House of Commons is usually an eminent man; yet the harangue of his Majesty will always be found much superior to that of the speaker in every parliament during this reign." His numerous proclamations are evidently wrought by his own hand, and display the pristine vigour of the state of our age of genius. That the state-papers were usually composed by himself, a passage in the Life of the Lord-keeper Williams testifies; and when Sir Edward Conway, who had been bred a soldier, and was even illiterate, became a viscount, and a royal secretary by the appointment of Buckingham, the king, who in fact wanted no secretary, would often be merry over his imperfect scrawls in writing, and his hacking of sentences in reading, often breaking out in laughter, exclaiming, "Stenny has provided me with a secretary who can neither write nor read, and a groom of my bed-chamber who cannot truss my points,"-this latter person having but one hand! It is evident, since Lord Conway, the most inefficient secretary ever king had, and I have myself seen his scrawls, remained many years in office, that James I. required no secretary, and transacted his affairs with his own mind and hand. These habits of business and of study prove that James indulged much less those of indolence, for which he is so gratuitously accused.

HIS WIT.

AMID all the ridicule and contempt in which the intellectual capacity of James I. is involved, this college-pedant, who is imagined to have given into every species of false wit, and never to have reached beyond quibbles, puns, conceits, and quolibets,— was in truth a great wit; quick in retort, and happy in illustration; and often delivering opinions with a sententious force. More wit and wisdom from his lips have descended to us than from any other of our sovereigns. One of the malicious writers of his secret history, Sir Anthony Weldon, not only informs us that he was witty, but describes the manner. "He was very witty, and had as many witty jests as any man living; at which he would not smile himself, but deliver them in a grave and serious manner.” Thus the king was not only witty, but a dextrous wit: nor is he one of those who are recorded as having only said one good thing in their lives; for his vein was not apt to dry.

His conversations, like those of most literary men, he loved to prolong at table. We find them described by one who had partaken of them :

"The reading of some books before him was very frequent,

while he was at his repast; and otherwise he collected knowledge by variety of questions, which he carved out to the capacity of different persons. Meehought his hunting humour was not off, while the learned stood about him at his board; he was ever in chace after some disputable doubts, which he would wind and turn about with the most stabbing objections that ever I heard; and was as pleasant and fellow-like, in all discourses, as with his hunstsman in the field. Those who were ripe and weighty in their answers, were ever designed for some place of credit or profit 1."

SPECIMENS OF HIS HUMOUR, AND OBSERVATIONS ON HUMAN LIFE.

THE relics of his witticisms and observations on human life, on state affairs, in literature and history, are scattered among contemporary writers, and some are even traditional; I regret that I have not preserved many which occurred in the course of reading. It has happened, however, that a man of genius has preserved for posterity some memorials of the wit, the learning, and the sense of the monarch 2.

In giving some loose specimens of the wit and capacity of a man, if they are too few, it may be imagined that they are so from their rarity; and if too many, the page swells into a mere collection. But truth is not over nice to obtain her purpose, and even the common labours she inspires are associated with her pleasures.

Early in life James I. had displayed the talent of apt allusion,

'Hacket's curious Life of the Lord-keeper, Williams, p. 38, Part 11.

2 In the Harl. MSS. 7582, Art. 3, one entitled "Crumms fallen from King James's Table; or his Table-Talk, taken by Sir Thomas Overbury. The original being in his own handwriting." This MS. has been, perhaps, imperfectly printed in "The Prince's Cabala, or Mysteries of State," 1715. This Collection of Sir Thomas Overbury was shortened by his unhappy fate, since he perished early in the reign. Another Harl. MS. contains things as they were at sundrie times spoken by James I." I have drawn others from the Harl. MSS. 6395. We have also printed, "Wittie Observations gathered in King James's ordinary Discourse," 1643; "King James his Apothegmes or Table Talk as they were by him delivered occasionally, and by the publisher his quondam servant carefully received, by B. A. gent. 4°. in eight leaves, 1643." The collector was Ben". Agar, who had gathered them in his youth; Witty Apothegmes, delivered at several times by King James, King Charles, the Marquis of Worcester," etc. 1658.

The collection of Apothegms formed by Lord Bacon offers many instances of the king's wit and sense. See Lord Bacon's Apothegms new and old; they are numbered to 275 in the edition 1819. Basil Montague in his edition has separated what he distinguishes as the spurious ones.

and his classical wit on the Spaniards, that "He expected no other favour from them than the courtesy of Polyphemus to Ulysses-to be the last devoured," delighted Elizabeth, and has even entered into our history. Arthur Wilson, at the close of his Life of James I., has preserved one of his apothegms, while he censures him for not making timely use of it. "Let that prince, who would beware of conspiracies, be rather jealous of such whom his extraordinary favours have advanced, than of those whom his displeasure hath discontented. These want means to execute their pleasures, but those have means at pleasure to execute their desires."-Wilson himself ably developes this important state-observation, by adding, that "Ambition to rule is more vehement than malice to revenge" A pointed reflection, which rivals a maxim of Rochefoucault.

The king observed, that "Very wise men and very fools do little harm; it is the mediocrity of wisdom that troubleth all the world."-He described, by a lively image, the differences which rise in argument: "Men, in arguing, are often carried by the force of words farther asunder than their question was at first; like two ships going out of the same haven, their landing is many times whole countries distant."

