Letter had followed the News of the Sermon if it had been a Chicken of the same Brood Finally There was nothing done that needed a Recantation Yet Opinions were so various that some spread it for a Fame That the Prince himself gave the Lord Keeper no Thanks for his Labour But that which follows will encounter it to break the Chaw-bone of the Lye as it is to be found in a Postscript of his to the Duke Cab. p. 85. May it please your Grace I Troubled his Highness with a long Relation of the Consulto we had about his Majesties taking the Oaths About which I was affrighted by Great Men that I had done his Highness a Displeasure to press his Majesty to assent to the same And I protest I was so poorly accompanied in my Opinion that I was truly afraid I had not done well And therefore I took occasion to write my Reasons at large to the Prince which I heard by Sir John Hipsley from your Grace was well taken I humbly thank your Grace who I know forwarded the same And so I perceive by a Letter from his Highness so full of sweetness as I am overwhelmed That sweet Letter is preserved written every Syllable with his Highness's own Hand which will shew the sufficiency of his Pen at those young Years but much more the Pleasure he took in those that did him faithful Service My Lord THere are three Circumstances which double any Good Turn that one Friend does to another To be done in absence being undesired and in time of Necessity You have not only done me a Friendly Office but in a time when my Reputation lay at the Stake I being absent upon an Occasion that few are fully satisfied with and in a thing that I did not particularly ask your help in And lastly With that which Crowns every Action Good Success I will not say how much I am bound to you for this For it were too much a Complementary way which I neither love nor am good at but only that I desire to have an Occasion to requite though not to put me out of this Debt How things stand here you have known before this time And I have nothing as yet to desire you to facilitate with you If you desire to know how soon I shall begin my Journey homeward I think certainly that it will be about the 27th of the next Month. But I fear that the Infanta shall not go with me So I end Your loving and constant Friend Charles P. Madrid July 30. 1623. This was sent away in 17 Days after the Agreement was struck up at Wansted Happy are they who being put to drudge at the Plough of State-Affairs do reap the Harvest of such Gracious Acceptance And a Prince will find it true that he gets as many Hearts when he receives the Devoirs of his Subjects comfortably and smilingly as when he rewards them bountifully So Pliny in the Paneg. to Trajan Non minùs regium summaeque humanitatis parva lubenti facilique suscipere animo quà m magna largiri A King cannot always reward but he may always commend the well-deserving of his Vassals Which is good Interest though it be not the Principal For an Ingenuous Servant that is not yet gratified is solaced with Hope But he that is not stroak'd with good Words is discourag'd for ever 153. Enough is contein'd in this little touch that his Highness in his Letter of surpassing Love was just to himself as well as gracious to his trusty Minister One Man's Wit wrought Miracles here to soder up all the broken pieces of the business Though the Prince had skilful Men about him yet there wanted such another Head-piece at his Elbow in Spain I cannot but think of him when I remember what Cuiacius said of his great Master in the Caesarean Law Nemo unus erit unquam Papinianus Neither let his Praise fall lower because he was not a Nestor in Years For he was elder at this time than Papinian was when he died He followed the Cares of the Prince in Madrid when his Imployment was call'd for but being far off not altogether with the like success It was hot Weather now in that Torrid Climate the Bocca Difurno as they call it and the Treaty of the Match was not a little scorch'd The Duke wrote to the Lord Keeper July 8. That he did not altogether distrust a good End His Highness in his July 30. seems to presage That he hop'd for a desired End The Words are sufficiently chearful but some Art was in them For perusing the very Reports of those gallant Persons when they came into England I find all things about this time look very sickly and with a Face of Consumption The Earl of Bristol an understanding Author in these Affairs writes That the Match was so really intended that it was past all danger of miscarrying if the fault were not on our side yet together he confesseth That the Spaniards have committed many Errours in their proceeding with the Prince Cab. P. 23. Right For 't is easie to tumble forth an huddle of them at this time The Ratification of the Articles was ready to be publish'd by the Nuncio after much ado But the Pope dies July 8. Benè fecit Regulus quod mortuus est melius si ante says Pliny Lib. 6. Ep. ad Arn. But well had it been if old Gregory had lived longer or died sooner The Life of his Dispensation and Confirmations expired with him All the Ground we had trod must be trod over again and we are carried back to the beginning of the Race from whence we started And no coming forward no not a foot till St. Peter's Chair was fill'd again Whose Successor was not chosen till August the 6th Nor he at leisure to mind this Matter in his new Pontificality till September Nor a second Impression of a Dispensation to be gotten till November even spent Who would not have consider'd the Disdain that a generous Love and a more generous Mind must conceive to have the Cherry bob at his Lip and to be snatcht from him Quo propiùs accesseris ad spem fruendi hòc impatientius careas says the same Pliny Lib. 6. Ep. 1. But let a free born Spirit see what it is to wait upon the Papal Pleasure so lingring so imperious I know not which is worst Christianity bids us submit to them which watch over our Souls Heb. 13. but it doth not make us Religious Slaves Therefore the Prince declar'd it for his resolute Mind That he would not abide the delay of the next Missive from Rome nor stay for the Birth of another Elephant Neither should all the Syrens in Spain stop his departure Which made them whisper That his Highness would rob them of his Company and take no leave and set some though not openly to keep Centinel to prevent him Which surmise he confronted with a Message equal to the best of the ancient Apophthegms That though he
it that the Impulsive of it was the supposed Irregularity which was then reviv'd but because he would not Licence a Sermon of Dr. Sibthorp's which the King sent to him by Mr. W. Murry of the Bed-chamber for his Hand to the Printing which he denied saying There was some Doctrine in the Sermon which was contrary to his Judgment I write I confess by hear-say but I heard it from his own mouth and have it in a Manuscript under his own Hand It had been a wild thing to rake up the Irregularity again out of the Embers since in the interim he had Consecrated many Prelates nay since he had Consecrated the Elements of Christ's Supper at the King's Coronation and set the Crown upon His Majesties Head And not long after he returned from Foord to a Parliament Summon'd to begin March 17. 1627. he Consecrated that Learned Divine Mr. Richard Montagu Promoted to the See of Chichester at Croydon Aug. 24. 1628. Yet that great Scholar had Presented his studied Papers for the Irregularity to the Lord-Keeper more then any man But now he was satisfied to be Consecrated by the whilom Irregular supposed And at the same time Dr. Laud then Bishop of London was Assistant with the Arch-Bishop to impose Hands Such Changes there are in Human Judgments 80. Perhaps I may be thought Irregular my self that I have knit the Election and Consecration of the Bishop of Lincoln to the long Series and Discussion of this famous Case I crave Pardon if I want one Now I step back to the Lord-Keeper who before the end of June was a Keeper of more then he desired the Earl of Southampton one of his dearest Friends on Earth being committed a Prisoner to his Custody A worthy Lord and of a gallant Freedom yet such as less then Kings do not like In the Session of Parliament which was then newly ended he was interpreted to exceed in some words against the Royal Prerogative a Stone of Offence that lay in many men's ways Beside he had Rebuk'd the Lord Marquess of Buckingham with some Passion and Acrimony for speaking often to the same thing in the House and out of Order Therefore he was Confined but with as much Gentleness as could be devised rather to a Nurse then a Jaylor But the Lord-Keeper though he lik'd his Guest yet he preferred his Liberty before that Liking and never gave over till he had got his Enlargement discharged him from the Attendance of Sir William Parkhust who as a Spy was sent to wait upon him at Tichfield that he might be lest only to the Custody of his own good Angel as he writes Cabal p. 59. Likewise in Tenderness to the Earl's Wealth and Honour he kept him from an Information in Star-chamber which was threatned and buoy'd him up at last to the King's Favour so as he might rather expect new Additions then suspect the least Diminution from his Gracious Majesty Though all this came purely from his Love and Industry yet of all that was obtained he would take nothing to himself but directed the Earl to cast his Eye upon my Lord of Buckingham Of whose extraordinary Goodness says he your Lordship and my self are remarkabe Reflections the one of his Sweetness in forgetting Wrongs the other of his Forwardness in conserring Court sies These Passages occur in the Printed Bundle But there is a Letter the Publisher of the former did not meet with it dated two days before Jul. 19. written to the Lord Marquess in behalf of that Honourable Earl and likewise of Mr. J. Selden my great Friend while he lived who was clap'd up at the same time because being a Member of the House of Commons in that Parliament he had preferred the danger of telling Truth before the safety of Silence Thus for them both together he Solicites My most Noble Lord WHat true Applause and Admiration the King and your Honour have gained for that gracious and most Christian-like Remorse shewed the E. of Southampton a Delinquent by his own Confession I refer to the Relation of others lest I might be suspected to amplifie any thing which my self had propounded The Earl if he be a Christian or a moral honest Man will endeavour to regain His Majesty's further Favour by more observance and to requite your unexpressible Goodness towards him by all true and hearty Friendship both which he deeply Vows and Protests Now poor Mr. Selden flies to the same Altar of Mercy and humbly Petitioneth your Lordship's Mediation and Furtherance He and the World take knowledge of that Favour your Lordship hath ever offorded my motions and my self without the motion of any and so draweth me along to Entreat for him The which I do the more boldly because by his Letter inclosed he hath utterly denied that ever he gave the least Approbation of that Power of Judicature lately usurped by the House of Commons My Lord The man hath excellent Parts which may be diverted from an Affectation of Applause of idle People to do some good and useful Service to His Majesty He is but young and this is the first Offence that ever he committed against the King I presume therefore to leave him to your Lordship's Mercy and Charity These soft words mollified Anger and Mr. Selden was Released by the next Pacquet that came from the Court in progress If the Stoics had been wise men truly the Lord-Keeper had been none for they pronounced with their Master Zeno in Laertius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That wise Men are not Pitiful But insooth there was never a greater Stickler then he to bring Afflicted Ones out of Durance and Misery when he could effect it by Power and Favour none that lent their hand more readily to raise up those that were cast down But if a Gentleman of Mr. Selden's merit were under the peril of Vindicative Justice he would stretch his whole Interest and cast his own Robe as it were to save him When he had brought him to Liberty he stay'd not there He perceived his Fortune in those days was not equal to his Learning therefore he conferred the Registership of the College of Westminster upon him not meaning to hinder his Growth with a Garment that was too little for him but he procured a Chapman that gave him 400 l. for his Right in the Place A Courtesie which Mr. Selden did never expect from the Giver and was repaid with more Duty and Love then the Giver could ever have expected from Mr. Selden And although that singular good Scholar Mr. Montagu did never agree with Mr. Selden as their Adverse and Polemical Writings about the Right of Tithes do evidence yet the Lord-Keeper made them both agree in his Favour and Patronage Which Mr. Montagu hath proclaimed abroad in his Treatise of Invocation of Saints Licensed for the Press with his Lordship 's own Hand in Right as he was his Visitor in the Colleges of Windsor and Eaton His Words may be found in the Epistle Dedicatory
and Decrees of my Predecessors I would be loth to succeed any man as Metellus did Caius Verres Cuius omnia erant ejusmodi ut totam Verris Praeturam retexere videretur Whose Carriage saith Tully was a meer Penclopes Web and untwisting of all the Acts of Verres ' s Pretorship Upon New matter I cannot avoid the re-viewing of a Cause but I will ever expect the forbearing of Persons so as the Ashes of the Dead may be hereafter spared and the Dust of the Living no further Raked Fourthly I will be as cautelous as I can in referring of Causes which I hold of the same Nature of a By-way Motion For one Reference that Spurs on a Cause there are ten that bridle it in and hold it from hearing This is that which Bias calls the backward forwarding of a Cause for as the Historian speaks Quod procedere non potest recedit Fifthly I profess before hand this Court shall be no Sanctuary for Undiscreet and Desperate Sureties It is a Ground of the Common Law That a man shall make no Advantage of his own Follies and Laches When the Mony is to be borrowed the Surety is the first in the Intention and therefore if it be not paid let him a God's Name be the first in Execution Lastly I will follow the Rules of this Court in all Circumstances as near as I can And considering that as Pliny speaks Stultissimum est adimitandum non optima quaeque proponere It were a great Folly to make Choice of any other then the very best for Imitation I will propound my Old Master for my Pattern and Precedent in all things Beseeching Almighty God so to direct me That while I hold this place I may follow him by a True and Constant imitation And if I prove Unfit and Unable for the same That I may not play the Mountebank so in this Place as to Abuse the King and the State but follow the same most Worthy Lord in his Chearful and Voluntary Resignation Sic mihi contingat vivere sicque mori 88. This he deliver'd thus much and I took Councel with my self not to Abbreviate it For it is so Compact and Pithy That he that likes a little must like it all Plutarch gives a Rule for Sanity to him that Eats a Tortoise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eat it up all or not a whit for a Modicum will Gripe the Belly He that fills himself with a great deal shall procure a Cleansing Evacuation So the Speech of a Great Orator is Instructive when it is entire Pinch it in with an Epitome you mangle the meaning and avile the Eloquence From Words he fell to Practise Industry I think was his Recreation for certain he had not a drop of Lazy Blood in his Veins He fill'd up every hour of the Day and a good part of the Night with the dispatch of some public and necessary business And though as a Counsellor of State and both as a Peer and Speaker in Parliament he had many diversions yet none of the work in Chancery was diminish'd which Attendance grew so light and familiar to him that in a little while it seem'd to be no more a burthen to him then the Water is to the Fishes under which they Swim He would not excuse himself a day for any the most lawful pretence he would not impart himself to the Star-Chamber or Parliament when it sate before he had spent two hours or more among the Pleaders Two or three Afternoons he Allotted every Week to hear Peremptories By which unequall'd diligence commonly he dispatch'd five or six Causes in a morning according to the quality or measure of the Points that came to be debated He did not only labour Six Days but as it follows in the Commandment He did all that he had to do For of all the Causes that were usually set down for hearing he never left any of them unheard at the End of the Term which was both an especial Ease and Comfort to the Subject and a full Testimony of his labour and ability to expedite so many Knotty and Spacious Causes that came before him in as little time as the Clients could expect The Survey of an whole year will give better satisfaction then every Term a part by it self Whereupon he Writes thus to the Lord Marquess July 10. 1622. In this Place I have now serv'd His Majesty one whole Year diligently and honestly But to my Hearts Grief by Reason of my Rawness and Inexperience very unprofitably Yet if his Majesty will Examine the Regâ—ers there will be found more Causes finally Ended this one Year then in all the Seven Years preceding How well ended I confess ingeniously I know not His Majesty and your Lordship who no doubt have Received some Complaints though in your Love 〈…〉 from me are in that the most competent Judges A Testimony of Great Labour and not more Copious then Clear For the Registry could not I ye Thus Joseph in his faithful Service under King Pharaoh gather'd in as much in one Year as was wont to be Reap'd in Seven And truly it becomes him that he was not confident but mistrustful of himself least some Waspish and Vexatious men had attempted to lay open some Errors to his Superiors which should escape him in fixing so many Planetary Causes But there was I had almost said none Yet then I had forgotten Sir John Bourcher who complain'd to both Houses of Parliament that his matters in debate were for ever shut up in a Decree before his Counsel was ready having some Allegations which expected more time to be Ripen'd still more time The business of this Knight was Arbitrated with consent by the Chief Baron Jac. 7. That Arbitration he would not stand to It was Decreed in full hearing by the Lord Elsmore Jac. 10. This did not please him Yet it was Order'd to the same Effect by the Lord Bacon Jac. 17. And after this the same Decree was confirm'd by the Lord William's Jac. 19. Having the consent of Justice Hutton Justice Chamberlain and the Master of the Rolls with an hundred Pounds advantage more then was given him before And was not this Suit come to Adultage for Tryal after Seventeen Years Vexation in it first and last If a Suitor shall have Power to define when his Cause is sufficiently heard a Fidler would not undertake the Office of a Judge Sir John durst not have presum'd to this Boldness but that he was encourag'd by his Father-in-Law the Lord Sheffeild who was a Scholar a Judicious Lord and of great Experience that knew well enough the Futility of this Appeal for it was discharg'd with a general Rebuke But the Spirits usually beat with an un even Pulse when they stirr too much in pity to our own Relations 89. Some others there were I yet remember it of the coarsest Retainers to Court who liv'd by picking up Crumbs that fell from Stale Bread these Whisper'd their Discontents that Causes
he should be Executing the Riger of his Laws against Papists at Home while he did labour for Peace to them of the Religion Abroad The most likely way to obtain what he did seek of those Princes being a Moderation of the Severity of Laws against Priests and Papists at least for a time Thus far that wise man but the Reason was stronger than he enforc'd it For in sundry Places beyond our Seas the Churches of the most disconsolate Reformed were never so near if not to an Extirpation yet to an utter Dispersion Those in Bohemia and Moravia were hunted from Hole to Hole by the Emperor's Men of War The King of Spain was Victorious over the persecuted Servants of Christ in the Val-Teline The King of France prepared to lay Siege to Rochel and to all his fenced Cities that were in the Hands of the Protestants The Duke of Savoy was suspected that he would watch this time to surround Geneva with an Army while Cuspis Martis shin'd so sinistrously upon their Brethren every where Now what Remedy was more ready to pacifie these destroying Angels for their Sakes with whom we walk'd in the House of God as Friends then to begin in Clemency to those among us that carry their Mark Can a Kingdom be governed without such Correspondencies Salmasius in his Notes upon Simplicius introduceth Aristides Sirnamed the Just that he was compell'd to unpeg his Rigor and to make it go to a softer Tune in rugged Times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he translates it Quod rationibus patrae se accommodaret quae multâ injustitiâ opus habert Necessity is so great a Part of Reason that that is Justice which looks like Injustice because of Necessity Our good People forsooth would have the Protestants suffer no Ill Abroad under the Dominions of the Pontificians and yet mitigate no Severity to Pontisicians under the Dominion of Protestants Hand stulte sapis siquidem id est sapere velle id quod non potest contingore says the Comaedian This is wisely laid if a thing may be wisely laid which can never be effected I am not able to express this so well as the Lord Keeper hath done in his Sermon preached at King James's Funeral P. 49. This Blessed King in all the time I serv'd him did never out of deep and just reason of State and the bitter Necessity of Christendom in these latter Times give way to any the least Connivance in the World towards the Person of a Papist for to his Doctrine he never did he never would do nor was there any Consideration under Heaven would have forc'd him thereunto but he strictly guided himself in the same by some notable Precedent of Queen Elizabeth the Load-Star of all his greatest Actions and that in the very Point and bath'd his Favours in Showers of Tears I speak it in the Presence of Almighty God least those Intendments of his for the apparent Good of the State might scandalize for all that in an oblique Line his weak but well-meaning Subjects in their Religion and Doctrine This was a Testimony of the Integrity of these Proceedings almost three years after But for present and full Satisfaction here followeth a long Letter anticipated in the Cabal but here inserted in its proper Place which was written to the Lord Viscount Anan by the same Hand Sept. 17. 1622 declaring the Nature and Reason of the Clemency at that time extended to the Lay-Recusants of England Right Honourable 104. I Owe more Service to that true Love and former Acquaintance which your Lordship hath been pleased to afford me now these full ten years then to be sparing or reserved in satisfying your Lordship about any doubt whatsoever The Resolution whereof shall lie in my Power Concerning that Offence taken by many people both this side the Borders and in Scotland from that Clemency which his Majesty was pleased to extend to the Imprisoned Lay-Recusants of this Kingdom And my Letter Written to the Justices for the Reigling of the same which your Lordship did intimate unto me yesterday at Mr. Henry Gibb his House out of some News received from a Peer of Scotland This is the plainest return I can make unto your Lordship In the general as the Sun in the Firmament appears unto us no bigger then a Platter and the Stars but as so many Nails in the Pomel of a Saddle because of that Esloinment and Disproportion between our Eyes and the Object So there is such an un-measurable distance betwixt the deep Resolution of a Prince and the shallow Apprehension of Common and Ordinary people that as they will be ever Judging and Censuring so they must be Obnoxious to Error and Mistaking Particularly for as much as concerns my self I must leave my former Life my Profession my continual Preaching my Writing which is extant in the Hands of many my private Endeavours about some great Persons and the whole bent of my Actions which in the place I live in cannot be conceal'd to Testifie unto the World what favour I am like to importune for the Papists in point of Religion For the King my Master I will tell you a Story out of Velleius Paterculus A Surveyor bragging to M. Livius Drusus that he would so contrive his House Ut libera à conspectu immunis ab omnibus Arbitris esset That it should stand Removed out of sight and be past all danger of Peeping or Eaves-dropping was answer'd again by Drusus Tu vero si quid in te artis est ita compone domum meam ut quicquid agam ab omnibus conspici possit Nay my good Friend if you have any devices in your head contrive my House after such a manner that all the World may see what I do therein So if I should endeavour to flourish up some Artificial Vault to hide and conceal the intentions of his Majesty I know I should receive the same Thanks that the Surveyor did from M. Drusus I was not called to Counsel by his Royal Majesty when the Resolution of this Clemency to the Lay-Recusants was first concluded But if I had been asked my Opinion I should have advised it without the least Hesitation His Majesty was so Popishly addicted at this time that to the incredible exhaustments of his Treasury he was a most Zealous Interceder for some Ease and Refreshment to all the Protestants in Europe his own Dominions and Denmark only excepted Those of Swethland having lately provoked the Pole had no other hope of Peace Those of France of the Exercise of their Religion Those of the Palatinate and adjoyning Countries of the least connivency to say their Prayers then by the earnest Mediation of our Gracious Master And advised by the late Assembly of Parliament to insist a while longer in this milky way of Intercession and Treaty what a preposterous Argument would this have been to desire these mighty Princes Armed and Victorious to grant some Liberty and Clemency to the Protestants because himself
most Friends And that 's a Friend that will incur Anger rather than leave his Friend to sooth himself in a Mischief It had been well for the Duke if his bold Friend had perswaded him to take that Counsel which Christopher Thuanus gave to the Cardinal of Lorain being in great Favour with Henry the 2d of France Si potentiam suam diuturnam cuperet moderatè eâ uteretur in politicá administratione leges regni conservaret alioqui fore ut publicae invidiae impar Procerum regni Nobilitatis contra se concitato odio aliquando succumberet Aug. Thua An. 1568. Secondly Some of the Lords of the Council were willing to spare the Keeper for that having a mighty standing Wardrobe of Reason likely he bore down that side which he oppos'd Why would not Plato endure Homer in his Utopia because he was too great a Citizen for his City And Aristotle lib. 3. Polit. c. 4. Says the Argonautes were weary of Hercules and dismist him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his main strength at the Oar was above his Fellows his parts were unequal in supere minence Nor did his Majesty like it well that he would never give over till he was Conqueror in the Argument that he held and he ever held him to be too nimble and versatile in his Discourses For the Taste of that good King's Mind was much like to his Palate he never loved Sauce with his Meat nor Sharpness in his Counsels He desired to see all his way before him and not to be led through Windings and Allies Another King was of that Conceit says Thua lib. 11. Franciscus magna ingenia suspect a habere coepit Thirdly The blaff that help'd to blow down this Cedar was the Breath of Obtreclators and Tale bearers Who are too much about great Men as it may be said by Allusion from the 66 Psal v. 3. After the vulgar Latin For the Greatness of thy Power shall the People be found Lyars unto thee These were too thick about the Duke and cherish'd with his Countenance and Liberality For Reward not Minstrils and you shall be sure to be rid of them If any are loth to put Bishop Laud in this Number I must either reform their Knowledge or write against mine own They are yet living that have heard it confest by the Lord Buckingham's Mother And these words are in the Manuscript remembred before Penn'd by Arch-Bishop Abbot That the Countess of Buckingham told the Bishop of Lincoln that St. Davids was the Man that did undermine him with her Son and would underwork any Man in the World that himself might rise St. Davids saw no Man in the prospect of likelihood but this one to carry the highest Miter from him Interna crevit Roma Albae ruinis as Livy says Fourthly my Lord-Duke was soon satiated with their Greatness whom he had advanc'd It was the inglorious Mark of those Thirteen Years of his Power to remove Officers Which was like a sweeping Floud that at every Spring-tide takes from one Land and casts it upon another In two Years of King Charles's Reign Williams Lee Conway Suckling Crow Walter had their Top-sails pull'd down by him and if Sir Henry Yelverton had liv'd not only Sir A. Welden writes it but common Rumour nois'd it that he had been promoted to the Place of the Lord Coventry Which was very prejudicious to the true Discharge of those Dignities As Theophrastus complains in Tully Men were so short liv'd that by the time they began to know the World Death snatch'd them out of it So a Magistrate can yield no great Fruit that 's pluck'd up before he be well rooted Antonnius call'd the Philosopher provided better for that as Capitolinus hath it as he was wise in all his Government 21. Still the Plot was busie against the Lord-Keeper to displace him with some colour of Charge And the King being come to Salisbury in September with a full Court it came to a Catastrophe He that was hunted after was at harbour at a House of the Lord Sand's in Barkshire five Miles from Windsor call'd Foxly Where he was surely inform'd that after much sifting spent after all that ever he did since his high Promotion the old Matter was renewed how he stirred up those that lifted at the Duke at Oxford which was urg'd with strange and punctual Confidence and was the weakest and least grounded Surmise that ever was hammer'd Therefore it was supplied with another Objection That at the same time and place he had abus'd the King with ill Counsel advising him to vail his absolute Sovereignty too much to a social Communication with his Subjects Which being divulg'd got him that was accus'd a strong Gale of popular Favour did his Majesty no right and cast the Duke upon such a Shelf as no High-tide could bring him off while he liv'd The Keeper hearing every day what Cavillations were fomented and heard to put him to blame and shame found it in vain to coast the Season any longer to have the Great-Seal tarry with him Only resolv'd on the 21st of September to prepare his way by his Pen before he went to Salisbury to salute the King's Ear with softness and to shew that he did not despond but that he was ready for a Justification if he were call'd to answer Which for all his Labour would hardly be believ'd For all Treasure hid in the Ground is the Kings But how will he find it So all truth that concerns his Justice and Prosperity is his But how will he know it This Man is not the first that made it true which Sidon Apoll. observes Lib. 3. Ep. 3. That it is dangerous serving of Kings in a near place who are compar'd by him to fire Qui sicut paululum à se remota illuminat ita satis sibi admota comburit It is a good Element or light and warmth to those that stand aloof but singeth that which comes too near it Yet nothing venture nothing have One Arrow must be shot after another though both be grast and never found again In aequo est amissio rei timor amittendi says Seneca Nay he loseth more quiet of Mind that looks every day to lose that which he loves than in the Minute when he is deprived of it One says When the Brunt is over the Heart will recover Time and long day will mitigate sad Accidents 't is a slow Medicine but a sure one 22. Now let the Letter to his Majesty be observ'd which was his Harbinger Most gracious Sovereign and my dear Master WHile I spare my self at home for a few days to be quite rid of an Ague which I brought from Southampton I do humbly crave your Majesty's Pardon to make my Address in these Lines which I will contract to so narrow a room as the Matter will possibly give me leave First as touching the Information of the Access I should give at Oxford to those dangerous Persons of the House of
he was taught his first Rudiments of the Latin and Greek Tongues I have heard some of his Contemporaries say that his Master knew not for a while how to manage him he was of so strange a mixture for at sometimes he was addicted to loiter and play and to much exercise of Body Again by fits he would ply his Book so industriously that his Praeceptor thought it a great deal too much for a Child to undergo it But like a prudent Man he quickly consented to leave his Scholar to his own pace wherein he got ground so fast of all his Fellows He that raised himself up to that height of Knowledge in his adult Age had need to lay some part of the Foundation so early For as Comines observes it Lib. 1. Hist Indubitatum est ees qui in ullâ re unquam excelluerunt maturi puerilibus annis ad cam accessisse 6. All things fell out happily by Divine Disposition to bring him up from a towardly Youth to a worthy Man For by that time this Bud began to blow it fortun'd that Dr. Vaughan afterward the Reverend Lord Bishop of London came into Wales and took the School of Reuthen in his way where he found his young Kinsman John Williams to be the Bell-weather of the little Flock Dr. Vaughan was exceeding glad to find him in that forwardness and being not only as Learned as most Men to try a Scholar but Judicious above most Men to conjecture at a rich Harvest by the green Blade in the Spring took speedy care to remove his Kinsman to Cambridge and commended him to the Tuition of Mr. Owen Gum of St. John's College well qualified by his Country and Alliance for a Friend and no indiligent Tutor The young Youth was now entring into the 16th Year of his Age an 1598. much welcom'd to Cambridge by the Old Britains of North-Wales who praised him mightily in all places of the University â—for they are good at that to them of their own Lineage and made more Eyes be cast upon him than are usual upon such a Punie Which took the rather because of his great Comeliness I might say Beauty And it is a great Attractive of common Favour when virtue takes up a fair Lodging One thing put him to the blush and a little Shame that such as had gigling Spleens would laugh at him for his Welsh Tone For those who knew him at his Admission into St. John's Society would often say that he brought more Latin and Greek than good English with him This also pluck'd Advantage after it for it made him a very retired Student by shunning Company and Conference as far as he could till he had lost the Rudeness of his Native Dialect Which he labour'd and affected because he gave his Mind to be an Orator which requires Decus linguae regnumque loquendi as Manlius lays it out Lib. 4. And all that heard him will subscribe that when he was put to it to speak publickly his Gesture and Pronunciation did add much Grace to his Matter and Invention 7. He was the Pattern of a most diligent Student to all that did emulate him then or would imitate him hereafter He had read over so many Authors in several Sciences so many Volumes so many Historians and Poets Greek and Latin in four Years the Evidence of it was in his Note-Books that I may say Aetatem ultra putes who would have thought it had been the dispatch of an Under-Graduate He had ransack'd not only the bare Courts and spacious Lodgings but the very Closets and Corners of the best Arts and Authors Nothing so great that exceeded him nothing so little that escap'd him I will make this Credible to all that are not utter Drones He plied his Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As much in the Night as in the Day Nature contributed to this a strange Assistance that from his Youth to his old Age he ask'd but 3 hours Sleep in 24 to keep him in good plight of Health This we all knew who lived in his Family It would not quickly be believed but that a cloud of Witnesses will avouch it that it was ordinary with him to begin his Studies at six of the clock and continue them till three in the morning and be ready again by seven to walk in the Circle of his indefatigable Labours Aristo complains thus in Pliny l. 7. c. 50. Vivendi breve tempus homini datum quoniam somnus veluti publicanus dimidium aufert That which makes the Life of Man short is That Sleep like an exacting Publican takes half of it away for Toll and Tribute But here was one that paid very little Custom to that common Publican of Nature and kept so much Time continually going in his Stock that he lived almost twice as much as any Man that lived no longer Who will not say now but so much Toil was plain Drudgery And I marvel it the more that so great a Wit could endure to task him to such constant and vexatious Pains No doubt he look'd far afore him upon the hope of a great Recompence in Church or Commonwealth that contented him and confirmed him Marius speaks gailantly in Salust Nae illi falsi sunt qui res diversissimas pariter expectant ignaviae voluptatem praemia virtutis They are much mistaken that think to piece together two Things so different the Pleasure of Ease and the Guerdon of Virtue Therefore all these concurr'd together in him to make up the Master-piece of a Scholar a rare Wit a most tenacious and even stupendious Memory a clear Judgment a most distinguishing common Sense called Natural Logick which is the best and most vital part of Judgment and that which hatch'd all these that they might not addle uncessant Industry Truly he that will build many Stories high had need of all these Materials And let those that are happy in great Natural Endowments take Example by him to joyn the Felicity of Nature with such a Mate as Diligence Gardners give the most attendance to the best Stocks in their Nursery and the Fruit will quit the Cost after due time hath matur'd it It was God above therefore that gave his young Servant so wise a Mind to fill up the choice Vessels of Nature with Liquors distill'd from his own Studies And herein I may compare him to Messala Corvinus in Tully as he writes of him to Brutus Ep. 15. Tanta industria est tantúmque evigilat in studio ut non maximo ingenio quod in eâ— summum est gratia habenda videatur He was so laborious and vigilant about his Studies that though his Wit were of the best kind yet he was not most beholding to it 8. I have not added a Grain to the just weight of Truth that his Sails were filled with prosperous Winds which blew from the Cape of Nature yet that he plied the Oar with main might to make a gaining Voyage Especially the good God was pleased to give
