After they returned to York-house, my Lord wished him to stay and sup with him and told him he should be witness of the large supper he would make: telling him withal: Faith, if I should sup for a wager, I would dine with a Lord Mayor. 19. Sir Robert Hitcham said, He cared not though men laughed at him: he would laugh at them again. My Lord St. Alban answered, If he did so he would be the merriest man in England. 20. My Lord St. Alban would never say of a Bishop the Lord that spake last, but the Prelate that spake last. King James chid him for it, and said he would have him know that the Bishops were not only Pares, as the other Lords were, but Prælati paribus.1 21. He was a wise man 2 that gave the reason why a man doth not confess his faults. It is, Quia etiam nunc in illis est. 22. Will you tell any man's mind before you have conferred with him? So doth Aristotle in raising his axioms upon Nature's mind. 23. Old Lord Keeper Sir Nicholas Bacon had his barber rubbing and combing his head. Because it was very hot, the window was open to let in a fresh wind. The Lord Keeper fell asleep, and awaked all distempered and in great sweat. Said he to his barber, Why did you let me sleep? Why, my Lord, saith he, I durst not wake your Lordship. Why then, saith my 1 This I think must be misreported. It must have been Bacon who defended himself on this ground for preferring " Prelate" to "Peer: ' for so Prelate would imply Peer, whereas Peer would not imply Prelate. 2 Seneca, Ep. 53. .... 8 "The 4 of February [21 Eliz. i. e. 1578-9]. . . . fell such abundance of snow, &c. . . . It snowed till the eight day and freezed till the tenth. Then followed a thaw, with continual rain a long time after.. .. The 20 of February deceased Sir Nicholas Bacon.". Stowe's Chronicle. Lord, you have killed me with kindness. So removed into his bed chamber and within a few days died. 24. Four things cause so many rheums in bese days as an old country fellow told my Lord Al bau Those were, drinking of beer instead of ale; using glass windows instead of lattice windows: Wearing of silk stockings; missing of smoky chimneys. 25. King James and Gondomar were discoursing in Latin. The King spoke somewhat of Tully's Latin Gondomar spoke very plain stuff. Gondomar langbed The King asked him, Why he laughed? He answered, Because your Majesty speaks Latin Like scholar, and I speak Latin like a King. 26. Gondomar said, Compliment was too hot för summer, and too cold in winter. He meant it against the French. 27. King Henry the fourth of France having an oration offered him, and the orator beginning Great Alexander," said the King, Come let's begone. 28. The beggar, that instructed his son, when he saw he would not be handsome, said, You a beggar! I'll make you a ploughman. 29. Marquis Fiatt's first compliment to my Lord St. Albans was, That he reverenced him as he did the angels, whom he read of in books, but never saw.1 1 Bacon being ill and confined to his bed, so that though admitted to his room he could not see him. Compare Rawley's Life of Bacon, Vol. I. p. 56. Tenison (Baconiana, p. 101.) makes Fiatt say, "Your Lordship hath been to me hitherto like the angels, of which I have often heard and read, but never saw them before:" (the words “hitherto" and "before" being his own interpolation, and entirely spoiling the story:) and proceeds, “ To which piece of courtship he returned such answer as became a man in those circumstances, *Sir, the charity of others does liken me to an angel, but my own infirmities tell me I am a man;'" of which reply there is no hint in Rawley, either in the common-place book or in the life: an addition, I suspect, by a later hand. 30. My Lord Chancellor Ellesmere's saying of a man newly married; God send him joy, and some sorrow too, as we say in Cheshire. The same my Lord St. Alban said of the Master of the Rolls. 31. My Lord St. Alban said, when Dr. Williams, Dean of Westminster, was made Lord Keeper; I had thought I should have known my successor. 32. My Lord St. Alban having a dog which he loved sick, put him to a woman to keep. The dog died. My Lord met her next day and said, How doth my dog? She answered in a whining tone, and putting her handkerchief to her eye, The dog is well, I hope. 33. The physician that came to my Lord after his recovery, before he was perfectly well. The first time, he told him his pulse was broken-paced; the next time, it tripped; the third day, it jarred a little. My Lord said, he had nothing but good words for his money. 34. Mr. Anthony Bacon chid his man (Prentise) for calling him no sooner. He said, It was very early day. Nay, said Mr. Bacon, the rooks have been up these two hours. He replied, The rooks were but new up: it was some sick rook that could not sleep. 35. [The following is not given in any of these collections, but comes from a letter of Mr. John Chamberlain to Sir Dudley Carleton, 11. Oct. 1617. See Court and Times of James I., ii. p. 38.] The Queen lately asked the Lord Keeper [Sir F. Bacon], What occasion the Secretary [Sir R. Winwood] had given him to oppose himself so violently against him who answered prettily, "Madam, I can say no more, but he is proud, and I am proud." NOTE. There remain sixteen apophthegms which appear to have been introduced into the collection without any authority, and have no right to be there. But as they are to be found in all editions of Bacon's collected works, and readers may wish to judge for themselves, I add them here; with references to the book from which they were taken.1 SPURIOUS APOPHTHEGMS, INSERTED BY THE PUBLISHER OF THE THIRD EDITION OF THE 1. SIR Nicholas Bacon being appointed a judge for the northern circuit, and having brought his trials that came before him to such a pass, as the passing of sentence on malefactors, he was by one of the malefactors mightily importuned for to save his life; which, when nothing that he had said did avail, he at length desired his mercy on account of kindred. "Prithee," said my lord judge, "how came that in?" "Why, if it please you, my lord, your name is Bacon, and mine is Hog, and in all ages Hog and Bacon have been so near kindred, that they are not be separated.”, Ay, but," replied judge Bacon, "you and I cannot be kindred, except you be hanged; for Hog is not Bacon until it be well hanged." 1 66 2. Two scholars and a countryman travelling upon the road, one night lodged all in one inn, and supped together, where the scholars thought to have put a trick upon the countryman, which was thus: the scholars appointed for supper two pigeons, and a fat capon, which being ready was brought up, and they having sat down, the one scholar took up one pigeon, the other scholar took the other pigeon, thinking thereby that the countryman should have sat still, until that they were ready for the carving of the capon; which he perceiving, took the capon and laid it on his trencher, and thus said, "Daintily contrived, every one a bird." 2 3. A man and his wife in bed together, she towards morning pretended herself to be ill at ease, desiring to lie on her husband's side; so the good man, to please her, came over her, making some short stay in his passage over; where she had not long lain, but desired to lie in her old place again: quoth he, "How can it be effected?" She answered, "Come over me again." "I had rather," said he, "go a mile and a half about." 8 4. A thief being arraigned at the bar for stealing of a mare, in his pleading urged many things in his own behalf, and at last nothing availing, he told the bench, the mare rather stole him, than he the mare; which in brief he thus related: That passing over several grounds about his lawful occa8 Id. 30. 1 Witty Apophthegms, 10. 2 Id. 11. |