* especially in persons known to be qualified with that place and employment, which, though unworthy, I am vouchsafed, I enforce nothing, thinking I have done my part when I have made it known, and so leave it to your lordship's honourable consideration. And, so with signification of my humble duty, &c. TO SIR ROBERT CECIL, SECRETARY OF STATE.* IT MAY PLEASE YOUR HONOUr, towards myself, or so contemptuously towards causes, much more in matters of this nature, her majesty's service. For this Lombard (pardon me, I most humbly pray your lordship, if, being admonished by the street he dwells in, I give him that name) having me in bond for three hundred pounds principal, and I having the last term confessed the action, and by his full and direct consent, respited the satisfaction till the beginning of this term to come, without ever giving me warning, either by letter or message, served an execution upon me, having trained me at such time as I came from the Tower, where Mr. Waad can witness, we attended a service of no mean importance; neither would he so much as vouchsafe to come and speak with me to take any order in it, though I sent for him divers times, and his house was just by; handling it as upon a despite, being a man I never provoked with a cross word, no, nor with many delays. He would have urged it to have had me in prison; which he had done, had not Sheriff More, to whom I sent, gently recommended me to a handsome house in Coleman street, where I am. Now, because he will not treat with me, I am enforced humbly to desire your lordship to send for him according to your place, to bring him to some reason; and this forthwith, because I continue here to my farther discredit and inconvenience, and the trouble of the gentleman with whom I am. I have a hundred pounds lying by me, which he may have, and the rest upon some reasonable time and security, or, if need be, the whole; but with my more trouble. As for the contempt he hath offered, in regard her majesty's service to my understanding, carrieth a privilege eundo et redeundo in meaner * It is not easy to determine what this service was; but it seems to relate to the examination of some prisoner; perhaps Edward Squire, executed in November, 1598, for poisoning the queen's saddle; or Valentine Thomas, who accused the King of Scots of practices against Queen Elizabeth [. [Historical View, p. 178;] or one Stanley, concerning whom I shall insert here passages from two MS. letters of John Chamberlain, Esq., to his friend, Dudley Carleton, Esq.; afterwards ambassador to Venice, the United Provinces, and France; these letters being part of a very large collection, from 1598 to 1625, which I transcribed from the originals. "One Stanley," says Mr. Chamberlain, in his letter dated at London, 3d of October, 1698, "that came in sixteen days over land with letters out of Spain, is lately committed to the Tower. He was very earnest to have private conference with her majesty, pretending matter of great importance, which he would by no means utter to anybody else." In another letter, dated 20th of November, 1598, Mr. Chamberlain observes, that on "the day that they looked for Stanley's arraignment, he came not himself, but sent his forerunner, one Squire, that had been an under purveyor of the stable, who being in Spain was dealt withal by one Walpole, a Jesuit, to poison the queen and the Earl of Essex; and accordingly came prepared into England, and went with the earl in his own ship the last journey, and poisoned the arms or handles of the chair he used to sit in, with a confection he had received of the Jesuit; as likewise he had done the pummel of the queen's saddle, not past five days before his going to sea. But, because nothing succeeded of it, the priest thinking he had either changed his purpose, or betrayed it, gave Stanley instructions to accuse him; thereby to get him more credit, and to be revenged of Squire for breaking promise. The fellow confessed the whole practice, and, as it seemed, died very penitent." I humbly pray you to understand how badly I have been used by the enclosed, being a copy of a letter of complaint thereof, which I have written to the lord keeper. How sensitive you are of wrongs offered to your blood in my particular I have had not long since experience. But, herein I think your honour will be doubly sensitive, in tenderness also of the indignity to her majesty's service; for as for me, Mr. Sympson might have had me every day in London; and, therefore, to belay me while he knew I came from the Tower about her majesty's special service, was to my understanding very bold. And two days before he brags he forbore me, because I dined with Sheriff More: so as with Mr. Sympson, examinations at the Tower are not so great a privilege, eundo et redeundo, as Sheriff More's dinner. But this complaint I make in duty; and to that end have also informed my Lord of Essex thereof; for, otherwise his punishment will do me no good. So, with signification of my humble duty, I commend your honour to the divine preservation. At your honourable command particularly, From Coleman street, this FR. BACON. TO MR. SECRETARY CECIL.