Valladolid where it stands over the high Altar with a cut face the skars yet remaining as marks of honour but dressed most richly and adorned with a pretious Crowne And this they call whatsoever they think our blessed Lady Shee hath a rich Wardrope and great change of Gownes one of white Sattin with gold lace another of red another of green Sattin and yet another of blew besides her cloth of gold for high dayes and the worst day in the week the Image goes in Sattin while the poore are naked and farther then all this is as brave in action as in clothes for it works a wondrous store of miracles but I had not the honour to see one of them Only one of the Jesuits came one day after dinner hastily to us Schollers and told us with much laughter how he had perswaded a good old wife that shee was cured of her infirmity by the Virgin Mary though she did not feele ease suddenly and that she must not faile to bring the figure in wax of the part cured and hang it up with other figures of that kind before the Image in honour of the Virgin Mary and to preserve the memory of the Miracle CHAP. 2. I Will not have to doe with Controversie but as it lyes in my way For if I turn my stile altogether from the sweet and peaceable comforts of the Spirit to the noise and loud alarums of Controversie I am a fish took out of the water And therefore I professe if they write a thousand times and I answer as often I will never stirre a foot from this very spirituall way of writing let them object a disability on my side or what they please The command of Christ to my soule is Goe and preach and every thing that comes from mee while I am I shall be if it be holy an act of obedience to that command But I lose time This Image-worship performed with much bending of the knee and body is a learned kinde of Idolatry Nicephorus entitled by them Scriptor Catholicus the Catholike Writer confesseth it was a custome introduced first in imitation of the Pagan Idolators But who can give a law of religious worship which took not beginning from Christ or his Apostles God forbiddeth all worship of this ugly stamp in those holy words of the law Thou shalt not bow downe thy selfe to them nor serve them We see that Exo. 20 5. the prohibition imposeth a tye upon the outward gesture And their answer will not hold together that we are onely commanded not to make or bow downe to an Image which wee make as well our God as our Image and bow to as to our God because God in his law immediatly addeth For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God Jealousie in us is a superfluity of love and being mingled with feare and suspition feareth every shadow and appearance of neglect and suspecteth every likenesse of evill And therefore howsoever they change the phrase and plead that the worship dwelleth not in the Image but lodging as it were at the signe of the Image goeth on her journey to God and to the Saint Yet God being still a jealous God his jealousie will be very fearefull and suspitious of all worship which is not directed the next way to him for though his love be cleane from all defect acting with us now his part is the jealous Lover And what a puzling is here of ignorant peoples brains with these ordinations and terminations And this holy parcell of holy Scripture Josephus the Jew with us maketh a part of the second Commandement But with what threats and promises God keeps us to the keeping of this Commandement Visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the children Ver. 6. unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keepe my commandements The iniquity of the Fathers shall be punished in the children if they be also children of their sinnes and idolatrous practises but hee will shew mercy unto thousands whose Fathers abhorred such odious wayes yea though their children are not inheritors of all their Fathers vertues because hee is more prone to mercy And as farre as thousands exceed in number the third and fourth generation so farre will his mercy be more active and operative then his Justice And this odd kinde of worship is exceedingly scandalous to all the heathenish world of unbeleevers and especially to the Jews who yet ake both in body and soule and know they doe so partly for their Fathers old sins of Idolatry There standeth a great woodden Image of the Crucifix in St. Pauls Church in Rome But why doe I say it standeth Alas it cannot stand Out of which they teach that Christ talked with St. Brigit And the Curtaine being drawne the people fall downe before it and sigh and knock their breasts and then the little beads drop I have seene an Image of the Sun through the mouth of which in the old time the devill spake to the people But while I am reasonable I shall not beleeve that God would ever speak out of an Image and tempt some to Idolatry and confirme others in it And it doth not suit with his greatnesse to come so neere the devill in his wayes who long deceived the world by a counterfeit way of speech in Oracles and who practised to speak in Images almost from the beginning of the world Indeed the great Doctors of the Church commonly call the devil Gods Ape because hee much labours to be like him that he may passe for him and deceive with more Authority But no good man hath ever said in expresse termes that God doth imitate the devill for when wee imitate another wee learne something of him And they will not deny if they be not brasse all over but as well their Priests tutored by the devill