agreeable Conversation of her Nephew the Earl of Ailesbury and his Countess For still she had a numerous Family and a Croud of Servants which now in her Age must have incircled her with as many Troubles also if by the Advice of her Neece the Countess of Ailesbury the Decency and Composure of her mind as well as Business had not been secured For her great Age had rendred her own Vertues something unactive but this was abundantly supplyed by such Methods and Guards of Prudence which she received from another hand by whose Care and Wisdom her Thoughts and Affairs were defended from a great many Vexaions and Hazards And the more our good Lady wanted the Assistance of a true and prudent Friend the more the Countess of Ailesbury considered her Duty and with the most generous Compassions in the lowest Declination of our Ladies strength and years increased her Attendance and by such Counsels as she had always ready in her Prudent mind and a wise observation of things made the last Scenes of her life more easie and honourable Before Death seized her it shewed it self at a distance and God was pleased so to order it that by some previous Infirmities as well as by a great Age she should be called upon to provide for her greatest Interest And she soon understood the Intent of Gods Providence and by Methods truly Christian prepared her self for Him Her last sickness though it continued for some time was entertained with great Patience and repeated Devotions with a perfect Resignation to Gods Will and all the Offices preparatory to an holy Dying but considering with her self that Charity was that only Grace which entred Heaven her Love to God became now more intense and operative nor could she even under her Pains forbear her usual Compassion and Bounties to the Poor but would often inquire of her Neece the Countess of Ailesbury whether there were none that wanted Relief and would by the hands of her Chaplain to the very last minutes of her Life continue the beloved Practices of Beneficence Her Servants had received many and those very great Instances of her Bounty but she could not leave them without a farewel Testimony and therefore besides the large Legacies left to them by Will she ordered a great sum to be given amongst them not long before her Death by the Countess of Ailesbury To whom our Lady thought her self so infinitely obliged that she beseeched her to make choice of her own Retributions which she would confirm by signing any Instrument which should be offered to her But the Countess had had her Reward before and would have no other than the inward satisfactions of mind arising from the Delights of doing well And now our good Lady was hastning to Heaven and being Crowned with many Years and Honours she went to receive that of Immortality in January 1674. The Noble Lord her Son took care that the solemnities of her lying in State and those also of her Funeral should correspond to the Magnificence of her living The Train which waited on her to her Burial was great and noble and besides her own Retinue which was more numerous than any other of her Quality her Nephew the Earl of Ailesbury his Eldest Son the Lord Bruce his second Son Mr. Robert Bruce whom for some years she had taken into her own Care and Family and Colonel Cook whom as a constant Friend to her self and her Relations she had made one of the Overseers of her Will did atttend her to Derby the Burial Place of the Earl of Devonshires Family where during her life she had Erected a Monument for her Lord Her self and Children One of them Colonel Charles Cavendish a Person of that Bravery and Worthiness that his very Ashes ought to be sacred was so Dear to his Mother that according to her desire his Corps were taken up at Newark and in another Herse waited that of his Beloved Mothers to Derby To both passing through Leicester were due Respects paid to their Memories the Magistrates of that Place attending in their Formalities the Gentry o the County also meeting there and waiting them out of Town The same Honourable Reception they had at Derby where they were both interred Her Funeral Sermon preached by Mr. Frampton Chaplain to the Earl of Elgin now Bishop of Glocester his by Mr. Naylor Chaplain to the Countess Never was a Woman more honoured through her whole life and at her death and by both she hath taught all Ladies That the surest Path to Honour is by Vertue And both for the Method and the Experiment we have not had of late a more pregnant Instance than this of our Noble Lady for by the Methods of Vertue she obtained the Reputation to be a Person of the greatest Character and Blessings Amongst which it was not the least in her own Account that she had such fair hopes that her Nobleness would descend and continue in her Son the Earl of Devonshire and her two Grandchildren the Lord William and the Lady Anne Cavendish He the young Lord appearing one of the finest Gentlemen in the World married to a Daughter of his Grace the Duke of Ormond a