History of the family of Seton during eight centuries > Volume 2

644 THE CHANCELLOR'S CORRESPONDENCE
President of the Council the Lord James Elphinstone, brother of Father
George; but they are all directed by Lord Alexander Seton. He is a
Catholic, as is also the Lord President and the Royal Advocate. In
political wisdom, in learning, in high birth, wealth and authority, he
possesses far more influence than the rest, and his power is universally
acknowledged. But he publicly professes the State religion, rendering
external obedience to the King and the ministers, and goes occasionally,
though rarely, to the sermons, sometimes to their heretical communion.
He has also subscribed their Confession of faith, without which he would
not be able to retain peaceable possession of the rank, office, and estates,
with which he is so richly endowed. He has brought all the principal men
of the kingdom round to the same view, and very few venture to differ
from him, owing to his eloquence, learning, and authority. Two or three
times a year he comes to Catholic confession, and communicates with his
mother, brother, sister, and nephews, who are better Catholics than
himself.' x
Several curious letters from Seton, about this period, turn up in the
Harleian Collection of mss. in the British Museum. Thus, on the nth of
September 1604, he writes to ' M r Harry Savele, Escuyer,' relative to a
theological work translated by ' Seigneur de Montaigne,' in which he refers
to the 'barbarous Latine y e booke was first written in.' 3
Three years later (8th April 1607), in writing to ' M r Adame Newtoun,
Edinburgh, Deane of Duresme (Durham) and preceptor to the Prince
his Grace,' he refers to his recommendation of ' ane freind of myne callit
George Setoun.' 3 The seal on the letter bears the Chancellor's favourite
device of a cinquefoil within a crescent, surmounted by a
coronet.
The year following (13th July 1608) he communi-
cates with Lord Salisbury, Lord High Treasurer of
England, relative to troops (200 men) sent to Ireland,
with the account of the expenses. 4
X^ ,<>> O n ^e 25th of May 1606 the Chancellor indites a
long and indignant letter 5 to his ' maist sacred Soverane,'
with reference to certain aspersions that had been cast upon him by a
certain ' Maister Jhone Forbes,' in which the courtier and the scholar are
both admirably represented, and he confidently leaves it to the King to
determine whether 'a condemned traitour' or his Majesty's Chancellor is
' maist worthie of credeit ' !
In the course of the two following years (1607-8) a good many letters
appear to have been addressed to the King by Lord Dunfermline relative
to the disorderly condition of the district of Athole, the feud between the
Earls of Eglinton and Glencairn, and the Gowrie Conspiracy.
1 Narratives of Scottish Catholics (1885), 3 Harl. MSS. 7004, f. 33.
p. 278. « 32,476, ff. 9- 1 1.
2 Harl. MSS. 7002, f. 37. 6 See Memoir of Chancellor Seton, p. 74.