THOUSAND FAMOUS THINGS 285
Something Has Seen Gained
THEIR works follow them—as I think this Oliver Cromwell's works
have done and are still doing. Somewhat has been gained for
poor mankind. Men's ears are not now slit off; star chambers,
branding irons, are gone. Carlyle
On the Storm in which Cromwell Died
WE must resign ! Heaven his great soul does claim
In storms as loud as his immortal fame ;
His dying groans, his last breath, shake our isle.
And trees uncut fall for his funeral pile.
Edmund Waller
GJiarles Stuarfs Advice to His Son
SON, If these papers come to your hands, they may be so far useful
to you as to state your judgment aright in what hath passed ;
and they may also give you some directions how to remedy the present
distempers, and prevent the like for time to come.
I had rather you should be Charles le Bon than le Grand, Good
than Great; I hope God hath designed you to be both.
With God I would have you begin and end, who is King of Kings,
the Sovereign Disposer of the kingdoms of the world, who pulleth
down one and setteth up another. The best government and highest
sovereignty you can attain to is to be subject to Him3 that the
sceptre of His word and spirit may rule in your heart.
The true glory of princes consists in advancing God's glory, in the
maintenance of true religion and the Churchss good ; also in the
dispensation of civil power with justice and honour to the public peace.
Take heed of abetting any factions, or applying to any public
discriminations in matters of religion, contrary to what is in your
judgment and the Church well settled. Your partial adhering to any
one side gains you not so great advantage in some men's hearts (who
are prone to be of their King's religion) as It loseth you in others.
Take such a course as may either with calmness and charity quite
remove seeming differences and offences by impartiality ; or so order
affairs that you shall not need to fear or flatter any faction. For if
ever you stand in need of them, or must stand to their courtesies,
you are undone : the serpent will devour the dove.
When you have done justice to God, your own soul, and His
Church, in the profession and preservation both of truth and unity in
religion, the next main hinge on which your prosperity will depend
and move is that of civil justice, wherein the settled laws of these