ZZ. Life, p. xxvii.

Rawley's Life. His birth and other capacities qualified him, above others of his profession to have ordinary accesses at court, and to come frequently into the queen's eye, who would often grace him with private and free communication, not only about matters of his profession or business in law, but also about the arduous affairs of estate, from whom she received, from time to time, great satisfaction; nevertheless, though she cheered him much with the bounty of her countenance, yet she never cheered him with the bounty of her hand; having never conferred upon him any ordinary place, or means of honour or profit, save only one dry reversion, of the Register's Office, in the Star Chamber, worth about 1600l. per annum, for which he waited, in expectation, either fully or near twenty years; of which his lordship would say, in Queen Elizabeth's time, that it was like another man's ground, buttalling upon his house, which might mend his prospect, but it did not fill his barn. Nevertheless, in the time of King James, it fell unto him.

Dugdale, in his account of Bacon says, In 32 Eliz. he was made one of the clerks in council.

The author of Bacon's life, in the Biographia Britannica, speaking of the reversion of the Register's place in the Star Chamber, says, His having the reversion of this place, I take to be the reason, why several writers style him one of the Clerks of the Privy Council; for that he had no other employment than this under that reign, is very clear from the foregoing passage in Dr. Rawley's Memoirs, and from his own letters.

2 Z. Life, p. xxvii.

In historical collections by Jonson, there is the following preamble to the proceedings in this parliament:-A Journal of the Parliamentary Proceedings in the lower house, Anno xxvo Eliz. Annoq. Dom. 1592, very laboriously collected being chiefly called for consultation and preparation against the ambitious designs of the King of Spain; in which some unusual distastes happened between her Majesty and the House, by reason of their intermeddling with her Majesties successor to the crown, which she had forbidden. This session begun on Monday, February 19, 1592, and ended April 9, 1593.

Birch's Elizabeth, vol. i. 93. Anthony was member for Wallingford, and his brother Francis for Middlesex. Not. Parliam. by Browne Willis, LL.D. p. 127, 31 edit. London, 1750. He sat in that parliament, which met November 19, 1592, as one of the knights of the shire for Middlesex.

B B. Life, p. xxvii.

Mr. Speaker, That which these honourable personages have spoken of their experience, may it please you to give me leave likewise to deliver of my common knowledge. The cause of assembling all parliaments hath been hitherto for laws or monies; the one being the sinews of peace, the other of war: to one I am not privy, but the other I should know. I did take great contentment in her majestie's speech the other day, delivered by the Lord Keeper; how that it was a thing not to be done suddenly, or at one parliament, nor scarce a year would suffice to purge the statute book, nor lessen it, the volumes of law being so many in number, that neither common people can half practise them, nor lawyers sufficiently understand them, than the which nothing would tend more to the praise of her majesty. The Romans they appointed ten men who were to collect or recall all former laws, and to set forth these twelve tables so much of all men commended. The Athenians likewise appointed six for that purpose. And Lewis the Ninth, King of France, did the like in reforming his laws.-See CC, next note.

Dugdale's Baronage, vol. ii. p. 438.

CC. Life, p. xxvii.

The suggestions by Lord Bacon upon Improvement of the Law are either 1st. Tracts upon the improvement of the law.

2dly. Scattered observations in different parts of his works.

Lord Bacon's Tracts for the Improvement of the Law are

1. Certificate touching the Penal Laws.

2. A Proposition to his Majesty touching the compiling and amendment of the Laws of England.

3. An offer to King James of a Digest of the Laws of England.

4. Dedication and Preface to his Law Maxims.

5. Draught of an Act against Usury, and

6. Ordinance for the Administration of Justice in Chancery.

7. Justitia Universalis.

Sir Stephen Procter's Project relating to the Penal Laws.

In the Harleian manuscripts in the British Museum there is the following memorial, viz. [See MS. Lansd. 486, fol. 21.]

1st. A Memorial touching the Review of Penal Lawes and the Amendment of the Common Law.*

Forasmuch as it was one of his Majesties Bills of Grace That there should be certain Commissioners, 12 Lawyers and 12 Gent of experience in the Countrie for the Review of penal Lawes and the Repeal of such as are obsolete and Snaring, and the Supply where it shall be needful of Lawes more mild and fit for the time, &c. And thereupon to prepare Bills for the next Parliament. It were now a time for his Majty out of his Royal Authoritie and Goodness to act this excellent intent, and to grant forth a Commission accordingly wherein besides the excellency of the work in it self, and the pursueing of the intent of that Bill of Grace, Two things will follow for his Majesties Honour and repu

tation.

