¶ The fashion and face of our Customes beeing thus layd open, theyr Vse by practise but once made knowne; would enflame the world with admiration and loue of the speciall Blessings & Pru∣dence of our Land; the Zeale whereof onely hath preuented all our Studies, almost consumde our selues, and yet is the motiue of all our best Endeuours.
Customes therefore and Subsidies, both depending on Trafficke, as Effects that rise and fall with theyr efficient Cause: the raysing of Trafficke like Hony in Hyues, must needes increase eyther.
TRAFFICKE! O the compasse and profunditie of this one & onely word (Trafficke,) more fit for Wisedome to study, and Elo∣quence to vtter, then our weake braynes to spell. In which re∣gard we cannot but bewayle the losse and want of those worthy Wits of older tymes, that to tune the whole World, wrote Vo∣lumes on this Theme.
The three Bookes of SIBILLA, so well preserued, so deerely bought, and carfully kept by Tarquine the Elder, are long since by Stillico that Traytor, blowne vp, burnt and gone.
Ne tantùm Patrijs saun et Proditor Armis, Sancta SYBILLIN ae fata cremauit Opis.
But, ô, those Acroamata, and pryuate Instructions of kingly Doctrine! so grauely discussed, so attentiuely heard, and richlie rewarded with Talents of Gold, are eyther forgotten, beyond our hearing, or out of our reach.
And Tully De Republica. A Booke able to make a Wise-man in one dayes reading, (as some beleeue and write) so carefullie sought for, both farre and neere by our late Cardinall Poole, hath not yet been seene, except the Amalihean Ʋatican of our neweo TARQVINIVS PRISCVS haue happily found it out, whose care, cost, and loue to Learning, in the Kingdom of the Muses,