for fear or favour backslide or depart from the same and give them the assistance of thy Spirit that may enable them so to preach thy word that may keep the people upright in the midst of a corrupted and corrupt generation And good Lord bless thy people every where with hearing ears understanding hearts conscientious souls and obedient lives especially those over whom I have had either lately or formerly a charge that with meek heart and due reverence they may hear and receive thy holy word truly serving thee in righteousness and holiness all the dayes of their lives And we beseech thee of thy goodness and mercy to comfort and succour all those that in this transitory life be in trouble sorrow need sickness or any other adversity Lord help the helpless and comfort the comfortless visit the sick relieve the oppressed help them to right that suffer wrong set them at liberty that are in prison restore the banished and of thy great mercy and in thy good time deliver all thy people out of their necessities Lord do thou of thy great mercy fit us all for our latter end for the hour of death and the day of judgement and do thou in the hour of death and at the day of judgement from thy wrath and everlasting damnation good Lord deliver us through the cross and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ In the mean time O Lord teach us so to number our our dayes and me my minutes that we may apply our hearts to true wisdom that we may be wise unto salvation that we may live soberly godly and righteously in this present world denying all ungodliness and worldly lusts Lord teach us so to live that we may not be afraid to dye and that we may so live that we may be alwayes prepared to dye that when death shall seize upon us it may not surprise us but that we may lift up our heads with joy knowing that our redemption draws nigh and that we shall be for ever happy being assured that we shall come to the felicity of the chosen and rejoyce with the gladness of the people and give us such a fulness of thy holy Spirit that may make us stedfast in this faith and confirme us in this hope indue us with patience under thy afflicting hand and withal a chearful resolution of our selves to thy divine disposing that so passing the pilgrimage of this world we may come to the Land of promise the heavenly Canaan that we may reign with thee in the world to come through Jesus Christ our Lord in whose blessed name and words we further call upon thee saying Our Father c. Let thy mighty hand and out-stretched arme O Lord be the defence of me and all other thy servants thy mercy and loving kindness in Jesus Christ our salvation thy true and holy word our instruction thy grace and holy Spirit our comfort and consolation to the end and in the end through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen His Speech and Prayer ended with much meekness and spiritual consolation He submitted his neck to the stroak of the Axe to as great a loss of the Church of Christ and of all good men as hath happened in our times I have the more enlarged my self that my Reader might not without a kinde of a consternation or possession of strange amazement pass by the concernments of this blessed Heroe The same day of Doctor Hewets tryal was also tryed John Mordant of Clement Danes Esquire with whom he was a fellow-prisoner the charge against him was for combining with Henry Bishop of Parham in Sussex Gent. Hartgil Baron and Francis Mansil with divers others for raising War against Oliver Lord Protector in the behalf of Charles Stuart and confering with J. Stapely Esq Henry Mallory and others how to effect the same and delivering Commissions to several persons in the name of and as from the said Charles Stuart c. He stood long upon it as did the Doctor before to have Councel assigned him and that he might be tryed by a Jury but finding it would not be granted he at last pleaded not guilty many witnesses deposited against him yet he by his ingenuity so cleared himself that notwithstanding many endeavours to the contrary he was discharged July the 17. following Collonel Ashton and John Betley were executed the one in Tower-street the other in Cheapside Collonel Ashton was the first being drawn on a Sled that Worthy Divine Doctor Warmestry submitting for the good of a poor Christians soul to lye along with him upon the Sled that he might lose no time for his spiritual converse They were drawn from Newgate to Towerstreet over against Mark-lane end where a Gibbet was erected As he ascended the Ladder Doctor Warmestry said Almighty God who is a strong Tower be with thee and make thee know and feel that there is no other name under heaven whereby to attain everlasting life but by the name of Jesus The Blessing of God the Father the Son and Holy Ghost be with you henceforth and for ever Amen He being upon the Ladder exprest a great deal of confidence he had in the merits and mercies of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ not doubting but that through the red Sea of his blood he should arrive at the heavenly Canaan and in little space behold his Saviour whom his soul so much longed after Then fixing his eyes upon the multitude he spake to this effect I am brought here to a shameful death I am an English man borne and as many know a