these Times young Dorothy the eldest Daugâ—teâ— married Robert Viscount Lisle after the death of his Father Eâ—â—l of Leicester by whom he had a numerous Issue like Clive branches aâ—out his Table The younger Daughter Lucy a Lady of â—â—â—ompâ—rable Beauty solemnized in the Poâ—â—s oâ—â—he most exquiâ—â—e Witsâ—f â—f her time married the Lord Hayes now made Viâ—count Doncaster against hâ—r Father's will â—ho aimed at higher â—xtractiâ—â—â— during his Imprisonment which the old Earâ—'s stubborn spirit not brooking would never give hâ—r any thing And Doncaster whose affection was abâ—ve money â—etting only a valuationâ—pon â—pon his much-admired Bride strove to make himselâ— meritorious and prevailed so with the King for his Fâ—ther-in 〈◊〉 that he got his Release But the old Earl would hâ—rdly be drawn to take a Release from his hand so that when he had liberty he restrained himself and with much importunity was wrought upon by such as knew the distempers of his body might best qualifie those of his mind peâ—â—uading him â—oâ—â—ome indisposition to make a journey to the Bath â—hich was one special motive to accept of his Son-in-laâ—'s respects HONORATISSâ—â—â—â— Dê° HENRICVS PERCEY COMâ—â—â—â— NORTHVMBERIANâ—… If Art could shewe the Spirit in the Face And in dead Sines expresse a Liuing Grace You might though wanting an Inscription sweare That this the shadowe of a PERCY were For when the Noblest Romane worthies Liud Though greater Fame their Fortunes have atcheiud No brauer Spiritts did in ROME command Then were the PERCYS of NORTHVMBERIAND But now War breaks in upon us following that blazing Fore-runner the House of Austria like Pyrrhus and Lysander extending their Dominions no further than the Sword could reach having long seat hered their Nests with the Eagles plumes grew formidable to the Princes and States of Germany And because they found the Popes had shrewdly plumed some of their Predecessors till they had wrested most parts of Italy from the Empire they were content to maintain their Grandure by the Popes power and to ingratiate themselves the more became great Persecutors of the Reformed Religion A little before this time Ferdinand Uncles Son to Matthias the Emperor was Crowned King of Bohemia with this Reservation that he should not exercise the Power of a King as long as the old Emperor lived This kind of Crowning of Kings one in the life of another was the great Chain that link by link held the Empire and the two Kingdoms of Hungaria and Bohemia together in the Austrian Family so that the State of either Kingdom could not or durst not put forth their Strength to shake them asunder The Emperor kept his Court at Vienna King Ferdinand at Gretz in Stiria so that the Government of Bohemia rested in such Counsellors as the Emperor Matthias left there for the management of Publick Affairs These Counsellors and Ministers with the Archbishop of Prague broke out about this time not only to demolish the Protestant Churches but by the help of the Iesuits their bitter Enemies strove to undermine the Religion it self The Protestant States and Nobles of the Country summoning an Assembly to redress their Grievances were opposed by some of them Emperor's Ministers of State the very day of their meeting which exasperated them to such a height of Passion being backt by some Forces they brought with them for their Security that they threw Slabata the Emperor's chief Justice Smesansius one of the Council of State and Fabricius a pragmatical Secretary from a high Window in the Castle down into the Court though some of them took little hurt and lived as reports go to this time This rash Action the Bohemians strive to palliate by Apologies to the Emperor but withal strengthned themselves making Leavies both of Horse and Foot the better to secure their own Peace and banishing those Firebrands the Iesuits out of Prague whose malicious and distemper'd Zeal first kindled the Flame The Emperor hearing of these mischiefs raises an Army under the command of Count Bucquoy and the Protestant States finding the Emperor exasperated raise two Armies one commanded by Count Thurne the other by Count Mansfeldt some bickrings past betwixt the Imperial Army and the Bohemians some Towns taken on both sides and in the heat of this stir the old Emperor dies Ferdinand King of Hungary and Bohemia and adopted heir of old Matthias meeting after summons at Frankford with the three Electors of Mentz Collen and Trevers and only with the Representatives of the other three Electors The Church carried it for him and he was chosen King of the Romans The States of Bohemia disclaimed the election as invalid because he could not be an Elector himself as King of Bohemia for that he had never been actually in possession of the Crown And though their dissent could not lessen Ferdinand's Election to the Empire yet they protested by oath never to acknowledge him for their King These eruptions made a noise all over Christendom and most knowing men looked on this heavenly Torch the late Comet as fit fuel to give fire to such a train Our King fearing