et on which he was
executed.--Answer. I have shown that this confession was such an
aukward forgery that lord Bacon did not dare to quote or adhere to
it, but invented a new story, more specious, but equally
inconsistent with, probability. 7. After Henry the Eighth's
accession, the titles of the houses of York and Lancaster were fully
confounded, and there was no longer any necessity for defending
Henry the Seventh and his title; yet all the historians of that
time, when the events were recent, some of these historians, such as
Sir Thomas More, of the highest authority, agree in treating Perkin
as an impostor.--Answer. When Sir Thomas More wrote, Henry the
Seventh was still alive: that argument therefore falls entirely to
the ground: but there was great necessity, I will not say to defend,
but even to palliate the titles of both Henry the Seventh and
Eighth. The former, all the world agrees now, had no title(49) the
latter had none from his father, and a very defective one from his
mother, If she had any right, it could only be after her brothers;
and it is not to be supposed that so jealous a tyrant as Henry the
Eighth would suffer it to be said that his father and mother enjoyed
the throne to the prejudice of that mother's surviving brother, in
whose blood the father had imbrued his hands. The murder therefore
was to be fixed on Richard the Third, who was to be supposed to have
usurped the throne, by murdering, and not, as was really the case,
by bastardizing his nephews. If they were illegitimate, so was their
sister; and if she was, what title had she conveyed to her son Henry
the Eighth? No wonder that both Henrys were jealous of the earl of
Suffolk, whom one bequeathed to slaughter, and the other executed;
for if the children of Edward the Fourth were spurious, and those of
Clarence attainted, the right of the house of York was vested in the
duchess of Suffolk and her descendants. The massacre of the children
of Clarence and the duchess of Suffolk show what Henry the Eighth
thought of the titles both of his father and mother.(50) But, says
Mr. Hume, all the historians of that time agree in treating Perkin
as an impostor. I have shown from their own mouths that they have
all doubted of it. The reader must judge between us. But Mr. Hume
selects Sir Thomas More as the highest authority; I have proved that
he was the lowest--but not in the case of Perkin, for Sir Thomas
More's history does not go so low; yet happenin