the Dependances I told the Baron I feared such an Answer might ruin the Business since it could not come till the beginning of the Spring and might then give the French a Pretext of recalling his Word after the passing of it had laid asleep all Thoughts or Preparations for War both in Flanders and Holland from whence the first Assistance is to be expected And that I thought the Answer of Spain ought to be full and absolute as to the Acceptance of what is offered by France And if they would make room for the Contraventions he mentions that they should do it rather by enlarging the Acceptance than restraining it to any Condition and say they accepted the Arbitrage upon those Dependances and all other Differences arising upon the Peace in the Discussion whereof the Spanish Pretensions might likewise be brought before the Arbitrators but at a more seasonable Time than this next Spring will prove The Baron profess'd to be convinced by these Reasons But because there is not much Trust to a Person who is so far in Love with his own Sufficiency and seems to mind the valuing of himself at least equally with the doing of his Business I thought it not impertinent to give your Lordship my Reflection upon this Matter That if you approve it you may by some safe Way or Cypher transmit it to Sir William Godolphin For otherwise I am confident the Spanish Answer will be perplexed with those Contraventions which have held the Commissioners all this while at a Bay at Lisle and will not be admitted by France in the Decision of the Dependances I sent your Lordship inclosed Baron d'Isola's rough Propositions concerning his Master's joining with the Triple Alliance which the Ministers of the Confederates think fit to discourse first among themselves and afterwards enter into Conference with him as the Ministers of one united Power All we can do at first will be to communicate what passes to our Masters And therefore I send your Lordship the first Proposals by Advance that I may the sooner know your Reflections upon them After what will pass here in the Conclusion of our Guaranty and Suedish Payments I think if Monsieur Ognati can propose any good way of securing his Majesty or rather furnishing him before-hand with what one quarter of the Suedish future Subsidies will amount to for the 3 Months which are to be advanced it would add to the Strength and Credit of our Alliance in giving so great a Satisfaction to the Suede as they would receive by his Majesty's undertaking for the fifteen thousand Crowns a Month which they have so much insisted on and seem so much unsatisfied with failing in it I had Notice from my Lord Falconbridge of his intended Journy and have already begun our Correspondence by a Letter which will meet him at Paris And shall not fail in that nor I hope in any other Duties of my Employment I wish my Lord Berkly all Success in his new and great Charge not knowing any other wherein a diligent honest and able Person may be of greater Service to his Majesty than in That I am ever My LORD Your Lordship 's most faithful and most humble Servant To Sir William Godolphin Hague Apr. 3. S. N. 1670. SIR THIS Bearer Monsieur Chiese is dispatched by his Highness the Prince of Orange to Madrid for the Prosecution and Recovery of a great Debt owing now some time from that Crown to his Highness and I think not disputed by them And though this Gentleman goes armed with much better Weapons than any I can furnish him towards the Pursuit of his Enterprize yet the Prince having commanded me to give him my Recommendations to You among many other he carries I could not fail of it nor will I doubt its being of some Force with you since it comes in the Service of a Prince whose Birth gives him so much Interest in all English Men and whose Personal Qualities and Virtues give him a great deal more in all those that have the Honour to know him I must therefore beg all the good Offices and Assistances you can shew this Gentleman in Pursuit of his Highness's Concernments as well as your Advice to him if he desires it how to address himself by such Persons and in such Ways as will give him most appearance of Success Your Favour herein I shall take Care to value as I ought towards his Highness as I shall always my self acknowledge it and remain SIR Your obedient humble Servant To the Marquis of Castel-Rodrigo Hague Apr. 3. S. N. 1670. My Lord THO' the Bearer hereof Monsieur Chiese will have no need of other Support beside the Name of the Prince his Master and the Justice of the Affair he has in charge I would not fail however of giving him besides this Recommendation to your Excellence as well to pay my Duty to his Highness the Prince of Orange as to shew my Confidence that I have yet some Share in the Memory and Friendship of your Excellency I can assure you that the Court of Spain in doing Justice to his Highness will oblige a Prince who equals his great Birth by his great Qualities and who will be one day capable of recompensing the Kindness that shall be shewed him at present His Highness already takes great part in the good Turn of the Spanish Affairs by such Sentiments as deserve to be cherished and not discouraged by any Treatment either unjust or disobliging I could not recommend his Pretensions to a Person more generous than your Excellency nor to one who has been always pleased to interess him so much in what regards the King my Master And your Excellency's Favour in this Affair cannot be desired with greater Instance nor by one who is more than I am My Lord Your Excellency's c. Au Marquis de Castel-Rodrigo La Haye 3 Avril S. N. 1670. Monsieur QVoy que le porteur de cette Lettre Monsieur Chiese n'ait pas besoin d'autre appuy que du nom du Prince son Maitre de l'equité de la cause dont il est chargé je n'ay pourtant pas volu manquer á luy donner comme par surabondance de droit cette recommendation auprés de V. E. autant pour satisfaire á mon devoir envers son Altesse le Prince d'Orange que pour me faire honneur de la confiance avec laquelle je croy avoir encore quelque part dans le Souvenir l'amitié de V. E. Je pourrois bien l'assurer qu'en faisant justice á son Altesse la Cour d'Espagne obligera un Prince dont les grandes qualites egalent la grandeur de la naissance qui sera un jour en etat de reconnoitre les bontez qu'on aura á present pour luy Ajouteray-je que ce Prince prend deja beaucoup de part au bon train que prennent les affaires d'Espagne de tels sentimens quand ils seroient seuls
should have had any Part in this Delay and that you should have told him you had no Orders from me to pay him that Money However to take away all scruple if any can still remain after our last Conference at Brussels upon this Subject I do by these Presents order and appoint you pursuant to those Powers that have been given me from the King to pay or cause to be payd to Monsieur Rhintorf or his Order alâ— such Sums of Money as you shall any ways be able to raise either by the Sale of such Tin as is already arrived or shall arrive at Ostend upon his Majesty's Account with all the Diligence and Dispatch that is possible Or in case you do not find any ready Sale for it that you will at least pay him all such Sums as you shall be able to raise by pawning or engaging it to the best advantage you can after this I need say no more than to Conjure you by all the Zeal you have for his Majesty's Service and all the Friendship you have for me to employ upon this Occasion your utmost Diligence and Credit for the Conjuncture is grown so extremely pressing at this time that I can never say enough to recommend this Service to your best Endeavours I am SIR Your Servant To my Lord Arlington Brussels Oct. 13. S. N. 1665. My Lord UPON Saturday last about Nine at Night the Bishop's Agent there brought me a Desire from the * Of Castel Rhodrige Governâ—â— of the Spanish Netherlands Marques to come privately to him We stay'd long together and talked much The Substance was that he had last Post writ to the Spanish Ambassadour to inform the King that he heard the French were ready to march in Assistance of the Hollander against the Bishop of Munster and had told the Spanish Ambassadour in France they should take all Delays here in leave of Passage for Denial That he the Marquess was resolved upon Confidence of his Majesty's late Letter and Assistance to oppose them till he received Orders from Spain and hopes his Majesty will not fail of protecting and defending him in this Resolution He speaks with much Earnestness and Passion for concluding the League between England and Spain and either a Peace or Truce between Spain and Portugal in which he very much presses His Majesty's Interposition at this Time because nothing else will take away the Dishonour on the Spanish side but the Respect given to so Great and Powerful a King's Mediation He assures me he has given an absolute Denial to the Hollanders Demand of buying a great Quantity of Corn in these Countries which now begins to be one among their other great Wants That the French upon Jealousie of the Swede sent very lately an Envoy into Holland to join with them in pressing the Dane to put himself into a Posture of making a Diversion That for Security of these Countries six thousand Spaniards and Italians were in few Days expected here these by Land those by Sea And that for raising German Troops he had last Week sent five hundred thousand Gilders into Germany from whence if they needed he could have twenty four thousand Men so as he doubted not to defend these Countries if France Assaults him The Biass of all this Discourse was to shew they had no great need of our Assistance at the same time they press so much to be assured of it and to represent the mutual Necessity of a Conjunction between England and Spain with all the Expressions of Affection to His Majesty's Person and Service that a Courtier or almost a Lover could use Upon this last Subject I could not let him pass with the Discourse of the late King's Ruine and His Majesty's Danger at home for want of Friendship abroad nor could I leave that Point because he had so often harped upon it till I forced him to confess at least by Silence that his Majesty was as safe at Home at this time as either French or Spanish King For the rest finding him now much warmer than he used to seem in the Desires of the Bishop of Munster's Success or at least Preservation and finding from Alderman Backwell that he had yet been able to raise no more Money upon all our Tin at Antwerp for the second Payment those paltry Merchants combining to Ruine him in the Price of it upon the Belief of his Necessity to sell I would not omit that Occasion of desiring the Marquess to find some Person out that should take it all off our Hands with ready Money which they might raise at their own leisure and I believed with much Gains in which I assured him he would give His Majesty a great Testimony of his Affection to his Service which was so much concerned in the Bishop of Munster's Fortunes He told me he would consult about it next Morning and upon Sunday Night sent one with a Dispatch of mine to Alderman Backwell to know the whole Quantity and lowest Price So that I am now in great hopes of seeing some good Issue of that Business which I almost begun to despair of An Express from the Bishop of Munster came to me on Saturday last protesting he could no longer subsist unless the Money came anâ— Your Lordship may easily imagine how much Pain I am in upon that Occasion especially hearing my Self so often reproached for having drawn him to so desperate an Adventure so much against his own Resolutions which were not to take the Field till the second Payment were received and the third assured on this side It would look like Vanity in me to tell Your Lordship more of what I hear too much of this kind but I will say that unless you take some speedy and effectual Resolution in this Particular I shall look like the veriest Rogue in the World and such as it will not be much for his Majesty's Honour to employ But after all I will tell Your Lordship freely that I think all my Trains had not taken Fire without a perfect Accident which I had the good Fortune to improve so upon the sudden as to make it the absolute Occasion of the Bishop's taking the Field when he did which I shall some time or other I hope entertain you with and will serve for a Moral to shew how small Shadows and Accidents sometimes give a Rise to great Actions among Mankind for either such or the beginning of such this bold March is like to prove All I know of its Success you will find in these Letters one from my Lord Carlingford to whom I cannot send Your Lordship's last till I have farther Directions from him for my Address the other being Part of one from a Person in the Holland Camp belonging to the Rhingrave Twenty Rumours more we have of his Successes but I will not yet credit them this much I will that nothing can probably endanger him besides want of Money and that I know him to be a Man too firm to be
with our Conclusion For upon our first Conference with the Commissioners he had said Tout cela s'en ira en Fumèe que le Roy son Maitre s'eu mocqueroit The Day before our Signing being told we advanced very fast he replied Et bien d'icy á six semaines nous en parlerons relying upon the Forms of the State to run the Circle of their Towns Upon our giving him Part of the whole Business he replied coldly that he doubted we had not taken a right Way to our End that the Fourth Article of the Second Instrument was not in Terms very proper to be digested by a King of twenty nine Years old and at the Head of eighty Thousand Men That if we had joined both to desire his Master to prolong the Offer he had made of a Cessation of Arms till the Time we propose and withal not to move his Arms further in Flanders tho' Spain should refuse we might hope to succeed But if we thought to prescribe him Laws and force him to Compliance by Leagues between our Selves or with Spain tho' Sueden and the German Princes should join with us he knew his Master ne flecheroit pas and that it would come to a War of forty Years From this he fell a little warmly upon the proceeding of the States saying they knew his Master's Resolutions upon those two Points neither to prolong the Cessation proposed beyond the End of March nor to desist the Pursuit of his Conquests with his own Arms in Case Spain consented not to his Demands within that Term. He said His Majesty not being their Ally might treat and conclude what he pleased without their Offence but for the States who were their nearest Ally to conclude so much to his Master's Disrespect at least and without communicating with him the Ambassadour at all during the whole Treaty he must leave it to his Master to interpret as he thought fit Monsieur de Witt defended their Cause and our common Intentions with great Phlegm but great Steddiness and told me after he was gone that this was the least we could expect at first from a Frenchman and that I should do well however to give His Majesty an Account of it by the first that we put our Selves early in Posture to make good what we have said and that as to the Time and Degree of our Arming he would consult with the States and let me know their Thoughts to be communicated to His Majesty upon this Occasion I was in hopes to dispatch this away to morrow Morning but I shall be hindred till Night by the Delay of Signing of a separate Article with the Count de Dona whereby Place is reserved for Sueden to enter as Principal into this Treaty For I have gone along in the whole Business since my coming over with perfect Confidence and Concert with the Count de Dona upon his assuring me his Orders were to conform himself to His Majesty's Resolution in what concerns the two Crowns tho' before he absolutely engages he expects from the Spaniards by our Intercession some Supplies for Payment of his Troops and some other Adjustments with the Emperour which will be treated between the several Ministers at London under His Majesty's Influence In what I shall sign upon this Occasion together with the States I confess to Your Lordship to go beyond my Instructions but apprehending it to be wholly agreeable to His Majesty's Intentions and extremely advantageous to the common Ends and Affairs I venture upon this Excess and humbly beg His Majesty's Pardon if I fail Your Lordship will be troubled with some Postscript to Morrow before I dispatch an Express with the Copies to be ratified by His Majesty within a Month tho' I hope a less Time will be taken those of Holland having undertaken theirs on fifteen Days I am c. To my Lord Arlington Hague Jan. 26. S. N. 1668. My Lord SInce the Close of my long Dispatch I have every Hour expected the Copies to be transmitted for His Majesty's Ratification without being able to procure them I cannot but imagine some Occasion of the Delay may have been a Desire in them here to interpose some Time between the Receipt of my last Friday's Letter and of this Pacquet to the End His Majesty may in the mean Time have dispatch'd his Orders to me about the Provisional Articles tho' I cannot think they should be of such Moment inserted or omitted to either Side I now dispatch the inclosed Copies of the Treaty in Order to His Majesty's Ratification which is generally desired may be returned as sudden as possibly the States having undertaken to have theirs ready in fifteen Days after the Signing and believing it necessary to proceed jointly and early to the mutual Councils of Arming in Case France continues the Dispositions they seem to be in at present of pursuing the War My Brother who will deliver this Dispatch to Your Lordship is able to add what particular Circumstances I may have omitted or Your Lordship shall think fit to enquire from this Place and what he fails Count Dona will supply who is a Person very well worth Your Lordship's particular Acquaintance and Assistance in his Negotiations or at least the Forms and Entrances of them being in all Points our Friend Yesterday the Spanish Ambassadour received the Communication of our Treaties from Monsieur de Witt and me with some Descants upon the hardship of it but I believe Satisfaction at Heart I have this Day written at large and with all the Instance imaginable to the Marquess de Castel-Rodrigo to induce his Consent and immediately upon the Ratifications shall away and pursue that Point at Brussels I cannot but rejoice in particular with Your Lordship upon the Success of this Affair having observed in Your Lordship as well as my Lord Keeper a constant steddy Bent in supporting His Majesty's Resolution which is here so generally applauded as the happiest and wisest that any Prince ever took for Himself or his Neighbours What in earnest I hear every Hour and from all Hands of that Kind is endless and even extravagant God of Heaven send His Majesty's Councils to run on the same Course and I have nothing left to wish since I know Your Lordship will continue to esteem me what I am with so great Passion and Truth My Lord Your c. To Sir Orlando Bridgman Lord Keeper Hague Jan. 27. S. N. 1668. My Lord THo' I know my long Dispatch by this Express to my Lord Arlington will give Your Lordship your Share of Trouble yet I could not omit the encharging my Brother with a particular Attendance upon Your Lordship from me nor accompanying him with these Acknowledgments of Your Lordship's great Favour and good Opinion even before I had the Honour of being known to you I will presume I have done nothing since to forfeit them as I had nothing before to deserve them and that my late good Fortunes at the Hague will help to