the clap would fall heavy upon the Protestant party sent the Viscount Doncaster extraordinary Ambassador to mediate a Reconciliation betwixt the Emperor and the Bohemians But the asperity and bitterness was too great to find an allay by his sweet and candid Complements being sitter for the bosoms of Lovers than the armed breasts of Uprores and Tumults LOTHARIVS PAR LA GRACE DE DIEV ARCHEVESQVE DE TREVES B. Moucorneâ— excudit Our King that looked upon his own condition through the Optique of the peoples mutable and unstable affection would by no means countenance such a Precedent as should give them power to dispose of an established Royal dignity at their pleasure and upon every change of humor for so he might shake his own foundation which made the Barons addresses crude and nauseous to his Appetite till time had a little digested them And then he dispatched two Ambassadors into Bohemia One was Sir Richard Weston who was afterwards Lord high Treasurer of England and left to his posterity the Earldom of Portland a man of a haughty spirit yet knew how by suppling it to make his way to the height he arrived at For his Religion gave place to his Policy and mounted him till he became one of the great grievances of the Kingdom The other was Sir Edward Conwey a man of a grosser temper bred a Soldier being Governor of Bril when England gave over her interest in the cautionary Towns who was after made a Viscount and Secretary of State a rough impollished peice for such an imployment But the King that wanted not his Abilities would often make himself merry with his imperfect scrouls in writing and hacking expressions in reading so that he would break into laughter and say in a facetious way Had ever man such a Secretary that can neither Write nor Read These two were suited for the imployment happily upon
the delights she suckt in there made his condition again known to her Father The old man being troubled with his Daughters disobedience imbitter'd her being near him with wearisome and continual chidings to wean her from the sweets she doted on and with much ado forced her into the Country But how harsh was the parting being rent away from the place where she grew and flourished Yet she left all her Engines and Imps behind her the old Doctor and his Confederate Mrs. Turner must be her two supporters She blazons all her miseries to them at her depart and moystens the way with her tears Chartley was an hundred miles from her happiness and a little time thus lost is her eternity When she came thither though in the pleasantest time of Summer she shut herself up in her Chamber not suffering a beam of light to peep upon her dark thoughts If she stirred out of her Chamber it was in the dead of Night when sleep had taken possession of all others but those about her In this implacable sad discontented humour she continued some moneths always murmuring against but never giving the least civil respect to her Husband which the good man suffered patiently being loth to be the divulger of his own misery yet having a manly courage he would sometimes break into a little passion to see himself sleighted and neglected by himself but having never found better from her it was the easier to bear with her Robert Earle of Essex his Excellence Generall of the Army etc For coming to London next Winter with this full sail loaden with lust she found the Viscount much prepared for her who being at first fastned on the Object absence and all those little Artifices that mischievous Women and cunning Impostures could devise had advanced him as much in his desires as they had hindred the other We could dispute the Nature of these Operations how far they are Contingent and how the fancy works with them though ignorant of them making their impulsions more active being the sparks that kindle this combustible matter for we will never allow there was any other Diabolical means used Nature being strong enough for such a production but being not pertinent to the Story will leave it and follow them that found the effects of it and had affections suitable to it which they made use of with an unbridled appetite yet meeting closely in corners Sin being at first shamefaced but afterwards they grew more bold and every hour that the Viscount could steal from his Royal Master he dedicated it to his Disloyal Mistris being caught in this Net of Adulation he becomes a willing Prisoner Lust only getting liberty to all looseness and licentiousness Places of frequent Meetings are daily renewed Persons fitted for such practices are employed and when Nature was exhausted Art her subtil Imitator brought in her store to contribute new Spirits purchased at any rate All outward Adornment to present Beauty in her full Glory were not wanting on both sides being Lusts fuel which tended to the Consumption of all Reason And among the rest yellow starch the invention and foyl of Iaundice Complexions with great Cut-work Bands and Piccadillies a thing that hath since lost the name crouded in and flourished among us Mrs. Turner being nominoted to be the first Contriver