sometimes united by the malice of his Holines Though armed with no more naturall weapons then what her mony puts into the hands of strangers the most unhappy Militia a State can imploy Yet because all her Senatours look one way and not a squint upon Forreign Interests as the Privadoes of our Kings have beene knowne to doe in relation to their respective Pensions Unity improves their small force to so much advantage as they have for these latter yeares not onely disputed the dominion of the Seas with the Grand Seigniour but forced him to wash away with his peoples bloud divers markes of advantage his multitudes of Souldiers had purchased him in the Levant So as if Monarchs were owners of so much Christianity as to spend but the tith of what is consum'd yearly in Masques and such unnecessary vanities this way a thing not to be hoped for till our good God have discovered to all Nations the curse of monopolized authority this enemy to Christ might be easily reduced Since all the force he can make returnes him from this single State nothing but dishonour and losse whereas the greatest German Caesar was never yet able to beare the least branch of his power without imploring and receiving aide from most of Christian Princes who are now so weltered in their own blood as they omit the opportunity Thinking themselves more charitably imployed in the ruine of their own people or Neighbours A Lunacy could never befall them were they not agitated by such ridiculous humours as Common-wealths disdaine to be affected withall where there is no roome for any disputation about such triviall things as crabbid Titles Legitimacy c. all being ejected there as spurious that conduce not to honour or safety And what advantage this State hath in the wise Conduct of affaires may be easily discerned by any eye that shall passe over the Transactions of this Senate and Paul the fift during the Interdict and compare them with the Treaties of our King James with Spaine the first redounding no lesse to the honour of that Republique then the latter to the shame and losse of this Nation Neither are these advantages peculiar to Venice onely but to all found under this Government which officiating in the double capacities of a King and a Councell both cannot choose but be wiser then the first and lesse subject to corruption then the latter it being as unnaturall for them to betray their owne power as it is usuall with the greatest Courtiers to sell the revelation of their Masters most secret Counsels Though Offenders under Free States are punished with the greatest severity it is with the least injustice and partiality Single persons being more subject to be agitated by the tempests of Fury Prejudice or Revenge then Popular Tribunals which in all reason are not capable of so totall a distemper as to utter such intoxicated Censures as ordinarily drop from single judgements who rather then confesse a mistake will with the Tyrant in Seneca make three guilty because they find one innocent Neither doth Covetousnesse the root of all evill prosper so well or spread so much in the hearts of Senaters as in those of Kings lest their Posterity should be forced to disgorge what they had devoured Too vast estates being so formidable to this Government as they cannot be pass'd by without observation and jealousie by such as know the cause of the reduction of the State of Florence under the House of Medici But Kings are such bottomlesse pits that they proclaime themselves responsible to none but God for all their rapines and injustice By which they doe not onely adjourne all reparation to the day of Doome but leave their oppressions for lawfull inheritances to their successours As the Monopoly Queene Elizabeth granted upon Glasses was improved since to very Raggs and Marrow-bones All a Senate can justly be charged with by way of disadvantage after perfectly founded is division which if pure from popular ambition may possibly occasion more good then hurt by keeping them upright One Faction remaining as a guard upon the rest Their owne safety perswading all Corporations to intend the generall welfare in which Reason gives the right hand of advantage to the Government by a Senate rather then that of a King whose best designes are retarded if not buried with his person whereas this Jurisdiction is never sick much lesse subject to drink or death but reacheth through a continuall suppliment to as immense an eternity as Providence hath afforded any humane Society not being apt to be scared out of the paths leading to their advantage consisting of too great a number to be subject to any clandestine attempt or abused by evill Counsels or corrupted by rewards whereas experience teacheth that Kings may be forced through feare or allured by flattery to resigne their reason and concede things not onely contrary to their peoples but their owne interest as appeared by that celebrated Prince Henry the Fourth of France who was not ashamed to confesse he durst not for feare of his owne life but revoke the just Ban he and all the Parliaments of France had pronounced against the bloudy Jesuits whose expulsion the Venetians make good against all their machinations threats of the Pope and mediation of Princes From whence I may observe That though experience proves by this State and the Catholique Cantons c. that the Roman profession may sute in some measure with all kinds of Government yet undeniable Reason of State renders Monarchy most acceptable to the Pope as it doth the Reformation to Free States who are too wise to admit willingly a Forraigne