I shall always contribute by my good Wishes and whatever Services I may be capable of to the Support of this good Intelligence so happily restored between both Nations In the mean time God Almighty take Your High and Mighty Lordships inot his Holy Protection A mon Audience de congé aux Estats Generaux Hauts Puissants Seigneurs SA Majesté le Roy de la Grande Bretagne mon Maitre ayant vn conclurre si heureusement en si peu de jours trois divers traitez avec V. H. P. S. par lesquels la seureté commune des deux Nations vient d'etre retablie les semences de toutes les nouvelles discordes entierement deracinées le chemin á la paix au repos ouvert pour la Chretienté en cas que nos voifins s'y portent avec la meme foy la meme franchise qui nous la deja fait acheminer sa Majesté croit n'avoir plus besoin de moy en ce lieu puisque les Ministres ne servent ne sont propres qu'a cimenter entretenir la confiance mais la notré se voit etablie sur de si solides fondemens qu'elle n'aura plus besoin des appuis ni des aides ordinaires C'est pourquoy sa Majesté ordonne mon retour a Brusselles pour y poursuivre de concert avec V. S. en faveur de nos voisins ce que nous venons de conclure icy pour nous memes Máis elle m'a commandé sur mon depart d'assurer V. S. de sa part que comme une chose n'est jamais mieux conservée que par les principes qui l'ont fait naitre aussi sa Majesté ne manquera pas d'observer constamment tout ce qui vient d'etre conclu cela avec autant de bonne foy avec la même sincerité la meme droiture de coeur qu'on luy a vû temoigner lors qu'elle l'a fait negotier Et sa Majesté ne doute point que V. S. ne soient entierement resolus á tenir la même conduite á son egard c'est lá le dernier sceau qui doit etre apposé de part d'autre á nos traitez pour preuve d'une parfaite confiance Pour ce qui me regarde en particulier je ne saurois sortir d'icy sans me louer hautement de la judicieuse sincere conduite de Vos H. P. S. dans tout le cours de cette Negotiation particulierement de l'extreme prudence que vous avez fait paroitre dans le choix de Messieurs les Commissaires que vous m'avez donné Leur candeur leur capacité consommée leur ardeur leur application pour l'affaire proposée n'ont pas peu contribué au bonbeur á la rapidité de la conclusion de nos Traitez Pour moy comme je me souviendray toute ma vie avec joye meme avec tendresse du court espace de tems que j'ay passé prés de V. S. aussi dans quelque lieu du monde que je sois appellé á passer ma vie je ne negligeray jamais de contribuer par mes voeux par toutes sortes de soins de services dont je me croiray capable au maintien de cette mutuelle intelligence que je vois si heureusement retablie entre les deux Nations Cependant je prieray Dieu ardamment de prendre vos H. P. S. sous sa sainte protection A Letter from the States to the King of Great Britain Feb. 18. S. N. 1668. SIR IT is merely in Compliance to Custom that we do our Selves the Honour to write to Your Majesty in Answer to the Letter you were pleased to send us relating to Sir William Temple For We can add nothing to what your Majesty has seen your self of his Conduct by the Success of the Negotiation committed to his Charge As it is a Thing without Example that in so few Days three such important Treaties have been concluded so we can say that the Address the Vigilance and the Sincerity of this Minister are also without Example We are extremely obliged to Your Majesty that you are pleased to make use of an Instrument so proper for confirming that strict Amity and good Intelligence which the Treaty at Breda had so happily begun And we are bold to say that if Your Majesty continues to make use of such Ministers the Knot will grow too fast ever to be untyed and Your Majesty will ever find a most particular Satisfaction by it as well as We who after our most hearty Thanks to Your Majesty for this Favour shall pray God c. and remain SIR c. Lettre de Recreance de la part des Etats Au Roy de la Grande Bretagne Le 18. de Feur S. N. 1668. SIRE CE n'est que pour satisfaire á la coutume que nous nous donnons l'honneur d'ecrire á Votre Majesté en response de la lettre qu'il luy a plû nous ecrire au sujet de Monsieur le Chevalier Temple car nous ne pouvons rien ajouter a ce que Votre Majesté meme a vû de sa conduite par le succez de la Negotiation qui luy avoit eté confié Comme c'est une chose sans example que dans si peu de jours trois si importans Traitez ont êté ajustéz aussi pouvons nous dire que l'addresse la vigilance la sincerité de ce Ministre sont aussi sans example Nous sommes bien fort obligés a V. M. de ce qu'il luy a plû se servir vir d'un instrument si propre á achever d'etreindre le noeud d'amitié de bonne intelligence que le traité de Breda avoit commencé á serrer Et nous osons dire qui si elle continue d'employer des semblables Ministres le lien deviendra indissoluble Elle en tirera toujours une satisfaction toute particuliere aussi bien que nous qui aprés l'avoir remercié de tout notre coeur de cette faveur prierons Dieu SIRE c. A Letter from Monsieur de Witt to my Lord Arlington Febr. 14. S. N. 1668. My Lord AS it was impossible to send a Minister of greater Capacity or more proper for the Temper and Genius of this Nation than Sir William Temple so I believe no other Person either will or can more equitably judge of the Disposition wherein he has found the States to answer the good Intentions of the King of Great Britain Sir William Temple ought not to be less satisfied with the Readiness wherewith the States have pass'd over to the concluding and signing of those Treaties for which he came hither than they the States are with his Conduct and agreable manner of Dealing in the whole Course of his Negotiation It appears My Lord that you throughly understand Men
Head of those Councils For my part I resent it not only as a Thing I have not deserved upon an Employment cast wholly upon me by the King's Choice and as he seems to think by the Necessity of his Affairs but as that which I find plainly by the short Experience of my last Ambassy will not defray the Expence of another with any Honour to the King or my Self abroad And though I do not pretend to make my Fortune by these Employments yet I confess I do not pretend to ruin it neither I have therefore been resolved several times absolutely to refuse this Ambassy unless it be upon the Terms all others have had But my Lord Arlington puts so much weight upon my going that he will not hear of it He says 't is That our good Friends would have and intend by this Usage and that I can no way disappoint them so much as by going and that this Rule will be broken in three Months time That I should not consider small matters of Money in the course of my Fortune and that the King cannot fail of making mine at a Lump one time or other That there is nothing I may not expect from him upon my return from this Ambassy And that if His Majesty had not thought me of absolute Necessity to him in Holland upon this Conjuncture he had brought me now into Secretary Moris's Place which upon my going abroad is designed for Sir John Trevor My Lord Keeper is of the same mind to have me by no means refuse it as he says neither for the King's sake nor my own And your old Friend Sir Robert Long agrees with them both and says after a Year or two of this Ambassy I cannot fail of being either Secretary of State or sent Ambassador into Spain which are both certain ways of making any Man's Fortune With all this I confess I find it not very easie to resolve and very much desire yours and my Brother's Opinion upon it And that you may the better give it me I shall tell you one Circumstance which weighs a little with me though not at all with my Friends here They are all of Opinion the Measures the King has lately taken cannot be broken nor altered however they may be snarled at by some Persons upon particular Envy or Interest But I see plainly there are others of another Mind Six Thomas Clifford said to a Friend of mine in Confidence upon all the Joy that was here at the Conclusion of the Tripple Alliance Well for all this Noise we must yet have another War with the Dutch before it be long And I see plainly already that He and Sir George Downing are endeavouring with all the Industry that can be to engage the East-India Company here in such Demands and Pretensions upon the Dutch as will never be yielded to on that Side and will encrease a Jealousie they will ever have of our unsteddy Councils and of our leaving still a Door open for some new Offences when we shall have a mind to take them On t'other side the French will leave no Stone unturned to break this Confidence between Us and Holland which spoils all their Measures and without which they had the World before them If they can they will undermine it in Holland by Jealousies of the Prince of Orange or any other Artifice and will spare neither Promises nor Threats If I should be able to keep that Side stanch they will spare none of the same Endeavours here and will have some good Helps that I see already and may have others that do not yet appear If by any of these Ways or other Accidents our present Measures come to change I am left in Holland to a certain Loss upon the Terms they would send me though I should be paid but to a certain Ruin if I should not which I may well expect from the good Quarter I may reckon upon from some in the Treasury And when my Ambassy ends I may find a new World here and all the fine Things I am told of may prove Castles in the Air There is I know a great deal to be said for my going but on t'other Side I am well as I am and cannot be ruined but by such an Adventure as this I beg of you to let me know your Opinion upon the whole And if I could have the Confidence I should beg a great deal more earnestly that I might see you here since I cannot get loose to wait on you there Till I hear from you I shall let the Talk and the Forms of my Embassy go on and am confident however they presume yet I can spin out the Time of my going till about the End of August in hopes of seeing you here which will be I am sure the greatest Satisfaction that can befal SIR Yours c. The End of the First Volume of Sir William Temple 's Letters LETTERS TO Sir William Temple From Sir Thomas Clifford Copenhagen Octob. 7. 1665. SIR I Have received your obliging Letter of the 20 30th past And the News of this Country is like the Commodities not of equal Value with the more Southern and so you are like to be a Loser by the Barter But your Kindness is the greater I hope the King of Spain's Death will no way alter the State of our Affairs with that Crown I cannot yet tell you the Effect of my Negotiation here but shall in my next give you some Hints The Direction of your Letter brings it safe to me I shall advise you before I remove Here came a Report last Night that a Squadron of the English Fleet had taken out of Fleckery nine of the Dutch Merchant-men and ran another on Shoar But I have examin'd it and find there was no Ground for the Report Two of their East-India Men are still at Tunsburg near Christiana in Norway and two more are returned to Bergen But the six Men of War and East-India-Man that came here into the Sound after the Storm are put to Sea and gone toward the Texel The East-India Ship that got into the River of Elve is there unlading and they are sendihg the Goods home in little small Vessels under the Convoy only of a little Toy of eight or ten Guns They go home over the Watts a Privateer lying there would probably make his Market Last Night some Dutch Ships going for Dantzick arrived here and boasted that their Fleet of ninety Sail under De Ruyter sailed upon Sunday last the first Instant towards England and to the Chanel as they thought to join with the French but no body gives credit to the Relation You see what a shift I make to compleat my Bill of Store but pray let it not dishearten you from corresponding For if I have nothing else to say I shall be glad of Opportunities to express my self SIR Your most affectionate humble Servant Thomas Clifford From the Earl of Clarendon Lord High Chancellor Oxford December 28 1665. SIR
affectionné tres humble Serviteur Johan de Witt. From the Lord Keeper Bridgeman July 26th 1668. SIR I Received yours yesterday morning after you were gone hence and am afraid the Letter which I sent you from Mr. Williamson might come unseasonably to discompose you It not being so intended by me nor I believe the Message from the King to be otherwise intended than out of Kindness and Respect to you to hasten you away that you might know how important he held your Negotiations might be for his Service at this critical Time And therefore I should be glad that you would take this by the right Handle I had a Letter this Night from Sir Thomas Clifford who writes that they in the Treasury have a great Desire to accommodate you And though it be not in the Privy Seal that you shall have three Months Advance besides the 1000 l. yet they will be careful that you receive the Mony as it is due The Draught of the Instructions are sent away to my Lord Arlington and expected back on Tuesday-night and the Foreign Committee appointed to sit on Wednesday to dispatch them Really Sir I do not think that there is any Intention in pressing your Departure for Holland but just and honourable towards you and with respect to the Greatness of the Employment and the Urgency of the King's Affairs at this time to have you at the Hague And if you will take my Opinion I would not have you take other Measures of it even for your own sake In the mean time while you do stay you may press on the Business of your Account tho' I should not advise you to retard your Journy upon that score It may be as well pressed on by your Lady if she do not not accompany you or else by your Sollicitors among whom I will be one who if any Obstructions be may write to you to remove them But you will find the Vice-chamberlain dilatory and then your stay at last upon this new Business for so I may call it may beget a Misconstruction You will pardom the Freedom I take in imparting my own Thoughts to you in this Case I wish You and my Lady to whom I recommend my humble Service a happy Journy and all other Felicities as I wish to my self who am ever Your faithful and very affectionate Servant Orl. Bridgeman C.S. The End of the First Volume LETTERS Written by Sir W. Temple Bar t AND OTHER Ministers of State Both at Home and Abroad CONTAINING An ACCOUNT of the most Important Transactions that pass'd in Christendom from 1665 to 1672. In Two Volumes VOL. II. Review'd by Sir W. Temple sometime before his Death And Published by Jonathan Swift Domestick Chaplain to his Excellency the Earl of Berkeley one of the Lords Justices of Ireland LONDON Printed for J. Tonson at Gray's Inn Gate in Gray's Inn Lane A. and J. Churchil at the Black Swan in Pater-Noster-Row and R. Simpson at the Harp in S. Paul's Church-yard MDCC Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE's First Embassy AT THE HAGUE Begun August 1668. VOL. II. To the Elector of Mentz Hague Aug. 31. S. N. 1668. SIR I Did not receive the Honour of your Highness's Letter till some time after my Arrival in England with the inclosed for the King my Master which he received with that Esteem his Majesty always bears to what comes from your Highness and having promised me an Answer upon my Return for Holland which has been put off from day to day I have deferred my particular Acknowledgments to your Highness till I could value them by the Honour of accompanying a Letter from his Majesty I send it now inclosed and desire your Highness to believe that I resent as I ought the Honour you have done me and that I will preserve your Highness's Letter among the greatest Marks of Honour to my Family and