as the old Priests in imitation of the devill have spoke to the people from the mouths of Images And the dressing of Images in silks and velvets what is it but the baby-sport of children onely the little childe hath more wit then to worship his idle Baby I have seene an old worme-eaten Image of the virgin Mary in Rome carried with all earthly pomp and triumph in Procession to which the people kneeled where it came with as humble submission as they could have done to God himselfe if hee had there appeared with all his Court of Angels in his Glory And before this Image I because I was somewhat dexterous in observing the State of their Service was admitted even to the saying of Masse Shall man the living Image of God worship the senselesse Image of a man or woman being a more ignoble creature then himselfe As the perfections of all things joyne hands in God with an infinite accesse of excellence So the perfections of all things but God scattered in them embrace one another in man in a finite and bounded manner
the Church and that 's a great way St. Cyprian in the same place exhorteth us very seriously not to deale with them not to eat with them not to speake with them O the foule corruption of our Times O for some zealous power that may reforme the abuses mine eyes have seene It is one of the first endeavours of the Papists in England which they exercise towards the society of men to gaine the good wills of Ministers For if they purchase the Ministers good will and good word they clip the wings of the Law hold him fast that hath a great stroke in matters concerning them And where the Papists have great meanes they are very free to Ministers in their entertainments and send their Coaches for them and their wifes But when they have beene merry and are gone their good name which they left behind them hath not as good entertainment as they For the Papists say and I have heard them These Ministers are the veriest Epicures meere belly-gods if we fill their bellies we shall be sure to have them our friends when the bag is full the Pipe will goe to our tune a long time after Modo ferveat olla if the pot seeth and there be warme meat providing for dinner what care they whether there bee a God or no If wee licker them throughly with strong Beere and good sparkling Canary and call them to ride and hunt with us they will talke familiarly with our Priests and heare them jest at their Religion and at the Professours and Defenders of it and as freely jest as they and yet will honestly keepe counsell they are not Christians but Atheists And thence the Papists fetch as they think a strong argument against our Religion And whilest these Ministers frequent their houses with a pretence of converting them for so they tell ignorant people that groane under the scandall they subvert them utterly Truly a Minister and a daily Guest of the Papists enquired when this Book which I intended for the service of God and the detestation of Popery came into the light that said he I may sit by the fire-side and laugh at it and I beleeve he will if he can spare so much time from drinking The Lord forgive him and teach him to be practicall in the practicable things in which this Book is doctrinall But why should I be opposed in my reasonable proceedings against the Adulteresse of Rome by my own Mothers owne children and so often by so many of them or why should entertainments or private ends be more deare to them then Gods truth Let every man observe what great Christmasses they keepe and how they abound in dancing and revelling striving thereby to make the hearts of the Country people which are soone taken with such baits their owne lest they should at any time either accuse them or beare witnesse against them And in their houses many if not the greater part of their servants were lately Protestants O Lord whither doe they pull us one by one I know where having one of a Family they made the number up five presently and the Father had bin but a while before a Church-warden and these are all Attendants upon a rich Papist I would their devotion did not blaze so much and so often like an Ignis Fatuus lead poore Travellers out of their way It is my opinion grounded upon experience In every day of the year O pitty Some and more then we dreame of in this little corner of the world are drawne with queint devices with smooth tearms of Art with trim speaking and eloquent behaviour from us from our owne body by them to them O weak people to be thus drawne weake in life or understanding or at least weak in resolution selling Christ for a messe of pottage or for thirty pence at most If the Papists goe on there will be quickly I say not few but fewer found hearts in England Take notice of this all good people Existimemus If we have no zeale we have no religion no Church and zeal is like fire if it be it burnes Wee carry our selves perinde quasi S. Chrysost hom 1 adversus Iudaeos nihil accideret grave saith St. Chrysostome cùm membra nostra putrescunt as if no harm did happen to us when our own limbs drop away in corruption from our bodies But I turne to the matter in hand CHAP. 18. THe Teachers of the Arian Heresie by which Christ was throwne downe from Heaven to the degree of a meere creature were the most affable and most insinuating people that lived in those dayes How subtill were they both in the propagation of their faith and the carriage of their manners they shewed the poore plaine people three corners of their handkerchers saying