Constitutional History of England Volume I Part 27

[593] Debates in 1621, p. 114, 228, 229.

[594] _Id. pa.s.sim._

[595] Carte.

[596] Clarendon speaks of this impeachment as an unhappy precedent, made to gratify a private displeasure. This expression seems rather to point to Buckingham than to c.o.ke; and some letters of Bacon to the favourite at the time of his fall display a consciousness of having offended him.

Yet Buckingham had much more reason to thank Bacon as his wisest counsellor, than to a.s.sist in crus.h.i.+ng him. In his works (vol. i. p.

712) is a tract, ent.i.tled "Advice to the Duke of Buckingham," containing instructions for his governance as minister. These are marked by the deep sagacity and extensive observation of the writer. One pa.s.sage should be quoted in justice to Bacon. "As far as it may lie in you, let no arbitrary power be intruded; the people of this kingdom love the laws thereof, and nothing will oblige them more than a confidence of the free enjoying of them: what the n.o.bles upon an occasion once said in parliament, 'Nolumus leges Angliae mutari,' is imprinted in the hearts of all the people." I may add that with all Bacon's pliancy, there are fewer over-strained expressions about the prerogative in his political writings than we should expect. His practice was servile, but his principles were not unconst.i.tutional. We have seen how strongly he urged the calling of parliament in 1614: and he did the same, unhappily for himself, in 1621. Vol. ii. p. 580. He refused also to set the great seal to an office intended to be erected for enrolling prentices, a speculation apparently of some monopolists; writing a very proper letter to Buckingham, that there was no ground of law for it. P. 555.

I am very loth to call Bacon, for the sake of Pope's ant.i.thesis, "the meanest of mankind." Who would not wish to believe the feeling language of his letter to the king, after the attack on him had already begun? "I hope I shall not be found to have the troubled fountain of a corrupt heart, in a depraved habit of taking rewards to pervert justice; howsoever I may be frail, and partake of the abuses of the times."--P.

589. Yet the general disesteem of his contemporaries speaks forcibly against him. Sir Simon d'Ewes and Weldon, both indeed bitter men, give him the worst of characters. "Surely," says the latter, "never so many parts and so base and abject a spirit tenanted together in any one earthen cottage as in this man." It is a striking proof of the splendour of Bacon's genius, that it was unanimously acknowledged in his own age amidst so much that should excite contempt. He had indeed ingratiated himself with every preceding parliament through his incomparable ductility; having take an active part in their complaints of grievances in 1604, before he became attorney-general, and even on many occasions afterwards while he held that office, having been intrusted with the management of conferences on the most delicate subjects. In 1614, the Commons, after voting that the attorney-general ought not to be elected to parliament, made an exception in favour of Bacon. Journals, p. 460.

"I have been always gracious in the lower house," he writes to James in 1616, begging for the post of chancellor; "I have interest in the gentlemen of England, and shall be able to do some good effect in rectifying that body of parliament-men, which is cardo rerum." Vol. ii.

p. 496.

I shall conclude this note by observing, that, if all Lord Bacon's philosophy had never existed, there would be enough in his political writings to place him among the greatest men this country has produced.

[597] Debates in 1621, vol. ii. p. 7.

[598] Debates, p. 14.

[599] In a former parliament of this reign, the Commons having sent up a message, wherein they ent.i.tled themselves the knights, citizens, burgesses, and barons of the commons' court of parliament, the Lords sent them word that they would never acknowledge any man that sitteth in the lower house to have the right or t.i.tle of a baron of parliament; nor could admit the term of the commons' court of parliament; "because all your house together, without theirs, doth make no court of parliament."

4th March, 1606. Lords' Journals. Nevertheless the Lords did not scruple almost immediately afterwards, to denominate their own house a court, as appears by memoranda of 27th and 28th May; they even issued a habeas corpus as from a court, to bring a servant of the Earl of Bedford before them. So also in 1609, 16th and 17th of February. And on April 14th and 18th, 1614; and probably later, if search were made.

I need hardly mention, that the barons mentioned above, as part of the Commons, were the members for the cinque ports, whose denomination is recognised in several statutes.