shall not fail upon all Occasions to shew how much I shall cherish the Title I pretend to with so much Justice of being SIR Your Highness's c. A l'Electeur de Mayence De la Haye le 31 Aout S. N. 1668. Monsieur LA Lettre dont V. A. m'a honoré qui est datée du 14 de May ne m'a eté rendue que quelques jours aprés mon à rrivée en Angleterre avec elle j'ay recû l'envelopé pour le Roy mon Maitre que je luy ay porté qu'il a reçû avec les memes marques d'estime que sa Majesté a toujours fait paroitre pour tout ce qui vient de la part de V. A. le Roy m'ayant promis la reponse pour le tems de mon retour en Hollande qui a toujours trainé de jour en jour J'ay differer de marquer a V. A. ma reconnoissance en particulier jusqu ' á ce que j'eusse l'honneur d'etre porteur d'un Lettre de sa Majeste Je l'envoye á cette heur je supplie V. A. de croire que je ressens comme je le dois l'honneur qu'elle m'a fait que je conservera sa Lettre la conteray parmi les titres les honneurs qui elevent la glorie de ma famille Je ne laisseray echaper aucune occasion de temoigner combien je cheris cheriray toujours la qualité que prens avec tant de justice de Mr. De V. A. c. To my Lord Arlington Hague Sept. 7. S. N. 1668. My LORD SINCE my last I have not stirred out but had the Favour of several Visits in my Chamber among the rest one from Monsieur Meerman on Wednesday and one of three Hours from Monsieur de Witt yesterday I fell into Talk with the first upon the Matter of the Guinea Company who said my Lord Holles and as I remember Mr. Secretary Morris had spoken of it to him before but only given him a general Relation upon which he could not sufficiently inform the States That they had likewise mentioned some other Parts of the Marine Treaty by which the East-India Company thought themselves aggrieved but remembred nothing particular besides the Form of Passports in which we might receive what Satisfaction we pleased and the better Definition of what was meant by a Town invested I told him the Business of Guinea was distinct from any Thing of the Marine Treaty though he was unwilling to understand it so that I was very little instructed in the first because his Majesty's Commands in that Point were only to procure the Reference of it to Commissioners for the proposing Rules by which both Companies should proceed and thereby preventing the said Company 's acting wholly by Rules and Officers of their own which had been the first Occasions of the unhappy Disputes between us and might possibly prove so again For the Marine Treaty I told him I had yet no Instructions upon that Subject but might have in a little Time and thereupon took occasion of discoursing to
our Point upon the Business of Surinam which was yesterday resolved on by the States General though the Province of Zealand protested against it And besides nothing has given us so hopeful a Prospect of the Prince's good Fortunes here as the Support of the Town of Amsterdam so declared and so warm in his present Concernment towards which I am confident Monsieur Van Beuninghen has very much contributed as being a Person of very great Influence in that City The State of that whole Business is so well and so fully set down in the Paper of Intelligence that I am sure I cannot amend it and therefore will not repeat it Your Lordship will know by the inclosed that Monsieur de St. Evremont set out this Morning towards England with the Portugal Ambassador likewise who both accompany Monsieur d'Opdam as far as Nieuport and there embark for Dover whilst he goes on to meet the French King at Dunkirk with the States Complements I am ever my Lord your c. POSTSCRIPT I Had forgot to tell your Lordship That another part of Monsieur Van Beuninghen's Instructions will be to endeavour all that can be that this State may be admitted into a Conjunction with his Majesty for the Pursuit of the Algerins till they are reduced to the Necessity of a Peace with both To Sir John Trevor Hague May 27. S. N. 1670. SIR I HAVE this Day received yours of the 13th current with the Account of my Lord of Essex's Treatment in passing the Sound which if wholly new was what we had very little Reason to expect from that Crown since the Change of their Ministry Though there are some Reports here that they intend to keep up a close Intelligence with France for fear of the Suede whose Forces give them at this time it seems some Jealousy I will hope my Lord of Essex may receive the Satisfaction he demands however he will have that of having discharged his part upon this Occasion with the Constancy that became him I do not question but you will receive a wiser Answer as you say from Spain and wish they could find wiser Men to encharge with their great Affairs and Governments than you will see they do by the Accounts I know you receive from Brussels of the Constable's late Caprices in order to his return for Spain It is here variously discoursed who shall succeed him The old Empress and Prince Charles of Lorrain being still in Name among some others either of which or both together as it is talk'd of seeming the best Choice that can now be made by the Crown of Spain It is wish'd here that his Majesty would further it all he can by the Offices of his Minister in that Court Yesterday the Spanish Ambassador's Secretary came to communicate to me a Letter he had received from the Ambassador at Brussels taking notice that upon a more particular Observation of our late Ratification of the Concert the Date of it was preceding to that of the Concert it self signed by me here at the Hague which was the last of January N. S. whereas the Ratification at Westminster bears Date the 7th of January O. S And this Remark of the Ambassadors I find to be true by comparing it with the Copy of the Ratification that lies by me And doubt not but the Mistake only was of the Month of January for February in the Ratification you sent me over Whereupon I assured the Secretary there could be no Difficulty in the Redress of it and he desired me to endeavour it as soon as I could and I hope the Notice of it may come time enough to prevent the same Mistake in the Instruments intended for Sueden and Holland as well as to procure a new one for Spain I could not by the last Post give you the Certainty of the Issue in the Prince of Orange's Affair the States of Holland not rising till one a Clock that Night after the warmest Debates which have been known among them for many Years However the Towns which favour the Prince having the Plurality of Voices and Amsterdam in the Head of them at length carried their Point and brought it to a Resolution That the Prince should have Session in the Council of State with a decisive Voice and should have the same Place his Ancestors were used to After this was resolved on that Party which the most opposed the Prince's Interest started two new Points The First That no Captain-General should be chosen otherwise than from Year to Year but by Unanimity of Voices And Secondly That in case the Prince should be chosen Captain-General for Life then it should be again debated and resolved by Plurality of Voices whether he should continue his Session in the Council of State And these two Points were agreed to by all the Towns excepting four or five in which number were Amsterdam and Haerlem who maintain That they were not now to be resolved but then only when those Matters came in Question The States of Holland being separated after these Resolutions the Execution of that concerning the Prince's entrance into the Council of State will remain in the States General and consequently receive no Opposition that I can foresee And though it bears no great Name yet I take it to be of that Importance as to leave his Highness's future Fortunes in a manner wholly dependant upon his own Carriage and Personal Qualities which give hitherto all the Signs that can be of advancing and not impairing them In the Course of this Business Monsieur Van Beuninghen has so much provoked the ill Will and Opinion of these Towns which were contrary to the Prince that they had almost resolved to make a Stop of his Journy but that is now over and he prepares to be gone the end of this Week And will not deserve to be less welcom in England for what has lately passed here though perhaps it may not be to his Advantage nor to the Prince's neither to give him any too publick Testimonies of it He gave me Hopes on Sunday-night that to Morrow the Business of Surinam would be ended according to the Form I drew up in Pursuit of our last Conference which I here send you enclosed Though he told me there would be Difficulty in the Point of Major Bannister's landing with so much Liberty as is insisted on And therefore he pressed me hard to be content with either remaining aboard his Ships or else lodging in the Fort till his Affairs were dispatched where all Convenience should be provided him But I refused both and so left the Thing with him in the Form it now runs I am Sir your c. To my Lord Berkeley Hague May 30. S. N. 1670. My LORD THo' I know your Excellency would easily forgive me a Commission which might save you a Trouble in the midst of many others that are a great deal more necessary Yet I could not forgive my self if I should any longer delay giving your
Servare modum finemque tueri Naturamque sequi P Lely pinx R. White sculp Printed for I. Tonson A. J. Chruchil R. SimpsoÌ„ Dominus Gulielmus Temple Equos Baronettus Ser.miet Pot. mi Mag. Britanniae Regis ad Ord Eoed â— Belgii Legatus Exns. et apud Tractatus pacis tamdquisgram quam Neomagi Legat Mediats. Ejusdem Ser. mi Regis a Secretioribus Concilus 16â—… LETTERS Written by Sir W. Temple Bar t. AND OTHER Ministers of State Both at Home and Abroad CONTAINING An ACCOUNT of the most Important Transactions that pass'd in Christendom from 1665 to 1672. In Two Volumes Review'd by Sir W. Temple sometime before his Death AND Published by Jonathan Swift Domestick Chaplain to his Excellency the Earl of Berkeley one of the Lords Justices of Ireland LONDON Printed for J. Tonson at Gray's Inn Gate in Gray's Inn Lane and A. and J. Churchil at the Black Swan in Pater-Noster-Row and R. Simpson at the Harp in S. Paul's Church-yard MDCC TO HIS Most Sacred Majesty William III. King of England Scotland France and Ireland c. These Letters of Sir W. Temple having been left to my Care they are most humbly presented to Your MAJESTY by Your Majesty's most dutiful and obedient Subject Jonathan Swift THE Publisher's Epistle TO THE READER THE Collection of the following Letters is owing to the diligence of Mr. Thomas Downton who was one of Sir William Temple's Secretaries during the whole time wherein they bear date And it has succeeded very fortunately for the Publick that there is contained in them an Account of all the chief Transactions and Negotiations which passed in Christendom during the seven Years wherein they are dated as The War with Holland which began in 1665 The Treaty between His Majesty and the Bishop of Munster with the Issue of it The French Invasion of Flanders in the Year 1667 The Peace concluded between Spain and Portugal by the King's Mediation The Treaty at Breda The Tripple Alliance and The Peace of Aix la Chapelle in the first Part. And in the second Part the Negotiations in Holland in consequence of those Alliances with the Steps and Degrees by which they came to decay The Journey and Death of Madame The seisure of Lorrain and his Excâ—llency's recalling with the first Unkindness between England and Holland upon the Yatch's transporting his Lady and his Family And the begnning of the second Dutch War in 1672. With thâ—se are intermixt several Letters fa◠〈…〉 and pleasant 〈…〉 Book among Sir William Tem◠〈…〉 â—â—th many others wherewith I had thâ—â—pportunity of being long conversant having passâ—d several Years in his Family I pretend no other Part than the Care that Mr. Downton's Book should be correctly transcribed and the Letters placed in the Order they were writ I have also made some literal amendments especially in the Latin French and Spanish These I have taken Care should be translated and printed in another Column for the Use of such Readers as may be unacquainted with the Originals Whatever faults there may be in the Translation I doubt I must answer for the greater Part and must leave the rest to those Friends who were pleas'd to assist me I speak only of the French and Latin for the few Spanish Translations I believe need no Apology It is generally believed that this Author has advanced our English Tongue to as great a Perfection as it can well bear and yet how great a Master he was of it has I think never appeared so much as it will in the following Letters wherein the Style appears so very different according to the difference of the Persons to whom they were address'd either Men of Business or Idle of Pleasure or Serious of great or of less Parts or Abilities in their several Stations So that one may discover the Characters of most of those Persons he writes to from the Stile of his Letters At the end of each Vollume is added a Collection copied by the same hand of several Letters to this Ambassadour from the chief Persons employ'd either at home or abroad in these Transactions and during six Years course of his Negotiations Among which are many from Pensionary John de Witt and all the Writings of this kind that I know of which remain of that Minister so renowned in his time It has been justly complained of as a defect among us that the English Tongue has produced no Letters of any value to supply which it has been the Vein of late Years to translate several out of other Languages tho' I think with little Success Yet among many Advantages which might recommend this sort of Writing it is certain that nothing is so capable of giving a true Account of Story as Letters are which describe Actions while they are alive and breathing whereas all other Relations are of Actions past and dead So as it hath been observed that the Epistles of Cicero to Atticus give a better account of those times than is to be found in any other Writer In the following Letters the Reader will every where discover the Force and Spirit of this Author but that which will most value them to the Publick both at home and abroad is First that the Matters contained in them were the Ground and Foundation whereon all the Wars and Invasions as well as all the Negotiations and Treaties of Peace in Christendom have since been raised And next that they are written by a Person who had so great a share in all those Transactions and Negotiations By residing in his Family I know the Author has had frequent Instances from several great Persons both at home and abroad to publish some Memoirs of those Affairs and Transactions which are the Subject of the following Papers and particularly of the Treaties of the Triple Alliance and those of Aix la Chapelle but his usual Answer was that whatever Memoirs he had written of those Times and Negotiations were burnt however that perhaps after his Death some Papers might come out wherein there would be some Account of them By which as he has often told me he meant these Letters I had begun to fit them for the Press during the Author's Life but never could prevail for Leave to publish them Tho' he was pleased to be at the Pains of reviewing and to give me his Directions for digesting them into Order It has since pleased God to take this great and good Person to Himself and he having done me the Honour to leave and recommend to me the Care of his Writings I thought I could not at present do a greater Service to my Countrey or to the Author's Memory than by making these Papers publick By way of Introduction I need only take notice that after the Peace of the Pyrenees and His Majesty's happy Restoration in 1660. there was a general Peace in Christendom except only the Remainder of a War between Spain and Portugal until the Year 1665. when that between England and Holland began which
