against our Gracious Soveraign and by designing his Majesty the Time and Person are both made known For it is not probable that from the present French King such fruit shall proceed by his conversion to the Reformed Religion or so easing the burthens of his Subjects having seized already lately on Aurange and Marseilles two great receptacles for those of the Religion and their ancient Liberties and who still threatneth Geneva Now here I must take leave to assume liberty to draw an Argument from that which is not yet fullfilled but begun only accounting it as already done For thus doth S. Paul from the certain conversion of the Jews which was then to be but neither in his time nor to this day fulfilled Rom. 11. perswade the Christians not to despise that people but account them as brethren And the Holy Ghost assuring us of the burning of the City of Rome a thing not yet accomplished adviseth the people of God to leave that City lest they should perish with it Revel 18. 4. Thus I having already declared and by the fore-going reasons proved that K. Charles II will perform by Gods Grace undoubtedly in England all the promised matters do by probable conjecture infer that it shall in France be performed by him also For to do such great matters is not every day seen None of all the Kings of France since King Clovis nor French Kings have cured the putrid sores of that Kingdom None of the 27. Kings and Queens of England from the Confessor have done that till now Nor is it probable that any of the French Kings there educated would be of the Reformed Religion And as much unlikely it is that any of those Kings should take away all the Corruption in Justice and Manners But since it must be done how probable may it seem that it can be done by none else but by him who hath done the like in England and may do the same in France unto which Kingdom he hath a most just Title So much for my first Argument Secondly It is not likely that God will honour him who hath not the right as him who hath the just Title to that Crown with so glorious a work in that place For the Crown of France by just Title is devolved upon our Gracious Soveraign from Edward III King of England in right of his mother Queen Isabella She was daughter unto Philip the Fair King of France which Philip had three sons successively Kings of France viz. Lodowik Hutin Philip the Tall and Charles the Fair all which dying without issue Isabella their only sister remaining alive was married unto Edward II King of England by whom she had issue Edward III to whom our Royal Soveraign is the next heir by descent from him Against whose right the French do only pretend the Salique Law by which no daughter of France is admitted to the Crown but when and by what sufficient authority there enacted their Lawyers give us no satisfaction And the Reasons why the Person is not so expresly designed for France as here before for England are of moment 1. Because by setting us to enquire after that Prince who shall work so great a happiness to that Kingdom we are thereby driven to finde out the causes for which most probably God may give as He hath formerly given Kingdoms to Princes and extraordinary possessions to others Princes such an opportunity and blessing we may thereby light upon the very Person For God hath made all things for his own Glory and all men but specially Princes induing them for that purpose with great power and those which suffer great things for his sake and stand for him and love his people he seldome sends them away without some ample recompence in this life Yet it was needful that the King whom the Lord had appointed for the happiness of England should be more clearly discovered as it hath pleased God to do touching our Royall Soveraign For who could conjecture that a Prince who had been so exceedingly enraged by the wickedness of some should be so merciful as to spare his cruel enemies and to be so loving and merciful to his people so tender toward those whose consciences cannot admit that for fear of man which their sincere love to God made them to deny if God had not more expresly shewn King CHARLES II to be that Good Prince For which cause the King which shall be the Deliverer of France is more obscurely figured because he is already discovered in the Type of Englands Helper 2. Because the assurance of what shall be by our Soveraign done in France to Gods people there which cannot be until he rule there as King shall appear unto his Royal Majesty when God shall move his Heart to begin in England first so that the Lord would have him to hasten that great weighty and heroick work Now let us look back to the causes which the Lord seemeth to have respect unto in making King CHARLES so happy and see if we can finde like Examples Observe his unjust and cruel sufferings Shall a Prince who after the murther of his Royal Father under the pretence of Justice by the most unjust Judges which ever sate in Judgement and by feigned Holiness was banished with the whole Royal Family as malefactors and the King himself made a Traytor and his precious life hunted after shall his Innocence with the rest of that Royal house against none of whom the least crime or cause was objected only make his people happy May a King who hath suffered such wrongs and done such excellent things for God and his people expect no blessing but a bare restitution God owes no man any thing but what we receive is of gift yet the Lord Almighty hath not wont but in such cases to shew his acceptance and make recompence Nebuchadrezzar for fighting against the City of Tyre which rejoyced at the captivity of the Jews when they were carried unto Rabylon received the Kingdom of Egypt as a reward of his labor Ezek. 29. ver 18. Son of man Nebuchad-rezzar King of Babylon caused his Army to serve a great service against Tyrus every head was made bald and every shoulder was peeled yet had he no wages nor his army for Tyrus for the service which he served against it Ver. 19. Therefore thus saith the Lord God Behold I will give the land of Egypt unto Nebuchad-rezzar King of Babylon and he shall take her multitude and take her spoil and take her prey and it shall be the wages for his army Ver. 20. I have given him the land of Egypt for his labor wherewith he served against it because they wrought for me saith the Lord God And did not the Lord bestow upon Queen Elizabeth of blessed memory for her imprisonment for maintaining of Gods true Religion for resisting the Spaniard befriending the French against the League and protecting the Neatherlands the Kingdom of Ireland For what of that Kingdom had all her
