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his principal work, entitled, Del Arcano del Mare, &c. printed at Florence in 1630, and again in 1646, in two volumes folio, is highly valuable. His powerful sudorific was long known under the name of, The Earl of Warwick's Powder.'

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SIR FRANCIS WALSINGHAM,

SECRETARY OF STATE TO QUEEN ELIZABETH.*

[1536-1590.]

FRANCIS WALSINGHAM, descended of an ancient and good family, was born at Chislehurst, about the year 1536. After he had spent some time at King's College, Cambridge, his friends sent him to travel in foreign countries, while he was extremely young; and to this happy circumstance it was owing, that he remained abroad during the administration of Queen Mary, to whose bloody bigotry he might otherwise, for his declared attachment to the reformed religion, have fallen a victim.

A genius for political investigation† directed his

* AUTHORITIES. Camden's Annals of Queen Elizabeth; Lloyd's State-Worthies; Melvil's Memoirs; and Biographia Britannica.

↑ Lloyd, in his State-Worthies,' observes, " His head was so strong, that he could look into the depth of men and business, and dive into the whirlpools of state. Dexterous he was in finding a secret, close in keeping it: much he had got by study, more by travel, which enlarged and actuated his thoughts. His conversation was insinuating and reserved: he saw every man, and none saw him. His spirit was as public as his parts; and it was his first maxim, 'Knowledge is never too dear:' yet as debonnair, as he was prudent; and, as obliging to the softer predomi

attention in early life to the study of the forms of government, the manners, and the customs of the different nations of Europe; and of these he acquired such an extensive knowledge, that upon his return to England, in the reign of Elizabeth, his abilities recommended him to Sir William Cecil, by whom he was employed in some of the most important affairs of state. The first of his public functions was an embassy to France, where he resided several years during the heat of the civil wars in that kingdom. In August, 1570, he was sent thither to negotiate a marriage between his royal mistress and the Duke of Alençon, with other matters of the highest consequence; and he continued there till April, 1573, sparing neither pains nor expense to promote to the utmost the Queen's service.* Upon his return to England, he

nant parts of the world, as he was serviceable to the more severe; and no less dexterous to work on humour, than to convince reason. He would say, 'he must observe the joints and flexures of affairs;' and so would do more with a story, than others could with an harangue. He always surprised business, and preferred motions in the heat of other diversions; and, if he must debate it, he would hear all: and with the advantage of the foregoing speeches, that either cautioned or confirmed his resolutions, he carried all before him in conclusion, beyond reply. This Spanish proverb was familiar with him, Tell a lie, and find a truth;' and this, 'Speak no more than you may safely retreat from without danger, or fairly go through without opposition.' Some are good only at some affairs in their own acquaintance; Walsingham was ready every where, and could make a party in Rome as well as England. He waited on men's souls with his eye, discerning their secret hearts through their transparent faces."

"In this negociation," remarks De Wicquefort, "the interest of the Reformed, wherewith he was charged, was a very nice affair; and he had to deal with Charles IX. and his mother, the most suspicious and treacherous of princes: notwithstanding

was appointed one of the principal Secretaries of State; and soon afterward, on the promotion of his constant friend and patron Sir William Cecil to the peerage, he received the honour of knighthood. From the death of Sir Thomas Smith indeed, the senior Secretary, which happened in 1577, Sir Francis may be considered as second in the administration of public affairs, and the firm supporter of Burghley's power against that of Leicester and his party.

In that place of trust, he absolutely devoted himself, his life, his time, and his estate to the service of his Queen and country; and to compass his ends, he guided himself by such maxims as these, recorded by Lloyd in his State-Worthies: "A habit of secrecy is policy and virtue." To him "men's faces spoke as much as their tongues, and their countenances were indexes of their hearts." He would so beset men with questions, and draw them on, and pick it out of them by piece-meals, that they discovered themselves whether they answered, or were silent. He served himself of the factions at court, as the Queen his mistress did, neither advancing one, nor depressing another: familiar with Cecil, allied to Leicester, and an oracle to Sussex. He could overthrow any matter by undertaking it, and move it so as it must fall. He never broke any

which, he acquitted himself with great honour. To which it can be no exception, that he did not suspect the court of France's perfidiousness: being himself an honest man, he could never imagine that so black a villainy could enter into man's heart, as the Massacre of Paris, executed by order of the despicable Charles IX. From our embassador's letters it appeared, that bis expenses were so immense, very probably in gaining intelligence, that (to use his own words) sometimes he had neither furniture, money, nor credit.”

business, yet carried many: he could discourse any matter with them that most opposed; so that they, in opposing it, promoted it. His fetches and com pass to his designed speech were things of great patience and use.-So patient was this wise man, that his native place never saw him angry, the university never passionate, and the court never discomposed. Religion was, in his judgement, the interest of his country, and it was the delight of his soul; therefore he maintained it as sincerely as he professed it: it had his head, his heart, and his purse. He laid the great foundation of the Protestant constitution, as to it's policy, and the main plot against the Popish as to it's ruin.

In this capacity we are told, that he maintained no fewer than fifty-three agents in foreign courts, and eighteen spies; by means of whom he undermined all the plots of the private as well as public enemies of his nation. “He outdid the Jesuits," says Lloyd, " in their own bow, and over-reached them in their own equivocations and mental reservations; never settling a lie, but warily drawing out and discovering truth." So good was his intelligence, that he was confessor to most of the Papists before their death, as they had been to their brethren before their treasons.-For two pistoles an order, he had all the private papers of Europe. Bellarmine read his lectures at Rome one month, and Reynolds had them to confute the next. Few letters escaped his hands, whose contents he could read, and not touch the seals. He had the wonderful art of weaving plots, in which busy people were so entangled that they could never escape, but were sometimes spared upon submission, at others hanged for

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