The Elegant Combat OR, THE Mutual Entertainment between the two learned and famous Frenchmen Monseiur Du Moulin and Monseiur De Balzac. Extracted out of the original, By Robert Codrington Master of Arts. And dedicated to the truly ennobled Master Anthony Mildemay. printer's device of Anne Griffin LONDON, Printed by Anne Griffin. 1634. TO THE TRUE LOVER of all good Learning, and the perfect Mirror of his own rank, the most worthy and the most accomplished, Anthony Mildemay, Esquire. SIR, IF these papers live, it is because they devote themselves to you, in whom alone they gratulate the happiness of your Family, which is ennobled by so safe and so pure a Virtue, that as no Envy dares apapproach it, so no Flattery can corrupt it, a Family which hath enjoyed the favour of your Sovereigns by descent, and which hath proved your Virtues as hereditary as your honours. But because it did appear to cheap a glory to be absolute in that Court which the King doth daily crown with the divine examples of his Virtues, and where he is no Subject whose practice expresseth not the loyalty of obedience to such his most royal inclinations, it hath been your Business to transplant them into remote Kingdoms and Courts, who have admired the method of his Government by your Discourse, and believed it by your Conversation, a Truth which their Jmitation hath illustrated, and which the Pirate and the Infidel hath understood and been guilty of it, who taken more by the more victorious sweetness o● your Nature, than you were by their insolence forgot that they were Turks and made your Deliverance as famous as your Wisdom. You have enjoyed by this a reflecting happiness, and have improved our Practice at home, by being such a studied and an elaborate Example abroad and teaching dispersed Nations the English Virtue, you have made the World indebted to your own. These are the Garlands which do crown your praises, which your love to learning doth perpetuate & advance as much in excellence as number, but the modest gratitude of learning being Compendious always in the Panegyriks of her living Benefactors doth become to them more absolute and more just by Death, for Eternity being the Object and the End of Learning, their Memory must rather be her Subject than themselves. But your love unto Religion as it is unbounded, so will your Reward be, which hath invited Blessings to descend upon you, Blessings which shall raise you high as in their Centre from whence they flow, and leaving your Story a mirror to Posterity, shall give life unto your Epitaph, when the Ruins of your Tomb can remember it no more. This I do not presage, but demonstrate, for Fame is but the herald and the voice of Honour, and Jmmortality rather a Debt then a Reward to Virtue. But I forbear to afflict you with your praises, which are therefore the more due, the more unwilling you are to hear them. Pardon my imposed Error, the assurance of your Virtues did give unto my knowledge that it was a sin to conceal them and my insufficiency to express that knowledge hath made my language as guilty as my silence. But I presume these few leaves delivered in what form soever will be acceptable to you, not for any beauty that this rude hand of mine can lend unto them, but for the primitive excellence of their Authors, who meet as admirably in their eloquence as they differ in their sense. The smallness of the Present shall the more ennoble and crown your Acceptance. The Sea receiveth the smallest drops with as much acknowledgement as the greatest Rivers, & the like liberality of entertainment hath renowned the Assyrian Monarch, and endeared him more to Immortality then all the Glory of the East or the Majesty of his Empires could. Be pleased to entertain this with your leisure and your patience, which shall oblige me ere many months be expired, to present you with a larger volume, as devoted ever to express myself, The constant honourer of your Virtues, R. C. A Letter of Mounseiur Du Moulin to Mounseiur De Balzac. SIR, I Have received the book which out of your favour it hath pleased you to send unto me, which you could not have given to any Man that did more esteem it, or less deserve it, for although I find myself one of the most unworthy to come into your remembrance, yet I am one of the first that do extol your Virtue, by which you have attained to the height of the Art of Eloquence, and drawing the Bridge after you have with admiration left Despair unto Posterity. In the description of Eloquence which the Ancients thought to have no being but in Fancy, you have made an entire body, and have demonstrated that a man of these times may out go them, the force and dexterity of your Spirit having exceeded their imagination, you delight the understanding and instruct it, and have joined two things rarely sociable, beauty with solidity. This is one of the belssings of this Age to have bred a Man that in effect hath showed how fare that Eloquence may go. But of this I had rather speak to others than yourself, who without affecting praise are content to merit it, and which followeth you so much the closer, by how much the less you search it, so that