confers them as a distribution made to His Creatures and that He may cause them by sensible means to experiment His Goodness The Magnificence of a Man renders him considerable if his Spirit in it be Great and Heroick But it is not enough to have spoken of that which constitutes Felicity we must take some account of the means which conduce unto it Nature Constancy and Reason do contribute to endue us with Virtue The two former do enrich the Mind and dispose it to receive Virtue then Reason being cleared by the light of Precepts makes it spring up and cultivates it Of all Precepts those of greatest efficacy are the Political which being indeed Laws do command and oblige Men to obey in a manner blindly necessitating and constraining us to live well whether we will or no. 'T is upon this ground it hath been said That there lies no servitude at all in submitting to the power of the Law and that it 's the proper act of Men truly free to reduce their inclinations and subject their practice to the same Forasmuch as the conforming of Life and Manners to the impulses of Virtue which is always right always uncorrupt is in truth a setting our our selves at full liberty and an enfranchisement from the Empire of importunate and irregular Passions But of these general Theses enough It is time at length to enter upon the subject which occasion'd my taking up the design of this present Treatise CHAP. III. 1. Of the French Monarchy 2. Of the Situation and Quality of France 3. Of the Nature of the French THE Monarchick Government doth not more excell other Governments than the French Monarchy doth all other Monarchies on Earth It is hereditary and for Twelve whole Ages there hath been seen Reigning from Male to Male upon the Throne of France the August Posterity of Meroue of Charlemagne and of Hugh Capet For it is exactly proved that these three Races of our Kings are Branches issued out of the same Stock This very Succession so Legitimate as it hath been and so long continued makes at present the surest foundation of the welfare of the State and carries in it Splendor Reputation and Majesty Indeed to how many Ills are Elective Kingdoms exposed How many Cabals How many Complottings and in truth Wars are kept on foot by so many different agitations The one and the other Roman Empire and the Kingdom of the Poles do administer sensible proofs of this Opinion If the Spartans heretofore did draw so great an advantage from the Honour they had to be commanded by Princes of the Blood of Hercules The French have far greater cause to glory since in the Catalogue of His Majesties triumphant Ancestors there may be counted an hundred Heroes greater than Hercules himself Is there a Monarch in the World whose just power is more absolute than that of our King and by consequent is there a Monarchy comparable to the French Monarchy It is necessary that the power of a good King be not confin'd within other bounds than Reason and Equity do prescribe otherwise there will ever be division between Princes and People to the ruin of them both What a disorder would it be in Man if the Eye or Hand should fail of following the impulses of the Soul this disobeying and rebellious Member would prove dead or seized with a Palsie If then the whole Body should fall into an universal revolt against the Spirit of Man all the Symmetry the Order and oeconomy would be utterly defaced Thus the Subjects in a Monarchy once ceasing to yield their King a full Obedience and the King ceasing to exercise His Soveraign Authority over them the Political Ligatures are broken the Government is dissolved by little and little all is reduced to extream calamities and oft-times to Anarchy and an annihilation Such are the inconveniencies that occur in Royalties of the Lacedemonian kind where the Prince hath but a limited Authority and if all that England suffer'd in the late times were pourtray'd here it would be easie to observe of what importance it is unto the felicity of a Monarchy that the Prince do in it command without restriction In fine the obedience of instrumental parts as those of Organical Bodies and the Subjects of a State is of so indispensible a necessity that the common good and conservation of that Whole which they compose depends upon it In Democracies even the most tumultuous and disorderly all must bow under the Will of the multitude though blind ignorant and seduced in like manner the parts of the Bodies of Brutes must act by their motions though they be in rage and madness And the reason of this necessity is that the Body and the Soul which is the form thereof are but one indivisible Whole so a King and Subjects are together but one whole that is one State In fine the French Monarchy is accompanied with all the mixture that can be desired for a compleat and perfect Government The Counsellors of State do compose an excellent Oligarchy in it The Parliaments and other Officers of Judicature do form an Aristocracy The Provosts of Merchants the Mayors the Consuls and the General Estates do represent rarely well limited Democracy so that all the different modes of governing by Laws being united in the Monarchy do render it as excellent and consummate as Reason can propose The Regality of France is therefore of the Oeconomick kind in which the King hath an absolute power in his State as the Father of a Family in his House and though he govern at His pleasure and without contradiction it is always for the good of His Kingdom even as the Master