He had made such proficiency in the former art, as even to compose some pieces of church music, which were sung in his chapel.[*] He was initiated in the elegant learning of the ancients. And though he was so unfortunate as to be seduced into a study of the barren controversies of the schools, which were then fashionable, and had chosen Thomas Aquinas for his favorite author, he still discovered a capacity fitted for more useful and entertaining knowledge. The frank and careless humor of the king, as it led him to dissipate the treasures amassed by his father, rendered him negligent in protecting the instruments whom that prince had employed in his extortions. A proclamation being issued to encourage complaints, the rage of the people was let loose on all informers, who had so long exercised an unbounded tyranny over the nation: [**] they were thrown into prison, condemned to the pillory, and most of them lost their lives by the violence of the populace. Empson and Dudley, who were most exposed to public hatred, were immediately summoned before the council, in order to answer for their conduct, which had rendered them so obnoxious. * Lord Herbert. ** Herbert, Stowe, p. 486. Holingshed, p. 799. Polyd. Virg. lib, xxvii. Empson made a shrewd apology for himself, as well as for his associate. He told the council, that so far from his being justly exposed to censure for his past conduct, his enemies themselves grounded their clamor on actions which seemed rather to merit reward and approbation: that a strict execution of law was the crime of which he and Dudley were accused; though that law had been established by general consent, and though they had acted in obedience to the king, to whom the administration of justice was intrusted by the constitution: that it belonged not to them, who were instruments in the hands of supreme power, to determine what laws were recent or obsolete, expedient or hurtful; since they were all alike valid, so long as they remained unrepealed by the legislature: that it was natural for a licentious populace to murmur against the restraints of authority; but all wise states had ever made their glory consist in the just distribution of rewards and punishments, and had annexed the former to the observance and enforcement of the laws, the latter to their violation and infraction; and that a sudden overthrow of all government might be expected where the judges were committed to the mercy of the criminals, the rulers to that of the subjects.[*]