These were very great helps to him, and it must be confessed his own elaborate Study had not less owing to it. There is nothing that has relation to this most Noble Order, which he has not touched on; and indeed it is a Work so very copious, that he does himself acknowledge he has inserted some things of little importance; which he desires may be considered to be done, to gratify some few who have a more immediate concern therein.
The Reader will in this Treatise find little else omitted: A very painful and exact Abridgment has been made, many Corrections of the Author’s, which he saw before his Death, and left among his other Books in his Library at Oxford, are here carefully altered; some Additions are made, a List continued, of the several Knights-Companions, as well as Officers of the Order, for above forty Years; and the Coats of Arms of abundance of the Knights-Companions visibly corrected from good Authorities; and every distinct Chapter treated of at large; so that this Work has not been compleated but at great Labour as well as Expence, which could not have been supported, but for the Encouragement some of the Knights-Companions of the most Noble Order were pleased to give it; as well in their Subscriptions, as in the good Opinion they seemed to Express of the Design.
THE
HISTORY
OF THE
Most Noble Order
OF THE
GARTER.
IT was, undoubtedly, a good Sentiment in the first Collector of this Learned Work, to introduce, as well as a Discourse of Knighthood in general, a Treatise of all the several Orders that have prevail’d in other Parts of the World; for these in their Rise and Institutions, having a relative Sense to the particular Subject he was to illustrate, seemed to afford him a very good Opportunity of doing it, by building on so convenient a Foundation.
I shall therefore, (tho’ much more confin’d to brevity) follow the same Method, making it serve as a proper Introduction; there being many Things in the voluminous Original, which I conceive may with less Inconveniency be dispenc’d with.
It was a constant Maxim in all well-regulated Governments, to give a just Encouragement to Merit, and this by proportioning Rewards to the Service done; for Merit must be suppos’d to consist in the Performance of some Virtuous or Heroick Action, directed for the publick Good: And as Vertue is either Military or Civil, so the Distribution of Rewards is different; either by bestowing Degrees and Titles of Honour, or by Donations of Wealth; so that in either Construction, Vertue may have its proper and suitable Reward.
But the proper Reward of Military Vertue, is Honour: (to which distinct Head this Work is confin’d.) Honour, which Aristotle calls the Greatest of exteriour Goods: And being an Object of a nobler Ambition than the Accumulation of Wealth, is principally the Aim of that Vertue we understand by Valour; which springs from more generous Spirits, and hath been the constant Foundation of raising Men to the highest Eminence of Glory, and superiour Dignity.
But that Fame might not lose itself in an unbounded Notion, it was at length thought fit to reduce Honour into Form and Order, by investing the Person meriting with some particular Title or Appellation of Excellence, (the Original of all Nobility;) of which Knighthood, as it hath been accounted the most suitable Reward to the greatest Vertue, so it hath been esteemed the chief and primary Honour among many Nations.