and out of those their Treatises wherein especially they handled the Cause for which he Appealed unto them And Thirdly When he had fixed what was prime and principal Truth in any Debate with great Meekness and Sweetness he gave copious Latitude to his Auditors how far they might dissent keeping the Foundation sure without breach of Charity These were the Constellations whose fortunate Aspect did shine upon this Neophytus in the Orb of Cambridge and being under the Influence of such Luminaries a judicious Academian might Prognostic how much he would prosper without a judicious Astrologer But for all that he posted so speedily through the broad Way of the best Tracts of Knowledge yet he found a little leisure to call in as he went at the attaining of some Skill in Musick Instrumental and Vocal not as a Siren to catch him but as a Delight to solace him Nay though he set his Face to the end of a great Journey yet in transiâ—â— he took Acquaintance of the French Tongue to make himself able to read the choice Pieces of that acute Nation which flow'd in easily and apace into him having the Pipes of the Latin Tongue ready cast to convey it What shall we say to him that took in hand such a long Sorites of Sciences and Tongues together But that such Blood and Spirits did boil in his Veins as Tully felt when he spake so high Mihi satis est si omnia consequi possim Nothing was enough till he got all 14. The Gamester was the freer to throw at all because he was like to draw a good Stake Preferment already holding its Hand half open For â—fâ—câ—bi 2º his Patron and tenderly-loving Kinsman Dr. Vaughan was Removed from the Bishoprick of Chester to the See of London The young Eaglets are quickly taken up upon the Wings of the old one But the good Bishop within three Years after he had ascended to that Dignity ended his days greatly lamented of all and lived not till his young Cousin was adult for Promotion This only was much to his Benefit that every Year the Bishop sent for him to spend a few Weeks in his Palace of London a great help to his Breeding to let him see the course of Church-Government managed by the Piety and Wisdom of so grave a Prelate who had much of a Gentleman much of a Scholar and most of a Christian During his abode in the Reverend Bishop's Palace he had the opportunity to tender his Duty to that noble-minded and ancient Baron John Lord Lumley who received him with equal Courtesie and Bounty as his Kinsman That Lord having given his Sister in Marriage to Mr. Humfry Llyd of Nor. h. Wales a most industrious Antiquary as appears in Ortelius and Adjutant to Mr. Cambden in his great Work This Lord Lumley did pursue Recondite Learning as much as any of his Honourable Rank in those Times and was owner of a most precious Library the Search and Collection of Mr. Humsry Llyd Out of this Magazine that great Peer bestowed many excellent Pieces printed and Manuscript upon Mr. Williams for Alliance sake a Treasure above all Presents most welcom to him Yet the noble-hearted Lord a free Mccaenas gave with both hands and never sent his young Kinsman away from him without a Donative of ten Pieces The first Gift of Books he kept better then Gold for the Gold went from him again as magnificently as if he had been no less then the Lord Lumley himself But that he had received those noble Favours I heard him remember with great and grateful Expressions in the Chancel of the Parish-Church of Cheam near to Nâ—nâ—â—câ— in Surrey whereof my self have been Rector now above 30 Years coming on a day to view the Burial-place of the Lord Lumley where his Body lies under a comely Monument 15. It fell out luckily to Mr. Williams to keep him from incurring great Debts that he had such an Ophir or Golden Trade to drive with the Lord Lumley's Puâ—se who supplied him with a Bounty that grudg'd him nothing till the Year 1â—â—9 for then that aged Baron died Four Years before the loss of that dear Friend An. 1605 he took his Degree of Master of Arts and he Feasted his Friends at the Commencement as if it had been his Wedding having more in Cash at command by the full Presents of many Benefactors then is usual with such young Graduates His Merits being known brought him in a great Revenue long before he had a certain Livelihood A Master of Arts is a Title of honest Provocation rightly considered Nomina insignia onerosa sunt says the Emperor Alexander Mammaens But they are scarce so many as a few that are warm'd with the remembrance of that Honour which the Regent-House conferr'd upon them worthy to be taxed in parodie with that Increpation Heb. 5.12 Cum deberetis Magistri esse propter tempus rursum indigetis ut vos doceamini When for the time ye eught to be Masters you have need one teach you again Whose Reproach hath this and no other use that they are a pitiful Foil to their Betters I am sure I explain a Man who added as much Grace to the Name as any his Ancestors of those that came after he that was the best was but second in the Order Every day borrowing much of the Night advanced his Knowledge He hired himself to labour under all Arts and sorts of Learning The more he toil'd the more he perceiv'd that nothing in this Earth had such Amplitude as the extent of Sciences He saw it was a Prospect which had no Horizon a Man can never say he sees the utmost bound of the Coast Therefore he was continually drawing his Bow because he was sure he could never shoot home No Man fishes to get all the Fish in the Sea yet since the Sea contains so much he is slothful that labours but for a little Our Student began now to fall close to the deep and spacious Studies of Divinity I deliver from his own mouth what he would relate sometimes in his riper Years That he began to read all the Scriptures with the choicest and most literal and as he found it fit with the briefest Commentators so that all his Superstructure might knit close to that Foundation He compared the common places of P. Martyr Chemnitius and Musculus Calvin and Zanchie being in at all with the Sacred Text and found that Harmony in them all with the Oracles of God's Word that he perceived he might with a good Conscience as he would answer it to Christ Jesus defend the Integrity of the Reformed Religion taking it not upon Trust but upon Judgment and Examination But an Artist knoweth not what he hath got by all his Diligence till he useth it neither can a Scholar understand what Tast is in the Waters of his own 〈◊〉 till he draws some quantity out Therefore he disclosed himself both in his own Terms and for his Friends in common Places and
working in the Must Every day this Sufficiency grew with him more and more till he became the only Jewel which the Lord Chancellor hung in his Ear. Yet in four months after he fell to this Trade his best Customer fail'd him the Court of the Prince being Dissolv'd by the Death of Prince Henry Nov. 6. 1612. with whom so much Light was extinguish'd that a thick Darkness next to that of Hell is upon our Land at this day O matchless Worthy live in everlasting Fame with the Elogy given by that quaint Historian Velleius to Pub. Rutilius Non seculi sui sed omnis aevi optimus The third Step of Felicity upon which he clim'd Eis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is Athanasius his Metaphor into the Bosom of his Master's Soul was That he had pick'd up in a short space some Gleanings in his own modest words in the knowledge of the Common Laws of the Realm but indeed full Sheaves if his Acquaintance may be believ'd He remitted not the Studies of his own Science and Profession but having read the Tenures the Doctor and Student and somewhat else like unto them at hours of Relaxation he furnish'd himself with no little quantity of that Learning by Discourse and Conference and enquiring after some cases how they sped in the Courts of Justice When he was at a non-plus he respited that Difficulty till he met with Sir John Walker afterward Lord Chief Baron whose Judgment was most agreeable to his Genius This was his Practise not now but all along to gather up more at the Interspaces of Leisure then others do at their Study Which was the Contrivance of Scipio Aemilianus the Sir Philip Sidney of the Old Romans Neque quisquam Scipione elegantius intervalla negotiorum otio dispunxit says the Character of the Author lately cited 35. Here I will provide a little to set my Shoulder against the Justle of an Objection Perhaps some will say What did the Study of our Laws belong to him The Dainties of the Scriptures were his daily Diet prescrib'd him by his Calling Why did he seed upon those coarse Coleworts And who could spare any of the Time of this short Life when the Work of a Divine is more then this Life can dispatch so that the Remainder must be learnt in Life Eternal Somewhat to that purpose is pithily express'd by Seneca Quae dementia est in tantâ temporis egestate supervacua discere Ep. 48. And what say you to the Judgment of Pope Honorius the Third who sat an 1216. who forbad all Clerks to study Physick or the Pandects of the Laws Or to the Emperor Justin the elder who lived 600 years before Honorius c. leg 41. Opprobrium est si Ecclesiastici peritos se velint ostendere legum forensium I say those Laws must be weighed with Grains of Temper and Charity Whom Nature hath made docile it is injurious to prohibit him from learning any thing that is docible Marie he that forsakes his holy Calling and lists himself in another Warfare that gives himself up wholly to scrape a Livelihood from curing Diseases or fogging in Secular Causes is a Renegado and must be brought back again to his Colours with the Infamy of a Fugitive But far is he from being guilty of this Fault who serves Christ Jesus faithfully in the Labour of the Gospel and can do it the better by poizing Humane Laws and trying how consonant they are to God's Justice and by searching the Virtue of Plants and other Creatures can find out how wonderful the Almighty is in all his Works The Collation between Moses and the Imperial Laws which Paulus Modestinus and others of his Robe have made why may not a Minister peruse it with as much profit as an Advocate It were a Tyranny more then barbarous to confine a Wit that hath a Plummet to found the depth of every Well that the Arts have digged or to clip his Wings that he may not fly into every Bush as freely as the Fowls of the Air. Padre Paulo the Frier the brightest Star in the Hemisphere of Italy was second to none in Divinity while he liv'd equal with the best Doctors in Rome or Siena in explicating Canon or Civil Laws and above all the Practisers of Padua or in the World in understanding the Aesculapian Art says Fulgentius Albericus Gentilis spoke it to do Honour to the Industry of Dr. Reynolds of Corpus-Christi College that he thought that great 〈◊〉 had read as much in the Civil Law as himself Wherein then consists the difference Why might not Mr. Williams examine the Cases Reports and Maxims of our Municipal Laws to be expert in them Both being egg'd on into it by the Happiness of his Attendance in the Pretorian Court where he might learn much and labour little for it and making it the Recreation not the Intermission of his proper Studies Therefore out of Charity give him leave to gather Stubble where he would since he fulfil'd his Task of Brick Exod. 5.18 The Lord Chancellor did highly countenance him in it and was so taken with his Pregnancy that at his leisure-times both for his own solace and his Chaplain's furtherance he would impart to him the Narration of some famous Causes that had been debated in Chancery or Star-Chamber What could not such a Master teach What could not such a Scholar learn Socrates says in Plato of Alcibiades that he Gloried in nothing so much as that he was Ward to Pericles and brought up under him Neither had this Chaplain a more graceful Ornament to shew in the Eyes of the World then that he was Disciple to the Lord Egerton That great Senator the most judicious Judge and Counsellor of his Age would not have disparaged himself to give a young Divine so great a Place in his Affections but that he had founded him and discover'd him to be a person of rare Abilities By this favour to which he had attained though he was not in the place of one of the Secretaries yet he became to be like a Master of Requests especially in weightier Petitions he could prevail more then any other Minister which was not to be presisted by the other Officers He had a Mind full of worth and full of warmth and no place became him so well as the foremost as Pliny says of Cocks lib. 10. c. 21. Imperitant suo generi regnum in quâcunque sunt domo exercent None of his Fellows had cause to repent that he rode upon the Fore-Horse For he was courteous and ready to mediate in any Cause and as bountiful as might be wish'd for he left all Fees and Veils of Profit to those to whom they did belong By this in a little while they that would have kept him back at first did their utmost to put him forward which did not need For the Lookers on did mark that his Lord did not only use him in his most principal Employments but delighted to confer with him
For read him what he was indeed out of the Description which Tacitus gives lib. 16. Annal. circa finem to P. Egnatius Client to Soranus the famous Senator Cliens hic Sorani autoritatem Stoicae sectae praeferebat habitu ore ad exprimendam imaginem honesti exercitus caeterùm animo perfidiosus subdolus Yet this Stoical Gravity did not long conceal him but that his needless Vexations of harmless People his cutting Fees his Briberies and other Muck of the same Dunghil made an out-cry and put the King 's good People to seek a Remedy by preferring Articles against him at the Assizes where he was charg'd home with an Alphabet of Misdemeanors He pleaded to the general that he was so much despited because he had look'd more narrowly into the Disobedience of the Paritans then formerly had been used My Opinion is that such Physicians of no value Job 13.4 may cast the Water of such sick Distempers but will never heal them Infamous Judges may correct them they will never rectifie them For he that is fallen into a Moral Turpitude is soon convinc'd in his own Mind but he that is misguided by darkness of Understanding thinks that he doth right to his own Conscience by going wrong and is never so well reclaim'd as when he is mildly rebuk'd by them whose open Integrity and Pity justifie them that they walk as Children of the Light But for the Particulars which laid down so many Oppressions at the Official's door they were not Dust which would be brush'd away with the Fox Tail but Dirt that stuck to him till the Dean his Mediator obtain'd from the Judges a Reference to himself and some others for further Examination By which sly Diversion some of his Charges were laid aside by Composition all of them by delay and delusion After this what should be the End of it I know not without it were to make him look big and superciliously upon his Prosecutors the Dean engaged his Friends at Cambridge my self was one that was solicited from him to sublimate the Official with the Degree of a Doctor wherein he had one Repulse in the Regent-House such an ill relish his Name had but he was carried out in a second day's Scrutiny But for all his Doctorship he was not out of the Brakes he was but Tapisht as Hunters call it The stirring Spirits of the the subtle Air of Northamptonshire prefer'd their Articles afresh against him to the House of Commons assembled in Parliament an 1620. Wedges enough to cleave a bigger Log then Dr. Lamb and yet he was no little one but Saginati corporis bellua as Curtius says of Dioxippus the Pugil Well nay indeed ill his Friend that was too sure to such a branded Man now become the Dean of a College near to the Parliament finds the Articles in the hand of the Chair-man of the Committee appointed to sift the Complaints it was Sir Edward Sackvil afterward the brave-spoken Earl of Dorset with whom he wrought to abortive the Bill before it came to the Birth and so he set Dagon upon his Feet again who was fallen with his face upon the ground 1 Sam. 5.4 but the palms of his Hands were never cut off for so long as he lived he could take a Bribe I blush to remember that the Dean did not only set him up again as well as ever he stood before but raised him higher For he wrote to a great Lord in Court the Letter is among my Papers to procure him the Honour of Knighthood which was obtained And when his Enemies laboured to cut his Comb he got the Spurs 'T was pleasantly spoken by Sir Ed. Montagu since that Pious and Loyal Lord Montagu of Boughton when a cluster came about him to ask Counsel and Assistance for a third Petition against Sir John Lamb says Sir Edward If we tamper the third time his great Friend that hath already made him a Doctor and a Knight I fear will make him a Baron I have thus much to say for the Dean his friend whose very Entrails I knew that he was strongly espoused to love where he had loved and 't was hard to remove his Affections when good Pretences had gained them Chiefly he was of a most compassionate Tenderness and could not endure to see any Man's Ruine if he could help it And though Offences were as legible as a Dominical Letter he would excuse any thing that was capable of an Excuse as far as Wit and Mercy could contrive it But if a little Confession were wrung out it cut down many Faults to make him see as it were a Glade of Repentance in a Grove of Sins and did ever hope for better Fruits upon easie and formal Promises Let Quintilian help me out a little more in his sixth Declam Si angustus saltem detur accessus per quem intrare humanit as possit vera clementia occasione contenta est Yet David's Rule is better then all this Be not merciful to them that offend of malicious wickedness Psal 59.5 And our God is so merciful that whosoever adds a dram beyond his Pattern it must be reckoned for foolish and hurtful Lenity Certainly God was not pleased that the Dean would save a Man whom He meant to destroy 1 King 20.42 And though it slept Unpunished about 12 Years yet in the end the Lord awaken'd it with a Mischief through the treachery of that Man whom himself had protected 45. That which I have hitherto pass'd over was but his low and shrubbish Fortune compared with that Access which the Providence of God in short time after did cast upon him Which Providence is Religiously appeal'd to in all things yet without any check to Reason and Experience to trace it in its Manifestations The Omni-regency of Divine Providence is the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden of the World the Strings of whose Root are secretly interwoven with all Works and Motions But the Sons of Adam are not content unless they taste of the Tree of Knowledge and have a Lust as far as Curiosity can pry to learn how God doth put the Issue of his Wisdom into outward and Instrumental Causes I am ready therefore to shew what Men will seek the Occasions which were in the way and who was Lord of the Ascendant when God did raise up this his Servant that he might set him with Princes even with the Princes of his People Psal 113.8 His Abilities were worthy of a great Place none so Emulous or so Envious that denied it Neither was there any Church-man in his time so likely to purchase a great Place with those Abilities He that will will read Budaeus his Epistle to his Notations upon the Pandects shall find this Character of Mons Peganay Chancellor of France Cujus ea vis fuisse ingenii at que animi cernitur ut quocunque loco natus esset in quodcunque tempus incidisset fortunam ipse sibi facturus videretur A Word as fit
then himself For why should he render himself as an Hostage to Fortune when he needed not Or what could mend his present Condition but a contented Mind Pol si est animus aequus tibi satis habes qui vitam colas Plaut Aul. He that hath much and wants nothing hath yet as little as comes to nothing if he wants Equanimity It was generously spoken of Esau Gen. 33.9 I have enough my Brother And they that lose a good Portion which they had before because their Appetite did over-drive them let them look upon Children playing at a petty Game they will not stand but ask for another Card which puts them out Though these things were so maturely considered an Occasion came about which did lead him quite aside yet it was in the King's High-way He was at Royston in Attendance on the King and in the Marquess his Absence The King abruptly without dependance upon the Discourse on foot asked him When he was with Buckingham Sir says the Doctor I have had no business to resort to his Lordship But wheresoe'er he is you must presently go to him upon my Message says the King So he did that Errand and was welcom'd with the Countenance and Compliments of the Marquess and invited with all sweetness to come freely to him upon his own Addresses Who mark'd rather from whom he came then to whom he was sent And gather'd from the King's Dispatch That His Majesty intended that he should seek the Marquess and deserve him with Observance From henceforth he resolved it yet not to contaminate his Lordship with Bribery or base Obsequiousness but to shew himself in some Act of Trust and Moment that he was as sufficient to bring his Lordship's good Ends to pass as any whom he employed both with readiness to do and with judgment to do well Which thus succeeded to his great Commendation My Lord Marquess was a Batchelor and ripe for a gallant Wedlock His Youth his comely Person his Fortunes plentiful and encreasing his Favour he held with the King being as much or more then the Cardinal-Nephews in the Pope's Conclave What Graces could be sweeter in the Girdle of Venus that the Poets speak of Cestum de Veneris sinu calentem Martial He could not seek long to be entertained who was so furnished for a Suitor The Lady with whom he desired to match was Lady Katherine Manners Daughter and only Child surviving to Francis Earl of Rutland Hereby he should marry with a Person of Honour her Family being very anciently Noble and draw to his Line an access of Wealth and Revenue as the like not to be expected from the Daughter of any Subject in this Realm The Motion was set on foot in the beginning of the Year 1520 which stuck at two Objections The Earl of Rutland was slow or rather fullen in giving way to this lusty Woer who came on the faster directed it seems by Proverbial Wisdom That faint Heart never won fair Lady Certain it is that he kept not such distance in his Visits as was required Which put the Earl into so strong a Passion that he could not be mitigated though great Ones had attempted the Pacification In this distraction Dr. Williams took the opportunity to go between the great Men and to Umpire the Controversie He had often in former times made Journeys from Lincoln to visit the Earl at his Castle of Belvoir who was Lord-Lieutenant of the County of Lincoln and held some Leases of that Church whereof the Doctor was a Residentiary and Precentor The Earl had found him so true and fortunate in many Offices of Service which he had manag'd for his Lordship's sake that he prefer'd him before all his Neighbours for Wisdom and Fidelity Therefore he gave him very patient Hearing to his Propositions about the Lord Marquess his Amours and took down the heat of Inflammation with cool Advice All youthful Dalliances were clear'd from sinister Jealousie and had Allowance to be inoffensively continued To speak all together The Doctor brought the Earl about so dextrously with his Art and pleasant Wit that his Lordship put it into his hands to draw up all Contracts and Conditions for Portion and Joynture which he did to the fair satisfaction of both sides the noble Earl being so glad of a good Understanding between him and the Lord Marquess that the Counsellor at his Elbow induced him to settle more upon the Marriage then the Marquess and his Mother had demanded The first Door that was shut against the young Lord in Cupid's Court was thus opened to him Nothing is so good to soften that which is hard as the Language of a discreet Man Therefore the old Gauls did carve the God of Eloquence not after the shape of Mercury but of Hercules says Lucian carrying his Club in one hand his Bow and Shafts in the other But innumerous small Rings were drawn through his Tongue to which a multitude of Chains were fasten'd that reach'd to the Ears of Men and Women to which they were tied meaning by this Picture that he performed all his hard Labours by his Tongue and not by his Club 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And that which the Doctor brought to pass in the preceding Matter is fit for the Application of the Apologue Of whose Performance the Mother-Countess her Noble Son with the Ladies of the Kindred gave the best Account to the King that Thankfulness could make 51. The King commended it and was right glad that they were well out of the Mire where they all stuck before And now the Progress of the Suit seemed so easie as if a pair of Doves might draw the Chariot of Love when His Majesty put a strong Spoke into the Wheel which I may call The Second Obstruction For the Lady Katherine though she and her Family were not rigid forbearers of our Church yet she was bred a Papist This was no Straw at which the King stumbled For he knew it would sad the Spirit of some good People most tender of the Religion established when they should hear that the Noble-man in whom His Majesty did most delight was wedded to a Lady of that disaffected Superstition Therefore he liked not that the Marquess should proceed in that Marriage till the Lady were tried with sweet Perswasions to serve God together with her Husband constantly and without Hypocrisie after the Confession of the Reformed Church of England So His Majesty called for Dr. Williams and laid his strict and highest Commands upon him to use his best Skill upon the Conscience of that tender Lady misled by Education to make her a true Proselyte Before that was done He would be loth to give his Blessing to the Nuptials This He required of him before all his other Chaplains as well because he had the Ear of the Family more then any Man of his Coat whereof Proof was made in his late Actions as because he knew he had the Gift of Wisdom mixed with Learning to cure
Majesty was the Chariot and Horsemen of our Israel that now he would be pleased to double the Spirit of Elias upon his Servant Elisha whom Your Majesty hath thus invested with his Robe and Mantle And for my especial direction I will take up that Counsel which Pliny gave his Friend Maximus Newly Elected Praetor for Achaia Meminisse oportet Officii Titulum I will never forget my Office and Title I am design'd to be a Probationer in this Place and as a Probationer by God's Grace I will demeane my self I will take up together with this Seal that Industry Integrity and Modesty Non ut me Consulem sed ut consulatus candidatum putem That is I will not Esteem my self a Keeper but a Suitor only for the Great Seal And if I feel the burden too heavy which I mightily fear and suspect I will choose rather desinere quà m deficere to slip it off willingly to some stronger Shoulder than to be crush'd in pieces with the poise of the same And I humbly beseech your Majesty also to Remember I am no more than a meer Probationer If I prove Raw at the first I must have my time to Learn The best of them all have craved no less and I will desire no more For if after the full weighing of my Strength I shall still find my self unable for this Service I will say unto Your Majesty as Jacob said unto Pharaoh Pastor ovium est servus tuus whatsoever You are pleas'd Sir to make me I am but a Keeper of Sheep in that Calling Your Majesty found me and to that Calling I shall ever be ready to appropriate my self again In the mean time I beseech Your Majesty to protect this Court of Justice wherein You have plac'd me that the Strength and Power of that body be nothing impaired through the weakness of the Head Nemo Adolescentiam meam contemnat Let not my Fellows of an other Profession cry out with him in the Psalm There there so would we have it neither let them say We have Devoured him And so I end with my Prayer unto God That Your Majesty may Live long and my self no longer than I may be serviceable to Your Majesty 73. The King heard him very Graciously to the end and used no more then these few Words in Answer That he was pleas'd in his Settlement as in any whom he had prefer'd and was perswaded he would not deceive his Judgment Neither did the good liking of the most stick at any thing but that the Worthies of the Lay and chiefly of the Law were pretermitted But his Majesty rather regarded the fitness of a Man then the Custom of a Tribe As he that takes a Lodging in the City never Examines which are the best Rooms by Squares of Architecture but likes that for the best Chamber which hath â—the best Furniture At the same time the Lord Keeper by super-impregnation of favour was made a Bishop and Reap'd no less than two Harvests in one Month. It was K. James his wont to give like a King for the most part to keep one Act of Liberality warm with the covering of another A meaner Man then a King could say it is Pliny lib. 2. Epist beneficia mea tueri nullo modo melius possum quam ut augeam He that hath plac'd a benefit well let him imitate himself and do another that 's the sure way of obliging The Bishopric of Lincoln was bestowed on him by the Royal Congè d'Elire the Largest Diocess in the Land because this New Elect had the Largest Wisdom to super-intend so great a Circuit Yet in as much as the Revenue of it was not great it was well piec'd out with a Grant to hold the Deanery of Westminster into which he shut himself fast with as strong Bars and Bolts as the Law could make Else when the Changes began to Ring in the Fifth year after he had been sure to be thrust out of Doors in a storm when he had most need of a Covering Yet some Suitors were so importunate to compass this Deanery upon his expected leaving that he was put to it to plead hard for that Commenda before he carried it The King was in his Progress and the Lord Marquess with him to whom he writes to present his Reasons to the King which were that the Port of the Lord Keeper's Place though he would strike Sail more than any that preceded him must be maintain'd in some convenient manner Here he was handsomly housed which if he quitted he must trust to the King to provide one for him as His Majesty and his Predecessors have ever done to their Chancellors Here he had some Supplies to his House-keeping from the Colledge in Bread and Beer Corn and Fuel of which if he should be depriv'd he must be forc'd to call for a Diet which would cost the King 1600 l. per annum or crave for some addition in lieu thereof out of the King 's own means as all his Foregoers in that Office had done In that Colledge he needed to entertain no Under-Servants or Petty-Officers who were already provided to his Hand Beside the Very Name and Countenance thereof would take away all expectation of extraordinary Entertainments And it was but a step from thence into Westminsterhall where his business lay and 't was a Lodging which afforded him marvelous quietness to turn over his Papers and to serve the King He might have added for it was in the bottom of his Breast he was loath to stir from that Seat where he had the Command of such exquisite Music A Request laid out in such Remonstrance was not nay could not be refus'd by so Gracious a Prince who granted twenty Suits to one that he denied Magnarum largitor opum largitor honorum pronus which singularly fits King James though Claudian made it for Honorius Likewise by the Indulgence of his Commenda he reserv'd the Rectory of Walgrave to himself a Trifle not worthy to be Remembred but his Reason is not unworthy to be detected Take it as he Read this Lecture to me upon it That in the instability of humane things every man must look for a Dissolution of his Fortunes as well as for the Dissolution of his Body the latter of sure Things is most sure the former of usual Things is most usual Common Men are in doubtful Places great Men in slippery Places but Sacrilege being a Raven that continually croaks over the Church-Patrimony Clergy-men were in most obnoxious Places Many have paid dear for this Experience That Fortune will fly quite away when she is well fledge Then let such as are upon the highest Stairs of those Preferments have this Forecast To keep a little Room behind their Back-door to which they may retreat When there was no place for Elijah in Jezreel he took his Commons in an obscure Village to which God sent him with the Widow of Zarephath Anselm Arch-Bishop of Canterbury kept his Right to a poor Cell
His Majesty for a Pension to support them in their sequestred Sadness where they might spend their Days in Fasting and Prayer It was vehemently considered that our Hierarchy was much quarrel'd with and opposed by our own Fugitives to the Church of Rome who would fasten upon this Scandal and upon it pretend against our constant Succession hitherto undemolish'd with all the Malice that Wit could excogitate And indeed they began already For the Fact was much discoursed of in Foreign Universities who were nothing concerned especially our Neighbours the Sorbonists at Paris ' 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 4.15 over-busie to have an Oar in our Boat Disputing it three several times in their Schools and concluded the Accident to amount to a full Irregularity which is an Incapacity to exercise any Ecclesiastical Act of Order or Jurisdiction His Majesty upon the eruption of these Scruples was called up to think seriously that his Sweetness and Compassion did not leave a Slur upon this Church which himself under Christ had made so Glorious It belonged to the four Bishops Elect to be most Circumspect in this matter expecting their Consecration shortly and to be informed whether they should acknowledge that the Power of an Arch-Bishop was Integral and Unblemish'd in a casual Homicide and submit to have his Hands laid upon their Heads Dr. Davenant shewed Reason That it behoved him not to be seen in the Opposition because the Arch-Bishop had Presented him to the rich Parsonage of Cotnam not far from Cambridge It was well taken for among honest Pagans a Benesiciary would not contend against his Patron Howsoever such as knew not the wherefore were the more benevolous to the Arch-Bishop's misfortune because so great a Clerk stood off and meddled not The Rhodian's Answer in Plutarch was not forgotten who was baited by his Accusers all the while that the Judge said nothing I am not the worse for their Clamours says the Defendant but my Cause is the better that the Judge holds his peace Non refert quid illi loquantur sed quid ille taceat The other three without Davenant stirred in it the most they could to decline this Metropolitan's Consecreation not out of Enmity or Superstition but to be wary that they might not be attainted with the Contagion of his Scandal and Uncanonical Condition The Lord-Keeper appearing for the rest writes thus to the Lord Marquess as it is extant Cabal p. 55. MY Lord's Grace upon this Accident is by the Common-Law of England to forfeit all his Estate to His Majesty and by the Canon-Law which is in force with us irregular Ipso facto and so suspended from all Ecclesiastical Function until he be again restored by his Superior which I take it is the King's Majesty in this Rank and Order of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction I wish with all my heart His Majesty would be as Merciful as ever He was in all his Life But yet I hold it my Duty to let His Majesty know by your Lordship that His Majesty is fallen upon a Matter of great Advice and Deliberation To add Affliction to the Afflicted as no doubt he is in Mind is against the King's Nature To leave a Man of Blood Primate and Patriarch of all his Churches is a thing that sounds very harsh in the old Councils and Canons of the Church The Papists will not spare to descent upon the one and the other Heave the Knot to His Majesties deep Wisdom to Advise and Resolve upon A gentler Hand could not touch a Sore yet I think of his Judgment in this Point as Sealiger did of the sine Poet Fracostorius Ab suâ ipse magnitudine descendisse credi potest aliquando He flew lower at this Game then the pitch of his wonted Wisdom For the Question did hang yet upon this Pin Whether there were a Sore to be cured His Lordship had look'd attentively into the Canonists whom he could cite by rote with his happy Memory Their Decretals and Extravagants Un-bishop a Man that kill'd a Man and meant a Beast nay further if the Bishop's Horse did cast the Groom that water'd him into a Pond and drown'd him But if we Appeal from them to higher and better Learning their Rigour will prove Ridiculous The Fact is here confess'd But is Sin in the Fact or in the Mind of the Facient Omne peccatum in tantum est peccatum in quantum est voluntarium This is the Maxim of the Schools upon actual Sins and a true one A guilty Mind makes a guilty Action An unfortunate Hand concurs often with an innocent Heart Quis nomen unquam sccleris errori indidit Put the Case that these Writers are very inclinable to have Absolution granted incontinently to such Contingencies but to keep a bustle whether Absolution is to be given or not when there is no fault is to abuse the Power of the Keys Irregularities in that Superstitious Latin Church are above Number what have we to do with them That we did cut them off we did not name it indeed in our Reformation under Edward the Sixth c. for they were thrown out with Scorn as not to be mention'd among ejected Rubbish For we perceived they were never meant to bind but to open I mean the Purse He that is Suspended may entangle himself from the Censure with a Bribe The Canonists are good Bone-letters for a Bone that was never broken their Rubrics are filled with Punctilio's not for Consciences but for Consciuncles Haberdashers of small Faults and palpable Brokers for Fees and Mercinary Dispensations Therefore those plain-dealing and blunt People among the Helvetians otherwise Clients of the Roman Party serv'd them very well as Simler hath Page 64. of his History Cum Papa Rom acceptà pecuniâ Matrimonium contra canones concesserat populus recognitâ statuit Si divitious pecunià numeratâ hoc licitum sit etiam pauperibus absque pecunid fas essc And a little before Pag. 135. when those poor Cantoners could not enjoy their own in quiet for the Rent-gatherers of the Court of Rome they bid them keep off at their own peril with this popular Edict Si pergant nundinatores bullarum jus urgere in vincula conjiciontur ni huic renuntient aquis submorgantur scilicet ut ita bullae bullis eluantur Such resolute Men as these were too rude to be cozen'd So Irregularities should be used which are invented for the Prosit of Dispensative Graces having nothing in them to Unsanctisie the Order of a Bishop by Divine Law or the Law of Nature because they can be wiped away with a Feather if it be a Silver Wing and the Feathers of Gold But because these double Doctors of Canon and Civil Laws will pretend to some Reason in their greatest Folly it is not amiss to repeat the best Objection with which they stiffen their Opinion Thus they divide the Hoof That if one by chance-medly kills a Man being then employed in nothing that is evil
