THat Business of Secluding His Royal Highness from the Imperial CROWN of England, is a matter of so high concern to this our British world, yea, and in its example to the larger Continent; And being the repeated desires of the Commons in some successive Parliaments, it may be thought too great a boldness, for any single man on this side Tweed, to concern himself therewith. But under favour, as all the Subjects in the three Kingdoms, will or may, some one way or other, be interessed in the Effects and Sequel of this Affair; so it is hoped, that none can justly blame any, who is a Subject to the Monarch of Great Britain, modestly to endeavour the satisfaction of his Reason, Judge­ment, and Conscience, in this so great a Resolve; Especially when it was but a hatching, and under deliberation. And though once hastily passed the Vote of the Commons: never yet agreed unto by the Peers, and by His Majestie's Prorogations taken altogether off the File: And now that a new Parliament is within a day or two, to sit at Oxford, which consisting most­ly of the same Members, perhaps it may be feared, they will bring with them the same minds, and fall again upon the Succession, though it is to be wished by all good and peaceable men, that they would study so far to comply with His Majestie's Proposals, as not to irritat Him to any further Prorogati­ons or Dissolutions.

Allow me then freely Sir, to propose to you, my weak thoughts upon this so tender a point, equally important to the quiet of His Majesties Kingdoms, and the duty of His Subjects, that I may from your better judgement be either fortified in my grounds, or resolved of my doubts and questions. First then, as in all Cases of this nature (for the better avoiding of needless wranglings hereafter) let the Question be fairely stated, which I humbly conceive may be thus: Whether or not a Prince, of a Religion differing from that by the Laws of the Land established (be he Popish, Heretick, or Idolater) may lawfully (conform to the Principles, and Precepts of our Reformed Protestant Pro­fession) by the people or their Representatives in Parliament, whereunto even at last the King should be induced to consent, be (I say) lawfully seclu­ded from His Birthright and Inheritance? where I understand the term Law­fully as consonant to the true Rules of Justice and Equity, and not as an act of a Legislative power only.

I stick not here then upon that Cob-web'd limitation of Birthright, to him only that first openeth the womb; and as little upon that quibling Distinction of Heirs Presumptive and Apparent, seing the Law sayes, Haereditas non tantum ad proximum haeredem, sed ad ulteriores defer­tur: And if his Highness be not in the Case, the next Heir, why are the Commons so pressing for his Seclusion? And as none, I hope, will deny his Title by [Page 4] Blood, so as little need I to prove, that the Imperial CROWN of England is an Hereditary Crown, which descends to the lawfull Successors, by all Laws and Rights of Nature, Nations, and the Land, as their undoubted Birthright and just Inheritance, without exception of, or relation to Sex, Age, Quali­fication, Limitation or Restriction whatsomever. So you will yield me (I hope) that the next appparent Heir of such an Hereditary Crown, hath at least Spem Succedendi, which is to him Jus quoddam, as in all other He­ritages.

So then, this Seclusion being Exhaeredatio, it falls to be considered, what is necessarily required before such a disinheriting can be in my sence Law­full. And I hope you will grant, that Omnis Exhaeredans debet habere Ex­haeredatum sua in Potestate. I know there be who would thirle this Theo­reme to the Patria Potestas only, which yet from the deductions of clear sense and reason, must be equally extensive to all who challenge a just pow­er and right to Disinherit. And I suppose I need not here demur upon that distinction, betwixt a naked and supine Preterition, and an active and formal Exclusion. And so will next come to be considered, How far the apparent Heir of an Hereditary Crown, is under the power of the People or Parliament, in order to the Disinheriting him from the Crown of his Ancestors, due unto him by his right of Blood; for we are not here in Regno constituendo, but in Regno haereditario jamdudum legitime consti­tuto.

Then I say, that the apparent Heir of such an Hereditary CROWN, cannot be Disinherited by the People or Parliament: because that Power which can Disinherit, can also make and constitute. For, Qui potest hare­dem praeterire aut exhaeredare, potest etiam haeredem sibi instituere. And should the People, Commons, or Parliament, be but once gratified in this Point, it is to be feared, they might be tempted to assume to themselves other things.

So that here the Commons cannot Exhaeredare, because that were well nigh to give the People a Power to make and unmake Kings at their plea­sure, and so unsensibly unhinge the Hereditary Monarchy, that it would at last lodge the Supremacy in the Populace.

And though the Commons should in a forward zeal, hastily pass such a Vote, yet the Peers could not agree to it; because at the CORONATION of the KING, in their Oath of Homage and Fealty, they swear to be faithful and true to the Crowned King, and His Heirs Kings of England: yea not only the Peers, but all the Feudataries in the Realm, who hold their Land of the Crown in Capite, are by the nature of their Investitures tyed to this Fealty, whether the Oath be formally administred or not: and whereof the first indispensible branch is by the Lawyers worded, quod fidelis Domino suo & Haeredibus ejus erit in perpetuum. How then can any Peer who was present at the CORONATION, or yet any Feudata­ry, who holds his Estate in Capite of the Crown, by a free and voluntary act of his own, vote the Disinheriting and Secluding of the righteous Heir, and undoubted Successor? For questionless this Fealty, maugre all the Alpha­betical niceties of Domino vero meo, &c. stands from the Obligations of [Page 5] Gratitude, beyond all Equivocation, conscientiously binding to the Suc­cessors of blood in all the Negative tyes, though the duties to the present Superior be stronger in the Positives.

Neither could His Majesty passe, or give consent to such an act, Because by His Coronation-Oath, He swears to maintain the Subject in His Right, Liber­ty, and Property. And since his Highness is His Majesties Subject (though one of His Greatest & Noblest Subjects) and that as an apparent Heir, he hath Spem suc­cedendi, and that the CROWN is an ancient Hereditary Crown: The KING cannot take away His only Brothers Spem succedendi, Because it is by blood, his undoubted right, from the unalterable Law of Nature, ratified by the Law of Nations and secured by the Law of the Land, and nature of the Crown, which is Hereditary, and which fixes it beyond the fears of being altered by either King or Parliament from that Paradoxical State-immortalitie of an Hereditary Monarch. And if an Act of Parliament can alter the Succes­sion, by excluding or passing by the righteous Heir; dare I ask if an Act of Parliament could clip the Commons in their Magna Carta, could but the King and Peers fall upon a packed Rump, or a Marvellous Parliament that could work wonders, though under the Epithet of Indoctum or In­sanum.

Yea, should the King, Peers, and Commons agree, to passe such a Bill in Act, yet would such an act of Seclusion, be but in it self void and null, Because it would be contra jus Coronae that great Law, which virtually and Originally, is a parcel of the Law of the Land, and that part of their Common Law, which hath the precedence of all Laws and Customs of England. And if omnis actus Parliamenti, vel consuetudo Regni; quae se ex­altet in Praerogativam Regis, be said to be void in Law, how binding will an Act of Seclusion be, which strikes not only against the Right and Prerogative, but undermines the very Nature and Beeing of an Heredi­tary Crown.

And as for his Highness being of a different Religion, and the great noise rais'd upon that. First, To differ in perswasions of Religion, while men retain the general name of Christian, does not make up a Crime, Merito­rious of Seclusion. Secondly, Religion it self, under whatever notion, is neither essentially constitutive, or indispensibly seclusive of Magistracy, where the Royalty is Supreame, and Hereditary. For, should an appa­rent Heir be disinherited by a Protestant Parliament, for being a Papist, why not a Prelatick heir by a Presbyeterian Parliament? And why not a Presbyterian by an Independant, an Independant by an Anabaptist, and he by a Quaker, and so on. Is not this not only to found Dominion in Grace, but even Property and heritage, in Grace. For an Hereditary Crown, is by Birth­right so far the Successors property & heritage, as that by all laws, he lawfully Succeds to the same Jure sanguinis et haereditario, in right of his Progenitors. And if a Prince may be thus Secluded from his Inheritance, for difference of Religion, why should not the same be extended to all others, who claim any Heritage by right of Blood from their Predecessors? For, ubi eadem ratio, ibi idem jus, and so a Popish Son should not succeed to his Prote­stant Fathers Estate: & sic de caeteris. And it would be seriously consi­dered, what a door this opens to the Papists, for that principle of depo­sing and disinheriting of Heretical Kings. And I suspect the Doctrinal dif­ference [Page 6] betwixt Secluding and Deposing in this present Case in hand, is but too Metaphysical for sound Christian Politicks, and all the Argu­ments that ever I yet heard, for that way of disinheriting, by an Act of Seclusion, were all but ab incommodo, inconveniencies, jealousies and fears; which I fear can never justifie Protestant Subjects, to take away the Birth­right from their lawful and Hereditary Prince.

For, as Magistracy is an Emanation of Gods power, as Creator, who is thereby pleased to Govern and preserve the World from Confusion. The difference of Religion does not nullifie his Office, as by our Confession of Faith is justly acknowledged: so Inheritance being a Gift of Gods bounty and providence from him as Almighty, and as he manifests his Dispensati­ons, or as the Schoolmen phrase it, as he is pleased to act in Regno Naturae; difference in Religion (I say) does not hinder either wicked or Heretical persons or Kings, to inherit their Estates, Civil Powers, Dignities, and He­reditary Crowns, because Religion stands lifted under the Collours of Re­guum Gratiae, whose Laws are not destructive to the Laws of Nature and Nations, according to the trit saying jus Gratiae non tollit jus Naturae vel Gentium. So let us not, for the securing of our Kingdoms, from fears of dubious events, presume to confound the diversified (though fixed) me­thods used, or offer to remove the Land-marks set, by Jehovah Zebaoth, in the managing of his Kingdoms of Nature and grace.

For I do a little doubt, if too forward a zeal for the preservation of the Protestant Religion, or of any Religion that flows from Christ the Son, as Saviour and Mediator, will justifie the taking away from our Prince and Neighbour, that which by the Laws of Nature, Nations and the Land, he hath gotten bestowed upon him, by the bounty, favour, and providence of God the Father, as Creator and Preserver of the Univerese, and the great and eternally loving Benefactor to mankind.

