erbury, for Canterbury; _Paltri_-politans,
for Metropolitans; _See Villains_, for Civilians; and Doctor
of _Devility_, for Divinity! and more of this stamp. Who could
imagine that the writers of these scurrilities were learned
men, and that their patrons were men of rank! We find two
knights heavily fined for secreting these books in their
cellars. But it is the nature of rebellion to unite the two
extremes; for _want_ stirs the populace to rise, and _excess_
the higher orders. This idea is admirably expressed in one of
our elder poets:--

"Want made them murmur; for the people, who
To get their bread, do wrestle with their fate,
Or those, who in superfluous riot flow,
Soonest rebel. Convulsions in a State,
Like those which natural bodies do oppress,
Rise from repletion, or from emptiness."
ALEYNE'S _Henry VII_.

[421] The writer of Algernon Sidney's Memoirs could not have known
this fact, or he would not have said that "this was the first
indictment of high treason upon which any man lost his life
for _writing anything without publishing it_."--Edit. 1751, p.
21. It is curious to have Sidney's own opinion on this point.
We discover this on his trial. He gives it, assuming one of
his own noble principles, not likely to have been allowed by
the wretched Tories of that day. Addressing the villanous
Jeffries, the Lord Chief Justice:--"My Lord, I think it is _a
right of mankind, and 'tis exercised by all studious men_, to
write, in their own closets, what they please, for their own
memory; and no man can be answerable for it, unless they
publish it." Jeffries replied:--"Pray don't go away with _that
right of mankind_, that it is lawful for me to write what I
will in my own closet, so I do not publish it. We must not
endure men to talk thus, that by the _right of nature_ every
man may contrive mischief in his own chamber, and is not to be
punished till he thinks fit to be called to it." Jeffries was
a profligate sophist, but his talents were as great as his
vices.

[422] Penry's unfinished petition, which he designed to have
presented to the Queen before the trial, is a bold and
energet