which I am devoted. Your grace's thrice humble J. ELIOT."

servant.

"Novemb. 8. 1623."1

Now, not a single expression in this letter is inconsistent with the construction which I have placed on it, or justly appropriate to any other construction. The complimentary phrases fall evidently short of the notorious custom of the time. I am, indeed, surprised at the bareness of the language, considering the year in which it was written. Buckingham had just then managed to conciliate the country party2, and was bespattered with praise in all directions. The people, freed from the political panic that had been caused by the prospect of the Spanish match, in the suddenness of the escape showered applauses on the masked duke; and sir Edward Coke, leading the opposition in the house of commons, was betrayed shortly after into the very professional hyperbole of calling him the "saviour of his country."3 Had the terms of Eliot's letter, therefore, been most adulatory, there would have existed little cause for wonder: we see that they are not so. Whether the letter was answered or not, appears uncertain; but the acquaintance of the parties did not cease here, as I shall have occasion to indicate hereafter. 4 One word more on this subject. Mr. D'Israeli, alluding to the date of this letter, calls it "the close of 15235," which would intimate that parliament had already commenced its sitting; and then goes on to tell his readers, that the patriotism of Eliot was a "political revolution, which did not happen till two years after he had been a suppliant to this very minister." This is most untrue. The letter was written in the eighth month of 1623 (old style), two months before the assembling of parliament; and in that parliament the voice of Eliot was heard, in stirring accents of honest patriotism. Though none of his speeches at this period have been preserved in the parliamentary histories, I am prepared to prove, from the journals of the house of commons, and from manuscript records, that no " political revolution" ever occurred in his life; that he was consistent from the first; that his eloquence was often exerted in that last assembly of James's reign, and never but in support of the great party for whose rights and privileges he afterwards suffered death.

A few words may here be allowed to me, on the aspect of public affairs at the meeting of this parliament, which introduced Eliot to public life.2 I shall always avoid, in these biographies, matters of general history or character, except so far as may be needed in illustration of individual conduct, or of those particular questions which called forth its distinctive energies. That individual conduct shall also be limited, as much as possible, to the subject of each life. Thus, in the present instance, I have nothing to do with the great men who laboured in the same cause with Eliot, except as their general policy and characteristics illustrate his exertions. I have nothing to do with the great questions they agitated, except in so far as they called forth his individual energies: what remains will be noticed in other biographies; nor shall I seek in vain the opportunity of observing upon any great incident of this great era of statesmanship. The first object will in all cases be, to carry light and life into general history, by particular details of character.

The ignominious defeat of the elector palatine by Spinola, and the circumstances which ought especially to have induced James to render assistance to his weak but unfortunate son-in-law, belong to history. In not doing so, he subjected himself to the derision of Europe 2, and to the self-reproach (if he were able to have felt it) of having sacrificed the noblest opportunity of making himself popular in his own nation, and honoured every where, as the asserter of civil and religious liberty. But he was bound in the fetters of Spain, and had set his foolish heart on a match for the prince with the infanta. This was a politic bait thrown out by that wily country, and greedily seized by the king. It was intended as a means of dragging the pusillanimous James into the league with the house of Austria, for oppressing the protestants, and invading the liberties of Germany. It succeeded. The people of England saw their brother protestants abroad hunted down by tyrants; they saw the evangelical league broken and discomfited by the Roman catholic union; themselves made parties to the wrong which they abhorred, and enemies to that holy cause of freedom and of conscience, on which, at home, they had staked all. Discontent rose to a frightful pitch, and the person of the king was even threatened. At this moment the tide of affairs was suddenly turned; and the man who had resisted the outcries of an insulted nation, yielded to the peevish complaints of a haughty and offended minion.

Jealousy of Bristol's negotiations had resolved Buckingham to carry the prince to Spain; jealousy of the wily archbishop Williams now induced him to wish for home. Moreover, he had been neglected in that stately country, not to say insulted, for his levity and profligate bearing. A deadly jealousy had also risen between him and the Spanish minister, Olivarez; and he began to feel that, in proportion as the edifice of his power was lofty, it was unstable. He saw an expedient for securing it on a wider and more solid basis, and straightway seized it. He effected a rupture, and hurried the prince home, whither the welcome news of this new policy had travelled before, securing them an enthusiastic welcome. The unaccustomed acclamations wafted a new sense into the all-grasping soul of Buckingham; and, resolving to try the game of patriotism, he forced the king to summon a parliament. He threw himself into the arms of the (deceived) popular party, and drove the unhappy James from his boasted "kingcraft," into a declaration of war against Spain. 1

The parliament assembled, with hopes never before entertained. The dissolution of the Spanish treaty was justly considered a great national deliverance; and the favourite of James, who had disrobed him of his inglorious mantle of peace, was now the favourite of the nation. At this extraordinary juncture, Eliot took his seat in the house of commons.

It has been asserted by Wood2 and others, that he sat in the previous parliament; but this is certainly a mistake. He was returned now for the first time, with Mr. Richard Estcourt, for the borough of Newport, in Cornwall.

And now, from the first moment of his public life,

The keenest dissection, as it appears to me, of the conduct of Buck ingham and the prince, throughout the whole of this Spanish affair, will be found in a work very recently published in the present series, - History of England, vol. iv., continued from sir James Mackintosh.

2 Wood is seldom to be relied on in any date, except those which are furnished by the Oxford books: -lord Nugent has inaccurately adopted his statement that Eliot sat in the parliament of 1621.

his patriotism began, - not from pique, or a spirit of opposition - for as yet he had no opponents, save those of his religion and his country. For be it ever remembered, that, in that day, politics were necessarily and intimately connected with religious doctrine. The Romish cause was the cause of the oppressor, while the protestant was that of the oppressed; and the English constitutional party saw no chance for good government, save in a root-and-branch opposition to the Roman catholic faith. Their cause of freedom at home was weakened by the success of popish tyranny abroad; and the great struggle going on between the protestant patriots of Bohemia, and the various Roman catholic powers leagued in extensive confederacy against them, seemed a not improbable shadowing forth of the future destiny of the popular party in England. So thought the leaders of this parliament, - "the greatest and the knowingest auditory," as a political adversary called them, "that this kingdom, or perhaps the world, afforded1;" and so they acted, confirming that great reputation.

Eliot at once distinguished himself, and was received as a leader of the country party. I have been at some pains to trace his conduct through this parliament, for it has not been mentioned by any historian; whilst advantage has been taken of the silence, to bear out the assertion of his having been, at this period, a mere undistinguished subserver to the duke of Buckingham. We shall see how far this is just.

The parliament met on the 12th of February, 1623. It was adjourned, however, until the 19th, when the speech was delivered, and the house further adjourned until the 23d. The three following days were occupied in arranging conferences with the lords, respecting the duke's intended "Narrative." On the 27th, Eliot arose. It was the earliest day of the session, and it was his first appearance in the house. He declared at once the cause he had entered to sustain; and, putting aside, as subordinate, 1 Hacket's Life of Williams, p. 179.