We Are Naturally Prone To Applaud The Times Behind Us, And To Vilify
The Present; For The Concurrent Of Her
Fame carries it to this day,
how loyally and victoriously she lived and died, without the grudge
and grievance of
Her people; yet the truth may appear without
detraction from the honour of so great a princess. It is manifest
she left more debts unpaid, taken upon credit of her privy-seals,
than her progenitors did, or could have taken up, that were a
hundred years before her; which was no inferior piece of State, to
lay the burthen on that house {26} which was best able to bear it at
a dead lift, when neither her receipts could yield her relief at the
pinch, nor the urgency of her affairs endure the delays of
Parliamentary assistance. And for such aids it is likewise apparent
that she received more, and that with the love of her people, than
any two of her predecessors that took most; which was a fortune
strained out of the subjects, through the plausibility of her
comportment, and (as I would say, without offence) the prodigal
distribution of her grace to all sorts of subjects; for I believe no
prince living, that was so tender of honour, and so exactly stood
for the preservation of sovereignty, was so great a courtier of the
people, yea, of the Commons, and that stooped and declined low in
presenting her person to the public view, as she passed in her
progress and perambulations, and in her ejaculations of her prayers
on the people.
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