REVIEW OF THE STATE OF POLITICAL AFFAIRS—DISSOLUTION OF
PARLIAMENT—PROTEST—JAMES TEARS IT OUT OF THE JOURNALS OF THE HOUSE
OF COMMONS—ACTS OF OPPRESSION—CASE OF THE EARL OF OXFORD—OF LORD
SOUTHAMPTON—PERSECUTION OF SIR EDWARD COKE—THE CONDUCT AND
IMPEACHMENT OF LORD BACON—THE PART TAKEN BY BUCKINGHAM IN THIS
AFFAIR—THE ABUSES OF MONOPOLIES—CASE OF SIR GILES MOMPESSON—OF SIR
FRANCIS MICHELL—BACON’S LETTERS TO PARLIAMENT—HIS ILLNESS—THE
GREAT SEAL TAKEN FROM HIM—JAMES’S RELUCTANCE TO ACT WITH
VIGOUR—SHEDS TEARS UPON THE OCCASION—BACON STILL PROTECTED BY
BUCKINGHAM—WILLIAMS, BISHOP OF LINCOLN, IS MADE CHANCELLOR—HIS
CHARACTER, BY BISHOP GOODMAN.
=CHAPTER VI.=
It is now necessary to make a short review of the state of political
affairs coëval with these successive manifestations of a blind
partiality shown by James to Buckingham.
The autumn of 1621 had witnessed the dissolution of the Parliament. This
step, which was imputed to the advice of Buckingham, was hastened by a
protest from the two houses of commons, declaring “that the liberties,
franchises, and jurisdictions of Parliament are the ancient and
undoubted birthright of the subjects of England;” asserting the point
that the arduous affairs of state, the making of laws and redress of
grievances, are the proper subjects of debate in Parliament; and
maintaining the privilege of each member to enjoy entire freedom of
speech.
This protest, which James and his son would have done well to have for
ever remembered, was drawn forth by the King’s resentment at the
interference in the Spanish marriage.[321] “He considered it,” he said,
“presumptuous in the Parliament humbly to beseech him to permit his son
to marry a Protestant Princess; and he intimated that if they had fixed
upon any person or place, he should have thought it high treason.”
Footnote 321:
Oldmixon.
The proclamation which announced the dissolution was ascribed to the pen
of Archbishop Laud, who now exercised an ascendancy over Buckingham; and
the King, hastening to London, called a Privy Council, and, sending for
the journal of the House of Commons, declared the protest void, and tore
it from the book with his own hands.[322]
Footnote 322:
Ibid.
These rash and blamable measures were resented by the whole kingdom.
They were followed by acts of oppression and injustice. The first object
of the King’s wrath was Henry Vere, Earl of Oxford. This young nobleman,
who was endowed with great ability, courage, and high reputation, was
one of those young and daring aspirants whose honours were not only
inherited from a long series of noble progenitors, but by merit made
their own.[323] He had already distinguished himself in the cause that
was dearest to the hearts of the English—that of the Palatinate, and had
extorted from the King one regiment to employ in the service of his
son-in-law, Frederic. The body of men whom he led to the unequal
contest, was, says a contemporary, “the gallantest for the persons and
outward presence of men,” that, “in many ages, ever appeared at home or
abroad.” It consisted almost entirely of gentlemen, the flower of the
commoners of England, who went to improve themselves in the art of war,
to which the English had for years been strangers. Oxford, with his
noble associates and brave soldiers, did all that was possible for man
to do; and then, finding that there was no support from England,
returned, hopeless, but not disgraced.
Footnote 323:
Brydges’s Peers of James I.
Here was one of those “gallant spirits who aimed at the public liberty
more than at their own interest; and who yet, when the Government which
they served, or the prerogative which they held sacred, was attacked,
were fierce in defence of the King and his authority; supporting,” says
Arthur Wilson, “the old English honour, they would not let it fall to
the ground.”[324]
Footnote 324:
Wilson, p. 162.
In spite of this acknowledged loyalty, the Earl of Oxford was accused by
a man named White, henceforth called Oxford-White, of having spoken
against the King; and was committed to the Tower, where he was long
imprisoned, until, on account of his known bravery, he was made one of
Buckingham’s Vice-Admirals on the English coast. A letter, addressed to
Buckingham, whilst the Earl was under this disgrace, appealing to the
King, to the favourite’s own conscience, whether he had ever harboured
any treasonable thoughts, obtained for him, perhaps, this tardy
justice:—“If it shall please the King,” wrote the gallant Vere, “to line
me out my path to death (the period we must all travel to) by
imprisonment, I shall be far from repining at the sentence, but with all
humbleness will undergo it, and employ my heartiest prayers for the long
continuance of his health and happiness.”[325]
Footnote 325:
Cabala.
The persecution of Vere reflects infinite dishonour upon Buckingham—but
that bright star was fast losing the purity of its lustre. Buckingham
was an altered man. Unbounded prosperity was changing the once generous
foe into an avenger.
Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton, was the next subject of the
Marquis’s wrath. Upon this brave peer the King’s favours had hitherto
been showered down, and he had been endeared to the people by his
friendship for the unfortunate Earl of Essex, on whose account he had
suffered confinement in the reign of Elizabeth. On the accession of
James, Lord Southampton was brought from “the prison to the
palace.”[326] His lands had been forfeited to the crown: they were
immediately restored. On the meeting of the first Parliament called by
James, the Earl was restored by a bill, read after the recognition of
the King, to his titles.[327] The rest of this nobleman’s life was spent
in promoting worthy objects, to some of which even the lettered attached
ridicule. For instance, his patronage of colonization, his sending ships
to America for the purpose of discovery and traffic, excited the
ridicule of some of the caustic geniuses of the day. Yet Lord
Southampton received many tributes from the learned; and such was his
protection of letters, that he was called “learning’s best
favourite.”[328] It was, however, his highest praise that he was the
patron and friend of Shakspeare.
Footnote 326:
Brydges’s Peers of James I., p. 324.
Footnote 327:
Ibid, 326.
Footnote 328:
By Richard Braithwayte in the dedication of his Scholar’s Medley.—See
Brydges’s Peers, p. 325.
It was upon this popular nobleman that the ire of Buckingham next fell.
It must, however, be acknowledged, that Lord Southampton’s credit at
Court had been on the decline previous to the altercation which took
place between him and Buckingham in the House of Lords; the Earl having
incurred the royal displeasure on several occasions, especially in
opposing illegal patents, a tender subject which had lately been under
the consideration of Parliament. Under these circumstances, when he
called the Favourite to order in a debate of the House of Lords, he only
rekindled the embers of former animosities. Prince Charles attempted,
indeed, successfully, to check the dispute; nevertheless, Southampton
sustained an imprisonment of twelve days upon the adjournment of
Parliament. He was allowed, on the eighteenth of July, to go to his own
house at Titchfield, where he was, however, a prisoner.[329] The famous
Selden, Pym, and Sir Robert Philips, were imprisoned in the Tower of
London for freedom of speech;[330] in short, during this Parliament,
were the seeds of that arbitrary disposition, which afterwards
manifested itself so calamitously, first ripened. It was not among the
least sources of public regret, that the heir-apparent should have
witnessed, and in some measure participated in, these flagrant
oppressions.
Footnote 329:
Oldmixon, p. 56.
Footnote 330:
Lord Southampton died in a foreign service, that of the
States-general, in the defensive alliance at Bergen-op-Zoom in 1624.
His family fell into the deepest pecuniary distress, and afterwards
solicited the aid of Buckingham.—_See_ “_Cabala_,” p. 299.
Buckingham either perceived that these infringements upon the liberty of
the subject had been permitted to go far enough, or his native good
nature prevailed over the virulence of party and the love of power; for
on the nineteenth of July he came to London, visited the Earl of
Northumberland in the Tower, passed two hours with the Earl of
Southampton at Westminster, and with the Earl of Oxford at Sir Thomas
Cockaine’s. “This was taken,” writes Mr. Chamberlain, “for a good
presage, like the coming of St. Elmo after a tempest.”[331] Two days
afterwards, the Lord Keeper Williams took the Earl of Southampton to
Theobald’s where the king was. A long conference ensued; the Lord
Keeper, the Marquis of Buckingham, and Southampton being the only
persons admitted to the royal presence. On the following day,
Southampton, was set at liberty.[332]
Footnote 331:
Nichols, iv., 670.
Footnote 332:
Oldmixon says not until the 1st of September (see p. 56); but Mr.
Chamberlain’s information is more precise and impartial.
Sir Edward Coke was likewise among those who incurred the displeasure of
James for freedom of speech. Imprisonment in the Tower followed his
offence. The locks and doors of his chambers in the Temple were sealed
up, and several securities for money taken away. Immured in prison, his
family not being suffered to approach him, he had yet another trial to
encounter. James, whose meanness equalled his improvidence, took this
base occasion to sue Coke for an old pretended debt due from Sir
Christopher Hatton to Queen Elizabeth. The reply of the
Solicitor-general, Sir John Walter, when the brief of this iniquitous
case was sent to him, is worthy of a nobler character of mind than that
usually imputed to the English lawyer of that period. “Let my tongue,”
he answered, “cleave to the roof of my mouth whenever I ope it against
Sir Edward Coke;” yet the suit was rigorously prosecuted. “That spirit
of fiery exhalation”[333] was not daunted even by this petty and
malignant persecution. It was observed of him that he lost his
advancement in the same way that he got it[334]—by his tongue. To the
last, he steadily resisted the oppressions of the crown, and his
character, odious as it was to his contemporaries, odious when we
reflect upon him as the vituperative judge of Ralegh, and too justly
censured by Bacon “for insulting misery,”[335] has received the respect
and gratitude of posterity for its general political independence.
Footnote 333:
Wilson.
Footnote 334:
Life of Sir Edward Coke, published by the Society for the Diffusion of
Knowledge, p. 22.
Footnote 335:
“Perhaps,” says Mr. Amos, “Sir Edward Coke never descended lower in
point of wit and insult of misery, than when he told Cuffe, when under
trial for high treason, ‘that he would give him a cuff that should let
him down by-and-by.’”—Grand Oyer of Poisoning, p. 460.
The fate of Bacon himself excited a still more mournful interest in good
minds, than the injuries inflicted upon Coke.
It becomes necessary for the biographer of Villiers, to examine into the
circumstances of an affair with which, as with every public event of the
day, he was intimately connected. Bacon, in afterwards addressing James,
alludes to Buckingham when he imputes his degradation to the personal
views of some secret foe. “I wish that, as I am the first, so I may be
the last of sacrifices in your times; and when, from private appetite,
it is resolved that a creature shall be sacrificed, it is easy to pick
up sticks enough from any thicket, whither he has strayed, to make a
fire to offer it with.”[336]
Footnote 336:
Life of Bacon, by Basil Montague. Preface, p. 9.
