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are above bona fortuna. If this power to command the persons of his subjects is in the King, then, I say, more reason that their estates should be in his power in this case of defence." He then goes on to examine the statutes and authorities cited on the other side, making very light of them. Magna CHARTA he dismisses with the observation, that to the enactment " nullum tallagium imponatur nisi per commune concilium," there is the implied exception, unless for the public good. To the statute 25 Ed. 1. c. 5., and all subsequent statutes on the subject he gives the answer, that "acts of parliament may take away flowers and ornaments of the Crown, but not the Crown itself. No act of parliament can bar a King of his regality, or his trust and power to defend his subjects; therefore, acts of parliament to take away his royal power in the defence of his kingdom are void. They are void if they profess to take away the power of the King to command the persons, goods, and money of his subjects: no acts of parliament make any dif ference." The Petition of Right" he treats with great contempt, -on the ground that, from having been Speaker when it passed, he knew there was no intention thereby to alter the old law. With text writers, of course, he is very unceremonious. Fortescue, he says, is entitled to no weight, because the treatise "De Laudibus" was written during the wars of York and Lancaster, when the author was in exile, and wished to please the people, and to return to his own country. After getting rid of all the authorities in a similar manner, he arrives at the conclusion, "that the King has a clear right, in case of danger, to impose a tax for the defence of the realm;—that the expectancy of danger is sufficient ground for the King to charge his subjects;-that the King is the sole judge of the danger;-that the King's averment of danger is not traversable,--and therefore that the defendant was bound to pay the sum assessed upon him."*

Lord Clarendon says-" Undoubtedly my Lord Finch's speech in the Exchequer Chamber made ship-money much more abhorred and formidable than all the commitments by the Council table, and all the distresses taken by the Sheriffs of England: the major part of men (besides the common unconcernedness in other men's sufferings) looking upon those proceedings with a kind of applause to themselves, to see other men punished for not doing as they had done;-which delight was quickly determined when they found their own interest, by the unuecessary logic of that argument, no less concluded than Mr. Hampden's.

But this logic endeared him to the Court, and ensured him farther preferment as soon as any opportunity should occur. In the meanwhile he strengthened his claim by his conduct in the Star Chamber, where, having been made a Privy Councillor, he now acted as a Judge. We may take, as an example, his proof that he would not be swayed by private considerations to spare an old

* 3 St. Tr. 1216.

acquaintance, when he proposed an aggravation to the punishment of Prynne, whom he had known well at the bar. The Court having agreed that, for a new libel which he had published along with Bastwick and Burton, "he should stand in the pillory, lose his ears, pay a fine of 5000, and be perpetually imprisoned in a distant fortress," the Chief Justice moved, by way of amendment, "that he should likewise be stigmatised in the cheeks with the two letters S. and L. for a Seditious Libeller,"-to which all the Lords agreed.*

He likewise distinguished himself in pressing for severe punishment on Bishop Williams, when that Prelate was the second time brought before the Star Chamber on pretences more frivolous than the first, although he had then rather taken the part of the defendant, not aware that he was so odious to the government. Being now reproached for his inconsistency, he replied with candour,"I was soundly chidden by his Majesty for my former vote; and I will not destroy myself for any man's sake.Ӡ

At last, on the death of Lord Keeper Coventry, Finch's ambition was fully gratified. That event having happened on the 13th of January, 1640, on the 17th of the same month the Great Seal was delivered to him as Lord Keeper, and on the 23rd, the first day of Hilary term, he was installed with great pomp in the Court of Chancery, and was raised to the peerage by the title of Baron Finch of Fordwich.‡

This appointment caused great dismay at the time, as a proof of the spirit which still actuated the King's coun[A. D. 1640.] cils, even after the difficulties in which he had been involved by his arbitrary government, and after he had found it absolutely necessary again to summon a parliament. Modern historians, even those who are impartial, pass over the promotion of Finch at this juncture without a censure,-and with Hume he is a decided favourite.

