present House of Bourbon and granted good terms to the Protestants but was afterwards stabb'd by Ravillac of the Romish and Jesuitical Faction The first occasion as was hinted of these Troubles was the Massacre at Merindal Anno 1545. but specially the great Massacre at Paris and thereupon presently throughout the whole kingdom an 1572. from which time the Holy League began Which was a Sacred Confederation of the Pope king of Spain and Duke of Guise for the Catholick Religion and to root out Hereticks And to that end to set up some more Catholick and zealously affected and engaged King and Interest either the King of Spain or Duke of Guise of the Family of Lorrain descended from Charles the great on whom the Pope pretends to have bestowed no less than the Roman Empire upon its ruine and the kingdom of France upon its alienation to Pepin his Father Lewis the 13 th his Son succeeded 1610 the most absolute King of France since Charles the Great For he reduc'd the Protestants to his obedience and all the Forts and Castles held by them to the number of three hundred diminishes the Liberty of Religion granted by Henry the fourth by Decree ordering that all the Protestants should be in all things equal with the Catholicks and enjoy the same Priviledges and Immunities In which War the Siege of Rochel was most famous where all the Art of War was shewn Anno 1628. taken and its Walls demolished Cardinal Richlieu was his chief Counsellor and Minister of State under whom he brings all France into one entire body and state yet Liberty of Religion by agreement continued to the Protestants And from that time bent all his Horce against Spain and House of Austria then encreasing So by the Conduct of Richlieu accomplish'd great things in Italy Germany Spain and Flanders as well as his own Kingdom So that by the peace at Munster between both Emperor and Spain all Alsatia was added to France and the strongest places on this side the Rhine and a good part of Flanders c. whereby France recovered the bounds as it were of ancient Gaul The Dukedom of Lorraine also during the German wars was put into the protection of France about the restoring of which there has been some difficulties of late or demurres An. 1642. Lewis the 14 th four years old succeeds in whose minority the Queen Mother managed affairs with Cardinal Mazarine a stranger which stirred the envy and hatred of the French against him 1650. The discontented Princes are imprisoned which causes intestine commotions the Prince of Conde chief 1651. They are freed Mazarin driven out of Paris and banished But the King entering his 14th year recalled Conde arms against the King 1652. At Mazarin's return now Civil Discords revive But the Cardinal outdoes them and becomes more potent and glorious Prince of Conde takes the Spaniards part in Flanders Afterwards Mazarine made Peace with England 1660. The Wars between France and Spain for twenty six years ended and Peace made The Kings marriage with Spains Infanta follows by Mazarin's and De Haro's means Which has since occasioned the late War in Flanders Conde reconcil'd to the King and restor'd Since which the Protestants never in lower condition nor more under the hatches and have lost more by this Peace then ever they did by their own Wares Aurange taken into the Kings protection and unwalled 1661. Duke of Orleans the Kings Brother Marries the Princesse of England The Duke of Lorraine sells his Provinces to the King of France his Nephew dissenting The rest since are flesh in memory Namely the Political and Civildeath as it were of the Protestants since the General Peace 1660 and since this last Peace also The Wars with England France confederating with Holland or rather poizing the lighter Ballance or weaker side The Comprehension of the Jansenists and the four Jansenian Bishops with the chief thereof Doctor Arnaud within the Bounds of the Romish Church Marshal Turein turn'd Catholick So that France is like to be one entire Body of Catholicks which no doubt is one main design on foot of the Pope and Jesuites who by strange and unobserved artifices sway Princes and their grand Ministers of State c. The Foundation and Revolutions of Spain and Portugal After the breaking of the Roman Empire there was a Kingdom founded over all Spain and Portugal by the West Goths coming out of Italy This Kingdom was destroyed afterwards by the Moors and Saracens The Goths began soon after to revive again and to erect several lesser Kingdoms by degrees as they could which in time were variously united and disunited again and perpetual Wars with one another The grand division at last was into the kingdom of the Moors and of the Christians or Goths The Moors Kingdom in the end fixed only in Andalusia or most Southern parts of Spain The Christians became divided also in time into four chief Kingdoms Castile Arragon Navarre and Portugal which could never unite till 1. Ferdinand the Great sirnamed the Catholick King of Arragon laid the Foundations of the last and greatest Monarchy of Spain by marriage with Isabel Queen of Castile c. towards the year 1480. in which Race continued ever since Whereupon mighty things ensued 1. Perpetual Union betwixt those two potent Kingdoms 2. The utter rooting out presently thereupon the Moors and Saracens from the kingdom of Andalusia who had held Spain more or less in subjection for seven hundred years Anno 1492. Upon which they presum'd to stile themselves King and Queen of Spain i. e. all Spain to the prejudice of Navarre and Portugal who were yet distinct Kingdoms 3. The seizing on the kingdom of Navarre whereto belonged Naples and Sicily c. 4. The discovery of the New World America the year 1492. After which they had the title of Catholick by the Pope to the prejudice of all other Kingdoms 5. The marrying of their only Daughter and Heir to Philip the Emperors Son Archduke of Austria Prince of the Netherlands thereby uniting those great Estates and laying the Foundation also for the present Austrian Greatness and Family continued ever since by so many intermarriages between the Spanish and Imperial branches of that potent Family And thus the Spaniards first became considerable in the World and a Terror to Neighbours and suddenly look'd like the beginners of a fifth or Universal Monarchy of the World at least the New-World Which they affected first in Title Getting 1. that of Catholick Kings after they had usurped that of Kings of Spain as designed by the Pope for Universal or Catholick Monarch to promote the Catholick Cause on Religion to root out Hereticks c. which has been alwayes their pretext and which they have been alwayes zealous and mighty sticklers for And 2 they have hereby claimed prerogative over all other Kings and by pretext of their Title have ever since look'd on themselves as the Greatest Monarchs of all the World as indeed they had
given for their assistance And so became possessed of innumerable places belonging to the Empire the Pope Milan and Kingdom of Naples working their greatness out of others ruines which sordid kind of Merchandise drew all the Princes of these parts afterwards to make War upon them every one to recover by strong hand what they had extorted from them in their necessity Being therefore arrived to their greatest height and power after mighty Tempest of War they begin to decline from about the year 1500. For now all Europe conspired to extinguish this Commonwealth the Pope being chief Author A League then is made between the Pope Emperour King of France King of Spain wherein lesser Princes joyn'd at Cambray in the Netherlands An. 1508. So secret and private that they were oppressed before they understood it and so were wholly almost overcome and scarce had any thing left but their City fell down at Caesar's feet and cry Peccavi By which submission they out-live this confederacy to see it desolved and thereupon easily recover again from each single what they had lost to all save Naples only And have ever since thought it their wisest course not to conquer but to keep and to become Mediators and Reconcilers rather then Medlers between differing Princes And by privy Leagues rather then open Wars do defend themselves against the Emperor and House of Austria Their latest Enemies and of this age have been the Pope the Emperor and above all the Turk The Pope An. 1605. excommunicates the Commonwealth of Venice 1 Because they would exclude all Ecclesiasticks from Government 2 because they would pay no pension to the Court of Rome and though good Catholicks yet little cared for the Pope The occasion was the difference between the State and the Churchmen The Pope defended the Churchmen and the Venetians their Laws and the right of Majesty They arm against the Pope the French and Spaniard stand lookers on the French to quench and the Spaniards to inflame the Fire Only the Hollanders bring help to the State And at last ended the Popes ridiculous War but with perpetuall Banishment of the Jesuites for adhereing to the Pope and would by no means be intreated to tolerate them in their Territories till ten years since through necessities of the Turks Wars and for favour of the late Pope they were restored again but on strict conditions c. These Jesuites were once also expell'd out of France for King-killing Documents and practises but soon cunningly worked themselves in again there An. 1616 There was War between the Venetians and the Austrians But the Holanders helping them Peace was soon made The occasion was about some Rights in Istria and Friuli c. An. 1645. The Turks invade Candy and soon make themselves Masters of all save the City of Candy it self which they have maintained for above this twenty years against all the Ottoman Power to the amazement of the World Specially this two last years close Siege 1650. The Venetians resist stoutly against the Turks both by Sea and Land 1659. They do famous things against the Turks by Sea and Land But too greedy of Plunder are driven back again to the Walls of Candy 1661. They defeat and scatter the Turks Fleet notably bringing relief to Canea Since which time they have for this two or three years laid close Siege to the City wrought their Mines Planted their Battries attempted several Storms and Assaults but still repulsed with incredible courage and conduct to the loss of first or last 't is thought near 80000. of their Army and the Vizier himself as is reported lately killed in a violent on-set The like Siege has not been known in our Age where all the Art Valour Skill and Prudence of War both of defence and offence has been shewn to the wonder of all Europe And perhaps hardly ever before c. Of Genoa They were anciently a large and flourishing Common-wealth getting their liberty out of the divisions of Italy among several Lords and Masters and were too potent for the Venetians as before hinted But through their own divisions and factions at length loose almost all their estates to Potent Neighbours and enemies The City being miserably torn in pieces by endless and perpetual factions The Berengarij as Kings of Italy opposit to the Emperor made them free An. 899. And first under Governors till 1100. Then Consuls to 1194. then Mayors And then added Governors of the People to them c. with wonderful fluctuation and inconstancy through the multitude of factions c. At last to alay the factions between the Nobles and Commons a Duke was created by the people for every two years of the Nobility or the Commons An. 1327. Those factions were first between the Dorij and Spinoli on one side and the Flischi and Grimaldi on the other About 1174. Next of the Negri and Mollani against the Salvatici and Embriam about 1289. and lastly frequently between the Nobles and Commons which brought them to this forementioned Government Which factions did so weaken them at home and abroad that they became of far less reputation and authority then anciently For this great City Commanded the Ocean and all the affairs of Italy in a manner once And brought the Venetians under to their last gasp as it were but through these divisions lost almost all their large Estates and reduced to that narrow compass they have now at present For neither did their factions change or cease with their Governments This Government by Dukes continued yet not without Parties still as between the Spinoli and Dorij themselves An. 1336. and the Nobility and Commons 1339. and the Guelfi and Gibellines c. till the French were called in by the Guelfian faction About An. 1390. for they were so broken that they were feign to put themselves under the protection of Neighbours to defend that little they had left And so they deliver themselves up to the King of France Afterwards An. 1403. they put themselves under the protection of the Dukes of Milan which were sometimes under the obedience of the French sometimes of the Spaniard But after many changes and alterations of this kind they are at length restored to liberty from the Empire of the French by Charles the fifth An. 1522. and the New form of Government instituted by Andrea Dori An. 1528. called therefore Father of their Country and Dukes are created every two years by lot This lasted till 1574. When dissentions arose between the Nobles and Commons but composed by the Emperor King of Spain and the Pope But not being able to preserve their freedom restored so to them they finally put themselves under Spain who becomes their Protector and thereupon all occasions of War borrows Mony of them upon use by which and by their Trade with Spain they have exceedingly thriven grown excessively rich contenting themselves only with Riches and Trade without aiming at Dominion And though far inferior to the Venetians
upon all Kingdoms and Nations and the whole World too at least occasionally or even but to see their own interests and concerns to hate the Whore and burn her with fire Daemonis Ira premens odijs ac fraudibus orbem Implet nec damnis hominum exsaturata quiescit The Devil fill'd with Rage the World doth fill With Wars and Cheats to rule it at his will And for more mischief is more greedy still The Devil Of Evil Will never have his fill This is the Kingdom of the Beast and the Synagogue of Satan or a General draught of the hellish Hierarchy of Rome or Popedom of King and Priest Lucifer on Earth The pretended grouuds and foundations of their Popedom Spiritual have been already hinted before Those for their Temporal are much of the same nature viz. That the Pope is Christ s that is God's Vicar or Vice-Gerent and so not only Vice-Roy as it were but Vice-God on Earth which title they dare own That He 's Visible Head of the Church and so of the State too in order to the Church For that the Church is above the State The Head of the Church above the Head of the State The State for the Church not the Church for the State and therefore dominion to be founded in Grace c. And so no Enemies of the Church Infidels or Hereticks to be capable thereof but to be destroyed and rooted out c. which are all they shall judge so Likewise many Rights Priviledges and Favours granted by Constantine the Great Charls the Great and other Emperors and Kings As also usurped and long permitted or connived at Customs Examples Presidents c. But in one word an outward Carnal Religion in the Letter without the Spirit The form of Godliness without the Power Christians both Pastors Preachers and People first not having the Spirit nor the wisedom from above namely the wisedom of God and the Power of God but the wisedom of man or that which is worse the wisedom from beneath earthly sensual and devillish Hence Ceremonies without substance external and carnal Ordinances Commandements and Inventions of men in the Worship and Service of God Love of the World and things of the World Pride Ambition Covetousness and Voluptuousness and Preaching and professing Religion for such ends and taking all up from tradition authority and forefathers c. Whence contentions and divisions about needless Opinions and Ceremonies for Dignity Superiority and Supremacy for Riches and Honours c. â—nd then a pompous gaudy and merry Religion to please the people and gratifie the outward man to maintain and uphold the greatness power pomp and pleasures of the Clergy through the secret and mysterious working of Iniquity in men of corrupt minds and erring concerning the Faith and the Truth which was after godliness c. with some frightful devices to scare and awe their guilty fearful and slavish Consciences and other petty ones again to pacifie and allay them mistaking the whole Mystery of Godliness and inverting it into a Mystery of Iniquity one degree of Error and Corruption bringing in another I say all this is the foundation and Superstructure of this Kingdom of darkness and of Hell For the natural man perceiveth not the things of God and of the Kingdom of God As for the Popes Temporal Principality and Soveraigne Estate in Rome and Italy and Avignon called the Estate or Land of the Church and St. Peters Patrimony The foundation thereof as a peculiar and distinct Soveraignty apart besides the forementioned grounds of the donation of Christ to St. Peter and his Successors as his Sea c. it depends over and above on the forged and counterfeit donation of Constantine on the real donation of Pepin and Charls the Great c. on the Countess Mathilda's last Will and Testament All which gave liberally to St. Peter and lastly on Usurpation Arms and Violence And notwithstanding it 's convenient situation for the command of all Italy and the perpetual fractions there formerly yet they could never so wisely manage their Pope-craft as yet to possess themselves like the ancient Romans of the whole which remains divided among many Princes and Soveraign Estates As the Estate of ancient Lombardy under which is contained the Dukedom of Milan subject to Spain the Dukedom of Mantua Modena Montferrat and the Principality of Piemont which belongs to Savoy The great Dukedom of Tuscany or Florence The Lands or Estate of the Church or the Popes Patrimony The Kingdom of Naples with Sicily Sardinia under Spain And lastly The Commonwealth of Venice Genoa and Lucca An. 1595. The Pope chalenged the Dukedom of Ferrara for want of lawful Issue in the right of the Church and partly by force partly by composition united it for ever to the Sea of Rome An. 1626. The great Dukedom of Urbin foremerly made fudatory to the Church and held thereof in homage for want of Heirs of right fell to the Pope c. About 1647. The Pope seized on the Dukedom of Castro from the Duke of Parma upon the account of feudatory Quit-rent due to the Popes whence arose War But the Controtroversie was composed by the authority of the King of France in their late treaty 1664. when agreed that Castro should be restored to Parma and the Duke to pay the mony due c. And then agreed likewise that the K. of France should restore Avignon to the Pope w ch he had seiz'd on not long before upon the quarrel about his Embassador at Rome w ch was acordingly done And thus we have in general represented the foundations and Revolutions of the Papal Hierarchy or Kingdom of the Pope both Temporal and Spiritual its rise growth increase height and decrease not being able well to comprehend so long and mysterious an History and so confused with all others in less room and willing only to touch upon chief particulars of their usurpations incroachings and domineerings down to our times that so you might have a Map or Table and plain veiw as it were at once of this Ecclesiastical and Priestly Kingdom All which 't was necessary to fetch so high the better to understand the coherence of the story and present State thereof with the Affairs and Revolutions both of the Governments and Religions of all Christendom which it has so wretchedly involved it self with The sum of all in short is this The Popedom was a digging working and preparing as it were underground about 400. years most eminently from Victor about the year 192. and others especially afterwards from under Constantine the Great about the year 300. to Boniface the 3 d. About the year 600. As Covetous Proud Corrupt Opinionated and in one word Apostate Luciferian Bishops Pastors and Priests that had fell from their first standing and foundation of the Apostles that is the primitive purity and simplicity of the Gospel to devised Fables Ceremonies Inventions Constitutions and Prudentials c. The Popedom Spiritual or Universal
