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ons till the next term following. Our pleasure therefore is, who are the head and fountain of justice under God in our dominions, and we out of our absolute power and authority royal do command you, that you forbear to meddle any further in this plea till our coming to town, and that out of our own mouth you hear our pleasure in this business, which we do out of the care we have, that our prerogative may not receive an unwitting and indirect blow, and not to hinder justice to be administered to any private parties, which no importunities shall persuade us to move you in. Like as only for the avoiding of the unreasonable importunity of suitors in their own particular, that oath was by our predecessors ordained to be ministered unto you. So we wish you heartily well to fare.

"Postcript.-You shall, upon the receipt of this letter, call our attorneygeneral unto you, who will inform you of the particular points which we are unwilling to be disputed of in this case."

Shortly after this correspondence the king returned to London, and the twelve udges were immediately summoned before the council at Whitehall (June 6th, 1616) to answer for their conduct. His majesty himself recapitulated the principal circumstances that had occurred, and commented with much asperity on the liberties that had been taken with his prerogative. With the formal pedantry for which he was conspicuous, he divided the charges against them into faults of matter and manner, and those of matter he distinguished into faults of omission and of commission. The omission consisted in not interrupting and reproving the barrister who had presumed to argue against his prerogative. "He had observed," he said, "that ever since his coming to the crown the popular sort of lawyers had been the men that most affrontedly in all parliament had trodden upon his prerogative, which being most contrary to their vocation of any men, since the law or lawyers can never be respected if the king be not reverenced; it did therefore best become the judges of any, to check and bridle such impudent lawyers, and in their several benches to disgrace them that bear so little respect to their king's authority." The faults of commission chiefly regarded the letter, to which he took exceptions both in matter and form; in matter, because he

affirmed that the delay which had been required was neither unnecessary nor unjust, that it was merely sufficient for maturity of advice; and that there could not be a more urgent cause for staying the proceedings, than the consulting with the king in a case which so nearly concerned the crown. "As for the form of the letter, his majesty noted that it was a new thing, and very indecent and unfit for subjects to disobey the king's commandment, but most of all to proceed in the mean time and to return to him a bare certificate; whereas they ought to have concluded with the laying down and representing of their reasons modestly to his majesty why they should proceed, and so to have submitted the same to his princely judg ment, expecting to hear from him whether they had given him satisfaction."

The report of the proceedings in couneil, from which the above statement is extracted, goes on to say, that imme diately after this declaration of the king the twelve judges fell on their knees and acknowledged their error as to the form of the letter, for which they craved his majesty's gracious favour and pardon; but that Sir Edward Coke entered into a defence of the matter of it, showing that the delay required would have been a delay of justice, and therefore contrary to law and the judge's oath. After some little altercation between the attorneygeneral and the lord chief justice, this point was referred to the decision of Lord Ellesmere, who gave it as his opinion that the stay which had been required by his majesty was not against the law nor the judge's oath. The judges were then severally asked, " Whether if at any time, in a case depending before them, his majesty conceived it to concern him either in power or profit, and thereupon required to consult with them, and that they should stay proceedings in the mean time, they ought not to stay accordingly?" and they all, with the exception of the lord chief justice, declared that they would. But Sir Edward Coke contented himself with answering that "when the case should be he would do that which should be fit for a judge to do." They were afterwards dismissed; his majesty commanding them "to keep the bounds and limits of their several courts, not to suffer his prerogative to be wounded by rash and unadvised pleading before them, or by new invention of law; for as he well knew the true and ancient common law is the

most favourable for kings of any law in the world, so he advised them to apply their studies to that ancient and best law, and not to extend the power of any other of their courts beyond their due limits, following the precedents of their best ancient judges, in the times of the best government; and that then they might assure themselves that he, for his part, in his protection of them, and expediting of justice, would walk in the steps of ancient and best kings." They were then permitted to proceed in the cause, which was finally decided against the Bishop of Litchfield and Coventry.

