But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity to his master's sons was without suspect; and yet the devil, who never dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable, he first resolved to kill him sitting in council; wherein, having failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him with a weapon of more weight. And, because nothing else could move his appetite, he caused his head to be stricken off before he eat his dinner. A greater judgement of GOD than this upon Hastings I have never observed in any story. For the self-same day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and others were (without trial of law or offense given) by Hastings' advice executed at Pomfret, I say Hastings himself, in the same day, and (as I take it) in the same hour, in the same lawless manner, had his head stricken off in the Tower of London. But Buckingham lived a while longer, and with an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners to elect Richard for their king. And having received the earldon of Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying the daughter to the king's only son, after many grievous vexations of mind and unfortunate attempts, being in the end betrayed and delivered up by his trustiest servant, he had his head severed from his body at Salisbury, without the trouble of any of his peers. And what success had Richard himself after all these mishiefs and murders, policies, and counter-policies to Christian religion, and after such time as, with a most merciless hand, he had pressed out the breath of his nephews and natural lords, other than the prosperity of so short a life, as it took end ere himsef could well look over and discern it? the great outcry of innocent blood obtaining at GOD'S hands the effusion of his; who became a spectacle of shame and dishonor both to his friends and enemies. [Transcription by John F. Tinkler]
Democritus to the Reader.
I have no such authority, no such benefactors, as that noble Ambrosius was to Origen, allowing him six or seven amanuenses to write out his dictates; I must for that cause do my business myself, and was therefore enforced, as a Bear doth her whelps, to bring forth this confused lump, I had not time to lick it into form, as she doth her young ones, but even so to publish it, as it was first written, "whatever came into my head" [Cicero], in an extemporean style, as I do commonly all other exercises, "I poured out whatever my genius dictated," out of a confused company of notes, and writ with as small deliberation as I do ordinarily speak, without all affectation of big words, fustian phrases, jingling terms, tropes, strong lines, that like Acestes' arrows caught fire as they flew, strains of wit, brave heats, elogies, hyperbolical exornations, elegancies, &c. which many so much affect. I am "a water-drinker" [Horace], drink no wine at all, which so much improves our modern wits, a loose, plain, rude writer, "I call a fig a fig and a hoe a hoe," and as free as loose, "the same thing on my pen as in my mind," I call a spade a spade, "I write this to the mind, not the ears," I respect matter, not words; remembering that of Cardan, "words for the sake of matter, not matter for the sake of words," and seeking with Seneca "what I write, not in what manner," rather what than how to write. For as Philo thinks, he that is conversant about matter, neglects words, and those that excel in this art of speaking, have no profound learning, "words may sound fine, yet have no inner meaning." Besides, it was the observation of that wise Seneca, when you see a fellow careful about his words, and neat in his speech, know this for a certainty, that man's mind is busied about toys, there's no solidity in him. "Prettiness is not a manly ornament": as he said of a nightingale, "you are a voice, and nothing besides." I am therefore in this point a professed disciple of Apollonius a scholar of Socrates, I neglect phrases, and labour wholly to inform my reader's understanding, not to please his ear; 'tis not my study or intent to compose neatly, which an Orator requires, but to express myself readily and plainly as it happens. So that as a River runs, sometimes precipitate and swift, then dull and slow; now direct, then "through windings"; now deep, then shallow; now muddy, then clear; now broad, then narrow; doth my style flow: now serious, then light; now comical, then satirical; now more elaborate, then remiss; as the present subject required, or as at that time I was affected. And if thou vouchsafe to read this treatise, it shall seem no otherwise to thee than the way to an ordinary Traveller, sometimes fair, sometimes foul; here champaign, there inclosed; barren in one place, better soil in another: by woods, groves, hills, dales, plains, &c. I shall lead thee "through the steeps of mountains, and the slipperiness of valleys, through the dew of lawns, and the clods of the fields," through variety of objects, that which thou shalt like and surely dislike. [Transcription and translations by John F. Tinkler]
