The works of Francis Bacon, lord chancellor of England.

LETTERS FROM BIRCH. 95
yet was it no manner of diminution to their power ted to the subcommissioners, touching the repair
or greatness. and improvement of your majesty's means: and
My second prayer is, that your majesty, in this I have done, not only in meeting, and conrespect of the hasty freeing of your estate, ference, and debate with the rest, but also by my
would not descend to any means, or degree of several and private meditation and inquiry: so
means, which carrieth not a symmetry with your that, besides the joint account, which we shall
majesty and greatness. He is gone from whom give to the lords, I hope I shall be able to give
those courses did wholly flow. So have your your majesty somewhat ex pro prio. For as no
wants and necessities in particular, as it were, man loveth better consulere in commune than I
hanged up in two tablets before the eyes of your do; neither am I of those fine ones that use to
Lords and Commons, to be talked of for four keep back any thing, wherein they think they
months together; to have all your courses, to may win credit apart, and so make the consultahelp yourself in revenue or profit, put into printed tion almost inutile. So, nevertheless, in cases
books, which were wont to be held arcana where matters shall fall upon the by, perhaps of
inmperii; to have such worms of aldermen, to no less worth than that, which is the proper sublend for ten in the hundred upon good assurance, ject of the consultation; or where I find things
and with such * -, as if it should save the bark passed over too slightly, or in cases where that,
of your fortune; to contract still where might be which I should advise, is of that nature, as I
had the readiest payment, and not the best bar- hold it not fit to be communicated to all those
gain; to stir a number of projects for your profit, with whom I am joined; these parts of business
and then to blast them, and leave your majesty I put to my private account; not because I would
nothing but the scandal of them; to pretend an be officious, (though I profess I would do works
even carriage between your majesty's rights and of supererogation if I could,) but in a true discrethe ease of the people, and to satisfy neither. tion and caution. And your majesty had some
These courses, and others the like, I hope, are taste in those notes which I gave you for the
gone with the deviser of them, which have turned wards, (which it pleased you to say, were no
your majesty to inestimable prejudice.* tricks nor novelties, but true passages of busiI hope your majesty will pardon my liberty of ness,) that mine own particular remembrances
writing. I know these things are majora quamn and observations are not like to be unprofitable.
profortund: but they are minora quamepro studio Concerning which notes for the wards, though I
et voluntate. I assure myself, your majesty might say, sic vos non vobis, yet let that pass.
taketh not me for one of a busy nature; for my I have also considered fully, of that great prostate being free from all difficulties, and I having position which your majesty commended to my
such a large field for contemplations, as I have care and study, touching the conversion of your
partly, and shall much more make manifest to revenue cf land into a multiplied present revenue
your majesty and the world, to occupy my of rent: wherein, I say, I have considered of the
thoughts, nothing could make me active but love means and course to be taken of the assurance,
and affection. So, praying my God to bless and of the rates, of the exceptions, and of the argufavour your person and estate, &c. ments for and against it. For, though the project
itself be as old as I can remember, and falleth
under every man's capacity, yet the dispute and
manage of it, asketh a great deal of consideration and judgment; projects being, like 2Esop's
TO THE KING. tongues, the best meat and the worst, as- they are
chosen and handled. But surely, ubi deJfciunt
IT MAY PLEASE YOUR EXCELLENT MAJESTY, rermedia ordinaria, recurrendum est ad extraordiI have, with all possible diligence, since your naria. Of this also I am ready to give your
majesty's progress, attended the service commit- majesty an account.
Generally, upon this subject of the repair of
* It will be but justice to the memory of the Earl of Salis- your majesty's means, I beseech your majesty to
bury, to remark, that this disadvantageous character of him, give me leave to make this judgment, that your
by Sir Francis Bacon, seems to have been heightened by
the prejudices of the latter against that able minister, majesty's recovery must be by the medicines of
grounded upon some suspicions, that the earl had not served the Galenists and Arabians, and not of the chyhim with so much zeal as he might have expected from so s or Paracelsi
near a relation, either in Queen Elizabeth's reign, or of that
of her successor. Nor is it any just imputation on his lord- by any one fine extract, or strong water, but by a
ship, that he began to decline in King James the First's good skilful company of a number of ingredients, and
opinion, when his majesty's ill economy occasioned de- those by just weight and proportion and that of
mands on the lord treasurer, which all his skill, in the busi-s o
ness of the finances, could not answer, but which drew some simples, which perhaps of themselves, cr
from him advices and remonstrances still extant, which that in over-great quantity, were little better than
king not being very ready to profit by, conceived some re-poisons but mixed and broken and in just quansentment against his old servant and even retained it against poisons, but, mixed and broken, and in just quar
his memory. tity, are full of virtue. And, -secondly, that as