ACCOUNT OF BOOKS.
481
to her judgment feemed a clofe crown, and a cypher which file took to be the king's : and that he difluaded her from going too far in reading the fcriptuie. Some fwore that he loved co converfe with foreigners ; and, as if ridi- culous charges, when multiplied, would amount to one real crime. Sir Richard Southwell affirmed, without fpecifying what, that he knew certain things, which touch- ed the earl's fidelity to the king. The brave young lord vehement- ly afBrmed himfelf a true man, and offered to fight his accufer in his fhirt ; and with great fpirit and ready wit, defended himfelf
againft all the witnefles to little
purpofe ! When fuch accufations could be alledged, they were fure of being thought to be proved. Lord Herbert infinuates, that the earl would not have been con- demned, if he had not been a commoner and tried by a jury. On what could he ground this
favourable opinion of the peers ? What twelve tradel'men could be found more fervile than almoft eve- ry court of peers during that reign ? Was the Duke of Buckingham, was Anne Boleyn condemned by ajury, or by great Lords f *
The duke, better acquainted with the humour of his mafter, or fonder of life as it grew nearer the dregs, figned a moll abject confeflion, in which however the greatell crime he avowed was hav- ing concealed the manner in which
his fon bore his coat-armour
an offence by the way to v/hich. the king himfelf and all the court muft long have been privy. As this is intended as a treatifs of curiojtty, it may not be amifs to mention, that the duke prefented another petition to the Lords, de- firing to have fome books fron> Lambeth, without which he had not been able to recompofe him- felf to fleep for a dozen of years. He defired leave too to buy St.
- The parliaments of that reign were not lefs obfequious than the peers
diftinctively : ' The Countefs of Salifbury,' fays Stowe, in his annals, p. i;8i.
• was condemned in parliament, though fhe was never arraioned nor tried be-
- fore. Catharine Howard was attainted by parliament, and fuflered without
- trial. Cromwell Earl of Eflex, though a lord of parliament, was attainted
• without being heard.' The power granted to the king of regulating tlie fuc- ceffion by his will was an unheard-of abufe. If vve pais from the peers to the lioufe of commons, and from thence to the convocation, vve fliall find that juries by no means delerved to be fligmatized for peculiar fervility. The commons be- fought the king to let hfs marriage with Anne Cleves be inquired into. Thedif- folution of that marriage for fuch abi'urd reafons as his majerty vouchf'afed to give; as her he'ing fio njirgiii^ which it feems he dlfcovered by a peculiar I'ecret of l)is own, without ufing the common method of knowing*; and his whimfical inability, which he pretended to have in vain attempted to remove by taking phyfic the mc-e to enable liim ; that diflblution, I fay, was an inftance of the grolTeft complaifance ; as Cranmer's having before pronounced the divorce fron Anne Boleyn was an effeft of the molt wretched timidity.
• In the cafe of his next nvife it proved ho<vj lad a judge he nvas tf iho/e matters ; nay, Jo bumble did be gronu on that head, and covfequently Jo uncer- tain did his conforming parliament inunediately think that dij'qiiifition, that An aS 'was pajfed to s'olige any luomaa, before fi:e Jhould efpoufe a king. To. dc' clare whether the wu; a virgin or not.
Vol. I. I i Auiltn.
