or rather into a manifest tyrannie as will easily appeare unto them which are advertised and have seene how Florence is at this day governed and ruled Besides this booke of a Prince or of a Principalitie Machiavell hath also written three bookes of discoursing upon the first Decade of Titus Livius with ilustrating the other booke of Principalitie is instead of a Commentary thereunto Through all which discourses hee disperseth heere and there a few words out of Titus Livius neither rehearsing the whole deede nor hystorie of the matter for which hee fisheth these words and applyeth them preposterously after his owne fantasie for the most part forcing them to serve to confirme some absurde and strange thing Hee also mixeth heerewith examples of small and pettie Potentates of Italy happening in his time or a little before which are not worth the recitall but are lesse worthie to bee proposed for imitation Yet heerein is hee to bee excused in that hee knew no better for if hee had known better I doubt not but would have brought them to light to have adorned his writings and to have made them more authentike and receiveable But out of those two bookes namely of Principalitie and out of Machiavels discourses I have extracted and gathered that which is properly his owne and have reduced and brought it to certaine Maximes which I have distinguished into three parts as may bee seene heereafter And I have beene as it were constrained so to doe that I might revocate and gather every matter to his certaine heade and place to the end the better to examine them For Machiavell hath not handled every matter in one same place but a little heere and a little there enterlacing and mixing some good things amongst them doing therin as poysoners doe which never cast lumpes of porson upon an heape least it bee perceived but doe most subtillie incorporate it as they can with some other delicate and daintie morsells For if I had followed the order that hee houlds in his bookes I must needes have handled one same point many times yea confusedly and not wholy I have then drawne the greatest part of his doctrine and of his documents into certaine propositions and Maximes and withall added the reasons wbereby he muntaineth them I have also set downe the places of his bookes to leade them thereunto which desire to try what fidelitie I have used either in not attributing unto him any thing that is not his owne or in not forgetting any reason that may make for him wherein so much there wanteth that I feare that any man may impose upon mee to have committed some fault therein that contrarie in some places I have better cleared and lightened his talke reasons and allegations than they bee in his writings And if any man say that I doe wrong him in setting downe the evill things contained in his bookes without speaking of the good things which are dispersedly mixed therewith and might bring honour and grace unto him I answere and will maintaine that in all his writings there is nothing of any valew that is his owne Yet I confesse that there is some good places drawne out of Titus Livius or some other authors but besides that they are not his they are not by him handled fully nor as they should For as I have abovesaid hee onely hath dispersed them amongst his workes to serve as with an honny sweet bait to cover his porson And therefore seeing that that which is good in his writings is taken from other better authors where wee may learne them better for our purpose and more whole and perfect than in Machiavell wee have no cause to attribute honour vnto him nor to thanke him for that which is not his and which wee possesse and retaine from a better shop than his And as for his precepts concerning the militarie art wherewith hee dealeth in his bookes which seeme to bee new and of his owne invention I will say nothing but that men doe not now practise them neither are they thought worthie of observation by them which are well seene in that art as wee may see in that which hee maintaineth That a prince ought not to have in his service any strange soldiors nor to have any fortresses against enemies but onely against his subiects when hee is in feare of them For the contrary heereof is ordinarily seene practised and in truth it sheweth an exceeding great pride and rashnesse in Machiavell that hee dare speake and write of the affaires of warre and prescribe precepts and rules unto them which are of that profession seeing hee had nothing but by heare-say and was himselfe but a simple Secrethrie or Towne-clarke which is a trade as far different from the profession of warre as an harquebush differs from a pen and inckhorne Heerein it fals out to Machiavell as it did once to the philosopher Phormio who one day reading in the Peripatetiâ—e schoole of Greece and seeing arrive Ciâ—ero de Orator Plutarch in Anniball enter thither Anniball of Carthage who was brought thither by some of his friends to heare the eloquence of the philosopher he began to speake dispute with much babling of the lawes of warre and the dutie of a good captaine before this most famous captaine which had forgotten more than ever that proud philosopher knew or had learned When hee had thus ended his lecture and goodly disputation as Anniball went from the auditorie one of his friendes which brought him thither demanded what hee thought of the philosophers eloquence and gallant speach Hee said Truely I have seene in my life many old dottards but I never saw so great an one as this Phormio So I doe not doubt but such as have knowledge in the militarie art will give the like iudgement of Machiavell if they reade his writings will say according to the common proverbe That he speaketh not like a clarke of armes But I leave things touching this matter unto them which have more knowledge therein than I for it is not my purpose any thing to touche that which Machiavell hath handled of the militarie art nor such precepts as concerne the leading of an army By this which wee have before spoken That Machiavell was during the raigne of Charles the eight and Lewis the twelfth kings of France and attained the beginning of At what time and wherefore Machiavell was received into France the raigne of Francis the first It followeth that there hath not beene past fiftie or three-score yeeres since his writings came to light whereupon some may mervaile why hee was not spoken of at all in France during the raigne of king Henry the second and that after them the name of Machiavell did but beginne to bee knowne on this side the mountaines and his writings into some reputation The answere heereunto is not very obscure to such as know how the affaires of France have beene governed since the decease of king Henry the second of
and triflingly talked with king Alexander the Great as if he had spoken to some simple burgesse of Athens And Calisthenes Plutarke in Alex. whom Alexander led with him in his voyage unto Asia to instruct him in good documents of wisedome who indeed was so austere hard and biting in all his remonstrances and reasonings as neither the king nor any others could take in good part any thing that he taught It is then very much expedient if a man mean to gather fruit and do good by his speech to use gentle and civile talke and persuasions especially if he have to doe with a Prince or great man which will not be gained by rigor or as they say by high wrastling but by mild and humble persuasions And above all men ought well to engrave in princes minds that notable answere which The difference of a friend and a flatterer captaine Phocion made unto the king Antipater who had required some thing of him which was not reasonable I would Sir doe for your service all that is possible for me but you cannot have me both for a friend and a flatterer as if he would say That they be two things farre different to be a friend and to be a flatterer as in truth they are For the true friend and servant of the prince orders and frames all his actions Plutarke de discri adul amici to the good of the prince and the flatterer tends and bends all his actions to his owne proper good the true friend loveth with a true love his prince and the flatterer loveth himself the true friend modestly sheweth his vices in his presence and praiseth his vertues in his absence but the flatterer alwaies exalts the prince in his presence rather for his vices than for his vertues and behind his backe he blameth and defameth him vaunting and saying that he governes him at his pleasure and that he possesseth him and makes him doe what hee will the true friend persevereth in the service of his prince as well in time of adversitie as prosperitie and the flatterer turnes his backe in time of adversitie the true friend serves for an healthfull medicine to his prince but the flatterer for a sweet poison the true friend conserveth his prince in his estate and greatnesse but the flatteter precipitateth him into ruine and destruction as we shall discourse the examples of al these things hereafter Moreover when we say that flatterers are pernicious to a prince that is not ment of all them which dedicate and give themselves to please the prince for there may well be Gentlemen of his owne age about him to accompany him in his honest pastimes as to ride hunt hawke to tourney to play at tennis to run and other like pastimes which doe not evill to give themselves to please him in such things but contrary it is right necessary and requisit that the prince have sometimes such companie For it should not be good nor comely in defect and for want of plaies and pastimes hee should to himselfe procure an habit of a Stoicall humour neither that he should get a complection too severe and melancholicke Hereof we read a very remarkable example above others in Alexander the great king of Macedon When he departed from his countrey to passe into Asia to make war upon that great Dominator king Darius he had with him most cheefe in his love amongst others Craterus and Hephaestion two gentlemen his especiallest friends and servants yet farre Plutarke in Alex. different the one from the other for Craterus was of an hard and sharpe wit severe stoicall and melancholicke who altogether gave himselfe unto affaires of Counsell and indeed was one of the kings cheefe Counsellors but Hephaestion was a young gentleman well complexioned and conditioned in his manners and behavior of a good and quicke wit yet free of all care but this to content and please the king in his sports and pastimes insomuch as men called Craterus the kings friend and Hephaestion the friend of Alexander as one that gave himselfe to maintaine the person of his prince in mirths and pastimes which were good to the maintenance of his health When Alexander had conquered Persia and Media he begun to apparrell himselfe after the Persian Median manner the rather to gaine the hearts of those nations newly conquered Hephaestion to please the king did the like leaving the Macedonike manner to apparrell himselfe as the Persians and Medes did for which the king liked him the better but Craterus kept alwaies his old fashions of Macedonie and much blamed that change of fashions in their apparrell and said it was but even to barbarize and begun to taunt and gibe at Hephestion for it This their contrarietie of manners was a cause that they entred farre into enmitie and quarrels insomuch as one day thēy came unto the drawing of swords one against another and streight assembled their friends on both sides wherby had falne out a great mutinie if the king himselfe had not come in good time hearing a great noise of people and seperated them presently openly rebuking Hephaestion calling him foole and mad man he tooke also privatly aside Craterus and told him he greatly marvelled that he being a wise man would so hate Hephaestion for so small a thing Afterward he agreed them publickely delared unto them that they were the two Gentlemen which most he loved in the world but if any more they fell to quarell again hee swore by Iupiter Amon that with his owne hands he would slay him that begun But after that they did nothing one against other Hereupon I say That it is necessary for a Prince to have such as Craterus for his counsell and it also becomes him well to have such as Hephaestion to keepe him companie in his honest pastimes But to the end men may better discerne such as are good friends and servants from flatterers I will now God willing discover the examples of many sorts of flatterers which for the most part have had in singular observation that Maxime of Machiavell namely To hold close from the Prince the truth of things and the better to distinguish them I will call them with such names as our auncestors have called them which are very proper and covenable unto them First there are a sort of flatterers which our auncient Frenchmen called janglers which signifieth as much Ianglers as a skoffer a trifler a man full of words or as we call them long tongues which by their jangling and babelings in rime or in prose such as do give themselves to please great men in praising and exalting them exceedingly rather for their vices than for their vertues These be they which by their fair language can make as one saith of a Devill an Angell but in the meane while they so enchant men and swell them up so with pride that in effect they make them become even Angelicall Devils This sort
but hee is not subtill enough to keepe himselfe from nets A man must then bee a Foxe to knovv all subtilties and deceits and a Lyon to bee the stronger and to make vvolves afraid The emperour Didius Iulianus knevv vvell hovv to play the Fox to come to the empire in promising men of vvarre great sommes of mony to obtaine the empire For after he vvas chosen hee played them a Foxes part deceiving them in giving them much lesse than hee promised but not knovving vvithall hovv to play the Lyon hee vvas incontinent overthrovvne For Severus vvho vvas cunning to play both came against him vvith great force insomuch as hee vvas slaine by his owne souldiers of his guarde which went to Severus side And in the meane while Severus seeing that the captaine Albinus was in Gaule with a puissant armie and captaine Niger in Levant likewise with a great army hee played the Fox to allure them by faire vvords that they would not hinder him to obtaine the empire for hee feared them because they had great forces in their hands and that they were more noble and of more ancient houses than hee Hee made them great promises especiallie hee promised Albinus to associate him in the empire and to give him the name and authoritie of Caesar vvhich vvas the like title as at this day is king of the Romanes And as for Niger hee held his children in his hands as hostages under coulour of honour and favour so that hee the lesse feared him As soone as hee had thus by playing the Fox and deceit stayed Albinus and Niger hee ended his enterprise to make himselfe knowne a peaceable emperour But after this taking unto him the nature of the Lyon he turned his forces against Albinus Niger and overcame them both one after another So that by knowing vvell how to play these tvvo beasts the Lyon and the Fox hee made himselfe a peaceable emperour vvithout competitor Contrary the emperour Maximin after he vvas elected emperour by the souldiers of his hoast could not play one part of the Fox but only of the Lyon which was the cause that he endured not and that many vvere elected to hinder his quiet possession of the empire insomuch as in the end hee vvas overthrovvne and slaine of his ovvne souldiers MAchiavell hath not yet handled a discourse more worthie of his sufficiency than this For hee teacheth by this Maxime the manner to be a beast and especially how a prince should in all his behaviours use himselfe like a beast Thinke you I pray you that to teach how being a man you may imitate a beast is a small matter I know well that our Machiavelists will say that heerein is hid a secret of philosophie that Machiavell meaneth that a prince should be as subtill as a Fox violent like a Lyon not that he must go with foure feet or that he must dwell in the deserts of Arabia or in holes in woods or commit other such like actions as the Fox Lion doe Well I am content to agree unto them this morall sence and that their master meant here to declare some singular memorable doctrine Let us now come to examine it He saith then when a prince cannot fight like a man that is by reason he ought to fight like a beast that is to use force and subtiltie To this I answere that a prince in his quarrell hath either reason or right on his side or els hee hath them not If hee hath them not he ought not to fight against any man for each war ought to have his foundation upon reason as other where wee have shewed If the prince hath reason on his side and he with whom hee hath to doe refuseth to come to reason then the prince may justly constraine him by force of armes and this is not called to fight like a beast nor like a Lion but it is to fight as a man using reason who employeth his owne corporall force and the force of his horses of his armies and walls and of all other things offensive and defensive to serve for instruments and meanes to execute that which reason commandeth and ordaineth so that force employed Force is a servant of reason to his right use is no other thing but a servant of reason which obeyeth her in all her commandements and therefore therein there is nothing of a beast and they which thus employ their forces doe nothing that holds of a beast As for guile and subtiltie I say likewise that in warre a man may lawfully use subtilties against his enemies if so be his faith and the rights of warre bee not violated and this is not called foxlike subtiltie or unlawful deceiving but it ought to be called militarie prudence And therefore in warre to use subtiltie fraud and militarie sharpenesse of wit for all those names may be well used is not to counterfeit the beast nor to play the Fox But I know well Machiavell is of another mind namely That a prince is not bound unto right faith or religious promise to hinder him that he may not use now force and now subtiltie according as the one or the other may best serve him to come to the end hee pretendeth For of faith and promise or of right and reason men may not speake in Machiavels schoole unlesse it be to mocke at them which esteeme such most holy bands of humane societie but concerning faith and promises we shall have another Maxime wherein we shall rip up this matter to the bottome but here only I will shew that these foxlike subtilties and deceits whereof Machiavell meanes in his speech doe not ever succeed well to them who use them but most commonly they fall into their owne nets When Anniball by meanes of an ambuscado had entrapped the captaine Tit. Livius lib. 7. Dec. 3. lib. 3. Dec. 4. Marcellus lieutenant generall of the Roman armie who was slaine upon the place he found about him his sealing ring hee considered straight upon a subtile device namely to write unto the Salapians which dwelt nigh in the name of Marcellus by which he sent them word that the next night hee would come into Salapia and that they should hold the garrison of the towne ready Crispinus the lieutenant of Marcellus knowing Anniball to be a master of subtile inventions doubting this sent suddainly through all the townes word that Marcellus was dead and his ring in Annibals hands and that they should beleeve no letter under the name of Marcellus The Salapians having received this advertisment and Annibals letters also put their garrison in armes and as Anniball approched the towne he caused such to march first as could speake the Roman tongue As soon as they arrived at the gates they called the guards thereof which playing well their parts at the last tooke up the port-cullis on high and suffered about six hundred of Annibals souldiers to enter in then let they fall the port-cullis and
