Principatus Princeps The Charter of H. 4 for entayling the Crowne This Charter I saw in the hands of Sir Rob. Cotton from it tooke these Summary notes The Noblenes and Family of H. E. of Rich. Glover 1413. Poli l. lib. 25. So King R. 2. called Iohn of Gaunt Avunculum nostrum Rec. in Tower But that was the fault of the barbarous Latine Clerks not knowing the difference between patruos avunculos In his Booke Le Recuerl des Ranges c. Part 2. Philip Plant. Lyonel Plant. D. of Clarence Pe. Henterus Ioh. Megerus Ariost. cant 19. Fra. Goodwin in Catalogo Episcoporuâ— Iohn Stow. Qu. Elizabeth â—raâ— li. 2. Cap. 16. King H. 7. only affected the Title de jure Belli Seneâ— An. Dom. 1 486. An. Dom. 1490. I have seene this Bull in the Cabinet of Sir Rob. Cotton The Popes Charter for the Title of Lancast. Eâ— de jure Belli c. for the dispensing with the Kings incestuous marriage The second invasion of the E. of Rich. Comines pag. 536. Leicest inquit Rex Richarduâ— cuâ— maxima Pompa portanâ— dâ—adema in capiâ—e Chron. Croy. Why K. Rich. wore the Crowne at Bosworth Chron. Croy. S. Wil. Brandon Father to Charles Brandon afterward Duke of Suff. Ovid. trâ—st l. 2. Eâ—eg 5. Dr Iohn Hird in Hist. Angl. Mathew Paris Henry â—untington Henry of Richmond Crowned in the Feild The Challeng of the 5 King of Scots to The. Duke of Norfolke Princes go not to Campe. Cruelties done to the body of King Richard Noble persons attainted by Parliament Sir Tho. Moor. Parliament ann 1. H. 7. The Duke of Norfolk slain by the Earl of Oxenford The Earle of Surrey escapeth at Bosworth Scots 〈◊〉 thrown by the E. of Surrey Iugulsus Lib. Eliensis The honour of Bastards Homer Livy Sir Charles Howard Camden in Octad Camdâ—n Octa. Lodow. Guicci du Paes Baess The Ancientry of Buck. M. Paris M. Westminst Redulphus de Câ—geshall Tho. Walsing Erasmus in Chiliad Terentius in Adelph * This Booke was lately in the hands of Mr. Roper of Eltham as Sir Edward Hoby who saw it told me Herodotus * He wrote many Poems and Epigrams sundry petty Comedies and Entâ—rludes often times personating with the Act ors as his so ving and familiar friend â— rasmus reports Brixius Antimore Ioan. Baleus de scriptoribuâ— Brit. â—ent â—8 cap. 69. Richard Grafton saith he died mocking and scoffing as he lived Courinus In scrinijs div Ro Cotton Terent. Phorm Iliad 20. The virtues of King Richard malitiously censured Cicero de Ossic. lib. 1â— * Pliny Livy valel Maximus Plutarch This Dutchesse of Yorke died about the 1â— of King Hen. 7. at Berkhamsted and was buried at Totheringam Iohn Stow. Seneca King Richard not deformed Rot. in an 2 R. 2. Sir Thomas Moor apud Harliâ—gton Doctor Shaw Socrates AEâ—opus Epictetus Galâ—a a great and excellent Captain of the Romans all of deformed stature Chron. Croyland Idem Croyland Anonymuâ— M. S. Rex Hen. 6. in custodia ut alij referunt gladâ—o alij meâ—ore deperijt Ioan Majerus Annall Flandr lib. 17. The slaughter of the Prince sonnâ— of H. 6. Polidor Virgil. lib. 24. Chron in quarto M. S. apud Dom. Regis Rob. Cotton Anna. uxoâ— Ed. filij reg H. 6. capta est cum marito Ioan. Majerus in Annal Fland. l. 17. Richard not guilty of the Duke of Clarence Polidor Virgil. â—rrour of Dr. Shaw That the Duke of Gloucester raised not the slander against the Dutchesse his Mother nor of his Brothers basterdy * Anno. 10. Edward 4. a Lib. M. S. in quarto apud Dom. Rob. Cotton b Chronicle Croyland c Loyalty bindeth men Father allie Quod vulgo corrupte Father in law dicitur In Parliament anno 17. Ed. 4. Iu. Stow. vidit legit Erasmus Câ—iliad Ioan de Seâ—res Invent. Who made away the sonnes of King Edward the fourth Poodir Virgill l. 2. 6. Dr. Morton Sir Tho. Moore Prior Croy. land Moore Hallingshed Graston Hall Stow. Dion Tacitus Sâ—eionius Counterfeit Princes It s written by some of the old Historians that King Harold was not shine at the Battaile of Hastings by the Conquerer but that he survived went to Ierusalem c. But it not importeth whether He were the true Harold or Pseudo Harold because he never came to claime any thing in England The practice of Hen. 7. with the Duke of Burgondy The meanes used by Hen. 7. to prevent the practises of Perkin in Ireland This Lady was so rarely faire and lovely that King H. 7 wondred at her beauty and was inamored of her sending her to London to be safely kept till his returne out of the West Countries where he theu was and first saw her The practice of H. 7. to the King of Scots and of Castile â—o get or supplant Perkins Don Pedro Aylau Hall in H. 7. Perkins Entertainment in the Court. * Raâ—k The force and mischiefe of Torture August in Civitate Dei The French â—all torture la Gehenne Yorke and Warwick paralels Of escape The French word escape is to seeke to be free and the French men translâ—â—e escape in to the Latine Salvus Escape what Just Stanford in pleas de la Corone lib. 1. cap. 26 27. Whether Don Sebastian of Portugall were a Counterfeit or not 162. Hiâ— legatus haec Domino Baroni Darcey retulit Edward 2. and Edward 3. Moor Hollinsh Stow Gainssord Moor Hollinsh Stow Grafton Gainsford Hal. Idem Autor a He was the Noble â—rogenitor of the Earles of York Hollinshed Grafton Hall Stow. Iohn Morton Thomas Moor. Grafton Mr. William Cambden Some think he dyed unnaturally Publike sword Private sword The arts of treachery Reasons why King Richard should not destroy his Nephewes Other great â—ones pâ—ivy to the deaths of those Princes especially of King â—â—â—â—â—â—ds Sons Ausonius Ennius apud Ci ceronem offic lib. 2. Sir Tho. Moor. Edward Hall Ralph Hâ—llinshead Iohn Stow c. The Earle of Oxen persecutor of Perkin a This Earle Iohn died Anno 4. H. 8. 1512 Dominâ—s de Arundell viva voâ—e b I may call it a stately Erledome for the Earle of Oxenford when he came to the possession of it was offered by some 12000 pounds per Annum and leave to his occupation all Man nors Houses Castles Parks Woods Forrests all the Demesn lands thereto belonging which might be more worth by yearly value then many Erldoms in this age c The Mathematicians that calculated the Nativitie of this Earle Edward told the Earle his Father that the Earledome would fall in his Sons time d Bastards of King Richard Grafton Chron. M. S. in quarto apud Dn. Rob. Cotton e Why the pub lique justice deferred the death of the Princes Dâ—mones Gâ—nij Plutaâ—â—â— in Anton. Philostrat in vita Appollon Vopiscus in Aureliano Angels good and bad Terentius in Phormio How extreme his desires ' were you may see in the Speech of the Duke of Buckingham set down by Sir Thomas Moor. Philip
masculine line from Edmond Plantagenet alias de Langley the first Duke of Yorke and the fourth Sonne of King Edward the third who was the most renowned and glorious Progenitor to those Princes of Yorke and Lancaster and the first King in a Lineall descent from that great Henry sirnamed Plantagenet famous for his great Prowesse and many victories King of England in the right of his Mother the Empresse Matilâ—â— or Maud daughter and heire of King Henry the first and stiled Anglâ—rum Domina sometime wife of the Emperour Henry the fifth by which he was also sirnamed filius imperatricis The French men called him Henry du Court Manteaâ— or Court Mantle because he wore a cloake shorter then the fashion was in those times By his Father Galfride or Geoffry Plantagenet he was Earle or Duke of Anjou for then Dux Comes and Ducatus Comitatus were Synonomies promiscuous words he was also Earle of Maine of Torraine and hereditary Seneschall or High Steward of France and by his marriage of Elianor Queene of France Repudiate Daughter and heire of William Duke of Gascoigne and of Guiene and Earle of Poictou He was Duke and Earle of those Principalities and Signiories also by the Empresse his Mother Duke of Normandy He was Lord of Ireland by Conquest and confirmed by Pope Adrian But these were not all his Seigniories and Dominions for after he was King of England he extended his Empire and Principate in the South to the Pyrerean mountaines The Confines of Spaine and France in the North to the Isles of Orkney and in the East and West with the Ocean as Giraldus Cambrensis Gâ—l Neubrigensis Ioannes Sarisburiensis grave and credible Authors affirme who stiled him Regum Britanniae maximus and doubtlesse he was the greatest King of Brittaine since King Arthur But it is controverted amongst the Antiquaries and Heralds which Earle of Anjou first bare the sirname and Sobriquet of Plantagenest or Plantagenet after the vulgar Orthodoxe by what occasion and for what cause it was taken and borne and from what time and age it had beginning Some would have the forenamed Geoffry Plantagenet Father of this Henry the first Earle of Anjou which bare it But we shall finde stronger reasons to derive it from a much more ancient Earle of Anjou and better causes then can be found in him if we step but a little backe to their stories and compare the men and their times Geoffry Plantagenet being a man of a gallant and active fire disposed to the Courts of Princes to Justs Turnaments c. and to the Courtship of faire Ladies those of the highest ranke and had so amorous a Star That Philippe le Grosse K. of France suspected him for too familiar commerce with his bed But it was of better influence when he archieved and married the Empresse Matilda by which we may very well calculate he neither had nor would be intent or at leisure for such a mortified and perilous Pilgrimage to Jerusalem But if we would know the man let us looke upon the first Fulke Earle of Anjou who lived about an hundred yeares before the Norman Conquest of England and was Sonne of Godefray or Geoffry Grisegonell the first Earle of Anjou according to du Haillon Ancestor and Progenitor to the foresaid Geoffry Plantagenet some seven or eight degrees in the ascending Line as Paradin accounteth a man raised upon the foundation of a great courage and strength two of the best Principles when they have good seconds and make too a glorious man where they serve his vertues not affections as in this Prince they did whose disposition on the other side being let out into as vaste an ambition and covetousnesse ne're looked upon the unlawfulnesse of his desires how horrid soever which amongst the many rest run him upon the shelves of wilfull perjury and murder the one for defrauding spoiling a Church of certaine Rights and the other for contriving the Tragedy of his young Nephew Drogâ— Earle of Brittaine to make himselfe Lord of his Countrey and Principallity The secret checke and scourge of those crimes had a long time to worke upon his conscience and of a great sinner made a great Penitent being old and having much solitary time and many heavy thoughts which naturally accompany old age and suggest better considerations of our former and youthfull sinnes he opens the horrour of them and his afflicted mind to his Confessor as great Constantine to AEgyppus who enjoyned him to make the same confession before the holy Sepulcher at Jerusalem which Pilgrimage the Earle performed in all lowly and contemptible manner passing as a private and unworthy person without traine or followers save two of his meanest which he tooke rather for witnesses then servants whose service was when they came neare Jerusalem the one with a cord such as is used for the strangling of Criminals thrown about his Masters neck to draw or leade him to the holy sepulcher whilst the other did acoustré and strip him as a condemned person and with extremity scourge him untill he was prostrate before the sacred Monument where he gave evidence of his unfained contrition and sorrow Amongst other devout expressions uttering this Mon dieu Signeur recâ—y a Pardon le perjure homicide miserable Foulque And after this pilgrimage he lived many years of prosperity in his Country honoured of all men To justifie this there be many Examples of other Princes and Noble Persons who lived about the yeare of our Lord one thousand and somewhat before and in three or foure ages after who under went the like Pilgrimages imposed under base and mechanicke nick-names and persons as of a Carpenter a Smith a Fisher-man a Mariner a Shepheard a Woodman a Broome-man c. In my Inquiry after that of Plantagenet I met with an ancient Manuscript that afforded me a large Catalogue of many such by the French called Sobriquets from whence I have transcribed these few for a taste Sobriquets Berger Shepheard GrisegoÌ„nelle gray-coat Teste de Estoupe Head of towe Arbuste A Shrub Martell A Hammer Grande boeuf Ox-face LaZouch Branch upon a Stem Houlette a sheep-hook Hapkin Hatchet Chapelle Hood Sans-terre Lackland Malduit Ill taught Geffard Ieuvencas or Heyfer Filz de Fleau Son of a Flaile Plantagenest the Plant or stalk of a Broome And under the name and habit of a Broome-man our Pilgrim performed this Penance and tooke the Sobriquet of Plantagenest from wearing a stalke of Broome or plant of Genest this is generally received but the time and reason neither set downe nor rendred by any of our Heralds and Antiquaries French or English for the time when he performed this I observe it about the yeare of our Lord one thousand certainly But for the particular relation this Count had to chuse the genest plant or Broome stalke before any other vegitall or thing I shall lay downe that opinion which is mine owne
noting for a circumstance by the way that the Broome in Hieroglyphicall Learning is the Symbole of humility and the Poets particularly Virgil the best of Poets give it the Epithet of humilis humilis genista and the Etymologists derive it from genu the knee the part most applyed and as it were dedicate to the chiefe Act of Reverence kneeling to which the naturall Philosophers say there is so mutuall a correspondency and so naturall a sympathy between genu and genâ—sta that of all other plants or vegitals it is most comfortable and medicinable to the paines and diseases of the knees Pliny a great Master amongst them saith Genista tuscae cum c. genua dolentia sanat But the considerable reason is as I conceive it from the use he was constrained to make of the twigges of Broome when he came to be scourged at Jerusalem the place necessitating the use of them to that purpose being as Strabo relates a stony sandy and barren soyle only naturall and gratefull to the genest as the watry and moist to the Birch Willow and Withy of which there could be none there for that reason And from hence it must most conjecturally take the beginning of that Honour which afterward his Princely and Noble Posteries continued for their sirname who became Dukes Princes in sundry places and some of them Kings of England France Scotland and Ireland and as the pious people of that Age verily beleeved by their observation were the more prosperous and happy for his sake For the continuance of the Name some who pretend to see further and better in the darke then others as cleare sighted would have it taken of late time and not used by the Kings and Princes of England of the Angeume race But there are many proofes to be adduced against them Let us looke into Master Brookes genealogies of England we shall find nothing more obvious and frequent in the deductions of those Princes of the House of Anjou then the addition and sirname of Plantagenet Edm. Plantagenet Geo. Plantagenet Iohn Plantagenet Edward Plantagenet Lyonell Plantagenet Humphry Plantagenet c. In the French Historians and Antiquaries Ion de Tillet Girard du Haillon Clande Paradin Iean Baron de la Hay we shall often meet with Geoffry Plantagenet Arthur Plantagenet Richard Plantagenet and diverse the like all of the first Age when the Angeume Princes first became English and some before Master Camden also in his Immortall Pâ—â—tannia mentioneth some very ancient as Richard Plantagenet Iohn Plantagenet c. And witnesseth that the forenamed Geoffry Plantagenet used to weare a Broome-stalke in his Bonnet as many Nobles of the House of Anjou did and tooke it for their chiefe sirname It might be added that these Earles of Anjou were descended out of the great house of Saxon in Germany which hath brought forth many Kings Emperors and Dukes and that they were of kindred and alliance to the ancient Kings of France and sundry other Princes But I will close here for the high Nobility of King Richard as the good old Poet did for another Heroicall Person Deus est utroque parente Ovid. And come to the other matters of his private story And first for his Birth and native place which was the Castle of Fotheringay or as some write the Castle of Birkhamsteed both Castles and Honours of the Duke his Father about the yeare of our Lord 1450 which I discover by the calculation of the Birth Raigne and death of King Edward his brother who was borne about 1441 or 1442. and raigned two and twenty yeares dyed at the age of one and forty Anno 1483. The Dutchesse of Yorke their Mother had five children betwixt them so that Richard could not be lesse then seven or eight yeares younger then King Edward and he survived him not fully three yeares This Richard Plantagenet and the other children of Richard Duke of Yorke were brought up in York-shire and Northampton-shire but lived for the most part in the Castle of Midelham in York-shire untill the Duke their Father and his Sonne Edmund Plantagenet Earle of Rutland were slaine in the battell of Wakefield Anno Dom. 1641 upon which the Dutchesse of Yorke their Mother having cause to feare the faction of Lancaster which was now growne very exulting and strong and of a mortall enmity to the House af Yorke secretly conveyed her two younger sonnes George and Richard Plantagenet who was then about some ten yeares old into the Low-Countries to their Aunt the Lady Margaret Dutchesse of Burgundy Wife of Charles Duke of Burgundy and Brabant and Earle of Flanders They continued at Utrich the chiefe City then in Holland where they had Princely and liberall education untill Edward Earle of March their eldest Brother had revenged his Fathers death and taken the Kingdome and Crowne as his right from Henry the sixth when he called home his two Brothers and enters them into the practise of Armes to season their forwardnesse and honour of Knighthood which he had bestowed upon them and soone after invests George into the Dutchy of Clarence and Earledome of Richmond which Earledome he the rather bestowed upon him to darken the young Earle of Richmond Henry Teudor Richard had the Dukedome of Glocester and Earledome of Carlile as I have read in an old Manuscript story which Creation the Heralds doe not allow But whether he were Comes thereof after the ancient Roman understanding that is Governour or Comes or Count after the common taking it by us English or others that is for a speciall Titular Lord I will not take upon me to determine but affirme I have read him Comes Carliolensis And after the great Earle of Warwicke and Salisbury Richard de Neville was reconciled to the Kings favour George Duke of Clarence was married to the Lady Isabell or Elizabeth the elder Daughter of that Earle and Richard Duke of Glocester to the Lady Anne which Ladies by their Mother the Lady Anne de Beauchamp Daughter and heire of Sir Richard de Beauchamp Earle of Warwicke were heires of that Earledome But Anne although the younger sister was the better woman having been a little before married to Edward Plantagenet Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall only Sonne of King Henry the sixth and was now his Princesse and Dowager by whom Duke Richard had a sonne called Edward created Prince of Wales when his Father came to the Crowne The imployment of this Duke was for the most part in the North as the Countrey of his birth so more naturally affected by him according to the Poet Natale solum dulcedine cunctos mulcet Ovid. And there lay his Appanage and Patrimony with a great Estate of the Dutchesse his Wife of which the Signiory of Penrith vulgò Perith in Cumberland was part where he much resided and built or repaired most of the Castles all that Northerne side generally honouring and affecting his Deportment being magnificent
