QlnrttpU ICatu ^rl^nol ICtbrary iHaraljaU iEquity (EollEttion (Sift of IE. 31. ilarsljaU, iC.ffi. 1. 1B94 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 1924 084 250 335 Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924084250335 Ea?; by W WeLI:icG...j tltwYif VJl'l^^lS' fLAKtP'flEIL LIVES OF THE LORD CHANCELLORS AND KEEPERS OF THE GREAT SEAL OF ENGLAND, FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TILL THE REIGN OF QUEEN VICTORIA, BY LORD CAMPBELL. SEVENTTI EDITION. ILLUSTRATED, VOL. I. NEW YORK: COCKCROFT & COMPANY, 1878. PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. " A NEW Edition of " The Lives of the Chancellors being called for, I have employed this Long Vacation in carefully revising the whole work, and I now offer it to the public in as perfect a state as I can hope that it may ever attain. The minute criticisms which it has under- gone in print, the private communications which I have received from friendly readers, and my own subsequent researches, have enabled me to correct various mistakes in the text, and to enrich the notes with valuable illustra- tions and references. As I despair of further improvements, the work is now stereotyped. I should have been glad if there had been no change in the appearance of the page or the number of the volumes ; but, with a view to make it accessible to all who may have a taste for such reading, I have fol- lowed the example of my distinguished friend Mr. Hal- lam, and adopted a form of publication which admits of a considerable reduction in price, and, avoiding double columns, may be agreeable to the eye of the reader. In ticking a final leave of the public as author of this work. I beg leave respectfully to proffer my warm and sincere thanks for the Mnd manner in whrch it has been received by the English nation, and by our brethren in the United States of America, where it has been often reprinted, and has been praised beyond its merits. Hartrigge, Roxburghshire, October zs, zSjd. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. When suddenly freed, in the autumn of 1841, from pro- fessional and official occupations, I revelled for a while in the resumption of my classical studies, and in the miscel- laneous perusal of modern authors. By degrees I began to perceive the want of a definite object : I recollected what Lord Coke and Lord Bacon say of the debt due from every successful lawyer to his profession ; and I felt within me a revival of the aspiration after literary fame, which, in my most busy days, I was never able entirely to ex- tinguish. Having amused myself with revising for the press " a Selection of my Speeches at the Bar and in the House of Commons," I resolved to write " The Lives of THE Chancellors." It is fof others to judge how this work is executed, but I am more and more convinced that the subject is happily chosen. " HISTORIES," says Lord Bacon, " do rather set forth the pomp of business than the true and inward re- sorts thereof. But LIVES, if th»y be well written, pro- pounding to themselves a person to represent, in whom actions both greater and smaller, public and private, have a commixture, must of necessity contain a more true, native, and lively representation."' In writing the lives of those who have successively filled a great office there ! yVf!yf^'l??W?"' 9f Learning. PREFACE. vii is unity of design as well as variety of character and inci- dent, and there is no office in the history of any nation that has been filled with such a long succession of distin- guished and interesting men as the office of Lord Chan- callor or Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England. It has existed from the foundation of the monarchy ; and although mediocrity has sometimes been the. recommen- dation for it,—generally speaking, the most eminent men of the age, if not the most virtuous, have been selected to adorn it. To an English statesman as well as an Eng- lish lawyer the narrative ought to be particularly instruc- tive, for the history of the holders of the Great Seal is the history of our constitution as well as of our jurispru- dence. There \s even a sort of romance belonging to the true tale of many of those who are to be delineated, and the strange vicissitudes of their career are not exceeded by the fictions of novelists or dramatists. I foresaw the difficulties that would beset me—some- times from the want and sometimes from the superfluity, of materials. Struggling with these, I have attempted to present to the reader a clear and authentic account of all who have held the Great Seal of England from the earliest times—adapting the scale of my narrative to the varying importance of what is to be told, and trying as I proceed to give a glimpse of the most important histori- cal events, and of the manners of the age. If I have failed, it will not have been for the want of generous assistance. I wish to speak with the most heart- felt gratitude of the kindness which I have experienced. I have been treated like a shipwrecked mariner cast on a friendly shore—every one eagerly desirous to comfort and to cherish him. In not one single instance since I entered on the undertaking, when I have applied for assistance, have I met with a rebuff; on the contrary, the most eager and disinterested disposition has been evinced to oblige me. Such good offices I have to boast of, not less from — viii PREFACE. political opponents than from political associates, and my thanks are peculiarly due to many clergymen of .the Church of England to whom I was personally unknown, and who have devoted much time and trouble in furnish- ing me with extracts from parish registers, copies of epitaphs, and other local information. In rapidly traveling through a period of above a thou- sand years, I am well aware that I must have committed many mistakes, and have passed by, without discovering, much interesting matter. I shall receive very thankfully any information with which I may be favored, either pri- vately or in print, to enable me to correct errors and to supply omissions. I hope that I have shown myself free -from any party or sectarian bias. The great principles of civil and re- ligious liberty I ever wish boldly to avow, and resolutely to maintain ; but I believe that I have fairly appreciated the acts and characters of those whose Lives I have had in hand, without being swayed by the consideration whether they were Roman Catholics or Protestants Whigs or Tories. I must request the candid' reader not to judge by any particular expression, or any particular Life, but by the whole scope and tendency of the work. Horace Walpole seeks to deter all who have ever touched a Great Seal from engaging in such a task, by observing, after his criticisms on the historical labors of Sir Thomas More, Lord Bacon, and Lord Clarendon, "It is hoped no more Chancellors will write our story till they can divest themselves of that habit of their profes- sion— apologising for a bad cause.'" My object has been uniformly to reprobate violence and fraud, and to hold up integrity and consistency for applause and imitation. I regret the length into which I have been drawn ; but, after a careful revision, I have found little that I could omit without injury to my design ; and when due regard ' Historic Doubts. PREFACE. ix is had to the number of persons whose history was to be narrated, and to the multitudinous facts to be introduced, I am not without hopes that I may receive some credit for condensation. It will be seen that this " First Series " comes down to the Revolution of t688. I was advised to begin with the Chancellors during the eighteenth century, and to travel back, after the precedent of Hume. Such a plan would have had advantages, the recent Lives being gen- erally considered the most interesting ; but as I profess to give the historj' of our jurisprudence, I thought that I should best succeed by starting from its sources, and following the course which it has run. I calculate that the work will be completed in two ad- ditional volumes, for which I have already made consider- able preparations, and which, if my life and strength be preserved to me, I shall ere long lay before the public. Little interruption to study is offered by the political bu- siness of the House of the Lords, and although I resolve still regularly to attend the hearing of Appeals and Writs of Error there, and the meetings of the Judicial Commit- tee of the Privy Council, a considerable portion of the year is left entirely under 'my own control. That the *' Second Series " may be less defective, I earnestly re- quest the communication of any scarce tracts' or "unpub- lished MSS. which are likely to be of s,|rvice to me. If the work should be worthily finished, my ambition is, that it may amuse frhe general reader ; that it "may afford some instruction to those who wish to become well acquainted with our constitutional history ; and above all, that it may excite the young student of the law to emu- lation and industry, and confirm in his mind the liberal and honorable maxims which ought ever to govern the conduct of an English Barrister.