* IT MAY PLEASE YOUR Honour, Because we live in an age, where every man's imperfections are but another's fable; and that there fell out an accident in the Exchequer, which I know not how, nor how soon may be traduced, though I dare trust rumour in it, except it be malicious, or extreme partial; I am bold now to possess your honour, as one that ever I found careful of my advancement, and yet more jealous of my wrongs, with the truth of that which passed; deferring my farther request, until I may attend your honour: and so, I continue Your honour's very humble and Gray's Inn, this FR. BACON. * From the Hatfield Collection TO ROBERT, LORD CECIL.* IT MAY PLEASE YOUR GOOD LORDSHIP, They say late thanks are ever best: but the eason was, I thought to have seen your lordship ere this; howsoever, I shall never forget this your last favour amongst others; and it grieveth me not a little, that I find myself of no use to such an honourable and kind friend. But, For that matter, I think I shall desire your assistance for the punishment of the contempt; not that I would use the privilege in future time, but because I would not have the dignity of the king's service prejudiced in my instance. herein I will be ruled by your lordship. It is fit likewise, though much against my mind, that I let your lordship know, that I shall not be able to pay the money within the time by your lordship undertaken, which was a fortnight. Nay, money I find so hard to come by at this time, as I thought to have become an humble suitor to your honour to have sustained me with your credit for the present from urgent debts, with taking up three hundred pounds till I can put away some land. But, I am so forward with some sales, as this request I hope I may forbear. For my estate, (because your honour hath care of it,) it is thus: I shall be able with selling the skirts of my living in Hertfordshire† to preserve the body, and to leave myself, being clearly out of debt, and having some money in my pocket, three hundred pounds land per annum, with a fair This is house, and the ground well timbered. now my labour. The TO ROBERT, LORD CECIL. IT MAY PLEASE YOUR GOOD Lordship, In answer of your last letter, your money shall be ready before your day, principal, interest, and costs of suit. So the sheriff promised when I released errors; and a Jew takes no more. rest cannot be forgotten; for I cannot forget your lordship's dum memor ipse mei: and if there have been aliquid nimis, it shall be amended. And, to be plain with your lordship, that will quicken me now which slackened me before. Then I thought you might have had more use of me, than now, I Not but I think Suppose, you are like to have. the impediment will be rather in my mind than in the matter or times. But, to do you service, I will come out of my religion at any time. For my knighthood,* I wish the manner might be such as might grace me, since the matter will not: I mean, that I might not be merely gregarious in a troop. The coronation is at hand. It may please your lordship to let me hear from you speedily. So I continue Your lordship's ever much bounden, For my purpose or course, I desire to meddle as little as I can in the king's causes, his majesty now abounding in council; and to follow my From Gorhambury, this 16th of July, 1603. private thrift and practice, and to marry with some convenient advancement. For, as for any ambition, I do assure your honour, mine is quenched. In the queen's my excellent mistress's time, the quorum was small; her service was a kind of freehold, and it was a more solemn time. All those points agreed with my nature and judgment. My ambition now I shall only put upon my pen, whereby I shall be able to maintain memory and merit of the times succeeding. Lastly, for this divulged and almost prostituted title of knighthood, I could, without charge, by your honour's mean, be content to have it, both because of this late disgrace, and because I have three new knights in my mess in Gray's Inn commons; and because I have found out an alderman's daughter, a handsome maiden to my liking. So as, if your honour will find the time, I will come to the court from Gorhambury, upon any warning. From the Hatfield Collection. † Gorhambury. Probably the lady whom he afterwards married, Alice, one of the daughters and co-heirs of Benedict Barnham, Esq., alderman of London. She survived her husband above twenty years. Life of Lord Bacon by Dr. William Rawley. THE BEGINNING OF A LETTER IMMEDIATELY If I shall seem, in these few lines, to write majora quam pro fortuna, it may please your majesty to take it to be an effect, not of presumption, but of affection. For, of the one I was never noted; and for the other, I could never show it hitherto to the full, being as a hawk tied to another's fist, that might sometimes bait and proffer, but could