onely without but against reason that the Commous in their severall and particulars should be made relievers or suppliers of his Majesties wants who neither know his wants nor the sums that may be this way raised to supply the same Secondly it is against reason that the particular and severall Commons distracted should oppose their judgment and discretion to the judgement and discretion of the wisdom of their Land assembled in Parliament who have there denied any such aid It argueth in us want of love and due respect of our Soveraign Lord and King which ought to be in every of us towards each other which is to stay every one which we see falling and reduce the current What prosperity can there be expected to befall either our King or Nation when the King shall haply of ignorance or 'tis I hope out of forgetfulnesse or headinesse commit so great a sin against his God as is the violating of his great and solemn oath taken at his coronation for the maintaining of his Lawes Liberties and Customes of this Noble Realm his Subjects some for fear some in pride some to please others shall joyn hands to forward so unhappy an achievement can he any way more highly offend the Divine Majesty whom he then invocated as also can he then give unto another Hen. 4. If such an one should rise up which God forbid a greater advantage let these Articles put up against R. 2. be looked on it will appear that the breach of the Laws infringing the Liberties failing in this his oath were the main blemishes wherewith he could distain and spot the honor of that good and gentle Prince who indeed was rather by others abused then of himselfe mischievously any way disposed Secondly as very irreligiously and uncharitably we help forward the Kings Majesty in that grievous sin of perjury so into what an hellish danger we plunge our selves even so many of us as contribute is to be learned out of the severall curses and sentences of excommunination given out against all such givers and namely the two following viz. the great curse given out the 36. H. 3. against all breakers of the Liberties and customes of the Realm of England with their Abettors Councellors and Executioners wherein by the sentence of Boniface Archbishop of Canterbury and the chief part of all the Bishops of this Land are ipso facto excommunicated And that of 24. Ed. I. denounced immediatly upon the Acts made against such Benevolence free Grants and Impositions had and taken without common assent which because it is not so large as that former I will set down as our Books deliver the same IN the Name of the Father Son and holy Ghost Amen Whereas our Soveraign Lord the King to the honour of God and of the Holy Church and for the common profit of the Realm hath granted for him and his heirs forever these Articles above written Robert Archbishop of Canterbury Primate of all England admonished all his Province once twice and thrice because that shortness will not suffer so much delay as to give knowledge to all the people of England of these presents in writing We therefore enjoyn all persons of what estate soever they be that they and every of them as much as in them is shal uphold and maintain those Articles granted by our Soveraign Lord the King in all points and all those that in any point do resist or break those Ordinances or in any manner hereafter procure counsel or in any ways assent to resist or break those Ordinances or go about it by word or deed openly or privatly by any maner of pretence or colour We therefore the said Archbishop by our authority in this Writing expressed do excommunicate and accurse and from the body of our Lord Jesus Christ and from all the company of Heaven and from all the Sacraments of the holy Church do sequester and exclude Sir hearing that to morrow the Justices will be here about this busie work of Benevolence wherein you have both sent unto and talked with me and thinking that it may be you would deliver up the names of the not-givers Forasmuch as I think I shal scarcely be at home to make my further answer if I should be called for I pray yon both hereby to understand my mind your self and if cause so require to let the Justices perceive as much So leaving others to their own consciences whereby in that last and dreadfull day they shal stand or fall before him who will reward every man according to his deeds I commend you to the grace of the Almighty and rest Your loving Neighbour and Friend OLIVER St. JOHN The Justices of Peace in the County of Devon to the Lords of the Councell THe Letters from his sacred Majesty unto the Justices of Peace in this County together with your Lordships have been opened and read according to the directions in your Lordships Letter to our high Sheriff expressed and the weighty business therein contained hath been maturely and speedily debated according to our most bounden duties to his excellent Majesty and the many concurring necessities which press the expedition of such a service and in those respects we can do no less then give your Lordships a timely knowledge of the vote and opinion of us all which was this day almost in the same words delivered by every of us That the sum enjoyned to be levied by the first of March is not to be so suddenly raised out of this County by any means much less by way of perswasion and hereof we had lately a certain experience in the business of the loans which notwithstanding the fear apprehended by the presence of the Pursivant hath come at least 6000. l. short of the expected sum and without him we suppose would have been much less and we are confident that nothing but extremities which had need also be back't by Law will raise his Majesty a sufficient quantity of treasure for his occasions For our selves at the time of the proposition of the forementioned Loans we did according to his Majesties proclamation and instruction then sent us engage our faithfull promise to our Countreymen that if they willingly yeilded to his Majesties necessities at this time we would never more be Instruments in the levy of aids of that kind his Majesties intentions so clearly manifested not to make that a president was the cause of that engagement and we conceive it cannot be for his honor or service for us to be the means of such a breach That his Majesties affairs and of his Allies do all want an instant supply of Royall provisions his provident and Princely Letter hath fully taught us but we have much more cause to wish then hope that these parts so lately and so many ways impoverished can yeild it Your Lordships may vouchsafe to remember how much this County hath been charged since the beginning of the war though sometimes refreshed with payment which we acknowledge
think it is only to draw the King to the best composition they can The Protestants of France to Charles King of Great Britain SIR the knowledg and resentment which it hath pleased your Majesty to take of the misery of the afflicted Churches of France hath given us the boldnesse to awaken your Compassion in such measure as our calamities are aggravated by the unmercifull rigour of our persecutors and as the present storme doth threaten neer at hand the total ruine and lamentable destruction of that which the mercy of God had yet kept intire unto us since the desolation of Rochel and as we have adored with humility the judgment of God in this bad successe which we impute only to his wrath justly kindled against us for our sins so our silence could be thought no lesse then ingratitude if we had not at the beginning of our Assembly resolved the most humble and most affectionate acknowledgment which wee now render to your Majesty for the great succour which you have sent us interessing your self so far in the grief of our oppression and in the means of our deliverance The most humble supplication which we do offer to your Majesty next after this our thansgiving is that your Majesty according to the sweet inclination of your goodnesse would permit us stil to present our complaints and discover our wounds before the eyes of your royall charity protesting unto your Majesty that we see none other hand under heaven by which we may be healed but your Majesties in case your Majesty will still vouchsafe to lift it up on the behalfe of oppressed innocents and of the Church of our Lord outragiously persecuted by the most invenom'd passion that our age or any age preceedent hath seen we most humbly beseech your Majesty to read this letter which is written with our tears and with our blood and according to your exquisite judgement your incomparable wisdome and the devotion of your zeale to the glory of God to consider our estate which is such that our persecutors upon the losse of Rochel supposing we had been put to utter discomfiture and into a weaknesse without recovery or resistance and boasting themselves that now there remained no more any eyes unto us but to bewaile our selves nor any sense but to feel the smart thereof without further imploying our hands or our arms for our defence have made use of this advantage with so much fiercenesse insultation and cruelty that they have not only sacked the houses and with an unheard of rudenesse and barbarismeâ— rifled the goods of our poore brethren of this Province of Languedock relying themselves upon publick faith and the benefits of the edicts of pacification especially of the last which your Majesty had favourably procured and confirmed unto us dissipating whole families and exiling them with perfidious inhumanity but also they have said wast and destroyed almost all the Churches of the same which are at their command and discretion under the liberty of edicts imploying Monks the Popes Emissaries assisted with force of souldiers and of the tyrannicall Authority of Governours to ravish mens souls and to draw the most constant with violence to Masse and to the feete of the Idol interdicting assembles and all exercise of true Religion in the same places beating imprisoning ransoming assasinating the faithful and their pastors with an inraged fury which hath exceeded all the inhumanities of the Inquisition profaning and demolishing of Temples their violence having proceeded so farre as publickly to burn in pomp and triumph the sacred books of Gods Covenant in presence of the Governor of the Province with damnable sacriledge which cryeth vengeance before God and doth elevate its voice to the eares Sir of a most puissant Monarch professing the purity of the Gospel zealous of his glory and capable to revenge so outragious an injury But your Majesty shal understand that all this hath produced an effect much contrary to the intention of our persecutors for so farre it is from us that their objects of pity and griefe whereof the very thought doth make us repine should render us faint-hearted and cause us to yeild our selves in prey to their rage that on the contrary seeing the Mask taken off and the pretext which they had alledged of the Army of rebellion whereof they accused us quite removed and that without any more distimulation their design goes on to the ruinating of our Religion and the extirpation of our Church and that there remained no more hope of safety and liberty but generall resolution to die in the Arms of our just and vigorous defence and that out persecutors possessing the spirit of our King and hindring the effects of his bounty have obtained a declaration of the fifteenth of December last which alluring us to implore his grace and mercy yet leaveth us not any hope of enjoying the benefits of any edict nor by consequence of any tolerable peace and soliciting us to disarm our selves and to put our selves into the condition of sacrafices destined by one and by one to the slaughter to be all at one stroak offered up to the fury of Antichrist by one general Massacre throughout the whole Kingdome whereof we doe not only heare the vaunts but doe almost see great armies upon our backs for execution This makes us Sir have recourse to your Royal and redoubtable puissance as to a place of refuge which God hath yet left open to us in your Ardent charity to finde within your assistance assured and effectual means to avoid ruine which is ready inevitably to fal upon our heads And to attaine thereunto Sir we have religiously renewed in this assembly the oath of union which binds us with a sacred bond unto the Armes of your Majesty of the violating whereof your Majesty may be assured that we will never make our selves guilty being encouraged to this resolution by the reiterate confirmations which my Lord the Duke of Rohan hath lately given us that your Majesty continues to take to heart the assistance and deliverance of our Churches according to your Royal promises being debtors to his sage and valorous conduct and to his pious magnanimity for all that strength and liberty which we yet enjoy and we will leave unto posterity memorable examples of our Constancie which prefers death before reproachfull cowardize and shameful servitude hoping that out of our ashes God will draw matter for his glory and the propagation of his Church being perswaded Sir that you are the instrument of his election to give us comfort and deliverance from our evils in time convenient Be you assured also that he wil uphold us in that extraordinary valour wherewith he hath inspired us to endure all extremities with a patience invincible expecting the succour of his hands through yours Of all Sir which a great Monarch could ever doe in the world nothing can be more just then this interprize nor more glorious then this deliverance the Lord having exalted you