to that Treatise as follow Let the World take notice if it may concern any your Honour is be unto whom next unto His most Sacred Majesty my most Gracious Sovereign and Master I owe more then to all the World beside Professing unseignedly in the word of a Priest Fâ—cisti ut vivam moriar ingratus 81. The Lord-Keeper being so great a Dealer in the Golden Trade of Mercy and so successful he followed his Fortune and tried the King and the Lord Marquess further in the behalf of some whom their dear Friends had given over in Despair to the Destiny of Restraint And those were of the Nobles For he carried a great regard to their Birth and Honour and knew it was good for his own safety to deserve well of those high-born Families The East of Nerthumberland had been a Prisoner in the Tewer above 15 years His Confidents had not Considence and a good Heart I say not to Petition but to dispute with the King how ripe the Earl was for Clemency and Liberty 〈◊〉 Majesty was very merciful but must be rubb'd with a Fomentation of hi◠〈◊〉 Oyl to make him more supple This dextrous Statesman infuseth into 〈…〉 how to compass the Design with what Insinuations and Argum◠〈…〉 were improved with the Earl's demulcing and well-languag'd Phrases And when it came to strong Debate the Lord-Keeper got the better of the King in Reason So the Physic wrought as well as could be wish'd and on the 18th of July the Earl of Northumberland came out of the Tower the Great Ordnance going off to give him a joyful Valediction Who turned his Thoughts to consider the Work of God that a Stranger had wrought 〈◊〉 Comfort for him in his old Age whose Face he had ne 〈…〉 never purchased by any Benefit nor courted so much as by the meâ—age of a Salutation Which his Lordship compared to St. Peter's Deliverance by the Angel of God Acts 12. when Peter knew not who it was that came to help him Though not in order of Time yet in likeness of Condition the Earl of Oxford's Case is to be ranked in the same File It was in April in the year following that he was sent to the Tower betrayed by a false Brother for rash Words which heat of Wine cast up at a merry meeting His Lordship's Enemies were great and many whom he had provoked yet after he had acquainted the Lord-Keeper with the long Sadness of his Restraint in a large Letter which is preserved he wrought the Earl's Peace and Releasment conducted him to the King's Chamber to spend an hour in Conference with His Majesty from whence a good Liking was begot on both sides Whom thereupon that Earl took for his trusty and wisest Friend using his Counsel principally how to Husband his Estate and how to employ his Person in some Honourable Service at Sea that the Dissoluteness of his Hangers-on in the City might not sink him at Land The Lord-Keeper did as much for the Earl of Somerset in Christmas-time before bringing him by his mediation out of the House of Sorrow wherein he had continued above five years that he might take fresh Air and enjoy the comfort of a free Life which was affected by him to gratisie the splendid and spreading Family of the Howards And they were all well pleased with him as were the greatest part of the Grandees except the Earl of Arundel for a Distast taken of which the Lord-Keeper need not be ashamed 82. Within Six Weeks after he was settled in that Office the Earls Secretary brought two Patents to be Sealed the one to bestow a Pension of 2000 l. per annum upon his Lord out of the Exchequer which was low mow'n and not sit to bear such a Crop beside the Parliament which was to meet again in the Winter could not choose but take Notice what over-bountiful Issues were made out of the Royal Revenue to a Lord that was the best Landed of all his Peers Yet the Seal was put to with a dry assent because there was no stopping of a Free River With this Patent came another to confer the Honour of the Great Marshal of England upon the same Noble Personage The Contents of it had scarce any Limits of Power much exceeding the streit Boundaries of Law and Custom The Lord Keeper searching into the Precedents of former Patents when the same Honour was conser'd found a great inequality and doubted for good Cause that this was a device to lay his unfitness for his great place Naked to the World if he swallowed this Pill But nothing tended more to the praise of his great Judgment with His Majesty He writes to my Lord of Buckingham to acquaint the King that he thought His Majesty intended to give to greater Power than the Lords Commissioners had who dispatch'd Affairs belonging to that Office joyntly before him and that all Patents refer to the Copy of the immediate Predecessors who were the Earls of Essex Shrewsbury and Duke of Somerset but my Lord leap'd them over and claim'd as much as the Howards and Mowbries Dukes of Norfolk did hold which will enlarge his Authority beyond the former by many Dimensions There is much more than this in the Cabal of Letters p. 63. And much more than I meet there in his own private Papers The King was much satisfied with the Prudence and Courage of the Man that he had rather display these Errors than commit them for fear of a mighty Frown so the Earls Counsel were appointed to attend the Lord Keeper who joyning their hands together examin'd the Obliquities of the Patent and alter'd them What would have follow'd if it had pass'd entire in the first Draught For being so much corrected and Castrated yet the proceedings of the Court of Honour were a Grievance to the People not to be supported The Decrees of it were most uncertain most Arbitrary most Imperious Nor was there any Seat of Judgment in the Land wherein Justice was brought a bed with such hard Labour Now I invite the Reader if he please to turn to the 139 pag. of Sir An. Wel. Pamphlet and let him score a Mark for his Remembrance at these Lines That Williams was brought in for this Design to clap the Great Seal through his Ignorance in the Laws to such things that none that understood the danger by knowing the Laws would venter upon This Knight when he is in a Course of Malice is never out of his Way but like an egregious Bugiard here he is quite out of the Truth For the New Lord Keeper walk'd so Circumspectly that he seem'd to fear an Ambush from every Grant that was to pass for the use of encroaching Courtiers if any thing were Ambiguous or Dangerous he was not asham'd to call for Counsel If any thing were prest against Rule he was inexorable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eth. He kept constant to Justice in its Flat Square I could be Luxuriant in instances nothing is
easier then to observe two which are in Print already But Twelve days after he was sworn Lord Keeper Mr. Secretary Calvert wrote to him and used the King's Name and to make all the stronger the Spanish Ambassadors Mediation was not wanting to deliver one Rockweed a Papist out of the Fleet. Not a jot the sooner for all this but he excuseth his Rigor to the Lord Marquess Cabal p. 62. That he would not insame himself in the beginning to break his Rules so foully which he was Resolv'd to keep straight against ah Men whatsoever Another of the same Stamp pag. 65. One Beeston had been committed from the Power of the High Court of Chancery loathing this Captivity he besought this New Officer to be Releas'd and was denied he Cries out for Mercy to the King Roars out that the Parliament might hear him follows the Lord Bucking with his Clamors who advised the Keeper to consider upon it It is a Maxim indeed in Old Colwnella lib. 6. c. 2. pervicax contumacia plerumque saevientem fatigat c. Boisterous Importunity thinks to fare better then modest Innocency but he gave the Lord Marquess this Answer My Noble Lord. Decrees once made must be put in Execution Else I will confess this Court to be the greatest Imposture and Grievance in the Kingdom The Damned in Hell do never cease repining at the Justice of God Nor the Prisoners in the Fleet at the Decrees in Chancery In the which Hell of Prisoners this one for Amiquity and Obstinacy may pass for a Lucifer I neither know him nor his Cause but as long as he stands in Contempt he is not like to have any more Liberty A Lion may be judg'd by these two Claws of his Pounce 83. And now I have past over these exordial Marks of his Demeanour and sufficiency before the Term began Upon the first day of it when he was to take his Place in Court he declined the Attendance of his great Friends who offered as the manner was to bring him to his first settling with the Pomp of an nauguration But he set out Early in the Morning with the Company of the Judges and some few more and passing through the Cloysters into the Abby he carried them with him into the Chappel of Henry the Seventh where he Prayed on his Knees silently but very Devoutly as might be seen by his Gesture almost a quarter of an hour then Rising up chearfully he was Conducted with no other Train to a Mighty Confluence that expected him in the Hall whom from the Bench of the Court of Chancery he Greeted with this Speech MY Lords and Gentlemen all I would to God my former Course of life had so qualified me for this Great Place wherein by the Will of God and the special Favour of the King I am for a time to bestow my self that I might have fallen to my Business without any farther Preface or Salutation Especially considering that as the Orator observes Id ipsum dicere nunquam sit non ineptum nisi cum est necessarium This kind of Orationing hath ever a Tincture of levity if it be not occasion'd by some urgent Necessity For my own part I am as far from Affecting this Speech as I was from the Ambition of this Place But having found by private Experience that sudden and unexpected Eruptions put all the World into a Gaze and Wonderment I thought it most convenient to break the Ice with this short Deliberation which I will limit to these two Heads my Calling and my Carriage in this Place of Judicature 84. For my Calling unto this Office it was as most here present cannot but know not the Cause but the Effect of a Resolution in the State to Change or Reduce the Governour of this Court from a Professor of our municipal Laws to some one of the Nobility Gentry or Clergy of this Kingdom Of such a Conclusion of State quae aliquando incognita semper justa as I dare not take upon me to discover the Cause so I hope I shall not endure the Envy Peradventure the managing of this Court of Equity doth Recipere magis minus and is as soon diverted with too much as too little Law Surely those Worthy Lords which to their Eternal Fame for the most part of an hundred years Govern'd and Honour'd this Noble Court as they Equall'd many of their own Profession in the knowledge of the Laws so did they excel the most of all other Professions in Learning Wisdom Gravity and mature Experience In such a Case it were but Poor Philosophy to restrain those Effects to the former which were produced and brought forth by those latter Endowments Examine them all and you shall find them in their several Ages to have the Commendation of the Compleatest Men but not of the deepest Lawyers I except only that mirror of our Age and Glory of his Profession my Reverend Master who was as Eminent in the Universal as any other one of them all in his choicest particular Sparguntur in omnes Uno hoc mista fluunt quae divisa beatos efficiunt conjuncta tenet Again it may be the continual Practise of the strict Law without a special mixture of other knowledge makes a Man unapt and undisposed for a Court of Equity Juris Consultus ipse per se nihil nisi leguleius quidam cautus acutus as M. Crassus was wont to define him They are and that cannot be otherwise of the same Profession with the Rhetories at Rome as much used to defend the Wrong as to Protect and Maintain the most upright Cause And if any of them should prove corrupt he carries about him armatam nequitiam that skill and Cunning to palliate the same that that mis-sentence which pronounced by a plain and understanding Man would appear most Gross and Palpable by their Colours Quotations and Wrenches of the Law would be made to pass for Current and Specious Some will add hereunto the Boldness and Confidence which their former Clients will take upon them when as St. Austin speaks in another Case They find That Man to be their Judg who but the other day was their hired Advocate Marie that depraedandi Memoria as St. Jerom calls it That promness to take Mony as accustom'd to Fees is but a Base and Scandalous Aspersion and as incident to the Divine if he want the Fear of God as to the common Lawyer or most Sordid Artizan But that that former Breeding and Education in the strictness of Law might without good Care and Integrity somewhat indispose a Practiser thereof for the Rule and Government of a Court of Equity I Learned long ago from Plinius Secundus a most Excellent Lawyer in his time and a Man of singular Rank in the Roman Estate for in his 2 3 and 6 Epist Making Comparison between the Scholastici as he calls them which were Gentlemen of the better sort bred up privately in feigned pleadings and Schools of Eloquence for the
would now quiet his eager Spirit but to put it to the question whether the Lordships were not content to open their Doors wide and to let all the Bishops out if they would The Lord Keeper Replied with a prudent Animosity That if he were Commanded he would put it to the Question but to the King and not to the House of Peers For their Lordships as well Spiritual as Temporal were call'd by the King 's Writ to sit and abide there till the same Power dissolv'd them And for my Lords Temporal they had no Power to License themselves much less to Authorize others to depart from the Parliament With which Words of irrefragable Wisdom that Spirit was conjur'd down as soon as it was rais'd But when the House was swept and made clean it returned again in our dismal Days with seven other Spirits worse than it self The Motion was then in the Infancy and we heard no more of it till it was grown to be a Giant and dispossessed our Reverend Fathers of their ancient Possession and Primigenious Right by Club-Law Let my Apostrophe plead with our Nobles in no Man's Words but Cicero's to Cataline In vastitate omnium tuas possessiones sacrosanctas futuras putas Could your Lordships imagine to limit Gun-Powder and Wild-Fire to blow up one half of the Foundation and to spair the other half When the Pillars of the Church were pluckt down could the Pillars of the State be strong enough to support the Roof of their own Dignity They should have thought upon it when they pill'd the Bark off the Tree that the Tree would flourish no more but quickly come to that Sentence Cut it down Why cumbereth it the Ground 92. Our Forefathers when they met in Parliament were wont to auspicate their great Counsels with some remarkable Favour of Priviledge or Liberality conferr'd upon the Church And because the Prelates and their Clergy were more concern'd than any in the Benefit of the Statutes made before the Art of Printing was found out they were committed to the Custody of their Religious Mansions The Reward of those Patriots was like their Work and God did shew he was in the midst of them They began in Piety they proceeded in Prudence they acted marvelously to the Maintainance of the Publick Weal and they Concluded in Joy and Concord But since Parliaments of latter Editions have gone quite another way to hearken to Tribunitial Orators that defamed the Ministry to encourage Projectors that would disseize them of their Patrimony when the Nobles from whom better was expected wax'd weary of them who were Twins born in the same Political Administration Samnium in Samnio We may look for England in England and find nothing but New England How are we fallen from our ancient Happiness How Diseased are we grown with the Running Gout of Factions How often have those great Assemblies been cut off unkindly on both sides before their Consultations were mellow and fit for Digestion We look for much and it came to little Was it not because the Lord did blow it away Hag. 1.9 It is not good to be busie in the Search of Uncertainties that are not pleasing yet they that will not trouble themselves to consider this Reason may find divers Irritations to Jars in the Causes below but I believe they will not reduce them better to the Cause of Causes from above From hence came Fierceness and Trouble upon this Session and God sent evil Angels among them Psal 78.49 For the House of Commons seem'd to the King to step out of their Way from the Bills they were preparing into the Closet of his Majesty's Counsels which put him to make Answer to them in a Stile that became his Soveraignty The King's Son-in-Law taking upon him the Title of King of Bohemia sore against the Father-in Law 's Mind the Emperor being in lawful Possession of that Kingdom over-run the greatest part of the Palatinate with some Regiments of Old Soldiers whereof the most were Spanish under the Conduct of Marquess Spinola Our King received the Injury no less than as a deep Wound gash'd into his own Body And all true English Hearts which did not smell of the Roman Wash were greatly provoked with the Indignity Prince and People were alike affected to maintain the Palsgrave in his Inheritance but several Ways They that are of one Mind are not always of one Passion The King assay'd to stop the Fury of the Imperialists by Treaty The Votes of the bigger Number of the House of Commons propounds nothing but War with Spain and this they could not do but in Civility they must first break off the Treaty of Marriage then in Proposition between the King 's dearest Son and the Infanta Maria. Neither of which pleased his Majesty in the Matter and but little in the Form that his Subjects should meddle in those high Points which he esteemed no less than the Jewels of his Crown before he had commended them to be malleated upon their Anvil The Matter that the Match with the Spanish Princess should be intended no more was dis-relishable because he esteemed her Nation above any other to be full of Honour in their Friendship and their Friendship very profitable for the enriching of Trade The Lady her self was highly famed for Virtue Wisdom and Beauty The Noble House of which she came had ever afforded fortunate Wives to the Kings of this Land and gracious with the People Her Retinue of her own Natives should be small and her Portion greater than ever was given with a Daughter of Spain And in the League that should run along with it the Redintegration of the Prince Elector in the Emperors Favor whom he had offended should be included Therefore his Majesty wrote thus to the Parliament We are so far engaged in the Match that we cannot in Honour go back except the King of Spain perform not such things as we expect at his Hands Some were not satisfied of which more in a larger Process that our Prince should marry a Wise of the Pontifician Religion For as Man's Soul contracts Sin as soon as it toucheth the Body so their severe and suspicious Thoughts were as consident as if they had been the Lustre of Prophetick Light that a Protestant could not but be corrupted with a Popish Wedlock Therefore the King took in hand to cure that Melancholy Fit of Superstitious Fear with this Passage that he sent in his Message at the same time If the Match shall not prove a Furtherance to Religion I am not worthy to be your King A well-spirited Clause and agreeable to Holy Assurance that Truth is more like to win than lose Could the Light of such a Gospel as we profess be eclips'd with the Interposition of a single Marriage A faint hearted Soldier coming near in his March to an Ambush unawares Plut vit Pelop. Cry'd out to his Leader Pelopidas Incidimus in hostes We are fallen among the Enemy No Man says his
this Rate he must buy the Soldiers Pay or be Scandaliz'd in the Army to the endangering of a Mutiny that he would yield nothing to save them from Starving who had jeoparded their Lives for him and his Children All this praemised I cannot dive into his Nature as some do that knew no more than I to say he was no Man of Courage but out of the Pith of his Arguments I can collect he was a Commander of Reason Happy those that liv'd under his Scepter who could say Claudian land Stil Hujus pacificis debemus moribus omnes Quod cuncti gens una sumus Plutarch compares Romulus and Numa that the former did all he could to train the People to Fight Numa did his best to suppress Wars Non ob ignavia sed innocentiae causa not out of Timorousness but of Harmlesness This is he that they say had the Goddess Aegeria to his Dry-Nurse whereas Romulus had a Wolf to his Wet-Nurse So I will define it in the Peroration that it was Harmlesness and Innocency that taught King James not to leave his Kingdom naked to the Storms of War and disrobed of the Mantle of Peace 94. Now to go on If the Matter debated about breaking of the Match and Proclaiming War with Spain had not disgusted the Modus Procedendi or Form how the Commons took in hand would have given less Displeasure But to keep them from hunting after such Royal Game his Majesty confines them into their own Purlues Not to meddle says he with any thing concerning our Government or deep Matters of State and namely not to deal with our dearest Son's Match with the Daughter of Spain nor to touch the Honour of that King or any other our Friends and Confederates And also not to meddle with any man's Particulars which have their due Motion in any Our Courts of Justice To which they Answer That they acknowledge it belonged to his Majesty alone to resolve of Peace and War and of the Marriage of the most Noble Prince his Son Nor did they assume to themselves any Power to determine of any Part thereof but to demonstrate those things to his Majesty which they were not assured could otherwise come so fully and clearly to his Knowledge which are mannerly but plain Shifts In the L'enocoy they rise higher That his Majesty did seem to abridge them of the ancient Liberty of Parliament for Freedom of Speech an Inheritance received from their Ancestors The Apple of Contention at last grew only upon the Stalk of those Words The King rejoyns unto it thus Although We cannot allow of the Stile calling it your ancient and undoubted Inheritance but could rather have wished that ye had said that your Priviledges were derived from the Grace and Permission of our Ancestors and Us for most of them grew from Precedents which shews rather a Toleration than inheritance Yet We are pleas'd to give you Our Royal Assurance that as long as you shall continue your selves within the Limits of your Duty We shall be as careful to maintain and preserve your Lawful Liberties and Priviledges as ever any of Our Predecessors were nay as to preserve Our own Royal Prerogative Had Queen Elizabeth sent such Lines to any of the Parliaments called in her Blessed Reign her Name had been advanc'd for a gracious and a renowned Lady It was this if not alone yet chiefly that made her Government more Popular at Home and Glorious Abroad than the Kings her Successors for they wanted nothing of Piety Wisdom and Justice that she never encountred with Harsh Gainsaying Tumultuous Parliaments But what Requital had King James sot his gentle Words perfum'd with sweet Gums Why they begat another Remonstrance full of strong Contestation That the Liberties Franchizes Priviledges and Jurisdictions of Parliament are the ancient and undoubted Birth-right and Inheritance of the Subjects of England and so forth along with every Note above Ela. Yet that no Diversion might be made nor Cessation of weightier Business for this the Lord Keeper writes to the Lord Marquess Decemb. Cabal p. 65. 16. in these Words His Majesty infers that the Priviledges of Parliament are but Graces and Favours of former Kings Most true for where were the Commons before Harry the First gave them Authority to meet in Parliament They claim those things to be their Inheritance and natural Birth-Right Both these Assertions if men were peaceably disposed and affected the Dispatch of the common Business might easily be reconciled Those Priviledges were originally the Favors of Princes and are now inherent in their Persons in their Politick Body His Majesty may be pleased to qualifie that Passage with some mild and noble Exposition This wise Letter cuts the Controversie by a Thred And this Office to mitigate that Passage Sir Humphry May performed singularly to his Praise yet nothing to Success Hereupon on the 21st of December this Session was Prorogued till February the 8th but utterly Dissolved by Proclamation Jan. 7. Surely every good man wish'd that the King and they had embrac'd at Parting Plutarch in the Life of Dion tells of a small Error in Nature which hapned in Syracusa That a Sow Farrow'd and her Pigs had no Ears That the Sooth-Sayers portended to Dionysius the Governor a great Mischief upon it that the People would be Disobedient and hear nothing that was Commanded There cannot be a more ominous Presage of Evil to come than when the Magistrate hath lost the Happiness of a persuasive Tongue and the People of a listning and obedient Ear. 95. An Evill befall that Archimago that Fiend of Mischief that set Variance between the Head and the Body The Lord Keeper who saw about him and before him understood who would have the worst of it in the End For the next Parliament is not weakned in its Power or Priviledges by the Dissolution of the Former but a King grows-less than himself if he depart asunder from that publick Assembly in a Paroxism or sharp Fit as Paul and Barnabas went one from another Acts 15.39 Therefore he read nothing so much to his Majesty as to study it next to his Faith in Christ how to close with the Desires of that High Court when it assembled again that it might be like a Mixture of Roses and Wood-binds in a sweet Entwinement And for his Part he was willing to serve him in it rather than in any thing to be unto him as the Black Palmer was to the Fairy Knight in Mr. Spencer's Moral Poem to guide his Adventure from all distemperate Eruptions Which was put home And let it rest a while till time brought it on that he was the Days-man of Success For now I remove him into his Place in Star-Chamber a Court though buried now yet not to be forgotten Cambden who kept the Nobleness of his Country from Oblivion says of it Curia camâ—rae sâ—llatae si vetustatem spectemus est antiquissâ—ma Si dignitatem honoratissima For the Antiquity the Lord
than the Lecturer of St. Martins in the Fields a great Opiniator who was committed to the Gate-House and having scarce kiss'd the Jayl was restored to go abroad and to Preach again at the Lord Keeper's humble Suit Who gave him grave Advice to take some other Theme to treat of before his Auditors than the King's Counsels and Intentions And what doth your Lordship prescribe me to Preach upon says this Frampul Man What else and that you know your self says he But Jesus Christ and him Crucified The next Sunday the Lecturer restor'd to his Place takes for his Text 1 Cor. 2. V. 2. I determined not to know any thing among you save Jesus Christ and him Crucified And withal told the People That a Bishop and a great Statesman had restrain'd him to Preach of that only and no other Scripture Of which Indignity when Sir George Calvert the Principal Secretary had brought him News he laugh'd heartily and said no more But let him alone Sir George he hath vented his Crotchet His Notes will not let him continue long on that Subject He delights in Quarrels but he shall never be question'd for my sake if he will not trouble the King So he dealt with him as Leo says he us'd Anatasius Ep. 57. Benigniores circa ipsum quam justiores esse volumus A Magistrate is in a great strait that deals with such a Head-strong Piece Whether he be summon'd to answer before Authority or pass'd over in Connivence his Heart is as fat as Brawn and hath no feeling of the Publick Peace Dicere si tentes aliquid tacitus ve recedas Tantundem est feriunt pariter Juven Sat. 3. Yet perhaps when they are left to themselves they will be soonest weary of themselves And every Dunghil smells ill but worst when it is stirr'd 100. A few things more subjunctive to the former were thought meet to be Castigated in Preachers at that time It jarr'd in the Ears of the Discreet to hear some that exercis'd in the Church battle out they knew not what about Regal Authority and limit which were the Enclosures of Subjection and which were not To Be subject to the Higher Powers is a constant and a general Rule and Reason can discern that the Supreme Majesty which unquestionably is in our King is inviolable For omnis motus est super quietem That all Penalties against them that offend may move orderly there must be a Power Quiescent and exempted from that Motion not subject to Penalty by Man He that maintains not this Principle leaps wilfully into Confusion and will never get out of it But for Active Obedience to Laws and Edicts 't is local and therefore various Every Nation know their own way best to what they are tied as we know ours He is a Busie-body that trasheth this in a Pulpit A Minister is pur-blind of that side and cannot tell how far the Eagle may fly For it comes not under the Divine's Cap but under the Judges Coif A Scholar of Broad-Gates in Oxford Mr. Knight that had newly taken Orders broke a Sermon against this Rock in April 1022. out of Paraeus his Aphorisms on the 13th Chap. ad Rom. how far forth he understood him I contend not he deliver'd that which derogated much from the safety of Regal Majesty Dr. Pierce the Vicechancellor a Learned Governor found the Crime too great for the Cognizance of his Consistory But inform'd Bishop Laud of all Passages and the Bishop the King Presently the Floods lift up their Voice Ruine is thundred against Knight who had set such a Beacon on Fire in the Face of the University To the Gate-House he was committed a close Prisoner till a Charge were drawn up against him to Impeach him of Treasonable Doctrine All other Passages I pretermit And how the Charge came not in shall be told by and by But this weak Predicant that run blindfold into Error and Destruction lay in Limbo a great while macerated with fear and want and hard Lodging Dr. White he who purchas'd Sion-College for the Clergy of London and conferr'd other Beneficence on the place had like to have kept Knight Company He Preach'd a Sermon at St. Paul's Church London in his Residentiaries Course though very Aged and was better able to discharge it Forty Years before There were among those that heard him some that wrested his Words to a bad meaning as if he had prick'd the Court in the Basilick or Liver-Vein Though his Doctrine was harmless in good Construction yet a Tale was told to the King to the contrary for he was very Rich. That was the Carrion after which the Crows cawed Though he was Orthodox his Money was Heterodox and the Informers look'd to part it among them To avoid this Peril Dr. White fled to the Lord Keeper's Sweetness and Civility who assured him he would do him the best Office he could He thought upon the Doctor and forgot not Mr. Knight but rubb'd his Fore-head to find a Stratagem how to hunt two Hares at one Course The next time he came into the King's Presence he fell upon it how to amaze his Majesty with a Paradox Some Instructions were appointed to be drawn up by his Discretion and Stile for the Performance of useful and Orderly Preaching Which being under his Hand to dispatch he besought his Majesty that one Proviso might pass among the rest that none of Holy Calling might Preach before the Age of thirty years compleat nor after threescore On my Soul says the King the Devil or some Fit of Madness is in the Motion For I have many great Wits and of clear Distillation that have Preach'd before me at Royston and New-Market to my great Liking that are under Thirty And my Prelates and Chaplains that are far stricken in Age are the best Masters in that Faculty that Europe affords I agree to all this says the Lord Keeper and since Your Majesty will allow both Young and Old to go up into the Pulpit it is but Justice that you shew Indulgence to the Young Ones if they run into Errors before their Wits be settled for every Apprentice is allow'd to mar some Work before he be cunning in the Mystery of his Trade and Pity to the Old Ones if some of them fall into Dotage when their Brains grow dry Will Your Majesty conceive Displeasure and not lay it down if the former set your Teeth on edge sometimes before they are mellow-wise and if the Doctrine of the latter be touch'd with a Blemish when they begin to be rotten and to drop from the Tree This is not unfit for Consideration says the King But what do you drive at Sir says he First to beg your Pardon for mine own Boldness Then to remember you that Knight is a Beardless Boy from whom Exactness of Judgment could not be expected And that White is a decrepit spent Man who had not a Fee-Simple but a Lease of Reason and it is expir'd Both these that have been
he had dazled the World with that false Light he never pleas'd his Judges that had secretly tried the Constitution of his Conscience Sir Edward Sackvile who shortly succeeded his Brother Richard in the Earldom of Dorset was at Rome Ann. 1624. and had Welcom given him with much Civility in the English College so far that he presum'd to ask rather out of Curiosity than Love to see this Prisoner de Dominis Mr. T. Fitz-herbert the Rector did him the Observance to go with him to the Jayl He found him shut up in a Ground-Chamber narrow and dark for it look'd upon a great Wall which was as near unto it as the breadth of three spaces Some slight forms being pass'd over which use to be in all Visits says Sir Edward My Lord of Spalato you have a dark Lodging It was not so with you in England There you had at Windsor as good a Prospect by Land as was in all the Country And at the Savoy you had the best Prospect upon the Water that was in all the City I have forgot those things says the Bishop here I can best Contemplate the Kingdom of Heav'n Sir Edward taking Mr. Fitz-Herbert aside into the next Room Sir says he tell me honestly Do you think this Man is employ'd in the Contemplation of Heav'n Says the Father Rector I think nothing less for he was a Male-content Knave when he fled from us a Railing Knave while he liv'd with you and a Motley parti-colour'd Knave now he is come again This is the Relation which that Honourable Person made Ann. 1625. which I heard him utter in the hearing of no mean Ones 113. But by this time Spalat was dead either by his fair Death or by private strangling Gallo-Belgicus that first sent the News abroad knew not whither But he knew what became of his Body that it was burnt at the same place in Rome where Hereticks do end their Pain It is a Process of Justice which is usual with their Inquisition to shew such abhorrence to Hereticks that were so in their sense to call them to account though they be dead and rotten First They are so Histrionical in their Ceremonies as if they made a Sport of Barbarousness that they cite the dead Men three several Days to appear or any that will answer for them but happy they if they do not appear then their Carkasses or Bones are brought forth and burnt in the common Market with a Ban of Execration The latest that were used so among us were Reverend Bucer and Fagius at Cambridge Anno 1556. And Dr. Scot Bishop of Chester one of Cardinal Pole's Visitors defended it before the University Haud mirum videri debeat si in mortem quoque ista inquisitis extendatur Bucer Scrip. Angl. p. 925. Sic postulare sacros Canones p. 923. This is their Soverity from which the Dead are not free Now by the Blaze of that Bonfire in which De Dominis his Trunk was consum'd we may read an Heretick in Fiery Characters I mean as he was entred into the black Book of the Roman Slaughter-House He lived and died with General Councils in his Pate with Wind-Mills of Union to concord Rome and England England and Rome Germany with them both and all other Sister-Churches with the rest without asking leave of the Tridentine Council This was his Piaculary Heresie For as Aâ—orius writes Tom. 1. Moral Lib. 8. Cap. 9. Not only he that denies an Article of the Roman Creed but he that doubts of any such Article is an Heretick and so to be presented to Criminal Judgment Si quem in foro exteriori l gitime allegata proâ—ata probaverint in rebus Fidci scienter voluntarie dubitasse arbitrer cum ut v re propriè haeretiâ—um puniendum Therefore if Spalat had return'd a Penitent in their Construction and imbodied himself into that Church as only true and Apostolical he could not have suffered in his Offals and Carkass as an Heretick So the same Azorius confesseth Lib. 8. Cap. 14. And Alphonsus à Castro is angry with Bernard of Lutzenburg for holding the contrary Lib. 1. Cap. 9. Quis unquam docuit eum esse dicendum haereticum qui errorem sic tenuit ut monitus conviclus non crubuerit palinodiam cantare This was the success of the variable Behaviour of M. Antonius de Dominis De Domims in the plural says Dr. Crakanthorp for he could serve two Masters or twenty if they would all pay him Wages He had an Hearing as it is mention'd before in our High Commission To countenance the Audience of so great a Cause the Lord Keeper gave attendance at it I began at that end of his Troubles and having footed all the Maze am come out at the other 114. Johosaphat distinguisheth between the Lord's Matters and the King's Affairs 2 Chron. 19.12 So do I in the Subject before me I have given some Says of his Church-Wisdom in the former Paragraph I go on to set the Sublimity of his State-Wisdom in the latter I must look back to a small Service which he did perform in Michaelmas-Term 1621. for as much as the Conjunction of some things which rais'd a Dust in the Year following are sit to go together Upon the solemn Day when the Lord Cranfield then Master of the Wards and immediately created Earl of Middlesex took his Place as Lord Treasurer in the Exchequer-Chamber the Lord Keeper gave him his Oath and saluted his Admission with a short Speech following My Lord You are called to serve his Majesty in the Place of a Lord Treasurer by the most Honourable and most Ancient Call in this Realm the delivery of a Staff to let you know that you are now become one of the surest Staffs or Stays that our great Master relies upon in all this Kingdom And these Staffs Princes must lean upon being such Gods as die like Mon and such Masters as are neither omni-sufficient nor independent For St. Austin writing upon that place of the Psalm I have said unto the Lord Thou art my God my Goâ—ds are nothing unto thee observes that God only is the Master that needs no reference to his Servant All other Masters and Servants are proper Relatives and have a mutual Reciprocation and Dependence Eges tu Domino tuo ut det panem Eget te Dominus tuus ut adjuves labore As the Servant wants a Master to maintain him so the Master wants a Servant to assist him For the present supplying of this want in his Majesty I will say as the Historian did of the Election of Tiberius Non quaerendus quem eligeret sed eligendus qui emineret The King was not now to think of one whom he should choose but to choose one who was most eminent For as Claudian said of Ruffinus Taciti suffragia vulgi Vel jam contulerant quicquid mox addidit Aula You were stated in this Place by the Votes of the People before you understood the Pleasure
