can very well assure you and in the Word of a King promise unto you that I shall never give the first occasion of the breach thereof neither shall I ever be moved for any particular or private passion of mind to interrupt your publick peace except I be forced thereunto either for reparation of the honour of the Kingdom or else by necessity for the weal and preservation of the same In which case a secure and honourable War must be preferred before an unsecure and dishonourable peace Yet do I hope by my experience of the by past blessings of peace which God hath so long ever since my birth bestowed upon me that he will not be weary to continue the same nor repent him of his grace towards me transferring that sentence of King Davids upon his by past Victories of War to mine of peace That that God who preserved me from the devouring jaws of the Bear and of the Lion and delivered them into my hand shall now also grant me Victory over that uncircumcised Philistine But although outward peace be a great blessing yet it is as far inferiour to peace within as Civil Wars are more cruel and unnatural than Wars abroad And therefore the second great blessing that God hath with my Person sent unto you is Peace within and that in a double form First by my dedescent lineally out of the loyns of Henry the seventh is re-united and confirmed in me the Vnion of the two Princely Roses of the two Houses of Lancaster and York whereof that King of happy memory was the first Vniter as he was also the first ground-layer of the other peace The lamentable and miserable events by the civil and bloody dissension betwixt these two Houses was so great and so late as it need not be renewed unto your memories which as it was first setled and united in Him so it is now re-united and confirmed in Me being justly and lineally descended not only of that happy conjunction but of both the Branches thereof in any Times before But the Union of these two Princely Houses is nothing comparable to the Union of the two ancient and famous Kingdoms which is the other Inward peace annexed to my Person And here I must crave your patience for a little space to give me leave to discourse more particularly of the Benefits that do arise of that Vnion which is made in my blood being a matter that belongeth most properly to me to speak of as the Head wherein that great Body is united And first if we were to look no higher than to Natural and Physical Reasons we may easily be perswaded of the great Benefits that by this Vnion do redound to the whole Island for if twenty thousand men be a strong Army is not the double thereof forty thousand a stronger Army If a Baron enricheth himself with double as many Lands as he had before is he not double the greater Nature teacheth Vs that Mountains are made of Motes and that at first Kingdoms being divided and every particular Town or little Country as Tyrants or Usurpers could obtain the possession of a Signory apart many of these little Kingdoms are now in process of Time by the Ordinance of God joyned into great Monarchies whereby they are become powerful within themselves to defend themselves from all Outward invasions and their Head and Governour thereby enabled to redeem them from Foreign Assaults and punish private transgressions within Do we not yet remember that this Kingdom was divided into seven little Kingdoms besides Wales And is it not now the stronger by their Vnion And hath not the Vnion of Wales to England added a greater strength thereto Which though it was a great Principality was nothing comparable in greatness and power to the antient and famous Kingdom of Scotland But what shall we stick upon any Natural appearance when it is manifest that God by his Almighty Providence hath pre-ordained it so to be Hath not God first united these two Kingdoms both in Language and Religion and similitude of Manners Yea hath he not made Vs all in one Island compassed with one Sea and of it self by Nature so indivisible as almost those that were borderers themselves on the late Borders cannot distinguish nor know or discern their own Limits These two Countries being separated neither by Sea nor great River Mountain nor other strength of Nature but only by little small Brooks or demolished little Walls so as rather they were divided in apprehension than in effect and now in the end and fulness of time united the right and title of both in my Person alike lineally descended of both the Crowns whereby it is now become a little World within it self being intrenched and fortified round about with a natural and yet admirable strong Pond or Ditch whereby all the former fears of this Nation are quite cut off The other part of the Island being ever before now not only the Place of Landing to all Strangers that were to make Invasion here but likewise moved by the Enemies of this State by untimely Incursions to make inforced diversion from their Conquests for defending themselves at home and keeping sure their Back-door as then it was called which was the greatest hindrance and Let my Predecessors of this Nation ever had in disturbing them from their many famous and glorious Conquests abroad What God hath conjoyned then let no man separate I am the Husband and all the whole Island is my lawful Wife I am the Head and it is my Body I am the Shepherd and it is my Flock I hope therefore no man will be so unreasonable as to think that I that am a Christian King under the Gospel should be a Polygamist and Husband to two Wives that I being the Head should have a divided and monstrous Body or that being the Shepherd of so fair a Flock whose Fold hath no wall to sence it but the four Seas should have my Flock parted in two But as I am assured that no honest Subject of whatsoever degree within my whole Dominions is less glad of this joyful Vnion than I am so may the frivolous objection of any that would be hinderers of this Work which God hath in my Person already established be easily answered which can be none except such as are either blinded with ignorance or else transported with malice being unable to live in a well-governed Common-wealth and only delighting to fish in troubled waters For if they would stand upon their reputation and privileges of any of the Kingdoms I pray you were not both the Kingdoms Monarchies from the beginning And consequently could ever the Body be counted without the Head which was ever unseparably joyned thereunto So that as the honour and priviledges of any of the Kingdoms could not be divided from their Sovereign so are they now confounded and joyned in my Person who am equal and alike kindly Head to both When this Kingdom of England was divided
more prayers and oblations offered here to the Mother than to the Son For the Marquess himself as he was a man of excellent symmetry and proportion of parts so he affected beauty where he found it but yet he looks upon the whole race of Women as inferior things and uses them as if the Sex were one best pleased with all And if his eye cull'd out a wanton beauty he had his Setters that could spread his Nets and point a meeting at some Ladies House where he should come as by accident and find Accesses while all his Train attended at the dore as if it were an honourable visit The Earl of Rutland of a Noble Family had but one Daughter to be the Mistris of his great Fortune and he tempts her carries her to his Lodgings in Whitehall keeps her there for some time and then returns her back again to her Father The stout old Earl sent him this threatning Message That he had too much of a Gentleman to suffer such an indignity and if he did not marry his Daughter to repair her honour no greatness should protect him from his justice Buckingham that perhaps made it his design to get the Father's good will this way being the greatest match in the Kingdom had no reason to mislike the Union therefore he quickly salved up the wound before it grew to a quarrel And if this Marriage stopt the Current of his sins he had the less to answer for This young Lady was bred a Papist by her Mother but after her Marriage to the Marquess she was converted by Doctor White as was pretended and grew a zealous Protestant but like a morning dew it quickly vanished For the old Countess of Buckingham never left working by her sweet Instruments the Iesuits till she had placed her on the first foundation So that the Marquess betwixt a Mother and a Wife began to be indifferent no Papist yet no Protestant but the Arminian Tenets taking root were nourished up by him and those that did not hold the same opinions were counted Puritans These new indifferences now grew so hot in England that the Protestant Cause grew very cold in Germany Which made the spirits of most men rise against the Spanish Faction at home and Spain's incroaching Monarchy abroad And though the King sped ill the last Parliament of Somerset's undertaking and thought to lay them by for ever as he often expressed looking upon them as incroachers into his Prerogative and diminishers of his Majesty and Glory making Kings less and Subjects more than they are Yet now finding the peoples desires high-mounted for regaining the Palatinate he thought they would look only up towards that and liberally open their Purses which he might make use of and this Unanimity and good agreement betwixt him and his people would induce his Brother of Spain to be more active in the Treaty in hand and so he should have supply from the one and dispatch from the other But Parliaments that are like Physicians to the bodies of Common-wealths when the humors are once stirred they find cause enough many times to administer sharp Medicines where there was little appearance of Diseases For in this Recess and Ease Time-servers and Flatterers had cried up the Prerogative And the King wanting Money for his vast expenses had furnished himself by unusual courses For Kings excessive in gifts will find followers excessive in demands and they that weaken themselves in giving lose more in gathering than they gain in the gift For Prodigality in a Soveraign ends in the Rapine and Spoil of the Subject To help himself therefore and those that drained from him he had granted several Patents to undertakers and Monopolizers whereby they preyed upon the people by suits and exactions milkt the Kingdom and kept it poor the King taking his ease and giving way to Informers the Gentry grown debauched and Fashion-mongers and the Commons sopt and besotted with quiet and restiness drunk in so much disability that it might well be said by Gondemar England had a great many people but few men And he would smile at their Musters for through disuse they were grown careless of Military Discipline ill provided of Arms effeminate Officers neglecting their charges and duties conniving for gain at their Neighbours miscarriages Some of the Officers in the Militia and Iustices of the Peace not a few being Church-Papists floating upon the smooth stream of the times overwhelming all others that opposed them stigmatizing them with the name of Puritans and that was mark enough to hinder the current of any proceeding or preferment aimed at or hoped for either in Church or State And the Iesuits ranging up and down like spirits let loose did not now as formerly creep into corners using close and cunning Artifices but practised them openly having admission to our Counsellors of State for when Secretaries and such as manage the intimate Counsels of Kings are Iesuitical and Clients to the Pope there can be no tendency of Affection to a contrary Religion or Policy Those were only most active in the Court of England that courted the King of Spain most and could carry the face of a Protestant and the heart of a Papist the rest were contented to go along with the cry For they hunted but a cold scent and could pick out and make nothing of it that drew off or crost or hunted counter Which raised the spirits of the people so high against them that were the chief Hunters in these times that they brought the King himself within the compass of their Libels and Pasquils charging him to love his hounds better than his people And if this bad blood had been heated to an itch of Innovation it would have broke out to a very fore and incurable Malady every man seeing the danger few men daring to prevent it The Pulpits were the most bold Opposers but if they toucht any thing upon the Spanish policy or the intended Treaties for the Restitution of the Palatinate was included in the Marriage before it was the Spaniards to give their mouths must be stopt by Gondemar without the Lady Iacob's Receipt and it may be confined or imprisoned for it So that there were noplain downright blows to be given but if they cunningly and subtily could glance at the misdemeanors of the Times and smooth it over metaphorically it would pass current though before the King himself For about this time one of his own Chaplains preaching before him at Greenwich took this Text 4 Mat. 8. And the Devil took Iesus to the top of a Mountain and shewed him all the Kingdoms of the World saying All these will I give c. He shewed what power the Devil had in the World at that time when he spake these words and from thence he came down to the power of the Devil now And dividing the World into four parts he could not make the least of the four to be Christian and of
