Page:A History and Defence of Magna Charta.djvu/147

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MAGNA CHARTA.
101

“realm. [Perhaps not a quarter of the number which we have in one naturalization act.] “That for the time to come the natives of England, who are faithful and practicable to the realm, may have the ordering of all affairs under the King.”

These things being, thus covenanted, in a little while after, pacts, promiſes, oaths notwithſtanding, ſeveral knights on the King’s ſide ſtored Windſor Caſtle with a great quantity of proviſions and arms, and they and the prince begun a new war. This war laſted with great variety of ſtrange ſucceſſes on both ſides for ſeveral years, till the earl of Leiceſter was overthrown and ſlain in the battle of Eveſham. Upon which the hiſtorian ſays; “And thus ended his labours that great man Earl Simon, who ſpent, not only his, but himſelf in behalf of the oppreſſed, in aſſerting a juſt cauſe, and maintaining the rights of the realm. He undertook this cauſe, in which he fought to the death, by the advice, and at the inſtance of the bleſſed Roger Grosthead biſhop of Lincoln, who conſtantly affirmed, that all that died for it were crowned with martyrdom.”

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