pretty quiet ever since the Janizaries had deposed and kill'd the Grand Senior 1648. now invade Transylvania The Imperialists march against them into Hungary and Transylvania The Turks subdue a great part of Transylvania and constitute a new Prince thereof Abaffy 1662. Count Serin spoils the Turks Countries Turks take Fogaras Castle domineer establish Abaffi who besieges Clausenburg Rais'd by the Imperialists Turks make a treacherous and perfideous Truce in Transylvania The Turks again invade Hungaria 1663. Besiege and take Newhausel and other places in Upper-Hungary The Emperor married to the Infanta 2d Daughter of Spain 1664. Zeckeild and Clausenburg betrayed and sold by the Souldiers to Abaffi Count Serin with Auxiliary Forces invades the Turks Countries takes strong places Burns the five Protestant Churches returns loaden with prey But kild by a wild Boar after Peace made with the Turks the year after viz. 1665. Assembly of Emperor Electors and Princes and States of the Empire to consult against the progress of the Turk and to sollicite Kings Princes and States for help At length Peace made with the Turk 1665. War between the Elector of Mentz or Mayence and the Elector Palatine 1664 not yet allay'd Also between the two Dukes of Luneburgh for the division and succession into their elder Brother's Estates begun and ended almost at the same time towards the beginning of 1665. Between the United Provinces and Bishop of Munster during their differences with England but soon ended 1668. Battel fought between the Palatine and Lorrainers Victory dubious rather inclining to the Lorrainers Palatine seeks help Endeavours for Peace now on foot The Revolutions of the Electoral Estates c. To the Revolutions of the Empire pertain those of the Electoral Princes under which the Kingdom of Bohemia those of Hungary and the three grand Principalities Transylvania Walachia and Moldavia Of which briefly All the Princes of Germany anciently were Electors in common and no distinction between Electors and Non-Electors The Princes and consequently the Electors were and are absolute Princes in their own Estates Electors began about the year 1000 under Otho the third by permission only for convenience of taking Votes and avoiding Confusions and by the prevalency of the more potent under specious pretences No certain number of Electors at first but sometimes more sometimes less By use and tacit confent at last Seven onely introduced chiefly about the year 1200. But finally establish'd and confirm'd by the Golden Bull 1356. An Eighth instituted for the Palatine by the Treaty of Munster 1648 who was outed of the fifth The Ecclesiastick Electors had the precedency through the usurped Soveraignty of the Pope above the Emperor and power of the Clergy and Bishops in those dayes The Arch-Bishop of Mentz Chancellor through Germany Dean and President of the Colledge of Electors to convocate preside propose and conclude He hath the priviledge of crowning Caesar except at Aken i. e. Aix la Caplle in the Dukedom of Juliers which belongs to the Elector of Colen The Arch-Bishop of Tryers Chancellor through France And of Colen Chancellor through Italy who pretends right of crowning Caesar whence in the Diet at Ratisbone some ten years since he departed without saluting Caesar And this had like to have broke out into a publick quarrel The Secular are the King of Bohemia the Duke of Bavaria Saxony Brandenburgh and the Palatine The Electorship of the Palatine with his Country the Upper Palatinate was conferr'd on the Duke of Bavaria by Munster-Treaty 1648. It was anciently call'd the Electorate of Bavaria the Palatine being of that House And so that long dispute ended which had lasted above three hundred years The Duke of Bavaria exercises the Vicarship in vacancy of the Empire But the Palatine disputed it at the chusing of this present Emperor 1658. The Duke of Saxony convocated the Protestant Princes 1630 for a Defensive League who conclude to maintain Liberty by Arms and so it becomes a Saxonick War He unfaithfully and unjustly transacts Peace alone with the Emperor after the Battel at Norlington and other Princes yield to his Articles 1635. This Peace causes a new War with the Swede and French confederate never ended till 1648. Duke of Saxon marries 1663 with the eldest daughter of Denmark The Marquess of Brandenburgh has the largest Dominions of all being Duke of Pomerania many ages since Prussia was divided between him and Poland he to have the title of Duke of the whole and to hold his part with some Homage to Poland An. 1525. The Swedes since have disturb'd him both in Pomerania and Prussia By the Treaty of Munster Upper Pomerania and Stetin c. to remain to the Swede the Lower to Brandenburgh The Arms and Titles to both He obtain'd the Fee-Simple of Prussia 1611. In 1658 Prussia is made an absolute Dukedom free from all dependance or homage on Poland Understand still the Duke's part of Prussia Konigsberg refused yet 1662 acknowledges the Elector Supream Prince And his Soveraign Power over Prussia establish'd 1663 when they swear to him again The Elector Palatine was made 8th Elector and so who for so many years had been first was now last of all the Princes Electors He is restor'd to the Palatinate in part since Munster Peace War since with Mentz 1665 and Lorrainers at present before hinted Late Revolutions of Bohemia in short The King of Bohemia Elector and one of the Estates of the Empire first among the Secular Electors has now only a Vote but not the right of Session and Suffrage in the Electoral Colledge nor Universal Diets of the Empire Bohemia distracted and ruin'd came at last to forreign Kings and in the end to the House of Austria above an hundred years since and so continues Moravia and Silesia were many ages since added to Bohemia and have ever since followed its fortunes The Kingdom of Bohemia was ever elective till the late Bohemian Wars lost them that priviledge as it were About the year 1618 they exclude the Emperor according to priviledge a bloody enemy of the Protestants and choose the Palatine King as has been shewn Chief heretofore of the Electoral Princes and Head of the Protestants Cavinists whence ensues the bloody War of Thirty years durance Since which made in a manner an Hereditary Province of the Empire and House of Austria The Empire having no open formidable enemy at present save the Turk in Hungary and Transylvania we shall here subjoyn the present face of things there Of Hungary Hungary being ruined by the Tartars about Anno 1242 began to seek forreign Kings about the year 1300. At length the Emperor and Austrian Family obtains it about 1440. But afterwards ensu'd grievous wars with the Turks against whom Huniades a famous Hero The Emperor contending with the Prince thereof who was chosen by the Estates of the Kingdom and for his assistance made use of the Turk about the year 1520 loses the greatest part thereof to Solyman the Magnificent whence continual
since the occasion of War between them He then besieges Smolensko 1634 and there receives a great and shameful Overthrow and Destruction by the Poles which Dukedom has ever since been the Apple of Contention as well as formerly betwixt them He reigned till 1645. To whom succeeded his young Son Alexius the present Emperor In 1646 they made peace with Poland and during the Kings minority there was some troubles and distempers in the State and an horrible Sedition 1648. but all soon quietly setled Anno 1654. The Moscovites invade Lituania overcome Smolensko and 1655 take Vilna invade Livonia 1656 The Cossacks a Confederate Army of Rogues and Robbers that take either side for their Prey or Money or other ends and designs or as they are pleased or displeased with affairs and belong chiefly to Poland they joyn with the Poles and defeat the Moscovites anno 1659. The Poles prosper But the Cossacks at last break Faith and again rebel to the Moscovites and invade and spoyl some Provinces An. 1660 Czarneckie in Lituania beats the Muscovites Their Army also in Poland under Zeremetzie reduc'd to straits and forced to surrender themselves to the Poles Vilna in Lituania besieged by the Poles till next year An. 1662 The Moscovite beats the Tartars Overcomes the Cossacks under Chimilinsky But again overcome by Cossacks and Tartars And 1664 The Moscovites overcome and beat by the Pole Peace since between them The Emperor of Moscovia now sollicits for the election of his Son to the Crown of Poland offers fair Conditions and that he shall change his Religion from the Greek to the Roman which would have much influence upon the Jesuites perhaps and zealous Religionists of the Papists if Reason of State otherwayes did not hinder The great Enemies you see of the Russes then are the Pole the Swede and the Tartar helpt by the Turk Anno 1230 the Tartars over-ran all Russia and made it tributary and for three hundred years kept their Power over it more or less and gave and took away Dukes over them as they pleased Anno 1500 Basil shook off this yoke Yet Anno 1570 an hundred thousand Tartars on a sudden overran Mosco and laid it wholly in Ashes The Poles and Russes strive for the Dukedom of Smolensko and Severia which both claim and both win and take continually Of late years the Cossacks with all Ukrain revolted to the Russes But since Peace and Compositions of things made The Swede and Russe contend for Livonia The Swede by success of Arms has expell'd both the Russe and the Pole and annex'd it to their Crown Hence the Wars between the Russe and Swede continually Riga has been often attempted and besieg'd in vain by the Russe But we pass to their next neighbour Poland The Revolutions of Poland Poland has for many ages been a distinct Soveraignty The first that was elective was Piastus after the failure of the former line a plain Country-man elected Duke of Poland An. 800. Afterwards became a Kingdom still in Piastus's line An. 1320. Silesia fell from Poland to Bohemia and could never be recovered An. 1386. They made the Great Duke of Lituania by marriage into their King's Family King and so joyn'd that great Dukedom to Poland An. 1466. Casimir adds Prussia and 1561 Livonia is added to it also The Royal Family being extinct they chuse forreign Princes anno 1573. and first chuse the Duke of Anjou Brother of Charles the 9 th King of France about the year 1575. But he quickly left it for the Crown of France An. 1579 they chose Bathor Prince of Transylvania by recommendation of the Turks He firmly united Livonia to the Crown and had a great hand upon the Moscovites He dying without issue they chose Sigismund the King of Swede's Son about the year 1590 whose posterity has ever since enjoy'd it but now the line fails He joyn'd the Kingdom of Swede and Poland But turning Papist endeavours by the Jesuites perswasions to disturb Religion in Swedeland and so was ejected and losing his Patrimonial kingdom only keeps Poland Hence those lasting Wars between the two Nations To him succeeded Uladislaus famous for the memorable Victory against the Moscovites besieging Smolensko an 1634. After whose death Anno 1647 The kingdom became extreamly imbroyl'd by Factions specially by the mutinous and seditious Cossacks a Rebellious Army as it were of Boors and Moss-troopers that live upon prey and rapine and serve any side as was hinted risen first and chiefly out of the wild parts of Poland Lituania c. next Russia who at this time began to be more troublesome than ever during all the present king Casimir's Reign and not fully setled till very lately and perhaps not to hold long neither King Casimir succeeded an 1648. so troubled all his dayes that he has been a long time weary of his Crown and now at last laid it down not obtaining leave to nominate his Successor The better to understand the late Revolutions of Poland in brief take them thus Poland has suffered great Revolutions and Troubles from forreign Enemies Rebellious Cossacks and Confederate Nobles Grand Enemies are the Swede the Russe the Tartar and the Turk The Wars with the Swede are for Livonia for pretence to the Crown of Swede for Titles and Arms. Hereupon the late king of Sweden overran in one year almost all Poland but lost all again the next But these pretences now cease in the present king having no heirs With the Russes for several causes before mentioned With the Tartars commonly call'd the Crim Tartars distinct from those in Asia these bordering upon Russia and Poland who make yearly Incursions almost for prey and plunder either as friends or enemies all 's one Therefore the Tartars do not seek to conquer so much as to plunder Poland But the greatest Enemies are the Turks ever since they got Walachia Moldavia and Transylvania the Walls Bulwarks as it were of Poland and also the Tartars to be subject to them But they have yet threatned more than done any thing and little has passed besides consultings and fears hitherto betwixt them The seditious and mutinous Cossacks have done most mischief One of the chief causes of their Rebellion was the great oppression of the Natives by the Jews in all the Customs and Tributes almost of the Kingdom granted to them by King Casimir and ever since possessed by them by the means of Esther a Jewish in behalf of her Nation who obtain'd great Priviledges for them And in the late fatal Confusions of Poland the Russians again besieged Smolensko and seiz'd not only on it but all Ukrain or black Russia and great part of Lituania The occasion whereof was first the Jesuites taking away the Russes Temples and hindring the free Liberty of Religion to them Next the Nobles Tyranny over the Peasants killing them at their pleasure Hence inraged they rise up against their Masters kill the Jesuites and Priests call the Cossacks and Tartars to their help
and mutual prey These mischiefs increased during the Poles dissention about Election of a King and had like to have ruin'd all Poland After long Contentions they chose Casimir Brother of the deceased King who being not enough assisted by his People backward then to wage War is circumvented by the Cossacks and forc'd to those Conditions of Peace that the present Necessity required To all which Evils succeeded War with the Swedes and lastly with the Nobles under Lubomirskie about nominating a Successor during the King's Reign c. We will recollect and summe the passages according to the years they happened in Uladislaus dyes 1648. Casimir constituted 1649 who marches against the Rebellious Cossacks The King marries his Brothers Widow 1651. Poles beat Tartars and Cossacks and put them to flight 1654. The Moscovite with 40000 breaks into Lituania and takes Smolensko so often won and lost For An. 1500 a Poland Noble-man betray'd it to the Moscovite The Poles recover it 1610. The Moscovite attempts it 1634 but beaten then shamefully and now take it c. 1655. King of Swede marches against Poland and overrun all in a years time The Brandenburgh per force Confederates with him 1656. Moscovite takes Vilna in Lituania 1657. Ragotzi marches into Poland but loses all his Army and then his own Country The Elector of Brandenburgh agrees with the Pole prevailing against the Swede 1658. The Rebel Cossacks overcome by General Wyhoskie 1659. The Cossacks joyn'd with Poles beat the Moscovites The Poles prevail and prosper At last the Cossacks break Faith given to the Poles and again rebel to the Moscovite and spoil the Poland Provinces 1660. The War between Swede and Pole confederate with Brandenburgh ended and peace made and Brandenburgh made absolute over Prussia 1663 and they swear to him again The Moscovite overcome by Pole and Czarneskie Also the Moscovian Army under Zeremetzie reduced to straits forced to yeeld Vilna Tower besieg'd by Poles to the next year 1661. The Poland Army and Lituanian Army confederate together against the King Whence many Mischiefs to both Countries Czarneskie adhering to the King overcomes the Moscovites under Cowanskie Vilna and other places in Lituania taken from the Moscovites 1662. The confederate Army under Schwidersky make a stricter Confederacy and several thousands enter Prussia and demand Tribute or Taxes The Cossacks under Chimilinsky besieging a place are beat by the Moscovite under Romadonofsky But the Moscovites afterwards are overcome by the Cossacks and Tartars The Lituanian Confederate Army kill their chief Marshal and Treasurer 1663. The Confederate Armies in Poland and Lituania dissolve their Confederacy and agree with the King and their General Lubomirsky victorious in Battel against the King restor'd again And so the Civil War between the King and Nobility drew towards an end 1664. K. of Poland takes many Towns from the Cossacks A famous Victory by General Packs or Pasky against Wikousky General of the Rebel Cossacks They are reduc'd under the King's power to obedience The Moscovites overcome by the Lituanians Since peace and settlement of things has been transacting on all sides not without difficulty and new troubles to the King about nominating his Successour being ever since about laying down his Government And now at last having first quieted and satisfied all parties as much as possible has left the Crown unto Factions and Competitors not being able to nominate a Successor before he left it and eased himself of such a burden The whole business now being about Succession concerning which observe Of the Election of Poland First the Power of the Nobles Secondly the Competitors for the Crown For the Power of Election 1. The Power of the Nobles is exceeding great and each single Noble is as it were a single King and hath Soveraign power over his Slaves even of Life and Death 2. The Nobles choose the King and prescribe what Laws they like 3. If any will not accept these Laws they proclaim PIASTUS i. e. they will go to the choosing of some Rustick or plain Country-man of their own Nation 4. There are perpetual strifes between the Nobles and Senators or Council The Senators favour the King the Nobles the Kingdom 5. There is a like power of all the Nobles so that one dissenting the other Suffrages are void and one only Noble hath right to intercede in the Diet or Parliament against all and to plead the Cause When all the rest had given their consent a Noble stands up once and said I do not consent Being asked his Reason sayes Because I am a Noble Nor did they reckon the Decree good till they had his Consent 6. In the Parliament or Diet of Poland the Deputies of the Nobility and the publick Liberty call'd Land-Nuncio's or Messengers to plead strongly their Cause against the King and Senators of the Kingdom are of greatest Authority For the Nobles are alwayes afraid lest they should lose their Priviledges to the King which are so great Next for the Competitors Eligible know First that though the Kingdom be Elective yet they never past by the Kings Family to choose others but when the Line fails then they seek strangers and grievous Factions arise before they can agree Secondly The Competitors have been 1. the Moscovite because of the same Language and Nation originally and Neighbourhood 2. The Crim Tartar urging that He is powerful and able to bring an hundred thousand Horse into the Field That he is hardy and can live at a low rate That as for Religion so controverted and disputed in Poland with such Commotions he will not stand for that they shall have what they will Thy Luther says he My Luther Thy Pope my Pope as once in his Ambassadors Letters Credentials he wrote And that rather than put them to any charge to find his Table he could live with Horseflesh His Embassy thereupon entertain'd with laughter 3. The House of Austria specially since one Faction chose the Archduke Maximilian but the prevailing the King of Swedes Son by the King of Polands Sister yet Maximilian reserv'd both right and title 4. The King of France ever since Charles the 9 ths time when they chose his Brother the Duke of Anjou afterwards King of France Ever since which the French have alwayes cherished some party against the House of Austria and Emperor specially after that the last King but this viz. Uladislaus fetch'd his Wife out of France marrying the Dutchess of Nevers whom this K. Casimir his Brother also married after his death 5. Of late there also was great endeavours and underhand for the Prince of Conde's Son Duke of Anjou after this Kings death or some other addicted to the French But this distasted the Nobles and would not do But since the Resignation of the Crown the present Strivers for it are the Moscovit's Son who will turn Romanist and makes fair promises for it The Duke of Newburgh or Nevers whom the King of France endeavours to promote and the Emperor
