Seas or Navigable Rivers But yet there are Badges and Memorials of Borders Of which point I have spoken before For the Language It is true the Nations are unius Labii and have not the first curse of disunion which was Confusion of Tongues whereby one understood not another But yet the Dialect is differing and it remaineth a kind of mark of distinction But for that Tempori permittendum it is to be left to time For considering that both Languages do concur in the principal Office and Duty of Language which is to make a mans self understood For the rest it is rather to be accounted as was said a diversity of Dialect then of Language and as I said in my first Writing it is like to bring forth the enriching of one Language by compounding and taking in the proper and significant Words of either Tongue rather then a continuance of two Languages For Leagues and Confederacies It is true that neither Nation is now in hostility with any State wherewith the other Nation is in amity but yet so as the Leagues and Treaties have been concluded with either Nation respectively and not with both jointly which may contain some diversity of Articles of straitness with one more then with the other But many of these matters may perhaps be of that kind as may fall within that Rule In veste variet as sit scissura non sit Now to descend to the particular points wherein the Realms stand severed and divided over and besides the former six points of separation which I have noted and placed as the defects or abatements of the six points of the Union and therefore shall not need to be repeated The points I say yet remaining I will divide into External and into Internal The External Points therefore of the separation are four 1. The several Crowns I mean the ceremonial and material Crowns 2. The second is the several Names Stiles or Appellations 3. The third is the several Prints of the Seals 4. The fourth is the several Stamps or Marks of the Coins of Monies It is true that the External are in some respect and parts much mingled and interlaced with considerations Internal and that they may be as effectual to the true Union which must be the work of time as the Internal because they are operative upon the conceits and opinions of the People The uniting of whose hearts and affections is the life and true end of this Work For the Ceremonial Crowns the question will be whether there shall be framed one new Imperial Crown of Britain to be used for the time to come Also admitting that to be thought convenient whether in the Frame thereof there shall not be some reference to the Crowns of Ireland and France Also whether your Majesty should repeat or iterate your own Coronation and your Queens or only ordain that such new Crown shall be used by your Posterity hereafter The difficulties will be in the conceit of some inequality whereby the Realm of Scotland may be thought to be made an accession unto the Realm of England But that resteth in some circumstances for the compounding of the two Crowns is equal The calling of the new Crown The Crown of Britain is equal Only the place of Coronation if it shall be at Westminster which is the ancient august and sacred place for the Kings of England may seem to make an inequality And again if the Crown of Scotland be discontinued then that Ceremony which I hear is used in the Parliament of Scotland in the absence of the Kings to have the Crowns carried in solemnity must likewise cease For the Name the main question is whether the contracted Name of Britain shall be by your Majesty used or the divided Names of England and Scotland Admitting there shall be an alteration then the case will require these following Questions First whether the Name of Britain shall not only be used in your Majesties Stile where the entire Stile is recited and in all other forms the divided Names to remain both of the Realms and of the People Or otherwise that the very divided Names of Realms and People shall likewise be changed or turned into special or sub-divided Names of the general Name That is to say for example whether your Majesty in your Stile shall denominate your self King of Britain France and Ireland c. And yet nevertheless in any Commission Writ or otherwise where your Majesty mentioneth England or Scotland you shall retain the ancient Names as Secundum consuetudinem Regni nostri Angliae or whether those divided Names shall be for ever lost and taken away and turned into the sub-divisions of South-Britain and North-Britain and the People to be South-Britains and North-Britains And so in the example foresaid the Tenour of the like clause to run Secundum consuetudinem Britanniae Australis Also if the former of these shall be thought convenient whether it were not better for your Majesty to take that Alteration of Stile upon you by Proclamation as Edward the third did the Stile of France then to have it enacted by Parliament Also in the alteration of the Stile whether it were not better to transpose the Kingdom of Ireland and put it immediately after Britain and so place the Islands together and the Kingdom of France being upon the Continent last In regard these Islands of the Western Ocean seem by Nature and Providence an entire Empire in themselves and also that there was never King of England so entirely possest of Ireland as your Majesty is So as your Stile