Selected quad for the lemma: enemy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
enemy_n	advantage_n	force_n	great_a	1,015	5	2.7879	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29225	The captive-captain, or, The restrain'd cavalier drawn to his full bodie in these characters ... presented and acted to life in a suit of durance, an habit suiting best with his place of residence.	Brathwaite, Richard, 1588?-1673.	1665 (1665)	Wing B4258; ESTC R34274	72,749	197

MVSGRAVE GOVERNOUR OF CARLISLE A PERSON Whose LOYALTY to his SOVERAIGN CONSTANCY to his COVNTREY INTIMACY to his OWN INTEGRITY to ALL Have Rendered Him EMINENT in the Acception of his PRINCE DEAR in the Estimate of the STATE R. B. HIS most AFFECTIONATE KINSMAN and SERVANT PRESENTS the ADDRESS of these TWO COVNTREY-INTERESTS THE INTEREST OF WEST MERLAND THis County stands highly ingaged to her own Interest a People frugal and tenacious naturally inclined to Industry which may be an Argument of Her Frugality made good by that Italian Maxim That which we get with our own hands we ever forego with heavy hearts Hence it is that there is no way readier to ingratiate their Commonty than to claw them with an opinion of moderating their Charge or declining the face of hostility without cost They are infinitely sensible of the emptying of their own pail be they never so lightly milkt For the Publick it is a Star of such a Magnitude above them or distance from them that albeit they derive all their light from that Orbe yet so individually cemented are these to their own as they hold the Publick proficience or deficience smally concerns them A little Tax foments such distaste as it operates more violently upon the pulse of their spirit than a precipice of the whole State The Pesants and Plebeians we onely hint at for the Gentry are generally of that clear and candid nature and grounded on such loyal Principles as might be instanced in those sad-wasting times of our late distractions where it was observed that never any of Quality within the whole Barony was ever known to take up Arms against his Sacred Majesty or for their own security contract with an Associate County This County consists of two sorts and in these two dissorted into different opinions The Gentry and Commonty For Nobility some antient Structures she reteins as Monuments or Trophies of their owners quality but either by the irrevocable decree of fate or deplorable violation of their faith they are divided from their Countrey leaving onely those main and massy piles for Land-marks or aged reliques of their pristine Magnificence and Glory The Gent. here are generally well-bred though in times of distraction more apt to Command than to be obey'd There is nothing that begets more breaches in their Society nor discords in their harmony than that deluding bait of popularity Which puts me in mind of that State-axiom He cannot be justly regular that desires to be popular Self-opinion drawn from the propriety of their own worth or a reflexion to their Family or Birth become inducements many times to ambitious and elated spirits to quarrel with Authority For a supposed parity cannot brook priority This makes Propositions concluded in the Evening to lose their vigour and validity in the Morning While the distasted precedency of the person not the inequality of the proposition occasions this opposition This County holding such gradual distance from the Sun I mean the face of the Court has been in publick Assemblies where the protection of Counties was debated and with great deliberation carefully secured as an inconsiderable place dis-regardfully sleighted nothing in it worthy to be valued it was left to support it self or suffer The Sun shining then in a clear Zodiack would not dart one small beamling on her Yet it is admirable to observe how this obscure and deserted Angle in times of greatest distemper even then when men and all things so miserably jarring had seem'd to change their nature stood ever firm and immutable in her fidelity and resolute in contemning those assassinate braves and threats of a confining Enemy Besides never did County to her succeeding glory in testimony of her Piety open her bosom more freely to return hospitality to such as were pursued by the Enemy Being a Nook in comparison of other Shires yet One of the very last Counties that veil'd to their over-powerful Enemy and upon such Signal Conditions as that Foe to Fidelity could not glory much in the purchase of his Mercenary and ignominious victory And to give a further addition to their unquestion'd valour and renown it has been reported how at that time when that Handfull of Men being held a narrow and inconsiderate County spit defiance in the face of their Enemy making this their constant Impreze INTACTA EST WESTRIA VIRGO Which being without derogation to their Honour afterwards subdu'd or rather compounded with to lay down their Arms They changed into this VITIATA EST WESTRIA VIRGO Which unexpected but necessitated Overture wrought such distempers upon some of their Commanders as they could not endure to remain any longer in those polluted Nests wherein such Ravenous Fowls pretended an Interest Mean time those loyal-hearted Souldiers left behind though discomfited they were not discouraged for though the insulting Enemy was more in number They never durst incounter them without great advantage such was their valour It has been reported that even at such time as those late Malignants who bounded near her and by a daily recruit of their numerous Forces might probably perplex her when their powers increased and their Victories vain-gloriously dispersed yet the very Colonels and chief Commanders of their Enemies Faction seriously interceded their Association so formidable was the prowess of this small County to a populous Army a victorious Enemy Yet could neither Promises nor Menaces make a breach upon that impregnable Fortress of their Loyalty They disclaimed all concurrence with State-competitors when Crowns and Scepters lay at Stake they neither held it safe nor honourable to admit least acquiescence much less adherence to such fomenters of debate This enforced the Enemy to stand continually upon his Guard to his great disadvantage which though it injoyned this County to a constant charge yet it conduced highly to their safety and preservation of their honour Howbeit some scattered aspersions have lately spread themselves which at the first blush may seem to some prejudicate opinions detractive from the reputation of this County but upon more mature and serious discussion of every particular though my Person be a stranger to those Parts which may imply an impartial Pen I have heard it amply debated and unanimously concluded that no action was committed nor design omitted that might any way derogate from their Honour for by labouring to surprize an Enemy as was apparently proved they might at that time have made way for the Enemy to seize upon the Rendevouz for that County which would not have been so easily repriz'd being once possessed by reason of the Inhabitants within it and places adjacent to it whose affections were dangerously corrupted It was held by an excellent refined judgment for a gallant action if they could decline the fury of a powerful neighbouring Enemy without forein Protection which by their Commanders care hath been bravely performed crowning the issue of their actions with undaunted resolution The Souldiers who are designed to keep Garrison in these Parts are Men of

