1620.] BACON ON YELVERTON'S CASE. 139 shall not insist upon it, it hath The City is a noble body of them honourable; and none them that they may be called into question for surreption. For the greatness of the fault, I already been so soundly sounded. well-deserving subjects. I hold shall desire more than I that they may be free from fears and molestations. But let them not go too far: for it is one thing to take away the shackles, another to take away the girdle. To free them from wars and courts of justice! This is the mere life of the state. It is not fit such liberties should be poured on them let them be beholden to those sweet showers of the King's favours they receive, but let us have no dashes. For the other fault of fees, to make it greater is superfluous. For error of judgment, the wisdom of the law sometimes appears in fitness of terms; and if a man by the greatness of his mind shall only think on the authority of his place, and think to slip away under the name of a mistaking, he may soon commit misprision. Here is a wilful excess: his authority was to be guided by precedent and anteacts: therefore erring upon a warrant, this aggravates the fault. He had the former charters, he went as far as they, and also further; he kept the rule by him, and yet he transgresses. For extenuation of the fact, I am satisfied there was no corruption of reward. But in truth that makes the offence rather divers than less: for some offences are black, some scarlet, some sordid, some presumptuous. His warrant was to pass whatsoever had been formerly granted or intended to the City but that must never appear but in a patent expressly. And to accept of usage by such as were interessed therein was palpable error. Now it rests that I fine him; wherein I shall the rather abate him in the money punishment, because his error arose not out of money, as Mr. Chancellor well observed. Therefore I agree to the least fine of 40007. and to the rest of his punishment; for his place I declare him unfit for it, and so leave it to his Majesty to dispose of it. The next day Bacon reported to Buckingham the result of the proceeding. 1 This I think must be the proper punctuation. The MS. has only a comma after "justice." 2 There is evidently some confusion here in the report. For the effect of what was said, see the concluding paragraph of the "Notes."-p. 134. LORD CHANCELLOR BACON то THE MARQUIS OF My very good Lord, Yesternight we made an end of Sir Henry Yelverton's cause. I have almost killed myself with sitting almost eight hours. But I was resolved to sit it through. He is sentenced to imprisonment in the Tower during the King's pleasure. The fine of 4000l. and discharge of his place, by way of opinion of the court, referring it to the King's pleasure. How I stirred the court, I leave it to others to speak; but things passed to his Majesty's great honour. I would not for any thing but he had made his defence; for many chief points of the charge were deeper printed by the defence. But yet I like it not in him; the less because he retained Holt, who is ever retained but to play the fool. God ever prosper you. Your Lordship's most obliged friend, 11 Nov. 1620. and faithful servant, FR. VERULAM, Canc. 8. The preparations for Parliament had been going on all this time without intermission. It had been settled that it was to meet on the 16th of January; and the proclamation, as altered by the King -"who would not be entreated," says Chamberlain, "by the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Chamberlain to leave out the word 'wrangling lawyers' "-had been sent forth on the 7th of November. The letters which follow will explain themselves. TO THE KING.2 It may please your most excellent Majesty, In performance of your royal pleasure, signified by Sir John Suckling, we have at several times considered of the petition of Mr. Christopher Villiers, and have heard as well the registers and ministers of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, and their counsel, as also the counsel of the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. And setting aside such other points as are 1 Birch, from the collections of Robert Stephens. 2 Gibson Papers, vol. viii. f. 134. Draught, with interlinear corrections by Meautys. 1620.] PATENT FOR ENGROSSING WILLS. 141 desired by the petition, we do think, That your Majesty may by law and without inconvenience appoint an officer that shall have the ingrossing of the transcripts of all wills to be sealed with the seal of either of the Prerogative Courts which shall be proved in communi formá; and likewise of all inventories to be exhibited in the same courts. We see it necessary that all wills which are not judicially controverted be ingrossed before the probate. Yet, as the law now stands, no officer of those courts can lawfully take any fee or reward for ingrossing the said wills and inventories, the statute of the 21st of King Henry the 8th restraining them. Wherefore we hold it much more convenient that it should be done by a lawful officer to be appointed by your Majesty, than in a course not warrantable by law. Yet our humble opinion and advice is, that good consideration be had in passing this book, as well touching a moderate proportion of fees to be allowed for the pains and travel of the officer, as for the expedition of the suitor, in such sort that the subject may find himself in better case than he is now, and not in worse.1 But howsoever we conceive this may be convenient in the two courts of prerogative, where there is much business; yet in the ordinary course of the Bishops diocesans, we hold the same will be inconvenient, in regard of the small employment.2 Your Majesty's most faithful, and obedient servants, FR. VERULAM, Canc. HENRY MONtagu. 