the greatest Dominions And this would have been a fair step to be the Head of Kingdoms as the Pope was of the Church And just such beginnings had the Pope himself over all other Bishops Secondly by Arms. For there remained two kingdoms in Spain Portugal and Navarre both which they seize on First that of Navarre and Naples c. Whence perpetuall Wars ever since with France in Catalonia c. For this Kingdom which still retains the Title and by Arms continually requires the possession And then of Portugal by Philip the 2 d about sixty years after viz. about the 1560. Thirdly by Shipping and Sea-Forces or Power at Sea specially afterwards with their Invincible Armado in 88 wherein were above thirty thousand Souldiers to joyn with as many out of the Netherlands And again afterwards with as great Preparation against the Hollanders but to as little purpose too in the year 1640 aiming at Superiority and Dominion of the Northern Seas and consequently of all the World But the Hollanders and English were grown by that time of the World too big to do any good on them 2. To Ferdinand the Catholick succeeds Philip Archduke of Austria c. before-mentioned Son to Maximilian the Emperor about 1504. 3. After whom comes Charles the 5 th An. 1516. king of Spain Archduke of Austria Duke of Milan Burgundy Brabant Earl of Catalonia Flanders Holland c. and Emperor of the Germans under whom the Monarchy of Spain grew towards its greatest height He added the Realms of Mexico and Peru the Dukedom of Milan and several Estates in the Netherlands Marched into Africa possesses Tunis and other parts thereby disposing Kingdoms there at his pleasure But was at last soon outed of the Empire as a foresaid leaving Spain and the Netherlands and other Spanish Territories too 4. His Son Philip the 2d An. 1558. under whom this Kingdom recieved its utmost increase by Portugal and the East Indies therewith and also its greatest decrease by the Netherlands For upon the death of Sebastian King of Portugal slain in Africa without Issue appeared six chief Competitors for the Crown Of all whom the Duke of Braganza had most right but the King of Spain notwithstanding all the help from France and England got it And so was the first of the West-Goths since the Moors that obtain'd the Universal Monarchy of all Spain and both the East and West-Indies besides the Belgick Provinces and other dominions in Europe in so much that they could brag that the Sun rose and set in their ground So that now the whole bulk of his swelling titles was compleated viz. King of Spain Castile Leon Arragon Navar Hierusalem Naples Sicily Sardinia Majorck and Minorck and of the Isles and Continent of the Indies and of the Main Ocean King Arch-Duke of Austria Duke of Burgundy Lorraine Brabant Lucenburg Gelderland and Milan Earl of Hapsburg Flanders Artois Henault Holland Zealand c. Marquess of the Sacred Empire Lord of Friezland Meckleburgh Ulricht c. Great Lord of Asia and of Africa 5. Which mighty Monarchy labouring with its own weight soon began to fall into peeces 1 through exhausting of its people and want of men by naval expeditions into both Indies by many and long Wars by ejecting the Moors and Jews before afterwards c. by the Spanish Inquisition and grievous Taxes and oppressions of the Countrymen and labourers 2 By wasting of its Riches and Wealth by Wars and imprudence 3 By loss of kingdoms and Provinces as well as great defeats of its Armies and Armado's As namely the loss of the Netherlands the Defeat in 88 the long Wars with the French who alwayes oppos'd this rising Monarchy on all sides which brought lastly the revolt of Portugal and Catalonia and so the loss of half their entire united Monarchy besides the new conquests in Flanders the last year by the French all which have made pretty wide gaps in those numerous swelling titles 6. But this great Kingdom was chiefly impair'd by the Revolt of the Netherlands and Portugal For this Philip in indeavouring to bring Tyrannick Government both Civil and Religious specially the last by the bloudy Inquisition and to reduce them back a gain by force to the Church of Rome from that Reformation of Religion which was now every where begun whereof he was a violent Enemy was by a great part of the Provinces confederate together rejected from being their Prince An. 1581. for seeing the Spaniards would bring in absolute domination both over Soul and Body they became desperate to the death declare him for a Tyrant and perpetual Enemy and by eighty years Wars brought the Spaniard to an open confession or conviction of his bad Politicks for Force of Religion and taught them and the World too if they will be taught this Rule That a free Nation must be governed freely For the Pride and Tyranny specially in Religion and the unmerciful Inquisition fill'd all Christian People with Hate and Terror of the Spaniards specially these most concern'd For by no more powerful argument did the Prince of Orange inflame the Netherlanders Spirits than saying That These burn men alive for Religion which set them all on fire So ill does Force upon either mens Civil or Religious Liberties conduce to establish Princes where Subjects are once sensible of them And that Religion had a chief hand in these Revolutions you must know that the main design then driven on by the Catholick Princes and Party was the defence and propagation of that Religion the Protector whereof the King of Spain vaunted to be and the extirpation of Hereticks and so to make the King of Spain Universal and absolute and truly and indeed Catholick at least by some c. In such sort that about 1560 Charles the 9 th king of France with the Queen-Mother Katherine of Medices a busie and Imperious Queen and Isabel this king of Spains Wife and the Duke of Alva make a league to joyne the Power and Policies of both Nations to root out the new increasing Hereticks The Hugonots out of France and the Protestants out of the Low-Countries and Germany and immediately ensued the Holy League in France wherein this King was a mighty stickler also and then those wars here So that he not only confederated with the Leaguists against the Hugonots but also about the year 1580 when the other would not do endeavours also upon the same account to hinder the Reformation growing in his own Dominions by bringing in the Inquisition and arbitrary Government amongst them whereby he was wholly driven out of those Provinces confederating together for their Liberty and Priviledges And indeed except mens Civil Liberties be first invaded their Religious can hardly be To recover which Countries they exhausted all their strength in vain for eighty years till they were at last forc'd to a shameful submission in the Treary of Munster 1648. therein renouncing for ever all Right c. and treat with them and
his submission granted to him and his heirs The title of the Kings of England As if they never had it since the Conquest of right before Hence it is observed sayes the Popish writers That all Kings of England must acknowledg the Pope for their Landlord And in like manner his predecessor Hadrian the 4 th about 1555. gave Ireland to the Kings of England for a penny to be paid yearly out of every house as much as a shilling now But As long as there 's a Goose or Gander We must remember Alexander If it were but for this verse sake which ends a coppy sent to him by a Monkish Rimer little better in the Latin About 1190. Celestine Crowns the Emperor with his foot and then spurns it off again with this saying By me Kings reign He set all Princes almost together by the ears that Rome might gain with siding with one part or the other and making them friends again And this was and is a constant practise with them and a principal matter whereby they stand For if one deserts them another still upholds them for their own interest which is mingled with the Papal over all the World About 1200. Innocent the third raised the Otho's against Philip the Emperor resolving that he would uncrown him or be uncrown'd by him because chose without his liking And as soon as Otho himself was made Emperor excommunicates him too as also King John of England Peter King of Aragon and Raimund Earl of Tholoss And decreed in a Council held at Rome from thence forth the Pope to have the correction of all Christian Princes and no Emperor to be acknowledged all he had sworn obedience to him In pursuance whereof deposes the said King John and gives away his Kingdom to the French King causes him to surrender his crown to his Legate interdicts him the Kingdom for six years together and makes him stand to his mercy to have it again and upon the restoring to make it Tributary fining it at the yearly rent of 8000. Marks to be held of the Pope in fee-farme And his usurpations were so great here in England That the Nobles writ in their Letters to their Bishops To such a Bishop or such a Chapter who had rather dye then he ruined by the Romish Task-Masters Likewise the said King of Aragon Naples and Sicily c. was forced also to subject his Kingdoms as feudatory to the Church of Rome and to be held of the Pope And now also was brought up that Idol of Transubstantiation and adoration of the Host to subject the people to a more divine Reverance and external devotion and deportment towards their Holy things and mysteries which is wonderful to behold even to this very day and to make their Religion and Priests more Venerable at least this has been the efect thereof What matter of Zeal Fury and Persecution this became afterwards all storyes and ages ring of as if it had been to deny God indeed and Christ and all Religion to deny this their Idol God they had and have to this day so possessed people with such a fond Imagination God also giving them up to believe lyes and to erre concerning the Faith mistaking the Letter for the Spirit Also that devise of Auricular confession was introduced about this time which aws the people exceedingly likewise Moreover about the same time arose those deadly seuds between the Papaline Guelphs and Imperial Gibelines or if you will Elfs and Goblins so called as is thought from their terrible doings c. which destracted all Italy and contiuned for many ages after which factions were stirred up by the Pope and his Agents means and practises c. It was about the year 200. likewise that Philip King of France was excommunicated and then it was said In the year of the Reign of Christ not of Philip. Also 1204. the Sea of Constantinople and the Greek Church and Emperor became subject to the Roman for above 30. years through their projects c. And about 1220. the East as well as Westren Emperor was crowned at Rome by the Pope no longer now as a Servant you may now well think but their Lord and Superior by what has been already rehearsed For in this Popes time some thought fitting to make this Embleme There are two great lights The Sun that is the Pope and the Moon that is the Emperor Nay the high Papalists would have none to be truly Monarch and Soveraign that is absolute and Independent on any other as Supreme but the Pope as before has been intimated About 1240. the twentieths of Ecclesiastick Revenues are obtained for the Pope It came afterwards to the tenths nay the fifths and fourths too in some Kingdoms c. About 1245. Innocent the fourth excommunicates the Emperor Frederick the fourth time having been three times before by former Popes though he had been his greatest friend and deposes him the King of France in vain interceeding and sets up Anti-Cesaers because his Highness forsooth would not stope low enough to his Holiness and in the end because he would not bring him enough under got him poyson'd The four orders of the begging Fryars viz. the Dominicans Franciscans Carmelits and Augustins began to swarm under him as their great Patron and by their voluntary humility and external devotion to uphold this their exalted and triumphant Church and Religion This Pope demanded also the payment of the Twentieths before granted and afterwards of the Tenths of all Revenues and Profits of the Church adding grievous threatnings if they were not paid and by his Legate in Poland one fifth of all Afterwards he perswaded the French King to make War against Henry the 3 d. of England and to make him either yeeld to all the Pope demanded or to drive him out of his Kingdom An. 1255. The King of Lithuania being converted to Christianity is crowned by the Pope and subjects his Kingdom to him For if they would be Christians they must all acknowledge Christs Vicar or else be Infidels still for all other Christianity now was almost fled the Earth An. 1260. The Pope translates the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily which the King of Aragon had made feudatory to the Church as before c. and which the former Pope also would have sould to Henry the 3 d. of France from the right owners and bestows it on the French most bountifully And now was the Pope come to the hight of power riches and authority and to have mighty interest in the World and now all the Nations worshiped the Beast The Princes generally began to make appeals to the Roman Court and the people were devoted to the Romish Laws Customs and Religion The Pope had now the creating of Electors of the Empire almost as he listed and consequently the Emperor in a manner at his beck About 1270. Rodolph of Napsburg or Ausburgh the first of the Austrian House was affraid to go to Rome to take his Crown or to
Monarchies nor leave their Kings so much elbow-room nor their Commands so absolute and Sovereign as the other There are moreover in Europe other lesser Kingdoms comprehended under these as those of Bohemia and Hungary under the Emperor That of Navarre under the Crown of France Those of Naples Sicily Sardinia and Maiorck under the King of Spain And those of Scotland and Ireland under the King of England The Seven Electors three Eccleasiastick four Saecular and of late a fifth are the Arch-Bishop of Mentz Dean of the Colledge of Electors Lord High-Chancellor of the Empire in Germany The Arch-Bishop of Colen Lord High-Chancellor of the Empire in Italy The Arch-Bishop of Trevers Lord High-Chancellor of the Empire in France The King of Bohemia at this time Emperor till the young King his Son come to be installed therein chief Cup-bearer of the Empire Count Palatine of the Rhine heretofore the fifth Elector chief Almoner of the Houshold now the eighth and Lord High-Treasurer since the Duke of Bavaria new-created was put in his place The Duke of Saxony Lord High-Marshal or Sword-Bearer and the Marquess of Brandenburgh Lord High-Chamberlain and who has the largest Territories next the Emperor himself These Electors are Sovereign in their Estates and though Members of the Empire yet can make Peace and War when they please whereof we have at this present a sad example between the Elector Palatine and the Elector of Mentz with the Lorrainers The Ecclesiastick Electors ever had the precedency of the other by reason of the height and Supremacy of the Pope in Temporals and the Saecular Power of the Bishops in former times The seven Grand Dutchies or Dukedoms which have each their particular Lords and Masters are the Dukedom of Moscovy the Prince whereof assumes the Title of Emperor and by some is reckoned among Empires As indeed to say the truth it is a Dukedom on which depends thirty other Dutchies and three Kingdoms which exceed Germany and Poland in extent and notwithstanding all their Cold are fill'd with Inhabitants And the Duke himself is absolute over his Subjects The Dutchy of Savoy at this day the first in Europe the Dutchy of Tuscany of Lorrain of Saxony and Bavaria whose Dukes are Electors and the Dutchy of Holstein As for the great Duke of Lithuania he is subject to the King of Poland and the Dutchy of Milan to the King of Spain And the other petty Dutchies of Germany and Italy are not of any force or reckoning with these seven We must crown all these Dutchies or Dukedoms with the one only Arch-Dukedom of Austria whereof the Emperor is Master and add that all these Estates have nothing mixt in the form of their Government and that they acquiess under the Authority of one alone The seven Common-Wealths are those of the Suisses of Venice of the United Provinces of Genoa of Lucca of Geneva and of Raguza For the petty Common-Wealth of St. Marine must not come into this Range As for the Hans-Towns and free Cities of Germany they acknowledge some subjection or other to the Empire c. The three grand Principalities are Transilvania Wallachia and Moldavia all three tributary to the Turk As for the Prince of Precopia or lesser Tartary called the Crim Tartar he is now made slave to the Turk and over him a Beglerbeg or Bassa to command in chief It will not perhaps distast the Reader to give a List here of the present Kings and Princes according to their different Ages together The King of Spain Swedeland the Prince of Orange the Land-grave of Hesse-Cassel the Duke of Mantua the Duke of Modena are yet in their Minority The King of France England Portugal the Elector of Bavaria the Duke of Saxony the Duke Regent of Holstein the Dukes of Lunenburgh the Landgrave of Hesse-darmstat the Duke of Mickleburgh the Prince of Mount-Belliard the Prince of East-Friezland the Marquess of Bada the grand Duke of Moscovy and the grand Segnior All these Princes are in the prime of their Age and like to reign long Those that have passed the middle of their dayes and begin to draw towards their evening are the Pope alwayes the King of Poland who has now lately resign'd his Crown and none other yet chose the King of Denmark the three Electors Ecclesiastick three of the Secular the Palatine the Elector of Saxony and of Brandenburgh the three Princes of Transilvania Walachia and Moldavia The Duke of Lorrain Wittenburgh Newburgh Brunswick Wolfen-Buttel the great Duke of Tuscany and the Duke of Parma The Ecclesiastick Government of Europe in general is either Papal owning the Pope as Supream or Episcopal owning the King as Supream in all causes and Arch-Bishops and Bishops under him call'd also Prelatical as in the Church of England or Super-intendent which is a kind of Episcopal among the Lutherans but yet owning no Head of the Church neither Pope nor King or Civil Magistrate to order the Affairs of the Church as such The Presbyterian or Synodical owning a Presbytery or Synod as Supream and Lay-Elders c. but no Bishops nor Super-intendents as in France Holland c. As for other forms of Government there are none established any where by publick Authority And this is the present face almost of Europe in General LANGUAGES The present Languages of Europe for we pass by those that are out of date as the Hebrew Greek and Latine which are rather Scholastical than National and onely us'd among the Learned may be reduced to three the Teutonick the Sclavonian and the derivatives of Latin and Greek corrupted By the way only take notice that the Arabick Tongue is the same in Asia that the Latin is in Europe and that by its help one may march from the Bosphorus in Europe to the furthermost Lands of the Indians We find not therefore in Europe more then two Mother Tongues at present which have each their several Dialects with some sprouts as it were of the two dead Languages Latin and Greek The two Mother Languages then are the Teutonick and the Sclavonian The Sclavonian is familiar at Constantinople and even at Grand Caire And has for its principal Dialects the Rheuthenick or Russian for the Moscovites the Dalmattan for the Transilvanians and Hungarians the Bohemian and the Polonian the Illyrian Jazigian c. with some others which have their course amongst the Walachians and the Moldavians and the lesser Tartary The Teutonick hath three principal Dialects the German the Saxon and the Danish And of these again issue forth other Idioms as the Flemish or Low-Dutch the English the Swedish the Cauchian of the East-Friezlanders amongst themselves only for they use Dutch to strangers the Language of Norway and of the Suissers The Greek Language Mort or dead but less corrupted than the Latin hath divers Reliques and shootings forth in divers Isles of the Archipelago in Achaia and Morea under the great Turk and is better preserv'd here in these named then in
any other Province of Greece The States General of the United Provinces did some years since contribute liberally to the charge of an Impression of the New Testament in Vulgar Greek whereto there has been joyn'd the Ancient or Original Greek for the consolation of those poor people that groan under the Tyranny of the Ottomans The Latin the other Tongue Mort has but three principal shoots or branches the Italian French and Spanish But this last has an huge medly of barbarous tearms left from the Moors And under these three are to be comprehended the Savoyan and Piemontian those of Sicily Sardinia and of the Grisons in the Alps. We might find out yet seven other Tongues in Europe but of far less extent then the preceding and not nois'd of in the World As the Albanian or Epirotick in Epirus and Macedonia The Bulgarian for Servia Bosnia and Bulgaria under the Turks The Cossack or Tartarian of the lesser Tartary in the Taurica Chersonesus and all along the River Tanais The Finnick in Finland and Lapland Provinces of Swedeland That of the Wilde Irish and Scotch in Ireland and the West of Scotland The British or Welch in Wales and some parts of Cornwal in England and half through Bretain Armorica or Little Britain in France And lastly the Biscayan on this side and that side the Pyrenean Hills and near to the Cantabrian Ocean as little understood to the rest of the World as the old British it self Besides some Arabick not worth mentioning in the Mountains of Granada call'd Alpuxarras ever since the Moors possess'd those parts Of all these Languages there are some Masculine but something rude and harsh as the German and in some sort the Spanish through the Reliques and mixture of the Moorish And some Faeminine but more delicate and fine as the Italian and in some sort the English Which are more graceful in the mouths of the Women and become them best than the Mens who cannot use too much gravity in their Speech Moreover the Language of the Spaniards is said to be Manly the Italian Courtly and the French Amorous The German is like their Nation Warlike The English is now become a compleat mixture of all viz. old Dutch or Saxon Latine and chiefly French with some sprinklings of Spanish and Italian flourishing now at length with a rare choice out of all occasioned by the constant travels and education of our English Gentry and Nobility and Scholars with them abroad By reason of all which diversities of Tongues there has been not only Designs but real Endeavours and Essayes and of late more than ever towards an Universal Character and Language to avoid the confusion of these And of all the Universally Learned Wilkins excels and has wonderfully out-done all the Ingenioso's Virtuoso's or Literado's of the World that have gone about it or medled therewith And it no longer lies now on the Inventors but the Learners no less than the whole Worlds part who are hardly taught all one thing to make it familiar and easie that is Universal RELIGIONS Three Religions do at this day divide all the Earth Heathen Mahometan and Christian The first is without doubt the largest the second in like manner carries it from the third and best but with this difference that this last is more concentred together and fills the most peopled Provinces of the Universe As for the Jews they are no Nation but dispersed in all have no fixt Seat Principalities nor Magistrates Yet their number is great both in Poland and Greece and all the Turks Dominions besides some sprinklings in Italy Holland c. Paganism or Heathenism embraces more than three quarters of both the America's and more then two thirds even of Africa and Asia also All that prodigious space of Ground of the America's greater than all the other three parts of the World besides put together is fill'd with Idolaters who worship Animals Vegetables Stars and Devils And comprehends innumerable vast Regions populous Nations and mighty Kingdoms And in Africa and Asia in like manner a fearful company of Nations Kindreds and People live in thick darkness of Paganism and Ignorance of the true God Mahometism never yet had footing in America But in Africk the mighty Kingdoms of Fez and Morocco the Jurisdictions of Tremisen Algiers Tunis Tripolis of Barce and Egypt In Asia the Grand Seignor the Kings and Princes of the three Arabia's the Grand Cham of Tartary the King of Persia the Grand Mogul the Kings of Visapor and Colconda The Kings on both the sides of Coromandel and of Malavar The King of the Maldives The King of Achem and all the Princes of the Grand Isle of Sumatra The Emperor of Java The King of Bantam and other Princes of the Neighbouring Isles For their people are generally Idolaters Which we ought no more to wonder at than at the medly that is found in like manner among Christians themselves Christianism makes two Grand Branches the Trunk or Body whereof is in Europe but the Branches extend themselves far and near into all the parts of the Universe both Asia and Africa and America And they are the Eastern Christians or the Eastern and Greek Church the Roman Christians or Papists the corrupt Church and the Protestant Christians or Reformed Church both members of the Latin or Western Church in opposition to the Greek or Eastern The Greek Church differs chiefly from the Latin about the Profession of the Holy Ghost and some other Points and Articles of Faith The Protestant from the Papistical chiefly about the Popes Supremacy and Infallability Sacrament of the Altar and Indulgences which gave the first occasion and other corrupt Points and Doctrines stablish'd since by the Council of Trent The Romans call themselves the Catholick Apostolical Church but most unjustly and all the rest Hereticks and the Protestants reckon themselves the onely true Catholick Apostolick and call the others the Antichristian Babylonish or false and themselves the Reformed Church which indeed is true so far as they are truly reformed But yet 't is much to be fear'd and shrewdly to be suspected that Antichrist reaches further than Rome and that all Rome 't is to be hoped is not Babylon The Christians of the East make up a great number and possess large Countries the Christians Roman and the Christians Protestant may dispute for Number and Power and make comparison We make none here but only of the Provinces which they possess without going beyond our mark intending only a bare Relation or plain Table and no Zeal of Comparisons In the Eastern Church are also many differences crept in but the Greeks bear the chief sway although both the Armenia's who make a company apart are a considerable Body We put all together here the Greeks the Abyssins the Armenians and the Muscovites the Nestorians the Cophites the Maronites the Georgians the Jacobites and the Melchites or Assyrians In the Reformed Church of the Protestants are the two great Sects of the
