them good freeholders in England, she had saved above two millions of pounds, which were consumed in times of those rebellions. For what held the Gascoignes firm to the crown of England, of whom the Duke of Espernon married the inheritrix, but his earldom of Kendal in England, whereof the Duke of Espernon, in right of his wife, bears the title to this day? And, to the same end I take it, hath James, our sovereign Lord, given lands to divers of the nobility of Scotland; and, if I were worthy to advise your lordship, I should think that your lordship should do the King great service, to put him in mind to prohibit all the Scotish nation to alienate and sell away their inheritance here; for, by the selling, they not only give cause to the English to complain, that the treasure of England is transported into Scotland, but his Majesty is, thereby, also frustrated of making both nations one, and of assuring the service and obedience of the Scots in the future.

Couns. You say well; for though those of Scotland, that are advanced and inriched by the King's Majesty, will, no doubt, serve him faithfully; yet, how their heirs and successors, having no inheritance to lose in England, may be seduced, is uncertain. But let us go on with our parliament. And what say you to the denial in the twentysixth year of his reign, even when the King was invited to come into France by the Earl of March, who had married his mother, and who promised to assist the King in the conquest of many places lost?

Just. It is true, my good lord, that a subsidy was then denied, and the reasons are delivered in English histories; and indeed, the King, not long before, had spent much treasure in aiding the Duke of Bretagne to no purpose, for he drew over the King, but to draw on good conditions for himself, as the Earl of March, his father-in-law, now did; as the English barons did invite Lewis of France, not long before, as, in elder times, all the kings and states had done, and, in late years, the leaguers of France entertained the Spaniards, and the French Protestants and Netherlands, Queen Elisabeth; not with any purpose to greaten those that aid them, but to purchase to themselves an advantageous peace. But what say the histories to this denial? They say, with a world of payments there mentioned, that the King had drawn the nobility dry; and, besides that, whereas, not long before, great sums of money were given, and the same appointed to be kept in four castles, and not to be expended, but by the advice of the peers : It was believed that the same treasure was yet unspent.

Couns. Good Sir, you have said enough? Judge you, whether it were not a dishonour to the King, to be so tied, as not to expend his treasure, but by other men's advice, as it were, by their licence,

Just. Surely, my lord, the King was well advised, to take the money upon any condition, and they were fools that propounded the restraint; for it doth not appear, that the King took any great heed to those overseers; kings are bound by their piety, and by no other obligation, In Queen Mary's time, when it was thought she was with child, it was propounded in parliament, that the rule of the realm should be given to King Philip, during the minority of the hoped prince or princess; and the King offered his assurance, in great sums of money, to relinquish the government, at such time as the prince or princess should

be of age. At which motion, when all else were silent in the house Lord Dacres, who was none of the wisest, asked who shall sue the King's bond, which ended the dispute: For what bond is between a king and his vassals, but the bond of the King's faith? But, my good lord, the King, notwithstanding the denial at that time, was, with gifts from particular persons, and otherwise, supplied for proceeding on his journey, for that time, into France; he took with him thirty casks, filled with silver and coin, which was a great treasure in those days. And, Lastly, notwithstanding the first denial, in the King's absence, he had escuage granted him, to wit, twenty shillings of every knight's fee.

Couns. What say you then to the twenty-eighth year of that King, in which, when the King demanded relief, the states would not consent, except the same order had been taken for the appointing of four overseers for the treasure? As also that the lord chief justice and the lord chancellor should be chosen by the states, with some barons of the Exchequer, and other officers.

Just. My good lord, admit the King had yielded their demands, then whatsoever had been ordained by those magistrates to the dislike of the commonwealth, the people had been without remedy; whereas, while the King made them, they had their appeal, and other remedies. But those demands vanished, and, in the end, the King had escuage given him, without any of their conditions. It is an excellent virtue in a king to have patience, and to give way to the fury of men's passions. The whale, when he is struck by the fisherman, grows in that fury that he cannot be resisted, but will overthrow all the ships and barques that come in his way; but, when he hath tumbled a while, he is drawn to the shore with a twine-thread.

Couns. What say you then to the parliament in the twenty-ninth year of that king?

