Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	hear_v	lord_n	sin_n	15,720	5	5.7661	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A83496	Speeches and passages of this great and happy Parliament: from the third of November, 1640, to this instant June, 1641. Collected into one volume, and according to the most perfect originalls, exactly published.	England and Wales. Parliament.; Mervyn, Audley, Sir, d. 1675.; Pym, John, 1584-1643.; Strafford, Thomas Wentworth, Earl of, 1593-1641.	1641 (1641)	Wing E2309; Thomason E159_1; ESTC R212697	305,420	563

MY Lord Primate of Ireland and my Lords and the rest of these noble Gentlemen It is a great comfort to me to have your Lordships by me this day because I have been known to yours long time and I now desire to be heard a few words I come here my Lords to pay my last debt to sin which is death and through the mercies of God to rise again in eternall glory My Lords if I may use a few words I shall take it as a great curtesie from you I am come here my Lords to submit to the judgement that is passed against me I do it with a very quiet and contented minde I do freely forgive all the world a forgivenesse not from the teeth outwards as they say but from my heart I speak it in the presence of Almighty God before whom I stand that there is not a displeasing thought that arifeth in me against any man I thank God I say truely my conscience bears me witnesse that in all the honour I had to serve his Majesty I had not any intention in my heart but did aime at the joynt and individuall prosperity of the King and his people although it be my ill hap to be misconstrued I am not the first man that hath suffered in this kinde it is a common portion that befalls men in this life righteous judgement shall be hereafter here we are subject to errors and misiudging one another One thing I desire that I might be heard and do hope that for Christian charities sake I shall be beleeved That I was so farre from being against Parliaments that I alwayes did think Parliaments in England to be the happy constitutions of the Kingdome and Nation and the best means under God to make the King and his people happy As for my death I do hear acquit all the world and beseech God to forgive them In particular I am very glad his Majesty conceives me not meriting so severe and heavy a punishment as the utmost execution of this sentence I do infinitely rejoyce in it and in the mercy of his and do beseech God to return to him the same that he may finde mercy when he hath most need of it I wish this Kingdom all prosperity and happinesse in the world I did it living and now dying it is my wish And I professe heartily and do humbly recommend it to you and wish that every man would lay his hand on his heart and consider seriously whether the beginning of the peoples happinesse should be written in letters of bloud I fear they are in a wrong way I desire Almighty God that no one drop of my bloud rise up in judgement against them I have but one word more and that is for my Religion My Lord of Armagh I do professe my self seriously faithfully and truly to be an obedient sonne of the Church of England in that Church I was borne and bred in that Religion I have lived and now in that I dye prosperity and happinesse be ever to it It hath been said I was inclined to Popery if it be an obiection worth the answering let me say truly from my heart that since the time that I was 21. yeers of age unto this day going on 49. yeers I never had thought or doubt of the truth of this Religion nor had ever any the boldnesse to suggest to me the contrary to my best remembrance and so being reconciled to the mercies of Christ Jesus my Saviour into whose bosome I hope shortly to be gathered to enioy eternall happinesse which shall never have end I desire heartily to be forgiven of every man if any rash or unadvised words or deeds hath passed and desire all your prayers and so my Lord farewell and farewell all things in this world The Lord strengthen my faith and give me confidence and assurance in the merits of Christ Jesus I trust in God we shall all meete to live eternally in Heaven and receive the accomplishment of all happinesse where every fear shall be wiped from our eyes and sad thought from our hearts And so God blesse this Kingdome and Jesus have meroy on my soul Then turning himself about he saluted all the Noblemen and took a solemne leave of all considerable persons on the Scaffold giving them his hand And after that he said Gentlemen I would say my prayers and I intreat you all to pray with me and for me then his Chaplain laid the book of Common-prayer upon the chair before him as he kneeled down on which he praied almost a quarter of an houre then he prayed as long or longer without a book and ended with the Lords prayer then standing up he spies his brother Sir George Wentworth and cals him to him and saith brother we must part remember me to my sister and to my wife and carry my blessing to my eld●st sonne and charge him from me that