unsettledness of the Times or of mens Minds rather whilst some were led by Conscience others by their Temporal Concerns some out of Love to Reformation and others out of fear of Superstition some again out of desire of Change but most out of dread of Forreign Servitude that the Conclusion of this Match gave beginning to a desperate Rebellion which though at first it seem'd despicable enough being headed by no better a man then Sir Thomas Wyat a private Knight of Kent the Duke of Suffolk who was in the Conspiracy being apprehended almost as soon as he appear'd yet before it could be supprest the wise Match-makers found they had met with their Match in that Rebel who was so fortunate as to rout the Queens General and take all their Ordnance and Ammunition Upon which he march'd up with full Assurance of taking the chief City into which though he brought but sive Ensigns 't is probable he might have carried it had not Heaven taken part against him as usually it doth against Rebels first arming them with Impudence and then disarming them with Fear making the Arch-Traytor a terrible Example of unparallel'd Insolence who whiles he was at large continued bold as a Lion but being once apprehended prov'd so base a Coward that brib'd with the hopes of Life he made himself guilty of a greater Treachery then he was to dye for accusing Edward Earl of Devon and the Princess Elizabeth the Queens Sister to have been privy to his Conspiracy which gain'd Credit not so much from the Suspect of any private Affection betwixt them two although he alleadged they were to be married as from the secret disaffection either of them had he to the King that should be as being his Rival she to the Queen that was as being her Disseisor the two Sisters as little agreeing in point of Right of Succession as their two Mothers in point of Right of Marriage but fain he would have acquitted them when he found he could not be acquitted himself by it for having serv'd their turn of him the Statesmen gave the fatal turn to him However the malitious Chancellor Gardner resolving to take the Truth at the wrong end and believe it as he pleas'd secur'd them in several Prisons till he were at leisure to examine the matter being then deeply ingaged in providing Fire and Faggots for those Learned Hereticks Cranmer Ridley and Latimer c. who were to make a Holocaust preparatory to the Queens Nuptials which having been defer'd by this unexpected Rising was now propos'd in Parliament For the greater confirmation the three States of the Kingdom assenting thereto upon the Conditions following First That King Philip should admit no Stranger into any Office but only Natives Secondly That he should Innovate nothing in the Laws and Customes of the Realm Thirdly That he should not carry the Queen out of the Realm without her consent nor any of her Children without consent of the Councel Fourthly That surviving the Queen he should challenge no Right in the Kingdom but suffer it to descend to the next Heir Fifthly That he should carry away none of the Crown Jewels nor remove any Shipping or Ordnance Sixthly and lastly That he should neither directly nor indirectly intangle the Realm of England with the Wars betwixt Spain and France Upon which Terms 't was hop'd by those affected not the Match that Philip would knock off there being neither Youth or Beauty to tempt him But as the House of Austria did ever prefer their Ambition before their Love so designing the universal Monarchy he thought he made a great step to it by being put in possession of England and so near intituled to France And now the most Catholick King being joyn'd with the Faith defending Queen it cannot be imagin'd but that they must begin with Religion In order to the Regulation whereof Cardinal Pool being first restored again in blood and reputation was sent for over who arm'd with his Legatine Power and a natural Force of Eloquence press'd hard upon the Parliament and shewed them the danger they were in by their late Schism being become as he said Exiles from Heaven and in no capacity to have been ever readmitted had he not brought from Rome the Keys that opened the gates of Life and thereupon he advised them to abrogate those Laws which lay as blocks in their way urging them thereto from the Example of their good King and Queen who he said had resigned their Title of Supream Head to shew themselves true Members of the Mystical Body and had made Restitution of those Lands which had been sacrilegiously taken from the Church by their Predecessor Which Speech of his being very Methodically digested and delivered with great gravity startled many of the Lords who reflected upon their Fore-fathers Devotion to the holy See but those of the lower House having it seems lower thoughts and deeming it a rare Felicity to have shaken off that heavy Yoke that had so long gall'd their Fore-fathers necks did not so readily assent to receive his profer'd Fenediction at so dear a rate as to part with their Lands which