relapse or cessation of expecting his reward which he enjoyed in enjoying her Out of which it follows that as Jacob was no kind of Bondman though he served and served out all his time twice over so neither are Apprentices And from this place of Holy Writ it is unanswerably proved that bodily service is a laudable means to atchieve any good or honourable purpose a means truly worthy of a Gentleman 5. Hereunto we finally adde and repeat that as an Apprentice ties himself to his Master in the word deservire that is to obey and do restrictively to the ancient reason and traditional Discipline of Apprentiship in London so the Master ties himself to his Apprentice in the word docere in lieu of his honest service to teach him his Art to the utmost Which Master's part is grown to such estimation as that Apprentices now come commonly like Wives with treble more portions than formerly to their Masters If then Apprentiship be a kind of servitude it is either a pleasing Bondage or a strange madness to purchase it with so much money For proof of this Assertion let me give a late Example A Gentleman of quality gave 300l with his younger Son an Apprentice to a Merchant and having continued together for three years and the Servant not as yet imployed in the particular mystery of Merchandizing himself complain'd to his Father of loss of time and both of them referred their Case to another Merchant for rendition of such part of the 300l as might turn him over to a better Master The Referrer rebuking the Master urged this as a truth and ancient custom defining the Contract as we have intimated and adding withall that the Father had right in Law and Custom to be repaid all his 300l and good dammage to his Son for the loss of so much precious time without profit of the Art and Mystery contracted to be taught him to the dishonour of the City and the very intention of the Contract and custom of London 6. An Apprentice therefore as an Apprentice being neither ratione obsequii temporis contractus nor conditionis in any kind or any respect a Bondman and hath therefore no more lost his title and right to Gentry than he hath done to any Goods Chattels Lands Royalties or any thing else which if he never had been an Apprentice either had might or ought to have come to him Nay much less can Gentry be lost in this case than right to Lands and Goods how much more inherent the rights of Blood are than the rights of Fortune for according to the Law-rule jur a sanguinum nullo jure civili dirimi possunt unless in cases of Felony or Treason whereas those other may be dissolved And that Gentry is a right of Blood may appear by this that no man can truly alienate the same or vest another in it though legally he may in case of Adoption which is but an humane invention of Nature and therefore in reiveritate no Alienation at all but a fiction or an acception in Law as if it were such So that none can any more pass away his Gentry to make another a Gentleman thereby who was not a Gentleman before than he can pass away any Habit or Quality of the Mind as Virtue or Learning to make another honest or learned who was unlearned or dishonest before for Gentry is a quality of Blood or Name as Virtue and Learning are of the Mind Upon which reason that rule of Law is grounded which teacheth us that annulus signatorius ornamenti appellatione'non continetur 7. To all this if it be replied that Apprentiship is a kind of Bondage for that if an Apprentice abandon his Master's service his Master may both fetch him back again as Lord for the time over his Servant's Body and compell him also to live under obedience We answer thus That such a power over the body of the Apprentice is not sufficient to constitute a Bondman though the Service of the Apprentice belongs to the Master God's part in him and the Common-wealths being first deducted Aristotle held that only the Grecians were free and all other barbarous that is to say all not being Grecians were Bond. Some among us seem Aristotelians in this point who as he gloriously overvalued his Countrymen so these overvalue their paragon Gentry and repute none worthy of Arms and Honour but themselves we supposing on their behalf that they are indeed not vain Pretenders but true dependents from the most unquestionable Noble Races howsoever troubled perhaps with some little of the spirit of vanity and of too too much scorn of others But as the Italians and their Nobility in our time notwithstanding they think meanly of all who are not Italians calling them in Aristotle's humour Tramontanes and in that word implying them to be Barbarous do commit an error as well as the great Philosopher whilst they themselves do take it to be no disparagement to merchandize nor the haughty German Nobility who although they do believe it to be dishonourable to marry with the Daughter of a Burgher or Citizen do not refuse gain of Commerce or Merchandise so these Gentlemen how eminently Noble soever will be likewise found to live in error for that others may be truly Gentlemen for any thing that as yet