in this perswasion to your Lordship-wards to frame and accommodate your actions and mind to that end I fear I say that this untimely despair may in time bring forth a just despair by causing your Lordship to slacken and break off your wise loyal and seasonable endeavour and industry for reintegration to her Majesties favour in comparison whereof all other circumstances are but as Atomi or rather as a Vacuum without any substance at all Against this opinion it may please your Lordship to consider of these reasons which I have collected and to make judgment of them neither out of the melancholy of your present fortune nor out of the infusion of that which cometh to you by others relation which is subject to much tincture but ex rebus ipsis out of the nature of the persons and actions themselves as the truest and less deceiving ground of opinion For though I am so unfortunate as to be a stranger to her Majesties eye much more to her nature and manners yet by that which is extant I do manifestly discern that she hath that character of the Divine nature and goodness as quos amavit amavit usque ad finem and where she hath a creature she doth not deface nor defeat it insomuch as if I observe rightly in those persons whom heretofore she hath honoured with her special favour she hath covered and remitted not only defections and ingratitudes in affection but errors in state and service 2. if I can Scholar-like spell put together the parts of her Majesties proceedings now towards your Lordship I cannot but make this construction That her Majesty in her Royal intention never purposed to call your doings into publique question but only to have used a cloud without a shower and censuring them by some restraint of liberty and debarring from her presence For both the handling the cause in the Star-chamber was inforced by the violence of libelling and rumours wherein the Queen thought to have satisfied the world and yet spared your appearance And then after when that means which was intended for the quenching of malicious bruits turned to kindle them because it was said your Lordship was condemned unheard and your Lordships Sister wrote that private Letter then her Majesty saw plainly that these winds of rumours could not be commanded down without a handling of the Cause by making you party and admitting your defence And to this purpose I do assure your Lordship that my Brother Francis Bacon who is too wise to be abused though he be both reserved in all particulars more then is needfull yet in generality he hath ever constantly and with asseveration affirmed to me That both those dayes that of the Star-chamber and that at my Lord Keepers were won of the Queen meerly upon necessity and point of honour against her own inclination 3. In the last proceeding I note three points which are directly significant that her Majesty did expresly forbear any point which was irrecuperable or might make your Lordship in any degree uncapable of the return of her favour or might six any character indeleble of disgrace upon you For she spared the publick places which spared ignominie she limited the Charge precisely not to touch disloyalty and no Record remaineth to memory of the Charge or Sentence 4. The very distinction which was made in the sentence of Sequestration from the places of service in State and leaving to your Lordship the place of Master of the Horse doth in my understanding point at this that her Majesty meant to use your Lordships attendance in Court while the exercises of other places stood suspended 5. I have heard and your Lordship knoweth better that now since you were in your own custody her Majesty in verbo Regio and by his mouth to whom she committeth her Royal grants and Decrees hath assured your Lordship she will forbid and not suffer your ruine 6. As I have heard her Majesty to be a Prince of that magnanimity that she will spare the service of the ablest Subject or Peer where she shall be thought to stand in need of it so she is of that policie as she will not blaze the service of a meaner then your Lordship where it shall depend meerly upon her choice and will 7. I held it for a principle That those diseases are hardest to cure whereof the cause is obscure and those easiest whereof the cause is manifest Whereupon I conclude that since it hath been your errors in your lowness towards her Majesty which have prejudiced you that your reforming and conformity will restore you so as you may be Faber fortunae propriae Lastly Considering your Lordship is removed from dealing in Causes of State and left only to a place of Attendance methinks the Ambition of any which can endure no Partners in State-matters may be so quenched as they should not laboriously oppose themselves to your being in Court So as upon the whole matter I cannot find neither in her Majesties person nor in your own person nor in any third person neither in former precedents nor in your own case any cause of peremptory despair Neither do I speak this but that if her Majesty out of her resolution should design you to a private life you should be as willing upon the appointment to go into the wilderness as into the land of promise only I wish that your Lordship will not despair but put trust next to God in her Majesties grace and not be wanting to your self I know your Lordship may justly interpret that this which I perswade may have some reference to my particular because I may truly say testante non virebo for I am withered in my self but manebo or tenebo I should in some sort be or hold out But though your Lordships years and health may expect return of grace and fortune yet your Eâ—clipse for a time is an ultimum vale to my fortune And were it not that I desired and hope to see my Brother established by her Majesties favour as I think him well worthy for that he hath done and suffered it were time I did take that course from which I disswade your Lordship Now in the mean time I cannot choose but perform those honest duties unto you to whom I have been so deeply bound c. The Earl of Essex his Answer to Mr. Anthony Bacons Letter Mr. Bacon I Thank you for your kind and carefull letter it perswadeth that which I wish for strongly and hope for weakly that is possibility of restitution to her Majesties favour Your arguments that would cherish hope turn into dispair You say the Queen never meant to call me to publick censure which sheweth her goodness but you see I passed it which sheweth others power I believe most stedfastly her Majesty never intended to bring my cause to a publick censure and I believe as verily that since the sentence she meant to restore me to tend upon her person but those which could use occasions
aspersions of either adversary especially when the Auditory is suspected with the one or the other infection 6. Lastly That the Archbishop and Bishops of this Kingdom whom his Majesty hath good cause to blame for their formâ—â—â—â—â—â—â—ss he more wary and choise in the licensing of Preachers and 〈◊〉 grâ—â—â— made to any Chancellor Official or Commissary to pass Licences in this kind And that all the Lecturers throughout the Kingdom a new body and severed from the antient Clergie of England as being neither Parsons Vicars nor Curates be licensed henceforward in the Court of Faculties only upon recommendations of the party from the Bishop of the Diocess under his hand and seal with a Fiat from the Archbishop of Canterbury and a confirmation under the great seal of England and that such as transgress any of these Directions be suspended by the Lord Bishop of that Diocess or in his default by the Lord Archbishop of that Province ab officio beneficio for a year and a day untill his Majesty by the advice of the next Convocation shall prescribe some further punishment By this you see his Majesties Princely care that men should preach Christ crucified obedience to the higher powers and honest and Christian conversation of life but in a regular form and not that every young man should take unto himself an exorbitant liberty to teach what he listeth to the offence of his Majesty and to the disturbance and disquiet of the Church and Commonwealth I can give unto your Lordship no better directions for the performance hereof then are prescribed to you in his Majesties Letter and the Schedule hereunto annexed Wherefore I pray you be very carefull since it is the Princely pleasure of his Majesty to require an exact account both of you and of me for the same Thus not doubting but by your Register or otherwise you will cause these Instructions to be communicated to your Clergy I leave you to the Almighty and remain your Lordships loving brother George Cant. Croydon Aug. 15. 1622. King James Instructions to the Archbishop of Canterbury concerning Orders to be observed by Bishops in their Diocesses 1622. 1. THat the Lords the Bishops be commanded to their severall Sees excepting those that are in necessary attendance at Court 2. That none of them reside upon his land or lease that he hath purchased nor on his Commendum if he hold any but in one of his Episcopall Houses if he have any and that he waste not the woods where any are left 3. That they give their charge in their Trienniall Visitations and at other convenient times both by themselves and the Archdeacons and that the Declaration for setling all questions in difference be strictly observed by all parties 4. That there be a speciall care taken by them all that the Ordinations be solemn and not of unworthy persons 5. That they take great care concerning the Lecturers in their severall Diocess for whom we give these special Directions following First That in all Parishes the after-noon Sermons may be turned into Catechising by Question and Answer when and wheresoever there is no great cause apparent to break this ancient and profitable order Secondly that every Bishop ordain in his Diocess that every Lecturer do read Divine Service according to the Liturgy printed by authority in his Surplice and Hood before the Lecture Thirdly That where a Lecture is set up in a Market Town it may be read by a company of grave and Orthodox Divines neer adjoyning and in the same Diocess and that they preach in Gowns not in Cloaks as too many use to do Fourthly That if a Corporation do maintain a single Lecturer he be not suffered to preach till he professe his willingnesse to take upon him a living with cure of souls within that Incorporation and that he actually take such Benefice or Cure so soon as it shall be fairly procured for him Fifthly That the Bishops do countenance and encourage the grave Orthodox Divines of their Clergy and that they use means by some of the Clergy or others that they may have knowledge how both Lecturers and Preachers within their Diocess do behave themselves in their Sermons that so they may take order for any abuse accordingly Sixthly That the Bishops suffer none under Noblemen or men qualified by Law to have any private Chaplain in his house Seventhly That they take speciall care that Divine Service be diligently frequented as well for Prayers and Catechismes as for Sermons and take particular note of all such as absent themselves as Recusants or others Eighthly That every Bishop that by our grace and favour and good opinion of his service shall be nominated by us to another Bishoprick shall from that day of nomination not presume to make any Lease for three lives or one and twenty years or concurrent Lease or any way renew any estate or cut any Wood or Timber but meerly receive his Rents due and to quit the place For we think it an hatefull thing that any man leaving the Bishoprick should almost undo his Successor And if any man shall presume to break this Order We will refuse him Our Royall assent and keep him at the place he hath so abused Ninthly and lastly We command you to give us an account every year the second of January of the performance of these our commands Subscribed at Dorchester I. R. Bishop of Winchester to his Archdeacon to the same effect SAlutem in Christo I have received Letters from the most Reverend Father in God the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury the tenor whereof foloweth Right reverend Father in God my very good Lord and brother I have received from the Kings most excellent Majesty a Letter the tenor whereof here ensueth Most reverend Father in God right trusty and right entirely beloved Councellor we greet you well For as much as the abuses and extravagancies of Preachers in the Pulpit have been c. According to the tenor of these Letters you are to see that these limitations and cautions herewith sent unto you be duly and strictly from henceforth observed and put in practice and that several Copies of those Directions be speedily communicated to every one of those whom they shall concern and that you may imploy your uttermost endeavors in the performance of so important a business considering that his Majesty will have a special eye over you and me and expect a strict accompt at both our hands whereof praying you to have all possible care I commend your endeavours therein to the blessing of God From Farnham Aug. 15. 1622. Your very loving friend Lan. Winton The Bishop of Lincoln L. Keeper to the Bishop of London concerning Preaching and Catechising My very good Lord I Doubt not before this time you have received from me the directions of his most excellent Majesty concerning Preaching and Preachers which are so graciously set down that no godly or discreet man can otherwise then acknowledge that they do much
assistance or no. But the Duke of Bovillon hearing inckling of it made more haste and hath been with the King and doth return forthwith to him as soon as he hath been at the marriage of the Lady Tremoville Your Lordship knows the circumstances of my journey are not such as can afford me any means to judge but this your Lordship may assure that by that time I have spoken to the King things will break out one way other so far as it will appear whether it be worth the tarrying to treat or no after once the King has been dealt with to which I will address my self with all speed and not tarry for the States who may be come to Paris by that time I do return for I believe they will be content to treat any where I shall have a miss of Sir Thomas Wilks were it not we were well instructed and surely he was grown very heavy of late and dull If I should stay here to attend his recovery it would comsume me to no purpose I have written a Letter to the Queen of some such gathering as I have gotten and of the speeches between me and the President because her Majesty may not be offended that I write not particularly to her selfe of something Although the Spaniards from Callis have spoyled Base-Bologne yet it is not holden here that the Cardinall will sit down before any Town speedily for he will not be able Neverthelesse the Constable is come into Picardy to give stay to the Province if that be the fruit of the Treaty we shall have less need to disswade the King I much fear Sir Tho. Wilks to be in a Lethargie Since your Lordships Letter of Feb. 15. which found me at Dover a little before my imbarking the wind hath not served to bring me any Letter out of England The Lord of heaven send me tidings of your Lordships health for whom I will daily pray I received also a Letter from the Earl of Essex of the 16. and did imbark the 17. I humbly take my leave and rest Feb. 26. 