Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A29484
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A brief survey (historical and political) of the life and reign of Henry the III, King of England dedicated to His Most Sacred Majesty.
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Cotton, Robert, Sir, 1571-1631.
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1680
(1680)
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Wing B4650; ESTC R18954
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16,080
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30
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an end they never spoke word of it Well! at Lewis the Armies met and the King endeavours a Reconciliation but in vain for Arguments are ever unprofitable when Justice is inferiour to Force Wherefore the Sword decides the Controversie and makes the two Kings and their eldest Sons Prisoners The Person and the Power being now both of them in the hands of Montford and Glocester found no other means of Security or expectation of Liberty than what the emulous Competition of Greatness which began to break forth between these two mighty Rivals gave hope of For Leicester designing by engrossing from his Partner the Person of the King and securing to his Followers the best part of the Spoil to draw more fruit from this Advantage than in Fellowship it could yield dissolv'd the Knot of all their Amity Thus we may observe that equal Authority with the same Power is ever fatal to all great Actions for to reduce minds to so even a pitch that they should not have some strings of Disagreement is absolutely impossible Montford having thus broken all faith with his Confederates as well as Duty to his Sovereign left the Path of Moderation and Wisdom to approach the King by that of Haughtiness and Distrust plying him with pretences that his Arms and Ends were evermore directed to the good of the Publick and the ease of the People that in all this he entertain'd no private Passion in opposition to the sense of his Allegiance but was capable of regulating his Desires according to his just Power and consequently to his Majesties Satisfaction in case he would be rul'd that is to say as he explain'd himself command the Forts and Castles of his now Opposite Glocester and the rest to be deliver'd up into his hands It was no easie matter we may well imagine for the King thus to be tutor'd by his inferiour and Vassal But Necessity in such Cases commonly bears down before it all Formalities And therefore this poor Prince who lying at the Victors Discretion seem'd to have been rais'd only to shew the Inconstancy of Fortune and the Vanity of man suited himself with incomparable Wisdom according to the Exigences of the Times Neither could Humility injure Majesty when the only means to contein Spirits so insolent within due bounds was Dissimulation Wherefore he summons in Person the Forts of his faithfullest Friends to yield to his greatest Enemies entering them in shew as his Lodging but in effect as his Prison and sees himself forc'd to take Law from him to whom he lately thought to have given it Leicester is now become the Darling of the Rabble who easily crouch and change to every new Master but yet the Sober and considering part of the Nation durst not venture to sayl along with his Fortune by the Light of his Glory as knowing well that Crystal though it fairly glitters yet is soon broken and that as the Ascent of Usurpation is slippery so the Top is tottering and the Fall dreadful To account this man therefore at the very height of his false Felicity to be truly Happy was but to give the name of the Image to the Mettle that was not yet molten For by this time the imprison'd Prince had made an Escape and was fast assur'd of Glocester upon the ty of his great Mind and Discontent Wherefore they both of them united with the shattered Remnant of the Loyal Army and by a speedy march arriv'd unlookt for upon the banks of the unarmed Troops of the secure Rebels quartering about Evesham whom they instantly assayl'd as knowing it to be no fit season to give time when no time could assure so much as Expedition promis'd Spencer and other Lords of that Faction made toward the King for Mercy but could not get clear of the Press being hurry'd along the Stream and perished in the Confusion We are to consider that Publick Motion depends in a great measure upon the Conduct of Fortune Private on our own Carriage And we must take heed how we run down steep Hills with heavy Bodies which being once in motion are hurry'd on by their own weight and Stops are then no longer Voluntary Now Leicester being at that instant with the King and out of the Storm might have got away if his Hope and Courage had not encreas'd his Resolution with his Misfortune He could neither abandon his Followers nor his Ambition so that improving Adversity into an exercise of Virtue he came and fell The King being by this succesful Turn freed and obey'd began to enquire into the ground of his former Miscarriages and why that Virtue and Providence which had so long settled and supported the English Empire in the greatest Lustre and Reputation throughout the Reign of his Glorious Ancestors should now turn tail upon Him and Confederate with his Enemies to the almost absolute destruction of the State and as if her Genius had quite forsook her Upon due search he finds his squandering hand to have made too bold with the Substance and Estates of his People and that the rapacious Exorbitances of his Civil Ministers the Licentiousness of his Martial Followers his own harsh Demeanour and Inaccessibleness and his neglect of keeping his Word had lost him his Nobility at home And that his Necessities which forc'd him to make Merchandize of Peace and War as his last Refuge and to put himself into the power of Persons doubtful or injur'd together with his giving himself up to a sensual Security and entrusting with the management of the State base griping and unworthy Officers whose Counsels were ever more subtle than Substantial had wounded his Reputation abroad and thrown down those Pillars of Soveraignty Credit and Veneration Wherefore he enters upon his regain'd Authority with Gentleness and Clemency wholly passing over the faults of most of the Rebels A gracious kind of pardoning not so much as to take notice of the Offence and so forgot the Rest that they might live but to the Glory of his Goodness for the fewer kill'd the more remain to adorn the Trophy Tyrants indeed shed Blood for Pleasure but Kings out of Necessity And yet lest his Justice and Power might suffer too much by his Grace and Mercy some few he punish'd with easie Fines others by Exile as the two Guiltless yet unpity'd Sons of the Arch-Traytor Leicester So odious we see is Treason in the Head that it involveth the innocent Children in an everlasting Distrust and that which in others is but Suspicion in them is Guilt Then he proceeds to confer upon the constant adherers to his broken Fortunes the Forfeitures of his Enemies but with much more Wariness than before as having found by Experience immoderate Liberality to be but a weak means to win Love because it lost more in the Gathering than it gain'd in the Giving A Bounty plac'd without Respect is taken without Gratitude discredits the Receiver and detracts from the judgment of the Bestower blunting the Appetites of such as