A Cat May Look Upon a King by WELDON Sir Anthony (died 1649) - 1714

Amsterdam, 1714. Updated version of the original 1652 edition. three-quarter black morocco over marbled boards, lettered in gilt on spine, marbled endpapers (rebound perhaps early 1900s). Title page relined with some parts of margins lacking, contemporary brown ink notations on first page. . Octavo. 59 pp Sometimes there may be two facing title pages, one as here and one with a woodcut of a cat The title "A Cat May Look Upon the King" comes from an old saying which means "Even a person of low status or importance has rights."An updated version of Sir Anthony's satirical account of English kings first published in 1652. Anthony Weldon was an English 17th century courtier and politician. who supported Parliament during the English Civil War, and held and administered the county of Kent. He is thought to be the author of "The Court and Character of King James I" which contains the comment that James was "the wisest fool in Christendom." He was dismissed from the court of King James which is usually thought to be the cause for the book's criticisms of the King.Weldon says about Henry VIII "To say much of him, were to make you surfeit; Sir Walter Rawleigh's [sic] testimony of him is sufficient. If all the Pictures and Patterns of a merciless Prince were lost in the world, they might all be painted again to the life out of the story of this king..." Of King James "To write the Life and Reign of this King, requires a better Book-man, and a better Pen-man; That which I have to observe, is only to render him as great a Tyrant as any of the rest; ... he laid as many springs to enslave this Nation as every any; his will was the sole rule of his government ..." Of James II he says "Had the courage of his grand-father, and the religion of his mother; the Malice and Inveteracy of his father, and was altogether rul'd by pristes, Jesuits ... it was more than suspected that he had the chief hand in the burning of the City of London [the fire of 1666] ...".