more facility that Maximilian the Emperour the Father of their late King desired no better than to be called in to supply the place of his Son during the minority of his Grandchild Thus Ferdinand more fortunate than he expected was invited to retake the Government of Castile which two and twenty months before had been ignominiously taken from him and did not lose so favourable an occasion The conjecture that had been made of his moderation proved to be exactly true and that politick Prince was so far from revenging himself on those who had thrust him out that he made it his particular care to gain them and the first places that fell void as well as the favours that came to be distributed were all for them So rare and judicious a procedure had the effect that Ferdinand expected from it The Castilians being persuaded that he generously pardoned because he affected to seem unmindful of their fault on their part remembred it no more neither but only to make amends for it and lived afterward in so exact a submission that during the Reign of Ferdinand they forbore to demand as it was their custom to do the Convocation of the Estates for regulating the Government of the Monarchy and if thereafter they were assembled it was at his desire None but Manuel who being more politick and by consequent more distrustful than the rest was of a contrary opinion to that of the publick and would never trust Ferdinand He thought that he had too highly offended him to refer himself absolutely to his diseretion without passing for an imprudent man and the instance of the Great Captain * Gonsalvo whom his Friends proposed to him as a signal proof of the clemency of the Catholick King wrought nothing at all upon him He chose rather to banish himself from Castile than to live under an offended Master and quitted the great preferments that he owed to the liberality of Philip of Austria that he might go live without employment in Flanders with the Archduke Charles Chievres who intended to make use of him for the execution of the designs that shall be related in the sequel of this History received him as the services which he had rendered to their common Master deserved and made him his intimate friend Ferdinand was the more incensed at the retreat of Manuel because he knew him to be a man capable of forming and keeping on foot dangerous intrigues against him in Castile though he was in the Low Countries and used all means to hinder him from doing so Nevertheless his Catholick Majesty thought it not fit to persecute him directly lest the other Castilians might take umbrage thereat but thought it enough to attack him by such ways as concealed private revenge under a cloak of publick good However he deprived him of what he had purchased in Spain and endeavoured as much as in him lay to reduce him to his first state The pretext which he took to impoverish him without startling the Castillians deserves to be known The profuseness of Philip of Austria had been so great that it had encroached upon the Crown-Rents of the Kings of Castile which till then had never been alienated In the revocations of Ferdinand Ferdinand took the occasion he sought for to revoke all the Grants made by that young Prince for what cause soever and reserved to himself the liberty of confirming those which should appear to him to be just The Castillians took no exceptions at that order because it excused them from supplying the ordinary charges of the State and Manuel thereby lost the great settlements that he had in Castile He thought it not convenient to make any attempt for retaining them for besides that he foresaw it would be fruitless he would not give Ferdinand the satisfaction of refusing him He suffered himself to be stript of all without complaining and revenged himself afterwards according to the manner of the most refined Politicians that is to say by the help and under the name of another He seconded Chievres in his design of thrusting Ferdinand once more out of Castile by opposing the Emperour Maximilian the First to him and the measures that were taken to bring that about were so just that had it not been for France they had succeeded The Emperour rejected no proposition that gave him occasion of getting much money with little pains and upon that weak side Chievres and Manuel attacked him They caused it to be represented to him by men that seemed zealous for his Interests that the Catholick King had doubly offended him first in putting upon him so great an affront that no ordinary Gentleman would sit down with without venturing his life to have satisfaction for it next in doing him a notorious piece of injustice equally contrary to the right of private men and to that of Sovereigns The affront consisted in this that the Catholick King struck at the Emperours reputation in supposing him incapable of the guardianship of the Children of the late King of Castilē his Son seeing he had taken from him the administration of the best part of their Inheritance which was the Monarchy of Castile that the injustice regarded the exclusion of the noble Sex and the substitution of the more ignoble in the most important of civil actions which was the Regency of States That all the Laws and Customs of Europe called the Fathers of young Sovereigns to that Regency even when their Sovereignties came by the Mother and that if there were no Father the Grandfather for the same reason was preferred before the Grandmother and the Paternal Grandfather before the Maternal Nevertheless the Catholick King was gone into Castile had received the Oath of the People had put himself into possession of the Guardianship of the Children and converted their Revenues to his own use That the People of the Low Countries had so universally acknowledged that they could not lawfully frustrate the Emperour of the Guardianship of his Grand-children that the seventeen Provinces had by common consent referred it to him and that if the Castillians had not imitated them the blame must be cast upon the cunning of Ferdinand who had over-reached them That there was no more needful to force him once more out of Castile but to represent to them that they were outwitted by him and that if notwithstanding they persisted to own him as Regent it was easie for his Imperial Majesty to bring him to reason by sending German Forces into the Kingdom of Naples by the Gulph of Venice The Emperour was so much the more sensibly moved with this discourse that it opened him a way of enjoying almost the whole revenues of his Grandsons the eldest being maintained by the Flemings and the younger needing only a small pension for maintaining him in the Colledge of Alcala where he was His Imperial Majesty sent Embassadours to Ferdinand to bid him leave the administration of Castile and to declare War against him if
