A transcript in an unidentified hand of the early seventeenth century, of a political tract by the antiquary Sir Robert Bruce Cotton, on the repression of recusants: 'Considerations for the repressinge of the Encrease of Preests, Jesuites and Recusants without drawinge of Blood written by Sir Robert Cotten Knight and Barronett' (First line: 'I am not ignorant that this latter age hath brought [for]th a swarme of busie heades ...'; last line: '... least manie be animated to aduise rashelye, and others dishartned to Counsell grauelie') (ff. 1-25 verso).
The tract was first published in 1641 in two editions, A Treatise Against Recusants (London, 1641, Wing C6502) and Seriovs Considerations for Repressing of the Increase of Iesvites, Priests and Papists (London, 1641, Wing C6497). It was later included in Cottoni Posthuma: Divers Choice Pieces of ... Sir Robert Cotton, ed. by James Howell (London, 1651, Wing C6458), pp. 109-159, where it is entitled 'Twenty four arguments ... to suppress popish practices', and dated 11 August 1613, as is the text in London, British Library, MS Harleian 354. (See also Kevin Sharpe, Sir Robert Cotton 1586-1631: History and Politics in Early Modern England (Oxford, 1979), pp. 128, 230-231).