to apply Sir Thomas Moore something above his ability which he exprest most in his hospitality And surely if men are taken to the life best from their actions we shall find him in the circle of a Character not so commaculate and mixt as passionate and purblinde pens have dasht it whilst we squint not at those vertues in him which make up other Princes absolute His wisedome and courage had not then their nicknames and calumny as now but drew the eyes and acknowledgment of the whole Kingdome towards him and his brother had a sound experience of his fidelity and constancy in divers hazardous congresses and battels through which he had faithfully followed his fortune and return'd all his undertakings successefull as at Barnet where he entred so farre and boldly into the Enemies Army that two of his Esquires Thomas Parr and Iohn Milwater being nearest to him were slaine yet by his owne valour he quit himselfe and put most part of the Enemies to flight the rest to the sword With the like valour he behaved himselfe at the battell of Exon Doncaster St Albans Blore-heath Northampton Mortimers Crosse and Tewkesbury And it was then confest a very considerable service to the State his taking of the famous Pyrate Thomas Nevill alias Faulkonbridge Earle of Kent with whom complyed Sir Richard de Nevill Earle of Warwicke a neare kinsman to the Earle of Kent his naturall Father which â—â—â—d him up in the better esteeme and whetted him to any Attempt â—or this haughty Earle who had drawne him from the House of Yorke to which he had done valiant service not long before to the party of Henry 6. and his Lancastrian faction and fearing what forces and aid King Edward might have from beyond Sea provides a warlike Fleet for the narrow Seas of which this Faulconbridge was appointed Admirall with Commission to take or sinke all Ships he met either of the Kings friends or Subjects who did not under act it but made many depredations on the Coasts and put many to the Sword becoming an Enemy the more considerable King Edward finding as the case stood then with him his Attemps by Sea would be of too weake a proofe to surprise him which the Duke of Gloucester contrived by an advertisement he had of his private stealth into severall of the parts sometimes where he had recourse to some abetters of that Faction and comming too shore at Southampton by a ready Ambush seized and apprehended him from whence he was conveyed to London so to Middleham Castle and after he had told some Tales put to death And whilst he continued in the Northern parts he governed those Countries with great Wisdome and Justice preserving the Concord and Amity betweene the Scots and English though the breaches were not to be made up with any strength and continuance the borders living out of mutuall spoyles and common Rapines ever prompt for any cause that might beget braules and seâ—ds And in the last yeare of the Reigne of the King his brother the Quarrels grew so outragious and hostile that nothing could compose them but the Sword and open War arising from an unjust detaining the Tribute King Iames was yearly bound to pay as Polidore thus writeth King Edward tooke it very ill at the hands of Iames fourth King of Scotland that he refused to pay the Tribute whereunto he was bound by Convenant And therefore resolved by Armes to compell him to it But King Edward being distracted with a jealous care and watching of France neglected that businesse of Scotland and in the meane time Alexander Duke of Albany Brother to King Iames pretending earnest businesse in France makes England in his way and instigates King Edward to put on Armes against his Brother promising to returne shortly out of France and raise a power in Scotland for his aide Hereupon the King resolved it and sent the Duke of Glocester with a good Armie into Scotland who marched master of the field neare to Barwicke having a little before sent thither Thomas Stanley to besiege it and soone after tooke it himselfe But the Duke of Albany failed him and had underhand strooke up a peace with his Brother of Scotland yet Richard of Gloucester accomplished the expedition very honourably and happily Thus Polidore But to enlarge what he reporteth desertively and abridgeth King Edward notwithstanding that negligence noted by him levied strong forces the King of Scotland being as vigilant in that businesse and made the Duke of Glocester his Generall under whom went Sir Henry Peircy Earle of Northumberland the Lord Stanley after Earle of Derby the Lord Lovell the Lord Gray of Grestocke the Lord Scroope of Bolton the Lord Fitzhugh Sir William Parre of Rose a noble and valiant Gentleman Father of the Lord Parr of Rose Kendall and Fitzhugh and Grandfather to Sir William Parr Earle of Essex and Marquesse of Northampton Sir Edward Woodville Lord Rivers Brother to the Queene Elizabeth with many other of Eminency and Noble quality The Duke marched first with his Armie to the borders and frontieres of Scotland giving the overthrow to such as resisted then made up to the strong Towne of Barwicke which at that instant the King of Scotland possessed by the surrender of Henry 6 and had the like successe with those Troopes of the Enemies he met and found about the Towne After a short siege the besieged upon Summons and Parlee finding themselves too weake to make good the opposition were easily perswaded to be at quiet and safely rendring the Towne and Castle vpon very slender conditions as is recorded in the Chronicle of Croyland Having plac't a Governour and Garrison in the Towne he continued his march towards Edenborough with a purpose to besiege and sacke it but was met in the halfe way by Embassadours from thence who after a favourable audience and accesse craved in the name of their King and Nation implore a League or at least a Truce betweene the Kingdomes offering so faire conditions for it that the Generall after a deliberate consultation granted to suspend or intermit all hostile proceedings with a faire entertainement to their persons and a publike Edict throughout the Army that no English should offer any violence or offence to any Scot or their goods and by this provident truce that ruddy storme which seemed terrible to impend was diverted and made a calme preface to the famous League afterward concluded by him when he was K. and Iames the 4 th of Scotland But whilst these imployments staid him there newes arrived of King Edwards death and was muttered very doubtfully by some who had confidence and ground to suppose it hastened by treachery The Nobles at London and in the South parts speedily call the Duke home by their private letters and free approbation to assume the Protection of the Kingdome and two Princes committed unto him by the King Rex Edwardus 4. filios suos Richardo Duci Glocestriae
in tutelam moriens tradidit as Polidore testifieth The Army and affaires of those parts disposed he came to Yorke where he made a few daies stay to pay some religious Offices and Ceremonies to the manes and exequies of the deceased King so hastned to London having in his Traine besides his owne ordinary Retinue sixe hundred voluntary Gentlemen of the North parts brave Horsemen and gallantly mounted upon the way he dispatched certaine seguall messengers to the young King who was then at Ludlow Castle in Wales to provide for his honourable Conduct of London where he arrived not long after the Lord Protector and was magnificently received and lodged at the Bishops Pallace his Brother the Duke of Yorke was then with the Queene Mother in the Pallace at Westminster who out of a pretended motherly care rather indeed her pollicy would not let him stirre from her to see the King who had desired his company but instantly takes Sanctuary with him in the Abbey The Lord Protector sollicites her by some Noblemen to send or bring him to the King which she peremptorily stood against untill Cardinall Bourser Archbishop of Canterbury was made the Messenger who so gravely and effectually perswaded with her that she delivered him the Duke After some dayes respite in London-House the King according to ancient custome was to remove Court to the Tower of London the Castle Royall and chiefe House of safety in the Kingdome untill the more weighty affaires of the State and such troubles if any hapned as often interceeds the alterations of Raignes were well dispatched and composed some threatning evils of that kind being discovered and extinguished before the Protector came to London And untill all things proper to his Coronation were in preparation and readinesse the Lord Protector still being neere unto him with all duty and care and did him homage as Honourable Phillippe de Comines Le Duâ— de Glocester avoit fait homage á son Nâ—phâ—n Comme á soâ— Roy souverain Seigneur but this Testimony being a voucht by one who loved not the Protector may leave more credit who sayes when the young King approacht towards London the Lord Protector his Unckle rode barehead before him and in passing along said with a loud voice to the People Behold your Prince and Soveraigne to which the Prior of Croyland who lived in those dayes reporteth Richardus Protector nihil reverentiae quod capite nudato genu Flecto aliove quolibet corporis habitur insubdito exigit regine potisuo facere distulit aut recusavit And why should these services and his constancy be judged lesse real to the Son then to the Father his care providence looking pregnantly through all turnes that concern'd him and his State and therefore timely remov'd such of Danger as were vehemently suspected for their Ambition and insolent assuming Power and Authoritie not proper to them and so stood ill-affected to their Prince and turbulent Maligners of the Government And thus his strict justice to some begat the envie of others as it fell out in the time of King Edward betweene those of the blood Royall with whom the ancient Barons sided and the Reginists who being stubborne haughty and incomputable of the others nearnesse to the King stir'd up Competitions and turbulencies among the Nobles and became so insolent and publique in their pride and Out-rages towards the people that they forc't their murmurs at length to bring forth mutiny against them But finding the Kings inclination gentle on that side they so temper'd it as they durst extend their malice to the Prince of the blood and chiefe Nobilitie many times by slanders and false suggestions privately incensing the King against them who suffered their insinuations too farre whilst his credulitie stood abus'd and his favour often alienated from those whose innocence could understand no cause for it The Engines of those intrusions and supplantations were the Grayes the Woodvills and their kinsmen who held a strong beliefe to have better'd their power with the young King their kinsman and then they might have acted their Rodomontades and injuries in a higher straine remov'd the Prince of the blood and set up what limits they pleased to their Faction and Power during the minoritie of the King and after too whilst the Queene Mother could usurpe or hold any superintendency upon the Soveraigntie or her Sonne These things and the mischiefes that seem'd to superimpend the State equally poiz'd and consulted by the Lord Protector and others of the principall Nobilitie it was resolv'd to give a timely remedy or period unto them all which Sir Thomas Moore acknowledgeth and confesseth the Nobles of the Kingdome had reason to suspect and feare the Queenes Kindred would put their power more forward when their Kinsman came to be King then in his Fathers time although then their insolencies were intollerable And this Author further acknowledgeth there had bin a long grudge heart-burning betweene the King and Queenes Kindred in the time of King Edward which the King although he were partiall for the Queenes Faction was earnest to reconcile but could not And after he was dead the Lord Gray Marquesse Dorset the Lord Rich. Gray and the Lord Rivers made full accompt to sway the young King and having learn'd it was best fishing in a troubled streame threw all occasions of dissention amongst the great men of this Kingdome that so whilst the other Nobles were busie in their owne quarrells they might take an opportunitie to assault and supplant where they hated And for provision towards the Designe the Marquesse had secretly gain'd a great quantity of the Kings treasure out of the Tower and the Woodevills made good preparations of Armes of which some were met with by the way as they were conveighed close packed in Câ—rts It was therefore high time for the Protector and ancient Nobilitie to looke circumspectly about them and fasten on all occasions that might prevent such growing Treacheries which could be no way but by taking off their heads Which being resolved the Marquesse of Dorset the Lord Richard Gray their Uncle Sir Anthony Woodeville Lord Rivers and some other of that kindred and Faction were apprehended and at Pomfret executed onely the Marquesse by some private notice given him fled and tooke Sanctuary At the same time the Lord Hastings who much favoured the Queene and her partie especially the Marquesse therefore the more to be suspected dangerous was Arrested for High Treason and in the Tower upon the Greene had his head chop 't off an Act of more strange and severe appearance then the other having the esteeme of a good Subject and generally supposed much affectionate to the Protector and the Duke of Buckingham And Sir Thomas Moore reporteth that the Protector was most unwilling to have lost him but that he saw him joyning with their Enemies and so his life had ill requited them and their purpose this was a Dilemma But
what that purpose was and what they had in Agitation at that instant is not disertly said onely from other places of the Story And those which follow Sir Thomas Moore it may be conceiv'd they doubted him for his affectation of the Soveraigntie some practice against the King and his Brother for those be the charges they presse upon him although it is neither said nor made good by any direct and just proofe But admit he was now growne jealous of him and sent Sir William Catseby a man in great credit with the Lord Hastings to â—ound what opinion he held of that Title and Claime he might lay to the Crowne who presuming upon Catsebies gratitude and trust that had beene advanced by him without circumstance and even with indignation exprest an utter mislike thereof and engaged himselfe his uttermost power and abilitie against it peremptorily adding he had rather see the death and destructions of the Protector and Duke of Buckingham then the young King deprived of the Crowne Which reply Catseby being more just to his employment then honour in this poynt returnes the Protector who layd hold upon the next occasion to seize his head which is the greatest and bloodiest Crime that brings any proofe against him and yet not so cleare but that there may be some other State-mistery or fraud suspected in it Let us leave it up on that accompt and but consider how much more wee forgive the fames of H. 1. E. 3. H. 4. E. 4. H. 7. because they had their happy Starres and successe and then Prosperum scelus virtus vocatur there is applause goes with the Act and Actor Iulius Caesar was and ever will be reputed a wise and a great Captaine although his Emulation cost an infinite quantitie of excellent humane blood and his Nephew Octa. Augustus never ceased proscribing banishing and massacring untill he had dispatched all his proud Emulators Iulius Caesar thought it Crimen sacrum vel crimen Regale or Crimen sacrum Ambitio whoâ—e rule was Si violandum est jus regnandi gratiâ Violandum est ali is rebus piet atem colas If right for ought may e're be violate It must be only for a Soveraign State Drawing it from that rule though Apocrypha in Euripides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Si injuste agere oportet pro tyrannide aut regno pulcherrimum est injuste agere in aliis pietatem colere expedâ—t And Antonius Caracalla alledged the Text to justifie the killing of his Brother Geta his Collegue in the Empire Polynicâ—s the Brother of Eteocles was of the same Religion and said A Kingdome could not be bought at too high a rate put in Friends Kindred Wife and Riches Via ad potentiam est tollere â—â—â—ulos premere Adversarios which the great Mâ—ster of Axiomes allowed hath beene countenanced by many great examples of State-reason and policie in all times even since the Ogygian Age for an old observation and generall in all forraigne Countries saith Regnum furto Et fraude ademptum antiquum est specimen imperii So King Atreus by his owne experience could say Vt nemo doceat fraâ—dis sceleris vias Regnum docebit But what those Ages call'd Valour Wisedome and Policy in those great Schollers of State who with credit practised their Artes Imperii and rules of Empire comes not under the license or warrant of our Christian times yet we may speak thus much for Richard to those who cry him so deepe an homicide that he had either more conscience or lesse cruelty then they attribute to him that by the same Act of power could not secure himselfe of others he had as just cause to feare especially Iasper Earle of Pembroke his Nephew Richmond and the subtill Doctor Morton who was extreamly his Enemy and the Chiefe Instrument that secretly mov'd against him And although the King had no certain notice which way his Engins wrought yet he knew enough to suspect him for and to remove him from the Councell-Table unto the custody of the Duke of Buckingham the man he had reason to suppose nearest to his trust though his expectation leaned on a broken Reed there for the Duke was now secretly in his heart defected from the King and become male-content Morton but toucht his pulse and knew how the distemper lay which he irritated into such sparklings as gave him notice where his constitution was most apt and prepared yea so subtilly mastred it that he had leave to steale from Brecknock Castle to Ely so for good store of Coine found safe passage into France whither his desires vehemently carried him in hope to fashion the Earle of Richmond to his Plot and under pretence of a Lancastrian Title to stirre him to take up Armes and invade England with the Assurance of many mightie friends here which would make the Designe of an easie and quick dispatch nor forgot he how much Artificiall and Eloquent perswasions adde to the Blaze of Ambition knowing the Earles temper like other mens in that and observing him with a kind of pleasure listen he gave such a studied glosse and superlation to the Text that the Earle was now so full of encouragement and hope for the invasion that their purposes spread as well into England as in France The Protector having also certaine intelligence of some particular Designes disposed himselfe in his actions more closely and knew what Friends and Confederates had engaged themselves to Richmond who yet kept a face of love and fidelitie towards him as did the Duke of Buckingham and the Countesse of Richmond who appeared at this instant an earnest Sutor to reconcile her Sonne into favour and that the King would bee pleased to bestow on him any of King Edward the fourth his Daughters But this took not the vigilancy of his eye from him and his partie the cause being of greater danger and apprehension now then in King Edwards time for the Earle had drawne unto him many of the English Nobilitie and Gentry and some Forraigne Princes had in favour to him promised their aydes But in the time of King Edward his Title and he was so little understood by his blood of Lancaster that the better judging-sort of the English Nobilitie and Gentry King Lewis the eleventh of France Francis the second Duke of Brittaine and other Forraigne Princes looked very slightly upon it And yet as Iohn Harding observed the King might be jealous of him being given out for an Heire of the House of Lancaster and Nephew to Henry the sixt With this he considered that some Forraigne Princes stood not well-affected to him or that some at home envying his House and Posteritie would catch at any sparke to trouble his peace and kindle a Sedition therefore he had good reason to thinke that as his libertie might make these beginnings more popular so their ends more dangerous and ingratefull the vulgar tasting all things by the eare and
terra cujus Rex est Puer But here Sir there is exception of further consequence against them That they were not borne in lawfull Marriage the King having than another Wife living Dame Elizabeth Butler Besides the great dishonour and reproach he received by disparaging his Royall bloud with a woman so far unmeet for his bed These Considerations have resolutely turned all their eyes and Election towards your Grace as only worthy of it by your singular vertues and that interest in the Crownes of England and of France with the Rights and Titles by the high Authority of Parliament entailed to the Royall bloud and issue of Richard Duke of Yorke whose lawfull begotten Sonne and heire you are which by a just course of inheritance and the Common Lawes of this Land is divolv'd and come to you And unwilling that any inferiour Bloud should have the Dominion of this Land are fully determined to make your Grace King to which with all willingnesse and alacrity the Lords and people of the Northerne parts concurre And the Maior Aldermen and Commons of this City of London have all allowed and gladly embraced this generall Choice of your Grace and are come hither to beseech you to accept their just Election of which they have chosen me their unworthy Advocate and Speaker I must therefore againe crave leave in the behalfe of all to desire your Grace will be pleased in your noble and gracious zeale to the good of this Realme to cast your eyes upon the growing distresses and decay of our Estate and to set your happy hand to the redresse thereof for which we can conceive no abler remedy then by your undertaking the Crowne and Government which we doubt not shall accrew to the laud of God the profit of this Land and your Graces happinesse This speech of the Duke is recorded by Doctor Morton Sir Thomas Moore and other Chronicles and Historians to which the Protector gave this reply MY most noble Lords and my most loving friends and deare Country-men Albeit I must confesse your request most respective and favourable and the points and necessities alledged and urged true and certaine yet for the entire love and reverend respect I owe to my Brother deceased and to his Children my Princely Couzens you must give me leave more to regard mine honour and fame in other Realmes for where the truth and certaine proceedings herein are not knowne it may be thought an ambition in me to seeke what you voluntarily proffer which would charge so deep a reproach and staine upon my honour and sincerity that I would not beare for the worlds Diademe Besides you must not thinke me ignorant for I have well observed it there is more difficulty in the Government of a Kingdome then pleasure especially to that Prince who would use his Authority and Office as he ought I must therefore desire that this and my unfained Protestations may assure you the Crowne was never my ayme nor suits my desire with yours in this yet I shall thinke my selfe much beholding unto you all in this Election of me and that hearty love I find you beare me and here protest that for your sakes it shall be all one whether I be your King or no for I will serve my Nephew faithfully and carefully with my best counsels and endeavours to defend and preserve him and this Kingdome nor shall there want readinesse in me to attempt the recovery of that hereditary right in France which belongs to the Kings of England though of late negligently and unhappily lost There the Protector became silent and thought it not safe in his discretion or policy to open all the disgusts he had of the Soveraignty for that would have been matter of Exprobation of the Barons and toucht too neare the quicke though he had well observed by sundry experiences of the leading times and moderne too the inconstant ebbing and flowing of their dispositions how variable and apt they were to take up any occasion of change pursuing their Kings if once stirr'd so implacably that many times they never left without death or deposing Examples he had in the Raignes of King Edward his Brother and Henry the sixth not long before that in the time of Richard the second and his Grandfather Edward the second more anciently the extreame troubles and distresse of King Iohn and Henry the third all by the Barons being dreadfull warnings and insolent monuments of their haughtinesse and Levitie and this was Altamente repostum with the wise Prince But the Duke of Buckingham thinking the Protector set too slight a consideration upon so great a Concernment and the affection tender'd by himselfe and the Nobilitie and over hearing something he privately spake to the Lord Maior and Recorder tending to his mislike for an Epilogue or close to his former Oration he thus freely addes SIR I must now by the Priviledge of this Imployment and in the behalfe of those and my Countrey adde so much freedome unto my dutie as to tell your Grace It is immoveably resolved by the Barons and people that the Children of King Edward shall not Reigne over them Your Grace hath heard some causes nor need I intimate how these Estates have entred and proceeded so offensively to other men and so dangerously to themselves as is now too late to recall or retire And therefore they have fixt this Election upon you whom they thinke mostable and carefull for their safetie But if neither the generall good the earnest Petitions of the Nobility and Commonalty can move you wee most humbly desire your Answer and leave to Elect some other that may be worthy of the Imperiall Charge in which wee hope wee shall not incurre your displeasure considering the desperate necessitie of our welfare and Kingdome urges it And this is our last Suit and Petition to your Grace The Protector toucht by this round and braving farewell which made him very sensible For as Sir Thomas Moore disertly confesseth the Protector was so much moved with these words that otherwise of likelyhood he would never have inclined to their Suit And saith That when he saw there was no remedy but he must either at that instant take the Crowne or both he and his heires irrecoverably let it passe to another paradventure one that might prove an Enemy to him and his especially if Richmont stept in betwixt whom and this Prince the hatred was equally extreame Therefore it behoved the Protector to Collect himselfe and fixing his Consideration upon the effect of that necessitie they last urged gave this Reply MY most Noble good Lords and most loving and faithfull friends the better sense of your loves and most eminent inconveniencies insinuated by your Noble Speaker hath made me more serious to apprehend the benefit of your proffer and Election And I must confesse in the meditation thereof I find an alteration in my selfe not without some distraction when I consider all the Realme so bent
