of receiving doing good Not is there a sharper corrosive than the reflection upon those dayes and times that have passed over him Male aliud nihil agentem The highest hils are the barrennest ground and I would that saying did not so truly square to great Ones that is that the goodliest Trees as Cedars c. doe either beare none or the worst Fruit. Great parts and abilities without exercise and putting forth are but secret and unknowne Mines of Silver and Gold which lye hid in an unfruitfull and unprofitable soyle And therfore you the great and Noble Worthies in whose hands are the Publike Faith the Publike Mercy the Publike Justice and the Publike Peace be good and let your goodnes make you quicke dispensers of what you have in Stewardship because the time is short and the word redde rationem may be given suddenly look upon us as mortall men who shall not live long to receive and upon your selves who shall not live long to give the fruits of your hands And because the Occasion invites me let me propound an object to your charitable justice that is the relief of those great sufferers who have bin great doers I meane the first adventurers with this great Commander when he first cut through the Alps. As for the great and doubtfull matters that are under your hand I would not be thought so rash as to wish you to precipitate A Pilot among shelves and rocks may be too quick A Cunctator sometime saved the Common-wealth only thus I may pray that when the Haven lyes faire before you and is without barre you may fortiter occupare set in stifly lest new waves raised by crosse winds carry you backe into the Main againe 3. Arme you against your fall that the day therof may be to you as the Passion-day of the Martyrs was called the birth-day of Eternity Nequaquam morte mortemini was the inlet of our sin and misery keeps the doore open to sin still The Epicure hath his Armour against death a senselesse consideration of it as of a nothing or a not being The great Spirit hath his Armour too A contempt of death out of principles of Valour and Honour but neither of these Armours can keep the arrow from the quicke There is a terrible clause in the Statute of dying And after that the judgement Nor yet will I goe about to arme you with this meditation that we shall have a shorter journey from death to life again than we had from not being unto life or that which is cited by Gerard out of Luther that all the time that hath run or shall run out from the beginning to the end shall seeme to Adam when he riseth againe but tanquam somnus unius horae as the sleep of the body for one houre But if you will breake the fall which else will breake you then you Gods must become Saints for all Gods are not Saints the death of Saints is more precious then the death of Gods Grace is speciall baile against death there is no gall and vinegar in it to be drunk by them for whom Christ hath already drunke it Death saith the Apostle is yours because contributory and subservient to your happines That life which is hid with Christ in God is out of the reach of death our Saviour proves Abraham to be living because God had long after his death said I am the God of Abraham Those that are confederate with God in Covenant must always live that the Covenant may not be dissolved by the death of the one party There is a way then to break the teeth of death and to be immortall Have God for your God labour to have something in you that is immortall besides your very souls lay up for your selves a treasure beyond the sea of death that when this membrana dignitatis as Seneca cals it a thin skin of honour breaks you may not be quite bankrupts enrich your souls with the power of godlines which is profitable to all things The place of Princes the magnificence and great works of great men The faith and godlines of poore men doe make a rare composition Do not in stead of disarming death arme it rather against you by putting a sword into the hand of it The more service that you may doe by the advantage of ground you stand upon the heavyer will your accounts be if your greatnes be made a Stage and Theater for to act the parts of luxury lasciviousnes oppression upon What difference is there between such gods and those in Homer of whose drunkennesse and adulteries there is frequent mention let me speake one word to you young Noblemen and Gentlemen Learne you the way of godlinesse that may free you from the loosenesse and vanitie incident to greatnesse for when you have given florem Diabolo the floure of your time to lusts of youth your fall may come before you can so much as give faecem Deo the dregs thereof to God I conclude this point with that which one observes upon Gods seeing all the works that he had made that they were very good for then immediately saith he followed the Sabbath or rest of God which though our salvation be not of workes may signifie thus much to you that when you shall come to a retrospect upon your wayes and works and find them so empty of and contrary unto God there can be no expectation of a Sabbath or rest unto your soules and therefore wash ye make ye cleane c. Isa 1. 