In the early period of his career, Buckingham had owed much to the
countenance, and more to the advice, of Bacon. The author of the _Novum
Organum_ seems to have been among the first to discern that remarkable
association of personal and mental qualities in Villiers, which promised
to secure him an ascendancy over James. Bacon lent the lustre of his
name to shine upon the young courtier, and expected in return that aid
which Buckingham, he soon perceived, would have it in his power to
bestow. A mutual dependence was established; Buckingham existed on the
capital of Bacon’s intellect; Bacon throve on the inferiority of the
youth, conscious of his defects, and wise enough to remedy his own
weakness by the strength of another.
No greater proof of confidence in a friend can be given than to seek his
advice, and Villiers paid Bacon that tribute. He requested him “to
instruct him how to fulfil his high station, how to serve the King, how
to conciliate the people.” In consequence of this, Bacon had addressed
to the Favourite a letter of advice,[337] “such,” observes the
biographer of Bacon, “as is not usually given in courts, but of a strain
equally free and friendly, calculated to make the person to whom it was
addressed good and great, and equally honourable to the giver and the
receiver; advice which contributed not a little to his prosperity in
after life.”[338]
Footnote 337:
The essay or letter treated of the following subjects:—1. Matters that
concern religion, and the Church, and Churchmen. 2. Matters concerning
justice, and the laws, and the professions thereof. 3. Councillors,
and the council-table, and the great offices and officers of the
kingdom. 4. Foreign negotiations and embassies. 5. Peace and war, both
foreign and civil, and in that the navy and forts, and what belongs to
them. 6. Trade at home and abroad. 7. Colonies, or foreign
plantations. 8. The court and curialty.
Footnote 338:
Life of Lord Bacon, by Basil Montague, p. 181.
This manual of a courtier’s duty, it must be owned, was sadly at
variance with the practice that followed these nobly conceived
instructions on the part of him who gave them.
“You are,”—Bacon thus addressed Villiers—“as a new risen star, and the
eyes of all are upon you; let not your own negligence make you fall like
a meteor.” “Next to religion,” he adds elsewhere, “let your care be to
promote justice. By justice and mercy is the King’s throne established.”
“And as far as it may rest in you, let no arbitrary power be intended.
The people of this kingdom love the laws thereof, and nothing will
oblige them more than a confidence of the free enjoying of them.” “Your
greatest care must be,” he adds, towards the conclusion, “that the great
men of the court—for you must give me leave to be plain with you, for so
is your injunction laid upon me—yourself in the first place, who are
first in the eye of all men, give no just cause of scandal either by
light, vain, or by oppressive carriage.”[339]
Footnote 339:
Lord Bacon’s Works, i., p. 518-19.
Notwithstanding these admirable precepts, the years during which Lord
Bacon held the Great Seal, and during which Villiers ruled predominant,
were, as it has been justly observed, “the darkest and most shameful in
English history.”[340] The domestic government of James and his
favourite, in weakness and want of high principle, corresponded but too
mournfully with their foreign policy; with their indifference to the
great struggle for the interests of liberty and of Protestantism in
Germany; with their vacillating and cowardly counsels. Whilst the
continental nations were venting their surprise and indignation in
sallies of ridicule directed against England, the King, who had nothing
to bestow in the aid of a loyal cause in which the welfare of his own
child was bound up, resorted at home to the most disgraceful expedients
in order to exalt his favourite. During this period, Buckingham held an
absolute empire over the actions of Bacon. A system of persecution
against Coke had followed the disgraceful affair of Sir John Villiers’
marriage. In an unlucky hour, Bacon interfered between Lady Hatton and
her injured husband; he even descended to lend himself to the low
affairs of these vulgar great, and to take part against his enemy, Coke,
and with his arrogant wife. This was during the King’s absence in
Scotland: as matters then stood, this proceeding on the part of the Lord
Keeper militated against the marriage which Buckingham had at heart.
Bacon was soon taught, therefore, to see his error. The Favourite
resented his interference, and refused to be pacified. In vain did the
Lord Keeper stay certain proceedings against Coke which had been
instituted in the Star Chamber; in vain did he hasten to testify his
submission to Buckingham. Two successive days he went to the stately
apartments of the Favourite; waited meekly in an ante-chamber, seated on
an old box, with the Great Seal of England at his side. At length, when
he was admitted, he threw himself at the feet of Buckingham, and swore
never to rise thence till he had received the pardon of the lofty
personage whom he had once instructed in the art of conducting himself
with dignity.[341]
Footnote 340:
Macaulay’s Essay on Bacon in the _Edinburgh Review_.
Footnote 341:
Sir Anthony Weldon’s Court and Character of King James.