Here are three and these three are not one how then can three persons be one God And they did not juggle onely with the simple sort For they deluded Ruff lib. 10 Eccl. hist cap. 21. six hundred Bishops by a cunning proposall whether they would worship Christ or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who because they were not skill'd in the Greek language answered they would worship Christ and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 little thinking they denied Christ to be consubstantiall with his Father And how cunningly did they serue themselves into the favour of great-ones moving one by another as Constantine by his sister Constantia What did they not attempt against holy Athanasius they suborned a false woman to accuse him of rape they brought in the arme of a dead man with an intention to soyle him with murther and sorcerie they would have pulled him limb from limb in the midst of an honourable Assembly In very truth no people were ever so like these heretikes in their practises as the Popish Priests and Jesuits of these days I have heard from themselves that one Jesuit sat singing in a Coblers shop with his apron before him to hide himselfe from the Officers that pursued him another counterfeited himselfe to be drunk and acted it rarely that he might put a trick upon a Constable and that a third dancing with a Lady heard her Confession sin after sin as he met her because he wanted better opportunity These are but pranks yet the good Fishermen would not have done so What black sin will they not fix upon him that is their enemy though a friend to Christ But here I cannot stay Yet note God hath layd a curse upon dissemblers that if you neerly follow their lifes and actions with your eyes you shall clearely perceive them often tripping and plainely discovering the foule disorder of their hearts in crooked proceedings that doe not savour of Evangelicall doctrine or Apostolicall gravity It is the prophocie of Esay The Esay 15. 6. waters of Nimrim shall be dried up Some English it the Panthers waters shall be dried up The Panther say the best writers of naturall History being exceedingly spotted doth seek out secret fountains
Rome like Smithfield in London I humbly desire all religious people when they talke of this pamper'd man not to think of me He was not a native of this Countrey and in many things he behaved himselfe like an Atheist and an Epicure he was cut out into a Dissembler when he was young for he had beene a Jesuit I never was but abhorre the name In Ligorne a Towne lying by the Mediterranean Sea and subject to the Duke of Florence I saw the man upon whom part of a wall fell and held him to the ground while he was tooke in the act of villany with a Calfe and money had redeemed him And yet notwithstanding it was one of the cherishing stories with which the notable Monke of Doway did ease me of my burden That an Italian Gentleman having sent a wicked Varlot to cut off the nose of his enemy and there are persons both in Italy and Spaine to be hired for such damnable purposes And the deed bein done the wronged person recollected his spirits and desired to know the summe by which he was induced to that foule enterprise Which being told he gave the like summe for the performance of the same exploite upon the other And the same vile instrument in the very same manner upon the same conditions cut off the nose of him that first imploy'd him In Italy they bury altogether in Vaults and in the time of my residence there the Friers had conveyed a Maid under ground and having abused her killed her in her grave Salvianus is a great enemy to these Hypocrites His words in one place are Quid agis stulta persuasio Peccata interdixit Salv. l. 5. de Guber Dei Deus non matrimonia Foolish perswasion what doest thou the Law of God forbiddeth sinne not marriage But why doe I taxe them for killing It is scarce so hainous in Italy to kill a man as to kill a dog When a man is killed in the streets of Rome another perhaps will step to him and looke if he know the face to quiet his thoughts concerning his own friends but he goes his way againe presently and makes no strange matter of murder it is so common The way of the Italians is as the Colledge hath taught me after a quarrell betwixt two one deviseth presently how he may kill his adversary upon this foundation because he must either kill or be kill'd Yet in the execution of a condemned person in Spaine I cannot no I cannot but observe one commendable passage which I could wish that their practice would commend to our imitation Sure it would bee a matter of high and publike concernement The offender being dead immediately standeth up by him hanging or lying as a triumph of justice a Priest or Minister who presently maketh a speech to the people not unlike a Sermon wherein he treats of his offence of the Diabolical delusions in which he was ensnared by little and little of his former life and of the manifestation of the divine justice in his end and death At which time he doth so point to the dead body and so often shew it to the eyes of the people whose hearts are already strucke with the horror of his present ruine and moreover he doth so charge and warne the people by his example and cries so many times looke here you who are alive that indeed he moves exceedingly to good life If I goe on I shall never have done CHAP. III. OUr ghostly Father in the Colledge was an old Jesuit who had said freely amongst his companions