and in like sort his friend the Earl of Holland as if his soul had divined he should see them no more which infusions towards fatal ends had been observed by some Authors of no light Authority On the very day of his death the Countess of Denbigh received a Letter from him whereunto all the while she was writing her answer she bedewed the Paper with her tears And after a most bitter passion whereof she could yield no reason but that her dearest Brother was to be gone she fell down in a swound Her said Letter ended thus I will pray for your happy return which I look at with a great cloud over my head too heavy for my poor heart to bear without torment but I hope the great God of Heaven will bless you The day following the Bishop of Ely her devoted friend who was thought the fittest preparer of her mind to receive such a doleful accident came to visit her but hearing she was at rest he attended till she should awake of her self which she did with the affrightment of a dream Her Brother seeming to pass thorow a field with her in her Coach where hearing a sudden shout of the people and asking the reason it was answered to have been for joy that the Duke of Buckingham was sick Which natural impression she scarce had related unto her Gentlewoman before the Bishop was entred into her Bed-chamber for a chosen Messenger of the Dukes death This is all that I dare present of that nature to any of judgement not unwillingly omitting certain prognostick Anagrams and such strains of fancy He took to Wife eight years and two moneths before his death the Lady Katherine Manners Heir general to the Noble House of Rutland who besides a solid addition to his Estate brought him three Sons and a Daughter called the Lady Mary his first born his eldest Son died at Nurse before his Journey at Rheez and his third the Lord Francis was born after his Fathers death so as neither his first nor his last were participant of any sense of his misfortunes or felicities His second Son now Duke of Buckingham was born to chear him after his return from that unlucky Voyage For these sweet pledges and no less for the unquestionable vertues of her Person and Mind he loved her dearly and well expressed his love in an act and time of no simulation towards his end bequeathing her all his Mansion-houses during her natural life and a power to dispose of his whole personal Estate together with a fourth part of his Lands in joynture He left his elder Brother of the same womb a Viscount and his younger an Earl Sir Edward Villiers his half Brother on the Fathers side he either preferred or removed call it how you will from his step-mothers eye to the Presidentship where he lived in singular estimation for his justice and hospitality and died with as much grief of the whole Province as ever any Governour did before his religious Lady of sweet and Noble disposition adding much to his honour The eldest of the Brethren and Heir of the Name was made a Baronet but abstained from Court enjoying perhaps the greater Greatness of self-fruition He left his Mother a Countess by Patent in her own person which was a new leading example grown before somewhat rare since the dayes of Queen Mary His Sister of Denbigh that right character of a good Lady he most humbly recommended to the Queen who after a discharge of some French in her Court that were to return took her into three several places of honour and trust In short not to insist upon every particular Branch of those private preferments he left all his female kindred of the entire or half blood descending of the Name of Villiers or Beaumont within any near degree either matched with Peers of the Realm actually or hopefully with Earls Sons and Heirs or at least with Knights or Doctors of Divinity and of plentifull condition He did not much strengthen his own subsistence in Court but stood there on his own feet for the truth is the most of his Allies rather leaned upon him then shoared him up His familiar servants either about his person in ordinary attendance or about his affairs of State as his Secretaries or of Office as his Steward or of Law as that worthy Knight whom he long used to solicite his Causes He lest all both in good Fortune and which is more in good Fame Things very seldome consociated in the instruments of great Personages THE GREAT ACTION BETWEEN POMPEY AND CAESAR Extracted out of the Roman and Grecian Writers by H. W. K t. for an Historical Exercise The DEDICATION to Sir EDMUND BACON Knight and Baronet WHEN Rome in the revolution of 702. years was grown pregnant of an universal Monarchy After hard labour with foreign Hostilities and â—…orse with inward Rents and Divisions which mangled her own bowels The State yet free or Loosness mistaken as it is often for Liberty seemed now to stand most in danger of two eminent Gentlemen Caius Julius Caesar and Cneus Pompeius The one of all men living the likeliest to stir up again the Sinders of the Marian the other of the Syllan Party These Gallants of the time had some years before besides their near alliance by Marriage of Pompey to Julius Caesar's Daughter a Lady of imperious allurement been likewise united together in a Triumviral Knot with Marcus Crassus the wealthiest of the whole Nobility which Consortship was in effect a kind of Segregate or Cabinet-Senate importing secretly no less then that no Act of Moment should pass without consent of all three So as upon this foundation by their own personal Pursuits by the mutual Strength and Coherence of their several Dependants and by all other insinuative and ambient Arts in a long corrupted Common-wealth still forbidden and still increasing after they had run through the principal Dignities at home Crassus on the Eastern side with a puissant Army as Money wants no Followers went Governour of Syria Pompey Southward got Libya of new and retained both Spains under former Lieutenants As for Caesar who by an insolent Consulship had awaked much jealousie they gave him at first only Illyricum and the nearer Gallia Provinces then of little doings as it were to impound his spirits yet least the People whose good will had cost him deep should bluster in his behalf the Senate was afterwards between Favour and Fear content to extend his Commission to Gallia Narbonensis beyond the Alps. Thus were the Three distributed at distance enough as perchance was thought meet upon more doubt hitherto of their too much agreement and conference of Counsels and Plots together then of any rupture or disunion at hand So short-sighted is that which we call humane Providence and so easily can the Supream Mover delude our Imaginations For Crassus not long after either greedy of Fame or Spoil and too confident as it should seem in the weakest of
