Lords before the Parliament.

1. GReat Lords by reason of their Flat∣terers, are the first that know their own Vertues, and the last that know their own Vices: Some of them are a∣sham’d upwards, because their Ancestors were too great. Others are ashamed down∣wards, because they were too little.

2. The Prior of St. John of Jerusalem, is said to be Primus Baro Angliae, the first Baron of England, because being last of the Spiritual Barons, he chose to be first of the Temporal. He was a kind of an Otter, a Knight half Spiritual, and half Temporal.

3. Quest. Whether is every Baron a Ba∣ron of some Place?

Answ. ’Tis according to his Patent; of late Years they have been made Baron of some Place, but antiently not, call’d only by their Sir-Name, or the Sir-Name of some Family, into which they have been married.

4. The making of new Lords lessens all the rest. ’Tis in the business of Lords, as it ’twas with St. Nicolas’s Image: The Country-Man, you know, could not find in his Heart to adore the new Image, made of his own Plum-Tree, though he had formerly worship’d the old one. The Lords that are antient we honour, because we know not whence they come; but the new ones we slight, because we know their beginning.

5. For the Irish Lords to take upon them here in England, is as if the Cook in the Fair should come to my Lady Kent’s Kitchen, and take upon him to roast the Meat there, because he is a Cook in another place.