Peer that was nobly descended he could not be justified but was enjoyned by the House to give the Lord Spencer such satisfaction as they prescribed which his Greatness refusing to obey he was by the Lords sent Prisoner to the Tower and Spencer re-admitted into the House again When Arundle was well cooled in the Tower and found that no Power would give him Liberty but that which had restrained him rather blaming his rashness than excusing his stubborness his great Heart humbled it self to the Lords betwixt a Letter and a Petition in these words To the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in the Higher House of Parliament assembled May it please your Lordships WHere as I stand committed here by your Lordships Order for having stood upon performing some part of that which was injoined me by your Lordships which I did rather in respect the time was short for advice than out of any intent to disobey the House for which I have suffered in this place till now I do therefore humbly beseech your Lordships to construe of what is past according to this my profession and for the time to come to believe that I both understand so well your Lordships power to command and your nobleness and tenderness to consider what is fit as I do and will wholly put myself upon your Honors and perform what is or shall be injoyned me So beseeching your Lordships to construe these lines as proceeding from a heart ready to obey you in what you command I rest Your Lordships most humble Servant Thomas Arundle Tower 2 June 1621. Upon this submission the Lords commanded him to be sent for and presenting himself at the Bar of the House with the accustomed Humility that Offenders do he thus expressed himself Because I have committed a fault against this House in not obeying all the Order that your Lordships commanded me I do here acknowledg this my fault and ask your Lordships pardon for the same and am ready to obey all your Lordships commands Thus this great Lord though he fluttered in the Air of the Court and mounted by that means upon the Wings of Passion was glad to stoop when consideration lured him to it lest by the heat that he himself made melting the Waxen Plumes that he thought would have supported him his suffering might have been a greater mischief to him than his submission so sour and severe a School-master is Passion to be both Author and Punisher of our Errors yea making the best Natures often correct themselves most The fourth of Iune this year the Parliament had a Recess the King being to go his Progress wherein some Lords and others of the Parliament were to attend him For it seems his business was not yet ripe for the Parliament and he was loth they should have too much leisure therefore they were not to meet again till the eighth of February following which being a long time of Vacancy the House of Commons before they parted took the Miseries of the Palatinate into serious debate and though they felt the King's pulse and knew the beat of his thought when he spake of providing an Army this Summer for the recovery of it and would engage his Crown Blood and Soul for it finding him apt to say what he had no will to do yet they were so wise as not to slacken or draw back in so good a work that if there were a failing it should not be on their side knowing how much Religion was concerned in it for to the appearance of Reason the triumphing Emperor and Universal King would quickly tread all under foot therefore with one voice none daring to oppose they made this Declaration THe Commons assembled in Parliament taking into most serious consideration the present state of the King's Children abroad and generally afflicted estate of the true Professors of the same Christian Religion professed by the Church of England in Forreign Parts and being touched with a true sence and fellow-feeling of their distresses as Members of the same Body do with unanimous consent in the name of themselves and the whole Body of the Kingdom whom they represent declare unto his most excellent Majesty and to the whole World their hearty grief and sorrow for the same and do not only joyn with them in their humble and Devout Prayers unto Almighty God to protect his true Church and to avert the Dangers now threatned but also with one heart and voice do solemnly protest That if his Majestie s pious endeavours by Treaty to procure their Peace and Safety shall not take that good effect which is desired in Treaty wherefore they humbly beseech his Majesty not to suffer any longer delay that then upon signification of his Majestie s pleasure in Parliament they shall be ready to the utmost of their Powers both with their lives and fortunes to assist him so as that by the Divine Help of Almighty God which is never wanting unto those who in his fear shall undertake the defence of his own Cauâ—e he may be able to do that with his Sword which by a peaceable Course shall not be effected The King took this Declaration of the Commons in very good Part and meant when occasion served to make good use of it For as he found them forward enough to begin a War so he knew his own constitution backward enough the Sword being in his Hand and did fore-see an advantage arising from a Medium betwixt the Parliament and him if he could bring his Ends about which he after put in practice but it broke all to pieces and now away he goes on his Progress Towards Winter the Lord Digby returns from his soliciting journey in Germany His first addresses he made to the Emperour his second to the Duke of Bavaria and his last to the Infanta at Bruxels and all to as little purpose as if he had stayed at home that three-fold Cord twisted by the power of Spain was not easily to be broken Some little twilight and scintil of Hope was given him by the Emperour for restitution of the Palatinate yet not so much as would discover the error of our easie belief But the Bavarian had already swallowed the Electurate and his Voraginous appetite gaped after the possession of the Countrey though the English there were bones in his way Digby being arrived at Court and bringing him with doubtful answers from the Emperour and sullen ones from the Duke of Bavaria the King thought it good Policy to shorten the long Recess till February and to re-assemble the Parliament the 20 th of November that meeting before their Time it might more amaze them and intimate some extraordinary Cause which happily might produce some extraordinary effect if well mannag'd And as incident thereunto he gave order to Digby as soon as the Parliament assembled to make relation to the Houses of his proceedings there which he did in these words IT pleased his Majesty to
by the Text of Scripture free both the Doctrine and the Discipline of the Church of England from the aspersions of either adversary especially where the Auditory is Suspected to be tainted with the One or the other infection 6. Lastly that the Arch-Bishops and Bishops of the Kingdom whom his Majesty hath good cause to blame for this former remissness be more wary and choice in their licensing of Preachers and revoke all Grants made to any Chancellor Official or Commissary to pass Licences in this kind And that all the Lecturers throughout the Kingdom of England a new Body severed from the ancient Clergy as being neither Parsons Vicars nor Curates be licensed henceforward in the Court of Faculties but only from a Recommendation of the Party from the Bishop of the Diocess under his hand and seal with a Fiat from the Lord Arch-Bishop of Canterbury a Confirmation under the great Seal of England And that such as do transgress any one of these Directions be suspended by the Bishop of the Diocess or in his default by the Arch-Bishop of the Province ab officio beneficio for a Year and a Day until his Majesty by the advice of the next Convocation shall prescribe some further punishment The Directions the Archbishop recommended to his several Diocesans that they might be put in execution with caution And then may be observed that the King's affections tended to the peaceable comportment of his people that both Papist and Puritan might have a quiet being which preponderation of His puts them in Aequi-librio nay the Papist was in the prime Scale But this new thing called a Lecturer he could by no means endure unless he past through all the Briers of his several Courts to the Broad Seal which was a kind of pungent Ordeal Tryal to which he must put his Teste me ipso and then it was Orthodox so that though Lecturers were not absolutely forbidden yet the charge and trouble to come to it made the way inaccessible Preachers by an Order of Star-chamber in Heaven were first licensed with an Ite praedicate before Henry the Eighth's time and certainly they have a great Seal from thence for what they do Therefore it behoves them to take heed what they say left that Spirit they receive Directions from bind them not up But this Animosity of the King 's against Puritans was thought to be fomented by the Papists whose Agent Bishop Laud was suspected to be though in Religion he had a Motley form by himself and would never as a Priest told me plainly in Flanders bring his neck under the obedience of the Roman Yoak though he might stickle for the grandure of the Clergy And now he began to be Buckingham's Confessor as he expresseth in his own Notes and wore the Court Livery though the King had a sufficient character of him and was pleased with Asseveration to protest his incentive Spirit should be kept under that the flame should not break out by any Preferment from him But that was now forgotten and he crept so into favour that he was thought to be the Bellows that blew these Fires For the Papists used all the Artifices they could to make a breach between the King and his People that they might enter at the same for their own Ends which to accomplish they slily close with the chief ministers of State to put the King upon all his Projects and Monopolies displeasing to the people that they might the more Alienate their Affections from him Sowing their seeds of Division also betwixt Puritan and Protestant so that like the second Commandment they quite exclude the Protestant For all those were Puritans with this high-grown-Arminian-popish party that held in judgment the Doctrine of the Reformed Churches or in practice live according to the Doctrine publickly taught in the Church of England And they attribute the name of Protestant 1. To such Papists as either out of policy or by popish indulgence hold outward Communion with the Church of England 2. To such Protestants as were either tainted with or inclinable to their opinions 3. To indifferent Men who imbrace always that Religion that shall be commanded by Authority Or 4. To such Neutrals as care for no Religion but such as stands with their own liking so that they allow the Church of England the Refuse both of their Religion and Ours Then they strive to make a Division of Regians and Republicans The Regians are the great Dependents upon the Crown both in Church and State who swell up the Prerogative preaching and distilling into the King the Almightiness of his power That all that the People hath is the King 's and that it is by his mercy they have a bare empty Being And this hoisting up of the King they knew would stir up the Republicans to oppose him in his Designs by which they pinch as the King thinks his Prerogative feeding a strife betwixt Law and Prerogative whereby they escape the Dint of both and hope the fire they kindle will break out at last to consume their Adversaries That these things were acted and fomented by Papists was very probable for they were great Sticklers about the Court and Council-Table But it was too apparent that some of the Clergy to make their way the smoother to their wished end began so to adore the King that he could not be named but more reverence was done to it than to the Name of God And the Iudges in their itinerant Circuits the more to enslave the people to Obedience being to speak of the King would give him such Sacred and Oraculous Titles as if their advancement to higher places must necessarily be laid upon the foundation of the peoples debasement On the other side The well affected to Religion that knew no other inclination than the Dictates of their own Reason experiences of former times and the constant practices of the Romanists for propagating their own designs did by their writings and discourses strive to warm the King 's cold temper and put fresh spirits into his chilled veins shewing the Tyranny of the incroaching Monarchy of the House of Austria who was Rome's great Factor and how just and secure the opposing of such a growing power will be That no Sword is so sharp nor Arm 's so strong as those that are cemented with true Religion The security of Conscience grounded upon the Word of Truth being not only a Bulwark to defend but the best Engin to oppose Idolatry and Ambition Thus stood the Kingdom divided in it self But as the King strove after this Rupture betwixt him and the Parliament to settle things at home and keep his people in obedience so he was as active abroad to keep up his own Reputation For he made a full account to salve up all these miscarriages by the intended Match with Spain that his people might see he could discern further into the intrinsical matters of State than they and so make the
Canterbury knowing that a Toleration was to be admitted though he stood tottering in the King's Favour and had the Badg of a Puritan clapt upon him thought it better to discharge his Conscience though he hazarded all rather than be silent in such a Cause where the Glory of God and the Good of the Kingdom were so higly concerned Therefore he writes this letter to the King May it please your Majesty I Have been too long silent and am afraid by my Silence I have neglected the Duty of the Place it hath pleased God to call me unto and your Majesty to place me in And now I humbly crave leave I may discharge my Conscience towards God and my Duty to your Majesty And therefore I beseech your Majesty give me leave freely to deliver my self and then let your Majesty do with me what you please Your Majesty hath propounded a Toleration of Religion I beseech you Sir take into your consideration what the Act is next what the consequence may be By your Act you labour to set up that most Damnable and Heretical Doctrine of the Church of Rome the Whore of Babylon How Hateful will it be to God and grievous unto your good Subjects the true Professors of the Gospel that your Majesty who hath often disputed and learnedly written against those wicked Heresies should now shew your self a Patron of those Doctrines which your Pen hath told the World and your Conscience tels your Self are Superstitious Idolatrous and Detestable Add hereunto what you have done in sending the Prince into Spain without the consent of your Council the Privity and Approbation of your People And though Sir you have a large Interest in the Prince as the Son of your Flesh yet hath the people a greater as the Son of the Kingdom upon whom next after your Majesty their Eyes are fixed and Welfare depends And so tenderly is his going apprehended as believe it Sir however his return may be safe yet the drawers of him to that Action so dangerous to himself to desperate to the Kingdom will not pass away unquestioned and unpunished Besides this Toleration which you endeavour to set up by Proclamation cannot be done without a Parliament unless your Majesty would let your Subjects see That you will take unto your self a liberty to throw down the Laws of the Land at your Pleasure What dreadful Consequence these things may draw after them I beseech your Majesty to consider And above all lest by this Toleration and discontinuance of the true profession of the Gospel whereby God hath blessed us and under which this Kingdom hath for many years flourished your Majesty do not draw upon the Kingdom in general and your Self in particular God's heavy Wrath and Indignation Thus in discharge of my Duty towards God to your Majesty and the place of my Calling I have taken humble Boldness to deliver my Conscience And now Sir do with me what you please Thus did our Solomon in his latter time though he had fought with the Beasts at Ephesus as one saith of him incline a little too much to the Beast Yet he made his tale so good to the Archbishop of Canterbury what reservations soever he had that he wrought upon the good old man afterwards in the Conclusion of the work to set his Hand as a Witness to the Articles And his desires were so heightned to the Heats of Spain which boyl'd him to such a Distemper that he would listen to nothing and almost yield to any thing rather than not to