is spoken in the former Sophism viz. that the Master hath power over his Apprentice's body Ergo Apprentices are a kind of Bondmen because if such a power be enough to constitute a Bondman we will say nothing of those Free-born persons being in Minority whose bodies their Guardians in Lands holden by knight-Knight-service might not long ago not only by a right in Law fetch back after escape or flight but give away also in Marriage nay if for that reason Apprentices born Gentlemen shall be thought to have forfeited their Gentry in what estate are all the Sons and Children of all good houses in England whose bodies in their Minority their Parents by a right of Nature may fetch back after flight and exercise their pleasure or displeasure upon them even to disinhereson of Lands not entailed Scholars under their Tutors or Schoolmasters are not Bondmen Nay in what case are Soldiers to whom most properly and most immediately the Honour of Arms doth belong who for withdrawing themselves from their Banner or Captain without leave may not only be forced back to serve but according to the usual Discipline of War may by Martial Law be hanged up or shot at the next Tree or wheresoever deprived at once of life and reputation together so absurd it is to dispute that the power of a Master by the title of a Contract over the body of an Apprentice in case of Discipline doth convince a Servility of condition in the Sufferer For if the right to exercise corporal Correction should absolutely constitute a state of Bondage in the Subject the injury of that untrue assertion would reach to persons of far higher mark than
denominates the Action and proves Apprentiship not to be base The contrary Opinion pernicious to Manners and good Common-wealth among us chiefly now The different face of both Opinions in daily Experience Whether APPRENTISHIP extinguisheth GENTRY THE FIRST PART THE present Question whether Apprentiship extinguisheth Gentry being now not so much a Paradox as grown in secret to be of late a common Opinion I am bold to call it a weighty and important Question unjustly grounded upon the learned folly of Erasmus of Roterdam and the incircumspection of Sr. Thomas Smith Knight in his Book de Republica Anglorum and out of certain wandring conceits hatcht among Trees and Tillage as shall appear hereafter Weighty and Important I call it and it is so because in looking out upon the concernings of the Case I find that prospect so specious that within the compass thereof as well the greater as the lesser Nobility of England are very notably and very inexplicably enwrapped what do I say of the subalternate Nobility when the Royal Name it self was deeply interessed in the Proposition For Queen Elizabeth though a free Monarch and chief of the English in her turn was a Party to the Cause which she ingenuously and openly acknowledged calling Sir Martin Calthrope Kinsman as indeed he was being at that time Knight and Lord Mayor of London as also Sir Godfrey Bullen Knight and Lord Mayor of London was lineal Ancestor to Queen Anne Mother to Queen Elizabeth no longer before than in the Reign of Henry the sixth King of England Both which Knights being also Gentlemen born and of right worthy Families ascended by due degrees from the condition of Apprentices to the greatest Annual Honour in this Kingdom It is Weighty and Important because without much impropriety of speech it may be called Quaestio status which in the ancient phrase of the Emperor Justinian is as much as to say a Tryal whether one is to be adjudged bond or free servile or ingenuous and implieth that odious and unnatural sequel which by Textuists is named Capitis diminutio whereof though the Roman Laws make a threefold division yet in this our question is but only whether the third and lowest degree were incurred which happeneth cum qui sui juris fuerunt coeperunt alieno juri subjecti It is weighty and important and can appear none other because it directly tends to darken and as it were to intercloud the luminous body of that beautious Planet Honour with foul and lasting Spots For what can lightly be a more disparagement than for the Free-born to become a kind of Bond-men or to come of such nay there is nothing without it which can be of so great disparagement Finally it is weighty and important for very many other reasons and particularly because it is not only fit that states of Opinions should be rectified in this kind as breeding bad affections among people of this Nation from whence great mischiefs often arise even to hatred quarrels and homicides but that such also as through vanity or other distempers of the wit or judgment disdain to seem either City-born or bred or to own any thing of their Worship or Estate either to the City or Citizens may understand their own place and true condition lest they be convinced to be among them who are unworthy of so honest either Original or Accession as the City yeildeth 2. But let us first behold the Cities Honour in Arms as it stands displayed in Ancient Heraldry and as it is commented