interest into the Common-wealth by a multiplicity of Ecclesiasticks independent on any other power but that of Rome which Kings being but single persons dare not resist for feare of the Knife it being besides a maine disadvantage in worldly policy to professe a Religion so odious to their neighbours that they are looked upon under no better notion then Heretickes and so no faith to be kept with them nor marriage contracted but by an especiall Indulgence from his Holinesse which Republickes have no use of And being already under the ill opinion of the Roman Church doe but desire a faire opportunity to free themselves from it and make booty of the Religious Houses long since looked upon by them as dens of Traiters and idle persons Therefore such as desire a through Reformation displease their ends by abetting Monarchy Kings being knowne not onely to have beene the Begetters and Nources but the onely Maintainers of Antichrist if the POPE be the man And if any in opposition to this truth object Queene Elizabeth her Brother Edward's Youth and short raigne rendring his inclinations abortive to the benefit of the Nation I answer whosoever considers how resolutely the Pope denied to reverse her Illegitimation refusing to give a decent reception to her Embassadours And with what affection the Parliament out of pure zeale hatred to the
A PERSWASIVE TO A Mutuall Compliance UNDER THE PRESENT GOVERNMENT Together with A PLEA FOR A FREE STATE COMPARED WITH MONARCHY ROM 13. 1. The Powers that be are Ordained of God PROV 11. 14. In the Multitude of Councellours there is Safety OXFORD Printed in the Yeare 1652. To his Excellency The Lord Generall CROMWELL MY LORD IT is hoped Your Excellency may pardon this boldnesse upon the consideration That this poore mite offered in zeale may longer beare Your superscription then choicer pieces cast into the Treasury of Your desert by greater and more popular pens However his Election cannot be blamed that seekes shelter under that Tree of Honour which during the stormes of so many contrary Factions hath not onely shadowed all formerly owned by Antiquity but may chill the hands of Posterity with despair of ever being able to match Your Actions hereafter For those most celebrated for their Valour and Conduct did but gleane repute amongst the thornes of contrary and doubtfull Successes Whereas You being the true Master of the Harvest of Honour never were knowne to returne without bringing Your sheaves with You Which may be the lesse wondred at by those who observe how just an Accomptant You are to Your alone Captain the Lord of Hosts in summing Your Bils of Victory to his glory not Your own Who hath now not onely suffered You to build but to shut the Gates of the Temple of Warre And will no doubt inspire you with a patterne for that of Peace so that as you have begun with Joshua you may end with Solomon Jethro hath long since layed the platform how to make a people happy And it were presumption to offer to prescribe farther unto Master-Builders Yet in particular for Oxford of which Providence hath made you Chancellour may it be spoken without offence That the Vniversity however represented retaines no surfeit of Obstinacy or Riches Your Reformation being as sutable to her desires as Your Protection if Your wisedome apprehend a superfluity in one place the next glance may possibly discover hundreds that want it Her misfortune is to be look'd upon as having laboured so long of a Malignant Feaver that she is run past recovery in the bookes of prejudice having nothing to redeeme her from ruine but Your pity and power if You would be pleased to take Her into Your more peculiar Protection and not suffer Her any longer to lye committed unto other Hands then Your Owne and such as under You and nearer Her shall be thought fit to put Her into Which she hath the greater hopes to obtaine because more then ten times the number of good men assigned by God for the stoppe of the severest sentence ever pronounced against a City Listed themselves in one day under the Noble Governour that then was without looking backe upon any thing of their own Interest esteemed vile in comparison of the Publique Safety and Your Honour There needs no more interruption be given to Your weightier affaires then to acquaint You that the Author absents his Name out of no other feare then to keepe himselfe in a condition to doe You farther service For though Kings fall before You their Instruments may rise up against others that endeavour to give evidence to an opposite Government especially having no Legions to defend him but Your Name and the assurance he hath to be owned as truly he is Jan. 1. 1651 2. My Lord Your Excellencyes most humble and obedient Servant To the Reader NOt to stumble into the like folly with those who court their Readers for Applause since the most are wont to crowd about new Bookes rather to note the blemishes then beauties of Authors hooting like Boyes at all they find dissonant from what Custome or Education hath tun'd their apprehensions to and not considering that what seems harsh now may when it is perfectly scan'd be most harmonious I will say no more least I should seem to spread my endeavours to catch c. This being only directed to such candid spirits as being themselves in quest of Truth and the present Quiet cannot but love those that doe though but weakely promote it A PERSWASIVE to a Mutuall compliance under THE PRESENT GOVERNMENT IT was never thought safe much lesse prudent for a supprest party to be intemperate in speeches and turbulent in their Actions especially