“ Attorney—The king's safety and your clearing cannot agree. I protest before God, I never knew a clearer treason.
Raleigh—I never had intelligence with Cobham since I came to the Tower.
Attorney—Go to, I will lay thee upon thy back, for the confidentest traitor that ever came at a bar. Why should you take 8,000 crowns for a peace?
Lord Cecil—Be not so impatient, good Mr. Attorney. Give him leave to speak.
Attorney—If I may not be patiently heard, you will encourage traitors and discourage us. I am the king's sworn servant, and must speak; if he be guilty, he is a traitor; if not, deliver him. ”

“ Lord President—Sir, this is the third time that you have publicly disowned this Court, and put an affront upon it. How far you have preserved the privileges of the people, your actions have spoke it; but truly, Sir, men's intentions ought to be known by their actions; you have written your meaning in bloody characters throughout the whole kingdom. But, Sir, you understand the pleasure of the Court.—Clerk, Record the Default.—And, Gentlemen, you that took charge of the Prisoner, take him back again. ”

“ King—Sir, I know it is in vain for me to dispute, I am no sceptic for to deny the Power that you have; I know that you have Power enough: Sir, I confess, I think it would have been for the kingdom's peace, if you would have taken the pains for to have shewn the lawfulness of your Power; for this Delay that I have desired, I confess it is a delay, but it is a delay very important for the Peace of the Kingdom; for it is not my person that I look on alone, it is the kingdom's welfare, and the kingdom's peace; it is an old Sentence, That we should think long, before we resolve of great matters. ”

“ King—Sir, By your favour, I do not know the forms of law: I do know law and reason, though I am no lawyer professed; but I know as much law as any gentleman in England; and therefore (under favour) I do plead for the Liberties of the People of England more than you do: and therefore if I should impose a belief upon any man, without reasons given for it, it were unreasonable: but I must tell you, that that reason that I have, as thus informed, I cannot yield unto it.
Lord President—Sir, I must interrupt you, you may not be permitted; you speak of law and reason ”

“ Gentlemen, upon your consciences be it; the preservation of the government, the life of the King, the safety and honour of our religion, and the discharge of our consciences as loyal men, good Christians, and faithful subjects, are at stake; neither her age or her sex are to move you who have nothing else to consider but the evidence of the fact you are to try. I charge you therefore, as you will answer it at the bar of the last judgment, where you and we must all appear, deliver your verdict according to conscience and truth. ”

“ Attorney—He is a party, and may not come; the law is against it.
Raleigh—It is a toy to tell me of law; I defy such law, I stand on the fact.
Lord Cecil—I am afraid my often speaking (who am inferior to my lords here present) will make the world think that I delight to hear myself talk. My affection to you, sir Walter, was not extinguished, but slaked in regard to your deserts. You know the law of the realm (to which your mind doth not contest) that my lord Cobham cannot be brought. ”

“ You should not have asked me a question so often, but I would have given you a plain answer, though I were under the obligation of an oath as you are.
Dunne—My lord, pray ask the question again once more and I will tell you.
Lord Chief-Justice—I will so, and I will ask it you with all the calmness, and seriousness, and candour, that I can; if I know my own heart, it is not in my nature to desire the hurt of anybody, much less to delight in their eternal perdition ”

“ But truly, Sir, that of the kingdom of Arragon, I shall think some of us have thought upon it, where they have the justice of Arragon, that is, a man, tanquam in medio positus, betwixt the King of Spain and the people of the country; that if wrong be done by the King, he that is king of Arragon, the justice, hath power to reform the wrong; and he is acknowledged to be the king's superior, and is the grand preserver of their privileges, and hath prosecuted kings upon their miscarriages. ”

