THE EARL OF SOMERSET. 415 



First, I shall read some passages of Overbury s 

 letters, namely these : &quot; Is this the fruit of nine 

 years love, common secrets, and common dangers ?&quot; 

 In another letter : &quot; Do not drive me to extremity 

 to do that, which you and I shall be sorry for.&quot; In 

 another letter : &quot; Can you forget him, between 

 whom such secrets of all kinds have passed ?&quot; etc. 



Then will I produce Simcock, who deposeth from 

 Weston s speech, that Somerset told Weston, that, 

 ft if ever Overbury came out of prison, one of them 

 must die for it.&quot; 



Then I will say what these secrets were. I mean 

 not to enter into particulars, nor to charge him with 

 disloyalty, because he stands to be tried for his life 

 upon another crime. But yet by some taste, that I 

 shall give to the peers in general, they may conceive 

 of what nature those secrets may be. Wherein I 

 will take it for a thing notorious, that Overbury was 

 a man, that always carried himself insolently, both 

 towards the queen, and towards the late prince : that 

 he was a man, that carried Somerset on in courses 

 separate and opposite to the privy council : that he 

 was a man of nature fit to be an incendiary of a 

 state : full of bitterness and wildness of speech and 

 project : that he was thought also lately to govern 

 Somerset, insomuch that in his own letters he vaunt 

 ed, &quot; that from him proceeded Somerset s fortune, 

 credit, and understanding.&quot; 



This course I mean to run in a kind of gene 

 rality, putting the imputations rather upon Over- 

 bury than Somerset ; and applying it, that such a 