Richard pursued him with so much speed and fiercenesse that he forc't him to his Standard And now high in bloud and anger to see his Valour deluded by such a politicke Bravery with his Sword makes way and with his owne hand slew Sir Charles Brandon Standerd-Bearer thinking to have made the next blow as fatall to the Earle but the confluence of Souldiers interjecting rescued him Sir Iohn Cheney being one of the foremost whom the King stroke from his Horse to the Earth But Charged and invironed with multitudes that like a storme came on him Valiant Richard falls the Sacrifice of that day under their cruell Swords so rabious in their execution as if his body must suffer more because they could not kill his better part mangling and wounding his dead Corps whilst it lies drentcht in gore Et Lupus turpes instant morientibus ursi Et quaecunque minor nobilitate fera est As Currs in their kenells will bite and teare the skin of those beasts which in the fields they durst not barke at Occidit in bello miseranda caede Richardus Crinibus attractus dum ferro saeviat hostis And after all to compleate their barbarisme threw his body behind one upon a Jade and so conveyed it to Leicester A story to be thought incredible at least to charitable and modest eares and highly upbraided by the happier and Christian fame of William the Conquerour who severely punished a Souldier but for hacking the thigh of King Harold after he was dead though an Usurper and his perfidious enemy with all noblenesse causing the body to be delivered to his Mother for an honourable interment which was solemnly celebrated in his own Abbey at Waltham The Battle thus fought and won the Victor was Crowned in the field with that Crown K. Rich. wore which the L. Stanley put upon his head salutes him King by the stile of Hen. 7. K. of England c. And Henry Earle of Richmond Son of Edmund ap Meredith ap Teudor alias of Hadham Earle of Richmond and of Margaret Daughter and Heiâ—e of Iohn Beaufort Duke of Sommerset attained to the Crowne and had the easier ascent by the oversight and remissnesse of Richard in that Catastrophe of his Raign who gave too much opportunity and scope to the actings of his Enemies when they were under his power and arme And in the Fortune of his judgment at the closing Scene that did not better presuppose his Enemy too prudent and reserved to trust the advantage he had upon so sharpe and single an hazzard But Richard beleeving he had the odds in courage and monomachie of him which probably might make him Master of the Combate and so of the Field the straite being so desperate too resolved rather to trust to the Fate of his owne Valour then the chance of an uncertaine escape a resolution not so rash and overweening as commendable if we looke upon the very aymes and necessity of it neither is it new or improper for Princes to demand the tryall of campe fight or single Combate personaly in their Armies and to the Generals in their absence William the Conquerour challenged King Harold Before that a Combate was fought betweene Edmund Ironside and Canute the Danish King for the whole Kingdome of England our Richard the first and Edward the first in Palestine proffered the like to some of the Pagan Princes so did Edward the third Henry the fifth with the Kings of France In the last Age the valiant Prince Iaâ—es the fifth of Scotland in Person challenged Thomas Lord Howard Duke of Norfolke Generall for the King of England who accepted it But the King into his Demands would have the Country or Lands then in Controversie to be made Brabium victoris which was without the Generalls power to engage being the Inheritance of the King his Master but proffers better Lands of his owne upon the Combate which was not accepted so that concluded nothing The better end of these Challenges and Combates being at first levelled from Mercy and Piety for by this single adventure the Innocent bloud of Armies was more then stanched preserved Forraigne Stories brings this home to us and highly Characters their Kings and Generalls in the like examples which this Age draws a Curtaine before as not fit for imitation making too desperate a wound in a setled State and Succession the first who rendred that or some more Politike reason for Princes not to adventure themselves was Phi. the 2 K. of Spain as a late writer ascribeth but is mistaken For the more ancient Histories of Syria and Persia mentions some Kings that refrain'd from Warres long before as Herodotus Diodorus Trogus Pompeius tells us But let us take measure from that Times Wisedome Valour Policy c. to this and wee shall find them but tottering foundations of States which cannot uphold themselves or obvert the least Decree of God when he intends to scourge or alter kingdomes for where such vicissitudes are destin'd the Councells and faculties of men must be darkned and there will fall out all concurrences and advantages to further that purpose So in the extirpation and transferring of Families the Potter in Ieremy breaking one Jarre to make another whose fatall commutations should extimulate the pietie of our natures and make us modest censurers of their events For as wee see things but through a Cloud whilst wee measure them by accidents so wee intrude on Gods providence judging mens actions in their successe while wee over-act our owne Of such a composition was the ill-wishers of King Richard who forgot him not in his grave but indeavoured to be equally cruell to his memory And in November following a Parliament was holden in which he was attainted of High Treason a straine very high to make him guiltie of that being a King he could not commit By the same figure may others who were stiled chiefe ayders and assistants of King Richard in the Battaile of Bosworth as Sir Iohn Howard Duke of Norfolke c. though some would have him retired from the Court all King Richards raigne But Sir Thomas Moore affirmes He was constantly with him and neare his Counsells Sir Thomas Howard Earle of Surrey Sonne and heire apparent to the Duke Francis Lovel Viscount Lovel Sir Walter Devereux Lord Ferrers of Chartley Sir Iohn de la Sâ—uch Sir Robert Harrington Richard Charleton Richard Ratcliffe William Berkley William Catesby Thomas Broughton Iohn Buck Humphrey Stafford Robert Midleton Robert Brokenbury Iohn Kendall Secretary to the King Walter Hopton Ieoffry Saint-German Roger Wake Thomas Billington William Sapcoate William Brampton all Knights and some Heralds at Armes with divers other an Act of Parliament being made to disable and fore-judge them of all manner of Honour State Dignitie Also to â—orfeit all Mannors Castles Lordships Hundreds Franchises Lâ—berties Advowsons Priviledges Nominations Presentations Tenements Rents Suits Reversions Portions Annuities Pensions Rights Hereditaments
Strelley and was so constant in his Affection that although she dyed in his best Age he made a Religious Vow and became a Knight of the Rhodes his Armes are yet to be seene in the Ruines of the Hospitall of Saint Iohns neaâ—e Smithfield and in the Church of Alhallows at the upper end of Lumbard Street which was repaired and enlarged with the Stones brought from that demolished Caenoby he lived sub rege Edvardo filio Regis Henrici as I have seene by the date of his deed in Herthilâ— Anno 1 Ed. 1. Anno 22. Ed. 1. From this Knight of the Rhodes descended Sir Iohn Bucke who for his too much forwardnesse in charging a Fleet of Spaniards without the leave of the Earle of Arundell Lord Admirall was committed to the Tower testified by the Records there Anno 13. Richard the second Lawrence Buck his Son followed Edward Plantagenet Duke of Yorke and was at the Battel of Agin Court with him when he was slaine Iohn Bucke Knight the Sonne of this Laurence married a Daughter and Heire of the House of Staveley out of which are descended the Barons Parres of Kendall and Rosse Queene Katherine the last wife of King Henry the eighth the Lord Parre Marquesse of Northampton and the Herberts Earles of Pembrooke and Montgomery These Bucks residing for the most part at West-Stanton and Herthill in Yorkeshire and matched into the Families of Strelley or Stirely of Woodhall Thorpe Tilney then of Lincolnshire and Savill by which we have much Noble kindred Sir Iohn Bucke for his service to the House of Yorke especially at Bosworth lost his head at Leicester he married the Daughter of Henry Savill by whom he had Robert Bucke and other Children who were brought into the Southerne parts by Thomas Duke of Norfolke where they have remained ever since for the Children being Orphans were left in miserable estate by the Attainder of their Father But the Duke bestowed two Daughters in marriage one with the Heire of Buck The other with the Heire of Fitz-Lewis very Ancient Families from which Matches divers honourable and Noble Persons are descended The Sonnes were one a Souldier the other a Courtier the third a Priest afterward the Duke bestowed Robert Bucke the Eldest Sonne at Melford Hall in Suffolke and married him into the Families of Higham and Cotton as also did the Blounds of Elwaston the Talbots of Grafton from whom the Barons of Monioy and the late Earles of Shrewsbury descended one of the Daughters of this Bucke Married to Fredericke Tilney of Shelley Hall in Suffolke his nearest Kinsman by the Duchesse his Mothers side But some perhaps must call this my vanity I shall but answer them that I thinke my selfe bound by all the bloud and memory I claime from them to pay them my best Relations and endeavours acknowledging with the great Consulare Philosopher Parentes charissimos habere debemus quod ab ijs vita patrimontum libertas Civit as tradita est And I should thinke there is none who hath an interest in the quality of Gentile or Noble for all is one but lookes backe which some delight to their first Commemoration and finds a strong engagement due to the Vertues and worth of their first Fathers for that expresse charge to honour Father and Mother is not to be understood only of our Parents superstits and living here with us but our forefathers that is beyond our great Grandfather for we have no proper word for them above that degree but Antecessours vulgò Ancestours whom the Romans called Majores and comprehendeth all our Progenitours departed sooner or later for the word Pater and Mater as also Parens Parentes extend very largely and reach up to the highest Ancestours The Ancient Roman Jurisconsults deliver in their Law for an Axiome that Appellatione Parentum omnes in infinitum majores utriusque sexus significantur and the word Parentes yet spreadeth further comprehending all Kinsfolkes and Cosins of our Bloud and Linage being used in that sense by AElius Lampridius by Iulius Capitolinus and other the best Writers in the times of the declined Empire as Isaac Causabonus hath well observed in his Annotations The Italians Spanish and French whose Language is for the most part Romanzi mongrell Latine and broken and corrupted Romane Language use Parenti Parentes and Parents for all their Kinsfolkes and Gentilitious Cosins We English-men being more precise follow the Ancient and Classique Latine Writers holding Parent strictly to the simple signification of Pater and Mater the present and immediate Parents But the using of the word Parentes as those Imperiall Historians use it serveth better for our purpose here And I could most willingly imitate the Pious Gentlemen of Italy Spainâ— and France in their Religious and Charitable indeavours to advance the happinesse of their Parents defunct if those desires could besteed them But where I should crave pardon I become more guilty and extravogant it is time therefore to know good manners and returne home to our proper taske which will be to refell the grosse and blacke Calumnies throwne unjustly upon the Memory and Person of King RICHARD And falls within the Circle of the next Booke Explicit Liber Secundus THE THIRD BOOKE OF KING RICHARD THE THIRD The Contents of this Booke THe Defamations of King Richard examined and answered Doctor Morton and Sir Thomas Moore malevolent to the House of Yorke Their frivolous exceptions against his gestures lookes teeth shape and birth hie vertues depraved The death of King Henry the sixth and his Sonne Edward Prince of Wales The Actors therein The offence of killing an anointed King Valiant men hate treacheries and bloudy acts King Richard not deformed The Slanders of Clarence translated to King Richard The Cause of Clarences execution How the Sonnes of King Edward came by their deaths King Richard Exculpable thereof The story of Perkin VVarbeck compared with Don Sebastian King of Portugall who are Biothanati Counterfeit Prince detected young Prince marvellously preserved Many testimonies for the assertion that Perkin VVarbeck was Richard Duke of Yorke his honourable entertainment with forraigne Princes vox populi Reasons why it is not credible King Richard made away his two Nephewes the force of Confession The evill of Torture the guilt of attempting to escape out of prison what an escape is The Earle of Oxford severe against Perkin and his end The base Sonne of King Richard the third secretly made away The Sonne of the Duke of Clarence put to death The power of furies Demones Genii Apollonii Majestas Quid tibi non vis alteri ne feceris THE THIRD BOOKE OF KING RICHARD THE THIRD THere is no story that shewes the planetary affections and malice of the vulgar more truly then King Richards and what a tickle game Kings have to play with them though his successor Henry the seventh play'd his providently enough with helpe of the standers by yet even those times which had promised the happiest example of a
allatum est id sibi relatum esse putant And if their injustice suffer under the same lash they must know this doome hath the credit of an Oracle quale verbum dixisti tale etiam audies But so much gall and envy is thrown upon King Richards story as cannot possibly fall into the stile of an ingenuous and charitable pen all his virtue is by a malitious Alchymy substracted into crimes and where they necessarily fall into mention either scornefully transmitted or perverted with injurious constructions not allowing him the resemblance of goodnesse or merit If his disposition be affable and curteous as generally it was which their owne relations cannot deny then he insinuates and dives into the peoples hearts so where he expresses the bounty and magnificence of his minde it is a subtle tricke to purchase friendship let him conceale the knowledge of his jujuries and his patience is deepe hypocrisie for his mercy and clemency extended to the highest offendors as to Fogge the Atturney who had made a Libell against him besides the counterfeiting of his hand and seale they were but palliated and his friendship meerely a Court brow They have yet a more captious and subtle calumny reproaching the casting of his eyes motions of his fingers manner of his gesture and his other naturall actions I confesse with Cicero that status incessus sessio occubatio vultus oculi mannum motio have a certaine kind of decorum but he makes it not a vice to erre in any of them nor that any errour committed in them was a vice although in him it must be so defined by the Lawes of Utopia nay they will dissect his very sleepes to finde prodigious dreames and bug-beares accidents frequent to themselves which they dresse in all the fright and horrour fiction and the stage can adde who would have sung Peans to his glory had his sword brought victory from Bosworth field but now their envy is borne with him from his mothers wombe and delivers him into the world with a strange prodigy of Teeth although I am perswaded neither Doctor Morton nor Sir Thomas Moore ever spake with the Dutchesse his Mother or her Midwife about the matter But if true it importeth no reason why those earely and natalatious teeth should presage such horrour and guilt to his birth when we shall remember those many Noble and worthy men who have had the like without any imputation of crime as Marcus Curius sirnamed thereupon Dentatus Cu. Papiene King of the Epirots a Prince much renowned for his victories and virtues Monodas Sonne of Prusias King of Bithynia borne with an intire semicircular bone in their mouthes instead of Teeth then they aggravate the pangs of the Dutchesse in her travaile with him which had not been sufferable without death if so extreame and intolerable as they would have them thought for Quod ferri potest leve est quod non breve est But she overcame them and lived almost fifty yeares after others have died in that Bed yet the children not made guilty of murther Iulia the daughter of Iulius Caesar Wife to great Pompey Iuliola the deare daughter of Marcus Cicero Wife of Dolabella and Iunia Claudilla the Empresse and Wife of Caligula died all of the difficulties and extremity of their childe-bearing so did Queene Elizabeth Wife of King Henry the seventh and since the Mother of that most towardly and hopefull Prince Edward the sixth in travaile of his birth with many thousands more whose deaths much lesse their paines were never imputed to their children The next objection is somewhat of more regard but as farre without the certainty of a proofe which is the pretended deformity of his body controverted by many some peremtorily asserted he was not deformed of which opinion was Iohn Stow a man indifferently inquisitive as in all their other affaires after the verball relations and persons of Princes and curious in his description of their features and lineaments who in all his inquiry could finde no such note of deformitie in this King but hath acknowledged viva voce that he had spoken with some ancient men who from their owne sight and knowledge affirmed he was of bodily shape comely enough onely of low stature which is all the deformity they proportion so monstrously neither did Iohn Rouce who knew him and writ much in his discription observe any other and Archienbald Qhuitlaw Ambassador unto this King from Scotland in his Oration saies he had corpus exiguum not otherwise so to my conceit Philip de Comines and the Prior de Croyland who had seen and knowne this Prince seeme to cleere him implicatively for in all their discourses of him they never directly nor indirectly covertly or apertly insinuate this deformity which I suppose they would not have passed And by his sundry Pictures which I have seen there was no such disproportion in his person or lineaments but all decently compacted to his stature his face of a warlike aspect which Sir Thomas Moore calleth a crabled visage of all the children being said to be most like his Father in favour and composition of shape who though not tall was of an even and well disposed structure And Sir Thomas Moore himselfe doth not certainely affirme the deformity but rather seemes to take it as a malitious report for saith he King Richard was deformed as the fame ranne by those that hated him habemus reuâ— consitentem and surely it had been a strange kinde of confidence and reason in Doctor Shaw to disclaime a thing which must be so palpable openly in the Pulpit at Saint Pauls Crosse whilst the Protector was present before many hundreds of people who had seen and known him before and might then better view and note him In these words the Lord Protector is a very noble Prince the speciall patterne of Knightly prowesse as well in all Princely behaviour as in the lineaments of his body and in the favour of his visage representing the very face of the Noble Duke his Father this is the Fathers owne figure this is his owne countenance the very sure and undoubted Image and expresse likenesse of that Noble Duke Now what can malice extract out of this to upbraid or stigmatize his honour if men of blemisht persons may containe a wise valiant learned liberall and religious soule and be in every part most absolute exampled to us in many famous men and at our home as well in this present age as in the more ancient we have had men of a harsh fabrick most nobly furnisht in the composures of their mindes But because these cavils could not fetch blood from him they will make him guilty of other men and first of King Henry the sixth whose murther they say and very favourably his Brother Edward contrived but wrought him to act it an accusation of very harsh credit that either King Edward so truly noble and valiant a Prince should put