of the King Now for your own private I make no question but I may say of you my Lord as one said of Coccius Nerva Foelicior longè quà m cum foelicissimus That you were greater a great deal in your own Contentment than now that you have worthily attained to all this Greatness But as in this World of Things every Element forsakes his Natural Disposition so as we many times see the Earth and Water evaporating upward and the Fire and Air darting downward ad conservationem universi as Philosophy speaks to preserve and maintain the common course So in this World of Men private Must give way to publick Respects Now if it be expected that I should say any thing for your Lordships Direction in this Great Office your Lordships Wisdom and my Ignorance will plead pardon though I omit it I will only say one word and that shall be the same which Pliny said to one Maximus appointed Questor that is Treasurer for Achaia Memenisse oportet Ossicii titulum Remember but your Name and you shall do well enough Your Lordship is appointed Lord Treasurer Take such Order in his Majesties Exchequer that your Lordship do not bear this Denomination and Title in vain and your Lordship shall be worthily honour'd for the happiest Subject in this Kingdom And surely as your Lordship hath the Prayers so you have the Hopes of all good Men that Si Pergama dextrâ defendi poterant If any Man living can improve the Kings Revenue with Skill and Diligence you are that good Husband And so I wish your Lordship as much Joy of your Place as the King and the State do conceive of your Lordship This was the Perfume which was cast upon the new Treasurer in his Robes of Instalment The King was pleased much in his Advancement For his Majesty had proved him with Questions and found that he was well studied in his Lands Customs in all the Profits of the Crown in Stating of Accompts And in the general Opinion the White-Staff was as fit for his Hand as if it been made for it The most that could be objected was that he was true to the King but gripple for himself A good Steward for the Exchequer but sower and unrelishing in Dispatch A better Treasurer than a Courtier There was nothing in appearance but Sun-shine and warm Affections between him and the Lord Keeper The Lord Treasurer I know well had cross'd the other in one or two Suits which had been beneficial to him and not drawn a Denier out of the Kings Purse He dealt so with every Man therefore the Sufferer gave little sign of Grievance It was not his Case alone Another Pick in which they agreed not I cannot say disagreed was about a Brood of Pullein which were never hatcht The last Parliament being dissolv'd it was well thought of by some of the Lords of the Council-Board to sweeten the ill relish which it had in some Palats with a Pardon of Grace that might extend to a fair Latitude for the ease of those that were question'd for old Debts and Duties to the Crown for concealed Wardships and not suing out Liveries and such charges of the like kind which put those that were secure in their Improvidence to a great deal of trouble and disanimated their best Friends for fear of such blind Claps to be their Executors When the Lord Keeper had brought this Pardon so near to his Birth that the Atturney-General was sent for to draw it up the Lord Treasurer mov'd That such as took out this Pardon should pay their Fees which are accustomed in that kind to such Officers as he should appoint that the Advantage might enrich the King and that himself might have that share which the Lord Chancellour us'd to have who put the Seal to those Pardon 's This was heard with a dry laughter and denied him But from thenceforth he struggled to correct the lusty Wine of the Pardon with so much Water that there was no comfort in it and falling short of that Grace which was expected was debated no more The Lord Keeper having obtein'd a good Report for the Conception of the Pardon and the Lord Treasurer a great deal of Envy for the Abortion it curdled in his Stomach into Choler and Mischief And wherefore was he angry with his Brother Abel Look what St. John answers 1 Epist Chap. 3. Vers 12. He endeavoured first to make a Faction in Court against the Lord Keeper and it would not hit because he had no Credit with the Great Ones Then he falls to Pen and Paper and spatters a little Foam draws up Ten What-do-you-call-Um's some of them are neither Charges of Misdemeanour nor Objections which were meant for Accusations but are most pitiful failings entramell'd with Fictions and Ignorance They are extant in the Cabal Pag. 72. which the Lord Keeper puts away as quietly as the Wind blows off the Thistle-Down Pusheth his Adversary down with his little Finger yet insults not upon his Weakness As Pliny writes to Sabin Lib. 9. Ep. Tunc praecipua mansuetudinis laus cum irae causa justissima est It was very laudable to be so mild when there was just cause given to be more angry Yet he complain'd by Letters to the Lord Marquiss as if he were sensible of the despite and unto him was very loud in his own Justification From whom he got no more remedy but that his Adversary was not believ'd And was will'd to consider that he dealt with one whose ill Manners would not pay him Satisfaction for an Injury Unto which the Lord Keeper rejoyn'd to the Lord Marquiss His Majesties Justice and your Lordships Love are Anchors strong enough for a Mind more tost than mine is to ride at Yet pardon me my Noble Lord upon this Consideration if I exceed a little in Passion the Natural Effect of Honesty and Innocency A Church-man and a Woman have no greater Idol under Heav'n than their Good Name And they cannot Fight nor with Credit Scold and least of all Recriminate to Protect and Defend the same The only Revenge left them is to grieve and complain Then he concludes Whom I will either Challenge before his Majesty to make good his Suggestions or else which I hold the greater Valour and which I wanted I confess before this Check of your Lordships go on in my course and scorn all these base and unworthy Scandals as your Lordship shall direct me What need more be said In the space of a Month they wrangled themselves into very good Friends and the Lord Keeper was Gossip to the next Child that was born to the Treasurer As Nazianzen says of Athanasius Encom p. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There was the Condition of two kinds of Stones in his Nature that are much commended He was an Adamant to them that smote him found and firm and would never break But a Loadstone to draw them to him that discorded with him though they were as hard as
〈…〉 unsel being present keeping my Intention from my Chancellor himself from whom I never kept any of my weightiest Business Because if I had made him of my Counsel in that purpose he had been blamed for putting the same into my Head which had not been his Duty For it becometh no Subject to give his Prince Advice in such Matters In this Story it appears that the Father-King trod the way to his Son to undergo such an Audacious Journey in the pursuance of his Love Quid non effraeno captus amore Audeat Ovid. Then that he Persisted in his Principles of Secrecy for a generous End that he might not draw his Chief and Best Servants whom he loved most into a Snare of Guiltiness 127. Let Provision be made to the most that could be for the safety of all others yet Sir Ant. W. in his Court and Character of K. James hath one Exception That the King set this Wheel on Running to destroy Buckingham for the hatred which he had long bore him and would not think it ill to loose his Son so Buckingham might be lost also Pag. 149. O Horrid But the best is the Foundation is Rotten For Buckingham as all Men about the King would Testifie was in as high Favour at that time as any Subject was ever with his Sovereign But when Sir A. to make out the Proof he lays it upon Sir H. Yelverton displaced from the Office of Attorney General to the King and committed to the Tower 't was he that assured the Marquess that the King hated him more than any man Living pag. 159. Sir Harry was Unfortunate but too honest a Man to sow Discord between the King and his principal Peer and Attendant Now mark upon what Bottom the Contriver of this Tale doth wind his Forgery Sir W. Balfore at the time of his Lieutenancy of the Tower brought the Marquess at Midnight to Sir H. Yelverton's Chamber being then his close Prisoner Where Sir William heard those Passages and a great deal more between them And by one or other who came to the knowledge of it but this Sir Anthony O Wicked Servant to thy good Master O fowl Bird that defilest the Nest wherein thâ—u wert hatch'd and well fledg'd Thou art catch'd in thine own Lime for thou never couldst have Conserence with Sir W. Balfore or Sir H. Yelverton about such a matter For Learned Yelverton was never Prisoner to Valiant Balfore Sir Allen Apsley was Lieutenant all the time of that worthy man's restraint And Sir W. Balfore was not preferr'd to that Office of great Trust in more than four years after Sir Harry had obtain'd his Liberty when Knaves will turn Fools it is not amiss to be merry with them And I will fit Sir Anthony with a Jest out of Illustrius the Pythagorean p. 23. One Daphidas came to the Pythian Deity to beseech his Oracleship to tell him when he should find a Gelding of his that was gone astray You shall find him very shortly says Apollo's Minister I thank you for your good News says Daphidas but I have neither lost a Horse nor have a Horse to loose So I turn Sir Anthony over to the Committee of Oracles and proceed After the Princes Out Leap the King lingred at New-market till the time was nigh that every day Tidings were expected of his safe Arrival in Spain that he might shew himself to the Lords at White-hall with better Confidence which he did March 30. being the first day that the Lord Keeper spake with the King about his dear Sons Planetary Absence No sooner had he made most humble sign of his Majesties Welcome by Kissing his Hand but the King Laugh'd out this Question to him Whether he thought this Knight-Errant Pilgrimage would be lucky to win the Spanish Lady and to convey her shortly into England Sir says the Lord Keeper If my Lord Marquess will give Honour to Conde Duke Olivares and Remember he is the Favourite of Spain Or if Olivares will shew Honourable Civility to my Lord Marquess Remembring he is a Favourite of England the Woing may be Prosperous But if my Lord Marquess should forget where he is and not stoop to Olivares or if Olivares forgetting what Guest he hath Received with the Prince bear himself haughtily and like a Castilian Grandee to my Lord Marquess the Provocation may be Dangerous to Cross your Majesties good Intentions And I pray God that either one or both of them do not run into that Errour The King drew a Smile at the Answer but bit his Lip at the presage Discourse being Enlarg'd between them the King perceiv'd that his Counsellor had other Fears and that his Brain teemed with Jealousies of very hard Encounters which he knock'd upon softly that his Majesty might discern them and not seem to apprehend them Only thus far the King proceeded to ask him If he had wrote to his Son and to the Lord Marquess clearly and upon what Guard they should stand Yes Sir says he for that purpose I have dispatch'd some Packets Then continue says the King to help me and themin those difficulties with your best Powers and Abilities and serve me faithfully in this motion which like the highest Orbe carries all my Raccolta's my Counsels at the present and my prospects upon the Future with it and I will never part with you The Cause which made His Majesty so solicitous made the Lord Keeper need no Provocation to diligence He was before hand And upon the 25 of February by a Currier that was at Madrid almost as soon as the Prince he wrote two Letters following to his Highness and to the Lord Marquess A Letter to the Prince May it please your Highness 128 ALthough Prayer is all the Service That at this time either I the most obliged or any other the wisest of your Servants can perform unto you yet I Humbly beseech your Higness to pardon true Affections that cannot stay there but will be expressing of it self though peradventure neither wisely nor discreetly The Comick Writer held these two scarce competent Amare sapere And to exclude all shew of discretion I presume to write this First Letter of mine to your Highness without so much as excribing or taking a Copy of the same this opportunity admitting no leisure at all to do the one or the other Your Journey is generally reputed the depth of your danger which in my Fears and Representations your Arrival should be You are in a strange State for ought we know uninvited business being scarce prepared subject to be staid upon many and contrary pretenses made a Plot for all the Wisdom of Spain and Rome for all the contemplations of that State and that Religion to work upon And peradventure the detaining of Your Highness his Person may serve their turn as amply as their Marriage at least wise for this time and the Exploits of the ensuing Summer I write not this to fright you who have Testified to all the
same Trust to him for this and he shall not fail After he had parted from the King so deeply Charm'd to bestir his Wits in this Negotiation he was as Active as one could be that had little to work upon The Prince and his Paranymphus the Marquess had wrote some Letters upon the way how far they had proceeded in their Journey But the Buen Message that they were come to the Cape of Good-Hope in the City of Madrid was not yet brought to the City of London where the conflux at this time was very populous their Errand being to hearken after News And the particulars they long'd to hear of were these Whether His Highness were Arrived at the Court in Spain When he would return again their Honest Affections ran too fast to look for that so soon Whether he were not Tamper'd withal to alter his Religion And some were so reasonable and well pleas'd some were not to ask Whether he were Married and would bring his Bride with him for hope of Future Issue As much Satisfaction was given to these Scruples from the Lord Marquess by the First Post that Arrived here as could be expected in so short a time as he had spent abroad Of which more in due time But before his Lordship 's came the Lord Keeper wrote again and again unto him to Assist the main business and to pour in such Counsels into his Lordship's Breast as keeping close unto them he might promise himself more Grace with the King and Commendation with the Subject Philosophers who wrote the Practices of a Good life agree That unfeigned Love doth Justifie it self in three Probations or in either of them when it is Faithful to a dead Friend who shall never know it or to a Friend undone in misery who cannot requite it or to an Absent Friend who doth not perceive it As none that have Faith and Candor will wish to declare their sincerity in the two former Experiments so neither will they fail in the opportunity of the latter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Antient Thales in Laertius Remember your Friends as well far of as near you And in Rome says Lil. Giraldus These two Adverbs were Written under the Image of Friendship Longe Prope Be as Officious nay more to your Friend remote from you as when you are hand in hand together I have drawn out the Lord Keeper's Observance to his Raiser my Lord of Buckingham with this Pensil of Morality It would be tedious to fill up Leaves with those copious and punctual Relations which he wrote to his Lordship of all Agitations in the Court of Suits preferred to the King and how far he went about to stop them all till his Pleasure was signified in the next Return That which comes to the Institute I handle was thus Endicted bearing Date Marth 31. My most Noble Lord I Do humbly thank your Lordship for your Letter and all other your loving Remembrances of me by the last Packet It hath much revived me to hear of your Lordship's good Speed so far I was Yesterday with His Majesty the first time I saw his Face since your Lordship's Departure to know his Opinion of this Letter to the Count Gondamar which I send enclosed to stir him up to consummate the Marriage His Majesty lik'd it exceeding well yet I have sent it opened that if your Lordship and my Lord of Bristow who are upon the Place shall not allow thereof it may be suppressed Truly the Reasons are no Colours but very real that if new and tart Propositions sent from Rome occasioned by the Possession they have of his Highness's Person should protract this Marriage the Prince is in great danger to suffer exceedingly in the Hearts and Affections of the People here at Home and your Lordship sure enough to share in the Obloquies Better Service I cannot do the Prince and your Lordship than to thrust on the Ministers of the King of Spain with the best Enforcements of my Judgment who if they dead this Business with a Calm it is almost as bad as a cross Gale But my Lord I will not fail to continue as faithful to your Lordship as to mine own Soul Which to do at this time is not thanks-worthy his Majesty being so constant or rather so augmented in his Affections towards you as all your Servants are extraordinarily comforted therewith and the rest struck dumb and silenced But if any Storm which God will keep off had appeared your Lordship should have found a Difference between a Church-man and others who hath nothing to regard in this World but to serve God and to be constant to his Friend all the rest being but Trash to him who can confine his utmost Desires to a Book and a little Chamber But God Almighty never imparted unto you a greater Share of his Majesty's Affections that at this Time 131. This went by Sir J. Epsley After whom within three days Sir George Goring followed who was stay'd till April the 3d the next day after the joyful Packet came that his Highness saw Madrid by the 7th of March in our Stile and came thither in Health and good Plight after so much Travel by Day and Night so much hard Lodging such slender Fare in base Village-Osteria's Away went Sir George I said with Alacrity the next Day and carried these Lines to my Lord of Buckingham from the Lord Keeper My most Noble Lord IN Obedience to your Commands which I humbly thank your Lordship for I do write by this Bearer yet no more than what I have have written lately by Sir John Epsley All things stand here very firmly and well which may concern your Lordship only the Great Seal walks somewhat faster than usual which is an Argument that it was not my Lord of Buckingham only that set it a going We hear the Affairs proceed well where your Lordship is And here is conceived generally Great Joy and Acclamation for the brave Entertainment that the Prince hath received which the People did yester-night very chearfully express by Bon-fires and Bells only the Consummation of the Matrimony is wanting to consummate our Joys Yet the People spread it abroad upon sight of the Bonfires that all is perfected As they do also speak of your Lordship's Dukedom a Title which will well become both your Person and Employment The Patent whereof I believe the King will shortly send to you to testifie his Joy and to gratifie your Service But my Lord I am still against the Opinion of many wiser Men averse to your Lordship's Return hither as desirous as I am to enjoy your Lordships Presence untill you either see the Prince ready for his Return or that you may bring him along with you I have sent another Letter to my Lord Gondamar to be delivered or suppressed as your Lordship shall please to let him know by my Expostulations falling so thick upon him what is behoveful to be done If they make us stay their leisure
5. to be wasted over into Italy in his Bark Thus he went on with other flatuous Disparagements One Copy of this and no more came to the Leiger Embassador of the Catholick King of which the Lord Keeper had the Use and would never deliver it again but wrote to my Lord Marquess April 20th to bid the Earl of Bristow to take care either to stifle it if it were not divulg'd or to cause it to be called in if it were published Such Scriblers should be informed against in the Ragguaglia's of Pernassus and amerced to pay for the the Loss of our Time 133. Aste the gaudy Days of the Royal Welcome were past over my Lord of Buckingham obliged the Lord Keeper greatly unto him with a Letter Dated March 26 and came about the Declining of April for the Comfort of the Contents which were these My good Lord HOwsoever I wrote so lately unto you that I have not since received any Letter from your Lordship yet because you shall see that I let slip no Opportunity I do it again by this Conveyance and must again tell you the good News of his Highness's being in perfect Health I cannot doubt but many idle and false Rumors will daily be there spread during the Absence of his Highness which I know your Lordship and the wiser sort will easily contemn and believe only that which you shall find avowedly advertised from hence And here let me thus far prevent with your Lordship any sinister Report that shall be made in the main Point which is the Prince's Religion assuring you that he is no way pressed nor shall be perswaded to change it for so is it clearly and freely professed unto him I hope I shall shortly be able to advertise your Lordship of the Arrival of the Dispensation which will be the Conclusion of our Business And thus wishing your Lordship all Honour and Happiness c. The Pearl which came in this Letter is that Satisfaction purchased of God with the Prayers of all devout Men that the Prince should not be inveigled in Conferences or unquieted with Disputes to strip himself of the Wedding-Garment of that incorrupt Faith in Christ which he had professed from a Child for that Wedding sake which he came to conclude How impudently have some Trash-Writers out-faced this Truth as if the Prince had been beset on all sides to make Shipwrack of his Religion in the Gulph of Rome Ar. Wilson of all others is the most forward Accuser and therefore the Falfest Tast him in these Parcels P. 230 that the Earl of Bristow insinuated it with this crafty Essay to his Highness That none of the King 's of England could do great things that were not of that Religion Yet he interfears in that same Page That Gondamar prest the Earl of Bristow not to hinder so pious a Work assuring him that they had Buckingham's Assistance in it Then belike Gondamar was jealous of Bristow that he was contrary to that which he called a pious Work the Prince's Perversion Certainly he knew Bristow as far as a Friend could know a Friend And as many Bow-shots wide is he from my Lord of Buckingham's Sincority in that Action as a Lyar is from Heaven Is not his Lordship's Hand-writing so solemn'y mention'd an uncontroulable Testimony The same Author slanders Conde d'Olivares and makes him utter that which never came from him That if the Prince would devote himself to their Church it would make him â—th way to the Infanta's Afflictions and if he seared the English would rebel he should be assisted with an Army to reduce them The Conâ—e Duke carried no such threatning Fire in one Hand nor at that time any of his Holy Water in the other For he committed nothing to offend his Highness's Ears in that â—ind till his Passions made him forget himself about three Months after Not contented with this he makes the Prince say that which he never thought as that when the Conde Duke propounded That if his Highness would not admit of a sudden Alteration and that publickly yet he would be so indulgent to litten to the Infanta in Matters of Religion when they both came into England Which the Prince promised to do But what says true hearted Spotswood P. 544. That the Prince was stedfast and would not change his Religion for any worldly Respect nor enter into Conference with any Divines for that purpose Utri credetis Is there any Choice which of these two should rather be believed I am careful to praemonish conscientious Readers against Serpentine Pens least their nibling should ranckle A Serpent you know from the beginning was a Lodging for the Devil Gen. 3. and so is a Slanderer The Manual of Romish Exorcisms says Instruct 2. that it is presumed for a sign that he is possest with a Devil Qui linguam extorquet miris modis eandem exerit ingenti oris hiatu I translate that to the Manners of the Mind which is meant there of the Body And let the Living learn the dead Man whom I speak of can take no Warning it is a divelish thing to loll out the Tongue of Contumely These being fore Times to out-face the Truth and willing to listen to Defamations no marvel if some take the Liberty to Lye and have the Confidence to be believed But that Sectaries that have quite overthrown the Church of England a right and pleasant Vineyard of Jesus Christ that these should be the Men who for the most part have challenged the Prince and the chief Ministers that laboured to effect the Spanish Match for being luke-warm at the best and unfastned from the Religion then profest is very audacious The Accused were Innocent and never gave ground to any pernicious Alteration but themselves the Accusers have trodden down that Religion of which in their deep Hypocrisy they would seem to be Champions The Prince and Buckingham were ever Protestants those their Opposites you know not what to term them unless Detestants of the Romish Idolatry As if all were well so they be not Popified though they have departed from the Church in which they were Baptized and a Church I will not say as sound as it was in its Cradle in the Apostles Times but as pure and Orthodox in Doctrine and Government as far as they were maintained to be of Divine Right and Constitution as it was in its Childhood in the time of their Disciples even that next succeeded them And are these the Declamers for Religion and the Temple of the Lord Ex isto ore Religionis verbum excidere an t clabi potest as Tully said of Clodius Orat. pro domo suâ ad Pontif. and so I give them no better Respect at parting 134. But what will be said when one that is greatly affected to our poor demolish'd Church doth concur with those Snarling Sectaries of his own accord That in the flagrant expectation of that Match some for hope of Favour began to Favour the Catholick
Granted from His Majesty to make public Collections from such as are willing to set forward the same Towards every one whereof His Majesty will bestow Ten Pounds 10. The Lord-Keeper to be required to provide for every Convert Priest of good Parts and honest Life that shall Renounce the Romish Church and Embrace our Religion a Benefice of the first that shall fall in His Majesties Gift And every Bishop upon his coming to his See shall lay aside two Benefices for that use to be Nominated by the Metropolitan of the Province or whom else His Majesty shall trust therewith Now 't is an even Lay whether the Observator will call him The Head of a Popish or a Puritan Faction for providing such Bride-Laces for the Marriage He may call him what he will for his Tongue is his own unless his Conscience be subject to the Law of Charity But these were the Directions provided for their honest Satisfaction who perhaps would be troubled to see some Connivance granted to Recusants and could not spy into the necessity of State-Practice while the Prince was in the Power of the most rigid Adherents to the Papacy As for a Toleration it will be shewn by me in its due Place it never had an hour's Approbation with the King with this Prelate so much struck at by the Anonymus or by any of the grave Council Seditious Male-contents spread open such a Jealousie at first and this Author brings it to Light again not that he believes it I presume but to dishonour him whom he hath Persecuted both Living and Dead with a most unsanctified Disaffection Or if he believed it bitterness of Mind put his Judgment out of Taste And as Nazianzen says De Laud. Athan. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that is not ready to do Ill will not be ready to suspect Ill. Perhaps I might have spared the labour of this Apology for if the Accuser be no more believed than he is beloved his Pen will do no hurt Yet he hath wrote Things worthy of Praise but is not the World wide enough for one man's Praise unless he mount himself upon the Dispraise of a man that incomparably surpassed him Of such a strange mixture was C. Gracchus a knowing man industrious well meaning to his Country as this is to our Church but withal Proud Rough and Turbulent Ut dolerent boni omnes illa tanta ornamenta ad meliorem mentem voluntatemque non esse conversa Says Cicero de Arusp Respon 136. This Quarrel hath not put me out of my way my Lord of Buckingham's Letter is still in my Hand His Lordship gave the Lord-Keeper further Joy in the close of his News That the Dispensation from Rome was suddenly expected at Madrid which would be the conclusion of the Business A Dispensation came indeed yet not very fast but before April ended for the Copy of it was exhibited to King James in the beginning of May. The Discourtesie was That when it put forth a Hand out for the Womb it drew it back again like Zarah Gen. 38.29 For the Dispensation would not suffice to conclude the Consent of the Conclave to the Nuptials till upon submission to Articles interchangeable between both Parties a Ratification followed from the same Power This Ratification a frivolous Interloper to cross a Lover's Suit that went roundly on before though it came limping to Madrid at the end of June it was by Accident the Extermination of the Match Delay is a fretful thing in all Courts especially in Cupid's And two months Vacation to them that thought two days too long and looked homeward with many a long look found them nothing to do but to take Exceptions and Brabble Morae dispendia tantae Aen. 1.3 This is it which our King full of Stomach called the Spaniards dull Diligence first to depend upon Dispensations then upon returns of Queries and Objections And the more the Papalins frequented the Vatican Oracle to steer by that alone the further His Majesty recoiled from them professing He would hearken to his Brother the King of Spain if he did balance his Offers with as good from thence but He would do nothing upon dependance of the Pope's Authority or Advice Of whose Overtures and Postils as he calls them he was bid to beware by one of the Pope's Creatures It was the Spaniards Error of which they repented That no impending Danger to overthrow the whole Body of the Transaction would quicken their motion It is a Policy that grows to their State as the Bark to the Tree That they will ever dress their Counsels at a slow Fire For they are always gaping after those Benefits which Alterations may produce to their Advantage Therefore the English and they were not well matched in this business 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Plut. lib. cont Stoic Adrastus was got upon a speedy Horse but was never the better because he must keep pace with a Tortoise And as a hungry Stomach grumbles that the shadow of the Sun creeps slowly to the Meridian Line of high Noon Odi illud tardigradum animal horologium So the Lord Marquess chid sometimes with the great Dons that he could pluck on the Treaty no faster and plied Opportunity while it was green suspecting wisely that else it would never be ripe Therefore the Lord-Keeper wrote on the 20th of April both in the King 's and in his own Name thus unto him My Noble Lord I Am much revived with this last night's News by Mr. Killigrew That your Assurance from Rome is more quickned although I shall not be satisfied in that Point until I hear his Highness is married His Majesty doth upon all Occasions magnifie your Lordships noble wise and vigorous Enforcement of this great Business And bad me write to your Lordship That if it be dispatched which is my If and not His Majesties he will ascribe the Activity thereof very much to your Lordship It is observable that many times the comfort of Assurance is strangely suppressed in our Heart towards a matter which we greatly desire when God hath ordained not to bring it to pass Some such Instinct that came from above possessed the Lord-Keeper's mind that in all his Employments for this match wherein he was most hearty and serious he never raised his Style higher when he wrote than with Ifs and suppositive Unconfidence The Lord Marquess was of a more sanguine and better coloured Hope as in that which is related before out of his Letters March 26. So in another to the Lord-Keeper from Madrid Styl Angl. April 17. My noble Lord BE not angry with me that I write no oftner I confess you deserve all Trust of a Friend I understand more of your Actions than from your self Others have let me know exceeding much And as I owe you much I 'll pay you as much as I can I know you will desire no more And you shall have no less Our Business will end well and soon It lies not in
and ever owing Thanks to your Grace The Dispensation is come and with it good Tidings that your Carriage hitherto hath been so discreet and the Event so fortunate that our Master is wonderfully pleas'd But we were formerly never so desirous to see that Box that carries this Dispensation than we are now to open it and to know by reading the same what God hath sent us We all wonder at his Majesties Reservedness for it came hither on Saturday last this Day sevennight But his Majesty hath enjoyned Mr. Secretary Calvert silence therein And I believe for my part at the least that Mr. Secretary hath perform'd his Commandment We all think and the Town speak and talk of the worst and of very difficult Conditions My dear Lord You have so lock'd up all things in your own Breast and sealed up his Majesties that now our very Conjectures for more they were not are altogether prevented If things succeed well this course is best if otherwise I conceive it very dangerous But it were a great Folly to offer any Advice unto you who only know what you transact in your own Cabinet How then shall I fill up this Letter To certifie this only that all Discontents are well appeased and will so remain without doubt as long as Businesses continue successful But if they should decline I am afraid the former Disgusts of your appropriating this Service will soon be resumed And then how dangerous it is to leave your Friends ignorant of your Affairs and disabled to serve you I refer to your Graces Wisdom and Consideration I do believe none of us all would keep your Counsel without a Charge to do so this keeping Counsel is a thing so out of fashion nor reveal it if it be otherwise required c. The Lord Keeper in this Letter miss'd the true Cause why his Majesty did not yet impart a sight of the Dispensation to any of his Counsellors The reason was because it came to him in a private Packet And he expected it to be deliver'd to him as it ought by Publick Ministers the Ambassadors of the King of Spain who kept it dormant about a Fortnight in their Hands whether it proceeded from their Native Gravida to retein that long in their Stomach which needed no Concoction or to listen what the many-headed Multitude would say in London or out of some other State-juggling As I have laid forth in this what was mistaken by the L. Keeper out of his own Memorials preserv'd So in another Line he hazarded his Love to be ill taken representing to the Duke the Truth That the King did somewhat disgust his appropriating the whole Service to himself that is repulsing the Earl of Bristol or restreining him to silence where their Counsels were held I know not whether the Duke did so soon regret at this for it is the first time and 't is well plaister'd over with mild Counsel So Statuaries says Plutarch do not only hew and peck the Alabaster upon which they work but smooth it likewise which is the neatest part of their Cunning. By another Letter from the same Hand dated near to the former May 11. I perceive that the Duke our Lord Admiral demanded the Navy Royal to be made ready and to be sent to the Coast of Spain to conduct the Prince and his Followers Home Which the King gave order to be done But the Lord Keeper wrote to his Grace if it were not with the soonest the main Matter not grown yet to any colour of ripeness That the Charge would be very heavy to the Exchequer Such a Fleet must be costly to be set forth but far more costly to be kept long abroad As for Cost it was the least thing that was thought upon It was no time for Frugality The Stratagem was to have the Navy lie ready at Anchor in some safe distance from the Spanish Havens That if the Prince could recover no Satisfaction to reasonable Demands from stiff Olivarez and other Grandees Or if they persisted to burden the Match with insupportable Conditions his Highness after a short Complement might take his leave and have all things prepar'd at a Days warning if the Wind serv'd for his Reduction into England With this Fleet some precious Ware never seen no nor heard of in Spain before at least among the Laicks was transported thither the Liturgy of our Church translated into the Spanish Tongue and fairly printed by the Procurement and Cost of the Lord Keeper The Translator was John Taxeda the Author of the Treatise call'd Hispanus Conversus a good Scholar once a Dominican whom his Patron that set him on work secured to our Church with a Benefice and good Prebend He studied this Translation Day and Night till it was ended He that writes this was often at his Elbow to communicate with him when he put Questions how to proceed But the Lord Keeper himself with other Overseers that had perfectly learn'd the Castilian Language perus'd it faithfully and if there were not aptness in any phrase corrected it With his Majesties Privity and great Approbation two Copies of it were carried Religious Tokens the one to his Highness the other to my Lord Duke as the best and most undeniable Certificate that a particular Church can shew to vindicate the right Profession of their Faith from all Scandals and to declare their Piety in all Christ's Ordinances squared and practis'd by a publick Rule after the Beauty of Holiness A Book of Common-Prayer which all call a Liturgie is suitable to the Form of good Churches in all Ages reduceth us to good Notions from wandring Extravagancies preserves Harmonious Conformity between all the Daughter-Churches that are called from one Mother in one Realm or State It is our Witness to assoil us when we are spitefully charg'd with Errours so Chamieras Gerardus Camero Spanhemius Amyraldus and divers more the best of Modern Writers in defence of the Reformed way draw their second Rank of Arguments next to the Sacred Scriptures out of their Liturgies to justifie their Tenents Finally with this Office of Divine Worship he that celebrates Gods Service is ready at all times to offer up to God the Sacrifice of Prayer when some perhaps at some times are affected with Languor of Health and then not so sit to speak suddenly to God in the behalf of the People and when the most have Infirmity of Judgment and are unsit at all times Beshrew the Tettar of Pride that runs over many Wits and makes them care for nothing that 's made ready to their Hand and puts them in love with nothing but their own Conceptions What have we lost Nay What hath God lost in the Honour due unto him How is his Truth How is his Name How is his Glory dis-reverenced over all this Land since our Liturgie hath been Mortgag'd to the Directory 139. It would be remembred that this comes in upon the mention of the Fleet call'd for and hastned to weigh Anchor
that his Lordship should be offered up to Justice as a publick Sacrifice But they that contest for his Innocency observe that he was let loose to depart in Quiet when he should have been brought to the Horns of the Altar And when the Bill drawn up against him was put into Sir Robert Philip's Hand an active and a gracious Member of the House to manage it to his Ruine Sir Robert writes to the Duke Cab. P. 265. If Bristol frame a probable satisfactory Answer to any Charge will it not rather serve to declare his Innocency than to prepare his Condemnation Your Grace may consult with your self whither you may not desist with Honour upon having him further questioned Afterward when his Master King James was dead and when he was at the Stake I may say like to be worried in Parliament by his Accusers he writes thus confidently to the Lord Conway Cab. P. 20. As for the Pardon Jacob. 21. I should renounce it but that I know the justest and most cautious Man living may through Ignorance or Omission offend the Laws So that as a Subject I shall not disclaim any Benefit which cometh in general as it doth usually to all other Subjects in the Kingdom But as for any Crime in particular that may entrench upon my Employments in point of Loyalty and Fidelity I know my Innocency to be such that I am confident I shall not need that Pardon A. Gallius li. 12. c. 7. Take the Earl's Case Pro and Con it is very dubious therefore I will deal with it as the manner of the Areopagites was in such Perplexities adjourn it to be heard an hundred Years hence I say not He but They were the Proprophets of Baal that troubled our Israel Our Corner-miching Priests with the Bloomesberry-Birds their Disciples and other hot spirited Recusants cut out the Way with the Complaints of their no-grievous Sufferings which involved us in Distractions Rome and Madrid were full of them and they conjured Pope Gregory and the Catholick King to wind in their Safety and Immunity in the Articles of the Match as behoved a Father and a Friend If they had sate still and let the Business go adrist with the Tide it had been better for them They that force their Fruits to be Ripe do but hast them to be rotten Qui spretis quae tarda cum securitate prematura vel cum exitio properant Tacit. Annal. lib. 3. The Word of the King and Prince would not serve them that they would be gracious to all of their Sect that lived modestly and inoffensively to deserve their Clemency But they must have publick Instruments for it and Acts of Parliament if they could be gotten to debauch his Majesty in the Love of his People For as the Lord Keeper writes very prudently to the Duke Cab. P. 105. The Bent of the English Catholicks is not to procure Ease and Quietness to themselves but Scandals against their neighbouring Protestants and Discontents against the King and State Rhetorical Campian avows it in an Oration made at Doway Note this Apostrophe of his to our Kingdom As far as it concerns our Society we all dispersed in great Numbers through the World have made a League and Holy Solemn Oath that as long as any of us are alive all our Care and Industry all our Deliberations and Councils shall never cease to trouble your Calm and Safety Yet when our pragmatical Bosom-Enemies had wearied themselves with Solicitations the Earl of Nitsdale a main Prop of their Cause confest It may be Assurance sufficient to all Catholicks who have the Sense to consider that it must be our Master's and the Prince's gracious Disposition that must be our Safety more than either Word or Writ Thus he to the Duke Cab. P. 250. But while the Recusant Petitioners had caused all Affairs with us and Abroad to be obnoxious to Inflammation the Lord Keeper like a right Lapidary cuts a Diamond with a Diamond and useth Sir Tobâ— Mâ— is it not a Paradox the busiest Agent in that Cause to Manifest both in the Palace at Rome and in the Court at Madrid that the Petitioners grasp at more Favours than they could hold either with the Peace of this Kingdom or with the Laws of it which would endanger them to forfeit all that Connivance which they had gained before Give him his Due he rode with great Celerity to those remote Places and did his Work to the Proof and to his great Praise Sâ—stus est at mihi infidelis non est As Plautus in Trinummo The Lord Keeper failed not to put Gold in his Pocket but he paid him chiefly out of his Father's Purse That most Reverend Arch-Bishop of York his Father being highly distasted with Sir Toby's Revolt from the Protestant Religion made a Vow to Dis-inherit him and to leave him nothing The Lord Keeper plied the Arch-Bishop with sweet and pleasant Letters which he loved and with some Mediators in Yorkshire not to infringe his Vow for he did not ask him so much as to name him in his last Wiâ—l and Testament but to furnish him with Three thousand Pounds while he lived and the Sum was paid to his Son to a Peny How Sir Toby beâ— himself in the wisest Counsel which I think was given to the King of Spain may be read Cab. P. 25â— importuning his Majesty not to entangle the Prince with the Voâ—o of the Theologos to which he could not submit himself with Honour but to accept of those large Conditions for Catholicks which my Lord the King and the Prince have condescended to that so the Prince may have some foot of Ground upon which he may stand without Breach of Honour to comply with the incomparable Affection which he beareth to the Infanta This is sure that Sir Toby's Industry was well taken because he did what he could And he that employed him held him ever after to be a Person of Trust in any thing which he promised to do 145. Very consonant to the grand Particulars of the Praemises are the Contents of two Letters both dispatcht in June from the Lord Keeper to the Duke's Grace That which bears the former Date June 15 and yet unpublished lays out Errors advisedly and mannerly under the Heads of trivial Reports and furnisheth the Duke with Counsel for all Exigencies of Advantage especially diseloseth the King's Opinion if the Worst should come It is long but I could not pare it and not mar it Thus it is May it please your Grace IF ever I had as God knoweth I never had any extraordinary Contentment in the Fortunes of this World I have now good Cause offered me to redouble the same by that exceeding Love and Affection which every Man in his private Letter to others doth take Notice that your Grace doth bear and continually express to your poor Servant Nor is your Love incentred to me only in your own Breast but full of Operation having procured to me a good