unto him then he constrained him whether he would or no to accept that Office He had also a good grace in the election of the Senators of the Senat for he chose not any without demanding the advise of them which were already in that estate and enquired of the maners knowledge and sufficiencie of him or them which were to be Senators And when it came to passe that any man by his opinion did bring any into an Office that was not in all points sufficient as it often commeth to passe that they that favor a man make his manners good and his knowledge greater than it is he thus punished them to bring them to the lowest roume of all their companie which was a covenable and meet punishment for he that by undue and unlawfull meanes will advaunce another meriteth well to bee put from the place himselfe We find in our hystories of France that our kings have sometimes imitated this manner of proceeding of the Emperour Alexander in his manner of election of Counsellors and Magistrates For by auncient ordinances which lately were fresh in the publicke Counsell of Estates of Orleance but since evill observed Offices ought to be conferred upon such as were named to the king by the other Officers and Magistrates and by the Consuls Presidents of Townes and Provinces which were to make true report of the life good manners and sufficiencie of such as they named As for the vent and selling of Offices it seemeth that it hath been long time tollerated in Fraunce For M. Philip de Comines in his Hystorie which hee writ of Comines li. 1. cap. 12. the life of king Lewis the eleventh saith That alreadie in the time of that king when he had warre against the lords of the Commonweale in the yeare 1464 the Perisians made a great trafficke and commerce of Offices whereof they are more desirous than any others of all the French nation For sayth he there are some which will give eight hundred skutes or crownes for an Office that hath no wages nor stipend belonging unto it and some will give for an Office that hath a stipend belonging unto it more than fifteene yeares the stipend comes to But it seemes unto me that de Comines toucheth not the white when he speakes of the cause why the Parisians are so desirous of Offices For the true cause seemeth to be for that by the customes of Paris a father cannot bestow upon one child more than upon another be they daughters or sonnes unlesse it be in Offices And that therefore the Parisians which desire to advantage any of his children above other as commonly the father which hath many children loves one more than another are as it were constrained to buy Offices And would to God that this custome were yet to invent and that the Parisians had free dispensation of their goods and that they had not brought in this villainous trafficke of Offices But a strange thing it is which Comines addeth That even in the time of king Lewis the eleventh the parliament of Paris maintained that such a commerce and trafficke was lawfull But he speakes not of what Offices the Court of Parliament tollerates that kind of trafficke It is not credible that at that time Offices of judgement were sold nor that the Court of Parliament approved such a commerce but rather that they were Offices of Fines Vshers Castle keepers Sergeants Notaries Offices of Waters and Forrests and such like whereof the sale was tollerable but not of Offices of Presidents Counsellors Bailiffes Stewards Lieutenants and other Offices of judgement For it is seene by Annales vpon An. 1499. our Annales that king Lewis the twelfth who was called the Father of the people to spare his people and to pay the debts of king Charles the eight his predecessor and to helpe other great affaires which he had on his Arme for the recoverment of the Duchie of Millaine he was the first king that began to sell Offices Royall excepting alwayes the Offices of judgement which he touched not This was a very good king and did this to a good end to comfort and help his poore people from tallages and borrowings Who considered that it was as much and more reasonable that hee should take silver for such Offices which were not of judgement as privat persons did upon whom they were freely bestowed unto whom it was lawfull as is said by a sufferance alreadie inveterate of the said Parliament to sell and trafficke them But since the fact of this good king hath been drawn into a consequence and an use yea the exception of Offices of judgement is cleane also taken away in such sort that now al Offices indifferently are venall yea to him that offereth most to the last penny And although we may say still it is to the same end namely to helpe the people yet it is evident that that end is not sought nor followed For by the contrarie the people is eaten up even to the bones by these buyers of Offices which will needs draw out of them the mony of that they bought And it seemeth according to the saying of the Emperor Alexander that they have reason for that which may be bought may be sold As for the manner of election of the said Emperour whereby he preferred to estates such as demaunded them not before such as sought them our kings have sometimes used that also as king Charles le Sage when he gave the Office of Constable to that generous and valiant Knight Bertrand de Guesclin For de Guesclin Froisart lib. 1. chap. 290. lib. 2. cap. 49. Annales vpon An. 1402. excused himselfe the most that hee could in the world from accepting that estate shewing him that he was a simple knight that the Office of Constable is so great that he that will acquite himselfe of that Office ought rather to commaund great men than them that were of low calling and that he durst not enterprise so much as to commaund the brethren cousins and nephewes of his Majestie But the king replied unto him M. Bertrand by this meanes excuse not your selfe for I have neither Brother Cousin Nephew Countie nor Barron in my kingdome which shall not obey you with a good heart and if any one doe otherwise I will cause him to know that it displeaseth me So that in the end de Guesclyn accepted the Office as constrained After the death of this valiant Constable king Charles the sixt sonne of the said Charles le Sage minding to give that Office to the Lord de Coucy who was a brave and wise knight and of a great house and had performed great services unto the Crowne of France but he refused it saying that he was not capable for an Office of so great a burthen and that M. Oliver de Clysson was more sufficient than he to exercise that Estate for he was valiant bold wise and wel beloved of the people of warre M. Oliver made the
called with these gracious names Subsidies Subventitions Aydes Grants not with these tearmes Tailles Imposts Tributes Impositions which were tearmes more hard and odious Examples appeare of the first cause when the generall Estates assembled at Paris after the death of king Charles le Sage to provide for the government as well of king Charles the sixt being under Annal. upon An 1380 and Fross li 2. cap. 58. 60. age as of the kingdome which government they gave unto three of the kings uncles namely to the Duke of Berry Languedoc to the Duke of Bourgoigne Picardie and Normandie and to the Duke de Aniou the remainder of all the realme and the rule of the young kings person was committed to the said Dukes of Berry and Bourgoigne So was there ordained during the said kings life another ordinance In like manner the generall Estates were held at Tours after the decease of king Lewis the eleventh to purvey for the government of king Charles the eighth under Annal. upon An. 148. and Coâ—â—n â—ib 1. ca. 109. age and of the kingdome And by the same Estates was established a Counsell of twelve persons good men and of good calling to dispatch the affaires of the kingdome yet in the kings name and under his authoritie And the rule of the young kings person was committed unto Madame de Beavien his sister When king Charles the sixt le bien aime was come to the age of one and twentie yeares his uncles were discharged from the government of the kingdome by the Froiss lib 1. cap. 134. lib. 4. cap. 44. advise and deliberation of the kings great Counsell But this good prince by an accident of sicknesse fell a certaine time after into a frenzie which sometimes bereaved him of his sences insomuch that the Estates assembled at Paris gave the government of the kingdome during the kings indisposition to his two uncles the dukes of Berrie and Burgoigne The yeare 1356. that king Iohn was taken prisoner nie Poictres at the journey of Annal. upon An. 1356 and Fross li. 1. cap. 170. 171. Maupertins with his sonne Philip after Duke of Burgoigne and that they were led into England there remained in France three of the said king Iohns children namely Charles Dauphin and duke of Normandie Lewis duke de Aniou and Iohn duke of Berrie There was a question about the providing for the government of the kingdome because of the kings captiuitie but none of them would enterprise the mannaging thereof of himselfe insomuch that the generall Estates were assembled at Paris whereby were elected thirtie six persons some say fiftie to governe the affaires of the kingdome with Monsieur le Dauphin who at the beginning called himselfe the Lieutenant of the king his father but afterward he named himselfe Regent The yeare 1409. during the raigne of Charles the sixt king of France were held Monstrelet lib. 1. ca. 59. the generall Estates at Paris for the reformation of abuses in the kingdome And there it was ordained that all accountants for the kings revenues and rents should make their accounts By the meanes of which reformation great summes of money were recovered upon the same accountants and there were also made some good lawes and ordinances In other conventions of Estates the money and coine hath been reformed from weake and light unto thicke and of good waight and goodnesse Also of late at the generall Estates held at Orleans were made manie goodly ordinances for the good and comfort of the poore people reformation of justice and for the cutting off of manie abuses which were committed in plaies at Cardes and Dise in superfluitie of apparell and in matter of benefices But commonly commeth such euill hap that all good things which are introducted and ordained vpon good reason and to a good end incontinent vanish away and wicked examples are alwaies drawne into consequence As for the last cause for which we haue said the generall Estates in old time were called namely for the graunt of Helps Subsidies ther are manie examples in our Histories As in the time of king Iohn wherein the Estates accorded great subventions Froiss lib. 1. cap. 155. Annal. upon An 1354 58. 59. or subsidies to make warre against the English men which then held a great part of the kingdome And after he was taken prisoner and led into England the said Estates agreed to give vnto Monsieur le Dauphin his soune great summes of money to pay for the said kings raunsome and for Philip his sonne being also a prisoner And well to be marked it is that our histories doe witnesse that all the people of France generally were meruailously anguished grieved with the prisonment captivitie which they saw their king suffer but especially the people of the countrey of Languedoc For the Estates of the said countrey ordained that if the king were not delivered within a yeare that every one both men and women should lay by all coloured garments such also as were jagged and cut and such as were enriched with gold silver or other strange and costly fashion Likewise to make cease all stage-plaies morrisdauncings piping yea and plaies pastimes and daunces in signe and token of their mourning and lamentation for their princes captivitie A thing whereby appeared the great and cordiall affection of this people towards their king As truely the Frenchmen have alwaies been of great love and affection towards their kings unlesse they were altogither tyrants But to make an end of this point Certaine it is that before king Charles the seventh called le Victorieux no Subsidies were imposed without assembling the generall Estates And that our kings used thus to do was not because they had power by an absolute authoritie to impose tallages and subsidies without calling the Estates but it is to the end they may be better obeyed with a voluntarie and unconstrained obedience and to shunne all uprores and rebellions which often happen upon that occasion And truly the French people have alwaies been so good and obedient unto their kings that they never refused him any thing if there were but any appearance of reason to demand it Yea often the Estates have granted their king more than he would demand or durst looke for as is seene by that which our histories write of the Estates held for Subsidies But because Aydes and Subsidies were customably granted for the making of De Com. lib. 5. cap. 18. warres M. Philip de Comin saith That kings should also communicat and consult with their Estates whether the causes of such warres be just and reasonable and that the Prince cannot nor ought not otherwise to enterprise a warre For it is reason that they which defray the charges and expenses should know something But yet he passeth further and saith There is no Prince in the world which hath power to lay one pennie upon his subjects without their grant and consent unlesse he will use tyrannie and
death so that by the incestuous mariage wherewith Claudius had contaminated and poysoned his house he and his naturall sonne who by reason should have been his successor were killed with poyson We read likewise that the Emperour Bassianus Carracalla Spartian in Carac beholding one day Iulia his mother in law with an eye of incestuous concupiscence She said unto him Si tu le veux tu le peux If thou wilt thou maiest Knowest thou not that it belongs unto thee to give the law not to receive it which talke so enflamed him yet more with lust that he tooke her to wife in marriage Hereupon Hystoriographers note that if Bassianus had knowne well what it was to give a law he would have detested and prohibited such incestuous and abhominable copulations and not to have authorised them For breefely a Prince may well give lawes unto his subjects but it must not be contrary to nature and naturall reason This was the cause why Papinian the great Lawyer who well understood both naturall and civile law loved better to die than to obey the said Emperor Bassianus who had commanded him to excuse before the Senate his parricide committed in the person of Geta his brother For Papinian knowing that such a crime was against natural right so much there wanted that he would have obeied the Emperor if he had commanded him to have perpetrated and committed it that he would not obey him so far therein as to excuse it Wherein the Paynim Lawyer may serve for a goodly example to condemne many Magistrate Lawyers of our time which not only excuse but also cause to be executed unnaturall murders and massacres against all law divine and humane But now we have spoken of a Princes absolute power let us come to the other The other power which we call Civile is that which is governed and as it were The Civile power temperateth the Absolute limited within the bounds of Reason of right and equitie and which we must presume that the Prince will use and useth ordinarily in all his commaunds unlesse expressely he shew and declare that he willeth and ordaineth this or that of his absolute power and of his certaine knowledge This is that second power which is guided by prudence and good Counsell and which giveth a sweet temperature and counterpoise to that absolute power no more nor no lesse than the second motion of the Sunne tempereth the course of the first as we have abovesaid This is that power which establisheth and conserveth in assurednesse kingdomes and empiers and without which they cannot stand but incontinent shal be ruinated annihilated and laid on the ground This is that power which all good Princes have so practised letting their absolute power cease without using any unlesse in a demonstration of Majestie to make their Estate more venerable and better obeyed that in all their actions and in all their commands they desire to subject and submit themselves to lawes and to reason And in this doing they never thought or esteemed to doe any thing unworthie of their Majestie but contrary have ever accounted that there was no thing more beseeming the majestie of a soveraigne Prince than to live and carrie himselfe in all his actions according to right and equitie And that the domination and power of a Prince that so governeth himselfe is greater more secure and more venerable than his which governeth himselfe after the absolute power And truly all the good Romane Emperours have alwayes held this language and have so practised their power as we read in their hystories Yea the Emperour Theodosius L. digna Vox C. de Lege made an expresse law for it which is so good to be marked that I thought good to translate it word by word It is the majestie of him that governeth to confesse himselfe to be bound unto lawes so much doth our authoritie depend upon law And assuredly it is a farre greater thing than the Empire it selfe to submit his Empire and power unto lawes And that which we will not to be lawfull unto us we shew it unto others by the oracle of this our present Edict Given at Ravenna the eleventh day of Iune the yeare of the Consulship of Florentius and Dionisius To come then to our purpose you must understand that de Comines spoke of this second power in the place above alledged and not of the absolute power of a Prince for by that power it is certain that the Prince hath good authority to enterprise wars to levie imposts upon his subjects without their consent Because that by the roiall law above mentioned the Roman people gave all the like power unto the Prince as Dion de August ◠I. D. de Constit. Princ. they had themselves to use it towards the people against the people gave him absolute power without any astriction or bond to laws to do what he would We see also by the law of God the same absolute power is given unto kings soveraign Princes For it is written that they shall have full power over the goods persons of their subjects And althogh God have given them that absolute power as to his ministers 1. Sam. 8. lieutenants on earth yet wold he not have thē use it but with a temperance moderation of the second power which is ruled by reason equitie which we call Civile For so much there wanteth that God would that Princes shold use the said absolute power upon their subjects as he wold not so far constrain them as to sell their goods as is declared unto us in the example of Naboth For most unlikely is it that God 1. King 22. the great Dominator and Governor of al Princes would have Princes to abuse their powers with cruelties rapines injustices or any other unreasonable way of absolute power But as God by justice punisheth the wicked and by kindnesse and clemencie maintaineth the good and rightly and most holily useth his divine power so would he that Princes which are his lieutenants on earth should do the like not in perfection for that they cannot but in imitation To conclude then now our talke concerning the place of Comines certaine it is that a Prince may well make warre and impose tallies without the consent of his subjects by an absolute power but better it is for him to use his civile power so shuld he be better obeyed And as for Aydes and Subsidies whereof Comines speaketh some say they are not at this day levied by an absolute power but by the peoples consent Because in the time of Charles the seventh who had great and long warres against the English the Estates generall of the kingdome agreed unto him to levie Aydes and Subsidies every yeare without any more calling them together for that the warres endured so long and that their every yeares assembly would have come to great expences so that if the cause had alwaies continued then necessarily
