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A31743 Numerus infaustus a short view of the unfortunate reigns of William the Second, Henry the Second, Edward the Second, Richard the Second, Charles the Second, James the Second. Caesar, Charles, 1636-1707. 1689 (1689) Wing C203; ESTC R20386 35,156 134

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Destiny and by Imprudent Actions pernicious Counsels and an Arbitrary Assertion of his indisputable Prerogative to kindle those Flames of Mutiny and Discontent which never were extinguish'd but at the Expence of his own Blood and the Loss of his Crown Robert Vere Earl of Oxford and Marquiss of Dublin was his Darling and Michael de la Pool was his Favorite The first a Gentleman of commendable good Parts he created Duke of Ireland tho he himself was but Lord of it the other a man of mean extraction he made Earl of Suffolk and Chancellour of England both very obnoxious and not accomplish'd with such Merits as might advance them in Titles or Offices beyond the Ancient Nobility without Envy or Obloquy These Wicked Counsellors set a false Glass before the short sighted King and abused him with erroneous representations of his own sufficiency absolute Authority and uncontrollable Power Insomuch that in a Parliament then call'd the King began sharply to expostulate with the Lords and by an undecent Comparison with the Freedom of their Tenures to Challenge to himself an unquestionable liberty This haughty Carriage of the King exasperated the Parliament and fermented them to such a degree of dissatisfaction that instead of consenting to grant him a Subsidy toward his Wars they fell foul upon the New Chancellour and never gave him over till they obtain'd a severe Judgment against him to the Forfeitures of his Life and the Confiscation of his Estate The adverse Party were highly nettled at these proceedings and being push'd on by Revenge and Malice they combined in a horrid Design to Murther the Duke of Gloucester and such other Lords as cross'd the King in his extravagant Courses which Flagitious Plot was to be perpetrated upon an invitation of them to a Supper in London Sir Nicholas Brember the former Lord Mayor was a prime Instrument in this Enterprise but the King imparting this matter to Richard Exton the present Mayor and endeavouring to make him an Accomplice in the Action he would by no perswasions be induced to consent to so vile an Attempt and thereupon they desisted from the further prosecution of it Notwithstanding this and many other untoward passages a Subsidy was granted to the King under certain Limitations but the Parliament were so disgusted because the King had respited the Execution of the Judgment against the Chancellour that they positively declared unless the Chancellour were removed they would proceed no farther in a Parliamentary Course The King hereupon grew Cholerick and plainly told them he would rather apply himself to the French King for Assistance than submit to his Subjects Yet upon good Reasons offer'd by the Lords a great change was made in the Ministers of State and particularly the Chancellour was removed and so desirous were the Lords and Commons to have the Duke of Ireland excluded from the Kings Presence that they were content he should receive thirty Thousand Marks on condition he would transport himself into Ireland But no sooner was the Parliament dissolved but the King recanted all his condecensions revoked all Orders against the Chancellour the Duke of Ireland and the rest and received then into higher Favour than they were in before And tho' the Earls of Arundel and Nottingham performed a Noble exploit hardly to be parallel'd in History yet their Service was disregarded and their persons slighted because the Duke of Ireland gave them no countenance By whose contrivance a New Plot was laid to destroy the Duke of Gloucester and the easie King surrounded with Parasites and corrupt Judges suffer'd them to pursue their extravagant practices and Two Thousand Persons were at once indicted before Sir Robert Tresilian the Chief Justice He then propounded certain Queries to Robert Belknap Lord Chief Justice and other Judges which they soon resolved in defiance of the Law and the priviledges of Parliament And notwithstanding he stood in such ill Terms with his people yet a way was found to pack Juries in London and Indictments were found of many Crimes against some of the Lords Whom having a design to persecute he summon'd the Judges Justices and Sheriffs of the Kingdom that he might be informed what power of Men they could assure him of to serve him against the Lords And intending shortly to call a Parliament he tamper'd with them to have no Knight or Burgess chosen but such as the King and his Council should Name But finding by the Answer of the Sheriffs that they could not raise any Forces upon such a pretence nor infringe the Ancient Liberty in Elections to Parliament the King and the Duke of Ireland sent into all parts to raise men in this Quarrel against the Lords consulting on some Devices how to intrap them The Duke of Gloucester being advertised of this had a secret Conference with the rest and assembling a numerous Body of Men stood upon their