An Account of Denmark

18 Of the Remarkable Authority of the Council against Lewis the Eleventh

302 CHAPTER XVIII Of the Remarkable Authority of the Council against Lewis the Eleventh  The Power and Authority of the Council and the Estates assembled, appears by the foregoing Testimonies to have been very great, and indeed (as it were) Sacred. But because we are now giving Examples of this Power, we will not omit a signal Instance of the Authority of this Council , which interposed it self in the Memory of our Fathers against Lewis the Eleventh, who was reputed more crafty and cunning than any of the Kings that had ever been before him. In the Year 1460, when this Lewis governed the Kingdom in such a Manner, that in many Cases the Duty of a good Prince, and a Lover of his Country, was wanting; the People began to desire the Assistance and Authority of the Great Council, that some Care might therein be taken of the Publick Welfare; and because it was suspected the King would not submit himself to it, the Great Men of the Kingdom (stirred up by the daily Complaints and Solicitations of the Commons), “resolv’d to gather Forces, and raise an Army; that (as Philip de Commines expresses it) they might provide for the Publick Good, and expose the King’s wicked Administration of the Commonwealth.” They therefore agreed to be ready Chapter XVIII  303 prepared with a good Army, that in case the King should prove refractory, and refuse to follow good Advice, they might compel him by Force: For which Reason that War was said to have been undertaken for the Publick Good, and was commonly called the War du bien public. “Commines, Gillius, and Lamarc, have recorded the Names of those Great Men who were the principal Leaders, the Duke of Bourbon, the Duke of Berry, the King’s Brother; the Counts of Dunois, Nevers, Armagnac, and Albret, and the Duke of Charolois, who was the Person most concerned in what related to the Government. Wherever they marched, they caused it to be proclaimed , that their Undertakings were only design’d for the Publick Good; they published Freedom from Taxes and Tributes, and lent Ambassadors with Letters to the Parliament at Paris, to the Ecclesiasticks, and to the Rector of the University, desiring them not to suspect or imagine those Forces were rais’d for the King’s destruction, but only to reclaim him, and make him perform the Office of a Good King, as the present Necessities of the Publick required.” These are Gillius’s Words, lib. 4. fol. 152. The Annals intituled the Chronicles of Lewis the Eleventh, printed at Paris by Galliottus, fol. 27. have these Words. “The first and chiefest of their demands was, That a Convention of the Three States should be held; because in all Ages it had been found to be the only proper Remedy for all Evils, and to have always had a force sufficient to heal such sort of mischiefs .” Again, Pag. 28. “An Assembly was called on Purpose to hear the Ambassadors of the Great Men, and met on the 24th Day in the Townhouse at Paris; at which were present some Chosen Men of the University, of the Parliament, and of the Magistrates. The Answer given the Ambassadors , was, That what they demanded was most just; and accordingly a Council of the Three Estates was summon’d.” These are the Words of that Historian. From whence the Old Saying of Marcus Antonius appears to be most true. “Etsi omnes molestae semper seditiones sunt, justas tamen esse nonnullas , & prope necessarias: eas vero justissimas maximeque necessarias videri, cum populus Tyranni saevitia oppressus auxilium a legitimo Civium conventu implorat. Although all Sorts of Seditions are troublesome, yet some of them are just, and in a manner necessary; but those are extraordinary just and necessary, which are occasion’d when the People oppress’d by the Cruelty of a Tyrant, implores the Assistance of a Lawful Convention.” 304  Francogallia Gaguinus, in his Life of Lewis the Eleventh, pag. 265. gives us Charles, the Duke of Burgundy’s Answer to that King’s Ambassadors. “Charles (says he) heard the Ambassadors patiently, but made Answer, That he knew no Method so proper to restore a firm Peace, at a Time when such great Animosities, and so many Disorders of the War were to be composed , as a Convention of the Three Estates. Which when the Ambassadors had by Special Messengers...