he was proclaimed traitor for him and when Queene Margaret besiedged the City of Gloucester with the Kings power the Citizens stood at defiance with her Army and told her it was the Duke of Gloucester his Towne who was with the King and for the King and for him they would hold it his Loyalty bearing a most constant expression in this motto Loualto melie which I have seen written by his owne hand and subscribed Richard Gloucester The other was as constantly undermining at him after confederate with the Earle of Warwicke his Father Allie who had turn'd faith from the King and went into France solliciting for force against England which they brought in fought with the King and overthrew him and so fiercely pursuing the victory that the King was forc't to fly out of the Land Clarence not so satisfied unlesse he might utterly supplant him studied that slander of basterdy to bring in himselfe an heire to the Crowne which was proved and given in expresse evidence against him at his triall and attainder by Parliament amongst sundry other articles of high Treason Videlicet That the said Duke of Clarence had falsly and untruly published King Edward a bastard and not legitimate to Raigne that himselfe therefore was true Heire of the Kingdome the Royalty and Crowne belonging unto him and to his Heires these be the very words of the Record and enough to tell us who was the Author of that slander and what important cause the King had to quit himselfe of Clarens a bitter proofe of the old Proverbe fratrum inter se irae acerbissimae sunt and all the favour Clarence could at his end obtaine was to choose it as Iohn de Serres reporteth it so that it was not the Duke of Gloucester but the Kings implacable displeasure for his malice and treasons that cut him off who could not thinke himselfe secure whilst he lived Witnesse Polidor Virgil Edvardus Rex post mortem fratris se a cunctis timeri animadvertit ipse jam timebat neminem Next for the murther of the two sonnes of King Edward the fourth Edward the fifth King in hope and Richard of Shrewsbury Duke of Yorke and Norfolke his younger Brother they alleadge it in this manner That King Richard being desirous to rid those two Princes his Nephews out of the world imployed his trusty servant Iohn Greene to Sir Robert Brackenbury Lieutenant Constable of the Tower about the executing of this murther and by reason that plot tooke no effect Sir Robert not liking it The Protectour suborned foure desperate Villaines Iohn Dighton Miles Forrest Iames Tyrrell and William Slater to undertake it who as they further alleadge smothered them in their beds which done they made a deepe hole in the ground at the foote of the staires of their lodging and their buried them hiding the place under an heape of stones not after the antient manner of tumulus testis others vary from this and say confidently the young Princes were imbarqued in a Ship at Tower wharfe and conveyed from thence to Sea so cast into the Blacke deeps others averre they were not drowned but set safe on shore beyond Seas And thus their stories and relations are scatter'd in various formes their accusations differing in very many and materiall points which shakes the credit of their suggestion and makes it both fabulous and uncertaine one giving the lie to the other their malice having too much Tongue for their memories and is worth the noting how opposite and as it were ex Diametro repugnant they are In vulgus fama valuitfilios Edwardi Regis aliquò terrarum parteâ—migrasse atque ita supestites esse Thus Pollidor with which Dr. Morton and Sir Thomas Moore agree in one place The man say they commonly called Perkin Warbeck was as well with the Princes as with the people English and forraigne held to be the younger Son of Edward the fourth and that the deaths of the young King Edward and of Richard his brother had come so far in question as some are yet in doubt whether they were destroyed or no in the dayes of King Richard By which it appeares they were thought to be living after his death And as the act of their death is thus uncertainly disputed so is the manner of it controverted For Sir Thomas Moore affirmeth as before reported they were smothered in their beds with Pillowes but Pollidor saith peremptorily it was never known of what kinde of death they dyed Another Author and more ancient agreeth with them Vulgatum est Regis Edwardi pueros concessisse in sata sed quâ— genere interitus ignoratur one reason of this may be that they who held Perkin Warbeck and Richard Duke of Yorke to be all one give another accompt of his death whereas if it had beene certaine these foure before named for Assasines had murdered them then the place time and manner had beene easily known upon their strict examination they living freely and securely and without question long after this murdeâ— was said to be done Therefore there can be no excuse for this neglect of Examination much lesse for the suffering such to goe unpunished and at liberty which me thinks maketh much for the cleering of King Richard As for the burying of their bodyes in the Tower if that be brought in question certes the affirmative will be much more hard to prove then the negative For true it is there was much diligent search made for their bodies in the Tower all places opened and digged that was supposed but not found Then it was given out a certaine Priest tooke up their bodies and buried them in another secret place nto to be found hereunto but with better decorum for the more credit of this assertion they might have added it was done sub sigillo confessionis which may not be revealed Sir Thomas Moore seeing the absurdities and contrarieties of these opinions as a man puzeled and distracted with the variety and uncertainty thereof concludeth their bodies were bestowed God wot where and that it could never come to light what became of them Hall Hallingshed Grafton and the rest confesse the very truth hereof was never knowne And if there be a stricter inquiry into the mystery we shall discover that they were neither buried in the Tower nor swallowed in the Sea for the testimony and Relation of sundry grave and discreâ—te persons and such as knew the young Duke of Yorke will resolve us how he was preserved and secretly conveyed into a foraigne Country also alive many years after the time of this imaginary murder to which may be added strong authorities having layd downe some conjectures that may answer the iniquiry after the other And first whereas it is said the Lord Protector before his Coronation procured this murder To refell and contradict that there bee certaine proofes that the Princes were both living in the moneth of February following the death
of their Father which was ten moneths after for King Edward dyed in April before and this is plaine in the Records of the Parliament of Anno 1. Rich. 3. where there is mention made of this Prince as then living and Sir Thomas Moore confesseth that they were living long after that time before said But I conjecture Edward the Eldest brother lived not long after but died of sicknesse and infirmity being of a weake and sickly disposition as also was his Brother which the Queene their Mother intimated in her speech to the Cardinall Boursier and the weake constitutions and short lives of their sisters may be a naturall proofe to infer it probable enough this Prince dyed in the Tower which some men of these times are the rather brought to thinke certaine bones like to the bones of a Child being found lately in a high desolate Turret supposed to be the bones of one of these Princes others are of opinion it was the â—aâ—râ—asse of an Apekept in the Tower that in his old age had happened into that place to die in and having clamber'd up thither according to the light and idle manner of those wanton Animals after when he would have gone down seeing the way to be steepe and the precipice so terrible durst not adventure to descend but for feare stayed and starved himselfe and although hee might bee soone mist and long sought for yet was not easily to be found that Turret being reckoned a vast and damned place for the hight and hard accesse no body in many yeares looking into it But it is of no great consequence to our purpose whether it were the Carcasse of a Child or of an Ape or whether this young Prince dyed in the Tower or no for wheresoever hee dyed why should it not be as probable hee dyed of a naturall sicknesse and infirmity as for his young Cozen german the sonne and heire of King Richard many reasons conducing why the qualities and kinde of their death might be the same and neere one time being even parallels almost and in their humane constitutions and corporall habitude sympathizing of one Linage and Family of one blood and age of the same quality and fortune therefore not unlikely of the same Studies Affections Passions Distemperatures so consequently subject to the same infirmities to which may be added equall and common constellations the same compatient and commorient fates and times and then there is reason and naturall cause they might both die of like Diseases and infirmity and were not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken away by violence secret or overt for it may with asmuch Argument bee suspected the son of King Richard being in the like danger of secret violence for the same cause as his Cozen was might suffer so But to open the circumstance a little neerer what danger could the lives of those two Princes be to Richard who was accepted King by a just title and his Nephewes declared illegitimate by the high Court of Parliament and whilst they were reputed such by so great and generall a conclusion why should he be lesse secure of them then Hen. 2. was of Robert E. of Glocester base sonne to Hen. 1. or Richard the first of his base Brother Geoffrey Plantagenet So although Iohn of Gaunt left base sonnes aspiring enough yet they were of no danger to the Lancastrian Kings neither did Henry 7. or Henry 8. stand in any jealousy of Arthur Plantagenet and surely Richard the third was as valiant wise and consident as any of his predecessors and had as little cause to dread his Nephewes as they stood adjudged or be more cruell and bloudy neither hath my reading found any Bastards of France or Spaine who have aspired so publickly onely except Don Eurique E. of Trastamara who was drawne into that action by the violent rages of the people and by the perswasions of the revolted states of Castile to put downe a monster of Soveraignty the hatefull tyrant Don Pedro Cruell But being Sir Thomas Moore and our best Chroniclers make it doubtfull whether these two Princes were so lost in King Richards time or no and infer that one of them was thought to be living many years after his death that might be enough to acquit him which opinion I like the better because it mentioneth the survivance but of one of them Neither doe our most credible stories mention the transportation of more then one into Flanders nor had they reason it will bee sufficient if one of them survived him more or lesse time we will follow therefore the examination of his story under the opinion of those times and the attestation of grave and credible men because it will be more conspicuous in the true and simple narration of this one Brother every story being fraught with reports concerning him and few or none of his brother finding no mention of the Elder Bothers being in Flanders but of the youngers much and of his other adventures The prudent and honorable care of sending away this younger Brother by some is ascribed to Sr. Robert Brakenbury by others to the Queene his Mother and it may well be the projection of them both though no doubt there was the advise and assent of other well affected friends And it is the more credible the Queen wrought in it for the story of Sr. Thomas Moore saith shee was before suspected to have had such a purpose which was objected to her by some of the Lords and the Cardinall Boursier told her the maine Reason which made the Protector and Nobles so urgeing to have him sent to his Brother being then in the Tower was a suspition and feare they had shee would convey Him forth of the Realme So then it may be cleerly supposed he was sent into a forraine Country and that Flanders as all our stories testify there commended to a liberall education under the curature of a worthy Gentleman in Warbeck a Towne in Flanders but kept very privately all the life time of his Uncle his Friends not daring to make him of the councell After his death knowing Henry Richmond a cruell enemy to the house of Yorke for his better safety was committed to the care of Charles of Burgundy and his Dutchesse the Lady Margaret Aunt to the Prince as formerly the Dutchesse of Yorke upon a like cause of feare and jealousy had sent thither her two younger sons George and Richard The Dutchesse being very tender to let this young Duke have all Princely and vertuous education in Tornay in Antwerp and after in the Court of the Duke of Burgundy as hee had bin in Warbeck c. And with the greater circumspection because the Dutchesse of Burgundy had as jealous an opinion of Henry the Seventh as the Queene Widdow had of Richard 3. Therefore as yet it was advised to conceale his Name and Quality being not come to the growth nor age to have experience in his own affaires much lesse to undertake an attempt
so consequent and mighty as the recovery of a Kingdome neither were the times and opportunity yet ripe or propitious to fashion such an alteration as was projected and must be produced though there was pregnant hope of an induction to a change of Government stir'd by the Kings coveteousnesse and some acts of Tyrany Greivance and Rebellions in the North and West parts not long after which lent a seasonable hand to these designes great unkindnesse fell out betwixt Charles the French King and Henry the 7. who so far provoked the French that he besieged Bulloigne with a great army by land and Sea the quarrell was of good advancement to the Dutchesse of Burgondy's Plot and brought the Duke of Yorke better acquainted with forraigne Princes and their Courts who was sent into France into Portugall and other places where he was received and entertained like a Prince In which time such of the English Nobility as were interessed in the secret and knew where this Prince resided found some opportunity to give him assistance and sent Sr. Robert Clifford and Sr. William Barley into Flanders to give him a visit and intelligence of what noble friends he had ready to serve him though their more particular errant was to take a strict observance of him and such private marks as hee had bin knowne by from his Cradle there had beene some counterfeits incouraged to take upon them the persons of Edward E. of Warwick and Richard Duke of Yorke But here the certainty of their knowledge found him they looked for by his Face Countenance Lineaments and all tokens familiarly and privately knowne to them observing his behaviour naturaliz'd and heightned with a Princely grace and in his discourse able to give them a ready accompt of many passages he had heard or seene whilst hee was in England with such things as had beene done and discourst very privately speaking English very perfectly and better then the Dutch or Wallonish by which Sr. Kobert Clifford and the rest found themselves so well satisfied and were so confirm'd That they wrot to the Lord Fitzwater to Sir Symon Mountford and others who had a good opinion towards him the full accompt of what they had observ'd ex certa scientia supra visum corporis About this time to intermix the Scene with more variety and fill the Stage some principall persons well affecting the E. of Warwick and hoping to get him forth of the Tower in purpose to make him King had inticed a handsome young fellow one Lambert Simonell of Lancashire bred in the University of Oxford to become his counterfeit and so instructed him in the royall Genealogy that hee was able to say as hee was taught maintained and abetted cheifly by the Viscount Lovell the E. of Lincolne Sir Thomas Broughton and Sir Symon Preist c. who being presented to the Duke and Dutchesse of Burgondy and by them honorably entertained drew to him in Flanders one Martin Swartz a Captaine of a very eminent fame and some forces with which hee made over into Ireland where they received him as Edward Earle of Warwick as hee was of many here at home and when the deceit was discovered the excuse was those Lords but used this counterfet of the Earle for a Colour whilst they could get him out of the Tower to make him King But the vaile is easily taken from the face of such impostors examples giving us light in many for though some men may all cannot be deceived so Speudo-Agrippa in the time of Tiberius was soone found to bee Clemens the servant of Agrippa though very like to him and Puesdo-Nero in Otho's time who tooke upon him to be Nero revived was quickly unmasked Valerius Paterculus telleth of a certaine ambitious counterfet in Macedonia who called himselfe Philip and would be reputed the next heire of the Crowne but was discovered and nicknamed Pesudo-Philippus Also in the Raigne of Commodus one pretended to be Sextus Claudianus the son of Maximus with many such that are obvious in old stories and many of the like stampe have beene here convicted in England which bred the greater jealousy of this Richard when hee came first to be heard of Though those jealosies proceeded not from the detection of any fraud in him but of the late imposture of the said Lambert the Shooemakers son and the abuse of the Complotters for the Kingdome having been abused with those Pseudo-Clarences had reason to bee doubtfull of every unknowne person which assumed the name of greatnesse in regard whereof many shrunke in their opinions from this Perkin or Richard many others suspecting their beliefe were very curious to inform themselves who the further they inquired were the more confirmed that hee was no other but the second son of Edward the Fourth against whom those of the harder credulity objected it as an impossibility that this young Duke could bee conveyed out of the Tower so long and so concealed which the wiser sort could easily answer by many ancient examples which give us divers Relations of Noble Children preserved more admirably and this young Duke himselfe in his owne behalfe when such objections were made against him did alledge to Iames King of Scotland the History of Ioah mentioned in the Booke of the Kings and that most speciall one of Moses which the Dutches his Aunt Sister German to his Father was strongly confirmed in giving him all answerable and honorable accommodation so did the chiefe Nobility of those parts and as an heire of the house of Yorke there was rendred him the Title of La Rose-Blanch the proper and ancient devise of the house of Yorke with all a gallant Guard of Souldiers was allowed him for attendance and much was hee favored by the Arch-Duke Maximilian King of the Romans by Philip his Sonne Duke of Burgondy Charles the French King the King of Portugall and Scotland by the chiefest of Ireland and many Personages in England who at extreame perill and hazard avowed him to be the second son of Edward the fourth The Princes aforementioned readily supplying him with Coyne and assistance towards his atcheivements King Henry actively apprehends what it threatned and bestirs himselfe to take of their inclinations dispatching Doctor William Warkam after Archbishop of Canterbury with Sr. Edward Poynings a grave and worthy Knight to under-rare his credit with those Princes and such strong perswasions were used That Philip Duke of Burgondy for his Father Maximilian was before returned into Austria utterly declines himselfe and his subjects from his first ingagement but excepted the Widdow Dutchesse of Burgondy over whom hee had no power of command because shee had all justice and Jurisdiction in those large signories whereof her dowry was composed And thus Richard was supplanted here what hope of ayde hee had or did expect by his voyage into Portugall I cannot say though his entertainment there was honorable but by reason of the distance of the Country â—it may bee thought hee was