having been divided by the Queens father amongst them were by several Settlements and Alienations so translated from one Family to another that without great Inconvenience they could not be sever'd from their Temporal Proprieties However they so far complyed as to agree That the first Fruits and Tenths granted by the Clergy to King Henry Anno 1534 should be remitted But after they came to consider the Poverty of the Treasure the reason of the several Pensions that had been granted in Lieu thereof by the said King to divers Religious Persons that were still living they revok'd their Decree again Upon which the Legate not skilful enough to deal with a Multitude as appear'd afterward by his loosing the papal dignity desisted content it seems with the honour of having prevail'd over the more devout Queen the heat of whose Zeal had so softned her heart that it was fit for any Impression Now as he had a better Faculty in Canvassing of the Feminine Sex which Cardinal Carraffa afterward Pope Paul IV upbraided him withal in the open Conclave so he prevail'd with her to give up all that she had in her own possession who to move others to imitate her piety did it with that detestation of the Sacriledg of her Predecessors that when one of her wise Counsellors yet of the same Religion told her it would be a great Diminution to the Revenues of her Crown she answered piously and as she thought prudently that she had another Crown to look after that she valued a thousand times more then that But while she is thus careful for the eternal King Philip her Husband was no less busie to secure his Temporal Crown In order to which he went over to receive the Blessing of the Emperour his Father then in Flanders who upon his Arrival delivered up to him the possession of the Low
as it serv'd the King of France his turn to serve him he entertain'd him in that Court adversity knows no other Friends nor upon other Terms But King Henry by his mony quickly took him off and Heaven to requite the good turn not long after took off him for whom all this was done punishing his unjust detaining the livelihood of his innocent Nephew William with taking away the life of his own innocent Son William the only hope of his Family who being shipwrackt in his return out of Normandy with a hundred and fifty Passengers more amongst whom was his beloved Sister the Countess of Perch indeavouring to save her lost himself This Clap of Judgment coming in a Calm of glory when all the busling of his Ambition seem'd to be pass'd over so overwhelm'd the Joys of his past successes that as if his Conscience had shrunk at the horror of seeing his oppression and supplantation so repaid with the extinction of that for which he drew all this guilt upon himself 't is said that from that time he never was seen to laugh more and however he strugled with Destiny for more Issue Male marrying not long after a most vertuous and beautiful young Lady yet all was in vain The invenom'd Arrow stuck still in his Liver and for want of other Heirs he was forced to fasten the succession on his Daughter Maud who being intangled in his fate and as apparently Planet-struck as himself could never attain to be a Queen however a Dutchess and an Empress being disappointed by one that had less right and not so good pretence as her own Father And as the main Line of Normandy fail'd in him that was but the third Inheritor so the succession ever since proved so brittle that it never held to the third Heir in a right descent without being put by or receiving some alteration by usurpation or extinction of the Male blood which saith mine Author may teach Princes to let men alone with their Rights and God with his Providence But such is the unhappiness of Kings that they either understand not Destiny so well as private Men or cannot so readily submit to it and as Ambition is a restless passion which however it may be sometimes weary never tires so it urges them to be still pressing upon Fortune with hopes to compel or corrupt her hoping that if she will not be serviceable to them she may at least not oppose them He found that this rent at home had crack'd all the chain of his courses in France whose King took part with his Nephew William whilst his two great Friends Foulk Earl of Anjou and Robert Earl of Mellent declared against him Yet urg'd by his natural diligence or desire of Rule he could not but still push on till by the death of that unfortunate youth before mention'd all the hopes of his Brother Robert perished and came to be entirely his yet neither then could he take any Rest though he had no body to give him any disquiet his Conscience keeping him waking with continual Alarums without any kind of sleep but what was so disturbed and disorderly as declar'd to the whole World all was not well within Often did he rise out of his Bed in the Night and catching up his Sword put himself into a Posture of Defence as against some Personal assault and sometimes in company he would catch hold