wee come to alledge For they said That men must not stay upon fishing for froggs but men must catch in their nets the great Salmons that one Salmons head was more worth than tenne thousand froggs and that when they had slaine the cheefetaines of pretended rebels that they should easily overthrow the rude and rascally multitude which without heads could enterprise nothing These venerable enterprisers should have considered that which here their Doctor Machiavell saith which also since they have seen by experience That a people cannot want heads which will alwayes rise up yea even those heads which bee slaine If they had so well noted practised this place of Machiavell as they do others so much blood would never have ben shed their tyrannie it may be had longer endured than it hath done For the great effusion of blood which they have made hath incontinent cried for vengeance to God who according to his accustomed justice hath heard the voice of that blood and for the crie of the orphant and widdow hath laid the axe to the root of all tyrannie and alreadie hath cut away many braunches thereof and if it please him will not tarry long to lay all on the ground and so establish Fraunce in his auncient government As for Fortresses in frontiers of countries they have been long time practised and are profitable to guard from incursions and invasions of enemies and to the end such as dwell upon the borders may the more peaceably enjoy their goods Wee reade That the emperour Alexander Severus gave his Fortresses upon frontiers to Lamprid. in Alex. Pomp. Laetus in Constant Magno good and approoved captaines with all the lands and revenewes belonging unto them to enjoy during their lives to the end saith Lampridius that they might be more vigilant and carefull to defend their owne And afterward the emperour Constantine the Great ordained That the said Fortresses with their grounds and revenewes should passe to the heires of the said captaines which held them as other manner of goods and heritages And hereupon some say have come such as the civile law call Feudi 34. Maxime A Prince ought to commit to another those affaires which are subiect to hatred and envie and reserve to himselfe such as depend upon his grace and favour A Prince vvhich vvill exercise some cruell and rigorous act saith cap. 7. 14. of a prince M. Nicholas he ought to give the commission thereof unto some other to the end he may not acquire evill vvill and enmitie by it And yet if he feare that such a delegation cannot bee vvholly exempted from blame to have consented to the execution which was made by his Commissarie he may cause the Commissarie to be slaine to shew that he consented not to his crueltie as did Caesar Borgia and Messire Remiro Dorco THis Maxime is a dependancie of that goodly doctrine which Machiavell learned of Caesar Borgia which although it was very cruell yet meaning to appeare soft and gentle following therein the Maxime which enjoyneth dissimulation committeth the execution of his crueltie to Messire Remiro Dorco as at large before wee have discoursed that hystorie And because we have fully shewed that all dissimulation and feignednesse is unworthie of a prince we will stay no longer upon this Maxime Well will I confesse that many things there be which seeme to be rigorous in execution although they be most equall and just which it is good a prince doe commit to others to give judgement and execution by justice as the case meriteth For as the emperour Marcus Antonine said It seemeth to the world that that which the prince doth hee doth it by his absolute authoritie and power rather than of his civile and reasonable power Therefore to shun that blame and suspition it is good that the prince delegate and set over such matters to Iudges which are good men not suspected nor passionate not doing as the emperour Valentinian did who would never heare nor receive accusations against Iudges and Magistrates which hee had established but constrained the recusators or refusers to end their cause before those Iudges only Whereby he was much blamed and his honor impeached and disgraced For truly the cheefe point which is required to cause good Passionate Iudges cannot judge well justice to be administred is That Iudges be not suspected nor passionat because the passions of the soule and heart doe obfuscate and trouble the judgement of the understanding and cause them to step aside and stray out of the way It is also a thing of very evill example when a prince with an appetite of revenge or to please the passions of revengefull great men dooth elect Iudges and Commissaries that bee passionate and which have their consciences at the command of such as employ them As was done in the time of king Lewis Hutin in the judgement of Messire Enguerrant de Marigni great master of Fraunce and in the time of king Charles the sixt in the judgement of the criminall processe of Messire Iean de Marests the kings Advocate in the parliament of Paris And a man may put to them the judgements given in our time against Amie du Bourg the kings Counsellor in the said parliament and against captaine Briquemand and M. Arnand de Cavagnes master of the Requests of the kings houshold and against the countie de Montgomerie and many others For the executions to death which followed manifested well That the Iudges were passionate men their consciences being at the command of strangers which governed them 35. Maxime To administer good Iustice a Prince ought to establish a great number of Judges TO have prompt and quicke expedition of good Iustice saith Machiavell many Iudges must be established for few can dispatch Discourse lib. 1. cap. 7. few causes and a small number is more easie to gaine and be corrupted than a great number And vvithall a great number is strong and firme in Iustice against all men EXperience hath made us wise in France that this Maxime of Machiavell is not true For since they multiplied the Officers of Iustice Multiplicitie of Officers cause of the corruption of â—ustice in Fraunce in the kingdome by the encrease of Counsellours in parliaments by erection of Presidents seats by creation of new or alternative Officers we have processes and law causes more multiplied longer and worse dispatched than before insomuch as by good right and by good reason the last Estates generall held at Orleance complained to king Charles the ninth of that multiplication and multitude of Officers which served not as it doth not yet but to multiplie law causes to ruinate and eat up the people and yet no better expedition of Iustice than before but rather worse and notoriously more long and of greater charges to the parties Vpon which complaint it was holily ordained That offices of Iustice which became vacant by death should bee suppressed and that none should come in their
unbrideled and undiscreet appetites but a good Prince cannot correct so many evill Counsellors which will feed their Prince with smoke and lies and will hide from him such things as he ought to know for the Commonweale This may yet be better shewed by the examples of many Princes which have ben Princes of little wisedome have beene well governed by good Counsâ—ll Capitol in Goâ—d Iun. of small wisedome and vertue and yet notwithstanding have well ruled the Commonwealth by the good and wise Counsell of prudent and loyall Counsellors wherwith they were served as did the Emperour Gordian the yong who was created Emperour at eleven yeares of age insomuch that many judged the Empire to be falne in to a childish kingdome and so into a weakenesse and a bad conduction But it proved otherwise for this young Emperour Gordian espoused the daughter of a wise man called Misitheus whom he made the high Steward of his houshold and governed himselfe by his Counsell in all his affaires so that the Romane Empire was well ruled so long as Misitheus lived Likewise Ioas king of Israel came to the Crowne a young child of the age onely 2. Kings 11. and 12. and 2. Chro. 23. of seven yeares but hee was governed by Ioiada his vncle a very wise man Insomuch that whilest that good Counsellor lived the kingdome was well and rightly administred Charles the sixt king of France was but thirteene yeares old when hee came to the Crowne was of small vnderstanding yet during his minoritie the kingdome was well and wisely governed by his three uncles the Dukes of Anjou of Berry and Bourgoigne There was nothing in their government to be spoken against but only that they were a little drawing unto themselves the kings treasure all other affaires were administred well and prudently Yet true it is that after the kings majoritie they yet entred into the government of the kingdome because of a phrensie that tooke the king which endured more than twentie years but then their government was corrupted by ambition covetousnesse a desire of vengeance envie yet as I said during the kings minoritie they did governe well The kings of France Clotharie the fourth of that name and Chilperic the second Annales of France vpon the year 716 the three following were both Princes of small vnderstanding and indeed had no wisdome to conduct the affaires of the realme but they had for a Counsellor and Conductor of their affaires that valiant Lord Charles Martell that during their reigne the realme was well ruled yea with many great and excellent victories In our time we know that the Emperour Charles the fift was left very young by his father and grandfather in such sort as during his minoritie hee could never have Du Bellay lib. 1. de se Memoires knowne how to governe his affaires which were great and in great trouble in many places His said father then foreseeing at his death that his sonne had need of a good overseer which were a good man ordained for that purpose to governe him and his affaires king Lewis the twelfth praying him to accept that charge knowing well the sinceritie and loyaltie of that good king which for nothing would wound his conscience as he did not althogh he might for therby he had offered him great occasions of enlarging his limits The king then loyally to acquit himselfe of that charge gave unto that young Prince for Governour a good man faithfull and of good understanding called the Lord de Chieures by the counsell of whom and of certaine other good Counsellors the affaires of that young Prince were much better managed even in that low age than ever they were in his fathers or grandfathers time This good government in that base age proceeding from good Counsell gave so great a fame and reputation unto that yong Prince that he was chosen Emperour at the age of 20 yeares The Emperour Domitian besides he was not wise he was wicked and exceeding cruell yet he during his raigne had so good hap to encounter and light upon such Suetonius in Domit. cap. 3. 4. 8. 10. Governors and Magistrates for the Provinces of his Empire being good and wise men that whilest he raigned the Romane Empire was well governed and there was none but certaine particular persons of Rome which felt the evill of his vices and crueltie Charles the eight king of Fraunce came to his Crowne at the age of thirteene yeares and was a very good Prince but of no great understanding nor wisedome Annales of France upoÌ„ the yeare 1484. yet the Estates that were assembled at Tours gave him a good Counsell which they did chuse of fit and capable persons by which Counsell the affaires of the kingdome were well governed during the kings minoritie although there fell out some emotions and stirres of some revolters I will not here repeat the example of the Emperour Alexander Severus who very young came to the Empire and under whom the affaires of the Commonwealth were well governed by the meanes of good Counsellors as is abovesaid I may also here adde many other examples of our kings of Fraunce which were not too spirituall and yet governed well by their good Counsell As also there were many Emperours of the Romane Empire some ignorant and brutish others voluptuous and effeminate others cruell and knowing nothing but to handle yron As were Philipus Licinius Dioclesianus Maximianus Carus Carinus Gallus Constantius Aurelianus Galienus Leon Macrinus Zeno Iustintanus and many others which yet made very good Lawes as wel for distributive justice as for the pollicie of the Empire as is seene by the Code of Iustinian which lawes wee must needs attribute to their wise and learned men which were their Counsellors for none of all them knew any thing or little except Macrinus how to make good Lawes Therfore I conclude this point against the Maxime of Machiavell That a Prince may wel governe wisely the Commonweale by the good counsell of good and faithfull Counsellors although he be evill provided of wisdome But here remaineth a difficultie which is not small How an unwise Prince may Of the election of good CouÌ„sellors and Magistrats provide good and loyall Counsellors seeing that Princes that are wise and well advised are therein often deceived And upon this point I confesse there is nothing harder nor of greater consequence to a Prince than to guide himselfe well in the election of such persons whereof he should compose his Counsell For there are great hypocrisies and dissimulations and one seemes to be a good man sincere and continent which shewes himselfe another man when meanes comes in his hand to corrupt vertue for to make his particular profit thereof And we see but too much by experience that the old Proverbe is true Honours change manners You may see how the most gracious and courteous in all the world the most affable and officious to every one that is
death so that by the incestuous mariage wherewith Claudius had contaminated and poysoned his house he and his naturall sonne who by reason should have been his successor were killed with poyson We read likewise that the Emperour Bassianus Carracalla Spartian in Carac beholding one day Iulia his mother in law with an eye of incestuous concupiscence She said unto him Si tu le veux tu le peux If thou wilt thou maiest Knowest thou not that it belongs unto thee to give the law not to receive it which talke so enflamed him yet more with lust that he tooke her to wife in marriage Hereupon Hystoriographers note that if Bassianus had knowne well what it was to give a law he would have detested and prohibited such incestuous and abhominable copulations and not to have authorised them For breefely a Prince may well give lawes unto his subjects but it must not be contrary to nature and naturall reason This was the cause why Papinian the great Lawyer who well understood both naturall and civile law loved better to die than to obey the said Emperor Bassianus who had commanded him to excuse before the Senate his parricide committed in the person of Geta his brother For Papinian knowing that such a crime was against natural right so much there wanted that he would have obeied the Emperor if he had commanded him to have perpetrated and committed it that he would not obey him so far therein as to excuse it Wherein the Paynim Lawyer may serve for a goodly example to condemne many Magistrate Lawyers of our time which not only excuse but also cause to be executed unnaturall murders and massacres against all law divine and humane But now we have spoken of a Princes absolute power let us come to the other The other power which we call Civile is that which is governed and as it were The Civile power temperateth the Absolute limited within the bounds of Reason of right and equitie and which we must presume that the Prince will use and useth ordinarily in all his commaunds unlesse expressely he shew and declare that he willeth and ordaineth this or that of his absolute power and of his certaine knowledge This is that second power which is guided by prudence and good Counsell and which giveth a sweet temperature and counterpoise to that absolute power no more nor no lesse than the second motion of the Sunne tempereth the course of the first as we have abovesaid This is that power which establisheth and conserveth in assurednesse kingdomes and empiers and without which they cannot stand but incontinent shal be ruinated annihilated and laid on the ground This is that power which all good Princes have so practised letting their absolute power cease without using any unlesse in a demonstration of Majestie to make their Estate more venerable and better obeyed that in all their actions and in all their commands they desire to subject and submit themselves to lawes and to reason And in this doing they never thought or esteemed to doe any thing unworthie of their Majestie but contrary have ever accounted that there was no thing more beseeming the majestie of a soveraigne Prince than to live and carrie himselfe in all his actions according to right and equitie And that the domination and power of a Prince that so governeth himselfe is greater more secure and more venerable than his which governeth himselfe after the absolute power And truly all the good Romane Emperours have alwayes held this language and have so practised their power as we read in their hystories Yea the Emperour Theodosius L. digna Vox C. de Lege made an expresse law for it which is so good to be marked that I thought good to translate it word by word It is the majestie of him that governeth to confesse himselfe to be bound unto lawes so much doth our authoritie depend upon law And assuredly it is a farre greater thing than the Empire it selfe to submit his Empire and power unto lawes And that which we will not to be lawfull unto us we shew it unto others by the oracle of this our present Edict Given at Ravenna the eleventh day of Iune the yeare of the Consulship of Florentius and Dionisius To come then to our purpose you must understand that de Comines spoke of this second power in the place above alledged and not of the absolute power of a Prince for by that power it is certain that the Prince hath good authority to enterprise wars to levie imposts upon his subjects without their consent Because that by the roiall law above mentioned the Roman people gave all the like power unto the Prince as Dion de August ◠I. D. de Constit. Princ. they had themselves to use it towards the people against the people gave him absolute power without any astriction or bond to laws to do what he would We see also by the law of God the same absolute power is given unto kings soveraign Princes For it is written that they shall have full power over the goods persons of their subjects And althogh God have given them that absolute power as to his ministers 1. Sam. 8. lieutenants on earth yet wold he not have thē use it but with a temperance moderation of the second power which is ruled by reason equitie which we call Civile For so much there wanteth that God would that Princes shold use the said absolute power upon their subjects as he wold not so far constrain them as to sell their goods as is declared unto us in the example of Naboth For most unlikely is it that God 1. King 22. the great Dominator and Governor of al Princes would have Princes to abuse their powers with cruelties rapines injustices or any other unreasonable way of absolute power But as God by justice punisheth the wicked and by kindnesse and clemencie maintaineth the good and rightly and most holily useth his divine power so would he that Princes which are his lieutenants on earth should do the like not in perfection for that they cannot but in imitation To conclude then now our talke concerning the place of Comines certaine it is that a Prince may well make warre and impose tallies without the consent of his subjects by an absolute power but better it is for him to use his civile power so shuld he be better obeyed And as for Aydes and Subsidies whereof Comines speaketh some say they are not at this day levied by an absolute power but by the peoples consent Because in the time of Charles the seventh who had great and long warres against the English the Estates generall of the kingdome agreed unto him to levie Aydes and Subsidies every yeare without any more calling them together for that the warres endured so long and that their every yeares assembly would have come to great expences so that if the cause had alwaies continued then necessarily
