desire any kind of slavery, but that the quality of the master something graces the condition of the slave.

But if we consider it rightly what our duty, our engagements, and our honour exact from us, both our safety and our interest oblige us to, and it is as unanswerable in us to discretion, as it is to virtue, to let this viper live. For first, he knows very well it is only we that have the power to hurt him, and therefore of us he will take any course to secure himself he is conscious to himself how falsely and perfidiously he hath dealt with us, and therefore he will always fear that from our revenge which he knows he hath so well deserved.

Lastly, he knows our principles, how directly contrary they are to that arbitrary power he must govern by, and therefore he may reasonably suspect that we that have already ventured our lives against tyranny will always have the will, when we have the opportunity, to do the same again.

These considerations will easily persuade him to secure himself of us, if we prevent him not, and secure ourselves of him. He reads in his practice of piety, "chi diviene patron," &c.: he that makes himself master of a city that hath been accustomed to liberty, if he destroys it not, he must expect to be destroyed by it. And we may read too in the same author, and believe him, that those that are the occasion that one becomes powerful he always ruins

E

them if they want the wit and courage to secure themselves.

Now as to our interest, we must never expect that he will ever trust those that he hath provoked and feared; he will be sure to keep us down, lest we should pluck down him. It is the rule that tyrants observe when they are in power, never to make much use of those that helped them to it; and indeed it is their interest and security not to do it, for those that have been the authors of their greatness, being conscious of their own merit, they are bold with the tyrant, and less industrious to please him. They think all he can do for them is their due, and still they expect more; and when they fail in their expectations—as it is impossible to satisfy them-their disappointment makes them discontented, and their discontent is dangerous. Therefore all tyrants follow the example of Dionysius, who was said to use his friends as he did his bottles: when he had use for them he kept them by him, and when he had none, that they should not trouble him and lie in his way, he hung them up.

But, to conclude this already over-long paper: let every man to whom God hath given the spirit of wisdom and courage be persuaded by his honour, his safety, his own good, and his country's, and indeed the duty he owes to his generation and to mankind, to endeavour by all rational means to free

the world of this pest. Let not other nations have the occasion to think so meanly of us as if we resolved to sit still and have our ears bored, or that any discouragement or disappointments can ever make us desist from attempting our liberty, till we have purchased it, either by this monster's death or by our own. Our nation is not yet so barren of virtue that we want noble examples to follow amongst ourselves. The brave Sindercombe hath shown as great a mind as any old Rome could boast of; and had he lived there his name had been registered with Brutus and Cato, and he had had his statues as well as they.

But I will not have so sinister an opinion of ourselves, as little generosity as slavery hath left us, as to think so great a virtue can want its monuments even amongst us. Certainly in every virtuous mind there are statues reared to Sindercombe. Whenever we read the elegies of those that have died for their country; when we admire those great examples of magnanimity that have tired tyrants' cruelties; when we extol their constancies, whom neither bribes nor terrors could make betray their friends; it is then we erect Sindercombe's statues, and grave him monuments, where all that can be said of a great and noble mind we justly make an epitaph for him. And though the tyrant caused him to be smothered, lest the people should hinder an open murder, yet he will never be able either to smother his memory

or his own villany. His poison was but a poor and common device, to impose only on those that understood not tyrants' practices, and are unacquainted, if any be, with his cruelties and falsehoods. He may

therefore if he please take away the stake from Sindercombe's grave, and if he have a mind it should be known how he died, let him send thither the pillows and feather-beds with which Barkstead and his hangman smothered him. But, to conclude: let not this monster think himself the more secure that he hath suppressed one great spirit; he may be confident that "longus post illum sequitur ordo idem petentium decus."

There is a great roll behind, even of those that are in his own muster-rolls, that are ambitious of the name of the deliverers of their ccuntry; and they know what the action is that will purchase it. His bed, his table, is not secure; and he stands in need of other guards to defend him against his own. Death and destruction pursue him wheresoever he goes they follow him everywhere, like his fellowtravellers, and at last they will come upon him like armed men. Darkness is hid in his secret places, a fire not blown shall consume him; it shall go ill with him that is left in his tabernacle. He shall flee from the iron weapon, and a bow of steel shall strike him through, because he hath oppressed and forsaken the poor, because he hath violently taken away a house which he builded not. We may be con

fident, and so may he, that ere long all this will be accomplished: for the triumphing of the wicked is but short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment. Though his Excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reacheth unto the clouds, yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung. that have seen him shall say, Where is he?

They