wonderful Disease in its Nature this is much more to be wondred at in the CURE What notable Cures have been done in QUEEN ELIZABETHS time by her Royal Hand reade the Learned Treatise of D. Tooker de Charismate Sanationis Let those which doubt hereof which I know some do which nevertheless love and honour the King repair to the Court with his Majesties leave and there behold multitudes toucht by his Royall Hands and comparing the condition of such who have been toucht afterward with what it was before shall finde this vertue ascribed to his Majesty true and so resolve their doubts Yet what doth this wonderful Remedy work in the mindes of those which behold and feel it more then wonder and astonishment Doth it cause any other effect in the most wise and learned Certainly it doth not only they account the utmost of the thing to be a singular blessing to our Nation whose King God hath indued above other Princes with such a blessing to his subjects But we know that miraculous mercies have been Signal also else the raising of the dead man by the touch of Elisha's dead body 2 King 13. 21. and the restoring of life unto the childe of the Shunnamite by him had not been wrought but to shew the vertue of Christs death and the applying of Christ unto us who are dead in sins as the Prophet joyned his own unto the childes body 2 King 4. 34. although they were mercies withall Moreover it encreaseth the wonder of our Kings Gift of Healing that his power extends not so far as to heal all other diseases like as the Struma why not the Feaver the Gout Palsie c. and that all Patients and why every one receive not benefit by his Royal Hands All this must of necessity cause wonder in those that consider all this even to astonishment But wonder never was the utmost end for which the Lord at any time did send his Miracles which indeed is nothing more than an inthralling and captiving of the understanding and reason that it can move no farther which comes short in us of the end which the Lord aims at in his marvellous works Much less doth wonder distinguish one work from another Our Saviour did his Miracles to shew and make them know he was the promised Messias which when they saw all men as the Evangelist tels us marvelled But did this effect answer the end which the Lord intended thereby Plainly it did not Much less doth astonishment and amazement at the sight of the Lords mighty and strange works make any the least difference between them but that one Answer must be given of them all as I wonder at these strange things or God knows what they mean Admiration indeed is the way which God hath ordained for men to look up for a higher Workman than ordinary as when a man is led into a maze or labyrinth he is taught by nature to seek a way out which needs must be the Author of so great a matter and as the work it self is not light and vulgar that is wrought so must it be for some extraordinary end which ought to be sought out The wondring at these two Diseases hath seized upon many but it hath pleased Almighty God of his meer mercy to make known unto me the Causes why they were sent his love unto King Charles II and his Pity toward the long distressed people of England by the Gracious and Happy Government of our Royal Master For what am I in knowledge or learning more nay I am less then others that I should attribute the knowledge of these Mysteries to my self But in a time of great wickedness and affliction in a time of the sadness of my heart presently after the Lord had delivered me from a sickness past hope of recovery about ten years since which is not hard to prove the Lord made this known unto me Blessed be his Holy Name so that there is nothing altered in the Interpretations saving that of late some few things have by Gods Grace been added as an enlargement But that I may finde out the signification of the second Disease the KINGS-EVIL it will be necessary that it be enquired whether the cure of this Disease hath alwaies been performable by our Kings of England and if not who and what he was who first of our English Kings had this Gift of Healing given unto him as it is called the Disease of the KINGS-EVIL for being cured by the King The Gift of healing the Struma now called the KINGS-EVIL we shall finde to have been given by the Lord first of all Kings of England to King Edward III before the Conquest commonly named Edward the Confessor by the following words of Ailredus Abbot of Revesby De Vita Miraculis Edwardi Confessoris among the ten English Historians printed at London for Cornelius Bee 1652. page 390. Adolescentula quaedam nuptiis tradita duplici laborabat incommodo nam faciem ejus morbus deformaverat amorem viri sterilitas prolis ademerat Sub faucibus quippe quasi glandes ei succreverant quae totam faciem deformi tumore faedantes putrefactis sub cute humoribus sanguinem in saniem vertebant indè nati vermes odorem teterrimum exhalabant A little after he annexeth this which follows Jubetur autem in somnis adire Palatium ex Regiis manibios sperare remedium quibus si lota si tacta si signata foret reciperet ejus meritis sanitatem In English thus A very yong woman which was married was afflicted with two infirmities for her face was not only disfigured by a Disease but she was barren also which drew away the affection of her husband from her For under her jaws there grew a sort of kernels which by their swelling made her look deformedly and the humours corrupting under her chin turned her blood into mattur which breeding worms sent forth a very stinking savour At length she was warned in a dream to go to the Court and that the King should cure her so that if she were washt stroak'd and sign'd by the Kings hands she should receive a perfect cure by the Kings merits Then this Author declaring her repair to King Edwards Court and likewise the performance by the King in the Ceremony of what was desired adjoyns to his former Discourse that which follows Subitò ruptâ cute cum sanie vermes ebulliunt resedit tumor dolor omnis abscessit ammirantibus qui aderant tantam sub purpurâ sanitatem tantam Sceptrigeris manibus inesse virtutem that is All on the sudden the skin breaks the worms and mattur drop out the swelling fals all the pain goes away all that stood by being amazed to see such a cure to be performed in Royal Robes and such vertue to proceed from hands which held a Sceptre For not only the mention of healing the Struma in this manner is first found in the History of King Edward and the praise thereof attributed to him but those