Emperor unless they would have one chose for them Meeting therefore at Franck-fort they chose out of one of the weakest Families every Faction grown jealous and fearing the other Rodolphus Earl of Hapsburg in the year 1270. to be Emperor the Raiser of the present House of Austria upon this occasion and grand Revolution for by War and by his Imperatorian Power gaining Austria and other Territories adjoyning he confers them upon his Son And so the Earls of Hapsburgh become first Dukes then Arch-Dukes of Austria about the year 1280. and so propagated their power far and near unto our times By this time the seven Electors had rooted themselves in their usurp'd Electorship which began first by bare permission and under pretext of avoiding confusion and for better order in the Election to take the Votes of all the other Princes of Germany what should be best for the Common Interest afterwards used and usurped as their priviledge and so continued it till they got to be established therein by the Golden Bull. II. The Golden Bull or Seal is constituted as the perpetual and fundamental Law of the Empire not to be altered by the Emperor no not with the Electors consent themselves by Charles the Fourth in the year 1356. Yet to which since has been added Capitulations of the Emperor with the Electors and Princes of Germany In the Golden Bull was contained the Priviledges Liberties Order and mutual respect between the Emperor and Princes In it the seven Electors were established by publick Sanction and Law of the Empire before sometimes more sometimes less usurped the Power to themselves which bred dissentions and confusions alwayes in choice Also to hinder Haereditary Succession that three Emperors of one and the same Family should never be chosen together as had been by Power Interest and Factions formerly accustomed to keep it in one House which how well observed the Story will shew it having continued in that Line ever since and become in a manner quite haereditary and scarcely to be altered In it also was decided between the House of Bavaria and the Palatine the Controversie about Electorship which was by perpetual right then annexed to the Palatinate and ever since continued so till the late German Wars before each claiming the Electorship which therefore often disturbed their number to be more or less than seven III. About the year 1500. the State of Burgundy which contained the Low Countries was by Marriage with the Heiress thereof added to the House of Austria which further strengthened it About the same time under Maximilian the first the publick Courts of Judicature which followed the Emperors Court alwayes before were fixed to a certain place and this is called the Imperial Chamber the Supream Tribunal and Appeal of Justice in which in Civil Matters the Emperor and all the Princes should be subject and the greatest Controversies be submitted to its Judgment It was after two removes fixed at last to Spires hence the Chamber of Spires fam'd over all and the Empire also divided into ten Circles by the same Emperor at the same time IV. The Heir of Burgundy i. e. the Emperors Son by his Wife Heiress thereof marrying with the Heir of Spain unite the Kingdom of Spain and Burgundy and the House of Austria together and so the King of Spain becomes Arch-Duke of Austria Duke of Burgundy and Lord of the Low Countries and after his Grand-fathers decease Emperor also viz. Charles the Fifth Son of Philip King of Spain Son of Maximilian the Emperor succeeds his Father in his Estates of Inheritance of Spain Burgundy and the Low Countries Austria c. and by Election his Grand-father Maximilian in the Empire in the year 1519. under whom the German Empire rose to its greatest height and inlargement ever since the dismembring of it And indeed with this addition of Spain Burgundy and the Low Countries Naples and Sicily it might equal it under Charles the Great when it had France and Italy Members thereof or subject thereunto besides the Dukedom of Milan fell to this Charles also the Kingdom of Tunis and other parts in Africa became Tributary and moreover married the Daughter of Portugal and so laid a Foundation for that Kingdom also But if you add the West Indy Kingdoms the Kingdom of Mexico overcome Anno 1521. the Kingdom of Peru 1535. It had more extent though not greatness and power than all the Roman Empire ever had And had not the French opposed him he had over-ran all Europe and been Universal Monarch He had Prisoners at the same time the French King and the Pope of Rome He ruin'd the League made by the Protestants at Smalcalde in Germany Took Prisoners the Elector of Saxony and Landgrave of Hassia drove the great Turk from Vienna as well as won Tunis But the Turk soon broke his Power in Africa and being hunted out of Germany he resigned all his Estates and Kingdoms the Empire to his Brother who had been before elected King of Hungary and Bohemia Anno 1526. and by the procurement of this Charles elected King of the Romaus 1531. and now by his Resignation Emperor 1558. The rest of his Estates to his Son Philip the Second King of Spain and so went off the Stage and died private in a Monastery after he had been glutted as it were with the pomp and vanity of the World As Emperor of the Germans King of Castile Aragon Naples Sicily c. Arch-Duke of Austria Duke of Burgundy Prince of Belgium or Low Countries c. King of India and the Ocean c. Lord of Africa c. But in the end only Monk V. From this time the Austrian House took such rooting in Germany that the Empire is in name rather Elective but in reality Haereditary and become the Inheritance as it were of a Family Specially after he brought in the custom of creating King of the Romans during the Emperors life as he did to his Brother Anno. 1531. which is a Title proper to the Emperor notwithstanding the Elector of Saxony who by many Arguments shewed how it tended to inervate the free election of the Emperor VI. Under this Charles all Germany both Empire and Church is rent into two grand Factions or Parts Roman Catholicks and Protestants the Protestants again into Lutherans and Calvinists and from this division arose the two grand Wars the Smalcaldick and Bohemian The chief cause was the general hate of the Roman Court and Tyranny and base abuses and corruptions thereof both by the Princes and People ready to take any occasion against them But the occasion was the common selling of Indulgences by an impudent Monk whom another Monk but honester opposes Thus the two Instruments were two Monks one a very Knave or at best corrupt ignorant Friar the other an honest sincere and well-meaning Soul as well as zealous Martin Luther by name such as were many in those dayes as Thauler whom Luther much esteemed and praises or if you
will give him a truer name from his Deeds Martin Marr-Pope who at first taxes only the abuse and observes the corruptions of the Church become too notorious for any honest heart but finding no amendment nor reformation but things worse and worse makes a general defection Anno. 1522. This was no sooner done but the Reformers make a new Schism and divide between Luther and Zwinglius 1524. which rose to two grand Factions afterwards by the name of Lutherans and Calvinists towards the year 1560. the cause of much woe to Germany and never reconciled neither by Princes nor Pastors till the treaty at Munster 1648. Thus Germany and almost all Europe became divided into two General Factions or Parts Papists and Protestants but Germany into three Papists Lutherans and Calvinists which has been the principal cause indeed of all Mutations and Revolutions in all the Kingdoms and States ever since almost Hence the Revolutions of the Low-Countries of France of England of Bohemia c. must be deriv'd as from their original Head and Spring The head of the Catholicks was the Emperor and Popish-Princes of the Lutherans the Duke of Saxony of the Calvinists or Reformed the Elector Palatine VII And these preceding occasion'd also other Religions and Wars for these at least defensive For at this time of contending for Liberty and Reformation arose other Sects also aiming or pretending higher Reformation in Religion So that in the year 1525 one Thomas Munzer occasions the Rustick War of the Countrymen In the year 1534 succeeded the Anabaptists at Munster In the year 1529 arose the name Protestant in the General Assembly at Worms when the Elector of Saxony the Landgrave of Hasse the City of Noremberg and others protested against the Decrees of Caesar and appeal'd to an Universal-Council In the year following 1530 the Confession of the Protestants call'd the Augustan Confession was published VIII Upon these Grounds chiefly and a little after the Troubles and Interruptions by the other Sects mentioned breaks forth the Civil War between Caesar and the Protestants called the Smalcaldick War Anno 1547 which they began at Smalcaldia in Hassia where Caesar prevails ruins their League made there the same year begun and ended Soon after the Protestants revive prevail and in the end force the Emperor out of Germany procure the Passavian Transaction or Peace made there An. 1552 where by a perpetual Edict is established Liberty of either Religion Roman-Catholick and Augustan Confession that is Protestant So the Protestants by agreement and compact obtain'd full liberty and exemption from the Papal yoke and Peace in Germany till 1618. IX When chiefly from the same hidden causes grounds and motives the Bohemian War began For about the year 1612 Germany was again divided into two parts the League and the Union The League contained the Papist Princes the Union the Protestant Thence about the year 1618 the Bohemians according to their priyiledge rejecting the Emperor as never formally nor legally chosen as they had formerly done Uladislaus the 3d. elect the Count Palatine King of Bohemia and crown him at Prague Whence the Bohemian-War arose and spread over all Germany chang'd first into the Saxon and then into the Swedish-War for the support of the German Liberty and lasted for thirty years till the Treaty at Munster X. The Duke of Bavaria overcoming the Bohemians and the Palatine expell'd demands and obtains the Electorship which for a hundred and fifty years before had been claimed and controverted but by the Golden-Bull decided to the Palatine notwithstanding the Duke of Saxony and Marquess of Brandenburgh gainsaying but not daring to resist about the year 1620 And so the Palatine was ejected out of the upper Palatinate and the first place among the Electoral Princes Secular as well as the Kingdom of Bohemia XI And thus we are divolved amidst the late German-Wars which we can but only hint at Anno 1625 the Duke of Saxony slain King of Swede enters Germany in behalf of the Protestants and Princes Liberty An. 1630 Next year the Swede and Saxon come and prevail Swede strikes League with France King of Swede kill'd after famous Victories and Conquests Tilly General of the Imperialists dies of his wounds after glorious Victories against Bohemia Palatinate Denmark and Saxony both the same year 1632. Swede confirms his League with Protestants the next year 1633. Confederates overcome Imperialists 1634. Anno 1635 Duke of Saxony transacts with the Emperor makes Peace whereby the Duke of Brandenburgh and other States accept the Conditions and pass with him over to the Emperors part The same year the King of France denounces War against the Empire Anno 1636. Duke of Saxony slain by the Swede The Imperialists driven out of Pomerania by the Swede 1638. But the Palatine Princes are overcome Saxon and Bohemia invaded 1639. Anno 1640 The Swede repell'd out of Bohemia The War still continues hot Several Sieges and Battels till the End as there had been from the Beginning thereof In 1647 The Swede making Truce with Bavaria moves into Bohemia Is expelled thence The Emperor prepares War again and prayes to the Virgin Anno 1648 General Wrangel with the French invades Bavaria Ejected again General Conigsmark seizes on the Tower of Prague and sets against the City Munster-Treaty ensues And so the Thirty years War begun ends also at Prague wherein 325000 perished Of such direful consequence is the want of Liberty of Religion For the Emperor a bloudy enemy of the Protestants occasions this long War c. XII The Peace at Munster chang'd the state of the Empire and reduced it to that form which it now appears in For the Swede carries clear away the Bishoprick of Breme and Verd and the French Alsatta The Palatine is restor'd to his Estate in part and made Eighth Elector with the title of L. High Treasurer of the Empire which had hitherto but Seven The Protestants lastly both Lutheran and Reformed are asserted into full Liberty of Religion whom the Papists never prevail'd against so much by Force as by Cunning and Plots in time of Peace And therefore had alwayes need to add the Wisdom of Serpents to the Innocency of Doves So Peace has ever since continued to our times which we are now come unto whereof the most remarkable passages in brief are Frankendale restored to the Palatine 1652. Leopaldus Ignatius the present Emperour chosen King of Hungaria and inaugurated Anno 1655. Crown'd King of Bohemia 1657. In which year the Emperor dies also Bishop of Munster besieges Munster the same year And the States assemble at Frank-fort to chuse Emperor Leopold K. of Hungaria and Bohemia elected King and Emperor of the Romans 1658. Munster again besieged by its Bishop the Citizens stoutly resist 1660. But forc'd the next year to receive his Souldiers and lie at his mercy and a Cittadel imposed over them to keep them in awe and so reduced to obedience The same year viz. 1661. the Turks who had been
a long time before and make him Emperor again A Novelty never heard of before in this Kingdom it being the Grand Segniors common policy to strangle all the yonger Brothers However Mustapha younger Brother of Achmet was preserv'd either because Achmet being a younger Brother himself took pity on him or because he having no children of his own was not permitted to kill him But no sooner had they set Mustapha up again but they pluckt him down the next year and make him lay down his Empire 1623. and set young Amurath 4th or Morat in his place since which things Turkish Majesty and Authority has grown vile amongst them Morat the 4th a younger Brother also of Osman's spends his stomach against the Persians and with incredible preparations and an eight years Siege and War recovers Bagdad or Babylon as they call it Ibrahim Brother also of Morat preserv'd by his Mother in his Brothers life time and by her depos'd again for interdicting her the Court spends several years in the Wars of Candy against the Venetians without success for which and his being too much under the power of his Wives whom he follow'd more then his Wars was strangled by his Subjects in the year 1648. whom Mahomet the 4 th ten years old succeeded and continues War against Candy now reigning Lord of all this vast Empire containing all Dacia and Greece the greatest part of Sclavonia and Hungary the Isles of the Aegean Sea and a great part of the Taurick Chersonese in Europe and in Asia innumerable Provinces and Regions and in Africk all Egypt the kingdoms of Tunis and Algiers with the ports of Snachem and Erocco And whose stile is as swelling as their Empire Solyman stiling himself in his Letters to alerius Grand-Master of the Rhodes SOLYMAN King of Kings Lord of Lords most high Emperor of Constantinople and Trabezond the most mighty King of Persia Syria Arabia and the Holy Land Lord of Europe Asia and Africa Prince of Mecca and Aleppo Ruler of Jerusalem and Soveraign Lord of all the Seas and Isles therein The Turks first invaded Candy Anno 1645 and have ever since with all their might year after year attempted it and drove them out of all but Candy to which they have laid close Siege this two years last past without intermission and made several Mines Batteries and Assaults against it this present year but repulsed with incredible Courage and Warlike behaviour So that there has not been the like Siege known in this our Age. 'T is thought the Turks have lost near fourscore thousand men against The issue whereof the Pope has more cause to fear than any other Prince next to the Venetians themselves The Foundation and Revolutions of the present Empire of Russia The Prince hereof in his Ambassies with the Turk Emperor and Pope King of Swede and Danes c. stiles himself Tzar or Emperor though with the Poles only Great Duke Therefore we shall add this to the Empires also The last Emperor but one of the old Royal line was John Basilid that most famous Tyrant who extended his Empire even unto Persia and the Caspian-Sea made War upon Livonia or Liefland where receiving great defeats and losses acted with rage and fury commits horrible slaughters every-where both of his own as well as of his enemies and kill'd his hopeful Son John with his own hands With this king the English first began to confederate To him succeeds An. 1583 his Son Theodore of a good disposition the last of the former race who dying without issue Russia becomes distracted with unheard of Confusions and Miseries For through fault in Government and the Line failing there sprang horrible Factions and Commotions in the kingdom for ten years scarce to be parallel'd in History For John Basilid having two Sons left Demetrius and Theodore the former was secretly made away and kill'd before his Father's death and Theodore leaving no issue leaves the kingdom to his Brother-in-law who proving an unmerciful Tyrant The Jesuites take occasion to suborn a certain Scholar of theirs in their Colledge in Poland a Russe by Nation for the true Demetrius made away so cunningly that none of the Russians especially the fickle-minded multitude doubted but that it was the true and lawful Heir indeed and therefore generally flock to him which the other Tyrant seeing either with Grief or Poyson ended his dayes An. 1605. and the false Demetrius made absolute Monarch of Russia The king of Poland and the Pope favouring the design But the Russes soon smelling him out by his forreign manners and customs The Nobles conspire against him and behead him the next year The Impostor slain the stronger Faction thus prevailing make Zusky the Chief their Conspiracy An. 1606 Emperor But then presently another Demetrius as escaping by Miracle and by and by in opposition to him a third begin to peep up one in the Western the other in the Nothern parts by several Factions so that stil Demetrius as often as slain rises again But this last soon vanished Hereupon the Poles the Swedes and the Tartars take their advantage break-in on every side under pretext of help and the Russians become a prey to them all The Swedes help Zuskie and the Poles Demetrius Anno 1611 the Swedes take Novograd and the Poles Smolensko The Russes weary of these Impostures and Confusions seek out for a forreign Prince An. 1612 some for the Pole others for the Swede The Pole takes Mosco it self and with Fire and Sword lay it in the dust 200000 Russes perishing therein The Swedes eject the Poles out of Mosco again But the Southern Russes take Zusky send him into Poland and by recommendation and the power of the Polanders chuse the King of Polands Son create him Great Duke and the Northern chuse Charles the Brother of Gustavus Adolphus King of Sweden But the Russes loth to fall under the power of the Poles and desirous of settlement after such tiresome confusions and seeing themselves a scorn and prey to strangers do by the advice and counsel first of a Butcher only seek out a fit person of their own Nation and make choice at last of their Patriarch of Mosco's Son An. 1615 who presently makes this Butcher Treasurer and General and at length settles this vast Empire and manages it in a more constant way of Peace with the Turks Tartars Poles and Swedes than any of his predecessors before and founds the present Family and Empire Yet the second Demetrius's Widow hires the Cossacks to set up her young Son not of age who takes many Eastern Provinces of Russia with the Title of Kingdom for her Son the fourth false Demetrius But this Kingdom lasted but two years for both Mother and Son were taken and slain by the Russes So the Emperor first makes peace with Swede who restor'd to him the Great Dukedom of Novograd but keeps Livonia and other Northern Provinces with the City Novograd and add it to their Crown