praises and Elogies according to the contrary motions of popular waves And now to summe up the fruit of the Journey discourses ran thus among the clearest Observers It was said that the Prince himself without any imaginable stain of his Religion had by the sight of Forraign Courts and observations of the different Natures of people and Rules of Government much excited and awaked his spirits and corroborated his judgement And as for the Marquess there was note taken of two great additions which he had gained First he was returned with encrease of Title having there been made Duke by Patent sent him which was the highest degree whereof an English Subject could be capable But the other was far greater though closer for by so long and so private and so various consociation with a Prince of such excellent nature he had now gotten as it were two lives in his own Fortune and Greatness whereas otherwise the estate of a Favourite is at the best but a Tenant at will and rarely transmitted But concerning the Spanish Commission which in publick conceit was the main scope of the Journey that was left in great suspence and after some time utterly laid aside which threw the Duke amongst free Wits whereof we have a rank Soil under divers Censures The most part were apt to believe that he had brought down some deep distaste from Spain which exasperated his Councels Neither was there wanting some other that thought him not altogether void of a little Ambition to shew his power either to knit or dissolve Howsoever the whole Scene of affairs was changed from Spain to France there now lay the prospective Which alteration being generally liked and all alterations of State being ever attributed to the powerfullest under Princes as the manner is where the eminency of one obscureth the rest the Duke became suddenly and strangely Gracious among the multitude and was even in Parliament highly exalted so as he did seem for a time to have overcome that natural Incompatibility which in the experience of all Ages hath been noted between the Vulgar and the Soveraign Favour But this was no more then a meer bubble or blast and like an Ephemeral fit of applause as estsoon will appear in the sequel and train of his life I had almost forgotten that after his return from Spain he was made Lord Warden of the Cinque-Ports which is as it were a second Admiralty and Steward likewise of the Mannour of Hampton-Court Dignities and Offices still growing of trust or profit And the King now giving not only out of a beneficent disposition but a very habitual and confirmed custome One year six moneths two dayes after the joyful reception of the Prince his Son from Spain King James of immortal memory among all the lovers and admirers of Divine and Humane Sapience accomplished at Theobalds his own dayes on Earth Under whom the Duke had run a long Course of calm and smooth prosperity I mean long for the ordinary life of favour and the more notable because it had been without any visible Eclipse or Wave in himself amidst divers variations in others The most important and pressing care of a new and Vigorous King was his Marriage for mediate establishment of the Royal Line Wherein the Duke having had an especial hand he was sent to conduce hither the most Lovely and Vertuous Princess Henrietta Maria youngest Daughter to the Great Henry of Bourbon of whom his Majesty as hath been said had an ambulatory view in his Travels like a stolen taste of something that provoketh appetite He was accompanied with none of our Peers but the Earl of Mountgomery now Lord Chamberlain a Noble Gentleman of trusty free and open nature and truly no unsuitable Associate for that he himself likewise at the beginning of King James had run his Circle in the wheeling vicissitude of Favour And here I must crave leave in such of high quality or other of particular note as shall fall under my pen whereof this is the first not to let them pass without their due Character being part of my professed ingenuity Now this Ambassy though it had a private shew being charged with more formality then matter for all the essential Conditions were before concluded could howsoever want no Ornaments or bravery to adorn it Among which I am near thinking it worthy of a little remembrance that the Duke one solemn day Gorgeously clad in a suit all over-spread with Diamonds and having lost one of them of good value perchance as he might be dancing after his manner with lofty motion it was strangely recovered again the next morning in a Court full of Pages Such a diligent attendant was Fortune every where both abroad and at home After this fair discharge all Civil Honours having showred on him before there now fell out great occasions to draw forth his spirits into action a breach first with Spain and not longafter with France it self notwithstanding so streight an affinity so lately treated with the one and actually accomplished with the other As if indeed according to that pleasant Maxime of State Kingdoms were never married This must of necessity involve the Duke in business enough to have over-set a lesser Vessel being the next Commander under the Crown of Ports and Ships But he was noted willingly to embrace those Overtures of publick employment For at the Parliament at Oxford his Youth and want of Experience in Maritime service had somewhat been shrewdly touched even before the sluces and flood-gates of popular liberty were yet set open So as to wipe out that objection he did now mainly attend his charge by his Majesties untroubled and serene Commands even in a tempestuous time Now the men fell a rubbing of Armour which a great while had layn oyled The Magazines of Munition are viewed The Officers of Remains called to account frequent Councels of War as many private conferences with expert Sea-men a Fleet in preparation for some attempt upon Spain The Duke himself personally imployed to the States General and with him joyned in full Commission the Earl of Holland a Peer both of singular grace and solidity and of all sweet and serviceable virtue for publick use These two Nobles after a dangerous passage from Harwich wherein three of their Ships were foundred arrived the fifth day at the Hague in Holland Here they were to enter a treaty both with the States themselves and with the Ministers of divers allied and confederate Princes about a common diversion for the recovery of the Palatinate where the King 's only Sisters Dowry had been ravished by the German Eagle mixed with Spanish Feathers A Princess resplendent in darkness and whose virtues were born within the chance but without the power of Fortune Here it were injurious to over-slip a Noble act in the Duke during this Imployment which I must for my part celebrate above all his Expences There was a Collection of certain rare Manuscripts exquisitely written in Arabick and sought