he fear God and continue an obedient sonne of the Church of England and that he should approve himself a faithfull subject to the King and tell him that he should not have any private grudge or revenge towards any concerning me and bid him beware that he medle not with Church livings for that will prove a moth and canker to him in his estate and wish him to content himself to be a servant to his Country as a Justice of peace in his County and not aiming at higher preferments carry my blessing also to my daughters Anne and Arrabella charge them to fear and serve God and he will blesse them not forgetting my little Infant that yet knowes neither good nor evill and cannot speak for it self God speak for it and blesse it then sayd he now I have nigh done one stroke will make my wife husbandlesse my dear children fatherles and my poore servants master lesse and seperate me from my dear brother and all my friends but let God be to you and them all in all After that going to take off his doublet and to make himselfe unready he sayd I thank God I am no more afraid of death nor daunted with any discouragements rising from any fears but do as cheerfully put off my doublet at this time or ever I did when I went to bed Then he put off his doublet and wound up his hair with his hands and put on a white cap. Then he called where is the man that should do this last office meaning the Executioner call him to me When he came and askt him forgivenesse he told him he forgave him and all the World Then kneeling down by the block he went to prayer again himself the Bishop of Armagh kneeling on the one side and the Minister on other to the which Minister after prayer he turned himself and spoke some few words softly having his hands lifted up this Minister closed his hands with his then bowing himself to the earth to lay his head on the blocke he told the Executioner that he would first lay down his h●ad to

would come to nothing and this letter was read and presented unto us His Lordship represented N. H. that the Commissioners and all the Lords had engaged themselves faithfully and truly to declare to the Parliament the distresse of the Counties Hee declared that it was far from their Lordships purpose to move any supply of money from the House of Commons but to lay the cause before them and to leave it to their wisedome averring certainly that if some course were not taken the whole kingdome would be put into disorder Armies would not starve retiring was not yet as hee thought in the thoughts of the Scots Therefore they must plunder and destroy or advance into Yorkeshire and so into England to seeke subsistence the prevention whereof did highly import the King and kingdome His Lordship proposed another no lesse worthy of consideration to the whole kingdome But if the Scots Army were provided of a competency for the ease of those Counties it were very strange there should not an equall care be had for mainteining the Kings Army that stands before them He said the Scots Army was strong and powerfull and little other resistance against it but the impediments of an Army marching in winter But whether it were fit for a kingdome to bee trusted to accidents of Frosts with a people bred in Swedland and cold Countreys hee left to their discretion His Lordship confessed that the Scots had made great protestations and with great execrations averred that they had no intent to advance forward but returne when they shall have received satisfaction Yet their Lordships did not conceive that the kingdome should relye upon promises or protestations Many accidents might happen when a Nation come from a farre Countrey to a better should bee told the businesse they come about was just and their quarrell good who finding themselves in a fat pasture may pick quarrells which their Leaders if they should goe about to prevent them of the reward of their vertue and valour Upon these grounds his Lordship presented to the generall consideration the supply of his Majesties Army that it bee not disbanded which if it should come to passe Yorkeshire and other parts of England were left to the Scots discretion His Lordship said Hee durst not say the Scots would not come forward but that it was in their power if they would and therefore hee recommended this representation to the whole body of the kingdome to prevent furture dangers Hee concluded with a prayer to Almighty God to direct the hearts of all the kingdome and to give a blessing onely able to remove the great distractions so many and so grievous as under which since the Conquest this kingdome never laboured There were presented unto mee two papers more the one being Instructions from Newcastle to Sir Thomas Hope and others concerning the contribution the other an account of Arreers from the eleventh of September to the twentieth of November which were all read unto us nor doe I know how or to what use to imploy them Mr. RIGBYES SPEECH In answer to the LORD KEEPERS last SPEECH 1640. Master SPEAKER THough my Judgement prompts