attributed to the Side bones of a man and to the Sides of the Ark. The strange RISING of the SHIN-BONES in this Malady which are the middle and forward part of the BONES of the LEGS cannot well be understood until we first know what is to be understood by the Thigh and Leg-bones and the crookedness of them the knoppiness of the Ancle-joynts and the disproportionable rising up of the SHIN-BONES in their significations The THIGHS and LEGS are distinct parts yet in Holy Scripture they oftentimes go under the name of the Legs both Their office is to support and bear up the body from falling and in their figure ought to be upright and straight The Two Houses of Parliament under his Royal Majesty our Head are the Supporters of the whole Body the Kingdom while by them are enacted good Laws and they maintain the good and punish the evil by doing justice and not delaying it withoutwhich nor Kingdom nor State can long stand Often in Holy Scripture is impartial doing of Justice called judging uprightly Psal 58. 1. Do ye judge uprightly and Psa 75. 2. I will judge uprightly For he that favoureth one more then another inclineth his ear to hear or face to look upon or hand to receive a gift from him They are the LEGS who ought to have been UPRIGHT and STRAIGHT in judging uprightly But did they not start aside from their former and first uprightnesse in wresting of Judgement and delaying of Justice and because of such intolerable delays we had not justice from them straight The THIGH BONES were the first Parliament The LEG-BONES under them are the next succeeding Parliament not as they were indeed but as they assumed the name unto themselves the Leg-bones being of the nature of the thigh to sustain and bear up the body are for their common office and union I doubt not called by the same name both legs These later bones in such children are more crooked and more ordinarily then the thigh-bones and do pourtray unto us That the succeeding Parliament which followed the first did carry themselves with less uprightness and did more often transgress the rules of Justice then those which were their predecessors Of the truth of which assertion there are too many examples To the Legs are joyned the FEET but under them principal instruments of moving the body from place to place whithersoever we have a minde to go so that no going without them or even standing The feet of such children joyned unto the legs with STRONG KNOPPY ANCLE-JOYNTS is a proper Type How all men in place and power receiving them from the later and succeeding Parliaments should by wicked cunning and by imposing on them unlawful Oaths and Engagements be made fast to them thereby to secure that usurped power well knowing that without such instruments so compacted they could not go forward in their designes nor themselves stand Concerning the irregular shape of the SHIN-BONES in such children first let us examine the thing it self and then desiring Gods help I shall search out the hidden Mystery For the former in a word The figure of the bone is a RISING forward of the BONE upon the SHIN very HIGH in the MIDS and ABOVE and BENEATH RECLINING Which figure doth as it were in a picture represent and declare unto us that great sin of which the succeeding Parliament a part I mean of the first and left behinde in the House of Commons was guilty of For this rising of the bone is not in the Thigh but Leg which I shewed to signifie not the former but the after Parliament Now although this enormous figure appear in both legs as if both Houses were guilty of that sin it is not so to be understood but that part which sate in the House of Commons Two suffered upon the Crosse beside our Saviour both are said to have railed upon him yet one only was meant the other was a true penirent and honoured our Saviour The Mystery of these bones is That this part of the House of Commons should raise themselves too exceeding high and whereas the FIGURE of such bones doth manifestly paint the instrument by which our innocent Soveraign lost his life the EDGE of an AXE that out of their mouths would proceed that bloody Instrument as out of the mouth of Christ a two-edged sword is said to proceed because that which is commanded to be done comes out of the mouth which enjoyneth it by which our Soveraign should lose his Royall Head This figure indeed is not like unto the Axe wherewith his Majesties life was taken away for the edge thereof is straight and not at all reclining but being like the Axe which is carried before Traytors of such a shape as they commonly call glancing doth more plainly and fully declare the person and dignity of the King then if the shape of the edge of the other had been made upon such childrens legs Otherwise being even if the Shin-bone had been never so sharp it could not so easily have been apprehended to signifie an Axe Again every one that suffers death as a Traytor hath not such an axe or any born before him when he goes to his triall but such only as are persons of high degree For which cause the Lord would not that such a monstrous example of hypocritical and but once parallel'd wickedness that an innocent King should be accused condemned and suffer as a Traytor against express vows should not be written in visible Characters for the eyes of all men In the next place I am to consider that these diseased children although when they were yonger they were able to walk afterward in this Disease the use of their FEET is TAKEN AWAY We finde in Holy Scripture that Walking is working in Performance of proper Duties whereour Saviour Christ declaring his resolution not to forbear to preach and heal the sick he saith Luk. 13. 33. I must walk to day and to morrow and he admonishing his Disciples of their duties bid them Joh. 12. 35. Walk while ye have light So these Great Supporters of this Kingdomes body when they sate in Council together and to do Justice and Judgement when at first for a while they began to walk how soon after did they leave off performing cheif duties and do nothing at all to the oppressed or worse For the duty of our Parliament is to do that under the King which God enjoyned King Solomon to do 2 King 6. 12. To walk in his Statutes and to execute Judgement The last of this Disease is that Childrens GROWTH is HINDRED whereas some continue Dwarses hereby for ever And as these children are hindred in their growth so most certainly and fully doth the Antitype answer hereunto shewing that those people which should be sick of these Regents should grow neither in Grace nor Riches nor in Reputation nor in any thing that may be called good These are the particular Symptomes of the Disease collected from all which are
troubled therewith and the significations of them so far as the Lord hath enabled me I have also examined the Name of the Disease and found out the Mystery thereof but although the REKETS be the general name to all degrees and sorts of this Malady yet when the diseased are troubled with such JOYNTS and RIBS as they call DOUBLE this they call the TENT See Arnoldus Bootius in libello De Affectibus Omissis in Cap. De Tabe Pectoreâ If you then ask me What means this Name I answer By a Metonymy of the Adjunct it signifyeth and expresseth Souldiers and Armies For Castra the Latine word by interpretation Tents among the Romans is very often put to express an Army or Armies in the Field where Tents were used as among the Holy Writers Tents are put for Habitations and Houses because in former times the Israelites dwelt in Tents and sometimes Shepberds dwellings because their habitations in the Fields were constantly such But because among us here is no use of Tents but in time of War it must signifie naturally according to its Name and doth confirm that such Joynts were in signification