Gentleman born I was drawn into this business by several persons and am now brought here for my former sins God hath delivered me several times from several judgements he hath visited me at this time because I slighted and did not pursue that repentance that I promised Therefore I desire all good people to leave off their sins for Christ his sake and become new men for it is that that brings all men to ruine I beseech God of mercy have mercy upon my soul Lord God I come to thee Lord the Father of heaven have mercy upon me O God the Son Redeemer of the world have mercy upon me O God the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father and the Son have mercy upon me Remember not my offences but spare me good Lord God I beseech thee spare thy servant whom thou hast redeemed for thy dear Sons sake I have no more to say but desire the prayers of all good people Having ended his Speech he committed his spirit into the hands of God and having said Lord have mercy upon my soul he was turned off the Ladder and instantly cut down his belly ripped up and his bowels burnt in a fire ready prepared for that purpose he being not yet dead then was his head cut off and his body divided into four quarters put into a basket and conveyed back to Newgate Next they proceeded and fetcht John Betley for there was a great deal
having ascended their full height began to decline for notwithstanding he sent over great forces under the Duke of Lancaster and Earl of Hereford no great matter thereof ensued And now each day brings news of some Towns revolt or Commanders death the Earl of Warwick receives his death by a pestilential Dart Sir John Chandoys an expert Commander is unfortunately slain Sir William Molineux who had long served in the Wars of France deceaseth in England the Earl of Pembroke is taken prisoner by the Spaniards and the Noble Prince Edward dieth at Canterbury with whom saith Walshingham died all the hopes of the English during whose life they feared no invasion of the enemy abroad nor any division at home for he assailed no nation which he overcome not he besieged no City which he took not whose death lay so heavy on his heart that King Edward himself lived not long after A King saith Speed whose name among the surviving splendors of his actions is justly transmitted with honour to all posterity He died at his Mannor of Sheene near Richmond the 21. of July 1377. having lived 65. years and reigned 56. years 4. moneths and odde dayes his body was solemnly interred at Westminster Church where he hath his monument with this Epitaph engraven thereon made by Geffery Chaucer the Poet. Hic decus Anglorum flos regum praeteritorum Forma futurorum Rex clemens pax populorum Tertius Edwardus regni complens Jubilaeum Invictus Pardus pollens bellis Machabaeum Here Englands Grace the flower of Princes past Pattern of future Edward the third is plac't Milde Monarch Subjects peace Wars Machabee Victorious Pard his reign a Jubilee In the eleventh year of this Kings reign my Author writes was so great plenty that a quarter of Wheat was sold at London for two shillings a fat Ox for a noble a fat sheep for six pence and six Pigeons for a penny a fat Goose for two pence and a Pigg for a penny and other things after that the same cheap rate The Life of EDWARD the Black Prince IT may seem superfluous having writ the Reign of the Father in whose time he died to publish the life of this Prince but as an eminent Author writes as heroick persons purchase their own honours so they ought to inherit their own praises to wear their own laurels This may apologize for my enterprize more especially as I have endeavoured to avoid whatsoever hath been already written and to set down onely his more particular Transactions Edward the Black Prince so named of this dreaded acts and not from his complexion was the eldest son of King Edward the Third a Prince of an undaunted spirit so full of vertues that he left no room for any nnworthy vice who had he lived in the heroick times might well have been numbred amongst the nine Worthies At 15. years of age his father takes him over with him into France to initiate him as it were in the School of War as one of our modern Poets hath it In this fair heaven of magnanimity The Prince the star of honour decks the fly Fixt here so soon by 's Fathers band who meant He there should fall or gild that firmament I will for the more brevity treat onely of three special passages in this Princes life his Battel at Crescy his Victory at Poityers and his restoring Don Pedro to his Crown of Castile in the Battel at Crescy the French exceeded the English nigh four for one and by reason of their numbers being confident of Victory would needs hasten the Fates to their own destruciton and enforcd the English to make their passage through as they then determined the red Sea of their own blood nor could the terrible peals of Thunder from heaven nor shoals of Ravens and ravenous birds which came flying over their Hoast foreshewing the harvest of carcasses at hand hinder their proceedings but as if ascertained of victory they did erect their banner called Oliflame as a signe of taking none to mercy no more then fire is extinguisht by Oyl against which the English advance their Banner of the red Dragon to signifie no mercy