lose their claim to continued respect,' and the Sovereign would again be uncontrolled. No jot would Pym and Hampden consent to abate therefore, from what was strictly necessary to single out and set aside what Palmer had done, as matter of high and weighty censure. But they did not go beyond it. They demanded his committal to the Tower until due submission and retractation were made. Some indeed were eager to have gone farther, demanding his expulsion; but none of the great names on the liberal side appear among these, who were in truth led by the very man, Sir John Hotham, whom Clarendon represents as most opposed to what the more prominent and leading men desired. Sir Robert Cook, the member for Tewkesbury, would have had the offender not only sentenced to the Tower, but turned out of the House as well whereupon Sir John Strangways got up and reminded that worthy member, that as he had been sworn since the last Lord Steward surrendered his staff, some doubts existed how far there was any legal commission to swear him, and perhaps he might himself, by the statute 21st of James, be turned out of the house before Mr. Palmer. The member for Southwark, Mr. Bagshaw, rose next, and, as a brother barrister of Palmer's, took the liberty to doubt whether, having denied the fact charged, he was fit to be "of strength to make that act good, "which was in itself null. And I doubt," he adds, "this logic had an influence upon other acts of no "less moment than these." Those are surely very significant and pregnant words. 1 Clarendon occasionally, to use an expression of his own, "lets himself loose" (i. 7 as if, to quote Warburton's shrewd comment 66 on the phrase, he were speaking against his duty when he censures the Crown); and there is a remarkable and most weighty passage in his History (ii. 252), in which he distinctly admits that it was the King's habit to consent to particular measures (in this case he is speaking of the bill for taking away the legislative power of the bishops) from an opinion that what he held to be the violence and force used in procuring them, rendered them absolutely invalid and void, and "made the confirmation of "them less considered, as not being 2 Three days subsequent to this, an order was made to move the Lords to join with the Commons in moving his Majesty "to appoint the Earl of "Pembroke Lord Steward of his "Majesty's household for that this "house is deprived of certain mem"bers, by reason there is no Lord "Steward, to give or authorise the giving of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy." 66 sentenced; seeing that the charge had really not yet been proved by any one man, and all judges should go secundum allegata et probata. But Palmer found a more effective advocate in Mr. John Crew, the member for Brackley. Crew, a man of great fortune, and of principle as firm and unassailable as he was generally moderate in speech. (it was by his help chiefly that Vane and Cromwell were able subsequently to pass the Self-Denying Ordinance), had voted uniformly with Pym and Hampden throughout the debates on the Remonstrance,' and he now thought that the justice of the case, which he considered to have been fully admitted, would be satisfied sufficiently by such admonishment as the Speaker standing in his place might then and there administer. For himself, he would interpret things doubtful ever in the best sense; and he could not forget such service as Mr. Palmer had heretofore rendered to the cause which in this late matter had received some offence from him. "Sir," continued this discreet and temperate advocate, "though none can plead his merits 66 66 to excuse a fault, yet if I have received many favours “from a man that now doth me injury, I shall not forget "those benefits, but be the willinger to forget the injury, "and the rather in this place, because we have power to punish our own members when they offend, but not to "reward them when they do well." It was impossible that such an appeal as this should fail of effect; but the effect was in a great degree removed by a speech in which Waller meant to have followed up the advantage, but in his lively audacious way, seeking to please both sides, satisfied neither, and almost wholly lost what Crew had gained. He desired the House not to permit a man's success to be the proof of his delinquency. All their punishments were but the Tower and the Bar, and those were great punishments, when they were inflicted for great 1 It is worth mention, perhaps, that in the famous treaty of Uxbridge, nearly four years after this date, Crew was one of the commissioners on the side of the Parliament, with Geoffrey Palmer opposed to him on the King's side. See Clarendon, Hist. iii. 37, 76, and 90. offences. But the custom had arisen, both within and without those walls, of punishments disproportioned to the offence. In former days, while Queen Elizabeth reigned, a check from the Council Table, or a sentence in the Star Chamber, were of such repute that none esteemed men who were so checked or sentenced: but what was it their Remonstrance had justly taken exception to? Of late these punishments had been inflicted for such small offences, that all men did rather value and esteem those as martyrs who suffered in that way, than disesteem them for it. He adjured them, therefore, to let no man be punished for temperance, lest they should seem to punish virtue. The