of it I mean that you should trouble your self to reason me out of any Custom or Action you would have me leave off or say any thing upon such a Subject besides that you wish it had been otherwise which I desire you to believe shall in far greater Matters be from your hand Persuasion and Command enough to me My Presumptions may be great With my Friends but they are the easiliest check'd of any Man 's alive which is all I shall say upon this Occasion as to the future and for the past I will only assure you that I should not in the least have offered at what I did had it not been at the earnest Instance of the Prince of Munster's Resident here and I am to make it my Business abroad to enter as far as I can into the Secrets and for that end into the Affections of such Ministers as I have to deal with and as some Men are to be gained directly by their Heart so are others by their Hands But another Fault were easier to be born than a long Excuse I will not add to it by our News since of all I write I am sure you know as much as you please only in general our Bishop loses not Courage nor Strength upon all the great Preparations of Enemies or Disappointment of Friends The Dutch seem to be plagued by their own God and to grow unhappy in their own Element the Sea having done them in the last Storms most extravagant Harms some Letters from Amsterdam say to the Value of thirty and others of sixty Millions their Case may grow harder yet if the Frosts do so from the Munster side Our Court here is passionate towards the League between the two Crowns as I am in the Desires of growing in your Friendship and Favour and deserving it by any Testimonies I can give of my being SIR Your most Faithful humble Servant To Dame Augustina Cary. Brussels Feb. 16th S.N. 1666. Madam I Know not whether the shame of having been so long in your Debt be greater than that of paying it so ill at last but I am sure 't is much harder to be excused and therefore shall not attempt it but leave it to Father Placid's Oratory tho' having failed in the substantial Part of your Business I have little Reason to hope he will succeed better in the Ceremonial Part of mine The Truth is there is so great a Difference in common Sound between It is done and It will be done that I was unwilling to acknowledge the Honour of having received your Ladyship's Commands before I had compassed that of obeying them which the Marquess here hath so often assured me would suddenly fall to my share that I thought we had both equal Reason His Excellency to do it and I to believe it This Right I must yet do him that I never prest him in this Concern of your Ladyship 's but he told me all my Arguments were needless for the Thing should be done and how to force a Man that yields I never understood but yet I much doubt that till the Result be given upon the Gross of this Affair which is and has been some time under view your Part in particular will hardly be thought ripe for either his Justice or Favour which will be rather the Style it must run in if it be a Desire of Exemption from a General Rule given in the Case Whatever Person after the Father's Return shall be appointed to observe the Course of this Affair and pursue the Lady's Pretensions here will be sure of all the Assistance I can at any time give him tho' I think it would prove a more publick Service to find some way of dissolving your Society and by that Means dispersing so much Worth about the World than by preserving you together confine it to a Corner and suffer it to shine so much less and go out so much sooner than otherwise it would The ill Effects of your Retreat appear too much in the ill Success of your Business for I cannot think any thing could fail that your Ladyship would sollicite but I presume nothing in this lower Scene is worthy either that or so much as your Desire or Care which are Words that enter not Your Grates to disturb that perfect Quiet and Indifferency which I will believe inhabit there and by your Happiness decide the long Dispute whether the greater lies in wanting nothing or possessing much I cannot but tell you it was unkindly done to refresh the Memory of your Brother Da. Cary's Loss which was not a more general One to Mankind than it was particular to me But if I can succeed in your Ladyship's Service as well as I had the Honour once to do in his Friendship I shall think I have lived to good Purpose here and for hereafter shall leave it to Almighty God with a Submission as abandoned as you can exercise in the low common Concernments of this worthless Life which I can hardly imagine was intended us for so great a Misery as it is here commonly made or to betray so large a Part of the World to so much greater hereafter as is commonly believed However I am obliged to your Ladyship for your Prayers which I am sure are well intended me and shall return you mine That no ill Thoughts of my Faith may possess your Ladyship with an ill one of my Works too which I am sure can not fail of being very meritorious if ever I reach the Intentions I have of expressing my self upon all Occasions Madam Your Ladyships most humble and most obedient Servant To my Lord Arlington Brussels Mar. 1st S. N. 1666. My Lord I Need say nothing to bring your Lordship acquainted with Mr. Sherwood's Person or Errand yet because all Men take themselves to measure best their own Business I would not disappoint his Desires of this Address tho' to add any thing to what I write upon all Occasions of the Prince of Munster's Condition Necessities or Complaints were as I take it just so much of nothing to the Purpose All I will say is that whatever His Majesty resolves to do ought to be sudden and in a Lump to provide for his taking the Field this Spring with Heart and Strength which I believe a Sum within the Compass of a hundred of His Majesty's Subjects would enable him to do Nothing will ever me to give your Lordship those Testimonies I desire of the most hearty constant Passion wherewith I shall ever be My Lord. Your Lordships c. To the Duke of Albemarle Brussels Mar. 1st S. N. 1666. My Lord. UPon Mr. Sherwood's Passage this Way into England from the Bishop of Munster I could not refuse him the Occasion of waiting upon your Grace who so well knows how far His Majesty's Honour and Interests may be concerned in the Success of his Errand Tho' that Prince's Necessities may be grown great as well as his Complaints and the Arrears of his Payments yet I am
often over the Pleasures of the Air and the Earth and the Water but much more of the Conversation at Sheen and make me believe that if my Life wears not out too soon I may end it in a Corner there tho' Your Lordship will leave it I know in Time for some of those greater and nobler Houses that attend you I am obliged by the very pleasing Relations you give from those softer Scenes in Return of which such as I can make you from those of Business or War or Tumult must I know yield rougher Entertainment and therefore I have sent them in a Paper which shall pass rather for a Gazette than a Letter and shall content my self only to tell Your Lordship that 't is hardly to be imagined the Change which about three Weeks past have made in the Face of Holland's Affairs which are now esteemed here to be upon the Point of breaking into much such a Confusion as we saw in England about 1659 Nor can any Thing almost be added in these Parts to the Reputation of his Majesty's Arms and Affairs so far that it grows a Credit to be an English Man and not only here but in Amsterdam it self I am told my Lord Stafford who went lately thither about a Process has more Hats and Legs than the Burgomaster of the Town I will not increase Your Lordship's Trouble by any enlarging upon this Subject having offered you a much longer in the inclosed I wish I could give you some of another Kind by sending you a little Spanish Mistress from hence whose Eyes might spoyl your Walks and burn up all the green Meadows at Sheen and find other Ways of destroying that Repose Your Lordship pretends alone to enjoy in spight of the common Fate of Mankind But however your Friends suffer by it I wish it may last as long as it pleases you I am sure the Professions will do so of my being My Lord Your Lordships most Faithful humble Servant To my Lord Arlington Brussels Aug. S. N. 1666. My Lord I Am not to be forgiven that endeavour by one Trouble to make Room for another and solicite Your Lordship this Way that my Wife may have Leave to solicite you in a Matter wherein I can never resolve to do it my Self Your Lordship's Friendship has left me little to desire or complain of unless it be when I find my own Fortune so disproportioned to my Mind in the Resolutions I have of doing His Majesty all the Honour as well as all the Service I can But how ill they agree in this Point tho' I was ever Rich while I was private even beyond my Desires is a Story I would rather any Body should tell you than I However I should not bring my Wife into this Scene but that I know she will ask nothing but my own is a Person not apt to be troublesome or importunate and in all kinds the best Part of My Lord Your c. Patri Gottenburg Brussels Dec. 16th S.N. 1666. Domine REctè per manus dulcissimae tuae sororis accepi Chirothecas elegantissimè consutas non minus politè contextas Literas per quas nec me elapsum memoriâ vestrâ nec planè exutum Benevolentiâ sentio gaudeo Utroque nomine me pulcherrimae istae Indoli per totam vestram Familiam diffusae potius quam ulli meo merito obligatum aestimo Habeo itaque ago gratias quamplurimas ut vero acceptiori quodam modo eas referre studeam sororem optimam exoravi quae me ut spero Officio Debito perfunctum brevi redditura est Valeat interim Reverentia vestra studiis propositis auspicatissimè incumbat ex Votis procedat meque semper teneat Amicissimum c. To Mr. Thynn Brussels Feb. 19. S. N. 1667. SIR ABout two Days since I received the Favour of Yours of the 16th past and am sorry to be put upon the Defence in an Encounter so much to my Advantage This had not arrived if I could as easily have found the Way of conveying my Letters as the Dispositions of Writing For those I have always had about me since I knew your Station and Character which I thought would help to bear me out in that Attempt The little Acquaintance you are contented to own I durst not reckon upon because it was so much more than I deserved and so much less than I desired but am very glad that may be allowed of among the Obligations we have to enter upon this Commerce tho' we need no other than our Master's Service which may on both sides be improved by the Communication of what passes in our different Scenes I shall not engage in answering the Complements of your Letter tho' I should have much more Justice on my Side but I am very ill furnished with that sort of Ware and the Truth is there is required so much Skill in the right tempering as well as the Distribution of them that I have always thought a Man runs much hazard of losing more than he gains by them which has made me ever averse as well as incapable of the Trade It will be to more Purpose to let you know the Confidence we have here of our Treaty with Spain being Signed in all Points to our satisfaction but whether Portugal has or will accept their Part in it which is a Truce of forty five Years I cannot yet resolve you only this I am assured that it is feared in the French Court as well as hoped in ours The current News at Antwerp as well as here is of the Dutch Merchant Fleet from Nantes and Rochel consisting of above a hundred Sail under the Convoy of six Men of War being fallen into a Squadron of about twenty of our Frigats and few are said to have escaped tho' this be doubted of none here and the current Letters from Zealand as well as Ostend make it probable yet I suspend my Confidence till the Arrival of my English Letters which are my Gospel in these Cases This Coldness I know makes me lose many Pleasures but on the other side helps me to escape many Disappointments which light Belief in the midst of so many light Reports is subject to The Councils or Dispositions of a subordinate Government as this is are not worth troubling you with but those in the Court here are in short what we wish them Those of the Scene you are in deserve much more the Enquiry and I should be very glad to know them from so good a Hand My Desires of serving you can I am sure never be known from a better than my own which can value it self to you by nothing else but by telling I am SIR Your most obedient humble Servant To the Earl of Clarendon Lord High Chancellor Brussels Mar. 4. S. N. 1697. My Lord UPon the Arrival of the last Post from Spain which brought us the unwelcome News of our Treaty meeting an unhappy Obstruction when it was at the very
Region has no Share in the Storms of that below And besides as Men have more Curiosity to enquire how a great Man sleeps than what a mean Man does all day long so the very Rest and Idleness of that Roman Court seems among the Discoursers more worth knowing than the busie Motions of many small ones in this Northern Continent who yet at this Time pretend to be considered and to make a Noise This is all I can say to excuse my Inclosure of such Papers unless it be that to tell a plain Truth I was very glad of the Occasion to assure you that I am ever with very much Passion as well as with much Reason SIR Your most Faithful humble Servant The Triple Alliance was made in January 1668. To Sir John Temple London Jan. 2d S. N. 1668. SIR YOu will wonder to see a Letter from this Place my last having been from Brussels without any thoughts of such a Journey And because my Stay here is like to be very short and my Time extremely filled I take the first Hour I can find to give you some Account of this Adventure Soon after my last an Express came to me from His Majesty commanding me to come immediately into England with all the Speed I could possibly make but to take the Hague in my Way and there upon the Credit of a Visit I made Monsieur de Witt last September and which passed very well between us to make him another and let him know His Majesty had commanded me to do so on Purpose to inform my self of the Opinions he had concerning the French late Invasion in Flanders their great Success there and the Appearances of so much greater this ensuing Spring the Thoughts he had of what was the true Interest of His Majesty the States and the rest of Christendome upon this Occasion That His Majesty by knowing his Mind should believe he knew a great deal of that of the States and thought He might thereby be enabled to take such Measures as might be necessary for him in this Conjuncture I obey'd this Summons spoke with Monsieur de Witt entred into great Confidences with him made Report of all to His Majesty at my Arrival here gave Monsieur de Witt the Character I think he deserves of a very able and faithful Minister to his State and I thought a sincere Dealer very different from what Sir George Downing had given of him at Court who would have him pass for such another as himself but only a Craftier Man in the Trade than he Upon all this His Majesty came last Night to a Resolution of the greatest Importance which has yet passed I think here in any foreign Affair and begun the New Year I hope with a good Presage and in which the new Ministry particularly My Lord Keeper and My Lord Arlington have had a very great Part Mine will be to return immediately upon it into Holland where if it please God I arrive and succeed I expectâ—â— great deal of Satisfaction by my Errand and much the greater by knowing that you will have a great deal in it too as in an Affair I remember to be so agreeable with what have been always your Opinions The Season of the Year is bad and the Weather ill and yet my Sister has been so kind as to come with me hither from Brussels and to resolve to return with me at this short Warning to the Hague which will be a great Ease to me as well as Satisfaction and by freeing me from all domestick Cares leave me the more Liberty for those of my Business which I foresee will be enough to take up a better Head than mine My Wife and Children continue here till I see where my wandring Planet is like to fix but my Brother Harry resolves to be of the Party and take this Occasion of seeing Holland and what is like to pass in the World upon this great Conjuncture I am called away and left Time only to add the constant Professions of that Duty wherewith I am and shall be ever SIR Your c. To my Lord Arlington Hague Jan. 24. S. N 1668. My Lord UPon last Friday at Night I gave Your Lordship the Account of what Advance I had then made in my Negotiation and of the Point where it was then arrested with Desires of His Majesty's Pleasure whereupon having spent that whole Day in Debates I had little Time left for that Letter but intended to make some Amends for the Haste of it within two Days by a Dispatch with the Yatcht and tho' delayed a little longer will not I hope be more unwelcome by bringing Your Lordship a fuller and final Account which may be allowed to surprize you a little there since it is look'd upon as a Miracle here not only by those that hear it but even by the Commissioners themselves who have had the whole Transaction of it which I shall now acquaint Your Lordship with Upon my two first Conferences with Monsieur de Witt which were the Tuesday and Wednesday I found him much satisfied with His Majesty's Resolution concerning our Neighbours but of the Opinion that the Condition of forcing Spain was necessary to our common End and to clear the Means towards it from all Accidents that might arise For the Defensive League he was of his former Opinion that it should be negotiated between us but upon the Project offered His Majesty at Schevelin by which all Matter of Commerce might be so adjusted as to leave no Seeds of any new Quarrels between the Nations After two very long Conferences upon these Points we ended with some Difference upon the Necessity of concluding both Parts of my Projects at the same Time but for the rest with great Confidence and Satisfaction in one anothers sincere and frank Way of Treating since the first Overtures between us The first Time I saw him he told me I came upon a Day he should always esteem very happy both in respect of His Majesty's Resolutions which I brought and of those the States had taken about the Disposal of the chief Commands in their Army by making Prince Maurice and Monsieur Wurtz Camp-Masters-General and the Prince of Tarante and Rhingrave Generals of the Horse each to command in Absence of the other He told me all the Detail of that Disposition but the rest I remember not well I laid hold on this Occasion as indeed I thought was necessary to say what His Majesty gave me Order concerning the Prince of Orange which he took very well and said was very obliging to the States that for his own Part he never failed to see the Prince once or twice a Week and grew to have a particular Affection for him and would tell me plainly that the States designed the Captain-generalship of all the Forces for him so soon as by his Age he grew capable of it The next Day was my Audience which passed with all the Respect that could be given His