the Court of the Catholick King so had the Catholick King at his who discovered by means which Historians disagree about that the Grandson was taken off from the Interests of his Grandfather and that he had even called him an Usurper by confessing that he had unjustly seized the Kingdom of Navarre and by obliging himself to restore it so soon as it was in his power They acquainted the Catholick King with it who confirmed himself in the resolution that as we said before he had already taken of undoing Chievres and frustrating the Archduke not only of what he had acquired by Conquest but also of what he could pretend to in Spain The first step he made in his revenge was to put Navarre in a condition that though the Archduke would restore it yet his own Subjects might have right to take him off from it and to oppose the execution of his intentions For understanding of his Intrigue we must call to mind that the Monarchy of Castile was much more powerful in Spain than Arragon was before their union and that since Queen Isabella had enlarged it by joyning thereto the Kingdom of Granada It was more able than Arragon to preserve the Kingdom of Navarre when once that Kingdom were joyned to it and that was the only motive that made the Catholick King who till then had held the Kingdom of Navarre annexed to the Crown of Arragon change his Conduct and seek ways how he might joyn it to those of Castile He knew that John d' Albert with consent of the most Christian King raised a great Army in the Provinces of France adjoyning the Pryenees for recovery of his Crown and seeing he needed an extraordinary strength to resist him the States of Arragon and Castile were assembled at the same time that under one and the same pretext he might raise great Contributions in both Monarchies The Union of Navarre was offered to both and it was offered upon so much the better ground that that Crown on the one side bordered upon Castile and on the other upon Arragon so that it lay equally convenient for both Seeing Ferdinand had a design to impose upon those of Arragon he would not go himself to Sarragossa where the Estates were to assemble but thought it enough to send thither the Queen Germana in his place That Princess who had the Art of caressing and who besides for better deceiving the Arragonese was her Husbands blind made great Journeys and hastened to Monçon where the Estates had assembled themselves the Arragonese having declared that it was there and not at Sarragossa where according to the priviledges of the Country the Estates ought to meet She gained the two most powerful Bodies which were the Clergy and Nobility She represented to them according to the Instructions which she had received from the Catholick King that Arragon was much weaker than Castile and that if heretofore it had resisted it there were two such concurrent assistances of Heaven in the case that it would be a tempting of God to trust to the hopes of their continuance the one that all the Kings of Arragon to the number of twenty eight were always more witty and valiant than those of Castile and the next that the Castilians could never make War against the Arragonese longer than two years at a time and that at the end of that at farthest they had new Enemies or new Civil Wars to take them up which had obliged or to say better constrained them to give peace to the Arragonese That Arragon indeed was at present united to Castile but that it might be again separated from it and that in that case it would again return to its former state That to prevent Castile from reducing it then into a Province no better course could be taken than to joyn Navarre to Arragon because that encrease would render it so equal in strength to Castile that the Castilians durst not any more attempt to subject it That the only means of obliging the Catholick King to that seeing Navarre was his Conquest consisted in supplying him with moneys for the preserving it this one time only that is to say during the Campaign One thousand five hundred and fifteen because John d' Albert could make no other effort but that once and if he succeeded not France being discouraged by so constant a misfortune would no more protect him The Arrogonese being persuaded by a discourse which carried the more probability with it that they presumed themselves to be better beloved of the Catholick King than the Castilians by reason he was their Country man born and their Hereditary King willingly taxed themselves and furnished a vast Sum of Money considering the barrenness of their Country So that Queen Germana would have acquired a great deal of glory by her Negotiation had it not been for an adventure from which persons of her quality might seem to be exempted Anthony Augustine of Arragonian extraction but born in Catalonia had through his merit raised himself to the dignity of Vicechancellour of Arragon according to most Historians or of Chancellour according to others His Faction and Cabal was then strongest in the States and if one was not sure to obtain by his means what was desired it was certain at least there was nothing at all to be obtained if he opposed it The Queen who knew this very well made it her particular care to gain him and succeeded therein beyond what she expected seeing she made the Chancellour in love only by endeavouring to encrease his zeal for his Masters service Princesses have this unhappiness as well as other of their Sex that are inferiour to them that they cannot always captivate those whom they would and catch sometimes those whom they would not The Queen was so free in her civilities to the Chancellour In the History of that Chancellour and the Chancellour so well disposed to love the Queen that he was not aware of the Trap when his passion already bordered upon extravagance And the truth is instead of striving against it he applauded himself therein and valued himself most when he ought to have reckoned himself a fool He flattered himself with the hopes of a success which he had neither ground nor occasion to promise himself and fell into the extremity of doting by fancying that the Queen would be overjoyed to cherish the flame which she had kindled That the Interest of that Princess concurred in a very nice point with the passion which she had raised That she had no Children and that there was a necessity that by all means she should That it was but too apparent that she could have none by her Husband but that if she had so much modesty as not to court the help of another perhaps she would not have enough to refuse it when freely offered That there were some Junctures wherein if necessity lessened not the Crime yet it served to render it more excusable and that the Arragonese