of his Servants hands as apprehending they were about to draw upon him Thus was he dog'd with continued fears and those such as perhaps were Prophetical of what follow'd that some body should start up as immediately after there did who taking Example from himself should Spurn his ashes and usurp as much upon his Innocent Daughter and her Son as he himself had done upon his innocent Brother and his Son The Breach at which she first entred was made by King Stephen himself who foreseeing the approaching mischief drew on the evil he would avoid by the same way he thought to prevent it for suspecting the Castles he had permitted to be new built with purpose to have broken the force of any over-running Invasion might now as well become receptacles to the adverse Party he commanded them to be deliver'd up into his hands for securing the publick Peace This begat a general murmure that a dispute among the proprietors whereof those of most note being Clergy-men and Lords of great power and stomach presuming upon the Obligation he had to the Church which as they said advanced him to the Crown without any military help refus'd so give up their Keys into the hands of Laymen upon whom as they thought he had not the like tie of honour nor honesty as upon themselves Hereupon the Legate interpos'd who holding himself nearer allied to his Brother Prelates than to his Brother King urg'd the question of priviledg so far that 't was thought there wanted nothing but an opportunity to shew they could more willingly quit their Allegiance as they had done their Liberty than their possessions for King Stephen upon their refusal to obey his Order clapt up several of them in prison This opportunity Maud by her arrival rather gave than took when she made up the Crie and joyn'd her claim with theirs and thereby made the War to be felt before it was perceiv'd which spread it self like a burning Feaver through all the veins of the body politick but raged by Fits only it so happening that they were not seldom parted by the said new built Castles they contested for many of which standing neuter give stops to their Fury as if intended by Providence to allay their heat till it were temperate enough to admit of some Parley but that proving ineffectual like Game-cocks aftertaking breath they fell to it afresh with equal force and equal confidence the whole Nation being divided betwixt them according to their several interest for affections some taking part with her others with him these to discharge their Consciences those their honour some to advance their fortunes others to secure their advancements King Stephen gave every where proof of his courage she of her wisdom both of their diligence either perhaps worthy a greater Empire than they contended for but whilst the Body politick thus miserably tormented with the convulsions of Might and Right languish'd under the growing distemper behold a sudden change which seem'd the more mortal for that the grief seiz'd upon the head The King is taken prisoner with whose liberty one would have thought all the hopes of that side had been lost but it so hapned that the Feminine Victor found herself ingag'd in a more equal Contest with one of her own Sex and as of the same spirit so of the same name King Stephen's Wife takes up the Sword whilst her husband continues a prisoner who not looking that Fortune should fall into her lap was so industrious to catch it and heading her husbands Forces she brought the Title to a second trial with so
dispend a thousand Marks a day which I have the rather noted to shew how the Kingdom flourish'd as well as the King gaining as all wise States do by their layings out for the whole Revenues of the Crown in his Grand-fathers days were esteem'd to be not much above a hundred thousand Marks a year Five years the French King continued Prisoner here in England time enough to have determin'd the Fortune of that great Kingdom and dissolv'd their Canton'd Government into parts had it not been a Body consisting of so many strong Limbs and so abounding with Spirits that it never fainted notwithstanding all its loss of Blood but scorn'd to yield though King Edward came very near their heart having wounded them in the most mortal part their Head The Scotch King could not recover his Liberty in double the time being the less able to redeem himself for that he was upon the matter but half a King the other half being in the possession of Baliol who to secure a Moyety to himself surrendred the whole to King Edward whose Magnificence vying with his Justice he gave it back again upon Terms more befitting a Brother then a Conqueror shewing therein a Wantonness that no King perhaps besides himself would have been guilty of nor probably he neither had either his People been less bountiful to him or Fortune less constant which to say truth never forsook him till he like his Father forsook himself leaving all Action and bidding adieu to the World ten years before he went out of it declining