continue what my good Fortunes alone at Brussels began and my five Days stay at London served to improve in so great a Degree Yet I will assure Your Lordship if I can make any further Advance by the Resentments of your Favour by my Desires to deserve it in the Return of my best Services or by the true Honour and Esteem of those Qualities I have discovered in Your Lordship upon so short an Acquaintance I am very far upon my Way already But I will leave this Subject in the first Place to congratulate with you upon another which is the Success of a Council wherein I observed Your Lordship and my Lord Arlington to have the most steddy Bent in promoting a Resolution of His Majesty's which is on this side the Water esteemed generally the happiest and the wisest that could ever have been taken by any Prince in such a Conjuncture and upon Respects not only of his own Affairs but even those of all Christendom besides It is not fit for me to tell you much of what I hear of this Kind or the Applauses given to His Majesty and his Ministers upon this Occasion to tell you all I am sure would be endless but from what I hear I cannot but raise at least a happy Presage of a New Year and a new Ministry's running on together with a Succession of the same Honour and good Fortunes both to His Majesty and his Kingdoms In the next Place I will according to your Orders give Your Lordship an Account of some Particulars that fell into this great Transaction which I thought not fit to trouble my Lord Arlington with as not perhaps proper or of Weight enough for the View of His Majesty or the Foreign Commmittee and yet worth the Knowledge or Reflection of some of his Ministers in Order to the Conduct of His Majesty's Councils hereafter both in this and other of his Affairs I must tell Your Lordship that in my first Conference with Monsieur de Witt since my Return I begun with telling him that he could not but remember that when I passed this Way last into England I told him upon what Points His Majesty desired with the greatest Secrecy that could be to know his Opinion and by that to guess at what might be the States upon the present Conjuncture of Affairs in Flanders to the End His Majesty might accordingly take his own Measures That His Majesty guess'd by the general Carriage and Discourses of the Dutch Ambassadors at London the States were not willing to see Flanders over-run by France but could not find they had any thing positive to say to him upon that Subject That he had therefore sent me privately and plainly to tell him his Mind upon it as to a Man of Honour and who he believed would make no ill Use of it and if he thought fit to know his Sentiments upon that Affair That for His Majesty he neither thought it for his own Interest nor Safety nor for that of the States or of Christendom in general that Flanders should be lost and therefore was resolved to do his utmost to preserve it provided the States were of the same Mind and that it might be done in Conjunction between them and to that End desired to know whether the States would be content to enter into an Alliance with him both Defensive between themselves and Offensive against France for the Preservation of Flanders That he Monsieur de Wit might remember his Answer to me was first much Applause of His Majesty's Resolution great Acknowledgment of his Confidence towards him by that Communication much Assurance that the States would be of the same Mind as to the Preservation of Flanders which was their nearest Interest next their own That he found both His Majesty and the States had the same Mind as well as Interest in this Matter but that the Distrusts remaining upon the late Quarrel between them had kept either of them from beginning to enter frankly upon it But since His Majesty had pleased to break it to him in a manner so obliging tho' he could not pretend to tell me his Master's Mind yet he would his own which was that the Defence of Flanders was absolutely necessary but that it ought to be tryed first rather by a joint Mediation of a Peace between the two Crowns than by a Declaration of War but that if the first would not serve it ought to come to the other That I knew France had already offered a Peace to the Offiâ—es made by the States upon an Alternative at the Choice of the Spaniards that he thought our Mediation ought to be offered to both Crowns upon that Foot to induce France to make good their own Offer and Spain to accept it And that to this Purpose he thought it very necessary to make a strict Alliance betweeen His Majesty and the States That for making an Offensive Alliance it could not be for it was a Maxim observed by this State never to make any at least when they were in Peace that for Defensive Leagues they had them with many Princes and he believed would be ready to enter into one with His Majesty and tho' he could not at all answer what would be the Mind of the States upon these Points yet he had told me his and would add that he was not usually mistaken in theirs and that he would at least use all his Endeavours to bring the States to such Opinions and Resolutions When I had said this and observed by his Action and Face that he assented to this Recital of all that had passed between us I ask'd him whether this was all right that I might know whether I had mistaken nothing in representing His Majesty's Meaning to him nor his to His Majesty He answered that it was all right and that he very well remembred it and much commended a Method of proceeding so exact and sincere by an Endeavour to avoid all Mistakes between us I then told him that I had upon my Arrival in England represented all as faithfully to His Majesty as I had done to him and that upon it His Majesty had taken so much Confidence in his Monsieur de Witt 's Opinion and Judgment as well as in his Credit with the States that he had taken a sudden and firm Resolution upon it first to join with the States in the Offer of a Mediation between the two Crowns and upon such Terms as they and I should agree but with a Desire that they might be as advantageous as the States could be induced to for the Preservation of Flanders and Recovery of such Places as should be most necessary to it In the next Place to conclude a Treaty the strongest that could be between us for obliging France to accept the Peace upon those Terms and in the mean time for putting a stop to the Course of their Arms in Flanders But that His Majesty thought it necessary to begin all this with a strict League
between him and the States for their own mutual Defence and to this Purpose had sent me over as his Envoy to the States with full Powers and the Draught of a Defensive League between us but refers the rest for what touched Flanders to what the States and I should agree Monsieur de Witt received this Discourse with a Countenance pleased but yet as I mark'd something surprized and as if he expected not a Return from His Majesty so sudden and so resolute He said that the States would be much pleased with the Honour His Majesty did them and the Overture he made them that I should chuse my Time whenever I desired it for my Audience and would pass the Forms of demanding it from the President of the Week That he was still confident the States would enter with His Majesty into the Mediation tho' France gave them Hopes of succeeding by their own That the Provinces differed in Opinion upon what Terms the Peace should be made That Utrecht was so bold as to think nothing but Justice ought to be considered in the Case that all that France had conquered should be restored to Spain and their Pretensions be referred to Judgment or Arbitrage But Holland with most of the other Provinces were of another Mind and considering their own present Condition as well as that of France thought it best to keep the French to their own Offer but he believed would come to Means of more Force if France should recede from what they themselves had advanced to the States That for the Defensive League between us he did not know whether the late Sore were yet fit for such an Application but would try the Mind of the States That he doubted they would think it like to prove too sudden a Change of all their Interests and that which would absolutely break them off from so old and constant a Friend as France to relie wholly upon so new and so uncertain a Friend as England had pâ—â—â—ved I told him that the doing what he said would be the Effect of any Treaties of this Nature between us let them be as tenderly handled and composed as we could That France would take it as ill of us of them to be stopp'd in the remaining Conquest of Flanders as to the forced out of all they had already gained That he knew very well it had been long their Design at any Price to possess themselves of the Spanish Netherlands and he knew as well that it was their Interest to do so considering the Advantages it would give them over all the rest of Christendom that it was as much our Interest to hinder it and that nothing could do it but a firm Conjunction between us That the States Part would be next after Flanders was gone and therefore they had now as much need of being protected by England against France as they thought they had three or four Years ago of being protected by France against England and that they had no other Choice but either continuing their Friendship with France till they should see both Flanders and themselves swallowed up by such a Neighbour or else change their whole Measures and enter into the strictest Alliance with His Majesty for the Preservation of both and let France take it as they pleased Monsieur de Witt confessed the Design of France for the Conquest of Flanders spoke of the Treaties they had made with the States in Cardinal Richlieu's Time and lately offered again for partaging it between them and said he understood very well the Danger of such a Council and Neighbourhood or else he should have fallen into them but the Ventures were great on the other side too that the States were much more exposed than the King that the Spaniards were weak and ill to be trusted by the States between whom there had never yet been any better Measures than barely those of the Munster Peace after so great Rancors and long Hostilities That tho' he believed the German Princes would be glad of what His Majesty proposed yet he knew not how far Sueden might be engaged in the Measures with France who lay here at their Backs in the Dutchy of Bremen And last of all tho' this Resolution seemed now to be taken by His Majesty and his Ministers upon the surest and wisest Foundations which were those of true Interest and Safety yet no Man knew how long they might last That if they should break all their Measures with France and throw themselves wholly upon His Majesty by such a Conjunction any Change of Councils in England would be their certain Ruine That he knew not this present Ministry and could say nothing to them but that he knew the last too well Upon which he said a good deal of our uncertain Conduct since His Majesty's Return and concluded that the Unsteddiness of Councils in England seemed a fatal Thing to our Constitution he would not judge from what Grounds Mais que depuis le temps de la Reyne Elisabet il n'y avoit eu qu'une fluctuation perpetuelle en la Conduite de l'Angleterre avec laquelle on ne pouvoit jamais prendre des Mesures pour deux Annèes de Temps After this ended with some Melancholy that looked a little irresolute I told him that as to their own Interests he knew them and could weigh them better than I that after my Audience and first Conference with Commissioners I should quickly see how the States would understand them in which I knew very well how great a Part he would have That for our Danger I confest they would be first exposed to France and we the last which made it reasonable they should make the first Pace to their Safety That for Sueden I had no Orders to negotiate with them but being fully instructed in His Majesty's general Intentions I should be glad to see them strengthened all I could and to that Purpose if he thought fit I would talk with the Count de Dona the Suedish Ambassadour here and see whether he had any Powers to engage their Crown in any common Measures for the Safety of Christendom that if by such a Conjunction we could extend it to a Triple Alliance among us upon the same Foundation I believed he would think it too strong a Bar for France to venture on That for the Unsteddiness of our Councils I would rather bewail than defend it but that I should not have made this Journey if I had not been confident that had been ended and we now bottommed past any Change or Remove That I could not pretend to know any Body's Mind certainly but my own but that upon this Matter I was as confident of His Majesty's of Your Lordship's and My Lord Arlington's as I was of my own Upon this Occasion I said a great deal not only of the Interests but Resentments that had engaged His Majesty and His Ministers in this Council and concluded that I was confident it could never break but
IN my last Passage hither I had the Honour of trying your Majesty's Yatcht in such a Storm as that never felt before and a greater no Man in Her pretended ever to have seen The Fortune of Your Majesty's Affairs help'd us to the Discovery of a Pilot Boat at a distance from the Coasts that brought us happily in without which we had passed such another Night at Sea as I should not care to do for any Thing Your Majesty could give me besides Your Favour and the Occasions of serving You. If we had miscarried Your Majesty had lost an honest diligent Captain and sixteen poor Seamen so beaten out with Wet and Toyl that the Compassion I had then for them I have still about me and assure Your Majesty that five or six more will be necessary for your Yatcht if you use Her to such Passages as this But for the rest I believe there is not such a Boat in the Would She returns with along but final and happy Account of my Business to My Lord Arlington and with the Count de Dona who will be better Company than along ill Letter and deserves Your Majesty's Welcome by his other Qualities as well as his particular Devotions for Your Majesty's Person and Service I cannot end this Letter without congratulating with Your Majesty upon the Success of your Resolution which occasioned my Journey hither and which is generally applauded here as the wisest and happiest both for your Kingdoms and your Neighbours and the most honourable to Your Majesty's Person that ever was taken upon any Occasion by any Prince And the strange Success of it hath been answerable to the rest of Your Majesty's Fortunes and so amazing that the Expressions made of it here every Hour are altogether extraordinary not to say Extravagant God of Heaven continue Your Majesty's good Health and good Councils and good Fortunes and then I shall have nothing more to wish but that You may pardon the Faults and accept of the humble and hearty Devotions of SIR Your Majesty's most Loyal and most obedient Subject and Servant To Monsieur Gourville Hague Feb. 7. S. N. 1668. I Have just received by the Rhingrave's Favour yours of the 28th past and am extreme glad to have yet some Place in your Memory after so many Diversions in Germany which use to make one forget Things of much greater Importance But all this was necessary to comfort me for your Absence which I believe you have ordered with Design for all my Journeys into Holland this is now the third I have made since that of Breda without ever meeting you there you I say who are not able to live three Months without going thither tho' you are forced for it to leave the Ladies and the Orange-Trees at Brussels I can tell you no News the Duke of Lunenburg's Resident having assured me that he has sent you word of the Conclusion of our Treaty here whereof I every Day expect the Ratifications They will needs have me pass here for one of gâ—eat Abilities for having finished and signed in five Days a Treaty of such Importance to Christendom But I will tell you the Secret of it To draw Things out of their Center requires Labour and Address to put them into Motion but to make them return thither Nature helps so far that there needs no more than just to set them a going Now I think a strict Alliance is the true Center of our two Nations There was also another Accident which contributed very much to this Affair and that was a great Confidence arisen between the Pensioner and me he is extremely pleased with me and my sincere open way of dealing and I with all the Reason in the World am infinitely pleased with him upon the same Score and look on him as one of the greatest Genius's I have known as a Man of Honour and the most easie in Conversation as well as in Business In short the two Nations are closer united than if there never had been a War For Affairs in general I can tell you nothing but that our common Design is to give Peace to all Christendom so that if France pleases they may have it this Spring if not as Monsieur d'Estrades says at least not after our fashion they may have their fill of the War For the Convention at Aix I can tell you nothing till we get an Answer from France and Brussels where we have already sent Advice of our defensive League and of our Treaty or Project of the Peace This at least may serve for a new Health at your German Feasts when the old ones are gone round and will at the same time help to put you in mind of SIR Your c. A Mons de Gourville De la Haye 7 Fevr. S.N. 1668. JE viens de recevoir par les soins obligeans de Monsieur le Rhingrave votre lettre du 28 du passé je me rejouïs extremement d'occuper encore quelque place dans votre souvenir aprés tant de divertissemens goutez en Allemagne ce ne seroit pas la premiere fois qu'ils auroient fait oublier des choses plus importantes que ma personne Mais il ne falloit pas moins que les plaisirs que je say que vous avez gouté la nouvelle marque que vous me donnez de votre amitié pour me consoler de votre absence Je croy au reste que vous l'aviez concertée avec tous mes voyages en Hollande car voici le trosieme que j'y fais depuis celuy de Breda sans vous y trover vous dis je qui ne pouviez passer trois mois sans y aller quand meme il auroit fallu pour cela quitter vos orangers les mignonnes de Brusselles Je n'ay point de nouvelles á vous mander le Resident de Lunebour m'ayant assuré qu'il vous avoit appris la conclusion du traité que nous avons fait icy J'attens de jour en jour les ratifications On veut á toute force me faire passer icy pour habile homme á cause que j'ay achevé signé en cinq jours un Traité si important pour toute la Chretienté Mais je vous diray le secret quand on arrache les choses de leur centre il faut du tems de la peine même de l'addresse pour les faire mouvoir mais lors qu'il n'est question que de les y ramener la nature y ayde si puissament qu'il ne faut quasi que leur donner le branle Or je croy qu'une etroite Alliance est le centre de nos deux Nations Il y a encore un accident qui a fort contribué a cetté affaire c'est la parfaite confiance qui nous a reciproquement uni Monsieur le Pensionnaire moy il se loue de moy de ma maniere