knowledge in them But I doe not doubt but some will here make a question in this time wherein wee are The Catholicke religion and the Reformed are all one that is What Religion ought to be accounted Christian whether the Catholicke or reformed Hereunto I answere That we ought not to make two of them and that it is but one same Religion and as the names Catholicke and Evangelicke and Reformed are all one name so is the thing it selfe for the one and the other acknowledgeth Christ which is the foundation and hold the articles of the faith of the Apostles Symbole approve the Trinitie and the Sacraments of Baptisme and the holy Supper although there be some diversitie in the intelligence of certain points we may not for that make them two divers Religions For in breefe the one and the other is Christian seeing they take Christ for the foundation But for this purpose I will here recite a discourse of a learned man in my opinion which I lately heard at my lodging in my iourney from Paris to Basle By which discourse this good person although he was Evangelike maintained That the Catholikes and Evangelikes do agree not only in name but also in doctrin although Sophisters will persuade the contrary This proposition at the first seemed unto me a very Paradox but when I heard and understood the reasons of that good man his saying seemed very true unto me There was in the companie a gentleman Catholike none of these great talkers and bablers but a man very gentle and affable who tooke great pleasure to heare this discourse asked many questions of this good man whom I cannot name for I never saw him before He was no man of great shew neither was there any great estimation made of him at the beginning before we heard him speake but at the end of our Table wheÌ„ we had given thanks upon certain talke we had of Religion he put forth the said proposition All the company prayed him to cleare and illuminate that point and to speake his full opinion therein for there was neither Catholike nor Evangelike which desired not greatly to understand that point He begun then in this manner after he had prayed all the company to take in good part what he should say and humanely to excuse his faults if any escaped Masters saith he I see well that all this company casteth their eies upon me attending to heare of me the proofe of the proposition which I uttered To satisfie then your desires although I have not premeditated all the reasons which might be spoken to maintain that I say yet I will alledge some which I hope you will not iudge impertinent I will then here repeat my proposition that is That the Catholikes hold the same points of Christian Religion that we of the Reformed or Evangelike do True it is that the sophisters wil needs persuade the Catholikes that we hold another doctrine than they doe especially touching the Sacrament of the Altar or the Supper for all is one and touching good works and certaine other points and in veritie the doctrine of our Religion differeth farre from that of the Sophisters yea in principall points as is seene by the conference of our confession of Faith with their articles But I say and will maintaine That the most part of the Catholikes understand not the articles of the Sophisters neither can they comprehend them because they consist in certaine subtile distinctions and sophisticall tearmes The schoole doctors knowing that their doctrine cannot be comprehended by the simple sence and common iudgement of men make the people beleeve that it makes no matter though they understand nothing if so be they beleeve generally that the articles of their faith bee true And this they cal an implicit wrapped or entangled faith that is to say it is so covert and hid that the people understand nothing But I meane not to speake of the Sophists doctrine but of such points of Religion whereof the Catholikes have some knowledge by the apprehension of sence and common iudgement For I maintaine it is true That in these points or in the most part and especially in the cheefe things they agree with us although the Sophisters make them beleeve the contrary And by the way to make it appeare let us a little discourse upon the principall articles of our Christian Religion as of the Sacraments of Iustification of Workes and certaine other points and we shall see plainely that the Catholikes agree with us First if you aske of a good Catholike if when he receives the Sacrament on Easter day he crusheth and bruseth with his teeth the very flesh and bones of our Lord Iesus Christ he will answere you hee beleeves it not and that hee detesteth and abhorreth that talke of crushing and brusing with the teeth the flesh and bones of our Savior If you demand of him if he do not beleeve that when he receiveth the Sacrament he receiveth spiritually the body and bloud of our Lord Iesus Christ he will answer yea that he beleeves so If you yet aske him if when he receives the sacrament of the Host he beleeve that he receiveth and drinketh by the same meanes the sacrament of the blood by Concomitance and that the cup which is given him to drinke in is not but for him to rince his mouth withal he will say he beleeves not this and that eating is not drinking and that hee knoweth not what that CoÌ„comitance is that he beleeveth that receiving the Host he eateth the Sacrament of the body and that drinking on the cup he drinketh the Sacrament of the blood If you demand of him if he beleeve not that in the holy sacrament there is made a TransubstantiatioÌ„ he wil answer you that he beleeves it not because he knows not what Transubstantiation is nor what they meane by that long and prodigious word that he thinketh it is some obscure word invented by the Sophisters to hide from simple people holy things and to darken cleare things And truly it is a strange thing and abhorring from common sence and from all humanitie and Christianitie to bruse and burst the humane flesh bones of our Savior Christ betwixt our teeth And the Sophisters would so persuade the good Catholikes if they could and that they found this goodly doctrine upon a Canon which beginneth Ego Beringarius Where there is this in proper tearms I Beringer unworthy Ego Ber. de Conse dâ—st 2. deacon of the church of S. Maurice of Angiers knowing the true Catholicke and Apostolicke faith detest and anathematize all heresie and even that whereof I have ben before diffamed Therefore I confesse with hart and mouth that the bread and the wine which are set on the altar after the consecration are not only the Sacrament but are chaÌ„ged into the body and blood of our Lord Iesus Christ and that the priest toucheth not only sensually the Sacrament but that
alwayes see that darkenesse vanisheth and disperseth away by the light the shaddow also flieth the Sunne and hideth it selfe alwayes behind some opposit Therefore have the auncient doctors of the Church said and held for a principle of Theologie That much better it were a scandale and offence should come than that Truth should be forsaken Which sentence even the Popes themselves have caused to be placed amongst their rules of Cannon right and would to God they had observed it But I see well it is to no purpose to alleadge reasons against this Atheist and his Reg. 1. de Reg. Iuris in VI. disciples which beleeve neither God nor Religion wherefore before I passe any further I must fight against their impietie and make it appeare to their eyes at the least if they have any not by assailing them with armes of the holy Scripture for they merit not to bee so assailed and I feare to pollute the holy Scriptures amongst people so prophane and defiled with impietie but by their proper armes and weapons whereby their ignorance and beastlinesse defendeth their renewed Atheisme They then tooke for a foundation humane reason and prophane and Paynim authors but in truth both the one and the other foundation are so much against them as even by them I will prove our Christian Religion For first if wee consider the least creature in the world and sound the causes of his essence and nature it will Every creature leadeth maÌ„ to God leade us by degrees to one God Take an ante or a flie and consider the causes which makes these little creatures moove you shall finde it is heat and moisture which are two qualities consisting in all living creatures nourishers of nature for assoone as heat moisture faile in any living thing it can no more live nor moove straight is the body occupied with contrarie qualities coldnesse and drought the enemies of nature Mount and ascend vp higher and consider what is the cause that in the little bodie of an ante or flie there are found the two qualities of heate and moisture you shall find that it is because all living creatures are composed of the foure elements of fire of aire of water and of earth in which the said foure qualities of heat moisture colde and drinesse do consist and whilest heate and moisture raigne in the bodie it liveth but when colde and drought doe dominiere therein than dieth it Consider further what is the cause of the heate and the moisture and the other qualities which we see in the foure elements and in the bodies made of them you shall finde that the Sunne is cause of the heate and the Moone cause of the moisture as sence and experience shew it Let us yet passe further and seeke the cause wherefore the Sunne is hoate and the Moone moiste and from whence come unto them these qualities of heate and moisture wee must necessarilie now come to a first and sovereigne cause which is one God for the Sunne or Moone which are corporall and finite things as we see with our eyes cannot be God who is of infinite essence Behold then how the least creature of the world is sufficient to vanquish by naturall reason the opinion of the Atheists how much more if wee come to consider other creatures and especiallie the composition of mans body for there shall you contemplate without going any further so well ordered a rule that of necessitie must be concluded That there is a most ingenious and excellent workeman other than the Sunne and Moone which hath disposed that architecture and building for within mans bodie you shall see appeare an harmonie verie like a well governed common-wealth you see the minde and understanding of man which is as the king that is set in the highest place as in his throne and from thence commandeth all the parts you see also the heart the seat of amitie clemencie bountie kindnesse magnanimitie and other vertues all which obey the understanding as their king but the heart as the great master hath them all under his charge it hath also under his charge envie hatred vengeance ambition and other vices which lodge in the heart but they are holden mewed and bridled by the understanding after you have the liver which is the superintendent of victuals which it distributeth unto all the parts of the bodie by the meanes of his subalterne and inferiour officers as the bellie veines and other pores and passages of the bodie brieflie a man may see within man an admirable and well ordeined disposition of all the parts and it brings us necessarilie and whether we will or no to acknowledge that there must needs be a God a sovereigne architect who hath made this excellent building and by these considerations of naturall things whereof I do but lightlie touch the points the auncient philosophers as the Platonists the Aristotelians Stoickes and others have beene brought to the knowledge of a God and of his providence and of all the sects of philosophers there was never any which agreed not hereunto unlesse it were the sect of the Epicures which were gluttons drunkards whoremongers which constituted their sovereigne felicitie in carnall pleasures wherein they wallowed like brute beasts Out of this schoole Machiavell and the Machiavelists come which are well inough knowne to be all very Epicureans in their lives caring for nothing but their pleasures which also have no knowledge of good letters contenting them selves with the Maximes of that wicked Atheist Touching the doctrine of the Trinitie which we hold it must bee confessed that the philosophers understood nothing thereof and that by humane reason wee can not well be lead to the knowledge thereof but this knowledge is manifested unto us by the witnesses of God himselfe which are so cleare and evident in the holy scripture as nothing can be more but I have no purpose here to recite them yet will I say That the doctrine which I hold in this place is not repugnant nor contrary unto The dâ—ctâ—in of the Tâ—initie is not repugnant to human reason humane reason but consonant enough although the ancient philosophers have not penitrated so far For by their owne Maximes a very true thing it is That God who is an eternall and infinit spirit is not passible of any qualities or accidens so that that which is a qualitie in men as bountie love wisedome an essence in God This presupposed as a thing confessed of the philosophers themselves it followeth That that infinit admirable wisdome wherby God knoweth himselfe is an essence and not a qualitie in God yea it is one the same essence yet is it a distinct subsistence or hypostasis from him For the Wise and Wisedome cannot be without distinction This Wisdome then is the second person of the Trinitie which the scripture calleth the Word or the Sonne Neither also is it repugnant to humane reason to say That these two persons in one