Just. I say, that, the commons being unable to pay, the King relieves himself upon the richer sort; and so it likewise happened in the thirty-third year of the King, in which he was relieved chiefly by the city of London. But, my good ford, in the parliament in London, in the thirty-eighth year, he had given him the tenth of all the revenues of the church for three years, and three marks of every knight's fee throughout the kingdom, upon his promise and oath for the observing of Magna Charta; but, in the end of the same year, the King being then in France, he was denied the aids which he required. What is this to the danger of a parliament ? Especially at this time they had reason to refuse, they had given so great a sum in the beginning of the same year; and again, because it was known that the King had but pretended war with the King of Castile, with whom he had secretly contracted an alliance, and concluded a marriage between his son Edward and the lady Eleanor. These false fires do but fright children; and it commonly falls out, that, when the cause given is known to be false, the necessity pretended is thought to be feigned. Royal dealing hath evermore royal success; and, as the King was denied in the thirty-eighth year, so was he denied in the thirty-ninth year, because the nobility and the people saw it plainly, that the King was abused by e Pope, who, as well in despite to Manfred, bastard son to the

Emperor Frederick the Second, as to cousen the King, and to waste him, would needs bestow on the King the kingdom of Sicily; to recover which, the King sent all the treasure he could borrow or scrape to the Pope, and withal gave him letters of credence, for to take up what he could in Italy, the King binding himself for the payment. Now, my good lord, the wisdom of princes is seen in nothing more than in their enterprises. So how unpleasing it was to the state of England to consume the treasure of the land, and in the conquest of Sicily, so far off, and otherwise, for that the English had lost Normandy under their noses, and so many goodly parts of France of their own proper inheritance: The reason of the denial is as well to be considered as the denial.

Couns. Was not the King also denied a subsidy in the forty-first year of his reign?

Just. No, my lord, for, although the King required money, as before, for the impossible conquest of Sicily, yet the house offered to give fifty-two thousand marks, which, whether he refused or accepted, is uncertain; and, whilst the King dreamed of Sicily, the Welch invaded and spoiled the borders of England; for, in the parliament of London, when the King urged the house for prosecuting the conquest of Sicily, the lords, utterly disliking the attempt, urged the prosecuting of the Welchmen; which parliament, being prorogued, did assemble at Oxford, and was called the Mad Parliament, which was no other than an assembly of rebels; for the royal assent of the king, which gives life to all laws, formed by the three estates, was not a royal assent, when both the King and the Prince were constrained to yield to the lords. A constrained consent is the consent of a captive, and not of a king; and therefore there was nothing done there either legally or royally. For, if it be not properly a parliament where the subject is not free, certainly it can be none where the King is bound; for all kingly rule was taken from the King, and twelve peers appointed, and, as some writers have it, twenty-four peers to govern the realm; and therefore the assembly made by Jack Straw, and other rebels, may as well be called a parliament as that of Oxford. Principis nomen habere, non est esse princeps; for thereby was the King driven not only to compound all quarrels with the French, but to have means to be revenged on the rebel lords; but he quitted his right to Normandy, Anjou, and Mayne.

Couns. But, Sir, what needed this extremity, seeing the lords require but the confirmation of the former charter, which was not prejudicial to the King to grant ?

Just. Yes, my good lord, but they insulted upon the King, and would not suffer him to enter into his own castles; they put down the purveyor of the meat for the maintenance of his house, as if the King had been a bankrupt, and gave order, that, without ready money, he should not take up a chicken. And, although there is nothing against the royalty of a king in these charters (the kings of England being kings of freemen and not of slaves,) yet it is so contrary to the nature of a king to be forced even to those things which may be to his advantage, as the King had some reason to seek the dispensation of his oath from the Pope, and to draw in strangers for his own defence; yea, Jure salvo

Corona nostræ is intended inclusively in all oaths and promises exacted from a sovereign.

Couns. But you cannot be ignorant how dangerous a thing it is to call in other nations, but for the spoil they make, as also, because they have often held the possession of the best places with which they have been trusted.

Just. It is true, my good lord, that there is nothing so dangerous for a king as to be constrained and held as prisoner to his vassals; for by that Edward the Second and Richard the Second lost their kingdoms and their lives. And for calling in of strangers, Was not King Edward the Sixth driven to call in strangers against the rebels in Norfolk, Cornwall, Oxfordshire, and elsewhere? Have not the kings of Scotland been oftentimes constrained to entertain strangers against the kings of England? And the King of England at this time, had he not been divers times assisted by the kings of Scotland, had been endangered to have been expelled for ever.

