Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A52753
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Christianissimus Christianandus, or, Reason for the reduction of France to a more Christian state in Europ[e]
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Nedham, Marchamont, 1620-1678.
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1678
(1678)
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Wing N383; ESTC R14468
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47,167
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81
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Faction in Parliament which very much alarm'd the King and his Court insomuch that he conceived it was high time to rip open this Evil by discovering seizing and accusing some of the aforementioned Heads of the Faction viz. a Lord and Five Members of the House of Commons The Articles of the Charge against them were in number Seven One of which was That They had traiterously invited and encouraged a Foreign Power to Invade his Majesties Kingdom of England Which was so true that he desired a Tryal of them but their Party in the House not daring to permit it to be put to Proof they shock'd the King in the Business and so the Affair of the COVENANT and the other Effects of that Invitation ran the more roundly on to a ripeness and final Dispatch in Scotland by the time that the Sun in its course brought on the year 1643. And then came on a Second Invasion of England flourishing their Colours with this Rebellious Motto FOR THE CROWN AND COVENANT OF BOTH KINGDOMS And thus you see how far we were beholden to France for all the Miseries of the ensuing Wars and the numerous Brood of Factions which issued thence in England Scotland and Ireland Of the certain Truth whereof we might have had undeniable Evidence upon the Tryal of those whom the King had then charged with Treason if the Temper of that time would have permitted a fair prosecution however it was I remember sufficiently talk't of in those days and I have now by me a Book in the French Tongue which was printed 24 Years ago by Adrian Vlac at the Hague in Holland in the third part whereof are eight Chapters and over the second Chapter is this Title Le Cardinal de Richelieu la cause des Desordres arrivez en Angleterre That is to say Cardinal Richelieu the cause of the Disorders befallen England Which he brought in as I told you by the way of Scotland to the ruin of our Peace the Royal Family the Church and the whole State and Government of our Kingdom But this tampering with and corrupting other Prince's Subjects is an old Game that the French Ministers have ever been playing all over Europ Let it be remember'd how the same Richelieu wrought the Revolt of Portugal from the Spaniard and the Rebellion in Catalonia and carry'd on the Wars in both those Countries to bring down the Power of Spain how he tamper'd also with the Swede under Gustavus Adolphus to invade the Empire and then with the Emperour's General Wallestein to betray the Imperial Army by whose suddain death the French King lost the great opportunity to work himself into a possession of the Imperial Throne How Cardinal Mazarin after him carried on the Popular Commotions raised by Masaniello in the Kingdom of Naples by sending thither the Duke of Guise to be their Head to the almost wresting of that Kingdom out of the Hand of the Spaniard and then also how he lurch't that Duke and deserted him Moreover how the last Year the French Intrigues so far prevailed in Spain as to turn the Queen-Mother out of her Regency drive out her Favourites such as she thought most fit and firm for the young King's Safety to put him into other Hands and turn all things in that Court topsie-turvy that being agitated and held in play by their own divisions at Home they might be less able to have regard to the preservation of the Flemings or to the carrying on a Joynt-war with the Hollanders How they have been the common Enemies of every State destroying the Peace of Government every where sowing of Factions in all Princely Courts their Councils or among such of the Subjects as are factious or else they jumble one Prince against another by turns as they did the Prince Elector Palatine against the Elector of Mentz starting up an occasion of Quarrel betwixt them one while to take part with the Elector Palatine against Mentz another while with Mentz against the Prince whose Country they miserably harassed and wasted It cannot be forgotten what they lately did to corrupt the Emperor's Council by means of his own Favourite Prince Lobcowitz whom they bought for Mony to betray his Master's Counsels and Affairs besides their Intrigue in the same manner with the Prince of Furstenberg and his Brother Also what they did in the Vnited Provinces to incommode his Highness the Prince of Orange by bolstering up the De Wits and their Louvenstein Republican party against the Princely What they have done to clog the Emperor by fostering a Rebellion against him in Hungary and how great charge they are at to sever the power of the Duke of Bavaria and of the Duke of Hanover from the common Interest of the Empire in this War How they have diverse times indangered all Christendom by confederating with the Grand Seignior to disturb both Hungary and Poland for which cause as My Lord Herbert writes in his History the Pope had like to have given away the Title Most Christian from their French King Francis the First to bestow it upon our Henry the Eighth before he had been dubb'd by his Holiness with that of Defensor Fidei What Artifices have been used by them to settle and nourish perpetual Faction among the Polish Nobility whereby other great Opportunities have diverse times been given the Turk to fall upon them In a word their common practice hath been to give the World all manner of disturbance and so to render themselves in its Opinion the common Enemies of its Peace a publick Pest among States and Princes in every Country they either find combustible stuff or else make it and then set fire to it they are at a mighty charge to find Fodder for the various Animals of Faction in all Places By this means Divide Impera makes way for them and thus they conquer more than by their Arms they inflame Countries thus as well as burn them as they did Alsatia that having enough to do to quench fires at Home they may have neither leisure nor power to hinder French Projects abroad Questionless then since we in England have seen and do see our Neighbours Houses fired one after another 't is high time to look to our own and secure our selves and all Europ from such Boutefeus and the sad Effects of their Impious Courses SECTION IV. That as the French have dealt falsly with us and all other Princes in the point of Peace There is no Security to be had for any one Party but by a Joynt War HIs Majesty of England having hitherto on his part preserved a fair Respect and Amity towards France passing by the many Indignities and Injuries done to himself and his Nation in hope his Patience might by fair means have prevail'd with the French King at length to do reason to us and the rest of his Neighbours and that to that end his Majesty might have perswaded him to have forborn a further prosecution of the War in