16 17. The second Know ye not is spoken to you the lower shrubs You are to know that your great men may fall in the very time of their usefulnesse and service for your good In their losse bewaile your sins for though you feele not the stroke while the wound is fresh and green yet afterwards you will find the want of such as are worthy instruments when wee expect they should doe great things God by taking them away interrupts the cast Put not therefore your trust in Princes nor in the son of man in whom there is no salvation for his breath goeth forth and in that very day his thoughts perish Ps 146. 3 4. even his projects and intentions for your good dye in the wombe and are abortive If we leane hard upon the reed it breaks the sooner and wee are laid flat on the ground God will not let his people enjoy that long which they prize too much some worme shall smite that gourd and it shall wither and though many great men are not likely to be blasted by the confidence of the people yet our sad experience teacheth us that we smell too much to our sweetest flowers and so wither them I Shall now come to the paralell Herse of that Prince and great man fallen this day in England of whom though modestie it selfe may without blushing speak in a magnificent stile yet have my thoughts waved me too and fro it not being easie to be
War and generally to men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in headship or power whether Military Judg. 4. 2. 2 King 9. 5. or Senatorian yea though a man bee but the fore-man of his ranke Great man is a note of some singular eminencie above the ordinary trees of the wood and is a title given even to a Nabal that hath 3000. sheep and 1000. 1 Sam. 25. 2. goats which is the meanest ranke of greatnesse But where a great man is added to a Prince it may well import as much as magnificent a man of powerful interest great valour honourable atchievements noble activity in his place Magnus is an addition or hatchment by which Alexander Pompey Carolus c. have beene sirnamed for their great services or exploits So that a man by his orb or place he is set in is Princeps but by his influence and beams of worth raying from him upon the sublunary Commons he is Magnus It is an excellent conjunction a Prince and great man According to style of honour with us a man may be noble by birth discent or blood And though I be none of the new Switzers that could wish Princes Canton'd into the common level yet I may put you in mind that Antiquity of Race is but a Moss of time growing upon the back of worth or vertue And if a man carry not the primigeniall vertue with him which first made his race noble he is but a flower by change of soile degenerated into a weed as having nothing in him but the wax or matter without the form and stamp of Noblenesse And you know also that Nobility is often times the creature of a Prince his fancy which when there is no intrinsecall worth to be the supporter of it is as Charren saith but Nobility by parchment It 's a Cap. d◠Nobilitate brave consociation when the goodnesse and activity that makes you great is as high as the place which makes you Princes for if that crazy fancy take a man which possest some great ones they would be called Gods and personate an ostentation of greatnesse above men it may bewray pride madnesse but can never so far deceive the sense of underlings but that they will say as the Cobler did to Caligula in that state and humour that hee was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great Dotard It is the acting of your power and place which makes you great I cannot teach you to be princes Fortuitum est but I can tell you how to be great men not great in the glasse which Parasiticall flattery holds before you but indeed and that is thus Fill the sphere of your activity the Church and State the Towne or Countrey with the powerfull and benigne influences that flow from intrinsecall worth make the times the better for you Constraine by your example your inferiours to know God and reform their Families Let not Profanesse hide it selfe under the wing of your patronage nor lessen it self by the greatnesse of your examples Impartial speedy Justice with sweet refreshing Mercy will make you great men in the Commonwealth Zeal and Syncerity for God and his House will make you great men in the Church He that will be a great man must draw his lines to the center of publike good private ends never make a great man 2. The subject of this Lamentation is one Prince one great man Yee are called as some interpret the word the Corners of the people the Shields the Gods the Saviours the Shepheards of the people the Ministers of God for Good Benefactors c. Now the fall of one great Tree makes a great gappe in the hedge the Eclipse of one of the greater ruling Luminaries benights the world Our Lives Liberties c. are all bound up in you we poor men steal into our Graves with no greater noyse than can be made by a branch of Rosemary or a blacke Riband No body takes notice of the Gloeworme that goes out in the hedge bottome No Comet or Prodigie or Earth-quake tolls us the knell of our departure but one of you is carried forth by the teares of all ISRAEL provided that you be what your Names import publick men common Sanctuaries of the oppressed Cities of Refuge Altars of protection for otherwise you may be such as that your death would be more worth then your lives and then though you may be able to put men into black you cannot put them into mourning your death cannot be worth a teare when your lives are not worth a prayer 3. The subject of this Lamentation is a Prince A great man fallen Death is a fall from every thing but grace some do fall from a higher Scaffold