and other Princes put in for others But all lies in the will and pleasure of the Nobles as they can agree The present king Casimir is above threescore years old and besides his age and the ordinary cares of a Crown has never had one peaceable moment but perpetual troubles all his dayes either with the Cossacks or Tartars or the Moscovites or the Swedes or the Confederates So that he has had reason enough to be at last weary of a Crown in his old days and to rest And indeed layes it down not without honour having first reduced the Confederates and setled affairs else had done it sooner lest it should be thought he did it by force and because he could keep it no longer rather than choise and rather outed of it than voluntarily left it Note that these Cossacks so often mentioned inhabit the Eastern parts of Poland towards the Russes and Tartars and made but one Body under their General Chimilnisky who some years ago made a great noise in the World But were of late divided into three Bands whereof one adheres to the Moscovite the other to the King of Poland and a third contend for Liberty under the Orders of their General Tetera Beside the Army of the Confederates that was but now dissolved By all which it appears that Poland has declined much 1. By the loss of Walachia and Moldavia to the Turks 2. By the Revolt of the Cossacks and black Russes with all Ukrain 3. By the Moscovites possessing or spoyling and laying waste a great part of Lituania 4. By the Confederacy and Civil War of the Nobles with the King Victors in fight under Lubomirsky though at last weary of their own Confusions both sides hearkned to Reason and made a Composure And thus much of the confused story of Polands Confusions Sweden lies next concerned in our way The Revolutions of Swedeland The three Kingdoms of Denmark Norway and Sweden of old were often united and reunited till at last 1523 finally severed For Christiern the 2 d King of Denmark conquering Sweden us'd his Victory so cruelly and his own Subjects so insolently that both Kingdoms enrag'd rose up against him as a Tyrant outed him of all his Kingdoms and cast him in Prison where he miserably ended his dayes after thirty six years Imprisonment An. 1559. For Erick of an old Royal Blood of Sweden being carried by Christiern after his Conquests as a pledge into Denmark pittying his own Country escapes from amidst of Hunting in the habit of a Cowherd or Fisherman or both secretly to Lubick and from thence privily convey'd to Swedeland where he gets an Army against Christiern whose Uncle Frederick renouncing all right to Sweden makes a League with Erick and so both Nations joyn to deliver themselves from the Tyrant This Erick first brought in Protestantism i. e. Luthers Doctrine 2. Erick seeing the liberty of making Kings begot and continued troubles obtain'd of the States to make it an Hereditary Kingdom 3. His Son succeeded Anno 1561 who wars with the Dane and at last for Tyranny outed of his Kingdom by his Subjects and cast into Prison dyed miserably 4. The next King deliver'd Livonia from the tyranny and heavy pressures of the Russians after the year 1570 and added it to his Kingdom which he enlarged far and near through Lapland part of Russia all Ingria and Livonia 5. Sigismund his Son by the Sister of Sigismund King of Poland was created King of Poland Anno 1587. and succeeded in Swedeland anno 1593 thereby uniting both Kingdoms But chosen King of Poland with this condition that he should adde Livonia for ever to the Crown of Poland But being a Papist he would have brought Jesuites and the Roman Religion into Sweden and they refusing would have done it by force whereupon his Uncle Charls the former kings Brother began to oppose him whence a grievous and long War between both Kingdoms He had been made Governour and Vice-Roy as it were during his Brothers absence in Poland and at last King by the favour of the Calvinists who now began to appear in this kingdom the Lutherans being not very favourable thereunto Anno 1607 He made perpetual Wars against the Russes Poles and Danes and so prepared his Nation by use of Arms as it were for the succeeding Wars of Germany under 6. Gustavus Adolphus his Son the Greatest and most victorious of all the Kings of Swede and who first rais'd its fame in the World with incredible success of Arms overruns Germany frees the oppressed Princes of Pomerania and Brandenburgh restores the Duke of Meckleburgh takes all Places and Cities that lie in his way beats Tilly in two great Battels overruns a great part of Bavaria and at last kill'd in fight 1632 after such two or three years Success only During his Daughters minority the Wars are continued in Germany till the Treaty at Munster 1648. By which War the Swedes obtain'd besides vast Riches and Spoils and inestimable Treasure large Provinces near the Baltick-Sea or Sound the Dukedom of Breme and Verd saving the Liberty of the City to it self still all the further Pomerania Vismar and other smaller Territories c. Anno 1650 Christiana is crown'd a Princess for Arts rather than ARms or Government and weary of her Kingdom or Subjects or they of her leaves it An. 1654. Before which the same year Conigsmark invades the Bishoprick of Breme again and possesses it Christiana turns Catholick travels to Rome c. Her Story is common She having no Heirs her kinsman Charles Gustavus the 10 th descended from a Sister of Gustavus Adolphus Daughter of Charles the 9 th King of Swede succeeds is crown'd the same year and married to the Duke of Holsteins eldest daughter and for glorious feats of Arms and Conquests immitates his Uncle Gustavus Adolphus and soon also taken away An. 1656 The Moscovite invades Livonia in xain attempts Riga An. 1657 King of Denmark invades Breme takes Verd whilst the King of Swede is busie in Poland who hastens thence invades Holstein drives the Dane from the Dukedom of Breme besieges Verd in vain The Elector of Brandenburgh having the same year deserted the Swede and agreed with the Pole An. 1658 The Swede invades Fuinen Island marches over the Sea on Ice with his Army into Sealand drives the Dane to the Peace at Rotchild to follow Poland again but before all things fully ended and for some new actings and emergencies invades Sealand again the same year takes Cronenburg and at last besieges Copenhagen it self a long while which reduced to straits the Hollanders to relieve with Provisions and Forces have a Fight in the very Danish Creek or Strait About the same time also the Brandenburgh and Imperialists march into Holstein against the Swede and drive him out An. 1659. Fuinen Island recover'd by the Dane and his Confederates with other Islands and th' Swede overcome there The Elector of Brandenburgh also with his Confederates the Poles
c. marches into Pomerania takes several places besieges Stetin three months c. whilst the Swede busied against the Dane An. 1660. Peace made with the Pole and Brandenburgh Confederates against the Swede as also with the Dane The Ring about the same time dies leaving his young Son Charles the 11 th about five or six years of age Ring at present An. 1661. The Swede makes peace with the Moscovite Ever since they have been preparing great Armies and hovering up and down none scarce knows on which side or on what design Time must shew Revolutions of Denmark Christiern the 2 d being abhorr'd by all the North Ringdoms in common for his barbarousness and tyranny was by the Decree of the Danes Swedes and Norwegians outed of his kingdoms as beforesaid which endeavouring to regain by Arms was taken and miserably thrown into Prison where he lay about thirty seven years and ended his dayes and the Union of both kingdoms formerly made was quite dissolv'd For Frederick the Uncle of Christiern renounced all right in Sweden unto Erick king thereof upon his Confederacy with him against Christiern that Tyrant Hereupon the Nobles to whom Christiern had been odious for his Tyranny over them through means of the Citizens and Commons favouring him against them elect his Uncle Frederick Duke of Holstein Ring of Denmark and Norway upon certain Conditions and with great and large Priviledges to themselves reserv'd An. 1523 which they stifly alwayes maintain'd and afterwards under Frederick the 2 d encreased and made them far greater so that they had right of Majesty and Soveraignty in common with the Ring till lately in the year 1661 that they lost their ancient priviledges This Frederick the first reform'd Religion in both his Countries according to the Confession of Ausburgh or Augustan Confession that is the Doctrine of Luther there agreed on He being dead great Factions and Troubles about a Successor arose one party being violent and strong for Christiern in Prison who proceeded so far as to besiege Copenbagen But Christiern the third being elected by another with great troubles suppressed the other and perfected the Reformation begun by his Father Christiern the fourth engaging in the German Wars against the Emperor for the Liberties of Germany lost a great part of his Dominions by the prevailing Imperialists but soon compounded the business upon very good Terms and was restored to all his own again An. 1629 The Swede then coming in like a Tempest upon the Emperor An. 1643. The Swede moves into Holstein and Jutland and overcomes the Danes 1644. War between Swede and Dane with various fortune by Sea and Land whereby the Swede loses places in Germany but the Imperialists coming to help the Dane are beat 1645. Peace made between Swede and Dane and 1648 Frederick the 3 d the present king succeeds An. 1657 Ring of Swede invades Holstein c. before mentioned 1659. The Swede assaults Copenhagen is repulsed with great loss The Dane and his Confederates recover Fuinen and other Islands and overcome the Swede c. as before 1660. Peace between them whereby the Swede obtains Seandy Hallandt and Blecking from the Dane for ever This year was made the greatest mutation in the Ringdom of Denmark The Ring made absolute and supream Lord which depended before on the Senate of the kingdom and as it were redeem'd from the servitude of the Nobles The Nobles lose all their Priviledges and the Crown made hereditary to both sexes which before depended on Election And all this by the States of the kingdom conferred on him partly for his constancy and firm adhering to them in Person during all the Siege of Copenhagen as well as for other Reasons of State and Inconveniences made more evident and sensible by those Wars 1661. Norway swears homage and fealty to the Hereditary Prince 1663. A Plot and Conspiracy discovered against the Ring of Denmark Afterwards in the late Wars between England and Holland and Dane confederates with Holland But we hasten to France The Foundation and Revolutions of the present State of France 1. There have been three Races or Lines of the Kings of France the Merovinian Carolinian and Capetine or Saxon Line 2. Pepin Maire of the Kings Palace a place of vast power and priviledge and Father of Charles the Great deposed Childerick the last of the Merovignian Line the Pope approving thereof and confirming it To whom succeeded Charles the Great about the year 770 Ring of France and after large Conquests crowned Emperor of Germany by the Pope Anno 800 which the Pope ever since pretends to be his Gift 3. About the year 988. Hugh Capet Earl of Paris a place of something the like power with that of Maire formerly outed the Caroline Family 4. This Capetine Race has gone in three Families First in a direct Line till 1328. Then in the House of Valois till Henry the 4 th of the House of Bourbon an 1589. And ever since under Lewis the 13 th 14 th in the same House For Henry the 3 d the last of the Valoises created king of Poland fled privily thence upon the death of his Brother Charles the 9 th Ring of France and succeeded him thereupon Anno 1574 makes war against the Hugonites then in Arms upon the horrid Massacres not long before committed upon them and makes a new League with the Guises called the Holy League to root out the Hugonots For about this time there had been Commotions and Wars for Religion and Self-defence upon the growth of Calvin's Doctrine and Reformation and the Ringdom became divided into two Factions partly Ecclesiastick the Catholicks and Hugonots and partly Civil the Duke of Montmorrency or Conde that is the Bourbons and the Duke of Guise that is of Lorrain of the Race of Charles the Great Hence sharp Wars The Bourbons side with the Hugonots The Guises with the Catholicks which was called the Holy League In the mean while the Guises upon these occasions studied to exclude the House of Bourbon underhand viz. Henry the 4 th Ring of Navar and next of kin to this Ring and House as inclining to the Hugonets from succession and to set up themselves ruling the king as they pleased Who at last seeing himself abused and designs upon him through the power and favour of the Catholicks to the Guises the Head and Ringleaders of them sides with the Hugonites or they with him besieges Paris which they had seiz'd on but was there stabb'd by a Monk made use of by the Guisans and that Faction an 1589. and so the Family of the Valois ended and the Bourbons succeeds Namely Henry the 4 th next Heir Male King of Navar who continues War against the Leaguists who strongly oppos'd him but he greatly breaks them till at last seeing Religion the only hindrance to his quiet settlement in that Crown and the quite ruining of that League against him was prevail'd on to turn Catholick and so establish'd the
sit in the Temple of God as God and all to submit to the decision of the Bishop of Rome at least presiding in Council 4. The Bishop of Romes Seat was the Seat or metropolis of the Empire thereby gaining great authority power and priviledges and no less fame esteem and repute over all the World c. But we can but hint things here in brief 5. The Empire began soon to be divided into the Eastern and Western Where upon the Eastern Bishops contend for precedency and supremacy upon the removal of the Seat of Empire to Constantinople and the outward flourishing of that Church 6. At last upon the further breakings and weaknings of the Empire he obtains of Phocas killing the Emperor Mauritius in a tumult of the Souldiers the absolute supremacy and Title of Universal Bishop about 606. as aforesaid In these contentions for this spiritual supremacy they pretended for their Title and claim the donation or delegation of Christ thereto the Succession to St. Peter the donation and Constitution of Constantine the first Christian universal Emperor c. Having got the Supremacy of the Church in spirituals the same mystery of Iniquity works for Supremacy also in Temporals over all Emperors Kings and Princes and as it were universal Monarchy For from universal Bishop clearly follows universal Excommunication even of Emperors Rings and Monarchs afterwards practised From Excommunicating deposing From deposing disposing of Ringdoms From disposing to whom should he be more kind then himself Usurping and possessing So naturally one Wedge drives in and makes way for another And having got in his head casily wriggles in his whole Body c. Besides the Church was to be preferred above the State and the Head of the Church above the Head of the State And so the Spiritual Supremacy prepares and makes way for the Temporal For there is no end of Pride and Ambition so long as any equall or superior unless he be above all that is called God like Lucifer who would be above God himself and all Government or subjection But we must not insist As to this Temporal Power Particulars of fact in brief lye thus as well as we can observe things as they fell out Only first take notice the foundation of his spirituall Supremacy a little more particular in the order of time 1 By the Council of Nice in Constantines time the four Patriarchs of Rome of Jerusalem of Alexandria and of Antioch were all equal 2 about the year 410. the Bishop of Rome would pretend to be the first Patriarch and to that end falsifies the Canon and sends it to the Council of Carthage where it was rejected as false 3 The Imperial Seat being translated to Constantinople the Bishop thereof was made a fifth Patriarch in order and not long after the second the rest oppossing c. in vain 4 The Lombards overcoming Italy and the Pope not well pleased with the Emperor c. The Bishop of Constantinople endeavours the Title of Universal Bishope and obtains it of Mauritius the Emperor the Bishop of Rome to the utmost opposing and exclaiming against it as intolerable Pride and the signe of antichrist And whether out of a good mind or because he could not be uppermost himself laments the corruptions of the Church and Clergy For of the Priests he complains the World is full of them and yet but few Labours in the Lords Harvest We take upon us the office but discharge it who list And I think no dishonour to God can be shewed so great as that which it tolerated in Priests For they are come now to that pass that they jear at him that lives humble and continently and takes better courses then themselves which Mantuan versifies on to this purpose Poor Curats only keep Pope Gregory's Laws And fish in Rills and Rivers surface sweep But fatter Jacks and Carps escape their paws Mudding themselves in Coverts of the deep 'T is Prelats sink St. Peters larger Net And ' lone i' th deep all sort of Fish do get The said Gregory cryed out O times O manners The world is all on fire with Wars Christians are destroyed by Idolaters Cities and Temples by Barbarians and yet Priests as it were insulting over Calamities usurp the names of vanity and make ostentation of profane Titles to themselves thereby taxing this arrogance of the Constantinopolitan Patriarch 5 Phocas killing Mauritius and invading the Empire to oblige the Bishop of Rome to keep Italy the better in quiet and obedience grants the dignitiy of Universal Bishop to Boniface requesting it and decrees the Sea or Seat of Rome to be the Head of all Churches Which decrees Boniface publishes in a Synod of 62 Bishops and obtains it not without opposition and contention c. After these things the Eastren or Greek Church broke off from the Latine or Roman Italy by several Masters began to be quite pluck'd from the Empire and Rome to come into the Popes power and several Schisms and Heresies in the Church and contentions and quarrels between Popes and Emperors thereupon c. The Pope alienates the Romans or people of Italy and Rome from the Emperor brings them to oppose him amidst the troubles of Italy And condemns Emperors of the East of Heresie and at last excommunicates them And out of the ruines of Italy works his own greatness and by his means and through his occasion a new Empire is set up in the West by the Franks under Charles the Great and great Temporal Power and Dominion and Estates accrew'd to the Church and the Pope at length claims superiority above the Emperors themselves c. As the following particulars will manifest After the Supremacy of the Pope thus established the Greeke Church in the East seperates from the Roman not only for Primacy but other high points of Religion as was now said About the year 710. arose the controversie about Images And about 726. the Pope excommunicates the Emperor for his Edct against Images who laughs at it and excommunicates him again for an Idolater and forbids Revenues and Taxes to be paid in Italy Upon these differences Italy is torn from the Empire by divers Usurpers and Rome by the Pope c. An. 712. Lands and Teritories are first conferr'd on the Church by some new Conquerors And soon after more And at last most he now possesses by Pepin and Charles the Great For about this time Charles Martel Maire of the Kings Palace recovers France from the Infidel Moors and Saracens which drew the heart of the French towards him creating him Duke or Prince of France and might have had the Kingdom too if he had been so aspiring Pepin his Son under colour of Election is made King The lawful King having his Pole shaven and feign to retire into a Monastery the Pope approving these proceedings and investing and confirming Pepin in the Kingdom But the Pope being distressed in Italy calls in Pepin therefore whom he had so obliged to defend him