to run King of Britain Ireland and the Islands adjacent and of France c. The difficulties in this have been already throughly beaten over but they gather but to two Heads The one point of Honour and love to the former Names The other Doubt left the alteration of the Name may induce and involve an alteration of the Laws and Policies of the Kingdom Both which if your Majesty shall assume the Stile by Proclamation and not by Parliament are in themselves satisfied For then the usual Names must needs remain in Writs and Records the Forms whereof cannot be altered but by Act of Parliament and so the point of Honour satisfied And again your Proclamation altereth no Law and so the scruple of a tacite or implyed alteration of Laws likewise satisfied But then it may be considered whether it were not a Form of the greatest Honour if the Parliament though they did not enact it yet should become Suiters and Petitioners to your Majesty to assume it For the Seals That there should be but one Great Seal of Britain and one Chancellor and that there should only be a Seal in Scotland for Processes and ordinary Justice And that all Patents of Grants of Lands or otherwise as well in Scotland as in England should pass under the Great Seal here kept about your Person It is alteration Internal whereof I do not now speak
But the Question in this place is whether the Great Seals of England and Scotland should not be changed into one and the same form of Image and Superscription of Britain which nevertheless is requisite should be with some one plain or manifest alteration lest there be a Buz and suspect that Grants of things in England may be passed by the Seal of Scotland Or è converso Also whether this alteration of Form may not be done without Act of Parliament as the Great Seals have used to be heretofore changed as to their Impressions For the Moneys as to the Real and internal consideration thereof the question will be Whether your Majesty should not continue two Mints which the distance of Territory considered I suppose will be of necessity Secondly how the Standards if it be not already done as I hear some doubt made of it in popular rumour may be reduced into an exact proportion for the time to come and likewise the computation tale or valuation to be made exact for the Moneys already beaten That done the last Question is which is only proper to this place whether the Stamp or the Image and Superscription of Britain for the time forwards should not be made the self same in both places without any difference at all A matter also which may be done as our Law is by your Majesties Prerogative without Act of Parliament These points are points of Demonstration ad faciendum Populum But so much the more they go to the root of your Majesties intention which is to imprint and inculcate into the Hearts and Heads of the People that they are one People and one Nation In this kind also I have heard it pass abroad in speech of the erection of some new Order of Knighthood with a Reference to the Union and an Oath appropriat thereunto which is a point likewise deserveth a Consideration So much for the External Points The Internal Prints of Separation are as followeth 1. Several Parliaments 2. Several Councils of Estate 3. Several Officers of the Crown 4. Several Nobilities 5. Several Laws 6. Several Courts of Justice Trials and Processes 7. Several Receipts and Finances 8. Several Admiralties and Merchandizings 9. Several Freedoms and Liberties 10. Several Taxes and Imposts As touching the several States Ecclesiastical and the several Mints and Standards and the several Articles and Treaties of Intercourse with Forraign Nations I touched them before In these points of the straight and more inward Union there will interveen one principal difficulty and impediment growing from that root which Aristotle in his Politicks maketh to be the root of all division and diffention in Common-wealths And that is Equality and Inequality For the Realm of Scotland is now an Ancient and Noble Realm substantive of it self But when this Island shall be made Britain then Scotland is no more to be considered as Scotland but as a part of Britain no more then England is to be considered as England but as a part likewise of Britain And consequently neither of these are to be considered as things entire in themselves but in the proportion that they bear to the whole And therefore let us imagine Nam id Mente possumus quod Actu non possumus that Britain had never been divided but had ever been one Kingdom then that part of Soil or Territory which is comprehended under the name of Scotland is in quantity as I have heard it esteemed how true I know not not past a third part of Britain And that part of Soil or Territory which is comprehended under the name of England is two parts of Britain leaving to speak of any difference of Wealth or Population and speaking only of Quantity So then if for example Scotland should bring to Parliament as much Nobility as England then a third part should countervail two parts Nam si inaequalibus aequalia addas omnia erunt inaequalia And this I protest before God and your Majesty I do speak not as a man born in England but as a man born in Britain And therefore to descend to particulars 1. Parliament For the Parliaments the consideration of that Point will fall into four Questions 