battaile yet was hee encountred with another desastrous misfortune for as hee marched forward with his forces to fight with Sigismunds brother he was by him ouercome and slain and for a further disgrace his dismembred head fastened on the top of a pike carried about to the enterview of all men Hee left behind him three yoong sonnes whom his owne brethren and their vncles Clotaire and Childebert notwithstanding their yong tender yeares tooke from their grandmother Clotildes custodie that brought them vp as if they would enstall them into some part of their fathers kingdome but most wickedly and cruelly to the end to possesse their goods lands signiories bereft them al of their liues saue one that saued himselfe in a monestarie In this strange monstrous act Clotaire shewed himselfe more then barbarous when hee would not take pitty vpon the youngest of the two being but seuen yeare old who hearing his brother of the age of tenne yeares crying pittifully at his slaughter threw himselfe at his vncle Childeberts feet with teares desiring him to saue his life wherewith Childebert being greatly affected entreated his brother with weeping eies to haue pitty vpon him and spare the life of this poore infant but al his warnings and entreaties could not hinder the sauadge beast from performing this cruell murder vpon this poor child as he had done vpon the other The Emperour Phocas attained by this bloody means the emperiall dignity Nicephor lib. 18. cap. 58. euen by the slaughter of his Lord maister Mauricius whom as he fled in disguised attire for feare of a treason pretended against him hee being beforetime the leiutenant general of his army pursued so maliciously hotely that he ouertook him in his flight for his further griefe first put all his childrē seuerally to death before his face that euery one of thē might be a seuerall death vpon him before he died and then slew him also This murderer was hee that first exalted to so high a point the popish horn whē at the request of Boniface he ordained that the bishop of Rome shold haue preheminence authority oueral other bishops which he did to the end that the stain blame of his most execrable murder might be either quite blotted out or at least wincked at Vnder his regencie the forces of the Empire grew wonderously into decay France Spaine Almaigne and Lumbardy reuolted from the Empire and at last himselfe being pursued by his sonne in law Priscus with the Senators vvas taken and hauing his handes and feet cut off was togither with the whole race of his ofspring put to a most cruel death because of his cruell and tyrannous life Among all the strange examples of Gods iudgements that euer were declared in this world that one that befell a king of Poleland called Popiell for his murders is for the strangenesse thereof most worthy to bee had in memory hee raigned in the year of our Lord 1346 this man among other of his particular kinds of cursings and swearing whereof he was no niggard vsed ordinarily this oth If it bee not true would rats might deuour me Munst Cosmog Mandat 3. Cursing lib. 1. cap. 32. prophecying thereby his owne destruction for hee was deuoured euen by the same means which hee so often wished for as the sequele of his historie will declare The father of this Popiell feeling himselfe neare death resigned the gouernment of his kingdome to two of his brethren men exceedingly reuerenced of all men for the valor and vertue which appeared in them He being deceased and Popiell being growne vp to ripe and lawfull yeares when hee saw himselfe in full libertie without all bridle of gouernment to doe what he listed he began to giue the full swindge to his lawlesse and vnruly desires in such sort that within few daies he became so shamelesse that there was no kind of vice which appeared not in his behauior euen to the working of the death of his owne vncles for all their faithfull dealing towards him which hee by poyson brought to passe Which being done he caused himself forthwith to be crowned with garlands of flowers and to bee perfumed with pretious ointments and to the end the better to solemnize his entrie to the crowne commanded a sumptuous and pompous banket to be prepared wherevnto all the princes and lords of his kingdome were inuited Now as they were about to giue the onset vpon the delicate cheare behold an army of rats sallying out of the dead and putrified bodies of his vncles set vpon him his wife and children amid their dainties to gnaw them with their sharp teeth insomuch that his guard with all their weapons strength were not able to chase them away but being weary with resisting their daily mightie assaults gaue ouer the battaile wherfore counsell was giuen to make great coale fires round about them that the rats by that meanes might bee kept off not knowing that no pollicy or power of man was able to withstand the vnchangeable decree of God for for all their huge forces they ceased not to run through the midst of them and to assault with their teeth this cruell murderer Then they gaue him counsaile to put himselfe his wife children into a boat and thrust it into the middest of a lake thinking that by reason of the waters the rats would not approch vnto thē But alasse in vain for they swum through the waters amaine gnawing the boat made such chinckes into the sides thereof that the water began to run in which being perceiued of the boatmen amazed them sore and made them make post hast vnto the shore where he was no sooner arriued but a fresh muster of rats vniting their forces with the former encountred him so sore that they did him more scath then all the rest Wherevpon all his guard and others that were there present for his defence perceiuing it to be a iudgement of Gods vengeance vpon him abandoned and forsooke him at once who seeing himselfe destitute of succour and forsaken on all sides flew into a high tower in Chousuitze whether also they pursued him and climing euen vp to the highest roome where he was first eat vp his wife and children shee being guilty of his vncles death and lastly gnew and deuoured him to the very bones After the same sort was an Archbishop of Mentz called Hatto Munsteer Cosmographie punished in the year 940 vnder the raigne of the Emperour Otho the great for the extreame cruelty which he vsed towards certaine poore beggers whom in time of famine he assembled together into a great barne not to releeue their wants as he might ought but to rid their liues as he ought not but did for hee set on fire the barne wherein they were and consumed them all aliue comparing them to rats mise that deuoured good corne but serued to no other good vse Mandat 8. Auarice and vnmercifulnesse But God
Austria Greg. of Tours lib 2. who being tickled with an vnsatiable lust of raigne through the deceiuable persuasions of Cleodouius king of Fraunce slew his father Sigebert as he lay asleepe in his tent in a forrest at noone time of the day who being weary with walking laid himselfe downe there to take his rest but for all that the wicked wretch was so farre from attaining his purpose that it fell out cleane contrarie to his expectation for after his fathers death as hee was vewing his treasures and ransacking his coffers one of Cleodouius factors stroke him sodainly and murdered him so Cleodouius seased both vpon the crowne and treasures After the death of Hircanus Ioseph antiq Aristobulus succeeded in the gouernmēt of Iudea which whilest he stroue to reduce into a kingdome to weare a crown contrary to the custome of his predecessors his mother other brethren contending with him about the same he cast in prison and took Antigonus his next brother to be his associate but ere long a good gratefull son he famished her to death with hunger that had fed him to life with her teates euen his naturall mother And after persuaded with false accusations caused his late best beloued Antigonus to be slain by an ambush that lay by Stratos tower because in the time of his sicknesse hee entered the temple with pompe but the Lord called for quittance for the two bloosheads immediatly after the execution of them for his brothers blood was scarse washed of the ground ere in the extremity of his sicknesse he was carried into the same place there vomiting vp bloud at his mouth nosthrils to be mingled with his brothers he fell down starke dead not without horrible tokens of trembling and despaire Nero that vnnaturall Tyrant surpassed all that liued Corn. Tacit. lib. 14. as in all other vices so in this for hee attempted thrise by poyson to make away his mother Agrippina and when that could not preuaile by reason of her vsuall Antidots and preseruatiues hee assaied diuerse other meanes as first a deuise whereby shee should bee crushed to death as she slept Sueton. cap. 33. a loosened beame that should fall vpon her and secondly by shipwracke both which when shee escaped the one by discouery and the other by swimming hee sent Anicetus the Centurion to slaughter hir with the sword who with his companions breaking vp the gate of the city where shee lay rushed into her chamber and there murdered her It is written of her that when shee saw there was no remedy but death shee presented her belly vnto the murderer and desired him to kill her in that part which had most deserued it by bringing into the world so vile a monster and of himt hat he came to veiw the dead carcasse of his mother and handled the members thereof commending this and discommending that as his fancy led him in the mean time being thirstie to call for drinke so far was hee from all humanitie and touch of nature but he that spared not to embrew his handes in her blood that bred him was constrained ere long to offer violence vnto his own life which was most dear vnto him Munst Cosmog lib. 3. Henry the son of Nicolotus duke of Herulia had two wicked cruell and vnkind sons by the yonger of whom with the consent of the elder he was traiterously murdered because he had married a third wise for which cause Nicolotus their cousin Germane pursued them both with a iust reuenge for he depriued them of their kingdome and droue them into exile where they soone after perished Phil. Melanct. chron lib. 5. Munst Cosmog lib. 4. Selimus the tenth Emperour of the Turks was so vnnaturall a child that he feared not to dispossesse his father Baiaset of the crowne by treason and next to bereaue him of his life by poyson And not fatisfied therewith euen to murder his two brethren and to destroy the whole stocke of his own bloud But when hee had raigned eight yeares vengeance found him out and being at his backe so corrupted and putrified his reines that the contagion spread it selfe ouer all his bodie so that hee died a beast-like and irkesome death and that in the same place where hee had before oppressed his father Baiaset with an army to wit at Chiurle a citty of Thracia in the yeare of our Lord 1520 the month of September Casp Hedian lib. 6. cap. 29. Charles the younger by surname called Crassus sonne to Lodouick the third was possessed and tormented with a Deuill in the presence of his father and the peeres of the realme which hee openly confessed to haue iustly happened vnto him because hee had pretended in his mind to haue conspired his fathers death and deposition what then are they to expect that doe not pretend but performe this monstrous enterprise A certaine degenerate and cruel sonne longing and gaping after the inheritance of his father which nothing but his life kept him from wrought this meanes to accomplish his desire he accused his father of a most filthy and vnnameable crime euen of committing filthinesse with a cow knowing that if he were conuicted thereof Theat hist the law would cut off his life and herein he wrought a double villany in going about not onely to take away his life which by the law of nature he ought to haue preserued but also his good name without respecting that the staine of a father redoundeth to his posteritie Mandat 8. Calumniatiō lib. 2. cap. and that children commonly doe not only inherit the possessions but also imitate the conditions of their parents but all these supposes laid aside togither with all feare of God he indicted him before the magistrate of incest that vpon his owne knowledge insomuch that they brought the poore innocent man to the racke to the end to make him confesse the crime which albeit amidst his tortures he did assoone as he was out he denied againe howbeit his extorted confession stood for euidence and he was condemned to be burned with fire as was speedily executed and constantly endured by him exclaiming still vpon the false accusation of his sonne and his owne vnspotted innocencie as by the issue that followed most clearely appeared for his sonne not long after fell into a reprobate mind and hanged himselfe and the iudge that condemned him with the witnesses that bare record of his forced confession within one moneth died all after a most wretched and miserable sort And thus it pleased God both to reuenge his death and also to quit his reputation and innocency from ignominy and discredit in this world Manfred prince of Tarentum Phil Melanct. Chron. lib. 4. No better fruit to be expected of an◠bastard im◠bastard sonne to Fredericke the second smothered his father to death with a pillow because as some say he would not bestow the kingdom of Naples vpon him not content
who vpoÌ„ condition of hir yeelding to his lust and payment of 200 duccats promised safe deliuerance for him the poor woman seeing that nothing could redeeme her husbands life but losse shipwrack of her owne honesty told her husband who willed her to yeeld to the captains desire not to pretermit so good an occasion wherfore she consented but after the pleasure past the traiterous and wicked captaine put her husband to death notwithstanding which iniury when she complained to Gonzaga duke of Ferrara hee caused the captaine first to restore backe her 200 dukats with an addition of 700 crowns secondly to marry her to his wife and lastly when hee hoped to enioy her body to be hanged for his trecherie O noble Iustice and comparable to the worthiest deeds of antiquitie and deseruing to be held in perpetuall remembrance As these before mentioned excelled in punishing this sin so this fellow following excelled in committing it and in being punished for it Theat histor his name is Nouellus Cararius Lord of Pauie a man of note and credite in the world for his greatnesse but of infamy and discredit for his wickednesse This man after many cruell murders and bloodie practises which he exercised in euery place where he came fell at last into this notorious and abhominable crime for lying at Vincentia hee fell in loue with a young maid of excellent beautie but more â—ent honestie an honest citizens daughter whome hee â—anded her Parents to send vnto him that hee might haue his pleasure of her but when they regarding their credit and shee her chastitie more then the Tyrants command refused to come he tooke her violently out of their house and constrained her body to his lust and after to ad crueltie to villanie chopt her into small peeces and sent them to her Parents in a basket for a present wherewith her poore father astonished caried it to the Senate who sent it to Venice desiring them to consider the fact and to reuenge the cruelty The Venetians vndertaking their defence made war vpon the Tyrant and besieging him in his own city took him at last prisoner and hanged him with his two sons Francis and William Diocles sonne of Pisistratus Tyrant of Athens for rauishing a maid Lanquet was slain by her brother whose death when Hippias his brother vndertooke to reuenge and caused the maidens brother to be racked that he might discouer the other conspirators he named al the tyrants friends which by commandement being put to death the Tyrant asked whither there were any more none but only thy selfe quoth hee whome I would wish next to be hanged wherby it was perceiued how abundantly he had reuenged his sisters chastitie by whose notable stomacke all the Athenians being put in remembrance of their libertie expelled their tyrant Hippias out of their city Mundus a young Gentleman of Rome Lanquet chron rauished the chast Matron Paulina in this fashion when he perceiued her resolution not to yeeld vnto his lust hee persuaded the priests of Isis to say that they were warned by an Oracle how that Anubius the god of Aegypt desired the company of the said Paulina to whome the chast Matrone gaue light credence both because she thought the Priests would not lie and also because it was accounted a great renowne to haue to do with a god and thus by this meanes was Paulina abused by Mundus in the temple of Isis vnder the name of Anubius which thing being after disclosed by Mundus himself was thus iustly reuenged the Priests were put to death the temple beaten downe to the ground the image of Isis throwne into Tiber and the young men banished In the yeare of our Lord 955 Edwine succeeding his vncle Eldred was king of England Lanquet This man was so impudent that in the very day of his Coronation hee soddainely withdrew himselfe from his lords and in sight of certaine persons rauished his owne kinswoman the wife of a Nobleman of his realme and afterward slew her husband that he might haue vnlawfull vse of her beautie for which act he became so odious to his subiects and nobles that they iointly rose against him and depriued him of his crowne when hee had raigned foure yeares CHAP. XX. Other examples of Gods Iudgements vpon Adulterers AMongst all other things this is especially to bee noted how God for a greater punishment of the disordinate lust of men stroke them with a new yet filthy and stinking kind of disease called the French pocks though indeed the Spaniards were the first that were infected therewith by the heat which they caught among the women of the new found lands Paulus Iouius Ben. b. sowed the seeds thereof first in Spaine and from thence sprinkled Italy therewith where the Frenchmen caught it when Charles the eight their king went against Naples Guicciardine froÌ„ whence the contagion spread it selfe throughout diuers places of Europe Barbary was so ouergrowen with it that in all their cities the tenth part escaped not vntouched nay almost not a family but was infected From thence it ranne to Aegypt Siria and to the great Cair and it may nerehand truly be said that there was not a corner of the habitable world where this not only new and strange for it was neuer heard of in ancient ages but terrible and hideous scourge of Gods wrath stretched not it selfe They that were spotted with it and had it rooted in their bodies led a languishing life full of aches and torments and carried in their visages filthy markes of vncleane behauiour as vlcers boiles and such like that greatly disfigured them And herein we see the words of S. Paul verified 1. Cor. 6.18 That an Adulterer sinneth against his owne body Now for so much as the world is so brutishly carried into this sinne as to none more the Lord therefore hath declared his anger against it in diuers sorts so that diuers times hee hath punished it in the very act or not long after by a strange death Sabell Of which Alcibiades one of the great captaines of Athens may stand for an example who being polluted with many great and odious vices and much giuen to his pleasures and subiect to all vncleannesse ended his life in the middest thereof for as he was in companie of a Phrigian strumpet hauing flowne thither to the king of Persia for shelter was notwithstanding set vpon by certaine guards which the king induced by his enemies sent to slay him but they though in number many through the coÌ„ceiued opinion of his notable valor durst not apprehend him at hand but set fire to the house standing theÌ„selues in arms round about it to receiue him if need were Hee seeing the fire leaped through the midst of it and so long defended himselfe amongst them all till strength failed in himselfe and blowes encreasing vpon him constrained him to giue vp his life amongst them Plinie telleth of Cornelius Gallus and Q.