Guard and sent Commissioners to the King requiring such Traytors and Seducers as were about his Person to be delivered up to them The King was advised by the Duke of Ireland the Earl of Suffolk and others about him to offer Calice to the French King to procure his Assistance against the Lords and with all sent to the Mayor of London requiring to make an estimate of how many able men might be rais'd in the City who making Tryal of what could be done on such occasion received this Answer from the People that they would never fight against the Kings Friends and Defenders of the Realm In the mean time the Earl of Northumberland interposed with his advice and perswaded the King to send for the Lords under safe Conduct and friendly to expostulate with them to which the Lords consented upon Oath given by the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and the Lord Chancellour that no Fraud or evil practice should be used against them But being ready to come according to appointment they received intimation of an Ambush laid to intrap them and so desisted If the King was privy to this Plot he was guilty of an Action most unworthy of a Prince But the Conspirators were certainly known yet not call'd to Account for it After this upon a more secure Conduct from the King the Lords presented themselves before him and after some cholerick contest a Reconciliation was made and it was concluded that all matters should be heard and regulated in a Parliament speedily to be call'd Hereupon the Favorite-Lords were highly dissatisfy'd and plainly told the King they would not hazard their appearance at such a meeting and so the Duke of Ireland and the rest of that Faction withdrew from Court and absconded But the King not able to brook their absence ordered an Army to be rais'd for the safeguard of the Duke of Ireland and to reconduct him to his Presence who being encounter'd on the way by the Earl of Derby he fled and escaped by leaping into a River but after two or three years dy'd miserably in a foreign Country And now the Lords
Norman Followers he promised a restitution of their Ancient Laws and an indulgence to some Priviledges which were much valued by the people of those times but with the necessity the obligation ceased and he became a Bankrupt of his Word and Promise As little did he regard his Promises to God his Creator for being dangerously sick at Gloucester and despairing of Recovery he made a Solemn Vow that if he were restored to his Health he would lead a New Life and give over all his disorderly Courses but the restoration of his strength was accompanied with the return of his former vicious inclinations and he became ten times more the child of wrath than he was before He is reported to be very lascivious and incontinent but in regard he did not defraud his own Wife having never been married and was not observed to debauch the Wives of other Men he only passeth for a simple Fornicator and even in that not at all curious not entertaining a select Concubine but promiscuously trucking with any Woman that came in his way To shew how conscientious he was in matters of Religion take the words of Sir Richard Baker in his Chronicle of England p. 35. He appointed a Disputation to be held between Christians and Jews and before the day came the Jews brought the King a present to the end they might have an indifferent hearing the King took the present encouraging them to quit themselves like Men And swore by St. Lukes face his usual Oath that if they prevailed by Disputation he would himself turn Jew and be of their Religion A young Jew on a time was converted to the Christian Faith whose Father being much troubled at it presented the King sixty Mark intreating him to make his Son to return to his Judaism whereupon the King sent for his Son commanding him without more ado to return to the Religion of his Nation But the young Man answered he wondred his Majesty would use such Words for being a Christian he should rather perswade him to Christianity With which Answer the King was so confounded that he commanded the young Man to get him out of his sight But his Father finding the King could do no good upon his Son required his Mony again Nay saith the King I have taken pains enough for it and yet that thou mayst see how kindly I will deal you shall have one half and the other half you cannot in Conscience deny me In one Act he shew'd himself a Tyrant and an Atheist for fifty Gentlemen being accused for Hunting and killing the Kings Deer he caused them to be condemned to the Trial by Fire which they escaping untouch'd by the miraculous Providence of God and he thereby defeated of his greedy expectation by the Confiscation of their Estates fell into an outragious Passion and cry'd out How happens this is God a just Judg in suffering it Now a Murrain take him that believes it But vengeance from Heaven soon overtook him that did not believe it for the King though warned by Dreams and other uncommon Presages of some approaching Disaster appointed a Hunting in the new Forest upon the second of August When the day came he began to be perplexed with the remembrance of those ominous Bodings and stay'd within till Noon But having at Dinner driven