1507. Your Lordships humble and obedient Son RO. CECIL Sir Francis Walsingham Secretary to Monsieur Critoy Secretary of France SIR WHereas you desire to be advertised touching the proceedings here in Ecclesiastical causes because you seem to note in them some inconstancie and variation as if we somtimes inclined to one side somtimes to another and as if that clemencie and lenity were not used of late that was used in the beginning all which you impute to your own superficial understanding of the affairs of this State having notwithstanding her Majesties doing in singular reverence as the real pledges which she hath given unto the world of her sincerity in Religion and of her wisdom in Government well meriteth I am glad of this occasion to impart that little I know in that matter to you both for your own satisfaction and to the end you may make use thereof towards any that shall not be so modestly and so reasonably minded as you are I find therefore her Majesties proceedings to have been grounded upon two principles 1. The one That consciences are not to forced but to be won and reduced by the force of truth with the aid of time and the use of all good means of instruction and perswasion 2. The other That the Causes of Conscience wherein they exceed their bounds and grow to be matter of faction lose their nature and that Soveraign Prince ought distinctly to punish the practice in contempt though coloured with the pretence of Conscience and Religion According to these principles her Majesty at her coming to the Crown utterly disliking the tyranny of Rome which had used by terror and rigor to settle commandments of mens faiths and consciences though as a Prince of great wisdom and magnanimity she suffered but the exercise of one Religion yet her proceedings towards the Papists was with great lenity expecting the good effects which time might work in them And therefore her Majesty revived not the Laws made in the 28. and 35. of her Fathers reign whereby the Oath of Supremacie might have been offered at the Kings pleasure to any Subject though he kept his conscience never so modestly to himself and the refusal to take the same oath without further circumstance was made Treason But contrariwise her Majesty not liking to make windows into mens hearts secret thoughts except the abundance of them did overflow into overt and express acts or affirmations tempered her Laws so as it restraineth every manifest disobedience in impugning and impeaching advisedly and maliciously her Majesties supreme power maintaining and extolling a foraign jurisdiction And as for the Oath it was altered by her Majesty into a more gratefull form the hardness of the name and appellation of Supreme Head was removed and the penalty of the refusal thereof turned only into disablement to take any promotion or to exercise any charge and yet with liberty of being reinvested therein if any man should accept thereof during his life But after when Pius Quintus had excommunicated her Majesty and the Bulls of Excommunication were published in London whereby her Majesty was in a sort proscribed and that thereupon as upon a principal motive or preparative followed the Rebellion in the North yet because the ill humours of the Realm were by that Rebellion partly purged and that she feared at that time no foreign invasion and much less the attempt of any within the Realm not backed by some potent succour from without she contented herself to make a Law against that special case of bringing and publishing of any Bulls or the like Instruments whereunto was added a prohibition upon pain not of treason but of an inferior degree of punishment against the bringing in of Agnus Dei hallowed bread and such other merchandise of Rome as are well known not to be any essential part of the Romish religion but only to be used in practise as Love-tokens to inchant the peoples affections from their allegiance to their natural Soveraign In all other points her Majesty continued her former lenity but when about the 20. year of her reign she had discovered in the King of Spain an intention to invade her Dominions and that a principal point of the plot was to prepare a party within the Realm that might adhere to the Foreigner and that the Seminaries began to blossom and to send forth daily Priests and professed men who should by vow taken at Shrift reconcile her Subjects from their obedience yea bind many of them to attempt against her Majesties sacred person and that by the poyson which they spread the humours of most Papists were altered and that they were no more Papists in conscience and of softness but Papists in faction then were there new Laws made for the punishment of such as should submit themselves to such reconcilements or renunciations of obedience And because it was a Treason carried in the clouds and in
medicines for that State And as for other points of governing their Nobility as well in this Court as there of Knighthood of Education of their Children and the like points of comfort and allurement they are things which fall into every mans consideration For the extirpating of the seeds of troubles I suppose the main roots are but three The first the ambition and absoluteness of the chief of the Families and Sects the second the licentious idleness of their Kerns and Souldiers that lie upon their Country by sesses and such oppressions the third the barbarous customs in habits of apparel in these Poets or Heralds that inchant them in savage manners and sundry other such dregs of Barbarism and Rebellion which by a number of politique Statutes of Ireland meet to be put in execution are already forbidden unto which such additions may be made as the present time requireth But the reducing of this branch requireth a more particular notice of the state and manners there then falls within my compass For Plantations and buildings I do find it strange that in the last plot for the population of Munster there were limitations how much in Demesnes and how much in Farm and Tenantry how many buildings should be erected how many Irish in mixture should be admitted but there was no restraint that they might not build sparsim at their pleasure much less any condition that they should make places fortified and defensible the which was too much secureness to my understanding So as for this last point of plantations and buildings there be two considerations which I hold most material th' one of quickning th' other for assuring The first is that choyce be made of such persons for the government of Towns and places and such undertakers be procured as be men gracious and wel-beloved and are like to be well followed wherein for Munster it may be because it is not Res integra but that the former undertakers stand interessed there will be some difficulty but surely in mine opinion either with agreeing with them or by over-ruling them by a Parliament in Ireland which in this course of a politique proceeding infinite occasions will require speedily to be held it will be fit to supply fit qualified persons for underakers The other that it be not left as heretofore to the pleasure of the undertakers and adventurers where and how to build and plant but that they do it according to a prescript or formality For first the places both Maritine and Inland which are fittest for Colonies or Garrison as well for doubt of Foreigners as for keeping the Countrey in bridle would be found surveighed and resolved upon and then that the Patentees be tied to build those places onely and to fortifie as shall be thought convenient And lastly it followeth of course in Countries of new populations to invite and provoke inhabitants by ample liberties and Charters FR. BACON Sir Francis Bacon to the Lord Treasurer touching his speech in Parliament It may please your good Lordship I Was sorry to find by your Lordships speech yesterday that my last speech in Parliament delivered in discharge of my conscience my duty to God her Majesty and my Countrey was offensive if it were misreported I would be glad to attend your Lordship to disavow any thing I said not if it were misconstrued I would be glad to expound my words to exclude any sense I meant not if my heart be mis-judged by imputation of popularity or opposition I have great wrong and the greater because the manner of my speech did most evidently shew that I spake most simply and onely to satisfie my conscience and not with any advantage or policy to sway the cause and my terms carried all signifification of duty and zeal towards her Majesty and her service It is very true that from the beginning whatsoever was a double Subsidy I did wish might for presidents sake appear to be extraordinary and for discontents sake might not have been levied upon the poverty though otherwise I wished it as rising as I think this will prove or more This was my mind I confess it and therefore I most humbly pray your good Lordship first to continue me in your own good opinion and then to perform the part of an honorable good friend towards your poor servant and all in drawing her Majesty to accept of the sincerity and simplicity of my zeal and to hold me in her Majesties favour which is to me dearer then my life And so c. Your Lordships most humble in all duty FR. BACON Sir Francis Bacon to the Earl of Northampton May it please your good Lordship AS the time of sowing of a seed is known but the time of coming up and disclosing is casuall or according to the season so I am witness to my self that there hath been covered in my mind a long time a seed of affection and zeal towards your Lordship sown by the estimation of your vertues and your particular honors and favours to my brother deceased and to my self which seed sti l springing now bursteth forth into this profession And to be plain with your Lordship it is very true and no winds or noyses of evill matters can blow this out of my head or heart that your great capacities and love towards studies and contemplations of an higher and worthier nature then popular a matter rare in the world in a person of your Lordships quality almost singular is to me a great and chief motive to draw my affection admiration towards you and therefore good my Lord if I may be of any use to your Lordship I humbly pray your Lordship to hold me your own and therefore withall not to do so much disadvantage to my good mind as to conceive that this commendation of my humble service proceedeth out of any straits of my occasions but meerly out of an election and indeed the fulness of my heart And so wishing your Lordship all prosperity I continue yours c. FR. BACON To the Lord Kinloss upon the entrance of K. James My Lord THe present occasion awaketh in me a remembrance of the constant amity and mutual good offices which passed between my Brother deceased and your Lordship whereunto I was less strange then in respect of the time I had reason to pretend and withall I call to mind the great opinion my Brother who seldom failed in judgment of a person would often express to me of your Lordships great wisdom and soundness both in head and heart towards the service and affairs of the Lord our Soveraign King The one of those hath bred in me an election and the other a confidence to address my good will and sincere affection to your good Lordship not doubting in regard that my course of life hath wrought me not to be altogether unseen in the matters of the Kingdom that I may be in some use both in points of service to the King and your Lordships
I know hold it evil beseemmg so rare a greatness to come behind any King how pious vertuous soever either in the observance of the laws of mutual charity and friendship or in love or zeal to justice which to all Kingdoms and Governments gives the assuredst foundation and in defect whereof by the Spirit of God himself Kingdoms are said to be translated from one Nation to another The first King that God gave unto his people he elected of higher stature then the rest by the shoulders upwards signifying thereby how much Kings are to strive to exceed and excell in the height and measure of vertue and justice also how fit it is for them to over-look with their authorities and providences the highest head of their Ministers and to observe how they guide themselves By the contents of this paper inclosed your Majesty shall perceive the Christian and Kingly care the King my Master hath had not onely of the observances of the Articles of Peace since the same between your Majesties were concluded but of the punctuall accomplishment of the true Laws of amity and friendship which are more surely and expressively imprinted in Royall and Noble hearts then possibly they can be written or charactered by any pen in paper In your Majesties Kingdoms pardon I humbly beseech you if I speak plainly much contrary to that example the King my Masters subjects suffer all manner of spoils oppressions and miseries and are as well I may term them made a very prey to the hungry and greedy your Viceroyes and others enter their ships under cover and colour of Peace and Justice finding them rich they lay crimes to their charge whereof there appears neither proof nor probability yet serve their pretences to possess them of their goods to put the poor Merchants to a demand in Law wherein were truth alone the ballance they should be weighed by though that form of redress were far short of the immediate remedy provided by the King my Soveraign for your Majesties subjects yet were it much more allowable and to be endured but having here complained two whole years without any course at all taken for redress as in the cause with the Duke of Feria three intire years as in that with the Viceroy of Sardinia one year and more as in that of his Majesties servant Adrian Thibaut taken and spoiled by your Majesties Generall Don Luis as in that of Estry and Bispich imprisoned and bereaved of their goods by Iuan de Vendorza Alcalde of Madrid we are after so long a time spent in misery and charge countervailing a great part of the value of the goods taken from us inforced still to all punctualities and extremities of forms of law and to abide the uttermost perill of all advantages that by the inventions wits tongues of Lawyers can be devised to obscure and hide the light and right of truth The false colour given by every of these and the barbarous cruelty used to the parties would require too long and tedious a declaration It satisfieth that none of their pretences are proved nay which is more they are so false and fabulous as to no indifferent underderstanding they appear so much as probable My humble desire is your Majesty would be pleased to pass your own Royal eyes upon this paper and therefore to affect all possible brevity I will pass unto your Majesties other inferior ministers of your Ports of which few there are those in Biscay and some in Portugal only excepted where we have not divers oppressions imprisonments and unjust imbargements in Sivil especially whereof forty several suits and as many false sentences given raised and pursued by a man now dead and therefore in charity left unnamed We have hitherto in your Majesties Councel of war where before those noble Lords all passed by the equal line of Justice not failed in my remembrance in the overthrowing of any save one mistaken that passed in a wrong name and another concerning merchandise that had their manufacture in Embden whereof I suppose those Lords were not rightly informed only excepted In that Court I must acknowledge we have had redress but yet with your Majesties favour a miserable one our gain being whether we shall be owners of our own or not our expences and charges certain and the time without measure large whereby many have been undone some dead in prison in England for want of what was unjustly detained from them here Yet neither the false Judges in Sivil nor Promoters ever chastised or for any thing that I yet have understood so much as ever reprehended or found fault with I haste to a conclusion fearing lest I should dwell too long in a matter so unsavoury and unpleasing to your Majesties pittifull ears and Christian heart so much of it self disposed to all clemency and piety I will for the next resort to the ships cordage corn and other victuals and provisions taken from the King my Soveraigns subjects for your Majesties own services and the relief of the extreme necessity in your Gallies and Garrisons of the Navy of whom some have been enforced for want of payment of their monies to send their ships home unfreighted a loss extreme to poor Merchants that live by trade and time to repair to this Court and here remain some of them 14 moneths and others two years and more till their very charges had eaten out a great part of what was due unto them and in the end recover only their own without any relief or recompence either for their expences times lost or damages I will only instance two because their causes are most strange and pittifull and yet unsatisfied the one named Thomas Harrison and the other Richard Morris The first served your Majesty with his ship till the same with one of his sons and all of his men were swallowed with the seas and hath been here more then four years suing for his recompence and salary recommended by the King my Soveraign by Letters from your Majesties Ambassadors in England and by my self all that long time furthered with my earnest sollicitation which hath begot infinite promises but to this day no manner of payment or performance The other who sometimes hath been a man of wealth and reputation and falling into great poverty served your Majesty with all that in the world he was worth and all that in value above 6000 Ryals I blush I protest to think of it and my heart is grieved to mention it to so great a King of whose liberality and magnificence the world taketh so much notice His right and his necessity being well known unto your Officers he hath been more then three years and a half fed with hopes and put off with schedules and sending from one Port to another for the receipt of his mony till he hath indebted himself the most part of the sum and at present wanteth wherewith both to feed and cover him Now at last he is promised payment