This was not such conduct as would entitle a man to respect even from
him on whom he cringed. Yet Bacon, in one of his letters addressed to
Buckingham, declares him to have been the “truest and perfectest mirror
of friendship that ever was in a court;” and protests that “he should
count every day lost in which he should not study his well-doing in
thought, or do his name honour in speech, or perform service for him
indeed.”[342] Nor is the statement given by Weldon, of the manner in
which the seals were offered to Bacon by Buckingham, credible. According
to that writer, the Favourite, when he sent to proffer them to Bacon,
accompanied them with an insulting message, saying, that whilst he knew
him to be a man of excellent parts, he was also aware “that he was an
errant knave, apt, in his prosperity, to ruin any that had raised him in
his adversity;” yet from regard to his master’s service, he had obtained
the seals for him; but with this assurance, that if he ever should act
to him as he had done to others, he would be cast down as much below as
he was now above any honour that he had expected,[343] alluding to the
flagrant ingratitude and perfidy of Bacon to Essex. But this story,
supported by no evidence, is at variance with probability; and since it
rests upon the authority of one who is always inveterate against
Buckingham, it may be discarded as wholly unworthy of belief.
Footnote 342:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon, note.
Footnote 343:
Bacon’s Works, ii., p. 201.
That Buckingham knew well the character of the Lord Keeper before he
promoted him to the Chancellorship—that he calculated on his
subservience to himself, expressed in his letters, so that posterity may
judge of Bacon’s professions—that he had discovered that the doctrine of
expediency influenced the practice of Bacon, is almost certain; for he
did not hesitate to sway him to the most disgraceful countenance of
abuses for which the whole country was crying out for redress.
Amongst the grievances most disliked were those of monopolies; and
amongst the most detested of detestable patents was that for the
exclusive manufacture of gold and silver lace. It had been conjointly
granted to Sir Giles Mompesson, who is supposed to have been the
original of Sir Giles Overreach, and to Sir Frances Michell, who is said
to have suggested the character of Justice Greedy. Sir Giles was a
Wiltshire knight, patronised by Buckingham; or, as it was the fashion of
the day to speak, “a creature of the Favourite’s;” and was concerned,
not only in the patent of gold and silver lace, but in forming the
monopolies styled the patents of “Inns and Osteries.” In this affair
Michell assisted him.[344]
Footnote 344:
Nichols’s Progresses, vol. iii., p. 297.
To render Bacon justice, he had formerly, when applied to with regard to
these patents on behalf of Sir Christopher Villiers, advised Buckingham
not to have anything to do with them.[345] He declared them to be one of
the grievances which Parliament ought to put down; but avowed his
readiness, should it not be done away with, “to mould it in the best
manner, and help it forward.”[346]
Footnote 345:
Biographia Britannica, Art. Bacon, note.
Footnote 346:
Bacon’s Works, ii., p. 20.
The latter course was preferred by Buckingham, and was therefore
adopted. The result was not only that the manufacture of gold and silver
thread was adulterated, for that would have been a matter of
comparatively little consequence, but that an inquisitorial jurisdiction
was exercised by the patentees of the Inns and Osteries, who were armed
with as great powers as had ever been granted to the farmers of the
revenue. The abuses which resulted cried for redress; and, during the
session of 1620, Parliament took the matter up. It became the province
of the Lord Keeper to interpose, and he decided that it should be
settled with all convenient speed. “The meaning of this was,” writes
Lord Macaulay, “that certain of the house of Villiers were to go halves
with certain of the house of Overreach and Greedy in the plunder of the
public.”
Petitions were sent up to Parliament by persons who had suffered under
these exactions, and the whole affair was thoroughly “ripped up.”[347]
Footnote 347:
Oldmixon, p. 52.
The odium of these abuses fell upon Buckingham; the blame upon the Lord
Keeper, who had not restrained these patents. Sir Edward Villiers, who
was thought to be as “deep in the mire” as Mompesson and Michell, was
sent on an embassy for safety. Mompesson was, on the third of March,
1621, summoned to appear before Parliament: he had fled, assisted,
according to common report, by Buckingham, who dreaded further exposure,
for Mompesson’s neck was in danger. On the twenty-seventh of the same
month, the King went to Parliament, and pronounced sentence on Sir
Giles, the dignity of his wife remaining untainted.[348] Michell, a
newly-made knight, was brought to his trial on the third of May, and
suffered the singular sentence of degradation, with all “the ceremonies
of abasement,” “but that,” observes Arthur Wilson, “being most proper to
his nature, he was but eased of a burthen, his mind suffered not.”[349]
He was made incapable of holding office, fined 1,000_l._, and ordered to
be imprisoned in Finsbury Prison during the King’s pleasure. The
ceremonial was rendered sufficiently effective, and Buckingham, with the
highest persons of the realm, witnessed the process. The “old justice,”
as Michell was called, was brought by the Sheriffs of London to
Westminster Hall, on the last day of Term, when the sentence of
Parliament was read before him by a pursuivant, in an audible voice. His
spurs were then broken in pieces by the servants of the Earl Marshal,
and thrown away; the silver sword was taken from his side, broken over
his head, and thrown away. Last of all, he was pronounced no longer a
knight, but a knave; Garter, Clarencieux, Norroy sitting at the feet of
the Commissioners.[350]
Footnote 348:
Nichols, iv., 660.
Footnote 349:
Ibid, note.
Footnote 350:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 660.
Sir Giles Mompesson, meantime, having contrived to elude the sergeants
who had him in charge, was safe abroad; but a proclamation was out
against him. The Prince and Lords promised to do all they could to
ensure his being apprehended: the ports were guarded. Buckingham,
meantime, declared in the House that he had no hand in the matter, but
that the blame rested with the referees who had tested the lawfulness of
these patents.[351] Sir Giles was heavily fined; an annuity of 200_l._
on the new waterworks being all that was reserved for Lady Mompesson and
her child.