having no Power standing ready in the eye of probability to protect them Neither are Examples easily found all provocations considered of greater Clemency then hath been used by our present Governours Into whose hands God hath delivered by an indubitable Conquest some in his Anger as others in his Mercy Though Envie cannot charge me to have fallen from my first Love The true Representative of England yet I never wanted naturall bowels to those whom Prejudice and other more selfish respects had unhappily cast on the other side but did daily lay out my supplications and the poore Talent God intrusted me with to buy them to the waies of Peace And therefore I am not so much to be suspected of Partiality but that I may possibly perswade at least the Vanquisht and so in reason the most exasperated to such a temper as may render in their behalfe the prevailing Power as admirable for Moderation as Successe hath proclaimed them famous for their Valour That no Government extant this day can possibly be demolished by fowler hands then it was erected That by the judgement of Truth it selfe a strong man ought not in reason to be bound but by one more mighty And That the sword in all ages during the stormes of War hath pretended to a priviledge of cutting such knots as under a more serene Heaven might have puzled not only Reason but Religion to uniie Are so notorious to all not wilfully or naturally blind in Story as he that should endeavour the proofe of it would to the wise seem an Owle rather then an Athenian there being news of little else in all History both sacred profane And though such changes are strangers to us hatched under a still peace they were familiar to our Fathers whose births stood ordinary dated from some Forraine Conquest or their Deaths from a civil Dissention at home Yet by the continuance of many of their Names in the same possessions it doth plainly appeare they had more patience and wisdome then perpetually to oppose irreconsileable minds to succesfull and irresistible Powers And where this was not observed how fatall and impartiall the severity of Conquest hath proved is plain in Comines who attests to have seen a Branch of one of the most illustrious Families in England begging in Burgundy whose Duke after that infamous defeat given him by the Helvetians ran as was supposed the like fortune his body not being found Neither is there any thing likelier to cast our Nobility and Gentry into this condition then a chang by another Warre which will lie most heavy upon them besides the uncertainty of the event when as a
them unworthy of that favour in thinking it not felicity enough To be free from oppression themselves unlesse they be in such a condition as they may exercise with impunity a Tyrannicall power upon others as formerly they did when like burning glasses they multiplied the heat of the Kings Oppressions It is a wonder to me to see how nice they are now of their Honours And what a scruple they make of submitting to this power not to be denied Superlative when I remember how basely I have seen them or their Fathers lying at the feet of the Court Minnion scrambling for his durty Neeces not leaving Innes Shopps and if not belied worse places unsought to find some of his femall Kindred for their Heites Forgetting that he is more Noble who hath ventured his Life for Liberty then he that hath nothing to shew for his Honour but a good face or an Acquittance for so much money Look upon our General in his Cradle and you shall find him as good a Gentleman as most of these one of that House and Name having been a principall Instrument in overturning those Hives of Drones and freeing us from the tyranny of the Pope But consider him in his Saddle and you will think such low spirits unworthy to be his footmen If he hath any faults they lye neither in his Valour Conduct Prudence nor Humanity Being as far from Pride as Basenes and known to be as faithfull in the Preservation of his friends as Providence hath made him successefull in the subversion of his enemies I had not writ this for feare of being accused of Flattery but that I know he is so employed in purchasing new Honours and setling this Nation that he hath not the leasure to heare what he hath already deserved Concerning the Interest of the Ministry I mean such as have no other end then the glory of God They may be more happy under this then Monarchicall Government For though sublimer Titles the Diana of more licentious times be taken away yet since the Kingdome of Jesus Christ is promised to be set up in the place They ought with patience to expect Assuring themselves That God would never give so miraculous successe to men design'd for the ruine of Truth Neither is it sutable with the rest of the Prudence used by those who have the absolute power of determining to take away the decent maintenance of the Ministers of the Gospell or to demolish the Vniversities But rather hold the hands of such as like blind Samson might goe about to pull them down and ruine their own selves by their folly and indiscretion It is past humane prevention That two factions both so fruitfull in Learning as the Protestant and Papist should not fall into so many subdivisions as it is impossible to keep them all in Vnity Under a lesse severe restraint then an Inquisition as repugnant to charity as unsutable to the spirits of a free people Or els by enjoying so indulgent a Liberty as may leave every Conscience free All civil Obedience presupposed as due to the present Government Now such as conclude from this Permission That the Catholicks will