enjoy his own Humour Divers of his intimate Council affecting Popery were not slack to urge him to a Toleration and many Arguments were used inciting to it As that Catholicks were the King 's best and most peaceable Subjects the Puritans being the only Sticklers and the greatest Disturbers of the Royal peace trenching too boldly upon the Prerogative and striving to lessen the Kingly power But if the King had occasion to make use of the Catholicks he should find them more faithful to him than those that are ever contesting with him And why should not Catholicks with as much safety be permitted in England as the Protestants are in France That their Religion was full of Love and Charity where they could enjoy it with freedom and where Charity layes the Foundation the upper Building must needs be spiritual But these Arguments were answered and many reasons alledged against them proving the Nature of the Protestant Religion to be Compatible with the Nature of the Politick Laws of any State of what Religion soever Because it teacheth that the Government of any State whether Monarchial or Aristocratical is Supream within it self and not subordinate to any power without so that the Knot of Allegiance thereunto is so firmly tied that no Humane power can unloose or dissolve it Whereas on the contrary the Roman Religion acknowledging a Supremacy in another above that power which swayeth the State whereof they are Members must consequently hold that one stroke of that Supreme power is able to unsinew and cut in sunder all the Bonds which ty them to the Subordinate and Dependent Authority And therefore can ill accord with the Allegiance which Subjects owe to a Prince of their own Religion which makes Papists intolerable in a Protestant Common-wealth For what Faith can a Prince or People expect from them whose Tenet is That no Faith is to be held with Hereticks That the Protestants in France had merited better there than the Papists had done in England the one by their Loyalties to their lawful King having ransomed that Kingdom with their Bloods in the Pangs of her desperate Agonies from the Yoak of an Usurper within and the Tyranny of a Forain Scepter without The other seeking to write their Disloyalties in the Heart-Blood of the Princes and best Subjects of this Kingdom That the Number and Quality of the Professors of these different Religions in either Kingdom is to be observed For in France the Number of the Protestants were so great that a Toleration did not make them but found them a Considerable Party so strong as they could not have been suppressed without endangering the Kingdom But a Toleration in England would not find but form the Papists to be a considerable party witness their encrease by this late Connivency a thing which ought mainly to be avoided For the distraction of a State into several powerfull parties is alwaies weakning and often proveth the utter ruine thereof These thing were laid open to the King but all were waved by the King of Spain's Offering His engagement to the Pope by oath That he and the Prince his son should observe and keep the Articles stipulated betwixt them did exceedingly affect him And the Articles now coming to close up all they were ingrossed with a long preamble Declaring to all the World the much desired Union betwixt him and the King of Spain by the marriage of his son to
into so many petty Kingdoms as I told you before one of them eat up another till they were all united into One. And yet can Wiltshire or Devonshire which were of the West-Saxons although their Kingdom was of longest durance and did by Conquest overcome divers of the rest of the little Kingdoms make Claim to Priority of place or Honour before Suâ—sex Essex or other Shires which were Conquered by them And have We not the like experience in the Kingdom of France being composed of divers Dutchies and one after another Conquered by the Sword For even as little Brooks lose their Names by running and falling into great Rivers and the very name and memory of great Rivers swallowed up in the Ocean so by the conjunction of divers little Kingdoms into One are all these private differences and questions swallowed up And since the success was happy of the Saxon Kingdoms Conquered by the Spear of Bellona how much greater reason have We to expect a happy issue of this greater Vnion which is only fastned and bound up by the Wedding-Ring of Astrea And as God hath made Scotland the one half of this Island to enjoy my birth and the first and most imperfect half of my life and you here to enjoy the perfect and last half thereof so can I not think that any would be so injurious to me no not in their thoughts and wishes as to cut asunder the one half of Me from the other But in this matter I have far enough insisted resting assured that in your hearts and minds you all applaud this my Discourse Now although these blessings before rehearsed of inward and outward peace be great yet seeing that in all good things a great part of their goodness and estimation is lost if they have not appearance of perpetuity or long continuance so hath it pleased Almighty God to accompany my person also with that favour having healthful and hopeful Issue of my bod whereof some are here present for continuance and propagation of that undoubted Right which is in my person under whom I doubt not but it will please God to prosper and continue for many years this Vnion and all other blessings of inward and outward Peace which I have brought with me But neither peace outward nor peace inward nor any other blessing that can follow thereupon nor appearance of the perpetuity thereof by propagation in posterity are but weak pillars and rotten reeds to lead unto if God doth not strengthen and by the staff of his blessing make them durable for in vain doth the Watchman watch the City if the Lord be not the principal defence thereof in vain doth the Builder build the house if God give not the success and in vain as Paul saith doth Paul plant and Apollo water if God give not the increase for all worldly blessings are but like swift passing shadows fading flowers or chaff blown before the wind if by the profession of true Religion and works according thereunto God be not moved to maintain and settle the Thrones of Princes And although since mine entry into this Kingdom I have both by meeting with divers of the Ecclesiastical state and likewise by divers Proclamations clearly declared my mind in points of Religion yet do I not think it amiss in this so solemn an Audience to take occasion to discover somewhat of the secrets of my heart in that matter For I shall never with Gods grace be ashamed to make publick profession thereof upon all occasions lest God should be ashamed of me before Men and Angels especially lest at this time men might presume further upon the misknowledg of my meaning to trouble this Parliament than were convenient At my first coming although I found but one Religion and that which by my self is professed publickly allowed and by the Law maintained yet found I another sort of Religion besides a private Sect lurking within the bowels of this Nation The first is the true Religion which by me is professed and by Law is established The second is the falsly called Catholicks but truly Papists The third which I call a Sect rather than a Religion is the Puritans and Novelists who do not so far differ from us in points of Religion as in their confused form of policy and parity being ever discontented with the present Government and impatient to suffer any superiority which maketh their Sects insufferable in any well governed Common-wealth But as for my course towards them I remit it to my Proclamations made upon that subject And now for the Papists I must put a difference betwixt mine own private profession of my salvation and my politick Government of the Realm for the weal and quietness thereof As for my own profession you have me your head now among you of the same Religion that the Body is of As I am no stranger to you in Blood no more am I a stranger to you in Faith or in matters concerning the House of God And although this my profession be according to my education wherein I thank God I suckt the milk of Gods Truth with the milk of my Nurse yet I do here protest unto you that I would never for such a conceit of Constancy or other prejudicate opinion have so firmly kept my first profession if I had not found it agreeable to all reason and to the rule of my conscience But I was never violent nor unreasonable in my profession I acknowledg the Roman Church to be our Mother Church although defiled with some infirmities and corruptions as the Iews were before they Crucified Christ. And as I am no enemy to the life of a sick man because I would have his body purged of ill humours no more am I an enemy to their Church because I would have them reform their errors not wishing the down-throwing of the Temple but that it might be purged and cleansed from corruption otherwise how can they wish us to enter if their house be not first made clean But as I would be lother to dispense in the least point of mine own conscience for any worldly respect than the foolishest Precisian of them all so would I be as sorry to streighten the politick Government of the bodies and minds of all my Subjects to my private Opinions Nay my mind was ever so free from persecution or inthralling of my Subjects in matters of conscience as I hope those of that profession within this Kingdom have a proof since my coming that I was so far from increasing their burthens with Rehoboam as I have so much as either time occasion or law could permit lightned them And even now at this time have I been careful to revise and consider deeply upon the Laws made against them that some overture might be made to the present Parliament for clearing these Laws by reason which is the soul of the Law in case they have been in times past further or more rigorously extended by Iudges than the meaning of the
That Place is no Place for you to utter your Affections in you must not there hate your foe nor love your friend fear the offending of the greater party or pity the misery of the meaner ye must be blind and not see distinctions of Persons handless not to receive Bribes but keep that just Temper and Medium in all your Proceedings that like a just Ballance ye may neither sway to the right hand nor to the left Three principal Qualities are required in you Knowledg Courage and Sincerity that you may discern with Knowledg execute with Courage and do both in upright Sincerity And for my part I do vow and protest here in the presence of God and of this Honourable Audience I never shall be weary nor omit occasion wherein I may shew my carefulness of the Execution of good Laws And as I wish you that are Iudges not to be weary in your Office in doing of it so shall I never be weary with Gods grace to take account of you which is properly my calling And thus having told you the three causes of my Convening of this Parliament all three tending only to utter my thankfulness but in divers forms the first by word the other two by action I do confess that when I have done and performed all that in this Speech I have promised Inutilis servus sum When I have done all that I can for you I do nothing but that which I am bound to do and am accountable to God for the contrary For the difference betwixt a Rightful King and an Usurping Tyrant is this That the proud and ambitious Tyrant doth think his Kingdom and People are ordained for satisfaction of his desires and unreasonable appetite The righteous and just King doth by the contrary acknowledg himself to be ordained for procuring the wealth and prosperity of his People and that his greatest and principal worldly felicity must consist in their prosperity If you be rich I cannot be poor if you be happy I cannot but be fortunate and I protest that your welfare shall ever be my greatest care and contentment And that I am a Servant is most true that as I am a Head and Governour of all the People in my Dominions who are my Natural Vassals and Subjects considering them in numbers and distinct ranks So if we will take the People as one Body and Mass then as the Head is ordained for the Body and not the Body for the Head so must a righteous King know himself to be ordained for his People and not his People for Him For although a King and his People be Relata yet can he be no King if he want People and Subjects But there be many People in the World that lack a Head wherefore I will never be ashamed to confess it my Principal Honour to be the great Servant of the Common-wealth and ever think the Prosperity thereof to be my greatest felicity as I have already said But as it was the whole Body of this Kingdom with an uniform assent and harmony which did so far oblige me so is my thankfulness due to the whole State For even as in Matter of faults Quod à multis peccatur impunè peccatur even so in the Matter of virtuous and good deeds which are done by the willing Consent and Harmony of the whole Body no particular Person can justly claim thanks as proper to him for the same And therefore I must here make a little Apologie for my self in that I could not satisfie the particular humours of every Person that looked for some Advancement or Reward at my hand since my entry into this Kingdom Three kinds of things were craved of me Advancement to honour Preferment to place of Credit about my Person and Reward in Matters of Land or Profit If I had bestowed Honour upon all no man could have been advanced to Honour for the Degrees of Honour do consist in preferring some above their Fellows If every man had the like access to my Person then no man could have it and if I had bestowed Lands and Rewards upon every man the Fountain of my Liberality would have been so exhausted as I should want Means to be liberal to any man Yet was I not so sparing but I may without Vaunting affirm that I have enlarged my favour in all the three Degrees towards as many and more than ever King of England did in so short a space No I rather crave your pardon that I have been so bountiful For if the means of the Crown be wasted whither should I have recourse but to you my Subjects and be burthensome to you which I should be lothest to do of any King alive Two special Causes moved me to be so open-handed whereof the one was reasonable and honourable but the other I will not be ashamed to confess unto you proceeded of my own infirmity That which was Just and Honourable was that being so far beholden to the Body of the whole State I thought I could not refuse to let some small Brooks run out of the Fountain of my Thankfulness to the whole for refreshing of particular Persons that were Members of that Multitude The other which proceeded out of mine own Infirmity was the Multitude and importunity of Suters But although Reason come by infusion in a manner yet Experience groweth with time and labour And therefore do I not doubt but Experience will teach the particular Subjects of this Kingdom not to be so importune and undiscreet in craving and Me not to be so easily and lightly moved in granting that which may be harmful to my Estate and consequently to the whole Kingdom And thus at length having declared unto you my mind My Conclusion shall only now be to excuse my Self in case you have not found such Eloquence in my Speech as peradventure you might have looked for at my hands I might alledg the great weight of my Affairs and my continual business and distraction that I could never have leisure to think upon what I was to speak And I might also alledg that my first sight of this so Famous and Honourable an Assembly might likewise breed some impediment But leaving these excuses I will plainly and freely in my manner tell you the true Cause of it which is That it becometh a King in my opinion to use no other Eloquence than plainness and sincerity By plainness I mean that his Speeches should be so clear and void of all ambiguity that they may not be thrown nor rent in sunder in contrary senses like the old Oracles of the Pagan gods And by Sincerity I understand that uprightness and honesty which ought to be in a Kings whole Speeches and Actions that as far as a King is in Honour erected above any of his Subjects so far should he strive in Sincerity to be above them all and that his tongue should be ever the true Messenger of his heart And this sort of Eloquence you may ever assuredly look