[600] Debates in 1621, vol. i. p. 355, etc.; vol. ii. p. 5, etc. Mede writes to his correspondent on May 11, that the execution had not taken place; "but I hope it will." The king was plainly averse to it.

[601] The following observation on Floyd's case, written by Mr. Harley, in a ma.n.u.script account of the proceedings (Harl. MSS. 6274), is well worthy to be inserted. I copy from the appendix to the above-mentioned debates of 1621. "The following collection," he has written at the top, "is an instance how far a zeal against popery and for one branch of the royal family, which was supposed to be neglected by King James, and consequently in opposition to him, will carry people against common justice and humanity." And again at the bottom: "For the honour of Englishmen, and indeed of human nature, it were to be hoped these debates were not truly taken, there being so many motions contrary to the laws of the land, the laws of parliament, and common justice. Robert Harley, July 14, 1702." It is remarkable that this date is very near the time when the writer of these just observations, and the party which he led, had been straining in more than one instance the privileges of the House of Commons, not certainly with such violence as in the case of Floyd, but much beyond what can be deemed their legitimate extent.

[602] In a much later period of the session, when the Commons had lost their good humour, some heat was very justly excited by a pet.i.tion from some brewers, complaining of an imposition of four-pence on the quarter of malt. The courtiers defended this as a composition in lieu of purveyance. But it was answered that it was compulsory, for several of the princ.i.p.al brewers had been committed and lay long in prison for not yielding to it. One said that impositions of this nature overthrew the liberty of all the subjects of this kingdom; and if the king may impose such taxes, then are we but villains, and lose all our liberties. It produced an order that the matter be examined before the house, the pet.i.tioners to be heard by council, and all the lawyers of the house to be present. Debates of 1621, vol. ii. 252; Journals, p. 652. But nothing further seems to have taken place, whether on account of the magnitude of the business which occupied them during the short remainder of the session, or because a bill which pa.s.sed their house to prevent illegal imprisonment, or restraint on the lawful occupation of the subject, was supposed to meet this case. It is a remarkable instance of arbitrary taxation, and preparatory to an excise.

[603] Debates of 1621, p. 14; Hatsell's _Precedents_, i. 133.

[604] Debates, p. 114, _et alibi, pa.s.sim_.

[605] Vol. ii. 170, 172.

[606] _Id._ p. 186.

[607] P. 189. Lord Cranfield told the Commons there were three reasons why they should give liberally. 1. That lands were now a third better than when the king came to the crown. 2. That wools, which were then 20_s._ were now 30_s._ 3. That corn had risen from 26_s._ to 36_s._ the quarter. _Ibid._ There had certainly been a very great increase of wealth under James, especially to the country gentlemen; of which their style of building is an evident proof. Yet in this very session complaints had been made of the want of money, and fall in the price of lands (vol. i. p. 16); and an act was proposed against the importation of corn (vol. ii. p. 87). In fact, rents had been enormously enhanced in this reign, which the country gentlemen of course endeavoured to keep up. But corn, probably through good seasons, was rather lower in 1621 than it had been--about 30_s._ a quarter.

[608] P. 242, etc.

[609] _Id._ 174, 200. Compare also p. 151. Sir Thomas Wentworth appears to have discountenanced the resenting this as a breach of privilege.

Doubtless the house showed great and even excessive moderation in it; for we can hardly doubt that Sandys was really committed for no other cause than his behaviour in parliament. It was taken up again afterwards. P. 259.

[610] P. 261, etc.

[611] P. 284.

[612] P. 289.

[613] P. 317.

[614] P. 330.

[615] P. 339.

[616] P. 359.

[617] Rymer, xvii. 344; _Parl. Hist._ Carte, 93; Wilson.

[618] Besides the historians, see Cabala, part ii. p. 155 (4to edit.); D'Israeli's _Character of James I._, p. 125; and Mede's Letters, Harl.

MSS. 389.

[619] Wilson's _Hist. of James I._ in Kennet, ii. 247, 749. Thirty-three peers, Mr. Joseph Mede tells us in a letter of Feb. 24, 1621 (Harl. MSS.