had signified his further pleasure and that when the Princessa had been Six Months in England this Favour should be confirmed to her further Content The like was not yielded in the business Agitated with the Duke of Anjoy but a strict Exception was put in Ut nulla Occasio Anglis ad leges constitut as violandas praeberetur It was an ill time for the Embassadors to ask such things when not only seditious Spirits but the best of Protestants who had nothing in them of the peevish and refractory were sick of an ill Digestion of Jealousies It was a hard seeming work to overcome for the Ravens Croak'd and the Doves mourned at it Yet it was a worse time to deny them when the Pledge of our Future Happiness stuck fast in a Foreign Kingdom and nothing could Conduct him home with such Celerity and Safety as some drops of Grace Distilling from the Prerogative Royal to stay the longing of the Pontifician Faction They are beguiled that think Marquess Inoihosa or 〈◊〉 Carlos de Colonna pluck'd us over our Line to get a Wife for the Prince it was to get him home Jam non de Gloriâ sed de Salate pugnandum est Curt. lib. 4. Let his Highness look to it in Spain to come home with a Glorious Bride but all Loyal Hearts look earnestly for him whether single or double was not the Chief Point And the Anxiety of his Majesty was What shall I do for my Son 1 Sam. 10.2 This was the Compass that guided the Lords of the Councel in their condescension to bring their young Master out of Peril though it were with the Ransom of too much Mercy to them who were not the best that deserv'd it But who it was that set the Edge of the Razor upon the Hoane who it was that surpass'd himself in this Negotiation that cut off difficulties smoothly leaving no Raggedness to be seen in the Clest of his distinctions will appear in the ensuing dispatch of the Lord Keepers to the Prince whose goodness will satisfie for the Prolixity May it please your Highness 150. IF I shall touch upon any Service which I may seem to have performed towards Your Higness I humbly beseech your Highness to conceive I do it not to pick Thanks and much less to put any acknowledgment upon your Highness but only to discharge my self of that part of Duty which all the World knoweth I do above all Men in the World owe unto your Highness Before I did imagine that his Majesty would take any Opinion of mine in the Signing and Swearing of this Treaty Sir Fr. Cottington your most worthy Servant had acquainted me with all the dispatch and permitted me to Read the Papers over Upon Saturday last the 12 of July the Council formerly warned to attend his Majesty the next day at Wansted were discharged and some hour after my self commanded to attend Suspecting thereupon I might be questioned to that Effect I sent for your Highness Secretary and heard from him it would be so indeed and that His Majesty was much troubled and perplex'd about his Oaths Presently Town-Reports were Raised of great Opposition among the Lords against this Swearing In so much as the shameless people had made two Orations the one to be of mine for the Oaths and the other of my Lord of Canterbury's against the same which they supposed prevailed with the King and the whole Councel when neither of us had heard or spoken one word in that Theme I spent in a manner all that Night in debating with my self the Streights that your Highness was unto and at the last fell upon this Resolution contained in this Letter which I deliver'd upon Sunday Morning in private to his Majesty with an excuse for my Boldness therein His Majesty accepted thereof very well and Read it over three or four times that day and seemed to me at that time to approve thereof in all Points and put off further Discourse till the Afternoon I was so far emboldned therewith that after Dinner because I found some whispring among the Lords present I stept again to His Majesty and deliver'd him an Opinion that for the Oath of the Lords his Majesty should not leave it to their Disputation but command them to take 〈◊〉 there being no matter of scruple or moment in the same as indeed there is not This his Majesty well approved of and put in practise afterward with good success The Council being met whereof some were there by Reason of their Attendance as my Lord Chamberlain Earl of Carlisle Lord Fenton and Mr. Treasurer others warned as the Duke Lord Treasurer Lord Marshal my self Sir R. Weston and the two Secretaries his Majesty made a Speech unto us full of perplexity because of your Highness's Streits and his own Remorse of Conscience Chiefly he insisted it would be frivolous to be put upon it to move the next Parliament to abrogate the Laws already Establish'd against Recusants which would not be Heard much less Granted and that in point of Conscience and Religion he could not promise that no Laws hereafter should be made against them This his Majesty having utter'd with much Passion and earnestness left us to hear all the Papers Read and having Commanded us very passionately to give him our best Advice retired into his Chamber and left us together for two hours After the End of the Reading many odd and extravagant Propositions were made of Advice to be given to his Majesty how to get your Person home again wherein I durst not say one word finding none of my Opinion unless it were Secretary Calvert nor my self to concur with any of theirs At the last pressed thereunto I said that I conceiv'd upon the Discourse of his Majesty we could not deliver any Advice or Opinion at all For if his Majesty made a Conscience of taking the Oaths and had already Framed unto himself this Conclusion the immoveable Rule in this Case is Quod dubitas ne feceris nor there was no more in Policy or Divinity to be said therein On the other side if His Majesty would otherwise declare himself that he was not moved in Conscience or Religion but only in Honour and Safety to Refuse those Oaths I did hope no Lord in this Company would Advise his Majesty to desert his only Son and to desert him in this manner in the Face of all Christiandom For to pretend an excuse to fetch him home to bâ—lpâ—his Majesty to facilitate these Affairs would never repair his Credit who had subscribed that which his Father would not make good nor was he himself any way able to accomplish Beside that I made it a Question Whether the King of Spain after all this wooing would so easily be deceived in Licensing him to depart At the last his Majesty Returning and calling upon us for our Advice all the Lords Assented to this last Opinion and told his Majesty they durst not Advise him any thing until he express'd himself
more fully in the point of Conscience His Majesty turning to me whom he said he had made for this time his Counsellor and Confessor affirmed his Conscience to stand as he had said before but that he was willing to hear any thing that might move him to alter the same To the which as far as I can remember I spake in this manner SIR 151. IT is not for me upon a sudden to offer my Reasons unto your Majesty to alter a Conclusion of Conscience once Resolved on by your Majesty considering how Guilty I am both of mine own Greenness and Interruptions in these Studies and of your Majesties deep Learning in that part of Divinity especially But because I do conceive that your Majesties doubting in this kind is an absolute Condemnation of the Prince who hath already Subscribed and Presented these Oaths in their Perfection and Formalities to be taken by your Majesty and yet continueth my Soul for his as Zealous a Protestant as any Lives in the World which his Majesty by a short Interruption did with Tears acknowledge I would presume to say somewhat in defence of his Highness in this Case tho I dare not be so bold as to apply or refer it to your Majesty Two things appear unto me considerable in this Case the advancing of the True Religion and the suppressing of the Adverse within this Kingdom The former is a matter directly of Conscience and your Majesty is bound in Conscience to take care of the same to the uttermost of your Power And if your Son had suffered as he hath not one Syllable to be inserted into the Oaths or Articles derogating from the Religion Established he was worthily therein to be deserted and God to be by your Majesty preferred before him The suppressing of the Adverse within this Kingdom is to be consider'd in two degrees First Ita ut non praesit Secondly Ita ut non sit For the first I think his Highness doth make it a matter of Religion and Conscience that Popery do not praeesse prove so predominant in your Kingdoms as that the Religion Establish'd be thereby disgraced or dejected For certain he makes it a Conscience not to Erect Altare contra altare For as for the Leave he promiseth for Strangers to be present at Divine Offices with the Family of the Infanta it is per conniventiam and as his Highness shall approve thereof For the second Degree Ita ut non sit that the Popish Religion should be quite extirpated or the Penal Statutes for the suppressing the same be strictly Executed His Highness dares not make this a matter of Conscience and Religion but a matter of State only If the Prince should make this a matter of Conscience he should not only conclude the French King to be a false Catholic for not suppressing the Protestants and the Estates of the Low-Countries to be false Protestants for not suppressing the Papists at Amsterdam Rotterdam and Utricht especially but should conclude your Sacred Majesty to have often offended against your Conscience an horrible thought from such a Son to such a Father because your Papists are not suppressed and your Penal Statutes have been so often intended and remitted These things you may well do this Point continuing but a matter of State but you may not do it without committing a vash Sin if now you should strein it up to a matter of Conscience and Religion against the Opinion of all moderate Divines and the Practice of most States in Christiandom I conclude therefore that his Highness having admitted nothing in these Oaths or Articles either to the prejudice of the true or the Equalizing or Authorizing of the other Religion but contained himself wholly within the Limits of Penal Statutes and connivences wherein the Estate hath ever Challenged and Usurped a directing Power hath Subscribed no one Paper of all these against his own nor I profess it openly against the Dictamen of my Conscience As soon as I had ended the King spake Largely and Chearfully That in Conscience he was satisfied To which the Lords likewise as generally gave their Applause So the rest of the Counsel were Summon'd against the next Sunday the Arch-bishop of Canterbury Marquess Hamilton the Earl of Worcester the Bishop of Winton Viscount Grandison the Lord Cary the Lord Belfast with others whom I may have forgot And all was dispatch'd before the Embassadors as I need not to relate because Sir Fr. Cottington can best do it And if this Service may conduce to bring your Highness with Speed and Safety to all faithful ones that desire it with their earnest Prayers I shall be the Happiest among Your Highness's Most Humble Servants c. 152. So powerful and perspicuous was the Lord Keeper's Theology that all the Worthies of David his Majesties Secret Counsel concurr'd in the Confirmation Among whom was Bishop Andrews the Torturer of the best Roman Champion with his mighty Learning Another was Archbishop Abbots about whom Mr. Sanderson is most negligently mistaken to write thus Pag. 550. That he was then suspended from his Function and from coming to the Council-Table He sat that Day with the Lords and was the first that subscribed in the Catalogue as himself observes It may be Mr. Sanderson could not reconcile nor I neither how he should sign to the Ratification and undertake a long Letter to King James to disprove it with many Flourishes Cab. p. 13. The same Fountain cannot send forth salt Water and fresh Jam. 3.12 Therefore I deny the Letter I believe justly to have been written by him Such Frauds are committed daily to set Credit to spurious Writings under a borrowed Name A. Gell. picks out a fit Merchant for such Ware Sertorius a brave Commander but a great Impostor Literas Compositas pro veris legebat Lib. 15. Cap. 22. But I will prove my Conjecture strongly First So wise a Man would not shame himself with Inconstancy Act one thing to Day with his Sovereign Lord and pluck it down to Morrow Secondly The Letter crept out of Darkness Thirty Years after the Prince came out of Spain and Twenty Years after the supposed Authors Death A large time to hatch a Fable Thirdly The Lord Keeper vide supra certified the Prince that before the Lords came together to consult about the ease of the Oaths two Speeches were in many Hands rise in London The one for the Negative under the Archbishop's Name The other for the Affirmative under the Lord Keepers Name when no Colloquy had been begun about it Was it not as easie for the same Author or such another to forge a Letter as well as a Speech Fourthly The Archbishop was so stout in the Pulpit at Whitehal as to deplore the Prince's absence and his departure out of the Kingdom The ill relish of that passage I know it by the Papers under my Hand was sent abroad as far as Spain by Sir Edw. Villiers And I dare say the Tydings of that
the Letter for upon the Death of the late King of Spain being sent from his Master our Soveraign to the King of Spain that now is to understand his Mind upon the Treaty of Marriage he receiv'd this Chearful Answer That he was sorry he had not the Honour to begin it but now he would pursue it with all Alacrity The Earl of Bristol is another Witness Cab. p. 27. I insisted that Two Millions for the Portion were by the last King settled and agreed with me That this King had undertaken to pursue the Business as it was left by his Father and to make Good whatsoever he had promised Thereupon I desired that the Original Papers and Consultoes of the last King might be seen which very honestly by the Secretary Cirica were produced and appeared to be such that I dare say there was not any Man that saw them that doubteth of the last Kings real Intention of making the Match So I leave these Contradictions to blush at the sight of one another But to me Olivarez his Fidelity is the Leg that halts For as Tully said of Roscius the Comoedians Adversary Quod sibi probare non possit id persuadere alteri conatur he could never persuade that vigorously to another which he disbelieved himself It is a tedious thing to be tied to Treat with one that cares not for his own Honour nor regards his Modesty with whom he Treats I mean that same Person that Bashaw of King Philip the Conde Duke who entramel'd as many Devices as his Pate could bring together to raise a Dust and made Demands meerly to satisfie his own Pride that he might boast he had ask'd them though his discretion taught him that he could never obtain them When Sir Fr. Cottington return'd to Madrid with the great Article procur'd to suspend the Penal Statutes of England in favour of Recusants he presented it to the Conde and expected as the Casttlian Phrase is Las Albricias a reward for bringing of good News the Conde stoop'd not so low as to give Thanks but having perused the Paper told Sir Francis it would be expected the Prince should Negotiate a plain Toleration for the Protestants that endured that which was in his Hand would patiently endure more Sir Francis Answered him with the Old Simile That his Lordship was no good Musician for he would peg the Minikin so high till it crack'd Concerning his Attemptings upon the Prince my supply is out of private Letters that came from Friend to Friend The Conde had Oblig'd his Honour to his Highness when he came First to the Court of Spain never to meddle with him about his Religion He kept not his promise but solicited his Highness that as he lov'd his Soul he would return to England a Catholic in his Sense Well my Lord says the Prince You have broken your Word with me but I will not break my Faith with God Another time he besought his Highness to afford his Company at a Solemn Mass No Sir says the Prince I will do no ill nor the suspicion of it Once more this Idern told his Highness that he would accomplish all that he could desire from the Crown of Spain if he would profess himself a Son of the Roman Church he should not only carry home the bravest Lady for Beauty Birth and Vertue that was but be made as great a King in Riches and Power as was in Europe But as the Prophet says Isa 63.5 Excandiscentia mea fulcivit me my Fury it upheld me so the Prince was heated at the Offer and gave this provocation to him that had provok'd him that it was such a another Rhadomontade as the Devil made to Christ All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and Worship me Next to matters of Religion the stiffest thing that was tugg'd for in this Month was about the Restitution of the Palatinate The Secretary of the Elector came to Madrid with Letters to the Duke about it which were not first imparted to the King his Father-in-Law But all that shall be drawn up into one Process in the Transactions of August 155. But in all Disputes for Sacred or secular Matters the Ministers of our King were the more Naked and Unarm'd when they came to the push of the Spanish Subtleties because they kept not the correspondence with themselves If my Lord of Buckingham could have fashion'd his mind to draw the same yoke with the Earl of Bristol who was most conversant upon the place and best knew the Arts of that Nation success had been more Fortunate But those Civil Discords were the Cause of many disorders and incivilities Therefore the King imposed on the Lord Keeper to use his Pen once more to reconcile them which he did not fail to do the very next day which was his Majesties Remove to begin the Western Progress July 22. May it please your Grace I would not be troublesom with this Second Letter but chiefly to let your Grace know that you never stood in your Life more uprightly in his Majesties Favour then at this instant and that I shall need to pour out no other Prayers unto God but for the continuation of the same For Gods sake Write to my Lord Hamilton and acquaint his Lordship with some Passages of your Affairs For my self I shall be content to Rove and guess at them And I hope your Grace will be pleased to pardon this Excursion that is my running this second or third time into business which I am told but cannot by any means believe it hath already drawn your Grace's Offence against me It is a most Humble Zealous and earnest Petition to your Grace to Seal up and really confirm that agreement and reconciliation which to the great Contentment of all your Friends but the Regret of some among us you have made with the Earl of Bristol What I wrote formerly might be ill placed and offend your Grace but all proceeded from as true and sincere a Heart unto your Grace as you left behind you in all this Kingdom But the renewing of it now again hath a Root from a higher Power who hath observ'd your Grace his Favour so abounding towards me and my acknowledgments so far as my poor ability permitteth so returned to your Grace that he was pleased to say unto me this Morning upon this Theme That he knew you would regard any Representation that I should recommend unto you In good Faith his Majesty is more then Zealous not only of fair Terms of Friendship but of a near Alliance formerly spoken of between your Grace and that Earl Of whose Sufficiencies and Abilities I perceive His Majesty to retein an extraordinary good Opinion which in all Humility I thus leave to your Lordships Wisdom and Consideration The Earl of Bristol had heard how the Lord Keeper had ventur'd to make this Pacification and writes to him Cab. p. 20. That the Friendship of the Duke was a thing he did
Old Latium August and Sacred signified the same 'T were good if it would prove so now But it began with discontent on every side and never mended Our Wise King no longer smother'd his Passion but confess'd at sundry times a great fault in himself that he had been so improvident to send the Duke on this Errand with the Prince whose bearing in Spain was ill Reported by all that were not partial He put the bafful so affectedly upon the Earl of Bristol at every turn that those Propositions which his Majesty had long before approved with deep Wisdom and setled with the Word of Honour were struck out by my Lord of Buckingham only because Bristol had presented them Nay if the Prince began to qualifie the unreasonableness he would take the Tale out of his Highness's Mouth and over-rule it and with such youthful and capricious Gestures as became not the lowly Subjection due to so great a Person but least of all before Strangers It was an Eye-sore to the Spaniards above any people who speak not to their King and the Royal Stems of the Crown without the Complement of Reverence nor approach unto them without a kind of Adoration The more the Prince endur'd it the more was their judgment against it For every Mouth was fill'd with his Highness's Praise and nothing thought wanting in him to be absolutely good and Noble but to know his own Birth and Majesty better and to keep more distance from a Subject So the Earl of Bristol Writes Cab. p. 20. I protest as a Christian I never heard in all the time of his being here nor since any one Exception against him unless it were for being supposed to be too much guided by my Lord of Buckingham which was no Venial Sin in their censure For how much their gall Super-abounded against that Lord the same Earl could not hold to write it to the Lord Keeper bearing Date August 20. I know not how things may be Reconciled here before my Lord Duke's departure but at present they are in all Extremity ill betwixt this King his Ministers and the Duke And they stick not to profess that they will rather put the Infanta head-long into a Well then into his Hands One thing that fill'd up the Character of my Lord Duke before in this Work was that he had much of the brave Alcibiades in him In this they differ that Plutarch's Alcibiades suited himself so well to the Manners and Customs of all Courts where he came that he gave satisfaction to all Princes and they were best pleased with him that most enjoy'd him The great Lord Villiers was not so Fortunate for he thrived not in the Air of Madrid and he brook'd the Air of Paris as ill about two years after upon the like Occasion And no marvel For as Catulus said of Pompey in Paterculus Praeclarus vir Cn. Pompeius sed reipub liberae nimius So this Lord was a worthy Gentleman but too big to be one in a Free Treaty with other Ministers The Lord Keeper who was the Socrates to this Alcibiades had Noted his Lordships Errors and unbeseeming Pranks before For which he look'd for no better then he that rubs a Horse that is gaul'd Yet he resolv'd to shoot another Arrow the same way that the former went though the Duke had threatned to break his Bow as soon as he came Home But he was too prudent to be scared from doing Duty to so great a Friend 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Aristotle He is neither Wise nor Faithful but a Flatterer that denies his Spirit ingenious Freedom And it is a Speech worthy of Sir Ph. Sidney which the Lord Brooke ascribes to him Pag. 42. of his Life That he never found Wisdom where he found not Courage Therefore the Lord Keeper writes to the Duke Aug. 3. of which this is the Moral to him that reads it intelligently That no Man living can keep Favour who keeps not Conditions that merit to perpetuate Favour May it please your Grace I Have no more to trouble your Grace at this time withal than the Expression of that Service and those Prayers which as I do truly owe so shall I ever as faithfully perform to your Grace New Comers may make more large and ample Promises but will in the end be found to fall short of your old Servants in Reality and Performances If your Grace hath by this time thought that I have been too bold and too near your Secrets in those Counsels I presumed upon in my last Letters I beseech you to remember how easie it was for me to have held my Peace how little Thanks I am like to receive from any other beside your Grace for the same how far I am in these Courses from any end of mine own beside your Prosperity and Security If your Grace would give me leave to deliver my Opinion upon the main though no Hunter after Court-News it is this Your Grace stands this Day in as great Favour with his Majesty as your Heart can desire And if I have any Judgment in far more Security of Continuance than ever you did if you remain as for ought I can perceive you do in the same State with the Prince in the same Terms as your Pains have deserved with the Princess and out of Quarrels and Recriminations which will but weaken both Parties and make way for a third with the rest of his Majesties Agents in this Negotiation I cannot but presume once more to put your Grace in mind that the nearer you are drawn to his Highness in Title the more you are with all Care and Observance to humble your self unto him in Speech Gesture Behaviour and all other Circumstances yea although his Highness should seem to require the Contrary This cannot be any way offensive to your own and is expected to the utmost Punto by that other Nation I do presume of Pardon for all my Follies in this kind and that whatsoever is wanting in my Discretion your Grace will be pleased to make up out of my Sincerity and Affection However your Grace and the Earl of Bristol shall conclude I hope your Grace will pardon my Zeal though peradventure not according to Knowledge aiming only at your Grace's Service the Amplitude and Continuance of your Greatness For whatsoever your Grace shall determine and conclude I do and shall implicitly yield unto the same Yet am still of Opinion the way of Peace to be the broad way to enlarge and perpetuate your Grace's Greatness and Favour with his Majesty c. This was bold but faithful and ingenious Dealing The Duke's last Messenger whom he sent into England before he arrived Sir J. Hipsley gave him a touch of the same Cab. P. 316. For God's-sake carry the Business with Patience betwixt my Lord of Bristol and you And again in the same For God's-sake make what hast you may Home for fear of the worst For the King's Face began to gather Clouds upon the
perfect the Business as I said before those my Lords the Embassadors say that the thing which on their Part hath been desired and that which the most Excellent Prince and the Lord Duke of Buckingham did carry away in their Understanding and that which the Embassadors themselves have written to the King of Great Britain was That we must procure that the Restitution of these States may be to the Palatine himself This Point carrieth so great Difficulty with it to be conveyed to the Emperor's Ears that it may be feared yea and held for certain that the Persons who are interested in this Business wou'd procure to over-turn the World to make Complaints to the Pope and to have recourse also to others exaggerating that which they have done for the Restitution of that to the House of Austria which had been taken from it And they wou'd also ponder that which concerneth Religion whereby they might disquiet the Mind of Man and say that they having acquired it by their Arms or given Assistance towards it it is now taken from them and given to one who hath been a Rebel for this is the Language they will hold and is still an Enemy of the Catholick Religion And this being exaggerated as they well know how to do it may perhaps breed such Difficulty in the Business as that the Restitution even of the Son will not be obtain'd a thing which would be ill for us all and worse perhaps for the Palatine himself and his Children But this other may be disposed with more Sweetness and good Liking of all Parties Since the Marriage being once made they who might now contradict wou'd be wholly in Dispair to have any Paâ—t in this Business when they should see the Emperor interessed in the Affairs of the Palatine whereby they would grow not to oppose any of those things which his Imperial Majesty would think â—t to do concerning him And thus we shou'd come to facilitate the Addressing oâ— that which is now desired concerning the Palatine in his Person wherein my Lord the King will use all the possible Endeavor by doing Offices to the Emperor to obtain it and so to settle things with satisfaction which the Pope and other Princes and Potentates may receive by this way and which cannot be by that other to which my Lords the Ambassadors do point For as long as Men will speak of the Individual Person of the Palatine they have room to reprove his Actions and to hide their own Interests by the pretext of the Justifiableness of his Punishment And I conceive that although his Majesty will use all possible Endeavour yet the Business will be as it were impossible if we use not the Medium of depriving them of their Hopes by placing all upon the Son And I resolved to say all this to you to the end you may represent it to his Majesty of Great Britain assuring him that here is great desire to give him Satisfaction in all that is possible and that we must help our selves to obtein this by not demanding things that are impossible and whereby besides the difficulty which they would have very great Inconveniencies and greater Disquiet might result And I hope that his Majesty according to his great Prudence will consider and understand it after the same manner and you who understand the Business so will give it so to be understood Yet use it with that Prudence which you think convenient 162. For by these means I hold the Emperor to be in a manner already reduct and by that other although the thing be attempted and though we for our parts do all that possibly we can as we will do and this shall be given in Writing to the Ambassador if they press it Yet I fear much and I have much Ground to do so that we shall not be able to obtein it and that we shall scandalize and lose Reputation And it will prove as ill-favour'd a piece of Work as that which hapned in the Electorate of Bavaria which we contradicted and France favoured And if I may tell you freely what I think that which is pressed is much less than that which I offer Since by that which I say the Restitution of all the States is presently fix'd upon the Grand-Child of the King of Great Britain and the Electorate after the Life of Bavaria yea and during that Life all that may be done without affronting the said Duke And in that other way which is offer'd we are to walk all the Days of our Lives in the Question Whether the Submission which the Palatine maketh be sufficient or no And they who have Interests herein will be sure to except after a critical manner to any defect which may be suspected And as long as the State shall be undeliver'd the Business certainly will grow to nothing and become subject to the Power which some interested Persons have with the Emperor All which would cease if the Submission which the Palatine is to make were to be after the Estates were to be order'd to the eldest Son by this Match so that the Palatine would in fine make due Submission and give convenient Satisfaction and Security for true Friendship and Alliance with the Emperor my Lord the King and the Noble House of Austria I confess that I am a young Minister of State and I shew it by desiring to redress Businesses by way of Effecting and not of Delays which are ever used by old and prudent Ministers And I know that without doubt that the Proposition which is made by me is the better way And so you may understand thus much for your self And according to the dispatch which you shall receive of the Ambassador you may go walking on The thing which I conceive is the thing I relate unto you here and that which I told you by Word of Mouth in Madrid although the Ambassador as I said before affirm that you and they yea and the Prince had mistaken this by understanding that the delivery of the States should instantly be made to the Person of the Count Palatine and not to his Son And I would to God I might see this obteined of the Emperor who doth so greatly desire the Peace of Germany and the repose of the House of Austria For I for my part would be sure to do all that possibly I could for the effecting thereof Besides this I have seen by a Reply of the Earl of Bristol's that he maketh instance for us to ponder the Engagement wherein the most Excellent King of Great Britain doth find himself by his having obliged himself by publick Writings to restore all entirely or else to put all that he hath in adventure It is here to be understood that when it is said that that King made this Writing yet in case he made it the Palatine had not then committed those things which he executed afterward against the Will and Counsel of the most Excellent King of Great Britain Nor can
for Legal Notions When the Lord Keeper had done with the Living he began with the Dead and scrupled how their Dead should be Interr'd so as to give no offence nor be obnoxious to be offended The Resolution was brought to him that sent it That their Burials should be in their private Houses as secret as might be and without any sign of Manifestation but Notice to be given to the Parish-Clerk of their departure 164. Never was Man so entangled in an Els-lock all this while that could not be unravell'd as Marquiss Inoiosa till he publish'd his Choler in all sorts of Impatiency The Reader may take in so small a matter by the way that the Writer of these Passages said to the Lord Keeper That the Marquiss was the most surly unpleasing Man that ever came to his House His Lordship answer'd They were his Manners by Nature But he had been so vain to profess That he came an Enemy to us into England and for this Dowty Cause His Father was a Page to King Philip the Second while he lived here with Queen Mary and was discourteously used in our Court perhaps by the Pages Which was a Quarrel of Seventy Years old and bearing date before the Marquiss was born Which will cause a Passage of Dionysius the Tyrant of Sicily to be remembred who had robb'd and spoil'd some of the Islands under the Protection of Athens and when the Injury was expostulated he told them Their Countryman Ulysses had used the Sicilians worse 700 Years before as he believ'd it to be very true in Homer This Ambassador was a restless Man and held the Lord Keeper so close to turn and plow up the fallow of this Business that he would not give him the Jubilee of a Day to rest Yet the time do what he could had run at waste from the 20th of July to the end of August Then and no sooner the Frames of the Pardon and Dispensation were contriv'd and dispatch'd Yet the Mill would not go with this Water The Ambassadors call'd for more That two general Commands should be issued forth under the Great Seal the first to all the Judges and Justices of Peace the other to all Bishops Chancellors and Commissaries not to execute any Statute made against the Papists Hereupon the Spanish Faction was suspected that they had no hopes to bring some secret Drifts to pass but by raising a general hatred against our Government The Lord Keeper repulsed the Motion and wrote to the King being at Aldershot That whatsoever Instance the Ambassador makes to the contrary there was no reason why his Majesties Wisdom should give place to them He propounded That a private Warrant might be directed to himself to will him to write to the respective Magistrates fore-nam'd to acquaint them with the Graces which his Majesty had past for Recusants in that Exigence and to suspend their Proceeding till they heard further For as the Civilians say Cessant extraordinaria ubi ordinariis est locus Thus he contriv'd it that the King as much as might be should escape the Offence and let the Rumour light upon his private Letters For which he never put the King to stand between the People and his Errour nor besought him to excuse it to the next Parliament But as Mamertinus in Paneg. said of his own Consulship Non modò nullum popularium deprecatus sum sed ne te quidem Imperator quem orare praeclarum cui preces adhibere plenissimum dignitatis est Yet lest the Ambassador should complain of him to the Prince in Spain he writes to the Duke Cab. P. 8. Aug. 30. THat he had prevailed with the Lords to stop that vast and general Prohibition and gave in three Days Conference such Reasons to the two Ambassadors although it is no easie matter to satisfie the Capriciousness of the latter of them that they were both content it should rest till the Infanta had been six Months in England For to forbid Judges against their Oath and Justices of Peace sworn likewise not to execute the Law of the Land is a thing unprecedented in this Kingdom Durus sermo a harsh and bitter Pill to be digested upon a suddain and without some Preparation But to grant a Pardon even for a thing that is malum in se and a Dispensation with Poenal Statutes in the profit whereof the King only is interested is usual full of Precedents and Examples And yet this latter only serves to the Safety the former but to the Glory and Insolency of the Papists and the magnifying the service of the Ambassadors too dearly purchas'd with the endangering of a Tumult in three Kingdoms His Majesty useth to speak to his Judges and Justices of Peace by his Chancellor or Keeper as your Grace well knoweth And I can signifie his Majesties Pleasure unto them with less Noise and Danger which I mean to do hereafter if the Ambassador shall press it to that effect unless your Grace shall from his Highness or your own Judgment direct otherwise That whereas his Majesty being at this time to Mediate for Favour to many Protestants in Foreign Parts with the Princes of another Religion and to sweeten the Entertainment of the Princess into this Kingdom who is yet a Roman Catholick doth hold the Mitigation of the Rigour of those Laws made against Recusants to be a necessary Inducement to both those Purposes and hath therefore issued forth some Pardons of Grace and Favour to such Roman Catholicks of whose Fidelity to the State he rests assur'd That therefore you the Lord Bishops Judges and Justices each of those to be written to by themselves do take Notice of his Majesties Pardon and Dispensation with all such Poenal Laws and demean your selves accordingly This is the lively Character of him that wrote it Policy mixt with Innocency 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Nazianzen Cunning enough yet not divided from Conscience For Wit when it is not sheathed as it were in the fear of God will cut like a sharp Razor 165. All his Art would be requir'd to reconcile two things That the Ambassador should be put off no longer for so the King had now commanded by Dispatches from both the Secretaries And that he would finish nothing till he had heard either his Highness or the Duke's Opinion upon the Proceeding The general Pardon and the Dispensation were both sealed So he began But kept them by him and would not open the least Window to let either Dove or Raven fly abroad The King being return'd to Windsor signification was given that none of the Lords should come to him till he sent for them and was ready for Matters of moment No Superstructure could go on very fast when that Stone was laid From Windsor Sept. 5. Sir G. Calvert writes to him My very good Lord His Majesty being resolv'd to extend his Gracious Favour to the Roman Catholicks signifies his Pleasure That your Lordship should direct your Letter to the Bishops Judges