for at my hands Thus the Beams of Majesty had an influence upon every branch and leaf of the Kingdom by reflecting upon the Root their Representative Body every particular expecting what fruit this Sun-shine would produce striving as much to insinuate into him as he did into the general so that there was a Reciprocal Harmony between the King and the People because they courted one another But when the Kings Bounty contracted it self into private Favourites as it did afterwards bestowing the affection he promised the whole people upon one man when the golden showers they gaped for dropt into some few chanels their passions flew higher than their hopes The Kings aims were to unite the two Kingdoms so that the one might corroborate the other to make good that part of his Speech by this intermixtion wherein he divides England and Scotland into halves But the English stumbled at that partition thinking it an unequal division and fearing that the Scots creeping into English Lordships and English Ladies Beds in both which already they began to be active might quickly make their least half the predominant part But he was Proclaimed King of Great Britain England must be no more a Name the Scotish Coyns are made currant and our Ships must have Saint Georges and Saint Andrews Crosses quartered together in their Flags all outward Ensigns of Amity But those English that had suckt in none of the sweets of this pleasant Stream of Bounty repined to see the Scots advanced from blew Bonnets to costly Beavers wearing instead of Wadmeal Velvet and Satin as divers Pasquils written in that Age Satyrically taunted at Which is not set down here to vilifie the Scots being most of them Gentlemen that had deserved well of their Master but to shew how cross to the publick Appetite the Hony-comb is that another man eats But the King like a wise Pilot guided the Helm with so even an hand that these small gusts were not felt It behoved him to play his Master-prize in the Beginning which he did to the life for he had divers opinions humours and affections to grapple with as well as Nations and 't is a very calm Sea when no billow rises The Romanists bogled that he said in his Speech They were unsufferable in the Kingdom as long as they maintained the Pope to be their Spiritual Head and He to have power to dethrone Princes The Separatists as the King called them were offended at that Expression wherein he professed willingly if the Papists would lay down King-killing and some other gross errors he would be content to meet them half way So that every one grounded his hopes or his fears upon the shallows of his own fancy not knowng yet what course the King would steer But these sores being tenderly dealt with did not suddenly fester but were skinned over The King desirous of the Title Pacificus did not only close with his own Subjects but healed up also that old wound that had bled long in the sides of England and Spain both being weary of the pain both willing to be cured The King of Spain sent the Constable of Castile with a mighty Train of smooth-handed Spaniards to close up the wound on this side where the old Enmity being well mortified they were received with singular Respect and Civility The King of England sent his High Admiral the Earl of Notingham with as splendid a Retinue of English to close it on that Who being Personages of Quality accoutred with all Ornaments suitable were the more admired by the Spaniards for beauty and excellency by how much the Iesuits had made impressions in the vulgar opinion That since the English left the Roman Religion they were transformed into strange horrid shapes with Heads and Tails like Beasts and Monsters So easie it is for those Iuglers when they have once bound up the Conscience to tye up the Vnderstanding also EARL OF NOTTINGHAM GEORGE CAREW EARL OF TOTNES And to satisfie the Kings desires about an Vnion betwixt England and Scotland the Parliament made an Act to authorise certain Commissioners viz. Thomas Lord Ellesmere Lord Chancellor of England Thomas Earl of Dorset Lord Treasurer of England Charles Earl of Notingham Lord High Admiral of England Henry Earl of Southampton William Earl of Pembroke Henry Earl of Northampton Richard Bishop of London Tobie Bishop of Duresme Anthony Bishop of Saint Davids Robert Lord Cecil Principal Secretary Edward Lord Zouch Lord President of Wales William Lord Mounteagle Ralph Lord Eure Edmund Lord Sheffeild Lord President of the Council in the North Lords of the Higher House of Parliament And Thomas Lord Clinton Robert Lord Buckhurst Sir Francis Hastings Knight Sir Iohn Stanhope Knight Vice-Chamberlain to his Majesty Sir Iohn Herbert Knight second Secretary to his Majesty Sir George Carew Knight Vice-Chamberlain to the Queen Sir Thomas Strickland Knight Sir Edward Stafford Knight Sir Henry Nevill of Berk-shire Knight Sir Richard Bukley Knight Sir Henry Billingsley Knight Sir Daniel Dun Knight Dean of the Arches Sir Edward Hobby Knight Sir Iohn Savile Knight Sir Robert Wroth Knight Sir Thomas Chaloner Knight Sir Robert Maunsel Knight Sir Thomas Ridgeway Knight Sir Thomas Holcroft Knight Sir Thomas Hesketh Knight Atturney of the Court of Wards Sir Francis Bacon Knight Sir Lawrence Tanfield Knight Serjeant at Law Sir Henry Hubberd Knight Serjeant at Law Sir Iohn Bennet Doctor of the Laws Sir Henry Withrington Sir Ralph Grey and Sir Thomas Lake Knights Robert Askwith Thomas Iames and Henry Chapman Merchants Knights Citizens and Burgesses of the House of Commons or any eight of the said Lords and twenty of the said Commons Which Commissioners shall have power to assemble meet treat and consult with certain select Commissioners to be nominated and authorised by Authority of the Parliament of Scotland concerning such Matters Causes and things as they in their Wisdoms shall think and deem convenient and necessary for the honour of the King and common good of both Kingdoms Yet the good intentions of this Vnion took no effect as will follow in the sequel of this History But there were a great many good Laws made which are too voluminous for this place having a proper Sphere of their own to move in Thus the King sate triumphing as it were upon a Throne of his Peoples Affections and his beginnings had some settlement for being loth to be troubled he sought Peace every-where But our inbred distempers lay upon the Lee intermixt with other gross dregs that the Princes lenity and the Peoples luxury produced For the King minding his sports many riotous demeanours crept into the Kingdom the Sun-shine of Peace being apt for such a production upon the slime of the late War The Sword and Buckler trade being now out of date one corruption producing another the City of London being always a fit Receptacle for such whose prodigalities and wastes made them Instruments of Debaucheries divers Sects of vitious Persons going under the
pounds subsidies due to the late Queen besides what the Parliament had given him And fearing that Proclamations who were indeed very active Ministers would now become Laws ushering in the Kings will with large strides upon the peoples Liberties who lay down while they stept over them The ingenious sort sensible of this incroaching Monarchy brake out into private murmur which by degrees being of a light nature carried a Cloud with it by which the wise Pilots of the State foreseeing a Storm gathering strive to dissipate it the next Session of Parliament which was held the nineteenth of February in the seventh year of our Kings Reign Thomas Sackville Earl of Dorset Not long after this the Earl of Dorset Lord High Treasurer died suddenly as he sate at the Council Table which gave occasion to some persons disaffected to him as what eminent Officer that hath the managing of Moneys can please all to speak many things to his Dishonour But they considered not that besides the Black worm and the White day and night as the Riddle is that are gnawing constantly at the root of this tree of Life there are many insensible Diseases as Apoplexies whose Vapors suddenly extinguish the Animal Spirits and Apostems both in the upper and middle Region of Man that often drown and suffocate both Animal and Vital who are like imbodyed Twins the one cannot live without the other if the Animal Spirits fail the Vital cannot subsist if the Vitals perish the Animal give over their operations And He that judges ill of such an Act of Providence may have the same hand at the same time writing within the Palace walls of his own Body the same Period to his Lives earthly Empire The Earl of Salisbury succeeded him a man nourished with the milk of Policy under his father the Lord Burley famous for Wisdom in his Generation a Courtier from his infancy Batteld by Art and Industry under the late Queen mother of her Country Though Nature was not propitious to his Outside being Crooked backt She supplied that want with admirable indowments within This man the King found Secretary and Master of the Wards and to these he added the Treasurers staff knowing him to be the staff of his Treasury For he had knowledg enough to pry into other Mens Offices aswell as his own and knew the ways of disbursing the Kings moneys The Earl of Northhampton he made Lord Privy Seal and these were the two prime wheels of his triumphant Chariot The Earl of Suffolk was made Lord Chamberlain before but he came far behind in the management of the Kings affairs being a Spirit of a more Grosser Temper fitter to part a fray and Compose the differences of a disordered Court than a Kingdom Upon the Shoulders of the two first the King laid the Burthen of his business For though he had many Lords his Creatures some by Creation and some by insinuation for Kings will never want supple-hand Courtiers and the Bishops being his Dependents the most of them tending by direct Lines towards him as the Center of their advancement so that He like the Supreme Power moved this upper Region for the most part and that had an influence upon the lower in inferior Orbs yet these two noble Men were the two great Lights that were to discover the Kings mind to the Parliament and by whose Heat and Vigor the blessed fruits of Peace and Plenty should be produced The Lord Treasurer by a Command from the King instructs both Houses in their business and what they shall do well to insist upon this Session First To supply his Majesties wants Secondly To ease the people of their Grievances They go commonly yoakt together for the peoples Grievances are the Kings Wants and the Kings Wants are the peoples Grievances How can they be separated If the King will always want the people will always suffer For Kings when they do want lay commonly lawless impositions on the people which they must take off again with a sum of money and then they want again to a continued vicissitude These two Propositions are sweetned by him with a third Which is to make the Parliament witnesses of those great favours and honours that his Majesty intended his Royal Son Prince Henry in creating him Prince of Wales Which though the King might do without a Parliament and that divers Kings his Predecessors had done so as by many precedents was manifested yet being desirous to have a happy Vnion betwixt him and his People he would have nothing resound ill in their ears from so eminent an instrument to the Kingdoms good as his Son Then they excuse the Kings necessities proceeding from his great disbursements For the three hundred and fifty thousand pounds Subsidies due in the late Queens time he received with one hand and paid her Debts with another redeeming the Crown Lands which she had morgaged to the City He kept an Army of nineteen thousand men in Ireland for some time a foot wherein a great many of the Nobility were Commanders and other deserving Soldiers that would have been exposed to want and penury if not supplied And it was not safe for the King to trust the inveterate malice of a new reconciled Enemy without the Sword in his hand The late Queens Funeral Charges were reckon'd up which they hoped the Parliament would not repine at Nor was it fit the King should come in as a private Person bringing in one Crown on his head and finding another here or his Royal Consort with our future Hopes like so many precious Ienels exposed to Robbers without a Guard and Retinue How fit was the Magnificence at the King of Denmarks being here And how just that Ambassadors from Foreign Princes more than ever this Crown received should find those Entertainments and Gratuities the want whereof would put a dim lustre abroad upon the most sparkling Jewels of the Crown Besides the necessary Charge of sending Ambassadors to others being concurrent and mutual Civilities among Princes That these are the causes of the Kings wants and not his irregular Bounty though a magnificent mind is inseparable from the Majesty of a King If he did not give his subjects and servants would live in a miserable Climate And for his Bounty to those that were not born among us it must be remembred he was born among them and not to have them taste of the blessing he hath attained were to have him change his Vertue with his Fortune Therefore they desire the Kings wants may be supplied a thing easie to be granted and not to be valued by Wise-men nor spoken of without contempt Philosophy saith that all Riches are but food and rayment the rest is nugatorium quiddam And that it is but purior pars terrae and therefore but crassior pars aquae a thing unworthy the denial to such a King who is not only the wisest of Kings but the very Image of an Angel that hath brought good