to your Father-hood by the Passion of Jesus Christ this man is truly the King Don Sebastian he hath all the markes on his body without failing in any one as he had in his infancy only the wounds excepted which he received in that Battel at Affricke he gives the reason of his life account of all his passages c. He is knowne and re-known by the Conciergres by the Judges by the greater part of the Senate and by his owne Confessor c. and a great deal more of him upon knowledg he justifies as much witnesses Ion de Castro Sonne to Don de Alvaro de Castro one of the four Governours that ruled the Kingdome Conjunctly with the King Don Sebastian who in his letter the same man sayes thus The King Don Sebastian whom the enemies call a Calabrois is the very same which is detained here as certainly as you are Fryer Ioseph and my selfe Don Ion. He departed alive from the battaile but very sore wounded God having so delivered him with some other of his company amongst whom was the Duke Anegro c. as for the Exterior marks of his body he wants not one of them he is wounded on the brow of the right eye and on the head as many witnessed when they saw him in the Affrick Battell His hand-writing is still the same observing the very same method as is very well remembred by divers There might much more be instanced in the behalfe of this Sebastian but this may serve for better intelligence to which I may adde that men experienced in the Affaires and policy of State know it a rare thing to find in any History the examples of a Prince being seised and possessed of any Signiory or Principality how unlawfull soever who hath resigned them or any part to the true heires Have we not instances at home where the Sonne hath taken the Kingdome from the Father and would not let it goe againe but rather endeavoured to hast his Fathers fate Much after that manner when Henry Duke of Lancaster had got the Kingdome he held it and would not resigne to the right Heyr Richard the second nor after his death to the Earle of March though these were no Impostors neither was Edward Earl of Warwicke yet King Henry would not let his hold goe and the Cardinall Favourite finding he could not compasse his aymes one way contrived it another By the Machivilian advice he gave to Ferdinand King of Castile not to conclude the treaty of the Marriage betweene Prince Arthur and his Daughter Katherine untill this Earle and Perkin were disposed of which Ferdinando followed and urged the King pretending it the security of his Estate and Issue In briefe it is not possible to perswade a private man though wrongfully possessed to acknowledge the true proprietary hath a better title then he How unjustly have the Kings of Spaine detain'd sundry Signeuries and Principalities from the lawfull Heirs yet if the wrong done by such another disseising Lord be put to this former Usurper Malafide as the Imperiall Iurisconsults will terme him his sentence will be such a Rapinous Prince doth wrong But let us now take a more particular view of those witnesses who stood for Perkin And having formerly mentioned Sir Robert Clifford a Knight of the Noble Family of the Barons Cliffords I will proceed with that which may be the more remarkable in him because hee was of a Family that long hated the House of Yorke from the Battaile of Wakefield when and where they resolved an enmity so deadly as was not to bee reconciled or satisfied whilst one of them remained yet became followers againe of the White Rose family and this Sir Robert Clifford served King Edward very neare and in good credit so could not but have an assured knowledge of the Kings Sonnes and was therefore the more particularly sent to certifie his knowledge who certainely affirmed him to bee the younger sonne of Edward 4. and confirmed many with him such as had likewise served King Edward and had been acquainted with the Prince his conveying beyond Sea though much was done to alter Sir Roberts opinion the Lord Fitz-Walter was of the same beliefe and avowed Perkin the true Duke of York most constantly unto death as resolute was Sir William Stanley though he were Lord Chamberlaine to Henry the seventh and in great favour with Sir George Nevill Brother to the Earle of Westmorland Sir Symon Mountford Sir William Daubeny father to the Lord Daubeny Sir Thomas Thwaits Sir Robert Ratcliffe of the house of the Baron FitzWalter Sir Iohn Taylor Sir Thomas Chaloner Thomas Bagnall with many other Gentlemen of quality all maintaining him to be the Duke of Yorke sonne of Edward the fourth sundry of the Clergy who had beene Chaplaines to the King his Father or otherwise occasioned to attend the Court as Doctor Rochford Doctor Poynes Doctor Sutton Doctor Worsley Deane of St. Pauls Doctor Leyborn Doctor Lesly with many other learned Professors of Divinity who would not endure to heare him called Perkin The Lord FitzWater Sir William Stanley Sir Simon Mountford Sir Robert Ratcliffe Sir William Daubeny as martyrs of state confirmed their Testimonies with their bloods So did the Kings Serjant Ferrier who left the Kings service and applyed himself to Perkin for which he was executed as a Traitor and one Edwards who had served this Duke Richard was cut in pieces for the same cause also Corbet Sir Quinton Betts and Gage Gentlemen of good worth with 200. more at least put to death in sundry Cities and Townes particularly in Kent Essex Suffolke Norfolke and about London for their confidence and opinions in this Prince There were some great men though they made noe profession of their knowledge of him could whisper it one to another which in generall words is confessed by all our better writers who say that as well the Noblemen as others held the said Perkin to be the younger Sonne of King Edward the Fourth And Sir Thomas Moore after Doctor Morton thus writeth The man commonly called Perkin Warbeck was as well with the Prince as with the people held to be the younger Sonne of King Edward the Fourth Richard Grafton affirmeth the same in Flanders saith he and most of all here in England it was received for an undoubted truth not onely of the people but of the Nobles that Perkin was the Sonne of King Edward the Fourth And they all swore and affirmed this to be true The learned and famous Mr. Cambden averreth there were many wise grave and persons of good intelli gence who liued in that time and neere it That affirmed considently this Perkin was second Sonne to King Edward then both the Brothers were not made a way by King Richard and sarely it was little reason or policy to cut off the one spare the other neither indeed was there ever any proofes made by Testimony Argument or Presumption
nor by Reason Honour or Policy that this crime could be his though many to the contrary for he not onely preserved his Nephew the young Earle of Warwicke but in his confidence a speciall note of his magnanimity gave him libertie pleasure and the command of a Statly house of his owne Now if he had beene so Ambitious and bloudy he would have provided otherwise for him knowing his Title was to take place if his bloud had not beene attainted in his Father in regard whereof King Richard when his owne Sonne was dead caused his Nephew Iohn de la Poole Eldest Sonne of the Duke of Suffolke and of the Dutches his sister then the next lawfull heir to the Crowne to be proclaimed heir apparant an Argument of respect to his kindred next title to the Crowne in whomsoever it was which other men regarded not so much as the unhappy Sequel shewed there was an impious necessitie in that for whilst the Prince of Yorke survived Especially the males no other titular Lord or pretender could be King by his owne right or by colour of right nor by any other meanes unlesse he had married a daughter and the Eldest Daughter of King Edward the Fourth And although the deathes manner of taking away these Princes the Sonnes of King Edward is held by our writers uncertaine and obscure It is manifest at least for the generall manner of their death to be either by the Publicke sword that is the sword of Justice or of Battaile as were King Richard the Children of the Duke of Clarence and the Duke of Suffolke c or by the private sword that is by secret and close slights treachery which the Romans called Insidiae dolus by Smothering Strangling Poyson Sorcery c. And that the sword was used against the family of Yorke there is more then conjecture both by Testimonies of writers and records King Edward himselfe as Credible Authors report dyed of poyson In the Parliament Anno. 1. Richardi tertij there was aâ—cused and attainted of sorcerie and such other devilish practices Doctor Lewis Doctor Morton William Knevitt of Buckin gham the Countesse of Richmont Thomas Nandick of Cambridge Conjurer with others There was also an Earle accused of the same hellish Art and an old Manuscript Booke which I have seene sayes that Doctor Morton and a certaine Countesse contriveing the death of King Edward and others resolv'd it by poyson Which are conjectures and proofes more positive and strong against them then any they have against King Richard but it was a great neglect in their malice makeing King Richard soe politick and treacherous as they did not to charge him also with these Princes Sisters For it could not serve his turne to rid away the Brothers and not them who were capable of the Crowne and had their turne royall before any Collaterall males Then he had the children of his elder Brother George Duke of Clarence Edward Plantagent Earl of Warwick the Lady Margaret his sister after countesse of Salisbury to make away for they without their Fathers corruption of bloud which might easily have beene salved by Parliament the Lords and Commons affecting them had a Priority of bloud and precedency of Title before the Protector I would aske the reason too why King Richard might not endure his Nephewes being by Parliament held and adjudged illegitimate as well as the Kings Henry 7. and Henry the eight endured Arthur Plantagenet the Bastard of the same King Edward their natales and cases being alike or why Sir Thomas Moore and Doctor Morton should in one place say it was held in doubt when or how they were made away and in another place to averr that Tiroll and Dighton being examined confessed plainely the murder of them and all the manner of it These be contraries which with a great disadvantage drawes their allegation into another argument Bicorne or Crocodilites For in revealing the confession of these men it is implicatively granted their fault was not then to be punished and soe it appeares no fault or not worth the consideration the confession of a man being the greatest evidence can be produced against him Then in regard the confession of those was such as might not be opened nor the crime called in question as the same Authors acknowledge it was but a fained confession and they had done better not to have mentioned such a thing which begot but a jealousie in the falsitie thereof or privity of some great ones in it a just imputation of injustice upon the Magistracy For if Dighâ—on Tirroll Forrest and Slater confesse the murder in Act and manner King Richard being dead who was said to subborne and protect them necessarily and in due course of justice especially in the Act of so high a nature and notice as this was The punishment should have beene expected with all extremity But being for some unknowne causes deferred and after a while quite omitted and pardoned it may be thought such strange Clemency and impunitie proceeded from a singular high indulgence or else those examinations and confessions werebut Buzes and quaint devises to amaze the people and entertaine them with expectation of a justice to be done in some more convenient time which was never This was after the death of King Richard All that was done before was to make him the Author of that horrible crime and no bodie else For Dighton and the rest were in security and liberty yet it stood in good steed with the Lancastrians to draw the peoples hate upon King Richard not unlike that story of great Alexander and a noble man in his Court who stood so high in the favour of his Nobles and people that the King grew jealous and fearefull of his Popularity studying how he might decline it and him to contempt but could finde no colour or apt occasion because he was soe strongly fixt in the peoples likeing and was a man of so great a desert that noe crime could bee charged upon him The King unbosoming himselfe to the councell and care of a friend one Medius of his Country as I thinke had this advise Sir quoth hee let not this mans greatnesse trouble you cause him to be accused of some hainous crime though falsly and wee will finde meanes to make him guiltie so formally and firmely that the brand of it shall sticke up on him ever which he delivered in these termes though divers yet the same in effect Medeatur licet vulueri qui morsus aut dilaniatus est remanebit tamen Cicatrix And it is truely approved by an Antient Christian Poet thus Paulum distare videntur Suspecti verèque rei The guilty and suspected Innocent In mans opinion are little different For there is no more dangerous or fatall destiny to greatenesse then to be intangled in the multitudes contempt Odium et Contempt us being the two evills that overthrow Kings and Kingdomes the one that is Contempt
proceeding from the vanity and obstinacy of the Prince the other from the peoples opinion of him and his vices And then he must neither raigne nor live any longer Ennius said with Cicero quem oderunt perijsse expetunt And soe all that was practised upon the fortune fame and person of King Richard was by this rule though in the judgment and equity of the most knowing in those times their cunning translatio Criminis could take noe hold of him neither appeares it probable that the Earle of Richmond himselfe when he had got all justice and power in his hand did hold King Richard guilty of the murder and Subornation of those fellowes nor them the Assasines for doubtlesse then being so wise and religious a Prince he would have done all right to the lawes divine and humane And that I beleeve in the extreamest and publick'st way of punishment to make it more satisfactory and terrible to the people and times but they freely inioyed their liberty with security to naturall deaths without any question or apprehension Tirrell excepted who suffered for treason not long after committed by him against King Henry himselfe Neither was Iohn Greene named a party in this murder ever called in question nor doe the Historians of those times though meere temporizers charge him with this practise against his Nephewes untill after his Coronation some say they survived King Richard and giveing this respiâ—e of time there was no cause why after that he should make them away being then secure in his Throne and Title and they longe before pronounced uncapable First by the ecclesiasticall Iudges then by the Barons and Parliament and where was the cause of feare but if King Richard had beene of that bloody constitution the man whose life could be most prejudiciall unto him was the Erle of Warwicke lawfull Sonne of George Plant agenet Duke of Clarence Elder Brother to King Richard now there was a necessitie for the Lancastrian faction if they must have a King of that family to take those Princes away not to leave King Richard or his Sonne nor yet any legitimate issue of Lancaster for all those were before any of the house of Beauforts in the true order of Succession and stood in their way so did the Progeny of Brotherton of Woodstocke of both the Clarencies Glocester c. Though they feared few or none of those Titulare Lords being modest men not affecting Soveraignty but content with their owne private fate and feudall estate when all was one with the Lancastrians who were so vehement in their royall approaches that besides King Edward the Fourth and his two Sonnes King Richard and his Son the Prince of Wales there was afterward and as occasion served The Earle of Warwicke and Duke of Suffolke and others both male and female of that princly family laid in their cold vrnes and it must be so else there could be no place for the Beauforts and Somersets their turnes being last the Kings of Portugall of Castile and other being before them if not excluded by Act of Parliament In this Tragedy there was a Scene acted by Iohn de Vere Earle of Oxenford which may be worthy of our observation for example sake and makes not against the cause of Perkin This Earle of Oxenford much affected and devoted to King Henry the Seventh was a great enemie to this Richard Alias Perkin and I thinke the onely enemie he had of the great Nobility how this dislike grew I cannot say whether out of ignorance or incredulity or out of malice hateing King Edward and all that had a neare relation to that family or else to applyhimselfe to the honour of the King but he and the Cardinall are said to be the châ—ife vrgers of Perkins dispatch and hee being high constable pronounced the sentence against the young Earle of Warwicke which much distasted the Country and ne're to Heveningham Castle that was his cheifest Seate there lived in the woods an old Hermit a very devoute and holy man as the fame of those times admit him who seem'd much troubled to heare this newes for the love he bare to the ancient and Noble family of Oxenford of much anguish of Spirit saying the Earle and his house would repent and rue that guilty and bloody pursuite of the innocent Princes for the event of which prophesy this hath bine observed Not long after the Earle was arrested for an offence so small that no man considering his merit and credit with the King could have thought it worth the question for which he was fined at thirty thousand pounds in those dayes a kingly sum after this he lived many yeares in great discontent and dyed without issue or any child lawfully begotten by him and in much shorter time then his life time that great and stately Earldome of Oxenford with the opulent and Princly patrimony was utterly dissipated and como sal in agna as the Spaniard saith in the refran yet this Earle was a very wise magnificent learned and religious man in the estimation of all that knew him and one more like to raise and acquire a new Erledome But it thus fell and was wasted the Castles and Mannors dilapidated the Chappell wherein this Iohn de Vere and all his Ancestors lay intombed with their monuments quite defaced to the ground their bones left under the open Aire in the feilds and all this within lesse then threescore yeares after the death of the said Earle Iohn about the same time these unhappie Gentlemen suffered there was a base sone of King Richard the Third made away having beene kept long before in Prison The occasion as it seemeth was the attempt of certaine Irishmen of the West and South parts who would have got him into their power and made him their cheife being strongly affected to any of the house of Yorke were they legitimate or naturall for Richard Duke of Yorkes sake sometimes their viceroy and thus much in breife of that Now to resolve a question why the King deferred so long the death execution of the Earle of Warwick Perkin and tooke so much deliberation after he had resolved it one reason and the cheifest brought by some is That in regard Perkin was an Alien and in the allegeance of a Forraigne Prince therefore he could not be condemned nor executed for felony nor treason by our lawes which is a ridiculous evasion for we have frequent examples in our stories that the naturall subjects of France of Scotland Spaine Portugall Germany and Italy have had judgement and execution by our lawes for felony and treason as Peter de Gaveston a French man Sir Andrew Harcley a Scot and lately Dr. Lopez a Portugall therefore apparantly that was not the cause the King so doubtfully and as it were timerously deferred their Arraignments Executions The Heathens perhaps would have defined it some inward awe or concealed scruple such as they called Eumenides and
Eurinnies and beleeved haunted those men that had purposed or acted a wickednesse upon which the Poet said well Patiturque unos mens saucia Manes And assigned to every man his protecting Spirit whom the Greekes called Doemones the Latines Genios concluding that when the Genius of him against whom the mischiefe aimes is stronger and more active then his who is to act it there the Plot hardly taketh effect For example produce the mortall enmity betweene Octavianus Caesar and M. Antonius in which Anthony could never prevaile by any Attempt who consulting with his Soothsayers they give the reason to beethe power of Octavians Genius above his It is reported the great Philosopher Appollonius had such a secret protection and so strong that the Emperour Domitian had no power over his life though hee studied meanes to take it Suidas adding that this Philosopher in confidence of his Genius when he left the Emperour added this verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Me non occides quia fataliter protectus sum which is that Flamius Vopiscus calleth Majestatem Apollonij as I ghesse and with it the Profestors of Christian Religion agree in the effects not in the causes for those whom the Heathen call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Daemones c. Genios the Christian Theologues call Angels or Spirits whereof they hold good and bad But to returne to the matters further Allegate Probate The industrious Antiquary Master Iohn Stow being required to deliver his opinion concerning the proofes of this murther affirmed it was never proved by any credible evidence no not by probable suspitions or so much as by the Knights of the Post that King Richard was guilty of it And Sir Thomas Moore being puzelled with his Equivocations sayes that it could never come to light what became of the bodies of these two Princes Grafton Hall and Hollinshead agreeing in the same report that the trueth hereof was utterly unknowne Then where is their farre seeing knowledge that will have them transported into Forraign Countreyes or drowned or their giganticke proofes that say peremptorily they were both murthered and buryed in the Tower by those foure named before if so we need go no further for the truth But these are splenitick reaches and the Parachronisme is too groste as the Comaedian said Quod dictum indictum est Quod modo ratum irritum est Besides if Perkin were not the second Sonne of King Edward he must bee nothing for the Flemish French and Wallons acknowledged no such Noble young man to be borne in Warbecke or in Tourney but make honourable mention of a young Sonne of the King of England who was brought to the Dutchesse of Burgundy his Aunt being then in Flanders and how hee was in France and in other Kingdomes And surely so many Noble and discreet English if they had not knowne him to be the same by most certaine tokens and evidence would not so confidently have laid downe their lives to confirme their knowledge of him or hazarded their judgements and honours upon an Imposture or vanity especially those who had places of Quality and Eminency neare the King then living and were in favour at Court Therefore I would be resolv'd from our Anti-Richards what aim those Noble-men could have in averring him the Son of Edward the Fourth by the hazard of their lives and Estates if the KING pleased and how could they expect lesse for though they were enough to justifie it a truth they were too few to maintaine it against him there could be no aime or hope to super-induce young Richard to be King but meerly I am perswaded in point of truth and honour as they thought themselves bound to doe they freely tendred their lives to make good what their Conscience knowledge witnessed for it would be an Imposture of a miraculous Deception so many worthy and wise persons both of the Nobility and Clergy some of them having served the King his Father and himselfe that they all in their particular and generall intelligence and understandings should be mistaken and cheated I say it was a strange delusion if it could bee so but indeede those that would have it so leave it in question and know not well what to make of their own relations or how to resolve his History and if wee marke Sir Francis Bacon in the life of Henry the Seventh though his speculation be tender and as favourable as hee can that way touching the History of this young Duke hee gently slides from it Explicit liber tertius THE FOVRTH BOOKE OF THE HISTORY OF KING RICHARD the Third The Contents UPon what occasion the sentence of Bastardy was given upon the Children of King Edward the 4 th and why The sundry Loves Wooings Contracts and Marriages of King Edward the Fourth His divers Concubines His device of the Fetterlock and the Faulcon His wooing the Lady Elianor Talbott alias Butler the Lady Bona of Savoy and the Lady Elizabeth Gray widdow his marriage with her His former Marriage or Contract with the said Elianor her wrongs and her death Kings must not marry the daughters of their Vassalls nor other without the consent of their Barons Doctor Stillington Bishop of Bath Imprisoned for speaking of King Edwards Marriage with the Lady Elianor Talbott Spuria vitulamina How King Edward might have salved those Errors and prevented all the mischiefes following them The Children of King Edward the Fourth declared and adjudged illegitimate King Edwards death suspected by poyson the mortality of the Plantagenets The Authority of Parliament Parliaments how so called and derived Parliaments against Parliaments The first Parliament of King Henry the seventh what Treason is whether Soveraigne Princes may be said to commit Treason against their Subiects The treaty of Marriage between K. Richard the third and the Lady Elizabeth Plantagenet and cheifely sought by her selfe and the Queene her Mother The entertainement of the Lady Elizabeth at the Court the first Libell of Divorse the scruples of the Lady Elizabeth King Richard never meant to marry her The marriages of Neeces allowed by the Pope and usuall the true cause of Sir Thomas Moores Condemnation and execution The FOVRTH BOOK OF King Richard The Third THe Title King Richard the Third had to the Crown acâ—rued to him by the illegitimacie of the Children of King Edward the Fourth and the Attainder of the Duke of Clarence with the Corruption of his Blood and forfeiture of the Title in him and in his Heirs of which there was no question but of the forfeiture and disheritage of the sons of Edward the Fourth there hath been much The true cause hath not nor cannot be well known without the Narration of King Edward's sundry Loves and Wooings specially his Contracts and Marriages I shall not need to intimate how amorous and wanton this King was his many Mistrisses or Amasia's he kept in several private places whereof the most famous was Katharine de Clarington