And will it not be a harsh reflection upon the Protestant Religion, that it cannot be secured, unless its Professors run into the same ways so much by themselves condemned in some of the Papists. For I look upon the dis­inheriting of the Apparent Heir, as much of kin to their Deposing of Kings not of their own perswasion. And believe me the Birthright and Blood of Princes stand not many steps distant; and we have an ordinary saying, who takes away my livelyhood, takes away my life. And if the Birthright of an he­reditary Prince, be not his livelyhood, sure it is his honour, and the ho­nour of a Prince is the life of a Prince.

And the Protestant Religion will be driven to a hard pull, if we cannot keep it but by breaking some of the Rules and Precepts of it, and away with that ex duobus malis, &c. where the Election is allowed only in malis Poenae, but can in no Christianity be extended ad mala Peccati. For says not Paul, We should not do evil that good may come of it. And if it be an evil, or injury to take from a man his Birthright, why should that injury be done to His Royal Highness, seing it is said by Divines that injuriam homini eti­am scelestissimo facere, nemo sine peccato potest. And should the people in their Representatives, be but once authorized to Seclude an hereditary Prince from his Royal Office and Dignity, it might be feared, they would [Page 7] itch to do the like, to the function and very foundations of Government it self: a near and recent parallel instance whereof, we have fresher in our memories then it needs to be named.

And to represent to His Majesty, that there is no securing of the Prote­stant Religion, except he condescend to the Seclusion of His only Brother, seems first, to be a strnage limitation of the Holy one of Israel; For, what if his Highness should quit his perswasion? or what if His Majesty should Sur­vive? secondly, Does not this look too like a prescribing unto the pru­dence of other Parliaments: For what if subsequent Parliaments might fall upon smoother and calmer Methods for equally securing of Religion as Pro­testants, and salving of their duty as Subjects, to the equal Satisfaction of the Christian World, and their own Consciences. Thirdly, Shall the positive advice be no other way, and why the advice, and why so positive? Be there not many Members in the Commons House, who are Feudataries of the Crown, and being honoured in their Parliamentary capacities, to give Coun­cil to the King in arduis Regni, are they not by their Feudal fealty to advise their Lord Paramount to nothing but what is honestum. For this is one of the six by a Homager required, that when admitted to the consults of his Ma­ster, ut quae Domino honesta sunt consulat. Say now then, and say ingenuously, will the expecting World, or after Ages say, that it is honestum for Charles to Seclude and Disinherit James, his only Brother, and in the case of Survi­vage, the only Son of Charles the Martyr, yea the only Heir Male of the Illustrious Royal Line aftermentioned? or by disinteressed or unbyassed per­sons, will it be judg'd altogether honestum, for Feudatory Subjects, again and again, to press the advice of Secluding such an Heir, especially in a for­tuitous event, which may be, or may not be?

I need not I hope tell you Sir, that though here I urge some Arguments from the Feudal Law (pressing enough I conceive upon Vassals who are not willing to hazard a Disclamation of their Honours and property) yet you know I look not upon Monarchy (as betwixt Prince and People) to be with­in the verge of Feudal Contracts, knowing Kingdoms to be extra commerci­um, holding only of the King of Kings.

But if ever it should please God, in his All-wise-dispensations, to suffer the Crown to descend to a Popish Successor, I put the Query, Whether it be more consonant for Protestant Christians to submit to the Almightie's secret will, and bewail our condition, laying our mouths in the dust, while we examine whether or not the abuse of the Protestant Religion in this Isle, making a mask thereof, and alledging grounds therefrom, for rebelling against the best of Princes, might not in some measure have provoked God to suffer a Popish Successor, (which yet whatever be his private opinions I do not here charge upon his Highness,) seing the late unnatural Rebellion, drove his pious Father to that necessity, that he was not able to keep nor maintain His Family, or educat His Children as he would. And belyke earnest supplicati­ons to God (in whose hands are the hearts of Princes, to turn them whetherso­ever he listeth) under an humble sence thereof, might be more Christian, and consisting with the Principles of the Protestant perswasion, then a wilful Se­cluding and disinheriting of him. And whatever may fall out in matter of fact, or what people has done in such cases (for I am only here upon the point of [Page 8] right) sure it was a good observe that was given upon Josiah, that God did in him, blesse the Jewish nation, with one of the best of their Kings, because they rebelled not against, nor did cast off his wicked Predecessors Amon and Manasseh.

I know the English have ready at hand, to instance and urge their late Marian Persecution, with the miserable, bloody, and dismal severities there­of, which I can much easier regrate then justifie or excuse. Yet might I, in behalf of a misled zeale (ordinary to the weaker sex) be but indul­ged to represent, that those times and ours will hardly in all things run parallel. I could Suggest, that Hendrie the eigth, having departed from the Church of Rome, he quitted the stage of the World, before the Pro­testant Profession was in his Kingdoms well settled by Law. And his Son Edward the sixth succeeding young, when most of the Nobility, and many of the Nation stood Popishly affected; the matter of Religion came not in his short Reign to be so legally adjusted. So methinks (without of­fence) I might even out of compassion to a Foeminine frailty (still zealous for their own opinions) wink a little at some shadow of extenuation, in favours of Mary, from the then standing and unrepealed Statutes. But now that it hath pleased God, under the happy Reign of Queen Elizabeth, and her Protestant Successors, to strengthen that Profession by all just and Legal consolidations. Little I should hope may now be feared of altera­tion from his Highness (should he even succeed in a Popish perswasion) since his justice is so not our the World over, that (where he is not pic­pu'd below the Grandeur of His Birth) he glories to be an example of Obedience to the Laws of the Land, and whose interest certainly it will prove not to disturbe them: and who from a tenderness of conscience free­ly allows his Children to be educat, and his Family exercised in the Pro­testant Profession, as by the Laws and Church of England established and injoyned. And who, besides his personal Character, and innate modera­tion stands a little ingaged, in favours of His Race and Ancestors, not to forget the Historians observe, that Stuartorum Genus, was Lene & tempera­tum. Let us then be afraid to refuse the watters of Schiolah, that go softlie least the Lord be tempted, and bring upon us the waters of the River, strong and many, even with the King of Assyria, in all his glory. Nay, rather let us be­times send some of our humors and opinions to be washt at the Pool of Siloam, that so seing our mistakes, we may studie to build and cover the walls thereof, even to to the Stairs that go down to the Citie of our David, nigh to the Kings Garden, then thus foolishlie to fancie any solid rejoicing in some popular Rezius or Re­malialis sones.

But suppose the worst, that a jealous and fearful fancy can suggest, I would gladly ask the directors of our consciences, if it be lawful for Subjects in whatever capacity to reject or refuse their Native and undoubted Prince, for fear of Persecution under His Government, seing God hath gained as much Glory in the perseverance and Martyrdom of His Saints as in any state of the Church Militant whatsomever: And though the dayes of Persecu­tion be hot, sad, and lamentable trials, yet should Christians hazard upon an act of injustice to avoid them when they lie but supposedly lurking under the remoter skirts of jealousies and feares, which depend upon more uncertain events.

Thir few grounds (Sir) with other reasons too large for a Letter do hi­therto sufficiently convince me of the justice of the Peers, in their rejecting the Bill of Seclusion. Not that I desire any wayes to reflect upon the Honou­rable Members of the Commons, who might have gone upon grounds I know not. Thir my reasons and doubts, I only propose for my own satisfaction, Veri investigandi causa, and I hope the Commons will grant, that Parliaments may erre, and that zeal some times may prompt even good men to outrun their duty. And it were worth the while seriously to consider, how far a Seclusi­on of this nature, may be thought to participate of, or dip upon the dan­gerous Principles of Buchanan, Brutus his Vindiciae, Boucherus, Rutherford's Lex Rex, Nepthali, and the Jus Populi vindicatum.

And which makes me still the more admire His Majesties Justice, Piety and Prudence, in His Proposals by His Chancellor, to one of His late Parlia­ments, is, that granting the Act of Seclusion should passe, what further secu­rity can our Protestant Religion be in, by such an Act, then by the Propo­sals made by the King? Nay, surely in a worse condition, from a Successour irritated by an Act of Exclussion, which for my Reasons aforesaid, is but void in Law, and so explained in all emergent Cases of that nature. For can an Act of Parliament, Secluding JAMES of York from the Crown, because a Papist, be of greater force, then was the Act of Richard the 3. against Hen­ry of Richmount, then attainted of Treason? Not here to speak of the Acts concerning the drumbly successon of Henry the 8. And me fears the renew­ing the Bill of Seclusion, will by some be thought hardly well to consist in all things, with the Oath of Supremacie: For if the King be the Supreame Judge, in all Causes and over all Persons, and that his Judgement hath been once and again tryed, and his sentiments sufficiently known in this matter of Secluding his Brother from the Crown, to provoke His Majesty to give his judgment therein again Superiisdem deductis, may by some I say be thought too like a tacit declining of the Kings Supremacy. For what Pedaneous judge will readily alter his sentence upon a Reclamation Super iisdem deductis? and con­sidering the present posture of affairs in Europe, were it not as much for the true interest of the Protestant Religion, that the Parliament should here wave the point of Succession, and fall cordially to consider, and vigorously to com­ply with His Majesties Proposals (trusting God with the event of the two Royal Brothers survivage) then by too obstinately stickling upon so near and dear a concern to the King, lose so many fair opportunities of doing much good to Religion, King and Kingdoms.

And believe me (Sir) I write not thir things as being either Popish or Po­pishly affected, but sincerely from the Observations I have taken up of Christi­anity in its primitive Latitude, before it came to be ranked and rended by an Act of Classis. And needs must I confess, that my zeal participats not so much of the Son of Zebedeus fire, but that I can have charity to think there be many who have given up their names to the Church of Rome, that do not yet believe all the Idolatrous fopperies either practised in, or charged upon her, although I can so far regrate the growth and increase of Popery, that for the surer instructing of the Vulgar, I do heartily wish the old and solid way of Catechetical teaching were more constantly plyed and revived. For the run­ning of a glass upon a desultatory Text, cannot much confirm them and as little does a Polemical discourse edifie an apron'd auditory. Hence take the [Page 10] subtile Jesuits (I fear) too great advantage, under their party-colloured Vizorns to inveigle, deceive, and even to Rebellions debauch, the giddy, unstable, and not well grounded Plebeians. I speak not this any way to reflect upon the Reverend Clergy, but if the Fathers of the Church think fit more seriously to recommend to the Incumbents the Cateehetical way, for their evening exercise, it might (perhaps) in this juncto be of good use to establish the Comonality in the sound grounds of true Christianity.