rightful Heir of mine own Body was I forward at all these times to acknowledge thee the GOD of my support and comfort and shall I now question thy voice when thou demandest but a part of thine own Benefits No my dear Isaac although the Heavens know how much I love thee yet if thou wert or couldest be millions of times more precious in the eyes of thy trembling Father I would summon together all the strength of mine aged Limbs to render thee unto that gracious GOD from whom I had thee Alas poor Boy how sweetly thou slumbrest and in thy harmless Bed dost little think what change is towards thee but I must disturb thy rest Isaac arise and call up my Servants bid them prepare for a journey vvhich vve are to make unto the Mount Moriah and let some Wood be carried for the burning of a Sacrifice Mean while I will walk out a little by my self to contemplate the declining Stars and the approach of the Morning O ye Ornaments of the Sky who when all the World is silent obey your Maker in the determinate Order of your Motions Can Man behold his own duty in a fairer Volume why then stand I gazing here and do not rather go my self to hasten my Servants that I may execute his Will But stay His Will Why Is his Will contrary to the example of his own Justice Did he not heavily punish Cain even at the beginning of the first World for killing but a Brother and can I stay my Child and imbrue my hands in mine own Bowels without offence of his Immortal Majesty Yes why not The Act of Cain was the Act of his own sinful malice but I have received an immediate Command from God himself A Command Why Is his Command against his Law shall the Fountain of all Truth be served with Contradictions Did not the same God streight after the universal Deluge as our Fathers have told us denounce this Judgement That whoso sheddeth mans blood his blood shall be shed How then can I herein obey my God but I must withal disobey Him O my weak Soul what poor Arguments doest thou search to cover thine own rebellious Affections Is there any Warrant higher then his Will or any better Interpreter of his Will then himself If the Princes of the Earth who are but mortal Types of his invisible Glory can alter their Edicts at pleasure shall not the Lord of the whole whom Angels and Men adore have leave to dispence with his own Prohibitions Yes surely But then how shall the Blessing that my good God hath determined upon my Seed and even upon this very Child be accomplished if I destroy the Root O Lord was not thy Divine goodness pleased in the depth of thy Mercy to accept my Belief for Righteousness and shall I now frustrate thy Promises with my Obedience But what am I fallen again into a new Reluctation Have I before contested with thy Justice and shall I now dispute thy Power Didst thou not create the Light before the Sun and the effect before the cause and shall I bind thee to the Passions of a natural Agent Didst thou not make this All of Nothing even by thy Word which was thy Wisdom and foment all that thou hast made by thy Spirit which is thy Love and shall I doubt but thou canst raise innumerable Nations out of the very Ashes of my poor Isaac Nay did I not even at first receive him in a manner from a dead Womb and art not thou still the same Almighty and ever living God Merciful Father full of all tenderness and compassion that seest from Heaven whereof we are made Pardon my Discourses and forget my Delays I am now going to perform thy good Pleasure And yet there is remaining one humble Suit which refuse not O my God though it proceed from the weakness of thine unworthy Creature Take my Child and all that is mine I have resigned him with my whole Heart unto thy Will He is already thine and mine no longer and I glory that he shall die upon thy holy Altar But yet I fear withal that these my shaking hands and fainting Limbs vvill be seized vvith horror be not therefore Dear Lord displeased if I use my Servants in the Execution How now my Soul doest thou shrink in the last Act of thy Loyalty Can I yet vvalk up and down about vile and ordinary Functions and vvhen my God is to be served do my Joynts and Members fail me Have I humbled my desires to his Will and shall I deny him the choice of his own Instrument Or if his indulgent Mercy would permit it shall I suffer another to anticipate the chearfulness of my Obedience O thou great God of Life and Death who mightest have made me an insensible Plant a dead Stone or a poysonous Serpent and yet even in that likewise I should have conduced to the variety of thy glorious Wisdom but hast vouchsafed to endue us vvith the form of Man and to breath into our first Parent that spark of thy Divine Light vvhich vve call Reason to comprehend and acknowledge therewith thy high and indisputable Soveraignty over all Nature Thou then Eternal maker and Mover whose Will is the first of Causes and whose Glory is the last of Ends direct my Feet to the Place which thou hast appointed strengthen there these poor Hands to accomplish thy Pleasure and let Heaven and Earth obey thee A MEDITATION UPON CHRISTMAS-DAY Of the Birth and Pilgrimage of our Saviour CHRIRT on Earth O Glorious Morning wherein was born the Expectation of Nations and wherein the long Suspired Redeemer of the World did 〈◊〉 his Prophets had cryed rent the Heavens and come down in the Vesture of Humanity Thou that by the Vertue of the Highest wert conceived in the Womb of an inviolate Virgin of all Women the most blessed and yet more blessed by being thy Daughter and thy Servant then thy Mother Thou at whose Birth the Quire of Heaven did sing Hallelujahs and Angels made haste to acquaint even Shepherds with the news Stay my Soul before I go further and crave leave of thy Lord to ask some Questions Why wouldest thou be first made known to the meanest condition of Men why were they sent to see their Saviour not in some gorgeous Palace but in the vilest Room of a common Inn and instead of a Cradle decked with Rich Imbroideries lying in a Despicable Manger Why didst Thou not choose for the Place of thy blessed Mothers Delivery either Athens the Learned or Rome the Imperial or Ierusalem the Holy City Or since poor Bethlehem by thy Prophets prediction must receive that Honour why didst Thou not send Millions of Cherubims and Seraphims before Thee for thy Harbingers No my God it was Thy Will it was Thy Will which is the highest of Reasons by thy low beginning in the flesh to confound all Pride and to teach the Glories of the Earth to blush Yet thus born and thus