and the same essence have an infinit and mutuall Intelligence together which Intelligence proceedeth equally from two persons the Father and the Sonne as they are of equall essence yet can not be confounded with them although the said Intelligence be the same essence for Intelligens understanding and Intelligentia the understanding ought to be distinguished This Intelligence is the third person of the Trinitie which the scripture calleth the holy Spirit Behold then how mans braine may something comprehend by naturall reason the doctrine which wee hold of the Trinitie by a rude and grosse description which is like to that which the Geographers take to pourtray all the earth namely in five or six grosse lines in a paper of an hand breadth For the knowledge that our sence can have of so high a thing is farre lesse in comparison of the full truth thereof than is such a portrature of the Geographers in comparison of all the earth and therefore will I well confesse that we neither need nor ought much to travaile to dispute by humane reason of so high a thing which of it selfe is infinit and incomprehensible to our sences and understanding and that they which doe least dispute with philosophicall reasons are most wise most modest and that we ought wholie to hold and resolve upon that which is written by in the holy Scripture But having to do with Atheists which receive not the witnesses of the word of God it hath made me shew in few words That even by humane reason it selfe they may be vanquished by the truth of that doctrine which we hold Let us now come to another point Naturall reason and common sence teacheth us That there is one God and that he is perfect in all perfection for otherwise he could not be God this is a point resolved Hereof necessarily followeth it That God is perfect just and perfect mercifull Being perfectly just by the rule of Iustice he must needs condemne and reject all mankinde for all men generallie are vicious and vice meriteth condemnation but if God should condemne and reject all mankind it should be repugnant to his mercie which also ought to be perfect with effect How then shall we say that God cannot be perfectlie just and mercifull together because it seemeth that his mercie repugneth his justice God forbid that such blasphemie should proceed out of our mouths But we say That thereby naturall reason leads us to a Mediator who being God and perfect hath satisfied the Divine justice which satisfaction God the creator accepteth of mankind because the mediator is man also and by the meanes of this great mediator God and man which the creator hath given us hee hath shewed himselfe perfectlie just in receiving of him a satisfaction condigne to his justice and perfectlie mercifull in pardoning us for his sake without which mediator we evidentlie see that God cannot shew himselfe perfectly just and mercifull together that is to say that he cannot shew himselfe to be God for the Father cannot be without the sonne It is then a true demonstration drawne from most certaine and evident principles There is one God therefore he is perfect If God be perfect as no doubt he is he is then perfectlie just and mercifull but he cannot be both without a mediator God and man Euclide nor Archimedes ever made more certainer demonstrations But this mediator which the creator hath given to men to make manifest his perfect justice perfect mercie is his eternall Sonne the wisdome of the father in favour of whom as well before he came into the world and had taken our nature as since men have enjoyed the mercie and clemencie of God in employing that mediator to satisfie the justice of God This mediator was promised and established to men from the beginning of the world and since that his promises have beene so often reiterated that not only they have beene notoriovs to the particular people of God which followed the true Religion but also to other people which follow false Religion The Historiographer Suetonius a Paynim who never read any part of holie Scripture speaking of Vespasian as though it were a vulgar and common thing saith thus Through all the East countries alwaies there hath beene a constant and auncient opinion as a thing certaine that it was so ordeined and foretolde of God That from Iudea should come the dominator and ruler of the world As much saith the Historian Tacitus a Paynim also that never saw holy letters when he said speaking of the same time of Vespasian Many have this persuasion that within the spirits and writings of the auncient priests was conteined that at that time the East should be in great power and that from Iudea should come the dominator of the world By which witnesses of these two Historigraphers is clearlie seene that the promise of Messias the dominator of the world was knowne to everie one but not onelie the Paynims but the Iewes also themselves understand this of a temporall domination and indeed these two former historiographers and Iosephus himselfe Joseph lib. 7. cap. 12. de bel Juda. who was a Iew interpreted this prophecie of Messias of Vespasian who was created emperour of the Romane empire being in Iewrie in warre against the Iewes But this foolish and rash interpretation is nothing excusable in Iosephus who vaunteth that he himselfe was cunning foretelling things to come and in the knowledge of the bookes of Moses and of the other Prophets for all the Prophets doe all clearlie say That Messias ought to be borne of the race of Abraham of Iuda and of Dauid yea especiallie and plainly the place it selfe where he should be borne that is to say in Bethlem a little towne of the tribe of Iuda But Iosephus knew well that Vespasian was neither of that race nor borne in the towne of Bethlem but wee must beleeve that Iosephus understood better than he writ and that falslie he attributed that prophecie of Messias to the emperour Vespasian upon a flattering humor because he had received so many great favours and benefits of him And as for that which Tacitus and Suetonius have attributed unto the emperour Miracles of Christ aâ—â—â—ibuted unto Princes Vespasian that prophecie rather then to Christ men must not mervaile thereat for they were great enemies of Christ as is seene by many other places of their historie With the same faith Tacitus saith That the emperour Vespasian being in Iewry healed a blinde man which saw nothing with his spittle and another which had a drie Tacit. annal â—ib 20. hand wherewith he could not helpe himselfe for these indeed were the miracles of Christ which these prophane historians would steale from him to attribute unto Dion in Vesp their emperours And the better to discover their theft by their owne writings we must first marke that Tacitus himselfe saith That the blind man comming to Vespasian and falling on his knees before him said
acknowledgement of his faults and from thence forward he prospered so well that after he had ended his civile wars he also overcame his forrain wars against the English And this came of God who ordinarily exalteth the humble overthroweth the insolent proud For assuredly it doth not evill become a great prince to temperat his majestie by a gracious humility softnes affabilitie but saith Plutarch it is a very harmonious consonant temperation yea so excellent as there cannot be a more perfect than this But if the said king had then had such Counselors as many kings now adaies have what counsell would they hereupon have given him they would have said That thus to humiliate himselfe to his vassall as to ask him forgivenes to confesse his fault to acquitehim and his subjects of personall service these were things unworthy of a king and that a king ought never to make peace unlesse it be to his honor but such articles were to his dishonor and disadvantage and that he ought to have endured all extremities before he had made any peace whereby he should not remain altogether master to dispose of persons goods at his pleasure For how would not they say thus seeing they say at this day That it is no honorable peace for the king to accord his subjects any assurances with the exercises of their religion a reformation of justice yet you see that all K. Charles 7 his Counsell all the princes of his blood all the great lords of his kingdome all strange princes embassadors compelled the K. to passe more hard uneasie articles to digest for the good of peace Should we say that in so great a number of great personages ther was not any so wise and cleare sighted as the counsellors at this day as these Mesiers Machiavelists nay contrary they were al wise men of great experience in wordly affairs they were also of great knowlege as the delegates of the counsel of the universitie of Paris of the parliaments wheras at this day men know litle more than their Machiavell Likewise king Lewis the eleventh as soone as hee came to the crowne removed De Com. lib. 1. cap. 3. 5. others from charges and offices many great lords and good servants of the dead king Charles the seventh his father which had vertuously emploied themselves in chasing the English out of the kingdome of France and in lieu of such persons he placed and advanced men of meane and base condition Heereupon straight arose civile discention against the king which was called the warres of the common weale and these men complained that the kingdome was not politikelie governed because the king had put from him good men and of high calling to advance such as were of small estimation and of no vertue It was not long before the king acknowledged his great fault and confessed it not onely in generall but also in particular to every of them which he had recoyled and disapointed and to repaire this fault he got againe to him all the said lords and ancient servants of the dead king his father delivering them againe their estates or much greater and in somme he granted to these common wealth people all that they demanded as well for the generall as for the particular good of all people and all to obtaine peace with extinguishment of civile wars If he had had of his Counsell the Machiavellists of these daies they would not have counselled him thus to doe but rather would have told him That it became not a king to capitulate with his subjects nor so to unable himselfe unto them and that a prince ought never to trust to such as once were his enemies but much lesse ought hee to advance them to estates and that hee should diligentlie take heede of a reconciled enemie yet notwithstanding hee did all this and it fell out well with him for he was very well served of the pretended reconciled enemies and to this purpose Messier de Commines his chamberlaine saith That his humilitie and the acknowledgment of his faults saved his kingdome which was in great danger to bee lost if hee had stayed upon such impertinent and foolish reasons as those Machiavelists alledge for all things may not bee judged by the finall cause What dishonour then can it bee to a prince to use pettie and base meanes if so bee thereby hee make his countrey peaceable his estate assured and his subjects contented and obedient what makes it matter for him that is to ascend into an high place whether he mount by degrees and staires of wood or of stone so that hee ascend But this is not all to say That a prince ought to bee vigilant and carefull to make peace in his countrey for hee must after it is made well observe it otherwise it is to Peace ought to be well observed no purpose made unles men will say that one ought to make peace for after in breaking it to trap and ensnare them which trust therein But they which hold this opinion are people which make no account of the observation of faith as are the Machiavelists of whom wee will speake upon this point in another Maxime But indeede that a peace may bee well observed it must bee profitable and commodious to them with whom it is made to the ende by that meanes it may bee agreeable unto them and that they may observe it with a good will and without constraint for if it be domageable and disadvantageous making the condition of them to whom it is given worse than of other subjects and neighbours certaine it is it cannot long endure for people that have either heart or spirit in them cannot long endure to be handled like slaves Heereunto serveth the advice of that noble and sage companie of the ancient Senators of Rome There was a neighbour unto the Romanes which were called the Titus Livi. lib. 8. Dec. 1. Privernates upon which the Romanes made warre and many times vanquished them They seeing it was impossible any more to make head against the Romane forces sent embassadors to Rome for peace they were caused to enter into the place where the Senate did sit and because they had not well observed the precedent treatie of peace some Senators seemed hard to draw to give their cause any hearing thinking it a vaine thing to accord a peace unto such as would not keepe any notwithstanding some demanded of those embassadors what punishment they judged themselves to haue merited which had so often broken the precedent peace One of them speaking for all and remembring rather the condition of their birth than of their present estate answered That the Privernates merited the punishment that they deserve which esteeme themselves worthie of a free condition and which have a slavish condition This answere seemed to some Senators too hautie and unbeseeming vanquished people yet the president of the assembly who was a wise man benignly demanded
founded upon reason and they accorded to the people of the third estate magistrates which were called Tribunes of the people These had the charge to defend the common people against great men with power to imprison all such as seemed good unto them and this magistrate proved very profitable whilest they used it well but as soone as they abused it it fell out to bee very pernitious so is it of all other offices To demonstrate that men cannot keepe a peace when thereby they are handled like slaves the example of the Saguntines is very notable admirable The Saguntines Titus Livi. lib. 1. Dec. 3. a people of Spaine were besieged by Anniball of Carthage who held them so straightly in their city that they had no meane left to escape or resist They being reduced to this extremity Anniball sent them word by one of his nation called Alorcus to yeeld themselves to save their lives For courages said hee must needes bee vanquished when forces failed and Anniball would save their lives if they would yeeld to him and of his grace would deale well with them These poore people well considered the extreame danger wherein they were and that they had no meane to escape Anniball his hands but with yeelding unto him and to yeeld they should change their free into a servile condition which they feared so much as they loved better to lose their lives therefore resolved so to deale as neither their bodies nor their goods should ever come into the power of Anniball So they tooke choice of certaine young men of the towne which they caused to sweare to defend the gates of the towne even to the death that in the meane while the other townes-people might have leasure to execute their determination after this the cheefe of the towne resorted to the common market place and there caused to bee laid on a heape all the goods and treasures of the towne and about it to light a great fier within which many cast themselves and were burned lest they should fall into Anniballs hands others shut themselves up in their houses with their wives and children after putting fire thereunto burnt the said houses themselves and their goods and the said young men which were trusted with the gates made an end of fighting and living together Was not heere thinke you an admirable love of libertie for if they would but a while have lived under Anniball his yoake there had beene hope that the Romanes their allies would have delivered them but yet they rather tooke choice to lose their lives yea that by a most strange cruell death than to suffer for a small time a servile subjection under Anniball But as it is rare and unlikely that a servile peace should bee long and well observed so it is a very great fault to breake a peace when it is sufficiently commodious A tolerable peace ought not to be broken and tollerable This was the onely cause of the totall ruine of that great flourishing commonwealth of the Carthaginians for after they had many times broken the treatie of peace which they had with the Romanes and had beene many times vanquished in the end they were altogether destroyed and their townes rased and the cause that moved the Romanes thus to doe was for that they considered that the Carthaginians would never observe faith nor promise they made which alreadie so many times they had violated especially since they were not at any time bound to any hard condition of peace but onely hindered to rebell or waxe great Titus livi lib. 3. Dec. 4. and lib. 4. Dec. 5. Plutarch in P. Aemil. But the example of king Philip of Macedon and of Perseus his sonne is verie notable in this matter This king Philip about some light occasion enterprised warre against the Aetolians a people of Greece the Romanes allies The Aetolians called to their aid the Romanes sent an armie into Greece against Philip under the charge of captaine Sulpitius as well to succour the Aetolians as also the Athenians which Philip would have destroyed and lastly to revenge themselves of the king who covertly had aided with silver Anniball to make warre upon them after certaine conflicts this king fearing the forces and vertue of the Romanes did so much as hee wrought a peace with them after that they had made this peace hee observed it very well all the rest of his life and the better to keepe it from point to point hee had ordinarily in his hands the articles of that peace which hee ever read twise a day that hee might not breake any point of it When hee was dead Perseus his sonne succeeded him unto whom a Macedonian gentleman called Onesimus a faithfull friend and councellor of his father Philip gave this advice to have ever in his hands and often to reade the said treatise and articles of peace that as his father had done he might inviolablie observe them as the onely meane to maintaine him in his estate Perseus at the beginning did but despise the admonitions of that good seruant Onesimus but in the end hee had him in suspition and put him out of credit insomuch as the good person fearing worse unto himselfe fled to Rome After this Perseus gathering great store of money and esteeming himselfe strong enough to warre against the Romanes by little and little broke the articles of peace one after another altogether contrarying the contents of the articles in the mean time covertly prepared for warre finally the Romanes sent against him the consull Paulus Aemilius with a Roman armie which in lesse than a month seised upon all Macedonia and brought it into the Romane obedience and tooke prisoners the king Perseus and his sonne which hee carried to Rome in a triumph where they miserably dyed in a prison behold the evill haps of Perseus for not imitating the example of his father in the observation of the treatise of peace Verely the prince which well considereth the good that comes by living in peace will alwaies seeke to maintaine it but at the least within his owne domination for in peace all things do flourish and in warre all things are in ruine and devastation we reade that in the time of Antonius Pius all the Romane empire was in good peace and that by the same meanes all the provinces were rich and flourishing not onely Capitol in Antonio Pio. Plinius in epist ad Traianum in goods but in vertues and sciences for at that time good letters flourished al over and especially the civile law which was so well practised and in all places so good justice administred that the whole empire was a most excellent and admirable thing at that time Moreover that good emperour tooke a great delight to fabricate and build great works and common buildings as the Amphitheater which he builded at Nismes where hee was borne it is called at this day les Arenes the temple of Adrian