this the passage to his entertainment The King strucken suddenly with such heaps asked the Treasurer what this money was for who told him he had received his Majesties Commands to give so much to the Viscount Rochester The King that either carelesly thought five thousand pound to be no more than the noise so much makes in Scotland which doth not amount to above five hundred pounds or cunningly if he knew the value knew also the Treasurers meaning said it was too much for one man and made him be contented with less than the half And now the King casts his thoughts towards Peterborough where his Mother lay whom he caused to be translated to a Magnificent Tomb at Westminster And somewhat suitable to her mind when she was living she had a translucent passage in the night through the City of London by multitudes of Torches The Tapers placed by the Tomb and the Altar in the Cathedral smoaking with them like an Offertory with all the Ceremonies and Voices their Quires and Copes could express attended by many Prelates and Nobles who payd this last Tribute to her memory This was accounted a Piaculous action of the Kings by many though some have not stuck to say That as Queen Elizabeth was willing to be rid of the Queen of Scots yet would not have it her action and being it could not be done without her command when it was done she renounced her own act So though the King was angry when he heard his Mother was taken away by a violent death recalling his Ambassador threatning War and making a great noise which was after calmed and closed up with a large Pension from the Queen yet he might well enough be pleased that such a spirit was layd as might have conjured up three Kingdoms against him For Patrick Grey that the King sent to disswade Queen Elizabeth from taking away his Mothers life was the greatest Instrument to perswade her to it Distilling always into her this Sentence Mortua non mordet When she is dead she cannot bite But the Love that tends to self-preservation is an adjunct of Nature more powerful than Filial duty and therefore there will be no great strife where there are not adequate operations This time was also presented unto us in a various dress and the event shewed though some years after there was more cause of Mourning than Rejoycing though the latter got the predominance For the Prince Elector Palatine came over into England to Marry the Kings only Daughter and Death deprived us of the Kings eldest Son A Prince as eminent in Nobleness as in Blood and having a spirit too full of life and splendour to be long shrouded in a cloud of flesh If that which gave life to his life had been less he might happily have lived longer Not that there was too much Oyl or that concurrent Natural Balsamum in this fair and well-composed Lamp to extinguish it self but the light that came from it might cast so radiant a lustre as by darkning others it came to lose the benefit of its own glory Iealousie is like fire that burns all before it and that fire is hot enough to dissolve all Bonds that tends to the diminution of a Crown The Prince of Spain his contemporary Son to Philip the second not long before this like a young Phaeton wished himself but one day in his Fathers Throne and he fell not long after into the hard hand of an immature fate before he could step into the Chariot So dangerous are the paths of Greatness that the tongue many times rouling aside makes men tread awry Strange Rumors are raised upon this sudden expiration of our Prince the disease being so violent that the combate with Nature in the strength of youth being almost nineteen years of age lasted not above five days Some say he was poysoned with a bunch of Grapes others attribute it to the venemous scent of a pair of Gloves presented to him the distemper lying for the most part in the head They that knew neither of these are strucken with fear and amazement as if they had tasted or felt the effects of those violences Private whisperings and suspicions of some new designs a foot broaching Prophetical terrors That a black CARLO D'AVSTRIA PRINCIPE DI SPAGNA Christmas would produce a bloody Lent For the Spaniard who opposed the marriage of the Prince Palatine and saw their ruin growing up in Prince Henries towardly Spirit were reputed vulgarly the Mint-masters of some horrid practices and that a Ship of Pocket Pistols was come out of Spain fit Instruments for a Massacre And these Trepidations were not only in the lower Region but wrought upwards so high that Proclamations were sent abroad to forbid the making or carrying of Pistols under a foot long in the Barrel And all Papists are not only dis-armed being ever esteemed Vassals to the Catholick King but their Actions with caution pried into In such dark clouds as these the whole Kingdom was at a loss all ordinary Transitions of Nature are imputed to prodigious Omens the greater the fears are the more blazing is the Meteor that arises from them Some that knew the bickerings betwixt the Prince and the Viscount muttered out dark Sentences that durst not look into the light especially Sir Iames Elphington who observing the Prince one day to be discontented with the Viscount offered to kill him but the Prince reproved him with a gallant Spirit saying If there were Cause he would do it himself Now whether these rumors begot a further scrutiny or whether it be the Court-trick to daub and slubber over things that may be perspicuous I know not But the Physicians about the Prince gave it under their hands which was spread abroad in several copies that he died of a strong malignant Feaver so are all violent dissolutions where Nature hath power of resistance that his Liver was pale and livid lead-like the Gall had no Gall but was full of wind the Spleen was unnaturally black and the Lungs in many places spotted with much corruption the Midriff or Diaphragma blackish and the Head in some places full of blood and in some places full of clear water Thus was he Anatomized to amuze the World and clear the suspicion of poyson as if no venoms could produce these effects He died the sixth of November and was carried on a Hearse Triumphing even in Death to Westminster the seventh of December following the pomp of the Funeral being fully compleated with the People tears and Lamentations But the King though he could not but be troubled to lose so near a part of himself looked over all these Mists and like the Sun dispelled all these Clouds and Vapours commanding no man should appear in the Court in mourning he would have nothing in his Eye to bring so sad a Message to his Heart The jollity feasting and magnificence of Christmas must not be laid down There were Princes and Nobles
easily committed and concealed It is an offence that is Tanquam sagitta nocte volans it is the Arrow that flies by night it discerns not whom it hits for many times the poyson is laid for one and another takes it As in Sanders case where the poysoned Apple was laid for the Mother and the Child eat it And so in that notorious Case whereupon the Statute of 22 Hen. 8. cap. 9. was made where the intent being but to poyson one or two poyson was put in a little Vessel of Barm that stood in the Kitchen at the Bishop of Rochesters house of which Barm Pottage or Grewel was made wherewith seventeen of the Bishops Family were poysoned nay divers of the poor that came to the Bishops-gate and had the Pottage in Alms were likewise poysoned Here is great talk of Impoysonment I hope I am safe I have no enemies nor any thing men can long for that is all one for he may sit at the Table by one for whom poyson is prepared and have a drench of his Cup or of his Pottage and so as the Poet saith Concidit infelix alieno vulnere he may die another mans death and therefore it was most gravely judiciously and properly provided by that Statute that Impoysonment should be High-Treason because whatsoever offence tendeth to the utter subversion and dissolution of Human Society is in the nature of High-Treason But it is an offence that I may truly say of it Non est nostri generis nec sanguinis It is thanks be to God rare in the Isle of Britain It is neither of our Country nor of our Church You may find it in Rome and Italy there is a Religion for it if it should come among us it were better living in a Wilderness than in a Court. For the particular fact upon Overbury I knew the Gentleman it is true his mind was great but it moved not in any great good order yet certainly it did commonly fly at good things and the greatest fault that ever I heard by him was That he made his Friend his Idol But take him as he was the Kings Prisoner in the Tower and then see how the Case stands In that place the State is as it were a Respondent to make good the Body of the Prisoner and if any thing happen to him there it may though not in this Case yet in some others make an aspersion and reflexion upon the State it self For the person is utterly void of his own defence his own care and providence can serve him to nothing He is in the custody and preservation of Law and we have a Maxim in our Law that when a State is in preservation of Law nothing can destroy it or hurt it and God forbid but the like should be in Persons and therefore this was a circumstance of great aggravation Lastly To have a man chased to death in a manner as it appears now by matter of Record for other privacy of Cause I know not by poyson after poyson First Rosaker then Arsnick then Mercury sublimate then sublimate again it is a thing would astonish mans nature to hear it The Poets feign that the Furies had Whips and that they were corded with poysoned Snakes and a man would think that this subject were the very Case To have a man tied to a post and to scourge him to death with Serpents for so truly may diversity of poysons be termed It pleased my Lord Chief Justice to let me know that which I heard with great comfort which was the charge that his Majesty gave to himself and the rest of the Commissioners in this Case worthy to be written in Letters of Gold That the business should be carried without touch to any that was innocent not only without impeachment but without aspersion which was a most Noble and Princely caution for mens Reputations are tender things and ought to be like Christs Coat without seam And it was more to be respected in this Case because it met with two great Persons A Nobleman that his Majesty had favoured and advanced and his Lady being of a great and Honourable House though I think it be true that the Writers say that there is no Pomegranate so fair or so sound but may have a perished Kernel Nay I see plainly in those excellent Papers of his Majesties own hand-writing as so many beams of Iustice issuing from that Vertue which so much doth shine in him the business so evenly carried without prejudice whether it were a true Accusation on the one part or a practice or false Accusation on the other as shewed plainly that his Majesties judgment was Tanquam tabula rasa as a clean pair of Tables and his ears Tanquam janua aperta as a gate not side open but wide open to the Truth as it should be discovered And I may truly affirm that there was never in this Kingdom nor in any other the blood of a private Gentleman vindicated Cum tanto motu Regni or to say better Cum tanto plausu Regni If it had concerned the King or Prince there could not have been greater or better Commissioners The term hath been almost turned into a Iustium or Vacancy the people being more willing to be lookers on in this business than proceeders in their own There hath been no care of discovery omitted no moment of time lost and therefore I will conclude with the saying of Solomon this part of my Speech Gloria Deicelare rem and gloria Regis scrutari rem It is the glory of God to conceal a thing and it is the glory of the King to find it out And his Majesties honor is the greater for that he shewed to the World this business as it hath relation to my Lord of Somerset whose Case in no sort I do fore-judg being ignorant of the secrets of the cause but take him as the Law takes him hitherto for a suspect I say the King hath to his great honor shewed That were any man in such a case of blood as the Signet of his right-hand as the Scripture saith he would put him off Now will I come to the particular Charge of these Gentlemen And first I will by way of Narrative relate the Fact with the occasion of it This wretched man Weston who was the Actor or Mechanical party in this Impoysonment the first day being indicted by a very substantial Iury of selected Citizens to the number of nineteen who found Billa vera yet nevertheless at the first stood mute But after some days intermission it pleased God to cast out the Dumb Devil and he put himself upon his Trial and was by a Iury of great value upon his own Confessions and other testimonies found guilty So as thirty and one sufficient Iurors have past upon him and he had also his Judgment and Execution awarded After this being in preparation for another World he sent for Sir Overbury's Father and falling down upon his knees with great remorse