his princes and his wiues and concubines might drinke therein exalting himselfe thus against the Lord of heauen boasting in his Idols of earth therfore God being stirred vp to wrath against him appointed his destruction euen whilst he thus dranke and made merry in the midst of his iolity and caused a strange and fearfull signe to appeare before his eies a bodilesse handwriting vpon the wall ouer against the candlestick The words of which writing portended the destruction of his kingdom which presently ensued for the very same night he was murdred and the scepter seased vpon by Darius king of Media CHAP. XI Of the kings which in hatred to the law and religion of God afflicted the Iewes in the time of the Machabees 1. Mach. 2. 6. ANtiochus by sirname Epiphanes or excellent though by truer report of people contemptuously intituled the furious king of Asia being venimously enraged against the Iewes began at the first marueilously to oppresse them to rob and spoile their temple and to slaughter the people About ten yeeres after deceiuing the poore people with faire and smooth words couers of most vile and wretched treason whilst they imagined no mischiefe he set vpon them in such cruell sort that the losse desolation which they endured at that time was inestimable for besides the destruction of Ierusalem their city the slaughter of infinite multitudes of their people and the captiuitie of women and infants as if all these were not enough there was yet another misery to make vp the full sum worse then all the rest which was this The cursed tyrant seeing his purpose not to take the full effect commaunded euery where that all his subiects I meane the Iewes should forsake and abiure the law of God be vnited into one religion with the infidels By meanes of which edict the religion of God was defaced the bookes of his law rent and burned and those with whome any such books were found rigorously put to death Which fearfull crueltie when the Iewes perceiued it caused many of them to wax faint hearted to giue themselues ouer to wallow in the durty fashions of the vncircūcised idolaters in their madnes to subscribe to the vniust lawes of the vile monster Now after he had committed all these outrages he was repulsed with dishonour frō the city Elymais in Persia which he went about to spoile rob and forced to fly to Babylon where after tidings of the ouerthrow of his two armies in Iudea with grief despite he ended his daies Antiochus the sonne of this wretched father 1. Mach. 6. succeeding him as in his kingdom so in wickednes periury disloialty when to the end to consult about his own affaires he cōcluded a peace with the Iewes by solemne oath as well of himselfe as his princes confirmed the free exercise of their religiō behold suddenly he falsified his plighted sworn faith vndid all that euer he had done but it was not long ere he also was ouertaken by the army of Demetrius togither with Lysias his gouernor put to death A while after reigned Alexander his brother 1. Mach. 11. who whilst hee was encumbred with the troubles of Cilicia that reuolted from him the king of Aegypt his father in law came traiterously to forestall him of his kingdome tooke his wife gaue her to his deadliest enemy and afterward gaue him battell discomfited his forces and droue him to flie into Arabia for safety where in stead of help he found an hatchet to chop off his head which was sent for a present to gratifie the king of Aegypt withall Not long after Antiochus his son recouered 1. Mach. 13. the scepter of his father but alas his reign endured but a small space for being yet but a yong child he was slaine by Triphon in the way as he led him to war against the Iews and thus perished the cursed race of Antiochus which felt Gods wrath vpon it euen to the third generation Antiochus the son of Demetrius of whom mention was made but a litle before after he had chased Triphon from the kingdome of Asia which he vsurped 2. Mach. 5. and broken the league which he had made with the Iewes gaue himselfe wholly to worke them misceiefe Therfore comming against Ierusalem he tooke it by force commanding his souldiers to put all to death that were within the same So that within three daies there was such a massacre of young and old men women and children that the number of the slaine arose to fourescore thousand carcasses After this hauing executed many more villanies against this people in so much as to make them renounce the lavv of God putting them cruelly to death that did not obey his commandement It came to passe that this cruell tyrant was first of all pur to flight by the inhabitants of Persepolis a city of Persia for going about to rob their temple of their treasures next endamaged by an ouerthrow of his armie in Iudea which he no sooner vnderstood but he tooke counsell in his fury how to be reuenged on Ierusalem and belched forth bitter threats against it But in the meane while the Lord stroke him with a sudden incurable plague surprised him with a horrible torment of his entrails Howbeit for all this he ceased not his malitious enterprisse but hasted forward his iourny towards the Iews with such egernesse that in the way he fell out of his charriot bruised so his body that it became putrified so full of corruption that very vermine scrawled out therof and the rotten flesh dropped peecemeale away no man no nor himselfe being able to endure the stinch therof Then was he constrained in the midst of his torments to confesse that it was meet that he should submit himselfe vnto God that he which is mortall ought not to exalt himselfe so high as to compare with the immortall God and in this estate this reprobate ended his wicked daies by a strange and most miserable kind of death CHAP. XII Of those that persecuted the sonne of God and his Church IF they who in the law iniured and persecuted the Church of God were punished according to their deserts as we haue already heard is it any maruell then if the enemies persecuters of our Lord Sauiour Christ Iesus which labour by all meanes to discountenance and frustrate his religion and to oppresse his Church do feele the heauy fearfull vengeance of God vpon them for their wickednes vnbeliefe No verily for he that honoreth not the sonne honoureth not the father which sent him and is guilty therfore before God of impiety prophanesse From this hamous crime king Herod in no wise can be exempted that caused all the infants of Bethlehem of two yeres old vnder to be cruelly murdred Mat. 2. in hope therby to put the true Messias and sauiour of the world to death For which deed accompanied
many warres and at length assaulted with such an extreame paine throughout his vvhole body that languishing and consuming he desired oft to poyson himselfe and at last died in great distresse Vitellius Saturninus one of his Leiutenants in those exploits became blind Tert. as Scap. another called Claudius Herminianus gouernour of Capadocia who in hatred of his owne wife that was a Christian had extreamely afflicted many of the faithfull was afterward himselfe afflicted with the pestilence persecuted with vermine bred in his owne bowels and deuoured of them aliue in most miserable sort Now lying in this miserie hee desired not to bee knowne or spoken of by any least the Christians that were left vnmurthered should reioice at his destruction confessing also that those plagues did iustly betide him for his cruelties sake Decius in hatred of Philip his predecessor that had made some profession of Christianity wrought tooth and naile to destroy the church of Christ vsing all the cruelties and torments which his wit could deuise against all those which before time had offered themselues to be persecuted for that cause But his diuelish practises were cut short by means of the warre which he waged against the Scythians Euseb booke 7. chap. 1. Ecclesi hist wherein when hee had raigned not full two yeares his armie was discomfited and he with his sonne cruelly killed Valerian albeit in the beginning of his Empire hee shewed himselfe somewhat mild and gentle towards the professors of religion yet afterwards he became their deadly enemie but when he had terribly persecuted them in his dominions it was not long ere he was taken prisoner in the Persian warres being threescore and ten yeares old and made a slaue to his conquerour al the rest of his life In the sermon of the congregatiō of saints Euseb histor ecclesiast booke 7. chap. 30. And whose condition was so miserable that Sapor king of Persia vsed his backe as a blocke or stirrop to mount vpon his horse Yea hee dealt so cruelly with the poore old man as Eusebius testifieth that to make vp the full number of his miseries he caused him to be flaine aliue Aurelian being vpon point to trouble the quiet of the church which it a while enioied vnder the Emperour Galien euen whilst he was deuising new practises against it a thunderbolt fell from heauen at his feet which so amased him that his malicious and bloodthirstie mind was somewhat rebated and repressed from doing that which he pretended vntill that returning to his old bent and perseuering to pursue his purpose when Gods thunder could not terrifie him Vepis Eutrop. Nicephor hee stirred vp his owne seruants to cut his throat Dioclesian went another way to worke for hee did not set abroach all his practises at one push but first assaied by subtle means to make those that were in his armie to renounce their faith then by open proclamation commanded that their churches should be rased and beaten downe Ruffin their bibles burned and torne in peeces that they that were Magistrats or bore any publike office in the Commonwealth if they were Christians should bee deposed and that all bondmen that would forsake their profession should be enfranchised Whē hee had thus left no deuise vnpractised that might further to abolish and destroy the religion of Christ and perceiuing that notwithstanding all his malice and cruell rage it euery day through the wonderfull constancie of Martyrs encreased and grew euen against the haire with very spight and anger he gaue vp the Empire And lastly when hee had beene tormented with diuerse and strange diseases and that his house had beene set on fire with lightning and burned vvith fire from heauen and hee himselfe so scarred with thunder that he knew not where to hide him hee sell mad and killed himselfe There was ioined to this man in the gouernment of the Empire one Maximian whose crueltie and tyranny against the Christians was so outragious also Mandat 7. Lib. 2. cap. 12. that vpon a solemne feastiuall day when infinite numbers of them vvere assembled together at Nicomedia in a temple to serue God he sent a band of Atheists to inclose them burne the temple and them together as they indeed did for there vvere consumed at that bondfire as Nicephorus writeth twentie thousand persons Euseb histor ecclesiast 7. 8. chap. 16. Nicephor lib. 7. chap 6. In like sort dealt he with a whole citie in Phrigia which after he had long besieged hee caused to bee burnt to cinders with all the inhabitants therein But the end of this wretch was like his life euen miserable for lying a while sicke of a greeuous disease the very vermine and such horrible stinke came forth of his body that for shame and griefe he hung himselfe Maximinus that raigned Emperour in the East Nicephor 7.22 was constrained to interrupt and make cease his persecution which he had begun by means of a dangerfull and greeuous sicknesse and to confirme a generall peace to all Christians in his dominions by publike edicts But alasse it was so brittle that it lasted but sixe months for euen then he sought all meanes possible againe to trouble and disquiet their rest sent forth a new edict quite contrary to the former importing their vtter destruction And thus being nothing amended but rather made worse by his sicknesse it assailed him afresh in such sort that euery day growing in extremity as he grew in crueltie it at last brought him to his death his carcasse being all rotten and full of corruption and wormes Against the Gentiles S. Chrisostome writeth of him that the apple of his eie fell out before he died Macentius and Licinius the one Emperour of Italy the other of the East perceiuing how the Emperour Constantine that raigned in the West was had in great reputation for maintaining the cause of the Christians began also to do the like but by and by their malice and hipocrisie discouered it selfe when they vndertooke to trouble afflict those whom before they seemed to fauour for which cause Constantine taking armes against them destroied them both one after another for Maxentius thinking to saue himselfe vpon a bridge on Tiber was deceiued by the breaking of the bridge and so drenched and drowned in the water Licinius was taken and put to death And thus two tyrants ended their daies for persecuting the church of Christ Lanques chron In the tenth year of the persecution of Dioclesian Galerius his chiefe minister and instrument in that practise fell into a greeuous sicknesse hauing a sore risen in the nether part of his belly which consumed his priuie members frō whence swarmed great plentie of wormes engendred by the putrifaction This disease could not bee holpen by any chirurgery or phisicke wherefore hee confessed that it iustly happened vnto him for his monstrous cruelty towards the Christians called in his proclamations which he had published against
the dung of oxen serued some for meate others fedde vpon the leather of old shooes and buckles and diuers women were driuen to the extremitie to boile and eate their owne children Many thinking to saue their liues by flying to the enemy were taken and slit in pieces in hope to find gold and siluer in their guts in one night two thousand were thus piteously dealt withall and at last the whole city was by force taken and the holy Temple consumed by fire And this in generall was the miserable issue of that lamentable warre during which fourescore and seuenteene thousand Iewes were taken prisoners and eleuen hundred thousand slaine for within the city were inclosed from the beginning to the ending all those that were assembled togither from all quarters of the earth to keepe the Passeouer as their custome was As touching the prisoners some were carried to Rome in triumph others were here and there massacred at their conquerours wils somes lot it was to be torne in peeces and deuoured of wild beasts others were constrained to march in troopes against their fellows and kill one another as if they had beene enemies All which euils came vpon them for the despite and fury which they vsed towards the Sonne of God and our Sauiour and that was the cause why he foreseeing this desolation wept ouer Ierusalem and said That it should be besieged on euery side and rased to the ground and that not one stone should be left vpon another because it knew not the time of her visitation Likewise said he to the women that bewailed him as he was led to the crosse That they should not weepe for him but for themselues and their children because of the daies of sorrow which were to come wherein the barren and those that had no children the dugs that neuer suckled should be counted happy So horrible and pitifull was the destruction of this people that God would not suffer any of his owne children to be wrapped in their miseries nor to perish with this peruerse and vnbeleeuing nation for as Eusebius reporteth they were a little before the arriuall of these mischiefes aduertised from heauen by the especiall prouidence of God to forsake the city and retire into some farre countrey where none of these euils might come neere them This example belongeth also to the contempt of the word Lib. 1. cap. 34. The relikes of this wretched people that remained after this mighty tempest of Gods wrath were dispersed and scattered throughout all nations vnder heauen being subiect to them with whome they soiourned without king prince Iudge or magistrate to lead and guide them or to redresse their wrongs but were altogither at the discretion and commandement of the lords of those countries wherein they made their abode so that their condition and kind of life is at this day so vile and contemptible as experience sheweth that no nation in the world is halfe so miserable which is a manifest badge of Gods vengeance yet abiding vpon them And yet for all this these dispersed reliques ceased not to vomit out the fome of their malice against Christ it being so deepe rooted an euill and so inueterate that time nor reason could reuoke them from it And no maruell seeing that God vseth to punish the greatest sinnes with other sinnes as with the greatest punishment so they hauing shut their eies to the light when it shined among them are now giuen ouer to a reprobate and hardened sense otherwise it were not possible they should remaine so obstinate And albeit God be thanked wee haue many conuerts of them yet I dare say for the most part they remaine in malitious blindnes barking against despiting both our sauiour himselfe all that professe his name although their punishments haue bin still according to their deserts as by these examples following shall appeare The Iewes of Inmester a towne lying betwixt Calchis Antioch being vpon a time celebrating their accustomed plaies and feasts in the midst of their iollity as their vse is they contumeliously reuiled not onely Christians but euen Christ himselfe for they got a Christian child and hung him vpon a crosse and after many mocks taunts making themselues merry at him they whipt him to death What greater villany could there be then this or wherein could these deuils incarnate shew forth their malice more apparantly then thus not content once to haue crucified Christ the Sauiour of the world but by imitation to performe it againe and as it were to make known that if it were vndone they would do it So also handled they a boy called Simeon of two yeeres and an halfe old in the yeere of our Lord 1476 Iob Fincel lib. 3 another in Fretulium fiue yeres after that But aboue all they massacred a poore carpenters son in Hungary in hatred of Christ whom they falsly supposed to be a carpenters son for they cut in two all his veines suckt out his blood with quils And being apprehended and tortured they confessed that they had done the like at Thirna 4 yeeres before that they could not be without Christian blood for therwithall they anointed their priests But at all these times they suffered iust punishmēt for being still taken they were either hanged burned murdred or put to some other cruell death at the discretion of the magistrates Moreouer they would at diuers times buy the holy host of some popish priest and thrust it through with their kniues and vse it most despitefully this did one Eleazarus in the yere of our Lord 1492 the 22 of October but was burnt for his labour And eight and thirty at another time for the same villany by the Marquesse Ioachinus for the caitiues would suffer themselues to bee baptized for none other end but more securely to exercise their villanies Casp Hedius lib. 3. cap. 6. Another Iewe is recorded in the yeere of our Lord 147 to haue stollen the picture of Christ out of a Church and to haue thrust it through many times with his sword whereout when blood miraculously issued he amazed would haue burned it but being taken in the manner the Christians stoned him to death The truth of which story though I will not stand to auow yet I doubt not but it might be true considering that either the deuill might by his cunning so foster and confirme their superstition or rather that seeing Christ is the subiect of their religion as well as of ours though after a corrupt and sacrilegious forme and that the Iewe did not so much aime at their religion as at Christ the subiect of it the Lord might shew a miracle not to establish their errour but to confound the Iewes impiety especially in those young yeeres of the Church But that their impiety may be yet more discouered I will here set downe the confession of one of their owne nation a Iewe of Ratisbone conuerted to the faith one very skilfull in the
Hebrew tongue This man being asked many questions about their superstition and ceremonies answered verie fittely and beeing demaunded why they thirsted so after Christian mens blood he said it was a mystery onely knowen to the Rabbines and highest persons but that this was their custome he knew when any of them was ready to die a Rabbine annointed him with this blood vsing these or such like words If he that was promised in the law and prophets hath truly appeared and if this Iesus crucified be the very Messias then let the blood of this innocent man that died in his faith clense thee from thy sinnes and helpe thee to eternall life Nay Epiphanius affirmeth that the Iews of Tiberias did more confidently affirme it then thus for they vvould vvhisper into a dying mans eare Beleeue in Iesus of Nazareth whom our princes crucified for hee shall come to iudge thee in the latter day all which declareth how impious they are to goe against their owne conscience and vpon how fickle ground all their religion standeth CHAP. XV. Of those that in our age haue persecuted the Gospell in the person of the faithfull AS the religion of Christ hath beene hitherto cruelly crossed and besieged by the mightiest captaines of this world as hath been partly declared so it hath not beene any better entertained by the potentates of this age that ceased not to disturbe the quiet and pursue to death the liues of Gods children for their professions sake and to bring them vtterly to ruine to addresse all the engines and subtleties of their malicious and wicked counsels without leauing any one deuise vnthought of that their wit could imagine or their power affoord they ioined craft with force and vile treason with horrible cruelty therby to suppresse the truth quench that fair cleare light which God after long time of blindnesse and ignorance had caused of his infinit mercy to shine vpoÌ„ vs. Their fires were kindled euery where with the bones of Martyrs whilst for the space of fottie years or thereabouts they neuer ceased to burne those that were followers of that way Now when they saw that all their butcheries and burnings were not able to consume this holy seed but that the more they went about to choke it the more it grew vp and encreased they tooke another course and raised vp troubles and seditions in all quarters as if by that meanes they should attaine the end of their purpose Hell vomited vp all her furies of warre the whole earth was in a tumult young and old with tooth and naile were imployed to root out the Church of Christ but God stretching forth his arme against all their practises shewed himselfe not only a conquerour but also a most sharpe reuenger of all his aduersaries This is most apparant in that which happened to Thomas Arondell an English man History of Martyrs first booke Archbishop of Canterbury an enemie and persecutor of the truth of Christ who hauing put to death diuers holy and vpright men thinking that all he did was gaine was rooted out at last himselfe by a most straunge and horrible death for he that sought to stop the mouth of God in his ministers and to hinder the passage of his Gospel had his tongue so swollen that it stopped his owne mouth that before his death he could neither swallow nor speake and so through famine died in great despaire Foelix Eearle of Wartemberg one of the captains of the Emperour Charles the fift Illiricus being at supper at Ausbourg with many of his companions where threats were blowen out on euery side against the faithfull swore before them all that before he died he would ride vp to his spurres in the blood of the Lutherans But it happened in the same night that the hand of God so stroke him that he was strangled and choked with his owne blood and so he rode not but bathed himselfe not vp to the spurres but vp to the throat not in the blood of the Lutherans but in his owne blood before he died In the reigne of Francis de Valoys of late memory the first king of France of that name those men that shewed themselues frowardest sharpest and most cruell in burning and murdering the holy martyrs were also forwardest examples of the vengeance of God prepared for all such as they are For proofe whereof the miserable end of Iohn de Roma a monke of the order of the white Friers may serue who although in regard of his hood and habite ought not to be placed in the number of men of note yet by reason of the notable example of Gods vengeance vpon him wee may rightly place him in this ranke This man therefore at that time when the Christians of Cabrier and Merindol began to suffer persecution hauing obtained a commission from the bishop of Prouince and the ambassadour of Auignion to make inquisition after and seaze vpon the bodies of all them that were called Lutherans ceased not to afflict them with the cruellest torments he could deuise Among many of his tortures this was one to cause their bootes to be filled with boiling grease and then fastening them ouerthwart wise ouer a bench their legs hanging ouer a gentle fire to seeth them to death The French king aduertised of this his cruelty sent out his letters patents from the parliament of Prouince charging that the said â—ohn de Roma should be apprehended imprisoned and by processe of law condemned which newes when the caitiue heard hee fled backe as fast as hee could trot to Auignion there purposing to recreate and delight himselfe with the excrements of his oppression and robbery which hee had wroong out of the purses of poore people but see how contrary to his hope it fell out for first hee was robbed of his euill gotten goods by his owne seruants and presently vpon the same fell sicke of so horrible and strange a disease that no salue or medicine could bee found to asswage his paine and beside it was withall so lothsome that a man could not endure his companie for the stinke and corruption which issued from him For which cause the white Friers his cloisterers conueyed him out of their couent into the hospitall where increasing in vlcers and vermine and being become now odious not onely to others but to himselfe also he would often cry either to be deliuered from his noisomnesse or to be slaine being desirous but not able to perfourme the deed vpon him selfe And thus in horrible torments and fearfull despaire he most miserably died Now being dead there was none found that would giue sepulture to his rotten carkasse had not a monke of the same order dragged the carrion into a ditch which he prouided for the purpose The lord of Reuest who a while supplied the place of the chiefe president in the parliament of Prouince by whose meanes many of the faithfull were put to death after hee was put beside his office and returned
