The governance of England: otherwise called The difference between an absolute and a limited monarchy. A rev. text edited with introd., notes, and appendices by Charles Plummer.

necessarye ffor the demeynynge and rule off this counsell, mowe be conseyued be layser, and putt in a boke, and that boke kept in this counsell as a registir or a ordinarye, howe thai shall doo in euery thynge.

THE Romaynes, while thair counsell callid þe senate was gret, gate, through þe wysdome off that counsell, the lordshippe off gret partye of the world. And aftirward Julyus, thair ffirst emperowre, coun|selled by þe same senate, gate the monarchie ner|hande off all þe world. Wherthrough Octavian, þer secounde emperour, commounded all þe world to be discribed as subget vnto hym. But aftir this, when yll dysposed emperours, as Nero, Domician, and oþer had slayn grete parte off þe senatours, and dyspiced the counsell off þe senate, the estate off þe Romans and off þer emperours be ganne to fall doune, and hath ffallen alwey sythyn, in to suche decay, þat nowe the lordeshippes off þe emperour bith not so gret, as be þe lordeshippes off some kynge, wich, while þe senate was hole, was subget to þe emperour. Be wich ensample it is thought, þat yff the kyng haue such a Counsell as is beffore specified, his lande shall not only be ryche and welthy, as were