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Mr. Toby Matthew; so as I cannot deny but it was, I adding farther, that he had received divers former upon the matter, pendente lite.

To the fifteenth article of the charge, namely, "William Compton being to have an extent for a debt of 1200. the lord chancellor stayed it, and wrote his letter, upon which, part of the debt was paid presently, and part at a future day; the lord chancellor hereupon sends to borrow 5001. and because Compton was to pay 400l. to one Huxley, his lordship requires Huxley to forbear six months; and thereupon obtains the money from Compton: the money being unpaid, suit grows between Huxley and Compton in chancery, where his lordship decrees Compton to pay Huxley the debt, with damage and costs, when it was in his own hands:"

I do declare that in my conscience the stay of the extent was just, being an extremity against a nobleman, by whom Compton could be no loser; the money was plainly borrowed of Compton upon bond with interest, and the message to Huxley was only to entreat him to give Compton a longer day, and in no sort to make me a debtor or responsible to Huxley; and therefore, though I was not ready to pay Compton his money, as I would have been glad to have done, save only 100, which is paid, I could not deny justice to Huxley in as ample manner as if nothing had been between Compton and I; but if Compton hath been damnified in my respect, I am to consider it to Compton.

To the sixteenth article of the charge, namely, "In the cause between Sir William Bronker and Awbrey, the lord chancellor received from Awbrey 100/."

I do confess and declare, that the money was given and received, but the manner of it I leave to the witnesses.

To the seventeenth article of the charge, namely, "In the lord Montague's cause, he received from the lord Montague 600 or 7001. and more was to be paid at the ending of the cause:"

I confess and declare there was money given, and, as I remember, to Mr. Bevis Thelwall, to the sum mentioned in the article, after the cause was decreed; but I cannot say it was ended: for there have been many orders since, caused by Sir Francis Inglefield's contempts; and I do remember, that when Thelwal brought the money, he said that my lord would be yet farther thankful if he could once get his quiet; to which speech I gave little regard.

To the eighteenth article of the charge, namely, "In the cause of Mr. Dunch, he received from Mr. Dunch 200/."

I confess and declare, that it was delivered by Mr. Thelwall to Hatcher my servant for me, as I think, some time after the decree; but I cannot precisely inform myself of the time.

To the nineteenth article of the charge, namely, "In the cause between Reynell and Peacoke, he received from Reynell 2001. and a diamond ring worth 500 or 600l."

I confess and declare, that at my first coming to the seal, when I was at Whitehall, my servant Hunt delivered me 2001. from Sir George Raynell, my near ally, to be bestowed upon furniture of my house;

favours from me; and this was, as I verily think, before any suit begun: the ring was certainly received pendente lite; and though it were at new year's tide, it was too great a value for a new year's gift; though, as I take it, nothing near the value mentioned in the article.

To the twentieth article of the charge, namely, "That he took of Peacoke 100l. without interest, security, or time of payment:"

I confess and declare, that I received of Mr. Peacoke 100l. at Dorset-house, at my first coming to the seal, as a present; at which time no suit was begun; and at the summer after, I sent my then servant Lister to Mr. Rolfe, my good friend and neighbour at St. Albans, to use his means with Mr. Peacoke, who was accounted a moneyed man, for the borrowing of 500l. and after by my servant Hatcher for borrowing of 500. more, which Mr. Rolfe procured; and told me at both times, it should be without interest, script, or note, and that I should take my own time for payment of it.

To the twenty-first article of the charge, namely, "In the cause between Smithwicke and Wiche, he received from Smithwicke 2001. which was repaid:" I confess and declare, that my servant Hunt did, upon his account, being my receiver of the fines upon original writs, charge himself with 2001. formerly received of Smithwicke; which, after that I had understood the nature of it, I ordered him to repay, and to defalke it out of his accounts.

To the two and twentieth article of the charge, namely, "In the cause of Sir Henry Ruswell, he received money from Ruswell, but it is not certain how much:"

I confess and declare, that I received money from my servant Hunt, as from Mr. Ruswell, in a purse; and whereas the sum in the article being indefinite, I confess [it] to be 300 or 400l. and it was about some months after the cause was decreed: in which decree I was assisted by two of the judges.

To the twenty-third article of the charge, namely, "In the cause of Mr. Barker, the lord chancellor received from Barker 7001."

I confess and declare, that the sum mentioned in the article was received from Mr. Barker some time after the decree past.

To the twenty-fourth, twenty-fifth, twenty-sixth articles of the charge, namely, The twenty-fourth, "There being a reference from his Majesty to his lordship of a business between the grocers and the apothecaries, the lord chancellor received of the grocers 2001." The twenty-fifth article, " In the same cause, he received of the apothecaries, that stood with the grocers, a taster of gold worth between 400 and 500, and a present of ambergrease." And the twenty-sixth article, "He received of a new company of apothecaries, that stood against the grocers, 100l."