rather to discharge him of his Office than constraine him to doe a thing against his conscience The prince then which will make a good election of magistrates ought to take care to chuse persons which like Cato will not winke at vices and which will patiently heare parties and judge equally as did Quintius which will be diligent well to draw out the truth of the fact before he give judgement upon any as did Sulpitius which may be such persons as feare to offend their consciences like Helpidius And briefly that they be fearers of God lovers of truth not covetous according to Iethro his counsell Thus doing hee need not feare to have his justice well ruled and holily administred He must take heed he doe not like the emperour Tiberius who gave his Offices to great drinkers and gourmandizers taking pleasure to see a man tunne up much wine and viands into his bellie Neither ought hee to imitate the example of Suet. in Tib. cap. 42. Aâ— Marcel lib. 23 27. the emperour Iulian the Apostata who for a Iudge one time gave to the towne of Alexandria in Aegypt a most cruell and turbulent man And when it was told him that this Iudge was a man very unwoorthie of such an Office I know nor sayth hee how unworthie he is but because the Alexandrians be turbulent and covetous persons I will give them a like Iudge which may deale with them after their merits This was a very inconsiderate part of this emperour to give a wicked magistrate to a corrupted people for their amendment for that is as if one should give unto a diseased person a wicked physician to heale him There was the like fact committed in our time by the Machiavelists but no marvaile if Atheists follow the traces of an Apostata for the one is as good as the other Neither ought the prince also to doe as the emperor Valentinian who constrained the parties to subject themselves to the judgment of suspected Iudges to bee their enemies For all these said emperours were greatly blamed by authors of their time and are yet by all hystories for their so evill choise of unworthie men in Offices which rather they ought to have recoiled and dejected as many other emperors did which for farre lesse causes have cassierd and dispatched them out of their Offices as some have written That Augustus Caesar cassierd a magistrate as ignorant and incapable because hee writ Ixi in place of Ipsi And Vespasian cassierd another because he perfumed himselfe smelled of muske saying he would have loved him better if he had smelled of Garlicke And Domitian cassierd another because he delighted in dauncing and puppet playes for Domitian although otherwise very wicked had this good in him that he caused wel to be chastised all such as our Machiavelists are at this day Likewise also Fabricius Censor cassierd out of the Senate Cornelius Rufinus Senator because hee had vessels of silver weighing tenne marks which at this time comes to 40 crownes But I leave you to thinke if they would not then have rigorously punished such as doe spoile and eate the people which sell Iustice or which commit like abuses which at this day are manifestly tollerated in France since they cassierd men out of their Offices for farre lighter causes as to faile in the orthographie of a word to smell of a perfume to daunce to have plate of the value of tenne pound for these things seeme not to be great faults but at this time men do rather make vertues of them But it is not ynough that a prince make good election of his Officers and Magistrates by the consideration of each mans particular vertues but also in seats where he must needs establish many Iudges together hee ought to take good advisement well â—o compose the bodie of that assembly by considering the qualities required to give a good harmonie and temperature to all the bodie And for this purpose hee ought to compose and temper it of persons of divers estates and divers countries as for example A parliament and judgement seat which ought to bee composed of many ought not to be made of men all of the Nobilitie or of the Clergie or of the third estate but some of every estate Likewise it ought not to be composed of men all of one towne but they ought to bee taken from divers jurisdictions or diocesses And those two points have aunciently been observed in France according to royall ordinances so enjoyning But in the time wherein we are wee may adde by the like reason That in a parliament or the like seat they ought not all to be Catholike Romanes and none of the Reformed Religion For if the estate of the Clergie for the conservation of her priviledges hath well obtained that in all such places there be magistrates of the Clergie although they bee of the same religion in all points with the Catholike Lay-men why should they denie it to men of the profession of the Gospell To this purpose we reade That at Rome there was a time wherein there was many more knights in the assembly of Iudges soveraigne of causes than of Senators insomuch as by soveraigne judgement Publius Rutilius who was a good and sincere man was condemned to banishment because hee had repressed the excessive and undue exactions of Publicans in Asia being evill beloved of the knights which were the greater number of the assembly The Senatours disdaining and grieving at this wicked judgement stirred up Livius Drusus Tribune of the people at whose pursute there was a law made That from thence forward the Senatours and knights should be of a like number in the judgements of causes Which law was found good and profitable to the commonweale as by the contrary they found not good that law which before Caius Gracchus who also was a Tribune of the people would have caused to passe wherby he sought to these that in the judgement of causes there might be two knights against one Senator For herein there is no equalitie nor equitie and therefore by good reason that law was rejected yea and to the ruine of Gracchus who was slaine in the too earnest pursute of that law Iosaphat also king of Iudea after he had established good magistrates through the townes of his kingdome and expressely enjoyned them to execute good justice Paral. lib. 2. cap. 1410. Antiq. lib. 9. cap. 2. to every man without having any regard but to the feare of God and not to the riches nor the dignitie of persons finally established a seat like a parliament in the towne of Ierusalem composed of persons elected from all the lines and families of his kingdome as Iudges holding the degree of supreame jurisdiction unto which men might only appeale from the sentences of inferior Iudges The same temperature kept also the ancient Romanes in all sorts of their magistrates For they not only had of their nobilitie but also of their knights and of
happie memorie For during his raigne and before the kingdome was governed after the meere French manner that is to say following the traces and documents of our French auncestors But since it hath governed by the rules of Machiavell the Florentine as shall bee seene heereafter Insomuch that since that time untill this present the name of Machiavell hath beene celebrated and esteemed as of the wisest person of the world and most cunning in the affaires of Estate and his bookes held dearest and most precious by our Italian and Italionized courtiers as if they were the bookes of Sibilla whereunto the Paynims had their recourse when they would deliberate upon any great affaire concerning the common wealth or as the Turkes hould deare and precious their Mahumets Alcaron as wee have said above And wee neede not bee abashed if they of Machiavells nation which hould the principall estates in the government of France have forsaken the ancient manner of our French ancestors government to introduct and bring France in use with a new forme of managing ruling their countrie taught by Machiavell For on the one side every man esteemeth and priseth alwaies the manners fashions customes other things of his owne countrey more than them of an others On the other side Machiavell their great doctor Cap. 3. De Princ. Discourse lib. 2. cap. 30. lib. 3. cap. 43. Machiavells slanders against the kings and the people of France describes so well France and the goverment thereof in his time blaming and reprehending the Frenchmens conduction of affaires of Estate that it might easily persuade his disciples to change the manner of French government into the Italian For Machiavell vaunteth that being once at Nantes and talking with the Cardinall of Amboise which was a very wise man in the time of king Lewis the twelfth of publike State affaires hee plainly tould him that the Frenchmen had no knowledge in affaires of Estate And in many places speaking of French causes hee reprehendeth the government of our abovenamed kings Charles the eight and Lewis the twelfth yea hee hath beene so impudent speaking of that good king Lewis rebuking him for giving succours unto Pope Alexander the sixt that hee gives him the plaine lie saying hee belyes himselfe having passed Italie at the Venetians request yet succoured the Pope against his intention And in other places hee calls our kings Tributaries of the Suisses and of the English men And often when hee speaketh of the Frenchmen hee calleth them Barbarous and saith they are full of covetousnesse and disloyaltie So also hee taxeth the Almaignes of the same vices Now I beseech you is it not good reason to make so great account of Machiavell in France who so doth defame reproove the honour of our good kings of all our whole nation calling them Ignorant of the affaires of Estate Barbarous Covetous Disloyall But all this might bee borne withall and passed away in silence if there were not another evill But when we see that Machiavell by his doctrine and documents hath changed the good and ancient government of France into a kind of Florentine government whereupon we see with our eies the totall ruine of all France It infallibly followeth if God by his grace doe not remedie it soone that now it should be time if ever to lay hand to the work to remit and bring France againe unto the government of our ancestors Hereupon I humbly pray the Princes and great lords of France to consider what is their duties in this case Seemeth it most Ilustrious Lords seeing at this time poore France which is your countrey and mother so desolate and torne in sunder by strangers that you ought to suffer it to be lost and ruinated Ought you to permit them to sowe Atheisme and Impietie in your countrey and to set up schooles thereof Seeing your France hath alwaies been so Zealous in the Christian Religion as our ancient kings by their pietie and iustice have obtained that so honourable a title and name of Most Christian Thinke you that God hath caused you to be borne into this world to help to ruinate your countrie or coldly to stand still and suffer your mother to be contaminated and defiled with the contempt of God with perfidie with sodomie tyrannie crueltie thefts strange usuries and other detestable vices which strangers sowe heere But rather contrarie God hath given you life power and authoritie to take away such infamies and corruptions and if you do it not you must make account for it you can looke for but a greevous iust punishment If it be true as the Civilian lawiers say That he is a murderer and culpable of death which suffereth to die with hunger the person unto whom he oweth nourishment And shall not you be culpable before God of so many massacres murders and desolations of your poore France if you give it not succours seeing you have the meanes and that you are obliged thereunto by right of nature Shall you not be condemned and attainted of impietie Athisme and tyrannie if you drive not out of France Machiavell and his government Heere if any man will inquire how it appeareth that France is at this day governed by the doctrine of Machiavell the resolution heereof is easie and cleere For the effects which France governed by the doctrine of Machiavell we see with our eies and the provisions and executions of the affaires which are put in practise may easily bring us to the causes and Maximes as we have abovesaid which is one way to know things by ascending from effects and consequences to the knowledge of causes Maximes And whosoever also shall reade the Maximes of Machiavell which we shall handle heereafter and discend from thence into the particularities of the French government hee shall see that the precepts and Maximes of Machiavell are for the most part at this day practised and put in effect and execution from point to point Insomuch that by both the two wayes from the Maximes to the effects and from the effects to the Maximes men may clearely know that France is at this day governed by the doctrine of Machiavell For are they not Machiavelists Italians or Italianized which doe handle and deale with the seales of the kindgome of France Is it not they also which draw out and stampe Edicts Which dispatch all things within and without the realme Which hould the goodliest governments and fermes belonging unto the Crowne Tea if a man will at this day obtaine or get any thing in the Court for to have a good and quicke dispatch thereof hee must learne to speake the Messereske language because these Messers will most willingly heare them in their owne tongue and they understand not the French no not the tearmes of iustice and Royall ordinances Whereupon every man may coniecture and imagine how they can well observe or cause to be observed the lawes of France the tearmes whereof they
for Senators and Lawyers may as well be flatterers as others although they should shew better example because commonly they are wiser You must then vnderstand that in the time of the Emperour Tiberius many were accused for light matters said or done towards the Emperour because they knew he tooke pleasure in such accusations Amongst others one day there was accused Vitellio Sueton in Top. 5. in a full Senate of treason a Romane Knight called Lucius Ennius because he had melted a silver image of his owne which represented the Emperours image to make some other worke for his owne vse you may thinke what an huge crime this was and how men should find it evill for a man to do with his owne at his owne pleasure The Emperour Tiberius seeing that this accusation had no colour in it and that it was but a mockerie to call it a crime much lesse a crime of treason he forbad that the Knight should be criminalized for it Yet Atteius Capito a Senator and a great Lawyer but a very flatterer rose up and as upon a free libertie of speech he used these words to the Emperour Sir we are here assembled in the Senate where every one hath libertie freely to vtter his opinion for the good and utilitie of the common-wealth we beseech you not to take from us the power that we haue to punish such as commit crimes against the common-wealth and pardon not you alone that injurie which is done to all For what a despight and contempt is this for Ennius that he dare found and cast into the fire a Princes image ought not he rather to have kept it by him as an holy and sacred thing to have reverenced it for the honor of him whose representation it was this shews what heart and affection he beares towards his Prince and that if he could he would do as much vnto him as he doth to his Image For he that reverenceth the gods reverenceth also their images Had he not otherwise enough whereof to make his silver vessel but to melt for it this sacred Image hee would not do so much with the images of Brutus and Cassius for he honoureth them in his heart and would well at this day find the like which might enterprise the like disloyaltie against our good Prince as they did against Caesar Our Lawes will that in crimes of treason the least apparant suspition sufficeth to condemne the accused And it is the great interest and profit for the common-wealth rigorously to punish such as never so little attempt against the Prince vnlesse a man will say that the body hath not to do neither needeth to care when the head is wounded and offended And therfore I conclude that justice be executed vpon Ennius as a man attainted and culpable of treason The Emperour Tiberius although he was cruell in such matters knew well that this faire opinion of the Lawyer Capito was but a meere flatterie which he vnderstood better then he vttered therefore notwithstanding the said Capito his remonstrance and opinion he persisted in the Inhibitions before made that the knight Ennius should be no more vexed nor endangered about that matter And the abovesaid Tacitus saith that Capito by this his goodly opinion acquired a great infamy and evill reputation to himselfe greatly dishonouring both the knowledge of the civile Law humane and good letters wherewith he was excellently endowed Vpon this point I note that which master Philip de Comines well saith That Lawyers and great learned Comines lib. 1. cap. 24. men are very fit to be about a Prince and of his Counsell if they be good men but being otherwise they are very dangerous For they can so wel paint and set out their language alledging lawes and histories which every man understandeth not that often they take euill conclusions But when they be good men they may marueilously order and conduct matters which are handled in Counsell and bring them to a good resolution as may be proved by infinit examples out of Titus Livius and other Hystoriographers which I will not here accumulate because it is from our determined purpose In the ranke of janglers may well be placed the Poets of our time which by their Poesies full of flatteries and lies seeke to hooke in some abbotship or priorship or Poets janglers some other such gift in recompence of their adulations I confesse that a Poet may and should take more libertie to write the praises of some one man than an Oratour or an Hystoriographer but when praises are so hyperbolicall as they rather fall out to be the dishonour than the honour of him of whome they are written then are they not any thing tollerable I will take for example but the Epitaphes which were imprinted at Paris a little after the death of king Charles the ninth There those goodly Poets say That the king before he died overthrew more monsters than ever did Hercules in shedding so much bloud of his rebellious subjects That he died like Sampson who at his death pulled downe and overthrew the pillers which hee had in his armes and the house upon himselfe so in Fraunce justice pietie and religion died with him That France had been his stepmother That there was in him an exceeding great cunning in all arts and sciences and that he was also very expert in divers handicrafts That the king Henry his brother that now raignes succeeded him as Castor to Pollux as one god to another god That king Charles died a martyr of Iesus Christ and that from thenceforth he ought to be invocated as a Saint I pray you is there any man of sober judgement which doth not plainly see that such speeches become rather men void of wit and understanding by some extreame affection of flatterie than these gallant Poets which are drawne on and led with a generous and right Poeticall spirit for meaning unmeasurably to praise there escapes from them that they speake things redounding to their dispraise and if the dead king were alive he would not thanke them for such praises For a good Prince as Horace saith of Augustus ever rejecteth such foolish praises To purpose ill shall never goe my verse To Caesars eare for as his deeds appeare So would he I his praises should rehearse Too much his praise detesteth hâ— to heare And indeed it is common to all good and vertuous people not onely to reject excessive praises but also to hate as flatterers and liers all such as use them as Euripides witnesseth saying A good man praise too great cannot abide But hates that thing which puffes him so with pride If those goodly Poets before they had made their Epitaphs had well read Virgil and Horace they should have found that these two excellent Poets writ in many Aenead 6. Hora. lib. 4. Carm. Ode 5. 15. places the praises of Augustus But wherefore do they praise him For that he established a good peace in all the Romane Empire