so fast from the fortieth year of his Government that it may rather be said his famous Son Prince Edward commonly call'd the Black Prince reign'd then he and happy 't was for him that when his own Understanding fail'd him he had so good a Supporter who having it in his power to dispose of Kingdoms whilst he liv'd ought not to be denyed after he dyed the honour of being esteem'd equal to Kings in the Prerogative of a distinct Character Begin we then the Date of his Government from the Battel of Crassy which happening in the Sixteenth year of his Age makes the Computation of his Glory to commence near about the same time his Fathers did who however he was King at fourteen rul'd not till after Mortimer's death by which Battel he so topt the Fortune of France as his Father had that of England that he may be said to have taken thereby Livery in order to the Seisin of that Kingdom And after the Recovery of Calais it may be said the Keys of the Kingdom rather then of that Town were deliver'd into his hand for that he therewith open'd all the Gates of almost every Town he came to till the King of France incompassed him like a Lion in a Toil with no less then 60000 of the best Men of France and brought him to that streight that it seem'd alike disadvantageous to sight or yield and which made the danger more considerable as things then stood England it self was in some hazard of being lost with him here he seem'd to have been as well accomptable to his Country as to his Father for his Courage and Discretion and how well he acquitted himself appears by the Sequel when forcing Hope out of Despair like fire out of a Flint he necessitated his Men to try for Conquest by shewing them how impossible 't was for him to yield and by that incomparable Obstinacy of his made Fortune so enamour'd of his Courage that she follow'd him wherever he went while his Sword made its way to Victory and his Courtesie to the Affections of the Conquer'd whom he treated with that regard and generosity that many of them were gainers by the loss being dismiss'd with honourable Presents that made his second Conquest over them greater then the first the King of France himself being so well pleas'd with his Bondage that he return'd voluntarily into England after he was redeem'd to meet two Kings more that might be Witness of his Respect and Gratitude In short he was as King of England on the other side the Water as his Father was on this side keeping so splendid a Court in Acquitaine that no less then three Kings came to visit him too all at once these were the King of Majorque Navar and Castile the last of which craving Aid of him against an Usurper who was back'd by an Army consisting of no less then One hundred thousand men if the Writers of those times say true was re-instated accordingly by his single power to shew the World that he could as well make Kings as unmake them His second Brother who had the Title of King by marrying with the King of Castile's Daughter and Heir being principally indebted to him for the honour of that Title and it prov'd a fatal Debt both to him and his Son Richard the Second costing the one his Life the other both Life and Kingdom too for as himself never recover'd the health he lost in undertaking that Expedition so his Son never recover'd the disadvantage put upon him afterward by his Uncle Lancaster who by that means having got the Regency of his drooping Father King Edward who tyred with Action rather then Age fatally submitted to the loss of more years of his Government then he got by his unnatural Anticipation from his own Father and suffer'd himself to be buried alive as we may say under his Cradle put fair for setting his Nephew aside but wanting a Colour for so apparent an Injustice his jealous Father the Black Prince having declar'd him his Successor in his life time to prevent all tricks he thought it enough to make way for his Son to do it and accordingly put such an impression of dislike upon the innocent Youth at his very first Edition as prov'd Indelible in his riper years for the very same day he was presented to take his Grandfathers Seat in Parliament as Heir apparent to the Crown being then but eleven years old he taught him to demand a Subsidy purposely to turn the Peoples blood who were then big with their Complaint of Taxes But possibly he is made more splenetick as well as more politick then he was for it was scarce possible to make the Youth more odious then he had made himself before by disgusting those two potent Factions of the Church and the City of London who to shew how weary they were of his governing the old Child his Father would not after his Death let him longer Rule the young Child his Nephew but purposely depos'd him to the end as they said that he might not depose the other Thus this great King ended as ingloriously as he began who having stept into the Throne a little before he should 't is the less wonder he left it a little before it was expected he would especially if we consider that in out-living the best Wife and the best Son in the World he had a little out-liv'd himself being so unfortunate