be able to oppress another And that we ought ever to hold it even betwixt France and the House of Austria and if either of them exceed to reduce it to an Equality this was accounted a principal part of the Ancient Grandeur of the English Nation King Henry the Eighth first well setled it in managing the Differences betwixt Charles the Fifth then both Emperor and King of Spain and Francis the First King of France the two Grand Competitors of that Age. That excellent Princess Queen Elizabeth well improved it and so it continued till the time of Cromwell who first erred in this matter of Publick Interest to serve his own private by greatning of France beyond due proportion so that he interposed the Difficulties which since lay in the way of Reducing it By the Influence of this old piece of policy it was that England was always in a condition whensoever she pleased to dispence Peace or War to every Nation and thereby great Honour redounded to our own throughout the World and there is nothing but War can restore it by curing the overgrown Dropsie of the French Greatness VI. You had before an Intimation of another most considerable Reason drawn from a consideration that no Peace that can be made can give us any security of enjoying it long to which I may add That a Peace will but betray us to the next Opportunity the French shall please to take Besides in the interval we should but give him the opportunity to reinforce himself ramass his Treasury and thereby inable himself to prosecute the old Artifice of corrupting other Princes Ministers Officers and Governors and work his Ends so as to alienate and separate as many of the Consederates as he can from their holding Counsels in common for Mutuall preservation to embrace such terms as he shall under a specious shew of Advantages think fit to propose unto them which if obtained would utterly break them one after another and induce this Inconveniency upon England to be left alone or with but few Participants to joyn in the Work of Reducing France into its former legitimate moderate Condition VII Another Reason is to be derived from a Consideration of the great increase of the Naval Power of France whereby they are enboldened to give disturbance to our Merchant-men in our own Seas such an Indignity to his Majesty and Violation of our Rights by Sea as is not to be indured and which the Kings of this Island have from all Antiquity possessed as far as the very shores of France exclusive of any Pretentions of Right of any other Nations within the FOUR SEAS The Evidences whereof were collected and with Arguments drawn from all sorts of Learning and Records digested into one excellent Book by that most famous Man Mr. Selden entituled MARECLAVSVM Among the particulars whereof I remember that the Addition of the Port-Cullis to the Royal Badges of the Crown of England which is yet to be seen upon many of the Royal Houses built by our Kings was made for this Reason even to signifie to all the World That we had a just Right and Title at pleasure to shut up and open the Sea when we thought fit as it were with a Port-Cullis to all Passengers passing by Sea And by the same Evidences it is there proved that our Title to our Propriety in the Sea is as good as any Title the French King hath to any part of his Dominion by Land His Grand-Father wrote divers Letters with his own Hand to King James which I have formerly seen in the Paper-Office at White-Hall to ask Leave for some few Vessels to fish for Soales as he should have occasion for his own Table Which was a sufficient Acknowledgment where the Soveraignty lies by Sea There have been also in former time brisk Messengers sent to the French Kings requiring them as soon as they had but begun to lay the Carcass of some pitiful Ship upon the Stocks to forbear building Which shews the present Presumption of the French in making so grand Naval Preparations to invade our Seas And our Honour as well as our Right calls aloud for a Vindication VIII There is Reason also to be drawn from a Consideration of the hazard of Religion 1. As concerning the Protestant about which I shall not use any more words to clear this point than this short Proverb now used in France and by them attributed to their own King That his Grand-Father loved the Protestants his Father feared them and he himself hated them Which any one that beholds the Ruines of their demolished Churches and the hard Conditions under which they are oppressed in every point within that Kingdom too large here to recite will easily believe 2. As touching the Roman Catholick Religion how that is like to fare may readily be prognosticated Tros Rutilúsve fuat nullo discrimine habebunt Be a Papist or be a Protestant the French make no difference in usage wheresoever they come Witness to this how they have dealt in Catalonia Alsatia the Spanish Low-Countrys and divers other Roman Catholick Countrys where all men exclaim against the Domination of France 3. Whereas it was of old a Doctrine instilled into the minds of the Romanists by their Father-Confessors that they ought to adhere to Spain and the House of Austria rather than to promote the French Empire because Spain being then much the greater Kingdom and esteemed the dearer Son of the Church by reason of its greater Zeal and more strict and intire Imbracement of the Romish Faith and through the diligence of the Inquisition kept without any mixture of that which they call Heresie and therefore more likely to continue firm to the Roman See now of later time the State of Empire being altered Spain brought much lower and not able to give such Protection and Defence as formerly to the Roman Cause in these parts of the World the Pope and his Priests and Jesuits are so far altered too that having since seen the French go on like Conquerers they have quitted the former Reasons on Spain's side and like the Men of the World are turned Courtiers of Fortune crying up France altogether now though if they please to remember how not many Years ago France upon a petty Quarrel in Rome betwixt some of the Pope's Souldiers and the Duke of Crequi's Servants then Ambassador there ruffled the Pope himself with such unheard of Insolence that for meer fear he was constrained to abandon divers of his Friends and Kindred and to the perpetual disgrace of the Holy-Chair and of their Religion and of the Adored-Father of Christians as they would seem to repute him they made him cry like a Child and erect a Pillar in Rome with an Inscription signifying the pretended Affront to France engraven upon it and it continued some Years standing till the Tears of his Holiness prevailed for the demolishing of it Notwithstanding all this I say the Roman Priests do venture to magnifie France as