tionaries of another: yet it should not be forgotten, that, as the law of England now stands, the unbaptised quaker, and even the jew, may present to benefices in her church.

This reign was as little favourable to the protestant dissenters as to the roman-catholics. Some of the former did not object so seriously to receiving the sacrament of our Lord's-supper according to the church of England, as to neglect it, when it was absolutely necessary for qualifying them to hold offices: this was termed Occasional Conformity; and an act* was passed to prevent it.—In the last year of the reign of her majesty, a bill was introduced, to prevent, as it was termed, the growth of schism, and to impose, for that purpose, some further restraints on nonconformists; it passed through both houses of parliament, but, in consequence of the decease of the queen before the day on which it was to have received the royal assent, never became a law†.

CHAP. LXIX.

ACCESSION OF THE HOUSE OF BRUNSWICK.

1714.

THE English catholics, and all the other subjects of the united empire, are so greatly interested in the fortunes and fates of this illustrious house, that the

11 Anne. + Rights of Protestant Dissenters, p. 45.

writer believes the following historical digression, which gives a very succinct account of it, will be generally acceptable to his readers.

It has been said, that not fewer than one thousand works have been written on the genealogy and history of the Guelphs: the points to be particu larly attended to, are their Italian origin, German principality, and English monarchy*.

LXIX. 1.

Their Italian Descent.

THE Italian descent of this illustrious family from Azo, who married Cunegunda, the heiress of the Guelphs of Altorf, is unquestionable. With great learning and clearness, Scheidius, in his Origines Guelphica, has attempted to show the Guelphic extraction of Azo.

According to him, two brothers, Ethico and Guelph, were princes of the Skyrri, a nation in Holsace, not far from the southern bank of the Eider. The former was a general of Attila's army, and had two sons, Odoacer, who, by his conquest of Italy, put an end to the Roman empire of the west, and Guelph, who settled in the Tyrol.

* This article is chiefly taken from the "Origines Guelphicæ "of Scheidius; Hanoveræ, 1759, et seq. 7 vol. fol." After a fruitless search for it in the London and French markets, the writer was indebted for the loan of an imperfect copy of it to the late earl of Leicester. That a work of such importance to the family history of its sovereign, and by no means rare in Germany, should not be on sale in London, may be thought remarkable.

Odoacer, with Thilanes his only son, were killed in 493. A count of Bavaria, whose name is not known, and who died in 687, was seventh in succession to Guelph. He had issue two sons, Adalbert, count of Bavaria and patriarch of the marquisses of Tuscany, and Ruthard, an Alemannian count. Azo was ninth in succession to Adalbert; Cunegunda was heir and ninth in succession to Ruthard. Azo and Cunegunda intermarried about 1050; and thus, if the scheme proposed by Scheidius be relied on, the two branches of the Guelphic stem were re-united after a lapse of three centuries.

A son, called Guelph, was the issue of Azo and Cunegunda. After the decease of Cunegunda, Azo married Gersenda, a daughter of Hugh count of Maine, and had issue by her, a son called Fulk, from whom the dukes of Modena are lineally descended. Guelph, the son of Azo by Cunegunda, had two sons, Guelph, and Henry the black: the former married the princess Mechtildis, the heiress of the elder branch of the house of Esté, renowned for her celebrated donation to the see of Rome. She died without issue, but her husband retained some part of her hereditary possessions, and died without issue.

LXIX. 2.

Their German Principalities.

HENRY the black was the founder of the German principalities possessed by his family. He married Wolphildis, the sole heiress of Herman of Billung, the duke of Saxony, and of his possessions on the

Elbe. His son, Henry the proud, married Gertrude, the heiress of the dutchies of Saxony, Brunswick, and Hanover. Thus Henry the proud,

1st. As representing Azo, his great-grandfather, -inherited some part of the Italian possessions of the younger branch of the Estesine family they chiefly lay on the southern side of the fall of the Po into the Adriatic :

2d. As representing count Boniface, the father of the princess Mechtildis,-he inherited the Italian possessions of the elder branch of the Estesine family they chiefly lay in Tuscany :—some part of the possessions of the princess Mechtildis also devolved to him:

3d. As representing Cunegunda, his grandmother, he inherited the possessions of the Guelphs at Altorf:

4th. As representing his mother, the sole heiress of Herman of Billung,-he inherited the possessions of the Saxon family on the Elbe:

5th. And through his wife,-he transmitted to his descendants the dutchies of Saxony, Brunswick, and Hanover.

All these possessions descended to Henry the lion, the son of Henry the proud. He added to them Bavaria, on the cession of Henry Jossemargott, -and Lunenburgh and Mecklenburgh by conquest. Thus he became possessed of an extensive territory; -he himself used to describe it in four German verses, which have been thus translated:

HENRY THE LION is my name:

Through all the earth I spread my fame,
For, from the Elbe, unto the Rhine,

From Hartz, unto the sea,-ALL'S MINE.

In other words, his possessions filled a considerable portion of the territory between the Rhine, the Baltic, the Elbe, and the Tyber.

Unfortunately for him, in the quarrels between the pope and the emperor Frederick Barbarossa, he sided with the former. The emperor confiscated his possessions; but returned him his allodial estates in Brunswick, Hanover, and Lunenburgh: he died in 1195. By his first wife, he had no issue male his second, was Maud, the daughter of Henry the second of England. By her, he had several sons; all of whom died, except William, called of Winchester, from his being born in that city. William of Winchester had issue Otho, called puer, or the boy.

At the decease of Otho the boy, the partition of this illustrious house commences. An outline of it appears in a table, in the writer's History of the Revolutions of the German Empire: it shows the Guelphic genealogy, from the marriage of Azo with Cunegunda to the present time.

The subject of these sheets leads only to the Lunenburgh branches of the Guelphic shoot of the Estesine line.

On the death of Otho the boy, Brunswick and Lunenburgh, the only remains of the splendid possessions of William the proud, were divided between his two sons, John and Albert: Lunenburgh was assigned to the former, Brunswick to the latter: thus the former became the patriarch of what is called the old house of Lunenburgh. Otho his son, received Hanover, as a fief from William Sigefred the bishop of Hildesheim. Otho had four sons ;