the honour of his nation vengeances and enmities are perpetuall and irreconcilable and indeed there is nothing wherein they take greater delectation pleasure and contentment than to execute a vengeance insomuch as whensoever they can have their enemie at their pleasure to be revenged upon him they murder him after some strange barbarous fashion and in murdering him they put him in remembrance of the offence done unto them with many reprochfull words and injuries to torment the soule and the body together and sometimes wash their hands and their mouthes with his blood and force him with hope of his life to give himselfe to the divell and so they seeke in slaying the bodie to damne the soule if they could God by his grace keepe all countries but especially England which alreadie is so spotted with other vices and with the doctrine that Machiavell teacheth and which they of his nation practise that they be not soiled and infected with that immortall and irreconcilable vengeance For how should it be possible that any man should be without infinit quarels and continual and ordinarie batteries and murders yea with parents and friends and with al other persons with whom he hath any frequentation if offences may never be blotted out but by vengeance Every one may well know by experience that they which are amongst themselves great friends and familiars yet commit offences one to another and sometimes have great stirres despights and contentions amongst them But must men as soone as they receive any offence at the hand of a parent friend or of any other forget and blot out all amitie Christian and brotherly charitie towards his neighbour and to pardon no faults but seeke the ruin of him that offendeth us Surely this is not onely farre from all Christian pietie but also from all humanitie and common sence yea brute beasts which have no reason are not so unreasonable Irreconcilable vengeance contrary to natural right for a dog which we have offended will be appeased with a piece of bread yea will fawne upon him which beat him and as much will an horse do and an oxe which hath ben pricked and beaten when hey is given them and as for such as say that vengeance is lawfull by right of nature are greatly deceived as the beasts named before doe shew True it is that nature teacheth man and all living creatures to put backe violence with violence when a man is upon the act and instant it selfe when as violence is inferred but it teacheth not that after the act of violence outrage is committed a man ought to seeke vengeance to put backe that violence outrage for this is not to repell and repulse injurie which already being received cannot be repulsed but rather to inferre a new injurie violence withall that naturall right To repulse violence with violence it must be understood with reason equal moderation that is to say That such right hath place when by no other mean in any other sort we can shun the violence which is offered unto us And indeed the brute beasts themselves shew us we must so use it for you shall not see a wolfe nor a swine seeke to put backe the violence offered him whilest they have place enough to flie and that they be not brought to a strait and therfore it is a beastly ignorance to colour that detestable vice of vengeance by the right of nature for it is cleane contrarie and especially to the irreconcilable vengeance whereof Machiavell speaketh which he saith cannot be defaced nor forgotten by new pleasures But I doe well know that some Machiavelist will replie upon this doctrine that Machiavell speaketh onely of princes and great lords unto whom he saith That new pleasures cannot extinguish old injuries and that hereunto accordeth that which Homer saith A mightie king that angry is against one lesse than he Hom. Iliad lib. 1. Can hide full deepe in spightfull heart that hard it is to see His fierce and angry wrathfull mood till he espies his time Revenge to take according to the greatnesse of the crime But let the case be so that the wrath and irritations of great princes and lords dwell longer in their hearts than in other persons of lesse qualitie as the meaning of Homer seemes to be hereof it followeth not that a prince is implacable and that he cannot be appeased by any pleasures or services It seemes that Homer noted no other thing in the particular natures of kings and great lords but that they knowe how for a time to dissemble despights and offences perpetrated against them and can attend opportunitie to revenge them a thing very true and that wee see often practised But it is farre from Homer to say that kings and princes cannot be appeased by pleasures and good services that may bee done unto them after the offence yea in humiliating and reconciling themselves to them Homer speakes here of cholericke kings which are not masters of themselves not being able to command their passions and affections which raigne in them and which doe darken their reason and judgement such as was king Agamemnon of whom he especially spoke in the place above alledged For many good and wise kings and princes are seene which Good princes encline to pardon can so well make their passions and affections obey reason that not onely their wise judgement never suffereth that a desire after perpetuall vengeance shall take root in their hearts but rather will not leave in their memorie the offences that are done them but will forget and pardon them of their owne motion before any pardon be demanded for their wisedome judgeth that those passions of vengeance besides that they doe but torment and make leane the heart of a prince are altogether contrarie to the principall vertue which ought to shine in a prince as clemencie gentlenesse and goodnesse a vertue making a princes estate pleasing and assured which ought principally to shine in privat offences as justice ought especially to shine in publicke offences as shall be spoken more at large in another place although even in publicke offences it is sometimes requisit for the publicke good and utilitie that the prince use clemencie and forgetfulnesse To this purpose is very regardable the opinion that in the Senat that great and Titus Livi. lib. 4. Dec. 3. wise person Quintus Fabius Maximus held When the Romanes begun to get up and reprosper after their ruine at Cannas many of their allies which had revolted to Anniball profered to come to them againe Amongst others there was one Classius Altinius Arpinus who came to Rome and made the Senat understand That he had meanes to bring the towne of Arpos where he inhabited into their hands The matter comming to deliberation in the Senate some argued That it was not good to trust in this Altinius nor in any other Arpinois seeing they had violated their faith by revolting unto Anniball and that it were
an act exercise of jurisdiction But it is an undoubted Maxime that none can exercise jurisdiction in his owne deede therefore it seemeth that the illation doth not evill conclude That the Pope cannot legitimate his owne bastards but seeing wee are entred into this talke wee will deeper looke into the matter to draw out some good resolution from this question by the way onely of a tentative and pleasant disputation and not of a full determination heereof For as Cato saith amongst serious things ioyous and mery things would bee sometimes mixed Vpon this question then namely Whether the Pope can legitimate his own bastards there do appeare unto us many strong and ample arguments as well in law as in speculative Theologie and as well for the affirmative as the negative For on the affirmative they alledge that by law and right of nature it is given to man to procreate his like so that when the Pope exerciseth the act of procreation therein hee doth nothing which agreeth with the law of nature This for the first Secondly they alledge that Popes are called fathers and therefore they ought to have children for the name of father is relative to the name of the son one of them cannot be without the other Thirdly it is a point altogether peremptorie and such as no reply can bee made against it namely that by the cannons and papall constitutions it is expressely determined that the Pope ought to bee garnished and furnished with genitories otherwise hee were incapable and unable to bee Pope by the disposition of law without any other declaration Insomuch as if there happen so great a mischiefe and unhappie hap to Christendome as by adventure they elect an eunuch Pope all whatsoever hee doth were nothing woorth nor of any value so that his bulls and collations of benefices his dispensations fulminations aggravations pardons legitimations and other like provisions should have no strength vigor nor effect which is an admirable point in law to say that a privation of genitories should induce a nullitie of bulls as if the Popes power depended altogether upon his genitories But hereof some yeeld this reason because say they eunuches commonly are effeminate having neither the force nor power which naturall men have so that it should not bee found strange that the cannons will that the Pope must be accounted without force and power when he is without genitories Others whom this reason satisfieth not doe say That the cannons in this place containe a right positive and whatsoever hath been constituted by a positive right a reason cannot be rendered of it and that we must content our selves and be satisfied that it hath beene so ordained That the Pope ought to have genitories without further enquiring the reason therof Yet if it were requisit to yeeld a reason of that constitution we must rather say it was ordained to shut the gate of the Popedome from Papesses or shee Popes which otherwise might have crept into that holy seat as the Papesse Ioan did But out of this doctrine of the cannons which importeth That all Popes ought to be furnished with genitories men draw out corolaries and consequences which marvellously serve to the confirmation of the affirmative of our question For if it bee so say the cannonists that it is requisit by a necessitie that the Pope must have genitories it followeth that it is for some end and use For it were very absurd to say that by the cannon law any thing hath beene ordained without any end because all humane actions are done to some end and utilitie and by consequent with stronger reason the ordinances of the cannon law ought to tend to some end But it is so that genitories can serve for nothing but for generation and therfore it followeth that the Pope ought to use them to that worke And if any object that he ought to use them for generation in the estate of marriage the replie to overthrow it is very readie founded upon the universall vow of the Catholicke Romane Church whereby all Ecclesiasticall persons and especially the Pope chiefe of them have made a vowe never to be married If then it be not lawfull for the Pope by the doome of the Catholicke Romane Church to be married as also by cannonicall constitutions it is of necessitie that he have genitories which he cannot have but for some use it necessarily followeth that he may and ought to have bastards This argument may bee reduced under the first forme of the first figure of Syllogismes in Barbara which as the Logicians say of all other are the best concluding arguments But say they taking now this conclusion for a cleare and well prooved Maxime that the Pope by disposition of right ought to have bastards wee shall easily come to the affirmative of our question For they are called legitimate children which are procreated after the ordinance and permission of law and right and therefore the Popes bastards shall be found alreadie legitimate from their creation but much more when farther the Pope himselfe which can doe all in all legitimateth them For this legitimation is a superabundant act which cannot but serve and at the least cannot hurt because that which is abundant impaireth not the rest that each act ought to be taken to some end and profitable operation They which hold the negative part of our question have other contrarie arguments The Pope say they is bound as other Ecclesiasticall people are to the generall vow of the church and therefore he ought to observe the vow as well as others especially that he may bee a good example to other priests For if the Pope who commonly is an old man dispence with himselfe to have bastards and doe breake chastitie and continencie required in the priestly order what an example should that be for a companie of young priests which are idle and at their case To say that nature hath given men genitories for procreation it is true say they but they must be used in marriage And if that be a good reason we may then say that it is lawfull for all priests to breake the vow of chastitie But the truth is contrarie For none ought to make himselfe priest nor to bind himselfe unto that vow unlesse hee know in himselfe a power to observe it To say also that Popes are called fathers this is true say they but it must be understood spirituall fathers not carnall fathers And wheras by the holy decrees it is ordained That the Pope ought to have genitories that is to shew say they that he is a perfect man having all his members as it is requisit he have And when that decree was made that the Pope should have genitories wee must not understand thereby a dispensation from the vow of the universall church whereunto he remaineth alwaies tied and bound For by the Cannons the Pope cannot dispence against a statute and ordinance of the universall church So that by consequent
clemencie yea your own and let none die that be culpable let no Senator be punished nor noble blood bee shed let such as are banished be called againe and let their consiscated goods be yeelded unto them againe and would to God that I could revoke and call again to life such as are dead For there was never found that a prince committed a good vengeance of his owne greefe but it was alwayes thought too rigorous and sharpe though never so just I would have you then to pardon Cassius his children his sonne in law and his wife How should I not say pardon since they have done nothing let them live in all assurance and so know that they live under the empire of Marcus Let them enjoy their fathers patrimonie his gold his silver and other their goods that they may be rich assured free and let them be examples of our pietie and clemencie also of yours in the mouth of al the world Neither ô ye Conscript Fathers is it any great clemencie to pardon the children and wives of such as are banished and condemned since I demand and pray for pardon even of the culpable themselves whether they be Senators or knights that you may deliver them from death from confiscations from infamie from feare from envie from all injuries and that you will do this whilest we raigne that they which were slaine in the tumult for enterprising against us bee not defamed After this missive was read in the Senate house all the Senators with an honorable acclamation begun to crie The gods conserve Antonine the clement Antonine most pittifull Antonine most mercifull The gods perpetuate thy empire into thy race We wish all good to thy Wisedome to thy Clemencie to thy Doctrine to thy Nobilitie and to thy Innocencie This acclamation declareth well how amiable acceptable Clemencie makes a prince for there is nothing in the world that better gains the hearts of men nor that brings to a prince more reverence and love than this gentlenesse and lenitie of heart And indeed this good emperour by his Clemencie got thus much that after his death all Rome made a certaine account that he was ascended into heaven as to the place of his originall Because said they it was impossible that so good a soule endowed with so excellent vertues shold come from any other place than from heaven either returne againe to any other place The very name of Antonine was also so reverenced and loved of all the world from father to sonne in many yeares and generations after him that many emperours his successors caused themselves to bee called Antonines that the rather they might be beloved of the people though that name belonged not unto them nor were of the race or familie of Marcus Antonine as did Diadumenus the emperour Macrinus his sonne and his companion in the empire and as also did Bassianus and Geta Severus his children and Heliogabalus they were all surnamed Antonines But as this name appertained not unto them so held they nothing of the vertues of that good emperour with whose name they decked themselves Yet many reprehended in Marcus Antonine this his great Clemencie whereby he so easily pardoned such as had conspired against him saying That he provided evill for the safetie of himself and his children to suffer conspirators to live This was but a meanes to emboulden wicked people to enterprise conspiracies and amongst others the empresse Faustine his wife found it evill and of bad consequence that he punished not rigorously the partakers of Cassius whereupon he writ a very memorable letter to this effect Very religiously dost thou ô Faustine my deare companion to have care of the assurance of us and our children but whereas thou admonishest me to punish the complices of Avidius Cassius I do advertise thee that I had rather pardon them for nothing more recommendeth a Romane emperour amongst all nations than Clemencie That was it which placed Iulius Caesar in the number of the gods which hath consecrated Augustus which gave that most honourable title of Pius that is gentle and godly to thy father Finally Cassius himselfe had not beene slaine if my advice had been demanded in the slaying of him I pray thee therefore my deare companion be not afraid but hold thy selfe assured under the protection of the gods who no doubt will guard us because pietie and Clemencie are so pleasant and agreeable unto them For a resolution then certaine it is that nothing can so become or is so worthy of a prince to practise as Clemencie by pardoning such as offend him and even them which have committed some fault that may bee excused by some equitable reason and by mitigating the punishments of the law to such as upon custome commit no excesse and which otherwise are vertuous and valorous people and their offence not exceeding great and hainous for if otherwise a prince use his Clemencie without having these considerations before his eyes his fact will rather hold of crueltie and injustice than of clemencie but for a man to practise it with a counterpoise and equall ballance of equitie justice can be nothing interressed but rather shall bee reduced and applied to his true rule But assuredly as a princes Clemencie bringeth to his subjects the fruit of a good equitie so doth it also acquire unto himselfe this inestimable good to be beloved of every one as was Marcus Antonine the emperour The like happened to Vespasian Sueto Vesp Pas cap. 14. 15. in â—iâ—o cap. 1. 9. the emperour who was greatly beloved for his great Clemencie and gentlenesse for he was so gentle kind and clement that he easily forgot offences committed against him yea he would doe good to his enemies As when he maried and endowed very richly and honourably the daughter of Vitellius his enemie which warred upon him Moreover hee would never suffer that any were punished who did not well deserve it Likewise his sonne Titus was so good and clement that hee was never blamed for bearing evill will to any man often he had this word in his mouth That he had rather perish himselfe than lose any He was of the people surnamed The delights of mankind for his kindnesse and Clemencie In like sort Traian Adrian Pius Tacitus and many other Romane emperours were so beloved and reverenced of their subjects for their naturall humanitie and Clemencie that they are placed after their deaths in the rowle of their gods Moreover whensoever a prince shall be soft and clement there is no doubt but Clemencie cause of good works his subjects will imitate him therein for it is the peoples nature to conforme themselves unto their princes manners as the Proverbe saith The example of the princes life in all things commonly The subiect seekes to imitate with all his possibilitie But whensoever subjects doe imitate that most excellent vertue of Debonairetie and Clemencie certaine also it is that the whole bodie of the commonwealth