To these I confess and declare, that the several sums from the three parties were received; and for that it was no judicial business, but a concord of composition between the parties, and that as I thought all had received good, and they were a1

three common purses, I thought it the less matter to receive that which they voluntarily presented; for if I had taken it in the nature of a corrupt bribe, I knew it could not be concealed, because it must needs be put to account to the three several companies.

that " covetousness is the root of all evil." I hope also that your lordships do rather find me in a state of grace, for that in all these particulars there are few or none that are not almost two years old; whereas those that have a habit of corruption do commonly wax worse: so that it hath pleased God to prepare me by precedent degrees of amendment to my present penitency; and for my estate, it is so mean and poor, as my care is now chiefly to satisfy my debts.

To the twenty-seventh article of the charge, namely, "He took of the French merchants 1000l. to constrain the vintners of London to take from them 1500 tuns of wine; to accomplish which, he used very indirect means, by colour of his office and authority, without bill or suit depending, terrifying the vintners by threats, and by imprisonments of their persons, to buy wines whereof they had no need, nor use, at higher rates than they were vendible:"tence may not be heavy to my ruin, but gracious and

I do confess and declare, that Sir Thomas Smith did deal with me in behalf of the French Company; informing me, that the vintners by combination would not take off their wines at any reasonable prices; that it would destroy their trade, and stay their voyage for that year; and that it was a fair business, and concerned the state; and he doubted not but I should receive thanks from the king, and honour by it; and that they would gratify me with a thousand pounds for my travail in it: whereupon I treated between them by way of persuasion; and to prevent any compulsory suit, propounding such a price as the vintners might be gainers 67. in a tun as it was then maintained unto me. And after the merchants petitioning to the king, and his Majesty recommending this business unto me, as a business that concerns his customs and the navy, I dealt more earnestly and peremptorily in it; and, as I think, restrained in the messenger's hand for a day or two some that were the most stiff; and afterwards the merchants presented me with 1000l. out of their common purse, and acknowledging themselves that I had kept them from a kind of ruin, and still maintaining to me, that the vintners, if they were not insatiably minded, had a very competent gain: this is the merits of the cause, as it there appears to me.

To the twenty-eighth article of the charge, namely, "The lord chancellor hath given way to great exactions by his servants, both in respect of private seals, and otherwise for sealing of injunctions:" I confess it was a great fault of neglect in me that I looked no better to my servants.

THIS declaration I have made to your lordships, with a sincere mind, humbly craving that if there should be any mistake, your lordships would impute it to want of memory, and not to any desire of mine to obscure truth, or palliate any thing; for I do now again confess, that in the points charged upon me, though they should be taken, as myself declared them, there is a great deal of corruption and neglect, for which I am heartily sorry, and submit myself to the judgment, grace, and mercy of the

court.

For extenuation I will use none concerning the matters themselves; only it may please your lordships, out of your nobleness, to cast your eyes of compassion upon my person and estate. I was never noted for any avaricious man; and the apostle saith,

And so fearing I have troubled your lordships too long, I shall conclude with an humble suit unto you, that if your lordships proceed to sentence, your sen

mixt with mercy; and not only so, but that you would be noble intercessors for me to his Majesty likewise for his grace and favour.

Your lordships' humble servant and suppliant, FR. ST. ALBAN, CANC.

THE lords having heard this confession and submission read, these lords undernamed, namely, the earl of Pembroke, lord chamberlain; the earl of Arundel, the earl of Southampton, the bishop of Durham, the bishop of Winchester, the bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, the lord Wentworth, the lord Cromwell, the lord Sheffield, the lord North, the lord Chandos, the lord Hunsdon, were sent to him the said lord chancellor, and showed him the said confession, and told him, that the lords do conceive it to be an ingenuous and full confession: and demanded of him, whether it be his own hand that is subscribed to the same, and whether he will stand to it or no; unto which the said lord chancellor answered, namely,

"My lords, it is my act, my hand, my heart: I beseech your lordships to be merciful to a broken reed."

The which answer being reported to the house, it was agreed by the house, to move his Majesty to sequester the seal; and the lords entreated the prince's Highness, that he would be pleased to move the king: whereunto his Highness condescended; and the same lords, which went to take the acknowledgment of the lord chancellor's hand, were appointed to attend the prince to the king, with some other lords added: and his Majesty did not only sequester the seal, but awarded a new commission unto the lord chief justice to execute the place of the chancellor or lord keeper.

