FALKLAND, LUCIUS CARY, VISCOUNT, was the eldest eou of the preceding, and born in 1610. From 1622 till 1629, during which time his father was Lord-Deputy of Ireland, he was educated at Triuity College, Dublin : but afterwards at St. John's College, Cam bridge. Before he was of age Ile inherited an ample fortuuo from his grandfather, and soon afterwards went over to the Netherlands, with the intention of taking a command, but finding the campaign inactive, he returned to England. He had greatly displeased his father by marrying a lady of small fortune ; and though the marriage was a very happy one, troubled by his father's ginger, he resolved to retire to the country and devote himself to literary studies. Having conceived a desire to bo able to read accurately the Greek authors, he secluded himself at his seat near Burford in Oxfordshire, and prosecuted his design with such vigorous iudustry that he became a master of the language in an iocredibly short time. His house was only about ten miles from Oxford, and Chilliugworth and other learned men of the university were at this time in the habit not only of visiting him, but of residing with him. In 1639 he joined the expedition against the Scotch. His peerage, being Scotch, did not entitle him to sit in the House of Lords, and in 1640 he was elected member for Newport, Isle of Wight, in the parliament which assembled on the 13th of April. Ile was again cleated for the same borough In the parliament which met on the 3rd of November in the same year. In the Commons, Lord Falkland, whilst fully concurring in the proposition for prosecuting the Earl of Strafford, urged strenuously, though without avail, and almost without support, the propriety, as a matter of justice, of appointing a committee to inquire into the earn conduct, and to frame specific charges, before proceeding to impeach him of high treason.
Lord Falkland was free from any party bias, and thinking that the leaders of the popular party were in certain instances pushing their measures to an extent which was illegal and fraught with danger, and that the king was disposed to acquiesce iu the just demands of the nation, he opposed them strenuously : hence he came to be regarded as an advocate of the court, and Charles I. invited him to become one
of his privy council, and offered to make him secretary of state in the room of Sir Henry Vane, whom the king had dismiased. Lord Falk land was much disinclined to associate himself with the court party, but after much persuasion by Lord Clarendon and other personal friends, he was prevailed upon to accept the king's offers. His severity of moral principle was ill fitted to harmonise with Charles's duplicity and unconstitutional designs, but the civil war having commenced, he adhered to him with inflexible firmness, using every effort to reconcile the contending powers, and, though without any military command, attending the king on all occasions of conflict or danger. But his alacrity of spirit had deserted him, and when sitting among his friends, after long silence and frequent aigha, be would ejaculate, "Peace, peace," in a mournful tone, and passionately profess that "the very agony of the war, and the view of the calamities and desolation the kingdom did and must endure, took his sleep from him, and would shortly break his heart." He insisted on making one in the first rank of Lord Byron's cavalry at the battle of Newbury, September 20, 1643, and on the first encounter was shot in the belly with a musket-ball ; he instantly fell from his horse, and his body was not found till the following day.
Lord Clarendon, who was his intimate friend, has pronounced a long and eloquent eulogiam on his character, which indeed appears to have been worthy of the highest admiration. His chief work was, ' A Discourse on the Infallibility of the Church of Rome.'