in his voyage to Spain and the Flemings would not have assisted him in levying of more if they should have known that he only needed them for maintaining the usurpations of Naples and Navarre So they would have been exposed to the invasions of Francis the First and Charles would have lost incomparably more than the two Crowns we last named were worth Nevertheless in the juncture that then happened he could not restore them nor so much as pretend it was his intention without entirely forfeiting the Succession of his Mother For if he had attempted of his own Authority and without the consent of the Monarchies to which the two Kingdoms were annexed to write to the Viceroys to restore them they would not have obeyed him and if by Proxy he had demanded the consent of the Estates of Castille for the restitution of Navarre and the approbation of the Estates of Arragon for rendring Naples It would not only have been denied him but more the two Monarchies would have joyned in an interest common to both and passed immediately from Disobedience to a Revolt There was a necessity then of waiting till the Catholick King were in possession of his Kingdoms of Spain and till he had taken such just measures for the Restitutions in question as might assure him of success and upon so well grounded reasons Chievres wrote to Gouffier great Master of the Houshold to the most Christian King That it was absolutely necessary for preserving peace betwixt the two young Kings whom they had had the honour to Educate that they should have a conference together and that they should adjust a Treaty so advantageous to their Masters that neither of them might be â—empted to violate it what favourable occasion soever might present Gouffier â—hew'd the Letter to Francis the First â—ho thought it not enough to approve â—he interview but besides proposed the â—lace where it should be and for that â—nd named the Town of Noyon in Picarâ—y which was accepted of in the Counâ—il of Bruxelles Chievres on his part disposed Charles to â—…ve him an unlimited power and as if â—…e two Kings had agreed to leave to the â—…scretion of the two persons who had â—een their Governours all the prelimiâ—ary difficulties to the Negotiation they â—justed them after their own way to â—…e satisfaction of the Councils of both â—…ings In consideration of the more â—…vanced age of the most Christian King â—…e preference was given to Gouffier â—…at Chievres went to meet him at Noyon â—here he staid for him in the beginning of Summer One Thousand Five Hundred and Seventeen and their ancient Friendship hindred them not from maintaining with equal vigour the Interests of their Masters They were longer than was expected in agreeing about their Affairs and Gouffier pretended that the Crowns of Naples and Navarre should be restored before the Catholick King went over to Spain His Reasons were that his Catholick Majesty was engaged to it by the Treaty of the Count of Nassau and that it was not the business to Negotiate of new In the Negotiation of Noyon but only to put in execution what was in formal terms resolved upon That the honour of Francis the First was concerned in the speediness of the Restitution and that if it was deferred the delay would be imputed to the weakness of his most Christian Majesty and by consequence would redound to his shame That the Kingdoms of Naples and Navarre had both been Usurped the first by the Infidelity and the second by the Jugling of the late King of Spain and that the matter was so evident that no man in all Europe doubted of it what care soever that cunning Prince had taken to dazle the eyes of the World by Manifesto's stuft with Falshoods and the discourses of his Agents That it was enough to France that Naples was directly Usurped from them and that John d' Albert had lost Navarre upon the only consideration that he would not break with Louis the Twelfth to make them with equal zeal solicite that the first of the two last mentioned Kingdoms should be restored to the King of France and the second to his Ally and that seeing there was no appearance that France could be in a better condition for the future than it was then in for recovering them nor that the Catholick King could be in a worse state for maintaining them by the way of Arms as wanting both men and money Francis the First would be for ever blamed if he let slip so favourable an occasion and Gouffier would in History pass for a notorious Prevaricator if he contributed to it in any manner whatsoever Chievres who had no satisfactory answer to make directly to such solid motives thought it enough to reply indirectly that the King his Master had the best and most sincere intentions in the World as to the matter in hand and seeing he knew him better than any man else he ought more to be credited than those who might have insinuated contrary thoughts into his most Christian Majesty But that Sovereigns as well as other men were liable to necessities and that that to which Charles was then reduced was the more excusable in that it was extream That it was true indeed he had fallen to a very large Succession but that it would wholly escape him if it were not managed with all imaginable care and industry That Navarre lay so very conveniently for the Monarchies of Castille and Arragon that they had no cause of fear from abroad but from thence and that the Pyrenean Mountains and the two Seas secured them on all other hands That as their Enemies being Masters of Navarre could presently bring whole Armies into the heart of their Countries so without that they could but weakly attack their Frontiers That to judge things aright the Kingdom of Naples was of no less importance to them seeing if they lost it they were certain not to keep Sicily long That nevertheless that was the Kingdom from whence Spain had Corn in the frequent scarcities to which it was subject and that these two motives would be enough to engage the Spaniards in a general Revolt if their new King obliged them presently to restore Naples and Navarre That it would be thought stranger that he should meddle in so nice an Affair upon his coming to the Crown in that he was a stranger That during the space of a Thousand years Spain had not been governed by Monarchs of that kind That they had never as yet seen Charles and that hardly any thing could make them endure that an absent stranger before he had taken possession of his Crowns should cut them short by two That before any such thing was attempted an infinite number of cautions must be taken and that he must begin the work by obtaining from the Estates an unlimited Authority That afterward a powerful Faction should be formed in the three Bodies which make up his Estates for disposing them to give
