Selected quad for the lemma: hand_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
hand_n	great_a	king_n	put_v	5,841	5	4.9400	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85713	The sage senator delineated: or, A discourse of the qualifications, endowments, parts, external and internal, office, duty and dignity of a perfect politician. With a discourse of kingdoms, republiques, & states-popular. As also, of kings and princes: to which is annexed, the new models of modern policy. / By J.G. Gent.; De optimo senatore. English	Goślicki, Wawrzyniec, 1530-1607.; Grimefield, John,; J. G., Gent.	1660 (1660)	Wing G2027; Thomason E1766_1; ESTC R10030	85,759	226

Globe This authority and dignity was conferred upon him by the supreme Governour of Heaven and earth who hath descended so far below his sacred Self as to make him his Co-partner in Government adorning him with divine understanding to the intent that the Scepter of this terrene Empire may be swayed by his Reason and Counsel The cause of this co-union of Government between God and Man proceeds from Reason which being perfect makes Man capable of imitating Almightiness so that it appears there is a kind of near alliance or consanguinity between the Creator and the Creature who sometimes is made God's Vicegerent upon earth yet without divine assistance no reason or counsel can be termed good or perfect For the seed of this glimmering resemblance of a Deity planted in Man if it light on fertile ground and that happen to meet with good culture produceth a crop according to the expectation of the Coelestial Planter otherwise it is like corn cast into a barren soyl whose product is nothing but brambles thorns or thistles Thus then Man being reduced to a sense or feeling of those sparks of divinity that lie latent in him should be wrought to a perswasion that he hath the Character or Idaea of a Deity in his mind the impression of the Creator's holy Image stamped on his soul and ought thereupon to be so industrious in the employment of his talent and the management of his affairs that his actions may speak him worthy in some sense of so heavenly a favour bestowed on him Yet though he be made God's associate as it were he must return him the glory to whom it properly and primarily belongs and acknowledge all authority to flow from him as from the Fountain For as brute Animals are not governed by Animals but by an Herdsman no more can Man rule or govern Man without the assistance and protection of Providence divine And should any man be so sordidly ignorant or atheistically prophane as to undertake the Government of any Country or Nation without divine knowledge or assistance it must necessarily follow that that State Common-wealth or Kingdom and every Member thereof be implunged into an Ocean of misery and infelicity For it is in vain to build upon the imagined welfare of a State or Kingdom if God be not the Protector and Patron thereof It is then as conspicuous as the Meridian Sun that all vertue wisdom and goodness owes its original to God which did instigate the purblind or rather pure-blind Heathen that had only the rush-candle of Nature to consecrate publike Temples to Vertue Faith Concord Wisdom Peace c. And if Ovid the Ethnick durst be so bold well may we then à fortiori affirm and maintain Est Deus in nobis agitante calescimus illo Spiritus hic sacrae lumina mentis habet It is therefore our duty to endeavour the deserving a more noble title than that of meer Man and strenuously to labour in the pursuit of Understanding that flies a higher pitch than either humanity or morality dare aspire unto that so if possible we may surpass all our Ancestors and live according to the dictates of that which hath the greatest supremacy in us viz. Reason by vertue whereof we are made sensible of a Deity know how to exercise Vertu●… embrace that which is good and avoid what is evill this is that which endows a man with the qualifications of Wisdom Valour and Justice by this we are able to discern that the terrestrial Globe is wheel'd about by divine wisdom it is this that makes a man Noble a Hero which was the reason that the Lacedaemonians imposed the title of Gods upon those persons that were judged to move in the highest sphear of understanding homines de meliore luto men of a more noble allay than dull mud-wall'd man can boast of Nay Homer deifies Hector in this ensuing Distich Non hominis certe mortalis filius ille Esse videtur sed divino semine natus So that we may maintain without being Paradoxical that that man who is guided by solid reason in all his words and actions is quasi semi-deus inter mortales a Demi-god among men Now of such repute is a Sage Senator or grave Cousellor who hath reason for his Cynosure and wisdom his coadjutress in all undertakings Such persons are so necessary in a Commonwealth that they can by no means be omitted or left out For the King being but a single person cannot have an eye unto all the transactions of his Kingdom besides somtimes it happens that he is seduced from the conduct of reason by yeilding to his affections or slackning the reins of his appetite and licentiousness and the rude multitude being ignorant is altogether uncapable of that understanding or knowledge Yet the Senate elected according to the Law of the Land and compacted or made up of vertuous sober grave discreet persons do from their place as from a Pharos or Watch-tower look about them and provide all things requisite for the discreet and well regulating of the State wherein they live preventing all mutinies