great Uncle and perceiving that all the Councels of the Calvinists do aim to bring in the Turk he will not condemn his translation For no less is the Lutherans hatred against the Calvinists as the Catholiques and they think less danger do proceed from the later It is to be hoped therefore that the Elector of Saxony and other Lutheran Princes when they see the business brought to this point will not so far disapprove thereof as to put themselves in Arms which I shall shortly understand of the most excellent Archduke Charls my brother who is for this cause to treat with the Elector of Saxony And these motives as they are of great consequence so I imagine you which are daily of his Majesties Councell have pondered them as diligently as my self and therefore that you will omit nothing that is pertinent to establish this business whereby we obtain the long and wished fruit thereof which is the propagation of the honor of Almighty God through the Empire and the augmentation of the common safety Family and Dignity Beloved Don Balthazar I understand that there was a motive of great consideration omitted in my Letter to wit that if we had more countenance of his Catholique Majesty then we have at this present the Empire should always remain in the hands of Catholiques and so according to reason in our House to whose advancement the Duke of Bavaria will willingly concur in recognition of such a benefit being promoted by an Emperour of that House to so eminent and high a dignity as in our letters Vienna Octob. 15. 1621. King James to Ferdinand the Emperour concerning the Palatinate Novemb. 12. 1621. IAmes by the grace of God King of Great Britain France and Ireland Defender of the Faith c. wisheth health and constant peace unto the most mighty and invincible Prince Ferdinando by the same grace elected Roman Emperour King of Germany Hungary and Bohemia Archduke of Austria c. our loving friend and cousin Most mighty and invincible Prince Brother Cousin and speciall loving Friend It is not unknown unto the whole world much less to your Imperiall Majesty how earnestly we have hitherto sought and endeavoured as well by the diligence of our Ambessadors whom we have sent as by the intercession of the chief German Princes the appeasing of those Bohemian wars ever since they first began and with what ardent zeal and affection we have so much hunted after the desire of peace Let it not therefore seem strange unto any man that we take it ill that all the very time when we were to the uttermost of our power treating of peace and giving our best furtherance for the overture of wholsome means to effect it even then notwithstanding we found clean contrary effects to ensue thereupon whereat we much marvelled seeing the Treaty was in hand and already begun on all sides as namely among the rest that our son-in-law was wholly despoiled and robbed of his hereditary patrimony that remained unto him excepting the â—lower Palatinate which was all by commandment of your Imperiall Majesty taken and possessed by the Duke of Bavaria according as himself confessed with strong hand and force of Arms and that for such reasons as are meerly new and such as the like were never hitherto once heard of That notwithstanding it plainly appeareth by the answer given unto our Ambassador that your Imperial Majesty had caused the suspension of that Ban or prescription in those Countries yet did your Imperial Majesty permit the taking of Arms again in hand which also after the same your Imperial Majesties answer was yet again likewise commanded to be done in the Lower Palatinate whereby there hath therein been since raised a grievous and cruel war and most part of the Country taken in by the Spaniards powerfull strength But as we diligently observed those things we cleerly see what great trouble and misery hath been occasioned by this our great patience and long delaying forbearing and doubtfulness which without all doubt may be hereafter further occasioned and which may perhaps prove heavier then the chief reasons of this misery it self And therefore we hold it best and most expedient that your Imperial Majesty do at length put a period to this most unhappy business And for that end and purpose have thought good at this time so propound what we prescribe our Son in law on th' one part to perform towards your Imperial Majesty which we have always councelled and exhorted our Son in law to do nor will we so much as in the least once doubt of the contrary and adverse success therein but are perswaded that your Imperial Majesty will be most graciously moved to receive our Son in law into grace and favour to redeliver unto him his hereditary lands and titles which he had enjoyed before those Bohemian wars and fully to restore him to his former honours and dignities In regard whereof the Count Palatine shall perform unto your Imperial Majesty as followeth 1. He shall for himself and his Son wholly renounce and acquit all pretence of right and claim unto die Crown of Bohemia and the incorporated Countries thereof 2. He shall from henceforward yield all constant due devotion unto the Imperial Majesty as do other obedient Princes Electors of the Empire 3. He shall upon his knee crave pardon of the Imperial Majesty 4. He shall not hereafter any manner of way either unfittingly carry or demean himself towards the Imperial Majesty or disturb your Kingdoms or Countries 5. He shall upon reasonable conditions reconcile himself with other his neighbour Princes and States of the Empire and hold good friendship with them 6. And shall really do all other like things as is above contained and that shall be reasonable and necessary Which proposed Conditions if your Imperial Majesty shall please to receive and accept of the same will be a notable testimony of your Imperial Majesties goodness and grace which how well and acceptable it will be unto us shall be acknowledged and shewed by our very willing service and unfeigned friendship as well towards your Imperial Majesty as towards the most renowned house of Austria But if it shall fall out contrary to our expectation that these our just demands and well-willed presentation shall not find acceptance or after this our diligent endeavor you shall seek to delay us by the using some new tergiversation and pretend to use that long councel and deliberate advice of the Princes of the Empire upon these our propounded conditions whereas notwithstanding your Imperial Majesty expresly promised in your last answer freely to declare what should be your purpose and resolution therein So that there being no ground to the contrary as we call God and the world to witness there is not and being forced and constrained by the duty and natural affection which we owe and bear to our Children for the preservation of their honour and welfare we are resolved to try the uttermost of our power
Infanta having an absolute commission to conclude a suspension and cessation of Arms should now at last when all objections were answered and the former solely pretended obstacles removed not onely delay the conclusion of the Treaty but refuse to lay her command upon the Emperours Generals for abstaining from the siege of our Garrisons during the Treaty upon pretext of want of authority So as for avoyding of further dishonor we have been enforced to recall both our Ambassadors as well the Chancellor of the Exchequer who is already returned to our presence as also the Lord Chichester whom we intended to have sent unto the Emperour to the Dyet at Ratisbone Seeing therefore that out of our extraordinary respect meerly to the King of Spain and the firm confidence we ever put in the hopes and promises which he did give us desiring nothing more then for his cause principally to avoid all occasions that might put us into ill understanding with any of the House of Austria We have hitherto proceeded with a stedfast patience trusting to the treaties and neglecting all other means which might probably have secured the remainder of our childrens inheritance Those Garrisons which we maintained in the Palatinate being rather for honor sake to keep a footing untill the generall accommodation then that we did rely so much upon their strength as upon his frienpship and by the confidence security of ours are thus exposed to dishonor reproach you shal tell that King that seeing all those endeavours and good offices which he hath used towards the Emperour in this business on the behalf of our son-in-law upon confidence whereof that our security depended which he continually by his Letters and Ministers here laboured to beget and confirm in us have not sorted to any other issue then to a plain abuse both of his trust and ours whereby we are both of us highly injured in our honour though in a different degree we hope desire that out of a true sense of this wrong offered unto us he will as our deer and loving brother faithfully promise and undertake upon his honor confirming the same also under his hand and seal either that the Castle and Town of Heidelbergh shall within threescore and ten dayes after this your audience and demand made be rendred into our hands with all things therein belonging to our son-in-law or our daughter as neer as may be in the state wheirn they were taken and the like for Manheim and Frankindale if both or eithe of them shall be taken by the enemy whilst these things are in treating as also that there shall be within the said term of threescore and ten days a cessation or suspension of Arms in the Palatinate for the future upon the severall Articles and Conditions last propounded by our Ambassador Sir Richard Weston and that the generall treaty shall be set on foot again upon such honorable terms and conditions as were propounded unto the Emperour in a letter written unto him in November last and with which the King of Spain then as we understand seemed satisfied or else in case all these particulars be not yeilded unto and performed by the Emperour as is here propounded but be refused or delayed beyond the time afore mentioned that then the King of Spain do joyn his forces with ours for the recovery of our childrens honors and patrimony which upon this trust hath been thus lost Or if so be his forces at this present be otherwise so imployed as that they cannot give us that assistance which we here desire and as we think we have deserved yet at the least he will permit us a free and friendly passage through his Territories and Dominions for such forces as we shall send and imploy into Germany for this service of all which disjunctively if you receive not of the King of Spain within ten days at the furthest after your audience and proposition made a direct assurance under his hand and seal without delay or putting us off to further Treaties and Conferences that is to say of such restitution cessation of Arms and proceeding to a generall treaty as is before mentioned or else of assistance and joyning his forces with ours against the Emperour or at least permission of passage for our forces through his said Dominions that then you take your leave and return unto our Presence without further stay otherwise to proceed in the negotiation of the marriage of our Son according to the instruction we have given you Given c. at Hampton Court Octob. 3. 1622. Earl of Bristol to King James Octob. 21. 1622. MAy it please your most excellent Majesty I received your Majesties Letter of the 9. of Septemb the 23. of the same moneth by them understand that your Majesty hath received much satisfaction by what I had formerly written unto your Majesty both concerning the restitution of the conclusion of the Match but that your Majesty findeth the effects very unsuitable both by the proceeding at Bruxels in the Palatinate as also by what you understand from Rome by Mr. Gage of the Popes demands I hope by the arrival of Mr. Cottington your Majesty will have received satisfaction in some measure at least that there hath been no diligence or time omitted either for the redressing of any thing that hath been amiss or for the advancing of your Majesties affairs The very day I received your Letters I sent a Gentleman post unto the King who was gone into the Escurial to demand audience which he presently granted me and I repaired thither unto him upon the third of October the Conde de Gondomar being likewise commanded to wait upon the King I was there well received and presently upon my arrival the Conde de Olivarez came to me to the lodgings which were appointed for me to rest in To him I delivered fully in the presence of Sir Walter Ashton and the Conde de Gondomar what I had to negotiate with the King both in the business of the Match and of the Palatinate In the Match I represented how much it imported your Majesty that a speedy resolution might be taken therein both in regard of the Prince being your Majesties onely son now arrived to the age of 22 years and for the setling of your affairs in England I repeated unto him all the passages in this Treaty how many years had been already spent in it that after so long an expectation the diligences used in Rome for the obtaining of the Dispensation had wrought but small effect since the Pope had lately made such demands as were altogether impossible for your Majesty to condescend unto and therefore your Majesty seeing the business still delayed held it fit that some such course might be taken that both your Majesties might speedily know what you were to trust unto and therfore had comanded me to signifie unto this King your uttermost resolution how far you would condescend in point of Religion towards what