Election of the People to whom that he might appear restor'd as by Divine Providence he appointed the day of his Coronation to be upon the very same day wherein the year before he had been Banished and to hold up the Cheat he was anointed with an Oyl which as 't was pretended was deliver'd to his Father together with this Prophesie That all the Kings that receiv'd their Chrisme from it should be Champions of the Church which as the Legend holds forth coming by chance to the hands of King Richard as he was going for Ireland he would have been anointed therewith had not the Arch-bishop of Canterbury disswaded him from it as not being lawful to be anointed twice however he was resolv'd to intitle himself self so far to the vertue of it as to stile himself Defensor Fidei The only man that withstood this Kings Usurpation and would not be perswaded to swim down the Stream with the rest of the Time-serving Nobility was the bold Bishop of Carlisle who having so frankly discharged himself upon the occasion of Debating in Parliament what should be done with King Richard for as yet they had not taken away his Life though they had taken his Crown and by a Speech as eloquent as pious shew'd what was the Complexion and Face of those Jugling Times and what was expected from what was done and what was done upon the found of the present Expectations I have thought it a respect due to the honour of his singular Merit to set it down expresly as he spoke it to the end the Reader may judge whether he had not Reason enough to justifie his Passion and pity 't was he had not power enough to justifie that Reason when combining with others of the same Judgment to Restore his true Soveraign he gloriously lost himself in the Attempt and with himself the unfortunate King he would have saved The words of his Speech were as followeth My Lords THE matter now propounded is of marvellous weight and consequence wherein there are two Points chiefly to be considered the first Whether King Richard be sufficiently put out of his Throne the second Whether the Duke of Lancaster be lawfully taken in For the first How can that be sufficiently done when there is no Power sufficient to do it The Parliament cannot do it for the King is Head of the Parliament and can the Body pull down the Head You will say but the Head may bow it self down and so may the King resign It is true but of what Force is that that is done by Force and who knows not that King Richard's Resignation was no other But suppose he be lawfully out yet how comes the Duke of Lancaster to be lawfully in If you say by Conquest you speak Treason for what Conquest without Arms and can a Subject take Arms against his lawful Soveraign and not be Treason if so then whoever Arms against him successfully does it rightfully and what hope of Peace at this rate If you say by Election of State you speak not Reason For what power hath the State to Elect while any is living that hath Right to succeed but such a Successor is not the Earl of Lancaster as descended from Edmund Crouchback the elder Son of Henry the Third put by the Crown for deformity of Body for who knows not the falseness of this Allegation seeing it is a thing notorious that this Edmund was neither the elder Son nor yet Crook-backt though call'd so for some other Reason but a goodly Personage and without any Deformity and your selves cannot forget a thing so lately done * * The Earl of March who it was that in the fourth year of King Richard was declar'd by Parliament to be Heir of the Crown in case King Richard should die without Issue but why then is not that Claim made good because that Inter Arma silent Leges what disputing of Titles against the stream of Power But howsoever 't is extream Injustice that King Richard should be condemned without being heard or once allowed to make his Defence and what can we Subjects expect when our King is thus abus'd My Lords I have spoken this at this time that you may consider of it before it is too late for as yet 't is in your power to undo that justly which you have unjustly done Those last words express'd a Zeal that seem'd to have something of the same effect as that of Lightning which is said to melt the Sword without so much as singeing the Scabard For however no body that heard him appeard to be warm by what he said yet a secret Fire was shot into many of their Breasts that after it came to be thorowly kindled in their Consciences could not be extinguish'd no not with Blood so that they continued their Resentments not for their own Lives only but intail'd the Quarrel upon their Posterity even untill the House of Clarence recover'd their Right in the third Generation after Now as a Clergy-man first declar'd against this King so a Clergy-man first Ingaged against him without considering his holy Unction which made him the great Champion of the Church for however