upon out of Authentick Monuments in that commendable Survey of London comprised by its Chronologer and Citizen Stowe The present figure with the same words as here they stand is a copy of that which an old imperfect Legier volumn at the Office of Arms containeth There needeth no greater demonstration of the Cities ancient Honour and of her peoples free quality than this that a principal Baron of the Realm of England was by Tenure her Standard-bearer being the Lord Fitz-Water from whence the now Lord Fitz-Water is descended The figure of St. Paul advanced it self in the Standard and upon the Shield those famous well known Armouries of the Cross and Weapon The like Picture of which Apostle was also embroidered in the Caparisons of that Horse of War which for the purpose of the Cities Service he received of Gift at the hands of the Lord Mayor Upon the Standard-bearers Coat Armour are painted the Hereditary Ensigns of his own Illustrious Family viz. Or a Fesse between two Cheverons Gules Which kind of Field the Ancients called Clauric perhaps à claritate because such Fields as were all of one colour made their Charges more cleerly seen and perspicuous And as they gave to that species of Blazon a peculiar Name for the Dignity so did they also assign to this manner of bearing two Cheverons the term Bialle or a Coat Bialle à numero binario In which brave times had that noble Gentleman but slightly and far off suspected that he displayed that Banner for a kind of Bondmen or as for their Service his great Heroick spirit would rather have troden such an offer under foot In good Assurance therefore of this common Causes justice we proceed 3. Sound Opinion meaning Doctrine is the Anchor of the World and Opinion meaning a worthy conceit of this or that person is the principal Ingredient which makes words or actions rellish well and all the Graces without it are little worth To take the fame from any man that is a Gentleman born is a kind of disablement and prejudioe at least wise among the weak who consider no farther than Seemings that is among almost all consequently a wrong and if a wrong then due to be redressed To find the Injury we must first enquire Whether Apprentiship extinguisheth Gentry 4. The main reason certainly the most generally used to prove it doth is That Apprentiship is a kind of Bondage and Bondage specially voluntary in which case the Imperial Law-rule Non officit natalibus in servitute fuisse may be perhaps defective doth not extinguish Native-Gentry But I deny that Apprentiship is either vera servitus Or omnino servitus For explanation of this difficulty I will set before your eyes the Case as it is A Gentleman hath a Son whom he means to breed up in an Art of thrift not rising meerly out of a stock of Wit or Learning but out of a stock of Money and Credit managed according to that Art and for this cause he brings his Child at fifteen or sixteen years of age more or less to the City of London provides him a Master and the Youth by his Father's counsel willingly becomes an Apprentice that is he interchangeably seals a written Instrument that he for his certain years of true and faithful Service shall learn that precious Mystery of how to gain honestly and to raise himself Let the legal and ordinary form of that Instrument extant in Wells's Presidents and familiar every
Dials Watches and the like fine works of Smith-craft as had also a late Baron of England which they practised and other persons also of Royal progeny are at this day excellent in several Artifices 4. If then such honour be done by God himself as aforesaid not onely to those that are necessary Handy-crafts but to those also which are but the Handmaids of Magnificence and outward Splendor as Engravers Founders and the like he shall be very hardy who shall imbase honest Industry with disgraceful censures and too unjust who shall not cherish or encourage it with praise and worship as the ancient Policy of England did and doth in constituting Corporations and adorning Companies with Banners of Arms and some special men with notes of Nobleness 5. And as of all commendable Arts all worthy Commonweals have their use so in London they have as it were their Palace But into the body of the City none generally are incorporated but such only as through the straight gates of Apprentiship aspire to the dignity and state of Citizens That the Hebrew Bondmen were not in Moses's Law among themselves like to our Apprentices howsoever the seventh year agrees in time with the ordinary time of our Apprentices Obligations is evident both in the Books of Exodus and Deuteronomy For first their title to their Bondmen grew to their Lords by a Contract of Bargain and Sale which was indeed a kind of Servitude For when the seventh year in which the Bondage was to determine and expire if then he resolved not to continue a Bondman for ever he was compelled to leave his wife if married in his Lord's house during bondage together with his children born in that marriage behind him though himself departed free but withall