a combining of Generals and Commanders with Souldiers of Parl. with Souldiers and Fortifying by Lands with Soldiers and though by Sea there is no use of Tents yet the Denomination is given to all for the outward likeness of the Types although proper but to Two of them and that not without example as the Crown and Sceptre are used in speech when by them we mean nothing but a Kingdome Thus the Wise God knoweth every word in our Tongues and when men or women give names to things they know not what nor why doth oftentimes so overrule them that they speak the Truth in a Mystery So did the High-Priest not knowing what he spake prophesy of our Saviour The MYSTERY of the THREE GENERAL REMEDIES AFter the Mystery of the REGETS and TENT and of each SYMPTOME thereof the three forenamed Vulgar REMEDIES are not without their Mystery The first Remedy is SWINGING such children from side to side and TOSSING them up and down and TURNING them Topsey Turvey This is ordinarily taken to be and used as a Remedy against that Disease but careful observation and experience teacheth the contrary that it is vain Thus for a Remedy against our evil Regents we were promised when we should change from a Kingdom to a Common-wealth we should have all amended But that then failing we were made to beleeve how such a Protector would indeed perform what others had promised and when he had deceived we must have a piece and the worst piece of a House of Commons to over-rule us who pleaded the Justice of their own cause as the rest did although the people never received Justice from any of them And was not this Tossing England from side to side and up and down When we were sometime under a King and Parliament we were up when we were subject to a Few or One of our Fellow-Subjects we were down At last we were turned Topsey Turvey when the Heels the Souldiers possest the place and RULE of our Superiors the King and Parliament And this was a False Remedy The Second REMEDY is the Lifting up such sick children by the Armes The meaning of which thing will by Gods grace be understood if we remember in what sense I declared to you from Holy Scripture and the reason thereof Armes are to be taken which is in signification of Armies This Remedy Lifting the sick children up by the Armes is a False Remedy and never used with success But it is much to be observed that above all other Remedies which are wont to be applied to such children there are none so much abhorred by them as this for when it is done they will complain and cry out The Mystery hereof is that when the childe of England should be lifted up by the Armes at which time the weight of the body depends upon the Armes that is the Armies and at that time the Armes also are lifted up and lifting up signifieth raising to honor Psal 113. 7. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill ver 8. That he may set him with Princes even with the Princes of his people The poor Patients which were troubled with the Regents would least of all endure and most of all complain against the Tyranny of the Soldiers and Army bearing rule that is the Lifting up by and of the Armes This was fulfilled to the utmost when the Agitators of the Army pluckt and threw out of the Parliament house that Piece remaining and left of the Whole House of Commons and for a short space under the greatest indignation of the people ruled alone The Third REMEDY generally famous but False is the letting of the diseased children Blood Behinde the Ear. And how true it hath been in the Antitype that the Head our Royal Head our Dear Lord the KING should for a pretended cure of our miseries be let blood behinde the Eare that is in the Neck by cutting off his Head to the encrease of our miseries I abhorre to think and much the more because it was plotted and acted by men which were Professors of the austerest religion But let not the Profession of Religion be branded for this cause Were not those that had the chiefest hand in our Lord Christs death one of his Disciples and the Priests Is not he that hath been guilty of so much of the blood of the Saints that the City of Rome is become drunk therewith counted the most Holy Father the Pope and with him the Fathers of the Clergy This is the craft of the old Serpent when he cannot destroy the Church by open enmity to endeavour it by seeming friends But for the real Cure and true REMEDIES of the Disease we call the REKETS as we take it according to the letter it may for good cause be accounted wonderful in that regard also and therein like unto the Leprosie The Leprosie was a Disease not curable by any Art or Power of man For thus answereth Ahab unto the King of Syria who sent unto him desiring that he would heal his servant Naaman of the Leprosie concluding the curing of that Disease to be a Divine work above mans strength 2 King 5. 7. Am I God to kill and to make alive that this man doth send to me to recover a man of his Leprosie To which purpose and more plainly speaketh our Saviour Luk. 4. 27. Many Lepers were in Israel in the time of Elizeus the Prophet and none of them was cleansed saving Naaman the Syrian Even so neither is the malady of the Rekets curable by any Art or Physician upon the Earth although I doubt not all men both Learned and unlearned beleeve the contrary perswaded from what they see that divers children afflicted very much with this Disease at length become found and perfect But although it cannot
should be the Lords Christ our King so doth the REKETS point at the Lords Anointed to be the Healer thereof our King But my Reader peradventure will say This being all granted to be true and that all this must be performed by a King yet it still remaineth doubtfull by what King all these things shall be wrought The resolving of which doubt by necessity brings me to examine the other strange Disease the KINGS-EVIL These two Diseases do portend and foreshew one and the same thing the greatness of our calamities Both and that we shall be delivered from them through the mighty Hand of the most merciful God For is it not a very wonderfull thing and above the thoughts of man among all other Infirmities of the REKETS perfectly cured in like manner to see and consider the crooked bones of Arms and Legs to become straight of their own accord Albeit the Wise-man saith Eccles 1. 