than ever the cause of Francis. He
strained every nerve to gain for him, in 1592, the situation of
attorney-general: but Burleigh opposed the appointment; Robert Cecil
openly expressed to the earl his surprise that he should seek to procure
it for "a raw youth;" and her majesty declared that, after the manner in
which Francis Bacon had stood up against her in parliament, admission to
her presence was the only favor to which he ought to aspire. She added,
that in her father's time such conduct would have been sufficient to
banish a man the court for life. Lowering his tone, Essex afterwards
sought for his friend the office of solicitor-general; but the same
prejudices and antipathies still thwarted him: and finding all his
efforts vain to establish him in any public station of honor or
emolument, he nobly compensated his disappointment and relieved his
necessities by the gift of an estate.

The spirit of Bacon was neither a courageous nor a lofty one. He too
soon repented of his generous exertions in the popular cause, and sought
to atone for them by so entire a submission of himself to her majesty,
accompanied with such eloquent professions of duty, humility and
profound respect, that we can scarcely doubt that a word of solicitation
from the lips of Burleigh might have gained him an easy pardon. It is
painful to think that any party jealousies, or any compliance with the
malignant passions of his son, should so have poisoned the naturally
friendly and benevolent disposition of this aged minister, that he
could bear to withhold the offices of kindness from the nephew of his
late beloved wife, and the son of one of his nearest friends and most
cordial coadjutors in public life. But according to the maxims of
court-factions his desertion of the Bacons might be amply
justified;--they had made their election, and it was the patronage of
Essex which they preferred. Experience taught them too late, that for
their own interests they had chosen wrong. Since the death of Leicester,
the Cecils had possessed all the real power at the court of Elizabeth:
they and they only could advance their adherents. Essex, it is true,
through the influence which he exerted over the imagination or the
affections of the queen, could frequently obtain grants to himself of
real importance and great pecuniary value. But her majesty's singular
caprice of temper rendered her jealous of every mark of favor extorted
from the tender weakness of her hear