UNION OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. 5 



kingdoms of that continent, Portugal only excepted, 

 to be united in an age not long past ; and now in our 

 age that of Portugal also, which was the last that 

 held out, to be incorporate with the rest. The lot of 

 France hath been, much about the same time, like 

 wise, to have re-annexed unto that crown the several 

 duchies and portions which were in former times 

 dismembered. The lot of this island is the last 

 reserved for your majesty s happy times, by the spe 

 cial providence and favour of God, who hath brought 

 your majesty to this happy conjunction with the 

 great consent of hearts, and in the strength of your 

 years, and in the maturity of your experience. It 

 resteth but that, as I promised, I set before your 

 majesty s princely consideration, the grounds of na 

 ture touching the union and commixture of bodies, 

 and the correspondence which they have with the 

 grounds of policy in the conjunction of states and 

 kingdoms. 



First, therefore, that position, &quot; Visunita fortior,&quot; 

 being one of the common notions of the mind, 

 needeth not much to be induced or illustrated. 



We see the sun when he entereth, and while he 

 continueth under the sign of Leo, causeth more ve 

 hement heats than when he is in Cancer, what time 

 his beams are nevertheless more perpendicular. The 

 reason whereof, in great part, hath been truly 

 ascribed to the conjunction and corradiation, in that 

 place of heaven, of the sun with the four stars of the 

 first magnitude, Sirius, Canicula, Cor Leonis, and 

 Cauda Leonis. 



