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england_n emperor_n king_n league_n 3,609 5 9.4892 5 false
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A35234 Historical remarques and observations of the ancient and present state of London and Westminster shewing the foundation, walls, gates, towers, bridges, churches, rivers ... : with an account of the most remarkable accidents as to wars, fires, plagues, and other occurrences which have happened therein for above nine hundred years past, till the year 1681 : illustrated with pictures of the most considerable matters curiously ingraven on copper plates, with the arms of the sixty six companies of London, and the time of their incorporating / by Richard Burton, author of The history of the wars of England. R. B., 1632?-1725? 1681 (1681) Wing C7329; ESTC R22568 140,180 238

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Charity is in the sigh● of God Several poor people plucked the ears of Corn while they were green in the common Fields meerly to keep themselves from starving at which the Owners being much offended desired the Priest of the Parish to curse and excommunicate them all the next Sunday but one in the Company adjured the Priest in the Name of God to exempt his Corn from the Sentence saying That it pleased him well that the Poor being pinched with Famine had taken his Corn and so commended what was left to the blessing of God The Priest being compelled by the importunity of the others had no sooner begun the Sentence but a sudden Tempest of Thunder Lightning Wind Hail and Rain interrupted him whereby all the Corn-fields thereabout were laid waste and destroyed as if they had been trodden under foot with Cart and Horses yea no kind of Fowl nor Beast would feed upon it But this honest tender-hearted man found all his Corn and Ground though mingled among theirs altogether untouched and without the least harm Awhile after the K calls another Parl. at London in order to the raising of more mony having tried before to borrow of the Londoners and found them to incline to the Lords To this Parliament the Lords come armed for their own defence and make Richard the Kings Brother Spokesman wherein they aggravate his breach of promise since neither were Strangers removed from about him but taken more into favour than before Nor was the former money disposed of according to appointment but the King made bold to make use of it at his own pleasure the Earl of Provence the Young Queens Father and Simon Montford a new Favourite and a French man born now made Earl of Leicester having a good share of the money collected they acquaint him also with all the rest of the disorders of the kingdom The King was so moved at this their Remonstrance that taking his Oath to refer the matter to divers grave men of the kingdom Articles were drawn sealed and publickly set up to the view of all And soon after the Earl of March solicites the King to make another journey into France whereupon he calls a Parliament at London and demands Aid which was not onely opposed but an account required of all the Taxations hitherto given with an absolute denial of any more Upon which the King comes to the Parliament in Person earnestly and indeed humbly craving their Aid for this once But all prevailed not for they had made a Vow to the contrary and the King is driven to get what he can of particular men of whom partly by Gift and partly by Loan he gets so much that he carries over with him thirty Barrels of Sterling money This Expedition had no better success than the former for after a whole years stay the King was forced to make a dishonourable Truce with the French and upon his return home he laid new Exactions on the Jews and the Londoners In the next Parliament at Westminster enquiry was made how much money the Pope had yearly out of England and it was found to be annually threescore thousand Marks which was more than the Revenue of the Crown which the King ordered an account to be taken of and sent it to the Council at Lyons This so vexed the Pope that he said It is time to make an end with the Emperour with whom he was then at variance that we may crush these petty Kings for the Dragon once appeased or destroyed these lesser Snakes will soon be trodden down Upon which it was absolutely ordained that the Pope should have no more money out of England But the King being of an irresolute and wavering nature and afraid of Threats soon gave over and the Pope continued his former Rapine The King had now abundance of Grandees come to see him from Foreign parts and having called a Parliament at London he is sharply taxed for his Expences and severely reprehended for his breach of promise having vowed and declared in his Charter never more to injure the State again also for his violent taking up Provisions of Wax Silk Robes and especially of Wine contrary to the will of the Seller and many other Grievances they complain of All which the King hears patiently in hope of obtaining Supplies which yet they would not give and thereupon the Parliament is prorogued till Midsummer following and the King growing more furious than before it was then dissolved in discontent But the Parliament not supplying him he is advised to supply his wants with sale of his Plate and Jewels of the Crown being told That though they were sold yet they would revert again to him And having with great loss received money for them he asked who had bought them Answer is made The City of London That City said he is an inexhaustible Gulph if Octavius Treasure were to besold they would surely buy it In his two and fortieth year another Parliament is held which by some was called Insanum Parliamentum the Mad Parliament because at this Parliament the Lords came with great Retinues of armed men and many things were enacted contrary to the Kings Prerogative And now to vex the City the King commands a Fair to be kept at Westminster forbidding under great penalties all exercise of Merchandize within London for fifteen days But this Novelty came to nothing for the inconvenience of the place as it was then and the foulness of the Weather brought more damage to the Traders than benefit At Christmas likewise he demands New-years-gifts of the Londoners and shortly after writes unto them his Letters imperiously commanding them to aid him with money and thereby gets twenty thousand pound of them for which the next year he craves pardon of them But notwithstanding his continual taking up of all Provisions for his house without money yet he lessens his House-keeping in no honourable manner Now seeing he could get nothing of the States assembled in Parliament he sends or writes to every Nobleman in particular declaring his Poverty and how he was bound by Charter in a debt of thirty thousand pound to those of Burdeaux and Gascoign who otherwise would not have suffered him to come back to England But failing of any relief from the Temporal Lords he addresseth his Letters to the Bishops of whom he finds as little relief yet by much importunity and his own presence he got an hundred pound of the Abbot of Ramsey but the Abbot of Burrough had the confidence to deny him though the King told him It was more charity to give money to him than to a Beggar that went from door to door The Abbot of St. Albans was yet more kind and gave him threescore Marks to such lowness did did the profuseness of this indigent King bring him But now the Lords assemble again at London and press him with his promise that the Lord Chief Justice Ch●ncellor and Treasurer should be appointed by the General Council of