he must borrow your pen who worthily would praise it, and I assure you that for the exercising of it you have made choice of a subject proportionable to your wit. For as the things done by the King could not be performed by any other than himself, so could not they have worthily been written by any other then by you, you insult especially on our miseries, but in that you are not to be blamed, because you writ according to your understanding, and that without this draught of your pencil the King's picture could not be perfected, whom though God hath employed to humble us, yet hath not his majesty forgotten our ancient services, nor is he ignorant how that the late King his Father of glorious memory found no refuge in time of his affliction but among our Churches. Would you be offended Sir, if I should say, that it seems to me, that God hath presented you another Subject worthy of your excellent Wit, that is the prowess and the happy success of the King of Sweden for sinee the King whom you have drawn out in so rich colours cannot satisfy himself to hear himself but praised, you shall follow his inclinations in drawing the portrait of another King that emulates his Virtues, mean while your work shall be to me not only a proof of your sufficiency, but also a pledge of your Bounty, and seeing it among my other books, I shall almost begin to think myself somebody, because in sending it to me, you testify that you have some good opinion of me, which shall oblige me to wish your prosperity and to remain, Your most humble and affectionate servant. Du Moulin. The Letter of Mounseiur De Balzac to Mounseiur Du Moulin. SIR, There is no modesty that can resist the praises that come from you, and I should dissemble if I should not acknowledge that I took pleasure to suffer myself to be corrupted by the first lines of your letter, but I must know myself a great deal less than I do to remain long in that error; A Man after he hath had a pleasant dream awaketh, and I see well that after you have spoken so advantageously of my labour, you have not used all the severity of your judgement, favour you have done me rather than justice, and have sought to oblige me though with the hazard of offending truth, yourself being theformost you encourage those that are in the race with your hand and voice, and to persuade them to follow you, you make them believe they shall outgo you. Lo here in good earnest an admirable Artifice, and which I had not discovered at the first blush, But whatsoever it be, or from what principle soever this glorious approbation comes to me, I do no less esteem it then an ambitious man would do a crown, and without penetrating into your design I rejoice in myfortune. It is no small thing Sir, to be beloved of you whom I have always perfectly esteemed, and have now a long time marked of the Huguenots party, as an excellent pilot who dares brave a whole fleet out of a Cockeboat, we have the Right and the Authority, but you have the Address and the Stratagems, and are no less confident of your courage than we are of our cause. Certain it is that thereby you may give to a Sedition the appearance of a just war, and to a multitude of Mutineers the face of a well disciplined army, thereby you make pleasing to many people an opinion that hath lost the grace of novelty, and although it leaneth towards a downfall, we must confess it hath both lineaments and complexion in your writings, and that never any man did so cunningly cover weakness or hold up ruins with finer force Si Pergamadextrâ Defendi possint etiam bâc defensa fuissent: The Town of Troy from being made a Grave This arm of thine if any Arm could save. I use always this language when there is occasion to speak of you, nor do I take any part at all with the passions of the vulgar, who conserve not the liberty of their own, judgement, and know neither the faults of their own nor the virtues of strangers. Form out of what cloud soever the Day comes forth, it seemeth beautiful, and I assure myself that at Rome the better part did praise Hannibal, and none but plebeians spoke opprobiously of him. For it is a kind of sacrilege to bereave whomsoever it be of the gifts of God, and if I did not confess that you had received much, I should think myself injurious to him who had given you much, and in a different cause should offend our common Benefactor. It is true that sometimes I have not flattered your party, and have been a little moved against the Authors of these late tumults, but having observed in your books that our opinions were agreeable, and that subjection due unto a Sovereign did make up a part of that religion which you teach, I thought I might speak with your consent that which I have already said, and that in this I was but your simple interpreter. Be the Tempest begotten by the North or by the South, it is equally odious to me, and I take not counsel in what concerns my duty either of England or of Spain. My humour is not to fight against the times, nor to oppose myself against things present, it is pain, to me to conceive only the Idea of Cato or of Brutus, and being to live under the power of another I