vires Major in exiguo regnabat corpore virtus In te enim sunt rei militaris virtus peritia foelicitas autoritas quae omnia in optimo exercitus principe Cicero requirit In te Serenissime Princeps praeclari Regis Imperatoris praecepta it a concurrunt ut nihil ad tuam Bellicam aut domesticam virtutem cujusquam oratoris verbis apponi possit Tu igitur Serenissime Domine Princeps de ineunda inter te nostrum Principem charitate amicitia sic age ut Angli Scoti dilectionis respectu nullum penitus discrimen habeatur sed in unum amoris benevolentiae vinculum videantur esse connexi sic numerabiles commoditates ex tui nostri populi dilectione dulci connubio unione Matrimonio Affinitate consurgent In freta dum fluvii current dum montibus umbrae Lustrabunt connexa polus dum sidera pascet Dum juga montis aper fluvios dum piscis amabit Dumque Thymo pascentur apes dum rore cicadae Semper honos nomenque tuum laudesque manebunt But what is this or more to malice and detraction that haunt him to his death and after that making the Catastrophe or last Tragical act of his life at Bosworth-field an immediate stroke of the divine vengeance for such offences as they please to particular from women or superstitious Clerks whose natures startle at the noise of War and Martial trial to whose fears and weaknesse such reasons would sound tolerable But if Bishop Morton and Sir Thomas Moor although they were men of the long Robe had considered with whom they conversed and where they most lived how could they forget That to die valiantly in the field for Countrey life and friends was always held a glorious farewel to the world or what infinite numbers of vertuous and most noble Captains have fallen so by the Sword and fate of War Lampridius affirmeth that all the best men have died violent deaths and what higher Quarrel could call any Heroical spirit then King Richard's fighting for a Crown kingdom and all his happie Fortunes here God hath many times taken away Princes and changed the Government of kingdoms for the iniquities of the people why then should not King Richard's fate be held in a modest Scale until we can better know or judge it Nor can it be safe to enquire or peremptorily to determine further after Gods proceedings in such cases He that owes him no malice things looked upon thorow judgement and charity may with more justice say he died valiantly and in a just quarrel when many of his enemies fell by deaths more vile and shameful Executions But he that hath but a reasonable pittance of Humanity will censure no mans life by the manner of his death for many good and holy men have suffered by violent deaths though it be this Princes fortune to fall under the ill affections of envious pens more then many that committed more publike and proved crimes then he which wanted much of his vertues and desert Examine him with Henry the First the good Clerk and learned Prince but so covetous and ambitious that he could not be content to usurp in this Kingdom the Right and Primogeniture of his elder brother Robert Courthose but by force took the Dukedom of Normandy from him and to make his injuries more exact and monstrous cast him into the Castle of Gloucester there kept him in cruel durance and caused his eyes to be put out so wearied him to most miserable death King Iohn by the general voice is charged with the murder of Arthur Plantagenet the son of his eldest brother and so the next Prince in right of blood to King Richard the First And it is written by good Authors that Edward the Third was not onely privie and consenting to the deposing the King his father a King anointed but also to his Massacre And because Edward Plantagenet Earl of Kent Protector and his Uncle moved him to restore the Crown to his father Edward the Second he called him Traitor and cut off his head at Westminster How King Henry the Fourth caused King Richard the Second the true and anointed King to be cruelly butchered at Pomfret is too notorious and this was Scelera sceleribus tueri King Edward the Fourth is accused of the murder and death of the King Saint Henry and of Edward Prince of Wales his son Ut supra King Henry the Seventh although amongst the best Kings in his general character is not thought guiltlesse of that Crimen sacrum vel regale in cutting off Edward Plantagenet Earl of Warwick an innocent Edwardum filium Ducis Clarenciae puerum infantem in suam suorum securitatem capite plexit And to secure his Estate had more then learnt other smart rules of Policie That reach of State upon Philip of Austrich Duke of Burgundy King of Castile and Arragon is not the least memorable This Prince Philip was by crosse Fortune put into the Kings hands purposing out of Flanders to go into Spain with the Queen his wife took shipping at Sluce and passing by the coasts of England was by a tempest forced for his safety to put into the Port of Weymouth in Dorset-shire the Queen being ill and distempered much with the storm was compelled to make some stay there Sir Iohn Carew and Sir Thomas Trenchard principal men in those parts gave speedy intelligence of this to the King who was glad of the accident and purposed to make good use of it as speedily returning his command to give them all honourable entertainment but not suffer them to depart until he had seen and saluted them The Duke ignorant of this as soon as the Queen and the rest had recover'd and refresht themselves thought he was onely to give those Knights thanks and take his leave which they by way of courtesie and request interpose in behalf of the Kings vehement desire to salute him and the Queen a motion the Duke much prest to be excused from as the necessity of his journey stood but the intreaty was so imperious he must stay and alter his journey for Windsor to meet the King who received him there in a magnificent manner and at the height of a Feast propounds a suit to the Duke for Edmund de la Pool then in his Dominions a pretender to the Crown of England and not so soundly affected to him a suit of a harsh exposition as the Duke apprehended it and to the blemish of his honour and piety as he nobly urged but no argument had vertue nor no vertue argument enough to excuse it the King must have him or the Duke must stay Cast upon this extreme and foreseeing what disadvantages were upon him some honourable conditions granted that he should neither lay punishment nor death upon him he gave his promise to send him and the King strictly and religiously bound himself to the exceptions
The Duke accordingly sent this de la Pool into England who upon his arrival was delivered to the Tower but his life not toucht until the King lay a dying then he equivocated his Vow by a Mental Reservation enjoyning his son after his death to cut off his head which was done when he came to be King and was held some taint to them both though the son held himself acquit warranted by the example of King Solomon who was made the instrument of such another subtil slaughter by his father David that thought he kept himself by equivocation examples not to be imitated by any Christian Prince being a sin and sins are to be avoided not imitated The eldest brother of these de la Pools Iohn de la Pool heir to the Duke of Suffolk and Head of this Family was slain casually at the Battel of Stoke and is he who as neerest kinsman to King Richard the Third was proclaimed heir apparant The sister of these Princely de la Pools the Lady Katherine was kept close prisoner in the Tower until grief and sorrow bowed her to the grave Nor is it much from our purpose to note that the chief Plantagenets namely the children of King Edward the Fourth had but cold influences then for the Lady Bridget was thrust into a Nunnery at Dartford chiefly as it was thought that she should live sterile and die without issue The Lady Cecily was married to a base fellow that so her issue might be ignoble and contemptible the wrong being the greater in regard she was offered Matches to her quality the King of Scotland propounding Prince Iames unto her and the French King Lewis demanded her for the Dolphin Charles of France It was observed too that this King was but an unkinde and severe husband to his Queen indeed they had all but short lives and our Stories report he picked a quarrel with the Queen-Dowager-Mother for an old and venial errour because she delivered her son Richard to the Protector for which there was a Confiscation upon all her Goods Chattels and Revenues and she confined to Bermondsey Abbey where she lived not long care and grief untwisting the threed of her sad fate And when death had seized him from all the glories and policies of this world his son succeeds and then Residuum Locustae Bruchus comedit residuum Bruchi comedit Rubigo for what remained of the House of York he gave the last blowe to and after the dispatch of the aforesaid Edmund de la Pool caused the Lady Margaret Plantagenet Countesse of Salisbury then daughter and heir of George Duke of Clarence to be attainted of Treason by Act of Parliament and condemned unheard being dragged to the Block barbarously by the hair of her head though above Threescore yeers in age Anno 33 Henr. 8. Not long after Sir Henry Pool her eldest son was put to death and her son Reynold Pool was attainted of Treason with her no man knowing what the Treason was but got suddenly out of the Kingdom into Italy where he became much favoured by the Princes there and by the Popes afterward made Cardinal and highly renowned in those times for his Learning Piety and other noble merits Richard Pool another son of the Countesse of Salisbury fled and lived a banished man in forraign Countreys yet at the height of a good reputation until he was slain at the Battel of Pavia These be sad pauses which my Pen but touches at to note the Partiality of some on one side and the malignity of some on the other side who have made King Richard the worst of all Princes when other of our own have had as great an appetite of Empire whose fames and sacred names we gratulate with honour Nor let my just and plain meaning be mistaken which urges nothing in dislike or exprobation that King Henry the Seventh had the Crown whom our age must acknowledge a wise provident and religious Prince The restorer of the ancient Line of the British Kings to their Raign and Kingdom Nephew of King Henry the Sixth by his Grandmother Queen Katherine widow of King Henry the Fifth and mother of King Henry the Sixth and of his brother Uterine Edmund Teudor Earl of Richmond the father of this King Henry the Seventh and so he was Nephew also to Charles the Seventh King of France I onely conceive he took it by too violent a hand not staying tempus bene placiti And here I may fitly take occasion to make up a Defect or Brack covertly imputed to the Titles of the Normans and Princes of York by our vulgar Historians and Chroniclers And first we are to suppose If there be it grew by the errour of King Edwards Marriage by which they hold that Title was weakned at the least blemished but that could have no continuance being made sound again as soon as King Richard came to raign and after cured and confirmed by the mighty power of sundry Parliaments by which it was made as strong and firm as ever besides the aid of the Dispensations Apostolical in those times sacred and authentick And without that if need were our King now raigning hath other Royal Rights more then funiculusi Triplex some more ancient authentick and just therefore more secured and of more prosperous hopes then that Norman Title which was a violent acquest of the Sword and a purchase made by blood so consequently none of the best which was well conceived by that great Macedon when he said Non est diuturna possessio in quam gladio inducimus Neither would it avail in this behalf to cite or avouch the Donation of this Kingdom which the Confessor is said to have made to William the Conquerour being to no purpose because that gift or Legacy was disclaimed and disallowed by the Barons of this Land and found to be void Yet time now and prescription have also made that Title good for prescription hath power to ratifie and confirm the Titles both of Princes and of private men But our King is the immediate and sole lawful Heir of King Egbert who first gave the name of England to this Land and was absolute Lord of it from him by the glorious Kings Edgar Edmund Athelstan Alfred and many others as well Saxons and Angles as Anglo-Saxons the Right and Title of this Kingdom is duely descended and devolved to Edmund Ironside King of England who was father to the most Noble Clyto Edward sirnamed Exul whose fair daughter and heir a religious Lady the Princesse Margaret of England was married to Malcom Canmoire King of Scotland from which ancient and happie Alliance the King our Soveraign Lord is directly and certainly descended and is the true and onely Heir to the Rights and Titles which were without flaw so the most ancient and famous Title and Right of the first Kings of Britain are in him being the next Heir of our last British King Henry Teudor
THE HISTORY of the Life and Reigne of RICHARD The Third Composed in five Bookes By GEO BUCK Esquire Honorandus est qui injuriam non fecit sed qui alios eam facere non patitur duplici Honore dignus est Plato de legibus Lib. 5. Qui non repellit a proximo injuriam si potest tam est in vitio quam ille qui infert D. Ambros. offic Lib. 3. LONDON Printed by W. Wilson and are to be sold by VV. L. H. M. and D. P. 1647. The true Portraiture of Richard Plantagenest of England and of France King Lord of Ireland the third King Richard TO THE FAVOVRABLE ACCEPTANCE Of the Right Honourable PHILIP Earle of Pembrooke and Mountgomery c. Sir HAving collected these papers out of their dust I was bold to hope there might be somthing in them of a better fate if mine obscure pen darken not that too Please your Lordshipp to let your name make them another witnesse of your noblenesse it may redeeme and improve them to a clearer opinion and acknowlegedment of these times in which I am to meet every Critick at his owne weapon who will challenge the Book at the very Title The Malicious and Malevolent with their blotted Coments the Captious Incredulous with their jealous praecisianâ—sines whose inclinations shewes them of envious perplexed natures to looke at other mens actions and memory by the wrong end of the perspective and me thinks I fancy them to our shaddowes which at noone creepe behind like Dwarfes atevening stalke by like Gyants they will haunte the noblest merits and endeavors to their Sun-set then they monster it but to the Common-rout they are another kind of Genius or ignis fatuus leades them into darke strange wanderings there they stick for to perswade the opinionated vulgar out of their ignorant selves is of as high a beliefe to me as to transpeciate a Beast into a man I therefore shall crave favour to protest these papers beyond their Censure and humour But to those they are wished I hope their weak accesses may be the more pardonable since they are the kindlings and scintillations of a modest Ambition to truth and gratitude which gives me the encouragement to assure your Lordship that if mine Authors be sincere and faithfull my penis free and innocent having learned that a story as it ought must be a just perspicuous Narration of things memorable spoken and don The Historiographer veritable free from all Prosopolepsyes or partiall respects and surely his pen should tast with a great deal of Conscience for there is nothing leaves so an infected a sting or scandall as History it rankles to all posterity wounds our good names to all memory places by an Authentick kind of preiudice I am with his opinion in his excellent Religio Medici who holds it an offence to Charity and as bloody a thought one way as Nero's in another My Lord under these humble addresses this sues to your honoured hand Presented by the unfained wishes of your Honours avowed and humble Servant GEO BUCK The ARGUMENT and CONTENTS of the First Booke The Linage Family Birth Education and Tirociny of King Richard the third THe Royall house of Plantagenest and the beginning of that name What Sobriquets were The antiquity of Sirnames Richard is created Duke of Gloucester his marriage and his issue His martiall imployments His Iourney into Scotland and recovery of Barwick The death of King Edward the 4 th The Duke of Gloucester made Lord Protector and soone after King of England by importunate suite of his Barons and of the People as the next true and lawfull heire Henry Teudor Earle of Richmond practiseth against the King He is conveyed into France The Noble Linage of Sir William Herbert his Imployment He is made Earle of Pembrooke King Edward the 4 th first and after King Richard sollicite the Duke of Brittaine and treat with him for the delivery of the young Earle of Richmond his Prisoner The successe of that businesse The quality and title of the Beauforts or Sommersets The Linage and Family of the Earle of Richmond The solemne Coronations of King Richard and of the Queene his wife his first at Westminster the second at Yorke Nobles Knights and Officers made by him Prince Edward his Son invested in the Principallity of Wales and the Oath of Allegeance made to him King Richard demandeth the Tribute of France His Progresse to Yorke His carefull charge given to the Iudges and Magistrates He holdeth a Parliament wherein the marriage of the King his Brother with the Lady Gray is declared and adjudged unlawfull their children to be illegitimate and not capable of the Crowne The Earle of Richmond and divers others attainted of Treason Many good Laws made The K. declared and approved by Parliament to be the only true and lawfull heire of the Crowne The King and Queene dowager are reconciled He hath secret advertisemeÌ„ts of Innovations and practises against him Createth a vice-Constable of England His sundry treaties with Forraigne Princes Doctor Morton corrupteth the Duke of Buckingham who becometh discontent demanding the Earledome of Hereford with the great Constableship of England He taketh Armes is defeated and put to death by marshall Law THE FIRST BOOKE OF THE HISTORY OF RICHARD THE THIRD OF ENGLAND AND OF FRANCE KING AND LORD OF IRELAND RIchard Plantagenet Duke of Glocester and King of England and of France and Lord of Ireland the third of that name was the younger sonne of Sir Richard Plantagenet the fourth Duke of Yorke of that Royall Family and King of England designate by King Henry the sixth and by the most noble Senate and universall Synod of this Kingdome the High Court of Parliament The Mother of this Richard Duke of Glocester was the Lady Cecily Daughter of Sir Ralph de Neville Earle of Westmerland by his wife Ioane de Beaufort the naturall Daughter of Iohn Plantagenet alias de Gaunt Duke of Guiene and Lancaster King of Castile and Leon third Sonne of King Edward the third for in that order this Duke is best accounted because William of Hatfield the second Sonne of King Edward the third dyed in his infancy and this Duke of Yorke and King designate was propagated from two younger sonnes of the same King Edward the third whereby he had both Paternall and Maternall Title to the Crowne of England and France But his better and nearer Title was the Maternall Title or that which came to him by his Mother the Lady Anne de Mortimer the Daughter and heire of Phillippa Plantagenet who was the sole Daughter and heire of Lyonell Plantagenet Duke of Clarence and second Sonne of King Edward the third according to the account and order aforesaid And this Lady Phillip was the Wife of Sir Edmond de Mortimer the great and famous Earle of March and that Duke Richard King designate by his Father Richard Plantagenet Duke of York sirnamed also de Conningsbâ—rrough issued directly and in a