1. The first what proportion shall be kept between the Votes of England and the Votes of Scotland 2. The second touching the manner of Proposition or possessing of the Parliament of Causes there to be handled which in England is used to be done immediately by any Member of the Parliament or by the Prolocutor and in Scotland is used to be done immediately by the Lords of the Articles whereof the one form seemeth to have more Liberty and the other more Gravity and Maturity And therefore the Question will be whether of these shall yield to other Or whether there should not be a mixture of both by some Commissions precedent to every Parliament in the nature of Lords of the Articles and yet not excluding the Liberty of propounding in full Parliament afterwards 3. The third touching the Orders of Parliament how they may be compounded and the best of either taken 4. The fourth how those which by inheritance or otherwise have Offices of Honour and Ceremony in both the Parliaments as the Lord Steward with us c. may be satisfied and duplicitly accommodated 2. Councils of Estate For the Councils of Estate while the Kingdoms stand divided it should seem necessary to continue several Councils But if your Majesty should proceed to a strict Union then howsoever your Majesty may establish some Provincial Councils in Scotland as there is here of York and in the Marches of Wales Yet the Question will be whether it will not be more convenient for your Majesty to have but one Privy Council about your Person whereof the principal Officers of the Crown of Scotland to be for Dignity sake howsoever their abiding and remaining may be as your Majesty shall imploy their Service But this point belongeth meerly and wholly to your Majesties Royal Will and Pleasure 3. Officers of the Crown For the Officers of the Crown the consideration thereof will fall into these Questions First in regard of the latitude of your Kingdom and the distance of place whether it will not be matter of necessity to continue the several Officers because of the impossibility for the Service to be performed by one The second admitting the duplicity of Officers should be continued yet whether there should not be a difference that one should be the principal Officer and the other to be but special and subalterne As for example one to be Chancellor of Britain and the other to be Chancellor with some special addition As here of the Dutchy c. The third if no such specialty or inferiority be thought fit then whether both Officers should not have the Title and the Name of the whole Island and Precincts As the Lord Chancellor of England to be Lord Chancellor of Britain and the Lord Chancellor of Scotland to be Lord Chancellor of
THE UNION OF THE TWO KINGDOMS OF SCOTLAND AND ENGLAND OR The elaborate Papers of Sir Francis Bacon Lord Verulam Viscount of St. Alban sometime High Chancellor of England The greatest Sates-man of his Nation and Schollar of his Age concerning that Affair Published in this form for publick satisfaction Nullum numen abest Edinburgh Printed in the year 1670. FOR The Right HONOURABLE Sir ANDREW RAMSAY KNIGHT Barron of Abbots-hall c. Lord Provost of Edinburgh and one of His Majesties most Honourable Privy Council My Lord OF the Union of the two Kingdoms now happily intended these being the Elaborate and most Learned Thoughts and Resolutions of that great States-man yet more great Lawyer but most of all the far greatest Schollar of his Age and Nation Sir Francis Bacon Lord Verulam Viscount of St. Alban presented to our sometimes Great SOVERAIGN King James the most Wise and Learned I have advised them again to the Press for the satisfaction of divers Noble and Worthy Persons the Book in which they first came to light being too voluminous for ordinary use and rarely to be found in this Kingdom And now my Lord I have made bold to give you the trouble of this Address and present these few Papers though small in bulk yet vast in matter to your hands both upon my own and the Authors account Upon mine own who have ever been your most humble Client and have had your noble Friendship and Favour to countenance me in all my private concerns And moreover you do as Chief Magistrate govern that City in which I was first educate in the Peripatetickwalks and under and in which I have for divers years profest Letters or practised Chyrurgery and Physick and with the rest of my fellow Citizens have found such refreshment under your Shade and Care that I thought it my duty to signifie it by this small testimony of my thankfulness And I am sure that upon the Authors account there is not a fitter Person to whom these Papers could be committed The great prudence and knowledge he had in State Affairs made him very acceptable to the Kings and People of his own Nation and the great moderation watchfulness and wisdom you have used in governing this City one of the greatest Interests of this Kingdom hath endeared you to all the Princes and Chiefs of this People What labour and trouble you put upon your self to preserve it under the late Usurpers your very enemies do acknowledge and praise How your care and resolution preserved it from ruine when the VVest Male-contents came marching to its very Gates all that were faithful to His Majesties Service are ready to witness And with what sweetness and calmness you have keeped