he caused justice to flourish hee brought the people into a good repose and assurance and reduced againe the golden world They praise him also because he amplified and enlarged the Romane Empire But they speake not one word of the civile warres nor for that hee overthrew Cassius and Brutus doe they either praise or despraise him And indeed as Plutarch sayth They are pitious triumphs which are made upon civile bloud These Plutarch in Caesar Epitaphers then should learne to praise a Prince as they ought to doe and as the elders have done But when they say that our dead king died like Sampson and that with him died also pietie and justice which he carried in the devise of his two pillers do they not plainely blame the kingdome at this present of impietie and injustice as if justice were not now so good nor religion in so good estate as in the time of the dead king or as if they were or could bee made worse yea contrarie every one seeth with his eye that justice and religion are still in as good estate in France as before that the king died and that they are now so well governed as they cannot waxe worse And when they say that France was a stepmother unto the dead king is not this injuriously to blame the French nation Wherein hath Fraunce appeared unto him a stepmother Because there were rebels against the king say they They which they call rebels denie they are such and in truth when edicts were maintained and observed they were seene to be very obedient But let it be so that there were in France some rebellious subjects must therefore all the nation bee blamed and be called their kings stepmother seeing there is no nation in the world more obedient than the French to his Prince And as for that great cunning in arts and the meanest mechanicall sciences which those Poets attribute to our dead king are not they goodly praises thinke you As if it were some goodly vertue in a Prince to make a coffer or to paint gourdes for which we reade that the emperor Adrian was mocked or to make some such like things But contrarie the Poet Virgil describing Aeneid 6. what kind of Princes the Romane Princes should be he wils they should have no knowledge in the mechanicall arts onely they should learne sayth he the Science well to command to governe to vanquish to pardon to make lawes and edicts and to establish good manners and customes upon the nations under their governance In like manner the prophane comparison of Castor and Pollux where one god succeeds another god how unfit a speech it is for a Christian If Princes at this day will beleeve janglers they make themselves to be adored upon the altar in the middest betwixt two Saints as was Caligula betwixt Castor and Pollux But ynough is spoken of janglers and of their janglings and of their too too impudent and strange praises Let us now come unto Marmosets A Marmoset according to the language of Marmosets our elders is as much to say as a reporter murmurer whisperer of tales behind ones backe in Princes and great mens eares against one or other which be false or else ought not to be reiterated or reported And it seemes unto me that this name of Marmoset is verie proper and fit for such people and that it meriteth well to bee againe called backe in use And I beleeue it is drawne from hence that such people go marmoting murmuring and whispering secretly in Princes eares flattering speeches which they dare not speake clearly and on high before the face of him whom they detract and speake evill of These people are worse and farre more perilous than plaine raylers scoffers jesters or janglers whereof we have before spoken for carrying the countenance of good servants and friends they make the Prince beleeve that they serve him as spies to marke and seek out the designes evill purposes and carriages of their secret enemies to the end he may not unawares be surprised of them and that no evill may come unto him And because saith Comines Comines lib. 1. cap. 9. 56. Princes are almost all suspitious for doubts and feares that are put into their heads by advertisements they easily beleeve Marmosets and reporters Yea some Princes saith he promise them that they will say nothing nor discover any thing which is one of the greatest faults that a Prince can commit For besides that in all men be they princes or privat persons the auncient proverb hath place which saith That the sinewes of Wisedome is not to beleeve lightly yet is it a thing as particularly required in a Prince to stop his eares to all reports unlesse the reporter will be well knowne and sustaine the punishment of a slaunder in case his report be not found true And thereupon the Prince ought to make diligent inquisition to have the truth well averred when the thing is waightie and meriteth it And he may not be satisfied with a light information thereof but he ought to heare him which is charged or blamed before he beleeve any thing And if the thing be not of great consequence and import him much as if they be but words spoken as it often happeneth lightly in some pleasant talke or at the table or in choler the Prince ought to despise and make no account of such words but as talke uttered in an immoderate bable and without thinking or considering thereof For there is no man so perfect that can so bridle his tongue but there will often fall words without consideration which after when he thinkes of them wisheth he had never spoken them And this imperfection which is in all men ought to be supported of some towards others and Princes ought rather to beare them then particular persons for two reasons The one for that he is more subiect to receive reports than privat men so that if he easily deliver his eare unto them he shall see a thousand griefes and displeasures and shall be in continuall doubts and feares The other reason is because all Princes ought to consider that men speake more of them than of anie privat person For there is neither great nor little but he will meddle to speake of Princes yea to judge of their actions and everie man to utter his follies of his good or evill behaviours What should Princes then doe It is impossible to bridle their tongues and if they should be forbidden to speake they would speake the more Seeing then both great and small doe ordinarily speake of Princes yea more then of other things it is impossible that in such abundance of talke there should not be alwaies much evill and he that would set foote therein should binde himselfe to an infinite paine from whence he should not know how to get out For the tongues of men are so ready and quicke workers in their trade that they will frame more businesses in a day then a
in hearing interrogating and confronting them with him that is accused Therefore hee sent the cause and the parties to Iunius Rufus Governour of Macedonie commaunding him to examine diligently the witnesses and take good advisement whether they were good men worthy of credit and if Alexander the accuser could not prove well his accusation that he should banish him to some place This commandement of the emperour Adrian hath since been marked by the Lawyers which since made a law thereof Behold how men must proceed when it lies on mens lives and not to beleeve Marmosets and reporters neither beleeve papers without seeing or hearing witnesses and the accused without searching whether the witnesses be good men or no as is done at this day for at this day there is nothing wherof magistrats make a better market than of mens lives But let us passe on Froissart lib. 2. cap. 173. lib. 3. cap. 63 68. and other following and lib. 4. cap. 92. c. I would now rehearse an example truly tragicall of king Richard of England who was sonne of that valiant and victorious prince of Wales This king came to the crowne very yong and had three good uncles about him the duke of Lancaster Yorke and Glocester by whose counsell for a certaine time hee governed well his kingdome But the earle of Suffolke whom the king made duke of Ireland entred so farre into the kings favour that he governed himselfe after his fancie Then took he occasions to talke so of the kings uncles as was very strange for he told him that his uncles desired nothing but to deale in the affaires of the kingdome to obtaine it to themselves a thing which they never thought And did so much by his reports that the king put his uncles from his counsell and from dealing with any of the affaires of the kingdome whereof the people and especially the Londoners were so evill contented that they rose up and made warre against the king or rather against the duke of Ireland and they were at a point to give the battell one against the other But the duke of Ireland who was generall of the kings armie lost his courage with great feare that he had to be slain or taken and therfore fled passed into Flanders where he finished his dayes never after returning into England As soone as he was fled his armie was dissipated the kings uncles seized upon the kings person established a new Counsell by justice executed some of them which were of the duke of Ireland his adherents A longtime after another Marmoset called the earle Marshall gained the duke of Ireland his place and was so farre in the kings good grace that he governed all as he would One day this earle Marshall talking with the earle of Darbie eldest sonne of the duke of Lancaster the earle of Darbie chanced to say Cousin what will the king do will he altogether subject the English nobilitie there will soone be none it is plainely seene that he desireth not the augmentation of his kingdome But he held this talke because the king had put to death chased away a great number of gentlemen and caused the duke of Glocester to die a prince of his blood and yet continued in that rigour to make himselfe be feared and revenging still that which was done in the duke of Irelands time The earle Marshall answered nothing to the speeches of the earle of Darbie but only marked them in his heart Certain daies after he reported them to the king and to make them seeme of more credit he profered and said hee was readie to enter into the campe against the earle of Darbie to averre the said words as outragious injurious against his Majestie The king not measuring the consequence of the deed in place to make no account of these words sent for the earle of Darbie his cousin germane and after hearing before him the earle Marshall speak his wil was they should enter into the camp and fight it to utterance But the kings Counsell conceiving it might come to be anevill example such great lords to slay one another and that the earle Marshall was not of equall qualitie unto the earle of Darbie they counselled the king to take another course namely to banish from England for ever the earle Marshall because he had rashly appealed and challenged unto single combat a Prince of the bloud to banish also the Earle of Darbie for ten years only for speaking the aforesaid words of the king his lord The king following the advice of his Counsel by sentence given by himself banished the earle Marshall out of England forever the earle of Darbie for six years only moderating his Counsels advice foure years When the earle of Darbie came to depart there assembled in the streets before his gates at London more than fortie thousand which wept cried lamented his departure extreamly blamed the king and his Counsell insomuch that going away he left in the peoples hearts an extreame anguish and greefe for his absence and a very great amitie towards him yet notwithstanding he left England and came into France Whilest he was in France the duke of Lancaster his father died The king to heape up his evill lucks caused to be taken seized into his hands all his lands goods because they fell to the earle of Darbie Hereby hee got great hatred and evill will of the Nobilitie and of all the people Finally the Londoners which are a people easie to arise made a complot and part against the king and secretly sent word to the earle of Darbie that hee should come and they would make him king The earle arriving in England found an armie of the Londoners ready So went he to besiege the king Richard in his castle unprovided whom he tooke and imprisoned and caused him to resigne unto him the Realme and Crowne of England King Richard was put to death in prison after hee had raigned two and twentie yeares a thing very strange rigorous and unheard of in England or in any kingdomes nigh unto it And so the earle of Darbie who had beene banished from England remained a peaceable king and was called Harry the fourth of that name This earle Marshall who kept at Venise knowing these newes died ragingly This was the end of this Marmoset and the tragicall evill hap whereunto he brought his master and that upon words reported which were never spoken as any evill speech of the king but onely for the greefe hee had that they of his Counsell governed so evill the kingdomes affaires Which words should nor ought not to have been taken up nor reported to the king and being reported unto him he should have made no account of them to have alwaies presumed rather well than evill of his cousin Germane Herodes borne of a lowe and base race was created king of Iudea Galalie Samaria Joseph Antiq â—ib 14. cap 23.
to plant colonies and chase away the ancient naturall inhabitants from their goods and possessions All which things are directly contrary to the Religion of Numa which he commendeth so much but it is likely that this ignorant beast praiseth Numa his Religion without knowing that it conteined the points which we now speake of I doubt not but some wil judge at the first sight That this religion of Numa could not bee evill which taught so good things as to observe Faith not to bee perjured nor to usurpe others goods and possessions but it must not be approved therefore for one must not by an evill and false introduce a good thing This was good to bring the people to an observation of Faith but to build a temple to Faith to imagine it was a god or goddesse and to doe service and ceremonies unto her these were damnable and against Gods honour from whom they steale the glory that belongs unto him when they by forme of Religion do honour to another thing than him be it a creature or devised thing Therfore was not that a christian oration which was made by Monsier Capel the kings advocate in the court of Parliament at Paris in Anno 1535 whereby praising the dead king Francis the second of that name of happie memorie because hee had care of Religion hee shewed That realmes and commonweales of the ancient Paynims which had good care well to observe their Religion obtained prosperitie in all felicitie For that saith he although their Religion was false and that they lived in error and darkenesse yet they prospered because esteeming it good and true they had it in a singular reverence and observation This oration of Capel had truly a little of Machiavell his doctrine to say that a false Religion was cause that the Paynims prospered But to shew that Machiavell knowes not what hee saith I will here recite an historie Tit. Livius lib. 10. Dec. 4. to this purpose In the yeere 574 after the foundation of Rome in the time of the consulship of Lucius Manlius and Fulvius Flaccus as men digged the earth in a certaine place in Rome they found the sepulchre of king Numa where there were two arches of hewen stone in the one of which Numa was buried in the other were the bookes found which he had written wrapped in waxe in such sort as they seemed to be new there were seven in Latin touching the ceremonies of the Religion which hee instituted Incontinent a fame went of these novels all over how the bookes of king Numa were found touching Religion insomuch as every man attended that they should be divulged and that by their meanes all abuses in the Romane Religion should alwaies bee reformed Yet to doe nothing rashly the consuls gave charge to Quintus Petilius lieutenant of justice well to turne over and peruse those bookes and to report the truth of them unto the Senat. Petilius read them from the one end unto the other and of them certified his opinion unto the Senat and it was found that the Religion which was handled in those bookes was of no accompt and that it should bee a pernitious and damageable thing to the common wealth to bring that Religion into use so was it resolved by a decree of the Senat that those books should bee publiklie burnt before all the people which was done I would now gladly know of Machiavell who so much esteemeth the Religion of Numa without ever having seene his bookes if hee can yeeld a better jugdment of them than the Lieutenant Petilius who read them and than all the Romane Senat. Is not this as a blinde man to judge of coulours who speakes of a thing hee knowes not As for Frier Ierome Savanarola the Florentins shewed well that hee was no such De com lib. 2. cap. 25. 53. 54. man as would leade them to any new Religion neither preached hee unto them any other Religion but the old Romish Religion only denouncing unto them somtime the vengeances punishments of God which from heaven should fall upon them if they repented and amended not their sinnes and this hee assured them as though hee had had some revelation from God But amongst other things which hee preached and affirmed most was that there should come a king out of France into Italie which should deliver the countrey from so many tyranizers and potentates as then held the countrey in great servage and slaverie This talke pleased some which desired change though others delighted not in it About the time that hee made those sermons king Charles the eight made a voiage unto Naples who assoone as hee was seene in Italie all the world began to say and beleeve that Frier Ierome was a true prophet and that hee had well foretould that which they see come to passe The worst was that the said king did nothing worthie of accompt in the voiage insomuch that the best part of Ieromes prophesie which was to purge Italie of so many tyranizers remained yet to accomplish Then the reputation of this good Frier Ierome began not onely to diminish but also men began to say and beleeve that hee was an abuser so that in the end hee was accused at Florence to be a most wicked heretike and his enemies said hee were worthie to bee put into a sacke and to be cast into the river and because hee still continued to preach his first theme That the king of France should yet againe come into Italie to performe that which he had not executed in that first voiage and that the will of God was so and if hee did not accomplish it yet God himselfe would punish it the Pope and the Duke of Millan which were hereat troubled for they thought this was but a bait to cause the king of France to come another time into Italie where of they were greatlie afraid therefore ioyned they together against this poore Frier and writ to the seignorie of Florence to doe justice upon him as upon a seducer and an heretike Amongst others which tooke Ierome in hand there was found a Frier for there never was love betwixt the Friers and the Iacobines which would needes mainetaine A disputation by Fire against him that hee was an heretike and to prove his so saying he presented unto Ierome the combat to commit themselves both into the fire and that hee which was not hurt by the fire should be held as it was reason for a soothsayer and the other whom the fire burned for a lyer and an abuser Frier Ierome was sore abashed to heare speake of such a manner of disputation and indeed would not accept it for he was not so learned not so farre a student in Logicke that he had learned such a kind of argumentation to prove his doctrine by fire yet was there found another young Iacobin a familiar friend of Ieromes which accepted the combat to maintaine his friends quarrell Then was the day and place assigned in