The one that it will beat down the opinion which is Sometime muttered, That his Majty will call no more Parliaments.

The other that whereas there are Some Rumors dispersed that now his Majesty, for the help of his wants, will work upon the penal Lawes, the people shall see his disposicion is so far from that, as he is in hand to abolish many of them.

There is a second work wch needeth no Parliament and is one of the rarest works of Sovereigne merit which can fall under the Acts of a King. For Kings that do reform the Body of their Lawes are not only Reges but Legis-latores, and as they have been well called, perpetui Principes, because they reign in their Lawes for ever.

Wherefore for the Common Law of England it is no Text Law, but the Substance of it consisteth in the Series and Succession of Judicial Acts from time to time which have been set down in the Books, which we term Year Books or Reports, so that as these Reports are more or less perfect, so the law itself is more or less certain, and indeed better or worse, whereupon a conclusion may be made that it is hardly possible to conferr upon this Kingdom a greater benefit, then if his Majty should be pleased that these Books also may be purged and reviewed, whereby they may be reduced to fewer Volumes and clearer Resolutions, which may be done,

By taking away many Cases obsolete and of no use, keeping a remembrance of some few of them for antiquity sake.

By taking away many Cases that are merely but iterations, wherein a few set down will serve for many.

By taking away idle Queres which serve but for seeds of uncertainty.
By abridging and dilucidating Cases tediously or darkly reported.
By purging away Cases erroneously reported and differing from the
original verity of the Record.

* Bacon touching the amendment of Lawes.

Whereby the Common Law of England will be reduced to a Coræ or Digest of Books of competent volumes to be studied, and of a nature and content Rectified in all points.

Thus much for the time past.

But to give perfection to this work his Majty may be pleased to restore the ancient use of Reporters, wch in former times were persons of great Learning, wch did attend the Courts at Westminster, and did carefully and faithfully receive the Rules and Judicial Resolutions given in the King's Courts, and had Stipends of the Crown for the same; wch worthy institucion by neglect of time hath been discontinued.

It is true that this hath been Supplyed somewt of later times by the industry of voluntaries as chiefly by the worthy Endeavours of the Lord Dier and the Lo. Coke. But great Judges are unfit persons to be Reporters, for they have either too little leisure or too much authoritie, as may appear well by those two Books, whereof that of my Lo. Dyer is but a kind of note Book, and those of my Lo. Coke's hold too much de proprio.

The choice of the persons in this work will give much life unto it; the persons following may be thought on, as men not overwrought with practice, and yet Learned and conversant in Reportes and Recordes, There are Six Names, whereof three only may suffice according to the three principal courtes of Law, The King's Bench, The Common Plees, and The Exchequer.

Mr. Whitlock,
Mr. Noie,
Mr. Hedley,

Mr. Hackwell,

Mr. Courtman,

Mr. Robert Hill.

The stipend cannot be less than 100l. per annum, which nevertheless were too little to men of such Qualitie in respect of Some hindrance it may be to their practice, were it not that it will be accompanied with Credit and expectacion in due time of preferment.

The first notice which I find of this tract is in the Letters and Remains by Robert Stephens, 1734. It is not mentioned either by Rawley or by Archbishop Tennison.

Observations. This tract was first inserted in any edition of the works of Lord Bacon, in the year 1740, in the folio edition, in four volumes, by Mallet. Printed for Miller. The following is the title: Appendix containing several Pieces of Lord Bacon, not printed in the last edition in four volumes in folio: and now published from the original manuscripts in the library of the Right Honourable the Earl of Oxford. This appendix was published separately in folio in 1760, and is in vol. v. page 362, of this edition. I do not find any manuscript of this tract in the Harleian collection, but it is in the Lansdowne MSS. No. 236, fol. 198. The same as printed in Stephens, pp. 367-377.

