Right Honourable,
It is the happiness of this city, to have a magistrate that bears not the sword in vain. Your place is high; God has lent you his own title: your work is great, it lies in the distribution of justice, which (according to Aristotle) comprehends all virtues in it. And in this your high orb you have acted vigorously. Your good government has helped to raise, if not London's structures, yet its fame. My Lord, to be a [illegible], a public good, will both render your life honourable, and your death comfortable. God did reserve you for such a juncture of time as this. When is there more need of zeal in superiors, than when vice grows heady in inferiors. The subject I here humbly dedicate to your Lordship, is, Violence for Heaven. A divine [illegible], or temperature of soul to be much aspired after; for by this you may help to save not only yourself, but others. Put on integrity as a robe; and let zealous violence more adorn you than the richest chain of gold. But I have cause to break forth into panegyrics. Indeed your own works praise you in the gates. Your prudence and courage; your impartiality in deciding causes; your punishing of oaths, and correcting the false balance; your compliance with his Majesty's Royal Proclamation against health-drinking, have erected for you a living monument in the breasts of all sober and pious men. Among other things, your self-denial has been eminent in letting go some of your perquisites for the good of others.
The former governors that had been before me (says Nehemiah) were chargeable to the people, and had taken of them bread and wine, etc. but so did not I. What pity is it that London should, like Sparta, keep such a governor but one year. My Lord, I hate to give flattering titles; but I have taken this boldness to say this little, both for your Lordship's encouragement, and the imitation of those that shall succeed in your chair. My Lord, this small tract comes under your Honor's patronage, and entreats your favourable perusal and acceptance of it; it was intended you sooner, but some emergent occasions intervening prevented. If this little spark shall give light or heat to any heart, I have my desire. The great God who has placed you at the helm of this city, fill you with his heavenly benediction, and so animate you with all might by his Spirit in the inner man, that you may be an Eben-ezer, a stone of help to us; that you may do worthily in London, and be famous in your generation; so prays he who is,
Sir, Your Servant in the Gospel, Thomas Watson, July 9, 1669.