halfe dead and with in short space died altogether without any appearance of repentance Among many other iudges which shewed themselues hot and rigorous in persecuting and proceeding against the faithfull prisoners of Valence in Daulphin and other Romanes at that season when two ministers of the same citie suffered martyrdome one Lanbespin a Counsellor and Ponsenas the Kings attourney at the parlement of Grenoble both two hauing beene professors in times past were not the backwardest in that action but God made them both strange examples of his wrath for Lanbespin falling in loue with a young maid was so extreamely passionate therein that hee forewent his owne estate and all bounds of ciuill honestie to follow her vp and downe whether soeuer shee went and seeing his loue and labour despised and set at naught hee so pined away with verie thought that making no reckoning of himselfe such a multitude of lice so fed vpon him took so good liking of their pasture that by no meanes he could be clensed of them for they increased issued out of euery part of his body in such number as maggots are wont to engender in a dead rotten carrion At length a litle before his death seeing his owne miserie and feeling Gods heauie vengeance vpon him he began to despaire of all mercie to the end to abridge his miserable daies hee resolued to hunger starue himself to death which purpose the lice furthered for they stack so thick in his throat as if they would haue choked him euery momeÌ„t neither could he suffer any sustenance to passe downe by reason of them They that were eie witnesses of this pittifull spectacle were wonderously mooued with compassion and constrained him to eat whether hee would or not And that they might make him take cullisses and other stewed broathes because hee refused and stroue against them they bound his armes and put gagges into his mouth to keepe it open whilest others poured in the food And in this wise being gagged he died like a mad beast with aboundance of lice that went downe his throat in so much that the very Papists themselues stucke not to say Persecution lib. 1. cap. 15. That as hee caused the ministers of Valence to haue gagges thrust into their mouthes and so put to death so likewise hee himselfe died with a gag in his mouth As touching Ponsâ—nas commonly called Bourrell a very butcher indeed of poore Christians after hee had sold his owne patrimonie and his wiues and friends also to the end to buy out his office had spent that which remained in house keeping hoping in short space to rake vp twise as much as he had scattered fell suddainly into a strange and vnknown disease and shortly grew in despaire of Gods succour and fauor towards him by a strong remembrance of those of Valence and the other Romanes which hee had put to death which would neuer depart out of his mind but still presented themselues before him Persecution Lib. 1. cap. 15. so that as one bestraught of reason sense he denied his maker and called vpon his destroier the Deuill with most horrible and bitter cursings which when his clarke perceiued he laid out before him the mercies of God out of all places of the scripture to comfort and restore his decaied sence But in stead of returning to God by repentance and praier hee continued obstinate and answered his clarke whose name was Steuen in this wife Steuen Steuen thou art blacke So I am and it please you quoth hee but I am neither Turke nor Moore nor Bohemian but a Gascoigne of red haire No no answered he not so but thou art blacke but it is with sinne That is true quoth hee but I hope in the bountifull mercie of God that for the loue of Christ who died for mee my blacke sinnes shall not bee imputed to me There he redoubling his choler cried mainely after his clarke calling him Lutheran Huguenot villaine At which noise his friends without rushed in to know what the matter was but hee commanded that Steuen his clarke should presently haue a paire of bolts clapt on his heeles and to bee burned for an Heretike In briefe his choler and rage boiled so furiously in him that in short space hee died a fearfull death with horrible houling outcries his creditors scarce gaue them respite to draw his carcase out of his bed before they seased vpon all his goods not leauing his poore wife and children so much as a bed of straw to lie in so grieuous was the curse of God vpon his house Another great Prince hauing in former time vsed his authoritie and power to the aduancing of Gods kingdome afterwards being seduced by the allurements of the world renounced God and took part with the enemies of his church to make warre against it in which warre hee was wounded to death and is one notable example of Gods iust vengeance to all that shall in like manner fall away CHAP. XXI Of Heretikes AS it is a matter necessarily appertaining to the first commandemeÌ„t that the puritie and sinceritie of the doctrine of Gods word be maintained by the rule whereof hee would haue vs both know him and vnderstand the holy mysteries which are reuealed to vs therein so also by the contrarie whatsoeuer tendeth to the corrupting or falsifieng of the same word rising from foolish and strange opinions of humane reason the same transgresseth the limits of this commandement of which sort is Heresie an euill of it owne nature verie pernicious and contagious and no lesse to bee feared and shunned then the heate of persecution and by meanes whereof the whole nation of Christendome hath beene heretofore tossed with many troubles and the church of God greeuously vexed But as truth got euer the vpper hand and preuailed against falshood so the brochers and vpholders of falshood came euer to the worse and were confounded as well by the strength of truth as by the speciall iudgements of God sent downe vpon the most part of them Acts. 5.36.39 Euseb eccle hist lib 2. cap. 10. Ioseph antiq lib. 18. cap. 1. lib. 20 cap. 2. Theudas and Iudas Galilaeus were two that seduced the Iewes before Christ for the first of them said hee was a Prophet sent from God and that hee could deuide the waters of Iordan by his word as Ioshua the seruant of the Lord did The other promised to deliuer them from the seruitude and the yoke of the Romanes And both of them by that means drew much people after them so prone is the coÌ„mon multitude to follow nouelties and to beleeue euery new fangle that is but yesterday set on broch But they came both to a deserued destruction for Fatus the gouernour of Iury ouertooke Theudas sending his trunck to the graue carried his head as a monument to Ierusalem As for Iudas hee perished also al his followers were dispersed manifesting their ends that their works were
earnestly to desire to know the day wherein hee should die which also his schoolemaster the deuill reuealed vnto him but vnder such doubtfull tearmes that he dreamed in his foolish conceit of immortalitie and that he should neuer die It chanced on a time as he was singing masse at Rome in a Temple called Ierusalem which was the place assigned for him to die in and not Ierusalem in Palaestina as he made himselfe falsly beleeue he heard a great noise of deuils that came to fetch him away A note worthy the noting note that this was done in masse while whereat hee being terrified and tormented and seeing himselfe not able any waies to escape he desired his people to rend his body in pieces after his death and lay it vpon a charriot and let horses draw it whether they would which was accordingly perfourmed for as soone as hee was dead the pieces of his carkasse were carried out of the Church of Laterane by the wicked spirit who as he ruled him in life so he was the chiefe in his death and funerals By like means came Benedict the ninth to the Popedome for he was a detestable magitian Benno Balleus and in the ten yeres wherin he was Pope hauing committed infinite villanies and mischiefes was at last by his familiar friend the deuill strangled to death in a forrest whither he went to apply himselfe the more quieter to his coniurings Gregorio the sixt scholler to Siluester as great a coniurer â—s his master wrought much mischiefe in his time Bal. but was at last banished Rome and ended his life in misety in Germany Iohn the two and twentieth being of no better disposition then these we haue spoken of but following iudiciall astrologie fed himselfe with a vaine hope of long life whereof hee vanted himselfe among his familiars one day aboue the rest at Viterbum in a chamber which hee had lately builded saying that hee should liue a great while hee was assured of it presently the flore brake suddenly in pieces and hee was found seuen daies after crushed to pieces vnder the ruines thereof All this notwithhanding yet other Pope eased not to suffer themselues to be infected with this execrable poison as Hildebrand who was called Gregorie the seuenth and Alexander the sixt of which kind we shall see a whole legend in the next booke and 43 chapter do but marke these holy fathers how abominable they were to be in such sort giuen ouer to Satan Cornelius Agrippa a great student in this cursed Art and a man famous both by his owne workes and others report for his Necromancie Iouius in elogijâ— vtrorum illustrium went alwaies accompanied with an euill spirit in the similitude of a blacke dog but when his time of death drew neare and he was vrged to repentance he tooke off the enchaunted collar from the dogs necke and sent him away with these tearmes Get thee hence thou cursed beast which hast vtterly destroied mee neither was the dog euer after seene some say hee leapt into Araris and neuer came out againe Agrippa himselfe died at Lions in a base and beggerly Inne Zoreastres king of Bactria is notified to haue beene the inuentor of Astrologie and Magicke Theat hist but the deuill whose ministerie he vsed when he was too importunate with him burned him to death Charles the seuenth of Fraunce put Egidius de Raxa marshiall of his kingdome Fulgos lib. 9. cap. 1. to a cruell and filthie death because hee practised this arte and in the same had murdered an hundred and twenty teeming women and young infants he caused him to be hanged vpon a fâ—â—ke by a hote fire and rosted to death Bladud the sonne of Lud king of Britaine now called England in the yeere of the world 3100 hee that builded the citie Bath as our late histories witnesse and also made therin the hote bathes addicted himselfe so much to the deuilish arte of Necromancie that he wrought wonders thereby in so much that hee made himselfe wings and attempted to flie like Dedalus but the deuill as euer like a false knaue forsooke him in his iourney so that he fell downe and brake his necke In the yeere of our Lord 1578 one Sâ—mon Penbrooke dwelling in S. Georges parish in London being a figure setter and vehemently suspected to be a coniurer by the commaundement of the iudge appeared in the parish Church of S. Sauiour at a court holden there where whilst hee was busie in entertaining a proctour and leaned his head vpon a pew a good space the proctour began to lift vp his head to see what hee ailed and found him departing out of this life and straight waies hee fell downe rattling in the throat without speaking any one word this straunge iudgement happened before many witnesses who searching him found about him fiue deuilish bookes of coniuration and most abominable practises with a picture in tinne of a man hauing three dice in his hand with this writing Chance dice fortunately and much other trash so that euery one confessed it to be a iust iudgement against sorcerie and a great example to cause others to feare the iustice of God Now let euery one learne by these examples to feare God and to stand firme stedfast to his holy word without turning from it on any side so shall he be safe from such like miserable ends as these wicked varlets come vnto CHAP. XXXIIII Of those that through pride and vainglory stroue to vsurpe the honour due vnto God A Forgetfull and vnthankfull mind for the benefits which God bestoweth vpon vs is a braunch of the breach of this first commaundement as well as those which went before and this is when we ascribe not vnto God the glory of his benefits to giue him thanks for them but through a foolish pride extoll our selues higher then we ought presuming aboue measure and reason in our owne power desire to place our selues in a higher degree then is meet With this fond and foolish affection I know not how our first fathers were tickled and tainted from the beginning to thinke to empaire the glory of God Gen. 3. and they also were puffed vp with the blast of ambition that I know not with what fond foolish rash and proud conceit went about after the flood to build a city and tower of exceeding height by that meanes to win fame and reputation amongst men Gen. 11. In stead whereof they ought rather to haue praised God by remembring his gratious goodnesse in their miraculous deliuerance in their fathers persons from that generall deluge and shipwracke of the world but forasmuch as with a proud and high stomacke they lifted vp themselues against God to whome onely all glory appertaineth therefore God also set himselfe against them and against their ouer bold practises interrupting all their determined presumptuous purposes by such a confusion and alteration of tongues which he sent amongst them that one could not
who had in charge to destroy it thought it a thing almost vnpossible by reason of the strength of the wals and matter of it Marcellus the Bishop vndertooke the labor and found out a man that promised to shake and roote vp the foundation of it by fire but when hee had put it in practise a blacke Deuill appeared and hindered the natural operation of the fire which when Marcellus perceiued hee by earnest and zealous prayer droue away the Deuill and so the fire rekindled and consumed it to nothing In all which examples wee may see the wonderfull indignation of God against Idol-worshippers when by such strange and extraordinarie meanes hee bringeth them to destruction And this doubtlesse is no new course for euen since the beginning of the world if we consult histories wee shall find that well nie all kingdomes places persons and countries that haue beene any wise infected with this sinne haue still come to some ruine or other and to some great ouerthrow and their idolatrie suppressed by some notable and strange accident whereof S. Ierome may may bee a witnesse who affirmeth that when Iesus being a child was carried into Aegypt for feare of Herod all the Idols of Aegypt fell downe and all their Oracles became mute Isai 19.1 which the Prophet Isaias foreseeing saith Behold the Lord rideth vpon a swift cloud and shall come into Aegypt and the Idols of Aegypt shall melt in the middest of her Besides the generall silence of the Deuill in all his Oracles throughout the world presently vpon Christs incarnation is a thing knowne and confessed of all men Notwithstanding al which the holy Pope will still maintaine his idolatrie albeit the Lord hath made knowne manifest tokens of his indignation against it As appeareth by that which happened in the year 1451 being the Popes Iubilie when such a concourse of people was made from all quarters of the world to honour that superstitious day for the people being vpon Adrians bridge were so thrust together that two hundred men and three horses lost their liues being trampled vpon and stifled to death manie fell into the water ouer the bridge and so perished of whom an hundred and thirty were buried at Saint Selsus and these are the fruits of their indulgences which are so much brought and sought for and of their Iubilies proceeding from the Bishop of Rome his impious and sacralegious zeale Now to eschew these and such like misfortunes the true and onely meanes is an vnfeigned diuersion from all Idolatrie and superstition and whatsoeuer else contrarieth the pure seruice of God and a conuersion vnto him to serue him in spirite and truth as the Scripture exhorteth CHAP. XXVIII Of those that at any time corrupted and mingled Gods religion with humane inuentions or went about to change and disquiet the discipline of the Church NOw seeing that God hath set downe a certaine forme of doctrine and instruction according to which hee would haue vs to serue him and established a kind of discipline and pollicie to bee obserued and maintained of euerie man inuiolablie it behooueth therefore euery Christian to conforme himselfe vnto this order and not to bee guided by euerie fickle imagination of his own braine or euerie rash presumption that ariseth in himselfe but onely by the direct rule of Gods word which onely wee ought to follow by meanes of neglecting which dutie many vaine and pernicious ceremonies and strange superstitions haue beene brought in and swaied mightily by reason whereof great controuersies and disputations are taken vp at this day Albeit indeed it bee a thing manifest that being not grounded and propped vpon the anchore of the scriptures they ought to be abolished what braue outward shew in appearance soeuer they beare And that they that set abroch such things are not blamelesse and excusable before God Leuit. 20. Numb 34. it appeareth by the punishment of Nadab and Abihu who being ordained Priestes of God to sacrifice and offer onely those things which were commaunded in the law yet were so euill aduised as to offer strange incense and perfume vpon the altar receiued at the very instant of the fact condigne punishment for their presumption for soddainly this their strange fire inuaded them so fiercely and so piercingly that they were soone burned and consumed therewith and so they were not spared albeit they were Aarons sonnes euen his first borne and Moses nephews that by them all other might feare and take warning how to enterprise any thing in Gods seruice contrary to his expresse ordinance This moderation also ought to be obserued in the church discipline to wit that euery man contain himselfe within the precincts of his vocation and that none intrude themselues into any charge without being called of god therunto wherin Corah greatly faulted Numb 16. when being not cōtent with the dignity of a Leuits office which God had bestowed vpon him he ambitiously aspired to the priests office besides this stirred vp and drew to his faction Dathan Abiram many others to the number of two hundred fifty persons against Moses and Aaron but hee drew withall the vengeance of God downe vpon himselfe and all that took his part in most horrible and fearefull manner for some of them to wit the two hundred and fifty who notwithstanding Moses reproof were so hardy and presumptuous as to present themselues the next morrow after the tumult openly before the tabernacle to offer incense as if they had ben true priests were for their flame of ambition and pride set on fire and consumed with the flame of Gods wrath others to wit Dathan and Abiram for their audacious enterprise against God in the person of his seruants Moses and Aaron and their high mindednesse and rebellion in not comming out of their tents at the commandement of Moses were throwne down into the lowest pit the earth opening her mouth swallowing them vp aliue with their tents and families and all that belonged vnto them to the fearfull amazement of the whole people that were beholders of this spectacle Oziah king of Iuda caried himselfe a long while vprightly and modestly in the seruice of God 2. Chron. 26. but after God had giuē him many great victories ouer his enemies the Philistims the Arabians the Amorites and that his renowne and feare was spred not only to his neighbours but also to strange nations by by his heart was puft vp with pride selfe conceit that he dared to enter the temple of God and burne incense vpon the altar which belonged only to the priests office to do not obeying the strong resistance countermaund of the good priests that had charge of the temple hee was stroken with a leprosie hastily carried out and sequestred from the society of men all his life time And so this prowd king that foolishly tooke vpon him more then was lawfull conuenient was forced to recoile and to be still being