Perchance he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows not it tolls for him; and perchance I may think myself so much better than I am, as that they who are about me and see my state may have caused it to toll for me, and I know not that. The church is catholic, universal, so are all her actions; all that she does belongs to all. When she baptizes a child, that action concerns me; for that child is thereby connected to that head which is my head too, and ingrafted into the body whereof I am a member. And when she buries a man, that action concerns me: all mankind is of one author and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated. God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another. As therefore the bell that rings a sermon calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come, so this bell calls us all; but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness. There was a contention as far as a suit (in which piety and dignity, religion and estimation, were mingled) which of the religious orders should ring to prayers first in the morning; and it was determined that they should ring first that rose earliest. If we understand aright the dignity of this bell that tolls for our evening prayer, we would be glad to make it ours by rising early, in that application, that it might be ours as well as his whose indeed it is. The bell doth toll for him that thinks it doth; and though it intermit again, yet from that minute that that occasion wrought upon him, he is united to God. Who casts not up his eye to the sun when it rises? but who takes off his eye from a comet when that breaks out? Who bends not his ear to any bell which upon any occasion rings? but who can remove it from that bell which is passing a piece of himself out of this world? No man is an island. entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. Neither can we call this a begging of misery or a borrowing of misery, as though we are not miserable enough of ourselves but must fetch in more from the next house, in taking upon us the misery of our neighbors. Truly it were an excusable covetousness if we did; for affliction is a treasure, and scarce any man hath enough of it. No man hath afflicion enough that is not matured and ripened by it, and made fit for God by that affliction. If a man carry treasure in bullion, or in a wedge of gold, and have none coined into current moneys, his treasure will not defray him as he travels. Tribulation is treasure in the nature of it, but it is not current money in the use of it, except we get nearer and nearer our home, heaven, by it. Another man may be sick too, and sick to death, and this affliction may lie in his bowels as gold in a mine and be of no use to him; but this bell that tells me of his affliction digs out and applies that gold to me, if by this consideration of another's dangers I take mine own into conteplation and so secure myself by making my recourse to my God, who is our only security.
Periods are beautiful when they are not too long; for so they have their strength too, as in a pike or javelin. As we must take care that our words and sense be clear; so, if the obscurity happen through the hearers', or readers' want of understanding, I am not to answer for them; no more than for their not listening or marking; I must neither find them ears, nor mind. But a man cannot put a word so in sense, but something about it will illustrate it, if the writer understands himself. For order helps much to perspicuity, as confusion hurts. . . . We shold therefore speak what we can, the nearest way, so as we keep our gait, not leap; for tooshort may as well be not let into the memory, as too long not kept in. [Transcription by John F. Tinkler]
Amidst those deepe and retired thoughts, which with every man Christianly instructed, ought to be most frequent, of God, and of his miraculous ways, and works, amongst men, and of our Religion and Worship, to be perform'd to him; after the story of our Saviour Christ, suffering to the lowest bent of weaknesse, in the Flesh, and presently triumphing to the highest pitch of glory, in the Spirit, which drew up his body also, till we in both be united to him in the Revelation of his Kingdome: I do not know of any thing more worthy to take up the whole passion of pitty, on the one side, and joy on the other, than to consider first, the foule and sudden corruption, and then after many a tedious age, the long-deferr'd, but much more wonderfull and happy reformation of the Church in these latter dayes. Sad it is to thinke how that Doctrine of the Gospel, planted by teachers Divinely inspir'd, and by them winnow'd, and sifted, from the chaffe of overdated Ceremonies, and refin'd to such a Spirituall height, and temper of purity, and knowledge of the Creator, that the body, with all the circumstances of time and place, were purifi'd by the affections of the regenerat Soule, and nothing left impure, but sinne; Faith needing not