c. to forbear any Moleslation of his said Subjects in respect of their Religion To send them forth with as much speed as conveniently may be that his Majesty may be freed from the Complaints of the Ambassadors Thrice again he was charg'd with the same Command To all which he answer'd He could do nothing without a private Warrant for it and that it was not possible to be agreed upon till he spake with his Majesty On the 6th of September the same Secretary writes again That an Exemplification of the Pardon should be deliver'd to the Ambassadors under the Great Seal That 's not hard to be done But upon what Limits and Conditions So the Lord Keeper rejoyns Sir G. Calvert is troubled again to satisfie that Scruple That no Copy of it should go out to any of the Roman Catholicks nor any of them be permitted to sue out their Pardons until his Majesties Pleasure be further known This came Sept. 8. The Lord Keeper held back yet till he knew what Assurance he should have from the Ambassadors to keep those Conditions Which held a Contest till Sept. 19. When Mr. Secretary Conway writes from Theobalds His Majesties Pleasure is That you deliver unto the Marquiss Inoiosa an Exemplification of the Pardon and Dispensation And his Majesty would not that you should press him for a Note of his Hand for Secresie and Stanchness for giving of Copies of the Pardon or Dispensation but only by Word to refresh his Memory of the faithful Promises he hath made in that Point to the King upon which his Majesty will relie Indeed it was order'd at Windsor Sept. 7. as appears in a Letter of Secretary Conways that when Marquiss Iniosa had the Exemplication all the Crast was in Catching that he should communicate them to none nor give Copies of them till we had knowledge from Spain of the Marriage or Desponsories There was nothing about these days that mitigated the Embassador more than a Trick that in sine did him least good Properly and without Levity it may be called a Flop with a Fox-Tail The Lord Keeper closed in with him not to be so hasty for Exemplifications which the Clerks of the Crown must write over soft and fairly A Matter of more weight should presently be set on foot not of Words but of real Benefit and Performance to his Party and to the Choice of them a Pardon for the Romish Priests that were imprisoned about which there had been struggling and yet nothing effected As the Lord Keeper seemed forward so to see the ill Luck it was cramp'd by a Letter from Sir Edward Conway Sept. 6. Dat. Windsor Right Honorable HIS Majesty hath signed the Warrant that was sent for the enlarging of the Priests out of Prison that he may shew the Reality of Performance on his Part in all that is to be done Yet his Majesty commits the Warrant to your Keeping without further Use to be made save only to pass the Great Seal which you may be pleased to expedite till important Considerations be provided for and satisfied As First That his Majesty receive Advertisement of the Marriage or Desposories Secondly That Provision be taken for these Priests that have expressed their Duties to the King either in Writing in his Defence or in taking the Oaths whose Protection his Majesty holds himself bound to continue and not to suffer them to incur any Danger for that their Conformity Thirdly That Order be taken that such Priests enlarged be not left at Liberty to execute their Functions publickly or at their Pleasure but only under such Limitations and Restraints as by the Pardon and Dispensations are provided 166. Of these three Caveats entred to modifie the Liberty which was Petitioned for and promised to the Priests the middlemost was a brave one wherein the Lord Keeper revenged himself on Inoiosa for all his Forwardness It aimed at one man Mr. Preston a Secular Priest Honest and rarely Learned The Author of the Works under the Name of Roger Widrington for the Oath of Allegiance The Author of that solid Piece called The last Rejoynder to T. Fitzherbert Bellarmine's Sculckenius and Lessius his Singleton upon that Subject Printed An. 1619. This Man for his own Preservation lay quiet in the Marshalsea his Death being threatned by the rigid Papalins This was he that was set forth as the only Evidence of his Majesty's Royal Mercy toward those that were in Holy Orders of that Religion the present Pattern of his keeping Promise according to the Articles But such a Priest as that if Marq. Inoiosa had been consulted for his Release perhaps he would have cried out Not him but Barabbas Preston had Leave that Summer twice or thrice to come to the Lord Keeper at Nonsuch where I saw them together discoursing as long as Leisure and Business would permit That Interview procured the Warrant for his Pardon from the King as followeth James Rex TO the Reverend Father in God Our Right Trusty and Right Well-beloved Counsellor Jo. Lord Bishop of Lincoln Lord Keeper of Our Great Seal of England Right Trusty and Right Well-beloved Counsellor We Greet you well These are to will and require to pass one Pardon and Dispensation according unto the Warrant directed unto you concerning the Roman Catholicks of this Kingdom in general for the Use and Benefit of Preston a Secular Priest now a Prisoner in our Prison of the Marshalsea And delivering unto the Spanish Embassador an Exemplification of the same Pardon under the Great Seal to keep the Original so Sealed under your own Custody untill you shall receive from Us some further Order Given at Our Court at Windsor Sept. 8. c. The Releasment of Preston was accordingly dispatched the first Fruits of the Common Grace expected by others sent as a Present to Don Inoiosa nay a Precedent for consequent Releasments So Secretary Conway to the Lord Keeper Sep. 17. His Majesty's Order to your Lordship was That the Pardon for this one Man should be exemplified as the Limitation and Rule to the Form of all the rest So as without Dispute or Controversie that was a present Possâ—ssion an Act performed by the King to be executed alike to each one to whom it appertains at the Time and upon the Conditions before specified the Sight whereof might give the Embassador Contentment But it was far from that Don John the Marquiss durst not say he was mocked but he fum'd like Lime that is slack'd with Water to see of all the Priesthood that man only enlarged whom above all he most hated Therefore his Violence augmented press'd the King so far that his Majesty caused the same Secretary to write again very roundly the next day to the Lord Keeper Right Honorable HIS Majest hath received from the Spanish Embassador a large Declaration of his Grievance by the great Delays he finds from your Lordship in point of the Pardon and Dispensation an Exemplification of which your Lordship hath Order to deliver
Madrid Novemb. 12. says Sir Wal. Aston whom I believe though others say later The tenth day after the Dispensation made known in the Church let the Betrothing be Solemnized and the tenth day after it the Marriage Then the Prince may take his own Time to return when he will but the Lady could not make ready for the Seas considering her Train that must attend her till March. The Prince did not like the Arithmetick of this Counting-Table More time than the first Week of September he was resolved not to spend in that Land The Coming of the Dispensation he would not await which might be failing thither upon the idle Lake in the Fary Queen â—oth slow and swift alike did serve their turn To stay and Consummate the Marriage in his own Person he knew was unfit in two Respects He must take a Blessing from one of their Bishops in the Face of their Church and submit to their Trinckets and Ceremonies which he had rather hear than see Then if the Infanta had Conceived they would keep her it is likely till she was delivered The Child must stay till it was strong to endure the Seas so it might come to pass to be bred up and Naturalized a Spaniard in Religion and Affection When the Clock would not go right with those Plummets the Junto cast the i me out ino another Figure that his Highness would out of Courtship wherein he excelled and out of great Love to his Mistress which he professed perfect the Desponsation in his own Person and trust no other with it the Marriage and the Lady should follow after that is upon the Certificate of their Embassador out of England that Conditions were performed there to which the King of Great Briâ— ain had engaged To this his Highness was short That he would linger no longer and play at Cards in King Philip's Palace till the Messenger with the Port-mantick came from Rome Neither would he depend upon Embassadors and their Reports when the Illustrious Damosel should begin her Journey towards England Embassadors might certifie what they pleased and inform no more than their great Master's Counsel inspired them At last his Highness took upon him to deside the Wrangling and cast out the sacred Anchor from the Stern to keep their Counsels from further Floating that he would be burdensom to the K. of Spain no longer the magnetick Vertue of his own Country drew him to it Yet to confirm that he lest his Heart behind with his Beauteous and high born Mistress he would Sign a Proxy and Assign it to K. Philip or his Brother Don Carlo or either of them which should remain in the Custody of the Earl of Bristol that the Espousals between him and the Infanta might be ratified within ten days after the dispensation unstopt the way unto them and he would leave it to the Princessa to shew her Cordial and Amorcuolous Affections how soon she would prepare to follow after him 168. Which stood for a Decree agreed and obey'd The King of Spain would have been glad if the Prince might be perswaded to stay longer in his Court But since after Six Months continuance there his Highness defir'd to breath again in his Native Air King Philip caused preparation to be made for it for freedom is the Noblest part of Hospitality and was dismiss'd with as much Honour and Magnificence as he was Receiv'd The Earl of Briâ—ol who certainly knew the day when he took his Leave writes to the Lord Keeper Cab. p. 21. That he would begin his Journey for England the 9th of Sept. others set it three days back and adds the day before I Conceive the contract will be which is false Printed it should be That the Day before he would Sign and Seal his Procuration for the Contract which Intelligence is Authentick being so Corrected Now looking upon those that were the Magnificoes of Spain when the Prince took his farewel of them and how dear they held him how they Voiced him beyond the Skies for the most express Image they had seen of Vertue and Generosity methinks his Highness should have behold it with his Eyes open and have inferred out of it that he could not be more happy then to marry with that Blood and to keep Friendship with that Nation He was most Gracious in the Eyes of all Great and under Great Never Prince parted with such Universal Love of all Cab. p. 16. and Bristol to the Lord Keeper p. 21. The Love which is here born generally to the Prince is such as cannot be believ'd by those that daily hear not what passeth from the King and his chief Ministers The most concern'd was the rare Infanta of whom says one out of the Spanish Reports Sander p 552. That she seem'd to deliver up her own Heart at parting in as high Expressions as that Language and her Learning could with her Honour set out Let not this Essay of her sweetness be forgotten that when the Prince told her His Heart would never be out of Anxiety till she had pass'd the intended Voyage and were safe on British Land She Answered with a modest Blush That if she were in danger upon the Ocean or discompos'd in Health with the rowling brackish Waves she would chear up herself and remember all the way to whom she was going For which she deserves to be Honour'd with Theogena the Wife of Agathocles for that saying Se nubendo ci non prosperae tantùm sed omnis fortunae iniisse Societatem Just lib. 20. When it came to the King her Brothers turn to Act his part of Royal Civility he carried the Prince with him to his most gorgeous and spacious Structure of the Escurial There he began That his Highness had done him favour beyond all compass of requital that he had Trusted the safe-guard of his Person with him and given him such an occasion in it to shew his Honour and Justice to part with him with as much Fidelity as his Highness desir'd or expected that there he was ready to perfect the Alliance so long in Treaty that he might call him Brother whom above all in the World he loved as a Friend The Prince Answered He had a better Heart to conceive then a Tongue to signifie how much he owed to his Majesty He hop'd the incomparable Infanta would thank him for the unparallel'd Courtesie shewn to him And because a drop of true meaning was better then a River of Words his Highness being encircled with the Noblest Witnesses of that Kingdom produced and Read his Proxy interpreted by the Earl of Bristol and committed to his Charge but first Attested to by the Hand of Secretary Cirica as a Notary of the greatest Place That this much pass'd it is certain Much more is Reported but it is contentious This Obligation intending to the Contract was thus dispatch'd in the Escurial of which let me say hereupon as Valerius of the Senate House of Rome lib. 6. Illam Curiam
quis mortalium concilium ac non fidei Templum dixerit It was become from the King 's best Palace the Temple of Faith After this the Chase of a Stag that was breath'd well and fell luckily brought his Highness on his way to the Sea-side But he stopt a little while at a Magnificent Repast provided in a Wood where the Table was Canopied with green Boughs when King Philip and the Prince had rose up from this Collation and had walk'd a little further a Marble Pillar was Erected a Monument of Alliance and Friendship between the two Kingdoms As when Laban said to Jacob Come thou let us make a Covenant I and Thou and let it be for a Witness between me and thee And Jacob took a Stone and set it up for a Pillar Gen. 31.45 There the two Potentates laying their Hands first upon this Pillar and then enfolding each other in Embraces took Congee and Divided Yet the Ceremony continued with the principal of the Nobles and others of the Spanish Cavalry who waited on his Highness to his Ship and Don Mendoza de Alcarness was appointed to go aboard with him for England to Congratulate before King James his Adventure to Spain and his Happy Return to his Majesty Upon the whole Carriage King Philip might say with his Honour as Abimelech did to Isaac We have done unto thee nothing but good and have sent thee away in Peace Thou art now the blessed of the Lord Gen. 26.29 169. Thus far the view of the Design was marvellously serene not a Cloud to be seen about the Horizon It smiled a little longer for the Earl of Bristol Writes to the Lord Keeper Cab. p. 21. Since the departure of his Highness there have every day passed Letters of extraordinary Affection between the King and the Prince this is Sept. 24. The Grandees also and others of the Castilian Bravery that conducted the Prince to the Seas were Feasted in our Admiral at a true English Table Free Pleasant Luxuriously bountiful with that Store which few Countries but this Fortunate Island could afford A Health was Superstitiously began to the Glorious Princessa and Proclaim'd to the Shore by the Thunder of the Great Ordnance success fell short of the Premises The fault may be laid upon the Spaniards with some partiality who suffered the Duke of Buckingham to part with a sore grudge against the Conde Duke and did not take the best Course to heal it They doubted that Buckingham would do all he could to cross the Match says Bristol in the same Letter yet they were so Stately that they would not seek to a suspected Enemy Belike they thought they had made all fast and that one man's Rash Defiance was inconsiderable But it behoves Wise Men says Isocrat Orat. de Pace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Repose the hopes of well doing upon their own Strength and Judgment not upon the Adversaries Weakness The Duke Olivares was never the nearer that Buckingham told him at their farewel That for his part he had so disoblig'd him that he would make no profession of Friendship to him at all but he would be an everlasting Servant to the King of Spain the Queen and the Infanta and would do the best Offices he could for the concluding the business and strengthning Amity between the two Kingdoms Olivares was not certain of him upon these Words since he was not certain at that time what himself would have For when our Passions are out of Order it is a hard thing for a Man to speak Truth to himself As soon as the Duke had the Prince at shrift as it were in his Cabinet Mr. Edward Clerk under Colour to Attend the Spanish Nobles to Madrid was sent with Letters to the Earl of Bristol to suspend the Procuration for the Contract till further Order was given One Scruple which must first be cleared was That a Monastery might not Rob the Prince of his Wife For a Headless Fable unless Olivares his Salt Tongue had given occasion to it was in many Mouths that after the Desponsories the Lady would enter into the strict Order of the Descalcas or bare Foot Nuns A Rumour that was Laugh'd out of countenance for she was a spriteful Virgin and had nothing of Monastical Austerity in her Complexion Neither did she dissemble but carried her Affections undisguised that she was stricken in Love with the Prince Yet to prevent the worst the Earl of Bristol was serious in Refuting that Folly as it is extant in his to the Prince Cab. p. 24. I have set down to your Highness all sorts of security that may be taken before the betrothing for preventing a Woman Post vatum Matrimonium non consummatum to betake her self into a Religious Life The King of Spain the Infanta all the Ministers would refuse no kind of security that in Reason could be demanded in that behalf This was a slight pretence and soon over There was another thing of greater Consequence Weaved into the mistrust I find it upon the Point wherein the Duke Expostulated with Sir W. Aston Cab. p. 35. You might have observed the Explanation the Prince made of himself to you by his Letters from St. Andreas and have seen his Care and Resolution not to engage himself into the Marriage without good Conditions for the Palatinate and Conservation of his Honour every way More light is opened to this in a Letter that an Ignote Wrote to K. James Cab. p. 219. The same day that Buckingham Received Letters from the Illustrious P. Palatine he caused the Procuration to be Revoked There needs no study upon it how the Structure of the Marriage so far advanc'd was overthrown in an hour An quae per totam res est notissima Lesbon Nunc ignota tibi est Metamor 1.2 The Rude people of Madrid cried it about the Streets says Mr. Clerk Piden el Palatinato Cab. p. 307. All the hope of that Alliance and the comfort from it was drowned in the Rhine 170. God is Love and delights in all the Bonds of Love Marriage is the first of Humane and the strictest It is common with the Great ones that Rule the Earth to Treat together to make such Links with their Children Nay with their Infants They confirm them with Embassies with Articles it may be with their Oaths and Holy Ceremonies Yet when all this is done if a greater Benesit to the State spring up by a New Offer a Curtain is drawn before Conscience The former Interest must give place to the later and that shall be excluded upon the like occasion for a fresh Emolument One Reason I believe tho' I write it fearfully That often times they are but little blest in their Progenies For can the most High forget it Cui vincla jugalia curae Virg. They that uncover Stories of Realms and Common Wealths let them apply it I go on to mine At the Escurial of St. Lorenzo this was the last Speech and accord about the
Palatinate The Prince making earnest obtestation for it K. Philip Engaged the Honour of a King upon it That he would intermit neither fair means nor soul means with the Emperor that it might be resigned into his Hand and then should be bestowed as a Gift upon the Marriage Hereupon his Highness seemed to depart well satisfied Yet having removed no further then from St. Lorenzo to St. Andreas Expostulates to have the Palatinate surendred to the Right owner and the Espousals to be procrastinated till it was done the King of Spain tells our Messenger He would do all he had promised upon the last Agreement and for his Life he could do no more So the Earl of Bristol remembers it to the Prince Cab. p. 25. They go on chearfully and confidently and I conceive will punctually perform all that they have Capitulated with you The Prince knew well where he was now when all their Capitulations were held to be Star-shootings Flashes and Meteors without the Bird in the Hand Plato hath a Crotchet lib. 8. de leg to shew the Citizens of his imagin'd Common-Wealth what they should do to escape all or the most Suits in Law that trouble men with Charge and Delays Marry says he Trust no Man without ready Mony in Buying and Bargaining wherein if you fail you shall have no Action to recover your Debt This Platonick dealing with which the Spaniards Challeng'd us was a New Erection of Justice by which the Marriage was consum'd into no Marriage but into a Platonick Love Whether the Prince were at Freedom having said and done so much at the Escurial to break off upon his own Conditions is such a Knot as I cannot find the Ends of it Therefore whether we came off clear or were sullied with some Dishonour is too intricate to be decided In a Report made to the Parliament hereafter the Lord Keeper being called unto it stretch'd his Learning to prove That any Man might lawfully Revoke his Procuration but he came not up to the Top of the Question whether it be Justifiable to Revoke the Obligation of Faith and Honour Aliud est jura spectare aliud justitiam Cicer. pro Balbo Conscience is a plain dealing Piece of Honesty though the Laws have many quirks Mr. Sander hath look'd commendably into this Treaty in this matter he is brief saying no more p. 552. But e're our Prince departed from that King Promises were made each to other to make Espousals ten days after the next Dispensation was brought Promises trasht in with Restrictions are absolute Debts Let your yea be yea says our Saviour to his Disciples And Learned Grotius says That the most of the Disciples Converted to him were of the Sect of the Essens of whom Josephus Writes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Negligent Men kept not their Oath so strictly as they kept their Word Ar. Wilson most spiteful against the Match and as spiteful against the breaking it flies high p. 253. That the Prince had not Power to re-call his Proxy having tied up his Hands That he Sealed the Proxy at the Escurial and Swore to perform the Marriage The Earl of Bristol who knew the most of any English man goes far Cab. P. 23. That his Majesty and the Prince stand engaged for it as far as Princes can be But much more in his Letter dated Novem. 1. first Read by the Clerk of the Parliament at the Report which the Lord Keeper made to the House of Peers That the Prince had engaged his Faith and Power not to retract the Procuration Yet after all these hear one that was ever Honest and understood himself The Prince when he came to take his Fathers Blessing at Royston Octob. 6. protested says the Lord Keeper in his Report That he came from Spain an absolute Free man but with one Limitation the Restitution of the Palatinate then he was bound in Honour to go on with the Deposories All which I believe to be most true Yet the Scales still hanging upon the Beam of the Palatinate this Question Resolv'd will turn them whether the Agreement between the other King and our Prince was that K. Philip should precise restore the Palatinate or to conditionate do his utmost to endeavour it 171. Perhaps I am too Curious to hunt this Scent too far Yet I find no remorse in my self to have prest Conscience and Honour the Urim and Thummim with which the Noblest whom God hath made should consult in all things It was commonly said That mis-understandings fomented by the Duke of Buckingham which had a small Relation to the principal business disturb'd all Who was not skill'd in the Duty of a publick Minister that is to contemn all considerations concerning himself that might hinder his Majesties Ends as Sir W. Aston wrote to him As Illustrius the Pythag. said of Stilpo that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 made up well for a private man and no further so the duke was a gallant lord to have the king's ear in private suits but not to have the king's trust in foreign dispatches being ever in custom to carry all with violence before him some may be great by chance but never wise it is admired to this day that his lordship should have such a command over the princes affections that he could so quickly make his highness forget such an incomparable beauty with whom he was so passionately enamour'd and she with him so Bristol Cab. p. 26. The World supposoth you infinitely Esteem her for her person and questionless for her Vertue and setled Affections to your Highness deserves you better then all the Women in the World Mr. Clarke likewise a man whom the Duke had Raised up for his own Use Writes to his Grace cab p. 307. The Infanta's Preparation for the Disposoria was great but greater her sorrow good Lady to see it deferr'd She had Studied our Language our Habit our Behaviour every thing but our Religion to make her self English She talk'd continually to her Attendants of the Prince and of her Voyage in the Spring What could the Duke say to blot the Image of such a person out of his Highness Heart This is strange to those that knew not his Highness who had a Quality to his Lives End I will call it Humility it is somewhat like it but it is not it to be easily perswaded out of his own Knowledg and Judgment by some whom he permitted to have Power upon him who had not the half of his intellectuals But for this Trick the Wag was Merry with the Duke who writes to K. James Cab. p. 223. In this his Highness coming off from Spain the Duke hath Advis'd him to no worse then he did himself For how many hath he abus'd and cozen'd with Promise of Marriage by his Grace in Court and Power with your Majesty If afterward things had been carried in a full Stream of Luck perhaps this Breach would not have been call'd a Fault Principally because the Wedlock that
being Eleven of them in the Tower Wisheech Newgate and no more This Favour had many Reasons to speak for it First To let all those who were inquisitive about the Event of his Highness Journey take notice that there was yet life in the Treaty by the motion of this Pulse Secondly To gratifie the most obnoxious of that Religion for requital of the Entertainment his Highness had among them Thirdly In Retaliation for the Prisoners that were set at Liberty in Spain to Congratulate the Princes welcom Fourthly That his Highness might keep his Word with those of that way who had done him good Offices abroad to whom he had said Cab. p. 251. That though the Marriage were broken his Catholick Subjects should not fare the worse for it Therefore hear what Mr. Secretary Conway Writes to the Lord Keeper October 7. Right Honorable HIs Majesty calling to Mind His promise to the Spanish Ambassadors for giving Liberty to the Priests requires your Lordship to prepare the Ordinance for their Liberty and to put it in Execution the rest of the Pardons being suspended till the Solemnizing the Marriage And His Majesty would that you should signifie so much to the Ambassadors in your own Person to acquaint them with His Mindfulness And then that your Lordship will be pleased to move the Ambassadors as giving them a good opportunity to do an acceptable Work that they would move for the Releasement of Dr. Whiting from Imprisonment who for his Sermon Preach'd at Hampton-Court stands committed but His Majesty will have him remain suspended from Preaching untill His further Pleasure be known Now for the Letters which his Majesty was made to believe were dispersed to the Magistrates Spiritual and Temporal about the Suspension of the Laws because his Majesty was disobeyed in it the Lord Keeper after he had seen the Inclination of the Court in three or four days wrote to the Secretary who knew all the Passages to put the Duke upon it to acquaint the King with the Naked Truth and fore-speak Displeasure Upon which Mr. Secretary Conway returns this Octob. 11. from Royston Right Honorable SO soon as I received your Letter with the like Observation that I will use in all your Command I took the Duke of Buckingham just as he was going to the King and had no more time with him but to tell him that Point touching your Wise and Moderate Retention of the Letters to the Bishops and Justices The Duke prepared the King so well as His Majesty gave me order to signifie to you that those Letters should still be retained unless some Complaints should make change of Counsels or the Accomplishment on the other side equal that of ours and occasion another step forward That Wise and Moderate way of your Lordships will ever get you Estimation and Ease I am glad to see how brave a Friend you have of the Duke And I know your Lordship will give me leave to make you as glad as my self that absence hath made no change towards my Lord Duke in the Kings Favour but his return if it be possible hath multiplied it And the Prince and He are for Communications of Counsels Deliberations and Resolutions as if they were but One. The King requir'd but one Thing more of the Lord Keeper that as he had addulced all Things very well to his Mind so the Ministers of the King of Spain might not Grudge that their Teeth were set on Edge with sower Grapes which he did effect most Artificially albeit the Ambassadors by his means had lost many Suits and more Labour as the Secretary was willed to acknowledge from Hinchingbrooke Octob. 25. Right Honorable I Delivered to his Majesty the good Temper you left the Embassadors in which gave his Majesty Contentment and moved his Thanks to you Your Humane and Noble Usage you may be sure will best beseem your Lordship and please others And when there is any Cause for you to take another Form on you be confident you shall have seasonable Knowledge For my Lord Duke hath as well a Noble Care of you as Confidence in you and Affection to you of which I am assured though a mean Witness So much was contrived and a great deal more to keep the Treaty from an utter dissociation till the next Parliament sate For the Coppy of the Memorials given January 19 by Sir Wal. Aston to the King of Spain professeth That because the Faculty for the Use of the Procuration expired at Christmas the King my Master that you may know the sound Intentions of his Proceedings with the good End to which it aims hath renewed the Powers and deferred the delivery of them only to give time for the Accomplishment and setling that which hath been promised for the satisfying his Expectations Cab. P. 39. Neither did the Spaniards return the Jewels which the Prince had presented at the Shrine of Love till the end of February at which Surrendry and not before the golden Cord was broken Nothing is more sure than that the Prince's Heart was removed from the Desire of that Marriage after the Duke had brought him away from the Object of that Delightful and Ravishing Beauty But all the while the King had his Head full of Thoughts brooding upon two things like the Twins that struggled in the Womb of Rebeckah the Consummation of the Marriage and the Patrimony of his Son-in-Law to be regained with the Dignity Electoral His Wisdom hovered between them both like the Sun at his Noonday Height Metâ distans aequalis utraque He knew he should be disvalued to the wounding of all Good Opinion if he did not engrast that Alliance into his Stem which he had sought with so much Expence of Time and Cost to strengthen and aggrandize his Posterity And he knew he should loose Honour with all the Potentates of Europe beside other Mischiefs if nothing were done for re-possessing the Palatinate Yet in sine he sate down and it cleast his Heart that he affected neither As a Canker eats quickly into soft and sappy Wood so an Error was gotten into his gentle Nature the same that Spartianus says had crept into Didius Julianus Reprehensus in eo praecipue quos regere authoritate sud debuit regendae reipub praesules sibi ipse fecit He submitted himself to be ruled by some whom he should have awed with Authority but he wanted Courage to bow them to his own Bent. A Prince that preserves not the Rights of his Dignity and the Majesty of his Throne is a Servant to some but therein a Friend to none least of all to himself 174. But he did so little bear up with an Imperatorian Resolution against the Method of their Ways who thrust his Counsels out of Doors that the Flies suck'd him where he was gall'd and he never rub'd them off He continued at Newmarket as in an Infirmary for he forgot his Recreations of Hunting and Hawking yet could not be drawn to keep the Feasts of
Keeper did not unforesee how far this Cord might be drawn And that those Discontents which were but Vapours in common talk might thicken into a Thunder-Clap in an ensuing Parliament Which though it assembled not in 14 Months after yet this Prometheus had learn'd his Lesson That Safety is easiest purchas'd by Prevention An Instrument that is strung may be us'd upon a little warning Having thus studied the Welfare of the Duke he spake to him to this effect My Lord YOur Mother is departed out of the Bosom of the Church of England into whose Confession of Faith she was Baptiz'd a strong Schism in any to go away from that Society of Christians among whom they cannot demonstrate but Salvation may be had I would we could bring her Home so soon that it might not be seen she had ever wandered For it is a favourable Judgment among Divines Hormisda in Epist ad Anastasium Imperatorem Propè ab Innocentiâ non recedit qui ad eam sine tarditate revertit He seems almost not to have faln from Innocency that returns into it without delay But my Care I cannot dissemble it is more for your self Your Integrity My Lord is wounded through your Mothers Apostasie Perhaps you hear not of it For I believe it is late before any Truth meets you that is offensive It is one of the greatest Miseries of Greatness which Pollio imputes to Gallienus Nemo ei vera nec in bonis nec in malis nuntiat But it is time to let your Lordship know That the Mouth of Clamour is opened that now the Recusants have a Potent Advocate to plead for their Immunity which will increase their Number When this is banded in the High and Popular Court by Tribunitial Orators what a Dust it will raise I have touch'd a Sore with my Finger I am furnish'd with an Emplaster to lay upon it which I presume will Lenifie Only measure not the Size of Good Counsel by the Last of Success My Lord Your Mother must be invited or provoked to hear Debates between Learned Men speaking to those Points of Controversie that have staggered her Let her Ladiship bring her Champions with her Entertain her with many of these Conferences Let them be solemn as can be devised the King himself being ever present at the Disputes and the Conslux of great Persons as thick as the Place will permit Let your Lordships Industry and Earnestness be Conspicuous to catch at every Twig of Advantage much more to give Applause to every solid Reason which may bring your Mother home to a sound Mind again If her Ladiship recover of her Unstableness by these Applications you have won a Soul very precious to you and will raise your self up into the Fame of a Sincere Protestant But if the Light within her be Darkness and that she frustrate all hopes of her Reparation the Notice of your Lordships Pious Endeavours will fill the Kingdom with a good Report and will smell to every good Nostril like a sweet Savour My Lord Courage I set my rest upon 't that this Counsel will not deceive because you will labour your Mothers Conversion not as a Stratagem of Counterfeacance but upon my Knowledge from the very Mind of your Heart The Conferences went presently to work His Majesty singularly versed in Polemical Theology was Superintendent The Champion in whose Sufficiency the Lady most affied was Fisher the Jesuit With whom Dr. Francis White then Dean of Carlile first encountred and gave him Foil after Foil as the Colloquy did let the World know most impartially publish'd But Female Weakness was not evinced by Manly Performance The Logick of the Serpent had strong force upon Eve and that Infirmity is descended upon her Daughters Another Meeting was prepared wherein the Lord Keeper entred the Lists with Fisher because he had advised to those Disputes he was willing to be Active as well as Consultative As the old Rule would have Precept and Example to go Hand in Hand Cum dixit quid faciendum sit probat faciendo He had observ'd when he was an Auditor at the former Conflict that if divers of the Jesuits Postulata were yielded to him datis non concessis that the Church of England repurging it self from the super-injected Errors of the Church of Rome would stand inculpable So he labour'd to evidence if unnecessary Strifes were discreetly waved what little was wanting to a Conclusive Unity Ut quae non licuit per omnia ex necessariis partibus allegentur as the Emperor Justin wrote to Pope Hormisda The King did greatly commend his Charitable and Pacificatory handling of Controversies which gentle usage though it put the Jesuit out of his ordinary trot yet he fell into a shuffling pace and carried away the Lady behind him The Lord Keeper exposed not his part in Print as Fulgentius says of Frier Paul That he writ nothing with Intention to publish it unless Necessity constrein'd him The third 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that contended with the Jesuit both for the Palm of Victory and to bring Eye-Salve to the dim-sighted Lady was Dr. Laud then Bishop of St. David's who galled Fisher with great Acuteness Which the false Loiolite traduced and made slight in his Reports Whereupon the Bishop for his just Vindication Corroborated all that he had delivered with very strong Enlargement paying his Adversary both with the Principal and Interest and divers Years after finish'd it with an Auctarium which hath rendred it a Master-Piece in Divinity But all this labour was spent in vain as to the Countess's part and she left to be numbred among those of whom Christ foretold that they loved Darkness more than Light Qui scis an prudens huc se dejecerit Atque Servari nelit Horat. Art Poet. Yet on my Lord her Sons part that which was desir'd was Atchieved He had appeared in the Field an Antagonist to her Revolt whom he Honour'd and Observ'd with the most of Filial Duty So she was less Valued ever after and sent from the Court for her Obstinacy But he was Blazed abroad for the Red-Cross-Knight that was Unàs Champion against Archimago Yet it was not Printed to be Read and Judg'd of till the Parliament Sate which was now call'd 179. And lest the precedents of the King's Writs should be lost as his Houses and Revenues are embezel'd here follows the Copy of the Summons directed to the Lord Keeper under the Signet James Rex TRusty and well beloved Counsellor we Greet you well Whereas we are Resolv'd to hold a Parliament at our Palace of Westminster the Twelfth day of February next ensuing These are to Will and require you forthwith upon the Receipt hereof to Issue forth Our Writs of Summons to all the Peers of our Kingdom And also all other usual Writs for the Electing of such Knights Citizens and Burgesses as are to serve therein And withal to issue out all usual Writs for the Summoning of the Clergy of both Provinces