he jumps with Chievres wherein the greatness of the Spanish Monarchy is concerned but he is always against him when the Low-Countries have any competition with the Monarchy of Spain Chievres as being a Fleming will have his Country to be the basis of the greatness to which the Archduke Charles aspires and that the others which he is to inherit by the distraction of his Mother and the death of his Grandfathers should only be the accessory Ximenes on the contrary pretends that Spain must always be the centre of the Archdukes Grandeur and the Low-Countries be reduced into bare Provinces Chievres represents to him in vain that they belong not to the Archduke by right of conquest and that if Philip his Father had not possessed them they would not have given him in Marriage the heiress of Spain Ximenes makes no satisfactory reply but he persists in his project and in that considers not that he thereby provokes the Governour of a young Prince who well quickly become his Master It is not easie to determine whether fortune did good or hurt to Doctor Adrian Florent in taking him out of the Colledg of Louvain whereof he was principal to raise him to all the Dignities of the Church not excepting the Papacy He had a Genius for the functions that render men famous in Vniversities but he went no farther and amongst the many employments that he had afterward there was not one that suited with him He had acquired reputation in the Schools and in the Pulpit His Commentary upon the Master of Sentences was admired and certainly if that Book was not the most subtil of the three hundred of the same nature which then were to be found in Libraries it was at least the clearest and most methodical His Harangues for the preservation of the priviledges of Scholars had had better success than he had promised himself and not only the Archduke Philip confirmed them but besides honoured the Vniversity of Louvain by being a member of it It was thereupon imagined that it would be a disgrace to the Flemings to suffer Adrian to continue longer in Louvain and it was not so much to do him justice as to satisfie the publick desire that Chievres took him to be Preceptor to the Archduke Charles He did not discharge his commission ill so long as his business was to instruct his Scholar But when he was sent into Spain to negotiate with the Catholick King he neither answered the expectation of Chievres nor of the Spaniards who took him for the ablest man of his Nation in Cabinet Councils He discovered at first that his Majesty was an irreconcileable enemy to Chievres and from that he concluded that it would do irreparable prejudice to the interests of the Archduke obstinately to defend his Governour how innocent soever he was for that reason alone he declared against Chievres and if he was not powerful enough to supplant him it was not his fault if he was not sent home to his house and the Spaniards intrusted with the supreme direction of the Council of the Low-Countries He shew'd his weakness asmuch after the death of the Catholick King when he had the occasion of making use of the Commission which he brought from Flanders for being Regent of Castile and Arragon in case of that death He suffered himself unseasonably to be prevented by Cardinal Ximenes who gained him by promising him the second place in the Councils of Spain He had indeed that place but he wanted the Authority that ought to have gone along with it He complained sometimes that the Cardinal consulted with him only about matters of small importance and that he dispatched the rest without him But that was all he did and thought not that he ought to fall out with him about the matter For that he had the Bishoprick of Tortosa and it was left to men to judg whether or not that was a recompence proportionable to the power that he was deprived of Death quickly rid him of Ximenes as it protected Ximenes from the Catholick King and he was afterward so happy that he ingenuously confessed he could not comprehend his own happiness Leo the Tenth made him a Cardinal in prospect only of gratifying Charles the Fifth and the Conclave having spent several Months without coming to agreement about the person who should succeed to Leo in spight chose him Pope whence it came to pass that the people of Rome loaded the Cardinals with reproaches as they came out and threw stones at them Till then the quality of common Father had been so respected that the Popes who had lived least exemplarily laid it not altogether aside and made a fair shew at least Adrian neglected it at first and when he went from Spain to go take possession of St. Peter's Chair he carried with him into Lumbardy the six thousand Soldiers who two years after took Francis the first before Pavia Instead of keeping the Balance even He took a side that he might rather cast it and if his Pontificate which lasted but two and twenty Months had been of longer duration it would have raised a schism in the Church more dangerous than that of Urban the Sixth and Clement the Seventh John Manuel was in reality the Politician of his age most crost by fortune but by his ability and patience he forced her at length to be favourable His extraction was low but his way of writing wonderfully well and yet very fast was the reason that when he was very young he was chosen under-Secretary of the Council of State of Castile He was not full eighteen years old when he grew weary of his Employment though at first he thought himself most happy in obtaining it He considered that the three chief Ministers of Spain Zapata Carvaial and Vargas were not much promoted and that the richest of them had not a thousand Crowns a year though they had long served the Catholick Kings Ferdinand and Isabelle with all imaginable zeal and that they had facilitated to them the conquest of the Kingdoms of Granada and Naples That was not a reward proportionable to the greatness of their services and the truth is it cannot be denied but that the Catholick Kings were too great Husbands in that particular if it be not pretended for their excuse that the Revenues of Castile and Arragon were not sufficient to gratifie the tenth part of their most faithful servants Manuel who saw nothing but Crowns above his ambition was satisfied to continue under-Secretary of State during the life of Queen Isabelle his Soveraign but he carried his desires higher when the Archduke Philip of Austria and Jane of Arragon his Wife went to Spain to get themselves declared apparent heirs of Castile Manuel was perswaded that that young Prince loved an easie life too well to trouble himself with the weight of affairs and that if he insinuated himself into his favour before all other Spaniards he might govern him at his pleasure and obtain
