"Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure,
Men love in haste, but they detest at leisure."
_Don Juan_, xiii., 16.
Rivals in love, rivals in law, rivals for place, Coke and Bacon, while
nominally friends, were implacable enemies, but they sought their ends
by different methods. When James I. had ascended the throne, Bacon
began at once to seek his favour; but Coke took no trouble whatever
for that purpose, and he was not even introduced to the royal presence
until several weeks after the accession. Bacon, then a K.C., held no
office during the first four years of the new reign; but his literary
fame and his skilful advocacy at the Bar excited the jealousy of Coke.
On one occasion, Coke grossly insulted him in the Court of Exchequer,
whereupon Bacon said: "Mr. Attorney, I respect you but I fear you not;
and the less you speak of your own greatness, the more I will think of
it." Coke angrily replied: "I think scorn to stand upon terms of
greatness towards you, who are less than little--less than the least."
Lord Campbell says that Sir Edward Coke's arrogance to the whole Bar,
and to all who approached him, now became almost insufferable, and
that "his demeanour was particularly offensive to his rival"--Bacon.
As to prisoners, "his brutal conduct ... brought permanent disgrace
upon himself and upon the English Bar." When Sir Walter Raleigh was
being tried for his life, but had not yet been found guilty, Coke said
to him: "Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever lived.
I want words sufficient to express thy viprous treasons." When Sir
Everard Digby confessed that he deserved the vilest death, but humbly
begged for mercy and some moderation of justice, Coke told him that he
ought "rather to admire the great moderation and mercy of the King, in
that, for so exorbitant a crime, no new torture answerable thereto was
devised to be inflicted upon him," and that, as to his wife and
children, he ought to desire the fulfilment of the words of the Psalm:
"Let his wife be a widow and his children vagabonds: let his posterity
be destroyed, and in the next generation let his name be quite put
out." According to Lord Campbell, Coke's "arrogance of demeanour to
all mankind is unparalleled."
Towards the end of the reign of Elizabeth, Coke, as Attorney-General,
had had another task well suited to his taste, that of examining the
prisoners stretched on the rack, at the Tower. Volumes of examinations
of prisoners under torture, in Coke's own handwriting, are still
preserved at the State Paper Office, which, says Campbell,
"sufficiently attest his zeal, assiduity and hard-heartedness in the
service.... He scrupulously attended to see the proper degree of pain
inflicted." Yet this severe prosecutor, bitter advocate and cruel
examiner, became a Chief Justice of tolerable courtesy, moderate
severity, and unimpeachable integrity.
If he had everything his own way in the criminal court and the torture
chamber, Coke did not find his wishes altogether unopposed in his
family. To begin with, he suffered the perpetual insult of the refusal
on the part of his wife to be called by his name. If her first husband
had been of higher rank, it might have been another matter: but both
were only knights, and it was a parallel case to the widow Jones,
after she had married Smith, insisting upon still calling herself Mrs.
Jones. Lady Elizabeth defended her conduct on this point as
follows:[3] "I returned this answer: that if Sir Edward Cooke would
bury my first husband accordinge to his own directions, and also paie
such small legacys as he gave to divers of his friends, in all cominge
not to above L700 or L900, at the most that was left unperformed, he
having all Sir William Hatton's goods & lands to a large proportion,
then would I willingly stile myself by his name. But he never yielded,
so I consented not to the other." Whether Hatton or Coke, as an Earl's
daughter she was Lady Elizabeth, by which name alone let us know her.
Campbell states that, after the birth of Frances, Sir Edward and Lady
Elizabeth "lived little together, although they had the prudence to
appear to the world to be on decent terms till the heiress was
marriageable." Coke had been astute enough to secure a comfortable
country-house, at a very convenient distance from London, through Lady
Elizabeth. Her ladyship had held a mortgage upon Stoke Pogis, a place
that belonged formerly to the Earls of Huntingdon,[4] and Coke, either
by foreclosing or by selling, obtained possession of the property. As
it stood but three or four miles to the north of Windsor, the
situation was excellent.[5] Sir Edward's London house was in the then
fashionable quarter of Holborn, a place to which dwellers in the city
used to go for change of air.[6] As Coke and his wife generally
quarrelled when together, the husband was usually at Holborn[7] when
the wife was at Stoke, and _vice-versa_. It was almost impossible that
Miss Frances should not notice the strained relations between her
parents. Nothing could have been much worse for the education of their
daughter than their constant squabblings; and, unless she differed
greatly from most other daughters, she would take advantage of their
mutual antipathies to play one against the other, a pleasing pastime,
by means of which young ladies, blessed with quarrelsome parents,
often obtain permissions and other good things of this world, which
otherwise they would have to do without.
