THE TRIUMPHS OF INTEGRITY.

The Trivmphs of Integrity. A Noble Solemnity, performed through the City, at the sole Cost and Charges of the Honorable Fraternity of Drapers, at the Confirmation and Establishment of their most worthy Brother, the Right Honorable, Martin Lumley, in the high Office of his Maiesties Lieutenant, Lord Maior and Chancellor of the famous City of London. Taking beginning at his Lordships going, and perfecting it selfe after His Returne from receiuing the Oath of Maioralty at Westminster, on the Morrow after Simon and Judes Day, being the 29. of October. 1623. By Tho. Middleton Gent. London, Printed by Nicholas Okes, dwelling in Foster-Lane. 1623. 4to.

To the honour of him to whom the noble Fraternity of Drapers, his worthy brothers, have consecrated their loves in costly Triumphs, the Right Honourable Martin Lumley, Lord Mayor of this renowned City.

Thy descent worthy, fortune’s early grace,
Sprung of an ancient and most generous race,
Match’d with a virtuous lady, justly may
Challenge the honour of so great a day.
Faithfully devoted to the worthiness of you both,
Tho. Middleton.
THE
TRIUMPHS OF INTEGRITY;
OR,
A NOBLE SOLEMNITY THROUGH THE CITY.

Of all solemnities by which the happy inauguration of a subject is celebrated, I find none that transcends the state and magnificence of that pomp prepared to receive his Majesty’s great substitute into his honourable charge, the city of London, dignified by the title of the King’s Chamber Royal; which, that it may now appear no less heightened with brotherly affection, cost, art, or invention, than some other preceding triumphs—by which of late times the city’s honour hath been more faithfully illustrated—this takes its fit occasion to present itself.

And first to specify the love of his noble fraternity, after his lordship’s return from Westminster, having received some service upon the water by a proper and significant masterpiece of triumph called the Imperial Canopy, being the ancient arms of the Company, an invention neither old nor enforced, the same glorious and apt property,[348] accompanied with four other triumphal pegmes,[349] are, in their convenient stages, planted to honour his lordship’s progress through the city: the first for the land, attending his most wished arrival in Paul’s-Churchyard, which bears the inscription of a Mount Royal, on which mount are placed certain kings and great commanders, which ancient history produces, that were originally sprung from shepherds and humble beginnings: only the number of six presented; some with crowns, some with gilt laurels, holding in their hands silver sheep-hooks; viz. Viriat, a prime commander of the Portugals—renowned amongst the historians, especially the Romans—who, in battles of fourteen years’ continuance, purchased many great and honourable victories; Arsaces, king of the Parthians, who ordained the first kingdom that ever was amongst them, and in the reverence of this king’s name and memory all others his successors were called Arsacides after his name, as the Roman emperors took the name of Cæsar for the love of great Cæsar Augustus; also Marcus Julius Lucinus; Bohemia’s Primislaus; the emperor Pertinax; the great victor Tamburlain, conqueror of Syria, Armenia, Babylon, Mesopotamia, Scythia, Albania, &c. Many honourable worthies more I could produce, by their deserts ennobling their mean originals; but for the better expression of the purpose in hand, a speaker lends a voice to these following words:

The speech in the Mount Royal.
They that with glory-inflam’d hearts desire
To see great worth deservingly aspire,
Let ’em draw near and fix a serious eye
On this triumphant Mount of Royalty;
Here they shall find fair Virtue, and her name,
From low, obscure beginnings, rais’d to fame,
Like light struck out of darkness: the mean wombs
No more eclipse brave merit than rich tombs
Make the soul happy; ’tis the life and dying
Crowns both with honour’s sacred satisfying;
And ’tis the noblest splendour upon earth
For man to add a glory to his birth,
All his life’s race with honour’d acts commix’d,
Than to be nobly born, and there stand fix’d,
As if ’twere competent virtue for whole life
To be begot a lord: ’tis virtuous strife
That makes the complete Christian, not high place,
As true submission is the state of grace:
The path to bliss lies in the humblest field;
Who ever rise[350] to heaven that never kneel’d?
Although the roof hath supernatural height,
Yet there’s no flesh can thither go upright.
All this is instanc’d only to commend
The low condition whence these kings descend.
I spare the prince of prophets[351] in this file,
And preserve him for a far holier style,
Who, being king anointed, did not scorn
To be a shepherd after: these were born
Shepherds, and rise to kings; took their ascending
From the strong hand of Virtue, never ending
Where she begins to raise, until she place
Her love-sick servants equal with her grace:
And by this day’s great honour it appears
Sh’as much prevail’d amongst the reverend years
Of these grave senators; chief of the rest,
Her favour hath reflected most and best
Upon that son whom we of honour call;
And may’t successively reflect on all!