that hee had laboured in digging under the Parliment house till every thred of his shirt was wet This man was not a fit Ghostly Father for young Schollers looking towards England The words were proved against him by the titular Bishop of Chalcedon from whose mouth I received them Who shewed me likewise a silver meddall in which Father Garnet was decked with the ornaments of a Saint and joyned with S. Ignatius Loyola I am bound also to his Lordship for the sight of two pictures of Garnets strawe each representing it in a severall forme and one being the second edition when the former had beene formerly reprehended even by me said the Bishop I hope the Jesuits will not deny that I lived warily and piously amongst them and glewed my selfe fast to my meditations when others neglected them and slept their time away who when the seven Sleepers were read in the Martyrologe at supper would merrily put off their caps in honour of them But I will onely take my leave of his Holinesse and then goe from Rome For I was sent hence by the Pope to England to convert soules and I brought out of his Treasure three thousand Indulgences with me which I meane to keepe till they are dearer The Pope is a Bishop and yet a Prince And the reason which Father Fitzharbert gave me why the old Ages payed to the Pope so little honour was because they saw him a Bishop and no Prince If this may stand the chiefe honour is due to him as a Prince and not as a Bishop He is carried in a chaire of state upon the shoulders of men from which chaire his blessing hath often come and sate upon my shoulders Kings and Cardinals may kisse his hands others of what degree soever onely the crosse upon his pantofle He has the keyes of Heaven and Hell and also of Purgatory he can turne the key open and shut when he pleaseth And he doth assure the Priest that saying Masse at a priviledge Altar that is an Altar to which this high priviledge is given by his Holinesse he shall free a soule out of Purgatory He will give you very liberally a plenary Indulgence of all your sinnes and remit all the temporall punishment due to the slaine in Purgatory when the guilt is removed by confession He will untie the Lawes of God and give you leave and freedome to labour in servile works as to plough sow and reap on the Lords day to take for your wife your neare kinswoman to kill the subject of any Prince whom he doth excommunicate You may goe to the Stewes in the full and open view of authority I am able to name the man whom they would have suffered to commit fornication under the pleasing title of a veniall sinne Teaching out of his chaire he cannot erre they meane when he doth instruct the world in matters of faith And though he bee an Arrian a Monothelite or other Hereticke the Spirit of God doth not forsake him for he hath a double portion of his Spirit and one being lost by heresie keeps the other He claimeth to himselfe a supreme Dominion over Princes be they Christians or Infidels and presumeth to disengage their true and lawfull subjects from their obedience to which they are tied by God He cannot be deposed for any crime but heresie he will give you if you please him a peece of sanctified and blessed waxe which shall quiet
reason that they both drew their first parentage from a Worme And thus hee sought creepingly amongst the Wormes for what hee could not finde though very neere him In like manner he played with the Immortality of the soule It pleased him and it displeased him He tooke it and he threw it off againe And he was more willing in the end to disclaime it then owne it And the flowings and ebbings of his owne braine had he studied inward might have urged him to a greater confusion of thoughts and more trouble of minde then Euripus in which Saint Gregorie Nazienzen teacheth he Greg. Naz. orat 3. in Julian drowned himselfe And this weake light or dawning of the day was truely most sutable and more then most agreeable with beginners CHAP. VIII SInne being now more strong more witty and more various and Nature being sufficiently informed of her owne weaknesse God sent the world letters from Heaven De illa eivitate unde peregrinamur S. Aug. con 2. in Psal 90. saith Saint Austin hae literae nobis venerunt these letters came from the great Imperiall City from which we travell And Moses the Messenger that brought these letters of so great importance frō God to the world delivered his message with caution and with respect to the Jewes hardnesse as it is cleerely gathered out of the words in which Christ arguing with the Pharisees concerning the permissive Law of Divorcement saith Moses because of the hardnesse of your hearts suffered you to put away your Mat. 19. 