seditions and dissentions that the rebellious rabble durst any waies attempt Of such great use and necessity are they and that not only to the King but the people also like unto the vital part of mans soul which residing in the heart enliveneth and quickens that which partakes of Reason and is situated in the head and a Monarch that is guided by the advice and counsel of a grave Senate rules his Kingdom prudently and governs it discreetly For as reason in all her proceedings makes use of the service of the senses yet she alone determines and deserves the greatest honour and esteem so a Prince though he admit of Counsel is to be judged the wisest and is uncontroulable in all his actions for it is a Maxim among us that The King can do no wrong And as the hand distinguished into fingers is thereby strengthned and made the more apt to lay hold on any thing so he that governeth with the aid and assistance of Counsel shall manage all affairs with the greater consideration and prudence Their original did proceed from the benefit that it was imagined would accrue to the Commonwealth whereof they were members by their counsel And although they that first assembled men into Cities who before like Savages ranged over the woods and inhabited the desarts dispersedly without either Law or Order first gained the Title of Kings yet that course alone could not make them understand the dutiful Allegiance they owed unto their Soveraign wherefore perceiving that when they were civilized and reduced from their brutality the authority of a single Person was not of sufficiency to curb and check them in the full career of their exorbitancies they judged it convenient to have assistance from serious and grave Counsellors which we find performed by Romulus the Proto-basileus or first King of the Romans who supposing the Government of a single Person

and fields like brute Animals were first by Cecrops and after by Theseus confined to a City which was then called Cecropia now Athens and at length reduced to a Kingdom descendable to their Posterity But what authority the Senate had under those Kings which order did represent the Optimacie cannot be manifested or apparently known by reason of the length of time and multitude of years since elapsed as also the paucity of those Writers that have any waies discoursed thereon Yet we must believe that Kings had in those daies their Sages or Wisemen about them and made use of their counsel in the management of their political affairs The Kings of that Age as Thucydides writes did rule by consent of People and with their suffrages did many times determine those things whereof they themselves were doubtful Yet that Government was of short continuance for in tract of time which altereth all things it was committed to the multitude whose force and power did utterly subvert the Commonwealth The Lacedaemonian State seemed to contain all the three sorts of Government viz. King Nobles and People the Nobles were their Senators and the People were the Ephori for they were alwaies elected out of the number of popular men Now the Lacedaemonians are very much extolled in that for the space of seven hundred years compleat they have continued without any alteration of their Laws Customs or Government But the Venetians in that respect may challenge a greater portion of glory for they have till this very present Age of ours constantly lived under one Form of Government and Governours the space of one thousand years and better Now the Venetians in framing their Republick do include within the name of People Gentlemen and Citizens being very careful to oppose any other if he presume or dare usurp that title because they only are capable of Magistracy The Senate is chosen out of that number that represents an Optimacie and is the foundation as it were of that State The Duke is elected out of that number that resemble Kings Polybius doth very much extol the Roman Monarchy because it was made up of the King Nobility and People supposing that by this means the King for fear of the People durst not become insolent and the People out of respect to the Senate durst not disobey the King Which Form of Republick is accounted most just For as perfect harmony is made up of Treble Mean and Base so the best and surest agreement among men and the most stable Government is established by the mixture of the Best the Mean and the Base people Romulus saith Livy being as we have already mentioned by consent both of God and men elected King though the State was then but an Embryo refused to have the reins of Government lie altogether upon his own shoulders and did therefore call unto his assistance one hundred Senators who out of respect to their Age and Gravity were called Fathers And lest the People should suppose that they were hereby deluded misled and defrauded of all honour and thereby envy and malignity might ensue to the prejudice of the King or Senate He made them Judges and gave them full power and authority to sit and determine War and conclude peace with many other priviledges thereunto annexed And if this model of Government had still continued in Rome there had not been so great an effusion of bloud in aspiring after Liberty and enlarging the Territories of the Roman Empire Nor had the happiness of that Country been shaken with so many seditions which did at length work her ruine and desolation for she was observed to be very little acquainted with peace all the time she stood upon her own legs ever since she was able to go alone But now let us take the Governments of our Age