He held the Great Seal little more than three terms, and during this short space of time the proceedings in the Courts of justice were much interrupted by political disputes, so that we do not know much of him as an Equity Judge; but we have an account of one of his early cases, showing that his legal and equitable principles corresponded, and that he acted in an enlarged sense on the doctrine that "equity follows the law. equity follows the law." A bill was filed to carry into effect an order of the Lords of the Council, upon a matter over which they had no jurisdiction. The defendant demurred for want of equity, and the demurrer coming on to be argued, Finch decreed for the plaintiff, saying, "that while he was Keeper, no man should be so saucy as to dispute these orders, and that

† Hacket's Life of Williams.

* 3 St. Tr. 75. ‡ Crown Office Minutes, Book, fol. 1. He had the extraordinary honour, when he was sworn, of having the book held for him by the Bishop of London, Lord Treasurer, and so had his successor, Littleton. On all other occasions of this sort the book is stated to have been held by the Master of the Rolls.

the wisdom of the board should be always ground enough for him to make a decree in Chancery.”*

When Easter term came round he was called away to preside in the House of Lords. Parliaments having now been intermitted above eleven years, the very forms of proceeding were almost forgotten, and none of the officers knew the duties they had to perform. The Lord Keeper was answerable for all, and much time was occupied in inquiries and preparations. The public looked forward with eager expectation to a redress of grievances, but the Court had resolved that the attention of both Houses should be' confined to the granting of supplies.

There was a grand procession the first day of the Session, and the people, delighted once more to witness such [APRIL 13, 1640.] a spectacle, were so good-humoured and grateful, that the less penetrating expected a happy result. The King being seated on his throne, and the Commons attending at the bar of the House of Lords, he merely said, "that never King had a more great and weighty cause to call his people together, but that he would not trouble them with the particulars, which they would hear from the Lord Keeper."

Finch began by celebrating the goodness of the King in calling a parliament, notwithstanding the memory of former discouragements, but strongly deprecated their interference with affairs of government. "His Majesty's kingly resolutions are seated in the ark of his sacred breast, and it were a presumption of too high a nature for any Uzziah, uncalled, to touch it.” He then warned them by the example of Phaeton, not to aim at that of which they were incapable. "Let us beware how, with the son of Clymene, we aim not at the guiding of the chariot, as if that were the only testimony of fatherly affection, but let us ever remember that though the King sometimes lays by the beams and rays of Majesty, he never lays by Majesty itself." After taking a view of the foreign relations of the country, which he justly represented as highly satisfactory, he says, "But what availeth this, si foris hosHe launches out into a tem non inveniat, si modo domi inveniat ?” bitter invective against the Scots, who had made a most ungrateful return for all the King's affection and bounty. "For when his Majesty had most reason to expect a grateful return of loyalty and obedience from that nation, some men of Belial, some Zelia hath blown the trumpet there, and by their insolences and rebellious actions draw many after them, to the utter desertion of his Majesty's government. Following the wicked counsels of some Achitophels, they have seized on the trophies of honour, and invested themselves with regal power and authority." He draws a striking contrast between Scotland and Ireland, where all was loyalty and obedience, and the parliament had lately voted large subsidies to assist his Majesty in restoring tranquillity in this island.

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He desires the English parliament to follow so good an example, and, "for a while laying aside all other debates, to pass such and so many subsidies as should be thought fit and convenient for so great an occasion." To avoid all question about tonnage and poundage, he said his Majesty had caused a bill to be prepared to authorise the collection of the tax from the commencement of his reign. This was the only concession alluded to; but he assured them, that "after the grant of such a supply as the urgency of the King's affairs instantly required, which he would accept as the pledge of their loving, happy, and dutiful affection to him, his person, and government, they should afterwards have an abundant opportunity for considering of such petitions as they should conceive for the good of the commonwealth."*

