Since my last to your lordship I did first send to Mr. Attorney General, and made him know that since I heard from court, I was resolved to further the match and conditions thereof, for your Lordship’s brother’s advancement, the best I could.”
He then details his further exertions in the matter; his apprising Lady Hatton and some other special friends that he would in anything declare for the match; his sending Sir John Bulter[[197]] to Lady Compton Villiers to tender his good offices; but even whilst he made these overtures and promises his courage flinched from abetting an event which would give such influence to his old enemy, Coke.
“I did ever foresee,” he writes, “that this alliance would go near to lose me your lordship, that I hold so dear, and that was the only respect particular to myself that moved me to be as I was, till I heard from you. But I will rely on your constancy and nature, and my own deserving, and the firm tie we have in respect of the King’s service.”[[198]]
Well might the writer of this letter complain that Lady Compton Villiers and her son, Sir John, who saw through all his professions, spoke of him with some bitterness and neglect. They were, it appeared, under the influence of Sir Edward Coke, and of Secretary Winwood, the latter of whom Bacon “took to be the worst of his enemies.”[enemies.”] But he resolved “to bear both with Lady Compton Villiers and her son—with her, as a lady; with her son, as a lover”—and ended by the exclamation:—“God keep us from these long journeys and absences, which make misunderstanding, and give advantage to untruth; and ever prosper and preserve your lordship!”
Nevertheless, Bacon is supposed to have been the instigator of certain proceedings in the Star Chamber, which were commenced against Sir Edward Coke, for what was called an outrage; although the carrying his daughter away were an action justifiable by law; and he quickly showed how earnest was his determination to prevent the match, by another letter to Buckingham. In this he complained of the officious busying himself of Secretary Winwood, and asserted that it was done rather to make a faction than out of any great affection for Buckingham. “It is true,” he adds, “he hath the consent of Sir Edward Coke (as we hear) upon reasonable conditions for your brother, and yet not better than, without question, may be found in some other matches.” He next states the objections to the match.
“First, that Sir John Villiers would marry into a disgraced house, which in reason of state is never held good.
“Next, he shall marry into a troubled home of man and wife, which in religion and Christian discretion is disliked.
“Thirdly, that he should incur the almost certain loss of friends, myself only excepted, who, out of a pure love and thankfulness, shall be ever firm to you.
“And lastly and chiefly, the danger that would be incurred of lessening Buckingham’s influence with the King.” He therefore recommended Buckingham to signify unto his mother, who seems to have been the main-spring in the affair, that his desire was that the marriage should not be proceeded in without the consent of both parties, thus making use of a plea in order to sound a retreat from the alliance; but all was in vain.
Bacon next addressed himself to the King. He touched him in his weak part. “Your Majesty’s prerogative and authority have risen in some just degrees above the horizon more than heretofore, which has distilled vapours; your judges are in good temper; your justices of peace (which is the great body of the gentlemen of England) grow to be loving and obsequious, and to be weary of this humour of ruffling; all mutinous spirits grow to be a little poor, and to draw in their horns, and not the less for your Majesty’s disauthorising the man I speak of;[[199]] now, then, I reasonably doubt that if there be but an opinion of his coming in with the strength of such an alliance, it will give a downward relapse in men’s minds unto the former state of things, hardly to be helped, to the great weakening of your Majesty’s service. He is by nature unsociable, and by habit unpopular, and too old to take a new place. And men begin already to collect, yea, and to conclude that he that raiseth such a smoke to get in, will set all on fire when he is in.”[in.”][[200]]