8. wives but from the beginning it was not so And so he corrected the Law in conformity to a more perfect condition And therefore the Greeke Church with us doth onely breake Matrimony in the case of Adultery in which point Eugenius the fourth laboured to reconcile her with the Church of Rome at Florence but he could not And even in the old dayes of the old Law God altered the phrase of his proceedings with correspondence to the person with whom he dealt and with whom he was to deale For the old Law being a Law of feare a Law of bondage and a maine difference betwixt the old Law and the new being as Saint Austin giveth it Aug. l. octoginta trium quaest tom 4. Timor Amor Feare and Love conversing now with the Synagogue a servant a bond-woman he stiles himselfe God the Lord Jehovah Mighty Terrible Yet meditating upon the new Law being a Law of Grace and liberty and turning to the sweete Spouse in the Canticles to which Law she did indeed most properly belong he doth as it were cover his greatnesse hide his beames and draw a great vaile over his Majesty For he cals himselfe a Bridegroome a friend a lover And in the whole book of Canticles we cannot finde with both our eyes one proper name of God not one of the tenne great names of God which are so easie to be found in the old Testament and which Saint Hierome doth briefely explicate in his learned Epistle to Marcella God will not be knowne to S. Hier. Ep. ad Marcel his bashfull and tender Spouse by the names which move terrour and affrightment For he would not as a man may say for all the world trouble or fright his pretty maiden Spouse And uses onely the titles which kindle and cherish love CHAP. IX ALl this while there occurred as well in the booke of Creatures as in the love-letters from the Creatour many faire and solid emblems of a Divine providence goodnesse wisedome mercie justice and so forth And before this man might already learne sufficiently that there was one God even in the Manuscript of Creatures by turning before his lesson from cause to cause till he came to the first cause from motion to motion till he came to the first Mover But the capacity of the childish young world was yet too meane too shallow to receive in plaine language the mysterious doctrine of a Trinity the heart of man being as it were not yet altogether unfolded not perfectly open'd into a Triangle Nor did ever any spirituall Traveller to this day meete with the perfect likenesse of the blessed Trinity in Creatures For there is no principle in naturall knowledge no foot-step of God in Creatures by the direction of which any created understanding either Humane or Angelicall may reasonably close with the assent or opinion or even suspition of the blessed Trinity or which can give us any true notice that it is possible For although the Understanding Will and Memory of man in which as in the most during part Gods image consisteth are three faculties and one soule yet they fall under being one and three after the manner as God is three and one nor is there such a difference in the faculties as distinction in the Persons And if you distinguish the faculties really with the Thomists the Persons will not be so really distinguished and yet they will be truely distinguished one from another besides that every one will be the same in Essence and the whole Essence If the learned urge that the soundest part of the heathen writers speake honourably of the blessed Trinity as Mercurius therefore called though some thinke otherwise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orpheus and that Plato speaks high things of the word divine love and other Platonists out of whose books S. Austin reporteth that he gathered these jewels this golden chaine of holy Scripture In principio erat verbum verbum S. Aug. l. 7 confess c. 9. Io. 1. 1. erat apud Deum Deus erat verbum In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God As if the Eagle had not taken it in a high flight from the holy Ghost but stooped to them for it I answer these Philosophers sucked the sweets of knowledge they had in this kind out of the Scripture And Clemens Alexandrinus Clem. Alex l. 1 Siromatum maketh mention of a certaine old Greeke edition of the old Testament before that of the Septuagint which came to the hands of Plato and of other Philosophers And also these Philosophers as it is abundantly manifest in Saint Justine travelled all into Egypt to better their S. Just paranesi sive cohort ad Gracos knowledge where the Jewes in their servitude had left many visible footsteps of heavenly learning Yet where they speake of the word and so plainely of the blessed Trinity they received their knowledge in the same strange manner as the Sibyls and they spoke as Plato said of the Sibyls many brave matters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not Plat. apud Just in paranesi reaching to the deepe and genuine sense of any word they said and the spirit failing not being able to recover the least representation of what they had said And truely Theodor. lib. 2. apud Gracos Theodoret gives a most exquisite reason why God was not willing to deliver the knowledge of the blessed Trinity
then in the taking away of my neighbours goods the act of retaining them being indeed a continuall taking of them and accompanied with much more deliberation and consequently a most deliberate negation or deniall of sorrow for having taken them and an implicit or close and secret will or love of the same and the like wicked action and verily an utter exclusion of repentance upon this ground Repentance by which we are grieved for the commission of one sinne or more if it include not virtually a sorrow for all our sinnes committed is not Repentance and therefore in it selfe according to the course and order of Gods proceedings with us even in Christ Jesus not pardonable We cannot grieve with the griefe of true repentance for one sinne or many except we grieve for all because repētance grieveth that we have offended God and every sin is a great offence against God Of this blacke stampe are likewise certaine offences committed against God or his Church As when their honour or goods are taken from them All goods as goods are his goods that is most good I understand by goods taken from God abused