great men fall divers stories from Honour Riches Offices others from the surface of a level ground having nothing to fall from but naked life Saints dye the gods doe fall I need not stand to prove it there is not one of you great men but shall be the proofe of this point shortly The Law of Death runs thus All Honours Titles c. to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding there is no Prerogative to check this Law I will not garnish this Deaths-head with fine fragments of Poetry and such stuffe nor would I at all set it before you as a standing dish were I not surrounded with so great a Corone of Princes and great men and haply some of you may be of Lewis the Eleventh his minde that charged all about him that they should not name the terrible word Death which yet you must heare of for it is the way of all the earth the house of all the living your long home or house of perpetuity of which its said Job 3. 14. 1 King 2. 2. Job 30. 2◠Luciannecy Kings Counsellours Princes small and great are there and there 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their bones and skeletons have no Inscription or Titles of Honour remaining on them The way to this house of all the living is as one saith sanguinea or lactea the bloudy or the milkie that is the common naturall or usuall way The former is troden by great men the Prince in my Text was sent home this way and so was the first man in the world that dyed The Sword hangs in a hair over the heads of great ones who are often cut Adrian the fourth Acts and Monum off by the hand of emulation and animosity That slaughter-house of Rome where it hath been practised by the Popes themselves who as one of them said do rather succeed Romulus making his way by blood then Peter hath sent out cruell Emissaries to cut off famous men by a meritorious knife How happily may you the Worthies of our Israel call to mind the goodness of that great God who hath bound the hands of such assassinating blood-suckers from executing their fury upon you all this while that you by renowned industry and zeale have given provocations to Rome and Hell The Common
way is troden by you great ones too for ye Gods do die and ye Princes shall fall like other men If you run your Genealogies high enough you will finde your selves but as other men in the fretum or narrow sea of Mankinde that divided the two Ocean worlds the Arke of Noah and thence if ye hold your way upward you will be found the sons of Adamah common dust And you that are the highest dust raised up a puff of winde of Honour above other men are laid like the small dust with one drop of rain There is a great Arbiter of all things that can thunder the proud Emperour under his bed and write the great King at three or foure words into trembling That can send Adrian the fourth Acts and Monum a Fly to fetch the Triple Crown before his Tribunal and make a hair or the kernel of a Raisin as mortall as Goliah his spear That can unspeake the whole world into nothing and blowe down a great bubble with an easie breath That by drawing one nail can throw down the stateliest building and undresse your souls by unpinning one pin If he take the Bridle off the head of that fire that 's in you it presently burns you up by a Fever If he loose the water it drownes you by a Dropsie If he lay his hand upon your mouth he takes away the airy difference betweene sleep and death He saith to Moses Go up and die and it follows after Moses my servant is dead Every man hath a day which is called His day and death never makes returne 1 Sam. 28. 10. Non est inventus in baliva nostra 4. The subject of this Lamentation is a Prince and a great man fallen in the time of his agency usefulnesse for the settlement of the destractions of Israel The key of the story unlocks the sense of these words This day in Israel It was a time that the promise of God to David was at the birth and the Midwivery of Abner was offered Let Abner otherwise be what he will for a man God may use an Egyptian midwife to bring forth the child of an Israelite But this great man falls in the very nicke of time before the good issue of his designes Let me point out this Observation to you It s not unusuall that great builders catch a fall when they are upon the scaffold aboute their worke Oh how it amazeth the faith of Gods people when the star that led them out of their own Countrey goes out of sight before it have brought them to their journeys end That youngling world of Reformation in Luthers time had a sore temptation when it must see the fall as I may say of the Electour of Saxony and others that were pillars of hope Moses must live no longer then to bring Israel into the plains of Moab himselfe is allowed but a prospect of that he hoped to have enjoyed and to have brought Israel into We are not without presidents our eyes have seen some of our greater lights eclipsed pleno orbe when they have been at their Full. The great God that hides his Counsels knows his Works from the begining to the end and he takes off such Instruments that he may shew that he doth not need is not tied to any tool for he made the great world without any When he saith Faciamus he speaks to himselfe alone not to himselfe and man Thus he makes way for some other Providence to come upon the Stage and brings about his Worke by a more crooked Instrument which wee imagined should be done by a strait one So Israel is speedily