“ Lord Chief-Justice—Very well. Now mark what I say to you, friend: I would not by any means in the world endeavour to fright you into anything, or any ways tempt you to tell an untruth, but provoke you to tell the truth, and nothing but the truth, that is the business we come about here. Know, friend, there is no religion that any man can pretend to, can give a countenance to lying, or can dispense with telling the truth: Thou hast a precious immortal soul, and there is nothing in the world equal to it in value: There is no relation to thy mistress, if she be so ”

“ Sir, by the old laws of England, I speak these things the rather to you, because you were pleased to let fall the other day, You thought you had as much knowledge in the Law as most gentlemen in England: it is very well, Sir. And truly, Sir, it is very fit for the gentlemen of England to understand that Law under which they must live, and by which they must be governed. And then, Sir, the Scripture says, 'They that know their master's will and do it not' what follows? The Law is your master, the acts of parliament. ”

“ Lord Cecil—If he say, you have been the instigator of him to deal with the Spanish king, had not the Council cause to draw you hither?
Raleigh—I put myself on it.
Lord Cecil—Then, sir Walter, call upon God and prepare yourself; for I do verily believe that my lords will prove this. Excepting your faults (I call them no worse) , by God I am your friend. The heat and passion in you, and the Attorney's zeal in the king's service, make me speak this.
Raleigh—Whosoever is the workman, it is reason he should give an account of his work to his workmaster. ”

“ Truly Sir, I hope all of us have so: That God, who we know is a King of Kings, and Lord of Lords; that God with whom there is no respect of Persons; that God, who is the Avenger of innocent Blood; We have that God before us; that God, who does bestow a curse upon them that with-hold their hands from shedding of blood, which is in the case of guilty malefactors, and that do deserve death: That God we have before our eyes. And were it not that the conscience of our duty hath called us unto this place, and this imployment, Sir, you should have had no appearance of a Court here. ”

“ But, Sir, we must prefer the discharge of our duty unto God, and unto the kingdom, before any other respect whatsoever. And although at this time many of us, if not all of us, are severely threatened by some of your party, what they intend to do, Sir, we do here declare, That we shall not decline or forbear the doing of our duty in the administration of Justice, even to you, according to the merit of your Offence although God should permit those men to effect all that bloody design in hand against us. ”

“ Lord President—Serjeant, take away the Prisoner.
King—Well, Sir, remember that the king is not suffered to give in his Reasons for the Liberty and Freedom of all his Subjects. [Pg 89]
Lord President—Sir, you are not to have Liberty to use this language; How great a friend you have been to the Laws and Liberties of the people, let all England and the world judge.
King—Sir, under favour, it was the Liberty, Freedom, and Laws of the subject, that ever I took—defended myself with arms; I never took up arms against the people, but for the laws. ”

“ Susanna had been condemned, if Daniel had not cried out, 'Will you condemn an innocent Israelite, without examination or knowledge of the truth?' Remember it is absolutely the Commandment of God: If a false witness rise up you shall cause him to be brought before the Judges; if he be found false, he shall have the punishment which the accused should have had. It is very sure for my lord to accuse me is my certain danger, and it may be a means to excuse himself. ”

“ If there be but a trial of five marks at Common Law, a witness must be deposed. Good my lords, let my Accuser come face to face, and be deposed.
Lord Chief-Justice—You have no law for it: God forbid any man should accuse himself upon his oath!
Attorney—The law presumes, a man will not accuse himself to accuse another. You are an odious man, for Cobham thinks his cause the worse that you are in it. Now you shall hear of some stirs to be raised in Scotland. ”

“ You had been a man fit and able to have served the king in good place. You had brought yourself into a good state of living; if you had entered into a good consideration of your estate and not allowed your own wit to have intrapped yourself, you might have lived in good comfort. It is best for man not to seek to climb too high, lest he fall: nor yet to creep too low, lest he be trodden on. It was the Poesy of the wisest and greatest Counsellor of our time in England, In media spatio mediocria firma locantur. ”