into consideration and first of the French Monarchy which owns a King who rules ad placitum at his own discretion and although his authority come not under the lash of the Law yet like an honourable and just Prince he acts nothing contrary to Law or Honour In his Kingdom the Noblemen which they call Peers represent an Optimacie the People are divided into three sorts Gentlemen Clergy-men and the popular Multitude and a choice number of these three assembled together by the Kings Edict or Command determine matters of greatest importance in the Kingdom This Council was anciently called Panceltium as the Aetolians named theirs Panaetolium and the universal Council of the Ionians was termed Panionium though since as we have already hinted by reason of the English wars there the King got all authority into his own hands so that his word carries as much force and validity with it as the former acts of Parliament which were their three Estates conven'd and met together As for the Spanish Monarchy the King there hath Soveraign authority and power the Council-Royal represents an Optimacie and the three prime Orders of Knighthood may be compared to the popular State For the Order of St Jago Collatrava and Alcantara assembled with the King decide the most important State-controversies and affairs The Monarchy of Polonia consists likewise of these three sorts i. e. The King Nobility and People but it is to be noted that this word People here denotes only Knights and Gentlemen The Union and Fellowship of these orders is so admirable that the King without the advice of his Council and their authority can do nothing nor can the Council determine without the King's approbation and the Peoples consent In this Kingdom the Laws are of so great force that every man religiously swears to keep and observe them and if any person act contrary to that Oath he is accounted unjust and impious Now that Oath by which they swear to be strict in the observance of their Laws and Liberty is in their vernacular language called Captue which is as much as Tegmen capitis in Latine for as the head is kept in health and preserved from the injury of the nipping weather by being covered so by vertue of that Oath their Laws Lives and Liberties are conserved and to maintain it no man is so fearful as not to venture his life against Tyrants and all such as endeavour to cut the wings of publick Liberty and Happiness This people enjoy great freedom being principled with this perswasion that to live according to the direction of the Law is the most absolute Liberty in the World In this Kingdom the Prince follows not the dictamen of his own will and fancy but sticks close to the Rule of the Law In waging war or concluding peace he makes use of his Council never transgressing Law which works this effect that the Kings person is not only honoured among the people but had in high reverence and estimation so that he may be said to be adored rather than obeyed And who indeed is there that would not entirely love honour respect and reverence that Prince that in governing steers himself

as to be term'd bawling And as he must be moderate in his speech so it is requisite that he be of a temperate mind Now Nature hath so ordered it that there is a kind of combate or contention between the mind and body of man suspending and diverting his disposition from the true end of vertue For the alluring irretiating lusts of the body do labour to oppress and enslave the mind and the mind armed and fortified with reason doth endeavour to resist and oppugn them and that vertue of mind is called Temperance which is employed in contemning all pleasures especially those that are known by the senses as Taste and Touch yet doth it not generally detest all pleasures but only those that thwart vertue and reason Now some pleasures there are by nature lawful and others unlawful and both incident to the mind as well as the body The corporeal pleasures are bred up and born with us so that with difficulty are they restrained especially in those men that take more delight and complacency in the exercises of the body than those of the mind which renders them brutish and sensual Therefore the body must submit to the checks and controulment of the mind and by this means man may attain perfection All Vertues conduce to the felicity of a Kingdom but Temperance alone is the preservatrix of felicity for it keeps the State from that infection which oftentimes ariseth from excess and immoderation and hath subverted many famous Cities and Countries Now every Senator ought to furnish the Kingdom with such Laws as may punish riot and excess lest the Subject being poyson'd therewith Covetousness spring up among them the mother of all Vices We read that in Rome there were Laws and Ordinances made and enacted against excess both in expences and apparel The Lacedemonians did also keep their feasts in publike places that no man should dare to be wastful in the sight of other Citizens and so encourage them to an imitation of their luxuriousness or extravagancy Heretofore the Magistrates of Gallia Belgica allowed of no Law nor Custome that might make the people effeminate And at this day licentiousness and immoderate expences are inhibited by Law in some parts of Italy And since the lusts of men are insatiable as appears by Catiline and his fellow-conspirators who being thriftless and licentious persons attempted to make war against the Commonwealth they must be held in with the bridle of the Law And the Senator must be free from intemperancy that so he may be an