reduced to David though Abner fall Or he humbles his people just before his promises take effect and first strikes them dumb before he open their mouthes in a Benedicite that the lowlinesse of his handmaidens may break forth into a Magnificat or the time is not yet come that Israel is to be brought out of Egypt and therefore though Moses begin to rescue the Israelite and slay the Egyptian yet he must flee for it and be hidden for Fourty years Or else he pulls the stool of our confidence from under us because we sit down upon it or else pulls up the sluce of some judgements which have been hindr'd by some Lot or great man or whatsoever it be We see that God writes the Names of our best and greatest men in the shell and takes them away by a kind of Ostracisme All the help hope and comfort is that God hath all instruments eminently in himselfe and can raise up a Ioshua in steed of Moses Wherefore if his Disciples cannot cast out the evill Spirit let us come to himselfe and make our selves as sure of his Word by faith as he is sure of his word by promise for though Ioseph die in Egypt yet he layes his bones at stake that God will surely visit his Israel Gen. vlt. ver 25. 5. All this that hath been said a Prince a great man fallen at such a time is just reason of sad and solemne lamentation and therefore David and Israel is in this mourning posture such a man whose influence had a large circumference or sphaere while he lived is followed by an honour and sorrow of the same compasse when he dyes You Princes and great men death will tell what the world thought of you while you live it may be Sycophants flatterers lay their egges in your eares and hatch monstrous opinions in you of your greatnesse Such Rooks usually build in the highest Trees and on the other side envy detraction may breath upon the glasse of your reputation that it shall not while you live report so cleare an Image of you but death wil make thorow-lights in you that you shall be seen on both sides sorrows will not cannot be tongue-tyed you will then begin to reape your due Then the world breaks out into these expressions Hee was a brave man He was a great Courtier that could not be curbed with a white staffe to bee of counsell to subvert the freedomes of his Countrey He was a Captain that could draw a line but not to the ignoble center of his private ends He was a Justice that would scatter the drunkards from their Ale-bench and did not understand the language of a bottle or a basket He was a Nehemiah whose kindnesses were great which he shewed to the house of God and the Offices thereof He was a Minister that could not only thunder in his Doctrine but lighten in his Life He was a Papinian a great Lawyer but hee would not defend Imperiall and arbitrary exorbitances though he dyed for it He was a man that appeared stood for the truth and for God in the worst times when the Summer birds were hidden in their hollow Trees He was a man firm and fixed and studied not the neutral art of putting off the cap to one and making a leg to another And is not this a
Robert Earle of Essex his Excellence Generall of the Army Imployed for the defence of the Protestant Religion the safety of his Maties Person and of the Parliament the preseruation of the Lives Liberties of the Subiects Aetatis suae 56. THE HEARSE OF THE Renowned THE RIGHT HONOURABLE ROBERT EARLE OF ESSEX and Ewe Viscount Hereford Lord Ferrers of Chartley Bourchier and Lovaine sometime Captaine Lord Generall of the Armies raised for the defence of King and Parliament As it was represented in a Sermon preached in the Abbey Church at Westminster at the Magnificent Solemnity of his Funerall Octob. 22. 1646. By RICHARD VINES Eccles 12. 5. Man goeth to his long home and the mourners goe about the streets Published by Order of the House of Peeres LONDON Printed by T. R. and E. M. for Abel Roper at the Sign of the Sun against Dunstans Church in Fleet-street 1646. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE The House of PEERES Assembled in PARLIAMENT Right Honorable I Have performed what service I am able to the memory of the renowned Lord deceased And to the Commands of that Right Honorable and Noble Triumvirate which gave being to this Sermon And to your Lordships by whose Order I have adventured upon this Publication All men except such whose either morosity or malignity doth account vetera in laude praesentià in fastidio must acknowledge the worth the valour the faithfulnesse which lie under the Robes you weare and that it is not a meere borrowed Opinion which makes you Honorable but the reflection or rebounding back of that upon you which went first out from you But this Sermon will teach you that Titles of Honour are written in dust and that Princes and great men must fall their very Monuments are mortall and will in time be found as Archemedes his Tomb by Cicero in vepretis over-growne with Thorns and Bryers and that light of memory which shines after your Sun-set is but like the Moon which wanes also by degrees No glory that 's woven in the finest Tapestry of this world but will lose colour decay and perish but saving grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a possession for eternity your zealous agency for the Church and State will carry you as far towards Immortality as any other Chariot in this world It s as much as nothing when one can say no more of a man then is said of some great ones that they reigned and died The Gen. 36. 