against the Sonnes of King Edward And therefore being certaine there is no man to whom the Crowne by just Title can be so due as to our selfe the rightfull Sonne and Heire of our most deare and Princely Father Richard Duke of Yorke to which Title of blood and nature your favours have joyned this of Election wherein wee hold our selfe to be most strong and safe And having the lawfull power of both why should I endure my professed Enemy to â—surpemy right and become a Vassall to my envious Subject The necessitie of these causes as admitting no other remedy urges me to accept your offer and according to your request and our owne right we here assume the Regall Praeheminence of the two Kingdoms England and France from this day forward by us and our heires to Govern and defend the one and by Gods grace and your good aydes to recover and establish the other to the Ancient Allegeance of England desiring of God to live no longer then wee intend and endeavour the advancement and flourishing Estate of this Kingdome at which they all cry'd God save King Richard And thus he became King But yet his Detractors stick not to slander and accuse all that was said or done in these proceedings of State for meer dissimulation by which justice they may as well censure At siâ— Reverentia dictum all the Barons worthy and grave Commons which had their Votes therein which would fall a most impudent and intolerable Scandall upon all the High Court of Parliament for in short time after all that was alledged and acted in that Treatie and Colloquy was approved and ratified by the Court of Parliament so that their Cavills onely discover an extreame malice and envy For it was not possible therefore not credible he could upon such an instant as it were by any practice attaine to that power and credit with all the Barons Spirituall and Temporall and Commons to procure and perswade them from the Sonnes of King Edward so unanimously to become his Subjects and put the Crowne upon his head with such Solemnitie and publicke Ceremonies Whilst those matters had their current the Northerne Gentlemen and his Southerne Friends joyned in a Bill Supplicatory to the Lords Spirituall and Temporall earnestly expressing their desires for the Election of the Lord Protector with the former causes urged Also that the blood of the young Earle of Warwicke was attainted and his Title confiscate by Parliament This Bill was delivered to the Lords Assembled in the great hall at Westminster the Lord Protector sitting in the Chaire of Marble amongst them upon the 26 of June some six or seven dayes after he was Proclaimed the tenor of the Bill was thus written in the Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland PRotector eodem die quo Regimen sub titulo regii nominis sibi vendicarit viz 26 o die Iunii Anno Dom. 1483. se apud Magnam Aulam Westmonasterii in Cathedram Marmoream Immisit tum mox omnibus proceribus tam Laicis quam Ecclesiasticis Caeteris assidentibus astantibus c. ostendebatur rotulus quidam in quo per modum supplicationis in nomine procerum populi Borealis exhibita sunt Primum quod silii Regis Edwardi erant Bastardi supponendo illum praecontraxisse matrimonium cum quadam Domina Elianora Boteler antequam Reginam Elizabetham duxisset in uxorem deinde quod sanguis alterius Fratris Georgii Scil Clarensiâ— ducis fuisset Attinctus Ita quod nullus certus incorruptus sanguis Linealis ex parte Richardi Ducis Eboraci poterat inveniri nisi in persona Richardi Protectoris Ducis Glocestriae jam eidem Duci suplicabant ut jus suum in Regno Angliae sibi assumeret Coronam acciperet But the Barons were all accorded before this Bill came both sides moving with an equall and contented forwardnesse And in July next following 1483. was Crown'd and receiv'd with as generall Magnificence and Acclamations as any King in England many years before For as a grave man writeth Fuit dignissimus regno c. non inter malos sed bonos principes Commemorandus That he was most worthy to Reigne and to be numbred amongst the good not bad Princes The Queene his Wife was Crowned with him and with no lesse State and Greatnesse Accompanied him from the Tower to Westminster having in their Traine besides the Nobilitie of the South parts foure thousand Gentlemen of the North. Upon the 19. of June 1483. in the 25. yeare of Lewis the French King he was named King of England the morrow Proclaimed and rode with great Solemnitie from London to Westminster where in the seat Royall he gave the Judges of the Land a strickt and religious charge for the just executing of the Lawes then departed towards the Abbey being met at the Church doore with Procession and the Scepter of King Edward delivered to him by the Abbot so Ascended to Saint Edwards Shrine where he offered the Monks in the meane time singing Te Deum From thence he return'd to the Palace where he lodged untill his Coronation Upon the fourth of July he went to the Tower by water with the Queene his Wife and the next day Created Edward his onely Son about ten yeares old Prince of Wales He Invested Sir Iohn Howard who was made Lord Howard and Knight of the Garter 17. Edward 4. in the Dukedome of Norffolke in a favourable admission of the right of the Lady Margaret his Mother Daughter of Sir Thomas Mowbray Duke of Norffolke and an heire generall of the Mowbrayes Dukes of Norffolke and Earles of Surrey descended from the Lord Tho. Plantagenet of Brotherton a younger Sonne of King Edward the first and Earle of Norffolke This King also made him Marshall and Admirall of England he was as rightfully Lord Mowbray Lord Segrave Lord Bruce as Lord Howard as I have seene him Stiled by Royall Warrant in a Commission for Treatie of Truce with Scotland His eldest Sonne Sir Thomas Howard was at the same time Created Earle of Surrey and made Knight of the Garter Henry Stafford Duke of Buckingham was made Constable of England for terme of life but he claimed the Office by inheritance Sir Thomas Moore writes That Sir Thomas Howard Executed the Office of Constable that day William Lord Berkley was Created Earle of Nottingham Francis Lovel Viscount Lovel and Chamberlain to the King the Lord Stanley restor'd to liberty and made Steward of the Household Thomas Rotheram Chancellour and Arch-Bishop of Canterbury having beene committed for delivering the Great Seale to the Queene Widow receiv'd to grace and many Knights Addubbed of the old Order and some of the new or habit of the Bath whose names I have set downe to shew what regard was had of their Family and in those times accused of so much Malignity Sir Edward De-la-Poole Sonne to the Duke of Norfolke George Gray Sonne to the Earle of Kent William Souch Sonne to the
Anchor a while and claspe up this first Booke with the Relation of his better Fortunes Explicit Lib. I. THE SECOND BOOKE OF THE HISTORY OF KING RICHARD THE THIRD The Argument of the Second Booke THe Earle of Richmond practiseth with Forreigne Princes and with the English Nobles for assistance and Forces to make his first and second invasions of England He came first to Poole with ill successe secondly to Milford cum bonis avibus What Bastards are and whereof they are capable who be of the House of Lancaster how Lancaster and Beaufort or Sommerset differ Bastards of Kings must not take the Sirnames of the King or Kingdome The honourable priviledge of the name of Plantagenet Prince Edward and Queene Anne John de la Poole proclaimed Heire of the Kingdom by Richard the Third Bastards of John Duke of Lancaster made legitimate and capable of Offices Honour and of Heritage by Richard 2 and the Parliament What the Legitimation of the Pope is Armes and Names of Princes Bastards The Nobility of King Henry 7 th He affied not much in the Titles of Yorke and Lancaster The Pope giveth to him the Title de jure belli de domo Lancastriae The greatnesse of the Title of Yorke of Counsell and Connsellours The Prerogative of the King in Iudgements and Controversies The Earle of Richmond landeth at Milford Haven His entertainment there and in Wales His aptnesse for divers wives he marcheth to Bosworth King Richard and he sight Richard is overcome and slaine also the Duke of Norfolke by the Earle of Oxford ut Creditur The Earle of Richmond is straight Crowned King in the field The fatall Errour of King Richard Kings loved Combate The Titles of King Henry 7 th Kings go not now to warâ— Cruelties committed upon the body of King Richard He was attainted of Treason though against the Laws of Nature and of Royall Majesty with many of his followers and servants The Earle of Surrey how released out of prison his Geneology from Hewardus walter de Buck and his Progeny The Second Booke WE left King Richard the Third in the growth of a flourishing and promising Estate and his fate now in the rise of a peacefull and prosperous Raigne of a calme and hopefull presage But Fortune that lends her smiles as Exactors do mony to undoe the Debtor soone cald for the Principall and Interest from this Prince to whom she was meerly Novercall and he might well call her with the expert Heros in Euripides fortuna diurna i. e. fortune of a daies life for in her best mood she is most slippery in her favours and redious in her mischiefes as was aptly considered by a grave man Fortuna adversas res cupido animo inducit secundas parco she is a mother but a little while a stepdame a long time and for ever to some here then we are aggressing into the turbulent and luctuall times which were towards the end and period of his Life and Raigne the formall and finall causes happening from the invasions attempted by the Earle of Richmond I will begin the Second Booke there and may say invasions because he twice invaded the Kingdome though by errour or ignorance of our Vulgar Historians they are confounded and made one which corruptly maimes the Story and conceales and pretermits some very remarkeable agitations particularly the true cause of the Duke of Buckinghams ill successe and defeate is misunderstood or not at all known To come to it therefore more certainly we must take notice of the first preparation by the Earle of Richmond who was resolved to advance his claime that way and unbosomes himselfe to the Duke of Brittaine his possibility and advantage by friends if he could raise but sufficient strength to set him safely in England The Duke gives him all good wishes to his undertaking but opposes against all Arguments of drawing him in first his Amity and League with England which in honour and justice he was not to violate Then his wants by the long Civill and cruell Warres with his Barons that had so exhausted his Coffers as durst he dispense with the former cause yet that might render him excused being unable to furnish him at least in so short a time as his expedition required beyond which answer for the present the Earle thought not fit to presse him But having a prompt and strong affiance in his good fortune makes up to some of the Dukes most honourable and powerfull Friends to lay siege that way to him by private advantages for by his ingenious demeanour he had won the inclinations of many great ones being Master of a pleasant acute wit which was well supplied in him by the straine of all Courtly Acts to those he had the helpe of the French Tongue which he spoke excellently well and to give all the more plausible accesse and influence hee was as Philip de Comines who knew him testifies a very compleat and well featur'd Gentleman which makes the rule certaine and well animating Gratior est pulchro veniens e corpore virtus The beauties of the mind more gratious are When as the bodies features are more faire In the number of those eminent persons he had gained during his faire imprisonment more fortunately he had applyed himself unto the Lady Margaret Dutchesse of Brittaine Daughter of Gaston de Foix a great man in the Westerne parts of France whose Ancestors were well affected to the English and Madam de Bevier the Dutches so farre countenanced him in his designe that she became an earnest suitor unto the Duke her husband and prevailed both for his liberty and aide for caution and pledge herein he was only to kneele at the High Altar before the blessed Sacrament in the Cathedrall Church of Saint Vannes there to make his religious Vow justly and truely to observe what restitution he privately had promised to the Duke and Dutches which protestation made he had three Ships well rigged and furnished with Men Armes and Victuals as my Author relates Au Conte de Richmond furent aux despens du duo trois grosses Navires de Brittannia charges de gens de Armes c. qui se misent in mer. But by the favour of this Brittish Writer the Earle staid many daies at Saint Malo to receive and send intelligence and made it the beginning of October 1484 before he came to Saint Poole in Dorset where he lay some time at Anchor to send his Boates a shore as Explorers or Spies for discovery of the Coasts where the Kings Armie or his friends lay who returned without any particular satisfaction but that there was many Armed men about the Country The Earle who in all things was circumspect and cautiously rimerous resolved immediately to loose from thence but the night following a terrible tempest constrained them with all hast to weigh Anchor and make into the Maine the Storme and darkenesse of the night severing and dispersing their
a Prince and his owne Brother upon so horrid a thing or he indure to heare it Sir Thomas Moore holds King Edward would not ingage his Brother in so butcherly an office there being many reasons that he durst not neither doe his adversaries charge him directly by any credible Author of that time or discover by whom this murther was onely the Prior of Croyland maketh it somewhat suspitious Hoc tempore inventum est corpus regis Henrici sexti exanime in turre Londinarium Parâ—at Deus spatium poenitentiae ei donet quiâ—unque sacrilegas manus in Christum Domini ausus immittere unde agens tyranni patiens gloriosi martyris titulum mereantur Tyrannus in the proper construction being Rex for whosoever is Rex is Tyrannus according to the ancient signification for amongst the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was used for a King simply good or bad and this some hold makes against King Edward Richard being Duke of Gloucester then yet so doubtfully as may be refelled by good authority for it is the opinion of very grave men Henry the sixth was not murthered but died of naturall sicknesse and extreame infirmity of body Rex Henricus sextus ab annis jam multis ex accidente sibi aegrituâ—ine quaâ—dam animi incurreret infirmitatem sic aeger corpore impos mentis permansit diutius this considered with the aggravation of his griefe and sorrow in the losse of his Crown and liberty being then a prisoner the overthrow of all his friends and forces in the Battaile of Teuxbury but above all the death of his Sonne the Prince might master a stronger heart and constitution then his in a shorter time which opinion is received and alleadged by a learned and discreet Gentleman The occasion of the murther of King Henry the sixth hath no other proofe but the malitious affirmation of one man for many other men more truly did suppose that he died of meere griefe and melancholy when he heard the overthrow of his cause and friends with the slaughter of the Prince his Sonne And Iohannes Majerus saith it was reported King Henry the sixth died of griefe and thought Concerning the slaughter of the Prince his onely Sonne it is noted to be casuall and made suddaine by his owne insolence not out of any pretended malice or premeditated treachery and so it cannot be called wilfull murther for the King demanding him why he invaded his Kingdome his reply was he might and ought to doe it in defence and preservation of the right which the King his Father and his heires had in the Crowne and maintained this lofty answer so peremtorily and boldly the King in rage strooke him with his fist as some say armed with a Gantlet and instantly the Noblemen attending as George Duke of Clarence Marquesse Dorset the Lord Hastings and others drew their swords upon the Prince and killed him which they would make the particular fact of Duke Richard But to the contrary I have seene in a faithfull Manuscript Chronicle of those times that the Duke of Gloucester onely of all the great persons stood still and drew not his sword the reasons to credit this are first it might be in his meere sence of honour seeing so many drawn upon him there was no need of his or in his respects to the Princes Wife who as Iohannes Majerus saith was in the roome and neare akinne to the Dutchesse of Yorke his Mother and to whom the Duke was also very affectionate though secretly which he soone after demonstrated in marrying her nay this Duke bore such a sence of noble actions in his bosome that mislikeing the obscure and meane buriall of Henry the sixth this Princes Father he caused his corps to be taken from Chertsey and to be Honourably conveyed to the Royall and stately Chappell of Windsor ordained for Kings And Sir Thomas Moore saith further he was suspected to have the contriving part in the Duke of Clarence his Brothers death yet confesseth it was commonly said Richard opposed himselfe against the unnaturall proceedings of the King both privately and publiquely and the truth is it was the Kings owne immoveable and inexplorable doome who thought it justly and necessarily his due for Clarence stood guilty of many treasons and great ones and by his ingratidude had so forfeâ—ted himselfe to the Kings displeasure that no friend durst move in his behalfe this the King did afterward acknowledge with some discontent when his wrath had cooled as we may guesse in this expression of his O infaelicem â—ratrem pro cujus salute neâ—o homo rogavit yet Polidor Virgil doth not rightly understand here as I conjecture by the sequell but let us interpret that a little and take up another accusation which puts into the way That Richard Duke of Gloucester should scandall the birth of the King his Brother with basterdy and alleadge it for a speciall matter in Doctor Shawes Sermon that he should fame King Edward the fourth a bastard and that the Dutchesse his Mother had wanton familiarity with a certaine Gentleman this he might erroneously scatter in the Pulpit and take it up on the like intelligence by which in the same Sermon he called her to whom King Edward was betrothed before his marriage with the Lady Grey Elizabeth Lucy whose name was for a certaine Ellenor Butler alias Talbot so called by King Richard and written in the Records This drift had been too grosse for King Richard to lay an imputation of whoredome upon his owne Mother a virtuous and honourable Lady being it cast also a shame and basterdy upon himselfe for if she offended in one she might as likely offend in another and in the rest And to quit him of it Sir Thomas Moore Richard Grafâ—on Mr. Hall say that King Richard was much displeased with the Doctor when he heard the relation which the Duke of Buckingham also affirmed in his speech to the Lord Mayor of London That Doctor Shaw had incurred the great displeasure of the Protectour for speaking so dishonourably of the Dutchesse his Mother That he was able of his owne knowledge to say he had done wrong to the Protectour therein who was ever known to beare a reverend and filiall love unto her and to cut of all farther doubt and question it was proved and is testified upon records that George Duke of Clarence onely raised this slander in an extreame hatred to the King his Brother many jarres falling between them by which the King had a just cause to take notice of his malice Visus est dux Clarentiae magis ac magis a regis praesentia desuâ—trahere in consilio vix verbum proferre neque libenter bibere aut manducare in domo Regis When Richard even in that calamitous time Henry the sixth had overthrowne King Edward in a battaile recovered the Kingdome and proclaimed Edward an usurper so faithfull was his Brother that
then Tyranny according to the style of Sir Thomas Moore When King Henry the Seventh as soon as he had got the Crown sent this young Prince to the Tower afterwards cut off his head yet that was no Tyranny after Sir Thomas Moore But our King Iames of ever happie memory hath thought it an act of so much detestation that particularly he protested against it and shewed another temper of Justice and Power in his Royal Clemencie to certain Noble persons in one of his Kingdoms who being Regal Titulars and pretending title to the Crown there as descended from some King of that Countrey his gracious and pious inclination was so far from seeking their ruine or so much as the restraining them that he suffered their liberty with possession of what they had Then they call the punishment of Iane Shore a Tyrannie A common and notorious Adulteresse as the Duke of Buckingham who knew her very well censured her which she deserved so justly that it was rather favourable then severe or tyrannous Next the death of William Collingborn is made one of his Tyrannies who as some trivial Romancers say was hanged for making a Satyrical Rhyme when the truth is he had committed Treason and was arraigned and condemned of High Treason as may be yet seen in the Record and then it was Justice and not Tyrannie Another proof against their grosse Paralogisms take from this observation made by Demosthenes Tyrannus res est inimica Civibus legibus contraria But King Richard was ever indulgent to his people careful to have the Laws duely observed his making so many good ones being an evident argument of his love to Law and Justice It is further observed that Tyrants contemn good counsel are opinionated of their own wisedoms and obstinate to determine all matters by themselves These Plaintiffs being called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is self-Councellors who say they are natura plerumque occulti insidiosi Arte Astu ea Tagere dissimulare conantur quae agunt non communicantes quicquid de suis Conciliis aut rebus cum aliis nec ab aliis Concilium petentes neque admittentes sed tantum sua Concilia sequuntur Also Erasmus hath this Axiome Nullo Concilio quicquam magnae rei aggredi tyrannicum est But King Richard nor did nor would do any thing of importance without consultation with the wisest and noblest And if in any matters he had delivered his judgement yet his manner as his detractors confesse was to say in the end and conclusion My Lords this is my minde if any of you know what may else be better I shall be ready to change it for I am not wedded to my own will Thus Sir Thomas Moor. Eastly Largition and excessive expences are thought vices proper to Tyrants the rather because the Romane Tyrants for their extreme excesses were called Monstra prodigia lues Imperii pesâ—es reipublicae c. As Caligula Nero Vitellius Domitian Commodus Heliogabolus Caracalla c. King Kichard was ever held to be frugal with the preservation of his honour nor can they tax him with Palliardise Luxury Epicurism nor Gluttony vices following many Tyrants but moderate and temperate in all his actions and appetites which is confessed and therefore needeth no further proof Indeed it had been advantage and safety to him in the event if he had been a Tyrant a while for then he might have preserved his life and kingdom and given a timely check to the practice of Bishop Morton the Marquesse Dorset Earl of Devon and his brother the Bishop the Lord Talbot the Lord Stanley and his brother Sir William Stanley with the Countesse of Richmond his wife and the rest But his remisnesse and patience bred his ruine not his tyranny that had been his protection And now the black curtain of malice and detraction is drawn let us see this King in his proper Royalty and vertues casting up the general and particular notions of A good King and happie Government then peruse what was wanting in him First then There is necessarily required proper to Empire Wisedom Justice Fortitude Beauty Magnificence Temperance and Piety That he had Wisedom and Prudence need no other witnesse then his wise and provident managing both of his own private affairs and Government of the Publike Also in the Military actions in which he was tried both as a Subject and a King his adversaries can allow him to be a wise prudent politick and heroical Prince his Wisedom appearing with his Justice very clearly in the good Laws he made acknowledged and honourably predicated by our Reverend and most learned Professors of the Laws For his further knowledge and love of Justice there can be no fairer argument then his desire and custome to sit in Courts of Justice hearing and distributing Justice indifferently to all men And when he made his Progresse into York-shire being informed there of some extortioners and foul offenders who were apprehended not tried he caused the Law to take the just current giving strict charge and commandment to all Officers of Justice for just administration to all men without partiality or private respects The Fortitude and Magnanimity of this Prince though of lowe stature were so great and famous as they need no Trumpet or Praecony being bred from his youth in Martial actions and the Battels of Barnet Exham Doncaster the second of S t Albans and of Tewksbury will give him the reputation of a Souldier and Captain Being made General of the Kings Armies into Scotland he prevailed happily in his Expedition and particularly recovered that famous and strong Hold of Berwick which King Henry the Sixth had so weakly let go And in this you shall hear the Elogie of one that was loth to speak much in his favour yet occasion forced him to speak his knowledge though coldly and sparingly King Richard was no ill Captain in the War he had sundry Victories and sometimes Overthrows but never by his own default for want of hardinesse or politick order Whereunto he addeth concerning his Bounty Free was he called of dispence and liberal somewhat above his power To which I will adde one Elogie more above all for Credit and Authority recorded in an Act of Parliament and addressed to him in the name of the whole high Court of Parliament in these words We consider your great Wit Prudence Iustice and Courage and we know by experience the memorable and laudable acts done by you in several Battels for the salvation and defence of this Realm Here followeth another general and memorable testimony of him and of more regard and honour because it is averred by one that knew him from his youth the Duke of Buckingham who after Richard was made King and this Duke became ill affected acknowledged to Bishop Morton in private speeches between them That he thought King Richard from his first knowledge even