the participation of my Lord of Rochester A point necessarily infolding two different consequences for if it vvere done vvithout his knowledge vve must expect of himself either a decadence or a ruine if not vve must then expect a reparation by some other great publick satisfaction vvhere of the vvorld may take as much notice These clouds a few dayes vvill clear In the mean vvhile I dare pronounce of Sir Thomas Overbury that he shall return no more to this Stage unless Courts be governed every year by a new Philosophy for our old Principles vvill not bear it I have shewed my Lord and Ladies Sister your Letter of the 18. of April vvho return unto you their affectionate remembrances and I many thanks for it The King hath altered his journey to Thetford and determineth to entertain himself till the progress nearer London The Queen beginneth her journey upon Saturday towards Bathe Neither the Marquess di Villa vvho cometh from Savoy nor Don Pedro di Sarmientâ—… vvho shall reside here in the room of the present Spanish Ambassador are yet either arrived or near our Coast though both on the way So as I can yet but cast towards you a longing and in truth an envious look from this place of such servility in the getting and such uncertainty in the holding of fortunes where methinks we are all over-clouded with that sleep of Jacob when he saw some ascending and some descending but that those were Angels and these are men For in both what is it but a Dream And so Sir wishing this Paper in your hands to whom I dare communicate the freest of my thoughts I commit you to Gods continual Love and Blessings Your faithful poor Friend and Servant H. WOTTON I pray Sir let me in some corner of every Letter tell my sweet Niece that I love her extreamly SIR I Have newly received your last of the 25th of April and acquainted my Lord with the Postscript thereof touching your Fathers sickness of which he had heard somewhat before by Sir R. Drury who at the same time told him the like of my Lady your Mother But we hope now that the one was never true and that the other which you confirm will be light and sufferable even at heavy years The long expected Embassador from Savoy arrived rived yesternight at Dover so as now I begin by the vertue of a greedy desire to anticipate before hand and to devour already some part of that contentment which I shall shortly more really enjoy in your sight and conversation Sir Thomas Overbury is still in the Tower and the King hath since his imprisonment been twice here and is twice departed without any alteration in that matter or in other greater My Lord of Rochester partly by some relapse into his late infirmity and partly as it is interpreted through the grief of his mind is also this second time not gone with the King some argue upon it that disassiduity in a Favorite is a degree of declination but of this there is no appearance Only I have set it down to shew you the hasty Logick of Courtiers The Queen is on her journey towards Bathe My Lady Elizabeth and the Count Palatine having lain long in our poor Province of Kent languishing for a Wind which she sees though it be but a vapour Princes cannot command at length on Sunday last towards evening did put to Sea some eight days after a Book had been Printed and published in London of her entertainment at Heidelberg so nimble an Age it is And because I cannot end in a better jest I will bid you farewell for this week committing you and that most beloved Niece to Gods dearest blessings London this Thursday the 29th of April 1613. Your own in faithfullest love H. WOTTON 1613. SIR YOur Friend Sir Robert Killegrew hath been committed to the Fleet for conferring vvith a close Prisoner in a strange Language which were as I hear the two circumstances that did aggravate his error Of his case whose love drew him into it I can yet make no judgement The humour seemeth to be sharp and there is wisdom enough in those that have the handling of the Patient to manage the matter so that at length his banishment from the Court may be granted as a point of grace The nature of his alteration vvas as you rightly judge it in the first access somewhat apoplectical but yet mingled in my opinion vvith divers properties of a lethargy vvhereof we shall discourse more particularly vvhen vve meet which I novv long for besides other respects that vve may lay aside these Metaphors This very morning shall be heard at the Star-chamber the Case of Sir Peter Buck an Inhabitant at Rochester an Officer as I take it of the Navy who hath lain some good while in Prison for having written to a Friend of his at Dover a Letter containing this news That some of the Lords had kneeled down to the King for a toleration in Religion besides some particular aspersion in the said Letter of my Lord Privy Seal whom likewise of late a Preacher or two have disquieted whereby he hath been moved besides his own nature and as some think also besides his wisdom to call these things into publick discourse quae spreta exolescunt if ancient grave Sentences do not deceive us My Lady of Shrewsbury my Lord Gray and the Lady Arabella remain still close Prisoners since their last restraint vvhich I signified unto you in a little ticket Sir William Wade vvas yesternight put from the Lieutenancy of the Tower I set down these accidents barely as you see vvithout their causes vvhich in truth is a double fault vvriting both to a Friend and to a Philosopher but my lodging is so near the Star-chamber that my Pen shakes in my hand I hope therefore the Embassador of Savoy vvho hath already had two Audiences vvill quickly be gone that I may flie to you and ease my heart By the next Carrier I shall tell you all his business In the mean vvhile and ever our dear Saviour bless you Your faithful poor Friend to serve you H. WOTTON 1613. This Friday morning May 7. in such haste that I must leave my dear Niece unanswered till I can better assemble my spirits and call the aid of the Muses SIR YOur Kinsman and Friend Sir Robert Killegrew vvas in the Fleet from Wednesday of the last vveek till the Sunday following and no longer vvhich I reckon but an Ephemeral fit in respect of his infirmity vvho vvas the cause of it vvhich to my judgement doth every day appear more and more hectical Yesterday his Father petitioned the King as he came from the Chappel that his Son might have a Physician and a Servant allowed him as being much damaged in his health by close imprisonment vvhich for my part I believe for the diseases of Fortune have a kind of transfusion into the body and strong vvorking spirits vvanting their usual objects revert upon
