The next head of civil grievances was comprised in the high court of star chamber, which some think succeeded that which in the parliament rolls is called magnum concilium, and to which parliaments were wont so often to refer those important matters which they had no time to determine. But now this court, which in the late restoration or erection of it in Henry VII.'s time, was especially designed to restrain the oppression of great men, and to remove the obstructions and impediments of the law,—this, which is both a court of counsel and a court of justice, hath been made an instrument of erecting, and defending monopolies and other grievances; to set a face of right upon those things which are unlawful in their own nature, a face of public good upon such as are pernicious in their use and execution. The soap patent and divers other evidences thereof may be given, so well known as not to require a particular relation. And as if this were not enough, this court hath lately intermeddled with the ship money! Divers sheriffs have been questioned for not levying and collecting such sums as their counties have been charged with; and if this beginning be not prevented, the star chamber will become a court of revenue, and it shall be made a crime not to collect or pay such taxes as the State shall require!
The eleventh head of civil grievances was now come to. He said, he was gone very high, yet he must go a little higher. That great and most
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