not to be confined in the choice of a Minister and Favorite by any thing without himself So that the earnest desire of promoting Philip of Croy was the thing that made him disagreeable and Charles the Terrible who in all appearance would have cast his eyes upon him had he not been spoke to about it would by no means do it because be had been recommended unto him In the causes of the disgrace of the Croyes He declared himself so briskly as to that that his Father thought it not convenient to press him any farther But the good Prince who had been only over sollicitous because of the extraordinary affection he had for the Croyes perceived that in respect of them he had made one of those politick steps which are irreparably hurtful when they do not succeed He was afraid that he had unseasonably given his Son an occasion of changing the indifference which he had shewed to the Croyes into an aversion and in prospect of that omitted nothing that he thought capable to insinuate them into his favours He was even of the mind that the young Prince his Son had too severely mortified the Croyes by his refusal and therefore that he might do what he could to please them he heaped favours and kindnesses upon them A Lady who was the last of the House of Bethune died not only without Children but also without any Kindred and without disposing of the vast Estate which she possessed By the right of ultimus haeres or Escheatage the whole Estate belonged to Philip the good and he made a Present of it to the Croys The liberality indeed was great but not extraordinary seeing that Prince had sometimes shewed the like nay and greater to those who had not served him so faithfully as the Croys had done however it passed for Prodigality and a piece of Injustice in the notion of Charles the Terrible He was already five and twenty years of age married Maria Heiress of Burgundy and the Father of one only Daughter which was all the Children he had In the mean time his Father who had no more Children neither but him had not as yet given him any thing in advance of the Low Countries which belonged to him in Succession He obliged him to live in the same Palace with himself to eat at Table with him follow the diversions that he did and to content himself with a small Pension for defraying his other Expences Charles who was to be one of the richest Princes in Christendom would not be more pinched nor stinted and omitted no opportunity of enlarging his Fortune Some Months before the death of the Lady of Bethune he had been informed that the fear of being poysoned by those to whom she might leave her vast Estate would infallibly hinder her from making a Will and therefore he begged the gift of it before-hand of his Father who freely granted it him But the good Prince had so wholly forgot it that he did not so much as remember even when his Son put him in mind of it He made answer to him in a positive manner that he had never promised in all his life time one and the same thing to two different persons and that seeing he had granted the Croys the Estate of the House of Bethune it must needs be that he never promised it to the Prince of Burgundy He continued so firm in that particular that the Croys had the gift But no sooner did those that envied them perceive how much the Prince of Burgundy was discontented thereat but that they inflamed his resentment by a rumour they raised in his Fathers Court that the Duke would not stop there and that he had only enriched the Croys with the Succession of Bethune that it might appear less strange in the World when he should devest himself and frustrate his only Son of the most important Province of the Low Countries by investing them in the Province of Namur in the same manner as he possessed it to wit in absolute sovereignty Thus affairs went already but bad enough at the Court of Burgundy for the Croys when an unexpected accident which at first was thought would retrieve all made every thing go worse and worse with them The Dauphin of France who was afterwards Louis the Eleventh stood in so bad terms with Charles the Seventh his Father that his Majesty drove him out of the Province of Dauphiné where he could not endure that whilst he was alive another should rule as a Sovereign Prince seeing there was no security for him in any other place in Europe but in the Low Countries no other State being in the humour to refuse the delivering him up to his Father in case he should demand him and that besides Philip the Good had sufficiently made it known to confirm the opinion that the Dauphin had of him that if he desired him to receive him at his Court he would not consent to it for fear of quarrelling with France but that if he entered the Low Countries without demanding permission Philip who gloried in Hospitality and had granted it to all sorts of People not excepting even the persons of Kings would not be so hard as to send him back again The Dauphin came as far as Brabant before it was known at the Court of Burgundy that he was upon his Journey His conjecture proved true and Philip though he was extremely troubled at his having such a Guest yet durst not desire him to depart out of the Low Countries His only care was how he might civilly send him back again and for that end chose the expedient of reconciling him to his Father He therein employed the Offices of his Agents and because so thorny a negotiation was not the business of one day he commanded the Croys to divert the Dauphin in the mean time and to link themselves in a strict friendship with him Obedience is never more readily performed than when the Orders of Sovereigns suit with the present interests of those who receive them The Croys were perswaded that there was no necessity of affecting any more a scrupulous complaisance for the Prince of Burgundy they had Estates in France they foresaw that the Dauphin would shortly be King and they stood absolutely in need of his prorection to secure them from the formidable Enemy whom they could not avoid but to have one day upon their backs In that prospect they omitted nothing that might win the Dauphin and succeeded therein the more easily that that Prince the most assiduous of his Age to make sure of those from whom he thought he might procure services on his part met them more than half way He had just before in some Conferences that he had had with the Prince of Burgundy experienced the strange Antipathy that was betwixt their two tempers He made no doubt but that it would one day be the cause of a War betwixt them that might last as long as they lived he thought it