generositie and hardinesse came to besiege new Carthage in Spain which the Carthaginians of Affricke had founded there and did so much as hee got it by assault Besides the great riches which he found within the towne he found there also within that towne a good number of Spanish hostages which the Carthaginians held there for the better assurance of other townes of Spaine which they had regained upon the Romanes after the death and overthrow of the Scipioes and their hoast Scipio as soone as the towne was taken caused all the hostages to be brought before him and wished them to take good courage and that they should feare nothing for they were falne into the power of the Romane people which loved better to bind men unto them by good deeds than by feare and to joyne all strange nations unto them rather by a societie than by a sad servitude After hee had thus encouraged them hee dispatched messengers through all Spaine to the end every man might come thither to seeke his hostages and in the meane while gave expresse charge to Flaminius his treasurer to handle them well and honourably Amongst other hostages there was a young ladie of a great house which was brought to Scipio which was of so great beautie that as she passed by she dreweach mans regard upon her This ladie was fianced unto one Allucius prince of the Celtiberians Scipio taking knowledge of her parents and to whom shee was fianced also that Allucius extreamely loved her he sent for them all Her parents came with a great quantitie of gold and silver for her ransome Allucius came also They all beeing present before Scipio hee said to that young prince Allucius My deare friend understanding that ardently you love this young ladie as her beautie well meriteth it I thought it good to keepe her for you as I would my affianced should be kept for me if the affaires of the commonweale permitted me to thinke upon the action of legitimate love in favor then of your affections I have preserved your loves inviolated in recompence whereof I only desire and pray you that from henceforth you will be friends unto the Roman people and if you will credit me as a good man that is desirous to follow the traces of my father and uncle which you knew Know you that in our towne there be many like to us and that there is no people in the world which you ought lesser to desire for enemies nor more for a friend After Scipio had thus graciously entertained this young prince he was so filled with shame and joy that presently he prayed the gods that they would acquite to Scipio that great benefit for hee could never doe it The said ladies parents stepped forward and presented unto him a great quantitie of gold and silver for their daughters ransome which although Scipio refused yet they pressed it so sore upon him that he accorded to take it and bad them lay it before him which they doing Scipio called Allucius and said unto him Good friend besides the dowrie which your father in law will give you my desire is that you will take this silver at my hands as an encrease of her dowrie Allucius very joyfull of so great a benefit thanking him greatly returned with his lover in great contentment unto his countrey where as soone as he came he sowed the fame of those things through all Spaine saying That there was come into that countrey a young lord like the gods which vanquisheth all men by armes by clemencie and magnificence Within a smal time after he came to the service of Scipio with 1400 horse Not long after came also to Scipio the parents of the other hostages which he had taken in new Carthage all which he yeelded unto them conditionally to be the Romanes friends Hee gave also to a great lord called Mandonius his wife who was sister of another great lord named Indibilis which were exceeding joyous thereof and promised Scipio all fidelitie Amongst those prisoners also there was found a young prince called Massiva the nephew of Massinissa king of Numidia which he sent to his uncle after he had honourably apparrelled mounted and accompanied him This was the cause that Massinissa stucke so firmely to the Romane partie wherein he constantly persevered all his life and greatly aided Scipio to the overthrow of the Carthaginians And as for the Spaniards whose hostages Scipio had sent home without ransome they performed many great favours to him in all his Spanish wars Breefely this great Clemencie kindnesse and gentlenesse of Scipio were the cause that all his high mightie enterprises were ever facile easie unto him But herein appeared in him a double Clemencie namely that the two lords above-named Mandonius and Indibilis revolted and so caused all their countrey to revolt also upon a false fame that run of Scipioes death But after finding the report false they resolved yet once againe to proove his Clemencie as an assured refuge and so went fell on their knees before him desiring pardon confessing their faults Scipio after he had rebuked them said unto them in this sort My friends by your merits you shall die but you shall live by the benefit of the Romane people And although the custome be to take all armes from rebels yet I will not take them from you but if you fall any more into such a fault I shall have reason with armes to take armes from armed people but not from disarmed Therefore seeing you have many times experimented the Romanes Clemencie take heed also you prove not their vengeance and wrath By this example then of Scipio it appeares that a prince ought alwaies to be enclined to Clemencie wherby he may obtaine friends augment his dominations shun Gods indignation the envie of men and to do to another that which he would should be done to himselfe This is it which Romulus said to the Antenates and Caeninians which hee had vanquished subjugated Although said he you have merited to suffer al extreame things for that you rather loved warre against us than our amitie yet many reasons Dioni Halic lib. 2. moove us to use our victorie moderately in respect of the indignation of the gods unto whom pride is odious the feare of the envie evill will of men and because we beleeve that Mercie and Clemencie is a great releese and remedie for the miseries and calamities of mortall men which we would gladly entreat of others in our owne distresses and calamities We therefore pardon you this fault and leave you in the same enjoiance of your goods as you were before The Romane Senat had alwayes Clemencie in great recommendation yea even towards them which had often rebeled The Ligurians which now we cal Genevois Titus Liviuâ— lib. 2. Dec. 2. rose up against the Romanes many times insomuch as they sent against them Marcus Popilius Consull with a puissant armie Popilius having subjugated and vanquished them
infected with such a corruption as to approove or follow such abhorrent doctrine from pietie and reason and such monstrous savage opinions For as Thucidides calleth them servants and slaves of absurd opinions such as follow evill counsell sooner than good as the Athenians often did So do I beleeve them to be double yea centuple slaves and miserable which suffer their spirits to bee persuaded and deluded with the doctrine and impietie of Machiavell 24. Maxime A prince desirous to breake a peace promised and sworne with his neighbour ought to moove warre against his friend THe prince saith Machiavell having made certaine capitulations with his neighbour vvhich long time have Discourse lib. 2. cap 9. beene established and well observed so that hee feareth directly to breake them lest he fall to open warre vvith his said neighbour he must stirr him by taking armes against his friend knowing that the other vvill feele himselfe touched vvhen the assault is delivered to his friend and confederate and vvill sustaine and revenge him and so shall it seeme that hee himselfe is the first provoker of warre and breaker of peace MAchiavell because hee hath above taught that a prince may alwaies finde coulours inough to palliate and cover the infraction of faith now hee gives a rule saying That to palliate a rupture of peace or confederation with a prince his neighbour hee must assaile his confederates friend Wee have before amply disputed against these subtill palliations and have shewed by many examples that the issue hath alwaies prooved evill to them that use them And surely such cautells and subtilties are not onely most unworthie of a generous prince but also of all other men and by lawes hee is no lesse punishable that hath done wrong to a man by cautell and subtiltie than if hee had done it by force The ancient Romanes by the forme and course they had to make confederations and peace with the people their neighbours shewed well how far they were from Titus Livius lib. 1. Dec. 2. this doctrine of Machiavell For the Pater Patratus who was the stipulator or master of the ceremonies or arbitrer of peace after all articles accorded of the one part and of the other oathes taken pronounced a great height these words The first of the two people which breaketh the peace bee it by deliberate counsell or by subtill deceit graunt ô Iupiter that the same day hee may bee bruised and beaten as now with this flint stone I bruise this pig and therewithall after this speach hee with a stone beats downe a porke pig Briefely they no lesse detested the rupture of a peace made by a subtiltie than if it had beene made by an open warre They also held it for a thing certaine that alwaies the evill fortunes of a renued warre fell upon them which had broken the peace but because we have above discoursed upon this matter we will passe on to the next Maxime 25. Maxime A prince ought to have his minde disposed to turne after every winde and variation of Fortune that hee may know to make use of a Vice when neede is A Good thing is not alwaies profitable nor in season and oftentimes a prince who would practise it shall thereby draw Cap. 18 25 Of a prince on his owne destruction For sometimes it fals out that necessarily hee must use that which is evill and vice Therefore a wise prince ought to take great heede to the time and to the windlike variation of Fortune and ought to have knowledge to serve himselfe with a vice for his profit and advantage vvhen time requireth it Othervvise if hee alwaies follovv vertue and that vvhich is good there are seasons so contrarie to it by the chance of Fortune that incontinent hee vvill fall into ruine BEcause a Prince that hath beene nourished in vertue as he reades Machiavell might make some difficultie to beleeve him and to esteeme that it should evill become him altogether to despoile himselfe of vertue to put on vice For this cause Machiavell desirous to resolve this doubt sheweth heere that it is not uncomely for a prince to change from vertue into vice And to encourage him to make this change he saith That sometimes such a time and season may happen that it is necessarie for a prince to know how to use a vice to serve fortunes turne which commonly oppugneth vertue Yet there is no man of so small judgement that sees not with his eies that this doctrine containeth two points altogether wicked One to say it is necessarie to a prince for the conservation of his estate to use vice The other to approve and allow lightnesse and inconstancie of manners by changing good into evill As for the first point wee have heeretofore amplie handled it where we have shewed That good princes which were given to vertue have alwaies prospered in their estates but contrary the wicked which exceeded in vices have alwaies had hard fortunes and evill haps in their kingdomes and have come to unluckie ends As for the other point Inconstancie we must heere touch in few words Constancie is a companion of all other vertues I will then presuppose that Constancie is a qualitie which ordinatilie accompanieth all other vertues yea it is as it were of their substance and nature Therefore is Iustice defined A constant will to yeeld to every man that which belongeth unto him And Temperance may bee also defined A constant moderation to use well all things and Prudence A constant provision in all affaires and so of all other vertues Heereupon I make this illation Since constancie is of the nature and substance of all vertues and as it were mixed amongst them that thereof it followeth That hee which is inconstant can have no vertue in him for vertue goes not without Constancie Machiavell also as beastly as hee is so understood this for by degrees going about to leade a prince and all them which follow his doctrine to a soveraigne wickednesse as philosophers leade men to a soveraigne good he hath considered that he must make for his foundation Inconstancie For an inconstant man disposed to turne with all windes can never bee but full of all sorts of vices and voide of all vertue Because in vertue there can fall out no change nor variation since all vertues doe accord and agree amongst themselves But amongst vices there may be changes inconstancies variations because often they are contrary and doe hold the places of extreames As for example Avarice and Prodigalitie are contrary vices as also are Temeritie and Cowardise Ignorance and malitious subtiltie Crueltie Dissolute lenitie Ambition and the Despight of Honour and so of other vices Inconstancie then may well pearch amongst vices flitting and moving from one to another But amongst vertues she can finde no place because as I have said they all naturally so hold on Constancie that without it they cannot bee vertues Machiavell then was not any
elected for their cheefetaine the said Giles governour of a great part of Gaule which the Romane emperor then held This Giles called Guiemand to be about him as one of his Counsell because he was reputed a wise man Guiemand dissembled the best he could by the space of nine yeares all which time he was about this Giles yet never forgetting the amitie and fidelitie which hee bore to his king But amongst other things which hee counselled this governour this was one that hee gave him to understand that the Frenchmens natures is to be rudely handled in great subjection and to take great heed they doe not enrich themselves for they are farre better poore than rich and when they are rich and at their ease then doe they incontinent rebell against their prince Breefely by this goodly counsell whereof he desired such issue as after happened hee put in that Romane governours head to lay great imposts and exactions upon the French people and withall to practise cruelties This was the cause that the Frenchmen by the advice and secret handling of Guiemand himselfe called againe their king Chilperick unto whom Guiemand sent the halfering which he had The king returning the French gentlemen met him even at Bar where they dealt with him most honorably The king also forgave them all new tributes and imposts and from thence forward governed himselfe wisely and of a Sardanapalus which he had been before his flight he became after his returne a noble and valiant prince and chased the Romanes from a good part of Gaule which they held and greatly enlarged the limits of the realme of Fraunce Therefore is it evidently seene that the Maxime of Machiavell or the counsell which Guiemand gave to Giles which is one same doctrine is not very good and that the issue thereof cannot be but evill And to argue this point by reason I thinke every man will confesse unto me that The force of a prince coÌ„sisteth in the riches of his countrey it is more expedient for a prince to bee king and lord of a rich and plentifull countrey than of a barren and poore countrey for a withered and poore country cannot nourish any great people Moreover a poore and barren countrey cannot produce and bring forth things necessarie to the tuition thereof as abundance of corn wine fodder money and other things Finally to make a kingdome strong and puissant as well to maintaine it as to augment it there is a necessitie that it bee copious and rich of all things And although Machiavell in a certaine place where he speaketh of warre maintaineth that the common saying is false That money are the sinewes of warre this hindereth not but that which we say may be true For suppose it bee true as Machiavell by his foolish subtiltie maintaines that it is the good soldiors which are the sinewes of the warre and not money yet these sinewes cannot stirre nor bee brought to any great actions without clapping upon the cataplasme of money So that if money be not the sinewes of warre after the foolish subtiltie of Machiavell because they have not of themselves either motion or operation yet at the least are they the meanes which causeth the sinewes to moove and without which souldiors can doe nothing or at least without paiment in equipolent kinds to mony as victuals apparrell and armour And if it be objected unto me that there are some poore nations which notwithstanding are puissant and warlicke as were the Macedonians in the time of Alexander the Great and these were poore in regard of the Greeks Persians and Medes and as at this day are the Tartarians and Scythians and as the Suisses were within this hundred yeares Hereunto I doe many wayes answer That first I will not denie that the nations or poore countries cannot bee but naturally good warriors as commonly all Northernly nations are of which number are the Macedonians Scythians and Tartarians yea the Suisses also the Almaignes hold now of the North But this their martiall vertue proceeds not from their povertie For in Affricke America and in many other places of Asia and in many Islands there are many poore nations yet nothing warlicke But if poore nations which are naturally warlicke become rich in their countrey they will not therefore leese their warlicke vertue As the Suisses at this day are very opulent and rich yet are they nothing lesse valiant in warre than they were in the time of the battaile of Morat about a hundred yeares since which they got against the duke of Bourgoigne in which time they were so poore that many of them could not discerne vessels of silver from peuter as M. de Comines saith The Macedonians also became very rich after that under the conduct of Alexander they had conquered Asia yet remained they alwayes generous and valiant The Romanes also in time of the foundation of Rome were very poore but within a small time they became very rich yet therefore lost not their valour and generositie It is not then the povertie of the country which makes a warlicke people but rather the nature and inclination of the heaven which likewise is much aided when the countrey may become rich If there be opposed unto me also That we see many princes and private persons Riches is more requisit for a generall than particulars which doe evill abuse their riches as Caligula did 67 millions of gold which Tiberius left him and as Caesar did the great treasures which hee heaped up in Gaule and as many others did Hereunto I doe two wayes answere First I say it followeth not that râ—ches and treasures are evill because some abuse them no more than wine is to be condemned because many are drunke therewith And although there bee some princes and other persons which have abused their riches there are also many which use them well I moreover say that the consequence is not good in this case from the particular to the generall For I confesse well that it should be better and more profitable for the commonwealth that in a countrey there were many houses meanly rich than some little number excessively rich because oftenest that excesse proves very pernitious to him that enjoyeth it who is thereby sometimes incited to stray out of the limits of lawes and temperance But suppose it true that great riches is most commonly domageable to particulars it therefore followeth not that they are not nor may bee in a countrey in generall but the more rich a countrey is so much more is it strong and puissant if so be that it be so well governed as the particulars abuse not their richesse which they will not doe especially being under the yoke of good laws and good magistrates if every man have not too great abundance therof but in a mediocritie according to their qualities and degrees for such a meane seemes very requisit and profitable because they are meanes and aids to come unto vertue and to bee