33. Lord give you hearts actuated with zeal for God together with a right temperament of counsels knowing that you are over a people who as Tacitus saith nec totā servitutem pati possunt nec totam libertatem and if your fall do come before you see or reap the fruit of your labours The Lord make you such as may take comfort with you and leave Honour behinde you so prayeth Your Lordships most humble and unworthy servant in and for Jesus Christ RICHARD VINES Die Veneris 23. Octob. 1646. ORdered by the Lords in Parliament assembled That this House gives thanks to Master Vines for the great pains by him taken yesterday in the Sermon hee preached at the solemnization of the Funerall of the Earle of Essex deceased And hee is hereby desired to Print and Publish the same which is not to be Printed by any but by Authority under his own hand Jo. Browne Cleric Parliamentorum I appoint Abel Roper to print this Sermon Richard Vines A SERMON PREACHED At the Solemnization of the Funerall of the Right Honorable ROBERT Earle of ESSEX c. Right Honorable c. AS that Lot sent forth to attach a particular man Josh 7. 16. did move gradatim and by steps taking first the Tribe then the Family then the House and at last the Man after which manner of progression though at fewer steps Jonathan was also taken 1 Sam 14. 42. So doe the trackes or vestigia appearing to your eye lead you at two or three removes to the most sad occasion of this extraordinary and magnificent solemnity The Escocheons which are the Index of the Family do speak first and tell the name of that honourable Family which this Lot hath taken And this sable field of men charged with a stately Herse honoured with so great a confluence of names and titles of honour granted either by the Sword or Gowne whether Honourable Worshipfull or Reverend and that in this place where the Dij majorum gentium have their Shrines where the Lions of England have usually put off their exuvias and where Majestie and highnesse have laid up what of Mortality they had doth proclaime him to bee some Prince or great name of that Family whom the Lot hath taken But then the Military Equipage the mourning Drumme the broken Launce the insignia Instruments of Warre reversed and in a mournful posture The Truncheon in a dead hand doe speake the very man It is Jonathan that is taken And shall Jonathan dye that hath wrought so great salvation in Israel It is alas too late to say shall Jonathan dye This Jonathan cannot be rescued by the love of Israel therefore I must sadly lay the Scene in one that is already 1 Sam. 14. 45. fallen for do not yee know that there is a Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel 2 SAM 3. 38. Know yee not that there is a Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel THIS Text presents you with the Herse of Abner a Prince and a great man fallen in Israel This day presents you with a paralell Herse of a Prince and a great man fallen in England both of them magnificently attended with the drooping statelines of publike and universall lamentation That I may set up some lights about the Herse of Abner you may please to call to minde 1. His Office 2. His Project 3. His Fall 4. His Funerall 1. His Office was Captaine of the Host or stylo novo Lord Generall of the Forces of Israel it was not so much because he toucht King Saul in bloud being Cousin-Germane as in respect of this high command that he is called A Prince and a great man 2. His Project which he had upon the Anvile now at his death was the reducement of all Israel unto the Scepter of David herein his Project concurr'd with Gods but took rise in him from an ill or suspicious ground Ishbosheth doth but question him for familiar usage of a Concubine of Sauls which if true was in those times accounted a kinde of Crimen Majestatis and this heats his bloud for great Instruments will not beare a checke and thereupon his Stomack brings him off to David God useth the sins and great Spirits or animosities of great men though they be not carried by Conscience to bring to birth his owne purposes and promises made to his Davids 3. His Fall which was by the hand of pretended revenge but reall emulation the spirit of Caesar and
moderatour of the Arguments that are for speech or silence Not because the matter will surpasse the work-manship and the copiousnesse of the subject shame the penury of my expression but because on the one hand it is argued that Funerall Encomiastickes of the dead are very often confections of poyson to the living for many whose lives speake nothing for them will draw the example into consequence and be thereby led into hope that they may presse a hackny Funerall Sermon to carry them to Heaven when they dye especially if such for whom no file could be rough enough while they lived be smooth-filed when they are dead on the other hand it may be said That though coÌ„mon graves have no inscription yet Marble Tombes are not without some Epitaph Heroicall examples should not go with a common passe but with a Trompet David afforded this Honorary to Saul and Abner and which is to be observed he drew not any line in their pictures with a black coale which yet he might have done for both of them had too much shadow if he would have used it but he dealt with them as the Painter did with Antigonus who had but one eye he drew his Picture imagine lusca halfe-faced