But to return, let me tell you, His Majestie hath but reason by all just and fair means to defend the Crown, in the true and righteous Heir Male, if he but either memember or consider, that He and His Royal Brother, are by the blessing and Providence of Almighty God, descended of most Roy­al Blood, in a true Line Male, lawfully from Father to Son (Kings, or Princely Cadets) for beyond fifteen entire Centuries. But, let me not be mistaken, For I am not to say that all His Majesties Progenitors were in this account Kings, but that they were all by Agnation Cadets and Descen­dants of the Royal Family, I hope to evince. For as to His descent from King Fergus the first, by some interposition of Daughters, the same is clear, obvious, and beyond contradiction, sufficiently by our Historians and others already established. But here my assertion is repeated, that His Sacred Ma­jesty, and His Royal Brother are lawfully descended from King Ethodius the first, and that by Princes or Princely Descendants in a true Line Male, from Father to Son, as I have already expressed it.

You know then (Sir) that Ethodius the first of that Name, and twen­ty fifth King of SCOTLAND, was Sisters Son to King Mogallus, and Succeeded to His Cousin King Conarus, about the year of our Saviour 162. when the two Collegiat Antonin's Philosophus & Verus govern'd the Roman Impire. So shall I mark Ethodius, and his Succession as followeth, giving the letter K. for King, with the figures to show what number the persons so marked stood in, and to avoid repetitions of Father and Son, be pleas­ed to understand that where the same is not so nominated, the person over­head is still Father to him who is placed next immediately below.

And now you see (Sir) my assertion made good by this Grand Jurie of His Majesties fourty five Progenitors aforenamed, all of them of the Stem, and Line Royal, lawfully descended. And that I may in this Criti­call and censorious Age, be as free of mistakes as possible, Suffer me (good Sir) yet once again to repeat what I have formerly insinuat, that I do not here by this Descent-Male intend to obsfuscat, or in the least prejudge or diminish His Sacred Majesty of his contingency of blood and cognation to all, or any of His hundred and nine Crowned Predecessors, in either their streight descendant or Collateral degrees. For that the Crown of Scotland hath contained in one certain Family, from K. Fergus the first (contempo­rary with the Grecian Monarch Alexander the Great,) is by all our Histo­ries put beyond any dispute. And to suggest any defence against the igno­rance of such who may here mistake the figuring of our Kings in the de­grees from Father to Son, as if the one immediatly succeeded the other, would but impose upon your better knowledge, who does sufficiently under­stand that the elder Collaterials secluded the Descendants (as was then al­so customary in other Northern Nations, untill King Kenneth the 3. Civi­liz'd it to a just succession in the true and immediat Descent.

But should this (Sir) ever go further then your Closet, I little doubt, but some will be apt to say, magno conatu nugas; and that all men are de­scended in a Line Male from Adam, which truly a little Rhetorick could perswade me to believe: but that all are come, or yet so come, of Kings and true Royal Cadets will require more Oratory, before I be proselyted a Leveller. Have I not salv'd His Majesties Descent from His Crowned Pre­decessors, even to our King Fergus the 1. and sufficiently obviat what ob­jections can be rais'd against me there, having here only but singled out the Descent-Male, which as it hath the Preachers blessing, our King even in this branch, being in all its steps still the Son of Nobles, so if the mourning Prophet meant (in that his 35. chap.) any good to Jonadab the son of Rhe­hab: is it not worth the considering, that God hath been pleased to conti­nue the Lawful Posterity of even our last Heathenish King in a true Line Male to this very day, especially now, when His Majesty is so frequently Addres­sed to Seclude his only Brother, who equally enjoys the same blessing with himself. But the Men of Shaftsburie, with Gallio, will care for none of those things, it matters the less if His Sacred Majesty should, who might graci­ously perhaps allow it to add one grain of weight to his fixed royal kindness, for the fourty fifth man child, from the Loyns of the first Ethodius, without any Female interruption, for beyond fifteen hundred years.

Yet seing even in this Branch of His Majesties Pedegree above represent­ed, I do not in all things agree with the more constant tradition, I beg your leave (Sir) to mark where I differ, intreating you would but patiently hear my reasons, wherein I shall endeavour to be as brief as the clearing of the matter will permit.

But as I am writing, One tells me, it will be thought arrogant presum­ption in me to alter the received Opinion, or to controvert with Buchanan, Boes, or Skeen, Good Lord! shall we live in an Age, wherein there is so much noise for the liberty of the Subject, and yet be denyed the liberty of [Page 13] reason, or reasoning in the enquiry of truth? I hope there be many good Protestants who will not presse me to believe all the legendary tales in Boes; and I am perswaded, there be many Loyal Subjects, who will not advise me to assent to all that Buchanan wrote; and I hope common reason will convince any man, that in Antiquities, which consists in matter of fact, it is safer to pin our faith upon old Charters truly expede by the Granters, and in the times to which they relate, then upon the looser sheets of pri­vate Historians, writing but some Centuries after, who belike if they kept the general threed of the story, did not much either examine or no­tice the particularities or Genealogies of Families; yea, and in some things here controverted, our Antiquaries do not agree with our Historians; and should you, and I, Sir, to gratifie their mistaken opinions, Mahomet-like, hang between?

But to the matter in hand; Boes sayes, Fincormachus was the Son of Cor­machus, and here I place him son to Donald 2. well, we agree however in the main assertion. For if Cormachus was Cousin-german to Crathilinthus, and Brother to Findocus, (for Boes calls him Patruus) Athirco the Grand­father behooved to be the common Stipes, and so is yet salved the de­scent in a Line Male. But if Cormachus was son of Athirco (which he be­hoved to be, if he was Patruus to Crathilinthus) why might not Boes have made his Uncle Dorus carry him also away from the cruelty of Natholocus, with his three Brothers Findocus, Carantius and Donaldus? But alace! Bo­es himself (except in this present case) doth with all our other Historians give Athirco no moe sons then the three I have just now named. But the truth is, That our King, who immediatly succeeded Crathilinthus, should not have been named Fincormachus, but Cormachus only; And the mi­stake lay here, that King Cormeick or Cormeig, (for so the old Highlanders term him) had the Epithet of Pheun, which in the Irish, or old Highland Language, signifies fair, (as the Tutor of M ^cleane informs me) so that Pheun Cormeich should be no more then Cormachus Pulcher, and not Filius Cor­machi. For the Highlanders do not make use of the Syllable Fin, but the Syllable Mack and Vic; when they intend to express Patronymicks; For if Fin be a Patronymick Particle, and hold so, in the Nephew Fincorma­chus, why not also in the Uncle Findocus? and so if Fin signifies Filius, his father should have been Docus, but he was Athirco; So that such who have first given an account of this King in Latine, perhaps had no great skill in the Irish Tongue. And finding him alwayes called Feun Cormeich, have wrote him Fincormachus. And if it be retorted, that if Fin be but Pheun in Fincor­machus, why should it not be also Feun in Findocus? I answer, the Parity holds not in Epithets and Patronymicks, for Fin is but Epithetital in Fin­cormachus, to the Person Cormeig, which is a full and Christned Name, and there are yet a stock of people who patronymically Surname themselves Mackormeichs, from one Cormeich, the founder of the Family; whereas Fin in Findocus is nothing but a bare syllable of the Christned name Findoch (with­out any signification in it self) as yet it sounds in the name Finlaw, common and ordinary with us to this day. And I am told, that Cormeich imports in the Irish as much as an Odd son, where the word Odd cannot relate to number; For Athirco having three sons before, if Cormeich was the fourth, then he could not be called an odd son in respect of number, for numerus quaternus est numerus par, non impar, so that Odd must relate to a quali­ty [Page 14] equivalent to the word Strange, which hath here been given him in re­spect of his Beauty and Fairness, of a Countenance be like more becoming a Woman than is allowed to the austerities of a Virile Complexion, and his Childhood Cormeich hath been confirmed in his riper years, by the Epithet Feun, Cormeich-feun, an odd son for his fairness. And for Buchanans nam­ing him Fincormachus and not Cormachus (who may be supposed under­stood the Irish Tongue) it imports not; for being but born in the Eastern parts of the Lennox, and bred still in places more easterly, he might not have understood all the Irish Dialects; but suppose he did, he writing a History impute and neat Latine, thought it not worth the noticing, in his designed Theme, to alter in this, the Copies before him; neither should I have meddled with it here, if Boes had not expresly named him Filius Cor­machi, whereas Buchanan and Lesly satisfie themselves, that he was Nephew to Findocus, and Cousin-german to Crathilinthus, without naming his Father, who was Donald. For when Dorus fled with his three Nephews, to the Picts, doubtless if his brother Athirco had had a fourth son, Cormachus that pious and kind Uncle, would not have left him to the mercy of the cruel Natholocus. And it will be but needless to suppose, that Fincormachus might have been the son of Carantius, and not of Donald; For first, that is against Boetius's own story. Secondly, It makes nothing against my great assertion, seing even by yielding, Res but redit eodem, that he is still Grand-child by a son to Athirco, but had he been the son of Carantius, for whom Boes bewrayes so much kindness (in that his Romantick fable of him) sure Cor­machus would never, by that Author, have had the honour to father the son of so noble a Warriour, and King of the Britons, as Boes makes his Caran­tius to be, amongst whose singular atchievements, I wonder why Boes (or rather his two stipendiary Friers, whom he imployed in the Collection of his History) forgot this so notable effort of his who having fled as suspe­cted accessory to the murthering of his brother K Findocus, and after traver­sing most part of the Roman Impire, had the good fortune, not only to re­turn to this Isle, and be install'd King of the Britons, before the death of his Goodsyre King Ethodius; but also to live after he purg'd himself of the false aspersion, before his Nephew Crathilinthus, which strange adventure (and I pray you mark it) he accomplished thus. Findocus was murther­ed in the year of our LORD 263. And if the Caurassius in Eutropius (whom the English name Caransius) be the same person with this our Carnasius, (as Boes is pleased to say he was,) then this Caurassius-Carantius-Carausius, (who rebelled against Caracalla, and succeeded in the British Throne to Bassianus) came to be King of the Britons, Anno 218. when his Grand-father Ethodius the 2. lived till the year 221. And Crathilinthus came not to the Crown, till the year 278. and yet Alectus governed after Carantius, Anno 225. which, when you reconcile to a just Synchronism, I shall the readier believe, that Cormachas was father to Fincormachus, and son to Athirco, even notwithstanding that the Tutor of M ^cleane tells me, the Highlanders with him speak always Cormeich, the son of Donald.