the Church-men are willing that others should belive their Miracles themselves do not this was the politick Abbot of Westminster a great Book-states-man who invited several of the Chief Nobility into a Combination to take away his Life so that Killing no Murther is no Modern Tenet and admitting what he suspected only there might be some reason for it for who would not dispatch an Enemy to God the King and the Church one that therefore had unduly made himself King that he might rob the great King of Kings of his due the ground of this Jealousie was upon certain words utter'd in the Abbots hearing whilst he was Duke of Hereford viz. That Princes had too little and Clergy-men too much upon which he concluded he would be a Persecutor of the Church rather then a Patron Neither it seems was the Abbot only of that Opinion but the Nation in general otherwise the House of Commons would not as they did afterward frame a Bill for setling the Church Lands in the Crown as believing it would be an acceptable Oblation to him Upon which this Abbot and the Bishop before nam'd and five Temporal Lords to wit the Dukes of Exeter Surry and Albemarle and the two Earls of Salisbury and Gloucester with many Knights and Gentlemen their Friends complotted to dispatch him at a publick Just or Tournament to be held at Oxford where they hop'd coming arm'd as the fashion was upon such Occasions they might as easily take him off as the Roman Senate did Caesar neither indeed was the Plot ill laid had not the same Power that set him up protected him against all their Machinations diverting the Destiny upon themselves by such a strange and unexpected discovery as shews that Secresie in Treason signifies nothing unless it could be hid from the All-seeing Eye of
is said to have been transformed into a kind of Copper-colour And having to that brazen face of his such an Iron heart as deem'd nothing too difficult for him to attempt they were easily perswaded to joyn themselves with him whiles he threw himself upon dangers seemingly invincible so seemingly unconcern'd as if he had known or at least believed that he earrled the Fate of the three Nations upon the point of his single Sword So that it is no marvel after a long Series of Successes both in Ireland and Scotland where his very name like that of Caesars made his way to Victory having at the last got the better of the King himself in the fatal Battel of Worcester whom yet with a Politick Modesty he denied to have been defeated by his but as he said by an Arm from Heaven he should be so hardy as with the same Club he wrested out of Hercules hand to dash out the Brains of the Infant Common-wealth not then full five years old making himself the sole Administrator of all its Goods and Chattels to wit the Moneys raised by sale of Crown and Church Lands the growing benefit of all Forfeitures Confiscations and Compositions together with the annual Rent of Ninety thousand pounds per mensem over and besides which he had advantage of all the queint Projections then on foot as the years rent laid on Houses built upon new Foundations in and about London the Contributions for the distressed Protestants in Savoy the Collections of the Committee of Propagation as 't was call'd who were to take care for the planting the Gospel in the dark Parts of the World being no inconsiderable Levies These I take to have been the personal Estate of the Common-wealth To the real Estate of Inheritance which he principally aim'd at viz. the Soveraignty and Dominion of the three Kingdoms by Sea and Land since he could make no better Title then as the first Occupant by his Primier Seisin which in effect was none other but plain Disseism so long as the right Heir was alive against whom there could be no bar by Fine or Recovery whilst he continued beyond the Seas the Learned Knaves about him advised him to intitle himself to it by Act of Parliament Now forasmuch as by the first Instrument of Government it was Articled that there should be a Parliament once in three years two whereof he had already call'd that had neither pleas'd him nor were pleas'd with him the first being so bold to question his Authority the next himself he resolv'd now to appear like the Grand Seignior with his Bashaws about him and accordingly he chose several Prefects of Provinces whom he call'd by the name of Major Generals whose business it was first to keep down the unreconcileable Cavaliers secondly to new mould the Linsey-wolsey Covenanters many of whom about this time began to be corrupted with Principles of Honesty and lastly to reform the Elections of Burgesses so that he might with no less satisfaction then safety call as a little after he did the third Parliament whom yet he vouchsafed not the honour of that Name but to shew them how little he feared any Battery of their Ordinance permitted them to be nick-nam'd The Convention a strange Pack made up on purpose for the strange Game he was to play of all Knaves but Knaves as it appear'd