389), "signed a pet.i.tion to the king which they refused to deliver to the council, as he desired, nor even to the prince, unless he would say he did not receive it as a counsellor; whereupon the king sent for Lord Oxford, and asked him for it; he, according to previous agreement, said he had it not; then he sent for another, who made the same answer: at last they told him they had resolved not to deliver it, unless they were admitted all together. Whereupon his majesty, wonderfully incensed, sent them all away, _re infecta_, and said that he would come into parliament himself, and bring them all to the bar." This pet.i.tion, I believe, did not relate to any general grievances, but to a question of their own privileges, as to their precedence of Scots peers. Wilson, _ubi supra_.

But several of this large number were inspired by more generous sentiments; and the commencement of an aristocratic opposition deserves to be noticed. In another letter, written in March, Mede speaks of the good understanding between the king and parliament; he promised they should sit as long as they like, and hereafter he would have a parliament every three years. "Is not this good if it be true?... But certain it is that the Lords stick wonderful fast to the Commons and all take great pains."

The entertaining and sensible biographer of James has sketched the characters of these Whig peers. Aikin's _James I._, ii. 238.

[620] One of these may be found in the _Somers Tracts_, ii. 470, ent.i.tled Tom Tell-truth, a most malignant ebullition of disloyalty, which the author must have risked his neck as well as ears in publis.h.i.+ng. Some outrageous reflections on the personal character of the king could hardly be excelled by modern licentiousness. Proclamations about this time against excess of lavish speech in matters of state (Rymer, xvii. 275, 514), and against printing or uttering seditious and scandalous pamphlets (_Id._ 522, 616) show the tone and temper of the nation.

[621] The letters on this subject, published by Lord Hardwicke (_State Papers_, vol. i.) are highly important; and being unknown to Carte and Hume, render their narratives less satisfactory. Some pamphlets of the time, in the second volume of the _Somers Tracts_, may be read with interest; and Howell's _Letters_, being written from Madrid during the Prince of Wales's residence, deserve notice. See also Wilson in Kennet, p. 750, _et post_. Dr. Lingard has ill.u.s.trated the subject lately (ix.

271).

[622] Hume, and many other writers on the side of the Crown, a.s.sert the value of a subsidy to have fallen from 70,000, at which it had been under the Tudors, to 55,000, or a less sum. But though I will not a.s.sert a negative too boldly, I have no recollection of having found any good authority for this; and it is surely too improbable to be lightly credited. For admit that no change was made in each man's rate according to the increase of wealth and diminution of the value of money, the amount must at least have been equal to what it had been; and to suppose the contributors to have prevailed on the a.s.sessors to underrate them, is rather contrary to common fiscal usage. In one of Mede's letters, which of course I do not quote as decisive, it is said that the value of a subsidy was _not above_ 80,000; and that the a.s.sessors were directed (this was in 1621) not to follow former books, but value every man's estate according to their knowledge, and not his own confession.

[623] _Parl. Hist._ 1383, 1388, 1390; Carte, 119. The king seems to have acted pretty fairly in this parliament, bating a gross falsehood in denying the intended toleration of papists. He wished to get further pledges of support from parliament before he plunged into a war, and was very right in doing so. On the other hand, the prince and Duke of Buckingham behaved in public towards him with great rudeness. _Parl.

Hist._ 1396.

[624] _Parl. Hist._ 1421.

[625] Clarendon blames the impeachment of Middles.e.x for the very reason which makes me deem it a fortunate event for the const.i.tution, and seems to consider him as a sacrifice to Buckingham's resentment. Hacket also, the biographer of Williams, takes his part. Carte, however, thought him guilty (p. 116); and the unanimous vote of the peers is much against him, since that house was not wholly governed by Buckingham. See too the "Life of Nicholas Farrar" in Wordsworth's _Ecclesiastical Biography_, vol. iv.; where it appears that that pious and conscientious man was one of the treasurer's most forward accusers, having been deeply injured by him. It is difficult to determine the question from the printed trial.

[626] 21 Jac. 1, c. 3. See what Lord c.o.ke says on this act, and on the general subject of monopolies. 3 Inst. 181.

[627] _P. H._ 1483.

[628] _Id._ 1488.

CHAPTER VII

ON THE ENGLISH CONSt.i.tUTION FROM THE ACCESSION OF CHARLES I. TO THE DISSOLUTION OF HIS THIRD PARLIAMENT