“ Authority and Jurisdiction of the kingdom, they have declared, That it is notorious, that the matter of the Charge is true, as it is in truth, my lord, as clear as crystal, and as the sun that shines at noon-day: which if your lordship and the Court be not satisfied in, I have notwithstanding, on the people of England's behalf, several Witnesses to produce. ”

“ Dunne—My Lord, I speak nothing but the truth.
Lord Chief-Justice—Well, I only bid you have a care, truth never wants a subterfuge, it always loves to appear naked, it needs no enamel, nor any covering; but lying and snivelling, and canting, and Hicksing, always appear in masquerade. ”

“ Lord Chief-Justice—There must not such a gap be opened for the destruction of the king, as would be if we should grant this. You plead hard for yourself, but the laws plead as hard for the king. I did never hear that course to be taken in a case of Treason, as to write one to another, or speak one to another, during the time of their imprisonment. There hath been intelligence between you; and what under-hand practices there may be, I know not. If the circumstances agree not with the Evidence, we will not condemn you. ”

“ But take all together, Sir; If you were as the Charge speaks, and no otherwise, admitted king of England; but for that you were pleased then to alledge, how that for almost a thousand years these things have been, Stories will tell you, if you go no higher than the time of the Conquest; if you do come down since the Conquest, you are the twenty-fourth king from William called the Conqueror, you shall find one half of them to come merely from the state, and not merely upon the point of descent. It were easy to be instanced to you; but time must not be lost that way. ”

“ I can say no more, Time and Death call me away; the everlasting, powerful, infinite and omnipotent God, that Almighty God, who is goodness itself, the true life and true light, keep thee and thine, have mercy on me, and teach me to forgive my persecutors and accusers, and send us to meet in his glorious kingdom. ”

“ Prove one of these things wherewith you have charged me, and I will confess the whole Indictment, and that I am the horriblest traitor that ever lived, and worthy to be crucified with a thousand thousand torments.
Attorney—Nay, I will prove all: thou art a monster; thou hath an English face but a Spanish heart. Now [Pg 19] you must have Money; Aremberg was no sooner in England (I charge thee, Raleigh) but thou incitest Cobham to go unto him, and to deal with him for Money, to bestow on discontented persons, to raise Rebellion on the kingdom. ”

“ Attorney—Thou art an odious fellow, thy name is hateful to all the realm of England for thy pride.
Raleigh—It will go near to prove a measuring cast between you and me, Mr. Attorney.
Attorney—Well, I will now make it appear to the world that there never lived a viler viper upon the face of the earth than thou.—And there withal he drew a letter out of his pocket saying further—My lords, you shall see this is an agent that hath writ a treatise against the Spaniard, and hath ever so detested him; this is he that hath spent so much money against him in service ”

“ To what friend to direct thee I know not, for all mine have left me in the true time of trial. And I perceive that my death was determined from the first day. Most sorry I am, God knows, that being thus surprised with death I can leave you in no better estate. God is my witness, I meant you all my office of wines, or all that I could [Pg 68] have purchased by selling it, half my stuff, and all my jewels, but some one for the boy; but God hath prevented all my resolutions, that great God that ruleth all in all: but if you can live free from want, care for no more, the rest is but vanity. ”

“ Raleigh—He is as passionate a man as lives; for he hath not spared the best friends he hath in England in his passion. My lords, I take it, he that has been examined, has ever been asked at the time of his Examination, if it be according to his meaning, and then to subscribe. Methinks, my lords, when he accuses a man, he should give some account and reason of it: it is not sufficient to say we talked of it. If I had been the plotter, would not I have given Cobham some arguments, whereby to persuade the king of Spain, and answer his objections? ”

“ If you have made up your mind to cut off a man's head, and if you are aware that your position as a judge is a false one, you are bound to assert your authority without much regard to prisoners' feelings, or even good manners. I am not in a position to discuss what effect the essential illegality of the trial, from a formal point of view, produced on contemporary and subsequent opinion; but I think it may safely be said that the trial presents the most striking example to be found in English history of the view held in this country of the authority of the law. ”