15 Nov. 1620. Sir Robert Anstruther returning from Denmark about this time brought Bacon another letter from King Christian, to which he returned the following answer : 1 Originally "that no just grievance of the subject may thereby be occa sioned." 2 The last paragraph is added in Meautys's hand. SERENISSIMO AC POTENTISSIMO REGI AC DOMINO, DOMINO CHRISTIANO QUARTO, DEI GRATIA DANIE, NORVEGIE, VANDALORUM, GOTHORUMQUE, ETC., REGI, DOMINO SUO CLEMENTISSIMO.1 Accepi literas Majestatis Vestræ per manus Domini Rob. Amstrudder, affinis mei, viri servitio Majestatis Suæ imprimis dediti; quarum nomine humillimas gratias ago Serenitati Suæ, quod me honorificâ et benignâ literarum suarum compellatione indies magis obligatum velit; summâ autem afficiebar voluptate quod in illis literis animum Serenitatis Suæ pium ac vere regium perspexerim. Cum enim bellicâ virtute floreat, pacis tamen cultorem se profitetur; rursus sub ipsâ pacis mentione veræ Religionis patrocinium anteponit. Itaque opto ut ex votis suis quæ cum nostris sunt conjunctissima, omnia fæliciter succedant. Superest ut humillime exosculer manus Majestatis Vestræ, eique omnia prospera perpetuo comprecer. Majestatis Vestræ omni observantia et devotione servus addictissimus. Ex Edibus Eboracensibus, FR. VERULAM, Canc. TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.2 Our very good Lord, We thought it our duty to impart to his Majesty by your Lordship one particular of Parliament business, which we hold it our part to relate, though it be too high for us to give our opinion of it. The officers that make out the writs of Parliament addressed themselves to me the Chancellor to know, whether they should 1 Archaeologea,' vol. xli. "I have received your Majesty's letters by the hands of Sir Robert Anstruther, my kinsman, a man especially devoted to your service, and I most humbly thank your Serenity for vouchsafing by these your honourable and gracious communications to make me daily more and more obliged; but that which gives me the highest pleasure is to see the pious and truly royal mind which appears in those letters; wherein your Serenity though eminent in warlike virtue yet professes devotion to peace and again along with the mention of peace prefers before it the protection of true Religion. May all things therefore succeed happily according to your wishes, which are most closely allied with ours. It remains for me humbly to kiss your Majesty's hands and pray that in all things you may always prosper." 2 Stephens's second collection, p. 129. From the original. 1620.] PRECEDENTS OF PRINCES CALLED TO PARLIAMENT. 143 make such a writ of summons to the Prince, giving me to understand that there were some precedents of it; which I the Chancellor communicated with the rest of the committees for Parliament business; in whose assistance I find so much strength that I am not willing to do any thing without them: Whereupon we (according to his Majesty's prudent and constant rule for observing in what reigns the precedents were) upon diligent search have found as followeth. That King Edward I. called his eldest son Prince Edward to his Parliament in the thirtieth year of his reign, the Prince then being about the age of eighteen years; and to another Parliament in the four and thirtieth year of his reign. Edward III. called the Black Prince his eldest son to his Parliament in the five and twentieth, eight and twentieth, and two and fortieth years of his reign. Henry IV. called Prince Henry to his Parliaments in the first, third, eighth, and eleventh years of his reign, the Prince being under age in the three first Parliaments, and we find in particular that the eighth year the Prince sat in the Upper-House in days of business and recommended a bill to the Lords. King Edward IV. called Prince Edward his son to his Parliament, in anno 22 of his reign, being within age. King Henry VII. called Prince Arthur to his Parliament in the seventh year of his reign, being within age. Of King Edward VI. we find nothing, his years were tender, and he was not created Prince of Wales. And for Prince Henry, he was created Prince of Wales during the last Parliament at which he lived. We have thought it our duty to relate to his Majesty what we have found, and withal that the writs of summons to the Prince are not much differing from the writs to the Peers; for they run in fide et ligeancia, and sometime in fide et homagio in quibus nobis tenemini, and after, consilium nobis impensuri circa ardua regni. Whereby it should seem that Princes came to Parliament not only [on] the days of solemnity, when they came without writ, but also on the days of sitting. And if it should be so, then the Prince may vote, and likewise may be of a Committee of the Upper-House, and consequently may be of a Conference with the Lower-House, and the like. This might have been made more manifest as to the presence |