his Prince for not punishing or banishing his evill Councellours and these who looke more upon their owne preservation then the Prince his safety or honour engage him more and more in their quarell by perswading him that to Rebells nothing must be granted who at length get all by force with the ruine of their Soveraigne and his posterity All this you may see verified in the life of Edward the Second King of England 3 But in case the quite contrary way be taken and that the Subjects to comply with perverse inclinations and those who are in power strive who shall be most wicked from thence must greater danger arise to the Prince then from any other emulation or discontent Vertuous men are few and consequently the Prince may without great difficulty finde them employments but if vice be rewarded he will not finde in his Kingdome wherewith to content half the number of dishonest pretenders and to satisfie some few of them is to disgust all the rest who being men of as little honour as conscience will make use of their number and power to obtaine what they could not by favour and will clime up to the height of their ambition by force and wicked devices This is the reason why Princes ought to esteeme and reward vertue and discountenance vice and why none ought to be of his Councell whose integrity is not notorious to his Subjects for how can a Prince discountenance vice if his Favourits be vicious and dishonest persons Their ill example may be his ruine because all men who desire to be preferred will prostitute their consciences to the Favourits will and pleasure and neglect his Master and when the Favourit hath gained the greatest part of the Subjects to his owne devotion perhaps he will plot something against the Soveraignes person and promote to the royall Throne some of his owne relations A Prince cannot be too suspicious and jealous of dishonest Councellours the greatest tye of fidelity being conscience they who have none must prove disloyall whensoever it stands with their conveniency Therefore it s most dangerous and want of true Policy in Princes to trust themselves or their affaires in the hands of such men for though it be their interest this day to be faithfull to their King it may be the contrary to morrowe I am sure it can never be his interest to stick to them or owne their dishonest proceedings The interest of Kings lyeth in the affection of his Subjects and its impossible they should affect a King who not onely protects but ownes manifest injustices Subjects are men and as apt to resent and revenge injuries as the Soveraigne He must handle them very gently and not expose them to the contempt or tyranny of wicked Ministers for though they may have patience for a time at length they may growe furious and he will finde himselfe mistaken in their temper when it is too late to dismisse or punish those who occasioned their distempers 4 Amongst all Princes ruined by the wickednesse of Ministers none is more to be pittied then Edward the VI. of England because he could as little depose as choose his Counsellours being alwayes in his minority It is the opinion of most Writers that Dudley Duque of Northumberland after beheading Seamour the Protectour did poyson the King to the end his sonne Guilford who married the Lady Iane Gray might in her right be King and himselfe in the right and reigne of his sonne governe England excluding Queene Mary and the Queene of Scots I doe not thinke that any history can give testimony of more dishonest Counsellours in one time and in one Kingdome then we read of in this poore childs reigne Seamour himselfe violated his oath and promise given to Henry the VIII that no new Religion should be brought into England during the Kings minority Afterwards he caused his owne brother to be beheaded The Duque of Northumberland plotted the Kings death dissembled his Faith which at length upon the scaffold he professed dying a Roman Catholick and exhorting the Nation to sticke to that Religion But what I desire Princes should reflect upon is how dangerous it is for them to have Counsellours void of all Religion and conscience A man would thinke that Dudley could have no other interest but that of King Edward whom he ruled together with the Kingdome and yet we see how farre he went to fetch a contrary interest and by what wicked and dishonest wayes There is no interest remote or too farre from one of a large conscience if he be perswaded its more for his purpose then the present which he manageth Let Princes therefore countenance vertue and banish vice from their Courts and Counsells if they have any care of their owne interest and security But now let us see CHAP. XIII How necessary it is for a Statesman to be a man of honour and of his word and how great a difference there is betweene Policy and Craft 1 ALl Statesmen must be Gentlemen in their actions They must shunne as much meane wayes in themselves as they must seeme not to dislike of them in other meane persons whom they employe or entertaine as necessary and base instruments They must countenance spyes but scorne to be spyes themselves The maxime of a Statesman