Having been admitted within the Bar, he was soon called up to the Bench, and nominated Reader; * and shortly afterwards appointed,'ratione verbi Regii Elizabethæ,' her counsel learned extraordinary, a grace,' says Rawley, if I err not, scarce known before.'+ In the Parliament which met in the year 1592, Bacon sat as one of the knights for Middlesex; and early in the session delivered a speech in favour of reform in the law, to which subject the Queen had called the attention of the house. The following report of it has been preserved : 'Mr. Speaker, That which these honourable personages have spoken of their experience, may it please you to give me leave, likewise, to deliver, of my common knowledge. The cause of assembling all the lord Bacon's lodgings were in Gray's Inn Square, No. 1. * Dugdale's Orig. Jurid. p. 295. + Rawley's Life of Bacon; Rymer's Fœdera, vol. 16, p. 596; and see Note (A.) parliaments hath been hitherto for laws or monies; the one being the sinews of peace, the other of war; to one I am not privy, but the other I should know. I did take great contentment in her majesty's speech the other day, delivered by the lord Keeper; how that it was a thing not to be done suddenly, or at one parliament, nor scarce a year would suffice to purge the statute-book, nor lessen it, the volumes of law being so many in number, that neither common people can half practise them, nor lawyers sufficiently understand them, than the which nothing would tend more to the praise of her majesty. The Romans they appointed ten men who were to collect or recall all former laws, and to set forth those twelve tables so much of all men commended. The Athenians likewise appointed six for that purpose; and Lewis the ninth, king of France, did the like in reforming his laws.'* * Bacon's Works, vol. 16, note (B. B.) In the same session, Bacon signalized himself by his opposition to the immediate* payment of a double subsidy, to the grant of which the House had assented, alleging that the 'poor men's rent is such as they are not able to yield it, and that the gentlemen must sell their plate, and farmers their brass pots, ere this will be paid;' ' and for us,' he added, 'we are here to search the wounds of the realm, and not to skin them over.' The Queen, incensed at this unusual freedom of speech, signified her displeasure in a way not to be mistaken; and it appears to have been thought that Bacon was endeavouring * Writing to the lord Treasurer, who had told Bacon that her majesty was somewhat gravelled, upon the offence she took at his speech in parliament,' he says, 'It is not unknown to your good lordship, that I was the first of the ordinary sort of the lower House that spake for the subsidy; and that which I after spake in difference, was but in circumstance of time, which methinks was no great matter, since there is variety allowed in counsel, as a discord in music, to make it more perfect.'-Works, vol. 12, p. 3. to ingratiate himself with the people,—a deadly political sin in those days of high prerogative. This, however, he denied. In a letter to the lord Keeper, (sir John Puckering,) he said, 'It is a great grief unto me, joined with marvel, that her majesty should retain an hard conceit of my speeches in Parliament. It might please her sacred majesty to think what my end should be in those speeches, if it were not duty, and duty alone. I am not so simple, but I know the common beaten way to please. And whereas popularity hath been objected, I muse what care I should take to please many, that take a course of life to deal with few.'* So, in a letter to the lord Treasurer, he says, 'I was sorry to find, by your lordship's speech yesterday, that my last speech in Parliament, delivered in discharge of my conscience, my duty to God, her majesty, and my country, was offensive; if it were misreported, I would * Bacon's Works, vol. 12, p. 275. be glad to attend your lordship to discover anything I said not; if it were misconstrued, I would be glad to expound my words, to exclude any sense I meant not; if my heart be misjudged by imputation of popularity or opposition, I have great wrong, and the greater, because the manner of my speech did most evidently show that I spake only to satisfy my conscience. It is very true, that from the beginning, whatsoever was a double subsidy I did wish might, for precedent's sake, appear to be extraordinary, and for discontent's sake, might not have been levied upon the poorer sort.'* Notwithstanding this sharp reproof of the court, Bacon continued to take an active part in the Parliamentary debates, rapidly acquiring a high reputation as an eloquent and convincing speaker. 'There happened in my time,' said Ben Jonson, tone noble speaker, who was full * Bacon's Works, vol. 12, p. 28. O rare Ben Jonson!' |