the weak, and fallible office of the Senses, to be either the Ushers, or Interpreters, of heavenly Mysteries, save where our Lord himselfe in his Sacraments ordain'd; that such a Doctrine should through the grossness, and blindnesse, of her Professors, and the fraud of deceivable traditions, drag so downwards, as to backslide one way into the Jewish beggary, of old case rudiments, and stumble forward another way into the new-vomited Paganisme of sensuall Idolatry, attributing purity, or impurity, to things indifferent, that they might bring the inward acts of the Spirit to the outward, and customary ey-Service of the body, as if they could make God earthly, and fleshly, because they could not make themselves heavenly, and Spirituall: they began to drawe downe all the Divine intercours, betwixt God, and the Soule, yea, the very shape of God himselfe, into an exterior, and bodily forme, urgently pretending a necessity, and obligement of joyning the body in a formall reverence, and Worship circumscrib'd, they hallow'd it, they fum'd it, they sprincl'd it, they be deck't it, not in robes of pure innocency, but of pure Linnen, with other deformed, and fantastik dresses in Palls, and Miters, gold, and guegaws fetcht from Arons old wardrobe, or the Flamins vestry; then was the Priest set to con his motions, and his Postures his Liturgies, and his Lurries, till the Soule by this meanes of over-bodying her selfe, given up justly to fleshly delights, bated her wing apace downeward: and finding the ease she had from her visible, and sensuous collegue the body in performance of Religious duties, her pineons now broken, and flagging, shifted off from her selfe, the labour of high soaring any more, forgot her heavenly flight, and left the dull, and droyling carcas to plod on in the old rode, and drudging Trade of outward conformity. [Transcription by John F. Tinkler]
Master Hartlib,
Ch. 1: 1. Thus saith the Lord, I inform you, that I overturn,
overturn, overturn. And as the Bishops, Charles, and the Lords,
have had their turn, overturn, so your turn shall be next (ye
surviving great ones) by what Name or Title soever dignified or
distinguished) who ever you are, that oppose me, the Eternall
God, who am UNIVERSALL Love, and whose service is perfect
freedom, and pure Libertinisme.
2. But afore I proceed any further, be it known to you, That
although that excellent Majesty, which dwells in the Writer of
this Roule, hath reconciled ALL THINGS to himselfe, yet this hand
(which now writes) never drew sword, or shed one drop of any mans
blood. (I am free from the blood of all men) though (I say) all
things are reconciled to me, the eternall God (IN HIM) yet sword
levelling, or digging-leveling, are neither of them his
principle.
Both are as farre from his principle, as the east is from
the West, or the Heavens from the earth, (though, I say,
reconciled to both, as to all things else) and though he hath
more justice, righteousnesse, truth, and sincerity, shining in
those low dung-hils, (as they are esteemed) then in the sunne,
Moone, and all the Stars.
3. I come not forth (in him) either with material sword, or
Mattock, but now (in this my day---) I make him my Sword-bearer,
to brandish the Sword of the Spirit, as he hath done severall
dayes and nights together, thorow the streets of the great City.
4. And now thus saith the Lord: 5. Behold,
behold, behold, I the eternall God, the Lord of Hosts, who am that might
Leveller, am comming (yea even at the doores) to Levell in good earnest,
to levell to some purpose, to levell with a witnesse, to levell the Hills
with the Valleys, and to lay the Mountains low. [Transcription by John F.
Tinkler]
The new president and Martin, being little beloved, of weake
judgement in dangers, and less industrie in peace, committted
managing of all things abroad to Captaine Smith: who by his owne
example, good words, and faire promises, set some to mow, others
to binde thatch, some to build houses, others to thatch them,
himselfe always bearing the greatest taske for his own share, so
that in short time, he provided most of them lodgings, neglecting
any for himselfe. This done, seeing the Salvages superfluitie
beginne to decrease (with some of his workmen) shipped himselfe
in the Shallop to search the Country for trade. The want of the
language, knowledge to mannage his boat without sailes, the want
of a sufficient power, (knowing the multitude of the Salvages)
apparell for his men, and other necessaries, were infinite
impediments, yet no discouragement. [Transcription by John F.
Tinkler]
After they had injoyed faire winds and weather for a season, they
were incountred many times with crosse winds, and mette with many feirce
stormes, with which the shipe was shroudly shaken, and her upper works
made very leakie; and one of the maine beames in the midd ships was bowed
and craked, which put them in some fear that the shipe could not be able
to performe the vioage. . . . [Transcription by John F. Tinkler]
ABIEZER COPPE. A Fiery Flying Roll.
1649.