example for others to follow and imitate wherein let him take pattern by the severity of the Censores who were the Masters and Tutors of civil temperance and modesty and so by private admonition as well as publike castigation he may withdraw them from intemperance Nor is this vertue without her Concomitants Modesty Bashfulness Honesty and Continency And by these mans life is beautified adorned and made happy Modesty say the Stoicks is a vertue that containeth the knowledge of decent speech and action And whatsoever we speak or do we ought to observe a mean lest we expatiate on a subject more largely than necessity requires forgetting the Counsel of Solon Ne quid nimis Wherefore tye your self to a comely decorum in all your words and actions composing your countenance eyes gesture motion and your whole body to a modest posture that the simplicity and integrity of your intentions may thereby be made manifest and apparent Bashfulness sometimes gains a man much commendation and this qualification renders a man honest and induceth him to lead a good life because in all actions it instructs how to avoid all reproach obloquy and villany And as Justice forbids the wronging of a person by act or deed so Bashfulness teacheth a man not to be offended for a good man doth not only voluntarily abstain from doing injury but is as it were frightned from it by Bashfulness Yet I mean not here that Bashfulness that is frequent with young men and Offenders because they are compelled or constrained to that kind of shamefac'dness and that perturbation of mind doth misbecome a grave and temperate person But that that we hunt after ariseth from a vertuous disposition and so gets a certain habit or exercise accompanied with a fixed resolution to avoid all evill so that if at any time through ignorance an errour be committed we remain ashamed which is commendable Julius Caesar engaged with Pompeius the younger at Corduba perceiving his men ready to retreat and seek for refuge by their heels steps out into the front and there in person behaved himself manfully which the Souldiers seeing could not for shame but turn about and face the enemy again being partly by the valour of their General and partly by their own shamefac'dness instigated thereunto There is in man a certain natural instinct of honesty prompting and spurring him on to the performance of all lawful actions and diverting him from the perpetration of what is unlawful which proceedeth from vertue and therein her dignity resteth though sometimes it ariseth from fame glory and opinion Now he that through diligent observation understandeth what is meant by measure order and gravity and observes this sweet decorum in his words and actions making it his chiefest care not to think or speak any thing unseemly effeminate or licentious may be termed honest and the power of honesty is so great that of it self it sufficeth to disswade men from an ignominious life Among the number of vertues required in our Senator Continency Abstinency challenge no mean place for they not only contemn the illecebrae or allurements of inordinate desires but also withhold our eyes from beholding or our hands from fastning on them Nor is there a more noble spectacle than to see men contented with what nature and industry hath allotted without coveting what appertains to others which they might easily do did they but consider that Natura pauc is contenta Nature will be satisfied with mean commons Paulus Aemylius is highly extolled for his continency who converted no part of the vast wealth that was brought out of Macedonia and Spain to his own private use but delivered the whole into the publike Exchequer choosing rather to be termed poor than branded with the name of deceitful And after his expiration his goods being sold under the Launce uti mos erat according to custome there was not left a sufficient competency for his Wife to live on The example of Scipio Africanus is admirable who in his greener years at the taking of Carthage being but twenty years old had there among many other captives a Virgin of incomparable beauty yet did he not offer to deflower her but gave her to a man unto whom she was formerly betrothed and bestowed all that gold upon her for a dowry which her friends offered for her redemption We therefore judge it necessary that our Senator be continent imitating Pericles in his advice to Sophocles

brave Admiral at Sea Cleon could manure lands and possessions Cicero was a famous Orator Pompeius a valiant General Cato a grave Senator and Scipio admirable both in peace and war So were several others that might be instanced for every man according to the Proverb is a Roscius in his own Profession Now when so many well-qualified Heroes are bound up together in Council what a Constellation of Vertues will shine and appear there And what firm Edicts and good Laws will there be enacted by them for the publick benefit and good of the Kingdom which he is obliged to for he is called Rex à Regendo but some will have it à recte agendo And it is clear that one man cannot be so clear sighted as to perceive all which proves that verse of Homer to be true rendred into Latine thus Bini conveniunt melius rem perspicit alter Nor doth this any waies diminish his power and authority for though many convene yet he is still the head of them all and hath a negative voice nor can any Act be pass'd without his Royal assent or approbation It is taken pro confesso that there is much care and vigilancy required in a Monarch for he must not seek so much after his own profit