voce Richardus eram Tutor eram Patriae Patrius pro jure Nepotis Dirupta tenui regna Britanna fide Sexaginta dies binis duntaxat ademptis AEtatesque tulitunc mea Sceptra duas Fortiter in Bello certans desertus ab Anglis Rex Henrice tibi septime succubui At sumptu pius ipse tuo sic ossa dicaras Regem olimque facis Regis honore Coli Quatuor exceptis jam tantum quinque bis annis Acta trecenta quidem lustra salutis erant Antique Septembris undena luce Kalendas Redideram rubrae jura petita Rosae At mea quisquis eris propter commissa precarem Sit Minor ut precibus poena levata tuis Deo O. M. Trino Uno sit laus gloria aeterna AMEN EPIGRAMMA In Richardos Angliae Reges ex vet lib. M. S. transcriptum TRes sunt Richardi quorum fortuna erat aequa In tribus aescariis sua cujus propria sors est Nam Concors horum finis sine posteritate Corporis atque rapax vitae modus violentus Interitus fuerat sed major gloria primi Praelia terrarum qui gesserat redeuntem Tela Balistarum feriunt apud extera regna Alter depositus regno qui carcere Clausus Mensibus extiterat certis fame velle perire Elegit potius quam famae probra videre Tertius exbausto statim amplo divitiarum Edwardi cumulo proscribens auxiliares Henrici partes post annos denique binos Suscepti regni Bello confectus eisdem Mundanam vitam tum perdidit atque Coronam Anno milleno Centum quater octuageno Adjunctis quinque cum lux Sextilis adest Vndena duplex dentes apri stupuerunt Et vindex albae Rosa Rubra refloret in orbe FINIS A Table of the Heads contained in this BOOKE A. AMbition and Covetuousnesse the cause of unnaturall fends murders and infinite other mischiefes Example pag. 5. 12 13 14. 35 36. 98 99. 104. 141. c. Ambassadour of Scotland his speech to K. Richard 3. p. 139. 140. Angell Guardian Genius p. 106. Ann de la Poole a Nun. 35. Anjou Fulke Earle of Anjou sonne of Geofrey Grisegonnelle p. 4. his purjury and murder of his Nephew Drogo ib. his pilgrimage to the holy Sepulcher his penance ib. his great and famous posterity p. 6 7. Armes of France assumed by Ed. 3. p. 47. Armes of the ancient Earles of Anjou pag. 47. Armes of bastards differenced 46. Arrogation of royall rights 45. Arts Imperij and rules of policy in auncient times not warrantable p. 14. Ancesters or Antecestoures the duty and respect we owe unto their memories p. 69. Ambitious minds easily flattered 35. a sower sweet p. 30. B. BArrons of England their great priviledge 118. Bastards what they are 44. cannot inherit p. 45. not beare their fathers name or arms 46. without speciall indulgence p. 48. Take the mothers name 46. 47. The ancient custome of England and France herein ib. Great families discended from bastards p. 66. may bee capeable of offices and dignities 48. Battell of Bosworth 60. 61. Baynard Castle London formerly Yorke house p. 20. Beauforts naturall children of Iohn of Gaunt so called from a towne in Anjou 45. not permitted to the title of Lancas ib. A charter of their legitimation 48. 49. Benevolence the meaning of that word in Edw. 4. his time 133. in Margin Barwick recovered by the English 10. Bucking an auncient famly 67. how desended c. 68. of the name ib. Buckingham Henry Stafford D. of Buck. his speech to the Lord protector 20. 22. His revolt and rebellion 34. his pretended title to the Crowne 35. retires sides with Richmond 36 his forces are scattered himselfe betrayed and beheaded 37. D. of Brittaine chose Knight of the Garter 18. C. CHarter of Henry 4. entailing the Crown to his 4. sons successively 50. Camp-fight or single combates between Princes and Generalls and grounds of it 62. Catarhe to dye of a Catarhe what it meanes in France 123. Censure and censuring 63. K. Charles our most Gracious and dear soveraigne Lord his just undoubted right his many great and auncient titles to the Imperial Crowne of England 144 145 146. Clarence G. D. of Clarence rebells against his Brother Edward 4. is taken and beheaded 82 83. Clergy pride of Popish Clergy 53. Comlinesse of personage adds a grace to vertue 42. Comes or Count two fold signification of it 8. Constable-ship of England joyned to the Earledome of Hereford 34. Vice-Constable a new and politick institution 31. A coppie of their Commission ibid. Cole Harbour London at first Heralds Office 138. Conquerour and Conquest Licentious power of it 54 55. Titles by conquest not safe nor lasting 144. distasted of the people as tyranicall 54. Covetuonsness roote of all evill 5. c. as in Ambition Councel and Councellers 51 52. 55. 103 Counterfeit princes many examples p. 89. Cowardice Insolence over a conquered enemy a note of it 61. Crowne little pleasure in it 21. D. DEath the best men have dyed violent deaths 140. To dye in battell a glorious death ibid. Wee must not a mans life by the manner of his death 141. Decree of God not to be prevented 63. Deformity of body no blemish to vertue 80. Desires unlawfull alwaies unsatiable 5. 116. Detraction v. Slander Dimock Champion to K. Rich. 3. makes a challenge in defence of the Kings title to the Crowne 27. Divorce of Wives formerly usuall upon slight occasions 127. Copy of a Bill of divorse in use among the Iewes 128. Dux and Comes Ducatus and Comitatus were formerly Synonomies 4. Drogo Young Earle of Brittaine made away by his Vncle 5. E. EDward 3. King of England his linage 4. thought privie and consenting to his fathers deposition â—assacre 141. Edward Earle of March obtaines the Crowne 8. sends an army into Scotland to recover his tribute 10. received tribute of France 29. much feared for his prowess 19. His wantonnesse and many loves 115 116. His witty Leman 121. Had two wives at once 116 117. Ill consequences of his last marriage 118. His answer to his mother 120. Adjudged unlawfull the children illegittimate Parliam Anno 1. Rich. 3. p. 30. And refused by the Barons and Commons as incapeable of rule 20. 22. His daughters meane fortunes 143. His death supposed by treachery 11. by poyson 102. 123. Appointed his brother Ric. D. of Glocester protector 11 Edward 5. conveyed with an honorable conduct from Ludlow to London 11. reports of his death diverse but uncertaine 83 84. most probable that he died of sicknesse and infirmity 85. Edward Prince of Wales sonne of Hen. 6. Murdered 81. 141. Edw. Prince of Wales son of R. 3. dyed to the great griefe of the K. Q 44. Elianor Talbott alias Butler married to Edw. fourth 116. her wrongs and death 122. Elizabeth Gray her witty strengths against K. Edwards amorous assaults 117. Is marrid to him privately in a lodge 118. Is confined to an Abbey by
name 4 5. borne by the Earls of Anjou ib. Growes into contempt 46. Geoffery Plantagenet Earle of Anjou a Courtly Prince 4. Married Maud the Empress ib. Who was first founder of that name in England 45. Poole Edmund de la Poole commanded to be put to death by H. 7. contrary to his promise 142. Katherine de la Poole dyed in prison ib. Sir H. de la Pool put to death ib. All of the house of Yorke Reynold Poole after Cardinall fled beyond Sea ib. Iohn de la Pool Ea. of Lincoln proclaimed heire apparant to the Crowne of England 44. Popes their power anciently very great 124. Limited by Canonists 47. Cannot legitimate Bastards to inherit ib. That belongs only to the Magistrate 48. Their intollerable pride 53. Dispense with incestuous marriages 55. Their dispensations held sacred 144. Popes Bull 55. Their proud defiance to all Laws divine humane 1â—8 Prescription power of it 144. Prince formerly a title of Soveraigne power but now restrained 49 50. Prince of Wales Sonne to H. 6. barbarously murthered at Tewksbury 81. Rich. 3. cleare of it ib. Prophesie of a Hermite concerning de Vere Earl of Oxford the occasion event of it 105. Providence Divine providence worketh by conrtary meanes 43. Cannot be prevented 63. Q. QUeen Mother and Dowager of Ed. 4. reconciled to R. 3. 29. Confined to an Abbey and dyes of griefe 143. Quithlaw Commissioner for the K. of Scots an eloquent man 33. 139 140. R. RAcke and torture use of it condemned 94 95. and reasons ib. Restitution of ill-gotten goods a hard and rare thing 43. 99. Resolution a notable example in Rich. 3. 59 60. Ryot and riotous Princes 139. Richard 3. King of England his great and Noble discent page 3. Time and place of his birth p. 7. Brought up at Utricht in Holland p. 8. Is Knighted created Du of Glost. marries the Princesse Dowager of Wales ibid. 81. His wisedome courage constancy to his brother 9. makes a prosperous expedition into Scot. 10 11 is made protector ib. His care of his Nephewes and duty to the young K. in hope Edw. 5. ib. Is elected K. by the Lords and Commons in Parliam 20. 22. Is crowned with his Queene and anoynted with great Magnificence 24 25 26. Received at Yorke in great honour and crowned the 2 time ib. His title conferred 30. Is cleared from the death of his Nephewes 21 22 23. 31. 84 85 86. 101. 102 103 104 106 107. Of his brother Clarence 82. Of H. 6. Prince Edw. his son 81 82 of his own wife 107. 129. from the slaunder raised upon his mother and brother 82 83. Was no Tyrant 78. his mildnesse his ruine 61. 136 His great magnificence wisedome justice 8 9. 12. 15. 27. 28. His many eminent vertues 136 137 138. His pious workes 138 139. His vertues maliciously depraved 78. The partiality of his accusers 130. 135. His defamations examined and answered 75 76 77 78 79. His description and commendation 148. Was not deformed His politick woing the L. Eliza. his Niece 126 127. 129. His treaties with forraigne princes 32. 33. 34. His noble valour at Bosworth field Weares the Crowne Royall and why 59. 60 61. Invites Rich. to a single combat ib. Is slaine and barbarously mangled 62. Is buried at Leicester under a faire Marble 147. His Epitaph 149. attainted of high treason with his followers 126. Is compared with other Kings of England 141. Three Richards Kings of England compared an Epigram vpon them 150. Rowles domus conversorum or house convertits 139. S. SAnctuary great priviledge of iâ— 19. 92 93. Sebastian King of Portugal escaped the battell of Alcazar 97 98. After long travel gets to Venice is knowne ib. Is betrayed into the K. of Spains power charged for a counterfeit made away 99. Slander and Slanderers 77 78. 103. Sotbriquets nick-names or sir-nâ—mes examples 5 6. Somersets Earls of Worcester from whom descended 47. Sorcery witch-craft divers accused of 102. Subjects men are Subjects to that Prinâ— under whose protection they live 105. Suspition evill of it 30. Note of an evill minde ib. Honest mind nor suspitious Ib. T. TAlbot Elianor Talbot Widow of the Lord Butler forsaken of Edward 4 th which caused her death 122. Teeth many worthy men borne with teeth 79. Traitor reward of Traitors 37. 97 Treason and rebellion their pretext 34. Soveraign Princes cannot commit Treason 126. K. R. 3. attainted of Treason but unduely ibid. Tyrant what it signifies in the proper signification 80. 133 134. Torture vid. Racke V. VAlour a notable example 60 61. Valiana minds hate treachery and bloody acts 81. Vanity and uncertainty of humane States 36 37. 59. Upstarts 46. W. WAkefield battell 7. Warre between England and Scotland and the cause of it 9 10. 7. Warren Earl of Surrey 46. Warwick Richard Nevil the great Earl of Warwicke 117. Distasts K. Edw. 4. and takes up armes against him 118. Edward Earl of Warwick put to death 96. Wedding King of England 146. William Conquerour his noblenesse toward his dead enemy 61. Woolsey the great Cardinall his just commendations 78. Y. YOrke Edmond Plantagen alias de Langley first Duke of Yorke 4. The Title of that House to the Crowne of England 3. Richard Du of York and Father of K. R. 3. designed King by H. 6. And the High Court of Parliament 3. Crowne entailed to his Issue 20. 51. Richard Duke of Yorke 2 d son of Edw. 4. sent beyond sea and brought up privately at Warbecke in Planders for feare of the faction of Lancaster 85 87. Discovers himselfe 88. Is acknowledg'd by the English Nobility ib. Favoured of Forreign Princes 90 91. His various fortunes 92. Is proclaimed King 92. Is taken and sent to the Tower 93. His sufferings there 94. His offence forged for which he is hang'd at Tiburn 95. Duchesse of Yorke her speech to her Son King Edward 4. 119 120. Cruelty shewed to the remainers of the House of Yorke 143. A finall subversion of that house and name ibid. An Explication of some dark words and Sentences SOtbriquets or Sobriquets Nickenams 4. Angeume of or belonging to Anjou Naturall son i. a Bastard also a naturall Father Rodomantade p. 12. a brag or bravado Cloth of assuyance 27. Towel or napkin that wait on the cup. Contrast withstanding or repugnance Parergum 32. Something added that is not of the principall matter Tort 35. wrong injury and violence Vmbrage or Ombrage 35. Suspition also disgrace Disgust 36. Distaste Contrecar 44. A counter-strength c Filij populi 44. Bastards so called being children of common women in respect of the Father of uncertaine Parentage Ne Croix ny Pile 51. Neither cross nor pile not one title or jot of right c. Ambidexter a Iack on both sides Brother uterine 51. 1 by the mothers side Abbayance 53. In delay or dispute such as Lawyers use a term borrowed from another creature Apodixis 60. Plain demonstration
traditory opinion more then justice and reason but equally examine his slanders they shall finde Malice and ignorance have been the Kings greatest accusers which can onely lay Suspition to his charge and Suspition in Law is no more guilt then Imagination for though Suspition many times lay a great blame upon a man men holding him to be guilty whom men suspect to be so though injuriously yet the Law holds it not a Crime because Suspition many times supposeth those to be culpable which are not for an Instrument may as easily be condemned as a Malefactor being an evil grown from the errour of men Wherefore Suspition of it self bringeth no sentence by Law Natural or Moral Civil or Divine according to that of the old Minographus Suspitio grave est hominibus malum And the Divine Chrysostome saith A good man hardly suspecteth another to be evil but an evil man scarcely supposeth any to be good far from the counsel of this Epigram Culparem quoquam quae non sunt nota malignum est Presertim si quam cognita sint bona sunt Non pateant faciles duris rumoribus aures Quae nescire juvat credere non libeat Linquantur secreta Deo qui quicquid opertum est Inspicit nullis indiget indicibus Accuse no man of faults to thee unknown And much lesse him from whom good fruits have grown Lend not thine ears to scandalous reports Believe not that which known nought thee imports Leave secret things to God who knows all hearts And hath no need of the Promoters arts But as Iulius Caesar who had many excellent Observations was wont to say Vir bonus tam suspicione quam crimine carere oportet That a good man must be as well without suspition as crime Yet none so innocent but may fall under the lash of the malicious for such like the Polypus will take any colour or make any tincture of a Crime to serve their ends Of such a vertue is the never-understanding Vulgar that like Kytes and Daws can digest nought but stench and filth their Ignorance being their Faith and that drawn from loose Pamphlets and the vomits of mercinary and mimick pens to which and their uncurable fits I leave them Explicit Liber quartus THE FIFTH BOOK OF THE HISTORY OF KING RICHARD the Third The Contents WHat a Tyrant is and how a Tyrant and King Richard differ The destruction of the Plantagenets The daughters of King Edward the Fourth how bestowed The death of the Queen their Mother The Vertues of King Richard the Third The Elogie of the three Brothers King Edward the Fourth George and Richard The Magnificent Publike and Charitable Buildings of King Richard the third His good Laws and other good works That to die in the Wars is no Dishonour but an Honour Artes Regiae Crimen regale His Comparison with other Kings accounted good King James his gracious demeanour to his Cousins A Character and Elogie of King Richard the third The title of the Norman Race and of York defended The sundry titles of King James The Wedding King of England Lapis Regno fatalis King Richards Sepulchre and Epitaph The Authors Scope Peroratio Votum THE FIFTH BOOK OF King Richard The Third WE will next endeavour to understand that Vocable or term Tyrannus that is a Tyrant or an evil King cast upon King Richard which indeed comprehendeth all scandals and impieties whatsoever Tyrannus est qui suis propriis Commodis studet publicis adversatur And Tyrannus est qui dominatu crudeliter abutitur A Tyrant is by another wise man compared to a Dragon who becometh not a Dragon until he hath devoured many Serpents of which Conceit this Epigram was wittily framed Post plures Coluber Serpentes Dracosit esos Gust at â humanâ carne fit homo Lupus The Dragon which doth many Serpents eat Becomes a Dragon of huge shape and strength And so the man which makes his flesh mans meat Transformed is unto a Wolf at length Another Philopher differeth not much from these who saith that of all tame beasts the flatterer is most pernicious and of all wilde the Tyrant who forbeareth not for any respect of good or ill but studies Oppressions Wrongs Exactions Robberies Sacriledges Blood-shed Murder Adultery Incest Rape Riot Gluttony Luxuriousnesse Prodigality and all manner of Excesses These be his arts of raigning and these be his vertues Invident Tyranni claris fortesque trucidant Another saith Tyrannus miserum vetat perire foelicem jubet So it was truely said by the famous Orator of Athens Liberalitas Tyranni nihil aliud est quam translatio pecunâ—arum a justis Dominis ad alienos idque indignos His thirst and covetousnesse for his largitious riots and lusts are so inordinate that nothing can quench it Non Tartessiaris illum satiaret arenis Tempestas pretiosa Tagi non stagna rubentis Aurea Pactoli totumque exhauserit Hermum Arde bit majore siti c. Quicquid conspicuum pulchrumque ex Equore toto Res sisci est c. These may serve for the notions of a Tyrant to any of which Impieties our King Richard was very little or not at all obnoxious For first Whereas a Tyrant imposeth many grievous Taxes and Oppressions upon his Subjects he took away such grievances and particularly by Act of Parliament a hateful Tax though disguised with the name of a Benevolence forbearing to impose any upon the people Then A Tyrant doth not onely rapine his Subjects but spoils and robs Churches and Church-men But King Richard did many good things both for the publike good advancing Gods service and maintenance of his Ministers and Church-men Tyrannum pium esse non est facile as Sophocles well observed And the Oracle pronounced Portae foelicitatis ad Tyrannidem clausae Tyrants be cruel and bloody but this King by the testimony of his enemies was very merciful and milde who confesse he was of himself gentle and assably disposed These be their own words Therefore where tyrannical acts be objected against him they must be conceived done by other men or by their practice or else before he was King and what he did then was not nor could be properly called Tyranny Amongst those they impute to him when he was King which are called Tyrannies the beheading Henry Stafford Duke of Buckingham was the chiefest yet that act the cause and just motives of it being well perused cannot be censured Tyranny rather due and necessary Justice for if the King had not put down the Duke the Duke would have put down the King Then it is objected He bare a tyrannical hand over his nephew Edward Earl of Warwick True it is he sent him to Shery-Hutton a goodly and pleasant house of his own in York-shire where he had liberty large diet all pleasure and safety and if that were imprisonment it was a prison Curtoise as Iohn Froisard saith yet this must not be lesse