to them that would shew none Both Armies divided into three Battalions the sign of Battel being given by King Philip the horrour of War began to show its self the grass was soon changed from green to red and their glistering faucheons to a purple colour Drums and Trumpets sounded the knells of death horrour and destruction appeared every where Amongst other Nations that assisted the French in this sad War were twelve thousand Genowayes being all of them Gross-bow men these were to open a way for the French horse with their shot but at the very instant fell such a showr of rain which for the present wet the Archers strings and made them less serviceable The French King hereupon commanded Count Alanson who commanded the Van to beat them from the point and to charge the English this was no sooner commanded then performed and the poor Genowayes trodden down by the horse who now turn their fury against the French seeking to destroy whom they came to help The English enemies unto either having reinforced their Archery liberally bestow their arrows amongst them endeavouring the destruction of them both who ever saw a Matachin dance imitate fighting might here see a fight imitate the Matachin dance The French way thus paved with Genoan bodies half out of breath with headlong haste never stay till they came up to the English Battel with whom encounters the noble Prince of Wales who commanded the English Voward that day the fight grew fierce and cruel each side striving to exceed the other in valour Who had seen the Prince of Wales at that present would have believed Pythagoras doctrine of Transmigration that the soul of great Hector had been infused into him what Poets have feigned of ancient Heroes fell short of the truth of what he performed that day The King of Bohemia whom age might have taught to have expected death in his Chamber and not to have sought him in the Fields of Mars seals his love to the French side with his dearest blood his troop of faithful followers with their slaughtered bodies covering him even in death whose plume of Ostrige feathers won then by valiant Edward hath every since been the Cognisance of the Princes of Wales Another trophey of the English Chevalry was the King of Majorca who in aid of the French was there likewise slain as a renowned Poet in his description of that victory One King 's too much but there two Kings must dye Leave two uncrown'd to Crown one victory It was now high time for King Philip to bring up the main Battel whose numbers threatned the destruction of the English this onset threatning so much danger King Edward is sent for to come up with his power to aid the Prince whose answer was Let them send no more to me for any adventure that may befall whilest my
humanity and charitable inclinations will afford me your devout prayers For my Saviours sweet mercy good people pray for me even for my eternal Saviours sake into whose bosom I render my woful and afflicted soul sweet Jesu my redeemer the redeemer even of me a woful and dejected sinner receive into thy arms my Spirit At the time appointed he marched to the Scaffold more like a General in the head of an Army to breath victory then like a condemned man to undergo the sentence of death The Lieutenant of the Tower desired him to take Coach for fear the people should rush in upon him and tear him in pieces No said he Master Lieutenant I dare look death in the face and I hope the people too have you a care that I do not escape and I care not how I dye whether by the hand of the Executioner or the madness and fury of the People if that may give them better content it is all one to me Having mounted the Scaffold and seeing his Brother Sir George Wentworth weeping Brother said he What do you see in me that deserves these tears doth my fear betray my guiltiness or my too much boldness any Atheism think now that you do accompany me to my marriage bed Nor did I ever throw off my cloathes with such freedom and content as in this my preparation to my Grave that stock pointing to the Block appointed for his Execution must be my Pillow here must I rest and rest from all my labours no thoughts of envy no dreams of treason jealousies of foes cares for the King the State or my self shall interrupt this nap therefore Brother with me pitty mine enemies who beside their intention have made me blessed rejoyce in my innocency rejoyce in my happiness Kneeling down upon the Scaffold he made this Protestation I hope Gentlemen you do think that neither fear of loss or love of reputation will cause me to belie God and my Conscience for now I am in the door going out and my next step must be from time to eternity either of peace or pain To clear my self to you all I do solemnly protest before God I am not guilty so far as I can understand of that great crime laid now to my charge nor have had the least inclination or intention to damnifie or prejudice the King the State the Laws or Religion of this Kingdom but with my best endeavours to serve all and support all concluding with these words as God might be merciful to his soul Addressing himself to my Lord Primate of Ireland he said It is my very great comfort that I have your Lordship by me this day in regard I have been known to you these many years and I do thank God and your Lordship