[Note: In the early years of the English Revolution (late 1640s),
numerous groups formed in what was a great ferment of
intellectual, religious, and political experimentation that soon
worried the new Revolutionary authorities. Especially famous were
the "Levellers," some of whom were associated with the army,
while others (the "Diggers," or "True levellers") were pacifists
who embarked on a communal agrarian experiment. From these groups
came a great outpouring of radical writing which was soon
censored by the new authorities (against Milton's famous
objections in Areopagitica). Coppe is known to us as one of the
most notorious of the "Ranters," another group of early
Revolutionary radicals. His Fiery Roll was condemned by
Parliament, and ordered to be collected and burned.]IZAAK WALTON. The Compleat Angler
1653.
from Ch. 4: And next you are to note, that till the sun gets to such a
height as to warm the earth and the water, the Trout is sick, and lean,
and lousy, and unwholesome; for you shall in winter find him to have a big
head, and then to be lank, and thin, and lean; at which time many of them
have sticking on them Sugs, or Trout-lice, which is a kind of worm, in
shape like a clove or a pin with a big head, and sticks close to him and
sucks his moisture; those I think the Trout breeds himself, and never
thrives till he free himself from them, which is till warm weather comes,
and then as he grows stronger, he gets from the dead, still water, into
the sharp streams and the gravel, and there rubs off these worms and lice:
and then as he grows stronger, so he gets him into swifter and swifter
streams, and there lies at the watch for any fly or minnow that comes near
to him; and he especially loves the May-fly, which is bred of the Cod-worm
or Caddis; and these make the Trout bold and lusty, and he is usually
fatter, and better meat at the end of the month, than at any time of the
year. [Transcription by John F. Tinkler] [Captain] JOHN SMITH. The General History of
Virginia. 1624.1
3.2: Being thus left to our fortunes, it fortuned that within ten
dayes scarce ten amongst us could either goe, or well stand, such
extreame weaknes and sicknes oppressed us. And thereat none need
marvaile, if they consider the cause and reason, which was this;
whiles the ships stayed, our allowance was somewhat bettered, by
a daily proportion of Bisket, which the sailers would pilfer to
sell, give, or exchange with us, for money, Saxefras, furres, or
love. But when they departed, there remained neither taverne,
beere house, nor place of reliefe, but the common Kettell. Had we
beene as free from all sinnes as gluttony, and drunkennesse, we
might have been canonized for Saints; But our President would
never have beene admitted, for ingrossing to his private,
Oatmeale, Sacke, Oyle, Aquavitae, Beefe, Egges, or what not, but
the Kettell; that indeed he allowed equally to be distributed,
and that was halfe a pint of wheat, and as much barely boyled
with water for a man a day, and this having fryed some 26 weekes
in the ships hold, contained as many wormes as graines; so that
we might truely call it rather so much bran then corne, our
drinke was water, our lodgings Castles in the ayre: with this
lodging and dyet, our extreame toile in bearing and planting
Pallisadoes, so strained and bruised us, and our continuall
labour in the extremities of the heat had so weakned us, as were
cause sufficient to have made us as miserable in our native
Countrey, or any other place in the world. . . .
WILLIAM BRADFORD. The History of Plimmoth
Plantation. 1630-46
Ch.9: Sept 6: These troubles being blowne over, and now all
being compacte togeather in one shipe, they put to sea againe
with a prosperous winde, which continued diverce days togeather,
which was some incouragement unto them; yet according to the
usuall maner many were afflicted with sea-sicknes. And I may not
omite hear a spetiall worke of Gods providence. There was a proud
and very profane yonge man, one of the sea-men, of a lustie, able
body, which made him the more hauty; he would allway be
contemning the poore people in their sicknes, and cursing them
dayly with greevous execrations, and did not let to tell them,
that he hoped to help to cast halfe of them over board before
they came to their jurneys end, and to make merry with what they
had; and if he were by any gently reproved, he would curse and
swear most bitterly. But it pleased God before they came halfe
seas over, to smite this yong man with a greevous disease, of
which he dyed in a desperate maner, and so was him self the first
that was throwne overbord. Thus his curses light on his owne
head; and it was an astonishment to all his fellow, for they
noted it to be the just hand of God upon him.