instigation of flatterers and envious people An example hereof is memorable of king Lewis the twelfth who was called the Father of the people For in his time certaine Cardinals and Prelates persuaded him to exterminate and utterly to root out all the people of Cabriers and Merindol in Provence which were the reliques of the Christians called Albi then sore persecuted for Christ telling him That they were sorcerers incestuous Molinaeus de la Monarchia deâ— Francois Anno. 155. persons and heretickes They of Merindol and Cabriers having some sente of the aforesaid accusation sent certaine of their wisest men to remonstrate to the king their justice and innocencie As soone as these men were arrived at the Court the said Cardinals and Prelates did what they could to hinder that they should not be heard and indeed told the king that he ought not to heare them because the Cannon law holds That men ought not to give audience to heretickes nor communicate with them The king replied That if he had to make warre upon the Turke yea against the divell himselfe he would heare them This was an answere worthie of a king For seeing kings hold in their hands the scepter of justice this is not to use but to abuse To condemne any not to heare them The said king Lewis then hearing the said messengers of Cabriers and Merindol they shewed him in all humilitie that their people received the Gospell the Bible the Apostles Creed the commaundements of God and the Sacraments but they beleeved not in the Pope nor in his doctrine and that if it pleased his Majestie to send to enquire of the truth of their speeches they were contented all to die if their words were not found true This good king would needs know if it were so and indeed deputed M. Adam Fumee his master of Requests and one M. Parvi a Iacobin his Confessor to go to Cabriers and Merindol to enquire of the life and religion of the inhabitants in those places which they did and after they had seene and knowne all they made their report unto the king That in those places their children were baptized they taught them the articles of the Faith and the commandements of God that they well observed their Sabboths alwayes preaching thereon the word of God and as for sorceries and whoredomes there were none amongst them moreover they found no images in their temples nor ornaments of the Masse The king having received this report what judgement gave he of it did hee condemne them straight because they had no images nor ornaments of the Masse No he presently swearing by his oth pronounced That they were better men than he or all his people Here may princes learne how to use themselves in supporting against slanderers such in whom there is no appearance of error But leaving this question and againe taking our purpose certaine it is That a prince ought not lightly to attempt warre as Machiavell persuadeth and upon A prince ought to seeke all meanes to put out war by a peace some necessitie having warre in hand he ought to search out and accept all honest conditions to get out of it For sometimes the prince which refuseth honest and reasonable conditions upon hope that his forces are great falleth oftentimes into great distresse and it hath been many times seene that pettie captaines have made head against great and strong powers of mightie princes In the time of the battaile of Poictiers where king Iohn was taken the prince of Wales before the battaile offered the king to yeeld him all that both hee and his Froisar lib. 1 cap 161. Annales upon Anno 1356 Annales upon Anno 1433. people had conquered since his departure from Bourdeaux also to yeeld him all the pillage but the king would not accept this offer but withall asked that the prince and foure of the greatest lords of the armie should yeeld themselves at his will The prince who was generous chose rather to fight it out than to accept so shamefull and dishonorable an accord so hee and his army fought valiantly insomuch that a very little numbar of English overcame great forces of the French and the king was taken and many other great princes and lords for which to redeeme the kingdome was so emptied of silver that they were compelled to make money of leather which in the middest had onely a note of siluer and from this battaile proceeded infinite evils miseries and calamities which had not happened if the king had beene so well advised as to have forgone that war by soft and assured meanes rather than by the hazard of the battaile But contrary to king Iohn king Charles the seaventh reconquering Guienne and Normandie upon the English never refused any proffer or composition sought alwaies to recover that which his predecessors had justly lost without effusion of bloud The Romane hystories are ful of such like examples For that which overthrew the Carthaginians the king Perseus the king Mithridates that which abated the pride of Philip king of Macedon of that great king Antiochus and of many others was they could never accept the good and reasonable conditions of peace which was offered unto them by the Romanes but would rather experiment what force founded upon a good right could doe I say founded upon good right because a small force which hath right with it oftentimes abateth a great force which is not founded on a good right the reason is evident because hee that knoweth hee hath just cause to make warre and which seeth that his adversary trusting much in his forces will not come to any reasonable composition redoubleth his courage his heat and fighteth more valiantlie than hee which is driven thereunto rather upon pride than of any generositie of heart but the principall reason thereof is that God who giveth victories inclineth most often to the rights side and although sometimes it seemes that the wrong carrieth away the victorie yet alwaies God shewes by the end issue according to which we must judge that hee is fot the right Above all the prince ought to appease the warres in his owne countrey whether A prince ought to appease war in his owne countrey they be raised by strangers or by his owne subjects for as for such warres as he may have in a strange land against strangers it may happen they will not prove so evill but hee may provide good souldiers in his neede and especiallie this point is considerable when a princes subjects are naturallie enclined to warre as is the French nation for then necessarily they must bee emploied in that wherein is their naturall disposition or els they will move war against themselves as Salust saith in these words If saith hee the vertue and generositie of princes captaines and men of warre might so well be emploied and shew it selfe of such estimate in peace as in warre humane things would carry themselves more constantly and men
acknowledgement of his faults and from thence forward he prospered so well that after he had ended his civile wars he also overcame his forrain wars against the English And this came of God who ordinarily exalteth the humble overthroweth the insolent proud For assuredly it doth not evill become a great prince to temperat his majestie by a gracious humility softnes affabilitie but saith Plutarch it is a very harmonious consonant temperation yea so excellent as there cannot be a more perfect than this But if the said king had then had such Counselors as many kings now adaies have what counsell would they hereupon have given him they would have said That thus to humiliate himselfe to his vassall as to ask him forgivenes to confesse his fault to acquitehim and his subjects of personall service these were things unworthy of a king and that a king ought never to make peace unlesse it be to his honor but such articles were to his dishonor and disadvantage and that he ought to have endured all extremities before he had made any peace whereby he should not remain altogether master to dispose of persons goods at his pleasure For how would not they say thus seeing they say at this day That it is no honorable peace for the king to accord his subjects any assurances with the exercises of their religion a reformation of justice yet you see that all K. Charles 7 his Counsell all the princes of his blood all the great lords of his kingdome all strange princes embassadors compelled the K. to passe more hard uneasie articles to digest for the good of peace Should we say that in so great a number of great personages ther was not any so wise and cleare sighted as the counsellors at this day as these Mesiers Machiavelists nay contrary they were al wise men of great experience in wordly affairs they were also of great knowlege as the delegates of the counsel of the universitie of Paris of the parliaments wheras at this day men know litle more than their Machiavell Likewise king Lewis the eleventh as soone as hee came to the crowne removed De Com. lib. 1. cap. 3. 5. others from charges and offices many great lords and good servants of the dead king Charles the seventh his father which had vertuously emploied themselves in chasing the English out of the kingdome of France and in lieu of such persons he placed and advanced men of meane and base condition Heereupon straight arose civile discention against the king which was called the warres of the common weale and these men complained that the kingdome was not politikelie governed because the king had put from him good men and of high calling to advance such as were of small estimation and of no vertue It was not long before the king acknowledged his great fault and confessed it not onely in generall but also in particular to every of them which he had recoyled and disapointed and to repaire this fault he got againe to him all the said lords and ancient servants of the dead king his father delivering them againe their estates or much greater and in somme he granted to these common wealth people all that they demanded as well for the generall as for the particular good of all people and all to obtaine peace with extinguishment of civile wars If he had had of his Counsell the Machiavellists of these daies they would not have counselled him thus to doe but rather would have told him That it became not a king to capitulate with his subjects nor so to unable himselfe unto them and that a prince ought never to trust to such as once were his enemies but much lesse ought hee to advance them to estates and that hee should diligentlie take heede of a reconciled enemie yet notwithstanding hee did all this and it fell out well with him for he was very well served of the pretended reconciled enemies and to this purpose Messier de Commines his chamberlaine saith That his humilitie and the acknowledgment of his faults saved his kingdome which was in great danger to bee lost if hee had stayed upon such impertinent and foolish reasons as those Machiavelists alledge for all things may not bee judged by the finall cause What dishonour then can it bee to a prince to use pettie and base meanes if so bee thereby hee make his countrey peaceable his estate assured and his subjects contented and obedient what makes it matter for him that is to ascend into an high place whether he mount by degrees and staires of wood or of stone so that hee ascend But this is not all to say That a prince ought to bee vigilant and carefull to make peace in his countrey for hee must after it is made well observe it otherwise it is to Peace ought to be well observed no purpose made unles men will say that one ought to make peace for after in breaking it to trap and ensnare them which trust therein But they which hold this opinion are people which make no account of the observation of faith as are the Machiavelists of whom wee will speake upon this point in another Maxime But indeede that a peace may bee well observed it must bee profitable and commodious to them with whom it is made to the ende by that meanes it may bee agreeable unto them and that they may observe it with a good will and without constraint for if it be domageable and disadvantageous making the condition of them to whom it is given worse than of other subjects and neighbours certaine it is it cannot long endure for people that have either heart or spirit in them cannot long endure to be handled like slaves Heereunto serveth the advice of that noble and sage companie of the ancient Senators of Rome There was a neighbour unto the Romanes which were called the Titus Livi. lib. 8. Dec. 1. Privernates upon which the Romanes made warre and many times vanquished them They seeing it was impossible any more to make head against the Romane forces sent embassadors to Rome for peace they were caused to enter into the place where the Senate did sit and because they had not well observed the precedent treatie of peace some Senators seemed hard to draw to give their cause any hearing thinking it a vaine thing to accord a peace unto such as would not keepe any notwithstanding some demanded of those embassadors what punishment they judged themselves to haue merited which had so often broken the precedent peace One of them speaking for all and remembring rather the condition of their birth than of their present estate answered That the Privernates merited the punishment that they deserve which esteeme themselves worthie of a free condition and which have a slavish condition This answere seemed to some Senators too hautie and unbeseeming vanquished people yet the president of the assembly who was a wise man benignly demanded
his sepulcher and another Amphitheater at Rome and many other goodly houses and publike buildings most sumptuous to behold he also caused to bee repaired bridges gates waies to furnish many townes with store of money as well to make new buildings in them as to renew the old heerein imitating the example of the emperour Trajan his predecessor who immortalized his name by his publike works and buildings which hee made even in building new townes and ioyning rivers one to another or to the sea by great and deepe channels to aide and make easie the commerce of all countries also in drying up great fennes and marrishes and in laying plaine rocks and mountaines to make fit waies for travailers and in doing other notable workes Such actions as these are meet workes for peaceable times and are honourable and proper to immortalize the name of a prince as to make warre to have victories and triumphs We see that the restauration of good letters which king Francis the first of that name of happie memorie brought into France in his time did more celebrate and make it immortall in the memorie of all Christian nations than all the great warres and victories which his predecessors had And truly princes which love and advance letters doe well merit that learned people should send their honourable memorie to all posterity and such as dispise them and hold them under feete are not worthie that hystoriographers and men of learning should bring their woords and victories into honour and reputation much lesse to immortalize them in the memorie of men For as lawyers say that they ought not to enjoy the benefite of lawes which offend and despise them so the prince which makes no account of learning ought not to enjoy the benefit thereof which is to make immortall generous and vertuous men But if we make comparison of the magnificence and Estate that a prince should Froisar lib. 7 cap. 353. 4. hold in the time of peace and prosperitie with that he should hold during war and povertie there is such difference as betwixt the day and the night for proofe hereof I will alledge but the time of Philip de Valois For wee reade that in that time which was a time of long peace that king had almost ordinarie in his court foure or five kings wich resided with him in regard of his magnificence as the king of Boheme the king of Scotland the king of Arragon the king of Navarre the king of Maiorque many great dukes counties barons prelates the greatest part of whose charges hee defraied that it might appeare that the king of Fraunce was a king of kings It is certaine to maintaine this magnificall and great Estate there must needs follow exceeding great expences but hee might well doe it for his people being ritch and full of peace they had better meanes to furnish and provide for him a crowne than in the time of warre to give him a three halfe pence At that time a king of England passed into France to doe homage unto king Philip for the dutchie of Guienne which the English had long time held of the crowne of France when the English king saw the traine of the court of France hee was ravished in admiration to see so many kings dukes counties barons princes peeres of France constable admirall chancelor marshall and many other great lords which reputed themselves happie to obtaine the good grace of king Philip. This moved the king of England far more easily and in other meanes to doe his homage than he thought to have done and at his returne into England he said on high That he supposed there was neither king nor emperor in the world that held so magnificent and triumphant an Estate as the king of France did Should not we desire to see such a time againe but we are farre from it and take no course thereunto for civile warres cannot bring us unto it but onely a good and holy peace well and inviolably observed by a good reformation of justice and of all estates which was corrupted in France For without it the people can never prosper but shall alwaies bee gnawne and eaten even to the bones and the people beeing poore the king cannot be ritch no neither his nobilitie nor clergie for all the kings revenewes all tallages all the nobilities and clergies rents proceede from the poore people By this which wee have above handled this Maxime of warre is sufficiently understoode I will add no more therunto but that Machiavell shewes himselfe a man of very good grace when he saith That the Italians are a people of nimble light spirits and bodies for hee cannot more properly note them of inconstancie and infidelitie and when afterward he saith That willingly they never go to battails he can not they any better taxe them of cowardise and pusillanimitie but the reason wherby he would seeme to couer this fault is more to be accounted of than the rest For saith he this proceedeth of the little heart cowardise of the captaines as if he said That all Italian captaines are faint hearted cowards which rather discourage than add heart unto their souldiers to fight And heerein I beleeve he saieth truth for so many Italian captaines as wee have seene in France this fifteene yeeres there hath not been one found that hath done any one memorable exploit they can indeede make many vaine and brave shewes and in many subtile stratagems there are found no better warriors but in battailes and assaultes of townes they never by their wills will come as their owne Machiavell beareth them witnesse 2. Maxime To cause a Prince to withdraw his mind altogether from peace and agreement with his adversarie he must commit and use some notable and outragious iniurie against him BEcause sayth Machiavell men are naturally vindicative and desirous Discourse lib. 3. cap. 32. to take vengeance of such as offend them it consequently fals out that they vvhich have outraged or iniured any but especially if the iniurie be great they can never trust him they have so iniured For every man feares and distrusteth his reconciled enemie And therefore to find meanes that a prince may never set his heart and mind upon peace nor reconcile himselfe to any adversarie hee must be persuaded to practise some outragious act upon his said adversarie So by that meanes he will never trust him nor be reconciled with him BEhold heere the very counsell that Achitophel gave to Absalon to make him irreconcilable with David his father and to place a division Samuel lib. 2. cap. 26. and perdurable confusion in all his kingdome For hee advised Absalon to cohabitate and dwell even with his father Davids wives which was the greatest and most villanous injurie that he could have done unto him and to this end he did it that Absalon and all they which followed him might bee utterlie out of hope to make peace with David and by that meanes