away all care and fear by drinking himself into hardiness and security he mounled his Horse and eagerly folowed the Chase shortly after Sir Walter Tyrrel a Knight of Normandy to whom the King at their going out had given two Arrows very strong and sharp telling him That he knew how to shoot to purpose having a very fat Buck in view and at a convenient distance to be struck let fly an Arrow which glancing on a Tree or else grazing on the Back of the Deer reach'd the King hit him in the Breast and he immediately dropt down dead Thus fell Nimrod the mighty Norman Hunter destroy'd by that very sport in which he took such excessive delight violently brought to death on that occasion by which he had deliberately design'd the destruction of many others and in that very place where his Father had depopulated so many Town and ruined so many Religious Houses for the accommodation of wild Beasts and to gratifie his own inordinate pleasures THE LIFE and REIGN OF HENRY the Second THO' the Accession of Henry the Son of Geoffrey Plantagenet Duke of Anjou to the Crown of England be not branded with the unsavory Terms of Intrusion or Usurpation yet whosoever will impartially revolve the Chronicles of those Times may modestly conclude that he jumpt into the Throne over the back of his Mother Maud commonly styled the Empress was the only Daughter and Heir of Henry the first and tho she was an Empress and afterward a Dutchess yet she could never arrive at the Station of a Queen Stephen usurp'd the Crown and kept it from her and Henry her Son confirm'd the Disseisin by compounding for his own Succession without any regard to his Mothers Title Whether she was lockt up in an unknown Prison or estranged by Banishment or secretly made away it were a great Presumption in me to assert since the Writers and Historians of those days make no positive Determination in the matter But that she was civilly dead that no Notice was taken of her Right and Legal Claim to the Government after she had so unsuccessfully contended with King Stephen nothing can be more manifest Henry her Son was a young active and Valiant Prince very potent endow'd with great possessions and in expectation of greater Additions He was in his own Right Duke of Anjou in Right of his Wife Duke of Guyen and Earl of Poietou and in Right of his Mother Duke of Normandy and presumptive Heir to the Kingdom of England This greatness of Estate added to the Greatness of his Spirit and buoy'd up by the Hopes of a far greater augmentation of his Fortunes push'd him on to set up for himself in a competition for the Crown of England to the Achievement of which many accidents concurring as the untimely Death of Eustace the Son of King Stophen the melancholick despair of his Mother the Empress upon her improsperous contest with Stephen and the Loss of her Brother and other her fast Friends he came to a composition with King Stephen and a perfect Reconciliation was made between them choosing rather to succeed him by Adoption than to wait the natural Descent of his Inheritance by the Death of his Mother Whether a Prophetick foresight of the short Period prescribed to the Reign of King Stephen or a secret design to catch some opportunity to accelerate His own Investiture prompted Him on to this Accommodation lies only within the compass of conjecture but so it fell out that his Possession by Survivership was not long Prorogued the Agreement being made in January by mutual consent and consummated in October following by the Death of King Stephen Henry the Second being
who unanimously press the King to apply a Remedy to their Greivances in the Rere of which they urge the Banishment of Gaveston The King seing no safety in expostulation consents to their Demands and the several Articles like those of the Council of Trent are injoyn'd under an Anathema and pain of Excommunication Hereupon Gaveston was sent into Ireland but as the Chief Goovernour not as an Exile where after he ●ad stay'd a while and acted things much conducing to his Reputation King Edward not able to endure his absence or indeed to live without him remanded him home and married him to the Sister of the Earl of Glocester but Gaveston was incorrigible his Power exceeded all Limits and his expences all possibility of supply the Kings Revenue was wasted the Queens maintenance retrenched and all diverted to the accommodating the Luxury of the Favorite The Lords began to ferment in a new Discontentment and repairing to the King positively told him if he did not immediately remove Gaveston out of the Court and Kingdom they would rise in Arms against him as a perjur'd King. But he after he had strugled a while between Love and Fear condescended to his pertual Banishment making his return a capital Offence and so to be proceeded against if ever found in the Kingdom Gaveston once more is dispatcht out of England and goes to France where finding no safe Abode he past into Flanders and there meeting with no secure shelter he secretly returns to England relying on the immovable Favor of the King and the interest of the Duke of Gloucester The bewitched King received him with transports of joy and slipping out of the sight of the Lords and all other Observers