Cary,Mary

Mary Cary (b. 1620/21, active 1645–53) was a radical millenarian author who espoused the beliefs of the Fifth Monarchy movement. Cary is known exclusively through her printed works, particularly her mature tracts,The resurrection of the witnesses; and Englands fall from (the mystical Babylon) Rome(1648), andThe little horns doom & downfall, or a scripture‐prophesie of King James and King Charles, and of this present Parliament unfolded, published withA new and more exact mappe, or description of new Jerusalem's glory(1651). Her 1647 publication,A word in season to the kingdom of England, advocates the political liberty of lay preachers and was sold, as were her later works, in the shop of Giles Calvert, the radical sectarian bookseller. Cary's works after 1650 bear a change of name to Mary Rande, although no further details of her life have been uncovered to date. Cary's extant production ceases after her 1653 appeal to the Barebones Parliament titledTwelve humble proposals to the supreme governours of the three nations, which recommended taxation to alleviate poverty, decried tithing, proposed university funding reforms, and discussed simplified laws and court procedures.