But if any demand how diviners and astrologers could so justly foretell the death of the emperour Domitian I answere that we must beleeve that this said prediction was not by art or science but the evill spirit would give boldnesse of enterprising unto Domitians enemies in making them know by frivolous divinations his fatall houre that they might beleeve the starres and heaven to aid their enterprise And God above who serves himselfe with such meanes as pleaseth him to exercise his justice gives efficacie to the spirit of error The same effect came of the divination of Caracalla for it was the cause that Macrinus enterprised to sley him although he never before thought of it till the astrologers declared their divination nay he would never have done that enterprise if that divination had not constrained and drawne him unto it Master Philip de Comines reciteth to this purpose a very memorable hystorie that happened in his time He saith there was at Naples a king called Alphonsus a bastard of the house of Arragon who was marvellous cruell a traitour and dangerous for none could know when he was angry he could so well manage his countenance yea and often betray men as he made them good cheare and he was a man wherein there was neither grace nor mercie neither had hee any compassion of the poore people This king Alphonsus had a sonne also as wicked as he called Ferrand who had found means to bring before him under his fathers assurance many princes and barons of the countrey to the number of foure and twentie and amongst them the prince de Rosane his brother in law having married his sister all which hee caused to be imprisoned notwithstanding the faith and assurance which he had given them insomuch as some remained foure or five and twentie yeares prisoners As soone as the king Alphonsus was dead and Ferrand his sonne was king the first thing hee did at his comming to the crowne was to massacre all those said great princes and barons which he himselfe had imprisoned during his fathers life by a Moorean slave of Affrica which he rewarded and straight after the execution sent him into his countrey This king Ferrand or Ferdinand having newes of the said murder as the king of Fraunce Charles the eight enterprised the conquest of Naples judging himselfe unworthie to be king because of his great and abhominable cruelties sent embassadors to the king to agree and to be at an accord with him offering to yeeld himselfe tributarie to the crowne of Fraunce to hold the kingdome of Naples of him and to pay him 50000 crownes yearely But the king who knew there was no fidelitie in the Arragonian race of Naples would enter into no treatie with the king Ferdinand who being in dispaire to be ever able to hold that kingdome against the king of Fraunce having his owne subjects his enemies died for sorrow and dispaire and left his sonne Alphonsus his successor This Alphonsus the new king was as wicked as his father and had alwayes shewed himselfe pittilesse and cruell without faith without religion and without all humanitie insomuch as perceiving that king Charles approched Rome his conscience also judging himselfe to be an unworthy king he resolved to flie into Spain and to professe himselfe a monke in some monasterie But before hee fled hee caused to be crowned king at Naples a young sonne of his called Ferdinand who was not yet hated in the countrey his nailes beeing not yet either strong or long ynough to doe evill This done hee fled into Sicilie and from thence to Valence in Spaine where he tooke the habite of a monke and in a little time after died of an excoriation of gravell But it was marvellous that this cruel tyrant should be so seized of feare as he should go in no good order away but left all his moveable goods and almost all his gold and silver in his castle at Naples And this feare proceeded to him from a faintnesse of heart for as Comines saith never cruell man was hardie And when one desired him onely to stay three dayes to packe up his goods No no said he let us quickly depart from hence heare you not all the world crie Fraunce Fraunce Men may see how an evill conscience leaves a man never in quiet This wicked man knowing that by his crueltie hee had procured the hatred of his subjects the wrath of God and the enmitie of all the world was tormented in his conscience as of an infernall furie which ever after fretted his languishing soule in the poore infected and wasted bodie And to end this tragoedie straight after he had saved himselfe the king of Fraunce obtained the kingdome of Naples And a little while after the said young Ferdinand sonne of the said Alphonsus died of a feaver and a flux So that within the space of two yeares God did justice on foure kings of Naples two Alfonses and two Ferdinands because of their strange cruelties which were accompained with disloyall impietie and oppression of subjects for alwaies those keepe company together A like punishment happened by the conduction and judgement of God to that Comines lib. 1 cap. 132. 133. and Bellay lib. 1. of his memories cruell king Richard of England king Edward the fourth his brother This king Edward deceasing left two sonnes and two daughters all yong and in the tutelage and goverment of Richard duke of Glocester his brother This duke desiring for himselfe the crowne of England caused his two nephewes cruelly to be slaine and made a report to goe that by chance they fell of a bridge and so were slaine His two nieces he put into a religion of Nunnes saying they were bastards because saith hee the dead king Edvard their father could not lawfullie espouse their mother for that before hee had promised to espouse a gentlewoman which hee named and the bishop of Bath beeing present protested it was so and the promises of marriage were made betwixt his hands The duke of Glocester having thus dispatched both his nephewes and nieces caused himselfe to be crowned king of England and because many great lords of England murmured at this crueltie this new tyrant king which named himselfe king Richard the third made to die of sundrie deaths all such as hee knew had murmured against him or his tyrannie After all this when hee thought hee had a sure estate in the kingdome it was not long before God raised him up for enemie the earle of Richmond of the house of Lancaster who was but a pettie lord in power without silver and without force who but a little before was detained prisoner in Bretaigne To whom certaine lords of England sent secretly that if he could come into England but with two or three thousand men all the people would come to him make him king of England The earle of Richmond hasted to king Charles the eight then raigning in France by whose permission hee levied people in
held Hesdin Surely it is a strange thing and very deplorable that there should be any such men in the world which durst maintaine with reasons so horrible a crime farre from all common sence and all reason and humanitie as is a massacre done and executed practisedly without any forme of justice Is not this to call things with contrarie names that is to call injustice by the name of justice crueltie by the name of clemencie night by the name of light evill by the name of good and the devill by the name of an Angell Is not this to praise that which is to be despised and detested to follow that which is to be fled to love that which is to be hated to bring into a confusion the distinction of good and of evill and to overthrow the order which God and nature have established in the distinction of good and evill things But after I have shewed that crueltie cannot bee but pernicious and cause of a princes ruine whatsoever Machiavell saith to the contrarie it will not be to any evill purpose now to shew That kindnesse clemencie and goodnesse are the true means to establish a princes estate in firmitie assurance But because we shall handle hereafter another Maxime where it shall bee more proper to discourse this matter wee will reserve the speaking therof to that place 9. Maxime It is better for a Prince to be feared than loved MEn saith our Florentine doe love as it please them and do feare as it pleaseth the prince Therefore the prince if hee bee vvise ought to found himselfe and to leane that vvay vvhich dependeth upon himselfe and not that vvay vvhich dependeth upon another If the prince can have both together to bee feared and loved that is the best but it being a very difficult thing for to embrace both it is more assured to be feared than to be beloved THis Maxime is a saying or proverbe which our elders have attributed to tyrants Oderint dum metuant that is Let them hate so be it they feare Caius Caligula usurped this auncient proverbe as Suetonius saith and put it in practice during all the time of his raign Sucto in Caligula cap. 30 and he ended as commonly such princes doe end which will rather bee feared than loved as in another place wee have said The emperour Tiberius would needs something mitigate this proverbe not allowing to make himselfe feared and yet disdained not hatred For he was wont to say as by the way of a proverbe or device Oderint dum probent that is Let them hate so they allow But it seemes he made an evill match in coupling hatred with approbation for that which a man hateth hee dooth not willingly allow and that which a man alloweth hee hateth not also Moreover all such sayings and proverbes Let them hate so they feare and Let them hate so they allow are but tyrants devices and our forefathers have so esteemed them and tyrants have alwayes practised them As Nero when he perceived that by his cruelties he was feared and redoubted he bragged that none of them which had been emperours before him had any understanding how to command neither knew they the power they had to make themselves be obeyed But that power was well made knowne to himselfe for men made him well to feele That power evill exercised acquireth hatred to him that exerciseth it and hatred ruine and destruction So happened it to Caligula so to Tiberius and so will it alwayes fall unto them which seeke to bee feared rather with hatred than with love As for that which Machiavell sayth That the prince is feared as he will and as it pleaseth him If this were true all should goe well for him for hee would alwayes be so feared as none should oppose themselves against his desseignes and commandements but that every one should come under the yoke and obey him purely and simply But experience shewes us the contrarie and makes us see and know That a prince cannot long be obeyed if that which he commandeth bee disagreeable and found unjust of him that should obey insomuch as at the first occasion that presenteth it selfe they unyoke themselves and their obedience endureth no longer than force and necessitie endureth And because no force nor necessitie can actually endure long time because no violent thing naturally lasteth therefore it followeth that disagreeable commandements cannot long be observed and that obedience founded upon feare is incontinent broken For the equitie justice of a commandement is the sinew thereof And as the bodie cannot move without sinewes unles only for a leape like a stone so a commaundement which for want of equitie displeaseth Equitie is the sinew of the commādement the obeyers shall never be well put in action and practised unlesse it bee for a small time and at the beginning And as for that which Machiavell saith That it is very hard for a prince to bee feared and loved together it is cleane contrarie For there is nothing more easie for A prince may well be seated and loved together a prince than to obtaine them both as reason sheweth it Because it is certaine that a prince which maintaines his subjects in good peace keepeth them from oppressions causing all them to bee punished which would oppresse them and which will maintaine their liberties and punish the breakers of them and who will observe a good pollicie in his countrey that therein there may be a free assured commerce without imposition of tributes or burdens and he that shall cause good justice to be ministred to every one it is certaine that such a prince shall be greatly beloved of his subjects yea and feared thus When men understand that the prince ministreth good justice in every place without support favour or corruption leaving not punishable faults unpunished and is not prodigall in graunting favours and pardons unlesse they have a good foundation upon reason and equitie certaine it is that hee shall be redoubted and feared not only in his own countrey but in strange countries also For example hereof are all the ancient and good emperours as Augustus Traian Adrian Antonine and others which were together feared beloved and reverenced I could here alleadge almost all our auncestor kings of France which with good justice were not onely redoubted of their subjects but also of all their neighbours yea that good reputation of justice in them was a cause that often strange princes have submitted their contentions to the judgment of the Court of Paris in France as we reade in histories And because they caused to be ministred good justice think you they were the more hated no not of the wickeder sort which are forced by their consciences to love and admire the good and vertue although their lives bee contrarie And how should they not be beloved of their subjects beeing good kings as they were seeing Frenchmen are of that nature that they can never hate their
by Machiavell which maintaineth his subjects in division and partialitie and which seekes to sley all them which love the commonweale and which desire a good reformation a good policie in the commonweale There are also other tokens and markes whereby to know a tyrant as them which wee have before alledged out of doctor Bartolus and them also which hystoriographers have marked to have been in Tarquin the proud For they say when he changed his just and royall domination Dioni Halic lib. 4. into a tyrannicall government he became a contemner and a despiser of al his subjects as well the meane people as the nobilitie and Patritians he brought a confusion and a corruption into justice he tooke a greater number of waiting servants into his guard than his predecessors had he tooke away the authoritie from the assembly of the Senate which it alwaies before had moreover hee dispatched criminall and civile causes after his fancie and not according to right hee cruelly punished such as complained of that change of estate as conspirators against him he caused many great and notable persons to die secretly without any forme of justice hee imposed tributes upon the people against the auncient forme and regalitie to the impoverishing and oppression of some more than of others hee had also spies to discover what was said of him and afterward punished rigorously such as had blamed either him or his government These be the colours wherewith the hystories do paint Tarquin when of a king he became a tyrant and these are ordinarily the colours and liverie of all tyrants banners whereby they may be knowne It seemeth that Tarquin forgot nothing of all that a tyrant could doe but that he slew not Brutus which was a fault in the art of tyrannie as learnedly Machiavell noteth it which fell to bee his ruin But the cause hereof was that Brutus in the court counterfeted the foole wherby Tarquin had no suspition of him For none but wise men and good people are suspect and greevous to tyrants but as for counterfeting fooles unthrifts flatterers bauds murderers inventors of imposts and such like dregs and vermine of the people they are best welcome into tyrants courts yet even amongst them are not tyrants alwaies without danger for amongst such fooles sometimes happeneth a Brutus who at last will plat out their ends so that ever their lives hangs by a small thred as Denis the tyrant sayth But the example of Hieronimus another tyrant of Sicilie is to this purpose well to be noted This Hieronimus was the sonne of a good and wise king called Hiero whom also they well called tyrant because he came not to that estate by a legitimate title although he exercised it sincerely and in good justice who when he died left this Hieronimus his sonne very young and under age For the government therefore of him and of his affaires he gave him fifteene tutors and amongst them Andronodorus and Zoilus his sonnes in law and one Thraso which he charged to maintaine the countrey of Sicilie in peace as he himselfe had done by the space of fiftie yeares of his raigne but especially that they should maintaine the treatie and confederation which he had all the length of his time duly observed with the Romanes The said tutors promised to performe his request and to change nothing in the estate but altogether to follow his footsteps Straight after Hiero was dead Andronodorus being angry because of so many tutors caused the king who was then but 15 yeares old to be proclaimed of sufficient age to bee dismissed of tutors and so dispatched himselfe as well as others of that dutifull care they ought to have had of their king and countrey After he got to himselfe alone the government of the kingdome and to make himselfe to bee feared under the kings authoritie hee tooke to him a great number of waiters for his guard and to weare purple garments and a diademe upon his head and to goe in a coach drawne with white horses altogether after the manner of Denis the tyrant and contrary to the use of Hieronimus yet was not this the worst for besides all this Adronodorus caused the yong king his brother in law to bee instructed in pride and arrogancie to contemne every man to give audience to no man to bee quarelous and to take advantage at words of hard accesse given to all new fashions of effeminacie and riotousnesse and to bee unmeasurable cruell thirstie after bloud After Andronodorus had thus framed to his minde this yong king a conspiration was made against him unto which Andronodorus was consenting to dispatch and sley him but it was discovered but yet executed which A conjuration discovered yet executed was strange For one Theodorus was accused and confessed himselfe to bee one of the conspiracie but being tortured and racked to confesse his complices and parteners in that conspiracie knowing he must needs die and by that meanes desiring to be revenged of that yong tyrant he accused the most faithfull and trustiest servants of the king This young tyrant rash inconsiderat straight put to death his friends and principal servants by the counsell of Andronodorus who desired nothing more because they hindered his deseignes This execution performed incontinent this yong tyrant was massacred and slain upon a straight way by the conspirators themselves which before had made the conjuration the execution whereof was the more easie by the discoverie thereof because as is said the tyrants most faithfull friends and servants were slaine Soone after the tyrants death Andronodorus obtained the fortresse of Siracuse a towne of Sicilie but the tumults and stirres which he raised in the countrey as he thought for his owne profit fell out so contrarie to his expectation that finally he his wife and all their race and the race of Hieronimus were extermined as well such as were innocent as they that were culpable And so doth it ordinarily happen to all young princes which by corruption are degenerated into tyrants So fals it out also to all them which are corrupters of princes to draw them into habits of all wickednesse Lastly here would not bee omitted altogether this wickednesse of Machiavell who confounding good and evill together yeeldeth the title of Vertuous unto a tyrant Is not this as much as to call darkenesse full lightsome and bright vice good and honourable and ignorance learned But it pleaseth this wicked man thus to say to plucke out of the hearts of men all hatred horror and indignation which they might have against tyrannie and to cause princes to esteeme tyrannie good honorable and desirable 16. Maxime A Prince may as well be hated for his vertue as for his vice THe emperour Pertinax saith Machiavell vvas elected emperor Cap. 19. Of the prince against the vvils of his men of vvarre vvhich before had customably lived licentiously in all vices and dissolutenesse under the emperour Commodus his predecessor