meddle with Italy Because as he said The Fox saw no safe return of his Predecessors out of the Lions paws And to be quiet in Italy he granted Romania and Ravenna to the Pope An. 1279. About 1280. The Popes having rais'd and fomented a quarrel between the King of France and the King of Aragon for the Kingdom of Sicily whence grew the Massacre of the French called the Sicilian Vespers wherein upon the toll of a Bell all sorts of French were cruelly butchered Pope Martin the 4 th for this excommunicates i. e. deposes Peter of Aragon and the whole Kingdom Had they done it on the Popes behalf 't is like it had pass'd for a noble action as many worse have done The King he contemn'd the excommunication But the Sicilians they it seems could not be quiet in their consciences or rather in their Kingdom for so bloudy a fact without doing penance to the Pope and comimg to ask pardon of him which their Embassadors did by delivering their Supplication in this manner saying three times O Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the World have mercy upon us And this was an expedient Salve on both sides to be quiet They hitherto have plaid Rex that is King now it seems they would act God on Earth too An. 1283. The said Pope sent his Legate into Germany to gather Monies c. and three or four years after requires one fourth of all Ecclesiastick Revenues of Germany degrading a Bishop for deposing it and also within a year more requires it again He also set a Vicar of the Empire over Italy For now the Emperors durst come no more thither nor no longer meddle with the affairs thereof loosing almost all their right power and possessions there An. 1293. To the inauguration of Celestine the fifth formerly a devout Monk two hundred thousand people resort But he was too honest and simple an Hermite to hold it out above a year For resolving to be strict in reforming the Church he was quell'd by one that fained himself an Angel speaking through a Trunk in a Wall Celestine Celestine g ve over the Chair for it is above they ability He meant sure Honesty Whereupon he would not hold it though the French King much perswaded him and decreed That the Pope might quit his place and turn Hermet and honest again which he did to that end but was hindred imprisoned and made away by the impostor that had deceiv'd him viz. Boniface the 8 th who the next year 1294. entered like a Fox but raigned after like a Lion and at last dyed wretchedly like a Dog He exempts the Clergy by his general Bull or zeal from all taxes and payments to temporal Princes Which was complyed with by the Clergy of England c. He threw ashes into an Arch Bishops Eyes on Ashwensday because he was a Gibelline and took the Emperors part excommunicated Philip King of France and gave away his Kingdom to the Emperor and boasted That all powers were subject to him Instituted the first Jubilee of Triumph therefore when in that great concourse of people and to make it great indeed every one that did repair to it was to have a plenary remission of all his sins What better invitation could there be devised besides the fine sight to be seen The Pope carried in Procession in a Chair of state wirh a Sumptuous Canopy born over his Head by Kings or Nobles for so he is in the year of Jubilee shewed himself openly before them all one day in the habit of a Pope and the next in the habit of an Emperor and every day caused two Swords to be carried before him in token that all power Ecclesiastical and Civil did belong unto him Yet King Philip in contempt of his Bull of excommunication gave the proud Fool his own writing back thus Let your mighty Foolship know that we are subject to none in Temporals And from this time forward the year of Jubilee has been us'd as a constant Fair as it were for the trade of Indulgence Agnus Dei's and other fine Sanctified knacks That so the people invited thereby to come or send from all parts to Rome to spend their Mony might not have nothing for it This was a pretty step towards making pardons and indulgences directly sealable afterwards And that it might not be so long a coming they not long after reduced it from every hundredth to every fiftyeth and at last to every twentyfifth year In his time about the year 1300. the forementioned factions of the Guelphs and Gibellines the one for the Pope and the other for the Emperor grew to their height and have lasted all ages ever since almost to ours more or less Not long after Clement the fifth removed the Sea from Rome to Avignon in France where it continued seventy years His inauguration was ennobled with the presence of several Kings and Princes in which Pomp he lost a Carbuncle out of his Hat valued at a great rate He rooted out the Knights Templars as too good for his turn excommunicated the Florentines Luccans and Venetians Whose Duke he made come and beg pardon chain'd like a Dog and fed under his Table He excommunicated the Emperor of the East because he would not subject himself and the Greeke Church to the Roman nor suffer appeals to Rome as his Father before him had done And likewise durst neither fearing God nor man forgive presently the Monk that then poysoned the Emperor of the West in the Host c. They were now arived to their utmost height and became so insolent and imperious that they could be indured no longer So that about this time there were several Meetings and Assemblyes of the Empire against their intolerable domineerings An. 1333. The Pope leaves at his death a vast treasure of twenty milions of Crowns which they had amassed thus together by their extortions and devises For all things e're this time had been become saleable at Rome Now it was that the Emperors wholly in a manner depended on the Popes will and pleasure who assume right and Soveraignty over the Cities Subject to the Empire in Italy And the Emperors give up as it were all their Power and Authority so long contested for to the Popes For Clement the 6 th after 1340. to diminish still more and more the Emperors Right and Authority created Vicount Vicars to rule the Empire Yet the Emperor again in requital instituted other Vicars to governe the Church This and other things so netled him that he would never be reconciled with the Emperor except he put himself and all his into his Holiness disposal Which for quietness sake and to prevent the shedding of Christian bloud the Emperor doth The Princes of the Empire exclaim against the Popes tyrannical usurpations The Arch-Bishop of Mentz is depos'd for but speaking on the Fmperors behalf and the other Electors partly brib'd and partly awed agree to set up his Son Thus the Empire
flourishing Monarchy laps'd into a short liv'd Commonwealth A State A Protector and a Miraculous return to where they began an unheard of Restitution of the Banished and wonderful preserved Prince without War or Bloud-shed We have seen the mightiest Emperor deposed and strangled by his own Vassals in the same year 1648. and his Successor much a-doe to escape the Rout in 1656. that made sixteen Bashaws one Vizier forcing the Emperess and the High Priest almost equal with the Emperor himself to the Seraglio c. And the Brother of a King to depose his Prince under pretence of Loyalty and the publick good keep him in durance Rule in his stead and make the Father and High Priest of the Church give his Queen to him for wife and all the Princes of Christendom even their late Master of Spain too himself by their Embassies and for their own Interests to approve in a manner all and to Complement the new Prince Regent from all parts We have seen also above twenty years civil Wars Broyls Commotions and Factions in Poland and the poor old King made weary of his Scepter by his own restless and unconstant Subjects We have seen him and a Queen besides to lay down their Crowns of their own accord for a more quiet and happy life We have seen a Universal Calme as it were and Peace for a while but a sudden Eruption of fierce Wars again both by Sea and Land and again a present deep Silence and stand as it were of a sudden and the World gazing on one another what they are about to do c. Lastly we have seen Grand Eclipses Conjunctions Comets and new Stars Innumerable Prodigies and Signs in the Heavens in the Earth in the Waters a raging Plague marching from Country to Country together with raging Wars and the most dreadful Fire that ever was designed or contrived of one of the greatest and most flourishing Cities in Christendom And behold greater things yet to come ch following c. An additional Observation concerning the late Popes designes There has already been hinted his new Negotiation with the Kings of the Earth to establish the Papal Sea's Infalibility He had a great zeal besides in rapairing the Church of St. Peter Paul and to erect there a new Apostolick Chair And would have imposed this Inscription thereon although hindred by the wiser Cardinals In the year of the Apostolick Authority restored the first He spent likewise all the time of his Priestdom in adorning Rome with new Palaces and Basilicon's especially in raising a Palace designed for the future choice of Popes called the Conclave into a stupendons Grandure To Erect which that there might not want room he commanded many Streets of the City with Temples and Monasteries to be demolished and sent for all sorts of Artificers out of Italy as if like Nebuchadnezer he meant to say This is Babilon the Great which I have built for an house of my Kingdom and for the Glory of my Majesty c. And now we should pass to the Foundations and Revolutions of the present Religion of Christendom but that they would swell this Table of the general heads of things only into a volumn already too larg And for that they may be also somewhat apprehended from this general View of the Revolutions of States and Kingdoms Behold the desolutions of the Earth For want of the King of Peace to rule The Pretensions and Interest of Europe The pretensions of Europe are either of one part to another as of England to France Spain to Portugal c. of which 't will be needless to speak a word or else to other parts of the World as to Asia Africa or America Of which a word or two These pretences are founded on wrong and false titles as Right of discovery or of Christianity and Religion and the Popes donation and disposal of the whole Infidel world accordingly thereupon For towards the year 1500. Pope Alexander the 6th as if he was Master of the whole Earth distributed by his Bull all the new World between Ferdinand the 5th King of Spain and John King of Portugal Here was a wonderful donation indeed of the World from East to West parted between two Princes And to make them agree it was accorded that the Portuguess should equally share from the fortunate Islands or Canaries by one streight line from North to South for the first Meridian an hundred and eighty degrees that is one half of the World Eastward and the Spaniard as many Westward And that both one and the other should have right to take possession of all the Earth they could seize on and all upon this title forsooth That they should convert the Infidels and Barbarous Nations to the Christian Faith which they did indeed more like Infidels and Barbarians then Christians So mankind preys one upon another like ravenous Beasts and Birds of prey Neither can the Protestans perhaps much reproach the Papists upon this account and both will alwayes agree in this point that glory and gain are not to be neglected what ever becoms of Christianity or humanity it self But when the Portuguese through ignorance and impudence judged that they had wrong done them as yet ignorant that the World was round or might be sail'd round by great importunity they extorted that the first Meridian should be removed from the Canary Islands to the Azores three hundred miles more Westward Hence the first Meridian ever since has place not in the Canaries but the Azores Islands the cause of which mutation is not the declination of the Margent and variation of the Needle or Compass but this division between the Portuguess and Spaniard Now by this change it happened that the Portugals afterwards obtained Brasil in the West Indies which fell within the Meridian of the Azores but the Spaniards reaped a far greater advantage because they from that time chalenge right to the greatest part of the East Indies viz. the Philippy Islands which they have to this day to the Molucco's and others c. then out of dispute the Portugals And this made the Spaniard alwayes retire and adhere to the Azores for the first Meridian As for the Interests of Europe in these sad dis-unions revolutions and confusions of Christendom The Interests of the whole and of every part seems mainly to be to agree in Religion and known Articles of Faith and not devour one another as Infidels and Pagans for Opinions or Ceremonies and exclude not only one another their Church but their Nation and the World too for Hereticks or if not agreement at least Freedom and liberty of Religion which is no unpracticable Romance we see also for Christian Princes to unite not so much against the Turk as with one another and not destroy and ruine one anothers Kingdoms and so many Subjects lives in unnatural unchristian Wars and quarrels and lastly each Nation to accord and conspire together into mutual correspondence and free intercourse in all their
beseeching you all by the adorable name of God to suffer your selves to be perswaded that nothing under Heaven greater can at this time be undertaken and performed by you then this very question to be determined Is it the Voice of God that sounds here or no c. Seeing O Kings Princes Common-wealths your duties are here set before your eyes with wholesome Counsels for the publick safty be you intreated in the name of God and by your own and the Worlds salvation this thing in the first place to take these very Books into your protection and command them to be exposed openly through all the Book-sellers Shops of your Kingdoms and Provinces as freely as any other Books whatever of good note Instilling into the Christian People the fear of God reverence of Kings and amendment of life As freely I say as other Books of this nature as the Book of the three men and three spritual Virgins Hermis Pastoris Ugutine the Monk Fryar Robert and Hildegard Elizabeth and Mathilda published by Jacob Faber at Paris 1513. who all had Revelations and Visions like these c. Hear O Kings Princes Common-wealths and every Power among Christian People this Book which is offered to you stirs you up against no man but exhorts you all in the name of God to do your duty in stopping the confusions brought in by Satan and restoring the order instituted from God As yet promising Benediction if you yet admit counsel or denouncing the last Wrath Plagues and Destruction if you yet harden your selves Let the fear of the Lord therefore be with you and deligently put in execution all things It is your glory O Kings to be nursing Fathers c. and also it is your Duty to restrain any Church that degenerating into Babylon exercises fierceness cruelty and if the Spouse of Christ putting on a whorish dress waxes wanton to hate the Whore and make her desolate and naked and to eat her flesh and burn her with Fire God putting it into your hearts to do his pleasure And no longer to give your Kingdoms to the Beast till the Word of God be finished Rev. 17. But behold in our times the words of all the Prophesies old and new are consummated which the universal commotion of Nations which you see and the universal change of things which you shall shorrly see do witness Ho! therefore take again unto you your power and leave not your Scepters any longer in a strange and wrong hand I have commanded you O Kings and Princes that you your selves Govern For you have even your name from me Gods on the Earth not from an Angel or any creature saies the Word of God to Drabricius c. But what must you do when you take unto you your power O Kings That very thing which the King of Kings whose Ministers you are at this time requires of you TO REFORM THE WORLD AND ALL THINGS IN IT THROUGH ALL NATIONS For he who has long since by the mouths of his most holy Prophets said that he would make all things new on you O Kings as his Vicegerents he confers this Honor that this glorious Renovation be begun by your happy undertaking and be done by your Co-working and Authority through the whole world And then shall be the peaceable state of the World and of the Church in the Kingdom of the Messiah promised in Paradise in the destroying of the Devils Kingdom And which all the Patriarcks looked for and the Prophets prefigured in types and the Apostles prophesied of and the Prophets and Prophesies of God ever since have declared And which is so often reiterated in these Books that Peace shall return to the Earth before the end of the World with the divine benediction poured forth upon all Drabricius Rev. 107. Peace such as never was the like from the beginning of things Rev. 149. when all Wayes all Paths all the Trumphets all Books all Voices and Languages of all People and Nations shall agree in one angle of PEACE and in one common CHARITY Rev. 384. when the spiritual Jerusalem shall be built anew so beautifully that the very times of Solomon may not be compared to these Cotterus 18. When the Messias shall plant new Hevens and new Earth viz. new Churches and a new State wherein dwells Righteousness Which manner of things seeing they cannot but be an exultation to true Christians and that this Book declares them suffer it as well ye O Roman Chatholicks Princes as others whosoever love the coming of our Lord Jesus suffer it to live and to be taken for a publick Testimony of Gods being yet God doing nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the Prophets And for a publick looking or perspective-glass rationally to view all things which are here doing in the Ages of the world And for the last protestation and bearing witness of God that it will not be his fault if a new deluge come upon the impenitent world And then lastly for a Publick Alarum or Sermon-Bell to Universal repontance and for the last Trumphet after whose sound great Voices shall be made in the Heaven of the Church The Kingdoms of the World are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ who now shall Raign throughout all Ages forever Rather do this O Kings and Powers for the Honour of Christ now taking unto him the Kingdoms of the World under the whole Heavens Learn who is the King of Kings against whom the Heathen rage in vain and the People imagin a vain thing c. To whom the Nations are given for an inheritance and the ends of the Earth for his possession who shall rule them with a Rod of Iron and shall break them as a Potters vessel Understand now therefore O ye Kings be instructed ye Judges of the Earth serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce before him with trembling learn discipline lest his wrath at length be kindled ye perish in the way understand the mystery of these times why the Nations are troubled and distrubed and the Kingdoms declining why the whole Earth is moved at the Voice of God Namely that these are the works of the Lord and set as Prodigies and Signs upon the Earth to take away War even unto the end of the Earth To snap the bow in sunder to break the Weapons in peieces and burn the sheilds with Fire Therefore cease O ye Kings from War see that the Lord is God that God will be exalted in the Nations that he will be exalted in the Earth c. O therefore Christian Kings take heed any longer to stand against the Prince of Peace Christ with your furious Arms disturbing and laying wast his Kingdom w ch Kingdom you your selves are as also the Universal Christian People committed to you Or it shall come to pass that he will find some one to send upon you even from the utmost East to devour your Armies if you will not know the thoughts of the Lord
nor understand his counsel Therefore Kings begin to know from his Oracles old and new founding in this very Book also that the Lord be not inraged against you and you perish in the way But how First By puting an end among your selves and all Christian People to WARS because now is the time for the King of Peace to Raign c. O Christian Kings Princes Common-wealths be Ministers of this Peacemaking King and cease to be a reproach to Christ For God will scatter the Nations that delight in War 2dly All mutual PERSECUTIONS for Religion are presently to be laid aside also which God never commanded but Satan began by Cain and by Ahab and Jezabel and the Babylonians and Antiochus and Caiphas with their bloudy Hypocrites and continued by Nero and other Pagans But among Christians only the impious Arrians dispairing to defend the depravity of their Opinion by Scripture first attempted to usurp against the most manifest Doctrine and practice of Christ and the Apostles and the holy Doctors and Martyrs of the Church who had rather be killed and devoured like Sheep then kill and devour like Wolves Thirdly Not to permit him neither who usurping primacy in the Church and supposing it to be defended by him with Sword and Fire hath now for some Ages raged do not suffer him to continue his rage and cruelty but that he also laying aside his Savageness may become a Lamb of Christs flock or an innocent Lyon Be mindful of that wise saying of Steven King of Poland that God hath reserved three things to himself 1. Creation out of nothing 2. Foreknowledge of things future 3. Domination or Lordship over Consciences Which the Roman Pope hath attempted to usurp and without either any Divine command or humane leave hath dared to build himself a Kingdom over all Kingdoms of the World and to maintain it by Sword and Flame And to lord it over the Consciences of all men even of his Brethren the Bishops and that which is more of Kings themselves who represent the divine Majesty on Earth Which what is it else but to climb into Gods Throne which if ye O Kings the Vicegerents of Divine Majesty on Earth continually tolerate God protests that he will no longer tole ate And to that end begins his Judgements against him and you and the world 4thly That what the season of the present Broils and Troubles of the world require of you O Kings that every one of you most solemnly proclaim to all your People universally publick Prayers Fastings and amendment of life and thereby true and general repentance after the example of the King of Nineveh Because this is the time of which Christ sayes that there shall be great Tribulation such as hath not been from the begining of the World nor ever shall be O ye Sons in high places now God arises to judge the Earth and to take his inheritance in all Nations 5thly If upon universal repentance God spare you a most solemn reformation and amendment of things is to be thought of Inquire into the Books of the Lord old and new hear your St. Bridgets most excellent counsel when St. Bernard inquired the counsel of God from her He that sat upon the Throne opening his mouth said Hear all my enemies living in the World because I speak not to my Friends who follow my will hear all Clergy men Arch Bishops Bishops and all inferior orders of the Church hear all Religious and Regulars of what soever order hear Kings and Princes and Judges of the Earth and all Ministirs and Subjects Hear Women Queens and Princesses and all Ladies Mistresses and Servants and all of what soever order and degree great and small that inhabit the world these words which I even I who have created you now speak unto you c. After complaining of all their sins impieties and vices Therefore I swear by my Deity that if you dye in the state wherein you are you shall never see my face nor escape my punishments c. Therefore return ye unto me with humiliations and I will receive you graciously as Sons c. And therefore for such an universal and serious return because serious and solemn thoughts once at length are to be entred upon counsel is given you even in these Books O Kings of convocating an UNIVERSAL COUNCIL out of all Christian People Holily to conspire together in a common universal repentance and universal serious deprecating and amendment of so great exorbitances now among us c. and to return all from curiosities and niceties about Articles and Questions of Faith which hath distracted us and from the many by-paths of error which we are run into and from earthly desires and lusts which have led us away into mutual strifes and Wars unto the simplicity and puriry of the Christian Faith and Life That all Christian Dissensions Strifes Hatreds Wars Devourings and Destroyings may be changed into Concord Peace Love Safety and Felicity and to this the only way is a COUNCIL truly universal truly free truly congregated in the Holy Ghost Arise O Christian Kings help things every where grown desperate the Patronage of this Book belongs to Kings because it comes in the name of the King of Kings and is printed with priviledge of the King of Kings and committed to the favor of all the Kings of the Earth every where to spread and divulge it and contains nothing hurtful to any but profitable and most useful to all If you hear not these divine counsels O Christians the Lord will send more Plagues Intestine Wars Famine Plague Savage Beasts i. e. Men worse then Beasts so that Christians shall be more savage and rage one against another more inhumanly then Turks and Barbarians because the condemnation of the great Whore is at hand Not for our selves O Kings and Princes do we the Publishers of this Book require your protection thereof but for your selves and the Christian People lest you perish from the fury of all the divine premointions It is comfort and protection enough to us from God who can boldly say with Hildegardis I have both spoke and writ these things not according to the invention of my own heart or of any man but as I have seen heard and perceived them in the Heavenly places or visions through the secret mysteries of God Therefore hear ye who preside in the place of God on Earth undertake so to manage this cause of God against Satan or of Satan against God for so different persons interpret differently that it may be ended and none may err concerning these things This lyes upon you upon a double right 1st because you are Kings 2dly Because you are the Churches nursing Fathers c. Therefore constitute forthwith a Judgement O ye who judge the Earth wherein may be decided whether our God that hath pity towards us all in common speakes here things profitable to his Reaple or some Devil instil things hurtful If the latter that the