as the ancient Patriarchs did in a continual Pilgrimage and so to distribute his cares time travels and presence that the Low-Countries Germany and Italy would have the better share oâ— them and Spain the least That there was no other way to ward so dangerous a blow than by insensibly bringing back the Catholick King into the course that Nature and the Law of Nations required of him and by convincing him by his own experience that the elder of his Grandsons deserved better to succeed to him than the younger and that so all that Charles had to do was to become more virtuous and better qualified than Ferdinand Chievres advised Charles in relation to the two other Crowns of Spain which were those of Navarre and Portugal that it would be convenient to continue the Project of the Catholick King for reuniting them to the â—est of the Spanish Monarchy by means of â—lliances but that there was but little appearance that that could be so soon accomplished seeing on the one hand Cathaâ—ine de Frix Queen of Navarre and â—ohn d' Albert her Son had such near Alliâ—nces with the Crown of France that â—ey would never dispose of their Children but with the consent and approbation of Louis the Twelfth And on the other hand Manuel King of Potugal had Five â—sty Sons by the Aunt of Charles his seâ—nd Wife and that by consequent the â—aughters of the same marriage could not â—pect to succeed so soon but that the â—gagement of the King of Navarre with tâ—e French might some time or other be â—…nare to him and that besides as the â—…sterity of Charlemain was extinct in the â—…ce of Eighteen years though it was so â—…merous that it consisted of thirty two â—…gorous Princes all married so that of Manuel might fail by a like or more unhappy Fate England was more important in all respects to Charles and his Governour advised him to look upon it at all times as a Kingdom able to do him great services and proportionably to hurt him for the Low-Countries in the condition they were then in needed not fear to succumb unless they had France for their Enemy and then they could not expect any assistance greater speedier more suitable to their necessity nor nearer at hand than that of the English That if the necessity of that assistance did not encrease after he came to the enjoyment of the Successions which he expected it would at least be as great seeing Spain would then become a Monarchy that might counterpoise France and none but England could be in a condition then to turn the balance to which side of the two it adhered That Charleâ— would always have the advantage of the French when he competed with them tâ— draw England over to his side since be sides the invincible antipathy betwixt the English and French Nation and the inveterate hatred fomented by so many Wars Henry the Eighth of England was marrieâ— to the last Infanta of Spain Sister to Charle his Mother and constantly favoured hâ— Father-in-law Ferdinand the Catholick against Louis the Twelfth In relation to Scotland it behoved Charles to reason from a quite opposite Maxime and that he must not expect upon any Juncture that could be offered to him to engage that King into his Interests The Alliance of that Nation with the French had without interruption continued seven hundred years from King to King and from Crown to Crown and though it had not been so old nor so strict yet it would be enough for the Scots that Spain courted the friendship of the English to make them declare against it for France though they had not as yet spoused any Party Italy came next in course into the thought of Chievres of which he only represented to the Archduke four principal Powers from whom the Inferiour were 〈◊〉 receive their influence to wit France â—pain the Holy See and the Republick of â—enice France held there the Dutchies of Genoa and Milan Spain the Kingdom of Naples â—…e Holy See ten Provinces besides the â—…ity of Rome and the Venetians the State â—hich is called Terra Firma The Italians â—…d no reason to fear that the Popes or â—enetians would trouble their repose because both had almost an equal interest to preserve it But if the French and Spaniards grew weary of Peace and took up Arms again they must infallibly have the same success which they already had that is to say that the Nation of the two which could get the Pope on their side would overcome and as the most Christian and the Catholick Kings did not conquer nor divide betwixt them the Kingdom of Naples but by the consent of Alexander the Sixth as the Spaniards had not driven the French from thence two years after but in pursuance of a secret Treaty concluded for that end betwixt the Great Captain and the same Alexander and as the Pope Julius the Second contributed most to hinder the most Christian King from recovering what he had lost by ruining the formidable Army of that Prince upon the side of the River of Garillan so the Spaniards in their turn would be driven out of the Kingdom of Naples whensoever it should be their misfortune to displease the same Julius or one of his Successours So that the Archduke in the sense of his Governour ought chiesly to apply himself to entertain his Holiness in the good disposition he was in in relation to Spain and if the matter was not difficult by reason that Julius hated Louis so much the more that formerly he loved him no more would it be in regard of succeeding Popes since on the one hand their State bordered immediately upon the Kingdoms of Naples and that they were next Neighbours whereas the Territories of divers Princes lay betwixt theirs and the Dutchy of Milan and that so the Court of Rome were not so much exposed to be surprised by an Invasion from the French as from the Spaniards and on the other hand it was not so much to be apprehended that the Spaniards would usurp all Italy if they retained the possession of Naples as it would be that France might reduce Italy into a Province if they added the Kingdom of Naples to the Dutchy of Milan because then they could march by Land into the Milanese having only the Alpes and Piemont to cross whereas the Spaniards could not go thither but by Sea and have a Voyage of five hundred Leagues to make The Republick of Venice according to Chievres was no less to be considered in matter of Politicks than the Court of Rome but for power it was not so much since the Holy See the Emperour France and Spain having entered into a League to ruine it Louis the Twelfth alone had defeated all its Forces at the Battel of Giaradadda and taken from it all it possessed in the Terra Firma It is true it afterward recovered part of that State but seeing it was not so easily regained as lost and that in all