PARLIAMENT. dat. primo Maii, and on Wednesday the second of May the said commission being read, their lordships agreed to proceed to sentence the lord chancellor to-morrow morning; wherefore the gentleman usher, and serjeant at arms, attendants on the upper house, were commanded to go and summon him the said lord chancellor to appear in person before their lordships to-morrow morning by nine of the clock; and the said serjeant was commanded to take his mace with him, and to show it unto his lordship at the said summons: but they found him sick in bed, and being summoned, he an

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PROCEEDINGS IN PARLIAMENT AGAINST THE LORD CHANCELLOR.

swered that he was sick, and protested that he feigned not this for any excuse; for if he had been well he would willingly have come.

The lords resolved to proceed notwithstanding against the said lord chancellor; and therefore, on Thursday the third day of May, their lordships sent their message unto the commons to this purpose, namely, That the lords are ready to give judgment against the lord viscount St. Alban, lord chancellor, if they with their speaker will come to demand it. And the commons being come, the speaker came to the bar, and making three low obeisances, said:

"THE knights, citizens, and burgesses, of the commons house of parliament, have made complaints unto your lordships of many exorbitant offences of bribery and corruption committed by the lord chancellor; we understand that your lordships are ready to give judgment upon him for the same; wherefore I their speaker, in their name, do humbly demand, and pray judgment against him the lord chancellor, as the nature of his offence and demerits do require."

The lord chief justice answered,

“MR. SPEAKER,

66

Upon complaint of the commons against the viscount St. Alban, lord chancellor, this high court hath hereby, and by his own confession, found him guilty of the crimes and corruptions complained of by the commons, and of sundry other crimes and corruptions of the like nature.

"And therefore this high court, having first summoned him to attend, and having his excuse of not attending by reason of infirmity and sickness, which, he protested, was not feigned, or else he would most willingly have attended; doth nevertheless think fit to proceed to judgment; and therefore this high court doth adjudge,

"I. That the lord viscount St. Alban, lord chancellor of England, shall undergo fine and ransom of forty thousand pounds.

"II. That he shall be imprisoned in the Tower during the king's pleasure.

"III. That he shall for ever be uncapable of

any office, place, or employment, in the
state or commonwealth.

"IV. That he shall never sit in parliament, nor
come within the verge of the court.
"This is the judgment and resolution of this
high court."

WORKS HISTORICA L.

THE HISTORY OF THE REIGN

OF

KING HENRY THE SEVENTH.

TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND MOST EXCELLENT PRINCE CHARLES,

PRINCE OF WALES, DUKE OF CORNWALL, EARL OF CHESTER, ETC.

IT MAY PLEASE YOUR HIGHNESS,

IN part of my acknowledgment to your Highness, I have endeavoured to do honour to the memory of the last king of England, that was ancestor to the king your father and yourself; and was that king to whom both unions may in a sort refer: that of the roses being in him consummate, and that of the kingdoms by him begun: besides, his times deserve it. For he was a wise man, and an excellent king; and yet the times were rough and full of mutations, and rare accidents. And it is with times, as it is with ways: some are more up-hill and down-hill, and some are more flat and plain; and the one is better for the liver, and the other for the writer. I have not flattered him, but took him to life as well as I could, sitting so far off, and having no better light. It is true your Highness hath a living pattern, incomparable, of the king your father: but it is not amiss for you also to see one of these ancient pieces. God preserve your Highness.

Your Highness's most humble and devoted servant,

FRANCIS ST. ALBAN.

AFTER that Richard, the third of that name, king | friars of Leicester to see an honourable interment to in fact only, but tyrant both in title and regiment, be given to it, yet the religious people themselves, and so commonly termed and reputed in all times being not free from the humours of the vulgar, since, was by the Divine revenge favouring the de- neglected it; wherein nevertheless they did not sign of an exiled man, overthrown and slain at then incur any man's blame or censure: no man Bosworth-field; there succeeded in the kingdom thinking any ignominy or contumely unworthy of the earl of Richmond, thenceforth styled Henry the him that had been the executioner of king Henry seventh. The king immediately after the victory, the sixth, that innocent prince, with his own hands; as one that had been bred under a devout mother, the contriver of the death of the duke of Clarence and was in his nature a great observer of religious his brother; the murderer of his two nephews, one forms, caused "Te Deum laudamus" to be solemnly of them his lawful king in the present, and the sung in the presence of the whole army upon the other in the future, failing of him; and vehemently place, and was himself with general applause and suspected to have been the impoisoner of his wife, great cries of joy, in a kind of military election or thereby to make vacant his bed, for a marriage withrecognition, saluted king. Meanwhile the body in the degrees forbidden. And although he were a of Richard, after many indignities and reproaches, prince in military virtue approved, jealous of the the diriges and obsequies of the common people honour of the English nation, and likewise a good towards tyrants, was obscurely buried. For though | law-maker, for the ease and solace of the common the king of his nobleness gave charge unto the people; yet his cruelties and parricides, in the

