TOUCHING HIS MAJESTY S STILE. 183 



and what must be left to further time, that our pro 

 ceeding may be void of all inconvenience and infor 

 mality ; wherein by the example of Almighty God, 

 who is accustomed to begin all his great works and 

 designments by alterations or impositions of names, 

 as the fittest means to imprint in the hearts of people 

 a character and expectation of that which is to 

 follow ; we have thought good to withdraw and 

 discontinue the divided names of England and Scot 

 land out of our regal stile and title, and to use in 

 place of them the common and contracted name of 

 Great Britany : not upon any vain-glory, whereof, 

 we persuade ourselves, our actions do sufficiently 

 free us in the judgment of all the world ; and if any 

 such humour should reign in us, it were better satis 

 fied by length of stile and enumeration of kingdoms : 

 but only as a fit signification of that which is already 

 done, and a significant prefiguration of that which 

 we further intend. For as in giving names to na 

 tural persons, it is used to impose them in infancy, 

 and not to stay till fulness of growth ; so it seemed 

 to us not unseasonable to bring in further use this 

 name at the first, and to proceed to the more sub 

 stantial points of the union after, as fast and as far 

 as the common good of both the realms should per 

 mit, especially considering the name of Britany was 

 no coined, or new-devised, or affected name at plea 

 sure, but the true and ancient name which God and 

 time hath imposed, extant, and received in histories, 

 in cards, and in ordinary speech and writing, where 

 the whole island is meant to be denominate ; so as it 