From this Mount Royal, beautified with the glory of deserving aspirers, descend we to the modern use of this ancient and honourable mystery, and there we shall find the whole livery of this most renowned and famous city, as upon this day, at all solemn meetings furnished by it: it clothes the honourable senators in their highest and richest wearings, all courts of justice, magistrates, and judges of the land.

By this time his lordship and the worthy Company being gracefully conducted toward the Little Conduit in Cheap, there another part of the Triumph waits his honour’s happy approach, being a chariot artfully framed and properly garnished; and on the conspicuous part thereof is placed the register of all heroic acts and worthy men, bearing the title of Sacred Memory, who, for the greater fame of this honourable fraternity, presents the never-dying names of many memorable and remarkable worthies of this ancient Society, such as were the famous for state and government: Sir Henry Fitz-Alwin, Knight, who held the seat of magistracy in this city twenty-four years together; he sits figured under the person of Government: Sir John Norman, the first lord mayor rowed in barge to Westminster with silver oars at his own cost and charges, under the person of Honour: the valiant Sir Francis Drake, that rich ornament to memory, who in two years and ten months’ space did cast a girdle about the world, under the person of Victory: Sir Simon Eyre, who at his own cost built Leadenhall, a granary for the poor, under the figure of Charity: Sir Richard Champion and Sir John Milborne, under the person of Munificence or Bounty: Sir Richard Hardell and Sir John Poultney, the one in the seat of magistracy six years, the other four years together, under the figures of Justice and Piety, that Sir John being a college-founder in the parish of St. Laurence Poultney, by Candlewick Street; et sic de ceteris: this Chariot drawn by two pelleted lions, being the proper supporters of the Company’s arms; those two upon the lions presenting Power and Honour, the one in a little streamer or banneret bearing the Lord Mayor’s arms, the other the Company’s.

The speech in the Chariot.
I am all Memory, and methinks I see
Into the farthest time, act, quality,
As clear as if ’twere now begun agen,[352]
The natures, dispositions, and the men:
I find to goodness they all bent their powers,
Which very name makes blushing times of ours;
They heap’d up virtues long before they were old,
This age sits laughing upon heaps of gold;
We by great buildings strive to raise our names,
But they more truly wise built up their fames,
Erected fair examples, large and high,
Patterns for us to build our honours by:
For instance only, Memory relates
The noblest of all city-magistrates,
Famous Fitz-Alwin; naming him alone,
I sum up twenty-four lord mayors in one,
For he, by free election and consent,
Fill’d all those years with virtuous government:
Custom and time requiring now but one,
How ought that year to be well dwelt upon!
It should appear an abstract of that worth
Which former times in many years brought forth:
Through all the life of man this is the year
Which many wish and never can come near;
Think, and give thanks; to whom this year does come,
The greatest subject’s made in Christendom:
This is the year for whom some long prepar’d,
And others have their glorious fortune shar’d;
But serious in thanksgiving; ’tis a year
To which all virtues, like the people here,
Should throng and cleave together, for the place
Is a fit match for the whole stock of grace;
And as men gather wealth ’gainst the year comes,
So should they gather goodness with their sums;
For ’tis not shows, pomp, nor a house of state
Curiously deck’d, that makes a magistrate;
’Tis his fair, noble soul, his wisdom, care,
His upright justness to the oath he sware,
Gives him complete: when such a man to me
Spreads his arms open, there my palace be!
He’s both an honour to the day so grac’d,
And to his brotherhood’s love, that sees him plac’d;
And in his fair deportment there revives
The ancient fame of all his brothers’ lives.

After this, for the full close of the forenoon’s triumph, near St. Laurence-Lane his lordship receives an entertainment from an unparalleled masterpiece of art, called the Crystal Sanctuary, styled by the name of the Temple of Integrity, where her immaculate self, with all her glorious and sanctimonious concomitants, sit, transparently seen through the crystal; and more to express the invention and the art of the engineer, as also for motion, variety, and the content of the spectators, this Crystal Temple is made to open in many parts, at fit and convenient times, and upon occasion of the speech: the columns or pillars of this Crystal Sanctuary are gold, the battlements silver, the whole fabric for the night-triumph adorned and beautified with many lights, dispersing their glorious radiances on all sides thorough the crystal.

