HENRY MONTAGU, EARL OF MANCHESTER, WAS grandson of sir Edward Montagu, lord chief justice of the King's-bench in the reign of Edward the sixth, and was father of the lord Kimbolton, who, with five members of the house of commons, were so remarkably accused by king Charles the first. Earl Henry was bred a lawyer, and rose swiftly through most of the ranks of that profession to some of the greatest honours of the state and peerage. His preferments are thus enumerated by Lloyd in his State Worthies3: serjeant at law, knight, recorder of London, lord chief justice of the King'sbench, lord treasurer of England 4, baron of • [In the Middle Temple, says Lloyd, where he attained to great learning: but he was first at Christ's college, Cambridge. See Fuller's Worthies of Northamptonshire, p. 289.] [Howell says, he bought his treasurer's staff of the countess of Buckingham for £20,000; yet was removed within the year. He was asked, on his return to London, "whether he did not find wood extremely dear at Newmarket ?"—for it was there he had received his white wand. See Letters, sect. 3. p. 116. Lloyd adds, that being asked what his treasurership might be worth per annum, he made answer: "It might be some thousands of pounds to him who after death would go ΥΑ Kimbolton, viscount Mandeville, president of the council, earl of Manchester, and lord privy seal 5. Lord Clarendon has drawn his character. He lived to a very great age, and wrote a book called "Manchester al Mondo, Contemplatio Mortis et Immortalitatis: or, Meditations on Life and Death." Lond. 1636, 12mo. third edit. [A short extract from this book may convey its general complexion, which is learned and sensible, serious and devout, philosophical and metaphysical. : "Man," says the noble writer, "was not made for contemplation onely; his part is to doe, as well as understand in earthly things to be an actor, of heavenly things to be a spectator. Therefore his felicitie consists neither in rest nor action, but in a fit mixture of both. "The counsellor saith, a statesman should be thus repartited his will, to God; his love, to his master; instantly to heaven; twice as much to him who would go to purgatory; and a nemo scit to him who would adventure to a worse place." Obs. on Statesmen, &c. p. 800.] 5 [When lord privy-seal, he brought the court of requests into such repute, that what formerly was called the almsbasket of the chancery, had in his time well nigh as much meat in, and guests about it, as the chancery itself. Fuller, ut sup.] 6 Vol. i. p. 54, 55. his heart, to his countrey; his secret, to his friend; his time, to businesse. It is true, retirednesse is more safe than businesse; periclitatur enim anima in negotiis: and yet the lesse you doe, the more you suffer. So a publike man should not alwayes bee shut up in thoughts, pleasing his life in the sweetnesse of thinking. "True contemplation hates idle speculation. To bee alwayes or never alone, is idlenesse. "In the courses of my life, I have had interchanges; the world itself stands upon vicissitudes : adversis et prosperis contexuit Deus vitam meam. When I first took me to a gown, I put on this thought -fortunam ut togam appeto, non longam sed concinnam, fit for my condition: finding, by others, that a contented kind of obscuritie kept a man free from envie: although any kind of superioritie be a marke of envie. Yet not to be so high as to provoke an ill eye, nor so low as to be trodden on, was the height of my ambition. But I must confesse, I have since had a greater portion of the world's favour, than I looked for; attamen ego nunquam fortuna credidi, etiam si videretur pacem agere. To checke repining at those above mee, I alwayes looked at those below me; nor did any preferments so delight me, as to make me neglect preparing for my dying day.” Lord Clarendon describes the earl of Manchester as a wise man, of an excellent temper, of great industry and sagacity in business, which he delighted in exceedingly; and preserved so great a vigour of mind, even to his death (when he was very near eighty years of age), that some who had known him in his younger years, did believe him to have much quicker parts in his age, than before. He maintained a good general reputation and credit with the whole nation and people; being always looked upon as full of integrity and zeal to the Protestant religion, as it was instituted by law, and of unquestionable loyalty, duty, and fidelity to the king 7. Two letters by this earl occur among the Harleian MSS. 1506 and 1516. The former of them was addressed to his second son, abbot Walter Montagu, on changing his religion, and becoming a convert to the church of Rome, without having previously consulted his father on the subject. "The earl's answer," says the Harleian catalogue, "is a noble piece, and sheweth him to have been master of great reason and learning, and also a truly loving father." The entire epistle would indeed be well worthy of insertion in the present work, but its length precludes the admission of little more than a fourth part 8. "Walter, your letter dated from Paris 20th November 1635, tells mee how much debate you had with yourself, whether with silence to suspend my beleefe, or by a cleer profession to assure mee what you feared to present to mee, but what was most satisfactory to first duty to God, that you thought most justifiable to your derivative duty to nature, therefore re your History of the Rebellion, vol. i. p. 44, fol. edit. It was printed in 1641, 4to. with Walter Montagu's Letters, sent from France to his Father, and a second Answer to it by the Lord Faulkland. |