Note 635 — Chapter XI · (continued 2)
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In his wrath against the proviso inserted by Sir George Downing, as above mentioned, in the bill of supply, Clarendon told him, as he confesses, that the king could never be well served, while fellows of his condition were admitted to speak as much as they had a mind; and that in the best times such presumptions had been punished with imprisonment by the lords of the council, without the king's taking notice of it. 321. The king was naturally displeased at this insolent language towards one of his servants, a man who has filled an eminent station, and done services, for a suggestion intended to benefit the revenue. And it was a still more flagrant affront to the House of Commons, of which Downing was a member, and where he had proposed this clause, and induced the house to adopt it.
Coventry told Pepys "many things about the chancellor's dismissal, not fit to be spoken; and yet not any unfaithfulness to the king, but instar omnium, that he was so great at the council-board and in the administration of matters there was no room for anybody to propose any remedy for what was amiss, or to compass anything, though never so good for the kingdom, unless approved of by the chancellor; he managing all things with that greatness which now will be removed, that the king may have the benefit of others' advice." Sept. 2, 1667. His own memoirs are full of proofs of this haughtiness and intemperance. He set himself against Sir William Coventry, and speaks of a man as able and virtuous as himself with marked aversion. See too Life of James, 398. Coventry, according to this writer (431), was the chief actor in Clarendon's impeachment, but this seems to be a mistake; though he was certainly desirous of getting him out of place.
The king, Clarendon tells us (438), pretended that the anger of parliament was such, and their power too, as it was not in his power to save him. The fallen minister desired him not to fear the power of parliament, "which was more or less, or nothing, as he pleased to make it." So preposterous as well as unconstitutional a way of talking could not but aggravate his unpopularity with that great body he pretended to contemn.