never fly. And, therefore, if, as it was said to one that spoke great words, Amice, verba tua desiderant civitatem,§ so your majesty say to me, "Bacon, your words require a place to speak them;" I must answer, that place, or not place, is in your majesty to add or refrain: and, though I never grow eager but to ******, yet your majesty *He was knighted at Whitehall, July 23, 1603. + Robert, Earl of Salisbury, who died 24th of May, 1612. The draught of this imperfect letter is written chiefly in Greek characters. These words of Themistocles are cited likewise by Lord Bacon at the end of his book De Augmentis Scientiarum. TO THE KING, IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE LORD majesty, this most humble oblation of myself; I TREASURER'S DEATH. IT MAY PLEASE YOUR EXCELLent Majesty, I cannot but endeavour to merit, considering your preventing graces, which is the occasion of these few lines. may truly say with the psalm, Multum incola Your majesty hath lost a great subject and a great servant. But, if I should praise him in propriety, I should say that he was a fit man to keep things from growing worse; but no very fit man to reduce things to be much better. For he loved to have the eyes of all Israel a little too much on himself, and to have all business still under the hammer, and, like clay in the hands of the potter, to mould it as he thought good; so that he was more in operatione than in opere. And, though he had fine passages of action, yet the real conclusions came slowly on. So that, although your majesty hath grave counsellors and worthy persons left, yet you do, as it were, turn a leaf wherein, if your majesty shall give a frame and constitution to matters before you place the persons, in my simple opinion, it were not amiss. But the great matter, and most instant for the present, is the consideration of a Parliament, for two effects; the one for the supply of your estate, the other for the better knitting of the hearts of your subjects unto your majesty, according to your in-tractions; and I fear Tacitus will be a prophet, finite merit; for both which, Parliaments have magis alii homines, quam alii mores. I know mine been, and are, the ancient and honourable remedy. own heart; and I know not whether God, that Now, because I take myself to have a little hath touched my heart with the affection, may not skill in that region, as one that ever affected that touch your royal heart to discern it. Howsoever, your majesty might, in all your causes, not only I shall go on honestly in mine ordinary course, prevail, but prevail with satisfaction of the inner and supply the rest in prayers for you, remainman; and though no man can say but I was a ing, &c. perfect and peremptory royalist, yet, every man makes me believe that I was never one hour out of credit with the Lower House; my desire is, to knew whether your majesty will give me leave to meditate and propound unto you some preparative remembrances, touching the future Parliament. Your majesty may truly perceive that, though I cannot challenge to myself either invention or judgment, or elocution, or method, or any of those powers, yet my offering is care and observance: and, as my good old mistress was wont to call me her watch candle, because it pleased her I did continually burn, (and yet she suffered me to waste almost to nothing,) so I must much more owe the like duty to your majesty, by whom my fortunes have been settled and raised. And so, craving pardon, I rest to say Your majesty's most humble servant devote, 31 May, 1612. TO THE KING, F. B. IT MAY PLEASE YOUR EXCELLENT MAJESTY, TO THE KING.* *** Lastly, I will make two prayers unto your majesty, as I used to do to God Almighty, when I commend to him his own glory and cause; so I will pray to your majesty for yourself. The one is, that these cogitations of want, do I not any ways trouble or vex your mind. remember Moses saith of the land of promise, that it was not like the land of Egypt, that was watered with a river, but was watered with showers from heaven; whereby I gather, God preferreth, sometimes uncertainties before certainties, because they teach a more immediate dependence upon his providence. Sure I am, nil novi accidit vobis. It is no new thing for the greatest kings to be in debt: and, if a man shall parvis componere magna, I have seen an Earl of Leicester, a Chancellor Hatton, an Earl of Essex, and an Earl of Salisbury, in debt; and * The beginning of this letter is wanting yet was it no manner of diminution to their power ted to the subcommissioners, touching the repair or greatness. My second prayer is, that your majesty, in respect of the hasty freeing of your estate, would not descend to any means, or degree of means, which carrieth not a symmetry with your majesty and greatness. He is gone from whom those courses did wholly flow. So have your wants and necessities in particular, as it were, hanged up in two tablets before the eyes of your Lords and Commons, to be talked of