But the Commons, instead of yielding to this request on the faith of this promise, immediately fell upon grievances,―shipmoney, the levying of duties on merchandise without the authority of parliament,-the cruelties of the Star Chamber and High Commission Court,-the breach of the privilege of the House in prosecuting and punishing members for words spoken in the House. Above all, they took up with earnestness the conduct of the Lord Keeper Finch, when Speaker of the House of Commons, on the last day of the last parliament. Sir Harry Vane gave a circumstantial account, from notes taken at the time, of the whole transaction, and of the Speaker's expressions, "that he dared not put the question, that he was commanded not to put the question, and that they should not force him to his ruin." A motion was thereupon made and carried, that a select committee be appointed to prepare a representation to his Majesty of the violation of the liberties of this House that happened the last day of the last parliament, humbly beseeching his Majesty "that the like violation may not hereafter be brought in practice to his prejudice or theirs." And a resolution was carried, “that it is the opinion of this House, that the Speaker's refusing to put the question after a verbal command from his Majesty, signified to this House by the Speaker, to adjourn, and no adjournment made by this House, is a breach of the privileges of this House."

The Lord Keeper thought that all these mutinous dispositions might be quelled by a proper display of vigour. Accordingly, on the 20th of April, both Houses were summoned to attend in the banqueting house at Whitehall, and there, in the King's presence, he read a lecture upon the necessity of giving supply precedence over grievances; but the Commons were obstinate, and on returning to their Chamber after a long debate, resolved to prefer grievances to supply. Charles then, without the Lord Keeper's advice or privity, took one of those rash steps which led to such fatal consequences in the dispute now commencing. He came suddenly into the House of Lords, and seating himself in his chair of

* 2 Parl. Hist. 529.

state without his robes, he addressed the Peers, and solicited their good offices in prevailing on the Commons to grant an immediate supply. When he withdrew, the Lords, flattered by his appeal to them, immediately agreed, on the motion of the Lord Keeper, "that the supply should have precedency, and be resolved upon before any other matter whatsoever, and that there should be a conference desired with the Commons in order to dispose them thereto."

The Commons having agreed to the conference, it was managed on the part of the Lords by the Lord Keeper, who strongly urged the Commons to postpone the consideration of their supposed grievances, reminding them that "they had the word of a King, and not only so but of a gentleman,”* for all they required respecting religion, property, and privilege. "Lastly, he told the Commons that the Lords had voted and declared as their opinion, that his Majesty's supply should have precedency and be resolved on before any other matter whatsoever; therefore he desired the House of Commons to go on with that first, as that which in the opinion of the House of Lords is held most necessary."+

As might easily have been foreseen, the Commons were highly incensed by these proceedings, and came to a re

solution "that their Lordships voting, propounding, [A. D. 1640.] and declaring, concerning matter of supply before it was moved from this House, was a breach of privilege, and that a remonstrance should be sent to the Lords to this effect; and the Lords voted a counter-resolution, that their merely expressing an opinion on the order in which the subject of supply should be considered, was no breach of the privileges of the Commons.”

Under the advice of Pym and Waller the Commons still insisted on proceeding with grievances. The King sent them two other messages to hasten the supply, and finding [MAY 5.] them inflexible,-by the rash and ruinous advice of the Lord Keeper, he suddenly made his appearance on the throne, and having praised the Lords and severely censured the Commons, abruptly dissolved the parliament, from which such national benefits had been expected. ` This measure is deeply deplored by Clarendon, who truly says that there never was a parliament in which Charles had so many true friends, and there can be no doubt that if he had evinced any sincere disposition to correct the errors of his government, an adequate supply would readily have been granted to him, the Scottish insurrection would have been suppressed, and he would soon have been relieved from all his difficulties. Again, had Strafford been at hand, the business would have been conducted with more dexterity, and there would have been a fair chance of success to arbitrary rule. But that able minister being in Ireland, a country then as distant from us for practical purposes as America now is, Charles was left with such

* One of the earliest instances of "gentleman" being used in this sense. † 2 Parl. Hist. 563.

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