I Received by my Brother the Honour of Your Lordship's and therein the Testimony of your Favour to me in a Manner so obliging and indeed altogether extraordinary that I know as little how to acknowledge as to deserve it and therefore I shall not enlarge my Self upon a Subject where I am sure not to succeed as I desire but leave it to Time and the constancy of my Services to express how very sensible I am of what I owe and how great a Value I place upon that Part Your Lordship is pleased to allow me in your good Opinion and Memory of which I beg the Continuance esteeming them among the very best of my Possessions I have written to My Lord Arlington at large upon the Confidence of this safe Conveyance by the Return of the Yacht which will give Your Lordship your Share of Trouble but withal a full Prospect of the Dispositions here and consequently the present as well as future Estate of our Alliance if it be pursued with the same Directness it has been contracted and the happy Continuance whereof I am perfectly of Your Lordship's Mind is the true Interest of both Nations and will be the surest Support of His Majesty's Honour and the Kingdoms Safety as well as Satisfaction The Expression Your Lordship pleases to make of endeavouring in your Station the inviolable Observation of it I shall value before I part to Monsieur de Witt and the other Commissioners as it deserves which will be easie to do for I dare say very truly that the general Opinion conceived here of Your Lordships and My Lord Arlington's Honour and Sincerity and unbiassed Pursuit of the true Interest of the Kingdom has very much contributed to the Success of my late Negotiation and been indeed the Spring of any Honour that Your Lordship or any others may attribute to me in the Conduct of it It will not become me to take no Notice of those repeated Offers Your Lordship pleases to make in a Fashion so extremely obliging to favour me in any of my own Concernments and therefore I shall humbly recommend to you the countenancing my Wife in her pursuing the Payment of my ordinary Allowances while I am abroad since the narrowness of my own Fortunes while it pleases God to continue my Father's Life to us will not suffer me to serve His Majesty without troubling him as I am forced to do whenever five or six Months of my Ordinaries are grown in Arrear Therefore upon Your Lordship's Encouragement I will tell my Wife She may beg your Countenance to her when She begins her next Pursuit of that Kind and that you may the more confidently own your favouring me in this Point I will assure Your Lordship His Majesty shall never be troubled with any Pursuits of mine further than what he has pleased to make my Due by my ordinary Establishment tho' lower than that of a much cheaper Countrey as I am informed but that is very indifferent to me for I am perfectly content to live just in the Posture His Majesty thinks fit I should while I serve him and very willing to spend his Allowance and my own Revenue but no more which is the plain Truth of my Story And I doubt now the Fonds at Antwerp fail out of which I have been hitherto paid by My Lord Arlington's Favour to me something against the Commissioners Inclination I may find longer Attendances upon the Exchequer for that is grown or growing due than my Occasions will suffer which makes me use this Liberty to Your Lordship tho' I should not have done it had you not now twice and of your self encouraged me For the obliging Message my Brother brought me likewise from Your Lordship's Favour to me besides my Acknowledgments I shall only say that * It was that he should be Secretary of State what Your Lordship pleased to mention would be as agreeable to my Inclinations as any thing I know but I shall never presume to ask any Thing of that Kind from His Majesty no more than of any other referring my Station and every Thing else wholly to his Pleasure and Choice whilst I have the Honour of serving him Besides I find every Body here and in Flanders designs another Post for me at least for a Month or two this Spring if the Treaty happens to be at Aiz believing that having had so much Part in what has been done already I am likely to have some Part in that too And I confess because People are fallen into this Thought I may take the contrary for a Mark of his Majesty 's not being satisfied with me in what is past and because I am by Advance instructed in the Business and acquainted with Persons I should be very well pleased with it if His Majesty finds none to serve him better esprcially if by the Marquess's going thither himself His Majesty should find it fit to send a Person of great Quality to maintain the Port of the Employment and give me my Part under his Shade I am ashamed to have said all this of my Self and my Concernments and beseech Your Lordship to remember that you have drawn it all from me and after that to forget it all if you please For to say the Truth I am very well as I am being of so dull a Complexion that I do not remember any Station or Condition of Life I have been in these dozen Years which I have not been pleased with and a little unwilling to leave However what Thoughts of this Kind Your Lordship shall have of me I desire you will please to communicate them to My Lord Arlington to whose Favour I have been long obliged And whatever Your two Lordships shall think fit in my Disposal will be ever perfectly welcom to My Lord Your c. To My Lord Keeper Hague Feb. 13. S. N. 1668. My Lord SINCE the writing of Your Lordship's Letter and the scaling up of My Lord Arlington's Pacquet I have been so far press'd by Monsieur de Witt to send him the Article for meeting Commissioners I desired might be added to the provisional Articles in a new Instrument that I have been fain to digest it as well as I could according to My Lord Arlington's Instructions and Your Lordship 's since given me in your Letter I thought fit likewise to draw up a Preamble to it whereby it might appear that the Intention of this Agreement was only an Effect of our mutual Kindness and for Prevention of any Disputes that might possibly arise to interrupt it and for cutting off all our Enemies Hopes ever to see us any more make Way for their Ends by our future Dissention I will send Your Lordship a Copy on the other side of this Sheet of both Preamble and Article which I have been forced to draw up as hastily as I could and hope if Monsieur de Witt thinks fit to pass it in this Form it will be in all Points of more Honour and Advantage
to as even than to have had it all omitted I desire Your Lordship to communicate all this to My Lord Arlington and to excuse this Trouble by Reason of His Lordship's Pacquet being already sealed up I am ever c. Proemium Tractatus inter Anglos Hollandos Febr. 13. 1668. QUandoquidem annuente Divinâ Gratiâ conspirante mutuarum rerum salute aequé ac Christiani Orbis jam temporis necessitate Vigesimo tertio Die Januarii proximè elapsi inter Serenissimum conclusum signatum sit Foedus perpetuum defensivum fortissimis utrinque tam mari quam terrâ proestandis auxiliis communitum Eodemque die alioque Instrumento de rerum vicinarum tranquilitate paceque Orbi Christiano restitundâ inter Praedictum pronis animis consultum conventum fuerit adeoque nihil aliud protenus superesse videatur quod tam mutuâ voluntate conflatam amicitiam necessitudinem ullo demùm tempore interpellare poterit praeter controversias de mercimoniorum speciebus hic inde redigendis forsitan orituras ex incertâ vel ambiguâ ejusmodi rerum utrinque adjudicatione forsitan etiam promovendis Quo autem omnibus innotescat quà m sincerâ sanctâque fide Praedictus nuper conflatae amicitiae non modo in praesens sed ad posteros colendae cavere voluerint jamdemum ad divellenda quaecunque non modo dissentionum sed vel altercationum semina praecidendamque penitus eorum Spem aut expectationem quorumcunque demùm praedictam amicitiam novis litibus concussam aut labefactatam iri interesse poterit In subsequentes Articulos utrinque conventum est qui pro normâ Regulâ ejusmodi rerum maritimarum mercaturae hic inde redigendae mutuò perpetuò observabuntur aut quousque saltèm ex utriusque partis Arbitrio Consensu Commissarii indicentur conveniant ad uberiorem iis de rebus omnibus Navigationisque Legibus tractatum communi utrinque commodo ulteriore experientiâ dirigendum Sequuntur Articuli Conclusio CUm autem rerum omnium Conventionum commoda aut Incommoda non nisi tractu temporis mutuaeque experientiae documentis penitùs indagari poterunt Conventum itaque est ut quocunque demùm Tempore utrique Parti id visum fuerit ex communi Confensu indici convenire poterunt utrinque delegati Commissarii quorum curae erit operis quodcunque in supra memoratis Articulis defecisse reperietur supplere quodcunque autem incongruum utrinque incommodum mutare aut circumscribere uberiorem demùm hisce de rebus omnibus Tractatum absolvere prorsus perlimare To the States at first Audience High and Mighty LORDS WHereas His Majesty of Great Britain the King my Master hath already found the good Effects of the late Peace concluded at Breda with Your High and Mighty Lordships by the general Satisfaction of His Majesty's Subjects as well as his own and doubts not but Your Lordships have likewise found the same Effects among your People in general as well as among your selves His Majesty esteems nothing more likely to encrease the mutual Satisfaction nor to assure the Safety of both Nations than an Increase of the Confidence and Friendship already contracted between His Majesty and Your Lordships by a stricter and firmer Alliance at this Time And whereas His Majesty contented with those great and powerful Kingdoms and Dominions which Almighty God has given him by an undisputed Succession covers nothing from his Neighbours nor has other Thoughts or Wishes besides those of the common Peace and Repose of Christendom His Majesty finds himself in this Conjuncture sensibly touched by the Calamities so many others are like to feel from the Continuance of the War lately broken out between the Neighbour Crowns and which in Course of Time cannot but involve most of the Princes and States of Christendom unless the Flame be quenched before it rise too high And His Majesty believes that nothing can so much contribute towards a safe and sudden Composure of that Quarrel nor consequently restore the Peace of Christendom as a joint Mediation of His Majesty with Your H. and M. Lordship's together with each others Allies between the two Crowns now in War Upon these two Considerations His Majesty hath thought fit to send me to Your Lordships with full Powers to treat and conclude upon what shall be found necessary between His Majesty and Your Lordships in the Adjustment of all Matters tending to these great Ends. And since nothing can bring these Negotiations to be of Effect so much as the suddenness of their Conclusion I desire Your Lordship 's to appoint such Commissioners as you shall think fit with whom I may fall upon the Treaty of these Matters and to whom I am ready to expose the full Powers which His Majesty the King my Master has given me upon this Occasion At my Audience of Leave to the States General High and mighty Lords HIs Majesty of Great Britain the King my Master having seen so happily finished and in so few Days three several Treaties with Your High and Mighty Lordships By which the common Security of both Nations is established the Seeds of all new Differences entirely rooted out and the Way laid open to the Peace of Christendome in Case our Neighbours proceed with the same good Faith wherewith we have begun His Majesty thinks he has no further Occasion for my Services here because Ministers are only proper for fastening and cementing a Confidence and Friendship whereas ours is so firmly established as not to require any even the most ordinary Supports For this Reason His Majesty has order'd my Return to Brussels there to pursue in concert with Your Lordships in favour of our Neighbours what we have here concluded for our selves But His Majesty has commanded me upon my Departure to assure Your Lordships from Him that as all things are best preserved by the same Means they are begun so His Majesty will not fail for ever to observe what he has now concluded with the same Faith the same Sincerity and the same open Heart wherewith he gave Command they should be negotiated and His Majesty doubts not at all that Your Lordships are entirely resolved to proceed after the same manner which is the highest Mark of a perfect Confidence to be given at present For my own particular I cannot part from hence without expressing my Satisfaction at the sincere and judicious Proceeding of Your High and Mighty Lordships in the whole course of these Negotiations and particularly at the great Prudence you have shewn in the Choice of those Commissioners you gave me their Candor and Sincerity their great Capacity and Application did contribute very much to the quick and happy Conclusion of our Treaties For my own particular as I shall ever bear in mind with Joy and Pleasure this short space of Time I have pass'd with Your Lordships in whatever Part of the World I may be so
for their own And therefore rejoyce in all your good Fortunes in Spain and wish you an Encrease of them in your next Designs I am c. To my Lord Keeper Brussels April 3. 1668. My Lord I Received some Days since the Honour of one from your Lordship of the 9th past and though I owe all the Acknowledgements that can be upon it yet I will not so much wrong your Lordship's Time or my own Sincereness as to enlarge them with much Ceremony It will be enough to say that nothing can be more obliging than your Favour to me both in the Degree and Manner of it arising so freely from your Lordship's Bounty and Generousness as well as express'd in a way so franck and so hearty as that of your last Letter and on the other side that no Man can resent it more though they may much better deserve it And that your Lordship can never reckon more truely nor more justly upon any Person 's Esteem and Services than upon mine which I humbly beg your Lordship to believe I doubt you will be troubled with my Wife's Attendances having told Her your Lordship had given Her that Liberty If she ever pretends your Favour and Countenance further than in receiving what the King has made my due upon this Employment while I have it or what His Majesty shall from his own Motion assign me upon any new Commission I disclaim Her before-hand and declare she goes not upon my Errand For I shall never think that too little which His Majesty thinks enough For the rest I will be confident neither your Lordship nor my Lord Arlington intend I should ruin my self by my Employments or that I should at my own Charge bear out a Character which of it self is enough to turn round a Head that has all its Life till these last three Years been used to Shade and Silence In case the Occasion should break and my Journey to Aix should yet fail I ask nothing of His Majesty though putting my self in a Posture to comply with any sudden Necessity of it has already forced me to enter into very considerable Expences But in case I must go I beg your Lordship that has Children to consider how hard it would be for Me to perform such a Journey upon my own Credit Whatever it be His Majesty thinks fit to assign Me upon such an Occasion if He pleases to order Alderman Backwell to furnish Me with a Letter of Credit for so much let it be what it will I will live according to what that and my own little Revenue will reach and not spare any little Presents I have received in His Majesty's Service where His Honour requires it All I desire is only not to be forced into Debts which to say the truth I have ever abhorred and would by my good Will eat dry Crusts and lie upon the Floor rather than do it upon any other Consideration than of His Majesty's immediate Commands and I hope those His Justice and my Friends Favour will prevent I beg your Lordship's Pardon for troubling you with this strange Freedom about my own Concernments which you have pleased to encourage Me to and may at any time check Me in it with the least Discountenance which I doubt I have already deserved But I will not encrease or lengthen my Faults by Excuses nor trouble your Lordship by repeating any thing of what my Lord Arlington receives from Me at large upon the Course of Publick Affairs here which though seeming to change often in others Eyes appears to Me constant