for four months together; to have all your courses, to help yourself in revenue or profit, put into printed books, which were wont to be held arcana imperii; to have such worms of aldermen, to lend for ten in the hundred upon good assurance, and with such **, as if it should save the bark of your fortune; to contract still where might be had the readiest payment, and not the best bargain; to stir a number of projects for your profit, and then to blast them, and leave your majesty nothing but the scandal of them; to pretend an even carriage between your majesty's rights and the ease of the people, and to satisfy neither. These courses, and others the like, I hope, are gone with the deviser of them, which have turned your majesty to inestimable prejudice.* I hope your majesty will pardon my liberty of writing. I know these things are majora quam pro fortunâ: but they are minora quam pro studio | et voluntate. I assure myself, your majesty taketh not me for one of a busy nature; for my state being free from all difficulties, and I having such a large field for contemplations, as I have partly, and shall much more make manifest to your majesty and the world, to occupy my thoughts, nothing could make me active but love and affection. So, praying my God to bless and favour your person and estate, &c. TO THE KING. IT MAY PLEASE YOUR EXCELlent Majesty, * It will be but justice to the memory of the Earl of Salisbury, to remark, that this disadvantageous character of him, by Sir Francis Bacon, seems to have been heightened by the prejudices of the latter against that able minister, grounded upon some suspicions, that the earl had not served him with so much zeal as he might have expected from so near a relation, either in Queen Elizabeth's reign, or of that of her successor. Nor is it any just imputation on his lordship, that he began to decline in King James the First's good opinion, when his majesty's ill economy occasioned demands on the lord treasurer, which all his skill, in the business of the finances, could not answer, but which drew from him advices and remonstrances still extant, which that king not being very ready to profit by, conceived some resentment against his old servant and even retained it against his memory. and improvement of your majesty's means: and this I have done, not only in meeting, and conference, and debate with the rest, but also by my several and private meditation and inquiry: so that, besides the joint account, which we shall give to the lords, I hope I shall be able to give your majesty somewhat ex pro prio. For as no man loveth better consulere in commune than I do; neither am I of those fine ones that use to keep back any thing, wherein they think they may win credit apart, and so make the consultation almost inutile. So, nevertheless, in cases where matters shall fall upon the by, perhaps of no less worth than that, which is the proper subject of the consultation; or where I find things passed over too slightly, or in cases where that, which I should advise, is of that nature, as I hold it not fit to be communicated to all those with whom I am joined; these parts of business I put to my private account; not because I would be officious, (though I profess I would do works of supererogation if I could,) but in a true discretion and caution. And your majesty had some taste in those notes which I gave you for the wards, (which it pleased you to say, were no tricks nor novelties, but true passages of business,) that mine own particular remembrances and observations are not like to be unprofitable. Concerning which notes for the wards, though I might say, sic vos non vobis, yet let that pass. I have also considered fully, of that great proposition which your majesty commended to my care and study, touching the conversion of your revenue of land into a multiplied present revenue of rent: wherein, I say, I have considered of the means and course to be taken of the assurance, of the rates, of the exceptions, and of the arguments for and against it. For, though the project itself be as old as I can remember, and falleth under every man's capacity, yet the dispute and manage of it, asketh a great deal of consideration and judgment; projects being, like Æsop's tongues, the best meat and the worst, as they are chosen and handled. But surely, ubi deficiunt remedia ordinaria, recurrendum est ad extraordinaria. Of this also I am ready to give your majesty an account. Generally, upon this subject of the repair of your majesty's means, I beseech your majesty to give me leave to make this judgment, that your majesty's recovery must be by the medicines of the Galenists and Arabians, and not of the chymists or Paracelsians. For it will not be wrought by any one fine extract, or strong water, but by a skilful company of a number of ingredients, and those by just weight and proportion, and that of some simples, which perhaps of themselves, cr in over-great quantity, were little better than poisons, but, mixed and