It is not to be supposed that this unjustifiable attempt to corrupt the fountain of public justice could have been made without exciting among a large portion of the community a strong feeling of disgust and disaffection towards the government under which it had originated. But we should greatly exaggerate the effect which this transaction must have had on the minds of the people at large, were we to estimate it according to what we might conceive would be the probable consequences of a similar occurrence in our own times. The press did not distribute periodically to the remotest corners of the kingdom a knowledge of those affairs in which every member of the state is concerned; nor was this attack on the liberties of the people of a nature such as necessarily to attain (like the case of the ship money, for example) immediate pub licity. But this adds to the merit of Coke. He could not have been excited to act thus by the mere wish of courting popularity. Unfortunately, too, had he been inclined to search for precedents of corruption among his predecessors on the bench, by way of authorizing his compliance with the king's wishes, he would have found many instances well suited to his purpose. Indced, obedience to the will of the sovereign was considered, in some sort, the duty of the judges, at a time when they held their offices by no safer tenure than the meanest servant of his household. Sir Edward Coke was perhaps the first who set the example of strict independence on the bench. After the Stuarts were finally driven from the throne, and a rational system of civil liberty had been established, it was wisely considered, that the surest method of ensuring for the future the just and impartial administration of the laws, would be to maintain, in their utmost purity, the

independence, the integrity, and the dignity of the judges. Accordingly, during the reign of William III., it was enacted, that only the address of both houses of parliament should be capable of procuring their removal from the bench. Unfortunately for James, and still more so for his successor, they could never understand (what it now needs no argument to prove) that the honour of the crown and the liberty of the subject can mutually support each other.

The firm and resolute conduct of the lord chief justice had given great umbrage to the king. It is supposed that this weak monarch, in addition to his other reasons for being displeased with Coke, had a mean jealousy of the popularity he had acquired. It was evident, indeed, that the fearless integrity which had thwarted his majesty's views was the principal cause of that popularity; and the circumstance did not escape the attention of James, who afterwards remarked that Sir Edward Coke had obtained it without "having in his nature one part of those things which are popular in men, being neither civil, nor affable, nor magnificent." He had, however, taken the surest means to acquire the lasting and deserved esteem of his countrymen. This was not the only occasion on which he had protected the rights of the nation against the arbitrary and unconstitutional encroachments of that prerogative, the undue exercise of which alienated from James the affections of his people, and brought his successor to the scaffold. He had more than once countenanced appeals to the King's Bench from the judgments of the commissioners of sewers, for whom, it is well known, extraordinary and illegal powers had been created. The privy council subsequently claimed the sole right of hearing complaints against these commissioners, and several persons who had brought actions against them at common law were committed to prison; but these violent measures, though not openly resisted, were sufficiently censured by the public opinion to recall the memory of the obligations due to him who had upheld the rights of the people. However, those actions which were calculated to excite the esteem or the admiration of the friends of civil liberty, were exactly those which were most likely to injure the author of them in the favour of James; and the conduct of Coke,

with regard to the commissioners of sewers, had been such as particularly to draw down on him the enmity of the council.

Nor were these the only clouds that were lowering over him. In the preceding year, in his capacity of lord chief justice, he had been actively and zealously engaged in the investigation of the circumstances connected with the atrocious murder of Sir Thomas Overbury. In the course of the inquiry which took place relative to this assassination it was proved that it had been perpetrated by the favourite, Somerset, and Lady Essex, between whom Overbury had discovered, and endeavoured to prevent, an illicit intercourse. The circumstances of the case were pecuHarly revolting. The victim of their resentment had been, under some slight pretext, conveyed a prisoner to the Tower; and the lieutenant-governor was induced to become a party to the plot that was laid for his destruction. After several ineffectual attempts, he was at length killed by a violent poison. The crime remained some years unpunished, but at length a strict inquiry was set on foot. It was found that several subordinate agents had been participators in it, and these suffered the death they had justly deserved. Somerset and Lady Essex escaped with their lives; but the downfal of the favourite was the consequence of the discovery; and Coke, who had been indefatigable in his endeavours to detect the perpetrators of the crime, was consequently in no small degree instrumental in procuring his disgrace. It is needless to add that this made him many and very powerful enemies; and it is not to be supposed but that they availed themselves of the opportunity which now presented itself for poisoning the ear of the king against him. Indeed, James himself is supposed to have harboured a deep feeling of resentment against the lord chief justice, on account of certain mysterious hints which are said to have escaped him during the trial of Somerset and his accomplices. It is certain that whispers concerning some secret transaction in which the king was implicated, had been circulated about the court soon after the institution of legal proceedings against the murderers of Sir Thomas Overbury; and many have not scrupled to believe (though without much foundation for the story)

