PREFACE. XXXIX 



and on the 2oth the Lord Treasurer reported to the 

 Lords that the Lord Chancellor was accused of bribery 

 and corruption, and that the charge was supported by two 

 cases alleged. Bacon, sick to death as he thought himself, 

 and tortured by his hereditary malady, felt that his enemies 

 had closed upon him. He knew of the courses that had 

 been taken for hunting out complaints against him, and 

 begged only a fair hearing, that he might give them an 

 ingenuous answer. He wrote to Buckingham: I know I 

 have clean hands and a clean heart, and I hope a clean house 

 for friends or servants. But Job himself, or whosoever was 

 the justest judge, by such hunting for matters against him, as 

 hath been used against me, may for a time seem foul, espe 

 cially in a time when greatness is the mark, and accusation 

 the game. And again, to the same : I praise God for it, 

 I never took penny for any benefice or ecclesiastical living ; 

 I never took penny for releasing anything I stopped at the 

 Seal ; I never took penny for any commission, or things of 

 that nature ; I never shared with any servant for any second 

 or inferior profit. To the King he said: For the bri 

 beries and gifts wherewith I am charged, when the books 

 of hearts shall be opened, I hope I shall not be found to have 

 the troubled fountain of a corrupt heart, in a depraved habit 

 of taking rewards to prevent justice ; howsoever I may be frail, 

 and partake of the abuses of the times. We must take into 

 account these protestations when we come to consider his 

 subsequent confession. The Houses adjourned on the 27th 

 of March till the lyth of April. The day before they met, 

 Bacon had an interview with the King. On the following 

 day the Lord Treasurer reported to the Lords that the 

 Chancellor desired two things of his Majesty : i. That where 

 his answers should be fair and clear to those things objected 

 against him, his Lordship might stand upon his innocency. 

 2. Where his answers should not be so fair and clear, there 

 his Lordship might be admitted to the extenuation of the 

 charge ; and where the proofs were full and undeniable, his 

 Lordship would ingenuously confess them, and put himself 