The speech from the Sanctuary.
Have you a mind, thick multitude, to see
A virtue near concerns magistracy,
Here on my temple throw your greedy eyes,
See me, and learn to know me, then you’re wise;
Look and look through me, I no favour crave,
Nor keep I hid the goodness you should have;
’Tis all transparent what I think or do,
And with one look your eye may pierce me through;
There’s no disguise or hypocritic veil,
Us’d by adulterous beauty set to sale,
Spread o’er my actions for respect or fear,
Only a crystal, which approves[353] me clear.
Would you desire my name? Integrity,
One that is ever what she seems to be;
So manifest, perspicuous, plain, and clear,
You may e’en see my thoughts as they sit here;
I think upon fair Equity and Truth,
And there they sit crown’d with eternal youth;
I fix my cogitations upon love,
Peace, meekness, and those thoughts come from above:
The temple of an upright magistrate
Is my fair sanctuary, throne, and state;[354]
And as I dare Detraction’s evill’st eye,
Sore at the sight of goodness, to espy
Into my ways and actions, which lie ope
To every censure, arm’d with a strong hope,—
So of your part ought nothing to be done,
But what the envious eye might look upon:
As thou art eminent, so must thy acts
Be all tralucent,[355] and leave worthy tracts
For future times to find, thy very breast
Transparent, like this place wherein I rest.
Vain doubtings! all thy days have been so clear,
Never came nobler hope to fill a year.

At the close of this speech this crystal Temple of Integrity, with all her celestial concomitants and the other parts of Triumph, take leave of his lordship for that time, and rest from service till the great feast be ended; after which the whole body of the Triumph attends upon his honour, both towards Saint Paul’s and homeward, his lordship accompanied with the grave and honourable senators of the city, amongst whom the two worthy consuls, his lordship’s grave assistants for the year, the worshipful and generous master Ralph Freeman and master Thomas Moulson, sheriffs and aldermen, ought not to pass of my respect unremembered, whose bounty and nobleness will prove best their own expressors.

Near the entrance of Wood Street, that part of Triumph being planted to which the concluding speech hath chiefly reference, and the rest about the Cross, I thought fit in this place to give this its full illustration, it being an invention both glorious and proper to the Company, bearing the name of the thrice-royal Canopy of State, being the honoured arms of this fraternity, the three Imperial Crowns cast into the form and bigness of a triumphal pageant, with cloud and sunbeams, those beams, by enginous[356] art, made often to mount and spread like a golden and glorious canopy over the deified persons that are placed under it, which are eight in number, figuring the eight Beatitudes; to improve which[357] conceit, Beati pacifici, being the king’s word or motto, is set in fair great letters near the uppermost of the three crowns; and as in all great edifices or buildings the king’s arms is especially remembered, as a[n] honour to the building and builder, in the frontispiece, so is it comely and requisite in these matters of Triumph, framed for the inauguration of his great substitute, the lord mayor of London, that some remembrance of honour should reflect upon his majesty, by whose peaceful government, under heaven, we enjoy the solemnity.

The speech, having reference to this Imperial Canopy, being the Drapers’ arms.
The blessedness, peace, honour, and renown,
This kingdom does enjoy, under the crown
Worn by that royal peace-maker our king,
So oft preserv’d from dangers menacing,
Makes this arms, glorious in itself, outgo
All that antiquity could ever shew;
And thy fraternity hath striv’d t’ appear
In all their course worthy the arms they bear;
Thrice have they crown’d their goodness this one day,
With love, with care, with cost; by which they may,
By their deserts, most justly these arms claim,
Got once by worth, now trebly held by fame.
Shall I bring honour to a larger field,
And shew what royal business these arms yield?
First, the Three Crowns afford[358] a divine scope,
Set for the graces, Charity, Faith, and Hope,
Which three the only safe combiners be
Of kingdoms, crowns, and every company;
Likewise, with just propriety they may stand
For those three kingdoms, sway’d by the meek hand
Of blest James, England, Scotland, Ireland:
The Cloud that swells beneath ’em may imply
Some envious mist cast forth by heresy,
Which, through his happy reign and heaven’s blest will,
The sunbeams of the Gospel strike[359] through still;
More to assure it to succeeding men,
We have the crown of Britain’s hope agen,[360]
Illustrious Charles our prince, which all will say
Adds the chief joy and honour to this day;
And as three crowns, three fruits of brotherhood,
By which all love’s worth may be understood,
To threefold honour make[361] the royal suit,
In the king, prince, and the king’s substitute;
By th’ eight Beatitudes ye understand
The fulness of all blessings to this land,
More chiefly to this city, whose safe peace
Good angels guard, and good men’s prayers increase!
May all succeeding honour’d brothers be
With as much love brought home as thine bring[362] thee!

For all the proper adornments of art and workmanship in so short a time, so gracefully setting forth the body of so magnificent a Triumph, the praise comes, as a just due, to the exquisite deservings of master Garret Crismas,[363] whose faithful performances still take the upper hand of his promises.