then in a short time Master all Doe not consider how much easier Oxen are kept out of a Pasture then Conies or Hares The Papist having rendred himselfe so unsociable to all opinions but his own as he is detested in Amsterdam where the Jewes find as good if not better protection Therefore the Vnited Provinces and all other Free States whose Foundations were layed under the mixt occasion of maintaining Religion and Liberty together are not reprovable for making use of and indulging tender Consciences though they retaine some things superfluous or have not yet the strength to concoct into practice all things necessary For as Rome was not built in a day so it is as impossible to pull it down in so short a time Wherefore I desire men to be more charitable in their censures since the Primitive Christians were so farre Independent That they retained only so much of the Truth as the tyranny of those times and the stronger or weaker light they walked by gave them opportunity to snatch up Some running away with a beleefe of the Holy Ghost others without so much as ever hearing of such a thing some with simple Baptisme others with a mixture of Circumcision Some with the bare knowledge of the Baptisme of John yet judged mighty in the Scriptures Some with a religious respect to Daies and Meats others without it And yet Paul is so farre from reproving them that he attests it was all done to the Lord. Neither is it lesse manifest that they all did teach And if the same Apostle would never eate Flesh rather then offend a weake brother what charity appears in those High Presbyterians that clamour for a Coercive power as Saul did before his conversion that they might deliver these men bound I would faine have them tell me What is meant by building with Hay Straw Stubble which shall raise at least the Builders to heaven provided Christ the Foundation be kept And if so let us take heed least a woe doe not follow the scandalizing these men who without doubt are our Saviours little ones And since we cannot recover the whole seamles coat of Christs righteousnesse let us not despise any about whom we find the undeniable peeces though spotted with the frailties of humanity The last Interest is the Peoples which if not already better under this present Government then a Kings they may thanke themselves who by their own intemperance and non-compliance occasion the major part of these heavy taxes Which the State can take no pleasure in raising Their own lands being as obnoxious to them as the meanest Subjects Therefore if all would willingly submit to the power God hath set over them The Tradesman might live free from being interrupted by Monopolies and the Husbandman from the rapine of Purvoyers Comissaries Deere Carriages Shipmony Wardships and an innumerable number of other illegall impositions Whereas otherwise it is impossible to make a Nation happy that is resolved to be miserable and to seeke their own ruine by hating to be Reformed FINIS
are so modest as to confesse themselves and their judgements implicitly contain'd in the suffrages of the Major part though the Law pass'd be never so contrary to their sense And I cannot but admire from whence this Infallibility should at first be derived which were no lesse madnesse for the people to give then presumption in any below a God to receive Such as allow the King a Negative voyce forget they place the Abstract of all the Prudence Power and Probitie of the Nation in one Individuall Juells of too high a value to be packt up in so single and weake Vessels as our English Monarchs appeare to have beene But were they better they might upon this account enervate the gravest results of the Supreme Councell yet denied by Law and Custome the ability to quash the sentence of an inferiour Court of Justice Then if no Example can be produc'd of any King that hath voluntarily and out of no more impulsive respect then meer conscience and indulgency to his poor prince-trodden people offered a Bill to abate the power he found so abused by his Predecessours and not likely to be better employed by such as might succeed What greater Impudence can there be then to maintaine That this Negative vote is claimed only to avoid the abolition of good lawes and to hinder the passing of worse Since it is notoriously knowne that all the customes people complaine of have beene intruded and still kept in being by the countenance of an exorbitant power pretended by Kings And therefore such a prerogative cannot be look'd upon as naturall and convenient but destructive to the very essence of Liberty and consequently void in it selfe In case of Minority Madnesse and Folly the triall of the Kings sufficiency is without question in the Parliament and if that be allowed to determine the extent of his power in contingencies no wayes chargeable upon any as faults Shall wicked contumacious and destructive principles and practises be exempt from their cognizance Since the fool or mad man cannot be lyable to so severe a censure as he that imployes his wit wholly to the destruction of his people And if we trace our Kings through all the paths their incroachments have made over the peoples immunities we shall find it was not Charity hath kept them from being more tyrannicall but Weapons and constraint all our priviledges having beene first written and in all ages forced to be copied out in the peoples bloud An argument sufficient to prove that little is to be expected from them in favour of the Publique but by constraint Kings intending nothing more then the augmentation of their owne Arbitrary power