was then such account made of Faith which they preferred before all difficulties and particular necessities And afterward many times that law of taking away from rich men that which they possessed more than five hundred acres was refreshed brought into question by other Tribunes to have it to passe but it never came to effect yet there arose of it infinite seditions murders pilleries and other innumerable evils A thing which well sheweth that the violation of publicke Faith draweth alwayes with it a great Iliade of evils and Titus â—ivius lib. 3. Dec. 3. calamities The Romanes seeing themselves one day want money for the maintenance of their armies and paiment of souldiers the Senat consulted what provision to make for this want none of them thought it good to impose a taillage or tribute upon the people which would prove very greevous in many sorts at last they all agreed that souldiers must needs be paid For said they if the commonwealth stand not by Faith it cannot stand by riches It were therefore better to spend the good of the commonwealth in loyally paying souldiers wages and so acquite themselves of their Faith towards them than to spare the commonwealth by the failing of Faith and word All the Senat being of this advice expedient then it was as they thought to find money and therefore a charge was given to the Praetor Fulvius in an oration to the people to shew them all their publicke necessities and to exhort such as were growne rich by farming grounds belonging to the commonwealth to lay out some silver for the maintenance of the armie in Spaine Fulvtus so well persuaded that the farmers accorded to lay downe a certaine summe of money as much as was demaunded upon conditions to enjoy their farmes for three yeares and that the commonwealth would take upon them the perils of the sea which might come unto them in their commerces by shipwracks and hostile incursions For they were certaine that such money as they lent to the commonwealth was as assured unto them as in their hands upon the publicke Faith and if the Romanes had not had that good reputation they should not so soon have found money for their need But they that have that vertue Well to observe their word shall never want with whom to contract King Perseus of Macedonie determining to make warre upon the Romanes sent embassadours to the Achaeans a people of Greece and allies of the Romanes to draw them on his side and only required of them a Diet where they were assembled to heare the said embassadors But Callicratides a notable man amongst the Achaeans was of advice That they should give no eare unto that king Perseus nor to his embassadors because the Achaeans had already confirmed an alliance by Faith and oath with the Romans that upon that Faith was founded all the assurance of their estate and that Faith had that propertie that it will not be violated nor suspected in any sort whatsoever And therfore it was a breach of Faith only to affoord audience Faith will neither be violated nor suspected to that king whome they saw plainely prepared to make warre upon the Romanes This reason founded upon the authoritie of publicke States was the cause that nothing was accorded to Perseus And likewise heereunto accordeth the saying of the emperour Antonine That the most lamentable thing in this world is when Faith is broken and violated by friends and without the same no vertue can bee Dion in Marcel assured To this purpose that Faith cannot bee suspected that is notable which Fabius Titus Livins lib. 2. Maximus Dâ—ctator did Anniball being in battaile array nigh Rome conceived this subtile device to ruinate and utterly to destroy all the houses in the fields both for pleasure and for other necessarie uses but onely the houses and commodities appertaining to Fabius And this hee did to bring a suspition upon Fabius that hee had made some secret compact with Anniball against his Faith and dutie Fabius knowing well that it was not sufficient perfectly to observe his Faith but that also he must be exempt from all suspition sent straight his sonne to Rome to sell and rid him of all he had without the towne which he did and so assured his publicke Faith by his particular damage taking from the people all sinister opinion they might take of him And assuredly there is nothing in the world more pleasant than when Faith is sincerely kept even in adversitie and when we have most to doe Therefore the Romanes esteemed such their good and loyall allies as kept their Faith loyally during the time they had warres in hand as did Ptolomeus king of Aegypt when the Romanes had to doe with Anniball and the Carthaginians for he was alwayes firme in the confederation and alliance which he had made with them insomuch as their warre being finished with Anniball they sent embassadors to Ptolomie to thank him for that in their so doubtfull and hazardous affaires his Faith had not altered and to pray him to continue Attalus king of Pergamus in Asia came to the degree of royaltie by his vertue Titus Livius lib. 3. 7. Dec. 4. for he was neither sonne nor successor of a king neither had hee the heroicall vertues of Hercules of Alexander or Caesar to conquer a kingdome yea breefely he had nothing in him saith Titus Livius that could either aid or bring hope unto him at any time to be a king but onely riches which he bestowed and used so well that by the meanes of them and by his fidelitie towards the Pergames he became king of Pergamus after he had once vanquished the Gaules of Asia As soone as he was come to this degree he allied himselfe by confederations with the Romans and alwaies kept his Faith perfect and entire insomuch as well by the integritie and constantnesse of his Faith as by good justice hee raigned foure and fortie yeares and left his kingdome stable and firme to Eumenes his sonne whose domination Fidelitie a good inheritance the Romanes greatly augmented because he continued in his fathers loyaltie who at his death charged him to repute that fidelitie to be the best heritage hee left him There was nothing in the world which the old Romanes had in greater reverence Titus Livius lib. 1. Dec. 1. lib. 4. Dec. 3. and observation than their publicke Faith Therefore had they a temple of Faith where men swore and solemnely promised all their treaties of peace truces confederations alliances and other such like and those who first did violate it were esteemed dedicated to the gods of hell and with a like sinceritie did they also observe their Faiths in particular contracts so that every one thought they could not better assure a debt than in lending to the commonwealth yea when by reason of great wars their treasuries were emptie of money such as had the custodie of pupils and widdowes portions and other
of their naturall effects as the fire cannot bee without his heating nor light without shining so that a man debonaire and gentle I speake of all men in generall but especially of a prince the chiefe meanes to obtaine the favour grace amity and reverence of the people he cannot avoide when he will but feele great utilities agreeable contentments pleasures benefits great assurance farre from all feare and most exceeding great repose and tranquilitie in his soule and conscience But in order to diduce the good effects utilities which proceede from clemencie I doe advertise the reader that I speake of that vertue in his most ample signification according whereunto it comprehendeth not onely mercie and kindnesse towards offenders but also bountie goodnesse of nature mansuetude of manners popularitie and facilitie to accommodate himselfe to the peoples humors and to all such as a man hath to command also humanity and officious affabilitie towards all men For briefely all these aforesaid vertues are like the honnie and sweetnesse of a well complectioned and setled soule which sweetnesse may well bee called in one word Clemencie although according to his divers effects and respects men give it divers names This naturall kindnesse and bounty of the soule then which men call Clemencie being in a prince the first produceth this effect that shee will soften and mitigate the punishments of offendors yea sometimes will forgive and altogether acquit them according as the circumstances of the fact and of the persons doe require For a prince ought well to consider When How To whom Wherefore he pardoneth a fault because it is not clemency but crueltie as the king S. Lewis said when a prince may doe justice and doth it not But forsomuch as equitie is the soule of justice which oftentimes is repugnant and contrarie to the rigour of lawes and ordinances therefore a prince must needes employ his clemencie to bring equitie in use by dispensing with the punishment of offendors which should suffer by the rigor of lawes But if there bee no equitie nor vailable reason to persuade a prince to dispense with the law then is hee bound to doe justice otherwise hee merits to be reputed not clement but cruell and culpable of the crime which he would not vouchsafe to punish And in this point very necessarie it is that a prince bee wise and vigilant to guard himselfe that hee be not surprised nor deceived and that he use not crueltie in steade of clemencie by the ordinarie opportunitie of such as sue for pardons And not to fal into this inconvenience whensoever the fact is of evill example and that the commonwealth hath interest therein the prince ought not to use remission and grace without knowledge of the cause and without good counsell The emperour Marcus Antonine governed himselfe very wisely in his use of clemencie to such as committed crimes for as to them which had not perpetrated Capit. Dio. in Marâ—o Vulc. Gallicanus in Avidio Cassio great and erronious faults and had not taken a custome therein he mitigated and lenified such punishments as were ordained by lawes by some other lighter punishment So in weightie crimes of evill consequence he was inexorable for them had no favour much lesse pardon And in regard of offences committed against himselfe particularly hee was as prompt and voluntarie to pardon as was possible and so it appeared in the case of Avidius Cassius For Cassius being in Esclavonia with a Romane armie hearing a false report that this good emperour was dead and beleeving this fame to be true he enterprised to make himselfe emperour and for such made himselfe to bee knowne and saluted by his armie After having certaine notice that he was in good health hee was much abashed and withall troubled that so rashly he had enterprised upon his masters estate yet notwithstanding hee desisted not from holding carrying himselfe as an emperour fearing that some would sley him so soone as hee forsooke his forces having so farre embarked and engaged himselfe therein yet could he not shun that which he so much feared for hee was slaine by certaine of his captaines which thought thereby greatly to please Marcus Antonine and carried to him his head Antonine seeing the head of Cassius was exceeding greeved and sorrowfull thereat and said to them which brought it That they should not have slaine him since hee had not so commaunded for so had they taken from him the use of mercie Hee rather desired they had brought him alive that he might have reproched the benefites received at his hands and with reason have shewed him how little cause he had to conspire against him so also might hee have shewed himselfe a better friend unto Cassius than Cassius had done to him Yea but Sir replied one of the captaines What if by sparing the life of Cassius he had gotten the victorie of you We doe not feare that answered the emperour for wee have not so honoured the gods nor lived in such sort as Cassius could have vanquished us No good princes or very few were at any time vanquished or slaine or despoiled of their estate but only such as well merited it as Nero Caligula Otho Vitellius and other like which were cruell and full of vices and like Galba and Pertinax which were exceedingly given to covetousnesse than which vice nothing becomes a prince worse But Augustus Traian Adrian our father Antonius Pius and such like as they modestly governed so deceased they honourably and without violence Cassius was a good and valiant captaine whose fault wee desired to have pardoned because it rather proceeded of temeritie than of evill will against us beeing persuaded when he made his enterprise that we had ben dead and although he could never have excused himselfe but that he had greatly injured our children which by right and reason ought to succeed us in our estate yet would not wee have had him to die for that for if our children merited to succeed us in the empite Cassius could not have overthrowne their estate but if contrary Cassius had better deserved than they to governe the comomwealth and had been better beloved it had also been reasonable and just hee had been emperour By this answere of that good emperour a man may see how facile and easie he was to pardon offences against him which is a very covenable vertue in a prince for a prince can hardly rigorously punish faults committed against himselfe but he shall be taxed and blamed for rigour and crueltie although the fault merit greevous punishment as the same emperour witnesseth by his missive rescribed unto the Senate which made too rigorous a pursute against the complices of Cassius And because the said letters containe notable sentences worthie of such a prince I will here translate them I pray saith he and require you Masters that in regard of the Cassian conspiration you will depose and lay aside your censure and conserve my pietie and
inferiour Iudges can hardly judge evill unlesse they erre either in Fact or Right from which they shall guard themselves if supreme Iudges performe well their duties by not sparing the personall adjornaments against such as by grosse ignorance doe erre in Right or which by the negligent inspection into their causes do erre in Fact And assuredly if such Iudges have good Censors which will marke their faults and will reproove and correct them Iustice shall bee as well administred by one alone in every inferiour seat as by many But our soveraigne Iudges are glad of the faults of their inferiours For their evill judgements brings the greater practise unto them to fill their purses to pay for their Offices to glut their avarice and to furnish the unmeasurable pompes of themselves and their wives So that to Iustice the same happeneth which dooth to an humane bodie For when the head is whole it will purvey and provide for the necessities and maladies of the members and seeke out all things fit for that purpose but when the head is diseased all the members feele it So the corruption which is in parliaments makes that all Iustice in inferiour courts is depraved and corrupted I resolve then against the saying of Machiavell That it were better that ther were but one person in every estate or degree of inferior justice than a great multiplicitie of Officers but my meaning is not to stretch this unto soveraigne Iustice but contrarie I thinke that it is good and necessarie that judgement bee executed by more than one person namely by a meane number of good and well chosen men For a judgement given by a notable companie hath more waight and gravitie as a soveraigne judgement ought to have than that which comes from one alone Also because a soveraigne judgement may sometimes take his foundation upon the pure and simple equitie which sometimes directly repugneth the locall customes ordinances and lawes written it is good and necessarie that equitie bee juged to bee equitie by the braine and judgement of many and it is not meete that one alone should take upon him that great licence to depart from authentike and received lawes to follow his owne opinion which hee will call equitie For that should bee as it were to give power to every particular Iudge to judge after his fantasie against received and approoved right and so to suffer to passe under the name of equitie huge iniquitie Since then none may easily and without great reason depart from received and approoved lawes it followeth that none may easily also induce an equitie against the said lawes unlesse to induce it hee use great and deliberate consideration and examination and doe well ponder the circumstances consequences by a good and experimented judgement which one alone cannot doe except hee bee of some exceeding invention knowledge and experience and of a good and sound judgement such a one as can hardly bee found Therefore it is much better to commit to many not to every one but unto such as are well chosen that power to induce equitie against received lawes than to one alone Besides this it appertaineth unto soveraigne judges to examine the new edicts and lawes of princes to marke and note if there be any thing hard in them which it were good to mitigate and lenifie which they must either themselves doe before they allow or divulge them or else must they signifie to the prince a cause why they approove them not This one alone can never so well doe as many how great and wise so ever hee bee because the spirit of one man alone is not capable to see and comprehend all the particular cases which may bee applied to the matter of an edict neither in memorie or cogitation can hee comprehend whatsoever absurditie incommodity or iniquitie can bee in a law But many casting and discoursing in their mindes every thing one foreseeing one thing and another another by examining and disputing upon the matter may the better perceive and comprehend the law and inconveniences thereof For it is not to bee doubted but that by the dispute of learned and sufficient men which doe examine by a good judgement reasons contrarie likely conjuncts and adjuncts of every thing may farre better comprehend the difficulties and in commodities of a edict than by the reasoning of one alone The manner which the Romanes anciently observed in the making of new lawes shewes this for they which proposed and preferred them were commonly men of good spirit great judgement and experience in the affaires of the common weale but yet every man great and small was heard to contradict that law which was proposed yea sometimes it was found and often that a base person of small estimation which had neither great knowledge nor experience yet hath noted in that law absurdities and inconveniences which were causes of rejection or at the least of moderating and correcting it Againe for that soveraigne judges are as it were censors and correctors of of inferior judges it is very requisit that they bee many in number because it will seeme hard for a magistrate to bee corrected by one alone unto whom it may be hee would not give place in any thing either in good knowledge or experience Finally because corruption is more to be feared in soveraigne judges which have none above them to correct their faults than in subalterne and inferiors who themselves may bee corrected therefore it is requisit that soveraigne judges bee in number for many are more uneasie to bee corrupted than one alone I confesse then in the soveraigne degree of justice of a prince it is good and expedient that hee have a sufficient number of persons to exercise it provided alwaies the number be not too great and unbrideled for the qualitie is therein more requisit than the quantitie The like is to bee of the kings Counsell where it is good and requisit there bee many heads as we have said in another place For confirmation of my saying I will alledge no other thing than the example of our ancestors For in the time and before king Lewis the twelfth inferior Officers were not many in one seate and degree of justice for there was but one in every seate thereof to administer it namely a Provost or ordinarie judge in the first degree a lieutenant generall or bayliffe as they call him or steward in the second degree but in soveraigne courts of Parliaments and the great Counsell they were many yet not in so great number as they bee at this day But seeing wee are in hand with meanes to establish a good justice I will touch therein some small points which I have marked in histories Wee must then presuppose Good Iustice consisteth in good lawes and good Magistrates that to cause good Iustice to bee administred a prince must needes have good lawes and create good Magistrates and Officers As for lawes some concerne the decision of matters and other the