of an House does Rule it with an entire Authority and incessantly provides for the accommodating of this Family There is nothing Despotical nor Barbarous in France as in the States of the Moscovites and Turks In short our Laws are Holy and Equitable to a greater degree than in any Common-wealth that ever was and they are conceived with so much prudence and judgement that they are apt to make the People happy in the gentle times of Peace and enable them to triumph in the occasions of War The Situation and Compactness of France are known to all the World so that it would be a needless labour should I here expatiate to shew the Beauty and Richness of our Grounds and of our Rivers or declare how we abound in Wine in Corn in Silk in Wools in Cloth in Wood in Cattle in Salt in Mines and in Money how necessary we are to our neighbours and to what degree we may forego their Succors and their Merchandise I might justly be accus'd of a fondness for superfluous Discourse if I should particularly consider all these great advantages and as much if I should speak of the pureness of the Air and the incredible number of Inhabitants the most ignorant having a full and an assured knowledge of ' em I shall only say that it need not
who is so clear-sighted see what an impoverishment it is to his Kingdom that France be tributary to a Stranger under the Title of Annates Offerings Dispensations Absolutions and Causes Matrimonial Against these Depredations our ancient Kings had provided some remedy by the pragmatick Sanctions vext to see the fairest Revenue of the Kingdom pass over the Alps by a Religious spoil and go into the Purses of those who laugh at our simplicity But what reason is there that they who pay so willingly Tribute to the Pope should make so great difficulty in paying to the King Is it not because they believe they owe all to the Pope and nought to the King St. Paul teaches them to pay Tribute to the Higher Powers inasmuch as they are Ministess of God And St. Chrysostom commenting upon this Text tells them who are these higher Powers If says he the Apostle has establisht this Law whilst the Princes were Pagans how much more ought this to be done under Princes that are Believers And he had said before The Apostle commands this to all even to the Priests Which is more he adds though thou art an Apostle though thou art an Evangelist or a Prophet or what ever else thou art From St. Ambrose we have the same Lesson in his Oration of delivering the Temples If Tribute be demanded refuse it not the Lands of the Church pay Tribute Even Pope Vrban and the Roman Decretal say That the Church pays Tribute of its exterior Goods Also That Tribute must be paid to the Emperors in acknowledgment of the Peace and Repose in which they ought to maintain and defend us The right of Kings and Truth must needs be very strong that could draw from the Pope and his Canonistical Doctors this acknowledgment For the Canon Law was not founded for any other end but to supplant the Civil Laws and establish the Popes Jurisdiction throughout This is a Body of Foreign Laws that have their Tribunal apart and that depends on a Foreign Prince and where the King has nothing to do but look on I mean till such time as he shall please to take cognizance of so unreasonable an Usurpation And forbid that any Cause be judged in France by other Authority than His and much less any Cause commenc'd in France be appeal'd to Rome And in truth he is but a King by halfs till he alone possess all the Jurisdiction exercis'd within his Kingdom This is what Charles du Moulin said in an Epistle to Henry II. where he writes freely against the Empire that the Pope has set up within our France where the Pope has Subjects that submit not to the Laws of the King but to those of the Pope which are the Canon-Law and the Constitutions that come from Rome But some may object Would you have the King judge in Spirituals I Answer That if the King ought not to be Judge it does not follow that the Pope must The King has his Bishops that may and ought to judge of matters purely Spiritual but of nought without being authoriz'd by the King and there is no need of an Authority out of the Kingdom for this I will say more That the Ecclesiastical Government is a part of the Office of a King For so it was in the Kingdom of Israel And who would believe that in this Age and in Spain where the Inquisition Reigns King Philip IV. assum'd to himself the Soveraign Power of Churches within his Dominions For this purpose he apply'd that excellent passage of Isodore which is attributed also to the Council of Paris That the Secular Princes should know that they ought to give an account of the charge of the Church committed to them by Jesus Christ for whether that the Peace or the Discipline receive improvement by believing Princes or that they are impair'd He who committed the Church to their Power will demand an account O the excellent passage O the Holy Lesson God give all Christian Kings the Grace so well to learn it that they may never leave this Charge of the Church which Jesus Christ has committed to them upon the hands of Strangers and when they have taken it into their own hands to acquit themselves worthily and render a good account Alas Alas Have Kings Eyes to see their Rights and have they no hands to maintain them Are they quick-sighted enough to perceive that the Government of the Church is committed to them and that they are to render an account to God and have they