To be on good terms with James and Buckingham meant a degree of subservience which shocks us now; but it did not shock people then, and he did not differ from his fellows in regarding it as part of his duty as a public servant of the Crown.

No doubt he had enemies--some with old grudges like Southampton, who had been condemned with Essex; some like Suffolk, smarting under recent reprimands and the biting edge of Bacon's tongue; some like Coke, hating him from constitutional antipathies and the strong antagonism of professional doctrines, for a long course of rivalry and for mortifying defeats.

But there is no appearance of preconcerted efforts among them to bring about his overthrow.

He did not at the time seem to be identified with anything dangerous or odious.
There was no doubt a good deal of dissatisfaction with Chancery--among the common lawyers, because it interfered with their business; in the public, partly from the traditions of its slowness, partly from its expensiveness, partly because, being intended for special redress of legal hardship, it was sure to disappoint one party to a suit.

But Bacon thought that he had reformed Chancery.