inferiour Iudges can hardly judge evill unlesse they erre either in Fact or Right from which they shall guard themselves if supreme Iudges performe well their duties by not sparing the personall adjornaments against such as by grosse ignorance doe erre in Right or which by the negligent inspection into their causes do erre in Fact And assuredly if such Iudges have good Censors which will marke their faults and will reproove and correct them Iustice shall bee as well administred by one alone in every inferiour seat as by many But our soveraigne Iudges are glad of the faults of their inferiours For their evill judgements brings the greater practise unto them to fill their purses to pay for their Offices to glut their avarice and to furnish the unmeasurable pompes of themselves and their wives So that to Iustice the same happeneth which dooth to an humane bodie For when the head is whole it will purvey and provide for the necessities and maladies of the members and seeke out all things fit for that purpose but when the head is diseased all the members feele it So the corruption which is in parliaments makes that all Iustice in inferiour courts is depraved and corrupted I resolve then against the saying of Machiavell That it were better that ther were but one person in every estate or degree of inferior justice than a great multiplicitie of Officers but my meaning is not to stretch this unto soveraigne Iustice but contrarie I thinke that it is good and necessarie that judgement bee executed by more than one person namely by a meane number of good and well chosen men For a judgement given by a notable companie hath more waight and gravitie as a soveraigne judgement ought to have than that which comes from one alone Also because a soveraigne judgement may sometimes take his foundation upon the pure and simple equitie which sometimes directly repugneth the locall customes ordinances and lawes written it is good and necessarie that equitie bee juged to bee equitie by the braine and judgement of many and it is not meete that one alone should take upon him that great licence to depart from authentike and received lawes to follow his owne opinion which hee will call equitie For that should bee as it were to give power to every particular Iudge to judge after his fantasie against received and approoved right and so to suffer to passe under the name of equitie huge iniquitie Since then none may easily and without great reason depart from received and approoved lawes it followeth that none may easily also induce an equitie against the said lawes unlesse to induce it hee use great and deliberate consideration and examination and doe well ponder the circumstances consequences by a good and experimented judgement which one alone cannot doe except hee bee of some exceeding invention knowledge and experience and of a good and sound judgement such a one as can hardly bee found Therefore it is much better to commit to many not to every one but unto such as are well chosen that power to induce equitie against received lawes than to one alone Besides this it appertaineth unto soveraigne judges to examine the new edicts and lawes of princes to marke and note if there be any thing hard in them which it were good to mitigate and lenifie which they must either themselves doe before they allow or divulge them or else must they signifie to the prince a cause why they approove them not This one alone can never so well doe as many how great and wise so ever hee bee because the spirit of one man alone is not capable to see and comprehend all the particular cases which may bee applied to the matter of an edict neither in memorie or cogitation can hee comprehend whatsoever absurditie incommodity or iniquitie can bee in a law But many casting and discoursing in their mindes every thing one foreseeing one thing and another another by examining and disputing upon the matter may the better perceive and comprehend the law and inconveniences thereof For it is not to bee doubted but that by the dispute of learned and sufficient men which doe examine by a good judgement reasons contrarie likely conjuncts and adjuncts of every thing may farre better comprehend the difficulties and in commodities of a edict than by the reasoning of one alone The manner which the Romanes anciently observed in the making of new lawes shewes this for they which proposed and preferred them were commonly men of good spirit great judgement and experience in the affaires of the common weale but yet every man great and small was heard to contradict that law which was proposed yea sometimes it was found and often that a base person of small estimation which had neither great knowledge nor experience yet hath noted in that law absurdities and inconveniences which were causes of rejection or at the least of moderating and correcting it Againe for that soveraigne judges are as it were censors and correctors of of inferior judges it is very requisit that they bee many in number because it will seeme hard for a magistrate to bee corrected by one alone unto whom it may be hee would not give place in any thing either in good knowledge or experience Finally because corruption is more to be feared in soveraigne judges which have none above them to correct their faults than in subalterne and inferiors who themselves may bee corrected therefore it is requisit that soveraigne judges bee in number for many are more uneasie to bee corrupted than one alone I confesse then in the soveraigne degree of justice of a prince it is good and expedient that hee have a sufficient number of persons to exercise it provided alwaies the number be not too great and unbrideled for the qualitie is therein more requisit than the quantitie The like is to bee of the kings Counsell where it is good and requisit there bee many heads as we have said in another place For confirmation of my saying I will alledge no other thing than the example of our ancestors For in the time and before king Lewis the twelfth inferior Officers were not many in one seate and degree of justice for there was but one in every seate thereof to administer it namely a Provost or ordinarie judge in the first degree a lieutenant generall or bayliffe as they call him or steward in the second degree but in soveraigne courts of Parliaments and the great Counsell they were many yet not in so great number as they bee at this day But seeing wee are in hand with meanes to establish a good justice I will touch therein some small points which I have marked in histories Wee must then presuppose Good Iustice consisteth in good lawes and good Magistrates that to cause good Iustice to bee administred a prince must needes have good lawes and create good Magistrates and Officers As for lawes some concerne the decision of matters and other the
formalitie of processe Touching such as concerne the decision of matters it seemeth well that there hath beene sufficiently provided by the locall custome of every countrey and by the right or law written Well might it bee desired that the doctrines of the docters of the civile and cannon law were well chosen and the good set a part and authorised For though in judgements wee can hardlie lacke them yet are they so confused and wrapped with contrarie opinions that they which hope to finde in the doctors gloses and commentaries the solution of some doubtfull question doe often fall into inexplicable laborinthes and for treasure doe finde coales Which would not come to passe if the good doctrines which often come in use and which are founded upon reason and equitie were separated and distinguished from the troupe and mixture of those doctors writings And touching lawes which concerne the formalitie and conduction of processe and litigations it seemes to mee there hath beene sufficient provision in France by Royall ordinances But it seemes not to bee sufficient that a prince make good lawes well and rightly to conduct and leade to the end the processes and contentions of subjects but it wil bee very requisit and necessarie that hee make lawes to prohibit and hinder the birth of these processes and contentions for otherwise good Iustice and readie expedition of causes shall indirectly serve for an occasion to increase and multiplie because men will bee made prompt and voluntarie to move actions when they are assured to have speedie and good Iustice So that to shunne this and to make that the thing which of it selfe is good and holy bee neither cause nor occasion of evill it shall bee as I have said very requisit to have good lawes to hinder the birth and originall of contentions wherein it seemes to mee that the said Royall ordinances are defectuous and maimed So is there great neede of some Licurgus or Solon to make those said laws mens wits are so wilde and their spirits so mervaisously plentifull and fertill to bring forth contentions and differences and so easily to discent one from another yet notwithstanding I thinke not that it is impossible something though not altogether to represse this arising and secunditie of law causes but because it will bee too long now to discourse wee will reserve it for another time But it is nothing to have good lawes if there bee not withall good magistrates for their execution for the magistrate is the soule of the law who gives it force vigour action and motion and without whom the law is but a dead and an unprofitable thing A good magistrate then is a most excellent thing yea the most excellent in the world yea he is a very rare thing at the least in his time yet might there bee sufficient in a mediocritie if they were well chosen and sought for But now the first that payeth most is received without any care to chuse the fittest Dion writeth That the emperor Caius Caligula had an horse called Velocissimus which he so much loved that he made him often to dine and sup at his table and caused him to be served with barley in a great vessell of gold and with wine in great caldrons of gold also Not contented thus to honour his Velocissmus hee determined with himselfe to advance him unto estates and offices and to the goverment of the commonwealth Caligula would make his horse a consul of Rome and so resolved to make him Consull of Rome and had done it saith Dion if hee had not beene prevented by death The Machiavellistes of this time which reade this in Dion can well say that this was an act of a sencelesse and mad man to give such an estate to a beast Yet doe they finde it good at this day to give estates to as sencelesse beasts more dangerous than Velocissimus was for if the worst had falne if Velocissimus had beene created Consull of Rome hee could have done no other harme to the commonwealth nor to particulars unlesse it had beene a blow with his foote to such as had saluted him too nigh but hee would never have made any extortions pillings or other abuses which the beasts of our time commit which are placed in Offices And this is it which Horace saith That wee mocke him which is evill favouredly powled and him that weareth a rent shirt under a silke coate or Epist 1. lib. 1 that hath his gowne on the one side long and on the other short but he is not mocked who wasteth great goods riotouslie who overthroweth right and committeth infinit sinnes and abuses in his charge men will peradventure say hee doth evill but not that hee ought to bee punished How many Offices bee there in France more fit for Velocissimus than for them which hould them And that which is least perilous every man doth laughat but this which is most dangerous to a commonweale no man dare so much as say it ought to bee amended much lesse corrected For there is a simple beastlinesle and ignorance and a malitious beastlinesse and ignorance The simple ignorance is like to that of Velocissimus which can doe neither good nor evill but malitious beastlinesse and ignorance is a beastly ignorance of all good and right things but of a great capacitie to hould all vices and wickednesse such as our Machiavellistes If then a man must needes choose one of the two who sees not that it were more expedient to choose a simple beastlinesse Can any then denie but it were better to have for a magistrate Velocissimus than some of our Machiavellists or our Office-cheators which comes by retaile unto that which they bought in grosse But the prince who resolves with himselfe to establish good Magistrates without which hee can have no good justice though his lawes bee the best in the world he must consider and note many things both in particular persons and in bodies in generall for hee should take notice what an office it is for which hee should provide an officer and accordingly seeke a person whose vertue and sufficiencie may be Proportion geometricall to bee observed in providing of Officers Aristo lib. 1. Ethniks correspondent and equall unto the functions of that estate For a farre greater sufficiencie is required in a President than in a Counsellor and in a Councellor than in an inferiour Iudge and in a Iudge than in a Chatellaine or castle guarder Heere it is where ought to bee observed the Geometricall proportion whereof Aristotle speaketh by giving to the most fittest and sufficientest the greatest estate to them which are meanely fit meane offices and estates and the least to such as are least sufficient This it is which Fabius Maximus shewed to the Romane people when they would needs create Consulls two yong lords that is Titus Octacilius Fabius his nephew Aemilius Regillus when Anniball made warre in Italie Masters said hee if wee had peace
respected and doubt honoured for as the Poet Euripides saith At the good accounted â—â— of Noble blood to bee Euri. in Hecu. But double is his honour whom wee vertuous doe see Heere will I ende these present discourses exhorting and praying the French Nobilitie and all other persons which love the publike good of France to marke and earnestly consider the points which above wee have handled against Machiavell For so may they know how wicked impious and detestable the doctrine of that most filthie Atheist is who hath left out no kind of wickednesse to build a tyrannie accomplished of all abhominable vices They which know this I beleeve will couragiouslâ—e employ themselves to drive away and banish from France Machiavell and all his writings and all such as maintaine and follow his doctrine and practise it in France to the ruine and desolation of the kingdome and of the poore people I could much more have amplified this discourse if I would have examined all the doctrine of Machiavell For hee handleth many other very detestable and strange things as the meanes to make conspirations and how they must bee executed as well with sword as with poyson and many other like matters But I abhorre to speake of so villanous and wicked things which are but too much knowne amongst men and have contented my selfe to handle the principall points of his doctrine which merit to bee discovered and brought to light I pray God our Father and Creator in the name of our Lord Iesus Christ our onely Saviour and Mediator that he will preserve his Church and his elected from the contagious and wicked doctrine of such godlesse and prophane men as are too common in the world and that he will not suffer them which are of his flock to bee tossed and troubled by a sort of turbulent and ignorant spirits But that he will grant us grace alwaies to persevere in his holy doctrine in the right way which he hath shewed us by his word and well to discerne and know abusive lying and malitious spirits to detest and flie them and continually to follow his truth which will teach us his feare and his commandements and by his grace will bring us unto eternall life So bee it FINIS THE INDEX OR TABLE OF Machiavels Maximes confuted in those discourses divided into three parts The Maximes of the first part doe handle such Counsell as a Prince should take A Princes good Counsell ought to proceed from his owne wisedome otherwise he cannot be well counselled Max. 1. The Prince to shun and not to bee circumvented of Flatterers ought to forbid his friends and Counsellors that they speake not to him nor counsell him any thing but only in those things whereof hee freely begins to speake or asketh their advice Max. 2. A Prince ought not to trust in Strangers Max. 3. The Maximes of the second part handling the Religion which a Prince ought to observe and be of A Prince above all things ought to wish and desire to bee esteemed Devout although he be not so indeed Max. 1. A Prince ought to sustaine and confirme that which is false in Religion if so be it turne to the favour thereof 2. The Paynims Religion holds and lifts up their hearts and makes them hardie to enterprise great things but the Christian Religion persuading to Humilitie humbleth and too much weakeneth their minds and so makes them more readie to be injured and preyed upon 3. 