Selected quad for the lemma: enemy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
enemy_n	army_n	part_n	town_n	1,194	5	6.1511	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49222	An edict of the French King prohibiting all publick exercise of the pretended reformed religion in his kingdom wherein he recalls and totally annuls the perpetual and irrevocable edict of King Henry the IV, his grandfather, given at Nantes, full of most gracious concessions to protestants : together with a brief and true account of the persecution carried on against those of the foresaid religion for to make them abjure and apostatize : to which is added to form of abjuration the revolting protestants are to subscribe and swear to : with a declaration of his Electoral Highness of Brandenburg, in favour of those of the reformed religion, who shall think fit to settle themselves in any of his dominions / translated out of French.; Edit de révocation de l'Edit de Nantes. English	France.; Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg, 1620-1688.; Louis XIV, King of France, 1638-1715.	1686 (1686)	Wing L3119; ESTC R14911	28,599	40

are witnesses of all these Cruelties with which they feast their Eyes and of all their Infamous and abominable words which ought to cover them with Horror and Confusion make only a matter of Sport and Laughter of it Thus these miserable Wretches being neither suffered to Live nor to Dye for when they see them sainting away they force them to take so much as to keep Body and Soul together and seeing no other way for them to be delivered out of this Hell in which they are continually Tormented are fain at last to stoop under the unsupportable Burthen of these extremities So that excepting only a few who saved themselves by a timely Flight preferring their Religion before all Temporal Possessions all the rest have been constrained to go to Mass Neither is the Country any more exempt from these Calamities than Towns and Cities nor those of the Nobility and Gentry than Citizens They send whole Companies of Souldiers into Gentlemens Houses who Treat them in the most outragious and violent manner conceivable insomuch that not a Soul can hope to escape except it may be some few who like the Believers of old wander in Desarts and lodge in Dens and Caves of the Earth Furthermore I can assure you that never was any greater consternation than that which we are in here at present the Army we hear is come very near us and the Intendant is just now Arrived in this City the greater part of the most considerable Merchants are either already gone or casting about how best to make their escape abandoning their Houses and Estates to their Enemies and there are not wanting some Cowardly Spirits who to avoid the mischief they are preparing for us have already promised to do whatsoever is required of them In a word nothing is seen or heard in these parts but Consternation Weeping and Lamentation there being searce a Person of our Religion who hath not his Heart pierced with the bitterest Sorrows and whose Countenance hath not the Lively Picture of Death Imprinted on it and surely if our Enemies Triumph in all this their Triumph cannot likely be of any long continuance I confess I cannot perswade my self to entertain so good an opinion of them as to think that ever they will be ashamed of these their doings so Diametrically opposite to the Spirit of the Gospel for I know the Gospel in their accounts passeth for a Fable but this I dare averr that this Method of theirs will infallibly lay waste the Kingdome which according to all appearance is never like to recover of it and so in time they themselves will be made as sensible of these miseries as others now are Commerce is already in a manner wholly extinct and there will need little less than a Miracle to recover it to its former State What Protestant Merchants will henceforward be willing to engage themselves in Trade either with persons without Faith and who have so cowardly behav'd their Religion and Conscience or with the Outrageous and Barbarous Persecuters of the Religion which they profess and who by these courses declare openly and frankly that it is their Principle not to think themselves oblig'd to keep their word with Hereticks And who are those of what Religion soever that will Negotiate with a State exhausted by Taxes and Subsidies by Persecutions by Barrenness and Dearth of several years continuance full of a despairing people and which infallibly will ere long be full of those that are proscrib'd and be bathing in its own Blood And these miserable Wretches who have been deceived by those who have told them that it would never be impos'd upon them to abjure their Religion and who are stupified by the extremity of their Sufferings and the terror of their bloody and cruel Enemies are wrapt up in so deep an astonishment as doth not permit them to be fully sensible of their Fall but as soon as they shall recover themselves and remember that they could not embrace the Communion of Rome without absolutely renouncing the holy Religion they professed and when they shall make a full reflection upon the unhappy change they have been forced to make then their Consciences being awakened and continually reproaching their faint-heartedness will rend them with sorrow and remorse and inflict torments upon them equal