But I hasten to Bancho, for whose Descent, as I offer it here from K. Ken­neth the 2. I shall presently be allarum'd with gratis dictum, gratis dictum. But soft a little, we are not here upon Apodeictick demonstrations, the case and antiquity thereof calls for no such proofs; 'tis fair we come to credit ra­tional and moral arguments and inducements.

I shall therefore ingenuously tell you, how I did first come by the Rela­tion. A country man of ours (now deceased) proposed to Charles late Duke of Lennox, to branch a compleat Genealogical Tree of the entire Family of the Stuarts, which so relished with that Noble Prince, that he brought with him, the last time he came to Scotland, a Paper, which gives Bancho's Descent, from K. Kenneth the 2. in all things as I have here, and in the Tree aftermentioned, marked: And which Paper, the Duke said, that his Uncle D. James got in the time of the late Troubles, from an in­genious Gentleman, and lover of Antiquities, as handed down to him from some documents, that were carried out of this Kingdom by Edward Lang­shanks. The Copy I got from a Gentleman, who had it from Duke Charles himself. And this account from the Duke of Lennox Paper, is agree­able in all things to the old Highland Shanchies rhime they have of the Thane of Lochabers Pedegree, and a Shanchy, Schanchaner, or Scheanchie, (as the Highlanders speak) is a person who hath charge to notice Genea­logies, the same with Buchanans Senecio, and such are yet in use with the Lairds of M ^cleane, Mclaud, and M ^cdonald, and as well K. Duncans esteem and imployments, as Macheths fears of this Banchu, conjoyned with the Weird-sisters response, his Inheritance and Title of Lochaber, with his Oy's com­ing so soon into favour, do abundantly speak him a Cadet of the Royal Family. And probable it is, that that Donald who kill'd King Daffus at the Castle of Forres, might have been our Bancho's Goodsyres elder Brother; for the Dukes Paper gives Murdocus two Sons, Donald and Pheachar, and the time will well allow it too; for Duffus was brother to Kenneth the third, and Culenus did Raign but four years, and we know with whom Bancho was con­temporary; (and that the old Kings spread the wings of the Royal Fa­mily, first to Galloway, then to Lochaber) and which Donald being of the blood Royal, might have had (amongst other temptations) his ambition set on edge, by some mock-prophesie from these Witches, with whom he truckt for discovery of the roasting the effigie of Duffus, that he or his, might sometimes enjoy the Crown, which was upon a better account renewed some years after to his Brothers Oy. And there goes an uncontroverted tradition, that Bancho is descended of one K. Kenneth, and which of the two last you pitch upon, is alike tome in the Case controverted. For if you cannot go the length of Kenneth the 2. hold you with Kenneth the 3. for the Grand-father, who was son of K. Malcolm the first, and he son to Donald the sixth, and he to Constan­tine the 2. who was eldest son to K. Kenneth the 2. and so are we but come where we were, and still in a Line Male. And do you think, I would willingly quit three Kings for three Cadets, if I thought Bancho had been by Ferquhard Grandchild to Kenneth the 3. But he being descended of one of the two last Kenneths, they have misplaced his Father and Goodsyre, making the father, who as by the Dukes Paper, should have been Kenneth to be Ferquhard, and the Goodsyre who should have been Ferquhard, to be Kenneth, whom they made K. Kenneth the 3. For will any think, that if such a martial man as Bancho had been Gran-child by Forquhard to K. Kenneth, the 3. but he might in those dayes (so shortly after Kenneths alteration of the former confused way of succeeding) have had some dispute for the Crown with the more easy natur'd K. Duncan, who stood in a degree re­moter, and that by the interposition of a Lasse too. And I remember that some years ago (before ever I did see the Paper produced by the [Page 16] Duke of Lennox) finding one Baron Mackcorquodale in the City, and hearing that he had an old Charter from one of the K. Kenneths, I went to the Gentleman, who seemed not to deny the having of such a Charter, but said it was at home, and that it should have been given to his Predeces­sor, from one K. Kenneth, of whom was descended the great Thane of Lo­chaber, and that his Land was given to his Predecessor, for bringing away the head of a Scots King from the Picts, and that the tradition was by his Pro­genitors thus handed down unto himself, and that his Estate was never more or lesse (except in the improvements of industry) and that God had blessed their small family in a constant Line Male to himself, who had then both sons and brethren alive. And as I believe this Deed or Grant, I scarce­ly dare name it Charter, were it produced to such as can read it, will ap­pear to be the oldest writ of that nature now extant in Scotland; so may it give encouragement to be Loyal to the living Prince, when this Baron Mackconquodales respect for the dead, hath been from Heaven so signally re­warded. And tho the Gentleman I spoke with could not tell me, whe­ther granter was K. Kenneth the 2, or the 3. yet Boes in his tenth Book makes it clear to have been Kenneth the 2. For when the Picts had barbarously cut off the head of K. Alpin, near to Dundie, they affixt it on a Pole, at the principal gate of their chief City, and that some Scots young men, having the Pictish Dialect, and conterfeiting themselves to play the Merchant, went to the City, stole away the Head, and carried it to his son King Kenneth the second, who was then in Argyle, and where (sayes Boes) they were rewarded by the King with Lands and Estate. And the Baron of Mackcorquodale's Fortune lyes (I hear) in Knapdale in Argile Shire; tho with credit to the tradition, yet with favour to the Gentleman, I shall hardly think the Charter so old; perhaps a later Charter may have such a Narrative, for I question if formal Charters were with us so old as Kenneth the 2. but the tradition provesall I intend. And Buchanan giving the in­ducements of Mackbeths murdering of Bancho, sayes, that he was homo potens industrius, & Regio jam sanguine imbutus, which sounds no other in plain English, then, That he was a powerful man fitted for action, yea, and more­over of the Family Royal. And so indeed he was, as well by his Descent, as by his Marriage, having taken to wife his Cousin Maud, daughter to Phaelus, who was son to Laeblanus, son to Garethus, eldest son of Dorus, and Grand-child to King Ethus. So that what I have said, will, I hope, ( in hoc facto antiquo, wherein there be in all things such an harmonius consonancy) sufficiently astruct Bancho's descent from K. Kenneth the 2. And it is of no weight to alledge any thing from the silence of our Historians, who touch little of Genealogies, except in the Crowned heads. Yea, and Buchanan belies them in the general, in that his Regio sanguine jam imbutus; though he be not special in the particular persons and degrees. And the very col­lecting or extracting of the forementioned Paper, from the documents car­ryed away with Edward Langshanks, cannot but fortifie what I have said; For that imperious Victor, designing to deface the very remembrance of a Kingdom here, by his taking away, and destroying what monuments he could have of our Kings and Kingdom, had he not amongst others found Bancho and his Posterity near and considerable Cadets of the Royal Fami­ly, I doubt if that Paper had (as I have related it) ever come to the hands of an English Gentleman, and questionless the repeated preferments and high trusts that K. Duncan heaped on Bancho, as well in the intestine Commo­tions, [Page 17] as in the Wars with the Danes, which happened in that Kings time, speaks him lowdly to have been his near Kinsman. And beyond all perad­venture, Mackbeth's jealousy flowed not so much from Bancho's valour or his bare response only, but as bottom'd upon his Cognation of blood, as Bucha­nan hath well observed in his Igitur veritus ne homo potens, &c. And which is legibly read in Malcolm Canmor's so quickly advancing his Grand-child to places of so great and near concern as Steward of his House and Kingdom, extended by the K. Maiden, to the Magnus Senescallus, and which Relation was also remembred by K. Robert the Bruce, for the Royal Stem residing in Argyle, the first branch spreads to Galloway, the next to Lochaber. And as the Bruce was the first who came to the Crown of the House of Galloway, who so fit a match for his eldest Daughter, as her Cousin, Walter the great Steward from Bancho of Lochaber? and which seems hath not been forgot, even by our later Mary, for no Husband to the Queen Heretrix of Scotland, and Douager of France, like to her Kinsman Darnly, by the House of Lennox, from Walter of Dundonald. So connatural is it for Princes to be just and true to the righteous Heir, that Queen Elizabeths last breath could ingeminate none but her Cousin JAMES, none but her Cousin JAMES.

And now (Sir) little remains but to give my reasons, why I differ from the Common opinion of the first Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, and to prove the Walter and Allan, whom here I insert in the Line, and who are left out in the ordinary accounts of the same.

The received opinion then gives Walter the son of Fleance, to be the first Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, and I make but Walter the second, (Grand-child by Allan to the first Walter) the first Great Stuart of Scotland. Now I hope we will agree, that Senescallus is homonymous, nor shall I here trouble you with all the various acceptations of the word; allow me but three.