4. The great Doctors of the Christian Religion by a great ostentation and stiffenesse have sought to abolish the remembrance of all good letters and antiquitie 4. When men left the Paynim Religion they became altogether corrupted so that they neither beleeved in God nor the Divell Max. 5. The Romane Church is cause of all the calamities of Italie Max. 6. Moses could never have caused his lawes and ordinances to bee observed if force and armes had wanted 7. Moses usurped Iudea as the Gothes usurped a part of the empire 8. The Religion of Numa was the cheefe cause of Romes felicitie 9. A man is happy so long as Fortune agreeth to his nature humor 10. The Maximes of the third Part entreating of such Policie as a Prince ought to have That Warre is just which is necessary and those Armes reasonable when men can have no hope by any other way but by Armes Max. 1. To cause a Prince to withdraw his mind altogether from peace agreement with his adversarie he must commit and use some notable and outragious injurie against him Max. 2. A Prince in a conquered countrey must establish and place Colonies or Garrisons but most especially in the strongest places and to chase away the naturall and old inhabitants thereof Max. 3. A Prince in a countrey newly conquered must subvert and destroy all such as suffer great losse in that conquest and altogether root out the blood and race of such as before governed there 4. To be revenged of a citie or countrey without striking any blow they must be filled with wicked manners 5. It is follie to thinke with Princes and great Lords that new pleasures will cause them to forget old offences 6. A Prince ought to propound unto himselfe to imitate Caesar Borgia the sonne of Pope Alexander the sixt 7. A Prince need not care to be accounted Cruell if so be that hee can make himselfe to be obeyed thereby 8. It is better for a Prince to be feared than loved 9. A prince ought not to trust in the amitie of men 10. A prince which would have any man to die must seeke out some apparent colour thereof and then hee shall not bee blamed if so be that he leave his inheritance and goods unto his children 11. A prince ought to follow the nature of the Lyon and of the Fox yet not of the one without the other 12. Cruelty which tendeth and is done to a good end is not to be reprehended Max. 13. A Prince ought to exercise Crueltie all at once and to doe pleasures by little and little Max. 14. A vertuous Tyrant to maintaine his tyrannie ought to maintain partialities and factions amongst his subjects and to slay and take away such as love the Commonweale Max. 15. A Prince may as well be hated for his vertue as for his vices 16. A prince ought alwaies to nourish some enemie against himself to this end that when he hath oppressed him he may be accounted the more mightie and terrible 17. A prince ought not to feare to be perjured to deceive and dissemble for the deceiver alwayes finds some that are fit to be deceived 18. A Prince ought to know how to wind and turne mens minds that he may deceive and circumvent them 19. A Prince which as it were constrained useth Clemencie and Lenitie advaunceth his owne destruction 20. A wise prince ought not to keepe his Faith when the observation therof is hurtful unto him that the occasions for which he gave it be takeÌ„ away 21. Faith Clemencie and Liberalitie are vertues very domageable to a prince but it is good that of them he only have some similitude likenes 22. A Prince ought to have a turning and winding wit with art and practise made fit to be cruell and unfaithfull that he may shew himselfe such an one when there is need 23. A prince desirous to breake a peace promised sworn with his neighbor ought to move warre against his friend with whom he hath peace 24. A prince ought to have his mind disposed to turne after every wind and variation of Fortune that he may know to make use of a vice when need is 25. Illiberalitie is commendable in a prince and the reputation of an handicrafts man is a dishonour without evill will 26. A prince which will make a strait profession of a good man cannot long continue in the world amongst such an heap of naughty wicked people 27. Men cannot be altogether good nor altogether wicked neither can they perfectly use crueltie and violence 28. He that hath alwayes caried the countenance of a good man and would become wicked to obtain his desire ought to colour his change with some apparent reason 29. A prince in the time of peace maintaining discords and partialities amongst his subjects may the more easily use them at his pleasure 30. Civile seditions and dissentions are profitable and not to be blamed 31. The meanes to keepe subjects in peace and union and to hould them from rebellion is to keepe them alwayes poore 32. A Prince which feareth his subjects ought to build fortresses in his countrey to hold them in obedience 33. A Prince ought to commit to another those affaires which are subject to hatred and envie and reserve to himselfe such as depend upon his grace and favour 34. To administer good Iustice a Prince ought to establish a great number of Judges 35. Gentlemen which hold Castles and Jurisdictions are very great enemies of commonweales 36. The Nobility of France would overthrow the Estates of that kingdome if their Parliaments did not punish them and hould them in feare 37. FINIS
will upon his owne daughter The custome which the Gaulois and many other people had to immolat and offer criminall men when they had an opinion that God was angrie with them what other thing was it but a following of the sacrifice of Abraham and of the sacrifices that God had commaunded for the expiation of sinnes The Paynims also imitated this of Moses his sacrifices that they immolated the like beasts and reserved also a part of the beast sacrificed to eat So that thereby also it is clearly seene That the Religion of Moses is the primitive and first and that the other religions are but fowle and lazie pourtratures and imitations thereof From hence followeth it That our Christian Religion which draweth his principles from the promises of Messias contained in Moses is the most ancient of the world yea as ancient as the world it selfe For I wil not vouchsafe to stay upō the refutation of the strange opinion of Machiavell and other ancient Philosophers Paynims which have maintained That the world had no beginning but I send them to Empedocles Plato and other ancient Paynim Philosophers which have maintained the contrarie I thinke that the ignorance of the philosophers which held That the world had no beginning shal something excuse them because they never saw the bookes of Moses and in a thing so difficile and hard to comprehend the spirits of men might easily faile But the impietie of Machiavel is no way excusable who hath seene the bookes of Moses yet followeth that wicked opinion like a mocker and contemner of the holy Scripture thinking to shew that he knowes more than others he I say who is ignorant and full of brutish beastlinesse as God willing I shall make knowne As for the simplicitie of the Christian Religion herein it is seene That the Christians Simplicitie of the Christian Religion will know God as he will that we should know him and as he hath manifested himselfe unto us simply without passing further For they are not so presumptuous as were those foolish Paynim philosophers which disputed of the Essence of God and disputing upon that point fell into opinions the most absurd and strange of the world Some after they had much dreamed in their brains cōcluded That the universall world was God others That it was the Soule of the world others That it was the Sun and others set forward certaine other like monstrous opinions They disputed also of his Power of his Eternitie and of his Providence by naturall reasons in all these they knew not how to resolve themselves therein For how is man so prowd and insensible to thinke that his braine which is not halfe a foot large can cōprehend so great and infinit a thing it is as great a foolery and grosenesse as he that in the palme of his hand will comprehend all the waters of the sea A Christian then hath this modestie and simplicitie To know God by those means and according as he will be known of men beleeving That to have a wil to passe further is to enter into darknesse not into knowledge From hence followeth it That the knowledge which a Christian hath of God is the only true knowledge and that all the knowledge that others as Paynims and Philosophers ever had it neither was nor is any other but a shadow and imagination very far from the most part of the truth And touching the excellencie of the doctrine of true Religion herein is it first seene The excellency of the Christian Religion that it is founded upon the promises of God made to the first fathers from the beginning of the world whereby all they that embrace that Religion are assured That God is their father and that he loveth them and that hee will give them eternall life by the meanes of Messias Can there then be any thing more excellent than this Is there any thing in the world that can give more contentment or repose to the spirit of man than this doctrine For when man considereth the brevitie of his dayes the languishments and miseries of this world full of envies enemities all vices and calamities will hee not iudge himselfe more unhappie than the beasts if hee hoped not for an eternall happinesse after this life The poore Paynims having this consideration aspired to an eternitie some in doing worthy acts wherof there should be a perpetuall memorie after them others writ bookes that might bee read after their death others persuaded themselves that the gods would send good mens soules into the Elisian fields and the wicked into the Acherontike and Stigian darkenesse Yet were there some Philosophers which disputed Cice. in Somn. Scipi Plato in Phaedo That the soules of generous and valiant men after death goe to heaven All these opinions and persuasions of men were but to give rest to their minds which iudged man of all creatures most unhappie without an eternall life after this But what assurance had they of these opinions which they gave to themselves These poore people had none neither founded they themselves but upon some weake and feeble reasons For thus they argued That it was not credible that God who is all good would create man who is the most excellent creature in the world to make him most unhappie which hee should doe if he should not enioy an happie and eternall life after this They also say That it is not credible that God which is all iust would equally deale with the good as with the bad which he should doe if there were not another life than this wherein the good might receive a felicitie and the wicked punishment for their misdeeds But what is all this These be but feeble and weake pettie reasons wherupon the spirits and consciences of men can find no good foundation to repose themselves and to take an assured resolution of a salvation and an eternall felicitie But the Christian hath another foundation than this for he knoweth that God is of old gone out if I may so say from his throne in heaven to communicate and manifest himselfe to our auncient fathers to speake vnto them to declare unto them his bountie and love towards mankind hee knowes that God hath made them promises of Messias which he hath since accomplished and that in him he hath promised to give eternall life to all them which lay hold of that Messias and use his meanes to come unto it These promises have ben many times reiterated to our said fathers and in ages well distant one from another that they might not be forgotten but that they might be so much the more cleare and known of every one insomuch that the Paynims themselves which never read our fathers writings have had some knowledge of the promises of God touching Messias they were so cleare not orious and well knowne as we shall say more at full in another place Heare thē for a resolution a great excellencie in this doctrine of Christian
Religion viz. what it brings us to a certain knowledge and a firme assurance of an eternall life after this which knowledge and assurance is not founded upon certaine leane Phylosophicall reasons but upon the promises proceeding from the very mouth of God which is the truth it selfe and cannot lie And as for the doctrine of maners I confesse that the Paynims and Philosophers which have held other religions have spoken and reasoned in reasonable good tearms but yet their doctrine cōmeth nothing nigh to that which the Christian Religion teacheth us thereof True it is that the Paynims have spoken something well of Iustice Temperance Clemencie Prudence Loyaltie Fidelitie Amitie Gentlenesse Magnanimitie Liberalitie Love towards ones countrie and such other vertues he that denieth that they have not spoken well and that some have not something practised them should do them wrong And the Christians have this in common with them To approve and follow all these vertues and for that cause they disdaine not to reade their bookes and to learne of them the goodlie documents which they have left touching these vertues but yet I must say that the Christian Religion hath lanched and entred farre deeper into the doctrine of good manners then the Paynims and Philosophers have done For proofe hereof I will take the Maxime of Plato That we are not only borne for our selves but that our birth is partlie for our countrie partlie for our parents and partlie for our friends behold a goodlie sentence we can say no other but if we come to conferre it with the doctrine of Christians it will be found maimed and defective For what mention doth Plato make of the poore where and in what place of this notable sentence doth he set them he speakes not at all of them breefly he would that our charitie should bee first employed towards our selves which they have well marked followed which say That a well ordered charitie begins at himselfe But this is farre from the doctrine which S. Paul teacheth the Christians when he sayth That Charitie seeks not her owne and also that which Christ himselfe commaundeth us To love our neighbour as our selves Secondly Plato placeth our love towards our countrey Thirdly our love towards our parents and lastly our friends And what becomes of the poore Let them doe as they can for Plato his Charitie stretcheth not to them And indeed a poore person in the time of the Paynims which had no meanes to live had no shorter way then to sell himselfe to be a slave unto him that bought him who afterward served himselfe with him and nourished him If such a poore man found no man to buy him he died with hunger True it is that some were sometimes touched with commiseration of humanitie towards poore persons when they saw thē with their eies languishing and in miserie but they called not this commisseration a vertue but only an humane passion Neither had they any hospitals to lodge and nourish the poore in nor their princes or great lords had their Almoniers as Christians have When a child was borne evill formed they would kill it a cruell thing and full of inhumanitie yet was it ordinarily practised yea at Rome it was an expresse law of Romulus whereby he Dionis Halicar lib. 2. commanded to expose and stifle the children which were borne disformed which not only was a crueltie against nature but as it were a despite and iniurie done to the Creator who had created and formed them They made accompt of poore men as they did of beasts for they slew their slaves at their pleasure and when and for what they would Vedius Dion in Augusto Polio a Romane gentleman in the time of Augustus Caesar ordinarilie caused to sley his servants and slaves wherof he had a great number in choosing alwaies the most profitable to cast the other bodies into his ponds which he had nigh his house to feede Lampreis which he had in those ponds In the Paynims time to offer pleasure pastime to the people they caused to make Theaters for combats to vttrance of poore slaves which they caused to bande in two parts one against an other and after that furiously set one upon an other with naked swords and none of them armed with any defensive thing And this sport ended when they of the one part had slaine all the others or else that all had slaine one another to the last the people laughed and tooke pleasure to see this no more nor no lesse than we take pleasure to see Cocks fight Hereby is it seene that the Paynims had no pitie of the poore nor of slaves servants but regarded them as brute beasts and made no more accompt of them but for their service they drew from them Also we never read amongst all their morrall precepts they had that they ever spake of the poore nor that they ever established any good pollicie to help them Yet notwithstanding this agreeth well with naturall reason To do wel to his like And this so noble a sentence which the Emperor Alexander Severus caried for his poësie or devise What thou wouldest not should Lampri in Alex. be done unto thee do it not to another agreeth well with the common sence and seemes well to be a principle of nature not only in the negative Not to doe but also in the affirmative To doe to another as we would he should doe unto us Yet although naturall light leade us hereunto the Paynims have not yet come to this point The hystoriagrapher Lampridius sayth That the Emperour Alexander learned this excellent device of the Christians or of the Iewes in his time Therefore it appeareth by the abovesaid reasons That the doctrine of manners which is taught us by the Christian Religion is much more excellent than that which the Religions of the Paynims and Philosophers teach seeing they make no account of the poore which are recommended unto us by so many precepts of Religion Moreover the Christian Religion abateth the pride of mens hearts and so makes them know they are sinners and the religion of Paynims and Philosophers fill men with pride presumption persuading them That naturally they are vertuous of themselves and inclinable to do good and vertuous works which they attribute to their owne vertue and not to God Yet more the Christian Religion teacheth us to be patient to support the imperfections one of another and to pardon but contrary that of the Paynims and Philosophers persuadeth to seek vengeance For a conclusion none can deny but that the doctrin of Christian Religion is in all points more excellent and perfect than that of the Paynim Religion But when I speake of the Paynim Religion I understand all other Religions unlesse it be the Iewish Religion out of which the Christian taketh his originall for I hold for Paynims the Turkes Sarracens and all other barbarous people which allow neither the old nor new Testament and that have no