But to pass from the manner to the matter of the learned gentlemen who appear on behalf of Malone's theory. Lord Campbell, after stating, in the introductory part of his letter, that in "The Two Gentlemen of Verona," "Twelfth Night," "Julius Caesar," "Cymbeline," "Timon of Athens," "The Tempest," "King Richard II.," "King Henry V.," "King Henry VI., Part I.," "King Henry VI., Part III.," "King Richard III.," "King Henry VIII.," "Pericles," and "Titus Andronicus,"--fourteen of the thirty-seven dramas generally attributed to Shakespeare,--he finds "nothing that fairly bears upon this controversy," goes on to produce from the remaining plays, _seriatim_, such passages as in his judgment do bear upon the question, and to remark upon them, thus isolated and disconnected from each other. Mr. Rushton is more methodic and logical. He does not merely quote or cite all the passages which he has noticed in which legal terms occur, but brings together all such as contain the same terms or refer to kindred proceedings or instruments; and he thus presents his case with much more compactness and consequent strength than results from Lord Campbell's loose and unmethodical mode of treating the subject. We can arrive at the merits of the case on either presentation only by an examination of some of the more important of the passages cited. Lord Campbell, as we have just seen, mentions "Henry VIII." as one of the fourteen plays in which he has found nothing which relates to the question in hand; but Mr. Rushton opens his batteries with the following passage from the very play just named; and to most readers it will seem a bomb of the largest dimensions, sent right into the citadel of his opponents:-- "_Suff_. Lord Cardinal, the king's further pleasure is,-- Because all those things you have done of late By your power legatine within this kingdom Fall into compass of a _premunire_,-- That therefore such a writ be sued against you, To forfeit, all your goods, lands, tenements, Chattels, and whatsoever, and to be Out of the king's protection:--this is my charge." _King Henry VIII_. Act iii. Sc. 2. We shall first remark, that, in spite of his declaration as to "Henry VIII.," Lord Campbell does cite and quote this very passage (p. 42); and, indeed, he must have been as unappreciative as he seems to have been inaccurate, had he failed to do so; for, upon its face, it is, with one or two exceptions, the most important passage of the kind to be found in Shakespeare's works. _Premunire_ is thus defined in an old law-book which was accessible to Shakespeare:--