afterward of different Complections These having fram'd another Instrument of Government Indeavours to make the Protector King pressed him by their humble Petition and Advice as they term'd it with not unlike flattery and falshood as M. Anthony did Caesar to legitimate his Usurpation by taking upon him the Title of King The Lawyers that were of his Common-Council urg'd him to it for that as they said there was no other way left for him to guard the Laws or for the Laws to guard him The States-men that were of his Privy-Councel provok'd him to it by the Example of Brutus the Roman Liberator whose folly they said it was that having murther'd Caesar he did not set up himself or some other King though by some other name since as he could not be ignorant that such abortive Liberty as he had given life to must needs prove the Parent of a lasting servitude so he might foresee that Caesar had so ingrafted himself into the Body Politick that one could not be separate from the other without the destruction of both and as he had need of Forces so had they of a Head and better one craz'd then none at all His nearest Friends and Relations press'd him upon the point of Honour Neither could there be a readier Argument to perswade him to take upon him to be a Prince then to tell him he was descended from Princes For who knew not that his great Ancestor Cradoc Vraych Vras Earl of Ferlix having as the Herauld said married the Princess Tegaire Daughter and Heir of Pelinor King of Great Britain many hundred of years before either the Norman or Saxon Conquerors could pretend to any thing so that now the Question was not so much with what right he could make himself King of England as by what right he had been so long kept out of it In this confusion of Counsels it came to his own turn at last to advise himself and accordingly he weighed all their Arguments and taking the last first into consideration he easily over-pass'd the honour of his Extraction for two Reasons First for that his was not the chief Family of Wales and secondly for that he was not the Chief of his Family Besides common Fame had debas'd him by an odd kind of Disparagement which however perhaps mistaken took much from the dignity of his Person as being believ'd to have been an ordinary Brewer though it prov'd to be as Daniel observes by Jaques D' Artevile the great Stickler of Flanders in Edward the Third his time a Brewer of more then of Beer Neither did he much more regard the point of Law for that he knew it to be no otherwise binding then as a silken Cord which upon any force used to it is apt to flip and let go its hold That which mov'd him most was the point of State rais'd out of that pinching President of Brutus yet there was an unanswerable scruple rested upon that too to wit How it could be reasonable for him to expect to hold them in with a twine thread of voluntary Submission who had so lately by his own advice broken the strong bond of Allegiance and which yet he durst not object to any but himself he foresaw his Death would make way for some of his Fellow Regicides to usurp by his own Example as much upon his Successors to the disseisin of those who call'd him Father as he had done by disinheriting the Sons of the true Father of his Country This shewing him that the thing call'd Chance would have its share in despight of all his wisdom and providence and that there was
unknown danger attended that unknown Chance he retreated into his first disguise acting over the dissembling part of * Who so reads Cromwell's Speech at dissolving the Convention Jan. 1657 will find this parallel of Tiberius very properly apply'd to him Tiberius boggling with the Convention as t'other with the Senate and telling them that from the Experience he had in matters of State he had by good proof learn'd the ill of Soveraignty how hard and difficult a thing it was how subject to change and clamor and seeing there were so many famous and worthy Personages able and confiding men as he call'd them to bear the burthen better it were and more easie that many joyning their cases and studies together should undertake the Charge then cast all on one mans shoulders These words as the †See Tiberius his Speech in Tacitus Suspensa semper obscura verba 1 An. Author hath it carried greater Majesty then Truth For Tiberius saith he and Cromwell say we either by nature or by custom spake those things which he would have known darkly and doubtfully but of set purpose indeavouring to hide his drifts wrapt himself then more then ever in dark Clouds of Incertainty and Ambiguity and canted as our Phrase is more skilfully then ever Our Senate as theirs having in the mean time that awe upon their Spirits that as he sayes by them that they thought it great peril if the Emperor I may say by these that they thought it no less dangerous if the Protector should doubt they perceiv'd his Dissimulation and so they acquiesced in the final Answer he gave them that he accepted the Government but not by the