where Gods word is generally despised not regarded nor profited by there some notable destruction approcheth Philip Melanc in collectaneis Manlij In a certain place there was acted a tragedie of the death and passion of Christ in shew but indeed of themselues for hee that plaied Christs part hanging vpon the crosse was wounded to death by him that should haue thrust his sword into a bladder full of blood tied to his side who with his fall slew another that plaied one of the womens part that lamented vnder the crosse his brother that was first slaine seeing this slew the murderer and was himselfe by order of iustice hanged therfore so that this tragedie was concluded with four true not counterfeit deaths and that by the diuine prouidence of God who can endure nothing lesse then such prophane and ridiculous handling of so serious and heauenly matters In the Vniuersitie of Oxford the historie of Christ was also plaied and cruelly punished that not many years since for he that bore the person of Christ the Lord stroke him with such a giddinesse of spirit braine that he became mad forthwith crying when he was in his best humour that God had laid this iudgement vpon him for playing Christ Three other actors in the same play were hanged for robbing as by credible report is affirmed Most lamentable was the iudgement of God vpon one Iohn Apowel somtimes a seruingman for mocking iesting at the word of God this Iohn Apowell hearing one William Malden reading certaine English praiers mocked him after euery word with cōtrary gauds flouting termes insomuch that at last he was terribly afraid so that his hair stood vpright on his head and the next day was found besides his wits crying night and day without ceasing The deuill the deuill Acts and monuments pag. 2103. O the deuill of hell now the deuill of hell there he goeth for it seemed to him as the other read Lord haue mercie vpon vs at the end of the praier that the deuill appeared vnto him and by the permission of God depriued him of his vnderstanding this is a terrible example for all those that bee mockers at the word of God to warne them if they do not repent least the vengeance of God fall vpon them in like manner Thus wee see how seuerely the Lord punisheth all despisers and prophaners of his holy things and thereby ought to learne to carrie a most dutifull regard and reuerence to them as also to note them for none of Gods flocke whosoeuer they be that deride or contemne any part of religion or the ministers of the same CHAP. XXXV Of those that prophane the Sabboth day IN the fourth last commandement of the first table it is said Remember to keep holy the sabboth day by which words it is ordained and enioined vs to seperate one day of seuen from al bodily and seruile labor not to idlenes loosenes but to the worship of God which is spirituall and wholesome Which holy ordināce whē one of the childrē of Israel in contempt broke as they were in the wildernesse Numb 15. by gathering stickes vpon the sabboth he was brought before Moses Aaron the whole congregation by them put in prison vntill such time as they knew the Lords determination concerning him knowing well that he was guiltie of a most grieuous crime And at length by the Lords owne sentence to his seruant Moses condemned to be stoned to death without the host as was speedily executed wherin the Lord made known vnto them both how vnpleasant odious the prophanation of his Sabboth was in his sight and how seriously and carefully euery one ought to obserue and keepe the same Now albeit that this strict obseruation of the sabboth was partly ceremoniall vnder the law and that in Christ Iesus wee haue an accomplishment as of all other so also of this ceremonie hee being the true sabboth and assured repose of our soules yet seeing wee still stand in need of some time for the instruction and exercise of our faith it is necessarie that we should haue at least one day in a weeke to occupie our selues in and about those holy and godly exercises which are required at our hands and what day fitter for that purpose then sunday Which was also ordained in the Apostles time for the same end and called by them Des dominicus that is The day of our Lord Because vpon that day he rose from the dead to wit the morrow after the Iewes sabboth being the first day of the weeke to which sabboth it by cōmon consent of the church succeeded to the end that a difference might be put betwixt Christians Iews Therfore it ought now religiously to be obserued as it is also commanded in the ciuil law with expresse prohibition not to abuse this day of holy rest in vnholy sports pastimes Cod. lib. 3. tit 12. leg 10. of euill example Neuerthelesse in steed hereof we see the euill emploiance abuse and disorder of it for the most part for beside the false worship and plentifull superstitions which raigne in so many places all manner of disorder and dissolutenesse is in request beareth sway in these daies this is the day for tipling houses and tauernes to be fullest fraught with ruffians and ribalds and for villanous and dishonest speech with lecherous and baudie songes to be most rise this is the day when gourmandise and drunkennesse shew themselues most frollick othes blasphemies flie thickest and fastest this is the day when dicing dancing whoring and such noisome and dishonest demeanours muster their bands and keep ranke togither from whence fome out enuies hatreds displeasures quarrels debates bloodsheddings and murders as daily experience testifieth All which things are euident signes of Gods heauy displeasure vpon the people where these abuses are permitted and no difference made of that day wherin God would be serued but is cōtrarily most dishonored by the ouerflow of wciked examples And that it is a thing odious and condemned of God these examples following will declare Gregory Turonensis reporteth that a husbandman who vpon the Lords day went to plow his field as he cleansed his plowshare with an iron the iron stucke so fast into his hand that for two yeeres hee could not be deliuered from it but carried it about continually to his exceeding great paine and shame Discipulus de tempore ser 117. Another profane fellow without any regard of God or his seruice made no conscience to conuey his corne out of the field on the Lords day in sermon time but hee was well rewarded for his godlesse couetousnesse for the same corne which with so much care he gathered togither was consumed with fire from heauen with the barne and all the graine that was in it A certaine noble man vsed euery Lords day to go a hunting in the sermon while Theatr. hist which impietie the Lord punished
of meat Fides fit apud Authorem snakes and of sauce serpents to the great terror of his conscience but that which is more one of the serpents leaped in his face and catching hold by his lip hung there till his dying day so that hee could neuer feed himselfe but hee must feed the serpent withall And this badge carried he about as a cognisance of an vnkind and vngratefull sonne Moreouer this is another iudgement of God that coÌ„monly as children deale with their parents so doe their children deale with them this in the law of proportion is most iust in the order of punishing most vsuall for the proofe wherof as experience daily teacheth so one example or two I wil subioine Theat histor It is reported how a certaine vnkind peruerse son beat his aged father vpon a time and drew him by the haire of his head to the threshold who when he was old was likewise beaten of his sonne and drawne also by the haire of the head not to the threshold but out of dores into the durt and how he should say he was rightly serued if he had left him at the threshold as he left his father and not dragged him into the streets which he did not to his thus did his owne mouth beare record of his impietie his own conscience condemn him before God and men Guiliel Lugdi Another old man being persuaded by his sonne that had married a young wife with faire and sugred promises of kindnesses and contentments to surrender his goods and lands vnto him yeelded to his request and found for a space all thinges to his desire Discipulus de temp but when his often coughing annoied his young and daintie wife hee first remooued his lodging from a faire high chamber to a base vnder roome and after shewed him many other vnkind and vnchildish parts and lastly when the old man asked for clothes hee bought foure elnes of clothes two whereof he bestowed vpon him and reserued the other two for himselfe Now his yoong sonne marking this niggardise of his father towards his grandfather hid the two elles of cloth and being asked why hee hid them whether by ingeniousnesse of wit or instinct of God he answered to the end to reserue them for his father against hee was old to be a couering for him Which answere touched his father so neere that euer after hee shewed himselfe more louing and obsequious to his father then hee did before Two great faults but soone and happily amended Would it might bee an example to all children if not to mitigate yet at least to learne them to feare how to deale roughly and crookedly with their parents seeing that God punisheth sinne with sinne and sinners in their owne kind and measureth the same measure to euerie man which they haue measured vnto others George Lanter de disciplina liberorum The like wee read of another that prouided a trough for his old decrepite vnmannerly father to eate his meat in who being demanded of his sonne also to what vse that trough should serue answered for his grandfather What quoth the child and must wee haue the like for you when you are old Which words so abashed him that hee threw it away forthwith At Millan there was an obstinate and vngodly sonne that wheÌ„ he was admonished by his mother of some fault which hee had committed made a wrie mouth Theat histor and pointed his fingers at her in scorne and derision Whereat his mother bâ—ing angrie Mandat 3. Cursing lib. 1. cap. 33. wished that he might make such a mouth vpon the gallows Neither was it a vaine wish for within few daies he was taken with a theft and condemned by law to be hanged and being vpon the ladder was perceiued to wryth his mouth in griefe after the same fashion which hee had done before to his mother in derision Henry the second of that name king of England sonne of Geffrey Plantagenet and Maud the Empresse Stow. chron after hee had raigned twentie yeares was content to admit his yoong sonne Henrie married to Margaret the French kings daughter into participation of his crowne but he like an vnnaturall sonne to requite his fathers loue sought to dispossesse him of the whole for by inciting the King of Fraunce and certaine other Nobles hee tooke armes and raised deadly warre against his owne naturall father betwixt whome diuerse strong battailes being foughten as well in England by the Deputies and friends of both parties as also in Normandie Poytou Guyan and Brittaine the victorie alwaies enclined to the father so that the rebellious sonne with his allies were constrained to bend to his fathers will and to desire peace which hee gently granted and forgaue his offence Howbeit the Lord for his disobedience did not so lightly pardon him but because his hasty mind could not tarrie for the crowne till his fathers death therefore the Lord cut him short of it altogether causing him to die sixe yeares before his father being yet but yoong and like to liue long Languet chron Lothair King of Soyssons in Fraunce committed the rule of the Prouince of Guyan to his eldest sonne Cramiris who when contrary to the mind of his father he oppressed the people with exactions and was reclaimed home hee like an vngratious and impious sonne fled to his vncle Childebert prouoked him to war vpon his owne father wherein he himselfe was by the iust vengeance of God taken burned with wife and children to death Leuit. 20. Furthermore it is not doubtles but to a very good end enacted in the law of God that he which curseth his father or mother shold dy the death that rebellious childreÌ„ such as be incorrigable should at the instance and pursute of their owne parents by order of law be stoned to death As children by all these examples ought not onely to learne to feare to displease and reuile their parents but also to fear and reuerence them least that by disobedience they kindle the fire of Gods wrath against theÌ„ so likewise on the other side parents are here aduertised to haue great care in bringing vp and instructing their children in the fear of God and obedience to his will least for want of instruction and correction on their part they themselues incurre a punishment of their carelesse negligence in the person of their children And this is prooued by experience of the men of Bethel 2. King 2. of whose children two and fortie were torne in peeces by beares for that they had beene so euill taught as to mocke the holy Prophet Elizeus in calling him bald pate 1. Sam. 2.4 Heli likewise the high Priest was culpable of this fault for hauing two wicked and peruerse sonnes whome no feare of God could restraine being discontent with that honourable portion of the sacrifices allotted them by God like famished and insatiable wretches fell to share
out more than was their due and by force to rauen all that which by faire meanes they could not get And that which is worse to pollute the holy Tabernacle of God with their filthie Whoredomes Contempt of holy things lib. 1. cap. 34. in such sort that the Religion of God grew in disgrace through their prophane dealings And albeit that it may seeme that their father did his dutie in some sort when hee admonished and reprooued them yet it is manifest by the reprehension of the man of God that hee did no part of that at all or if hee did yet it was in so careles loose cold maner vsing more lenitie thē he ought or lesse seueritie thē was necessary that God turned their destructions whē they were slain at the ouerthrow of Israel by the Philistims to bee his punishment for vnderstanding the doleful news of his sons death the arks taking at once he fel backwards from his stoole and burst his neck being old and heauy euen fourscore and eighteene yeares of age not able either to helpe or stay himselfe Lib. 2. cap. 10. de in titut christ fami Ludouicus Viues saith that in his time a certaine woman in Flaunders did so much pamper and cocker vp two of her sonnes euen against her husbands will that shee would not suffer them to want money or any thing which might furnish their riotous life both in drinking banquetting dicing yea she would steale from her husband to minister vnto thē but as soone as her husband was dead shee was iustly plagued in them both for they fell from rioting to robbing which two vices are commonly linked together and for the same one of thē was executed by the sword the other by the haltar shee her selfe looking on as a witnesse of their destructions whereof her conscience told her that her indulgence was the chiefest cause Hether may wee referre that common and vulgar story and I suppose verie true which is almost in euery childs mouth of him that going to the gallowes desired to speake with his mother in her eare ere hee died Cyriac. Spang and when she came vnto him in stead of speaking bit off her eare with his teeth exclaiming vpon her as the causer of his death because shee did not chastise him in his youth for his faults but by her flatteries established him in vice which brought him to this wofull end herein she was doubly punished both in her sons destruction her own infamy wherof shee carried about her a continuall marke This ought to bee a warning to all parents to looke better to the education of their children and to root out of them in time all euill and corrupt manners least of small sprigs they grow to branches and of qualities to habites and so either be hardly done of or at least depraue the whole body bring it to destruction but aboue all to keepe them from idlenesse vain pleasures the discōmodity and mischiefe wherof this present example wil declare At a towne called Hannuel in Saxonie the Deuill transforming himselfe into the shape of a man Iob Fincel lib. de miracu exercised many iugling trickes and pretty pastimes to delight yoong men and maids withall and indeed to draw after him daily great companies one day they followed him out of the citie gates vnto a hill adioyning where hee plaid a iuggling tricke in deed with them for he carried them all away with him so that they were after neuer heard of This history is recorded in the annales of the forenamed city and auouched to be most true being a notable and fearefull admonition to all parents to set their children to learning and instruction and to withdraw them from all such vaine and foolish pastimes CHAP. II. Of those that rebell against their Superiours NOw as it is a thing required by law and reason that children beare that honour and reuerence to their naturall parents which is commanded so it is as necessary by the same respect that all subiects perfourme that duty of honor obedience to their Lords Princes and Kings which is not derogatory to the glory of God and the rather because they are as it were their fathers in supplying that duty towards their subiects which fathers owe their children as namely in maintaining their peace tranquility in earthly things and keeping them vnder the discipline of Gods Church to which two ends they were ordained Rom. 13. For this cause the scripture biddeth euery man to be subiect to the higher powers not so much to auoid the punishment which might befall the contrary as because it is agreeable to the will of God And in another place To honour the king and To giue vnto Caesar that which is Caesars 1. Pet. 2. Matth. 22. Exod. 22. as vnto God that which is Gods So also in Moses law we are forbidden to detract from or speake euill of the magistrate or to curse the ruler of the people Yet for all this the children of Israel were not afraid many times to commit this sinne but then especially when they charged Moses with conspiring the murder of those rebels that vnder Corah Dathan and Abiram captaines of that enterprise set themselues against him and Aaron Num. 16. whome not hee but God for their pride and stubbornnesse had rooted out and destroied and thus they backbited and slaundered Moses and mutined against him being their soueraigne magistrate and conductour that so meekely and iustly had brought them ought of Aegypt euen by the speciall commission of almighty God But the fury of Gods displeasure was so stirred vp against them for this their fact that they were scourged with a most grieuous plague whereof died about foure thousand and seuen hundred persons In the time of king Dauids flight from Absolom who pursued him to bereaue him of his kingdome 2. Sam. 16. there was one Semei a Ieminite that in his wicked and peruerse humour in stead of seruice due vnto his soueraigne especially in that extremitie not only presented not himselfe vnto him as a subiect Mandat 3. Cursers lib. 1. cap. 33. but as a railer cursed him with most reprochfull termes as of murderer and wicked man and also threw stones at him and his followers in most despightfull maner for which his malicious and rebellious act though whilst Dauid liued he was not once called in question yet was he not exempted from punishment therefore for in the end his wickednesse fel vpon his owne head and destruction ouertooke him by desert of another fault 1. King 2. at the commandement of Salomon 2. Sam. 20. The punishment of Shiba the sonne of Bichri tarried not all so long who hauing also with a proud and audacious heart stirred vp the greatest part of Israel to rebell against Dauid then when he thought to haue beene most at quiet enioyed not long his disloiall enterprise for being speedily pursued by Dauids
The fathers shal not be put to death for the children nor the children for the fathers but euerie man shall beare his owne sinne 2. King 15. Neither did Shallum that slue Zacharia king of Israel prosper any better for he raigned but one month in Samaria wheÌ„ Menahim the sonne of Gadi rebelled against him and slew him as he had done his maister Amon the sonne of Manasseh was slaine by his owne seruants but the Lord stirred vp the people of the land to reuenge his death to kill all them that had conspired against their king But to let passe the holy histories of the sacred scripture wherein euer after any treason the Holy-ghost presently setteth down the punishment of traitors as it were of purpose to signifie how the Lord hateth all such rebels that rose vp against his owne ordinance Let vs consider a little the consequents of these in prophane yet credible authors and applie them vnto our purpose Iâ—lian lib. 1. Archelaus King of Macedonia had a mignion called Cratenas whome he loued most entirely but he againe required him not with loue but with hatred and stretched all his wits to enstall himselfe in his kingdome by deposing and murthering him which though he accomplished yet his deserts were cut short by the vengeance of God for he continued not many daies in his roialtie but he was serued with the same sauce that he had made Archelaus before him to tast of euen betraied and murdered as he well deserued Ludouicus Sfortia to the end to inuest himselfe with the dukedome of Millain spared not to shed the innocent blood of his two nephewes the sonnes of Galeachus togither with their tutors and one Francis Calaber a worthy and excellent man But the Lord so disposed of his purposes that he in stead of obtaining the kingdome was taken prisoner by the king of France so that neither hee nor any of his offspring enioyed that which he so much affected When Numerianus was to succeed Carus his father in the Empire Phil. Melanct. chron lib. 3. Arrius Axer his father in law to the end to translate the Empire vnto himselfe entred a conspiracie and slew his sonne in law that nothing mistrusted his disloialty But the Pretorian army vnderstanding the matter discharged Arrius and elected Dioclesian in his roome who laying hold vpon his competitor laid an action of treason to his charge and put him to death in the sight of the multitude Theodericke and Fredericke conspired against their owne brother Thurismund king of the Visigothes Chron. Sigebert to the intent to succeed him in his kingdome And albeit that nature reclaimed them from the act yet they slew him without all compassion But after thirteene yeres raigne the same Theodericke was requited by his other brethren with the same measure that hee before met to his brother Thurismund And so though vengeance slept a while yet at length it wakened Aelias Antonius Gordianus the third Emperour of Rome Phil. Melanct. chron Aventin lib. 2. though so excellent a young prince that hee deserued to be called the Loue and Iewell of the world yet was hee slaine by one promoted by himselfe to high honour called Philip Arabs when hee was but two and twentie yeere old after whose decease this Philip got himselfe elected Emperour by the band confirmed by the Senat. Ingratitude punished All which notwithstanding after fiue yeeres Decius rebelled and his owne souldiers conspired against him so that both he at Verona and his sonne at Rome were slaine by them about one time Aâ—entin lib. 2. After the death of Constantine the Great his three sonnes deuiding the Empire betwixt them succeeded their father Constantine the eldest had for his share Spaine France the Alpes and England Constance the second held Italy Africa Graecia and Illiricum Constantine the younger was king and Emperour of the East But ambition suffered them not to enioy quietly these their possessions for when the eldest being more proud and seditious thâ—n the other not content with his alotted portion made warre vpon his brother Constance his prouinces and stroue to enter Italy hee was slaine in a battell by Aquileia when he was but fiue and twentie yeere old by which meanes all the prouinces which were his fell to Constance and therewithall such a drowsinesse and epicurisme for want of a stirrer vp after his brothers death that he fell into the gout and neglected the gouernment of the Empire Wherfore in Auspurge and in Rhetia they created a new Emperour one Magnentius whose life before-time Constance had saued from the souldiers Notable ingratitude punished and therefore his treachery was the greater This Magnentius depriued and slew Constance but was ouercome by Constantine the third brother in Illiricum yet in such sort that the conquerour could not greatly brag for he lost an infinite company of his men and yet missed of his chiefe purpose the taking of Magnentius for he escaped to Lyons and there massacring all that he mistrusted at last growing I suppose in suspition with his owne heart slue himselfe also And so his traiterous ingratefull and ambitious murder was reuenged with his own hands Ritius lib. 1. regib Hispan Victericus betraied Luyba king of Spaine and succeeded in his place seuen yeeres after another traitor slew him succeeded also in his place Mauritius the Emperour was murdered by Phocas togither with his wife fiue of his children he seating himselfe Emperor in his Rome Howbeit traitours and murderers can neuer come to happy ends for as hee had slaine Mauritius so Priscus Heraclianus and Phorius three of his chiefest captaines conspiring against him with three seuerall armies gaue him such an alarme at once at his owne dores that they soone quailed his courage and after much mangling of his body cut him shorter by the head and the kingdome at one blow In the time of Edward the second and Edward the third in England Lanquet one Sir Roger Mortimer committed many villanous outrages in shedding much blood and at last king Edward himselfe lying at Barkley castle to the end that he might as it was supposed enioy Isabell his wife with whom he had very suspitious familiarity After this hee vniustly accused Edmond Earle of Kent of treason and caused him to be put to death therefore and lastly he conspired against king Edward the third as it was suspected for which cause he was worthily and deseruedly beheaded Among this ranke of murderers of kings we may fitly place also Richard the third vsurper of the crowne of England Stow. and diuers others which he vsed as instruments to bring his detestable purpose to effect as namely Sir Iames Tirrell knight a man for natures gifts worthy to haue serued a much better prince then this Richard if he had well serued God and bene indued with as much truth honestie as he had strength wit also Miles Forest Iohn Dighton two villains fleshed