that they related to the poisoning of the hope of the nation, the young prince Henry; a crime very generally attributed at the time to Viscountess Rochester, though James (however unjustly) has not entirely escaped the suspicion of being privy to the death of his own son. It was natural that the persons who credited and gave countenance to such rumours should be personally odious to the king, nor is it improbable that such a motive should have weighed with him even stronger than political reasons, when he determined on removing Coke from his post. Sir George Villiers also, who afterwards became Duke of Buckingham, having been thwarted by the chief justice in his endeavours to procure the reversion of a lucrative situation in the court of King's Bench, did not neglect an occasion so favourable for the exercise of his resentment, which his influence with James rendered sufficiently formidable. All these circumstances combined to produce Sir Edward Coke's disgrace; but the avowed cause of it was his conduct in the case of the commendams. For this he was arraigned in the privy-council. The accusation against him was reduced to three heads: 1. an act done; 2. speeches of high contempt uttered in the seat of justice; 3. uncomely and undutiful carriage in the presence of his majesty, the privy-council, and judges. These charges having been officially notified to him, on the 30th of June, 1616, he was again summoned before the council, where, on his knees, he received intimation of the sentence which the king had passed on him. The substance of it was, that he should be sequestered from the council-table till his majesty's pleasure was further known; that he should forbear from riding his summer circuit as justice of assize; and that, during the vacation, he should employ his leisure in revising and correcting his Reports, in which the pedantic despot, James, declared that Coke had uttered for law many dangerous conceits of his own, to the prejudice of his crown, parliament, and subjects. will scarcely be credited, that one of the charges brought against the lord chief justice was, that his coachman used to ride bareheaded before him; a mark of dignity which it was said he was by no means entitled to assume, and of which the earl marshal must take notice. To this Sir Edward Coke (very innocently no doubt) replied, that

It

his coachman did so for his own convenience, and not in consequence of any orders having been given him to that effect. A few months afterwards (Nov. 15th) he was altogether removed from the chief justiceship, and his place was supplied by Sir Henry Montague, the recorder of London. It is worthy of observation, that the new judge was not appointed until he had entered into a written engagement with Buckingham, by which he agreed to put the trustees of the favourite in possession of the situation he had been deprived of through the influence of Sir Edward Coke. This fact sufficiently shows what was the principal cause of Coke's removal from the bench. It may also in some measure explain why he was first suspended, and afterwards entirely removed; the intermediate time being no doubt left him to propitiate the good grace of Buckingham by submission to his wishes. If this be the case, it must reHect eternal honour on Coke, that he preferred renouncing his office altogether to procuring his continuance in it by unworthy means. This is one of a thousand instances in which proud integrity has fallen a sacrifice to the machinations of interested cabal and court intrigue.

Coke, however, did not remain long in disgrace. Some time before his removal from the bench, a negotiation had been set on foot concerning the marriage of his youngest daughter with Sir John Villiers, the brother of the Earl of Buckingham. He had then refused his consent to the match; but it is to be supposed, that the growing influence of the favourite, and the change that had been wrought in his own fortune, afterwards made him sensible of the advantages to be derived from so powerful an alliance, so that he was not indisposed to listen to a renewal of the same overtures, when a change in the relative situation of both parties had rendered an union between them more desirable. As to the sentiments the young lady herself might entertain on the subject, they appear not to have been thought worthy of the slightest consideration. Coke had himself consulted his interest alone in his own marriage with Lady Hatton, from whom he had long lived almost wholly estranged; and he was not of a character to sacrifice his own advancement to the inclination of his daughter. It was

through the medium of Secretary Winwood that the match was at length effected. That minister had felt himself offended by a certain tone of superiority which Bacon, on being promoted to the office of lord keeper, had thought proper to assume towards him; and it thenceforward became his study to raise up Coke from the dis grace into which he had fallen. With this view he obtained permission to renew the negotiation which had before been broken off, relative to the alliance with the family of the favourite. Buckingham, tempted by the offer of a large marriage portion which Coke promised with his daughter, immediately consented to the match; but it was not effected without considerable difficulty. Lady Hatton, who was always at variance with her husband, had a dislike to a connexion with the family of the Villiers, and was probably offended that she had not been in the first ininstance made privy to the negotiation. As she was a woman of masculine spirit, she determined to oppose the match; and accordingly, after pretending in vain to allege a contract with Lord Oxford, as a reason why the marriage could not take place, she caused her daughter to be secretly conveyed to the house of Sir Edmund Withipole, near Oatlands, whence she was afterwards removed to a residence of the Lord of Argyle's, in the neighbourhood of Hampton Court. Sir Edward, on finding his daughter had been sent from home, applied for a warrant to reclaim her; but in the mean time becoming acquainted with the place of her concealment, he determined on instantly rescuing her by force. Accompanied, accordingly, by his son and by about a dozen well armed men he proceeded to Hampton Court, tore down the doors of the house where she was confined, and carried her away. Lady Hatton having no other means of re dress, appealed to the privy council; and thus this domestic quarrel became at length an affair of state.

