Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/249

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Coke
243
Coke

by Butler; 14th, 1789; 15th, 3 vols. 8vo (previous editions are in folio), 1794; 16th, 3 vols. 1809; 17th, 2 vols. 1817; 18th, 2 vols. 1823; 19th, 2 vols. 1832. Among the American editions is a reprint, with additions by Day, of the 15th in 1812, and a reprint with additions by Small of the 19th in 1853. There are many abridgments, &c.; among them: 'A systematic arrangement of Lord Coke's First Institute, . . . on the plan of Sir Matthew Bale's Analysis,' by J. H. Thomas, 3 vols. 1818; 'A readable edition of Coke upon Littleton,' omitting obsolete matter, by Coventry, 1830; Serjeant Hawkins's 'Abridgment,' 8th edition, by Rudall, 1822. 4. 'The Second Part of the Institutes . . . containing the exposition of many ancient and other statutes.' This and the 3rd part were finished in 1628; for the fourth he had collected materials (see pref. to 1st Inst.) Ordered by the House of Commons, 12 May 1641, that Coke's heir should 'publish in print the commentary on Magna Charta, the Plees of the Crowne, and the jurisdiction of courts, according to the intention of the said Sir Edward Coke.' Separate editions: 1642, 1662, 1664, 1669, 1671, 1681, all in folio. Published, with the 3rd and 4th parts, in 8vo, 1797, 1809, 1817 (last edition). 5. 'The Third Part of the Institutes . . . concerning high treason, and other pleas of the crown, and criminal causes.' Separate editions: 1644, 1648, 1660, 1669, 1670, 1680, all in folio. 6. 'The Fourth Part of the Institutes . . . concerning the jurisdiction of courts.' Separate editions: 1644, 1648, 1660, 1669, 1671, 1681, all in folio. Many errors are pointed out in Prynne's 'Brief Animadversions on the Fourth Part of the Institutes, &c.' (1659). 7. 'The Compleat Copyholder, being a learned discourse of the antiquity and nature of manors and copy-holds with all things thereto incident,' 4to, 1630, 1640, 1641, 1644, 1650 (with Calthorp's reading 'between the lord of a manor and a copyholder, his tenant, and the orders of keeping a court leet and court baron), 8vo, 1668 (with supplement 1673), and in editions 10 to 12 of 1 Inst. Reprinted in Hawkins's 'Law Tracts,' 1764. 8. 'A Little Treatise of Bail and Mainprize,' written at the request of Sir William Hayden, 4to, 1635, 1637, 1715 (Brit. Mus.); also in editions 9 to 12 of 1 Inst., and in Hawkins's 'Law Tracts.' 9. 'Le Reading del mon Seignior Coke sur 1'estatute de 27 Edw. I appells 1'estatute de Finibus Levatis,' 4to, 1662; also in editions 9 to 12 of 1 Inst., and in Hawkins's 'Law Tracts.' 10. 'The Lord Coke, his Speech and Charge at the Norwich Assizes,' 4to, 1607.' Coke himself describes it (pref. to 7 Rep.) as 'libellum quendam, nescio an rudem et inconcinnum magis . . . quern sane contest ornon solum meomnino insciente fuisse divulgatum, sed (omissis etiam ipsis potissimis) ne unam quidem sententiolam eo sensu et significatione, prout dicta erat, fuisse enarratam.' 11. 'Discourse on the Unlawfulness of Private Combats' (Gutch's Collect. Cur. i. 9; Wallace's Reporters; Bridgeman's Legal Bibliog.; Marvin, Soule, Lowndes, Brit. Mus. Cat.)

What Roger Coke calls the copy of his commentary of Littleton, with the history of his life before it, is now in the British Museum (Harl. MS. 6687). It does not contain the commentary in its final form, but seems rather to have been a general notebook, mostly written at an earlier period of his life. Besides memoranda of his life, chiefly relating to the offices which he held and to the births of his many children, it comprises a copy of Littleton's 'Tenures,' with profuse notes in French; historical observations; a treatise on pleading, &c. The personal notes are printed in 'Collect. Top. et Gen.' vi. 100. Among the Holkham MSS. (727) is another biographical note-book, containing additional facts, and written partly in Coke's own hand (see Hist. MSS. Comm. 9th Rep. 373). A treatise on ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and a letter to the princes and states of Germany warning them of dangers impending from the house of Burgundy and the Spanish monarchy (Holkham MS. 677). On serjeanties of sundry times, from the records in the Tower, supposed to be by Coke (Hist. MSS. Comm. 3rd Rep. 201). Various manuscripts in British Museum, including a speech in the Inner Temple Hall, 1614 (Add. MS. 22591, f. 93 b), and a statement of his religious faith (ib. f. 289). In a letter of 1605, Coke says that he has almost finished his book proving that the king's right to the jurisdiction ecclesiastical throughout his realms is declared by ancient laws, and not merely by those of Henry VIII and later (8. P. D. xiii. 210); and, writing in 1607, Chamberlain mentions a pamphlet of Coke's which was suppressed the day after publication, but does not name its subject (ib. xxvi. 348). Still later is calendared among the State Papers, out of Laud's possession, a 'treatise of Sir Edward Coke on the power assumed by the clergy not only in convocation to make laws and canons for the government of the church, but also to put them in execution as laws ecclesiastical, and to imprison, deprive, and put the subjects out of their freehold by colour of the same' (ib. cclv. 344). This is evidently MS. 2440 in Queen's College, Oxford, mentioned in Johnson's 'Life,