as the publike good and commodity of his People he must observe the Laws preserve the Rights and Liberty of his Subjects and maintain the authority and reputation of his Senate For Kings were first of all instituted for the aid and assistance of the vertuous against those that are vicious to them absolute power is transmitted to the end that they may revenge injuries and be just Judges in all causes and legal proceedings A good King ought to be as vigilant over those whom Providence hath allotted him Supreme as a Shepherd is of his Flock Homer calls King Agamemnon the shepherd of the People and Plato in imitation of him the Shepherd and Conserver of Mankind Besides he should govern his People not as Masters do their Servants but as Parents do their Children with Paternal care not with rigid severity or cruelty And as it is customary with indulgent Parents sometimes to rebuke their Children sometimes to admonish and encourage them and sometimes also to correct and punish them so should a Prince behave himself toward his Subjects manifesting himself sometimes severe when moved thereunto and at other times gentle affable and courteous both for the preservation of his people and the safety of the Kingdom defending and enlarging the bonum commune with no less care than a Father provides for the sustentation of his Children This makes the difference between Kings and Tyrants the one is studious for the publike good the other for his own private profit The end of the Tyrants endeavour is voluptuousness but the Kings study is honour Riches are the mark at which a Tyrant levels but Vertue is the true Meta of the King Tyrants desire the assistance of strangers but Kings are guarded by their own loyal Subjects Alphonsus King of Arragon being demanded what Subjects of his he most tenderly affected answered I love them better that love me than those that fear me And not without reason did he thus express himself for fear is usually accompanied with hatred A King is as secure by the love good will and loyalty of his Subjects as by the defence of Arms and his Senators will stand him in more stead upon any occasion than a Tyrants Souldiers Trajanus that great Emperour of the World did alwaies call the Senate his Father for as the Father usually foretels the Son what may prove beneficial and what injurious to him so the Senate counsels the King and instructs him how to conserve his Kingdom and by what Laws and Ordinances it must be governed This is the only way to keep the King from Tyranny and the Subject from Rebellion Now tyranny in the one with rebellion in the other will soon verifie that Dystich of the Satyrist Adgenerum Cereris sine caede vulnere pauci Descendunt Reges sicca morte Tyranni A good King knows how to irretiate and allure the hearts of the People to him by love and clemency sooner than by violence and compulsion And good people know their duty and obedience and if the King through the sins of the people be any way misguided they will bite their nails and not scratch their heads they know it is a crime inexplable to quarrel with Majesty the only way to live happy in a Kingdom is this first to give God and then Caesar his due But when Kings grow tyrannical then there is little or no allegiance from the Subject but what they are compelled to whereas that is far more to be esteemed that flows naturally and voluntarily from the people and this usually stirs them up to sedition and so consequently to their utter ruine and destruction and the downfal both of Kingdom and King and the reason is because Tyrants use certain sleights and State-tricks to deprive the Subject of liberty First by clearing the Country of all good and wise men either by banishment imprisonment or death because the vertue of good men reproves them for their vice and renders them odious whenas all they aim at is only to enslave the Nation to the intent that they may prosecute their own lust and pleasure without obstruction Such counsel as this Periander poysoned Thrafibulus with who by his infernal Rhetorick endeavoured to perswade him to cut off the highest spikes of corn meaning thereby that he should cause the cream of the Athenian Nobility to be executed The like subtilty did Sextus Tarquinius the Son of Lucius follow who being suborned by his Father pretended to be banished and fled fraudulently to the Gabii where having scrap'd as much acquaintance as he judged convenient sent privily to his Father to know his will and pleasure and what farther was to be done in the business for his satisfaction who conducted the Messenger into the garden where walking together he with a wand in his hand strook off all the heads of the Poppies before him which being by the Nuncio reported to his Son who had hellish wit enough to understand such damnable mysteries soon put the chief of the Nobility to death and by force and injustice usurped the Government of the Commonwealth and deprived the Subjects of their liberty Another knack they have to prejudice their Subjects by inhibiting their meetings conventions and conferences to prevent their study of honest discipline Nay farther they often sow discord among the people to the end that filled with hate and private displeasure they may be stirred up to civil war and sedition who being thereby much impoverished and the war ceasing are compelled to pay for their pardon and being after this manner fleeced both waies of their money and reduced to poverty become base minded and altogether unfit to defend their Lives Laws or Liberties These and many more that might