for it that you are here I should be very glad to obtain so much silence as to be heard a few words but I doubt I shall not the noise is so great My Lords I am come hither by the good will and pleasure of Almighty God to pay that last debt I owe to sin which is death and by the blessing of that God to rise again through the merits of Jesus Christ to righteousness and life eternal Here he was much interrupted My Lords I am come hither to submit to that judgement which hath passed against me I do it with a very quiet and contented minde I thank God I do freely forgive all the world a forgiveness that is not spoken from the teeth outwards as they say but from the very heart I speak it in the presence of Almighty God before whom I stand that there is not a displeasing thought arising in me towards any man living I thank God I can say it and truly too my conscience bearing me witness that in all my employment since I had the honour to serve his Majesty I never had any thing in the purpose of my heart but what tended to the joynt and individual prosperity of the King and People although it hath been my ill fortune to be misconstrued I am not the first that hath suffered in this kinde it is the common portion of us all while we are in this life to erre righteous judgement we must wait for in another place for here we are very subject to be misjudged one of another There is one thing that I desire to free my self of and I am very confident speaking it now with so much chearfulness that I shall obtain your Christian Charity in the belief of it I was so far from being against Parliaments that I did alwayes think the Parliaments of England were the most happy Constitutions that any Kingdom or Nation lived under and the best means under God to make the King and People happy For my death I here acquit all the world and beseech the God of heaven heartily to forgive them that contrived it though in the intentions and purposes of my heart I am not guilty of what I die for And my Lord Primate it is a great comfort for me that his Majesty conceives me not meriting so severe and heavy a punishment as is the utmost execution of this sentence I do infinitely rejoyce in this mercy of his and I beseech God return it into his own bosome that he may finde mercy when he stands in need of it I wish this Kingdom all the prosperity and happiness in the world I did it living and now dying it is my wish I do most humbly recommend this to every one that hears me and desire they would lay their hands upon their hearts and consider seriously whether the beginning of the happinesse and Reformation of a Kingdom should be written in Letters of blood consider this when you are at your homes and let me be never so unhappy as that the least drop of my blood should rise up in judgement against any one of you but I fear you are in a wrong way My Lords I have but one word more and with that I shall end I profess that I dye a true and obedient son to the Church of England wherein I was born and in which I was bred peace and prosperity be ever to it It hath been objected if it were an objection worth the answering that I have been inclined to Popery but I say truly from my heart that from the time that I was one and twenty years of age to this present going now upon forty nine I never had in my heart to doubt of this Religion of the Church of England nor ever had any man the boldness to suggest any such thing to me to the best of my remembrance and so being reconciled by the merits of Jesus Christ my Saviour into whose bosom I hope I shall shortly be gathered to those eternal happinesses which shall never have end I desire heartily the forgivenesse of every man for any rash or unadvised words or any thing done amiss and so my Lords and Gentlemen farewel Farewel all the things of this world
declared and published to the end all persons may take notice thereof and in their several places and stations demean themselves peaceably giving obedience to the Laws of the Nation as heretofore in the exercise and administration thereof as endeavours shall be used that no oppression or wrong be done to the people so a strict accompt will be required of all such as shall do any thing to endanger the publick peace and quiet upon any pretence whatsoever O. Cromwell April 30. 1653. Certainly Parliaments if rightly chosen are the best physick to cure and redress the distempers of the Body Politick which might overflow in their intervals King James after his dissolving of three Parliaments did comply with the last he said he should be in love with Parliaments having learnt so many things by them which otherwise he should never have known His Son afterwards dissolved three whereof one of them proved fatal to him whereas the Virgin Queen that was well enough acquainted with the constitution of the Body of the Nation called Parliaments frequently but continued none very long by which as she came to be Mistress of the affections of the people so she was Commandress in chief of their purses Whereas the connexion of Great Cromwells Affairs as he was inveloped in designs forced him as they were to be read like to Hebrew backwards whatsoever he dissembled otherwise to use the subtlest of his endeavours like the Mole to undermine and render Parliaments odious to the