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British Library, Lansdowne Manuscripts

BL MSS La. 92, 66 [f.113]

[Transcribed by Dr Caroline Bowden for the project The Health of the Cecils]

Michael Hicks to Sr Hugh Beeston 2 Sep 1611 (copy of)

Sir Hugh Beeston: As I would have bene very glad to have had any matter mynestered unto me of rejoicing for some good befalne unto yow, so I am right hartely sorry to heare of the lamentable accident to your sonne which hath layd so heavy a crosse uppon yow his ffather. Whereof, as I have a compassionate feeling, (as being your auncient and loving frend) So can I not (but out of the dutye of Christian charitie) yeald you all the consolation & comfort I am able. For albeit (I thank god), I knowe not as yet what is the losse of a sonne, muche less of an only sunne: yet when I consedder Quod viri contigit cuius potest: That your case todaye maye be myne tomorrowe, I can not but participate of your grief, and seeke to applye a plaister to your perplexed mynd out of theise considerations following. First you complayne and are grieved for the death of your sonne. And I confesse yow have just cause so to be. But withall considder that it is the way of all ffleshe, and that the terme of a life, is but at the will of the Lord. But yow say he dyed in the floure of his youthe. Considder that this also is common and usuall; and is but lyke an apple gathered whilst it is greene, or as a Michalmas Rent payd uppon Midsomerdaye. But he dyed a sodayne, and an unusuall deathe: this is true. But your experience tells us that the one happens often, and the other sometymes: but neither to be so grievously taken, for that they have and may happen to good and godly men. For there is not a sparrow falls on the ground, not a heare from our head without his providence he hath an oare in all our actions. Judicia voi secreta sape, sed iusta semper. God who gives life may take it awaye againe, both when he list, and in what manner he list. Uno modo nascimur multis morimur: quocumque in loco aqua est ad Coelum via: We both can call to mynd that in our tyme many great and noble persons, have dyed without issue, wherby their possessions have gone both out of their bloud & name. And we have seene many great howses attaynted, whereby their lands have come to the crowne or to common persons. Many have only daughters, or a daughter only as yow knowe a worthy knight hath had, and lost hir as yow have nowe your only sonne. And therefore as your case is not without [without] many examples so make not your self an example of sorrowe and greife more then is fitt and convenient [f.113v.] but since it hath pleased God (for causes best knowen to him self) to cutt of the thred of his life and with his life many [of] the kingdom cares and muche labor, you had for him and concerning him; and by his death many miseries which he might have lived to have seene and suffred and many synnes towards god which he should have committed to the oncrease of his accompte: I do entreat you as a frend and require you as you will hold the reputation of a wise and a Christian man to suppresse your passions & to temper your mourninge with tyme and mesure like a naturall ffather, and not like one that hath loste both his reason and his hope. And now, Sir Hugh Beeston, to joyne myself in counsel with you ffor as muche as that glasse of our life is almost runne out, and the light of a candell burnt to the sockett, lett us with David learne to number our dayes and to applye our harts to wisdome. Lett us redeeme the tyme paste againste apprehension and with a[n] meditation of our approchinge end et ideo serio quia soro, to which end lett us caste of all worldly cogitations and cares, which are but grigs in our heades and thornes in our harts and being ballanced and vallewed are nothing els but trashe and transitorye. And to conclud lett us by the example of your sonne, take warninge to our selves. Lett us out of hand make even with God and the world and so be allways prepared against deathe that it maye never steal so sodainly uppon us but having oyle in our lampes we may with the wise virgins be ready to enter in at the gate of eternall bliss in the world to come: fœlix qui alieno pericula cavet sapiens qui suo. And thus for this tyme, is all that I will write, the which because I knowe it yeldes you not a plaister, broad enough to cover nor good enoughe to cure your deep and dangerous woundes. I will add another which I knowe will supple and greatly aswage the payne of your hurt, though it do not presently and altogether heale it. Which is that my lord when he was first told of this wofull accident to your sonne, he was sodainly striken with a silence and sadnes, and after a good pause sayd: Alas poore man I pray God comfort him. Synce which tyme his lordship hath often made a mencion of you with words of compassion: And understanding about 2 days past that I had a purpose to write to you, he required me to commend him unto you and to tell you in his name that as he is very sory for this affliction falen uppon you; so he saith that he is the more sensible of it by reason of the late and dangerous sicknes of his owne and only sonne. And although the stroke be past by him and light yppon yow, yett he hath a kind of simpathy of your greife and would not have yow dismayed nor discoraged but to submitt your self to gods will and to say Dominus dedit, Dominus abstulit, sit nomen Domini benedictum. And so I commend you to gods care whom I beseach in mercy to arme yow with pacyence and strengthen with comfort. From my lodging in the Strand 2 Sep 1611
[several areas of crossings out and insertions which suggest it may not have been sent and became a draft]