to those the Damned endure in Hell and will make them endeavour to be delivered from this Anguish and to find rest in the constant profession of that Truth which they have so unhappily betray'd And on the other side their Enemies will be loath to take the Lye at this time of day and therefore will endeavour through fear of Punishments to oblige them to stay in that Abyss of horror into which they have precipitated them but because all the Sufferings they can possibly threaten them with will be no ways considerable when compared with those Tortures their Consciences have already Inflicted upon them and wherewith they threaten them in case of a Relapse they will be constrained to drag them to the place of Execution or else seek to rid themselves of them all at once by a general Massacre which many good Souls have so long desired I hope Sir You will not be wanting in your most Earnest Prayers to beg of God that he would be pleased to take pity of these miserable Wretches and make the Heart of our Soveraign to Relent towards us that he would Convert those who in their Blindness think they do him Service by putting us to Death that he would cause his Voice to be heard by them from Heaven as to St. Paul Saul Saul Why Persecutest thou me and make the rest the Examples of his Exemplary Justice finally that he would grant that all those who have denied him being touched with a true Repentance may with St. Peter Go out and Weep Bitterly I am SIR Yours An Extract of a Letter containing some more Instances of the Cruel and Barbarous usage of the Protestants in France BUt this Sir is not the thing which troubles me most at this time there 's another cause of my Grief which is but too just and even pierceth my Heart with Sorrow and that is the Cruel Persecution which the Poor Protestants of France do suffer amongst whom I have so many near and dear Relations the Torments they are put to are almost Incredible and the Heavenly Courage wherewith some of them are strengthned by their great Captain and Leader to undergo them is no less amazing and wonderful I shall give for Instance one or two of these Champions that by them you may judge of the rest A Young Woman was brought before the Council in order to oblige her to abjure the Truth of the Gospel which she boldly and man fully refusing was commanded back again to Prison where they shaved her Head and sing'd off the Hair of her Privities and having stript her Stark-Naked in this manner led her throngh the Streets of the City where many a blow was given

striving to outvie each other in Inventing New Methods of Pain and Torment not to be appeased with Money or good chear Foaming and Roaring like Ravenous Raging Lyons and presenting Death at every Moment and that which is worse than all this driving People to Distraction and set seless Stupidity by those Devilish Inventions we have given you an Instance of in the Relation of Montauban Moreover this Persecution hath one Characteristical note more which without any Exaggeration will give it the Precedence in History for Cruelty above all those which the Church of God ever suffered under Nero Maximinus or Dioclesian which is the severe Prohibition of departing the Kingdom upon pain of Confiscation of Goods of the Gally of the Lash and perpetual Imprisonment All the Sea Ports are kept with that exactness as if it were to hinder the escape of Traytors and common Enemies All the Prisons of Sea Port Towns are cram'd with these miserable Fugitives Men Women Boys and Girls who there are Condemn'd to the worst of Punishments for having had a desire to save themselves from this dreadful Persecution and deluging Calamity this is the thing which is unparallel'd and of which we find no Instance This is that Superlative excess of Cruelty which we shall not find in the List of all the violent and Bloody Proceedings of the Duke of Alva he Massacred he Beheaded he Butchered but at least he did not Prohibit those that could to make their Escape In the last Hungarian Persecution nothing was required of the Protestants but only that their Ministers should Banish themselves and Abandon and Renounce the conduct of their Flocks and because they were unwilling to obey these orders therefore it is they have groaned under so long and so terrible a Persecution as they have done But this Hungarian Persecution is not to be compared with that we are Speaking of for the Fury of that Tempest discharged it self upon the Ministers only no Armies were Imploy'd to force the People to change their Religion by a thousand several ways of Torment much less did it ever enter the thoughts of the Emperours Council to shut up all the Protestants in Hungary in order to the destroying of all those who would not abjure their Religion which yet is the very condition of so many wretched Persons in France who beg it as the highest favour at the hands of their merciless Enemies to have leave to go and beg their Bread in a Forreign Country being willing to leave their Goods and all other outward conveniencies behind them for to lead a poor Miserable Languishing Life in any place where only they may be suffered to Dye in their Religion And is it not from all this most apparent that those Monsters who have Inspired the King with these designs have resin'd the Mystery of Persecuting to the utmost and advanc'd it to its highest