the Pope had demanded if herewith this King could be satisfied your Maj. desire that we might proceed to a final and speedy conclusion otherwise that this King would likewise cleerly declare himself that your Majesty might lose no more time in the disposing of the Prince your son Hereunto the Conde de Olivarez answer'd with some length the substance I shall only presume to set down briefly to your Majesty He proposed a sincere intention and resolution in the King to make the Match and that there should not be one day lost for the speedy dispatch thereof imported them as much as your Majesty and to the end that no time may be lost this King had the next day after for Don Balthazar de Zuniga appointed Don Ferdinando de Giron in his place in the Commission That for the going of Mr. Gage from Rome and the Popes demands they were absolutely ignorant of them That the King had done all that I my self desired for the redress of this error That I might assure your Majesty that you shall find all sincerity and cleer proceeding without any houres delay more then of necessity the nature of the business required As for the business of the Palatinate I presented at large the merits of your Majesties proceeding the many promises made from hence yet notwithstanding the whilst your Majesty was treating at Bruxels Heidelberg one of the three places which were only left and where your Majesty had Garrisons was besieged by the Archduke Leopold and Monsieur Tilly that this King had withdrawn his Forces and so exposed the Palatinate absolutely to the Emperor and the Duke of Bavaria The Conde de Olivarez answered me by acknowledging how much your Majesties proceedings had deserved at the Emperor and this Kings hands That whatsoever your Majesty could expect or had been at any time promised should by this King be really performed That the Prince Palatines own courses hitherto had been the only hinderance of the effecting of it That he referred it unto your Majesties own just judgment whether the calling of this Kings forces out of the Palatinate were with any ill intention or meerly for the defence of Flanders which otherwise had been put in great hazard by Count Mansfield as your Majesty saw by what had really passed That the siege of Heidelbergh was no way by the consent or knowledge of this King or any of his Ministers but was generally disapproved by them all I told them I conceived that was not enough for that your Majesty had engaged your self to this King that in case your Son-in-law would not conform himself you would not only forsake him but would declare your self against him and give the Emperor assistance for the reducing of him to reason and that your Majesty could not but expect a like reciprocal proceeding from the King He answered your Majesty should see the Kings sincerity by the effects and that if Heidelbergh should be taken and the Emperor refuse to restore it or to condescend to such accommodation as should be held reasonable this King would infallibly assist your Majesty with his Forces And this he spake with great assurance and wished me to desire your Majesty to be confident you would find nothing but real and sinc ere proceedings from hence I was then presently called for to the King to whom I spake first in the business of the Match and delivered him the contents thereof in writing which I have sent to Mr. Secretary I received from him the same answer in effect as from the Conde de Olivarez That he desired the Match no less then your Majesty That on his part there should be no time lost for the bringing of it to a speedy conclusion In the business of the Palatinate I spake unto the King with some length repeating many particulars of your Majesties proceedings and how much your honour was like to suffer that now whilst you were treating Heidelborgh defended by your Garrisons was like to be taken The King answered me He would effectually labour that your Majesty should have entire satisfaction and rather then your Majesty should fail thereof he would imploy his Arms to effect it for you My Lord Ambassador Sir Walter Ashton accompanied me at my audience and was a witness of all that passed as wel with the King as with the Conde de Olivarez Within few dayes after the newes of the taking of Heidelbergh came hither whereupon I dispatched again to the King in such sort as I have at large advertised Mr. Secretary Calvert The effect of my Negotiation was that they on the 13. of October dispatched Letters away of the Emperors and Duke of Bavaria's proceedings But pressing them further in regard their former Letters have wrought so little effect they have given me at present a second Dispatch which I have sent unto the Infanta and whereof Mr. Secretary will give your Majesty an account which I conceive will procure your Majesties better satisfaction then hitherto you have received from the Emperor and his party For the business of the match I have written to Mr. Secretary what is to be said at present and will only add that as I should not willingly give your Majesty hope upon uncertain grounds so I will not conceal what they profess which is That they will give your Majesty real and speedy satisfaction therein And if they intended it not they are falser then all the Devils in hell for deeper oaths and protestations of sincerity cannot be made It will only remain that I humbly cast my self at your Majesties feet for that addition of Title wherewith it hath pleased you to honour me and my posterity My gratitude and thankfulness wanteth expression and shall only say unto your Majesty That as all I have either of fortunes or honour I hold it meerly of your bounty and goodness so shall I ever cheerfully lay them down with my life into the bargain for the service of your Majesty and yours So with my humble prayers for the health and prosperity of your Majesty I humbly commend your Majesty to Gods holy protection and rest Your Majesties most humble servant and subject BRISTOL Madrid Octob. 21. 1622. King Philip the third of Spain to the Conde of Olivarez THe King my Father declared at his death that his intention never was to marry my sister the Infanta Donna Maria with the Prince of Wales which your Uncle Don Baltezer well understood and so treated this match ever with an intention to delay it notwithstanding it is now so far advanced that considering withall the aversness unto it of the Infanta as it is high time to seek some means to divert the treaty which I would have you find out and I will make it good whatsoever it be but in all other things procure the satisfaction of the King of Great Britain who hath deserved very much and it shall content me so that it be not the match Conde Olivarez his Answer to the King
things and all being helped with the good zeal of the Conde de Gondemer it may be that God wil open a way to it a thing so much for his and your Majesties service King James to the Earl of Bristol Octob. 8.1623 WE have received yours brought us by Gresly and the Copy of how well we esteem your dutifull discreet and judicious relation and humble advise to our self and our Son whereupon having ripely deliberated with our self and communicated with our dear Son we have resolved with the great liking of our Son to rest upon that security in point of doubt of the Infanta's taking a Religious house which you in your judgment shall think meet We have further thought meet to give you knowledge that it is our special desire that the betrothing of the Infanta with words de praesenti should be upon one of the dayes in Christmass new stile that holy and joyfull time best fitting so notable and blessed an action But first we will that you repair presently to that King and give him knowledge of the safe arrival of our dear Son to our Court so satisfied and taken with the great entertainments personal kindness favour and respect he hath received from that King and Court as he seems not able to magnifie it sufficiently which makes us not know how sufficiently to give thanks but we will that by all means you endeavour to express our thankfulness to that King and the rest to whom it belongs in the best and most ample manner you can And hereupon you may take occasion to let that King know that according to our constant affection to make a firm and indissoluble amity between our Families Nations and Crowns and not seem to abandon our honour nor at the same time we give joy to our onely Son to give our onely Daughter her portion in tears By the advice of â—hat Kings Ambassadors we have entred a Treaty concerning the restitution of the Palatinate as will more particularly appear to you by the copies herewith sent Now we must remember you that we ever understood and expected that upon the marriage of our son with the Infanta should have a clear restitution of the Palatinate Electoral dignity to our son-in-law to be really procured by that King according to the obligation of our honor as you have wel expressed in your reasons why the person of our Son-in-law should not be left out of the Treaty but that the Emperor should findout a great title or by increasing the number of Electorate stiles wherewith to satisfie the Duke of Bavaria We now therfore require you that presently in your first audience you procure from that King a punctual answer what course that King will take for the restitution of the Palatinate and Electorate to our Son-in-law and in case that either the Emperor or the Duke of Bavaria oppose any part of the expected restitution what course that King will take to give us assurance for our content in that point whereof we require your present answer and that you so press expedition herein that we may all together receive the full joy of both in Christmass resting our self upon that faithfull diligence of yours we have approved in all your service Though almost with the latest we must remember to you as a good ground for you to work on that our Son did write us out of Spain That that King would give us a Blank in which we might form our own Conditions concerning the Palatinate and the same our Son confirms to us now What observation and performance that King will make we require you to express and give us a speedy account c. Given c. Earl of Bristol in answer to King James Octob. 29. 1623. MAy it please your most excellent Majesty I have received your Majesties Letters of the 8. of October on the 21. of the same moneth some houres within night and have thought fit to dispatch back unto your Majesty with all possible speed referring the answer to what your Majesty hath by these Letters commanded me to a Post that I shall purposely dispatch when I shall have negotiated the particulars with this King and his Ministers wherein God willing all possible diligence shall be used But forasmuch as I find both by your Majesties Letter as likewise by Letters which I have received from the Prince his Highness that you continue your desires of having the Match proceeded in I held it my duty that your Majesty should be informed that although I am set free in as much as concerneth the doubt of the Infanta's entring into Religion new direction I now received from your Majesty that the Deposories should be deferr'd till Christmas the said powers are made altogether useless and invalid it being a clause in the bodies of the said powers that they shall onely remain in force till Christmas and no longer as your Majesty may see by the copie I send herewith inclosed Your Majesty I conceive will be of opinion that the suspending of the execution of the powers untill the force and validity of them be expired is a direct and effeftuall revoking of them which not to do how far his Highness is in his Honor ingaged your Majesty will be best able to judge by viewing the powers themselves Further if the date of these powers do expire besides the breach of the Capitulations although the match it self jealousies and mistrusts be hazarded yet the Princes coming at the Spring will be almost impossible For by that time new Commissions and Powers shall be after Christmas granted by the Prince which must be to the satisfaction of both parties I conceive so much of the year will be spent that it will be impossible tor the Fleets and other preparations to be in a readiness against the Spring for it is not to be imagined that they will here proceed effectually with their preparations untill they shall be sure of the Desposorios especially when they shall have seen them severall times deferred on the Prince his part and that upon pretexts that are not new or grown since the granting of the Powers but were before in being and often under debate and yet were never insisted upon to make stay of the business so that it will seem that they might better have hindered the granting of them then the execution of them Now if there were not staggering in former resolutions the which although really there is not yet can it not but be suspected and the clearing of it between Spain and England will cost much time I most humbly crave your Majesties pardon if I write unto you with the plainness of a true-hearted and faithfull servant who ever hath cooperated honestly unto your Majesties ends I knew them I know your Majesty hath been long time of opinion that the greatest assurance you could get that the King of Spain would effectually labour the intire restitution of the Palatinate was that he really proceeded to the effecting
