured to themselues by politike prouisions which not doing was the cause that their authoritie came

their own worth consequently often changeth their manners into the worse but especially that it encreaseth their pride insolence As for his educatiō in a house of souerainty that might put into the heads of these censuring subiects thus much for certainly they liked neuer a iot the better of Tiberiꝰ for hauing bin brought vp in so high a Schoole of soueraignty as the house of Augustus First that what seeds soeuer of haughtines and pride were in him hereditary and which he possessed by vertue of his bloud were now also through long custome sprung vp wanted but the season of reigning to bring forth their vnpleasant fruit Secondly that hauing by experience vnder so learned a master in the Art of gouernment beene taught how to hold them vnder as much as himselfe should please they could not looke for any remissenesse to proceede from want of knowledge how to keepe them low and consequently were sure to find his gouernment euery way vneasie Neijs quidē annis quibꝰ Rhodi specie secessꝰ exulem egerit aliquid quam iram simulationem secretas libidines meditatum Neither those yeeres that he liued vnder colour of retiremēt in exile at Rhodes did he meditate anything but wrath dissimulation secret lust It is reported of Tiberius that at the first hee trauelled voluntarily to Rhodes but being there he was cōmanded to stay Howsoeuer it was he obtained the fairename of retirement to couer the ignominy of banishment A man would perhaps thinke that aduersity should rather quench or at least asswage those passions which haue their life especially from great prosperity as wrath dissimulation lust And so it doth when the aduersitie is so great that the hope is lost of reducing their meditations into act But otherwise it worketh a cleane contrary effect For wheras anger commonly dyeth where reuenge is despaired of dissembling is laid aside where the labor of it is vain imaginations of lust diminish where they can neuer be accōplished whē aduersity is but such as they expect to ouercom it often falleth out that the hope which nourisheth such imaginations is enflamed thereby and men please their vicious fancies for the present with the cōceit of what they wil execute with effect hereafter when they shal haue the power This was the case of Tiberius and a cause of feare cēsure in those that were to liue in subiectiō vnder him Accedere matrem muliebri impotentiâ seruiendū foeminae duobꝰ insuper adolescentibꝰ qui Remp. interim premant quandoque distrahant That besides this there was his mother offeminine impotence that they were to serue a woman two yong men that would for the present oppresse the Commonwealth might hereafter rend it Next to the person of Tiberius they considered in him those of his Family that would also looke for seruice and obedience at their hands namely his Mother two sonnes Germanicus by adoption and his owne naturall sonne and thought them no small grieuance to the Commonwealth For it is a hard matter to serue and please well one Master but to please two or more when there is or may be betwixt them competition or iealousie leauing out that one of them is a woman is altogether impossible The cause hereof is not because the diligence and dexterity of a man cannot suffice for the quantity of seruice but because the quality of it will not permit for the seruice that the one will expect from you is most times this That you displease the other And this proceeds from the emulatiō of those that are in the way to autority that oftē labor not so much to outrunne each other in the course as they do to trip vp one anothers heeles And the same emulation when they once draw neere the races end makes them snatch at the prize and fall to violence and warre and to distract and draw the Cōmonwealth into faction and sedition FINIS A DISCOVRSE OF ROME A DISCOVRSE OF ROME IN the sight of any place there bee two especial Obiects Antiquitie and Greatnesse both which none can sooner challenge then Rome in the very beginning noted for Soueraignty The continuance of which in such diuersity of gouernments as Kings Consuls Tribunes Dictators Emperors cannot but shew a diuine power for otherwise so many changes might in all likelihood haue bred confusion and so consequently suppressed their rising to so great an Empire which as the last so it may be truely stiled the greatest that yet the world euer knew or heard of obtained onely by the valour of this one Citie no Commander and for a long time no Souldier that came not out from thence So that it may bee said the people of this one place made themselues masters of the rest Wherevpon they might haue iust cause to esteeme Orbem in vrbe the world confined in their Citie In the height of whose Imperiality which was in Augustus raigne Christ came into the world This as then the chiefe Commandresse of the whole was the place where holinesse and religion aymed to haue their principall plantation where during the time of the infidelity of the Emperours till Constantine the great who was the first that maintained the faith it is infinite to comprehend the tyrannizing ouer Christians the martyrdomes they endured so many that it is hard to name any who sealed not his faith with his bloud But now Constantine was conuerted to see the ill effects so good a cause produced cannot but breed admiration For the Ambition of the Bishops of Rome made this their first step to greatnesse and subuersion of the Empire How grounded vpon this donation I cannot imagine nor I thinke they yet well defend but this was the true Originall by which in succession of time the Empire was translated The zeale of this and some succeeding Emperours was so well taken hold of by the Prelates of Rome that by degrees they assumed more authority to themselues then was due the other in a manner before they were aware losing all at Rome but the title From which pretended power the Popes now take to themselues supremacie in all causes through all Kingdomes in the world and those which were before their superiours to bee as it were subiect and created by them that were their creatures Which shewes a great contrariety to the pretended arguments of Romanists for superiority and rather may bee returned vpon them that this their greatnesse hath more risen by encroachment then right Why therefore Princes haue beene so blinded with their pretences for greatnesse I cannot tell wherevnto to attribute it except to the fate of this place that hath euer beene or aymed to bee the Mistris of the world First by their wisedome and power and then vnder colour of Religion and Saint Peters Keyes And now to the description of Rome as I saw it In which I will neither goe beyond mine owne knowledge and fly to the reports of others nor yet so strictly