find no vettue more convenient than obedience. If I were a Swiss I could be content to be the King's compeer, and would not be his subject nor change my liberty for the best master in the world. But since God hath made me to be borne in chains I bear them willingly, and seeing they are neither rude nor heavy I will not mar my teeth in trying how to break them. It seems that Heaven approveth a government which it hath maintained by the succession of twelve hundred years, an Evil which had so long continued might in some sort become lawful, and if the Age of men be venerable that of states is holy. Those great spirits which I have designed in my work, and which you have had of your party ought to have come in the beginning of the world, to have given laws to new people, and to have travailed in the establishment of policy. But as it is necessary to invent good things, socertainely it is most dangerous to go about to change even evil ones themselves. I have no cruel thoughts Sir but those only that concern the cheifes of your party. I treat in a manner as an enemy, and I care not for insulting on your miseries, as you civilly reproach me, I who have written that the King should be blessed of all the world if after having suppressed the pride of Rebels he did not insult on the misfortune of the afflicted. The persecutors of those who submit themselves are in like execration with me as the destroyers of tombs, neither have I only pity of affliction, in some sort I have it in reverence. I know that heretofore men consecrated places that were stricken with thunder, the finger of God was respected in the person of the miserable, and great adversities do rather work Religion then receive reproaches. But so to style the good success of the King's arms were to speak improperly, we have all gained in his Victory, all the pain that hath been imposed upon yours hath been to make you as happy as ourselves, and they are now possessors and enjoyers of that security of which they were but amorous & jealous before their towns were taken. Our Prince will put no yoke on the consciences of his subjects, he will not have that received by force which cannot be well received but by persuasion, nor use those remedies against the French which were good against the Moors. If the King of Sweden doth so use his prosperity, and doth not defile so pure a Grace by punishments and proscriptions, I promise you to do that which you have desired of me, and to employ all my Art and Utensils to erect him a statue. This is just to touch my inclination to pray me to praise that prince, when should all the Crowns which are embroidered on his Scarf be changed into so many kingdoms, they would not be sufficient (me thinks) to recompense so rare a Virtue or to employ so vast a Spirit. As I expect nothing but Greatness from his valour, so I hope for nothing but Goodness from his Virtue. And although some have declared in Spain that he is the very AntiChrist, yet I am neither so devout to believe that news, nor so fearful to be afraid thereof. Only I say unto Scrupulous Men who ask me thereabouts, that in the mean time our King hath there a Second that serves him well and that no Man could present unto the house of Austria a Demur that could divert him more from studying on our affairs. Sir, I will pass no farther, Better it is to stand at the portal of a holy place then to enter thereinto being unprepared. Besides that this discourse is already long enough for the beginning of Acquaintance. Pardon (if you please) the Contentment which I have in entertaining you, which is the cause that I have forgotten both your business and my Custom which is not to preach with my friends, but you have given me the Text which I have treated on and I believe that you having suddenly opened the bottom of my heart, and I not dissembling with you my affections; you will hereafter take Confidence in my freedom; with which I protest unto you most solemnly that I am, Your most humble and affectionate servant. De Balzac. An answer of Monseiur DuMoulin to the letter of Monseiur De Balzac. SIR, I Had ere now answered your letters if they had been in my Possession, but they have along time run up and down the town every one desiring to take a Copy thereof, and from the town they have walked to the Villages from whence the pestilence hath removed us, for albeit that in all your writings there shine the force and liveliness of your Spirit seasoned with Grace and Sweetness, tie in these letters you have excelled yourself, so elaborate is the style, and the Conceptions strong and pleasing, that all here glisters: neither doth the soundness hinder the clearness of it, wherein you are different from many of these times who take delight to dabble in the ink, and amongst plenty of thorns have but little light, like that of a Glow-worm shining out of a Bush, wherefore in rejecting the praises that I have given your quill, you show in earnest how much you do deserve them, for you reject the title of eloquent with so much eloquence, as it seems that you have taken a task upon you to show that your Modesty is unjust, and to accuse me for not having