fared till king Charles the sixt sent an army of men to his succour Cap. 125 126. for he was his subiect by whose support he ouercame those rebels in a battaile foughten at Rose Be◠to the number of forty thousand the body of their chieftaine Philip Arteuill slaine in the throng hee caused to bee hanged on a tree Nic. Gil. vol. 2. And this was the end of that cruell Tragedy the countrie being brought againe into the obedience of their old Lord. A while before this Froiss vol. r. cap. 182. whilest king Iohn was held prisoner in England there arose a great cōmotion of the cōmon people in France against the nobilitie and gentilitie of the realme that oppressed them this tumult began but with an hundred men that were gathered togither in the countrey of Beauvoisin but that small handfull grewe right quickly to an armefull euen to nine thousand that ranged and robbed throughout al Brie along by the riuer Marne to Laonoise and all about Soissons armed with great bats shod with iron an headlesse crue without gouernour fully purposing to bring to ruine the whole nobility In this disorder they wrought much mischief broke vp many houses and castles murdered many Lords so that diuerse Ladies and knights as the Dutchesses of Normandy Orleance were faine to flee for safegard to Meaux whither when these rebels would needes pursue them they were there ouerthrowen killed and hanged by troupes In the yere of our Lord 1525 Sleid. lib. 4. there were certaine husbandmen of Souabey that began to stand in resistance against the Earle of Lupsfen by reason of certaine burdens which they complained themselues to be ouerlaid with by them their neighbors seeing this enterprised the like against their lords And so vpon this small beginning by a certaine contagion there grew vp a most dangerous and fearfull commotion that spread it selfe almost ouer all Almaine the sedition thus increasing in all quarters and the swaines being now full fortie thousand strong making their owne liberty and the Gospels a cloake to couer their treason and rebellion and a pretence of their vndertaking armes to the wonderfull griefe of all that feared God did not only fight with the Romane Catholikes but with all other without respect as well in Souabe as in Franconia they destroied the greater part of the nobility sacked and burnt many castles and fortresses to the number of two hundred and put to death the Earle of Helfestin making him passe through their pikes But at length their strength was broken they discomfited and torne in pieces with a most horrible massacre of more than eighteene thousand of them During this sedition there were slaine on each side fifty thousand men The captaine of the Souabian swaines called Geismer hauing betaken himselfe to flight got ouer the mountaines to Padua where by treason hee was made away In the yeere of our Lord 1517 in the Marquesdome of the Vandales the like insurrection and rebellion was of the comminaltie especially the baser sort against the nobilitie spirituall and temporall by whom they were oppressed with intollerable exactions their army was numbred to stand of ninety thousand men all clownes and husbandmen that conspired togither to redresse and refourme their owne grieuances without any respect of ciuill magistrate or feare of Almightie God This rascality of swaines raged and tyranized euery where burning and beating downe the castles and houses of noble men and making their ruines euen with the ground Nay they handled the noble men themselues as many as they could attaine vnto not contumeliously only but rigorously and cruelly for they tormented them to death and carried their heads vpon speares in token of victory Thus they swaied a while vncontrolled for the Emperour Maximilian winked at their riots as beeing acquainted with what iniuries they had bene ouercharged but when he perceiued that the rude multitude did not limit their fury within reason but let it runne too lauish to the damnifying as well the innocent as the guilty hee made out a certaine small troupe of mercenary souldiers togither with a band of horsemen to suppresse them who comming to a city were presently so inuironed with such a multitude of these swaines that like locusts ouerspread the earth that they thought it impossible to escape with their liues wherefore feare and extremitie made thē to rush out to battel with thē But see how the Lord prospereth a good cause for all their weake number in comparison of their enemies yet such a feare possessed their enemies hearts that they fled like troupes of sheepe and were slaine liee dogs before them insomuch that they that escaped the sword were either hanged by flockes on trees or rosted on spits by fires or otherwise tormented to death And this end befell that wicked rebellious rout which wrought such mischiefe in that countrey with their monstrous villanies that the traces and steppes thereof remaine at this day to be seene In the yeere of our Lord 1381 Stow Chron. Richard the second being king the commons of England and especially of Kent and Essex by meanes of a taxe that was set vpon them suddenly rebelled and assembled togither on Blackheath to the number of 60000 or more which rebellious rout had none but base and ignoble fellowes for their captaines as Wat Tilour Iacke Straw Tom Miller but yet they caused much trouble and disquietnesse in the realme and chiefly about the citie of London where they committed much villanie in destroying many goodly places as the Sauoy and others and being in Smithfield vsed themselues very proudly and vnreuerently towards the king but by the manhood and wisdome of William Walworth Maior of London who arrested their chiefe captaine in the midst of them that rude company was discomfited and the ringleaders of them worthily punished In like manner in the raigne of Henry the seuenth Stow Chron. a great commotiō was stirred vp in England by the commons of the North by reason of a certaine taxe which was leuied of the tenth penny of all mens lands good within the land in the which the Earle of Northumberland was slaine But their rash attempt was soone broken and Chamberlaine their captaine with diuers others hanged at Yorke for the same Howbeit their example scared not the Cornish men frō rebelling vpon the like occasion of a taxe vnder the conduct of the lord Audley vntill by wofull experience they felt the same scourge for the king met them vpon blacke heath and discomfiting their troupes tooke their captains and ringleaders and put them to most worthy and sharpe death Thus we may see the vnhappie issue of all such seditious reuoltings and thereby gather how vnpleasant they are in the sight of God Let all people therefore learne by these experiences to submit themselues in the feare of God to the higher powers whether they be lords kings princes or any other that are set ouer them CHAP. VI. Of Murderers AS
most traiterous and cruell part to massacre kill him in the Senat as he sate in his seat misdoubting no mishap as the sequele of their seuerall ends which were actors in this tragedy did declare Treason lib. 2. cap 3 4. Plutarch for the vengeance of God was so manifestly displaied vpon them that not one of the conspirators escaped but was pursued by sea and land so eagerly till there was not one left of that wicked crâ—e whome reuenge had not ouertaken Cassius being discomfited in the battell of Philippos supposing that Brutus had beene also in the same case vsed the same sword against himselfe a marueilous thing wherwith before he had smitten Caesar Brutus also a few daies after Eutrop. when a fearfull vision had appeared twice vnto him by night vnderstanding therby that his time of life was but short though he had the better of his enemies the day before yet threw himselfe desperately into the greatest danger of the battel for his speedier dispatch but hee was reserued to a more shamefull end for seeing his men slaine before him he retired hastily apart from view of men setting his sword to his breast threw himselfe vpon it piercing him through the body and so ended his life And thus was Caesars death reuenged by Octauius and Anthony who remained conquerours after all that bloodie crew was brought to naught betwixt whome also ere long burst out a most cruell deuision which grew vnto a furious and cruell battaile by sea wherein Anthony was ouercome and sent flying into Aegypt and there taught his owne hands to be his murderers And such was the end of his life who had beene an actor in that pernicious office of the Triumuirship and a causer of the deaths of many men And for asmuch as Cleopatra was the first motiue and setter on of Anthony to this warre it was good reason that shee should partake some of that punishment which they both deserued as she did for being surprised by her enemies to the intent she might not be carried in triumph to Rome she caused an aspe to bite her to death Marke here the pitifull Tragedies that following one another in the necke were so linckt together that drawing and holding ech other they drew with them a world of miseries to a most woful end a most transparent and cleare glasse wherein the visages of Gods heauy iudgements vpon all murderers are apparently deciphered CHAP. VIII Other examples like vnto the former AFter that the Empire of Rome declining after the death of Theodosius was almost at the last cast ready to yeeld vp the ghost Procopius and that Theodorick king of the Gothes had vsurped the dominion of Italy vnder the Emperour Zeno he put to death two great personages Senators chiefe citizens of Rome to wit Simmachus and Boetius onely for secret surmise which he had without probabilty that they two should weaue some slie web for his destruction After which cruell deed as he was one day at supper a fishes head of great bignesse being serued into the table purposing to bee verie merry sodainly the vengeance of God assailed amazed oppressed pursued him so freshly that without intermission or breathing it sent his body a sencelesse trunk into the graue in a most strange maruelous maner for he was conceited as himselfe reported that the fishes head was the head of Simmachus whom hee had but lately slaine which grinned vpon him seemed to face him with an ouerthwart threatning angrie eie wherewith hee was so scarred that forthwith hee rose from the table and was possessed with such an exceeding trembling icie chilnesse that ran through all his ioints that he was constrained to take his chamber go to bed where soone after with griefe fretting displeasure he died He committed also another most cruell and traiterous part vpon Odoacer whom inuiting to a banquet he deceitfully welcommed with a messe of swords in stead of other victuals to kill him withall that hee might sway the Empire alone both of the Gothes and Romans without check It was not without cause that Attila was called the scourge of God Iornand Greg. de Tours for with an army of 500 thousand meÌ„ he wasted and spoiled al fields cities villages that he passed by putting al to fire and sword without shewing mercie to any on this manner hee went spoiling through France and there at one time gaue battaile to the vnited forces of the Romans Vice-Gothes Frenchmen Sarmatians Burgundians Saxons and Almaignes after that he entred Italy tooke by way of force Aquilea sacked and destroied Millan with many other cities and in a word spoiled all the countrie in fine being returned beyond Almaigne hauing married a wife of excellent beautie though he was well wiued before hee died on his marriage night sodainly in his bed for hauing well caroused the day before hee fell into so dead asleepe that lying vpon his backe without respect the blood which was often wont to issue at his nosethrils finding those coÌ„duites stopped by his vpright lying descended into his throat stopped his wind And so that bloody tyrant that had shed the blood of so many people was himselfe by the effusion of his owne blood murdered and stifled to death Ithilbald king of Gothia at the instigation of his wife put to death very vnaduisedly one of the chiefe peeres of his realm after which murder as he sat banquetting one day with his princes enuironed with his guard other attendants hauing his hand in the dish and the meat betweene his fingers one sodainly reached him such a blow with a sword that it cut off his head so that it almost tumbled vpon the table to the great astonishment of all that were present Greg. of Tours lib. 3. histor Sigismund king of Burgundy suffered himselfe to bee caried away with such an extreame passion of choler prouoked by a false and malicious accusation of his second wife that hee caused one of his sonnes which hee had by his former wife to bee strangled in his bed because hee was induced to thinke that hee went about to make himselfe king which deed being blowne abroad Clodomire sonne to Clodoâ—ee and Clotild king of Fraunce and cousin German to Sigismund Refer this properly to lib. 2. cap. 11. came with an armie for to reuenge this cruell and vnnaturall part his mother setting forward and inciting him thereunto in regard of the iniurie which Sigismunds father had done to her father and mother one of whome hee slew and drowned the other As they were readie to ioine battaile Sigismunds souldiours forsooke him so that hee was taken and presently put to death and his sonnes which hee had by his second wife were taken also and carried captiue to Orleance there drowned in a well Thus was the execrable murder of Sigismund his wife punished in their owne children As for Cleodomire though hee went conquerour from this
betwixt whome was great strife for the soueraigne dominion but to rid himselfe of all his trouble at once hee slew his brother Manlius by treason and after continued his raigne in tyranny and all vnlawfull lusts the space of twentie yeares but although vengeance all this while wincked yet it slept not for at the end of this space as hee was hunting hee was deuoured of wild beasts In the yeare of our Lord God 745 one Sigebert was authorised king of the Saxons in Brittaine a cruell and tyrannous Prince towards his subiects and one that chaunged the ancient lawes and customes of his realme after his owne pleasure and because a certaine Nobleman somewhat sharpely aduertised him of his euill conditions he malitiously caused him to bee put to death but see how the Lord reuenged this murder hee caused his Nobles to depriue him of his kingly authority and at last as a desolate and forlorne person wandering alone in a wood to bee slaine of a swine-heard whose maister hee being king had wrongfully put to death In the yeare of our Lord 678 Childerich king of Fraunce caused a Nobleman of his Realme called Bolyde to bee bound to a stake and there beaten to death without the pretence of any iust crime or accusation against him for which cruelty his Lords and commons being grieuously offended conspired togither and slew him with his wife as they were in hunting In the raigne of Edward the second and Edward the third Sir Roger Mortimer committed many villanous outrages in sheading much humane blood but hee was also iustlie recompenced in the end first he murdered king Edward the second lying in Barkley castell to the end hee might as it was supposed enioy Isabell his wife with whome hee had very suspitious familiarity Secondly hee caused Edward the third to conclude a dishonourable peace with the Scots by restoring to them all their ancient writings charters and patents whereby the kings of Scotland had bound themselues to be feudaries to the kings of England Thirdly he accused Edmund Earle of Kent vncle to king Edward of treason and caused him vniustly to be put to death And lastly he conspired against the king to worke his destruction for which and diuerse other things that were laid to his charge he was worthely and iustly beheaded In the raigne of Henry the sixt Humfry the good duke of Gloucester faithfull protector of the king by the meanes of certaine malicious persons and especially the Marques of Suffolke as it was suspected was arrested cast into hold strangled to death in the Abbey of Bury for which cause the Marques was not only banished the land for the space of fiue yeares but also banished out of his life for euer for as he sailed towards France he was met withall by a ship of warre and there presently beheaded and the dead corps cast vp at Douer that England wherein hee had committed the crime might be a witnesse of his punishment As the murder of a gentleman in Kent called maister Arden of Feuersham was most execrable so the wonderfull discouerie thereof was exceeding rare this Arden being somewhat aged had to wife a young woman no lesse faire then dishonest who being in loue with one Mosby more then her husband did not onely abuse his bed but also conspired his death with this her companion for togither they hired a notorious ruffian one Blacke Will to strangle him to death with a towell as hee was playing a game at tables which though secretly done yet by her own guiltie conscience and some tokens of blood which appeared in the house was soon discouered and confessed Wherfore she her selfe was burnt at Canterbury Michael maister Ardens man was hanged in chaines at Feuersham Mosby and his sister were hanged in Smithfield Greene another partner in this bloody action was hanged in chaines in the high way against Feuersham And Blacke Will the ruffian after his first escape was apprehended and burnt on a scaffold at Flushing in Zealand And thus all the murderers had their deserued dewes in this life and what they endured in the life to come except they obtaine mercy by true repentance it is easie to iudge CHAP. XI Of Paricides or parent murderers IF all effusion of humane blood bee both horrible to behold and repugnant to nature then is the murdering of parents especially detestable when a man is so possessed with the deuill or transported with a hellish fury that he lifteth vp his hand against his owne naturall father or mother to put thē to death this is so monstrous and inormious an impiety that the greatest Barbarians euer haue had it in detestation wherefore it is also expressely commanded in the law of God that vvhosoeuer smiteth his father or mother in what sort soeuer though not to death Exod. 21. yet he shall die the death If the disobedience vnreuerence and contempt of children towards their parents are by the iust iudgement of God most rigorously punished as hath ben declared before in the first commandement of the second table how much more then when violence is offered aboue all when murder is cōmitted Diodor. Sic. Thus the Aegyptians punished this sin they put the cōmittants vpon a stack of thorns and burnt thē aliue hauing beaten their bodies before hand with sharp reeds made of purpose Solon being demanded why hee appointed no punishment in his lawes for Parricides answered that there was no necessity thinking that the wide world could not affoord so wicked a wretch It is said that Romulus for the same cause ordained no punishment in his Common-wealth for that crime but called euery murderer a Parricide the one being in his opinion a thing execrable and the other impossible And in truth there was not for 600 years space according to Plutarchs report found in Rome any one that had cōmitted this execrable fact The first Parricide that Rome saw was Lucius Ostius after the first Punick war although other writers affirme that M. Malliolus was the first and Lucius the second howsoeuer it was they both vnderwent the punishment of the law Pompeia which enacted that such offendors should be thrust into a sack of lether an ape a cock a viper a dog put in to accōpany them then to be thrown into the water to the end that these beasts being enraged animated one against another might wreke their teene vpon them so depriue thē of life after a strange fashion being debarred of the vse of aire water earth as vnworthy to participate the very elements with their deaths much lesse with their liues which kind of punishmēt was after practised and confirmed by the constitution of Constantine the great And albeit the regard of the punishmēt seemed terrible the offence it self much more monstrous yet since that time there haue ben many so peruerse exceedingly wicked as to throw themselues headlong into that desperat gulfe As Cleodorick son of Sigebert king of