in the French Design of a War which I believe nothing can alter but the visible Marks of Force and Steddiness in their Neighbours to oppose them I beg your Lordship's Belief that as I am with very great Reason so I am with very great Passion too My Lord Your c. To Monsieur de Witt. Brussels April 17. S. N. 1668. SIR I Doubt not but you are pleased as much as I at the Contents of the last Dispatches from Paris which make us believe that in two or three Days we shall have the Suspension of Arms to the end of May and then I do not see the least Difficulty that can happen which we shall not easily avoid in the Negotiation of the Peace For I see not how France can draw back after the Satisfaction we are going to give them at Paris And for Spain I never had the least scruple upon their Conduct And I still believe as I ever did that unless we drive them to Despair by ill Usage neither the Spanish Nation in general nor the Marquis of Castel-Rodrigo in particular will have recourse to any base Evasions And to speak to you in Confidence as it is necessary between Physicians since the Resolution you have talkt of about driving the Spaniards wholly out of this Country and Cantoning your selves in it And since so many violent Instances made by your Deputies for signing Monsieur de Lyonne's Project without altering a Word or so much as giving the Marquis any Assurance of assisting him in case France should draw back according to the Orders of the Queen I have often heard His Excellency say that if he were now in the Council of Spain he would give his Advice without further Difficulty for making Peace with France by delivering this Country up to them rather than suffer such a Treatment from all their Neighbours who are more interessed in the Loss of it than themselves For it cannot enter into the Marquis's Head why we should give France more Assurances than they desire in case of Spain's refusing the Alternative and even contrary to our Treaty at the Hague and yet refuse to give Spain the bare Assurances of the words of our Treaty in case of France's Refusal after having driven Spain to all we can ask Neither can the Marquis imagine why we press him so much to sign a Project word for word from Mons de Lyonne without first using our Endeavours at Paris to reduce the Affair of Cities in the Heart of the Country to some reasonable Exchange as we have always promised him and as I let him see in one of your Letters Nay without once endeavouring to hinder the Devastations in the Franche Compté So that by this Project he sees clearly he must be confined within Brussels as in a Prison shut up by French Garrisons within seven Leagues of him on one side and eight on the other And that Burgundy may be invaded as an open Country without the possibility of defending it a Day And if the Peace be made upon these Terms every one may see that France will only wait till we are engaged in a Quarrel with our Neighbours or till some Misunderstanding happen between our two Nations to finish the Conquest of this Country which they may do in fifteen days However the Marquis says that in case we will give him Assurances to follow the third of our Separate Articles he is
own Truth as well as my Business And so upon the 4th at Night all ended My Dissatisfaction with the Baron Bargeyck's Conduct since I came hither was I confess very great and my Expressions upon it very free in my several Expresses to the Marquis who it seems takes part in it and owns it so far as to seem most extremely ill satisfied with the Ministers using so much Earnestness here in beating him out of all those Designs I have had three several Letters from his Excellency since my being here upon that Subject but all so ill-humoured and so Emportèes that I think they had been better spared and though what was particular to Me civil enough yet some Expressions concerning the general Proceeding wherein I had the chiefest Part so Picquantes that I think I have reason to resent and am sure have not deserved it from any publick Minister either there or here And having answered them accordingly I know not upon what Terms we are like to be upon my Return And therefore could not forbear giving your Lordship the trouble of this Relation to justifie my self not only to your Lordship for there I am sure it will not need but if you think fit to the Count Molina and the Baron d' Isola too who may perhaps have received Letters from the Marquis upon our Proceedings here of the same Style that I have done I have been the more earnest in bringing this Matter to an Issue here which the Holland Ambassador says had never been done without Me because I conceived by all I have had from your Lordship as well as from other Hands not only that you desired it in England but that the Peace was necessary for the Constitution of His Majesty's present Affairs And since he has had the Glory of makng two Peaces so important we have now nothing to wish but to see him in a Condition to make War as well as Peace whenever the Honour and Interest of his Crowns shall make it necessary For that Necessity can I suppose be no ways long avoided but by our being in a Posture to welcome it whenever it comes and to make Advantage of it And I think the best Time to fall into Councils tending to this great End will be after the Conclusion of this general Peace when no Engagement abroad forces His Majesty to have so much need of Money from his People For the Time to repair the Harms that Storms have done a House is in fair Weather and to mend a leaky Ship she must be brought ashore God of Heaven send your Lordship to be an happy Instrument in the Proposal and Application of such Councils and that we may take warning by the poor Spaniards Example whose ill Conduct of late in the Government has so far subjected them to their Neighbours Disesteem and Insolence and Humour as well as to their Conquests Violence and Oppression which I confess have been enough to put them upon such desperate Councils as your Lordship mentions of giving up all to the French in these Countries rather than be the bare Guardians of other Frontiers And yet all these Misfortunes are the natural Consequences of their Conduct and will never fail befalling any Prince that follows their Example I wish That might befal the French to temper a little such an over-grown Greatness but I doubt it much from the present King's Dispositions among whose Qualities those of Carelesness or lavishing his Treasures I am afraid are none Therefore I wish him engaged in some very charming Pleasures or else in some more difficult Enterprises than his last and where we may not have so great a Share That which they talk on here may possibly prove so which is drawing or forcing the Empire to chuse the Dauphin King of the Romans For though his Party be grown strangely powerful in Germany and if Brandenburgh be falling into it as is believed none will be left to the House of Austria that I know of unless Saxony and Triers yet such a body so differently composed as the Empire should methinks very hardly move all one way in any new Course Monsieur Colbert talks of his Master's sending immediately ten or fifteen thousand Men for the Relief of Candy which were a glorious and Christian Council and in all ways that can be to be cherished and applauded And if any Offices could be done towards engaging the French Court in that Design by Us or the Dutch I think they were not ill bestow'd about which I have entertain'd Monsieur Beverning who is of my mind and have insinuated the same Notions among the German Ministers here who swallow it greedily and I hope it may take Effect and help to free all these Parts of the Jealousie which so great an Army must needs give as this Peace is like to leave idle upon the French Hands I intend to begin my Journey to Brussels to morrow Monsieur Beverning gone to day but I doubt I shall be five or six Days upon the Way not knowing any thing now that presses me to more than ordinary Haste I received 600 l. owing me upon my Employment there before my coming away and was very sorry to find by a Letter of my Wife 's that the Fear she had of my being dissappointed in that Particular made her draw up a Memorial which it seems the Council was troubled with about my private Concernments I may very truly and justly disown it as I do and hope she will be pardoned for too forward a Care and Concernment in that business For as to the Charge of my Journey here when your Lordship thinks fit to command it I shall send you the exact Account which my Secretary keeps of all I spend and leave it in your Lordship's Hands for His Majesty to do as he pleases in it which is all the Trouble I shall give you or my self about it I am ever with equal Passion and Truth c. TO The Marquis OF Castel-Rodrigo Aix May 8. S. N. 1668. My Lord I Received yours of the 4th Instant and am glad your Excellency is so extreamly satisfied with the Moderation as you are pleased to style it of the Baronde Bargeyck while at the same time you are so much provoked at the Complaints I made of his Conduct here I shall always openly confess that seeing Don Juan's Arrival with the intended Supplies delay'd and perhaps wholly frustrated seeing Holland so desperately fond of the Peace without considering the Interests of Spain seeing the Emperor appear wholly disinteressed in the Matter seeing Spain had used no Endeavors to engage the King my Master or Sueden otherwise than by fair words And that His Majesty was not in a condition to enter into the Affair alone upon pure Considerations of Generosity or of a Danger at distance Seeing also that Spain approved even the first Project of Peace drawn by Monsieur de Lionne I thought upon all these Considerations that it was their Interest sincerely to finish
ne voy rien qui nous en puisse frustrer y ayant de l'apparance que dés á present le Baron de Bergeyck aura executé le pouvoir que nous luy avous porte que la Cour de Madrid pour delivrer les Paiis bas de l'importunité de ses hôtes ne voudra pas differer de ratifier le traité 〈◊〉 Au reste je donne fort dans vos sentimens suis d'avis que l'on fasse negotier quelque exchange de places incontinent aprés la signature du traité J'en ay ecrit cy devant á Monsieur Beverning de sorte que je ne doute point que vous ne vous en soyez deja entretenu J'avoise aussi avec vous que cette negotiation se faira plus commodement dans la suite á Paris qu'ailleurs au moins si Monsieur le Marquis de Castel-Rodrigo peut resoudre á prendre assez de confiance aux Ministres du Roy de la Grande Bretagne de cet Etat pour s'en rapporter á eux de la negotiation d'une áffaire de cette nature quoyque s'il le considere bien il trouvera que nous y avons les uns les autres presque le même interêt Vous n'avez que continuer vôtre route sur le fondement de la convention du 23 Janvier pour soutenir la paix faite par une guarantie de tous les interessés en general en particulier ne point craindre que ceux qui travailleront au nom de cet Etat avec vous deconcertent cette belle harmonie que l'on a veu en toute la suite de cette negotiation Ils le feront non seulement en execution des ordres qu'ils en ont mais aussi par inclination Pour moy ce sera toujours avec joye que je seconderay vôtre zele que je rencontreray les occasions ou je vous puisse donner des preuves de la passion sincerité avec laquelle je suis Monsieur Votre tres humble Serviteur Johan de Witt. From my Lord Arlington Whitehall May 8 1668. SIR IF I had written to you last Post as I should have done if there had been time for it you would have heard me complain much of the Pain I was in not to hear from you in fifteen Days in so delicate a Conjuncture of Affairs which was occasioned by contrary Winds In the mean time we were a little eased by Sir John Trevor's Assurance to us of the Peace having been signed on the 2d S. N. which hath since been amply confirmed by two of yours brought together of the 2d and 8th S. N. So that now I can with Foundation give you the Parabien of this great Work which you may without Vanity call your own whatever Padrinoes you have had to assist you in it And with more Satisfaction considering what Escapes you made betwixt the Marquis's Irresolutions the Baron de Bergeyck's Puntillioes and Monsieur Colbert's Emportement God be thanked the great Business and You are so well delivered from these Accidents after which I hope this will find you safely arrived at Brussels and keeping your self still in the same Figure of Equipage to wear the better the Character of his Majesty's Ambassador at the Hague towards which I shall send you with all speed his final Resolution and Instructions In the mean time you will receive by the Inclosed his Mind to the Marquis recommending to his Excellence the making good with all speed to the Crown of Suede what we and the Dutch Ambassadors have promised to the Count de Dona as you will see by this inclosed Act which we gave him at the Exchange of our Treaty ingaging him in the Triple Alliance the performance of which the Dutch Ambassadors and I have already bespoken of the Count de Molina within six Weeks time when we hope the Ratification will be come from Stockholm and the said Ambassador observing already that the Count de Molina calls to the Dutch Ambassadors and Us for a Ratification he admonishes us to delay it till the Conditions be performed with him This I say is offered but not concluded by Us to be so observed His Majesty had resolved the Parliament should adjourn on Monday last but an unhappy Difference falling out betwixt the Lords and Commons upon a great Point of their Priviledges their sitting hath been spun on to this Day though not without hopes of our finally rising to Morrow Our long talked of Miscarriages have this Week been finished with a very unhappy one in the Queen after twenty Days going and raising the dejected Hopes of the whole Nation which even this Misfortune hath somewhat revived I leave it to Ambassador Patrick to entertain you upon this Subject who cannot fail of long Letters by this Post I am with all Truth and Affection SIR Your very humble Servant Arlington POSTSCRIPT YOU never sent us any Copy of the Promise of Guaranty you signed to the Marquiss though you did the Original of That he gave you in exchange of it with relation to the King our Master When the Count de Molina hath pressed me apart from the Dutch Ambassadors for his Majesty's Ratification I have told him he ought to have ready his Ratification from Madrid to exchange with ours which it will not be amiss for you to take notice of likewise to the Marquis when he shall give you occasion for it From the Elector of Mentz Mentz May 14 1668. My Lord THE Honour of a general Joy upon the Peace concluded and signed between the Crowns being equally due to the vigorous Interposition of his Majesty of Great Britain and to the wise Conduct of your Excellency in an Affair of such Importance to Christendom I desire to rejoyce with you upon the happy Success of it I hope the Ratification of this Treaty will be exchang'd in due time on both sides and shall not fail on my part of contributing all I can to the Preservation of the publick Peace and to second his Majesty's Intentions assuring your Excellency in the mean time that the Obligations will never be forgot which an infinite number of good Christians ow you for your Diligences in accomplishing the Peace And that for my particular I shall cherish all Occasions of shewing your Excellency the Sincerity of my Affection and how much I desire to let you know that I am Your Excellency's most humble and most affectionate Servant Jean Philippe De Mayence 14 May 1668. Monsieur L' Honneur d'une joye generale sur la paix conclue signée entre les Couronnes se devant êgalement á la vigoureuse interposition de sa Majesté de la Grande Bretagne á la sage maniere dont Vôtre Excellence a sceu conduire une affaire de telle importance á toute la Chrêtientié J'ay bien voulu me conjuir avec Elle de l'heureux succés