praised you enough, you must change your style if you would be believed, and must become barbarous to the end you may persuade. It would very ill become me to reply upon all points of your letter, I will not enter into that list with you, the scope of my writings being not to struck the ear but to strike the Conscience: This is their previledge that writ for true Doctrine, that incongruities pass oftentimes for elegancies, and that Barbarism is sociable with Truth. For as blue and red flowers among the Corn do delight the eye but disadvantage the harvest, so ornaments among good doctrine do diminish the fruit of the teaching, and do cause that instead of of teaching matters we are stayed at words, and do weigh periods, these flowers must fall before the fruits come on, and grosser terms do oftentimes give a deeper impression. And it being necessary in such matters to use sometimes strong reprehensions; to bring hither the flowers of eloquence, were as if we should scourge our children with a nosegay. It is for false religions to borrow these ornaments, as in their Temples and Ceremonies they will have splendour, so they require a swollne and an artificial language, like unto a Woman sparkling with Diamonds whose eyes are blind, which Sir, I say to answer to those offensive praises which you too liberally bestow upon me, praising me in that I have a Grace to lie, saying that I defend a bad cause with dexterity and Stratagems, without right and without Authority, and that I maintain an opinion which hath lost the grace of novelty, and for the height of all my praises, you say that I would be fit to give a Sedition the appearance of a just war, which dexterity of seducing you place amongst the gifts of God, which you say you have in great esteem, so with a double artifice you prick me as you tickle me, and lift me up a spectacle on high after you have besmutched and deformed me. Pardon me Sir if I tell you that there is no blame which is not more tolerable than these praises, to bring more Art and Industry to defend Error serveth to no other end but to go to hell with a better Grace, and to sweeten poison to destroy both himself and others with more dexterity. It were better a thousand times for such a Man to be dumb then so unhappily eloquent, and to be the most brutish amongst men then to have such an ingenious perverseness. This is ill taking of measures, to place a fraudulent Eloquence amongst the gifts of God. It is rather the Devil who whets the tongue and pen of such a Man, and lends him his arms to make war against God. In brief you have heaped on me those praises which Homer gives to Paris, praising the beauty of his locks but making him to be the ruin of his Country. Now that if on our side there were Benefices, Riches, and Pensions, you might have some Colour to think that a spirit desirous to appear had been drawn by these allurements to defend an evil cause, but Poverty and Reproach being the Cognizance of our Profession, to be wicked for nothing would be with the loss of piety to lose common Sense. And whereas you say that our Religion hath lost the grace of Novelty, I say that it is impossible it should lose that which it never had, but if it were or had been new, this should not have been a Grace unto it but a Blemish. Novelty may give some grace unto Salads or Apparel, but not to the Doctrine of Salvation: that were good news for Italy, where the new Saints do make the old ones lose their Credit, and for the church of Rome in which the Pope doth vaunt of his power to change that which God hath commanded in his word, and that he can make new Articles of Faith, who not being able to say with Saint Peter Gold and Silver I have none, useth his ship to traffic; making a noise with the keys, whose locks he hath changed. From this head a defluxion is fallen on the Body of the Clergy, who set up their Bank in the Temple, and abandoning the Dominical letter, are altogether addicted to the goldennumber, From whence it comes to pass that all is put to sale, even God himself and the remission of sins, and that private Masses are not said but for those who have contributed to the Church, the wit of avarice digging even into Sepulchers, so that a rich Man cannot go cheap into his Grave. And there can be no greater change than of a spiritual to make a temporal Monarchy, but our Religion is the true and ancient Christianity, only new in this, that it rejecteth all novelty, and esteemeth doctrine new that is not from the Beginning; It being the heavenly Truth which the Son of God brought into the world, the violence of provoked people have no more power against it then the Winds have power to change the beams of the Sun. This is it, why I make my prediction quite contrary to yours, and instead of the declining which you speak of I assure myself that it will flourish and chase away the darkness of this Age by the brightness of it. And I wonder how you can delude yourself with such a hope, in a time wherein our Religion receiveth so great Increase in the low Countries and in Germany, and wherein the Greek Churches do range themselves under our Confession, being drawn