pitch of perfection O Great God! who from thy Heavenly Throne dost behold all the outrages done to thy People hast thee to help us Great God whose compassions are Infinite suffer thy self to be touched with our extream desolution If Men be Insensible of the calamities we suffer if they be deaf to our cries not regarding our Groans and Supplications yet let thy Bowels O Lord be moved and affect thee in our behalf Glorious God for whose Names sake we suffer all these things who knowest our Innocence and Weakness as well as the Fury and Rage of our Adversaries the small support and help we find in the World behold we Perish if thy pity doth not rouze thee up for our Relief It is thou art our Rock our God our Father our Deliverer we do not place our confidence in any but thee alone let us not be confounded because we put our Trust in thee Hast thee to our help make no long tarrying O Lord our God and our Redeemer A Letter sent from Bordeaux giving an Account of the Persecution of those of the Protestant Religion in France SIR WHatsoever you have heard concerning the Persecution of those that are of our Religion in the Land of Bearn Guienne and Perigort is but too true and I can assure you that they who have given you that account have been so far fromamplifying the matter that they have only acquainted you with some few particulars yet am I not much surprised at the difficulty you find to perswade your self that the things of which your Friends Inform you are true in cases of this Nature so amazingly unexpected we are apt often to distrust our own Eyes and I profess to you that though all places round about us Eccho the Report of our Ruine and Destruction yet I can scarcely perswade my self it is so indeed because I cannot comprehend it It is no matter of surprise or amazement to see the Church of Christ afflicted upon Earth forasmuch as she is a stranger here as well as her Captain Lord and Husband the Holy and Ever-blessed Jesus was and must like him by the same way of Cross and Suffering return to her own Country which is above It is no matter of Astonishment to find her from time to time suffering the worst of usage and most cruel Persecutions all Ages have seen her exposed to such Tryals as these which are so necessary for the Testing of her Faith and so fit a matter of her Future Glory Neither is it any great wonder if amidst these sore Tryals vast numbers of those who made Profession of the Gospel do now renounce and forsake it We know that all have not Faith and it is more than probable that they who do not follow Christ but because they Thrive by it and for the Loaves will cease to be of his Retinue when he is about to oblige them to bear his Cross and deny themselves But that which seems Inconceivable to me is that our Enemies should pitch upon such strange ways and methods to destroy us as they have done and that in so doing they should meet with a success so Prodigious and doleful I shall as briefly as I can endeavour to give you an account of so much as I have understood of it All those thundring Declarations and destructive Arrests which continually were Sued for and obtain'd against us and which were Executed with the extremity of Rigour were scarce able to move any one of us The forbidding of our Publick Exercises the demolishing of our Churches and the severe Injunction that not so much as two or three of us should dare to Assemble in order to any thing of Divine Worship had no other effect upon the far greater part of us than to Inflame our Zeal instead of abating it obliging us to Pray to God with greater fervor and Devotion in our Closets and to Meditate of his Word with greater Application and Attention And neither the great wants to which we were reduced by being depriv'd of our Offices and Imploys and all other means of Living and by those insupportable charges

miserable Wretches Insomuch that of all those many numerous Assemblies we had in that Province as that of Pau d' Arthes de Novarre c. there are scarcely left a small number who either continue constant in despite of all these Cruelties or else have made their escape into Spain Holland England or elsewhere leaving their Goods and Families for a Prey to these Merciless and Cruel Men. Success having thus far answered their expectation they resolved to loose no time but vigorously Prosecuting their work they immediately turned their Thoughts and Arms towards Montauban where the Intendant having Summoned the Citizens to appear before him bespeaks them much in the same Language as was used to those of Bearne whereunto they having returned about the same Answer he orders 4000 Men to enter the City and makes them take up their Quarters as at Bearne only in the Houses of Protestants with express Command to Treat them in like manner as they had done those of Bearne and these Inhumane Wretches were so diligent and active in Executing these pittiless Orders that of 12 or 15000 Souls of which that Church did consist not above 20 or 30 Families are escaped who in a doleful and forlorn condition wander up and down the Woods and hide themselves in Thickets The Ruine of this Important place drew after it the desolation of all the Churches about it which were all Enveloped in the same common Calamity as those of Realmont Bourniquel Negreplisse c. Yet was not the condition of the Churches in