Page:The Works of Francis Bacon (1884) Volume 1.djvu/510

 HISTORY OF KING HENRY VII. _et down his prerogative to his parliament. For mint, and wars, and martial discipline, things of absolute power, he would nevertheless bring to parliament. Justice was well administered in his time, save where the king was party : save also, that the council-table intermeddled too much with &quot; meum&quot; and &quot; tuum.&quot; For it was a very court of justice during his time, especially in the beginning; but in that part both of justice and policy, which is the durable part, and cut, as it were, in brass or marble, which is the making of good laws, he did excel. And with his justice, he was also a merciful prince : as in whose time, there were but three of the nobility that suffered ; the Earl of Warwick, the lord chamberlain, and the Lord Audley : though the first two were instead of numbers, in the dislike and obloquy of the people. But there were never so great rebellions, expiated with so little blood, drawn by the hand of justice, as the two rebellions of Blackheath and Exeter. As for the severity used upon those which were taken in Kent, it was but upon a scum of people. His pardons went ever both before and after his sword. But then he had withal a strange kind of interchang ing of large and unexpected pardons, with severe executions; which, his wisdom considered, could not be imputed to any inconstancy or inequality ; but either to some reason which we do not now know, or to a principle he had set unto himself, that he would vary, and try both ways in turn. But the less blood he drew, the more he took of treasure. And, as some construed it, he was the more sparing in the one, that he might be the more pressing in the other ; for both would have been intolerable. Of nature assuredly he coveted to accumulate treasure, and was a little poor in admiring riches. The people, into whom there is infused, for the preservation of monarchies, a natural desire to discharge their princes, though it be with the unjust charge of their counsellors and ministers, did impute this unto Cardinal Morton and Sir Reginald Bray, who, as it after appeared, as counsellors of ancient authority with him, did so second his humours, as nevertheless they did temper them. Whereas Empson and Dudley that followed, being persons that had no reputa tion with him, otherwise than by the servile fol lowing of his bent, did not give way only, as the first did, but shape him way to those extremities, for which himself was touched with remorse at his death, and which his successor renounced, and sousrht to purge. This excess of his had at that time many glosses and interpretations. Some thought the continual rebellions wherewith .-.e had been vexed, had made him grow to hate his people: some thought it was done to pull down their stomachs, and to keep them low: some, for that he would leave his son a golden iWce: some suspected he had some high design &amp;gt;ipon forfigr parts : hut those perhaps shall come nearest the truth, that fetch not their reasons so far off: but rather impute it to nature, age, peace, and a mind fixed upon no other ambition or pur suit. Whereunto I should add, that having every day occasion to take notice of the necessities and shifts for money of other great princes abroad, it did the better, by comparison, set off to him the felicity of full coffers. As to his expending of treasure, he never spared charge which his affairs required : and in his buildings was magnificent, but his rewards were very limited : so that his liberality was rather upon his own state and memory, than upon the deserts of others. He was of a high mind, and loved his own will, and his own way ; as one that revered him self, and would reign indeed. Had he been a private man, he would have been termed proud. But in a wise prince, it was but keeping of dis tance, which indeed he did towards all ; not ad mitting any near or full approach, either to his power, or to his secrets, for he was governed by none. His queen, notwithstanding she had pre sented him with divers children, and with a crown also, though he would not acknowledge it, could do nothing with him. His mother he reverenced much, heard little. For any person agreeable to him for society, such as was Hastings to King Edward the Fourth, or Charles Brandon after to King Henry the Eighth, he had none : except we should account for such persons, Fox, and Bray, and Empson, because they were so much with him : but it was but as the instrument is much with the workman. He had nothing in him of vainglory, but yet kept state and majesty to the height ; being sensible, that majesty maketh the people bow, but vainglory boweth to them. To his confederates abroad he was constant and just, but not open. But rather such was his inquiry, and such his closeness, as they stood in the light towards him, and he stood in the dark to them. Yet without strangeness, but with a semblance of mutual communication of affairs. As for little envies, or emulations upon foreign princes, which are frequent with many kings, he had never any : but went substantially to his own business. Certain it is, that though his reputa tion was great at home, yet it was greater abroad. For foreigners that could not see the passages of affairs, but made their judgments upon the issues of them, noted that he was ever in strife, and ever aloft. It grew also from the airs which the princes and states abroad received from their ambassadors and agents here; which were at tending the court in great number: whom he did not only content with courtesy, reward, and pri- vateness : but, upon such conferences as passed with them, put them in admiration, to find his universal insight into the affairs of the world: which though he did suck chiefly from them selves, yet that which he had gathered from them all, seemed admirable to every one. So that they