Scotland was the less grievous, and divining of the King's government here accordingly; besides the comfort they ministered themselves from the memory of the Queen his mother. The ministers, and those which stood for the Presbytery, thought their cause had more sympathy with the discipline of Scotland than the hierarchy of England, and so took themselves to be a degree nearer their desires. Thus had every condition of persons some contemplation of benefit which they promised themselves; overreaching perhaps, according to the nature of hope, but yet not without some probable ground of conjecture. At which time also there came forth in print the King's book, entitled Baciлкòv Aôpov, containing matter of instruction to the Prince his son touching the office of a king; which book falling into every man's hand filled the whole realm as with a good perfume or incense before the King's coming in. For being excellently written, and having nothing of affectation, it did not only satisfy better than particular reports touching the King's disposition; but far exceeded any formal or curious edict or declaration which could have been devised of that nature, wherewith Princes at the beginning of their reigns do use to grace themselves, or at least express themselves gracious, in the eyes of their people. And this was, for the general, the state and constitution of men's minds upon this change. The actions themselves passed in this manner, etc. [The rest is wanting.] PREFACE. THE earliest notice of the following piece which I have met with is in a letter from Mr. John Chamberlain to Mr. Dudley Carleton, dated December 16, 1608. "I come even now," he says, "from reading a short discourse of Queen Elizabeth's life, written in Latin by Sir Francis Bacon. If you have not seen nor heard of it, it is worth your enquiry; and yet methinks he doth languescere towards the end, and falls from his first pitch neither dare I warrant that his Latin will abide test or touch." "" 1 : About the same time, or not long after, Bacon himself sent a copy of it to Sir George Carew, then ambassador in France, with a letter which, though undated, enables us to fix the composition of it with tolerable certainty in the summer of 1608. "This last summer vacation (he says), by occasion of a factious book that endeavoured to verify Misera Fomina (the addition of the Pope's Bull) upon Queen Elizabeth, I did write a few lines in her memorial; which I thought you would be well pleased to read, both for the argument and because you were wont to bear affection to my pen. Verum ut aliud ex alio, if it came handsomely to pass, I would be glad the President De Thou (who hath 1 Court and Times of James I., i. 83. written a history, as you know, of that fame and diligence) saw it; chiefly because I know not whether it may not serve him for some use in his story; wherein I would be glad he did right to the truth and to the memory of that Lady, as I perceive by that he hath already written he is well inclined to do." In answering a letter from Tobie Matthew dated February 10 [1608-9], Bacon sent him also a copy of this tract; with the following remarks. "I send you also a memorial of Queen Elizabeth, to requite your eulogy of the late Duke of Florence's felicity. Of this when you were here I shewed you some model; at what time methought you were more willing to hear Julius Cæsar1 than Queen Elizabeth commended. But this which I send is more full, and hath more of the narrative: and further hath one part that I think will not be disagreeable either to you or to that place; being the true tract of her proceedings towards the Catholics, which are infinitely mistaken. And though I do not imagine they will pass allowance there, yet they will gain upon excuse." Tobie Matthew, who had joined the Catholic Church not long before, could not quite allow this part himself, and appears to have taken exceptions to it in his reply. Upon which Bacon writes again, apparently in the summer of 1609, “For that of Queen Elizabeth, your judgment of the temper and truth of that part which concerns some of her foreign proceedings, concurs fully with the judgment of others to whom I have communicated part of it; and as things go, I suppose they are likely to be more and 1 Alluding possibly to the Imago Civilis Julii Cæsaris; the piece which stands next but one in this volume, and of which we know nothing but that Dr. Rawley found it among Bacon's papers, and printed it along with the Opuscula Philosophica in 1658. |