' Unto which I
replied,
'May it please your Honours,
'After the beheading of the late King, considering that in the three
subsequent years the Parliament acted nothing which concerned the
settlement of the nation in peace; and seeing the generality of people
dissatisfied, the citizens of London discontented, the soldiery prone to
mutiny, I was desirous, according to the best knowledge God had given
me, to make enquiry by the art I studied, what might from that time
happen unto the Parliament and nation in general. At last, having
satisfied myself as well as I could, and perfected my judgment therein,
I thought it most convenient to signify my intentions and conceptions
thereof, in Forms, Shapes, Types, Hieroglyphicks, &c. without any
commentary, that so my judgment might be concealed from the vulgar, and
made manifest only unto the wise. I herein imitating the examples of
many wise philosophers who had done the like.'
'Sir Robert,' saith one, 'Lilly is yet _sub vestibulo_.'
I proceeded further. Said I, 'Having found, Sir, that the city of London
should be sadly afflicted with a great plague, and not long after with
an exorbitant fire, I framed these two hieroglyphics as represented in
the book, which in effect have proved very true.
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