Heraclius hauing raigned Emperour but one yeere was poisoned by his stepmother Martina Zonoras tom 3. to the end to install her owne sonne Heraclon in the crowne but for this cruell part becomming odious to the Senat they so much hated to haue her or her sonne raigne ouer them that in stead thereof they cut off her tongue and his nose and so banished them the city Fausta the wife of Constantine the Great fell in loue with Constantine her sonne in law begotten vpon a concubine Zonoras 3. Annal. Sex Aur. whom when she could not persuade vnto her lust shee accused vnto the Emperour as a sollicitour of her chastitie for which cause hee was condemned to die but after the truth was knowen Constantinus put her into a hote bath and suffered her not to come forth vntill the heat had choaked her reuenging vpon her head his sonnes death and her owne vnchastitie CHAP. XII Of Subiect Murderers SEing then they that take away their neighbours liues doe not escape vnpunished as by the former examples it appeareth it must needs folow that if they to whom the sword of iustice is committed by God to represse wrongs and chastise vices doe giue ouer themselues to cruelties and to kill and slay those whome they ought in duty to protect and defend must receiue a greater measure of punishment according to the measure and quality of their offence Such an one was Saul the first king of Israel who albeit he ought to haue bene sufficiently instructed out of the law of God in his duty in this behalfe yet was hee so cruell and bloody minded as contrary to all iustice to put to death Abimelech the high priest with fourescore and fiue other priests of the family of his father 1. Sam. 22. onely for receiuing Dauid into his house small or rather no offence And yet not satisfied herewith h◠vomited out his rage also against the whol city of the priests and put to the mercilesse sword both man woman and child without sparing any Hee slew many of the Gibeonites who though they were reliques of the Amorites that first inhabited that lād yet because they were receiued into league of amity by a solemne oth and permitted of long continuance to dwell amongst them should not haue bene awarded as enemies nor handled after so cruell a fashion Thus therefore he tyranizing and playing the butcher amongst his own subiects for which cause his house was called the house of slaughter practising many other foul enormities he was at the last ouercome of the Philistims sore wounded which when he saw fearing to fall aliue into his enemies hands and not finding any of his owne men that would lay their hands vpon him desperately slew himselfe The same day three of his sonnes and they that followed him of his owne houshold were all slaine The Philistims the next day finding his dead body despoiled among the carcasses beheaded it and caried the head in triumph to the temple of their god and hung vp the trunke in disgrace in one of their cities to be seene lookt vpon and pointed at And yet for all this was not the fire of Gods wrath quenched for in king Dauids time there arose a famine that lasted three yeeres the cause whereof was declared by God to be the murder which Saul committed vpon the Gibeonites 2. Sam. 21. wherefore Dauid deliuered Sauls seuen sonnes into the Gibeonites hands that were left who put them to the most shamefull death that is euen to hanging Amongst all the sinnes of king Achab and Iezabel which were many and great 1. King 21. the murder of Naboth standeth in the forefront for though hee had committed no such crime as might any way deserue death yet by the subtill and wicked deuise of Iezabel foolish and credulous consent of Achab and false accusation of the two suborned witnesses he was cruelly stoned to death but his innocent blood was punished first in Achab who not long after the warre which hee made with the king of Siria receiued so deadly a wound that hee died thereof the dogges licking vp his blood in the same place where Naboths blood was licked 2. King 9. according to the foretelling of Elias the Prophet And secondly of Iezabel whome her owne seruants at the commandement of Iehu whome God had made executour of his wrath threw headlong out of an high window vnto the ground so that the walls were died with her blood and the horses trampled her vnder their feet and dogs deuoured her flesh till of all her dainty body there remained nothing sauing only her scull feet and palme of her hands Ioram sonne of Iehosaphat king of Iudah being after his fathers death possessed of the crowne and scepter of Iudah 2. Chron. 21. by and by exalted himselfe in tyranny and put to death sixe of his owne brethren all younger than himselfe with many princes of the realme for which cause God stirred vp the Edomites to rebell the Philistims and Arabians to make war against him who forraged his countrey sacked and spoiled his cities and tooke prisoners his wiues and children the yongest only excepted who afterwards also was murdered when he had raigned king but a small space And lastly as in doing to death his owne brethren hee committed crueltie against his owne bowels so the Lord stroke him with such an incurable disease in his bowels and so perpetuall for it continued two yeeres that his very entrails issued out with torment and so died in horrible misery Albeit that in the former booke we haue already touched the pride and arrogancie of king Alexander the Great yet wee can not pretermit to speake of him in this place his example seruing so fit for the present subiect for although as touching the rest of his life hee was verie well gouerned in his priuat actions as a monarch of his reputation might be yet in his declining age I meane not in yeeres but to deathward he grew exceeding cruell not only towards strangers as the Cosseis whome he destroied to the sucking babe but also to his houshold and familiar friends Insomuch that being become odious to most fewest loued hi◠and diuers wrought all meanes possible to make him away but one especially whose sonne in law and other neare friends he had put to death neuer ceased vntill he both ministred a deadly draught vnto himselfe Iustine whereby he depriued him of his wicked life and a fatall stroke to his wiues and children after his death to the accomplishment of his full reuenge Phalaris the tyrant of Agrigentum made himselfe famous to posterity by no other meanes Oros then horrible cruelties exercised vpon his owne subiects inuenting euery day new kinds of tortures to scourge and afflict the poore soules withall In his dominion there was one Perillus an artificer of his craft one expert in his occupation who to flatter and curry fauour with him deuised a new torment
and consent of parties is committed bee condemned how much more greeuous and hainous is the offence and more guiltie the offendour when with violence the chastity of any is assailed and enforced This was the sinne wherwith Sichem the sonne of Hemor the Leuit is marked in holy scripture for hee rauished Dina Iaacobs daughter Gen. for which cause Simeon and Lui her brethren reuenged the iniury done done vnto their sister vpon the head of not onely him and his father but all the males that were in the citie by putting them to the sword It was a custome among the Spartanes Messenians during the time of peace betwixt them to send yearely to one another certaine of their daughters to celebrate certaine feasts and sacrifices that were amongst them now in continuance of time it chanced that fiftie of the Lacedemonian Virgines being come to those solemne feasts were pursued by the Messenian gallants to haue their pleasures of theÌ„ but they iointly making resistance and fighting for their honesties stroue so long not one yeelding themselues a prey into their hands till they all died wherevpon arose so long miserable a warre that all the countrie of Messena was destroied thereby Aristoclides a Tyrant of Orchomenus a city of Arcadia fell enamoured with a maid of Stymphalis who seeing her father by him slaine because hee seemed to stand in his puâ—poses light fled to the Temple of Diana to take Sanctuarie neither could once bee pluckt from the image of the goddesse vntill her life was taken from her but hir death so incensed the Arcadians that they fell to armes sharpely reuenged her cruell iniury Appius a Romane a man of power and authoritie in the city â—â—us Liuius enflamed with the loue of a Virgin whose father hight Virginius would needs make her his seruant to the end to abuse her the more freely whilst he endeuoured with all his power and pollicie to accomplish his immoderate lust her father slew her with his own hands more willing to prostitute her to death than to so foule an opprobrie and disgrace but euery man prouoked and stirred vp with the wofulnesse of the euent with one consent pursued apprehended and imprisoned the foule lecher who fearing the award of a most shamefull death killed himselfe to preuent a further mischiefe In the yeare of our Lord 1271 vnder the raign of the Emperour Rodolphe Nic. Gil. vol. 1. the Sicilians netled and enraged with the horrible whoredomes adulteries Rapes which the Garrisons that had the gouernment ouer them committed not able to endure any longer their insolent outragious demeanor entred a secret coÌ„mon conspiracy vpon a time appointed for the purpose which was on Easter sunday at the shutting in of the euening to set vpon them with one accord and to murder so many as they could as they did for at that instant they massacred so many throughout the whole island that of all the great multitude there suruiued not one to beare tidings or bewaile the dead At Naples it chaunced in the Kings pallace Bâ—mb lib. 3. hist Venet. as young King Fredericke Ferdinands sonne entered the priuie chamber of the Queene his mother to salute her and the other Ladies of the court that the Prince of Bissenio waighting in the outward chamber for his returne was slaine by one of his owne seruants that suddainely gaue him with his sword three deadly strokes in the presence of many beholders which deed hee confessed that hee had watched three yeares to performe in regard of an iniurie done vnto his sister and in her to him Benzoni Milan of the new found land whome hee rauished against her will The Spaniards that first tooke the Isle Hispaniola were for their whoredomes and Rapes whhich they committed vpon the wiues and Virgins all murdered by the inhabitants The inhabitants of the Prouince Cumana when they saw the beastly outrage of the Spanish nation The same author that lay along their coasts to fish for pearle in forcing and rauishing without difference their women young and old set vpon them vpon a Sunday morning with all their force and slew all that euer they found by the sea coasts Westward till there remained not one aliue And the fury of the rude vnciuill people was so great that they spared not the Monkes in their cloisters but cut their throates as they were mumbling their Masses burnt vp the Spanish houses both religious and priuate burst in peeces their belles drew about their Images hurld downe their crucifixes and cast them in disgrace and contempt ouerthwart their streetes to bee trodden vpon nay they destroyed whatsoeuer belonged vnto them to their very dogges and hennes and their owne Countriemen that serued them in any seruice whether religious or other they spared not they beate the earth and cursed it with bitter curses because it had vpholden such wicked and wretched caitifes Now the report of this massacre was so fearefull and terrible that the Spaniards which were in Cubagna doubted much of their liues also and truly not without great cause for if the Indians of the Continent had beene furnished and prouided with sufficient store of barkes they had passed euen into that Island and had serued them with the same sauce which their fellows were serued with for they wanted not will but hability to doe it And these are the goodly fruits of their adulteries and Rapes which the Spanish nation hath reaped in their new found land The great calamity and ouerthrow which the Lacedemonians endured at Leuctria wherein their chiefest strength and powers were weakened and consumed was a manifest punishment of their inordinate lust committed vpon two Virgines â—i Mel. lib. 2. whome after they had rauished in that very place they cut in peeces and threw them into a pit and when their father came to complaine him of the villanie they made so light account of his words that in stead of redresse he found nothing but reproch and derision so that with griefe hee slew himselfe vpon his daughters sepulchre but how greeuously the Lord reuenged this iniurie hystories doe sufficiently testifie and that Leuctrias calamitie doth beare witnesse Pausan lib. 2. Brias a Grecian captaine being receiued into a Citizens house as a guest forced his wife by violence to his lust but when he was asleepe to reuenge her wrong she put out both his eies and afterward complained to the citizens also who depriued him of his office and cast him out of their city Macrinus the Emperour punished two souldiours that rauished their hostesse on this manner hee shut them vp in an oxes bowels with their heads out and so partly with famishment and partly with wormes and rottennesse they consumed to death Iohan magnus Rodericus king of the Gothes in Spaine forced an Earles daughter to his lust for which cause her father brought against him an army of Sarasens and Moores and not onely slew him
as the earth was corrupted and polluted with abundance of sinne so God sent abundance of water to purge and clense away the filthinesse thereof as at the latter day hee will send fire to purifie and refine heauen and earth from their dregs and restore them to their first and purest estate And thus God reuenged the extortion and crueltie of that age But yet for all this those sinnes were not then so defaced and rooted vp but that they be burnished againe and grown in time to as big a Bulke for euen at this day the greatest part of the world is giuen to practise fraud and deceit and by vnlawfull meanes to encroch vpon others goods which subtleties though they desire neuer so to disguise and cloke yet will they euer bee condemned reputed kinds of theft before God now as some are of greater power and authority than others in the world so answerable to their selues is the qualitie of their sinnes and by consequence the punishment the greater of power the greater theeues and the greater iudgement for if a poor man through pouerty and necessity cutteth a purse of stealeth any other trifle be culpable how much more culpable shall he that is rich bee that vsurpeth the goods of his neighbor Draco the lawgiuer of Athens appointed death to be the punishment of theft Solon mitigated that rigor and punished it with double restitution The Locrians put out his eies that had stolen ought from his neighbour The Hetrurians stoned them to death The Scythians abhorred theÌ„ more than all creatures because they had a communitie of all things except their cups The Vacceians vsed such seuerity towards this kind of men that if one had taken but a handfull of corne he was sure to die for it Marcus Fabius being Censor condemned his own son Buteâ— to death being apprehended for theft Tiberius the Emperor punished a souldior after the same manner for stealing a Peacock in sum there was no CoÌ„monwealth wherin this sin was not highly detested sharply punished except the Lacedemonian where it was permitted and tollerated for their exercise of warlike discipline It was a rash and seuere Theat histor yet as it proued a iust ded of Tamburlaine that mightie tyrant and conqueror of Asia when a poore woman complained to him of one of his souldiors that had taken from her a little milke and a peece of cheese without paiment he caused the souldiors belly to be ripped to see whither shee had falsly accused him or no and finding the milke in his stomacke adiudged him worthy of that punishment for stealing from so poore a woman When Theophilus raigned Emperour in the East there was a certaine souldiour possessed of a very gallant and braue horse which his captaine by all meanes possible sought to get from him Zonar Annal. 3. but he would not in any case part with him wherefore hee put him forth of pay and tooke his horse from him by force and sent him for a present to the Emperour Theophilus now it chanced that this poore souldiour was slaine in the battaile for want of his horse and his wife and children left destitute of succour insomuch that through necessity shee was constrained to flie to Constantionple and to complaine to the Emperour of the iniury done vnto her husband with this resolution entring the citie she met the Emperour riding vpon her husbands horse and catching the horse bridle chalenged him not onely for stealing the horse but also being the cause of her husbands death The Emperour wondering at the womans boldnesse examined her more narrowly and found out the whole practise of that wicked captaine whom he banished presently his Empire and bestowed his possession in recompence vpon the distressed widdow Ibicus the Poet being set vpon by theeues when hee saw that they would not only spoile him of his money but of his life also he cried for help and reuenge to the cranes that flew ouer his head a while after as these murdering theeues sat togither in the market place the same cranes appearing vnto them in the aire they whispered one another in the eare and said yonder flie Ibicus reuengers which though secretly spoken yet was ouerheard so that they being examined and found guiltie were put to death for their paines The like story Martin Luther Luther reporteth touching a trauailer only differing in this that as cranes detected the former so crows laid open the latter Albert. Krantz lib. 10. cap. 7. In the yeare 1384 when as al Saxony was so infested with theeues that no man could trauaile safely in the countrie the Princes calling a councill set downe this order That not only the theeues themselues should be seuerely punished but all that did protect or harbor any of them which decree wheÌ„ as Theodorick countie of Weringrode impugned the body of the councill sent for him and adiudged him to a most cruell and shamefull death Cranth lib. 10. cap. 30. In the year 1410 Henry duke of Luneburge a most iust seuere prince went about to purge his country from all thefts robberies insomuch as the least offence coÌ„mitted in that kind he suffered not to goe vnpunished now it happened as the Duke went towards Luneburge hee sent before him one of his chiefest officers to prouide necessaries against his comming who riding â—â—thout a cloake the weather being cold entreated a ploughman to lend him his cloke till his returne which wheÌ„ the clown refused to do he took it without leaue but it cost him his life for it for the ploughman awaited the dukes comming and directed his complaint vnto him on this maner What auaileth it O noble prince to seek to suppresse the outrage of theeues spoilers when as the chiefest officers dare commit such things vncontrolled as the lieutenant of Tzela hath but now taken froÌ„ memy cloke the duke hearing this complaint considering the cause dissembled his councill till his returne backe from Luneburge vnto the same place where calling for his leiutenant and rating him for his iniury he commanded him to be hanged vpon a tree a wonderfull seueritie in iustice and worthy to be commended for what hope is it to root out small and pettie theeues if we suffer grand theeues to goe vncorrected There is another kind of theft practised of them that be in authority who vnder the title of confiscation assume vnto themselues stollen goods and so much the readilier by how much the value of the things amounteth to more worth an action altogither vniust and contrary to both diuine and humane law which ordaine to restore vnto euery man his own truly he that in steed of restitution with holdeth the good of his neighbour in this manner differeth no more from a theefe than that the one stealeth boldly without feare the other timorously and with great danger and what greater corruption of Iustice can there be then this For who would follow the law vpon a theefe when
things a very niggard and pinchpenny shewed himselfe on the other side more then prodigall next he sent into Calabria for a Hermit reported to be a holy and deuout man to whome at his arriuall hee perfourmed so much dutie and reuerence as was wonderfull and vnseemely for hee threw himselfe on his knees and besought him to prolong his decaying life as if hee had beene a God and not a man but all that hee could doe was to no purpose no nor the reliques which Pope Sixtus sent him to busie himselfe withall nor the holy viall of Rheims which was brought him could prorogue this life of his nor priuiledge him from dying a discontent and vnwilling death he suspected the most part of his nearest attendants and would not suffer them to approch vnto him in his sicknesse after hee had thus prolonged the time in hope and yet still languished in extreame distresse of his disease it was at length told him in all speed that hee should not set his mind any longer vpon those vaine hopes nor vpon that holy man for his time was come and hee must needs die And thus hee that during his raigne shewed himselfe rough and cruell to his subiects by too many and heauy impositions was himselfe in his lattet end thus roughly and hardly dealt withall Christiern the eleuenth king of Denmarke Norway and Suecia after the death of king Iohn his father raigned the yeere of our Lord 1514 and was too intollerable in imposing burdens and taxes vpon his subiects for which cause the Swecians reuolted from his gouernment whome though after many battailes and sieges hee conquered and placed amongst them his garrisons to keepe them in awe yet ceased they not to rebell against him and that by the instigation of a meane gentleman who very quickely got footing into the kingdome and possessed himselfe of the crowne and gouernment Now Christiern hauing lost this prouince and beeing also in disdaine and hatred of his owne countrey and fearing least this inward heat of spight should grow to some flame of danger to his life seeing that the inhabitants of Lubeck conspiring with his vncle Fredericke began to take armes against him hee fled away with his wife sister to the Emperour Charles the fift and his young children to Zeland a prouince of the Emperours after hee had raigned nine yeeres after which the Estates of the realme aided by them of Lubeck assembling togither exalted his vncle Fredericke prince of Holsatia though old and ancient to the crowne and publishing certaine writings addressed them to the Emperour and the princes of his Empire to render a reason of their con-proceeding and to make knowne vnto them vpon how good siderations they had deposed and banished Christierne for the tyranny which hee exercised among them ten yeres after this hee got togither a new army by sea in hope to recouer his losses but contrary to his hope he was taken prisoner and in captiuity ended miserably his daies Henry king of Suecia was chased from his scepter for enterprising to burden his commons with new contributions Those that were deuisers of new taxes and tributes Nic. Gil. vâ—l 1. for the most part euer lost their liues in their labours for proofe whereof let the example of Parchenus or Porchetes serue who for giuing counsell to king Theodebert touching the raising of new subsidies was stoned to death by the multitude in the city Trieues Likewise was George Presquon cruelly put to death by the people for persuading and setting forward Henry of Suecia to the vexation and exaction of his subiects CHAP. XXXVIII More Examples of the same subiect Platiniae in vita Zacharin AIstulphus the nineteenth king of Lumbardy was not onely a most cruell tyrant but also a grieuous oppressour of his subiects with taxes and exactions Phil. Melanct. lib. 3. for hee imposed this vpon euery one of them to pay yeerely a noble for their heads against this man Pope Steuen prouoked king Pepin of France who comming with an army droue the tyrant into Ticinum and constrained him to yeeld to partiall conditions of peace howbeir Pepin was no sooner gone but he returned to his old byas wherefore the second time he came and droue him to as great extremitie in so much as another peace was concluded after the accomplishment whereof peruerse Aistulph still vexing his subiects was plagued by God with an apoplexie and so died Zonar lib. 3. Iustinian the Emperour as be was profuse and excessiue in spending so was hee immoderate and insatiable in gathering togither riches for hee exercised his wit in deuising new tributes and paiments and reioyced his heart in nothing more for which causes there arose a grieuous sedition at Constantinople against him wherein not onely the excellent and famous monuments of the Empire were burned but also fourty thousand men slaine and this was no small punishment for his oppression At Paris there is to be seene in the corne market a certain monument hard at the mouth of the common sinke which conuaieth away all the filth out of the city Eras in lingua the occasion whereof is reported to be this A certaine courtier seeing the king sad and melancholly for want of treasure counselled him to exact of euery countriman that brought ware into the city but one penny and that but for two yeares togither which when the king put in practise and found the exceeding commoditie thereof he not only continued that taxe but also inuented diuers others to the great damage of the Common-wealth and inriching of his owne treasurie Wherefore hee that put it first into his head when he saw that he had not so much authoritie in dissuading as hee had in persuading it to take punishment of himselfe for that inconsiderate deed and to warne others from attempting the like he commanded by his testament that his body should bee buried in that common sincke to bee an example of exaction and the filthinesse thereof Barnabe Vicount of Millane by the report of Paulus Ionius Tom. 2. ViuoruÌ„ illustrum was an vnconscionable oppressor of his subiects and tenants for hee did not only extort of them continuall imposts and payments but enioned them to keepe euery one a dog which if they came to any mishap or were either too fat or too leane the keeper was sure to bee beaten or at least some fine to be set on his head this tyrant was taken by Iohn Galeacius and after seuen months imprisonment poysoned to death Archigallo brother to Gorbonianus in nature Lanquet though vnlike in conditions for hee was a good Prince whereas this was a Tyrant was crowned King of Britaine in the yeare of the world 3671 we may well place him in this ranke of oppressors for he deposed the Noblemen and exalted the ignoble he extorted froÌ„ men their goods to enrich his treasure for which cause the estates of the realme depriued him of his roiall dignitie placed his yonger