Lady Elizabeth found a friend and a sympathiser in her domestic
worries. Francis Bacon, the former lover of her fortune, if not of her
person, became her consoler and her counsellor. Let not the reader
suppose that these pages are so early to be sullied by a scandal.
Nothing could have been farther from reproach than the marital
fidelity of Lady Elizabeth, but it must have gratified Bacon to annoy
the man who had crossed and conquered him in love, or in what
masqueraded under that name, by fanning the flames of Lady Elizabeth's
fiery hatred against her husband. Hitherto, Coke had had it all his
own way. He had snubbed and insulted Bacon in the law courts, and he
had snatched a wealthy and beautiful heiress from his grasp. The wheel
of fortune was now about to take a turn in the opposite direction.
About the year 1611, King James entertained the idea of reigning as an
absolute sovereign. Archbishop Bancroft flattered him in this notion,
and suggested that the King ought to have the privilege of "judging
whatever cause he pleased in his own person, free from all risk of
prohibition or appeal." James summoned the judges to his Council and
asked whether they consented to this proposal. Coke replied:--
"God has endowed your Majesty with excellent science as well as great
gifts of nature; but your Majesty will allow me to say, with all
reverence, that you are not learned in the laws of this your realm of
England, and I crave leave to remind your Majesty that causes which
concern the life or inheritance, or goods or fortunes of your subjects
are not to be decided by natural reason, but by the artificial reason
and judgment of law, which law is an art which requires long study and
experience before that a man can attain to the cognizance of it."
On hearing this, James flew into a rage and said: "Then am I to be
_under_ the law--which it is treason to affirm?"
To which Coke replied: "Thus wrote Braxton: 'Rex non debet esse sub
homine, sed sub _Deo et Lege_.'"[8]
Coke had the misfortune to offend the King in another matter. James
issued proclamations whenever he thought that the existing law
required amendment. A reply was drawn up by Coke, in which he said:
"The King, by his proclamation or otherwise, cannot change any part
of the common law, or statute law, or the customs of the realm." This
still further aggravated James.
Meanwhile Bacon, now Attorney-General, was high in the King's favour,
and he was constantly manoeuvring in order to bring about the downfall
of his rival. He persuaded James to remove Coke from the Common Pleas
to the King's Bench--a promotion, it is true, but to a far less
lucrative post. This greatly annoyed Coke, who, on meeting Bacon,
said: "Mr. Attorney, this is all your doing." For a time Coke
counteracted his fall in James's favour by giving L2,000 to a
"Benevolence," which the King had asked for the pressing necessities
of the Crown, a benevolence to which the other judges contributed only
very small sums. This fair weather, however, was not to be of long
duration.
In 1616 Coke again offended the King. Bacon had declared his opinion
that the King could prohibit the hearing of any case in which his
prerogative was concerned. In the course of a trial which shortly
afterwards took place, Bacon wrote to the judges that it was "his
Majesty's express pleasure that the farther argument of the said cause
be put off till his Majesty's farther pleasure be known upon
consulting him." In a reply, drawn up by Coke and signed by the other
judges, the King was told that "we have advisedly considered of the
said letter of Mr. Attorney, and with one consent do hold the same to
be contrary to law, and such as we could not yield to by our oaths."
James was furious. He summoned the judges to Whitehall and gave them a
tremendous scolding. They fell on their knees and all were submissive
except Coke, who boldly said that "obedience to his Majesty's command
... would have been a delay of justice, contrary to law, and contrary
to the oaths of the judges."