must be not to betray any man that confides in him for the food of Policy is information and knowledge of businesses which none will give that is afraid of being betrayed A man may be faithfull to his Prince without being a Traitour to his Subjects or any other and the favour of a Minister with his Prince must not be grounded upon information of other mens defects but upon his owne services strength of judgement and dexterity of managing affaires He who creeps into favour by telling tales and such meane wayes is rather a petty spy and informer then a wise Statesman I have knowne a great Minister of State who told a Gentleman that desired to be advised by him he would helpe him in what he could but warned him before hand that he would make use of any thing he heard for his Masters service and therefore bid him consider whether it was for his purpose to communicate unto him any secrecy This was honourable and plaine dealing he would serve his King and not betray others and yet this Minister of State is knowne to be as faithfull to his Master as ever Subject was to Prince having lost for his service as great an estate as any Subject in our parts of Christendome doth possesse 2 There are some persons that place the essence of a Polititian in being a Favourite of that faction which actually beareth sway they thinke it wisdome though not worth to change their friends as often as these doe their fortune and which is worse to become enemies or those who raised them from nothing because it s so necessary to humour the present power Such cut-purses and cut-throates are the infamy of Courts and the
attributed to an incapacity of learning even by experience the art of governing Therefore it concerns not onely the state but also the honour of Princes to condemne sometimes their owne first choice and judgements by second thoughts and reflections least the world should thinke that they are more wilfull then understanding more besotted upon an unhappy Favorite then attentive to the common good their owne interest and reputation This lesson was inculcated to the late King Charles by his Father when he charged him to beware of Master Laud whom King Iames did foresee to be as unfit for government as afterwards he proved by treating the English Nobility and Gentry with such scorne as if they were borne to be no lesse under his command then de facto they were at his disposall by reason of the Kings favour and commission Had his late Majesty beene as fortunate in taking his Fathers advice as his Father was prudent in giving it their posterity and the poore Cavalleers had beene in a better condition Princes are not so frequently ruined by their owne faults as by their Favorits unlesse you will reckon amongst their owne whatsoever is owned by them to excuse their Ministers Yet politick Princes are more apt to father their owne oversights upon others then adopt those of others to themselves and are seldome so constant in their affection to Favorits as for their sakes to bring their owne judgements in question either by owning their defects or defending their misgovernment 5 Heresy that could not get footing in Scotland during Iames the V. his reigne assaulted the same Kingdome in his daughter Queene Mary Stewards infancy borne but 8. dayes before her Father departed this world Iames Hamilton Earle of Aran taking upon him the government was solicited by Henry the VIII to send the young Queene into England that she might be married to his Sonne Edward Aran condescended but the Queene Mother and Cardinal Beton Chancellor of Scotland opposed Henry the VIII designe as destructive to Catholick Religion and by consent of the three States of the Realme sent the yong Queene to France to be espoused to the Delphin But before her departure Henry the VIII had gained some of the Nobility of Scotland to himselfe who preferring their private interests before Religion encouraged one Friar Williams a Dominican to preach against the Popes supremacy and to exhort all people to read the English Bible not doubting by these meanes to embroyle the Kingdome in such a manner that Henry the VIII sending an Army might not onely have the yong Queene but the whole Kingdome at his command Though the Queene escaped her Kingdome was all wasted with warre Paul the III. Bishop of Rome sent the Patriarch of Venice to comfort the Scots in their affliction exhorting them to be constant in that Faith which they had inherited from their Ancestours 6 By the sermons of Friar William and the liberty of reading the Bible many of the vulgar sort and also of the Nobility were perverted and because Cardinal Beton being Archbishop of Saint Andrews and Chancellor of Scotland was an obstacle to their intended rebellion and destruction of the Catholick Religion they did assassinate him in his owne chamber and hanged his body out at the window in his Cardinals robes It s certaine that his bloud could not be washed of from the stone of the window though great diligence was used to that purpose This murther was revenged by the King of France whose forces tooke the Castle to which the Hereticks retired punished