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SIR JOHN ELIOT (1592-1632)

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Originally appearing in Volume V09, Page 277 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SIR See also:JOHN See also:ELIOT (1592-1632)  , See also:English statesman, son of See also:Richard See also:Eliot, a member of an old See also:Devonshire See also:family lately settled in See also:Cornwall, was See also:born at his See also:father's seat at See also:Port Eliot in Cornwall in 1592 . He matriculated at See also:Exeter See also:College, See also:Oxford, on the 4th of See also:December 16071 and leaving the university after a See also:residence of three years he studied See also:law at one of the inns of See also:court . He also spent some months travelling in See also:France, See also:Spain and See also:Italy, in See also:company, for See also:part of the See also:time, with See also:young See also:George See also:Villiers, afterwards See also:duke of See also:Buckingham . He was only twenty-two when he began his See also:parliamentary career as member for St Germans in the " addled See also:parliament " of 1614 . In 1618 he was knighted, and next See also:year through the patronage of Buckingham he obtained the See also:appointment,of See also:vice-See also:admiral of See also:Devon, with large See also:powers for the See also:defence and See also:control of the See also:commerce of the See also:county . It was not See also:long before the characteristic See also:energy with which he performed the duties in his See also:office involved him in difficulties . After many attempts, in 1623 he succeeded by a See also:clever but dangerous manceuvre in entrapping the famous pirate See also:John Nutt, who had for years infested the See also:southern See also:coast, inflicting immense damage upon English commerce . The issue is noteworthy . The pirate, having a powerful See also:protector at court in See also:Sir George See also:Calvert, the secretary of See also:state, was pardoned; while the vice-admiral, upon charges which could not be substantiated, was flung into the See also:Marshalsea, and detained there nearly four months . A few See also:weeks after his See also:release Eliot was elected member of parliament for See also:Newport (See also:February 1624) . On the 27th of February he delivered his first speech, in which he at once revealed his See also:great powers as an orator, demanding boldly that the liberties and privileges of parliament, repudiated by See also:James I. in the former parliament, should be secured . In the first parliament of See also:Charles I., in 1625, he urged the enforcement of the See also:laws against the See also:Roman Catholics .

Meanwhile he had continued the friend and supporter of Buckingham and greatly approved of the See also:

war with Spain . Buckingham's incompetence, however, and the See also:bad faith with which both he and the See also:king continued to treat the parliament, alienated Eliot completely from the See also:administration . Distrust of his former friend quickly See also:grew in Eliot's excitable mind to a certainty of his criminal ambition and See also:treason to his See also:country . Returned to the parliament of 1626 as member for St Germans, he found himself, in the See also:absence of other chiefs of the opposition whom the king had secured by nominating them sheriffs, the See also:leader of the See also:House . He immediately demanded an inquiry into the See also:recent disaster at See also:Cadiz . On the 27th of See also:March he made an open and daring attack upon Buckingham and his evil administration . He was not intimidated by the king's threatening intervention on the 29th, and persuaded the House to defer the actual See also:grant of the subsidies and to See also:present a remonstrance to the king, declaring its right to examine the conduct of ministers . On the 8th of May he was one of the managers who carried Buckingham's See also:impeachment to the Lords, and on the loth he delivered the charges against him, comparing him in the course of his speech to See also:Sejanus . Next See also:day Eliot was sent to the See also:Tower . On the See also:Commons declining to proceed with business as long as Eliot and Sir See also:Dudley See also:Digges (who had been imprisoned with him) were in confinement, they were released, and parliament was dissolved on the 15th of See also:June . Eliot was immediately dismissed from his office of vice-admiral of Devon, and in 1627 he was again imprisoned for refusing to pay a forced See also:loan, but liberated shortly before the assembling of the parliament of 1628, to which he was returned-ELIOT, J . 277 as member for Cornwall .

He joined in the resistance now organized to arbitrary See also:

taxation, was foremost in the promotion of the See also:Petition of Right, continued his outspoken censure of Buckingham, and after the latter's assassination in See also:August, led the attack in the session of 1629 on the ritualists and Arminians . In February the great question of the right of the king to See also:levy See also:tonnage and poundage came up for discussion; and on the king ordering an See also:adjournment of parliament, the See also:speaker, Sir John See also:Finch, was held down in the See also:chair while Eliot's resolutions against illegal taxation and innovations in See also:religion were read to the House by Holies (q.v.) . In consequence, Eliot, with eight other members, was imprisoned on the 4th of March in the Tower . He refused to See also:answer in his examination, relying on his See also:privilege of parliament, and on the 29th of See also:October was removed to the Marshalsea . On the 26th of See also:January he appeared at the See also:bar of the king's See also:bench, with See also:Holles and See also:Valentine, to answer a See also:charge of See also:conspiracy to resist the king's See also:order, and refusing to acknowledge the See also:jurisdiction of the court he was fined £2000 and ordered to be imprisoned during the king's See also:pleasure and till he had made submission . This he steadfastly refused . While some of the prisoners appear to have had certain See also:liberty allowed to them, Eliot's confinement in the Tower was made exceptionally severe . Charles's anger had been from the first directed chiefly against him, not only as his own See also:political antagonist but as the prosecutor and See also:bitter enemy of Buckingham; " an outlawed See also:man," he described him, " desperate in mind and See also:fortune." Eliot languished in See also:prison for some time, during which he wrote several See also:works, his Negotium posterorum, an See also:account of the parliament in 1625; The Monarchie of Man, a political See also:treatise; De jure majestatis, a Political Treatise of See also:Government; and An See also:Apology for See also:Socrates, his own defence . In the See also:spring of 1632 he See also:fell into a decline . In October he petitioned Charles for per-See also:mission to go into the country, but leave could only be obtained at the See also:price of submission, and was finally refused . He died on the 27th of See also:November 1632 . When his son requested permission to move the See also:body to Port Eliot, Charles, whose resentment still survived, returned the curt refusal: " Let Sir John Eliot be buried in the See also:church of that See also:parish where he died." The manner of Eliot's See also:death, not without suspicion of foul See also:play, and as the result of the king's implacability and the severe treatment to which he had been subjected, had more effect, probably, than any other single incident in embittering and precipitating the dispute between king and parliament; and the tragic See also:sacrifice of a man so gifted and patriotic, and actuated originally by no antagonistic feeling against the See also:monarchy or the church, is the surest condemnation of the king's policy and administration .

Eliot was essentially a great orator, inspired by See also:

enthusiasm and high ideals, which he was able to communicate to his hearers by his eloquence, but, like See also:Chatham afterwards, he had not only the gifts but the failings of the orator, was incapable of well-reasoned and balanced See also:judgment, and, though one of the greatest personalities of the time, was inferior to See also:Pym both as a party leader and as a statesman . Eliot married Rhadagund, daughter of Richard Gedie of Trebursye in Cornwall, by whom he had five sons, from the youngest of whom See also:Nicholas the present See also:earl of St Germans is descended, and four daughters . The See also:Life of Sir J . Eliot, by J . See also:Forster (1864), is supplemented and corrected by See also:Gardiner's See also:History of See also:England, vols. v.-vii., and the See also:article in the See also:Diet. of Nat . Biog., by the same author . Eliot's writings, together with his See also:Letter-See also:Book, have been edited by Dr See also:Grosart .

End of Article: SIR JOHN ELIOT (1592-1632)
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