One of the great national grievances, as it appeared both to the government and the people, in James's reign, was the perpetual growth of the metropolis; and the nation, like an hypochondriac, was ludicrously terrified that their head was too monstrous for their body, and drew all the moisture of life from the remoter parts. It is amusing to observe the endless and vain precautions employed to stop all new buildings, and to force persons out of town to reside at their country mansions. Proclamations warned and exhorted, but the very interference of prohibition rendered the crowded town more delightful. One of its attendant calamities was the prevalent one of that day, the plague; and one of those state libels, which were early suppressed, or never printed, entitled, "Balaam's Ass," has this passage: "In this deluge of new buildings, we shall be all poisoned with breathing in one another's faces; and your Majesty hath most truly said, England will shortly be London, and London, England." It was the popular wish, that country gentlemen should reside more on their estates, and it was on this occasion the king made that admirable allusion, which has been in our days repeated in the House of Commons: "Gentlemen resident on their estates were like ships in port-their value and magnitude were felt and acknowledged; but, when at a distance, as their size seemed insignificant, so their worth and importance were not duly estimated." The king abounded with similar observations; for he drew from life more than even from books.

James is reproached for being deficient in political sagacity; notwithstanding that he somewhat prided himself on what he denominated "king's-craft." This is the fate of a pacific and domestic prince!

"A king," said James, " ought to be a preserver of his people, as well of their fortunes as lives, and not a destroyer of his subjects. Were I to make such a war as the King of France doth, with such tyranny on his own subjects-with Protestants on one side, and his soldiers drawn to slaughter on the other,-I would put myself in a monastery all my days after, and repent me that I had brought my subjects to such misery."

That James was an adept in his "king's-craft," by which term he meant the science of politics, but which has been so often misinterpreted in an ill sense, even the confession of such a writer as Sir Anthony Weldon testifies; who acknowledges, that" no prince living knew how to make use of men better than King James." He certainly foresaw the spirit of the Commons, and predicted to the prince and Buckingham, events which occurred after his death. When Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, whom James considered a useful servant, Buckingham sacrificed, as it would appear, to the clamours of a party, James said, "You are making a rod for your own back;" and when Prince Charles was encouraging the frequent petitions of the Commons, James told him, "You will live to have your bellyful of petitions." The following anecdote may serve to prove his political sagacity. When the Emperor of Germany, instigated by the pope and his own state-interests, projected a crusade against the Turks, he solicited from James the aid of three thousand Englishmen; the wise and pacific monarch, in return, advised the emperor's ambassador to apply to France and Spain, as being more nearly concerned in this project : but the ambassador very ingeniously argued, that James being a more remote prince, would more effectually alarm the Turks, from a notion of a general armament of the Christian princes against them. James got rid of the importunate ambassador by observing, that "three thousand Englishmen would do no more hurt to the Turks, than fleas to their skins: great attempts may do good. by a destruction, but little ones only stir up anger to hurt themselves."

His vein of familiar humour flowed at all times, and his facetiousness was sometimes indulged at the cost of his royalty. In those unhappy differences between him and his parliament, one day mounting his horse, which, though usually sober and quiet, began to bound and prance," Sirrah!" exclaimed the king, who seemed to fancy that his favourite prerogative was somewhat resisted on this occasion, "if you be not quiet, I'll send

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you to the five hundred kings in the lower house: they'll quickly tame you." When one of the Lumleys was pushing on his lineal ascent beyond the patience of the hearers, the king, to cut short the tedious descendant of the Lumleys, cried out, Stop mon! thou needst no more: now I learn that Adam's surname was Lumley!" When Colonel Gray, a military adventurer of that day, just returned from Germany, seemed vain of his accoutrements, on which, he had spent his all,-the king, staring at this buckled, belted, sworded, and pistolled, but ruined, Martinet, observed, that "this town was so well fortified, that, were it victualled, it might be impregnable."

EVIDENCES OF HIS SAGACITY IN THE DISCOVERY OF TRUTH.

POSSESSING the talent of eloquence, the quickness of wit, and the diversified knowledge which produced his "Table-Talk," we find also many evidences of his sagacity in the discovery of truth, with that patient zeal so honourable to a monarch. When the ship-wrights, jealous of Pett our great naval architect, formed a party against him, the king would judge with his own eyes. Having examined the materials depreciated by Pett's accusers, he declared that "the cross-grain was in the men, not in the timber." The king, on historical evidence, and by what he said in his own works, claims the honour of discovering the gunpowder-plot, by the sagacity and reflection with which he solved the enigmatical and ungrammatical letter sent on that occasion. The train of his thoughts has even been preserved to us; and, although a loose passage, in a private letter of the Earl of Salisbury, contradicted by another passage in the same letter, would indicate that the earl was the man; yet even Mrs. Macaulay acknowledges the propriety of attributing the discovery to the king's sagacity. Several proofs of his zeal and reflection in the detection of imposture might be adduced; and the reader, may, perhaps, be amused by these.

There existed a conspiracy against the Countess of Exeter by Lady Lake, and her daughter, Lady Ross. They had contrived to forge a letter in the countess's name, in which she confessed all the heavy crimes they accused her of, which were incest, witchcraft, etc.'; and, to confirm its authenticity, as the king was curious respecting the place, the time, and the occasion, when the letter was written, their maid swore it was at the countess's

Camden's Annals of James I. Kennet II. 652.