Footnote 351:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 13.
Two years afterwards he was, however, allowed to return to England for
three months, though under some risk; for the people did not forget that
the two words, “no Empsons,” formed his anagram, and he was only
permitted to land in England on the petition of his wife.[352]
Footnote 352:
State Papers, cxxii., No. 8.
With what sensations Buckingham, who had certainly regarded the
peculation permitted by these patents as a family perquisite, must have
witnessed these proceedings, it is not easy to say. His once generous
character was gaining in hardness, and losing the traces of its delicacy
and scrupulousness every day.
But evils of a more stupendous character were soon to be detected and
avenged by a people who, Bacon truly said, “loved the law of their
land.” The Lord Keeper had reckoned for a long time that the protecting
hand of the Favourite could cover his venial proceedings. On the
twenty-seventh of January, 1620, he was created Viscount St. Albans,
with plenary investiture. The Lord Carew carried his robe before him;
the Marquis of Buckingham held it up. The prosperous Lord Keeper gave
the King most hearty thanks for each successive step of his preferment.
1st, for making him his solicitor; 2nd, his attorney; 3rd, a privy
councillor; 4th, Keeper of the Great Seal; 5th, chancellor; 6th, Baron
Verulam; 7th, Viscount St. Albans;—honours and emoluments which had been
procured for him entirely through the influence of Buckingham. The
envious world wondered, according to Sir Symonds D’Ewes, at the
gratification of Bacon’s pride and ambition. His estates in land were
thought, at that time, not to be more in value than four or five hundred
pounds yearly; his debts were supposed to amount to 30,000_l._ He was
then known to receive bribes in all cases of moment that came before
him.[353] The hour of reckoning, however, eventually arrived.
Footnote 353:
Harl. MSS. 646—See Nichols, vol. iv., p. 649, note.
The disgraceful transactions which brought this tardy justice on the man
so pre-eminent in letters, so debased in honourable principle, had been
a frequent source of complaint in parliament. Thus, as a modern writer
observes, “was signally brought to the test the value of those objects
for which Bacon had sullied his integrity, had resigned his
independence, had violated the most sacred objects of friendship and
gratitude, had flattered the worthless, had persecuted the innocent, had
tampered with judges, had tortured prisoners, had plundered suitors, had
wasted on paltry intrigues the power of the most exquisitely constructed
intellect that had ever been bestowed on any of the children of
men.”[354] It is of no avail to say that the custom of the day
authorized the receiving of bribes and presents; or to justify the mean
subservience of the Lord Chancellor by blaming the interference of
Buckingham. That interference may be justly censured; but it forms no
ground of acquittal to Bacon.
Footnote 354:
Macaulay.
In the letter of advice addressed by this most inconsistent man to
Buckingham, when Sir George Villiers, he counsels him by no means ever
to be persuaded to interpose himself, “either by word or letter, in any
cause depending, or likely to be depending, in any court of justice, nor
suffer any other great man to do it where he could hinder it, and by all
means to dissuade the King from it.” “If it prevail,” he adds, “it
prevents justice; but if the judge be so just, and of such courage, as
he ought to be, as not to be inclined thereby, yet it always leaves a
taint of suspicion behind it. Judges must be chaste as Cæsar’s
wife—neither to be, nor to be suspected to be, unjust; and, sir, the
honour of the judges in their judicature is the King’s honour, whose
person they represent.”[355]
Footnote 355:
Advice to Sir George Villiers.
Shortly after Bacon had become Lord Keeper, a series of letters was,
nevertheless, commenced on the part of Buckingham in favour of persons
who were likely to come into chancery.[356] And it is related in
Hacket’s Life of the Lord Keeper Williams, the successor of Bacon, that
there was not a cause of moment, but that, as soon as it came to
publication, one of the parties concerned in it brought letters from
this mighty peer and the Lord Keeper’s patron.[357] A committee was
appointed by the House of Commons to inquire into the proceedings of the
courts of justice. Two charges of corruption were brought against the
Lord Chancellor; the one in the case of a man named Aubrey, who had been
advised to quicken a suit in chancery by the bribe of a hundred pounds.
The money was presented, through the medium of Sir George Hastings,
directly to the Lord Chancellor at his lodgings in Gray’s Inn, and when
Sir George came out from the chambers, he told Aubrey that his “Lordship
was thankful, and assured him of good success in his business, which,
however, he had not.”[358] The other case was that of Mr. Egerton, who
mortgaged his estate for four hundred pounds; a sum which Bacon at first
refused, saying it was too much, but accepted at last. These charges
were eventually preferred before the House of Lords, and when the
complaint was made in that assembly, it devolved on Buckingham, in the
absence of the Chancellor, who was sick, to present a letter praying for
time for the privilege of cross-examining witnesses; and requesting that
if there came up any more petitions of the same nature, their Lordships
would not take any prejudice at their numbers, considering that they
were against a judge that made two hundred and forty decrees in a
year.[359] During this interval, Bacon was assured of the sympathy of
James and the intercession of Buckingham. The King shed tears on hearing
of his dilemma, and procured a recess of parliament, in order to give
him time for defence. It was, however, judged best by the Chancellor,
notwithstanding all this powerful patronage, not to attempt a defence,
but to throw himself upon the mercy of the House. That, in spite of this
confession, Bacon still continued to enjoy the protection of Buckingham,
is evident, for the heir to the crown presented Bacon’s memorable
letter, full of eloquence, and expressed with the inimitable address
which he knew so well how to employ. This submission was not deemed
enough; a full confession was required. It was given by one sunk in
character and broken in spirit, and was received by the House. Prince
Charles was then requested to intercede with His Majesty that he would
sequester the Great Seal, to which James assented, declaring it was his
resolution to fill up the place of Chancellor forthwith. Bacon was
summoned before the House; he excused himself on the plea of sickness,
and sentence was passed upon him in his absence. He was decreed to pay a
fine of 40,000_l._, to be imprisoned in the Tower during the King’s
pleasure, and declared incapable of ever either sitting in Parliament
again, or of holding any office or employment; he was even forbidden to
come within “the verge”—that is, within twelve miles of the Court.[360]
Footnote 356:
Mr. Montagu’s Life of Bacon, note.