happily in England but the Original came out of France which fashion and colour did set off their lean sallow countenances Thus did the Viscount get the Conquest of two the King and this Lady but could not subdue his own lustful Appetite The Wheel of Fortune running towards the Scots turned by the Viscount Rochester was unhappily diverted upon the Lord Sanquir a Baron of that Nation and married to a good Family in England who some years before meeting with a sturdy Fencer one Iohn Turner who was a Master of the Weapon-Trade in his own School the young Lord strove to put some affront upon him making it no little Conquest to disgrace a Master in the Art as they termed it and the man apprehensive of the Attempt with a bold rudeness prest so hard upon him that he thrust out one of the Barons eyes This business was much regretted by Turner and the Baron being conscious to himself that he meant his Adversary some ill took the Accident with as much patience as men that lose one eye by their own default use to do for the preservation of the other Some time after being in the Court of the late great Henry of France and the King courteous to Strangers entertaining discourse with him askt him how he lost his eye he cloathing his answer in a better shrowd than a plain Fencers told him it was done with a Sword The King replies Doth the man live And that question gave an end to the Discourse but was the beginner of a strange Confusion in his working Fancy which neither Time nor Distance could compose carrying it in his breast some years after till he came into England where he hired two of his Country-men Gray and Carlile men of low and mercenary spirits to murther him which they did with a Case of Pistols in his own House in White-Fryars many years after the loss of his bodily eye thus the Baron lost the eye of his Reason This bold nefarious Act was very deeply resented at Court and the Kings Commands were so active for apprehension of the murderers that they were all three taken one upon the Borders of Scotland so far had his fears carried him another in a Ship bound for Hamburgh who scaping in a Storm the Seas delivered up and the Lord himself being obscured in this Tempest of his Soul hearing a thousand pound was offered to bring his Head so liberal was the King for Iustice threw himself into the Arms of his Mercy by the mediation of the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury to whom he presented himself an Object of pity but no intercession could prevail their lives satisfied the Law the Baron not having the honour of a Noble death Edward Earle of Dorset Lord Chamberlaine to the Queene etc. The Kings affections were not so monopolized but that his crafty Servant the Earl of Salisbury had a good hole as well in his Councils as Treasure And being not well pleased to see himself bearded by a Youth new started into the affairs of the World and mounted by the wing of love not of merit he cast out many mists before him to hinder and damp his passage so that the Viscount could not rise to that pitch during his life that he afterwards arrived at And one thing among the rest he obstructed was five thousand pounds the King had given him to maintain his Riot Which sum the Treasurer thought too great a bulk to be carried lightly away and therefore he desired the King might see what he did And having layd the money in Silver upon Tables in his Gallery at Salisbury-house he invited the King to dinner making
the Peace of the Land and had opposed himself against the wholsom advice of divers Princes Lords and excellent Persons aswel without as within the Land and that he had injured some of their mightiest Allies by his secret practices namely by calumniating the King of Great Britain as though he had been the Author of these troubles in the Low-Countries For that he had kindled the fire of Dissention in the Provinces had raised Souldiers in the Diocess of Utrecht had disreputed his Excellency as much as lay in his power had revealed the secrets of the Council and had received Presents and Gifts from Foreign Princes Finally for that by his Machinations and Plots new States have been erected in the State new Governments against the Government and new Unions and Alliances against the ancient Union to the general perturbation as well of Policy as of Religion to the exhausting of the Treasures of the Land to the jealousie and dislike not only of the Confederates but of the Natives of the Country who by this means were brought into danger that they were like to fall into final ruine He was born in Amersford descended from the Antient Family of Olden Bernevelt in his Fortune a private Gentleman but by his Industry Travels and Studies at home and abroad he made himself capable of managing the highest affairs which he did almost for forty years together He was five times Extraordinary Ambassador into England and France had been in the Field with the Princes of Orange and the Army as one of the States thirty two several Leaguers nothing was acted without his Advice Indeed he was the Tongue and Genius of the State But