were of transcendent parts yet was he tainted with the same infection and not many years after perished in his own corruption which shews That neither Example nor Precept he having seen so many and been made capable of so much can be a Pilot sufficient to any Port of Happiness though Reason be never so able to direct if Grace doth not give the gate But the King more to exalt Iustice and to shew the people his high abilities came in Iune this year to the Star-Chamber where in a long and well-weighed Discourse he turns over the volume of his mind that the World might read his excellent parts in lively characters He told the Lords he came thither in imitation of Henry the seventh his great Predecessor and the reason he came no sooner was that he resolved with Pythagoras for seven years to keep silence and learn the Laws of the Kingdom before he would teach others and the other seven years he was studying to find an occasion to come that might not be with prejudice For in his own cause he could not come in a great cause betwixt man and man it might be thought some particular favour brought him thither and in a small Cause it was not fit for him to come but now he had so much to say in relation to good Government that he could no longer forbear First He charges himself Secondly The judges Thirdly The Auditory in general In his own Charge he lays a foundation for raising a most excellent structure in Government wherein he was a Master-workman and had a most admirable Theory and full abilities to put it in practice and happily the bent of his intentions tended that way though it had for the most part a loose strong And to that which concerned the Judges he not only reckons up their Duties in their publick Relation but shews them the Iurisdiction and power of their several Courts how far every one did extend to which he would have them limited that they might not clash and contest one against another to shake the Basis on which they were built but that there might be a harmony and sweet concordance among them Expressing himself with such Elegance and Prudence that the most studious Lawyer whose design had been to imbellish a Discourse fitting for the ears of his Prince could not have gone beyond what he exprest to his People so strong and retentive was his judgment and memory so natural and genuine that which came from them that it did emanare flow from him to the admiration of the hearers To the people in general and under-Officers he gave an admonition to submit to the Law and Justice of the Land and not to go upon new Puritan strains such was his expression to make all things popular but to keep themselves within the antient limits of Obedience For he feared Innovation as a Monster got loose which should be always kept in such a Labyrinth as none should come at but by the Clew of Reason Then he commands the Judges in their Circuits to take notice of those Justices of the Peace that were most active for the good of the Country that they might have incouragement from him For to use his own words I value them that serve me faithfully there equally with those that attend my person Therefore let none be ashamed of this Office or be discouraged in being a Justice of the Peace if he serve worthily in it The Chancellor under me makes Justices and puts them out but neither I nor he can tell what they are therefore we must be informed by you Judges who can only tell who do well and who do ill without which how can the good be cherished and the rest put out the good Justices are careful to attend the service of the King and Country the bad are idle slow-bellies that abide always at home given to a life of ease and delight liker Ladies than Men and think it is enough to contemplate Justice when as Virtusin actione consistet contemplative Justice is no Justice and contemplative Justices are fit to be put out Another sort of Justices are Busie-bodies and will have all men dance after their Pipe and follow their Greatness or else will not be content A sort of men Qui se primos omnium esse putant nec sunt tamen These proud spirits must know that the Country is ordained to follow God and the King and not them Another sort are they that go seldom to the Kings service but when it is to help some of their Kindred or Alliance so they come to help ther Friends or hurt their Enemies making Jugice serve for a shadow to Faction and tumultuating the Country Another sort are Gentlemen of great worth in their own conceit and cannot be content with the present form of Government but must have a kind of liberty in the people and must be gracious Lords and Redeemers of their Liberty and in every cause that concerns Prerogative give a snatch against Monarchy through their Puritanical itching after Popularity some of them have shewed themselves too bold of late in the lower House of Parliament And when all is done if there were not a King they would be less cared for than other men So wise the Kings fears made him and so wary to prevent the popular violence And even in these Infant-times the contention doth appear which afterward got more strength when by his power he had gained in every County such as he made subservient to his will For as the King strove to loosen the Piles and Banks of the peoples liberties so the people strove to bound and keep off the Inundation of his Prerogative Then he takes notice of the swarms of Gentry that through the instigation of their Wives or to new model and fashion their Daughters who if they were unmarried mar'd their Marriages if married lost their Reputations and rob their husbands purses did neglect their Country Hospitality and cumber the City a general Nuisance to the Kingdom being as the spleen to the Body which as in measure it over-grows the Body wasts and seeing a Proclamation will not keep them at home he requires that the power of the Star-chamber may not only regulate them but the exorbitancy of the new buildings about the City which he still much repined at being a shelter for them where they spent their Estates in Coaches Lacquies and fine Cloaths like French-men living miserably in their houses like Italians becoming Apes to other Nations Whereas it was the honour of the English Nobility and Gentry above all Countries in the World to be hospitable among their Tenants Which they may the better do by the fertility and abundance of all things Thus the King pried into every miscarriage being willing to reform these then growing abuses But among all the heights of Reason that the spirit of man doth actuate and give life to the highest and most transcendent is that of Religion which
but what is their great Errand to get Money If they touch upon miscarriage in Government it disparages him to his people for now the inside of his Copses are well grown again If upon Religion he knows well enough how to order that if the Treaty with Spain goes on And for the affairs of State he seems to imply as if there were some hidden and secret Art in those Mysteries of King-craft that the Parliaments apprehension cannot reach For who can have wisdom saith he to judge of things CAESAR BORGIA VALENtiorum Dux Cum pater ad summos Romae esset vectus honores Borgaei toto Praesulvt orbe foret Purpuraei donat gnato huic insigne galèri Quod tamen hoc tantum respuit ille decus Cum ferabella sequi mallet Veneremâ— nefandam Et sratrâ—m è â—ediâ— tolleret suum of that Nature but those that are traded in them Every man in his Profession So the Priests by their old Oracles did strive to keep the World in ignorance as the Romish Factors do now Whereas the true way of Treaties is with Christian not Machiavelian policy This we require this answer we expect you shall have this Retribution from Us. If you go about to cozen and cheat Us by delays and spin out time for ends such Syrens must not be listened after Every State must stand upon the foundation of its own Reason and Power and not build Castles of paper Hopes upon deceitful promises unless there be such redundant Causes of dependency upon them as it is impossible to subsist without them It was observed by Comines that in all Treaties betwixt the English and the French the English ever had the worst but in all Wars and Conflicts the English had the better intimating that Subtilâ—y may deceive but plain down-right Honesty is best and will prevail Falsness is fit for such spirits as Pope Alexander or his Nephew Caesar Borgia Scipio though a Heathen in his pactions with Spain and Carthage scorned it and the old Roman Senate were so Gallant as to rebuke Lucius Marcius their Ambassador and General because in the managing of his Wars and Treaties with Perseus King of Macedon he went about by subtilties to circumvent him And now an Ambassador as one saith lyes abroad Reipublicae causa for the good of his Countrey which tends rather to the hurt of it But now they find that the King would only make Merchandize of the Common-wealth yet Merchants look for their Money again with advantage and therefore their Counsel in disposing it may be well spared But the Parliament it they raise Money from the People which is never to be repayed there is good reason they should know not only to what purpose it is levied but how prudently and sitly laid out otherwise as the King tells them in the comparison of the Robber though in relation to his Prerogative if they should be summoned to levy Money of the people without consideration of what it is for or how it shall be disposed for the good of the Kingdom they may very well say and protest That they meant not to take it from them so that is not to rob them of it But the King's necessities must come under the Common Emergencies which he would not have known and what will one Subsidy without fifteens do The Protestants want in the Palatinate so doth he in England But he had lately a great assistance from his People never King of England found greater love as he saith of himself yet he wants still and would have supply for it under the notion of a War They must consider what Money is fit what Foot what Horse necessary but they must not know for what All that they can imagine is that the King wants Money for his Favourite Buckingham and his kindred to furnish them against Christmas for feasting gaming and bravery the three main pillars of the Times licentiousness raised up to a stupendious and excessive height or to send out his Ambassadors or help his indigent and expensive Courtiers and then the Wars are ended for Want is a great War But if the good of the Kingdom the establishment of Religion the happiness of the King and his Posterity be not fit Themes for them to discourse of why are they called The late Queen whose memory will be for ever famous by the King 's own relation liked the Parliaments Petition well when they humbly besought her to marry because they did not prescribe her place and person but left that to her Election if they had done otherwise She would have thought it presumption in them The King thinks it presumption in the Parliament humbly to beseech him for the good of Religion to permit his Son to marry with a Protestant Princess if they had fixt upon place or person he would have thought it High Treason So many degrees high was the King's spirit mounted above a Woman's to humble Subjects and so many degrees lower then Hers was his Spirit to daring Enemies Some of these things were publickly discoursed of among them in the House and other-some muttered and talkt of in private for full breasts will find vent but the main business that the Commons insisted on was the King's incroachment upon their Liberties debarring them freedom of speech in Parliament which was a Natural Reasonable and uncontroul'd immunity as long as they kept themselves within the limits of their duty which the House was to be the sole judge of And who can tax any particular Member with miscarriages that way that the house hath not Censured hitherto for now the heat is but new broke in among them and this liberty of speech stuck most with them for if any man should speak any thing to displease the King though it tended never so much to the good of the Kingdom it might be termed insolent behaviour and be liable to punishment after Parliament if not then as the King threatens in his Letter which carried such a Terror and over-awing with it that they resolved to give over all business left they should offend Which the King hearing of writes again to his Secretary Calvert and the Speaker to take off the edge of those sharp expressions he used in his Letters thinking to cool the heat among them But before this heat was in the House of Commons the Lords began to consider how cheap they were made by the multitude of Irish and Scotch Earls and Viscounts the King had accumulated not the Natives of those Kingdoms but private English Gentlemen who had procured and assumed those Titles to perch above the English Baronry to their great regret and dishonour And after some debate and canvassing in it they resolved That though they could not debar the King from making such swarms of Nobles with Outlandish Titles yet they would let him know what prejudice it was to them and if it produced no other good effect the King might at least see they took offence and
Requiem to his retired thoughts at Guildford his place of Birth where he had built a very Munificent Alms-house for poor people and where he went to bring his Spirit under to make it more blessed than the Glories of the World can contribute to it There were very many willing to have him retire to his rest that gaped after his Dignity more than desert and though Doctor Laud was but newly initiated into his Bishoprick of St. David's by other hands because those of the Arch-Bishop were tinctured with blood as he saith himself yet his enmity was not small against him for being a means to let the King know he was reputed a Papist in Oxford and a dangerous turbulent Spirit But the King granted out a Commission to enquire whether casual Homicide did make the Arch-Bishop irregular And in the Disquisition of it he found many friends that restored him from his Alms-house to his Palace But this he did and would have done in either condition The widow of the man that fell by him was raised by him and she and her children as may be said built a commodious being upon his grave The King's mercy and indulgence extending towards the Papists taught many men to come as near Popery as they could stretch finding it the next way to preferment so that Arminius's Tenets flew up and down from Pulpit to Pulpit that indeed preaching was nothing but declamation little tending to Edification such Orthodox Ministers as strove to refute these erronious Opinions being looked on as Puritans and Antimonarchical which continual rubbing one against another begot so much heat as might have turned into a flame not easie to be quenched And the King had daily information how the Pulpits rung against the Spanish match So that to settle these extravagancies he directs his Letters to the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury in this manner for Regulating of the Ministery MOst Reverend Father in God right trusty and intirely beloved Councellor we greet you well For as much as the abuses and extravagancies of preachers in the Pulpit have been in all Times expressed in this Realm by some Act of Councel or State with the advice and Resolution of grave and learned Prelates Insomuch that the very licensing of Preachers had beginning by an Order of Star-Chamber the eighth day of July in the nineteenth year of the Reign of King Henry the eighth our Noble Predecessor And whereas at this present divers young Students by reading of late Writers and ungrounded Divines do broach Dr. GEORGE ABBOT Arch-Bishop of Canterbury c. many times unprofitable unsound seditious and dangerous Doctrines to the scandal of the Church and disquiet of the State and present Government We upon humble representations unto us of these inconveniences by your self and sundry other grave and reverend Prelates of this Church as also of Our Princely care and Zeal for the extirpation of Schism and dissention growing from these seeds and for the setling of a Religious and Peaceable Government both in Church and Commonwealth do by these Our special letters straitly charge and command you to use all possible Care and Diligence that these Limitations and Cautions herewith sent unto you concerning Preachers be duly and strictly from henceforth put in practice and observed by the several Bishops within your Jurisdiction And to this end Our Pleasure is that you send them forthwith Copies of these Directions to be by them speedily sent and Communicated unto every Parson Vicar Curate Lecturer and Minister in every Cathedral or Parish Church within their several Diocess And that you earnestly require them to imploy their utmost endeavours in the performance of this so important a business letting them know that We have a special Eye unto their Proceedings