Footnote 357:
Bishop Hacket’s Life of Williams.
Footnote 358:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 359:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 360:
Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
The condition of Bacon’s mind and body under this severe disgrace seems
to have been truly melancholy. One moment he was merry, and declared
that he believed he should be able to ride safely through the tempest.
When passing through the hall of his stately abode at York House, on his
servants rising at his presence, he said, “Sit down, my friends; your
rise has been my fall.” Upon one of his friends observing, “You must
look around you,” he answered, “I look above me.” At other times his
despair broke out in words that, although somewhat abject, were touching
in the extreme. As he lay in his bed, his frame swoln with disease, he
bade none of his gentlemen come near him, nor take any notice of him,
but altogether to forget him, not hereafter to speak of him, nor
remember that there was such a being in the world.
In this extremity of sorrow, Buckingham visited the fallen one. Already
had Bacon written to him in the following terms:—“Your Lordship spoke of
purgatory; I am now in it; but my mind is in a calm, for my fortune is
not my felicity. I know I have clean hands, and a clean heart, and I
hope a clean house for friends or servants. But Job himself, or whoever
was the justest judge, by such hunting for matters against him as hath
been used against me, may, for a time, seem foul, especially in a time
when greatness is the mark, and accusation is the game. And if this be
to be a Chancellor, I think, if the Great Seal lay upon Hounslow Heath,
nobody would stoop to take it up.” What marvellous self-deception, or
consummate duplicity! Owing to Buckingham’s mediation, a letter was
given to the King, from Bacon; in this he again asserted that innocence
to which he had solemnly renounced all claim before, in his submission
to Parliament.
“And now for the briberies and gifts wherewith I am charged; when the
book of hearts shall be opened, I hope I shall not be found to have the
troubled fountain of a corrupt heart, in a depraved habit of taking
rewards to pervert justice, however I may be frail, and partake of the
abuses of the times.”[361]
Footnote 361:
Montagu’s Life, p. 332.
On the nineteenth of March, Bacon addressed a letter to the House of
Lords, contending, he said, that charges of bribery were brought against
him; he prayed that they would not prejudge him for absence, having been
ill, and preparing for a higher tribunal; that they would give him
leisure to make his defence, which would be plain and ingenuous; also,
that they would not be prejudiced against him by the number of petitions
brought against a man who gives two hundred decrees and orders a year,
exclusive of causes. He did not, he said, desire to make greatness a
subterfuge for guiltiness.[362]
Footnote 362:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 28.
Notwithstanding a message from James to Parliament, saying that he had
refused the tender of the Great Seal from the Lord Chancellor, and hoped
that they would give him a patient hearing, “but to judge him as they
thought fit, if matters prove foul,”[363] Bacon was suspended. He wrote
a pitiful, specious letter to the House of Lords, in which he “rejoiced
that in the midst of his profound afflictions the greatness of a
magistrate was no shelter for crime.” His only justification, he said,
was his non-concealment of his offences. He did not mean to reply to
particular questions, nor cavil at witnesses, nor urge extenuations. He
submitted to their judgment and mercy, but hoped that the loss of his
soul might be sufficient expiation for his faults. He pleaded for
compassion, by the example of the King’s clemency, and their own fellow
feeling for him.[364]
Footnote 363:
State Papers, vol. cxx., No. 97.
Footnote 364:
Ibid, No. 104.
Until the first of May, 1621, Bacon remained Lord Chancellor of England.
On the afternoon of that day, the Lord Treasurer, Viscount Mandeville,
the Duke of Lennox, Lord Steward of the King’s Household, the Earl of
Arundel, Earl Marshal of England, the Earl of Pembroke, and the Lord
Chamberlain of the Household, repaired to York House. They were
introduced into the presence of Bacon, and then told him “that they were
sorry to visit him on such an occasion, and wished it had been better.”
“No, my lords,” he replied, “the occasion is good.” He then delivered to
them the Great Seal, saying, as he gave it up, “It was the King’s favour
that gave me this, and it is my fault that he hath taken it away.” The
seal was conveyed to Whitehall, and restored to the King, who exclaimed,
on receiving it, “Now, by my soul, I am pained at my heart where to
bestow this; for, as for my lawyers, they are all knaves.”[365] But
Buckingham had provided against this difficulty, and the high office
which Bacon had so greatly abused was bestowed upon Williams, Bishop of
Lincoln, who was now the chief adviser of the Marquis, and to whose
counsels much that had been done was attributed.
Footnote 365:
Nichols, from Sir Symonds D’Ewes’s Diary.