whether Ambition now in his old Age mounted him to grapple with the Prince for power or whether that wild and frantick fancy that men often brand their spirits with and call it Conscience but is nothing but pertinacy in opinion impt the wings of his Affections we cannot discover being only the secret Companions of his own Breast and let them dye with him But thus he ended in the seventy first year of his Age. He lived to see that which he had so much opposed a National Synod held at Dort whither our King sent Doctor George Carlton Bishop of Landaff Doctor Ioseph Hall Dean of Worcester Doctor Iohn Davenant Professor Regius in Cambridge and Master of Queens College and Doctor Samuel Ward Regent of Sidney College in Cambridge Divines of great Reputation sound Learning and well-grounded Faith Where they met with divers Divines from Switzerland and Germany besides the Natives of the Netherlands who altogether in a full Synod quashed as much as in them lay the Arminian Opinions and though they could not utterly extirpate the roots of the Heresie yet they laid them so low that they never broke out there since into exuberant branches though some of the Fibrae the small veins left behind much tainted our Nation as shall be expressed hereafter And now the Heavens declare the Glory of God A mighty blazing Comet appears in Libra whose bearded Beams covered the Virgin Sign it began on Wednesday morning the 18th of November this year and vanished away on Wednesday the 16th of December following making in 28 days motion its Circumgiration over most Parts of the known World extending its radiant locks by the observation of Astronomers sometimes 45 Degrees in length And as our Doctor Bambridge observed towards the Declination of it about the 11th of December it past over London in the morning and so hasted more Northwards even as far as the Orcades VERA EFFIGIES R.DI IN CHRISTO PATRIS GEORGII CARLETON EPISC.PI CICESTRIENSIS GEORGIUS CARLETONVS 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Age tu solus regai cor Orbis cor Sol est regai cor tu Pateriut Sol Orbe â—at reg sui seripta meant 〈◊〉 Si cor principum 〈…〉 Anglie reite Per 〈…〉 Nunquam futilibus excanduit ignibus Aether they make not their Course in Vain These Apparitions do always portend some horrid Events here below and are Messengers of mischief to poor Mortals The Divine Wisdom pointing to us what we should do to prevent these threatned dangers that we may have our lives for a prey It appears first in Libra the Emblem of Iustice and streams over the Virgin Astrea which as the Poet saith was last of all the Virtues left the Earth Ultima Coelestum terras Astrea reliquit We must by this Admonition from Heaven learn to do justly and it is for injustice that these sad Omens threaten us What miserable Effects of War Ruine and Devastation in most parts of the known World followed at the heels of this stupendious Harbinger is obvious to all and so far as relates to us may be declared God willing in the Progress of this History but I hope the operation and power of it is almost at an end for it began in Germany took France and Spain in the way and past over England to the Orcades and so vanished as Bainbridge relates in the Description of it Fol. 7. Fulgura non semper nec semper praelia durant let 's count it almost past For War like lightning doth not always last The first remarkable Accident that happened in England after this Prodigious Forerunner was the death of Queen Anne who died of a Dropsie at Hampton-Court and thence brought to her Palace in the Strand for the more triumphant glory of her Obsequies The Common People who naturally admire their Princes placing them in a Region above ordinary Mortals thought this great Light in Heaven was sent as a Flambeau to her Funeral their dark minds not discovering while this Blaze was burning the fire of War that broke out in Bohemia wherein many thousands perished She was in her great Condition a good Woman not tempted from that height she stood on to embroyl her spirit much with things below her as some busy-bodies do only giving her self content in her own House with such Recreations as might not make Time tedious to her And though great Persons Actions are often pried into and made Envies mark yet nothing could be fixt upon her that left any great impression but that she may have engraven upon her Monument a Character of Virtue About this time Henry Earl of Northumberland who had been a Prisoner in the Tower ever since the Powder plot a long Recluse was set at liberty The Cause of his Confinement was upon a Sentence in Star-Chamber for nourishing in his House Thomas Piercy his Kinsman who was one of the Complotters of the Treason And though nothing could be proved against the Earl to endanger his life yet upon the presumpâ—â—on of his knowledge of it he was fined in thirty thousand pounds and imprisoned in the Tower He was married to Dorothy eldest Daughter to Walter Earl of Essex by whom hâ— had a Nâ—ble yet surviving Issue two Sâ—ns and tâ—o Daughters Algernon now Earl of Northumberland and Henry both in