the Upper Guienne more Sad and Calamitous than that of those of the Lower Guienne and of Perigort which this horrible deluge hath likewise overwhelm'd Mounsieur Bousters and the Intendant having shared the Country between them Mounsieur de Bousters taking for his part Agenois Tonnein Clerac with the adjoyning places and the Intendant having taken upon him to reduce Fleis Monravel Genssac Cartillon Coutras Libourne c. The Troops which they Commanded in the mean time carrying Desolation to all the places they passed through filling them with Mourning and Despair and scattering Terror and Amazement amongst all those to whom they approached There were at the same time 17 Companies at Saint Foy 15 at Nerac and as many in proportion in all other parts So that all places being fill'd with these Troops accustom'd to Licentiousness and Pillage there is not any one of the said Places where they have not left most dreadful marks of their Rage and Cruelty having at last by means of their Exquisite Tortures made all those of our Religion submit themselves to the Communion of Rome But forasmuch as Bergerac was most signally Famous for the long Tryals it had most Gloriously endured and that our Enemies were very sensible of what advantage it would be to the carrying on of their Design to make themselves Masters there also at any price whatsoever they accordingly failed not to attempt the same with more Resolution and Obstinacy than any of the forementioned places This little Town had already for three Years together with admirable Patience and Constancy endured a Thousand ill Treatments and Exactions from Souldiers who had pick'd them to the very Bones for besides that it was almost a continual passage for Souldiers there were no less than 18 Troops of Horse had their Winter Quarters there who yet in all that time had only gain'd Three Converts and they such too as were maintain'd by the Alms of the Church But to return The design being form'd to reduce this City two Troops of Horse are immediately ordered thither to observe the Inhabitants and soon after 32 Companies of Foot enter the Town Monsieur Bousters and the Intendant of the Province with the Bishops of Agen and Perigueux and same other Persons of Quality render themselves there at the same time and send for 200 of the chiefest Citizens to appear before them telling them That the Kings Express Will and Pleasure was they should all go to Mass and that in case of Disobedience they had order to compel them to it To which the Citizens Unanimously answered That their Estates were at the dispose of his Majesty but that God alone was Lord of their Consciences and that they were resolved to suffer to the utmost rather than do any thing contrary to the motions of it Whereupon they were told That if they were so resolved they had nought else to do but to prepare themselves to receive the Punishment their Obstinacy and Disobedience did deserve and immediately 32 Companies more of Infantry and Cavalry enter the City which together with the 34 Companies beforementioned were all Quartered with Protestants with Express Command not to spare any thing they had and to exercise all manner of Violence upon the Persons of those that entertain'd them until they should have extorted a Promise from them to do whatsoever was Commanded them These Orders then being thus Executed according to the desires of those who had given them and these miserable Victims of a Barbarous Military Fury being reduc'd to the most deplorable and desolate condition they are again sent for to the Town-house and once more pressed to change their Religion and they answering with Tears in their Eyes and with all the Respect Humility and Submission imaginable That the matter required of them was the only thing they could not do the extreamest Rigour and Severity is denounc'd against them and they presently made good their Words by sending 34 more Companies into the City which made up the full number of a hundred who encouraging themselves from their numbers and flying like enraged Wolves upon these Innocent Sheep did rend and worry them in such a manner as the sole Relation cannot but strike with Horror and Amazement Whole Companies were ordered to Quarter with one Citizen and Persons whose whole Estate did not amount to 10000 Livres were taxed at the rate of 150 Livres a day when their Money is gone they Sell their Houshold-stuff and sell that for two pence which hath cost 60 Livres they bind and fetter Father Mother Wife and Children Four Souldiers continually stand at the door to hinder any from coming in to succour or comfort them they keep them in this condition two three four five and six days without either Meat Drink or Sleep on one hand the Child cries with the Languishing accent of one ready to Dye Ah my Father Ah my Mother What shall I do I must Dye I can endure no longer The Wife on the other hand cries Alass my Heart fails me I Faint I Dye Whilst their cruel Tormentors are so far from being touch'd with Compassion that from thence they take occasion to press them afresh and to renew their Torments frighting them with their Hellish Menaces accompanied with most execrable Oaths and Curses crying Dog Bougre What wilt not thou be Converted Wilt not thou be Obedient Dog Bougre Thou must be Converted we are sent on purpose to Convert thee and the Clergy who