CHAPTER VI.

1628-1633.

Coke employed as Privy Councillor in several commissionsBacon more civil towards him-Coke supported in Parliament the charges against Bacon for bribery--Presides in the Court of Star Chamber on the trial of Lord SuffolkSpeaks in support of the charges against Yelverton-Coke retires to Stoke Pogis-Is libelled by Jeffes-Coke's opinion of medicine-Meets with an accident-Coke's last days— His death-His last hours-His papers seized by Windebank-Memoir of Windebank-List of his papers seizedMemoir of Laud-Coke's friends and associates.

ALTHOUGH Sir Edward Coke was never restored to his Chief Justiceship, or promoted to any other place in the gift of the crown, yet he was entrusted as a Privy Councillor, with a variety of important services.

Thus in June 1619 he was employed in a com

mission with several others to put in force the act of Elizabeth against jesuits, seminary priests and others, and to banish them out of the King's dominions.* And in the same year he was joined with others in a commission to investigate the conduct of the officers of Revenue, the Exchequer, and others, having the charge of the public money. A short time afterwards he was appointed one of the commissioners empowered to examine, dispose, and arrange the jewels belonging to the deceased Queen Anne. And about the same period, he was empowered to treat with the deputies of the United Provinces, about the differences which had arisen between the Dutch East India Company and the English merchants trading to the East Indies. In July, 1620, he was employed to regulate the royalties of the crown, and to discharge the superfluous officers employed in their management, and collection of the dues arising from them. In the following December, he was engaged in examining into and preventing the illegal exportation of brass and iron ordnance.

And, as during these investigations, Coke continued in favour with the King and Bucking

* Rymer's Fœdera, t. 16, p. 93.

ham, the Lord Chancellor Bacon thought it well to run with the stream, and, in consequence, during the years 1618-19-20, in all his letters to the King and the favourite, he spoke of Coke's talents with much commendation.

Bacon and Coke could not but be aware of each other's talents. They both probably feared each other; their rivalry was of too long standing to be easily forgotten; their contests were far too keen, their disputes much too bitter, not to excite some degree of fear, and that as a natural consequence speedily engendered hatred.

Bacon, however, who could at the same time write like a philosopher and act like a slave, often publicly acknowledged the talents of his great antagonist; thus in his proposition addressed to the King for compiling and amending the laws of England, he says:*-" Had it not been for Sir Edward Coke's reports (which though they may have errors and some peremptory and extra-judicial resolutions more than are warranted, yet they contain infinite good decisions and rulings over of cases) the law by this time had been almost like a ship without ballast for that the cases of modern expe

* Law Tracts, p. 5.

rience are fled from those that are adjudged

and ruled in former time."

66

"I am in good

And again, page 13, he says, hope that when Sir E. Coke's reports and my rules and decisions shall come to posterity, there will be (whatsoever is now thought) question who was the greatest lawyer."

While Coke was now enjoying, for a second time, the smiles of the court, and the possession as a privy councillor of judicial power, he had an opportunity of repaying some of his old opponents for their proceedings against him.

Thus in 1620, came on the impeachment of the Lord Chancellor Bacon, for bribery and corruption, to which charge he pleaded guilty. Coke, as a member of Parliament, spoke in furtherance of the charge, but he did not take a very prominent part. It was quite needless to make his rival's case worse. Bacon's confession was amply sufficient for the greatest lover of clear cases of guilt,- he was ruined, and never rose again. Coke had previously witnessed the degradation of another enemy, for he presided in the Court of Star Chamber on the 13th of November 1619, when the Lord Treasurer, the Earl of Suffolk, and his lady received their sentence for various acts of corruption. This nobleman, it will be remembered, when

Coke was on his knees before the Privy Council, thought fit of his mere will and pleasure, to tell Coke he had no right to suffer his coachman to drive bareheaded. Coke now expatiated at much length upon the enormities perpetrated in all ages by Lord Treasurers, concluding by proposing a fine of one hundred thousand pounds but this, on the motion of the great Lord Chief Justice Hobart, was reduced to thirty thousand.

In 1820, the Attorney General Yelverton, who had filed an information against Coke, and otherwise opposed his daughter's marriage with Sir John Villiers, was prosecuted for putting into a charter of the City of London, several clauses for which he had no warrant. Coke spoke against him, in proposing sentence, long and bitterly, moving for a fine of six thousand pounds; but the court gave judgment for only four thousand.

From the dissolution of the last Parliament, which Coke lived to see, on the 28th of March 1628-9, he resided at his house at Stoke Pogis in Buckinghamshire, in peace and quietude. His conduct as a country gentleman, is said to have conciliated the esteem of all his neighbours. I can find, in this period, but one instance of his being publicly vilified for his conduct as a judge.