people which afterwards were no extraordinary friends to himself though they may possibly be civil to his posterity These domestick revolutions put new life into the Dutch who hoping from these distractions to reap a Victory over the English with great confidence put forth again to Sea thinking upon nothing so much as Chapmen for the English Fleet saying It was to be cried out by the sound of trumpets and horns But they were deceived in their expectations for coming to a fight on the North Foreland near unto the South point of the Gober their Fleet was defeated eleven men of War and two water Hoyes being taken besides six Captains and fifteen hundred Prisoners and six men of War which were sunk Certainly this War with the Dutch which the Parliament so successively drove on had not without great advantages been ended by them onely the Protectour at the present as a leading Card to his other Treaties entertained the Dutch tenders he being forced to take the first opportunity to signalize his Honour as also to please the more timerous sort of people with a sudden alliance of friends Not long after to set the better face on his resolute proceedings Cromwel calls another Parliament convened at Westminster who met July 4. 1653. to whom Generall Cromwel made a long speech declaring the wonderful mercies of God towards this Nation the progress of Affairs since the famous Victory at Worcester and the clearness of the Cull given them to take upon them the Supream Authority intermixt with sundry phrases of Scripture to make it the more plausible Then he produced an Instrument under his own Hand and Seal whereby the Supream Authority of the Nation was devolved upon them unto whom all persons were to yield obedience and subjection He declared that they were to sit no longer then the third of November 1654. and three moneths before their dissolution they were to make choice of other persons to succeed them who were not to sit above twelve moneths and then to take care for a succession in Government Now was the time come for the train to take the Dutch having as hath been expressed cast the urine of the present Affairs being quite tired with their continual losses sent Commissioners over into England to treat of Peace It hath been the result of the opinions of those that had their eyes in their heads that the Dutch thought to have made up their mouths to have taken our Navy napping in the time of the Treaty the Fight happening betwixt them and us but they found it otherwise their whole Fleet was put to flight their Admiral Van Trump a man of eminent valour being slain about thirty men of War sunk and fired six Captains and about a thousand men taken prisoners and about six thousand slain This great Victory did not a little conduce to hasten the conclusion of the peace but on such terms as were as one writes at that time more honourable for his present designs then advantageous to the English Nation For this service gold chains were presented to the Generals Blake Monk Penne and Lawson and to the other Flag Captains and silver Medals to the other Officers of the Fleet. Of the puissance of our Navies and the Dominion of the English at Sea accept what the Laureat of this Nation to the life expresses Lords of the Worlds great waste the Ocean we Whole Forrests send to reign upon the Sea And every Coast may trouble or relieve But none can visit us without our leave Angels and we have this Prerogative That none can at our happy seat arrive While we descend at pleasure to invade The bad with vengeance or the good to aid Our little world the image of the great Like that amidst the boundless Ocean set Of her own growth has all that Nature craves And all that 's rare as Tribute from the waves As Egypt does not on the Clouds rely But to her Nyle owes more then to the Sky So what our Earth and what our Heaven denies Our ever constant Friend the Sea supplies The taste of hot Arabia's Spice we know Free from the scorching Sun that makes it grow Without the Worm in Persian silks we shine And without planting drink of every Vine To dig for wealth we weary not our limbs Gold though the heavy'st Mettal hither swims Ours is the Harvest where the Indians mowe We plough the deep and reap what others sowe To reckon up the several opinions which about this time like Hydra's heads continually sprung up one upon the neck of another were a task ad infinitum and those of several kindes some for imposition of hands anointing with oyl and washing of feet some against them Brownists others Millinarians Arminians Seekers Ranters Enthusiasts Arians Pelagians Quakers cum multis aliis of all which I shall onely say thus much God knows his own time who suffers the Tares and the Wheat to grow together till Harvest there ought to be a great care least in plucking up the tares we pull up the wheat we ought not to invade mens consciences but to wait God Almighties leasure The Parliament having sat about as many weeks as the other had done years they dissolved themselves immediately making way for General Cromwel by their dissolution to be chosen Lord Protector of the Common-wealth of England Scotland and Ireland and of all the Islands and Territories thereunto belonging December the 16. 1653. Thus all men in their right wits may perceive how he laid down