false prophets and fainers of dreams may be put to death and iniquity be taken away from the midst of the people Deut. 13. And because the Eclesiasticks are ordinarily inclined to slay the Prophets behold we solemnly appeal from all Universities and Consistories to your tribunal O Kings and secular Powers Like Jeremiah from the Priests to the Princes and to the King himself and Paul the Apostle from the Council of the Priests to the Political Judges Felix Festus Agrippa and lastly to Caesar himself We beseech you undertake 1st the Patronage of this Book Permitting none to rage against it till plenary examination and delusion of the cause For what have these papers offended in receiving these Lamentations Mournings and Woes especially denouncing no sad things to the people of God But to Sodom Egypt Babylon the World Hell and the Devils afflicting the people of God Nor perswade any Nation or any Man any Rebellion against their Kings but all Loyalty that all things may return from all manner of confusions into all manner of order and peace Lastly because This Book is one of them by which God Convocates the Kings of the Earth from the four Corners of the World to reverence him it is your part therefore O Kings not to hinder but promote this Trumpet of God if you would be Ministers of his Kingdom Next The publishers themselves of this Book commend themselves to your Patronage O Gods Protectors of the Earth That you permit no unjust violence against them As the Princes and the King himself did not against Jeremiah and Baruch nor the Tribune of the Band and Felix Governor of Judea against Paul For it would be most unjust by force to act any thing against him who appealing to Justice sets himself before the Judgement As the Jewish Priests with their flatterers did against the Lord himself and against Paul c. 3. We commend to you O Powers of the Earth the very cause it self pleaded in these Books to be throughly examined for in the name of one more powerful these Oracles do come fulminating your People your Priests and your Selves with your Princes and citing all the inhabitants of the Modern World to a certain supreme invisible yet terrible Tribunal For if the words which these Books denounce be truly the words of God it is more Glorious then any thing yet in the Church since the Apostles time If Satanical Impostures they are more terrible and fearful ones then ever any have yet been If figments of humane craft nothing like hath ever yet come forth in any Nation by any humane wit But whether this or that or the other It is a matter most worthy of the care of Kings that at length what it is may appear whereunto serious Judgement is needful not neglect not contempt not fury Hasten O Kings to know and examine what matter of things these are before all the Plagues here denounced be powred forth upon your Kingdoms Deliver these things to wise men and fearing God and of publick spirits seriously to be weighed If you hear humane counsels why not also these which many wayes may appear to come by men indeed yet not from men If any one say Dare you broach and vend these things for Prophesies undoutedly Divine I will answer with Philip to Nathaniel Come and see For the offices and marks of true Prophets are here to declare to the people of God fallen into abominations their sins To denounce wrath and punishment to the impenitent and again Mercy and Grace to the penitent this and not another thing for the main scope and end you shall see is done here Only be sure to see that you make your selves certain which you may from the adjoyned history 1st That there have been really and indeed persons in this our Age who have written these things greater then any human wit 2ly And that they were simple Idiots not able to fain such things Act. 4. 13. 3ly And Godly fearing God not willing to deceive 4ly Incompassed with a cloud of Witnesses that there could be no place for Impostures 5ly Lastly that many Godly and solid Divines not in one Nation only do give testimony that greater wisedom shines forth in these things then that they can be attributed to men and that the whole work is more sanctions and holy then that it can be attributed to Satan Yet lest we may seem to obtrude any private Authority on the Publick we earnestly intreat a publick and solemn examination of these things under your Auspicions beginnings O Kings And that as soon as may be while witnesses are alive who can give it on their Faith that they have seen the fingers writing viz. Things flowing forth or droping from the pen of the Seers not what they themselves would but what by themselves for the most part not understood some certain invisible dictatour instilled into them which also their own hand writing viz. The originals themselves kept in a certain place further testifie The last thing we desire of you O most serene Princes is that if these be Counsels divine you would seriously purpose and resolve to obey and execute the divine Will saying All that the Lord hath said we will do Why may not these things be thus recommended c. seeing no man brings them forth of his own daring but they are offered in the name of God who is the God of all and takes care of all It is the Law of Arms and custom of the Nations that Trumpeters pass freely amongst the most deadly enemies even ready to give Battel bringing the command of their Principals Why may not he therefore be safe between the safeguards of your Majesty O Christian Kings who is your Interpreter from the King of Kings But they who would perswade you that this Book is hurtful stirring up to War and Arms betray their folly malice and impiety Because it does not make but after the manner of all the Prophets forewarn denounce and threaten Wars and Desolations without Repentence and Amendment And because none has ever drawn his Sword for the sake of this Book when yet all people draw their Swords one against another who is so blind yet and besotted as not to see his Arm stretched forth out of whose mouth are denounced these things beforehand Was Rome unwise in permitting it to be cry'd through all the City Hannibal s before the Gates Cease Mortals to be mad and quite out of your wits The voice of God and Angels forewarning you from destruction sound even in these Books The World is full of the Judgements of God The present commotion of the World and so many unlooked for Mutations do not signifie nothing Lest therefore the Christian people be still so grosly ignorant as they are of the terrible Judgements of God now in the world viz. of their Causes Manner End and Issue do ye who preside over the people in the place of God command that among other helps ministred from
Servant Drabricius some ten years since therfore will your Majesty also vouchsafe a peculiar Audience to his Messengers sent not with naked words but with testimonies gaining credit and with most ample instructions unto you Read O King or deliver these things to be read by your wise men You Great Lewis King of France does the great Lord by name invite yea call hither to his Glorious work of renewing the World Take counsel with your Collegues the Christian Kings of Europe to Convocate a Council of the Christian World to settle Truth and Peace and Righteousness therein That Angels may again sing Glory to God on High on Earth Peace Good will towards men If you will follow most Christian King with other Christian Kings the conduct of the Counsel of this Book undoubtedly all the World will shortly become Christian and the Times Peaceful Religious Inlightened and Happier than Solomons according as God did of old promise and does now remind us of that they are approaching Prepare for Christ a quiet Kingdom in the Earth removing his proud Rival Rejoyce that the like things are commanded and promised to you as once to Cyrus To be the Shepherd of the Lord that is a keeper of his Flock the Church the whole Church not any part only thereof as the Greek or the Latin or the French or the English or German-Churches c. For whoever calls on the Name of Christ are the People of Christ and the Sheep of his Flock fulfilling all his will saying to Jerusalem Thou shalt be built c. Isa 44. 28. and 45. 1 2 3 4. Cyrus the King when after the Conquest of Babylon he read the Prophecy of Isaiah presented to him by the Jews as Josephus witnesses and saw his name expressed believed God and presently freed the People of God from captivity O second Cyrus revived will not you imitate c. It is the work of the Devil and of Antichrist to destroy and take away the Liberty of Humane Nature which is the top of the Image of God in Man Whoever therefore shall be the Instrument of this Glorious Restitution of things shall be more than Cyrus more than Alexander more than Augustus more than Constantine or Charles the Great Arise therefore against all Antichrists i. e. Oppressors of Liberties thou King of France King of Liberties for so the word signifies And succour the Christian Nations where-ever groaning under any Corporal or Spiritual yoke Make to cease unchristian Wars and destroyings of one another by Rapines Fires Slaughters c. But especially free the Christian People from the Slaughterhouse of Consciences which they call the Inquisition and execute by Swords Halters Burnings alive Prisons Banishments and other kind of Tortures Let this most abominable Abomination be cast out of the Christian World as the manifest work of Satan by his Antichrists which he began by the impious Kill-Brother Cain and continued by Pharao's Saul's Ahab's Jezebel's Antiochus's Caiphas's Nero's Julians c. but has brought to the height only among us these one or two Ages last past Christ practised or commanded no force but only to teach the Nations and shake off the dust of their feet c. There 's no necessity for Force and Violence because Religion cannot be forced nor compelled They are plainly unteachable who do not observe that those former Persecutors gain'd nothing so but at length to ruine themselves Christ lives conquers reigns with his but Tyrants perish one after another with theirs Therefore take away that foolishness as Lactantius calls it from the Christian People most Christian King Take away that violent Tyranny of Consciences and Bodies from the Catholick People King of Liberties Most Serene of Kings God and the Christian People expect nothing but to answer your Name and what the Names and Titles given you by the Providence of God sound forth Lewis Deodat XIV most Christian King of France Lewis Refuge of the People Deodat Given of God XIV Most Christian King Christ's Vicegerent not Antichrists Of France i. e. Of Liberty The Devil and malicious and evil-minded men O King will stand in your way which two things you and all that love you for God's sake ought to fear For the Devil loth to have his Babylonish Kingdoms disturb'd will undoubtedly withstand you And malignant men seek your ruine as they did of your Heroick Ancestors c. But wise men fear more lest you your own self raise Impediments to your self and to your Victories O King by harkning to evil Counsellours and Instruments rather than to God But and if you refuse God will find out another to plead his Cause We do not stir you up against the Church greatest King but for it Nor against the Roman Church but for it also to restore it to its primitive Apostolick state from which it is deeply fallen God threatens here to send the barbarous Nations to reform us if none else will lend an helping hand Be intreated therefore by your own Salvation and of your most ample Kingdom and the whole Worlds not to let pass into the empty Air these Voices both Humane and Divine The Holy Spirit write in your Heart if not in Golden yet in flaming Letters that twice-made Protestation to negligent Eli High-Priest and disobedient Saul Those that honour me I will honour But those that contemn me shall be contemned of me In the Information to the Readers But are these things certain or are they not fables contriv'd and composed by the Art of some ingenious and witty to deceive T is answered It might be doubted at the first and was every-where doubted as the History of these things will shew But now there is no time for doubting seeing these things are confirmed both by abundant witnesses and confirm'd by divine signs and miracles as the same History will shew and now publickly appears And lastly where the truth of the Predictions are in apparent view and the very event does seal their divine authority Machiavillian Politicians Atheists imagining the World to be ruled by Humane Counsels have laughed at these as Phanatick things But behold God shews himself to be the Rector of the World These things being powerfully fulfilled which he hath commanded to be fore-denounced in his Name If any shall say therefore This Book is the Trumpet to Wars It must be answered 'T is so indeed but the Book of the Wars of the Lord as the Revelation of St. John and the Book of all the Prophets yea and the Book of the Gospel it self perhaps according to that of Christ Do you think that I came to send Peace on Earth c. For this Book describes 1. The Wars of God Jehovah against Idols As Ezek. 30. 13. 2. The Wars of the Lamb against the Beast already heretofore sounded Rev. 1714. 3. The Wars of the holy Spirit of God against all erroneous and unclean spirits in the Earth Zach. 13. 2. I say That here is the Revelation of the Revelation of
dayes in a lamentable manner First With his own hands killing his Mother and Daughter and at length grown desperate hanged himself Amidst such great Confusions of the China Empire the Christians grown to a great multitude were betwixt hope and fear and wait with sollicitous hearts the new own'd Emperors inclination and found him in the end more favourable then they could either wish or hope for Especially upon the account of Father Schall before mentioned as a Stranger of admirable prudence and skill in the Affairs of the China Kingdom and to whom he might unbosom the secret counsels of his heart securely and as one highly recommended to him for his rare skill in the computation of Time and Astronomy and other Arts of Europe And so made him Mandarine of the first Order and one of his supream Counsellors And set him about perfecting the reformation of their Calender for the Universal benefit and advantage of the Kingdom as before hath been declared After this was the Queen and her Son Converted and Baptized by the name of Helena and Constantine of which her Supream Minister of her Court Pan Achilleus long before a Zealous Christian more then once affectionately wrote Letters thereof both to the Pope and to the General of the Jesuites Society to send more Labourers into China as followeth The Interpretation of the China Letter from the Chancellor of the China Empire Pan Achilleus a Chinois Christian to our most Holy Lord by the Fathers Andrew Xavier and Michael Boym of the Society of Jesus in the Court of the Emperor of China for the time Assistants Of the most famous Empire of China by the command of the Emperor The Universal Vice-Roy of Kingdoms and Provinces Quám tum Quám Sy c Fò Kien Commissary of the Militia by Sea and Land Duke of the little petty King Quám Sy c Treasurer of the Revenues and Sollicitor absolute and sole decider or Judge of Causes in the absence of the Emperor Chief Captain of the Imperial Guard Master of the Horse Great Chancellor Privy Secretary of the Emperor and Chamberlain Pan Achilleus Christian on bended knees and head bowed down to the Ground prostrates himself before the Throne of the Vicar of God JESUS on Earth the Universal Doctor of the Catholick Church the true Lord the most Holy Father I Achilleus weigh with my self that being by Office Keeper of the Privy Chambers of the Emperor yet led by error I also take care of the Militia Whence I have diminished that is degraded or debased my self and without light and Discipline that is Instruction have augmented the multitude of sins Long since in the Northern Court or Palace through the good Will of God I hapned upon men of the Society of Jesus who led me who was rude and ignorant in the open Path exhorting me erring and going astray to follow the Faith Wherefore being with reverence expiated in the Holy Laver I then began to understand the documents that is Fundamentals or Principles of the Holy Doctrine and its hidden Excellency and high profundity And then being immers'd in this study night and day with a faithful heart I have prosecuted it twenty years and more nor durst I grow slack in the least So I have procured the help of the King of Heaven whom I know not how I shall be able to answer I had often a mind to come unto your most Holy Throne and with veneration to satisfie my eyes with your most Holy Countenance But the matters of the Empire were so various and the Royal Affairs so perplexed as they were permitted me not to perform the desires of my intimate Bosome Wherefore I am most highly aggrieved The onely thought and grief now of me a Sinner from the bottom of my Soul is in this that the calamity of the Empire has not yet ceased Therefore on purpose I went and asked a man of the Society of Jesus Father Michael Boym that in the next Ship that went away he would return back to the great West and come suppliant to you the chief Priest the most Holy Father that before the Altar of the Saints Peter and Paul with the universal Church of the whole World with eyes lifted up to Heaven you would pray to God that he would look down upon this Imperial House with mercy help and conserve the Empire and set limits of future speedy peace and together would grant that our most wise Emperor who is the eighteenth Successor of this Royal House and the twelfth Grand-child from the first founder of the Empire and Family That himself as Lord with his Subjects may adore Jesus the Lord of the Heavens This at length will be the intire happiness of our China Empire And indeed at present the most intire most wise most clement the venerable Empress of Christian Name Helena The Queen Mother of the Emperor of Christian name Mary The Queen his legitimate Wife of Christian name Anna and the Son of the Emperor Prince and Heir by Christian Name Constantine do all with humble hearts believe and worship the Holy Doctrine together they have the words of Speech which they send to the most Holy Throne viz. of the Pope As for me rude Sinner I humbly beseech you the most Holy Father That for the hour of my departure out of this life you would vouchsafe intire remission of the punishment of sins and would send also many men of the Society into this Empire of China who by their Doctrine may convert universally the men of the Age and may advertise them with Repentance to give good heed to Worship and adore the Holy Law nor may by a vain and transient stay be sent away with the Dust of their Feet snatch'd up that is quickly So at length I hope to attain Felicity truly never to have an end With Veneration I have in small measure by these things explained the Secrets of a simple ignorant Mind I cast my self wholly to the Earth expecting a mercifull beholding of your Countenance And no more Yum Lie the fourth year in order of the Revolutions of the Annual Letters Kem Yn the tenth Moon eighth day which was in the year 1650. the first day of November Further nothing to be read The place of the Seal wherein after the China manner for they do not use to write their Names otherwise are engraven these words The Seal of the most Valiant Generalissimo of Arms universal Vice-Roy The Interpretation of the China Letter from the Empress of the China Empire the Lady Helena by name and of the Queen = Mother the Lady Anne and the Queen = Wife the Lady Mary and also of the Son of the Emperor Prince and Heir the Lord Constantine By Father Andrew Xavier and sent to our most Holy Lord c. The Speech of Helena the most Intire most Wise most Clement Venerable Empress of the most famous Empire of China before the Throne of the Vicar on Earth of God JESUS Universal Doctor of the