thereunto by the evidence of the Truth. This without doubt is one of the praises which you reserve for the King of Sweden to have contributed to so good a Work, of whom besides his Valour and success you will advance his Clemency, and for this that in places conquered he hath used no violence against the Roman Clergy, but letteth even the jesuites themselves alone, although they teach that it is lawful to kill Kings, and that many parricides have come out of their schools, who having lately called this King Anti Christ do now in their Colleges make declamations to his praise. And if our Churches in France do suffer any Diminution, this proceeds not from the Cause of the contrary party, but from the Avarice of some of our Nobility who wound us in giving ear to that TIBIDABO which the Devil propounded to the Son of God, for there are found of thosewho are always armed againstiron, but not against silver, and in this golden Age a bag of Pistols is of great weight, & being put into the balance doth often times overweigh the Conscience. But the Church is no more weakened by that, than a Man's body is by having vomited a worm or spit forth some filthiness. So Pride, Vanity, and Avarice are more conveniently lodged in the temples of Idols then in the house of God. True it is that those of your party do talk of our Religion with great Contempt as of a desperate Cause which notwithstanding from the lowest is often mounted up on high: they speak of us, as if we intended to mine the Alps with a pin or pierce a Lion with a festraw. They black us over with injuries doing as the enemies of the Gospel did of old who clad the Martyrs in the skins of wild beasts to animate the dogs to tear them, for they transform us into monsters to provoke the people against us, but the son of God hath prepared us against this reproach, and he himself hath passed by the like proofs. I do rely upon your goodness and your Wisdom that you will support me if I be sensible on this side, for you are too clear sighted not to discern the weakness of your Cause, having a long time lived at Rome from whence with the examples of vices came the decisions of the Faith; where the jews, enemies of the name of Christ do live in peace, but the Christians & the faithful are burned; where in the time of Lent the Shambles are shut and the Stews are open; where the Penitents whip themselves in public for the sins of others; where is exercised a merchandise of Annats, of benefices, of dispensations, and pardons: and I remember that I have read in one of your letters that it is excellent good sinning there, and that you distinguish the Roman religion from the Pope's Court, for fear the corruption of the one should not stir up an evil presumption of the other, although that this Court doth rule religion. A spirit excellent as yours should not suffer itself to be inknarled with such senseless opinions. But you have a more delieate religion then that which the vulgar do believe, or your Church doth institute, nor do you fasten upon any thing which is not agreeable to your humour. I make no doubt but you scorn the hypochondriacal devotion of those who adore bones, who kissing and apparelling Images and tossing up and down their hallowed grains, do make their prayers by tale in words they understand not. Without doubt you do not think it good that Service should be said in an unknown tongue as if God were become barbatous to Men, or as if the Pope had forbidden God to speak in French; you have seen at Rome many Altars where the Pope hath set up pardons for a 100 and 200 thousand years with as many quarantines, and power to draw a soul out of purgatory; you have seen there the madness of the people coming two or three hundred miles to a jubily to obtain the remission of their sins which God hath presented us at home by the preaching of the Gospel; nor are you ignorant out of what stock the Pope draws this his liberality; for he heaps up the superabundance of Fast, whip, pilgrimages of Saints and Monks, and converts the same into payments for the sins of others. When at Rome you did refresh your chamber with a Gale sufficient to drive a Ship, and did mount into your Caroche only, to cross a street, you had not then the leisure to study these superstitions. But if you had then the Curiosity to take the missal, and therein to read the Cautels and the Rubrics which do provide against inconveniences in case the wind should carry away their God, or the Rats should have eaten jesus Christ, or the Priest should vomit him up, you would excuse us and say, certainly it is no marvel if this poor people do find these things of so hard digestion and ill agreeing with the majesty of the Son of God. On two points principally we insist, namely on the Succession of the Pope into the Apostleship, and on the primacy of S. Peter: and we could never yet obtain that any Man would show us the Institutions of these two things out of the word of God. But enough of these matters, from which I would have abstained if you had not pushed me forward. I subscribe to the rest of your letters. Obedience unto Sovereigns is a thing both just and necessary. To