First, That Senescallus is Dapifer, that he is Oeconomus, and that he is Lo­cum-tenens; which without other proof I know (you are so ingenuous) you will not refuse. Senescallus-Dapifer, for the Family within the walls, Steward of the House; Senescallus-Oeconomus, for the Provisions from abroad (as in the Purveyors of Solomon,) uplifter, and ingatherer of the Rents, which of old consisted most in ipsis corporibus. But when the use of money became more frequent, this Senescallus-Oeconomus came thereafter to be ab­sorbed in the Thesaurer or Chamberlain, as it relates to Quaestura. And yet the payment of the Rents, whether in ipsis corporibus, or in money, being of­ten refused, questioned, and debated, it was more than requisit that this Se­nescallus should have Jurisdictionem & potestatem quandam, a Civil Jurisdicti­on and distreinzeable power, and in case of force and resistance, military and coercive; in which case, when this Senescallus was in or about the exercise of his Office, he was said (for the better procuring to him of reverence and obedience) Tenere locum Regis. And as this midle Senescallus, Participat­ing of both extreams, was sometimes termed Dapifer, and sometimes Locum­tenens; So did the Senescallus-locum-tenens, through processe of time, creep up in his Military power and capacity to be Ductor Exercituum, Regiarum Co­piarum Praefectus, and to be stiled Magnus Senescallus, where the Epithet magnus is not prefixed to Senescallus, except the Locum-tenens be Generalissi­mo, [Page 18] and that, if not hereditary, for life at least, and not upon single emergents. And who among the ancient Romans boasted himself of the Title of Magnus, but Potestate etiam gaudebat Imperatoriâ: yea, Magni alone, to Martial signi­fied Imperatores. So what I have premised, furnishes me with this Distin­ction, Senescallus Regis, Senescallus Regni, and Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, agreeable to our Customs and Histories. Senescallus Regis, Dapifer, whose Fee is mentioned in the Acts of King Malcolme the second, Senescallus Regni, Walter the first, the Hereditary Oeconomus, who gave to his Posterity the Sir­name of Stuart. Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, Walter the second, the first here­ditary Generalissimo of the Kingdom, and in the Kings absence Commander alwayes in chief of his Forces, and the Kings Lieutenant, where ever the Roy­al Standart stood display'd.

But you will be apt to say, that bare assertions are too weak engines, to shake so rooted a tradition, and allowing of my Distinctions in the general, yet shall I nevertheless gain but few Proselytes, unless I prove that the first Walter was not Magnus Senescallus in the sense that I have given, and that there was a Walter, whom I name the 2. betwixt Alexander and Alan. Seing then it is easier to disprove an affirmative, then to prove a Negative, I say the first Walter's being Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, is but a meer vulgar tradition from a mistake, in confounding the Grand-father for the Oy, from the names of Walter and Malcolm: for as Walter the Goodsyre was made Senescallus Reg­ni, by K. Malcolm Canmoire, so was Walter the Oy, made Magnus Senescal­lus Scotiae, by K. Malcolm the Maiden. And the better to excuse the mis­take, much of the cause of both their preferments was their being active in suppressing some insurrections in Galloway and the Highlands, most pro­bably occasioned from the Kings Officers, demanding, and the Disobeyers undutifull refusing of their Rents and Revenues, due and addebted by them to the Crown. And the first Walter is never named Magnus Senescallus Scotia, by any of our Historians; For Boes calls him but Regni Senescal­lum, (i. e.) sayes he, Regiorum proventuum primarium Procuratorent. Bucha­nan speaks him no other then Stuartum totins Scotiae, adding, Quasi dicas, Oecanomum. John Fordon, in his Scotichronicon writes him, his Son, and his Grand-child, no more but Dapiferi, only Lesly hath these words, summi Senescalli ut loquimur, where ut loquimur explains the summus Senescallus, as commonly used in Leslies time, and does not tell the true import of it, In the dayes of Malcolm Canmoir, when our other Historians make him but Senescallus-Oeconomus, and Stuartorum familias Princeps. Yea, and Leslie's own Summus senescallus amounts to no more then Summus Oeconomus. And tho the word Scotiae had been added, yet will it with the understanding Rea­der signifie nothing but Regiorum Oeconomorum Supremus, which none de­nies; and any Grammaticaster can tell the difference betwixt Summus and Magnus.

So that it is now evident and obvious, that there is a palpable diffe­rence betwixt a Steward and a Magnus Senescallus. For does not Stuart, as a Sirname from Oeconomus, at one and the same time serve many Persons, and severall distant Houses and Families, whereas Magnus Senescal­lus Scotiae, as a special and particular Office in dignity, rested only in the person Chief of the whole Clan for the time, without any communication [Page 19] to others. And if Walter the first was, as Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, Regiarum Copiarum Ductor ac Praefectus, why was Gilchrist Earle of Angus, Comman­der in chief to the Forces of Malcolm the Maiden, against the Gallovidians and Highlanders, when Walter the second, the first Walters Oy, was in com­pany with him, and did not so much as lay claim to his right, as did there­after his Successor John at the Battel of Falkirk, as well against the more redoubted Warriour Wallace, as against the Cumin his elder Colleague in the Regency; But that even because then, the second Walter was only Senes­callus Oeconomus, and not Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, which shortly he got there­fore for several reasons conferred upon him, partly I suppose for his own va­lour shown with Earle Gilchrist, partly out of remembrance of his Father, who went to the Holy Wars with Godfrey de Bulloigne, and was present with him at the Siedge of Antioch; but more especially for a Raggio di Stato, it being thought belike then convenient that, the Summus Oeconomus should be made also Magnus Senescallus, while both were conjoyned in the person of a near and Loyal Kinsman. And have I not seen an old Coat of Arms, for the Stuart, Entasselled or cordeleired with Thistles, and as it were some leaves or twigs interwoven, and giving the Motto, Nemo me impune lacessit, where the Supporters held, one of them upon a Standart, the Flag of the Family, and the other bore a St. Andrews Cross. And what more proper Hierogliphick in Herauldry could be given to the Counting Oeconomus then the Fesse Chequie? And what fitter for a Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, then the Badge then used by the Kingdom, with the Thistles and Motto; abundantly expressive of his Duty, Courage, and Loy­alty, when conjoyned with the Crest, which was the head of an Unicorn. And in a Letter from the Nobility of Scotland to the Pope, Anno, 1320. among some thirty eight Seales appending, when I did see it, the Seale of Walter, Son-in-Law to Robert the Bruce, was only a plain Saltier or St. An­drew's Cross (as in my Notes upon that Letter I have observed.) And his Son Robert, the first King of the Stuarts, when he reserved and annexed the Estate and Office of the Great Steward of Scotland, for ever to the Crown, to be enjoyed alwayes by the Kings eldest son, the Prince Politickly said, It was too dangerous to make anie a Magnus Senescallus, or hereditarie Gene­ral, but the next Heir of the Crown, (although even that King shewed more then ordinary kindness for his second son Robert;) yet, for the honour of his Fathers House (for he came to the Crown in right of his Mother) did he advance the Badges and Symboles of the Office, to stand external Imbellish­ments to the Coat Royal, dignifying and inlarging the old Crest, by tying his gorged Ʋnicorn, with a chain of Loyal Magnanimity to suport the Re­gal Lyon; teaching thereby the Prince and Steward of Scotland, for ever to be faithful and Loyal to the Crown; which may convince such of their foolish ignorance, who from the Chain, in our Kings Atchievement, would for­sooth by a strange Armorial Logick, argue a Vassalage to England. What! Our Ʋnicorn is not chained, nor does he chain his Lyon to their Leopards; while in defence of his Quadrupedal Monarch, he bears a Horn, with a Ne­mo me impune lacessit. Hence, Sir, you may readily conceive I stand a little ingadged to crave pardon, why I so formally differ from those who write the Epigraph Nemo me impune lacesset, in a Circle environing the Image of St. Andrew, when I attribute all to the Magnus Senescallus. Permit me then Sir, to offer my Arguments, and guess at their grounds; and though this be a digression, yet speaking here of His Majesties Line Male, I hope it will [Page 20] not be to you unpleasant, that this Paper present you my thoughts of the Royal Badges of the Kingdom, with the Principal order of Knighthood, ordinarily thereunto assigned.

The tale then goes, That Hungus King of the Picts (assisted by A­chaius against the Saxon Athelstane) did at Elsanfoord neare Haddingtown, upon an Apparition of St. Andrews Cross, obtain a memorable and unexpe­cted Victory, whereupon that Apostle became St. Patron to the Scots and Picts. And in all Battels thereafter, was success under his Banner equally pray'd for, expected and promised; And to whose greater honour, did Achaius erect in the City of St. Andrews, an order of the Knights of the Thistle, with the Motto as last aforesaid, Nemo me impune lacesset. And yet there be some who attribute this to a congratulation of the League with Carlemain; as if it should be touchie and uneasy for any to disquiet the Scots, when so assisted by the French.

As to the truth of the Apparition, I leave it to those who list to believe it. Nor will I here concern my self, whether St. Andrew was Patron to the Picts before the days of Hungus, when Regulus the Grecian Monk first brought some of his Reliques to King Hergustus. Far lesse will I now state the Question, When, or by what methods and devices, the Religious remem­brance of, or respectful reverence to, the Names and Virtues of the Saints departed, did first in our Church creep up to a formal adoration, and su­perstitious Invocation of them. Since I verily believe (if our; Historians abuse us not, Spots. 1. B. Boes, 10. B.) that the storied Vision appeared not to Achaius. For the Scots Auxiliaries went under the conduct of his son Prince Alpine, the Crown­ed King; judging it below his Royal Dignity, to march in person as an Allie, in the but extrinsick quarrel of his bordering, and oftentimes offen­sive neighbour. And although the Badge of St. Andrew, be derived to us from the Picts; yet some in their relations thereof, are not so fully clear, in either the cause, occasion, or time, whether before or after the destru­ction of the Picts. If before, what tempted a Scots King to borrow from a Pictish? could he not have devised of his [...] or, should the one bro­ther-in-law, rob from the other, one of the choicest Badges of his Christian devotion, and Princely honour? But if the Scots assumed it after the fatal period of the Pictish Kingdom, sure Achaius lived not to see that exterminating blow. And how peaceable will you make Hungus with his Picts, who suf­fered a Scots King, not only quietly, but even gloriously, to erect himself Sovereign of an order of Knighthood, in one of the chieft Cities of their own Otholinia (before Kirk-Rule was Christned St. Andrews) and that too in the name and under the Protection of their beloved Tutelary Saint, with the blessing of large promises for Victory to his Votaries, under no less then the menacing Epigraph, of Nemo me impune lacesset: for who would think, that the poor passive Thistle, could ever be so boistrous in the future. But why, contrary to all other Mottoes, so severe a menace in the Future? Did the deceased Brother of St. Peter so soon forget the dictates and exam­ple of his living Master, who when he was reviled, stood so far wide of re­venge, as never so much as once to revile again; teaching his Disciples to learn of him to be meek and lowly, and not to suffer the Sun to go down upon their wrath. And why from a peaceable and inspired Apostle, such [Page 21] an ensurng word for Victory, successe and revenge, as Nemo me impune lacesset, when the infallible Oracle, bids tell a Puissant and Martial Monarch, Let not him that girdeth on his Harnesse, boast himself, as he that putteth it off. But belike that Ventorious, rather then Victorious Promise, hath been con­ceived a little scrimp of the common stile, Conjunctly, but not severally; else what a pitiful pickle will they put St. Andrews in, for an Orleans gloss up­on his Text, when the Oy of Achaius successively, and utterly, defeated. Druskenus, with his Vicomagian, Horestian, Otholinian, and all his other Picts, where the ears of the good Tutelar Saint, could not but strangely, and more then once and again, at one and the same instant, be miserably grated with the cries of many thousand Scots, Sancte Andrea, ora pro nobis, re-echoed with as many groans from the Picts, Dive Andrea, ora pro nobis. What could be left to the tender hearted Apostle, but to sit dumb, and let the Lord God of Hosts from the justness of the cause, and the valour of the Combatants alone decide the quarrel.