themselves because the nature of the mind being ever in motion must either do or suffer I take pleasure speaking to a Philosopher to reduce as near as I can the irregularities of Court â—…o constant principles Novv to return to the matter The King hath granted the Physician but denied the Servant by vvhich you may guess at the issue for vvhen graces are managed so narrowly by a King otherwise of so gracious nature it doth in my opinion very clearly demonstrate the asperity of the offence Sir Gervis Elvis before one of the Pensioners is now sworn Lieuteâ—…nt of the Tower by the mediation of the House of Suffolk notwithstanding that my Lord of Roâ—…ster vvas the commender of Sir Iohn Keys to that charge vvhich the said Keys had for a good while and this maketh the case the more strange always supplied even by Patent in the absence of Sir William Wade Upon vvhich circumstances though they seem to bend another vvay the Logicians of the Court do make this conclusion That His Maâ—…sty satisfying the Suffolcians vvith petty things â—…tendeth to repair the Viscount Rochester in the â—…ain and gross And therefore all men contemâ—…ite Sir Henry Nevil for the future Secretary â—…me saying that it is but deferred till the return of the Queen that she may be allowed a hand in 〈◊〉 Introduction Which likewise will quiet the voices on the other side though surely that point be little necessary For yet did I never in the Country and much less in the Court see any thing done of this kind that was not afterwards approved by those that had most opposed it such vicissitudes there are here below as well as of the rest even of judgement and affection I vvould say more but I am suddenly surprized by the Secretary of the Savoy Embassador vvho I think vvill depart about the end of the Whitson holy-days for vvhich I languish With his businesses I can acquaint you nothing till the next vveek by reason of this surprizal And besides it hath disturbed my Muses so I must remain still in debt to my sweet Niece for that Poetical Postscript that dropped out of her Pen. I do weekly receive your Letters which in truth are more comfort then I could hope to purchase by mine so as vvhereas before I had determined to continue this my troubling of you but till I should see you next I have now made a resolution to plant a Staple and vvhensoever vve shall be separated to venture my vvhole poor stock in traffique vvith you finding the return so gainful unto me And so committing you to Gods dearest blessings I ever rest May 14. 1613. Your faithfullest poor Friend and Servant H. WOTTON SIR I Have not yet presented to my Lord that Box vvhich came vvith your Letter of this vveek for he removed on Wednesday vvith the King and Houshold to Greenwich And I still remain here to shevv you that the Court doth like a Loadstone dravv only those that are intra orbem virtutis suae I mean vvithin the compass and circle of profit The Savoy Ambassador seemeth in his second Audience to have discharged all his Commission or otherwise he vvanteth authority to proceed further then to a general overture till the arrival of the Cavalier Battista Gabaleoni vvho is hourly expected and is here to remain as Resident for the said Duke With him likewise come certain other Gentlemen of Title vvho should from the beginning have dignified the Ambassadors Train but the cause of this stragling vvas a sudden attempt vvhich the Duke immediately after the Ambassadors departure vvho appointed those Gentlemen to follovv him made upon the Marquisat of Monferato vvhere he surprized three Towns vvith the Petarde the first time as one writeth from Venice that ever that pestilent invention had been put in practice beyond the Alps. The cause of this attempt vvas for that the Cardinal Gonzaga novv Dukeâ—… of Mantua had yielded to send home the Dowager Infanta to the Duke of Savoy her Father but vvould retain her only Child a Daughter of two years in whose right the said Duke of Savoy pretendeth colourably enough to the foresaid vvhole Marquisat and clearly to all the moveables left by the late Duke of Mantua her Father vvho died intestat Into vvhich point of Law there entered besides some jealousie of State being unfit for respects that vvould have fallen easily into the apprehension of duller Princes than the Italian to leave a Child out of the custody of her Mother in his that was to gain by the death of it Yet am I of opinion vvho have a little contemplated the Duke of Savoy's complexion that nothing moved him more in this business then the threatnings of the French Queen vvho had before commanded Didiguires to fall into the said Dukes estates by vvay of diversion if he should meddle vvith the least Village in the Monserrato vvhich feminine menacement did no doubt incite him to do it out of the impatience of scorn And vvithal he built silently upon a ground vvhich could not vvell fail him That the King of Spain vvould never suffer the French Souldiers to taste any more of the Grapes and Melons of Lombardy because L'apetit vient en mangeant vvhich the issue of the businesses hath proved true for the Governor of Milan having raised a tumultuary Army of Horse and Foot did vvith it only keep things in stay from farther progres on both sides till the agreement vvas made between the Duke of Mantua himself in Person and the Prince of Piedmont vvithin the Town of Milan The accord is advertised the King from Venice and Paris The conditions vvill be better known at the arrival of Gabaleoni and then likewise vve shall see the bottom of this errand vvhich hath been hitherto nothing but a general proposition of a match between the same Lady that vvas formerly offered and our Prince novv living vvhich the Ambassador hath touched so tenderly as if he vvent to manage his Masters credit Upon the vvhole matter I cannot conceive though he seemeth to let fall some phrases of haste that he vvill be gone yet this fortnight or three vveeks till vvhen I languish And so let me end all my Letters ever resting May 21. 1613. Your faithfullest poor Friend and Servant H. WOTTON May the 27. SIR J do as unwillingly put my Pen to tell you as I am sure you will be to hear vvhat hath befallen my Nephew Albertus this week He was going on Friday last towards evening in a Coach alone whose driver alighting I know not upon what occasion hard by Charing-Cross the Horses being young took some affrightment and running away so furiously that one of them tore all his belly open upon the corner of a Beer Cart my Nephew who in this mean while adventured to leap out seemeth to have hung on one of the pins of the Boot from whence strugling to get loose he brake the waste-band of his Hose behind and so fell with the greater