and expect a strict account thereof both from you and every of them And these Our Letters shall be your sufficient Warrant and discharge in that behalf Given under our Signet at our Castle of Windsor the 4. of August in the twentieth year of Our Reign Directions concerning Preachers sent with the Letter 1. THat no Preacher under the Degree and calling of a Bishop or Dean of a Cathedral or Collegiate Church and they upon the King's days and set Festivals do take Occasion by the expounding of any Text of Scripture whatsoever to fall into any set discourse or Common-place otherwise than by opening the Coherence and Division of the Text which shall not be comprehended and warranted in Essence Substance Effect or natural inference within some one of the Articles of Religion set forth 1562. Or in some of the Homilies set forth by Authority of the Church of England Not only for a help for the Non-preaching but withal for a Pattern and Boundary as it were for the preaching Ministers And for their further instructions for the performance hereof that they forthwith read over and peruse diligently the said Book of Articles and the two books of Homilies 2. That no Parson Vicar Curate or Lecturer shall preach any Sermon or Collation hereafter upon Sundays and Holy-days in the afternoon in any Cathedral or parish Church throughout the Kingdom but upon some part of the Catechism or some Text taken out of the Creed ten Commandments or the Lords Prayer Funeral Sermons only excepted and that those Preachers be most encouraged and approved of who spend the afternoons exercise in the examination of children in their Catechism which is the most ancient and Laudable custom of teaching in the Church of England 3. That no Preacher of what Title soever under the Degree of a Bishop or Dean at the least do from Henceforth presume to preach in any Popular Auditory the deep points of Predestination Election Reprobation or of the universality efficacy resistibility or irresistibility of God's Grace but leave those Themes rather to be handled by the learned Men and that moderately and Modestly by way of use and application rather than by way of Positive Doctrines being fitter for the Schools then for simple Auditories 4. That no Preacher of what Title or Denomination soever from henceforth shall presume in any Auditory within this Kingdom to declare limit or bound out by way of Positive Doctrine in any Lecture or Sermon the Power Prerogative and Jurisdiction Authority or Duty of Soveraign Princes or otherwise meddle with Matters of State and the differences between Princes and the People then as they are instructed and Precedented in the Homilies of Obedience and the rest of the Homilies and Articles of Religion set forth as before is mentioned by publick Authority but rather confine themselves wholly to those two heads of Faith and Good life which are all the subject of the ancient Sermons and Homilies 5. That no Preacher of what Title or Denomination soever shall presume causelesly or without invitation from the Text fall in t bitter invectives and undecent railing speeches against the Persons of either Papists or Puritans but modestly and gravely when they are occasioned thereunto
so spacious that her said Servants and Family may enter and stay therein In which there shall be an ordinary and publique door for them and another inward door by which the Infanta may have a passage into the said Chappel where she and others as above said may be present at Divine Offices 9. That the Chappel Church and Oratory may be beautified with decent Ornaments of Altar and other things necessary for Divine Service which is to be celebrated in them according to the custom of the Ho. Ro. Church and that it shall be lawful for the said Servants and others to go to the said Chappel and Church at all hours as to them shall seem expedient 10. That the care and custody of the said Chappel and Church shall be committed to such as the Lady Infanta shall appoint to whom it shall be lawful to appoint Keepers that no body may enter into them to do any undecent thing 11. That to the administration of the Sacraments and to serve in Chappel and Church aforesaid there shall be so many Priests and Assistants as to the Infanta shall seem fit and the election of them shall belong to the Lady Infanta and the Catholike King her Brother Provided that they be none of the Vassals of the King of Great Britain and if they be his will and consent is to be first obtained 12. That there be one Superiour Minister or Bishop with necessary Authority upon all occasions which shall happen belonging to Religion and for want of a Bishop that his Vicar may have his Authority and jurisdiction 13. That this Bishop or Superiour Minister may correct amend or chastize all Roman Catholiks who shall offend and shall exercise upon them all Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical and moreover also the Lady Infanta shall have power to put them out of her service when soever it shall seem expedient to her 13. That it may be lawful for the Lady Infanta and her Servants to procure from Rome Dispensations Indulgences Jubilees and all Graces as shall seem fit to their Religion and Consciences and to get and make use of any Catholike Books whatsoever 15. That the Servants of the Family of the Lady Infanta who shall come into England shall take the Oath of Allegiance to the King of Great Britain provided that there be no clause therein which shall be contrary to their Consciences and the Roman Catholike Religion and if they happen to be Vassals to the King of Great Britain they shall take the same Oath that the Spaniard doth 16. That the Laws which are or shall be in England against Religion shall not take hold of the said Servants And onely the foresaid Superiour Ecclesiastical Catholike may proceed against Ecclesiastical persons as hath been accustomed by Catholikes And if any Secular Judge shall apprehend any Ecclesiastical Person for any offence he shall forthwith cause him to be delivered to the aforesaid Superiour Ecclesiastick who shall proceed against him according to the Canon-Law 17. That the Lawes made against Catholikes in England or in any other Kingdom of the King of Great Britain shall not extend to the Children of this Marriage and though they be Catholikes they shall not lose the Right of Succession to the Kingdom and Dominions of Great Britain 18. That the Nurses which shall give suck to the Children of the Lady Infanta whether they be of the Kingdom of Great Britain or of any other Nation whatsoever shall be chosen by the Lady Infanta as she pleaseth and shall be accounted of her Family and enjoy the priviledges thereof 19. That the Bishop Ecclesiastical Persons and Religious of the Family of the Lady Infanta shall wear the Vestment and Habit of his dignity profession and Religion after the custom of Rome 20. For security that the said Matrimony be not dissolved for any cause whatsoever The King of Great Britain and Prince Charles are equally to pass the Word and Honour of a King and moreover that they will perform whatsoever shall be propounded by the Catholike King for further confirmation if it may be done decently and fitly 21. That the Sons and Daughters which shall be born of this Marriage shall be brought up in the company of the most Excellent Infanta at least until the Age of Ten years and shall freely enjoy the Right of Succession to the Kingdoms as aforesaid 22. That whensoever any place of either Man-servant or Maid-servant which the Lady Infanta shall bring with her nominated by the Catholike King her Brother shall happen to be void whether by death or by other Cause or accident all the said Servants of her Family are to be supplied by the Catholike King as aforesaid 23. For security that whatsoever is Capitulated may be fulfilled The King of Great Britain and Prince Charles are to be bound by Oath and all the King's Council shall Confirm the said Treaty under their hands Moreover the said King and Prince are to give their Faiths in the Word of a King to endeavour if possible that whatsoever is Capitulated may be established by Parliament 24. That conformable to this Treaty all these things proposed are to be allowed and approved of by the Pope that he may give an Apostolical Benediction and a Dispensation necessary to effect the Marriage But though our King and Prince subscribed these Articles as they were sent to them by the Earl of Bristol in this manner Hos supra memoratos Articulos omnes ac singulos approbamus et quicquid in iis ex nostra parte seu nostro nomine conventum est ratum atque gratum habemus approving and expressing them to be very acceptable unto them And after they had wrought the King to sign these large immunities to the Papists viz. Quod Regnorum suorum Romano Catholici persecutionem nullam patientur molestiáve officientur Religionis suae causa vel ob exercitium illorum ejusdem sacramentorum modò iis utantur absque scandalo quod intelligi debet inter privatos parietes nec juramentis aut sub alio praetextu qualicunque ordinem Religionis spectante vexabuntur That the Roman Catholikes should not be interrupted in the exercise of their Religion doing it privately without Scandal nor be vext with any oaths in order to the same What rested but a closing of both Parties Yet all would not do for the Spaniard never intended the Match at all as is evident by a Letter of the King of Spain's written to his Favourite the Conde of Olivares dated the Fifth of November 1622. found among the Lord Cottington's Papers THe King my Father declared at his Death That his intent never was to marry my Sister the Infanta Donna Maria with the Prince of Wales which your Unkle Don Baltazer understood and so treated this Match ever with intention to delay it notwithstanding it is now so far advanced that considering all the aversness of the Infanta to it it is time to seek some means to divert the Treaty
well cleared on both sides their Design which was the Prince's Perversion might mature and ripen For the Earl of Bristol confessed afterwards That it was a general received Opinion in the Spanish Court that the Prince came thither with intention to be a Roman Catholike And Gondemar pressed Bristol not to hinder so pious a work assuring him they had the Duke of Buckingham's assistance therein And it was evident enough their hopes were great by the Pope's letter to the Bishop of Conchen Inquisitor general in Spain Wherein he excites him not to slip the Opportunity providence had put into his hand of extending his Piety to the outtermost Nations The Prince of England being now in the Court of Spain that glorious Temple as it were that hath been a Bulwark to the Pontifical Authority and an Academy for propogation of Religion he desires he may not stay there in vain but that some of the impressions of the Piety of so many Catholick Kings as have lived there may be imprinted on him that he may be won with all sweetness as many of his noble Ancestors have been who have submitted their Crowned heads and Imperiall power to the Roman Obedience And to his glorious Victory and Eternal GREGORIVS XV alexander Luaouisuis Bononien creat die 9. Februarâ— an 1621. Sedit an 2. me â—s S. Obâ—t die 8. Iulij an 1623 Vac Triumph of Celestial Beatitudes the Treasures of Kings and Legions of Souldiers cannot contribute but the Weapons of Light that must come from Heaven whose Splendor inlightning the Prince's Eyes shall dazleâ— his Errors and establish his mind in meekness And he charges the Bishop and all his Fraternity to use the best strength and industry they can to this purpose So that the Prince was continually laid at by the insinuating Orations of cunning Iesuits the fained and cousening Miracles of reclused Holiness the Splendid and Specious Solemnities of their Formal Processions the rare and admirable Pictures of their reputed Saints besides many other painted devices and subtle Artifices brooded among them And the Pope used all the Rhetorick of his Cabalistical Consistory and Holy Chair to charm him to his Obedience as may be seen by this Letter which he writ to him himself MOst Noble Prince Health and Light of Divine Grace For asmuch as Great Britain hath always been fruitful in Vertues and Men of Merit having filled the one and the other World with the Glory of Her Renown She doth also very often attract the thoughts of the Holy Apostolical Chair to the consideration of her praises And indeed the Church was but then in her Infancy when the King of Kings did choose her for his Inheritance and so affectionately that it is thought the Roman Eagles prevailed not so much as the Banner of the Cross. Besides that many of her Kings instructed in the Knowledg of the true Salvation have preferred the Cross before the Royal Scepter and the Discipline of Religion before Covetousness leaving Examples of Piety to other Nations and to the Ages yet to come so as having Merited the principal and chief Places of Blessedness in Heaven they have obtained on Earth the Triumphant Ornaments of true Holiness And although now the State of the English Church be altered yet we see the Court of Great Britain adorned and furnished with Moral Vertues which might serve to support the Charity that We bear unto Her and be an Ornament to the name of Christianity if withal She could have for her defence and Protection the Orthodox and Catholike Truth Wherefore by how much the Glory of your most Noble Father and the apprehension of your Royal Disposition delights Us with so much more Zeal We desire that the Gates of the Heavenly Kingdom might be opened unto you and that you might purchase to your self the Love of the Universal Church Moreover it being Certain that Gregory the Great of most blessed Memory hath introduced to the English people and taught their Kings the law of the Gospel and the respect to Apostolical Authority We as inferior to him in Holiness and Virtue but equal in Name and Degree of Dignity it is very reasonable that We following his blessed Steps should endeavour the Salvation of those Provinces especially at this time when your Happy Design most Noble Prince elevates Us to the Hope of an extraordinary advantage And as you have taken a Iourney into Spain to the Catholike King with desire to allye your Self to the House of Austria so We do commend your Design and indeed do testifie openly in this present Business That you are he that takes principal Care of our Prelacy For seeing that you desire to take in Marriage the Daughter of Spain We may easily from thence conjecture That the ancient seeds of Christian Piety which have so happily flourished in the Hearts of the Kings of Great Britain May God prospering them revive again in your Soul And indeed it is not to be believed that he that loves such an alliance should hate the Catholike Religion and delight to oppress the Holy Chair To that purpose We have commanded to make continually most humble Prayers to the Father of Lights That he would be pleased to put you as a fair Flower of Christendom and the onely Hope of Great Britain in possession of that most noble Heritage that your Ancestors have purchased for you to defend the Authority of the Soveraign High Priest and to sight against the Monsters of Heresie Remember the dayes of old enquire of your Fathers and they will tell you the Way that leads to Heaven and what way Temporal Princes have taken to gain an Eternal Kingdom Behold the Gates of Heaven opened the most holy Kings of England who came from England to Rome accompanied with Angels did come to Honour and do Homage to the Lord of Lords and to the Prince of the Apostles in the Apostolical Chair their Actions and Examples being as so many Voices of God speaking and exhorting you to follow the course of the Lives of those to whose Empire you shall one day attain Great Brittaine is thy Birth right but the Earth Liâ—e then and conquer till victorious warre stoopes to the Vertues which exceede thy Birth Make thy Rule endles as thy Vertues are This Letter of the Pope's expresses not only the sleek and smooth waies that Soul-merchant takes to purchase his Proselytes but the end he proposes to himself which is to bring them under the Roman Obedience otherwise whatsoever they do or profess is Heresie And to build up the Towers of this great Babel the name of the most High God is brought down among them and used as a Master Builder Every Profession layes that name as a Foundation though the Superstructure be but straw and stubble of Hypocrisie which a whirl-wind shall scatter and the time is coming that her Lovers shall be destroyed and fiery-cloven tongues shall confound their Language The Prince was not slack in answering this
