He wrote "La Complainte de l'Ame pecheresse, par Guillaume Cicil:" in French verse: extant in the king's library 3. "Carmina duo Latina in Obitum Margaretæ Nevillæ, Reginæ Catherinæ à Cubiculis." The famous sir Thomas Chaloner wrote an epitaph on the same lady4. "Carmen Latinum in Memoriam Tho. Chaloneri Equ. aur. præfixum ejusdem Libro de Restaur. Republ." "A Preface to Queen Catherine Parr's Lamentation of a Sinner5." Being by the protector, Somerset, made master of the requests (the first who bore that title in England), he attended his grace on the expedition to Scotland, and furnished materials 3 Tanner, p. 216. [Reg. MS. 16 E. xxviii. This poetic exercise is very long, and opens with a long address to the Christian reader, which is thus prefaced: "Guillaume Cicile au Lecteur Chrestien. Par avoir leu ce traité, en desire Tanner, p. 216. Ib. [Reprinted in Bentley's Seventh Lampe of Virginitie, 1582.] • Camden. for an account of that war, which was published by William Patten, under the title of "Diarium Exped. Scotia." Lond. 1541, 12mo". It is on this account, I suppose, that his lordship is reckoned by Hollingshed among the English historians. "The first Paper or Memorial of Sir William Cecil, &c. Anno primo Eliz." from a manuscript in the Cotton library; printed among Somers's Tracts. It is only a paper of memorandums. "Slanders and Lies, maliciously, grossly, and impudently vomited out in certain traiterous Books and Pamphlets, concerning two Counsellors, Sir Nicholas Bacon Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, and Sir William Cecil principal Secretary of State to her Majesty'." "A Speech in Parliament, 1592"." [Republished at Edinburgh in 1798, from a copy printed in 1548, and entitled "The Expedicion into Scotlande of the most woorthely fortunate Prince, Edward Duke of Somerset, Uncle unto our most noble Sovereign Lord the Kinges Majestie, Edward the Sixth, Goovernour of hys Hyghnes Persone, and Protectour of hys Graces Realmes, Dominions, and Subjectes: made in the first Yere of his Majesties most prosperous Reign, and set out by way of Diarie, by W. Patten, Londoner."] "Instructions for the Speaker's Speech; drawn up in several Articles by the Lord Treasurer Burleigh 3." "Lord Burleigh's Precepts, or Directions for the well-ordering and Carriage of a Man's Life4." 16375. "Meditations on the Death of his Lady "." "A Meditation of the State of England, during the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, by the Lord Treasurer of England, the Lord Burleigh"." He wrote answers to many libels against the queen and government, the titles of many of 'Strype's Memorials, vol. iv. p. 124. 4 ["Left by William lord Burghley to his sonne at his death, who was sometimes lord treasurer of this kingdome." In Collins's Life of Lord Burleigh the following golden saying is ascribed to his lordship, and deserves to be emblazoned on the portal of every prime minister's levee-room: "A realme gaineth more by one year's peace than by tenne years warre; for warre is the curse, and peace the blessinge of a countrie."] • Harleian Catal. vol. ii. p. 755. 'Ballard's Memoirs, p. 184. [These Meditations, “written at Coling's lodge, by me, in sorrow, W. B. April 9th, 1589;" are said to be in possession of the hon. James West. See Female Biography by Mary Hays, vol. ii. p. 56.] Biogr. p. 1257. [Ballard, in his Memoirs of British Ladies, has printed this meditation from an original formerly in the possession of James West, esq. but now belonging to the marquis of Lansdowne. Biog. Brit. 2d edit. vol. iii. p. 402.] [Great was the value, says Lloyd, the queen set upon the which are now lost; some are said to be extant in print, more in manuscript. He was supposed too to be author of a thin pamphlet in defence of the punishments inflicted on the Roman Catholics in the reign of queen Elizabeth: it is called "The Execution of Justice in England for Maintenance of publick and Christian Peace, against certain Stirs of Seditions and Adherents to the Traytors and Enemies of the Realm, without any Persecution of them for Questions of Religion, as is falsely reported, &c." Lond. 1583, second edit. 2. Other political pieces were ascribed to him, and even the celebrated libel, called "Leicester's Commonwealth." It was pretended that he at least furnished the lord treasurer, as her ablest minister of state: for coming once to visit him, being sick of the gout at Burleigh-house in the Strand, and being much heightened with her head attire, then in fashion, the lord's servant who conducted her through the door said, "May your highness be pleased to stoop." The queen returned, "For your master's sake I will stoop, but not for the king of Spain." She would make him always sit down in her presence, saying, "My lord, we make use of you not for your bad legs, but for your good head." State Worthies, p. 293.] 9 Biogr. p. 1261. Ant. Wood, vol.i. p. 271. hints for that composition to Parsons the Jesuit3. This assertion was never proved: it ought to be, before it deserves any credit. Leicester was a bad man; but would that justify Cecil in employing one of his mistress's bitterest enemies to write against one of her ministers? Great numbers of his letters are preserved; a list of which may be seen in bishop Tanner. Thirty-three more are printed in Peck's Desiderata Curiosa: three others in Howard's Collections. His lordship also drew up a great number of pedigrees, some of which are preserved in the library of the archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth, particularly the genealogies of the kings of England, from William the conqueror to Edward the fourth; of queen Anne Boleyn; and of several princely houses in Germany. MS. Libr. Lambeth, No. 299, No. 747. [Wood seems to have derived his report of this matter from the affirmation of Dr. Thomas James, in a life of Father Parsons, printed at the end of the Jesuits' Downfall, 1612; but no evidence has been produced to confirm such report, nor does it appear to have obtained much credence.] • P. 202, 314. |