I know and do grant you, that the valiant Kenneth the second, did not assume, but as well by the Law of Arms, as right of blood justly claim'd, and Possest himself of the Pictish Badge, being equally their lawful Prince, and their fortunat Victor, who because of their undutiful refusing and re­sisting of his father and himself scorned to quarter their Arms with those of Scotland: yet, for a trophie of his success, and from a respect to the Reli­gious memory of the Apostle Andrew, did Politickly reserve the Badge of his Cross, to be born in his Martial Banner thereafter; whereof Boes sayes, mansit Pictis (to wit after Hungus victorie) & post eos deletos, Scotis exinde hoc institutum in perpetuum. To which Lesly agrees in his Cum hosti­bus congressurus semper postea gestabat, id quod Scoti omnes in memoriam victo­riae a Pictis etiamnum religiosissime observant. That wise King divining per­haps that the English-Saxons (conform to the tradition) once falling un­der the sign of S. Andrew, would be apt to fear the like thereafter. But that the Scots Kings used it further then in their Banners of War, untill thir later Centuries, would be proven ere I trust it. For who can, upon any ingenuous acknowledgement say, he any wayes ever saw (or from authentick Authors, read) the Effigies of St. Andrew or his Cross (by what ligament or Collar soever) pendulous to the Coat of Scotland, before the Stuart came to the Crown, not to discourse when those more modern methods of Double Supporters, pendant Medalls from Chains and Collars of Orders, with Epigraphs, came to be first, from a proud vanity embraced, and thereafter from an ambitious emulation affected, cherished, and entertained amongst the Independant Monarchs. Allowing then the Scots after Kenneths exstinguishing of the Picts, to have born the Cross and Badge of St. Andrew on their Standart Royal or Field-Banner, as in the pre­sent Banner Azure of Scotland, imbraced by the supporting Ʋnicorn in the Royal Atchievement, which Banner was necessarily given and intrusted to the Magnus Senescallus Scotiae, as the Kings Lieutenant in his Armies: and which Badge being equally the Ensign of the Kingdom, and Symbole of his Office, he most probably hath (according to the custom of other Officers of that nature) worn about his body on a Medal, in a Ribband, Richly wrought, with an interwoven Collour of Thistles and Rue, with the empha­tick and comprehensive Ditton, Nemo me impune lacessit. Not me, as the word [Page 22] is interpret to a person) the glorious St. Andrew, who am now beyond the concerns or provocations of Mortalls Eternally taken up, in the beatifick vision of the Trin-une Jehove; But me the Captain General of the Forces of Scotland, and Thesaurer, Chamberlain, Steward and Collector of the Rents and Revenues of the Crown, for the support of the King, and Go­vernment.

And such a Magnus Senescallus, might very justly and nobly, (and con­form to the Rules and allowances of Herauldry, very warrantably too) have given such a Callour to a Medal for St. Andrew, with the Nemo me (as I have explained it) impune lacessit. If it be but minded that our first Great- Stewards Grand-fathers Grand-father Bancho, when Thane of Lochaber (and Regionum Thani, sayes one plerisque in locis Stuarti vocantur) was so sorely wounded for discharging his duty in the collecting and in-bringing of the Kings rents, that Buchanan sayes of him, in his 7. Book Initium spernendi Imperium natum in Abria, adversus Banchonem ejus Regi­onis Thanum, hominem acrem, & aequitatis unicum cultorem, cujus in animad­veriendo severitatem, cum non perferendam ducerent mali, conspiratione adver­sus cum factâ, bonis direptis, vulneratum ac semivivum expulerunt. Or if the Insurrections and Commotions, raised mostly upon that same account, as well against his Grand-father, before he was made Summus Oeconomus, as against himself, before he came to be Magnus Senescallus, be not wholly, as yet forgot: with which, if you take into consideration Buchanans Cha­racter of King Duncan, that he was Vir majore erga suos indulgentiâ quam in Rege opus est. And speaking of the stirs set on foot by Angus of Galloway, in the Reign of Malcolm the Maiden, he continues his Discourse, with Qui plus tamen spei in Regis ignavia quam suis viribus collocaret, might not then, from thir grounds; our first Magnus Senescallus, upon his being inaugurat and entred in his Office, cause some Herauld proclaime, or intimat in his name as follows.

Ye the Vassals, Rentallers and Subjects of the Scottish Crown, although some of you, and your Predecessors, have, by Rebellions, refused your dues, and shaken off your Loyalty, and therein also abused Bancho, my Grand-father, and my self: which yet, with dutiful services to our Prince, we did so far overcome, as these outbreakings tended but to your loss, and to the greater advantage and ri­sing of our Family, as this day you see me by the blessing of God, and the favou­rable bounty of my Royall Master install'd the Kings Lieutenant, and the Great Steward of the Kingdom. Therefore I exhort you all to Loyalty and obedience, otherwise I will tell you, be you of whatever degree higher or lower, I have here an Unicorns Horn to push the one, and a Thistle to prick the other, and be as­sured however, that your Rebellions will but prove to you bitter as Rue in the end, and never offer to presume upon the good nature of my King, to whose honour and interest I will be still so faithful, as you must understand Nemo me impune lacessit. Yea, such fortunat experience have I of the Divine assistance, that blest Bancho, my Grand-father and my self, with success against those obstinat Rebels, when we stood but in lower stations, that being now by my Sovereign, advanced to, and fortified in a higher preferment; I shall not dispair, but that under his Roy­al Banner, and the luckie omen of St. Andrew, be able as Generalissimo of the [Page 23] Kingdom, without any vain ostentation to obtrude to all and whosoever the E­nemies of my Lord the King, Nemo me impune lacessit, where, whatever shall be wanting of successe in the event, shall not fail to be supplied by my heartie prayers, backed, I hope, with no despicable courage. And therefore do I now, take thir Symbols, to be constant and lasting monitors, to me and my successors, as well of our faithfulness and dutie to our Master, as towards our fellow-Sub­jects.

And which Symboles so chosen by the Great Steward, were thereafter, as I have already said, placed by K. Robert the 2. the exterior Ornaments to the Coat Royal (yea, I suppose those Voluminous extrinsick inbellishments and additaments, now in use in the Atchievements of free Princes, will neither here, nor scarcely elsewhere, own so old a date as Achaius, or his Grand-child Kenneth.) And so how handsomely does now the Regal Lyon in the Crest Royal, sit with his Sword and Scepter, a Vindicative Judge in defence of the Crown and Kingdom, when supported and incou­raged by his son and successor, examplifying to the People their Duty and Loyalty; advertising them, that whatever troubles they procure or creat to his Father or Predecessor, he as Prince and Steward of Scotland, stands there from God an avenging Magistrat at hand, with his Nemo me impune lacessit. What needs then you, Sir, me, or any man, trouble our selves with the too much Legendary tale of S. Andrews, me, in a meaning Future, when the Great- Steward helps us with better sense, History, and reason, from his own me, in a modester Present and Praeterfect sense. And as I be­lieve, the writing Laccesset, will be found upon a true scrutinie to be but some new fancy. So would I gladly know, when the Epigraph first incir­cled the Image, which leads me to the Order of Knighthood it self. And which, If I may without offence, I would exceedingly doubt of.

