send that brave to our Jerusalem, offering to lend her two thousand horses, if she be able for her part to set riders upon them. We know how Darius got the Persian empire from the rest of his fellow-peers by the first neighing of his generous steed. It were no harm if, in some needless suits of intricate precedency betwixt equal gentlemen, the priority were adjudged to him who keeps a stable of most serviceable horses.

He furnisheth and prepareth himself in peace against time of war, lest it be too late to learn when his skill is to be used. He approves himself courageous when brought to the trial, as well remembering the custom which is used at the creation of Knights of the Bath, wherein the king's master-cook cometh forth, and presenteth his great knife to the new-made knights, admonishing them to be faithful and valiant, otherwise he threatens them that that very knife is prepared to cut off their spurs.

If the commission of the peace finds him out, he faithfully discharges it. I say, finds him out; for a public office is a guest which receives the best usage from them who never invited it. And though he declined the place, the country knew to prize his worth, who would be ignorant of his own. He compounds many petty differences betwixt his neighbors, which are easier ended in his own porch than

in Westminster Hall: for many people think, if once they have fetched a warrant from a justice, they have given earnest to follow the suit, though otherwise the matter be so mean that the next night's sleep would have bound both parties to the peace, and made them as good friends as ever before. Yet

He connives not at the smothering of punishable faults. He hates that practice, as common as dangerous amongst country people, who, having received again the goods which were stolen from them, partly out of foolish pity, and partly out of covetousness to save charges in prosecuting the law, let the thief escape unpunished. Thus, whilst private losses are repaired, the wounds to the commonwealth (in the breach of the laws) are left uncured; and thus petty larceners are encouraged into felons, and afterwards are hanged for pounds, because never whipped for pence, who, if they had felt the cord, had never been brought to the halter.

If chosen a member of Parliament, he is willing to do his country service. If he be no rhetorician to raise affections, (yea, Mercury was a greater speaker than Jupiter himself,) he counts it great wisdom to be the good manager of yea and nay. The slow pace of his judgment is recompensed by the swift following of his affections, when his judgment is once

soundly informed. And here we leave him in consultation, wishing him, with the rest of his honorable society, all happy success.

THE VIRTUOUS LADY.

describe a holy state without a virtuous lady therein, were to paint out a year without a spring: we come therefore to her char

acter.

She sets not her face so often by her glass as she composeth her soul by God's word, which hath all the excellent qualities of a glass indeed.

1. It is clear; in all points necessary to salvation, except to such whose eyes are blinded.

2. It is true; not like those false glasses some ladies dress themselves by. And how common is flattery, when even glasses have learnt to be parasites !

3. It is large; presenting all spots cap-a-pie behind and before, within and without.

4. It is durable; though in one sense it is broken too often (when God's laws are neglected), yet it will last to break them that break it, and one tittle thereof shall not fall to the ground.

5. This glass hath power to smooth the

wrinkles, cleanse the spots, and mend the faults it discovers.

She walks humbly before God in all religious duties. Humbly; for she well knows that the strongest Christian is like the city of Rome, which was never besieged but it was taken; and the best saint without God's assistance would be as often foiled as tempted. She is most constant and diligent at her hours of private prayer. Queen Catharine Dowager

never kneeled on a cushion when she was at her devotions: this matters not at all; our lady is more careful of her heart than of her knees, that her soul be settled aright.

She is careful and most tender of her credit and reputation. There is a tree in Mexicana which is so exceedingly tender that a man cannot touch any of his branches but it withers presently. A lady's credit is of equal niceness: a small touch may wound and kill it which makes her very cautious what company she keeps. The Latin tongue seems somewhat injurious to the feminine sex; for whereas therein amicus is a friend, amica always signifies a sweetheart; as if their sex in reference to men were not capable of any other kind of familiar friendship but in way to marriage: which makes our lady avoid all privacy with suspicious company.

Yet is she not more careful of her own

credit than of God's glory; and stands up valiantly in the defence thereof. She hath read how, at the coronation of King Richard the Second, Dame Margaret Dimock, wife to Sir John Dimock, came into the court and claimed the place to be the king's champion. by the virtue of the tenure of her manor of Scrinelby in Lincolnshire, to challenge and defy all such as opposed the king's right to the crown. But if our lady hears any speaking disgracefully of God or religion, she counts herself bound by her tenure (whereby she holds possession of grace here, and reversion of glory hereafter) to assert and vindicate the honor of the King of Heaven, whose champion she professeth to be. One may be a lamb in private wrongs, but in hearing general affronts to goodness, they are asses which are not lions.

She is pitiful and bountiful to people in distress. We read how a daughter of the Duke of Exeter invented a brake or cruel rack to torment people withal, to which purpose it was long reserved, and often used in the Tower of London, and commonly called (was it not fit so pretty a babe should bear her mother's name?) the Duke of Exeter's Daughter. Methinks the finding out of a salve to ease poor people in pain had borne better proportion to her ladyship than to have been the inventor of instruments of cruelty.