them and suppressed their novelties But in the yeare 1558. when the Queene of Scots married the Delphin of France the Hereticks raised another rebellion The Ringleaders were Paul Meffinus a baker Harlaus a taylor and Iohn Duglas alias Grant who had beene a Carmelite Friar On the first of September the feast of Saint Giles had beene alwayes celebrated very solemnly in Edinburg as being Patron of that City The Saints Image being carried in procession according to the ancient and Catholick manner the Hereticks snatcht it away and committed many other abuses and sacrileges and spared not to exhort all sorts of people to rebell against the present government 7 Iohn Knox an Apostata Religious Priest being accused formerly of too much familiarity with his mother in law of witchcraft and of many other crimes was fled from Scotland into England and from thence to Geneva where he learnt Calvins doctrine and discipline This wicked man having by his Letters and Emissaries perturbed all in Scotland came in person in the yeare 1559. to compleat the worke he rallied all the dispersed Hereticks persuaded them to profane all Churches and Altars pull downe Monasteries banish all Bishops Priests and Religious deny obedience to the Queene Regent to whom Knox gave the lye divers times and to choose a new Councell whereof the chiefe was Iames Steward base sonne to Iames the V. who afterwards was Earle of Murray and liked well to see this confusion not doubting that his ambition might fish in the troubled water Calvin ep 285. Calvin writ to Knox congratulating with him the good successe and progresse of the Ghospel exhorting him to carry on the worke of the Lord like a valiant labourer in Christs Church But by succours from France the rebells were quieted and by the endeavours of Nicholas Pellevins the Popes Nuntius afterwards a Cardinal and of three Sorbon Doctors their heresie did not spread over the whole Nation though every day their number encreased Knox never omitted any opportunity afterwards to plant his Genevian Ghospel in his Countrey which at length by the helpe of the Devill and Iames Steward and other Polititians he perfected When King Iames came first into England being at dinner in a noble mans house he said Knot in his Protestancy condemned fol. 166. edit 1654. at Doway that God thought fit to set a visible mark of reprobation upon Knox even in this life before he went to the Devill which was that being sick in his bed with a good fire of coales by him and a candle light upon the table a woman or maid of his sitting by him he told her that he was extreamly thirsty and therefore willed her to fetch him some drinke She went and returned quickly but found the room all in darknesse for not onely the candle but the cole fire also was utterly extinct and she by that light which her selfe brought in immediatly after saw the body of Knox lying dead in the middle of the floor and with a most gastly and horrid countenance as if his body were to shew the condition of his soule Let Polititians reflect upon this horrid spectacle and consider whether they can invent a plot whereby Gods just judgement may be deluded What did it availe Knox in his last houre to have beene as powerfull in Scotland as Calvin was in Geneva and what will it availe any Polititian or Courtiour to have embroyled Kingdomes and made factions in this
world if in the other he must for all eternity be but a coale to keepe in and inflame hell fire 8 In the yeare 1564. Queene Mary Steward after her returne from France married the Lord Henry Steward a Prince of the bloud royall both of Scotland and England and though Murray the Queenes base brother advised her to marry this same Prince he joyned in rebellion with the Hereticks and other seditious men against her Majesty for marrying but they were soone quasht and the heads of the faction retired into England where with Queene Elizabeth they brewed a new rebellion and to give it a better colour and successe then the former had it was thought expedient to sowe sedition and jealousies betweene the Queene and her husband who having but 22. yeares of age and being high minded had not from her Majesty that unlimited power which he desired This restriction of the yong Prince his authority was thought to proceed from the advice of David Rizius the Queenes Secretary a grave and understanding man and a severe observer of hereticall designes The Lord Henry Steward being persuaded by the Hereticks that this old man was the onely obstacle of not having all the government in his owne hands resolved to dispatch him out of the way and to that end leads a company of armed Hereticks into the Queenes chamber she being at supper and great with child of King Iames at her feete whither he repaired for protection was the poore Secretary murthered and the Queene so barbarously dealt withall that it was strange she did not dye in the place or miscarry which was all that the Hereticks aymed at But her husband reflecting upon his passion and folly being also advertised by some of the company that the Hereticks made him but an instrument of his owne ruine he entered to