opinion of all men, weighed down his virtues and merits; and, in the opinion of wise men, even those virtues themselves were conceived to be rather feigned and affected things to serve his ambition, than true qualities ingenerate in his judgment or nature. And therefore it was noted by men of great understanding, who seeing his after-acts, looked back upon his former proceedings, that even in the time of king Edward his brother he was not without secret trains and mines to turn envy and hatred upon his brother's government; as having an expectation and a kind of divination, that the king, by reason of his many disorders, could not be of long life, but was like to leave his sons of tender years; and then he knew well, how easy a step it was, from the place of a protector, and first prince of the blood, to the crown. And that out of this deep root of ambition it sprung, that as well at the treaty of peace that passed between Edward the fourth and Lewis the eleventh of France concluded by interview of both kings at Piqueny, as upon all other occasions, Richard, then duke of Gloucester, stood ever upon the side of honour, raising his own reputation to the disadvantage of the king his brother, and drawing the eyes of all, especially of the nobles and soldiers, upon himself; as if the king, by his voluptuous life and mean marriage, were become effeminate and less sensible of honour and reason of state than was fit for a king. And as for the politic and wholesome laws which were enacted in his time, they were interpreted to be but the brokage of an usurper, thereby to woo and win the hearts of the people, as being conscious to himself, that the true obligations of sovereignty in him failed, and were wanting. But king Henry, in the very entrance of his reign, and the instant of time when the kingdom was cast into his arms, met with a point of great difficulty, and knotty to solve, able to trouble and confound the wisest king in the newness of his estate; and so much the more, because it could not endure a deliberation, but must be at once deliberated and determined. There were fallen to his lot, and concurrent in his person, three several titles to the imperial crown. The first, the title of the lady Elizabeth, with whom by precedent pact with the party that brought him in, he was to marry. The second, the ancient and long disputed title both by plea and arms, of the house of Lancaster, to which he was inheritor in his own person. The third, the title of the sword or conquest, for that he came in by victory of battle, and that the king in possession was slain in the field. The first of these was fairest, and most like to give contentment to the people, who by two and twenty years' reign of king Edward the fourth had been fully made capable of the clearness of the title of the white rose, or house of York; and by the mild and plausible reign of the same king towards his latter time, were become affectionate to that line. But then it lay plain before his eyes, that if he relied upon that title, he could be but a king at courtesy, and have rather a matrimonial than a regal power; the right remaining in his queen, upon whose decease, either with issue or without issue, he was to give place and be re

moved. And though he should obtain by parlia ment to be continued, yet he knew there was a very great difference between a king that holdeth his crown by a civil act of estates, and one that holdeth it originally by the law of nature and descent of blood. Neither wanted there even at that time secret rumours and whisperings, which afterwards gathered strength and turned to great troubles, that the two young sons of king Edward the fourth, or one of them, which were said to be destroyed in the Tower, were not indeed murdered, but conveyed secretly away, and were yet living which, if it had been true, had prevented the title of the lady Elizabeth. On the other side, if he stood upon his own title of the house of Lancaster, inherent in his person, he knew it was a title condemned by parliament, and generally prejudged in the common opinion of the realm, and that it tended directly to the disinherison of the line of York, held then the indubitate heirs of the crown. So that if he should have no issue by the lady Elizabeth, which should be descendants of the double line, then the ancient flames of discord and intestine wars, upon the competition of both houses, would again return and revive.

As for conquest, notwithstanding Sir William Stanley, after some acclamations of the soldiers in the field, had put a crown of ornament, which Richard wore in the battle, and was found amongst the spoils, upon king Henry's head, as if there were his chief title; yet he remembered well upon what conditions and agreements he was brought in; and that to claim as conqueror, was to put as well his own party, as the rest, into terror and fear; as that which gave him power of disannulling of laws, and disposing of men's fortunes and estates, and the like points of absolute power, being in themselves so harsh and odious, as that William himself, commonly called the Conqueror, howsoever he used and exercised the power of a conqueror to reward his Normans, yet he forbore to use that claim in the beginning, but mixed it with a titulary pretence, grounded upon the will and designation of Edward the Confessor. But the king, out of the greatness of his own mind, presently cast the die; and the inconveniences appearing unto him on all parts, and knowing there could not be any interreign, or suspension of title, and preferring his affection to his own line and blood, and liking that title best which made him independent; and being in his nature and constitution of mind not very apprehensive or forecasting of future events afar off, but an entertainer of fortune by the day; resolved to rest upon the title of Lancaster as the main, and to use the other two, that of marriage, and that of battle, but as supporters, the one to appease secret discontents, and the other to beat down open murmur and dispute: not forgetting that the same title of Lancaster had formerly maintained a possession of three descents in the crown; and might have proved å perpetuity, had it not ended in the weakness and inability of the last prince. Whereupon the king presently that very day, being the two and twentieth of August, assumed the style of king in his own name, without mention of the lady Elizabeth at all, or any relation thereunto. In

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