Catholick Doctrine the Supream Lord the most Holy Father I HELENA considering my self an humble Daughter that is of low estate and degree of this China Empire I am ashamed to abide in the Palace of the Emperour Heretofore I onely knew the observance of the Privy-Chambers I was ignorant of the Law of Forreign Lands It happened that a Man of the Society of Jesus Father Andrew Xavier did stay in our Court or Pallace promulging the holy Doctrine By relation of others I began to know him And behold I believed and with a Reverent Heart received from him the Holy Baptism I caused that Mary the Queen Mother of the Emperour Anne the Queen his lawful Wife and Constantine Son of the Emperour Prince and Heir being withal instructed did also receive the Holy Water it is now the third year since Now although I ought with blood dropping that is with drops of Blood to dissolve the Marrow of my Soul yet I attain not to answer and satisfie no not in the least It continually comes into my mind with Reverence to go unto the Throne of the Most Holy Father that in presence I may receive the Holy Documents onely I fear the difficult passages to so most remote a Kingdom Therefore I am frustrate of my Desire In the mean while with profound bowing even to the Ground We beseech You the Most Holy Father That You would be led before the Presence of the Divine Majesty and out of Pious Affection toward Us who are obnoxious to Sins and at the hour of Our departure out of this World You would vouchsafe to Indulge to Us intire remission of the punishment of Sins Withall we beseech You the Most Holy Father that with the Holy and Universal Church You would deprecate the Supreme Lord for Us That He would confirm Our Empire help and establish it being once restored with Peace and withall would grant that this Eighteenth Emperour of our Imperia House who is the Twelfth Grandchild from the first Founder of the Empire and Family namely That Himself as Lord and all his subjects together also may acknowledge and own the true Lord Jesus Finally We ask You the Most Holy Father That You would send very many Men of the Society of JESUS who far and near may divulge the Holy Faith These Things indulg'd to Us will be Monuments of Your Pious Affections toward Us. But other Things which are in our Desires We are not sufficient to explain in Words Onely a man of the Society of Jesus Father Michael Boym knows the Businesses of our Empire We command him to return Legate into the Great West to propound Our Speech before the Most Holy Father He can particularly relate Our humble Will We trust in the time of Peace to send Chineses Themselves Legates who may present Our Duty at the Altar of the Saints PETER and PAUL and offer Reverence With Heads bowed down to Your Feet We hope the Most Holy Father will kindly look upon these Senses of a rude Mind This onely the Speech In the year Yum Lie the fourth of the tenth Moon the eleventh day which was of the year from Christ 1650. the fourth day of November The place of the Seal wherein after the China Custom for they do not use to prescribe their Names otherwise are these words engraved The Seal of the most Intire most Wise most Clement Venerable Empress Here follow the Letters Responsory from Alexander VII Priest Best and Greatest Dated both to the Queen and to the Supreme Director of the Kingdom To our most Dear Daughter in Christ Helena Taminga Queen of China ALEXANDER VII POPE To Our most Dear Daughter in Christ Health and Apostolick Benediction VVE have known from Your Majesties Letter how great was the Goodness and Clemency whereby the God of gods brought You wrapt up in blind Errors and lying Superstition out of the Power of Darkness to the knowledge of Light and Truth He does not forget to shew Pity nor retains His Mercy in Wrath. For when You was a Daughter of This yet the Omnipotent Lord looked down upon You who would rather be called The Father of Mercy than The God of Vengeances and Revenges Now who can search out His Powerfulnesses Or find out the Way of His Counsels Immense and vast Lands whereof We have scarce heard any thing with Our Ears the Old Enemy hath possessed with his Frauds and Fallacies It was but like a Fable this mighty Kingdom no less for the Desarts and almost infinite distances of Places betwixt than because the false Religion and Worship hath took up all things possessed all over-spread all What access for Truth through so many Seas wandrings of Journeys almost another Heaven and Stars when they were prohibited from all the Shoars who desired a commutation of this precious Pearl before Gold and rich Merchandize And lastly when they were defended by the impiety of the Mountains continuedly adjoyning to the Ocean and by Laws and most strict Guards The study of promoting the true Faith broke through and overcame all these things By which so many Dangers and Difficulties Your Salvation hath been sought Whereby so much the more attentively Daughter in Christ You are to recall into Your Mind the Memory of so Great a Benefit and make known these things to Your Children that they may put their Hope and Confidence in GOD and not forget the Works of GOD and may enquire into his Commandments Although also to the sum of Joy which was brought Us neither was this wanting That Others also insisted on Your Example And the Royal Child Constantine does no more grow into the hopes of the Kingdom than of overturning Superstition Him truly as together also All We Fatherly embrace and most lovingly bestow upon Your Majesty the Benediction which You ask and ardently pray God to make Your most Dis-joyned Kingdom One with Us both in Affection and Faith Given at Rome at or with Saint Peter under the Ring of the Fisher the 18th day of December 1655. the First Year of Our Popedom NATALIS RONDININUS To Our Beloved Son Pan Achilleus Eunuch of the King of China Captain General by Sea and Land Beloved Son Health and Apostolick Benediction YOur Letter brought Us great Joy For from the Rising and Setting of the Sun from the North and from the Sea God hath dealt Mercy to Us And He who heretofore on a sudden illustrated with the Water and Grace of Baptism the Royal Eunuch mighty in much Treasure and Riches now hath called you Beloved Son intangled with the Cares of this Kingdom and the World among which never scarce is found place for the Doctrine of Christ which is counted foolishness by the Men of this World into the Light of his Son that is into an Immortal and neverto-perish Inheritance of another and true Kingdom The Greatness of which Benefit as it hath affected Our Heart with great Joy so you will plainly understand what is due from you therefore if you look unto Him continually who was made unto Us for an Example of his own Discipline But endeavour and co-work diligently that this Work may be consummated which is begun in this most ample Kingdom That there may be your Praise also in the Gospel For there ought to be no Vastness nor Longitude of Lands so great as to withstand that Faith which removes Mountains or Charity which never fails endures and works all things By this we admit you into Our Bosom whose Flame towards you and these Nations shall not be extinguish'd no not by the multitude of Waters which pass between Us nor ever wax cold by any Difficulties But the Benediction which you ask for your Self We most lovingly bestow upon you Given at Rome at or with St. Peter under the Ring c. NATALIS RONDININUS Since these Transactions the Emperour hath thought fit within these few years to send the Jesuites out of his Countreys and Dominions whether for their Good Deeds or Bad Deeds God knows For indeed the Jesuites are like some sorts of Persons The more you know them the worse you like them And it were well if the Western Kings and Princes would do so too If Kings would think upon 't there might be no Pope since if Popes could well help it there should be no Kings Doctor Sherman in his late Account of Faith against the Papists For if there be any honest Jesuites in the World we have little reason to think them at this End thereof For here whatever they are elsewhere they are grown so mischievous that every good Christian especially Englishman cannot chuse but be ready to help them to that which their Arms a Bow and Arrow have so long lack'd notwithstanding they Themselves too have so well deserv'd it A String FINIS * For the Law of Nature is Retaliation and the Law of Arms and Nations is Give and take Quarter * Interpreter * Since from divers other places * The Rock * tricks
Wars with the Turk who besieges Vienna it self 1529. The rest the Emperor is King of Between whom constant Wars Truces and Breaches and Invasions again After this time Transylvania dismembred from Hungaria About the Bohemian War great Troubles here also for Liberty of Religion which had been before granted them by the former Emperor Of Transylvania Walachia Moldavia Transylvania eastward of Upper Hungaria heretofore for long time a Province and Principality thereof and so of the Empire from which swerving constitutes a peculiar Principality distinct from the Kingdom of Hungary under the protection of the Turks about 1560. The Princes nominated and substituted by the Turk in opposition to the Emperor The Protestants choosing rather to fall under the Turk than the Emperor finding more mercy and liberty from him or rather from between both Their Princes being maintained and substituted by the Turk against the Emperor and again defended by th' Emperor and Poland from being made wholly thrall to the Turk to whom their Princes are tributary Hence Wars and Troubles with the Princes of Transylvania as well as Turk they often by War invading Caesar First Bathor makes work 1601. Next Botskay makes war about 1606. Then Bethlem Gabor a profest enemy of the House of Austria and Defender of the Protestants drives Gabriel Bathor the former Prince out of Transylvania 1620 having invaded Hungary the year before 1619 but after a great noise did effect little even at this time of the Hungarian and Bohemian Wars laying down his Hungarian Diadem 1622 and reconcil'd to the Emperor Anno 1644 Ragotzi moves into Hungary takes places and makes Peace a year or two after Since George Ragotzi the second mingling himself rashly and improvidently in the War between Sweden and Poland and beaten by the Polander 1658 and overcome by the Turks at Clausenburg Anno 1660 died of his wounds there received at Waradin Unhappy Prince seeking anothers loses his own And so the Ragotzies were overturn'd and quite outed Barkay is substituted by the Turks the same year opposed by Kemini-Janos Ragotzi's General who was chosen by the Estates The Turks take several strong places amongst the rest Waradin the Gate and Sluse as it were or Keys of Germany on this side the Danow Anno 1661 Count Serin bestirs himself against the Turks fortifies a Castle in his Island Kemini-Janos takes Barkay and kills him and his Brother The Imperialists march into Hungary and Transylvania against the Turks who subdue a great part thereof take Newstadt constitute Abaffy Prince 1662. Kemini-Janos makes work for Abaffy but betray'd by his own is kill'd Count Serin is active vexes the Turks They take Fogaras Castle and domineer throughout Take Deva and establish Abaffy Clausenburg a long time in vain besieged by Abaffy reliev'd by Imperialists Turks make a treacherous Truce in Transylvania with the Emperor 1663. Turks again invade Hungary take New-hausel and other places in Upper-Hungary Clausenburg and another Hold betray'd and sold by the Souldiers to Abaffy The French do exploits and get renown against the Turks having been sent to the Emperor's assistance Peace made 1665. Walachia bordering Southward of Transylvania and Moldavia has been a long time a Province of the Turks receive their Prince from that Court are tributary yet often cause troubles Moldavia eastward of Transylvania has also been a long time a Turkish Province They nominate their Prince are tributary yet not so fully in their Power as they would desire And so we pass to the Empire of the Turks The Foundation and Revolutions of the present Turkish Empire Osman or Ottoman rising to be Sultan in Asia minor i. e. those parts of Asia towards Europe where the Turks then had only footing being quite driven out of Persia and all their Eastern Kingdoms by the Tartars after the death of Sultan Aladine the 2d or 3d the last of the other House layes the Foundation of the present Empire and Family about the year 1300 subduing all the other inferiour Kingdoms of the Turks there in Asia minor among whom the Empire was divided after Saladines death without Heirs About 1350 they cross the Hellespont or Narrow-Sea out of Asia into Europe hiring the Genoa's Ships For what footing they had before in Gallipolis was inconsiderable by Land having subdued Nice the Imperial Seat of the Eastern i. e. Graecian Emperors in the time of Ottoman before mentioned From that time they get ground in Europe take Adrianople their first Imperial Seat in Europe and the Countries of Servia and Bulgaria In the year 1370 a great part of Thrace and Macedonia and Achaia in Greece but loose most part of their Empire in Asia by Tamerlane Emperor of the Tartars to the year 1400. But soon recover it again and reunite the whole Turkish Kingdom and inlarge it with the Conquests of Dacia and part of Sclavonia and Transylvania and the rest of Macedonia in Greece About 1420. take from the Constantinopolitan or Greek Empire all Achaia Thessaly Epirus shake the State of Hungary Uuder Mahomet the 2 d call'd the Great about 1450 this Empire rises to its height taking Constantinople it self the Imperial Seat and the whole Greek Empire making it the seat of Empire to this day He conquers two Empires the Constantinopolitan and of Trabezund a new erected Empire of the Greeks distinct from the Constantinopolitan twelve Kingdoms innumerable Provinces and two hundred Cityes and so put an end to the whole Greek Roman Empire About 1480 they drive the Venetians from Morea or Peloponnese a part of Greece on the East whereof lyes Candy over against it and part of Dalmatia and get some Countries or Kingdoms in Asia also Towards the year 1520 they subdue the Mammalucks of Egypt Grand Caire their Royal Seat also Palestine Syria Arabia bringing all under their Yoke After the year 1520 Solyman the Magnificent the most Powerful of all the Turkish Emperors and Scourge of the Christians surprises Rhodes Belgrade Buda with greatest part of Hungary and Babylon Assyria and Mesopotamia in Asia from the Persians But in vain besieges Vienna An. 1529 with three hundred thousand men and lost eighty thousand before it in a months time Never the like Siege read of This Hungarian War lasted all Solyman's time for forty years About 1567 take from the Venetians Cyprus and from the Moors Tunis then under the power of Charles the fifth King of Spain and Algiers both in Africa with their Territories after their defeat in the famous Sea-fight at Lepanto by the Christians After the year 1600 the Hollander first makes League with Achmet and the German Emperor afterwards He succeeded at nine years old the elder being kill'd by command of the Father Osman or Ottoman the 2d unsuccesfully making War upon Poland and endeavouring to remove the Seat of Empire from Constantinople to Cair in Egypt his Janizaries seditious take him and strangle him publickly 1622 and fetch Mustapha whom they had after two or three months reign imprisoned
and the Church in this Stile Peter the Apostle of Jesus Christ to you the most Illustrious King Pepin and to all Bishops Abbots c. I the Apostle Peter whose Adopted Sons you are admonish you that you perfectly come and defend this City c. And doubt you not but trust assuredly that I my self as if I stood before you do thus exhort you c. and that I Peter the Apostle of God will at the last day yeeld you mutual kindness and prepare you Tabernacles in the Heavens Upon this quarel of the Popes Pepin and his Son Charls destroy the Kingdom of the Lombards in Italy and give large Territories to the Church And these things made way and gave occasion and opportunity for Charles upon his great conquests to set up the German Empire of the West Franks The Pope in requital confirms Pepin in the Ringdom of France gives his Son Charls afterwards the Title of most christian King and crowns him Emperor of the Romans at Rome An. 800. From which he would pretend to be above Emperors and Kings and to be his right to Crown confirm and depose them if not dispose of their Kingdoms But Charls at length reassumes the ancient and original Imperial Dignity and Power to Govern the Church call Councils and order Papal Elections and confirm and invest them c. against all begun usurpations and incroachments of the Pope and aws Italy And keeps the Pope still Subject which Authority of the Empire was prety well upheld during the Caroline Race The Pope in the mean while under pretext of the Christian Religion and converting Infidels and the Nations increases in Wealth Power and Authority over the World Thundering out these Decrees of Holy Church Out of the Church no Salvation The Pope's the Successor of St. Peter the visible Head of the Church the Vicar of Christ on Earth His right as aforesaid to create confirm excommunicate and depose Kings and dispose Kingdoms for the cause of Religion c. That they are Hereticks that dissent from the Roman Church the only true Catholick Church or are Enemies to it c. Hereby the Consciences of the Nations Princes and People converted to an outward christianity are aw'd and fill'd with Reverence and Zeal for the Church to convert or root out Infidel Nations c. and to do any Benefices or Services for the Church As the most acceptable Service to Christ whom they began to acknowledge and Worship as their God and Saviour Hence almost all the Nations subject themselves to the Pope as Head of the Church yea and in Temporals also in a great measure nay some to hold their Kingdoms of him c. As if they could not any better way recompence Christs Vicar for the benefit of their Eternal Salvation then to submit themselvs all theirs to his dispose And this Opinion was brought about to prevail in the World that they might redeem their sins by good deeds and charitable works and services for the Church against it's enemies c. Hence Riches and Revenues of the Clergy and Hosts and swarms of clergy men Hence Churches Temples Abbies Monastries without number c. for the Redemtion of Souls Hence Expeditions Holy Wars Leagues and undertakings for the Church Hence Pardons Indulgences and devices for mony c. 'T would be endless to mention particulars c. The Pope having thus erected his Throne in the Consciences of men strongly seated there through Ignorance and blind Zeal and Devotion begins to play Rex in the World Besides there being perpetual emulation of Princes specially in Germany and Italy for Empire and Dominion c. The Pope interests himself in one part and the other for fear of excommunication or force becomes subject to him The Pope therefore now practises all wayes he can against the superiority of the Emperor and from being any wayes subject to his Authority or control and to undermine all Supremacy in Temporals presuming that all power is given to him both in Heaven and Earth in the Church and State c. 'Till in the end they come not only to let the Emperors have nothing to do in their Election Confirmation and Investiture but also to have all in a manner themselves to do in the Creation and Coronation of the Emperors Not long after the Caroline power and race declining and that partly through the Popes practises Italy is usurp'd by several Tyrants against the Emperor and almost wholly broken from it wherein the Popes have a finger and make their own advantage upon these distractions of the Empire For An. 884. Adrian the 3 d. denyes the Emperors Authority necessary to the creating Popes and about the year 900. the Empire is wholly and perfectly translated from the French or Caroline race to the Germans by Pope Agapetus's plotting And about the year 1000. as some write Gregory the fifth appoints Electors for choosing the Emperors whereby they afterwards became weakned and the Empire broken into factions and parties and the Pope thereby to have the better opportunity to work his own ends and to raise his greatness out of others ruines striving now to be uppermost not only in Church but State too and to be above even the Emperors themselves For after this time open and down right Tyranny over the Emperors begins to manifest it self First Pope John takes away all choise of Popes from the people to the Clergy only upon this plausible ground That the People are to be taught not followed Next Clement the 2 d. about 1047. set up by the Emperor against other Anti-Popes by the Authority of a Synod caused the Romans to renounce by oath the right they claimed in choosing Popes Then about 1050. Leo the 9 th invested by the Emperor is perswaded by Hildebrand to put off his pontificalibus or papal Robes in his journey from Germany to Rome to wave the Emperor and have a new election from the Roman Clergy and then made Hildebrand Cardinal who manag'd all at his pleasure After this Nicholas the 2 d. about 1060. takes away the election from the Roman Clergy bringing it about to a Colledge of Cardinals also then instituted that is of Spiritual Temporal or Lincy-woollcy Princes like himself the Supreme Emperor as it were for the greater grandure and more magnificent authority of his Almighty Holiness who was now almost got to the top of Empire Supremacy and Omnipotency For it was decreed in Council the Pope only to be chose by Cardinals whose Wounderful Worships or Eminencies might lift him up one step higher even as it were into Heaven to be God on Earth For so some thought fitting afterwards to stile forsooth his divine Majesty c. And then they order that no lay Person should confer Ecclesiaslick Investiture For what should the Church concern them But yet they themselves would invest and Crown Lay Princes For though the State had nothing to do with the Church yet the Church had to do