rewarded also So that voluntary Bondage is not only de jure gentium as the Roman Laws import by which a man might sell himself ad participandum pretium but also de jure divino positivo By which notwithstanding it doth not appear that such a Bondage was any disparagement or dis-enoblement in Jewish blood among the Jews because in Exodus we read of a provision made for the Hebrew Bondwoman whom her Lord might take in marriage to himself or bestow her upon his Son if he so thought good but might not to violate her Chastity as if he had jus in corpus But the Condition of an Apprentice of London resembleth the Condition of no person's Estate in either of the Laws Divine or Imperial for he directly contracteth with his Master to learn his Mystery or Art of honest living neither hath his Master who therefore is but a Master not a Lord Despoticum Imperium over his Apprentice that is such a power as a Lord hath over a Slave but quasi curaturam or a Guardianship and is in very truth a meer Discipliner or Teacher with authority of using moderate Correction as a Father not as a Tyrant or otherwise Immoderate Correction whosoever doth use is by a Gracious Statute of the fifth of Queen Elizabeth subject to be punished with the loss of the Apprentice by absolutely taking him away 6. Which things so often as I deeply ponder I cannot but hold it as loose and as wandring a conceit and as uncivil a Proposition in civil matters as any that Apprentiship should be imagin'd either to extinguish or to extenuate the Right of Native Gentry or to disable any worthy or fit person to acquisitive Armories for how can it in God's name work that effect unless it be criminal to be an Apprentice Because no man loseth his right to bear Arms or to write Gentleman unless he be attainted in Law for such a cause the Conviction whereof doth immediately procure corruption in Blood which as in this case no man yet hath dreamed of Again when by the old Common Law of England there are but onely two sorts of Bondmen Villains in gross and Villains regardant to a Mannour and it is most certain that our Apprentice or Scholar in City Mysteries is neither one nor other of them what ignorance then or offence was Mother at first of this not Paradox but palpable Absurdity that Apprentiship extinguisheth Gentry or that Apprentices are a kind of Bondmen when as the greatest and most famous Cities of Germany which were or have been composed of Apprentices or such as from them have become Masters as Norimbergh Lubeck Magdenburg c. are as Imperial and free Cities not thought unworthy to be matriculated into the Empire or to have places in their Dyets as some of the Estates thereof THE CONTENTS OF THE THIRD PART 1 2. FOR clearer understanding the Question the Service of an APPRENTICE described 3. The four main Points of the Indenture discussed the Service the Time the Contract the Condition 4. The Case of Laban and Jacob weighed 5. Of the mutual Bond between Master and Apprentice 6. An Apprentice proved to be in no respect a Bondman Of the right of blood in Gentry and of the right of wearing Gold rings among the Romans 7. The Master's power over the Apprentice's body objected and solved Aristotle's error about Bondmen Of young Gentlemen Wards in England Of University Students and of Soldiers in respect of their Bodies 8. Apprentiship a degree in Common-weal 9. Of the Tokens or Ensigns of that degree the flat round Cap and other 10. Unwisely discontinued 11. Resumption of Apprentiships Marks or Habits rather wished than hoped 12. The injurious great absurdity of the Adversaries Opinion and the Excellency of London Whether APPRENTISHIP extinguisheth GENTRY THE THIRD PART 1. THough in the premises we conceive to have said enough for the establishing our Negation in this Important Question that Apprentiship is not a kind of Bondage consequently that it cannot work any such effect as is before supposed yet to leave no tolerable Curiosity unsatisfied we will set before us as in a Table the whole Condition of an Apprentice meaning chiefly such an Apprentice as being the Son of a Gentleman is bound to a Master who exerciseth the worthier Arts of Citizens as Merchants by Sea Whole-Sale-men and some few others which may more specially stand in the first Class of the most generous Histories as those in which the Wit or Mind of man hath a far greater part than Bodily labour 2. Such an Apprentice therefore when first he comes to his Master is commonly but of those years which are every where subject to Correction His ordinary Services these he goes bare-headed stands bare-headed waits bare-headed before his Master and Mistress and while as yet he is the youngest Apprentice he doth perhaps for Discipline sake wipe over night his Master's shooes for the morning brusheth a Garment runs of Errands keeps silence 'till he have leave to speak followeth his Master or ushereth his Mistress and sometime their young Daughters among whom some one or other of them doth not rarely prove the Apprentice's Wife walks not far out but with his permission and