Office of Censor which was an Office very meete for him because he delighted more to blame and reprehend the vices of men than praise their vertues In the pursute of this Office of Censor hee had many competitors which also demanded this estate not so much for the desire they had to have it For they did well forsee that if Cato were Censor hee would practise a rigorous Censorship and that he would disgrade many Officers and Magistrates as this lay in the Censors power which were far from good And this which feared them most was that Cato himselfe as hee sued for that Office said openly that if hee were chosen Censor hee would bring to their tryall an heape of vitious corrupted Magistrates and would reforme offices by redusing them into the first forme and disgrading inculpable and unworthie officers and that they which opposed themselves to the pursute heereof did it for no other cause but because they feared the touch Bâ—iefely hee did so much that not onely hee was elected Censor but also gave him for a companion in his Censorship Lucius Valertus whom he demanded because he was like humorous as himselfe These two being Censors they failed not to remove many out of their places for they cassiered many Senators and Magistrates yea such as were of great houses and nobilitie They caused their houses to bee demolished and overthrowen which had builded on publike ground They caused divers ponds and lakes to be paved which were full of mudde and durt and to repurge all the gutters sinkes and jakes of the citie They greatly heightened and raised the farmes of the commonwealth hands which before had beene held at a low price by persons which by complots and intelligences had let them out farre dearer Briefely they administred a very lowable and profitable Censorship whereupon Cato was surnamed Censorius Would to God wee had at this day such men and that princes would employ them for the commonwealth stands in great need so to bee purged of so many evills and corruptions as doe infect and ruinate it King Charlemaine and S. Lewis may in this place serve for examples to all kings Annales upon Anno 809. and 2253. and princes For we reade That these two good kings true lovers of good Iustice performing the Office of good Censors sent often in their time commissiaries and enquestors through all provinces to bee informed against the abuses of Magistrates and such as they found in fault and did not well observe all edicts and ordinances they were rigorously punished Insomuch as during their raignes Iustice was exceeding well administred to the great help and comfort of the people The prince ought also in his election of Magistrates to advise himselfe well to chuse officers which in judgement will have no respect of persons For the Magistrate ought to yeeld right egally to the poore as the rich according to the merit of the cause and not after the desert of persons From the beginning of the Romane commonwealth they had either none or few lawes written to end contentions differences amongst them but Iudges ought to haâ—e no acception of persons they were ended as seemed good to Magistrates which alwaies gave a coulour to their sentences by certaine decrees and judgements which they said had ben before given in like cases By this palliation and deceit saying that they had been so before judged they administred Iustice after their owne fantasies yea in such sort as they almost Dion Halic lib. 10. alwaies carried away the gaining of the cause for Magistrates which were at their command supported and favoured them The meanest sort of people perceiving that under coulour of former judgements they were abused and so that they almost alwaies lost their causes against the great men of the citie many beganne to quarrell and complaine Insomuch as that the Tribunes publikely proposed that it was necessarie there were ten potentates elected in the place of two Consuls to administer the commonwealth and write lawes ordinances wherby from thence forward the differences and law controversies might bee decided and not after the fantasies and former judgements of Iudges Magistrates The great men after their custome opposed themselves against this Heereupon there arose a great stirre and sedition within the towne of Rome which neither the Consuls nor Senate could any Good Iustice cause of peace evill cause of Sedition way appease But at the new creation of Consuls it happened that Lucius Quintius who dwelt in the fields in a little husbandry hee had was elected Consul and sent for to his village where they found him at his ploughes taile ploughing his finall possessions This good person was honourably brought as soveraigne Magistrate into the towne as soone as hee was arrived hee beganne to exercise his estate and to administer justice to every man as well poore as rich without respect or exception of persons He in a little time dispatched all ould causes which had long hanged in suspence by the meanes of prorogations which rich men made and behaved himselfe so discreet and just in the handling of all causes as he was generally esteemed a good and equall judge Hee abode all day in the pallace to heare and dispatch causes and hee gave audience to every man very patiently and benignely and used speedie and good Iustice to one and others indifferently having no regard to persons but to the merits and to the Iustice of the cause then in the question onely By this meanes Quintius brought to passe that not onely the great men were no more suspected judges to the meanest but also Iustice was so agreeable and plausible to the people that the sedition ceased and all the people were appeased so that none demanded any more to have new lawes whereby to judge causes but every man greatly contented himselfe to have for a law so good and equall a judge and Magistrate And surely there is nothing in the world which sooner ceaseth seditions and stirres nor that better maintaineth publike peace and tranquilitie than a good Iustice administred by good and equall Magistrates But on the contrary a wicked Iustice is often cause of uproares insurrections and civile warres as poore France can say at this day The example of both these cases appeared certaine yeeres after Quintius was Dion Halic lib. 10. 11. out of his magistracie for they which succeeded him had not that grace nor dexteritie well to administer Iustice insomuch as the Tribunes tooke up againe their determination to create ten Potentates to write lawes and ordinances after which men might bee judged in all causes And indeede the Senate as it were constrained accorded to this creation there were chosenten Potentates which with great deliberation composed the lawes of the twelve Tables which were found very good and equall and not onely they proposed and made in publike places the said lawes and engraved them in Tables of brasse but which more is
the third estate to the contentment of every one and that magistrates being so temperated they so might be suspected neither to great nor little This is it which was said of Marcus Valerius that Dionis Halic lib. 7. valiant and wise Senatour and great captaine of warre persuading the Senate to receive the people to Offices and into the administration of the commonweale Masters said he all they which will well establish a publicke estate ought to consider not only that which is present but also that which may come But certainly if the whole administration of the commonweale remained alwaies in the hands of such as are rich and puissant it might so come to passe in succession of time that some small number of them would usurpe a tyrannous domination over the people But when some of the people shall be mixed amongst such as are rich and puissant they dare enterprise no tyrannie fearing to be punished by the lawes whereof the magistrats of the people may pursue against them the observation Finally so much the greater terror and feare we propose before the eyes of transgressors of lawes and corrupters of manners by putting against proud and covetous men many observers and watchers in their heads so much the better shall the estate of our commonwealth bee established and assured A Prince having by good election well ordained the magistrates of his Iustice A Prince ought to punish evill Iudges and to reward good men hee ought after to consider how hee may maintaine them in their dutie to walke upright and to keepe themselves from corruption To doe this hee must observe two things To cassier them which deale evill in their charge yea that hee punish them according to the greatnes of their faults and that he recompence remunerat them which deale well in their charges Wee have above set downe some examples of certaine emperours which chastised their vicious magistrates which examples doe merit well to be drawne into a consequence at the least for great faults of magistrats But above all a prince ought alwayes to have before his eyes the example of the king S. Lewis who of his kingdome sent often Commissaries throgh his provinces to get information of the abuses of magistrates that he might doe justice thereof For this example meriteth well to be practised in the time wherein we are Moreover the emperour Alexander Severus practised very well these two points wherof now I speake Lamprid. in Alex. touching the punishing of evill magistrates and remunerating the good For on the one side he so hated wicked magistrats which abused their Offices that one day there comming to his Court one Arabinus who was reported to have committed thefts in the administration of his Office he begun in a great choller O gods immortall Arabinus not onely liveth but dare appeare in the Senate and before mee On the other side Alexander would remunerate and bountifully reward such magistrates as were good and well acquited themselves in their charges For said hee good magistrates which are good men must be bought and enriched but wicked men of no value must be impoverished and driven away Wee may also alledge the example of the most part of our ancient kings of France which stipended well their Officers of Iustice For although it seeme that the wages which they take at this present is little yet at the time when their wages were first constiuted and set downe unto them they were great and sufficient ynough to maintaine them unto whome they were given And there is no doubt but a man might as well and honourably maintaine himselfe some 60 years agoe with 300 pound a year as now for 1000 for truly since that time all things have proved foure times dearer Whereupon it followeth since expences are quadruple and that the wages of magistrates are not raised that it were requisite they were augmented the rather to encourage them to doe their duties and to take from them all occasion and excuse of abuses Hereupon some have thought that to shun abuses corruptions of magistrats it were good and expedient to make them temporall as for two or three yeares or els Magistrates in Fraunce ought neither to bee temporall nor ambulatorie to make them ambulatorie by remooving of them from time to time from one province to another This opinion hath been held by a great person of our time which seemeth to be founded upon many good reasons For if magistrates were temporall by consequent they should be subject to the Syndiks and to give account of their administration and if they were ambulatorie they should not know the persons submitted to their jurisdictions neither could they contract with them any inward familiaritie and love which often doe cause Iudges to stray out of the right way do draw the curtaine from the eies of Iustice And both by the laws of the Romans and the ordinances of king Lewis and many other kings his successors the magistrates of Provinces could neither be perpetuall nor might they be magistrates in the provinces where they were borne Yet if we consider that France is composed of divers provinces which have every one their courses of law different wee shall find that it were impossible to find magistrates fit to administer justice in every severall province for want of knowledge of the different stiles customes and manners of every severall countrey which are not well learned but by use and practise And also old men and many persons very capable to exercise offices of magistracie neither can nor wil subject themselves to an uncertaine removing from one province to another for the affaires of their familie could not well beare it yet every man must have care of his familie We see also that men advanced to Offices although men learned capable yet at the first have not had the dexteritie well to applie their knowledge to use for it is obtained by the handling of matters experience Wherupon it followeth that if magistrats were temporall they should be at the end of their time even then when they begun to understand how they ought to handle their Offices by appointing deputies in their places the like would come to them and so would it come to passe that in Offices there would be placed more often new men than well experienced a thing neither good nor profitable to the commonweale And for this cause we read that the emperour Antonius Pius continued alwaies in his time his magistrats which Capit. in Pio. in their Offices acquited themselves well And in the time of Severus and other emperors after him it was practised that to the Office of the Praetorian praefecture they should alwayes provide some one of them which before had served as an Assessor and knew therefore how he should handle that Office And certainly in the Romans time there was this incommoditie in the matter of magistrates that often they were at the end of their time before
they understood how they should administer as a captaine Niger lieutenant of the warre for the emperor Marcus Antonine complained to him But that incommoditie was much more supportable in that time than Spart in Nigro at this day it can bee in Fraunce for the Romane magistrates seldome decided private and particular causes but in Fraunce magistrates must deale in all causes After that the prince hath well established his justice as well by publication of A Prince ought himself to minister Iustice good lawes as by institution of good magistrates yet is he not discharged For he ought himselfe also to deale therin And this is another point of the Counsell which Iethro gave to Moses For after he had counselled him what magistrates hee should establish under him he added more That Moses ought to reserve unto himselfe the knowledge and decision of great affaires which are of consequence And assuredly this is a point very necessarie and which a prince ought not to leave behind for hee is debtor of Iustice to his subjects and ought to give them audience in things wherof he is to have necessarie knowledge for all things are not proper to bee handled before magistrates established by the prince but there are many things wherof the knowledge ought to appertaine to the prince alone as when a meane man wil complaine against some great lord or magistrat or against Publicans and exactors of the princes money or when a man labours for a pardon gift recompence and many other like The prince then ought himselfe either alone or in his Counsell to give often audience unto his subjects For we reade that by the primitive creation of kings Dionis Halic â—ib 1. 5. and monarchs the authoritie which was attributed unto them by the people consisted in three very notable points whereof the first was To minister good justice unto their subjects by causing them to observe the lawes and customes of the countrey and to take knowledge themselves of the injuries which are great and of consequence amongst their subjects The second point was To convocat an assembly of a Senat to handle the affaires of the commonwealth And the third To be the cheefetaine and soveraigne of the warre And for as much as the first dutie of kings consisteth to do good justice unto their subjects the auncient Grecians even Homer calleth them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say Distributers of justice This is it wherefore almost all good princes have had their ordinary daies of Audience wherin they took knowledge of the complaints and grievances of their subjects and administred right and justice unto them Iulius Caesar tooke great paine and travaile to heare causes and to administer justice and to cause them to observe lawes which concerned Suet. in Caesar cap. 43. in Aug. cap. 3 in Claud. cap. 15. in Galba cap. 7. 8 9. Domitiano cap 8. the commonwealth as especially the law Sumptuariam which would permit no excesse in bankets nor dissolutnesse in apparell Augustus Caesar likewise kept an ordinarie Audience which he continued untill night yea being evill at ease he in a litter would be carried to the pallace or hold Audience in his house The emperour Claudius also although hee were of an heavie and dull spirit yet held hee his Audience and administred right to parties So did Domitian who how wicked soever he was in other deportments with great industrie and diligence administred good justice unto parties and often revoked decrees from the Centumvirat seat which for favor were given and spared not to punish corrupted Iudges The emperour Galba likewise although he was of the age of threescore and twelve yeares when he came to the empire yet dealt with audience of parties and administred justice So did Traian Adrian the Antonines Severus Alexander and many other Romane emperors give Audience to their subjects and administred justice unto them And very memorable is that which is written of the emperor Adrian namely That one day as hee went into the fields he was required by a poore woman who had watched to speake with him to doe her justice upon a certaine complaint she made unto him The emperour very Dion in Adrian kindly said unto her That that was no place where she should require justice and sent her away till another time The woman replied upon him Sir said she if you wil not doe me justice wherefore deale you to be emperour Adrian was never moved hereat but staied still heard her did her justice If we read the hystories of France wee shall find that it hath yet beene more ordinarie and common with our auncient kings to hold Audiences which men called Lict de Iustice The Bed of Iustice than with the Romane emperours Charlemaigne king of Fraunce and emperour besides Annal. upoÌ„ Anno 809 814 1215. that he tooke great care that Stewards Bayliffes and their deputies should walk upright without abusing their Offices would also that they should reserve unto him all great causes or such as were amongst great lords Then caused hee the parties to appeare before him he heard them patiently and agreed them amiably if he could by any means and so he gave his sentence and good and prompt justice King Lewis the first of that name surnamed le Debonaire because of his good and holy conditions following the traces of Charlemaigne his father held a publicke Audience in his pallace three times in the weeke and heard the grievances and complaints of every one executing to all quicke and right justice But what good came there hereof Even this saith the hystorie that the publicke good in this good kings time was so well governed and administred that there was almost no man found amongst his subjects which complained that any man did him wrong or injurie but al men lived in great peace and prosperitie one not daring to offend another for the feare they had of the kings good justice which he would administer himselfe and so cause his ministers to doe after his example So much could that royall vertue of Iustice doe for the maintenance of peace and prosperitie in a kingdome King Philip Augustus surnamed the Conquerour for his great prowesses and conquests was also a good Iusticer and willingly heard the complaints of his subjects insomuch as one day understanding that Guy Counte de Auverne used greatly to pill and violently to spoile his subjects and neighbours exacting upon them great summes of money against their wils and without the kings consent their soveraigne and having found him culpable hereof condemned him by the advice of the barons of the realme to lose his land and seignorie of Auverne which from that time was united to the crown We may also place here the good justice of the kings Charles le Sage Charles the seventh Charles the eight Lewis the twelfth and of many other kings of France Annal. upon Anno 1255 1269 Gaguin in the liâ—e of S.