violence on the ground hurting only the hindermost part of his head by what possibility we cannot conceive unless the motion of the Coach did turn him round in the fall The force of the concussion took from him for some hour or thereabouts the use of his voice and sense which are now well restored only there yet remaineth in his left arm a kind of Paralitical stupefaction and his right eye-lid is all black with some knock that he took in the agitation of the Coach which peradventure may have been the motive to make him leap out But these external evils do not so much trouble us as an inward pungent and pulsatory ach withing the skull somewhat lower then the place of his hurt which hath continued more or less since his fall notwithstanding twice letting blood and some nights of good rest and shaving of his head for the better transpiration which we doubt the more because it cometh sine ratione his hurt being only in the flesâ—…y part and very sleight without fracture of the skull without inflammation without any Feaver and all the principal faculties as memory discourse imagination untainted The King hath in this time much consolated us both with sending unto him and with expressing publickly a gracious feeling of his case but we must fetch our true comforts from him who is Lord of the whole and so I leave it Since my last unto you I am sure you hear how Sir Robert Mansfield hath been twice or thrice convented before the Lords and committed to the Marshalsie partly for having consulted with Mr. Whitlock the Lawyer about the validity of a Commission drawn for a re-search into the Office of the Admiralty whereof himself is an Accomptant and partly for denying to reveal the name of the said Lawyer his Friend who before had been committed to the Fleet for another case much of the same nature The point toucheth a limb of the Kings Prerogative and immediate Authority Sir Robert Mansfield's Answers by report had as much of the Philosopher or of the Hermite as of the Souldier or Courtier professing openly his little care of this World or of his own Fortunes in it and divers other phrases of that complexion Sir Thomas Overbury is still where he was and as he was without any alteration The Viscount Rochester yet no way sinking in the point of favour which are two strange consistents Sir R. Drury runneth at the Ring corbeteth his Horse before the Kings window haunteth my Lord of Rochesters Chamber even when himself is not there and in secret divideth his observances between him and the House of Suffolk And all this they say to be Embassador at Bruxels So as super uta materia I see appetites are not all of a kind Some go to the Tower for the avoiding of that which another doth languish to obtain I will end with my Paper and by the next Carrier either tell you precisely when I shall see you or prevent the telling of it And so our sweet Saviour bless you and my dear Niece H. WOTTON SIR BY the next Carrier for yet I must say so again you shall hear when this Embassador will be gone The mean while let me entertain you with the inclosed Paper which the Duke of Savoy hath published in his own defence joyning together the Sword and Reason Sir Robert Mansfield is still in restraint Sir Thomas Overbury not only out of liberty as he was but almost now out of Discourse We have lately started at a dispatch from Ireland importing a variance there about the choice of a Speaker in the summoned Parliament which came to so sharp a point that the Deputy was fain to fetch wisdome from hence Sure it is that the humours of that Kingdome are very hovering and much awaked with an apprehension taken that we mean to fetter them with Laws of their own making which in tâ—…th were an ingenious strain of State My 〈◊〉 and Lady are stollen down into Kent for a few dayes to take in some fresh air They go not this next Progress if my Brother can get leave of the King to see his Grand-children where he intends to spend some fortnight and the rest of the time between Boughton and Canterbury A Match treated and managed to a fair probability between my Lord Cook 's Heir and the second Daughter of Sir Arthur Throckmorton is suddenly broken the said Lord Cook having underhand entertained discourse about the Daughter of the late Sir Thomas Bartlet who in defect of her Brother shall be Heir of that Name I have nothing more to say and therefore God keep you and my sweet Neice in his continual love Your poor Uncle faithfull Friend and willing Servant H. WOTTON Albertus God be thanked groweth better and better and in the midst of his own pains hath remembred those in Suffolk whom we both so much honour SIR IN my last I told you that the Ambassador of Savoy was to meet the Queen at Windsor which pains she hath spared him by her own coming yesternight to Greenwich where I think she will settle her self a day or two before she admit him Now seeing the time of the Commencement at Cambridge so near as it is and being able to determine of this Ambassadors departure within that space I have resolved to take those Philosophical exercises in my way to you hoping in the mean time to see Albertus admitted by Oath to a Clarkship of the Council or at least to the next vacancy for he is now strong enough again to swear Sir Robert Mansfield and Mr. Whitlock were on Saturday last called to a very honourable hearing in the Queens Presence Chamber at Whitehall before the Lords of the Council with intervention of my Lord Cook the Lord chief Baron of the Exchequer and Master of the Rolls the Lord chief Justice being kept at home with some infirmity There the Attorny and Sollicitor first undertook Mr. Whitlock and the Recorder as the Kings Sergeant Sir Robert Mansfield charging the one as a Counsellor the other as a questioner in matters of the Kings Prerogative and Soveraignty upon occasion of a Commission intended for a research into the administration of the Admiralty against vvhich the said Sir Robert Mansfield being himself so principal an Officer therein had sought some provision of advice and This vvas the summe of the charge vvhich vvas diversly amplified Whitlock in his answer spake more confusedly then vvas expected from a Lawyer and the Knight more temperately then vvas expected from a Souldier There vvas likewise some difference noted not only in the manner but in the substance between them For Whitlock ended his speech vvith an absolute confession of his own offence and vvith a promise of imploying himself hereafter in defence of the Kings prerogative Sir Robert Mansfield on the other side laboured to distinguish between the errour of his acts and the integrity of his zeal and affection towards the King his Master protesting he should hold
