WILLIAMS LORD KEEPER. 



ccclxxvii 



of Westminster, and to hold the rectory of Waldegrave 

 in commendam. () 



had most need of a covering. Yet some suitors were so importunate to 

 compass this deanery upon his expected leaving, that he was put to it to 

 plead hard for that commenda before he carried it. The King was in his 

 progress, and the lord marquis with him, to whom he writes to present his 

 reasons to the King, which were, that the post of the lord keeper s place, 

 though he would strike sail more than any that preceded him, must be 

 maintained in some convenient manner. Here he was handsomely housed, 

 which if he quitted, he must trust to the King to provide one for him as 

 his majesty and his predecessors have ever done to their chancellors. Here 

 he had some supplies to his housekeeping from the college in bread, beer, 

 and fuel, of which if he should be deprived, he must be forced to call for 

 a diet, which would cost the King 1,600/. per annum, or crave for some 

 addition in lieu thereof, out of the King s own means, as all his foregoers 

 in that office had done. He might have added, for it was in the bottom of 

 his breast, he was loath to stir from that seat where he had the command 

 of such exquisite music. A request laid out in such remonstrance could 

 not be refused by so gracious a prince who granted twenty suits to one he 

 denied. Magnarum largita opum, largitor honorum pronus, which singu 

 larly fits King James, though Claudian made it for Honorius. Likewise, 

 by the indulgence of his commenda, he reserved the rectory of Waldegrave 

 to himself, a trifle not worthy to be remembered, but his reason is not 

 unworthy to be detailed. That in the instability of human things, every 

 man must look, for a dissolution of his fortunes, as well as for the dissolu 

 tion of his body. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, kept his right to a 

 poor cell in the monastery of Bee in Normandy, and that hospitality kept 

 him when he fled out of England, and all the revenues of his mitre failed 

 him : Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, held the mastership of 

 Trinity to his dying day, and said often, if all his palaces were blown down 

 by iniquity, he would creep honestly into that shell. They that will not 

 be wise by these examples I will send them to school to a fable in Plautus. 

 Cogitato mus pusillus quam sit sapiens bcstia et atatem qui &vi cubili nun- 

 quam committal suani, qui si unum ostium obsideatur aliud perfugium qu&vit. 

 So in the upshot he said Waldegrave was but a mousehole, yet it would 

 be a pretty fortification to entertain him if he had no other home to resort 

 to. Many such divinations flashed from others, who saw the hills of the 

 robbers afar off, who have now devoured the heritage of Jacob, and say 

 they are not guilty ; and they that have sold us and bought us say, Blessed 

 be the Lord, for we are rich.&quot; Racket s Life of Williams, p. 62. 



() How sagacious was the bishop in these stipulations, in refusing to 

 advance till he had secured a retreat. Buckingham afterwards boasted, 



