A50149:232
Pietas in patriam the life of His Excellency Sir William Phips, Knt. late Captain…
Pietas in patriam the life of His Excellency Sir William Phips, Knt. late Captain General and Governor in Chief of the province of the Massachuset-Bay, New England, containing the memorable changes undergone, and actions performed by him / written by one intimately acquainted with him.Pietas in patriam the life of His Excellency Sir William Phips, Knt. late Captain General and Governour in Chief of the province of the Massachuset-Bay, New England, containing the memorable changes undergone, and actions performed by him / written by one intimately acquainted with him.
London: printed by Sam. Bridge for Nath. Hiller, 1697
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Nevertheless, there was a little Party of Men, who thought they must not sleep till they had caused him to fall: And they so vigorously prosecuted certain Articles before the Council-board at White-hall against him, that they imagined they had gained an Order of His Majesty in Council, to suspend him immediately from his Government, and appoint a Committee of Persons nominated by his Enemies, to hear all Depositions against him; and so a Report of the whole to be made unto the King and Council.
Nevertheless, there was a little Party of Men, who thought they must not sleep till they had caused him to fall: And they so vigorously prosecuted certain Articles before the Council-board at White-hal against him, that they imagined they had gained an Order of His Majesty in Council, to suspend him immediately from his Government, and appoint a Committee of Persons nominated by his Enemies, to hear all Depositions against him; and so a Report of the whole to be made unto the King and Council.
But His Majesty was too well informed of Sir William's Integrity, to permit such a sort of Procedure; and therefore He signified unto His most Honourable Council, that nothing should be done against Sir William, until he had Opportunity to clear himself; and thereupon He sent His Royal Commands unto Sir William to come over. To give any retorting Accounts of the Principal Persons, who thus adversaried him, would be a Thing so contrary to the Spirit of Sir William Phips himself, who, at his leaving of New-England, bravely declared, that he freely forgave them all, and if he had returned thither again, would never have taken the least revenge upon them, that This alone would oblige me, if I had no other Obligations of Christianity upon me, to forbear it; and it may be for some of them, it would be to throw Water upon a drowned Mouse.
Nor need I to produce any more about the Articles which these Men exhibited against him, than This; that it was by most Men believed, that if he would have connived at some Arbitrary Oppressions too much used by some kind of Officers, on the Kings