not the courage to rescue them from unjust and strange Hands that snatch them away Think they to acquit themselves of this great Account of the Government of the Church of their Kingdoms by saying That the Holy Father has discharg'd them of it when they have in their hands the power to discharge Him from his Usurpations In Truth they will never be in condition to Govern the Church committed to them they will never be but Kings by halfs till they have banisht from their Territories this pretended Spiritual Jurisdiction which destroys the Civil and which will draw under its Cognizance all sorts of Causes there being none wherein there is not some matter of Conscience or some kind of Transgression of Gods Commandments and that by consequence belongs not to the Jurisdiction of the Pope if He must be own'd the Soveraign Spiritual Judge in France The Popes themselves inform our Kings of their Right to Govern the Church Leo IV. writing to Lewis and to Lotharius did not he own that the Investiture of the Bishop comes from the Emperor and the Pope has only the Consecration Did not He beseech the Emperor to invest a person he had recommended and does he not acknowledge that the Metropolitan dares not Consecrate him without the Emperors consent And Pope John X. in his Epistle to Hereiman of Cologue about the business of Heldwin of Tongres does he not observe That the old Custom has this force that none ought to confer a Bishoprick upon any Clerk save the King to whom the Scepter has been given of God The Council held at Thionvil under Lewis the Debonnair An. 835. gives us this good Maxim That the Pope ought to be call'd Pope and Brother not Father and Pontifex and that Lewis had more Power in the Government of the Gallicane-Church than the Bishop of Rome as Agobard Bishop of Lions has it in his Treatise of the Coâ—â—â—â—…ison of the Two Governments related by Bossellus in his Decretals Gregory Turonensis does furnish us with more than Ten Examples of the right of Investiture belonging to our Kings before the Empire fell into their hands In the times of Clovis they held the Royal Right of the Investiture of Bishops They had also a Right which they call'd Regal which was the Power of enjoying vacant Bishopricks and Prebends and the moveables of Bishops dying without a Will And it is very easie to prove that under the first Line of our Kings and a long while under
the true ground of the great hatred that is born us is it not for that if we are to be believ'd there would not in France be any French-man that is not the Kings Subject Causes Beneficial and Matrimonial would not be carried to Rome nor the Kingdom be Tributary under the shadow of Annates and the like Impositions And on this Subject the Testimony of Cardinal Perron for us in his Harangue to the Third State is very considerable wheâ— he says The Doctrine of the Deposition of Kings by the Pope has been held in France until Calvin Whereby he tacitely acknowledges That our Kings had been ill serv'd before and that those he calls Hereticks having brought to light the Holy Scripture have made the Right of Kings be known which had been kept supprest Shall they be said Friends of the State who owning themselves Subjects of a Stranger Soveraign dare endeavour to make themselves Masters of all the Temporal Jurisdiction of which the Marquess complains loudly and with good cause and of the great resistance they have made to maintain themselves in an Usurpation so unreasonable In this kind those of the Church of the Reform'd Religion could never be accus'd in the Towns where we have had some Power Our Religion is hated because it combats the Pride the Avarice and the Usur pations of the Court of Rome and their Substitutes in the Kingdom and because we have shewn to the World that sordid Bank of spiritual Graces they have planted in the Church and how they have drawn to themselves a Third of the Lands of France for fear of Purgatory from silly People mop'd with a blind Devotion and from Robbers and Extortioners who have thought to make Peace with God by letting these share in the booty 'T is an advice very suitable to the Politicks of France to examine well the Controversies that are most gainful to the Clergy as this of Purgatory concerning which an old Poet said the Truth in his way of Drollery But if it be so That no more Souls shall go To old Purgatory Then the Pope will gain nought by the Story It would be wisely done to examine what necessity there is for so many Begging-Fryers that suck out the Blood and Marrow of devout People and for so many Markets of Pardons in honour of a number of Saints of a new Edition and for what design are made so many Controversies And whether it would not be a great Treasure for the Kings Subjects to Teach them to work out their Salvation and put their Consciences in quiet at a cheaper rate God justly provok'd by the great Sins of France gives us not yet the Grace of that Gospel-Truth St. John Ch. 8. Know the Truth and the Truth will set you free And though it shines out so clear to let us see the Usurpation of the Popes upon the Temporals of the King and upon the Spirituals of the Church yet see we not clearly enough to discover all the mystery of Iniquity and to resolve to shake off the Yoak For this great design no other War need be made by the Pope but only take from him all Jurisdiction in France all Annates and all evocation of Causes to Rome This would hardly produce any other stirrs but the complaints and