The choice of Williams, for this high office, reflected no discredit
upon Buckingham. Bishop Goodman terms this prelate “a man of as great
wit and understanding as ever I knew any man.” “And truly,” he adds,
endeavouring to rebut Weldon’s charge of a mean birth, “he was as
well-descended and had as good kindred as any man in North Wales, none
beyond him. He had a very quick apprehension, and for the discharge of
the Lord Keeper’s Office, he was never taxed with any insufficiency. I
have heard him make his reports in the Lord’s House of Parliament, and
answer such petitions, that in truth we did wonderfully commend
him.”[366] To these essentials Williams added the popular qualities of
hospitality and liberality; in this respect he resembled Laud. “There
was not a man in England,” says Bishop Goodman, “that kept a more
orderly house than Laud did, or bred up his servants better. But I will
join these two celebrities together for the great hospitality which they
kept, inviting and entertaining strangers.” With regard to liberality,
the erection of St. John’s College, Cambridge, the foundation there of
several scholarships and fellowships, the library at Westminster, the
library at Lincoln, the repairs of Westminster Abbey, and the care which
Williams took, even when he was Lord Keeper, of the young scholars at
Westminster, sufficiently attest his great and salutary views.
Footnote 366:
Goodman’s Life, i., p. 285.
Whilst he was Proctor at Cambridge, he conducted a magnificent
entertainment, given to the Lord Chancellor Egerton, and to the Spanish
ambassadors, on which occasion Egerton told him that he “was fit to
serve a king,” and afterwards introduced him at court.[367]
Footnote 367:
Grainger, chap, iv., t. 1.
The chief circumstance that brought Williams into notice was his
figuring at Cambridge in a disputation, before Prince Charles, in
1612-13,[368] when he was made a Bachelor of Divinity by special grace,
in order that he might become a disputant in the Theological
Controversy.[369]
Footnote 368:
Nichols, vol. iii., p. 589.
Footnote 369:
Ibid, vol. ii., Appendix.
Still, great subserviency was expected even from the Lord Keeper in
those days of despotic rule. The industrious letter writer, John
Chamberlain, who supplies us with all the gossip and news which, in
those days, had no outlet in the public press, writes of this new
appointment in these terms:—
“The King has made the Dean of Westminster Lord Keeper for a year and a
half; if he behave well, he is to retain office for a year and a half
longer, and then to surrender it: he is to consult one of the Chief
Justices in all cases of importance.”[370]
Footnote 370:
Chamberlain to Carleton.—State Papers, vol. cxxiii., No. 23.
He quietly adds, immediately afterwards, that the Bishop of Bangor had
been sent to the Fleet for disputing “malapertly” with the King on the
Sabbath; and that Dr. Price had shared the same punishment for his
sermon at Oatlands. The “Prevaricator” of Cambridge was expelled the
University for saying, at a banquet that he gave, that he would have all
sorts of instruments except Gondomar’s pipe.[371] The Lord Keeper’s
“good behaviour,” therefore, meant an absolute subjection of reason and
understanding; and, more especially, an entire adherence to that line of
politics which might happen to be agreeable at the time to the King.
Footnote 371:
Chamberlain to Carleton, State Papers, vol. cxxii.,No. 23.
The Great Seal, when it had been fetched from the miserable Bacon, was
delivered by the King, in presence of the Prince and the Privy Council,
to Williams, and was received with a short speech, “marvelling at His
Majesty’s benignity,” and promising to be pastor of the sheep. In his
first speech in the Court of Chancery, the Lord Keeper vindicated the
principle on which the King had determined to fill up the post with one
who was not a lawyer.[372]
Footnote 372:
State Papers, vol. cxiii., No. 18.
A few months before Buckingham, who, as “Steward of the City and College
of Westminster,” was patron of the Deanery, had made the young disputant
Dean of Westminster. Williams, nevertheless, abstained from paying any
court to the Favourite; his pride and honesty kept him aloof. “For he
had observed,” says Bishop Hacket, “that the Marquis was very apt
suddenly to look cloudy upon his creatures, as if he had raised them up
on purpose to cast them down.” One day, however, whilst the Dean was
attending upon King James, in the absence of the Marquis, the Monarch
suddenly inquired, without any relation to the previous discourse, “when
he was at Buckingham?” “Sir,” replied Williams, “I have had no business
to go to his lordship.” “But,” rejoined the King, “you must go to him
about my business,” and Williams accordingly sought an interview with
the Marquis. The Favourite and the Dean were thus brought into contact,
and the result was favourable to both. To Buckingham it procured an able
and, for the time, a zealous friend, to whom he owed the great service
which Williams afterwards performed in converting Lady Katherine Manners
from Popery; and Williams obtained, for his part, a munificent and
deserving patron. A different version of the causes of Williams’s
elevation was given by a scandalous historian. According to Sir Anthony
Weldon, it was owing to the hopes which the Countess of Buckingham
entertained of becoming, in her third nuptials, the wife of Williams,
who is said to have “thought otherwise of that marriage when he was Lord
Keeper Williams, than he had done as Dean of Westminster,”[373] “which,”
he adds, “was the cause of his downfall.” But this report was wholly
without foundation. “Williams was generally beloved by his neighbours,”
says Bishop Goodman, “and for that report, that he should be great with
Buckingham’s mother, it is an idle, foolish report, without any colour
of truth.”[374] His appointment as Lord Keeper gave, however, great
offence to the members of the bar. It was loudly resented that the
highest post in the law should be bestowed upon a doctor of divinity;
and this step was, it was supposed, preparatory to filling all the
courts of judicature with churchmen. Williams, nevertheless, proved
himself to be admirably adapted for the office. He had already gained
general confidence by persuading the King to suffer Parliament to sit,
and to go on, in opposition to those who, being afraid of exposure, had
endeavoured to prejudice Buckingham and his royal master against that
assembly.[375] As a chancellor, he was acknowledged, even by the most
distrustful, to be a faithful counsellor; and by the friendship and
instruction of the Lord Chancellor, Egerton, to whom he had been
domestic chaplain, he had been prepared for the great duties of his
legal office. Egerton, on his death, had addressed to Williams these
words:—“If you want money, I will leave you such a legacy as shall
furnish you to begin the world like a gentleman. I know,” he added, “you
are an expert workmen. Take these tools to broach with: they are the
best I have.” He then gave him some books and papers, which he had
written with his own hand, being directions concerning the regulation of
the High Court of Parliament, the Court of Chancery, and the Star
Chamber, for the dying Chancellor foresaw that his chaplain might, in
the course of his career, require such materials.[376]
Footnote 373:
Oldmixon, 53.