the Match will be a good pawn in the business and the help and assistance which the Princes being once betrothed would be able to give in this Court to all your Majesties businesses would be of good consideration So fearing I have already presumed too far upon your Majesies patience I humbly crave your Majesties pardon and recommend you to the holy protection of God resting Your Majesties most humble and faithful subject and servant BRISTOL Madrid Octob. 29. 1623. Earl of Bristol to King James Novemb. 1. 1623. MAy it please your most excellent Majesty I find that upon the news that is now come from the Duke of Pastrava that the Pope hath cleerly passed the Dispensation which is now hourly expected here There is an intention to call presently upon me for the Princes powers for the marriage left in my hands the which I know not upon what ground or reason to detain the Prince having engaged in the said powers the faith and word of a Prince no way to revoke and retract from them but that they should remain in full force till Christmass and delivered unto me a politique declaration o his pleasure that upon the coming of the Dispensation I should deliver them unto this King that they might be put in execution and hereof likewise was there by Secretary Serita as a publique Notary an Instrument drawn attested by all the witnesses present If I shall alleadge your Majesties pleasure of having the marriage deferred untill one of the Holidays although they should condescend thereunto that impossible for the powers will be then expired If I shall insist upon the restitution of the Palatinate this King hath therein declared his answer and it would be much wondred why that should be now added fo a condition of the marriage having ever hitherto been treated of as a business apart and was in being at the granting of the said powers and hath been often under debate but never specified nor the powers delivered upon any condition of having any such point first cleered and I must confess unto your Majesty I understand not how with honour and that exact dealing which hath ever been observed in all your Majesties actions the powers can be detained unless there should appear some new and emergent cause since the granting of them whereof as yet I hear none specified Therefore being loath to be the instrument by whose hands any thing should pass that might have the least reflection upon your Majesties or the Princes honour which I shall ever value more then my life or safety and judging it likewise to conduce more to your service and assuring my self that your Majesties late direction to have the marriage upon one of the holidays in Christmass was for want of due information that the powers will be then expired I have thought it fit with the advice of Sir Walter Ashton to raise no scruple in the delivery of the said powers but do intend when they shall be required to pass on to the nominating of a prefixed day for the Deposorio's but I shall endeavour to defer the time untill I may be advertised of your Majesties pleasure if it may be within the space of 24 dayes and will labour to find some handsom and fair occasion for the deferring of them without alleadging any directions in that kind from your Majesty or the Prince The reasons why I have thought it fit to take this resolution are First I find by your Majesties letters and the Princes that your intent is to proceed in the marriage and to that purpose your Majesty and the Prince have set me free to deliver the powers according to the first intentions by removing that scruple of the Infanta's entring into Religion whereupon they were only suspended Secondly your Majesties Letter only intimateth a desire not a direction of having the marriage upon one of the holidays of Christmass which I conceive is to be understood if it may well and fittingly be so not if there shall be impossibility therein by reason of the expiring of the powers before and that the intention of having it then should be overthrown thereby when I am confident that what your Majesty writeth is for want of due information of the clause of expiration of the powers Thirdly if your Majesty upon these reasons and such as I have formerly alleadged unto your Majesty should as I no way doubt but your Majesty will give me order for the present proceeding to the marriage yet by my refusing of the powers and alleadging your Majesties or the Princes directions although afterwards all things should be cleered yet would it cast some kind of aspersion and jealousie upon the sincerity of your Majesties and the Princes proceedings On the contrary side if your Majesties intention be not to proceed in the match whereof I see no ground the intimation of that may be as well a moneth hence as now And I judge it duty in a servant especially in a business of so high a consequence and wherein your Majesty hath spent so much time to give his master leisure to repair to his second cogitations before he do any act that may disorder or overthrow This I offer with all humility unto your Majesties wise and just consideration and beseech you to make interpretation of my proceedings herein according to my dutifull and zealous care of your honour and service I have of purpose dispatcht this Post with this Letter to the end I may receive your Maiesties directions in this particular with all possible speed which I hope shall be to proceed directly to the marriage according to the Capitulations and so to order all things for the Princess he journy in the Spring And for the Palatinate your Maiesty may be confident there shall be diligence used in procuring a speedy and good resolution So c. King James to the Palsgrave My most dear Son WE have been carefull and are at this present to perform the promise which we made unto you to imploy all our power to re-establish you into your estates and dignities and having by the patience and industry which we have used reduced matters within a more neer circle and of a less extent then the generality m which they were heretofore We have thought good to give you knowledge of such things whereof hope is given to us that we shall in all apearance obtain them to the end you may have recourse to your wisdom and after a mature deliberation make choyce agreeable to the providence honor and safety of your estates duly weighing and examining all circumstances and therefore we present unto you these Propositions to wit In the first place a due submission to the Emperour under convenient limitations which first shall be granted and agreed in conformity to that which is Noble with a safe conduct and assurance requisite and sufficient for the free and safe going and return of your Person and Train This being done we make you offer of a present and
full restitution of all the Palatinate unto the person of your son and that you shall be his Administrato during your life And that after the death of the Duke of Bavaria your son shall be re-established in the Electorall dignity And for the better confirming the sound Amity and assuring your Possessions and enioying of all according to the contract which is presently to be made and also to serve for a preparation for the bettering of the said conditions to your person which will be in all likelihood when the marriage will be resolved and concluded to be made betwixt your eldest son our Grand-child and one of the Emperours daughters In contemplation whereof they have approached a degree neerer to wit that the Electorall dignity shall come again to your person after the Duke of Bavaria's death In which Treaty of marriage to clear the principall difficulty which consisted with the education of your son with the Emperour we have taken from them all hope therein wherein we assure our selves you will be content and are purposed that he shal have his education with our son and with and in the presence of the Infanta when she shall be in our Court We have exactly shewed you the state of this Negotiation which chiefly concerns you and yours to the end you may fix your eyes upon your necessity and bare condition and manner of living which dependeth on the courtesie and assistance of others and that you may judge advisedly whether your ready entrance into the possession of your own and with a kind of present liberty of living with insurance in time to recover the possession of it shall not be more convenient for you then a hazardous long expectation upon othet uncertain means The former whereof I prefer before the later We pray you to consider what probable and feasible means we may undertake to reduce your condition to that state as you promise your self wherein we doubt not but you will weigh our forces and those of our Allyes and such other whereof we may hope to be assured to the end that if it should happen that we cannot obtain to the entire of that we desire by way of treaty or that we should take another course you may be partaker of Councels as well as the issues and uncertain events And forasmuch as we are desirous to consider with you for your personall estate and as we are obliged to have regard to the right of our only daughter and to the inheritance of your children with the hope of their posterity by what way it may be most easily established and by what fit means provision may be made best to that effect And herein we remain your most affectionate Father From White-Hall Novemb. 20. Jacobus Rex The Palsgraves Answer to King James SIR I Take as a great honor and favour your Majesties Letter of the 2â— of November delivered unto me by the hands of your Ambassador Sir Dudley Carleton who hath further explained your Majesties intention touching that which concerneth my restitution unto my honors and patrimonial estate that you continue firm and constant in conformity to your promises to labour and effect by one way or other so that the said restitution may be intire and totall as well in that which concerneth the Electorall dignity as the Palatinates and that the Propositions which your Majesty makes by your Letter to content my self to be Administrator to my son and he to be invested with the said dignity and put into present possession of the Palatinate is but in all events if so be your Majesty could not attain to the totall restitution the desired effect of your intentions leaving me nevertheless to be at liberty to chuse the lesser of the two evils if I may be permitted to term them so the one by the totall restitution of my Estates but with diminution or rather annihilation for so in effect it wil be in respect of my person of the Electorall dignity th' other of the recovery of both by war the events whereof are uncertain First I most humbly thank your Majesty for the paternall care which you continue and shew in this occasion and which doth more comfort me and my dear wife in our afflictions then the fear of humane events can grieve or incline us to be willing to recover the loss of goods with the loss of honors I will therefore use the liberty which your Majesty is pleased to give me in answering every particular point of your Letter In the first whereof I observe the proceeding of my enemies who require a personall submission intended to precede all other things under the safe conduct of the Emperour whereas by natural order used in these occasions the restitution which is materiall and substantiall ought by reason to precede the other being but a point of ceremony at the least it is necessary that all things be resolved and concluded under such assurances as shall be held convenient and then if the intentions on the Emperours part be reall and sincere and without any aim to take advantage upon my person as the Emperour Charls 5. did upon the Lantgrave of Hessen under the subtilty of a distinction of a syllable in safe conduct Ewis for Einis the said submission may as well be made by a Deputy as otherwise whereby I shall be freed from the apprehensions which the execution at Prague other cruelties exercised by the Imperialists may easily impress in the mind of him who is unwilling to lose himselfe by a quiete de Coeur Besides a simple consent to such a submission under the specified condition to yeild the Electorate to the Duke of Bavaria will be sufficient to prejudice my cause for ever For the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburgh who have always protested against the translation of the Electorate and the other Princes of Germany who have like feeling will disavow their protestations in regard of him who shall abandon his own pretentions and in stead of favouring me upon some breach of the Treaty or otherwise may be my opposites Moreover the experience of things past teach us what issue we may hereafter expect of the like condition contented to on our part The Emperour having manifestly abused us in two already First in the instrument which I signed for the conditionall resignation of the Crown of Bohemia in the year 1621. Then in my ratification of the suspension of Arms this last Summer The first having served the Emperour to accelerate his Treaty then on foot with Bethlem Gabor The second to intimidate the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburgh that they might not undertake any thing against the Emperour both the one and the other being divulged to the same effect according to the knowledge which the Emperour had of these designes before any thing was therin resolved and concluded And so will the Emperour in all appearance make his profit of this present proposition and strike with one stone two blows by hindering the
progress of Gabor on the one side and by continuing on the other the intimidation of the Princes of Germany who may with reason excuse themselves if they move not for him who hath bound himself hand and foot and consented to a submission which being yeilded to it will be always in the Emperours power to break or go on as he shall hold it expedient for himself I do also promise my self that your Majesty will have regard that by such submission and intreaty my undue proscription and banishment which being done in prejudice of the constitutions of the Empire are therefore held by the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburgh of no validity be not approved and thereby a mark of infamy set upon me and my posterity Touching the second point your Majesty may be pleased to remember that on the part of Spain hope hath alwayes been given me from the beginning of a totall and intire restitution to my own person yea the Earl of Bristol hath assured me by his Letters from Madrid in November 1622. when the marriage was not so much advanced at this time That the King of Spain in case of refusall of the totall restitution would joyn his forces with those of your Majesty against the Emperor to constrain him thereunto And yet in stead of the said restitution the translation of my Electorate to the Duke of Bavaria was since at Ratisbone agreed and congratulated unto him from Bruxels the inferior Palatinate dismembred by the grant of the Bergstreat one of the best peeces thereof to the Elector of Mentz the superior with the Bailywicks granted to the Duke of Nuburgh thereby to engage them further in the quarrel by the particular defence of that which generally the Imperialists have usurped upon me they confiscate and seise the goods of my subjects and those that follow my party sparing neither widow nor orphans It seems therefore necessary above all things to have sufficient assurance for the total restitution of my Electorate and Palatinates before any new treaty of marriage be proposed Of the which treaties as they are ordinarily handled and managed by the house of Austria and drawn to length and delays with the onely aim to the augmentation of their greatness without respect to civil honesty word or promise I have a dolefull experience in my own house in the person of one of my predecessors Frederick the second who contributed more to the first foundation which was laid for the greatness of the said house of Austria then any other German Prince and for recompence was allured and drawn by the space of many years with treaties and promises of marriage without any real intention as was seen by the effect ever to bring them to execution Seeing therefore that he who had so well deserved of the house of Austria which in all external appearance held him in greater estimation then any other German Prince was nevertheless so unworthily used by them in a treaty of marriage I who have been unduly put into the Ban of the Empire and spoiled of all my honours and goods by the eagerness hatred and usurpation of the Emperor himself whose daughter is propounded for the marriage in question know not what to hope but the same effect of fraud and deceit which my forenamed predecessor found with a sorrowful repentance of the evil when it was pad remedy And the Emperor wanteth but two or three years of leisure which he shall easily gain by a treaty of a marriage to establish in Germany the