Parliament called wherein Justice might be done and himself pardoned all Offences he would be ready to come to him on his knees and as an humble Subject to obey him Yet upon this Conference with the Earl some say the King required only that himself and eight more whom he would name might have honourable allowance with assurance of a private quiet Life and that then he would resign his Crown and that upon the Earls Oath that this should be performed the King agreed to go with the Earl to meet the Duke but after four miles riding coming to the place where they had laid an Ambush the King was seized and carried Prisoner to Flint Castle where the Duke of Lancaster came to him and bowing the knee thrice came toward him whom the King took by the hand and lifted up saying Dear Cousin you are welcome the Duke humbly thanking him said My Soveraign Lord and King the Cause of my coming at this present is your honour saved to have restitution of my Person my Lands and Heritage whereto the King answered Dear Cousin I am ready to accomplish your Will so that you enjoy all that is yours without exception After this coming out of the Castle the King called for Wine and then mounted on Horseback and by easie Journeys came to London and the next day he was committed to the Tower As the King was carried toward London divers Citizens conspired to lye in wait by the way and suddenly slay him partly for private Grievances and partly for the Severity he had used toward the whole City But the Maior having notice thereof prevented it and rid forth with a Considerable Company to conduct him safely to the Tower and soon after a Parliament was called by the Duke of Lancaster but in the name of King Richard where many heinous points of Misgovernment were laid to his Charge and were drawn up into three and thirty Articles the Cheif whereof were Th●t be had wastefully spent the Treasure of the Realm upon unworthy Persons whereby great Taxes were laid upon the People That he had borrowed great sums of Money and given his Letters Patents to repay the same and yet not one peny ever paid That he had taxed men at the pleasure of himself and his unhappy Council and had spent the money in folly and not in paying poor men for their victual and viand That he said the Laws of the Realm were in his Head and Breast by reason of which phantastical Opinion he destroyed Noblemen and Impoverished the Commons That he most Tyranously and unprincely said that the Lives and Goods of all his Subjects were in his hands and at his disposition That when divers Lords as well spiritual as Temporal were appointed by Parliament to Treat of matters concerning the good of the Kingdom while they are busie therein he and others of his Party went about to impeach them of Treason and that the King caused all the Rolls and Records to be kept from them contrary to his promise made in Parliament and to his open dishonour That he had private Spies in every place and if any discoursed of his Lascivious living or his Illegal Actings he presently apprehended them and grievously fined them That he changed Knights and Burgesses of Parliament at his Pleasure putting out divers Persons and placing others in their Room to serve his Will and Appetite That when divers Lords and Justices were sworn to speak the truth in many things which concerned the honour and profit of the Realm the King so threatned them that they durst not speak what was right That by force and threats he compelled the Judges of the Realm to condescend to him for destruction of divers of the Lords That he caused his Fathers own Brother the Duke of Glocester without Law to be Attached and sent to Callice and there without Cause to be secretly Murdered That contrary to the Great Charter of England he caused several lusty young men to Challenge divers old men upon matters determinable at Common Law in the Court Martial where Tryal is only by battel which old men fearing submitted themselves to his mercy whom he fined unreasonably at his pleasure That in all his Leagues with Forreign Princes his way of Writing was so subtill and dark that no other Prince nor his own Subjects could beleive or trust him That he craftily devised certain private Oaths contrary to Law causing several to swear the same to the utter undoing of many honest men That he assembled certain Lancashire and Cheshire-men to make War upon the Lords and suffered them to rob and spoil without prohibition That notwithstanding his pardon granted them he inforced divers of those who joined with the Lords to be again Intollerably fined to their utter undoing Upon these and some other Articles which were read it was demanded of the Nobility and the Commons what they judged both of the Truth and desert of these Articles who all agreed that the Crimes were Notorious and King Richard was worthy for the same to be deposed from all Princely Honour and Kingly Government The Duke of York who a little before had been Governour of the Realm for the King and directed him much thought it best that King Richard should both Voluntarily Resign and also be Solemnly deposed by consent of all the States of the Realm for Resignation only would be imputed to fear and deprivation to force and therefore this being concluded on there came Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury the Archbishop of York the Bishop of Hereford the Duke of Lancaster and several other Lords and Abbots to King Richard in the Tower of London When all were set in their places King Richard was brought forth apparelled in his Royal Robes the Crown on his head and the Scepter in his hand and was placed among them in a Chair of State Never was Prince so Gorgeous with less Glory and greater Grief to whom it was not disgrace sufficient to lose both the honour and Ornaments of a King but he must openly do even in great scorn renounce the one and deliver up the other After a little Pause and expectation the King rose from his Seat and spake to the Assembly these words or to this effect I assure my self that some at this present and many hereafter will account my Case lamentable either that I have deserved this Dejection if it be just or if it be wrongful that I could not avoid it Indeed I do confess that many times I have shewed my self both less Provident and less painful for the benefit of the Commonwealth than I should or might or intended to do hereafter and have in my Actions more respected the satisfying of my own particular humour than either Justice to some private persons or the Common Good of all yet I did not at any time omit duty or Commit Grievance upon natural dulness or set malice but partly by abuse of Corrupt Councellors partly by Error of my Youthful Judgment