murmuring of them that are loosers And the condition truly Royal that the King at present is in will sufficiently secure Him from Insurrections at home and Invasions from abroad Or should any happen behold more than an hundred thousand Huguenots that the Noble Marquess has sound him in the heart of his State whom he is pleas'd to call His Enemies but who on all occasions and on this especially would do His Majesty a hearty and faithful Service The two main Interests of France being to weaken the House of Austria the Princes of which enclose him on both sides and to throw off the yoake of Rome which holds a Monarchy within the French Monarchy 't is easie to judge that amongst the Kings Subjects the Protestants are absolutely the most proper to serve him on both these occasions I know that amongst the Roman Catholicks as well Ecclesiasticks as Seculars there are excellent Instruments to serve the King in both these Interests But there is need of great caution to well assure him by reason of the multitude of Jesuits Scholars with whom these Fathers have Industriously fill'd all Professions of the State and Church and it is for no other end that they have so many Colledges They who have been too good Scholars of these Masters are contrary to both these Interests being so great Catholicks that they espouse the Interest of the Catholick King to advance that of his Holiness But to find amongst the Protestants trusty Instruments for both these accounts he need not try them they are fitted and form'd by their Education for these two Uses so necessary to France The Marquess assures His Majesty with good reason of the friendship of the Protestant Princes of Germany which they would never testifie so freely as in serving him to ruin the Power of the Pope who savours that of the House of Austria For thereby they would kill two Birds with one Stone Not to mention our other Neighbours who have broken with Rome and being disquieted by its secret practises will be ready to contribute to its destruction Who shall well consider the Scheme of the Affairs of Christendem shall judge that all things invite His Majesty to shut out the Jurisdiction of Rome beyond the Mountains Right Honour Profit Liberty Facility his Duty to his Crown to his Subjects and to his Royal Posterity and that many Aids smile upon him both within and out of his Kingdom for so fair and so just an Enterprize This is the warm desire of the honest French-men And none there are who better deserve that Title than they who with the most Indignation resent that their Kings should kiss the Feet of that Prelate who ought of Right to kiss their Feet for having receiv'd his Principalities from Kings of France and who in recompence of their good Deeds have plotted and plot continually their ruin When the King shall have deliver'd Himself and his People from this strange yoak he will find the enmity amongst his Subjects for matter of Religon greatly diminisht and the way open to a re-union And were the difficulties about the Doctrine overcome the Protestants would not stick much at the Discipline God who is the Father of Kings and the King of Glory protect and strengthen our Great King to accomplsh the Designs that turn to the general good of His Church to the greatness and to the respect of his Sacred Person and to the Peace and Prosperity of His State FINIS
when for the continued space of ten years the Receivers have accompted for it to the Chamber There are many questions proposable in reference to the Demesne but it is not our business to State them Chopin may be consulted who hath learnedly written of this Subject In necessities of the State divers things have been engaged by the King to the use of private private persons who have paid in Sums thereupon Yet these persons cannot hinder but that the things may be recovered And there are two equitable ways to effect this The First is by making a Principal of what is due to those Creditors and assigning them Rents upon the Town Hall of Paris or some other place of which there are examples For when the King had Sold or rather engaged some Rights of His unto particular Men they have been resum'd by Contracts for a Rent-charge Now those Rights were Demesne upon which to recover the Demesne Rents were charged The same course then may be taken again Nor could the Engagees have any cause to complain for the engagements made to 'em are but to secure their due and give them not any propriety their security therefore will be as great when they have Contracts for Rent For the one and the other pertains to the Demesne still And such kind of Impositions in like manner the power to impose them being Royal and Dominical the Engagees concerned will by this means have security for security and Rent for Rent But that the King may reap advantage from this exchange it is necessary to settle a Stock for the raising of these new Rents and to that end a new Imposition must be laid upon the Clergy the Countries of State Cities Commonalties Companies Colledges Merchants and other Members of the Kingdom the Engagees themselves paying their proportions There is in this no inconvenience at all because the Demesne having been engaged for the preservation and defence of all the Corporations in the Kingdom it is natural that they all contribute to free it again The second way to disengage the Demesne would be by giving ready Money instead of Rents and making an Imposition for this end which might be more easie A reimbursement