find in our own Religion or in that of the King's occasions of Rebellion is to raise up tumults to defend religion by courses condemned by Religion itself, who being necessitated in their own particular affairs, do hope to find ease by moving the fishpoole and to save themselves in the midst of Confusion. The Cause of God was never advanced that way. Moses had power to strike Egypt and their King with great plagues, yet would he never draw the Israelites out of Egypt without the permission of their King. I am of opinion that in Civil Causes it is more expedient for the people to have a bad master then to have none at all; how much more having a good and clement King are we obliged to be faithful to him, who in pardoning us hath not done as they do who help forward their clemency by disdain, esteeming him that hath offended them unworthy of their choler, but he hath followed his natural inclination which hath carried him not only to pardon but to benefit also, so that to be conquered by him is profitable. Furthermore I have always believed that there is no worse estate than Anarchy, in which every one is a slave because every one is a master and where the excess of liberty is the Cause of Slavery. For this liberty bringeth licence, and licence confusion, and confusion slavery. As the hand would be an unproper instrument, were the fingers all of an equal length, So a multitude of equal persons move not without inconvenience; your maxim that it is dangerous to change evil laws is true out of the business of Religion. To subject a Man's self by docility unto laws which lead unto hell, is to break the laws of God, and such who have made those laws shall not protect before God, those who obey them. But where nothing is to be considered but the loss of goods and life, it is better to undergo that unjust yoke then to be exempted from it by troubling the public peace by rebellion against the Sovereign, for the force of humane laws doth not consist in this that they are just, but in that they are laws, and are made by them who have Authority, and albeit they have something of unjust in them, yet it is just to obey them. There are to be found Estates who have a long time lived in peace and prosperity under unjust Laws well observed, and others living under just Laws but ill observed have fallen into ruin and confusion. This peace and prosperity will be always found more durable in a Monarchy than in any other form of State, for it is the only civil government which imitates the government of the universal World, where there is but one Master, and all other States when they are much grown must of necessity come unto it. But of Monarchies subsisting at this day, this of France hath the pre-eminence in Antiquity and good Laws: the moving humour of our nation & inclined to change is a clear proof that the State is well composed, for it had long since overturned the State, if the Pillars were not firm, and the building well compacted. Being borne under this Monarchy we desire the prosperity of it, and that the crown of our King may be like the crown of Eggs which daily doth increase by Age. If our religion were generally received in France, the King's Majesty should be more exalted and his power should the more enlarge itself. For the Pope should no more pretend to have power over the life and the Crown of our Kings, and should vaunt no more that he might depose them, there should not in France be any more justice than that of the Kings. Causes bred on this side the Alps should not be called over to Rome. The Clergy should be subject to Civil Laws and should be tryable before the King's judges. The Kingdom should no more be exhausted of money that goes to Rome for Annats, dispensations, and pardons. So many Lands possessed by the Clergy and thereby fallen into mortmain should owe unto the King the same services and duties which other Lands do which are possessed by the Nobility. In brief I dare say that the principal reason of the hatred which men bear to us is because we defend by the Word of God the right of our Kings against the usurpation of the Popes, who make them kiss their pantofles and under the shadow of penance do impose upon them corporal punishments. But this is our unhappiness that as the holy Scripture is a book which is hid from Kings, so in that which concerns the liberty and independence of their Crowns, they learn nothing but from them whom the Pope holds bound by the belly. But this is too much. The pleasure which I take in entertaining you makes me forget that I writ an Epistle and not a book, and hath carried me beyond my limits: that clause wherein you say that I would give unto a sedition the appearance of a just war hath urged me to take some kind of revenge which hath been this, to tyre you with the length of my letters; yet it shall not hinder me from admiring the beauty and the force of your wit. I honour the gifts of God wheresoever they be found, on the other side also, I hope that this little sharpness which I have used shall not deprive him of your favours who honours you and who is, Your most humble and affectionate servant. Du Moulin. FINIS.