sharp-sighted as to see at so great distance the mark he aimed at But it is a thing almost impossible long to conceal the manner how great Princes are Educated when it is not in all things conform to the Custom practised in their Age. The most Christian King Louis the Twelfth had an Affair to be concerted with the Archduke which required to be managed by so much the more skilful hands that the Emperour and Catholick King were concerned in it Hangist of Geulis one of the most noted and understanding Gentlemen of Picardy was chosen to negotiate it for two reasons one because his Person was acceptable to the Flemings and the other that being Chievres his Kinsman he might the more easily accord with him but Geulis was extremely surprised when he found himself obliged to treat hand to hand with Charles who was then but fourteen years old compleat He was glad of it nevertheless at first as hoping to make a better bargain of it but when he found that the Archduke at the Age and in the State he saw him in was already the ablest Prince of his time in the Art of Governing he began to suspect the evils that that might occasion to France and seeing it would not have been civil to have declared his thoughts as to that openly to Chievres he only told him that he did did not conceive why he put the Archduke upon so great an application to Affairs of State since it neither agreed with his tender age his quality constitution nor the profound Peace which the Low Countries enjoyed that the temper of that Prince was all fire and that his prodigious activity was a sufficient proof of it that nothing was so contrary to People of that constitution than a too long and serious meditation and seeing they spent incomparably more spirits than others in the exercise of their faculties they proportionably wore out the Organs they made use of and so hastened either their death or from a continual speculation ran into madness that the latter of these inconveniences was the more to be feared that in respect of Charles it was a Family distemper and that if his Mother was troubled with it without application he had reason to foresee that the excess of application might produce in him the most terrible and most ignominious of its effects Chievres gave Geulis an answer which the Spaniards have reason to match with the Apophthegms of Antiquity He replied that he had heretofore reflected upon all that he had said and often considered of it but that after all he was persuaded that it was the chief duty incumbent on him and to which he was most obliged in conscience according to the Commission given him to put Charles as soon as he could in a condition not to stand in need of a Tutor and nevertheless he must need one so long as he lived if he did not accustom him in his younger years to take cognizance of his own Affairs because if they expected till he was more advanced in age he would never apply himself to that so much as was necessary whether that he would find himself at first overcharged with the multitude of Affairs or that he would be discouraged by the pains he must take in determining them being but a novice therein and by the frequent impediments they would bring in the way of his pleasures and recreations However Chievres read in the thought of Guelis what care soever he took to conceal it that he feared the Archduke might become too knowing and laboured as much as he could to divert the prejudice that might redound to the Monarchy of France from the Education of the Prince Nay and at first he succeeded in it pretty fortunately and if after he was dead the affairs which he had well disposed changed countenance he is no more to be blamed for that than for the evils that hapned before he was born and those who out lived him gave him the testimony that if his life had been longer France and Spain had never engaged together in War. Louis the Twelfth had no Son and by consequent Francis Count of Angoulesm first Prince of the Bloud Royal was by the Law of the State next to succeed him This Prince was brought up at Coignac a Town of Angumeis but Louisia of Savoy his Mother was commonly at Court. She had quarrelled with the Queen for some reasons that make nothing for the clearing of this History and there could not be a greater misunderstanding betwixt two Princesses than when Louis was so ill that the Physicians despaired of his recovery His most Christian Majesty a few months before had concluded two Treaties the first with the Emperour Maximilian and the second with Ferdinand the Catholick King both Treaties carried in express terms That the Archduke Charles of Austria should marry Claudia of France eldest Daughter to the most Christian King. France in the present Juncture could not receive a greater prejudice than by that seeing the Marriage agreed upon would one day render it weaker than Spain and by consequent would infallibly expose it to succumb under the first War that might happen betwixt them Bretagne a Province of vast extent and important in situation had for many Ages been dismembred from the Monarchy of France and with extreme difficulty had been reunited to it again The Conduct of Philip Angust was signal in obliging the Dukes of Bretagne Princes of the Bloud and of the Branch of Dieux to perform a regular Homage to France and when the debate for that Fief arose betwixt John of Montfort and Charles of Blois King Charles the Fifth evocated the cause to his Parliament and decided it In a word when there was no Males in the House of Bretagne and that that Dutchy fell to Female France by an irregular Conduct of those who governed it under the Minority of Charles the Eighth was at the point of seeing that Dutchy fall into the House of Austria The French unseasonably declared War against the Bretons pressed them with extraordinary violence in a time when the Laws of War were as yet exactly enough observed attempted to seize the State of their Heiress without marrying of her and thereby constrained them to cast themselves into the Arms of Maximilian of Austria That young Prince by a strange good luck had married the Heiress of Burgundy and by that means deprived the French of their hopes of adding the Low Countries to their Monarchy His Wife lived no longer than was necessary to secure the property of the Low Countries to the House of Austria seeing she died within a few years after their Marriage leaving him only one Son and one Daughter He was therefore in a condition to engage in a second Marriage with the Heiress of Bretagne and again to border upon France by Normandy Maine Anjou Touraine and Poitou as he bordered upon it by Picardy Champagne and Burgundy That second Match the most considerable in Christendom
