rof would change the nature of the thinge,
if his fancy suggests to him any particular which himselfe might
performe in that action, upon the imagination that every body would
approove it, if it were proposed to them, he chooses rather to do it,
then to communicate, that he may have some signall parte to himselfe
in the transaction, in which no other person can clayme a share;
and by this unhappy temper, he did often involve himselfe in very
unprosperous attempts. The Kinge himselfe was the unfittest person
alive to be served by such a Councellour, beinge to easily inclined to
suddayne enterprizes, and as easily amazed when they were entred upon;
and from this unhappy composition in the one and the other, a very
unhappy councell was entred upon, and resolution taken, without the
least communication with ether of the three, which had bene so lately
admitted to an intire truste.

31.

THE LORD CAPEL.

_Arthur Capel, created Baron Capel 1641._

_Born 1610. Beheaded 1649._

By CLARENDON.

He was a man, in whome the malice of his enimyes could discover very
few faultes, and whome his frends could not wish better accomplished,
whome Crumwells owne character well described, and who indeede could
never have bene contented to have lived under that government, whose
memory all men loved and reverenced, though few followed his example.
He had alwayes lyved in a state of greate plenty and generall
estimation, havinge a very noble fortune of his owne by descent, and
a fayre addition to it, by his marriage with an excellent wife, a Lady
of a very worthy extraction, of greate virtue and beauty, by whome he
had a numerous issue of both sexes, in which he tooke greate joy and
comfort, so that no man was more happy in all his domestique affayres,
and so much the more happy, in that he thought himselfe most blessed
in them, and yett the Kings honour was no sooner violated and his
just power invaded, then he threw all those blessings behinde him, and
havinge no other obligations to the Crowne, then those which his owne
honour and conscience suggested to him, he frankely engaged his person
and his fortune from the beginninge of the troubles, as many others
did, in all actions and enterpryzes of the greatest hazarde and
daunger, and continewed to the end, without ever makinge one false
stepp, as few others did, though he had once, by the iniquity of a
faction that then praevayled, an indignity putt upon him, that might
have