which shall be done as soon as I have sealed this and sent it to the Carriers I thought now to have said no more but lest it lose the grace of freshness I pray let me tell you that yesterday morning the Viscount Rochester was very solemnly in the Banqueting hall in the sight of many great ones and small ones created Earl of Somerset and in the afternoon for a farther honouring and signalizing of the day my Lord Cook brought in by the said Earl was sworn a Privy Counsellor to counterpoise the difference of the profit between the Common-pleas and the Kings Bench. I will turn over the leaf though I die for it to remember the heartiest love of my soul to that good Niece to that sweet Niece to whom I have much to say by the next opportunity Our dear Saviour keep you both in his continual love Your faithful Servant H. WOTTON Touching the project of our House believe it Sir I boyl in it and am ready to begin again that I may tell you how busie I have been in the matter but let this also be put over till the following week which is likely to fall heavy upon you Written on the day of our great Preservation for which our God be ever glorified On Tuesday the 16th of November SIR AN express Messenger will ease us both of the trouble of a cypher but I was in pain whether I should send another or be that Messenger my self being now as near you as Royston and scant able to obtain pardon of mine own severity for not passing farther yet this may be said for me that the present occasion required little noise and besides I am newly ingaged into some business whereof I will give you a particular account when I shall first have discharged that part which belongeth to your self My Lord my Brother having been acquainted with the matter inclosed in your last to me dispatched the very next day Mr. Pen down to Boughton for such writings as had passed at your marriage which having consulted with his Lawyers he found those things to stand in several natures according to the annexed Schedule For the point of your coming up he referreth that to your own heart and I have only charge from him to tell you that without any such occasion as this which seemeth to imply your affectionate respect of his Daughter your own Person and conversation shall be ever most welcome and dear unto him As for my Lady through whose knowledge and myself through whose hands you have passed this point of confidence if you could behold us and compare us with my Lord you should see though no difference in the reality yet some in the fashion For to him you must allow the sober forms of his age and place but we on the other side are mad with gladness at the hope we have now taken by this occasion of enjoying both you and my Niece this Winter at London and we are contented to profess it as profusely as it is possible for a better Pen to set it down Nay for my part who in this case have somewhat single I flatter my self yet farther that the Term whereof not much now remaineth will accelerate your coming vvhich if you resolve I pray then let me only by this Bearer know it that I may provide you some fit Lodgings at a good distance from White-Hall for the preservation of blessed liberty and avoidance of the comber of kindness vvhich in troth as vve have privately discoursed is no small one Novv touching my self It may please you Sir to understand That the King vvhen he vvas last at Hampton called me to him and there acquainted me vvith a general purpose that he had to put me again into some use Since vvhich time the French Ambassador and very lately having at an Audience of good length besought His Majesty I knovv not vvhether voluntarily or set on by some of our own to disincumber himself of frequent accesses by the choice of some confident Servant to vvhom the said Ambassador might address himself in such occurrences as did not require the Kings immediate ear It pleased him to nominate me for that charge vvith more gracious commendation then it can beseem me to repeat though I vvrite to a Friend in vvhose breast I dare depose even my vanities But lest you should mistake as some others have been apt to do here in the present constitution of the Court vvhich is very ombragious the Kings end in this application of me I must tell you that it is only for the better preparing of my insufficiency and vveakness for the succeeding of Sir Thomas Edmunds in France towards which His Majesty hath thought meet first to indue me vvith some knowledge of the French businesses vvhich are in motu And I think my going thither vvill be about Easter Thus you see Sir both my next remove and the exercise of my thoughts till then vvherewith there is joyned this comfort besides the redemption from expence and debt at home vvhich are the Gulfs that vvould swallovv me that His Majesty hath promised to do something for me before I go I should novv according to the promise of my last tell you many things vvherewith my Pen is swoln but I vvill beg leave to defer them till the next opportunity after my coming to London And they shall all give place novv to this one question Whether there be any thing in this intended journey that you vvill command Which having said I vvill end ever resting Your faithfullest poor Friend and Servant H. WOTTON June 8. 1614. SIR IT is both morally and naturally true that I have never been in perfect health and chearfulness since we parted but I have entertained my mind when my body would give me leave with the contemplation of the strangest thing that ever I beheld commonly called in our Language as I take it a Parliament which hath produced nothing but inexplicable Riddles in the place of Laws For first it is aborted before it was born and nullified after it had a being insomuch as the Count Palatine whose Naturalization was the only thing that passed in both Houses is now again an Alien And whereas all other Parliaments have had some one eminent quality that hath created a denomination some being called in our Records mad Parliaments some merciless and the like This I think from two properties almost insociable or seldom meeting may be termed the Parliament of greatest diligence and of least resolution that ever was or ever will be For our Committies were as well attended commonly as full Houses in former Sessions and yet we did nothing neither in the forenoon nor after whereof I can yield you no reason but this one that our diversions were more then our main purposes and some of so sensible nature as took up all our reason and all our passion in the pursuit of them Now Sir what hath followed since the dissolution of this Civil Body let me rather