betook himself to York carrying his beloved Minion with him The Lords hearing of it make after him and choosing the great and potent Earl of Lancaster for their General sent a Message to the King to deliver Gaveston into their Hands or at least to send him peremptorily out of the Kingdom But being abused by evil Counsel and disregarding the Message from the Lords he marcht from place to place seeking a sure refuge for his dear Favourite refusing to stay with the Queen who with tears beg'd his company and lodg'd him in Scarborough-Castle which being furiously assaulted by the Confederate Lords Gaveston thought it best to render himself desiring only the favour to be allow'd once to see the King's face and the King reciprocally ask'd the same Gaveston was sent under a Convoy toward Wallingford but being intercepted by the way and forced from his Guard by the Earl of Warwick after long deliberation his Head was struck off at a place call'd Blacklow In the mean time the King of Scots taking notice in how unready a posture Affaires were in England how the King remitted all case of the Government to Gaveston and that he gave himself up to Luxury and Licentiousness in a short time and with little or no opposition reduced almost all Scotland to his obedience and encouraged by that success He entred England burnt and took several Towns and being encounter'd with a splendid Army raised by King Edward more resembling a Court than a Camp and consisting of a hundred thousand men he with an Army hardly amounting to thirty thousand utterly overthrew and defeated them This misfortune was follow'd by the loss of almost all Ireland and the treacherous Rendition of Berwick which yet King Edward was in a fair way to recover had not the Earl of Lancaster discover'd his immoderate kindness to Hugh Spencer the younger whom he had substituted and embraced in the room of Gaveston and thereupon withdrew his forces from his assistance These Crosses were accompanied with the loss of Northumberland whereof all the Towns were taken or burnt by the Scots and an incredible number of Prisoners and Cattel carried into Scotland King Edward in vain attempting to seek a Reprizal and at last forced to pass over all hopes of satisfaction by the conclusion of a Truce The unhappy King postponing the affections of his Subjects to the fond love of a Darling advanced Hugh Spencer to the highest pitch of Honour and Favour committed all Affairs to his sole Administration he in perfect imitation of his Predecessor servilely complying with the Kings Humours and arrogantly insulting over the Lords They to remove this insupportable Nusance continue in Arms confederate together and send a peremptory Message to the King requiring the confirmation and execution of the Articles formerly granted otherwise threatning to constrain him by force of Arms and accordingly assembled a mighty body about Dunstable where the King then lay but by the interposition of the Prelates an Accommodation was made and all things agreed to their mutual satisfaction Soon after a Parliament was call'd wherein the King complain'd that the Lords had taken up Arms had murthered Pierce Gaveston and done him many other Affronts they on the other side justifie their Proceedings as not undertaken against but for the Preservation of his Person and the punishment of the publick Enemies of the Kingdom but the Queen with the Prelates and the Duke of Gloucester found an Expedient to qualifie these heats the Lords became humble Suitors to the King for his Grace and Pardon and he receives them kindly as dutiful and loyal Subjects But this Reconcilement not being founded in sincerity was but of a short duration The two Spencers Father and Son became intolerable in their Covetousness Oppression and Arbitrary disposal of all Affairs wherefore the Earl of Lancaster with divers other Lords entred into a new Confederacy binding themselves by Oath to live and die together in the maintenance of the Rights of the Kingdom and to procure the expulsion of the two Spencers In pursuance hereof they gather a great Army march to London and insist stoutly on their former demands to which once more the King is induced to condescend by the mediation of the Queen and the Prelates and by publick Proclamation the Spencers are banished but in a short time after the Edict was revoked they recall'd and restored to their former place and authority The wind ●●gan now to change and by a strange caprichio of fortune the King got the Ascendent over the mutinous Lords conquered them in Battel slew many of them in the Field and put many to death by the Sword of Justice but so soon as the heat of Revenge was a little qualify'd repented of his proceeding Hitherto the miserable King received only slight wounds in the extreme parts of his Body now he received a stab at the Heart The Queen enraged to see her Husbands love diverted upon upstart Favorites and disdaining to be a Pensioner to their pleasure found a plausible Excuse to repair into France where to be revenged on her Husband for his neglect of her she continued in too scandalous a familiarity with the Lord Mortimer The King being advertised of it commanded her to return and she delaying to come he