Page:The Works of Francis Bacon (1884) Volume 1.djvu/42

xxxiv of the world, to proceed against my lord in the Star Chamber, by an information ore tenus, and to have my lord brought to his answer; howbeit she said, she would assure me that whatsoever she did should be towards my lord ad castigationem, et non ad destructionem, as indeed she had often repeated the same phrase before: whereunto I said, to the end utterly to divert her, Madam, if you will have me speak to you in this argument, I must speak to you as Friar Bacon's head spake, that said first, Time is, and then Time was, and Time would never be; for certainly, said I, it is now far too late, the matter is cold, and hath taken too much wind; whereat she seemed again offended, and rose from me, and that resolution for a while continued; and after, in the beginning of Midsummer term, I attending her, and rinding her settled in that resolution, which I heard of also otherwise, she falling upon the like speech, it is true, that seeing no other remedy, I said to her slightly, Why, madam, if you will needs have a proceeding, you were best have it in some such sort as Ovid spake of his mistress, Est aliquid luce patente minus, to make a council-table matter of it, and there an end; which speech again she seemed to take in ill part, but yet I think it did good at that time, and helped to divert that course of proceeding by information in the Star Chamber. Nevertheless, afterwards it pleased her to make a more solemn matter of the proceeding, and some few days after, when order was given that the matter should be heard at York House, before an assembly of councillors, peers, and judges, and some audience of men of quality to be admitted." Such were the measures adopted by the queen to dispel, as she termed them, "the bruits and malicious imputations" of her people; but, jealous of their affections, she resented every murmur of public disapprobation by some new severity to Essex; and her conduct, neither marked by strict justice, or generous forgiveness, exhibited more of the caprice of an angry woman than the steady resentment of an offended monarch. What calamities would have been averted, if, instead of suffering herself to be hurried by this conflict of agitated feelings, the queen had attended to the advice of Bacon, whose care for her honour, and love for his friend, might have been safely trusted, and who, looking through the present, decided upon consequences with a certainty almost prophetic. The most profound statesman of the present day, possessed of all the light which history gives him, can add nothing te the prudent politic course which Bacon pointed out to the queen. She rejected this advice with a blind despotism that would neither be counselled with or against her inclinations, and fearing and suspecting all around her, ruined the man she wished to save, and eventually made total wreck of her own peace of mind.

It was determined that proceedings should be instituted; but, as the queen assured Bacon, only "ad castigationem non ad destructionem" not to taint the character of Essex, by which he might be rendered unable to bear office about her person, but before a selected council, "inter domesticos parietes, non luce forensi." This resolution having been formed, the queen's counsel learned in the law, were assembled to determine upon the mode of proceeding. At this meeting, it was said by one of the courtiers, that her majesty was not resolved whether Mr. Bacon should act in this trial as one of her counsel. What must have passed in his mind when he heard this observation! He knew enough of the common charities of courts to suspect every thing. He knew that the queen looked with great jealousy and distrust at his having "crossed her disposition" by his steady friendship for Essex. He saw, therefore, that whether this remark was a stratagem to sound his intentions, or that some attempt had been made to ruin him in the queen's opinion, by inducing her to suppose that he would sacrifice her to the popular clamour, of which she was too sensible, it required his immediate and vigilant attention. In this situation of no common difficulty, the conflict of his various duties, to the queen, to Essex, and to himself, were instantly present to his mind.

To the queen he was under the greatest obligation: she was the friend of his father, and had been his friend from his infancy; she consulted with him in all her difficulties; she had conferred upon him a valuable reversion of £2000 a year, had promoted him to be her counsel, and, what perhaps was her greatest kindness, instead of having hastily advanced him, she had, with a continuance of her friendship, made him bear the yoke in his youth. Such were his obligations to Elizabeth, of whom he never spoke but with affection for her virtues, and respect for her commanding intellect.

He had also great esteem for the virtues of Essex, and great admiration of the higher powers of his mind. He felt for him with all the hopes and fears of a parent for a wayward child, and with all the affection of a friend, from a deep feeling of his constant regard, and the grateful recollection of what, in the common world, would be deemed of more importance, an act of pecuniary kindness, not, as in these cases is generally supposed, to purchase, but to procure his liberty of thought and action.

Of his relative duties to the queen and to Essex, no man was a more competent judge than Bacon: no man was better, none so well grounded in the true rules of this difficult part of moral science. In his tract on Duty, in the Advancement of Learning, he truly says, "There is formed in every thing a double nature of good; the one as every thing is a total or substantive in itself, the other