in their Houses of Convocation And this shall be your Warrant so to do Dated at our Palace of Whitehal in Westminster this 28 Decem. 1623. The Tenth of February was first appointed being Tuesday the day of the Week which K. James observ'd to auspicate his great Affairs but proving to be Shrove-Tuesday wherein the Younkers of the City us'd to exceed in horrid Liberty that day was scratcht out of the Writ and Thursday the Twelfth was chosen in the Room But God scratcht out the Twelfth day when the day was come Nay when the King and his Train were putting on their Robes so far in readiness to begin their Solemnity For the King look'd about him and miss'd the L. Steward Duke of Richmond and Lenox He was absent indeed absent from the Body and present with God 2 Cor. 5.8 He had Supp'd chearfully the Night before complain'd of nothing when he went to Bed slept soundly Et iter confecit dormiendo he finish'd this last Journey in his sleep His Servant was commanded to waken him and hasten him to attend the King but found that he had breathed out his Spirit about an Hour before said the Sons of Art because his Corps was but inclining to be Cold. What a do was made to no purpose to suspect some foul means to rock him into this Everlasting Sleep which would never have been question'd in a meaner Man And cannot God prepare a Worm to smite the Gourd of our Body that it shall wither in a moment He was deplor'd generally I am in with them for he deserv'd it French he was born and bred You might have seen the Gallican Decency in his manners of good Aspect and well shap'd Affable Humble Inoffensive contented with so much Favour as was never Repin'd One that never Wrestled with the King's Privado's and was never near a fall One whose Wit and Honesty kept him great and much belov'd of all which rarely meet One that deserves the Elogy which Lampridias gives to Quintilius Marcellus Counsellor to Alexander Severus Qs. Meliorem ne Historiae quidem continent More was spoken to his never-dying Honour by the Graceful Eloquence of the Lord Keeper upon a fit Text taken out of the 1 King cap. 4. verse 5. Zabud the Son of Nathan was principal Officer and the King's Friend This was perform'd at his Funerals in Westminster Abby April 27. Which were the most costly and set out with the most Princely Pomp for a Subject that ever I saw His Dutchess thinking nothing too sumptuous in his Obsequies to do him the greatest Renown that could be Which Love in her survived towards him to her last hour But good Lady what a penurious House-Wife and scorn to the World hath Ar. Wilson made her p. 259. That her Tables in her Hall were spread as if there had been Meat and Men to furnish them but before Eating time the House being voided the Linnen Return'd into their Folds again and all her people Grased on some few Dishes Out of what Rascal Fame he scrapt up this I know not The Author liv'd not one day after he had Publish'd his Work to Answer it But there are yet as many Living that know this to be maliciously false as there are Pages in his Book For my own part I knew the Order the Comliness the Bounty of her House-keeping in Holborn and at Exeter-House whether I came often on Message from a Lady of a great understanding and a great will the Lady Elizabeth Hatton to streiten an Account of 8000 l. between them I have been kept upon my business until Meal-times very often Noon and Night and have staid with her Worthy Steward Mr. William Bolton at his Table which I could not Civilly Refuse I never saw but that every Board in the Hall was bountifully serv'd the Stewards Table chiefly so costly in well Cook'd-Meats so Rich in the Plate wherein it was serv'd so well observ'd by the Attendants as I preferr'd it before the like in any Noble Family that ever I was present at in the Kingdom I am bound I take it to defend the Hospitality in Truth where I have been a Guest Neither doth it belong only to Knight Errands in Wildwitted that is no Witted Romances to defend a Ladies Honour but it is due from every man that professeth Justice and Ingenuity Principally as Aristotle Writes Prob. 9. Sect. 30 Defunctis opitulari magis Justum est quam vivis hominibus The Exequies of the Dead are call'd Justa and it is more Just to defend the Dead then the Living Let me Weave into the Fringe of this Paragraph a touch at as Wise and Faithful a Letter as ever the Lord Keeper wrote to the Duke of Buckingham He that Reads it all as it is Cab. p. 101. Shall find it no loss of time mending the Fault of the Date a mistake very common in that Rhapsody of Letters it should bear the Style of Feb 13. 1623. instead of Mart. 2. 1624. The Office of the Lord Steward of the King's House was become void by the Death of the Duke of Richmond The next Morning he writes to my Lord of Buckingham That it was a place sit to be accepted of by his Lordship What more Places but peruse the Letter and the Scope of it all along will appear to instruct him upon the Assumption of this to part with another place the Admiralty more beneficial to his Followers then to himself who therefore kept him from discarding But how far had his Lordship been more Fortunate if he had follow'd better Counsel First he had made himself a less Object of their Malice who look'd with Meager Countenance upon him for holding so many Places of Publick Trust Mastership of the Horse Admiralty Wardenship of the Cinque Ports Justice in Eyer over all Chaces and Forrests on this side Trent Whereas the Lord Steward serves the King only in his Houshold Therefore the Lord Keeper omits not to remember him there Your Grace may leave any Office you please to avoid Envy The plurality of the Dukes Offices were one and the first of the Grievances heard and Prosecuted in the Houses of the Lords and Commons throughout all his troubles while his Life lasted Secondly but for the Name of Lord Admiral he had never withdrawn himself from Court to head a Navy at the Sea where never any Commander of the English Fleet made so improsperous a Voyage As Renowned Camden anno 1601. Eliz. says of Robert Earl of Essex That he was a Brave Warrier but Fortune did much forsake him and he would not say with Astrologers That Mars being Lord of his Nativity ' in the Eleventh Station Afflictissimus nascenti affulserat So this Lord Admiral was Valiant and feared not his Foes but Mars was not a propitious Ascendant at his Nativity He that feared it and knew him to be both wilful and unskilful advis'd him to take a White Staff instead of an Anchor but the Duke return'd him no Gra-mercy
Honour and Safety could not approve 187. After this says the Reporter my Lord Duke hath informed you of the Dispensation the Whirly-Gig of the Dispensation which run round from Pope to Pope and never could be said to settle And though an orbicular Motion is fittest for the Spheres of Heaven yet a circular Motion which is ever beginning and never ending is stark naught for dispatch of Affairs on Earth Both the Dispensation and the Labour of the Junto of Divines upon it and their Fumbling Fingers were never fit to tye a Love-Knot Nay the Conde Duke brake out into such a Chase against their Theologues that he said the Devil put it into his Head to commit the Matter to their Learning So that it seems the Resolution of the Divines came quite contrary to the Inspiration of the Holy Ghost The next thing says he reported out of his Grace's Digestions was the Loathing that the Prince did take at the Length of the Treaty as well as the Matter but chiefly at that In the Matter that he was offered the present Conducting of the Lady into England so he would sell his Soul for the Favour and be a Client to Saints and Images to beg a Blessing of them upon his Marriage And whereas his Highness had travelled into so far a Country as well to relieve a Sister and her Posterity as to fetch a Wife he was at such a loss about the Loss of his Sister's Inheritance that the Spanish Council would fasten upon nothing to content him Hereupon his Highness declared himself plainly to the Conde in these Words Look to it Sir for without this you must not conclude of either Marriage or Friendship For I must go to my Father and acquaint him with your Resolution Here the Lord Keeper grew warm and besought their Lordships to observe how constant his Highness remained to the principal Ground of all the Restitution of the Palatinate which was the Hinge upon which all his subsequent Actions did move Look to it for neither Marriage nor Friendship can be made without the Restitution of that Dominion Which Protestation effecting little good his Highness look'd homeward But his Purposes and Preparations for his Return were often slackned But because the King of Spain expected a Betrothing with his Sister before his going away the Conde Duke revived the Treaty for the Restitution of the Paltz And after Conference with the Emperors Ambassadors there was projected a Restitution of the Country to the Son upon a Condition of a Marriage with the Emperors second Daughter which the Prince entertained But then the stabbing Condition comes after That for his Religion he must first be bred in the Emperors Court at which his Highness stopt his Ears But for the Electorate it was a thing in Nubibus out of their Power and it seems out of their Affections for they would not be drawn to meddle in it And whereas they had once made a chearful Proffer To assist us with the Arms if the Emperor did not keep his Word to put the Prince Palatine into his own again Now they slew back and confest the Emperor had been inconstant and did not deal well with them but if he would beat and buffet them they would not promise to employ a Leavy of Forces against the House of Austria 188. Now says the Voice of the Reporter since his Highness could prevail for nothing to come on well his wisest Project was to take care that himself might come off well For which there is not one of your Lordships I presume but would have given much and done much And it cost you nothing but the Perturbation of some Suspicions and Fears I say Fear was the worst you susser'd For Religion God be thanked suffer'd not at all though it was greatly mistrusted There the Lord Keeper delighted their Expectations in that which they listned after how the Kings Ministers and himself principally for he shrunk not in his Head did proceed from time to time in the last Summer about the Pardon and Dispensation about which the Spanish Ambassadors struggled for the Recusants sake In Contemplation whereof the Prince had a free and friendly Dismission yet not a Joint of Religion sprained nor a Law actually dislocated But as a Wound that is cured by a Weapon Salve sine contactu so the Law was never touch'd only the Point and Edge of the Weapon a little anointed and by the Operation of it our Noble Prince past the Pikes of Danger and is come Home to his Fathers House from a far Land without a Pater peccavi GOD be thanked he neither sinned against Heaven nor against his Father nor against you nor against the Laws or Religion for which we have cause to offer up a great Thanksgiving to GOD because there is not a spot in the Sacrifice He goes on then as the Tract of my Lord the Duke did lead him and enters into a large Field to rip up that which had been told them before how near the Prince and the Infanta were drawn together where the Marriage staid and upon what Conditions they parted Which though it had been many Years in Destination as we were credulous and do not yet lay down our Faith yet if Conde Olivarez may be trusted until they had seen the Gallantry of the Prince and his Deservings being daily now in their Eyes they held us with fair Words before but Performance till then was never meant Which he made good at least to his own Opinion by two Letters the first bears date Nov. 5. 1622. it was the late King of Spain's as the Conde said read over six times by his Highness and Sir Walter Aston and presently out of their Memories for they were not permitted to excribe it set down in Writing and I hope says the Lord Keeper when you consider the Notary you will hold it authentical The second Letter is written with Olivarez his own Hand Novemb. 8. 1623. Translated by the Prince himself very neatly and exactly Let the Clerk read them both These declare the Resolution of the Spanish Court at least in my Opinion that the great Conde's Heart was not with us till the Prince lodg'd in their Palace and sate in Council with them himself the last Summer But by that opportunity their Eyes were opened and they perceiv'd that their Lady whom they magnifie so much could never make a more happy Wife than with so brave a Husband So that no doubt the Desposorios and perhaps the Nuptials had been past by this time with mutual liking if the scandal of invading the Palatinate had been removed out of the way This the Duke's Grace says the Lord Reporter hath impartially spread out holding a just Balance in his Hand And most prudently knowing that he spake in the hearing of the wisest in the Kingdom and most faithfully for as Valerian said of Posthumius in the History of Pollio if Posthumius deceive us Sciatis nusquam gentium reperiri qui
do Honour to none but to the Students of the Laws hath run out of the Ring And is it not honester to say nothing than to go about to do good with a Mischief 207. And that Man might see better to do Justice who would never receive a Bribe to blind his Eyes 1 Sam. 12.3 This was known not only to me a Domestick but to all that walked the Streets who were informed what Repulses they had who tempted him with Gratifications This I am sure of as I know what is sweet by mine own Tast and by the common Opinion One thing I will remember not because it is of great Moment but because it is pleasant His Lordship being retired to Nonsuch in the Summer took the Air in the great Park and viewing from one of the Hills the little Village of Malden he espied a Church new built and asked at whose Charge it was done Mr. George Minors that attended him told him who was the greatest Benefactor And hath he not a Suit now depending in Chancery says the Keeper The very same says the other And the very same says the Keeper shall not fare the worse for building of Churches Which being related by Mr. Minors to his Neighbour the Gentleman the next Morning sent a Tast of the Fruits of his Orchard and of the Poultry in his Yard to Nonsuch-House Nay carry them back George says the Keeper and tell your Friend he shall not fare the better for sending of Presents If any were so uncharitably suspitious that this Lord sold Justice for Gold or Silver though not for meaner things and gathered where he should not there could be no Ground to surmise it but because he scattered much For he was magnificent in great Works profuse in Hospitality very expensive in Liberality to poor Scholars and decay'd Persons To maintain all this he had plenty coming in which wanted not the Art of good Husbandry to lay it out He was as Provident as he was Bountiful He never feasted the King and very rarely exhausted himself upon Courtiers in lavish Entertainments But according to the honest and thrifty Rule of Cassiodor Fundit potiùs qui mittit in plenum illud reconditur quod vasis vacuis congregatur He spread not out his Compost upon rich Soil but upon hungry Land He gave so fast to Scholars that it was not possible his Lest-hand should know what his Right-hand did Quod momentum aut beneficio sterile Aut vacuum laude Plin. Paneg. If they were young he did it to encourage them if aged to reward them And Gentlemen that were brought low not by their Vices but by Misfortune Poveri vergognesi as the Tuscan calls them Bashful and could not Crave though they perished he prevented their Modesty and would heartily thank those that discovered their commiserable Condition to him The Prisoners of the Gate-House found the way to their Neighbour's Purse every Week It were endless to take notice of his good Works but in great Constellations Fugiunt sine nomine signa Manil. lib. 1. Stars that appear Small and dim were never numbred And though he was better at Liberality than Patience yet when he had overgone three years in the Court of Chancery he watched his Passions so well that the Heat of his old Brittish Complexion was much abated and carried all things with far more Lenity than Choler Would chide little and bear much Vehement he was often to recall Pleaders to the Point and to press Order and Dispatch Vehemency is mistaken if it be called Anger As Cicero defends himself to Fusius Calenus Vehementer me agere fatcor iracundè nego Philip 8. But if his Passion break out too far beyond the Measure of Vehemency he never rested till he had made some Amends to him whom he had sadded or offended which is the Apology that St. Ambrose makes for the good Emperor Theodosius the Elder in his Funeral Rites Tunc proprior fuisset veniae cum fuisset commotio major iracundiae Optabatur in eo quod in aliis timebatur ut irasceretur So the Clients at the Bar had studied the good Nature of this Lord and presaged that after he had chased at their Mis-usance they might promise to themselves a good Cast of his Office long before the Sun set which never set before he was returned to Patience and loving Kindness 208. Difficulties in Parliament Labours in Chancery were well pass'd over but to keep in long with the Duke of Buckingham was insuperable unless the Lord Keeper would be stupid and oppose him in nothing though the Dukes as well as his Ruine were upon Contrivance and the notorious Hurt of them that were better than them both Since his Grace's Return from Spain you shall find the Keeper in every of his Letters in the Cabal few excepted endeavouring to take off the Edge of some late started Quarrel As P. 96. in a Date July 21 1624 in this Submission If ever I have offended your Grace I take Almighty God to witness it was for want of a perfect Understanding of those high Matters let the Reader be informed it was about the Earl of Bristol's Recriminations not out of any Corruption of Affections towards your Grace or the least struggling in a continued Resolution to live and dye your Grace's most constant and most faithful Servant But whether it would succeed to good Liking or no he was resolved to divert him from some desperate Courses into which his Grace was entring to raise vast Summs of Money the Nerves of a sudden War with Spain which he meant to begin as soon as he could be furnished with Coin The Keeper was very sick of a Fevor and a Flux at this time and after Danger of Life recovered by that great Secretary of Nature Dr. William Harvey being not able to go into the Air he writes to my Lord Duke what he conceived about his former Project Octob. 21. May it please your Grace I Hear a Whispering rather than a Report out of Westminster-Hall that some great Alteration is presently to be made of the small Remainder of his Majesty's or rather the Crown Lands Although I know not certainly being unimployed and unprofitable whether I ought to take notice hereof at all or what to advise yet presuming upon that Favour I have ever found and of late as much as ever with your Grace I have sent you this Ticket to read and burn If there be any Resolution taken for the general Alteration of the Crown Lands yet this is not a convenient time to go about it First Because there is not yet a Lord Treasurer that it may be Christned to be his Act. Secondly Because it hath not been debated at the Council-Table for want of whose Advice it will be appropriated to be your Grace's Act. Thirdly It cannot be ripe for Execution till the next Session of Parliament is dissolved for otherwise it will undoubtedly serve as an Excuse for not Granting Subsidies But setting those
it was not set off with much Ceremony to quicken Devotition yet it wanted neither a stamp of Reverence nor the metal of Godliness Yet he would be careful in Launching out so far in Curiosity to give no Scandal to Catholicks whose Jealousie might perhaps suspect him as if he thought it lawful to use both ours and the Church of Rome's Communion Therefore he made suit to be placed where none could perceive him and that an Interpreter of the Liturgy might assist him to turn the Book and to make right Answers to such Questions as fell by the way into his Animadversions None more forward then the Lord Keper to meet the Abbat in this Request Veritas oculatos testes non refermidat The Abbat kept his hour to come to Church upon that High Feast and a Place was well fancied aloft with a Latice and Curtains to conceal him Mr. William Beswell like Philip Riding with the Treasurer of Queen Candace in the same Chariot sate with him directing him in the Process of all the Sacred Offices perform'd and made clear Explanation to all his scruples The Church Work of that ever Blessed day fell to the Lord Keeper to perform it but in the place of the Dean of that Collegiate Church He sung the Service Preach'd the Sermon Consecrated the Lords Table and being assisted with some of the Prebendaries distributed the Elements of the Holy Communion to a great multitude meekly kneeling upon their knees Four hours and better were spent that morning before the Congregation was dismiss'd with the Episcopal Blessing The Abbat was entreated to be a Guest at the Dinner provided in the College-Hall where all the Members of that Incorporation Feasted together even to the Eleemosynaries call'd the Beads-men of the Foundation no distinction being made but high and low Eating their Meat with gladness together upon the occasion of our Saviours Nativity that it might not be forgotten that the poor Shepherds were admitted to Worship the Babe in the Manger as well as the Potentates of the East who brought Rich Presents to offer up at the shrine of his Cradle All having had their comfort both in Spiritual and Bodily Repast the Master of the Feast and the Abbat with some few beside retired into a Gallery The good Abbat presently shew'd that he was Bred up in the Franco-Gallican Liberty of Speech and without further Proem defies the English that were Roasted in the Abbies of France for lying Varlets above all others that ever he met We have none of their good word I am sure says the Keeper but what is it that doth empassion you for the present against them That I shall calmly tell your Lordship says the Abbat I have been long inquisitive what outward Face of God's Worship was retein'd in your Church of England What Decorums were kept in the external Communion of your Assemblies St. Paul did Rejoyce to behold good Order among the Colossians as well as to hear of the stedfastness of their Faith cap. 2.5 Therefore waving Polemical Points of Doctrine I demanded after those things that lay open to the view and pertain'd to the Exterior Visage of the House of God And that my Intelligence might not return by broken Merchants but through the best Hands I consulted with none but English in the Affairs of their own home and with none but such as had taken the Scapular or Habit of some Sacred Order upon them in Affairs of Religion But Jesu how they have deceiv'd me What an Idea of Deformity Limm'd in their own Brain have they hung up before me They told me of no composed Office of Prayer used in all these Churches by Authority as I have found it this day but of extemporary Bablings They traduc'd your Pulpits as if they were not possest by Men that be Ordein'd by imposition of Hands but that Shop-keepers and the Scum of the people Usurp that Place in course one after another as they presum'd themselves to be Gifted Above all they turn'd their Reproaches against your behaviour at the Sacrament describing it as a prodigious Monster of Profaneness That your Tables being furnish'd with Meats and Drinks you took the Scraps and Rellicks of your Bread and Cups and call upon one another to remember the Passion of our Lord Jesus All this I perceive is infernally false And though I deplore your Schism from the Catholick Church yet I should bear false Witness if I did not confess that your Decency which I discern'd at that Holy Duty was very allowable in the Consecrator and Receivers 218. My Brother Abbat says the Lord Keeper with a Smile I hope you will think the better of the Religion since on Christ's good Day your own Eyes have made this Observation among us The better of the Religion says the Abbat taking the Words to relate to the Reformed of France nay taking all together which I have seen among you and he brought it out with Acrimony of Voice and Gesture I will lose my Head if you and our Hugenots are of one Religion I protest Sir says the Keeper you divide us without Cause For the Harmony of Protestant Confessions divulg'd to all the World do manifest our Consonancy in Faith and Doctrine And for diversity in outward Administrations it is a Note as Old as Irenaeus which will justifie us from a Rupture that variety of Ceremonies in several Churches the Foundation being preserv'd doth commend the Unity of Faith I allow what Irenaeus writes says the Abbat for we our selves use not the same Offices and Breviares in all Places But why do not the Hugonots at Charenton and in other Districts follow your Example Because says the Lord Keeper no part of your Kingdom but is under the Jurisdiction of a Diocesan Bishop and I know you will not suffer them to set up another Bishop in the Precincts of that Territory where one is establish'd before that would savour of Schism in earnest And where they have no means to maintain Gods Worship with costly Charge and where they want the Authority of a Bishop among them the people will arrogate the greatest share in Government so that in many things you must excuse them because the Hand of constraint is upon them But what constreins them says the Abbat that they do not Solemnize the Anniversary Feast of Christ's Nativity as you do Nay as we do for it is for no better Reason then because they would be unlike to us in every thing Do you say this upon certainty says the Keeper or call me Poultron if I feign it says the other In good troth says the Keeper you tell me News I was ever as Tully writes of himself to Atticus in Curiositate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 apt to search narrowly into Foreign Churches and I did never suspect that our Brethren that live with you were deficient in that Duty For the Churches of the Low-Countries of Heidelberg Helvetia Flassia Breme and others do observe a yearly Day to the
extract advantage out of it But wherein lies the way You shall have better Heads then mine to help you if you please to be directed by me None can furnish you with the right Art of it but some of our sage Counsellors of our Common Laws I wish you therefore my Lord to proceed with the special knowledg of the Roman Catholicks that stir most in this Project Let them cull out some of the Learnedest Practisers together Let the King's Attorney General make one for my sake For the rest let your Clients pick out as they like An hundred Crowns among them that is a Fee of five pounds a Man will not be ill bestowed upon them Let them lay their Heads together And I will lose all I am worth if you do not thank me for having referred you to those who will fetch out by their Skill so much to be Granted that you will never be put to Contestation hereafter that you obtain'd much of the King and are never the nearer The Courtiers with whom alone you have had to do to this time have Complemented with your Lordship So could I do likewise give you Large concessions in Words and in Wax but in effect nothing Like Galley Pots Entitled with the Name of Cordials but have Cob-Webs in them and no more My Lord all that I have to say is no more but this will you be lead by me or will you wander still Sir says the Embassador Use me honestly I am a Stranger and while I am in England I will surrender up self to your Directions Nay I will possess our Virtuous and Illustrious Madam that you are a clear dealing Man and of good Faith and most worthy of her Trust when she comes into a strange Land And after a very civil Farewel at the present Mounsieur Villoclare made use of those Instructions For though he Climbed not so High as he looked yet he Climbed better for he stood sure where he could not fall 228. Which Papers came to the King with more satisfaction as he was pleas'd to say then he could have expected Not any Line of Wisdom or Learning could be lost to him who saw as far and as soon as any Man into the Intellectuals of another For as the Lord Bacon wrote his Majesty had a light of Nature which had such readiness to take Flame and blaze from the least occasion presented on the least spark of anothers knowledg deliver'd as was to be admir'd And this was the last present in that kind that the Lord Keeper sent to the King who finding some indisposition of Health retired for fresh Air and quietness to his Mannor of Theobalds VVhere Jacob gather'd up his Feet into the Bed and yielded up the Ghost Gen. 49.33 The Lord Keeper on March 22. being Tuesday receiv'd a Letter from the Court that it was feared his Majesties Sickness was dangerous to Death which Fear was the more confirm'd for he dispatching away in all haste met with Dr. Harvey in the Road who told him That the King us'd to have a Beneficial Evacuation of Nature a sweating in his left Arm as helpful to him as any Fontinel could be which of late had failed And that argued that the former Vigour of Nature was low and spent This Symptome of the Kings Weakness I never heard from any else Yet I believe it upon so learned a Doctors Observation And this might well cause a Tertian Ague and a Mortal when the Spring had Entred so far able to make a commotion in the Humours of the Body and not to expel them with accustom'd vaporation After the L. Keeper had presented himself before his Lord the King he moved him unto chearful Discourse but it would not be He continued til Midnight at his Bed-side and perceiv'd no Comfort but was out of all Comfort upon the consultation that the Physicians held together in the Morning Presently he besought the Prince that he might acquaint his Father with his Feeble Estate and like a faithful Chaplain mind him both of his Mortality and Immortality which was allowed and committed to him as the principal Instrument of that Holy and necessary Service So he went into the Chamber of the King again upon that Commission and Kneeling at his Palat told his Majesty He knew he should neither Displease him nor discourage him if he brought Isaiahs Message to Hezekiah to set his House in Order for he thought his Days to come would be but few in this World but the best remained for the next World I am satisfied says the Sick King and I pray you assist me to make me ready to go away hence to Christ whose Mercies I call for and I hope to find them After this the Keeper now of his Majesties Soul kept about him with as much Diligence as a Body of Flesh could endure He was ever at hand helpful not only in Sacred but in every kind of Duty never from that time put off his Cloaths to go to Bed till his Master had put off his Tabernacle which appear'd in his Looks on Sunday Night when he return'd to VVestminster employed himself Night and Day unless the Physicians did compose his Majesty to rest in Praying in Reading most of all in Discoursing about Repentance Faith Remission of Sins Resurrection and Eternal Life To which the King made Answer sometimes in Latin always with Patience and full of Heavenly Seasoning which Hallowed Works were performed between them on VVednesday as a Preparation to the Passover on Thursday the Fortifying of his Majesties Soul against the Terrors of Death with the lively Remembrance of Christ's Death and Passion in the Holy Communion At which the King made most humble Consession of his Sins craved Absolution rendred the Confession of his Faith before many Witnesses Profess'd he Died in the Bosom of the Church of England whose Doctrine he had defended with his Pen being perswaded it was according to the mind of Christ as he should shortly Answer it before him 229. All this while God did lend him such Strength to utter himself how well he Relish'd that Sacred Banquet of Christ's Body and Blood and how comfortably the Joy of the Holy Ghost did flow into his Soul as if he had been in a way of Recovery And his mournful Servants that saw and heard it rejoyced greatly that unto that time Sickness did not compress his Understanding nor slop his Speech nor Debilitate his Senses and submitted more willingly to God to have their Master taken from their Head because they believed the Lord was ready to receive him into Glory The next day his Soul began to Retreat more inward and so by degrees to take less and less Notice of external things His Custos Angelus as I may call him his Devoted Chaplain stirr'd very little out of the Chamber of Sorrow both to give an Far to every Word the King spake in that extream condition and to give it him again with the Use of some Divine
by Your Majesty are without exception Were it not divulged in the Upper House that I am to have a Proctor thrust upon me against all Presidents and that I dare not refuse him because I am guilty of I know not what Crimes When I wrote unto Your Majesty humbly as became me my Letter deliver'd by Your Majesty to the Duke was publish'd by him as an Effect of a dejected and guilty Conscience When I shall obey your Majesty in the disposal of my Proxy my L. Duke may use that Act also not only to serve himself which I desire he should with all my Heart but principally to wound and deprave me Displeasures of Favourites which are without Ground are also without End Hoc habent animi magnâ fortunâ insolentes quos laeserunt oderunt His Grace hath told Your Majesty that I call'd the Chapter at Westminster against the12 th of May to have a Colour to come to the Parliament whereas the Chapter is appointed to be held at that day by the Statutes of the College He hath told Your Majesty that I held correspondence with the Earl of Bristol from whom I have received neither Letter or Message these two years as I will answer it with my Head He hath told Your Majesty and all the World beside that I stirred the Lower House at Oxford and have my secret Instruments against his Grace even in this Parliament If he be able to prove either of these Charges I will lose not only my Bishoprick which his Grace hath threatned against the fundamental Laws of the Kingdom to take away from me but withal my Life also My Case Dread Soveraign is miserable and the more because it is not mine alone Your Commands come immediately in your own Name and therefore must be readily obeyed Your Graces are streined through the Hands of another and therefore are either not at all as in my Case or not so purely and sincerely received And when Your Majesty punisheth pardon a Truth plainly deliver'd which you were wont to love Dread Soveraign you do it not like your self because you do it not your self A King be he never so severe when he chasteneth his Subjects doth punish them with Justice because they are his Subjects but yet with Mercy because they are his own An angry Lord that makes bold with the King's Authority lays on Load as upon Men and that without Mercy as upon the Subjects of another It was a Complaint of Vinius Galba's Favourite and it is most worthy Your Majesties remembrance Minore licentiâ grassatus esset T. Vinius si ipse imperasset Nunc subjectos nos habuit tanquam suos viles ut alienos And in my case for the present if I should stand upon my Right and refuse Your Majesty I must expect all Severity because another hath your Rod. If I shall yield and obey I must hope for no acceptation because another holds the Garland And for this other if I seek him my Letters are shew'd and I am made foul and guilty If I let him alone I am deprived of the Sun and the Rain the ordinary Graces and Influences of Your Majesty Lastly When I know and all the World beside that I sink only under the causeless Malice of a Subject yet doth that great man wash his Hands and publish to the vexation of my honest Soul That I lye buried under the immediate Hatred of my Soveraign And therefore with an humble Protestation against Fear of Punishment which cannot fall upon my Innocency or Hope of Favour sure to be kept back by the Greatness of my Adversary I do out of religious Duty and mere Obedience to Your Sacred Majesty and no other Respect whatsoever send this Proxy for my L. of Winchester which I humbly beseech Your Sacred Majesty to direct not to be sent to his Lordship until such time as there shall be Use thereof c. 70. Such as knew the Duke of Buck. Metal will say that this was like to be answer'd with a Mischief But it may be his Grace gave the other the more Liberty to write what he would because he had stopt his Mouth from speaking in Parliament Which was a Benefit For Athenagoras was not deprived of Athens but Athens was deprived of Athenagoras There is much Weight in the worth of one man And much might have been expected from one that was so active and well versed to stop the Breaches of Contentions if he had been used and sought to The Duke was ill advis'd to keep them out of the House by threes and fours of whose Opposition he was jealous and could not tye up their Tongues that fell upon him by hundreds Sir Edward Cook Sir T. Wentworth Sir Robert Philips were prick'd to be High-Sheriffs of Buckingham York Somerset Shires to put them into Incapacity to be Members of the Commons-House What said our Bishop to it being in a merry Pin when one told him For certain he should be restrain'd from his Place in the House of Peers What then Am I made High-Sheriff of Huntington-shire Such minute Policies are frivolous and may serve among Huntsmen to save the life of a Hare when a sew of the old Dogs are tied up and not brought into the Field But were there now enow able men in both Houses though half a score were spar'd to follow their Game without changing This was that Parliament that spent the best part of 18 Weeks in drawing up a Charge and prosecuting it against the L. Duke What should this Bishop have done there being neither fit for the offensive nor defensive part How far he was from intending to offend he exprest in a Passage about his Proxy that he desired the Duke should serve himself by it with all his Heart And I heard him my self dispute it with one of the sharpest Antagonists of his Grace in the time of the Session and stagger him That it was the safest way for the Publick Good to desist from that vexatious Charge with this subtle Similitude That if a Beast were got into a Field of Wheat if the Neighbors ran in and hunted it about with their Dogs they would tread down more Corn than five Beasts could devour if they were let alone So to spend so much Time and Pains upon a Charge against one Peer did let Opportunity run by wherein many good Laws might be made and lost the Common-wealth more than it could gain by this Impeachment Neither would he displease the King to appear against a Lord that was unto him in a manner his whole Court. Una fuit nemus arbor Ovid. And as Illustrius the Pythagorean records it that Tyberius the Emperor wrote his Letter thus for Polemo the Philosopher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that will do Polemo wrong let him consider if he can give me Battel So His Majesty had wrapt up the Lord Duke as it were in his own Royal Robe to preserve him Yet if the Bishop had been in the
