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THE FIRST DEFENCE 7
good to his infinite wisdom, useth to cast down proud unbridled
kings, puffed up above the measure of mankind, and
often uprooteth them with their whole house. As for us, it
was by His clear command we were on a sudden resolved
5 upon the safety and liberty that we had almost lost; it was He
we followed as our Leader, and revered His divine footsteps
imprinted everywhere; and thus we entered upon a path not
dark but bright, and by His guidance shown and opened to
us. I should be much in error if I hoped that by my diligence
10 alone, such as it is, I might set forth all these matters as worthily
as they deserve, and might make such records of them as,
haply, all nations and all ages would read. For what eloquence
can be august and magnificent enough, what man has
parts sufficient, to undertake so great a task? Yea, since in so
15 many ages as are gone over the world there has been but here
and there a man found able to recount worthily the actions of
great heroes and potent states, can any man have so good an
opinion of himself as to think that by any style or language of
his own he can compass these glorious and wonderful works
20 —not of men, but, evidently, of almighty God ?
Yet such is the office which the most eminent men of our
commonwealth have by their influence prevailed upon me to
undertake, and have wished this next best task assigned to me
of defending their deeds from envy and calumny, against
25 which steel and the furniture of war avail not—of defending,
I say, with far other arms and other weapons, the works which
under God's guidance they had gloriously wrought. Their
decision, certainly, I count a great honor to myself—that they