brother Elydurus in his roome after he had raigned fiue yeares Hardiknitus king of Denmarke The same after the death of Harold was ordained king of England in the yeare of the Lord 1041 this king as he was somewhat cruell for he caused the body of Harold to be taken vp out of the sepulchre and smiting off his head to be cast out into the riuer Thames because he had iniured his mother Emma when he was aliue so hee was burdensome to his subiects in tributes and exaction for which cause growing into hatred with God and his subiects hee was stricken with suddaine death not without suspition of poysoning after he had raigned three years The same William Rufus second sonne of William the conquerour succeeded his father as in the kingdome of England so in disposition of nature for they were both cruell vnconstant and couetous and burdened their people with vnreasonable taxes insomuch that what with the morreine of men by pestilence and the oppressions of them by exactions the tillage of the earth was put off for one yeare being the yeare 1096 whereby ensued great scarsitie the yeare following throughout all the land but for the oppression William was iustly punished by sodaine death when being at his disport of hunting hee was wounded with an arrow glaunsing from the bow of Tyrill a French knight and so his tyranny and life ended togither The same Neither dooth the Lord thus punish oppressors themselues but also they that either countenance or hauing authoritie doe not punish the same as it appeareth by this example following In the yeare of our Lord 475 there liued one Corrannus a king of Scots who though hee gouerned the people in peace and quietnesse a long space and was indeed a good Prince yet because his Chancelour Tomset vsed extortion and exaction amongst his subiects and hee being aduertised thereof did not punish him hee was slaine traiterously by his owne subiects It is not vnworthie to bee noted how Edward the third king of England prospered a long while in the warres against France and got many worthie and wonderfull victories but when Prince Edward sonne vnto the foresaid Edward after conditions of peace concluded began to set taxes and impositions vpoÌ„ the country of Aquitaine then did king Edwards part begin to decline and the successe of war which the space of fortie years neuer forsooke him now frowned vpon him so that he quickly lost all those lands which by composition of peace were granted vnto him CAAP. XXXIX Of such as by force of armes haue either taken away or would haue taken away the goods and lands of other men NOw if they that oppresse their subiects and deuour them in this manner In this whole chapter note the nature of ambition and the fruits thereof bee found guiltie then must they needs bee much more that are carried with the wings of their own hungrie ambitious desire to inuade their lands and signiories attended on with an infinite retinue of pillages sackings ruines of cities and people which are alwaies necessarie companions of furious vnmercifull warre There are no flouds so broad nor mountaines so steepe nor rockes so rough and dangerous nor sea so long and furious that can restraine the rash and headstrong desire of such greedie minded Sacres so that if their bodie might bee proportioned to the square and greatnesse of their mindes with the one hand they would reach the East and with the other hand the West as it is said of Alexander howbeit hereof they boast and glorie no lesse than they that tooke delight to bee surnamed citie-spoilers others burners of cities some conquerors and many Eagles and Faulcons seeking as it were fame by infamy and by vice eternitie But to these men it often coÌ„meth to passe that euen then when they think to aduance their dominion and to stretch their bounds and frontiers furthest they are driuen to recoile for feare of being dispossessed themselues of their owne lands and inheritances and euen as they delt with others rigorously and by strength of weapons so shall they bee themselues rehandled and dealt withall after the same measure according to the word of the Prophet denounced against such as they Cursed bee thou that spoilest and dealest vnfaithfully when thou hast made an end of spoiling others thou thy selfe shall bee spoiled and when thou hast done dealing traiterously then treason shall begin to be practised against thee and this curse most commonly neuer faileth to sease vpon these great Theeues and Robbers or at least vpon their children and successours as by particular examples wee shall see after wee haue first spoken of Adonias who not content with his owne estate of being a kings sonne 1. King 12. which God had allotted him went about to get the crowne and kingdome from his brother Salomon Treason lib. 2. cap. 3. to whome by right it appertained for God had manifested the same by the mouth of his father Dauid but both hee and his assistants for their ouerbold and rash enterprise were iustly by Salomon punished with death â—arod Crassus king of Lidia was the first that made war against Ephesus and that subdued the Greekes of Asia to wit the Phrigians Mysians Chalybeans Paphlagonians Thracians Bythinians Ionians Dorians Aeolians and Pamphilians and made them all tributaries vnto him by meanes whereof hee being growne exceeding rich and puissant by the detriment and vndoing of so many people vaunted and gloried in his greatnesse and power and euen then thought himselfe the happiest man in the world wheÌ„ most misery and aduersity griefe and distresse of his estate and whole house approched neerest for first and formost one of his sonnes that was deare vnto him was by ouersight slaine at the chase of a wild bore next himselfe hauing commenced war with Cirus was ouercome in battaile and besieged in Sardis the chiefe city of his kingdome and at last taken and carried captiue to Cyrus despoiled of all his late glorie and dominion And thus Crassus as sayth Plutarch after Herodotus bore the punishmeÌ„t of the offence of his great grandfather Giges who being but one of king Candanles attendants slew his master and vsurped the crowne at the prouokement of the Queene his mistresse whom he also tooke to be his wife And thus this kingdome decaied by the same meanes by which it first encreased Policrates the Tyrant Herod was one that by violence and tyrannous meanes grew from a base condition to an high estate for being but one of the vulgar sort in the citie Samos hee with the assistance of sifteene armed men seased vpon the whole citie and made himselfe Lord of it which deuiding into three parts he bestowed two of them vpon his two brethren but not for perpetuitie for ere long the third part of his vsurpation cost the elder of them the best part of his life and the younger his liberty for he chased him away that hee might be
sole possessor of the whole Island after this he inuaded many other Islands besides many cities in the same land he raised the Lacedemonians from the siege of Samos which they had begirt And when hee saw that all things fell out so well to his owne wish that nothing could be more fearing so great prosperity could not but carry in the taile some terrible sting of aduersitie and mischance attempted by voluntary losse of something of value to preuent the mischiefe which he feared to ensue and this by the aduise of his deare friend and ally the king of Aegypt therefore hee threw a ring which hee had in great price into the sea to the end to delude fortune as he thought thereby but the ring was after found in a fishes belly and offered as a present vnto him and this was an euident presage of some ineuitable misfortune that waited for him neither did it proue vaine and friuolous for hee was hanged vpon a gibbet of Sardis by the commandement of Orates the gouernour of the city who vnder pretence of friendship and coulor of rendering his treasure into his hands and bestowing vpon him a great part thereof promising also to passe the rest of his daies vnder his wing for fear of the rage of Cambises drew him to come priuately to speak with him and so easily wrought his will vpon him Aristodemus got into his hands the gouernment of Cuma Dionâ—s Halicar lib. 7. after hee had made away the principall of the citie and to keepe it the better being obtained hee first won the vulgars hearts by presents then banished out of the Citie their children whome hee had put to death and entertained the rest of the youth with such varietie of pleasures and delights that by those deuises hee kept himselfe in his tyrannous estate many yeares but assoone as the children of those slaine Citizens were growne to ripe yeares of strength and discretion being desirous to reuenge their fathers deaths they set vpon him in the night so at vnawares that they put him and all his family to the slaughter Plutarch Tymophanes vsurped a principality power and rule in Corinth a free citie and became so odious thereby to the whole people yea and to his owne brother Tymoleon also that laying aside all respect of nature hee slew him with his owne hands preferring the libertie of his countrie before any vnity or bond of bloud When the cities of Greece sayth Orosius would needes through too greedie a desire and Ambition of raigne Lib. 3. cap. 12. get euery one the maisterie and soueraigntie of the rest they altogither made shipracke of their owne liberties by encroching vpon others as for instance The Lacedemonians how hurtfull and vncommodious the desire of bringing their neighbour adioining citties vnder their dominion was vnto them the sundrie discomfitures and distresses within the time of that warre vndertaken vpon that onely cause befell them Oros lâ—b 3. ca. 2. beare sufficient record Seruius Tullus the sonne to a bondman addicted himselfe so much to the exploits of warre that by Prowesse hee got so great credite and reputation among the Romanes that hee was thought worthie to bee made the sonne in law of king Tarquinius by marrying one of his daughters Titus Liuius after whose death hee also vsurped the crowne vnder colour of the Protectorship of the kings two yong sonnes Who when they came to age and bignesse maried the daughters of their brother in law Tullius by whose exhortation and continuall prouokement the elder of them which was called Tarquinius conspired against his father in law and practised to make himselfe king and to recouer his rightfull inheritance and that by this means he watched his oportunitie when the greatest part of the people were out of the citie about gathering their fruit in the fields and then placing his companions in readinesse to serue his turne if need should be he marched to the pallace in the roiall robes guarded with a company of his confederats and hauing called a Senate as hee began to complaine him of the trecherie and impudencie of Tullius behold Tullius himselfe came in would haue run violently vpon him but Tarquinius catching him about the middle threw him headlong down the staires and presently sent certaine of his guard to make an end of the murder which hee had begun But herein the cruelty of Tullia was most monstrous that not only first moued her husband to this bloudy practise but also made her coach to be driuen ouer the body of her father which lay bleeding in the middest of the street scarce dead Manlius after hee had maintained the fortresse of Rome against the Gaules glorying in that action Parricide lib â— cap. 11. and enuying the good hap and prosperity of Camillus went about to make himselfe king vnder pretence of restoring the people to their ancient entire libertie but his practise being discouered he was accused found guiltie and by the consent of the multitude adiudged to be throwne headlong downe from the top of the same fortresse to the end that the same place which gaue him great glory might bee a witnesse and memoriall of his shame and last confusion for all his valiant deedes before done were not of so much force with the people to excuse his fault or saue his life as this one crime was of weight to bring him to his death In former times there liued in Carthage one Hanno Oros lib. 4. c. 6. who because hee had more riches than all the Commonwealth beside began to aspire to the domination of the citie which the better to accomplish he deuised to make shew of marrying his only daughter to the end that at the mariage feast he might poyson the chiefest men of credit and power of the citie whome hee knew could or would any waies withstand or countermand his purpose but when this deuise tooke no effect by reason of the discouerie thereof by certain of his seruants he sought another meanes to effect his will He got togither a huge number of bondslaues and seruants which should at a sodaine put him in possession of the citie but being preuented herein also by the citizens hee seased vpon a castle with a thousand men of base regard euen seruants for the most part whither thinking to draw the Affricanes and king of the Moores to his succour he was taken first whipped next had his eies thrust out and then his armes and legs broken in peeces and so was executed to death before al the people his carcas being thus mangled with blows was hanged vpon a gallowes and all his kindred and children put to death that there might not one remaine of his straine either to enterprise the like deed or to reuenge his death That great and fearefull warriour Iulius Caesar one of the most hardie and valiants peeces of flesh that euer was after he had performed so many notable exploits ouercome all his enemies
contenteth at the first but it infecteth all his possessions sucketh out the marrow of them ere it be long Seing theÌ„ it is so abhominable both by the law of God and nature let vs shun it as a toad and flie from it as a cockatrice but when these persuasions will not serue let them turne their eies to these examples following wherin they shal see the manifest indignations of God vpon it In the Bishopricke of Coline a notable famous Vsurer lying vpon his death bed readie to die mooued vp and downe his chops and his lips as if hee had beene eating something in his mouth D sâ—ipul de temporâ— and being demaunded what hee ear hee answered his money and that the Deuill thrust it into his mouth perforce so that hee could neither will nor choose but deuour it in which miserable temptation he died without any shew of repentance The same Author telleth of another Vsurer that a little before his death called for his bags of gold and siluer and offered them al to his soule vpon condition it would not forsake him but if hee would haue giuen all the world it could not ransome him from death wherefore when hee saw there was no remedie but hee must needes die hee commended his soule to the deuill to bee carried into euerlasting torments which wordes when hee had vttered hee gaue vp the ghost Another Vsurer being ready to die made this his last Will and testament My soule quoth he I bequeath to the Deuill who is owner of it my wife likewise to the Deuill who induced mee to this vngodly trade of life Iohannes Auglus and my Deacon to the Deuill for soothing me vp and not reprouing me for my faults and in this desperate persuasion he died incontinently Vsurie consisteth not onely in lending and borrowing but in buying and selling also and all vniust and craftie bargaining yea and it is a kind of Vsurie to detaine through too much couetousnesse those coÌ„modities from the people which concerne the publicke good and to hoord them vp for their priuate gaine till some scarsitie or want arise and this also hath euermore ben most sharply punished as by these examples may appeare About the yeare 1543 at what time a great famine and dearth of bread afflicted the world there was in Saxony a countrie peasant that hauing carried his corne to the market and sold it cheaper than hee looked for as hee returned homewards hee fell into most heauie dumpes and dolours of mind with greife that the price of graine was abated and when his seruants sang merrily for ioy of that blessed cheapenesse hee rebuked them most sharpely and cruelly yea and was so much the more tormented and troubled in mind by how much the more he saw any poore soule thankfull vnto God for it but marke how God gaue him ouer to a Reprobate and desperate sence Whilest his seruants rode before hee hung himselfe at the cart taile being past recouery of life ere any man looked backe or perceiued him A notable example for our English cormorants who ioine barne to barne and heap to heap and will not sell nor giue a handfull of their superfluitie to the poore when it beareth a low price but preserue it til scarsity and want come and then they sell it at their owne rate let them feare by this least the Lord deale so or worse with them Another couetous wretch when hee could not sell his corne so deare as hee desired said the mise should eat it rather then he would lessen one iot of the price thereof which words were no sooner spoken but vengeance tooke them for all the mise in the countrie flocked to his barnes and fields so that they left him neither standing nor lying corne but deuoured all this story was written to Martin Luther Luther vpon occasion whereof hee inueighing mightilie against this cruell vsurie of husbandmen told of three misers that in one yeare hung themselues because graine bore a lower price than they looked for adding moreouer that all such cruell and muddie extortioners deserued no better a doome for their vnmercifull oppression D. Pomeranus Another rich farmer whose barnes were full of graine and his stackes vntouched was so couetous withall that in hope of some dearth and dearenesse of corne hee would not deminish one heape but hoorded vp daily more and more and wished for a scarsitie vpon the earth to the end hee might enrich his coffers by other mens necessities this cruell churle reioiced so much in his abundance that euery day hee would goe into his barnes and feed his eies with his superfluity now it fell out as the Lord would that hauing supped drunke very largely vpon a night as hee went according to his custome to view his riches with a candle in his hand behold the wine or rather the iustice of God ouercame his senses so that hee fell downe sodainely into the mow and by his fall set on fire the corne being drie and easie to be incensed in such sort that in a moment all that which he had scraped togither and preserued so charily and delighted in so vnreasonably was consumed and brought to ashes and scarce hee himselfe escaped with his life Another in Mifina in the yeare 1559 hauing great store of corne hoorded vp refused to succour the necessitie of his poore and halfe famished neighbours Iob. Flucel li. 2. for which cause the Lord punished him with a strange and vnusuall iudgement for the corne which hee so much cherished assumed life and became feathered soules flying out of his barns in such abundance that the world was astonished thereat and his barnes left emptie of all prouision in most woonderfull and miraculous maner No lesse strange was that which happened in a Towne of Fraunce called Stenchansen to the gouernour of the Towne The same author who being requested by one of his poore subiects to sell him some corne for his money when there was none to be gotten els where answered hee could spare none by reason hee had scarce enough for his owne hogs which hoggish disposition the Lord requited in it owne kind for his wise at the next litter brought forth seuen pigs at one birth to increase the number of his hogs that as he had preferred filthy ougly creatures before his poore brethren in whome the image of God in some sort shined forth so hee might haue of his owne getting more of that kind to make much of since he loued theÌ„ so well Equall to all the former both in cruelty touching the person and miracle touching the iudgement The same was that which is reported by the same author to haue happened to a rich couetous woman in Marchia who in an extreame dearth of vittailes denied not onely to relieue a poore man whose children were ready to starue with famine but also to sell him but one bushel of corne when â—e wanted but a penny of hir price