translation of my Electoral dignity and Patrimonial estate without any hope ever hereafter to recover the like opportunity as at this time that my pretensions are not prejudiced by a long interposition of time and that the memory of undue proceeding in the publication of the Ban against my person and the said translation of my Electoral dignity and seâ—sure of my patrimonial inheritance are yet fresh in the affections and minds of the Princes of Germany who are by the consideration of their own interests moved with the greater companion to see the wounds of my miseries yet fresh and bleeding and with passion and earnest desire to see them remedied And in this place I will say something in answer to the last point of your Majesties Letter wherein you commanded me to consider the means probable and feasible whereby my condition may be reduced to the former state and to weigh your Majesties forces with those of your Allies and others whereof your Majesty may hope and be assured If your Majesty hopeth for my restitution in Germany as an effect of the marriage with Spain nothing else is to be done but attend the event with patience And if you continue to distinguish between the Spaniards and the Imperialists there is no more to be said on this subject but as they have with joint consent conspired my ruine with the same forces the same councels and the same designs your Majesty will find if you please to unmask the fair seeming and hidden malice of the Spaniard the same effect as in the end you found the open and declared violence and hostility of the Imperialists who besieged your Majesties garrisons in my Towns taken into your protection I will use the liberty you have given me to discourse of your Majesties forces and those of your Allies and what may further with good probability be hoped from other friends and well-willers In the last rank I place what may be hoped from the Princes of Germany who to wit the two Electors of Saxony and Brandenburgh and in effect all the rest except those of the Catholique league have sufficiently declared the disavowing of the Emperors proceeding against me and their opinions that the peace of Germany dependeth upon my restitution besides the Levies which they made in the beginning of the last summer though by the unlucky accident of the Duke Christian of Brunswick they were soon after dismissed And certainly no want of any other thing to be converted to my aid but the countenance of a great Prince to support them against the power of the house of Austria the same affections remaining still in them and the same resolution to imbrace the first good occasion that shall be presented for the liberty of Germany Will there want hands for the accomplishing of such a work when it shall be undertaken openly and earnestly seeing that the number of those that have their interest conjoyned with mine is great and mighty For the greater part of the people both horse and foot which marched under the Catholique banner were of a contrary Religion to the Catholique and of affection as it is notorious to all the world more inclined to the ruine of those Leagues then to their preservation But the conduct of some powerfull Prince is necessary as well to the men of war us we have seen by experience the last year The King of Denmark is he upon whom all have set their eyes but he being a Prince
full of circumspection and unwilling to enter into play alone answereth unto all instances which are made unto him to that end That as the other Princes have their eyes upon him so hath he his upon your Majesty It is not for me to judge but since you have commanded me I will weigh them by the ballance of common judgment That the felicity wherewith God hath blessed the person of your Majesty having conjoyned the three Crowns of England Scotland and Ireland upon one head the power of the one of the three alone having done great matters in the affairs of Europe on this side the sea yea when it was counterballanced by the other gives demonstration what your Majesty may do with the joynt forces of the three together when you shall be pleased to take a resolution therein chiefly the question being for the interest of your own Children and by the voluntary contribution which we have already had in our support from your Majesty we may easily comprehend what may be promised of them when the publike authority of your Majesty shall be conjoyned with their particular affections there being no Prince in the world more loved and reverenced of his subjects nor more soveraign over their affections and means for the service of your person and Royal house Touching the Allies it is to my great grief that the unhappiness of this time hath separated a great part of them the united Provinces of Germany who make profession of the same Religion whereof they acknowledge your Majesty for Defendor and Protector But the same affection remaineth still in them entire and firm though they have been constrained to yield to the present necessity of their affairs and the occasion presenting it self your Majesty may accompt of them The rest the Estates of the united Provinces to whom we have recourse in our afflictions who support themselves by the help of God and the situation of their Country and Forces of their people alone untill this time against the puissance of Spain seconded by the Imperialists And in stead of fainting under such a burthen or of giving ear unto the overtures and submissions which from day to day are presented unto them they now put themselves to the offensive by a good Fleet prepared and ready to set sail to the West-Indies to the end they may at least interrupt the peaceable and annual return of the gold and silver of those parts by which the house of Austria doth continually advance their greatness This is commended by all good men and lovers of the publike liberty as the sole and only means to cast to the ground the fearfull power of Spain even as a great tree of large extent cut up by the root but is held too great for such a little extent of Country as this is and yet practically and to be done by forces answerable to the importance of such an enterprize And if your Majesty would be pleased to use the Forces of this estate by sea and land to the opposition of their enemies and by consequence of mine their profession of a loyall and sincere affection with the hazard of their lives and goods for the service of your Majesty grounded upon the experience of things past their present interest and the judgement which may be made of the future makes me assured that your Majesty may absolutely dispose of them and by their means being firmly conjoyned with your Majesty give the Law to Europe It is in obedience to your Majesties commandment that I have enlarged my self so far into this discourse which I will send with my most humble thanks for the continuance of your most gracious and paternall bounty particularly shewed in the care you have of the education of my eldest son in your Court who with all the rest are at your Majesties disposing and we hope to live notwithstanding our hard and dolefull condition to yeild unto your Majesty the fruits of a devout and filiall gratitude and I will remain untill the last day of my life From the Hague Decemb. 30. 1623 new stile Your Majesties most c. FREDERICK Postscript I am advertised from a good part that the Elector of Mentz and the other Princes of the Popish league are very instant with the Elector of Saxony and Brandenburgh to perswade them to acknowledge the Duke of Bavaria as an Elector of the Empire which if they obtain it were easie to judge how much it would prejudice my affairs and the common cause of the Empire I therefore most humbly beseech your Majesty that you will be pleased to prevent and hinder such an evil by the interposition of good offices and exhortations to the said secular Electors be it by some Ambassador by serious Letters or such other way as you shall hold meet and suitable to the importance of the matter which above all requireth singular celerity Your Majesty shall increase more and more my obligations and that of the publique of Germany c. Abignoto from Madrid THe Spaniard begins now to be sensible of the great disobligation and gross oversight he committed in suffering the Prince to go away without his Infanta For it hath given occasion of advantage to the English who now seem indifferent whether they match with him or no to proceed more stoutly and to add to the former Articles which the Prince had sworn at his being here certain new Propositions about the Palatinate which was thought to be unfit to motion at his being here by reason of the engagement of his person And there is a Commission sent to the Earl Bristol to treat of these two businesses joyntly and if the King of Spain give not a satisfactory answer therein then he is to return home Buckingham hath little obligation no Spain therefore for his own particular he hath good reason it he cannot prop himhimfelf this way to find other means for his support unkindnesses passed between him and Olivarez and a hot heart-burning between him and Bristol who told him here before the Prince that being so far his superior inhonor and might he might haply contemn him but he could never hate him Ever since his departure he hath attempted to crush Bristol to pieces who is out of purse two thousand pound of his own since his coming hither he is so crossed that he cannot get a peny from England If he cannot get a surrender of the Palatinate to the Kings mind he is in a poor case for he must hence presently he is much favoured of the King here and Olivarez therefore they will do much for him before Buckingham work his revenge upon him he hath received lately more comfortable dispatches from England and in the last the King sent him he requires his advice in certain things The Proxie the King of Spain had to marry the Infanta in the Princes name is proroged till March There is great resentment of the delayes in the Court here and the Infanta hath given over studing of
to the most eminent degree of dignity and power to be the nursing father of his Church she hath right being thus mangled and bloody to stretch forth her arms unto you even shee that Spouse of Jesus Christ the common mother of Christians and and your mother also by the respect of her bruised members and of the searing of her innocent brest covered with wounds she will move your pity She assures her selfe Sir that the glorious title which you beare of the Defender of the faith shall interceede for your accepting of her humble request if you doe extend unto us your cares your affections and your formidable Armes you shall nourish in our hearts affections of honour and obedience which shall never die you shall daunt all powers that would raise themselves against your Crown you shall raise your glory to such a height that all the earth shall admire it all Christendome shall celebrate it and your name shall be of sweet odour unto Angels and men and in perpetual benediction unto all posterity of Saints and your reward shall be great and eternal in heaven May it please your Majesty to pardon us if our necessities pressing us we all do presse your Majesty by our instant supplications accompanied with a most humble respect to strengthen our selves so soon as may be with the honour of your commandments and the declaration of your favâ—ur the wholesome effects of your assistance according to the sweetnesse of your compassion and Charity and we will redouble our prayers to the divine clemency for the length and safety of your life and the prosperity of your estate being ready with a most holy and ardent affect on to expose our goods and lives to render us worthy of the quality which we dare take of your most humble most obedient and moâ—t faithful servants the Deputies of the reformed Churches of France in their general Assembly held at Nismes and for all Jaques de Maresey adjunct la Reque The Duke of Rohan to his Majesty of great Brittain the 12 of March 1628. SIR the deplorable accident of the losse of Rochel which God hath suffered to humble us under his hand hath redoubled in the hearts of our enemies their passionate fiercenesse to our utter ruine with an assured hope to attain thereunto But it hath not taken away from the Churches of those Provinces either the heart or the affection to oppose their unjust plots by a just and lively defence This is it hath made them take resolution to assemble themselves to cojoyn in the midst of these commotions to assist me with their good counsels and with me to provide the means of their deliverance And for as much as the greatest support which God hath raised unto them upon earth is the succour our Churches have and do look to receive from your Majesty the general Assembly hath desired that my Letters which alone hitherto have represented unto your Majesty the interest of the publick cause might be joyned to their most humble supplications put up to your Majesty I do it Sir with so much the more affection because I am a witnesse that these poor people who with sighes and groanes implore your assistance having once laid down their weapons which the oppression of their enemies made so necessary because they knew such was your desire to take them up again so soon as they heard that your Majesty did oblige them thereunto by your Counsel and Promises they have upon this only assurance continued all dangers surmounted all oppositions accounted their estates as nothing and are still ready to spend their bloud till the very last drop they esteem your love and favour more precious then their own lives and whatsoever promises or threatnings have been used to shake their constant resolution they could never be brought to make any breach in that they had tyed themselves to never to hear of any Treaty without your consent This great zeal for the preservation of all the Churches of this Kingdome which is naturally knit to the preservation of these few we have left and that fidelity with our example are worthy and glorious subjects to exercise your Charity and Power You are Sir Defender of that Faith whereof they make profession suffer it not to be so unjustly oppressed you have stirred up their affection in this defence by your royal promises and those Sacred words that your Majesty would imploy all the power in your Dominions to warrant and protect all our Churches from the ruine that threatned them have been after Gods favour the onely foundation of all their hope so the Churches should thinke no greater a Crime could be committed by them then doubt of your Royal performance thereof if their miseries and Calamities have at the beginning moved your Compassion This wofull subject hath increased with such violence that nothing but your succor can prevent their utter undoing for at this day the greatest offence our Enemies lay to our Charge and proclaim nothing can expiate but our blood is to have implored your aid and hope for it for this cause our Lands and Possessions are taken away and destroyed our houses made desolate and reduced to ashes our heads exposed to sale to murtherers our families banished and wheresoever the cruelty of them that hate us can extend men and women are dragged and beaten to Mass with Bastinâ—does To be short the horrour of the persecution we suffer is so great that our words are too weak to express it Moreover we see great and mighty Armies at our Gates that waite their onely fit time to fall with impetuosity upon the places of retreat that remain and after that to expel and banish the exercise of Religion and massacre all the faithfull ones throughout the whole kingdomes These things considered Sir I do beseech your Majesty not to forsake us I should feare by such words to offend so great so potent and so faithfull a king But because of urgent necessity that presseth us I have presumed importunately to intreat the hastening of your assistance to keep us from falling under the heavy burthen of our Enemies endeavors Your Majesty need not to draw but out of the source of your own profound wisedom for the fit meanes how to make your succor dreadfull and powerfull to those that contemne it and salutiferous to so many people that wait and long for it Your Majesty shall by this meanes acquire the greatest glory that can be desired pluck out from the fire and sword three hundred thousand families that continually pray to God for your prosperity preserve a people whom God hath purchased with his most pretious blood and which hath even in the middest of most eminent dangers and cruellest torments kept intire a sound and an upright faith both towards God and man you shall settle the fidelity of your word the reputation of your kingdomes and Armes to a pitch worthy of your grandeur and in repressing of the audaciousness of those that