2. Proposition touching the compiling and amendment of the Laws of England. This tract is thus noticed in the Baconiana, with a reference to the Resuscitatio, page 271: "The twelfth is, a Proposition to King James, touching the compiling and amendment of the Laws of England, written by him when he was attourney-general and one of the privy-council." It will be found in vol. v. of this edition, page 337. The following is a copy of the title: A Proposition to His Majesty. By Sir Francis Bacon, Knt. his Majesties Attorney-General and one of his Privy-Councel; touching the Compiling and Amendment of the Laws of England.

3. An Offer to our late Soueraigne King Iames of a Digest to be made of the Lawes of England. London, printed by John Haviland for Humphrey Robinson, 1629. It is thus noticed in the Baconiana by Archbishop Tennison: "The thirteenth is, An Offer to King James, of a Digest to be made of the Laws of England." It will be found in vol. v. of this edition, page 353. Another edition in folio was published in 1671, in the third edition of the Resuscitatio. The first edition was published in 1629, in a small 4to. by Dr. Rawley, consisting of four tracts, of which this is one.

• In the Miscellan. Works, p. 137, and 2nd part of Resusc.

4. Dedication to Elements of the Common Law. In his dedication to the Queen, and in his preface to the Elements of the Common Law, there are various suggestions to the Queen, and observations upon improvement of the law. They will be found in vol. xiii. of this edition, page 133.

5. Justitia Universalis.

In the year 1605, Lord Bacon expresses his intention, in the advancement of learning, to write upon the laws of laws. The passage is as follows: "Notwithstanding, for the more public part of government, which is laws, I think good to note only one deficience: which is, that all those which have written of laws, have written either as philosophers, or as lawyers, and none as statesmen. As for the philosophers, they make imaginary laws for imaginary commonwealths, and their discourses are as the stars, which give little light, because they are so high. For the lawyers, they write according to the states where they live, what is received law, and not what ought to be law; for the wisdom of a law-maker is one, and of a lawyer is another. For there are in nature certain fountains of justice, whence all civil laws are derived but as streams: and like as waters do take tinctures and tastes from the soils through which they run, so do civil laws vary according to the regions and governments where they are planted, though they proceed from the same fountains. Again, the wisdom of a law-maker consisteth not only in a platform of justice, but in the application thereof; taking into consideration, by what means laws may be made certain, and what are the causes and remedies of the doubtfulness and incertainty of law; by what means laws may be made apt and easy to be executed, and what are the impediments and remedies in the execution of laws; what influence laws touching private right of meum and tuum have into the public state, and how they may be made apt and agreeable; how laws are to be penned and delivered, whether in texts or in acts, brief or large, with preambles, or without; how they are to be pruned and reformed from time to time, and what is the best means to keep them from being too vast in volumes, or too full of multiplicity and crossness; how they are to be expounded, when upon causes emergent and judicially discussed, and when upon responses and conferences touching general points or questions; how they are to be pressed, rigorously or tenderly; how they are to be mitigated by equity and good conscience, and whether discretion and strict law are to be mingled in the same courts, or kept apart in several courts; again, how the practice, profession, and erudition of law is to be censured and governed; and many other points touching the administration, and, as I may term it, animation of laws. Upon which I insist the less, because I purpose, if God give me leave, (having begun a work of this nature in aphorisms), to propound it hereafter, noting it in the mean time for deficient. ii. of this edition, page 295.

Vol.

Observations. The outline contemplated by Lord Bacon of a treatise on Universal Justice is, as it seems, contained in Aphorism 7, in his description of a good law published in 1623, in the Treatise de Augmentis. Vol. ix. p. 82.

Lex bona censeri possit, quæ sit

Intimatione certa;

Præcepto justa;

Executione commoda;

Cum forma politiæ congrua; et

Generans virtutem in subditis.

It probably was his intention to have completed this work, and if not, to leave it as a hint to future ages. The part which he has completed is in the first of his five divisions.

The Certainty of Laws. It is written in his favourite style of Aphorisms (see de Augmentis, Lib. vi.), in which the Novum Organum is written, in both of which there is the reality without the show of method; the frame is beautiful, although the divisions and muscles are not obtruded.

5. Generans Virtutem in subditis.

1. Omitting obsolete

laws.

2. Retaining Anti

4. Uncertainty of Judgment. 2. Emulation of Courts.

94.

3. Bad Registry.

4. Facility of Appeal.