ing my cause to your noble minds and magnanimous affections.

"Your lordships are not simple judges, but. parliamentary judges; you have a further extent of your arbitary power than other courts; and, if your lordships be not tied by the ordinary course of courts or precedents, in points of strictness and severity, much more in points of mercy and mitigation.

'And yet, if any thing which I shall move might be contrary to your honourable and worthy ends to introduce a reformation, I should not seek it. But herein I beseech your lordships to give me leave to tell you a story. Titus Manlius took his son's life for giving battle against the prohibition of his general; not many years after, the like severity was pursued by Papirius Cursor, the dictator, against Quintus Maximus, who being upon the point to be sentenced, by the intercession of some principal persons of the senate, was spared; whereupon Livy maketh this grave and gracious observation:

66

Neque minus firmata est disciplina militaris periculo Quinti Maximi, quam miserabili supplicio Titi Manlii." The discipline of war was no less established by the questioning of Quintus Maximus, than by the punishment of Titus Manlius: and the same reason is of the reformation of justice; for the questioning of men of eminent place hath the same terror, though not the same rigour, with the punishment.

'But my case standeth not there; for my humble desire is, that his Majesty would take the Seal into his hands, which is a great downfall; and may serve, I hope, in itself for an expiation of my faults. Therefore, if mercy and mitigation be in your power, and do no ways cross your ends, why should I not hope of your lordships' favour and commiseration?

'Your lordships will be pleased to behold your chief pattern, the King our sovereign,a king of incomparable clemency, and whose heart is inscrutable for wisdom and good

ness.

Your lordships will remember that there sat not these hundred years before a Prince in your House (and never such a prince) whose presence deserveth to be made memorable by records and acts mixed of mercy and justice: yourselves are either nobles (and compassion ever beateth in the veins of noble blood,) or reverend prelates, who are the servants of Him that would not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax. You all sit upon one high stage; and therefore cannot but be more sensible of the changes of the world, and of the fall of any of high place. Neither will your lordships forget that there are vitia temporis as well as vitia hominis, and that the beginning of reformations hath the contrary power of the pool of Bethesda; for that had strength to cure only him that was first cast in, and this hath commonly strength to hurt him only that is first cast in; and for my part, I wish it may stay there, and go no further.

Lastly, I assure myself, your lordships

have a noble feeling of me, as a member of your own body, and one that, in this very session, had some taste of your loving affections, which, I hope, was not a lightning before the death of them, but rather a spark of that grace, which now in the conclusion will more appear.

"And therefore my humble suit to your lordships is, that my penitent submission may be my sentence, and the loss of the Seal my punishment; and that your lordships will spare any further sentence, but recommend me to his Majesty's grace and pardon for all that is past. God's holy spirit be amongst you. Your Lordships' humble servant and suppliant,

'April 22, 1621.'

'FR. ST. ALBAN, Canc.'*

This eloquent appeal, however, though presented by the King's son, failed to satisfy the House; and it was then debated

* Bacon's Works, vol. 12, p. 74; State Trials, vol. 12, p. 1102.

whether the Chancellor should be summoned to the bar to hear the charge, which consisted of twenty-eight articles, or whether it should be sent to him in writing, which last mode was agreed to,-respect being had to his person, as he still held the Great Seal. A copy of the charge was accordingly sent to the Chancellor, with the following message:

That the lord Chancellor's confession is not fully set down by his lordship in the said submission, for three causes.

1st. His lordship confesseth not any particular bribe or corruption.

2nd. Nor showeth how his lordship heard the charge thereof.

3rd. The confession, such as it is, is afterwards extenuated in the same submission. And therefore the Lords have sent him a particular of the charge, and do expect his answer to the same with all convenient expedition.*

For the particulars of the charge, see Bacon's