together the Union of the Burgesses who were ready through heat and unadvisedness to divide themselves your late appearance before the Right Honourable Committee of Trade and your oppose to those that were ready to violate the old Sett of the Good-Town is a testimony above exception I could add many more evidences of your great Prudence and Moderation but I will rather forbear them then give the least blush or trouble to your modesty Only this I must add that as your Lordship hath been a great Preserver of the Union of this Burgh So I do not doubt but you who are the most eminent Member of a Party not least concerned in this Affair I mean the Burroughs will with your good advices endeavour such an Union of the two Kingdoms as shall most advance the Glory and Prerogative of our Gracious King and promove most the Honour Trade and Safety of both People This and your Preservation shall ever be the sincere Devotion of My Lord Your most humble Servant C. Irvin A Speech used by Sir Francis Bacon in the Lower House of Parliament 50. Jacobi concerning the Article of general Naturalization of the Scots Nation IT may please you Mr. Speaker Preface I will use none but put my self upon your good Opinions to which I have been accustomed beyond my deservings Neither will I hold you in suspence what way I will choose but now at the first declare my self that I mean to counsel the House to Naturalize this Nation Wherein nevertheless I have a request to make unto you which is of more efficacy to the purpose I have in hand then all that I shall say afterwards And it is the same which Demosthenes did more then once in great Causes of Estate to the people of Athens Ut cum calculâ— Suffragiorum sumant Magnanimitatem Reip. That when they took into their hands the Balls whereby to give their Voices according as the manner of them was They would raise their thoughts and lay aside those considerations which their private Vocations and Degrees mought minister and represent unto them And would take upon them cogitations and minds agreeable to the Dignity and Honour of the Estate For Mr. Speaker as it was aptly and sharply said by Alexander to Parmenio when upon the Recital of the great offers which Darius made Parmenio said unto him I would accept these offers were I as Alexander He turned it upon him again So would I saith he were I as Parmenio So in this cause if an honest English Merchant I do not single out that State in disgrace for this Island ever held it Honourable but only for an instance of a private profession If an English Merchant should say Surely I would proceed no further in the Union were I as the King It mought be reasonably answered No more would the King were He as an English Merchant And the like may be said of a Gentleman of the Countrey be he never so worthy and sufficient Or of a Lawyer be he never so wise and learned Or of any other particular condition in this Kingdom For certainly Mr. Speaker if a man shall be only or chiefly sensible of those respects which his particular Vocation and Degree shall suggest and infuse into him and not enter into true and worthy considerations of Estate he shall never be able aright to give counsel or to take counsel in this matter So that it this request be granted I account the cause obtained But to proceed to the matter it self All Consultations do rest upon Questions comparative For when a question is de Vero it is simple for there is but one Truth But when a question is de Bono it is for the most part comparative For there be differing degrees of Good and Evil and the best of the Good is to be preferred and chosen and the worst of the Evil is to be declined and avoided And therefore in a Question of this nature you may not look for Answers proper to every inconvenience alledged For somewhat that cannot be specially answered may nevertheless be encountred and overweighed by matter of greater moment And therefore the matter which I shall set forth unto you will naturally receive this distribution of three parts First an Answer unto those inconveniences which
Britain But with several Proviso's that they shall not intromit themselves but within their several Precincts 4. Nobilities For the Nobilities the consideration thereof will fall into these Questions The first of their Votes in Parliament which was touched before what proportion they shall bear to the Nobility of England Wherein if the proportion which shall be thought fit be not full yet your Majesty may out of your Prerogative supply it For although you cannot make fewer of Scotland yet you may make more of England The second is touching the Place and Precedence wherein to marshal them according to the Precedence of England in your Majesties Stile and according to the Nobility of Ireland that is all English Earls first and then Scots will be thought unequal for Scotland To marshal them according to Antiquity will be thought unequal for England because I hear their Nobility is generally more ancient And therefore the Question will be whether the indifferentest way were not to take them interchangeably As for example first the ancient Earl of England and then the ancient Earl of Scotland And so Alternis vicibus 5. Laws For the Laws to make an entire and perfect Union it is a matter of great difficulty and length both in the collecting of them and in the passing