should be compleated in five or six years Mean time and before all things the Engagees must be put out of Possession and order given that the Receivers of the Demesne do take up the profits For if any condition be propos'd while the said Engagees are in possession they will make a thousand difficulties at it and on the contrary if they no longer possess they will readily consent But that the matter may be transacted with less noise it ought to be expedited in each Parliament apart or at least the Receivers commanded by virtue of a Decree of the Kings Council to receive all the profits and even those of the engaged Demesnes If there be not made a new imposition in order to recover those Demesnes the affair will not be of advantage to the King and there may one be very justly made for the reasons now alledged and for the putting of things again in order Let us pass unto the art of the Tallies The Imposition of the Tallies or Taxes is a kind of Subsidy or Aid laid upon the people Under it in France are comprehended the Tallion and the Subsistance as they term them The Tallie is hugely equitable it is ancient it is necessary and in use all the world over For there never was People that paid not to defray the publick Expences In France it is so moderate and may be so easily paid that it hath been known to be higher than now it is because the sums that make it up are receiv'd without much trouble Yet at present though it be considerably diminish'd the People are scarce able to pay it and the Country extreamly incommodated by it The prime cause of this is that the ratable persons considered the rates are not duely proportion'd the rich Peasants the Justicers of the Villages the Gentlemens Farmers the Eleus and other Persons of Power are so eased that they pay almost nothing and the poorest of all do bear all A second cause of the mischief is that they who are Commission'd to receive the Tallies do so run up the charges that they far exceed the principal and thus draw Money out of the Peoples hands which they can part with but once When the Sergeants of Villages need a Cow or Corn or some piece of Houshould-stuff they go to the Peasants houses where they know the same is to be had there they make Seizures and then Sales at what price they please They seize and sell whatever they find to the very Household-loaf of Bread that hath been cut and is in use upon this the poor Rustick hath nothing left to help himself but is utterly distressed and can no longer do his work The greatest part of these Officers must be suppress'd the more there are of them in the matter of the Finances the more disorder and oppression there is For all of them look for profit and they spoil all by their avarice and ignorance To remedy the two Evils that have been mention'd effectual order must be taken that the Peasants may pay equally that is in proportion to the estate they have and pay without charges superadded First all the Taxes should be made real as they are in Languedoc that every one may pay Secondly The Tax should be levied in kind of the fruits that are receiv'd from the Lands and Tenements as Wine Sider Beer Corn Cattle and the like the quantity that is to be taken being stinted and fix'd for example to a Tenth part A Peasant that might have ten Bushels of Corn would very willingly pay one to the King and might do it without inconvenience But when for payment of Forty Sous in Money which he hath not the Sergeants and Collectors seize upon and sell the ten Bushels of Corn which too are priz'd at an extream low rate and all is spent in charges doth he not really instead of Forty Sous pay Twenty Livres This turns not at all to the profit of the King and tends to the undoing of his People Under the name of Lands and Tenements this Tenth might be extended unto Houses in Cities Towns and Villages and they ordered to pay a Tenth part of the Money they might be let out for which should be very low rated In like manner a Tenth or Twentieth part might be taken upon Contracts for a Rent-charge For these are stocks and a real Estate The Ecclesiasticks who have sure been wary men have taken their Rents in kind and these sorts of Rents are now infinitely augmented The greatest part of the Revenues of the Romans and Aegyptians themselves was paid in Fruits They paid their Armies and Officers with them Many Kings have taken a Tenth of Estates oft-times a Fifth sometimes a Third It is not necessary that the People have Money but they must have Fruits
they have lost had they well examin'd our Ports and Havens in fine had they compar'd the Coasts of France with those of England they would condemn their Vanity as Canutus one of their ancient Kings did 'T is true all States are not disposed unto Navigation either because they are too far up in Midland Countries or because the temper of the People suits not with it or because they want Subjects but 't is so far that any of these Obstacles should hinder the French from addicting themselves unto it that on the contrary all things conspire to raise desire of it in them and to give them hope of advantageous success The work however is such as must be leisurably carried on and perfected by little and little so great a design continually allarming Europe Asia Africa and America Friends and Foes A precipitation of it would be its ruine I say not what number of Vessels would be fit for France to put to Sea But I affirm that the King may keep an hundred Gallies and an hundred Ships