Therefore Flattery rather then Truth fonted them Fathers of their Country to which they are in nothing sutable unlesse in correction the severest and least hospitable part of Justice They indeed as domestique Fathers are oftentimes suborn'd by a particular naturall love to doe that which is destructive to the generall well being of a Nation as where an equall affection to their children shall cause a division of their Kingdome into severall Cantons by which the whole is weakned in regard of the expence of more Courts and expos'd to ruine by division as is not without a precedent in Story Next the affection they beare to their female issue makes them raise great taxes to marry them not onely sutable to their birth but unlimited ambition By which meanes a people are often made subject to the curse of a forrain Jurisdiction And in case it should happen to light upon France or Spaine or any Prince else unwilling to remove his Throne further from the Sun they must run the fortune of Naples Sicily Millan Navarre c. who are so miserable as to be under the Regiment of unnaturall Strangers And say they should be so mad as to follow their ambitious humours in quest of honour out of their owne territories as Francis and John of France did they may like them fall into captivity and tie their Kingdomes to harder conditions and a greater Ransome then all the particular benefits redounding from that government are able to compense or all the inconveniencies objected to a Popular State parallel who are confess'd on all sides to be responsible for their misgovernment in parcell as particular Members or in grosse as the whole Councell when dissolved Whereas the flattering Clergy and Courtiers by perverting the Scriptures have in a single person situated Regality out of the reach of all question so as he may shake or kicke about the world without any feare of other danger then what the Poets faine fell to Phaëton from Jupiter himselfe Which cannot but perswade wise men to keepe it out where it never was and upon all advantages to explode it where misfortune hath brought it in Queene Elizabeth though an excellent Prince yet incroach'd upon the English Liberty by denying them to enquire who should be her Successour The unnaturalnesse of this tyranny being hid from the eyes of the people whose interest it was to know it by the delicate and soft hand she carried over them defective in nothing in their imagination but that it was fraile earth and so subject to mortality which made the Commons winke at the commitment of Pigot and Wentworth valuing the satisfaction of her mind before the Members of their owne Body Neither could they well have found weapons to have revenged this unparallel'd outrage she standing so faire painted in her Subjects hearts Therefore though they did well to passe by a fault they could not punish yet the goodnesse of her raigne cannot be said to expiate the curse she brought in by this example the unnaturalnesse of the Scotch Line tooke advantage of which I believe had never come in especially without Caution but that the feare of the Londoners wanting time to secure their wealth and the basenes of the Nobility tempted them to betray themselves into the hands of those who were ever enemies to this Nation Now if there was so little care found in a Queene raised from a prisoner and goodnesse in a King taken from the barren mountaines of Scotland Who could expect more gratitude then we have found in his Son that to make good his Fathers Monopolies and his own illegall taxes covered the Kingdome with a Sea of blood It is impossible for a Popular Government to be so expensive as these two last Kings though with Ieroboam they should sell themselves to work wickednesse not having whereupon to bestow it without making so palpable a demonstration of their Covetousnesse as the people would soon take notice thereof and redresse it by their change or ruine which might be obtained at an easier rate then by a Warre without which no Monarch though never so bad is able to be removed who commonly hath a power to defend him proportional to his prodigality and the Honours he throws about by which those multitudes who only hope are as strongly taken as the few that enjoy
in one single individual it cannot but be most safe to divide it amongst more Many not being so apt as one to be intoxicated by the fumes of power and flattery The childish Love the Common people beare the gaudy person of a King gives occasion to beleeve that popular Goverments are rather results of Princes disorders then the naturall effects of the peoples inclinations and therefore founded with the more difficulty But after establishment easiest maintained wise men being apter to connive at a fault in this Goverment out of hope to have one day the happinesse to mend or commit it themselves The first Monarchies were purely tyrannicall as Babylon and Persia who used to try both Plaintif and Defendant in a Starchamber of Beasts Yet though absolute tyrants over their people so much enslaved to their own passions as what was uttered against the life of the Prophet in folly was not after repealable in judgement And under these arbitrary Monsters the world laboured till necessity the pregnant Mother of all conveniency taught their Subjects to temper them with Lawes But sinding absotute Princes of so faithlesse a nature that they were not tenable by compact delighting like the Demoniaques in the Gospell to rome in the estates and among the graves of their Subjects some Nations exploded them quite as formerly severall Citties of Greece