The lord keeper, Bacon, used every exertion to prevent the match, which he was aware would be the means of reestablishing Coke in the king's favour. It is supposed to have been at his instigation that proceedings were instituted in the Star-Chamber against the perpetrator of this outrage, as the forcible rescue was affectedly called; though he could not but know that it was an act per

fectly justifiable by law. This was not the only step he took towards breaking off the intended marriage. The following letter was addressed by him to the Earl of Buckingham:

My very good Lord,

I shall write to your lordship of a business which your lordship may think to concern myself; but I do think it concerneth your lordship much more. For as for me, as my judgment is not so weak to think it can do me any hurt, so my love to you is so strong, as I would prefer the good of you and yours before mine own particular. It seemeth Secretary Winwood hath officiously busied himself to make a match between your brother and Sir Edward Coke; and as we hear, he doth it rather to make a faction than out of any great affection to your lordship. It is true he hath the consent of Sir Edward Coke, (as we hear,) upon reasonable conditions for your brother, and yet not better than without question may be found in some other matches. But your mother's consent is not had, nor the young gentlewoman's, who expecteth a great fortune from her mother, which without her consent is endangered. This match, out of my faith and freedom to your lordship, I hold very inconvenient both for your brother and yourself.

First, he shall marry into a disgraced house, which in reason of state is never held good.

Next, he shall marry into a troubled house of man and wife, which in religion and christian discretion is disliked. Thirdly, your lordship will go near to lose all such your friends as are adverse to Sir Edward Coke, (myself only excepted, who out of a pure love and thankfulness shall ever be firm to you.) And lastly and chiefly, (believe it,) it will greatly weaken and distrust your service. For though in regard of the king's great wisdom and depth I am persuaded those things will not follow, which they imagine; yet opinion will do a great deal of harm and cast the king back, and make him relapse into those inconveniences which are now well on to be recovered.

Therefore my advice is, and your lordship shall do yourself a great deal of honour, if, according to religion and the love of God, your lordship will signify unto my lady your mother that your desire is that the marriage be not pressed or proceeded in without the

consent of both parents; and so either
break it altogether, or defer any further
delay in it till your lordship's return.
And this the rather for that (besides
the inconvenience of the matter itself)
it hath been carried so harshly and in-
considerately by Secretary Winwood, as
for doubt that the father should take
away the maiden by force, your mo-
ther to get the start hath conveyed her
away secretly, which is ill of all sides..
Thus, hoping your lordship will not
only accept well, but believe my faithful
advice, who by my great experience in
the world must needs see further than
your lordship can, I ever rest, your
lordship's true and most devoted friend
and servant,
FRANCIS BACON.

In another letter which he wrote to the king on the same subject, the following passage occurs :

"Your majesty's prerogative and authority have risen some just degrees above the horizon more than heretofore; which hath dispersed vapours: your judges are in good temper, your justices of peace (which is the great body of the gentlemen of England) grow to be loving and obsequious, and to be weary of the humour of ruffling: all mutinous spirits grow to be a little poor, and to draw in their horns; and not the less for your majesty's disauctorizing the man I speak of. Now then I reasonably doubt that if there be but an opinion of his coming in with the strength of such an alliance, it will give a turn and relapse in men's minds into the former state of things, hardly to be holpen, to the great weakening of your majesty's service."

Again: "he is by nature unsociable, and by habit popular, and too old to take a new plye. And men begin already to collect, yea, and to conclude that he that raiseth such a smoke to get in, will set all on fire when he is in."

The lord keeper was not content with taking such measures as these: he even ventured to threaten Winwood with a pramunire for having granted the warrant. But in this he went too far. Buckingham was highly incensed with his conduct, and even the king, who was on his return from Scotland, wrote him a severe letter on the subject (25th July, 1617.) "Every wrong," he said, "must be judged by the first violent and wrongous ground, whereupon it proceeds. And was not the thefteous stealing away of the

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