the Queenes chamber with pretext of causing her to signe a paper in favour of the murtherers and there acknowledging his fault both got away privatly to the Castle of Dumbar raised forces dissipated the Army of their Enemies some whereof were executed but Murray the bastard that plotted all the mischiefe was pardoned at the instance of Queen Elizabeth who was resolved by this Hereticks meanes to destroy his Sister the innocent Queene of Scots as afterwards happened 9 Prince Henry Steward considering that Queene Elizabeths kindnesse to the bastard Murray was grounded upon her hatred to his Queen and himselfe was resolved to prevent his owne death by permitting Justice have its right against a man who employed all his thoughts in rebellious designes he communicated his resolution with the Queene but she being of a more mercifull and mild disposition then the times and troubles required disswaded her husband from putting him to death though even after his last pardon there was proofe enough of treason He perceiving that the Prince looked upon him as a Traitor dealt with his confederats about murthering the Prince and promised to Iames Heburne Earle of Bothuel that he should be married to the Queene if he would kill her husband the rest of his hereticall Cabale put their hands to this engagement whereupon Bothuel murthered Henry Steward in his bed not farre from Edinburg at a Countrey house whether he had gone for his recreation and afterwards tooke the Queene prisoner as she was returning from visiting her child King Iames who was nursed at Sterling Bothuel forced his prisoner to be his wife assuring her no other hopes were left for her selfe other sonne to survive Prince Henry but his protection who was of great power amongst the hereticks as then he imagined but the contrary was soone discovered for the very same hereticks that set him upon killing the Prince and marrying the Queene raised an Army to ruine him and professed to the Queene they had no other dâ—signe in raising forces but to revenge the death of her husband whereof they knew Bothuel to be the Author and humbly desired her Majesty would be pleased to deliver him up to Justice and receive them into her grace protesting to live and dye in her obedience Bothuel was delivered to their hands whom they let escape but the poore Queene contrary to their oath and engagement was not onely made prisoner but reviled and afronted in the highest degree laying to her charge that she had murthered her husband and to make her odious and infamous to the whole Kingdome and Christian world they carried before her all the way to Edinburg the picture of her husband dead with many wounds and her little sonne painted by his fathers corps praying to God for justice against his mother This is the faith and fruit of heresy and policy When Polititians heads direct Hereticks hands we may expect nothing but such tragicall stories as this is Queene Elizabeth by destroying this poore Lady aymed at the establishment of her owne usurpation and security Murray by her death had hopes to governe Scotland Knox Buchanan and the rest of the hereticall crue looked upon the setling of Calvins Reformation and Discipline and to that end advised that the innocent Queene should be put to death of the same opinion was her good brother the bastard Murray but that glory was reserved for our Virgin Queene of England whose malice could not be satiated with afronts afflictions and many yeares imprisonment untill at length upon a publike stage the most vertuous and renowned Queene of Scots lost her head against the Law of Nature and Nations by the command of a Iezabel that cruell head heart and darling of the venerable Protestant Church of England 10 Before it was resolved by the Assembly of Hereticks whether the Queene should dye it was decreed the government of the Kingdome should be resigned to her sonne and in his minority being then but 13. moneths old to Murray and his Camerades Hereupon the Infant was declared King and in stead of the Masse honest Iohn Knox made a sermon against that holy Sacrifice and all Catholick Tenets and ceremonies recommending much to the people the observance of his Calvinian Discipline Morton and Humes swore in the young Kings name to set up the new Religion and pull downe the old which was already brought so lowe that the Queene could scarce finde one Catholick Priest to baptize her sonne the same did celebrate her husbands funerall whom she commanded to be buried in her fathers Tombe wherewith these two Catholick Princes King Iames the V. and Prince Henry Steward lyeth also enterred the Catholick Religion that for so many ages had florished in Scotland Duke Hamilton and his brother Iohn Archbishop of Saint Andrews the Earles of Huntley and Argile with many others of the Nobility protested against the oath that was taken in the Kings name of destroying that Faith which his Majesty and themselves had inherited from their noble Progenitors yet the Queene of Scots being made prisoner by Queene Elizabeth and most of the Catholick Nobility being killed in her quarrell Murray Knox and other Hereticks