on the Mediterranean and a Fleet of Two hundred Sail upon the Ocean The more Vessels He shall have the more enabled He will be to recover the expence made about ' em As to the building of such numbers six or ten years of time may be allotted for it and there is Timber in France there is Cordage there are Sails there is Iron and Brass there are Victuals and Workmen so that the King's Subjects will gain the Money which is laid out in ' em Is it not far better for the King of France to build Ships for the employing and enriching of His Subjects than it was for the Kings of Aegypt to build their useless Pyramids There need be no anxious enquiry whence a Stock should rise for this advance every year will bring in Money and the Vessels once made and their Guns mounted it will not cost the King a Quardecu for other Equippings 'T will be but to give the Captains Places in the Ships and Gallies on condition to fit them out and there will more persons come to take them than there will be Offices and Places to be bestowed 'T is true Fleets being out there will need vast Sums to maintain them but the Sea will yield a maintenance for the Sea either by Commerce or by War Neither will it be always proper to keep so many Vessels in service On the other hand it will not be necessary to have so many Troops at Land as are at present For Spain or Italy will not dare to disfurnish themselves of their Men so there will be no need of a Land-Army but towards Germany The number of Rowers will be made up by bringing Men from Canada and the American Islands or by buying Negroes at Cape Verde or by sending all Malefactors to the Gallies And when things have taken their course Seamen will be had time and the profit that will accrue will afford store and bring them in from all parts of the World Hereupon the Corsairs of Algiers Tunis and Tripoli will not be able to keep at Sea and the French being continually on their Coasts they will be constrain'd to tarry at home for the guarding of their Towns so not in a condition to send out Troops for collecting the Tribute which they exact of the Arabs and Princes who lye further up in Africa the Tributaries will without fail revolt and the King may in the sequel Treat with them for their recovering their Liberty and take them into his Protection There is no cause to fear the Power of the Ottoman Port in this particular For beside that the Turks are no good Seamen the Grand Signior doth make no such account of the Pyrats of Algier as that their fortune is considerable to Him The Friendship of the French is more necessary for Him both in point of Commerce and in reference to other Interests The Fleets which the King might keep upon the Ocean would make Him Master of all the Powers and Trade of the North. Yea though the English and Hollanders should unite against France they could not avoid their ruin in the end For how should the one and the other make good their Commerce which is all they have to trust to if they were forced to maintain great Armada's to continue it The point of Bretannie is the Gate to enter into and go out of the Channel Fifty Ships of War at Brest would keep this Gate fast shut and they should not open it but by the King's Command Spain and Portugal would not be able to attempt any thing but by His permission if there were kept a Fleet on the Coast of Guyenne Thus there would need no War almost to be made for all these things nor His Majesties Forces hazarded It would be sufficient to give his Order to Forreiners Nor will it be difficult to cut them out work in their own Countries and by this means stay their Arms at home and make them spend their strength there I shall something of this in its place hereafter There is one further excellent means to strengthen the King at Sea and it is the taking Order that no more of His Subjects go to Malta To do this there must be given in Fee to the French Knights of St. John of Jerusalem some Isle in the Mediterranean as for Instance the Isle du Levant for which they should pay an acknowledgment to the King as they do for Malta to the King of Spain There might be given them too on the same condition an Isle in the Ocean as Besle-Isle l'Isle-Dieu or the Isle of Ree so that the French Knights fighting not but against the Enemies of their Country they would make War upon the English as upon Turks and keep the Islands at their own charge whereas the King is fain to keep great Garisons and be at vast expence to do it There is no cause to fear that they will ever give the King any trouble for being French they cannot fail of Affection or Obedience and their Kindred together with the Wealth they have in France will be perpetual Hostages to the King and caution for their Fidelity This Project is just for of ten parts of the Knights of Malta no less than eight do come from the Commanderies of France and it is easie to be put in execution for there need be only a stopping the income of the Commanderies to effect it The Order in general will find its advantages in it both in that there will be an addition made it of two considerable Islands and that the King will receive the Knights into a more particular Protection than he hath done hitherto The number of Commanderies may also be augmented by giving them some Maladeries or Hospitals for the diseased which are always usurped by People that have no right to them at all Be it observed in the last place that it is very requisite the Office of Admiral and Powers of the Admiralty