own Instrument as to represent it con buon ' sapore but yet no further then the matter would bear which was but a generality of good will and no direct satisfaction And whereas now they did desire me likewise to reiterate to the King my Master their great sensibility of the Common Interest I told them ingeniously con un ' stringer di spalle that I knew not well how to do it till they gave me more subject For Philosophy whose naked Principles I had more studied then Art of Language had taught me even in one of her most Fundamental Maxims that ex nihilo nihil fit Hereupon the Duke fell very seriously to dilate upon the Senates Answer and left me indeed with some occasion of contentment For he told me I might mark by the said Answer a Resolution in the Senate not to neglect a Cause wherein they held themselves so interessed and as had been said before already actually ingaged though the business of the Grisons and the new noise from thence did at the present distract them Of this I took presently hold replying That I would receive this Speech as a Commentary upon the Senates Answer and represent unto his Majesty that when the principal reason of their excuse should cease namely these fresh stirrings so near them which seemed to require their abetment then they would give us more particular satisfaction For which to rivet it the better I gave thanks and told him I would hearken after the issue of this Rhetian noise and accordingly put him in mind again of our own necessities to which he gave me un gratioso accenamènto and so fell to tell me with extream gladness their news of the late defeat given by Mansfelt to the Bavarian Troops Now to collect the fruit of my poor endeavors thus we stand If action shall grow on this side we shall surely receive more benefit by that diversion then we should by contribution For the Arch-duke Leopoldo would by chance be drawn from Alsatia to think of Tirol and the Neapolitan and Milan Levies which should supply Germany will be spent here If Italy be quiet then dicam audax verbum this State must necessarily help us that it may be so stil for I shall not need to make them sensible of the vicissitude of humane troubles either here or there which is their common Text But all dependeth upon his Majesties urging of his own merits which was my highest Argument together with that Obligation which he will acknowledge as his own gracious Letters import This account I send with some diligence that it may prevent the new Venetian Ambassadors first Audience or at least the leave-taking of the old into whom it may please his Majesty to infuse his good thoughts and to take notice of these Audiences which I had here in the way of his Service And so the Lord of Heaven bless Him and His. POST SCRIPT Signior Filippo Calandini came hither vvith Instructions from the States much resembling a Quadruple entrenchment vvherein being beaten from the first he vvas to retire to the second and so forth The first vvas To sollicite a free and open Contribution The second That they vvould at least Contribute under the Name of the said States The third That they vvould Contribute joyntly vvith the States The fourth That at least they vvould pay the Arearages of 10000 Florins per mensem that have run due by virtue of their League from the 9th of April 1621. Since vvhich term the said States pretend to have re-entred into Action and in this Case the States promise to contribute five of those Months to the Elector Novv considering the hopeful Answer that I have received I have dealt vvith Signior Calandrini to spend the perswasion of the States in the first point absolutely and in the last to urge only the Arearages upon the Contract vvithout adding the intention of the States to contribute any portion thereof to the Elector least it might prejudice the hope of a greater Contribution vvhich no doubt his Majesty may have from hence if it please him to urge his own merits 1624. S. P. I Send you both the inclosed unclosed and my Seal vvithal that vvhen you have perused them you may seal them for because they contain a recommendation of your self it vvere somewhat incongruous to present them open You had yesterday received them but that I suspended my hand too long in expectation of Iames about vvhom vve are yet in much doubt of some misadventure by his stay You see that in the Postscript to the Duke I mention the design of Caprarola vvhich I have left out of his Letter that you may not come unto him vvith empty hands It shall be fit for your self to offer him your service abroad which I have as you see offered the Prince through Mr. Thomas Carie's hands who I hope will let his Highness see my Letter And so languishing to hear somewhat from my Nephew with all my duties remembred to all I rest This Tuesday Morning Your ever true Friend HENRY WOTTON Upon the Design you must play the Mountebank And tell the Duke that the one Paper containeth the Plant or ground-Lines the other the reared work in Perspective with all the Dimensions so exactly as if it please him he may easily have a Model made thereof in Pastboard If Mr. Thomas Cary should by chance have been sent away again into France then deliver with my humble service the Letter to my Lord of Lepington his Father and beseech him to shew it the Prince May 1626. The Copy of my Report after the Examination of the Lord of Oldebare's Daughter ACcording to His Majesties good pleasure signified unto me by an Order from His Counsel Table under the 19th of May and delivered by an express Messenger on Monday morning the 22. of the said Moneth at His Majesties Colledge of Eton that I should examine the Lord of Oldebare's Daughter now resident in the Town of Windsor in the circumstances of a business which His Majesty had committed to my trust vid. concerning a certain Roll of Names mentioned in a late malicious diffamatory Pamphlet which one George Eglisham had scattered in Print pretending therein that it was a Roll of divers great Personages which were to be poysoned by the now Duke of Buckingham and among those Great ones the said George Eglisham himself for one which said Roll as the said Eglisham affirmeth the foresaid Daughter of the Lord Oldebare had brought to the late Lord Marquess of Hamilton her Cousin who was one of the inrolled to be poysoned grounding this defamation upon the testimony of that Roll brought by the said Gentlewoman to the foresaid Marquess I say According to His Majesties Command herein I repaired the next day after the receit thereof to the said Lord of Oldebare's Daughter by Name Anne Lion though not nominated by the foresaid Eglisham but under her Fathers Title at her Lodging in Windsor where I found her