Austria in Germany it would be his own fault if he conquered not the Kingdom of France and that afterward the rest of Europe would make but a weak resistance whereas if the States to which the Archduke ought to succeed were divided and if the Testament of the Catholick King which continued him to the Inheritance of his Father and Paternal Grandfather held good in that particular If the Infanto Ferdinand had Spain and if by that means variance entred into the House of Austria not only the greatness of the Monarchy of Spain would be at a stand but also it would lose all that it held in Italy and in the Neighbourhood It was only then in that prospect and without any respect to the Archduke and his personal qualities that Zapata Carvaial and Vargas declared in his Favours and the advantage he reaped from it is no less singular for the causes of it than it is in it self The three Ministers represented to Ferdinand that seeing his Majesty thought fit that they should continue to speak to him with open heart as they had been wont to do He would still have the goodness to take in good part the liberty they took to tell him that he seemed to have changed his Conduct at the end of his life and by his last Will and Testament condemned his most considerable Actions and which had acquired him greatest Reputation That he had done them the honour to declare when he called them to his Council that his only intention in this World was the enlargement of his Territories and that though he had not expressed himself so plainly yet there needed no more but to study his past life to convince them of it That no Man in Europe was ignorant how Ferdinand the Catholick at the age of fifteen years had espoused the Party of the late Queen Isabella sister to Henry the fourth of Castile against the Infanta Jane the Daughter of that King in no other view but because Isabella by bestowing herself upn him had offered to unite the Crowns of Castile to those of Arragon and that if Jane had been so well advised as to have preferred his Alliance before that of the Prince of Portugal who sought her in Marriage her Party would not have succumbed and she had not past for a Bastard That after the union of Castile and Arragon for adding the Kingdom of Granada to them Division had been sown betwixt him who was King of it and his brother and the more powerful was so weakned by supporting the weaker against him that both at length were oppressed That for an accession also to Arragon by joyning thereto the Kingdom of Naples in the City of Tarento the Prince who carried the name of it and who was the only Son of the King of Naples was Besieged That he had been prevailed with to relie upon the Faith and Truth of the Spaniards whose General the Great Captain had sworn to him upon the Holy Sacrament to leave him in liberty and that notwithstanding he had been detained Prisoner and under a sure Guard sent into Spain where still he remained in Prison That in a word a pretended Bull from the Pope had been made use of for seizing the Kingdom of Navarre and for driving from thence John d' Albert who had Married the Heiress of it In the mean time his Catholick Majesty destroyed his own work by preferring the younger of his Grandsons before the elder and laid an everlasting impediment to the greatness that Spain began to be raised to by kindling betwixt the two Brothers a War which would not end but by the entire ruine of him that should be overcome and such a weakning of the Conqueror that Spain would be so far from expecting new Conquests under him that it would become a Prey to the first who should invade it That since the Spaniards had bestirred and delivered themselves from the Slavery of the Moors they had been oftener subject to Civil Wars than Foreign for no other reason but that the Nobles had been too powerful and more apt to give Laws to their Masters than to receive them from them That they had not behaved themselves more modestly nor reservedly under his Catholick Majesty but because after his Marriage with Queen Isabella the Nobility of Castile were apprehensive of succumbing under the Forces of Arragon which they doubted not but would pour in upon them and that the Nobles of Arragon had had a juster cause to fear their being run down by the Arms of those of Castile That if young Ferdinand were King one of the two would have time during his minority to take measures against him and would retain so little respect for his Person because he was but fourteen years of age and was not so well brought up as his elder brother that they would oblige him at least for some years to leave the publick administration to the Grandees of Castile and the chief of Arragon which would infallibly renew Civil Wars in Spain That if his Catholick Majesty suffering things to go according to their ordinary course called the Archduke to his Succession the Gentlemen of Castile and Arragon would want both a pretext and means of revolting A pretext in that the Archduke at sixteen years of Age was no less able to govern them than the wisest Kings of Spain have been And means seeing their Rebellion would instantly be crushed by the Forces which that Prince would raise in Flanders and Germany and might easily bring into Spain by occasion of the Treaty which he had ratified with the new King of France The Catholick King strangely surprized and nevertheless convinced with this discourse made answer that seeing he could not conveniently leave Castile and Arragon to the Infanto In the last Council given to Ferdinand He must at least resign to him the three great masteries of the Order of St. James Calatrava and Alcantara the Revenue whereof would be sufficient for the subsistence of a Prince of his quality That his Majesty at the same time he resolved to make him his Heir had written to the Court of Rome to have him invested into these three headships of Orders That the Affair had been negotiated first with Julius the second and since with Leo the tenth and that the chief difficulty that those two Popes had found in it proceeded from a Bull granted before by Julius to the Commander Padilla which assured him of succeeding to his Catholick Majesty in the great Mastery of Calatrava provided he outlived him That the Bull of Julius was insignificant since Padilla was dead and that so nothing now hindred the expedition of that which allowed his Majesty the resignation of the three Masteries in favour of the Infanto But the three Counsellors of State being encouraged by the success of their Remonstrances and perswaded that having obtained the chief point his Majesty would not long refuse to grant them what was but accessory replied to the Catholick