and the Infanta of Spain that was then in motion but to the infringement of the Peace and Amity established betwixt the two Crowns The King's fears being heightned to Anger he disavows the Action and lest others of his Subjects should by this example take the boldness to attempt the like Hostility against the King of Spain he puts out a Proclamation wherein he shews his detestation of such proceedings and threatens severe punishment to the enterprisers thereby to deter them Which gave Gondemar some satisfaction whose design being only to get Sir Walter Raleigh home after this brush vented little passion but so cunningly skinned over his malice that when Raleigh was in Ireland he found nor heard of no such great difficulties Dangers often flying upon the wings of rumor but that he might appear in England and the men not willing to be banished their own Country though some of them had France in their eye put in at Plimouth Raleigh was no sooner ashore but he had private intimation which gave him cause to suspect the smoothness of this beginning would have a rough end therefore he attempted an escape from â—hence in a bark of Rochel But being apprehended by Sir Lewis Stukly his Kinsman who had private warrant and instructions to that purpose so unnatural and servile is the spirit when it hath an allay of baseness there being many others sitter for that employment he is brought to London and recommitted to the Tower He was no sooner in the Tower but all his Transactions in this business are put to the Rack and tenter'd by his Adversaries They say he knew of no Mine nor did Kemish know that the Mine he aimed at was Gold but Kemish bringing him a piece of Ore into the Tower he fobb'd a piece of Gold into it in dissolving making the poor man believe the Ore was right that by these golden degrees he might ascend to Liberty promising the King to fetch it where never Spaniard had been But when Kemish found by better experience he was couzen'd by Raleigh he came back from the Mine And Raleigh knowing that none but Kemish could accuse him made him away This Vizard was put upon the face of the Action and all the weight of the Miscarriage was laid upon Raleigh's shoulders Gonaemar that looked upon him as a man that had not only high Abilities but Animosity enough to do his Master mischief being one of those Scourges which that old Virago the late Queen as he called her used to afflict the Spaniards with having gotten him into this Trap laid now his baits about the King There is a strange virtue in this spirit of Sol the intenseness makes men firm the ductilness brings them to be active French Crowns are not so pure not so piercing as Spanish Pistols Auri sacra fames quid non mortalia pectora cogis The King that loved his Peace is incensed by them that loved their Profit and the poor Gentleman must lay down the price of his life upon the old Reckoning Raleigh answered That he was told by his Council that Iudgment was void by the Commission his Majesty was pleased to give him since under the Great Seal for his last Employment which did give him a new vigour and life to that service The Lord chief Justice replyed that he was deceived and that the opinion of the Court was to the contrary Then he desired that some reasonable time might be allowed him to prepare for Death but it was answered That the time appointed was the next morning and it was not to be doubted but he had prepared himself for death long since Raleigh having a courageous spirit finding the bent of the King's mind and knowing Disputes to be in vain where Controversies are determined acquiesc'd was conveyed to the Gatehouse and the day following was brought to the Old Palace yard at Westminster and upon a Scaffold there erected lost his head He had in the outward man a good presence in a handsom and well-compacted person a strong natural wit and a better judgment with a bold and plausible tongue whereby he could set off his parts to the best advantage And to these he had the Adjuncts of general Learning which by Diligence and Experience those two great Tutors being now threescore years of age was augmented to a great perfection being an indefatigable Reader and having a very retentive memory At his Arraignment at Winchester his carriage to his Judges was with great discretion humble yet not prostrate dutiful yet not dejected Towards the Iury affable but not fawning not in despair nor believing but hoping in them carefully perswading them with Reasons not distemperately importuning them with Conjurations rather shewing love of life than fear of death Towards the King's Council patient but not insensible neglecting nor yielding to Imputations laid against him in words which Sir Edward Cook then the King's Attorney belched out freely and it was wondred a man of his high spirit could be so humble in suffering not being much overtaken in passion And now at his last when Deeth was presented before him he looked upon it without affrightment striving to vindicate his Actions by taking off the veil that false Reports had cast upon them especially the Imputation of his glorying and rejoycing in the fall at the death of the laâ—e E. of Essex which had stuck so many years in his breast this new miscarriage of Kemish's of a later date imputed to him for having provided himself privately for heaven clearing his Accounts with God before he came to the Scaffold He publickly at last reckon'd with man being to quit all soores and so made an end Times of Peace are accounted the happiest times and though they are great Blessings proceeding from the influence of supreme Mercy and the showers of Grace yet the branches of the Tree of Knowledge growing by this Sun shine for want of due pruning do often become so exuberant that their very fruits are not only their burthen but sometimes their ruin Prosperity is of an Airy constitution carried about with the breath of strange fancies which mount sometimes as high as Omnipotency but there finding-resistance they come down amain and beat the lower Region with a Tempest of Strife and Malice When the Romans wanted Enemies they digged them out of their own bowels Active Spirits will be set on work Our Neighbours of the Netherlands that had so long bounded the Spanish Power humbled their Pride so far as to acknowledg them a Free-State before they would so much as listen to an Overture of Peace had a fire kindled in their own bosomes It is now some time since the 12 years Truce betwixt Spain them began being in the Wain last Quarter While they had their hands full of business they had not their heads full of old Curiosities Now like Plethorique bodies that want letting blood they break out into distemper A Schism in the Church
and a Faction in the State The first Author of the Schism was Arminius of the Faction Barnevelt Persons of great parts and power though of different natures The one had been Divinity-Professor at Leyden the other the Manager of all the great affairs of the State Distempers in Kingdoms and States are like madness in bodies which doth not break out till some accident doth stir the humor Arminius dyed just upon the beginning of the Treaty which was in the year 1609. Leaving behind him the seeds of this Pelagian Heresie which though it were cherished much by some in whose bosomes he had sown it yet happily it might never have taken root had not Peace and Ease manured it and made it fruitful The Mysteries of Predestination and the ineffable Essence of God Quaetremenda admiranda sunt sed non scrutanda to use our King 's own words which are to be trembled at and admired not pried into are the great Theme Such intuitions are too high for flesh and blood Yet what will not Pragmatical spirits do when they proudly look into Divine things with the Eye of Reason not humbly with the Eye of Faith Rombout Hogerbeets pensionaris der Stad Leyden But long before this time our King saw the Storm coming upon them For in the year 1611 he forewarns the State telling them that by the unhappy succession of two such Prodigies in one Sphere as Arminius and Vorstius some dreadful mischief would succeed For Arminius was no sooner dead but those that drew on the Design had an eye on Vorstius his Disciple to make him Divinity-Professor in his place which the King hearing of and having read some of Vorstius blasphemous Writings sends to his then Ambassador Sir Ralph Winwood Resident there to let the State know that Vorstius rather deserved punishment than promotion that the head of such a Viper should be trod upon and crushed that was likely to eat his way through the bowels of the State And if they nevertheless would persist to prefer him he would make known to the World publickly in Print how much he detested such abominable Heresies and all allowers and tolerators of them The Ambassador urging the King's desires they returned a long Answer in justification of Vorstius First That the Curators of the University of Leyden according to their duty and the ancient custom ever since the foundation of that University having diligently made inquiry for some Doctor to be chosen in the place of Divinity-Professor there at that time void after mature deliberation they made election of Conradus Vorstius to that place Which Election and Calling was countermined presently after by certain persons to whose Office or Disposal the business did nothing at all belong who charged the said Vorstius with unsoundness of Doctrine whereupon the Curators thought fit with the good liking of Vorstius himself that both at Leyden and at the Hague he should appear in his own justification to answer all Accusers which he did and there came none to charge him But not long after six Ministers undertook to prove That Vorstius had published false Doctrine who being heard in a full Assembly of the States of Holland and Westfrizeland they could by their Arguments find no reason why the Execution of what was done by the Curators lawfully ought to be hindred or impeached And they do assuredly believe that if his Majesty of Great Britain were well informed of the true Circumstances of this business he would according to his high wisdom and prudence conceive favourably of them they proceeding in this business with all reverence care and respect to his Majestie 's serious admonition Dated at the Hague 1 Octob. 1611. The King seeing which way the States went by the print of the footing that Vorstius had set among them caused his Books publickly to be burned in Paul's Church-yard and both the Universities And not giving it over writes to them again to be mindful of the glory of God and not suffer such scan dalous members to remain in the body of the true Reformed Church that maintain such execrable Blasphemies as to deny the Eternity and Omnipotency of God Therefore he desires them so much to mind the glory of God and their own honour and safety as to extirpate such Atheisms and Heresies But if they suffer such pestilent Hereticks to nestle among them who dare take upon them the licentious liberty to fetch again from Hell ancient Heresies long since condemned and invent new ones of their own to the depravation of the true Catholick Church he should be constrained publickly to protest against them Dated at Theobalds 6 Octob. 1611. Sir Ralph Winwood represented this Letter to the States and finding them cold and backward in proceeding any further against Vorstius according to the King's Directions to him he made this Remonstrance to them My Lords JACOBUS ARMINIUS S. S. TH. DOCT. ET PROFESS NATUS OUDEWATRIAE MDLX DENAT LUGD. BATAV MDCIX AETAT XLIX Qui nunc per altas aurei caeli domos Regnat beatus et suo junctus Deo Humana celsus spernit ac nescit simul Sic. Hospes ora magnus ARMINIUS tulit Caelare mores atque dotes ingeni Doctumque pectus quod fuit sed heu Fuit Manus nequivit artifax et quid manus Effere cum non lingua non stylus queant These are in part the opinions of that great Divine who is chosen to domineer in the Chair at Leyden In opposition whereunto I mean not to say any thing but that which the Roman Orator did once pronounce in the like Case Mala est impia consuetudo contra Deum disputandi sive serio id fit sive simulaté It is an evil and wicked Custom to dispute against God whether it be in earnest or in jest Now my Lords I address my self unto you and according to the Charge which I have received from the King my Master I conjure you by the amity that is betwixt his Kingdoms and your Provinces to awaken your Spirits and to have a careful eye at this Assembly of Holland which is already begun ne quid Respublica detrimenti capiat that the Commonwealth take no harm which undoubtedly at one time or other will be turned upside down if you suffer such a dangerous Contagion to harbour so near you and not remove it as soon as possibly you may The Disciples of Socinus with whose Doctrine Vorstius hath been suckled in his Childhood do seek him for their Master and are ready to embrace him Let him go he is a Bird of their own feather Et dignum sanè patellâ operculum A fit Cover for such a Dish On the other side the Students in Divinity at Leyden to the number of six and fifty by a dutiful Remonstrance presented unto the States of Holland the sixteenth of October the last year being 1610. did most humbly beseech the said States not to use their authority in compelling them to receive a Professor