Footnote 374:
Goodman, vol. i., p. 286.
Footnote 375:
Note to Biog. Brit. Art. Bacon.
Footnote 376:
Oldmixon, p. 53.
The promotion of Williams involved very important consequences to the
English Church. It was by his instrumentality that Bishop Laud was first
brought forward at the Court of James.
Williams foresaw the rise of that eminent and unfortunate man, but few
persons could have predicted his fall.
An accidental circumstance drew upon Laud the attention which his
learning, his zeal, and his ardent piety, tainted as it was by bigotry,
might not have procured him. Bishops, and even archbishops, in those
days, were, as we have seen, by no means restricted from the diversions
of the hunting-field, nor even, if occasion occurred, from martial
exploits. Archbishop Abbot, among the rest, had been a jovial huntsman.
The practice was, it is true, forbidden by the canons of the church, but
those had not been admitted by the law of the land. There was a high and
violent party in the church, who were eager that Abbot should be
deprived of his ecclesiastical dignities, on account of the accident in
which he shot a keeper, a mishap which the worst construction could only
render into justifiable homicide. Laud was amongst the most vehement of
these, and his views of the case were so rigid, that he did not consider
the orders which Archbishop Abbot conferred afterwards to be valid.
There were others who judged differently, and amongst the rest, the
justly celebrated Lancelot Andrews, who maintained that since Bishop
Juxon was famous for breeding the best dogs in England, and was yet
worthy to be promoted to a see, Abbot was excusable.
But the resistance of Laud was agreeable to Buckingham, who already had
constituted himself his patron. By his influence, Williams was induced
to get Laud made Bishop of St. David’s, and Laud afterwards acknowledged
that and other obligations by exclaiming, “My life will be too short to
repay his Lordship’s goodness.” Yet he lived to change his opinion.
The rise of Laud at Court may be traced by distinct, steps. In 1621-2,
we find him preaching at Court, on the day of the King’s accession,[377]
and “commanded to print.”[378] Shortly afterwards the King sent to Laud,
to converse with him about the Countess of Buckingham, who was wavering
on the subject of her faith. Several interviews succeeded, and in
consequence, it may be presumed, of Laud’s exertions in that cause, he
became chaplain to the Marquis of Buckingham. For a time, his efforts at
conversion appear to have been crowned with success. The Countess
consented to receive the sacrament in the King’s chapel, and received a
present, according to common report, of 2,000_l._ for her
conformity.[379] Sometimes religious discussions took place before His
Majesty, and on one occasion, the answer of Laud to the nine articles,
delivered in a book from Fisher, the Jesuit, was read and argued upon at
Windsor, in the presence of James, his son, Buckingham, his mother, and
his lady. These endeavours proved futile; the Countess became eventually
confirmed in the Church of Rome, and retreated to her house at Goadby,
to enjoy the exercise of her persuasion, undisturbed by the observations
of the world. Hitherto, she had been one of the most brilliant leaders
of fashion; her retirement from the Court was therefore the theme of
much remark. Her compliance with the King’s wishes in receiving the Holy
Communion was said to have been prompted by her dread of banishment from
that sphere in which she had figured.[380] It was during the following
year that she relapsed to Popery, and after she was, as Mr. Chamberlain
declared, _sent_ from Court, either on that account, or perhaps on
account of a quarrel with her daughter-in-law.[381]
Footnote 377:
March 24th.
Footnote 378:
Nichols, vol. iv., p. 754.
Footnote 379:
Ibid, p. 769.
Footnote 380:
State Papers, vol. cxxxi., No. 24.
Footnote 381:
Ibid, vol. cxxxiii., No. 24.
Whatsoever may have been the reason for the retirement of this ambitious
woman, one may easily imagine with what mingled emotions of chagrin and
triumph she returned to the scene of her early married life; her sons,
already great, were ennobled, and influential; her title and fortune
formed a striking contrast between the all-powerful mother of a royal
favourite, and the lowly serving maid in the household of an obscure
Leicestershire country gentleman; yet there were, as it so appears,
clouds overshadowing even the brightness of her destiny, and darkening,
eventually, the close of her singularly prosperous career.