15. That which is crooked cannot be made straight Touching the cure of the Struma no man of judgement can deny the Hand of God therein Which Two Maladies as in part they do agree so do they also thus differ the REKETS beside the Disease sheweth who should be the Authors of our evils under the name of the Disease the KINGS-EVIL who should cure us with the Title of his Dignity Again the REKETS explaineth Fully what the KINGS-EVIL delivereth more Briefly and this is to be done by one Person our Dread Soveraign who by the Grace of God given unto him as he healeth the Bruises and Putrified Sores of those whom he toucheth will take away the Falsness of Doctrine and Blasphemy in Religion Injustice Oppression in the State and wicked living from all Which may well be signified by corruption and putrid Ulcers by a Metaphorical name because these things proceed from a Diseased Soul are loathsome and odious to God and man and stink in their nostrils To prove therefore King CHARLES II and no other to be that King which shall perform those great things in England it will be necessary to shew this unto you by Example of the Leprosie and thereof who was or were the First Cleansers and who the last that so in like manner Who he was who first cured the KINGS-EVIL being known we may know the last and he that was presaged thereby The First Cleanser of the Leper was the Priest as appears in Lev. 14. But the Person foreshewn thereby was our Saviour Christ a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech From which Example of the Leprosie two Rules are to be laid down 1. That the Type and Antitype be both alike 2. That there be as much and more in the Antitype than in the Type in the most perfect Antitype As in the Precedent of the Leprosie The Type and Antitype were Both to be Priests and not so only I speak of the Persons but lest it might be thought that any of the Priests the Sons of Aaron succeeding the First Cleanser before Christ might be the Person prefigured therefore a more excellent Priest was to be still expected not such an one as offered up Buls and Goats like the Typical Priests but himself once for all According to which two Rules our Dear Lord King CHARLES II is the Antitype unto the First Curer of the KINGS-EVIL But because Christ had many Types of himself which being put together did so describe him that no man might mistake him when he was come for he was not fully prefigured by Priests but partly by Prophets by their foretelling their raising the dead as Elias and Elisha did c. by Solomons wisedom Jonas's being in the Fishes belly c. But our Lord the King having no such Types of him beside the First healer of the KINGS-EVIL as our Saviour had therefore his whole Type is pourtrayed in Edward the Confessor Secondly it will follow that more must be in the Cure of our Soveraign the Antitype then was in King Edward the Type from the second Rule lest some other of the Kings of England might be thought Edwards Antitype but in the outward and bodily cure they are alike and equal therefore that more in the Antitype must be of those fore-named things signified thereby I now will shew you according to the First Rule a Full Equality betwixt King Edward and King Charles so that no other King but King Charles II can be the parallel to his Royal Predecessor King Edward the Confessor King Edward was banished his Countrey so was our Liege Lord King Charles King Edward was sent for to come and govern thus was our Dread Soveraign humbly entreated by Both his Houses of Parliament to Assume the Government of his Kingdomes and was sent for And how welcome our King was unto the Clergy who expected restitution into their places and to all Ministers which before expected to be deprived of all maintenance as they were threatned and how far above the welcome of King Edward the Confessor to his who felt and feared no such evil the different reasons will plainly determine And with what gladness of heart his Subjects received King Charles after their intolerable oppressions and never otherwise likely to be removed no man can doubt nor can tongue express but their Presents their Triumphs their Attendance their incessant Shouts and Acclamations as in a continued Street from Dover to London of yong and old to see their King do plainly testifie But above all King Edward the Confessor was the Son of Edward the Martyr even so our Gracious K. Charles the Confessor was Son to King Charles the Martyr And lest it trouble my Reader to imagine how Edward the Confessor may be called the son of Edward the Martyr since in property of speech and by general consent he is not the Son but Nephew and brothers son to Edward the Martyr All this notwithstanding Edward the Confessor by the Phrase of Holy Scripture which we for the most part follow and ought to follow in this Divine interpretation is the Son of Edward the Martyr For we reade 1 Chro 3 16. And the sons of Joakim Jeconiah his son Zedekiah his son when indeed and in nature Zedekiah was not the son but the uncle of Jeconiah but cause Zedekiah was Jeconiahs Successor he is called his son as by the same rule Edward the Confessor being Successor to Edward the Martyr is called Edward the Martyrs Son And yet a farther reason thereof common to both is That in orderly and legal Succession the son of either ought to have succeeded his Father that is of Jeconiah and Edward the Martyr Here likewise is brought in the second Rule in some part Edward was stiled the Martyr only as it is declared because he was murdered innocently Edward was sir-named the Confessor because he was a Pious and Charitable man and enacted good Laws But for far better cause is our Royal Soveraign King Charles I named the Martyr which name his Majesty took unto himself is
so intitled in the Writings of Learned men and is so to be accounted for giving Testimony with his blood to that which in the secret thoughts of his heart he judged to be the Truth King Charles II our Gracious Soveraign for better cause then his Predecessor King Edward the Confessor hath deserved that name for his Majesty hath made a Holy and Royal Confession with his mouth Wherefore I most humbly Almighty God in whose hand are the hearts of Kings so to dispose his Majesties heart and I humbly beseech his Majesty to be entreated that he will not suffer such men who have opened their mouths in vows to the Most High God to be enforced either to revoke that which cannot be recalled or being pious skilful and faithful laborers for that cause to be excluded from working in the Lords Harvest And I do with confidence believe that my prayer is heard in heaven and will be upon the earth Whereunto if there be need of more marks which may shew that King Charles II was designed to be the Antitype of Edward the Confessor though the distance of time betwixt them be the space of 600 years or more for Edward the Confessor died about the year 1066. having reigned much about the time of twenty three years See Henry Knighton and John Brompton in Edward the Confessor adde and observe that K. Charles II our Royal Soveraign succeeded his martyred Father CHARLES I after so many Governors and Governments and no more as Edward the Confessor succeeded after Kings the Martyred Edward Moreover two of those one in the Types the other in the Antitypes are strangely of one Name and in the same Order of Governing that is the III. Let us compare them Edward the Martyr I Egelred II Edmund Ironside III Hardicantus IV Edward the Confessor V. The ANTITYPE Charles the Martyr I Common-wealth II Oliver Protector by-named Ironside III Richard Protector IV Charles our Gracious Soveraign