of them For first as to the collecting of them there must be made by the Lawyers of either Nation a Disgest under Titles of their several Laws and Customs as well Common Laws as Statutes that they may be collated and compared and that the diversities may appear and be discerned of And for the passing of them we see by experience that Patrius Mos is dear to all men and that men are bred and nourished up in the love of it and therefore how harsh Changes and Innovations are And we see likewise what Disputation and Argument the alteration of some one Law doth cause and bring forth How much more the alteration of the whole Corps of the Law Therefore the first Question will be whether it be not good to proceed by parts and to take that that is most necessary and leave the rest to time The parts therefore or subject of Laws are for this purpose fitliest distributed according to that ordinary didivision of Criminal and Civil and those of Criminal Causes into Capital and Penal The second Question therefore is Allowing the general Union of Laws to be too great a Work to embrace whether it were not convenient that Cases Capital were the same in both Nations I say the Cases I do not speak of the Proceedings or Trials That is to say whether the same Offences were not fit to be made Treason or Fellony in both places The third Question is whether Cases Penal though not Capital yet if they concern the Publick State or otherwise the discipline of Manners were not fit likewise to be brought into one degree As the case of Misprision of Treason the Case of Premunire the Case of Fugitives the Case of Incest the Case of Simony and the rest But the Question that is more urgent then any of these is Whether these Cases at the least be they of an higher or inferiour degree wherein the Fact committed or Act done in Scotland may prejudice the State and Subjects of England or è converso are not to be reduced to one uniformity of Law and Punishment As for example a Perjury committed in a Court of Justice in Scotland cannot be prejudicial in England because Depositions taken in Scotland cannot be produced and used here in England But a Forgery of a Deed in Scotland I mean with a false date of England may be used and given in evidence in England So likewise the depopulating of a Town in Scotland doth not directly prejudice the State of England But if an English Merchant shall carry Silver and Gold into Scotland as he may and thence transport it into Forraign Parts this prejudiceth the State of England and may be an evasion to all the Laws of England ordained in that case and therefore had need to be bridled with as severe a Law in Scotland as it is here in England Of this kind there are many Laws The Law of the 50. of Rich. the 2. of going over without Licence if there be not the like Law in Scotland will be frustrated and evaded For any Subject of England may go first into Scotland and thence into Forraign parts So the Laws prohibiting transportation of sundry Commodities as Gold and Silver Ordnance Artillery Corn c. if there be not a correspondence of Laws in Scotland will in like manner be deluded and frustrate For any English Merchant or Subject may carry such Commodities first into Scotland as well as he may carry them from Port to Port in England And out of Scotland to Forraign parts without any peril of Law So Libels may be devised and written in Scotland and published and scattered in England Treasons may be plotted in Scotland and executed in England And so in many other cases if there be not the like severity of Law in Scotland to restrain offences that there is in England whereof we are here ignorant whether there be or no it will be a gap or stop even for English Subjects to escape and avoid the Laws of England But for Treasons the best is that by the Statute of 26. King Hen. the 8 th Cap. 13. any Treason committed in Scotland may be proceeded with in England as well as Treasons committed in France Rome or elsewhere 6. Courts of Justice and Administration of Laws For Courts of Justice Trials Processes and other Administration of Laws to make any alteration in either Nation it will be a thing so new and unwonted to either People that it may be doubted it will make the Administration of Justice which of all other things ought to be known and certain as a beaten way to become intricate and uncertain And besides I do not see that the severalty of Administration of Justice though it be by Court Soveraign of last resort I mean without appeal or errour is any impediment at all to the Union of a Kingdom As we see by experience in the several Courts of Parliament in the Kingdom of France And I have been alwayes of opinion that the Subjects of England do already fetch Justice somewhat far off more then in any Nation that I know the largeness of the Kingdom considered though it be holpen in some part by the Circuits of the Judges and the two Councils at York and in the Marches of Wales established But it may be a good Question whether as commune vinculum of the Justice of both Nations your Majesty should not erect some Court about your Person in the nature of the Grand Council of France To which Court you might by way of evocation draw Causes from the ordinary Judges of both Nations For so doth the French King from all the Courts of Parliament in France many of which are more