for the poor wretch making great shift to borrow that penny returned to her againe and desired her hee might haue the corne but as he paied her the mony the penny fell vpon the ground by the prouidence of God which as shee stretched out her hand to reach it miraculously turned into a serpent and bit her so fast that by no meanes it could bee loosened from her arme vntill it had brought her to a wofull and miserable end Fulgos lib. 2. cap 2. Sergius Galba before hee came to bee Emperour being President of Affrica vnder Claudius when as through penurie of vitailes corne and other food was verie sparingly shared out and deuided among the army punished a certaine souldiour that sold a bushell of wheat to one of his fellowes for a hundred pence in hope to obtaine a new share himselfe in this maner he commanded the Quaestor or treasurer to giue him no more sustinance since hee preferred lucre before the necessitie of his owne bodie and his friends welfare neither suffered hee any man els to sell him any so that he perished with famine and became a miserable example to all the armie of the fruits of that foule dropsie couetousnesse And thus we see how the Lord raigned down vengeance vpon all couetous Vsurers and oppressors plaguing some on this fashion and some on that and neuer passing any but either in this life some notable iudgement ouertakes them either in themselues or their ofsprings for it is notoriously knowne that Vsurers children though left rich yet the first or second generation became alwaies beggers or in the life to come they are throwne into the pit of perdition from whence there is no redemption nor deliuerance CHAP. XLI Of dicers and card plaiers and their theft IF any recreation be allowed vs as no doubt there is yet surely it is not such as whereby wee should worke the dammage and hurt of one another as when by gaming we draw away another mans money with his great losse and this is one kind of theft to vsurpe any mans goods by vnlawfull meanes wherfore no such sports ought to find any place amongst Christians especially those wherin any kind of lot or hazzard is vsed by the which the good blessings of God are contrary to their true and naturall vse exposed to chance and fortune as they tearme it for which cause Saint Augustine is of this opinion concerning them Epist 54. à Maced That the gain which ariseth to any partie in play should be bestowed vpon the poore to the end that both the gamesters aswell the winner as the looser might bee equally punished the one by not carrying the stake being woon the other by being frustrated of all his hope of winning Plaiers at dice both by the Elibertine and Constantinoplitane councell vnder Iustinian were punished with excommunication Can. 79. Can. 50. and by a new constitution of the said Emperor it was enacted that no man should vse dice play either in priuate or publicke no nor approue the same by their presence vnder paine of punishment and bishops were there appointed to be ouerseers in this behalfe to espie if any default was made Cod. li. 3. tit 43. Horace an Heathen Poet auouched the vnlawfulnes of this thing euen in his time Od. 24. lib. 3. Lndere doction scu graeco iubeas trocho seu malis vetita legibus alea. wheÌ„ he saith that dice playing was forbidden by their law Lewis the eight king of France renowned for his good conditions and rare vertues amongst all the excellent lawes which hee made this was one That all sports should bee banished the Commonwealth except shooting whether with long bow or crossebow and that no cards nor dice should either bee made or sold by any to the end that all occasion of gaming might bee taken away Surely it would bee very profitable and expedient for the weale publicke that this ordinance might stand in effect at this day and that all Merchants and Mercers whatsoeuer especially those that follow the reformation of Religion might forbeare the sale of all such paltrie wares for the fault in selling such trash is no lesse than the abuse of them in playing at them for so much as they vpon greedinesse of so small againe put as it were a sword into a mad mans hand by ministring them the instruments not onely of their sports but also of those mischiefes that ensue the same there a man may heare curses as rife as words bannings swearings and blasphmies banded vp and down there men fret themselues to death and consume whole nights in darke and deuillish pastimes some lose their horses others their cloakes a third sort all that euer they are worth to the vndoing of their houses wiues and children and some againe from braulings fal to buffitings from buffets to bloodsheding from bloudsheading to hanging and these are the fruits of those gallant sports Discipu de tempâ—r ser 12. But this you shall see more plainly by a few particular examples In a Towne of Campania a certaine Iew playing at dice with a Christian lost a great summe of money vnto him with which great losse being enraged almost beside himselfe as commonly men in that case are affected he belched out most bitter curses against Christ Iesus his mother the blessed virgin in the midst whereof the Lord depriued him of his life and sence and stroke him dead in the place as for his companion the Christian indeed he escaped sodain death howbeit he was robbed of his wit and vnderstanding Blasphemy li. â— cap. 31. suruiued not very long after to teach vs not onely what a grieuous sinne it is to blaspheame God and to accompany such wretches and not to shun or at least reproue their outrage but also what monstrous effects proceed from such kind of vngodly sports how grieuously the Lord punisheth them first by giuing them ouer to blasphemie secondly to death and thirdly and lastly to eternall and irreuocable damnation let our English gamesters consider this example and if it will not terrifie them from their sports then let them look to this that followeth which if their hearts be not as hard as adamants will mollifie and persuade them In the yeere 1553 neare to Belissan a citie in Heluetia Ioh. Fincel Andreas Muscabus in diabol blasphemiae there were three prophane wretches that plaied at dice vpon the Lords day without the wals of the citie one of which called Vlrich Schraeterus hauing lost much mony and offended God with many cursed speeches at last presaging to him selfe good lucke he burst forth into these termes Mandat 4. Breach of Saboth lib. 1. cap. 35. Mandat 3. Blasphemy lib. 1. cap. 31. If fortune deceiue me now I will thrust my dagger into the very body of God as farre as I can now fortune failed him as before wherefore forthwith he drew his dagger and taking it by the point threw it against
betoke him to flight and hid himselfe in an outway amongst thornes and bushes which with great paine hauing past through being weary of his life he threw himselfe downe into a pit foure foot deep and when he could get none of his men to lay their hands vpon him he desperately and miserably slew himselfe Vitellius for the murders and other outragious misdeedes which he committed Sueton. was taken in his shirt drawn through the streetes with a halter about his necke and his handes bound behind him and the point of a dagger vnder his chin the people casting durt and dung vpon him in detestation and calling him make-bate and seditious villaine with other opprobrious reproches and at last being massacred with many blowes was drawne with a hooke into Tiber like a carrion Domitian was a cruell enemy of the Christians Sueton. hee reiected his owne wife to take a new and being couertly reprooued by Heluidius for the same in a play of the diuorce of Paris and Enon which he presented vnto him he put him to death for his labor many worthie Senators and chiefe men and such as had borne the office of the Consull without iust cause giuen of reprehension were murdered by him he spared not his owne bloud and neerest allies no nor his own brother Titus but what with poyson and sword destroied them all to confusion But in the end when hee saw that the world hated him for his outragious cruelties he consulted with the Astrologians and coniurers what death did wait for him one of the which amongst the rest told him that he should be slaine and that very shortly wherewithall being sore troubled hee first caused him that had prognosticated this euill vnto him to be slaine then hee compassed himselfe with a strong guard and to the end to see them that should come neare he made his gallerie wals where hee walked of such a kind of glistering and shining stone that he might see in them all about him both behind and before when the day and houre which was forecalculated for his death was come one of the conspiratours came in with his left arme in a scarfe as if hee had beene sore hurt feigning that he would bewray the whole treason which he so much feared and being entred his chamber presented him with a long discourse in writing touching the matter and manner of the conspiracie and when in reading the same hee saw him most astonished then he tooke occasion to strike him suddenly into the belly with his dagger his owne seruants making vp the murder when they saw him go about to resist and thus by all his wisdome and prouidence he could not rid himselfe from being surprised nor hinder the execution of Gods iust fore-appointed iudgement And these were the ends of those wicked Emperours who in regard of their vile liues were rather monsters then men and not only they whome we haue named but many moe also as Antonius Caracalla Heliogabalus and other like may be worthily placed in this ranke Tigellinus one of the captaines of Neros guard a chiefe procurer and setter forward of his tyrannie was the cause of the death of many great personages in Rome and being enriched by their spoile and other such like robberies after the death of Nero whome in his extremity he forsooke plunged himselfe and wallowed in all manner of licencious and disordinate delights now though he was worthy of a thousand deaths for his cruelties towards many good citizens yet by the meanes of one Iunius the Emperour Galba his chiefe minion whose fauour he had by great summes of mony bought and obtained for he gaue vnto his daughter at one time fiue and twenty thousand crownes and to himselfe at another a carknet worth fifteene thousand crownes for a present hee was spared and kept in safetie but as soone as Otho was installed in the Empire his downfall and destruction began presently to follow for Otho to the end to gratifie the Romans sent to apprehend him who was then in his houses of pleasure in the field banketting and sporting with his harlots and vsing all manner of riot albeit by reason of a deadly disease which was vpon him he was euen at deaths dore When he saw himselfe thus taken and that no meanes of escape was left no not by the vessels which he had prepared at the sea shore for purpose if need were to conueigh him away that hee which had commission to take him would giue him no aduantage of escaping though he offered him great rewards for the same he entreated only leisure to shaue his beard before he went which being granted he tooke a rasour and in stead of shauing cut his owne throat CHAP. XLIII More Examples of the same argument HIeronymus a true tyrant of Cicile Tit. Livius inured and fashioned to all pride and of most corrupt and rotten manners began right after the death of his father Hiero that left him a peaceable and quiet kingdom to shew foorth his arrogancie for hee quickely made himselfe fearefull to his subiects both by his stately and proud manner of speech as also by the hardnes of accesse vnto him togither with a kind of disdainfull contempt of all men but most of all did the inward pride of his heart appeare when he had gotten a guard about his body for then hee ceased not to bait bite and deuoure and to exercise all kind of cruelty against euery man and all kind of riot and excesse of filthinesse against himselfe so that hee became so odious and contemptible to his subiects that they conspired against him to depriue him both of his life and kingdome which conspiracie though it came to light yet for all that wanted not his due effect for after hee had through listening to false reports put to death vniustly his truest and dearest friends and those that would indeed haue helped him in his necessitie both with good aduise other succour he was surprised as he walked in a narrow and straight way and there cruelly murdered Now there was one Andronodorus his brother in law that aspiring to the crowne had corrupted his manners and thrust him forward to all these misdemeanours to the end by those practises he might make him odious to his people that by that meanes he might obtaine his owne purpose as indeed he did for after his death hee seazed vpon the scepter though with no long enioyance for through the troubles and commotions which were raised in the countrey by his meanes both hee his wife and whole race togither with the whole progenie of Hieronymus whether innocent or guiltie were all vtterly rooted out and defaced Andronicus was one of the most wickedst men that liued on the earth in his time for hee excelled in all kind of euill in ambition boldnesse in doing mischiefe cruelty whoredom adultery and incest also to make vp the whole number besides he was so treacherous and disloiall that he traiterously
returned aboue ten all the rest beeing either drowned or pined to death Francis Pizare a man of base parentage for in his youth he was but a hogheard and of worse qualities and education Benzoni for he knew not so much as the first elements of learning giuing himselfe to the West Indian warres grew to some credite in bearing office but withall shewed himselfe very disloiall trecherous and bloudy-minded in committing many odious and monstrous cruelties entering Peru with an army of souldiours to the end to conquer new lands and dominions and to glut his vnsatiable couetousnesse with a new surfet of riches after the true Spanish custome hee committed many bloudie and traiterous acts and exercised more than barbarous crueltie for first vnder pretence of friendship faining to parle with Artabaliba King of Cusco the poore king comming with fiue and twenty thousand of vnarmed men in ostentation of his greatnesse not in purpose to resist he welcommed him and his men so nimbly with swords and courtelaxes that they had all soone their throats cut by a most horrible slaughter the king himself was taken put in chains yea and the city after this massacre of men abroad felt soone the insolences of these braue warriors within in fine though Pizarre promised Artabaliba to saue his life in regard of a ransome amounting to more than two Millians of gold yet after the receit thereof hee traiterously caused him to bee hanged contrary to both his oth and all equitie and reason but this cruel perfidie of his weÌ„t not long without punishmeÌ„t for both he and all the rest that were any waies accessary or consenting to the death of this king came to a wretched end but especially his foure brethren Ferdinand Gonzall Iohn Martin of Alcantara and Diego of Almagro who as they were principall in the action so were they in the punishment the first that was punished was Iohn Pizarre who with many other Spaniards was surprised in the citie Cusco and slaine by the men of warre of Mangofrem and Artabaliba next after that there arose such a deuision and heartburning betwixt the Pyzarres and Almagro their partakers that after they had robbed and wasted and shared out the great and rich countrie of Peru they slew one another by mutuall strokes and albeit that there was by common consent an agreement accorded betwixt them for the preseruing of their vnity and friendship yet Francis Pizarre enuying that Almagro should be gouernour of Cusco he not interrupted all their agreâ—ments by starting from his promises and rekindled the halfe quenched fire of war by his own ambitioÌ„ for he presently defied Almagro sent his brother Ferdinand before to bid him battaile who so well behaued himselfe that he tooke Almagro prisoner and deliuered him bound to his brother Francis who caused him to bee strangled in prison secretly and after to be beheaded in publicke now Ferdinand being sent by his brother towards Spaine with a great masse of gold to cleare himselfe of the death of Almagro could not so well iustifie the fact as that all his treasure could saue him froÌ„ the prison what became of him afterwards knowne it is to God but not to the world A while after the fellows and friends of Almagro whose goods the Pizarrists had seazed vpon tooke counsell with Don Diego Almagro his sonne to reuenge the death of his father therefore being in number but twelue with vnsheathed swords they desperately burst into Francis Pizarres house then Marques and gouernor of Peru and at the first brunt slew a captaine that guarded the entrance of the hall and next him Martin of Alcantara with other moe that kept the entrance of the chamber so that hee fell dead euen at his brother the Marquesses feet who albeit his men were all slaine before his eies himselfe left alone amidst his enemies yet gaue not ouer to defend himselfe stoutly and manfully vntill all of them setting vpon him at once he was stabd into the throat so sel dead vpon the ground and thus finished he his coÌ„plices their wretched daies answerable to their cruell deserts but their murderers though they deserued to be thus delt withal yet for dealing in this sort without authority were not faultlesse but receiued the due wages of their furious madnes for Don Diego himself after he had ben a while gouernor of Peru had his army ouercome discoÌ„fited by the Emperors force was betraied into their haÌ„ds by his own lieutenant of Cusco where he thought to haue saued himself right soon lost his head with the greatest captains and fauourits that hee had who were also quartered Now of the fiue brethren wee haue heard foure of their destruction onely one remaineth namely Gonzalle Pyzare to bee spoken of who being sent for by the conquerors to be their chiefetaine and Protector against the Viceroy that went about to make them obserue the Emperours lawes and decrees touching the liberty of the Indian Nation was betraied and forsaken by the same men that sent for him and so fell into his enemies hands that cut off his head the Generall of his army a couetous and cruell man that in short space made away aboue three hundred Spaniards and all as it were with his owne hand was drawne vp and downe at a horse taile the space of halfe a quarter of an houre and then hanged vpon the gallowes and quartered in foure parts The Munke of Vauuard called Vincent who with his crosse porteise had encouraged Pizarre his army against Artabaliba and was for that cause treated bishop of Peru when Diego came to the gouernement fled into the Island Puna to escape his wrath but in seeking to auoid him hee fell into as great a snare for the Islanders assaulted him one night and knockt him to death with staues and clubs togither with fortie Spaniards of his fellowship that accompanied him in his flight and started not from him in his death And thus the good and holy Monke for medling with and setting forward the murder of so many poore people was for his paines and good deeds iustly rewarded by the Indians of that Island Moreouer after beside al these troubles seditions ciuill wars of Peru all they that returned from Spaine suffered shipwrack for the most part for their fleet had scarse attained the midst of their course wheÌ„ there arose so terrible a teÌ„pest that of 18 ships 13 so perished that they were neuer heard of after of the fiue which remained two were tuÌ„bled back to the coast of S. Dominick al berent shiuered in peeces other three were driuen to Spain wherof one hitting against the bay of Portugal lost many of hir meÌ„ the admiral hir selfe of this fleet perished neere vnto S. Lucar de barra meda with two hundred persons that were within her and but one onely of them all got safe into the hauen of Calix without dammage Here we may see how
strange thing to consider how that prowd citie hath lifted vp her head aboue all others and vsurped a tyranny ouer nations and which Lactantius Hierom Rome he meaneth and Augustine three learned fathers entituled Babylon how I say she hath been humbled for all her pride and empouerished for all her riches and made a prey vnto many nations It was sacked ransacked twice by the Visigothes takē once by the Herulians surprised by the Ostrogothes destroied and rooted vp by the Vandales annoied by the Lumbards pilled and spoiled by the Grecians and whipped and chastised by many others and now like Sodome and Gomorra it is to expect no more punishment but the last blow of the most mightiest his indignation to throw it headlong into euerlasting and horrible desolation CHAP. XLIX Of such punishments which are common to all men in regard of their iniquities THese and such like effects of Gods wrath ought to admonish instruct euery man to look vnto himselfe for doing euill and to abhorre and detest sin since it bringeth forth such soure and bitter fruits for albeit the waies of the wicked seeme in their owne eies faire and good Prou. 22. yet it is certaine that they are full of snares thorns to intrap and pricke them to the quicke for after that being fed with the licourous deceitfull sweetnesse of their owne lusts they haue sported themselues their fils in their pleasures wicked affections then insteed of delights and pastimes they shall find nothing but punishment sadnesse their laughter ioy pompe magnificence and glory shall bee turned into torments dolors weepings opprobries ignominies confusion and misery euerlasting for if God spared not great cities Empiers monarchies and kings in their obstinate misdeeds shall we thinke hee will spare little cities hamlets and villages men of base estate when by their sins they prouoke him to anger No it cannot be for God is alwaies of one the same nature alwaies like vnto himselfe A God executing iustice and iudgement vpon the earth Ierem. 9. Psal 5. A God that loueth not iniquitie with whom the wicked cannot dwell nor the fooles stand before his presence It is hee that hateth the workers of vnrighteousnesse and that destroieth the liers abhorreth all deceitfull disloiall periurous murdering persons as with him there is no acception of persons so none of what estate or condition soeuer be they rich or poor noble or ignoble gentle or carterlike can exempt themselues from his wrath and indignation when it is kindled but a little Rom. 2.9 if they delight and continue in their sinnes for as S. Paul saith Tribulation anguish is vpon the soule of euery man that doth euill Now according to the variety and diuersity of mens offences the Lord in his most iust and admirable iudgement vseth diuersity of punishments sometimes correcting them one by one in particular other whiles altogither in a heape sometimes by stormes and tempests both by sea and land other times by lightning haile and deluge of waters often by ouerflowing and breaking out of riuers and of the sea also and not seldome by remedilesse and sudden fires heauen earth and all the elements beeing armed with an inuincible force to take vengeance vpon such as are traitors and rebels against God sundry times he scourgeth the world as it well deserueth with his vsuall and accustomed plagues namely of warre and famine and pestilence which are euident signes of his anger according to the threats denounced in the law touching the same and therefore if at any time he defer the punishment of the wicked it is for no other end but to expect the fulnesse of their sinne and to make them more inexcusable when contrary to his bountifulnesse and long suffering which inuiteth and calleth them to repentance they harden themselues and grow more obstinate in their vices and rebellion drawing vpon their heads the whole heape of wrath the more grieuously to assaile them And thus the vengeance of God marcheth but a soft pace as saith Valerius Maximus to the end to double and aggrauate the punishment for the slacknesse thereof CHAP. L. That the greatest punishments are reserued and laid vp for the wicked in the world to come NOtwithstanding all which hath bene spoken and howsoeuer sinners are punished in this life yet is certaine that the greatest and terriblest punishments are kept in store for them in another world and albeit that during this transitory pilgrimage they seeme to themselues often times to liue at their ease and enioy their pleasures and pastimes to their hearts contentment yet doubtlesse it is so that they are indeed in a continuall prison and in a dungeon of darkenesse bound and chained with fetters of their owne sinne and very often turmoiled and butchered with their owne guiltie conscience ouercharged with the multitude of offences fore-feeling the approch of hell and in this case many languish away with care feare and terror being toiled and tired with vncessant and vnsupporrable disquietnesse and tossed and distracted with despaire vntill by death they be brought vnto their last irreuocable punishment which punishment is not to endure for a time and then to end but is eternall and euerlastingly inherent both in body and soule I say in the bodie after the resurrection of the dead and in soule after the departure out of this life till all eternity for it is iust and equall that they which haue offended and dishonored God in their bodies in this life should be punished also in their bodies in the world to come with endles torments of which torments when mention is made in the holy scripture they are for our weake capacity sake called gehenna or a place of torment vtter darkenesse and hell fire where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth c againe eternall fire a poole and pit of fire and brimstone which is prepared for the deuill and his darlings and how miserable their estate is that fall therein our Sauiour Christ giueth vs to know in the person of the rich glutton Luk. 16. who hauing bathed himselfe in the pleasures and delights of this world without once regarding or pittying the poore was after death cast into the torments of hell there burneth in quenchlesse flames without any ceasing or allaying of his griefes therefore whatsoeuer punishments the wicked suffer before they die they are not quitted by them from this other but must descend into the appointed place to receiue the surplus of their paiments which is due vnto them for what were it for a notorious and cruell tyrant that had committed many foule and wicked deeds or had most villanously murdered many good men to haue no other punishment but to be slaine and to endure in the houre of death some extraordinarie paine could such a punishment ballance with his so many and great offences whereas therefore many such wretches suffer punishment in this world wee must thinke