and Rome c. and of later years the united Provinces who having obtained their liberty and so not being exhausted by the exorbitant and vast expences of a King nor shackled by the distracted and contrary interests of a foolish and suborn'd Counsel were able from their infancy to teare such morsells out of the throat of his great Catholick Majesty as the weakenesse of France suffered him to swallow and the feares of King James caused him to sell to prevent the danger he was perswaded by his jealousies and some of his Counsellors more servants unto that State then to him wayted upon the delivery or deniall of the Cautionaâ—y townes to the King of Spaine which this poore spot of Earth doth not only dare to owne as their birthright But have brought him to that passe as he hath twice concluded peace with them under the free notions of an Independant State And some Nations never at all admitted any Kings and such as are celebrated for most wisdome felicity and continuance Apparent in the State of Venice who hath outliv'd the story of her own birth and seen the often repeated funeralls of all the Kingdomes in Europe being now by her account onward of her twelfth Century And though France seems to boast of little lesse continuance deriving her originall from the uncertain history of Pharamond supposed her first King Yet the impartial reader may find her subject to the discipline of strangers and her own inferior Princes till Lewis the eleaventh's wisdome had compounded for her wardship and if Edward the fourth his contemporary had been owner of so much prudence as the Free Cantons of the Swisse he had mis'd of his marke Fulnes of bread that inclines a people to Idolatry makes them so proud and wanton as to think any of their own body too mean to Governe choosing rather with the Froggs in the Fable a Storke for their King though it be his nature to devoure them then a selected number of their own tied in reason to preserve them Not perceiving that Monarchy is a sacrilegious overcharging a single person with more honour and power then so fraile a creature is able to beare without falling into the distempers of excesse which renders industrious Nations more capable of freedome as neerer to a parity then such as time and luxury have overstock'd with Nobility and Gentry who scorning to be subject to those of their own quality and not so well able to tyrannize over inferiours upon their own single score cry up Princes whose faults they cover with a false varnish made up of an imaginary Divine Right glistering only in the eyes of fooles wise men owning it as borrowed from the Easterne Idolaters who were never better pleased then when they saw something carried before them gloriously adorned with the eare-rings jewels and spoyles of the people Which gives all Politians occasion to to pronounce that a Prince cannot disparrage his affaires more then by suffering his power to fall under a popular contest Nor a Republick decline sooner into a tyranny then by continuing that shadow which decency constraines Free Governments to retain of Monarchy too long in one Family as the Dutch did without change or some vigorous opposition For however Insurrections like thunders are terrible for the present They render Liberty more serene and cleere Princes being apt with Alexander to apprehend themselves more then humane unles they be now and then besprinkled with their own blood Affliction and opposition being better able to put them into the way of duty then flattery or prosperity so as if Feare were not more prevalent with them then Love Subjects would be farre more miserable since it is without question that the interest of Princes lookes with a contrary aspect to that of the People His gaine being for the most part their losse as in case of illegall taxes which if once carried cleer without question are conveyed as an inheritance to their posterity who improve rather then diminish any thing layed in charge by their Predecessours Therefore Governours out of their own body in reason should be more naturall then these fathers in Law who see nothing about them but what they falsely imagine to be their own Now though a Senate may have inclusively the same power they are more tender of using it for feare the evill consequence should reach their Children who in these impartiall Governments mingle among the people and participate of all their inconveniencies unles wisdome and good parts makes them capable of their Fathers dignities which happens rarely Able Statesmen finding their virtues commonly wanting in their Children And this discovers another grosse inconvenience in successive Kingdoms where not only Law and Custome but Religion if you trust Regall divinity teacheth the people to cry Hosanna to the next Heyre Though nature or which is worse his wicked inclinations render him unworthy the government of a Asse Whereas a Senate is continually fill'd with the most able men Not to loose time in casting up the account Antiquity made of this Government upon whose approbation it is the nature of men to looke through the prospective of multiplying opinion as they doe upon lesse remote verities with the eies of envy and contradiction The progresse and vertues of the State of Venice are patterns not found in the greatest or match'd by the best of Kings Who hath received nothing her situation only excepted but from the benevolence of Heaven and her own vertue which hath inabled her though but a Pamphlet in comparison of the Voluminous power of other Nations to beare the opposition of all her Neighbours in their turnes and