broken, and in just quantity, are full of virtue. And, secondly, that as your majesty's growing behindhand, hath been in general have place next the e.dest brothers' work of time, so must likewise be your majesty's wives, I hold convenient. coming forth and making even. Not but I wish it were by all good and fit means accelerated, but that I foresee, that if your majesty shall propound | to yourself to do it per saltum, it can hardly be without accidents of prejudice to your honour, safety, or profit. Endorsed, Lastly, Whereas it is desired, that the apparent heirs males of the bodies of the baronets may be knighted during the life of their fathers; for that I have received from the lord chamberlain a signification, that your majesty did so understand it, I humbly subscribe thereunto with this, that the baronets' eldest sons being knights, do not take place of ancient knights, so long as their My letter to the king, touching his estate in gene- fathers live. ral, September 18, 1612. All which, nevertheless, I humbly submit to your majesty's judgment. Your majesty's most humble TO THE KING. MAY IT PLEASE YOUR MAJESTY " According to your highness's pleasure, signified by my Lord Chamberlain,* I have considered of the petition of certain baronets,† made unto your majesty for confirmation and extent, or explanation of certain points mentioned in their charter, and am of opinion, that first, whereas it is desired, that the baronets be declared a middle degree, between baron and knight, I hold this to be reasonable as to their placing. TO THE KING. IT MAY PLEASE YOUR MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY, Having understood of the death of the lord chief justice,* I do ground, in all humbleness, an assured hope, that your majesty will not think of any other but your poor servants, your attorney† and your solicitor, one of them for that place. Secondly, Where it is desired, that unto the Else we shall be like Noah's dove, not knowing words degree or dignity of baron, the word honour where to rest our feet. For the places of rest, might be added; I know very well, that in the after the extreme painful places wherein we serve, preface of the baronets' patent it is mentioned, have used to be either the lord chancellor's place, that all honours are derived from the king. I find or the mastership of the rolls, or the places of also, that in the patent of the baronets, which are the chief justices; whereof, for the first, I could marshalled under the barons, (except it be certain be almost loath to live to see this worthy counselprincipals,) the word honour is granted. I find lor fail. The mastership of the rolls is blocked also, that the word dignity is many times in law with a reversion. My Lord Coke is like to outa superior word to the word honour, as being live us both: so as, if this turn fail, I, for my applied to the king himself, all capital indict-part, know not whither to look. I have served ments concluding contra coronam et dignitatem nostram. It is evident also, that the word honour and honourable are used in these times in common speech very promiscuously. Nevertheless, because the style of honour belongs chiefly to peers and counsellors, I am doubtful what opinion to give therein. Thirdly, Whereas it is believed, that if there be any question of precedence touching baronets, it may be ordered, that the same be decided by the commissioners marshal; I do not see but it may be granted them for avoiding disturbances. Fourthly, For the precedence of baronets I find no alteration or difficulty, except it be in this, that the daughters of baronets are desired to be declared to have precedence before the wives of knights' eldest sons; which, because it is a degree hereditary, and that, in all examples, the daughters *Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk. The order of baronets was created by patent of King James I., dated the 22d of May, 1611. The year following, a decree was made relating to their place and precedence; and four years after, viz., in 1616, another decree to the same purpose. See Selden's Titles of Honour, Part II., Ch. V., p. 21. Ch. XI., p. 910, and 906. 2d Edit. fol. 1613. your majesty above a prenticehood, full seven years and more, as your solicitor, which is, I think, one of the painfullest places in your kingdom, specially as my employments have been: and God hath brought mine own years to fiftytwo, which, I think, is older than ever any solicitor continued unpreferred. My suit is principally that you would remove Mr. Attorney to the place. If he refuse, then I hope your majesty will seek no farther than myself, that I may at last, out of your majesty's grace and favour, step forwards to a place either of more comfort or more ease. Besides, how necessary it is for your majesty to strengthen your service amongst the judges by a chief justice which is sure to your prerogative, your majesty knoweth. Therefore, I cease farther to trouble your majesty, humbly craving pardon, |