For what a manck and slender Order will it be, consisting only of a single Sovereign without any Fellows. O! but some are confident enough, to speak of the number of the Companions; yet in all ages down from A­chaius they name not so much as one person. You know it is betwixt the more knowing and the Vulgar controverted, whether Edward the third, or his Son the Black Prince instituted the Garter. But here is Achaius insti­tuting an order (and if so, the oldest in Europe of a Kings institution; for the Pairrie of Charles the Great was a Society of men for Council and Go­vernment, and not an Order of Knighthood for Honour & Chevalry:) and yet not so much, as admitting his eldest son Alpine a Fellow, though he it was, who with Hungus beat Athelstane. And sure Kenneth hath had but little respect for his Grand-fathers institution, and been as regardless of his Friends, if he bestowed not a little honour on those to whom he gave so much of fortune, by associating his Barus and Fifus into the Order. And must we be so unmannerly, to say, that K. Duncan hath been but a sorry Good-fel­low, who could not quaffe it over to Bancho, for that his St. Johnstown col­lation to the Danes. And doubtless Malcolm Canmoir was peevish, who when he indulg'd so famous a Girth to Mackduff, yet grudg'd him, a green Ribband with a Thistle. Or did not the Hay at Lonkartie, the Kieth at Camstane, with the Stewart who defeated Acho at the Largs deserve it. And questionless Robert the Bruce, but undervalued the service of the good Lord [Page 24] Dowglas, when he but dub'd him a Knight, without vouchsafing him the Collar of St. Andrew. And was the Black Knight of Lorn, who by wedding of a Queen, gave Brothers and Sisters to a King, adopted a Companion of the Order. And was not James the Fourth much more sparing of his fa­vours then his person, who would not by alluring the Nobles into the So­ciety of the Thistle, better incourage and detain them in that his too for­ward invasion at Floudown. And can you judge but James the 5. himself, would have lent Oliver Sinclare, his Nemo me impune lacesset, were it but to have stated him in competition with the Maxwel at Solvay-Moss: And what Inamorato will say, that Marie should have denyed her Darling Darnlie the Communication of the Order (whereof she was equally Sovereign as her Sister Elizabeth of the Garter) when she designed to honour the Duke of Rothsay, with the Nuptial bed of a free born and Independant Queen; yea, would not her learned Son, amongst the rest of his Unions have interchan­ged some English Noblemen to the Thistle, as he did Scots to the Garter. But when did our Kings quit this so Antient and honourable an Order? Why do not the Champions of it give the account, as in other Orders we read and find. Sure it was derelinquist in no Century, for want of Marti­al and deserving men: but belike it went out, because it never came in, and it is but Childish to think, that there cannot be an antient Crown without a formal Order of Knighthood appendant to it, where the Argument runs stonger on the contrary side. And I am apt to believe, that this very mi­stake prevails with some, for their so tenacious maintaining of this so allead­ged antiquitated Order, which looks to me too like a French translation, to be believ'd a Scots Original. For there's a St. Michael; here a St. An­drew, and an Apparition for both, the one to a Father, Charles, the other to a Son Alpin; both in, or near Battels, near also to Bridges and Rivers, the one against the English, at the Bridge of Orleans in La Beauss upon the Loyre; the other against the English too, near a Bridge upon Tine in Lothian: both, for ought I know, in a green Ribband, but to be sure, with intervoven Collours and lofty Mottoes, Immensi tremor Oceani, which, beyond all peradventure Nemo me impune lacesset: the Seat of the one at St. Michaels Mount in Normandy, from which the French partly had, and ful­ly resolved to turn out the English Normans. The other at the Town of St. Andrews in Otholinia (now Fife) out of which by a strong Divinati­on Achaius foresaw, that his Grandchild, would drive the Picts, only we want a St. Andrew-Herauld, when they had a Mount St. Michael, to attend upon the Order. Is it then any Heretical, disrespective, or disloyal con­jecture to conceive that Kenneth the 2. made no other use of the Military Ensign of the Picts, then to repeat the same for his own, as victoriously gained by him in open Battel, ornamented thereafter as I have expressed by the Great Steward, for the Badge of his Charge (as in some comparison, we yet see the Chamberlain wear the Golden Key on a blew Ribband,) aug­menting the Royal atchievement, by the direction of Robert the 2. and in­tended for an Order by James the 5. after his return from France, who having had the Garter from his Uncle the Cockle, from his Father-in-law, and the Fleece from his friend and Allie, the Emperour Blusht: belike, to want an order of his own; which, that it might not derogat from the anti­quity of his Kingdom, was it not as easy for him to hire Monks to skrew it up to Achaius, as for Edward Langshanks to cause contrive to Fable of Bru­tus, for clatching up a claime, before the Pope to Scotland. And if this Or­der [Page 25] was established before the days of K. James the 5. Why cite they not an authentick and creditable Author, who wrote before him, giving some rational account of the same? And why is he our only King, whose shoul­ders appear surrounded with the Ribband? Was the Collar of St. Andrew in­consistent with the penitential Girdle of his Father? but what should have impeded his other Predecessors to use it, or if he perfected the Order, who were his Companions? it is not so long since, but some of them might be re­membred. And why did his Daughter and Grand-child, lay this his (so much hugged) Order, so soon aside? I shall little doubt, but here you might from the suggestions of some, alledge, I have run my self in a gross (if not dangerous) Praemunire. But I write to one who knows the difference betwixt Badges and Arms. Far be it from me, to rob the Royal Atchieve­ment of that its honourable (tho extrinsick) Badge of St. Andrew, pendu­lous to the Collar, which I never see, but it equally minds me of the De­struction of the Picts, gallant Resolution of the Great Steward, and reveren­tial Duty of our Robert the 2. to the memory of His Fathers Family. And beyond peradventure, had James the 6. or any of the Charles's, lookt upon this as the Badge of an Order, they would have worn it, at least when they were in Scotland. And to alledge the French and English Writers gives it so, is but to gratifie their mistakes, to the prejudice of our true and more martial antiquities; for our Kings never wanted power to confer Knight­hood, but as they did it most in Procinctu, to the deserving so did they little value those prescribed Orders, that creept but in upon designs inlater times, the Knights of our Antient Kings being truly Milites, tho of no formal Order, beyond that of merit.

But me fears, I have provoked your patience to be a little out of Order, to the hazard of losing my solitary Walter and Allane.

To prove then my Second Walter; I first instance Skeen, in that his Table of the Kings, from Malcolm the second, printed with the Acts of Parliament, (and which I also repeat, for proving him the first Great Steward) where to be sure that we do not mistake the Malcolm, by misfiguring 4. for 3. he adds the word the Maiden, for he Prints expresly, Walter made Great Steward of Scotland, by Malcolm 4. the Maiden. And Skeen being Clerk Register, he hath been doubtless from the Records of the Kingdom sufficiently instru­cted for his so writing him the first Great Steward. And though he mistook the sending of his son Allan to the Holy Wars, if he means these of Godfrey de Bulloigne, yet is he abundantly fortified in his Walter, by Fordon in the 25. chap. of his 8. Book, saying, Walterus filius Allani Dapifer Regis, qui Pa­sletum fundavit; obiit, Anno 1177. And if Walter the son of Fleance, who was more then twenty years old, ere he came to Scotland to his Cousin Malcolm Canmoir, lived to this time, expressed by Fordon, as he was Se­nescallus, so should I well allow him to be Magnus for his Age, since upon the most Sober computation that can be, he behooved to exceed an hundred years at least: For himself being twenty before he frequented the Court of his Grand-father in Wales, and which was before he came unmarried to Scot­land, what years will you allow to his son at Antioch, 1099. who being the eldest, probably left also a son behind him when he departed the Kingdom. But Oh, this Walters father is Allan, not Fleance, and but yet Dapiser to For­don, [Page 26] whose Grand-father then could not have been the first Magnus Senes­callus Scotiae. Moreover, this my second Walter is further astructed by a Charter, which I have seen granted by Malcolm 4. confirming the Church of Falkirk, and certain Lands thereunto belonging, to the Abbacy of Haly­rude-house, bearing Date at the Maiden Castle, where the witness, next after the Bishops and Earles, is Waltero filio Allani. And this Charter which must be before the year 1165. and after the year 1153. (for in the one did Malcolm the Maiden succeed, and in the other did he die) does unanswe­rably make out from their own concessions another Walter then he of Dun­donald. For the Father of this Walter is expresly in the Charter named Al­lan. Will you then say, Walter of Dundonald, who lived till the year 1241, would be insert as a probative witness to a deed of Malcolm the 4. (when the witnesses ingros'd in the Charters of our Kings, were, and yet are men of years and offices) seing they interpose Alexander who builded Pasley, to be his Father: whose father, yet notwithstanding, was even our second Allan, of whom Fordon in the 56 chap. of his 9. Book, sayes, obiit Walterus filius Allani junioris, Anno Dom. 1241. And justly was he Juni­or, because Allan the Grand-child to Fleance was Senior. And most truly might Fordon write him Father to Walter of Dundonald, seing I have seen him in a Charter from King Alexander the 2. to the House of Sutherland, Da­ted at St. Andrews, 26. of Decemb. the 22. year of his Reign, which answers to the year of Christ, 1234. or 1235. insert a witness next after Patrick Earle of Dumbar, in these words, Waltero filio Allani Senescallo justitiario Scotiae. And in another Charter yet in my hands, granted by the said King Alexan­der the 2. at Traquair, the first day of June, in the twenty first year of his Reign; confirming to the Abbacy of Cowper, two Carrucats and a half of Land measured in Feodo de magno Blair in Excambion for the Common Muir of Blair, per easdem divisas sayes the Charter, per quas Walterus filius Allani Se­nescallus noster Scotiae, & alii probi homines nostri dictam terram iis ex parte nostra assignaverunt & tradiderunt. Now choose you whether this Walterus filius Allani, ingrossed in the bosom of the Charter, in the Nominative Case, be the son of the first or the second Allan. I do not much reguard it, though it may be more probable, he was the Son of the first Allan, and my second Walter; because this Kings Uncle, who builded the Abbacie of Cow­per, might have employed his Cousin the Steward, to divide these Lands to the Monks. And that he hath not the office of Justitiary, which is here given to one of the Witnesses, who are William Bishop of Glasgow the Chan­cellor, Clement Bishop of Dumblain; Patrick Earl of Dumbar, and then fol­lows, as in the Earl of Sutherlands Charter VValtero filio Allani Senescallo ju­stitiario Scotiae. So be the Witness and Person ingrost here, one and the same, or distinct, importeth nothing, seing Fordon and my three Charters still prove Allan a father of a Walter, and Walter the son of an Allan, and that in distinct times and Generations.

And thus you see, Sir, how I have cleared my second Walter, and my second Allan, the leaving out of whom, has flow'd (I suppose) from a de­fect in the first concoction, in not exactly observing the Walters and the Al­lans, which because they could not well clear, they have choosed rather, first to lay these two aside, that they might thereafter be alto­gether left out. And how strangely does Skeen abuse his first Wal­ter: For if his Allan was with Godfrey of Bulloigne, surely he could not be the [Page 27] Son of his own first Walter. For how can it be supposed, that the son of a man contemporary but with Malcolm the Maiden (who came not to the Crown, till the year 1153) could be of vigour and valour, to undertake so long, tedious, and dangerous a Voyage, to go and fight against the In­fidels in Jurie-land, Anno 1099. for of what age can you suppose him to have been when he went away, and of what a vigorous constitution behooved his Father to be (if he was the Son of Fleance) who was thought fit to be in­trusted with such a Military Charge, as to be made in his Office of Magnus Senescallus, the Kings Lieutenant and Captain General of all the Forces in the Kingdom, by Malcolm the Maiden. And the same mistake so pinches another how handsomely to conjoyn Alexander the First, with Allan the Frist, that he makes Alexander to have been begotten the very year his fa­ther was at the Siedge of Antioch, and counts (as if at Cards) a just hun­dred, and all made; making him with a French Fortaage to die in the year, 1199. Whereas this my second Walter, and second Allan (so clearly pro­ven as aforesaid) salves all these Phoenomena from so many idle contradi­ctions and moral impossibilities. And if any man shall here cavil and say, that I cite Fordon wrong, when I make him alledge a Walter was the foun­der of Paisley when it is known it was Alexander, I answer, that Fordon in the Liberary of Edinburgh will attest me just to him in the Citation. And for Fordons Vindication, know, that my second Walter witnessed as much true piety at home, as did his wandering Father of blind Zeal abroad, when upon his being advanced to the Office of Great Steward of Scotland, he erect­ed (if not primarily founded) Paisley in a Collegiat Church, considerably doting the same, which the Devotion of his Son Alexander extended, and in­larged to an Abbacie. And in a Book yet extant in Pasley commonly called the Register (not the Black Book) of Pasley, The first Benefactor next to the Founder of the Abbacie, stands inrolled, Allan; which Allan, cannot be thought the first Allan, Grand-Father to the Founder, but must be the Se­cond Allan, Son to Alexander, and Father to Walter the third, commonly called of Dundonald.