Confessor V. Now according to Example in the Balm according to Scripture and reason as that precious oyle ceast to be when Christ had suffered and as the substance being come the shadow goes away and there is no reason to expect a signe when the thing signified thereby is now come I conclude that our Royal Soveraign will be the last of the Kings of this Nation to whom God will give the gift of healing the KINGS-EVIL Now Reader take here notice of the Pride Malice and Subtlety of the Devil and his Emulation of Almighty God who hath so wound himself into the mindes of Impostors and thorow them into the perswasions of the ignorant and rude multitude that the seventh son in order from the first without any daughter born betwixt is able to cure that Disease which we call the KINGS-EVIL And this Imposture is frequently undertaken and performed by stroaking with the hand and the Minister thereof is called a Stroaker This I say is attributed by some to a seventh son by others to a seventh son of a seventh son Which albeit a lye from the father of lies the devil immediatly proceeding doth nevertheless declare the devils knowledge and fore-knowledge of our Royal Soveraign King CHARLES II his virtue And as the Lord will win glory unto himself from all Creatures and all Things for to this purpose they were by him created so will he likewise from Satan and his practices even to illustrate and confirm though against the mindes of the Serpent his Glory and Truth This is the matter the Prerogative which the Lord hath given to the Kings of England and among but far above them to our Dread Soveraign Charles II the devil having a foresight of in his counsell which he giveth to Impostors doth secretly thereby acknowledge and yet defaceth but not wholly by adding somewhat of his own For it is true that a seventh son of a seventh is indued with Power from above not only to cure the bodily malady called the KINGS-EVIL as others have had but to take away the Evil of the Kingdom and is his Royal Prerogative which none of his Predecessors have had This Profession of curing this Malady is held out ordinarily in this form viz. The seventh son without a daughter born betwixt them cures the KINGS-EVIL In which expression the devil as he hath wont to do abuseth the truth three waies 1. By speaking ambiguously as he did use in the Oracle of Apollo leaving it uncertain whether Son be in those words to be taken according to the common acception of the word or otherwise 2. By leaving out some part of the matter which notwithstanding sometimes I have heard used and which serves to discovery of the truth and that is these words of a seventh 3. By adding words thereto wholly false such are without a daughter born betwixt and putting Son after seventh so making it to be of a seventh son Thus did Satan speak doutfully when he told our first parents They should be as God or Gods knowing good and evil The word there signifying God and also damned Spirits and knowing good and evil to be interpreted both knowledge of speculation and knowledge of feeling joy and sorrow the later of which Adam and Eve felt as did those lost Angels As for leaving out part of the truth the Devil was guilty thereof when speaking unto our Saviour to fast himself down from a pinnacle of the Temple he used this expression Mat. 4. 6. If thou be the Son of God cast thy self down For it is written He shall give his Angels charge concerning thee and in their hands they shall bear thee up lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone in which words taken out of Psa 91. 11 12 these words are left out by the devil to keep thee in all thy waies Lastly by adding words the devil corrupteth the truth which he did when he spake unto Saul unto the truth which he spake in part by aujoyning lies 1 Sam. 28. And the Lord hath done by him saith the devil concerning David truly as he spake by me which was false for the Lord spake not so by the Devil but by the true Samuel What I affirmed before That a seventh son of a seventh shall cure the KINGS-EVIL and to be understood in such manner as abovesaid of the Person of King Charles II doth thus appear Account all the Descents from father to son that is in a right line from King Henry VII to our Dread Soveraign now reigning taking and including both terms we shall finde them to be seven so that our Soveraign last in order is the seventh son of a seventh understand Henry For it is common in Scripture not to call the grandchildren sons only as Josiah is said Matth. 1. 11. to have begotten Jeconiah but those which after many generations have come out of the loins of a man by the name of sons to such a one as the children of Israel of Esau But more nearly to our purpose Enoch is
called the seventh from Adam Jude 14. in which place son is to be understood For Henry VII is the First Margarite his daughter Q to James IV. King of Scotland the Second James V the third Mary Q. of Scotland his daughter the Fourth James VI King of Great Britain the fifth King Charles I the sixth K. Charles II the seventh And this is a good Argument to prove that King Charles II the seventh of a sea earth is not to be understood so to cure the Kings-evil as in a literal sence which some of these and more of his Predecessors have done but in some speciall and mystical way as I have declared And this computation agrees in another account if we reckon by the daughter of Queen Margarite and her issue for Queen Margarite daughter to King Henry VII first married to King James IV had issue James V after married to Archibald Douglas Earl of Angus by him had issue Margarite As King Henry VII the first Margarite Queen to King James IV the second Margarite her daughter by Archibald Earl of Angus and Wife to Matthew Stuart Earl of Lenoix the third Henry Lord Darley her son husband to Mary Queen of Scotland the fourth King James his son King of Great Britain the fifth King Charles I the sixth King Charles II the seventh For which cause I do humbly beseech the Kings Majesty that a Law may be enacted by the King and his Parliament for the deserved punishment of such diabolical impostures as this is which is frequently committed in this land by seventh sons taking upon them the Royal Prerogative of our Kings with the touch of their hands to cure the Kings-evil For the practice here of tends much to the dishonour of God and of our good King and to the delusion of his Majesties Subjects But one thing more touching the Rekets must not be forgotten that is to say the time when that Disease first seized upon Children in this Kingdome and had that name of Rekets given unto it It was the third year after our Royall Soveraigns Nativity or the next unto it when the weekly Bill of Mortality mentioned one to have been buried of the Rekets in the Moneth of May and no mention thereof in any of the said Bils before that time As I have found by search in the Parish Clerks Register kept in their Hall For as the time when Darius took the Babylonian Kingdom is exprest Dan. 5. 