result of which homily, by one whose great wit and parts had brought himself such small esteem, may perhaps be measured by what followed immediately after. Sir John Hotham declared that if by the rules of the House any greater censure than expulsion and the Tower could be laid upon the offender, he would gladly go higher than even those. Happily the majority were not of that opinion. "This last debate," says D'Ewes, "held till past four, "at which time I withdrew out of the house. When I "returned again, the debate was, which of the two "questions should be put first: whether for his sending 66 to the Tower, or for his being expelled out of the "House." Upon this, Sir Ralph Hopton, member for Wells, afterwards so conspicuous on the King's side in the war as "Hopton of the West," appears to have taken the lead. He moved that the question of sending to the Tower should be first put, because, he argued, if that for expulsion were put first, being the greater, the judgment of the House would be past by it, and then the lesser question could not be put. Such a point mooted as this rarely failed to call up D'Ewes. He rose accordingly, and craved leave rather to speak to the orders of the House than to the order of putting the questions. In respect of the remarks which had been last made, he wondered to hear such from an ancient parliament man: for it was not the putting and voting of one, two, three, or four questions there, that made the judgment of the House. "That, "Sir," continued the precise Sir Simonds, "is to be pro"nounced by yourself, our Speaker, to whom we direct "our speeches; and then, and not till then, is the judg "ment of this House past." He added that, if they could not agree which of the two questions should be past first, for his part he should be content to have them past together. 66 66 66 66 The result is thus succinctly recorded by the same veracious and conscientious witness. "Others spake "after me, and the contention which question should be "first put was again set on foot, till at last it was resolved, by question, that the matter touching Mr. Palmer's "going to the Tower should be first determined; and thereupon the Speaker did first put this question-As many as are of opinion that Mr. Palmer should be sent "to the Tower, there to remain during the pleasure of "the house, let them say Aye. Upon which followed a great affirmative; and, the question being put negatively, “there were many Noes: whereupon there followed a "division of the house, and the Speaker appointed Sir “Thomas Barrington and Sir John Clotworthy tellers for "the Ayes, of which I was one, and we went out and were in number 169; the tellers appointed for the Noes "who stayed in the house, being the Lord Falkland and "Mr. Strangways," (the member for Bridport), "and the "number of them was 128. Then the Speaker put the "second question, namely—As many as are of opinion "that Mr. Palmer shall be expelled from being a member "of this house during this parliament, let them say Aye. Upon which followed a lesser affirmative than formerly; "and upon the negative, a greater number of Noes. The "house was again divided, and the same tellers appointed "both for the Ayes and Noes as before. I was an Aye, "and the Ayes went out again, and were in number 131. "The Noes that continued in the house were 163. And "so Mr. Palmer escaped expulsion out of the House, 66 66 "which his offence had deserved in a high measure. 66 66 We appointed to meet to-morrow morning by ten of the clock, and so the House rose between six and seven of "the clock at night." On the next day, Friday the 26th of November, Palmer "in his barrister's gown" appeared at the Bar to receive sentence; and, kneeling there, was informed by Mr. Speaker that the judgment awarded to his offence was committal to the Tower during the pleasure of the House. To the Tower he was committed accordingly, and there remained until Wednesday the 8th of December, on the morning of which day "the humble petition of Geoffrey "Palmer was read, wherein he did acknowledge his offence and the justice of the House, and his sorrow "that he had fallen into its displeasure:" upon which an order passed for the discharge of Mr. Palmer from his imprisonment in the Tower. 66 As to this submission of his friend, Clarendon is wholly silent; and, in so far as the sin of suppression may be less than of deliberate falsification, the circumstance should perhaps be mentioned to his praise. He also unconsciously renders tribute to the sagacity and steadiness of purpose with which the leaders had pursued and obtained their object in these long and passionate debates, when he says that having compassed their main end, they found the sense of the House more at their devotion from that time, and admits that the minority grew so cast down and dejected, that the leading men ever after met no equal opposition within its walls (ii. 61, 62). But in every other point of these later, as of the earlier proceedings, every single sentence he utters is a misstatement. He says there was not the least doubt that there never had been any precedent for calling a member to account for words spoken except at the moment of their utterance: whereas D'Ewes's precedents have been seen. He says, that, after two hours' debate, additional delays and bitterness were only spared by Palmer's own voluntary offer that to save the House farther |