Couns. But yet you know those kings were deposed by parliament. Just. Yea, my good lord, being prisoners, being out of possession, and being in their hands that were princes of the blood, and pretenders. It is an old country proverb, That might overcomes right: A weak title, that wears a strong sword, commonly prevails against a strong title that wears but a weak one; otherwise Philip the Second had never been Duke of Portugal, nor Duke of Milan, nor King of Naples and Sicily. But, good lord, Errores non sunt trakendi in exemplum : I speak of regal, peaceable, and lawful parliaments. The King, at this time, was but a king in name; for Gloucester, Leicester, and Chichester made choice of other nine, to whom the rule of the realm was committed, and the prince was forced to purchase his liberty from the Earl of Leicester, by giving for his ransom the county palatine of Chester. But, my lord, let us judge of those occasions by their events: What became of this proud earl? Was he not soon after slain in Evesham ? Was he not left naked in the field, and left a shameful spectacle, his head being cut off from his shoulders, his privy-parts from his body, and laid on each side of his nose? And did not God extinguish his race? After which, in a lawful parliament at Westminster, confirmed in a following parliament of Westminster, were not all the lords that followed Leicester disinherited? And when that fool Gloucester, after the death of Leicester, whom he had formerly forsaken, made himself the head of a second rebellion, and called in strangers, for which, not long before, he had cried out against the King, was not he in the end, after that he had seen the slaughter of so many of the barons, the spoil of their castles and lordships, constrained to submit himself, as all the survivors did, of which they, that sped best, paid their fines and ransoms, the King reserving to his younger son the earldoms of Leicester and Darby.

Couns. Well, Sir, we have disputed this king to his grave; though it be true, that he outlived all his enemies, and brought them to confusion; yet those examples did not terrify their successors, but the Earl Marshal, and Hereford, threatened King Edward the First with a new

war.

Just. They did so; but, after the death of Hereford, the earl marshal repented himself, and, to gain the King's favour, he made him heir of all his lands. But what is this to the parliament? For there was never a king of this land had more given him for the time of his reign, than Edward, the son of Henry the Third, had.

Couns. How doth it appear?

Just. In this sort, my good lord; in this king's third year, he had given him the fifteenth part of all goods. In his sixth year, a twentieth; in his twelfth year, a twentieth; in his fourteenth year he had escuage, to wit, forty shillings of every knight's fee; in his eighteenth year, he had the eleventh part of all moveable goods within the kingdom; in his nineteenth year, the tenth part of all church livings in England, Scotland, and Ireland, for six years, by agreement from the Pope; in his three and twentieth year, he raised a tax upon wool and fells, and, on a day, caused all the religious houses to be searched, and all the treasure in them to be seized and brought to his coffers, excusing himself, by laying the fault upon his treasurer; he had also in the end of the same year, of all goods, of all burgesses, and of the commons, the tenth part; in the twenty-fifth year of the parliament of St. Edmundsbury, he had an eighteenth part of the goods of the burgesses, and of the people in general, the tenth part. He had also the same year, by putting the clergy out of his protection, a fifth part of their goods; and, in the same year, he set a great tax upon wools, to wit, from half a mark to forty shillings upon every sack; whereupon the Earl Marshal and the Earl of Hereford, refusing to attend the King into Flanders, pretended the grievances of the people. But, in the end, the King having pardoned them, and confirmed the great charter, he had the ninth penny of all goods, from the lords and commons; of the clergy, in the south he had the tenth penny, and in the north the fifth penny. In the two and thirtieth year, he had a subsidy freely granted: In the three and thirtieth year he confirmed the great charter of his own royal disposition, and the states, to shew their thankfulness, gave the King, for one year, the sixth part of their goods, And the same year the King used the inquisition, called Traile Baston: By which all justices and other magistrates were grievously fined, that had used extortion, or bribery, or had otherwise misdemeaned themselves, to the great contentation of the people. This commission likewise did enquire of intruders, barrators, and all other the like vermin, whereby the King gathered a great mass of treasure, with a great deal of love. Now, for the whole reign of this king, who governed England thirty-five years, there was not any parliament to prejudice.

Couns. But there was taking of arms by the Earl Marshal and Hereford.

Just. That is true, but why was that? Because the King, notwithstanding all that was given him by parliament, did lay the greatest taxes that ever king did without their consent. But what lost the King by those lords? One of them gave the King all his lands, the other died in disgrace.

Couns. But what say you to the parliament in Edward the Second's