tell him what I could make of all this laid together For on the one side there were Circumstances enough to awake a suspicious Man and on the other side he could never think it possible for any Nation or Court it self to quit so certain a Point of Interest and great a Point of Honour as must be forfeited by our breaking our Alliances with this State or entring into any with France whose Greatness had occasioned our Measures for our own as well as our Neighbour's Defence He said I knew the best of any how all these Matters had pass'd How his Majesty had engaged these States in those common Measures and even prevailed with them to make a Sacrifice of the ancient Kindness and Alliance this State had always before with France to the Considerations of the present Danger from the Greatness of that Crown to the rest of Christendom though they might have had what Terms they pleased from them for the dividing of Flanders That I knew with how inviolate Faith and Firmness the States had constantly observed for these two Years past their Friendship and Alliances with his Majesty and how great a Part I had in contracting and pursuing them by the particular Confidence the States and He especially had in my Person as one that was persuaded of our common Interests that knew my Master's Mind and would not be an Instrument to deceive those that trusted me For these Reasons he said he desired to know my Opinion upon this whole Matter especially that of my Journy into England which he said would be very surprizing to every Body here and therefore he would be glad to give the News of it to the States in the best manner he could I protested to him that I had hitherto received constant Assurances from both the Secretaries of State of his Majesty's Resolutions to observe constantly the Measures in which he was engaged to this State And that I knew not a Word more of the Reasons of my sudden Journy into England than what I had told him That I had Orders to leave my Family behind me And that his Majesty might possibly think it necessary for his Information to speak with me upon the present Conjunctures and to return me immediately according to my Lord Arlington's Letter That I confessed I was apt to make many of those Reflections that he had done but could not believe it possible for any Crown ever to enter into Councils so destructive to their Honour and Safety as those he suspected That if such a Thing should ever happen I desired him to remember what I told him upon the Scruples he had made in trusting our Court upon the Negotiations of the Triple Alliance Which was that I told him then what I thought of his Majesty's Dispositions and Resolutions as well as those of his Ministers That I could not believe it possible for them to change in a Point of so evident Interest and which would be so understood by the whole Nation That however I could answer for nobody besides my self but this I would and that if ever such a Thing should happen I would never have any Part in it That I had told the King so as well as him and would make it good That for the present there was nothing more to be said but that I must go away for England That if I returned he would know more and I doubted by what he said that he would guess more if I returned not Monsieur de Witt smiled and said I was in the right That in the mean time he would try to cure himself and Others of all Suspicions upon my Journy And would hope on t'other side it might be of use to the common Interests by possessing his Majesty of the great Importance of the late Seisure of Lorrain and of the States Resolutions to stick close to him in all Measures he should take upon it And so we parted I would have gone away immediately upon this Summons but that it found me very ill and uncertain whether it would end in a Fever as it seemed to begin but since a great Swelling fallen upon my Face I hope it may pass However being forced to delay my Journy some few Days I could not but give your Lordship this Account before-hand and leave it to you to make what use of it you think fit without expecting any Answer since I hope so soon to follow it But I know your Lordship fully persuaded of our Interest to preserve our Alliances here and the present Measures of Christendom which depend upon them And tho' you have said nothing yet to make me distrust our Counsels in that Matter yet I confess I have not the better Opinion of it from what I find of your Lordship's estranging your self of late or being estranged from the Consultations of them I have likewise reflected upon the kind Hint your Lordship gave me some time since of my Lord Arlington's not being the same to me which he had formerly been and constantly since our first Acquaintance Which made me I confess then doubt rather some Mistake in your Lordship's Observation than any Change in his Friendship or Dispositions From himself I must needs say I yet find nothing of it and tho' his Style seems a little changed in what concerns our Publick Affairs yet not at all in what is particular to me When I come into England I shall soon know the Truth of your Conjecture and tell it you because by that I shall judge the Truth of mine For having never said or done any Thing to deserve the least Change in his Lordship's Friendship to me since it first began I am sure if it happens it can be derived from nothing else but a Change he foresees in those Measures at Court which he has been with your Lordship so deeply engaged in and which he knows as well as your Lordship that I will never have any Part in the Councils of altering till I can be convinced that any others will be more for his Majesty's Honour and Safety All this I say in Confidence to your Lordship without touching any Word of it to my Lord Arlington or any other Person And shall increase this Trouble no further because I hope to have so soon the Honour of seeing you and assuring you a nearer way with how much Passion as well as Truth I am and shall be ever My Lord your Lordship 's c. To the Great Duke of Tuscany London Nov. 4. 1670. SIR I Should not have satisfied my self barely to resent all the Favours of your most Serene Highness and particularly the Honour of your last of September the 30th if I were any way capable of acknowledging them as I ought either by my Expressions or my Services But your Highness being pleased to oblige so many ways so unprofitable a Person can hope for no other Returns than the Pleasure of your own Generosity and the Devotion of a Heart so grateful as mine I
you some Passages of Fact upon which I ground the Judgment I make of Affairs wherein I have no Part and which I am not so sollicitous to draw into the Light as I doubt others are to keep them in the Dark And when I have told you these I shall leave you to judge whether I take my Measures right as to my own private Conduct You know first the Part I had in all our Alliances with Holland how far my own personal Credit was engaged upon them to Monsieur de Witt and the Resolutions I not only acquainted Him and You with but his Majesty too that I would never have any Part in breaking them whatever should happen Tho' that I confess could hardly enter into any Bodies Head that understood the Interests of Christendom as well as our own I have given you some Intimations how cold I have observed our Temper at Court in those Matters for this last Year and how different it was thought abroad from that Warmth with which we engaged in them So as it was a common Saying at the Hague Qu'il faut avouer qu'il y a eu neuf mois du plus grand Ministere du monde en Angleterre For they would hardly allow a longer Term to the Vigour of that Council which made the Triple Alliance and the Peace of Aix and sent me over into Holland this last Ambassy to pursue the great Ends of them and draw the Emperor and Princes of the Empire into the common Guaranty of the Peace Instead of this our Pretensions upon the Business of Surinam and the East-India Companies have grown high and been managed with Sharpness between Us and the States and grounded as Monsieur de Witt conceives more upon a Design of shewing them our ill Humour than our Reason I was sensible that my Conduct in all these Matters had fallen short for many Months past of the Approbation at Court it used to receive and that Mr. Worden was sent over to me only to disparage it or espy the Faults of it tho' I think he returned with the Opinion that the Business would not bear it 'T is true both my Lord Arlington and Sir John Trevor continued to the last of my stay in Holland to assure me that the King still remained firm in his Measures with the States But yet I found the Business of admitting the Emperor into the Guaranty went downright lame And that my Lord Keeper was in a manner out of the Foreign Councils for so he writ to me himself and gave me notice at the same time that my Lord Arlington was not at all the same to me that he had been Which I took for an ill Sign in our publick Business and an ill Circumstance in my own and the more because I was sure not to have deserved it and found nothing of it in his own Letters but only that they came seldom and run more upon indifferent Things than they used to do Ever since Madame's Journy into England the Dutch had grown jealous of something between Us and France and were not like to be cured by these Particulars I have mentioned But upon the Invasion and Seizure of Lorrain by France and my being sent for over so suddenly after it Monsieur de Witt himself could keep his Countenance no longer though he be neither suspicious in his Nature nor thought it the best Course to discover any such Disposition upon this Occasion how much soever he had of it But yet he told me at my coming away that he should make a Judgment of us by the suddenness of my return which the King had ordered me to assure him of When I came to Town I went immediately to my Lord Arlington according to my Custom And whereas upon my several Journies over in the late Conjunctures he had ever quitted all Company to receive me and did it always with open Arms and in the kindest manner that could be he made me this last time stay an hour and half in an outward Room before he came to me while he was in private with my Lord Ashly He received me with a Coldness that I confess surprized me and after a quarter of an hours Talk of my Journy and his Friends at the Hague instead of telling me the Occasion of my being sent for over or any thing else material he called in Tatá that was in the next Room and after that my Lord Croâ—ts who came upon a common Visit and in that Company the rest of mine pass'd till I found he had nothing more to say to me and so went away The next Morning I went however to him again desiring to be brought by him to kiss the King's Hand as I had used upon my former Journies He thought fit to bring me to his Majesty as he was walking in the Mall who stopt to give me his Hand and ask me half a dozen Questions about my Journy and about the Prince of Orange and so walk'd on Since which Time neither the King nor my Lord Arlington have ever said three Words to me about any thing of Business though I have been as often in their way as agreed with such an ill Courtier as I am or a Man without Business as I found my self to be I have seen my Lord Keeper and Mr. Secretary Trevor And find the first uneasy and apprehensive of our present Councils the last sufficient and confident that no Endeavors can break the Measures between Us and Holland because they are esteemed so necessary abroad and so rational at home But I find them both but barely in the Skirts of Business and only in Right of their Posts And that in the Secret of it the Duke of Buckingham my Lord Arlington my Lord Ashly and Sir Thomas Clifford at present compose the Ministry This I tell you in short as the Constitution of our Affairs here at this Time and which I believe you may reckon upon You know how different Sir Thomas Clifford and I have always been since our first Acquaintance in our Scheams of Government and many other Matters especially concerning our Alliance with Holland And that has been the Reason I suppose of very little Commerce between us further than common Civility in our frequent Encounters at my Lord Arlington's for several Years past This made me a little surprized at his receiving me upon my first coming over and treating me since with a most wonderful Graciousness till t'other day which I suppose has ended that Style Upon the first Visit he made me after many Civilities he told me he must needs have two hours Talk with me at some Time of Leisure and in private upon our Affairs in Holland And still repeated this almost every time he saw me Till one Day last Week when we appointed the Hour and met in his Closet He began with great Compliments to me about my Services to the King in my Employments abroad went on with the Necessity of preserving our Measures with
would answer if ever it did it should never be by my Hand and was as confident I might answer the same for Your Lordship and My Lord Arlington and that you would fall or stand upon this Bottom Monsieur de Witt seemed much satisfied with what I had said assured me for his Part he would give his Hands towards a good Conclusion of this Affair That he would trust His Majesty's Honour and Interest upon so great a Conjuncture as well as the Sincereness and Constancy of His Ministers whom he could judge of by no other Lights but what I gave him made me Compliments upon the great Confidence he had taken in me and my manner of dealing by what he had heard and seen of me since the first Visit I made him in my Passage here after the End of the War and concluded that I should see the Count Dona and try how far Sueden was to be engaged in this Affair I tell Your Lordship all these Circumstances that knowing where the Difficulties have been how they have been overcome and upon what Advances on my side this Knot has been tied Your Lordship and My Lord Arlington may the better know how to support this Affair and make any others easie by recovering the Credit of our Conduct in England so far lost by the Unsteddiness too truly laid to our Charge and at least by your own Constancy in what you have begun make good the Characters you have already in the World and the Assurances I have given Monsieur de Witt upon your Occasion That Evening I went to the Count Dona and run over all Ceremonies of our Characters by going straight into his Chamber taking a Chair and sitting down by him before he could rise out of his I told him I hoped he would excuse this Liberty upon an Errand wherein I thought both our Masters were concerned that Ceremonies were intended to facilitate Business and not to hinder it that I knew nothing to make my seeing the other Ambassadours at the Hague necessary and so was content with the Difficulties had been introduced between our Characters but thinking it absolutely for my Master's Service to enter into Confidence with His Excellency upon my Errand here I had resolved to do it in this Manner and if he gave me Leave would pursue it as if our Acquaintance and Commerce had been of never so long a Date The Count embraced me gave me great Thanks for the Honour I did him made me Compliments upon so frank and confident a Manner as I used with him and said he was ready to return it upon any Thing that I should think fit to communicate to him After this I entred into the Detail of my whole Progress to that Time both in England and here of His Majesty's Reasons of the common Interests of Christendom of the Reception my Errand found from Monsieur de Witt and the Hopes I had of succeeding Of our Discourses about engaging Sueden in the same Measures and a Desire of extending our League into a Triple Alliance among us for our own mutual Defence the Safety of Flanders and thereby of Christendom That I knew how the Crown of Sueden had been treated of late Years by France how close they had kept to the Friendship with His Majesty and how beneficial as well as honourable such a Part as this might prove to them by the particular Use they might be of to the Crown of Spain and that upon any good Occasion they might be sure of His Majesty's Offices and the States who resolved to enter into this Affair without any other Interest than that of the Preservation of Flanders and thereby of their own Safety and the common Good The Count Dona professed to applaud His Majesty's Council to be confident that Sueden would be content to go his Pace in all the common Affairs of Christendom which he was assured of by his own Instructions in general but that such an Affair as this not being foreseen he could have none upon it That if it succeeded he would make all the Paces he could to engage his Master in it as what he thought of Honour and Advantage to the common Safety But that he would return my Frankness to him with the same to me in telling me that he doubted my bringing it to an Issue That he first doubted Monsieur de Witt 's Resolution to break upon any Terms with France and close with England not only considering what had lately passed between us but the Interests of the House of Orange which he must ever believe would at one Time or other be advanced by us whereas he was sure to be supported against them by France Therefore he believed tho' he would not oppose it because the States and People might run into it yet he would find some Means to elude the Conclusion or Effect of it without appearing himself in any such Design That in the next Place since such a Treaty could not be made by the States general without first being sent to all the Provinces and Towns for their Approbation and Orders upon it to their Deputies he did not see how it was possible for the French Ambassadour to fail of engaging some Towns or Provinces against it and the Opposition of any one of them would lose the Effect since no new Treaty could be made by the Constitutions here without an universal Consent That however he would not discourage me but wish'd me Success with all his Heart upon many Reasons and among others as being so much a Servant to the House of Orange which could not but profit by a Conjunction between England and Holland And again promised whenever I brought it to a Period to use all his Endeavours and stretch his Powers as far as he could towards engaging his Master in the same Measures with us In the second Conference I had with Monsieur de Witt I acquainted him with what had passed with Count Dona which he seemed much pleased with and said tho' we could not expect he should have Powers so general as to conclude such an Affair yet an Instrument might be drawn up between us whereby Room may be left for Sueden to enter as a Principal into our Alliance and the Count de Dona had so much Credit at his Court to recommend it there so as to succeed especially upon the hopes we must give him of obtaining Subsidies from Spain which might countervail what they might lose from France upon this Occasion I then fell upon the Form of concluding this Treaty saying I could easily foretell the Fate of it if it must pass the common Forms of being sent by the several Deputies to all their Principals for their Result upon it That I knew this would take up a Month or six Weeks Time and that nothing would be so easie as for the French Ambassadour to meet with it in running that Circle and by engaging some one Member perhaps by Money thrown among the chief Persons in