Although Coke was now in terrible disgrace at Court, he might have
retained his office of Chief Justice, if he would have sanctioned a
job for Villiers, the new royal favourite. George Villiers, a young
man of twenty-four, since the fall of the Earl of Somerset had
centralised all power and patronage in his own hands. The chief
clerkship in the Court of King's Bench, a sinecure worth L4,000 a
year, was falling vacant, and Villiers wished to have the disposal of
it. The office was in the gift of Coke, and, when Bacon asked that its
gift should be placed in the hands of Villiers, Coke flatly refused
and thus offended the most powerful man in England. Nothing then
became bad enough for Coke and nothing in Coke could be good. His
reports of cases were carefully examined by Bacon, who pointed out to
the King many "novelties, errors, and offensive conceits" in them. The
upshot of the whole matter was that Coke was deprived of office. When
the news was communicated to him, says a contemporary letter, "he
received it with dejection and tears."[9]
It would be natural to suppose that by this time Bacon had done enough
to satisfy his vengeance upon Coke. But no! He must needs worry him
yet further by an exasperating letter, from which some extracts shall
be given. It opens with a good deal of scriptural quotation as to the
wholesomeness of affliction. Then Bacon proceeds to say:[10]
"Afflictions level the mole-hills of pride, plough the heart and make
it fit for Wisdom to sow her seed, and for grace to bring forth her
increase. Happy is that man, therefore, both in regard of Heavenly and
earthly wisdom, that is thus wounded to be cured, thus broken to be
made straight, thus made acquainted with his own imperfections that he
may be perfect. Supposing this to be the time of your affliction, that
which I have propounded to myself is, by taking the seasonable
advantage, like a true friend (though far unworthy to be counted so)
to show your shape in a glass.... Yet of this resolve yourself, it
proceedeth from love and a true desire to do you good, that you,
knowing what the general opinion is may not altogether neglect or
contemn it, but mend what you may find amiss in yourself.... First,
therefore, behold your Errors: In discourse you delight to speak too
much.... Your affections are entangled with a love of your own
arguments, though they be the weaker.... Secondly, you cloy your
auditory: when you would be observed, speech must either be sweet, or
short. Thirdly, you converse with Books, not Men ... who are the best
Books. For a man of action & employment you seldom converse, & then
but with underlings; not freely but as a schoolmaster with his
scholars, ever to teach, never to learn.... You should know many of
these tales you tell to be but ordinary, & many other things, which
you repeat, & serve in for novelties to be but stale.... Your too much
love of the world is too much seen, when having the living" [income]
"of L10,000, you relieve few or none: the hand that hath taken so
much, can it give so little? Herein you show no bowels of
compassion.... We desire you to amend this & let your poor Tenants in
Norfolk find some comfort, where nothing of your Estate is spent
towards their relief, but all brought up hither, to the impoverishing
of your country.... When we will not mind ourselves, God (if we belong
to him) takes us in hand, & because he seeth that we have unbridled
stomachs, therefore he sends outward crosses." And Bacon ends by
commending poor Coke "to God's Holy Spirit ... beseeching Him to send
you a good issue out of all these troubles, & from henceforth to work
a reformation in all that is amiss, & a resolute perseverance,
proceeding, & growth, in all that is good, & that for His glory, the
bettering of yourself, this Church & Commonwealth; whose faithful
servant whilest you remain, I am a faithful servant unto you."
If ever there was a case of adding insult to injury, surely this piece
of canting impertinence was one of the most outrageous.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] _Life of Sir Edward Coke._ By H.W. Woolrych. London: J. & W.T.
Clarke, 1826, pp. 145-48.
[4] Lipscomb's _History and Antiquities of the Co. of Bucks_, 1847,
Vol. IV., p. 548.
[5] Gray made the churchyard of Stoke Pogis the scene of his famous
Elegy, and he was buried there in 1771.
[6] _Ency. Brit._, Vol. XIV. Article on London.
[7] Lady Elizabeth's house in Holborn was called Hatton House. A
letter (_S.P. Dom._, James I., 13th July, 1622) says: "Lady Hatton
sells her house in Holborn to the Duke of Lennox, for L12,000."
Another letter (ib. 26th February, 1628) says that "Lady Hatton
complained so much of her bargain with the Duchess of Richmond for
Hatton House, that the Duchess has taken her at her word and left it
on her hands, whereby she loses L1,500 a year, and L6,000 fine."
[8] "Under no man's judgment should the King lie; but under God and
the law only."
[9] Letter from John Castle. See D'Israeli's _Character of James I._,
p. 125.
[10] _Cabala Sive Scrina Sacra_: Mysteries of State and Government. In
_Letters of Illustrious Persons, etc_. London: Thomas Sawbridge and
others, 1791, p. 86.