make a Governour But as our Cambridge term is he was staid with Nescio's He was not known in Court nor City for he had not shewn himself in a Pulpit in 20 years He that says no credit is to be given to the Information that he died a Papist I would he had proved it for as Cortesius writes to Politian p. 242. Plus de invento vero gaudeo quà m de victoriâ I had rather it were true than get the Victory But Wishes will not bring it about Nemo facit optando ut verum sit quod verum non est says St. Austin Ep. 28. By what colour or appearance can he be vindicated to dye a Protestant May we not as soon light a Candle by a Glow-worm In what did he seem to be a Son of our Reformed Church I do not mean as an Ape is like to a Man but as a Child is like to his Mother Hypocrisie dwells next door to Orthodox Doctrine but it never comes in to her Neighbour So the Upshot will bear it that the Bishop of Lincoln did justly discover his Kinsinan and Friend's Apostacy though his own blame did depend upon it Which will leave him the Praise that Erasmus gives to a L. Montjoy Ep. p. 162. Haec est tua n obilit as ut mentiri nescias si velis nec velis si scias 95. There would be no end to repeat with how many Quarrels this unfortunate Bishop was provok'd yet his Adversaries did but dry-ditch their matters and digged in vain though they still cast up Earth who were no better than the Arrians of whom Athanasius writes Lib. ad Sol. Vit. Agen. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They fretted if they had spent a day wherein they could not do a Mischief And it will do the Sufferer no right to tell how he threw all day and cast not one good Chance but was worsted in all his just Appeals Quis enim suâ praelia victus Commemorare velit Metam l. 9. Yet I will insist in that noble Contest he had with the Archbishop of Canterbury about his metropolitical Visitation that hereafter when God shall send the like occasion as I trust he will the Diocesans of Lincoln may know what their stout Predecessor did alledge for their exemption This may come to pass But as the unknown Oratour said to Constantine in his Panegyrick p. 246. Ista felicitas viderit utrum adhuc meae aetati debeatur Archbishop Land enterprizing to visit his whole Province found opposition only from the Universities from Cambridge I am sure and from the Bishop of Lincoln whom next to the substance of the Cause one circumstance displeased that Sir John Lamb was commissioned to be the metropolitan Vicar to visit his Diocess Sir John had been very officious about him for many years I let it go with that of Tully to Atticus Pompeius Scauro studet sed utrum fronte an mente dubitatur And the Bishop had done as much for Sir John as he could have done for the Worthiest of all his Profession 'T is amplified enough before and makes another instance That so wise a man was not always circumspect in his Patronage Lamb was crafty and of much experience but in the running of some years he was hated of all men and much complained of that he was ravenous in taking Fees Like as one says of the Pope's drawing in Moneys from all Parties That he was a Participle that took from Clergy and Laity When he perceived these things distasted Bishop Williams and that he had not Encouragement from him as before and dreaming of Golden Mountains from another hand he turn'd the falsest man and the greatest Enemy to him in the World Archbishop Laud he 'd worm him quite from adhering to Lincoln and much good do him with him Whereupon I remember what Plutarch tells merrily of a goutish man that had his Slippers stolen from him says the man full of Pain I wish the Thief no more harm but that my Slippers were fit for him Well the Visitation being design'd and to be carried on by Lieutenant Lamb our Bishop wrote to my Lord of Canterbury as followeth 96. Most Reverend c. UPon the Message which I received from Mr. Sherman of your Graces intention to visit my Diocess this year being the year of mine own Triennial Visitation and the certain News I heard of Sir J. Lamb's collecting of Presidents to induce your Officers to stir up your Grace thereunto I have both by my self and others made some enquiry into the Records and several Registries of the Diocess and do find clearly that in Grosthead's time anno 1235. this Diocess had never been metropolitically visited and that ever since that time until now no Archbishop of Canterbury did visit this Diocess otherwise than in vacancy of the See but by the vertue and power of some particular Bull procured from the Pope or Letter of Assistance from the King's Majesty since the Supremacy was reassumed in this Realm And I find the several Bishops in these several Ages to have assented to these Visitations as they were Papal and Regal only not forbearing notwithstanding to exercise all manner of Act or Acts belonging to their Jurisdiction Episcopal not only in the times but in and on the very days of these Archiepiscopal Visitations and refusing to pay any Procurations or other Fees by vertue of a special exemption granted unto this See and some others by Pope Innocent the Fourth by the procurement of Bishop Grosthead deposited in this Registry and never waved by the Bishops of this See however some other of your Graces Suffragans have omitted peradventure as having not the custody thereof to implead the same Yet do I differ may it please your Grace in this particular from all my Predecessors in this See that I do believe your Grace may visit even by your own metropolitical Power all this Diocess unless this great Prescription of an hundred years may debarr the same but truly I do under Favour conceive that your Grace ought not to inhibit my ordinary Jurisdiction nor do any acts to impeach the same Nor can I find any word sounding that way in any one of all the Visitations kept as before is rehearsed by your Grace's Predecessors excepting only in Archbishop Cranmer's the last Archbishop who above one hundred years since visited this Diocess and yet Longland then Bishop of Lincoln did not only execute all parts of his Jurisdiction pendente visitatione metropoliticâ but the Dean of the Arches Archbishop Cranmers and the King 's chief Commissioner for that Service did freely and voluntarily of himself set all the Bishop's Officers at full liberty to exercise all their Jurisdictions after the first day of his Visitation reserving his Detections only to his own cognizance Now since this Visitation of Archbishop Cranmer which was more Regal than Metropolitical as appears by the Instructions given to the Commissioners at that time no Archbishop of Canterbury hath ever offer'd
Archbishop and if all that read it do not condemn it I am not in my Senses For I will Appeal in those words of Job c. 17. v. 8. Upright men shall be astonied at this and the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite Mark how the Game was plaid by a black Bishop and two Rooks and how the white Bishop was taken by discovery Dr. Walker our Bishop's Secretary hardly escap'd in the second Bill and Kilvert's anger did still hang over him Cadwallader Powel his Steward was then fined at 300 l. and Imprisonment yet was never toucht in his person nor a peny of the Fine exacted of him For which Favours he is dealt with to espy what he could to crush his Lord with some fresh Oppression Who raking in every Corner to find out somewhat that might answer his Undertaking he produceth two Letters of Mr. Osbolstons the head School-master of the King's School at Westminster The Bishop to whom they are written will not own them that he did ever receive them Powel says he found them in his Chamber And it is possible there was such heedlessness for I knew the House well and have seen some careless oversights in that kind A fault incident to Melanctthon says Camerarius in vit p. 37. Litterae quae afferebantur quotidie omnium oculis manibus expositae ex quibus subtractum plurimum esse constat A negligence not to be cover'd with the excuse of the greatest and gravest studies But it was made highly probable that these Letters were neither found scatter'd at random nor pick't out of a Desk or Hamper of Papers both which for certain Powel broke open but Powel received them immediately from the Carrier and never deliver'd them to his Lord and Master So it was confirm'd by many Oaths in Court nay confest by Powel That when his Lord was in remoter parts he had order to open all Letters directed to his Lordship to look into them if they had any matter concerning the Suits so hotly prosecuted against him and to send them as he thought fit to the Secretary to London The Contents of these two Letters being glost upon by Powel to be dangerous to the Archbishop and lap'd up in dark folds to give a greater affright it founds likely that he reserved them to himself and kept them in lavender for such a day wherein they might stand him in stead For more confirmation the Bishop takes his Oath He did not remember that ever he received such Letters and Osbolston swears point blank He never had an answer to them which makes a strong presumption that this trusty Steward did pocket them up Of whom Kilvert received them which is not denied And he presents them to his Grace and if his Grace had been the Master of a brave Spirit we would have thrown them into the sire That had been generous to abhor a Servant that betray'd his Master and to borrow no Office of Villany from him That had been noble not to rake for Secrets and Advantages in the Letters of his Adversary So did Caesar when Scipio's Cabinet was brought to him found at Thapsus so he did with Pompey's Papers seized on at Pharsalia which he would not look into but burnt them Illa suit vera incomparabilis animi sublimitas captis apud Pharsaliam Pompeii magni sertniis Epistolarum concremasse eas optima 〈◊〉 aâ—que non legisse Plin. lib. 7. Nat. Hist c. 15. Such Gallantry had better become a Primate of all England than the Dictator of Rome and all the World This had been way to have got him a great Name to give Lincoln such an Eslay of his Civility Nihil laudabilius nihil magno praeclaro viro dignius 〈◊〉 clemâ—ntiâ Tul. 2. l. Of. But to look for such things from a revengful mind is as unlikely as to make the brisâ—ly skin of a Hedghog smooth And when all the Stuff in the Letters are scann'd what Fadoodles are brought to light First Osbolston is charg'd to write libellous matter against his Grace in That he call'd him Vermin little Urchin medling Hocas Pocas and the Lord Treasurer deceased Great Leviathan 2. To contain false News and tales in this passage That the little Urchin and great Leviathan are become at great distance in earnest 3. To contain a Conspiracy to destroy his Grace because one Letter enquires when Lincoln would come to Westminster to look after this Gear On the Bishop's part a Note scribled hastily but no Letter is produced sent to Walker in these Words MR. Osbolston importunes me to contribute to my Lord Treasurer some Charges upon the little Great man and assures me they are mortally out I have utterly refused to meddle in this Business And I pray you learn from Mr. Selden and Mr. Herbert if any such falling out be And keep it to your self what I write unto you If my Lord Treasurer would be served by me he must use a more solid and sufficient Messenger and free me from the Bonds of the Star Chamber Else let them fight it out for me What a Spider's Thread is here to pull a Man into the Star Chamber by itâ— So Fulgentius tells us of Padre Paulo that he wrote a Letter in Cypher to Gabriel Collison touching at the Court of Rome as if some came to Dignities by evil Services which Collison revealed to St. Severmo Cardinal and Head of the Office of Inquisition for which Paul was trounced with continual disturbance And our Inquisitor St. Severo did now make use of the like or rather less opportunity 125. To slide this Cause with the most sly advantage into a hearing Lincoln is kept in close Imprisonment from All-hollantide till the end of Christmas for what Cause will appear in order that he might be surprized and neither trouble the King with Petitions nor the Court of Star-Chamber with motions He chaft at it extreamly and could do no less 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Aristotle Eth. 4. c. 5. They that are not angry upon meet occasion are Foo's But the day is set and come without any respect had to his due preparation according to Rules and Customs At the hearing Mr. Osbolston pleads That the great Prelate had no reason to take those nick-names to himself that he neither named him nor thought of him He swears it and proves it strongly That the Hocas Pocas was one Dr. Spicer who was vulgarly abused with that by-word and that Judge Richardson was the great Leviathan who had committed Spicer at that time no less than five years before to Newgate What reason was there but he should expound his own Riddle Now here 's a forked Dilemma let the Bishop or any man living escape one horn of it if it be possible For if he receive such Letters and not complain of them if it come to light distortions of Phrases shall endanger him to be guilty of smothering a Libel If he take the other course and reveal them to
a Justice of Peace and say he takes the Arch-bishop to be meant by Vermin Urchin Hocas Pocas since the Writer did swear the contrary he had evidently made himself the Author of a libellous Exposition But the Bishop pleads he never received such Letters to his remembrance and to make it likely Osbolston swears he never had an Answer of them Powel will not swear but says he found them in a Band-box in the Bishop's Chamber They were like the Cup in Benjamin's Sack no body but Joseph and the Steward that plotted it could tell how it came there Dr. Walker believes but dares not swear that his Lordship receiv'd them yet adds he could not be assured that he understood them for upon his knowledge the Bishop was often to seek to understand Mr. Osbalston 's gibrish and was fain to send to him for his Cypher which in this matter he did not That which the King's Counsel urged was from the Papers that Dr. Walker brought in under his Lords hand which tuned somewhat like to a Replication to the two Letters The Secretary was pelted with many hard words that day from divers Lords for doing that ill Oâ—lice to his Master I have heard Dr. Walker protest deeply so have many besides That he would not have done it for all the world but that he knew it was a main witness of his Lord's Innocency and enough to clear him howsoever the Court did strangely misunderstand it I am bountiful to him if I think he did it for that good end and I will think so because I never saw any immorality or vice in the course of his life And he was right that the Paper is very candid and did deserve from the Archbishop that he should have cast away at least some unprofitable courtesies upon the Bishop for it And the proof was clear even ex parte Reg is in the Court that he refused to consent or agree to make one in a quarrel against the Archbishop but he holds close to his main Plea That the Letters excepted at did never come to his hands If the matter of them be worthy of a censure let it light upon his Steward and his Secretary who confess to have seen those Papers some years before and to know the ironical meaning and did conceal them He appeals also to the Laws of the Land that if such Letters had come to him like Merlin's Rhimes and Rosicrusian bumbast that no Law or Practice directs the Subject to bring such Gryphes and Oracles but plain litteral grammatical Notions of Libels to a Justice of Peace against a known and clearly decipher'd Magistrate That nothing were more ridiculous than to prefer a Complaint for canting and unintelligible Expressions It cannot be but so many wise Lords as sat in Judgment understood this Well might the Bishop say that all flesh had corrupted their way The Court in those days was rolled about with fear and were steered by imperious directions As Syncsius said of Athens in his days Ep. 235. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There was nothing but the Hide left to shew what a fair Creature it was in times of Yore Let it not be thought rash to write thus of so noble a Senate How did a Commission of Lords use Queen Ann of Bullen and a greater Commission than that use Mary Queen of Scotland But Mr. Osbalston is sentenc'd out of all his Freehold was doom'd to an opprobrious branding who escap't it by concealing himself from the cruelty of the Tyger only the Earl of Holland voted that he saw no proof to bear a Sentence but cleared both Osbolston and the Bishop so did not the Lord Finch and Sir Fr. Windebank who listed up the Bishop's Fine to Ten thousand pounds Such as these made that Honourable Court insupportable to the Subject odious to the Parliament For whose sake I will change a word in a passage of Tullies Philip. 13. I st is locus si in hâc Curiâ fuerit ipsi Curiae non erit locus Sir J. Brampston Lord Chief Justice led the most Voices for 8000 l. Fine and Damages for receiving Libellous Letters Yet was so judicious not to call the Script sent privately to Dr. Walker a divulging of them as some others did nor did he tax him for not blaming the Indiscretions of Osbolston yet those were the Heads to which the most did refer the Contents of their dislike For all this the Bishop rested in peace of mind and piously wish't his Judges Mercy from God which Prayer I hope was heard for their persons but God was offended at the Court which over-drip't so many with its too far spreading Branches of Arbitrary and Irregular Power If the Excrescencies had been pruned away the rest might have serv'd for wholsome use When the Romans found the Carriage of their Censors to be insolent Mucronem sensorium mustis remediis retuderant Alexâ—ab Alex. lib. 3. c. 23. They blunted the Edge but still kept the Sword in the Magistrates hand But God spared not to dig up this burdensome Tree by the root as Auson in Paneg. Quae mala adimis prospicis ne esse possint rediviva yet it may be the Stump is in the Earth though fetter'd to be kept under with a band of Iron and Brass Dan. 4.15 and may spring again in due season But this guilt among a hundred more upon it is that this Bishop being mulcted in eight thousand pounds for a pretence thinner than a Vapour a Trespass to mean for one Christian to ask forgiveness of it from another and never clap't upon him by the Evidence of any Proof yet not a doit was remitted of that vast Sum. And yet I look upon our Bishop as one that had a better hold in present comfort hope hereafter and glory for ever For it is better by far to suffer than to do an Injury Miserior est qui suscepit in se scelus quà m qui alterius facinus subire cogitur Cic. Philip. 11. 126. Lucilius a Centurion in Tacitus Annal. lib. 1. had a scornful name given him by the Military Dicacity of his own Company Cedo alteram Quta fractâ vite in terga militis alteram rursus alteram poscebat when he had broken a Bastonada of a tough Vine upon a Souldiers shouldiers he call'd for another and another after that Such an indeâ—inent Cruelty was exercised upon the person of this suffering Bishop when one Bill was heard and censur'd Cedo alteram rursus alteram was all the pity that he sound 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesiod lib. 5. Fortune is not content with some mens miseries unless they be all over miserable A new Information is brought on with as much fury as if Jehu had march't with it and that the Desendant might be utterly ignorant of a Conspiracy that was hatching abroad he was shut up close upon colour that he was obstinate and had not answer'd to some Interrogatories as was expected They were Eighty in all To which
Houses to accept thereof Obj. 3. They desire the King to command the Clerk of the House of Peers to enter this their Petition and Protestation among his Records which derogates from the Rights of Parliament As though the King could be his Command make a Record of Parliament 〈◊〉 It is to be conceived that the Bishops never intended that this Petition as may appear by the Directory thereof should be preferred to the King in any other place but in the Upper House of Parliament And it will appear among the Records of that most Honourable House 11 Rich. II. num 9. that the King in that House hath commanded the like Protestation of the Bishops to be enrolled which made the Bishops use that Phrase Howbeit beside the King's Command the Assent of the Peers and Commons have still concurred and the Bishops never conceived it otherwise which made them presume that no matter of their Protestation could possibly amount to any higher Crime than that of Error or Mistake considering that it was still to be admitted or rejected by the King with the Assent of the Peers and Commons Here the Answer ends in this brief compass Let all the Council in the Land plead against it and shew where it is not sound and satisfactory Yet the Bishops desire no other reparation for their false Imprisonment but Liberty and Safety to Vote in that House to which they were called by the King 's Writ Sidonius speaks in pity of Eutropia lib. 6. ep 2. Victoriam computat si post dammum non litiget And these innocent men would not hold it for Justice done unto them if after so much Wrong sustained the Contention might be ended 170. Every subsequent Action of that Parliament did castrate their Hope Day utter'd unto Day how they meant to dissolve that Primitive and Apostolick Order piece by piece And what shall we have next The very Kingdom of Christ set up in the Church if you will believe them As Pisistratus would perswade the Athenians that he changed not their Laws but reduced them to those that were in Solon's time by which Trick he made them his Slaves Laert. in Vit. Sol. Is it possible that men could have the face to pretend more ancient Rulers in Christ's Church than Bishops The method of Sacrilege was first to pluck the Spiritual Lords out of the House and to disable all the Clergy from intermedling in Secular Affairs The Bill is read and easily pass'd now the Bishops were not in place to hear it and dispute it The Plaintiff pleads the Cause at Westminster what can the Defendant say to it in the Tower Proceed my good Lords he that runs alone by himself must needs be foremost This was worse than if a young Heir were sent to travel by his Guardian and the Guardian pulls down his House fells his Woods leaseth out his Lands when he is not in the way to look to it But where were those Earls and Barons that sided with the Bishops before Shrunk absent or silent They that are wise Leave falling Buildings fly to them that rise Or as Plautus in Stych as neat in his Comick Phrase as Johnson Si labant res lassae itidem amici collabascunt But the King's part is yet to come The Parliament makes ready a Bill the King only makes it a Law So he did this and it was the last I think that ever he signed Why he did it is a thing not well known and wants more manifestation Necessity was in it say they that would look no further Nulla necessitas excusat quae potest non esse necessitas Tertul. Exh. ad Cast c. 7. The most said That nothing was more plausible than this to get the Peoples Favour Or that the Houses had sate long like to continue longer and must have Wages for their Work because they are no Hirelings they will chuse and take and this Boon they will have or the King shall have no Help from them It would ill become a Royal Spirit to plead he was compelled by Fear else His Majesty might have revoked this Act upon that Challenge As Sir Nic. Throgmorton surpassing most of his Age for Wit and Experience assured Mary Queen of Scots shut up in the hold of Loquelevin Cessionem in carcere extortam qui justus est metus planè irritam esse Cambd. Eliz. ann 1569. Yet Fear had not so much stroke in this as the Perswasions of one whom His Majesty loved above all the World The King foresaw he was not like to get any thing from this Parliament but a Civil War he would not begin it but on their part he heard their Hammers already at the Forge Et clandestinis turgentia fraudibus arma Manil. lib. 1. He being most tender to provide for the Safety of his Queen went with her to Dover to convey her into France not that she desired to turn her Back to Danger or refused to partake of all Hazards with her Lord and Husband for she was resolute in that as Theogena the Wife of Agathocles Justin lib. 20. Nubendo ei non prosperae tantùm fed omnis fortunae iniisse societatem But because His Majesty knew himself that he should be more couragious if his dear Consort were out of the reach of his Enemies Being at Dover the Queen would not part with the King to Ship-board till he signed this Bill being brought to believe by all protestation of Faith from Sir John Culpepper who attended there for that Dispatch that the Lords and Commons would press His Majesty to no more Bills of that unpleasing nature So the King snatch'd greedily at a Flower of a fair Offer and though he trusted few of the men at Westminster yet in outward shew he would seem to trust them all the more because the Queen had such Confidence in them How Culpepper instilled this into the Queen and how she prevailed York is my Author and could not deceive me for he told me in the Tower That the King had sacrificed the Clergy to this Parliament by the Artifices contrived at Dover a day before the News were brought to London Then they fell to Bells and Bonfires and prophaned the Name of God that He had heard them whose Glory was not in their Thoughts from the beginning to the end A Day-labourer lifts up his Ax towards Heaven but strikes his Mattock into the Earth And all the Evil that the Earth breeds was in their Mind when they seemed to look up to God That which is of God must have its Foundation in Humility its binding fast in Obedience its rising in Justice and its continuance in Peace So begins the Misery and Fall of the Bishops Synesius hath lent us words fit to express jump in the same Case Ep. 70. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is the Bishops were expulsed meerly by Slander nothing being demonstrated to lay any Crimes against them And verily God was gracious to them What should they have done as it
the elder would never punish a Slave till the Slaves of the Family who did wear the same Chain did cast him by their Verdict Now the case is alter'd at Westminster-Hall a Prisoner is tryed at the Bar neither by the Law for Reason nor by Jury upon Matter of Fact but by the Conscience of some that are commissioned to judge upon Law Reason Right and Fact Suppose that the Conscience of Sultan Cromwel and his Visier Bashaw alias Bradshaw sit among them that Court must prove a Rock against which an Innocent cannot chuse but split and these high Justitiaries Gentlemen of the first Edition Quid facturi sunt illi si consules si Dictatores fuissent qui proconsulorem imaginem tam trucem saevamque fecissent Liv. Dec. 1. lib. 5. They that raised such Storms among us being Vapours in the lower Air would have lightned and thunder'd if they had been Exhalations in the middle Region but that the Authors of the forenamed Miseries and Depressions durst say that they took up Arms against the King for Liberty take out the Tables and write down Villany 188. Our Observation must not launch now into the Whirl-pool or rather plounce into the Mudd and Quagmire of the Peoples Power and Right pretended That the Soveraignty is theirs and originally in them That they of meer Choice and Election cast themselves into such and such forms of Government at first and may dissolve them by Force and Constraint when they will and do no man Injury for they recall their own which they did but lend during pleasure upon a natural Paction Some things discovered before were very ill which did disorder us to Rebellion saying that this Invention doth disembogue it self into the roughest and blackest Sea of Treason Like to Verres's stripping the Sicilians his last Oppression was a more grievous Pillage than all the former Secum ipse certat id agit ut semper superius suum sacinus novo scelere vincat Act. 7. The Axiom which hath gone from hand to hand in some dangerous Books is Rex singulis major est Universis minor Grotius said so but it was Grotius the Advocate of Rotterdam a Minister to a popular State and Barnevale's Creature but Grotius the Ambassador to the French King from the Swedish Crown would be asham'd of such Politicks So says as spightful an Author to the Honour and Safety of Princes as ever writ Stephanus Junius Brutus that 's the Title of his disguise whom learned K. James suspected to be a Papist dissembling the person of an Hugonote to make them all odious But we are beholden to Gisb. Vootius who hath pull'd off his Mask Tom. 2. Disp p. 852. he says that Tronchinus making an Oration in Geneva at the Funerals of Simon Goulartius made it known to his Auditors that Simon Goulartius had assured him that Hubertus Languettus a Gentleman of Burgundy and of good same till this Mischief came to light did hatch the Monster and send it forth To spare the rest all but one the same is the Doctrine of Parsons the Jesuite in his Dolman who follows it all the way That Civil Government is radically in the People that they may set up and pull down their Rulers for the publick good as they will Let the Index of Expurgation look to it whether the Temporal Soveraignty of the Pope come not under the Whip of this Doctrine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Odyss 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The People of Romania Bononia Ancona Ferrara will be very insolent if you buz such a Bee into their Brain every light Offence taken will make them threaten But whence do these People-pleasers draw this Maxim That a King is greater than every Subject apart but less than their Body taken altogether Not from Scripture for the Kings of Israel and Judah in that Book were above all the Tribes in their Aggregation Hiram writes to Solomon Blessed be the Lord who hath given to David a wise Son over this great people 1 Kin. 5.7 Hear the Queen of Sheba likewise That Solomon was Minister Dei non populi God delighted in thee to set thee in his Throne to be a King for the Lord thy God and made thee over them to do judgment and justice to all 1 Chron. 9.8 Shall I leave my fatness says the Olive in the Parable to be promoted over the Trees That is over every Tree in the Forrest But these Dogmatists dare not recourse to Scripture they must be traced in prudential ways Proteus the man of all shapes says Synesius Ep. 136. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 acted always among Men not in Heavenly but in Earthly Wisdom Let it be Reason and not Fallacy wise men will be ready to hear it One Argument of the Adversaries is That once upon a time they know not when Men were gathered out of Desarts and Savageness into a body to live sociably and it was their Courtesie then to set up such a King as did please them He is but the Peoples Creature therefore in his first making and always at their mercy This is a Tale put together of a thing out of the Memory of all Writers which were it true as it is unlikely it will come to nothing If the People did part with their Right to a King to be governed and defended in Wealth and Peace their Act is irrevocable the Bond indissoluble Though Democritus thought his Atoms might concurr to make a World yet the World being made those Atoms could not fall asunder again to dissolve the World Conceive we were in Polonia at this day the Eligents who make the King by their Vote are tyed fast by their Oaths and Faith to their own Act. Nor do they give the King his Power but design his Person because Election is not an Act of Power but of Privilege That a Monarch is not greater than the Universe of his People whether it look like somewhat to the weakness of Sence I know not but it is nothing to Reason for Comparisons are to be made between things of the same kind Mark then A part of the Body is less than the whole Body in magnitude but the Soul though one part of Man and no more is greater in Virtue than all the Body The intellectual Faculty is but one Faculty yet greater in Dignity and Regency than all the Faculties of the Soul beside The Sorbonists adhering to the Council of Constance tell us That a Pope is less than a whole general Council they give him Honour and Place before any single Prelate Metropolitan or Patriarch by Ecclesiastical Constitution yet he is inferiour to an Oecumenial Synod in totâ because he comprehends not in his Office the Vertue of the Catholick Church for that 's an Usurpation But the Vertual Power of the Kingdom is in the King which discovers the odds of the Comparison Our Politico's also object that the People were before the King Not before him if Soveraignity grew first out of Paternal Right
Dureque ad miseros veniebas exulis annos says the banish'd Poet at Tomes upon his Nativity-day lib. 3. de Trist El. 13. Pompey was slain as near as could be to his Birth-day Pridie Natalium in the Observation of Plutarch William Earl of Penbrook died suddenly upon his very Birth-day Sanders Hist p. 141. Macrobius tells a Wonder Saturn lib. 1. that Antipater Sidonius had ever a Feaver upon his Birth-day and in his Old-age died of a great Fit the same day This Holy Father had compleated the just number of 68 years Satietas vitae maturum tempus mortis assert Cic. de Sen. He was weary of Life in those hateful Times therefore Death came welcome to him and the more welcome because he lamented his own Condition that he could contribute nothing to raise up the Ruins of the Church and Kingdom Tum cecidit cum lugere rempub potiùs possit quà m servare says the same Eloquent of Hortensius in his Brutus When Satiety of Years was come about a Body wasted a Mind oppress'd with Desolation of the Publick-weal it had been a Punishment not to dye after that neat Similitude of Epictetus lib. 2. c. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is an Injury or in his word a Curse upon Corn when it is Summer-ripe not to be cut down with the Sickle So this worthy Father of the Church died in his Maturity of Age at Glocketh in the Parish of Eglowaysrose in the County of Carnarvan his Body was interred where his House of Pentrin stands in Llangeday the Heriot which every Son of Adam must pay to the Lord of the Mannor of the whole Earth If you look for more of him it is in another and a better World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Says the Epigram Anthol l. 3. If you look for Menender it is â—all one if I said Archbishop Williams look for him with GOD and the Saints above Or if a little more will suffice read this Inscription upon his Tomb in the Chancel of Llangeday-Church Plato in the Twelfth Book of his Laws would have no Epitaph exceed the length of four Verses this shall not hold you four minutes 211. HOspes lege relege Quod in hoc Sacello paucis noto haud expectares Hic situs est Johannes Wilhelmus omnium Praesulum celeberrimus A paternis natalibus è familia Wilhelmorum de Coghwhillin ortus A maternis è Griffithis de Pentrin Cujus summum ingenium in omni genere literarum praestantia Meruit ut Regis Jacobi gratiâ ad Decanatum Sarum Post Westmonasterii eveheretur Ut simul atque uno munere tanto Regi esset à consiliis secretis deliciis Magni Sigilli Custos Sedis Lincolniensis Episcopus Quem Carolus primus infula Episcop Eboracen decoraret Omnes scientias valdè edoctus novem linguarum thesaurus Theologiae purae illibatae medulla prudentiae politicae cortina Sacrae canonicae civilis municipalis sapientiae apex ornamentum Dulciloquii cymbalum memoriae tenacissimae plusquà m humanae Historiarum omnis generis myrothecium Magnorum operum usque ad sumtum viginti mille librarum structor Munificentiae liberalitatis hospitalis lautitri Misericordiae erga pauperes insigne exemplum Postquà m inter tempora luctuosissima Satur esset omnium quae videret audiret Nec Regi aut Patriae per rabiem perduellium ampliùs servire potuit Anno aetatis 68º expleto Martis 25º qui fuit ei natalis Summâ fide in Christum inconcussâ erga Regem fidelitate Animam anginâ extinctus piissimè Deo reddidit Nec refert quod tantillum monumentum in occulto angulo positum Tanti viri memoriam servat Cujus virtutes omnium aetatum tempora celebrabunt Abi viator sat tuis oculis debes 212. That which my Prayers and Studies have long endeavoured the dispatch of this Labour is come to pass by the good Hand of God this Seventeenth of February 1657. which is some hearts-ease but with respect that I wait the Consolation of the Lord in better times Which Benefit not I perhaps but such as are younger may live to see as the old Father said to his Son in Plaut Trin. Mihi quidem aetas acta fermè est Tuâ isthuc refert maximè I need not admonish my Readers for they find it all the way that my Scope is not so much to insist upon the memorable things of one Man's Life as to furnish them with reading out of my small store that are well-willers to Learning in Theological Political and Moral Knowledge Yet in those Observations I have not set down a Cyrus a feigned Subject but wrought them into the true Image of this Prelate So Nazianzen informs us that when Athanasius drew out the Life of Anthony the Hermite 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He drew out the Instructions of a Rural Hermetical Lise in his Behaviour Some are cheated with Wit now-a-days after the French fashion and had rather Men should be commended in Romances of Persons that were never extant than in such as lived among us truly deserved Glory and did us good My Subject is real and not umbratick a Man of as deep and large wisdom as I did ever speak with and I fear not to say of him as Laelius doth of Cato major Aut enim nemo quod quidem magis credo aut si quis usquam ille sapiens fuit He was constant to that Religion wherein he was catechized and instructed in it more perfectly in Cambridge A punctual observer of the ancient Church Orders whereof he was a Governour and a great decliner of innovations holding to it that what was long in use if it were not best it was fittest for the People He tasted equally of great Prosperity and Adversity and was a rare Example in both like Lollius in Horace Secundis rebus dubiisque rectus not elevated with Honour nor in the contrary state cast down His Enemies lik't nothing worse in him than his Courage and he pleased himself in nothing more Of a stately Presence and a Mind suitable to it Some call'd it Pride and Haughtiness a Scandal laid upon St. Basil says Nazianzen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They twisted him that he was lofty and supercilious Underlings will never forbear to object it to Men in places of Preheminence when there is more of it in themselves Well said Petrus Blesensis Melior est purpurata humilitas quà m pannosa superbia Yet I concur with others who knew this Lord that Choler and a high Stomach were his Faults and the only Defects in him And it had been better for him if he had known a meek temper and how to be resisted Otherwise his Vertues were super-excellent A great Devotee to publick and private Prayer There did not live that Christian that hated Revenge more than he or that would forgive an Injury sooner Most Munificent Liberal Charitable above his Means for he died in a Debt of 8000 l. though