31. to be when he was about threescore and two years old that the Jews might observe as judiciously H. Broughton hath noted upon that place that at the time they were carried into captivity which was about the time of Darius his birth the Jews might then know the Lord had a Deliverer born for them So the Nation of England may learn Gods special care that he did not send them the Disease of the Rekets till He was born who should free them from the Miserie 's signifyed thereby and from the Disease it self Hitherto of the Kings-Evil as it pertaineth to the King and Kingdom of England Whereas I said The sins and calamities of this Nation with the Causers of them were pointed at by the Name and Disease of the Rekets and not the Name of our Deliverer but in the other the Kings-Evil yet notwithstanding it doth appear who shall be our Deliverer albeit not in the Name of the Disease or the Symptomes of the Rekets yet in the quality of the Persons which are troubled therewith The Patients so afflicted are Children and no other partly but not principally that we might be left without all pretence of any other inferior cause but be constrained to look up to the Hand which hath smitten us and yet we will not but in despight of reason seek about after this and that cause most vainly Again partly it is to let us understand that the afflictions foreshewn thereby should fall upon the childe of God Thirdly and principally the Rekets is laid on children that by the quality of the person afflicted by it it being the childs disease we may understand him that shall free us from it and what is signified thereby As it is called the Kings-evil not because it is caused by or laid upon but cured by the King So is it called and to be called the Childes disease because a childe shall heal it Surely you will ask me What childe We finde in Holy Scripture that our Saviour hath called himself barely by the name of the Son If the Son shall make you free saith our Savior you shall be free indeed And since we finde that God doth communicate his own Name to Princes calling them Gods and hence it seems to have been first used among Princes to name themselves in the plural number though single by the word we and us imitating as it were the Lord Almighty who is One and Three he doth seem to express by this word the childes Disease the Disease of the childe above all other children the childe a son of the King After which manner the son and daughter of the King of Spain is called infante and infanta that is the son and daughter childe as being well enough exprest alone to understand what son and daughter is meant thereby So when we say the childes Diseases 〈◊〉 may be well understood that Disease which the Childe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 above all children that is the Kings son shall heal In which expression of childe is also shewn first that our King shall be when this is done a childe albeit not according to the vulgar use of the word in our English tongue yet according to the signification of that word which in the Hebrew signifieth sometimes a childe in years else where a yong man although not very properly by the Translators rendred also a childe where in Daniel it signifieth a yong man calling the three companions of Daniel three children that he shall then be yong in years How great a matter of comfort is hereby administred unto us that are the people of the land that the Lord is so pleased that the King shall not differ the making us a happy nation to his old age but go about it and perfect the Lords work while he is yong Secondly here is an Argument of Almighty Gods great Power and Mercy that he should frame his Majesties heart to clemency as not to suffer him although his Royal Father was murthered to break out in cruel and unjust revenge It is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our eyes And lest any man should thus object This Disease of the Rekets is common to women children as well as to men as that it should not seem thereby to point at a cure to be performed by the King in regard of the sex as to be performed by the son more than the daughter of a King let him take a view of those great Types of our Savior the Prophets whereof although the most part were men yet
Ancestors who were called Lords and Kings thereof but charge and trouble beside a bare Title But to her was the Kingdom conquer'd and quieted that as the Author of the History called Pacata Hibernia in the Epistle to the Reader speaks Q. Elizabeth might have it justly written upon her Tomb Pacata Hibernia or Ireland Tamed But our Royal Soveraign is doing more and hath begun it already and suffered longer and worse than ever Queen Elizabeth did Yet not thou O Charles but God which is in thee Secondly If we consider his Majesties Constancy and Patience in the mids of his great Tentations Shall K. Charles II who was by wicked men banished from his own Kingdome forced to remain in the Dominions of a Popish Prince such a King who by no Necessities nor Sollicitations could be drawn to forsake God to advance himself shall he I say be miraculously preserved in his escape from his cruel hunters and more miraculously in France and Flanders from Idolatry and only be kept to make us happy God forbid Had not Joseph whose bow abode in strength whom the archers sorely grieved shot at and hated Genes 49. 23 24. a double portion to him and his posterity Ezek. 47. 13. having one portion for that cause above his brethren given him by his father taken out of the hand of the Amorite with the sword and with his bowe Gen. 48. 22. But our Soveraigns bowe abode as much and more in strength when for the sollicitations of the Egyptian Romish harlot he started not aside Beside in the very letters of their names there is a parity between the Type and Antitype and this sometime happeneth not by chance but providence as when Mary Aarons Sister a virgin and Jesus Moses successor prefigured in deed and names the virgin Mary and Jesus our Savior betwixt Clovis and C and Clovis as to note those great evils shall be taken away when C and Lovis meet as now they do Concerning the Healing of the Kings-Evil in France and what is prefigured thereby thus far If any of my Readers shall object which doubtless most will do that what I do presage touching our Royal Soveraign and the Kingdom of France is no more then probable to him I will be bold to say and let him well consider that even among the Sages of the Law great Probabilities have the esteem of Certainties and according thereunto Sentence is pronounced by them And we know that in the difference of the two Harlots about a surviving childe who should be the true mother thereof when King Salomon gave sentence on her side who shewed pity toward the Infant as to be mother thereof judgement thus given from probable conjecture is said to be the Wisedom of God in him 1 King 3. 