and so buried the deformitie out of the beholders sight Neither is this all which makes me stand in a slippery place but the various senses and censures too which are very likely to be found in this great multitude Some that hated the sound of his Drums and Trumpets will not patiently endure the Ecchore-sounding to their dis-affected eares And some againe are indifferently content to heare some good words of his Epitaph because it begins with Hîc jacet here he lyes as Caracalla said to them that desired that some honours might be spent upon his Brother Geta now dead out of his way Sit divus saith he modo non sit vivus honour him as you will so as he doth not live The most voyces will doubtlesse vote that it is needlesse to set up a Candle to the Sunne for his story is yet alive in all mens memories and the stage whereon he acted it is yet warme The truth is I had rather leave him to the history which I hope the honourable Houses have bespoken and to that Homer that shall be the praco of this Achilles But because his name would sometime have passed me clear through all Guards and probably hath not as yet lost that vertue and that this State and presence speakes him with more eloquence then I so that I can but run the hazard of being an imperfect interpreter by word of that honour which your selves doe speake by signes And since death hath put him beyond pride all beyond envy and my selfe beyond flattery what if wee make a short Index of his Story and audit his dâ—bentur in the mean time not drawing him in full proportion but as Ezekiel pourtrayed the Citie of Ierusalem upon a Tile which wil indeed be more suitable to the posture we are in for deepe sorrowes make no long orations Leves loquuntur curae ingentes stupent Since then it must be so jacta est alea I shall impose upon my self this law not to build his Monument of common stones nor trouble my self and you to gather such flowers to cast upon his grave as grow in common fields nor descend or stoope to any thing which is beneath Heroicall His Nobilitie and his Noblenesse though they might each of them adorne his Monument yet the third which is his Excellency is the transcendent For his Nobilitie He was sprung of an exceeding faire an ancient Stem which doth branch forth into the great and Noble Families of the Princes and great men of England and he was the third of this Title which was inoculate into that Stem by Q. Elizabeth of famous memory But Titles of Honour must dye as well as men and because this renowned streame carries it's name no further I shall omit all matter of Heraldry as not becomming me at this time and place His Noblenesse was of a high and honourable elevation He was a man of fixed principles and of a masculine resolution of an inviting familiarity in a stately presence too generous to be cruell too great a Patriot to be Courted his compasse without trepidation or variation had constantly stood right to that Pole the good of his Country which he kept in his eye both when he wore the Gowne and Sword He was fidè Romana Anti-Romana of Roman faithfulnesse and of Anti-Roman faith A Senatour that honoured his Robes The teares of England of his servants of his tenants do speake him in a better language then the most eloquent Marble is able Though tenants teares be no commendation to a living landlord yet are they credit to the dead The Character of his Excellency may be that which David sometime gave to Abner the great man in my Text Art not thou a valiant man and who is like thee in all Israel When the time was come that Ianus Temple must be open'd here in England by the Porter that onely hath the key of it Necessitie and those orphane sisters before spoken of Libertie and Propertie were to chuse their Guardian Champion and Vindex you the Honourable Trustees looked out for a Dictator in whose hands you might deposite the very being safety freedom lives Senatus populique Romani of the Parliament and people of England and happily pitcht your eye and choyce upon this man who was stirpe ingenio bellicosus One that had honour to give credit to the Cause he undertooke reputation to vindicate his undertaking from contempt of enemies Interest whose Drum could presse an Army dexteritie to manage the Sword Counsell to direct it Valour to use it faithfulnesse to discharge it And he was the man you then resolv'd to live and dye with It was the greatest honour in the world to be credited with the infinite depositum of the life and being of the Parliament of England And at this time when you had assigned this Theater to act his part upon it was the highest honour to him that he would undertake to Pilot a Ship so laden with so great a fraught through the tempestuous and angry Seas which then began to swell and be intractable when this poore Kingdome knew not for the most part how to weare Buffe and Steele untill taught by him in whom that ancient Chivalry and Valour of England which had left it's Monuments in France and other parts of the world but of later times almost emasculate and grown obsolet was concenter'd and by transmigration had layd it selfe up in him He was the man that was to breake the yce and set his first footing in the Red Sea a Hercules but not in bivio a man resolved when others hung in suspence fixt when some starres of greatest magnitude were moved with trepidation or erratick That filled the breach when many lay post principa behind the hedge