Lady of great Goodness and singular Charity She the Lady Anne Cavendish improving her youth to such early Vertues that she soon became Eminent for her extraordinary Modesty and most punctual Duty to her Parents married first to the Lord Rich Grandchild to the Earl of Warwick who dying left her a young Widow to make Fortunate the Lord Burleigh now Earl of Exeter her second Husband One thing more there was which she would say added infinitely to her Contentments to see that excellent and noblest Friendship between the Earl of Devonshire her Son and the Earl of Ailesbury her Nephew Which as it was one of the greatest Pleasures of her life so the continuance of it was one of her latest and most passionate Desires And such effect it had upon these two noble Lords that the Friendship which began at Relation and Acquaintance stayed not there but went forward to the best thing in all the World to the most particular Indearment and most usefull Love For seeing a Worthyness in each other which is the just and proper Motive for Friendship They united such Affections as were natural and vertuous made up of great Dearness and the bravest Combination of Councils and Fortunes and Interrests And it were well that when ever we enter into such a Friendship which we intend should be as indeed true Friendship is the Pleasure of Life and the Delight of Conversation that we would choose a Friend amongst the Prudent and the Generous the Secret and the Faithful the Ingenuous and the Honest for no other are fit or able to do those Offices for which Friendship is useful and excellent FINIS
discovery dies with him The Mother of the Maccabees brings up her Children to Martyrdom and dies her self bravely after them Others are as famous in the Monuments of Antiquity for Piety Clotilda converts France to Christianity Indegondis her Grandchild recovers her Husband and part of Spain from the Arrian Heresie Helena plants Christianity in the Roman Empire Cesaria in Persia Theolinda in Italy Margaret in England Gisellis in Hungary Dambruca in Poland Olga in Russia Ethelbirga in Germany And for private Vertues Abigail Susanna S. Agnes S. Cicely S. Monica S. Felicitas Zenobia Pulcheria Theodora Marcella Paula Eustochium and ten Thousand more are the noblest Images They were Women that in the Infant Church led on the Men to Martyrdom and thronged themselves in little Armies to Martyrs Fires that brought up their Infants to the most glorious sufferings who smiled the Tyrants into Rage and posed the subtlest inventions of Pains and Tortures And indeed the numbers and sorts of vertuous Women have so increased in later Histories that to refuse them their honour would be the same thing as to deny the Splendors of the Sun and either we must have no eyes to see into the present nor any faith to credit past Records or we must allow and admire their merit But I might have superseded all these Authorities and relyed wholly upon the following Life to have demonstrated this verity Necessary it will be before we come to relate what she did to know from whence she was it being not the least Glory of her Character that as God had equall'd her by Birth to the greatest of her time so she her self equalled her Vertues to her Extraction Daughter she was to Edward Lord Bruce of Kinloss Privy Councellor to King James both in England and Scotland and Master of the Rolls He Edward Lord Bruce discending from Robert Bruce the Norman to whom William the first gave the Castle and Lordship of Shelton which was a Barony by Tenure From him descended all the Noble Bruces both of England and Scotland and particularly Robert and David both Kings of the Scots whose Sister marrying into the Family of the Stewarts They in her Right inherited the Crown of that Nation It cannot therefore but be worthy our first thoughts to contemplate how the divine Providence designing her for the most illustrious Life besides that it furnished her Soul with extraordinary Graces took care that it should be united to a Body descending from a Family flourishing in Riches and Honours intending to Remarque to her what she soon understood and as truly practised that as God had raised her by her Birth to the heights of Glory so she should conduct her self to excel others as much in the Eminencies of Goodness as she did in Blood Such a Beauty therefore we have here to delineate not as we could wish were or a strong Imagination can Fancy but such an one as is true and solid and far better expressing her self in her own life than is possible by this Copy she not being to be parallell'd by any thing but her self Who as she was prepared by the Divine goodness for Scenes of Difficulty and Honour so was she better taught to act her own Part by observing how her noble Father performed his He the Lord Bruce amongst other great Services done for his Royal Master King James was also a Principal and happy Instrument of facilitating his obtaining the Crown of England to which though he had an undoubted Right