a great madness said our Soveraign King Iames a Prince whose constant addresses were beautified with Palms of Peace for the Master of a Team of Horses being furnish'd with some of a clearer sight to set a blind Horse before We have store of quick-sighted Men let such be deputed leaving these Ayry-Spirited Lapwings who leave their Nests before they 'r taught to fly Such flickering Birds by reason of their untimely flight have been ever held incapable of publick imployments Persons of prudent and composed tempers are the properest Engines for such Affairs and the discreetest Moderators betwixt Prince and Subject by rendring to the One what he by his Prerogative may justly demand and informing the other what he ought duely to perform In your Personal Execution of which Office you are to imitate the course of an expert and experient'st Pilot by avoiding such perilous Shelves as may probably indanger your Commissionary Passage These are briefly toucht in the Act it self by which you are to be directed and expresly taught to do nought either for Fear Favour or Hatred Being the very same which our best Ethnicks exactly observed in their Course of Justice commanding that nothing should be acted to the dishonour of their Proceedings either for Amity Enmity or Commodity Such an even and equal Scale poized the Conduct of their Actions And this they did without any future hope of a fruition of further glory than their Poetical fancy of those Elysian Fields and their imaginary Fame to Posterity the sole aims of their Eternity That small glimpse or beamling which they had received from the Light of Nature without any farther influence produc'd these rare effects which might justly beget a shame in those who more divinely illumined though they believe an Eternity and the End of their Creation Supreme Felicity fall incomparably short of those Naturalists in the Course of Judicature nay even of Civil Morality Store of Instances might be return'd you in this deserving no less your admiration than imitation Rake up the Records of former times wherein true Native Honesty flourished and Political Designs of the Teeming Birth whereof every Nation sadly laboureth appeared Strangers and you shall find sundry imitable Mirrors of this kind whose uprightness in the management of State-Affairs needed no other Annal nor Monument to Memorize them than the continued Fame of their unquestion'd deportment which begot to them a reverence and an unsought for advancement in the Common-Weal where they were seated As in the first place to insist upon every particular that may obstruct your Course in the Execution of your Office whereto you are designed you shall find one of those Ethnicks though a firm Professor and Preserver of Amity neglect the sollicitancy of his Friend in an action of Favour saying Dear is my Friend but dearer is my Reputation I may have many Friends though I lose thee but in losing God I can have no more there is but one God He is a treacherous Friend who makes his Friend a Foe to himself Neither were these less armed against the fury of Revenge Enmity though never so mortal could not decline them no more than Amity could over-byas them in the direct line and path of their proceedings One of them could say like a brave Commander of his own Affections I shall accompt it the lowest of my Scene to take Revenge of mine Enemy to my own disadvantage Neither do I intend to play so much the Fools part to ingage a Publick reproach for a Private revenge He does himself the greatest wrong who labours to right himself by doing his Enemy wrong In Publick Places where Offices of Justice are to be Administred and what is due to every one justly distributed not so much as the least thought of a bosom-injury is to be fomented much less discovered He deserves not the Place where he sits who sits only to take revenge of him whom he hates That discreet Sage well deserved to be called to the Dignity of one of the Ephori who knew by the attest of the whole Senat how to bear and digest injuries and in what manner to demean himself on the Seat of Iustice neither by eying his Friend with a countenance of Favour nor his Foe with an intentional displeasure Whence it was that in Athens were set up in their High Court of Judicature Astraeas Scale and Tidaeus Shield the one to ballance the justness of the Cause the other to support it For Experience our best Mistriss in the process of Humane Affairs may sufficiently inform us that though Justice bestow her strength and utmost endeavour the best Cause may suffer wanting a powerful Fortress to support her There is another Shelf too no less dangerous than either of the former and this is Commodity being such an universal Leprosie as we may worthily accompt him a rare Man that is advanc'd to a Place of Profit or Receipt of Custom and has got the faculty of holding his mercenary hand from taking This self-interest is a perillous Copes-mate apt to infect where it consorts Nay such an absolute Commandress over this Little World Man as it is held the Wheel that with its career turns the course of all his actions O how many have inconsiderately perished by the poysonous Pills of this familiar and bosom-nurs'd Impostor We shall little need to travel far for Instances of this kind our own Coast can furnish us with plentious store and in high Place and of eminent quality Persons excellently gifted who miserably depraved by that infectious malady of corrupt Gehezi suffer'd themselves to ingage their honour for shameful lucre nay to aggravate their folly how many have we known who continent enough in their own desires through an ambitious humour of maintaining their riotous followers in a deportment above their rank or quality have patiently endur'd to see themselves with open eyes palpably cousen'd and abused by those Officious Lerchers and Licentious Lechers to their irreparable dishonour without gain to themselves Now for this Office whereto you are deputed much cannot be expected because little will be offered yet as Petilarceny by our Law is punishable as well as Higher Felony though in a lower quality so there be sundry petty abuses which may usually occurr in the Execution of these Offices which by a superiour Power deserve due Censure And from what source may these Obliquities arise but from your easie connivence towards those Puny Clarks imployed under you These though they know little they can find out the way of exacting Fees where none are due No Discharge nor Acquittance must pass upon Receipt without advantage wherein though it redound to the Clarks Gain it may be properly call'd the Masters Crime Neither can I be less than jealous of the Officers themselves but that some of them through their indigence of spirit will not stick to become Master-Sharers in these imposed Exactions But this is contriv'd so covertly that they know how to wipe their Mouths