Abuti saith Saint Austin est uti aliquo ad usum non suum To abuse a thing S. Aug. super illud Psal Loquens adversus justum in superbia in abusione is to bow it aside to an use for which it was not ordained Gods honour is taken from him in the commission of every sinne every sinne being opposite to his honour and as farre as it is able destructive of it because a violation of his precept and a contempt of his power But the more eminent and more speciall taking away of his honour which accordingly requires a more eminent and more speciall satisfaction is the most foule and deformed act of speaking blasphemous words in the hearing of our neighbours as being a plaine act of open defiance against God The strong foundation upon which this holy Doctrine standeth is Repentance implyeth a revoking of sinne past to the farthest extent of our ability For it necessarily includeth a will which would that it never had beene committed but sinne is not sufficiently revoked if the wrongs of our neighbours bee not redressed and certainely they are not redressed without satisfaction made or forgiven for the rent is not sowed up And againe Repentance supposeth a performance of all the necessary obligations of Charity and one of the first and chiefest is to repaire the ruines of injustice Wherefore with Gods efficacious help according to the Canon of holy Scripture And he shall make amends for the harme that he hath done I will restore to God his Levit. 5. 16. own and because I am his my selfe set his honour free and turne his goods into the channell where at first they were by him set a running towards him I will correct the judgements of the people whom I have perverted and labour to rectifie both their opinions and lives and because the Spanish word is very significant disengannar to undeceive them I will restore if need be and if I am able encrease and preserve the goods and honour of his Church And where I was injurious towards my neighbour I will with all diligence peece up the losse though by the weakening of my owne estate For then I am a very weake creature when that by which I am strong is due by Gods ordinance to another and perhaps another is weake because I am strong by his weaknesse I will endeavour by all possible meanes to know if the goods devolv'd upon me have beene well gotten whether they bee mingled goods or no partly well gotten and partly otherwise and restore what is not mine The Preacher speakes like a Prcacher There is a sore Ecclesiastes 5. 13. evill which I have seene under the Sunne namely riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt I said he speakes like a preacher for the riches that are kept above the Sunne are not kept for the owners thereof to their hurt but under the Sun oftentimes riches are kept for the owners to their great hurt amongst which in the first place are il-gotten riches for they have so much of evill having beene ill-gotten that they seldome turne to good till they are well-gotten againe And although God doth not keepe riches for the owners thereof to their hurt because although he knowes all the secrets of future events all his ordinances are pure and undefiled yet their friends doe for they must needs intend the hurt because ill-gotten goods without any other addition of evill are hurtfull to their owners and the reason is cleare what is unjustly gotten is detained unjustly if the case be not varied by length of time and of all hurts the hurt of wickednesse is the greatest The holy Ghost is the rule by which I worke And Zacheus stood and said unto the Luke 19. 8. 9. Lord Behold Lord the halfe of my goods I give to the poore and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation I restore him foure-fold And Jesus said unto him This day is salvation come to this house It is not I will give but I give and therefore the reward is quick This day And restitution is made although the thing taken be small and the person damnified of small account If I have taken any thing from any man And howsoever the words here run we must first restore and afterwards give It was Lord before but the promise of satisfaction having interceded it is now Jesus And therefore where I have tooke away the good-name of any man I will recover it by the law of God and give it againe And why doth not the Church of Rome which talketh so much of satisfaction give me my owne againe injuriously taken from me Sunt homicidae saith Saint Clement S. Clem. ep 1. ad Jacob interfectores fratrum sunt homicidae detractores eorum There are homicides who murder their brethren and there are homicides also that detract from them If my report was false I will humbly acknowledge my falsehood before the witnesses of my report who if they be farre distant shall be made also witnesses of my acknowledgement by word or letter If my report was of a thing wrapt in the clouds of uncertainty which yet I published under the name or colour of a certainty I will take all the worke to pieces againe and propose all a fresh as uncertain but my owne weaknesse If of a thing true and exposed in the light but not in the light of the Sunne but of a Candle as being secret or not knowne where I made it knowne I will conquer the wrong with charitable services If the wronged person be dead I will in matter of goods performe my sacred obligation to his friends keeping my eye upon the just tenour of his will and intention In matter of good-name to his good-name which as it sickens not with him so neither does it