LETTERS FROM BIRCH. 293 



Mr. Tobie Matthew * to Sir Francis Bacon, Attorney- 

 General. 

 May it please you, Sir, 



The notice I have from my Lord Roos, Sir Henry Goodere, 

 and other friends, of the extreme obligation wherein I con 

 tinue towards you, together with the conscience I have of 

 the knowledge how dearly and truly I honour and love 

 you, and daily pray that you may rise to that height which 

 the state wherein you live can give you, hath taken away 

 the wings of fear, whereby I was almost carried away from 

 daring to importune you in this kind. But I know how 

 good you have always been, and are still, towards me ; or 

 rather because I am not able to comprehend how much it 

 is ; 1 will presume there is enough for any use, whereupon 

 an honest humble servant may employ it. 



It imports the business of my poor estate, that I be res 

 tored to my country for some time; and I have divers 

 friends in that court, who will further my desire thereof, 

 and particularly Mr. Secretary Lake and my Lord Roos, 

 whom I have desired to confer with you about it. But 

 nothing can be done therein, unless my Lord of Canterbury f 

 may be made propitious, or at least not averse; nor do 

 I know in the world how to charm him but by the music 

 of your tongue. I beseech you, sir, lose some minutes 

 upon me, which I shall be glad to pay by whole years of 

 service ; and call to mind, if it please you, the last speech 

 you made me, that if I should continue as I then was, and 

 neither prove ill-affected to the state, nor become otherwise 

 than a mere secular man in my religion, you would be 

 pleased to negotiate for my return. On my part the con 

 ditions are performed ; and it remains, that you do the like: 

 nor can I doubt but that the nobleness of your nature, 

 which loves nothing in the world so well as to be doing of 

 good, can descend from being the attorney-general to a 



* Son of Dr. Tobie Matthew, Archbishop of York. He was born at Oxford 

 in 1578, while his father was Dean of Christ Church, and educated there. 

 During his travels abroad, he was seduced to the Romish religion by Father 

 Parsons. This occasioned his living out of his own country from the year 

 1607 to 1617, when he had leave to return to England. He was again ordered 

 to leave it in October 1618; but in 1622 was recalled to assist in the match 

 with Spain ; and, on account of his endeavours to promote it, was knighted by 

 King James I. at, Tloyston, on the 10th of October, 1623. He translated into 

 Italian Sir Francis Bacon s Essays, and died at Ghent in Flanders, October 13, 

 1655, N. S. 



t Dr. George Abbot. 