yet he met with very potent Obstructions which in a great measure were removed by the Interest this noble Lord had before made in Secretary Cecil afterwards Earl of Salisbury and divers others of the English Nobility A friendship he had contracted both intimate and fortunate with some of the greatest Interest and Power during his Embassy here in England to Queen Elizabeth joined in it to the Earl of Marre proving afterwards an opportunity of a nobler conjunction that of the two Crowns which the King had no sooner well setled to his Head but he took this good Servant nearer to his Heart and Person Animadverting that he could not wear them with that security and pleasure he desired unless he might be Assisted by so useful and loyal a Servant brought him therefore into England with him that he might continue him in his Favours and have him near to conduct his Affairs and Councils Several Sons he had and but this only Daughter she born to him on Christmas day and for that reason had the name of Christian answering up to the highest measures the glorious Omen both of the Day and of her Name appearing so soon to be Christian as if indeed she had been born one expressing in her younger years such vigorous Demonstrations of Goodness that the World might easily see she had a Soul and Body made at first to all possible Perfections Such Impressions did this Purity of her Youth the Pregnancy of her Wit her freedom from Passions that neglect of Vanity and hatred of Excess together with that Modesty and Sweetness which were naturally hers made upon the mind of her Indulgent and Discerning Father that he expressed his value of her and her own merit by the first publick notice he could make which was to marry her to an Heir of one of the greatest Families and Estates in England and by giving also such a Portion as in those Days did exceed and would also now be a very great one viz. 10000 l. Her Husband was Sir William Cavendish Son to the Lord Cavendish made afterwards Earl of Devonshire descending from the ancient stock of the Jernon and Norman blood Made thus a Wife she soon put in practice all those Vertues which such a Relation required from her Such a Respect she paid as Saint Paul commended to Christian Women that should also increase to Reverence and Obedience Considering wisely with her self that when the Wife once falters from the Command of her Husband storms and tempests invade the Family and that her own her Husbands her Childrens and her Friends happiness and quiet are not indangered only but scattered into disorders worse than Hell This Obedience she looked upon as no hard Task because love assisted to bear the pleasing burden Her own and Husbands Soul met in equal Poize and the thoughts and desires of the one were the thoughts and desires of the other God made them two into one and they were one in Judgment and in Will and in Affection and in Care And as Love made them so Loyalty another of her Conjugal Vertues so kept them The Husband inclosed her to himself when he espoused her with his Ring his was the Right and hers the Virtue to be only his Assistance also one of those ends for which God made her Woman and marriage a Wife she gave to that eminent Degree that it is not easy to resolve whether it was more for the Interest or Honour of the Cavendish Family that she was united to
with veneration he being also of that Gallantry of mind that though he delights in great things he does not care to hear of them Leave howsoever I may take to make it up from the younger Son of our Lady Colonel Charles Cavendish a Person that equalled the bravest of his time in the Accomplishments both of mind and body which as they rendred him the delight of all that knew him so too the most favoured by his Prince And not without just Reason for he was a Gentleman so furnished with all the interior and politer parts of Learning obtained at home and abroad both by reading Books and Men as well as Courage that he was prepared to defend his Prince with his head and hand by the strongest Reason and most generous Valour Of both which he gave such great and glorious Instances that those brave Gentlemen of the Temple who offered themselves as a Guard to the Royal Person of the late King in the first breaking out of those Tumults which ushered in the Rebellion chose him for their Captain knowing he would thither lead them where Law Honour and Conscience would oblige them to follow A Gentleman that made the true Figure both of Valour and Vertue that carried forth his Arms with the first under the Standards of Loyalty and for the same reason they ought to be hung up in the Temple of Glory The Profession of Arms in his case was the most renowned marching with the Hosts of God and the King and he esteemed himself more innobled by the bloud he lost for his Prince and Country than by that he drew from the loins of his Progenitors And indeed being excited by so generous a Design as to Cement the Breaches that were made upon Monarchy