mee to fit still and be silent yet the duty I owe to my King my Countrey and my Conscience moves me to stand up and speake Master Speaker had not this Syren so sweet a tongue surely hee could never have effected so much mischiefe to this kingdome you know Sir optimorum putrefactio pessima the best things putrefied become the worst and as it is in the naturall so in the body politick and what 's to be done then Master Speaker wee all know ense recidendum est the sword Justice must strike nè sinceratruhatur Master Speaker it is not the voice non vox sed votum not the tongue but the heart and actions that are to be suspected for doth not our Saviour say it Shew mee thy faith by thy workes O Man Now Master Speaker hath not this kingdome seene seene say I nay felt and smarted under the cruelty of this mans Justice so malicious as to record it in every Court of Westminster as if hee had not beene contented with the enslaving of us all unlesse hee entailed it to all posterity Why shall I beleeve words now cum factum videam Shall we be so weake men as when wee have beene injured and abused will be gained againe with faire words and complements Or like little children when we have beene whipt and beaten bee pleased againe with sweet meats Oh no there be some birds in the Summer of Parliament will sing sweetly who in the Winter of Persecution will for their prey ravenously fly at all upon our goods nay seize upon our persons and hath it not beene with this man so with some in this assembly Master Speaker it hath beene objected unto us that in Judgement wee should thinke of mercy and Bee yee mercifull as your heavenly Father is mercifull now God almighty grant that we may be so and that our hearts and Judgements may be truly rectified to know truly what is mercy I say to know what is mercy for there is the point Master Speaker I have heard of foolish pitty foolish pitty doe we not all know the effects of it and I have met with this Epithete to mercy Crudelis misericordia and in some kind I thinke there may be a cruell mercy I am sure that the spirit of God said Be not pitifull in Judgement nay it saith Bee not pitifull of the poore in Judgement if not of the poore then a Latiori not of the rich there 's the Emphasis We see by the sett and solemne appointments of our Courts of Justice what provision the wisedome of our Ancestors hath made for the preservation honour and esteeme of Justice witnesse our frequent Termes Sessions and Assises and in what pompe and state the Judges in their Circuits by the Sheriffes Knights and Justices and all the Countrey are attended oft-times for the hanging of a poore thiefe for the stealing of a hog or a sheep nay in some Cases for the stealing of a penny and Justice too in terrorem and now shall not some of them be hanged that have rob'd us of all our propriety and sheered at once all our sheepe and all we have away and would have made us all indeed poore Bellizarasses to have begged for halfe-pennies when they would not have left us one penny that wee could have called our owne Let us therefore now Master Speaker not be so pitifull as that wee become remisse not so pitifull in Judgement as to have no Judgement but set the deplorable estate of Great Brittain now before our eyes and consider how our most gracious Soveraigne hath beene abused and both his Majesty and all his Subjects injured by these wicked Instruments for which my humble motion is that with these particulars wee become not so mercifull as to the generality the whole kingdome wee grow mercilesse Fiat Justitia Mr. VVALERS SPEECH

Let every man wipe his heart as he does his eyes when hee would judge of a nice and subtile object The eye if it be pretincted with any colour is vitiated in its discerning Let us take heed of a blood-shotten-eye of Judgement Let every man purge his heart cleare of all passions I know this great and wise body politick can have none but I speak to inviduals from the weaknesse which I finde in my selfe Away with personall animosities away with all flatteries to the people in being the sharper against him because he is odious to them away with all feares lest by the sparing his bloud they may be incenst away with all such considerations as that it is not fit for a Parliament that one accused by it of Treason should escape with life Let not former vehemence of any against him nor feare from thence that he cannot be safe while that man lives be an ingredient in the sentence of any one of us Of all these corruptives of judgement Mr. Speaker I doe before God discharge my self to the uttermost of my power And doe with a cleare Conscience wash my hands of this mans blood by this solemne protestation that my Vote goes not to the taking of the Earle of Straffords life FINIS The Two last SPEECHES of Thomas Wentworth Late Earle of Strafford and Deputy of Ireland His speech in the Tower to the Lords RIght Honourable and the rest you are now come to convey me to my death I am willing to dye which is a thing no more than all our Predecessors