Lewis The good justice of Lewis which gave oedinarie audience to the complaints of their subjects and to doe them justice But it shall suffice to close up all this matter with the example of that good king S. Lewis who amongst other vertues wherewith he was endowed he was a very good and upright administer of justice This good king having a great zeale to establish a good Iustice in his kingdome first hee would and ordained That the good and auncient lawes and customes of the kingdome should be well and straitly observed upon the paine he would take of his Bayliffes Seneshals and other magistrates if they caused them not to bee well observed And to the end the said magistrates might carry themselves well in their offices he chose other officers the best that hee could find of which he secretly enquired of their vertues and vices And to the end they might administer good and breefe justice to the poore as to the rich without exception of persons he forbad them to take presents unlesse some present of victuall which may not exceed tenne shillings by the weeke nor any other benefites for them or their children neither of them which were in contention nor of any other person of their bailiwike and territorie and commaunded they should take nothing within their perfecture or jurisdiction For this good king considered that presents benefits and desire to gain are the means wherby magistrates may be corrupted and therfore to shun all corruption he must cut off the meanes therunto Moreover he very rigorously punished such officers of Iustice as abused their estates spared not even great lords themselves but punished them after their merits as happened to the lord de Coucy who caused to strangle two yong Flamins when he found them hunting in his woods For the king caused to be called before him the said lord who fearing to be handled as he had delt with the Flamins wold have taken the hearing of the cause from the king saying he was to be sent for before the peeres of France But the king forced him to abide his judgments indeed had made him die if great lords parents friends of the said lord de Coucy had not importuned so much the king for his pardon unto which the king accorded that he shold have his life but yet he condemned him to the warre against the Turks and Infidels in the holy land by the space of three yeares which was a kind of banishment and besides condemned him in a fine paiment of 10000 Paris pounds which were bestowed on the building of an Hostle Dieu at Ponthoise This king gave not easily any pardon nor without great deliberation And for a devise he had often in his mouth that verse of the Psalme of David Happie are they which doe iudgement and Iustice at all times He said also That this was no mercie but crueltie not to punish malefactors Moreover he was a king full of truth chast charitable and fearing God which are vertues exceeding woorthy for a good prince and which commonly accompanie good justice But the godly precepts hee The tenne commandemēts which the king S. Lewis at his disease gave to his eldest sonne gave being in extremitie of his life to king Philip the Hardie his sonne and successor doe well merit to be written in letters of gold upon the lintels of doores and the houses of all kings and Christian princes to have them alwaies before their eies My deare sonne saith he since it pleaseth God our Father and Creator to withdraw me now from this miserable world to carrie mee to a better life than this I would not depart from thee my sonne without giving you for my last blessing the doctrines and precepts which a good father ought to give to his sonne hoping you wil engrave in your heart these your fathers last words I command you then my deare sonne That above all things you have alwaies before your eies the feare of God our good Father for the feare of God is the beginning yea the accomplishment of all true wisedome if you feare him he will blesse you Secondly I exhort you to take all adversities patiently acknowledging that it is God which visiteth you for your sins not to wax proud in prosperitie accounting that it comes to you by Gods grace not by your merits Thirdly I recommend unto you charitie towards the poor for the good you doe unto them shall be yeelded unto you an hundred fold and Iesus Christ our Saviour shall account it done unto him After I recommend to you very straitly my deare sonne that you cause to keep well the good laws customes of the kingdome and to administer good justice to your subjects for happy are they which administer good justice at all times and to doe this I enjoine you that you be carefull to have good magistrates and command you them that they favor not your Procurators against equitie and that you rigorously punish such as abuse their Offices for when they make faults they are more punishable than others because they ought to govern other subjects and to serve them for an example Suffer not that in judgement there be acception of persons and so favour the poore onely as the truth of his fact doth appeare without favoring him as to the judgement of his cause Moreover I command you that you bee carefull to have a good Counsell about you of persons which be of staied good age which be secret peaceable not covetous for if you doe this you shall bee loved and honoured because the light of the servants makes their masters shine Also more I forbid you to take tallages or tributes upon your subjects but for urgent necessitie evident utilitie and just cause for otherwise you shall not bee held for a king but for a tyrant Further I command you that you be carefull to maintaine your subjects in good peace and tranquilitie and observe their franchises and priveledges which before they have enjoyed and take heede you moove no warre against any Christian without exceeding great occasion and reason Item I exhort you to give the benefices of your kingdome to men of good life and good conscience not to luxurious and covetous wretches My deere sonne if you observe these my commands you shall bee a good example to your subjects and you shall bee the cause that they will adict themselves to doe well because the people will alwaies give themselves to the imitation of their prince and God by his bountie maintaine you firme and assured in your estate and kingdome Thus finished this good king his last words full of holy zeale and correspondent to his life passed and yeelded his soule to his creator which had given it him His sonne king Philip third of that name called the Hardie because of his valiancie which he shewed against the infidels and against other enemies as well during the life as after the death of
That poverty hath many times been cause of great insurrections and civile warres We reade that at Rome Dion Halic lib. 5. 6. 7. there were many stirrs and seditions against usurers which eate up and impoverished the people and caused great faintnesse The like often happened in France for in the time of king Philip Augustus the conquerour in the time of S. Lewis in the time of king Iohn and many other times the Iewes and Italians which held bankes Annal. 3. and practised usuries in France whereby they ruinated the people were chased and bannished out of the kingdome The factions of Mailotins and of such as carried coules and hoods of divers coulours and other like popular inventions tending to seditions and civile warres were not founded upon any other foundation than that For poore people of base estate are alwaies the authors executioners of such factions and seditions In the time also that France was under the obedience of the Romane empire we reade that the Gaulois rose up often when they sought to impoverish Dion in Aug. them by undue exactions As in the time of Augustus there was in Gaul one Licinius a receiver of imposts who practised great and undue exactions upon the people unknowne to Augustus and because at that time part of Gaulois payed tributes each chiefe of every house a certaine summe by moneth this master deceiver made a weeke but sixe daies and a moneth but of twentie foure daies so that in the yeere were foureteene moneths and so two fell to his profit Augustus being advertised heereof was much grieved yet did no justice thereon Not long after Augustus sent for governour into Gaul Quintilius Varus who was a great lord and before had had the government of Siria where he had filled his hands Ariving in Gaul hee sought to doe there as hee had done in Siria and began to commit great exactions upon the people and to deale with them after the Sirian manner that is like slaves The Gaulois seeing this made a countenance voluntarily to accompanie Varus and his army against the high Almaines upon which hee made warre but after they had conducted him and his army into a straight whence hee could not save himselfe they set upon him defeated cut his army in pieces Varus the other great lords of his company slew themselves in dispaire And heereupon the Gaulois rebelled against the Romane emperours many times as under Nero under Galien under many others and at the last freed and cut off themselves altogether from the obedience of the empire Whereupon I conclude That to goe about to hould the people poore as Machiavell counselleth there can arise nothing but insurrections feditions and confusions in the commonwealth But the meanes that a prince ought to hould to inrich his subjects without weakening his owne power is first to take away all abuses which are committed upon Means how a pâ—ince may enrich his subjects on the people in the collection of ordinarie tributes For a prince most righteously may levie ancient accustomed tributes to sustaine publike charges otherwise his estate would dissolve And he ought not to follow the example of Nero who once would needes abolish all tributes and imposts and because the Senate shewed him that hee ought not to doe it hee imposed other new without number For a good wise prince will doe neither the one nor the other but without inventing any new tributes will maintaine himselfe in the exaction onely of the ancient which hee will cause to bee received the most graciouslie and without stirre of the people that can bee which to doe it seemes to bee requisite that such taxes imposts be duely laid without favour or respect of persons which in times of ould was a reformation that the king Tullius Hostilius made in his time at Rome whereupon hee was much praised and his poore people comforted Men must also imitate the ancient Romanes which excepted no person from patrimoniall tributes which are such reall burdens Titus Livin lib. 6. Dec. 3. lib. 3. Dec. 2 as are payed in regard of grounds whereunto they belong For there was neither Senator nor bishop but hee paied as well as they of the third estate There must also bee a provision made that the receivers and treasurers which are they which doe most hurt to the people may no more pill and spoile the world There must also an hand bee houlden that so excessive usuries be no more practised under the name of pensions and interests and that it bee permitted to deliver silver to a certaine moderate profit which upon great paines it may not bee lawfull to exceede for to forbid at once all profit is to give unto men occasions to seeke out palliations in contracts by sales of pensions by letting to hire fruits by selling to sell againe fained renumerations such like coulours There must be a provision made that strangers banquers nor others may no more make themselves bankrouts And here would bee brought in use a law made in the time of the emperour Tiberius whereby it was ordained that no man might hould a banque upon a great paine which had not two Sueton. in Tib. cap. 48. third parts of his goods in ground of inheritance moreover there must bee expressed the superfluities of apparell of banquets and other like whereby men doe so impoverish themselves this shall bee a cause that povertie or to have little shall bee the more tollerable For as Cato the elder said in an oration for the law Oppia against the great estates and luxuries of women It is a great evill and dangerous shame the shame of povertie parcimonie but when the law forbiddeth superfluities excesses of apparell and other vaine expences it covereth that shame with an honourable mantle of living after lawes seeing that it is a most praiseable thing and the contrary punishable and vituperable And assuredly saith hee it ordinarily commeth to passe that when wee are ashamed of that whereof wee should not wee will not be ashamed of that whereof wee ought to have shame Finally a prince must be a good justicer ever respective that the meaner poorer sort be not oppressed by the greatest neither by such men as are violent or evill livers All those things shall bee no charge to the prince to bring to passe yet by these meanes hee may greatly inrich his subjects which then will never spare any thing they have at their princes demand The people of the earledome of Foix are of their owne natures rude and stubborne enough yet wee reade That in the time of Gaston contie of Foix who was in the time of king Charles the sixt his subjects paied him so great tallies and imposts as hee held a kings estate though hee were but a counte Yea they payed him them very liberally without constraint and bore unto him great amitie and benevolence and whereupon came this but because hee
maintained them in peace when all his neighbors about him were in great warre and that hee maintained so good justice amongst them as none but hee alone pilled and vexed them And certaine it is that if men must needes bee robbed and spoiled they had rather to bee so dealt with by one man alone then of many and that subjects will beare it better at their princes hands than of particulars but especiallie when extreame and hard tallies and imposts are laid upon subjects if they bee descried to bee imployed for the publike good and that it bee something softened and sweetened by a good peace justice And therefore de Comines together praiseth and reprehendeth king Lewis the eleventh his master saying That hee pilled and oppressed his subjects but yet hee would never suffer any other to doe them any evill or any way to rob or spoyle them But to many it may seeme that that we have abovesaid tendeth too much unto the dispraise of Povertie which notwithstanding seemes to bee praised and recommended by our Christian religion But hereunto I answer That Povertie of it selfe is neither praiseable nor vituperable but men must judge of them according to circumstances For if it bee suffered with an holy patience by a Christian man who takes in good part and contenteth himselfe with the vocation whereunto God hath called him and with the meanes which he hath given him and if it bee accompanied with a simple and gentle spirit assuredly such a Povertie may bee placed in the ranke of the greatest vertues For it is no small vertue to bee able well and constantly to beare Povertie without straying out of the path but rather a very difficill and rare thing Therefore the Panims themselves praised and admired Aristides Phocion Lisander Valerius Publicola Fabricius Curius Quintus Cincinnatus Menencus Agrippa Paulus Aemilius and many other great persons which have carried themselves like good and vertuous people though they were very poore because they suffered Povertie with a great and constant courage and without straying any thing from vertue Yet so much there wanteth that Christian doctrine approveth this Povertie of begging that contrary it forbiddeth plainely that none bee suffered to beg And likewise the word of God witnesseth unto us That good men will not willinglie suffer their children to beg their bread for alwaies God assisteth and giveth them meanes Therefore Monkes called Mendicants have gone too far in praising extolling and exalting Povertie not taking it as it must be understoode by the word of God And so it is like they will soone repent that from the beginning they have made so deepe a profession of Povertie against which they have many times since pleaded kicked and spurned yet could never bee rid nor dispatched of it but alwaies have beene compelled by Popes and Parliaments alwaies to hould and observe it as a thing wherein lay and lyeth all the perfection of the orders But because this account and narration is pleasant to tyred and wearied readers I will a little discourse upon the warres of these Mendicant friers You must then know that these Mendicants at their first entrie into the world to renowne their names proposed to themselves straightly to follow the estate of perfection How the Mendicants pleaded against Povertie lost the cause that by their owne merits they might enter into Paradize and cause others to enter into favour of them and with their authoritie This estate of perfection they constituted in three points Chastitie Obedience and Povertie Of the two first points wee will not speake heere but onely of the last point which is Povertie Of this Povertie also they have made three kinds High Meane and Base High Povertie which the Franciscan Friers attribute unto themselves is that which hath nothing in this world neither in proper nor in common any way that is neither fields nor house nor possession nor rents nor pension nor beasts nor moveables nor apparrell nor bookes nor rights nor actions nor fruits nor any other thing in the world Behold here indeede a soveraigne pure and exceeding neere Povertie wherin there neither wanteth any thing neither is there any thing to be reprooved since it hath nothing at all The second kind which is for the Dominicans and Iacobins is a Meane Povertie which hath nothing particular or proper but only somethings in common as bookes apparrell and daily victuals The third and last kind which the Carmelites Augustines have retained for themselves is Base Povertie which may have proper common and in particular whatsoever is justly necessarie to life as apparrell bookes certaine pensions and some lands for helpe of their kitchin and necessitie of their living And it is good to note in those good brethren the Carmelites and Augustines how humble they shew themselves to bee contented with so base a kind of Povertie without any desire to mount higher as acknowledging themselves unworthie and incapable for to ascend into so high and superlative a degree These Mendicants then being obliged and restrained unto Povertie by a solemn vow which they make at their profession in their orders they are so annexed united and incorporated in it and with it that never after they could be never so little seperated or dismembred what diligence or labour soever they used to do it hereof they have found themselves much troubled and sorrowfull For howsoever gallant and goodly the Theorique of Povertie is yet in practise they have found it a little too difficile and hard And indeede if you consider more nigh the Theorique thereof especially of that high and soveraigne Povertie I know not whether you can finde any thing in the world more excellent or more admirable For they which make profession thereof in my opinion come something nigh an Angell like nature because the Angels have no need of the use of the earthly corruptible goods of this miserable world but onely take care of divine and spirituall things More also they which make profession of this high Povertie have this advauntage over the rich men which possesse the goods of this vale of miserie that they are not wrapped in so many mischeefes and travailes which accompanie those goods but are franke and free taking no care nor thought for ploughing manuring sowing reaping grape-gathering lopping of trees grafting eradicating cutting planting building selling buying or doing any other like things which concerne the affaires of the world From all these things they are free and exempted having nothing which hindereth them to be in a continuall contemplation and meditation of divine things to come in time unto a great and deepe wisedome yea to approch to the Angelicall nature of the Cherubins and Seraphins which have no other occupation than to contemplate and exalt the Divinitie But also if on the other side you consider the great difficulties in this so strict and straight use of Povertie you shall find it verily a sad and unpleasant thing For it is an approoved