though with his bloud he did such things in War as increased the Palms and Crowns which had long invironed the heads of his Predecessors and seemed to be the Person reserved by Heaven to Finish the Honors of his Family Many eminent Actions he performed for his Prince in the late Rebellion and one particularly in the sight of the Queen which is to be a Trophey to his memory as she was coming from Burlington where she landed to Oxford He took Burton upon Trent by Storm incouraging his Souldiers by his own example to swim over where you might have seen him under showers of Bullets defye all the most dreadful Images of death and with such a Resolution scale the Works beset with Arms and Terrours as if his Life had been as Immortal as he hath made his Honour And it is not the least part of his fighting Glory that it could never have been taken from his head but by such base men who added Treachery to their Treason murdering him in cold blood near Gainsburrough after Quarter given by Colonel Bury who made himself dear to the Usurper Cromwel by this and some other Acts of Cruelty But the memory of Colonel Cavendish could not thus be destroyed nor his Esteem for when his Body was brought to Newark to be interred the whole Town was so fond of it even dead that they would not suffer it for some days to be laid into the Ground but wept over it and admired it and not without the greatest Reluctancy at last committed him to his Dormitory covering the Hears with Tears and Laurels nay and about Thirty years after when his body was removed to be interred at Darby with his Mother fresh lamentations were made by those that knew and others that had heard his Fame and the whole People of Newark expressed the most sorrowful unwillingness to part with the Reliques of so dear a Person who had been when alive the Ornament and Defence of that Place But sit it was he should be laid as near as possible to his indulgent Mother because his death came nearest her heart of any affliction God was pleased to try her Patience with And indeed but for his loss and that of her only Daughter the Lady Rich Daughter-in-Law to the Earl of Warwick she had an uninterrupted Prosperity during the whole time of her Widowhood abating also her great Concern for those common Calamities which befel her self together with the King and Church But it cannot be imagined what grief seized her Spirits upon the death of two such Children it being the hardest Contest that ever was seen as those observed that were present with her between a Maternal Affection and Magnanimity of mind And though by Reason and Religion she restrained her Passion from breaking out into a Tempest yet she had sunk under the Pressure of her dolours if she had not next to those supports which she received from Heaven had great comforts from the company and pious Assistances of her Brother the Earl of Elgin who stirred not from her on both these sad Occasions her Son the Earl of Devonshire being young when under the former and at too great distance when under the later of these Tryals That worthy Daughter of hers whose death gave a great part of these sorrows was whilst alive the noblest Transcript of her Mothers Vertues and for that reason became the Darling of the Family she was matched into as well as her own A Lady of that comprehensive and known Goodness that her very Name is a sufficient Character nor dare I venture at any other it being indeavoured by the Wits and Orators of her own time my Lord Faukland Mr. Waller Mr. Godolphin and others However I may Remarque so far That though she was a Lady that might derive Honour from the Greatness of her Bloud she rather chose to do it by the worthiness of her Actions her Wit and Discretion kept equal measures and her freedom of conversation was bounded with modesty she had a great mind without disdain the sweetest Meen but not without Majesty and in sum every thing she said or did like her self fair and transcending and what became a Daughter of the Countess of Devonshire To whom it is time to return and we shall now find her in the exaltation of her Vertues for towards the later end of the Rebellion spending some part of her time at Greenwich the deplorable condition of the King and Church which had lain for a long time heavy upon her thoughts set her mind into the noblest Ferment and that produced the most vigorous Resolutions at least of endeavouring with her utmost skill and diligence the Recovery of her Prince and the Nation from those Usurpations that were upon his Crown and their Liberties by an insolent hypocritical and ill natured Party And a fair Prospect she apprehended there was of effecting this brave Undertaking the Projecting of which was the Enamel and Beauty of all her other Deeds because Devereux Earl of Essex and the Earl of Holland seemed at this time desirous to expiate their former Crimes by such a Repentance as should make full restitution to the King and People by returning Him to his Dignity and them to their