Title of KING To say truth he was afraid of those only by whom only he us'd to make others afraid his emulous Bashaws those mighty men of War before mention'd who wheeling about declar'd against all Monarchy on Earth but that of Jesus Christ under whom they thought themselves as well entituled to be Major Generals as under him Amongst whom not to mention the rest I take Lambert Desborow Whaley Goffe Harrison and Pride to be six more unruly Beasts then those six Oldenburgh Horses which but a little before disdaining his lash however three Nations lay patiently under it had ominously flung him from his Seat when in a frolick he took upon him to drive his own Chariot and having got him under their feet so bruis'd and batter'd him that he was taken up for dead which being the only fatal Accident that ever lighted on his Body by doing him that hurt did him this good to teach him that it was no jesting matter to take the Reins into his hands For in case these head strong Beasts should have taken the Bitt between their Teeth too as those other did they would certainly have flung him down beyond all Recovery having before that so far derided and scorn'd his mimical Majesty that they would by no means admit of his new House of Lords or vouchsafe them any other name then that of The * Yet after his death they got to be call'd The Vpper House other House whereby he found himself if not only uneasie but so unfixed in his Greatness that the apprehensions thereof put him into such a kind of a Frenzy for the time being that he could not forbear in great passion to †See his Speech at the breaking of the Convention 1657. tax them with having betray'd him into that great Charge he had which as he said could not be made secure but by making it greater and it troubled him the more for that it look'd like a Judgment to have his Ambition so stifled in the very birth after his having indured the Throws and Pangs of so many anxious thoughts and sharp contradictions and the convulsions of a more then a common guilt but that which came yet nearer the quick was that as he was dash't out of all hopes of being a King so he began to lose his confidence of continuing a Tyrant perceiving a daily defection of many of those in whose firm disloyalty he most confided This turn'd all his Blood into Choler and that became more adust by the grief conceived for the death of his second and most beloved Daughter who expiring under the apprehensions of being tormented for his sins made it seems that impression upon him by her Sentiments of his Cruelty and Injustice that the disturbance of hers brought such a distraction into his mind as meeting with a suitable Distemper of Body left him not till he left the World out of which he departed with no less blustering and noise then he continued in it his Exit being attended with as dreadful a Storm as that which hapned at the departure of Romulus to whom therefore a witty Flatterer of those times took the confidence to compare him though without any Testimony given of his as there was of t'others going to Heaven his Death suggesting no less matter of shame then grief to the inspired Party that depended on him whilst one of their Seers assured them that God had given him his life His Son Richard succeeded him but was so daunted with the horror of that unexpected height he arriv'd at that not being able to keep the Reins long in his hands he fell like another Phacton leaving all in Flames about him Then began that Chaos of The Committee of Safety out of which Fleetwood started up like the Beast in the * Cap. 13. Revelations that rose out of the Sea with (a) Thâ— seven Commissioners for Government of the Army made by Act of Parliament who were to execute the Office and Power of Lievtenants Geneal from 11 Oct. 59. to 22 Fâ—lâ— following seven Heads (b) Lambert who was restor'd after his Commission was taken away one whereof was wounded to death and heal'd again and (c) The ten Persons chose by the Chief Officers of the Army at Whitehall to act as the Supream Councel for the Commonwealth ten Horns to whom saith the Text was given a Mouth speaking great things and Blasphemies till God as himself express'd it spitting in his face blasted him This many headed Monster receiving its power from the Dragon by which we may either understand the Devil in a mystical or the Army in a literal sense had Instruction 1. To bring all Delinquents to Justice that was to murther whom they pleas'd 2. To prevent and suppress all Insurrections and Rebellions that was to rob rifie and imprison whom they thought fit 3. To treat with Forreign States that was to sell the whole Nation whensoever they could find a fit Chapman for it 4 To raise the Militia in every County that was to make the People Instruments of their own Servitude 5. To fill up all places of Trust that were void and to remove such as were scandalous in order to the making void of more 6. To make sale of all Delinquents Estates and as an Appendix to that Power they