28. Or are our children known to be the fathers but by probability Yea although we are enjoyned to give diligence to make our calling and election sure how few of the elect ever attained to that height in this life that all his mis-doubtings were taken away and that he was fully assured of a future happinesse I must acknowledge that there are degrees of likeliness some things which are probable are not yet firm enough to conclude others of so high a degree of probability that according to the example commended by the Spirit of God in Solomon they are as strong as the clearest certainties And of that sort of probable things which are the strongest or very near them I here maintain these sore-named to be Thus much pertaining to the cure of the Struma performed by the French King and what is signified thereby And here at last it will not be unseasonable to explain what before was partly touch'd by me whence it is that neither our Soveraign nor yet the French King do heal of the Struma all that are touch'd by their hands 2. That they do not likewise help such as are troubled with the Gout Feavers Palsie c. but this Evil onely 3. Kings of this Kingdom and of the French nation although they have erred in the faith and have been of a false Church have healed this Disease as well as those which have been sound in the faith and members of that true Church of which Christ is Head in which small number our Royal Soveraign is one and a principal 4. That in some few although healed at present the foresaid disease through some occasion breaks out again In answer to the first Objection first acknowledging if the healing of this Evil were perfectly miraculous like unto those cures wrought by our Saviour it should be perfect in any of which our King should lay his Royal hands Joh. 7. 23. Are ye angry at me saith our Saviour because I made a man altogether whole upon the SÃ bbath day Then was there no unsoundness left behinde therefore we may conclude this power given unto our Kings was not for the same cause for which our Saviour and his Apostles healed the sick To the second Objection I confess that whereas our Saviour healed all that were sick and likewise the Apostles yea the Pool of Bethesda all with what infirmity soever they were troubled it was to signifie that which the Scripture elsewhere saith He healeth all thy Diseases that is all both outward and inward Diseases of which sort are sins specially Wherefore for some other distinct cause doth our Soveraign cure the Struma only Nevertheless it cannot be denied that this vertue given to our Kings is miraculous although not to perfection To the next Objection I say That even miracles themselves were wrought by the hands of the evil as well as the good sometimes For is it not written that at the last day some reprobates should say unto our Saviour Have we not in thy Name cast out devils And this was given unto them not as it was unto the Apostles who represented Christs person and were as in Christs stead so the gift of healing this Evil because it was given as a signe of what was to come so much as they were Types in being Kings of such a Kingdom was given to the evil as well as to the good Kings Thus to the last thing which is objected I say I cannot deny but to have known how some after a long continued soundness and being cured of their mattury ulcers have began to fall back into the same Disease and Symptomes but being touch'd again have recovered All which notwith standing doth not disprove the miraculous cure but pointeth at somewhat else therein Now to satisfie the first and second objection to the full Our Royal Soveraign doth not take away the Struma by that power which is given him from above because it is a great evil for there are greater which he cannot cure nor yet because it is a little one as if his vertue could extend it self to small Diseases for we know there are less which he cannot take away but for that this Disease which we call the Kings-evil is such a malady which is parallel to the things which are signified his Majesty shall help and other Diseases are not like them For what likeness is there in the Gout Feavers and Palsie to the bruises and putrid sores full of corruption of which Isaiah speaketh the corruption of Doctrine and manners leath some to the eyes and unsavory to the nostrils of God and man Erasmus though tormented with the Stone rejoyceth that he did not suffer under some disease which might make his presence leathed But the Kings-evil we know hath bruises and putrid sores full of corruption This Malady therefore the Providence of God did make choice of to demonstrate what sins and afflictions our Royal Soveraign through Gods mercy will cure not for it self nor for the sick Patients sakes but for the cause of that which being most like unto it was to be taken away Nor is it done to perfection in all some being remediless which are touch'd that we may know that corruption in justice unsoundness in faith and doctrine shall not and cannot be so universally taken away by our Good King but that some do what he can tares and wicked men will continue among the wheat and good men And touching the last Objection where it is said that some which have been healed of this Evil have relapsed it doth indeed plainly inferr that this healing of the Evil by our Kings must be in that respect different from the like miracles of old The smiting of the rock twise by Moses was his sin as if the doing of it once had not been sufficient and the virtue of causing the water to flow out of the rock had been in his hand If once touching by the Royal hand be not ever and altogether sufficient for the cure and the second be helpfull it may well signifie that in this our good Josiahs reformation men shall not be so fully reformed as that none shall endeavour to fall back again but yet by his Royal hand they shall be reduced A PRAYER In the mean time let us beseech Almighty God to plant in our Soveraigns Heart the awful Fear of his Holy Name and that his unerring Word may be the Measure and Rule by which alone Religion and Justice may be reformed as by Josiah his Royal Type was done Hasten him O Lord herein that thou mayest hasten to reward him with another Crown upon the earth and a Crown of Glory hereafter which is void of cares and fadeth not Make me O Lord and all his Subjects unfeignedly to love and honour him for thy sake and grant we may never forget what by woful experience we have found true the counsel of thy wise servant King Solomon My Son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with them which are given to change For their calamity shall rise suddenly and who knoweth the ruine of them both Amen Lastly of all which hath been spoken to God alone be given the Praise and Glory for from him and by him and to him are all things He revealeth the deep and secret things he knoweth what is in darkness and the light dwelleth with him For thine is the Power and the Glory and thou hast now made known unto us the Kings matter FINIS