go about every day to blemish the same through their vile and unworthy reproches you shal add to your titles that of the Restorer of a people the most innocent and most barbarously persecuted that ever was In that which concerns me Sir I will not make mention to your Majesty of my owne Interest though I might doe it having as it seems the honor be unto you what I am but I have so long since consecrated all things with my selfe to the publicke good that I shall esteeme my self happie enough so that the Church were not miserably distressed and that I may have this advantage that through my actions which your Majestie will not disavow I may make it known that I am Your Majesties most humble and most obedient servant Henry de Rohan Pope Gregory the 15 to the â—â—quisitor General of Spain April 19. 1623. Venerable Brother THe protection of the Orthodox Religion in the most spacious Kingdoms of Spain we think to be happily committed to your Fraternity for we know with what watchful vigilancie in this renowned station you are careful that Monsters of wicked doctrine steal not into the bounds of the Church and Vine But at this time occasion from heaven is offered you by which you may extend the benefits of your piety beyond the bounds of those Kingdoms and extend them also to forraign Countries We understand that the Prince of Wales the King of Great Britains son is lately arrived there carried with a hope of Catholike Marriage Our desire is that he should not stay in vain in the Courts of those Kings to whom the defence of the Popes authority and care of advancing Religion hath procured the renowned name of Catholique Wherefore by Apostolike Letters we exhort his Catholike Majestie that he would gently endeavour sweetly to reduce that Prince to the obedience of the Romane Church to which the ancient Kings of Great Britain have with heavens approbation submitted their Crowns and Scepters Now to the attaining of this victory which to the conquered promiseth triumphs and principalities of heavenly felicity we need not exhaust the Kings treasure nor levie Armies of furious souldierâ— but we must fetch from heaven the armour of Light whose divine solendor may allure that Princes eye and gently expel all errours from his minde Now in the managing of these businesses what power and art you have we have well known long ago wherefore we wish you to go like a religious Counsellor to the Catholike King and to try all ways which by this present occasion may benefit the Kingdoms of Britain and the Church of Rome The matter is of great weight and moment and therefore not to be amplified with words Whosoever shall enflame the minde of this Royal youth with the love of the Catholike Religion and breed a hate in him of Heretical impiety shall begin to open the Kingdom of heaven to the Prince of Britain and to gain the Kingdoms of Britain to the Apostolike See into the possession of so great glory I make no doubt but that your Fraternity armed with the sword of Verity will be desirous to come About which matter our venerable brother Innocent Bishop of _____ the Apostolike Nuncio shall discourse with you more at large whom you may trust And we with most accurate prayers will endeavour to procure the assistance of God for you upon whom most lovingly we bestow our Apostolical benediction Given at Rome in St. Peters under the Fishers Seal April 19. 1623. of our Popedom 30. Pope Urban to Lewis the 13. Aug. 4. 1629. To our dearest Son in Christ Jesus Lewis the most Christian King of France Pope Urban sendeth greeting MOst dear Son in Christ Health and Apostolical benediction The high exploits of your Royal valour which have drawn upon them all the eyes of Christendom bring a great deal of comfort to our fatherly care as well in regard of the glory of your Arms as the hope of your triumphs For considering as we do with much grief the impiety of Hereticks living in some places without fear or danger we now thank the Lord of hosts that hath in so fit an opportunity made your Majestie to maintain with Arms the dignity of the Catholike Religion Oh fair Apprentiship of Royal Warfare and worthy of a most Christian King What an admirable thing it is that the age which other Princes out of a kinde of softness and idleness use to pass away in sports and delights your Majesty should employ so generously so fortunately in appeasing differenâ—es conducting Armies and besieging the strongest places of Hereticks and all not without the special counsel of God by which Kings raign Is it almost credible that the very first steps of your thoughts should carry you in so high and troublesome an enterprise and that the dangers and difficulties which have stopt others in their course should onely serve for a spur to the greatness of your courage Enjoy dear Son the Renown your name hath got and follow the God that fights for you to the end that as you are now held the Thunderbolt and Buckler of War so you may hereafter be esteemed the praise of Israel and the glory of the world From the height of our Apostolick Dignity whereto if hath pleased God of his goodness to raise us unworthy of so great grace we assist your Arms with heart and affection and by our frequent prayers prepare the divine remedies And though we doubt not but your own vertue will make you constant in the work you have begun nevertheless we have thought good to adde Exhortations that the world may see the care we have of the advancement of true Religion and how willing we are to give way to your glory You have been hitherto infinitely bound to God for his bounty towards you and as we hope and wish you shall hereafter a great deal more For you having your minde endued with celestial doctrine and not with the bare precepts of humane wisdom do well know that Kingdoms have their foundation upon the truth of Orthodox faith and unless God keep the City what principality can subsist with any assurance It may easily be judged with what fidelity they are likely to defend your Royal Throne that have cast the very Saints themselves out of their Temples and done as much as in them lay to put them out of the number of the blessed yea out of Paradise it self that with impious temerity condemn the Institutions of our Fathers the Custom of Kings the Decrees of Popes and the Ceremonies of the Church These are the disturbers of the Christian Commonwealth and the reproaches of France whom the great God hath reserved to be exterminated as it were in the beginning of your Raign Know then that all Europe which the event of your Arms holds all this time in suspence hopes shortly it will hoyse sail upon the Ocean under the conduct of your Greatness and Power and go to the place which serves now for
advancement of the Crowne Revenues and lastly in the competent number of Bishops and other able and Learned Ministers of the Church of England of all sorts which we especially attribute to the blessednesse of your time and to the Industryes Zeale Judgment and moderation of your Deputy as well in your Majesty service as towards this peopleâ— having now well learned this great office and to the good beginnings of the two last precedent Deputies under direction of your most Renowned Father Secondly we understand that your Deputy and Councel are blamed for the present surcharge of your Revenues here far beyond the support thereof Herein your Royal Majesty may be pleased to cause a review of our dispatch from hence in August 1627. wherein it wil appear that their part in that offence hath been only obedience to extraordinary warrants from thence and that if those warrants had not beene fully performed out of your Revenues you had had about 40000 pound Irish to pay pensioners in your Coffers and answer other necessities which have since increased So as we humbly crave pardon freely to affirme that the fault hath not been here and further also to say for your Majesties honour and our comfort that during 200 years last past England hath never been so free of the charge of Ireland as now it is Thirdly we understand that your Deputy is accused for miscarriage in the legal prosecution of Phelim Mach Frâ—gh and others adhering to him in certain treasonable Acts and Practises Herein we most humbly beseech your Majesty that a review may be of a declaration sent from hence about the beginning of your Deputies government signed hy him and all the Counsel then here whereby wil appear how the parts of Lemster at least have been from age to age infested by him and his predecessors and the inhabitants of the territory of Ranelagh wherein he tooke upon him a Chiefery and therein will also appeare that it was the special affection and endeavour of several worthy Deputies here to have cleared that offensive plot which no wise State could suffer so neer the seat thereof and that they also severally attempted it by force the said Phelims Father being slain by actuall Rebellion by Sir William Russels prosecution but the generall Rebellion of the Kingdome alwaies interrupted the settlement thereof This being at that time the declaration of the State moved your Deputy being a stranger to have a wary aspect upon the people for the Common peace which he hath carefully performed Afterwards at the time when the general voice was amongst the Irish that the Spaniards would be here your Deputie had cause to examine several persons and causes concerning that Rumour wherby fell out to be discovered to him among others that this Phelim had confederated for raising a Commotion in Lemster and murthering a Scottish Minister and Justice of peace a ready instrument in Crown Causes inhabiting about the border of the said territory Before which time we never heard of any displeasure or hard measure born by your said Deputy to him or offence taken by him at any particular done to him unless he were offended that your Deputy refused his mony offered to blanch your Majesties title to the Lands in Ranlagh now granted to undertakers discovered and prosecuted at first by his brother Redmond and his Councel Peter de la Hoyd We do also herein in all humility testifie and declare that he acquainted several Privy Councellors here and others of Judgment with the same And also in every Act and passage thereof used the labour and presence either of your Majesties Privy Concellours Judges or learned Councel alwaies professing publickly and privately which we also in our consciences do believe that he had no particular envy or displeasure to Phelims's person or any of his neither had any end in what might fall out upon that discovery or pains or any act done concerning that Country other then the reducement thereof to the conformity of other civil parts the common peace of your Majesties good Subjects adjacent and the legal and plenary effecting of that which by so many good governours in times of disturbance could not be done there being no power in him to make any particular benefit of the Escheate either in lands or goods and before any thing was to be done for the tryal of him and the rest for their lives he made a speedy and immediate address to your Majesty dated 27. August 1628 upon the indictment found to inform you of the then present estate of that businesse which we have seen not doing it before as he affirms for that he had formerly received gracious approbations of his proceedings in the like discoveries We also in all humblenesse and duty do declare and protest that if upon their evil demerits and the due proceedings of Law those now questioned may be taken away and the Territory settled in legal Government and English order towards which a strong Fort is already almost built in the midst of it by your Majesties Undertakers lately planted there It will be a service of the greatest importment to bridle the Irish assure the inhabitants of other Parts and strengthen the generall peace of the Kingdom next to the great Plantation of Vlster that hath been done in this age If otherwise they shall by fair tryall acquit the course of your Majesties free and indifferent justice it will make them wary in point of duty and loyalty hereafter And we do further in all submission declare That in these discoveries the persons and Causes considered it was of necessity that the personal pains of your Highness Deputy should be bestowed the rather for that the Evidences being to be given for the most part by persons involved in the same confederacyes and who were to become actors they would not be drawn to confess truths to any inferior Ministers being of stubborn and malign spirits besides the disswasions of Priests and of the Dependants and manifold Allies of the said Phelim if they had not been warily look'd after Lastly We in all humblenesse of heart and freedom of faithful servants do beseech your most sacred Majesty to consider how much the sufferings of your zealous servants may prove to your disservice especially in this place where discouragement of your most dextrous service is most aimed at by multitudes of several qualities and cannot but soon perplex the present happy state of your affairs Wee beseech the eternall God to guide and prosper your Majesties advices and designes 28. April 1629. Your most humble and obedient Subjects and Servants Signed by L. Primate V. Valentia V. Kilmallock V. Ranelagh L. Dillon L. Cauffeild L. Aungier L. Pr. of Munster L. Chief Justice St Adam Loftus Mr of the Wards L. Chief Baron Sr Charles Coote Ab Ignoto Of the Affairs of Spain France and Italy 5 Jan. 1629. SIR THough it be now full three months since I received any line from you yet I dare not nor will I