have done and a debt that our Posterity must in their due time discharge which since it can be no way avoyded it ought the lesse to be feared for that which is common to all ought not to be intollerable to any It is the Law of Nature the tribute of the flesh a remedie from all worldly cares and troubles and to the truly penitent a perfect path to blessednesse And there is but one death though severall wayes unto it mine is not naturall but inforced by the Law and Iustice it hath been sayd that the Lawes vex only the meaner sort of people but the mighty are able to withstand them it is not so with me for to the Law I submit my self and confesse that I receive nothing but Iustice for he that politikly intendeth good to a Common-weale may be called a just man but he that practiseth either for his own profit or any other sinister ends may be well termed 2 delinquent person neither is delay in punishment any privilege for pardon And moreover I ingenuously confesse with Cicero That the death of the bad is the safety of the good that be alive Let no man trust either in the favour of his Prince the friendship and consanguinity of his Peeres much lesse in his own wisedome and knowledge of which I ingeniously confesse I have been too confident Kings as they are men before God so they are Gods before men and I may say with a great man once in this kingdome Had I strived to obey my God as faithfully as I sought to honour my King fraudulently I had stood and not fallen Most happie and fortunate is that Prince who is as much for his justice feared as for his goodnes beloved For the greater that Princes are in power above other the more they ought in verrue to excell other and such is the royall Soveraign whom I late served For my Peeres the correspondence that I had with them during my prosperity was to me very delightfull and pleasing and here they have commiserated my ruine I have plentifully found who for the most generous of them I may boldly say though they have detested the fact yet they have pitied the person delinquent the first in their loyaltie the last in their charitie ingenuously confessing that never any Subject or Peere of my rank had ever that help of Counsell that benefit of time or a more free and legall tryall than I have had of the like to which none of my Predecessors hath had so much favor from his Prince so much sufferance from the people in which I comprehend the understanding Commons not the many headed monster Multitude but I have offended and sentenced and must now suffer me And for my too much confidence in my supposed wisdome and knowledge therein have been the most deceived For he that is wise to himself and knowes by others faults to correct his own offences to be truly wise is to be Secretaries to our selves for it is meere folly to reveale and intimate thoughts to strangers wisdome is the most precious Gem with which the minde can be adorned and learning the most famous thing for which a man ought to be esteemed and true wisedome teacheth us to do well as to speak well in the first I have failed for the wisedome of man in foolishnesse with God For knowledge it is a thing indifferent both to good and evill but the best knowledge is for a man to know himself he that doth so shall esteem of himself but little for he considereth from whence he came and whereto he must he regardeth not the vain pleasures of this life he exaiteth God and strives to live in his fear but he that knoweth not himself is wilfull in his own wayes unprofitable in his life unfortunate in his death and so am I. But the reason why I sought to attain unto it was this I have read that he th●t knoweth not that which he ought to know is a bruit beast amongst men he that knoweth more then he ought to know is a man amongst beasts but he that knoweth all that may be known is a God amongst men To this I much aspired in this I much failed Vanitie of Vanities all is but vanity I have heard the people clamour and cry out saying That through my occasion the times are bad I wish that when I am dead they may prove better most true it is that there is at this time a great storm in ending God in his mercie avert it And since it is my particular lot lik Jonab to be cast into the sea I shall think my life well spent to appease Gods wrath and satisfie the peoples malice O what is eloquence more than air fashioned with an articulate and distinct sound when it is a speciall vertue to speak little and well and silence is oft the best oratory for sools in their dumbnesse may be accounted wise It hath power to make a good matter seem bad and a bad cause appear good but mine was to me unprofitable and like the Cypresse trees which are great and tall but altogether without fruit What is honour but the first step to disquietnesse and power is still waited on by envy neither hath it any priviledge against infamy It is held to be the chiefe part of honour for a man to joyn to his office and calling courtesie and affability commiseration and pity for thereby he draweth to