As for the other Persons in the Descent, they are all clear by the Histo­ries of the Kingdom, and the Writes of the House of Lennox, fully down to our own Memory and Times.

And now from the Premisses, I suppose I have proven my Position, even His Majesties Descent, in a true Line Male from Father to Son, (in Princes or true Princely Cadets) from the Loines of the first Ethodius, for fifteen hundred years, and that by as strong Proofs, as the nature of the Subject allows, or in such cases are required: For the Descent of the House of Len­nox (of which was His Majesties great Grand-Father, on the Father side) is uncontroverted from Walter of Dundonald, as Walter of Dundonald is known (whatever be the persons) from Bancho; and to men that are not prejudi­cat, and who are free to allow Kings to be Gentlemen, I need to say no more then what is before-mentioned, for Bancho from K. Ethus, and our Historians are my Vouchers for Ethus from Ethodius; and when any Ge­nealogy of equal Antiquity shall be better Documented (saving still such as are in the Sacred page) then let not this be believed: But I fancy, some [Page 28] will rashly and with confidence enough, say, what will I do with Queen Mary? Nay, may even her soul praise God, and her bones rest in peace with those of Marjory Bruce, the Daughter of Allan of Galloway, David of Huntingtoun, and K. Malcolm the second. I have not been so idle, as to aver, that in this Descent Male, all his Majesties Progenitors were Kings, satisfying my self, that they were either Kings or true Princely, and un­doubted Cadets from the Stock Royal. Although I have honoured my self, to deduce in the Tree aftermentioned, all the Kings from Marjory Bruce to Queen Mary, parallel to those of the House of Lennox, that it may appear, it may be more justly said of His Majesty, then of the Roman ‘—Deus est in utroque Parente.’

But when I designed a Letter, loe it swells to a Book. And trust me, the Singularities in His Majesties Line, might challange a Volume; in its An­tiquity (whether you view His Scotish, British, or Irish Extract) preferable to any now extant in the Ʋniverse, unless they go higher then Fergus, Cas­sibilane, or Gathelus, a Line singularly blest, to show to the World the first two Christian Kings, with the first Christian Emperour: Fortunat even in its losses; for when the straight Line was broke off, to make way to Colla­terals, even such lopped Branches Ornamented the Stock with better names then those of Sons and Daughters. Witness that Great Light, Levir Maure, or the British Lucius, with our first Donald and Constantine the Great, a Bri­ton by his Mother Helena, Daughter to King Coilus. To which we may add the Gallantry of Arthur, which listed him one of the nine Worthies of the World: The Devotion of Cadwallader, with the Chastity of our Mai­den King. And (to take in both Sexes) their Virgin Queen, a Line, which next to that of Judah's, stands the liveliest Commentary I know, upon Solomons, Per me Reges regnant; a Line, whose Crowns from Gathelus down, are all but acquests in the right of Succession, by the common road of Ju­stice and Equity. For whether Gathelus entred into Possessionem vacuam, or compacted with the Natives, when he first came to Ireland, Quis rem tam veterem pro certo affirmet? But sure his authority was from Heaven. For what Fanatick can have a forehead to refuse, that the Spirit of God assisted the Penman of,

Where the four M's, the two D's, three C's, four L's, six visible V's, with the seven I's, by a strange numerical Prophesie, holds to the Year of the World, 5537. in which was born K. James the sixth, who found the fa­tal Chair at Westminster before him. Fergus was called in by his Kinsmen the Scots, and by them of their own consent, lawfully constitute their King. Kenneth the Second did but recover the Possession of the Pictish Kingdom, due to him in right of his Grand-mother Ferguisiana, Sister to Hungus King of the Picts, after the death of her Nephews Dorstolorgus and Ethanus: from which Crown, Kenneth and his Father Alpin, were debarred by Usur­pers of the peoples Election. So that Kenneths attaining the Crown of the Picts, was not a Conquest, but a severe example of Gods just indignation against Rebells, in secluding the righteous Heir from his Inheritance, the [Page 29] Picts after that, never regaining the face or name of a People, Nation, or Kingdom. And the Monarchy of England was no gift of Queen Elizabeths to King James, because a Protestant; but his due Inheritance from K. Hen­ry the seventh, by his eldest Daughter, neither were the Queens words, James of Scots the Protestant, but James of Scots my Cousin. It is true, happy was the Conjunction in that blessed Peace-maker, whom Heaven it seems had pre­ordain d to be Ʋnionum Ʋnio, a Pearl of price amongst the other Gems. But woe be to Princes, if Religion, nay rather the Forms, Modes, Sects, con­ceited Opinions, nicknamed Principles, and parties of assumed Designa­tions, from either the dismembred parts, hems, or Fringes thereof (which in thir dregs of Time, are atomed beyond Arithmetick) come once to be the only Standart of their Scepters. But blessed be God, Crowns of the Lords anointing do not so easily totter; consider that strange Eteostick for His Majesties Birth; ‘eCCe VeL angLorVM aC haCtenVs VLLVs oVat. 1630.’

As strangely answered by the Minted, Hactenus Anglorum Nullus, which equally befool'd the Devils, Nullus in his vir puer alecto, &c. And Olivers more hellish Nollus, most strangely suffering an Ecclipse and direful Syna­laepha, more sadly Historical then Grammatically Prosodiacal, before the En­glish can scan the Ovat of the Restauration.

And if it were lawful for the Subjects of Charles to vote their King by pole, would not the Scots do injustice to themselves, should they prefer any to one lawfully descended from their own First Fergus, when they have here Lochaber imped in the House of Galloway, by the last Great Steward, and Marjory Bruce; And this from David of Huntingtoun, Ingraft in the Stock by King David the First; that by Bancho, and his Progenitors from K. Ethus. And if there be yet any of the Pictish Blood remaining, would they refuse a Prince from the Loins of their own King Hungus-Father; or if there be be­yond Tweed, who delight in variety (and sickly Stomach's, nauseat a con­stant Diet) let them here pick and choose, which of the Roses smelleth sweetest, since our James the fifth, by his Mother, can furnish them with either. Will they have the Normans, from France, or from Flanders; be­fore, or after the Conquest; Then our James the first gives the one by a Daughter of Somerset, from John of Ghaunt, Son to Edward the third; and our Kenneth the third, by the Daughter of William Longespee, does (with­out a stain) supply them with the other: Would they have the outlaw'd Edward restored; our Malcolme Canmoir in his St. Margaret, hath done it to their hand. Wish they the Danes, our James the fourth by his Mother may please them. Which of the Heptarchies desire they? Egbert the Great can direct them. And what Welshman will refuse the Ofspring of Cadwal­lader, be he North or South, Hursell will be pleased when Hur hears, it is by the Wife of Fleance, but the Progeny of Griffith ap Lewelin ap Sitsylth, Prince of Guinedh, and the Lady Angharad, Daughter to Meredith ap Owen, Prince of Deheubarth. And both the Grand-fathers from Roderick Mawre (without a doubt) descended of Cadwallader. Or what will they have? the Native Britons; Whether from the Greater Britain, or the Lesser Bre­tagne? And whether before, or after Lucius Legacy to the Romans? even [Page 30] to the Ancestors of the Founder of their beloved Trino hantin-Caerlud. Cad­wallader then from Constantine, the Son of Aldroenus King of Armorica in France does for me sufficiently the one, and their own Geoffrie of Monmouth spares me the labour to do for them the other. Or if yet any wild Irish, dare offer to disown the juster and nobler Scepter of Gathelus, Simon Breck, and Ferquard the Father of our Fergus, it will be easie to Harp them a spring upon the harsher Title of Conquest. Yea, is not our Sacred So­veraign a King, who by his Predecessors, through the Mother of the third English Edward from the fourth Philip of France, hath (as the nearest Heir) by the Law of Nations and Nature, a fairer pretence to the Lillies, then could in justice the Posterior and more unequitable Salique constitution, give either to the House of Valois or Bourbon.

Yes, a Line Sir, wherein the Prince Regnant for the time, may with great­er justice then any Potentate under the great beaming Luminary, without complement, name his Vassalls his Cousins. For let the Baronages of his Treeple Crowned Kingdoms be but impartially surveyed; And if they be of any standing, the greatest Nobility they can glory in, will be found soon or sine, derived to them, by some blood-rillet or other, from this very same Royal Fountain. So that the Peerage (not to say how dim those Stars hang in the Firmament of the State, during the least Ecclipse of the Monar­chical Sun, as was by a total, both lately and sadly experimented) So that the Peerage, I say of Britain and Ireland, are not faithful to their own honour, if they do not here (even without Oaths of Allegiance) acknowledge they owe their Native Prince all Homage and Loyalty, since most of them leave to say, that they are Flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bone.

And yet I know not how it comes to pass, that this very Line seems to have equally intail'd upon it the Fate and Blessing of Joseph. For the Ar­chers have shot at it; yea, verily the Archers have shot, and grieved it sore­ly, yea, hated it too; but blessed be the God of Jacob, its Bow yet abid­eth in its strength; And by the hands of the Almighty, hath it become a fruitful Bough, whose Branches have run over the Christal Walls of Albion. Is it not then the duty, as well as honour, of all in this British World, to pray that there may never want one from this Stock,